BETWEEN THE CZAK AND THE SULTAN. 37 might be a complex task to prove that the rule chap. of the English in Hindostan is connected with '. — the stability of the Sultan's dominions in a far- distant region of the world; but whether the theory of this curious inter- dependence be sound or merely fanciful, it is certain that the conquest of the shores of the Bosphorus and the Dardan- elles by one of the great Continental Powers would straiten the range of England's authority in the world, and, even if it did not do her harm of a positive kind, would relatively lessen her strength. The effect, too, of Russia's becoming a Mediterranean Power could not be so clearly fore- seen and computed as not to be a fitting subject of care to English statesmen. The people at large were not accustomed to turn their minds in this direction ; but the ' Eastern Question,' as it was called, had become consecrated by its descent through a great lineage of Statesmen ; and the traditions of the Foreign Office were reinforced by English travellers : for these men, going to Eastern countries in early life, and becoming charmed with their glimpse of the grand, simple, violent world that they had read of in their Bibles, used soon to grow interested in the diplomatic strife always going on at Constantinople ; and then coming home, they brought back with their chibouques and their scymitars a zeal for the cause of Turkey which did not fail to find utterance in Parliament. In process of time the accumulated counsels of these travellers, coming in aid of dip- lomatists and statesmen, put straight the deflec- '132721
