The M.P. for Russia Vol. II
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ThgM P lor R^^^ </>?t^h THE M.P. FOR RUSSIA // /^^ ^'^./^. The M.P. for Russia REMINISCENCES & CORRESPONDENCE OF MADAME OLGA NOVIKOFF EDITED BY W.^'^'^'Vy'sTEAD VOLUME TWO LONDON: ANDREW MELROSE 3 YORK STREET, Covent Garden 1909 CONTENTS CHAP. PAGE I. The Aftermath of the War I 11. Lord Salisbury as Herald Angel 28 " " III. Russia and England 56 IV. The Triumph of 1880 78 V. Crossing Swords with Mr. Gladstone 102 VI. 1880-1885 .... 121 VII. M. DE Laveleye " " VIII. SkOBELEFF AND THE SLAVONIC CaUSE IX. PeNJDEH AND THE AFGHAN FRONTIER 201 X. Alexander III. 236 XI. Sir Robert Morier and Captain Wiggins 257 XII. 1891-1892. Jews and Famine 276 XIII. A Defender of Autocracy 296 XIV. Mr. Froude .... 321 XV. Russia from Within XVI. Three Russian Editors 341 XVII. Verestchagin 355 vi CONTENTS CHAP. PAGE XVIII. The Armenian Question .... 364 XIX. The Pioneer of The Hague Conference . 393 XX. The Fourth War Scare .... 413 XXI. De Omnibus Rebus ..... 427 XXII. Finis Coronat Opus .... 440 Appendix A. The Traditional Policy of Russia . 457 „ B. A Nation's Protest against War . 471 Index . 477 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS VOLUME II Madame Olga Novikoff (in Russian Court Dress, 1904) ..... viii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Alexander Novikoff (Sasha) . Facing p. 292 James Anthony Froude . „ 321 Madame Olga Novikoff (1887) . „ 331 Michael Katkoff ...... 341 Vladimir Gringmuth. „ 350 Vassily Verestchagin . ,, 355 The Empress Alexandra of Russia and her Sister the Grand-Duchess Serge 364 The Grand-Duchess Alexandra Josephovna 380 Nicholas II. 394 Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman . 415 Grand Duke Alexei Nicholaievitch 427 Madame Olga Novikoff in her Library. 440 THE M.P. FOR RUSSIA PART IV, 1878-1908. CHAPTER I. The Aftermath of the War. sooner was the Russo-Turkish War at an end NO than we were confronted by its hateful sequence in the shape of war in Afghanistan and an insurrection in Macedonia. When Lord Beaconsfield was menacing Russia with war in Europe, and secretly preparing an expedi- tion of Indian troops to seize Cyprus, with or without the consent of the Sultan, to hold it as place d'armes against the Tsar, the Russians on their side had been preparing to make reprisals. By an agreement be- tween Russia and England, entered into when Mr. Gladstone was in ofhce, Afghanistan was recognised as a territory in the British sphere of interest within which Russia undertook not to interfere. No Russian agent was accredited to Cabul. The Ameer was sub- sidised and armed by the Indian Government, in order to enable him to hold Afghanistan as a buffer state, independent, but in friendly relations with the British. VOL. II. — I 2 THE M.P. FOR RUSSIA So long as Russia and England were at peace and in friendly relations, this agreement, excluding Russian influence from Afghanistan, was loyally observed. But when Russia was openly menaced with war, when the arsenals of England were ringing with preparations for armaments to be used against Russia, and when thousands of Indian troops were being conveyed to Europe in readiness to attack the Russian armies in Bulgaria, the obligation to refrain from intervention in Afghanistan lost much of its force. By way of preparation for the threatened attack in Europe, the Russian Government dispatched General Stolietoff with a small Russian escort on a " " mission of courtesy to Cabul. When peace was made in Europe, the Stolietoff mission was with- from and so far as drawn Afghanistan ; there, Russia was concerned, the incident came to a close. With us, it was not the end. It was rather the beginning of a war which for wantonness and stupid- ity has few parallels even in the long list of similar crimes. Ever since Lord Lytton had been sent out as Viceroy, to proclaim the Queen as Empress of India, that unquiet spirit had been pining for an opportunity to rectify the north-western frontier of India. Recti- fication of frontier then, as always, was a euphemism for stealing a slice of our neighbour's territory. Accord- ing to the original fantasy which was born in the fevered brain of the Forward school, Afghanistan was to be reduced to the position of a vassal state, in fact if not in name. A British envoy was to be sent to Cabul, and British officers were to occupy positions of vantage at Candahar and elsewhere. Shere Ali, the Ameer, a man moody of disposition, like Saul the King of Israel, with no David to soothe his evil temper by skilful harping, soon discovered THE AFTERMATH OF THE WAR 3 the danger which menaced him from beyond the passes. He became suspicious and unfriendly. The more the signs of his unfriendhness multiphed, the more obvious appeared to Lord Lytton and his school the need for rectifying the frontier. All projects of the kind were, however, postponed by the outbreak of the Russian war with Turkey, which at the same time diverted the attention of the British to the Near East, and suggested to the Russians the possibility that they might have to prepare for war with England in Asia as well as in Europe. Shere Ali, sullen, distrustful, and alarmed, anxious only for his own independence and the integrity of his country, had no more love for the Russians than for the British. But as the latter were menacing his independence, he could not help casting his eyes towards the Central Asian steppes, from whence the shadow of the Great White Tsar stretched dark across the hills. When the Treaty of Berlin was signed, July 13, and war was averted. General Stolietoff had been a month on the road from Samarcand to Cabul. He arrived at Cabul, and was formally received by Shere Ali on August II. Ministers revelling in the short-lived triumph, which they had labelled Peace with Honour, were suddenly confronted with the spectre of a Russian General welcomed with honour at Cabul by Shere Ali, who had always refused to receive a British officer in his capital. The sane and reasonable policy to pursue was to have asked Russia for the explanations which she would have found it easy to give. General Stolietoff would have been recalled, and everything would have gone on as before. This policy, however, did not commend itself to the British Government. It was 4 THE M.P. FOR RUSSIA too cruel a commentary upon their high-flown boast- such a humihation without ing for them to accept show of resentment. They did not wish to attack Russia, so they determined to fasten a quarrel upon the luckless Shere Ali. " To run into something cheap," said Mr. Bright, " is the cynical order which the coachman receives when the horses have bolted." The Jingo party at home was furious at the betrayal of its confidence by the Government. Its counterpart in India, hunger- " ing for a "scientific frontier and prestige in Central Asia, would not be denied. So it came to pass that in September Sir Neville Chamberlain, with a force of 1000 men, "too large for an escort and too small for an army," was ordered to proceed to Cabul. His advance was stopped at the mouth of the Khyber Pass, and the pretext for another disastrous war in Afghanistan was created of which Lord Lytton and the Forward school took such advantage that it was not until the middle of 1880 Lord Lytton' s successor was able to evacuate the country. While the Indian Government was preparing for the invasion of Afghanistan, Madame Novikoff returned to London and at once resumed her useful task of enlightening the British public as to what the Russians thought of them and of their policy in Europe and Asia. Before her arrival, as already mentioned, she had been in communication with Mr. Gladstone on the subject of the Rhodope Commission. I had written to Mr. Gladstone enclosing a memo- randum from Madame Novikoff about the Commission which had reported on the Rhodope insurrection, and at the same time had asked for his opinion as to whether the reception of the Russian mission by the Ameer justified, in his opinion, hostile action against THE AFTERMATH OF THE WAR 5 Afghanistan. He answered on September i8, the same day Sir Neville Chamberlain had left Peshawur on his abortive mission to Cabul : — " September i8, 1878. " My Dear Sir,—Your question was addressed to me last week, I presume because you felt puzzled, and I as to a but because are in am puzzled reply ; simply we the dark as to the facts. I think, however : (i) that the Daily News has been extremely precipitate in affirming the necessity of going forward while so in the dark that it should be examined how much ; (2) far our sending a force to Quettah was compatible with the understanding entered into with Russia as to our of influence whether respective spheres ; (3) our conduct may have released Russia from her a distinct cause of pledges, and given her complaint ; is or (4) whether coercion against Afghanistan wise warrantable whether interference with the Ameer's ; (5) independence is not as bad as coercion. " This morning I have your note with the enclosure from Madame Novikoff . It is clear, and gives more in- formation as to the Commission than I had previously received. But I do not think it satisfactory. The writer admits that the French Commissioner is a good— man, and says that he is the author of the report. Yours faithfully, W. E. Gladstone. " »» 1 The Liberal candidate for Truro expects to win When the news came that Sir Neville Chamberlain had been turned back, I advocated strongly the holding of meetings of protest against another Afghan war.