Preparations for war were pressed on till, on March 3rd, the signing of the Treaty of San Stefano, which put an end to Turkish rule in Bulgaria, seemed to close the crisis. But instantly the trouble broke out again. The British Government claimed that this new treaty, since it altered the European settlement ratified in 1856 by the Treaty of Paris, must be submitted to and endorsed by a Congress of the Powers. Russia declined to be thus bound, and a new crisis arose in which Lord Derby, who had withdrawn his previous resignation, now finally gave up the Secretaryship of Foreign Affairs, being succeeded by Lord Salisbury.
In 1881 Sir Charles, while Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, became aware that Lord Derby's retention of office after his first resignation had been little more than nominal. He says in the Memoir for that year:
'In the course of my researches among the Tunis papers I discovered the curious fact that in February and March, 1878, foreign affairs were being conducted by a committee of the Cabinet, consisting of Lord Beaconsfield, Lord Cairns, and Lord Salisbury, and that Lord Derby, the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, was virtually shelved for the whole period. At this moment Lord Beaconsfield proposed the creation of a Mediterranean league for the maintenance of the status quo in the Mediterranean: England, France, Italy, and Greece to be first consulted, and Austria to come in afterwards if she pleased. Italy declining, the scheme collapsed. Foolish Italy!'
While in Parliament the Tory party was ridding itself of its 'peace men,' party feeling out of doors ran to unusual heights. These were the days when a music-hall song added a word to the political vocabulary, and the "jingo" crowd signalized its patriotism by wrecking Mr. Gladstone's windows at 73, Harley Street, where he went to live after his retirement from the Liberal leadership.
'On Sunday, March 10th, in coming back from the Grosvenor Gallery, I passed a great mob, who were going to howl at Mr. Gladstone—at this time the ordinary Sunday afternoon diversion of the London rough.'
Schouvalof, the Russian Ambassador, had on March 4th summed up the situation in an epigram: "England has challenged Russia to a duel, and has chosen for her weapon swords at fifteen paces" (l'épée à quinze pas). But the preparations for this combat were menacing.
'On March 29th the Eastern Question blazed up again with Lord Derby's resignation, the discussion of which enlivened a party at Lady Waldegrave's, there being before us a Queen's Message alleging the existence of imminent national danger and great emergency as a reason for calling out the reserves. On Saturday the 30th Trevelyan … informed me of a resolution which had been prepared by Lubbock on behalf of those Whigs who had not gone with Gladstone, but wished to make some movement of their own. Later in the evening I saw Childers, who proposed a better motion in the form of an addition to the Message in the sense of a strong desire for peace. The object of both suggestions, of course, was by a moderate middle course to prevent a division for and against the Message in which Gladstone and Bright and eighty others would vote No, while eighty would follow Hartington in voting Yes, and the majority of the party run away, thus destroying the Liberal party, as it was destroyed in the time of Pitt and the war with France. Later, again, in the evening I saw Montgélas (who told me that Russia had held different language to Austria and to England, and that she had drawn back and did not mean war) [Footnote: 'On February 9th I went to a party at the Austrian Embassy "to meet the Archduke Rudolf." Beust was gone away and Montgélas was host. … On February 12th I met again the Crown Prince of Austria.'] and Randolph Churchill, who made an appointment to come to me on Sunday about the papers, which he agreed with me in thinking damaging to the Government, and full of evidence of their total isolation. When he came, we decided only that the Government ought to be asked for further papers.'
This demand Sir Charles accordingly made on April 1st. His position was at this point extremely difficult. He was not prepared to acquiesce in the aggrandisement of Russia, and therefore could not go with his habitual associates, who had formed a Committee upon the Eastern Question. On the other hand, he was determined to join with them in opposing the calling out of the reserves, because this step implied that England would go to war alone, and he did not believe either that England was likely to do so, or that she ought, as a member of the European Concert, to take such a step.
'There was a moment after the fall of Lord Derby when I became a supporter of the Government in their Eastern policy, for they appeared to me to adopt my own, but it did not last long. "Lord Salisbury's circular" (so-called, but written by Lord Cairns), issued upon the accession of Lord Salisbury to the Foreign Office, contained the statement of this policy. … Speaking in the House on April 9th …, I repudiated the defence which came from some on the Liberal side, of the conduct of Russia, and, looking upon the Government despatch as a vindication primarily of general European interests, and, in the second place, of Hellenic interests, against Russian violence and universal Slav dominion throughout the Levant, I separated myself from my party and praised the new Minister of Foreign Affairs. I was afterwards bitterly disappointed at finding the policy of the April circular abandoned by its authors in the Congress of Berlin. …
'On April 4th Gennadius, the Greek Chargé d'Affaires (afterwards Minister), the American Minister, Matthew Arnold, W. E. Forster, Grant Duff, Lubbock, George Sheffield (Lord Lyons' factotum), Tom Hughes, and my old friend Sir David Wedderburn dined with me. And in this Whig and Hellenic party a general agreement with my views was met with; but the same was not the case amongst my brother Radicals of "Mr. Dillwyn's Committee upon the Eastern Question."'