there "was no
question now of issuing the Proclamation[527]." And on the nineteenth
could write officially that a Proclamation based on the Bill had indeed
been issued, but without the objectionable fourth section[528].

The whole affair of the "Southern Ports" Bill occupies more space in the
British Parliamentary Papers, and excited more attention from the
British Government than it would seem to have merited from the
Washington attitude toward it. The Bill had been drawn by the Secretary
of the Treasury, and its other sections related to methods of meeting a
situation where former customs houses and places for the collection of
import duties were now in the hands of the Confederacy. The fourth
section alone implied a purpose to declare a paper blockade. The idea
of proclaiming closed the Southern ports may have at first received the
sanction of Seward as consistent with his denial of the existence of a
war; or it may have been a part of his "high tone" foreign policy[529],
but the more reasonable supposition is that the Bill was merely one of
many ill-considered measures put forth in the first months of the war by
the North in its spasm of energy seeking to use every and any public
means to attack the South. But the interest attached to the measure in
this work is the British attitude. There can be no doubt that Russell,
in presenting papers to Parliament was desirous of making clear two
points: first, the close harmony with France--which in fact was not so
close as was made to appear; second, the care and vigour of the Foreign
Secretary in guarding British interests. Now in fact British trade was
destined to be badly hurt by the blockade, but as yet had not been
greatly hampered. Nor did Russell yet think an effective blockade
feasible. Writing to Lyons a week after his official protest on the
"Southern Ports" Bill, he expressed the opinion that a "_regular_
blockade" could not possibly prevent trade with the South:

"If our ships can go in ballast for cotton to the Southern
Ports it will be well, but if this cannot be done by
agreement there will be surely, in the extent of 3,000 miles,
creeks and bays out of which small vessels may come, and run
for Jamaica or the Bahamas where the cargoes might be
transhipped. But it is not for Downing Street to suggest such
plans to Cheapside and Tooley Street[530]."

A better knowledge of American geography would have made clear to
Russell