ABSTRACT
Soon after Derby's brief government of 1852 was formed Palmerston offered a few tips to the incoming Foreign Secretary; the earl of Malmesbury He adumbrated certain basic principles, such as both the need for, and the perpetual difficulty of obtaining, good relations with France, but referred most particularly to the 'power of prestige England possesses abroad' and to a Foreign Secretary's overriding duty to ensure its safe continuance. 1 In the confident years after 1815 Britain's world-wide influence, buttressed by its navy and commercial supremacy; had been acknowledged on every side (Ch. 22). In the 1850s and 1860s, however, just as the domestic tranquillity which accompanies prosperity was achieved, the first significant blows to Britain's 'power of prestige' were struck. Britain, the self-assured Palmerston included, reacted too slowly to shifts in the balance of forces in Europe after 1848 and found its power to influence Continental affairs substantially reduced. In the wider world, though Britain's trading primacy remained universally recognized, perplexing questions of commercial influence and colonial domination presented themselves. Increased defence commitments were required. According to the classical canons of Gladstonian Liberalism (Chs. 37 and 39), economic laissez-faire implied minimal government interference and the lowest taxes possible. Yet in 1869, the first full year of Gladstone's prime ministership, Britain spent £27m on its army and naV)r, virtually twice as much as when Palmerston gave his advice to Malmesbury [D.i.2]. Britain's world role did not come cheap and Gladstone would never realize his dearest ambition, to abolish the income tax.
