Part 16 (1/2)
It will be remembered that the Crimean War broke up the Coalition Ministry which Lord Aberdeen had formed. This was due to the fact that the motion for enquiry into the state of our soldiers before Sebastopol was carried by a great majority against the Government. Lord Aberdeen resigned when this happened, and Lord Palmerston came into office, with Mr. Gladstone as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Then, when Palmerston acceded to the demand that a committee of enquiry should be appointed, Gladstone, who had opposed it before, thought he ought not to remain in the Cabinet which had now agreed to have the enquiry made. So he gave up office, but still helped the Government generally until after Orsini's attempt in 1858, upon Napoleon III's life. Perhaps it is necessary to recall here that Gladstone had taken up the cause of the prisoners--especially political prisoners-- in the prisons of Naples in 1851. He spoke strongly on the terrible cruelties which were perpetrated there. In _this_ effort to help forward an enquiry Gladstone threw himself most heartily.
”I send you to-day a Latin Grammar which I have found on my shelves. By the _binder's_ ticket 'Penrith' I infer it to be Harry's. I hope I may congratulate him.... I never met Gladstone. He was a hero of mine for about a year. I hoped great things of him. After the letters on Naples and his Chancellors.h.i.+p of the Exchequer, I thought he had worked clear of the errors of his youth and was 'the coming man.' But in the Russian war his intense party spirit and endless mistakes have lowered his ...
intellectual discernments.
”I am, ever yours heartily,
”F. W. Newman.”
In December of this year Newman writes word that he has been working hard at Arabic for some time, because he has undertaken to teach a friend modern Arabic. He is again staying at Hastings, where he had been so constantly.
”20 White Rock Place, Hastings, ”_30th Dec._, 1858.
”My dear Nicholson,
”I am strangely thrown anew into sympathy with _your_ studies. I have been working really hard at Arabic for some time--and why, do you think?
Because I had the temerity to undertake (for philological reasons) to teach a friend modern Arabic. I could not have been so rash or so foolish as to undertake to teach ancient Arabic; yet I am almost driven on learning the ancient by the number of questions which have kept arising.... I have been looking up all my old MSS., and am surprised at the extent of my former attainments, very much indeed of which I had forgotten. But words come back to me with a pleasant rapidity, and I am delighted to find how much I have exaggerated to myself the gap between old and new Arabic.”
With this letter those belonging to the year 1858 come to an end.
With 1859 begin Newman's criticisms on the policy and unscrupulous methods of Louis Napoleon.
The latter had made himself absolute ruler of France in 1851. Later on he annexed Savoy and Nice. In his campaign in Lombardy against Austria he was a.s.sisted by Great Britain. In May, when this letter following was written, Napoleon's Manifesto had just been published in the London papers of 4th May:--
”10 Circus Road, S. John's Wood, ”_5th May_, 1859.
”I dare say you read Louis Napoleon's Manifesto in yesterday's papers. I wonder what you think of it. I find myself at variance with most of my friends, and with nearly all the newspapers _that I see_; but the _Morning Chronicle_ and the _Daily News_, of which I have only seen _one_ article for a long time back, appeared to be maintaining what I hold. That we ought to be strictly neutral (not armed and threatening neutrals) seems to be an axiom; but at the same time I look at the crisis with much hope and little or no fear. To declaim against L. N.'s treachery is only a way of playing into the wrong hands, i.e. supporting Austria. He has pledged himself to expel her from Italy and not to seek dominion in Italy for France. If he fails he shatters his own power in Paris: so much the better, I suppose. If he succeeds, Italy is a certain gainer, and Europe through Italy. I say a certain gainer, because the existing oppression (testified by Gladstone and Clarendon) rests upon the aid of Austria, and is far worse than war, and worse than a transitory dictators.h.i.+p of France; and the mischief of Austria has been that her power has been confirmed by European diplomacy; but if France proves treacherous, it will be against the protest of Europe, and her rule _cannot_ be permanent. Besides, L. N.
must almost of necessity give some aggrandizement to Sardinia. Lombardy, Tuscany, and Parma seem inevitably to rush into Victor Emmanuel's arms, if not also Venice, if the Confederates are victorious. Hence a stout power is interposed between France and Southern Italy. And is it not stupid to think that because L. N. is a bad, unscrupulous man, therefore he covets nothing but _territory_? He covets _stability_ and the glory of liberating Italy; and acting with heroic moderation is the obvious way of winning to his side republicans in France and the diplomatists of Europe. _If_ he acts thus, I think his dynasty will be permanent; if not, not, or hardly.
The Papists already hate him, and he already distrusts them....”
It is impossible to read many letters of Newman's and not recognize the unfailing unselfishness with which he constantly gives up his own plans of seeing his friends, in order that his wife may go to those places for which she has a special affection. Not infrequently he gives up a journey much farther afield for the purpose of pursuing antiquarian researches because he knows how great would be her ennui were she to accompany him, and he is ever full of a tender concern that she shall suffer no unnecessary discomfort or trouble.
”_13th July_, 1859.
”My dear Nicholson,
”I had really hoped we might spend a few days at Penrith and have a chance of seeing you, for my wife talked seriously of Keswick and the neighbourhood. But when she began to remember in detail the climate of the Lakes, her courage broke down, and she said there was nothing did us good but the seaside, and especially the coast of Wales. So now we are starting for Carmarthen, Cardigan, Aberayron, Aberystwith, etc., a weary distance from Penrith.