as yet it is not known _why_ he
asked for such aid, nor on what terms it is to be granted.

L. told me an odd thing connected with these troops. Easthope
received a commission from a secretary of Soult to sell largely
in our funds, coupled with an assurance that the troops would
_not_ retire. I don't know the fate of the commission.

There are various reports of dissensions in the Cabinet, which
are not true. The Duke of Wellington was sent for by Lord Grey
the other day, to give his opinion about the demolition of the
Belgian fortresses; so the ex-Prime Minister went to visit his
successor in the apartment which was so lately his own. No man
would mind such a thing less than the Duke; he is sensitive, but
has no nonsense about him. He is very well and, however disgusted
with the state of everything at home and abroad (which after all
is greatly imputable to himself), in high spirits.

The King did a droll thing the other day. The ceremonial of the
coronation was taken down to him for approval. The homage is
first done by the spiritual Peers, with the Archbishop at their
head. The first of each class (the Archbishop for the spiritual)
says the words, and then they all kiss his cheek in succession.
He said he would not be kissed by the bishops, and ordered that
part to be struck out. As I expected, the prelates would not
stand it; the Archbishop remonstrated, the King knocked under,
and so he must undergo the salute of the spiritual as well as of
the temporal Lords.

August 30th, 1831 {p.185}

[Page Head: TALLEYRAND'S CONVERSATION.]

Left Stoke yesterday morning; a large party--Talleyrand, De Ros,
Fitzroy Somersets, Motteux, John Russell, Alava, Byng. In the
evening Talleyrand discoursed, but I did not hear much of him. I
was gouty and could not stand, and all the places near him were
taken. I have never heard him narrate comfortably, and he is
difficult to understand. He talked of Franklin. I asked him if he
was remarkable in conversation; he said he was from his great
simplicity and the evident strength of his mind. He spoke of the
coronation of the Emperor Alexander. Somebody wrote him a letter
at the time from Moscow with this expression: 'L'Empereur
marchait, precede des assassins de son grand-pere, entoure de
ceux de son pere, et suivi par les siens.' He said of the Count
de Saint-Germain (whom he never saw) that there is an account of
him in Craufurd's book; nobody knew whence he came nor whither he
w