armies to
restore the strength and efficiency of the armies for the next campaign.
Probably the troops first sent over will require four months' rest
before they will be able to move against an enemy.' Procrastination was,
however, to have its perfect work, and Lord John, chilled and indignant,
told Lord Aberdeen on January 3 that nothing could be less satisfactory
than the result of the recent Cabinets. 'Unless,' he added, 'you will
direct measures, I see no hope for the efficient prosecution of the
war;' for by this time it was perfectly useless, he saw, to urge on Lord
Aberdeen the claims of Lord Palmerston.

FOOTNOTES:

[36] _Life of Edward Miall, M.P._, by A. Miall, p. 179.

[37] _Life of Lord John Russell_, by Spencer Walpole, vol. ii. 232-235.

CHAPTER XII

THE VIENNA DIFFICULTY

1855

Blunders at home and abroad--Roebuck's motion--'General Fevrier
turns traitor'--France and the Crimea--Lord John at Vienna--The
pride of the nation is touched--Napoleon's visit to Windsor--Lord
John's retirement--The fall of Sebastopol--The Treaty of Paris.

PARLIAMENT met on January 23, and the general indignation at once found
expression in Mr. Roebuck's motion--the notice of which was cheered by
Radicals and Tories alike--to 'inquire into the condition of our Army
before Sebastopol, and into the conduct of those Departments of the
Government whose duty it has been to minister to the wants of that
Army.' Lord John, in view of the blunders at home and abroad, did not
see how such a motion was to be resisted, and at once tendered to Lord
Aberdeen his resignation. His protests, pointed and energetic though
they had been, had met with no practical response. Even the reasonable
request that the War Minister should be in the Commons to defend his own
department had passed unheeded. Peelites, like Sir James Graham and Mr.
Sidney Herbert, might make the best of a bad case, but Lord John felt
that he could not honestly defend in Parliament a course of action which
he had again and again attacked in the Cabinet. Doubtless it would have
been better both for himself and for his colleagues if he had adhered
to his earlier intention of resigning; and his dramatic retreat at this
juncture unquestionably gave a handle to his adversaries. Though
prompted by conscientious motives, sudden flight, in the face of what
was, to all intents and purposes, a vote of censure, was a grave
mistake. Not unnaturally, such