The war alone did not greatly distress him; already in
his short life he was used to seeing people wade in blood, and he
could plainly discern in history, that man from the beginning had
found his chief amusement in bloodshed; but the ferocious joy of
destruction at its best requires that one should kill what one
hates, and young Adams neither hated nor wanted to kill his
friends the rebels, while he wanted nothing so much as to wipe
England off the earth. Never could any good come from that
besotted race! He was feebly trying to save his own life. Every
day the British Government deliberately crowded him one step
further into the grave. He could see it; the Legation knew it; no
one doubted it; no one thought of questioning it. The Trent
Affair showed where Palmerston and Russell stood. The escape of
the rebel cruisers from Liverpool was not, in a young man's eyes,
the sign of hesitation, but the proof of their fixed intention to
intervene. Lord Russell's replies to Mr. Adams's notes were
discourteous in their indifference, and, to an irritable young
private secretary of twenty-four, were insolent in their
disregard of truth. Whatever forms of phrase were usual in public
to modify the harshness of invective, in private no political
opponent in England, and few political friends, hesitated to say
brutally of Lord John Russell that he lied.
Pages:
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204