In 1867 Lord Cowley resigned the Embassy at Paris, and the post was offered by Lord Stanley to Lord Lyons. Lord Cowley was a model diplomatist of the old school, self-restrained, undemonstrative, absolutely ignorant of those arts of advertisement which form too large a portion of the equipment of the statesmen of to-day. He had been brought up in the strictest sect of diplomacy, and only six years, during which the Embassy at Paris had been held by Lord Normanby, separated him from the time when his father held the same post. The first Lord Cowley was one of those three famous brothers, the other two being the great Duke of Wellington and the Marquess of Wellesley, of whom it would be idle and out of place to say aught here. The second Lord Cowley, afterwards created an earl, had gained an influence at the Court of the Tuileries which on more than one occasion saved a difficult situation. Never was this more conspicuously shown than when, in 1860, Mr. Cobden was sent to Paris on his famous mission in connection with the treaty of commerce. The negotiations, so long as Mr. Cobden insisted on conducting them by himself, were none too prosperous. Indeed, there came a day when after a protracted conference, Mr. Cobden came back to the British Embassy ready to throw up the sponge. Lord Cowley comforted him and said: “Let me see what I can do.” He skilfully turned the corner and the treaty was signed. But Cobden claimed and received all the glory. It was in the footsteps of this great diplomatist and statesman, whose quiet dignity, no less than his political sagacity, had made him a very real factor in all international affairs, that Lord Lyons was to follow. He felt that it was a difficult succession; he wrote to him: “When I first heard that you were likely to give up Paris, I felt, as I think I said in my letter to you, alarmed at the prospect of the Embassy’s falling into other hands. I should have been indeed alarmed had I then known into whose hands it was likely to fall.” This was characteristic modesty, but Lord Lyons need have been under no alarm. Lord Cowley might well feel that his successor would be worthy of him, and it is hardly too much to surmise that his advice was sought by Lord Stanley before the appointment was made. Lord Cowley was acquainted as no other man could be with all the forces at work in France from the Emperor downwards; he knew the whole intricate network of French politics, and he was in a position to take the measure of all the men who might be “in the running” for the Embassy. It is hardly thinkable that so judicious a statesman as Lord Stanley should not have consulted him. Be that as it may, the wisdom of the choice was fully justified.