it his duty to criticize Spain. From his place in the House of Commons, whence his words flew over Europe, Mr. Canning, Minister of Foreign Affairs, said:—

Fellow-citizens, you shall decide, on hearing the story, if we also have not complaints; but I, too, hope that all will end well.

(1.) One act of the British Cabinet stands foremost as an omen of peril,—foremost in time, foremost also in the magnitude of its consequences. Though plausible in form, it is none the less injurious or unjustifiable. I refer to that inconsiderate Proclamation, in the name of the Queen, as early as 13th May, 1861, which, after raising Rebel Slavemongers to equality with the National Government, solemnly declares “neutrality” between the two coëqual parties: as if the recognition of equality was not an insult to the National Government, and the declaration of neutrality was not a moral absurdity, offensive to reason and all those precedents which make the glory of the British name. Neutrality is equality; neutrality is equity. It is both. But is there just equality between these two parties? Can neutrality between such parties, especially at the very outset, be regarded as equity? Even if the Proclamation could be otherwise than improper at any time in such a rebellion, it was worse than a blunder at that early date. The apparent relations between the two powers were more than friendly. Only a few months had passed since the youthful heir to the British throne was welcomed everywhere, except in Richmond, as in the land of kinsmen. And yet, at once, after tidings of the Rebel assault on Fort Sumter, before the National Government had begun to put forth its strength, and even without waiting for the arrival of our newly appointed minister, who was known to be at Liverpool, on his way to London, the Proclamation was suddenly launched. I doubt if any well-informed person, who reads Mr. Dallas’s despatch of 2d May, 1861, recounting a conversation with the British Secretary, will undertake to vindicate it in point of time. “I informed him,” the minister reports, “that Mr. Adams had apprised me of his intention to be on his way hither in the steamship Niagara, which left Boston on the 1st May, and that he would probably arrive in less than two weeks, by the 12th or 15th instant. His Lordship acquiesced in the expediency of disregarding mere rumor, and waiting the full knowledge to be brought by my successor.”[3] And yet the blow was struck without waiting. The alacrity of this concession was unhappy, for it bore an air of defiance, or at least of heartlessness, towards an ally of kindred blood engaged in the maintenance of its traditional power against an infamous pretension. More unhappy still was it that the good genius of England did not save this historic nation, linked with so many triumphs of Freedom, from a fatal step, which, under the guise of “neutrality,” was a betrayal of Civilization itself.

It is difficult to exaggerate the consequences of this precipitate, unfriendly, and immoral concession, which has been, and still is, an overflowing fountain of mischief and bloodshed,—“hoc fonte derivata clades,”—first, in what it vouchsafes to Rebel Slavemongers on sea and in British ports, and, secondly, in the removal of impediments from British subjects ready to make money out of Slavery,—all of which has been declared by undoubted British authority. Lord Chelmsford, of professional renown as Sir Frederick Thesiger, now an ex-Chancellor, used these words recently in the House of Lords: “If the Southern Confederacy had not been recognized by us as a belligerent power, he agreed with his noble and learned friend [Lord Brougham], that any Englishman aiding them by fitting out a privateer against the Federal Government would be guilty of piracy.”[4] But this is changed by the Queen’s Proclamation. For Rebel Slavery there is recognition; for the British subject opportunity of trade. For Rebel Slavery there is fellowship and equality; for the British subject a new customer, to whom he may lawfully sell Armstrong guns, and other warlike munitions of choicest British workmanship, and, as Lord Palmerston tells us, even ships of war, to be used in behalf of Slavery.[5] What was unlawful is suddenly made lawful, while the ban is taken from an odious felony. It seems superfluous to add, that such concession, thus potent in reach, must have been a direct encouragement and overture to the Rebellion. Slavery itself was exalted, when barbarous pretenders, battling to found a new power in its hateful name, without so much as a single port on the ocean where a prize could be carried for condemnation, were yet, in face of this essential deficiency, swiftly acknowledged as ocean belligerents, while, as consequence, their pirate ships, cruising for plunder in behalf of Slavery, were acknowledged as national ships, entitled to equal immunities with the national ships of the United States. This simple statement is enough. It is vain to say that the concession was a “necessity.” There may have been strong temptation to it, constituting, perhaps, imagined necessity, as with many there is strong temptation to Slavery itself. But such concession to Rebels fighting for Slavery can be vindicated only as Slavery is vindicated. As well declare “neutrality” between Right and Wrong, between Good and Evil, with concession to Evil of belligerent rights, and then set up the apology of “necessity.”

If he is an enemy who does what pleases an enemy, according to the rule borrowed by Grotius from the Christian lawyer of the age of Justinian,[6] then did England become the enemy of the National Union, for this most fruitful concession rejoiced beyond measure the Rebel enemy.

(2.) An act so essentially unfriendly in character, and also in the alacrity with which it was done, too clearly indicated an unfriendly sentiment, easily stimulated to menace of war. And this menace was not wanting, when, soon afterwards, the two Rebel emissaries on board the Trent were seized by a patriotic, brave commander, whose highest fault was, that, in the absence of instructions from his own Government, he followed British precedents only too closely. This accident—for such it was, and nothing else—assumed at once overshadowing proportions.