a similar scheme, which never was actually carried out, to be found in the letters of John Richard Green. The idea of establishing an Historical Review goes back a great number of years. In fact, it is at least thirty -nine years old, though our Review is only twenty. On 28 January 1867 J. R. Green wrote to Freeman from his vicarage at Stepney:
Hunt is here.[1]. . . Much of our chat turned on a scheme Hunt and I thought we had hit out together, but which (it seems) Bryce had anticipated—the starting of a purely Historical Review. He had consulted Macmillan, who believed it would certainly succeed, but recommended the form to be an annual volume like the Oxford Essays. This, however, is not Bryce's view; he would prefer a quarterly; for my own part I believe in a shilling monthly. ... He had spoken to Stubbs, and Stubbs was warm in support. He thought of Stubbs as editor.[2]
Nearly two years later we hear of the subject again in Green's letters. But now Mr. Macmillan was less sanguine.
'The new organization of the North British, with its wonderfully good summary of the historical literature of the quarter, and the appearance of the Academy, ' Green confessed, 'certainly cut into our original plan. . . . It is far too big a job to begin without clearly seeing one's way.'[3]
Those were the days when the Academy was a paper written by scholars for scholars; and the North British Review was vigorously supported by Lord Acton, who contributed twenty-five reviews to the current number (October 1869) at the date of Green's letter. It is curious to think that a stumbling-block should have been unconsciously placed in the way of the original Historical Review by the man who was one of the foremost to promote the success of our Review sixteen years later. After an interval of more than two years, in April 1872, the Historical Review seemed to be really taking shape. Green hoped that Mr. Bryce would take the editorship,[4] but there were differences of opinion as to the exact character which the Review should assume. Then after the lapse of four years (15 June 1876) Green wrote a long and most interesting letter to Macmillan on the various schemes proposed, in which he declared his conviction that 'none of the projects which have as yet been suggested is likely to command a practical success'. I need not go into the particulars of these various proposals, whether the Review was to be strictly scientific; or part scientific, part popular; or again part political. But it is clear that Green was definitely asked to edit the Review and that he declined.[5] From that date, June 1876, to 1885 I have no knowledge as to whether any progress was made with the scheme. But I think that there
