Studies in Literature and History
King of Italy, and, after reading them aloud, told the ministers that
these writings undoubtedly amounted to promises of help in the
circumstances that were then actually under discussion. The Cabinet
accepted these proofs that the alliances might be reckoned upon as
substantial, so that it is not unreasonable to suppose that Bismarck
had drawn the same conclusion from the intimations that had reached
him, and had set himself to provoke a war before the secret
combinations against him should be ready for action. It must be borne
in mind that from 1866 he had been deliberately preparing for it,
being convinced, as he said later, that until France had been defeated
in the field, his grand design of founding a German empire, with its
capital at Berlin, could not be realised.
We may therefore be permitted to suggest that the discussion with
which M. Ollivier closes this volume is to some extent superfluous,
for it is incontestable that Bismarck had reasons for desiring the
war, and that France was inveigled into declaring it. In the final
section he returns to the question whether France or Prussia were
responsible for the rupture; and after summing up the evidence he
pronounces judgment against Prussia. It was Prussia that invented the
Hohenzollern candidature, against which France was bound to protest
forcibly; and even if it be admitted, he says, that the French Cabinet
was wrong in taking mortal offence at the insolent official version of
the king's refusal to receive the French ambassador, there can be no
doubt that this public affront infuriated the French nation, and drove
it to the extremity of war. That the explosion was instantaneous he
regards as a proof that it had not been expected nor premeditated by
France. All these things are, indeed, neither denied nor deniable, for
Bismarck's own arrogant revelations leave no doubt that the war had
been desired and premeditated by that astute and far-seeing
politician; and though upon the methods by which the Hohenzollern
candidature was originally started Bismarck is judiciously silent, we
may be morally certain that the instigation came from Berlin. The
maxim _Fecit cui prodest_ affords fair ground for this inference,
particularly when we remember the obvious improbability that the
Spanish ministry would have gratuitously set up a candidature which
must infallibly have brought their country into collision with its
formidable neighbour.
How the French Government fell into a net that had been spread for
them is to most of us sufficiently clear. Whether the emperor and his
ministers ought to have detected and avoided it, is the real question,
and it is practically the only question that concerns M. Ollivier. In
the final pages of his book, which touch in dignified and pathetic
words upon the injustice of the reproaches that have been heaped upon
him and the rancorous calumnies by which he has been pursued, his
readers are told that, having done his best to defend the cause of his
nation, he will terminate his work without taking up his personal
justification, though on one point he desires not to be misunderstood.
It has been pleaded on his behalf, he says, that he was in fact
opposed to the declaration of war, but agreed to it under the violent
pressure of public opinion, or else from reluctance to betray internal
dissensions that would have broken up the ministry, or for other
reasons. M. Ollivier insists, on the contrary, that after Bismarck's
'soufflet' he was convinced that peace could be maintained only at
the price of his country's abject humiliation; and that he chose the
alternative of war as infinitely preferable, without the least regard
to his personal reputation or interests. We may willingly agree that
M. Ollivier acted throughout from motives of high-minded patriotism,
and although we cannot acquit him on the charge of grave imprudence we
may freely admit that he was entangled in a situation of extraordinary
difficulty. To Englishmen, who are familiar with the regular and
recognised working of constitutional government, it will be plain that
he was the victim of a system that had placed him before the public as
the nominal head of a Cabinet that he was supposed to have formed, and
of a party in the Chamber that he was expected to lead. Whereas in
fact he had no proper control over the policy of the Cabinet, and no
solid support in the Chamber. The emperor presided at the meetings of
the Cabinet; and it is clear that the ultimate decision in the
supremely important departments of the army and of foreign affairs was
still reserved to the sovereign, on whom the Foreign Secretary (as we
should call him) could urge his views separately, and from whom he
could take orders independently of the first minister. In this
radically false position M. Ollivier found himself committed to
measures on which he had not been consulted, and hurried into
dangerous courses of action for which he had no recognised official
responsibility, since they were sanctioned by the emperor's
unquestionable authority. We have to remember, also, that in July
1870, liberal institutions had been no more than six months under
trial after eighteen years of autocratic rule, that the advocates of
the old _regime_ were numerous and openly hostile to the reforms, and
that all the ministers of the new _regime_ lacked experience in the
art and practice of constitutional administration. It is among those
conditions and circumstances that we must find some explanation of
their imprudence, and of their inability to make a stand against the
emperor's weakness, the clamour of hot-headed deputies, and the
war-cries of journalists; some excuse, in short, for the heedlessness
with which a well-meaning ministry stepped into the snare that had
been laid for them.
When, in 1871, the ex-emperor was told of M. Ollivier's earnest
protest against the cruel injustice of holding him alone answerable
for the national disasters, Napoleon is reported to have replied that
this responsibility must be shared by the ministry, the Chamber, and
himself.
'Si je n'avais pas voulu la guerre, j'aurais renvoye mes ministres;
si l'opposition etait venue d'eux, ils auraient donne leur
demission; enfin, si la Chambre avait ete contraire a l'entreprise,
elle eut vote contre.'[53]
In a broad and general sense this conclusion may be accepted, for all
parties concerned were heavily to blame; and manifestly the disasters
were the outcome of a situation in which weakness and rashness were
matched against unscrupulous statecraft and the deep-laid combinations
of a consummate strategist.
FOOTNOTES:
[41] _L'Empire Liberal: Etudes, Recits, Souvenirs._ Par Emile
Ollivier. Vol. xiv.: La Guerre. 1909.--_Edinburgh Review_, January
1910.
[42] 'Animo retto e buono' (_Memorie_, p. 407).
[43] Benedetti, _Ma Mission en Prusse_.
[44] _Papiers Secrets: Les Prefets._
[45] _Reflections and Reminiscences of Prince Bismarck._
[46] _Histoire du Second Empire_, vi. 258.
[47] 'Rien n'etait plus officiel que l'entretien qui se poursuivait en
ce moment entre le ministre des affaires etrangeres et l'ambassadeur
de Prusse.'--Gramont, _La France et la Prusse_, p. 168.
[48] _La France et la Prusse_ (1872), pp. 131-2.
[49] _L'Empire Liberal_, p. 270.
[50] _Historical Essays_, p. 222.
[51] 'Au debut nous avions demande au Roi de conseiller ou d'ordonner
a son parent de renoncer, ce qui entrainait implicitement une garantie
que la candidature ne se reproduirait plus. Le Roi ayant refuse
d'intervenir, et la candidature ayant disparu a son insu, nous avions
reclame sous une forme explicite, notre premiere demande.'--_L'Empire
Liberal_, p. 453.
[52] Some light is thrown on these obscure intrigues by Lord Acton in
the essay already cited. He writes that in 1869 Bismarck learned from
Florence that Napoleon was preparing a triple alliance against him,
and sent a Prussian officer, Bernhardi, to Madrid. 'What he did in
Spain has been committed to oblivion. Seven volumes of his diary have
been published; the family assures me (Acton) that the Spanish portion
will never appear.... The Austrian First Secretary said that he
betrayed his secret one day at dinner. Somebody spoke indiscreetly on
the subject, and Bernhardi aimed a kick at him under the table, which
caught the shin of the Austrian instead. He was considered to have
mismanaged the thing, and it was whispered that he had gone too far--I
infer that he offered a heavy bribe to secure a majority in the
Cortes. Fifty thousand pounds of Prussian bonds were sent to Spain at
midsummer 1870.... I know the bankers through whose hands they
passed.'--_Historical Essays_, p. 214.
[53] _L'Empire Liberal_, p. 475, footnote. Prince Napoleon told M.
Ollivier that the emperor repeated this to him several times.
SIR SPENCER WALPOLE[54]
1839-1907
Sir Spencer Walpole's death in 1907 left a gap in the front rank of
contemporary English Historians. To a volume of his collected essays,
published in the following year, his daughter, Mrs. F. Holland,
prefixed an admirable memoir of his private life and character, with
affectionate reminiscences of her father's 'strenuous work, his
universal kindliness, and his simplicity of soul.' On this personal
subject, therefore, little or nothing remains to be said. I will only
add that during several years of intimacy with him I had every reason
to feel honoured by his friendship, to set high value on his literary
judgments, and to appreciate his scrupulous intellectual integrity.
From that memoir I take the main incidents that belong to Sir Spencer
Walpole's personal biography. After leaving Eton he entered the Civil
Service at an early age, and worked for some time in the War Office,
until he was transferred to a position of larger independence. He was
subsequently appointed to the Governorship of the Isle of Man, where
he remained for about twelve years; and afterwards he became Secretary
to the Post Office until his retirement in 1899. In the discharge of
the duties of these offices he was indefatigable; his services were
fully approved by all with whom he came into public relations; yet
throughout these years he found time for hard and unceasing literary
work. In his earlier days he was a regular contributor to the
periodical press, mainly on questions of finance; he wrote the lives
of two Prime Ministers--his grandfather Spencer Perceval and Lord John
Russell--while from 1876 up to the year of his death he was engaged
upon his _History of England_. Five volumes were published, at
intervals, on the period between 1815 and 1857; and four subsequent
volumes, under the title of the _History of Twenty-five Years_,
brought the whole narrative up to 1880. But the proofs of the two
final volumes had not been revised by his hand, when he was struck
down by a sudden and fatal malady of the brain. Other recent
publications were a small book on the Isle of Man, entitled the _Land
of Home Rule; Studies in Biography_; and the collection of essays to
which I have already referred.
It is upon this History of England from 1815 to 1880 that Sir Spencer
Walpole's lasting reputation, as a man of letters, will rest. To have
combined the writing of such a book with the duties of a very diligent
official is no slight achievement; though one may observe that direct
contact with administration, with political affairs, and with
parliamentary leaders, is for the historian a distinct advantage. It
is worth remarking that his family connections, which brought Walpole
into the Civil Service, in no way biased his judgment on public
questions. The grandson of a high Tory Prime Minister, the son of a
Conservative Secretary of State, he was throughout his life an
advanced Liberal, with an unswerving trust in popular government as