Lord Granville did not oppose the address, but vindicated Lord
Derby from the imputation of being a lunatic, as Lord Beaconsfield had suggested, and Lord Beaconsfield himself from the imputation of having only a few days previously paid Lord Derby so many profound compliments without meaning them. He intimated that a great blunder had been made in not leaving the conditions for the Congress in the hands of Austria, who invited it to meet, and who had received from Russia satisfactory assurances as to the terms on which it would meet ; and he criticised the needless position of isolation in which the policy of the Government had from the first tended to place us. Lord Derby followed Lord Granville, in a very remarkable speech, of which we have said so much in other columns, that we need only state here that he spoke with some authority as to the possible allies of England, declaring his belief that Austria was the only possible ally, and that it was very likely indeed that Austria would fail us. Lord Cairns expressed his desire for the Congress, and tried to whittle down Lord Salisbury's circular into a matter of little meaning. And Lord Selborne replied in a speech of much spirit, in which he quizzed Lord Salisbury for having fallen a prey to the Armenian craze, after so stoutly resisting it, and pointed out the Government's great change of front since last year in relation to the independence of Turkey.
