The Sun.
London, England, 1859-07-30 00:00:00

than the French had done. The French had been convert-
ing, and not building, so that they now possessed fewer
sailing vessels by 114 than they did in 1852, whilst we had
nearly the same number of sailing vessels now as we had
then. Taking then the whole force of sailing vessels and steam
ships together, he found that in 1852 the English navy had
475 vessels, and in 1858 it had no fewer than 760 vessels,
showing an increase of 285 in six years. On the other hand,
the French in 1852 had, of steamers and sailing Tessels to-
gether, 380, and in 1853 they had 408, showing an increase
' of only 28. This great increase of the French navy, which
had he .:m so much talked of, amounted to just 28 vessels—
whereas th
toe iii `'tease of the English navy in the same period
amounted
e rR thereeally
waslyh
note n haeo sawme mistaket e se
figures
be almost doubted abut
them, until they were cerroborated by persons more conver-
sant with the matter than lie .imself was. But if it were
true that we had now 760 ships of war 4,73,1n5t the French
408, and if the augmentation of our navy had been 285
against the French 23 in a perio4 o f six years, what became
then of those gigantic .(preparations for Aft AttAck upon
our naval nower at which the right hon. gentleman
was so much terrified. (Hear, hear.) how, he observed
sh in
the comparisons which had been. publicly made of g4gli
and French navies, one omission, and iii must say it was an
uncandid omission—that of the corvettes amend other small
vessels of war. He was told by the wisest heads both here
and in America, that those large line-of-battle ships, upon
which were now pluming ourselves as our sole defence,
would in a case of war be found to be mere slaughterhouses.
He did not pretend to offer this as his own opinion. He
knew that it was acted upon in America, whore the United
States Government had not laid down one line-ot-battle
ship, and did not intend to do so, confining their navy alto-
gether to those long, low vessels, the corvettes, of a tonnage
equal to our severty-fours. The argument he had heard
was that, if we put a thousand men into a line-of-battle
ship, with. 30 tons or 40 tons of gunpowder below them, and
exposed that great ship, a most conspicuous target, to the
fire of such reisstiee as were now contrived to be discharged
from the kind of gums at present in use or in preparation,
we should really be providing a mere slaughterhouse for
those men. (Hear, hear.) This idea was corroborated by
one passage of the report he had quoted, in which, speak-
ing of the iron-sided ships under construction, it was re-
marked that they were expected in France to supersede
line-of-battle chips ; that no more of these would be laid
down, and that in ten years that class of vessels would be-
come obsolete. Now the point he would call attention to
was this. With the rapid progress of discovery and im-
provement now both in the building of ships, and in gun-
nery, was it not apparent that we should be subjected to a
great end cortgtast increase of expenditure in substituting
one kind of chip arid Fen. for another ? This novel state of
things must be the cattse of endless expense for different
new kinds of armament. Only compare the armaments of
the present day with those in use 20 years ago. ire remem-
bered 12 years ago sitting on a committee with respect to
the navy, and at that time there was net a screw line-of-
battle ship in existence; at that time they were think-
ing of having a fleet of paddle-wheel steamers. Now, all
'our steamers had the screw. He remembered the time
when it was considered that 32-pounders were the ne plus
ultra of the armament of a ship of war, and we were
just then dispensing with the old carronades by which
Nelson won his battles. Now, a modern ship of war
was armed with sixty-four pounders, and with ninety-
eight pounders carrying hollow shot and shell. The
whole thing had been completely metamorphosed, and so it
might be with regard to the line-of-battle ships. At the
end of this financial year we should have fifty line-of-battle
ships. He was informed by competent judges that they
I were a complete mistake, and that in case of war, we had
better put our men and guns into anything rather than a
line-of-battle ship. The impression was now gaining
ground that we should have to alter that system, and to
adopt a longer, lower form of ship. This opinion recom-
mended itself to common sense, for we were making im-
provements in gunnery to enable us to throw a shell three
or four miles. It would not be difficult to strike such a
mark as a line-of-battle ship, and if a shell were thrown
into her, causing her to explode, with 800 or 1,000 men on
board of her, and with 30 or 40 tons of powder stored be-
neath them, the destruction would be enormous. He did not
think we had yet got to the limit of these inventions ;
mechanical genius was only now beginning to be directed
to these things, and he observed that in America an im-
proved rifled cannon had just been tested, carrying twice
the distance with the same quantity of powder. He did
not say we should adopt all these inventions, but we should
not have a larger stock on hand than we could help, lest it
should have to be superseded at a great expense by some-
thing different. Now, seeing that by this alarm and panic
about invasion we did not mend our situation, he asked
could we not find some better way to remedy the evil ?
Could not reason and common sense be brought to bear
upon it ? What was it that we were afraid of ? It was said
that we were afraid of France, for no one said anything
about America ; no one pretended to be afraid of Holland
or Spain ; and as for Russia, since we had destroyed her
fleet in the Black Sea, and limited her future armament
there, he had not expected to hear anything more of that.
It was obvious that we were only alarmed at France, and in
that case the question they. ought to ask was, " Is our Go-
vernment, after all, on friendly terms with that of the Em-
peror ?" (Hear.) lie had heard his noble friend (Lord J.
Russell) declare that he had the most perfect confidence in
the Emperor's loyalty, good faith, and fidelity. Now was
that true, or was it not ? That the country did not believe
it was true was certain—(cheers)—and the reason was this,
while the Government were telling us that they had confi-
dence in the Emperor they presented us with a bill of four
or five millions for the increase of our armaments to protect
us against him. lie (Mr. Cobden) could imagine nothing
more perilous, and he must tell the house he had come to the
conclusion that we really were in danger of a war with
France. He had of late observed quite an altered tone in
the way in which men spoke about the matter. He heard
them beginning to say that we had better fight it out ; and
they argued very intelligibly. They said, "If while the
Government is telling us that they have perfect confidence
in the Emperor they indrease our armaments and add 4d.
to the income tax, which they require us to pay in October
—if all this goes on when there is no quarrel, when there is
nothing to explain and nothing to remove out of the way,
where is it all to end ? Surely we had better have a war,
destroy the French fleet, and start afresh." Apart from
the question of humanity, which, however, he should be
sorry to put for one moment out of:his sight, there was no
logical answer to this line of argument. It was a great
misfortune, but we were drifting towards that point, for the
English people were beginning to get reconciled to the pos-
• sibility, nay to the inevitableness of a war with our neigh-
bours. (Hear, hear.) He did not say that it was the fault
of this Government or that Government, or of the Govern-
ment of France ; but amongst all those Governments the
responsibility must lie. W all knew the amity which the
two Governments had long expressed for each other; we
had heard of our Sovereign going over to France and em-
bracing its ruler in a bating machine—(laughter)—and of
th• French Emperor coming over to England and receiving
courtesies and honours at Windsor. But was there, with
all this, no forbearance, no honesty, no desire to come to a
proper understanding ? It was degrading the policy of one
enlightened and civilised nation towards another below the
conduct of the red Indians in their woods. The Indians
when they had smoked the pipe of peace, buried the hatchet
of war, in token that they did not intend to go on alarming
each other by preparations for hostilities. (Hear, hear )
Yet we, while professing all this apprehension, went on ex-
pressing confidence and even offering adulation to the Em-
peror of the French—of whom if he (Mr. Cobden) had to
speak, he should not have fallen into quite such a strain of
compliment as had been used by the noble lord. (Hear.)
He (Mr. Cobden) feared the separation of Parliament.
because when Parliament was not sitting other organs of
public opinion, which were not always so peaceable as
they were in that house, were left in possession of
the field ; and much more mischief 'consequently hap-
pened in the recess than in the session. (Hear, hear.) He
was anxious, therefore, that this house should give expres-
sion to the fact that other states of feeling and other views in
England existed than he had seen prevail out of doors for some
time past.i.ie n
lealea
communicationsr. ) I Was
which as iit w
impossibleere
passing
i nthe
betweencourse
ofthe
the two countries to exchange a word of explanation ?
(Cheers.) Had his noble friend, or the noble lord the mem-
ber for London, or the right hon. gentleman opposite, or
Dord Derby, ever exchanged a single word in explanation of
these preparations for war? Let him not be told that those
preparations were not against :France. Everybody knew
that it was against France that we were preparing. Look at
our facetious publication, Punch, of that very week, and
they would find John Bull was represented grumbling at
having a he .vy extra insurance because his next door neigh-
bour—they could not mistake who that meant—was so fond
of fireworks. (Hear, hear.) Look at all our organs of opi-
nion—look at the .Edinburgh, at the Quarterly, and at all
the newspapers, from the Tones downwards, and they would
find them all possessed with the threats of an invasion. He
had been so struck with a paragraph in the letter of one of
" our own correspondents" at Paris that he had cut it out
and brought it de,,vn with him to the house. The writer
stated that, " at Toulon, notwithstanding the peace, appli-
cations for leave of absence had been stopped; the men-of-
war's men wera.arnied with tomahawks and boardinc, Dikes,
and a war with England was considered imminent'?" He
(Mr. Cobden) only wondered that the writer did not odd
that the men were supplied with scalping knives as well as
tomahawks. (Laughter.) He hoped that the country
would not fall into a false security engendered by the old
Latin maxim which said that if you would preserve yourself
in:peace be prepared for war. No one could really think
that that of saw had any application in these times. Look
at the great military powers; look at France, at Austria,
at Russia. Had they not all been at war, and could any
one doubt that the reason was to be sought in their great
standing armies ? (Cheers.) An honourable member talked
of fifty line-of-battle ships; but they had all read the
statement in the Edinburgh, showing that in point of ton-
nage and weight of metal thrown by our guns, our naval
f .rce now exceeded that which we possessed in 1809, when
we were at the very height of the war; and they did not
think there was some danger of our falling into what had
been described by Lord Aberdeen as a desire to test the effi-
ciency of our great warlike preparations ? (Cheers.) -Was
there nct danger that something might happen in Egypt
or elsewhere, and that we might find ourselves after all in
that state in which we had all at least dreamt we should
never again fall—plunged into a war with our next door
neighbour ? What proof had we that France wished to in-
vade us ? What overt act had the Government of France
or the French people in any collective capacity ever com-
mitted to warrant such suspicion ? Recollect it was not
against a war with France that wo were making these pre-
parations, but against an invasion. Englishmen never fell
into such a paid before ; and it was surprising that they
did not see the insult that was involved in it. How should
we like thi. French to be constantly assuming that we in-
tended to invade them without warning ? (Hear.) lie
should perhaps be told that the Emperor had attacked Aus-
tria. Ile (Mr. Cobden) was the last man wh) would wish
to see two neighbouring powers going to war for any con-
ceivable purpose whatever, feeling certain as he did that
there was no rational object to be gained by hostilities that
could not be equally gained without them ; at the same time
he must remind the house that in the late war the feeling
of all the world was in favour of France and against Aus-
tria. He did not wish to speak disrespectfully of any or-