Chapter V: Part 5

It was Sir Garnet’s good fortune not to bring his enterprise to an end without the rounding off of complete success. The return march of the British troops towards the coast commenced on the 6th. At Fommanah, where the General halted for four days, he was again visited by envoys from Koffee Calcalli, bearing in their hands a thousand ounces of gold, and asking for a draft of the treaty, to be signed forthwith by the defeated monarch. The draft was accordingly given to them, and was actually signed a month later. What had brought the King to this tardy and, as it would seem, unnecessary submission now that Wolseley had done his worst, and was retreating? It was the march of Captain Glover that had occasioned the step. That officer, working up from the East, with troops drawn from the native tribes of the Akims, Yorubas, and Houssas--between three thousand and four thousand in number--had arrived within eighteen miles of Coomassie, when he heard of the capture and destruction of the place. His difficulties had been great. Many of the men with whom he originally set out had deserted, and he had failed to make the junction with Wolseley, which, had it taken place a few days earlier, must have crushed the foe effectually. Nevertheless, his advance had operated as a useful diversion on the left of the Ashantee forces; and when he, too, arrived near the ruined city, the monarch’s spirit altogether left him. Thinking that some of the British forces might still be in Coomassie, Glover sent on Captain Reginald Sartorius with twenty men to reconnoitre. Then occurred one of the most dashing exploits of the war. Sartorius found the capital deserted. None of the inhabitants had returned to try and secure their property, or view their burned homesteads. But they might be lurking anywhere--in fact, Sartorius heard that the King and his attendants were near at hand, weeping over the ruins of Coomassie. With his little band of twenty men, Sartorius rode boldly through the deserted precincts, and then onwards through fifty miles of hostile territory, to join the British army, passing one burnt village after another, but not meeting any human form till, at Fommanah, they came up with the main body of Sir Garnet’s forces. Captain Glover followed in the track of Sartorius first to Coomassie and then to Fommanah.

The treaty, finally signed by King Koffee Calcalli, stipulated that he should renounce all rights of Protectorate over the petty monarchs in alliance with the British Queen, and formerly tributary to the kingdom of Ashantee; also over any of the tribes formerly connected with the Dutch Government on the Gold Coast; that free trade should be permitted between Ashantee and the British ports; that the road between Coomassie and the Prah should always be kept open; that the King should use his best efforts to check the practice of human sacrifice; and that he should pay in instalments a war indemnity of 50,000 ounces of approved gold, beginning with 1,000 ounces forthwith.

The cost of the war to the British Government was estimated at 900,000 pounds sterling. To Sir Garnet Wolseley, who declined titular honours, a sum of 25,000 pounds was awarded in recognition of his services.

FUNERAL OF DR. LIVINGSTONE (1874).

=Source.=--_Punch_, April 25, 1874. (Reprinted by the special permission of the proprietors of _Punch_.)

DAVID LIVINGSTONE, DIED ON THE SHORES OF LAKE BEMBA, MAY 4, 1873; BURIED IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY, APRIL 18, 1874.

Droop half-mast colours, bow, bareheaded crowds
As this plain coffin o’er the side is slung,
To pass by woods of masts and ratlined shrouds
As erst by Afric’s trunks, liana-hung.

’Tis the last mile of many thousands trod
With failing strength but never-failing will
By the worn frame, now at its rest with God,
That never rested from its fight with ill.

Or if the ache of travel and of toil
Would sometimes wring a short, sharp cry of pain
From agony of fever, blain, and boil,
’Twas but to crush it down, and on again.

He knew not that the trumpet he had blown
Out of the darkness of that dismal land,
Had reached and roused an army of its own
To strike the chains from the slave’s fettered hand.

Now we believe he knows, sees all is well;
How God had stayed his will and shaped his way,
To bring the light to those that darkling dwell
With gains that life’s devotion will repay.

Open the Abbey door and bear him in
To sleep with King and statesman, chief and sage,
The missionary come of weaver-kin,
But great by work that brooks no lower wage.

He needs no epitaph to guard a name
Which men shall prize while worthy work is known
He lived and died for good--be that his fame;
Let marble crumble: this is Living-stone.

DISRAELI ON PARTIES IN THE CHURCH (1874).

=Source.=--_Hansard_, “Debates,” vol. 221, p. 78.

_Speech on Public Worship Regulation Bill._

I look upon the existence of parties in the Church as a necessary and beneficial consequence. They have always existed even from Apostolic times; they are a natural development of the religious sentiment in man; and they represent fairly the different conclusions at which, upon subjects that are the most precious to him, the mind of man arrives. Ceremony, enthusiasm, and free speculation are the characteristics of the three great parties in the Church, some of which have modern names, and which the world is too apt to imagine are in their character original. The truth is that they have always existed in different forms or under different titles. Whether they are called High Church or Low Church or Broad Church, they bear witness, in their legitimate bounds, to the activity of the religious mind of the nation, and in the course of our history this country is deeply indebted to the exertions and the energy of all those parties. The High Church party, totally irrespective of its religious sentiment, fills a noble page in the history of England, for it has vindicated the liberties of this country in a memorable manner; no language of mine can describe the benefits which this country has experienced from the exertions of the Evangelical school at the commencement of this century; and in the case of the Broad Church it is well that a learned and highly disciplined section of the clergy should show at the present day that they are not afraid of speculative thought, or are appalled by the discoveries of science. I hold that all these schools of religious feeling can pursue their instincts consistently with a faithful adherence to the principles and practices of the Reformation as exhibited and represented in its fairest and most complete form--the Church of England. I must ask myself, What then, sir, is the real object of the Bill? and I will not attempt to conceal my impressions upon it, for I do not think that our ability to arrive at a wise decision to-day will be at all assisted by a mystical dissertation on the subject-matter of it. I take the primary object of this Bill, whose powers, if it be enacted, will be applied and extended impartially to all subjects of Her Majesty, to be this--to put down Ritualism. The right hon. gentleman the Member for Greenwich [Mr. Gladstone] says he does not know what Ritualism is, but there I think the right hon. gentleman is in an isolated position. That ignorance is not shared by the House of Commons or by the country. What the House and the country understand by Ritualism is--practices of a portion of the clergy, avowedly symbolic of doctrines, which the same clergy are bound in the most solemn manner to refute and repudiate. Therefore, I think there can be no mistake among practical men as to what is meant when we say that it is our desire to discourage Ritualism....

Believing as I do that those principles [those of the Reformation] were never so completely and so powerfully represented as by the Church of England; believing that without the authority, the learning, the wealth, and the independence of the Church of England, the various sects of the Reformation would by this time have dwindled into nothing, I called the attention of the country, so far as I could, to the importance of rallying around the institution of the Church of England, based upon those principles of the Reformation which that Church was called into being to represent.... I wish most sincerely that all should understand that, if I make the slightest allusion to the dogmas and ceremonies which are promulgated by the English Ritualists, I am anxious not to make a single observation which could offend the convictions of any hon. gentleman in this House. Whether those doctrines which were quoted from authoritative writings apply to the worship of the Virgin, to the Confessional, or to the various subjects which were quoted by the hon. Member, so long as those doctrines are held by Roman Catholics, I am prepared to treat them with reverence; but what I object to is that they should be held by Ministers of our Church, who, when they enter the Church, enter it at the same time with a solemn contract with the nation that they will oppose those doctrines and utterly resist them. What I do object to is Mass in masquerade. To the solemn ceremonies of our Roman Catholic friends I am prepared to extend that reverence which my mind and conscience always give to religious ceremonies sincerely believed in; but the false position in which we have been placed by, I believe, a small but a powerful and well-organised body of those who call themselves English clergymen in copying these ceremonies, is one which the country thinks intolerable, and of which we ought to rid ourselves.

THE ARCTIC EXPEDITION (1875).

=Source.=--_Annual Register, 1875_; _Public Documents_, pp. 214, 215.

LETTERS FROM THE CAPTAINS.

_No. 1._

H.M.S. “DISCOVERY,”
AT SEA

(Lat. 64° 43´ N.; long. 52° 52´ W.),
_July 2, 1875._

SIR,--

I have the honour to inform you since parting company with H.M.S. _Alert_ on the night of June 13, during a heavy westerly gale, I made the best of my way to rendezvous 4, 5, and 6, in accordance with your instructions to Captain Jones of H.M.S. _Valorous_, a copy of which you forwarded for my guidance.

On the afternoon of the 13th, at 3 p.m., while still in company, a heavy sea struck the starboard whale-boat (waist), and, detaching the foremost fall, the boat filled, and in swinging round was cut in half by the stay of the after-davit, which necessitated her being cut away. We experienced strong westerly breezes and head winds until we rounded Cape Farewell on Sunday, June 27. On the morning of the 28th, we made the land about Cape Desolation ahead, and fell in with the land ice and some bergs. We tacked on the edge of the ice, and stood to the north-west. On the 29th (lat. 61° N., long. 50° 43´ W.), during the morning, we steamed through a quantity of loose sailing ice. A strong breeze springing up from the eastward towards the afternoon, which freshened to a gale from the northward, obliged us to stand off the land amongst a great quantity of heavy field ice, after laying to during the night, under close-reefed topsails, and occasionally nearing to avoid the driving pack, which was going to the southward in heavy streams at the rate of two or three knots. Some of the ice, however, was loose enough to be sailed through, and, there being no opening into clear water, I got up steam on the morning of the 30th, and, under close-reefed topsails and reefed courses, beat to windward through it, with the object of reaching the land water. The weather moderating, this was accomplished in the evening of the same day, having passed through some heavy pack ice. On the 1st instant, we again steamed through some large fields of sailing ice. When abreast of Goathaab, on the 2nd instant, at 7 p.m., we sighted the _Alert_, and closed this morning, as per signal. With the exception of the loss of the one boat before mentioned, I have no defects or damage to report, and have the honour to enclose a copy of the ship’s log from June 13 to the 1st instant.

I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
H. F. STEPHENSON,
_Captain_.

_No. 2._

“ALERT,”
AT DISCO,
_July 15, 1875_

SIR,--

I have the honour to inform you that H.M. ships under my command left Bantry Bay on June 2. The _Valorous_ arrived at this port on the 4th, and the _Alert_ and _Discovery_ on the 6th instant. After leaving the Irish coast, finding that the _Valorous_ could not keep station while we were under sail alone, I directed her to part company, and make her voyage independently. During the passage we encountered three consecutive gales from the westward, and after passing Cape Farewell one from the northward, each accompanied with high seas. Owing to the heavy lading of the Arctic ships they were extremely wet and uneasy, which necessitated the hatchways to be frequently battened down; otherwise they behaved well. The _Alert_ and _Discovery_ each lost a whale-boat during a heavy gale on June 13; beyond this loss I am happy to say that the defects of the ships are merely nominal. The _Valorous_ will supply two boats to replace those lost. On the night of June 13 (while the _Alert_ was wearing) the _Discovery_ was lost sight of during a heavy squall, and the two ships did not again join company until the 30th, in Davis Strait. The _Valorous_ having economised her coal as much as possible, has been able to complete each of the Arctic ships with as much as they can carry, and has remaining for her return voyage a quantity equal to that expended during her outward voyage. All the provisions and stores brought here by the _Valorous_ for our use have been taken aboard, and we are now complete in all respects for three years from July 1, 1875.

After passing Cape Farewell, each ship fell in with loose pack ice from fifty to sixty miles south-west of Cape Desolation, with a clear sea to the westward of it--it was the débris of very thick ice, and had evidently been carried round Cape Farewell, from the east coast of Greenland. The ice extended north as far as latitude 62° 30´, since which none has been sighted within sixty miles of the coast; there has also been a remarkable absence of icebergs.

Mr. Krarup Smith, the inspector of North Greenland, and the other Danish officials have been extremely obliging in giving me every information in their power, and in providing for our wants. Mr. Smith has arranged for my being supplied with all the dogs we require. Twenty-five have been received from Disco, and twenty are to be ready on our arrival at Ritenberk; the rest will be taken on board at Uppernivik. An Esquimaux accompanies the expedition from Disco, and I think it probable that Hans, who was in the _Polaris_ with Captain Hall, and is now at Proven, will also be willing to join me. I would respectfully suggest that Mr. Smith should be officially thanked for his ready compliance with all our requirements, and his courteous behaviour.

Finding that it was absolutely necessary that at least one Assistant-Paymaster should accompany the expedition, I have ordered Mr. Thomas Mitchell of the _Discovery_ to remain on board that ship to superintend the victualling of the two vessels. I have ordered Mr. George Egerton, sub-Lieutenant of the _Alert_, to take charge of the provisions of this ship, with the same remuneration as the officer in charge of stores received.

I leave this port for Ritenberk to-morrow, and intend to call at Proven and Uppernivik on my passage north. Letters will be left at the latter settlement for conveyance to Europe, via Copenhagen. It is reported that the last winter has been mild in this neighbourhood, but the spring very backward, which I trust will prove to have been caused by the early break-up of the ice farther to the north.

The health of the expedition is excellent. There is no one sick on board either vessel, and the utmost hope and enthusiasm for the success of the work allotted to us prevails.

In the orders for the guidance of the expedition it is directed that documents are to be deposited due north of the cairn marking their position. As a mistake might arise in calculating the variation of the compass, I have issued directions that the documents are to be deposited magnetic north, and twenty feet magnetic north of the cairns.

During my stay at Disco I inspected the store of provisions belonging to the American Government, but had not time to open any of the packages to ascertain if the contents were in good order, but from the appearance of the outside, I should expect them to be in a fair state of preservation, considering the time they had been exposed. The store is dry and each package is clear of the ground. As the United States Government may like to know what is in the store, I enclose a nominal list of the packages obtained from the Danish officials and inspected by the officers of this ship. The former have taken great trouble to prevent the stores deteriorating.

I have the honour to enclose a copy of the log and track-chart of H.M.S. _Alert_ and proceedings of H.M.S. _Discovery_, while absent from June 13 to July 1, 1875.

I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
J. S. NARES,
_Captain_.

PURCHASE OF THE SUEZ CANAL SHARES: AN OPPOSITION VIEW (1875).

=Source.=--_Annual Register, 1875_; _English History_, pp. 123–125.

“You will expect,” said Sir William Harcourt at Oxford, on December 30, “that I should say something to you on the subject of the Suez Canal shares. Well, that is a matter on which no prudent politician in our present state of information will hazard a competent opinion. At the same time, after all that has been said on the matter, to be wholly silent would be an affectation of reserve. For my part, if the matter had been allowed to remain in the regions of high policy, I should have been content to abstain from criticising it altogether. I am not unfavourable to a far-seeing and a bold policy in the conduct of great affairs. We have had somewhat too little of that spirit of late. But all reticence upon that score is at an end. The most contradictory and, in some respects, the most absurd surmises with respect to this transaction were afloat some weeks ago. Lord Hartington, at the beginning of this month, invited a declaration from the Government of the real meaning and object of their policy, and Lord Derby accepted the challenge with perfect frankness. Since the speech of the Foreign Secretary the whole aspect of the question has been completely changed both at home and abroad. Up to that time a sort of glamour had invested a very plain business with the unnatural haze that distorts the true proportion of things. There was something Asiatic in this mysterious melodrama. It was like ‘The Thousand and One Nights,’ when, in the midst of the fumes of incense, a shadowy Genie astonished the bewildered spectators. The public mind was dazzled, fascinated, mystified. We had done we did not know exactly what--we were not told precisely why--_omne ignotum pro magnifico_. The Government maintained an imposing and perplexing silence. But our daily and weekly instructors gave free rein to their imagination. We were told by those who assumed the patronage of the grand arcanum that a great blow had been struck, that a new policy had been inaugurated, and that England had at length resumed her lead among the nations. The Eastern Question had been settled by a _coup d’état_ on the Stock Exchange, and Turkey was abandoned to her fate. Egypt was annexed. The Bulls of England had vanquished the Bears of Russia. Moab was to be our washpot and over Edom we had cast our shoe. France and M. de Lesseps were confounded. We were a very great people; we had done a very big thing, and, to consummate the achievement, a Satrap from Shoreham, attended by a plump of financial Janissaries, was despatched to administer the subject provinces of the English protectorate on the Nile. All this, if somewhat nebulous, was in the grand manner, and if any inquisitive person, like the troublesome little boy on the field of Blenheim, was disposed to ask ‘what good came of it at last,’ we could always answer, like the judicious Kasper--

“‘Why, that I cannot tell,’ said he,
‘But ’twas a glorious victory.’

“We all of us felt some six inches taller than before. We spread our tails like peacocks to the sun, and were as pleased as children at our soap-bubble, iridescent with many hues. But, all of a sudden, this beautiful vision melted away; the Egyptian mirage evaporated; the great political phantasmagoria faded like a dissolving view. There is nothing so delightful as magic, until, in an unhappy moment, the conjuror consents to reveal the apparatus to us by which our senses have been deluded, and shows us how it is done. Lord Derby is a great master of prose, and he has translated the Eastern romance into most pedestrian English. But the Foreign Secretary is a responsible statesman. He has widely warned us against ‘cant’ and against ‘rant,’ and he cannot afford to indulge in the exaggerated visions in which journalists may, with impunity, amuse themselves and their readers. It was not his affair to mystify England, but to reassure Europe; and therefore with that straightforwardness and common sense for which he is eminent, he told us at Edinburgh that the affair which had created so much sensation at home and abroad was not at all the sort of thing it had been represented to be; that, if it had been capable of the construction which had been put upon it, it would have been neither a wise nor a honest transaction. He repudiated with scorn the idea that England aspired to an Egyptian protectorate; they had not reversed their Eastern policy; still less had they contemplated to appropriate the territories of the Khedive as our share in a scramble for general plunder. What had really been accomplished was a very ordinary affair. The Khedive had certain shares in the Suez Canal. So far from being ambitious to get hold of them, Lord Derby would have much preferred that the ruler of Egypt should have kept them in his own hands; but, as he found himself obliged to part with them, the English Government thought it better to purchase them than to let them go elsewhere. They have acquired them, not to give England any special or predominant foreign influence, nor to secure any exclusive advantage, but to keep open a communication for the benefit of all, which to England is of supreme importance. And with these explanations, tendered on the good faith of an English Minister, upon the credit of which Lord Derby justly relies, he tells us that the European Powers are amply satisfied. And so the nine days’ wonder is over, the enchantment is at an end, the chariot of Cinderella relapses into its original pumpkins and mice. Since Lord Derby has so pitilessly dowsed with cold water the heated enthusiasm of visionary journalists, they have never ceased to weep and to wail over the ruins of their pet toy, which has collapsed like a pricked bladder or a broken drum. They beg us to believe that the Foreign Minister does not understand the meaning of his own acts, or the scope of his own policy; that, in spite of all his protestations to the contrary, we are the veritable _perfide Albion_.

“For my own part I cannot refuse to respond to the appeal of Lord Derby, when he says, ‘We have told Europe what we want, and why we want it, and Europe is in the habit of believing what we say.’ I hope the day will never come when an English Government will be justly charged with saying one thing and meaning another. I therefore gladly take Lord Derby at his word. But now that this grand affair is reduced to the moderate dimensions of a sort of post-office subsidy, we may criticise it in a manner and upon grounds which might in another aspect of the question have been inappropriate. Of course, if this transaction had been really of the magnitude which was represented, the Government would have been deeply responsible for not inviting at once the judgment of Parliament upon a policy which vitally involved the interests and the future of the country, but being what it is, we may well wait a few weeks for fuller explanations of some points which still remain very obscure. There will be no disposition, I imagine, in any quarter to approach the discussion in a spirit of carping or of captious criticism. Upon the main ground by which this purchase is justified--namely, the determination to secure a free passage between the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean, there will be no conflict of opinion. That is a policy in which England is profoundly interested; and for that, statesmen of all parties will be prepared to make common efforts, and, if necessary, great sacrifices. No one, I think, will contend that even 4,000,000 pounds of money is too large a sum for the accomplishment of such an end. But that which has not hitherto been explained, and what remains to be shown, is in what manner and to what extent this investment really does conduce to that desirable object.”

DISRAELI’S AIMS IN POLITICS (1876).

=Source.=--_Annual Register, 1876_; _English History_, p. 113.

On the 22nd of August, Mr. Disraeli, now Lord Beaconsfield, issued his farewell address to his former constituents. “Throughout my public life,” wrote the Premier, “I have aimed at two chief results. Not insensible to the principle of progress, I have endeavoured to reconcile change with that respect for tradition, which is one of the main elements of our social strength; and, in external affairs, I have endeavoured to develop and strengthen our Empire, believing that combination of achievement and responsibility elevates the character and condition of a people.”

A SPIRITED SPEECH BY THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD (1876).

=Source.=--_The Times_, November 10, 1876.

THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD AT THE LORD MAYOR’S BANQUET.

The Earl of Beaconsfield, who was received with repeated plaudits, said....

“During these twelve months of anxiety and agitation, my Lord Mayor, I would take this opportunity of stating what have been the two great objects which Her Majesty’s Government have proposed with reference to those critical circumstances which have occurred since I had the honour of addressing your predecessor. The first has been the maintenance of the general peace of Europe, which involves almost every other consideration that may affect the interests of this country and the general welfare of humanity. We have believed that that peace would be best maintained by an observance of the treaties in which all the Great Powers of Europe have joined. Those treaties are not antique and dusty obsolete documents. They are not instruments devised under a state of circumstances different from those that exist, and ill adapted to the spirit of the age in which we live....

“... As the Lord Mayor has told us to-night, there is no country so interested in the maintenance of peace as England. Peace is especially an English policy. She is not an aggressive Power, for there is nothing that she desires. She covets no cities and no provinces. What she wishes is to maintain and to enjoy the unexampled Empire which she has built up, and which it is her pride to remember exists as much upon sympathy as upon force. But, although the policy of England is peace, there is no country so well prepared for war as our own. If she enters into conflict in a righteous cause--and I will not believe that England will go to war except for a righteous cause--if the contest is one which concerns her liberty, her independence, or her Empire, her resources, I feel, are inexhaustible. She is not a country that, when she enters into a campaign, has to ask herself whether she can support a second or a third campaign. She enters into a campaign which she will not terminate till right is done.”

THE EASTERN QUESTION: FIERY SPEECHES AT ST. JAMES’S HALL (1876).

=Source.=--_The Times_, December 9, 1876.

THE DUKE OF WESTMINSTER: The worst Government now remaining in Europe is that of Constantinople, and it seems to us a most extraordinary thing that men in this country and a portion of the Press seem to think that the Turks have still a power of regeneration within themselves. We hear them say, and with some justice, that the Turks are peaceful citizens and warlike soldiers. The warlike qualities for which they are distinguished seem to me not the best calculated to work for the happiness and the contentment of the people under the fell sway of Turkish dominion....

After all our sacrifices during the Crimean War, after having shed the blood of thousands of our fellow-countrymen and expended millions of treasure, England surely has some right to say now what should be done, and how it should be done. The situation, though in some respects very similar to that which existed in 1854, is entirely changed as regards the state of public opinion in this country. Although it may be said that Russia is thundering at the gates of Constantinople, England is determined that she will not go to war against Russia for Turkey.

MR. GEORGE HOWELL (late Secretary to the Trades Parliamentary Committee) said that throughout the length and breadth of the land they would not find among the working classes such an opinion on this question as was entertained in the clubs among educated gentlemen. He might inform the educated classes present that they represented the intensified feelings of the working classes when they pronounced an opinion altogether averse from going to war, under any pretext whatever, for the purpose of propping up Turkey. We ought to stand by the other European Powers, and to insist that justice should be done to the Christian provinces of Turkey, and to tell her plainly that if this were not done, she must, at whatever cost, pack up, bag and baggage, and leave Europe.

MR. EVELYN ASHLEY, M.P.: In his opinion the path of honour and of safety lay in the active co-operation of England with Russia. Turkey must be told that if she refused to give the necessary guarantees for the safety of her Christian subjects, we would send our fleet to take her fleet in pawn until she gave way. As to the fear of what might be the result of Mussulman fanaticism if such a course were taken, he could only say that the fanaticism of the Mussulman never broke out when he was beaten, while he had no apprehension that our prestige would be diminished among the Mussulman population of India.... Great nations, like great ships, could ride in safety only on the high seas, and although Russia might have her ambitions, which it might one day be our duty to resist, we should be able to do so all the better if we could but succeed in obtaining freedom for those down-trodden populations of Turkey.

PROFESSOR BRYCE: Turkey would not yield so long as an atom of hope of help from England was held out to her. The Porte believed it in the very name of Constantinople, a spell which could call up the fleets of England in the Bosphorus when it chose. That spell had never failed it yet, and it had in it most implicit confidence. If, then, war was to be averted, Turkey must be at once undeceived, and must be told that we not only will not support her, but that we are prepared to coerce her, and that she shall not be allowed to run a new race of tyranny.

CANON LIDDON: If the Christian provinces were to be really reformed, there must be a new law which would secure equal rights to every human being in the Turkish Empire. It was impossible to suppose, however, that any legislation of this kind would be voluntarily accepted by Turkey. There must be something in the nature of a military occupation.

LORD SHAFTESBURY: The Emperor of Russia has given us his personal word of honour that he desires no territorial aggrandisement. Take every precaution, surround yourselves by every legitimate defence, but let us go with him as far as he will go with us, and let us reserve our quarrel until we have something to quarrel about. But now let us rejoice in the attitude of the United Kingdom this day. It is majestic--a free and mighty people demand nothing for themselves, neither power, nor commerce, nor extended empire. They seek simply the welfare of others and the solidarity of nations.

PROFESSOR E. A. FREEMAN: From amid the clatter of wine-cups a voice of defiance went forth, conveying the brag which all the world had heard, that England would fight a first, a second, and a third campaign rather than permit another Power to do the work which she herself ought to accomplish. Were they prepared to wage war for a single hour, or to shed one drop of English blood in order to prop up as foul and bloody a fabric of wrong as ever a shuddering world had gazed upon? Would they consent to draw the sword to protect the sovereign rights of those whose hands were steeped in blood as their tongues were in falsehood? Would they fight to uphold the integrity and independence of Sodom? Should it be said that England, which had used every effort to put down the slave trade, was ready to go to war in order that the Eastern traffic in human flesh might still go on and supply our barbarous ally with the victims of his hideous lusts? Was it, indeed, for such an object that the countrymen of Canning and Wilberforce were to be called upon to fight?

But it was said that we were bound by treaties to maintain the independence and integrity of Turkey. He, however, did not so read the treaties to which reference had been made, and which already had been broken; and as for our interests in India being in peril, he would only say let duty come first and interest after, and perish our dominion in India rather than that we should strike a blow in such a cause as that of the Porte! Besides, it was not through Constantinople that the road to India lay; nor was it for Constantinople that the Emperor of Russia was ready to draw the sword.

MR. FAWCETT, M.P.: If the Government went to war on behalf of Turkey, he hoped the Liberal party would use every form allowed by Parliament to prevent them from having one sixpence until they had ascertained by an appeal to the country whether it was their wish that the blood and treasure of England should be spilt, and the reputation of England cast away in order to prop up a wretched, effete, and dissolute despotism.

MR. GLADSTONE, who was received with prolonged cheering:

“... What are we to say to the question of the Treaty of Paris? I will give you my opinion in the most distinct manner. The Ottoman Porte has in a most signal and conspicuous manner broken and trampled under foot the Treaty of Paris. The meaning of this Guildhall speech was to set forth that we were all bound by this Treaty to suggest that the Ottoman Porte would be entitled to appeal to it; and whatever theoretical acknowledgment there might be about affording assistance to the Christian populations, yet in practice the appeal would have resolved itself into the old practice of remonstrances and expostulations, with results either none whatever, or confined to idle and empty words. The Treaty of Paris in regard to the Porte I affirm to be no binding Treaty at all. I am as far as possible from saying that the Treaty of Paris is not binding as between the other Powers, but I stand simply upon this broad, clear, and I think incontrovertible proposition--that one who has broken a Treaty is no longer in a position to appeal to it.... I now come to the conclusion of the Guildhall speech which carried its sting, and a sting indeed it was, charged and overcharged with venom. Why was it necessary to say that when England enters into a war she has not to ask herself whether she can support a second or a third campaign? Cannot that reference be understood? After her second campaign in the Crimea Russia had to ask herself the question whether she could enter upon a third? Why, then, was that particular form given to a declaration which was perfectly unnecessary, of the capacity of this country to go to war? Do not suppose that the capacity of this country to go to war is increased by these idle vaunts. We know what effect these words had in Russia; but a more important question was, What was their effect in Constantinople? According to the reports of those who have seen it, Constantinople is a Paradise of Nature; but there are other paradises, one of which is called a Fool’s Paradise. I am afraid that the Ottoman Porte, relying on the assistance of England in the last extremity in all circumstances, has for a long time been in a Fool’s Paradise, and it would have been much greater kindness not to use words which were calculated to delude the Porte into the belief that such were the intentions of England. We know that the Turk has been relying on British aid, and although we do not think very highly of his intelligence, has he no warrant for so relying? Why was the squadron sent to Besika Bay, augmented into a fleet, in imitation of the step taken in 1853?”

BILLING AND SONS, LTD., PRINTERS, GUILDFORD

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Transcriber’s note:

Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unpaired quotation marks were corrected.

Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained.