"We have heard much of late—a great deal too much, I think—of the prestige of England. We used to hear of the character, of the reputation, of the honour of England."[[276]] Even Roebuck, whose motion had once defended Palmerston's against the consequences of actions hardly more honourable than this, came back to the Liberal side. "The rule of morality extends over the globe, and what is just and unjust in the Mersey is equally just and unjust in the river before Canton."[[277]] On this occasion Palmerston's majority deserted him. He won by a small majority in the Lords, but was soundly beaten in the Commons. But the resources of the constitution were not exhausted. He dissolved Parliament and appealed to the country. The result of the election was not encouraging to those who valued honour in foreign policy. The Crimean fever had not abated, and this fresh appeal to national arrogance produced a great demonstration in favour of the Prime Minister. The most striking feature of the election was the extinction of the Manchester School. Cobden, Bright, Milner Gibson, and Fox of Oldham were all turned out of their seats. But though the Liberals were thus censured by their contemporaries, the judgment of posterity must be pronounced hardly less emphatically in their favour. Ten years later the new Liberal party, united on domestic and foreign policy, came into power, and it governed in both fields in a spirit which was the very opposite of that of Palmerston.
In the meantime the lively veteran proceeded with varying success and unchanging cheerfulness. In November, 1857, he saw fit to pass public censure on the French Emperor, which he had done nothing recently to deserve. But by the following February he had completely changed his tone. A man named Orsini had made bombs in London for the purpose of blowing up the Emperor in Paris, and Count Walewski, in a most impudent dispatch, requested Palmerston to alter the law of England so as to prevent the repetition of such practices. To the consternation of a House of Commons which had been
elected to express approval of his high-handed dealings with Russia and China, he meekly introduced a Conspiracy to Murder Bill. This was too much even for his own followers, and within twelve months of his triumph he was beaten, and resigned. But nothing could stop him, because nobody could replace him. In two years he returned to office, and he remained there until his death in 1865.
Foreign affairs gave him more than one more opportunity for the display of his peculiar qualities. The Indian Mutiny was provoked and suppressed in India, and except for the protest which some Liberals raised against the occasional ferocity of the conquerors, there were few revelations of differences of opinion. The appropriation of Schleswig and Holstein by Germany in 1863 attracted at once Palmerston's zeal for national independence and his desire to assert himself in Europe. He was always eager to protect the little man irrespective of his merits. He and Lord John Russell ventured to interfere with some outrageous oppression of the Poles by Russia and Prussia in the beginning of 1863. It was a clear case of interference with domestic concerns of another nation, and the Russian Government in effect told them to mind their own business. Their suggestions for reform here produced no good effect whatever. But in the same year they again interfered, with hardly more excuse and no better result, in the quarrel between Prussia and Denmark. The quarrel did little credit to anybody concerned. Prussia, under the direction of Bismarck, behaved with that dishonesty which was as marked a feature of that statesman's diplomacy as its apparent success. Denmark behaved with a rashness which she could not afford in defence of a position which she ought not to have taken up. By a Treaty of London which had been signed in 1852 by England, France, Austria, Prussia, Russia, Sweden, and Denmark, the two Duchies of Schleswig and Holstein had been united with Denmark. Their inhabitants were mostly German, so that this treaty was inconsistent with Liberal theory. But such as it was, Prussia could not honestly refuse to observe it. In 1864, after some fruitless
negotiations, she and Austria invaded the Danish territories. Probably no war has ever been begun with less justification since Frederick the Great marched into Silesia. Palmerston was carried away by his feelings, and declared that "those who made the attempt would find in the result that it would not be Denmark alone with which they would have to contend."[[278]] Relying on this rash declaration, Denmark maintained a bold front. A speedy surrender might have left her with part at least of the disputed provinces. In the end she was despoiled of both. France and Russia would not fight, England would not fight alone. After encouraging Denmark to her fatal resistance, and after summoning an ineffectual conference of the Powers she left her to her fate.
The error of the Government in this case lay not so much in their view of the facts or their refusal to go to war as in the rash declarations which had led the Danes to believe that they would have English support. Palmerston had once more applied Liberal principles in an awkward and disastrous way. Even Cobden supported him in Parliament, and approved of his refusal to go to war with a military Power like Prussia. But he pointed out that there were other principles in issue besides the interests of the reigning House of Denmark, and protested against "the dynastic, secret, irresponsible engagements of our Foreign Office," which had in the first place assigned these German men and women to a Danish Government. He emphasized the need that all diplomatists should attend to "the question of nationalities—the instinct, now so powerful, leading communities to seek to live together, because they are of the same race, language, and religion.... There will never again, in all probability, be a conference meeting together to dispose, for dynastic purposes, of a population whose wishes they do not take into account."[[279]] The Government contrived to remain in office until Palmerston died, and the maintenance of the rights of nations fell into the hands of people who were as ardent as himself, and much more wise.
On the whole, the foreign policy of Palmerston had been more ostentatious than wise, and its failures were as conspicuous as its successes. But in one quarter he and Lord John Russell together by their boldness rendered invaluable service to a struggling nationality. The Treaty of Vienna had operated nowhere so vilely as in Italy. The whole country had been parcelled out between Governments, some of whom were alien and others barbarous. The kingdom of Sardinia and Piedmont was Italian. Lombardy and Venetia were Austrian. In the middle, the Pope misgoverned one-third of the people. The last third was oppressed in Naples and Sicily by a King of the House of Bourbon. The rising of 1848 had been suppressed by French troops at Rome and by Austrian troops in Lombardy. But in 1860 the zeal and devotion of Italian men and women of all classes won a final victory, and it was England's privilege to assist at this great awakening, the birth of that new Italy which died the other day in Tripoli. By a series of miraculous victories, Garibaldi drove the Bourbons out of Sicily and Naples, and Vittorio Emmanuele marched down through the Papal States to meet him. The Powers watched this uprising of a people with mixed feelings. Austria, France, Prussia, and Russia expressed their emphatic disapproval. Lord John behaved like a Whig whose fire the Manchester School had not quenched. In a dispatch written on the 27th October, 1860, he supported the new Italian system. He quoted Vattel with point: "When a people from good reasons take up arms against an oppressor, it is but an act of justice and generosity to assist brave men in the defence of their liberties." The question was whether the Italian rising had taken place for good reasons. "Upon this grave matter Her Majesty's Government hold that the people in question are themselves the best judges of their own affairs.... Such having been the causes and concomitant circumstances of the Revolution in Italy, Her Majesty's Government can see no sufficient grounds for the severe censure with which Austria, France, Prussia, and Russia have visited the acts of the King of Sardinia. Her Majesty's Government turn their eyes rather to the gratifying prospect of a people
building up the edifice of their liberties, and consolidating the work of their independence, amid the sympathies and good wishes of Europe." All the noble temper which had been wasted on Turkey, Poland, and Denmark was concentrated with triumphant success in this dispatch. The despotic Powers held their hands, and the Italian nation was enabled to work out its own destiny.
One more controversy arose during the Palmerston era, and it tested English Liberalism as severely as any other. This was the American Civil War, which broke out in 1861 and continued until 1864. It was easy for a Liberal to find a logical reason for taking either side. He might support the North, because it was fighting to suppress slavery. He might support the South, because it was fighting for local independence against a central tyranny. The States were all legally independent except for certain common purposes of defence. It was thus very plausibly argued that it was the duty of a Liberal to support the South in its claim to secede from the Union which interfered with its internal affairs. Though it was not the business of England to go to war with the North, it could easily be squared with the doctrines of men like Canning that she should formally recognize the independence of the South as soon as it appeared to be achieved. When the issues were thus confused, English statesmen were dangerously vague in their language and their conduct. Toryism and the governing class took the side of the South, which in its aristocratic temper differed from the North much as they themselves differed from the Manchester School. Russell and Gladstone took the false Liberal view, and inclined towards recognition. The Manchester men were severely injured by the blockade of the Southern ports and the consequent dearth of cotton, and many of them may have hoped, even against their convictions, that the Government would take such an easy way of ending the war. The situation was highly dangerous. The North were fighting for national unity. They were fighting to keep within the Union people who wanted to secede only to maintain the most infamous of all human institutions save one. The war was not a war between nations. The Southerners were