Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 54.djvu/361

 The congress of Vienna assembled in September 1814, and, with his brother, Sir Charles Stewart (now Lord Stewart), ambassador at Vienna, Lord Castlereagh represented Great Britain. His policy was now to secure the permanence of peace by the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy, by limiting France to its prerevolutionary frontiers, by discouraging the revolutionary elements in Europe, and by checking the growing power of Russia. With the latter object he desired therefore to restore the German confederation and the kingdom of Poland, and so to maintain the balance of power; and in order to consolidate the power of Germany, he was for increasing the resources of the two chief German states, Prussia and Austria, by giving the former Saxony, which had deserved hard treatment by its support of Napoleon, and the latter north Italy, where it was supposed no native state could be permanently established strong enough to resist the neighbouring power of France. For these ends he was prepared to risk the charges of spoliation and disregard of the rights of nationalities. Norway, too, was to be annexed to Sweden, and so with an independent Poland two strong powers would be formed to keep a check over Russia. No doubt this plan wholly disregarded the feelings of the minor peoples of Europe, but it had for its principal object the old ideal of European statesmen, the maintenance of the balance of power as the best security against such a dangerous ascendency of one nation as had been recently seen in the Napoleonic empire.

Castlereagh had not the good fortune to see this policy fully carried out. The czar desired indeed a restored Poland, but it was to be one of which he should himself be hereditary king. Castlereagh found few supporters of a free Poland, nor did this article of his scheme excite any enthusiasm at home. He secured the admission of France to the congress, but, to his disappointment, Talleyrand gave him little support, and the united Germany he desired seemed as little likely to be created as an independent Poland. Prussia, in return for aid on the Saxon question, sided with the czar, and Austria was alike opposed to any increase of Prussian power and any surrender of the Polish territory. The English people at the moment were chiefly interested in the abolition of the slave trade, and were neither clearly set on territorial gains for Great Britain, nor eager for any particular arrangement of Europe. Castlereagh thus found his hands tied by feeling on this subject at home which demanded the instant abolition of the slave trade as the condition of the retrocession of the Dutch and French colonies, while to this abolition Talleyrand, whose aid was required elsewhere, offered a steady opposition. The Polish question almost provoked a renewal of the war. The czar occupied Poland with his troops even while the congress was sitting, and handed over Saxony to the king of Prussia. As Great Britain was more concerned in general peace than in particular partitions, Castlereagh was now instructed by the British cabinet to endeavour to bring about a compromise, by which some part of Saxony at least might be retained to its royal family. Having failed after various interviews to shake the resolution of the czar, he set to work to detach Prussia from its Russian alliance by bringing his influence to bear on the Prussian ministers, and through them on the Prussian king. His arguments were supported by Talleyrand and Metternich, but for a considerable time the czar was immovable, and the king of Prussia could not be detached from him. Wellington, as early as the end of September, had formed the opinion that war was inevitable, and now Bavaria and France increased their forces, the Austrian troops were concentrated, and, at Castlereagh's instance, a treaty, offensive and defensive, was agreed to between Great Britain, France, and Austria on 3 Jan. 1815.

This bold act turned the scale, and at this juncture an important point was gained by the conclusion at Ghent of a treaty of peace between Great Britain and the United States, thanks to the conciliatory policy laid down by Lord Castlereagh for the British commissioners. The liberation thus effected of a British army and the discovery by the czar of the treaty of 3 Jan. led at length to a compromise. The Polish question was settled by conceding to Prussia a defensible frontier against Russia, limiting the Russian claims on Austrian Poland, and leaving to the czar Warsaw and its province. Castlereagh so far prevailed for the Poles as to procure for them the grant of a constitution on paper; but as no one else was much concerned for them, he could do no more, and was practically defeated on this point. A settlement of the Saxon and other questions soon followed. Luxembourg was annexed to the Netherlands, as the most feasible, if not the best, mode of preventing a future expansion of France into the Low Countries; and the same paramount necessity of securing Italy against French ambition led Castlereagh, in spite of the British pledges given by Lord William Bentinck to the Genoese, to favour the annexation of the reluctant Genoese to Piedmont. With