Representative British Orations Volume 4 (of 4) / With Introductions and Explanatory Notes

by Unknown

The Greek Government having neglected to give protection they were bound to extend, and having abstained from taking means to afford redress, this was a case in which we were justified in calling on the Greek Government for compensation for the losses, whatever they might be, which M. Pacifico had suffered. I think that claim was founded in justice. The amount we did not pretend to fix. If the Greek Government had admitted the principle of the claim, and had objected to the account sent in by M. Pacifico—if they had said, “This is too much, and we think a less sum sufficient,” that would have been a question open to discussion, and which our Ministers, Sir E. Lyons at first, or Mr. Wyse afterwards, would have been ready to have gone into, and no doubt some satisfactory arrangement might thus have been effected by the Greek Government. But the Greek Government denied altogether the principle of the claim. Therefore, when Mr. Wyse came to make the claim, he could not but demand that the claim should be settled, or be placed in train of settlement, and that within a definite period, as he fixed it, of twenty-four hours.

Whether M. Pacifico’s statement of his claim was exaggerated or not, the demand was not for any particular amount of money. An investigation might have been instituted, which those who acted for us were prepared to enter into, fairly, dispassionately, and justly.

M. Pacifico having, from year to year, been treated either with answers wholly unsatisfactory, or with a positive refusal, or with pertinacious silence, it came at last to this, either that his demand was to be abandoned altogether, or that, in pursuance of the notice we had given the Greek Government a year or two before, we were to proceed to use our own means of enforcing the claim. “Oh! but,” it is said, “what an ungenerous proceeding to employ so large a force against so small a power!” Does the smallness of a country justify the magnitude of its evil acts? Is it held that if your subjects suffer violence, outrage, plunder, in a country which is small and weak, you are to tell them when they apply for redress, that the country is so weak and so small that we cannot ask it for compensation? Their answer would be, that the weakness and smallness of the country make it so much the more easy to obtain redress. “No,” it is said, “generosity is to be the rule.” We are to be generous to those who have been ungenerous to you; and we cannot give you redress because we have such ample and easy means of procuring it.

Well, then, was there anything so uncourteous in sending, to back our demands, a force which should make it manifest to all the world that resistance was out of the question? Why, it seems to me, on the contrary, that it was more consistent with the honor and dignity of the Government on whom we made those demands, that there should be placed before their eyes a force, which it would be vain to resist, and before which it would be no indignity to yield. If we had sent merely a frigate and a sloop of war, or any force with which it was possible their forces might have matched, we should have placed them in a more undignified position by asking them to yield to so small a demonstration. Therefore, so far from thinking that the amount of the force which happened to be on the spot was any aggravation of what was called the indignity of our demand, it seems to me that the Greek Government, on the contrary, ought rather to have considered it as diminishing the humiliation, whatever it might be, of being obliged to give at last to compulsion, that which had been so long refused to entreaty.

Well, then, however, did we, in the application of that force, either depart from established usage, or do anything that was unnecessarily pressing on the innocent and unoffending population of Greece? I say the innocent and unoffending population, because it was against the Government, and not against the nation, that our claim for redress was directed. The courses that may be pursued in cases where wrong is done by one Government towards the subjects of another are various. One is what is commonly called “reprisals”; that is, the seizing something of value, and holding it in deposit until your demands are complied with; or, if you fail in that and don’t choose to resort to other methods, applying that which you have seized, as a compensation for the wrong sustained. That is one method. Another is the modified application of war—such as a blockade—a measure frequently adopted by the governments of maritime states when they demand redress for injuries. Last come actual hostilities. Many instances of such measures have been quoted in this debate as having been adopted by the governments of other countries, especially by the French Government, when they have had a demand to make for injuries sustained by their subjects; and, by the by, when people complain of the peremptory manner in which our demand was made, and the shortness of the time allowed for consideration, I wish to call to the recollection of the Honorable Gentlemen what was done by the French squadron no longer ago than 1848.

There was an insurrection at Naples, in May, 1848. The great street of the town was filled with barricades, and the troops had to force those barricades. To do that, they were obliged to occupy the houses right and left, in order to turn those defences; and as they forced one house after another, and passed on from house to house, they neglected to leave any guards behind them. They were followed by the Lazzaroni,[13] and the houses were plundered. Some French people whose shops were thus rifled, complained to the French Minister, and to the French Admiral—there being then a French squadron before the port at Naples. The French Admiral, Admiral Baudin, quite cut out Sir W. Parker, and being applied to by those French citizens, he sails up the bay, lays his ships broadside to, in front of the palace, and writes a note to the Government to say, that he has been called on by his countrymen to protect them; and he adds—that letter being dated half-past one on the 17th of May—that unless by three o’clock of that very day he obtains a satisfactory assurance—a satisfactory assurance that his countrymen shall be efficiently protected, reserving, he says, for future discussion their claims for compensation—but—

“Unless in one hour and a half I get, on board this ship, a satisfactory assurance that they shall be efficiently protected, I shall land the crews of my fleet, and will take care of them myself.”

Well, then, I say that Sir W. Parker acted with the greatest moderation in enforcing our demands. He began with reprisals, not with a blockade, wishing to avoid all unnecessary interruption to the commerce of other countries. But he made reprisals in a way which I believe has not often been adopted. The Government was the offending party, and he took possession of vessels belonging to the Government. Now, that is not the usual plan, and for very good reasons.

Vessels belonging to governments are armed. They may feel it to be their duty to defend themselves. To seize armed vessels would probably lead to bloodshed; and reprisals are generally effected by seizing merchant vessels belonging to the country on whom the demand is made. But, the disparity of force being so great on this occasion, Sir W. Parker began by seizing the few armed vessels belonging to the state. He then gave the Government time to reflect upon that demonstration. It was not attended to. Even then he did not immediately proceed to make reprisals upon merchant vessels. He first laid an embargo upon them. He gave notice that he had placed a lien upon them, and that they must not quit their ports. That failed; then he took merchant vessels, but only a limited number, and placed them under the custody of his fleet, avoiding to subject commerce in general to any greater degree of restraint than was unavoidably necessary for the execution of his instructions. It has been said, that we seized upon fishing-boats, and interrupted the coasting trade. I don’t believe that. On the contrary, I believe that the embargo did not extend to fishing-boats, or to vessels of small tonnage employed in the coasting trade of the country.

Well, sir, in that state of things, the French Government offered us their good offices and mediation. We readily and cheerfully accepted their good offices. We accepted them by a note of the 12th of February, which has been laid on the table, and in which we distinctly stated the grounds and conditions on which, and the extent to which, those good offices were accepted.