The foreign part of Lord Rosebery's speech, after a gibe
about the policy of the Government in Siam being a repudia- tion of all they had said in Opposition, was chiefly taken up with the Armenian problem. After asking whether our friendship either with Austria or Italy stood where it did when be left Office, Lord Rosebery went on to assail Lord Salisbury for having used menacing language to the Sultan after he knew that Russia would not allow him to back his words by action. That, of course, was a good oratorical point ; but it comes badly from a friend of Armenia. Was Lord Salisbury to tell the Sultan that his hands were tied, and that therefore he might proceed with the massacres ? If not, then Lord Salisbury was right in continuing to use firm language. After a kindly compliment to Mr. Watson, Lord Rosebery closed his speech with a peroration more impassioned than is his wont. It had come to this, that after nearly twenty centuries of Christianity, we were prepared to let the Christiana be massacred by barbarous Kurds, "directed or connived at by a still more barbarous Government." On Wednesday Lord Rosebery made another speech—at the South Australian dinner—but here his tone was far more imperial. The whole speech was indeed excellent. Lord Rosebery is at his best when saying pleasant and optimistic things about the Colonies.
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