CHAPTER I

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LORD DERBY’S SECOND ADMINISTRATION. PAGE

A Commercial Crisis--Suspension of the Bank Act--The Fall of Lucknow--Sir Hugh Rose in Central India--Last Days of the Rebellion--The Operations in China--The Queen’s Personal Direction of Affairs--Palmerston’s waning Popularity--Attacks on Lord Canning--The Orsini Plot--French Menaces to England--The Conspiracy Bill--Defeat of the Ministry--The Second Derby-Disraeli Government--Abandonment of the Conspiracy Bill--The Queen’s Opposition to the India Bill--The Oudh Proclamation and Ellenborough’s “Secret Despatch”--A Tropical Summer and an Exhausted Legislature--Confirmation of the Prince of Wales--The Queen at Birmingham and Leeds--The Dispute between France and England about the Principalities--The Queen’s Visit to Cherbourg--The Royal Visit to Prussia--The Meeting with the Princess Frederick William--A Royal “Middie”--The Indian Proclamation--The Queen at Balmoral--Donati’s Comet--The Controversy over the Indian Army--Abdication of the King of Prussia--The Queen’s Letter to the Prince of Wales--France and Portugal--Failing Health of the Prince Consort 1

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