William IV. died at Windsor Castle, and at 5 o'clock on the morning of
June 20th, 1837 (just 58 years from the day this is written), a young
girl of eighteen was awakened to be told she was Queen of Great Britain
and Ireland. Victoria was the only child of Edward, Duke of Kent,
brother of William IV. Her marriage in 1840 with her cousin, Prince
Albert of Saxe-Coburg, was one of deep affection, and secured for her a
wise and prudent counsellor.
On account of the high price of corn, Ireland had for years subsisted
entirely upon potatoes. The failure of this crop for several
successive seasons, in 1846 produced a famine of such appalling
dimensions that the old and the new world came to the rescue of the
starving people. Parliament voted L10,000,000 for food. But before
{160} relief could reach them, two millions, one-fourth of the
population of Ireland, had perished. The anti-corn measures,
championed by Richard Cobden and John Bright, which had been bitterly
opposed by the Tories under the leadership of Disraeli, were thus
reinforced by unexpected argument; foreign breadstuffs were permitted
free access and free trade was accepted as the policy of England.
Nicholas, the Czar of Russia, was, after the fashion of his
predecessors (and his successors), always waiting for the right moment
to sweep down upon Constantinople. England had become only a land of
shopkeepers, France was absorbed with her new Empire, and with trying
on her fresh imperial trappings. The time seemed favorable for a move.
The pious soul of Nicholas was suddenly stirred by certain restrictions
laid by the Sultan upon the Christians in Palestine. He demanded that
he be made the Protector of Christianity in the Turkish Empire, by an
arrangement which would in fact transfer the Sovereignty from
Constantinople to St. Petersburg.
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That mass of Oriental corruption known as the Ottoman Empire, held
together by no vital forces, was ready to fall into ruin at one
vigorous touch. It was an anachronism in modern Europe, where its
cruelty was only limited by its weakness. That such an odious,
treacherous despotism should so strongly appeal to the sympathies of
England that she was willing to enter upon a life-and-death struggle
for its maintenance, let those believe who can.--Her rushing to the
defence of Turkey, was about as sincere as Russia's interest in the
Christians in Palestine.
The simple truth beneath all these diplomatic subterfuges was of course
that Russia wanted Constantinople, and England would at any cost
prevent her getting it. The keys to the East must, in any event, not
belong to Russia, her only rival in Asia.
France had no Eastern Empire to protect, so her participation in the
struggle is at first not so easy to comprehend, until we reflect that
she had an ambitious and _parvenu_ Emperor. To have Europe see him in
confidential alliance with England, was alone {162} worth a war; while
a vigorous foreign policy would help to divert attention from the
recent treacheries by which he had reached a throne.
Such were some of the hidden springs of action which in 1854 brought
about the Crimean War,--one of the most deadly and destructive of
modern times. Two great Christian kingdoms had rushed to the defence
of the worst Government ever known, and the best blood in England was
being poured into Turkish soil.
It was soon discovered that the English were no less skilled as
fighters, than as "shop-keepers." They were victorious from the very
first, even when the numbers were ill-matched. But one immortal deed
of valor must have made Russia tremble before the spirit it revealed.
Six hundred cavalrymen, in obedience to an order which all knew was a
blunder, dashed into a valley lined with cannon, and charged an army of
30,000 men!
"Forward, the Light Brigade!"
Was there a man dismay'd?
Not tho' the soldier knew
Some one had blunder'd:
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Their's not to make reply,
Their's not to reason why,
Their's but to do, and die;
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
The horrible blunder at Balaklava was not the only one. One incapable
general was followed by another, and routine and red-tape were more
deadly than Russian shot and shell.
Food and supplies beyond their utmost power of consumption, were
hurried to the army by grateful England. Thousands of tons of wood for
huts, shiploads of clothing and profuse provision for health and
comfort, reached Balaklava.
While the tall masts of the ships bearing these treasures were visible
from the heights of Sebastopol, men there were perishing for lack of
food, fuel and clothing. In rags, almost barefoot, half-fed, often
without fuel even to cook their food, in that terrible winter on the
heights, whole regiments of heroes became extinct, because there was
not sufficient administrative ability to convey the supplies to a
perishing army!
So wretched was the hospital service, that {164} to be sent there meant
death. Gangrene carried off four out of five. Men were dying at a
rate which would have extinguished the entire army in a year and a
half. It was Florence Nightingale who redeemed this national disgrace,
and brought order, care and healing into the camps.
When England recalls with pride the valor and the victories in the
Crimea, let her remember it was the _manhood in the ranks_ which
achieved it. When all was over, war had slain its thousands,--but
official incapacity its tens of thousands!
It was a costly victory: Russia was humiliated, was even shut out from
the waters of her own Black Sea, where she had hitherto been supreme.
To two million Turks was preserved the privilege of oppressing eight
million Christians; and for this,--twenty thousand British youth had
perished. But--the way to India was unobstructed!
England's career of conquest in India was not altogether of her own
seeking. As a neighboring province committed outrages upon its British
neighbors, it became necessary in self-defence to punish it; and such
{165} punishment, invariably led to its subjugation. In this way one
province after another was subdued, until finally in the absorption of
the Kingdom of Oude (1856) the natural boundary of the Himalaya
Mountains had been reached, and the conquest was complete. The little
trading company of British merchants had become an Empire, vast and
rich beyond the wildest dreams of romance.
The British rule was upon the whole beneficent. The condition of the
people was improved, and there was little dissatisfaction except among
the deposed native princes, who were naturally filled with hate and
bitterness. The large army required to hold such an amount of
territory, was to a great extent recruited from the native population,
the Sepoys, as they were called, making good soldiers.
In 1857 the King of the Oude and some of the native princes cunningly
devised a plan of undermining the British by means of their Sepoys, and
circumstances afforded a singular opportunity for carrying out their
design.
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A new rifle had been adopted, which required a greased cartridge, for
which animal grease was used. The Sepoys were told this was a
deep-laid plot to overthrow their native religions. The Mussulman was
to be eternally lost by defiling his lips with the fat of swine, and
the Hindu, by the indignity offered to the venerated Cow. These
English had tried to ruin them not alone in this world, but in the next.
Thrilled with horror, terror-stricken, the dusky soldiers were
converted into demons. Mutinies arose simultaneously at twenty-two
stations; not only officers, but Europeans, were slaughtered without
mercy. At Cawnpore was the crowning horror. After a siege of many
days the garrison capitulated to Nana Sahib and his Sepoys. The
officers were shot, and their wives, daughters, sisters and babes, 206
in number, were shut up in a large apartment which had been used by the
ladies for a ballroom.
After eighteen days of captivity, the horrors of which will never be
known, five men with sabres, in the twilight, were seen to enter the
room and close the door. There {167} were wild cries and shrieks and
groans. Three times a hacked and a blunted sabre was passed out of a
window in exchange for a sharper one. Finally the groans and moans
gradually ceased and all was still. The next morning a mass of
mutilated remains was thrown into an empty well.
Two days later the avenger came in the person of General Havelock. The
Sepoys were conquered and a policy of merciless retribution followed.
In that well at Cawnpore was forever buried sympathy for the mutinous
Indian. When we recall that, we can even hear with calmness of Sepoys
fired from the cannon's mouth. From that moment it was the cause of
men in conflict with demons, civilization in deadly struggle with
cruel, treacherous barbarism. We cannot advocate meeting atrocity with
atrocity, nor can we forget that it was a Christian nation fighting
with one debased and infidel. But terrible surgery is sometimes needed
to extirpate disease.
Greed for territory, and wrong, and injustice may have mingled with the
{168} acquisition of an Indian Empire, but posterity will see only a
majestic uplifting of almost a quarter of the human family from debased
barbarism, to a Christian civilization; and all through the
instrumentality of a little band of trading settlers from a small
far-off island in the northwest of Europe.
But there were other things besides famine and wars taking place in the
Kingdom of the young Queen. A greater and a subtler force than steam
had entered into the life of the people. A miracle had happened in
1858, when an electric wire threaded its way under the Atlantic, and
two continents conversed as friends sitting hand in hand.
Another miracle had then just been achieved in the discovery of certain
chemical conditions, by which scenes and objects would imprint
themselves in minutest detail upon a prepared surface. A sort of magic
seemed to have entered into life, quickening and intensifying all its
processes. Enlarged knowledge opened up new theories of disease and
created a new Art of healing. Surgery, with its unspeakable anguish,
was {169} rendered painless by anaesthetics. Mechanical invention was
so stimulated that all the processes of labor were quickened and
improved.
In 1851 the Prince Consort conceived the idea of a great Exposition,
which should under one roof gather all the fruits of this marvellous
advance, and Sydenham Palace, a gigantic structure of glass and iron,
was erected.
In literature, Tennyson was preserving English valor in immortal verse.
Thackeray and Dickens, in prose as immortal, were picturing the social
lights and shadows of the Victorian Age.
In 1861 a crushing blow fell upon the Queen in the death of the Prince
Consort. America treasures kindly memory of Prince Albert, on account
of his outspoken friendship in the hour of her need. During the war of
the Rebellion, while the fate of our country seemed hanging in the
balance, we had few friends in England, where people seemed to look
with satisfaction upon our probable dismemberment.
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We are not likely to forget the three shining exceptions:--Prince
Albert--John Bright--and John Stuart Mill.
It was while that astute diplomatist, Disraeli (Lord Beaconsfield) was
Prime Minister, that French money, skill and labor opened up the
waterway between the Mediterranean and the Red Sea. It would never do
to have France command such a strategic point on the way to the East.
England was alert. She lost not a moment. The impecunious Khedive was
offered by telegraph $20,000,000 for his interest in the Suez Canal,
nearly one-half of the whole capital stock. The offer was accepted
with no less alacrity than it was made. So with the Arabian Port of
Aden, which she already possessed, and with a strong enough financial
grasp upon impoverished Egypt to secure the right of way, should she
need it, England had made the Canal which France had dug, practically
her own.
[Illustration: The British in India: A native prince receiving the
decoration of the order of the Star of India from Albert Edward, the
Prince of Wales. From the painting by Sydney Hall, P.M.A.]
Lord Beaconsfield had crowned his dramatic and picturesque Ministerial
career by placing a new diadem on the head of the {171} widowed Queen,
who was now Empress of India. His successor, William Ewart Gladstone,
the great leader of the Liberal party, was content with a less showy
field. He had in 1869 relieved Ireland from the unjust burden of
supporting a Church the tenets of which she considered blasphemous; and
one which her own, the Roman Catholic, had for three centuries been
trying to overthrow. We cannot wonder that the memory of a tyranny so
odious is not easily effaced; nor that there is less gratitude for its
removal, than bitterness that it should so long have been. It is
certainly true that the disestablishment of the English Church in
Ireland was one of the most righteous acts of this reign.
The Irish question is such a tangled web of wrong and injustice
complicated by folly and outrage, that the wisest and best-intentioned
statesmanship is baffled. Whether the conditions would be improved by
giving them their own Parliament, could only be determined by
experiment; and that experiment England is not yet willing to try.
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