The Press.
London, England, 1856-06-21 00:00:00

'TILE PRESS.

Much evil results to the public at large from
such a state of affairs. The working of Parliament
has become anomalous. Domestic improve-
ment is checked as much as if we were still at
war. Two or three committees on commercial
questions are kept at work, and the old subject
of University Improvement is put forward as a
great measure. Army Reform, Civil Service
Organisation, educational measures, are un-
heeded ; and the Liberals are weak enough to
acquiesce in being used as accomplices in this
do-nothing-at-all policy. Where have gone
their sturdy promoters of social improvement?
Where are their members of Parliament—
frank, bold, and independent—like the late
Mr. HOME, cr Mr. GROTE, or Colonel THODIP-
SON? No briliant reputations are rising amongst
them. The public Treasury is their temple of
liberty, and when denied admission openly
they are content to slihk in at the side doors.
How they must laugh in their sleeves as they
look back upon a time when Liberals
really did believe in the British Constitution,
as interpreted by statesmen and orators of
high renown, before Mr. HATTER was accepted
as the true model for practical politicians.

Cort!'nonlitntt.

MR. CRAMPTON.
TO THE EDITOR OF " THE PRESS."

Sir,—ln my letter last week 1 attempted to
show why I thought it nearly impossible for
America to go to war with us without a
disruption of the Union following closely on
such an act of fully. In that letter I carefully
avoided everything which could be construed
into an expression of opinion relative to the
merits of the question at issue between the
two countries. Neither will I now trespass
upon ground which will be so much better oc-
cupied by yourself.
The title of Mr. Hunt's extraordinary pic-
ture in the Academy has been already applied
to oue diplomatist on whom it was supposed
that the Government were anxious to shift the
responsibility of the fall of Kars unrelieved and
uncured for. But it strikes me that there is a
disposition on the part of the public press to
invest Mr Crampton still more unmistakeably
with the attributes of the Levitical scapegoat ;
and it is against such unfair and ungenerous
treatment of this gentleman that I would re-
cord my humble protest through the columns
of your journal.
The Daily News never thought much of
Mr. Crampton. The Times always knew he
was an agreeable sort of fellow, a pleasant com-
panion, and a good raconteur; but, as for his
diplomacy, Heaven save the mark ! the less
said about that the better (though, to be sure,
it did tell us a week ago that he was the best
and most p)tilar Minister we had ever sent
to AmericaT; while even the paralytic Post,
which a few days ago mouthed and gibed at
Mr. Dallas with senile fury, and threatened
the United States Government with more dire
punishment than ever Pantaloon iu a panto.
mime seeks to inflict upon Harlequin, is at
the beginning of this week as willing to sacri-
fice Mr. Crampton as the Thunderer or the
Daily News itself.
Now, pray, sir, what right has the Times to
draw an absurd and unfeeling caricature of an
honourable gentleman and able public servant,
and then hold it up to the public, as his vera
effigies! To be sure the Times knows every-
thing; even such unknown facts as that
Washington is a limbo fur incapable diploma-
tists, and that the members of the mission to
the United States are " shelved " for ever and
placed out of the pale of promotion, which is
manifestly the reason why Sir Charles Bagot,
Sir Stratford Canning, Sir Charles Vaughan,
Sir Richard Pakenham, Sir Henry Bulwer,
and such inferior fellows, have been i acked
off to the banks of the Potomac, in which
stream they doubtless committed suicide, for
the world has never heard of their very
existence since they went there ; and as for
their advancement in their profession ! good
heavens ! is it not well known in Printing-
house Square that no Government could
venture to promote such condemned blun-
derers?

But, seriously, there is no reason and there
can be no reason, as Mr. Disraeli has well

SATURDAY,

said in the House, why the acts of Mr. Cramp-
ton should be separated from those of the
Government which has steadily approved his
conduct and pertinaciously refused to acknow-
ledge that there was any just reason for his
recal. It is too late to discuss the expe-
diency or wisdom of the Foreign Enlistment
Act of 1854. The only questions now are,
did Mr. Crampton zealously carry out the in-
structions of a Government whose servant he
is? If so, is it fair that his actions should be
separated from that of the Government which
employed him? Is it not quite enough that
he should be involved in the consequences of
acts which were decided on in Downing-street,
in a council where he had no voice? But
some persons will say that he should have
warned the Government at home of the dis-
astrous consequences likely to follow upon an
attempt to enlist soldiers in the Union, and
should have urged his own recal, in order to
save his superiors from the humiliation which
he ought to have foreseen would full upon
them. I would put two questions to persons
using this argument. First, are they quite
certain that it would be considered fitting in
an envoy to express his dissent from a course
of policy deliberately adopted by the Cabinet
and sanctioned by the Legislature at home?
Secondly, supposing the Secretary of State
were to invite the Minister to enter with him
upon a discussion of the pros and cons. of the
matter, is it to be expected that the whole
country is to be taken into their confidence,
told what arguments were used by the envoy,
what rejoinders made by the Secretary of
State, and invited to pronounce its opinion
which of the two officials had formed the
clearer judgment of the rk sults of the policy
decided upon? If so, a reporter from the Times
had better be accommodated with a chair ut all
future Cabinet Councils.
But what would have been said if Mr.
Crampton had done what a more selfish or
less conscientious public servant would un-
doubtedly have done—if he had contented
himself with writing barren despatches, and
taken care never to commit himself with the
Government of the United States by raising
one soldier for the Queen? A tool of Russia,
a lukewarm Gallio, a traitor to his country,
would have been the mildest epithets applied
to him by the fulminator of Printing-house
Square.
I can think of no other reason fir styling
Mr. Crampton a second or third rate diploma-
tist than that he is not a lord. I have heard
that Americans much prefer a titled envoy.
But such administrative reformers as the
Times and Daily News can hardly indulge a
similar partiality. For the Post, passe.
Mr. Crampton's high character, ability, and
great accomplishments furnish the best
answer to such a wild assertion. If his can-
did calumniators deny iu him the existence of
those qualities, I can only meet them by the
counter-assertion that there is no man in the
kingdom more especially qualified in every
way to represent us in America than our late
able Minister. Not only have four successive
Foreign Secretaries—Lords Granville, Mahnes-
bury, J. Russell, and Clarendon—shown
that this is their opinion, but such Americans
as President Fillmore, Mr. Webster, and Mr.
Everett have repeatedly declared their high
appreciation of Mr Crampton. I myself have
often heard Daniel Webster express that feeling
with all the solemnity of utterance with which
he always spoke a profound conviction If
laudari a laudato be a legitimate source of sa-
tisfaction to any man, Mr. Crampton may well
be proud of the admiration of that greatest
of American statesmen.
I will trespass on your time no further: I
am confident that my humble protest against
the ungenerousness and injustice of English-
men echoing the worst Transatlantic calumnies
against Mr. Crampton, and sneering at Ins
personal bearing and demeanour, which even
Ivlr. Cushing felt compelled to respect, in
order the more easily to reconcile ourselves to
the humiliation which we have sustained, will
be cordially responded to by every candid and
honourable man in this country, especially if,
like myself, he has chanced to he at any
period during the last six years
A TRAVELLER IN AbusaicA.