24 MARCH 1877, Page 1

Lord Dudley on Thursday made a speech advocating English effort

to secure justice to the Turkish Christians, which induced Lord Derby to give the House of Lords the " latest information" about the negotiations. After complaining that the discussion had been irregularly raised, he said,—" I can only say that no result has been arrived at in the negotiations, on which we are stall engaged, and if the noble Earl knows the result at which we are to arrive, I can only say that he knows a great deal more than I do, or than any other member of the Cabinet knows." it is evident, therefore, that Lord Derby does not enter- tain any great confidence in the success of his own policy, which was directed, he said, towards securing the main- tenance of peace. " The noble Earl next says that the peace of Europe is only a secondary consideration, the primary one being the good government of the Turkish provinces. I hope I do not undervalue the importance of good government in the Turkish provinces, but it must be obvious to any one that a single month—I might almost say a single week—of a European war would give rise to far greater horrors than any which have occurred in, the Turkish provinces." Lord Derby does not under- stand what horror is. That a greater number of deaths might occur in a week of war than in a year of Turkish misgovernment, is true, but he might just as well say that greater horrors of the kind which destroy civilisation occur in Great Britain than in Bulgaria, because, week by week, more people are buried here. Did any horrors occur in the week of European war which made Germany? To judge from his speech, it would be better that Turkey should be depopulated of Christians by the Pashas, than that a few thousand Turks should be killed and wounded to pre- vent those horrors for ever.