d only be for him to do what
he considered best for his own happiness, and that half-measures
did not answer; that he now knew the whole truth and it was for him
to judge how to act. He said then, "I cannot have a doubt; I will
visit you less frequently; I will speak very little to you in
public, but I cannot, unless you positively forbid me, renounce the
intimacy now established with your family." I said, of course, that
it would be a great happiness to us all not to lose him, but that I
was very doubtful of the wisdom of his decision, as it might only
be rendering himself more unhappy. "That," he said, "is my affair,
and I am willing to run the risk." ... Fanny, to whom I told
everything, says she is now quite happy, and her mind at ease.

He seems, however, to have made up his mind to keep away from them for some
weeks. The next mention of him is on May 7th, more than a month later:

Morning visit from Lord John. Said he had a great speech to make
this evening on sugar.... Billy came to dinner full of admiration
of the speech. Honest, noble, clever. Well, we shall go out with
honour.

This speech on sugar was made at a crisis of particular difficulty. The
debate was the first important discussion in Parliament on the new
principle of Free Trade. Greville describes Lord John's speech as an
"extraordinarily good one," and Lord Sydenham [19] wrote from Canada:

I have read your speech upon opening the debate on the sugar
question with feelings of admiration and pleasure I cannot
describe. The Free Traders have never been orators since Mr. Pitt
in early days. We have hammered away with facts and figures and
some argument, but we could not elevate the subject and excite the
feelings of the people. At last you, who can do both, have fairly
undertaken it, and the cause has a champion worthy of it.

[19] Lord Sydenham said later, "Lord John is the noblest man it has ever
been my fortune to follow" (Spencer Walpole's "Life of Lord John Russell").

Mr. Baring, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, proposed to lower the import
duty on foreign and colonial timber and sugar. Lord John, before the Budget
speech, announced his intention of moving the House into a committee on the
Corn Laws. During the course of the eight days' debate he admitted that the
proposal of the Ministry would be a fixed duty of 8s. a quarter on wheat.
It was on the occa