But it
soon leaked out that Lord Palmerston who thought he understood full well
the foreign relations of England, and what her policy should be, had
both in public dispatches and private conversation spoken favorably of
the policy adopted by Louis Napoleon. He had even expressed to Count
Walewski, the French Ambassador in London, his entire approval of the
Prince President's act. This was too much for the Queen, who had as
early as the August before, in a memorandum sent to the Premier,
imperatively protested against the crown's being ignored by the Foreign
Secretary, so Lord Palmerston was dismissed from office by Lord John
Russell, Christmas Eve, 1851. He bore his discharge with meekness, and
even omitted in Parliament to defend himself in points where he was
wronged. But Justin McCarthy says: "Lord Palmerston was in the wrong in
many if not most of the controversies which had preceded it; that is to
say, he was wrong in committing England as he so often did to measures
which had not the approval of the sovereign or his colleagues."
In February following, 1852, Lord Palmerston enjoyed, as he expressed
it, his "tit-for-tat with Johnny Russell" and helped the Tories to
defeat his late chief in a measure for reorganizing the militia as a
precaution against possible aggression from France.
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