oved to be graver than even
the Premier had imagined; for it showed the Liberals once again that
Toryism is by instinct hostile to freedom.

But events were now at hand before which the Public Worship Regulation
Act and the Slave Circular paled into insignificance.

In the autumn of 1875 an insurrection had broken out in Bulgaria, and
the Turkish Government despatched a large force to repress it. This was
done, and repression was followed by a hideous orgy of massacre and
outrage. A rumour of these horrors reached England, and public
indignation spontaneously awoke. Disraeli, with a strange frankness of
cynical brutality, sneered at the rumour as "Coffee-house babble," and
made odious jokes about the Oriental way of executing malefactors. But
Christian England was not to be pacified with these Asiatic
pleasantries, and in the autumn of 1876 the country rose in passionate
indignation against what were known as "the Bulgarian Atrocities."
Preaching in St. Paul's Cathedral, Liddon made a signal departure from
his general rule of avoiding politics in the pulpit, and gave splendid
utterance to the passion which was burning in his heart. "Day by day we
English are learning that this year of grace 1876 has been signalized by
a public tragedy which, I firmly believe, is without a parallel in
modern times.... Not merely armed men, but young women and girls and
babes, counted by hundreds, counted by thousands, subjected to the most
refined cruelties, subjected to the last indignities, have been the
victims of the Turk." And then came a fine burst of patriotic
indignation. "That which makes the voice falter as we say it is that,
through whatever misunderstanding, the Government which is immediately
responsible for acts like these has turned for sympathy, for
encouragement, not to any of the historical homes of despotism or
oppression, not to any other European Power, but alas! to England--to
free, humane, Christian England. The Turk has, not altogether without
reason, believed himself, amid these scenes of cruelty, to be leaning on
our country's arm, to be sure of her smile, or at least of her
acquiescence."

And soon a mightier voice than even Liddon's was added to the chorus of
righteous indignation. Gladstone had resigned the leadership of the
Liberal Party at the beginning of 1875, and for sixteen months he
remained buried in his library at Hawarden. But now he suddenly
reappeared, and flung himself into the agitation again