come, only as a pleasant omnibus-top memory.
The viceroy of India's state barge.
From a Photograph.
"But it was not to be so. A few evenings afterwards, I happened to be in the strangers' section of the House of Lords. My eyes were wandering about from face to face, lingering here and there upon one which seemed like an historical figure head of ancient historic England. But a voice struck me as one I had heard before. I could not be mistaken in that low clear tone... It was my friend of the omnibus-top. Dry as the theme was— I have forgotten it—the speaker had invested it with interest. He had looked deeper into it than others, knew the point on which the question turned, and in a few simple words made the statement to which nothing could be added. Since then it has been my privilege to meet Lord Dufferin in society, to listen to him, to know something of his life, and my first impression has been more than confirmed. I am quite sure there is no one among the Peers of England who surpasses him in all that goes to make the gentleman, the true-hearted man, and the refined scholar.... Many most influential men at once named him as the right man to succeed Lord Mayo in India. There was, indeed, a slight disappointment in some quarters, that Lord Northbrook should have been preferred for the post in question. But Canada gains a great deal by it. England could send her no better man."
Native feeding tiger cub with baby's bottle.
From a Photograph.
In 1879, at the moment when diplomatic relations between England and Russia were strained almost to snapping point, Lord Dufferin was appointed Ambassador to St. Petersburg. The threatened outbreak of hostilities averted, he was transferred to Constantinople. Of his sojourn on the Bosphorus and on the Nile mention has already been made.
In 1884 he proceeded as Viceroy to India,
