For this characteristic Chauvinism Douglas paid the inevitable penalty. Clayton promptly ridiculed this attitude. "He is fond of boasting ... that we are a giant Republic; and the Senator himself is said to be a 'little giant;' yes, sir, quite a giant, and everything that he talks about in these latter days is gigantic. He has become so magnificent of late, that he cannot consent to enter into a partnership on equal terms with any nation on earth—not he! He must have the exclusive right in himself and our noble selves!"[[405]]
It was inevitable, too, that Douglas should provoke resentment on his own side of the chamber. Cass was piqued by his slurs upon Old Fogyism and by his trenchant criticism of the policy of reasserting the Monroe Doctrine. Badger spoke for the other side of the house, when he declared that Douglas spoke "with a disregard to justice and fairness which I have seldom seen him exhibit." It is lamentably true that Douglas exhibited his least admirable qualities on such occasions. Hatred for Great Britain was bred in his bones. Possibly it was part of his inheritance from that grandfather who had fought the Britishers in the wars of the Revolution. Possibly, too, he had heard as a boy, in his native Vermont village, tales of British perfidy in the recent war of 1812. At all events, he was utterly incapable of anything but bitter animosity toward Great Britain. This unreasoning prejudice blinded his judgment in matters of diplomacy, and vitiated his utterances on questions of foreign policy.
Replying to Clayton, he said contemptuously, "I do not sympathize with that feeling which the Senator expressed yesterday, that it was a pity to have a difference with a nation so friendly to us as England. Sir, I do not see the evidence of her friendship. It is not in the nature of things that she can be our friend. It is impossible that she can love us. I do not blame her for not loving us. Sir, we have wounded her vanity and humbled her pride. She can never forgive us."[[406]]
And when Senator Butler rebuked him for this animosity, reminding him that England was after all our mother country, to whom we were under deeper obligations than to any other, Douglas retorted, "She is and ever has been a cruel and unnatural mother." Yes, he remembered the illustrious names of Hampden, Sidney, and others; but he remembered also that "the same England which gave them birth, and should have felt a mother's pride and love in their virtues and services, persecuted her noble sons to the dungeon and the scaffold." "He speaks in terms of delight and gratitude of the copious and refreshing streams which English literature and science are pouring into our country and diffusing throughout the land. Is he not aware that nearly every English book circulated and read in this country contains lurking and insidious slanders and libels upon the character of our people and the institutions and policy of our Government?"[[407]]
For Europe in general, Douglas had hardly more reverence. With a positiveness which in such matters is sure proof of provincialism, he said, "Europe is antiquated, decrepit, tottering on the verge of dissolution. When you visit her, the objects which enlist your highest admiration are the relics of past greatness; the broken columns erected to departed power. It is one vast graveyard, where you find here a tomb indicating the burial of the arts; there a monument marking the spot where liberty expired; another to the memory of a great man, whose place has never been filled. The choicest products of her classic soil consist in relics, which remain as sad memorials of departed glory and fallen greatness! They bring up the memories of the dead, but inspire no hope for the living! Here everything is fresh, blooming, expanding and advancing."[[408]]
And yet, soon after Congress adjourned, he set out to visit this vast graveyard. It was even announced that he proposed to spend five or six months in studying the different governments of Europe. Doubtless he regarded this study as of negative value chiefly. From the observation of relics of departed grandeur, a live American would derive many a valuable lesson. His immediate destination was the country against which he had but just thundered. Small wonder if a cordial welcome did not await him. His admiring biographer records with pride that he was not presented to Queen Victoria, though the opportunity was afforded.[[409]] It appears that this stalwart Democrat would not so far demean himself as to adopt the conventional court dress for the occasion. He would not stoop even to adopt the compromise costume of Ambassador Buchanan, and add to the plain dress of an American citizen, a short sword which would distinguish him from the court lackeys.
At St. Petersburg, his objections to court dress were more sympathetically received. Count Nesselrode, who found this uncompromising American possessed of redeeming qualities, put himself to no little trouble to arrange an interview with the Czar. Douglas was finally put under the escort of Baron Stoeckle, who was a member of the Russian embassy at Washington, and conducted to the field where the Czar was reviewing the army. Mounted upon a charger of huge dimensions, the diminutive Douglas was brought into the presence of the Czar of all the Russias.[[410]] It is said that Douglas was the only American who witnessed these manoeuvres; but Douglas afterward confessed, with a laugh at his own expense, that the most conspicuous feature of the occasion for him was the ominous evolutions of his horse's ears, for he was too short of limb and too inexperienced a horseman to derive any satisfaction from the military pageant.[[411]]
We are assured by his devoted biographer, Sheahan, that Douglas personally examined all the public institutions of the capital during his two weeks' stay in St. Petersburg; and that he sought a thorough knowledge of the manners, laws, and government of that city and the Empire.[[412]] No doubt, with his nimble perception he saw much in this brief sojourn, for Russia had always interested him greatly, and he had read its history with more than wonted care.[[413]] He was not content to follow merely the beaten track in central and western Europe; but he visited also the Southeast where rumors of war were abroad. From St. Petersburg, he passed by carriage through the interior to the Crimea and to Sebastopol, soon to be the storm centre of war. In the marts of Syria and Asia Minor, he witnessed the contact of Orient and Occident. In the Balkan peninsula he caught fugitive glimpses of the rule of the unspeakable Turk.[[414]]
No man with the quick apperceptive powers of Douglas could remain wholly untouched by the sights and sounds that crowd upon even the careless traveler in the East; yet such experiences are not formative in the character of a man of forty. Douglas was still Douglas, still American, still Western to the core, when he set foot on native soil in late October. He was not a larger man either morally or intellectually; but he had acquired a fund of information which made him a readier, and possibly a wiser, man. And then, too, he was refreshed in body and mind. More than ever he was bold, alert, persistent, and resourceful. In his compact, massive frame, were stored indomitable pluck and energy; and in his heart the spirit of ambition stirred mightily.