A scandal of this kind was by no means a pleasant end to the life of a Parliament, and for the Government by no means a pleasant prelude to a general election. But it cannot be said that public feeling was very deeply or very generally stirred. There was no question of deciding upon the life or death of a Ministry; it was a "natural dissolution;" Parliament had died of old age, and not by the violent hands of a defeated Minister. So most of the constituencies fought out their battles quietly and uneventfully; the Liberals making Reform their war cry, and the Conservatives making answer that Reform was neither necessary nor expedient. It was generally expected that Lord Palmerston's Government would have a considerable majority. Only two contests were looked upon with a very high degree of interest—that for the University of Oxford, where Mr. Gladstone was opposed by Mr. Gathorne Hardy; and that for Westminster, where Mr. John Stuart Mill came forward as a candidate. It was almost the first time, perhaps the very first time, in English history that a philosophical and economical writer of the first rank had come forward to ask for the vote of a constituency solely on the ground of his writings. A large committee was formed, including most of the leading Liberal names in England, to carry him into Parliament at no expense to himself. The exertions of his admirers, the novelty of the experience, and the influence of Mr. Mill's own dignified presence, seen as it was by so many for the first time, carried him to his seat. But enthusiasm for an idea does not hold its ground for very long in England, and thus it came to pass that at the general election of 1868 Mr. Mill was sent back again to private life.
The other election which concentrated public attention was that for the Oxford University. Mr. Gladstone had represented that exceptional constituency for eighteen years, though many attempts had been made to remove him from his seat, as from time to time his opinions showed fresh divergence from those of his youth. On this occasion a powerful opponent was brought forward in Mr. Gathorne Hardy, one of the most influential members of the Conservative party. The constituency of the University was composed of the members of its Convocation—that is, of all persons who had taken a degree not lower than that of Master of Arts, and who retained their names on the register by certain payments. In this election, for the first time, it was legal to use voting-papers, which enabled members to vote without coming up to Oxford to record their votes in person. This provision, passed only in the last Parliament, was fatal to Mr. Gladstone. His Liberalism, supposed to be extreme, and believed to favour views not wholly adverse to the disestablishment of State Churches, cost him his seat. He was beaten by Mr. Hardy by a majority of 180, the numbers being—Hardy 1,904, Gladstone 1,724. Mr. Gladstone took his farewell of the University in an address that expressed his "profound and lasting gratitude" for its support during the "arduous connection of eighteen years." The very night of his defeat, he owned, in the Liverpool Amphitheatre, that he had "clung to the representation of the University with desperate fondness." That day, the 18th of July, was typical of the whole of his life. He stood, to use words of his own, between the "ancient, great, and venerable University" and the "hives of teeming enterprise." He went from Oxford to South Lancashire, and after a campaign of magnificent speech-making, was returned by a narrow majority. We shall have to record, in the history of the next election, his subsequent loss of the same seat; but that loss mattered comparatively little. The real turning-point in his political career, and in the history of his party, was his rejection for Oxford University. From that moment he was, politically speaking, another man.
The total result of the elections was the return of 367 Liberals and 290 Conservatives—a gain of nearly fifty votes to the former party. It will be seen, however, that a large number of those who described themselves as Liberals soon showed their dissent from the policy of the Liberal Government; so that the majority was in reality very much smaller than might have been supposed. The political history of the year ends with the elections. From July to December political passions slept, political voices were dumb; only the Cabinet were at work on the questions of the next year—questions which, after Lord Palmerston's death, became more pressing and important.
Trade and finance were prosperous during this year, though the cotton market had not quite recovered from the shock of the American War. It had, however, partially recovered; and to the manner of its recovery, indeed, is to be indirectly traced much of the disastrous panic of 1866. The history of that panic will be told in a future chapter; at present we may remark that the stoppage of the American supplies caused first of all a stoppage, more or less complete, of English trade; that a new cotton supply was looked for from India, and that hence new and various channels were opened for trade; that thus arose all kinds of feverish, unsteady, and unwise speculation, the newspapers being crowded with daily advertisements of new enterprises, many of them on a gigantic scale. For this year, all went well. Two hundred and eighty-seven new "Limited Liability" companies were started, embracing every kind of undertaking, from the negotiation of foreign loans to the manufacture of an improved blacking. Everybody turned investor. The price of Consols went down from 91³⁄₈ in April to 86³⁄₄ in December, showing that where so many profitable investments were open, people would not buy stock which would pay them only three per cent. In a word, everything looked well, and every one was busy; the crash was as yet far distant, and all had their fortunes to make.
The general prosperity of the country received, however, a severe blow in the outbreak of the cattle plague, which first appeared in June in this year; but by the end of December had carried off more than forty thousand head of cattle. The disease, which was in a high degree contagious, was that known in Germany under the name of Rinderpest; and all that was ascertained of its origin is told in the admirable First Report of the Royal Commissioners (Lord Cranborne, Mr. Lowe, Dr. Lyon Playfair, and several others) who were appointed to investigate it. Two English cows, says the report, were purchased at the Islington Cattle Market on the 19th of June, and on the 27th a veterinary surgeon first noticed symptoms of disease in them. They were in the shed of the cowkeeper who had bought them. Two Dutch cows, bought at the same time and place, were also taken with the disease in another shed. Immediately afterwards, the plague—for it had become a plague—broke out in numerous London sheds, and spread very fast and very destructively. The Islington cowkeeper lost her whole herd, ninety-three in number. In a very few weeks the disease had passed out of London to nearly every county in England, and even to Scotland. It had gone across the sea to Holland with some Dutch oxen that had been sent for sale to the London market, but which were sent back again, because they could not be sold at a remunerative price. Now, among the foreign cattle that had been sold in the Metropolitan Cattle Market about this time were some oxen from Revel on the Baltic; and it was shown that some of these were ill at the time of their landing with what afterwards proved to be the disease. But this, though not improbable in itself, was considered by the Commissioners to be not proved; and they left it an open question whether the plague had been imported this way or viâ Holland. Anyhow there was and is little doubt that the original home of the disease is the steppe country of Southern Russia. Four times at least in previous centuries had the plague, or one very similar to it, appeared in England; the last attack—which continued for the twelve years from 1745 to 1757, carrying off several hundred thousand cattle—formed a precedent of great value for the guidance of the authorities in the present visitation.
The Commissioners found the only regulations in force to be certain Orders in Council, published as a Consolidated Order in September, 1865, under the authority of an Act of Parliament originally passed in 1848, which gave to orders of the kind the force of law. This Consolidated Order appointed inspectors, or caused them to be appointed by the local authorities, gave these inspectors full power to enter any shed, etc., and then and there destroy any infected animal; and made strict regulations forbidding the transit of diseased animals, and closing the Metropolitan Cattle Market, "except for purposes of immediate slaughter." This order, as the Commissioners said, was good but insufficient. The report told the country plainly that difficulties and sacrifices must be expected; that London must import her meat dead and not alive; that the only way to get rid of the disease quickly was to prevent the movement of cattle absolutely. But at the same time such a prohibition would have been a very serious step; it would have caused a sudden and alarming interruption in trade and would probably have led to an evasion of the law. Hence the Commissioners—though a majority of them ventured to recommend the total stoppage of all movement of cattle as the best course—advised certain alternative measures in case the difficulties of that course should be found too great. These alternative recommendations forbade the transit of lean or store stock, and imposed strict regulations on the movements of fat stock for slaughter. The report also suggested great restrictions on the importation of foreign cattle; such as that they should only be allowed to land at certain ports, that the fat stock should be immediately slaughtered, and that various forms of quarantine should be imposed upon the stock not immediately meant for the butcher. For Ireland, where the disease had not appeared, the Commissioners urged the extreme importance of being prepared in case it should appear, and of being ready and able to stamp it out.
These recommendations were, of course, open to the objection that the measures they pointed to were centralising, imperial—in other words, un-English. It was in vain that it was answered that it was the disease which was un-English; that it was against the disease that the objection lay and not against the recommendations. Lord Russell's Government knew that the very breath of an Englishman's life is the liberty "to do what he likes with his own." So the Ministry did what commended it to the people, and what did less than nothing to check the disease. It "empowered the local authorities." It gave to mayors of boroughs and to the county quarter sessions certain powers, apparently extensive, really very limited, towards hindering the plague. It did not even empower the justices in quarter sessions to prevent the movement of sheep, or pigs, or goats from place to place within their jurisdiction. The result was, that the tradition of English liberty was preserved, and that the disease spread like wild-fire. The first report of the Commissioners was dated October 31, 1865; the orders followed very soon; and yet the number of animals attacked, which had been 11,300 up to October 7, increased by January 27 to 120,740. To mark the mortality from the disease it may be observed that of these hundred and twenty thousand, only 14,162 are known to have recovered. Although the fear of approaching contagion drove the farmers to send unusually large numbers of cattle for slaughter—and, therefore, the supply, instead of falling off, increased—the price of meat rose enormously. Instead of eightpence or ninepence, tenpence or a shilling became the common price for a pound of meat. With this increase came a corresponding and more justifiable rise in the price of milk, especially in London. The 7,000 cattle that had been attacked in the London district up to the end of the year were almost entirely milch-cows. Of course, an immediate rise in the price of milk followed and a dislocation of the London milk trade. The dairymen became importers instead of producers. The railways began to develop new facilities for the carriage of milk from the country into London; and then were first to be noticed on a large scale, trucks loaded with great broad-bottomed cans bringing up the produce of the country meadows for the use of the metropolis. No disinterested person can regret this at least among the results of the plague.
Among the results of the American War, that which came home most rapidly and strikingly to the English mind was the organisation of the Fenian Conspiracy. Every American knows well the extent of the "Irish element" in the United States. The end of the war threw hundreds of Irishmen out of work. It mattered little whether they had fought for North or South; hatred of "the Saxon," and the chance of making a display in the cause of Erin, were strong bonds of union. Hence arose the Fenian Brotherhood—a military conspiracy, with civil branches, having for its object "the overthrow of the Queen's government in Ireland, and the establishment of the Irish Republic." No one seems to know certainly the origin of the name "Fenian;" but it is probably derived from "Fianna," the ancient Irish militia. At all events, the name of the organisation was suggested by John O'Mahony, of New York, a Celtic scholar of some repute, who had to fly from Ireland, with his life in his hands, in "'48," for an abortive attempt to excite the Tipperary peasantry to armed resistance. "There is no time to be lost," wrote one of the leaders (John O'Leary, afterwards editor of The Irish People); "this year—and let there be no mistake about it—must be the year of action.... The flag of Ireland, of the Irish Republic, must this year be raised." "I was told," said a witness at one of the Fenian trials, "that arms were to be given to carry out those objects.... They told me that the Fenians in Ireland were to be officered by French officers; and since the war was over in America, that they were to be officered by Federal officers." Again a Thomas Mooney wrote, "We have an Irish leader in John O'Mahony, backed by 50,000 veteran Irish soldiers in America ready for the word." These are a few indications, taken at random from many documents that were produced at the trials of various prisoners.
