Congress Of Berlin
In the summer the famous congress assembled at Berlin (June 13 to July 13), with Lord Beaconsfield and Lord Salisbury as the representatives of Great Britain, to sanction, reject, or modify the treaty of San Stefano. Before the congress met, the country received a shock that made men stagger. While in London it was impossible to attempt to hold a meeting in favour of peace, and even in the northern towns such meetings were almost at the mercy of anybody who might choose to start a jingo chorus; while the war party exulted in the thought that military preparations were going on apace, and that the bear would soon be rent by the lion; a document was one afternoon betrayed to the public, from which the astounding fact appeared that England and Russia had already entered into a secret agreement, by which the treaty of San Stefano was in substance to be ratified, with the single essential exception that the southern portion of Bulgaria was to be severed from the northern. The treaty of Berlin became in fact an extensive partition of the Turkish empire, and the virtual ratification of the policy of bag and baggage. The Schouvaloff memorandum was not the only surprise. Besides the secret agreement with Russia, the British government had made a secret convention with Turkey. By this convention England undertook to defend Turkey against Russian aggression in Asia, though concessions were made to Russia that rendered Asiatic Turkey [pg 576] indefensible; and Turkey was to carry out reforms which all sensible men knew to be wholly beyond her power. In payment for this bargain, the Sultan allowed England to occupy and administer Cyprus.
At the end of the session Mr. Gladstone wound up his labours in parliament with an extraordinarily powerful survey of all these great transactions. Its range, compass, and grasp are only matched by the simplicity and lucidity of his penetrating examination. It was on July 30:—
Finished the protocols and worked up the whole subject. It loomed very large and disturbed my sleep unusually. H. of C. Spoke 2-½ hours. I was in body much below par, but put on the steam perforce. It ought to have been far better. The speech exhausted me a good deal, as I was and am below par.
He sketched, in terse outline, the results of the treaty—the independence of Roumania, Servia, and Montenegro; the virtual independence of northern Bulgaria; the creation in southern Bulgaria (under the name of Eastern Roumelia) of local autonomy, which must soon grow into something more. Bosnia and Herzegovina, though Mr. Gladstone would have hoped for their freedom from external control, had been handed over to Austria, but they were at any rate free from the Ottoman. The cardinal fact was that eleven millions of people formerly under Turkish rule, absolute or modified, were entirely exempted from the yoke. “Taking the whole of the provisions of the treaty of Berlin together, I most thankfully and joyfully acknowledge that great results have been achieved in the diminution of human misery and towards the establishment of human happiness and prosperity in the East.” A great work of emancipation had been achieved for the Slavs of the Turkish empire. He deplored that equal regard had not been paid to the case of the Hellenes in Thessaly and Epirus, though even in 1862, Palmerston and Russell were in favour of procuring the cession of Thessaly and Epirus to Greece. As for the baffling of Russian intrigue, it was true that the Bulgaria of Berlin was reduced from the Bulgaria of San Stefano, but [pg 577] this only furnished new incentives and new occasions for intrigue.[352] Macedonia and Armenia were left over.
The British Plenipotentiaries
On the conduct of the two British plenipotentiaries at Berlin he spoke without undue heat, but with a weight that impressed even adverse hearers:—
I say, sir, that in this congress of the great Powers, the voice of England has not been heard in unison with the institutions, the history, and the character of England. On every question that arose, and that became a subject of serious contest in the congress, or that could lead to any important practical result, a voice has been heard from Lord Beaconsfield and Lord Salisbury which sounded in the tones of Metternich, and not in the tones of Mr. Canning, or of Lord Palmerston, or of Lord Russell. I do not mean that the British government ought to have gone to the congress determined to insist upon the unqualified prevalence of what I may call British ideas. They were bound to act in consonance with the general views of Europe. But within the limits of fair differences of opinion, which will always be found to arise on such occasions, I do affirm that it was their part to take the side of liberty; and I do also affirm that as a matter of fact they took the side of servitude.
The agreement with Russia had in truth constantly tied their hands. For instance, Lord Beaconsfield and Lord Salisbury might make to Russia as many eloquent speeches as they liked against the restoration of Bessarabia, but everybody in the room knew that the British government had taken the lead in virtually assuring Russia that she had only to hold to her point and Bessarabia should again be hers. Most effective of all was his exposure of the convention with Turkey, a proceeding by which we had undertaken, behind the back of Europe and against the treaty of Paris, to establish a sole protectorate in Asiatic Turkey.[353] We had made a contract of such impossible scope as to bind us to manage the reform of the judicature, the police, the finances, the civil service of Turkey, and the stoppage of the sources [pg 578] of corruption at Constantinople. The load, if we took it seriously, was tremendous; if we did not take it seriously, then what was the whole story of the reform of Asiatic Turkey, but a blind to excuse the acquisition of Cyprus? This great presentation of a broad and reasoned case contained a passage near its close, that had in it the kernel of Mr. Gladstone's policy in the whole controversy that was now drawing to an end:—
I think we have lost greatly by the conclusion of this convention; I think we have lost very greatly indeed the sympathy and respect of the nations of Europe. I do not expect or believe that we shall fall into that sort of contempt which follows upon weakness. I think it to be one of the most threadbare of all the weapons of party warfare when we hear, as we sometimes hear, on the accession of a new government, that before its accession the government of England had been despised all over the world, and that now on the contrary she has risen in the general estimation, and holds her proper place in the councils of nations. This England of ours is not so poor and so weak a thing as to depend upon the reputation of this or that administration; and the world knows pretty well of what stuff she is made.... Now, I am desirous that the standard of our material strength shall be highly and justly estimated by the other nations of Christendom; but I believe it to be of still more vital consequence that we should stand high in their estimation as the lovers of truth, of honour, and of openness in all our proceedings, as those who know how to cast aside the motives of a narrow selfishness, and give scope to considerations of broad and lofty principle. I value our insular position, but I dread the day when we shall be reduced to a moral insularity.... The proceedings have all along been associated with a profession as to certain British interests, which although I believe them to be perfectly fictitious and imaginary, have yet been pursued with as much zeal and eagerness as if they had been the most vital realities in the world. This setting up of our own interests, out of place, in an exaggerated form, beyond their proper sphere, and not merely the setting up of such interests, but the mode in which they have been pursued, has greatly diminished, not, as I have said, the regard for our material strength, but the [pg 579] estimation of our moral standard of action, and consequently our moral position in the world.