EARL GRANVILLE DEAD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8530, 2 April 1891, Page 5

EARL GRANVILLE DEAD.

Press Association. Telegraph.—Copyright: London, March 30. The death is announced of Lord Granville. "■ V- * \

The Right Hon. Granville George Leveson Gower, second Earl Granville, K.G. (born 1815), was educated at Eton, and at' Christ Church, Oxford, where he took his degree in 1834. He first entered Parliament as Liberal member for Morpeth in 1836, which seat he exchanged for Lichfield in 1840, and succeeded to the peerage in 1846. Office first came to him in 1840, when for a few months he was Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs. Having been appointed Vice-President of the Board of Trade in 1840, he entered the Cabinet in 1851, and was Foreign Secretary during the expiring weeks of the ministry of Earl Russell. From that time no Ministry" of which Liberals formed a whole or a part was regarded as complete without him, and after filling the offices of Lord President of the Council and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, he became Lord President of the Council and Ministerial leader in the House of Lords (1855-58). The fall of the Palmerston Ministry was followed by the brief Derby administration, but 1859 saw him once more Lord President of the Council, his attempt to form a Ministry including both Palmerston and Russell having failed, owing to the latter'a preference for Palmerston as a leader. In 1860 he accepted the position of Chairman of the Commission of the Great Exhibition of 1862. Lord Granville continued in office until 1866. In December, 1868, he became Mr. Gladstone's Colonial Secretary, and after the death of Lord Clarendon, in 1870, Secretary for _ Foreign Affairs. As such, he arranged the treaty between England, France, and Prussia, guaranteeing ohe independence of Belgium, in 1870, and met with a dignified protest Russia's repudiation of the Black Sea clause of the Treaty of. Paris, but the London Conference of January-March, 1871, resulted on the part of England in the surrender of her demand that no Russian men-of-war should appear on those waters. About the same time Lord Granville and Prince Gortschakoff confirmed the agreement that Afghanistan should form an " intermediary zone" between England and Russia. This was followed by the Russian advance upon Khiva in 1873, in spite of the assurance given by Count Schouvaloff, made to Lord Granville in January, that no permanent occupation was intended. The general election having resulted unfavourably to the Liberals, Lord Granville again became leader of the Opposition in the Upper House, and conducted with much quiet irony the attacks upon the Ministerial party, which was stronger both in numbers and oratorical ability than his own. Some of his speeches on the Eastern Question were particularly incisive. In 1880 he became once more Minister of Foreign Affairs under Mr. Gladstone. The first question that came before him was the settlement of the outstanding matters connected with the Berlin Treaty. By a naval demonstration the Sultan was forced to surrender Dulcigno to Montenegro ; but Greece, owing to the snpineness of France, had to put up with a frontier line drawn much farther south than she had hoped. In May, 1881, he launched a vigorous protest against the occupation of Tunis by the French. From that time forward Egyptian affairs occupied for the most part the attention of the Foreign Secretary. The military revolt of Arabi Pasha against the Khedive was suppressed by British bayonets at Tel-el-Kebir on September 12th, 1882, and early in the following year the Anglo-French control was abolished and an attempt made to set up popular institutions in the country. These reforms were explained by Lord Granville in a circular note to the Powers. In April, 1884, he issued invitations to the Powers to attend a Conference on Egyptian finance, over which he presided, but it separated in August without result, owing to French hostility. Meanwhile the appearance of the Mahdi in the Soudan threatened the very existence of the Egyptian Government, and a series of disasters ensued. In other quarters the Foreign Secretary had cause for anxiety during the last days of the Liberal Government. France was openly hostile owing to our intervention in Egypt; Prince Bismarck showed anger at the English opposition to his colonial schemes : and above all, the attempt to demarcate the Afghan boundary seemed to have failed owing to the nonarrival of the Russian commissioner, while the advance of the Russian troops upon certain positions held by our Government to be within Afghan territory, seemed for a brief moment to have rendered a new war with Russia inevitable. Lord Granville retired with his colleagues from office in May, 1885, bub on Mr. Gladstone's return to power in 1886, he became Colonial Secretary ______________