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BLACKWOOD'S EDINBURGH MAGAZINE NO

CCCXXVII

JANUARY 1843

VOL

LIII

CONTENTS GREAT BRITAIN AT THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE YEAR 1843 LESURQUES; OR THE VICTIM OF JUDICIAL ERROR CALEB STUKELY PART X

IMAGINARY CONVERSATION

BY WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR TASSO AND CORNELIA THE WORLD OF LONDON SECOND SERIES PART I

THE DREAM OF LORD NITHSDALE TWO HOURS OF MYSTERY THE EAST AND SOUTH OF EUROPE THE CURSE OF GLENCOE

BY B

SIMMONS THE MARTYRS' MONUMENT

A MONOLOGUE TASTE AND MUSIC IN ENGLAND GREAT BRITAIN AT THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE YEAR 1843

Great Britain at the present moment occupies a position of dignity of grandeur and of RESPONSIBILITY unparalleled in either her own history or that of any other nation ancient or modern

Let him who is inclined to doubt this assertion of whatever country he may be and whether friendly hostile or indifferent to England glance for a moment at a map of the world and having at length found out our little island (which perhaps he may consider a mere fragment chipped off as it were from the continent of Europe ) turn to our stupendous possessions in the east and in the west--in fact all over the world--and he may be apt to think of the fond speculative boast of the ancient geometrician "[Greek: Dos pou sto chai ton chosmon chinaeso] " and to paraphrase and apply it thus--"Give the genius of Great Britain but where she may place her foot--some mere point peeping above the waves of the sea--and she shall move the world

" Is not this language warranted by recent facts? While our irritable but glorious neighbour France--_pace tantae gentis!_--is frittering away her warlike energies in Algeria and Russia is worried by her unsuccessful and unjust attempts upon Circassia behold the glorious monarch of this little island Queen Victoria roused by indignities and injuries offered to her most distant subjects in the East strike single-handed a blow there which shakes a vast and ancient empire to its very foundations and forces its haughty emperor from his throne to assume the attitude of a suppliant for peace yielding her peremptory but just demands even at the cannon's mouth and actually relinquishing to her a large portion of his dominions

Events these so astonishing that their true character and consequences have not yet been calmly considered and appreciated by either ourselves or other nations

Look again at recent occurrences in British India--that vast territory which only our prodigious enterprise and skill have acquired for us and nothing but profound sagacity can preserve to the British crown--and observe with mixed feelings two principal matters: a perilous but temporary error of overweening ambition on the part of Great Britain yet retrieved with power and dignity; and converted into an opportunity of displaying--where for the interests of Great Britain it was imperiously demanded--her irresistible valour her moderation her wisdom; exhibiting under circumstances the most adverse possible in its full splendour and majesty the force of that OPINION by which alone we can hold India

Passing swiftly over to the Western Continent gaze at our vast possessions _there_ also--in British North America--containing considerably upwards of four millions of square geographical miles of land; that is nearly a ninth part of the whole terrestrial surface of the globe![1]--besides nearly a million and a half miles of water--five hundred thousand of these square miles being capable and in rapid progress of profitable cultivation! at more than three thousand miles' distance from the mother country and in immediate juxtaposition to the territory of our distinguished but jealous descendants and rivals--a rising nation--the United States! Pausing here in the long catalogue of our foreign possessions let our fancied observer turn back his eye towards the little island that owns them; will he not be filled with wonder possibly with a conviction that Great Britain is destined by Almighty God to be the instrument of effecting His sublime but hidden purposes with reference to humanity? Assume however our observer to be actuated by a hostile and jealous spirit and to regard our foreign possessions and the national greatness derived from them as only nominal and apparent--to insinuate that we could not really hold them or vindicate our vaunted supremacy if powerfully challenged and resented

Let him then meditate upon the authentic intelligence which we have just received from the East: what must then be his real sentiments on this the 1st day of January 1843? Let us ask him in all manly calmness whether England has not _done_ what he doubted or denied her ability to do? whether she has not shown the world that she may indeed do what she pleases among the nations so long as her pleasure is regulated and supported by her accustomed sagacity and spirit? She has however recently had to pass through an awful ordeal principally occasioned by the brief ascendency of incompetent councils; and while expressing in terms of transport our conviction that "out of this nettle danger we have plucked the flower safety"--we cannot repress our feelings of indignation against those who precipitated us into that danger and of gratitude towards those who under Divine Providence have been instrumental in extricating us from it not only rapidly but with credit; not merely with credit but with glory

To appreciate our present position we must refer to that which we occupied some twelve or eighteen months ago; and that will necessarily involve a brief examination of the policy and proceedings of the late and of the present Government

We shall speak in an unreserved and independent spirit in giving utterance to the reflections which have occurred to us during a watchful attention paid to the course of public affairs both foreign and domestic in the interval alluded to; though feeling the task which we have undertaken both a delicate and a difficult one

[1] Malte Brun xi

179

Alison x

256

After a desperate tenacity in retaining office exhibited by the late Government which was utterly unexampled and most degrading to the character and position of public men engaged in carrying on the Queen's Government Sir Robert Peel was called to the head of affairs by her Majesty in accordance with the declared wishes of a triumphant majority of her subjects--of a perfectly overwhelming majority of the educated the thinking and the monied classes of society

When he first placed his foot upon the commanding eminence of the premiership the sight which presented itself to his quick and comprehensive glance must have been indeed one calculated to make --"the boldest hold his breath For a time

" What appalling evidence in every direction of the ignorance and madness of his predecessors! An exchequer empty exactly at the moment when it ought to have been fullest in order to support our tremendous operations in the East and elsewhere: in fact a prospect of immediate national insolvency; all resources ordinary and extraordinary exhausted; all income anticipated: an average deficiency of revenue actual and estimated in the six years next preceding the 5th of January 1843 of L

10 072 000! Symptoms of social disorganization visible on the very surface of society: ruin bestriding our mercantile interests palsied every where by the long pressure of financial misrule: credit vanishing rapidly: the working-classes plunged daily deeper and deeper into misery and starvation ready to listen to the most desperate suggestions: and a Government bewildered with a consciousness of incompetency and of the swiftly approaching consequences of their misrule at the eleventh hour--on the eve of a general election-- suddenly resolving (in the language of their own leader) to stir society to its foundations by proposing a wild and ruinous alteration in the Corn-Laws declaring that it and it only would bring cheap bread to the doors of the very poorest in the land:--after the manner of giving out ardent spirits to an already infuriated mob

In Ireland crime and sedition fearfully in the ascendant; treasonable efforts made to separate her from us; threats even held out of her entering into a foreign alliance against us

So much for our domestic--now for our foreign condition and prospects

He would see Europe exhibiting serious symptoms of distrust and hostility: France irritated and trifled with on the verge of actual war with us: our criminally neglected differences with America fast ripening into the fatal bloom of war: the very existence of the Canadas at stake

In India the tenure by which we hold it in the very act of being loosened; our troops shedding their blood in vain in the prosecution of as mad and wicked an enterprise as ever was undertaken by a civilized nation; the glory of our hitherto invincible arms tarnished; the finances of India deranged and wasted away in securing only fresh accessions of disgraceful defeat

In China we were engaged in spite of the whisper of our guardian angel Wellington in a _little war_ and experiencing all its degrading and ruinous consequences to our commerce our military and naval reputation our statesmanship our honour

Did ever this great empire exhibit such a spectacle before as that which it thus presented to the anxious eye of the new Premier? Having concluded the disheartening and alarming survey he must have descended to his cabinet oppressed and desponding enquiring who is sufficient for these things? With no disposition to bestow an undue encomium on any one we cannot but say happy was Queen Victoria in having at such a moment such a man to call to the head of her distracted affairs as Sir Robert Peel

He was a man preeminently distinguished by caution sobriety and firmness of character--by remarkable clear-sightedness and strength of intellect--thoroughly practical in all things--of immense knowledge entirely at his command--of consummate tact and judgment in the conduct of public affairs--of indefatigable patience and perseverance--of imperturbable self-possession