After having unsuccessfully contested Hertford in 1826, Bulwer joined the Diplomatic Service in 1827 and was sent to Berlin in August that year, to Vienna in April 1829 and then to The Hague in April 1830. In July 1830, he entered the House of Commons as MP for the rotten borough of Wilton and was sent to Brussels the following month to report on the Belgian Revolution. A year later, he was returned for Coventry, again in 1833, then for Marylebone in 1835. That year, Bulwer planned to join General Evans, who was raising a legion to help Isabella II of Spain in the First Carlist War, but was instead sent back to the newly independent Belgium as secretary of legation. When a general election was called two years later on the death of William IV, Bulwer decided not to contest his current seat for Marylebone and after having commuted between Parliament and his diplomatics posts for seven years, decided to become a full-time diplomat and was sent to Constantinople.