THE MINISTERIAL CHANGES.
LORD BEACONSFIELD has displayed his usual tact in re- organising his Ministry. It was essential to him, when Lord Derby seceded—avowedly because the measures accepted by the Cabinet tended to war—to fill the Foreign Secretaryship with a man who did not belong to his personal following, who had not committed himself to the War Party, and yet who would obediently carry out the Premier's policy with his accustomed audacity, and he selected Lord Salisbury. No anti- Turk could object to the Marquis who had signed the Minutes of the Conference of Constantinople, no one could say Lord Beacons.. field had selected a mere agent, and yet here was a man clearly prepared to tear up the Treaty of San Stefano. Lord Beaconsfield wanted also a man who could give to despatches literary force, who could meet any Ambassador in Europe as an equal, and who, his pen once in his hand, would feel embarked in a literary as well as a diplomatic contest. We see in the now famous Despatch how accurately the Premier had judged, and how thoroughly he has succeeded. The first Despatch from the whilom leader of the Peace party is almost a declaration of war. We do not say it is one, because we are not convinced that the Marquis's action will be as reckless as his words are trenchant; but for the moment Lord Beaconsfield has succeeded, and his Foreign Secretary is his most acceptable mouthpiece. How far he will be an effective one remains to be seen. Lord Salisbury knows the diplomatists of Europe, he is in a singular degree master of French, and he can, meet Prince Gortschakoff with sarcastic sentences better even than his own ; but his recent career shows that his mind takes no grip upon a policy, that he wavers in his conception of ends as well air means, and that he has, with the verve and quickness of the literary temperament, its great impressibility. He has given way as Cabinet Minister to Lord Beaconsfield, he has yielded as master of India to Lord Lytton's melodramatic follies, and he has not succeeded in making Anglo-Indians believe that his policy is distinct. For the present, nevertheless, his selec- tion is a triumph of skill, only surpassed by that of Mr. Stanley, the heir of Knowsley, as Minister at War. In itself this is a good appointment. Mr. Stanley inherits much of the brain- force of his family, he is thoroughly familiar with the Depart- ment, and though somewhat dilatory, will probably govern it with sufficient energy and skill. He will certainly defend it well in the House, where his speeches, though scarcely noticed by the public, have given him weight, and where he will bring to the aid of Sir Stafford Northcote—now so hard pressed—a much-wanted faculty, that of summing-up a debate so as to leave the needed impression just before a division. Nor is it to be reckoned among his disadvantages that lie resembles in many respects his brother rather than his father—the Falk- land rather than the Rupert of Debate—that he has some- thing cold and contemptuous of Chauvinism in his intellect, and that his defect will be caution rather than recklessness. With war in the near prospect, and the country temporarily bereft of self-command, and dozens of fire-eaters in Parlia- ment, a man of that temper may prove invaluable in a House of Commons whose leader, with many fine qualities, lacks the reserved strength of colder men. It was not only for these qualities, however, that Lord Beaconsfield pitched upon his new Cabinet Minister. To let Lord Derby go, andnel break the sword in his hand ; to quarrel with the Earl, yet retain most of the influence of Knowsley ; to go his own way against the Stanley, yet be able to show Lancashire that the Stanleys were still with him,—this must have been a triumph as dear to his heart as it is important to his Ministry, and this he has accomplished. It is a masterpiece of social political strategy, and suggests that under the coronet of Carabas still lives the fire of the old Vivian Grey.
The remainder of the appointments are of less consequence, and may fairly be pronounced good. Mr. Hardy has quite earned a peerage, if he wishes for one, and as a debater will be better placed in the Peers than in the Commons, where, in
of his energy and his readings, his occasional rushes frequently brought discomposure to his friends. He cannot " rush" in that heavier atmosphere, he will not receive the same provocation, and a sturdy fighter there may seriously assist the Government. He will not charge Lord Rosebery with falsehood, or Lord Camperdown with obstruction ; there is no distinctively Irish Peer to make him rabid, unless Lord Dufferin comes home to chaff him into rage ; and if he gets over the ropes, Lord Granville, with that soundless whip of his, will make him look so ridiculous that he will in future perforce restrain himself within the rules. As a Secretary for
India, he ought to succeed. He has been a very good War Secretary, he will not find the Council more troublesome than the Duke of Cambridge ; and the work to be done is work he thoroughly understands. We take it, Mr. Hardy's special capacity for office, apart from his debating power, is that he can fit means to ends, can force the Depart- ments to be ready, can, if he wants a corps d'armee, insist effectually that it shall not be a nominal one, but whether adequate for the work or not, shall be thoroughly in fighting trim. That is a considerable faculty, and it is just now wanted in India. The Commander-in-Chief there is said by experts to be a good man, and the Governor of Bombay has the energy of a dozen average adminis- trators, but if the Army is ready for any great exploits, if all the arsenals are full, and all the carts have traces to them, and there are transports ready for anything, India is strangely changed since the days when she was always at war. Chronic immobility is the grand defect of the Indian Army, and we do not know a better administrator to correct it than Mr. Gathorne Hardy, or one who will make a new impulse felt more quickly. On other subjects he has his Council, and if we go to war, _Indian finance, like English finance, will from the first minute depend on the British Treasury.
On the whole, and with the strong reserve that Lord Salis- bury seems as yet to be merely the agent of Lord Beaconsfield —and of course, without reference to the dominant question of peace or war—the great changes strengthen the working power of the Cabinet, and the smaller changes are by no means unsatisfactory. Lord Bandon has carried out Mr. Forster's Education policy consistently and satisfac- torily, and has deserved as an administrator more credit than he has received. It must have been weary work during these four years even for a patient eldest son, of Evangelical proclivities. Lord Sandon has, however, if report may be trusted, refused higher office, and will bring to the Board of Trade his capacity for mastering detail, and an amount of sense which is certainly not in Sir Charles Adderley, perhaps the least successful official who never was turned out. Even Shipping Acts will not frighten Lord Sandon, and he will be composed in the presence of philanthropists in fits. There is very, heavy Railway business to be done, in renew- ing and revising the powers of the Railway Commission, and Lord Bandon, who deserves real respect, impatient as his -wooden imperturbability makes us, will probably succeed in satisfying both the Railways and the country. The choice of ,his successor is a curious one, for Lord George Hamilton is really chosen, but we do not know that it is unwise. He must smile to himself to find himself made Director- General of Schoolmasters, and congratulate himself a little that they can neither examine him in arithmetic nor birch him for ignorance of foreign languages, but he 'will probably, unless too much disgusted with the worry of the most sensitive of professions, do very well. There is life .and " go " in him, and an exceptional power of getting up
information. He is a little too jaunty in his speeches, and does not yet know that sitting on Irish Members benefits no Department, and perhaps believes a little too strongly in his own qualifications, but we do not know another Member who could on Tuesday have made that defence of Sir J. Strachey's budget. It takes an Anglo- Indian to understand how very good it was, how well the for- gotten point in favour of the equalisation of the Salt Dues was put, or how admirably adroit was the threat, which, if we understand the Presidency towns, will keep them as quiet as mice about the Licence Duties. They do not want the Income-tax renewed, whatever else they may be wishing for, and more especially under circumstances which will make it permanent. There was cool cleverness, too, in the way in which the sop was thrown to the Northern traders, without a parade of it in the speech, and without the demand for aid a less tranquil debater would have made. All this is not proof of statesmanship, but it is of ability, and we are glad to see a lively young politician of genuine promise promoted as rapidly as is consistent with more serious claims. If our own leaders would take half the trouble to find out the boys and bring them forward that Lord Beaconsfield does, it would be an excellent thing for the party, and the country too. Their notion would seem to be that men of fifty are exactly the men whom Under-Secretaryships will train. Lord Beaconsfield's notion is a different one, and though we dread and detest the purpose of all his changes, we cannot be blind to the fact that they are both courageous and well conceived.
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