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A photograph of Benjamin Disraeli, taken by Cornelius Jabez Hughes on July 22nd, 1878, the year that the Congress of Powers met in Berlin. The chief challenge facing the Congress was that the Foreign Office was itching for war with Russia, convinced that Emperor Alexander II’s fractious relationship with Turkey was a cloak for a dastardly plan to invade India. A counter-campaign was led by John Bright MP, and in the event the Congress recognised Russia’s legitimate concerns for Christians struggling for their rights under the Turkish Ottoman Empire. Independence was secured for Montenegro, Serbia and Romania, and autonomy for Bulgaria — though handing Bosnia and Herzegovina to Austria-Hungary proved a grave mistake.
Introduction
On July 13th, 1878, statesmen gathered in Berlin for a Congress of Powers amid high tensions. The Germans had recently invaded France, Russia was demanding Turkey respect the rights of Christians and Turkey was stoking British fears that Russia meant to invade India. Much rested on the tact of Britain’s Prime Minister, Lord Beaconsfield — which was just what his aides were afraid of.
ON the evening before the formal opening of the Congress, Lord Beaconsfield* was received with high honours at the British Embassy. In the course of the evening one of his private secretaries came to Lord Odo Russell* and said:
‘Lord Odo, we are in a frightful mess. The old chief has determined to open the proceedings of the Congress in French. He has written out the devil’s own long speech in French and learnt it by heart, and is going to fire it off at the Congress tomorrow. We shall be the laughing stock of Europe. He pronounces épicier* as if it rhymed with overseer, and all his pronunciation is to match. It is as much as our places are worth to tell him so. Can you help us?’
Lord Odo listened with amused good humour to this tale of woe, and then replied: ‘It is a very delicate mission that you ask me to undertake, but then I am fond of delicate missions. I will see what I can do.’
And so he repaired to the state bedroom, where our venerable Plenipotentiary was beginning those elaborate processes of the toilet with which he prepared for the couch.
* Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881), Prime Minister in 1868 and 1874-80, had been created 1st Earl of Beaconsfield in 1876. His Government regarded Russia with suspicion and was inclined to take Turkey’s side in the recent Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78, whereas his arch-rival William Gladstone (1809-1898) was more sympathetic towards Russia and to the Christians of countries such as Bulgaria, Romania and Serbia, then under the Ottoman yoke. Disraeli’s outspoken critic John Bright MP (1811-1889) declared in a speech in April 1878 that “the English Government was the only obstacle to the Congress”, and that the Foreign Office was bent on forging a European coalition for war with Russia. He and his supporters felt vindicated when the Congress chose another course.
* Odo William Leopold Russell (1829-1884), 1st Baron Ampthill, styled Lord Odo Russell between 1872 and 1881. He was Britain’s first Ambassador to the German Empire, a country created in 1871 on the back of victory in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, which had been initiated by Otto von Bismarck, Chancellor of what was then the North German Confederation. The author of this passage, George W. E. Russell, was a great-grandson of the 6th Duke of Bedford, who was Lord Odo’s grandfather.
* An épicier is a grocer. See also A Nation of Shopkeepers.
Précis
On the eve of the 1878 Congress of Powers in Berlin, rumours were flying in the British Embassy that the Prime Minister, Lord Beaconsfield, intended to give his keynote speech in long-winded and mispronounced French. An aide burst into the Ambassador’s room and begged him to help, and being rather tickled by the request Lord Odo Russell smilingly agreed. (59 / 60 words)
On the eve of the 1878 Congress of Powers in Berlin, rumours were flying in the British Embassy that the Prime Minister, Lord Beaconsfield, intended to give his keynote speech in long-winded and mispronounced French. An aide burst into the Ambassador’s room and begged him to help, and being rather tickled by the request Lord Odo Russell smilingly agreed.
Variations: 1.increase the length of this precis to exactly 65 words. 2.reduce the length of this precis to exactly 55 words. 3.introduce one of the following words into the precis: about, not, or, otherwise, ought, since, whether, who.
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