council-table, and the lukewarmness of Austria, belongs almost entirely the credit for the terms that were obtained. But to Lord Palmerston must at least be attributed a steady support of their representations, and unselfish acquiescence in their decisions, though he was himself in favour of the exaction of harder conditions. "Russia is humiliated," said Baron Brünnow," and she is about to sign a treaty such as she has never signed before." He probably spoke in all sincerity, for never in the whole course of her history as a nation had Russia been compelled to consent to the surrender of territory; and the indignity was the greater because the cession of Bessarabia was made at the demand of non-belligerent Austria. The main object for which England had been fighting, "security for the future," was more than obtained by the restoration of Kars to the Sultan, the destruction of the fortifications of Sebastopol, the "efficacious assurance" of the free navigation of the Danube, the continuance of the Principalities under the suzerainty of the Porte, the understanding that no Power had a right to interfere in the internal administration of the Turkish Empire, and the neutralisation of the Black Sea to ships of war and military arsenals. It is true that the last condition was abrogated by Prince Gortschakoff's action in 1870; but what Russia may have gained in material strength by converting the Euxine into a private lake, she lost through the feeling of universal distrust which her conduct inspired throughout Europe. Besides, the Peace of Paris secured for the Ottoman Empire a freedom from external complications for twenty years, during which time it was not altogether ultra-Utopian to hope that it would take some measures for its own regeneration. And when at last the struggle began afresh, and the Russian eagles

drew near the city of Constantine, it was, as Lord Palmerston prophesied, the undying memory of the Alma and Inkermann which forced her to pause at the gates. The conditions were, in fact, amply satisfactory to England and France without being oppressive to Russia; and the Queen was only expressing the feelings of the nation when she offered Lord Palmerston the Garter in recognition of the manner in which, under his guidance, the war had been brought to a conclusion, and the honour and interests of the country had been maintained by the Treaty of Paris.

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CHAPTER XI.

WARS AND RUMOURS OF WARS.

1856-1859.

Monotony of Home Affairs-Dispute with the United States-Russian chicanery-The Danubian Principalities-Egypt and the Suez Canal-Palmerston and Persigny - The Persian War - The "Arrow" Affair-The Dissolution and General Election-The Indian Mutiny-The Conspiracy to Murder Bill-Defeat of the Government.

DURING the whole of Lord Palmerston's first administration, foreign politics continued to absorb the attention of Parliament and the press to the exclusion of home interests. With the exception of the storm in the teapot about the Wensleydale peerage, there was little to exercise the public mind until a grievance was manufactured from the "desecration of the Sabbath " by bands in the parks. Even Mr. Disraeli's periodical exhibitions of fireworks barely evoked a cheer from the ranks of the Opposition. On continental questions alone was any interest taken, and of these an abundant crop was provided by the unsettled complications created by the Crimean war.

A little squabble with the United States was speedily settled. Under the provisions of the Foreign Enlist

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ment Act, the Government had raised recruits whom they believed to be British subjects and Germans living in the United States for the regiments in Nova Scotia. Unfortunately, several American citizens were enlisted, and the neutrality of the United States was thereby violated. A qualified apology was offered by Lord Clarendon; but the correspondence that ensued was conducted by Mr. Marcy, the United States Secretary, with considerable acrimony; and finally Sir John Crampton, our Minister at Washington, was recalled at the request of the Government of the United States, who asserted that he was implicated in the illegal enlistments. The British Government, feeling that they had been placed in a false position, determined to ignore the rebuke, and in the following year Lord Napier presented his credentials at Washington, and was duly received. As Lord Palmerston pointed out, when attacked in the House of Commons, it was useless to maintain the importance of friendly relations between England and America on the one hand, and to attempt to prove on the other that England had been insulted; and as the United States Government had finally acknowledged that they were satisfied with regard to the conduct of the British Government, though not with that of its agents, among whom they reckoned Sir John Crampton, it was unnecessary to adopt measures of retaliation.

Far more serious were the complications directly connected with the Treaty of Paris; and in spite of the secret Treaty of April 15th between Austria, France, and England, guaranteeing the existence of the Ottoman Empire-the œuvre posthume of the Congress, as Baron Brünnow called it-there seemed to be some considerable danger of a revival of hostilities. The con

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tingency was the more to be feared, because the AngloFrench alliance was for the moment non-existent. For the Czar, bitterly incensed at the part played by Austria in proposing the cession of Bessarabia, was making open overtures to Napoleon; and the Emperor of the French, flattered by the attentions of the autocrat, and surrounded by advisers like Morny and Walewski who were notoriously Russian in their proclivities, lent a ready ear to the voice of the charmer, more especially as he had received a rebuff from Austria in her refusal to take possession of the Principalities at his invitation. England, on her side, drew closer to Austria. disruption of the European concert naturally gave Russia an opportunity for indulging in those pettifogging and vexatious evasions in the execution of treaties with which the name of Prince Gortschakoff will always be associated. "Russia," according to his well-known phrase, was not sulking, she was only collecting herself together." Still she displayed the spirit of a beaten and angry school-boy in demolishing the fortifications of Kars, Ismail, and Reni, before surrendering them; in seizing Serpent's Island at the mouth of the Danube, though it was palpably within the new Bessarabian frontier; and in attempting to alter that line by insisting that it should be carried to the south, not of the old Bolgrad shown upon the map used at the Congress, but of a new Bolgrad, the existence of which was then for the first time made known to Europe.

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Lord Palmerston was not the man to put up with chicanery of this sort. The evacuation of Kars was procured by the hint that if further delay took place no English representative should attend the Emperor's coronation. The despatch of a British fleet into the Black Sea, with an intimation in answer to Prince