(Gladstone Papers).]
[Footnote 396: Bancroft, _Seward_, II, p. 219. Bancroft cites also a
letter from Seward to his wife showing that he appreciated thoroughly
the probability of a foreign war if France should press on in the
line taken.]
[Footnote 397: F.O., America, Vol. 773. No. 623. Confidential. Lyons to
Russell, Nov. 4, 1861.]
[Footnote 398: _Ibid._, No. 634. Confidential. Lyons to Russell, Nov. 8,
1861. In truth Lyons felt something of that suspicion of France
indicated by Cowley, and for both men these suspicions date from the
moment when France seemed lukewarm in support of England in the matter
of Bunch.]
CHAPTER VII
THE "TRENT"
The _Trent_ affair seemed to Great Britain like the climax of American
arrogance[399]. The Confederate agents sent to Europe at the outbreak of
the Civil War had accomplished little, and after seven months of waiting
for a more favourable turn in foreign relations, President Davis
determined to replace them by two "Special Commissioners of the
Confederate States of America." These were James M. Mason of Virginia,
for Great Britain, and John Slidell of Louisiana, for France. Their
appointment indicated that the South had at last awakened to the need of
a serious foreign policy. It was publicly and widely commented on by the
Southern press, thereby arousing an excited apprehension in the North,
almost as if the mere sending of two new men with instructions to secure
recognition abroad were tantamount to the actual accomplishment of
their object.
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