'"I deeply feel the loss we sustain in your absence from public life, after you had given such varied and conclusive proof of high capacity to serve your country; and I have almost taken it for granted that with the end of this Parliament, after anything approaching the usual full term, the ostracism could die a kind of natural death. And I heartily wish and hope that you may have lying before you a happy period of public usefulness."' Sir Charles was in no hurry. Another invitation had reached him, from Dundee, and 'on November 4th a unanimous request to contest the borough of Fulham.' But his determination was to let nothing interrupt the work on his book; after that, various promises both of writing and speaking had to be redeemed. Meanwhile he remained in touch with the political world. 'I carried on a controversy with Labouchere about his views in favour of reforming the House of Lords, to which I was bitterly opposed, preferring, if we could not get rid of it, to go on as we are.' All Labouchere's letters were full of references to the position of Chamberlain, and Chamberlain himself came from time to time to discuss that point. 'On December 2nd, 1889, I saw Chamberlain. On October 10th he had told me that he was clear that ultimately he should join the Conservatives, unless Mr. Gladstone were soon to go and a Rosebery-Harcourt combination would come to terms with him about Ulster. On December 2nd I found a little change back from his general attitude, and in face of the probable break-up of the Parnellite party over the O'Shea case, which was beginning to be talked of in detail, Chamberlain was undecided, he said, and no doubt thought, between the two parties. But I noted in my diary: "Labouchere sets him against the Liberals, and Balfour attracts him to the Tories." It was clear that I thought that the change was but a temporary one, and that he was certain to return to his attitude of October, as in fact he did.' _Problems of Greater Britain_ appeared at the end of January, 1890, and within a month the edition was exhausted. In America, Sir Charles, expecting censure, had arranged to reply in the _North American Review_ to his censors; but there was so little adverse comment that he chose another subject. Discussion of military problems abounded in the book, but the 'Problems' treated were by no means only those which concerned military experts. Mr. Deakin wrote: