we shall see, in 1872 it
very nearly led to a disastrous explosion. This idea first found distinct
and official utterance in the despatch of 1869. Besides compensating
individuals for depredations, we were to pay for the cost to America of
chasing the cruisers; for the transfer of most of the American commercial
marine to the British flag; for enhanced insurance; and generally for the
increased difficulty of putting down the rebellion.

All through 1870 a rather troublesome exchange of letters went on between
Washington and the foreign office, and Mr. Gladstone took an active
concern in it. "I grieve to trouble you with so much manuscript," Lord
Clarendon writes him on one occasion (Mar. 17, 1870), "but I don't venture
single-handed to conduct a correspondence with the United States.... All
this correspondence can do nothing but harm, and I have made my answer as
short as is consistent with courtesy. I should like to send it on
Saturday, but if you have not time to look at it, or think it ought to be
seen by the cabinet, I could, make an excuse for the delay to Motley." All
this was in entire conformity to Mr. Gladstone's enduring conception of
the right relations between a prime minister and the foreign secretary. We
need not follow details, but one must not be omitted. In 1868 a royal
commission recommended various material changes in the Foreign Enlistment
Act, and in 1870 accordingly a new law was passed, greatly strengthening
the hands of the executive, and furnishing due means of self-protection
against such nefarious manoeuvres as those of the _Alabama_.(258) By this
Act, among other things, it was made an offence to build a ship with
reasonable cause to believe that it would be employed in the service of a
foreign state at war with a friendly state.

As the year 1870 went on, the expediency of an accommodation with America
strengthened in Mr. Gladstone's mind. One member of the cabinet pointed
out to the foreign secretary that if there was any chance of a war with
Russia about the Black Sea, it would be as well to get causes of
differences with America out of the way; otherwise, however unprepared the
United States might be at the moment, we should undoubtedly have them on
our hands sooner or later.(259) With Mr. Gladstone the desire was not a
consequence of the possible troubles with Russia. His view was wider and
less specific. He was alive to the extent to which England's power in
Europe was reduced by the s