English opinion on the mediation question.
Our Northern files bring us some interesting extracts from late English papers, relative to the course which the
Queen's Ministers have chosen in respect to the mediation proposal of the
French emperor.
The London
Times alludes to the
Northern penchant to abuse the Britisher, and to express unbounded confidence in
France and
Russia, and says:
‘
"All this is at an end now. In every household in every soldier's tent, both North and South, it will be known in a fortnight's time, not only that the
French Emperor wishes to end the war, but that it cannot end in the subjugation of the
South."
’
It further says:"We cannot look upon the proposal of the
French Emperor as wholly useless, inasmuch as it has called forth such clear opinions from the two leading nations of
Europe, and gives, also, reason to believe that the
Russia which the
Republican affect so much to admire is equally opposed to the policy of
Washington." The
Times expresses the opinion that the
Northern elections, if adverse to the Republicans, will be merely the prelude to some sharper and more deadly struggle.
The
Morning Herald is very pointed in its comments.
It says:
‘
"such is the language with which be [Lord Russell] mocks the hopes and insults the misery of half a million of starving English labor are"
’
"Everything is to be sacrificed to the vain hope of retaining the parliamentary support of
Messrs Bright and
Cobden, and the still more absurd delusion that, by abject patience and dastardly submission, we may avert the vindictive wrath and pacify the causeless hatred of the mongrel rabble which controls the
Government of the
Northern States Of all political crimes, since history began, this, which has just been committed by the
English Government, is one of the most foolish and the most unpardonable.
For cold-blooded cruelty and pusillanimous betrayal of duty, Lord Russell and his colleagues are hardly to be matched among statesmen, living or dead.
If their rivals in guilt are to be found, they must be sought among the
Generals and Ministers of
Mr. Lincoln, and the agitators and self styled preachers of the Gospel, who hound them on to deeds of wickedness unparalleled in the history of civilized war fare "
The
Daily News, (Exeter Hall organ,) endeavors to show that the proposal of
France would benefit the
South and injure the
North.
‘"Confederate paper would go up, and the
South would supply itself with commodities which would enable it to enter upon the war next spring prepared to continue it for years.
The proposal is one which would deprive the
North of all the advantages of the approaching campaign, which it has been preparing for at the cost of millions, and in which its naval resources are calculated to give it peculiar advantages.
The
North is to be asked to forego the use of its large gunboat fleet just in the season when the rivers are full, and every circumstance is favorable for naval operations.
There is nothing in the proposal to set over against these disadvantages for the
North.
What is more important is that the reinforcement of the
South, which it would be the means of procuring, would enable the Confederate Government to distaste its own terms of peace."’
The
London correspondent of the New York World makes important disclosures relative to
Napoleon's proposition to the
European Powers and the relations of English diplomacy to the
American question.
He says
France desires to see
America united under one Government, while
England prefers the establishment of two Confederacies; that the departure of Lord Lyons was delayed to enable him to receive instructions based on the result of propositions made by the
British Government to the Governments of
France,
Spain,
Italy Russia, and
Prussia, earlier in the autumn.
The tenor of these propositions was similar to that of the subsequent propositions of
Napoleon, with this vital difference: that the
English propositions contemplated what M. de I'Huys, in his subsequent dispatch, describes as a ‘"pressure"’ in case of their non acceptance.--The Powers replied substantially as follows:
‘
"
Spain as a maritime and colonial State, nearly interested, declined committing herself to any action which might at once expose her possessions to immediate annoyance, and bring upon her the imputation of availing herself ungenerously of the distresses of the
United States to secure indemnity for the past and security for the future.
"
Italy regarded that her relations with the
United States were such as to indispose her to become a party to any untimely pressure upon that country while passing through a crisis analogous in many respects, though in an inverse sense, with that from which the
Italian kingdom Itself is just emerging.
"
Russia regarded the moment as inopportune for a demonstration of the kind intended, and did not consider herself sufficiently interested to warrant any action so emphatic at this time.
"
France was unwilling to adopt measures which might, indeed, bring on a peace, but at the expense of the
Union, the hope of seeing which re-established she was not yet fully prepared to forego."
"Such (the
World's correspondent has reason to believe) was the tenor of the replies which finally determined the
English Cabinet to hold their action on the
American question in suspense.
The French propositions were intended to take the place of those just rejected, and had they been accepted by
Great Britain they would probably have commanded the adhesion of the other powers.
Failing in this they have been published as a part of the history of the times, and to put the
French Government right in regard to its intentions in this momentous matter.
’
