Gladstone's hatred of war, and his resolve to avoid it at all hazards
unless national duty required it, determined his much criticized
action in regard to the _Alabama_. That famous and ill-omened vessel
was a privateer, built in an English dockyard and manned by an
English crew, which during the American Civil War got out to sea,
captured seventy Northern vessels, and did a vast deal of damage
to the Navy and commerce of the Union. The Government of the United
States had a just quarrel with England in this matter, and the
controversy--not very skilfully handled on either side--dragged on
till the two nations seemed to be on the edge of war. Then Gladstone
agreed to submit the case to arbitration, and the arbitration resulted
in a judgment hostile to England. From that time--1872--Gladstone's
popularity rapidly declined, till it revived, after an interval of
Lord Beaconsfield's rule, at the General Election of 1880. In the
first Session of that Parliament, he vindicated the pacific policy
which had been so severely criticized in the following words:
"The dispositions which led us to become parties to the arbitration
of the _Alabama_ case are still with us the same as ever; we are not
discouraged, we are not damped in the exercise of these feelings
by the fact that we were amerced, and severely amerced, by the
sentence of the international tribunal; and, although we may think
the sentence was harsh in its extent and unjust in its basis, we
regard the fine imposed on this country as dust in the balance
compared with the moral value of the example set when these two
great nations of England and America, who are among the most fiery
and the most jealous in the world with regard to anything that
touches national honour, went in peace and concord before a judicial
tribunal to dispose of these painful differences, rather than resort
to the arbitrament of the sword."