When Lord Elgin returned, in 1854, from the Government of Canada, there were comparatively few persons in England who knew or cared anything about the great work which he had done in the colony. But his brilliant successes in the East attracted public interest, and gave currency to his reputation; and when he returned from China in the spring of 1859 he was received with every honour. Two great parliamentary chiefs, Lord Derby and Lord Grey, from opposite sides of the House of Lords, contended for the credit of having first introduced him into public life. Lord Palmerston, who was at the time engaged in forming a new Administration, again offered him a place in it, and he accepted the office of Postmaster-General. The students of Glasgow paid him the compliment of electing him as their Lord Rector; and the merchants of London showed their sense of what he had done for their commerce, first by the enthusiastic reception which they gave him at a dinner at the Mansion House, and afterwards by conferring upon him the freedom of their city. Lord Elgin was not one of those men, if any such there be, who are indifferent to the appreciation of their fellows. He could, indeed, in a mock-cynical humour, write of what a man must do 'if he thinks it worth while to stand well with others:'[1] but in himself there was nothing of the cynic, and to stand well with others was to his genial nature a source of genuine and undisguised gratification. It was well said of him afterwards in reference to the honours paid to him at this period, that while he did not require the stimulus of praise, or even sympathy, to keep him to his work, but would have worked on for life, whether appreciated or overlooked, still 'he whose sympathies were always ready and warm enjoyed himself being understood and valued; and that welcome in the City was very cheering to him after his long experience of English indifference about Canada and what he had done there.' He was not destined, however, to enjoy for long either the tranquil dignities of his new position or the comfortable sense of a work accomplished and completed. Fresh troubles broke out in the East; and, on the 26th of April, 1860, within less than a year after his arrival in England, he was again crossing the Channel on his way back to China. [Sidenote: Origin of Second Mission to China.]