Early in the following year, Lord John was raised to the peerage as Earl Russell of Kingston-Russell and Viscount Amberley and Ardsalla. 'I cannot despatch,' wrote Mr. Gladstone, 'as I have just done, the Chiltern Hundreds for you, without expressing the strong feelings which even that formal act awakens. They are mixed, as well as strong; for I hope you will be repaid in repose, health, and the power of long-continuing service, for the heavy loss we suffer in the House of Commons. Although you may not hereafter have opportunities of adding to the personal debt I owe you, and of bringing it vividly before my mind by fresh acts of courage and kindness, I assure you, the recollection of it is already indelible.' Hitherto, Lord John--for the old name is the one under which his family and his friends still like to apply to him--had been a poor man; but the death, in the spring of this year, of his brother the Duke of Bedford, with whom, from youth to age, his intercourse had been most cordial, placed him in possession of the Ardsalla Estate, and, indeed, made possible his acceptance of the proffered earldom. Six months later, her Majesty conferred the Garter upon him, as a mark of her 'high approbation of long and distinguished services.' Lord John had almost reached the age of three score and ten when he entered the House of Lords. He had done his work in 'another place,' but he was destined to become once more First Minister of the Crown, and, as Mr. Froude put it, to carry his reputation at length off the scene unspotted by a single act which his biographers are called upon to palliate. CHAPTER XV UNITED ITALY AND THE DIS-UNITED STATES 1861-1865 Lord John at the Foreign Office--Austria and Italy--Victor Emmanuel and Mazzini--Cavour and Napoleon III.--Lord John's energetic protest--His sympathy with Garibaldi and the struggle for freedom--The gratitude of the Italians--Death of the Prince Consort--The 'Trent' affair--Lord John's remonstrance--The 'Alabama' difficulty--Lord Selborne's statement--The Cotton Famine.