CHAPTER XI.

RUSSIA AND THE CRIMEAN WAR.

Origin of the Crimean War.-The Holy Places.-Russia, Turkey, and the Christian Protectorate. Declaration of War by Turkey.-Mr. Bright on British Interests and the Integrity of Turkey.-War Fever in England. -Sir Charles Napier and the Peace Society.--Powerful Speech by Mr. Bright.-Mr. Kinglake on the attitude of Cobden and Bright.- Deputation from the Peace Society to the Czar.-Treaty of Alliance between England, France, and Turkey.-Mr. Bright on Sir C. Napier and the English Cabinet.--Flippancy of Lord Palmerston.-Declaration of Hostilities against Russia.-Debate in the House of Commons. Elaborate Speech by Mr Bright.-University Reform, Church Rates, etc.-The Manchester Patriotic Fund Meeting.-Letter from Mr. Bright.-The Law of Vattel.The Vienna Note.-The Policy of the English Government.-Effects of Mr. Bright's Letter.-Meetings at Manchester.-War Debates in the House of Commons.-Gross Mismanagement of the War.-Mr. Bright condemns the War with singular eloquence and power.-Memorable Scene during his Speech.

ENGLAND, in the language of the Earl of Clarendon, found herself 'drifting into war' at the close of the year 1853. The attitude which Mr. Bright assumed in the great Russo-Turkish conflict rendered him for a time very unpopular with a large body of his countrymen, and as his speeches on the Crimean War are in some respects amongst the most important he ever delivered; before dealing with these addresses, we shall briefly describe the events of this momentous period.

Russia had long been credited with designs upon Turkey, and as far back as the year 1844 the Czar had conversed with the Duke of Wellington and Lord Aberdeen on the probable dissolution of the Turkish Empire. The Emperor Nicholas embodied his views in a Memorandum, which was transmitted to London, but kept secret for ten years-that is, until 1854-by the British Cabinet. In 1853, a dispute arose between the Greek and Latin Churches as to the exclusive possession of the Holy Places; and in this dispute Russia and France took opposite sides. On the recommendation of the Porte, a Mixed Commission was formed, which decided in favour of the Greeks, and a firman was promulgated to this effect. France was dissatisfied with this, and the quarrel soon assumed a wider scope. The Russians demanded that a convention should be signed by

the Sultan, granting to the Czar such a protectorate over the Greek Christians in Turkey as the Sultan considered inimical to his own authority. A Conference of representatives of England, France, Austria, and Prussia met at Vienna on the 31st of July, and agreed to a Note. This was accepted by the Czar, but the Sultan subsequently required modifications which Russia rejected. On the 14th of September, two English and two French ships entered the Dardanelles, and on the 5th of October the Sultan declared war against Russia,

There was a strong feeling in England against the Northern Power; and on the very day after the declaration of war by Turkey, a meeting was held at the Manchester Athenæum for the purpose of denouncing the conduct of Russia, and of encouraging the British Government to protect British interests and to preserve the integrity of Turkey. Mr. Bright, in reply to an invitation to attend this meeting, wrote: I cannot conceive anything more unwise than to endeavour to excite public opinion to drive the Government into war with Russia in defence of Turkey. If such a war should be undertaken, I believe our children and posterity will judge us precisely as we now judge those who involved this country in war with the American colonies and with France, with this difference only, that we shall be held to be so much more guilty, inasmuch as having had the blunders and crimes of our forefathers to warn us and to guide us, we have wilfully shut our eyes to the lesson which their unfortunate policy has left us. Manchester, and the two millions of people in this district, I hope and believe regard those men as their worst enemies, who, by any act at this moment, shall weaken the efforts of Lord Aberdeen to preserve the peace of Europe. If men would let their reason guide them rather than their feelings, I am sure the pressure of public influence would be for peace, and not for war. War will not save Turkey if peace cannot save her; but war will brutalize our people, increase our taxes, destroy our industry, and postpone the promised Parliamentary Reform, it may be for

many years.

But the appeal was made in vain. The war fever had already severely attacked the great bulk of the population. Admiral Sir Charles Napier, speaking at a meeting on the 8th, held at the London Tavern, said he saw there was to be a Peace Conference at Edinburgh, on the 13th, and Mr. Bright and all the peaceable men were to be there. He was a peaceable man, and he was going too.' The Conference met on the 12th in due course. Eleven members of Parliament were present, in

cluding Messrs. Cobden, Bright, Miall, Hadfield, Cowan, and Heyworth; and amongst others who attended were the Rev. Dr. Guthrie, Dr. John Brown, Mr. Joseph Sturge, and Mr. Elihu Burritt. Mr. Cobden delivered a powerful speech; but the chief interest centred in the second day's proceedings, when it was known that Sir Charles Napier would attend, and fulfil his threat of bearding the Peace Society on its own ground. The gallant Admiral combated the notion that naval and military men were always for war and large establishments. Lord Nelson was not fond of bloodshed or war, and the Duke of Wellington was always a peace man-after the war was over,' he added, amid loud laughter. Sir Charles went on to say that he was just as anxious for peace as his hon. friend Mr. Cobden; but the plan propounded by the latter was not the way to preserve peace. The views of the Peace Society were perfectly right, if you can carry them into execution. The speaker defended such an army and navy for England as would be sufficient for her protection, showed the great power which Russia possessed, and concluded by expressing his opinion that if France and England did not come forward hand in hand, and the other nations of Europe, to prevent the hostilities between Russia and Turkey, no man would see the last of that war. He was as fond of peace as any one could be, but he was not one of those who would support non-resisting opinions.

Mr. Bright followed. Having shown the groundlessness of previous alarms, he went on to say that the right time to oppose the errors and prejudices of the people never comes in the eyes of those writers in the public press who pander to these prejudices. 'They say, We must not do so and so; we shall embarrass the Government. But rumour says the Government has been pretty well embarrassed already. They say that we shall complicate the question if we interfere; but it cannot well be more complicated than it is, for hardly anybody but the peace.men can tell how to unravel it. Now, what is it that we really want here? We wish to protest against the maintenance of great armaments in time of peace; we wish to protest against the spirit which is not only willing for war, but eager for war; and we wish to protest, with all the emphasis of which we are capable, against the mischievous policy pursued so long by this country, of interfering with the internal affairs of other countries, and thereby leading to disputes, and often to disastrous wars.' Admiral Napier had said that his friend Mr. Cobden had persuaded a feeble Government to reduce the armaments of this country to nothing. What was 'nothing' in the Admiral's

estimation? Fifteen millions a year! The hon. gentleman next observed that we had kept up great expenditure on fallacious grounds, and he objected to these armaments as provoking a war spirit. From the maintenance of great fleets and armies, there grows up an esprit de corps-there grows a passion for these things, a powerful opinion in their favour, that smothers the immorality of the whole thing, and leads the people to tolerate, under those excited feelings, that which, under feelings of greater temperance and moderation, they would know was hostile to their country, as it is opposed to everything which we recognize as the spirit of the Christian religion."'

Further, said Mr. Bright, they (the members of the Peace Society) were against intervention. Our interventions hitherto -and he cited the cases of Spain, Portugal, and Syria-had brought us nothing. As to its being our duty to interfere with a despotic power like Russia, he asked, 'If it were not contrary to international law and to the law of Europe for a Russian army to invade Hungary, to suppress there a struggle which called for, and obtained too, the sympathy of every man in favour of freedom in every part of the world,-I say, how can it be contrary to international law and the law of Europe for Russia to threaten the Sultan of Turkey, and to endeavour to annex Turkey to the Russian Empire? He wanted our policy to be consistent. As to Russia securing Constantinople and getting to India, these were very remote contingencies. Sufficient reasons had not been advanced for England's going to war, and entering on what perhaps might be a long, ruinous, and sanguinary struggle with a powerful empire like Russia.

In a very impressive passage Mr. Bright asked his hearers what war was, expressing his belief that half the people who talked about it had not the slightest idea what it involved:

:

In a short sentence it may be summed up to be the combination and concentration of all the horrors, atrocities, crimes, and sufferings of which human nature on this globe is capable. But what is even a rumour of war? Is there anybody here who has anything in the funds, or who is the owner of any railway stock, or anybody who has a large stock of raw material or manufactured goods? The funds have recently gone down 10 per cent. I do not say that the fall is all on account of this danger of war, but a great proportion of it undoubtedly is. A fall of 10 per cent. in the Funds is nearly £80,000,000 sterling of value, and railway stock having gone down 20 per cent. makes a difference of £60,000,000 in the value of the railway property of this country. Add the two- £140,000,000—and take the diminished prosperity and value of manufactures of all kinds during the last few months, and you will understate the actual loss to the country now if you put it down at £200,000,000 sterling. But that is merely a rumour of war. That is war a long way off-the small cloud, no bigger than a man's hand; what will it be if it comes nearer and becomes a fact? And surely sane men

ought to consider whether the case is a good one, the ground fair, the necessity clear, before they drag a nation of nearly 30,000,000 of people into a long and bloody struggle, for a decrepit and tottering empire, which all the nations in Europe cannot long sustain.'

War, too, continued the speaker, wore a very different aspect from what it formerly did. It would now wither up the sources of the prosperity enjoyed by the middle and working classes of the country. War in 1853 would be infinitely more perilous and destructive to the country than it had ever yet been at any former period in its history. After indicating other evils, Mr. Bright said that if we went into war we should have more banners to decorate our cathedrals and churches. Englishmen would fight as well as they ever did, and there was ample power to back them, if the country could be but sufficiently excited and deluded. We might raise up great generals another Wellington and another Nelson too-for the country could grow men capable for every enterprise. But what would become of themselves, their country, and their children? When he thought of the tremendous perils into which unthinking men were willing to drag or to hurry the country, he was amazed how they could trifle with interests so vast, and consequences so much beyond their calculation.

With this peroration, which deeply moved the audience— ensuring first their complete silence and then their rapturous plaudits-Mr. Bright concluded :

'You profess to be a Christian nation. You make it your boast eventhough boasting is somewhat out of place in such questions-you make it your boast that you are a Protestant people, and that you draw your rule of doctrine and practice, as from a well pure and undefiled, from the living oracles of God, and from the direct revelation of the Omnipotent. You have even conceived the magnificent project of illuminating the whole earth, even to its remotest and darkest recesses, by the dissemination of the volume of the New Testament, in whose every page are written for ever the words of peace. Within the limits of this island alone, on every Sabbath, twenty thousandyes, far more than twenty thousand temples are thrown open, in which devout men and women assemble that they may worship Him who is the "Prince of Peace." Is this a reality? or is your Christianity a romance? Is your profession a dream? No, I am sure that your Christianity is not a romance, and I am equally sure that your profession is not a dream. It is because I believe this that I appeal to you with confidence, and that I have hope and faith in the future. I believe that we shall see, and at no very distant time, sound economic principles spreading much more widely amongst the people; a sense of justice growing up in a soil which hitherto has been deemed unfruitful; and, which will be better than all, the churches of the United Kingdom-the churches of Britain-awaking, as it were, from their slumbers, and girding up their loins to more glorious work, when they shall not only accept and believe in the prophecy, but labour earnestly for its fulfilment, that there shall come a time-a blessed time-a time which shall last for ever-when "nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.