The Express.
London, England, 1852-02-06 00:00:00

To Till ZulToi or Till DAILY TIMIS.

SIR.--The estimate I have formed of the cireum-
starlet, that attended the dismissal of Lord Palmer-
ston. differs somewhat from that expressed by
0 11. P.." in your publication of yesterday. My esti-
mate of the noble lord himself differs considerably
(min that which appears to be most prevalent. Will
you allow me room fur • few remarks on these to-
Pies! There can be no harm in listening, for a few
moments, to what a man has got to say, who, what-
ever be the eilibre of his judgment, has watched
Lord Palmerston closely for more than twenty years,
and 11.14 endeavoured. by nailing, to make up for his
o at of opportunities to observe personally his pre-
v WWI conduct.
With regard to the circumstances of his dismissal,
I must confess that Lord John Russell's explanation
is not so satisfactory as I could have wished: but
that fur a reason that I have not yet seen alluded
to.

The !pat-amen of Lord John's charge against his
Lite colleugue is, that the ex-foreign secretary took
an important step, or sent off to important despatch,
oehuut previously communicating it to the head
of :lie ministry, ur obtaining fur it the sanction of the
,rou n.

lord John's notion of what is the proper constitu-
ti.inal practice in this respect appears to me perfectly
wool Ministers are responsible for their acts, but
thy are also the ministers of the crown. If the
bilerrign insists upon their doing what they think
ening they ern resign. If the act they were asked
to perform is unconstitutional, no other ministers
aid accept office on the condition of performing it.
The crown will he obliged to meal them, and allow
them to take their own way. Here we have a suffi-
cient constitutional cheek on the power of the crown.
It is unnecessary, it is intolerable, that ministers
should presume to act without previously intimating
their ititentrin4 to the crown, and thereby deprive it
of the option of sanctioning or negativing their policy
in the first place.
Again, the crown in nominating a ministryreposes
its chief confidence in one individual. Some leading
statesman is called upon to form a cabinet. The
crown undertakes to support him in his policy:
those who accept office under him tacitly pledge
themselves to conform to that policy. A certain
latitude of free discussion in the cabinet is necessary,
but it cannot be tolerated that any other minister
shall systematically thwart the policy of the Premier.
Nor can it be tolerated that any other minister shall
steal a march on the Premier, by putting important
measures in force, or sending off important des-
?delves, without previously informing him what
they were.
Now it will be admitted that the tone to be
adopted in communicating with the French President,
after the 2nd of lb-ember, was a matter of vital con-
squence. Lonl Palmerston, however, expressed his
views to the Ft ench minister without consulting any,
of his colleagues or informing the Crown. This came
to the knowledge of Lord John Russell, on the Bth
of Decem- cr, who on that or the following day ap-
plied to the Foreign Secretary for an explanation of
his conduct. No answer was returned till the 16th,
and during the eight days that intervened Lord John
received con the Lith) it letter from his royal mis-
trem calling upon him for an explanation, and Lord
Palmerston sent off (on the 15th) a despatch to Lord
Normanhy which he did not preciously communicate
to the Premier or any of his colleagues.
lord Palmerston has asserted a latitude of inde-
pendent at tion which no Premier or cabinet can safely
tolerate in a colleague. Were every minister allowed
to act as he has dune, as many contradictory policies
might be enforced at once as there are mem-
ters in the cabinet. Lord Palmerston more-
over was not only insubordinate, he was wan-
tonly rude and offensive in his insubordination. He
left the Premier's letter unanswered for eight days,
persisting all the time in conduct which he knew had
pren umbrage. Lastly, it is clear that this has not
brea Lord Palmerston 's first offence ; for in August,
I'd'),it was deemed necessary formally to intimate
to him that he exceeded tis posers in enforcing
commies which had not previously been submitted
for the sanction of the crown.

Bat though lam clearly of opinion that Lord
John Rusa II has acted perfectly right on the pre-
lim occasion, I am, and for this very mama, as
clearly of opinion that he acted very wrong in 1830.
When Lord Palmerston was attacked in the
Home of Commons in June, IMO, for his eroded
towards Greece, and for cis foreign policy gene-
rally, Lord John Russell defended ham o fortranec
He held up Lord Palmerston as a model foreign
minister. Vet, in August of the same year, Lord
John was obliged to call in the aid of their royal
mistress to tie down this model minister to fiir,
reuonable, and oak conduct. A rescript like that
of August. Ixitt, produced by Lord John on Toes-
dia night, denotes a "foregone conclusion." It shows
that Lord Palmerston had been in the habit of acting
without consulting his colleagues, or anybody, and
that his actions had been of a nature gravely to com-
promise them. At the very moment that Lord John
se- puffing lord Palmerston in the House of Coto-
uNns with a forty horse power, he felt convinced in
hit secret conscience that Lord Palmerston was a
esinetimus colleague, and an unsafe foreign minister.
It will be said that it was the generosity of Lord
lAn's nature that scduord him into this insincerity.
The enemies of the noble lord might insinuate that it
sus rather his fear of irritating a clever and unseen-
puluus partisan leader, or breaking up a ricketty ad-
ministration. But lam no enemy of the a dale lord;
Imes the more favourable interpretation. risks!
rd.t.w. But if Lord John's old ally had claims
open his leniency, Lonl John's Queen and country
hid claims upon his sincerity. fie swerved a.gaintis
his duty towards both in making false preform .= tt
"men tlw dclingeencit-a, or what he believed to be
the delitioneneini, of a colleague. In secret be
trembled at the henilem audacity of Lord
Palmerston. as something that he thought might
at any moment involve this country in war.
In puhlie he affected to believe that brow
$11,4 was the only safe and capable foreign minis-
ter to he had in Plngland. Ile exerted himself to
keep in Aire one whom he believed extremely likely
toile mischief there. Ile sacrifieed the interests of
leer muniry to a piece of clap-trap sentimentalism.
And he nor, appears before that country in the
Idalit of a man who has Inc years been laying one
thing aid thinking another. Lord John professes to
1,.0e at heart pirlinmentary reform, Chancery re-
Nal, and many other reforms; hut who, after the
("al "-iticis if Tuesday night. can have confidence in
his sine. city ? By his hollow advocacy or Lord
Klesesien t.lll former occasions he has incalculably
diminished his own palter to do good.
so tar I hare lilt • ntirely omit of view the essential
mulls re demerits of Lord Palmeniton's foreign
P"liry. They had nothing to do with the question.
Iris poliey might he the perfection of wisdom ; the
min ptiliaw way in a hill he sought to smuggle it
through more than re etralised all that of good was
in it. Hee Ido not shrink from stating my estimate
or Lord Palmerston as a foreign minister, though
slant that it is fifth: in accordance with what is en-
Ignallud by the balk of the liberal party.

Lord Pahnerstan's oacial career extends over a
tract of forty years, but it is only for about the last
twenty years that he has had anything to do with
foreign affairs. It is of a mach more recent date
that he has come to be held up as an oracle in them.
Under Lords Grey and Melbourne he was only
" trying his 'prentice hand." And they whose
memory goes so far back will recollect that our
neophyte was for the greater part of these his
Inendos days regarded as the mere scholar, or, men
correctly 'peaking, dope, of Talleynnd. But every
man must buy his experience by committing blunders
and suffering for them. It is with Lord Palmerston,
since he set up for himself, that I have to do.
Now, when I ask what Lord Palmerston's pay
tisane have had to say in hie favour, I find that,
fairly analysed, it all resolves itself into this : that
he has been animated by a generous sympathy for
the Waggles of freedom in all parts of the world.
I might have said last week that fine sentiment is a
fine thing, but that something more is required in a
foreign minister. After what passed on Tuesday
night, however, the dclurion as to Lord Palmenton's
sympathies with freemen and freedom must be dissi-
pated effectively and for ever. Our English liberals
(conservative and progressive) can no longer say
with the late Sir Robert Peel " We are all proud of
him." He must in future be gauged, not by a senti-
mental, but by an utilitarian scale.
Proceeding to do this the first thing that strikes
one in taking a retrospective view of Lord Palmer-
ston's diplomatic career is the utter want of any
consistent guiding principle in it. His actions were
always decided by some petty aim of the moment,
not by the established practical law of nations. When
Russia established a paper blockade of the Circassian
coasts Lord Palmerston truckled to Russia. lie
shrunk from asserting the rights of British subjects
whose vessel had been seized and their goods confis-
cated under this unreal and illegal blockade. Again,
Lord Palmerston kept alive for years a fruitless and
exasperating controversy with the United States,
which at one time brought us to the very verge of
war with the republic. In the boundary question he
persisted, in defiance alike of tho terms of
a treaty, the recognised practice of nations,
and the facts of physical geography, in main-
taining that " the highlands in which cer-
tain rivers have their rise," meant " the
highest mountain peaks to bo found in a cer-
tain region." He needed only to look to the weald
of Sussex to se- that the water-shed of a country is
not necessarily its line of highest elevation, but had
he done so he could not have prolonged his
squabble with America, and therefore he wilfully
shut his eyes. Again, in the Syrian war, Lord Pal-
merston at the imminent hazard of plunging this
country into a war with France, disregarded the
established maxims of international law regarding
the rights of defiteN governments. Lord Palmers-
ton nrogni,ed no law of nations but his own per-
sonal crotchet of the moment. Self-will had great
part in this, but so had ignorance. It is obvious
from Lord Palmerston's despatches that he has
picked up his notions of international law on the
pressure of emergencies; that relying on his own
cleverness he has always sought not to discover what'
was law, but what it would be best for his purpose to
have thought law.
A man thus drifting rudderless on the vexed sea I
of foreign re'ations would, with the most quiet and
inoffensive disposition, bo a dangerous minister.
But Lord Palmerston is neither quiet nor inoffen-
sive. He has great self-command and a pleasing
manner, his personal intercourse is pleasing; even in
debate he " tickles" while he probes the wound ; his
soin'es arc excessively
.agreeable. But beneath his
sweet and smooth exterior is an irascible and vindic-
tive temper. He is as ambitious of shining as a din-'
ing-out wit, or a belle of the Denson ; and he is as
implacable when his attractions are disregarded. His
envenomed rivalry with Louis Philippe (a bird of
the same feather) it was that prompted him to brave
the hazard of a war with France on a question in
which this country had no interest. His impatience
of having Lord Ashburton praised for his peace with
America led himto attack that peace in conversation,
in parliament, and the press,withunserupulous misre-
presentations that would hive disgraced the most
venal of hack scribblers.

Lord Palmerston is in short not a statesman in the
true high sense of the word, but a dexterous politi-
cian. Ile is a master of the whole art of getting
into place and keeping there; but when in place he
has no principles and no measures of his own to sup-
port. His want of great and useful aims, Lis want
of profound systematic knowledge of affairs, com-
bined with his pleasing, versatile, self-seeking, un-
scrupulous spint of intrigue, render him one of the
most dangerous of public men.
I have not waited for the risible cooling of the
affection borne to his person by parliament and the
public to say thus much of him. I do hope, how-
ever, that in the present mood of the public the
opinions of Lord Palmerston, which I have expressed
now and formerly—rica roe, and in print—will have
a better chance of being candidly and dispassionately
listened to. lam no partisan of his lordship's =-
friends, new or old; except as a dangerous politician
I have nonuse to bear him ill-will; but most sin-
cerely do I believe that the perpetuation of his pre-
sent exclusion from office, and influential position,
mast be of the greatest benefit to the country.
AN EX-M.P.

gig. Court.

WINDSOR, Fut. 5.

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tad
by LiestAbi Um A. Gesden.
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beild, arrived be. Landon this beemen et tAr thedft rid
hid an mama of the Queen, to Sr edam ef the
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measles of eariag pertiessaL MIMI Hill, the
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bed n audimee et bar Idebelyi to Proms tlio eddies tom
the Heraisellbernens, in mom to the speeth heft the
throne ea the maim .1 the present easier of parlkaseas.
The 'Queen wee attended by Lord Win/mirk, Lard Is
Waiting.

luviations have bees received by the following penes-
zes, who are expected to arrive lathe (Netts to-day :—The
s'aadrojusnof ofstuirnYto.thi;sl.gooarnrimant V4"gbsef, the Bari
un
Lord and Lade Avnburton, Lord Broughton, and the Eight
Hon. T. B. Macaulay.
Lord Cowley left the Castle this afternoon.

M. Van de Weyer, the Belgian Minister, transacted
balance. yesterday, at the Foreign•office. Ilia Excellency
had an interview with the Right lion. Henry Labouchere
yeeterday, at the office of the Board of Trade.
Mr. Abbot Lawrence, the American Minister, had en in-
terview with Ee.l Grey yesterday, at the Colonial-office.
Mr. Oahorne had an interview with Lord John Remelt on
Wednesday, at his official residence in I)owning-street.
A deputation, tensioning of Lord Stradhreke, Sir Ed-
ward Gooch, Bart., M.P., Mr. Adair, M.P.,and Mr.
Petn, M. l'., had an interview with Sir George rey ;ester-
day, at the llonse•ollice, on the subject of elualising the
eased, rates o( the county of SuSolk.
Mejor•tienevel the lion. George Cathcart, Governor of
the Cape of Good Hope, hail an interview yesterd•y with
Earl Grey. Mr. Cripp. had also an interview yesterday
with the noble earl at the Colonial-offiec.

Mr. Sunlit.ld, M P., had an interview yesterday with
the Right lion.llenry lAhotiehere.
Mr. M.eityn, M.P., had an interview yesterday with Sir
George Or'''.
apreh, a were received from the Governor of New
South Wales yrstvrday at the Colottial-oMee.

A Dr.rt-rtrioN from the pariah of St. Paul. Shad•
well connistins of Mr. Aila•e, churchwarden, and enamors
of the bred PEr,i iinciitnry It..ruem Avancintion; Mr. Sut-
ton, iiverneer; Mr. W. K Owner, shipowner; C iptcin
Make, and Mr Worn-, tog. th. r with the vestry clerk, had
au interview with Mr. 11..thinichere on Wednesday, at the
alma of the Bard of Trude, in reference to the MercAntile
Marine Act. The deputation were eoorteomly neeived by
the right hon. gentleman and his colleagme.