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 THE DEMEANOUR OF ENGLAND. 251 that what our army wanted was 'a Head ; '(^^) chap, but having no successor in prospect who might. be able to bear a comparison with the existing chief, they did not bring themselves to resolve that they would peremptorily demand his recall. They knew him to be a commander in whom our own army, and the army of our Allies, put full trust.(30) However, before many days, they were ready with their plan of attack; and on the 23d of December they disclosed it to the eyes of the public. With all the apt materials for invective that could be distilled from the accounts of Mr Russell and numberless other contributors, the great journal was to rage against Lord Eaglan itscuri- and his Headquarter Staff: yet, so far as con- planned -.nil i_c hostility to cerned the measures to be founded on that herce Lord Ragiac , ... and the impeachment, was to shape its hostility upon Headquar- ..., ter Staff. a quaintly modified plan which seems to have been borrowed from the theory of 'constitutional The'con- 'stitutional ' government.' Lord Eaglan was to become a system de- ° .,,.,. vised for kind of sovereign who would ' reign, as it were, our Head- • 1 1 • 111^11 quarter from a throne without being held lully answer- camp: able for the acts or omissions of his vicegerents ; but, on the other hand, the chiefs of his Head- quarter Staff were to be elevated by this novel theory to a station like that of some ' responsible ' Ministry,' and — again like a ' Ministry ' — to ■ expiate the winter misfortunes by being dis- missed from their posts ! Lord Raglan, under this charter, would begin his ' constitutional ' reign ' by submitting against his will to be deprived of the well-tried staff ofi&cers in whom