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 BETWEEN THE CZAIt AND THE SULTAN. 199 orders, and remonstrated when they were directed c H A P. XII to do so ; but the Czar was so prone to believe L_ what he wished to be true, that diplomatists who were forced to make painful communications to his Government could easily do a great deal to blunt the edge of their instructions. So, although in the real Europe Nicholas had become isolated, yet in Europe, as represented at St Petersburg, the true order of things was reversed. There, it was Sir Hamilton Seymour who stood alone. More than this, it was believed at St Petersburg that the delinquency of M. Castelbajac often went beyond mere inaction, and that when the Czar was pained and discouraged by the reserve or the warning language of the Queen's ] epresentative, he used to turn for solace to the complaisant Frenchman standing always in readiness to assure him that Sir Hamilton Seymour's grave tone was the sheer whim of an obstinate Englishman. The Emperor Nicholas had laid down for him- The czar-i self a rule which was always to guide his conduct upon the acquies- upon the Eastern Question; and it seems to be cenceor 1 England. certain that at this time, even in his most angry moments, he intended to cling to his resolve. "What he had determined was, that no temptation should draw him into hostile conflict with Eng- land. He did not know that already he was breaking away from England, and rapidly going adrift. Persisting in the belief that the opposition which he had been encountering at Constantinople was the work of the English Ambassador, and of him alone, or at worst of the Foreign Office, he