In February he
'dined with Lady Waldegrave to meet the Duc de Chartres—no better and no worse than the other Princes of his house…., not excepting the Duc d'Aumale, who had, however, the reputation of being brilliant, and who … was interesting from his great memory of great men. They all grew deaf as they grew old, and the Comte de Paris is now (1890) almost as deaf as the Prince de Joinville, who was put into the navy in his youth, because, not hearing the big guns, he alone of all the family was not frightened by them.'
In March, 1878, Gambetta sent to Dilke with an introduction 'Henri Hecht, who was deep in his secrets, and in the habit from this time forward of visiting for him Germany as well as England.' Going backwards and forwards to his house at Toulon, Sir Charles always broke the journey at Paris to see Gambetta. He writes to Ashton Dilke:
"Gambetta says that he shall say at Grenoble that MacMahon said: 'J'irai jusqu'au bout,' and that he must—i.e., he must complete his term. He won't have him again. 'J'en ai assez d'une fois.'"
At Easter Sir Charles was using his influence with Gambetta on behalf of a great artist who had been politically compromised in the troubles of 1871 —Dalou the sculptor, who had done to Dilke's commission a copy in has- relief of Flaxman's "Mercury and Pandora."
'When I was leaving for Paris I had several interviews with Dalou as to getting him leave to return to France without his asking for it. He had been sub-curator of the Louvre under the Commune, and had helped to preserve the collections from destruction; but after he fled the country he had always refused to ask for leave to return, which, had he asked, would at once have been granted to him. Gambetta always insisted, when I spoke to him upon the matter, that Dalou should write some letter, however private and however personal, to ask for leave to return; but this was just what Dalou's pride would never let him do, and although he was willing to ask me verbally, and even to refer to the matter in a private letter to myself, he never would write about it to anyone in France. Dalou was afterwards selected to make the official statues of the Republic, and may be said to have become, after the general amnesty, Sculptor-in-Ordinary to the Government of France.'
There is a story of Count Beust's difficulties when the Empress of Austria suddenly asked herself to dine with him at the Austrian Embassy at six on Sunday, at twenty-four hours' notice. Beust's cook was out of town; but worse was the difficulty of finding guests of adequate importance. The Prince of Wales had a dinner-party of his own at Marlborough House, so recourse was had to another Royal couple, the Duke and Duchess of Teck. They were engaged to the Marlborough House dinner, but suggested a heroic expedient. "Why not dine with you at six, and go on at a quarter-past eight and dine again!" So it was settled.
An eccentric dinner took place at 76, Sloane Street, when the Maharajah of Johore returned the visit which Sir Charles had paid him in his States near Singapore. Lord Randolph Churchill and other people interested in India were among the guests, and the Maharajah brought his own cook, who prepared enough for all, so that the guests had their choice of two menus. The host took the Maharajah's, 'which was good but rich,' and 'suffered, as did all who ate his garlics and his grease.'
'On March 21st I breakfasted with Lord Granville to meet Lord Lyons, there being also there Lord Ripon, Lord Acton (a man of great learning and much charm), Lord Carlingford (Chichester Fortescue that had been), Grant Duff, Sir Thomas Wade (the great Chinese scholar, and afterwards Professor of Chinese at Cambridge), Lefevre, Meredith Townsend of the Spectator, old Charles Howard, and "old White," roaring with that terrible roar which seems almost necessary to go with his appearance. I have known two men, both in the Foreign Office service, that looked like bears—Lord Tenterden, [Footnote: Permanent Under-Secretary of State, afterwards Dilke's colleague at the Foreign Office.] a little black graminivorous European bear, and "old White," a polar bear if ever I saw one, always ready to hug his enemies or his friends, and always roaring so as to shake the foundations of your house. "Lord Lyons," I noted in my diary, "does not make any mark in private, but that may be because he does his duty and holds his tongue. The diplomatists who talk delightfully, like Odo Russell, are perhaps not the best models of diplomacy." But White afterwards made a great Ambassador.
'On March 3rd Goschen dined with me, asked by me to meet "Brett, Hartington's new secretary"' (now Lord Esher). 'Reginald Brett was, and is, an extremely pleasant fellow, and he was the ablest secretary, except Edward Hamilton, that I ever came across; but he was far from being a model secretary, because … he always behaved as if he held delegated authority from Hartington to represent Hartington's conscience when it would not otherwise have moved, and "Hartington's opinion" when the chief had none…. But Brett in all he did had public ends in view….