21 JULY 1894, Page 25

Statesmen, Past and Present (Cassell and Co.), is a reprint

of between thirty and forty articles which originally appeared in the

Daily News. It may be imagined, therefore, how the portraits

are coloured. That they should be not conspicuously caricatures is perhaps as much as could be expected from them. This weak- ness is to be detected in this,—Unionist statesmen have some

credit allowed them ; but for Gladstonians nothing is too good.

When it is impossible to say anything better, we are told that "the British public are apt to think that fidelity and simplicity, &c., are more valuable qualities than the dexterous command of a versatile intelligence." Was it John Bright who said that when a man was notoriously dull, he was always described as an admirable " administrator " P