consequently lost the legal advantage of his position. Having arrived at this conclusion, the Secretary further supported it by the example and authority of the declarations of his own Government, particularly instancing a letter of instructions from James Madison, when Secretary of State in the administration of Thomas Jefferson, to James Munroe, then our minister to England. On that occasion the necessity was directly maintained of determining all rights of seizure of persons and property in neutral ships by bringing them before a legal tribunal. The conclusion was irresistible:

"If I decide this case in favor of my own Government, I must disallow its most cherished principles, and reverse and forever abandon its essential policy. The country cannot afford the sacrifice. If I maintain those principles and adhere to that policy, I must surrender the case itself. It will be seen, therefore, that this Government could not deny the justice of the claims presented to us in this respect upon its merits. We are asked to do to the British nation just what we have always insisted all nations ought to do to us. The claim of the British Government," it was added, "is not made in a discourteous manner. This Government, since its first organization, has never used more guarded language in a similar case." Nor did the Secretary neglect the assertion or proviso that "if the safety of this Union required the detention of the captured persons, it would be the right and duty of this Government to detain them. But the effectual check and waning proportions of the existing insurrection, as well as the comparative unimportance of the captured persons themselves, when dispassionately weighed, happily forbid me from resorting to that defence. Nor am I unaware that American citizens are not in any case to be unnecessarily surrendered for any purpose into the keeping of a foreign State. Only the captured persons, however, or others

who are interested in them, could justly
raise a question on that ground." In
fact, the case was turned to a corrobora-
tion of the long agitated policy of the
United States in respect to the rights of
neutrals. Gracefully waiving any old
assumptions or precedents from the acts
of Great Britain, the Secretary pre-
ferred to express his satisfaction "that
by the adjustment of the present case,
upon principles confessed by Americans,
and yet, as I trust, mutually satisfactory
to both of the nations concerned, a ques-
tion is finally and rightly adjusted be-
tween them, which heretofore, exhausting
not only all forms of peaceful discussion,
but also the arbitrament of war itself, for
more than half a century alienated the
two countries from each other, and per-
plexed with fears and apprehensions all
other nations." It remained only to
pronounce the liberation of the prison-
ers who were now declared to be at the
disposal of the British minister.
the first of January they were accord-
ingly taken in a small steamer running
in Boston Harbor from their quarters at
Fort Warren, and placed on board of
the British steam gunboat Rinaldo, at
anchor near Provincetown. They were
carried in this vessel to St. Thomas, and
thence by the regular packet to South-
ampton.

On

The equitable and honorable decision of the Secretary of State in the surrender of the commissioners, was further fortified by a friendly dispatch from M. Thouvenel, the head of the administration of foreign affairs at Paris, strongly urging the delivery of the prisoners by an appeal to the liberal principles and practice of the United States in the protection of neutrals. This was handsomely acknowledged by Mr. Seward, who further took advantage of the opportunity to express the wish on the part of the Government of the United States "that the occasion which had elicited this correspondence might be improved, so as to secure a more definite agree

DIPLOMATIC EXPRESSIONS OF OPINION.

ment upon the whole subject by all
maritime powers." This was a deli-
cate appeal in behalf of the assertion
of the points of the treaty of Paris,
and the broader principle of Mr. Mar-
cy's position, which had been urged in
the outset of President Lincoln's ad-
ministration, but which, as we have seen,
had been thwarted by the recognition of
the belligerent rights of the Southern
insurgents.

145

will not be unfaithful to their traditions and policy as an advocate of the broadest liberality in the appreciation of the principles of international law to the conduct of maritime warfare." As in his reply to M. Thouvenel, Mr. Seward hoped that the occasion would be improved to the revision and further settlement on these questions of the Law of Nations. As the conclusion of this diplomatic history, we may cite the note by Earl Russell, on the 23d of January, in reply to Mr. Seward's dispatch to Lord Lyons, combatting several of the American Secretary's positions, especially in reference to the assertion that "the circumstance that the Trent was proceeding from a neutral port to another neutral port does not modify the right of the belligerent capture." That, said Earl Russell, would authorize the capture of a packet carrying a Confederate agent from Dover to Calais, or a Confederate vessel of war might capture a Cunard steamer on its way from Halifax to Liverpool on the ground of its carrying dispatches from Mr. Seward to Mr. Adams. "Her Majesty's Government, therefore," he added, "think it necessary to declare that they would not acquiesce in the capture of any British merchant ship in circumstances similar to those of the Trent, and that the fact of its being brought before a Prize Court, though it would alter the character, would not diminish the gravity of the offence against the law of nations, which would thereby be committed." In refer

The Prussian and Austrian Governments, through their respective ministers, also expressed to the Cabinet at Washington their sense of the proceeding of Captain Wilkes as an infringement of the rights of neutrals to which America herself was so firmly pledged, with the suggestion that the demand of England for redress could not be considered unreasonable. "As far as we are informed of them," wrote Count Bernstoff from Berlin, "we entertain the conviction that no terms have been proposed by England by which the dignity of President Lincoln could reasonably be offended." The language of Count de Rechberg in his note to Chevalier de Hulsemann was similar: "According to the notions of international law adopted by all the Powers, and which the American Government has itself often taken as a basis for its conduct, England could not dispense in the present case, to protest against the insult to her flag and demand a just reparation. Moreover, it appears to us that the demands made in this respect by the Cabinet of St. James have nothing hurtful to the Cabinet at Wash-ence to the assertion of Mr. Seward that ington, and that the latter may perform an act of equity and moderation without the slightest sacrifice of its dignity." To this Mr. Seward responded, calling the attention of the Imperial Government "to two important facts;-first, that the United States are not only incapable for a moment of seeking to disturb the peace of the world, but are deliberately just and friendly in their intercourse with all foreign nations; and, secondly, that they

"if the safety of the Union required the detention of the captured persons it would be the right and duty of his Government to detain them," he regarded him as "entirely losing sight of the vast difference which exists between the exercise of an extreme right and the commission of an unquestionable wrong. His frankness compels me to be equally open and to inform him that Great Britain could not have submitted to the perpe

tration of that wrong, however flourishing might have been the insurrection in the South, and however important the persons captured might have been."

gates of the sea. Never before in her active history has Great Britain ranged herself on this side. Such an event is an epoch. Novus sæclorum nascitur ordo. To the liberties of the sea this Power is now committed. To a certain extent this course is now under her tutelary care. If the immunities of passengers, not in the military or naval service, as well as of sailors, are not directly recognized, they are at least implied; while the whole pretension of impressment, so long the pest of neutral commerce, and operating only through the lawless adjudication of a quarterdeck, is made absolutely impossible. Thus is the freedom of the seas enlarged, not only by limiting the number of persons who are exposed to the penalties of war, but by driving from it the most offensive pretension that ever stalked upon its waves. To such conclusion Great Britain is irrevocably pledged. Nor treaty nor bond was

Mr. Sumner, Chairman of the Committee of Foreign Relations, made the delivery of Messrs. Mason and Slidell the occasion of an elaborate speech in the Senate, in which he asserted that the transaction, as it had been managed by Great Britain and the United States, had furnished a legal precedent, affecting the rights and privileges of neutrals of the utmost value. Approving of the action of the Government in the surrender of the ambassadors, he maintained that their seizure without taking the ship into port was wrong, inasmuch as a Navy officer is not entitled to substitute himself for a judicial tribunal; that had the ship been carried into port, it would not have been liable on account of the rebel emissaries, neutral ships being free to carry all persons not apparently in the military or naval service of the enemy; that dis-needed. It is sufficient that her late patches were not contraband of war so as to render a neutral ship liable to seizure. In considering these propositions he aptly exhibited the position of the two parties to the discussion by an illustration from Shakspeare. In the struggle between Laertes and Hamlet, the two combatants exchanged rapiers; so that Hamlet was armed with the rapier of Laertes and Laertes was armed with the rapier of Hamlet. And now on this sensitive question a similar exchange has occurred. Great Britain is armed with American principles, while to us is left only those British principles which, throughout our history, have been constantly, deliberately, and solemnly rejected." The result in his view was a great triumph. "Mr. President," he added, "let the rebels go. Two wicked men, ungrateful to their country, are let loose with the brand of Cain upon their foreheads. Prison doors are opened; but principles are established which will help to free other men and to open the

appeal can be vindicated only by a renunciation of early, long-continued tyranny. Let her bear the rebels back. The consideration is ample; for the sea became free as this altered Power went forth upon it, steering westward with the sun, on an errand of liberation."*

In this simple manner, disembarrassed of the grave perplexities which seemed to beset the subject, diplomacy peacefully handled a matter which at the time seemed to be portentous with all the horrors of a great maritime war. The case will always be of interest as an important precedent in international law. It bears a lesson not less significant to the moralist and statesman of the danger to which two highly civilized nations may be exposed by an imperfect understanding of one another's motives, the excitement of popular clamor, and the unbridled license of a free press. The outburst of indignation, the loss of temper, the misstatement of facts, confusion of ideas, the * Speech of Mr. Sumner in the Senate, January 9, 1862.

which presumes to announce itself as the leader of civilization and the prophet of human progress in these latter days. By Captain Wilkes let the Yankee breed be judged !”

illiberal and unworthy suggestions of all the more sacred instincts of human the English press on the receipt of the nature; to defy as long as danger does news of the capture of the Confederate not appear, and as soon as real peril ambassadors, were all based upon the shows itself, to sneak aside and run idea, utterly without foundation, of a vio-away-these are the virtues of the race lent aggression upon British rights in a hostile spirit by an unfriendly nation. For weeks a fanaticism of hostility to the United States seemed to possess the British public. We may smile now as we read the plethoric denunciations charged with fury and malice, but they were irritating and sad enough at the time when they were coupled with the active preparations for war by the British Government. Not even in the first fury of the invasion of Russia, it was said, were such violent imprecations uttered, or such belligerent designs manifested.

"The blood and spirit of John Bull," said the London Chronicle of November 30th, "appear to be thoroughly aroused upon the subject of the American insult to the British flag ;" and any one who would learn what such an exhibition was like, may acquire the information from a perusal of any file of the newspapers of the ensuing month.

Captain Wilkes, a courteous gentleman, with whom the British public might have been supposed to have been better acquainted, from his scientific pursuits, was absurdly converted into a desperate ogre, full of senseless fury-something between a rogue and a pirate in his assaults upon British virtue. His portrait was thus drawn in a journal of large popular circulation:* Captain Wilkes is unfortunately but too faithful a type of the people in whose foul mission he is engaged. He is an ideal Yankee, swagger and ferocity, built up on a foundation of vulgarity and cowardice these are his characteristics; and these are the most prominent marks by which his countrymen, generally speaking, are known all over the world. To bully the weak, to triumph over the helpless, to trample on every law of courtesy and custom, willfully to violate * The London (Sunday) Times.

Similar malicious nonsense was uttered in far higher quarters. If the journal just quoted was not to be judged by the loftiest standard, what could be said for the cultivated Saturday Review, the organ of the University men, with its pride and punctilio and lofty superciliousness? It had been the pleasure of this journal throughout the American difficulty, to suggest doubts and disparagements, and throw contempt on the Northern cause. Its language now was that of studied insolence. "The American Government,' it proclaimed, "is in the position of the rude boor, conscious of infinite powers of annoyance, destitute alike of scruples and of shame, recognizing only the ultimate arbitration of the strong arm which repudiates the appeal to codes, and presuming, not without reason, that more scrupulous States will avoid or defer such an arbitration as long as ever they can." Punch, which, with all its comic exaggerations, is fairly supposed to represent the prevalent sense and feeling of the British people on all popular questions, was ludicrously offensive. Two of its caricatures, when the fever in London was at its height, at the beginning of December, were aimed at poor Wilkes and his unfortunate act of patriotism. In one of these a huge truculent sailor of Her Majesty's service, confronted a peaked, diminutive Bobadil, of the make usually accorded to slave drivers, whose petty stature was eked out by an American flag. "You do what's right, my son," says the swag-bellied Britain, I'll blow you out of the water." "Now mind you, sir," says the same pretty

or

personage to a splay-footed, knock-kneed representation of an American Commodore, "no shuffling-an ample apologyor I will put the matter into the hands of my lawyers, Messrs. Whitworth and Armstrong."

Mr. Seward, the Secretary of State, was, somehow, throughout the affair, an object of especial hostility. He was absurdly charged with the project of uniting South and North in an attack on Canada, with a bitter hostility to England, and the Times, forgetting all sense of decency, in an editorial article reported | a silly story that "during the visit of the Prince of Wales to America, Mr. Seward took advantage of an entertainment to the Prince, to tell the Duke of Newcastle he was likely to occupy a high officethat when he did so, it would become his duty to insult England, and he should insult her accordingly." Any nonsense seemed worthy of publication in the excited state of the public mind.

66

ship of gigantic size which had been recently completed to the admiration of all England, was fitted out in haste for immediate service. The Persia, the most expeditious of the transatlantic steamships, was taken from the mail service to New York, to transport troops to Canada. Various batteries and battalions of famous regiments were forwarded to the probable seat of war, as it was considered in the excitement of the hour. The naval preparations made for the reinforcement of Admiral Milne on the North American and West India stations would, it was expected, place at his disposal at the beginning of February, for the blockade, if necessary, of the Atlantic ports, a fleet of sixty-five sail, including seven line-of-battle ships, thirtythree frigates and twenty-five corvettes and sloops. "Of the squadron of frigates," said the London Times, "each vessel has been carefully chosen for its great sailing speed, high steam power and heavy armament; and never yet has such a fleet of picked cruisers been sent against any enemy." The list included, beside the Warrior, the newlybuilt iron plated vessels the Black Prince, Resistance and Defence, which it was confidently asserted, could pass unharmed by the harbor defences of New York, and dictate their own terms of peace by laying the fleet broadside unto the streets of that city.*

Nor were these exhibitions of feeling confined to idle talk. The Government itself gave currency to the alarm by the energy and rapidity of its warlike demonstrations. Throughout Sunday, the first of December, there was the greatest activity at the Tower of London in the packing and dispatch of twenty-five thousand stand of arms for Canada. A Royal Proclamation appeared on the fourth, prohibiting the exportation of arms, ammunition, military stores, in- In the midst of this reckless depreciacluding percussion caps and fuses, and tion and threatening tumult, one manly also lead." Shipments of saltpetre were voice was heard to assure America of stopped at the Custom-House. No in- the sympathy of the great middle class surance could be got on American ves- of England. The eloquent John Bright, sels. The shipping interest was thrown the representative of the Manchester prostrate. The already considerable school in Parliament, the tribune of the naval squadron on the North American people, and the sturdy defender of liband West India stations were largely eral principles and progress, in a speech reinforced. Powerful ships were mus- at Rochdale on the evening of the day tered on all sides, both for the regular of the royal prohibitory proclamation, service and for transports. Whitworth took up the cause of the injured United and Armstrong guns were in requisition. States. He called to mind the origin of The heavily armed Warrior, the boast the civil war, not as with the colonies, in of the British navy, an iron clad steam

*Times, January 7, 1862.