Chapter XVI

The exhausted volcanoes--Mr. Gladstone's failure and
unpopularity--Ireland worse than before--Loss of influence
in Europe--The Election of 1874--Great Conservative
majority--Disraeli again Prime Minister with real power--His
general position as a politician--Problems waiting to be
dealt with--The relations between the Colonies and the
Empire--The restoration of the authority of the law in
Ireland--Disraeli's strength and Disraeli's
weakness--Prefers an ambitious foreign policy--Russia and
Turkey--The Eastern Question--Two possible policies and the
effects of each--Disraeli's choice--Threatened war with
Russia--The Berlin Conference--Peace with honour--Jingoism
and fall of the Conservative party--Other features of his
administration--Goes to the House of Lords as Earl of
Beaconsfield and receives the Garter--Public Worship
Act--Admirable distribution of patronage--Disraeli and
Carlyle--Judgment of a conductor of an omnibus 232

CHAPTER XVII

Retirement from office--Dignity in retreat--Hughenden--Lord
Beaconsfield as a landlord--Fondness for country
life--'Endymion'--Illness and death--Attempted estimate of
Lord Beaconsfield--A great man? or not a great man?--Those
only great who can forget themselves--Never completely an
Englishman--Relatively great, not absolutely--Gulliver among
Lilliputians--Signs in 'Sybil' of a higher purpose, but a
purpose incapable of realisation--Simplicity and
blamelessness in private life--Indifference to
fortune--Integrity as a statesman and administrator 254

INDEX 263

LORD BEACONSFIELD