"Oh, that was a very good reason for moving; but I hope you told the
Duchess of Sutherland why you left her."

"Well--no; I don't think I did that. But I told the Duchess of Inverness
why I came and sate by her!"

Thus were opportunities of paying harmless compliments recklessly
thrown away.

It was once remarked by a competent critic that "there have been
Ministers who knew the springs of that public opinion which is delivered
ready digested to the nation every morning, and who have not scrupled to
work them for their own diurnal glorification, even although the recoil
might injure their colleagues. But Lord Russell has never bowed the knee
to the potentates of the Press; he has offered no sacrifice of
invitations to social editors; and social editors have accordingly
failed to discover the merits of a statesman who so little appreciated
them, until they have almost made the nation forget the services that
Lord Russell has so faithfully and courageously rendered."

Be this as it may, there is no doubt that the old Whig statesman lacked
those gifts or arts which make a man widely popular in a large society
of superficial acquaintances. On his deathbed he said with touching
pathos, "I have seemed cold to my friends, but it was not in my heart."
The friends needed no such assurance. He was the idol of those who were
most closely associated with him by the ties of blood or duty. Even to
people outside the innermost circle of intimacy there was something
peculiarly attractive in his singular mixture of gentleness and dignity.
He excelled as a host, doing the honours of his table with the