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 BETWEEN THE CZAR AND THE SULTAN. 121 execution of the Ambassador's painful mandates chap. might perhaps he suffered to encounter a little v delay. So thought, so temporised, the wise tran- quil statesmen at the Porte. Of course, this kind of ascendancy was often very galling to the Sultan's advisers. They knew that the English Ambassador was counselling them for the good of their country; but they felt that he humbled them by making his dictation too plainly apparent, and they were often very conscious that the motive which made them suc- cumb to him was dread. Yet, if the Ambassador was unrelenting and even harsh in the exercise of his dominion over the Turks, he was faithful to guard them against enemies from abroad. He chas- tened them himself, but he was dangerous to any other man who came seeking to hurt his children. Now it happened that this was exactly the kind of ascendancy over the Turks for which the Em- peror Nicholas had long been craving. Some men imagine that the Emperor's designs in regard to Turkey were steadily governed by sheer desire for his neighbour's land ; and they are not without specious materials for forming such an opinion : but perhaps a full knowledge of the truth would justify the belief that, from the Peace of Adrian- ople in 1829 down to the time of his death, the Czar would have preferred the ascendancy which Sir Stratford Canning enjoyed at Constantinople to any scheme of conquest. And, what is more, if Nicholas had succeeded in gaining this ascend- ancy, he would have been inclined to use it as a