A modest writer proposed to the Times on Monday that
the whole English nation should show its respect for the late Emperor Napoleon by adopting the ten days' mourning of the Court. We have no wish to write severely of the dead, but all this fawning upon him' is beyond bearing. The late Emperor was always prepared to abide by his faithful British ally when it was good policy, and to throw that ally over when it ceased to be so. The unsuccessful Belgian negotiation was by far the worst instance of this, but in annexing Nice and Savoy, in his Syrian policy, and in relation to the aggression on Denmark, he showed markedly enough the same disposition. We do not particularly blame him for anything but the Belgian treachery. Rulers of great countries cannot accommodate their policy to that of other nations out of mere sentimental sympathy. But we wholly deny that the English people have any just reason for political grati- tude towards the late Emperor,—except, perhaps, in the year of the Indian Mutiny,—while it is impossible that they can feel even respect, or anything but just indignation, for many of his public acts. That a man is dead may be a reason for not bearing with special severity on his worst actions, but it is no reason at all for insincere praise or hollow adulation.
