The Treaty of Paris was signed on the 3Oth March. It was well known in the congress that, but for England, the conditions imposed on Russia would have been far easier. And though they were still too easy, yet England might congratulate herself on having obtained so much in circumstances so adverse. For the Emperor was perhaps the only man in France who held firmly to the alliance. The French nation had no strong interest in the affairs of Turkey, and was now ready to believe, and to proclaim, that it had been made the tool of England. And Louis Napoleon himself had already obtained from the war all that was necessary for his purpose, in the victory of the Tchernaya, and the brilliant finale of the Malakoff ; while the unfortunate condition into which his army in the Crimea had fallen during the winter supplied an ample reason for desiring peace.
302 Strength of the British Army.
Nevertheless he continued to act in thorough unison with his ally, and again declared that he was ready to recommence the war if Russia should refuse her concurrence to the treaty. The feeling with which the two nations regarded the close of the war was thus expressed by the Prince Consort : " Peace is signed. Here it has been received with moderate satisfaction ; in Paris with exultation." That they should have cause for even moderate satisfaction was by the British people rightly attributed to the firm, patriotic spirit of Palmerston, who, amid all the clamours of the Peace Party and the Opposition, steered right on, winning a popularity which, when he appealed to the Country in the following year, returned him to power with a largely increased majority.
On the 2d April the Upland was for the last time shaken by the thunders of the artillery of the Allies. This time it proclaimed in salutes the tidings of peace. To those who have noted the difficulty with which we put even a small army in the field in these days, the dislocation of all our establishments which attends the operation, and the paucity of reserves, there is something almost marvellous in the strength of our Forces in the Crimea at the close of a war in which we had lost 22,000 men. At Christmas 1855 we had there still greater forces of men than those already enumerated, with 1 20 guns ; and in the middle of April 18,000 fresh .troops were mustered at a field-day in Aldershot camp. The land transport, the commissariat, and the hospital system of the Army were all in excellent working order.
The Results of the War. 303
But they did not long remain so. Upon the return of the Army, the reduction of its establishments was effected in the usual reckless fashion. We soon reverted to our customary condition of military inefficiency, and during the next thirty years nearly all that remained to us as the result of the experience which we had gained in the war were the present excellent system of our military hospitals, the great example of these established at Netley, the framework of the Land Transport corps, which still survives in the Army Service corps, and Aldershot camp.
For a whole generation the world continued to have the benefit of the war in the enforced quiescence of Russia. Her wounds were too deep to permit her during that time to attempt measures of aggression, or to indulge a desire to disturb the peace of the world. And this result proved that the point of attack upon her had been rightly and fortunately selected. The small proportion of coast line she exposes to the descent of an invader, the immense distances from the extremities to the heart of the Empire, the scarcity of roads, the rigours of the climate, all rendered the attack of the Western Powers upon Russia a nearly insoluble problem. But on the other hand, when she had once resolved to bring all her might and all her resources to bear on the defence of Sebastopol, these conditions turned against her, and rendered her course absolutely ruinous. Her fleets were at once imprisoned in their ports, her troops were obliged to traverse enormous spaces to reach the point of conflict, the length and bad condition of the lines of communica-
304 Russia repudiates the Treaty later.