o give you my opinion of Lord Salisbury,
whom I know pretty well in private. He has little foreign or
eastern knowledge, and little craft; he is rough of tongue in
public debate, but a great gentleman in private society; he is
very remarkably clever, of unsure judgment, but is above anything
mean; has no Disraelite prejudices; keeps a conscience, and has
plenty of manhood and character. In a word the appointment of Lord
Salisbury to Constantinople is the best thing the government have
yet done in the eastern question.

As the conference met, so it ran a usual course, and then vanished. The
Powers were in complete accord as to the demands that were to be made upon
Turkey for the protection of the unfortunate Christian rayahs. The Turk in
just confidence that he should find a friend, rejected them, and the
envoys departed to their homes. Mr. Gladstone, however, found comfort in
the thought that by the agitation two points had been gained: the
re-establishment of the European concert, and extrication from a
disgraceful position of virtual complicity with Turkey.

In the spring of 1877 he wrote a second pamphlet,(342) because a speech in
the House could not contain detail enough, and because parliamentary
tradition almost compelled a suspension of discussion while ministers were
supposed to be engaged in concert with other Powers in devising a
practical answer to Russian inquiry. He found that it "produced no great
impression," the sale not going beyond six or seven thousand copies.
Still, the gala remained from the proceeding in the autumn, that the
government dared not say they had nothing to do with the condition of the
Christian rayahs of Turkey, and any idea of going to war for Turkey was
out of the question.

Public feeling had waxed very hot, yet without any clear precision of
opinion or purpose on the side opposed to Mr. Gladstone's policy of
emancipation. Dean Church (Dec. 1876) describes how "everybody was very
savage with everybody about Turks and Russians: I think I never remember
such an awkward time for meeting people (until you know you are on the
same side) except at the height of the Tractarian row."(343)

(M181) A little later we have one of the best pictures of him that I know,
from the warm and vivid hand of J. R. Green, the historian:--

_Feb. 21, 1877._--Last night I met Gladstone--it will always be a
memorable night to me; Stubbs was there, and Goldwin S