16.  In this Russell stated that he agreed with Thouvenel the cotton situation was alarming, but he added:  “The evil is evident—­not equally so the remedy.”  He assured Cowley that “Her Majesty’s Government wish to take no step in respect to the Civil War in America except in concert with France and upon full deliberation[618].”  Meanwhile Lindsay’s diplomatic career had received a severe jolt in London.  Confidently addressing to Russell a request for an interview, he received the reply “that I thought the best way for two Govts. to communicate with each other was through their respective Embassies....  He [Lindsay] rejoined that he feared you [Cowley] had not stated the reason why the Emperor wished to make the proposal through him rather than the usual channel, and again asked to see me, but I declined to give any other answer, adding that you and the French Ambassr. could make the most Confidential as well as Official Communications[619].”  This rebuff was not regarded as final, though exasperating, by Lindsay, nor by the Confederate agents, all being agreed that Napoleon was about to take an active hand in their favour.  Lindsay returned to Paris accompanied by Mason, and on April 18 had still another conversation with Napoleon.  He reported Russell’s refusal of an interview, and that he had seen Disraeli, but not Derby, who was ill.  Disraeli had declared that he believed Russell and Seward to have a “secret understanding” on the blockade, but that if France should make a definite proposal it would probably be supported by a majority in Parliament, and that Russell would be compelled to assent in order to avoid a change of Ministry.  In this third interview with Lindsay expressions of vexation with British policy were used by Napoleon (according to Slidell), but he now intimated that he was waiting to learn the result of the Northern effort to capture New Orleans, an event which “he did not anticipate,” but which, if it occurred, “might render it inexpedient to act[620].”

Evidently the wedge was losing its force.  Mason, returning to London, found that the “pulsations” in Paris had no English repetition.  He wrote that Lindsay, failing to reach Russell, had attempted to get at Palmerston, but with no success.  Thereupon Lindsay turning to the Opposition had visited Disraeli a second time and submitted to him Palmerston’s rebuff.  The strongest expression that fell from Disraeli was—­“if it is found that the Emperor and Russell are at issue on the question the session of Parliament would not be as quiet as had been anticipated.”  This was scant encouragement, for Disraeli’s “if” was all important.  Yet “on the whole Lindsay is hopeful,” wrote Mason in conclusion[621].  Within a fortnight following arrived the news of the capture of New Orleans, an event upon which Seward had postulated the relief of a European scarcity of cotton and to Southern sympathizers a serious blow.  May 13, Cowley reported that the Emperor had told him, personally, that “he