A change is evidently impending in the British Embassy at
Constantinople. As we lately took occasion to notice, oblique charges against Lord Stratford. de Redaliffe have been rife for some time past, and especially since the fall of Kars ; but now the accusation comes out directly and nakedly through the lead- ing columns of the Times. "It is his misfortune," we are told, " to live in a state of dissension with almost every man near him." He resents any slight of his advice, will dictate by a Mit; and avenge disobedience to it. A British Ambassador can convey to statesmen like those of the Porte a message from his own Go- vernment in such terms of strained formality as suggest rejection: or evasion ; and hypocritical Orientalists, with ready duplicity; acquiesce in the strategy. General Williams was not appointed. by the advice of the British Ambassador, but by the advice of the Foreign Office, in consequence of the- ability which he had, displayed in acquiring the language and exercising influence as Commissioner on the Turco-Persian boundary. Utiappointed by the British Ambassador, he could not expect his favour. He was simple enough, indeed, to suppose that the mere duty of protect- ing British interests would compel our:representative at Constan- tinople to support his claims. When, therefore, he found himself stinted in supplies and ammunition through the excessive corrup- tion of the Turkish administration, he sent to our Ambassador despatch after despatch, letter after letter, sixty-three in all ; but received not a single answer. The surrender of Kars was thus accomplished from Constantinople. The Times calls for a proof or disproof of these charges, by the production of the correspond- ence in Parliament ; and it intimates that Lord Stratford is not to remain Ambassador at Constantinople.
There is a rumour that he is to be succeeded by a gentleman who lived in a state of dissension with the Court " near " which- he was Ambassador—in Spain ; who subsequently resided at Florence ; and who is the author of the Bulwer-Clayton treaty, which our Government is discrediting by its interpretations.
