_December 9th, Tuesday._--On Saturday afternoon Wharncliffe came to the office and sent for me. I found him walking about the room, when he immediately broke out, 'Well, I must say the impudence of the "Times" exceeds all I ever knew.' 'What's the matter?' I asked, 'what have they done?' 'Why, notwithstanding the contradiction in the "Standard" last night, they have not only neither qualified nor withdrawn their assertion, but have repeated the statement more positively than before. I must say this beats every other impudence.' 'Well,' I said, 'don't you see the reason, namely, that the "Times" does not care for the denial of the "Standard," and thinks its own authority for the statement better than any the "Standard" can have for denying it.' I then told him that everybody believed the 'Times,' go where you would people canvassed which was the most credible, and all believed the 'Times,' Lord Carnarvon, whom I met in the morning, for instance; and I myself believed it, that is, I believed it to be substantially correct, though perhaps not so in all its details. 'Very well,' he said, 'a short time will show the truth; but I tell you again that the "Times" knows nothing about it, has been mystified, and you will soon see that you are all wrong.' On this I said, 'Am I then to understand you that the facts put forth by the "Times" are really untrue, that no resolution has been come to by the Cabinet, and that the Duke of Wellington in one House and Peel in the other are _not_ going to bring forward a measure which, without quibbling or splitting of hairs, is a virtual abandonment of the principle of protection?' He said, 'Well, I do mean to say that all this is untrue, it is not the fact; I positively tell you so, and I mean it without any quibbling whatever.' 'Very well, of course you know and I cannot, and I am bound to believe you. May I then contradict it on your authority?' 'No, I will not have my name used. I tell you not to believe it, and you may say what you please as from yourself, but I will not have my authority mentioned, and events will contradict it soon enough.' We had a great deal more talk. He complained of the mischief that the report had done, and the speculation it had set afloat. After this contradiction so positive, specific, and peremptory, I knew not what to believe. On Monday I looked with anxiety for the article in the 'Times,' and found only a calm adhesion to its story. Delane had seen Aberdeen the evening before, who said to him that he had not said a bit too much, except that his statement the second day, that 'the heads of the Government had agreed,' was more correct than that of the first, which said that 'the Cabinet' had. He desired him to go on in the same strain, reasoning on it as a fact. He gave him, however, to understand that the publication had created considerable agitation. Delane in the course of conversation said that the whole thing turned on the Duke of