BOOKS.
• THE LIFE OF THE PRINCE CONSORT.* THE reading of this third volume has deepened in our minds the regret that it should have been published at this moment. We cannot but fear that Mr. Martin has been induced in great
" The Life of his Royal Iliglmest the Prince Consort. By Theodore Martin. Vol III. London : Smith, Elder, and 00.
measure by the revival of the Eastern Question to enlarge his plan of operations in relation to those years during which the Crimean war was being fought, and wo are sure that the result has not been fortunate. No careful reader of Mr. Martin's second volume can avoid seeing how widely different the situations at the opening of that Russo-Turkish war and at the opening of this Russo-Turkish war, really were. Yet the ordinary public will hardly be able to keep this steadily in mind, and the result must be that many of the positions which the Prince Consort and the Queen were quite right in taking between 1854 and 1856 will be regarded as applicable to the political situation of 1875-7, without their really being applicable to it at all. For our own parts, we hold, in complete opposition to Mr. Bright, that the war of 1854-6, though in many respects most unfortunate, was forced upon us by the dictatorial and aggressive policy of the Emperor Nicholas, and must be regarded not, in time first in- stance, as a war for the maintenance of the integrity of the Turkish Empire, but as a war for the firm repulse of Russian aggression ; and that the support of Turkey was but the use of a natural and almost inevitable, but even then very unsatisfactory means, to a satisfactory end. In these latter days the situation has been altogether changed. The policy of Russia has been one with which the Prince Consort, had he been still living, would, we believe, have sympathised entirely, and it seems to us almost a misfortune, not only for his own reputation as a states- man, but for the public which rightly attaches so much weight to his opinions, that the story of his policy during the Crimean war should be read with the running commentary supplied by events which have so much in them calculated to suggest misleading in- terpretations of his convictions, and to put a false gloss upon his aims.
With this warning against the too probable misunderstanding of the Prince Consort's memoranda and correspondence on the Eastern Question contained in this volume, and with the remarks which we made last week on his view of this question, we shall content our- selves, and pass from it to other interesting details of these years, which are recorded by Mr. Martin with his usual good-taste, though in a style of almost courtly reverence which sometimes diminishes its literary effect. We seem to be reading the sentences of a modern Slr Walter Raleigh rather than of the translator of Faust and of the witty author of Bon Gaultier. Still the book bears, of course, the impress of the accomplished hand of its author in every page ; it is full of the moat valuable materials for history ; and it is pervaded by the character of the subject of the bio- graphy,--in other words, by a character of calm serenity, of cul- tured sagacity, of an imperious love of duty, of a very deep and curiously penetrating preference for that which is fitting and decorous in the mode of right-doing, and of a large and exquisitely cultivated esthetic feeling. It is hardly just to compare a states- man in such a situation as that of the Prince, with men in the position of the Parliamentary statesmen of the day, like Lord Aberdeen, Lord Palmerston, Lord John Russell, and the rest. You cannot combine the nature which is competent to defend itself in all the jostlings of public life, with the nature which is competent to survey and judge them all. Whether the Prince would have made his mark in such a life as the life of Parlia- mentary struggle, is doubtful, and at all events hardly a useful question. But it is impossible not to feel how surely and truly he did feel the deficiencies of the ablest of the Queen's Ministers, without displaying the slightest disposition to enjoy picking holes in anybody. He never drops a word of criticism which is not wise and just. Lord Aberdeen was evidently his favourite, but he says quite justly, in 1854, " Even yet Aberdeen cannot rise to the level of the situation," and no one can read this volume without seeing that it was a blunder in Lord Aberdeen ever to have retained office after the war was resolved on. Lord John was a puzzle to the Court, and the odd gyrations of his mind under the alternating influences of diplomatic persuasion and popular impulse, made him a greater puzzle than ever during the disasters of the winter 1854-5 and the subsequent Vienna negotiations ; but the Prince's letters distinctly show how completely he had gauged the incapacity of Lord John Russell to guide opinion,—how clearly he had grasped that he was rather a very sensitive barometer, telling the weight of the atmosphere of opinion by which he was surrounded, than one of the forces which altered its law of distribution. Just so, again, in relation to Lord Palmerston. Lord Palmer- ston he did not like. The Prince justly criticised, for instance, the vulgarity of the boastful speeches at the Reform Club, when Sir Charles Napier was feted before taking command of the Navy. But he clearly and distinctly felt that Lord
Palmerston had a force and resoluteness which could, to some extent at least, lead public opinion, and that he was the Minister for such a war as that. Yet the Prince's own preference probably was for Lord Clarendon. He preferred the unsensa- tional Minister who mastered the data of a problem and pushed nothing to excess, who could give way when it was needful, and persist where persistency was urgent,—who could refuse to waver from one extreme to another with Lord John, and yet shrank from the somewhat coarse popular policy of Lord Palmerston. The Prince Consort knew them all,—knew the value of what is called popular
fibre,' though ho did not Iike it, his own preference being for the calm, thoughtful style of administration, though he was well aware that it was not the best for obtaining popular support.
He was a keen observer, too, of the character of foreign states- men. His account of the Emperor Louis Napoleon, after his visit to him at Boulogne, though too favourable, is very skilfully drawn, and he saw very clearly, later on, what the Emperor's views as to his alliance with us really were. We take this concerning Louis Napoleon from a letter to the King of the Belgians, written
at Christmas, 1855 :-
" Sad would it be, were England to show that fitfulness of purpose, which is visible, alas I every twenty-four hours in France, and which is duo to the fickleness and frivolity of the nation, the stock-broking propensities (Agiotagewesen) of its public men (Staatsleute), and the temptation under which its ruler lives to regard every phase of the political problem with reference to the influence it may have upon his personal position at home. On the failure of any assault upon a battery at Sebastopol, he was for evacuating the Crimea ; after any little suc- cess over Russia, ho was for pushing forward to Moscow; either a dis- graceful peace was to be concluded, or the border provinces of the Rhino to be invaded ; Austria was to be bought over to the side of the allies by promises of Prussian territory, or her Italian provinces were to be taken from her; no peace "sans que la France ait eu an grand succes, gui est ne'cessaire a l'Empereur," and as soon as a success was achieved, peace at once, 'pour en sortir avec la gloire exclusive,' &I"
But the Prince's most important papers and speeches in this volume are perhaps those in which he comments on the real and great difficulty of combining popular and Parliamentary government with that unity of action and promptness of purpose essential to the success of a great war. Most people who are more than forty years old will remember the excitement caused by his saying at a Trinity House dinner that for the purposes of war, Constitutional Government was " on its trial," as it was then supposed that he had said,—he really seems to have said only that oonstitutional government, in waging war, was "under a heavy trial,"—but few people remember how soon the justice of either remark was confirmed by the House of Commons itself. Let Mr. Martin's account of a Parliamentary incident which occurred very soon after, justify the Prince's thoughtful and just words :—
" The very next night, however, the Government narrowly escaped a serious defeat. By a Convention concluded with Turkey on the 2tith of June, the Governments of France and England undertook to guarantee the payment of the interest of a loan of £5,000,000 to Turkey. The French Chambers had already sanctioned this Convention, but the Re- solutions introduced with a similar object by Lord Palmerston on the 20th of July met with en opposition as determined as it was unexpected. The money was absolutely necessary to enable the Porto to boar its share of the costs of the war, but without the guarantee proposed there was no chance of its being raised. To have repudiated the transaction would have been an outrage to our allies, who might well have shrunk from further co-operation with an Executive whose most solemn en- gagements were liable to be rendered nugatory by a Parliamontary vote. What stronger confirmation could have been given of the difficulties of a constitutional government than the possibility of such a result ? And yet the Resolutions were only carried by a majority of three, the numbers being 135 to /82. On reflection, many of those who had voted in the minority saw that they had made a mistake, and the Bill to give effect to the Resolutions was passed without further opposition."
The volume will be found to contain a good deal of graphic and pleasant incident. There is a charming account of the bonfire at Balmoral, lit up by the Prince's own hands on the taking of Sebas- topol, and there are also very pleasant extracts from the Queen's diary concerning the Emperor's visit hero and her own visit to Paris. The following extract from the Queen's diary contains one of the most picturesque touches in the book. It is the account of the arrival of the Emperor and Empress at Windsor in 1855 "News arrived that the Emperor had reached London at ten minutes
and wont over to the other to five. I hurried to be ready
side of the Castle, where we waited in one of the tapestry rooms near the guard-room. It seemed very long. At length, at a quarter to seven, we heard that the train had loft Paddington. The expectation and agitation grew more intense. The evening was fine and bright. At length the crowd of anxious spectators lining the road seemed to move, then came a groom, then we hoard a gun, and we moved towards the staircase. Another groom came. Then wo saw the avante-garde of tho escort; then the cheers of the crowd burst forth. The outriders appeared, the doors opened, I stepped out, the children and Princes Close behind ma ; the band struck up, Portant pour la Syrie,' the trumpets sounded, and the open carriage, with the Emperor and Empress, Albert sitting opposite to them, drove up and they got out. I cannot say what indescribable emotions filled me—how much all seemed like a wonderful dream. Those great meetings of Sovereigns, surrounded by very exciting accompaniments, are always very agitating. I advanced and embraced the Emperor, who received two salutes on either cheek from me, having first kissed my hand. I next embraced the very gentle, graceful, and evidently very nervous Empress. Wo presented the Princes [the Duke of Cambridge and the Prince of Loiningon, the Queen's brother], and our children (Vicky with very alarmed oyes making very low curtsies); the Emperor embraced Bartio ; and then we went upstairs, Albert loading the Empress, who, in the most engaging manner, refused to go first, but at length with graceful reluctance did so, the Emperor leading me, expressing his groat gratification at being here and seeing me, and admiring Windsor."
" Vicky with very alarmed eyes making very low curtseys " is as lifelike a picture as could have been drawn. Why does not some one.of our great painters immortalise the Princess Imperial of Prussia, by painting her in the situation in which the Queen has here described her ?
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