‘Your fleet,’ he said, ‘was also in admirable order, but we were quite your match; and I tell you frankly that though I have no unfriendly feeling towards your nation, I die a disappointed man in that I lost the opportunity of a fight; for I had hoped, if not victorious, to have been able to wage such a battle as would have wiped out the defeats our squadrons and ships had almost always experienced in the last great war.’
Lord Ponsonby was in town when I arrived; he took the greatest interest in the message I brought him, and requested me to inform Admiral Lalande it was perfectly correct that he had been led to believe he had induced, or secretly encouraged, the Turkish Admiral to deliver up the fleet to Mehemet Ali; but that Admiral Lalande’s declaration was sufficient to convince him that he was mistaken, and that he greatly regretted having joined with others in putting forward such an accusation. He requested me also to say that he was much pleased and gratified that the Admiral should have desired to have this matter cleared up, and told me to thank him and to express a hope that he would yet live for many years to serve his country.
I wrote to Admiral Lalande and made known Lord Ponsonby’s reply. My letter reached him a few days before his death, which occurred within the three weeks, as he had prognosticated.
In the same year I was directed, by order of Her Majesty’s Government, to accompany Colonel Barnett to Egypt, on his appointment as Political Agent and Consul-General, and remained there several months. After a few weeks’ residence at Cairo, I was offered by Lord Palmerston, through Colonel Barnett, the post of Consul at Alexandria, which the latter endeavoured to persuade me to accept as he urged it would lead to my being appointed his successor; but the climate of Egypt did not agree with me and I declined, preferring to return to the Embassy at Constantinople.
Commodore Porter was at this time Minister of the United States at Constantinople.
He was a distinguished officer, who had rendered important services during the war with Great Britain. The commodore was very eccentric, a type of the rough sailor of by-gone days, but pleasant and amusing, and, when spinning yarns about actions between British and United States ships, always careful to avoid—even when the story related regarded the capture by himself of one of our ships—any expression which he thought might wound my susceptibilities as a ‘Britisher.’
He lived at San Stefano, a village about ten miles from Constantinople. I had made the acquaintance of his nephew, Mr. George Porter, the Secretary of the United States Legation, who frequently invited me—when there was a passage of quail—to a day’s shooting and to dinner with his uncle; but I was the only member of the Diplomatic Corps at Constantinople thus favoured.
Since he had presented his credentials to the Sultan, and made the usual formal visits to his colleagues, he called upon no one—not even upon the Vizir or any member of the Turkish Government.
One day, after dinner, I happened to relate to the Commodore a political event that had recently occurred, in which he appeared to take great interest; so, finding him in good humour, I took the liberty of observing that, as he had mentioned he never visited or received visits from members of the Turkish Government or of the Diplomatic Corps, I thought he must find it a difficult matter to keep his Government properly and correctly informed upon passing events, which were at that time of the greatest importance to the political world.
The Commodore replied, his eyes twinkling with humour, ‘I am very careful to keep my Government fully informed of all that takes place, and I receive replies expressing satisfaction with my interesting reports and the foresight they declare I show in predicting events which are likely to happen.’