The Express.
London, England, 1864-07-11 00:00:00

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.Aftermas. 71 275.

LONDON, MONDAY, JULY 11.

Now that the smoke of the Parliamentary artil-
lery which shook the British Isles and half the
continent of Europe last weeks clearing away, it
may be worth while to take a calm survey of the
field, and to ascertain some results of the action.
It is long since a battle of parties was fought
with more impetuous courage or more resolute
tenacity. It was in the strictest sense a general
action, all the forces on either side, to the very
last available man, being engaged ; and on both
aides it was felt to be a mortal struggle for other
objects than those set down in the declaration of
hostilities. War has its forms, its ceremonies,
its decencies, acd its hypocrisies ; and one
of its hypocrisies is the solemn assump-
tion of some grand principle as the
ostensible cause, while the real cause is ambition,
or rapacity, or vanity, • sovereign's ennui or •
woman's affront. The Mover of the intended
Address to the Crowe, having • fine eye for the
picturesque, went forth to fight for the leavened
influence of England and the lost integrity and
independence of Denmark ; • romantic and
chivalrous enterprise, like the liberation of Italy
from the Alpe to the Adriatic, but admitting of a
settlement on the cheaper and easier terms of tow-
ing out a Ministry and occupying Downing-street.
Nothing could be more adroit, as a manoeuvre, than
the terms of the proposed Address to the Crown.
It caught up and echoed every vague and restless
murmur of public dissatisfaction ; it struck that
sensitive chord of national feeling which vibrates
to the vulgarest touch ; it caressed the coarser
susceptibilities of the shop. Yet it has failed
utterly, not in spite, but because of its adroitness ;
convicted by its own art. Constructed to catch
every wavering, or irritable, or scruptiletui con-
science, this ample net was all too weak for so
extraordinary • draught of fishes.
It was curious to observe as the debate pro-
ceeded how the case of the Opposition defeated
itself. All the eloquence, the acuteness, the au-
thority and honest emotion of such speakers as Lord
STANLEY, Lord Roezar Cecil., General Pre; and
Mr. HARDY, served but to bring out in strougerre-
lief the contradictions of the indictment. As they
advanced from position to position the ground they
left behind them became • quicksand, and the
ground before them became a quagmire. Not
only were the speeches of the Opposition leaders
destructive of each other—one all for fighting, like
an Irishman at a fair, without regard to coat, or
right or wrong ; another all for peace at any price,
yet sticking Poland and Denmark together as
victims into his peroration—but it was an assault
upon the common sense of the House to go in for
peace and office at once, while accusing Ministers
of having failed to maintain and uphold what
could only have been maintained and upheld
by war. Mr. DISRAELI and his colleague%
with perhaps one generous and gallant exception,
would on no account have gone to war for Den-
mark ; neither would they have written • single
threatening, or warning, or rebuking, or protest-
ing word to the German Powers ; hut by simply
holding their tongues and pens they would
have conciliated the German people, paralyzed the
German Powers, and arrested the German troops ;
or if the Germans were not to be arrested by the
silence of the British Cabinet, but resolved to work
their wicked will as they have done and are doing,
still the just influence of England would be as
high as ever, because the fifteen hundred folio
pages of Danish papers presented to Par-
liament would not have been written. The
Parliament of England was invited to believe
that had the Tories been in power from the death
of the late King of DENMARK to the present mo-
ment, the Duchies would not have been invaded,
and the Foreign Minister of England would not
have written a despatch on the subject. Or, if
Parliament would not quite accept this view, it was
asked to record its belief that the integrity and in-
dependence of Denmark might have been
preserved without assistance from Russia,
France, Sweden, or England by the mere
presence of Lord MALVISBCRY or Mr. Dienseu
at the Foreign-office. There is no escaping this
dilemma. Of two things one—the Tories would
have maintained the independence and integrity
of Denmark, or they would not have maintained it.
They would have maintained it without fighting
or even writing in its behalf; or having failed
to maintain it, they would have upheld the just
influence of England more successfully than our
present Government, who have at least protested
in the name of England against the wrong, and have
shown themselves more ready than any other of the
neutral Powers to assert and defend the right.
Lord M• L. 4 MIT RI. (11 ho has left, it seems, un-
counted volumes of unpublished despatches behind
him in the Foreign Office), would have
held his peace from first to last on this
Dano-German question ; he would have at-
tempted nothing on behalf of Denmark, and there-
fore have failed in nothing. The Tory Ministry
would not have hurt the feelings of the Emperor
of the Faeseu with regard to Poland and the