TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE ISSUE BETWEEN THE TWO PARTIES. I.—THE CONSERVATIVE CASE. THERE is nothing to be gained either in war or negotiation by shutting one's eyes to the enemy's precise position, and we will, therefore, try to state with all the frankness and force we may the few broad ideas, or rather impressions, which induce sensible Conservatives, not devoted to Lord Beacons- field, nevertheless to vote for his Government and to wish it a general success at the Elections. Those ideas, though per- ceptible everywhere, are concealed by over many words and a sort of fury of expression on the part of individual speakers, who have, we suppose, grown hot in the conflict, and who, being naturally and permanently less articulate than their rivals, have something of the irritability of the dumb.
These Conservatives think that the present Premier, whether at heart an Imperialist or not, did, by a flash of genius, per- ceive that, partly from the current of events, partly from Mr. Gladstone's dislike to interrupt a flow of prosperity in which he exulted, the United Kingdom had been to a great extent deprived of her historic position in the world as one of the greatest of States. She had been made to appear willing to submit to arbitration when a proud State would have fought. She had been quietly and deferentially, but still decisively, shunted out of European affairs on the Con- tinent. Great arrangements were made without her consent, such as the Berlin Memorandum, or rather, her consent was assumed as a sort of matter of course. She was falling into the sort of position held by the Isle of Man towards English counties, not exactly despised and never interfered with, but not reckoned when a contest is on hand. Even in the Eastern Question, in which in 1856 she had been so active, she was not expected to take any resolute or separate part. Russia, these Conservatives think, though disliked and even dreaded by the rest of the Continent, was more considered that England ; and but for England, arrangements would have been made with her which would either have left her mis- tress of Constantinople, or have given her such a prepon- derating influence there that she, and not Europe, still less England, would have ruled Asiatic Turkey, an empire controlling all the routes to India. In such a position there was great loss of a reputation very dear to this country, and much actual danger to a Power which, claiming to be first in Southern Asia, must have free and rapid access there. This danger was, moreover, increased in appearance, if not in reality, by a certain decline of influence on the North-West Frontier, where a petty Sovereign, holding the important " march " or dividing territory between Russia and India, con- sidered, or affected to consider them equal Powers, with equal rights to leadership, between whom he was at liberty to judge for himself. There might not have been immediate danger, but there was prospective danger and immediate humiliation. Lord Beaconsfield, seeing this situation, seized the first opportunity presented to him of remedying it,— the Russian invasion of Turkey. It was not a good oppor- . tunity, because divisions at home did not allow him to declare war for Turkey, and the Turkish case was a bad one to defend by argument ; but such as it was he seized it boldly. He signified, by requiring a vote of money, by sending the Fleet into the Sea of Marmora, by calling out the Reserves, and by summoning the Sepoys to Malta, that England would either resist by force an entry to Constantinople, or would occupy the Asiatic half of Turkey, and so make the Russian success a sham. Whether Russia gave way to this demeanour, or was alarmed by the two Kaisers, signifies little. A body of opposition was made manifest before which Russia shrank, while England was instantly reckoned again in the list of effective States always to be counted with in the event of territorial redistribution. Her new position was not, perhaps, so effectively marked at the Berlin Congress as it might have been, because Lord Salisbury, caring mainly for the great result, and himself lacking tenacity, had, to avoid the calamity of a war which might have been European, secretly made many concessions to Russia ; but still the total result was the rehabilitation of England in the world,—a result emphasised, first, by her seizure of Cyprus ; and secondly, by her claim, received with astonishment, but without protest, to a Protectorate over Asia Minor. It is true her demand for reforms there has not been complied with, the Porte being obstinate, foolish, and corrupt ; but it is difficult to coerce an ally, and the claim remains, and as against Russia or the rest of the world is still valid. That much more might have been done to defeat Russia or coerce Turkey may be true, but still Lord Beacons- field did what he could without actual war. He stopped, with his allies, all aggression on Constantinople. He stopped, with- out allies, all aggression on Asia Minor. He made the Sultan accept reforms in theory ; and he ordered the Indian Government to reduce Afghanistan, once for all, to vassal- age as regarded foreign affairs. That was accomplished by the Treaty of Gundamuck, the serious point of which was Yakoob Khan's surrender of independence in foreign affairs ; and though, partly through blundering and partly through Afghan fanaticism, the Treaty failed, and Afghanistan is reduced to anarchy, still the original idea was bold and bright, and may be realised yet with patience, and a reasonable amount of fighting. At all events, Lord Beaconsfield's Government had neither overlooked nor evaded danger, but in Europe and Asia had frankly threatened to meet it by actual war ; and that of itself had made them influential, and recovered for the British Monarchy its high position in the world. The Liberal Govern- ment, Conservatives add, would not have done this. It might,. and possibly would, have fought at• last, but it would have shown no readiness to fight, have assumed no initiative, have mani- fested none of the proud fearlessness which a small State ruling dependent continents must always manifest, if it wishes to be respected. Attitude is much in society, and even sup- posing the two parties equally resolved, the attitude assumed by the Beaconsfield Cabinet was the more dignified and be- coming to so ancient and proud a people, who want to be great in history as well as to be comfortable at home. That it cost money is true, but the money was not much—less than the cost of Emancipation in the West Indies,—and a State had better lose money than the repute of firmness in dangerous times, or times of extensive change. The same argument applies to the future. What Lord Beaconsfield has done he will do again. Whether he is exaggerating the approach- ing danger or not does not much matter. There is danger in the air, a storm visibly gathering, and when it bursts, Lord, Beaconsfield will give Europe the impression that, if necessary, England will fight, and will thus keep for England an influ- ence which she ought to have, if patriotism of an effective kind is to survive. Patriotism cannot live without pride, and the Liberal chiefs, these Conservatives say, dread rather than exult in the pride of their countrymen. They are always. restraining it and deprecating it, till the result is that enemies fancy they will not act, or, at all events, will act only through due and slow process of reasoning and law.
This is, we believe, the general impression of the sane Con- servatives, which their leaders try to state in bursts of in- effective declamation ; and their notion about the Irish question, is much of the same kind. They know at heart that Home- rule will never be granted by either party, but they say the Liberals show a dangerous tolerance for it, and for Irish ideas,—and, above all, for Irish bad temper. They want the Irish to be treated in the historic Conservative way,—that is, more or less like children ; to be told that they have no warrant for their bad temper, and shall have nothing at all, unless they can ask for it in a more becoming way. The Conservatives do not believe that the Liberals would give Home-rule, or confiscate the land ; but they think they would treat Home-rule as a political demand and not as an impertinence, and make concessions on the agrarian ques- tion which, wise or foolish, ought not to be made now. The Irish are " bullying," and the Conservatives, not understand- ing the difference between the two races, or the extent to which strong language consoles and relieves the weak, think the bullying deliberately insolent, and pine to make their irritation felt. They do not want even to con- sider Irish matters, until Great Britain has asserted her- self, and it is unmistakably clear that the Islands are to remain under one administration and one law. It is not so much that Liberals will give up anything, as that they do not seem to hate Parnellism and Agrarianism and Obstructionism half enough. They keep their tempers to exasperation. Those things should be treate3 as moral evils, not as symp- toms of a disease, to be tenderly remedied with pity all the while. The Radicals, in Conservative estimation, are absurdly sympathetic with Ireland.—so sympathetic that they will give this, that, and the other to soothe a patient who had much better be treated as a crypto-monomaniac, and put under the restraint of, inattention. It is not what Lord Beaconsfield does to Ireland that they approve, but his atti- tude towards her ; not Lord Hartington's Irish views they dis- like, but his apparently incurable patience when sharp rebuke or total neglect is obviously required. The position of England in the Three Kingdoms is not asserted enough, and matters which ought to be matters of law are treated as matters of negotiation. Even Lord Hartington says he will redress grievances, while his followers, such as Lord Ramsay, almost promise to hunt for them. That, Con- servatives think, is not a befitting frame of mind while Ireland elects Members who, like Mr. Parnell, say landlordism must end, or, like Mr. Biggar, hint that Ireland may develope Nihilists. Threats should be met by defiance, and as Lord Beaconsfield is ready to assume that attitude, or even has assumed it, they, on the whole, support Lord Beaconsfield. Conservatives, in fact, are pining to hear Ireland sworn at, and if they do not believe that the mealy-mouthed Liberals are accomplices, they do believe that such senti- meital people will be beguiled at last into conceding a great deal too much.
Those, frankly expressed, are, we believe, the two ideas which, especially in London and the counties, still protect Lord Beaconsfield, and which his followers endeavour to utter, but fail, because, being furious with the Liberals, they want to express them through the inconvenient and comparatively obscure medium of abuse of their opponents.
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