d when their efforts became dangerous or
revolutionary. Louis Napoleon showed great ability for intrigue in
forcing the English cabinet to adopt his warlike policy, when its own
policy was pacific. It was a great triumph to the usurper to see England
drifting into war against the combined influence of the premier, of
Gladstone, of the Quakers, and of the whole Manchester school of
political economists; and, as stated in the Lecture on the Crimean war,
it was an astounding surprise to Nicholas.

But this misfortune would not have happened had it not been for the
genius and intrigues of a statesman who exercised a commanding influence
over English politics; and this was Lord Palmerston, who had spent his
life in the foreign office, although at that time home secretary. But he
was the ruling spirit of the cabinet,--a man versatile, practical,
amiable, witty, and intensely English in all his prejudices. Whatever
office he held, he was always in harmony with public opinion. He was not
a man of great ideas or original genius, but was a ready debater,
understood the temper of the English people, and led them by adopting
their cause, whatever it was. Hence he was the most popular statesman of
the day, but according to Cobden the worst prime minister that England
ever had, since he was always keeping England in hot water and stirring
up strife on the Continent. His supreme policy, with an eye to English
interests on the Mediterranean and in Asia, was to cripple Russia.

Such a man, warlike, restless, and interfering in his foreign policy,
having in view the military aggrandizement of his country, eagerly
adopted the schemes of the French emperor; and little by little these
two men brought the English cabinet into a warlike attitude with Russia,
in spite of all that Lord Aberdeen could do. Slight concessions would
have led to peace; but neither Louis Napoleon nor Palmerston would allow
concessions, since both were resolved on war. Never was a war more
popular in England than that which Louis Napoleon and Palmerston
resolved to have. This explains the leniency of public opinion in
England toward a man who had stolen a sceptre. He was united with Great
Britain in a popular war.

The French emperor, however, had other reasons for seeking the alliance
of England in his war with Russia. It would give him a social prestige;
he would enter more easily into the family of European sovereigns; he
would be called _mon frere_ by the Queen