HC Deb 30 May 1872 vol 211 c841
MR. DISRAELI

I wish, Sir, to ask the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government a Question with respect to a Lecture recently delivered at Oxford on the Treaty of Washington by one of the High Commissioners. I have read the report of that Lecture with equal amazement and alarm, and wish to know, Whether that Lecture was delivered with the sanction of Her Majesty's Government?

MR. GLADSTONE

I am glad, Sir, that the right hon. Gentleman, by giving me private Notice of this Question, has enabled me to communicate respecting it with my noble Friend at the head of the Foreign Office. Having done so, I have now to say that the lecture to which the right hon. Gentleman refers was not delivered with the sanction or in any manner with the participation of Her Majesty's Government. Of course, I do not wish to be understood as passing any opinion upon the delivery of that lecture. I merely wish to say that in the delivery of it the right hon. and learned Gentleman from whom it proceeded acted on his own responsibility.