me British anti-slavery opponents feared that this was just what
the Government was inclined to do, and with promptness. Here and there
meetings were hurriedly called to protest against recognition[122]. This
fear was unfounded. Neither in London nor at Washington was there any
official inclination to hasten recognition. Lyons had held up to Seward
the logic of such action, if British trade were illegally interfered
with. By April 9 Lyons was aware that the so-called Radical Party in the
Cabinet would probably have its way, that conciliation would no longer
be attempted, and that a coercive policy toward the South was soon to
follow. On that date he wrote to Russell stating that people in
Washington seemed so convinced that Europe would _not_ interfere to
protect its trade that they were willing to venture any act embarrassing
to that trade. He himself was still insisting, but with dwindling
confidence, that the trade must not be interfered with under any
circumstances. And in a second letter of this same date, he repeated to
Russell his advice of treating the Southern Commissioners with
deference. Any rebuff to them, he asserts again, will but increase the
Northern confidence that they may do anything without provoking the
resistance of England[123].

Like a good diplomat Lyons was merely pushing the argument for all it
was worth, hoping to prevent an injury to his country, yet if that
injury did come (provided it were sanctioned by the law of nations) he
did not see in it an injury sufficient to warrant precipitate action by
Great Britain. When indeed the Southern capture of Fort Sumter in
Charleston harbour finally brought the actual clash of arms, Lyons
expressed himself with regard to other elements in the struggle
previously neglected in his correspondence. On April 15 describing to
Russell the fall of Sumter, he stated that civil war had at last begun.
The North he believed to be very much more powerful than the South, the
South more "eager" and united as yet, but, he added, "the taint of
slavery will render the cause of the South loathsome to the civilized
world." It was true that "commercial intercourse with the cotton States
is of vital importance to manufacturing nations[124]...." but Lyons was
now facing an actual situation rather than a possible one, and as will
be seen later, he soon ceased to insist that an interruption of this
"commercial intercourse" gave reasonable ground for recognition of
the South.