It is not necessary to describe at length the steps which led up to the outbreak of war between Russia and Turkey on the 23rd of April, 1877. In vain did Lord Derby implore Turkey to grant of her own free will the concessions she had refused to the abortive Conference. Russia stood grimly on the frontier, with her hand on her sword-hilt, asking Europe how long she was to wait ere she unsheathed her weapon. In March a Protocol was signed by the Powers pressing Turkey to yield. To this Russia appended a declaration that she would disarm if Turkey accepted the advice of the Powers, and also sent an ambassador to St. Petersburg to arrange for mutual disarmament. But otherwise Russia clearly indicated her intention to use force. Lord Derby accepted, as did the other Powers, this declaration, only he added, on behalf of England, a reservation that she would consider the instrument null and void if it did not lead to disarmament. The Turks rejected the appeal of the Protocol. Prince Bismarck rejected a personal appeal which the Queen made to him to hold back Russia; and so war was declared. To the last the Turks expected that England would take their side, and they had been confirmed in their attitude of contumacy by the appointment of Mr. Layard, a notorious supporter of Turkey, to the British Embassy at Constantinople on the day on which the Protocol was signed. If it was the object of Lord Beaconsfield to prevent the outbreak of war and to save the Ottoman Empire in Europe from ruin, his policy must be described as an utter failure. And it failed for obvious reasons. Lord Beaconsfield and the British diplomatic agents in Turkey talked and wrote in terms which persuaded the Turks that, if they resisted the demands of Europe, England would defend them, as in 1853-4. On the contrary, if Lord Beaconsfield desired the Foreign Policy of England to succeed, and to save Turkey from being crushed by Russia, he should have taken steps to convince her that, even if he had the will, he had not the power to do battle for her.
Others besides the Turks shared the opinion that Lord Beaconsfield meant to drag England into a new Crimean War. On the 5th of May Mr. Carlyle stated in the Times, “not on hearsay, but on accurate knowledge,”[114] that Lord Beaconsfield was contemplating a feat “that will force, not Russia only, but all Europe to declare war against us.”[115] The idea of the Government was to occupy Gallipoli to protect British interests. This would have forced Russia to declare war against England, and then English public opinion would, of course, have supported Lord Beaconsfield in fighting on the side of Turkey. But Mr. Carlyle’s sudden revelation of the scheme roused public opinion in favour of non-intervention, and Mr. Gladstone “took occasion by the hand” to inflame the populace against Lord Beaconsfield’s supposed designs. Stormy meetings were held all over England during the first week of May, and then Ministers seemed to have changed their offensive tone towards Russia. On the 6th of May Lord Derby buoyed out for Russia the torpedoes called “British interests” which lay in her way. He laid down in a polite despatch the precise conditions under which England would remain neutral, conditions so plainly reasonable that Prince Gortschakoff accepted them with the utmost frankness. Meanwhile Mr. Gladstone was seriously misled by the public indignation which had been roused against a conspiracy to fight for Turkey under the pretext of protecting British interests. He imagined it would enable him to carry out his own project of coercing Turkey in company with Russia. He therefore submitted to the House of Commons six Resolutions, which were discussed early in May. Of these, however, he was forced to withdraw two, because a powerful section of the Liberal party considered that they bound England to joint action with Russia. Thus Mr. Gladstone’s formidable array of Resolutions dwindled down to the simple and harmless proposition that the Turk was a bad man, who did not deserve English sympathy or support. The House, however, by a majority of 131, carried a colourless amendment declining to embarrass the Government by any formal vote, and leaving “the determination of policy entirely in their hands.” The debate on the Resolutions was one of those high and sustained triumphs of Parliamentary eloquence which at great crises display the British House of Commons at its best. It may be said to have exhausted the controversy on the Eastern Question. Mr. Gladstone’s speech (which would of itself have rendered the debate historical) admittedly soared as high as the loftiest flights of Chatham and of Burke.
There is no need to narrate the events of the war, how Osman Pasha, from behind his earthworks at Plevna, blocked the Russian advance, and Mukhtar held the Russians at bay in Asia Minor. As the star of fortune shed its beams on either side, public opinion in England grew feverish and excited, the Tories all the while clamouring for intervention on behalf of Turkey. Some of them, indeed, seemed to hold that it was the duty of England to head a new Crusade on behalf of Islam against Christianity. But the public utterances of Ministers indicated their determination to remain neutral, and Lord Derby did his best to convince Musurus Pasha that Turkey was abandoned to her fate.
RUSSIAN WOUNDED LEAVING PLEVNA.
Though the fact was not known at the time, a perfectly frank and friendly understanding existed between the English and Russian Governments; in fact, Russia had informed England, through her ambassador, what terms of peace she would offer to Turkey, if Turkey were to yield before Russian troops were compelled to cross the Balkans. This information was given so that Lord Derby might have an opportunity of modifying these terms if necessary for the protection of British interests, prior to their presentation to the Porte, and Lord Derby thought them so reasonable that he made more than one fruitless effort to get Mr. Layard to press them on Turkey. Unfortunately the diplomacy of 1877 was kept a profound secret, and as the people were not aware of the good understanding between the Governments of Russia and England, a fierce and exasperating controversy between the Russophiles and the Russophobes raged through the land. On the 14th and 15th of October the Turkish defence in Asia Minor collapsed. On the 11th of December the fall of Plevna was announced, and when it was intimated that Parliament was to meet on the 13th of January, 1878, the country was panic-stricken. Nobody knew that Lord Derby and Count Schouvaloff had practically agreed about the terms of peace that were to be imposed on Turkey, and that Lord Derby had repeatedly warned the Turks to expect no help from England. Everybody, in fact, inferred, from the tone of the Ministerial press and of the speeches of Lord Beaconsfield, Mr. Hardy, and Lord John Manners, that a scheme of intervention was “in the air,” and that the early meeting of Parliament implied a demand for supplies to carry on a war with Russia. The Money Market rocked and swayed with excitement, and securities fell with amazing rapidity.[116] Throughout England meetings were held by business people protesting against any divergence from a policy of neutrality. At night bands of young men, representing the War Party, marched about London, the only English city which favoured war, singing the chorus of a song then becoming popular in the music-halls, and which began—
“We don’t want to fight,
But by Jingo if we do,
We’ve got the ships, we’ve got the men,
And we’ve got the money too.”
