ill the Cabinet meets,
which would be either on Monday 11th, or Wednesday 12th, as
would be most convenient to you and our colleagues. But is
it likely that the Federals would consent to an armistice to
be accompanied by a cessation of Blockades, and which would
give the Confederates means of getting all the supplies they
may want?"

* * * * *

"Then comes the difficulty about slavery and the giving up of
runaway slaves, about which we could hardly frame a proposal
which the Southerns would agree to, and people of England
would approve of. The French Government are more free from
the shackles of principle and of right and wrong on these
matters, as on all others than we are. At all events it would
be wiser to wait till the elections in North America are over
before any proposal is made. As the Emperor is so anxious to
put a stop to bloodshed he might try his hand as a beginning
by putting down the stream of ruffians which rolls out from
that never-failing fountain at Rome[813]."

But Russell was more optimistic, or at least in favour of some sort of
proposal to America. He replied to Palmerston:

"My notion is that as there is little chance of our good
offices being accepted in America we should make them such as
would be creditable to us in Europe. I should propose to
answer the French proposal therefore by saying,

"That in offering our good offices we ought to require both
parties to consent to examine, first, whether there are any
terms upon which North and South would consent to restore the
Union; and secondly, failing any such terms, whether there
are any terms upon which both would consent to separate.

"We should also say that if the Union is to be restored it
would be essential in our view, that after what has taken
place all the slaves should be emancipated, compensation
being granted by Congress at the rate at which Great Britain
emancipated her slaves in 1833.

"If separation takes place we must be silent on the trend of
slavery, as we are with regard to Spain and Brazil.

"This is a rough sketch, but I will expand it for the
Cabinet.

"It will be an honourable proposal to make, but the North and
probably the South will refuse it[814]."

Here were several ideas quite impossible of a