On the surface Lindsay’s effort of July 18 had resulted in ignominious failure.  Lyons called it “ill-timed....  I do not think we know here sufficiently the extent of the disaster [to McClellan] to be able to come to any conclusion as to what the European Powers should do.”  But the impression left by the debate that there was a strong parliamentary opinion in favour of mediation made Lyons add:  “I suppose Mercier will open full cry on the scent, and be all for mediation.  I am still afraid of any attempt of the kind[706].”  Very much the same opinion was held by Henry Adams who wrote, “the pinch has again passed by for the moment and we breathe more freely.  But I think I wrote to you some time ago that if July found us still in Virginia, we could no longer escape interference.  I think now that it is inevitable.”  A definite stand taken by the North on slavery would bring “the greatest strength in this running battle[707].”

In spite of surface appearances that the debate was “ill-timed” the “pinch” was not in fact passed as the activities of Slidell and Mason and their friends soon indicated.  For a fortnight the Cabinet, reacting to the repeated suggestions of Napoleon, the Northern defeats, and the distress in Lancashire, was seriously considering the possibility of taking some step toward mediation.  On July 16, two days before the debate in the Commons, Slidell at last had his first personal contact with Napoleon, and came away from the interview with the conviction that “if England long persists in her inaction he [Napoleon] would be disposed to act without her.”  This was communicated to Mason on July 20[708], but Slidell did not as yet see fit to reveal to Mason that in the interview with Napoleon he had made a definite push for separate action by France, offering inducements on cotton, a special commercial treaty, and “alliances, defensive, and offensive, for Mexican affairs,” this last without any authority from Benjamin, the Confederate Secretary of State.  On July 23 Slidell made a similar offer to Thouvenel and left with him a full memorandum of the Southern proposal[709].  He was cautioned that it was undesirable his special offer to France should reach the ears of the British Government—­a caution which he transmitted to Mason on July 30, when sending copies of Benjamin’s instructions, but still without revealing the full extent of his own overtures to Napoleon.

[Illustration:  JOHN SLIDELL (From Nicolay and Hay’s “Life of Abraham Lincoln”:  The Century Co.  New York)]

In all this Slidell was still exhibiting that hankering to pull off a special diplomatic achievement, characteristic of the man, and in line, also, with a persistent theory that the policy most likely to secure results was that of inducing France to act alone.  But he was repeatedly running against advice that France must follow Great Britain, and the burden of his July 20 letter to Mason was an urging that a demand for recognition