Page:Australian views of England.djvu/38

   that the honour of the country was in the hands of Lord Palmerston. The friends of peace looked to Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Milner Gibson, and refused to believe that an ultimatum was winging its way across the Atlantic. Men of money and of commerce began to count the cost; more than £100,000,000 of British capital was sunk in American stocks, and at least £50,000,000 was employed in the trade between the two countries. Were we prepared to have it wiped out by a bloody sponge? Blusterers were for chastising the Yankees at all hazards. Lancashire cried, in subdued groans, "Open the Southern ports!" Yorkshire and Staffordshire wailed aloud, "Heaven help us, if you close the markets of the North!" The confusion and anxiety spread wider and deeper as time rolls on. But amidst it all there is a large class of thoughtful public-spirited Englishmen, whose anxiety arises from a full knowledge of the terrible cost of war, and a feeling of national pride that would preserve the honour of their country at any cost. They see nothing of the attempt, for the first time in the history of the world, to create a new empire avowedly on the foundation of slavery. They refuse to consider