Page:Public School History of England and Canada (1892).djvu/192

 In 1850 a Bill was passed giving self-government to the Australian colonies, and, in 1852, New Zealand was given the same boon.

9. The Eastern Question.—The year 1851 was noted for the first great Exhibition of the industries of all nations. It was very largely an idea of Prince Albert, who, with others, thought it would bring about an age of peace and good-will among all peoples. It was held in London, and although many greater Exhibitions have since been held, yet none aroused so great curiosity and so much hope for the future.

The same year Prince Louis Napoleon, the President of the French Republic, by a treacherous massacre of his opponents in the streets of Paris, succeeded in obtaining the control of French affairs, and a year later made himself Emperor. He was the nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, and the British naturally feared that this second Napoleon might try to imitate the policy of his uncle, and plunge Europe into another great war. Their fears led to regiments of volunteers being formed in 1852, and so we have the beginning of the volunteer system now so popular and useful.

Napoleon, however, was friendly to England, and it was not long before France and England were fighting side by side to save Turkey from the ambition of Russia. Russia had for many years looked with longing eyes on Constantinople, and when a quarrel broke out, in 1852, about the rights of the Greek and Latin Churches over the Holy Places in Jerusalem, the Emperor Nicholas of Russia, thought it a good opportunity to demand the right to protect the Greek Christians that lived in the Sultan’s dominions. Nicholas wished England to join Russia in making a division of Turkey’s possessions, but this England would not do. Then, when Turkey refused to admit Russia’s claim to protect the Sultan’s Christian subjects, Nicholas took the law into his own hands, and sent troops into the Turkish provinces on the Danube.

10. The Crimean War.—War now began and the Turks, who when aroused are brave soldiers, defeated the Russians near the Danube. France and England, in 1854, came to the aid of the Turks, for England feared Russia’s influence in Asia, and the Emperor Napoleon thought a successful war would make the French forget the loss of their freedom. England had not taken part in a great war for nearly forty years, and she was wholly