on; that is to say a majority. Of one
meeting he said playfully to a colleague, "A very fair cabinet to-day--only
three resignations." The large packets of copious letters of this date,
written and received, show him a minister of unalterable patience,
unruffled self-command; inexhaustible in resource, catching at every straw
from the resource of others, indefatigable in bringing men of divergent
opinions within friendly reach of one another; of tireless ingenuity in
minimising differences and convincing recalcitrants that what they took
for a yawning gulf was in fact no more than a narrow trench that any
decent political gymnast ought to be ashamed not to be able to vault over.
Though he takes it all as being in the day's work, in the confidence of
the old jingle, that be the day short or never so long, at length it
ringeth to evensong, he does not conceal the burden. To Mrs. Gladstone he
writes from Downing Street on May-day:--

Rather oppressed and tired with the magnitude and the complication
of subjects on my mind, I did not think of writing by the first
post, but I will now supply the omission by making use of the
second. As to all the later history of this ministry, which is now
entering on its sixth year, it has been a wild romance of
politics, with a continual succession of hairbreadth escapes and
strange accidents pressing upon one another, and it is only from
the number of dangers we have passed through already, that one can
be bold enough to hope we may pass also through what yet remain.
Some time ago I told you that dark as the sky was with many a
thunder-cloud, there were the possibilities of an admirable
situation and result, and _for me_ a wind-up better than at any
time I could have hoped. Russia and Ireland are the two _great_
dangers remaining. The "ray" I mentioned yesterday for the first
is by no means extinct to-day, but there is nothing new of a
serious character; what there is, is good. So also upon the Irish
complications there is more hope than there was yesterday,
although the odds may still be heavily against our getting forward
unitedly in a satisfactory manner.

On May 2, as he was looking at the pictures in the Academy, Lord Granville
brought him tidings of the Russian answer, which meant peace. His short
entries tell a brave story:--

_May 3, Sunday._--Dined at Marlborough House. They were most kind