1853.]

THE CZAR'S LETTER TO THE QUEEN.

573

As for all the stories of Turkish fanaticism that had frightened the Queen, Lord Palmerston scoffingly described them as "fables invented at Vienna and St. Petersburg."*

The Czar's Manifesto of the 1st of November still further excited the

War Party, and it was followed by a letter to the Queen, written by his own hand, begging her Majesty to decide between him and her Government in the dispute which had arisen from his attempt to apply the principles of the Treaty of Kainardji to the new situation which French pretensions in Syria had created in Turkey. To this the Queen replied with dignified courtesy, saying that, after repeatedly reading and studying the 7th Article of that * Ashley's Life of Lord Palmerston, Vol. II.,

p. 13.

For Lord Aberdeen's answer to Palmerston's bellicose special pleading, see Martin's Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. XLVIII.

Treaty, she could not fairly say that the Czar's interpretation of it was correct, and adding that the continued occupation of the Principalities must lead to events "which I should deplore, in common with your Majesty."* The year closed with the ferocious attacks of a certain portion of the Press on Prince Albert, and as for the future, it was dark with the signs and omens of impending war.

CHAPTER XXX.

WAR.

The War Fever in 1854-Attacks on Prince Albert-Aberdeen's Correspondence with the Queen-The Queen's Opinion of the Country-"Loyal, but a little mad"-Stockmar on the Constitution-Prince Albert's Position at Court-The Privileges of a Reigning Queen's Husband-Debates on the Prince's Position-The Peace and War Parties-Mr. Cobden's Influence-A new Vienna Note-A Challenge to Russia-The Russian Ambassador leaves London-Recall of Sir H. Seymour from St. Petersburg-Russian Intrigues with the German Powers-The Czar's Counter-Propositions -His Sarcastic Letter to Napoleon III.-An Austrian Compromise-Lord Clarendon's Ultimatum to Russia-The Czar's Reply-Declaration of War-Omar Pasha's Victories in the Principalities--The Siege of Silistria-Evacuation of the Principalities-The Rising. in Greece-The Allies at the Piræus-The Allies occupy Gallipoli-Another English Blunder-Invasion of the Crimea The Duke of Newcastle and a Sleepy Cabinet-Lord Raglan's Opinion on the War-The Landing of the Allies at Eupatoria-Battle of the Alma-Death of Marshal St. Arnaud-Russian Fleet Sunk at Sebastopol-At Balaclava-The Siege of Sebastopol-Battles of Balaclava and Inkermann-Mismanagement of the War-Public Indignation against the Government-Mr. Roebuck's Motion-Fall of the Coalition Ministry.

No writer has described more effectively than Mr. Cobden the sudden change that hurried the country into the military alliance with France against Russia which was made operative in 1854. Suppose, he said, an invalid had been ordered in the spring of 1853 to go to Australia and back for the benefit of his health. When he left home he must have noted that "the Militia was preparing for duty; the coasts and dockyards were being fortified; the Navy, Army, and Artillery were all in course of augmentation; inspectors of artillery and cavalry were reported to be busy on the Southern coast; deputations from railway companies, it was said, had been waiting on the Admiralty and Ordnance to explain how rapidly the commissariat and military storescould be transported from the Tower to Dover or Portsmouth; and the latest paragraph of news from the Continent was that our neighbours on the other side of the Channel were practising the embarkation and disembarkation of troops by night. He left home amidst all these alarms and preparations for a French invasion. But he returns, and, supposing he has not been hearing *This letter, dated the 14th of November, was not sent till it had been submitted to Lord Aberdeen and Lord Clarendon for their approval. The precedent should be noted, because, as Sir Hamilton Seymour told Count Nesselrode at the time, "these correspondences between sovereigns are not regular, according to our Constitutional notions." At the same time, when personally addressed by a foreign sovereign, the Crown cannot, as a matter of courtesy, reply through a Minister of State. The course taken by the Queen in this instance is obviously the prudent one.

1854.]

PRINCE ALBERT'S TREASON.

575

or giving heed to tidings from Europe, in what condition does he find his country ? He steps on shore at Liverpool, and the first newspaper he sees. informs him that the English and French fleets are lying side by side in Besika Bay. An impending naval engagement between the two Powers is naturally the idea that first occurs to him; but, glancing at the leading article of the journal, he learns that England and France have entered on an alliance, and that they are on the eve of commencing a sanguinary struggle against Russia."* He would have also found the Tory organs of public opinion vieing with the demagogic Press in denouncing the Queen's husband as a traitor to his wife and as a servile spy of Russia; from which, if he had been a shrewd man, he would have inferred that the Queen had been. again guilty of the atrocious crime of differing from Lord Palmerston, and that Prince Albert had been criticising rather too plainly his bellicose Foreign Policy.

During the first few weeks of 1854 society, indeed, could talk of little else than the "treason" of Prince Albert. The Queen's vexation found frequent expression in letters to Lord Aberdeen, and that amiable Minister did what he could to comfort her. The Prince, however, treated his slanderers with wellsimulated contempt, but, in spite of that, their injustice stung him to the quick, and he suffered much both in health and spirits. Yet nothing could be done in his defence till Parliament met, and the Queen was, therefore, fain to believe that the country, as she says in a letter to Stockmar, was "as loyal as ever, only a little mad." Long and ponderous essays from Stockmar on the Constitutional prerogatives of the Crown, and the political functions of Prince Albert, as her Majesty's private secretary, did little to dispel the gloom that settled over the Court. The fact is that Stockmar slightly erred in imagining that the hostility to the Prince was really due to wrong ideas on these interesting points. As Prince Albert bluntly put it, one main element in the agitation against him was the hatred of the old High Tory Party towards him, in the first place, because of his friendship with Peel, and, secondly, because of his success with the Great Exhibition. † The grumblers of the military clubs, too, joined in the cry against his Royal Highness because, when Adjutant-General Browne resigned, after quarrelling with Lord Hardinge, the Commander-in-Chief, about the weight of the soldier's knapsack, the Prince was supposed to have taken Lord Hardinge's side. The masses, too, had never seriously thought out the question of the position. which an able man who was husband of a reigning Queen was certain,. through the mere dictates of nature, to take in the counsels of the Sovereign. It struck them like a galvanic shock when they discovered that for fourteenyears the Prince had been actively helping to govern them, whilst the omniscient flunkeys of the Press were almost daily smothering him with adulation * Cobden's Collected Writings, Vol. II., p. 269. Martin's Life of the Prince Consort, Chap. L.

for his "wise abstinence from politics." Having stupidly deceived themselves as to the precise influence which the Prince wielded, they were in the right state of mind to be deceived by the Prince's enemies as to the influence which he did not wield, and which he never sought to wield. These reasons, and not the dubiety of the British Constitution as to the political rights of the husband of an English Queen, gave rise to much of the foolish clamour of the hour.

It need hardly be said that when Parliament met on the 31st of January, the leaders of both parties in both Houses summarily disposed of the falsehoods which had been uttered to the discredit of the Court. The Debates on the Address on this occasion are of high historical and Constitutional importance, because they defined with great precision the position of the consort of a queen regnant in the British Constitution, establishing beyond doubt his right to assist the Sovereign with advice in all matters of State. The address of Lord Campbell may be usefully referred to as giving the legal view of the question; but the speeches which delighted the Queen most were those of Lord John Russell, who, she says, in a letter to Stockmar, "did it admirably," and "dear, excellent Lord Aberdeen, who has taken ít terribly to heart." It was, however, Lord Campbell's address which gave most satisfaction to Prince Albert. The common-sense view of the question obviously was, that if the husband of a queen regnant in England embarrassed her Majesty's responsible Ministers by unconstitutional interference, the fault must be theirs and not his. The Constitution places in their hands the formidable weapon of resignation, and resignation in such circumstances simply means that government is rendered impossible till the unconstitutional interference which is objected to is stopped.

"If,"

Nobody has stated with greater correctness the political situation of the country at the beginning of 1854 than Sir George Cornewall Lewis. said he, in a letter to Sir Edmund Head, "war is averted, there will be a Reform Bill, which is likely to lead to an early Dissolution. If war arrives, the Reform Bill and all other similar measures likely to produce party struggles and divisions must be postponed."* The Tories had, therefore, one strong temptation to encourage the War Party. Those Whigs who, like Lord Palmerston, dreaded Reform, were in like case, except Lord John Russell, who, with a Reform Bill on the anvil, was foolish enough to share with Palmerston the leadership of the War Party in the Cabinet. As the war would be one against Russia, the mainstay of despotism in Europe, the Radicals, mindful of how the revolution was stamped out in Hungary, were for once on the side of war. Nobody, in fact, had any genuine desire for peace save the Queen, Prince Albert, and the Peelites, who desired "peace with honour," and the Cobdenites, who seemed to desire "peace at any price." any price." The Peace Party was strong in brains and common-sense, but weak in numbers. The strength Letters of Sir G. C. Lewis, p. 276.

1854.]

THE COBDENITES AND PEACE.

577

of the War Party lay in its numbers, and it would be absurd to assert that, with leaders like Derby, Disraeli, Palmerston, and Russell, it lacked intellectual ability. As usual, numbers won the day, and an abnormal alliance

of "the classes and masses" rendered the Peace Party-sadly weakened in moral authority by the Moravian fanaticism of the Cobdenites-utterly impotent. Mr. Cobden cherished the illusion that his influence had strengthened the Peace Party. Yet, with the exception of Lord Palmerston, Lord John