The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1856-02-12 00:00:00

conveniently for the purposes of our own navigation ; and the
open force by which the scheme was ultimately carried into

act of usurpation a char

:ter of violence

still mow to bo regretted

Captain Haines was to Aden what Captain Lock was to
Nicaragua: Now, Mr. President, the same course of con-
duct that has distinguished the course of the British
government in India marks the designs and character of
the same government in Central America at the same perio I.
Those who (lid not scruple to se'ze Aden to controul the
Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, had no more scruples when they
came to a much more important strait—to a passage more
important to commerce than a hundred Bab-el-Mandebs.

however—

let me not underrate it—is one

of vast importance "; ter you observe that Biitish statesmen
at that period anticipated what is now about to occur—a
canal connection between the Mediterranean with the Red
Sea by the Isthmus of Suez. Viewed in this light, the
importance of Aden becomes vastly greater than was ever
dreamed of by men not bent on controuling the keys
of commerce throughout the world. The same charac-
teristics mark the seizure of Central America and the Colony
of the Bay Islands. Mora than fifty years ago, the seizure
of Malta, and the retention of it in defiance of the treaty of
Amiens, brought on a long and desolating war with France,
and this important naval station was never relinquished,
though its occupation caused the expenditure of rivers of
blood. The war with Spain for Gibraltar was another
evidence of the same rapacious spirit; and now the war
with Russia, having for its object the eventual control of
the Bosphorus, is believed to give proof that the same
policy is still to be pursued in both hemispheres. Hr. Presi-
dent, it will be recollected by honourable Senators here,
and all others who chose to observe my humble course in
public life, that I was reluctant and slow to believe that
Great Britain could disgrace herself by such pretexts
as are used to circumvent the treaty of 1850. The
honorable senator from Michigan (Mr. Cass) understood,
them batter than I did ; there were others here who under-
stood them ; I—and I call all hero to witness it—l,
believing from the declarations of the British Minister,
Lord John Russell himself, that it was impossible that such
a monstrous construction should ever be resorted to as is
now adopted by the British Ministry, did on repeated
occasions, on the floor of the Senate, attempt to vindicate
the course that Great Britain had pursued, and, in the
exercise of that charity which I trust I shall always exercise
towards all men, I endeavoured to show that Great Britain
was not yet dishonored—that she might retrace those steps
which were erroneous, and that eventually we must have con-
fidence that she would carry out her contract, But, sir,
when I:heard the onnual message of the President of the
United States read from your table, my convictions under-
went a total revolution. I saw from the monstrous
construction set up that the treaty was to be considered
as only prospective in its operation—that we were to be
subjected to the same kind of shuffing and the same despi-
cable attempts at special pleading which marked the letter
of Lord Palmerston to Castillon, Minister of Nicaragua, on
the 16th of July, 1849, and which, indeed, marked the
correspondence of the British government with all the
feeble Central American nations during the whole period for
which Lord Palmerston had the direction of British
foreign affairs. Sir, if any man wishes to see a specimen of
that kind of writing which I call despicable special
pleading, let him look at the arrogant overbearing letter
written by Lord Palmerston to Castillon, the minister of
Nicaragua, to which I have referred, and which is to be
found in senate document 75, page 180, communicated by
President Fillmore to the Senate on the 19th of July,
1850. I ask the attention of the Senate in this connec.
tion particularly to that letter, for the purpose of illus-
trating the duplicity that has marked the course
of the British government on this whole subject.
In the letter of Lord Palmerston to Senor Castillon he rea-
sons—if it can be called reasoning—by founding his pre-
tensions on the treaties with Spain of 1783 and 1786. He
considers those treaties as in full force and effect, and in so
viewing them, be presses upon the minister of Nicaragua
that under and by virtue of them the British protectorate
was established—an argument which I think no other man
on earth would use who had read the treaties. Again, sir,
in a letter written on the sth of January, 1850,
_to Mr.
Lawrence, our minister in London, Viscount Palmerston
refers expressly to a letter written by Frederick Chatfield, a
British agent in Central America at that time, and says
that that lettersiet Chatfield "contains a statement of facts
showing the nature of the connection which has existed since
the middle of the seventeenth century between Great Britain
and the Mosquito nation." He refers him to that as showing
the authority upon which the British government has acted,
and sends Mr. Lawrence a copy of Chatfield's letter, at the
close of which von find that Chatfield not only recognises
those treaties of 1783 and 1786, but says expressly that the
evidence of the hereditary monarchy of the Mosquitoes is
to be found in those treaties of 1783 and 1786, which, he
says, "the British agents have never repudiated and have
constantly recognised." Now, what think you, after all
that, of this same Viscount Palmerston, standing at the head
of the British government,
directing the correspondence of
Lord Clarendon, and Lord Clarendon writing to our Min.
inter at London, Mr. Buchanan, stating that these treaties
" were put an end to by a subsequent state of war" with
Spain, which terminated in 1809 ? Here is a pat contradic-
tion of binaself by himself, which ii submit is nothing lesS
than disgraceful to a public minister. I can use no milder