Chapter XXVIII: Appendix: D

AUTHOR’S CORRESPONDENCE WITH LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL

Gastein, _August_ 3, 1883.

MY DEAR BLUNT,

Many thanks for your letter, also for the Cairo papers which amused me. I am sorry to tell you I have not received your book, “The Future of Islam.” I hope it will reach me as I have every opportunity of reading so interesting a work with the care and attention which it deserves. Have you done anything yet about getting into Parliament. Northcote has come to awful grief over the Canal which has been much more fatal to him than to Gladstone. I hope Gorst and Wolff will make long and damaging speeches against the Khedive on Baring’s vote; Mind you egg them on. This is a horrid dull place and we are badly lodged. I wish I had done with it.

Yrs. most sincerely,
RANDOLPH S. CHURCHILL.

LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL, M.P., TO MR. BLUNT

Gastein, _August_ 14, 1883.

MY DEAR BLUNT,

I have to thank you for your two very interesting letters and enclosures. I cannot see my way to doing anything myself in the matter, for I am too far off to communicate effectually with you and secondly it is a sine qua non of these baths that one should do absolutely nothing. I hope you will write to the Times just to keep the thing alive, and in the winter by one or two speeches in the country I shall try to rub it all in. The awkward fact remains that the Government has made no answer to my indictment and in all probability cannot make one. You appear to have given up your intention of going to Ceylon to see Arabi which I am sorry for. This a desperately dull place and time hangs heavily. The Baths are lowering I think and one feels quite indisposed for any exertion. I shall hope to be back in London by the 2nd week in September in case you should still be there. We leave this on the 29th.

Yrs. most sincerely,
RANDOLPH S. C.

P.S. I have to thank you for your most interesting book which reached me safely. When is Ninet’s book coming out?

LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL, M.P., TO MR. BLUNT

Innspruck, (end of) _August_ 1883.

MY DEAR BLUNT,

I arrived here this morning from Ischl and found your letter for which many thanks. I have read your poem with pleasure and I need not say with perfect sympathy. Publish it. Poetry often makes converts where prose fails. I have no doubt that you are a Cassandra and that we shall pay dearly for our freaks in Egypt. But it is a despairing task to try and right the wrong. But I mean to do what I can in my little way when the proper season for extra Parliamentary utterances may arrive. I have a horrid idea that the advent of the opposition to office might be worse for Egypt than any conceivable eventuality. I imagine from your last letter that you are still decided on your journey to India, and I wish you a safe and speedy return.

The idea of having Arabi elected to the new Senate is ingenious, but to be effective he should be elected in many districts. Otherwise it might turn to ridicule.

Believe me Yours most faithfully,
RANDOLPH S. CHURCHILL.

LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL, M.P., TO MR. BLUNT

Blenheim Palace, _Dec._ 26, 1883.

MY DEAR BLUNT,

I have to thank you for three long and highly interesting letters. I have not written before because I really did not know whether letters had much chance of reaching you. However if I do not write you will think I do not value your letters which would be a great error on your part. I have not much to tell you. I hope by the time you get this that you will have seen the speech I made at Edinbro’ on Egypt which is fully reported in the Times of the 19th. I cannot tell you what effect it produced as you would think me very conceited. All I can say is that I am more than satisfied. Tewfik’s position grows more hopeless every day. There is no Government in Egypt at all. I think we shall be able to make it very hot for the G. O. M. when Parliament meets. Your poem was very highly praised in the reviews. Gorst is in India at Hyderabad on legal business of the Nizam. Please remember me most kindly to Lady Anne and accept for her and yourself from me the warmest wishes of the season. Do not delay your return too long. We must have stirring times in the spring.

Yours ever,
RANDOLPH S. CHURCHILL.

WRITTEN BY MR. BLUNT AND APPROVED BY LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL

“AM I A TORY DEMOCRAT?”

_May_ 1885.

With regard to English Home Politics I am prepared to support the Conservative party. That is to say, I desire no change in the existing Constitution or in the relations between Church and State. I am opposed to merely secular Education. I am a strong supporter of the House of Lords. On the land question I should like to see any measure introduced which should make the acquisition of land easier for the man of the people, believing this would be a popular, and in the truest sense, a Conservative measure. I consider, however, that the principles of liberty and property are closely connected, and I am altogether opposed to the Radical views of State ownership in land.

I am inclined to favour the idea of special commercial advantages being given to the British Colonies and India; and I am anxious to see the union between the Colonies and the Empire preserved.

In India I am for large reforms in the direction of self-government, believing these to be absolutely necessary on financial and political grounds if India is to remain loyal.

So, too, in Ireland I am in favour of Home Rule. I consider it urgent to accept the principle of Nationalism, both for Ireland’s sake and for England’s. My motto would be “Ireland for the Irish and England for the English.” The plan has succeeded in Hungary and Galicia in reconciling the Hungarians and Poles to the Austrian Crown. Why not, therefore, in Ireland?

Foreign politics are my strongest ground. With regard to these I am quite clear in my opinion that what is required for England is a return to plain dealing and respect for international law. These have been grossly outraged during the last four years by Mr. Gladstone’s Government, and it is we with our complicated commercial interests in every part of the globe that will eventually suffer from the example given. Our relations with the States of Europe should be based upon a recognition of the fact that our system of parliamentary and popular government makes special alliances and secret treaties impossible. Our old-fashioned diplomacy, with its tortuous dealings, its equivocations and its concealments, is out of date and needs reform; and I would have the contrary to all these things introduced as a cardinal point of policy. As towards Europe we should make the most of our insular position, increase our navy and protect our shores. But in Asia we cannot be insular, and we must submit to the conditions of Empire as long as India remains in our charge. In this view we need the alliance of the Mohammedan nations against Russia, and I am in favour of England accepting the full responsibility of her position, as the heir of a great Mohammedan Empire. My quarrel with Mr. Gladstone’s action in Egypt was not based on any principle of non-intervention, for I am not a non- interventionist, but because he intervened unjustly, unwisely and in such a way as to alienate Mohammedan sympathies. I consider that a duty of reparation is required of England for the wrong done to the Egyptians and I advocate a reconciliation with the Sultan and a restoration of the Egyptian National party. I need hardly say that I am in favour of immediate peace with the Soudan.

Lastly, I consider that justice, not mere expediency, should be the determining law of our conduct towards all nations. I am strongly averse to the Manchester doctrine which allows injustice to weaker nations in the interests of finance and trade, though not of military glory. I believe, on the contrary, that it is England’s duty to protect weaker nations from injustice where they come in contact with her. Nor can I convince myself that a high standard of national morality is incompatible with the extremest Conservative principles. I believe, on the contrary, that much of what was best in the so-called “Midlothian” doctrines has more real affinity to Tory than to Whig instincts; and I should be glad to see these adopted, now they have been discarded by the Radicals, as part and parcel of Conservative ideas. Truth, justice, liberty—these are great names, going at this moment in beggars’ weeds about the world. Can these find an asylum in the new temple of Tory Democracy?

WILFRID BLUNT TO LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL

_June_ 8, 1885.

MY DEAR CHURCHILL,

I am glad you have stated so clearly the Conservative policy, in nearly all of which I heartily agree, though on some points, such as Ireland, I have larger views than you are prepared for of Home Rule. The necessity for an inquiry into the working of the Indian Government is very urgent, and the fact that you should have included it in your programme, and are to support Mr. Slagg’s motion, gives me more hope than any thing else which has happened regarding India during the past year. The truth is that if India had to trust solely to the Whigs for reform it might wait till eternity, or rather till that crash came which certainly will come if the rigidity of the present bureaucratic system is not modified. The Whigs are bureaucrats born and bred and will not stir a finger to help us.

With regard to Egypt too, I think you are right. The day for such a policy as Mr. Chamberlain’s, which he has just announced, has gone by, and the only agreement which France is likely to come to with Mr. Gladstone is one which will put Egypt practically into France’s hands. Two years ago, or even perhaps a year ago, before the conference and the Nile campaign, Egypt’s complete independence, under a strong and popular government might have been secured, but Mr. Gladstone would not hear of it then, and by persisting in keeping Tewfik as the corner stone of his policy he has thrown away his chance. Now France will not be content with anything from him less than her own protectorate, or Europe with anything less than the letter of her bond. To get back our right to give Egypt liberty, the first condition will be that we guarantee her debt; the second that we make peace with the Sultan and act under his authority. Here, again, therefore, I look rather to you than to the Whigs for practical help. One knows by experience so exactly what Mr. Chamberlain’s arrangement would come to—an independent Egypt would be an Egypt separated from the rest of the Mohammedan world, but governed really in the sole interests of France and the bondholders. The form of a “native” government would be preserved, perhaps, but the form only. Egypt’s “independence by arrangement with Europe” means Egypt for the bondholders, with France for their protector and Ismail for their king. If Mr. Chamberlain had said a word about repentance for past errors I could have better believed him; but we heard all the promises and declarations he now makes, two years ago, and in far stronger language from Mr. Gladstone himself, and with what result? No; I prefer your programme for Egypt, though it seems to promise less.

I will take this opportunity of giving you my view of what a Conservative Government might do for Egypt and generally for Western Asia. The Whigs will never do anything but harm, because they are Whigs and because they hate the Mohammedans, and the Radicals will never do anything at all, because they are Radicals and will undertake no responsibility. You know that the Mohammedan faith is in solution—that it is seeking to place itself on a new basis—to regenerate its political and social life. Enormous abuses exist everywhere, enormous injustices. The poor are ground down by the rich, the weak by the strong. The whole earth, as Arabi used to say, is famished for justice, and calls out for a deliverer. The recognition of this was the secret of his own influence. It is the secret of the Mahdi’s. It may any day be the secret of England’s. But in Mohammedan lands it is not sufficient to administer an equal law for it to be accepted by the people even for their own good. The law must be connected with their religious beliefs and sanctioned by their religious authority. I am not arguing whether it is best so—though I believe it is best—but am stating a fact. And it is the perverse refusal to acknowledge facts which has made of Lord Granville’s policy in Egypt so piteous a failure. His idea would seem to have been, and Sir Evelyn Baring’s with him—if idea at all they had—that the people’s faith and social traditions were a “negligeable quantity,” and that, no matter what the law and no matter who administered it, it would be accepted with thanks. For this reason, though Tewfik was notoriously regarded as a traitor to his faith and nation, they placed him in authority, and men with him for Ministers whose only merit was that they had preferred their interests to their beliefs and were without moral principle or religious prejudice. Even these, however, in later times have refused to serve them, and they have been forced to take up with Nubar and his speculating crew of Armenians as the element supple enough to do their bidding. This has had its effect. The whole of the religious forces of the country are against them, and the whole of the people. Their reforms have remained sterile, their attempts to pacify, impotent. The people have refused their friendship and their justice, and will have none of their advice. The Liberal party of Mohammedan reform have been driven out of the country, the honest men have been driven from the Administration, and the mass of the people into the arms of the Mahdi.

It is in the power of England, and England alone, to repair the evil done—and, what is more, it is England’s duty. But it cannot be effected except at the cost of assuming Egypt’s sole protection, and the protection also of general Mohammedan interests. The Sultan must be taken into confidence, peace must be made with the Mahdi, and Arabi must be recalled. Europe, too, must be bought out by accepting Egypt’s debt. These conditions observed, all difficulty, it will be found, will disappear, and the regeneration of Egypt may at last be begun, and with it gradually of all the Mohammedan East.

It seems to me, therefore, that the Conservative Party, if it acts on your idea, has a great and satisfactory work before it, which, if honestly performed, and avoiding the snare of turning Egypt’s protection into a means of providing Englishmen with places and pay, may yet redeem the past and give reality to the dreams of reformers. You especially, with your sympathy for popular causes, will know that the only foundation of success in the East, as in the West, is the consent of the people. Get the Egyptian people on your side, and all Mohammedans will follow you, and with hardly an effort you will transform the world.

I wish you, therefore, all success in your electoral campaign. You have given too many proofs of your sincerity and steadfastness in this matter of Egypt for me to doubt you, and I know that you will do your best for her. Of the present Government I have long ceased to have any hope.

[N.B.—This letter was read to and approved by Lord Randolph Churchill for publication in the “Times,” with the alteration of a single phrase concerning Ireland, the words “than you are prepared for of Home Rule” being changed into “than you are apparently yet prepared for.”]

LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL TO MR. BLUNT

_Most Private._

India Office, _Aug._ 13, 1885.

DEAR BLUNT,

The enclosed explains itself. Will you see to it?

Yours ever,
RANDOLPH S. C.

COPY OF TELEGRAM FROM SIR H. DRUMMOND WOLFF

(_Enclosure._)

Dated Vienna, 12 _August_, 1885.

Received at London Office, 5.10 p.m.

“I think it would be well for Jemal-ed-din Afghani to come. Have you (any objection?),[135] if involving no responsibility or complicity on my part, and if it can be done without his coming into collision with Turkish authorities. I leave this probably to-morrow evening or Friday morning.”

MR. A. W. MOORE TO MR. BLUNT

_Private._

India Office, 15 _August_ /85.

DEAR MR. BLUNT,

I have just deciphered the enclosed from Sir H. Wolff. Lord Randolph is unwell and in bed, but I shall see him during the afternoon. I think it is best however to send you the telegram at once, as I understand the present arrangement is that Jemal-ed-deen leaves to-morrow.

Please let me hear from you what I am to reply to Sir H. Wolff.

Yours very truly,
A. W. MOORE.

COPY OF A TELEGRAM FROM SIR H. DRUMMOND WOLFF

(_Enclosure._)

“Buda Pest, 15 _August_.

“From something I have heard it would be well for Jemal-ed-deen not to leave England till I can telegraph to you from Constantinople.”

LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL, M.P., TO MR. BLUNT

India Office, _November_ 1, 1885.

DEAR BLUNT,

Many thanks for your letter and enclosures which I return. I feel sure that your lecture on Egypt at Newcastle must have been profoundly interesting and instructive to the audience and a little more circulation of such facts would do much good. You will certainly not receive an encouraging reply from Lord Salisbury about Arabi. Even if he was disposed (as I should be) to favour your views he would not dare take such a step on the eve of the Elections.

Yours ever,
RANDOLPH S. CHURCHILL.

MR. BLUNT TO LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL

Crabbet Park, _Dec._ 24, 1885.

MY DEAR CHURCHILL,

I am obliged to come to an immediate decision about continuing my connection with Camberwell or indeed in any active form with party politics, my pressing difficulty being Ireland. About this, now that Mr. Gladstone has taken up Home Rule, it is necessary for me to speak and at once to my Electors; and, unless I hear from you that there is still hope of an agreement between Lord Salisbury and Mr. Parnell on a really solid basis, I shall conclude, as everybody tells me it is, that Conservatism and Home Rule are for the present incompatible terms and give up trying to make them agree. I fear I have not in me the spirit of a good party man, but I thought at one time I could help you individually in the pursuit of better things. Egyptian affairs seem in the same deadlock they were a year ago, and altogether I am far from hopeful or disposed for further combat.

Yours very truly,
WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT.

LORD RANDOLPH CHURCHILL TO MR. BLUNT

_Private._

India Office, _Dec._ 26, 1885.

MY DEAR BLUNT,

There is no question or doubt about the matter. If you want Home Rule you must go to Gladstone for it. We cannot touch it.

Yours ever,
RANDOLPH S. C.