PALMERSTON AS PRIME MINISTER, FROM 1859 TO HIS DEATH.

THE unification of Italy was the first matter of importance to which Lord Palmerston’s new Cabinet had to apply itself. Lord John Russell was Foreign Secretary, but we perceive that Palmerston kept a hold of the reins himself. The things chiefly to be done were as follows. Austria still held Venetia, but had been made to abandon Lombardy by Marshal Mac Mahon at the battle of Magenta. Austria had to be put down and made to depart out of Venetia if possible. France had been victorious; but the Emperor claimed as his reward Savoy and Nice. It was too late for Palmerston to save Savoy and Nice. That blot on poor Cavour’s name must remain a stain for ever. He had told our Minister at Turin that they were not to be given up, and had known when he said so that their doom had been spoken. But the Emperor must be stopped and not allowed to run headlong with the éclat of his victories. In this matter the Emperor, too, had deceived him. And Italy must be encouraged to take her place among the nations of Europe.

These were the matters as to which, in regard to Italy, the British Cabinet was at the present moment anxious. Palmerston’s dislike to Austria,—{189}we might almost call it hatred,—still remained hot as ever. In a memorandum prepared for the Cabinet, Lord Palmerston defended Napoleon as against Austria. “Austria took our subsidies, bound herself by treaty not to make peace without our concurrence, sustained signal defeat in battle, and precipitately made peace without our concurrence. But on what occasion has the Emperor Napoleon so acted?—on none.” This was written in January, 1860; but a little later on, when the story of Savoy and Nice was known, he shows his jealousy of Napoleon. In April of the same year, he writes to Lord Cowley at Paris; “The Emperor’s mind is as full of schemes as a warren is full of rabbits, and, like rabbits, his schemes go to ground for the moment to avoid notice or antagonism.” And there is a record of a conversation which he had with Count Flahault a few days previously. Count Flahault was just going to Paris, and asked him what he should say to the Emperor. The Prime Minister was, what we shall call, very outspoken. England desired peace, he said, but if the Emperor was desirous of war, he would find that England was quite ready for him. And he says in a letter to the Duke of Somerset; “I have watched the Emperor narrowly, and have studied his character and conduct. You may rely upon it, that at the bottom of his heart there rankles a deep and inextinguishable desire to humble and punish England.” He says to Lord Cowley; “The seizure of Savoy and Nice, and the breach of promise towards Switzerland about the cession of the Swiss of the neutralized district, are matters which cannot be got over easily.” From these quotations it will be seen how intent he was on keeping the Emperor in his place, and saving this country, if it{190} might be saved, from some future battle of Dorking. But in regard to the state of Italy at the time, he had expressed himself very strongly in the memorandum above quoted; “There can be no reasonable doubt, therefore, that both France and Sardinia would unite with England in maintaining the principle that the Italians should be secured against foreign compulsion, and should be left free to determine, according to their own will, what shall be their future political condition.”

In all these matters Lord Palmerston and Lord John Russell were, between them, successful—at any rate in the accomplishment of their wishes. Austria was altogether driven out of Italy. The French Emperor did not attempt to avenge Waterloo. And Italy has become a united nation, ruling herself in accordance with her own will.

But in order to make good the boasts which he had made to Count Flahault, it was necessary that the country should be on its guard. Its security, by military means, was always present to Lord Palmerston’s mind. He had written a letter in December, 1859, to Mr. Gladstone on the subject, and he must, we should think, have startled Mr. Gladstone by the nonchalant audacity with which he proposed that ten or eleven millions should be at once voted for fortifications to defend Portsmouth and Plymouth. Then he goes into the manner in which the money should be raised,—as to which we cannot but imagine that Mr. Gladstone had his own way. But the millions were voted, and the fortifications were erected; and the Volunteer Force was set on foot,—with what enormous results is now patent to the whole country. In consequence of what was then done, England has now got a{191} double army, one for service abroad, and the other at home. It is only now beginning to be seen and understood that the defence of our own shores may be trusted to men less expensively organized than in regiments of the line.

In 1861 Lord Palmerston was installed as Warden of the Cinque Ports, by which he obtained the use of what was believed to be a comfortable residence near Dover. As Broadlands and Brocket Hall, as well as Cambridge House, in Piccadilly, to which he had long since removed, were all on his hands, this could not have been much to him. But the installation gave him at any rate the pleasure of going down once more to Tiverton, and meeting his old friend Mr. Rowcliffe, the butcher. For the Wardenship was an office, so called, of profit, and the new election was necessary. He was returned without a contest, but not without the usual preliminary discussion with Mr. Rowcliffe.

It is hardly possible to refer to all the measures, or even to all those of importance, with which Lord Palmerston was concerned at this period of his life. In 1860 the paper duties had been discussed; and now that this matter has been well-nigh forgotten among the things that have been quickly settled, we can hardly realize the disturbance to our feelings, and even the animosity, which they created. The House of Lords took upon itself to throw the bill out; whereas a remission of taxation is an affair which the Lower House conceives to belong exclusively to itself. But Palmerston, whose own heart was hardly in the matter, but who was much concerned in keeping peace between the two Houses, contrived to smooth matters down, so that the bill was passed in 1861, and nothing more has been since heard of the paper{192} duties. To us it seems that a penny is, and ever has been, the normal price of a daily newspaper,—unless when the Times, or some other daily journal if there be another, chooses on behalf of old gentlemen and ladies to be absurdly luxurious at threepence.

In 1861 the American War of Secession commenced, and in the same year, on the 14th of December, the Prince Consort died. It must have been pleasant to Lord Palmerston to remember that all feelings of animosity,—or rather of hard judgment against him,—had passed away. We can all remember the intense personal sorrow with which the death of the Prince was received by us. A good man had gone from among us, leaving vacant a place which could never more be filled. A man so good at all points is a rare possession, and England has never ceased to want him and to mourn him.

Almost exactly at the same time there sprang up an incident in the American War of Secession which nearly carried us into the whirlpool in spite of the careful efforts we made to avoid the danger. The Southern States had seceded because they had been unwilling to see the government of the country pass from them, the Democratic party, into the hands of their opponents, the Republicans. The Democratic party had grown up and been in power almost since the days of the Adamses, and now felt aware that all their most cherished political institutions were endangered by the appointment of Mr. Lincoln as President. Mr. Lincoln was a thorough Republican. To show how the two parties had hitherto fought the battle, each by the creation of new States which should, or should not, foster slavery within their boundaries, is too long a task to be undertaken here. Should Texas, which was devoted to slavery, become{193} one State or should it be four? Should Kansas be slave or free? Should Nevada and Nebraska, free-soil States as they would be, be admitted or excluded? Each State must have two Senators, and on the number of Senators the manipulation of the powers of government depended. The growing wealth and population of the North at last won the day, and the South, seeing how it was with them, determined to secede. They did endeavour to secede, and a state of war was the consequence.

There can now be no doubt, I think, in any unprejudiced mind that the sole effort made by the English Government during the war was to hold their own hands with absolute impartiality, and allow the Americans to fight it out. In private life, opinions varied; and, following a broad line, we may say that the commercial classes were in favour of the North, and the agricultural and the aristocratic of the South. And these feelings, either on the one side or the other, were enhanced by the growing deficiency of cotton. We find even Lord Palmerston suggesting that the idea of a French Ambassador should be entertained, for compelling the Northern States to let cotton from the South make its way to Europe. A more unjust, or indeed impossible, solution of the difficulty could not be found. But Palmerston simply mentioned the matter to a colleague in the Cabinet, and the question of interference or non-interference, of recognition or the reverse, was, as far as outsiders could perceive, left chiefly in the hands of Lord Russell, who was Foreign Secretary. Lord John had been created a peer in July, 1861. By the entire Cabine............