The unique personal ascendancy of Gladstone went far towards masking many of the shortcomings and internal tensions of the party he led for so long and in so distinctively personal a style. It was, then, perhaps inevitable that the legacy of Gladstonian Liberalism should be the post-Gladstonian Liberal party. It was exceedingly difficult in the 1890s to strike a resounding positive note about Liberal virtues. The proprietor of the Manchester Guardian was reduced to entering minor caveats over the derisive remarks of the Liberal front-bencher Reid which had been reported to him – ‘Do you not think he exaggerates matters when he speaks of the party in the House as money combined with intrigue? Of course, the party is practically leaderless and we know how the sheep wander without a shepherd?’ The leadership issue was certainly a recurrent problem, but hardly more than one aspect of a more general malaise. There was a marked predisposition towards abdication on the part of all the men whom Gladstone's mantle might have draped.