PUBLIC OPINION ON TURKEY.
[To no EDITOR OF THE "sPICOTATOR."] is most true, as stated in your article entitled, " How Public Opinion is Formed upon Foreign Affairs," that "Lord Palmerston treated the conditions of peace imposed in 1856 as the eonditions of a new probation for the Turks." No one knew his mind at that time better than Lord Russell, who, in his "Recol- lections and Suggestions, 1813-73," says :—" Lord Palmerston himself did not expect that the Treaty of 1856 would last four- teen years, which was the actual time of its duration ;" and Lord Russell adds, with reference to the later views of Lord Palmerston • —" He was anxious to press upon Turkey the reform of her finances and an honest administration of justice, and he did not disguise his opinion that Great Britain could not go to war to defend a dead carcase."
Since those words were written, the condition of the finances of Turkey has passed from bad to bankruptcy, and the hope of "an honest administration of justice " has faded into despair.—I am, Sir, &e.,
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