PORTUGAL AND GREECE.
It is now time to turn to the general course of foreign policy during
the closing years of the reign of George IV. The only foreign problems
which gave serious trouble during this period were the Eastern and
Portuguese questions. The influence which the former exercised on
domestic policy has rendered it necessary to trace its course as far as
the battle of Navarino in the last chapter. We must now take up the
other question where we left it, at the recognition of the independence
of Brazil and the expulsion of the Spanish troops from the mainland of
America.
Peter I., Emperor of Brazil, though an independent sovereign, was still
heir-apparent to the throne of Portugal, and the ultra-royalists hoped
that, in spite of the provisions of the Brazilian constitution, his
succession to his ancestral crown would restore the unity of the
Portuguese dominions. The death of King John VI. on March 10, 1826,
brought the matter to a crisis. Four days before his death he had
appointed a council of regency which was to be presided over by his
daughter, Isabella Maria, but from which the queen and Dom Miguel, then
twenty-three, were both excluded. By this act the absolutist party were
deprived of power until they should be restored to it by the action of
the new king, or by a revolution. The regency wished the new king to
make a speedy choice between the two crowns; and it was anticipated that
he would abdicate the Portuguese crown in favour of his seven-year-old
daughter, Maria da Gloria. The absolutists on the other hand hoped that
the king might by procrastination avoid the separation of the crowns.
What was their surprise when they discovered that the king had indeed
determined to procrastinate, but in such a way as to displease the
absolutists as much as the friends of constitutional government? No
sooner had the news of his father's death reached Peter at Rio Janeiro,
than he issued a charter of 145 clauses, conferring a constitution on
Portugal. This constitution which was destined to alternate for nearly a
generation with absolute monarchy or with the revolutionary constitution
of 1821, had the advantage of being the voluntary gift of the king. It
was, however, composed in great haste, and, except that it retained the
hereditary nobility as a first chamber in the cortes, was almost
identical with the constitution established in Brazil in the previous
December. Among other provisions it subjected the nobility to taxation
and asserted the principle of religious toleration. A few days later, on
the 2nd of May, King Peter executed an act of abdication in favour of
his daughter Maria, providing, however, that the abdication should not
come into effect until the necessary oaths had been taken to the new
constitution and until the new queen should have been married to her
uncle, Dom Miguel.
[Pageheading: _CIVIL WAR IN PORTUGAL._]
This compromise pleased nobody. It is true that it seemed to make
permanent the separation of Brazil from Portugal, since the former state
was destined for Peter's infant son, afterwards Peter II.; but the
Brazilian patriots would have preferred a more definite abandonment of
the Portuguese throne, and Peter's half-measure of abdication was one of
the main causes of the discontent which drove him to resign the
Brazilian crown five years later. The Portuguese liberals were alarmed
at the prospect of a restoration of Dom Miguel to power, while the
absolutists were indignant at the imposition of a constitution. From the
very first it encountered opposition. The new constitution was indeed
proclaimed on July 13, and the necessary oaths were taken on the 31st.
But on the same day a party, consisting mainly of Portuguese deserters
in Spanish territory, proclaimed Miguel as king and the queen-mother as
regent during his absence. Miguel, however, gave no open support to this
party; on October 4 he actually took the oath to the new constitution,
and on the 29th he formally betrothed himself at Vienna to the future
Queen of Portugal. But the Portuguese insurgents were not deterred by
the apparent defection of the prince whose claim to reign they
asserted, and they received a thinly disguised encouragement from the
Spanish government, which certainly did nothing to interfere with their
organisation in Spanish territory. On the 10th the last insurgents had
been expelled from Portuguese territory, but in November they were
openly joined by some Spanish soldiers, and on the 22nd of that month
they invaded the Portuguese province of Traz-os-Montes. Another division
made a simultaneous irruption into the province of Alemtejo. This latter
body was quickly expelled from the kingdom and marched through Spanish
territory to join its more successful comrades in Northern Portugal. The
whole province of Traz-os-Montes had fallen into the hands of the
absolutists in a few days, and its defection was followed by that of the
northern part of Beira, when the arrival of British forces gave the
constitutional party the necessary encouragement to enable them to
arrest the progress of the insurrection.
As in 1823, the Portuguese government, represented in London by
Palmella, applied for British assistance against the ultra-royalists at
home. But on the present occasion Portugal was able to appeal to
something more than the general friendship of Great Britain. By the
treaties of 1661 and 1703, renewed as recently as 1815, Great Britain
was bound to defend Portugal against invasion, and Portugal now claimed
the fulfilment of these treaties. The formal demand was received by the
British ministry on December 3, but it was not till Friday, the 8th,
that official intelligence was received of the invasion. Not a moment
was lost in despatching 5,000 troops to Portugal. This resolution was
formed by the cabinet on the 9th, approved by the king on the 10th, and
communicated to parliament on the 11th. On the evening of the 12th
Canning was able to inform the house of commons that the troops were
already on the march for embarkation.
The debate in the house of commons on the address in answer to the royal
message announcing the request of the Portuguese government, was the
occasion of two of the most famous speeches that Canning ever delivered.
After recounting the treaty obligations of this country to Portugal, and
the circumstances of the Portuguese application for assistance, and
disclaiming any desire to meddle with the domestic politics of
Portugal, he referred to a previous anticipation that the next European
war would be one "not so much of armies as of opinions". "Not four
years," he proceeded, "have elapsed, and behold my apprehension
realised! It is, to be sure, within narrow limits that this war of
opinion is at present confined: but it is a war of opinion that Spain
(whether as government or as nation) is now waging against Portugal; it
is a war which has commenced in hatred of the new institutions of
Portugal. How long is it reasonable to expect that Portugal will abstain
from retaliation? If into that war this country shall be compelled to
enter, we shall enter into it with a sincere and anxious desire to
mitigate rather than exasperate, and to mingle only in the conflict of
arms, not in the more fatal conflict of opinions. But I much fear that
this country (however earnestly she may endeavour to avoid it) could
not, in such case, avoid seeing ranked under her banners all the
restless and dissatisfied of any nation with which she might come in
conflict. It is the contemplation of this new power in any future war
which excites my most anxious apprehension. It is one thing to have a
giant's strength, but it would be another to use it like a giant. The
consciousness of such strength is undoubtedly a source of confidence and
security; but in the situation in which this country stands, our
business is not to seek opportunities of displaying it, but to content
ourselves with letting the professors of violent and exaggerated
doctrines on both sides feel that it is not their interests to convert
an umpire into an adversary."
In his reply at the close of the debate Canning vindicated his
consistency in resisting Spanish aggression upon Portugal, while
offering no resistance to the military occupation of Spain by France,
which had not yet terminated. He pointed out that the Spain of his day
was quite different from "the Spain within the limits of whose empire
the sun never set--the Spain 'with the Indies' that excited the
jealousies and alarmed the imaginations of our ancestors". He admitted
that the entry of the French into Spain was a disparagement to the pride
of England, but he thought it had been possible to obtain compensation
without offering resistance in Spain itself. Then came the famous
passage: "If France occupied Spain, was it necessary, in order to avoid
the consequences of that occupation, that we should blockade Cadiz? No.
I looked another way--I sought materials of compensation in another
hemisphere. Contemplating Spain, such as our ancestors had known her, I
resolved that if France had Spain, it should not be Spain 'with the
Indies'. I called the new world into existence to redress the balance of
the old."[93]
[Pageheading: _TROOPS SENT TO PORTUGAL._]
The two speeches were greeted with applause both in parliament and in
the country, but their vanity was excessive. So far from "creating the
new world," Canning had merely recognised the existence of states which
had already won their own independence, and even so he was only
following the example of the United States. It was not only extremely
foolish, but altogether disingenuous, to maintain that the recognition
of the South American republics had been resolved on as a counterpoise
to French influence in Spain. The reasons which prompted this
recognition were commercial, not political, and it had been announced to
the powers as our ultimate policy before any invasion of Spain had taken
place. The king had only consented to the step on condition that it was
not to be represented as a measure of retaliation, and Canning himself
when he delivered these speeches knew that the French had promised to
evacuate Spain in the following April.[94] But however little justified
by facts, the two speeches made a profound impression throughout Europe.
Whatever Canning might desire, it was quite clear that he contemplated
the possibility of a military alliance between this country and the
revolutionary factions on the continent, and the impression gained
ground that he desired to pose as the champion of liberalism against
legitimate government.
The first detachment of the British army reached Lisbon on Christmas
day. It was not destined, however, to play an active part in the
Portuguese struggle. The insurgent army was as greatly discouraged as
the loyal troops were elated by its arrival, and the government was
moreover enabled to employ a larger force on the scene of hostilities.
The insurgents were in consequence driven out of the province of Beira
and the greater part of Traz-os-Montes. A new invasion from Spanish
territory, supported by some Spanish soldiers and Spanish artillery,
took place during January, 1827. The greater part of the province of the
Minho fell into the hands of the rebels, and on February 2 they captured
the important town of Braga. But the forces of the regency proved too
strong for them, and early in March the insurgents evacuated Portugal
altogether. The Spanish government, now that little could be effected by
further assistance to the Portuguese refugees, determined at length to
perform the duties of a neutral power, and disarmed them.
The British troops remained in Portugal till March, 1828. By that time
the disturbances had assumed a purely domestic character, and it was
ultimately decided to recall them. But a firmer policy than that
actually followed would have been necessary in order to extricate Great
Britain from the strife of Portuguese factions, in which her recent
action had given a decided advantage to the constitutional party. That
party had been driven into opposition before the British troops were
recalled. On July 3, 1827, King Peter had issued a decree appointing Dom
Miguel his lieutenant, and investing him with all the powers which
belonged to him as king under the charter. Miguel, after visiting
London, arrived at Lisbon on February 22, 1828, and was sworn in as
regent four days later. As he was twenty-five years old, and therefore
of full age according to Portuguese law, he could not with any show of
equity have been kept out of the regency longer. Miguel's installation
as regent was followed by a series of riots as well on the part of the
absolutists, who desired to make him king, as on the part of the
constitutionalists who feared that he would make himself king. It was
not long before he definitely identified himself with the absolutist
party.
[Pageheading: _MIGUEL'S USURPATION._]
On March 14 the cortes were dissolved. On May 3 Miguel summoned the
ancient cortes in his own name, and on June 26 they acknowledged him as
king. The immediate result of this act was that all the ambassadors,
except those of Spain and the Holy See, quitted Lisbon, and the lapse of
time did not induce them to change their attitude towards Miguel. A
further complication was introduced by Peter's definite abdication in
favour of his daughter on March 3, executed before he had any suspicion
of Miguel's designs, which placed Miguel in the position of regent for
his infant niece instead of for his brother. After this formal
abdication Peter despatched his daughter to Europe, intending that she
should proceed to Vienna. When, however, she arrived at Gibraltar on
September 2, her conductors, hearing of Miguel's usurpation, determined
to take her to England, and she landed at Falmouth on the 24th. Peter,
on hearing of Miguel's usurpation, naturally considered the regency
terminated, and claimed to act as the guardian of the infant queen; the
Brazilian ministers in Europe acted as his agents, while his partisans
assembled in England and attempted to use this country as a basis for
warlike operations in Portuguese territories.
The situation of 1826 was thus reversed. Instead of an ultra-royalist
party resting on Spain, a constitutionalist party resting on Brazil and
attempting to rest on England was now threatening the established
government at Lisbon. Wellington was anxious to maintain a strict
neutrality, but he failed to prevent a ship of war and supplies of arms
and ammunition going from Plymouth to Terceira in the Azores, where
Donna Maria was acknowledged as queen. He succeeded, however, in
preventing a larger armament, which had been raised under the name of
the Emperor of Brazil, with Rio Janeiro as its nominal destination, from
landing at Terceira. This action, though the logical consequence of the
British opposition to the conduct of Spain in 1826, was severely
criticised in England as equivalent to an intervention on behalf of
Miguel.
Meanwhile Canning's attempt to prevent the separate action of Russia in
the Eastern question had been doomed to disappointment. The destruction
of the Turkish navy at Navarino was naturally regarded at Constantinople
as an outrage, and the Porte demanded satisfaction from the ambassadors
of the allied powers. This they refused to grant on the ground that the
Turks had been the aggressors, and they in their turn demanded an
armistice between the Turkish troops and the Greek insurgents. As the
Porte remained obdurate, the ambassadors of France, Great Britain, and
Russia, acting in accordance with their instructions, left
Constantinople on December 8, 1827. But though war seemed imminent, the
tsar still disowned all idea of conquest, and professed to desire
nothing further than the execution of the treaty of London. A protocol
was accordingly signed on the 12th by which the three powers confirmed
a clause in the treaty, providing that, in the event of war, none of
them should derive any exclusive benefit, either commercial or
territorial.
The British government imagined that the powers might still effect their
object by diplomacy, and that it would not be necessary to abandon the
Turkish alliance. But any such idea must have been rudely shaken by the
hati-sherif of December 20. In that document the sultan enlarged on the
cruelty and perfidy of the Christian powers and summoned the Muslim
nations to arms: he denounced Russia in particular as the prime mover of
the Greek rebellion, the instigator of the other powers, and the
arch-enemy of Islam; and he declared the treaty of Akkerman, by which
the outstanding disputes between Russia and the Porte had been settled
in October, 1826, to have been extorted by force and only signed in
order to save time. This defiance of Russia, if not of all Christendom,
was followed by a levy of Turkish troops and the expulsion of most of
the Christian residents from Constantinople. No course was now open to
Russia but to make war. It remained to be seen whether any other power
would join her. On January 6, 1828, a Russian despatch announced the
tsar's intention of occupying the Danubian principalities, and suggested
that France and Great Britain should force the Dardanelles and thus
compel the Porte to comply with the provisions of the treaty of London.
[Pageheading: _WELLINGTON'S EASTERN POLICY._]
It is possible that if the direction of British foreign policy had
remained in the hands of Goderich and Dudley, our government might have
lent its support to a settlement of the Eastern question which would in
effect have been the work of Russia only. The more daring policy of
Canning, by which Great Britain had attempted to take the lead as
opportunity offered, either in active co-operation with Russia or in
active opposition to her, could only be directed by a more versatile
statesman than the nation now possessed. The accession to office of
Wellington, though it left Dudley at the foreign office, was really
marked by a return to the policy of Castlereagh, a policy which, if not
brilliant, was at least honourable, consistent, and considerate, and
which in the hands of Wellington was managed with a sufficient measure
of firmness, though with less tact and insight than had been shown by
Castlereagh. The first object of this policy was to keep the special
grievances of Russia distinct from the complaints which Europe at large
or, in the present situation, the three allied powers were able to bring
against the Porte. By so doing the British government hoped to prevent
Russia from dragging other powers into a war for her private benefit,
and also to render it impossible for Russia to use her special
grievances as a lever by which she might effect a separate settlement of
the general question. For some years this policy was successful. Russia
did indeed wage a separate war with the Turks, but the Greek question
was settled by the three powers conjointly, and Great Britain rather
than Russia took the lead in the settlement. It was only after
Palmerston had succeeded to the direction of our foreign policy in 1830,
that it was discovered how far the victory of Russia in war had placed
her in a position to dictate the general policy of the Ottoman court.
Wellington experienced no difficulty in striking out a line of policy
along which he could carry France with him. On February 21 De la
Ferronays, who had been recalled from the French embassy at St.
Petersburg to occupy the post of foreign minister in the new liberal
administration, which had been formed in France in December, 1827,
despatched a note urging the immediate employment of energetic measures
against the Porte. He saw that the hati-sherif gave special occasion of
war to Russia, and he was naturally anxious to anticipate her isolated
action by combined measures of coercion. He had, however, nothing better
to suggest than the execution of the Russian proposals of January 6.
Wellington, in his reply, dated the 26th, rightly minimised the
seriousness of the hati-sherif, and characterised the proposed measures
of coercion as destined to be ineffectual. He also expressed the fear
that if the three powers combined to make war on the Turks there would
be a general insurrection of the subject races in the Turkish dominions
which might last indefinitely. He therefore proposed first to settle the
Greek question by local pressure, after which he anticipated no serious
trouble about events at Constantinople. On the same day he drafted a
memorandum to the cabinet in which he proposed that the allied squadrons
should proceed to the Archipelago, blockade the Morea and Alexandria,
destroy the Greek pirates, stop the warfare in Chios and Crete, and call
upon the Greek government to withdraw the forces which were operating
in western and eastern Greece respectively under the command of two
foreign volunteers, General Church and Colonel Fabvier. In other words,
he proposed to coerce not the Porte but the actual combatants, Greece
and Egypt, and to check each party where it was the aggressor. If the
prime object of the government in the eastern question was the
maintenance of order, these proposals were excellent. The one capital
defect of the whole scheme was that it ignored the Russian desire for
war, which rendered it impossible for the tsar to postpone the
settlement of his own grievances until an arrangement should be come to
on the Greek question; on the other hand, by isolating the Greek
question, it left it possible for the western powers to proceed with its
solution in spite of the outbreak of hostilities between Russia and the
Turks.[95]
[Pageheading: _WAR BETWEEN RUSSIA AND TURKEY._]
Russia's determination to act singly was, however, already made. On the
same day, February 26, on which Wellington sketched his policy,
Nesselrode issued a despatch declaring that war was inevitable,
including among his reasons the repudiation of recent treaties by the
Porte and the proclamation by it of a holy war. At the same time he
endeavoured to disarm any possible opposition on the part of the powers
by an invitation to them to make use of the coming war to carry out the
treaty of London. In any case Russia would execute the treaty, but if
she were left to herself, the manner of execution would be determined by
her own convenience and interest.[96] So far Russia had done nothing
directly inconsistent with the maintenance of her concert with France
and Great Britain, whose representatives had been sitting in conference
with hers at London since January, 1827. But the reference in this last
note to the possibility of a settlement of the Greek question according
to the convenience and interest of Russia appeared like a threat of
breaking up the alliance in case France and Great Britain refused to
send their fleets to the Mediterranean. At least Wellington so
understood it, and, rather than be a party to the war, he dissolved the
conference of London in the middle of March. But he soon found that by
so doing he lost the co-operation of France, and he was therefore
compelled to accept the assurances of Russia that she intended to keep
within the limits of the treaty of London, and to regard the
Mediterranean as a neutral area. The conference was in consequence
reopened at the beginning of July. Meanwhile hostilities had actually
begun between Russia and the Turks. Russia declared war on April 26. On
May 7 her troops crossed the Pruth. They rapidly overran the Danubian
provinces, and on June 7 crossed the Danube into Bulgaria. They were
destined, however, to spend more than a year between the Danube and the
Balkans before they could force their way into Rumelia.
During the interval considerable progress was made with the settlement
of the Greek question. The treaty of London in providing for the
autonomy of Greece had specified no boundaries, and the first problem
demanding the attention of the powers that had assumed the task of the
settlement of Greece was to determine the limits within which that
settlement was to be effected. It might be urged that all the Greeks who
had accepted the armistice imposed by the powers in consequence of the
treaty of London had a right to share in the settlement at which that
treaty aimed. But the armistice had been broken by Greek attacks on
Chios and Crete, and Wellington held that the powers were, in
consequence, free from any obligation imposed by the nominal acceptance
of the armistice. He, accordingly, desired to adopt the simple principle
of granting the proposed autonomy to those parts of Greece in which the
insurrection had proved successful, namely, the Morea and the Ægean
Islands, and refusing it in Northern and Central Greece, where the
Turkish forces still held their own. But the British cabinet was far
from being unanimous; many, among whom Palmerston was specially
prominent, urged the concession of a greatly increased territory. The
changes which took place in the British ministry towards the end of May,
1828, deprived Palmerston of his share in its deliberations, and by
substituting Aberdeen for Dudley at the foreign office, placed our
foreign relations under the direction of a man of talent and experience,
who had already exercised an important influence on British policy and
who was more in sympathy with the policy of the prime minister than
Dudley had been, but who was not content, like Dudley, to be a mere
cipher in the department over which he was called to preside. Aberdeen,
though opposed to the narrow boundaries which Wellington wished to
assign to liberated Greece, was no less antagonistic than his chief to
any attempt to make the new Greek state politically important; and he
was even of opinion that the Russian declaration of war had released
Great Britain from any further obligation under the treaty of London.
Such were the composition and policy of the British government when the
conference of London reassembled in July. The differences between the
powers had prevented any active intervention in Greece, since the battle
of Navarino. The ports in the Morea, still occupied by Ibrahim, had
indeed been blockaded, but it had been found impossible to induce
Austrian vessels to acknowledge a blockade of such questionable
legality, and the allied fleets had even permitted the embarkation of
Ibrahim's sick and wounded together with 5,500 Greek prisoners, who were
sold into slavery on their arrival at Alexandria. The renewal of the
concert of the three powers was followed by a rapid change in the
situation. On the 19th it was decided that France should send an
expedition to expel the Turco-Egyptian troops from the Morea, while
Great Britain should render her any naval assistance that might be
necessary. This step was valued by the British government as definitely
committing France to a share in the settlement of the Greek question,
and therefore interesting that power in opposition to any attempt at a
separate settlement by Russia. It also furnished a safe outlet for
French military ardour, disappointed by the results of the Spanish
expedition. In fact, the evacuation of Spain, which was in progress at
the date when this agreement was concluded, materially reduced the
strain which the new undertaking imposed upon the French government.
France immediately prepared to send out a force amounting to nearly
22,000 men. But before they could arrive, the greater part of their task
had been performed by other hands.
[Pageheading: _TURKS EXPELLED FROM THE MOREA._]
Codrington's conduct in permitting the embarkation of the Turkish sick
and wounded with their prisoners had given great dissatisfaction at
home, and the cabinet had resolved on his recall before the ministerial
crisis of the latter part of May. That crisis occasioned a fortnight's
delay, and, in consequence, Codrington was able, before his successor
arrived, to make a naval demonstration before Alexandria and on August 6
to obtain the consent of Mehemet Ali to the following proposals: an
exchange of prisoners was to take place, involving the liberation of
the recently enslaved Greeks, and the Egyptian army was to be withdrawn
from the Morea, but Ibrahim was to be allowed to leave behind 1,200
Egyptian troops to help to garrison five fortresses which were held by
the Turks. Before either the new London protocol or the Alexandria
convention could be carried into effect, further differences had arisen.
Russia had proclaimed a blockade of the Dardanelles and ordered her
admiral to carry it out. This proceeding was regarded by the British
government as a breach of faith and a menace to British commerce. It
was, however, impossible to abandon co-operation with Russia for fear
that the Greek question might become involved in the issues at stake
between her and the Porte. Wellington, in consequence, contented himself
with obtaining certain exemptions from the operation of the blockade on
behalf of British subjects trading with Turkey, and with the exclusion
of the Russian fleet from the operations conducted in the Mediterranean
in accordance with the orders of the London conference. The French force
for expelling the Egyptians from the Morea arrived almost simultaneously
with the Egyptian transports for removing them. On October 5 Ibrahim set
sail for Egypt, with 21,000 men, leaving 1,200 behind in the five
fortresses in accordance with the terms settled at Alexandria. The
French began their attack on the remaining fortresses two days later,
and by the end of November had expelled all the Turks from the Morea. By
the terms of their engagements, they ought now to have departed. But it
was hardly to be expected that France would so readily abandon the
advantage that the presence of her troops gave her in the settlement of
the eastern question.
Meanwhile the negotiations made slow progress. On November 16 a protocol
was issued placing the Morea with the neighbouring islands under the
guarantee of the powers. Wellington had opposed any extension of the
guarantee to Central Greece on the ground that the allies had to provide
both the necessary military force and the cost of maintaining the Greek
government, so that any undertaking beyond the Morea would involve heavy
expense without rendering lighter the task of maintaining order. But the
real decision of the question lay not with the diplomatists at London,
but with the diplomatists on the spot. Representatives of the three
powers had been sent to Poros to make detailed arrangements in
accordance with the terms of the treaty of London. Stratford Canning,
who represented Great Britain, was one of the supporters of an extended
frontier, and in the end the ambassadors at Poros drew up a protocol in
favour of erecting Greece south of a line connecting the Gulfs of Arta
and Volo into a hereditary principality, which was also to include
nearly all the islands. Even Samos and Crete were recommended to the
benevolent consideration of the courts. All Mohammedans were to be
expelled from this territory. The tribute payable to Turkey was to be
fixed at 1,500,000 piastres, but this was to be paid not to the Turkish
government, but to those who might suffer pecuniary loss by the
confiscation of lands hitherto owned by Mohammedans.
[Pageheading: _PEACE OF ADRIANOPLE._]
The spring of 1829 was marked by events which went far to cancel the
arguments on which Wellington had based his case for a restricted
frontier. Not only the north coast of the Gulf of Corinth but Acarnania
and Ætolia were liberated by the Greek forces under Sir Richard Church
the castle of Vonitza falling on March 17, Karavasara shortly
afterwards, Lepanto on April 30, and Mesolongi on May 17.[97] Meanwhile
the terms agreed upon at Poros had been adopted and further defined by
the conference at London on March 22. It was now provided that the
future hereditary prince was to be chosen by the three powers and the
sultan conjointly, and that the terms were to be offered to the Porte by
the British and French ambassadors in the name of the three powers; any
Turkish objections were to be weighed.[98] It was not till June that
Robert Gordon and Guilleminot, representing Great Britain and France
respectively, were able to lay these proposals before the Porte, and it
was only after a Russian army under Diebitsch had crossed the Balkans
that the Porte on August 15 accepted them, and even then only with
extensive modifications. These limited the new state to the Morea and
the adjacent islands, and left the tribute assigned to the same purposes
as before the revolt; a limit was to be set to the military and naval
forces of Greece, and Greeks were not to be allowed to migrate from
Turkish dominions to the new state.
Wellington was of opinion that these concessions were adequate. He
attached great importance to the consent of the Porte, to dispense with
which seemed to him a sure method of encouraging a general revolt in the
Turkish dominions; and he also advocated a limited frontier in the
interests of the Ionian Islands. He doubted whether it would be found
possible to remove Capodistrias, who had been elected president of
Greece for a period of seven years on April 14, 1827, from his office to
make room for a hereditary prince, and he felt sure that if Capodistrias
were once granted Central Greece he would not hesitate to attempt the
conquest of the Ionian Islands. Capodistrias had in fact refused to
accept any of the arrangements proposed by the London conference, and
was still engaged in the vigorous prosecution of the war. Wellington did
not, however, succeed in inducing France and Russia to remain content
with the Turkish concessions. Diebitsch's successful march through
Rumelia encouraged Russia to demand more, and filled the minds of the
French ministers with the wildest schemes of aggression. They actually
proposed to Russia that the northern part of the Balkan peninsula should
be divided between Austria and Russia while the whole peninsula south of
the Balkans, with Bulgaria to the north, was to be formed into a new
state under the sovereignty of the King of the Netherlands, whose
hereditary dominions were in their turn to be divided between France,
Great Britain, and Prussia.
Such chimerical projects were based on the assumption that
Constantinople lay at the mercy of the army of Diebitsch; and this was
believed to be the case not only by the court of Paris, but by that of
London, and even by that of Constantinople. But no one knew better than
Diebitsch how precarious his situation was, and, if Russia wished to
obtain advantageous terms, it was necessary for her to make the most of
the illusion while it lasted. On September 14 the peace of Adrianople
was signed, which established the virtual independence of the
principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia and secured for all powers at
peace with Turkey a free passage for merchant ships through the
Bosphorus and Dardanelles; Russia received a small addition to her
Asiatic territories, and Turkey accepted both the treaty of London of
July 6, 1827, and the protocol of London of March 22, 1829. The
difficulties raised by Turkey's opposition to the full terms of the
protocol were thus swept aside, and it was now clear that, if that
protocol was to be further modified, it would be modified out of regard
for the interests of Europe not by way of concession to Turkey. France
and Great Britain were naturally averse from a settlement of the
question by Russia alone, even when that settlement was on lines to
which they had given their consent, and they might have been expected to
propose some alteration in the scheme. But the conciliatory action of
Russia rendered such proposals needless. On September 29, only fifteen
days after the treaty, Aberdeen received a formal proposal from Russia
that Turkey should be offered a restriction of the Greek boundary in
return for a recognition of the total independence of Greece.[99] This
proposal removed Wellington's fear that the new principality might be
used as a basis for an attack on the Ionian Islands; while the
maintenance of Turkish suzerainty seemed less important after the
apparent prostration of Turkish military power in the recent war.
It now remained for the allied powers to select a prince to whom the new
crown should be offered. This subject engaged their attention from
October, 1829, to January, 1830. Finally, Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg,
widower of the Princess Charlotte, was selected, greatly to the
annoyance of King George IV. On February 3 Prince Leopold was formally
offered the sovereignty of Greece as an independent state, bounded on
the north by a line drawn from the mouth of the Aspropotamo to
Thermopylæ. Before accepting the crown he made an effort to obtain a
stronger position for its future prince. He asked for a complete
guarantee of independence from the three powers, some security for the
Greek inhabitants of Crete and Samos, an extension of the boundary to
the north, and financial and military support. The powers on February 20
decided to grant the guarantee and a loan of £2,400,000, and to allow
the French troops to remain in Greece for another year, but refused the
extension of territory and would not recognise the right of the Greek
state to interfere in the affairs of Crete and Samos. Leopold accepted
the crown on these conditions on February 24, and they were accepted by
the Porte on April 24. Capodistrias, who had no desire to make way for
another ruler, invited Leopold to the country, but suggested that he
would not be well received and that he would have to change his
religion.[100] These considerations, combined with other causes, induced
him to renounce the crown on May 21.
[Pageheading: _FRANCE CONQUERS ALGERIA._]
One other foreign event exercised the minds of Wellington's cabinet
during the last months of George IV.'s reign. This was the French
punitive expedition to Algiers, which resulted In the conquest of that
state. The expedition was originally planned in concert with Mehemet Ali
of Egypt, and appeared to Wellington to be prompted by the idea that the
defeat of the Turks by Russia afforded a convenient opportunity for a
partition of Turkish territory. The British government was able by means
of diplomatic pressure to induce Mehemet Ali to refrain from
co-operating, but it could not deny the justice of the French expedition
or prevent it from sailing.
FOOTNOTES:
[93] Stapleton, _Life of Canning_, iii., 220-25, 227-35.
[94] See Lloyd, _Transactions of the Royal Historical Society_, N.S.,
xviii. (1904), 77-105.
[95] Wellington, _Despatches, etc._, iv., 270-79.
[96] _Ibid._, pp. 280-86.
[97] So S. Lane-Poole, writing from Church's papers, _English Historical
Review_, v., 519.
[98] Hertslet, _Map of Europe by Treaty_, p. 142.
[99] Wellington, _Despatches, etc._, vi., 184.
[100] See the letters in the _Annual Register_, lxxii. (1830), 389-401.