s was done by
amicable and accommodating measures towards the government, whose
position was thus cushioned and made easy in order that it might be
willing to give it a continued acquiescence. The hinge of the whole
situation was this: the government itself was not to be a substantive
power in matters of finance, but was to leave the money power supreme
and unquestioned. In the conditions of that situation I was reluctant to
acquiesce, and I began to fight against it by financial self-assertion
from the first, though it was only by the establishment of the Post
Office Savings Banks and their great progressive development that the
finance minister has been provided with an instrument sufficiently
powerful to make him independent of the Bank and the City power when he
has occasion for sums in seven figures. I was tenaciously opposed by the
governor and deputy-governor of the Bank, who had seats in parliament,
and I had the City for an antagonist on almost every occasion.--_Undated
fragment_.

THE DUKE OF NEWCASTLE AND SIDNEY HERBERT

_Page 521_

With reference to the Crimean war, I may give a curious example of the
power of self-deception in the most upright men. The offices of colonial
secretary and war minister were, in conformity with usage, united in the
hands of the Duke of Newcastle. On the outbreak of war it became
necessary to separate them. It evidently lay with the holder to choose
which he would keep. The duke elected for the war department, and
publicly declared that he did this in compliance with the unanimous
desire of his colleagues. And no one contradicted him. We could only
'grin and bear it.' I cannot pretend to know the sentiments of each and
every minister on the matter. But I myself, and every one with whom I
happened to communicate, were very strongly of an opposite opinion. The
duke was _well_ qualified for the colonial seals, for he was a
statesman; _ill_ for the war office, as he was no administrator. I
believe we all desired that Lord Palmerston should have been war
minister. It might have made a difference as to the tolerance of the
feeble and incapable administration of our army before Sebastopol.
Indeed, I remember hearing Lord Palmerston suggest in cabinet the recall
of Sir Richard Airy.

In that crisis one man suffered most unjustly. I mean Sidney Herbert. To
some extent, perhaps, his extraordinary and most just popularity led
people to