XXXIV. 1840. CHAP. with Russia; large steamboats required to be purchased in England. Thus for all the matériel of war, both by land and sea, France was obliged to have recourse to her enemies a melancholy reflection for a country which had once sent forth from its own resources the armies of Louis XIV. and Napoleon, and in 1812 had despatched one hundred thousand horses into Russia; but easily accounted for, when it is recollected that France was now divided among ten millions of landed proprietors, the 217, 218. great majority of whom, so far from being able to feed a horse, were barely able to feed themselves.1 1 Cap. x. 98. memoran English Go vernment. July 24, 1840. Farther removed from the centre of agitation, and M. Guizot's not equally enamoured as M. Thiers of revolutionary dum to the excitement and military power, M. Guizot was in a situation in London to judge more correctly the true state of affairs, and at the same time appreciate the real anxiety of the British Government to adjust the affairs of the East without coming to an actual rupture with the French Cabinet. While, therefore, he officially addressed an able memorandum to Lord Palmerston on the treaty of 15th July, defending the conduct of France in regard to the affairs of the Levant,* he was careful to transmit to Paris, by circuitous channels, detailed information to the King as to the real views of the British * "La France a toujours désiré, dans l'affaires de l'Orient, marcher d'accord avec la Grande Bretagne, l'Autriche, la Prusse, et la Russie. Elle n'a jamais été mue dans sa conduite que par l'intérêt de la paix. Elle n'a jamais jugé les propositions qui lui ont été faites que d'un point de vue général, et jamais du point de vue de son intérêt particulier. Jugeant de ce point de vue, elle a consideré comme mal conçus tous les projets qui avaient pour but d'arracher de Méhémet Ali par la force des armes les portions de l'Empire Turc qu'il occupe actuellement. La France ne croit pas cela bon pour le Sultan; car on tendrait ainsi à lui donner ce qu'il ne pourrait ni administrer ni conserver. La France s'est surtout prononcée contre le projet dont l'adoption devait entraîner l'emploi de la force, parcequ'elle ne voyait pas distinctement les moyens dont les cinq Puissances pouvaient disposer. Mais au surplus, sans insister sur la question que pourrait faire naître cette manière de procéder à son égard, la France le déclare de nouveau: Elle considère comme peu réfléchie, comme peu prudente, une conduite qui consistera à prendre des résolutions sans moyens de les exécuter, ou à les exécuter par des moyens insuffisans ou dangereux.”—Memorandum adressé au VICOMTE PALMERSTON par M. GuizOT, July 24, 1840. CAPEFIGUE, Xx. 218-219, note. XXXIV. 1840. Cabinet, and the ease with which affairs might be ad- CHAP. justed, and the serious dangers of a general war averted. These representations fell in too completely with the King's own pacific views not to meet with a ready attention; and he was the more inclined to attend to them, that unmistakable symptoms showed the terror which had seized upon the monied interest in consequence of the prospect of a general war. By an ordonnance of 10th September, M. Thiers had declared the necessity for the fortification of Paris urgent, and opened a credit of 600,000 francs (£24,000) to begin them. In the midst of these warlike preparations, and while columns of cavalry and infantry, with long trains of artillery, were constantly traversing the streets, the public funds fell seventeen per cent in the space of three months: they Ann. Hist. sunk from 86 on 6th July to 69 on 2d October.1 These Doc. Hist. alarming symptoms, and the general effervescence of the public mind, excited the serious alarm of the King; and in order to discover if possible a mode of escaping from the dangers with which he was surrounded, in the middle of September he commanded M. Guizot to meet him at the Chateau d'Eu in Normandy. The ambassador 2 Cap. x. quickly obeyed the summons, and long and anxious con- Ann. Hist. ferences took place between them, upon which the destinies 306. of Europe depended.2 xxiii. 93; 249, 250; xxiii. 304 opinions on question. Louis Philippe was seriously desirous to uphold the 99. national dignity and independence; but he had no in- M. Guizot's clination to retrograde to the revolutionary fervour of the Eastern 1830, to which the policy of his prime - minister was hurrying him; and his difficulty was, that, as matters were situated, he did not see how he could extricate himself from the one without compromising the other. M. Guizot expounded his ideas to him on both points with his wonted clearness and precision. He observed that what was now passing in England was rather an accident than a settled policy; that the French alliance was suspended, not abandoned; that by a few concessions on both sides a good XXXIV. 1840. CHAP understanding might be restored; and that the declamations of the journals on either side were not to be taken as a true test of the general feeling. On the next point, whether it was possible to venture upon the experiment of a conservative cabinet, the opinions of M. Guizot were equally decided. He thought that the circumstance which most powerfully influenced external nations in their opinion of what was going on in France, was the over-excitement of the public mind, the distress of material interests, the want of consistency in the conduct of Government, of unity in the views of the Cabinet, and of the majority of the Chamber. It was by no means impossible, he thought, to form a government which should be in harmony with the majority of the Chamber, foreseeing in a conservative sense, and with the mission to temper the political fever, which left no moderation in opinion, and was evidently hurrying on the nation to the most dreadful catastrophe. The danger arose from having, in the composition of M. Thiers' Cabinet, removed to a distance all the men of weight in parliament, 251,252 and who had rendered immense service to the monarchy and the cause of order.1 1 Cap. X. 100. al of the French fleet from the Levant. Oct. 7. These opinions were too consonant to the pacific disWithdraw position and prudent character of the King not to meet with his entire concurrence; and he in secret resolved, when an opportunity occurred, to remove a Minister from the lead in his councils whose measures were tending so rapidly to embroil him with the whole of Europe. Whether it was that M. Thiers divined these views on the part of the King, or that he himself recoiled from the prospect of encountering the hostility of all Europe on the Rhine for the sake of maintaining the influence of France in Egypt, certain it is that, after this interview in the Chateau d'Eu, the policy of the Cabinet underwent a total revolution. Orders were given to Admiral Duland to leave the mouth of the Dardanelles, where the French fleet had lain close to XXXIV. 1840. xxxii. § 62 the British all the summer; and after performing several CHAP. insignificant evolutions to conceal the real object in view, it made sail for Toulon, where it arrived by the end of October. Meanwhile, the English fleet, under Admirals Stopford and Napier, entered upon the short and brilliant Ante, c. campaign already recorded,' which terminated in the cap- 69. ture of Acre, and the entire expulsion of the Egyptians from Syria. These events were decisive. The French had retired from the theatre of conflict, the English had triumphed in it. In vain M. Thiers sought to conceal his mortification by declaring "that the French fleet was more at his disposal in the roads of Toulon than in the seas of Syria; and that, by means of the telegraph, he could send it everywhere to combat the allied squadrons." The flimsy device deceived no one. Every man in France, so eminently a warlike nation, saw that in leaving the Levant, at the very time when hostilities were commencing, was the most decisive shunning of the conflict. In his note of 8th October, addressed to Guizot, he contented himself with declaring that "France would in no event consent to the dethronement of Mehemet Ali." This, however, was what none of the allied powers desired; the expulsion of his forces from Syria, and its restoration to the Porte, being the object to which their efforts were directed. The crisis therefore had now passed in the East; there was no longer any subject of contention between France and the allied powers. It must be confessed, France was con "Les plus chers intérêts de l'Europe se rattachaient à la continuation de l'existence de la Turquie. Cet empire tenu dans l'abaissement, ne pouvait servir qu'à l'agrandissement des Etats voisins, au détriment de l'équilibre général; et sa ruine aurait amené, dans les positions existantes des grandes Puissances, un changement qui aurait modifié l'aspect du globe entier. La France, et les autres Puissances avec elle, ont si bien compris ce résultat éventuel, que de concert avec ses alliés elle a constamment et loyalement travaillé à la conservation de l'Empire Ottoman, quelque profondément que leurs intérêts respectifs pussent être engagés relativement à la conservation ou à la ruine de ce royaume. Mais la partie intégrale de l'Empire Ottoman s'étend des rives de la Mer Noire à celles de la Mer Rouge. Il est aussi essentiel de garantir l'indépendance de l'Egypte et de la Syrie que l'indépendance des Dar danelles et du Bosphore."-M. THIERS à M. GUIZOT, October 8, 1840. CAPEFIGUE, X. 259. 1840. CHAP. tent to forego a tempting prize, and England avoided a XXXIV. serious danger on this occasion, for which the latter power was indebted to the moderation of the French sovereign, the diplomatic ability of Lord Palmerston, and the strength of the European alliance, but by no means to the magnitude of its national resources. For such had been the prostration of the British forces by sea and land at this period, in consequence of the wretched system of economy which had been forced upon the Government by the reformed House of Commons, that France had fifteen ships of the line in the Levant, while England had only nine; and while the former had three hundred thousand regular soldiers ready to be marched down to the coasts of the Channel, not twenty thousand men, after providing for the necessary garrisons, could have been assembled to meet them on the British shores.1* 1 Note, Oct. 8, 1840; Cap. x. 254-257. 101. But although the crisis had passed for Europe, it was Immediate by no means over with the French Minister; and the cause of M. vacillation of system which saved the world from a genedownfall. ral war, proved fatal to the Minister who had so nearly Thiers' induced it. M. Thiers was worse than defeated-he was humiliated; he had not met death in fair fight-he had shunned it. He had lost the confidence of all par * M. Thiers wrote, on the 3d October 1840, to M. Guizot in London: "They (England) have gratuitously sacrificed for a secondary interest an alliance which has maintained the integrity of the Ottoman empire much more effectually than it will be by the Treaty of 15th July. It will be said that France has yielded to the wishes of England, and purchased its alliance by that sacrifice. The answer to this is obvious. France, once in union with the views of the allies, will have made none of those essential sacrifices which no independent nation should make to another, but only that of a way of viewing certain questions of boundaries. But they left her no choice. They offered to admit her into an alliance already formed. From that moment she required to isolate herself, and she has done so. But, faithful to her pacific policy, she has never ceased to counsel moderation to Mehemet Ali. Though armed and at liberty to act, she will do all in her power to preserve the world from the catastrophe with which it is threatened. With the exception of sacrifices which might affect her honour, she will do everything to preserve peace. If at present she holds this language to the British Cabinet, it is less in the spirit of complaint than to prove the honesty of her policy, not only towards Great Britain, but the entire world, of which no state, how powerful soever it may be, can venture to despise the opinion."-M. THIERS to M. GUIZOT, October 3, 1840. CAPEFIGUE, X. 257, 259, note. |