Lord John Russell screwed up his courage to the point of contemplating the removal of Lord Palmerston from the Foreign Office to some other department of State, he himself undertaking the duties of Foreign Secretary along with those of the Premiership. Such a combination is never a wise one. Even in recent times, when Lord Salisbury attempted to unite in his own person the two offices, the strain was found to be greater than his strength could bear; and in the case of Lord John, whose health was at this time capricious and precarious, it was perhaps as well that at the eleventh hour he shrank from proposing the change to Lord Palmerston. Lord John has been accused of lack of courage in connection with this affair. The truth is, that a perverted chivalry prompted him to stand by Lord Palmerston. The Greek affair was hardly defensible. But it was bruited about that the Opposition, under cover of condemning Lord Palmerston in that special case, meant to direct a severe attack on the foreign policy of the Government as a whole. Lord Palmerston’s colleagues had, however, permitted themselves not only to be identified with that policy, but had thought fit to defend every blunder he had made in carrying it out. Lord John Russell, then, cannot be blamed for considering that to desert the Foreign Secretary on the Greek Question, would have been tantamount to making him the scapegoat of the Cabinet. Hence, in spite of the Queen’s strong feeling in the matter, it was agreed that Palmerston should not be “thrown over.”