But, gentlemen, there is one other topic on which I must touch.  If the management of our domestic affairs has been founded upon a principle of violence, that certainly cannot be alleged against the management of our external relations.  I know the difficulty of addressing a body of Englishmen on these topics.  The very phrase “Foreign Affairs” makes an Englishman convinced that I am about to treat of subjects with which be has no concern.  Unhappily the relations of England to the rest of the world, which are “Foreign Affairs,” are the matters which most influence his lot.  Upon them depends the increase or reduction of taxation.  Upon them depends the enjoyment or the embarrassment of his industry.  And yet, though so momentous are the consequences of the mismanagement of our foreign relations, no one thinks of them till the mischief occurs and then it is found how the most vital consequences have been occasioned by mere inadvertence.

I will illustrate this point by two anecdotes.  Since I have been in public life there has been for this country a great calamity and there is a great danger, and both might have been avoided.  The calamity was the Crimean War.  You know what were the consequences of the Crimean War:  A great addition to your debt, an enormous addition to your taxation, a cost more precious than your treasure —­the best blood of England.  Half a million of men, I believe, perished in that great undertaking.  Nor are the evil consequences of that war adequately described by what I have said.  All the disorders and disturbances of Europe, those immense armaments that are an incubus on national industry and the great obstacle to progressive civilization, may be traced and justly attributed to the Crimean War.  And yet the Crimean War need never have occurred.

When Lord Derby acceded to office, against his own wishes, in 1852, the Liberal party most unconstitutionally forced him to dissolve Parliament at a certain time by stopping the supplies, or at least by limiting the period for which they were voted.  There was not a single reason to justify that course, for Lord Derby had only accepted office, having once declined it, on the renewed application of his sovereign.  The country, at the dissolution, increased the power of the Conservative party, but did not give to Lord Derby a majority, and he had to retire from power.  There was not the slightest chance of a Crimean War when he retired from office; but the Emperor of Russia, believing that the successor of Lord Derby was no enemy to Russian aggression in the East, commenced those proceedings, with the result of which you are familiar.  I speak of what I know, not of what I believe, but of what I have evidence in my possession to prove—­that the Crimean War never would have happened if Lord Derby had remained in office.