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Fortunately for the government, the Tories did not mind castigating Russell for his handling of the Northerners, but they had no desire to be seen as the defenders of slavery, or of rebellion.34 Nor were they by any means confident that their party had enough support in the House for a change of ministry.35 Confronted by the possibility of a change in government, Charles Francis Adams decided that he preferred Palmerston to survive. Adams still attended Lady Palmerston’s weekly parties with gritted teeth, but the sight of the eighty-year-old prime minister standing jauntily at the top of the grand staircase no longer oppressed him.

Adams’s usual cynicism about British politics was in partial abeyance owing to a happy family event. Charles Francis Adams, Jr., had at last taken his furlough and come to England. The term of the 1st Massachusetts Cavalry had expired at the end of 1863, but Charles had encouraged his company to follow his example and reenlist. “They seem to think that I am a devil of a fellow,” he wrote. “These men don’t care for me personally. They think me cold, reserved and formal. They feel no affection for me, but they do believe in me, they have faith in my power of accomplishing results and in my integrity.”36

Benjamin Moran envied Charles Francis Jr.’s assured deportment. “He is a sturdy weather tanned man of about 30 years—stout and strong with a bald head; and is a good deal taller than either his father or his brother Henry [and] is coming to Europe to dip into English society,” he wrote in his diary. Moran’s hope that it would only be a little dip was soon dashed. “Mr. Adams can’t introduce his secretaries to their rights,” he thundered, “but he and his wife go out of their way to stuff their son into every possible house in London, when he really has no business there.”37 At a party given by Lady de Grey, Moran sidled up to a crowd that included the poet Robert Browning and the artist John Everett Millais. “When, Lo! Mrs. Adams appeared forcing her way through followed by the Captain at her apron string. I was disgusted,” he wrote. “She was in her element and talked as loud and vulgarly as ever. Holding her finger up and shaking it towards him, she said, ‘here Charley, here, here,’ and on his joining her presented him to Browning and Tom Hughes [the author of Tom Brown’s Schooldays]…. I got out of the way and went down stairs.”38

Moran was outraged when “the Captain” failed to pay a visit to the legation offices. “He is pure Adams,” Moran wrote spitefully. But his opportunity for revenge on the family came sooner than he expected. Charles Francis Adams wished to take both his sons to the Queen’s levee on March 2. “This morning,” wrote Moran on March 1, “Mr. H. B. Adams came into the Legation and rather insolently insisted that he was entitled to outrank us at Court.” Henry ought to have known that Moran would not allow a threat to his rank as assistant secretary to pass unchallenged. As a mere private secretary, Henry had no official rank.

“I even questioned the propriety of his going to Court at all—to say nothing about his right,” recorded Moran. With extraordinary timing, Sir Edward Cust, the Queen’s Master of Ceremonies, called at the legation at the height of the argument and confirmed that the right of attendance was extended only to daughters of ministers, not to sons or private secretaries. Naturally, exceptions were allowed, but unofficial private secretaries such as Henry Adams would certainly be ranked behind the last attaché or assistant secretary. Moran had been waiting to hear this ever since Henry’s arrival. The look of triumph on the secretary’s face was too much for Henry, and he swore never to go to court again. “I don’t think anyone will regret that decision,” wrote Moran smugly.39

Shortly after the altercation with Moran, Henry and Charles Francis Jr. left for Paris, “a city for pleasure,” wrote Charles Francis Jr.40 The brothers took every advantage