The opening of Chapter I
Causes of the quarrel--Influence of the press--Preparations--Departure from England--Malta--Warnings.
The causes of the last war with Russia, overwhelmed by verbiage, and wrapped up in coatings of protocols and dispatches, at the time are now patent to the world. The independence of Turkey was menaced by the Czar, but France and England would have cared little if Turkey had been a power whose fate could affect in no degree the commerce or the reputation of the allies. France, ever jealous of her prestige, was anxious to uphold the power of a nation and a name which, to the oriental, represents the force, intelligence, and civilization of Europe. England, with a growing commerce in the Levant, and with a prodigious empire nearer to the rising sun, could not permit the one to be absorbed and the other to be threatened by a most aggressive and ambitious state. With Russia, and France by her side, she had not hesitated to inflict a wound on the independence of Turkey which had been growing deeper every day.