There is no such word in the Russian vocabulary as "honour." As to the thing itself, it is considered to be a French delusion. "Schto takoe honneur? Eto Fransusski chimere," is a Russian proverb. For the invention of Russian honour the world is exclusively indebted to my Lord Palmerston, who, during a quarter of a century, used at every critical moment to pledge himself in the most emphatic manner, for the honour of the Czar. He did so at the close of the session of 1853, as at the close of the session of 1833. Now, it happens that the noble lord, while he expressed his most implicit confidence in the honour and good faith of the Czar, had just got into possession of documents, concealed from the rest of the world, and leaving no doubt, if any existed, about the nature of Russian honour and good faith. He had not even to scratch the Muscovite in order to find the Tartar. He had found the Tartar in his naked hideousness. He found himself possessed of the self-confessions of the leading Russian ministers and diplomatists, throwing off their cloaks, opening out their most secret thoughts, unfolding, without constraint, their plans of conquest and subjugation, scornfully railing at the imbecile credulity of European courts and ministers, mocking the Villeles, the Metternichs, the Aberdeens, the Cannings, and the Wellingtons; and devising in common, with the savage cynicism of the barbarian, mitigated by the cruel irony of the courtier, how to sow distrust against England at Paris, and against Austria at London, and against London at Vienna, how to set them all by the ears, and how to make all of them the mere tools of Russia. At the time of the insurrection in Warsaw, the vice-royal archives kept in the palace of Prince Constantine, and containing the secret correspondence of Russian ministers and ambassadors from the beginning of this century down to 1830, fell into the hands of the victorious Poles. Polish refugees brought these papers over first to France, and, at a later period, Count Zamoyski, the nephew of Prince Czartoryski, placed them in the hands of Lord Palmerston, who buried them in Christian oblivion. With these papers in his pocket, the noble viscount was the more eager to proclaim in the British Senate and to the world, his most implicit confidence in the honour and good faith of the Emperor of Russia. It was not the fault of the noble viscount, that those startling papers were at length published at the end of 1835, through the famousPortfolio. King William IV, whatsoever he was in other respects, was a most decided enemy of Russia. His private secretary, Sir Herbert Taylor, was intimately connected with David Urquhart, introducing this gentleman to the King himself, and from that moment Royalty was conspiring with these two friends against the policy of the truly English minister. After the death of the King, Lord Palmerston refused to pay the printer of the Portfolio, disclaimed publicly and solemnly all connection on the part of the Foreign Office with it, and induced, in what manner is not known, Mr. Backhouse, his under-secretary, to set his name to these denials. We read in The Times of January 30, 1839: In consequence of her financial distress, resulting from the exhaustion of the treasury by the unfortunate war of 1828-29, and the debt to Russia stipulated by the Treaty of Adrianople, Turkey found herself compelled to extend that obnoxious system of monopolies, by which the sale of almost all articles was granted only to those who had paid Government licenses. Thus a few usurers were enabled to seize upon the entire commerce of the country. Mr. Urquhart proposed to King William IV a commercial treaty to be concluded with the Sultan, which treaty, while guaranteeing great advantages to British commerce, intended at the same time to develop the productive resources of Turkey, to restore her exchequer to health, and thus to emancipate her from the Russian yoke. The curious history of this treaty cannot be better related than in the words of Mr. Anstey: So favourable to Russia, and so obnoxious to Great Britain, was the treaty as altered by the noble lord, that some English merchants in the Levant resolved to trade henceforth under the protection of Russian firms, and others, as Mr. Urquhart states, were only prevented from doing so by a sort of national pride. With regard to the secret relations between the noble lord and William IV, Mr. Anstey stated to the House: It is one of the most astonishing facts that, while the King was vainly struggling against the Russian policy of the noble lord, the noble lord and his Whig allies succeeded in keeping alive the public suspicion that the King who was known as a Tory was paralysing the anti-Russian efforts of the truly English Minister. The pretended Tory predilection of the monarch for the despotic principles of the Russian Court, was, of course, made to explain the otherwise inexplicable policy of Lord Palmerston. The Whig oligarchs smiled mysteriously when Mr. H. L. Bulwer informed the House, that no longer ago than last Christmas Count Apponyi, the Austrian Ambassador at Paris, stated, in speaking of the affairs of the East, that this Court had a greater apprehension of French principles than of Russian ambition. (House of Commons, July 11, 1833) They smiled again, when Mr. T. Attwood interrogated the noble lord: what reception Count Orloff, having been sent over to England, after the treaty of Unkiar Skelessi, had met with at his Majesty's Court? (House of Commons, August 28, 1833) The papers entrusted by the dying King and his secretary, the late Sir Herbert Taylor, to Mr. Urquhart, for the purpose of vindicating, upon the fitting opportunity, the memory of William IV, will, when published, throw a new light upon the past career of the noble lord and the Whig oligarchy, of which the public generally know little more than the history of their pretensions, their phrases, and their so-called principles in a word, the theatrical and fictitious part the mask. This is a fitting occasion to give his due to Mr. David Urquhart, the indefatigable antagonist for twenty years of Lord Palmerston, to whom he proved a real adversary one not to be intimidated into silence, bribed into connivance, charmed into suitorship, while, what with cajoleries, what with seductions, Alcine Palmerston contrived to change all other foes into fools. We have just heard the fierce denunciation of his lordship by Mr. Anstey: On February 23, 1848, the same Mr. Anstey had compared the noble viscount to the infamous Marquis of Carmarthen, Secretary of State to William III, whom, during his visit to his Court, the Czar, Peter I, found means to corrupt to his interests with the gold of British merchants. (House of Commons, February 23, 1848.) Who defended Lord Palmerston on that occasion against the accusations of Mr. Anstey? Mr. Sheil; the same Mr. Sheil who had, on the conclusion of the Treaty of Unkiar Skelessi, in 1833, acted the same part of accuser against his lordship as Mr. Anstey in 1848. Mr. Roebuck, once his strong anatagonist, procured him the vote of confidence in 1850. Sir Stratford Canning, having denounced during a decennium, the noble lord's connivance with the Czar, was content to be got rid of as ambassador to Constantinople. The noble lord's own dear Dudley Stuart was intrigued out of Parliament for some years, for having opposed the noble lord. When returned back to it, he had become the me damn e [french: a willing tool] of the truly English Minister. Kossuth, who might have known from the Blue Books that Hungary had been betrayed by the noble viscount, called him the dear friend of his bosom, when landing at Southampton.
The Story of the Life of Lord Palmerston by Karl Marx