not America, but Europe, made the Republic such a Power that, if she had continued as she was a few years ago, she would have been the great bully of the world. Why, sir, she-- “... bestrode the narrow world, Like a Colossus; and we petty men Walked under her huge legs, and peeped about To find ourselves dishonourable graves.” As far as my influence goes, I am determined to do all I can to prevent the reconstruction of the Union, and I hope that the balance of power on the American Continent will in future prevent any one State from tyrannising over the world as the Republic did. [For opposing view see next extract.] OPPOSITION TO MR. ROEBUCK’S MOTION (1863). =Source.=--_Annual Register_, 1863; _English History_, pp. 130, 131. Mr. Bright animadverted severely upon the speech of Mr. Roebuck.... Mr. Roebuck, he said, would help to break up a friendly nation, and create an everlasting breach between the two nations, because he deemed it for the interest of England. The whole case rested upon either a miserable jealousy or a base fear. He looked upon the interest of England from a different point of view. He believed the war was more likely than anything else to abolish slavery. The supply of cotton under slavery must always be insecure. It was the interest of England that the supply of cotton should be by free labour rather than by that of slaves. As to the political aspect of the question, the more he considered this war, the more improbable he thought it that the United States would be broken into separate Republics. The conclusion to which he had come was that if there should be a separation, the interests, the sympathies and the necessities, perhaps the ambition, of the whole Continent were such that it would be reunited under a Central Government. And this Government might be in the hands of the South. Having dwelt at considerable length upon the hideous features of Southern slavery, and eulogised the Northern institutions, it was against such a Government, he observed, in such a contest with such a foe, that Mr. Roebuck asked the House to throw into the scale the weight of the hostility of England. A POLICY OF MEDDLE AND MUDDLE (1864). =Source.=--_Annual Register_, vol. 106; _English History_, p. 7. ATTACK ON EARL RUSSELL’S FOREIGN POLICY BY LORD DERBY (FEBRUARY 4).