The Second Funeral of Napoleon
Page: 16

remain quietly as he was: and the balance of power in Europe might
have been--the deuce knows where.

Here, then, in a nutshell, you have the whole matter in dispute.
While Mrs. Corbett and the Prince de Joinville were innocently
interchanging compliments at St. Helena,--bang! bang! Commodore
Napier was pouring broadsides into Tyre and Sidon; our gallant navy
was storming breaches and routing armies; Colonel Hodges had seized
upon the green standard of Ibrahim Pacha; and the powder-magazine of
St. John of Acre was blown up sky-high, with eighteen hundred
Egyptian soldiers in company with it. The French said that l'or
Anglais had achieved all these successes, and no doubt believed that
the poor fellows at Acre were bribed to a man.

It must have been particularly unpleasant to a high-minded nation
like the French--at the very moment when the Egyptian affair and the
balance of Europe had been settled in this abrupt way--to find out
all of a sudden that the Pasha of Egypt was their dearest friend and
ally. They had suffered in the person of their friend; and though,
seeing that the dispute was ended, and the territory out of his
hand, they could not hope to get it back for him, or to aid him in
any substantial way, yet Monsieur Thiers determined, just as a mark
of politeness to the Pasha, to fight all Europe for maltreating
him,--all Europe, England included. He was bent on war, and an
immense majority of the nation went with him. He called for a
million of soldiers, and would have had them too, had not the King
been against the project and delayed the completion of it at least
for a time.

Of these great European disputes Captain Joinville received a
notification while he was at sea on board his frigate: as we find by
the official account which has been published of his mission.

"Some days after quitting St. Helena," says that document, "the
expedition fell in with a ship coming from Europe, and was thus made
acquainted with the warlike rumors then afloat, by which a collision
with the English marine was rendered possible. The Prince de
Joinville immediately assembled the officers of the 'Belle Poule,'