766

LIFE OF COBDEN. [oma®:

1880. anything besides to cement the good relations betwee”
Xr. 56. the two countries. As this was said with a good deal of
emphasis, and appeared to be the communication he had i®
view when he sent for me, I replied, with equal emphasis
Impossible! you really do not understand us in England P
I then explained exactly my position towards Lord Cowley;
that I had from the first been only an interloper on his
domain ; that he had acted with great magnanimity in
tolerating my intrusion ; that a man of narrow mind would
have resented it, and that I felt much indebted to him for
his tolerance of me, etcetera. The Prince remarked that &
man of first-rate capacity ought to have resented it, and
either have given up his post altogether to me, or to hav®
resisted my encroachment on his functions. I remarked
that Lord Cowley had frankly owned that I had superiof
knowledge to himself on questions of a commercial OF
economical character, and that, considering how much they
had been my study, it was not derogatory to him to grant
me precedence in my own specialty. I begged him to 88
no more upon the subject.
“June 14.—To-day a féte-day at Paris, a holiday, 2
review, flags, and illuminations. The Emperor was well
received by the populace on his way from the railway
the Tuileries, and in going and coming from the Champs d°
Mars, where he passed in review upwards of 50,000 troop?
and national guards. The occasion of these demonstration?
was the celebration of the annexation of Savoy and Nice ©
France. An acquisition of more territory is as popular with
the masses here and in the United States (and would be i?
England if we had anything but the sea for our frontier), 8%
in ancient times it was with despots and conquerors. The
world is governed by the force of traditions, after they have
lost by the change of time and circumstances all relatio?
to the existing state of human affairs. It is only by 18°