MR. GLADSTONE.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 4813, 25 August 1876, Page 3

MR. GLADSTONE.

Those who • have seen and conversed with Mr. Gladstone this year' cannot but be struck as much with his improved:health as by his keener interest in. political topics. He is without exaggeration ten years younger than on the day he quitted office, and he walks with an 'elasticity' and vigor which those who knew him only during the last year or two of his administration would hradly believe possible. Simultaneously with this return of vigor the idea is getting abroad that he will sooner or later display a, desire to return to political life, and those who know him best declare that he has been occupying himself of late chiefly with weighing the. respective advantages of the various political questions still on the horizon, and trying to' decide which' is the cloud which is destined to'coyer .most, rapidly the apparently unbroken monotony 'of. the Conservative sky, . His recent'utterances,' and especially his publications in the Cbnitm,-[ porary Review, lead one to conclude 'thatjie does not see his way to unity in'.the' LißefaL party over the question of the county franchise,'; but thinks it more probable'that; it may.be led to victory with the cry of; disestablish--irtent. This idea is certainly the dominant' one just now in the clubs', and there is'a. general though still vague conviction that Mr.' Gladstone is really once more girding on his. sword for the fray, and, that ere long he will sound the note of attack,' and more! decidedly ~than he has yet done.—Home L ','