things had made
imminent[1010]." Lyons had argued with Seward the inadvisability of
sending such a despatch, since it was now known that Russell had "spoken
in a satisfactory manner" about Confederate vessels, but Seward was
insistent. Lyons believed there was real cause for anxiety, writing:

"A good deal of allowance must be made for the evident design
of the Government and indeed of the people to intimidate
England, but still there can be little doubt that the
exasperation has reached such a point as to constitute a
serious danger. It is fully shared by many important members
of the Cabinet--nor are the men in high office exempt from
the overweening idea of the naval power of the United States,
which reconciles the people to the notion of a war with
England. Mr. Seward for a certain time fanned the flame in
order to recover his lost popularity. He is now, I believe,
seriously anxious to avoid going farther. But if strong
measures against England were taken up as a Party cry by the
Republicans, Mr. Seward would oppose very feeble resistance
to them. If no military success be obtained within a short
time, it may become a Party necessity to resort to some means
of producing an excitement in the country sufficient to
enable the Government to enforce the Conscription Act, and to
exercise the extra-legal powers conferred by the late
Congress, To produce such an excitement the more ardent of
the party would not hesitate to go, to the verge of a war
with England. Nay there are not a few who already declare
that if the South must be lost, the best mode to conceal the
discomfiture of the party and of the nation, would be to go
to war with England and attribute the loss of the South to
English interference[1011]."

On the same day Lyons wrote, privately:

"I would rather the quarrel came, if come it must, upon some
better ground for us than this question of the ships fitted
out for the Confederates. The great point to be gained in my
opinion, would be to prevent the ships sailing, without
leading the people here to think that they had gained their
point by threats[1012]."

So great was Lyons' alarm that the next day, April 14, he
cipher-telegraphed Monck in Canada that trouble was brewing[1013], but
soon his fears were somewhat allayed. On the seventeenth he could repor