THE NEGOCIATION.
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of the principal subscribers to its funds in Manchester and its neighbourhood met at the League Rooms, and resolved unanimously that an appeal to the public should be made for a fund of £250,000, and that a meeting should be held in the Town Hall on Tuesday, the 23rd, for that purpose. Before that time Lord John Russell had relinquished his attempt to form a ministry. The following narrative of the negotiations is from Miss Martineau's "History":—
"Lord J. Russell was at Edinburgh. The royal summons reached him at night on the 8th of December. As there was then no railway to London, it was the 10th before he arrived in town; and the 11th before he appeared in the Queen's presence at Osborne, in the Isle of Wight He had made up his round, that If asked to undertake the formation of a ministry, he must decline, because his party was in a minority in the Commons of from 90 to 100. This was his answer when the Queen made the expected request: but Sir Robert Peel had left with the Queen a paper, in which, after declaring the reasons of his resignation, he avowed his readiness, in his private capacity, to aid and give every support to the new ministry whom Her Majesty might select to effect a settlement of the question of die Corn Laws.' This wholly changed the state and prospect of the case. Lord J. Russell returned to consult such of his friends as were within reach. Through J. Graham, Lord J. Russell was pat in possession of all the information on which the late ministers had proceeded; but not of the details of their proposed measures. It was no time for a general election. None but a rash minister would dream of requiring it while the country was in strong excitement, and under the visible doom of a great calamity. Instead of this, the thing to be done was to frame such & measure of Corn-Law repeal as would secure the support of Sir R. Peel and the colleagues who had adhered to him. After a good deal of correspondence, through the Queen, of difficult transactions by statesmen so delicately placed with regard to each other, Lord J. Russell conceived himself justified in attempting to form an administration; and he communicated with the sovereign to that effect on the 18th of December. But next morning an insuperable difficulty arose. One of the friends on whom he had confidently rested as a coadjutor, declined to enter the Cabinet. This Fås Lord Grey. Highly as Lord J. Russell valued him, he would at any other time have endeavoured to form a Cabinet without him, at his own desire; but the position of the whigs was now too critical—or at least their leaders thought so to admit the risk of such speculation as would be excited at the exclusion of Lord Grey. On the 20th, there-
