The Hon. E. Ellice, the well-known member for Coventry, expired
last week on his own estate in the Highlands, in the 80th year of his age. The son of an Aberdeen farmer who gained great wealth by trade in America and Canada, the whipper-in of the Reform Government of 1831, and for a short period Secretary-at-War, Mr. Ellice has been chiefly known to the public as the Nestor of the Whigs, the confiden- tial adviser of a series of Liberal Cabinets. A man of cool judgment and vast experience in many countries and many grades of life, Mr. Ellice was as a politician distinguished for a prompt masculine sagacity, which rendered him almost invaluable to the aged gentlemen who for so many years have held the reins of power. He could give wise advice on the moment, and for years he was as much consulted as if he had accepted the offices so often pressed on his acceptance. His political foresight, too, was remarkable. In 1847, he predicted to his friends that a convulsion was at hand, though he could not point to the spot, and he had for years before his death declared that the United States were on the verge of a furi- ous civil war. As the great Whig referee in all questions of constitutional etiquette and administrative difficulty it will be hard to supply his place, while Coventry will scarcely find a member so heartily to her taste. Mr. Arthur Peel, son of the late Sir Robert, is to stand for the vacant seat.
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