The _Levant Herald_ contented itself with an authorised contradiction to the report that Sir Joseph Atlee--the Sir was an ingenious blunder--had conformed to Islamism, and was in treaty for the palace of Tashkir Bey at Therapia. With a neatness and tact all his own, Atlee narrated Brumsey’s blunder in a tone so simple and almost deferential, that Lord Danesbury could show the letter to any of his colleagues. The whole spirit of the document was regret that a very well-intentioned gentleman of good connections and irreproachable morals should be an ass! Not that he employed the insufferable designation. The Cabinet at home were on thorns lest the press--the vile Tory organs--should get wind of the case and cap the blundering government of Ireland with the almost equally gross mistake in diplomacy. ‘We shall have the _Standard_ at us,’ said the Premier. ‘Far worse,’ replied the Foreign Secretary. ‘I shall have Brunow here in a white passion to demand an apology and the recall of our man at Constantinople.’ To accuse a well-known housebreaker of a burglary that he had not committed, nor had any immediate thought of committing, is the very luckiest stroke of fortune that could befall him. He comes out not alone innocent, but injured. The persecutions by which bad men have assailed him for years have at last their illustration, and the calumniated saint walks forth into the world, his head high and his port erect, even though a crowbar should peep out from his coat-pocket and the jingle of false keys go with him as he went. Far too astute to make the scandal public by the newspapers, Atlee only hinted to his chief the danger that might ensue if the secret leaked out. He well knew that a press scandal is a nine-day fever, but a menaced publicity is a chronic malady that may go on for years.