of a strictly defensive character. This was one
of those peculiar compromises that in their sequel contain surrender.
The step soon showed how critical it was. Well indeed might Lord
Aberdeen tell the Queen that it would obviously every day become more
and more difficult to draw the line between defensive and offensive,
between an auxiliary and a principal. So much simpler is a distinction
in words than in things. Still, he was able to assure her that, though
grounds of difference existed, the discussions of the cabinet of the 8th
were carried on amicably and in good humour. With straightforward common
sense the Queen pressed the prime minister for his own deliberate
counsel on the spirit and ultimate tendency of the policy that he would
recommend her to approve. In fact, Lord Aberdeen had no deliberate
counsel to proffer. Speedily the weather roughened.

SPEECH AT MANCHESTER

Four days later (October 12) the minister repeated that, while elements
of wide difference existed, still the appearance of that day was more
favourable and tended to mutual agreement. At this cabinet Mr. Gladstone
was not present, having gone on an expedition to Manchester, the first
of the many triumphal visits of his life to the great industrial centres
of the nation. 'Nothing,' he wrote to Lord Aberdeen, 'could have gone
off better. Yesterday (October 11), I had to make a visit to the
Exchange, which was crammed and most cordial. This morning we had first
the "inauguration" of the Peel statue, in the presence of an enormous
audience--misnamed so, inasmuch as but a portion of them could hear; and
then a meeting in the Town Hall, where there were addresses and speeches
made, to which I had to reply. I found the feeling of the assemblage so
friendly that I said more on the war question than I had intended, but I
sincerely hope I did not transgress the limits you would think it wise
for me to observe. The existence of a peace and a war party was evident,
from alternate manifestations, but I think the former feeling was
decidedly the stronger, and at any rate I should say without the
smallest doubt that the feeling of the whole meeting as a mass was
unequivocally favourable to the course that the government have
pursued.'

'Your Manchester speech,' Lord Aberdeen wrote to him in reply, 'has
produced a great and, I hope, a very beneficial effect upon the public
mind, and it has much promoted the cause of peace.' This result