A History of England, Period III. Constitutional Monarchy

by J. Franck Bright

Napoleon examines the resources of Egypt, England, and Ireland. 1803.

During his absence the difficulties with France continued to increase, and the signs of Bonaparte's intention of making war sooner or later became more obvious. At length, in January 1803, was published a report of Colonel Sebastiani, who had been sent by Napoleon, nominally for commercial purposes, to examine the resources of Egypt and the East; in fact, so far from being commercial in its character, the report was devoted almost entirely to show with what ease Egypt could be again conquered by the French. It was impossible that such an official document could be issued by a power which was really friendly. At the same time Bonaparte had sent both to England and to Ireland agents who, under the same commercial pretext, were really minutely examining the resources of England and instigating Irish rebellion. Nor was the question of Malta as yet at rest. The project of obtaining a guarantee from the European powers had failed, and in face of the constant aggressions of Bonaparte, it was impossible for England to evacuate the island with the certainty that it would be immediately occupied by the French. But Bonaparte was still anxious to keep the occasion of war in his own hands, and still hoped to impose His interview with Lord Whitworth. Feb. 18, 1803. upon the feeble ministry of England. He summoned Lord Whitworth, the English ambassador, to an interview, in which he declared that he did not desire war, but that he would rather see England in possession of the Faubourg St. Antoine than of Malta, that he was ready to attempt a descent upon England if necessary, but how much better would it be for England to join with him and share his spoils and his greatness. Two things only were necessary for this,—the suppression of the press, and the removal of Georges, a Chouan leader and emigrant, from English protection. As for the counter-charges of the appropriation of Piedmont and of Switzerland, they were but trifles not worth mentioning. Almost immediately after this the Moniteur declared, in its annual account of the condition of the nation, that as long as party government existed in England an army of 500,000 must be kept on foot for defence and vengeance.

The militia embodied. March 11, 1803.

This was too much even for Addington, and on the 8th of March a message was brought down from the King to the Commons, declaring it necessary that measures of precaution should be adopted, alleging for this the great military preparations which were going on both in Holland and in France, which were in fact intended for St. Domingo, but which in the feverish state of international feeling were a just cause of uneasiness. In accordance with this message the militia were on the 11th ordered to be embodied. In spite of all that Bonaparte had done he pretended to be indignant at this step; and at a public reception at the Tuileries accosted Lord Whitworth with passionate words, Failure of renewed negotiations for Pitt's return. accusing England of driving him into war. Then at length Addington began to yield to public feeling, and through Lord Melville opened negotiations for the return of Pitt to office. But a frank resignation and an open acknowledgment that Pitt was the better man of the two was beyond him. He stipulated that Grenville and Windham, who had throughout opposed him, should be excluded from the new arrangements. He wished Lord Chatham to assume the position of nominal Prime Minister, while he and Pitt should be equal Secretaries. Pitt was not a man to accept a position of even nominal subordination; he did not even hear Lord Melville's proposition to the end. "Upon my word," said he, "I had not the curiosity to ask what I was to be." And thus England plunged afresh into war, while all her best statesmen were still excluded from office. For the crisis came rapidly nearer. The feeling of the nation was aroused, and Addington could no longer withstand it. An ultimatum with regard to Malta was drawn up, demanding its retention for ten years, its surrender after that period to the inhabitants, and the cession to England in its stead of the island of Lampedusa. Bonaparte was somewhat taken aback by this exhibition of vigour, but as his answer to the ultimatum was not satisfactory, Lord Whitworth demanded his passports, and War declared. May 18, 1803. withdrew from Paris on the 12th of May. The French ambassador left London on the 16th, and on the 18th a declaration of war was published.

Character of the war.

This war was of a distinctly different character from that which preceded it. The one had been undertaken in the interest of aristocracy and of property, in a panic of fear of the growth of the liberty of the people; now the whole nation was driven to defend itself, and, while defending itself, Europe also, from the aggressions of a gigantic and all-absorbing ambition. The outbreak of this war marks a change in the career of Napoleon. He had hitherto acted, nominally at all events, as an agent for the propagation of national liberty. He had pretended throughout to be spreading the principles of the French Revolution; he had met with much sympathy from downtrodden nations; he had found it easy to overwhelm effete and unpopular dynasties. He was now entering upon a war against the people themselves, and, though success at first attended his arms, when it became evident that it was not assistance against tyrants but subjugation to a foreign power that he brought, the efforts to oppose him became national, and before the uprising of nations he ultimately succumbed. Bonaparte's first step after war was declared corresponded exactly with this Napoleon arrests all the English in France. change. Crowds of Englishmen had thronged to see with their own eyes the condition of revolutionized France. All the English in France between the age of eighteen and sixty, numbering it is believed about 12,000, were suddenly by a single decree taken prisoners, and kept confined till the close of the war, thus spreading sorrow and discomfort broadcast through England. The pretext was the capture of two ships before war was declared; they were not however captured till after the ambassadors had withdrawn, nor, as has subsequently been made evident, till Bonaparte had himself ordered an embargo to be laid on the English shipping.

He excites discontent in Ireland.

Bonaparte's interference in the affairs of Ireland had also its share in rendering the war truly national. It had been hoped that the great work of the Union, following the suppression of the Rebellion of 1798, would have introduced peace and prosperity into the island. Nor at first did the hopes appear ill founded. Both Lord Hardwicke, the Lord-Lieutenant, and Lord Redesdale the Chancellor, appear to have believed in the rapid improvement both of the physical and political condition of the country. The Catholics, although disappointed of their hopes, seem to have understood the state of affairs which obliged Pitt to refrain from the further prosecution of their claims, and to have postponed all idea of present agitation.

But the miserable cultivation and the prevalence of waste lands in Ireland allowed of the existence of an extremely ignorant and prejudiced peasantry, and among them it was not difficult to excite again their old animosity to England. Bonaparte took advantage of this opening, and while the Peace of Amiens lasted many French agents seem to have been poured into Ireland, both for the purpose of inquiring minutely into the resources of the English Government there and of establishing a connection with the discontented peasantry. Many intercepted letters proved to Government the existence of these agents; their presence in Ireland was excused, like Sebastiani's mission to Egypt, by the assertion that they were merely commercial agents, following a system which had obtained in France ever since the time of Colbert. Their success was limited by the distaste of the Catholics for the French Revolution. In spite of Bonaparte's intercourse with Rome and the establishment of the Concordat with Pius VII., by which he established Roman Catholic Christianity as the religion of France, the Catholics could not forget the destructive doctrines which had attended all the former steps of the Revolution. It was therefore among the republicans only (not an influential body) and the ignorant mob that the agitation took any hold. A leader was found in Robert Emmett, the son of a Dublin Emmett's Rebellion. 1803. physician, who with his brother had been more or less implicated in the affairs of 1798. He visited Paris early in the Peace, had personal interviews with the First Consul, and returned home ready to instigate the rebellion. The other leaders were Russell, a religious enthusiast, and Quigley, a professional agitator. About Christmas 1802 the conspirators began their operations. Arms and powder were collected at depôts in Dublin, and members of the conspiracy were enrolled. Some of these informed the police of what was going on. The explosion of the powder in one of the depôts, and the discovery of pikes there, still further warned the Government, and Emmett considered it necessary to hasten the outbreak. Saturday the 23rd of July was the day fixed for the rising. It proved to be little more than a city riot. As no soldiery had been brought into Dublin, it was for some time in the hands of the mob, who plundered and got drunk. The only important incident of the riot was the murder of Lord Kilwarden, the Chief Justice, who, returning from his country-seat with his daughter and nephew, was met in the streets by a part of the mob and brutally murdered. The arrival at the castle of his daughter, who had contrived to make her escape from the murderers, at length set the military in motion, and the mob was dispersed without much difficulty. The depôt was discovered, with the supply of arms, green uniforms, and the proclamation of the provisional government which was to have been established. Emmett sought safety by pretending to be a French officer; but the French were not liked; his flight was not favoured by the people; he was captured and hanged. The importance of the outbreak lies chiefly in the disclosure of the deepseated hostility of the Irish, and the necessity laid upon the English of establishing a series of coercive laws, which remained in force for many years, and went far to neutralize the healing effect which it was hoped the Union would have exercised.

The declaration of war called Pitt from his retirement, for the war, in the form it had now assumed, seemed to demand the co-operation of all patriotic men. Pitt therefore again appeared in the House; he thought it his duty to see, now that war had come, that no laxity was displayed in its support, and returned to his place, intending, as he himself said, not to join in any opposition to the ministry so long as their measures seemed energetic, but to forget all that was past (and many things had been done of which he could not fully approve) and devote himself to insuring vigour and activity for the future. Few positions could now be more embarrassing than that of Addington. His peaceful plans had come to nothing; and conscious, as he could not but have been, of his own inferiority, and of the general desire under present Difficulty of Addington's position. circumstances for Pitt's return to office, he had now to withstand the powerful attacks of an unusually able Opposition, and the damaging criticism of a so-called friend whom all the world regarded as his rival. And it must be owned that Pitt's views were far more in accordance with the views of the Opposition than with those of the minister. Grenville, Windham, and Spencer, the consistent supporters of the preceding war, had entered into a close alliance with Fox, its consistent opponent. Their common view, which was shared by Pitt, was that the condition of the country was so critical that nothing but the ablest possible ministry could be tolerated—that the present ministry, consisting as it for the most part did of the least able members of Pitt's old Government, was wholly incompetent to meet the present dangers, and that the one thing necessary was a great combined arrangement by which the administration of affairs should be intrusted to men of all parties of the widest experience and the greatest talents. They were naturally anxious that Pitt, whose views they knew to be almost identical with their own, should openly join them, but, as has been seen, although he shared their views, he felt himself still bound to give some sort of support to a ministry which he had himself created, and which nominally upheld the same principles which he had always advocated. In this trying position Addington's Government showed His vigorous measures inefficiently carried out. very creditable activity. Their budgets, with which Pitt had at first been discontented, were now conceived in accordance with his own principles. A considerable portion of the increased burden was borne by taxation, especially by the reimposition of a property tax, and loans were contracted only as far as needful. Militia to the number of about 70,000 were embodied; an army of reserve 50,000 strong, raised by ballot to serve for four years, voted; and by a Bill, known as the Military Service Bill, the enrolment as volunteers of all men between the ages of seventeen and fifty-five provided for. The number of these volunteers speedily rose to beyond 300,000. As the standing army was kept at about 120,000, there must have been of one sort or other upwards of 500,000 armed men for the purposes of defence. The temper of the nation was thoroughly roused. Pitt himself, as Warden of the Cinque Ports, raised and commanded 3000 volunteers, and caused considerable offers of gunboats to be sent in to the Government from the maritime towns.