possible, and the vessels were permitted without interference to proceed steadily and swiftly toward completion.

At last, on September 3, Adams learned that one of the ships was practically finished and was about to sail. It was to be nominally transferred to a French company, and then turned over by it to the Confederates. In his diary Adams wrote: "I clearly see that a collision must now come out of it. The prospect is dark for poor America." But he made one last appeal to Russell, pointing out tersely and clearly what the sailing of the ironclads would mean to America, and what England's responsibility would be; adding perhaps the most celebrated and momentous phrase ever penned by an American diplomat: "It would be superfluous in me to point out to your Lordship that this is war." It is pleasant to add that this supreme utterance was anticipated by Russell. Before it reached him he had already decided to assume the personal responsibility of stopping the ironclads from leaving port. His order to that effect was given on September 3. He realized that he had been tricked into treating America badly in the case of the Alabama, and he meant not thus to be bamboozled again. Whether his chief, Palmerston, would approve his course, he did not know, but he did not let possible disapproval deter him from duty. He wrote to Palmerston that the conduct of the men who had contracted for the ironclads was so suspicious that he had decided to direct that the vessels be detained. In that the solicitor-general sustained him, not on grounds of law but of public policy. "We shall thus test the law," he said, "and if we have to pay damages we have satisfied the opinion, which prevails here as well as in America, that that kind of neutral hostility should not be allowed to go on without some attempt to stop it." Russell added a request that, in case Palmerston did not approve his course, a cabinet meeting should be called at once. But none was called. Palmerston did not dissent from Russell's course. A strong naval force was placed at the harbor entrance, to prevent a surreptitious exit of the vessels. The builders blustered and protested, but did not venture to bring suit for damages or for the release of the vessels. Neither did the Government care to take action for their condemnation. Ultimately, during the following year, the British government settled the matter by

purchasing them for its own navy. And that was the last contraband shipbuilding in Great Britain.

Still more flagrant was the contraband shipbuilding in France, though it attracted less attention. Slidell, the Confederate commissioner to that country, was the shrewdest and most successful of all the Southern agents in Europe, and in France he had to deal with an emperor who was naturally hostile to America and with ministers who were unscrupulous and corrupt. It was realized that the success of the attempted French conquest of Mexico depended upon the destruction of the United States, and accordingly the emperor and his half-brother, the Duke of Morny, used every possible influence short of open war in aid of the Confederacy. Not only was the building of Confederate vessels in private yards permitted, but at least two were built in the national navy yards and were provided with supplies from the government arsenals.

Two small vessels were finished and were permitted to sail. Two other powerful ironclads were also finished, and early in 1864 lay at the docks at Cherbourg, ready for service, and Slidell wrote to the Confederate government that they would be at sea within a week. Our minister at Paris, John Bigelow, had apparently exhausted the resources of diplomacy, but in vain. But at the last moment he resorted to an effective trick. He wrote to the American consul at Marseilles a letter, which he arranged should be stolen on the way and should be published in the press. In this he told the consul of the fitting out of armed cruisers or privateers by New York and Boston speculators, which were presently to sail in and from the Gulf of Mexico with letters of marque from Benito Juarez, the Mexican president, who, though a refugee in the mountains, still maintained his title against the French. These cruisers would, said Bigelow, direct their operations against French commerce, and the ravages of the Confederate cruisers indicated how serious the results would be for France. In this there was no truth whatever, but the emperor supposed it all to be true, and he made haste to stop the sailing of the Confederate ships and to assure Bigelow of his friendship for the United States.

THE

XXII

THE CIVIL WAR-INTERVENTION

HE question of mediation or intervention between the Federal and Confederate governments arose early in the war. It was practically considered, however, by only two European governments, those of France and Great Britain. Of these the former was by far the more inclined toward such action. It proposed it earlier and more frequently, and in the more extreme form. Between the two there was a radical difference, which is readily explicable not only on general grounds but particularly on the specific grounds of France's relations with the neighboring republic of Mexico.

For many years before the outbreak of our Civil War the Mexican republic had been in a disturbed and revolutionary condition, and had fallen into financial chaos. Heavy claims against it were preferred by Great Britain, France, and Spain. These were chiefly well founded and deserved satisfaction, though it is not clear that they warranted the employment of other than diplomatic means. Such means were alone employed until some months after the beginning of our Civil War. Then, when it became evident that the United States government would for some time be fully occupied with the suppression of a formidable attack upon its own integrity, the European powers deemed the moment opportune for the application of extreme measures. Accordingly at the end of October, 1861, the three powers named entered into an agreement for despatching to Mexico a joint naval and military expedition, for the protection of their subjects and the satisfaction of their claims. Such an enterprise would never have been undertaken had the United States been unembarrassed by domestic strife and thus free to vindicate its ancient policy.

With what from one point of view seemed fair friendliness and from another defiant and contemptuous irony, the United

States-which had perhaps greater claims against Mexico than any of the others-was invited to participate in the undertaking, the invitation being offered some weeks after the agreement had been made by the three European powers. Seward received it in good faith, but declined it in unequivocal terms. It was, he truly said, contrary to the policy of the United States to go to war or to use military force for the collection of pecuniary claims due to its citizens by the citizens or even the Government of a foreign country. He might have added with equal and pertinent truth that such action was also contrary to the policy of Great Britain, as set forth by Palmerston himself. He did add a suggestion that the United States might consent to guarantee the payment of the Mexican debt and all just claims against that country, and thus obviate all reason for European intervention. Nor did he omit to give warning that the United States would never consent to the seizure of Mexican territory by any European power, or to the oppression or political control of that republic by any of them. The powers replied that the guaranteeing of Mexican obligations would not be sufficient, since an equal purpose of the intervention was to secure more ample protection for the lives, freedom, and property of foreigners domiciled in Mexico.

France was,

The tripartite expedition therefore proceeded to Mexico. At an early date in its operations, however, it became apparent that the three powers had by no means the same objects. Great Britain and Spain were in good faith seeking satisfaction of claims and security for their subjects, and nothing more. however, intent upon military conquest and political control of Mexico, with the object of ultimate annexation. When this became clear to Great Britain and Spain, they withdrew from the enterprise, leaving France-doubtless to Louis Napoleon's great satisfaction-to carry it on alone. When disclosure of the French plans, or of the British and Spanish interpretation of them, was made to the United States, representations and inquiries were made to France, with the result that in June, 1862, the emperor categorically declared that "the French troops do not go there to interfere with the form of government, nor to acquire an inch of territory"; a brazen falsehood which was frequently repeated during that and the succeeding two or three

years. With the remainder of this Mexican embroilment we shall presently deal. Reference is made to it here and at this length in order to illuminate the real attitude and purposes of the French government toward the United States during the Civil War. Just as the three powers saw in that war their opportunity for intervention in Mexico, so Louis Napoleon saw in the success of the Confederacy and the downfall of the United States his only hope of permanent conquest of Mexico and the establishment of a French Empire in America.

As early as March, 1861, before the firing on Fort Sumter, the French minister at Washington, Mercier, advised his Government to recognize the Confederacy as a sovereign and independent power, and in May following he further recommended forcible intervention for raising the Federal blockade of the Southern ports. This was far in advance of any proposals of action by Great Britain, and went beyond anything that the latter country then contemplated. The French government was profuse in its protestations of friendliness to the Untied States, but it secretly sounded the British government, and would have acted upon Mercier's suggestions with avidity if the British government would have joined it in so doing. The ulterior object of this should have been and doubtless was apparent to Seward, in the aggressive course which France was then pursuing toward Mexico. It was judicious and diplomatic, however, to regard it as a purely friendly and benevolent offer, and this Seward did. "That generous offer," he wrote to Dayton on June 8, "imposes a new obligation on us toward France, which we acknowledge with sincere pleasure." But he proceeded to decline it, with an explicit and vigorous statement of American policy. "If mediation were at all admissible," he said, "that of his Majesty would not be declined. But the present paramount duty of the Government is to save the integrity of the American Union. Absolute, self-sustaining independence is the first and most indispensable element of national existence. This is a republican nation; all its domestic affairs must be conducted and even adjusted in constitutional, republican forms and upon constitutional, republican principles. This is an American nation, and its internal affairs must not only be conducted with reference to its peculiar continental position, but by and through Amer