§ THE EARL OF ELLENBOROUGHMy Lords, I wish to put a question to my noble Friend at the head of Her Majesty's Government, with reference to a circumstance which came to my knowledge yesterday. It appears that a general order has been issued from St. Petersburg for the preparation for sea of twelve frigates and corvettes on the breaking up of the ice. The question I have to put is, whether Her Majesty's Minister's intend, if they can, to prevent those frigates and corvettes from leaving the Baltic? It is impossible to entertain the smallest doubt that the intention of Russia with respect to these twelve ships of war is to send them out of the Baltic before our ships arrive at the entrance to the Categat. If they leave the Categat and reach the entrance of the 1323 North Sea, the Naze of Norway, before the 21st March, they may take a northern passage, round by Scotland and Ireland; and before five weeks have elapsed from this time, the tranquillity which has lasted so long at Lloyd's may be suddenly disturbed by the notification of the capture of unsuspecting British merchantmen in the chops of the Channel or to the north of Ireland, and the feelings of all England may be distracted by the capture of British artillery in sailing vessels, without convoys, by Russian men-of-war on their voyage to the Mediterranean. I infer that this is the destination of those ships from circumstances which I shall mention. There are not less than eleven Russian men-of-war that I know of distributed in different positions on foreign stations. A frigate and a brig are at Manilla, flanking the whole of the China trade; and we have only a 50-gun ship—which was lately in a state of mutiny, I am sorry to say—at Hong Kong—though that I know would not prevent them from fighting should it be found necessary. There is a Russian 60-gun frigate off Australia, where we have only a 26-gun frigate, which is ordered to be relieved by another frigate of the same power. The whole of the Australian trade will, therefore, be at the mercy of that Russian man-of-war. At Rio there is a 44-gun frigate, the Aurora, which we, in the exercise of a generous hospitality, recently repaired at Portsmouth, at a time when our artificers were required for constructing or repairing ships for our own purposes. That vessel is now at Rio; and I believe the whole number of guns which we have now at that station is not equal to the number of guns mounted by that one ship alone. There is also at Madeira a schooner, heavily armed. Two heavy frigates were seen on the 9th November off Cape de Verde, and from the direction they were steering, and from the circumstance of our not having heard of them since, my impression is, that these frigates have gone round Cape Horn. Again, in the Adriatic, there are three Russian frigates, in an Austrian port, fomenting a Greek insurrection. All these vessels are unwatched, and may all pounce upon our trade in different parts of the world. The Emperor of Russia is at perfect liberty to give orders to that effect, because he is perfectly entitled to assume that what we have done amounts to war, if he so pleases. We may take it as war or not, as we please, but it is war, and 1324 justifies him in giving instructions to the commanders of these vessels to act accordingly. The ships in the Baltic, to which I have alluded, may be met with an equal or a superior force, to keep them out of the Categat; but if they are not prevented from leaving the Categat three times the number will not be sufficient to protect our trade; and therefore it becomes a matter of absolute urgency that Her Majesty's Ministers should make up their minds as to what they mean to do on this subject. The orders should be given immediately; not a day or an hour should be lost. It will not do to issue instructions to each ship which may be sent to the Categat at an interval of three or four weeks, to intimate to each Russian ship that may be met with, that she must go back to her own port, or come into an English port. The sending of such a message might embarrass extremely all the operations of the English vessel, for at the very time she is sending a boat, perhaps she ought to be firing her guns double-shotted, and thus her movements may be materially impeded. I trust, therefore, that that course will not be adopted. I conclude that it can never be considered possible to attack without notice; and therefore I conclude that notice must be given to the Emperor of Russia as to the intention which we entertain; and as these vessels may be at the mouth of the Categat before ours may meet them, in three weeks, not an hour or a day ought to be lost in giving that notice. And, therefore, I ask my noble Friend if Her Majesty's Government are prepared to prevent these frigates and corvettes from leaving the Baltic?
§ THE EARL OF ABERDEENMy Lords, I think my noble Friend who has been accustomed to conduct and regulate military operations of great importance, can scarcely expect me to give him an answer to this question. I think I might hope that my noble Friend would give Her Majesty's Government credit for possessing in some degree the activity and watchfulness which belongs to himself. My Lords, I am not inclined to give an answer to this question—an answer which can only be useful to the Power against whom it is desired that our movements should be directed. And, my Lords, henceforth, I beg two say that I shall consider it my duty to answer no question respecting prospective military or naval operations of this description. My noble Friend has, with more or less accu- 1325 racy, described the position of the Russian naval force in different parts of the world; but he has made one grievous error in his description, in saying that they are unwatched. Further than this I do not think it necessary to enter into the question; I decline to give an answer to the question asked by my noble Friend; and I trust, under the circumstances, the House will see and feel the propriety of the course which I take.
§ THE EARL OF ELLENBOROUGHMy Lords, I contend that I am not justified in giving Her Majesty's Ministers credit for activity and watchfulness in this matter. For anything that can be drawn from within the four corners of a book on political economy or finance I may give them credit, and I believe they would generally, in this respect, propose measures which to a great extent would obtain my confidence and support; but as a war Ministry they are as yet utterly untried; and when I see that they are not aware of the value of time, which in war is almost everything—when I see they have postponed for two or three months the most necessary and essential preparations—preparations absolutely required for success, and even for the protection of the coasts of England—when I see that the military and naval forces they propose to employ are utterly inadequate—believing that it is discreditable to enter on a war with the peace establishment scarcely increased—and when I see them endeavouring to persuade themselves that that is a little war which is one of the greatest in which we have ever been engaged—I say, my Lords, that having these impressions with respect to the past conduct of Her Majesty's Ministers in reference to this war, I cannot give them credit either for watchfulness or for activity. I shall be most happy, indeed, if my forebodings should not be realised, and if those who have shown, to a great extent, abilities for the conduct of our affairs in peace, should exhibit similar qualifications for the conduct of war.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, there is one point on which I concur with the noble Earl: I agree with him in what he has stated on this and a former evening—that this war—which I am afraid I must describe as an immediately impending war—is not a little war, and cannot be considered a little war. But that which I most distinctly deny is, that Her Majesty's Government have ever looked at the war, for a moment, in the light of a little war; and if the noble Earl knew more than he 1326 appears to know of the preparations that have been made to meet that war, and the manner in which those preparations have been conducted—and which, so far as there is any evidence before the public, have been exhibited in the magnificent fleets now preparing to sail, and the admirable army now preparing to be sent out—he would see that all the evidence is in favour of the watchfulness, the foresight, and the determination of Her Majesty's Government. And when the noble Earl comes to look into these particulars, I am confident he will have the candour to own that these preparations are such as are calculated to be effectual, and that they will afford sufficient proof, not only in the particular details which he has brought under the consideration of the House, but in every particular spreading over every portion of the globe, of the watchfulness of the Queen's Government. But let me add that it would take away a great deal from the merit and from the effect of that watchfulness, if, having been watchful, they were to announce the details of that watchfulness to the public and to this House—even upon a question propounded by the noble Earl—in such a manner as to add nothing to the effect of that watchfulness, but to betray it in its details to the enemy.
§ THE EARL OF ELLENBOROUGHLet me say one single word as to the example just adduced by the noble Marquess of the foresight and watchfulness on the part of the Government. The noble Marquess has particularly adverted to the "magnificent fleet" now in preparation. That fleet, my Lords, consists, I believe, of eighteen line of-battle ships, out of which eighteen vessels seven only have ever been at sea; and I do say that that state of things, with the chance of their being engaged with the enemy in a fortnight or less—eleven untried ships, with eleven untried crews—is not a proof either of foresight or of watchfulness. It was precisely to that very point that I was adverting; because I do think the state of the negotiations in the early part of November was such, that the Government should have commenced to make all the preparations which they commenced two or three months later, and then they would have had such a fleet as we were accustomed to conquer with—a fleet which had been at sea, and one in which all the officers knew the, men, and in which there was such a degree of discipline and experience as to give a certainty of success.
THE EARL OF WICKLOWsaid, the allegation against the Government was, that they were sending out ships which had not had an opportunity of being engaged, and with new and untried crews. Now, how it was possible after forty years of peace to have such experience and discipline as the noble Earl looked for he could not understand.