Page:Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy, 1738-1914 - ed. Jones - 1914.djvu/444

 Europe generally believed that there was to be a war on a great scale, of which the restoration of Poland was to be one of the main objects. Is it at all remarkable that the French Government and the French people, cautious as they were before, should have responded to such invitations and such stimulating proposals? We know how the noble lord fooled them to the top of their bent. The House recollects the six propositions to which the attention of the Emperor of Russia was called in the most peremptory manner. The House recollects the closing scene, when it was arranged that the ambassadors of France, Austria, and England, should on the very same day appear at the hotel of the Minister of Russia, and present notes ending with three identical paragraphs, to show the agreement of the Powers. An impression pervaded Europe that there was to be a general war, and that England, France, and Austria were united to restore Poland.

The House remembers the end of all this—it remembers the reply of the Russian Minister, couched in a tone of haughty sarcasm and of indignation that deigned to be ironical. There was then but one step to take, accordin to the views of the French Government, and that was action. They appealed to that England which had itself thus set the example of agitation on the subject; and England, wisely as I think, recurred to her traditionary policy, the Government confessing that it was a momentary indiscretion which had animated her councils for three or four months; that they never meant anything more than words; and a month afterwards, I believe, they sent to St. Petersburg an obscure