of the attractions of this enormous metropolitan playground, the legitimate successor to and evolution of Vauxhall and Cremorne, which we found quite too kaleidoscopic for coherent narration. Above all, the genius of Imré Kiralfy here seems to have reached its climax, and furnishes such a "spectacular apotheosis (I believe this is how he modestly puts it) as quite pales the lustre of "America," at the Chicago Exposition. Beyond this, with twelve hundred performers at once on a stage as large as all out-of-doors, to the lovely music of Dan Godfrey's famous military band, I should think that even phantasmagoria could no further go. Fortunately for us, a station of the Metropolitan Railway is quite near, and, free from smoke or cinders, we were speedily whirled many miles by artificial light beneath the whole West End, by this very agreeable substitute for overhead transportation, and alighted late at night at the Temple Station, close to our lodgings.

Our other expedition was to Windsor, Eton, and Stoke Pogis, which may well be accomplished by rail in a long day's outing. Leaving by the Waterloo Station, we skirt the southern bank of the Thames, cross it at Rich

mond, and just beyond Staines catch glimpses from the car-window at the left of the green lowlying plain of Runnymede, where the barons there assembled forced craven King John to sign the Great Charter of English liberties. Sweeping around Windsor Park, where are oaks a thousand years old, Datchet reminds us of Falstaff and his buckbasket; and we alight beneath the beetling crag on which rise the towering walls of Windsor Castle, the most superb survival of feudalism in architecture that remains to this day. The town clusters about its base, and along the hill leading up to the castle from the station. There has been a castle here since the Conqueror's day; but Edward III., George IV., and Victoria are to be credited with the present majestic sweep of ramparts and the royal palaces which they enclose, all of which are in perfect repair, and constitute one of the favorite residences of the queen. The royal standard was not flying when we were there, for she was at Osborne. Her Majesty, although enormously wealthy, has done little during her long widowhood, either here or elsewhere, to sustain the great functions and stimulate the social activities of royal circles, devolving these responsibilities

with her advancing years more and more upon the prince and his most charming and popular consort. Albert Edward and Alexandra are names to conjure by anywhere in England, and nowhere more so than at Windsor. Their uniform graciousness and tact entirely captivate the English people, who dearly love a lord and lady like this; and the indiscretions of the prince's early life, if any, have long been condoned and forgotten in their admiration for his very great ability and bonhomie, and for the many earnest virtues and accomplishments of the princess, and of their family in the next generation. If Her Majesty had accomplished nothing more than the social purification of the dissolute court of the Georges, she would have had excuse enough for reigning.

The form of the British government will not be altered for many a day, if ever. The House of Lords may be mended; it will not be ended, so far as I can foresee. Constitutional government by Parliament, with the sovereign as its leader and representative figure, fits the temper of the English people as its very raiment, and long may it do so. For it cannot be doubted, reasoning from history, that such a limited monarchy is as capable of