irit he refused to take part in a
conference of European Powers which the French Emperor desired to
convene to settle the Roman question, declaring that this question was
one with which England should in no way meddle, and that a conference
would be useless and dangerous unless a basis were laid down before.
He refused to interfere in any way with the Cretan rebellion, and with
the impending disputes between Turkey and Greece. His abstention on
this question was blamed by some, but it met with the full approbation
of his great opponent, Lord Russell, who declared that 'he had acted
with much prudence and discretion.' He laid the foundation also of the
settlement of the long outstanding difficulty with America by
proposing to refer the Alabama question to arbitration, and he
negotiated a treaty on the subject, which, however, the Senate refused
to ratify.

In all this he was very consistent. The same consistency cannot be
claimed for his support of a Reform Bill far more Radical than that
which his party had so recently rejected. In my own judgment it is
impossible to defend with success the conduct of the Derby Ministry on
this question, and although Lord Stanley took only a subsidiary part
in it, he cannot escape his share of the responsibility. The
difficulty of the position of the eldest son of the Prime Minister who
was taking this 'leap in the dark' was very great, and it must be
remembered that he had long been identified with the more democratic
wing of his party. After the great agitation that followed the
downfall of the Russell Ministry, he probably regarded a democratic
measure as inevitable, and it was the character of his mind to be very
ready to accept what he considered the inevitable, and to endeavour by
timely compromise to mitigate its effects. Lord Derby's health was now
completely broken, and on February 24, 1868, he resigned office, and
Disraeli became Prime Minister.

Mr. Gladstone soon re-united the sundered sections of the Opposition
by raising the question of the Disestablishment of the Irish Church.
The resolutions asserting the expediency of this policy were
introduced into the House of Commons in April. Lord Stanley was put
forward as the principal opponent. His amendment expressed no opinion
about the merits of the proposed policy, but simply affirmed that it
was a question which ought to be reserved for a new Parliament which
was soon to be elected under an altered franchise. In his speec