[13] Clarendon, to whom I told this, said it was not true: he had said nothing about their support, but had said, ‘I approve of your policy, but you must have no war.’
September 5th, 1840
I have been more in the way of hearing about the Eastern Question during the last week than at OPPOSITION TO LORD PALMERSTON. any previous time, though my informants and associates have been all of the anti-Palmerston interest—Holland House, and Clarendon, Dedel (who objects to the form more than the fond), and Madame de Lieven, who is all with Guizot, because he is devoted to her, and she feels the greatest interest where she gets the most information. Clarendon showed me the other day a long letter which he wrote to Palmerston in March last, in which he discussed the whole question, stating the objections to which he thought Palmerston’s policy liable, and suggesting what he would have done instead. It was a well-written and well-reasoned document enough.
Those who are opposed to Palmerston’s policy, and even some who do not object to the policy itself so much as to the manner in which it has been worked out, feel confident that the means will fall very short of accomplishing the end, and that peace will be preserved by their very impotence at a great expense of the diplomatic reputation of the parties concerned; and they are confirmed in this notion by the failure of some of the anticipations in which Palmerston so confidently indulged, especially the conduct of the Pasha and the Syrian insurrection. Clarendon says that, ‘whatever his opinions may have been, now that they are fairly embarked in Palmerston’s course, he must as earnestly desire its success as if he had been its original advocate.’ But both he and Lord Holland have been so vehemently committed in opposition to it, that, without any imputation of unpatriotic feelings, it is not in human nature they should not find a sort of satisfaction in the frustration of those measures which they so strenuously resisted, and this clearly appears in all Lord Holland said to me, and in Lady Holland’s tone about Palmerston and his daring disposition.
September 6th, 1840
On arriving in town this morning, I found a note from M. Guizot, begging I would call on him, as he wanted to have a few minutes’ conversation with me. Accordingly I went, and am just returned. His object was to put me in possession of the actual state of affairs, and to read me a letter he had just received from Thiers, together with one (either to Thiers or to him) from their Consul-General at Alexandria.
Thiers’ letter expressed considerable alarm. After describing the failure of Walewski and the other French agents, and enlarging upon the efforts they had made, and were still making, to restrain the Pasha, and prevent his making any offensive movement, he said that this was the Pasha’s ultimatum. He offered, if France would join him and make common cause with him, to place his fleets and armies at her disposal, and to be governed in all things by her advice and wishes, a thing utterly impossible for France to listen to. Upon the impossibility of this alliance being represented to him, the prudence of keeping quiet strenuously urged upon him, and the utmost endeavours made to convince him that a defensive policy was the only wise and safe course for him, he had engaged not to move forward, or take any offensive course unless compelled to do so, by violence offered to him; his army was concentrated at the foot of the Taurus, and there (but in a menacing attitude) he would consent to its remaining; but if any European troops were to advance against him, or be transported to Syria, any attempt made to foment another insurrection in Syria, or any attack made upon his fleet, or any violence offered to his commerce, then he would cross the Taurus, and, taking all consequences, commence offensive operations. In that case, said Guizot, Constantinople might be occupied by the Russians, and the British fleet enter the Sea of Marmora; and if that happened, he could not answer for the result in France, and he owned that he (and Thiers expressed the same in his letter) was in the greatest alarm at all these dangers and complications. He had seen Palmerston this morning, and read Thiers’ letter to him. I asked him if it had made any impression on Palmerston. He said, ‘Not the slightest;’ that he had said, ‘Oh! Mehemet Ali cédera; il ne faut pas s’attendre qu’il cède à la première sommation; mais donnez-lui quinze jours, et il finira par céder.’ Guizot said that the failure of so many of his predictions and expectations had not in the slightest degree diminished Palmerston’s THE POLICY OF FRANCE. confidence, and that there was in fact no use whatever in speaking to him on the subject. Guizot is evidently in great alarm, and well he may be, for there can be no doubt that his Government are in a position of the greatest embarrassment, far from inclined to war, the King especially abhorring the very thoughts of it, and at the same time so far committed that if the four allies act with any vigour and drive Mehemet Ali to desperation, France must either kindle the flames of war, or, after all her loud and threatening tone, succumb in a manner not only intolerably galling to the national pride, but which really would be very discreditable in itself.
Guizot dwelt very much upon their long-continued and earnest efforts to make the Pasha moderate and prudent, and on the offers he had made to join the allies, and unite the authority of France to that of all the others for the purpose of preventing the Pasha from advancing a step further, provided they would leave him in his present possessions. I certainly never saw a man more seriously or sincerely alarmed, and I think (now that it is so near) that the French Government would avoid war at almost any cost; but the great evil of the present state of affairs is, that the conduct of the question has escaped out of the hands of the Ministers and statesmen by whom it has hitherto been handled, and henceforward must depend upon the passions or caprice of the Pasha, and the discretion of the numerous commanders in any of the fleets now gathered in the Mediterranean, and even upon the thousand accidents to which, with the most prudent and moderate instructions from home, and the best intentions in executing them, the course of events is exposed. As Guizot said, Europe is at the mercy ‘des incidents et des subalternes.’ He promised to keep me informed of everything that might occur of interest.
September 10th, 1840
The day after I saw Guizot I related to Clarendon all that had passed, when he told me that Melbourne was now become seriously alarmed, so much so that he had written to John Russell, ‘he could neither eat, nor drink, nor sleep,’ so great was his disturbance. Lord John was also extremely alarmed, and both he and Melbourne had been considerably moved by a letter the former had received from the Duke of Bedford, enclosing one from Lord Spencer, in which he entered into the whole Eastern Question; and said that it was his earnest desire to give his support to the Government in all their measures, but that it would be contrary to his judgement and his conscience to support them in their policy on this question. This appears to have made a great impression upon them, but not the least upon Palmerston, who is quite impenetrable, and who always continues more or less to influence his colleagues; for Lord John, after meeting Palmerston at Windsor, came back easier in his mind, and, as he said, with a conviction (not apparently founded on any solid reason), ‘that they should pull through.’ Palmerston, so far from being at all shaken by anything Guizot said to him, told him that the only fault he had committed was not taking Lord Ponsonby’s advice and proceeding to action long ago. The second edition of the ‘Times’ mentions a violent note delivered by Pontois to the Porte. I thought this of such consequence that I sent the paper to Guizot, and begged him, if he could, to afford the means of contradicting it. He wrote me word he would, as soon as he had des renseignements plus précis. In the meantime, I find Metternich has protested against the tone of Pontois’ communication, which was verbal and not written. His own account of it to Thiers exhibited strong, but not indecent language.