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 "L I E> RAFLY 
 
 OF THE 
 U N IVERSITY 
 or ILLI NOIS
 
 MR GLADSTONE'S SCOTCH SPEECHES 
 
 BEING 
 
 AN ADDRESS 
 
 DELIVERED AT EDINBURGH, DEC. 12, 1879 
 
 TO THE 
 
 CONSEEYATIYE WOEKING MEN'S ASSOCIATION 
 
 BY 
 
 ARTHUK JAMES BALFOUR 
 
 OP WHITTINGHAME, M.P. 
 
 REVISED BY THE AUTHOR 
 
 WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS 
 
 EDINBURGH AND LONDON 
 
 MDCCCLXXX
 
 MR GLADSTONE'S SCOTCH SPEECHES. 
 
 Mr Balfour, who was received with loud cheers, said, — I cannot 
 enter into what I have got to say to you on the large political 
 subjects with which I have to deal, without first thanking Sir 
 George Warrender for the kind and flattering — too flattering — 
 expressions with which he has introduced me to you. He 
 alluded to the fact that I was Lord Salisbury's private secretary. 
 Gentlemen, I am proud of the connection. But 1 ought to say 
 that I come here to address you, not as Lord Salisbury's private 
 secretary, but as an independent, although loyal and steadfast, 
 supporter of her Majesty's Government, and as a near neighbour 
 of your own. When my friend Mr Usher wrote to me some two 
 months back, and did me the honour of asking me to address the 
 Conservative Working Men's Association, he said in his letter 
 that I might choose my own subject. Gentlemen, as events have 
 turned out, there is no choice in the matter. Accident has fixed 
 the date on which I am to address you at a time when no man 
 speaking on political subjects in Scotland, and more especially 
 in Mid-Lothian, can do otherwise than occupy himself with the 
 interminable series of speeches with which Mr Gladstone has 
 lately favoured us. There are many reasons, gentlemen, of a 
 purely personal kind which make me desire that the task of 
 criticising those speeches had fallen on somebody else. But 
 speaking as I do, not yet four days after the last speech has been 
 delivered from the last railway station, and considering, as I 
 must, the number and the nature of the accusations which Mr 
 Gladstone has thought fit to bring against her Majesty's Govern- 
 ment, the party which support her Majesty's Government, and 
 more especially the Foreign Secretary, there is no choice for me 
 but to deal as shortly as I can with some of the points on which 
 he has touched. Gentlemen, political controversy in this country 
 has lately been sullied by language which ought never to be
 
 admitted, I think, into our discussions, however hot our political 
 feelings may be. Language has been used in a bad cause which 
 would, in my opinion, disgrace any cause. I shall attempt to 
 avoid these faults ; but I am obliged to address myself to what 
 Mr Gladstone has said in a manner, and with a directness, which 
 cannot but appear personal, and that for this reason. Mr Glad- 
 stone is not merely an able and acrimonious critic, — he is much 
 more than this. Not this country only, but Europe also, looks to 
 him as the successor of the Government should the Government 
 be turned out. Therefore his words have a value and importance 
 to us even beyond the ability which always mark them. We see 
 in him not only a critic of the Government, but the would-be 
 successor of the Government ; and if we want to know what the 
 policy is which will be pursued by this country when the present 
 Government loses the confidence of the electors, it behoves us to 
 study most carefully the speeches of Mr Gladstone. Mr Glad- 
 stone, in the course of his remarks, has made accusations of so 
 wide a character on the policy of the Government that there 
 must always be some difficulty in knowing where to begin. He 
 has dwelt on finance, agriculture, and legislation. He has criti- 
 cised the home policy of the Government. Above all, he has 
 criticised the foreign policy of the Government, and that with 
 the utmost minuteness and detail. I shall have to contradict 
 directly a large number of the statements he has made. I shall 
 have to point out to you that he has not only erred in the 
 inferences he has drawn, that he has not only misunderstood 
 the policy of the Government, but that he has actually misstated 
 a large number of facts. But, gentlemen, I ought to say, at the 
 same time, that I wish to make no imputations on the veracity 
 or conscientiousness of Mr Gladstone. How he has come to the 
 conclusions he has arrived at, where he got the facts which he 
 has put before the electors of Mid-Lothian, 1 do not know ; but 
 I am bound to suppose, and I do suppose, that in making these 
 statements he was actuated, as I hope all public men are actuated, 
 by conscientious motives. With this preface, gentlemen, I now 
 proceed to what Mr Gladstone has said on the foreign policy of 
 the Government. 
 
 You are aware, gentlemen, that in the course of the many 
 speeches which Mr Gladstone has thought fit to deliver, he has 
 found in his copious vocabulary a very large number of somewhat 
 abusive phrases. Out of one speech I took the trouble to-day 
 to collect the following set of epithets applied to the existing 
 Government. They are accused of acting with " secrecy" and "cor- 
 ruption"; they are accused of " cupidity" ; their policy is declared 
 to be " mean," to be " shabby," to be " dastardly," to be " disloyal," 
 and to be "subversive." If any of these things are true, gentlemen.
 
 5 
 
 there is no doubt that her Majesty's Government will not deserve 
 to retain the confidence of the country ; but I hope to show you 
 that, in all the cases where Mr Gladstone has thought fit to apply 
 these epithets to the policy of the Government, he has either 
 misunderstood that policy, or he was wholly in error about the 
 facts. Mr Gladstone, in surveying the career of the present 
 Government, divides it into two halves ; and he draws the 
 dividing line at the time that Lord Derby and Lord Carnarvon 
 left the Government — though we were bad before that period, 
 we have been much worse since. It appears that these noble 
 Lords exercised, in his opinion, the most salutary effect upon the 
 course the Government was pursuing : but yet I am not sure, if 
 Mr Gladstone's words are candidly considered, that these two 
 noble Lords will have any cause to congratulate themselves upon 
 the compliment that Mr Gladstone has paid them ; because, if I 
 understood Mr Gladstone's position rightly, he attributes all our 
 misfortunes in Africa to the occupation of the Transvaal, which 
 was done by Lord Carnarvon, — and all our misfortunes in Europe 
 to the rejection of the Berlin Memorandum, which was done by 
 Lord Derby. And, gentlemen, apropos of the Berlin Memoran- 
 dum, Mr Gladstone gave us a very curious piece of secret history 
 respecting the Liberal party. He explained to us that it was 
 entirely from patriotic motives that the Liberal party abstained 
 from criticising the Government when the Government decided 
 to reject that Memorandum. They behaved, according to Mr 
 Gladstone, exactly as Sir George Warrender in his opening re- 
 marks told us that an Opposition ought to behave, — they trusted 
 the Government in the details of foreign negotiations. Here Mr 
 Gladstone seems to have done great injustice to the virtues of 
 the Liberal party ; because, unless my memory greatly deceives 
 me, their patriotism was not only equal to the efibrt of abstaining 
 from criticising the policy of the Government, — it was so self-deny- 
 ing that it actually prompted them to go about saying that they 
 liked it ! So far as I recollect in all the history of party politics, 
 that is the greatest act of disinterestedness as yet on record. But 
 I do not wish to detain you on the subject of the Berlin Memor- 
 andum except for this one object, — it is concerning the Berlin 
 Memorandum that Mr Gladstone first makes that charge, which 
 he constantly repeats afterwards with regard to almost every 
 action of the Government in the East — the charge, namely, that 
 our policy destroyed what is called the European concert. In 
 other words, he implies that the Great Powers of Europe, acting 
 together, were prepared to carry out a policy, and that England 
 refusing to join with them, their action was effectually frustrated. 
 Now, gentlemen, the accusation with regard to this and to the 
 other cases to which Mr Gladstone has applied it is unfounded,
 
 But that is not the point to which I want to call your attention. 
 If I desired to give an illustration of what I think is Mr Glad- 
 stone's incapacity to deal with large questions of foreign policy, 
 I should certainly select the superstitious admiration he has of 
 the European concert as an instrument for managing Eastern 
 affairs. I am perfectly ready to admit that the concert of Great 
 Powers, if it can be obtained, is an admirable thing; but Mr 
 Gladstone's belief in it goes much further than that. His idea 
 is that there should be a line of policy pursued by the Great 
 Powers acting, so to speak, in their corporate capacity, and 
 nothing ought to be done in the East except in that way. I do 
 not hesitate to say that a more absurd machine for carrying out 
 any continuous policy than the concert of the Great Powers does 
 not exist. I might, gentlemen, appeal to experience. What has 
 the concert of the Great Powers ever done ? The battle of 
 jSTavarino, which liberated Greece, was done in the teeth of some 
 of the Great Powers. The separation of Egypt from Turkey was 
 done in the teeth of some of the Great Powers. Nay, from Mr 
 Gladstone's own admissions, I would draw the conclusion that 
 the Great Powers have been a feeble instrument for obtaining the 
 ends they are supposed to have in view. What, in his opinion, 
 have been those ends during the. last twenty years? Among 
 other things, the welfare of the subject-populations of the Porte, 
 because, since the Treaty of Paris, these subject-populations have 
 been under the tutelage of the Great Powers of Europe. During 
 that period England was one of the Powers most interested ; and 
 in its councils during a great part of that period Mr Gladstone 
 was himself sometimes an important member of the Cabinet, 
 and at one time was its chief. Since 1876, we have been aware, 
 though nobody ever before suspected it, that Mr Gladstone has 
 always been keenly alive to the fate of the subject-populations 
 of the Porte. We might therefore suppose that the European 
 concert was acting under highly favourable conditions. Yet, what 
 has it done ? Nothing. According to Mr Gladstone's own admis- 
 sion, the condition of those populations got worse instead of 
 better ; and therefore I say that we have ample evidence from 
 experience that the concert of the European Powers is a perfectly 
 worthless instrument. But we do not need experience to show 
 this : common-sense shows it at once. The Great Powers are 
 influenced by different views, different aims, and different tradi- 
 tions. They can only act if they all agree together. How often 
 and for how long may we expect them to agree ? Mr Gladstone, 
 in praising this European machinery, said that "the common 
 action of the Great Powers is fatal to selfish views." It never 
 seemed to have occurred to him that selfish views were absolutely 
 fatal to common action. Many of you have probably served on
 
 committees. These decide what action^they will pursue by means 
 of the voice of the majority. Yet all know the difficulty of de- 
 ciding any question in such a committee, and you will therefore 
 easily understand the difficulty of deciding on common action in a 
 committee of six in which a single member can at any time para- 
 lyse the action of the other five. The European concert is, in 
 fact, an instrument for doing as little as possible with the greatest 
 possible amount of friction. 
 
 Now, gentlemen, I come to some particular criticisms of Mr 
 Gladstone upon the Eastern policy of the Government. And 
 here I must go back, following his example, to what is almost 
 ancient history — I mean to the time before the Russo-Turkish 
 war. He has said regarding that period, over and over again, 
 that everything would have gone well, that war would have been 
 avoided, that liberty would have been secured for the subject- 
 populations of the Porte, had England only consented, in concert 
 with the other European Powers, to coerce Turkey. Now, with- 
 out going minutely into that question, I ask you to reflect for 
 one moment on the general conditions which had to be fulfilled 
 before successful coercion could have been accomplished. In the 
 first place, Mr Gladstone admits that coercion, if I understand 
 him rightly, would not have been desirable if it had ended in the 
 use of force. He assumes, in other words, that that policy would 
 only have been a right policy if Turkey had yielded to the pres- 
 sure of Europe. Now I want to know what probability there 
 was that Turkey would have so yielded at that time ? We know 
 she was perfectly ready to brave war with Eussia, because she 
 did so immediately afterwards. She must have known then that 
 Eussia was by far the strongest Power, and that Eussia was pre- 
 pared to go to extremities with her. What probability is there 
 that Turkey would have yielded to the pressure of Europe, know- 
 ing, as Turkey would have known, that that pressure never would 
 have ended in the exercise of force ? There is not any proba- 
 bility. When the threat of the overwhelming force on the part 
 of Eussia failed to move her, can we suppose that pressure, not 
 to be followed by force, would have had the effect of bending her 
 will? The idea is chimerical. Next, I want to know what 
 probability is there that actual force could have been exercised 
 by the six Powers in concert with any advantage ? In order that 
 the force could be exercised with any probability of good results, 
 you must assume that ever}^ Power in Europe was interested 
 solely in the welfare of the subject-populations of the Porte, and 
 had no selfish objects in view. I shall not dwell on the question 
 as to whether particular Powers had or had not selfish views; but 
 I ask those who are acquainted with the history of the past five 
 years what grounds there were for thinking that the six Powers
 
 of Europe were prepared to agree, with purely disinterested 
 motives, in pressing this coercion on Turkey ? If you ask your- 
 selves this question, I am sure you will be left in no doubt as to 
 the result of the measure which Mr Gladstone looks back to as 
 the neglected panacea and remedy for all the evils that have 
 since occurred. You will be convinced, that just as at that time 
 no result at all could be anticipated from the threat of pressure, 
 no good result could be anticipated from the exercise of pressure. 
 Now, gentlemen, I pass from the time immediately before the 
 Eusso-Turkish war to the time succeeding it ; and I understand, 
 with regard to the period succeeding the Eusso-Turkish war, that 
 Mr Gladstone has in the main two accusations against the Gov- 
 ernment, and they are both included in this one, — that we have 
 increased the power of Eussia. Gentlemen, that accusation, as it 
 stands, I venture to describe as grotesque. I am perfectly certain 
 that there is not a single man on the continent of Europe — be he 
 Frenchman, German, Italian, or Eussian — who believes for one 
 moment that the result of our action has been to increase the 
 power of Eussia. The universal belief, both among those who 
 like England and those who dislike her, has been that what she 
 has done has been to curtail that power. There is no doubt 
 whatever that amongst the foremost people who held that belief 
 are the Eussians themselves. And, gentlemen, in what way 
 does Mr Gladstone say we have increased the power of Eussia ? 
 Why, in two ways. First, in regard to Bessarabia. He says : 
 " Lord Salisbury met with Count Schouvaloff and agreed that he 
 would support the restoration to the despotic power of Eussia of 
 that country north of the Danube which at that moment con- 
 stituted the portion of a free state." And then he goes on to 
 say : " Why, gentlemen, what had been done by the Liberal 
 Government? Eussia, which was a Danubian Power, lost her 
 position, by the action of the Liberal Government, on the 
 Danube." I may remark, before going on, that at the time when 
 the Liberal Government performed this feat of driving Eussia 
 back from the Danube, Mr Gladstone himself was in Opposition, 
 and was, unless I am greatly mistaken, attacking that Liberal Gov- 
 ernment by every means in his power. I believe I am right in 
 that, as far as I recollect. But what I want to ask now is, Was it 
 our duty to imitate the Liberal Government of 1856, and drive 
 back Eussia from the Danube ? The position of matters was this : 
 Eussia had the territory of Bessarabia within her grasp. The 
 interests threatened by her permanent possession of it were not 
 English interests at all. If they were anybody's concern besides 
 those of Bessarabia and Eoumania, they were the interests of 
 Austria or Germany; but neither Austria nor Germany would have 
 lifted a finger to remove Bessarabia from the grasp of the Czar.
 
 So that if we had attempted to prevent Russia carrying out her 
 intentions in that respect, we should have had to do it single- 
 handed. I do not know whether Mr Gladstone actually would 
 have desired us to go to war with Russia in such a cause. He is 
 very fond of letting it be understood that, on proper occasions, he 
 himself would have been capable of a very spirited foreign policy 
 with regard to Russia. He almost hints that he would have liked 
 to have gone to war with that Power, not only about Bessarabia, 
 but about Afghanistan also. Yet I recollect an occasion on 
 which Russia acted in a manner which much more nearly con- 
 cerned England — and that was when she declared she would 
 no longer be bound by the clause of the Treaty concerning the 
 Black Sea: did we ever hear that at that time Mr Gladstone 
 was inflamed by any military ardour? Though that was a 
 matter which much more nearly affected the interests of this 
 country than the retrocession of Bessarabia, he bore it with 
 admirable meekness. So much, gentlemen, for the first way in 
 which we have increased the power of Russia by our action. 
 Now I come to the second: and here I think Mr Gladstone's 
 language far less justifiable, and far more likely to produce mis- 
 chief than that which he used about Bessarabia. Let me read to 
 you what he said about Batoum : " Lord Salisbury has lately 
 stated to the country that by the Treaty of Berlin the port of 
 Batoum is to be only a commercial port. If the Treaty of Berlin 
 stated that it was to be only a commercial port, it could not be made 
 into an arsenal, and that fact would be very important." Then 
 he goes on : " Why, gentlemen, Leith is an essentially commer- 
 cial port, but there is nothing to prevent the people of this 
 country — if in their wisdom or in their folly they should think 
 fit — from converting Leith into a great arsenal or naval fortifica- 
 tion." These words can only bear one construction. Mr Glad- 
 stone is of opinion that under the Treaty of Berlin Russia is 
 quite as much at liberty to turn Batoum into an arsenal as we at 
 this moment are to turn Leith into an arsenal. Now, gentlemen, 
 let me make plain this matter to you. In the Treaty of Berlin 
 there is a clause entirely devoted to the assertion that Batoum is 
 to be essentially a commercial port. Mr Gladstone has a great 
 opinion of the wisdom of the European Powers in their collective 
 capacity, and I want to know what meaning he supposed the 
 European Powers attached to that clause ? Batoum was given to 
 Russia by the Treaty. By the Treaty Russia was told that it 
 was to be essentially a commercial port. But, gentlemen, if 
 Russia may, under that Treaty, make it anything it likes — an 
 arsenal, or anything else it chooses — what on earth is the use of 
 putting anything at all about it in the Treaty ? There was a 
 time when Russian diplomacy was not in very good odour in
 
 10 
 
 this country, when it was supposed Russian diplomatists were 
 not above taking advantage of any flaw which misdirected in- 
 genuity could discover. Yet I should consider it an insult to 
 Eussian diplomacy if I said that this interpretation of Mr Glad- 
 stone's was worthy of it. Its falsity, indeed, is not merely shown, 
 though it is sufficiently shown, by the words of the Treaty inter- 
 preted in the light of common-sense. For, as you are all aware, 
 treaties like this of Berlin are preceded by meetings of the 
 Plenipotentiaries, and the proceedings of the Plenipotentiaries 
 in these meetings are embodied in protocols. These are signed 
 after each day's sittings by all the Plenipotentiaries ; and they are 
 not merely records of what has occurred, like the newspaper 
 reports of a debate in the House of Commons, — they are diplo- 
 matic announcements by the various Powers, which have an 
 authoritative character. Now, at one of these meetings of the 
 Conference Lord Salisbury made this assertion. He said: "Lord 
 Salisbury understands that Batoum is to be only a commercial 
 port, and therefore accepts in principle the status quo ante for 
 the Straits." The meaning of that assertion of Lord Salisbury is 
 this, — on the understanding that Batoum is to be (not essentially, 
 in Mr Gladstone's meaning of the word, but) only a commercial 
 port, I, on behalf of England, will assent to the Straits being 
 closed against vessels of war ; in other words, if Batoum is not 
 to be a commercial port, the Straits shall be open to vessels of 
 war, and we shall be able to send our fleet into the Black Sea. 
 And that assertion of Lord Salisbury is in the protocols of the 
 Conference at Berlin, with which Mr Gladstone, I should have 
 supposed, would by this time have made himself thoroughly 
 acquainted. 
 
 Now, gentlemen, I pass from Europe to Cyprus. But before 
 I do so there is one matter I should like to touch upon, and 
 that is the question of what is known as the Salisbury-Schouvaloff 
 agreement. You all know the abuse which was heaped on 
 the present Foreign Secretary after that document had become 
 public, and that abuse has been levelled at him by states- 
 men who are so well acquainted, or who ought to be so well 
 acquainted, with the way in which foreign negotiations must 
 be managed and always have been managed, that they should have 
 known better. What is the accusation which they bring against 
 the Government for this preliminary agreement with Eussia ? 
 What they say is this, — they say you are asking for a European 
 conference to decide the affairs of Europe, yet before that 
 conference meets you decide the affairs of Europe behind its 
 back. That is the accusation. Now, gentlemen, I should like 
 to say a word upon that. You will see at once that the accusa- 
 tion can have no weight or significance unless the agreement com-
 
 11 
 
 plained of binds the conference. If the two Powers, by meeting 
 together before the conference, were able by their united action 
 to bind the decision of the conference, no doubt there may 
 be something in the accusation. But no action of England and 
 Eussia together could by any possibility bind the conference. The 
 conference of European Powers was as free after that agreement 
 as it was before. Supposing that before going into the House 
 of Commons I was to make an arrangement with some other 
 member as to the vote I was going to give, would Parliament 
 thereby be bound ? Supposing I was to agree with any number 
 of people, would Parliament be bound by that vote? It might 
 be replied, " Yes, if you were to agree with the majority before- 
 hand, Parliament would be bound." But in conferences matters 
 are not settled by a majority. Every single Power is able at 
 its own discretion to break up the conference. Therefore there 
 is no possibility of any agreement between any two Powers, or 
 any three Powers, having any effect whatever in binding the 
 decision of the conference ; or, in other words, binding any 
 Power which was not a party to that agreement. But I go 
 farther, and say that no conference has any chance of suc- 
 cess unless the Powers which are more especially interested 
 meet together, before the conference, and come to some agree- 
 ment among themselves. There were agreements between 
 separate Powers before the Congress of Vienna ; and I may tell 
 you, gentlemen, that though England and Eussia are the only 
 two Powers who are commonly known to have come to an 
 understanding before the Conference of Berlin, they are by 
 no means the only Powers who actually did so. And it could 
 not be otherwise. To say that no such agreements were to be 
 made, to say that Powers were not to come to any understand- 
 ing with each other as to the course they were to pursue in 
 conference before the conference met, would be to foredoom it 
 to failure before its meeting. I hope, gentlemen, that by these 
 few remarks I have clearly explained a matter which has been 
 greatly misrepresented and misunderstood, so that there should 
 be no excuse for anybody in the future misunderstanding the 
 action of the Government. 
 
 Gentlemen, misrepresentation is thick with regard to the 
 policy of the Government in Europe : but I think that the 
 misrepresentations with regard to their policy in Europe are as 
 nothing compared to the misrepresentation of their policy in 
 Cyprus. In almost the last speech that Mr Gladstone made, he 
 used very strong language about a parallel which Lord Salisbury 
 drew the other day between our recent occupation of Cyprus and 
 our seizure of Malta and Gibraltar in past times. This, Mr 
 Gladstone was good enough to say, was more like the statement
 
 12 
 
 of a political bandit than that of an English Minister. Now, 
 gentlemen, in the first place, Mr Gladstone, I need hardly say, 
 has altogether misunderstood the drift of Lord Salisbury's re- 
 marks. It is perfectly true that in his speech at Manchester 
 Lord Salisbury drew a parallel or comparison between our occu- 
 pation of Cyprus and our seizure of Gibraltar and Malta ; but 
 the parallel had no reference to the mode of their acquisition, 
 but only to their utility to us when acquired. He did not mean, 
 nor did he say, that we got Cyprus in the way that we got 
 Gibraltar and Malta ; but that having got Cyprus, it was useful 
 to us in the same kind of way as Gibraltar was, or as Malta was. 
 Mr Gladstone appears to assume that we committed an act of 
 robbery in acquiring Cyprus. Now let us consider the con- 
 ditions under which we got Cyprus. In the first place, our 
 opponents themselves are very fond of asserting, when it suits 
 their purpose, that we paid more for Cyprus than its value. 
 They are always telling us " what a bad bargain you have got 
 in Cyprus ; you pay more to the Turk in money than he could 
 ever get from the island ; and besides the money-payment, you 
 have entered into all sorts of onerous engagements on his behalf : 
 do you mean to say that this little island is worth as much as 
 that ? " Again, it cannot be denied that the Turks entered into 
 this arrangement willingly — as, indeed, might naturally be 
 expected, considering the advantages they gain by it. So that 
 we are now in a position exactly to understand what Mr Glad- 
 stone means by the act of a political bandit. He means occupy- 
 ing a man's territory with his full consent, and paying for it 
 more than its value. I can only say, gentlemen, that, speaking 
 to you as a distressed landlord, I should like to be robbed in that 
 way, and on as large a scale as possible. 
 
 So much for the method by which Cyprus has been acquired. 
 Now let me touch for a moment on the Anglo -Turkish Con- 
 vention, the instrument by which we acquired it. There are 
 two accusations made against us with regard to that Anglo- 
 Turkish Convention. The one is, that by the Anglo-Turkish 
 Convention we broke the European concert ; and the other is, that 
 we took upon ourselves too great responsibilities. The accusa- 
 tion about the European concert amounts to this : Mr Gladstone 
 says that Europe since 1856 has determined that the affairs of 
 Turkey shall be the affairs of Europe as a whole, and not of any 
 part of Europe ; that by the Anglo-Turkish Convention we have 
 made the aiSairs of Turkey our concern apart from the rest of 
 Europe ; and that by doing so we have broken the European 
 concert and overridden the Treaty of Paris. Well, if that is the 
 meaning of the European concert — and that must be the mean- 
 ing according to Mr Gladstone— the European concert has never
 
 131 
 
 existed; and for this reason, that directly after the Treaty of 
 Paris, by which the affairs of Turkey were placed under the six 
 Powers, another treaty was concluded called the Tripartite 
 Treaty, by which Austria, France, and England bound them- 
 selves as between each other to protect the integrity and inde- 
 pendence of the Ottoman Empire. Therefore if the European 
 concert is broken by the fact that any one or more Powers, other 
 than the six Great Powers, concern themselves with the affairs 
 of Turkey, — if that constitutes a breach of the European concert, 
 then it has been broken ever since 1856, and I may dismiss that 
 accusation altogether. Then I come to the other accusation — 
 that, namely, which relates to the responsibilities that we have 
 brought upon ourselves by the Convention ; and these, gentlemen, 
 are asserted to be of two kinds — military and administrative. 
 With regard to the first, Mr Gladstone, as far as I understand 
 him, says that we are bound by that Convention to send an 
 army in case of war to the Armenian frontier. We are not 
 bound to do anything of the kind. We are bound to assist the 
 Turks against the Russians if the Russians attack the Armenian 
 frontier. We are not bound to give that assistance in any 
 particular manner ; nor have we been so foolish as to pledge 
 ourselves to any particular military manoeuvre. In engaging to 
 assist the Turks to the best of our ability we have certainly not 
 defined the precise manner in which that assistance is to be 
 given. The other point, as to the administrative responsibilities 
 we have incurred, may be very shortly disposed of. Mr Glad- 
 stone stated on more than one occasion that we have made 
 ourselves responsible for the good government of Asia Minor. 
 That statement is entirely incorrect. We have made ourselves 
 responsible for nothing of the kind. The responsibility lies 
 with the Turk — it does not lie with us ; and when Mr Gladstone 
 says that it does, it only shows that he has not read the articles 
 of the Convention with that attention which so important an 
 instrument demands. So much, gentlemen, for the Anglo- 
 Turkish Convention. I now come to Cyprus itself, and here 
 Mr Gladstone attacks us for having passed two ordinances 
 which he thinks are a disgrace to any Government. One of 
 the ordinances, you will recollect, which he deals with, provides 
 that the Government of Cyprus shall, under certain circumstances, 
 be able to banish any individual whom they may regard as 
 dangerous to the island; and Mr Gladstone, amidst cries of 
 "shame," directed all the force of his eloquence against what 
 he was pleased to describe as " a disgrace to this country," and 
 a "scandal before the world." Mr Gladstone, however, forgot 
 to mention, or was unaware, that a law of similar import is 
 already in force in others of our colonies, and was so in force
 
 14 
 
 under the last Government. Therefore, in introducing a similar 
 law into Cyprus, the present Government have at all events not 
 stepped beyond precedent. I do not mean to say that this is 
 by itself a full justification, but it shows at any rate that the 
 question before us is one of expediency and not principle ; that 
 it should be discussed on its merits, and not summarily dis- 
 missed with a few strong epithets. Now I have not time to go 
 into a detailed justification of that measure, but I will draw 
 your attention to two considerations. The ordinance is directed, 
 as perhaps you are aware, against political agitators — and the 
 political agitator in the East is a. much more important indi- 
 vidual than perhaps you have any idea of. He is to be 
 found all over the Balkan Peninsula in the service of this 
 or that Government, or of this or that interest. Nor will 
 any one acquainted with the East venture to assert that the 
 danger which this statute was intended to guard against is 
 altogether illusory. In the next place, the ordinance is sur- 
 rounded with safeguards. It is not in the power of the Governor 
 to banish a man on his sole responsibility and without assigning 
 a reason. He has to get the consent of the Legislative Council 
 of the island ; and on the Council are, besides the ex officio 
 members, a Turk, a Greek, and an Italian. Not only that, but 
 the Governor, having banished a man, has immediately to report 
 the fact to the Secretary of State at home ; and if that is not 
 sufficient, there is a watchful Opposition in Parliament ready 
 enough to take up anything that can be made to redound 
 to the discredit of the Government. You will easily believe, 
 therefore, that this power, great as it is, is not likely to be 
 abused ; and I may mention that it has never yet been found 
 necessary to put it into operation. Mr Gladstone, however, is 
 not content with criticising laws which really exist: he has 
 taken the trouble to invent one, apparently for the sole purpose 
 of criticising it. He asserts that, by an ordinance we have 
 passed in Cyprus, we forbid any foreigner to buy land. I have 
 only to say in regard to Mr Gladstone's statement on this, as on 
 many other subjects, that it is incorrect. There is no statute 
 preventing a foreigner from buying land.* 
 
 Gentlemen, I cannot now deal with all the subjects that I 
 would have liked to deal with, but I must say one word, before 
 leaving Cyprus, on the subject of the harbour of Famagosta. Mr 
 Gladstone poured derision upon the harbour of Famagosta, and 
 drew an elaborate parallel between the harbour of Famagosta 
 
 * Mr Gladstone may have been misled (though it seems difficult to believe it) 
 by an ordinance which requires foreigners to obtain a licence before buying land. 
 This enactment has no tendency, either in theory or in practice, to check the 
 purchase of land for legitimate purposes, and it has never yet been found neces- 
 sary to refuse a licence. . , . - - ,
 
 15 
 
 and the harbour of Alderney, on which a late Government — I 
 think a Liberal Government — spent vast sums of money, and 
 produced no results whatever. Well, I looked into a book of 
 Sir Samuel Baker's which Mr Gladstone quoted, thinking that he 
 might have got his information out of that, and been misled by 
 it. What did I iind there? I found that Sir Samuel Baker 
 asserts that every competent authority is of opinion that, at 
 very small expense, a magnificent harbour might be constructed 
 at Famagosta — superior to that at Malta. Well, gentlemen, Mr 
 Gladstone has not got his information from Sir Samuel Baker, 
 nor yet can he have got it from the papers laid before Parliament, 
 because in the latter Admiral Hornby has given a report, in which 
 he says that very little dredging would make Famagosta a magni- 
 ficent harbour ; that it is situated at about 250 miles — not 300 
 miles as Mr Gladstone says — from Egypt, and is in a most 
 central position for a coaling depot. All competent authorities 
 have admitted that Famagosta might be made a good harbour, 
 Nevertheless all competent authorities might be wrong, and Mr 
 Gladstone might be right. But, unfortunately for Mr Gladstone, 
 Famagosta as it is at present is an efficient harbour — not so 
 good as it might be made ; but it is at this moment a fair har- 
 bour, and you can do there what you cannot do at Malta. Not 
 two months ago the Mediterranean ileet went in in double column 
 -T-a manoeuvre which cannot be executed at Malta — and anchored 
 there ; yet Mr Gladstone boldly says, not only that there is no 
 port at Famagosta which will accommodate British ships of war, 
 but that there never will be ! 
 
 In passing now from Cyprus to India, let me say one word 
 about Abyssinia. In his speech at the Corn Exchange, Mr 
 Gladstone threw out a challenge to the Government, you will 
 recollect, with regard to the expenses of the Abyssinian war. 
 He said that, in regard to the Abyssinian war, the Government 
 dissolved, after telling the country that they only owed £5,000,000 ; 
 and that when they, the Liberals, came into office, they discovered 
 that the cost of that war approached £9,000,000.* He chal- 
 lenged the Government to contradict that statement, — and he said 
 it with the air of a man who did not think it would be contra- 
 dicted, and would be very sorry if it were. Gentlemen, I am not 
 a member of the Government, but 1 am ready to take up Mr 
 Gladstone's challenge. It is perfectly true that when the Govern- 
 ment prorogued they believed that the expenses would amount 
 to only £5,000,000, and that was according to the last informa- 
 tion derived from India. On the 1st of December of 1868, Sir 
 Stafford Northcote, who was Secretary of State for India, pressed 
 the Government of Bombay for complete accounts ; but mark 
 
 * See Appendix.
 
 16 
 
 this, it was not till the 17th of Decemher that the first intimation 
 was received that an expenditure approaching £9,000,000 would 
 be reached. Well, Parliament was dissolved on the 11th of 
 November, and the new Parliament reassembled on the 10th of 
 December, so that it was more than a month after the dissolution 
 that the news was received, and nearly a week after the reassem- 
 bling of the new Parliament. So much for the shortcomings of 
 the last Conservative Ministry. iN'ow I shall speak very briefly 
 about India. You will recollect that Mr Gladstone accuses the 
 present Government of having by their extravagance produced a 
 deficit of £6,000,000 in the finances of the United Kingdom. 
 Having made that accusation against the home Government, 
 listen to what he says about the Indian Government : " It 
 was after the disappearance of Lord Northbrook that the new 
 policy, of which you have had a nearer knowledge in Europe, 
 began to develop itself in India, and with the commencement 
 of that new policy, so fatally accurate is the machinery that 
 is set at work, there began the reign of deficiency." If that 
 sentence means anything, it means that the deficit in the 
 Indian Exchequer was caused by a policy as characteristic of a 
 Conservative Government as that which at home produced a 
 deficiency of £6,000,000. Now Mr Gladstone is perfectly right 
 in saying that, in the four years from 1876-77 to 1879-80, there 
 was a deficiency in the Indian Exchequer of nearly £6,000,000. 
 But observe how that deficiency arose. In that period there was 
 more than £8,000,000 spent in famine relief, and there was more 
 than £11,000,000 lost in the exchanges through the low price of 
 silver. If I compare with those figures the figures in the seven 
 years which Mr Gladstone claims as the years during which a 
 good financial system prevailed, I find that while there was a 
 surplus of six and a half millions, there was spent on famine 
 relief — I give it in round numbers — about six millions and a half, 
 and through loss by exchange a little over £5,000,000. If from 
 the two periods under discussion we exclude famine relief and 
 loss by exchange, which we are bound to do, considering that 
 neither the one nor the other could be possibly supposed to be 
 owing to the policy of the Government, I find that the average 
 surplus per annum under Lord Northbrook's Administration was 
 about £2,500,000 ; under Lord Lytton's it was nearly £3,500,000. 
 When you reflect, gentlemen, that Mr Gladstone made that state- 
 ment about Indian deficits to a multitude of people who prob- 
 ably knew nothing whatever about Indian finance, but knew that 
 Mr Gladstone was a great financial authority, I think you will 
 agree with me that he showed on that occasion something like 
 culpable carelessness. 
 
 Now, gentlemen, I turn to Afghanistan; but in order that
 
 17 
 
 you may fully understand the temper of mind in which Mr 
 Gladstone approaches the subject of European interference in 
 Central Asia, let me read to you an extract which I cut out of 
 one of his speeches in regard to the advance of the Eussians 
 in those regions : " The position of Russia in Central Asia I 
 believe to be one that has in the main been forced upon her 
 against her will. She has been compelled — and this is the impar- 
 tial opinion of the world — she has been compelled to extend her 
 frontier southwards in Central Asia by causes in some degree 
 analogous, but certainly more stringent and imperative, than the 
 causes which have commonly led us to extend, far more import- 
 antly, our frontier in India." That is Mr Gladstone's judgment 
 upon the advance of Russia, which, whatever its motive, has 
 added largely to her territory. Now, gentlemen, I want you to 
 compare with that his judgment on the Government of his own 
 country, which, without any wish to extend its territories, has 
 been obliged, in self-defence, to enter upon the operations in 
 Afghanistan. How does he describe these operations ? He says 
 they are mean, shabby, dastardly ; that they showed cupidity ; 
 that they were loilfully unjust and destructive. There you have 
 a comparison of his views of the Russian Government and of 
 the English Government. Now, gentlemen, let me recall to your 
 mind for one moment the causes which have led to_ our action in 
 Afghanistan. I shall simply indicate them. There is no Indian 
 statesman, I believe, of any authority who has ventured to deny 
 that the condition of Afghanistan was important to us in an 
 altogether special and exceptional way, and that we could not 
 look upon the attitude of the ruler of Afghanistan with the 
 same calm indifference with which we could look upon the ruler, 
 under ordinary circumstances, of a neighbouring state ; and the 
 ground of that opinion is that it is universally recognised — and 
 is recognised by Mr Gladstone himself in one of his speeches, I 
 think the Glasgow one — that it is necessary to our Indian em- 
 pire that on its north-west frontier there should be a friendly 
 State guarding and maintaining the passes. Now, gentlemen, our 
 Government also thought it was necessary to have a friendly 
 Power guarding and maintaining the passes. Unfortunately 
 they found that they had not got one. They had conclusive 
 evidence — evidence which every day tended to confirm — that 
 they could not possibly rely upon the fidelity of the Ameer 
 of Afghanistan. It was necessary, under these circumstances, 
 that he should admit an Envoy whom we could trust. It 
 was necessary that he should admit an Envoy ; and the fact 
 that he refused to admit one was one indication that he was not 
 the faithful guardian of the passes whom Mr Gladstone con- 
 siders to be necessary, or at all events highly important, for the
 
 18 
 
 safety of our Eastern possessions. Among' other indications of 
 the unfriendly feeling of the Ameer towards us, we found that he 
 intrigued with Eussia, and finally admitted a Eussian Envoy. 
 What does Mr Gladstone hereupon say ? He says : " If you 
 wanted to go to war with anybody you ought to have gone to war 
 with Eussia ; it was mean, it was cowardly, to go to war with 
 Afghanistan." Now, in the first place, the offence of Eussia was 
 not of an aggravated nature, because at the time Eussia sent her 
 Envoy to Afghanistan, the relations between Eussia and England 
 in Europe were of the most strained description. If, under such 
 circumstances, Eussia overstepped the strict limits of international 
 obligation (into which we need not now inquire), at all events her 
 offence may be judged leniently. But that does not show the 
 full absurdity of Mr Gladstone's idea. He seems to think we 
 went to war with Shere Ali out of the mere wantonness of 
 revenge, for what I might almost call the fun of the thing, and 
 that if we wanted to revenge ourselves, the proper people with 
 which to make war were the Eussians. But the great object of 
 our policy was not revenge— it was security. And how was 
 security to be obtained — how were we to obtain that friendly 
 State to guard and maintain the passes by going to war with 
 Eussia? I think even Mr Gladstone's ingenuity will fail to 
 inform us. 
 
 Gentlemen, let me pass by a sudden transition from Afghan- 
 istan to England, and let me mention one of the circumstances 
 about that event which we are all looking forward to with so. 
 much interest — the dissolution. Mr Gladstone has invented — 
 for this occasion only — a new constitutional principle ; and it is 
 this, that you ought never to allow a Parliament to run to seven 
 sessions, because if you do, in the last session jobbery will always 
 reign triumphant. The' reason why it will reign triumphant is 
 this, — that when everybody knows there must be a dissolution, 
 various cliques will always press their schemes upon the Govern- 
 ment, to the detriment of the national interests. But it never 
 seems to have occurred to Mr Gladstone that if people knew there 
 would be a dissolution after the sixth session these cliques would 
 be quite as ready to press their schemes upon the Government 
 then as they ever could be during the seventh session ; so that this 
 constitutional principle, such as it is, appears to be fitted only for an 
 Irish Parliament — if an Irish Parliament is ever to exist. There 
 is not only, however, this objection, founded on what I may call 
 the intrinsic absurdity of Mr Gladstone's constitutional principle. 
 There is another objection which has been pointed out to him, 
 that he himself was a member of a Government which carried on 
 Parliament during seven sessions — from 1859 to 1865. This was 
 pointed out to Mr Gladstone in the newspapers, and he took
 
 19 
 
 occasion to reply to it in one of his later speeches — I forget in 
 which, there were so many — but I think it was at Glasgow. 
 And what was his reply ? In substance it was this. He said : 
 " Our first session — the session of 1859 — was really only half a 
 session ; you cannot count it ; it was a sort of thing you cannot in 
 fairness count." I was rather astonished at this, and I took the 
 trouble to look out the dates. Here they are. This Parliament 
 began on the 5th of March 1874 ; the session of 1859 — the first of 
 what, for convenience, I may call Mr Gladstone's Parliament — be- 
 gan on the 31st of May. EKcluding the Easter holidays, which 
 occurred between the beginning of March and the end of May, I 
 make out — unless my arithmetic is wrong — that the difference 
 between our first session — that is, the session of 1874 — and Mr 
 Gladstone's first session of 1859, was about nine weeks. Observe, 
 therefore, gentlemen, how delicately poised is the British Consti- 
 tution. It is perfectly secure if you curtail the first session out 
 of seven by nine weeks ; restore those nine weeks and the Con- 
 stitution is shaken to its foundation ! 
 
 Now, gentlemen, though I have not exhausted the vast field of 
 misrepresentation provided by Mr Gladstone for future Conser- 
 vative orators, I fear that in the meantime I must have exhausted 
 your patience. I have been obliged to point out in more than 
 one instance that Mr Gladstone has altogether misrepresented 
 facts ; and that in other cases he has drawn altogether false 
 deductions from facts. Now let me repeat again that I do not 
 accuse Mr Gladstone of any want of conscientiousness. I believe 
 that his hatred of the present Government is such that any as- 
 sertion that tells against them he is irresistibly moved to believe ; 
 and that any assertion that tells in their favour he regards as ipso 
 facto incredible. If it should be suddenly discovered that two 
 and two making four was a fact that told in favour of her 
 Majesty's Government, he would conscientiously believe that 
 two and two made five, — that it was violating a great principle 
 of international morality to believe the contrary, — and that the 
 late Sir Robert Peel had always been of that opinion. A friend 
 has just intimated — but I do not know if the intimation will 
 meet with your approval — that I should say something upon the 
 subject of the Church. You may recollect, then, gentlemen, that at 
 Manchester Lord Salisbury gave a warning to the Mid- Lothian 
 electors. Lord Salisbury said, in effect, that when Mr Gladstone 
 was canvassing Lancashire a dozen years ago, he announced that 
 the Irish Church was outside the sphere of practical politics ; 
 but that, nevertheless, only a short time elapsed before the Irish 
 Church was discovered to be an iniquitous institution which 
 could not be too soon destroyed, — a political Upas-tree which, 
 without further delay, must be cut down; and Lord Salisbury
 
 20 
 
 warned the Mid-Lothian electors that, if Mr Gladstone an- 
 nounced for the moment that the destruction of the Scotch 
 Church was outside the sphere of practical politics, they might 
 find that but a short time would elapse before Mr Gladstone 
 would undergo a conversion as rapid and not less effectual. 
 These remarks of Lord Salisbury called forth a reply on the 
 first day Mr Gladstone came to Mid-Lothian, — a reply which, 
 I venture to think, contained one of the most curious pieces 
 of autobiography which had ever been vouchsafed by a great 
 statesman to the public. Lord Salisbury had ventured upon 
 no hypothesis as to how it came about that the Irish 
 Church suddenly ceased to be a matter outside practical 
 politics, and became a matter which should be dealt with at 
 once by a strong hand. But Mr Gladstone has himself sup- 
 plied the omission; he has given to an astonished world the 
 reasons which converted him from the idea that the Irish Church 
 might be left as it stood, to the idea that it was a Upas-tree which 
 must be instantly destroyed. One of these reasons was, that two 
 policemen were shot in Manchester ; and another was, that a 
 prison was blown up in London. Ever since — in an "unlucky 
 moment — Lord Hartington, the titular leader of the Liberal 
 party, came down to Scotland, and, under the inspiration of Mr 
 Adam, announced that the Established Church might very well be 
 dealt with, it had been a constant object of Scotch Liberal statesmen 
 to reassure their friends in the Established Church. With this 
 laudable object, they have administered to them a great variety of 
 consolations ; but the consolations administered by Mr Gladstone 
 are surely the most extraordinary and most remarkable of all. He 
 told his friends — if he has any friends in the Established Church 
 — that a "just and fair" anxiety prevailed among them lest they 
 should be condemned without having what he called a "fair 
 trial ; " and he endeavoured to reassure them by telling them 
 that a fair trial they should certainly have. Gentlemen, you 
 have probably heard of an old method of deciding causes, known 
 as "ordeal by battle," in which the accuser and the accused 
 fought, judgment being always given in favour of the victor. It 
 is in the certainty of that kind of " fair trial " that Mr Gladstone 
 expects the Church of Scotland to find substantial comfort. We 
 know what shape this fair trial will take, because we have already 
 seen an example of it in the case of the Irish Church. A fair 
 trial means that Mr Gladstone will stump the country from one 
 end to another, — that the whole Liberal organisation would be 
 set to work, and every other means used to inflame men's minds 
 against the doomed institution. If the members of the Estab- 
 lished Church find in these utterances of Mr Gladstone any 
 security for the safety, the prosperity, and the continuance of
 
 21 
 
 that Church, then they are more easily taken in than I would 
 give them credit for. 
 
 Gentlemen, you have greatly mistaken the drift of my speech 
 if you suppose my object has been to merely show that the 
 accusations of Mr Gladstone against the Government have no 
 foundation. His bitter and somewhat reckless criticism sup- 
 plies (as I think I have shown you) a very unsafe guide for 
 judging the past ; but it may furnish a warning for the future, 
 of which the country will do well to take heed. If it gives no 
 trustworthy account of the character of the present Government, 
 we may find in it clear indication of what the character of the 
 next one will be. Mr Gladstone says that the Ministry now in 
 office may be judged by their actions, and that the country has 
 ample material for judging. I agree with him ; and I also think 
 that in Mr Gladstone's speeches the country has ample material 
 for estimating the qualities which we may expect to find in their 
 successors. The question, gentlemen, for you to decide is not 
 simply whether you will continue your allegiance to the Govern- 
 ment against whom such speeches have been made, but whether 
 you will transfer your allegiance to the party whose opinions and 
 judgments such speeches embody. Mr Gladstone is by far the 
 most eminent representative of those politicians who advocate 
 what we must now call the Liberal foreign policy — notwithstand- 
 ing that many good Liberals look at it with small favour. Whether 
 we admire that policy, or whether we think, as all of us assembled 
 here probably do think, that it shows a lack of insight into the 
 true principles by which this country should be guided, nobody 
 can deny that those who have advocated it have shown an extraor- 
 dinary mastery of fine phrases. They have freedom, international 
 law, justice, always on their lips. They exhibit a most remark- 
 able power of manipulating scraps of morality which, although 
 no doubt excellent in themselves, are by themselves hardly a 
 sufficient guide in the conduct of foreign affairs. The only 
 Government I ever heard of which has surpassed them in 
 this particular art, was the Government of France in the last 
 decade of the last century — perhaps the most mischievous and 
 the most destructive Government which ever existed. The Con- 
 servative party I believe to be as interested in the cause of 
 humanity, in the cause of freedom, in the cause of progress, in 
 the cause of international right, as any other party in the State. 
 But I do not believe that these great objects will be less attained, 
 because it puts first the safety, the honour, and the wellbeing of 
 the great country committed to its charge.
 
 22 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 ME GLADSTONE AND THE ABYSSINIAN WAE. 
 
 [To THE Editor of the Scotsman.] 
 
 Mr Gladstone has written the following letter to a gentleman in 
 Edinburgh who called his attention to criticisms by Mr Balfour, M.P., 
 upon his statements in reference to the Conservative Government's 
 finance of the Abyssinian war. Mr Balfour's statements were made in 
 an address which he recently delivered to a Conservative Association : — 
 
 Hawarden Castle, Chester, 
 Deceniher 17, 1879. 
 
 Dear Sir, — Your appeal to me is most legitimate. I have referred 
 to the ' Scotsman,' and I understand that the fuller statement in the 
 ' Courant ' agrees with it. 
 
 The fact before us is a very grave one. It is that, while an expen- 
 diture approaching nine millions was incurred in 1867-68 for the Abys- 
 sinian war, Parliament and the country were left, until 1869, under 
 the belief that the expenditure was within five millions. The ques- 
 tion is whether this fact, which is of a nature fatal to all parliamen- 
 tary control, was due to a wilful reticence, or to a most gross adminis- 
 trative miscarriage, highly discreditable to any Government. 
 
 Mr Balfour seems to exult in the belief that he has taken the trans- 
 action out of the former category and placed it in the latter. 
 
 But he has not. What he says is that the Government made no 
 inquiry about the probable charge (or got no answer) between the 
 Budget and the 1st of December, and that the answer to their in- 
 quiry of the 1st came on the 17th. 
 
 Mr Balfour is evidently in the secrets of the Departments. I wish 
 he had more liberally told them. But what he shows is that, for 
 some reason not stated, but evidently very special, during seven 
 months after the Budget, and during six months after the war was 
 ended (I speak in round numbers), the Government, charged with the 
 care of our purses, remained wholly ignorant of its cost, and forbore 
 to ask until the dissolution was over, and (December 1) they had 
 determined to resign. 
 
 Why did they so forbear to ask ?
 
 23 
 
 There may be a satisfactory reply, but we have not yet had it ; and 
 Mr Balfour has not only given no reply, but he has confined himself 
 to official communications, and has not said whether the Indian 
 authorities did or did not convey unofficially, during these seven 
 months, their knowledge or belief that the expenditure would exceed 
 five millions. 
 
 I hope that if Sir Stafi'ord Northcote refers to this matter at Leeds, he 
 will do it fully and conclusively, and therefore in a manner altogether 
 different from Mr Balfour. You are, of course, free to publish this 
 letter, — and I remain. Dear Sir, your faithful servant, 
 
 W. E. Gladstone. 
 
 Whittinghame, December 30, 1879. 
 
 Sir, — My attention has been called to a letter of Mr Gladstone's 
 which appeared in your issue of the 19 th inst., and which criticised 
 some remarks I made in a speech, delivered at Edinburgh on the 12th 
 inst., relative to the expenditure on account of the Abyssinian war 
 incurred by the Conservative Government of 1867-68. 
 
 Mr Gladstone states the case in the following words : " The fact 
 before us is a very grave one. It is that, while an expenditure 
 approaching nine millions was incurred in 1867-68 for the Abyssinian 
 war. Parliament and the country were left, until 1869, under the be- 
 lief that the expenditure was within five millions. The question is 
 whether this fact, which is of a nature fatal to all parliamentary con- 
 trol, was due to a wilful reticence, or to a most gross administrative 
 miscarriage, highly discreditable to any Government. Mr Balfour 
 seems to exult in the belief that he has taken the transaction out of 
 the former category and placed it in the latter." 
 
 On this statement of the question I have to remark, first, that as I 
 never admitted that the Ministry of 1867 must necessarily be guilty 
 either of *' wilful reticence " or " gross administrative miscarriage," it 
 is a singular perversion' of my argument to say that because I have 
 shown that they cannot justly be accused of the former off'ence, I 
 " exult in the belief" that they committed the latter. As a matter of 
 fact, I believe they were innocent of both. 
 
 In the second place, let me point out that the question I was prim- 
 arily concerned with in my speech was not the defects or merits of a 
 previous Administration (a matter chiefly of historic interest), but 
 the kind and quality of the facts and arguments by which Mr Glad- 
 stone has sought to persuade the electors of Mid-Lothian, as he has 
 already persuaded himself, that the present Administration has com- 
 mitted, or may be expected to commit, almost every species of politi- 
 cal crime. One of the methods by which he endeavoured to do this, 
 and one of the most characteristic, was to imply that as there was 
 very good ground for thinking that a Conservative Government had 
 wilfully kept back information from Parliament twelve years ago with 
 respect to the liabilities of the country, so a Conservative Government
 
 2i 
 
 might now be expected to pursue a g|?iil^i' course. In answer to this, 
 I pointed out incidentally that, as tifee Government of 1867 did not 
 possess the inforUiation in question, they could not possibly have kept 
 it bafek; but, if 'I understand Mr Gladstone rightly, he now thinks 
 that, if they did not possess the iniormation, it was because they in- 
 tentionally abstained from asking fot it till after the dissolution. He 
 admits the iglioritnce, but asserts Viat it was wilful, and therefore 
 guilty. ■ • ^" >; 
 
 For this i charge I believe there is not the shadow of foundation. 
 The Abyssinian Expedition was iffit completely terminated till the 
 end of October 1868. Parliamentlwas prorogued on the 31st July. 
 So far, therefore, as the House of ifommons was concerned, the Min- 
 istry necessarily contented itself %ith giving estimates, and all it 
 could do was to give the best edfemates it possessed. This it did ; 
 and if we are determined to find thjf causes which made the estimated 
 expenditure fall short of the act^ill expenditure, we should look for 
 them rather in the peculiar circumstances under which we made war 
 in Abyssinia, and in the unfores^n difficulties which attended the 
 return of the Expedition to India,!;?than in the incompetence ot care- 
 lessness of the high authorities on whom the Government relied for 
 its information. The Home Government was as little to blame for 
 the delay in the transmission to this- country of the completed accounts 
 as it was for the inaccuracy in the original estimates. Their total 
 amount was not accurately known «ven at the end of Jiily 1870 ; and 
 if blame for this attaches anywhere,l(which I am far from fiiplying), it 
 attaches to the Indian rather than |6 the English Administration. 
 
 The Abyssinian Expedition ana the questions connected with it 
 have now only a historic interest.^ Mr "Ward Hunt, who was then 
 responsible for the finances of the country, and whose repiitation Mr 
 Gladstone's strictures must in the first instance be supposed to affect, 
 is no longer living. Nor is there ahy question now before the country 
 with which the conduct of the Government of 1869 can be brought 
 into relation, except by a rhetorical artifice. I might, therefore, while 
 addressing an audience interested rather in the politics of the present 
 than of the past, have ignored Mr Gladstone's specific assertions, and 
 have contented myself with showing the absurdity of his practice of 
 making the existing Conservative Ministry bear the burden of all the 
 sins which he detects in the conduct of previous Conservative Minis- 
 tries—even of those of which he himself was a member. It seemed 
 better, liowever, not to allow a charge which is one of the most serious 
 that can be brought against a parliamentary statesman, which affects 
 the living as well as the dead, and which was made under circum- 
 stances which necessarily gave it the widest possible publicity, to 
 remain altogether unanswered. — 'lam &c., 
 
 " ' '^-y Arthur JAmes Balfour. 
 
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