process of construction, and he had done more than any other man to bring
them from a derisive by-word into solid realization of brick and mortar.
He took credit to himself for 'the selection of Waterhouse as architect
against Gilbert Scott and Digby Wyatt.' Care to see this business fully
through was one of the reasons which determined him to come up for a
fourth year, and to hold the Presidency a second time in the Lent term of
1866. On his retirement he proposed Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice for his
successor, and thus left the lead in hands he could trust.

Of his own speeches he has preserved some detail, showing how early his
opinions displayed the character which was to be constant in them:

'In 1864-65 I spoke twice at the Union [Footnote: After Dilke's death,
when a resolution of regret was carried at the Union, the Vice-
President, Mr. J. H. Allen of Jesus, said in moving it: "Sir Charles
was in a double sense the architect of the fortunes of the Society,
because he was responsible for the superintendence of the change from
the old inadequate home in Queens' Street into the more glorious
building which they now enjoyed. It was for that reason that on two
occasions the Society elected him to the highest position which they
could confer."] in favour of the foreign policy of Lord Palmerston,
opposing several of my friends who were condemning it. Cobden at the
time was attacking supposed extravagance, based, as he thought, on
panic, and I sided with Palmerston in thinking that the enormous
increase of the French Navy could only be intended for an anti-English
policy, while in the event of even the temporary loss of the command
of the Channel, invasion by an immense French army would become
possible. To Poland I was friendly, but unwilling to contemplate, as
Lord Palmerston was unwilling to contemplate, interference by England
in alliance with the Emperor Napoleon. I was so far from strongly