THIRD MARQUESS OF SALISBURY 281
Salisbury managed to pass a useful Bill for the Housing of the Working Classes, based on the report of a Commission for which he had moved in the previous year.
Abroad the situation was full of embarrass- ments. Isolated in Europe, the country was embroiled in quarrels all over the world, and was on the brink of war with Russia on the Afghan frontier. In this matter, which arose out of what is known as the Penjdeh incident, the Liberal Foreign Minister, Lord Granville, had made concession after concession, justifying Lord Salisbury's taunt that ' the Government go into every danger with a light head, and then they make up by escaping from it with a light foot." He took a more firm attitude, and the Russians, seeing that he was in earnest, agreed to the appointment of a boundary commission. War, which a few months earlier had appeared to be inevitable, was thus avoided. In Egypt and elsewhere, Lord Salisbury's handling of the problems left him by his predecessors had good results, and even won the approbation of Gladstone, who said " he could not object to one item of his foreign policy " ; on hearing which, Lord Salisbury remarked, " I fear I must have done wrong." 1 But before his work could be perfected, the general election (December, 1885) again put the Liberals in office, a result due to the gratitude of the newly enfranchised agri- cultural labourers.
1 Life of Lord Cranbrook, II. 239.
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