Parliament was no sooner up, than the riots broke out,[39] sufficiently alarming but for the railroads, which enabled the Government to pour troops into the disturbed districts, and extinguish the conflagration at once. The immediate danger is over, but those who are best informed look with great anxiety and apprehension to the future, and only consider what has recently happened as the beginning of a series of disorders. It is remarkable that whilst England and Scotland have been thus disturbed, Ireland has been in the profoundest tranquillity, and when everybody, themselves included, feared that Ireland would be hardly governable under Tory rule, they have not had the slightest difficulty in that quarter. O'Connell has been much quieter since Peel came into office than he was before, and is evidently doing all he can to keep the country quiet. The Queen, too, is to all appearance on just as good terms with the present Government as she was with the last. There is no such intimacy with anybody as there was with Melbourne, but she is very civil to all her Ministers, invites them constantly to her house, and, what is curious, hardly ever takes any notice of those members of the late Government and Household whom she appeared not to be able to live without; even Melbourne is very rarely a guest either at Windsor or Buckingham House. [Footnote 39: [On August 4 serious disturbances broke out at Staleybridge and Manchester. Troops were sent down and a conflict took place. At Preston and at Burslem some persons were killed. The riots were caused by a threatened reduction of wages.]] [Sidenote: WITHDRAWAL FROM AFGHANISTAN.]