“How like flunkies, after all, are these great gentlemen when it becomes a question of place. There is a dash of ‘Jeames’ through Cabinet appointments positively frightful. “Wasn’t it cunning to send Garibaldi where he could do nothing? It was the way they muzzle a troublesome man in the House by putting him on a committee. He (G.) grumbles sorely, says he ought to be in Istria, &c.; but there is always the _dessous des cartes_ in this war, and France has had to be consulted or conciliated everywhere.” _To Dr Burbidge._ “Villa Morelli, _July_ 21, 1866. “I take shame to myself for not having sooner replied to your kindest of notes and thanked you for all your trouble at Malta; but first of all I was obliged to go to Spezzia, and then came the wondrous turn-out of the Whigs, which has kept me in close correspondence with scores of people,--no other good result, however, having come of the advent of my friends to power. “Malta, at all events, is out of the question; for though they have got no further than civil messages to me, common report (a common liar, says Figaro) says that I _ought_ to get something. “The war absorbs fortunately thoughts that might under other circumstances have taken a more personal turn, and the war resolves itself pretty much into what that arch scoundrel, L. N., may do next. For the moment he is all but stalemated--that is, he can scarcely move without a check. If he aid Prussia, it will be to strengthen the great Germany that he dreads, and aggrandise the Power that threatens to be more than his rival. If he assist Austria, it is to throw off Italy and undo the past. If he remain neutral, it is to let France subside into the position of seeing Europe able to do without her. “The armed intervention which he desired with us and Russia we will have none of. He is, as Bright said of somebody the other day, ‘a bad fellow to hunt a tiger with.’ “Now, Prussia was so manifestly in the wrong at first, and had contrived to be so unpopular with us besides, and Bismarck’s views were so palpably false and tricky, he could have no sympathy with us at all,--and yet success (that dear idol of Englishmen) has done fully as much as the best principles and the purest ambition could, and we are rapidly becoming Prussian. “I own that I am extremely Prussian. I see no hope of any barrier against France but a strong-big-ambitious-non-scrupulous Germany. “Beer-drinking, stolidity, and the needle-gun will do for the peace of Europe more than Downing St. and the homilies of the whole Russell family. “I have little trust in the F. O. policy of the Conservatives. The theory is, the Tories love a war; and to controvert this we shall be driven to bear more insult under a Tory Government than if we had Bright on the Treasury bench.