Paris, June 4, 1878.
I am very glad that you and Lord Beaconsfield have determined to go yourselves to the Congress. The matters to be treated are too grave to be left to subordinates, and they could hardly be treated properly by any one who had not had a minute acquaintance day by day with the recent communications with Russia and Austria.
Waddington will, I think, be a satisfactory colleague in some respects, but in others I am afraid you will have difficulties with him. His English blood and his English education tell both ways. On the one hand, he is more straightforward than most Frenchmen; he understands and shares many English feelings, and he sees the force of English arguments, or perhaps I should rather say, of arguments put forward in an English way. But, on the other hand, he feels strongly the necessity of guarding against the tendency in France to suspect him of an English bias. He will be disposed to join in resistance to exaggerated Russian pretensions with regard to Roumelia and the Danube. His personal sentiments are strongly in favour of Greece. He has a certain sympathy with Christian as against Mussulman, but he does not carry this to an immoderate or unpractical extent. There is, however, one point on which you may find him very stiff. He is most strongly opposed to any change in the relative position of the Great Powers in the Mediterranean, and he would, I am afraid, be quite as unwilling to see England extend her influence in that sea, as he would be to see Russia do so. It is in order to prevent any alteration in the statu quo in the Mediterranean, more than from any other reason, that he has made the participation of France in the Congress conditional on the exclusion of all questions not directly arising out of the war between Russia and Turkey, and has positively mentioned Syria and Egypt as countries to be excluded from the discussion. He would not perhaps be disinclined to let these questions come up, if he thought he should obtain the support of other Powers in resisting any change made outside of the Congress.
At any rate, public feeling in France would probably be too strong to allow him to acquiesce in any redistribution of territory or influence in favour of England. But I expressed my opinion on this point so fully to you and Lord Beaconsfield in the interview I had with you just before I left England, that I have nothing more to say about it. The horrible event[19] which took place at Berlin the day before yesterday has, however, thrown so strong a light upon one phase of French opinion, that I feel bound to direct your attention to it. It seems very shocking that while the Emperor William is suffering from the wounds so wickedly inflicted, people here should be speculating upon the consequences of their being fatal, but so it is. The French believe that the maintenance of the present military system in Germany depends upon the Emperor William, and that even if His Majesty's successor had the same determination as His Majesty himself to keep it up, public opinion in the country would make it impossible for him to do so. What foundation there may be for this supposition, I do not pretend to determine; but that it influences the French is certain. Anything which makes them believe the life of the Emperor to be precarious, diminishes the restraint which the fear of Germany imposes upon them, and renders them more stiff in asserting their own views and pretensions, and less averse from contemplating the possibility of supporting them by more than words.
There are, in my opinion, strong arguments to be brought in favour of our taking measures to be in a position to resist Russia by our own means, if other Powers will give us no help in doing so; but as you said in a former letter, logic is perhaps not of much use in diplomacy, and seems to me to be of still less use in influencing public opinion. I doubt our logic doing much to reconcile the French to our exercising a separate protection over Turkey in Asia, or occupying a Turkish island in the Mediterranean. I am afraid you will think I have become more nervous than ever, and more prone to the common error among diplomatists of exaggerating the importance of the country in which they are themselves stationed, but anyhow I have not seen any reason to change my views as to the feelings prevalent in France.
The Parliamentary session at Versailles is about to close. Thanks to the Exhibition, it has been a very tranquil one, but we must be on the look-out for squalls when the Chamber meets again in the autumn. Gambetta has hitherto restrained his followers from opposing the Ministry, and from proposing radical measures, but it is doubtful whether he will be able, even if willing, to restrain them after the end of the Exhibition. Some unexpected incident might even produce a crisis before. At any rate the elections of a portion of the Senate, which will take place early next year, may remove the check which the Conservative majority in that House has hitherto put upon the Chamber of Deputies. The Marshal does not talk of making any more attempts at resisting the will of the majority, but I understand that he does not talk very seriously of retiring as soon as the election is over.
It may perhaps be worth while to mention that Waddington finds the influence of Gambetta over the Government very irksome, and is not fond of having it alluded to.
The Congress met at Berlin in the middle of June, and the awkward question of whether Waddington should be informed of the Anglo-Turkish Convention or not was debated. Lord Lyons knew perfectly well that the French would be furious when they heard of it, and that the greater the surprise, the greater would be their indignation. The lines laid down for Waddington's guidance at the Congress were that France desired:
1. Peace.
2. Neutrality.
3. The necessity of the consent of all the Powers to any modifications of the Treaties.
4. The exclusion of Egypt, Syria, the Holy Places, and other topics foreign to the Russo-Turkish War.
These points were certainly not favourable to England receiving any support from France in defending her menaced interests in Asia Minor, as the absolute neutrality of France was the point most insisted upon. In fact France was so obviously anxious to stand aloof, that one suggestion was made that she should be asked to co-operate with us in Asia Minor on the assumption that such co-operation was sure to be refused. This, however, was considered to be too hazardous a course, and it was eventually decided to say nothing to Waddington for the time being, lest he should make the Anglo-Turkish Convention an excuse for not attending the Congress at all. The secret, unlike the Anglo-Russian agreement, seems to have been well kept, and cannot have been known to the Russians, or they would have utilized it for the purpose of sowing discord between the British and French representatives. Finally, on July 6, Lord Salisbury told the whole story to Waddington in a private letter.
In this letter Lord Salisbury pointed out that, as far as the Russian annexations in Asia Minor were concerned, we were in a completely isolated condition, since Austria was only willing to take part in restoring the Porte to a certain independence in Europe, while France had clearly intimated that she had no intention of engaging in war for the purpose of maintaining the stipulations of the Treaty of 1856. The result was that England was compelled to act alone, as her interests were too great to allow the status quo in Asia Minor to be completely destroyed, and consequently the onerous obligation of a defensive alliance with Turkey had been undertaken in order to provide against future Russian annexations beyond the frontier assigned under the present negotiations at Berlin. As this engagement could not be carried out from such a distance as Malta, the Sultan had made over Cyprus to England during such period as the defensive alliance might last. The conditional nature of the Convention, and the restraint shown by Her Majesty's Government in rejecting more tempting and advantageous offers are dealt with in the following passages.
We have entered into an agreement which is now embodied in a formal Convention at Constantinople, that whenever the Russians shall, for whatever reason, return to their Asiatic frontier as it existed before the last war, we will immediately evacuate the island; and that intermediately we will annually pay the Sultan whatever is ascertained to be the surplus of revenue over expenditure.
I am telling Your Excellency no secret when I say that we have been very earnestly pressed, by advisers of no mean authority, to occupy Egypt—or at least to take the borders of the Suez Canal. Such an operation might have been very suitable for our interests and would have presented no material difficulties.
No policy of this kind however was entertained by Her Majesty's Government. We had received an intimation from the French Government that any such proceeding would be very unwelcome to the French people, and we could not but feel the reasonableness of their objection under existing circumstances.
We have therefore turned a deaf ear to all suggestions of that kind.
We have been likewise recommended to occupy some port on the coast of Syria, such as Alexandretta, but we felt that, however carefully guarded, such a proceeding might, in the present condition of opinion with respect to the Ottoman Empire, be construed as indicating an intention to acquire territory on the mainland of Western Asia; and we did not desire to be suspected of designs which will be wholly absent from our thoughts. We have therefore preferred to accept from the Sultan the provisional occupation of a position less advantageous indeed, but still sufficient for the purpose, and not exposed to the inconveniences I have mentioned. How long we shall stay there I cannot tell. But I think there is just ground of hope that the Russians will find in a short time that the territory they have acquired is costly and unproductive; that the chances of making it a stepping-stone to further conquests is cut off, and that they will abandon it as a useless acquisition. In that case our raison d'être at Cyprus will be gone and we shall retire.
I have adopted this form of conveying the matter to you, as the Convention being entirely within the Treaty competence of the two Powers, requires no official communication. But it would have been inconsistent with the feelings of friendship existing between our two countries, and with my gratitude for your courteous procedure towards me personally, to have allowed you to hear it first from any other source.
There can be little doubt as to the identity of the 'advisers of no mean authority,' for Bismarck had been urging upon England for some time the occupation of Egypt, obviously with the main intention of creating discord with France, and Her Majesty's Government deserved all the credit claimed by Lord Salisbury for resisting these overtures. It is, however, somewhat difficult to follow Lord Salisbury's reasonings for preferring Cyprus to Alexandretta. It was plain that the occupation of either of these places would cause irritation, and as subsequent events have shown, Cyprus has never been of much use to us, and besides being crushed under the burden of the tribute annually paid to the Turkish Government, is inhabited chiefly by Greeks who do not appear to thoroughly appreciate British rule. Alexandretta, on the other hand, might, under our control, have developed into a highly important seaport and become the starting-place for the Bagdad railway; whereas, as a matter of fact, it has now practically passed into the hands of the Germans.
M. Waddington did not remain long in sole possession of his exclusive information, for on July 8, the Anglo-Turkish Convention was made known to the world, and the general impression produced was that Lords Beaconsfield and Salisbury had effected a brilliant coup. In France, however, the news caused quite unjustifiable indignation, and the prudent Lord Lyons telegraphed to Lord Salisbury on July 10, advising him to get the final acts of the Congress signed as quickly as possible, lest Waddington should be directed to come away without putting his name to anything.