Upon sitting down at table I found myself between the Duc de Richelieu and Lord Clanwilliam, and one removed from the foreign lady, who turned out to be H.I.H. the Grand Duchess Marie of Russia. Strogonoff is the man she married three years after her first husband's death--but she had to wait till Nicholas died too. When Nicholas first observed his daughter's preference for the young officer, he took him by the arm and pointed out from the window the view of Fort George. Strogonoff thought the Emperor's manner strange, but did not take the hint till his brother officers reminded him that Fort George is a State prison; so there was no more love-making till after the Tsar's death. The Princess is at this time fifty, still extremely handsome, with a long string of enormous pearls round her neck. Nothing could be more lively and agreeable. She first carried on a contest with my neighbour, the Duc, about the Emperor Napoleon; said he was only _trop bon_, and lauded him to the skies. The Duc came out as the pure Legitimist, though he said his own party had not a shadow of a chance; that the Emperor had been going down ever since the fatal Italian campaign; that there were no Orleanists in France, and that the Duc d'Aumale was conspiring against the Comte de Paris, &c. &c.--a tissue of absurdity. Then, _sotto voce_ to me, 'Je voudrais bien jouir davantage de votre societe, mais vous voyez comme je suis place' (i.e. next the Princess). 'Tres conservative dans mes principes, je n'aime pas les princes. Il faut vivre avec ses egaux.' He said this twice. The second time I replied, 'Monsieur, cela est bon pour les ducs--mais nous autres?' 'Ah! sous ce rapport je ne fais aucune distinction. Hors des princes, tout est egal.' A good deal of conversation about the Irish Church Bill which is just now in the crisis of the Lords' amendments. H.I.H. asked me my opinion. I replied that they were now disputing about nothing at all--i.e. the application of a surplus which will not exist for many years. Brunnow said he was of the same opinion. Lord Clanwilliam and I had a great deal of talk. He had been with Lord Castlereagh at the Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1818. Spoke a good deal of Metternich, justly. When M. met Guizot in London after 1848, he was struck by the motto G. had adopted--_via recta brevissima_. Lord Clanwilliam said that the shortest way was also the best. 'Yes,' added Metternich, 'and it has also the advantage that on that path you don't meet anybody'--'auf diesen Weg wird niemand begegnet.' Sitting upstairs after this dinner I had a curious conversation with Brunnow and Lord Granville on the causes of the Crimean War. They agreed that had either Aberdeen or Palmerston been in power alone, the war would have been prevented; but that the combination of the two rendered it inevitable.