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is almost idle to praise it now, for it has taken its place among the accepted masterpieces of English political biography. It has, indeed, a special historical significance the meaning of which is only now emerging clearly into the light of day. The main burden of its teaching was the need for research into the less obvious sources before a final judgement is passed upon historic figures. Before Mr. Wallas wrote, Place was little more than a casual foot-note in the politics of Westminster; now it is clear that the perspective of the time is better and more rightly seen within the mirror of his life than in those of men who stride more proudly across the stage. He worked, like a mole, in the dim twilight-world. Statesmen like Grey and Lord John Russell would have barely known of his existence; or, if his name passed over their lips, it would have been with some phrase that emphasized a doubt whether the influence of such humble men as Place was wise. They still regarded politics as the prerogative of a leisured class. They did not see that because it so deeply touched the intimate recesses of the worker's life his interest in it, could he be given the means of influence, was fundamental. The worker, as Disraeli saw, was nothing so much as a separate nation; and they would have closed the gates of power to Francis Place because he did not, like Croker or Creevey, fawn his way to the bottom of the rich man's table.

But Place was of a tougher fibre. His life had known bitter hardship; and he was one of the priceless men whom misfortune renders only more eager to mend the hardships of their fellows. The friend of Bentham and the Mills, the political master of Joseph Hume, without exception the ablest political organizer in London, he did not need friendships that would not have been offered upon an equal basis. He is one of those rare instances in public life of men who devotedly serve the noblest of all causes without demanding recompense in personal reputation. The history of modern trade-unionism turns upon the fundamental reform he secured. He gave life and substance to the decayed radicalism of England after its long somnolence during the Napoleonic wars. It was his intervention which staved off that Wellington administration of 1831 which might well have proved the prelude to a disastrous revolution. He was active in the movement for popular education. He was one of the pioneers of Chartism. He contributed to political organization not a few of the chief technical