Tuesday, 16 February: […] Baillie came on with a motion on the Mutinies. Palmerston appealed to him to give way. Baillie seemed to be replying to the appeal and all were looking for his withdrawal, when he at once slid into his subject. (General titter.) Members go to dinner.

8.20. Came down & found Baillie had done, and Lord John defending Dalhousie. Oude for 55 years systematically broke treaties with us. Want of prudence: — not enough troops in Oudh to tread out opposition. Govt. shd. not have denuded India for Persian war. He did not like the Russian war — but if the war were wise — more troops should have been sent. Dissertation on the vain phantom of ‘prestige’, which had ruined Napoleon at Moscow. This, too, we have been following in some of our Eastern wars.