[214] And yet on the day before the Prince wrote to Aberdeen he says, in a letter to Stockmar:—“The Vienna Conferences, which it would have been better to have left open, must now be closed, if only to get the Ministry rest in Parliament. Oh, Oxenstiern! Oh, Oxenstiern!”—Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXIV.

[215] Mr. Sidney Herbert was another Peelite who resisted Prince Albert’s intimidation.

[216] Canrobert’s neglect to seize the Mamelon Hill before the Russians crept into it on the 9th of March and fortified it, was one of the fatal blunders that protracted the siege.

[217] Lord Malmesbury records a conversation in his Diary with Persigny on this point. “Persigny strongly for peace, and says France is all for it.... He says, if the Emperor is to go to the Crimea, there must be peace at any price to prevent it. If not, the war ought to go on; but if the French army is lost then there will be a revolution.”—Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 16.

[218] The War, by W. H. Russell, p. 498. London: Routledge and Co., 1855.

[219] Napoleon III. was abjectly ignorant of military geography. At the council of 1854, said Persigny to Lord Malmesbury, his Majesty “announced the attack on Baltic.” Persigny asked if he meant Cronstadt. “No, of course not, it would require 100,000 men, cavalry included,” said the Emperor, loftily. “But,” replied Persigny, “Cronstadt is an island.” “No, it is not,” said the Emperor, as he went for a map. Everything, said Persigny, was done with the same ignorance and carelessness. Yet it was a campaign—devised by this charlatan against the opinion of his best officers, that Lord Raglan, according to Sir T. Martin, approved! See Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 15.

[220] Reminiscences and opinions of Sir F. H. Doyle (Longmans, 1886), p. 414. There was a terrible snow storm in Devonshire this year. It was made memorable by the footmarks of some creature which nobody could identify. These created a sort of panic in the West of England, for the people thought that the devil was abroad among them.

[221] Letters of Sir George Cornewall Lewis, p. 295. His additional taxes were, (1), 3s. per cwt. on sugar; (2), 1d. per pound on coffee, raising the duty from 3d. to 4d.; (3), 3d. per pound on tea, raising the duty from 1s. 6d. to 1s 9d.; (4), equalisation of duty on Scotch and English spirits, bringing the former from 6s. to 7s. 10d. per gallon; (5), increase of duty on Irish spirits from 4s. to 6s; (6), increase of 2d. on Income Tax, raising it from 1s. 2d. to 1s. 4d. in the £.

[222] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXI. It was this letter that ultimately led to the founding of Netley Hospital.

[223] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXIII.

[224] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 24.

[225] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 12. Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXII.

[226] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 18. See also Times, 17th of April, 1855.

[227] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXII.

[228] Ducos was personally hostile to England, though he pretended to be in favour of the alliance. Lord Malmesbury says that he and General Changarnier were the authors of a plan in 1851 for a piratical descent on the Isle of Wight, and for seizing the Queen’s person at Osborne. See Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. I., pp. 360 and 396. General Cavaignac also thought at the time such a plan to be feasible in the event of a war with England.

[229] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXII.

[230] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 19.

[231] It was said to be composed by his mother, Queen Hortense.

[232] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXII.

[233] Vast numbers had been unable to find seats—in fact, as much as £100 was given for a box. When the curtain rose, crowds of ladies and gentlemen in evening dress were seen packed closely together at the back of the stage behind the artists—a curious revival of the old practice, in virtue of which persons of quality and rank frequented this part of the house in preference to any other. Jenny Ney played “Leonora.” It was her first performance on the English stage. Tamberlik, Formes, Tagliafico, and Luchesi took the male parts.

[234] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXII.

[235] No account of the Memorandum is given by Sir T. Martin, and probably it was a ceremonial rather than a serious document.

[236] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 20.

[237] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXII.

[238] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXV.

[239] This resort to the dreaded instruments of “personal Government” and “Court intrigue” by Palmerston was adopted after diplomatic means had failed. Mr. Greville, in the Third Part of his “Journal,” gives an amusing description of how we touted for a Portuguese alliance in these days.

[240] It is not generally known that “Old Jérôme” really caused the Emperor to abandon his intention of going to the Crimea. Every argument pressed by his Ministers and the Queen failed to shake his determination. Part of his plan was to make Jérôme not Regent, but Chief of the Council of Ministers in his absence. The Ministers artfully persuaded Jérôme, who was a vain man, to refuse this office unless he were vested with the same despotic power as the Emperor. This frightened the Emperor, and he immediately gave up his Crimean expedition. See a conversation between Lord Cowley and Mr. Greville in the Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. I., p. 263 (Longmans), 1887.

[241] Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. I, pp. 283-286.

[242] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXVII.

[243] They crossed over from France on the 28th of August. Mr. Greville says, “While they were in the yacht crossing over, Prince Albert had told him (Clarendon) that there was not a word of truth in the prevailing report and belief that the young Prince of Prussia and the Princess Royal are fiancés, that nothing had ever passed between the parents on the subject, and that the union never would take place unless the children should become attached to each other.”—Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. I., p. 287. On the 13th of September, however, Prince Albert writes to Stockmar, saying, “I have received a very friendly letter from the Princess of Prussia.” In this letter the Princess (now Empress of Germany) intimated the fact that her son came with the consent of his parents and the King of Prussia to sue for the hand of the Princess Royal.

[244] The Crown Prince of Germany—A Diary. London (Sampson Low), 1886.

[245] “The Officer in command is directed to arrange times so that the Prince may have ample opportunities of becoming acquainted with such various matters as horseshoeing, fencing, vaulting, limbering and unlimbering guns, and stable work, as well as the routine of lessons and singing in the schools.”—Extract from Von Griesheim’s Instructions. The Crown Prince of Germany—A Diary, p. 24.

[246] The Crown Prince of Germany—A Diary, p. 28.

[247] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXVIII.

[248] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 37.

[249] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 38.

[250] It is now known that Cavour suggested that Austria might be asked to retire from that part of Papal territory which she occupied.

[251] Greville Memoirs, Third Part, p. 303.

[252] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol II., p. 38.

[253] “Exclusive of officers who have come back by reason of wounds, sickness, or promotion to the depôt battalions, only thirty-three out of an army of 52,000 men have come home on private affairs.”—Letter of Prince Albert to the Prince of Prussia. Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXIX.

[254] See a curious letter on this subject from Colonel Hope, V.C., in the Daily Chronicle of 14th September, 1886, and a note appended to it from the pen of the Editor of that newspaper.

[255] Simpson was bitterly blamed for not asking Campbell’s Division of Guards and Highlanders, who were picked and seasoned soldiers, to assault in the first instance. Campbell, however, though he often exacted cruel sacrifices from his men, was parsimonious of blood, and it was said in the camp that he refused to attack till he had time to make the necessary preparations. Then he observed, grimly, he would not “attack, but ‘tak’ he Redan.” Codrington seems to have imagined that there was no need for all this caution. He attacked, but did not take, the fortress; in fact, to take it on his plan was an utter impossibility.

[256] That was partly due to the fact that our trenches were 200 yards from the Redan. This space was enfiladed by a murderous fire when crossed by the stormers. The French, 20,000 strong, were only 20 yards from the Malakoff. Simpson’s excuse for hastening the attack instead of pushing the trenches closer was that every day the French were losing 200 and we 60 men in the trenches.

[257] The Duke of Newcastle, who had gone to the seat of war to examine affairs on the spot, in a letter to Clarendon, says that Simpson seemed “never to be doing but always mooning. He has no plan, no opinion, no hope but from the chapter of accidents.” He thought Pélissier just as incompetent. “I believe,” he adds, “Pélissier’s officers have no confidence in him, and I know his soldiers dislike him.” Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXVII. The Sardinian De La Marmora was the only one of the Allied Commanders-in-Chief who had any marked ability.

[258] So the Russians afterwards said. This plan was proposed by Sir E. Lyons, but Pélissier laughed scornfully in his face when he suggested it, and poor Simpson, as usual, concurred with Pélissier.

[259] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXVIII.

[260] Evelyn Ashley’s Life of Lord Palmerston, Vol. II., p. 322.

[261] The excuse for the Franco-Austrian intrigue was that the rejection of the terms by Russia bound Austria to join France and England in going on with the war. But of course Austria had taken pains to find out what terms Russia would accept before she gave her pledge, so that she never had the remotest intention of fighting on our side. As for the terms they were, as Mr. Greville puts it, but a second edition of the proposals which we had rejected at the Vienna Conference. There was, says Mr. Greville, this difference: “while on the last occasion the Emperor knocked under to us and reluctantly agreed to go on with the war, he is now determined to go on with it no longer, and requires that we should defer to his wishes.”—Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. I., p. 297.

[262] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXVIII.

[263] Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. I., p. 310.

[264] Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. I., p. 315.

[265] Sir G. C. Lewis’s Letters, p. 309.

[266] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 37.

[267] Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXX. Sir Theodore, when he penned this, had not seen Mr. Disraeli’s cynical letter to Lord Malmesbury, otherwise he would probably not have added “such generosity among statesmen may always be counted on as a matter of course.”

[268] This was a nickname which Serjeant Hayes had stuck to Parke on account of his prejudice in favour of fossilised forms and precedents.—Life of Lord Campbell, Vol. II., p. 388.

[269] Life of Lord Campbell, Vol. II., p. 340.

[270] Mr. Babbage, Dr. Lyon Playfair, and Sir R. Murchison, it was said, were to be the first batch of life scientific peers.

[271] Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. II., p. 51.

[272] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 43.

[273] Mr. Greville, writing on March 9, says, “Called on Achille Fould, who introduced me to Magne, Minister of Finance, said to be a great rogue. Everything here is intrigue and jobbery, and I am told there is a sort of gang, of which Morny is the chief, who all combine for their own purpose and advantage: Morny, Fould, Magne, and Rouher, Minister of Commerce. They now want to get out Billault, Minister of the Interior, whom they cannot entirely manage, and that minister is necessary to them on account of the railways, which are under his management.” Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. II., p. 31. At a party at Lord Holland’s house in Paris, where a great many aristocratic ladies were present, Mr. Greville says that when MM. de Flahault and Morny were announced, “the women all jumped up like a covey of partridges and walked out of the room, without taking any notice of the men.”

[274] The Treaty of Paris was signed on Sunday, March 30. Each of the fourteen plenipotentiaries originally intended to keep the pen with which he signed it as a memento of the occasion. They, however, yielded to the request of the Empress Eugenie, who begged that only one pen should be used, which should be retained by her as a souvenir. Only one was accordingly used. It was a quill plucked from an eagle’s wing, and richly mounted with gold and jewels.

[275] In 1870 the neutrality of the Black Sea was abandoned—Russia having declared she would no longer respect the Treaty on that point. After the last Russo-Turkish war, Russia took back Bessarabia. The “Declarations,” in fact, are the only portions of the Treaty that remain in force.

[276] History of England, Vol. V., p. 143.

[277] Correspondence of A. de Tocqueville with Mr. Nassau Senior, Vol. II., pp. 99, 101.

[278] This refers to Lord Malmesbury’s attack in the House of Lords on the Treaty of Peace.

[279] Continuing a year after this, Lord Malmesbury records his impressions of a conversation with Lady Ely on the famous “happy family” dinner of 1856. He says, “It looks as if her Majesty made up the dinner of these discordant materials for fun, and, from the same malice, made me take Lady Clarendon to dinner, as it was only two days after I had attacked Lord Clarendon in the House of Lords, and Lady Clarendon would not speak to me at first, but I ended by making her laugh. The Queen, who was opposite, was highly amused, and could hardly help laughing when Lady Clarendon at first would not answer me.”—Memoirs of an ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 67.

[280] Nobody regretted this, for they created a host of highly-paid place-holders. Mr. Disraeli declared that these measures were at first supposed to be an ingenious means of compensating Ireland for the failure of the Tipperary Bank.

[281] Greville Memoirs, Third Part. Vol. II., pp. 42-45.

[282] A few days before this event, on the 10th inst., the Royal Nursery was robbed. The Royal Household is, of course, under the control of the Lord Steward. One of his sub-departments is called “The Silver Pantry,” which has three yeomen, one groom, and six assistants attached to it. Yet, when the nursery plate had to be sent to Windsor, these gorgeous functionaries, with their staff of porters, horses, grooms, and carts, could not condescend to convey it. It was trusted to a common carrier, who unhappily, when on his way, stopped at a public-house for refreshments. He and his men were “only absent for five minutes,” but in that time a light spring cart had driven up to the carrier’s waggon, and when it drove away, the box containing the Royal nursery plate had vanished. The plate chest was found in Bonner’s Fields containing everything but the bullion. The knife-blades and packing, which latter consisted of women’s dresses, were found, but the plate was never traced.

[283] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXXII.

[284] De Lacy Evans’ proposal was referred to a mixed Commission of civilians and military men.

[285] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXXII.

[286] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 49.

[287] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXXII.

[288] When the frontier was drawn, Count Orloff said to Lord Clarendon that he should take it as a favour if he would draw it a little farther south so as to include Bolgrad, which was the capital of some Russian military colonies in which the Czar was greatly interested. This was done as a matter of courtesy to the Czar, Orloff pointing to the position of Bolgrad on the map—a French map—and showing that it was such a long way from Lake Jalpuk, that the concession did not give Russia access to a Moldavian lake on which she might, perchance, one day build a threatening flotilla. After the Treaty was signed, it turned out that the place marked as Bolgrad on the French map was really Tabak, and that Bolgrad was actually far to the south of it, on the northern shore of Lake Jalpuk. The Russians therefore, insisting on the letter of the Treaty, claimed Bolgrad, on the left shore of the lake, leaving the right shore to Moldavia.

[289] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 50.

[290] Lowe’s Bismarck, Vol. I., p. 218.

[291] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXXIII.

[292] The French Emperor was pledged to support Russia against us. But after his return from Biarritz, he found political parties were using his disagreement with England to weaken the Anglo-French alliance, and discredit his foreign policy. The secret history of the transaction, however, was not creditable to Palmerstonian diplomacy. Lord Malmesbury writes on the 21st of November, “Persigny told me Walewski is in disgrace. The difficulty about Bolgrad and the Isle of Serpents arises from the Emperor having been entrapped into a promise by the Russians; but Persigny has suggested a solution, which has been accepted by the Emperor and our Government, namely, a Congress, which is to assemble, into which Sardinia is to be admitted, on condition of voting against Russia. Austria goes with England, and Prussia is of course excluded. This gives England a majority, and the Emperor an excuse for giving way.”—Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II, p. 53. Lord Clarendon, had, up till the beginning of December, refused to submit the dispute to a Congress, for the point which Russia raised about Bolgrad was simply a point of obvious chicanery which it was beneath the dignity of England to debate. Lord Palmerston and he yielded, however, and, as Mr. Greville says scornfully, by “this dodge saved us.”—Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. II., p. 68.

[293] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 55.

[294] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 58. See also Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. II., p. 69.

[295] The Duke of Beaufort and eighty Members of the Lower House, however, threatened to leave the Party if places in a Tory Government were given to the Peelites.—Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 57.

[296] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXXV.

[297] On the estimate of expenditure and revenue for 1856-1857 there was a deficit of £10,000,000. To meet this Sir George Lewis had borrowed £7,499,000, and he had raised £1,000,000 in Exchequer Bills. The total receipts from all sources, said Sir George Lewis in his Statement (Annual Register, Vol. XCIX., p. 29), would, when the financial year closed, be £79,384,000, and the expenditure £78,000,000, leaving a surplus of £1,384,000. This was a wrong calculation. The net income of the year was £75,569,575, or, after deductions, £72,963,151, showing a deficit on the expenditure of the year of £3,254,604. For the coming year, 1857-1858, Sir George estimated his expenditure at £63,224,000, to which £2,000,000 had to be added for the service of war loans. The revenue he estimated at £66,365,000; so that he expected a surplus of £891,000.

[298] Quite apart from the cost of the Crimean War, Mr. Gladstone showed that £6,000,000 had been added to the ordinary expenditure of the country during the four years ending 1856-1857.

[299] Of course, Lord Beaconsfield before he died educated the Foreign Office up to the truth, which is, that “the key of India” is held in London—and that the defensible gates of India are those on our frontier which we can protect by our arms. But the amazing thing is that when the Foreign Office did believe that Herat was the “key of India,” they never would let it be held by a Power which, like Persia, was strong enough to keep it safe with British help. Persia was the natural ally of England against Russia. But every effort of the Indian Government to conciliate Persia has been thwarted by the Foreign Office. Since we abandoned her for the sake of the Russian alliance against Napoleon I., the English Foreign Office has exhausted the resources of its diplomacy in betraying, browbeating, and irritating her. And yet it is a fact, that without the goodwill of Persia, which enabled Russia to draw supplies from “the golden province of Khorassan,” Russia could never have marched from the Caspian to the gates of Merv.

[300] Correspondence respecting relations with Persia, Parliamentary Papers, 1857, pp. 21-39.

[301] This story of diplomatic blundering is told in the speeches of Mr. Layard and Lord Palmerston. Hansard, Vol. CXL., pp. 1717-1722.

[302] Papers respecting Persia, p. 211.

[303] India under Lord Canning, by the Duke of Argyll, p. 72. See also 21 and 22 Vict., c. 106, Section 55. Lord Beaconsfield made another attempt to evade this section by bringing Indian troops to Malta during the Russo-Turkish War in 1877.

[304] Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. II., p. 93.

[305] Life of Cobden, Chap. XXIV.

[306] The vote was 247 for, and 263 against, the Ministry. See Cobden’s Speeches, Vol. II., pp. 121-156, for his indictment.

[307] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 63. Mr. Greville declares that Lord Derby and Mr. Disraeli had “made up their minds to coalesce with Gladstone and the Peelites on the first opportunity.”—Greville Memoirs, Third Part. Vol. II., p. 93. Lord Malmesbury says that at a private meeting of the Tory Party on the 4th of March, Lord Derby denied that he had coalesced with Mr. Gladstone, but refused to be dictated to by any member of the party as to “the course he should pursue with regard to any political personages whatever,” a declaration which was loudly cheered. The general opinion was that such a coalition, though the Tory leaders favoured it, would have split up the Tory Party.

[308] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 64. Note that the attitude of the Peelites to the Tory Party curiously resembled that of the Liberal Unionists in 1887.

[309] Correspondence of Abraham Hayward, Q.C., from 1814 to 1844. Edited by Henry E. Carlisle. 2 Vols. London, Murray, 1886.

[310] Life of Cobden, Chap. XXIV.

[311] Annual Summary of the Times for 1857. On the 24th of February, 1858, the Tories formed, Lord Derby’s second Government.

[312] Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. II., p. 99.

[313] Lord Derby had shrunk from carrying on the Crimean War when Lord Aberdeen resigned.

[314] Even new Tory candidates, when they saw how the current of public opinion was setting, began to beg support by saying that if they had been in the House when the China vote was taken, they would have voted for Lord Palmerston.—See Greville Memoirs, Vol. II., p. 100.

[315] Correspondence of Abraham Hayward, Q.C., Vol. I., pp. 312, 313.

[316] Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXXV. On the 5th of March, 1858, he writes to Stockmar:—“Lord Palmerston’s sudden decline in popularity was a remarkable phenomenon.”—Martin’s Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. LXXXIV.

[317] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. II., p. 70.

[318] This was one of the first recorded cases of “obstruction” in the modern sense of the word. Mr. Parnell used, at one time, to justify his tactics by citing as a precedent Mr. Gladstone’s opposition to the Divorce Bill.

[319] That no such distinction should be made is the view which seems to be gaining ground now. The French Chamber adopted it in their Divorce Bill of 1886, and it has been adopted in the law of Scotland, where, as in France, paramours are not permitted to marry after divorce is granted. In England the marriage of paramours, outside the forbidden degrees of affinity and consanguinity, strongly condemned by Bishop Wilberforce in the debates on the Divorce Bill, is permissible. Though, as a concession to Wilberforce and his followers, it was enacted that a clergyman might refuse to perform the ceremony, the concession did not satisfy anybody.—See Life of Wilberforce, Vol. II., pp. 343-347.

[320] Life of Lord Campbell, Vol. II., p. 351.

[321] Life of Lord Campbell, Vol. II., p. 353.

[322] Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. II., p. 3.