Shadow of great britain

After Arthur promised to solve the problem, General Napier hummed a tune and left.

However, the secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs stayed and chatted with Arthur about the changes that had taken place in London in recent times.

In addition to worker riots caused by the port quarantine policy, there are also various cases where family members of patients stormed isolation hospitals because of the strict isolation of patients.

All in all, it sounds like the Minister of Internal Affairs, Viscount Melbourne, must be very troubled recently.

In terms of official duties, he had to deal with the Swain riots of the southern farmers, the medical and health issues caused by cholera, and even various security incidents. In terms of personal relationships, he also had to find time to deal with the charges against him regardless of relationship by Judge George Norton.

Although the position of the Minister of the Interior has always been considered one of the three cabinet seats alongside the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Minister of Finance, this position has now become a hot potato.

Even with Viscount Melbourne's naturally lazy personality, he was forced to work overtime and attend various multi-department joint meetings to study how to suppress these things.

It is said that his sister, Lady Cowper, once privately advised the Viscount of Melbourne: "Now that we are burdened with all kinds of things, it is better to settle with George Norton out of court. Doesn't that rude guy just want to extort 1,400 pounds? We Lamb The family doesn’t need this little money.”

However, Viscount Melbourne was extremely resistant to his sister's persuasion. He verbally rejected his sister's suggestion and asked her not to continue to interfere in the matter.

Seeing that her brother would not listen, Mrs. Cowper went to Viscount Palmerston to borrow money, planning to secretly help her brother reach a settlement with George Norton.

As a result, when Viscount Melbourne learned about this incident from Viscount Palmerston, His Excellency the Viscount, who had not blushed with anyone for decades, became angry. He immediately sent someone to stop his sister and asked her He repeatedly stated that he and Mrs. Norton were innocent, and that he had no intention of bowing to a villain like Norton, nor would he take the initiative to tarnish his reputation.

Mrs. Cowper, who was scolded by her brother, felt extremely aggrieved. She obviously wanted to do something for her parents' family, but her brother still didn't care about her.

Mrs. Cowper did not attend any social gathering for two weeks and was nowhere to be seen in London.

I heard from the ladies of the Allmark Club that she seemed to have returned to Earl Cowper's territory in anger, and may not return to London until the social season comes again in the spring of next year.

When George Norton saw that Viscount Melbourne was so tough, he was furious and formally filed an adultery lawsuit against Viscount Melbourne and his wife in court.

However, since Norton except for Mrs. Norton's frequent visits to the Home Office, conclusive evidence could not be found in the letters of both men and women he provided.

So, after a trial, the Viscount Melbourne and Lady Norton were found innocent.

But the end of the trial doesn't mean the matter is over. Judge Norton, who was not satisfied with the outcome of the trial, immediately kicked his wife out of the house after losing the case, and sent their three sons, who were only 2, 4, and 6 years old at the time, to relatives to raise, and strictly prohibited both mother and son from having sex. Meet.

Because of its gossipy nature, such an incident naturally caused an uproar in London.

Various London tabloids began to rush to report the details of the extramarital affair.

Opponents argued that Viscount Melbourne's victory was due to his dirty political influence on the court. A woman always goes to the Ministry of Internal Affairs when she has nothing to do. How can she do anything else besides having private meetings with lovers?

Supporters believe that Viscount Melbourne's reputation is time-tested. The Viscount of Melbourne's wife, Baroness Ponsonby, had been causing trouble for more than ten or twenty years, but His Excellency the Viscount did not criticize his wife and Lord Byron too harshly. He even took the initiative to speak for his wife when she was at the center of the storm, hoping to calm the situation. How could such a loyal and kind-hearted gentleman do such an immoral thing as destroying other people's families?

Some analysts tried to explain the problem from a human perspective. They first assumed that the Viscount Melbourne had an affair with Mrs. Norton.

And they think it is because the Viscount Melbourne was cheated by Lord Byron, and because his wife, Baroness Ponsonby, is a completely crazy woman, she even threw herself in front of the onlookers on the street when Lord Byron's coffin returned to China. He rolled around on the coffin.

It is precisely because of experiencing these burdens that ordinary people cannot bear that the educated Viscount Melbourne developed a certain degree of psychological abnormality.

And his relationship with Mrs. Norton is probably to make up for his shortcomings.

As the saying goes, despise the tauren, understand the tauren, become a tauren, and surpass the tauren.

Analysts tend to summarize the above sentence as the psychological development process of Viscount Melbourne.

Ladies in London generally despise the so-called 'tauren theory'. The complicated relationship between the Viscount of Melbourne and his wife is well known in the streets of London.

And what Dame Ponsonby said to her servants before she died, "Please call William, he is the only one in this world who has never let me down" has hit the hearts of thousands of girls. superior.

William Lamb, Viscount Melbourne, is a first-class figure in terms of knowledge, status and appearance, and he has not remarried since his wife's death. Therefore, after having such a bleak and sad marriage story, he was labeled as infatuated by the ladies.

Because of this, Viscount Melbourne's popularity with women has always been good, and these female supporters of Viscount Melbourne naturally cannot tolerate other people's attacks on him. Therefore, when the extramarital affair lawsuit first came out, many upper-class ladies and middle-class female novelists came out to support him.

On one side, there are calls for the removal of morally impure ministers from their posts, and on the other side, there is a barrage of accusations against cruel husbands for humiliating their wives.

Corresponding to the cliff-like decline in port throughput during the cholera period, the explosive growth of London's print media was like a rocket taking off.

As soon as Arthur heard this, he suddenly said to Alexandre Dumas who was listening with interest: "Alexander, the finale of Charles's "The Pickwick Papers" hasn't been released yet, has it?"

Alexandre Dumas picked his ears: "No, haven't you been holding back the manuscript? Charles previously thought that the manuscript was held back because there was something wrong with what he wrote. For this reason, he privately revised it several times. He even went to the editorial office to ask me about it.

Arthur, it’s not that I’m talking about you. You can’t treat a talented young writer like Charles like this. Pressing down the manuscript will damage your creative confidence. And readers are also very dissatisfied. More than half of the complaint letters in the editorial department of "The British" came to ask why "The Pickwick Papers" was suddenly suspended for so long. "

When Arthur heard this, he just said: "I didn't mean to suppress his manuscript, and I didn't suppress it because he couldn't write well. On the contrary, I think he wrote really well, and for I helped Charles write the court part, and I also opened a portion of the court file to him.

Because this is a perfect ending, we must choose the most appropriate time to release this ending in order to live up to Charles' efforts. Alexander, listen to me, the next issue of "The British" will release the climax of the finale of "The Pickwick Papers" all at once. "

"Releasing it all at once?" Dumas glared and said, "That's three or four issues. Do you want us to print more on the page?"

Arthur said nonchalantly: "Just pay more for the printing fee. Believe me, Alexander, the sales volume of the next issue will definitely surprise you."

When the secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs heard this, he couldn't help but asked curiously: "To be honest, I am also a big fan of "The British". Mr. Hastings, for the sake of our friendship, can you reveal a little bit about "The British"?" Is there anything special about the finale of The Pickwick Papers?"

Arthur rubbed his temples: "This...I really can't remember it. After all, it's been a while since the finale was written. Why don't you let Mr. Dumas, the fashion literature editor of "The Anglican" beside me, introduce it to you? Bar."

Alexandre Dumas also didn't understand where Arthur's confidence came from. Although he also believed that the finale of "The Pickwick Papers" was quite good, it was not easy to increase the sales of the entire magazine.

Alexandre Dumas said: "In the previous serial, didn't Mr. Pickwick receive a summons from the court? The summons from the court was actually about a lawsuit involving annulment of marriage.

The cause of the lawsuit was that two greedy lawyers, Dawson and Fogg, came forward on behalf of the landlord Mrs. Bardale, saying that Mr. Pickwick had promised to marry her, but Mr. Pickwick did not execute the marriage contract, so the two lawyers proposed A claim for £750 was made.

But Mr. Pickwick was very disgusted with this kind of litigants who specialized in the law, so although he was able to pay the compensation, he was unwilling to give in to this false accusation, so he was unfortunately imprisoned in debtors' prison.

Unexpectedly, when the two lawyers saw that Mr. Pickwick refused to pay the fine and Mrs. Bardale could not pay the legal fees, they actually threw her into debtors' prison together... Well..."

When Dumas introduced it here, he suddenly felt something was wrong.

He recalled the plot and suddenly suggested to Arthur: "I think the lawyer's claim for compensation from Mr. Pickwick for 750 pounds is still too little. Why not change it to 1,400 pounds? Wouldn't that make everything right?"

Arthur shook his head: "Alexander, what are you trying to insinuate? You have to remember that The British is an objective and fair literary magazine. We do not export any opinions to readers, whether it is political or public opinion. of."

Alexandre Dumas crossed his arms and nodded repeatedly: "Yes, that's right, we don't export politics, nor do we export public opinion. We mainly export political public opinion, such as our supplement "The Economist". Okay, let's stop talking nonsense. Damn it! Arthur, how did you predict this? Did you know that Norton would sue all along?"

Arthur just shrugged and said: "Alexander, I told you before, I know "The Pickwick Papers" well, not only the plot, but also the background. This is the basic quality of a literature lover."

"Ah? You also mentioned the background. Didn't you lay the groundwork for this?"

The secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs looked at the two people talking to each other, and just said with a smile: "Although I don't know what is going on. But being able to lay the background is an ability that everyone envies in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and we don't have this kind of ability there. talents, so Britain’s foreign policy has always been one step at a time.”

When Alexandre Dumas heard this, his face was full of disbelief: "Sir, your words are too belittling your diplomatic work. In my opinion, Britain's diplomatic work may be the best in Europe, but you are So many anti-French alliances were organized.”

"No, no, no, Mr. Dumas, organizing the anti-French alliance is certainly an achievement, but the main credit for making this work lies not with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but with France."

"How do you say this?"

The secretary took a sip of tea and said: "You have to know that good and bad are usually set off. France has always done a good job in laying out the background."

When Alexandre Dumas heard this, he couldn't help but retorted: "But sir, when you were laying the background in France, you should still be a citizen of the German Principality of Hesse, right?"

The secretary shrugged and said: "To be precise, at that time, my father was a Hessian mercenary serving for the Commonwealth of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the Kingdom of Hanover. If you insist on criticizing my German ancestry, well, I do Yes, but so what? I am an honorable British gentleman now."

There was nothing Alexandre Dumas could do about such a person. He gritted his teeth and said: "Maybe I should ask Heinrich to come over and listen to what you have to say... Oh, no... That kid might envy you. .”

The secretary asked: "Huh? I heard you say that there is a German here?"

Arthur nodded and said: "Indeed, there is, but don't worry, that's not a Bavarian."

"Fortunately." The Secretary-General breathed a sigh of relief: "But dealing with the Bavarians is actually not bad, at least it is not as strenuous as dealing with the Austrians. On this point, it is rare that I can reach an agreement with Viscount Palmerston. "

Arthur asked: "Huh? Does Viscount Palmerston hate Austria? This is strange. Isn't he usually very close to the Russians? The relationship between the two is so close that I thought he was a despot who supported the Czar. Where is the person?"

The secretary nodded and said: "No, Mr. Hastings, you misunderstood. His Excellency the Viscount's preferences are not divided by doctrine, but by personal feelings. It is also an authoritarian country, and he likes the Russians because of Levin His wife gave him a lot of help, and his hatred of Austria was due to Metternich.

Of course, his dislike for France is also very high. In addition to deep-rooted national feelings, the French ambassador, Mr. Talleyrand, also played an important role in this regard. As you know, MPs are creatures who live in the news and public opinion, so Viscount Palmerston naturally hates people who steal his limelight.

In the field of diplomacy, the two Europa diplomatic twins, Metternich and Talleyrand, are naturally the ones who have the upper hand and influence over the British Foreign Secretary. "

Arthur held his chin and thought: "I can always hear some interesting stories from your mouth. I heard that Viscount Palmerston built the Ministry of Foreign Affairs like an airtight fortress. Anyone who leaks information about the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will be severely punished. Therefore, out of consideration for protecting my friends, I will not continue to inquire further."

The secretary just smiled when he heard this: "Mr. Hastings, don't take those kinds of rumors too seriously. If there is a large-scale leak in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the only person who leaks the secrets is the Viscount himself. You have to know, The Government, unlike the Royal Navy, usually leaks from the top. So screw it. I value you as a friend far more than I value the job at hand. Assistant Under-Secretary of State in the Foreign Office It’s just a position, I can’t be promoted anyway, and as you know, the top deputy minister positions are usually reserved for congressmen.”

When Arthur heard this, he smiled and stretched out his hand: "Friend, please forgive me for forgetting, what is your name?"

The secretary didn't care about Arthur's little oversight. He held Arthur's hand and replied with a smile: "August Schneider, it's nice chatting with you, Arthur. Although I want to continue, but I have to arrange Mr. Napier's next trip. But before I leave, I have one more little news for you."

Arthur asked: "Or from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs?"

"Well... no..." Schneider said: "To be precise, it was the East India Company who took the initiative, and the Ministry of the Interior and the General Administration of Customs nodded in agreement. They want to send more manpower to help you continue to investigate the customs issue in Liverpool. "

"Oh?" Arthur asked, "Who is he? Do you know?"

Schneider smiled and said: "The East India Company's chief professor of political economics at Haileybury College and his team of students. By the way, this professor also has a very interesting nickname. You must have heard of it."

"What nickname?"

Schneider stood up and folded his coat: "'Population' Malthus."