Lord Salisbury was loyal throughout to Sir Stafford Northcote, even in a degree which was often detrimental to party interests. But, whatever his wishes may have been, the settlement of the National Union dispute sealed that unfortunate statesman’s fate--so far as the leadership of the House of Commons was concerned. The dinner to which, in celebration of the peace, Lord Salisbury invited the Council of the National Union, including a majority of those who had been his most active opponents during the past year, was the public acceptance of Tory Democracy in the councils of the Conservative party. The great meeting held in the Pomona Gardens at Manchester in August and addressed by Lord Salisbury, Lord Randolph Churchill, and Sir Michael Hicks-Beach, was a plain indication of the Cabinet and Parliamentary arrangements which would be a necessary consequence of that acceptance. Sir Henry Wolff, who had been throughout these conflicts Lord Randolph’s most intimate and trusted friend, entirely approved of the steps which had been taken to end the quarrel.[24] Mr. Gorst also wrote to Lord Randolph on July 27, 1884, expressly and explicitly signifying his concurrence and describing Lord Randolph Churchill’s refusal to continue as Chairman of Council of the National Union as ‘a good stroke of policy.’ But it has since been suggested, upon apparently unimpeachable authority,[25] that Mr. Gorst disapproved of the reconciliation; that he thought greater advantage to the Conservative party would have followed from the prosecution of the dispute; and that he conceived himself in some measure deserted by its abandonment. Of Lord Randolph’s behaviour to his able, energetic supporter the reader will be able to judge before the story is complete. But there is no doubt that Mr. Gorst was for a time, after the _concordat_, in a position of much weakness and isolation. He had incurred very bitter enmities by the part he had taken in the quarrel. It was especially resented that those talents of organisation which had so greatly aided the Tory victory of 1874, should have been employed against the recognised leaders of the Conservative party ten years later. Men who did not think it wise, in view of what had happened in the past, and still more of what might happen in the future, to anger Lord Randolph Churchill, were glad enough to indulge their spite upon Mr. Gorst. His real feeling--that he had been thrown over--must have become apparent to Lord Randolph Churchill, in spite of his written agreement in the course adopted; and a coolness ensued between them, diversified with occasional heats.