9. The tone of Lord Lyons was a more permissible manifestation of British spleen than the higher functionaries at home displayed, yet none the more acrid. This appears in all his letters and dispatches respecting blockade, privateering, the arrest of spies, and the detention of British subjects, or the seizure of prizes. It is especially offensive in the letter to Mr. Seward which drew forth a diplomatic rebuke upon a dictation by English law authority regarding constitutional construction.
10. The correspondence of the State Department was conducted by Mr. Seward (as was well said by the N.Y. Evening Post, Dec. 21) with great skill and adroitness. It was also firm in the defence of our national honor and rights. His rhetoric was always measured by the dignified, tasteful, and cautious rules of international intercourse. Its entire tone in correspondence was earnest but restrained, and in style fully equaling his best, and most ornate efforts.
What are Mr. Seward's views in the 'Past' respecting England and the emergency of a war with her, is a question now much mooted. It can be readily answered by reference to a speech made at a St. Patrick's Day dinner whilst he was Governor. 'Gentlemen, the English are in many respects a wise as they are a great and powerful nation. They have obtained an empire and ascendancy such as Rome once enjoyed. As the Tiber once bore, the Thames now bears the tribute of many nations, and the English name is now feared and respected as once the Roman was in every part of the world. England has been alike ambitious and successful. England too is prosperous, and her people are contented and loyal. But contentment and loyalty have not been universal in the provinces and dependencies of the English government. The desolation which has followed English conquest in the East Indies has been lamented throughout the civilized world. Ireland has been deprived of her independence without being admitted to an equality with her sister-island, and discontent has marked the history of her people ever since the conquest. England has not the magnanimity and generosity of the Romans. She derives wealth from her dependencies, but lavishes it upon objects unworthy of herself. She achieves victories with their aid, but appropriates the spoils and trophies exclusively to herself. For centuries she refused to commit trusts to Irishmen, or confer privileges upon them, unless they would abjure the religion of their ancestors.'
Ten years later, in the United States Senate, during the debate upon the Fisheries dispute, Mr. Seward said, after discussing England's financial and commercial position: 'England can not wisely desire nor safely dare a war with the United States. She would find that there would come over us again that dream of conquest of those colonies which broke upon us even in the dawn of the Revolution, when we tendered them an invitation to join their fortunes with ours, and followed it with the sword—that dream which returned again in 1812, when we attempted to subjugate them by force; and that now, when we have matured [pg 209] the strength to take them, we should find the provinces willingly consenting to captivity. A war about these fisheries would be a war which would result either in the independence of the British Provinces, or in their annexation to the United States. I devoutly pray God that that consummation may come; the sooner the better: but I do not desire it at the cost of war or of injustice. I am content to wait for the ripened fruit which must fall. I know the wisdom of England too well to believe that she would hazard shaking that fruit into our hands.'
Another question, now asked,—'Will Mr. Seward exhaust negotiation?'—may be in like manner answered by himself. In a succeeding debate on the same 'fisheries' controversy, commenting upon negotiation, he said: 'Sir, it is the business of the Secretary of State, and of the government, always to be ready, in my humble judgment, to negotiate under all circumstances, whether there be threats or no threats, whether there be force or no force: but the manner and the spirit and the terms of the negotiation will be varied by the position that the opposing party may occupy.'
It can not be denied that more cordial relations exist between the President and the Secretary of State than ever any previous administration disclosed: so that when Mr. Seward acts, the government will prove a powerful unit. Indeed, in this connection, history will hereafter write precisely what Mr. Seward, in his speech on the 'Clayton-Bulwer treaty,' said respecting the Taylor administration:—'Sir, whatever else may have been the errors or misfortunes of that administration, want of mutual confidence between the Secretary of State and his distinguished chief was not one of them. They stood together firmly, undivided, and inseparable to the last. Storms of faction from within their own party and from without beset them, and combinations and coalitions in and out of Congress assailed them with a degree of violence that no other administration has ever encountered. But they never yielded.'
We can not better conclude this paper, while the volumes of Mr. Seward's works are open on the table, than by quoting still again, and asking the reader to apply his own remarks on Secretary of State Webster in the fisheries-war speech, before alluded to: 'I shall enter into no encomium on the Secretary of State; he needs none. I should be incompetent to grasp so great a theme, if it were needed. The Secretary of State! There he is! Behold him, and judge for yourselves. There is his history; there are his ideas; his thoughts spread over every page of your annals for near half a century. There are his ideas, his thoughts impressed upon and inseparable from the mind of his country and the spirit of the age. The past is at least secure. The past is enough of itself to guarantee a future of fame unapproachable and inextinguishable.'
TO ENGLAND.
The Yankee chain you'd gladly split,