England was no longer in the position of dangerous isolation which she had occupied when he took office in i885. The initia tory approaches which he had then made to the German chan cellor had re-established friendly relations between them, and his successful obstinacy about Bulgaria had presented England to Europe as a power that had to be reckoned with. In '86, circum stances all combined to draw her towards the grouping of Central European Powers,—Germany, Austria and Italy as against the Russo-French combination. Russia had been alienated by her resistance to the coercion of Bulgaria, while across the Channel France's growing resentment at her continued presence in Egypt had operated in the same direction. But in 1887 there was an in terval of hesitation. Salisbury was repelled by the German chan cellor's methods. Throughout the preceding autumn and winter he had been ceaselessly resisting the chancellor's efforts to induce an Anglo-Russian war and so shift the Bulgarian quarrel from Aus trian to English shoulders. The menacing pressure with which the chancellor visited any crossing of his wishes by a friendly Power had been a constant source of irritation. Salisbury's wish for a wider choice in friendships expressed itself that spring in a new departure in Egyptian policy. He offered to Turkey—as the su zerain power—an engagement to evacuate Egypt in three years if the conditions for her security permitted and with a right of re-entry reserved. After prolonged negotiation the sultan agreed to sign a convention to that effect (May 22, 1887). But France rejected the proffered compromise with indignation, and under threats of violence from her and Russia the sultan withdrew his consent, and refused ratification. The attempt, though it failed in its main object in a reconciliation with France, was not fruit less. It freed England from further solicitations and intrigues on the score of Egypt. She had made her offer and it had been rejected. Thenceforward, as Lord Salisbury soon made abun dantly clear, she would consult only her own judgment as to the period of her occupation.
But France's inveteracy was decisive in determining England's continental friendships for the next ten years. Lord Salisbury declined to give them the character of alliances. In response to insistent requests from the Austrian and Italian Governments, backed by a private letter of strong appeal from the German chancellor (Nov. 22), he that autumn signed an engagement (the Tripartite Agreement, Dec. io, 1887), to join with them in resisting any future coercion of Turkey on the part of Russia. The chancellor's letter hinted at a more general and binding ad hesion to the Triple Alliance and it was followed by other sug gestions to the same effect. These were ignored or evaded and more definite proposals met with more definite refusals. In the spring of 1887, Italy had asked for a defensive alliance specifically directed against France and in Jan. 1889 Germany invited a similar compact. Salisbury's answer on both occasions was that an undertaking to fight on an unarrived issue was contrary to the traditions of English policy and was impossible for a Constitu tional Government.
To maintain this refusal of the only thing that constituted an alliance in Continental eyes without falling into the pit of national isolation was a difficult problem for diplomacy. Salisbury's large success in solving it during the period of his ministry was due in the main to his avoidance of exaggerated claims and his readiness not only to acquiesce in but actively to assist those of other countries wherever they were in any way admissible. Thus the
detachment which must otherwise have become a source of jealousy and suspicion was, time and again, presented in a guise attractive to the needs of other nations. England never occupied a position of greater authority in Europe than during this time, and after Bismarck's retirement in 1890 Salisbury's became the dominating figure among European statesmen.
The white invasion of Africa which signalized that decade afforded opportunity for a marked display of his capacity for international co-operation. It was a movement unique in history for the rapidity, and, it may be added, the human benefit of its achievement. But behind the inrush of explorers, mission aries and traders of all nations, had now come their Governments, whose claims—undefined and illimitable—were, by the end of the eighties, advancing to inevitable conflict. England, whether by earlier occupation or the present activity of her adventurers, was a competitor in every region, north, south, east and west, and Lord Salisbury accepted the initiative to bring order out of chaos which was thus marked out for him. He engaged in negotiations, delimitations, arbitrations, and struck the best bargains he could forhisown clients compatible with an instructed sympathy with their rivals' requirements. With an eye for a future still eight years distant he averted encroachment upon the Nile valley up to the river's source, though no Englishman had as yet set foot south of Wady Half a, and placated French enmity beforehand by a large complaisance in the west and north-west of the continent. He reasoned suavely with Italy's aspirations and sharply with Portugal's baseless obstruction to the northward advance of Cecil Rhodes' South Africans; and when England's and Germany's irreducible requirements proved incompatible, threw Heligoland into the scales in security of a peaceful settlement (June 189o). When he left office the main outlines of actual occupation and prospective "spheres of influence" had been drawn without the serious chilling of a single international relationship.
The elections of 1892 resulted in a victory for the Liberal party though with a small and unharmonious majority. Glad stone passed a bill for Home Rule and one for Welsh Disestab lishment through the House of Commons in successive sessions, but the evident want of enthusiasm in the country for either measure encouraged Salisbury, in accordance with the principle on which he acted in this connection, to invite their rejection by the House of Lords. The place of the Lords in the Constitution was to secure an appeal to the electorate but they could only wisely assert it against the House of Commons when there were sound reasons to believe that the electorate agreed with them. On this occasion his judgment proved amply justified. Parliament was dissolved in '95 and the verdict of the constituencies ratified the Lords' action by a substantial majority. Lord Salisbury again became prime minister and foreign secretary while the Liberal Unionist leaders established the fusion of the two sections of the party by joining his cabinet.