Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol 7.djvu/121

A RETKOSPECTIVE ENQUIRY. 77 conduct, or try to conduct, the business of any chap. new war which the future might have in store. ' The Crown could furnish no substitute for The effect of what It destroyed ; and our country thus leit destruction, to fare on without any engine of State equiv- alent to a real War Department, was thenceforth kept under conditions which exposed it to the risk of cruel misfortunes when engaging in any new war. If this havoc, as some have imagined, had cause of the - . p . Ill destruction. resulted from motives or economy, it would have matched the wildest sample of retrenchment that any spendthrift ever afforded in his mo- ments of tremulous penitence ; but already we have seen full enough to prevent our throwing the blame of these Koyal and official misfeas- ances on the always ready shoulders of the ' House of Commons ; ' for, to know the curious terms of what I called the ' partition ' effected in times long past, is to learn that the act of destruction followed naturally, followed even inevitably — unless the Crown should give way — from the terms of the ' standing compromise ' between the ' personal ' and the genuine ' State ' king. In conformity with that understanding, the war had been carried on by the ' State ' — that is, by ' Government ' chiefs whom the ' Letters of Service ' called always ' his Majesty's ' Ministers ' — men enjoying the confidence of Parliament, and to Parliament directly respon- sible ; but, when peace returned, the old Eoyal claim was unhappily suffered to refasten itself on the country, and at once to break up that