But he was laborious in research, a master of narrative, with a genius for seizing dramatic points.

Above all, he had imagination, without which the vastest knowledge is as a ship without sails, or a bird without wings.

His objects, even his prejudices, were frankly avowed, and his prejudices gave way to fresh facts or reasons.

The records at Simancas, for instance, completely changed, and changed for the worse, his estimate of Queen Elizabeth's character, and he admitted it at once with his transparent candour.

To defend Froude against mendacity seems like an insult to his memory, for if he loved anything it was truth, though he sometimes spoke in a cynical way about the difficulty of attaining it.