that the "irresistible principle of historical necessity" was a principle "not recognized by Her Majesty's Ministers!"
There speaks the man who recognized the realities in the situation at the Congress of Berlin. From the novels, let us return once more to the biography, to the final volume, for a last specimen of the Disraelian irony playing upon himself and at the sare time upon the great German master of the arts which he himself practised. England, as part o: her share of the plunder divided by the victorious statesmen—England, or rather Disraeli personally, had secretly seized upon Cyprus; and in a confidential interview with the "honest broker" had communicated the fact to Bismarck. I quote the passage in which Disraeli reports this interview to his sovereign:
When he (Bismarck) heard about Cyprus, he said: "You have done a wise thing. This is progress. It will be popular; a nation likes progress." His idea of progress was evidently seiz ing something. He said he looked upon our relinquishment of the Ionian Isles as the first sign of our decadence. Cyprus put us right again.
"His idea of progress was evidently seizing something." Evidently Disraeli's idea of progress was not precisely that. The Bismarckian point of view and personality interested him, to be sure, piquantly. He was mildly amused by the "iron" statesman's table talk, with its "Rabelaisian monologues." He was astounded by his "endless revelations of things
