When Lord Lyons returned to Paris at the beginning of April the question of whether there was to be a Congress or not was still in suspense. French opinion was rather more in favour of England on the Eastern Question than had been expected, but there was no sign of anything more than passive sympathy, and Waddington, who was particularly sensitive on the subject, intimated, not obscurely, that the good will of France depended upon England not acting independently of her in Egypt. It looked, in fact, as if England would be left to bell the cat, although Lord Salisbury's circular, as was generally admitted, had immensely raised British prestige on the continent. The suspicion felt in France as to Russian intentions was shown by the failure of agents of the Russian Government to negotiate a loan at Paris for thirty millions sterling, and Lord Salisbury's letters in the early part of April show that, while there were symptoms of yielding in Europe, there appeared to be no prospect of those concessions with regard to Asia Minor to which Her Majesty's Government attached great importance.
On the whole, the French Government was apparently anxious to act as far as possible with England, without committing itself too much, since the idea of a Russian naval station in the Mediterranean was highly obnoxious; but Waddington was hampered, amongst other causes, by the proceedings of Gambetta, who was disporting himself in some of the European capitals with the object of forming, or appearing to form, relations with foreign statesmen, which would enable him to put forward a claim to become eventually Minister for Foreign Affairs. Waddington always in private repudiated responsibility for what Gambetta said or did, but the latter was now so important a personage that it was necessary to keep on good terms with him and to submit to a patronage which must have been irksome to French Ministers.
Lord Salisbury to Lord Lyons.
Foreign Office, April 24, 1878.
The negotiations for the simultaneous withdrawal of the fleet and army from Constantinople proceed very slowly. We are making no difficulties, but the Russians cannot make up their minds about details, and are probably trying to screw some concessions out of the luckless Turks. I shall be very glad to see the arrangement succeed, because our fleet is doing no possible good there at this moment. Whatever value it had, disappeared as soon as the peace was signed. But as the Russians seem to be afraid of it, we must make the most of it. Possibly, in their secret hearts, they entertain very much the same opinion as to the position of their armies.
The general negotiations do not improve. Russia gives me the impression of a Government desperately anxious for peace, and driven on by some fate towards war. Andrassy undoubtedly means to have Bosnia; but whether he will be satisfied with that I am not so certain. It is a possible policy for him to throw the Danube over altogether; to secure an outlet for his produce by a railway to Salonika, and to accept a simultaneous extension southward in parallel lines of Austrian and Russian possession—whether in the form of actual territory, or of vassal states. In that case, he will throw us over, and his course will be easy enough if he can square the Hungarians. But that may be a difficulty. Do you gather any information about his objects?
Is it your impression—as it is mine—that the French are supremely anxious to push us into war?
Lord Lyons's reply to these inquiries gives the reasons why the French views with regard to an Anglo-Russian conflict had undergone an alteration.
Paris, April 26, 1878.
I owe you many thanks for your letter of the day before yesterday.
You ask me whether it is my impression that the French are extremely anxious to push us into war.
Confidence in their returning military strength, and the apparent success of their endeavours to conciliate Germany have calmed their fears of Bismarck. They are no longer nervously desirous that the forces of England should be kept in the west, as a necessary check upon the great Chancellor's supposed designs upon Holland, upon Belgium, or upon France herself. On the other hand, they have given up counting upon Russia as an ally against Germany, and have abandoned Décazes's policy of courting her and espousing her interests. The result of all this is that they are willing enough that the main force of England should be employed at a distance from home.
They have been reassured about Egypt, and they think that if England is engaged in hostilities with Russia, she will be less disposed and less able to interfere with France or to separate from her in Egyptian affairs. They have lost their great fear, which was that England, instead of opposing Russia, would seek a compensation for herself in the annexation of Egypt. Thus another of the reasons which made them desire that England should abstain from all action has disappeared.
There are, moreover, the patriots, who look far ahead, who do positively desire that England should go to war with Russia. Their calculation is that Austria and Italy would sooner or later be drawn into the war on the English side, and that then, Germany and Russia being isolated, France might join the rest of Europe against them, and recover Alsace and Lorraine. These are said to be the views of Gambetta and his friends.
There is, however, one feeling which pervades the great mass of Frenchmen. They wish England to take the chestnuts out of the fire for them. They are quite determined not to go to war themselves for anything less than Alsace and Lorraine, but they do wish to exclude Russia from the Mediterranean, and they are very willing that the danger and the burthen of effecting this should be incurred by England.
With these views their newspapers go on patting us on the back, and may continue to do so, as long as we seem to be ready to act alone; but they would change their note, if they saw any risk of France being drawn into the war with us, until after Austria and Italy had joined us.
I know of nothing to confirm Odo Russell's information that in return for the consent of Germany and Russia to exclude Egypt, etc., from the deliberations of the Congress, Waddington engaged to support Germany and Russia in everything else. What appeared on the surface was that this exclusion was made openly by France a sine qua non of her attending the Congress, that she communicated the condition simultaneously to all the Powers, and did not at all ask for the assent to it as a concession. If there is only Bismarckian authority for the bargain stated to have been made by Waddington with Germany and Russia, I think it mérite confirmation. The one object of Bismarck seems always to be to sow dissensions between France and any other Power that she may seem to be approaching.
Notwithstanding the Comte de St. Vallier's assertion to Odo Russell, Mr. Adams is quite certain that it was M. de St. Vallier himself who reported to Mr. Waddington that Odo had communicated to the Emperor William, Prince Bismarck, etc., a telegram from Mr. Adams on the subject of the sympathies of France with England. In fact Mr. Waddington who is an old schoolfellow and friend of Mr. Adams, read to him parts of the private letter from M. de St. Vallier in which the report was contained, and indeed one of the phrases he cited from the letter was le telegramme Adams as the source of the communication made by Odo Russell.
The Prince of Wales arrived this morning and I have been all the afternoon at the Exhibition with him, which obliges me to write in such haste, that I cannot be brief.
I have just seen Hobart Pasha, who goes on to England to-morrow morning and will try to see you.
I doubt whether Waddington or the Austrian Ambassador here get any information about Andrassy's real views and objects.
The Russians seem to be hard at work trying to make the execution of the Treaty of San Stefano a fait accompli. Beati possidentes.