Nor is land, who, when his men were working fourteen hours a day, many years ago, proposed to cut off two hours, and give them the same amount of pay for the twelve as they had had for the fourteen; the proposal was rejected, owing to some insane imagination that it was an interference with the men! this all. The selfishness that has in time past presided so generally over the arrangements of large works makes workmen suspect, whenever a new proposal is made, that it must, in some clandestine way, be designed for the advantage of the employers. The whole bearing of the operative class towards the upper is one of suspicion. Officers in artisan volunteer companies remark with surprise that when they make any proposal, it seems to be the instinctive feeling of the men that in some way it is to operate against them. Does this fact tell no ugly tale as to our former habitual treatment of the class? Does it indicate no feeling, on the part of the poor, that whenever a new burden behoved to be borne, it was their shoulders it was laid on-the weakest class went to the wall? Very likely, they are letting the spirit of suspicion survive the occasion that justified it. Very likely, too, they are allowing themselves to be perhaps unconsciously influenced by the demagogues who assure them that the upper classes are leagued against them, and that the policy of the country is to keep them down. But should not those whose hearts are earnestly bent on doing them good make great allowance for these things, and stretch their forbearance and their patience accordingly? Granting that they are suspicious, unduly, discreditably suspicious, are they for that reason to be abandoned? Those who in real earnestness desire their welfare, and show their desire perseveringly and unmistakably, may rest assured that ere long the last trace of suspiciousness towards them will vanish, and they will command the utmost confidence of their working friends. There is a kind of instinct that discovers, in the course of time, who are really in earnest, who are the real friends of the working man. It soon becomes known whether a master is the sort of man that will try to palm off on them sham or tinsel benefits, while he deprives them of substantial rights, or that will profess great zeal in their cause for the sake of a newspaper paragraph, or an electioneering cry. Let a master once convince his men that he has their welfare at heart, and let him take ordinarily prudent measures to promote it, all experience shows that he will become the object of their highest esteem and confidence, and be able to wield an almost unparalleled influence over them. And this leads us to make special mention of what, oftener than once in the course of this paper, we have hinted at as essential for inspiring men with confidence and esteem towards one occupying a higher sphere; we mean the manifestation of a personal interest in them, and of personal feelings of kindness towards them. It will not do for employers to stand on their dignity, to stand on their lofty pedestal, and from thence throw down their bounties on their people with however lavish a hand. It will not do for them to content themselves with building libraries, or institutes, or baths, or churches, at whatever expense, and never mingle with their people in kindly intercourse, nor let out one solitary manifestation of fellowfeeling towards them. It would be no difficult matter to fill a volume with proofs of the marvellous charm there is in the spirit of personal interest, the spirit that takes personal trouble. Just as we are thinking of this, we glance at a daily paper, and in a letter from a foreign correspondent, we find a description of the captain of a war-vessel, in discipline the sternest despot that ever ruled a crew, and yet the idol of his men, because it is he that, when they are in hospital, makes kindly visits to them with grapes and lemons and soothing draughts, and writes their letters to parents and friends, and has withal a heart as brave as it is kind and true. We remember meeting in a large town a number of wealthy employers who had laid out large sums of money for the benefit of their people, but had stood aloof from their homes and hearts, grumbling not a little because their beneficence had not been appreciated. Soon after, we were in the house of a zealous Christian worker in the middle rank of life, who could only say to the poor of the neighbourhood, Silver and gold have I none, but such as I have, in the form of personal Christian interest in you all, and personal sacrifices cheerfully made for your sakes, I freely give; and literally the house was crowded with memorials of the gratitude and devotion of the people. Even a genial, popular manner, though not represented by corresponding qualities within, does wonders. Since the days of Absalom, the charm of manner has often compensated for many great defects. But better far than a captivating manner is a genial, sympathizing heart. And greatest of all is its power in the case of those who, by their personal sacrifices, show how intensely love burns within. "Relinquishing their several 'vantage-posts Of wealthy ease and honourable toil To work with God at love." Last of all, let it be borne in mind that the deeper one goes in one's efforts to advance the welfare of others, the greater is the power one acquires. If the interest be limited to things earthly and temporal, the hold one attains on the heart will be proportionally shallow. If it embrace the deeper and more momentous concerns of the immortal nature, it will be proportionally strong and enduring. We have certainly no desire to throw cold water on those whose efforts to do good among their people are limited to temporal interests. Very probably, if they did not work at this, they would work at nothing, pure selfishness would be the presiding genius of their establishment, and one is glad of anything that divides her dominion. But we must warn such persons not to expect great results, and not to anticipate that they will acquire any very strong hold on their people. Don't let them dream as if "The bread of man indeed made all his life, And washing seven times in the People's Baths' Still leaving out the essential prophet's word There is no security for success even in temporal beneficence, unless we "Raise men's bodies still by raising souls, As God did first." On the platform of Christianity, every enterprise of philanthropy has a tenfold greater power. For there the workers toil under the inspiration of a charity that never faileth, and a hope that never dies. "The world's old, But the old world waits the time to be renewed, Excluding falsehood. He shall make all new." ART. II.-A Dictionary of the English Language, by ROBERT GORDON LATHAM, M.A., M.D., F.R.S., etc. Founded on that of Dr. SAMUEL JOHNSON, as edited by the Rev. H. J. TODD, M.A. With numerous Emendations and Additions. completed in 36 parts. Parts I. to VI. London, 1864. To be "AN English Dictionary." How much is expressed in those three words. But wide as they are, there are three which are still wider" The English Language." No dictionary can contain the English language; the most that the best can do is to attempt to exhibit a fair sample of the golden grain garnered in the storehouse of English speech. The English language -what a stately tree upheld by many roots! In that one tongue how many others have merged their utterance. All the known races that have held this soil of Britain have left their mark behind them. First came the Britons. Some few words of daily use, many names of places, many a hill and river, many a surname of high and low, form the tiny upland rill, the glistening silver thread of Celtic speech, which serves as a clue to lead us to the very end of this philological labyrinth. Next came the Romans, and on our native soil threw up those earthworks and roads and walled camps, which still in ruins tell the tale of their strong hands, and to which many a Latin name or ending still clings. They came, they ruled, they left the land, and Britain was still Celtic in speech, though even then no doubt her dialect was laced with many a Teutonic word learned from the German colonists, which the Romans had brought in as mercenary soldiers but who remained as settlers. After the Roman legions left the Britons to themselves, there is darkness over the face of the land from the fifth to the eighth century. Those are really our dark ages. From 420, when it is supposed that Honorius withdrew his troops, to 730, when Bede wrote his History, we see nothing of British history. Afar off we hear the shock of arms, but all is dim, as it were, when two mighty hosts do battle in the dead of night. When the dawn comes and the black veil is lifted, we find that Britain has passed away. The land is now England; the Britons themselves, though still strong in many parts of the country, have been generally worsted by their foes; they have lost that great battle which has lasted through three centuries. Their Arthur has come and gone; he lies at Glastonbury, never again to turn the heady fight. Henceforth Britain has no hero, and merely consoles herself with the hope that he will one day rise and restore the fortunes of his race. But though there were many battles in that dreary time, and many Arthurs, it was rather in the VOL. XLI.-NO. LXXXII. U everyday battle of life, in that long unceasing struggle which race wages with race, not sword in hand alone, but by brain and will and feeling, that the Saxons won the mastery of the land. Little by little, more by stubbornness and energy than by bloodshed, they spread themselves over the country, working towards a common unity, from every shore. If the Britons stood in their way they threw them out; but the Britons had learned from their Roman lords to build towns and to dwell in them. The Saxons loathed cities; "they loved better to hear the lark sing than the mouse cheep," and thus there was room for a long time for two races who had little in common, and rarely crossed each other's path. In all likelihood the din of the battles between Celt and Saxon, with which those gloomy centuries are full, rose rather towards their close, when the Saxons had multiplied and grown to be a great power in Britain, and the settlers' seven kingdoms of the Heptarchy had so eaten their way into the waste, as to know that they formed a Saxon Confederation. However that may be, certain it is that for a long time after the time of Bede, and therefore undoubtedly also before his day, the Celtic and Saxon kings in various parts of the island lived together on terms of perfect equality, and gave and took their respective sons and daughters to one another in marriage. Hence it is that we find Saxon princes with Celtic names, and vice versa; and hence it was that many a word was borrowed by either speech, and soon passed as good Saxon or Celtic, as the case might be, after it had undergone the process of mastication, if we may be allowed the word, that alteration and attrition, whether it be in accent or in form, which every foreign word must undergo before the tongue which is about to make it its own, will consent to swallow and digest it. But though this lasted some time, it was not to be always so. In language as in race the rule holds that the weakest must go to the wall. The Saxons were the strongest. They began by winning their way to being equal with the Celts, they ended by overpowering them altogether. This struggle for supremacy was prolonged for some time during that twilight in our history called the Saxon Heptarchy, but towards the close of that period the Saxons had mastered their foes, who henceforth are found only in the mountainous ridges and holes and corners of the land. In Egbert's time the Saxons are really lords in England. Had there been purists and precisians in those days, we may fancy some Priscian or Varro undertaking to weed the native field of Saxon speech of the Celtic growths which had been sown broadcast over it when the two races walked and strove upon it face to face. But even without the help of such learned |