266 THE ALABAMA [1862 ceedings, wrote Cockburn, "it became in my opinion the duty of the Commissioners of Customs at once to direct the seizure to be made. Misled by advice which they ought to have rejected as palpably erroneous, they unfortunately refused to cause the vessel to be seized." In the meantime Adams had sent the affidavits, Collier's opinion and many other papers relating to the case to Earl Russell. "I ought to have been satisfied with the opinion of Sir Robert Collier," wrote Russell in after years, with a candor which does him honor, "and to have given orders to detain the Alabama at Birkenhead." Now ensues an episode which, useful as it would have been to the writer of an opera-bouffe libretto, or to Dickens for his account of the Circumlocution Office, completely baffles the descriptive pen of the historian. The papers received from the Commissioners of Customs and those which Adams had sent to Russell were submitted to the law officers of the Crown, one set reaching them July 23, the other July 26; that is to say, they reached the senior officer, the Queen's Advocate, on those days. Sir John Harding, who was then the Queen's Advocate, had been ill and incapacitated for business since the latter part of June; in fact, his excitable nerves and weak constitution had succumbed to the strain of work, and he was now verging on insanity. At his private house these papers lay for five days. Work on the Alabama went on briskly, and everybody in the kingdom was satisfied with having done his duty. The collector had referred the matter to the Commissioners; the Commissioners had referred it to the Lords of the Treasury; the Lords and Earl Russell had referred it to the law officers of the Crown. The papers on which perhaps depended war or peace between two great nations, either received no notice whatever or were examined only by a lawyer who was going mad. CH. VII] THE ALABAMA 267 Finally on July 28, the Attorney-General and SolicitorGeneral got hold of the papers. Their report was conclusive. "We recommend," they said on July 29, "that without loss of time the vessel be seized by the proper authorities." It was too late. The Alabama had left port that morning, and under pretence of a trial trip had gone out to sea. Yet she was still off the Welsh coast, only fifty miles from Liverpool, where the most ordinary energy on the part of the London and Liverpool authorities would have been sufficient to effect her apprehension before she started on the career which was to do so much in driving the American merchant marine from the high seas. The Alabama left Liverpool without guns or munitions of war of any kind; these as well as coal were brought to her at the Azores by two British vessels which sailed from England about the middle of August. However unfriendly the action of England was in the case of the Alabama, it must be borne in mind that the fault was one of omission. The British government, unlike the Emperor of the French, was during the whole war innocent of any overt unfriendly acts. The Queen's speech at the prorogation of Parliament on August 7, 1862 declared that her Majesty had still determined to take no part in the contest on the American continent. Again, though the dominant sentiment of England toward the North is to be deplored and the want of due diligence in the performance of her duties as a neutral is unquestioned, her atonement has been ample. English books, magazines and newspapers are full of sincere admissions that the public opinion of the country took a wrong direction. In the treaty of Washington, the regret which Great Britain expressed at the escape of the Confederate cruisers is all that can be 268 EUROPEAN INTERVENTION [1862 asked in the way of moral reparation from a high-spirited people conscious of their strength. As far as pecuniary damages were concerned, our case, already very strong, was made absolutely secure by the terms submitting the dispute to arbitration. That the score has been wiped out should be recognized at the bar of history. McClellan's failure on the Peninsula, Pope's inglorious campaign resulting in his crushing defeat at the second battle of Bull Run, during the summer of 1862, had a profound influence on the governors of England. The correspondence between Palmerston and Russell indicates that they were about ready to propose to the Cabinet that England should take the initiative and ask France, Russia and the other powers to join her in some intervention in the struggle in America. The Federals "got a very complete smashing," wrote the Prime Minister on September 14; and if Washington or Baltimore "fall into the hands of the Confederates," as "seems not altogether unlikely," should not England and France "address the contending parties and recommend an arrangement upon the basis of separation?" Russell replied: "I agree with you that the time has come for offering mediation to the United States Government with a view to the recognition of the Confederates. I agree further, that in case of failure, we ought ourselves to recognize the Southern States as an independent State." He suggested, moreover, a meeting of the Cabinet, and if a decision were arrived at, to propose, first, the intervention to France and "then on the part of England and France to Russia and the other powers. When Palmerston replied to this letter, he was watching the Antietam campaign, and thought that if the Federals should sustain "a great defeat" it would be well to proceed with the project of media CH. VII] GLADSTONE 269 tion; but if "they should have the best of it we may wait awhile and see what may.follow." Gladstone, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the third member of the Cabinet in importance, was well aware of Palmerston's and Russell's attitude and, feeling certain that such would develop into the policy of the government, anticipated this probable event in a speech at Newcastle on October 7, wherein he expressed positively the view of the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary as well as that of most of the aristocracy and higher middle class. "There is no doubt," he declared, "that Jefferson Davis and other leaders of the South have made an army; they are making, it appears, a navy; and they have made what is more than either they have made a nation. We may anticipate with certainty the success of the Southern States so far as their separation from the North is concerned." An exchange of confidential letters between members of a ministry is a different affair from an announcement to the public of a policy which has not been fully determined upon, and, soon after the delivery of this speech, it was felt that Gladstone had committed an indiscretion; yet for the moment Palmerston and Russell were bent on the policy of mediation and probable subsequent recognition of the independence of the Confederate States. On October 13, Russell sent to his colleagues a confidential memorandum putting the question "whether it is not a duty for Europe to ask both parties in the most friendly and conciliatory terms to agree to a suspension of arms.' Fortunately for the North there were differences in the Cabinet, and Gladstone's speech provoked a quasi-reply from Sir George Cornwall Lewis, the member of the Cabinet ranking next in importance to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Addressing his constituents on October 14, he in effect 270 CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS [1862 asserted that the time had not yet arrived for the recognition of the Southern States and he followed this up by circulating among his Cabinet colleagues a confidential counter memorandum in reply to the circular letter of Earl Russell. A Cabinet meeting was called for October 23. Previous to that time, the Prime Minister had changed his mind and did not travel to London from the country to keep the engagement. Hence no Cabinet meeting was held, but in the informal discussion among the ministers who had gathered, Russell and Gladstone were in favor of some sort of interference while the others held to the position formulated by Lewis. Adams saw the Foreign Secretary by appointment on the same afternoon and said to him: "If I had entirely trusted to the construction given by the public to a late speech, I should have begun to think of packing my carpet-bag and trunks. His Lordship," as Adams proceeds to relate the conversation, "at once embraced the allusion, and whilst endeavoring to excuse Mr. Gladstone, in fact admitted that his act had been regretted by Lord Palmerston and the other Cabinet officers. Still he could not disavow the sentiments of Mr. Gladstone so far as he understood them, which was not that ascribed to him by the public. Mr. Gladstone was himself willing to disclaim that. He had written to that effect to Lord Palmerston. His Lordship said that the policy of the Government was to adhere to a strict neutrality and to leave the struggle to settle itself. But he could not tell what a month would bring forth. I asked him if I was to understand that policy as not now to be changed. He said, Yes." In the meantime, the Emperor of the French had made an attempt to conquer Mexico and place a European monarch upon her throne. For the success of his Mexican policy and because France wanted cotton for her manufacturing in |