Ten Englishmen of the Nineteenth Century | Page 7

upper and nether millstones. To Anthony Ashley Cooper, Earl of Shaftesbury, more than to any other is due the persistent investigation and disclosure which aroused the public mind to the prevailing conditions in mine and factory where hours of labor were excessive, and where women and children were subjected to degrading tasks and brutal treatment. The Factory Law and kindred legislation since 1830 are the fruits of the beneficent and untiring labors of the Earl.
PALMERSTON AND FOREIGN RELATIONS
The era which had been marked by such political, social, and economic reforms and agitations came to a close in the middle of the century. The Whigs came into power in Parliament in 1846 for a long term. Foreign affairs supplied the most notable topics for the next twenty years. The foreign minister during much of this time was Lord Palmerston. He it was who piloted the nation without disaster through the rocks of 1848-51, when thrones were toppling in every European kingdom, and England was being appealed to for help against despot and democrat.
THE EASTERN QUESTION
The "Eastern Question" now came up. The Czar of Russia, an object of suspicion to England, because of his rivalry with her for the possession of India, endeavored to secure from the Sultan of Turkey official recognition of his government as the legitimate protector of Christians in the Ottoman empire. Such a responsibility would have afforded many opportunities for interfering in Turkish affairs. France opposed the demand, and Palmerston placed England on the side of Napoleon III., against the Czar, who had invaded Turkey in pursuance of his design to annex a large part of her European provinces, and advance his position toward Constantinople. The Crimean War which followed (1854-56) at least checked Russia for the time. It was the only European war in which England had borne arms since Waterloo. But in Asia and Africa the Queen's troops had found almost continual employment along the frontiers of the now vastly extended empire. In 1857 Persia had to be chastised for edging toward India by way of the Afghan possessions. Russia had been at the Shah's elbow. In 1856, and repeatedly until 1860, the British fleets were battering open the ports of China and extorting trade concessions. But the most memorable war in the imperial history of these years was within the borders of the empire, though in a distant land. This was the Sepoy Rebellion or Indian mutiny of 1857.
THE GREAT SEPOY MUTINY
The British possessions in India had been more than doubled in extent since the opening of the century. In 1833 the trade monopoly of the East India Company had been broken, but its civil and military servants continued to administer the government. Their ability was displayed especially in the rapidity with which they were extending British authority over the native states when the outbreak came. A conspiracy was laid among the Sepoys, the native soldiers in the regiments of "John Company." as the great corporation was called in Asia. To their private grievances was added the false report that the company intended to force them into Christianity by serving out to them cartridges which would defile them, neat's tallow for the Hindoo venerator of the sacred cow, and hog's lard for the Mohammedan hater of swine! In May, 1857, the mutiny burst into flame. The Sepoys slaughtered their officers and many other Europeans, and restored the heir of the ancient race of kings to the throne of his fathers at Delhi. Here and there, at Cawnpore and Lucknow, a few British troops defended themselves and the refugees against the hordes of bloodthirsty rebels. The "Massacre of Cawnpore" and "the Relief of Lucknow," phrases which have passed into history, suggest the fate of the two beleaguered garrisons. The rebellion was over in a twelve- month, smothered in its own blood. Close upon its suppression came the death of the East India Company, abolished by act of Parliament in 1858. Since that year the crown has ruled the Indian realm through a Secretary of State for India, residing in London, and a Viceroy holding court at Calcutta. From the defeat of the mutineers, in 1859, to his own death, in 1865, Lord Palmerston managed to save the nation from being embroiled to the fighting-point in the perpetual quarrels of Europe. Italy fought and won her liberty from the Austrian; Poland rose against the Russian; Denmark had her damaging Schleswig-Holstein War with Prussia and Austria. English sympathies were strongly enlisted in all these troubles, but Palmerston would not allow her to proceed to the point of breaking the peace. From 1861 to 1865, while the Civil War was being fought out in America, his government was prompt to recognize the belligerent status of the Confederacy, and to favor the South by allowing privateers like the "Alabama" to