I met John Russell at dinner on Tuesday night. No particular talk; but Young, the Secretary of the Treasury, had been with him, which looked well enough for concert. Clarendon told me after dinner that Lord John was bitter against Peel, more so than when he left town; this is very unfortunate. He is very clever, but his mind is little. It is difficult not to think that he is jealous of Peel. He is probably provoked that a man of whom he has so bad an opinion should have outstripped him in popularity and public consideration; for, without doubt, if the country were to be polled whether he or Peel should be Minister, there would be a great majority for Peel. [Footnote 121: [It is a striking proof of Mr. Greville's love of truth and justice, that although he had no personal regard for Sir Robert Peel, or intimacy with him, and sometimes judged his actions and his motives with severity, yet at this crisis he took the trouble to write a pamphlet in defence of the Minister, whom he conceived to be unfairly traduced and assailed, not only by his political opponents, but by some of his former friends.]] _January 23rd._--Went to the House of Commons last night. Francis Egerton moved the Address very well, and his speech was admired. Immediately after the seconder, Peel rose and spoke for about two hours. A very fine speech in a very high tone. He owned to a change of opinion which had been going on for two years; was confirmed by the statistical result of his Free Trade experiment, and urged on to action by the potato failure in November, when he wanted to call Parliament together and open the ports, but was overruled in the Cabinet, where he had only three others with him. His statistical results were very curious. He declared himself indifferent to office, which was too much for him bodily and intellectually, but while he could be of use to the Queen and the country he would stay there. His peroration was fine, in a tone of great excitement, very determined, and full of defiance. He did not get a solitary cheer from the people behind him, except when he said that Stanley had always been against him and never admitted either the danger or the necessity, and then the whole of those benches rang with cheers. He made two mistakes. He went on too long upon his Conservative measures, in a strain calculated to offend those in conjunction with whom he must now fight this battle; and he talked of 'a proud aristocracy,' which was an unlucky phrase, though clear from the context that he did not mean anything offensive in it. It certainly was not a speech calculated to lead to a reconciliation between him and the Tories; and it is difficult to see how he will be able to go on after this session, supposing him to settle the Corn Bill. Lord John rose after him, and spoke very well; gave his explanation (Peel had explained everything up to Lord John's being sent for), and read all the correspondence that had passed.