feeling, instructed an expression of regret to be sent to the British Government. In introducing the Conspiracy to Murder Bill, Lord Palmerston (18th of February), carried the first reading by leading the House of Commons to believe that this Imperial apology was adequate. He did not think it worth while to explain that it had not been inserted in the _Moniteur_, where the insults and menaces of the French Colonels had appeared, and that the French people were thus fully under the delusion that their vaporous threats had coerced England into restricting the liberty of her subjects at their bidding. Later on, this deception was discovered. Walewski’s despatch, by an inconceivable blunder, was laid before the House, which also found out that it had never been answered with spirit and dignity. The anger of the Representatives of the people then rose to white heat; and when Mr. Milner Gibson moved a resolution of censure, which had been drafted by Sir J. Graham and Lord John Russell on the 19th of February, it was carried by a majority of 19, in a House of 459. Lord Palmerston and the Cabinet immediately resigned. At first the Queen, knowing the difficulty of forming a new Government, was reluctant to accept their resignation. She contended--very properly--that it was a bad precedent for a Government to go out on the strength of a vote which was hardly constitutional. The treatment of a despatch was, in her Majesty’s opinion, purely a question for the Executive to decide. The House of Commons had but a very dubious right to touch it at all; at any rate, no Ministry was bound by the Constitution to resign because of a Vote of Censure from either House of Parliament on such a question.