VIII
The petitions presented to the House of Commons on April 26, 1836, and the resolution moved by Mr. Patrick Stewart in reference to them, referred not only to the Danube, but to Circassia too, the rumour having spread through the commercial world that the Russian Government, on the plea of blockading the coast of Circassia, claimed to exclude English ships from landing goods and merchandise in certain ports of the eastern littoral of the Black Sea. On that occasion Lord Palmerston solemnly declared:
"If Parliament will place their confidence in us—if they will leave it to us to manage the foreign relations of the country—we shall be able to protect the interests and to uphold the honour of the country without being obliged to have recourse to war."—(House of Commons, April 26,1836.)
Some months afterwards, on October 29, 1836, the Vixen, a trading vessel belonging to Mr. George Bell and laden with a cargo of salt, set out from London on a direct voyage for Circassia. On November 25, she was seized in the Circassian Bay of Soudjouk-Kale by a Russian man-of-war, for "having been employed on a blockaded coast."—(Letter of the Russian Admiral Lazareff to the English Consul, Mr. Childs, December 24, 1836.) The vessel, her cargo, and her crew were sent to the port of Sebastopol, where the condemnatory decision of the Russians was received on January 27, 1837. This time, however, no mention was made of a "blockade," but the Vixen was simply declared a lawful prize, because "it was guilty of smuggling," the importation of salt being prohibited, and the Bay of Soudjouk-Kale, a Russian port, not provided with a custom-
