London, they boasted of having taken forcible possession of rooms that had been hired by the Liberals for the purpose of holding meetings. One evening a company of these highspirited and gallant gentlemen, flushed with pride and wine, seeing Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone in a West End street, became so grossly insulting, and made such threatening demonstrations, that it became necessary for the lady to seek shelter in the hall of a house, at the door of which a servant was standing. The vote of credit asked for by the government had been granted by a large majority. Prince Gortschakoff had declared that, far from marching onward, the Russian troops had been ordered everywhere to cease from further hostilities; the British Mediterranean fleet had been sent to Constantinople. On the 3rd of March, 1878, a treaty of peace between Russia and Turkey was signed at St. Stefano, by which Russia, while securing the freedom of the Christian populations from Turkish rule, would not only have claimed a large war indemnity, but would have expanded Bulgaria into a state, of which she would practically have had control. This treaty was at once denounced by Lord Derby as an attempted readjustment of the treaty of Paris, without the consent of the other contracting powers, while Lord Beaconsfield represented that it would virtually give Russia control over the whole of south-eastern Europe. It was demanded that the terms of a treaty should be considered in a conference at Berlin, and the demand was accompanied by demonstrations, in which Lord Derby could not concur, since he regarded them as approaching to a declaration of war. The reserve forces were called out, and it was afterwards known that orders had been sent to the Indian government to send 7000 native troops to Malta, and that we had prepared to occupy the island of Cyprus, and land an armed force on the coast of Syria. Lord Derby feeling that he could not remain in the ministry sent in his resignation, and the Marquis of Salisbury was appointed to the direction of foreign affairs, Mr. Gathorne Hardy (Lord Cranbrook) taking the India office. After much contention Russia agreed to submit the terms of the treaty to a congress, which was to assemble at Berlin on the 13th of June. Somewhat to the surprise of the public the prime minister announced the intention of himself accompanying Lord Salisbury to attend it. The result of the conference was that a treaty was signed intrusting Austria to occupy Bosnia and the Herzegovina, an arrangement which Lord Beaconsfield afterwards admitted was made for the purpose of placing another power as a block to a Russian advance on Constantinople. The organization of these provinces was left to Austria. Roumania, Servia, and Montenegro were to be independent, the latter state receiving the seaport of Antivari and some adjoining territory. The Balkans were to be the southern frontier of Bulgaria, which was made tributary to the sultan, but with an independent government under a prince elected by the people, with the assent of the contracting powers and the confirmation of the sultan. South of the Balkans a state was to be created called Eastern Roumelia, which was to be under the direct authority of the sultan, who, however, was not to send thither any of those irregular troops whose atrocities had aroused so much indignation. Roumania was to restore to Russia a part of Bessarabia which had been detached by the treaty of 1856, and in exchange was to receive from Russia part of the Dobrudscha, including Silistria and Magnolia. The Porte was bound to come to some arrangement with Greece for the rectification of the frontier; to "apply to Crete the organic law of 1868;" to hand over to Russia Ardahan, Kars, and Batoum; and to pay a war indemnity. The congress having concluded its sittings, with a settlement by which Russia did not do very badly after all, Lord Beaconsfield returned to London, where he was received with enthusiastic acclamation, and after a kind of ceremonial procession from the railway-station addressed the multitude from a window of the Foreign Office. He said: “Lord Salisbury and myself have brought you back peace, but a peace, I hope, with honour, which may satisfy our sovereign, and tend to the welfare of the country." For some time afterwards DIFFICULTIES IN AFGHANISTAN. Not 319 "peace with honour" was a motto or watch- | ready to resent his reception of advances that word. Lord John Russell had used the phrase were friendly. In 1878, when the result of the five-and-twenty years before, when in a speech protests made against Russia's advance upon at Greenock he had said: "If peace cannot be the Turkish provinces was uncertain, a Rusmaintained with honour it is no longer peace." sian envoy was sent to Cabul with the appaThe Berlin treaty was accomplished, and rent object of concluding some kind of alliance Lord Beaconsfield's presence at the conferwith the Ameer. This, of course, would, if ence may have had considerable effect. not frustrated, have been a serious injury to the effect which the Jingoes attributed to it, that imperial policy which had found some however; for, so far as England was concerned, expression by an addition to the royal title instead of the terms of the treaty having been which was to be used only in relation to India. proposed and settled by acute and authorita- If Russia sent an envoy England must have tive discussion, it was afterwards discovered a mission. The changes which had been that there had been a " diplomatic correspond- made in the office of viceroy of India in 1876 ence" and secret engagements with Russia and had led to the resignation of Lord NorthTurkey, which in effect had already settled brook, and Lord Lytton (better known to most of the clauses of the proposed treaty, readers of verse by his nom de plume of Owen and had been agreed on and signed at the Meredith), the son of the brilliant novelist, Foreign Office before the meeting of the con- succeeded him, for what reason or what special gress. capacity nobody seems to have discovered at that time. He was prepared to carry out the We have not yet done with the Eastern policy of the government, and, without regard question. While the treaty of Berlin was supposed to shut the front gate to India, the marauder seemed to be plotting to gain an entrance by the back door. We have already noted the early disturbances in connection with the occupation of Cabul. It now seemed as if that terrible story was about to be repeated. Dost Mahomed had left as his successor the Ameer Shere Ali, whose claims were resisted by the other sons, so that after many vicissitudes of war he did not gain firm possession of the Afghan capital till 1868. He conceived that he had little reason to love the English, who had refused to guarantee him against the advance of Russia, and had recognized his rivals Afzul Khan and Azim Khan as de facto rulers of Cabul during their successful resistance to his claims. In 1869 Lord Mayo, the viceroy-whose assassination by a native in the Andaman Islands was one of the darkest events in 1872-had paid him an official visit and furnished him with six lacs of rupees and some artillery. We had refused to protect him against the hostile advances of Russia; but we were equally 1 Vol. i. p. 288; vol. ii. p. 7. to the protests of Shere Ali, the mission was sent to Cabul. It was stopped on the frontier by an officer of the Ameer, who refused to allow it to pass till he had the authority of his chief. This was regarded as a deliberate refusal, the manner of which demanded a resort to force; and a British force supported the mission and marched to Gandamuk, a place between Jellalabad and Cabul, where they formed a camp. Meantime Shere Ali died; his son Yakoob Khan, with whom he had quarrelled, came to the throne, professed a desire to be on friendly terms with the British, and went into the camp. A treaty was entered into to pay the Ameer £60,000 a year in exchange for the frontier, the "scientific frontier," as Lord Beaconsfield had called it, to be occupied by the British. A British representative was to be resident at Cabul, and the Ameer was to be assisted to defend himself against any foreign enemy. Almost before the ink of the treaty was dry, and while the sound of applause at the dexterity with which we had occupied Cabul and Candahar, and so could keep Russia out of India, was still ringing, news came that Sir Louis Cavagnari, the English envoy, and nearly all the officers of the mission with the native escort, had been murdered by insurgents in Cabul. They had been attacked in the residency by a crowd of fierce but cowardly foes, who came upon them like a horde of wolves. The Englishmen, seeing nothing for it but to fight, made a swift sudden sally and drove back the crowd that thronged the gate, and then rapidly retired, leaving some of the enemy dead-many of them driven headlong by blows from the fist, for the officers were not completely armed. Even repeated sallies like this were of no avail, the mob, pressed forward by increasing numbers, closed upon them; they were overwhelmed and slain. It was war then, of course, and there was no time to lose. The forces that came to stop the British advance were defeated with heavy loss, and General Sir Frederick Roberts held Cabul with the troops under his command, Sir D. Stewart reoccupying Candahar. Yakoob Khan abdicated, and with some of his advisers was sent to Peshawur. This caused a general insurrection in the country round Cabul, the leaders of which ordered an attack on the forces of Sir Frederick Roberts, who had retired to the cantonments of Sherpur to await reinforcements. Before any aid arrived our troops had beaten their assailants, whose leaders fled, and Shere Ali Khan, the Afghan governor of Candahar, having remained loyal to the English, was left as inpendent ruler, while Sir D. Stewart marched with part of his force to Cabul to assume supreme command. On the way he met and defeated an Afghan army, probably raised by the fugitive chiefs, near Ghuzni. He then continued negotiations which made Abdul Rahman Khan, son of Afzul Khan, Ameer of Cabul. It was to General Sir Frederick Roberts, however, that the great achievement of the campaign was due; and, but for the skill and almost unparalleled boldness of that commander and the unyielding courage of his men, a great disaster might at the last have befallen the British arms. In June, 1880, Ayub (a brother of Yakoob Khan), who had taken up his position at Herat, marched against Candahar with a large force. General Burrows advanced to oppose him, but some of the native troops deserted to the enemy, and he was severely defeated at Maiwand, and had to fall back in confusion on Candahar, which was closely invested by Ayub Khan. Reinforcements were delayed for want of transport, the crisis was becoming dangerous, when Sir Frederick Roberts set out with his army of 10,000 men on a forced march from Cabul to Candahar, a distance of about 300 miles, through a difficult and hostile country. The heat was tremendous, and there was some fighting to be done on the way, but in three weeks the journey was accomplished. The men, without hesitation, attacked the enemy, and gained a brilliant victory, which re-established the prestige and the temporary power of the British arms, and enabled us to place the administration, as well as the ameership, in the hands of Abdul Rahman Khan, and to retire from Cabul, leaving "the scientific frontier" to remain an expression without much practical meaning. The gallantry and remarkable generalship of Sir Frederick Roberts was perhaps not so completely recognized as some subsequent successes by other generals have been, but he was honoured with the thanks of the queen and the country, and his name and that of his army is still associated with the deed of prowess which alone seemed to give some lustre to a war undertaken without counting the cost and singularly barren in results. Alas! there was, if possible, a still worse and less honourable enterprise before the country in what was known as the Zulu war. It is so recent that a few lines only need be devoted to it. The various states of South Africa differed so considerably that it was not at first easy to unravel their claims, still less their alleged grievances. There were Cape Colony and Natal directly under British control. There was the Transvaal, the territory north of the Vaal river, a Dutch republic, with a population of 40,000 Europeans and 250,000 Kafirs and natives. There was the Orange Free State, formed by Dutch settlers who emigrated from Cape Colony because they disliked British rule, and whose independence had been recog |