power for good.

The fourth, that I was absolutely precluded under present
circumstances, being bound by the clearest considerations of
honour and duty to render a loyal allegiance to Granville as
leader of the party, and to Hartington as leader in the Commons,
and was entirely disabled from so much as entertaining any
proposition that could directly or indirectly tend to their
displacement.

There is a fifth consideration that now presses me, of which the
grounds had hardly emerged in regard to myself personally at the
time when we conversed together. Nothing could be so painful, I
may almost say so odious to me, as to force myself, or to be
forced, upon the Queen, under circumstances where the choice of
another from the ranks of the same party would save her from being
placed in a difficulty of that peculiar kind. This, it may be
said, belongs to the same category as my first and second
objections; but there it is.

The enthusiasm of Scotland is something wonderful. As to the
county of Midlothian, I doubt whether the well-informed tories
themselves in the least expect to win. We go to Taymouth on
Monday. I hope you are well and hearty and see cause to be
contented with the progress of opinion. The more I think about the
matter, the more strange and mysterious does it seem to me that
any party in this free nation should be found to sanction and
uphold policy and proceedings like those of the last two years in
particular. I have written this because I am desirous you should
have clearly before you the matter of my conversation with you,
and the means of verifying it.

_Mr. Bright to Mr. Gladstone._

_Rochdale, Dec. 12, 1879._--Perhaps I ought to have written to you
sooner to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 28th ult.,
but I preferred to let you get home before I wrote, and I was in
truth rather puzzled as to what I ought to say.

You, with sufficient accuracy, describe the purport of your
remarks during our conversation when I was with you a year ago. I
saw the difficulty, then in the future, now perhaps near upon us.
But it is one in which nothing can be done, and "a masterly
inactivity" seems the only wise course. If a break-up of the
present concern comes, the Queen will be advised to send, for
Granville or Hartington. The one sent for will ac