see on perusing what I have written, that in the endeavour to set forth
the virtues and great qualities of your father, I seem more or less to
disparage other men, including even Sir Robert Peel whom he so much
esteemed and loved. I had no such intention, and it is the fault of my
hand, not of my will. He would not have claimed, he would not have wished
nor borne, that others should claim for him superiority, or even parity in
all points with all his contemporaries. But there was a certain region of
character which was, so to speak, all his own; and there other men do seem
more or less dwarfed beside him. In the combination of profound feeling
with a calm of mind equally profound, of thorough penetration with the
largest charity, of the wisdom of the serpent with the harmlessness of the
dove, in the total suppression and exclusion of self from his reckonings
and actions--in all this we may think him supreme, and yet have a broad
array of good and noble qualities in which he may have shared variously
with others. There are other secrets of his character and inner life into
which I do not pretend to have penetrated. It always seemed to me that
there was a treasure-house within him, which he kept closed against the
eyes of men. He is gone. He has done well in his generation. May peace and
light be with him, and may honour and blessing long attend his memory upon
earth.--Believe me, my dear Arthur, affectionately yours, W. E. GLADSTONE.

Cabinet Of 1868-1874

_Page __255_

_First lord of the treasury_, W. E. Gladstone.
_Lord chancellor_, Lord Hatherly (Page Wood).
_President of the council_, Earl de Grey (created Marquis of
Ripon, 1871).
_Lord privy seal_, Earl of Kimberley.
_Chancellor of the exchequer_, Robert Lowe.
_Home secretary_, Henry Austin Bruce.
_Foreign secretary_, Earl of Clarendon.
_Colonial secretary_, Earl Granville.
_War secretary_, Edward Cardwell.
_First lord of the admiralty_, H. C. E. Childers.
_Indian secretary_, Duke of Argyll.
_President of the board of trade_, John Bright.
_Chief secretary for Ireland_, Chichester Fortescue.
_Postmaster general_, Marquis of Hartington.
_President of the poor law board_, George J. Goschen.

On Lord Clarendon's death in June 1870, Lord Granville became fore