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 32 CAUSES INVOLVING TKANCE AND ENGLAND CHAP, one his late colleagues avowed.* At all events, I'- wG now see that the ill-omened decision of the 22d of December took place within the brief period of Lord Palmerston's exclusion from the Cabinet, f + There was a widespreail belief that if Lord Pahnerston had not been driven from the Foreign Office, the war would have been prevented. Of this the Prince Consort was aware. H<'. writes, I see, to Baron Stockmar on the 19th of October : ' The Palmerstonian stocks liere have gone up imnienselj', ]ieople ' saying that if he had been at the F. 0., he would, by his ' energy, have brought Pussia to reason.'— 'Life of the Prince Consort,' vol. ii. p. oiL
 * See Lord Clarendon's avowal, cited ante, ^ip. 26, 27.