nt, that the
Black Sea question was one on which Great Britain might be compelled to
go to war with or without allies. Lord Morley's _Life of Gladstone_
(vol. ii., p. 354) is explicit on this interesting point. The
information which, by special permission of the Pope, Cardinal Manning
was able to give to him on all that was going on in the Council was, of
course, of great value to Odo Russell, but his views on other aspects of
the question were derived from quite different sources.

In this respect he had the advantage of the Cardinal, both on account of
his diplomatic position and of his long and intimate knowledge both of
Vatican policy and of the forces which the Curia has at its command. On
the strength of those forces, and on the small amount of effective
support which British opposition to the Decree of Infallibility was
likely to receive from the Catholic Powers, he no doubt held strong
opinions. Some years later he did not conceal his conviction that Prince
Bismarck would be worsted in his conflict with Rome on the Education
Laws, and the event proved his forecast to be perfectly correct. This is
an example of the dangers which beset a too glib and superficial
treatment of political events which were conducted in secret, and with
every circumstance of mystery.

Several of the characteristics which diversify Mr. Strachey's remarkable
volume are exemplified in the following quotation. It deals with the
funeral of Cardinal Manning:--

"The route of the procession was lined by vast crowds of working
people, whose imaginations, in some instinctive manner, had been
touched. Many who had hardly seen him declared that in Cardinal
Manning they had lost their best friend. Was it the magnetic vigour
of the dead man's spirit that moved them? Or was it his valiant
disregard of common custom and those conventional reserves and
poor punctilios, which are wont to hem about the great? Or was it
something untameable in his glances and in his gestures? Or was it,
perhaps, the mysterious glamour lingering about him of the antique
organisation of Rome? For whatever cause, the mind of the people
had been impressed; and yet, after all, the impression was more
acute than lasting. The Cardinal's memory is a dim thing to-day.
And he who descends into the crypt of that Cathedral which Manning
never lived to see, will observe, in the quiet niche with the
sepulchr