CHAP. remonstrance or protest; for if Austria was the country most endangered by the seizure of the Principalities, she was also the Power which could most easily extirpate the evil, because, whenever she chose, she could fall upon the flank and rear of the Russian invaders by issuing through the passes of the Eastern Capachan range, or the frontier which touched the

Moreover, France and England, by bringing Geir feets into the Levant, by causing them to apreach the Dardanelles, by passing the Straits, by anchoring in the Golden Horn, by ascending the Bosphorus, by cruising in the Euxine, and, finally, by interdicting the Russian flag from its waters, could always inflict a graduated torture upon the Czar, and (oven without going to the extremity of war) could make it impossible that the indignation of Europe should remain unheeded.

The concord of the States opposing the Czar's encroachment was already so well perfected that, on the very day when the Russian advance - guard crossed the Pruth, the representatives of the four Powers assembled in Conference, determined to address to Russia a collective Note pressing the Czar to put his claims against Turkey in conformity with the sovereign rights of the Sultan. Here was the very principle for which France and England had been contending; and it was obvious that if this concerted action of the four Powers should last, it would insure peace: for, in the first place, any resistance to their united will would be hopeless; and, * 2d July 1853.

XIII.

on the other hand, a Prince whose spirit rebelled CHA P. against the idea of yielding to States which he looked upon as adversaries, might gracefully give way to the award of assembled Europe. In short, the four Powers could coerce without making war; and the business of a statesman who sought to maintain the peace and good order of Europe was to keep them united, taking care that no mere shades of difference should part them, and that nothing short of a violent and irreconcilable change on the part of one or more of the Powers should dissolve a confederacy, which promised to insure the continuance of peace and a speedy enforcement of justice.

How came it to happen that in the midst of all this harmony there supervened a policy which discarded the principle of a peaceful coercion applied by the whole of the remonstrant Powers, and raised up in its stead a threatening alliance which was powerful enough to wage a bloody and successful war, but was without that more wholesome measure of strength which can enforce justice without inflicting humiliation, and without resort to arms? How came it to happen that within six days from the date of the collective Note, and without the intervening occurrence of any new event, the concert of the four Powers was suddenly superseded and paralysed by the announcement of a separate understanding between two of them?

It was not for reasons of State that by one of the high contracting parties this evil course was designed; and in order to see how it came to be possible that

CHAP. the vast interests of Europe should be set aside in XIII. favour of mere personal objects, it will presently be

necessary to contract the field of vision, and, going back to the winter of 1851, to glance at the operations of a small knot of middle-aged men who were pushing their fortunes in Paris.

CHAPTER XIV.

XIV.

State of
Republic

the French

in Nov.

In the beginning of the winter of 1851 France CHAP. was still a republic; but the Constitution of 1848 had struck no root. There was a feeling that the country had been surprised and coerced into the act of declaring itself a republic, and that a monar- 1851. chical system of government was the only one adapted for France. The sense of instability which sprang from this belief was connected with an agonising dread of insurrections like those which, forty months before, had filled the streets of Paris with scenes of bloodshed. Moreover, to those who watched and feared, it seemed that the shadow on the dial was moving on with a terrible steadiness to the hour when a return to anarchy was, as it were, pre-ordained by law; for the Constitution required that a new president should be chosen in the spring of the following year, and the French, being by nature of a keen and anxious temperament, cannot endure that lasting pressure upon the nerves which is inflicted by a long-impending danger. Their impulse under such trials is to rush forward, or to run

XIV.

CHAP. back, and what they are least inclined to do is to stand still and be calm, or make a steady move to the front.

In general, France thought it best that, notwithstanding the Rule of the Constitution which stood in the way, the then President should be quietly reelected; and a large majority of the Assembly, faithfully representing this opinion, had come to a vote which sought to give it effect; but their desire was baffled by an unwise provision of the Republican Charter, which had laid it down that no constitutional change should take place without the sanction of three-fourths of the Assembly. By this clumsy bar the action of the State system was hampered, and many, whose minds generally inclined them to respect legality, were forced to acknowledge that the Constitution wanted a wrench. Still, the republic had long been free from serious outbreak. The law was obeyed; and indeed the determination to maintain order at all sacrifices was so strong that, even upon somewhat slight foundation, the President had been intrusted with power to place under martial law any districts in which disturbances seemed likely to occur. The struggles which went on in the Chamber, though they were unsightly in the eyes of military men and of those who love the decisiveness and consistency of despotism, were rather signs of healthy political action than of danger to the State. It is not true, as was afterwards pretended, that the Executive was wickedly or perversely thwarted either by the votes of the Assembly or by the speeches of its members;