The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-04-19
PRIMROSE DAY.

the 10Th of April, 1881. This April day Is
known in England as Primrose day, and
on its annual recurrence in large cities
and country towns thousands of people of
both sexes, of every rank, caste and con-
dition of life, including peers, shop girls,
artisans and lnborers, wear on their bosoms
the pale yellow wild primrose that was the
favorite flower of the great man
whose memory is thus celebrated. The
Primrose League has membership of
nearly q million, and includes doubtless
large number Of persons who were not
Tories in a partisan sense in Beacons-
fields day, but have come with the lapse
of years to appreciate him as wise, able
and humane statesman.
Beaconsfeld, or, as we prefer to call
him. Disraeli, stands higher in the estima-
ton of his countrymen and of Europe and
America than he did the day of his death.
Like Byron, his favorite poet, his fame
endures the test of time and his figure
casts larger shadow than when he was
borne to the tomb. The progress of events
has done something to justify the far
reaching sagacity and political prescience
of his effort to establish a scientific
frontier for India, where a desperate
struggle between England and Russia is
sure some day to take place. As states
man of profound insight and foresight in
European affairs; executive energy
and audacious courage, Disraeli is
fairly described as the foremost Eng
lishman of his time. He foresaw
the downfall of Peel, and at the critical
moment forced the event in memorable
speech that lifted him to the life leader
ship of the Tories. He foresaw the neces-
sity and recognized the right of the people
for an extension of suffrage, and the
household suffrage reform bill, which
Gladstone with his party could not pass,
Disraeli compelled the Tories not only to
adopt but to enact in an enlarged form.
The reform bill of 1882 added large
commercial and middle class to the voting
population and extinguished few rotten
boroughs, but the chief credit of the pres
ent English electoral system belongs to
Disraeli, who by his reform bill of 1867
created household suffrage. without which
today Gladstone's party in England would
be too few in numbers to help
him to ultimate home rule for Ireland.
The superior statesman-like foresight
and wisdom of Disraeli was again shown
by his position during our civil war, when
Disraeli and Sir Stafford Northcote among
the Tories and the Duke of Argyle
and Sir George Cornwall Lewis of
the Liberals were the men who
kept England neutral, preserved her from
ruinous complications and saved our own
cause from unwelcome foreign interference
that might have robbed us of victory.
Gladstone, the son of an English merchant
who had owned slaves, had opposed West
India emancipation in his youth. and, al
ways inferior to Disraeli in political in
sight and foresight, the great orator of the
Liberals threw up his hat for Jeff Davis
as 'the founder of an empire" Many
Liberals and Tories ached to hold out
helping hands to the South. The English
upper classes were nearly unit for recog-
milton of the Confederacy, but Disraeli
incisively said ''Southerners may pos
sibly whip three Yankees a piece, but they
cannot fight progress backed by Yankee
dollars" He knew that the wealth of the
United States was with the Middle and
Western states; he knew that if England
went to war with America, Russia would
dsmember and absorb her vast Indian
Empire.
With all Gladstone's great services to
the cause of good government, it is ques-
tionable if he ever did his country or
humanity so great a service as Disraeli
performed when he saved England from a
war with the United States, whose out
come would have been not only defeat,
but disgrace and dishonor; for the sons of
the men who forced emancipation in the
West Indies could not afford to range
themselve. in support of the black
flag of human slavery. At this
critical juncture Gladstone's language and
action were most disappointing, and
to Disraeli belongs the gratitude of Amer
lea that he was wise and Just enough to
tell his country and his party that En-
gland neither as matter OF state
policy nor international humanity could
afford TO cast It's lot with q confederacy
whose cornerstone was a crime against
the inalienable rights of man, and whose
political philosophy was that of pirates
writing might makes Right" on the
tomb of Washington. Disraeh was too
bright a man TO do stupid and too wise
and just a man to do wicked act, and his
great influence saved England from the
greatest political biunder of modern times
when Gladstone was blind to the conse-
quences of its commission.
Disraelis insight and foresight were
splendidIy manifest not only in the
promptness OF his preparation to thwart
the designs of Russia both in Central Asia
and the Orient, but in the self-restraint
which refused 10 precipitate . conflict.
From the Berlin congress he brought
home peace with honor. This treaty,
which Gladstone denounced in his great
campaign that turned Disraeli out of
| power. had it's justification when Glad
| stone in office declared it would be his
| care TO maintain this treaty and enforce
| the policy he had denounced. Disraells
! purchase of the Suez canal was master
stroke of commercial policy for mari
time nation like England. The acquisi.
ZION OF Cyprus added to the chain of mill
tary and naval ports on the Nediterra-
mean, in which Gibraltar Malta and Suex