did not spring from imagination or
from prejudice; nor were they the results of illogical inference. To
the outside world the British Government is the British Parliament; and
citizens of the United States knew that their country had been
subjected in the House of Lords and in the House of Commons to every
form of misrepresentation, to every insult which malice could invent,
to every humiliation which insolence and arrogance could inflict. The
most distant generation of Americans will never be able to read the
Parliamentary reports from 1861 to 1865 without indignation.
Discussions touching the condition of the United States occupied no
small share of the time in both Houses, and in the House of Lords
cordiality was never expressed for the Union. In the House of Commons
the Government of the United States had sympathizing friends, eloquent
defenders, though few in number. Bright, Forster, Cobden, and men of
that class, spoke brave words in defense of the cause for which brave
deeds were done by their kindred on this side of the Atlantic--a
kindred always more eager to cherish gratitude than to nurture revenge.

But from the Government of England, terming itself _Liberal_, with Lord
Palmerston at its head, Earl Russell as Foreign Secretary, Mr.
Gladstone as Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Duke of Argyll as Lord
Privy Seal, and Earl Granville as Lord President of the Council, not
one friendly word was sent across the Atlantic. A formal neutrality
was declared by Government officials, while its spirit was daily
violated. If the Republic had been a dependency of Great Britain,
like Canada or Australia, engaged in civil strife, it could not have
been more steadily subjected to review, to criticism, and to the menace
of discipline. The proclamations of President Lincoln, the decisions
of Federal courts, the orders issued commanders of the Union armies,
were frequently brought to the attention of Parliament, as if America
were in some way accountable to the judgment of England. Harsh comment
came from leading British statesmen, while the most ribald defamers of
the United States met with cheers from a majority of the House of
Commons, and indulged in the bitterest denunciation of a friendly
Government without rebuke from the Ministerial benches.(1)

The notorious Mr. Roebuck, in a debate, March 14, 1864, upon the
progress of the civil war, said: "The whole proceedings in this
American war are a blot upon human natur