43036	----	INDEX Aberdare, Lord (Henry Austin Bruce), home secretary (1868), ii. 644; on Collier affair, ii. 385; on Ewelmcase, ii. 387; Licensing bill of, ii. 389-390; on _Alabama_ case, ii. 409 _note_; on Irish University bill, ii. 439; Gladstone's appreciation of, ii. 462; president of the council (1873), ii. 463 _note_, 645; describes last cabinet meeting (1874), ii. 497; otherwise mentioned, ii. 421, 504; iii. 386. ---- papers, extract from, on position in 1872, ii. 389. Aberdeen, Gladstone presented with freedom of, ii. 378. Aberdeen, 4th Earl of:-- _Chronology_--on Wellington's anti-reform speech, i. 69; Gladstone's visit to (1836), i. 137; at Canada meeting, i. 641; party meetings, i. 239; on Maynooth resignation, i. 273; Gladstone's relations with, i. 280; estimate of Peel, i. 283; on Peel's eulogium of Cobden, i. 292; on freedom in official position, i. 298; home and foreign policy of, contrasted, i. 367; learns Gladstone's views of Neapolitan tyranny, i. 390, 393-395; on Don Pacifico case, i. 395; Gladstone's Letters to, i. 392, 394 _and note_, 396, 398, 399 _note 2_, 400, 401 _note 3_, 641, 642; views on papal aggression question, i. 405, 407; asked to form a government (1851), i. 405 _and note_; leader of Peelites, i. 408; Reform bill of (1852), ii. 238; attitude of, towards first Derby administration, i. 417, 419, 429; on Gladstone's attitude towards Disraeli, i. 432; on possible heads for Peelite government, i. 443; Irish attitude towards, i. 444; undertakes to form a government, i. 445; Gladstone's budget, i. 464-466; letter to Prince Albert on Gladstone's speech, i. 468; letter to Gladstone, i. 469; attitude towards Turkey in 1828, i. 480; Crimean war, preliminary negotiations, i. 481-484, 487, 490; on Gladstone's Manchester speech, i. 483; on effect of Crimean war, i. 484; suggests retirement, i. 491-492; opposes postponement of Reform bill, i. 648; regrets of, regarding the war, i. 494, 536-537; defeat of, ii. 653; Gladstone's consultations with, in ministerial crisis (1855), i. 526, 530-535; on position of premier, ii. 416; Gladstone's projected letters to, on Sebastopol committee, i. 542 _note_; discourages Gladstone's communicating with Derby, i. 556; Lewis's budget, i. 560; Divorce bill, i. 570; Conspiracy bill, i. 575; approves Gladstone's refusals to join Derby, i. 578, 586; uneasiness regarding Gladstone's position, i. 581; Gladstone's visit to, i. 594; discourages Ionian project, i. 595; desires closer relations between Gladstone and government, i. 596; Arthur Gordon's letter to, i. 604; Bright's visit to, i. 626 _note 2_; death of, ii. 87. Foreign influence of, i. 392, 529; foreign estimate of, ii. 351; iii. 321. Gladstone's estimate of, i. 124, 393, 417; ii. 87, 639-644; his estimate of Gladstone, i. 613; ii. 170, 203; Gladstone's letters to, i. 425-426, 429, 463, 549; ii. 3. Palmerston contrasted with, i. 530. Patience of, with colleagues' quarrels, i. 520; loyalty to colleagues, ii. 639-640. Sobriquet of, i. 177. Trustfulness of, i. 197; ii. 113, 640, 642-643, Otherwise mentioned, i. 139, 142 _note_, 270, 293, 294, 367, 420, 437, 458, 460, 482 _note_, 520, 539, 543, 548, 584; ii. 184, 194; iii. 228. Aberdeen, 7th Earl of, iii. 385, 517. Abeken, H., ii. 332-333 _and note_. Abercromby, Sir Ralph, iii. 314. Abolition, _see_ slave-holding. Acland, A. H. D., iii. 495 _and note_. ---- Arthur, i. 54, 59 _note_, 74. ---- Sir H. W., iii. 421. ---- Sir Thomas, member of W E G, i. 59 _note_; brotherhood formed by Gladstone and, i. 99; advice to Gladstone on Jewish disabilities question, i. 376; correspondence with Gladstone on popular discontent, ii. 172-174; on Gladstone's position (1867), ii. 227; otherwise mentioned, i. 54, 74, 148; ii. 280, 430, 431; iii, 495. Act of Uniformity bill (1872), ii. 410. Acton, Lord, recommended by Gladstone for a peerage, ii. 430; correspondence with Gladstone on Vaticanism, ii. 509, 511, 515, 519-521; compared with Döllinger, ii. 558; letter on Gladstone's proposed retirement, iii. 172; elected fellow of All Souls', iii. 421; Gladstone's letters to, i. 481, 628; ii. 1, 214; iii. 355-359, 413-416, 422, 456, 457, 544; criticism of Gladstone, iii. 360-361; otherwise mentioned, ii. 254, 617; iii. 103, 351, 462. Adam, W. P., commissioner of public works, ii. 463 _note_; supports Gladstone's Midlothian candidature, ii. 584-585; otherwise mentioned, ii. 586, 602, 620. Adams, Charles Francis (American minister), hints withdrawal, ii. 80 and _note 2_, 83; Evarts coadjutor to, ii. 189; breakfasts with Gladstone, ii. 212-213; on _Alabama_ case, ii. 395-396; work on the arbitration board, ii. 411-412. Adderley, C. B., quoted, i. 362 _note 2_. Adullamites, ii. 205, 211, 224, 225. Advertisements, tax on, i. 459, 462 _and note_. Affirmation bill (1883), i. 414 _note_; iii. 14, 18-20, 107 note, 312. Afghanistan:-- Cavagnari in, iii. 151. Reversal of conservative policy in, iii. 10. Russian action in (1885), iii. 178, 183-185, 208 _note_. War with, ii. 583; Gladstone's references to, ii. 592, 595. Africa South:-- Cape Colony-- Dutch sympathy in, with Transvaal, iii. 39-40 _and note 2_, 42 _note 2_, 43. Representatives from, on South African situation, iii. 33. Cape of Good Hope petition, ii. 545. Confederation scheme, iii. 22-24, 31. Frere in, iii. 2, 6. Native affairs in, committee on, i. 358. Orange Free State-- Advice from, iii. 32-33. Sympathy in with Transvaal, iii. 39-40 _and note 2_, 43. Transvaal-- Administration of, by Great Britain, iii. 31 _and note 1_. Annexation of (1877), iii. 25; Boer resistance to annexation, iii. 25-26, 31; Gladstone's attitude towards, iii. 27; Hartington's attitude to, iii. 27. Cabinet abstentions on division regarding, iii. 35. Commission suggested by Boers, iii. 35; suggestion accepted, iii. 36 _and note 1_, 40; constitution of commission, iii. 41; Boer requests regarding, refused, iii. 41; parliamentary attack on appointment, iii. 41-42; Boer attitude towards, iii. 44; Pretoria convention concluded by, iii. 44-45. Conventions with, iii. 45 _and note_. Forces in, iii. 31, _note 2_. Midlothian reference to (1879), ii. 595; (1885), iii. 248. Misrepresentations regarding Boers, iii. 31. Native struggles with Boers in, iii. 24. Rising of, iii. 31-32; course of hostilities, iii. 34-37; armistice, iii. 39. Self-government promised to, iii. 25, 28 _and note 2_, 29, 30 _and note 2_; promises evaded, iii. 30, 33. W. H. Smith's view of proceedings in, ii. 601. Suzerainty question, iii. 45 _and note_. Sympathy with, from South African Dutch, iii. 39-40 _and note 2_, 42 _note 2_, 43. Ailesbury, Lord, ii. 556. Airey, Sir Richard, i. 651. _Alabama_ claims-- Arbitration accepted on, ii. 405. Gladstone's views on, ii. 394, 396-397, 406, 409, 538. Indirect damages claimed by Sumner, ii. 399, 406-412. Mixed commission proposed to deal with, ii. 397; refused by United States, ii. 398; accepted, ii. 400; constitution of, ii. 400-401; work of, ii. 401-405. Origin of, ii. 393-394. Parliamentary anxieties regarding, ii. 390. Soreness regarding, ii. 392. Albania, i. 605-608. Albert, Prince, speeches at Suppression of Slave Trade meeting, i. 227; on Peel's retirement, i. 293; presented with Gladstone's translation of _Farini_, i. 403 _note_; Gladstone's budget submitted to, i. 464; on Gladstone's budget speech, i. 469; unpopularity of, ii. 426, 652; views on Roebuck committee, i. 537; estimate of Gladstone, ii. 28; on _Trent_ affair, ii. 74; on Danish question, ii. 93, 102; death of, ii. 89; Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 90-91; effect of his death on Gladstone's relations with the Queen, ii. 91; statue to, at Aberdeen, ii. 100; otherwise mentioned, i. 242, 274, 541; ii. 14, 92. Albert Victor, Prince, iii. 322. Alderson, Baron, i. 381. Alfred, Prince, ii. 98, 99, 105. Alexander II., Emperor of Russia, ii. 499. Alexander III., Emperor of Russia, iii. 116, 117. Alexandretta, project to seize, ii. 573. Alexandria, English and French fleets at, iii. 79; bombardment of, iii. 81, 84, 85. Alice, Princess, _see_ Louis. All the Talents ministry, i. 446. Allon, Dr., ii. 134-135, 255, 458. Alsace, annexation of, ii. 346-348. Althorp, Viscount, Gladstone's first intercourse with, i. 101; dissuades Howick from moving for papers on Vreedenhoop, i. 105; views on Ashley's factory proposals, i. 106; Cobbett snubbed by, i. 114; contrasted with Russell, i. 118; action of, on tithe collection, i. 133; Grey opposed by, i. 430; otherwise mentioned, i. 103, 115, 649; ii. 436; iii. 503. America:-- British North, ii. 607. Canada, _see that title_. United States, _see that title_. American civil war, _see under_ United States. Annuities bill, ii. 52-53, 125. Anonymous articles by Gladstone, ii. 345 _note 1_; iii. 415. Anson, Sir W. (warden of All Souls'), iii. 421. Anstice, Prof., i. 55-56, 58, 59 _note_, 65, 74, 162, 134. Antonelli, Cardinal, ii. 215. _Antony and Cleopatra_ at Drury Lane, ii. 476. Aosta, Duke of, ii. 327. Appointments and honours, Gladstone's care in selections for, ii. 428; iii. 97. Arabi, iii. 73, 80, 83, 85-86. Arbitration in _Alabama_ case, ii. 405, 411-412; soreness at award, ii. 392, 413. Arbuthnot, George, i. 519; ii. 182, 193. Argyll, Duke of, on presbyterian view of a church, i. 158 _note_; attitude towards Gladstone's budget, i. 466; on postponement of Reform bill, i. 648; attitude towards French treaty scheme, ii. 22; on Paper Duties bill, ii. 33, 37; ecclesiastical views, ii. 37; supports Gladstone on estimates struggle, ii. 140; views on Danish question, ii. 192; advises dissolution on Reform bill, ii. 209; in Rome, ii. 217; the pope's estimate of, ii. 218; views on annexation of Alsace and Lorraine, ii. 347; on _Alabama_ case, ii. 403; views on Gladstone's retirement, ii. 505; views on J. S. Mill memorial, ii. 543; on Bulgarian question, ii. 552; Hawarden, ii. 582; Indian secretary (1868), ii. 644; lord privy seal (1880), ii. 653; letter to Gladstone on outside influence, iii. 4; views on Transvaal commission, iii. 41; divergence of views from Chamberlain's, iii. 48-49; resignation, ii. 654; iii. 90; on Disturbance Compensation bill, iii. 113; on franchise disagreement (1884), iii. 127; suggested to effect conference between leaders on Franchise bill, i. 135; letter to Gladstone on election address, iii. 220-221; views on Carnarvon's interview with Parnell, iii. 229 _note 1_; on Irish situation, iii. 280-281; refuses Gladstone's invitation to birthday dinner, iii. 322; on land question, iii. 477; Gladstone's letters to, i. 652; ii. 45, 73, 76, 288-290, 295, 462, 475, 500, 520, 524, 563, 564, 615, 636; otherwise mentioned, i. 420, 492, 495, 536, 539, 624, 635-636; ii. 47 _notes_; ii. 72, 183, 212, 459, 504, 644. Aristotle, i. 131, 207 _note 2_. Armellini, iii. 464. Armenian atrocities, iii. 521, 522. Armitstead, George, iii. 463 _and note_, 493, 525, 533. Armstrong, E. J., ii. 195 _and note_. Army:-- Cardwell's work for, ii. 359. Commander-in-chief, position of in Parliament, ii. 362, 649. Estimates for (1874), ii. 483. Purchase abolished, ii. 361-365. Short service system, ii. 626, 649. War office, qualifications for, ii. 649. Arnold, Matthew, views of, on _Peter Bell_, i. 220; appointment sought by, ii. 540; views on copyright, ii. 541; poem on his father, iii. 483; estimate of Wordsworth, iii. 448; on Christianity, iii. 520. Arnold, Dr. T., sermons of, read by Gladstone, i. 100, 135; view of the church, i. 158; attitude towards Newman, i. 165; on Gladstone's first book, i. 176; on Jerusalem bishopric, i. 308; M. Arnold's poem on, iii. 483. ---- Mrs. T., iii. 358. Ashley, Lord, on factory legislation, i. 106; on Jerusalem bishopric, i. 308, 309; votes against Gladstone at Oxford, i. 333. ---- Evelyn, ii. 51 and _note_, 153, 154, 252. Asquith, H. H., iii. 495 _note_. Athenæum Club, ii. 174. Athens, i. 605; iii. 91. Attwood, Thomas, i. 114 _note_. Augustenburg, Duke of, ii. 116, 580. Augustine, Saint, i. 117, 161, 207 _note 2; ii. 544. d'Aumale, Duc, ii. 190. Austin, Charles, i. 229; iii. 464. Australia, convict transportation to, i. 359 _and note_. Austria:-- Alliance with, Gladstone's view of, i. 546. Berlin memorandum, ii. 549. Berlin treaty obligation, attitude towards (1880), iii. 9. Black Sea provisions of Treaty of Paris disapproved by, ii. 350. Bosnia and Herzegovina transferred to, ii. 576; iii. 82. Confusion in policy of, ii. 120. Danubian provinces, quasi-independence of, opposed by, ii. 3. Eastern question, attitude towards, ii. 549, 571. Egyptian question, attitude towards, iii. 80, 82. Excessive expenditure, effects of, ii. 53. France, peace with, Lord Elcho's motion on, ii. 19 _note 2_ expects aid from, ii. 337; alliance sought by (1870), ii. 323; efforts to avert Franco-Prussian war, ii. 326; neutrality during the war, ii. 344. Ionian Islands despatch, attitude towards, i. 601. Italy, tyranny in and war with, i. 390-402, 618, 620 _note 3_; ii. 6 _et seq._, 641. Midlothian references to, iii. 8. Prussia--attitude of, i. 489; war with, ii. 115, 210 _note_, 214. Russia--policy towards, i. 488; hostility of, ii. 4. Sadowa, defeat at, ii. 115. Slowness of, ii. 4. Tariff negotiations with, i. 267. Ayrton, A. S., ii. 460-461, 463-464, 651. d'Azeglio, ii. 17. Bach's passion music, ii. 582. Bacon, Lord, cited, ii. 30. Badeley, ----, i. 380 _note 2_. Bagehot, W., ii. 62. Baker, Sir Samuel, iii. 145 _note 2_, 161. Balfour, A. J., Gladstone's communications with, on Irish situation, iii. 259, 284; Irish secretary, iii. 374; on Irish rents, iii. 374; compared to Halifax, iii. 378; Irish administration of, iii. 378-379; Mitchelstown, iii. 381-382; on adverse bye-elections, iii. 427; defends Irish policy at Newcastle, i. 428; replies to Gladstone, iii. 490; moves vote of censure on Irish administration, iii. 501; tribute to Gladstone, iii. 510, 530. Ball, Dr., ii. 264, 269. Ballot, Gladstone's opposition to (1833), i. 99, 106; his later views (1870-71), ii. 367-368; recommended by committee, ii. 367; government bill (1870), ii. 368-369; results of, ii. 370. Balmoral, Gladstone's visits to, ii. 97-106; Queen's fondness for, ii. 426. Bangor, bishopric of, i. 260 _note 1_. Bank Charter Act (1833), iii. 300. ---- of England, Gladstone in conflict with, i. 518-519, 650-651. Bankruptcy bill (1883), iii. 112. Banks, abolition of private notes of, desired by Gladstone, ii. 650-651. _Baptist_, Chamberlain's article in, iii. 367 _and note 2_. Baring, Bingham, ii. 534. ---- Sir E., administration of, iii. 119; advises abandonment of Soudan, iii. 147; agrees on fitness of Gordon for the work, iii. 149; warns Granville of difficulties, iii. 149, 151; telegram to, approved by Gladstone, iii. 150; procures nomination of Gordon as governor-general of Soudan for evacuation, iii. 152; gives him an executive mission, iii. 153; Gordon's request to, regarding Zobeir, iii. 155; supports request, iii. 157; forbids Gordon's advance to Equatoria, iii. 162; advises immediate preparations for relief of Gordon, iii. 163; position of, iii. 179; advises abandonment of Khartoum expedition, iii. 180. ---- Sir Francis, Macaulay and Gladstone contrasted by, i. 192-193; in whig opposition, i. 420 _and note 1_; estimate of the coalition, i. 449-450 _and note 1_; refuses to succeed Gladstone, i. 539. ---- T., i. 417. Barker, Mr., i. 341, 345. Barrow, ii. 536; iii. 467 _note_. Bassetlaw election (1890), iii. 452. Bath, Lord, ii. 617. Bathurst, Lord, i. 142 _note_. Baxter, W. E., ii. 463 _note_. Beach, Sir M. Hicks, colonial secretary, iii. 26; negotiations with Hartington on Franchise bill, iii. 134, 136; moves amendment on budget (1885), iii. 200, 206; views on Spencer's Irish policy, iii. 213; in debate on the address, iii. 285; gives notice regarding Irish bill, iii. 287; on Collings' amendment, iii. 288; on suggestion of withdrawal of Home Rule bill after second reading, iii. 334; speech on night of the division, iii. 337-338; Irish secretary (1886), iii. 362; denounces Parnell's bill, iii. 369; repudiates policy of blackmail, iii. 369, 373; retires from secretaryship, iii. 374. Beaconsfield, Earl of (Benjamin Disraeli):-- _Chronology_--Views on slavery, i. 104-105; Gladstone's first meeting with, i. 122; on free trade, i. 265; on Gladstone's Maynooth resignation, i. 279; taunts Peel with inconsistency, i. 286; on Peel's party relations, i. 289; young England group of, i. 304-305; motion on agricultural distress (1850), i. 354; supported by Gladstone, i. 354-356; on Cobden, i. 352; view of the colonies, i. 361; Don Pacifico debate, i. 368-369; Peel's forecast regarding, i. 374; on Ecclesiastical Titles bill, i. 414; in Derby's cabinet (1852), i. 416; on protection (1852), i. 425, 428; Aylesbury speeches, i. 428-429, 452; combination of, with Palmerston suggested, i. 431; attitude towards Peel, i. 432; on free trade, i. 432; Herbert's speech against, i. 433, 435 _and note_; budget of (1852), i. 435-440, 459; defeat of, on house duty (1852), iii. 203 _note 2_; acceptance of defeat, i. 441-442; remark on coalition government, i. 446; correspondence with Gladstone on valuation of furniture, i. 457-458; opposes Gladstone's attempted operation on national debt, i. 472-473; on Oxford reform, i. 507-508; willing to yield leadership of Commons to Palmerston, i. 525; views on Derby's failure to form a ministry, i. 527-528; leadership of Commons by, discussed, i. 552, 555; overtures to Genl. Peel, i. 555; Derby's relations with, i. 555, 561; conversant of Derby's communications with Gladstone, i. 559; on Lewis' budget, i. 560, 561; denounces China war, i. 564; on ministerial blundering as occasion for international quarrel, i. 576; animosity against, i. 581; attitude towards Graham, i. 584, 587; Herbert's alleged attitude towards, i. 585; letter to Gladstone, i. 586; conversation with Vitzthum, i. 591 _note_; remark to Wilberforce regarding Gladstone, i. 591 _note_; schemes of, regarding government of India, i. 592; Ionian schemes attributed to, i. 613; opposes union of the Principalities, ii. 4; Gladstone's renewed conflicts with, ii. 19; on Gladstone's efforts for economy, ii. 42; on excessive expenditure, ii. 48; estimate of financial statements of, ii. 55; on Danish question, ii. 118-120; on Gladstone's franchise pronouncement, ii. 127; on franchise (1859), ii. 200; taunts Gladstone on Oxford speech, ii. 203; on Reform bill (1866), ii. 205; position in Derby government (1866), ii. 211; Reform bill of 1867, ii. 223-236; thirteen resolutions, iii. 300 _note 4_; cabinet divisions of, iii. 175; proposals for Ireland, ii. 242; becomes premier, ii. 244; on Irish church question, ii. 247; on the bill, ii. 264, 265 _and note_, 274, 275, 280; dissolves, ii. 248; resigns, ii. 252; on Irish Land bill, ii. 295; taunts Gladstone on Irish policy, ii. 297; on Franco-Prussian question, ii. 329, 335; on crown prerogative, ii. 864; watchfulness during 1872, ii. 390; speech at Manchester, ii. 390; strikes imperialist note, ii. 391; on _Alabama_ case, ii. 401, 406, 407; Irish University question, ii. 435, 414; action during ministerial crisis, ii. 447-450, 452-456; Brand's view of position of, ii. 456; letter at Bath election, ii. 475; on Gladstone's manifesto, ii. 488; counter manifesto, ii. 488-489; on the dissolution (1874), ii, 496; letters from, on his wife's illness and death, ii. 546-547; refuses adherence to the Berlin memorandum, ii. 549; created Earl of Beaconsfield, ii. 550; speech at Lord Mayor's feast, ii. 558; at Berlin Congress, ii. 575, 577; attack on Gladstone's eastern policy, ii. 579; turn of popular feeling against, ii. 594; election address (1880), ii. 605-606; reception of defeat (1880), ii. 612; _Daily Telegraph_ inspired by, ii. 622; on mediocrity in cabinets, iii. 3; apprehensions on Ireland, iii. 47; peers created by, ii. 429 _and note_; death of--tribute from Gladstone, iii. 89. Deterioration in public life due to, iii. 475. Eminence of, iii. 89. Estimate of, ii. 245; iii. 539. Gladstone's estimate of, i. 356; Gladstone's antipathy to, i. 429, 432, 435, 436, 508; contrasted with Gladstone, ii. 392, 561. Judaism of, ii. 552-553, 558; iii. 475-476. Novels of, i. 588. Penetration of, ii. 122, 392; iii. 539. Parliamentary courage of, i. 188; debating method of, ii. 189; parliamentary wit of, iii. 473. Turkish sympathies of, ii. 349, 558, 563. Otherwise mentioned, i. 424, 433, 437, 624, 631; ii. 85 _note 1_, 100, 187, 499, 501, 620; iii. 276, 465. Beard, C, ii. 544. Beatrice, Princess, ii. 96. Beaufort, Duke of, on coalition with Peelites, i. 562. Bedford, Duke of, ii. 229; iii. 241. Beer duty, ii. 651; iii. 7, 187, 200. Bekker, Dr., ii. 99. Belgium:-- Bismarck's threat to, ii. 330. Franco-Prussian treaty regarding, ii. 340. Neutrality of, guaranteed (1870), ii. 341, 580. Severance of, from Holland, ii. 2. Benedetti, ii. 330-331, 333 _note_, 340. Bennett, W. J. E., i. 380 _note 2_. Benson, Archbishop, iii. 96, 105, 131, 460. Bentham, Jeremy, i. 82, 144, 156, 200; ii. 60. Bentinck, Lord George, quarrel with Gladstone, i. 301-302; protectionist position of, i. 352; iii. 465; on Irish University bill, ii. 444; otherwise mentioned, i. 294, 296, 350, 416, 430, 437 _and note_. Berber, Gordon's arrival at, iii. 155; Gordon shows Khedive's firman at, iii. 160; route by, impossible for relieving force, iii. 163; fall of, iii. 164; reconnaissance towards, iii. 165; railway from Suakin to, iii. 178. Beresford, Lord, required to support Roman Catholic Relief bill, ii. 649. ---- Major, relations with Disraeli, i. 369; views on the Peelites, i. 418. Berlin congress (1878), ii. 575, 577; iii. 82. ---- memorandum (1876), ii. 549. Berlin treaty (1878), ii. 575-576; iii. 82, 522; enforcement of, attempted (1880), iii. 8-10. Bernard, Mountague, i. 628; ii. 401. Berryer, M., ii. 140 _and note_, 221. Bessarabia, ii. 574 _and note 2_, 577. Bessborough, Lord, presides over Irish Land Commission, iii. 54, 56; otherwise mentioned, ii. 274, 292, 503. Bethell, Sir R., _see_ Westbury. Beugnot's _Chute du Paganisme_, iii. 387. Biarritz, Gladstone's visit to, (1891-1892), iii. 463 _et seq._; (1893), iii. 504, 508. Biblical passages on special occasions, i. 201; biblical studies, iii. 415-416, 421, 544. Biggar, J. G., iii. 53. Biggar, family settlement in, i. 9 _note_. Binney, T., ii. 134. Birmingham:-- Bright celebration at, iii. 111. Gladstone's visit to (1877), ii. 570; Gladstone's speech at (1888), iii. 387-389. Biscoe, F., i. 50, 64, 80. Bismarck, Prince, Napoleon III. in collision with, ii. 5; rise of, ii. 114; French diplomatic overtures reported by, ii. 319; views on Belgium and Holland, iii. 320; scorn for France, ii. 320; hopeful of peace, ii. 322; anxious for war with France, ii. 323-324, 329, 330-333, 335 _note 1_; complaint against England, ii. 331; condensed telegram incident, ii. 332-333; on Franco-Prussian agreement regarding Belgium, ii. 340; agrees to arrangement for neutrality of Belgium, ii. 341; understanding with Russia regarding Black Sea, ii. 350; interviews with Odo Russell, ii. 352-354; estimate of Russian diplomacy, ii. 353 _note_; on Egyptian question, iii. 79, 80, 89; French suspicion of (1882), iii. 82; Gladstone's annoyance with, iii. 121; antipathy towards England, i. 122; otherwise mentioned, ii. 356, 492; iii. 235. Blachford, Lord (Frederick Rogers), i. 54, 59, 307; ii. 171-172. Blackburn, Lord, ii. 383. Blackheath, Gladstone's speech at (1871), ii. 380-381; speech on Bulgarian atrocities (1876), ii. 552, 554. Black Sea:-- Neutralisation of (1856), i. 550. Russian claims in (1870), ii. 349-356, 398, 400. Blakesley, J. W., i. 135. Blanc, Louis, cited, ii. 79. Blantyre, Lady, ii. 95. de Blignières, iii. 119. Blomfield, Bishop, i. 161, 175, 274. ---- Captain, i. 607. Board of Trade:-- Cobden offered vice-presidency of (1846), i. 244. Functions of, formerly, i. 240 _note_. Gladstone vice-president of, i. 240-243, 250; his views on, i. 243-245. Boccaccio, i. 117. Boers, _see under_ Africa, South. Bohn, H. G., ii. 476. Bonham, F. R., i. 285. Boniface VIII., Pope, ii. 516. Bonn Conference, iii. 422. Boord, T. W., ii. 490. Booth, General, ii. 530. Borough Franchise bill (1864), ii. 125-131. Bosnia:-- Austrian acquisition of, ii. 576, iii. 82. Revolt in, 548, 567. Bossuet, i. 134, 159, 382-383; ii. 518; Gladstone compared with, i. 382-383; denounced by de Maistre, ii. 518. Bournemouth, iii. 526. Bouverie, E. P., ii. 444 _note_. Bowen, Lady, i. 607. Bowen, Lord-Justice, ii. 469, 470. Boycotting, _see under_ Ireland. Bradlaugh, opinions of, iii. 11; claims to affirm, iii. 12 _and note_; to take the oath, iii. 13; hostility to, iii. 13-14, 465; elected again (1885), iii. 20; carries an affirmation law, iii. 20-21. Braemar, Gladstone's visit to (1892), iii. 493. Braila, Sir Peter, i. 616. Bramwell, Baron, ii. 383, 469. Brancker, T., i. 61-62. Brand, President, messages from, on South African situation, iii, 32-34, 39; on Transvaal commission, iii. 41. ---- H. B. W., _see_ Hampden. Brandreth, W. F., i. 111. Brasseur, M., ii. 378. Brassey, Sir Thomas and Lady, iii. 217. Braybrooke, Lord, i. 223. Brazil, _Alabama_ case, ii. 405, 412. Brewster, Sir D., ii. 464. Bright, John:-- _Chronology_--Gladstone's first meeting with, i. 257; elected for Durham, i. 257 _note_; _Life of Cobden_ submitted to, i. 282 _note_; on Disraeli's agricultural distress motion, i. 354; Palmerston's view of, i. 367; Don Pacifico debate, i. 368; estimate of Graham, i. 408; on papal aggression question, i. 408, 410; letter on the Crimean war, i. 494 _and note 3_; on exclusion of dissenters from universities, i. 505; Peelites sit with, after resignation from Palmerston cabinet, i. 539 _and note_; unpopularity of, i. 542, 548; on Crimean war, i. 546; ii. 548, 574; view of the eastern question, i. 547; repulsed at election (1857), i. 564; return to parliament (1858), i. 574; letter to Gladstone, i. 578; on Indian government, i. 593; on the 'moral sense and honest feeling of the House,' i. 625, 632; unpopularity of, in Oxford, i. 630; suggests commercial treaty with France, ii. 20; on Paper Duties bill, ii. 34 _note_, 35; attacks fortifications scheme, ii. 47; Gladstone's protest against being classed with, ii. 49; iii. 182; letter against American war with England, ii. 75; speech on American civil war, ii. 86; Reform bill of 1858, ii. 199, 201; remarks on death of Cobden, ii. 143; Palmerston's remark on class attacks of, ii. 156; views on Reform bill of 1866, ii. 201; advises dissolution, ii. 208; Reform campaign of 1866, ii. 227; disapproved by Gladstone, ii. 223; induced to join Gladstone's cabinet (1868), ii. 254; president of board of trade, ii. 644; on Irish Church bill, ii. 264; views on Irish land question, ii. 282, 290-291, 294; iii. 55; on Education bill, ii. 305, 309-310; on civil service reform, ii. 315; on Belgian neutrality guarantee, ii. 342; on annexation of Alsace and Lorraine, ii. 347; on great thinkers, ii. 366; resignation (1870), ii. 381 _note_, 644, 650; at Hawarden (1871), ii. 381-382; succeeds Childers in the duchy, ii. 463 _note_; on the Greenwich seat question, ii. 471; chancellor of the duchy (1873), ii. 645; at Hawarden (1873), ii. 474; on Gladstone's retirement, ii. 505; radical attitude towards, ii. 630; chancellor of the duchy (1880), ii. 654; on the Bradlaugh question, iii. 12, 15; on Transvaal affairs, iii. 35, 36, _note 1_; on suspension of Habeas Corpus Act in Ireland, iii. 50; resigns on bombardment of Alexandria, iii. 83, 90; explanation in parliament, iii. 85; Birmingham speech on 'Irish rebels,' iii. 111-112; on Gladstone's view of Gordon's mission, iii. 177; at Spencer banquet, iii. 214; against home rule, iii. 291 _note_, 294; again declines to join cabinet, iii. 303 _note_; views on exclusion of Irish members from Westminster, iii. 307, 326-327; disapproves Land bill, iii. 326-327; conversation with Gladstone on Home Rule and Land bills, iii. 326; letter to Gladstone, iii. 327; long demur regarding vote on second reading, iii. 329; letter to dissentients' meeting, iii. 336; electioneering against the bill, iii. 342. Co-operation, faculty for, i. 189. Forster's estimate of, ii. 123. Gladstone's appreciation of, ii. 417, 418, 462; iii. 85, 349; his appreciation of Gladstone, ii. 177-178, 233-234, 505; Gladstone's letters to, ii. 462, 478, 599; iii. 84, 138. Granville's estimate of, ii. 283. Influence of, iii. 326, 336, 342. Linguistic error of, iii. 476; otherwise mentioned, i. 423, 447, 626 _note 2_, 631, 632; ii. 128, 202, 203, 205, 224, 226, 230, 235, 260, 446, 481, 485, 495, 498, 504, 563, 600, 617; iii. 13, 100, 288, 311. Brodie, Sir B., i. 300, 455. Broglie, Duc de, ii. 356. Brontë, Charlotte, ii. 538. Brooks, Mr., i. 441. Brougham, Lord, loses Liverpool election, i. 20; Wetherell on, i. 71; estimates of, i. 75, 117, 133, 149; on slave-apprenticeship system, i. 146; view of social reform, i. 156; estimate of Gladstone, i. 264; on Conspiracy bill, i. 575; oratory of, i. 75, 149; ii. 589; otherwise mentioned, ii. 28, 181. Broughton, Lord, i. 264, 288 _note_. Brown, Baldwin, ii. 134. Browne, Bp. Harold, iii. 95, 96 _note_. Browning, Robert, iii. 417. Bruce, Sir F. W. A., ii. 18 _note_. ---- Mrs., ii. 99, 103. ---- Lady Augusta, ii. 100-103. ---- Lord Ernest, i. 242. ---- F., i. 59 _note_. ---- Henry Austin, _see_ Aberdare. ---- J., _see_ Elgin, Earl of. Brunnow, Baron, on war with Turkey, i. 479; in disfavour, i. 486 _and note_; on blunders, i. 576; Gladstone desirous of an interview with, ii. 350-351. Bryce, James, iii. 495 _note_, 497 _note 1_. Buccleuch, Duke of, i. 374; ii. 584, 588. Buckingham, Duke of, i. 242-243, 254. Budgets:-- Disraeli's (1852), i. 435-440, 459. Gladstone's-- his keenness regarding, ii. 55; (1853), i. 460-472, 646-648; iii. 537; (1854), i. 514-515; (1859), ii. 19; (1860), i. 474; ii. 24 _et seq._, 635; (1861), ii. 38-39; (1863), ii. 66, 67; (1866), ii. 68, 200; (1880), iii. 7; (1885), iii. 187, 200. Goschen's (1887), iii. 385. Lewis' (1857), i. 559-562. Lowe's, ii. 373. Whigs', i. 459. Bulgaria:-- Atrocities in (1876), ii. 548, 553, 567. Division of, into northern and southern, ii. 576, 577 and _note 1_. Gladstone's first pamphlet on, ii. 552-554; second, ii. 560, 562. Resistance of, a breakwater to Europe, i. 477. _Bulgarian Horrors and the Question of the East, The_, ii. 552-554. Buller, C., i. 65. ---- Sir Redvers, cited, iii. 372. Bulteel, H. B., i. 58. Bulwer, _see_ Lytton. Bunsen, Gladstone's book approved by, i. 176; Gladstone's view of book by, i. 321; otherwise mentioned, i. 309 and _note 1_. Buol, Count, i. 602. Burgon, J. W., i. 503, 506. Burke, Sir B., ii. 184. ---- Edmund, Gladstone influenced by, i. 203, 208; attitude towards Turkey, i. 479 _note_; Gladstone's estimate of, iii. 280, 469; Macaulay's estimate of, iii. 280 _note_; citations from, in home rule debate, iii. 314; quoted, i. 25; ii. 51, 61, 366; otherwise mentioned, i. 265; ii. 295, 424; iii. 125. ---- T. H., murder of, iii. 67 _and note_, 68, 391 _note 1_, 392. Burne-Jones, Sir Edward, ii. 559. Burnett, Mr., i. 341; ii. 477. Burton, Sir E., cited, iii. 169 _note_. Bute, Lord, i. 293. Butler, Bishop, Gladstone's attitude towards, i. 161, 207 _note 2_; ii. 544; iii. 520-521; on over-great refinements, i. 210; on habit, iii. 464. Butt, Isaac, i. 503, Buxton, Sir T. F., i. 105, 145. Byron, i. 159. Cabinets:-- Angularities a cause of friction in, ii. 419. Authority of, Gladstone's views on, ii. 396. Committees in, Gladstone's view of, ii. 289. Consultation of, on succession to cabinet office, not necessary, iii. 101 _note_. Divisions in, iii. 175. Gladstone's (1868), efficiency of, ii. 255, 414-415; his estimates of colleagues, ii. 414, 417, 419, 421; his censure of defaulters, ii. 418-419; changes in, ii. 463 _note_; cabinet of 1880, ii. 653; of 1886, iii. 296 _note 2_; of 1892, iii. 495 _note_. Mediocrity in, iii. 3. Peel's view of government by, i. 300. Responsibility of members of, Gladstone's views on, iii. 113 _note_, 114. Caird, Dr., ii. 98. Cairnes, J. E., cited, ii. 70 _note_. Cairns, Lord, on Irish Church bill, ii. 270, 274-280; on Irish Land bill (1870), ii. 294. Cambridge:-- Dissenters' disabilities at, ii. 313 _note 1_. Famous sons of, iii. 476. Gladstone's early visit to, i. 11; visit in 1831, i. 80; in 1887, iii. 385; his solicitude regarding, iii. 486. ---- Duke of, i. 171; ii. 455; iii. 105, 150 _note_, 524. Cameron, Mr., i. 78. Campbell, Lord Chancellor, ii. 33, 37, 39, 635-636. Campbell-Bannerman, Sir H., Irish secretary (1884), ii. 654; war secretary (1886), iii. 297 _note_; war secretary (1892), iii. 495 _note_; on Home Rule bill committee of cabinet, iii. 497 _note 1_. Canada:-- American relations with, ii. 82, 86. Assembly in, Gladstone's speech on, i. 360 _and note 1_. Cession of, to United States suggested, ii. 401 _and note 2_. Commercial relations with, Gladstone's despatch on, i. 359. Constitution suspended (1838), i. 144, 641. Duty on corn from, lowered, i. 255 _note_. Ecclesiastical position in, ii. 161. Fishery questions of, adjusted (1871), ii. 405. Government of Canada bill (1840), i. 360 and _note 2_. Revolt of (1837), Molesworth's view of, i. 361 and _note 5_; Gladstone's opposition to indemnification of rebels in, i. 353 _note_. Irish constitution to approximate to, suggestions regarding, iii. 215, 317. Liberal policy towards, ii. 607. Cannes (1883), iii. 102-104; (1897), iii. 523; (1898), iii. 526. Canning, Lady, i. 139, 149. ---- Charles John, Earl, offered lordship of the treasury, i. 126; in parliament, i. 137; Russell's disapproval of, i. 536; on Peelites' refusal to join Palmerston, i. 535; death of, ii. 88; otherwise mentioned, i. 54, 140, 420 _and note 2_, 539; ii. 193, 194, 317. ---- George, views on slavery, i. 25; Gladstone's attitude towards, i. 25, 34, 38, 89, 208, 212; call at Eton, i. 34; attitude towards reform, i. 69, 70; Peel's reference to, i. 126; Peel contrasted with, i. 248; age of, on entering cabinet, i. 261; Palmerston a follower of, i. 367; chancellor and first lord (1827), ii. 463; wit of, iii. 473; Wellington's treatment of (1827), iii. 485; Turgot praised by, iii. 491; otherwise mentioned, i. 9-10, 20, 21, 298, 372, 419, 420 _note 2_; cited, ii. 394, 577, 589, 595; iii. 125, 465. ---- Stratford, _see_ Redcliffe. Cardwell, Lord, withdraws from Oxford election, i. 328-329; attitude of, towards liberals (1852), i. 419; Gladstone's budget submitted to, i. 464; favours dissolution, i. 467; Russell's disapproval of, i. 536; refuses to succeed Gladstone, i. 539; Gladstone's relations with, i. 551, 552, 559; on Paper Duties bill, ii. 31, 33, 37; against economy, ii. 94; estimate of Gladstone's position, ii. 171; the pope's estimate of, ii. 218; war secretary (1868), ii. 644; on Irish land question, ii. 283, 292; on civil service reform, ii. 315; on suggested Antwerp expedition, ii. 339; capacity of, ii. 359; army reforms of, ii. 359, 626-627; Gladstone's letter to, on qualifications for war office, ii. 649; unpopularity of, ii. 389-390; Gladstone's letter to, on quarrelsome colleagues, ii. 421; objects to reduction of estimates, ii. 483-484; peerage, ii. 497; otherwise mentioned, i. 405 _note_, 420, 560; ii. 221, 243, 376, 410, 462, 478, 503, 504, 602, 636. Carey, J., iii. 103. Carlingford, Lord (Chichester Fortescue), views of, and correspondence with, on Irish land question (1869-70), ii. 283, 288, 290-293; electoral defeat of (1874), ii. 491; Irish secretary (1868), ii. 644; president of board of trade (1870), ii. 644; president of council (1883), ii. 654; lord privy seal (1885), ii. 654; against home rule, iii. 291 _note_; otherwise mentioned, ii. 462, 504; iii. 50. Carlisle, Lord, i. 624. Carlow election (1891), iii. 458. Carlton club, Gladstone's membership of, i. 98; Gladstone insulted at, i. 441; Gladstone withdraws from, ii. 29. Carlyle, Thomas, on Gladstone's first book, i. 176 _note_; Gladstone contrasted with, i. 195; Gladstone attracted by, i. 219; estimate of Gladstone, ii. 229-230; supports Gladstone on the Bulgarian question, ii. 559; death of, iii. 98; Gladstone's estimate of, iii. 98-99, 425; otherwise mentioned, i. 329; ii. 534, 582. Carnarvon, 2nd Earl of, i. 75. ---- 4th Earl of, suggests Gladstone for Ionian Islands, i. 594; on Irish Church bill, ii. 262 _note 1_, 268, 271; resigns, ii. 574 _note 1_; on Transvaal annexation, iii. 25; address to House of Lords on Irish policy, iii. 211, 259; interview with Parnell, iii. 228-231; anxieties of, regarding National League, iii. 278; resigns, iii. 279, 280; otherwise mentioned, iii. 284, 287. Carteret, i. 367; ii. 428, 542 _note_. Castelcicala, i. 398, 399 _note 1_, 400. Catholic emancipation, _see_ Roman catholic. Cavagnari, iii. 151. Cavendish, i. 380 _note 2_. ---- Lord F., Gladstone's appreciation of, ii. 462; appointed lord of the treasury, ii. 463 _note_; appointed Irish secretary, ii. 654; iii. 66; murdered, i. 67, 391 _note 1_; Gladstone's tribute to, i. 69; otherwise mentioned, ii. 195, 212, 446, 563. ---- Lady F., iii. 69-70. ---- Lord Richard, ii. 232. Cavour, Count, interested in Gladstone's budget, i. 470; ii. 55; Gladstone's interview with (1859), i. 618; ii. 5; England a difficulty to, ii. 6; dealings with Napoleon iii., ii. 7; resigns, ii. 8; Manzoni's estimate of, ii. 11; development of aims of, ii. 15; remarks on Italian free trade, ii. 17; death of, ii. 17 and _note 3_; prediction of, regarding Prussia, ii. 114, 115; otherwise mentioned, i. 390, 401, 404, 480; ii. 13, 158, 356, 532; iii. 235, 475, 540. Cecil, Lord Robert, _see_ Salisbury. Cephalonia:-- Archbishop of, i. 603-604; ii. 532. Condition of (1858), i. 599-600, 603-604. Rising in (1848), i. 600, 603; Gladstone's despatch on, i. 620 _note 3_. Chaillé-Long, Colonel C., cited, iii. 169 _note_. Challemel-Lacour, iii. 105. Chalmers, Dr., Gladstone's estimate of, i. 59, 109-110, 170-171; views on church establishment, i. 169-171; otherwise mentioned, i. 137, 138. Chamberlain, Joseph, on Education Act (1872), ii. 308; supports the resolutions on Turkey, ii. 564; with Gladstone calling on Cardinal Newman, ii. 570 _note_; president of board of trade (1880), i. 240 _note_; ii. 630, 654; popularity of, with radicals, iii. 3; on Transvaal annexation, iii. 28-29; abstains from voting in Transvaal division, iii. 35; Argyll uneasy at speeches of, iii. 49; on suspension of Habeas Corpus Act in Ireland, iii. 50; communications with Parnell, in. 64; offers to yield Dilke his post, iii. 99; Gladstone's correspondence with the Queen regarding, iii. 100-101; views on liberty of speech for cabinet ministers, iii. 112-114; social programme of, iii. 173-174; on Crimes Act, iii. 192; suggests central board of local government for Ireland, iii. 193; opposes land purchase for Ireland, iii. 194-195; resigns, iii. 195; on conservative repudiation of Lord Spencer's policy, iii. 214-215; view of Gladstone's election address, iii. 220; Gladstone's conversation with, iii. 223-226 _and notes_; Gladstone's attitude towards (Sept. '85), iii. 222; antagonism to Hartington, iii. 233, 288; opposes home rule, iii. 233, 234; former nationalist leanings of, iii. 233; Russian and Austrian speech of June 17th, iii. 233-234; visit to Hawarden, iii. 247; liberal losses attributed to, iii. 249; on liberal losses at the elections, iii. 251; agrarian policy of, iii. 250, 288; advises leaving Parnell to Conservatives, iii. 267; Parnell's attitude towards, iii. 275; alleged desire for Irish secretaryship, iii. 291; joins the cabinet, iii. 294-295; local government board, iii. 297 _note_; objections to proposed Home Rule bill, iii. 302; resigns, iii. 302-303; propounds federation views, iii. 316-317, 327, 339; opposed to Land bill, iii. 332; meeting of dissentients in Committee, iii. 335-337; no terrors for, in dissolution, iii. 339; Gladstone's comments on, to Acton, iii. 355; speech at Birmingham, iii. 364, 365, 367; Gladstone's comments on position of, iii. 366; at round table conference, iii. 364 _note_, 367; article in _Baptist_, iii. 367 _and note 2_; gives up conference, iii. 368; Gladstone's conversation with (Ap. '87), iii. 385; Gladstone's reply to, on Home Rule bill (May '93), iii. 499-500; Gladstone's letters to, iii. 92, 133; otherwise mentioned, iii. 186, 191, 198, 264, 328. Chancery commission, ii. 650. Chandos, Lord, i. 628, 630. Chantrey, Sir F., i. 112. _Chapter of Autobiography_, publication of, ii. 249-250. Charities and income-tax, ii. 65-66. Charity, sums spent in, iii. 419-420. Charles I., King, iii. 480-481. Chartism, i. 276, 358. Chatham, Lord, i. 223 _and note 1_, 367, 372; iii. 178. Chester, speech at, on colonial policy (1855), i. 363. Chevalier, Michel, Gladstone's letters to, ii. 336, 343. Childers, H. C. E., on estimates (1865), ii. 140; on civil service reform, ii. 315; on Russia's Black Sea announcement, ii. 351; retirement of (1873), ii. 463 _note_; on the Greenwich seat question, ii. 472 _note_; suggested for war office, ii. 625, 627; first lord of admiralty (1868), ii. 644; resigns (1871), ii. 645; chancellor of the duchy (1872), ii. 645; retires (1873), ii. 645; war secretary (1880), ii. 654; Colley's acknowledgments to, iii. 35 _note_; efficiency of, in Egyptian campaign (1882), iii. 83 _note_; chancellor of exchequer (1882), iii. 99, 654; home rule views of, iii. 235, 291 _note_; home secretary (1886), iii. 296 _note 2_, 297 _note_; otherwise mentioned, ii. 339, 370 _note 1_, 376; iii. 187. Chillingworth, i. 220. Chiltern Hundreds, i. 288 _note_. China:-- Opium question (1840), i. 225-226; Gladstone's attitude towards, i. 226-227, 229, 239, 242, 244. Tai-ping rising in, suppressed by Gordon, iii. 149 _note 3_. War with (1857), i. 563-564; (1859-60), ii. 18 _and note_, 30, 38. China, collection of, ii. 213, 523 _and note_. Chios, Archbishop of, ii. 532. Christianity, Acton on, iii. 360-361. Christopher, R.A., i. 536. Church, Dean, _Oxford Movement_ by, i. 163 _note 1_, 168 _note 2_; position of, at Oxford (1847), i. 334-335; estimate of Gladstone, ii. 155, 177; appointed to St. Paul's by Gladstone, ii. 433; otherwise mentioned, ii. 430, 860; iii. 69-70, 96, 97. _Church and State_ (Coleridge), i. 167. _Church Principles_, i. 181, 182, 224. Churches:-- Anglican-- Antagonism of, to liberal party, ii. 307. Catholic revival in, nature of, i. 159. Clerical calling, Gladstone's leanings to, i. 81-82, 323-324, 382, 383, 635-641. Condition of (1831-1840), i. 153. Convocation, revival of, ii. 162-163. Crisis in (1882), iii. 97. Disestablishment-- Gladstone's speech against (1873), ii. 457-458 _and note_; his attitude towards (1874), ii. 501-502, iii. 540; his views on (1891), iii. 471; Chamberlain's view of, iii. 225. Evangelical party in, social reforms effected by, i. 156, 163; Gladstone brought up in, i. 159, 208; Tractarians in alliance with, i. 167; anti-slavery work of, i. 200 _note_. Gladstone's position regarding, iii. 541-543. Gorham case, i. 316, 378-381, 632. Guizot's views on, ii. 538. Ireland, in, _see under_ Ireland. Manning's views on outlook for (1846), i. 325. Orders in, iii. 521. Palmer's book on, i. 162, 167, 168 _note 1_. Poetry in, iii. 484. Preferments in, Gladstone's case with, ii. 430-433. Rates, abolition of, ii. 161. Ritualism in, ii. 501, 514. Roman _versus_, Gladstone's views on, i. 317-318, 321. State and-- Gladstone's views on, (1846), i. 324-326; (1857), i. 570; (1865), ii. 159-163; growth of ideas on, i. 182-183; views modified by Lady Hewley case, i. 322; supremacy question, i. 381; Gladstone's view of concessions, ii. 159; conversation at Biarritz, iii. 470-471. _State in its Relation with the Church, The_ (1838), i. 172, 175. Welsh disestablishment question, Chamberlain's article on, iii. 367 _and note 2_; difficulty of, iii. 471; advance of (1892-94), iii. 495. Distinction of, from state, in general view, i. 155. Gladstone's interest in, i. 152; ii. 507. Nature of, Gladstone's ideas regarding, i. 87-88, 157-159. Roman:-- Anglican _versus_, Gladstone's views on, i. 317-318, 321. Infallibility dogma of, ii. 378, 511-512, 515, 516, 520. Jansenists in, i. 325. Jesuits of, ii. 516. Neapolitan tyranny connected with, i. 397. Old Catholic dissenters from, ii. 511, 513. Papal aggression question (1851), i. 408; views on, i. 405-410, 414, 415 _and note_. Parnell leadership denounced by, iii. 448-449. Proselytising of, ii. 188, 514. Religion spoiling morality in, ii. 185. Secession to, by Newman, i. 317; by Miss Helen Gladstone, i. 318; by Hope and Manning, i. 385-387; second great tide of, i. 378; Gladstone's views on, i. 312, 321; Manning's views on, i. 317. Syllabus (1864)-- importance of, ii. 508; influence of, on Irish legislation, ii. 511; contents of, ii. 516; Gladstone's correspondence with Acton regarding, ii. 520. Temporal power, Gladstone's views on, i. 403, 404; ii. 512-513, 519; iii. 414; Vatican decrees in relation to, ii. 508, 517, 519. Ultramontanes _v._ liberals, ii. 508-509, 511-513; basis of ultra-montanism, ii. 518. Vatican decrees (1870), ii. 502, 509 _et seq._; in relation to temporal power, ii. 508, 517, 519. Scottish, establishment question, iii. 248, 471. Churchill, Lady, ii. 98, 102, 104. ---- Lord Randolph, party of, iii. 2, 89, 108 _note_; on Dutch sentiment in South Africa, iii. 42 _note 2_; on franchise extension in Ireland, iii. 142; on Crimes Act, iii. 188-189; revolt of, against 'the old gang,' iii. 200-201; on Irish affairs, iii. 213, 278, 280; on tory prospects after the defeat, iii. 289; on Gladstone's chances of forming a government (1886), iii. 297; on 'reconstruction' of Home Rule bill, iii. 335; chancellor of exchequer, iii. 362; resignation, iii. 363, 365-366; Ulster plan of campaign encouraged by, iii. 371 _note_; speaks on budget (1887), iii. 385; on imprisonment of Irish members, iii. 426; on Gladstone's reply to Balfour, iii. 502. Churton, E., i. 111. Civil Service reform, i. 509-512, 649-650; ii. 314-315. Clanricarde, Captain, i. 608. Claremont, i. 242, 243. Clarendon, Earl of, addresses House of Lords, on Irish policy (1850), iii. 211 _note_; attitude towards Gladstone's budget, i. 466, 467; on British policy preceding Crimean war, i. 481, 485; efforts for peace, i. 487; Aberdeen in conflict with, i. 495 _and note 3_; attitude towards ecumenical council, ii. 510, 512; satisfies Aberdeen, i. 535; condemns Peelites' resignation, i. 542; on Garibaldi's departure, ii. 111; foreign secretary (1865), ii. 153 _note_; the Pope's estimate of, ii. 218; in Rome, ii. 222; foreign secretary (1868), ii. 254, 644; on civil service reform, ii. 315; foreign policy of, ii. 317-318; correspondence on reduction of armaments, ii. 321-322; _Alabama_ case, ii. 397, 399; death of (1870), ii. 324, 644; Gladstone's appreciation of, ii. 414, 417; iii. 490; Granville's estimate of, ii. 417; otherwise mentioned, i. 481 _note_, 491, 493, 526, 532, 624, 648; ii. 11, 106, 189, 210, 260, 270, 352, 512. Clark, Sir Andrew, ii. 279, 423, 446, 462, 498, 504, 563; iii. 101, 102, 159 _note_, 216, 387, 520. Clarke, Mr., i. 111. Classical education, Gladstone's view of, ii. 312, 646-649. Clémenceau, M., iii. 103. Clerk, Sir G., i. 420. Clifford, W. K., ii. 524. Closure, _see under_ Parliament. Clough, Arthur H., i. 329. Clowes, Mr., ii. 552. Clumber, i. 95, 121; ii. 144. Clyde, Lord, ii. 359. Coalition government (1853-59), i. 443 _et seq._; cabinet harmony in, i. 495; Crimean war's effect on, i. 484, 495, 521. Coalitions, views on, i. 533. Cobbett, i. 114; ii. 22. Cobden, Richard:-- _Chronology_-- free-trade advocacy of, i. 249, 251; Peel's eulogium on, i. 291-293, 295, 296; views on colonial government, i. 362; Don Pacifico debate, i. 368; on Crimean war, ii. 548; unpopularity of, i. 542, 548, 630; view of the eastern question, i. 547; on proceedings in China, i. 563; repulsed at election (1857), i. 564; declines to join Palmerston's government, i. 626; visit to Hawarden, ii. 18, 20; French treaty negotiations, ii. 20-21, 46, 77 _note 3_; experience on expenditure committees, ii. 46; Gladstone's protest against being classed with, ii. 49; iii. 182; writes against American war with England, ii. 75; on Danish question, ii. 113, 119; death of, ii. 143. Co-operation, faculty for, i. 189. Disraeli on, i. 352. Forster's estimate of, ii. 123. Gladstone's estimate of, i. 239, 249, 291, 292, 296 _note_; ii. 143, 213; Gladstone's confidence in, i. 562. Graham's estimate of, i. 296. _Life_ of, cited, 282 _and note_, 291 _note 1_. Originality of, ii. 59, 122; iii. 539. Palmerston's view of, i. 367. Stanley's estimate of, i. 239. Otherwise mentioned, i. 232, 244, 278, 423, 447; ii. 13, 23, 37, 58, 120, 156, 189; iii. 431. ---- Club:-- Chamberlain's speech at dinner of (1883), iii. 112-113. Gladstone's eulogy of Cobden at dinner of (1886), ii. 213. Cockburn, Chief Justice, ii. 384, 395, 412. Coercion, _see under_ Ireland. Colborne, Capt., i. 228. Cole, Mr., i. 59 _note_, 135. Colenso, Bishop, i. 316; ii. 168-169, 313. Coleridge, S. T., i. 159, 167, 176 _note._ ---- Lord Chief Justice, recommends Northcote to Gladstone, i. 333 _note 1_; uneasy regarding Gladstone's views, i. 628; introduces bill for removing tests, ii. 313; made lord chief justice, ii. 463 _note_, 470; on the Greenwich seat question, ii. 469 _and note_; _Times_ libel action tried before, iii. 394. Colley, Sir George, iii. 31 _and note 1_, 34-38, 42. Collier, Jeremy, cited, iii. 467. ---- Sir Robert, ii. 383-386. Collings, Jesse, iii. 288. Collins, i. 169. Colonial Society, ii. 401 _note 2_. Colonies:-- Church in, ii. 168-169. Disraeli's views on, i. 361; ii. 606; speech on (1872), ii. 391. Gladstone's views on, i. 359-361, 363-364, 645. Home rule (Irish), attitude towards, iii. 323. Military expenditure for, i. 362 _and note 1_; reduction of troops in (1870), ii. 360 and _note_, 374. Protection adopted by, against England, ii. 132. Combes, M., iii. 113 _note_. Commercial treaties-- French, ii. 20-21, 46; various (1866), ii. 200. Companies, Gladstone's bill for regulation of, i. 268. Concert of Europe, Gladstone's view of, ii. 560, 564, 573, 575; iii. 80, 82. Condé, cited, i. 188. Congo debate (1883), iii. 110. 'Conservative,' adoption of name of, i. 422. Conservative party:-- Changes in (1870-1885), iii. 177. Church the rallying point of, i. 154. Closure by guillotine introduced by, iii. 377. Coercion-- repudiated by, iii. 212-214, 257; revival of, a last resort for, iii. 278-279, 285; proposed by, iii. 287; Salisbury's 'twenty years' proposal, iii. 317. Electoral losses of (1886-1890), iii. 427. Factions in, i. 143. Fourth party among, iii. 2, 89, 108 _note_. Franchise extension not inimical to, iii. 129. Gladstone's early connection with, i. 245 _note_; his views on (1885), iii. 221. Ireland, traditional policy towards, iii. 242-243. Irish alliance with, iii. 188-190, 200, 203, 258, 260, 269-271, 274, 276, 284. Liberal aid to, on important measures, iii. 257-258; liberal seceders' union with, iii. 350. Nationalist support of, at general election (1885), iii. 244-245. O'Connell, attitude towards, i. 129, 138. Lord Spencer's policy, and, iii. 262. Tory democracy, iii. 173, 201, 240-241. Whig seceders' fusion with, i. 139. Consistency, Gladstone's view of, i. 211-212. Conspiracy to Murder bill, i. 574-576. Constantinople:-- Meeting of the Powers at (1870), ii. 559. Patriarch of, ii. 532. Convocation, revival of, ii. 162-163. Conway, General, iii. 181. Copyright, Gladstone's views on, ii. 59, 541. Cordite vote, iii. 177 _and note_. Corfu:-- British retention of, advised, i. 601, 619-620. Gladstone's arrival at, i. 602; house at, i. 613. Petition drawn up by, i. 615. University at, i. 605. Corn Laws:-- Gladstone's support of, i. 106, 114, 231-232, 249; modification of views, i. 252-254, 260-262, 264. Graham's defence of, i. 114. Repeal of-- Peel's policy regarding, i. 282-287, 290; results of, i. 426; liberal aid to tories for, iii. 257, 284. Correspondence in the Octagon, ii. 526-547. Corrie, Messrs., i. 9. Corry, H., i. 351 _note 1_, 420. Corrupt Practices bill (1883), i. 97 _and note 1_; iii. 110. Court gossip, Gladstone's view of, ii. 254. Cousin, Victor, i. 163; ii. 220-221. Coutts, Miss Burdett, ii. 168. Cowan, Sir J., ii. 609; iii. 517 _note 3_, 535 _note_. Cowley, Lord, ii. 28. Cowper, Lord, iii. 65, 324, 362. ---- William (Lord Mount-Temple), i. 234; ii. 154. Craik, Sir Henry, cited, ii. 302 _note_. Cranborne, Lord, _see_ Salisbury. Cranmer, Archbishop, iii. 466-467. Craven, Mrs., i. 320, 383. Crawford, R. W., ii. 207, 210, 233. Creighton, Bishop, ii. 535. Crimea, Catherine's seizure of, i. 478. Crimean war:-- Coalition government wrecked on, i. 484, 495, 521. Committee on, Roebuck's motion for, i. 521, 523, 537-539, 542. Course of, i. 494-495, 545-548. End of, i. 550. Gladstone's view of, i. 484, 492, 544-546, 652-653; Gladstone charged with 'starving,' i. 629. Ignorance of facts of, among politicians, i. 547. Illusions of, ii. 4. Income-tax renewal necessitated by, i. 474. Kinglake's book on, i. 480-481 _and note_. Napoleon III. strengthened by, ii. 4. Newcastle and Herbert, charges against, i. 651-652. Objects of, i. 545. Origin of, i. 478. Popular British opinion on, i. 489-490. Responsibilities for, i. 481. Turkish position after, ii. 548. Croke, Dr., iii. 449. Cromwell, ii. 287, 555; iii. 480. Crown:-- Critical wave against, ii. 425-426. Gladstone's attitude towards, ii. 423-427. Prerogative of, Gladstone charged with resorting to, ii. 364-365. Crown Princess, ii. 100, 472. Crowther, Rev. ----, i. 58-59. ---- ---- ii. 217. Cullen, Cardinal, opposes Irish University bill, ii. 434, 439-440, 443; Gladstone's meeting with (1877), ii. 571; mentioned, i. 397. Cumberland, Duke of, i. 127, 141, 279. Currie, Sir Donald, iii. 115, 517. Customs, articles liable to, in various years, ii. 25 _and note_. Cyprus:-- British acquisition of, ii. 607. Convention regarding, ii. 576, 578; iii. 522. Gladstone's Midlothian reference to, ii. 592; iii. 27-28. Seizure of, projected, ii. 573. _Daily News_, ii. 495, 625 _and note_. _Daily Telegraph_, ii. 622; iii. 430 _and note_. Dale, R. W., ii. 134-135, 304, 305, 570. Dalhousie, Lord, i. 350; iii. 303 _note_. Dalkeith, Lord, ii. 584, 612. Dalmeny, ii. 588, 609-610; iii. 239, 491. Dalrymple, Mr., iii. 248. Dante:-- Gladstone's appreciation of, i. 202, 207 _note 2_, 215, 223; iii. 423-424, 488, 550. Scartazzini on, iii. 387. Darbishire, Mr., ii. 136. Darfur, iii. 146, 149 _note 3_, 157. Daru, ii. 321-322. Darwin, ii. 536-537, 562. Davidson, Bishop, i. 498 _note 1_. Davis, Jefferson, ii. 72, 79-81. De Retz, iii. 255. De Tabley, Lord, ii. 193. December, important events in Gladstone's life in, ii. 256. Delane, Mr., i. 153, 624; ii. 270, 439, 552. Demerara, i. 22-24, 224. Democracy:-- Fair play a natural tendency of, iii. 308. Gladstone's feeling for, ii. 77; iii. 123, 125, 133, 203, 610-611; iii. 88; his efforts against besetting vice of, ii. 250-251; his faith in, i. 621, 650; iii. 173; his moulding of opinion of, iii. 537; their devotion to Gladstone, iii. 89, 90, 250, 330. Mazzini's work for, iii. 478. Oxford in relation to, ii. 35. Spendthrift tendency of, iii. 537. Denison, Bishop Edward, censure of Hampden opposed by, i. 161. ---- Archdeacon, Gorham case, i. 380 _note_ 2; withdraws support from Gladstone, i. 451; condemnation of, for heresy, i. 557; otherwise mentioned, i. 54, 71, 79, 98 _note_. ---- J. E. (Speaker), ii. 198. Denmark:-- Gladstone's cruise to (1883), iii. 115-117 (1894), iii. 517; tribute from, ii. 532. Schleswig-Holstein question, see _that title_. Deputations, i. 256. Derby, 14th Earl of, abolition, proposals of, i. 102, 105; advocates reform, i. 143; joins conservatives, i. 144; Brougham's estimate of, i. 149; resigns on Irish church question, i. 154; Peel's annoyance with, i. 234; on tariff question, i. 263; Gladstone's relations with, i. 280; attitude towards repeal, i. 283; resigns, i. 285; on Peel's eulogium of Cobden, i. 291-292; New Zealand question, i. 298; on quarrel between Gladstone and Bentinck, i. 301-302; Graham's attitude towards, i. 368; invites Gladstone to enter the government, i. 393, 406; Gladstone declines, i. 407; views on papal aggression question, i. 406; reply to Lord Howick in sugar duties' debate, i. 644; cabinet of three men and a half (1852), i. 416; supported by the Peelites, i. 424, 428; attitude towards free trade, i. 425, 429; Oxford commission, i. 500; gratitude to Gladstone, i. 434; resigns on budget defeat, i. 441; views on Gladstone's budget, i. 472; attempts to form a ministry (1855), i. 525-526; fails, i. 527, 528; communications with Gladstone, i. 551-552, 554, 558, 561; relations with Disraeli, i. 555, 561; recommends union with Disraeli and Peelites, i. 562; vote of censure on Palmerston (1857), ii. 269; forms second administration (1858), i. 576; financial policy of, ii. 633; letter to Gladstone, i. 577; Bright's views on position of, i. 579; Reform bill (1859), i. 621; ii. 199; defeat and dissolution, i. 622; ii. 265; Gladstone in sympathy with, i. 631; Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 193; forms a government (1866), ii. 211; on Irish railways commission, ii. 243 _note_; on Irish church bill, ii. 268, 278; peers created by, ii. 429; otherwise mentioned, i. 177, 432, 437 _and note_, 529, 530, 536, 641; ii. 156 _note_ 1, 253, 653; iii. 289 _note_, 465. Derby, 15th Earl of, on Reform bill (1866), ii. 202; on Ireland, ii. 242; on Luxemburg guarantee, ii. 320, 357 _and note_; declines to serve on _Alabama_ commission, ii. 400; subscribes to Mill memorial, ii. 543; views on eastern question, ii. 551, 567, 572; resigns, ii. 574 _note_ 1; declines office with Gladstone, ii. 629; colonial secretary (1882), ii. 654; London convention with Transvaal (1884), iii. 45 _and note_; declines to join Gladstone's government (1882), iii. 99; joins as colonial secretary, iii. 100; Gladstone's letter to, on Ireland, iii. 215; declares against Home Rule, iii. 291 _note_, 294; otherwise mentioned, i. 103, 133, 134, 139, 177, 227, 239, 248, 296, 393, 420; ii. 499; iii. 268, 270. Devon, Lord, i. 343-344. Devonshire, Duke of, ii. 243 _note_; iii. 69, 166, 171. Dickson, Colonel, ii. 570. Dilke, Sir Charles, supports the resolutions on Turkey, ii. 564; declines to join Gladstone's government except with Chamberlain, ii. 630; president of local government board, ii. 654; claim of, to cabinet position, iii. 99; appointed to local government board, iii. 100; conferences on Franchise bill, iii. 138; agrees to send Gordon to Soudan, iii. 150; on Crimes Act, iii. 192; opposes land purchase for Ireland, iii. 194-195; resigns, iii. 195; speech on Irish policy, iii. 264; for home rule, iii. 291 _note_. Dillon, J., iii. 448, 455. Dillwyn, L., ii. 141. Dingwall, Gladstone presented with freedom of, i. 476. Disestablishment, _see under_ Churches. Disraeli, B., _see_ Beaconsfield. ---- Mrs., ii. 195, 196, 546-547. Dissenters:-- Affirmation bill opposed by, iii. 20. Disestablishment speech by Gladstone, effect of, ii. 457-458. Educational views of (1843 and 1847), ii. 302; (1870) ii. 303-305; estrangement of, by Education Act of 1870, ii. 307, 388; opposition to the Act, ii. 308. Election of 1874, action in, ii. 495. Gladstone's relations with (1864), ii. 134-135; (1868) ii. 255; (1869) ii. 272; views on Gladstone's retirement, ii. 505-506. Home rule, attitude towards, in Wales, iii. 323. University exclusion of, i. 505-506; ii. 313 _and note 1_. Dissenters' Chapels bill, i. 208, 330, 331. Disturbance Compensation bill, iii. 113. Divorce:-- French law on, i. 567 _note_. Gladstone's views on, i. 568-572 _and note_. Statistics regarding, i. 572 _note_. ---- bill (1857), i. 569-573. Dodson, J. G., ii. 463 _note_, 654; iii. 291 _note_. Döllinger, Dr., Gladstone's visit to (1845), i. 318-320 _and note 2_; later visit (1874), ii. 513-515; criticisms from, on Vaticanism, ii. 521; Acton compared with, ii. 558; Gladstone's visit to (1886), iii. 351-352; Salmon's agreement with, iii. 417; death of, iii. 421; Gladstone's estimate of, iii. 422-423, 467. Dollis Hill, iii. 385, 517. Don Pacifico debate, i. 368-371 _and note_, 372, 374, 395. Dongola, iii. 144, 163. Donnachaidh clan, i. 16. Douglas, Sir C., i. 419. Dobrudscha, ii. 574 _note 2_. Doyle, Francis, at Eton, i. 34, 37, 42-43; Gladstone's friendship with, i. 39, 54; Gladstone's letters to, i. 207; ii. 631; otherwise mentioned, i. 32 _note_, 59 _note_, 73, 111, 135, 581; ii. 184. Dragonetti, the Marquis, ii. 12. Drayton, i. 132. Drew, Mrs. (Mary Gladstone), Gladstone's letter to, ii. 473; accompanies Gladstone to Midlothian, ii. 587; Acton's letter to, on Middlesex candidature, ii. 617; engagement of, iii. 280; Gladstone's letter to, on _Robert Elsmere_, iii. 356. Drift, Gladstone's view of, ii. 352. Dryden, iii. 484. Duff, Grant, iii. 28 _note 2_. Dufferin, Lord, urges Turkish intervention in Egypt, iii. 80; advises abandonment of Kordofan and Darfur, iii. 146; mentioned, ii. 64, 212, 294, 645; iii. 413. Dugdale, W. S., i. 150. Duncan, Mr., ii. 27 _note_. Dundonald, Lord, iii. 180 _note_. Dunfermline, Lord (Speaker), i. 150. Dunkellin, Lord, ii. 206. Dunrobin, i. 476. Dupanloup, Bishop, ii. 532. Durham, Lord, i. 144, 178. Dyke, Sir W. Hart, iii. 279. Eastern question, _see_ Turkey. ---- Roumelia, ii. 576. Eastlake, Sir C., ii. 189. _Ecce Homo_, ii. 166-167, 172, 173, 533. Ecclesiastical appointments, i. 153; ii. 122, 430-433. ---- Commission (1835-36), iii. 468. ---- Titles bill, i. 405, 409-415 _and note_; effect of Act on whigs, i. 446; repeal of (1871), ii. 517. Economy:-- Churchill's efforts for, iii. 365. Direct taxation conducive to, ii. 62. Gladstone's efforts for, ii. 42-45, 53, 61, 63-65, 482-484, 498; iii. 110, 507, 508, 537. Edinburgh, Gladstone's early visit to, i. 10; reception in (June '86), iii. 343; Gladstone first lord rector of university, i. 634. ---- Duke of, ii. 378, 455. _Edinburgh Review_, Gladstone's anonymous article in, ii. 345. Education, primary:-- Board school question at Hawarden, ii. 646. Condition of, in 1869, ii. 302 _note_. Controversy on, nature of, ii. 306-307. Differences regarding, in liberal party, ii. 498. Dissenters' views on (1843 and 1847), ii. 302; (1870), ii. 303-305; estrangement by Act of 1870, ii. 307; opposition to the Act, ii. 308. Forster's bill (1870), ii. 298, 301, 303-307, 309-311, 495. Free, advocated by Chamberlain (1885), iii. 173, 224. Peel's bill (1843), ii. 299 _note_. State aid for, Gladstone's views on, i. 148; ii. 298-300, 310, 311. ---- secondary:-- Classical course, Gladstone's view of, ii. 646-649. Reform of (1869), ii. 311-312. Edwards, Jonathan, iii. 477. Egerton, Sir P., i. 59 _note_. ---- ii. 146-147 _and note_. Egypt:-- Alexandria--English and French fleets at, iii. 79; bombardment of, iii. 81, 84-85. Anglo-French control in, iii. 74, 78, 118; proposal of Anglo-French occupation, i. 76-77. Annexation idea unfavourably viewed in England, iii. 119. Army, revolt of, in. 73, 78, 83. British responsibilities in, ii. 631; iii. 146. Conference of Constantinople, iii. 81. Financial position of, iii. 73, 76, 120-122, 170,192,197; London convention, iii. 122. Gladstone's prognostication regarding, iii. 72. Northbrook's mission to, iii. 121. Reforms in, possible only by evacuation of Soudan, iii. 148. Soudan, _see that title_. Southern frontier of, determined (1885), iii. 180. Suez Canal:-- Construction of, i. 591-592. France, attempted agreement with, regarding, iii. 122. Protection of (1882), iii. 80, 82, 83. Tel-el-Kebir, iii. 83, 120 _note_. Withdrawal from, difficulties of, iii. 120; Salisbury's policy regarding, iii. 495. d'Eichthal, Gustave, ii. 538. Elcho, Lord, ii. 19 _note 2_. Elections, general:-- (1885) iii. 249-255; (1886) iii. 345-346; (1892) iii. 492, 494; dates of Gladstone's, ii. 608. Elgin, Lord (J. Bruce), i. 54, 59 _note_; ii. 18, 194, 636. Eliot, Lord, i. 236. Elizabeth, Queen, iii. 480. Ellenborough, Lord, i. 525, 583, 641. Ellice, E., i. 222, 237, 467, 493; ii. 194. Elliot, Arthur, iii. 285. Elwin, W., i. 553, 555. Emancipation, _see_ Slave-holding. Emerson, R. W., i. 176-177 _note_, 220; ii. 458. Employers' Liability bill (1893), iii. 504. Endowed Schools bill (1869), ii. 312. Epirus, ii. 576. Errington, W. V., iii. 63. Esher, Viscount, cited, ii. 624 _note_. Essays and Reviews, i. 316; ii. 163-164, 431. Estcourt, T. G. B., i. 328. Estimates (_see also_ Expenditure), (1853 and 1860), ii. 24; (1874-75) ii. 375 _note 1_, 483; (1892), iii. 507-509. Eton, Gladstone's career at, i. 26-44; examines at (1840), i. 229. _Eton Miscellany_, i. 34, 37-38. Eugénie, Empress, ii. 458. Evarts, W. M., ii. 189. Eversley, Viscount (speaker), i. 266. Ewelme appointment, ii. 386-387; iii. 540. Exchequer and Audit Act (1866), ii. 61. Expenditure:-- Annual amount of (1860-65 and 1873), ii. 374. Army and Navy, on (1857-66), ii. 51. Excess in, Gladstone's efforts against, ii. 42-45, 53, 61, 63-65. Policy of (1853-59), i. 475. Spirit of, Gladstone's protest against, ii. 50, 62. Export trade, growth of (1860-66), ii. 66-67. Factory legislation, i. 106. Faguet, cited, ii. 594. Farini, i. 402-404; ii. 8. Farquhar, Sir W., i. 162, 473; ii. 165. Farr, W. W., i. 29. Farrer, Lord, i. 333 _note 1_. Fasque, family portraits at, i. 9; church at, i. 11 _note 1_; purchase of, i. 107; Helen Gladstone buried at, ii. 604; T. Gladstone's golden wedding at, iii. 219; Gladstone's visit to (1891), iii. 462. Favre, Jules, ii. 356. Fawcett, H., ii. 302, 444 _note_, 455, 463 _note_. Fechter, C. A., ii. 189 _and note_, 190. Fénelon, i. 184, 215. Fenians:-- Papal rescript, attitude towards, iii. 384. Parnell's alleged conversation with a spy regarding, iii. 404-405. Plots by (1867), ii. 241-242. Temper of (1887), iii. 373. Ferdinand, King, i. 392, 397, 401. Ferguson, Dr., ii. 27. Field, Cyrus, ii. 71, 458. Fielden, J., i. 114. Finance (_see also_ Budgets, Expenditure, National Debt, Taxation):-- Egyptian, iii. 170, 192, 197. Gladstone's masterly statements on, ii. 593; iii. 7; his principles of, ii. 26, 56-61, 63, 68. Home Rule bill provisions regarding, _see under_ Ireland. Pitt's, ii. 627-638. Popular interest in, i. 458. Finance bill, ii. 39-40. Finlay, G., i. 605, 610 _note_, 614. Fire insurance duty, ii. 373, 651. Fish, H., ii. 82, 401-402, 406. Fisher, Bishop, ii. 535. Fitzgerald, Lord, i. 259. Fitzmaurice, Lord E., ii. 463 _note_. Fitzroy, Lord C., i. 419; ii. 102. Fitzwilliam, Lord, iii. 314, 339. Florence, ii. 8-9; iii. 387. Follett, Sir W. W., i. 322. Foreign affairs, British ignorance of, ii. 535-536. Foreign Enlistment Act (1870), ii. 399 and _note_, 405. ---- policy:-- Gladstone's views on, ii. 316-318. Peel's influence on, i. 247. Popular fickleness regarding, i. 480. Forster, W. E., on American civil war, ii. 86; views on liberal party, ii. 123; vice-president of council (1870), ii. 644; Education bill of, ii. 298, 301, 303-307, 309-311, 495; Endowed Schools, bill of, ii. 312; Ballot bill, ii. 368; on _Alabama_ case, ii. 403, 408; on Irish university debate, ii. 444-445; on Bulgarian question, ii. 549; Irish secretary (1880), ii. 630, 654; radical attitude towards, ii. 630; allows Coercion Act to lapse (1880), iii. 48; on Lords' rejection of Disturbance bill, iii. 409; 'village ruffian' theory, iii. 49; seeks coercive powers, iii. 49, 51; Coercion bill of, iii. 52 _and notes_, 296 _note 1_; at Hawarden, iii. 57; Gladstone's letters to, iii. 58, 66; condition of Ireland under, iii. 379; resigns, iii. 65, 90, 654; on franchise extension in Ireland, iii. 143 _note 3_; otherwise mentioned, ii. 447 _note_, 462, 476, 498, 504, 566, 644; iii. 64, 169, 175, 353 _and note 2_. Fortescue, C., _see_ Carlingford. _Fortnightly Review_, iii. 75-76. Fortunato, i. 398. Fould, A., ii. 55-56, 221. Fowler, H. H., iii. 336, 495 _note_. ---- William, ii. 295. Fox, General, i. 228. ---- C. J., views of, on emancipation of slaves, i. 104; estimates of, by Peel and Harrowby, i. 132-133; motion of, against Lord Sandwich, i. 144; parliamentary position of, i. 445-446; protests against British interference in Crimea, i. 478. Otherwise mentioned, i. 131, 365; ii. 230, 589. ---- Henry, i. 570. France:-- Alliance with, Gladstone's view of, i. 546; ii. 15. Alliances sought by (1869), ii. 321, 323. American war, joint mediation in, urged on England and Russia, ii. 85. Austria, peace with, Lord Elcho's motion on, ii. 19 _note 2_. Berlin treaty obligations, attitude towards, iii. 9. Black Sea affair, ii. 350, 356 _and note_. Commercial treaty with:-- suggested by Cobden, ii. 18, 20; negotiation of, ii. 21, 46; discussed in cabinet, ii. 21-22; provisions of, ii. 21 _note_, 23; objects of, ii. 22-23; publication of, in Belgian papers, ii. 27; results of, ii. 66, 637, 638; Gladstone's later views on, ii. 66 _note_. Commune (1871), ii. 308. Confusion in policy of, ii. 120. Crimean war, _see that title_. Danubian provinces, policy regarding, ii. 3. Divorce illegal in (1816-84), i. 567 _note_. Don Pacifico case, offer of good offices in, i. 368. Egypt, action regarding (1881), iii. 73; understanding with Salisbury, iii. 74; the joint note, iii. 75-76; fleet at Alexandria, iii. 79; fleet withdrawn, iii. 81; agrees to British advance in Egypt, iii. 82; declines to take any action, iii. 83; Salisbury policy frustrated by, iii. 495. German unity a menace to, ii. 319. Gladstone's finance admired in, ii. 56; Gladstone elected foreign associate of institute of, ii. 220 _and note_; tribute at his death, iii. 532. Italian unity aided by, ii. 7-8, 14, _see also_ Napoleon. Land question in, iii. 477. Nice and Savoy acquired by, ii. 9, 22, 30, 108. Orsini affair, representations regarding, i. 574. Palmerston's attitude towards, i. 367; ii. 47, 49. Poetry in, iii. 483. Prussia:-- Treaty with, regarding Belgium, ii. 340. War with (1870)--British efforts to avert, ii. 326-330, 335-336; declaration of, ii. 335 _and note 2_; French miscalculations, ii. 337; course of, ii. 342-343; British sympathy after Sedan, ii. 357; effect of the war on British naval expenditure, ii. 374. Republic-- recognition of (1871), ii. 345; statesmen of, iii. 475. Rome-- occupation of, ii. 107-108, 214, 319, 323; British attitude towards the occupation, ii. 512; evacuation of, ii. 217, 512. Roumania, coolness with Britain regarding, ii. 4. Schleswig-Holstein question, ii. 116-118. Tariff negotiations with, i. 267. Turkish murder of consul at Salonica, ii. 547; attitude towards Turkey (1881), iii. 74. Vatican decrees, attitude towards, ii. 510. Vicissitudes of government in, i. 413. War with (1812), iii. 471; war rumoured (1859-60), ii. 43-44, 46-47. Zenith of the empire, ii. 5. Franchise extension:-- Anticipations regarding (1885), iii. 172, 201. Bill of 1860, ii. 200; bill of 1866, ii. 200-205; bill of 1867, ii. 223-236, 238, 257. Boroughs, for, workmen's attitude towards, ii. 125, 139, 198, 211, 227; Palmerston's views regarding, ii. 128, 200; household suffrage struggle, ii. 223-236; liberal aid to tories for (1867), iii. 238, 257. Counties, for, ii. 200, 475, 481; iii. 124 _et seq._ Conservative party the gainers by, iii. 129. Ireland, _see under_ Ireland. Gladstone's speech on (1864), ii. 126-130. Manhood, Chamberlain's pronouncement on, iii. 174. Reform bill of 1866 restricted to, ii. 200. Fraser, family of, i. 17 _note_. ---- Bishop, ii. 432. ---- Sir William, i. 8 and _note 2_, 9 _note_. Frederick William, Crown Prince of Prussia, i. 176. Free trade:-- Disraeli's pronouncement on, i. 432. Employment in relation to, ii. 57. External agitation, production of, ii. 227. French commercial treaty in relation to, ii. 21 _note_, 24. Gladstone's speech on (1881), iii. 61. Freeman, E. A., ii. 365. _Freeman's Journal_, ii. 292. Fremantle, T. F., i. 237. Frere, Sir Bartle, liberal disapproval of, iii. 2, 6; responsible for Zulu war, iii. 22; the Queen's feeling for, iii. 23-24; enquires liberal policy, iii. 28; promises Boers self-government, iii. 30; South African Dutch exasperated by, iii. 43 _note_; recalled, iii. 24, 32 _note_. Freshfield, J. W., i. 233, 339. Freycinet, M. de, iii. 75, 79-83. Frohschammer, J., ii. 525. Frost, J., i. 400. Froude, Hurrell, i. 161, 166, 306. ---- J. A., i. 313 _note 1_; ii. 539, 559. Funerals, ii. 422. Furse, C. W., ii. 433. Gaisford, Dr., i. 49. Gambetta, ii. 335 _note 1_; iii. 75, 77, 78, 82, 465. Garfield, Mrs., iii. 108. Garibaldi-- sails from Genoa, ii. 10-11; enters Naples, ii. 17; in England, ii. 108-113; Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 109-110, 114; Italian estimate of, ii. 113; Manning's attitude towards, ii. 192; letters from, ii. 533; mentioned, ii. 184; iii. 532. Gaskell, Mrs. Benjamin, i. 160. ---- James Milnes, Gladstone's friendship with, i. 39, 54; debating society in rooms of, i. 59; speech on Reform bill, i. 73; Gladstone's visits to, i. 95; ii. 437; otherwise mentioned, i. 34, 37, 43, 48, 49, 64, 65, 74, 75, 77, 80, 97, 131, 137, 138, 139, 229, 248. George III., ii. 428; iii. 181. Gerasimus, Bishop, i. 604. Germany (_see also_ Prussia):-- Berlin memorandum, ii. 549, 571. ---- treaty obligations, attitude towards (1880), iii. 9. Black Sea provisions of Treaty of Paris disapproved by, ii. 350. Colonial question in, iii. 122. Egyptian question, attitude towards, iii. 79, 80, 82, 89. Italian alliance with, iii. 414. Luxemburg affair, ii. 320, 357 _and note_. Poetry in, iii. 483. Schleswig-Holstein question, ii. 114-118. Turkish murder of consul at Salonica, ii. 547. Unification of, ii. 358; France menaced by, ii. 319. Vatican decrees, attitude towards, ii. 509. Gibbon, i. 195; iii. 476. Gibson, Milner-, Gladstone against, i. 467; efforts towards peace, i. 547; return to parliament (1858), i. 574; in Palmerston government, i. 626; unpopularity of, in Oxford, i. 630; on Paper Duties bill, ii. 33, 37-39; Gladstone supported by, ii. 36, 140, 635-636. Gladstone, name changed from Gladstones, i. 18 and _note 2_. ---- Agnes (daughter), engagement of, ii. 472-473; marriage, ii. 475. ---- Anne (sister), i. 17 _note 1_, 160. ---- Helen Jane (sister), i. 17 _note 1_; Gladstone abroad with, i. 284, 318; secession to Rome, i. 318, 331; death, ii. 604. ---- Henry (son), Gladstone's message to, on learning Latin, ii. 94; at school, ii. 191; starts for India, ii. 557; Gladstone's letters to, ii. 586, 598; iii. 296. ---- Herbert (son), Gladstone's letters to, ii. 59 _and note_, 637; iii. 258; returned for Leeds, ii. 618; press interview of (Dec. '85), iii. 264-265; otherwise mentioned, ii. 474, 477, 614, 617; iii. 1. ---- Sir John (father), political work of, i. 9-10, 20-21, 249; churches built by, i. 11 _and note 1_; marriage of, i. 16; views of, on slave-holding, i. 22-24; Gladstone's defence of, in the _Liverpool Courier_, i. 32; loses Berwick election, i. 43; political acuteness of, i. 68-69; criticisms on W. E. Gladstone, i. 74; Howick's attack on, i. 102; Fasque bought by, i. 107; seventieth birthday of, i. 118; loses Dundee election (1837), i. 141; disapproves Jamaica journey, i. 148; transfers Demerara property to his sons, i. 224; assists Scotch training college scheme, i. 231; correspondence with Peel regarding his sons, i. 257-258; views of, on protection, i. 300, 327; baronetcy of, i. 293, 300; views on Gladstone's Oxford candidature, i. 330; on Jewish Disabilities Removal bill, i. 376; buys portion of Hawarden estates, i. 341; attitude towards Peel (1849), i. 353; death of, i. 388; W. E. Gladstone's relations with, i. 19, 32, 43, 82-83, 98; W. E. Gladstone's letters to, i. 123, 280, 283-284, 353, 375-376, 635; letters from, on choice of profession, i. 640; W. E. Gladstone's estimate of, i. 19, 138. Gladstone, Mrs. John (mother), W. E. Gladstone's devotion to, i. 95, 128, 131; death of, i. 131. ---- John (brother), i. 15, 17 _note 1_; travels of, with W. E. Gladstone, i. 86; Walsall candidature of, i. 231-232; parliamentary election of, desired by his father, i. 258; W. E. Gladstone's letter to, on family differences, i. 388; illness and death of wife of, ii. 95, 96; death of, ii. 187. ---- Mary (daughter), _see_ Drew. ---- Robertson (brother), i. 17 _note 1_; appointed manager of Demerara properties, i. 224; position of, in Liverpool, i. 258; at Gladstone's Lancashire candidature (1865), ii. 146; W. E. Gladstone's letters to, i. 494, 552-553, 626; ii. 62, 130, 456. ---- Stephen (son), ii. 256, 474, 500. ---- Thomas (grandfather), i. 16. ---- ---- (brother), slave-holding defended by, i. 24; attitude towards Reform bill, i. 70 _note_; on Gladstone's Oxford candidature, i. 330; Gladstone's letter to, on offers of a peerage, ii. 494; otherwise mentioned, i. 17 _note 1_, 68, 258. ---- William Ewart:-- Appearance of (1827), i. 34; (1840) i. 194; (1882) iii. 91. _Career, chronological sequence of_-- =1809-1831.= Birth and baptism, i. 7; childhood, i. 10-14; at Eton, i. 26-44; first speech, i. 35; Oxford, i. 48-85; tries for the Ireland, i. 61, 329 _note_. =1832.= Foreign travel, i. 86-88; impressions in Rome, i. 87; Newark candidature, i. 88-94, 96-97; election addresses, i. 90; first speech as member of parliament, i. 94; visits to Clumber, Thornes, and Leamington, i. 95; birthday, i. 97. =1833.= Lincoln's Inn, i. 98; membership of Oxford and Cambridge club and Carlton club, i. 98 _and note_; forms brotherhood with Acland, i. 99; enters parliament, i. 100; maiden speech, i. 103; party votes (1833), i. 106; visit to Fasque, i. 107. =1834.= Visit to Seaforth and Oxford, i. 111; at Fasque, i. 116; treasury appointment, i. 119-120; opposes admission of dissenters to universities, i. 330. =1835.= Returned for Newark without contest, i. 121; meets Disraeli at Lord Lyndhurst's, i. 122; appointed under-secretary for the colonies, i. 123; contemplates resignation, i. 125; speech on Irish church, i. 126; speech at Newark, i. 129; committee on native affairs at the Cape, i. 358. =1836.= Death of his mother, i. 131; visit to Drayton, i. 132; visit to Hawarden, i. 134; speech on negro apprenticeship, i. 134 _and note_; visit to Haddo, i. 137; committee on waste lands, i. 358. =1837.= Speech at Newark on toleration, etc., i. 138; presents the Queen with the Oxford address, i. 140; canvassing at Newark, i. 140; nominated for Manchester, i. 141; elected for Newark, i. 141; at Dundee, Glasgow, Liverpool, Manchester, i. 141; at Fasque, i. 142; first interview with Duke of Wellington, i. 143. =1838.= Admitted to consultations on Canadian affairs, i. 144; speaks on Molesworth's vote of censure, i. 145; speech on slave apprenticeship system, i. 145-147; work on educational questions, i. 148; influenced by Coleridge and Palmer, i. 167-168 _note 1_; _The State in its Relation with the Church_, i. 172, 175; foreign travel, i. 173. =1839.= Opinions on his book, i. 175-181; work on committees, i. 219; marriage, i. 223. =1840.= Speech on China question, i. 226; birth of eldest son, i. 227; dines at Guizot's, i. 229; examines at Eton, i. 229; Scotch training college scheme, i. 230-231, 330; committee on colonisation of New Zealand, i. 358. =1841.= _Church Principles_, i. 181; his brother's Walsall election, i. 231-232; visits Nuneham and Oxford, i. 235; speaks on sugar duties, i. 236; re-elected for Newark, i. 238; Sir S. Glynne's candidature--Hoylake--Hawarden, i. 239; vice-president of the board of trade, i. 240-245, 250; re-elected for Newark, i, 243; correspondence with Peel on journalistic imputations, i. 245-246; Jerusalem bishopric, i. 309; advocates increase in colonial episcopate, i. 330. =1842.= Protection question, i. 249-254; suggests retirement, i. 253; tariff reform, i. 255-257; shooting accident, i. 185; Glenalmond, i. 231. =1843.= Enters the cabinet, i. 259; parliamentary success, i. 261; protection question, i. 262-264; tariff negotiations with foreign countries, i. 267; advocates removal of prohibition on export of machinery, i. 267-268; close relations with Manning and Hope, i. 310; anxiety regarding Newman's position, i. 310-313; protests against sentence on Pusey, i. 317. =1844.= Bill for regulation of companies, i. 268; Telegraph Act, i. 268; Railway Act, i. 269; publishes Prayer-Book, i. 314 _note_; reply to Ward's _Ideal_, i. 314-315; Lady Hewley case, i. 322; proposes himself as Vatican envoy, i. 271-272; Maynooth, i. 271-275, 278. =1845.= At Windsor Castle, i. 274-275; resigns office, i. 276-278, 279; votes for second reading of Maynooth bill, i. 279; tariff reform, i. 279; pamphlet on results of fiscal changes of 1842, i. 280 _and note_; on free labour sugar proposal, i. 280; at Munich, i. 318; at Baden-Baden, i. 320; corn law repeal, i. 283-287; secretary for the colonies, i. 285. =1846.= Colonial clergy questions, i. 358; recall of colonial governor, i. 359; out of parliament, i. 287-288; offended at Peel's eulogium on Cobden, i. 291-292; conversation with Lord Lyndhurst on conservative party, i. 293-294; with Jocelyn and Graham, i. 295; interview with Peel, i. 297-300; quarrel with Lord G. Bentinck, i. 301-302. =1847.= Oxford candidature, i. 328-332; election, i. 333; Jewish Disabilities Removal bill, i. 375-377; Oak farm and Hawardenvc estate embarrassments, i. 337, 356. =1848.= Special constable against chartists, i. 358; Oxford D.C.L., i. 377; on Hampden's appointment as bishop, i. 377. =1849.= Divergences from Peel, i. 353; mission for his friend, i. 364-365; Gorham case, i. 378. =1850.= Supports Disraeli's agricultural distress motion, i. 354-356; Gorham case, i. 378-381 _and note_; death of his daughter, i. 381, 387-388; Australian Colonies bill, i. 362; Don Pacifico debate, i. 369-371 _and note_; death of Peel, i. 371; question of leadership, i. 373-374; opposes universities commission, i. 497; Naples, i. 389-393; on committee for exhibition medal inscriptions, ii. 539. =1851.= Returns to London, i. 393; Letters to Lord Aberdeen, i. 392, 391 _and note_, 396-398, 400-401 _and note 3_; invited by Stanley to take office, i. 393, 406; declines, i. 407; Ecclesiastical Titles bill, i. 409-415; secession of Manning and Hope, i. 383-386; death of his father, i. 388; letter to a Scotch bishop on religious freedom, i. 384, 426. =1852.= First Derby administration, i. 417; approaches Aberdeen and Graham, i. 417-418; views on Peelite policy, i. 417-419; overtures from Russell, i. 421; supports Derby, i. 424; on Four Seats bill, i. 424 _and note_; re-elected for Oxford, i. 426-427; equipoise of opinions, i. 431; defends free trade, i. 433; overtures from Derby, i. 434; speech on Disraeli's budget, i. 438-440; incident at the Carlton, i. 440-441; New Zealand Government bill, i. 362 _and note 2_, 645; appointed chancellor of the exchequer, i. 448. =1853.= Difficulties at Oxford, i. 450-452; re-election, i. 453; moves to house of chancellor of exchequer, i. 457; advocates reduction of force in the Pacific, i. 458; budget, i. 460-472; iii. 537; attempted operation on national debt, i. 472-473, 646-648; Latin lessons to his son, i. 464; illness at Dunrobin, i. 476; presented with freedom of Dingwall, i. 476; speech at Inverness, i. 476; Crimean war, i. 481 _et seq._; speech at unveiling of Peel statue at Manchester, i. 483; case of Mr. Maurice, i. 454-456; Oxford reform, i. 500. =1854.= Letter on revival of convocation, ii. 162; speeches on Oxford reform, i. 503, 509 _note 2_; civil service reform, i. 509-512, 649; criticisms of his finance, i. 513-514; speech on budget, i. 514-515; conflict with Bank of England, i. 518-519, 650-651; Savings Bank bill, i. 519; woods and forests dismissal case, i. 520. =1855.= Ministerial crisis, i. 522-543; opposes Roebuck's motion, i. 523-524; joins Palmerston, i. 536; opposes Roebuck's motion in cabinet, i. 537-538; resigns, i. 539; unpopularity, i. 542-543; efforts for peace, i. 545-548; at Penmaenmawr, i. 549; Homeric studies, i. 549-550; Chester speech on colonial policy, i. 363. =1856.= Communications with Lord Derby, i. 551-552, 554; isolation, i. 553; letter to Bishop Hampden, i. 168; case of Archdeacon Denison, i. 557. =1857.= Interviews with Lord Derby, i. 558-561; opposes Lewis' budget, i. 560-562; co-operation with Disraeli, i. 561; communications with Cobden, i. 562; speech on the China war, i. 563; returned for Oxford unopposed, i. 565; opposes Divorce bill, i. 570; encounters with Bethell, i. 570-571; illness and death of Lady Lyttelton, i. 572-573. =1858.= Opposes Conspiracy bill, i. 575-576 _and note_; refuses to join Derby, i. 576-578; renewed proposal from Derby, i. 583; refused, i. 585, 590; motion on the Principalities, ii. 4; letter from Disraeli, i. 586; reply, i. 589; supports Suez Canal scheme, i. 592; letter to Graham on Indian government, i. 593; at Haddo, i. 594; commission to Ionian Islands, i. 594-618; at Athens, i. 605. =1859.= At Venice, Turin, Vicenza, Verona, Milan, i. 618; interview with Cavour, i. 618; defends nomination boroughs, i. 621; speech on Italian question, ii. 13; votes with Derby government, i. 625; joins Palmerston's government, i. 626; letters on his position, i. 627-628; trouble at Oxford, i. 628-630; re-elected for Oxford, i. 630; budget, ii. 19; speaks on Italian affairs, ii. 19; Cobden's visit, ii. 18, 20; views on French war scare, ii. 43-44; first lord rector of Edinburgh university, i. 634. =1860.= Budget, i. 474; ii. 24 _et seq._, 625; illness, ii. 26-27, 31, 34, 35; unpopularity, ii. 29, 31; defeat on Savings Bank bill, ii. 34; speech on Paper Duty Repeal bill, ii. 34; chief trains of cabinet business, ii. 36, 635-636; the fortification scheme, ii. 42, 44-47; cabinet struggle on question of economy, ii. 42-45; interview with Palmerston, ii. 45-46; at Penmaenmawr, ii. 184; death of Lord Aberdeen, ii. 87. =1861.= Budget, ii. 38-39; cabinet struggles, ii. 39, 93-96; correspondence with Sir Wm. Heathcote on finance, ii. 632-635; attacks and abuse, ii. 48; American civil war, ii. 70-72, 74-75; on education, ii. 312, 646; deaths of Graham and Herbert, ii. 87-88. =1862.= Speech on Italy, ii. 108; correspondence with Palmerston, ii. 49-50; panegyric on Prince Consort, ii. 89; American civil war, ii. 75-77, 79-82; triumphal reception in the north, ii. 77-79; Newcastle speech on American war, ii. 79-82; funeral of Mrs. John Gladstone, ii. 96; Windsor, i. 96. =1863.= Death of his brother John, ii. 187; budget, ii. 66, 67; proposal to extend income tax to charities, ii. 65-66; speech on Italy, ii. 189; at Penmaenmawr, ii. 191; at Balmoral, ii. 97-104. =1864.= At Balmoral, ii. 104-106; letters on _Essays and Reviews_ judgment, ii. 164; speech on Mr. Dodson's bill, ii. 313 _and note 2_; Garibaldi's visit, i. 109-113; speech on extension of franchise, ii. 126, 238; correspondence with Palmerston, ii. 127-130; address from York workmen, ii. 130-131; Schleswig-Holstein question, i. 116-119; speeches in Lancashire, ii. 131-133; relations with protestant dissenters, ii. 134-135; development in ideas, ii. 121 _et seq._ =1865.= Cabinet struggles, ii. 140; criticism of _Ecce Homo_, ii. 166-167, 172, 173; elected foreign associate of the Institute of France, ii. 220 _and note_; speech on Irish church, ii. 142; death of Cobden, ii. 143; letter to his son on ecclesiastical affairs, ii. 159; defeat at Oxford, ii. 145; Lancashire candidature and election, ii. 145-147; speech on conservatism, ii. 178; letter to Russell on death of Palmerston, ii. 151; at Glasgow, ii. 154, 155. =1866.= Leader of Commons, ii. 156-157; tribute to Palmerston, ii. 157; introduces Reform bill, ii. 200; disaffection of followers, ii. 202, 205-209; second reading of Reform bill, i. 203-204; budget, ii. 68, 200; votes for abolition of church rates, ii. 161; against vote of confidence after debate, ii. 207-209; audiences of the Queen, ii. 209, 211; declines to speak at Hyde Park demonstration, ii. 212; speech at Cobden club, ii. 213; goes to Italy, ii. 213; in Rome, ii. 214-219; illness, ii. 217. =1867.= Dinner with the Society of Political Economists of France, ii. 221; household suffrage struggle, ii. 223-236; disaffection of followers, ii. 224, 225, 227-228, 232-235; Irish church questions, i. 243; speech at Newspaper Press Fund dinner, ii. 235. =1868.= Correspondence with Acland on popular discontent, ii. 172-174; bill on church rates, ii. 161; Irish church question, ii. 245-248; election for Greenwich, ii. 251 _and note 1_; publication of _Chapter of Autobiography_, ii. 249-250; candidature in S.-W. Lancashire, ii. 250-251 _and note 1_; letter from the Queen, ii. 252; forms a cabinet, ii. 253-255; speech at Greenwich, ii. 371. =1869.= Colonial Society dinner, ii. 402 _note_; letter to General Grey on foreign policy, ii. 316; Irish church bill preliminaries, ii. 258-263; bill introduced, ii. 263-264; committee stage, ii. 266; struggle with the Lords, ii. 267-271; Lords' amendments rejected, ii. 272-275; concessions, ii. 277-278; proposes acceptance by Commons of modifications, ii. 279; illness, ii. 276, 279-280; visit to Walmer Castle, ii. 280, 422; Irish land question, ii. 287 _et seq._; letter to Bright on principles _v._ details, ii. 290. =1870.= Irish land bill withdrawn, ii. 294; _Alabama_ case, ii. 399; education question, ii. 298, 303-311; on reduction of armaments, ii. 321-322; efforts to avert Franco-Prussian war, ii, 326-330; daily conferences with Granville, ii. 338; neutrality of Belgium guaranteed, ii. 341-342; views on annexation of Alsace and Lorraine, ii. 346-348; Russian claims in Black Sea, ii. 350-352, 355; difficulties with the court, ii. 360; army reform, ii. 360 _et seq._; question of commander-in-chief's position, i. 360-361, 649; Ballot bill, ii. 368-369. =1871.= Views on neutralisation of Alsace and Lorraine, i. 357; anonymous article in _Edinburgh Review_, ii. 345; instructions to _Alabama_ commission, ii. 404; abolition of purchase, ii. 361-365; Ballot bill, ii. 369, 377; struggles for economy, ii. 374; visit to Tennyson, ii. 377; freedom of Aberdeen, ii. 378; at Balmoral, ii. 378; at Edinburgh, ii. 379; funeral of Sir E. Murchison, ii. 380; speech at Blackheath, ii. 380-381; conversations with Bright, ii. 381-382; Collier appointment, ii. 382-386; Ewelme appointment, ii. 386-387; licensing questions, ii. 390; repeal of law against ecclesiastical titles, ii. 517. =1872.= Unpopularity, ii. 387; cleavage in party, ii. 388; attitude of radicals, ii. 388-390; _Alabama_ case, ii. 409-411; indignation on American claims, ii. 406; Act of Uniformity bill, ii. 410; speech at King's College council meeting, ii. 523; visit to Oxford, ii. 436-437; address at Liverpool on Strauss, ii. 524. =1873.= Irish University bill, ii. 436-445; letters to the Queen on retirement, ii. 442-443; ministerial crisis, ii. 446-456, 652; letter to Bright, on education question, ii. 309, 646; speech against disestablishment, ii. 457-458 _and note_; the Queen's birthday, ii. 422; death of Wilberforce, ii. 459; ministerial embarrassments, ii. 460-465; becomes chancellor of exchequer, ii. 463, 645; dispute as to vacating seat thereby, ii. 465-472; at Balmoral, ii. 472; engagement of his eldest daughter, ii. 472-473; at Hawarden, ii. 473-474; cabinet embarrassments, ii. 474; marriage of his eldest daughter, ii. 475. =1874.= Financial plans, ii. 478, 481-482, 487; question of dissolution, ii. 479 _et seq._; electoral manifesto, ii. 487-489; speeches at Greenwich, etc., ii. 490 _and note_; election, ii. 490; resignation, ii. 492-493 _and note_; offers of a peerage, ii. 493-494; retirement from leadership, ii. 497-499, 503-506; death of Sir S. Glynne, ii. 500-501; Vatican decrees question, ii. 502, 509-512; visit to Munich, ii. 513-515; _Vatican Decrees_ pamphlet, ii. 515-517; its reception, ii. 517-520. =1875.= Meeting of Metaphysical Society, ii. 504; article in _Quarterly Review_, ii. 520; more work on Vatican question, ii. 520-521; _Vaticanism_ published, ii. 521; sale of house in Carlton House Terrace, ii. 522. =1876.= Letter to Herbert Gladstone on Pitt's finance, ii. 637; pamphlet on Bulgaria, ii. 551-554; speech at Blackheath, ii. 552, 554; visits in the north, ii. 555-556; work at Hawarden, ii. 557; visit to Liverpool, ii. 558; 'The Hellenic Factor in the Eastern Problem,' ii. 558; St. James's Hall meeting, ii. 559; letter on denominationalism, iii. 542. =1877.= _Lessons in Massacre_, ii. 560, 562; visit to Darwin, ii. 562; the five resolutions, ii. 563-565; speech in parliament, ii. 565-568; visit to Birmingham, ii. 570; views on Transvaal annexation, iii. 27, 28; visit to Ireland, ii. 571. =1878.= Hostile crowds, ii. 574; declines to stand for Leeds, ii. 611; speech on treaty-making power, ii. 377 _note 2_; speech on Anglo-Turkish convention, ii. 576-578; article on 'England's Mission,' ii. 579, 581; literary work and emoluments, ii. 581; sits to Millais, ii. 581-582; visit of Argyll and Ruskin to Hawarden, ii. 582. =1879.= Invited to stand for Midlothian, ii. 584; agrees, ii. 585; the campaign, ii. 587-590; iii. 27; day at Glasgow, ii. 590-592; from Glasgow to Hawarden, ii. 596; reflections, ii. 597; correspondence on leadership, ii. 598-603. =1880.= At Hawarden, ii. 603, 604; with his sister at Cologne, ii. 604; election address, ii. 606-608; Midlothian campaign in general election, ii. 608-612; letter to Rosebery, ii. 613; to Argyll, ii. 615; conversations on leadership, ii. 616-617; interview with Hartington, ii. 621-624; with Granville and Hartington, ii. 624-625; audience of the Queen, ii. 626-628; construction of cabinet, ii. 628-630; personnel of cabinet, ii. 653-654; iii. 2-3; anonymous article in _Fortnightly Review_, ii. 345 _note_; parliamentary difficulties, iii. 5-6; budget, iii. 7; illness, iii. 8; cruise in _Grantully Castle_, iii. 8; Berlin treaty obligations, iii. 8-10; Bradlaugh question, iii. 11 _et seq._; question of Frere's recall, iii. 22-24. =1831.= Colley's correspondence, iii. 34; Boer overtures, iii. 35; Majuba, iii. 37-38; letters to the Queen, iii. 40; parliamentary attack, iii. 41-42; Transvaal commission, iii. 44; Coercion bill, iii. 49-50; obstruction, iii. 52-53; Irish Land bill, iii. 53-57; letter to Granville on home rule, iii. 57; visit to Leed's, iii. 59-61; agrees to imprisonment of Parnell, iii. 61; address to common council, iii. 61; Egyptian question, iii. 74 _et seq._ =1882.= Egyptian question, iii. 78 _et seq._; letter to Forster, on Irish local government, iii. 58; communications from Parnell, iii. 64; letter to Forster on his resignation, iii. 66; to the Queen on Irish situation, iii. 66; Phoenix Park murders, iii. 67-69; public position, iii. 89-90; political jubilee, iii. 91; appoints Benson to see of Canterbury, iii. 95-97; reconstruction of cabinet, iii. 99-101; letters to Bright on Egyptian policy, iii. 84, 85; vexed with Bismarck, iii. 121. =1883.= Stay at Cannes, iii. 102-104; interview with Clémenceau, iii. 123; renewed offer of a peerage, iii. 104; at Paris, iii. 105; at Sandringham, iii. 105; objects to sending troops to Suakin, iii. 149; speech on Affirmation bill, i. 139; iii. 14, 18-20, 107, 312; letter to Bright on 'Irish rebels' speech, iii. 111; cruise to Denmark, iii. 115-117; speech at Kirkwall, iii. 117-118, 354 _note_; Congo debate, iii. 110. =1884.= Agrees to send Gordon to evacuate Soudan, iii. 149, 151 _and note 2_; advises disavowing him after his abandonment of instructions, iii. 156; opposes appointment of Zobeir, iii. 158; advises his appointment, iii. 159; illness, iii. 159 _and note_, 160, 162; views on relief expedition for Gordon, iii. 162; Franchise bill, iii. 125-126, 140; speech on House of Lords, iii. 128; memorandum on case between Lords and Commons, iii. 129; efforts at arrangement, iii. 131-133; re-introduction of Franchise bill, iii. 136; conferences with Salisbury and Northcote, iii. 137-139; cabinet divisions, iii. 175; speech at Edinburgh on Transvaal, iii. 40 _note 2_. =1885.= On Chamberlain's social programme, iii. 174; Acton's letter on retirement, iii. 172; learns death of Gordon, iii. 166, 172; letter in reply to the Queen's telegram, iii. 167; memorandum on military position in the Soudan, iii. 178-179, 555-559; on Russian action in Afghanistan, iii. 178; three cabinets on Soudan, iii. 179-180; speech on war-supply for Afghanistan, iii. 184; cabinet difficulties, iii. 185-186; budget, iii. 187, 200; cabinet disagreements on Ireland, iii. 190-195; letter to the Queen on Irish policy, iii. 192; intimation regarding Crimes Act, iii. 188; letter to Hartington on cabinet crisis, iii. 196; ministerial crisis, iii. 203-208; audience of the Queen, iii. 205; offer of an earldom, iii. 209-210; defeated on budget, iii. 200; suddenness of defeat, iii. 202; resigns, iii. 200; letters to the Queen, iii. 199, 203; letters on advance in Irish situation, iii. 215-216; throat troubles, iii. 216; cruise in the _Sunbeam_, iii. 217-218; election address, iii. 220; conversation with Chamberlain, iii. 224-226; consideration of Home Rule question, iii. 234-241; letter to the Queen on Crimes Act discussions, iii. 199; work on books--miscellaneous reading--reply to Réville, iii. 247; Midlothian speeches, iii. 247-248; election, iii. 248; considerations of Irish situation, iii. 256-259, 261-264, 266, 268-276; tenders support to Lord Salisbury, iii. 258-260, 284; unauthorised publication of home rule scheme, iii. 264 _and note_, 265; party urgency for action, iii. 267; renewal of intercourse with Manning, iii. 281; birthday, iii. 281. =1886.= Political rumours, iii. 279; begins the session, iii. 281; comments on Hartington's communication, iii. 282; attitude towards home rule, iii. 283; debate on the address, iii. 284-288; supports Collings' amendment, iii. 288; accepts the Queen's commission, iii. 290; to Osborne, iii. 290; formation of government, iii. 291 _and note_, 296 _and note 2_; preparation of bills, iii. 298; difficulties in cabinet, iii. 302-304, 306; interview with Parnell, iii. 305-306; introduction of Home Rule bill, iii. 310-312; violent hostility of opponents, iii. 321-322; conversation with Bright, iii. 326; strenuous efforts for the bill, iii. 331; letter from Bright, iii. 327; Parnell's letter, iii. 333-334; party meeting at foreign office, iii. 332-333; second meeting with Parnell, iii. 334; replies to Hicks Beach, iii. 334-335; speech on night of the division, iii. 338-340; decides for dissolution, iii. 341; electioneering, iii. 342-345; elected for Midlothian and for Leith, iii. 344; letter to the Queen, iii. 344; decides for resignation, iii. 346-347; final audience of the Queen, iii. 347-348; views on Chamberlain's _Baptist_ article, iii. 368; at Tegernsee, iii. 351-352; speaks on Tenants Relief bill, iii. 353; at Hawarden, iii. 353; article on _Locksley Hall_, iii. 353-354; attitude towards plan of campaign, iii. 370-372; birthday, iii. 354-355. =1887.= Letters to Acton, iii. 355-359; at Sandringham, Cambridge, Hawarden, Dollis Hill, Windsor, iii. 385; speech on Criminal Law Amendment (Ireland) bill, iii. 375 _and note_; on introduction of closure, iii. 377; on Mitchelstown, iii. 380; _Robert Elsmere_ article, iii. 356-360; tour in South Wales, iii. 386-387; visit to Florence, iii. 387. =1888.= Attitude towards Parnell commission, iii. 398-399; sympathy with Parnell, iii. 408; speech on report of the commission, iii. 408-411; speech at Birmingham, iii. 387-389; speech on Ireland, iii. 389; visit to Naples, iii. 413. =1889.= Reasons for not visiting Rome, iii. 413-415; Old Testament studies, iii. 415-416; golden wedding anniversary, iii. 417; Parnell's visit to Hawarden, iii. 420, 445-446. =1890.= Letter on General Gordon, iii. 169; visit to Oxford, iii. 420-421; death of Newman and Döllinger, iii. 421; views on Parnell's position, iii. 429-433, 435-437, 440, 443-444; Parnell leadership question, iii. 450, 452-453, 455-458; memoranda on Parnell leadership question, iii. 443-445; meeting at Lord Rendel's, iii. 434; letter to Morley on Parnell leadership, iii. 436; urges publication of letter, iii. 440-441; speaks at Bassetlaw, iii. 452; Morley's visit to Hawarden, iii. 452-454; communications with Irish party towards an understanding, iii. 455-456; speech of condolence with the Speaker, iii. 456. =1891.= Death of Granville, iii. 462; death of his eldest son, iii. 460; Fasque-- Glenalmond--Newcastle programme, iii. 462; Biarritz, iii. 463 _et seq._; birthday, iii. 477. =1892.= Biarritz, iii. 480 _et seq._; to the Riviera, iii. 489; re-elected for Midlothian, iii. 492; formation of cabinet, iii. 494-495 _note_; Home Rule bill, iii. 496. =1893.= Home Rule bill, iii. 500 _et seq._; reply to Chamberlain, iii. 499-500; at Biarritz, iii. 504,508. =1894.= Advocates dissolution on Lords question, iii. 505; naval estimates, iii. 506-508; return to England, iii. 509; last cabinet, iii. 510-511; last speech in parliament, iii. 511-512; at Windsor, iii. 512-514; letter of resignation, iii. 514; the Queen's reply, iii. 515; letter to Sir H. Ponsonby, iii. 516. =1895-1898.= Literary work, iii. 520-521; speeches at Chester and Liverpool, iii. 521-522; last diary entry, iii. 523; visit to Cannes, iii. 523; last meeting with the Queen, iii. 524; visit to Butterstone, iii. 525; illness, iii. 525-528; visit to Cannes, iii. 526; to Bournemouth, iii. 526; at Hawarden, iii. 526-528; death, iii. 528; parliamentary tributes, iii. 528-531; foreign tributes, iii. 531-533; funeral, iii. 533. Characteristics:-- Ambition for noble ends, i. 218. Caution--suspense of judgment, i. 309, 376, 418, 547; iii. 343. Concentration, i. 186, 190, 255; iii. 88. Considerateness, i. 195, 339, 364; iii. 456. Continuity, i. 190. Conversational charm, ii. 180, 561; iii. 482. Co-operation, aptitude for, i. 189-190. Copiousness, ii. 427; iii. 502. Courage, i. 188, 218; ii. 246; iii. 44. Courtesy, i. 213; ii. 416, 532, 562. Deference to colleagues, ii. 415-416, 420, 492; iii. 4, 5, 497, 530. Detachment--alacrity of mind--freedom of judgment, ii. 168, 562. Disregard of appearances--regard for things rather than persons, i. 357; ii. 365; iii. 536-537, 540. Duality of disposition, i. 2, 18, 189, 264. Eloquence-- oratorical power, i. 191-195, 261, 410; ii. 41, 54-55, 123, 439, 566; absence of bitterness, i. 503; battle-cry element, ii. 592; dramatic force, ii. 589, 594; iii. 500; lofty tone, i. 5, 14; iii. 312; persuasiveness, i. 440; physical resources, ii. 380, 593; iii. 60, 91, 338, 500. Essentials, grasp of, iii. 54, 331, 371. Excitability of temperament--nervous sensibility, i. 83, 103, 434; ii. 40, 111, 119, 140, 381, 493, 565, 576, 631; iii. 18, 101-102, 170, 290. Family feeling, i. 95-96, 339. Gaiety of mind, i. 188. Gravity of temperament, i. 212. Growth, mental, continuance of, i. 207-208. Humanity, ii. 555, 561, 595, 596. Hurry, i. 186-187, 380. Idealism, i. 197-198, 255. Imagination, moral and political, i. 189, 255; ii. 56, 554; iii. 244, 540. Impulsiveness, ii. 148, 203. Industry, i. 186, 192, 197; ii. 261, 421; iii. 88, 298, 496; in public duties, i. 101-102; ii. 418, 422; iii. 7-8, 110, 353, 496. Intellectual curiosity, limits of, i. 202, 209. Intensity, ii. 563. Irritability, ii. 228. Lancashire temperament, i. 192; ii. 41, 60. Liberty, instinct for, _see_ Liberty. Loyalty to colleagues, ii. 599-601, 603, 619; iii. 110, 510. Magnanimity, ii. 48. Missionary temper, i. 231. Modesty, ii. 561. Musical ability, i. 98. Nature, delight in, ii. 280; iii. 478, 479. Opportuneness, sense of, i. 190; ii. 240-241; iii. 258, 276, 509, 539. Optimism--confidence, i. 218, 312, 364, 611, 630; ii. 265; iii. 354. Orderliness, i. 206; iii. 88. Over-refining--subtlety--'sophistry,' i. 165, 210-212, 354, 359, 453, 516; ii. 54, 396, 590; ii. 185. Patience, iii. 185, 298, 456, 497. Patriotism, i. 617. Practical aptitude, i. 67, 195, 206; ii. 547, 553; iii. 88. Personal questions, dislike of, ii. 462; iii. 455, 456. Quietude, desire for, i. 187. Religious temper, i. 2-4, 31, 56-57, 84, 200-201, 204; fixity of dogmatic views, i. 153, 207; religious growth, 160-162; leanings towards clerical calling, i. 323-324, 382, 383, 635-641. Reserve, i. 196-197, 376. Resignation, i. 215-217. Scrupulosity, i. 261. Self-control, i. 189, 196; iii. 195, 298. Self-distrust, i. 190-191. Simplicity--trustfulness, i. 194, 197, 204; ii. 570; iii. 540. Sincerity--integrity, i. 193, 194, 261, 410, 440; ii. 531, 554; iii. 482, 540. Slowness of mental development, i. 14, 198, 529; of judgment, i. 453. Tact, iii. 100. Tenacity of purpose, i. 315; ii. 38, 42, 59, 138, 207, 211, 404, 415, 569; iii. 29, 186, 209, 331. Tolerance, i. 316-317; ii. 416, 432, 517, 535; iii. 12-13, 18. Tradition, reverence for, i. 201-202, 209. Unity of purpose, i. 200. Versatility, i. 184; ii. 168; iii. 455, 467. Vital energy, i. 185; iii. 60, 498. Vivacity, ii. 593. Walking, fondness for, i. 116. Will-power, i. 185, 189, 470. Eyesight, difficulties with, i. 111, 138, 140, 142, 143, 173, 185, 230; cataract, iii. 492, 506, 515, 517-519. Family and genealogy of, i. 7-9 _and note_, 16 _and note 2_, 17 _notes_. Horoscope of, i. 197. Letters of, characteristics of, i. 6; ii. 180. Residences of, i. 232-233 _note_; ii. 523 _note_. Verses by; i. 38, 63 _note_, 118. Gladstone, Mrs. W. E. (wife), on Gladstone's duality, i. 189; ancestry of, i. 223; to possess Hawarden Castle for life, i. 344; at Oxford (1848), i. 377; at Hagley, i. 572; foreign travel prescribed for, i. 596; Wood's conversations with, i. 623, 624; at Newcastle (1862), ii. 78; intimacy of, with Duchess of Sutherland, ii. 183; medical skill of, ii. 190; appears to rioters, ii. 211; accompanies Gladstone to Midlothian, ii. 587; to Cannes (1882), iii. 102; has news of Cavendish murder, iii. 67; visit to Biarritz, iii. 463; on necessity for her husband's hearing both sides, iii. 479; eightieth birthday, i. 486; Rosbery's tribute to, iii. 531; death of, iii. 533; W. E. Gladstone's letters to, i. 187, 215, 233, 272-275, 276, 285, 335-336, 339-340, 355, 383-384, 436-439, 445, 480 _note_, 481 _and note_, 519, 570-573, 575; ii. 21, 138-141, 143, 152, 154, 378-379, 500, 503, 522, 523; iii. 115, 186, 352, 420. ---- W. H. (son), birth of, i. 227; letters to, on Hawarden estate, i. 340-343, 344-349; parliamentary career of, i. 346, 348; Gladstone unwilling to bequeath a title to, i. 384; speech at his father's Lancashire candidature, ii. 147; Gladstone's letter to, on ecclesiastical affairs, ii. 159; letter on dissolution (1874), ii. 487; Worcestershire candidature of (1880), ii. 614; return to Hawarden after election, ii. 617; death of, iii. 460; otherwise mentioned, ii. 98, 139, 410, 603, 604, 617. Glanville, cited, i. 209 _and note 1_. Glasgow, Gladstone's inaugural address at (1879), ii. 590-591; public meetings, i. 591-592; iii. 562. _Gleanings_, preparation of, ii. 581; later series of, iii. 521. Gledstanes, family of, i. 8-9 _and note_, 16 _and note 2_. Glenalmond, i. 230-231; iii. 462. Glenelg, Lord, i. 144, 362. Glynne, Lady, i. 274, 341. ---- Catherine (_see also_ Gladstone, Mrs. W. E.), Gladstone's engagement to, i. 222. Glynne, Henry, i. 342-344. ---- Sir Stephen, Gladstone's travels with, i. 173; candidature of, in Flintshire, i. 239; financial affairs of, i. 337 _et seq._; repulsed at election (1857), i. 565; munificence of, ii. 195; death of, ii. 500; otherwise mentioned, i. 223; ii. 274, 279, 373 _note 1_, 385, 410, 418, 421, 446, 476. Goderich, Lord, i. 75, 431, 543. Goethe, i. 159, 202; ii. 467, 534. Gordon, Colonel, i. 228. ---- Arthur, _see_ Stanmore. ---- General, advises evacuation of Soudan, iii. 147-148, 153-154; suggested for the work, iii. 149; previous career of, iii. 149 _note 3_; agrees to policy of evacuation, iii. 150, 153-155; characteristics of, iii. 151; popular feeling for, iii. 152, 156; changes his plans, iii. 152; appointed temporarily governor-general of Soudan, iii. 152; instructions of, iii. 153, 154, 554; views of, on the situation, iii. 153, 155; request regarding Zobeir, iii. 155-160; shows Khedive's secret firman, iii. 160-162 _and note 1_; reports himself safe, iii. 162; relief expeditions to, contemplated, iii. 162-164; Nile expedition to, despatched, iii. 165; death of, iii. 166; Gladstone's estimate of, iii. 169; Gladstone's views of appointment of, iii. 177, 196. Gorham case, i. 316, 378-381, 632. Görres, Dr., i. 319-320 _and note 1_. Gortchakoff, ii. 15, 343, 350, 353 _note_, 354, 355. Goschen, G. J., included in Russell cabinet (1865), ii. 156 and _note 1_; on Irish Church bill, ii. 274; bill of, for throwing open all lay degrees, ii. 313; on civil service reform, ii. 315; president of poor law board (1868), ii. 644; Local Bating bill of, ii. 377, 388; first lord of admiralty (1871), ii. 615; considered for exchequer (1873), ii. 463; opposition support of, i. 472-473; opposes reduction of estimates (1874), ii. 483-484; at Constantinople, iii. 9-10; on Soudan question, iii. 175, 176; votes with conservatives on Collings' amendment, iii. 288; against home rule, iii. 291 _note_, 294; defeated in Edinburgh, iii. 343; chancellor of exchequer (1886), iii. 364; compared with Hartington, iii. 366; urged by Hartington to join the government, iii. 367; budget (1887), iii. 385; otherwise mentioned, ii. 498, 503, 504, 563, 625, 644-645; iii. 220, 268. Goulburn, Henry, appointed chancellor of exchequer, i. 240; attitude of, towards repeal, i. 283; towards Lord Derby, i. 419; otherwise mentioned, i. 271, 420, 472. Government Annuities bill, ii. 52-53, 125. ---- powers, i. 304. Gower, F. Leveson, ii. 459 _note_. ---- Lord Ronald, ii. 183. Grafton, Duke of, ii. 467. Graham, General, iii. 176. ---- Sir James:-- _Chronology_--Reform advocated by, i. 143; corn laws defended by, i. 114, 249; resigns on Irish church question, i. 154; estimate of Peel, i. 248, 263; attitude towards protection, i. 253, 352; bill on Irish colleges, ii. 434; supports Peel on repeal, i. 283; views on Peel's eulogium of Cobden, i. 295, 296; on Peel's changes of policy, i. 296; on Disraeli's agricultural distress motion, i. 354-356; Don Pacifico debate, i. 368; papal aggression question, i. 407; Russell's proposal to include, i. 416; decides for Russell rather than Derby, i. 418-421 _and note_, 423, 424; views on Gladstone's attitude to Disraeli, i. 432; Russell's attitude towards, i. 444; refuses chancellorship of exchequer, i. 447-448; on Gladstone's representation of Oxford, i. 453; on Gladstone's budget, i. 465, 466; misgivings of, i. 466, 467; on Napoleon III., i. 485; on Peelites' position regarding Palmerston, i. 534; opposes Roebuck's proposal, i. 538; resigns, i. 539; reason for resigning, i. 542; efforts for peace, i. 546; Gladstone's relations with, i. 551, 559; position of, contrasted with Gladstone's, i. 555; discourages Gladstone's communicating with Derby, i. 552, 556; views of, on reconstructed government, i. 561; on Divorce bill, i. 571; uneasiness regarding Gladstone, i. 581; on party relationships, i. 584 _and note_; Disraeli's attitude towards, i. 584, 587; inclines to Gladstone's joining Derby, i. 586, 590, 591; in sympathy with Palmerston's government, i. 628; on Russell's despatch regarding Italy, ii. 16; death of, ii. 87-88. Debating, method of, i. 195. Estimate of, i. 407-408. Gladstone's estimate of, i. 248, 250; iii. 525; his estimate of Gladstone, i. 186; ii. 170; Gladstone contrasted with, i. 407; otherwise mentioned, i. 126, 177, 238, 248, 258, 273, 275, 293, 405 _note_, 418, 420, 445, 446, 449, 482, 490, 492, 511, 526, 535, 536, 560, 566, 576, 593, 595-596, 613; ii. 30, 37, 194, 302. Gramont, Duc de, ii. 325-328, 330, 334, 336, 337. Grant, General, ii. 406. ---- G., Gladstone's godfather, i. 7. Granville, Lord:-- _Chronology_--On cession of Canada, i. 402 _note_; on Gladstone's budget, i. 466; on Peelites' refusal to join Palmerston, i. 535; tries to form a government, i. 625; French treaty, ii. 22; Paper Duties bill, ii. 33, 37; letter to Gladstone on his leadership, ii. 172; against vote of confidence after Reform defeat, ii. 207; on Gladstone's _Chapter of Autobiography_, ii. 249-250; colonial secretary (1868), ii. 644; Irish Church bill, ii. 261-262, 269-271, 274-279, 645; foreign secretary (1870), ii. 324, 644; efforts to avert Franco-Prussian war, ii. 325-330, 335; deprecates Gladstone's absence, ii. 422; Gladstone's daily conferences with, ii. 338; on annexation of Alsace and Lorraine, ii. 348; on Black Sea provisions of Treaty of Paris, ii. 349-351, 355; on Collier appointment, ii. 383; on _Alabama_ case, ii. 403, 410, 411; opposes honours for Mill, ii. 430; consultations with, on ministerial crisis, ii. 446-447, 452; at Hawarden (1873), ii. 474; advocates resignation before assembling, ii. 492; on question of leadership, ii. 504; on Italian view of _Vatican Decrees_ pamphlet, ii. 520; reports Disraeli's proposed resignation, ii. 550; on Bulgarian question, ii. 550, 552, 556, 564; views on the party vote, ii. 568; succession of, to power, foretold by Gladstone, ii. 582; approves Gladstone's Midlothian candidature, ii. 584, 585; views on leadership, ii. 601-602 _and note_, 620-621, 624; omission of, by the Queen, disapproved by Gladstone, ii. 622; foreign secretary (1880), ii. 625, 626, 653; Smyrna demonstration affair, iii. 9; Egyptian question (1881-82), iii. 74, 76-80, 87; letter to Gladstone on renewed offer of peerage, iii. 104; conferences on Franchise bill, iii. 137, 138; correspondence, etc., on evacuation of Soudan, iii. 147,149 _and note 2_, 152 _and note_, 157 _note 2_, 159, 160 _note_, 162, 164; agrees to send Gordon to Soudan, iii. 150; at his send-off, iii. 150 _note_; Gladstone's conversations with, on Ireland (May '85), iii. 191-192; favours plan of central board for Ireland, iii. 194; on Gladstone's refusal of an earldom, iii. 210; correspondence with, on relations to liberal party, iii. 232-238; at Hawarden and Chatsworth, iii. 261; Gladstone's consultations with, iii. 261, 263, 268; view of Irish situation, iii. 288; Gladstone's memorandum, iii. 270-272; declines requesting Gladstone to convene late cabinet, iii. 269; colonial secretary, iii. 297 _note_; declares for home rule, iii. 291 _and note_, 294; prefers home rule to Chamberlain's Irish scheme, iii. 291; Gladstone consults with, on birthday dinner, iii. 322; golden wedding presentation to Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone, iii. 418; meeting at Lord Rendel's on Parnell affair, iii. 434 _note_; death of, iii. 462. Brevity of letters of, ii. 526. Gladstone's appreciation of, ii. 414; loyalty to, ii. 599-601, 603, 619; his estimate of Gladstone, ii. 415; Gladstone's letters to, ii. 288, 289, 292, 300, 375, 381, 479, 503, 555, 556, 563, 587; iii. 57, 83, 93, 101, 103-105, 113, 131, 171, 174, 175, 210, 216, 236, 261, 268-270, 282, 413. Temporising tendency of, ii. 602. Otherwise mentioned, i. 415, 458, 492, 493, 495 _note 1_, 624, 635-636, 648; ii. 39, 106, 120, 189, 233, 240, 244, 283, 297, 410, 417, 459, 462, 473, 477, 484, 485, 493, 502, 519, 557, 616-617, 644; iii. 5, 102, 112, 186, 414. Grattan, Henry, ii. 589; iii. 313-314, 339. Gray, Sir John, ii. 292. Greece:-- Berlin treaty's provisions regarding, iii. 8, 10. Don Pacifico case, i. 368-371, _and note_, 372, 374. Ionian Islands desirous of union with, i. 599, 602-605, 614; ceded to, i. 620. Gladstone's budget (1860) popular in, ii. 29; Gladstone's political jubilee commemorated by, iii. 91; tribute at his death, iii. 532. Salisbury policy regarding, iii. 525. Thessaly and Epirus desired for, by Palmerston and Russell, ii. 576. Greeks, position of, in relation to Turkey, i. 477. Green, J. H., i. 455. ---- J. R., ii. 561. Greenwich:-- Dockyard suppressed, ii. 374. Gladstone's election for (1868), ii. 251 _and note 1_; speech at, ii. 371; dispute as to vacating seat by becoming chancellor of exchequer (1873), ii. 465-472; manifesto to (1874), ii. 487-489; election for, ii. 490; election address, ii. 490 _and note_; refusal to stand for (1879), ii. 584. Greenwood, J., ii. 618 _note_. Greg, W. R., i. 46. Gregory VII., Pope, ii. 516. ---- XVI., Pope, iii. 62. Grenville, Lord, i. 104, 223 _and note 1_, 293, 445. ---- Thomas, i. 223 _note 1_. ---- George, i. 223 _and note 1_. Greswell, Richard, i. 330, 409. Greville, A., ii. 463 _note_. ---- C., i. 121 _note_; 243, 470; ii. 29; iii. 419. Grévy, M., iii. 105. Grey, General, Gladstone's letter to, on foreign policy, ii. 316; Gladstone's appreciation of, iii. 516. Otherwise mentioned, ii. 99, 103, 252, 267; iii. 473. ---- Lord, dissolution by (1831), i. 69; resignation of (1832), ii. 653; government of, broken up (1834), i. 113, 154; attitude of, towards Lord J. Russell, i. 297; refuses office (1845), i. 367; ii. 244; Althorp and Russell opposed to, i. 430; Taylor's estimate of, iii. 488; otherwise mentioned, i. 75, 77, 104, 222, 241, 418, 543; ii. 238, 436, 619; iii. 223, 289 _note_, 535. ---- Lord de, _see_ Ripon. ---- Sir George, defends slave apprenticeship law, i. 146; home secretary (1855), 540 _note_; leadership of Commons by, desired by Gladstone, ii. 152-153, 199; estimate of Gladstone, ii. 174; declines to join Gladstone's cabinet (1868), ii. 253; on Irish Land bill (1870), ii. 295; otherwise mentioned, i. 190, 297, 361 _note 3_, 576; ii. 33, 100, 104, 105, 401, 435, 635-636. Grillion's dining club, i. 227-228, 239. Grosvenor, Lady, iii. 523. ---- Lord, ii. 195, 201-202, 205. ---- Lord R., iii. 269, 270. Grote, George, i. 200; ii. 366, 370, 430. ---- Mrs., cited, iii. 4. Guizot, F.-P.-G., on state of Italy, i. 398; Aberdeen's letter to, i. 449; estimate of Cavour, ii. 6-7; letters from, ii. 533, 538; sends Gladstone his _Peel_, ii. 538; otherwise mentioned, i. 163, 229, 371; ii. 100, 102, 220, 240. Gurdon, Mr., ii. 468. Gurney, Samuel, i. 461. Gurwood, Colonel, i. 228. Haddo, i. 137, 594. Halifax, Viscount (Charles Wood), on Gladstone's budget (1853), i. 465, 466, 468; budgets of, criticised by Gladstone, i. 470; first lord of admiralty, i. 540 _note_; objects to French treaty project, ii. 21; on Paper Duties bill, ii. 31, 33, 37; estimate of financial statements of, ii. 55; created viscount (1866), ii. 222 _note_; views on condition of liberal party (1867), ii. 228; on Gladstone's position in the House, ii. 229; declines Irish vice-royalty, ii. 253; on Irish Church bill, ii. 278; _Alabama_ case, ii. 401, 411; appreciation of Gladstone, ii. 414; Lord privy seal (1870), ii. 644; on defections of liberal party, ii. 436; on the Greenwich seat question, ii. 471; on election of 1874, ii. 494; otherwise mentioned, i. 222, 297, 420 _and note 1_, 458, 491, 492, 521, 623, 624, 648; ii. 363, 504, 635-636. Hall, Jane, i. 16. ---- Newman, ii. 134. Hallam, Arthur, Gladstone's friendship with, i. 39-42, 66-67; _In Memoriam_ stanzas descriptive of, i. 39 _note_; estimate of Gladstone, i. 95; death of, i. 108; Gladstone's mourning for, i. 108-109, 112; otherwise mentioned, i. 34, 37, 54. ---- Henry, i. 112, 137, 220, 230, 329; iii. 476. ---- Henry (junr.), i. 229-230. Hamilton, 10th Duke of, i. 102. Hamilton, 11th Duke of, ii. 193; iii. 485. ---- E. W., ii. 493; iii. 112, 306; Gladstone's letter to, iii. 210. ---- Lord George, ii. 264. ---- Walter, Bishop of Salisbury, Gladstone's friendship with, i. 54, 161; Gladstone's letter to, on _Essays and Reviews_ judgment, ii. 164; Gladstone's letter to, on state-aided education, ii. 299; otherwise mentioned, i. 78, 111, 235. ---- Sir William, i. 51. Hammond, E., ii. 324, 411. Hampden, Dr., Oxford estimate of (1829), i. 57; Gladstone examined by, in science, i. 78; attack on (1836), i. 161, 167, 316; Gladstone's early views regarding, i. 161, 167; Gladstone's letter to, i. 168; made a bishop, i. 377. ---- Lord (H. B. W. Brand), advice of, on Reform bill, ii. 202, 207; Gladstone's consultations with, ii. 210, 211; Gladstone's letter to, from Rome, ii. 217, 222; from Paris, ii. 221; dinner to, ii. 234-235; defines situation on Educational bill (1870), ii. 304; on Collier appointment, ii. 385; on session of 1872, ii. 390; on Irish university debate, ii. 445; on Disraeli's tactics, ii. 456; Gladstone's letter to, on the Greenwich seat question, ii. 467; reply regarding writ, ii. 470; forecast of general election (1880), ii. 605; on parliament of 1880, iii. 2; the Bradlaugh question, iii. 12-13, 16-17; action of, against obstruction, iii. 52-53; views on obstruction, iii. 57; on Bright's 'Irish rebels' speech, iii. 112; letter from, iii. 457. ---- John, i. 413-414. Hanbury, R. W., iii. 426 _and note 1_. Handley, W. F., i. 92-93. Harcourt, L. V., i. 72. ---- Sir William, on Foreign Enlistment Act, ii. 399 _note_; solicitor-general, ii. 463 _note_, 470; on the Greenwich seat question, i. 470; home secretary, ii. 653; speech on Khartoum vote of censure, iii. 176; Gladstone's consultation with, iii. 288; declares for home rule, iii. 291 _note_; round table conference convened by, iii. 364, 366-368 _and note_; chancellor of exchequer (1886), iii. 296, 297 _note_; party loyalty of, iii. 296, 364; meeting at Lord Rendel's on Parnell affair, iii. 434 _note_; chancellor of exchequer (1892), iii. 495 _note_; at last cabinet council, iii. 511; tribute to Gladstone, iii. 530; otherwise mentioned, ii. 602; iii. 67, 105, 106, 219, 268, 270, 273, 387, 429, 432, 433, 441. Hardinge, Lord, i. 122, 351, _note 1_, 420, 432, 549, 641. Hardwicke, 4th Earl of, i. 561. ---- 1st Earl of (1753), i. 567. Hardy, Gathorne, opposes Gladstone at Oxford, ii. 144-145 _and note_, 149; on Irish Church bill, ii. 264; Bentinck's appeal to, ii. 444. Harrison, B., i. 59 _note_, 78, 111. ---- F., ii. 524. ---- Archdeacon, ii. 422. Harrowby, Lord, i. 75, 132; ii. 268, 501. Hartington, Lord, moves vote of censure on Derby government, i. 625 _and note_; postmaster-general (1868), ii. 644; Irish secretary (1870), ii. 644; ballot bill of, ii. 368; suggested as leader, ii. 498; accepts leadership (1874), ii. 506; Gladstone's loyalty to, ii. 599-600, 603, 619; views on leadership, ii. 602 _and note_, 620-624; audience at Windsor and interview with Gladstone, ii. 621-624; suggested for India office, ii. 625, 627; Indian secretary (1880), ii. 654; war secretary (1882), ii. 654; iii. 150; compared with Palmerston, iii. 3; on local option motion, iii. 6; on evacuation of Candahar, iii. 10; opposes annexation of Transvaal, iii. 27, 28; on withdrawal from Egypt (1882), iii. 120; negotiations with conservative leaders on Franchise bill, iii. 133-134, 136, 138; against franchise extension in Ireland, iii. 141; agrees to send Gordon to Soudan, iii. 150; views on relief of garrisons, iii. 156; defence of government, iii. 163 _and note 1_; readiness to send troops, iii. 164; Queen's telegram to, iii. 167; at Holker, iii. 166, 171; on avoidance of liberal rupture, iii. 171; defends the government against vote of censure, iii. 176; opposes plan of central board for Ireland, iii. 194; Gladstone's letter to, on cabinet crisis (May '85), iii. 196; presides at banquet to Lord Spencer, iii. 214; views on conservative repudiation of Spencer's policy, iii. 215; friction with Parnell, iii. 220, 241; friction, with Chamberlain, iii. 226, 288; opposes home rule, iii. 233, 267, 273, 291; Gladstone's letters to, on Irish policy, iii. 240, 262, 273; reproaches Chamberlain for indiscretion at the elections, iii. 251; attends banquet at Belfast, iii. 252; Granville's visit to, iii. 261; letters to Gladstone and to his chairman on Irish situation, iii. 266; letter to the _Times_, iii. 269, 270, 273; Parnell's attitude towards, iii. 275; announces possibility of counter-declaration, iii. 282; votes with conservatives on Collings' amendment, iii. 288; declines to join Gladstone's cabinet, iii. 292; explanatory letter, iii. 293; Eighty club speech, iii. 293 _note_; speech on second reading of Home Rule bill, iii. 301 _note 1_, 313; at Opera House meeting, iii. 324; decides to vote against second reading, iii. 329; declines Salisbury's offer to head government, iii. 364; Gladstone's comments on position of, iii. 365-366; declines to join round table conference, iii. 366; urges Gladstone to denounce plan of campaign, iii. 371; otherwise mentioned, iii. 447, 503, 504, 552, 564, 568, 616-617, 622, 644; iii. 99, 166, 219, 259, 322, 363, 388, 430. Harvey, Rev. W. W., ii. 386-387. ---- i. 112 _and note_, 113. Hastings, Warren, iii. 469. Hatchard, J., i. 74. Hatherley, Lord (W. Page Wood), ii. 383-385, 414, 644, 645. Hawarden:-- Board school question at, ii. 646. Cattle plague at, ii. 195. Gladstone's first visit to (1836), i. 134; his marriage at, i. 223. Oak Farm embarrassments of, i. 338 _et seq._, 356; Gladstone's public finances influenced by, i. 474. St. Deiniol's library, iii. 420, 521. Tourist pilgrimages to, ii. 569. Transference of, to W. H. Gladstone, i. 344. Hawkins, Edward (provost of Oriel), i. 379, 627 _and note 1_; iii. 124. Hawtrey, E. C., i. 30, 31, 229. Hayter, Sir W. G., i. 440, 539 _note_; ii. 29. Hayward, A., ii. 382. Healy, T., iii. 447, 451. Heathcote, Sir William, Derby's intermediary, i. 551; Walpole's advances to, i. 683; Gladstone's letters to, i. 627, 630; letter to Gladstone on taxation, ii. 632; election of (1865), ii. 145 _note_; secedes from Derby government (1867), ii. 224. Helena, Princess, ii. 98, 103. _Hellenic Factor in the Eastern Problem, The_, ii. 558. Helmholtz, ii. 536. Henley, J. W., i. 417; ii. 31, 295. Henry VIII., King, iii. 466. Herbert, J. R., ii. 476. ---- George, Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 617. ---- Sidney, maiden speech of, i. 112; appointed secretary at board of control, i. 121 _note_; on Peel's eulogium of Cobden, i. 293; Russell's proposal to, i. 350; Peel's forecast regarding, i. 374; Gorham case, i. 381; attitude of, towards first Derby administration, i. 419; against Villiers' amendment, i. 433, 435 _and note_; on Gladstone's budget, i. 466, 467; favours dissolution, i. 467; invited by Derby to join government, i. 525; refuses, i. 526; inclines to join Palmerston, i. 532; wavers, i. 534; declines, i. 535; agrees to join, i. 536; resigns, i. 539; opposes joining peace party, i. 546; Gladstone's friendship with, i. 551, 559, 565-566, 577; discourages Gladstone's communicating with Derby, i. 552, 556; Derby's attitude towards, i. 577; approves Gladstone's refusal to join Herbert, i. 578; views of, on the Ionian question, i. 596; work of, during Crimean war, i. 651-652; on Paper Duties bill, ii. 33, 37; on French war rumours, ii. 43; correspondence with Gladstone on military charges, ii. 44; illness of, ii. 93; death of, ii. 88; otherwise mentioned, i. 55, 79, 351, 355, 405 _note_, 420, 423, 450, 468, 490, 492, 525, 527, 560, 576, 582-583, 585, 617, 648; ii. 47 _note 2_, 184, 238, 635-636; ii. 194; iii. 485. Herries, J. C., i. 112, 417. Herschell, Lord, on the Bradlaugh question, iii. 12; joins Gladstone's cabinet (1886), iii. 297 _note_; at round table conference, iii. 364 _note_; in cabinet (1892), iii. 495 _note_, 497 _note 1_. Herzegovina:-- Austrian acquisition of, ii. 83, 576. Revolt in, ii. 548, 567. Hewley, Lady, case of, i. 321-323. Heywood, J., i. 498; ii. 147 _note_. Hicks, General, iii. 145-146 _and note_, 161. Hignett, Mr., i. 345. Hinds, Bishop, ii. 259. Hobhouse, Sir John, i. 238, 266, 289, 420 _and note 1_. Hodgkinson, G., ii. 225 _and note_, 226. Holidays, ii. 379, 421-422. Holker, iii. 166, 171. Holland:-- Belgium's severance from, ii. 2. Prussian attitude towards, ii. 320. Holloway, T., ii. 459. Holmbury, ii. 459 _and note_. Holmes, Colonel, ii. 212 _and note 2_, 213. Homeric studies, i. 549-550; ii. 423, 476-477, 523, 536; iii. 353, 356, 385, 415, 443-445. Home rule, _see under_ Ireland. Honours and appointments, Gladstone's care in selection for, ii. 428; iii. 97. Hook, Dean, i. 148; ii. 459. Hooker, R., i. 160-161, 175; iii. 2. ---- Sir Joseph, ii. 536. Hope, Admiral, ii. 18 _note_. ---- Beresford, A. J. B., ii. 224. Hope-Scott, Miss, ii. 474. ---- ---- J. R., Gladstone influenced by, i. 162; interest in Gladstone's book, i. 162, 172-173; offers services to Gladstone, i. 224; godfather to Gladstone's eldest son, i. 227; on Chapters bill, i. 228 _and note_; interest in Scotch training college scheme, i. 230-231; Gladstone's proposal to, of visiting Ireland, i. 281; on Jerusalem bishopric, i. 308, 309; Gladstone's close relations with, i. 310; acquaintance with Dr. Döllinger, i. 318; Gorham case, i. 379-380 _notes_; secession of, to Rome, i. 386-387; death of, ii. 458; otherwise mentioned, i. 55, 212, 260, 272, 317, 321, 393, 403; iii. 419, 485. Horace, iii. 482, 492, 510, 512. Horsman, E., ii. 444 _note_, 445. Houghton, Lord, ii. 212, 369. House-tax, i. 106, 436-437. Howick, Lord, i. 102, 105, 222, 262, 420 _and note 1_, 644; iii. 300. Howley, Archbishop, i. 175; ii. 271; iii. 108. Howson, Dean, ii. 260. Hoylake, i. 239. Hübner, Baron, ii. 532. Hudson, George, i. 199. ---- Sir James, ii. 5-6. Hume, Joseph, impugns Gladstone's honesty, i. 301; views on intolerance of dissenters, i. 414; otherwise mentioned, i. 101, 106, 251 _note 2_, 362, 371, 423. Hunter, John, cited, iii. 388. Huskisson, W., John Gladstone's estimate of, i. 20; his support of, i. 249; work of, towards free trade, i. 39, 251, 255; death of, i. 66, 68, 69; otherwise mentioned, i. 89, 248, 265, 419. Hutton, R. H., iii. 349. Huxley, Gladstone's articles on, iii. 280-281; Manning's estimate of, ii. 308; approves Gladstone's attitude towards Vatican decrees, ii. 520; letters from, ii. 536; estimate of Gladstone, ii. 562; iii. 536; otherwise mentioned, ii. 423, 524. Iddesleigh, Lord (Sir Stafford Northcote):-- _Chronology_-- Works for Gladstone's Oxford candidature, i. 329, 333, 334; vindicates Gladstone (1847), i. 359 _note 2_; appointed executor in Gladstone's will, i. 387; return prepared by, on civil service, i. 510, 512; _Twenty Years of Finance_, i. 516; refuses to serve on Gladstone's committee (1859), i. 628; article in _Quarterly_ attributed to, ii. 94; serves on _Alabama_ commission, ii. 401, 404; on the Bradlaugh question, iii. 12, 16-17; on measures against obstruction, iii. 53; on Land bill of 1881, iii. 53-54; on Phoenix Park murders, iii. 68; on Bright's 'Irish rebels' speech, iii. 112; on Franchise bill, iii. 135-139; moves vote of censure on Khartoum affair, iii. 175; death of, iii. 356. Financial ability of, ii. 637. Gladstone's estimate of, iii. 356, 465, 466; his estimate of Gladstone, i. 333 _note 1_; Gladstone's letters to, i. 516, 517, 647; ii. 148-149, 648. Otherwise mentioned, i. 358, 452; iii. 6, 115, 537. Ignatieff, General, ii. 349. Imperialism, ii. 391-392. _Impregnable Book of Holy Scripture, The_, iii. 421 _note_. Income-tax, _see under_ Taxation. India:-- Burke's work for, iii. 469. Coolies shipped from, for West Indies, i. 24. Disraeli's schemes regarding government of, i. 592; procedure on bill of 1858, iii. 300. Gladstone's references to wrongs of, ii. 592, 595. Government of, contrasted with that of Ireland, ii. 284. Mutiny, France quiescent during, ii. 44. North-West frontier policy, iii. 10; difficulties (1885), iii. 177, 183-185. Parliamentary indifference to affairs of, i. 113. Troops from, for South Africa, iii. 34; refused for Soudan, iii. 147. Indulgences, i. 319. Inglis, Sir Robert, Oxford candidature of, i. 328, 332, 333; Gladstone proposed by, for Oxford and Cambridge club, i. 98 _note_; on China question, i. 227; Gladstone's divergence from, i. 321; political record of, i. 328; on papal aggression, i. 409; denounces Irish provincial colleges, ii. 434; otherwise mentioned, i. 120, 278, 306, 335, 336, 377, 427. Ingogo river, iii. 35. Ingram, Dr., ii. 437. Innocent iii., Pope, ii. 516; iii. 425. Inshes, family of, i. 17 _note_. Inverness, speech at, i. 476. Ionian Islands:-- Case of, i. 597-601. Gladstone's commission to, i. 594-597; his arrival at, i. 602; his scheme for, i. 610 _et seq._ Greece, union with, desired by, i. 599, 602-605, 614; granted, i. 620. Ireland:-- Act of Union-- Gladstone's views regarding, iii. 409. Home rule in relation to, iii. 285. O'Connell's amendment for repeal of (1833), i. 106; iii. 284 _and note_. Resolutions preliminary to, iii. 299. Agitation in, relief measures due to, iii. 410. Ashbourne Act (1885), iii. 287. Assassination bill (1846), i. 430. Beaconsfield's reference to, in election address (1880), ii. 606; his apprehension regarding, iii. 47. Boycotting in, iii. 199, 243-244 _and note 1_. Budget of 1853, as affecting, i. 462, 465-468, 646. Carnarvon's statement on (1885), iii. 211. Central board, _see below_ Local government. Chamberlain's views on compulsory expropriation, iii. 224; his attitude towards home rule, iii. 223, 225 _note 2_, 234, 267; his speech on condition of (June '85), iii. 233-234; his federation scheme, iii. 316-317, 327, 339. Chief secretaries for, in Gladstone's cabinets (1868-74), ii. 644; (1880-85), ii. 654; (1886), iii. 297 _note_; (1892), iii. 491, 495 _note_. Churches-- Presbyterian against home rule, iii. 318. Protestant episcopal-- Appropriation question, i. 54. Disestablishment of-- difficulties of, ii. 257-258; preliminaries, ii. 259-263; bill in the Commons, ii. 263-264, 266; with the Lords, ii. 266-271; back to the Commons, ii. 271-272; back to the Lords, ii. 272-279; modifications accepted by the Commons, ii. 280; debates on, iii. 57; Gladstone's letter to the Queen on, ii. 427, 645. Disraeli's proposals for, ii. 242. Gladstone speaks on, in Parliament, i. 126; at Newark, i. 129; his five resolutions on, iii. 300; his attitude towards (1865), ii. 141-143; (1865-68), ii. 239-240; his action regarding (1868), ii. 243, 245-248. Home rule opposed by, iii. 318. Reform bill, Gladstone's speech on (1833), i. 105; Inglis's opposition to, i. 328. Roman catholic, Parnell leadership denounced by, iii. 448-449. Coercion:-- Acts and bills (1833), i. 106; (1846) i. 290; (1847-85) iii. 211; (1866) ii. 200; (1870) ii. 297; (1880) iii. 56, 62; (1881) iii. 52 _and note_, 65, 71, 253, 274, 296 _note 1_; (1882) iii. 70, 188-192, 194, 198-199; (1886) iii. 350; (1887) iii. 375 _and note_, 376 _and notes_, 377-378, 380. Conservative party's repudiation of, iii. 212-214, 257; revival of, as a last resort, iii. 278-279; silence regarding, iii. 285; proposal of, iii. 287; Salisbury's 'twenty years' proposal, iii. 317. English realisation of, iii. 379; English attitude towards (1890), iii. 427-28. Liberal unionists accomplices in, iii. 368. Parnell's view of, iii. 369; his fear of renewal of, by liberals, iii. 274-275. Commissions and committees on (1880-86), iii. 362; (1894) i. 646. Compensation for Disturbance bill, iii. 49, 113, 409, 410. Conservative administration of (1886-87), iii. 369-370, 372-376, 378-383. Consolidated annuities, i. 468 _and note_, 646. Cowper commission, iii. 362, 372-374. Crimes Acts, _see_ Coercion _under this heading_. Cromwell's insight into problem of, ii. 287. Devon commission (1843), ii. 285. Education grant, Gladstone's views of, i. 227. Election results in (1880), ii. 613; (1885) iii. 252-255; (1886) iii. 346. English traditional attitude towards, iii. 291, 307-308, 340. Evictions in, iii. 48, 372, 379, 380, 410; compensation in cases of, _see_ Compensation _under this heading_. Famine in (1845), i. 282, 352. Fenians in:-- Parnell's alleged conversation with a spy regarding, iii. 404. Plots of (1867), ii. 241. Release of prisoners (1870), ii. 297. Secret committee on, proposed (1871), ii. 297. Temper of (1886), iii. 373. Financial relations commission, i. 646. FitzGerald's stanzas on, i. 31. Franchise extension in, iii. 139-142. Gladstone's first cabinet concerned with, i. 261; his proposal to visit (1845), i. 281; his forecast regarding (1845), i. 383; uneasiness regarding state of, ii. 132, 174; his view of his mission regarding, ii. 252; his visit to (1877), ii. 571. Government of Ireland bill (1886), _see_ Home rule _under this heading_. Habeas Corpus Act, suspension of, iii. 49-51, 57, 553. Home rule for:-- Act of Union, relative to, iii. 285. Bill of 1886:-- Alterations of original plan of, iii. 300-301. Amendments proposed for, iii. 332. Cesser of Irish representation, iii. 302, 304, 307, 309, 324, 326-327; opposed, iii. 324-325, 327, 332. Defeat of, iii. 341. Disabilities specified in, iii. 302, 309. Financial provisions of, iii. 305, 306, 319, 331, 560. Introduction and first reading of, i. 363 _note_; iii. 310-312, 316. Postponement of, after second reading, suggested, iii. 333-334. Reception of, in the press, iii. 318-319; by Irish party, iii. 319-320 _and notes_. Resolutions instead of, later views on, iii. 299-301. Second reading of, iii. 313-316, 317, 330, 334-341. Summary of, iii. 559-561. Taxation provisions of, iii. 302, 306-307, 560. Withdrawal of, after second reading, suggested, iii. 333-334. Bill of 1892-- preparation, iii. 496-497 _and note 1_; crux of Irish representation, iii. 497-498; second reading stage, iii. 499-500; majority, iii. 504; committee stage, iii. 498-499, 500-503; third reading, iii. 504; defeat in House of Lords, iii. 504. Cesser of Irish representation-- question of (1886), _see above under_ Bill of 1886; Gladstone's speech on, at Swansea (1887), iii. 386; question of (1892), iii. 497-498. Chamberlain's attitude towards, iii. 325 _note 2_, 233, 234, 267. Gladstone's speech on, at Aberdeen (1871), ii. 378; his letter on (1881), iii. 57; his attitude towards, before the elections (1885), iii. 215-216, 234-241; after the elections, iii. 256-257, 259, 261-264, 266, 268-276, 283; his pamphlet on, iii. 352 _and note 1_. Hartington's opposition to, iii. 233, 267, 273. Independence of nationalist vote desirable for concession of, iii. 238. Liberal party in relation to:-- Central organisation declares for Gladstone, iii. 323. Cleavage in, iii. 291 _and note_, 302-303, 324; Gladstone's decision to act regardless of, iii. 288-304; number of seceders on night of the division, iii. 341. Dissentients' meeting in committee room 15, iii. 335-337. Meeting of, at foreign office, iii. 332-333. Vacillations of, iii. 323. Waiting attitude counselled by Gladstone, iii. 285; adopted, iii. 286. National pronouncement for, iii. 252-255. Parnell's demand for, iii. 232. Popular sentiment regarding, iii. 330, 342. Salisbury's attitude towards, iii. 231, 233, 239, 242-244. Inglis's views on, i. 279. Intimidation in, iii. 198, 199, 211, 283, 287. Invincibles, iii. 70, 103. Jansenism in, iii. 384. Lady correspondents on turbulence in, ii. 531; iii. 348. Land League:-- Commission on, iii. 398, 401 _et seq._ Gladstone's view of, iii. 47, 59. Land Act of 1881 in relation to, iii. 57, 66. Land tenure in:-- Acts and bills:-- (1849) ii. 287. (1860) ii. 287 _and note_. (1870) ii. 294-296: iii. 49; precautions against eviction, ii. 294; debates on, iii. 57; Vatican decrees inimical to parliamentary success of, ii. 511; Greek congratulations on, ii. 532; effect of, iii. 257; failure of, iii. 54. (1881) iii. 53-57; debates and speeches on, iii. 56-57; Parnell's attitude towards the Act, iii. 57-61; nationalist efforts to amend the Act, iii. 66; inadequacy of, iii. 254; effect of, iii. 257; secured by agitation, iii. 410; unpopular, iii. 537. (1885) iii. 190, 194-195, 197; widespread repugnance to, iii. 310, 324-327, 332. (1886) pressed by Spencer and Morley, iii. 301; interest in, eclipsed by home rule, iii. 310; first reading of, iii. 313 _note_. (1887) iii. 373-374. Dual ownership, iii. 54, 55. Encumbered Estates Act (1849), ii. 287. English ignorance of, ii. 281. Peculiarities of, ii. 285-286. Landed gentry, rule of, destroyed by liberal party, iii. 256-257. Local government for (other than home rule):-- Canadian scheme suggested, iii. 215, 317. Central board scheme, iii. 193; Gladstone's attitude towards, iii. 191, 193-194; Parnell's approval of, iii. 194, 231, 291; his repudiation of, iii. 215, 230; his conversation with Carnarvon regarding, iii. 230-231; liberal cabinet's attitude towards, iii. 194, 291. County Government bill discussed by Gladstone and Chamberlain, iii. 225 _and note 2_. Federation views of Chamberlain, iii. 316-317, 327, 339. Gladstone's letter to Forster on (1882), iii. 58. Small holdings and allotments bill, Chamberlain's views on, iii. 224 _and note_. Maamtrasna debate, iii. 213, 279. Military _v._ moonlighters in, iii. 362. Mitchelstown affair, iii. 380-383. National League:-- Bill to deal with, proposed by Hicks Beach, iii. 287. Commission upon, iii. 398, 401 _et seq._ Elections influenced by, iii. 255. Power of, iii. 278. Papal intervention in, suggested, iii. 62-63; on plan of campaign, iii. 383-385; on Parnell leadership, iii. 449. Parnell's position in (1890), iii. 431; elections after the split, iii. 457, 458. Peel's view of condition of (1836), i. 133; his decision against Gladstone for chief secretary, i. 241 _and note_. Peers, Irish, called to House of Lords by Beaconsfield, ii. 429 _note_. Phoenix Park murders, iii. 67, 90, 308, 391. Plan of campaign:-- English and Scotch view of, iii. 373. Gladstone's attitude towards, iii. 370-372. Nature of, iii. 369-370, 373. Parnell's attitude towards, iii. 370. Pope Leo's pronouncements on, iii. 383-385. Ulster, for, encouraged by Churchill, iii. 371 _note_. Poerio's arrival in, i. 401. Queen's attitude towards, ii. 425. Railways in, Gladstone's commission on, ii. 243 _note_. Rents in:-- Arrears bill (1882), iii. 66. Beach on, iii. 369, 373. Bessborough commission on, iii. 54, 56. Buller's evidence on, iii. 372. Conservative vacillations regarding, iii. 373-375. Cowper commission on (1887), iii. 372-374. Crime in relation to excess of, iii. 409, 410. Parnell on, iii. 369, 372. Richmond commission on, iii. 54. Roman catholic party in, supporting English government, Gladstone's view of, i. 129. Social condition of (1886), iii. 297 (_see also_ Intimidation _under this heading_). Tenants' Relief bill, iii. 353, 369. Tithes bills, iii. 114. Tractarian movement's effect on feeling towards, i. 308. Ulster:-- Elections of 1885 in, iii. 252-253. Gladstone's consideration of, iii. 236. Home rule opposed by, iii. 327. Plan of campaign for, encouraged by Churchill, iii. 371 _note_. Separate assembly for, suggestion of, iii. 332. Solemn League and Covenant for, iii. 318. Variation in rents, attitude towards, iii. 374. University education in:-- Gladstone's bill for (1873), ii. 437-445, 495. Roman catholic attitude towards, ii. 435-436, 440-441. Unsettled condition of, ii. 434. Irish party:-- Aberdeen, attitude towards, i. 444. Anti-Parnellites, Gladstone's responsibility towards (1892), iii. 493. Bright's estimate of, iii. 328. Cleavage of (1890), iii. 350. Committee Room Fifteen, iii. 446 _and note 2_, 452. Conservative understanding with, iii. 188-190, 200, 203, 258, 260, 269-271, 274-276, 284. Criminal Law Amendment bill (1887), tactics on, iii. 377-378. Dependence upon, undesirable for settlement of home rule question, iii. 238. Exclusion of, from Westminster, proposed, iii. 302, 304, 307, 309, 324, 326-327; opposed, iii. 324-325, 327, 332; Gladstone's speech on, at Swansea (1887), iii. 386; question of (1892), iii. 497-498. Gladstone, estrangement from, on Italian question, ii. 122; on his Vatican campaign, ii. 502; vituperation of (1882), iii. 89; general attitude towards, iii. 274; ovation to (1893), iii. 500. Home Rule bill of '86, excitement at introduction of, iii. 311; acceptance of, iii. 319. Irish University bill, attitude towards, 441, 444, 445. Italian Nationality, views on, i. 618; ii. 122. Khartoum vote of censure supported by, iii. 176. Liberal party-- attitude of (1873), ii. 441; support of (1884), iii. 143 _and note 4_; opposition to (1885), iii. 184; dislike of, iii. 274; alliance with, apprehended by tory leaders, iii. 287; alliance accomplished, iii. 370; impossibility of uniform action with, iii. 371. Obstructionist tactics of, iii. 48, 51-53, 57, 123, 124. Papal rescript, attitude towards, iii. 384. Parnell re-elected by (Nov. 1890), iii. 438; effect on, of Gladstone's letter, iii. 442; split on leadership question, iii. 450-452; attempts at an understanding, iii. 455. Parnellites, iii. 458, 470. Revolution in parliamentary procedure effected by, iii. 377. Russell, attitude towards, i. 431. Separate parliamentary organisation of (1874), ii. 491. Spencer, Lord, attitude towards, iii. 108. Strength of (1885), iii. 253, 255. Violence of (1880-85), iii. 308. Irving, Edward, i. 44, 100. ---- Sir H., ii. 604. Ismail Pasha, iii. 145 _note 2_. Italian language, ii. 648. Italy:-- _Alabama_ tribunal, represented on, ii. 405, 412. Austria--tyranny of, i. 389-403; Aberdeen's views on, ii. 641-642; Gladstone's Letters on, to Lord Aberdeen, i. 392, 394 _and note_, 396; Aberdeen's view on the letters, i. 398, 399 _note 2_, 401, 641, 642; effect of the Letters, i. 396-398, 400-401 _and note 3_; Austrian war (1859), i. 618, 620 _note 3_; ii. 6 _et seq._ Eastern question, attitude towards, ii. 571. Ecclesiastical policy of, Gladstone's views on, ii. 510 _note_. Finance of, ii. 107. France-- aid from, ii. 7-8, 14; alliance sought by (1870), ii. 323; neutrality during Franco-Prussian war, ii. 344. German alliance of, iii. 414. Gladstone's visit to (1850), i. 389-393; (1859) i. 618; (1866) ii. 213-219; (1889) iii. 413; Italian recognition of his services, ii. 533; iii. 532; his views on policy of (1888), iii. 413-415, 561. Rome occupied by government of, in Franco-Prussian war, ii. 343, 512. Savoy, distinct from, ii. 22. Smyrna demonstration favoured by, iii. 9. Suez canal protection, invited to help in, iii. 80. Unification of, ii. 17; Gladstone slow to advocate, i. 389, 390; ii. 12-13; effect of movement on England, ii. 123-124. Venetia transferred to, ii. 214. Ithaca, i. 603. Jackson, Dean, i. 49 _and note 2_. Jacobson, Bp., i. 457; ii. 148. Jamaica:-- Apprenticeship system in, i. 145. Slave estates in, i. 22. Suspension of constitution of, proposed, i. 221. James, Sir Henry, made attorney-general, ii. 463 _note_, 470; on the Greenwich seat question, i. 470; on the Bradlaugh question, iii. 12; Gladstone's regard for, iii. 110; Corrupt Practices bill, i. 97 _note 1_; iii. 110; Collings' amendment, iii. 288; on spies, iii. 404 _note_. ---- Sir Walter, Gladstone's letters to, i. 357, 409, 549; otherwise mentioned, ii. 557, 565. Jansenism, iii. 384. Jeffreys, H. A., i. 71, 72, 80. Jelf, W. E., ii. 386. Jenner, Dr., ii. 99, 103. Jerusalem:-- Bishopric question, i. 308-309, 312. Greek and Latin dispute regarding holy places in, i. 478. Jessel, Sir G., ii. 463 _note_, 468-470. ---- Lady, iii. 106. Jesuits, ii. 516. Jeune, Dr., i. 499, 508. Jevons, W. S., ii. 57. Jews:-- Admission of, to parliament, i. 375-377; opposed by Gladstone, i. 106; by Inglis, i. 328. Disraeli's sympathies with, ii. 552-553, 558; iii. 475-476. Eastern question, attitude towards, ii. 571. Peerage recommended for, by Gladstone, ii. 429. Rothschild's work for, iii. 11. Jingoism, iii. 173. Jocelyn, Viscount, i. 295. Johnson, Dr., iii. 481. ---- Reverdy, ii. 401 _note 2_. Jones, Rev. J., i. 11. ---- Ernest, i. 396, 400. Joubert, General, iii. 25, 29, 34, 39. Jowett, B., supports Gladstone at Oxford, i. 335; on Oxford reform, i. 501, 502; Gladstone's appreciation of, i. 508, 512; advocates civil service reform, i. 512; estimate of Gladstone, ii. 178; work on educational reform (1869), ii. 312. Joy, Henry Hall, i. 29, 34. Juxon, Archbishop, iii. 96 _and note 1_. Kainadji, treaty of, ii. 550. Kean, Charles, ii. 528. Keate, Dr., i. 28, 30, 32, 34, 42, 44-46. Keble, John, i. 57, 178, 317, 380 _note 2_; ii. 181-182. Kempis, Thomas à, ii. 186, 187. Kew Gardens feud, ii. 420. Khalifa, the, iii. 144. Khartoum, _see under_ Soudan. Kimberley, Earl of, lord privy seal (1868), ii. 644; on _Alabama_ case, ii. 411; colonial secretary (1870), ii. 644; (1880), ii. 654; correspondence, etc., on Transvaal question, iii. 28, 31-36, 38, 40, 42-44; decides against a Transvaal commission, iii. 33 _and note_; Indian secretary (1882), ii. 654; for home rule, iii. 291 _note_; Indian secretary (1886), iii. 297 _note_; president of council and Indian secretary (1892), iii. 495 _note_; at last cabinet council, iii. 511; otherwise mentioned, ii. 304; iii. 50. King, Locke, ii. 126, 653. Kinglake, A. W., i. 480-481 _and note_; ii. 557 _note_. Kingsley, Dr., ii. 143. ---- Rev. C, ii. 433. Kiréeff, Colonel, ii. 557 _note_. Kitchener, Major, iii. 166. Kitson, Sir James, ii. 611; iii. 59-60. Knapp, Rev. H. H., i. 29, 80. Knatchbull, Sir E., i. 254, 420; ii. 156 _note 1_. Knollys family, ii. 100. Knowles, J., iii. 356, 358, 360. Knox, Alexander, i. 161. Knutsford, Lord, iii. 45 _note_. Kordofan, iii. 146. Kossuth, i. 402, 415. Kruger, President, Gladstone's meeting with (1877), ii. 571; urges reversal of annexation, iii. 25, 29; correspondence with Colley, iii. 35-36, 38. Labouchere, H. L., i. 420 _note 1_. Labour, war-loans as affecting, i. 517. Lacaita, Sir James, Gladstone's acquaintance with, i. 390-391; secretary to Gladstone's Ionian commission, i. 597, 607; Gladstone's letters to, i. 399; ii. 15, 107, 219, 510, 519; otherwise mentioned, i. 396; ii. 184. Laing's Nek, iii. 34, 36, 37, 42. Lake, Dean, i. 335; iii. 95. Lamartine, cited, i. 395. Lamb, Charles, i. 215 _and note 1_. Lambert, Sir John, ii. 226, 467-468. Lamennais, i. 200, 457. Lancashire:-- American civil war, effect of, ii. 66; Gladstone's relief works, ii. 77 _note 1_; fortitude under distress, ii. 124. Gladstone's speeches in (1864), ii. 131; (1865), ii. 178; invited to stand for (1865), ii. 144; his candidature, ii. 145-147; his election, ii. 147. Lancaster, T. W. L., i. 111. Landed property:-- Chamberlain's pronouncements on, iii. 174. Gladstone's views on, i. 345-349, 463; his budget proposals regarding, i. 463, 471. Ireland, in, _see under_ Ireland. Langley, ----, ii. 490. Lansdowne, 3rd Marquis of, view of, on repeal, i. 289; on reform, i. 416; retirement of, i. 445; on Gladstone's budget, i. 465, 466; attempts to form a government, i. 528; fails, i. 529; conditionally consents to join Palmerston's government, i. 533; assists Palmerston, i. 539; recommends Derby for premiership, i. 576; otherwise mentioned, i. 75, 431, 493, 530, 648. ---- 5th Marquis of, iii. 48, 90. Lanyon, Sir O., iii. 31-32, 40, 43 _note_. Laud, Archbishop, iii. 480. Lavalette, Marquis de, ii. 324-325, 329. Law of nations, i. 370, 371 _note_. Layard, Sir A. H. L., iii. 2. Leboeuf, Marshal, ii. 334. Lecky, W. E. H., iii. 425. Leeds, Gladstone elected for (1850), ii. 611 _and note 2_; his visit to (1881), iii. 59-61; Herbert Gladstone returned for, ii. 618. _Leeds Mercury_, iii. 264 _note_. Lefevre, J. G. Shaw-, i. 252; ii. 654; iii. 291 _note_, 495 _note_. Legacy duty, _see_ Succession duty. Legislation work, Gladstone's review of, ii. 51-52. Legh, ----, ii. 147 _note_. Leighton, F. K. (warden of All Souls'), i. 627. ---- Archbishop, i. 319. Leith, Gladstone's election for, iii. 344. Leo XIII., Pope, iii. 383-385. Leopardi, essay on, iii. 548. Leopold I., i. 449. ---- II., King of the Belgians, ii. 195, 458; iii. 162. ---- Prince, ii. 260. ---- ---- (Hohenzollern), ii. 323-328, 330, 332, 333 _note_. Lesseps, M. de, i. 591, 592; ii. 533. _Lessons in Massacre_, ii. 560, 562. Lewis, Sir G. Cornewall, on American civil war, ii. 69, 80, 84 _and note_; on Irish agrarian outrage, i. 281 _and note_; on Gladstone's influence in Oxford, i. 499; criticises Gladstone's budget (1859), ii. 19; succeeds Gladstone as chancellor of exchequer, i. 539-540; budget of (1855), i. 517, 559-562; Gladstone's differences with, on finance, ii. 22, 67, 623, 632; agreement with, ii. 633; objects to French treaty project, ii. 21; on Paper Duties bill, ii. 33, 37; views of, on nature of government, ii. 63; cabinet struggle with Gladstone (1862), ii. 95; Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 67; his estimate of Gladstone, i. 547; death of, ii. 67; otherwise mentioned, i. 229, 256, 374, 441, 481 _note_, 519, 624; ii. 31, 50, 194, 635-636; iii. 539. Lewis, Sir Gilbert, Gladstone's letter to, ii. 67. ---- Lady Theresa, ii. 190. Liardet, ----, ii. 490. Liberal party:-- Adullamites, ii. 205, 211, 224, 225. Apathy and disorganisation of (1879), ii. 586. Aristocratic element withdrawn from, iii. 293. Church of England, antagonistic to (1870), ii. 307. Cleavage in (1867), ii. 228, 232; (1872) ii. 388; (1874) ii. 499; threatened (1885), iii. 170, 185, 188, 197, 200, 265, 267, 282, 294; Gladstone's efforts to avert, iii. 220, 222, 241, 273, 282, 283; Gladstone's determination not to take part in, iii. 222; not to lead a home rule opposition, iii. 282; to act regardless of followers, iii. 288, 304; cleavage accomplished, iii. 291 _and note_, 302-303; first public mark of, iii. 324; number of seceders on night of home rule division, iii. 341; reunion desired by Gladstone, iii. 363, 366, 371 (_see also below_, Disaffection). Closure countenanced by, iii. 377. Colonial and Irish policy of, vindicated by Gladstone, ii. 606-607. Conservative party supported by, on important measures, iii. 257-258. 'Construction' shibboleth of, iii. 173. Disaffection in (1866-67), ii. 202, 205-209, 224, 225, 227-228, 232-235; (1868) ii. 246; (1869-74) ii. 495; (1870-73) ii. 497; (1872-73) ii. 436, 442, 444 _and note_, 445; (1873) ii. 457 (_see also above_, Cleavage). Electoral losses of (1874), ii. 490-491; triumph (1880), ii. 609, 613-614; gains (1886-90), iii. 427. Foreign policy of, attacked by _Pall Mall Gazette_, ii. 579. Forster's view of (1863), ii. 123. Gladstone's junction with, i. 626; his reception by, ii. 204. Hartington accepts leadership of (1874), ii. 506. Home rule, _see under_ Ireland. Irish party, _see under_ Irish party. Leadership of-- Hartington's acceptance of (1874), ii. 506; Gladstone's correspondence on (1885), iii. 223, 225-227. Majority of, in 1868, ii. 251 _and note 2_. Parnell's denunciations of, iii. 445, 450, 459. Questions tending to divide, list of, ii. 503. Round table conference, iii. 364, 366-368 _and note_. Tea-room schism, ii. 228, 232. Ultra-toryism in, ii. 37. Liberal Unionist party:-- Coercion the touchstone for, iii. 368. Conservatives, union with, iii. 350. Round table conference, iii. 364, 366-368 _and note_. Liberalism, Acton on, iii. 361. Liberty:-- De Maistre on, ii. 518. Gladstone's feeling for, i. 60, 84, 179, 180, 384-385; ii. 518, 524, 582; iii. 18-19, 88, 144, 178, 260, 475, 535; his views regarding fitness for, iii. 58. Licensing bills (1871), ii. 388-390. Liddell, Dean, i. 59 _note_; ii. 312, 539. Liddon, Canon, ii. 433; iii. 421. Lieven, Madame de, i. 270, 397, 401, 469. Life-insurance duty, i. 462. Lightfoot, Bp., ii. 433. Lincoln, Lord, _see_ Newcastle, 5th Duke of. Lincoln, President, ii. 75; iii. 235. Liquor interest, influence of, on election of 1874, ii. 495. Literary controversy, temper for, iii. 351. Littlemore, i. 235, 310. Littleton, E. J. L., i. 113. Liverpool:-- Canning's election for, i. 9-10. Conservatism of, ii. 605. Early condition of, i. 21-22. Electoral scandals at, i. 105. Gladstone, John, settles in, i. 16. Gladstone's debt to, i. 192; speech at (1856), i. 363 _note 2_; speech at (1864), ii. 132; election speech at (1865), ii. 145-146; speech at, on reform (1866), ii. 202; address at, on Strauss (1872), ii. 524; reception at (1876), ii. 558; speech at (1895), iii. 521. _Liverpool Courier_, Gladstone's letters to, i. 32. _Liverpool Standard_, Gladstone's contributions to, i. 98. ---- Lord, church patronage under, i. 153; nature of government of, i. 298; policy of, i. 121; otherwise mentioned, i. 242, 419; iii. 465, 543. Lloyd, Bishop, i. 57. Loans for war purposes, i. 515-518. Locke, i. 135; iii. 476-477. Lockhart, J.G., i. 274, 314-315. Loch-Lochy, battle at, i. 17 _note_. Lochnagar, i. 116; ii. 99, 102. Loftus, Lord A., ii. 321-322. Lombardy, i. 248; ii. 7. London, election results in (1880), ii. 613. ---- and N.-Western Railway, iii. 171. ---- convention (1884), iii. 45 _and note_. ---- protocol, ii. 562. Londonderry, Lord, i. 419; iii. 6. Longley, Archbishop, iii. 96 _note 1_. 'Lord Dundreary,' ii. 96. Lords, House of, _see under_ Parliament. Lorraine, annexation of, ii. 346-348. Louis, Princess of Hesse (Princess Alice), ii. 90, 97-100, 103, 187, 378. ---- xvi., iii. 480. ---- Napoleon, _see_ Napoleon III. Louise, Princess, ii. 379, 411, 533; iii. 524. Lowe, Robert (Lord Sherbrooke), opposes Reform, ii. 201-203, 205, 224, 228, 231, 235; iii. 300 _note 4_; declines to join Derby government, ii. 211; pronouncement on franchise, ii. 155-156; on Gladstone's leadership, ii. 172; chancellor of exchequer (1868), ii. 254, 644; views on Irish land question, ii. 283, 292; urges civil service reform, i. 510; ii. 314-315; opposes transportation of convicts to Australia, i. 359; Gladstone's letter to, on treasury administration, ii. 372, 650; budgets of, ii. 373; speech at Sheffield on finance, ii. 375-376; on _Alabama_ case, ii. 410, 411; attitude towards Gladstone, ii. 416; Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 417, 464-465; on Irish University bill, ii. 441; post office scandal, ii. 460-461, 463, 464; home secretary (1873), ii. 463 _note_, 645; on the Greenwich seat question, ii. 469; protests against Gladstone's retirement, ii. 498; viscounty desired for, by Gladstone, ii. 631; otherwise mentioned, ii. 247, 260, 504, 644, 645. Lowther, James, ii. 295. Lubbock, Sir John, ii. 562. Lucas, ----, i. 258. Lucretius, iii. 19, 481, 484. Lushington, ----, i. 59 _note_. Lyndhurst, Lord, failure to form a ministry (1832), ii. 653; attitude towards repeal, i. 283; Brougham's compliment to, i. 575 _and note_; Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 96; otherwise mentioned, i. 75, 122, 293-294; ii. 194. Lyons, Lord, on _Trent_ affair, ii. 73-75; on reduction of armaments, ii. 322; Spanish sovereign affair, ii. 325, 327-330, 336; on Black Sea affair, ii. 351; mentioned, iii. 105. Lyttelton, Lady (Mary Glynne), Gladstone's appreciation of, i. 187; marriage of, i. 223; illness and death of, i. 572-573; mentioned, i. 274, 293; ii. 100. ---- Lord, marriage of, i. 223; examines at Eton, i. 229; attitude towards Welsh bishoprics question, i. 288; connection with Oak Farm, i. 337 _et seq._; views on Gladstone's new policy (1865), ii. 133; endowed schools commissioner, ii. 501; Gladstone's letters to, i. 327, 381, 454; ii. 237, 299, 306, 312, 364, 646; otherwise mentioned, i. 187, 306; ii. 212, 539. Lyttelton, Neville, on Herbert Gladstone's candidature, ii. 617. Lytton, E. L. Bulwer, Lord, casts Gladstone's horoscope, i. 196-197; suggests to Gladstone mission to Ionian islands, i. 594; Gladstone's relations with, i. 609, 617; funeral of, ii. 437; otherwise mentioned, i. 149, 561; ii. 28, 181. ---- Sir Edward, i. 609, 612. Macaulay, Lord, first speech of, i. 22 _note_ 2; Sadler defeated by, i. 99 _note_; meets Gladstone in Rome (1838), i. 173-174; on Gladstone's first book, i. 177-178; on _Church Principles_, i. 181; on Gladstone's political position, i. 182; Gladstone contrasted with, i. 192-193, 195; debating method of, i. 195; on the China question, i. 226; Gladstone's censure of, i. 236; on Lady Hewley case, i. 322; on Gladstone's ecclesiastical views in 1838, i. 323; on Disraeli's budget debate, i. 440; on Barrow, ii. 536; iii. 467 _note_; _Warren Hastings_, iii. 290; Gladstone's estimate of, iii. 98, 425; linguistic purity of, iii. 476; on Dryden, iii. 484; Gladstone's essay on, iii. 546; otherwise mentioned, i. 220, 245 _note_, 315, 539; ii. 55, 194, 238, 249. ---- Z., i. 236. McCarthy, J.H., on conservative overtures to Irish party, iii. 190 _and note_ 2; Gladstone's views on Parnell leadership announced to, iii. 436, 437, 444; ignorant of Parnell's plans, iii. 439; leads away the anti-Parnellites, iii. 451-452. Macdonald, family of, ii. 17 _note_. ---- Sir John, ii. 401. Macedonia, iii. 532. Machiavelli, ii. 9 _and note_, 518, 594. Macgregor, J., Gladstone's estimate of, i. 250, 252. Macmillan, Mr., i. 455. McNeile, Rev. Hugh, ii. 545. Magee, Bishop, ii. 258, 260-261, 265 _note_, 275 _note_. Magyars, eastern question, attitude towards, ii. 571, 609. Mahdi, the, iii. 144, 149, 157, 161. Mahon, Lord, _see_ Stanhope. Maine, ii. 405. Maistre, Joseph de, ii. 518-519 _and note_ 2; iii. 476. Maitland, Sir Thomas, i. 619 _note_ 2. Majuba Hill, iii. 37. Malacca Straits, ii. 488. Malet, Sir E., iii. 146. Malmesbury, Lord, estimate of, i. 198; his estimate of Gladstone, i. 431; on co-operation with Gladstone, i. 562; distrusted by Gladstone, i. 623, 624; otherwise mentioned, i. 361 _note_ 4, 417, 561, 595. Maltby, Bp., i. 56. Manchester:-- Disraeli's speech at (1872), ii. 390. Fenian outrage in, ii. 241. Fraser appointed bishop, ii. 432. Gladstone nominated for (1837), i. 141; his speech at (1853), i. 483. Nonconformist protest at, against Education Act, ii. 308. Manin, D., i. 402; ii. 533. Manners, Lord J., _see_ Rutland. Manning:-- _Chronology_--Strongly anglican attitude, i. 161; in Rome with Gladstone, i. 173, 174; approves _Church Principles_, i. 182; revises ms. of _Church Principles_, i. 224; godfather to Gladstone's eldest son, i. 227; with Gladstone before resignation on Maynooth, i. 273, 274; Gladstone's close relations with, i. 310, 313; Newman's letters to, i. 311, 312; Guy Fawkes sermon, i. 313 _note_ 1; on secession to Rome, i. 317; on Gladstone's career, i. 323; on church outlook, i. 325; Gorham case, i. 378-380 _and note_ 2; secession to Rome, i. 385-387; estrangement from Gladstone, i. 387 _and note_ 2; on Gladstone's Irish church policy, ii. 143, 246, 250, 279; letter on Oxford defeat, ii. 147, 150 _note_; letter to Gladstone on premiership, ii. 255; Irish Land bill (1870), ii. 294, 296; on Education bill, ii. 308; on Irish University bill, ii. 439, 440; pamphlet of, replying to Gladstone's on Vatican decrees, ii. 504, 519-521; on eastern question, ii. 571; intercourse with Gladstone renewed, iii. 281; on cesser of Irish representation, iii. 325; on Parnell leadership, iii. 448-449. Contrasted with Newman, ii. 137, 521. Gladstone's letters to, i. 171, 230, 276, 323-325, 378; iii. 106. Ultramontanism of, ii. 509-510; otherwise mentioned, i. 55, 141, 148, 207 _note_ 2, 260, 321, 364, 393, 403 _note_; ii. 192, 214-215, 474, 499, 504, 509; iii. 191, 197. Mansfield, Lord, i. 17, 75. Manzoni, i. 173; ii. 11, 151 _note_ 2, 533; ode translated, iii. 549. Marcus Aurelius, i. 207 _and note_ 1. Maria, Donna, i. 248. Marie Antoinette, iii. 469. Marlborough, Duke of, ii. 268, 275, 571. Marriage--civil, legalisation of, i. 567; deceased wife's sister question, i. 569; Gladstone's views on, i. 568-572. Marriott, C, i. 59 _note_, 334. Marsham, Dr., i. 336, 426-427. Martin, Sir J., ii. 383. ---- Sir Theodore, ii. 47 _note_ 1. Martineau, Miss, ii. 541. ---- James, ii. 136; iii. 525. Maskell, Rev. W., i. 380 _note_ 2. Match tax, ii. 373 _and notes_. Mathew, Father, ii. 192. Maurice, F. D., influence of, i. 54; Newman compared with, i. 165; proceedings against, i. 168, 316, 454-455; on Gladstone's Oxford candidature, i. 331-332; King's College attack on, i. 454-455; appointed to Vere St., i. 456; otherwise mentioned, i. 54, 59 _note_, 60, 64, 79, 149, 376; ii. 534. May, Sir T. E., on the Greenwich seat question, ii. 467, 469; assists Speaker against obstruction, iii. 53; memo. by, iii. 285 _note_; mentioned, iii. 306. Maynooth:-- Conservative advantage regarding Act, iii. 238. Gladstone's retirement on question of, i. 632; ii. 238, 240. Inglis opposes grant to, i. 328. Irish Church bill (1869) concerned with, ii. 263, 266. Peel's policy regarding, i. 270; Gladstone's attitude towards Peel's policy, i. 271-273, 278. Russell's speech on, i. 411-412. Mazzini, i. 390, 396, 402; ii. 150, 184; iii. 464, 478. Melbourne, Lord, dismissal of (1834), i. 118 _and note_ 2; Hampden appointment, i. 166-167; on Peel's position (1843), i. 266; nature of government of, i. 298; Gladstone's estimate of, iii. 472; long administration of, iii. 493; otherwise mentioned, i. 143, 543; iii. 471, 490. Melvill, H., i. 100. Menschikoff, i. 486, 494. Mérimée, Prosper, ii. 533. Merivale, Charles, ii. 539. Metaphysical Society, ii. 524. Metaphysics, Gladstone's attitude towards, i. 209. Metastasio, i. 108. Metternich, i. 366; ii. 319. Mexico, French embarrassments in, ii. 84-85. Miall, E., ii. 305, 444. Middlesborough, ii. 78 _and note_. Midlothian, Gladstone's invitation to stand for, ii. 584; agrees, ii. 585; general outlook, ii. 586-587; the campaign, ii. 587-596; iii. 27; the Queen's disapproval, ii. 628; iii. 102; his return for (1880), ii. 611-612; (1886) iii. 344; (1892) iii. 492; his farewell to, iii. 535-536. Mignet, F.-A.-A., ii. 220. Miguel, Don, i. 248. Miles, ----, i. 264. Mill, James, i. 144, 200; ii. 366-367. ---- J. S., views on the Tractarians, i. 163-164; on civil service reform, i. 509; estimate of Gladstone, ii. 123; on government of India, ii. 284; on Irish land question, ii. 293; on education, ii. 302; against the ballot, ii. 366-367; memorial to, ii. 543-544; Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 544; otherwise mentioned, i. 187, 189, 229, 314; ii. 220, 282, 430, 534; iii. 491. ---- Dr. W. H., i. 319, 380 _note_ 2. Millais, Sir J., ii. 581-582. Milman, Dean, i. 56, 166; ii. 166, 539. Milnes, R. Monckton, i. 135, 149, 177, 229, 234. Milton, Gladstone's estimate of, i. 96; views on the church, i. 155; on marriage, i. 568, 572; Gladstone compared with, ii. 555. Minghetti, ii. 533. Mold, speech at (1856), i. 363 _note_ 2. Moldavia, ii. 3. Molesworth, Sir William, views on toleration, i. 138; on Canadian revolt, i. 361 _and note_ 5; in coalition cabinet, i. 447, 450; Denison's attitude towards, i. 451; supports Gladstone's budget, i. 466; attitude towards Crimean war, i. 482 _note_; on colonial policy, i. 645; otherwise mentioned, i. 144, 358, 361, 362, 458, 492, 648; iii. 13. Moltke, ii. 321, 324, 332-333. Moncreiff, Rev. Sir H. W., i. 59, 73. Money dealings, i. 206; iii. 419-420. Monsell, W., postmaster-general (1870), ii. 460-461, 463 _note_, 479, 644. Montalembert, De, i. 178; ii. 185, 476, 481; letter from, ii. 544. Monte Cassino, ii. 218-219. Montenegro:-- Berlin Treaty's provisions regarding, iii. 8-10. Revolt in, ii. 549, 553, 561, 566-567. Sympathy in Gladstone's illness, iii. 527. More, Hannah, i. 12. Moriarty, Bishop, ii. 512. Morier, Sir Robert, ii. 525. Morpeth, Lord, i. 222. Morley, Arnold, iii. 429, 433, 434 _note_. ---- John, appointment of, as Irish secretary, iii. 295, 297 _note_; previous utterances of, on Irish question, 296 _note_ 1; presses Irish land bill, iii. 301; in communication with Parnell, iii. 304-306, 320 _note_ 1; letter from Parnell against withdrawal of bill after second reading, iii. 333; letter on Parnell's view of resignation, iii. 347; at round table conference, iii. 364 _note_; Gladstone's letter to, on Churchill's retirement, iii. 364; interviews with Parnell, iii. 369, 370; Gladstone's letters to, on plan of campaign, iii. 371-372; Bingley Hall meeting, iii. 388; Parnell consults with, on _Times_ letters, iii. 394; Gladstone's letter to, on Italian policy, iii. 414; Gladstone's letter to, on Parnell, iii. 429-431; meeting at Lord Rendel's on Parnell affair, iii. 434 _note_; Gladstone's letter to, on Parnell's leadership, iii. 436; interviews with Parnell, iii. 439-441, 444; visit to Hawarden (1890), iii. 452-454; Gladstone's letters to, on Kilkenny election, iii. 457; on his birthday, iii. 458; on death of eldest son, iii. 461; at Biarritz, iii. 463 _et seq._; at Dalmeny, iii. 491-492; Gladstone's letter to, on election, iii. 494; Irish secretary (1892), iii. 495 _note_; at Butterstone with Gladstone, iii. 525; farewell visit, iii. 528; otherwise mentioned, iii. 387, 423, 497 _note_ 1, 499 _note_, 500. Mortgage of land, Gladstone's views regarding, i. 347, 349. Mozley, J. B., i. 334. ---- T., ii. 260. Mulgrave, Lord, iii. 211 _note_. Mundella, A. J., iii. 297 _note_, 495 _note_. Münster, Count, iii. 247. Murray, Archbishop, i. 178. ---- Sir G., i. 112; ii. 156 _note_ 1. ---- John, i. 274; ii. 382. Murchison, Sir R., ii. 380. Myrianthes, Archimandrite, ii. 532. Napier, Sir Charles, on Ionian islanders, i. 598-599. Naples:-- Gladstone's visit to (1850), i. 389-393; later visit (1888), iii. 413. Misgovernment of, i. 390-393; ii. 12, 16-17. Victor Emmanuel's entry into, ii. 17. Napoleon I., i. 320 _and note_ 1; iii. 482, 485, 549. ---- III., plot to slay, i. 574; aids Italy, ii. 7-8, 14; estimate of, by a papal official, ii. 10 _note_; difficulties of, with French ultramontanes, ii. 15; Cobden's negotiations with, ii. 20; estimate of Gladstone's budget speech, ii. 28; friendliness towards England, ii. 46; Palmerston's mistrust of, ii. 49; urges plan of representations to America, ii. 84-85; on Garibaldi, ii. 111; on Danish question, ii. 117, 118, 580; Gladstone dines with (1867), ii. 221; uneasiness regarding Prussia, ii. 321; deposition of, ii. 343; letter from, ii. 546; otherwise mentioned, i. 485-486, 489, 490; ii. 3-7, 325, 328 _note_ 1, 329, 334. National Debt:-- Conversion scheme (1853), i. 472, 513, 647. Proposals regarding (1866), ii. 57, 200. Reduction of (1868-73), ii. 375. Terminable annuities for paying off, ii. 651. ---- Press Agency, iii. 264 _note_, 265. Nationalist party, _see_ Irish party. Nationality:-- Emergence of principle of, ii. 2-3. Gladstone's attitude towards (1851), i. 389, 390; (1854) ii. 12-13; (1859) i. 618; (1885) iii. 260; (1888) iii. 361. Napoleon III.'s views on, ii. 7. Negro apprenticeship, Gladstone's speech on, i. 134 _and note_. Neilson of Springfield, i. 16. Nelson, Thomas, i. 110. Neruda, Mme. Norman, ii. 459. Nettleship, Mr., iii. 519. Neville, Father, iii. 388. Newark, Gladstone's candidature and election for (1832), i. 88-94, 96-97, 181; returned for, without contest (1834), i. 121; speech at (1835), i. 129; speech at (1837), i. 138; returned for (1837), i. 141; (1841) i. 238; end of his connection with, i. 287. Newcastle, Gladstone's visit to (1862), ii. 76-78; his speeches at (1891), iii. 462. Newcastle, 4th Duke of, offers Gladstone influence in Newark, i. 88-89; views of, i. 91-92; Gladstone's relations with, i. 94; Gladstone's visit to, i. 95; Sadler a nominee of, i. 99; Gladstone's first book approved by, i. 176; mentioned, i. 286. ---- 5th Duke of, informs Gladstone of parliamentary opening at Newark, i. 88; re-elected (1846), i. 288; on Gladstone's quarrel with Bentinck, i. 302; Russell's proposal to, i. 350; advises Gladstone to decline office, i. 406; desires leadership of Peelites, i. 408; attitude towards Derby, i. 418; ideas of a third party, i. 419, 423; supports Gladstone's budget, i. 466; war minister during Crimean war, i. 651-652; suggests substitution of Palmerston for himself, i. 522; on Peelites' refusal to join Palmerston, i. 535; favours Ionian project, i. 595; attitude towards French treaty scheme, ii. 22; on Paper Duties bill, ii. 33, 37; supports Finance bill proposal, ii. 39; death of, ii. 143; Gladstone trustee for, ii. 151; Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 193, 256; otherwise mentioned, i. 54, 74, 113, 119, 242, 285, 287, 355, 420, 443, 480 _note_, 490, 491, 493 _and note_, 528, 536, 584, 648; ii. 237, 238, 635-636. Newdegate, C. N., iii. 15. Newman, Francis, i. 329; letter from, ii. 177, 539. ---- Cardinal, J. H., Gladstone's early contact with, i. 57-58 _and note_ 1; sermons by, i. 58, 79, 86; Gladstone's estimate of, i. 163 _note_ 1; on _Church Principles_, i. 181; on J. R. Hope, i. 228 _note_; Gladstone's correspondence with, i. 272; Tract Ninety, i. 306-307, 311; view on Jerusalem bishopric, i. 308, 309, 312; on system of Roman church, i. 310; position of (1843), i. 310-313; Gladstone on treatment of, i. 316; secession of, i. 317; letter of, describing Gladstone's position, i. 632; contrasted with Manning, ii. 137, 521; on Gladstone's criticism of _Ecce Homo_, ii. 167; on Gladstone's _Chapter of Autobiography_, ii. 250; reply to Gladstone's _Vatican Decrees_ pamphlet, ii. 520; to _Vaticanism_, ii. 521; last letter from, ii. 547; Gladstone's call on, with Chamberlain, ii. 570 _and note_; Gladstone's letter to, on papal responsibility for disloyal priests in Ireland, iii. 62; reply, iii. 63; death of, iii. 421; otherwise mentioned, i. 159, 165, 168, 235, 319; ii. 192, 504; iii. 388. Newnham College, iii. 385. New Zealand, i. 297-298, 358, 645. Nice, French acquisition of, ii. 9, 22, 30, 108. _Nineteenth Century_, iii. 356-360, 519. Nomination boroughs, i. 621. Nonconformists, _see_ Dissenters. Normanby, Lord, i. 407. Norreys, Lord, i. 72. North, Lord, i. 133; ii. 467; iii. 181. North Notts, i. 287. Northbrook, Earl of, Gladstone's letter to, on Egyptian mission, iii. 121; agrees to send Gordon to Soudan, iii. 150; against home rule, iii. 291 _note_, 294; otherwise mentioned, i. 450 _note_; ii. 654; iii. 268. Northcote, Sir S., _see_ Iddesleigh. Norway, Gladstone's cruises to (1883), iii. 115-117; (1885) iii. 217-218. Novalis, cited, iii. 466. Novikoff, Mme., ii. 557, 574, 582. Nubar, iii. 149, 153, 157. Oakeley, F., i. 310. Oak Farm, financial embarrassments of, i. 337 _et seq._; Gladstone's preoccupation with, i. 272, 340, 342; his public finance influenced by experiences with, i. 474. O'Brien, W. Smith, i. 400. ---- W., iii. 448. Obstruction, _see under_ Parliament. O'Connell, Daniel, repeal amendment of (1833), i. 106; iii. 285 _note_; on Harvey committee, i. 112 _note_, 113; influence of, on Gladstone, i. 113; tory attitude towards, i. 129, 138; visits Newark, i. 130; on Gladstone's first book, i. 178; Peel's attitude towards (1844), i. 270; Gladstone contrasted with, ii. 593; crime denounced by, iii. 50; otherwise mentioned, i. 101, 266, 372; ii. 227; iii. 11, 62, 493. Octagon, the, ii. 526-548. Office, Gladstone's view of desire for, i. 554. O'Hagan, Lord, ii. 292. Okes, Provost, i. 11. Oliver, Mrs., i. 9 _note_. Opium question, i. 259-260. Oratory, political, i. 191-195, 411, 470; ii. 589; iii. 312 (_see also_ Gladstone, W. E.--characteristics--eloquence). Orsini affair, ii. 24, 44. Osman Digna, iii. 178. Ossory, Archdeacon of, ii. 265. Oswald, Alex., i. 419. Otho, King, i. 479, 605. Ottomans, _see_ Turkey. Owen, Professor, ii. 537. Oxenham, ----, i. 59, _note_. Oxford:-- Bias of, i. 60, 70, 84. Chandos opposes Gladstone at, i. 628. Christ Church, enthusiasm at, after Gladstone's election (1847), i. 336. Democracy, attitude towards, ii. 35. Dissenters' disabilities at, ii. 313 _and note_. Ewelme appointment, ii. 386-387. Famous sons of, iii. 476. Gladstone's career at, i. 48-85; his feeling for, i. 80, 84-85; ii. 148; iii. 486, 528; his combination of Lancashire and, i. 192; ii. 41; his visits to (1834), i. 111; (1847) i. 235, 377; (1853) i. 457; (1872) ii. 436-437; his reception of D. C. L. degree at, i. 377; his advice to his son at, i. 205; sympathy from, iii. 527. Gladstone's candidature for (1847), i. 328-333; election, i. 333-335; his return for (1852), i. 426-427; return for (1853), i. 452; return for (1857), i. 565; return for (1859), i. 614 _note_, 630; defeat at (1865), ii. 145-148. Gladstone's membership for, effect of, on his career, i. 327, 429, 453; on the university, i. 499; as it appeared to himself, i. 630. Influence of, i. 501. Method of study at, i. 50-51 _and note_. Reform--commission proposed by Lord J. Russell (1850), i. 497; opposed by Gladstone, i. 426, 497; Oxford resistance to, i. 498; conduct and report of, i. 499 _and note_ 4; Gladstone's scheme, i. 500, 501, 506-507; its reception, i. 502-503; results of, i. 508-509; Tractarian movement's effect on, i. 57. Tests, i. 506-507; abolition of, ii. 313 _and note_; i. 314. Tractarian movement, _see_ Oxford movement. W E G Essay Club at, i. 59-60. Oxford and Cambridge Club, Gladstone's membership of, i. 98 _and note_. Oxford movement:-- Gladstone unaffected by, i. 161; his election affected by, i. 328. Ireland affected by, i. 308. Nature of, i. 163-165. Oxford, influence on, i. 496. Second phase of, i. 305. _Tracts for the Times_, i. 329; Tracts Eighty and Eighty-seven, i. 307 _note_; Tract Ninety, i. 235, 306, 310, 311; iii. 422. Pacific, Gladstone advocates reduction of force in, i. 458. Paget, Miss, iii. 524. ---- Lord Clarence, ii. 112, 140. Paine, Thomas, ii. 127. Pakington, Sir J., i. 561. Palgrave, F. T., ii. 474. _Pall Mall Gazette_, ii. 579-580, 618. Paley, cited, i. 422. Palmer, Kelly and, i. 518. ---- Roundell, _see_ Selborne. ---- William, Gladstone influenced by, i. 162, 167; Gladstone's estimate of, i. 235; on Maynooth grant, i. 279. Palmerston, Lord:-- _Chronology_--On sugar duties, i. 236; on free trade, i. 265; on Spanish treaties, i. 280; on repeal, i. 289; Don Pacifico debate, i. 368-371; on Neapolitan tyranny, i. 394, 400; ii. 13; relations with Kossuth, i. 415; dismissal by Russell, i. 415; amendment on Militia bill, i. 416; in opposition to Peel, i. 420 _and note_ 1; section represented by, i. 431; moves amendment against Villiers, i. 433; joins coalition government, i. 446-447; on Gladstone's budget (1853), i. 465-467; different views of, on eastern question, i. 480; communications with preceding Crimean war, i. 481-482; approves Lord Stratford, i. 488; desired as war minister during Crimean war, i. 651; on Black Sea affair, ii. 349; Derby's vote of censure on (1857), i. 561-562; ii. 269; defeat of, on Cobden's motion, i. 564; ii. 265; urges postponement of Reform bill, i. 490, 648; Gladstone's letter to, on Crimean operations, i. 494; Aberdeen in conflict with, i. 495 _and note_ 3; foreign office reconstructed by, i. 510; suggested by Newcastle as substitute for himself, i. 522; invited by Derby to join government, i. 525; refuses, i. 526; approves Gladstone's refusal, i. 527; Peelites' attitude towards, i. 531-535; satisfies Aberdeen, i. 535; intention of, to oppose Roebuck's committee, i. 538, 542; advises acceptance of Roebuck's committee, i. 539; on Crimean war, i. 548; triumph of, at election (1857), i. 564; defeated on Conspiracy bill, i. 574-576; suggested as leader of Commons by Disraeli, i. 587; views on Suez Canal scheme, i. 591; on Corfu, i. 619; hands over Ionian Islands to Greece, i. 620 _and note_ 2; communications with Russell, i. 624; forms a government (1859), i. 626; views of, identical with Derby's, i. 631; the Principalities, ii. 4; French treaty scheme, ii. 20, 22; Paper Duties bill, ii. 31-33, 37, 39; Finance bill, ii. 39; franchise proposals of, ii. 200; supports Herbert, ii. 44; fortifications scheme, ii. 47; makes a peace speech (1859), ii. 48; correspondence with Gladstone, ii. 49-50; on _Trent_ affair, ii. 74; favours suggestion of representations to America, ii. 75-77, 85; advises Gladstone regarding Newcastle speech, ii. 76; on American separation, ii. 82; on reduction in naval estimates, ii. 94; receives Garibaldi, ii. 110; views on Garibaldi's departure, ii. 112; on Danish question, ii. 115-118, 120; on Gladstone's franchise pronouncement, ii. 127-130; on cabinet government, ii. 142; death of, ii. 151; Gladstone's action regarding funeral of, ii. 153; Gladstone's speech on, ii. 157. Career and abilities of, i. 543. Characteristics of, i. 366-368. Compared with Lansdowne, i. 530; with Aberdeen, i. 530; with Gladstone, ii. 172; with Disraeli, ii. 551; with Hartington, iii. 3. Ecclesiastical appointments of, ii. 122, 430. Foreign estimates of, i. 366, 367, 392. Foreign policy, principles of, i. 367; Granville's view of, ii. 348. Frankness of, i. 554. Gladstone's relations with, from 1850, i. 371; his opposition to, i. 553, 558, 566, 585; ii. 43; his harmony of sentiment with, i. 628; Gladstone's estimate of, i. 567; ii. 35; his estimate of Gladstone, ii. 171; Gladstone's conflicts with, on expenditure, ii. 43, 138-139. Leadership of, ii. 172. Life-objects of, ii. 45. Peers created by, ii. 429. Popularity of, i. 400, 493, 543, 564; ii. 633; cooling of, ii. 50, 176. Queen's attitude towards, ii. 98. Selection of work by, ii. 465. Otherwise mentioned, i. 120 _note_, 226, 402, 431, 444, 450, 526, 528, 579, 622; ii. 3, 19, 63, 80, 100, 104, 106, 111, 131, 171, 189, 194, 256, 423, 435, 494, 576, 577, 595, 619, 635-636; iii. 96 _note_ 1, 178, 228, 300, 419, 443, 475. Panizzi, Sir A., influence of, on Gladstone, i. 389-390; interview of, with king of Naples, i. 401; Gladstone's letters to, i. 402; ii. 107, 151; illness of (1868), ii. 196; otherwise mentioned, ii. 110, 184, 552. Papal States, ii. 108, 185. Paper duty, ii. 24-25, 30-41, 238-239, 636. Paris, Comte de, ii. 189; iii. 103, 470. ---- Treaty of (1856), i. 550; ii. 349-356, 607; iii. 522. Parish Councils bill (1893), iii. 504, 505, 511. Parliament:-- House of Commons:-- Attendance in--Gladstone's diligence regarding, i. 102; ii. 418, 422; iii. 7-8; Peel's view of, i. 299. Balance of parties in (1850), i. 373; (1852) i. 428; (1853) i. 446, 448-449. Burning of, in 1834, i. 114. Closure, introduction of, iii. 377; Gladstone's distaste for, iii. 124; drastic form of, on Parnell commission bill, iii. 401. Colonial affairs, indifference to, i. 362. Committee Room Fifteen, Irish party proceedings in, iii. 446 _and note_ 2, 454. Composition of first reformed, i. 101. Ecclesiastical discussions in, ii. 502. Excitement in, manifestations of, iii. 441; on introduction of Home Rule bill (1886), iii. 310-311. Executive sphere invaded by, iii. 6. Expenditure controlled by, under Exchequer and Audit Act (1866), ii. 61. Gladstone's diligence for duties of, _see above_, Attendance; his feeling of powerlessness in, i. 221; his care for rights and traditions of, ii. 492-493; iii. 7, 206, 208, 510, 530; his mastery of, i. 193, 410-411, 470; iii. 312; his place in (1847-52), ii. 211 _note_; his position in (1858), i. 581; his isolation in (1867), ii. 229. Grote's estimate of, ii. 370. Indian discussion, indifference to, i. 113. Intolerance of, in the Bradlaugh matter, iii. 13-20; resolution of 1881 struck off records of, iii. 21. Irish members of, _see_ Irish party. Irish representation in, cesser of, contemplated, iii. 302, 304, 307, 309, 324, 326-327; opposed, iii. 324-325, 327, 332; Gladstone's speech on, at Swansea (1887), iii. 386; question of (1892), iii. 497-498. Lords, conflict with, _see below under_ House of Lords. Majorities, large, dating from Gladstone's premiership, ii. 264-265. Obstruction in, Irish, iii. 48, 51-53, 57, 123-124; unionist, iii. 499. Party obligations in, i. 292, 295, 299. Payment of members, Gladstone's views regarding (1861), i. 611 _note_; his scheme for (1891), iii. 478-479; Chamberlain's pronouncement, iii. 174. Popular influence on, i. 150; iii. 4. Position of seats in, significance of, i. 422-423, 539; iii. 363; Gladstone's place (1853-1866), i. 631 _note_. Procedure of, violated by Disraeli, ii. 189; altered by Gladstone, ii. 631; Gladstone's advocacy of reform in, iii. 123. Reform, _see that title_. Reversal of previous vote ruled not out of order, i. 462 _note_. Shah's interest in, ii. 459. Supply, rights regarding, ii. 38, 40, 61. Tactics in, Stephen on, i. 147; Russell's skill in, i. 467; Gladstone's, iii. 538-539. Temper, school of, i. 199. Temporary retirements from, Gladstone's views of, i. 357-358. Uncertainties in, i. 650. Variety of style desirable for stating a case in, i. 192. House of Lords:-- Ballot bill rejected by, ii. 369. Chamberlain's attitude towards, iii. 173, 225. Commons' feeling against premier from (1894), iii. 513. Compensation for Disturbance bill rejected by, iii. 49, 409, 410. Conservative influence in, iii. 258; occasions of defeats, ii. 269. Employers' Liability bill mutilated by, iii. 504. Franchise bill struggle (1884), iii. 126-139. Gladstone's first hearing of debate in, i. 75-76; his first conflict with, i. 471; his refusal of position in, iii. 104, 209; his attitude towards (1884), iii. 127-128, 130; his later attitude towards (1894), iii. 504-505; his speech against (Mar. 1), iii. 511-512. Home Rule bill (1892) thrown out by, iii. 504. Irish church question, attitude towards, ii. 246, 258, 267-279. Opposition by, a stimulus to popular causes, ii. 248. Paper duty struggle with Commons, ii. 25, 31-40, 238-239, 636. Parish Councils bill maimed by, iii. 504, 505, 511. Parnell's apprehensions regarding, iii. 240. Peel's view of, ii. 133. Permanent opinion represented by, Gladstone's exposure of the theory, iii. 128. Preponderance of cabinet in (1865), ii. 153-154. Reform bill of 1867 amended by, ii. 226. Jews, admission of, i. 375-377. Premiership, labours entailed by, i. 297-299. Parnell, C. S. (_see also_ Irish party), number of followers of (1880), ii. 613; party of, iii. 2; obstructionist tactics, iii. 48, 53, 57, 123-124; attitude of, towards Compensation for Disturbance bill, iii. 49; indicted for seditious conspiracy, iii. 50 _note_ 1; attitude towards Land Act of 1881, iii. 57, 61; Gladstone's warning to, at Leeds, iii. 61; imprisonment of, iii. 61-62, 228, 233; Chamberlain's communications with, iii. 64; offers to resign his seat, iii. 70; on franchise extension in Ireland, iii. 143; supports government (May 1885), iii. 184; conservative understanding with, iii. 188-190, 200; not counted on by Gladstone, iii. 191, 197; favours plan of central board for Ireland, iii. 194, 231, 291; repudiates it, iii. 215, 230; on Maamtrasna case, iii. 213; friction with Hartington, iii. 220, 241; speech of (Aug. 1885), iii. 220, 228, 233; public estimate of, iii. 228; Carnarvon's interview with, iii. 228-231; home rule demanded by, iii. 232; victory of adherents of, at the elections, iii. 253, 255; Salisbury's reference to, at Newport, iii. 243; gives Irish vote to conservatives at the election, iii. 244-245; speculations regarding, iii. 267, 268; attitude towards Gladstone, iii. 274; tactics after elections (1885), iii. 274-275; in communication with Morley, iii. 304-306; characteristics of, iii. 304, 311; interview with Gladstone, iii. 305-306; objections to financial provisions of Home Rule bill, iii. 305, 306, 319, 331; consultations with colleagues, iii. 319-320 _and notes_; on introduction of Home Rule bill, iii. 311; on continued Irish representation at Westminster, iii. 324; opposed to withdrawal of the bill, iii. 333; second meeting with Gladstone, iii. 334; speech on night of the division, iii. 337, 340; deprecates ministerial resignation, iii. 347; systematic disagreement with, iii. 369; illness of, iii. 370, 376; disapproves plan of campaign, iii. 370; tactics on Crimes bill (1887), iii. 376-377; produces Tenants Relief bill, iii. 369; on papal rescript, iii. 38; forged letter in _Times_, iii. 391 _and note_ 1; denial in the House, iii. 392; further letters, iii. 394; personal statement in the House, iii. 395; asks for select committee, iii. 395; special commission, iii. 396-399; alleged interview of, with spy from America, iii. 404; Gladstone's sympathy with, iii. 408; visit to Hawarden, iii. 420, 445-446; speech at Liverpool, iii. 446 _note_ 1; divorce suit, iii. 428-430; public opinion regarding the verdict, iii. 430-434, 448-449; question of leadership of, iii. 435 _et seq._; Gladstone's letter to Morley regarding, iii. 436, 444; attitude of, iii. 438, 442-443; re-elected by Irish party, iii. 438; interviews with Morley, iii. 439-441; manifesto to the Irish people, iii. 445; committee room fifteen, iii. 446 _and note_ 2-448, 449-452; denounces liberal party, iii. 450-459; elections adverse to, iii. 458; last speech of, in England, iii. 459; death of, iii. 459; otherwise mentioned, ii. 492; iii. 56, 225 _and note_ 2, 240, 286, 367, 369, 372, 493. Parnell, Sir Henry, i. 251. _Parnellism Unmasked_, iii. 406. Parnellites, _see under_ Irish party. Party:-- Elements deciding relations of, i. 422, 435. Gladstone's views on, i. 304, 405. Tenacity of system, i. 448 _note_ 1. Pascal, i. 153. Patronage, i. 649; ii. 428. Patten, Wilson, i. 351 _note_ 1, 438. Patteson, Bishop, ii. 581; iii. 419. ---- Sir T., i. 455. Pattison, Sister Dora, ii. 604. ---- Mark, iii. 482. Paxo, i. 601. Pearson, C. B., i. 77. Pedro, Don, i. 248. Peel, General, i. 351 _note_ 1, 355. ---- Arthur, ii. 492; ii. 463 _note_; iii. 455. ---- Mrs., iii. 455. ---- Sir Robert (2nd Bart.):-- _Chronology_--Oxford University representation resigned by, i. 53; Oxford honours of, i. 79-80; praises Gladstone's maiden speech, i. 103; views on emancipation, i. 104; on Irish Church Reform bill, i. 105; Cobbett's attack on, i. 114; Gladstone encouraged by, i. 114; election promises of, ii. 489; summoned to form a government (1834), i. 118; Gladstone offered treasury post by, i. 119; Gladstone appointed under-secretary of the colonies by, i. 123; cabinet of (1835), i. 420; composition of whig opposition to, i. 419-420 _and note_ 1; resigns, i. 127; views on Ireland (1836), i. 135; speaks at Glasgow (1837), i. 138; Stanley dines with, i. 139; on Canada question, i. 641; on Molesworth's vote of censure, i. 145; on slave-apprenticeship law, i. 146; on Wilberforce, i. 150; defeated on Irish church question, i. 154; views on Gladstone's first book, i. 177; Jamaica case, i. 221-222; misunderstanding with the Queen, i. 222; China question, i. 225, 242; annoyance with Stanley, i. 234; views on sugar duties, i. 236, 280, 644; turns out whigs by majority of 1 (1841), i. 237; ii. 203 _note 2, 264; party meetings, i. 239; forms a government (1841), i. 240; Gladstone's inclusion in cabinet, i. 240, 305; privy council, i. 243; position of, regarding protection, i. 250-253, 258, 262-263, 282-287; lays duty on Irish spirits, i. 646; miscalculation of, regarding income-tax (1842), i. 474 _and note_; letter to Sir John Gladstone, i. 257; appeal to Pope Gregory, iii. 62; Lady Hewley case, i. 321, 322; Irish Land bill introduced by government of (1845), ii. 285; Maynooth, i. 270-274; precarious position of, i. 264-266; resigns, i. 283; agrees to resume office, i. 283, 285; iii. 207 _note_ 1; repeal of corn laws, i. 208, 282-287, 290, 459; hostility towards (1846), iii. 322; resigns (1846), i. 290-291; eulogium on Cobden, i. 291-293, 295, 296; party relations of, i. 289-290, 292, 293, 295; Gladstone's farewell interview with, i. 297-300; Russell's overtures to (1846), i. 350; votes for Gladstone at Oxford, i. 333; advocates keeping protectionists out of office, i. 352, 373; Gladstone's divergencies from, i. 353, 354; letter on Gladstone's mission for his friend, i. 365; Don Pacifico debate, i. 368-369, 372; death of, i. 371; statue of, inaugurated at Manchester, i. 483. Administration of (1842-44), importance of, i. 247; character of, i. 298, 642-643; ministerial discipline of, iii. 114. Age of, on entering cabinet, i. 261. Changes of policy of, i. 266, 425. Compared with Grey, i. 248; with Gladstone, i. 269; with Palmerston, i. 367; with Russell, i. 373; with Aberdeen, ii. 640-641. Courage of, i. 188, 289. Debating method of, i. 195. Disraeli's attitude towards, i. 432. Estimate of, i. 372; estimate of financial statements of, ii. 55. Gladstone--relations with, i. 112; 280, 286; confidence in, and appreciation of, i. 139, 221, 241, 243, 246, 252, 257, 259, 261, 277, 354; estimate by, i. 254; iii. 465; influence upon, i. 269; forecast regarding Disraeli and, i. 374. Graham's estimate of, i. 248, 263. Guizot's book on, ii. 538. Influence of, in the House, i. 373. Justice of, ii. 640. Liberalism of, i. 418, 419. Oxford training of, i. 497; convocation mob at election, i. 629. Parliamentary tactics of, i. 254. Peers, views on, ii. 133. Premiership of, length of, ii. 61. Otherwise mentioned, i. 49, 98, 126, 128, 149, 192, 212, 227, 236, 238, 245-6, 258, 263-4, 293, 300, 356, 416, 419; ii. 147, 154, 156 _note_ 1 178, 229 _note_, 277 _and note_, 288, 328, 423, 433-435, 463, 498, 619, 623, 627, 628; iii. 238, 277, 486. ---- Sir Robert (3rd Bart.), ii. 444 _note_. ---- Lady, i. 469. Peelites:-- The tory whip's attitude towards, i. 418. Derby's first administration supported by, i. 424; Derby's second administration supported by, i. 428; Derby's questions regarding (1856), i. 551. Dissolution of, as a party, i. 591. Disturbing effect of, i. 551-552, 558, 567. Divergencies of, i. 351, 353, 417-420. Gladstone's view on best policy for, i. 417-419. Leadership of--discussed (1850), i. 373-374; accepted by Aberdeen, i. 408. Palmerston, designs of, i. 447; attitude towards (1855), i. 531-535; in cabinet of, i. 536; resignation, i. 539; public outcry, i. 541. Papal aggression question, attitude towards, i. 410. Position of seats of (1852), i. 422-423. Protectionists, attitude towards, i. 407. Russell's proposal to include (1852), i. 416. Third party, position as, i. 417. Whigs, coalition with (1853), i. 443 _et seq._ Peerage:-- Additions to, during various premierships, ii. 428-429 _and note_. Offer of, to Gladstone, iii. 104, 209. Pembroke, Lady, i. 293. _Pembroke Castle_, Gladstone's cruise in, iii. 115-117. Penjdeh, iii. 183. Pensions, political, iii. 107-108 _note_. Penzance, Lord, ii. 383. People, the, _see_ Democracy. Perceval, Spencer, i. 298, 543; ii. 467 _and note_. ---- Mr., i. 452. Persico, Monsignor, iii. 383. Persigny, ii. 20. Petty, Lord Henry, ii. 156 _note_ 1. Phillimore, Sir Robert, on Hawarden settlement, i. 343-344; assists in Oxford reform scheme, i. 501, 502; on Gladstone's China war speech, i. 563; on Ionian Islands mission, i. 594; interview with Gladstone, i. 623; Gladstone assisted by, at Oxford, i. 628-629; on paper duties debate, ii. 33; on Gladstone's franchise pronouncement, ii. 130; on Irish church, ii. 141, 279-280; on disaffection of liberals, ii. 232, 234-235; on Gladstone's _Chapter of Autobiography_, ii. 250; on Gladstone's intention of retiring, ii. 388; on Gladstone's Irish University bill, ii. 437; on resignation of ministers (1874), ii. 493; Gladstone's letters to, i. 325-326, 388, 409, 616; iii. 94; otherwise mentioned, i. 54, 65, 75, 79, 80, 393, 623 _note_; ii. 26, 29, 31, 34, 35, 47 _note_ 2, 48, 73, 88, 92, 127, 214, 295-296, 422, 432, 461-462, 475. Phillpotts, Bishop, ii. 530. Phipps, Sir C., ii. 98. Pickering, ----, i. 75. Piedmont, growth of, ii. 7-9, 17. Pierrepont, Hon. H. E. (American minister), ii. 552. Pitt, William (the younger), finance of, ii. 58-59, 637-638; views of, on emancipation of slaves, i. 104; Glynnes related to, i. 223 _and note_ 1; income tax imposed by, i. 255; free trade theories promulgated by, i. 265; habits of, i. 298; Palmerston contrasted with, i. 367; Scott's lines to memory of, i. 371; Gladstone compared with, i. 469, 472; warlike preparations of (1791), i. 478; censured for French war, iii. 471; length of premiership of, ii. 61; resolutions of, preliminary to Act of Union, iii. 299; on the Union, iii. 313, 314; otherwise mentioned, i. 372, 419; ii. 230, 264, 343, 428, 435, 589, 619; iii. 256. Pius IX., Pope, syllabus of 1864, issued by, _see under_ Churches--Roman; Italian federation under, suggested, ii. 7; French ambassador's estimate of, ii. 10; invasion of territories of, ii. 11, 15; annexation to Piedmont of states of, ii. 17; misgovernment in states of, ii. 108; Gladstone's intercourse with, ii. 215-216, 218; attitude towards eastern question, ii. 571. Playfair, Lord, ii. 444, 463 _note_, 562; iii. 53. Plimsoll, S., ii. 620 _and note_. Plumptre, ----, i. 146. Plunket, Lord, ii. 589; iii. 139-140. Poerio, imprisonment of, i. 391, 396, 401; views of, i. 392-393; exile of, i. 401; Gladstone's efforts on behalf of, ii. 11; Gladstone's letter to, ii. 13; speech at Gladstone dinner (1867), ii. 218; compared with Mazzini, iii. 478. Poland:-- French feeling in regard to, ii. 118. Gladstone's interest in, i. 248. Peel's forecast regarding, i. 133. Russian dismemberment of, i. 477. Warsaw, meeting of monarchs at, ii. 5, 16, 184. Pollok, Robert, i. 132. Ponsonby, Sir Henry, messages during ministerial crisis (1873), ii. 447-450, 452; in Lords and Commons controversy, iii. 131; on North's American policy, iii. 181; interview with, on ministerial crisis, iii. 205, 207 _and note_ 1; brings Gladstone the Queen's commission, iii. 290; states the Queen's message, iii. 291; on feeling against peer premier, iii. 513; Gladstone's letters to, iii. 112, 179, 516. Poor Law Act (1834), i. 115, 121, 140. Porter, ----, i. 55, 64. Portland, Duke of, i. 543. Portugal:-- British preoccupation with affairs of, i. 248. Tariff negotiations with, i. 267; ii. 641. Positivists, iii. 358. Post office:-- Gladstone's admiration for, ii. 182. Scandal regarding, ii. 460-463. ---- ---- Savings Banks, i. 651; ii. 52, 125. Postage, cheap, ii. 57, 60. Preaching, English and Italian, i. 174. Premiership:-- Age for quitting, Gladstone's view on, ii. 423, 443. Foreign secretary, Gladstone's view of relations with, ii. 399. Limitations of, ii. 416, 420. Parliamentary labours entailed by, i. 297-299. Responsibilities of, ii. 416. Prerogative of the crown, Gladstone charged with resorting to, ii. 364-365. Press:-- Excitement fomented by, ii. 650. Gladstone popular with, ii. 41, 184; his views on, ii. 41, 557. Pretoria convention, iii. 44-45 _and note_. Prevost, Sir G., ii. 382. Prince Imperial, iii. 6. Princess Royal, i. 275. Privy council appointment, ii. 382-386. Protection:-- Colonial, against England, ii. 132. Gladstone's position regarding, i. 249-254, 260, 262, 264, 283-285. Peel's position regarding, i. 250-253, 258, 262-263, 282-289; his apprehensions regarding, i. 352; iii. 465. Peelites' views regarding, i. 351-352, 373, 407. Rout of, i. 425, 428, 441-442. Proudhon, i. 157. Prussia (_see also_ Germany):-- Army of, ii. 359. Austria--attitude towards (1853), i. 489; war with (1866), ii. 210 _note_, 214. France:-- Treaty with, regarding Belgium, ii. 340. War with (1870)--British efforts to avert, ii. 320-330, 335-336; declaration of, ii. 335 _and note_ 2; French miscalculations, ii. 337; course of the war, ii. 342-343; effect of, on British naval expenditure, ii. 374. Schleswig-Holstein question, ii. 114-118. Tariff negotiations with, i. 267. Public Worship Regulation Act, Gladstone's suggested substitute for, ii. 514 _note_ 3. Purcell, cited, i. 58 _note_ 1, 379-381 _and note_. Pusey, Dr. E. B., on Jerusalem bishopric, i. 308; on Newman's letters, i. 311; intolerance towards, i. 316, 317; supports Gladstone's Oxford candidature, i. 335; on Jewish Disabilities Removal bill, i. 375; Gorham case, i. 380 _note_ 2; on Gladstone's reform scheme, i. 504; Gladstone's relations with, ii. 135; Manning's letters to, ii. 137; on _Ecce Homo_, ii. 166-167; on Temple's appointment, ii. 432; Gladstone's meeting with (1872), ii. 437; death of, iii. 94; Gladstone's letters to, i. 316; ii. 181; otherwise mentioned, i. 57, 163 _note_ 2, 179, 235, 317; ii. 144, 236. ---- Philip, on Irish agrarian outrages, i. 281. Pym, John, i. 413-414. _Quarterly Review_, i. 315; ii. 520. Radical Party:-- Beer duty opposed by, iii. 187, 200. Chamberlain's popularity with, iii. 3. Characteristics of, Gladstone's views on causes of, iii. 240-241. Coercion for Ireland opposed by, iii. 190-191. Eastern question (1877), attitude towards, ii. 564, 568. Educational views of, ii. 303. Gladstone not popular with (1867), ii. 229; Gladstone criticised by, for resorting to crown prerogative, ii. 364; his attitude towards (1872), ii. 388-390; (1880), ii. 630; iii. 5. Irish land purchase opposed by, iii. 190, 194-195. Social programme of (1885), iii. 173-174. Suffrage, attitude towards, ii. 227. Utilitarian reforms effected by, 156. Raikes, H. C., iii. 96. Railways, i. 269, 353. Rampolla, Cardinal, iii. 521. Ramsay, Dean, ii. 379-380. Rangabé, i. 605. Rawson, ----, i. 333 _note_. Reading aloud, ii. 558. Reclamation work, iii. 419. Redcliffe, Lord Stratford de (Stratford Canning), views on Neapolitan question, i. 407; on eastern question, i. 486-488; ii. 555; otherwise mentioned, i. 406, 417, 420 _note_, 523. Redistribution of Seats bill, iii. 137-139, 176-177, 203, 205, 246. Redmond, J., introduces Arrears bill, iii. 66 _note_; on Parnell leadership, iii. 447; otherwise mentioned, iii. 66, 494. Reform, i. 490; ii. 370. ---- bills:-- (1832), i. 69-70, 75-76; ii. 227; iii. 125, 535. (1851), i. 415. (1852), ii. 238. (1854), i. 648. (1860), ii. 26, 29-30. (1866), ii. 200 _et seq._ (1867), ii. 223-236; iii. 57, 125, 175, 300 _note_ 4. (1884), iii. 125 _et seq._ Various, ii. 199. Reid, J. J., ii. 612. Religion:-- Gladstone's prepossession by, _see under_ Gladstone, W. E.--characteristics. Ecclesiasticism _versus_, ii. 306. Peerages independent of, ii. 430. Religious controversy, temper for, iii. 351. ---- Disabilities Removal bill (1891), i. 414 _note_. Renan, ii. 476. Rendel, Lord, iii. 386, 413, 434, 523, 526, 533. Retz, De, iii. 480. Reynolds, Henry, ii. 134. Ricasoli, Baron, ii. 8, 218-220, 533; iii. 475. Richards, Dr., 332 _and note_. Richmond, Duke of, i. 262; iii. 130, 131. ---- George, i. 233. Rio, i. 319. Ripon, Earl of (F. J. Robinson), at board of trade, i. 240, 243, 257; Gladstone's estimate of, i. 250; at board of control, i. 259; otherwise mentioned, i. 252, 253, 254, 255, 641-642. Ripon, Marquis of (Lord de Grey), war secretary (1865), ii. 153 _note_; education bill (1870), ii. 300-301, 303; on civil service reform, ii. 315; president of _Alabama_ commission, ii. 400-401, 404, 408, 411; created marquis after treaty of Washington, ii. 408 _note_; president of council (1868), ii. 644; retires (1873), ii. 463 _note_, 465; on Transvaal suzerainty question, iii. 45 _note_; Gladstone's letter to, iii. 69; for home rule, iii. 291 _note_; first lord of the admiralty, iii. 296 _note_; colonial secretary (1892), iii. 495 _note_. _Robert Elsmere_, iii. 356-360. Roberts, General, iii. 41. Robertson, Provost, i. 7-8, 17 _note_. ---- Anne, i. 16. ---- Colin, i. 12. Robinson, _see_ Ripon, Earl of. ---- Sir Hercules, iii. 32 _note_, 34, 41, 43. Roebuck, J. A., i. 239, 521, 523, 537-539, 542; ii. 173. Rogers, Frederick, _see_ Blachford. Rogers, S., i. 137, 149, 176, 320; ii. 540. Roman catholic church, _see under_ Churches. Roman catholics:-- Affirmation bill opposed by, iii. 20. Cesser of Irish representation opposed by, iii. 325. Election of 1874, action in, ii. 495. Emancipation of, i. 52-53, 277 _note_, 328, 506; ii. 227; iii. 257, 284. Irish university education, attitude towards, ii. 435-436, 440-441. Peerages recommended for, by Gladstone, ii. 429-430. Rome:-- Church of, _see under_ Churches. Ecumenical council at (1869), ii. 508, 510-512. French--occupation by, ii. 214, 319, 323, 512; evacuation by, ii. 217, 512. Gladstone's visit to (1832), i. 86-87; his feeling for, i. 174; his reasons against visiting (1888), iii. 413-415. Italian occupation of, ii. 343, 512. Misgovernment in, ii. 12. Romilly, Lord, ii. 168. Roon, Albrecht, Count von, ii. 332-333. Roscoe, W., i. 117. Rose, Sir John, ii. 400. Rosebery, Lord, invites Gladstone to stand for Midlothian, ii. 584; Gladstone the guest of, ii. 588, 609; speech after Gladstone's election, ii. 612; first commissioner of works, ii. 654; lord privy seal, ii. 654; at Hawarden, iii. 261; Gladstone's consultations with, iii. 261, 263, 268; for home rule, iii. 291 _note_; foreign secretary (1886), iii. 297 _note_; foreign secretary (1892), iii. 495 _note_; Gladstone's letters to, ii. 613; iii. 4, 239; farewell visit to Gladstone, iii. 528; tribute in parliament, iii. 531; otherwise mentioned, iii. 270, 414, 533. Rothschild, Baron, ii. 325, 328 _note_; iii. 11. Rouher, M., ii. 221. Roumania, ii. 4; iii. 532. Roumelia, iii. 91. Round, Mr., i. 329, 330, 332, 333. Round table conference, iii. 364, 366, 368 _and note_. Rousseau, i. 128, 203. Routh, Dr., i. 330, 384. Ruskin, John, i. 329; ii. 559, 582. Russell, Hastings, ii. 232. ---- Lord John (Earl Russell):-- _Chronology_--on Irish Church funds, i. 127; on Ireland (1835), i. 130; proposes 8s. corn duty, i. 254; Edinburgh letter, i. 282, 289, 444; Jewish Disabilities Removal bill, i. 376; defeat of (1851), ii. 653; Grey's refusal to join (1845), i. 367; ii. 244; fails to form a government, i. 283; takes office (1846), 290; overtures to Peel (1846), i. 350; on colonial government, i. 363; Palmerston dismissed by, i. 367, 415; on Neapolitan tyranny, i. 400; Ecclesiastical Titles bill, i. 405, 409; Durham letter, i. 408, 444; defeated (1852), ii. 264; resigns, i. 406; overtures to Gladstone, i. 421; on Four Seats bill, i. 424; views on leadership of coalition government, i. 444; joins Aberdeen's government, i. 445; budget of, i. 459; Gladstone's budget, i. 465-467, 469; negotiations preceding Crimean war, i. 481-482; approves Lord Stratford, i. 488; postpones Reform bill, i. 648; on Crimean war, i. 493; Aberdeen in conflict with, i. 495, _and note_ 3; Oxford reform, i. 497, 503; on exclusion of dissenters from universities, i. 505; on civil service reform, i. 511; on woods and forests dismissal case, i. 520; resigns on Roebuck's notice of motion, i. 521; his explanation, i. 523; Gladstone unwilling to join, i. 528; attempts to form a government, i. 530; fails, i. 531; complains of Peelites, i. 536; colonial secretary, i. 540 _note_; resigns, i. 548; opposes Lewis' budget, i. 560; Graham's relations with, i. 584 _note_; on Gladstone's Ionian commissionership, i. 613; on Italian nationality, i. 618-619; ii. 13; declines Palmerston dinner, i. 624; states conditions of joining Granville's government, i. 626; on economy, ii. 48; on the Principalities, ii. 4; despatch of, on Italian question (1860), ii. 15-16; supports French treaty scheme, ii. 22; on Nice and Savoy, ii. 23; Reform bill of (1860), ii. 26, 29-30; on Paper Duties bill, ii. 32-33, 37; supports Gladstone in finance debate, ii. 40; Trent affair, ii. 74; on American war, ii. 76-77, 83, 85; on Gladstone's Newcastle speech, ii. 80; interview with Mr. Adams, ii. 83; statement on Morocco loan, ii. 92-93; opposes reduction in naval estimates, ii. 94; on Danish question, ii. 117-118; Gladstone's letter to, on Palmerston's death, ii. 151; commissioned to form a government, ii. 152; offers Gladstone leadership of Commons, ii. 154; Reform bill of 1866, ii. 199, _et seq._; the supplemental charter, ii. 435; resigns, ii. 208; audience with the Queen, i. 209-210; disaffection against, ii. 228; on Irish church question, ii. 239; retires, ii. 243; asked by Gladstone to enter his cabinet, ii. 253; education proposals of, opposed by dissenters, ii. 302; on _Alabama_ case, ii. 394-397, 409 _and note_; on Thessaly and Epirus, ii. 576; Gladstone's visit to (1878), ii. 582. Compared with Althorp, i. 118; with Peel, i. 373. Gladstone's estimate of, i. 237; ii. 244; his attitude towards, i. 429; ii. 122. Impatience during recess, i. 235. Irish attitude towards, i. 430. Leadership of, i. 300. Palmerston's views regarding, i. 622. Parliamentary courage of, i. 188. Queen's mistrust of, ii. 98. Otherwise mentioned, i. 143, 146, 208, 266, 277, 280, 289, 420, 422, 430, 446, 450, 500, 526, 527, 543; ii. 12, 14, 20, 106, 116, 120, 144, 196, 229, 251, 295, 476, 577, 595, 623, 635-636; iii. 125, 238, 300, 476. Russell, Odo, ii. 352-354, 509, 510; iii. 179 _note_. Russia:-- Accusations against, applicable to, i. 652. Afghanistan, action in (1885), iii. 178, 183-185, 208 _note_. American war, mediation in, declined by, ii. 85. Austria, attitude of, i. 488; hostility to, ii. 4. Berlin memorandum, ii. 549. Bessarabia claimed by, ii. 574 _and note_ 2, 577. Bismarck's estimate of policy pursued by, ii. 353 _note_. Black Sea claims of, ii. 349-356, 398, 400. British secret agreement with, ii. 575, 577. Confusion in policy of, ii. 120. Crimean war, _see that title_. Don Pacifico case, offer of good offices in, i. 368. Egyptian question, attitude towards, iii. 82, 178. France, estrangement of, from England the aim of, ii. 4; neutrality in Franco-Prussian war, ii. 344. Germany, attitude towards, ii. 343, 348. Gladstone's attitude towards, i. 545; ii. 3, 499; tribute at his death, iii. 532. Ionian Islands despatch, attitude towards, i. 601. Rise of, i. 477. San Stefano, treaty of, ii. 572, 575. Smyrna demonstration favoured by, iii. 9. Turkey, war with (1771), i. 477; (1828) i. 480; (1853) _see_ Crimean war; (1877) ii. 562, 569, 572. Rutland, Duke of (Lord John Manners), i. 238, 303-305; iii. 533. Ryder, _see_ Harrowby. Sadler, Michael T., i. 99 _and note_. Sadowa, ii. 115, 214, 302, 319, 359. St. Asaph, bishopric of, i. 260 _note_ 1. St. Deiniol's, iii. 420, 521. St. Germans, Lord, i. 420. St. Leonards, Lord, i. 416, 448 _and note_ 1. St. Paul's Cathedral, i. 12, 233-234. Salisbury, Marquis of:-- _Chronology_--Views on the Principalities, ii. 4; on Gladstone's American war speech, ii. 86; on Danish question, ii. 120; retires from Derby government (1867), ii. 223, 231, 235; Disraeli's sarcasms against, ii. 247; on Irish Church bill, ii. 268, 270-271; on religious tests, ii. 314; subscribes to Mill memorial, ii. 543; at Constantinople, ii. 559-560; at Berlin congress, ii. 575, 577; Egyptian policy, iii. 74, 180 _and note_, 495; on Franchise bill (1884), iii. 132, 135-139; overtures to Irish party, iii. 188-190; unwilling to take office (1885), iii. 204-207; takes office, 208; countenances repudiation of coercion, iii. 212-213; Carnarvon's interview with Parnell unauthorised by, iii. 229 _note_ 1; but known to, iii. 230-231; speeches on Irish policy (Oct. 7), iii. 233, 242-244, 260; (Nov. 9) 239; nationalist support of, at the elections, iii. 244-245; on destruction of government system in Ireland, iii. 256-257 _and note_ 1; Gladstone's tender of support to, iii. 258-260, 284; resigns, iii. 289; Hottentot speech, iii. 317-318; at Opera House meeting, iii. 324; offers Hartington premiership, iii. 364; on rents in Ireland, iii. 374-375; on _Times_ forgeries, iii. 392; on report of special commission, iii. 402; Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 560; his estimate of Gladstone, i. 3; iii. 529; hesitation of, iii. 277; otherwise mentioned, i. 127; ii. 203, 587; iii. 90, 131, 203, 344, 365, 525. ---- Lady, iii. 526. Salmon, Dr., iii. 417. San Juan boundary question, ii. 405. San Stefano, treaty of, ii. 572, 575. Sand River convention, iii. 45. Sandon, Lord, i. 103. Sandwich, Lord, i. 144. Sandwith, Humphry, ii. 561. Sanquhar, i. 11. Sarpi, Father Paul, i. 598. Saunders, Dean, i. 52, 80. Saunderson, E., ii. 410. Savings banks, i. 519; ii. 34. Savoy, French acquisition of, ii. 9, 22, 30. Say, Léon, iii. 486. Scartazzini, iii. 387. Science, Gladstone's attitude towards, i. 209; iii. 359. Schiller, i. 108. Schleswig-Holstein question, ii. 114-120, 265, 580; Prince Consort's view of, ii. 93, 102. Schleiermacher, i. 166. Schouvaloff memorandum, ii. 575. Schwarzenberg, Prince, i. 395-396, 398, 399, 600. Scott, Hon. F., i. 356. ---- Sir Claude, i. 18. ---- James Hope, _see_ Hope-Scott. ---- Dr., Dean of Rochester, i. 61, 329 _and note_; ii. 433, 536. ---- Sir Walter, i. 159, 337, 371, 387 _note_ 1; iii. 424, 491. Scotland:-- Disestablishment question in, iii. 471. Election results in (1880), ii. 613-614. Enthusiasm of, ii. 588, 599, 608-609. Home Rule (Irish), attitude towards (1886), iii. 323, 324, 346. Liberalism of, iii. 536; liberal losses (1874), ii. 490. Local government suggested for, iii. 198. Peers, Scotch, called to House of Lords by Beaconsfield, ii. 429 _note_. Reform Act's effect on, iii. 535. Religious freedom in, Gladstone's views on, i. 384. Scotch Patronage bill, ii. 501. Seaforth, i. 107. Seaton, Lord, i. 228. Seats bill, _see_ Redistribution. Seely, C., ii. 113 _note_ 2. Selborne, Lord (Sir R. Palmer), ignorant of Irish land tenure, ii. 281; on Irish Land bill, ii. 295, 296; on Education bill, ii. 306; on abolition of army purchase, ii. 363, 364; on Collier appointment, ii. 385; on _Alabama_ case, ii. 403; on the Greenwich seat question, ii. 469-472; on leadership discussion, ii. 602 _note_; lord chancellor (1872), ii. 645; on Irish Church bill, ii. 646; otherwise mentioned, ii. 99, 165, 232 _note_, 239, 243, 436, 504, 627, 653; iii. 13, 53. Selden on contracts, iii. 45-46. Selwyn, Bishop, i. 38, 39, 43; iii. 419. Semon, Dr., iii. 216. Servia, i. 477; ii. 549, 553. Settembrini, i. 396, 401; ii. 11. Seward, W. H., ii. 75. Sexton, Thomas, iii. 69, 447, 451, 452 _note_. Seymer, H. K., i. 49, 59 _note_. Seymour, ----, i. 230. Shaftesbury, Lord, i. 163; ii. 111, 113, 122, 171, 367, 369. Shah, the, ii. 459. Shaw, Sir F., iii. 114. ---- W., ii. 613. ---- Lefevre, _see_ Lefevre. Sheil, R. L., i. 135, 195, 208, 221, 263-264, 322-323. Shelburne, Lord, i. 265; ii. 401 _note_ 2. Sheldon, Archbishop, iii. 95. Shelley, i. 96, 159; iii. 484, 549. Shepstone, Sir T., iii. 43 _note_, 45. Sheridan, i. 265; ii. 589. Shurey, Mrs., i. 27. Sibthorp, Col., i. 288 _note_. Sidmouth, Lord, i. 431. Simeon, Charles, i. 11 _and note_ 2. Simon, Jules, ii. 221. Sinclair, Sir G., i. 113, 178. Sinking Fund, ii. 68. Sinope, i. 490. Skingley, ----, i. 113. Slavery:-- American war, ii. 70 _et seq._ Apprenticeship system, i. 134 _and note_, 145-147, 221. Demerara estates question, i. 22-24. Education scheme for slaves, i. 125. Emancipation question, i. 102-105; iii. 300. Evangelical party against, i. 200 _note_. Gladstone's reply to Poulett Thomson on, i. 142 _note_. Gordon's decree sanctioning, iii. 156; his observations on, iii. 158-159. Suakin retained to check slave trade, iii. 180 _note_. _Slave Power, The,_ cited, ii. 70 _note_. Smith, Adam, i. 251; ii. 58. ---- Goldwin, i. 499, 508, 630; ii. 312, 561. ---- John, i. 22 _and note_. ---- Sydney, i. 56, 135. ---- W. H., view of, on South African affairs, ii. 601; against franchise extension in Ireland, iii. 141; Irish secretary, iii. 279; rapid visit of, to Dublin, iii. 296; on introduction of closure, iii. 377; on _Times_ letters, iii. 395; on bill for special commission, iii. 397. Smyrna, iii. 9. Smyth, Sir J. C., i. 24 _note_ 1. Soap duty, i. 462, 465, 466. Social question, Gladstone's attitude towards, ii. 56, 60; his disapproval of socialism, iii. 221. Socrates, ii. 538. Solferino, ii. 7. 'Some of my Errors,' quoted, i. 179. Somerset, Duke of, ii. 33, 153 _note_, 635, 636; iii. 358. Soudan:-- Egyptian misrule of, iii. 144-145; loss of, iii. 146. Evacuation of, advised, iii. 145-148; difficulties of, iii. 147, 149; determined, iii. 180; agreed to, by Gordon, iii. 150, 153-155; intention of, divulged by Gordon, iii. 160-161 _and note_ 1. Foreign attitude towards embarrassments in, iii. 177-178, 183. Garrisons in, to be extricated, iii. 148, 151; Mahdi's treatment of, iii. 149 _note_ 1; Gordon's opinion regarding abandonment of, iii. 156; Zobeir's appointment urged for extrication of, iii. 159. Khartoum, garrison of, to be relieved, iii. 150, 151; Gordon's arrival at, iii. 155; disaffection of tribes round, iii. 160; fall of, iii. 166; expedition to, urged by Goschen, iii. 176; deprecated by Baring, iii. 180. Mahdi's rise in, iii. 144. Nile campaign, iii. 165-166. South Sea stock, i. 472, 513, 647. Southey, i. 140; ii. 538. Spain:-- Hohenzollern candidate for throne of, ii. 323-328, 330, 332, 333 _note_. Land question in, iii. 477. Palmerston on treaties with, i. 280. Tariff negotiations with, i. 267. Special commission, the, unconstitutional character of, iii. 390, 400, 401; offer of, by government, iii. 396; bill for, iii. 397-401; sittings of, iii. 401-407; scope of, iii. 402; report of, iii. 402, 408-411; effect of, on public opinion, iii. 411-412. _Spectator_, ii. 175-177. Spedding, James, i. 509; ii. 534. Spencer, 3rd Earl, i. 235, 292. ---- 4th Earl, i. 341. ---- 5th Earl, interview of, with Cardinal Cullen, ii. 439-440; president of the council (1880), ii. 653; Irish viceroy (1882), iii. 65, 654; magnitude of task in Ireland, iii. 70-71; Irish party, attitude towards, iii. 108; on renewal of Crimes Act, iii. 190, 192; views on Land Purchase bill, iii. 194-195; conservative attack on, iii. 213-214, 262; banquet to, 214, 233; at Chatsworth and Hawarden, iii. 261; Irish administration of, 261, 379; Gladstone's consultations with, iii. 261, 263, 268; Gladstone's letter to (Dec. 30), i. 272; for home rule, iii. 291 _note_; views on Chamberlain's Irish scheme, iii. 291; president of council (1886), iii. 297 _note_; first lord of admiralty (1892), iii. 495 _note_; Gladstone's intention to recommend, as his successor, iii. 512; otherwise mentioned, ii. 260, 265; iii. 50 _note_, 67, 69, 105, 186, 195, 198, 301, 306, 429, 497 _note_. Spencer, Lady Sarah, iii. 518. Sport, Gladstone's view of, i. 116. Spring-Rice, T., Lord Monteagle, i. 420 _and note_. Spurgeon, Rev. Charles, ii. 135, 272, 530, 531. Stafford, Augustus, i. 356. _Standard_, iii. 264 _note_. Stanhope, Lord (Lord Mahon), i. 351 _note_, 438, 569; ii. 536. Stanley, Dean, position of, at Oxford (1847), i. 335; on Oxford reform, i. 498, 503; serves on Oxford commission, i. 499; on religious tests, i. 506; visits to Monte Cassino, ii. 219; in Rome, ii. 222; death of, iii. 98; otherwise mentioned, i. 15, 46-47; iii. 98. ---- Edward, Bishop of Norwich, i. 46. ---- Lady Augusta, ii. 216 _and note_; ii. 222. ---- of Alderley, Lord, ii. 39-40, 118. ----, Lord, _see_ Derby. Stanmore, Lord (Arthur Gordon), private secretary to Gladstone, i. 597, 604-608; Gladstone's letters to, i. 573; ii. 225, 550, 639; iii. 139; otherwise mentioned, i. 399 _note_ 2; 490; ii. 88. Stansfeld, Sir James, ii. 113 _note_ 2, 415, 504, 645; iii. 297 _note_. _State in its Relation with the Church, The_, Hope's interest in, i. 162, 172-173; Gladstone's purpose in, i. 172; his later estimate of, i. 179-180; opinions on, i. 175-177; German translation of, i. 181 _note_. Stead, W., ii. 550 _note_. Stephen, Sir James, i. 127, 142 _note_, 146, 147, 359. Sterling, John, i. 177; ii. 534. Stewart, Colonel Sir Herbert, iii. 145-147, 155, 160, 165. Stocker, C. W., i. 78. Stockmar, Baron, ii. 244. Stopford, Archdeacon, ii. 258-259. Storks, Sir Henry, i. 614, 616, 617; ii. 649-650. Stowe, Mrs. Beecher, ii. 72. Strahan, Sir George, iii. 32 _note_. Stratford, Lord, _see_ Redcliffe. Strauss, ii. 524 _and note_ 2, 525. Strossmayer, Bishop, iii. 352-353. Stuart, R., i. 237. Stubbs, Bishop, ii. 535, 561. Suakin, iii. 178, 180 _note_. Succession duty, i. 463, 465, 474, 513. Success, Gladstone's view of, i. 213-214. Suffrage, _see_ Franchise. Sugar duties, i. 236, 643-644; ii. 632-634. Sullivan, Sir Edward, ii. 264, 279, 283. Sumner, Bishop, iii. 96 _note_. ---- Charles, i. 441; ii. 70, 75, 398, 401, 402. _Sunbeam_, Gladstone's cruise in, iii. 217-218. Sussex, Duke of, i. 178. Sutherland, Duchess of, Gladstone's letters to, ii. 71, 88, 89, 146, 182-197, 215-217, 218, 246; friendship for Gladstone, ii. 183, 197; death of, ii. 197. Sutherland, Duke of, ii. 111, 112, 185-186. Sutton, Manners (Speaker), i. 100. Sydenham, Lord (Poulett Thomson), i. 142 _note_. Tait, Archbishop, on Oxford commission, i. 499; Gladstone's letter to, on _Essays and Reviews_ judgment, ii. 164; consultations with, on Irish Church bill, ii. 261-262, 267-270, 274, 278, 624; conversation with Disraeli, ii. 265 _and note_; on Gladstone's concern at outbreak of Franco-Prussian war, ii. 335; Gladstone's relations with, iii. 94; erastianism of, iii. 471. Talbot, ----, i. 380 _note_ 2. ---- Bp. of Rochester, ii. 436. Talfourd, Sir T. N., i. 135, 136; iii. 467. Talleyrand, i. 515 _note_; ii. 343; iii. 485. Tariff revision (1842), i. 255-257; (1845) i. 279. ---- treaties, attempts at, i. 267; ii. 21. Taste, i. 190. Taunton, Lady, ii. 183. Taxation:-- Chamberlain's views on (1885), iii. 174, 224. Collection of taxes, ii. 650. Conveyance duties, ii. 373, 651. Customs, articles liable to, in various years, ii. 25 _and note_. Direct, ii. 62, 63, 634. Fire insurance duty, ii. 373, 651. Gladstone's policy regarding (1857), ii. 632-635. Home Rule bill's provisions regarding, iii. 302, 306-307. House tax, i. 106, 436-437. Income tax:-- Assessments for, in 1842 and 1862, ii. 67. Chamberlain's pronouncement on, iii. 174. Charities, proposed extension to, ii. 65-66. Committee on (1851), i. 459. Crimean war, effect of, i. 474. Disraeli's proposals regarding (1852), i. 436. Expenditure, spirit of, fostered by, ii. 62. Gladstone's policy regarding (1853), i. 460, 462, 465, 466, 468, 471, 472; iii. 537; (1857) ii. 632-634; (1869) ii. 651; (1874) ii. 478, 483. Ireland, proposals regarding, i. 465, 646. Peel's policy regarding, i. 251; his miscalculation, i. 474 _and note_. Rate of, in 1866, ii. 58. Repeal of, possible only in 1874, ii. 496. Rise of, in 1859, ii. 19. Unpopularity of, i. 254-255. Indirect, ii. 21, 63, 634. Local--Goschen's Local Rating bill, ii. 337, 388; question of (1874), ii. 479, 481, 482. Malt duty, i. 436; ii. 651; iii. 7. Match tax, ii. 373 _and notes_. Powers regarding, ii. 40. Probate duty, ii. 650. Soap duty, i. 462, 465. Sugar duties, i. 236, 643-644; ii. 632-634. Tea duty, Disraeli's operation on (1852), i. 436; Gladstone's operation on (1853), i. 462; Lewis' additions to, ii. 633; Gladstone's policy regarding, ii. 632-635. Tea licences, ii. 650. War, for, i. 515-518. Arthur Young's view of, i. 559. Taylor, Colonel, ii. 448. ---- Sir Henry, remark of, on Gladstone, i. 27; on money-dealings, iii. 420; otherwise mentioned, i. 135, 205 _and note_; ii. 55, 195 _note_, 358; iii. 488. Tea duties, _see under_ Taxation. Tegernsee, iii. 351-352. Telegraph Act (1844), i. 268. Tel-el-Kebir, iii. 83, 120 _note_. Temple, Archbishop, position of, at Oxford (1847), i. 335; advocates civil service reform, i. 512; views on Gladstone's Irish Church bill, ii. 264 _note_ 1; work on educational reform (1869), ii. 312; appointment to Exeter, ii. 431-432. ---- William, i. 392, 400. Temporal power, _see_ Churches--Roman. Tenants Relief (Ireland) bill, iii. 353. Tennyson, Alfred, Lord, Essay Club's vote on, i. 59; lines on Prince Consort, ii. 95; Gladstone's estimate of _Maud_, ii. 184; iii. 547-548; later estimate, ii. 581; given Gladstone's translation of _Iliad_, Bk. I. ii. 190; Gladstone's visit to (1871), ii. 377; on Irish self-government, ii. 540; pension of, ii. 540 _note_; reads _Harold_, ii. 557; conversation with, on theology, ii. 558; with Gladstone on _Pembroke Castle_, iii. 115, 116; at Kirkwall, iii. 117-118; views on Franchise bill, iii. 132; _Locksley Hall_, Gladstone's article on, iii. 353-354; early work of, iii. 484; Gladstone's essay on, iii. 546-547; otherwise mentioned, ii. 183, 187, 192, 193. Tenterden, Lord, ii. 405, 410, 412. _Terrible_, Gladstone's voyages in, i. 602, 605-606, 618; cost of constructing deck cabins on, ii. 64-65. Tests, religious:-- Abolition of, i. 328; ii. 313 _and note_ 1, 314; iii. 257. Gladstone's early attitude towards (1833), i. 106; later (1863), ii. 313. Tewfik, Khedive, constitutional position of, iii. 73; embarrassments of, iii. 78, 118; claims of, on England, iii. 119. Thackeray, W. M., ii. 189, 538. Theological studies as mental training, i. 514-515 _and note_. Thessaly, Palmerston's and Russell's views regarding, ii. 576. Thiers, M., opposes war with Prussia, ii. 335 _note_ 1, 336; mission to courts of Europe, ii. 345; anecdote of, iii. 486; otherwise mentioned, ii. 5, 221. Thirlwall, Bishop, Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 248; on Irish Church bill, ii. 269; on Gladstone's disestablishment speech (1874), ii. 502; letters from, ii. 536; memorial to, i. 209 _note_ 2; otherwise mentioned, i. 229; ii. 228. Tholuck, F. A., i. 181 _note_. Thompson, ----, ii. 147 _note_. ---- Dr. W. H., ii. 228. Thomson, Dr. Andrew, i. 110. ---- Poulett (Lord Sydenham), i. 142 _note_. Thornton, ----, i. 59 _note_. ---- Sir Edward, ii. 401. Thring, Lord, i. 501. _Times_-- Chamberlain's _Baptist_ article in, iii. 367 _note_ 2. Forged letters published by, iii. 391 _and note_ 1, 405; libel action, iii. 393-394. Franco-Prussian treaty divulged by, ii. 340. Gladstone's retirement, article on (1875), ii. 504; on his position (1882), iii. 90. Hartington's letter to, iii. 269, 270, 273. Irish land question, letters on (1870), ii. 293. _Parnellism and Crime_ article, iii. 391, 393. Tocqueville, de, i. 415 _note_; iii. 470. Toleration:-- Bradlaugh's question, iii. 12-13, 18. Gladstone's growth towards, i. 138-139, 316; ii. 137. Papal aggression question in relation to, i. 410. Torquay, i. 89. Tory democracy, iii. 173, 201. ---- party, _see_ Conservative. Tosti, Padre, ii. 219. Total abstinence, Gladstone's view on, ii. 192. Townsend, M., ii. 175-177. Tractarians, _see_ Oxford Movement. Traill's _New Lucian_, iii. 91 _and note_. Treaties:-- Berlin convention (1878), ii. 575-576; iii. 82; enforcement of, attempted (1880), iii. 8-10. ---- memorandum (1876), ii. 549. Kainardji, ii. 550. London convention (1885), iii. 122. Paris (1856), i. 550; ii. 349-356, 607; iii. 522. San Stefano, ii. 572, 575. Transvaal, with, iii. 45 _and note_. Washington, ii. 390, 405, 410. Trench, Archbishop, views on Irish church question, ii. 248, 258, 262 _note_; Gladstone's letter to, offering help in organising Irish voluntary church, ii. 280. _Trent_ affair, ii. 73-75, 580. Trevelyan, Sir Charles, i. 510, 512. ---- Sir G. O., views on abolition of army purchase, ii. 361; county franchise extension pressed by, ii. 475; iii. 124; views on Bulgarian question, ii. 559; question by, on Turkey, ii. 566; Irish secretary (1882), ii. 654; iii. 71; chancellor of the duchy (1884), ii. 654; Scotch secretary, iii. 294, 297 _note_; at round table conference, iii. 364 _note_; against home rule, iii. 291 _note_; resigns, iii. 302-303; Scotch secretary (1892), iii. 495 _note_; otherwise mentioned, ii. 463 _note_. Truro, Lord, i. 92, 93, 121. Tupper, M. F., i. 53 _and note_, 65. Turgot, iii. 4, 91. Turkey:-- Armenian atrocities, iii. 521-522. Berlin treaty obligations repudiated by, iii. 9; effect of pressure, i. 10. Britain--support from (1771), i. 477; secret convention with, ii. 575, 579, 592; antipathy of (1881), iii. 74. Bulgarian atrocities (1876), ii. 548 _et seq._ Crimean war, _see that title_. Egypt, pretensions in, iii. 73; irritation at the joint note, i. 76; declines to join European conference, i. 79; complications of the conference, i. 81; unfitness of the Sultan to be protector of the Khedive, i. 118; interference in, suggested, iii. 147; frustration of Salisbury policy in, iii. 495. Foreign consuls murdered in, ii. 548-549. French, hostility towards (1881), iii. 74. Gladstone's distinction regarding government of, towards Christians and orientals, iii. 74 _note_; his achievements against, iii. 538. Lebanon government, ii. 580. Problem of, i. 477, 544. Roumania and Servia partially released from, ii. 2. Russia, war with (1828), i. 480; (1853) _see_ Crimean war; (1877) ii. 562, 569, 572. Salisbury policy regarding, iii. 525. San Stefano, treaty of, ii. 572, 575. Secret convention with, ii. 607. Suez canal scheme as affecting, i. 591-592. Turkey, Asiatic, British protectorate over, ii. 577. Turner, ----, ii. 146-147 _and note_. ---- Dr., i. 46. Tyler, J. E., i. 78. Tyndale memorial, i. 209. Tyndall, John, ii. 524. Ultramontanism, i. 404. Unitarian chapels, i. 321-323. Unitarianism, i. 160; ii. 136. United States:-- _Alabama_ claims, _see that title_. Church in, ii. 169. Civil war:-- Books on, cited, ii. 70 _note_. Course of, ii. 75, 81. Forster's attitude towards, ii. 301. France and Russia, attitude of, ii. 85. Gladstone's view of, ii. 70-72, 74-77, 79-82; later view, ii. 124; his speeches on, ii. 79-82, 85 _and note_ 2, 86. Lancashire, effect on, ii. 66, 77 _note_ 1, 124. Lewis' estimate of, ii. 69. Principles of, ii. 70. Rams built at Birkenhead for confederates, ii. 395-396. Gladstone--popularity of, ii. 82-83; tribute to, iii. 532. Irish--on Home Rule bill, iii. 318, 323; on papal rescript, iii. 384; spy from among, at Parnell commission, iii. 404; Parnell repudiated by, iii. 459. Materialism of, iii. 475. Palmerston's attitude towards (1845), i. 367. Roman catholic prelates in, chances of, ii. 511. Senate of, ii. 407. War with (1782), iii. 181-182. Universities, Gladstone's view of (1833), i. 106 (_see also_ Cambridge _and_ Oxford). Utilitarians, i. 156. Vatican decrees, Döllinger's attitude towards, iii. 422. _Vatican Decrees in their Bearing on Civil Allegiance_, ii. 515-517; reception of, ii. 517-520. _Vaticanism_, ii. 521; iii. 281. Vattel, cited, ii. 16. Vaudois valley, i. 87. Vaughan, Mr., ii. 79. ---- Rev. ----, i. 59 _note_. ---- Dean, ii. 433. Vauvenargues cited, iii. 482. Veitch, Prof. John, i. 9 _note_. _Vestiges of Creation_, ii. 165, 166 _and note_. Victor Emmanuel, King, ability of, ii. 8; Gladstone's appreciation of, ii. 107, 114; Gladstone's audience of, ii. 218; otherwise mentioned, ii. 17, 356, 532. Victoria, Princess, ii. 103. ---- Queen:-- _Chronology_:--Gladstone's first presentation to, i. 140; misunderstanding with Peel, i. 222; at swearing in of Privy Council (1841), i. 242-243; Gladstone's audience of, on Maynooth resignation, i. 276; on Peel's retirement, i. 293; premier's correspondence with, i. 297, 299; on Palmerston's relations with Kossuth, i. 415; on Gladstone's budget speech, (1853), i. 469; consults Aberdeen on Crimean question, i. 482; views on Stratford's policy, i. 487; Gladstone dines with, i. 490; Newcastle recommended to, i. 493; refuses resignation of coalition ministry, i. 522; sends for Derby, i. 525; for Lansdowne, i. 528; for Russell, i. 530; desires continuance of Palmerston government, i. 537; on Peelites' resignation, i. 540-541; commends Gladstone's offer regarding Ionian position, i. 612; reply of, to Corfiote petition, i. 615; sends for Lord Granville, i. 625; for Palmerston, i. 626; draft of letter to, on Peel's government, i. 642; grief at Prince Albert's death, ii. 89-90, 99; references to Prince Albert, ii. 96, 98, 104, 105; at Balmoral, ii. 97-106; on Danish question, ii. 102, 104, 117, 192; on Garibaldi, ii. 113 _note_ 3; action on Palmerston's death, ii. 152, 155; commends Gladstone's leadership, ii. 157; Russell and Gladstone in audience, ii. 209-211; sends for Lord Derby, ii. 211; advised by Disraeli to dissolve, ii. 248; difficulty regarding Lord Clarendon, ii. 254; Irish church disestablishment, ii. 259-262, 267-271, 273, 278, 427; urged by Gladstone to open parliament (1870), ii. 293; suggested action of, to avert Franco-Prussian war, ii. 327; army reform, ii. 360, 363, 649; at Balmoral (1871), ii. 378-379; seclusion of, criticised, ii. 425-427; Gladstone's report to, on Irish University bill, ii. 439, 441; ministerial crisis, ii. 446-455, 480; Gladstone's communications to, on dissolution, ii. 484-487; offers peerage to Gladstone, ii. 493; receives ministers' resignations, ii. 493 _note_; remarks on Gladstone's retirement, ii. 504-505; averse to meddling with ecumenical council, ii. 510; on Disraeli's proposed resignation, ii. 550; Hartington's audiences of, ii. 621-624; views on Lowe's viscounty, ii. 631; friendship for Dean Wellesley, iii. 93; desirous of Harold Browne's appointment to Canterbury, iii. 95-96; on cabinet reconstruction (1882), iii. 100; urges Gladstone's acceptance of a peerage, iii. 104; Gladstone's memorandum to, on case between Lords and Commons, iii. 129; her efforts towards settlement, iii. 130-139; on Egyptian question, iii. 80, 159, 162, 167, 179; Gladstone's letters to, on ministerial defeat, i. 199, 202; suggests continuance, i. 203; summons Lord Salisbury, i. 204; Gladstone's audience of, i. 205; negotiations through Sir H. Ponsonby, i. 205-208; offers Gladstone an earldom, i. 209; Gladstone's audience of (Feb. 1, '86), iii. 290, 291; views on Gladstone's electioneering, iii. 344; Gladstone's final audience of (1886), iii. 347-348; Gladstone's last cabinet report to, iii. 511; Gladstone's last audience of, iii. 513-514; last meeting with Gladstone, iii. 524. Enthusiasm, dislike of, ii. 425. Gladstone, letters to, ii. 89-90, 185, 252, 459, 526, 527, 649; iii. 15-16, 40, 115-117, 167, 180, 192, 199, 202, 209, 515; appreciation of, ii. 267, 426; friction with, ii. 427-428, 599; his estimate of, ii. 424, 626, 628. Gladstone, Mrs., letter to, ii. 472-473; telegram to, iii. 531. Home Rule, attitude towards, iii. 291. Otherwise mentioned, i. 199, 274, 276, 448; ii. 31, 67, 74, 104-141, 182, 186, 189, 191, 208-209, 418, 472, 499, 617; iii. 6, 23-24, 385. Villafranca, ii. 7, 13. Villiers, de, chief justice, iii. 33, 41. ---- C., i. 249, 433; ii. 33, 37, 45, 635-636. Virgil, iii. 481. Vitzthum, i. 576 _note_, 591 _note_. Vivian, third Lord, iii. 116. ---- Sir Hussey, iii. 386. _Vivian Grey_, ii. 499. Votes of confidence, Gladstone's dislike of, ii. 209, 442. Wakefield, E. G., i. 358, 361 _note 3_. Wales:-- Bishoprics question, i. 260 and _note_, 288. Church disestablishment question in, iii. 367 and _note 2_, 471, 495. Election results in (1874), ii. 490; (1880) ii. 613, 614. Gladstone's tour in (1887), iii. 386, 387. Home rule (Irish), attitude towards (1886), iii. 323, 346. ---- Prince of (King Edward VII.), on Danish question, ii. 120; on Phoenix Park murders, iii. 68; friendliness to Gladstone, iii. 103, 105; Gladstone's letter to, iii. 108; gift to Gladstone on golden wedding anniversary, iii. 417; letter from, on Gladstone's impending resignation, iii. 510; Gladstone's estimate of, ii. 294, 378; iii. 200; otherwise mentioned, i. 275; ii. 92, 141; iii. 322, 385, 524, 533. ---- Princess of (Queen Alexandra), ii. 99, 189, 499; iii. 117, 417, 510. Walewski, i. 491; ii. 21. Wallace, D. Mackenzie, ii. 561. Wallachia, ii. 3. _Wallenstein_, ii. 101. Walpole, Sir R., i. 37; ii. 59, 61, 91, 638. ---- Spencer H., i. 561, 583, 631; ii. 31, 39. ---- Spencer, i. 467 _note_. Walsh, Dr., iii. 449. ---- Father, ii. 535. War:-- Gladstone's opinion of, iii. 182-183 _and note_; 547-548. Manchester school's view of, iii. 182. Popular fevers for, ii. 221, 574, 575. Preparations for, effect of, ii. 44. Taxation and loans for, i. 515-518. Ward, Mrs. Humphry, iii. 357-359. ---- W. G., i. 274, 313-316, 331; ii. 165. Waste lands, committee on, i. 358. Waterford, Lord, iii. 143 _and note_. Watson, Colonel, iii. 149. Watts, George, ii. 541-543. Webster, Daniel, ii. 369. ---- Sir Richard, iii. 394, 398, 409. Welby, Lord, iii. 306, 526. Wellesley, Dean, i. 39; ii. 89, 273-275; iii. 92-94. Wellington, Duchess of, iii. 93. ---- Duke of, retrenchments by, i. 121; unpopularity of, i. 122; at Drayton, i. 133; methodical ways of, i. 134; Gladstone's first interview with, i. 143; view of, on church question, i. 155; on China question, i. 225; Gurwood on, i. 228; on boundary question, i. 260; on 'the Queen's government,' i. 283; advises dissolution, i. 290; on Peel's view of party, i. 290; as premier, i. 300; on Ionian Islands, i. 598; leadership of Lords by, ii. 369; brevity of, ii. 532, 545; letters from, ii. 545; cabinet fight over statue of, iii. 5; Gladstone's estimate of, iii. 481; position of, iii. 485-486; otherwise mentioned, i. 68-69, 75, 110, 120, 149, 243, 376, 543, 641-642; ii. 641, 649, 653; iii. 277, 473. Wells, David Ames, ii. 373. Wesley, John, i. 319. West, Sir Algernon, ii. 279. Westbury, Lord (Sir Richard Bethell), Gladstone assisted by, i. 472 _note 1_, 501; views on Divorce bill, i. 570-571; on Ionian Islands, i. 620 _note 2_; on stamp duties, ii. 64; on Danish question, ii. 118; _Essays and Reviews_ judgment, ii. 164; otherwise mentioned, i. 502, 518. Westminster, Duke of, iii. 523 _note_. ---- Lord, i. 239. ---- Abbey, ii. 460; iii. 6, 533. Wharncliffe, Lord, i. 75, 242. Whately, Archbishop, i. 51, 57, 158. Whigs:-- Characteristics of (1853), i. 446. Coalition of Peelites with (1853), i. 443 _et seq._ Defeat of (1841), i. 237; ii. 203 _note 2_, 264. Finance of, i. 458, 459. Fusion of seceders with tory party, i. 139. Influence of, till 1868, iii. 293. Name of, discussed, 422. Opposition of, to Peel (1835), composition of, i. 419-420 _and note_. Protectionist combination with, i. 290. Whitbread, S., iii. 12, 303 _note_. White, Blanco, i. 57, 74, 217. ---- Edward, ii. 134. Whiteside, Chief Justice, ii. 128. Wigan, i. 287. Wilberforce, Samuel, Bishop (of Winchester), advice to Gladstone, i. 150-151; on marriage question, i. 569; advocates revival of convocation, ii. 162; on rise of Disraeli, ii. 230; archbishopric of York desired for, by Gladstone, ii. 430; death of, ii. 459; Gladstone's estimate of, 460; _Life_ of, ii. 597; Gladstone's estimate of, i. 227; ii. 460; his estimate of Gladstone's position, ii. 134, 171; Gladstone's letters to, i. 387; ii. 149, 159, 162; otherwise mentioned, i. 568; ii. 183, 423, 534; iii. 96 _note_. ---- William, Gladstone's meeting with, i. 12; emancipation views of, i. 104; Gladstone's estimate of, i. 106-107; Peel's view of, i. 150; otherwise mentioned, i. 23, 213, 236. Wilbraham, Mrs., i. 234. Willes, Sir James Shaw, ii. 383. William I., Emperor, on Russell's despatch, ii. 16; interviews with Benedetti, ii. 330-331, 333 _note_; San Juan boundary question referred to, ii. 405. ---- III., King, iii. 284 _note_. ---- IV., King, Melbourne government dismissed by, i. 118 _and note_; death of, i. 140; perversity of, i. 144; otherwise mentioned, i. 103; iii. 653. _William George Ward and the Oxford Movement_, i. 313 _note 2_. Williams, Isaac, i. 111, 307 _note_. ---- R., i. 309-310. Wilmslow, ----, i. 46. Wilson, Sir Charles, iii. 165. Winchelsea, Lord, i. 279. Window duty, i. 106, 459. Wiseman, Cardinal, i. 173, 174, 318, 408. Wolf, F. A., iii. 543. Wolowski, Count, ii. 220. Wolseley, Lord, in South Africa (1879), iii. 25-26, 31 _note 2_; defeats Arabi at Tel-el-Kebir, iii. 83; at Gordon's send-off, iii. 150 and _note_; advises preparations for relief expedition, iii. 163; appointed to command, iii. 164-165; asks reinforcement, iii. 178; position of, 179; cited, ii. 360. Wolverton, Lord, at Hawarden, ii. 474; letter on leadership, ii. 601-602; Gladstone's reply, ii. 602; discusses leadership with Gladstone, ii. 616-617; at Hawarden (June 1885), iii. 196; otherwise mentioned, ii. 462, 463, 485, 493, 563, 564, 584; iii. 102. Wood, Sir Charles, _see_ Halifax, Lord. ---- General Sir E., on South Africa, iii. 37-41; on General Gordon, iii. 149. Woods and forests dismissal case, i. 520. Woolner, Thomas, ii. 191, 192. Wordsworth, Charles, Bishop of St. Andrews, i. 50, 74, 329. ---- Dr. Christopher, i. 80, 213. ---- William, Gladstone's estimate of, i. 96, 135, 220; intimacy with, i. 136-137; on Gladstone's first book, i. 176; on Kendal railway scheme, i. 269 _note_; ii. 540; pension of, ii. 540 _note_; Gladstone's reminiscences of, iii. 483-484, 488; otherwise mentioned, i. 159, 204 _and note_. Wortleys, the, i. 123, 468. Wyndham, Sir W., i. 223 _note 1_. Wynford, first Baron, i. 75. York, address from, ii. 130-131. Young, Arthur, cited, i. 559. ---- Sir John, i. 420, 595, 601, 611. ---- Lord, ii. 469. Young England group with Disraeli, i. 304-305. Zambelli, Napoleon, i. 616. Zante, i. 599, 604. Zetland, Lord, ii. 78. Zobeir, iii. 155-160. Zulu war, ii. 583, 592, 595; iii. 6, 22. ERRATA VOLUME I: Page 129, marginal date, for _Æt. 25_ read _Æt. 26_. " 222 and 223, marginal dates, for _1840_ read _1839_; for _Æt. 31_ read _Æt. 30_. " 251, line 24, omit _and_. VOLUME II: Page 49, line 9, for _council-keeping_ read _counsel-keeping_. " 220, line 4, for _previous year_ read _1865_. " 227, line 23, for _1868_ read _1866_. " 264, line 35, for _91_ read _1_. " 345, footnote, for _three_ years read _two_ years. " 455, line 9, for _on luxury_ read _luxury_. " 562, line 24, for _made_ read _much_. " 608, line 11, after _1865_ insert _1868_. * * * * * Transcriber's note: Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). Text enclosed by equal signs is in bold face (=bold=). Small capital text has been replaced with all capitals. In this text file the transcriber has chosen to show the superscripted note numbers as non-superscripted numbers (example: _note 2_ rather than _note ^2_). The cover for the eBook version of this book was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain. 
9900	----	THE GRAND OLD MAN OR THE Life and Public Services of The Right Honorable William Ewart GLADSTONE Four Times Prime Minister of England BY Richard B. Cook, D.D. PREFACE William E. Gladstone was cosmopolitan. The Premier of the British Empire is ever a prominent personage, but he has stood above them all. For more than half a century he has been the active advocate of liberty, morality and religion, and of movements that had for their object the prosperity, advancement and happiness of men. In all this he has been upright, disinterested and conscientious in word and deed. He has proved himself to be the world's champion of human rights. For these reasons he has endeared himself to all men wherever civilization has advanced to enlighten and to elevate in this wide world. With the closing of the 19th century the world is approaching a crisis in which every nation is involved. For a time the map of the world might as well be rolled up. Great questions that have agitated one or more nations have convulsed the whole earth because steam and electricity have annihilated time and space. Questions that have sprung up between England and Africa, France and Prussia, China and Japan, Russia and China, Turkey and Armenia, Greece and Turkey, Spain and America have proved international and have moved all nations. The daily proceedings of Congress at Washington are discussed in Japan. In these times of turning and overturning, of discontent and unrest, of greed and war, when the needs of the nations most demand men of world-wide renown, of great experience in government and diplomacy, and of firm hold upon the confidence of the people; such men as, for example, Gladstone, Salisbury, Bismark, Crispi and Li Hung Chang, who have led the mighty advance of civilization, are passing away. Upon younger men falls the heavy burden of the world, and the solution of the mighty problems of this climax of the most momentous of all centuries. However, the Record of these illustrious lives remains to us for guidance and inspiration. History is the biography of great men. The lamp of history is the beacon light of many lives. The biography of William E. Gladstone is the history, not only of the English Parliament, but of the progress of civilization in the earth for the whole period of his public life. With the life of Mr. Gladstone in his hand, the student of history or the young statesman has a light to guide him and to help him solve those intricate problems now perplexing the nations, and upon the right solution of which depends Christian civilization--the liberties, progress, prosperity and happiness of the human race. Hence, the life and public services of the Grand Old Man cannot fail to be of intense interest to all, particularly to the English, because he has repeatedly occupied the highest position under the sovereign of England, to the Irish whether Protestant or Catholic, north or south, because of his advocacy of (Reforms) for Ireland; to the Scotch because of his Scottish descent; to the German because he reminds them of their own great chancellor, the Unifier of Germany, Prince Bismarck; and to the American because he was ever the champion of freedom; and as there has been erected in Westminster Abbey a tablet to the memory of Lord Howe, so will the American people enshrine in their hearts, among the greatest of the great, the memory of William Ewart Gladstone. "In youth a student and in eld a sage; Lover of freedom; of mankind the friend; Noble in aim from childhood to the end; Great is thy mark upon historic page." CONTENTS. CHAPTER I ANCESTRY AND BIRTH CHAPTER II AT ETON AND OXFORD CHAPTER III EARLY PARLIAMENTARY EXPERIENCES CHAPTER IV BOOK ON CHURCH AND STATE CHAPTER V TRAVELS AND MARRIAGE CHAPTER VI ENTERS THE CABINET CHAPTER VII MEMBER FOR OXFORD CHAPTER VIII THE NEAPOLITAN PRISONS CHAPTER IX THE FIRST BUDGET CHAPTER X THE CRIMEAN WAR CHAPTER XI IN OPPOSITION TO THE GOVERNMENT CHAPTER XII HOMERIC STUDIES CHAPTER XIII GREAT BUDGETS CHAPTER XIV LIBERAL REFORMER AND PRIME MINISTER CHAPTER XV THE GOLDEN AGE OF LIBERALISM CHAPTER XVI THE EASTERN QUESTION CHAPTER XVII MIDLOTHIAN AND THE SECOND PREMIERSHIP CHAPTER XVIII THIRD ADMINISTRATION AND HOME RULE CHAPTER XIX PRIME MINISTER THE FOURTH TIME CHAPTER XX IN PRIVATE LIFE CHAPTER XXI CLOSING SCENES [Illustration: Gladstone entering Palace Yard, Westminster.] "In thought, word and deed, How throughout all thy warfare thou wast pure, I find it easy to believe." --ROBERT BROWNING List of Illustrations. WILLIAM E. GLADSTONE (_Frontispiece_) GLADSTONE ENTERING PALACE YARD, WESTMINSTER GLADSTONE AND SISTER INTERIOR OF THE OLD HOUSE OF COMMONS BIRTHPLACE OF GLADSTONE GLIMPSES OF GLADSTONE'S EARLIER YEARS HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT GLADSTONE'S LONDON RESIDENCE LOBBY OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS GRATTAN KILMAINHAM JAIL GLADSTONE'S MARRIAGE AT HAWARDEN NO. 10 DOWNING STREET, LONDON THE PARK GATE, HAWARDEN OLD HAWARDEN CASTLE HAWARDEN CASTLE, FROM THE PARK WATERFALL IN HAWARDEN PARK COURT YARD, HAWARDEN GLADSTONE READING THE LESSONS AT HAWARDEN CHURCH THE REV. H. DREW DOROTHY'S DOVECOTE DINING-ROOM IN THE ORPHANAGE STAIRCASE IN THE ORPHANAGE HAWARDEN CHURCH HAWARDEN CASTLE LOYAL ULSTER GLADSTONE'S EARLY ENGLISH CONTEMPORARIES GLADSTONE'S LATER ENGLISH CONTEMPORARIES GLADSTONE IN WALES CITY AND COUNTY VOLUNTEERS OF DUBLIN CONDITION OF IRELAND, 1882 GLADSTONE VISITING NEAPOLITAN PRISONS GLADSTONE INTRODUCING HIS FIRST BUDGET THE SUNDERLAND SHIPOWNER SURPRISED FAMILY GROUP AT HAWARDEN HOUSE OF COMMONS WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR GLADSTONE AND GRANDDAUGHTER GLADSTONE'S AXE GLADSTONE FAMILY GROUP SALISBURY MINISTRY DEFEATED THE OLD LION GLADSTONE'S RECEPTION IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS GLADSTONE'S MAIL RELEASE OF PARNELL, DILLON AND O'KELLY GLADSTONE ON HIS WAY HOME THE MIDLOTHIAN CAMPAIGN QUEEN VICTORIA GLADSTONE AND HIS SON, HERBERT GALLERY OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS IRISH LEADERS IRISH CONSTABULARY EVICTING TENANTS GLADSTONE'S STUDY AT HAWARDEN FOURTH ADMINISTRATION CABINET GLADSTONE ON THE QUEEN'S YACHT ST. JAMES PALACE QUEEN AND PREMIER GLADSTONE IN HIS STUDY, READING MR. AND MRS. GLADSTONE, 1897 INTRODUCTORY. There are few, even among those who differed from him, who would deny to Mr. Gladstone the title of a great statesman: and in order to appreciate his wonderful career, it is necessary to realize the condition of the world of thought, manners and works at the time when he entered public life. In medicine there was no chloroform; in art the sun had not been enlisted in portraiture; railways were just struggling into existence; the electric telegraph was unknown; gas was an unfashionable light; postage was dear, and newspapers were taxed. In literature, Scott had just died; Carlyle was awaiting the publication of his first characteristic book; Tennyson was regarded as worthy of hope because of his juvenile poems; Macaulay was simply a brilliant young man who had written some stirring verse and splendid prose; the Brontës were schoolgirls; Thackeray was dreaming of becoming an artist; Dickens had not written a line of fiction; Browning and George Eliot were yet to come. In theology, Newman was just emerging from evangelicalism; Pusey was an Oxford tutor; Samuel Wilberforce a village curate; Henry Manning a young graduate; and Darwin was commencing that series of investigations which revolutionized the popular conception of created things. Princess, afterwards Queen Victoria, was a girl of thirteen; Cobden a young calico printer; Bright a younger cotton spinner; Palmerston was regarded as a man-about-town, and Disraeli as a brilliant and eccentric novelist with parliamentary ambition. The future Marquis of Salisbury and Prime Minister of Great Britain was an infant scarcely out of arms; Lord Rosebery, (Mr. Gladstone's successor in the Liberal Premiership), Lord Spencer, Lord Herschell, Mr. John Morley, Mr. Campbell-Bannerman, Mr. Asquith, Mr. Brice, Mr. Acland and Mr. Arnold Morley, or more than half the members of his latest cabinet remained to be born; as did also the Duke of Devonshire, Mr. Balfour and Mr. Chamberlain, among those who were his keenest opponents toward the end of his public career. At last the end of Mr. Gladstone's public life arrived, but it had been extended to an age greater than that at which any English statesman had ever conducted the government of his country. Of the significance of the life of this great man, it would be superfluous to speak. The story will signally fail of its purpose if it does not carry its own moral with it. We can best conclude these introductory remarks by applying to the subject of the following pages, some words which he applied a generation ago to others: In the sphere of common experience we see some human beings live and die, and furnish by their life no special lessons visible to man, but only that general teaching in elementary and simple forms which is derivable from every particle of human histories. Others there have been, who, from the times when their young lives first, as it were, peeped over the horizon, seemed at once to-- "'Flame in the forehead of the evening sky,'" --Whose lengthening years have been but one growing splendor, and who at last-- "------Leave a lofty name, A light, a landmark on the cliffs of fame." CHAPTER I ANCESTRY AND BIRTH All history, says Emerson, "resolves itself into the biographies of a few stout and earnest persons." These remarks find exemplification in the life of William Ewart Gladstone, of whom they are pre-eminently true. His recorded life, from the early period of his graduation to his fourth premiership, would embrace in every important respect not only the history of the British Empire, but very largely the international events of every nation of the world for more than half a century. William Ewart Gladstone, M.P., D.C.L., statesman, orator and scholar, was born December 27, 1809, in Liverpool, England. The house in which he was born, number 62 Rodney Street, a commodious and imposing "double-fronted" dwelling of red brick, is still standing. In the neighborhood of the Rodney Street house, and a few years before or after the birth of William E. Gladstone, a number of distinguished persons were born, among them William Roscoe, the writer and philanthropist, John Gibson, the sculptor, Doctor Bickersteth, the late Bishop of Ripon, Mrs. Hemans, the poetess, and Doctor James Martineau, Professor of Mental and Moral Philosophy in Manchester New College, and the brother of Harriet Martineau, the authoress. The Gladstone family, or Gledstanes, which was the original family name, was of Scottish origin. The derivation of the name is obvious enough to any one familiar with the ancestral home. A _gled_ is a hawk, and that fierce and beautiful bird would have found its natural refuge among the _stanes_, or rocks, of the craggy moorlands which surround the "fortalice of gledstanes." As far back as 1296 Herbert de Gledstane figures in the Ragman Roll as one of the lairds who swore fealty to Edward I. His descendants for generations held knightly rank, and bore their part in the adventurous life of the Border. The chief stock was settled at Liberton, in the upper part of Clydesdale. It was a family of Scottish lairds, holding large estates in the sixteenth century. The estate dwindled, and in the beginning of the seventeenth century passed out of their hands, except the adjacent property of Authurshiel, which remained in their possession for a hundred years longer. A younger branch of the family--the son of the last of the Gledstanes of Arthurshiel--after many generations, came to dwell at Biggar, in Lanarkshire, where he conducted the business of a "maltster," or grain merchant. Here, and at about this time, the name was changed to Gladstones, and a grandson of the maltster of Biggar, Thomas Gladstones, settled in Leith and there became a "corn-merchant." He was born at Mid Toftcombs, in 1732, and married Helen Neilson, of Springfield. His aptitude for business was so great that he was enabled to make ample provision for a large family of sixteen children. His son, John Gladstone, was the father of William E. Gladstone, the subject of our sketch. Some have ascribed to Mr. Gladstone an illustrious, even a royal ancestry, through his father's marriage. He met and married a lovely, cultured and pious woman of Dingwall, in Orkney, the daughter of Andrew Robertson, Provost of Dingwall, named Ann Robertson, whom the unimpeachable Sir Bernard Burke supplied with a pedigree from Henry III, king of England, and Robert Bruce, of Bannockburn, king of Scotland, so that it is royal English and Scottish blood that runs in the veins of Mr. Gladstone. "This alleged illustrious pedigree," says E.B. Smith, in his elaborate work on William E. Gladstone, "is thus traced: Lady Jane Beaufort, who was a descendant of Henry III, married James I, of Scotland, who was a descendant of Bruce. From this alliance it is said that the steps can be followed clearly down to the father of Miss Robertson. A Scottish writer upon genealogy, also referring to this matter, states that Mr. Gladstone is descended on the mother's side from the ancient Mackenzie of Kintail, through whom is introduced the blood of the Bruce, of the ancient Kings of Man, and of the Lords of the Isles and Earls of Ross; also from the Munros of Fowlis, and the Robertsons of Strowan and Athole. What was of more consequence to the Gladstones of recent generations, however, than royal blood, was the fact that by their energy and honorable enterprise they carved their own fortunes, and rose to positions of public esteem and eminence." It has been their pride that they sprang from the ranks of the middle classes, from which have come so many of the great men of England eminent in political and military life. In an address delivered at the Liverpool Collegiate Institute, December 21, 1872, Sir John Gladstone said; "I know not why the commerce of England should not have its old families rejoicing to be connected with commerce from generation to generation. It has been so in other countries; I trust it may be so in this country. I think it is a subject of sorrow, and almost of scandal, when those families who have either acquired or recovered wealth and station through commerce, turn their backs upon it and seem to be ashamed of it. It certainly is not so with my brother or with me. His sons are treading in his steps, and one of my sons, I rejoice to say, is treading in the steps of my father and my brother." George W.E. Russell, in his admirable biography of Mr. William E. Gladstone, says, "Sir John Gladstone was a pure Scotchman, a lowlander by birth and descent. Provost Robertson belonged to the Clan Donachie, and by this marriage the robust and business-like qualities of the Lowlander were blended with the poetic imagination, the sensibility and fire of the Gael." An interesting story is told, showing how Sir John Gladstone, the father of William E. Gladstone, came to live in Liverpool, and enter upon his great business career, and where he became a merchant prince. Born at Leith in 1763, he in due time entered his father's business, where he served until he was twenty-one years old. At that time his father sent him to Liverpool to dispose of a cargo of grain, belonging to him, which had arrived at that port. His demeanor and business qualities so impressed Mr. Corrie, a grain merchant of that place, that he urged his father to let him settle there. Consent was obtained and young Gladstone entered the house of Corrie & Company as a clerk. His tact and shrewdness were soon manifest, and he was eventually taken into the firm as a partner, and the name of the house became Corrie, Gladstone & Bradshaw. John Gladstone on one occasion proved the temporary preserver of the firm of which he had become a member. He was sent to America to buy grain for the firm, in a time of great scarcity in Europe, owing to the failure of the crops, but he found the condition of things the same in America. There was no grain to be had. While in great perplexity as to what to do he received advices from Liverpool that twenty-four vessels had been dispatched for the grain he was expected to purchase, to bring it to Europe. The prospect was that these vessels would have to return to Europe empty as they had come, and the house of Corrie & Company be involved thereby in ruin. It was then that John Gladstone rose to the emergency of the occasion, and by his enterprise and energy saved himself and partners from financial failure, to the great surprise and admiration of the merchants of Liverpool. It was in this way: He made a thorough examination of the American markets for articles of commerce that could be sold in Europe to advantage, and filling his vessels with them sent them home. This sagacious movement not only saved his house, but gave him a name and place among the foremost merchants of his day. His name was also a synonym for push and integrity, not only on the Liverpool exchange, but in London and throughout all England. The business of the firm became very great and the wealth of its members very large. During the war with Napoleon, on the continent, and the war of 1812 with the United States, the commerce of England, as mistress of the seas, was injured, and the Gladstone firm suffered greatly and was among the first to seek peace, for its own sake and in the interests of trade. In one year the commerce of Liverpool declined to the amount of 140,000 tons, which was about one-fourth of the entire trade, and there was a decrease of more than $100,000 in the dock-dues of that port. John Gladstone was among those who successfully petitioned the British government for a change of its suicidal policy towards the American States. After sixteen years of successful operations, during a part of which time it had been government agent, the firm was dissolved and its business was continued by John Gladstone. His six brothers having followed him from Leith to Liverpool, he took into partnership with him his brother Robert. Their business became very extensive, having a large trade with Russia, and as sugar importers and West India merchants. John Gladstone was the chairman of the West India Association and took an active part in the improvement and enlargement of the docks of Liverpool. In 1814, when the monopoly of the East India Company was broken and the trade of India and China thrown open to competition, the firm of John Gladstone & Company was the first to send a private vessel to Calcutta. John Gladstone was a public-spirited man and took great interest in the welfare of his adopted city. He was ever ready to labor for its prosperity, and consequently endeared himself to the people of all classes and conditions, and of every shade of political opinion. The high estimation in which he was held by the citizens of Liverpool was especially manifest October 18, 1824, when they presented him with a testimonial, consisting of a magnificent service of plate, of twenty-eight pieces, and bearing the following inscription: "_To John Gladstone, Esq., M.P., this service of plate was presented MDCCCXXIV, by his fellow townsmen and friends, to mark their high sense of his successful exertions for the promotion of trade and commerce, and in acknowledgment of his most important services rendered to the town of Liverpool_." John Gladstone, though devoted to commerce, had time for literary pursuits. He wrote a pamphlet, "On the Present State of Slavery in the British West Indies and in the United States of America; and on the Importation of Sugar from British Settlements in India." He also published, in 1830, another pamphlet, containing a statement of facts connected with the same general subject, "in a letter addressed to Sir Robert Peel." In 1846 he published a pamphlet, entitled "Plain facts intimately connected with the intended Repeal of the Corn Laws; or Probable Effects on the Public Revenue and the Prosperity of the Country." From the subject discussed it can be readily and truly imagined that John Gladstone had given thought to political subjects. He was in favor of a qualified reform which, while affording a greater enfranchisement of the people, looked also to the interests of all. Having an opinion, and not being afraid to express it, he was frequently called upon to address public meetings. The matters discussed by him were, however, rather national than municipal, rather humane than partisan. He was a strong advocate for certain reforms at home in 1818, and in 1823 on the seas, and for Greek independence in 1824. "On the 14th of February, 1824, a public meeting was held in Liverpool Town Hall, 'for the purpose of considering the best means of assisting the Greeks in their present important struggle for independence.' Mr. Gladstone spoke impressively in favor of the cause which had already evoked great enthusiasm amongst the people, and enlisted the sympathies and support of Lord Byron and other distinguished friends of freedom." It was in 1818 that he addressed a meeting called "to consider the propriety of petitioning Parliament to take into consideration the progressive and alarming increase in the crimes of forging and uttering forged Bank of England notes." The penalties for these crimes were already heavy, but their infliction did not deter men from committing them, and these crimes increased at an enormous rate. Resolutions were passed at the Liverpool meeting, recommending the revision and amendment of existing laws. Then again, so late as the year 1823, the navigation between Liverpool and Dublin was in a lamentable condition, and human life was recklessly imperiled, and no one seemed willing to interfere and to interest himself in the interests of humanity. It was then that he again came to the front to advocate a just cause. To illustrate the dangers to vessels and passengers, the case of the sloop _Alert_ may be cited. It was wrecked off the Welsh coast, with between 100 and 140 persons on board, of whom only seventeen were saved. For the safety and rescue of all those souls on board this packet-boat there was only one small shallop, twelve feet long. Mr. Gladstone was impressed with the terrible nature of the existing evil, and obtained an amendment to the Steamboat Act, requiring imperatively that every passenger vessel should be provided with boats sufficient for every passenger it was licensed to carry. By this wise and humane provision thousands of lives were doubtless saved that would otherwise have been lost--the victims of reckless seamanship and commercial greed. John Gladstone, either through the influence of Mr. Canning, or from having imbibed some political taste, sat in the House of Commons nine years, representing Lancaster in 1819, Woodstock from 1821 to 1826, and Berwick in 1827; but he never would consent to sit in Parliament for the city of Liverpool, for he thought that so large and important a constituency required peculiar representation such as he was unqualified to give. He was the warm supporter and intimate friend of the celebrated Canning. At first he was a Whig, but finally came to support Mr. Canning, and became a Liberal Conservative. In 1812 he presided over a meeting at Liverpool, which was called to invite Mr. Canning to represent the borough in Parliament. After the election the successful candidates were claimed and carried in procession through the streets. The procession finally halted at Mr. Gladstone's house, in Rodney Street, from the balcony of which Mr. Canning addressed the populace. His election laid the foundation of a deep and lasting friendship between Mr. Canning and Mr. Gladstone. "At this time the son of the latter was but three years of age. Shortly afterwards--that is, as soon as he was able to understand anything of public men, and public movements and events"--says G.B. Smith, "the name of Canning began to exercise that strange fascination over the mind of William Ewart Gladstone which has never wholly passed away," and Mr. Gladstone himself acknowledged that he was brought up "under the shadow of the great name of Canning." John Gladstone presided at a farewell dinner given by the Liverpool Canning Club, in August, 1822, in honor of Mr. Canning, who had been Governor-General of India. But Mr. Canning, instead of going to India, entered the British Cabinet, and in 1827 became Prime Minister, and John Gladstone moved a congratulatory address to the king upon the formation of the Canning Ministry. In 1845 John Gladstone was created a baronet by Sir Robert Peel, but he lived to enjoy his deserved honors but a short time, for he died in 1851, at the advanced age of eighty-eight. His motto had ever been, "Diligent in business." His enormous wealth enabled him to provide handsomely for his family, not only after death, but during his lifetime. At the time of his father's death, William E. Gladstone was still an adherent of the Tory party, yet his steps indicated that he was advancing towards Liberalism; and he had already reached distinction as a statesman, both in Parliament and in the Cabinet, while as yet he was but 42 years old, which was about half of his age when called for the fourth time to be Prime Minister of England. Sir John Gladstone and his wife had six children--four sons, Thomas Gladstone, afterwards baronet; John Gladstone, who became a captain, and died in 1863; Robert Gladstone, brought up a merchant, who died in 1875, and two daughters, Annie McKenzie Gladstone, who died years ago, and Helen Jane Gladstone. William E. Gladstone was the fourth son. The following is from the pen of the son, who says of his aged father, Sir John Gladstone: "His eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated; he was full of bodily and mental vigor; whatsoever his hand found to do he did it with his might; he could not understand or tolerate those who, perceiving an object to be good, did not at once and actively pursue it; and with all this energy he gained a corresponding warmth, and, so to speak, eagerness of affection, a keen appreciation of humor, in which he found a rest, and an indescribable frankness and simplicity of character, which, crowning his other qualities, made him, I think, and I strive to think impartially, nearly or quite the most interesting old man I ever knew." Personally, Sir John Gladstone was a man of much intelligence and of sterling principle, of high moral and religious character, and his house consequently was a model home. "His house was by all accounts a home pre-eminently calculated to mould the thoughts and direct the course of an intelligent and receptive nature. There was a father's masterful will and keen perception, the sweetness and piety of the mother, wealth with all its substantial advantages and few of its mischiefs, a strong sense of the value of money, a rigid avoidance of extravagance and excesses; everywhere a strenuous purpose in life, constant employment, and concentrated ambition." Mrs. John Gladstone, the wife and mother, is described by one who knew her intimately as "a lady of very great accomplishments; of fascinating manners, of commanding presence and high intellect; one to grace any home and endear any heart." The following picture of the everyday life of the family is interesting and instructive, on account of Sir John Gladstone, as well as on that of his more distinguished son, and is from the pen of an eye-witness: "Nothing was ever taken for granted between him and his sons. A succession of arguments on great topics and small topics alike--arguments conducted with perfect good humor, but also with the most implicable logic--formed the staple of the family conversation. The children and their parents argued upon everything. They would debate as to whether a window should be opened, and whether it was likely to be fair or wet the next day. It was all perfectly good-humored, but curious to a stranger, because of the evident care which all the disputants took to advance no proposition, even as to the prospect of rain, rashly." In such a home as this was William E. Gladstone in training as the great Parliamentary debater and leader, and for the highest office under the British crown. This reminds us of a story of Burke. The king one day, unexpectedly entering the office of his minister, found the elder Burke sitting at his desk, with his eyes fixed upon his young son, who was standing on his father's desk in the attitude of speaking. "What are you doing?" asked the astonished king. "I am making the greatest minister England ever saw," was the reply. And so in fact, and yet all unconsciously, was Sir John doing for his son, William. William E. Gladstone "was born," says his biographer, G.W.E. Russell, "at a critical moment in the fortunes of England and of Europe. Abroad the greatest genius that the world has ever seen was wading through slaughter to a universal throne, and no effectual resistance had as yet been offered to a progress which menaced the liberty of Europe and the existence of its States. At home, a crazy king and a profligate heir-apparent presided over a social system in which all civil evils were harmoniously combined. A despotic administration was supported by a parliamentary representation as corrupt as illusory; a church, in which spiritual religion was all but extinct, had sold herself as a bondslave to the governing classes. Rank and wealth and territorial ascendency were divorced from public duty, and even learning had become the handmaid of tyranny. The sacred name of justice was prostituted to sanction a system of legal murder. Commercial enterprise was paralyzed by prohibitive legislation; public credit was shaken to its base; the prime necessaries of life were ruinously dear. The pangs of poverty were aggravated by the concurrent evils of war and famine, and the common people, fast bound in misery and iron, were powerless to make their sufferings known or to seek redress, except by the desperate methods of conspiracy and insurrection. None of the elements of revolution were wanting, and the fates seemed to be hurrying England to the brink of a civil catastrophe. "The general sense of insecurity and apprehension, inseparable from such a condition of affairs, produced its effect upon even the robust minds. Sir John Gladstone was not a likely victim of panic, but he was a man with a large stake in the country, the more precious because acquired by his own exertion; he believed that the safeguards of property and order were imperilled by foreign arms and domestic sedition; and he had seen with indignation and disgust the excesses of a factious Whiggery, which was not ashamed to exult in the triumph of the French over the English Government. Under the pressure of these influences Sir John Gladstone gradually separated himself from the Whigs, with whom in earlier life he had acted, and became the close ally of Canning, whose return for Liverpool he actually promoted." With such surroundings it is not to be wondered at that William E. Gladstone entered political life a Tory, contending against the principles he afterwards espoused. His original bent, however, was not towards politics, but the church; and it was only at the earnest desire of his father that he ultimately decided to enter Parliament, and serve his country in the Legislature. His subsequent life proved the wisdom of the choice. In the Legislature of his country was begun, carried on and consummated grandly, one of the most remarkable careers in the annals of history for versatility, brilliancy, solidity and long continuance. Rarely has there been exhibited so complete a combination of qualities in statesmanship. His intellectual endowments were almost without a parallel, and his achievements without a precedent. In him seemed to be centered a rich collection of the highest gifts of genius, great learning and readiness in debate and discourse in the House of Commons, and extraordinary wisdom in the administration of the affairs of the nation. His financial talent, his business aptitude, his classical attainments, and above all his moral fervor, and religious spirit were conspicuous. Some men would have been contented with political power, or classical learning, or literary distinction, but he excelled in all these--not only as a statesman, but as a man of letters and a classical scholar. Neither has held him exclusively as its own--he belongs to all, or rather they belong to him--for he explored and conquered them. His literary productions equal in merit his papers of State, while his knowledge of the classics would do credit to any scholar. He possessed the unusual quality of throwing the light of his own mind on the greatest questions of national and international importance, of bringing them down to the understanding and appreciation of the masses of the people, of infusing, by his earnestness, the fire of his own soul in the people, and of arousing in them the greatest enthusiasm. In the biography of this wonderful person we propose to set before the reader the man himself--his words and his deeds. This method enables him to speak for himself, and thus the reader may study him and know him, and because thereof be lifted into a higher plane of nobler and better being. The acts and utterances of such a character are his best biography, and especially for one differing so largely from all other men as to have none to be compared with him. In this record we simply spread before the reader his private life and public services, connected together through many startling changes, from home to school, from university to Parliament, from Tory follower to Liberal leader, from the early start in his political course to the grand consummation of the statesman's success in his attainment to the fourth Premiership of this Grand Old Man, and the glorious end of an eventful life. We could not do better, in closing this chapter, than to reproduce a part of the character sketch of William E. Gladstone, from the pen of William T. Stead, and published in the "Review of Reviews:" "So much has been written about Mr. Gladstone that it was with some sinking of heart I ventured to select him as a subject for my next character sketch. But I took heart of grace when I remembered that the object of these sketches is to describe their subject as he appears to himself at his best, and his countrymen. There are plenty of other people ready to fill in the shadows. This paper claims in no way to be a critical estimate or a judicial summing up of the merits and demerits of the most remarkable of all living Englishmen. It is merely an attempt to catch, as it were, the outline of the heroic figure which has dominated English politics for the lifetime of this generation, and thereby to explain something of the fascination which his personality has exercised and still exercises over the men and women of his time. If his enemies, and they are many, say that I have idealized a wily old opportunist out of all recognition, I answer that to the majority of his fellow-subjects my portrait is not overdrawn. The real Gladstone may be other than this, but this is probably more like the Gladstone for whom the electors believe they are voting, than a picture of Gladstone, 'warts and all,' would be. And when I am abused, as I know I shall be, for printing such a sketch, I shall reply that there is at least one thing to be said in its favor. To those who know him best, in his own household, and to those who only know him as a great name in history, my sketch will only appear faulty because it does not do full justice to the character and genius of this extraordinary man." Mr. Gladstone appeals to the men of to-day from the vantage point of extreme old age. Age is so frequently dotage, that when a veteran appears who preserves the heart of a boy and the happy audacity of youth, under the 'lyart haffets wearing thin and bare' of aged manhood, it seems as if there is something supernatural about it, and all men feel the fascination and the charm. Mr. Gladstone, as he gleefully remarked the other day, has broken the record. He has outlived Lord Palmerston, who died when eighty-one, and Thiers, who only lived to be eighty. The blind old Dandolo in Byron's familiar verse-- The octogenarian chief, Byzantium's conquering foe, had not more energy than the Liberal leader, who, now in his eighty-third year, has more nerve and spring and go than any of his lieutenants, not excluding the youngest recruit. There is something imposing and even sublime in the long procession of years which bridge as with eighty-two arches the abyss of past time, and carry us back to the days of Canning, and of Castlereagh, of Napoleon, and of Wellington. His parliamentary career extends over sixty years--the lifetime of two generations. He is the custodian of all the traditions, the hero of the experience of successive administrations, from a time dating back longer than most of his colleagues can remember. For nearly forty years he has had a leading part in making or unmaking of Cabinets; he has served his Queen and his country in almost every capacity in office and in opposition, and yet to-day, despite his prolonged sojourn in the malaria of political wire-pulling, his heart seems to be as the heart of a little child. If some who remember 'the old Parliamentary hand' should whisper that innocence of the dove is sometimes compatible with the wisdom of the serpent, I make no dissent. It is easy to be a dove, and to be as silly as a dove. It is easy to be as wise as a serpent, and as wicked, let us say, as Mr. Governor Hill or Lord Beaconsfield. But it is the combination that is difficult, and in Mr. Gladstone the combination is almost ideally complete. "Mr. Gladstone is old enough to be the grandfather of the younger race of politicians, but still his courage, his faith, his versatility, put the youngest of them to shame. It is this ebullience of youthful energy, this inexhaustible vitality, which is the admiration and despair of his contemporaries. Surely when a schoolboy at Eton he must somewhere have discovered the elixir of life, or have been bathed by some beneficent fairy in the well of perpetual youth. Gladly would many a man of fifty exchange physique with this hale and hearty octogenarian. Only in one respect does he show any trace of advancing years. His hearing is not quite so good as it was, but still it is far better than that of Cardinal Manning, who became very deaf in his closing years. Otherwise Mr. Gladstone is hale and hearty. His eye is not dim, neither is his natural force abated. A splendid physical frame, carefully preserved, gives every promise of a continuance of his green old age. "His political opponents, who began this Parliament by confidently calculating upon his death before the dissolution, are now beginning to admit that it is by no means improbable that Mr. Gladstone may survive the century. Nor was it quite so fantastic as it appears at first sight, when an ingenious disciple told him the other day that by the fitness of things he ought to live for twenty years yet. 'For,' said this political arithmetician, 'you have been twenty-six years a Tory, twenty-six years a Whig Liberal, and you have been only six years a Radical Home Ruler. To make the balance even you have twenty years still to serve.' "Sir Provo Wallis, the Admiral of the Fleet, who died the other day at the age of one hundred, had not a better constitution than Mr. Gladstone, nor had it been more carefully preserved in the rough and tumble of our naval war. If the man who smelt powder in the famous fight between the Chesapeake and the Shannon lived to read the reports of the preparations for the exhibition at Chicago, it is not so incredible that Mr. Gladstone may at least be in the foretop of the State at the dawn of the twentieth century. "The thought is enough to turn the Tories green with sickening despair, that the chances of his life, from a life insurance office point of view, are probably much better than Lord Salisbury's. But that is one of the attributes of Mr. Gladstone which endear him so much to his party. He is always making his enemies sick with despairing jealousy. He is the great political evergreen, who seems, even in his political life, to have borrowed something of immortality from the fame which he has won. He has long been the Grand Old Man. If he lives much longer he bids fair to be known as the immortal old man in more senses than one." [Illustration: GLADSTONE'S BIRTHPLACE, RODNEY STREET, LIVERPOOL.] CHAPTER II AT ETON AND OXFORD There is very little recorded of the boyhood of some great men, and this is true of the childhood of William E. Gladstone, until he leaves the parental home for school, which he does in 1821, at the early age of eleven. He was fortunate in his parentage, but no less so in his early associations, both in and out of school. We refer particularly to his private preceptors, two of whom, the venerable Archdeacon Jones and the Rev. William Rawson, first Vicar of Seaforth, a watering-place near Liverpool, were both men of high character and great ability. Mr. Gladstone always highly esteemed Mr. Rawson, his earliest preceptor, and visited him on his death-bed. Dr. Turner, afterwards Bishop of Calcutta, was for two years young Gladstone's private tutor, beginning his instruction when his pupil left Eton in 1827. Besides these associations of his early life there were Canning, a frequent visitor, as has been mentioned, at his father's house, and Hannah More--"Holy Hannah," as Horace Walpole called her. She singled out "Billy" Gladstone for her especial pet out of the group of eleven children in whom her warm heart delighted, and it has been asked wonderingly if Miss More could preternaturally have lengthened her days until William E. Gladstone's present glory, whether she would have gone on dubbing him "Billy" in undignified brevity until the end. William E. Gladstone, when very young, gave such evidence of uncommon intellectual ability and promise of future greatness that his father resolved upon educating him in the best schools of England. There are four or five great schools in England in which the English youth are prepared in four or five years for Cambridge or Oxford. "Eton, the largest and the most celebrated of the public schools of England, ranks as the second in point of antiquity, Winchester alone being older." After the preparation at home, under private teachers, to which we have referred, William E. Gladstone was sent to Eton, in September, 1821. His biographer, George W.E. Russell, writes, "From a provincial town, from mercantile surroundings, from an atmosphere of money-making, from a strictly regulated life, the impressible boy was transplanted, at the age of eleven, to the shadow of Windsor and the banks of the Thames, to an institution which belongs to history, to scenes haunted by the memory of the most illustrious Englishmen, to a free and independent existence among companions who were the very flower of English boyhood. A transition so violent and yet so delightful was bound to produce an impression which lapse of time was powerless to efface, and no one who knows the man and the school can wonder that for seventy years Mr. Gladstone has been the most enthusiastic of Etonians." Eton of to-day is not in all respects the Eton of three-quarters of a century ago, and yet in some particulars it is as it was when young "Billy" Gladstone studied within its walls. The system of education and discipline pursued has undergone some modifications in recent years--notably during the provostship of the Rev. Francis Hodgson; but radical defects are still alleged against it. It is not remarkable, however, that every Eton boy becomes deeply attached to the school, notwithstanding the apprenticeship to hardships he may have been compelled to undergo. The "hardships" there must have been particularly great when young Gladstone entered Eton, at the close of the summer holidays of 1821. The school was under the head-mastership of "the terrific Dr. Keate." He was not the man to spare even the scholar who, upon the emphatic testimony of Sir Roderick Murchison, was "the prettiest boy that ever went to Eton," and who was as studious and well-behaved as he was good-looking. The town of Eton, in which the school is located, about 22 miles from London, in Berkshire, is beautifully situated on the banks of the river Thames, opposite Windsor Castle, the residence of the Queen of England. Eton College is one of the most famous and best endowed educational institutions of learning in England. It was founded in 1440 by Henry VI. The king was very solicitous that the work should be of a durable kind, and he provided for free scholarships. Eton of Mr. Gladstone's day, according to a critic, was divided into two schools--the upper and the lower. It also had two kinds of scholars, namely, seventy called king's scholars or "collegers," who are maintained gratuitously, sleep in the college, and wear a peculiar dress; and another class--the majority--called "oppidans," who live in the town. Between these two classes of students there prevails perpetual hostility. At Cambridge, there was founded, in connection with Eton, what is called King's College, to receive as fellows students from Eton, and to give them gratuitously an education. The ground on which students of Eton were promoted to King's College and these fellowships was, strangely to say, upon that of seniority, or long residence, and not of merit. Because there was no competition, scholars who were deficient in education at Eton were promoted to Cambridge, where they had no incentive to work, being exempt from the ordinary university examination. At Eton "no instruction was given in any branch of mathematical, physical, metaphysical or moral science, nor in the evidences of Christianity. The only subjects which it professed to impart a knowledge of were the Greek and Latin languages; as much divinity as can be gained from construing the Greek Testament, and reading a portion of Tomline on the Thirty-nine Articles, and a little ancient and modern geography." So much for the instruction imparted. As regards the hours of tuition, there seems to have been fault there, in that they were too few and insufficient, there being in all only eleven hours a week study. Then as to the manner of study, no time was given the scholar to study the style of an author; he was "hurried from Herodotus to Thucydides, from Thucydides to Xenophon, from Xenophon to Lucian, without being habituated to the style of any one author--without gaining an interest in the history, or even catching the thread of the narrative; and when the whole book is finished he has probably collected only a few vague ideas about Darius crying over a great army, Abydos and Nicias and Demosthenes being routed with a great army near Syracuse, mixed up with a recollection of the death of Cyrus and Socrates, some moral precept from Socrates, and some jokes against false philosophers and heathen gods." Hence the Eton student who goes to Cambridge finds he has done but a little desultory reading, and that he must begin again. It was charged that the system of education at Eton failed in every point. The moral discipline of the school was also called in question. The number of scholars was so great that the proper control of them seemed impossible under the management. Great laxity prevailed among the larger boys, while the younger and weaker students were exposed to the tyranny of the older and stronger ones without hope of redress. The result was that the system of "fagging," or the acting of some boys as drudges for the others, flourished. "The right" of fagging depended upon the place in the school; all boys in the sixth and fifth forms had the power of ordering--all below the latter form being bound to obey. This system of fagging has a very injurious effect upon most of the boys; "it finds them slaves and leaves them despots. A boy who has suffered himself, insensibly learns to see no harm in making others suffer in turn. The whole thing is wrong in principle, and engenders passions which should be stifled and not encouraged." Why free and enlightened England should tolerate, even then, such barbarous slavery cannot be understood and yet there are outrageous customs prevailing among college students of our day in every civilized land that should be suppressed. Flogging was in vogue, too, at Eton, with all its degrading and demoralizing effects, and was performed by the Head-Master himself. In 1820, the year before Mr. Gladstone entered Eton, there were 280 upper students and 319 lower, a total of 612, and none were exempt. Some curious stories are told of flogging, which has ever existed at Eton, and from which even the largest boys were not exempt. Mr. Lewis relates how a young man of twenty, just upon the point of leaving school, and engaged to be married to a lady at Windsor, was well and soundly whipped by Dr. Goodford, for arriving one evening at his tutor's house after the specified time. And it is related that Arthur Wellesley, afterwards the Iron Duke of Wellington, was flogged at Eton for having been "barred out." At the same time there were eighty boys who were whipped. And the Eton of twenty years later was very little improved over its condition in Mr. Gladstone's time there, or in 1845. John D. Lewis, speaking of this period, says that after the boys reached the fifth form, then began "some of the greatest anomalies and absurdities of the then Etonian system." The student was now safe from the ordeal of examinations, and that the higher classes, including ten senior collegers and ten senior oppidans, contained some of the very worst scholars. "A boy's place on the general roll was no more a criterion of his acquirements and his industry than would be the 'year' of a young man at Oxford or Cambridge." The collegers, however, were required to pass some kind of examination, in accordance with which their place on the list for the King's college was fixed. But the evils regarding the hours of study and the nature of the studies were as bad. "The regular holidays and Saints' days, two whole holidays in a week, and two half-holidays, were a matter of common occurrence." Lord Morley, in his examination before the Commission on Public Schools, was asked whether a boy would be looked down upon at Eton for being industrious in his studies, replied, "Not if he could do something else well." And this seems to be the spirit of the Eton boy with whom a lack of scholarship is more than made up by skill in river or field sports. This is true to-day; for a recent writer in the _Forum_, upon "The Training of Boys at Eton," says: "Athletic prominence is in English public schools almost synonymous with social prominence; many a boy whose capacity and character commanded both respect and liking at the universities and in after life, is almost a nobody at a public school, because he has no special athletic gifts.... Great athletic capacity may co-exist with low moral and intellectual character." There were few inducements to study and to excel in scholarship, and plenty to idleness and neglect, hence he who did so must study in hours and out of hours, in season and out of season. The curriculum is still strictly classical, but French, German and mathematics are taught. The collegers of recent years have done very fair work and carried off many distinctions at Cambridge. With all these odds against them, and these difficulties to surmount, yet there were Eton boys whose attainments were deep and solid, and who became famous men, and one of these was William E. Gladstone. When young Gladstone entered Eton his brothers, Thomas and Robertson Gladstone, were already there, and the three boys boarded at Mrs. Shurey's, whose house "at the south end of the broad walk in front of the schools and facing the chapel," was rather nearer the famous "Christopher Inn" than would be thought desirable nowadays. On the wall opposite the house the name of "Gladstone" is carved. Thomas Gladstone was in the fifth form, and William was placed in the middle remove of the fourth form, and became his eldest brother's "fag." This doubtlessly saved him much annoyance and suffering, and allowed him better to pursue the studious bent of his indications. William E. Gladstone was what Etonians called a "sap"--in other words, a student faithful in the discharge of every duty devolving upon him at school--one who studied his lessons and was prepared for his recitations in the classroom. This agreeable fact has been immortalized in a famous line in Lord Lytton's "New Timon." He worked hard at his classical studies, as required by the rules of the school, and applied himself diligently to the study of mathematics during the holidays. It is said that his interest in the work of the school was first aroused by Mr. Hawtrey, who afterwards became Head-Master, who commended some of his Latin verses, and "sent him up for good." This led the young man to associate intellectual work with the ideas of ambition and success. While he did not seem to be especially an apt scholar in the restricted sense for original versification in the classical languages, or for turning English into Greek or Latin, yet he seemed to seize the precise meaning of the authors and to give the sense. "His composition was stiff," but yet, says a classmate, "when there were thrilling passages of Virgil or Homer, or difficult passages in 'Scriptores Graeci' to translate, he or Lord Arthur Hervey was generally called up to edify the class with quotations or translations." He had no prizes at Eton except what is called being sent up for good, on account of verses, and he was honored on several occasions. Besides he took deep interest in starting a college periodical, and with some of the most intellectual of the students sustained it with his pen. The more studious of Eton boys have on several occasions in the present century been in the habit of establishing periodicals for the purpose of ventilating their opinions. In 1786 Mr. Canning and Mr. Hookham Frere established the _Microcosm_, whose essays and _jeux d'esprit_, while having reference primarily to Eton, demonstrated that the writers were not insensible to what was going on in the great world without. It was for this college paper that Canning wrote his "Essay on the Epic of the Queen of Hearts," which, as a burlesque criticism, has been awarded a high place in English literature. Lord Henry Spencer, Hookham Frere, Capel Lofft, and Mr. Millish, were also contributors to the columns of the _Microcosm_. In the year 1820 W. Mackworth Praed set on foot a manuscript journal, entitled _Apis Matina_. This was in turn succeeded by the _Etonian_, to which Praed contributed some of his most brilliant productions. John Moultrie, Henry Nelson Coleridge, Walter Blunt, and Chauncy Hare Townshend were also among the writers for its papers, who helped to make it of exceptional excellence. Its articles are of no ordinary interest even now. In the last year of William E. Gladstone's stay at Eton, in 1827, and seven years after Praed's venture, he was largely instrumental in launching the _Eton Miscellany_, professedly edited by Bartholomew Bouverie, and Mr. Gladstone became a most frequent, voluminous and valuable contributor to its pages. He wrote articles of every kind--prologues, epilogues, leaders, historical essays, satirical sketches, classical translations, humorous productions, poetry and prose. And among the principal contributors with him were Sir Francis Doyle, George Selwyn, James Colville, Arthur Hallam, John Haumer and James Milnes-Gaskell. The introduction, written by and signed "William Ewart Gladstone" for this magazine, contained the following interesting and singular passage, which probably fairly sets forth the hopes and fears that beset statesmen in maturer years, as well as Eton boys of only seventeen years of age: "In my present undertaking there is one gulf in which I fear to sink, and that gulf is Lethe. There is one stream which I dread my inability to stem--it is the tide of Popular Opinion. I have ventured, and no doubt rashly ventured-- Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders, To try my fortune in a sea of glory, But far beyond my depth." At present it is hope alone that buoys me up; for more substantial support I must be indebted to my own exertions, well knowing that in this land of literature merit never wants its reward. That such merit is mine I dare not presume to think; but still there is something within me that bids me hope that I may be able to glide prosperously down the stream of public estimation; or, in the words of Virgil, '--Celerare viam rumore secundo.' "I was surprised even to see some works with the names of Shakespeare and Milton on them sharing the common destiny, but on examination I found that those of the latter were some political rhapsodies, which richly deserved their fate; and that the former consisted of some editions of his works which had been burdened with notes and mangled with emendations by his merciless commentators. In other places I perceived authors worked up into frenzy by seeing their own compositions descending like the rest. Often did the infuriated scribes extend their hands, and make a plunge to endeavor to save their beloved offspring, but in vain; I pitied the anguish of their disappointment, but with feelings of the same commiseration as that which one feels for a malefactor on beholding his death, being at the same time fully conscious how well he has deserved it." Little did this diffident and youthful editor imagine that he was forecasting the future for himself by the aid of youth's most ardent desires, and that he would live to become the Primate of all England and the foremost statesman of his day. There were two volumes of the _Miscellany_, dated June-July and October-November, respectively, and Mr. Gladstone contributed thirteen articles to the first volume. Among the contributions were an "Ode to the Shade of Watt Tyler," a vigorous rendering of a chorus from the Hucuba of Euripides, and a letter under the name of "Philophantasm," detailing an encounter he had with the poet Virgil, in which the great poet appeared muttering something which did not sound like Latin to an Eton boy, and complaining that he knew he was hated by the Eton boys because he was difficult to learn, and pleading to be as well received henceforth as Horace. We give a quotation from a poem, consisting of some two hundred and fifty lines, from his pen, which, appeared also in the _Miscellany_: "Who foremost now the deadly spear to dart, And strike the javelin to the Moslem's heart? Who foremost now to climb the leaguered wall, The first to triumph, or the first to fall? Lo, where the Moslems rushing to the fight, Back bear their squadrons in inglorious flight. With plumed helmet, and with glittering lance, 'Tis Richard bids his steel-clad bands advance; 'Tis Richard stalks along the blood-dyed plain, And views unmoved the slaying and the slain; 'Tis Richard bathes his hands in Moslem blood, And tinges Jordan with the purple flood. Yet where the timbrels ring, the trumpets sound, And tramp of horsemen shakes the solid ground, Though 'mid the deadly charge and rush of fight, No thought be theirs of terror or of flight,-- Ofttimes a sigh will rise, a tear will flow, And youthful bosoms melt in silent woe; For who of iron frame and harder heart Can bid the mem'ry of his home depart? Tread the dark desert and the thirsty sand, Nor give one thought to England's smiling land? To scenes of bliss, and days of other years-- The Vale of Gladness and the Vale of Tears; That, passed and vanish'd from their loving sight, This 'neath their view, and wrapt in shades of night?" Among other writers who contributed to the first volume of the _Miscellany_ were Arthur Henry Hallam and Doyle, also G.A. Selwyn, afterwards Bishop Selwyn, the friend of Mr. Gladstone, and to whom he recently paid the following tribute: "Connected as tutor with families of rank and influence, universally popular from his frank, manly, and engaging character--and scarcely less so from his extraordinary rigor as an athlete--he was attached to Eton, where he resided, with a love surpassing the love of Etonians. In himself he formed a large part of the life of Eton, and Eton formed a large part of his life. To him is due no small share of the beneficial movement in the direction of religious earnestness which marked the Eton of forty years back, and which was not, in my opinion, sensibly affected by any influence extraneous to the place itself. At a moment's notice, upon the call of duty, he tore up the singularly deep roots which his life had struck deep into the soil of England." Both Mr. Gladstone and the future Bishop of Selwyn contributed humorous letters to "The Postman," the correspondence department of the _Eton Miscellany_. In the second volume of the _Eton Miscellany_ are articles of equal interest to those that appeared in the first. Doyle, Jelf, Selwyn, Shadwell and Arthur Henry Hallam were contributors, the latter having written "The Battle of the Boyne," a parody upon Campbell's "Hohenlinden." But here again Mr. Gladstone was the principal contributor, having contributed to this even more largely than to the first, having written seventeen articles, besides the introductions to the various numbers of the volume. Indeed one would think from his devotion to these literary pursuits during his last year at Eton, that he had very little leisure for those ordinary sports so necessary to Eton boys. He seems to have begun his great literary activity. Among them may be mentioned an "Ode to the Shade of Watt Tyler," mentioned before, which is an example of his humorous style: "Shade of him whose valiant tongue On high the song of freedom sung; Shade of him, whose mighty soul Would pay no taxes on his poll; Though, swift as lightning, civic sword Descended on thy fated head, The blood of England's boldest poured, And numbered Tyler with the dead! "Still may thy spirit flap its wings At midnight o'er the couch of kings; And peer and prelate tremble, too, In dread of mighty interview! With patriot gesture of command, With eyes that like thy forges gleam, Lest Tyler's voice and Tyler's hand Be heard and seen in nightly dream. "I hymn the gallant and the good From Tyler down to Thistlewood, My muse the trophies grateful sings, The deeds of Miller and of Ings; She sings of all who, soon or late, Have burst Subjection's iron chain, Have seal'd the bloody despot's fate, Or cleft a peer or priest in twain. "Shades, that soft Sedition woo, Around the haunts of Peterloo! That hover o'er the meeting-halls, Where many a voice stentorian bawls! Still flit the sacred choir around, With 'Freedom' let the garrets ring, And vengeance soon in thunder sound On Church, and constable, and king." In a paper on "Eloquence," in the same volume, he shows that even then his young mind was impressed by the fame attached to successful oratory in Parliament. Visions of glory and honor open before the enraptured sight of those devoted to oratorical pursuits, and whose ardent and aspiring minds are directed to the House of Commons. Evidently the young writer himself "had visions of parliamentary oratory, and of a successful _debut_ in the House of Commons, with perhaps an offer from the Minister, a Secretaryship of State, and even the Premiership itself in the distance." But then there are barriers to pass and ordeals to undergo. "There are roars of coughing, as well as roars of cheering" from the members of the House, "and maiden speeches sometimes act more forcibly on the lungs of hearers than the most violent or most cutting of all the breezes which AEOLUS can boast." But the writer draws comfort from the fact that Lord Morfeth, Edward Geoffrey, Stanley and Lord Castlereagh who were all members of the Eton college debating society were then among the most successful young speakers in Parliament. This sounds more like prophecy than dreams, for within a very few years after writing this article the writer himself had passed the dreaded barrier and endured the ordeal, and had not only made his appearance in the House of Commons, but had been invited to fill an honorable place in the Cabinet of the Ministry then in power. Another contribution of Mr. Gladstone's to the _Miscellany_, and perhaps the most meritorious of the youthful writer's productions, was entitled, "Ancient and Modern Genius Compared," in which the young Etonian editor ardently and affectionately apostrophized the memory of Canning, his father's great friend and his own ideal man and statesman, who had just then perished untimely and amid universal regret. In this article he first takes the part of the moderns as against the ancients, though he by no means deprecates the genius of the latter, and then eloquently apostrophizes the object of his youthful hero-worship, the immortal Canning, whose death he compares to that of the lamented Pitt. The following are extracts from this production: "It is for those who revered him in the plenitude of his meridian glory to mourn over him in the darkness of his premature extinction: to mourn over the hopes that are buried in his grave, and the evils that arise from his withdrawing from the scene of life. Surely if eloquence never excelled and seldom equalled--if an expanded mind and judgment whose vigor was paralleled only by its soundness--if brilliant wit--if a glowing imagination--if a warm heart, and an unbending firmness--could have strengthened the frail tenure, and prolonged the momentary duration of human existence, that man had been immortal! But nature could endure no longer. Thus has Providence ordained that inasmuch as the intellect is more brilliant, it shall be more short-lived; as its sphere is more expanded, more swiftly is it summoned away. Lest we should give to man the honor due to God--lest we should exalt the object of our admiration into a divinity for our worship--He who calls the weary and the mourner to eternal rest hath been pleased to remove him from our eyes. "The degrees of inscrutable wisdom are unknown to us; but if ever there was a man for whose sake it was meet to indulge the kindly though frail feelings of our nature--for whom the tear of sorrow was to us both prompted by affection and dictated by duty--that man was George Canning." After Hallam, Selwyn and other contributors to the _Miscellany_ left Eton, at midsummer, 1827, Mr. Gladstone still remained and became the mainstay of the magazine. "Mr. Gladstone and I remained behind as its main supporters," writes Sir Francis Doyle, "or rather it would be more like the truth if I said that Mr. Gladstone supported the whole burden upon his own shoulders. I was unpunctual and unmethodical, so were his other vassals; and the '_Miscellany_' would have fallen to the ground but for Mr. Gladstone's untiring energy, pertinacity and tact." Although Mr. Gladstone labored in editorial work upon the _Miscellany_, yet he took time to bestow attention upon his duties in the Eton Society of the College, learnedly called "The Literati," and vulgarly called "Pop," and took a leading part in the debates and in the private business of the Society. The Eton Society of Gladstone's day was a brilliant group of boys. He introduced desirable new members, moved for more readable and instructive newspapers, proposing new rules for better order and more decorous conduct, moving fines on those guilty of disorder or breaches of the rules, and paying a fine imposed upon himself for putting down an illegal question. "In debate he champions the claims of metaphysics against those of mathematics, and defends aristocracy against democracy;" confesses innate feelings of dislike to the French; protests against disarmament of the Highlanders as inexpedient and unjust; deplores the fate of Strafford and the action of the House of Commons, which he claimed they should be able to "revere as our glory and confide in as our protection." The meetings of the Eton Society were held over Miss Hatton's "sock-shop." In politics its members were Tory--intensely so, and although current politics were forbidden subjects, yet, political opinions were disclosed in discussions of historical or academical questions. "The execution of Strafford and Charles I, the characters of Oliver Cromwell and Milton, the 'Central Social' of Rousseau, and the events of the French Revolution, laid bare the speakers' political tendencies as effectually as if the conduct of Queen Caroline, the foreign policy of Lord Castlereagh, or the repeal of the Test and Corporation Act had been the subject of debate." It was October 15, 1825, when Gladstone was elected a member of the Eton Society, and on the 29th of the same month made his maiden speech on the question "Is the education of the poor on the whole beneficial?" It is recorded in the minutes of the meeting that "Mr. Gladstone rose and eloquently addressed the house." He spoke in favor of education; and one who heard him says that his opening words were, "Sir, in this age of increased and increasing civilization." Says an eminent writer, by way of comment upon these words, "It almost oppresses the imagination to picture the shoreless sea of eloquence which rolls between that exordium and the oratory to which we still are listening and hope to listen for years to come." "The peroration of his speech on the question whether Queen Anne's Ministers, in the last four years of her reign, deserved well of their country, is so characteristic, both in substance and in form," that we reproduce it here from Dr, Russell's work on Gladstone: "Thus much, sir, I have said, as conceiving myself bound in fairness not to regard the names under which men have hidden their designs so much as the designs themselves. I am well aware that my prejudices and my predilections have long been enlisted on the side of Toryism (cheers) and that in a cause like this I am not likely to be influenced unfairly against men bearing that name and professing to act on the principles which I have always been accustomed to revere. But the good of my country must stand on a higher ground than distinctions like these. In common fairness and in common candor, I feel myself compelled to give my decisive verdict against the conduct of men whose measures I firmly believe to have been hostile to British interests, destructive of British glory, and subversive of the splendid and, I trust, lasting fabric of the British constitution." The following extracts from the diary of William Cowper, afterwards Lord Mount-Temple, we also reproduce from the same author: "On Saturday, October 27, 1827, the subject for debate was: "'Whether the deposition of Richard II was justifiable or not.' Jelf opened; not a good speech. Doyle spoke _extempore_, made several mistakes, which were corrected by Jelf. Gladstone spoke well. The Whigs were regularly floored; only four Whigs to eleven Tories, but they very nearly kept up with them in coughing and 'hear, hears,' Adjourned to Monday after 4. "Monday, 29.--Gladstone finished his speech, and ended with a great deal of flattery of Doyle, saying that he was sure he would have courage enough to own that he was wrong. It succeeded. Doyle rose amidst reiterated cheers to own that he was convinced by the arguments of the other side. He had determined before to answer them and cut up Gladstone! "December 1.--Debate, 'Whether the Peerage Bill of 1719 was calculated to be beneficial or not.' Thanks voted to Doyle and Gladstone; the latter spoke well; will be a great loss to the Society." There were many boys at Eton--schoolfellows of Mr. Gladstone--who became men of note in after days. Among them the Hallams, Charles Canning, afterwards Lord Canning and Governor-General of India; Walter Hamilton, Bishop of Salisbury; Edward Hamilton, his brother, of Charters; James Hope, afterwards Hope-Scott; James Bruce, afterwards Lord Elgin; James Milnes-Gaskell, M.P. for Wenlock; Henry Denison; Sir Francis Doyle; Alexander Kinglake; George Selwyn, Bishop of New Zealand and of Litchfield; Lord Arthur Hervey, Bishop of Bath and Wells; William Cavendish, Duke of Devonshire; George Cornwallis Lewis; Frederic Tennyson; Gerald Wellesley, Dean of Windsor; Spencer Walpole, Home Secretary; Frederic Rogers, Lord Blachford; James Colvile, Chief Justice at Calcutta, and others. By universal acknowledgment the most remarkable youth at Eton in that day was Arthur Hallam, "in mind and character not unworthy of the magnificent eulogy of 'In Memoriam.'" He was the most intimate friend of young Gladstone. They always took breakfast together, although they boarded apart in different houses, and during the separation of vacations they were diligent correspondents. The father of William E. Gladstone, as we have seen, discovered premonitions of future greatness in his son, and we may well ask the question what impression was made by him upon his fellow school-mates at Eton. Arthur Hallam wrote: "Whatever may be our lot, I am confident that _he_ is a bud that will bloom with a richer fragrance than almost any whose early promise I have witnessed." James Milnes-Gaskell says: "Gladstone is no ordinary individual; and perhaps if I were called on to select the individual I am intimate with to whom I should first turn in an emergency, and whom I thought in every way pre-eminently distinguished for high excellence, I think I should turn to Gladstone. If you finally decide in favor of Cambridge, my separation from Gladstone will be a source of great sorrow to me." And the explanation of this latter remark is that the writer's mother wanted him to go to Cambridge, while he wished to go to Oxford, because Gladstone was going there. Sir Francis Doyle writes: "I may as well remark that my father, a man of great ability, as well as of great experience of life, predicted Gladstone's future eminence from the manner in which he handled this somewhat tiresome business. [The editorial work and management of the _Eton Miscellany._] 'It is not' he remarked, 'that I think his papers better than yours or Hallam's--that is not my meaning at all; but the force of character he has shown in managing his subordinates, and the combination of ability and power that he has made evident, convince me that such a young man cannot fail to distinguish himself hereafter.'" The recreations of young Gladstone were not in all respects like his school-mates. He took no part in games, for he had no taste in that direction, and while his companions were at play he was studiously employed in his room. One of the boys afterwards declared, "without challenge or contradiction, that he was never seen to run." Yet he had his diversions and was fond of sculling, and kept a "lock-up," or private boat, for his own use. He liked walking for exercise, and walked fast and far. His chief amusement when not writing, reading or debating, was to ramble among the delights of Windsor with a few intimate friends; and he had only a few whom he admitted to his inner circle. To others beyond he was not known and was not generally popular. Gladstone, Charles Canning, Handley, Bruce, Hodgson, Lord Bruce and Milnes-Gaskell set up a Salt Hill Club. They met every whole holiday or half-holiday, as was convenient, after twelve, "and went up to Salt Hill to bully the fat waiter, eat toasted cheese, and drink egg-wine." It is startling to hear from such an authority as James Milnes-Gaskell that "in all our meetings, as well as at almost every time, Gladstone went by the name of Mr. Tipple." [Illustration: HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT.] The strongest testimony is borne to the moral character of young Gladstone while at Eton. By common consent he was pre-eminently God-fearing, orderly and conscientious. Bishop Hamilton, of Salisbury, writes: "At Eton I was a thoroughly idle boy; but I was saved from some worse things by getting to know Gladstone." This is the strong testimony of one school-boy after he has reached maturity and distinction for another. "To have exercised, while still a school-boy, an influence for good upon one of the greatest of contemporary saints, is surely such a distinction as few Prime Ministers ever attain." Two stories are told of him while at Eton that go to show the moral determination of the boy to do right. On one occasion he turned his glass upside down and refused to drink a coarse toast proposed, according to annual custom, at an election dinner at the "Christopher Inn." This shows the purity of his mind, but there is another illustrating the humane feeling in his heart. He came forth as the champion of some miserable pigs which it was the inhumane custom to torture at Eton Fair on Ash Wednesday, and when he was bantered by his school-fellows for his humanity, he offered to write his reply "in good round hand upon their faces." At Christmas, 1827, Gladstone left Eton, and after that studied six months under private tutors, Dr. Turner, afterwards Bishop of Calcutta, being one. Of this Mr. Gladstone writes: "I resided with Dr. Turner at Wilmslow (in Cheshire) from January till a few months later. My residence with him was cut off by his appointment to the Bishopric of Calcutta.... My companions were the present (1877) Bishop of Sodor and Man, and Sir C.A. Wood, Deputy-Chairman of the G.W. Railway. We employed our spare time in gymnastics, in turning, and in rambles. I remember paying a visit to Macclesfield. In a silk factory the owner showed us his silk handkerchiefs, and complained much of Mr. Huskisson for having removed the prohibition of the foreign article. The thought passed through my mind at the time: Why make laws to enable people to produce articles of such hideous pattern and indifferent quality as this? Alderly Edge was a favorite place of resort. We dined with Sir John Stanley (at Alderly) on the day when the king's speech was received; and I recollect that he ridiculed (I think very justly) the epithet _untoward_, which was applied in it to the Battle of Navarino." In 1828, and after two years as a private pupil of Dr. Turner, Mr. Gladstone entered Christ Church College, Oxford and in the following year was nominated to a studentship on the foundation. Although he had no prizes at Oxford of the highest class, unless honors in the schools be so called--and in this respect he achieved a success which falls to the lot of but few students. In the year 1831, when he went up for his final examination, he completed his academical education by attaining the highest honors in the university--graduating double-first-class. Of the city of Oxford, where Oxford University is situated, Matthew Arnold writes: "Beautiful city! So venerable, so lovely, so unravaged by the fierce intellectual life of our century, so serene! And yet, steeped in sentiment as she lies, spreading her gardens to the moonlight, or whispering from her towers the last enchantments of the Middle Age, who will deny that Oxford, by her ineffable charm, keeps ever calling us near to the true goal of all of us, to the ideal, to perfection--to beauty, in a word, which is only truth seen from another side." Describing Christ Church College, a writer has said that there is no other College where a man has so great a choice of society, or a man entire freedom in choosing it. As to the studies required, a greater stress was laid upon a knowledge of the Bible and of the evidences of Christianity than upon classical literature; some proficiency was required also, either in mathematics or the science of reasoning. The system of education accommodated itself to the capacity and wants of the students, but the man of talent was at no loss as to a field for his exertions, or a reward for his industry. The honors of the ministry were all within his reach. In the cultivation of taste and general information Oxford afforded every opportunity, but the modern languages were not taught. An interesting fact is related of young Gladstone when he entered Oxford, as to his studies at the university. He wrote his father that he disliked mathematics, and that he intended to concentrate his time and attention upon the classics. This was a great blow to his father, who replied that he did not think a man was a man unless he knew mathematics. The dutiful son yielded to his father's wishes, abandoned his own plan, and applied himself with energy and success to the study of mathematics. But for this change of study he might not have become the greatest of Chancellors of the Exchequer. Gladstone's instructors at Oxford were men of reputation. Rev. Robert Biscoe, whose lectures on Aristotle attracted some of the best men to the university, was his tutor; he attended the lectures of Dr. Burton on Divinity, and of Dr. Pusey on Hebrew, and read classics privately with Bishop Wordsworth. He read steadily but not laboriously. Nothing was ever allowed to interfere with his morning's work. He read for four hours, and then took a walk. Though not averse to company and suppers, yet he always read for two or three hours before bedtime. Among the undergraduates at Oxford then, who became conspicuous, were Henry Edward Manning, afterwards Cardinal Archbishop; Archibald Campbell Tait, Archbishop of Canterbury; Sidney Herbert, Robert Lowe, Lord Sherbrooke, and Lord Selborne. "The man who _took_ me most," says a visitor to Oxford in 1829, "was the youngest Gladstone of Liverpool--I am sure a very superior person." Gladstone's chosen friends were all steady and industrious men, and many of them were more distinctively religious than is generally found in the life of undergraduates. And his choice of associates in this respect was the subject of criticism on the part of a more secularly minded student who wrote, "Gladstone has mixed himself up with the St. Mary Hall and Oriel set, who are really, for the most part, only fit to live with maiden aunts and keep tame rabbits." And the question, Which was right--Gladstone or the student? may be answered by another, Which one became Prime Minister of England? "Gladstone's first rooms were in the 'old library,' near the hall; but for the greater part of his time he occupied the right-hand rooms on the first floor of the first staircase, on the right as the visitor enters Canterbury gate. He was, alike in study and in conduct, a model undergraduate, and the great influence of his character and talents was used with manly resolution against the riotous conduct of the 'Tufts,' whose brutality caused the death of one of their number in 1831. We read this note in the correspondence of a friend: 'I heard from Gladstone yesterday; he says that the number of gentlemen commoners has increased, is increasing, and ought to be diminished.' Every one who has experienced the hubristic qualities of the Tufted race, and its satellites, will cordially sympathize with this sentiment of an orderly and industrious undergraduate. He was conspicuously moderate in the use of wine. His good example in this respect affected not only his contemporaries but also his successors at the university; men who followed him to Oxford ten years later found it still operative, and declare that undergraduates drank less in the forties, because Gladstone had been courageously abstemious in the thirties." But there were those who better estimated Gladstone's worth and looked approvingly upon his course, as "the blameless schoolboy became the blameless undergraduate; diligent, sober, regular alike in study and devotion, giving his whole energies to the duties of the place, and quietly abiding in the religious faith in which he had been trained. Bishop Charles Wordsworth said that no man of his standing in the university habitually read his Bible more or knew it better. Cardinal Manning described him walking in the university with his 'Bible and Prayer-book tucked under his arm.' ... He quitted Oxford with a religious belief still untinctured by Catholic theology. But the great change was not far distant, and he had already formed some of the friendships which, in their development were destined to effect so profoundly the course of his religious thought." In reference to the religious and political opinions and influences prevailing at Oxford, it may be remarked that the atmosphere of Oxford was calculated to strengthen Mr. Gladstone's conservative views, and did have this effect, and as English statesmen had not then learned to put their trust in the people, the cause of reform found few or no friends at the university, and he was among those hostile to it, and was known for his pronounced Tory and High Church opinions. He belonged to the famous debating society known as the Oxford Union, was a brilliant debater, and in 1831 was its secretary, and later its president. On various occasions he carried, by a majority of one only, a motion that the Wellington Administration was undeserving of the confidence of the country; he defended the results of the Catholic Emancipation; he opposed a motion for the removal of Jewish disabilities, and he persuaded 94 students out of 130 to condemn Earl Grey's Reform Bill as a measure "which threatened not only to change the form of government, but ultimately to break up the very foundation of social order." His last speech at Oxford was in support of his own amendment to a motion for the immediate emancipation of the slaves in the West Indies. On a certain occasion he entertained a party of students from Cambridge, consisting of Sir Francis Doyle, Monckton Milnes, Sunderland, and Arthur H. Hallam, who discussed among them the superiority of Shelley over Byron as a poet. The motion was opposed by one Oxonion, the late Cardinal Manning, but Shelley received 90 votes to 33 for Byron. One who heard the debate on the Reform Bill says that "it converted Alston, the son of the member in Parliament for Hertford, who immediately on the conclusion of Gladstone's speech walked across from the Whig to the Tory side of the house, amidst loud acclamations." Another who was present writes, "Most of the speakers rose, more or less, above their usual level, but when Mr. Gladstone sat down we all of us felt that an epoch in our lives had occurred. It certainly was the finest speech of his that I ever heard." And Bishop Charles Wordsworth writes his experience of Mr. Gladstone at this time, "made me feel no less sure than of my own existence that Gladstone, our then Christ-Church undergraduate, would one day rise to be Prime Minister of England." In the spring of 1832 Mr. Gladstone quitted Oxford. In summing up results it may be said, in the language of Mr. Russell: "Among the purely intellectual effects produced on Mr. Gladstone by the discipline of Oxford, it is obvious to reckon an almost excessive exactness in the statement of propositions, a habit of rigorous definition, a microscopic care in the choice of words, and a tendency to analyze every sentiment and every phrase, and to distinguish with intense precaution between statements almost exactly similar. From Aristotle and Bishop Butler and Edmund Burke he learned the value of authority, the sacredness of law, the danger of laying rash and inconsiderate hands upon the ark of State. In the political atmosphere of Oxford he was taught to apply these principles to the civil events of his time, to dread innovation, to respect existing institutions, and to regard the Church and the Throne as inseparably associated by Divine ordinance." [Illustration: Gladstone's London Home] CHAPTER III EARLY PARLIAMENTARY EXPERIENCES It is customary for the sons of gentlemen who graduate at Cambridge and Oxford to spend some time in travel on the continent upon the completion of their university studies. The custom was observed in Mr. Gladstone's early days even more than at the present. In accordance then with the prevailing usage he went abroad after graduating at Oxford. In the spring of 1832 he started on his travels and spent nearly the whole of the next six months in Italy, "learning the language, studying the art, and revelling in the natural beauties of that glorious land." In the following September, however, he was suddenly recalled to England to enter upon his first Parliamentary campaign. At Oxford Toryism prevailed, and was of the old-fashioned type, far removed from the utilitarian conservatism of the present day. Charles I was a saint and a martyr, the claims of rank and birth were admitted with a childlike simplicity, the high functions of government were the birthright of the few, and the people had nothing to do with the laws, except to obey them. Mr. Gladstone was a Tory. The political views he held upon leaving Oxford had much to do with his recall from abroad and his running for a seat in the House of Commons. Of these opinions held by him then, and afterwards repudiated, he, in a speech delivered at the opening of the Palmerston Club, Oxford, in December, 1878, says: "I trace in the education of Oxford of my own time one great defect. Perhaps it was my own fault; but I must admit that I did not learn, when at Oxford, that which I have learned since, viz., to set a due value on the imperishable and inestimable principles of human liberty. The temper which, I think, too much prevailed in academic circles, was that liberty was regarded with jealousy and fear, which could not be wholly dispensed with, but which was continually to be watched for fear of excess.... I think that the principle of the Conservative party is jealousy of liberty and of the people, only qualified by fear; but I think the policy of the Liberal party is trust in the people, only qualified by prudence. I can only assure you, gentlemen, that now I am in front of extended popular privileges. I have no fear of those enlargements of the Constitution that seem to be approaching. On the contrary, I hail them with desire. I am not in the least degree conscious that I have less reverence for antiquity, for the beautiful, and good, and glorious charges that our ancestors have handed down to us as a patrimony to our race, than I had in other days when I held other political opinions. I have learnt to set the true value upon human liberty, and in whatever I have changed, there, and there only, has been the explanation of the change." It was Mr. Gladstone's Tory principles that led to an invitation from the Duke of Newcastle, whose son, the Earl of Lincoln, afterwards a member of Lord Aberdeen's Cabinet during the Crimean War, had been his schoolmate at Eton and Oxford, and his intimate friend; to return to England and to contest the representation of Newark in Parliament. In accordance with this summons he hurried home. Let us review the national situation. It was a time of general alarm and uncertainty, from political unrest, commercial stagnation, and devastating pestilence. "The terrors of the time begat a hundred forms of strange fanaticism; and among men who were not fanatics there was a deep and wide conviction that national judgments were overtaking national sins, and that the only hope of safety for England lay in a return to that practical recognition of religion in the political sphere at the proudest moments of English history. 'The beginning and the end of what is the matter with us in these days,' wrote Carlyle, 'is that we have forgotten God.'" England was in a condition of great political excitement and expectancy. One of the greatest battles in Parliamentary history had just been fought and won by the people. The Reform Bill, which admitted large classes, hitherto unrepresented, to the right of citizenship, had passed, after a long struggle, during which law and order were defied and riots prevailed in various parts of the kingdom. The King clearly perceiving that the wish of the people could no longer be disregarded with safety, and heedless of the advice of the aristocracy, gave his assent to the measure. This bill, which became a law June 7, 1832, "transformed the whole of the Electoral arrangements of the United Kingdom." It was demanded that the King be present in the House of Lords to witness the ceremony of the subjugation of his crown and peers, as it was deemed, but the King, feeling he had yielded enough to the popular will, refused. Walpole, in his history, writes: "King and Queen sat sullenly apart in their palace. Peer and country gentleman moodily awaited the ruin of their country and the destruction of their property. Fanaticism still raved at the wickedness of a people; the people, clamoring for work, still succumbed before the mysterious disease which was continually claiming more and more victims. But the nation cared not for the sullenness of the Court, the forebodings of the landed classes, the ravings of the pulpit, or even the mysterious operations of a new plague. The deep gloom that had overshadowed the land had been relieved by one single ray. The victory had been won. The bill had become law." The first reformed House of Commons, after the passage of the terrible Reform Bill, met and was looked upon by some of the friends of Reform with fond hopes and expectations, and by others, the Tories, with fear and apprehension. The poor looked upon the Reform Bill as a measure for their redemption, and the landed proprietors regarded it as the first sign of departed national greatness. Both classes were disappointed. It neither revived business nor despoiled owners. The result was a surprise to politicians of both parties. The Reformers did not, as was anticipated, carry their extreme measures, and the Tories did not realize the great losses they expected. While the Ministry preserved its power and even obtained some victories in England and Scotland, it sustained serious defeats in Ireland. In England many earnest and popular friends of Reform were defeated in the election, and some counties, among them Bristol, Stamford, Hertford, Norwich and Newark, were pronounced against the Ministry. The Duke of Newcastle, who was one of the chief potentates of the high Tory party, and had lost his control of Newark in 1831, by the election of a Radical, was determined to regain it. He regarded it as his right to be represented in the House of Commons, or that Newark should elect whom he nominated. And he had propounded the memorable political maxim, "Have I not a right to do what I like with my own?" The Duke wanted a capable candidate to help him regain his ascendency. His son, Lord Lincoln, here came to his aid. He had heard the remarkable speech of his friend, Mr. Gladstone, in the Oxford Union, against the Reform Bill, and had written home regarding him, that "a man had uprisen in Israel." At his suggestion the Duke invited the young graduate of Oxford to run as the Tory candidate for a seat in Parliament from Newark. The wisdom of this selection for the accomplishment of the purpose in view, was fully demonstrated. [Illustration: The Lobby of the House of Commons] His personal appearance at this time may be thus described: He was somewhat robust. His youthful face bore none of those deep furrows which have rendered his countenance so remarkable in maturer years. But there was the same broad intellectual forehead, the massive nose, the same anxious eyes and the earnest enthusiasm of later years. His look was bright and thoughtful and his bearing attractive. He was handsome and possessed a most intelligent and expressive countenance. Says his biographer, Mr. Russell: "William Ewart Gladstone was now twenty-two years old, with a physical constitution of unequalled vigor, the prospect of ample fortune, great and varied knowledge, and a natural tendency to political theorization, and an inexhaustible copiousness and readiness of speech. In person he was striking and attractive, with strongly marked features, a pale complexion, abundance of dark hair and eyes of piercing lustre. People who judged only by his external aspect considered that he was delicate." Young Gladstone found two opponents contesting with him to represent Newark in Parliament, W.F. Handley and Sergeant Wilde, afterwards Lord Chancellor Truro. The latter was an advanced Liberal and had unsuccessfully contested the borough in 1829 and 1830, and had in consideration of his defeat received from his sympathetic friends a piece of plate inscribed: "By his ardent friends, the Blue electors of the borough, who by their exertions and sufferings in the cause of independence, largely conduced to awaken the attention of the nation to the necessity of Reform in Parliament. Upon this humble token of respect (contributed in the hour of defeat) the Blue electors of Newark inscribe their sense of the splendid ability, unwearied perseverance, and disinterested public spirit displayed by Sergeant Wilde in maintaining the two contests of 1829 and 1830, in order to emancipate the borough from political thraldoms, and restore to its inhabitants the free exercise of their long-lost rights." But Sergeant Wilde was more successful the following year, 1831, when the "Reform fever" was at its height, and defeated the Duke of Newcastle's nominee and became member of the House of Commons for the borough. These facts made the coming election, which followed the passage of the Reform Bill, of unusual interest, to those concerned, and the struggle would be of a close and determined character. Mr. Gladstone entered upon the contest with his experienced, able and popular antagonist, with much against him, for he was young, unknown and untried; but his youth and personal appearance and manly bearing were in his favor, and these, with his eloquence and ready wit, gained for him many friends. His speeches demonstrated that he lacked neither arguments, nor words wherewith to clothe them. He needed, however, to call into requisition all his abilities, for Sergeant Wilde was a powerful antagonist, and had no thought of being displaced by his youthful opponent, "a political stripling," as he called him, without a desperate struggle. But Mr. Gladstone had behind him the ducal influence and the support of the Red Club, so he entered upon the contest with energy and enthusiasm. The young Tory's first election address was delivered upon this occasion. It was dated October 9th, 1832, was all such an address should be, and was addressed, "To the worthy and independent electors of the borough of Newark." It began by saying that he was bound in his opinions by no man and no party, but that he deprecated the growing unreasonable and indiscriminating desire for change then so common, but confessed that labor has a right to "receive adequate remuneration." On the question of human slavery, then greatly agitated, he remarked, "We are agreed that both the physical and the moral bondage of the slave are to be abolished. The question is as to the _order_, and the order only; now Scripture attacks the moral evil _before_ the corporal one, the corporal one _through_ the moral one, and I am content with the order which Scripture has established." He saw insurmountable obstacles against immediate emancipation, one of which was that the negro would exchange the evil now affecting him for greater ones--for a relapse into deeper debasement, if not for bloodshed and internal war. He therefore advocated a system of Christian education, to make the negro slaves fit for emancipation and to prepare them for freedom, Then, he argued, without bloodshed and the violation of property rights, and with unimpaired benefit to the negro, the desirable end might be reached in the utter extinction of slavery. Of this appropriate address, so important in the light of coming events, we quote two paragraphs in full. In speaking of existing evils and the remedies for them, he observed: "For the mitigation of these evils, we must, I think, look not only to particular measures, but to the restoration of sounder general principles. I mean especially that principle on which alone the incorporation of Religion with the State in our Constitution can be defended; that the duties of governors are strictly and peculiarly religious; and that legislatures, like individuals, are bound to carry throughout their acts the spirit of the high truths they have acknowledged. Principles are now arrayed against our institutions; and not by truckling nor by temporizing--not by oppression nor corruption--but by principles they must be met. "And now, gentlemen, as regards the enthusiasm with which you have rallied round your ancient flag, and welcomed the humble representative of those principles whose emblem it is, I trust that neither the lapse of time nor the seductions of prosperity can ever efface it from my memory. To my opponents, my acknowledgments are due for the good humor and kindness with which they have received me; and while I would thank my friends for their jealous and unwearied exertions in my favor, I briefly but emphatically assure them, that if promises be an adequate foundation of confidence, or experience a reasonable ground of calculation, our victory _is sure_" The new candidate for Parliamentary honors was "heckled," as it is called, at the hustings, or was interrupted continually while speaking, and questioned by his opponents as to the circumstances of his candidature, his father's connection with slavery, and his own views of capital punishment. From his first appearance in Newark, Mr. Gladstone had been subjected to these examinations and he stood the ordeal well and answered prudently. An instance of this is given. A Radical elector, Mr. Gillson, asked the young Tory candidate if he was the Duke of Newcastle's nominee, and was met by Mr. Gladstone demanding the questioner's definition of the term "nominee." Mr. Gillson replied that he meant a person sent by the Duke of Newcastle to be pushed down the throats of the voters whether they would or not. But Mr. Gladstone was equal to the occasion, and said according to that definition he was not the nominee of the Duke, but came to Newark by the invitation of the Red Club, than whom none were more respectable and intelligent. This same Red Club was Conservative, and promised to Mr. Gladstone, the thorough Conservative candidate, 650 votes, the whole number within its ranks. He also received the promise of 240 votes of other electors. This was known before the election, so that the result was confidently predicted. On the 11th of December, 1832, the "nomination" was held and the polling or election was held on the two following days, and Mr. Gladstone was chosen by a considerable majority, the votes being, Gladstone, 882; Handley, 793; Wilde, 719. Sergeant Wilde was defeated. During the public discussions before the election Mr. Gladstone was placed at a great disadvantage. There were three candidates to be heard from and his speech was to be the last in order. Sergeant Wilde made a very lengthy speech, which exhausted the patience of his hearers, who had already stood for nearly seven hours, and showed disinclination to listen to another three hours' address, which, from Mr. Gladstone's talents, they were far from thinking impossible. The Sergeant was condemned for occupying the attention of the electors for such an inordinate length of time, but this did not prevent a scene of outrageous noise and uproar when the Tory candidate rose to speak. The important topic was slavery, but Mr. Gladstone had not proceeded far when the hooting and hissing drowned his voice so that he found it impossible to proceed. When a show of hands was demanded it was declared in favor of Mr. Handley and Sergeant Wilde, but when the election came, it was Mr. Gladstone who triumphed, as has been seen, and who was sent to Parliament as the member from Newark. In speaking of the manner in which the Parliamentary elections are conducted, an English writer says: "Since 1832, few of those scenes of violence, and even of bloodshed, which formerly distinguished Parliamentary elections in many English boroughs, have been witnessed. Some of these lawless outbreaks were doubtless due to the unpopularity of the candidates forced upon the electors; but even in the largest towns--where territorial influence had little sway--riots occurred upon which we look back with doubtful amazement. Men holding strong political views have ceased to enforce those views by the aid of brickbats and other dangerous missiles. Yet at the beginning of the present century such arguments were very popular. And to the violence which prevailed was added the most unblushing bribery. Several boroughs, long notorious for extensive bribery, have since been disfranchised. The practice, however, extended to most towns in the kingdom, though it was not always carried on in the same open manner. By a long established custom, a voter at Hull received a donation of two guineas, or four for a plumper. In Liverpool men were openly paid for their votes; and Lord Cochrane stated in the House of Commons that, after his return for Honiton, he sent the town-crier round the borough to tell the voters to go to the chief banker for £10 10s. each. The great enlargement of the constituencies, secured by the Reform Bill of 1832, did much to put an end to this disgraceful condition of things; but to a wider political enlightenment also, some portion of the credit for such a result must be attributed." What the friends and foes of the new Tory member for Newark thought of his successful canvass and election, it is interesting to learn. When Mr. Gladstone entered upon the contest the question was frequently put, "Who is Mr. Gladstone?" And it was answered, "He is the son of the friend of Mr. Canning, the great Liverpool merchant. He is, we understand, not more than four or five and twenty, but he has won golden opinions from all sorts of people, and promises to be an ornament to the House of Commons." And a few days after his election he addressed a meeting of the Constitutional Club, at Nottingham, when a Conservative journal made the first prophecy as to his future great political fame, saying: "He will one day be classed amongst the most able statesmen in the British Senate." The impression his successful contest made upon the late friends of his school-days may be learned from the following: A short time before the election Arthur Hallam, writing of his friend, "the old _W.E.G._," says: "I shall be very glad if he gets in.... We want such a man as that. In some things he is likely to be obstinate and prejudiced; but he has a fine fund of high, chivalrous Tory sentiment, and a tongue, moreover, to let it loose with." And after the election he exclaims: "And Gladstone has turned out the Sergeant!... What a triumph for him. He has made his reputation by it; all that remains is to keep up to it." That one of Mr. Gladstone's Liberal opponents was impressed by his talent and character is shown by the following lines of "descriptive prophecy, perhaps more remarkable for good feeling than for good poetry:" "Yet on one form, whose ear can ne'er refuse The Muses' tribute, for he lov'd the Muse, (And when the soul the gen'rous virtues raise, A friendly Whig may chant a Tory's praise,) Full many a fond expectant eye is bent Where Newark's towers are mirror'd in the Trent. Perchance ere long to shine in senates first, If manhood echo what his youth rehears'd, Soon Gladstone's brows will bloom with greener bays Than twine the chaplet of the minstrel's lays; Nor heed, while poring o'er each graver line, The far, faint music of a flute like mine. His was no head contentedly which press'd The downy pillow in obedient rest, Where lazy pilots, with their canvas furl'd, Let up the Gades of their mental world; His was no tongue which meanly stoop'd to wear The guise of virtue, while his heart was bare; But all he thought through ev'ry action ran; God's noblest work--I've known one honest man." Mr. Gladstone spoke at Newark in company with his friend, the Earl of Lincoln, shortly after his election, when another favorable testimony was given, and his address spoken of as "a manly, eloquent speech, replete with sound constitutional sentiments, high moral feeling, and ability of the most distinguished order." In commenting upon the result of the election a representative of the press of Newark wrote: "We have been told there was no reaction against the Ministry, no reaction in favor of Conservative principles. The delusion has now vanished, and made room for sober reason and reflection. The shadow satisfies no longer, and the return of Mr. Gladstone, to the discomfiture of the learned Sergeant and his friends, has restored the town of Newark to the high rank which it formerly held in the estimation of the friends of order and good government. We venture to predict that the losing candidate in this contest has suffered so severely that he will never show his face in Newark on a similar occasion." But Mr. Gladstone had made bitter political enemies already, who were not at all reconciled to his election, nor pleased with him. That they were not at all slow to express unbecomingly their bitterness against him, because of their unexpected defeat, the following shows from the _Reflector_: "Mr. Gladstone is the son of Gladstone of Liverpool, a person who (we are speaking of the father) had amassed a large fortune by West India dealings. In other words, a great part of his gold has sprung from the blood of black slaves. Respecting the youth himself--a person fresh from college, and whose mind is as much like a sheet of white foolscap as possible--he was utterly unknown. He came recommended by no claim in the world _except the will of the Duke_. The Duke nodded unto Newark, and Newark sent back the man, or rather the boy of his choice. What! Is this to be, now that the Reform Bill has done its work? Are sixteen hundred men still to bow down to a wooden-headed lord, as the people of Egypt used to do to their beasts, to their reptiles, and their ropes of onions? There must be something wrong--something imperfect. What is it? What is wanting? Why, the Ballot! If there be a doubt of this (and we believe there is a doubt even amongst intelligent men) the tale of Newark must set the question at rest. Sergeant Wilde was met on his entry into the town by almost the whole population. He was greeted everywhere, cheered everywhere. He was received with delight by his friends and with good and earnest wishes for his success by his nominal foes. The voters for Gladstone went up to that candidate's booth (the slave-driver, as they called him) with Wilde's colors. People who had before voted for Wilde, on being asked to give their suffrage said, 'We cannot, we dare not. We have lost half our business, and shall lose the rest if we go against the Duke. We would do anything in our power for Sergeant Wilde and for the cause, but we cannot starve!' Now what say ye, our merry men, touching the Ballot?" However Mr. Gladstone had won as we have seen the golden opinions of many, and the dreams of his more youthful days were realized when he was sent to represent the people in the House of Commons. On the 29th of January, 1833, the first Reformed Parliament met, and William E. Gladstone, as the member from Newark, took his seat for the first time in "an assembly which he was destined to adorn, delight and astonish for more than half a century, and over which for a great portion of that period, he was to wield an unequalled and a paramount authority." There were more than three hundred new members in the House of Commons. Lord Althorp led the Whigs, who were largely in the majority and the Tories constituted a compact minority under the skillful leadership of Sir Robert Peel, while the Irish members who were hostile to the ministry followed O'Connell. On the 5th of February the king attended and delivered the speech from the throne in person. This Parliamentary session was destined to become one of the most memorable in history for the importance of the subjects discussed and disposed of, among them the social condition of Ireland, the position of the Irish church, the discontent and misery of the poor in England, and slavery in the British colonies; and for the fact that it was the first Parliament in which William E. Gladstone sat and took part. There was no reference made to the subject of slavery in the speech from the throne, but the ministry resolved to consider it. Mr. Stanley, the Colonial Secretary, afterwards fourteenth Earl of Derby and Prime Minister, brought forth, May 14th, 1833, a series of resolutions in favor of the extinction of slavery in the British colonies. "All children of slaves, born after the passage of the Act, and all children of six years old and under, were declared free. But the rest of the slaves were to serve a sort of apprenticeship--three-fourths of their time was for a certain number of years to remain at the disposal of the masters; the other fourth was their own, to be paid for at a fixed rate of wages." The planters were to be duly compensated out of the national treasury. It was during the discussion of these resolutions that Mr. Gladstone made his maiden speech in Parliament. It was made in answer to what seemed a personal challenge by Lord Howick, Ex-Under Secretary for the colonies, who, opposing gradual emancipation, referred to an estate in Demerara, owned by Mr. Gladstone's father, for the purpose of showing that great destruction of life had taken place in the West Indies owing to the manner in which the slaves were worked. In reply to this Mr. Gladstone said that he would meet some of Lord Howick's statements with denials and others with explanations. He admitted that he had a pecuniary interest in it as a question of justice, of humanity, and of religion. The real cause of the decrease, he said, was owing, not to the increased cultivation of sugar, but to the very large proportion of Africans upon the estate. When it came into his father's possession it was so weak, owing to the large number of negroes upon it, that he was obliged to add two hundred more people to the gang. It was well known that negroes were imported into Demarara and Trinidad up to a later period than into any of the colonies; and he should at a proper time, be able to prove that the decrease on his father's plantation, Vreeden Hoop, was among the old Africans, and that there was an increase going on in the Creole population, which would be a sufficient answer to the charges preferred. The quantity of sugar produced was small compared to that produced on other estates. The cultivation of cotton in Demarara had been abandoned, and that of coffee much diminished, and the people engaged in these sources of production had been employed in the cultivation of sugar. Besides in Demarara the labor of the same number of negroes, distributed over the year, would produce in that colony a certain quantity of sugar with less injury to the people, than negroes could produce in other colonies, working only at the stated periods of crops. He was ready to concede that the cultivation was of a more injurious character than others; and he would ask, Were there not certain employments in other countries more destructive of life than others? He would only instance those of painting and working in lead mines, both of which were well known to have that tendency. The noble lord attempted to impugn the character of the gentleman acting as manager of his father's estates; and in making the selection he had surely been most unfortunate; for there was not a person in the colony more remarkable for humanity and the kind treatment of his slaves than Mr. Maclean. Mr. Gladstone, in concluding this able defense of his father, said, that he held in his hand two letters from Mr. Maclean, in which he spoke in the kindest terms of the negroes under his charge; described their state of happiness, content and healthiness--their good conduct and the infrequency of severe punishment--and recommended certain additional comforts, which he said the slaves well deserved. On the 3d of June, on the resumption of the debate on the abolition of slavery, Mr. Gladstone again addressed the House. He now entered more fully into the charges which Lord Howick had brought against the management of his father's estates in Demarara, and showed their groundlessness. When he had discussed the existing aspect of slavery in Trinidad, Jamaica and other places, he proceeded to deal with the general question. He confessed with shame and pain that cases of wanton cruelty had occurred in the colonies, but added that they would always exist, particularly under the system of slavery; and this was unquestionably a substantial reason why the British Legislature and public should set themselves in good earnest to provide for its extinction; but he maintained that these instances of cruelty could easily be explained by the West Indians, who represented them as rare and isolated cases, and who maintained that the ordinary relation of master and slave was one of kindliness and not of hostility. He deprecated cruelty, and he deprecated slavery, both of which were abhorrent to the nature of Englishmen; but, conceding these things, he asked, "Were not Englishmen to retain a right to their own honestly and legally-acquired property?" But the cruelty did not exist, and he saw no reason for the attack which had recently been made upon the West India interest. He hoped the House would make a point to adopt the principle of compensation, and to stimulate the slave to genuine and spontaneous industry. If this were not done, and moral instruction were not imparted to the slaves, liberty would prove a curse instead of a blessing to them. Touching upon the property question, and the proposed plans for emancipation, Mr. Gladstone said that the House might consume its time and exert its wisdom in devising these plans, but without the concurrence of the Colonial Legislatures success would be hopeless. He thought there was excessive wickedness in any violent interference under the present circumstances. They were still in the midst of unconcluded inquiries, and to pursue the measure then under discussion, at that moment, was to commit an act of great and unnecessary hostility toward the island of Jamaica. "It was the duty of the House to place as broad a distinction as possible between the idle and the industrious slaves, and nothing could be too strong to secure the freedom of the latter; but, with respect to the idle slaves, no period of emancipation could hasten their improvement. If the labors of the House should be conducted to a satisfactory issue, it would redound to the honor of the nation, and to the reputation of his Majesty's Ministers, whilst it would be delightful to the West India planters themselves--for they must feel that to hold in bondage their fellow-men must always involve the greatest responsibility. But let not any man think of carrying this measure by force. England rested her power not upon physical force, but upon her principles, her intellect and virtue; and if this great measure were not placed on a fair basis, or were conducted by violence, he should lament it, as a signal for the ruin of the Colonies and the downfall of the Empire." The attitude of Mr. Gladstone, as borne out by the tenor of his speech, was not one of hostility to emancipation, though he was undoubtedly unfavorable to an immediate and indiscriminate enfranchisement. He demanded, moreover, that the interests of the planters should be duly regarded. The result of the consideration of these resolutions in the House of Commons was that human slavery in the British Colonies was abolished, and the sum of twenty million pounds, or one hundred million dollars was voted to compensate the slave-owners for their losses. Thus was the work begun by Wilberforce finally crowned with success. It is an interesting question how Mr. Gladstone's first efforts in Parliament were received. Among his friends his speech was anticipated with lively interest. That morning he was riding in Hyde Park, on his gray Arabian mare, "his hat, narrow-brimmed, high up on the centre of his head, sustained by a crop of thick curly hair." He was pointed out to Lord Charles Russell by a passer-by who said, "That is Gladstone. He is to make his maiden speech to-night. It will be worth hearing." From the first he appears to have favorably impressed the members of the House. Modest in demeanor, earnest in manner, and fluent in speech, he at once commanded the respect and attention of his fellow-members. And here is a later testimony as to the early impression made upon his colleagues and contemporaries, when he was twenty-nine years of age, erroneously stated as thirty-five: "Mr. Gladstone, the member for Newark, is one of the most rising young men on the Tory side of the House. His party expect great things from him; and certainly, when it is remembered that his age is only thirty-five, the success of the Parliamentary efforts he has already made justifies their expectations. He is well informed on most of the subjects which usually occupy the attention of the Legislature; and he is happy in turning his information to good account. He is ready on all occasions, which he deems fitting ones, with a speech in favor of the policy advocated by the party with whom he acts. His extempore resources are ample. Few men in the House can improvise better. It does not appear to cost him an effort to speak.... He is a man of very considerable talent, but has nothing approaching to genius. His abilities are much more the result of an excellent education and of mature study than of any prodigality of nature in the distribution of her mental gifts. _I have no idea that he will ever acquire the reputation of a great statesman. His views are not sufficiently profound or enlarged for that; his celebrity in the House of Commons will chiefly depend on his readiness and dexterity as a debater, in conjunction with the excellence of his elocution, and the gracefulness of his manner when speaking_.... His style is polished, but has no appearance of the effect of previous preparation. He displays considerable acuteness in replying to an opponent; he is quick in his perception of anything vulnerable in the speech to which he replies, and happy in laying the weak point bare to the gaze of the House. He now and then indulges in sarcasm, which is, in most cases, very felicitous. He is plausible even when most in error. When it suits himself or his party he can apply himself with the strictest closeness to the real point at issue; when to evade the point is deemed most politic, no man can wander from it more widely." How far these estimates were true we leave to the reader to determine, after the perusal of his life, and in the light of subsequent events. Mr. Gladstone, after his maiden speech, took an active part in the business of the House during the remainder of the session of 1833. He spoke upon the question of bribery and corruption at Liverpool, and July 8th made an elaborate speech on the Irish Church Temporalities Bill. The condition of Ireland was then, as now, one of the most urgent questions confronting the Ministry. Macaulay "solemnly declared that he would rather live in the midst of many civil wars that he had read of than in some parts of Ireland at this moment." Sydney Smith humorously described "those Irish Protestants whose shutters are bullet-proof; whose dinner-table is regularly spread out with knife, fork, and cocked pistol; salt-cellar and powder-flask; who sleep in sheet-iron nightcaps; who have fought so often and so nobly before their scullery-door, and defended the parlor passage as bravely as Leonidas defended the pass of Thermopylae." Crime was rife and to remedy the serious state of affairs a stringent Coercion Bill was introduced by the government. Mr. Gladstone voted silently for the bill which became a law. The other bill introduced was that upon the Irish Church, and proposed the reduction of the number of Protestant Episcopal Bishops in Ireland and the curtailment of the income of the Church. This bill Mr. Gladstone opposed in a speech, and he voted against it, but it was passed. It was in the following session that Mr. Hume introduced his "'Universities Admission Bill,' designed to enable Nonconformists of all kinds to enter the universities, by removing the necessity of subscribing to the thirty-nine articles at matriculation." In the debate that followed Mr. Gladstone soon gave evidence that he knew more about the subject than did the author of the bill. In speaking against the bill, he said in part, "The whole system of the university and of its colleges, both in study and in discipline, aimed at the formation of a moral character, and that aim could not be attained if every student were at liberty to exclude himself from the religious training of the place." And in reply to a remark made by Lord Palmerston in reference to the students going "from wine to prayers, and from prayers to wine," Mr. Gladstone replied, he did not believe that in their most convivial moments they were unfit to enter the house of prayer. This bill was also passed. It might have been expected that Mr. Gladstone's active participation in the debates in the House of Commons, and the practical ability and debating power he manifested would not escape the attention of the leaders of his party. But the recognition of his merit came sooner than could have been expected. It became evident, towards the close of 1834 that the downfall of the Liberal Ministry was near at hand. Lord Althorp, who had kept the Liberals together, was transferred to the House of Lords, and the growing unpopularity of the Whigs did the rest. The Ministry under Lord Melbourne was dismissed by the king, and a new Cabinet formed by Sir Robert Peel. The new Premier offered Mr. Gladstone the office of Junior Lord of the Treasury, which was accepted. Truly has an eminent writer said: "When a Prime Minister in difficulties, looking about for men to fill the minor offices of his administration, sees among his supporters a clever and comely young man, eloquent in speech, ready in debate, with a safe seat, an ample fortune, a high reputation at the university, and a father who wields political influence in an important constituency, he sees a Junior Lord of the Treasury made ready to his hand." Appealing to his constituents at Newark, who, two years before, had sent him to Parliament, he was re-elected. Mr. Handley having retired, Sergeant Wilde was elected with Mr. Gladstone without opposition. Mr. Gladstone was "chaired," or drawn by horses through the town, seated on a chair, after the election, and then addressed the assembled people to the number of 6,000, his speech being received with "deafening cheers." Shortly after Parliament assembled, Mr. Gladstone was promoted to the office of Under-Secretary for the Colonies. His official chief was Lord Aberdeen, afterwards Prime Minister; and thus began a relation which was destined to greatly affect the destinies of both statesmen. Mr. Gladstone gave ample proof in his new office of his great abilities and untiring energies. In March he presented to the House his first bill, which was for the better regulation of the transportation of passengers in merchant vessels to the continent and to the Islands of North America. This bill, which contained many humane provisions, was very favorably received. The new Parliament, which met February 10, 1835, contained a considerable Liberal majority. The old House of Commons had been destroyed by fire during the recess, and the new Commons reassembled in the chamber which had been the House of Lords, and for the first time there was a gallery for reporters in the House. "A standing order still existed, which forbade the publication of the debates, but the reporters' gallery was a formal and visible recognition of the people's right to know what their representatives were doing in their name." However, the new Ministry was but short-lived, for Sir Robert Peel resigned April 8th, and Mr. Gladstone retired with his chief. Mr. Gladstone spent the days of his retirement from ministerial office partly in study, and partly in recreation. Being free to follow the bent of his own inclinations, he ordered his life according to his own ideals. He lived in chambers at the Albany, pursued the same steady course of work, proper recreation and systematic devotion, which he had marked out at Oxford. He freely went into society, dined out frequently, and took part in musical parties, much to the edification of his friends who were charmed with the beauty and cultivation of his rich baritone. His friend Monckton Milnes had established himself in London and collected around him a society of young men, interested in politics and religion, and whom he entertained Sunday evenings. But this arrangement "unfortunately," as Mr. Milnes said, excluded from these gatherings the more serious members, such as Acland and Gladstone. Mr. Milnes expressed his opinion of such self-exclusion in these words: "I really think when people keep Friday as a fast, they might make a feast of Sunday." But Mr. Gladstone evidently was not of this opinion, and remained away from these Lord's Day parties. However at other times he met his friends, and received them at his own rooms in the Albany, and on one memorable occasion entertained Wordsworth at breakfast and a few admirers of this distinguished guest. Mr. Gladstone's relaxations were occasional, and the most of his time was devoted to his Parliamentary duties and study. His constant companions were Homer and Dante, and he at this time, it is recorded, read the whole of St. Augustine, in twenty-two octavo volumes. He was a constant attendant upon public worship at St. James', Piccadilly, and Margaret Chapel, and a careful critic of sermons. At the same time he diligently applied himself to the work of a private member of the House of Commons, working on committees and taking constant part in debate. In 1836 the question of slavery again came up before Parliament. This time the question was as to the working of the system of negro apprenticeship, which had taken the place of slavery. It was asserted that the system was only slavery under another name. He warmly and ably defended again the West Indian planters. He pleaded that many of the planters were humane men, and defended also the honor of his relatives connected with the traffic so much denounced, when it was assailed. He contended that while the evils of the system had been exaggerated, all mention of its advantages had been carefully withheld. The condition of the negroes was improving. He deprecated the attempt made to renew and perpetuate the system of agitation at the expense of candor and truth. He also at this time spoke on support of authority and order in the government of Canada, and on Church Rates, dwelling upon the necessity of national religion to the security of a state. Mr. Gladstone was not only a Tory but a High Churchman. King William IV died June 20, 1837, and was succeeded by Queen Victoria. A general election ensued. The Parliament, which had been prorogued by the young queen in person, was dissolved on the 17th of July. Mr. Gladstone, without his consent, was nominated to represent Manchester in the House, but was re-elected for Newark without opposition. He then turned his steps towards Scotland, "to see what grouse he could persuade into his bag." The new Parliament met October 20th, but no business of importance came before it until after the Christmas holidays. In 1838 a bill was presented in both Houses of Parliament for the immediate abolition of negro apprenticeship. Many harrowing details of the cruelties practiced were cited. Mr. Gladstone returned to the championship of the planters with increased power and success. His long, eloquent and powerful speech of March 30th, although on the unpopular side of the question, is regarded as having so greatly enhanced his reputation as to bring him to the front rank among Parliamentary debaters. Having impassionately defended the planters from the exaggerated charges made against them, he further said: "You consumed forty-five millions of pounds of cotton in 1837 which proceeded from free labor; and, proceeding from slave labor, three hundred and eighteen millions of pounds! And this, while the vast regions of India afford the means of obtaining at a cheaper rate, and by a slight original outlay, to facilitate transport, all that you can require. If, Sir, the complaints against the general body of the West Indians had been substantiated, I should have deemed it an unworthy artifice to attempt diverting the attention of the House from the question immediately at issue, by merely proving that delinquencies existed in other quarters; but feeling as I do that those charges have been overthrown in debate, I think myself entitled and bound to show how capricious are the honorable gentlemen in the distribution of their sympathies among those different objects which call for their application." Mr. Gladstone, "having turned the tables upon his opponents," concluded by demanding justice, and the motion before the House was rejected. About one month later Rev. Samuel Wilberforce, afterwards Bishop of Oxford, and of Winchester, wrote to Mr. Gladstone: "It would be an affectation in you, which you are above, not to know that few young men have the weight you have in the House of Commons, and are gaining rapidly throughout the country. Now I do not wish to urge you to consider this as a talent for the use of which you must render an account, for so I know you do esteem it, but what I want to urge upon you is that you should calmly look far before you; see the degree of weight and influence to which you may fairly, if God spares your life and powers, look forward in future years, and thus act _now_ with a view to _then_. There is no height to which you may not fairly rise in this country. If it pleases God to spare us violent convulsions and the loss of our liberties, you may at a future day wield the whole government of this land; and if this should be so, of what extreme moment will your _past steps_ then be to the real usefulness of your high station.... Almost all our public men act from the merest expediency.... I would have you view yourself as one who may become the head of all the better feelings of this country, the maintainer of its Church and of its liberties, and who must now be fitting himself for this high vocation.... I think my father's life so beautifully shows that a deep and increasing personal religion must be the root of that firm and unwearied consistency in right, which I have ventured thus to press upon you." Mr. Gladstone began his Parliamentary life as a Tory. Later he developed into a Liberal, a Radical, and yet there is not one who conscientiously doubts his utter honesty. His life has been that of his century--progressive, liberal, humanitarian in its trend. [Illustration: Grattan] CHAPTER IV BOOK ON CHURCH AND STATE We have now followed Mr. Gladstone in his course until well on the way in his political career, and yet he is but twenty-eight years of age. His personal appearance in the House of Commons at this early stage of his Parliamentary life is thus described: "Mr. Gladstone's appearance and manners are much in his favor. He is a fine looking man. He is about the usual height and of good figure. His countenance is mild and pleasant, and has a highly intellectual expression. His eyes are clear and quick. His eyebrows are dark and rather prominent. There is not a dandy in the House but envies what Truefit would call his 'fine head of jet-black hair.' It is always carefully parted from the crown downwards to his brow, where it is tastefully shaded. His features are small and regular, and his complexion must be a very unworthy witness if he does not possess an abundant stock of health. "Mr. Gladstone's gesture is varied, but not violent. When he rises he generally puts both his hands behind his back, and having there suffered them to embrace each other for a short time, he unclasps them and allows them to drop on either side. They are not permitted to remain long in that locality before you see them, again closed together and hanging down before him. Their reunion is not suffered to last for any length of time, Again a separation takes place, and now the right hand is seen moving up and down before him. Having thus exercised it a little, he thrusts it into the pocket of his coat, and then orders the left hand to follow its example. Having granted them a momentary repose there, they are again put into gentle motion, and in a few seconds they are seen reposing _vis-a-vis_ on his breast. He moves his face and body from one direction to another, not forgetting to bestow a liberal share of his attention on his own party. He is always listened to with much attention by the House, and appears to be highly respected by men of all parties. He is a man of good business habits; of this he furnished abundant proof when Under-Secretary for the Colonies, during the short-lived administration of Robert Peel." From this pen picture and other like notices of Mr. Gladstone he must, at that time, have attained great distinction and attracted a good deal of attention for one so young, and from that day to this he has commanded the attention not only of the British Senate and people, but of the world at large. And why? may we ask, unless because of his modest manner and distinguished services, his exalted ability and moral worth. "The House of Commons was his ground," writes Justin McCarthy. "There he was always seen to the best advantage." Nevertheless, Mr. Gladstone wrote with the same earnestness and ability with which he spoke. It was early in life that he distinguished himself as an author, as well as an orator and debater in the House of Commons. And it was most natural for him to write upon the subject of the Church, for not only his education led him to the consideration of such themes, but it was within his sphere as an English statesman, for the law of the land provided for the union of the Church and State. It was in 1838, when he was not thirty years of age, that he wrote his first book and stepped at once to the front rank as an author. He had ever been a staunch defender of the Established Church and his first appearance in literature was by a remarkable work in defense of the State Church entitled, "The State in its Relations with the Church." The treatise is thus dedicated: "Inscribed to the University of Oxford, tried and not found wanting through the vicissitudes of a thousand years; in the belief that she is providentially designed to be a fountain of blessings, spiritual, social and intellectual, to this and other countries, to present and future times; and in the hope that the temper of these pages may be found not alien from her own." This first published book of Mr. Gladstone's was due to the perception that the _status_ of the Church, in its connection with the secular power, was about to undergo the severe assaults of the opponents of the Union. There was growing opposition to the recognition of the Episcopal Church as the Church of the State and to taxation of people of other religious beliefs for its support; and this objection was to the recognition and support of any Church by the State. What is called the "American idea"--the entire separation of the Church and State--or as enunciated first by Roger Williams in 1636, in Rhode Island, that the magistrate should have authority in civil affairs only, was becoming more and more the doctrine of dissenters. Preparations were already being made for attacking the national establishment of religion, and with all the fervor springing from conviction and a deep-seated enthusiasm, he came forward to take part in the controversy on Church and State, and as a defender of the Established or Episcopal Church of England. Some of the positions assumed in this work have since been renounced as untenable, but its ability as a whole, its breadth and its learning could not be denied. It then created a great sensation, and has since been widely discussed. After an examination and a defense of the theory of the connection between Church and State, Mr. Gladstone thus summarizes his principal reasons for the maintenance of the Church establishment: "Because the Government stands with us in a paternal relation to the people, and is bound in all things not merely to consider their existing tastes, but the capabilities and ways of their improvement; because it has both an intrinsic competency and external means to amend and assist their choice; because to be in accordance with God's mind and will, it must have a religion, and because to be in accordance with its conscience, that religion must be the truth, as held by it under the most solemn and accumulated responsibilities; because this is the only sanctifying and preserving principle of society, as well as to the individual, that particular benefit, without which all others are worse than valueless; we must, therefore, disregard the din of political contention and the pressure of novelty and momentary motives, and in behalf of our regard to man, as well as of our allegiance to God, maintain among ourselves, where happily it still exists, the union between the Church and the State." Dr. Russell in the following quotation not only accounts for this production from the pen, of Mr. Gladstone, but gives also an outline of the argument: "Naturally and profoundly religious ... Mr. Gladstone conceived that those who professed the warmest regard for the Church of England and posed as her most strenuous defenders, were inclined to base their championship on mistaken grounds and to direct their efforts towards even mischievous ends. To supply a more reasonable basis for action and to lead this energy into more profitable channels were the objects which he proposed to himself in his treatise of 1838. The distinctive principle of the book was that the State had a conscience. This being admitted, the issue was this: whether the State in its best condition, has such a conscience as can take cognizance of religious truth and error, and in particular whether the State of the United Kingdom at that time was, or was not, so far in that condition as to be under an obligation to give an active and an exclusive support to the established religion of the country. "The work attempted to survey the actual state of the relations between the State and the Church; to show from history the ground which had been defined for the National Church at the Reformation; and to inquire and determine whether the existing state of things was worth preserving and defending against encroachment from whatever quarter. This question it decided emphatically in the affirmative. Faithful to logic and to its theory, the book did not shrink from applying them to the external case of the Irish Church. It did not disguise the difficulties of the case, for the author was alive to the paradox which it involved. But the one master idea of the system, that the State as it then stood was capable in this age, as it had been in ages long gone by, of assuming beneficially a responsibility for the inculcation of a particular religion, carried him through all. His doctrine was that the Church, as established by law, was to be maintained for its truth; that this was the only principle in which it could be properly and permanently upheld; that this principle, if good in England, was good also for Ireland; that truth is of all possessions the most precious to the soul of man; and that to remove this priceless treasure from the view and the reach of the Irish people would be meanly to purchase their momentary favor at the expense of their permanent interests, and would be a high offense against our own sacred obligations." We quote also from the opening chapter of the second volume of this work, which treats of the connection subsisting between the State of the United Kingdom and the Church of England and Ireland, and shows Mr. Gladstone's views at that period of his life upon the relations of the Church as affecting Ireland in particular. The passage also indicates the changes that have taken place in his mind since the time when he defended these principles. It also shows the style in which this remarkable book was written and enables us to compare, not only his opinions now and then, but his style in writing then with his style now. "The Protestant legislature of the British Empire maintains in the possession of the Church property of Ireland the ministers of a creed professed, according to the parliamentary enumeration, of 1835, by one-ninth of its population, regarded with partial favor by scarcely another ninth, and disowned by the remaining seven. And not only does this anomaly meet us full in view, but we have also to consider and digest the fact, that the maintenance of this Church for near three centuries in Ireland has been contemporaneous with a system of partial and abusive government, varying in degree of culpability, but rarely, until of later years, when we have been forced to look at the subject and to feel it, to be exempted in common fairness from the reproach of gross inattention (to say the very least) to the interests of a noble but neglected people. "But, however formidable at first sight the admissions, which I have no desire to narrow or to qualify, may appear, they in no way shake the foregoing arguments. They do not change the nature of truth and her capability and destiny to benefit mankind. They do not relieve Government of its responsibility, if they show that that responsibility was once unfelt and unsatisfied. They place the legislature of the country in the condition, as it were, of one called to do penance for past offences; but duty remains unaltered and imperative, and abates nothing of her demand on our services. It is undoubtedly competent, in a constitutional view, to the Government of this country to continue the present disposition of Church property in Ireland. It appears not too much to assume that our imperial legislature has been qualified to take, and has taken in point of fact, a sounder view of religious truth than the majority of the people of Ireland in their destitute and uninstructed state. We believe, accordingly, that that which we place before them is, whether they know it or not, calculated to be beneficial to them; and that if they know it not now, they will know it when it is presented to them fairly. Shall we, then, purchase their applause at the expense of their substantial, nay, their spiritual interests? "It does, indeed, so happen that there are powerful motives on the other side concurring with that which has here been represented as paramount. In the first instance we are not called upon to establish a creed, but only to maintain an existing legal settlement, when our constitutional right is undoubted. In the second, political considerations tend strongly to recommend that maintenance. A common form of faith binds the Irish Protestants to ourselves, while they, upon the other hand, are fast linked to Ireland; and thus they supply the most natural bond of connection between the countries. But if England, by overthrowing their Church, should weaken their moral position, they would be no longer able, perhaps no longer willing, to counteract the desires of the majority tending, under the direction of their leaders (however, by a wise policy, revocable from that fatal course) to what is termed national independence. Pride and fear, on the one hand, are therefore bearing up against more immediate apprehension and difficulty on the other. And with some men these may be the fundamental considerations; but it may be doubted whether such men will not flinch in some stage of the contest, should its aspect at any moment become unfavorable." Of course the opponents of Mr. Gladstone's views, as set forth in his book, strongly combated his theories. They replied that "the taxation of the State is equal upon all persons, and has for its object their individual, social and political welfare and safety; but that the taxation of one man for the support of his neighbor's religion does not come within the limits of such taxation, and is, in fact, unjust and inequitable." It was no easy task for Mr. Gladstone, with all his parliamentary duties, to aspire to authorship, and carry his book through the press. In preparing for publication he passed through all the agonies of the author, but was nobly helped by his friend, James R. Hope, who afterwards became Mr. Hope-Scott, Q.C., who read and criticised his manuscript and saw the sheets through the press. Some of the letters from the young Defender of the Faith to his friend contain much that is worth preserving. We give some extracts. He writes: "If you let them lie just as they are, turning the leaves one by one, I think you will not find the manuscript very hard to make out, though it is strangely cut in pieces and patched. "I hope its general tendency will meet with your approval; but a point about which I am in doubt, and to which I request your particular attention, is, whether the work or some of the chapters are not so deficient in clearness and arrangement as to require being absolutely rewritten before they can with propriety be published.... Between my eyes and my business I fear it would be hard for me to re-write, but if I could put it into the hands of any other person who could, and who would extract from my papers anything worth having, that might do. "As regards myself, if I go on and publish, I shall be quite prepared to find some persons surprised, but this, if it should prove so, cannot be helped. I shall not knowingly exaggerate anything; and when a man expects to be washed overboard he must tie himself with a rope to the mast. "I shall trust to your friendship for frankness in the discharge of your irksome task. Pray make verbal corrections without scruple where they are needed." Again: "I thank you most cordially for your remarks, and I rejoice to find you act so entirely in the spirit I had anticipated. I trust you will continue to speak with freedom, which is the best compliment as well as the best service you can render me. "I think it very probable that you may find that V and VI require quite as rigorous treatment as II, and I am very desirous to set both my mind and eyes at liberty before I go to the Continent, which I can now hardly expect to do before the first week in September. This interval I trust would suffice unless you find that the other chapters stand in equal need. "I entirely concur with your view regarding the necessity of care and of not grudging labor in a matter so important and so responsible as an endeavor to raise one of the most momentous controversies which has ever agitated human opinion," Again: "Thanks for your letter. I have been pretty hard at work, and have done a good deal, especially on V. Something yet remains. I must make inquiry about the law of excommunication.... I have made a very stupid classification, and have now amended it; instead of faith, discipline and practice, what I meant was the rule of faith, discipline, and the bearing of particular doctrines upon practice. "I send back also I and II that you may see what I have done." The work was successfully issued in the autumn of 1838, and passed rapidly through three editions. How it was received it would be interesting to inquire. While his friends applauded, even his opponents testified to the ability it displayed. On the authority of Lord Houghton, it is said that Sir Robert Peel, the young author's political leader, on receiving a copy as a gift from his follower, read it with scornful curiosity, and, throwing it on the floor, exclaimed with truly official horror: "With such a career before him, why should he write books? That young man will ruin his fine political career if he persists in writing trash like this." However, others gave the book a heartier reception. Crabb Robinson writes in his diary: "I went to Wordsworth this forenoon. He was ill in bed. I read Gladstone's book to him." December 13, 1838, Baron Bunsen wrote: "Last night at eleven, when I came from the Duke, Gladstone's book was lying on my table, having come out at seven o'clock. It is a book of the time, a great event--the first book since Burke that goes to the bottom of the vital question; far above his party and his time. I sat up till after midnight, and this morning I continued until I had read the whole. Gladstone is the first man in England as to intellectual power, and he has heard higher tones than any one else in the land." And again to Dr. Arnold he writes in high praise of the book, but lamenting its author's entanglement in Tractarian traditions, adds: "His genius will soon free itself entirely and fly towards Heaven with its own wings." Sir Henry Taylor wrote to the Poet Southey: "I am reading Gladstone's book, which I shall send you if he has not.... His party begin to think of him as the man who will one day be at their head and at the head of the government, and certainly no man of his standing has yet appeared who seems likely to stand in his way. Two wants, however, may lie across his political career--want of robust health and want of flexibility." Cardinal Newman wrote: "Gladstone's book, as you see, is making a sensation." And again: "The _Times_ is again at poor Gladstone. Really I feel as if I could do anything for him. I have not read his book, but its consequences speak for it. Poor fellow! it is so noble a thing." Lord Macaulay, in the _Edinburgh Review_, April, 1839, in his well-known searching criticism, while paying high tribute to the author's talents and character, said: "We believe that we do him no more than justice when we say that his abilities and demeanor have obtained for him the respect and good will of all parties.... That a young politician should, in the intervals afforded by his Parliamentary avocations, have constructed and propounded, with much study and mental toil, an original theory, on a great problem in politics, is a circumstance which, abstracted from all considerations of the soundness or unsoundness of his opinions, must be considered as highly creditable to him. We certainly cannot wish that Mr. Gladstone's doctrine may become fashionable among public men. But we heartily wish that his laudable desire to penetrate beneath the surface of questions, and to arrive, by long and intent meditation, at the knowledge of great general laws, were much more fashionable than we at all expect it to become." It was in this article, by Lord Macaulay, that the mow famous words occurred which former Conservative friends of Mr. Gladstone delight to recall in view of his change of political opinions: "The writer of this volume is a young man of unblemished character and of distinguished parliamentary talents; the rising hope of those stern and unbending Tories who follow, reluctantly and cautiously, a leader whose experience and eloquence are indispensable to them, but whose cautious temper and moderate opinions they abhor. It would not be strange if Mr. Gladstone were one of the most unpopular men in England." Higginson writes: "The hope of the stern and unbending Tories has for years been the unquestioned leader of English Liberals, and though he may have been at times as unpopular as Macaulay could have predicted, the hostility has come mainly from the ranks of those who were thus early named as his friends. But whatever may have been Mr. Gladstone's opinions or affiliations, whoever may have been his friends or foes, the credit of surpassing ability has always been his." It was remarked by Lord Macaulay that the entire theory of Mr. Gladstone's book rested upon one great fundamental proposition, namely, that the propagation of religious truth is one of the chief ends of government _as_ government; and he proceeded to combat this doctrine. He granted that government was designed to protect our persons and our property, but declined to receive the doctrine of paternal government, until a government be shown that loved its subjects, as a father loves his child, and was as superior in intelligence to its subjects as a father was to his children. Lord Macaulay then demonstrated, by appropriate illustrations, the fallacy of the theory that every society of individuals with any power whatever, is under obligation as such society to profess a religion; and that there could be unity of action in large bodies without unity of religious views. Persecutions would naturally follow, or be justifiable in an association where Mr. Gladstone's views were paramount. It would be impossible to conceive of the circumstances in which it would be right to establish by law, as the one exclusive religion of the State, the religion of the minority. The religious teaching which the sovereign ought officially to countenance and maintain is that from which he, in his conscience, believes that the people will receive the most benefit with the smallest mixture of evil. It is not necessarily his own religious belief that he will select. He may prefer the doctrines of the Church of England to those of the Church of Scotland, but he would not force the former upon the inhabitants of Scotland. The critic raised no objections, though he goes on to state the conditions under which an established Church might be retained with advantage. There are many institutions which, being set up, ought not to be rudely pulled down. On the 14th of June, 1839, the question of National Education was introduced in the House of Commons by the Ministry of the day. Lord Stanley opposed the proposal of the government in a powerful speech, and offered an amendment to this effect: "That an address be presented to her Majesty to rescind the order in council for constituting the proposed Board of Privy Council." The position of the government was defended by Lord Morpeth, who, while he held his own views respecting the doctrines of the Roman Catholics and also respecting Unitarian tenets, he maintained that as long as the State thought it proper to employ Roman Catholic sinews, and to finger Unitarian gold, it could not refuse to extend to those by whom it so profited the blessings of education. Speeches were also made by Lord Ashley, Mr. Buller, Mr. O'Connell and others, and in the course of debate reference was freely made to Mr. Gladstone's book on Church and State. Finally Mr. Gladstone rose and remarked, that he would not flinch from a word he had uttered or written upon religious subjects, and claimed the right to contrast his principles, and to try results, in comparison with those professed by Lord John Russell, and to ascertain the effects of both upon the institutions of the country, so far as they operated upon the Established Church in England, in Scotland and in Ireland. It was at this time that a very remarkable scene was witnessed in the House. Turning upon Mr. O'Connell, who had expressed his great fondness for statistics, Mr. Gladstone said the use he had made of them reminded him of an observation of Mr. Canning's, "He had a great aversion to hear of a fact in debate, but what he most distrusted was a figure." He then proceeded to show the inadequacy of the figures presented by Mr. O'Connell. In reply to Lord Morpeth's declaration concerning the duty of the State to provide education for Dissenters so long as it fingered their gold, Mr. Gladstone said that if the State was to be regarded as having no other functions than that of representing the mere will of the people as to religious tenets, he admitted the truth of his principle, but not that the State could have a conscience. It was not his habit to revile religion in any form, but he asked what ground there was for restricting his lordship's reasoning to Christianity. He referred to the position held by the Jews upon this educational question, and read to the House an extract from a recent petition as follows: "Your petitioners feel the deepest gratitude for the expression of her Majesty's most gracious wish that the youth of the country should be religiously brought up, and the rights of conscience respected, while they earnestly hope that the education of the people, Jewish and Christian, will be sedulously connected with a due regard to the Holy Scriptures." Mr. Gladstone very pertinently asked how the education of the Jewish people, who considered the New Testament an imposture, was "to be sedulously connected with a due regard to the Holy Scriptures," which consisted of the Old and New Testaments? To oblige the Jewish children to read the latter would be directly contrary to the views of the gentlemen on the other side of the House. He would have no child forced to do so, but he protested against paying money from the treasury of the State to men whose business it was to inculcate erroneous doctrines. The debate was concluded, and the government carried its motion by a very small majority. Two years later, when the Jews' Civil Disabilities Bill was before Parliament, Mr. Gladstone again took the unpopular side in the debate and opposed the Bill, which was carried in the House of Commons but defeated in the House of Lords. Mr. Gladstone published, in 1840, another work, entitled "Church Principles Considered in their Results." It was supplementary to his former book in defense of Church and State, and was written "beneath the shades of Hagley," the house of Lord and Lady Lyttelton, and dedicated "in token of sincere affection" to the author's life-long friend and relative, Lord Lyttelton. He dwelt upon the leading moral characteristics of the English Episcopal Church, their intrinsic value and their adaptation to the circumstances of the times, and defined these characteristics to be the doctrine of the visibility of the Church, the apostolic succession in the ministry, the authority of the Church in matters of faith and the truths symbolized in the sacraments. In one chapter he strongly attacks Rationalism as a reference of the gospel to the depraved standard of the actual human natures and by no means to its understanding properly so called, as its measure and criterion. He says: "That therefore to rely upon the understanding, misinformed as it is by depraved affections, as our adequate instructor in matters of religion, is most highly irrational." Nevertheless, "the understanding has a great function in religion and is a medium to the affections, and may even correct their particular impulses." In reference to the question of the reconversion of England to Catholicism, earnestly desired by some, Mr. Gladstone forcibly remarked: "England, which with ill grace and ceaseless efforts at remonstrance, endured the yoke when Rome was in her zenith, and when her powers were but here and there evoked; will the same England, afraid of the truth which she has vindicated, or even with the license which has mingled like a weed with its growth, recur to that system in its decrepitude which she repudiated in its vigor?" If the Church of England ever lost her power, it would never be by submission to Rome, "but by that principle of religions insubordination and self-dependence which, if it refuse her tempered rule and succeed in its overthrow, will much more surely refuse and much more easily succeed in resisting the unequivocally arbitrary impositions of the Roman scheme." Here is the key-note of many of Mr. Gladstone's utterances in after years against the pretentious and aspirations of Rome. The defense of the English Church and its principles and opposition to the Church of Rome have been unchanging features in Mr. Gladstone's religious course. But, in the light of these early utterances, some have criticised severely that legislative act, carried through by him in later years, by which the Disestablishment of the Irish Church was effected. How could the author of "The State in its Relations with the Church" become the destroyer of the fabric of the Irish Church? To meet these charges of inconsistency Mr. Gladstone issued, in 1868, "A Chapter of Autobiography." The author's motives in putting forth this chapter of autobiography were two--first, there was "the great and glaring change" in his course of action with respect to the Established Church of Ireland, which was not due to the eccentricity or perversion of an individual mind, but to the silent changes going on at the very basis of modern society. Secondly, there was danger that a great cause then in progress might suffer in point of credit, if not of energy and rapidity, from the real or supposed delinquencies of the author. He stated that "The author had upheld the doctrine that the Church was to be maintained for its truth, and that if the principle was good for England it was good for Ireland too. But he denied that he had ever propounded the maxim _simpliciter_ that we were to maintain the establishment. He admitted that his opinion of the Church of Ireland was the exact opposite of what it had been; but if the propositions of his work were in conflict with an assault upon the existence of the Irish Establishment, they were even more hostile to the grounds upon which it was now sought to maintain it. He did not wish to maintain the Church upon the basis usually advanced, but for the benefit of the whole people of Ireland, and if it could not be maintained as the truth it could not be maintained at all." Mr. Gladstone contended that the Irish Episcopal Church had fallen out of harmony with the spirit and use of the time, and must be judged by a practical rather than a theoretic test. In concluding the author puts antithetically the case for and against the maintenance of the Church of Ireland: "An establishment that does its work in much and has the hope and likelihood of doing it in more; that has a broad and living way open to it into the hearts of the people; that can command the services of the present by the recollections and traditions of the past; able to appeal to the active zeal of the greater portion of the people, and to the respect or scruples of living work and service, and whose adversaries, if she has them, are in the main content to believe that there will be a future for them and their opinions; such an establishment should surely be maintained. "But an establishment that neither does nor has her hope of doing work, except for a few, and those few the portion of the community whose claims to public aid is the smallest of all; an establishment severed from the mass of the people by an impassable gulf and a wall of brass; an establishment whose good offices, could she offer them, would be intercepted by a long, unbroken chain of painful and shameful recollections; an establishment leaning for support upon the extraneous aid of a State, which becomes discredited with the people by the very act of leading it; such an establishment will do well for its own sake, and for the sake of its creed, to divest itself, as soon as may be, of gauds and trappings, and to commence a new career, in which renouncing at once the credit and the discredit of the civil sanction, and shall seek its strength from within and put a fearless trust in the message that it bears." Such, then, were the reasons that led the defender of the Irish Church to become its assailant, "That a man should change his opinions is no reproach to him; it is only inferior minds that are never open to conviction." Mr. Gladstone is a firm Anglican, as we have seen, but the following extract from his address made at the Liverpool College, in December, 1872, gives a fine insight as to the breadth of his Christian sentiments: "Not less forcibly than justly, you hear much to the effect that the divisions among Christians render it impossible to say what Christianity is, and so destroy all certainty as to the true religion. But if the divisions among Christians are remarkable, not less so is their unity in the greatest doctrines that they hold. Well-nigh fifteen hundred years have passed away since the great controversies concerning the Deity and the person of the Redeemer were, after a long agony, determined. As before that time, in a manner less defined but adequate for their day, so, even since that time, amid all chance and change, more--aye, many more--than ninety-nine in every hundred Christians have, with one voice, confessed the Deity and incarnation of our Lord as the cardinal and central truth of our religion. Surely there is some comfort here, some sense of brotherhood; some glory due to the past, some hope for the times that are to come." Mr. Gladstone as Prime Minister of England, during his several administrations, has had a large Church patronage to dispense, in other words, has been called upon, by virtue of his office, to till many vacancies in the Established Church, but it has been truly testified that there has probably never been so laboriously conscientious a distributor of ecclesiastical crown patronage as Mr. Gladstone. In his ecclesiastical appointments he never took politics into consideration. A conspicuous instance of this may be mentioned. When it was rumored that he intended to recommend Dr. Benson, the present Archbishop, for the vacant See of Canterbury, a political supporter called to remonstrate with him. Mr. Gladstone begged to know the ground of his objection. "The Bishop of Truro is a strong Tory," was the answer; "but that is not all. He has joined Mr. Raikes's election committee at Cambridge; and it was only last week that Raikes made a violent personal attack upon yourself." "Do you know," replied Mr. Gladstone, "that you have just supplied me with a strong argument in Dr. Benson's favor? for, if he had been a worldly man or self-seeker he would not have done anything so imprudent." Mr. Gladstone sympathized more or less with the Nonconformists struggling against the application of university tests and other disabilities from which the Dissenters suffered, but it was not until 1876 that he really discovered the true religions work of the English Nonconformists. The manner in which the Congregationalists, Baptists, Quakers and others rallied to the standard raised in the cause of Bulgarian nationality effected a great change in his attitude towards his Dissenting fellow countrymen. He entertained many of the representative Nonconformist ministers at breakfast, and the fidelity and devotion of Nonconformists generally to the Bulgarian cause left on his mind an impression which has only deepened with the lapse of time. The extent to which this influences him may be gathered from the reply which he made to Dr. Döllinger whilst that learned divine was discussing with him the question of Church and State. Dr. Döllinger was expressing his surprise that Mr. Gladstone could possibly coquette in any way with the party that demanded the severance of Church and State in either Wales or Scotland. It was to him quite incomprehensible that a statesman who held so profoundly the idea of the importance of religion could make his own a cause whose avowed object was to cut asunder the Church from the State. Mr. Gladstone listened attentively to Dr. Döllinger's remarks, and then, in an absent kind of way, said, "But you forget how nobly the Nonconformists supported me at the time of the Eastern Question." The blank look of amazement on Dr. Döllinger's face showed the wide difference between the standpoint of the politician and the ecclesiastic. But Mr. Gladstone knew upon whom to rely in the hour of need, when great moral issues were at stake. The Bishops of the House of Lords had not always done their duty. Lord Shaftesbury, himself a very ardent Churchman, wrote, June 16, 1855, in reference to the Religious Worship Bill: "The Bishops have exhibited great ignorance, bigotry and opposition to evangelical life and action, and have seriously injured their character, influence and position." Mr. Gladstone never displayed more marked respect for the "Nonconformist conscience" than when, in deference to their earnest appeal, he risked the great split in the Home Rule ranks that followed his repudiation of Mr. Parnell. Mr. Gladstone never hesitated or made the slightest pretense about the matter. If the Nonconformists had been as indifferent as the Churchmen, his famous letter about the Irish leadership would not have been written. "He merely acted, as he himself stated, as the registrar of the moral temperature which made Mr. Parnell impossible. He knew the men who are the Ironsides of his party too well not to understand that if he had remained silent the English Home Rulers would have practically ceased to exist. He saw the need, rose to the occasion and cleared the obstacle which would otherwise have been a fatal impediment to the success of his course. Mr. Gladstone is a practical statesman, and with some instinct divined the inevitable." Mr. Gladstone's religious belief, as well as his opinion of the Bible and the plan of salvation revealed in the Gospel, are manifest as expressed in the following words from his pen: "If asked what is the remedy for the deeper sorrows of the human heart--what a man should chiefly look to in his progress through life as the power that is to sustain him under trials and enable him manfully to confront his afflictions--I must point him to something which, in a well-known hymn is called 'the old, old story,' told of in an old, old book, and taught with an old, old teaching, which is the greatest and best gift ever given to mankind." Another may read the lessons on the Lord's day in Hawarden Church and write and speak in defense of the Established Church of England, but Mr. Gladstone did more--he put his trust in his Lord and Saviour, and believed in his word. Mr. Gladstone was denominationally a member of the Episcopal Church, but religiously he held to views commonly held by all Evangelical Christians, from which the temptations of wealth at home, of college and of politics never turned him. [Illustration: Kilmainham Jail, where the Irish M.P.'s were confined in 1883] CHAPTER V TRAVELS AND MARRIAGE Mr. Gladstone spent the winter of 1838-9 in Rome. The physicians had recommended travel in the south of Europe for his health and particularly for his eyes, the sight of which had become impaired by hard reading in the preparation of his book. He had given up lamps and read entirely by candle-light with injurious results. He was joined at Rome by his friend, Henry Manning, afterwards Cardinal, and in company they visited Monsignor, afterwards Cardinal, Wiseman, at the English College, on the feast of St. Thomas of Canterbury. They attended solemn mass in honor of that Saint, and the places in the missal were found for them by a young student of the college, named Grant, who afterwards became Bishop of Southwark. Besides visiting Italy he explored Sicily, and kept a journal of his tour. Sicily is a beautiful and fertile island in the Mediterranean Sea, and is the granary of Rome. His recorded observations show the keenness of his perceptions and the intensity with which he enjoyed the beautiful and wonderful in nature. Mount Etna, the greatest volcano of Europe, and which rises 10,000 feet above the sea, stirred his soul greatly, and he made an ascent of the mountain at the beginning of the great eruption of 1838. Etna has many points of interest for all classes of scientific men, and not least for the student of arboriculture. It bears at the height of 4000 feet above the level of the sea a wonderful growth--a very large tree--which is claimed by some to be the oldest tree in the world. It is a venerable chestnut, and known as "the father of the forest." It is certainly one of the most remarkable as well as celebrated of trees. It consists not of one vast trunk, but of a cluster of smaller decayed trees or portions of trees growing in a circle, each with a hollow trunk of great antiquity, covered with ferns or ivy, and stretching out a few gnarled branches with scanty foliage. That it is one tree seems to be evident from the growth of the bark only on the outside. It is said that excavations about the roots of the tree showed these various stems to be united at a very small depth below the surface of the ground. It still bears rich foliage and much small fruit, though the heart of the trunk is decayed, and a public road leads through it wide enough for two coaches to drive abreast. Travelers have differed in their measurements of this stupendous growth. Admiral Smyth, who takes the lowest estimate, giving 163 feet, and Brydone giving, as the highest, 204 feet. In the middle of the cavity a hut is built, for the accommodation of those who collect and preserve the chestnuts. One of the Queens of Arragon is reported to have taken shelter in this tree, with her mounted suite of one hundred persons; but, "we may, perhaps, gather from this that mythology is not confined to the lower latitudes." Further up the mountain is another venerable chestnut, which, with more reason, probably, may be described without fear of contradiction as the largest chestnut tree in the world. It rises from one solid stem to a remarkable height before it branches. At an elevation of two feet from the earth its circumference was found by Brydone to be seventy-six feet. These trees are reputed to have flourished for much more than a thousand years. Their luxuriant growth is attributed in part to the humid atmosphere of the Bosco, elevated above the scorching, arid region of the coast, and in part to the great richness of the soil. The luxuriance of the vegetation on the slopes of Etna attracts the attention of every traveler; and Mr. Gladstone remarked upon this point: "It seems as though the finest of all soils were produced from the most agonizing throes of nature, as the hardiest characters are often reared amidst the severest circumstances. The aspect of this side of Sicily is infinitely more active and the country is cultivated as well as most parts of Italy." He and his party started on the 30th of October, and found the path nearly uniform from Catania, but the country bore a volcanic aspect at every step. At Nicolosi their rest was disturbed by the distant booming of the mountain. From this point to the Bosco the scenery is described as a dreary region, but the tract of the wood showed some beautiful places resembling an English park, with old oaks and abundant fern. "Here we found flocks browsing; they are much exposed to sheep-stealers, who do not touch travelers, calculating with justice that men do not carry much money to the summit of Etna." The party passed the Casa degli Inglesi, which registered a temperature of 31°, and then continued the ascent on foot for the crater. A magnificent view of sunrise was here obtained. "Just before we reached the lip of the crater the guide exultingly pointed out what he declared to be ordinarily the greatest sight of the mountain, namely, the shadow of the cone of Etna, drawn with the utmost delicacy by the newly-risen sun, but of gigantic extent; its point at this moment rested on the mountains of Palermo, probably one hundred miles off, and the entire figure was visible, the atmosphere over the mountains having become and continuing perfectly and beautifully transparent, although in the hundreds of valleys which were beneath us, from the east to the west of Sicily, and from the mountains of Messina down to Cape Passaro, there were still abundant vapors waiting for a higher sun to disperse them; but we enjoyed in its perfection this view of the earliest and finest work of the greater light of heaven, in the passage of his beams over this portion of the earth's surface. During the hour we spent on the summit, the vision of the shadow was speedily contracting, and taught us how rapid is the real rise of the sun in the heavens, although its effect is diminished to the eye by a kind of foreshortening." The writer next describes in vivid and powerful language the scene presented to the view at the very mouth of the crater. A large space, one mile in circumference, which a few days before had been one fathomless pit, from which issued masses of smoke, was now absolutely filled up to within a few feet of the brim all round. A great mass of lava, a portion of the contents of this immense pit, was seen to detach itself by degrees from one behind. "It opened like an orange, and we saw the red-hot fibres stretch in a broader and still broader vein, until the mass had found a support on the new ground it occupied in front; as we came back on our way down this had grown black." A stick put to it took fire immediately. Within a few yards of this lava bed were found pieces of ice, formed on the outside of the stones by Frost, "which here disputes every inch of ground with his fierce rival Fire." Mr. Gladstone and his fellow-travelers were the first spectators of the great volcanic action of this year. From the highest peak attainable the company gazed upon the splendid prospect to the east spread out before them, embracing the Messina Mountains and the fine kindred outline of the Calabrian coast, described by Virgil in the third book of the Aeneid. Mr. Gladstone graphically describes the eruption which took place and of which he was the enraptured witness. Lava masses of 150 to 200 pounds weight were thrown to a distance of probably a mile and a half; smaller ones to a distance even more remote. The showers were abundant and continuous, and the writer was impressed by the closeness of the descriptions in Virgil with the actual reality of the eruption witnessed by himself. On this point he observes: "Now how faithfully has Virgil (Ae. iii, 571, et seq.) comprised these particulars, doubtless without exaggeration, in his fine description! First, the thunder-clap, or crack-- 'Horrificis juxta tonat Aetna ruinis.' Secondly, the vibration of the ground to the report-- 'Et, fessum quoties mutet latus, intremere omnem Murmure Trinacriam.' Thirdly, the sheet of flame-- 'Attolitque globos flarmmarum, et sidera lambit.' Fourthly, the smoke-- 'Et coelum subtexere fumo.' Fifthly, the fire shower-- 'Scopulos avulsaque viscera montis Erigit erucatans, liquefactaque saxa sub auras Cum gemitu glomerat, fundoque exae tuat imo.' Sixthly the column of ash-- 'Atram prorumpit ad aethera nubem Turbine fumantem piceo et candente favilla.' And this is within the limits of twelve lines. Modern poetry has its own merits, but the conveyance of information is not, generally speaking, one of them. What would Virgil have thought of authors publishing poems with explanatory notes (to illustrate is a different matter), as if they were so many books of conundrums? Indeed this vice is of very late years." The entire description, of which this is but an extract, is very effective and animated, and gives with great vividness the first impressions of a mind susceptible to the grand and imposing aspects of nature. "After Etna," says Mr. Gladstone in his diary, "the temples are certainly the great charm and attraction of Sicily. I do not know whether there is any one among them which, taken alone, exceeds in beauty that of Neptune, at Paestum; but they have the advantage of number and variety, as well as of highly interesting positions. At Segesta the temple is enthroned in a perfect mountain solitude, and it is like a beautiful tomb of its religion, so stately, so entire; while around, but for one solitary house of the keeper, there is nothing, absolutely nothing, to disturb the apparent reign of Silence and of Death.... The temples enshrine a most pure and salutary principle of art, that which connects grandeur of effect with simplicity of detail; and, retaining their beauty and their dignity in their decay, they represent the great man when fallen, as types of that almost highest of human qualities--silent yet not sullen, endurance." While sojourning at Rome Mr. Gladstone met Lord Macaulay. Writing home from Rome in the same year, Lord Macaulay says: "On Christmas Eve I found Gladstone in the throng, and I accosted him, as we had met, though we had never been introduced to each other. He received my advances with very great _empressement_ indeed, and we had a good deal of pleasant talk." And again he writes: "I enjoyed Italy immensely; far more than I had expected. By-the-by, I met Gladstone at Rome. We talked and walked together in St. Peter's during the best part of an afternoon. He is both a clever and an amiable man." Among the visitors at Rome the winter that Mr. Gladstone spent in the eternal city were the widow and daughters of Sir Stephen Richard Glynne, of Hawarden Castle, Flintshire, Wales. He had already made the acquaintance of these ladies, having been a friend of Lady Glynne's eldest son at Oxford, and having visited him at Hawarden in 1835. He was thrown much into their society while at Rome, and became engaged to the elder of Lady Glynne's daughters, Catharine Glynne. It is strange to relate that some time before this when Miss Glynne met her future husband at a dinner-party, an English minister sitting next to her had thus drawn her attention to Mr. Gladstone: "Mark that young man; he will yet be Prime Minister of England." Miss Glynne and her sister were known as "the handsome Miss Glynnes." William E. Gladstone and Catharine Glynne were married July 25, 1839, at Hawarden Castle. At the same time and place Miss Mary Glynne was married to George William, fourth Lord Lyttleton, with whom Mr. Gladstone was on the most intimate terms of friendship until his lordship's untoward and lamented death. The brother of these ladies was Sir Stephen Glynne, the then owner of Hawarden. Mrs. Gladstone was "in her issue heir" of Sir Stephen Glynne, who was ninth and last baronet of that name. The marriage ceremony has been thus described by an eye-witness: "For some time past the little town of Hawarden has been in a state of excitement in consequence of the anticipated nuptials of the two sisters of Sir Stephen Glynne, Bart., M.P., who have been engaged for some time past to Lord Lyttelton and to Mr. W. Ewart Gladstone. Thursday last (July 25th) was fixed upon for the ceremony to take place; but in consequence of the Chartists having attacked Lord Lyttelton's mansion in Worcestershire, it was feared that the marriage would be delayed. All anxieties on this subject were put an end to by orders being issued to make ready for the ceremony, and the Hawarden folks lost no time in making due preparations accordingly. The church was elegantly and profusely decorated with laurels, while extremely handsome garlands, composed of the finest flowers, were suspended from the venerable roof. About half-past ten a simultaneous rising of the assembled multitude and the burst of melody from the organ announced that the fair brides had arrived, and all eyes were turned towards the door to witness the bridal _cortege_. In a few minutes more the party arrived at the communion table and the imposing ceremony commenced. At this period the _coup d'oeil_ was extremely interesting. The bridal party exhibited every elegance of costume; while the dresses of the multitude, lit up by the rays of a brilliant sunlight, filled up the picture. The Rev. the Hon. G. Neville performed the ceremony. At its conclusion the brides visited the rectory, whence they soon afterwards set out--Lord and Lady Lyttelton to their seat in Worcestershire, and Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone on a visit to Sir Richard Brooke, Norton Priory Mansion, in Cheshire. The bridal party having returned to the castle, the good folks of Hawarden filled up the day with rambling over Sir Stephen Glynne's delightful park, to which free access was given to all comers; and towards evening a dance on the green was got up." It is to be remarked that by his marriage Mr. Gladstone became allied with the house of Grenville, a family of statesmen, which, directly or in its ramifications, had already supplied England with four Prime Ministers. Baron Bunsen, who made his acquaintance that year, writes that he "was delighted with the man who is some day to govern England if his book is not in the way." Mrs. Gladstone is widely and deservedly known for her many philanthropic enterprises, but even better, perhaps, has proved herself to be a noble and devoted wife and mother. She has cheered by her sympathy her illustrious husband in his defeats as well as in his triumphs, in the many great undertakings of his political career, and been to him all the late Viscountess Beaconsfield was to Mr. Gladstone's Parliamentary rival. As a mother, she nursed and reared all her children, and ever kept them in the maternal eye, carefully watching over and tending them. One of the most interesting buildings at Hawarden is Mrs. Gladstone's orphanage, which stands close to the castle. Here desolate orphans are well cared for, and find, until they are prepared to enter on the conflict and to encounter the cares of life, a happy home. Mrs. Gladstone, although in many respects an ideal wife, was never able to approach her husband in the methodical and business-like arrangement of her affairs. Shortly after their wedding, the story runs, Mr. Gladstone seriously took in hand the tuition of his handsome young wife in book-keeping, and Mrs. Gladstone applied herself with diligence to the unwelcome task. Some time after she came down in triumph to her husband to display her domestic accounts and her correspondence, all docketed in a fashion which she supposed would excite the admiration of her husband. Mr. Gladstone cast his eye over the results of his wife's labor and exclaimed in despair: "You have done them all wrong, from beginning to end!" His wife, however, has been so invaluable a helpmeet in other ways that it seems somewhat invidious to recall that little incident. She had other work to do, and she wisely left the accounts to her husband and his private secretaries. The union of Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone has been blessed by eight children, all of whom save two still survive. There were four sons, the eldest, William Henry, was a member of the Legislature, and the second, the Rev. Stephen Edward Gladstone, is rector of Hawarden. The third son is named Henry Neville and the fourth Herbert John Gladstone. The former is engaged in commerce and the latter is the popular member for Leeds. The eldest daughter, Anne, is married to Rev. E.C. Wickham, A.M., headmaster of Wellington College; and the second, Catharine Jessy Gladstone, died in 1850; the third daughter, Mary, is married to Rev. W. Drew, and the fourth, Helen Gladstone, is principal of Newnham College. As Sir John Gladstone had the pleasure of seeing his son William Ewart become a distinguished member of Parliament, so Mr. Gladstone in his turn was able to witness his eldest son take his seat in the British Senate. It was a sad bereavement when the Gladstones were called upon to part with their little daughter, Catharine Jessy, April 9, 1850, between four and five years old. Her illness was long and painful, and Mr. Gladstone bore his part in the nursing and watching. He was tenderly fond of his little children and the sorrow had therefore a peculiar bitterness. But Mr. Gladstone has since had another sad experience of death entering the family circle. July 4, 1891, the eldest son, William Henry Gladstone, died. The effect upon the aged father was greatly feared, and the world sympathized with the great statesman and father in his sad trial, and with the afflicted family. In a letter dated July 9, the day after the interment, Mr. Gladstone wrote: "We, in our affliction are deeply sensible of the mercies of God. He gave us for fifty years a most precious son. He has now only hidden him for a very brief space from the sight of our eyes. It seems a violent transition from such thoughts to the arena of political contention, but the transition may be softened by the conviction we profoundly hold that we, in the first and greatest of our present controversies, work for the honor, well-being and future peace of our opponents not less than for our own." When away from the trammels of office, Mr. Gladstone taught his elder children Italian. All the sons went to Eton and Oxford, and the daughters were educated at home by English, French and German governesses. A close union of affection and sentiment has always been a marked characteristic of this model English family. Marriage and domestic cares, however, made little difference in Mr. Gladstone's mode of life. He was still the diligent student, the constant debater and the copious writer that he had been at Eton, at Oxford and in the Albany. [Illustration: THE OFFICIAL RESIDENCE OF THE BRITISH PREMIER, No. 10 DOWNING STREET, LONDON.] In the early days of their married life, Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone lived in London with Lady Glynne, at 13 Carlton House Terrace. Later they lived at 6 Carlton Gardens, which was made over to them by Sir John Gladstone; then again at 13 Carlton House Terrace; and when Mr. Gladstone was in office, at the official residence of the Prime Minister, Downing Street. In 1850 Mr. Gladstone succeeded to his patrimony, and in 1856 he bought 11 Carlton House Terrace, which was his London house for twenty years; and he subsequently lived for four years at 73 Harley Street. During the parliamentary recess Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone divided their time between Fasque, Sir John Gladstone's seat in Kincardineshire, and Hawarden Castle, which they shared with Mrs. Gladstone's brother, Sir Stephen Glynne, till in his death in 1874, when it passed into their sole possession. In 1854 Mrs. Gladstone's brother added to the castle a new wing, which he especially dedicated to his illustrious brother-in-law, and which is fondly known as "The Gladstone Wing." And Mr. Gladstone, having only one country house, probably spent as much time at Hawarden as any other minister finds it possible to devote to residence out of London. Hawarden, usually pronounced Harden, is the name of a large market-town, far removed from the centre and seat of trade and empire, in Flintshire, North Wales, six miles southwest from the singular and ancient city of Chester, of which it may be called a suburb. It is not pretty, but a clean and tolerably well-built place, with some good houses and the usual characteristics of a Welsh village. The public road from Chester to Hawarden, which passes by the magnificent seat of the Duke of Westminster, is not, except for this, interesting to the stranger. There is a pedestrian route along the banks of the river Dee, over the lower ferry and across the meadows. But for the most part the way lies along dreary wastes, unadorned by any of the beautiful landscape scenery so common in Wales. Broughton Hall, its pleasant church and quiet churchyard, belonging to the Hawarden estate, are passed on the way. The village lies at the foot of the Castle, and outside of the gates of Hawarden Park. The parish contains 13,000 acres, and of these the estate of Mr. Gladstone consists of nearly 7000. The road from the village for the most part is dreary, but within the gates the park is as beautiful as it is extensive. Richly wooded, on both sides of its fine drive are charming vistas opening amongst the oaks, limes and elms. On the height to the left of the drive is the ancient Hawarden Castle, for there are two--the old and the new--the latter being the more modern home of the proprietor. [Illustration: THE PARK GATE, HAWARDEN.] The ancient Castle of Hawarden, situated on an eminence commanding an extensive prospect, is now in ruins. What, however, was left of the old Castle at the beginning of the century stands to-day a monument of the massive work of the early masons. The remnant, which ages of time and the Parliamentary wars and the strange zeal of its first owner under Cromwell for its destruction, allowed to remain, is in a marvelous state of preservation, and the masonry in some places fifteen feet thick. There is a grandeur in the ruin to be enjoyed, as well as a scene of beauty from its towers. The old Castle, like the park itself, is open to the public without restriction. Only two requests are made in the interests of good order. One is that visitors entering the park kindly keep to the gravel walks, while the other is that they do not inscribe their names on the stone-work of the ancient ruin, which request has been unheeded. This ancient Castle was doubtless a stronghold of the Saxons in very early times, for it was found in the possession of Edwin of Mercia at the Norman Conquest, and was granted by William the Conqueror to his nephew, Hugh Lupus. In later times Prince Llewelyn was Lord of Hawarden, of which he was dispossessed by his brother, David. It was only after Wales was conquered that Hawarden became an English stronghold, held against the Welsh. [Illustration: OLD HAWARDEN CASTLE.] The Castle had its vicissitudes, both as to its condition and proprietorship, for many years, even generations. Somewhere between 1267 and 1280 the Castle had been destroyed and rebuilt. It was rebuilt in the time of Edward I or Edward II, and formed one link in the chain by which the Edwards held the Welsh to their loyalty. Its name appears in the doomsday-book, where it is spelled Haordine. It was presented by King Edward to the House of Salisbury. Then the Earls of Derby came into possession, and they entertained within its walls Henry VII in the latter part of the fifteenth century. During the Parliamentary wars it was held at first for the Parliament, and was taken by siege in 1643. The royalists were in possession two years later, and at Christmas time, in 1645, Parliament ordered that the Castle be dismantled, which was effectively done. The latest proprietor of those times was James, Earl of Derby. He was executed and the estates were sold. They were purchased by Sergeant Glynne, Lord Chief Justice of England under Cromwell, from whom in a long line of descent they were inherited, upon the death of the last baronet, Sir Stephen Glynne, in 1874, by the wife of William E. Gladstone. Sergeant Glynne's son, Sir William, the first baronet, when he came into possession, was seized with the unaccountable notion of further destroying the old Castle, and by the end of the seventeenth century very little remained beyond what stands to-day. [Illustration: A GLIMPSE OF THE CASTLE FROM THE PARK.] Hawarden is supposed to be synonymous with the word Burg-Ardden, Ardin, a fortified mound or hill. It is usually supposed to be an English word, but of Welsh derivation, and is no doubt related to dinas, in Welsh the exact equivalent to the Saxon _burg_. The Welsh still call it Penarlas, a word the etymology of which points to a period when the lowlands of Saltney were under water, and the Castle looked over a lake. The earlier history of the Castle goes back to the time when it was held by the ancient Britons, and stood firm against Saxon, Dane, or whatever invading foe sought to deprive the people of their heritage in the soil. On the invasion of William, as we have seen, it was in the possession of Edwin, sovereign of Deira. "We find it afterwards," says another account, "in the possession of Roger Fitzvalarine, a son of one of the adventurers who came over with the Conqueror. Then it was held, subordinately, by the Monthault, or Montalt, family, the stewards of the palatinate of Chester. It is remarkable, as we noticed in our story of Hughenden Manor, that as the traditions of that ancient place touched the memory of Simon de Montfort, the great Earl of Leicester, so do they also in the story of the old Castle of Hawarden. Here Llewelyn, the last native prince of Wales, held a memorable conference with the Earl. With in the walls of Hawarden was signed the treaty of peace between Wales and Cheshire, not long to last; here Llewelyn saw the beautiful daughter of De Montfort, whose memory haunted him so tenderly and so long. Again we find the Castle in the possession of the Montalt family, from whom it descended to the Stanleys, the Earl of Derby.... Here the last native princes of Wales, Llewelyn and David, attempted to grasp their crumbling sceptre, Here no doubt halted Edward I, 'girt with many a baron bold;' here the Tudor prince, Henry VII, of Welsh birth, visited in the later years of the fifteenth century; and this was the occasion upon which it passed into the family whose representatives had proclaimed him monarch on Bosworth field. But when James, Earl of Derby, was beheaded, after the battle of Worcester, in 1651, the estate was purchased under the Sequestration Act by Sergeant Glynne, whose portrait hangs over the mantleshelf of the drawing-room; 'but,' says Mrs. Gladstone, in calling our attention to it, 'he is an ancestor of whom we have no occasion to be and are not proud.'" This remark of Mrs. Gladstone's may be explained by the following from the pen of a reputable author: "Sergeant Glynne, who flourished (literally flourished) during the seventeenth century, was a most unscrupulous man in those troubled times. He was at first a supporter of Charles I, then got office and preferment under Cromwell, and yet again, like a veritable Vicar of Bray, became a Royalist on the return of Charles II. The Earl of Derby, who was taken prisoner at the battle of Worcester, in 1661, was executed, and his estates forfeited. Of these estates Sergeant Glynne managed to get possession of Hawarden; and though on the Restoration all Royalists' forfeited estates were ordered to be restored, Glynne managed somehow to remain in possession of the property." [Illustration: WATERFALL IN HAWARDEN PARK.] It is very probable that Hawarden Castle was no exception to those cruel haunts of feudal tyranny and oppression belonging to the days of its power. Many years ago, when the rubbish was cleared away beneath the Castle ruin, a flight of steps was found, at the foot of which was a door, and a draw-bridge, which crossed a long, deep chasm, neatly faced with freestone; then another door leading to several small rooms, all, probably, places of confinement; and those hollows, now fringed with timber trees, in those days constituted a broad, deep fosse. The old Hawarden Castle, a curious ruin covered with moss and ivy, like many other ancient piles of stone in historic England, is a reminder of a past and warlike age, when an Englishman's home had to be a castle to protect him and his family from his enemies. But times have changed for the better, and long immunity from internal foes and invading armies has had its peaceful effects upon the lands and the homes of men. As the grounds of Hawarden show the remarkable cultivation produced by long periods of peaceful toil, so the ancient castle has given way for the modern dwelling, a peaceful abode whose only protecting wall is that with which the law surrounds it. Modern Hawarden Castle is a castle only in name. The new "Castle" has been the home of the Glynns' for generations, and ever since the marriage of Mr. Gladstone and Miss Glynn has been the dwelling of the Gladstones. Mr. Gladstone has greatly improved the Hawarden estate and the castle has not been overlooked. Among the improvements to the castle may be named the additions to the library and the Golden Wedding Porch. The new Castle was begun in 1752, by Sir John Glynne, who "created a stout, honest, square, red-brick mansion;" which was added to and altered in the Gothic style in 1814. The Glynnes lived in Oxfordshire till early in the eighteenth century, when they built themselves a small house, which was on the site of the present Castle. The new Hawarden Castle stands in front of the massive ruin of the old Castle, which has looked down on the surrounding country for six centuries. A recent writer speaking of the new structure as a sham Castle, with its plaster and stucco, and imitation turrets, says: "It would not have been surprising if the old Castle had, after the manner of Jewish chivalry, torn its hair of thickly entwined ivy, rent its garments of moss and lichen, and fallen down prostrate, determined forever to shut out the sight of the modern monstrosity." However, the author somewhat relents and thus describes the modern edifice: "The aspect of the house is very impressive and imposing, as it first suddenly seems to start upon the view after a long carriage-drive through the noble trees, if not immediately near, but breaking and brightening the view on either hand; yet, within and without, the house seems like its mighty master--not pensive but rural; it does not even breathe the spirit of quiet. Its rooms look active and power-compelling, and we could not but feel that they were not indebted to any of the aesthetic inventions and elegancies of furniture for their charm. Thus we have heard of one visitor pathetically exclaiming, 'Not one _dado_ adorns the walls!' Hawarden is called a Castle, but it has not, either in its exterior or interior, the aspect of a Castle. It is a home; it has a noble appearance as it rises on the elevated ground, near the old feudal ruin which it has superseded, and looks over the grand and forest-like park, the grand pieces of broken ground, dells and hollows, and charming woodlands." [Illustration: COURT YARD, HAWARDEN CASTLE.] The traditional history of Hawarden Church, as well as that of the Castle, travels back to a very remote antiquity, and is the central point of interest to many a tragedy, and some of a very grotesque character. For instance, for many ages the inhabitants of Hawarden were called "Harden Jews," and for this designation we have the following legendary account. In the year 946, during the reign of Cynan ap Elisap Anarawd, King of Gwynedd North, there was a Christian temple at Harden, and a rood-loft, in which was placed an image of the Virgin Mary, with a very large cross in her hands, which was called "holy rood." During a very hot and dry summer the inhabitants prayed much and ardently for rain, but without any effect. Among the rest, Lady Trowst, wife of Sytsyllt, governor of Harden Castle, went also to pray, when, during this exercise, the holy rood fell upon her head and killed her. Such behavior upon the part of this wooden Virgin could be tolerated no longer. A great tumult ensued in consequence, and it was concluded to try the said Virgin for murder, and the jury not only found her guilty of wilful murder, but of inattention in not answering the prayers of innumerable petitioners. The sentence was hanging, but Span, of Mancot, who was one of the jury, opposed this act saying it was best to drown, since it was rain they prayed for. This was fiercely opposed by Corbin, of the gate, who advised that she should be laid on the sands by the river. So, this being done, the tide carried the lady, floating gently, like another lady, Elaine, upon its soft bosom, and placed her near the walls of Caerleon (now Chester), where she was found next day, says the legend, drowned and dead. Here the inhabitants of Caerleon buried her. Upon this occasion, it is said, the river, which had until then been called the Usk, was changed to Rood Die, or Rood Dee. We need not stay here to analyze some things belonging to locality and etymology, which appear to us somewhat anachronistic and contradictory in this ancient and queer legend. Hawarden Church is a fairly large structure, externally a plain old brick building with a low tower and a dwarf spire, standing in the midst of a large population of graves. There is preserved in the annals of the Church a list of the rectors of Hawarden as far back as 1180. About forty years ago a fire broke out in the Church, and when all was over, very little was left of the original structure except the walls. It was restored with great expedition, and was re-opened within the same year. The present building is a restoration to the memory of the immediate ancestor, from whom the estate is derived by the present family. It is the centre of hard, earnest work, done for an exceptionally large parish. But the Church population is occasionally recruited from all the ends of the earth. It is here that the Gladstone family worship on the plain, uncushioned pew, near the lectern and opposite the pulpit. When the estates came into the hands of the Glynnes the living was bestowed upon a member of the family. The Rector is Rev. Stephen Gladstone, second son of the Premier. He is not a great preacher, but he is quietly earnest and instructive. Mr. Gladstone was up early on Sunday mornings and seldom failed to be in his pew at Church. Crowds filled the Church Sunday, morning and evening, week after week, many of them strangers, to see the Prime Minister of England, and behold him leave his pew and, standing at the reading-desk, go through his part of the service--that of reading the lessons for the day, in this obscure village Church. After church Mr. Gladstone went to the rectory with his family, with his cloak only over his shoulders, when the weather required, and as he walked along the path through the churchyard would bow to the crowds that stood on either side uncovered to greet him as he passed by. The two brothers, until recently, lived at the rectory, and the whole family seemed to live in the most beautiful harmony together. Both Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone attribute much of his health to the fact that he will have his Sabbath to himself and his family, undisturbed by any of the agitations of business, the cares of State, or even the recreations of literature and scholastic study. This profound public regard for the day of rest, whether in London or at Hawarden, awakens a feeling of admiration and puts us in mind of his great predecessor in statesmanship, Cecil, Lord Burleigh, who, when he arrived at Theobalds on a Saturday evening would throw off his cloak or chain of office and exclaim, "Lie there and rest, my good lord treasurer." [Illustration: THE REV. H. DREW, WARDEN OF ST. DENIOL'S.] One of the main points of interest at the home of Mr. Gladstone is the library. There is not a room in Hawarden Castle in which there is not an abundance of books, which are not all collected in the library, but distributed all over the house. Where other people have cabinets for curiosities, china, etc., there are here shelves and cases full of books. In ante-room and bed-room dressing-room and nursery they are found, not by single volumes, but in serried ranks; well-known and useful books. But it is in the library where Mr. Gladstone has collected by years of careful selection, a most valuable and large array of books, from all parts of the world, upon every subject. These books are classified and so arranged as to be of immediate use. All those on one particular subject are grouped together. [Illustration: DOROTHY'S DOVECOTE] Mr. Gladstone was a familiar figure in the book stores, and especially where rare, old books were to be found, and he seldom failed to return home with some book in his pocket. Mrs. Gladstone is said to have gone through his pockets often upon his return home, and sent back many a volume to the book-seller, that had found its way to the pocket of her husband, after a hasty glance at its title. He kept himself informed of all that was going on in the literary, scientific and artistic worlds, receiving each week a parcel of the newest books for his private readings. Every day he looked over several book-sellers's catalogues, and certain subjects were sure of getting an order. Hawarden library gave every evidence of being for use, and not show. Mr. Gladstone knew what books he had and was familiar with their contents. Some books were in frequent use, but others were not forgotten. He could put his hand on any one he wanted to refer to. At the end of a volume read he would construct an index of his own by which he could find passages to which he wished to refer. There are few stories that Mr. Gladstone told with greater relish than one concerning Sir Antonio Panizzi, who many years ago visited the library at Hawarden. Looking round the room and at its closely packed shelves, he observed in a patronizing tone, "I see you have got some books here." Nettled at this seemingly slighting allusion to the paucity of his library, Mr. Gladstone asked Panizzi how many volumes he thought were on the shelves. Panizzi replied: "From five to six thousand." Then a loud and exulting laugh rang round the room as Mr. Gladstone answered: "You are wrong by at least two thousand, as there are eight thousand volumes and more before you now." Since then the library has grown rapidly. [Illustration: DINING ROOM IN THE ORPHANAGE, HAWARDEN.] The fate of this large library was naturally a matter of much consideration to Mr. Gladstone. It was particularly rich in classical and theological works, so it occured to its owner to form a public library under a trusteeship, for the benefit of students, under the care of the Rector of Hawarden, or some other clergyman. So he caused to be erected at a cost to him of about $5,000, a corrugated iron building on a knoll just outside Hawarden Church. The name of this parish library is "The St. Deiniol's Theological and General Library of Hawarden." In 1891, Mr. Gladstone had deposited about 20,000 volumes upon the shelves in this new building, with his own hands, which books were carried in hand-carts from the castle. Since that time thousands have been added to this valuable collection. [Illustration: STAIRCASE IN THE ORPHANAGE, HAWARDEN.] It was a happy thought of Mr. Gladstone to found a theological library in the immediate vicinity of Hawarden; also to have connected with it a hostel where students could be boarded and lodged for six dollars a week and thus be enabled to use the library in the pursuit of their studies. Mr. Gladstone has endowed the institution with $150,000. Rev. H. Drew, the son-in-law of Mr. Gladstone, is warden and librarian. [Illustration: HAWARDEN CHURCH.] CHAPTER VI ENTERS THE CABINET We come now to another memorable period in the life of William E. Gladstone. This period, beginning with 1840, has been styled "a memorable decade" in the history of Parliament. His marriage and the publication of his first book were great events in his eventful life, but the young and brilliant statesman was soon to enter the British Cabinet. He was before long to demonstrate that he not only possessed the arts of the fluent and vigorous Parliamentary debater, but the more solid qualities pertaining to the practical statesman and financier. In following his course we will be led to observe the early stages of his changing opinions on great questions of State, and to trace the causes which led to his present advanced views as well as to his exalted position. The estimation in which he was then held may be indicated by the following, from one of his contemporaries, Sir Stafford Northcote, afterwards Lord Iddesleigh, and who subsequently succeeded him as leader of the House of Commons: "There is but one statesman of the present day in whom I feel entire confidence, and with whom I cordially agree, and that statesman is Mr. Gladstone. I look upon him as the representative of the party, scarcely developed as yet, though secretly forming and strengthening, which will stand by all that is dear and sacred in my estimation, in the struggle which I believe will come ere _very_ long between good and evil, order and disorder, the Church and the world, and I see a very small band collecting round him, and ready to fight manfully under his leading." In 1840 Mr. Gladstone crossed swords with the distinguished historian and Parliamentary debater, Lord Macaulay, in debate in the House of Commons on the relations of England with China. The speech of Mr. Gladstone was remarkable for its eloquent expression of anxiety that the arms of England should never be employed in unrighteous enterprises. Sir James Graham moved a vote of censure of the ministry for "want of foresight and precaution," and "especially their neglect to furnish the superintendent at Canton with powers and instructions calculated to provide against the growing evils connected with the contraband traffic in opium, and adapted to the novel and difficult situation in which the superintendent was placed." Mr. Gladstone, on the 8th of April, spoke strongly in favor of the motion, and said if it failed to involve the ministry in condemnation they would still be called upon to show cause for their intention of making war upon China. Answering the speech of Lord Macaulay of the previous evening, Mr. Gladstone said: "The right honorable gentleman opposite spoke last night in eloquent terms of the British flag waving in glory at Canton, and of the animating effects produced on the minds of our sailors by the knowledge that in no country under heaven was it permitted to be insulted. But how comes it to pass that the sight of that flag always raises the spirit of Englishmen? It is because it has always been associated with the cause of justice, with opposition to oppression, with respect to national rights, with honorable commercial enterprises; but now, under the auspices of the noble lord, that flag is hoisted to protect an infamous contraband traffic, and if it were never to be hoisted except as it is now hoisted on the coast of China, we should recoil from its sight with horror, and should never again feel our hearts thrill, as they now thrill with emotion, when it floats proudly and magnificently on the breeze." The ministry escaped censure when the vote was taken by a bare majority. In the summer of 1840 Mr. Gladstone, accompanied by Lord Lyttleton, went to Eton to examine candidates of the Newcastle Scholarship, founded by his political friend, the Duke of Newcastle. Mr. Gladstone had the pleasure in this examination of awarding the Newcastle medal to Henry Fitzmaurice Hallam, the youngest brother of his own beloved friend and son of the historian Hallam. One of the scholars he examined writes: "I have a vivid and delightful impression of Mr. Gladstone sitting in what was then called the library, on an _estrade_ on which the head master habitually sate, above which was placed, about 1840, the bust of the Duke of Newcastle and the names of the Newcastle scholars.... When he gave me a Virgil and asked me to translate Georg. ii, 475, _seq_., I was pleasantly surprised by the beautiful eye turning on me with the question, 'What is the meaning of _sacra fero_?' and his look of approval when I said, 'Carry the sacred vessels in the procession.'" "I wish you to understand that Mr. Gladstone appeared not to me only, but to others, as a gentleman wholly unlike other examiners or school people. It was not as _a politician_ that we admired him, but as a refined Churchman, deep also in political philosophy (so we conjectured from his quoting Burke on the Continual State retaining its identity though made up of passing individuals), deep also in lofty poetry, as we guessed from his giving us, as a theme for original Latin verse, 'the poet's eye in a fine frenzy,' etc. When he spoke to us in 'Pop' as an honorary member, we were charmed and affected emotionally: his voice was low and sweet, his manner was that of an elder cousin: he seemed to treat us with unaffected respect; and to be treated with respect by a man is the greatest delight for a boy. It was the golden time of 'retrograding transcendentalism,' as the hard-heads called the Anglo-Catholic symphony. He seemed to me then an apostle of unworldly ardor, bridling his life." The Whig administration, which for some time had been growing very unpopular, was defeated and went out of power in 1841. From the very beginning of the session their overthrow was imminent. Among the causes which rendered the ministry obnoxious to the country, and led to their downfall, may be named the disappointment of both their dissenting English supporters and Irish allies; their financial policy had proved a complete failure and dissatisfied the nation; and the deficit in the revenue this year amounted to no less a sum than two millions and a half pounds. Every effort to remedy the financial difficulties offered by the ministry to the House was rejected, Hence it was felt on all sides that the government of the country must be committed to stronger hands. Accordingly, in May, Sir Robert Peel proposed a resolution in the House of Commons to the effect that the ministry did not possess sufficiently the confidence of the House to carry through measures deemed essential for the public welfare; and that their continuance in office was, under the circumstances, at variance with the Constitution, For five days this resolution was discussed, but Mr. Gladstone took no part in the debate. The motion of Sir Robert Peel passed by a majority vote of one, and on the 7th of June Lord John Russell announced that the ministry would at once dissolve Parliament and appeal to the country. Parliament was prorogued by the Queen in person June 22d, and the country was soon in the turmoil of a general election. By the end of July it was found that the ministry had been defeated and with greater loss than the Tories even had expected. The Tories had a great majority of the new members returned. The Liberal seats gained by the Tories were seventy-eight, while the Tory seats gained by Liberals were only thirty-eight, thus making a Tory majority of eighty. Mr. Gladstone was again elected at Newark, and was at the head of the poll; with Lord John Manners, afterwards Duke of Rutland, as his colleague. The new Parliament met in August, and the ministers were defeated, in both Houses, on the Address and resigned. Sir Robert Peel was called upon by the Queen to form a new ministry, and Mr. Gladstone was included by his leader in the administration. In appearing on the hustings at Newark Mr. Gladstone said that there were two points upon which the British farmer might rely--the first being that adequate protection would be given him, and, second, that protection would be given him through the means of the sliding scale. The duties were to be reduced and the system improved, but the principle was to be maintained. "There was no English statesman who could foresee at this period the results of that extraordinary agitation which, in the course of the next five years, was destined to secure the abrogation of the Corn Laws." There is a tradition that, having already conceived a lively interest in the ecclesiastical and agrarian problems of Ireland, Mr. Gladstone had set his affections on the Chief Secretaryship. But Sir Robert Peel, a consummate judge of administrative capacity, had discerned his young friend's financial aptitude, and the member for Newark became vice-president of the Board of Trade and master of the Mint. Although in the midst of engrossing cares of office as vice-president of the Board of Trade, yet Mr. Gladstone found time to renew his old interest in ecclesiastical concerns. In the fall of 1841 an English Episcopal Bishopric was established at Jerusalem, Mr. Gladstone dined with Baron Bunsen on the birthday of the King of Prussia, when, as reported by Lord Shaftesbury, he "stripped himself of a part of his Puseyite garments, spoke like a pious man, rejoiced in the bishopric of Jerusalem, and proposed the health of Alexander, the new Bishop of that see. This is delightful, for he is a good man, a clever man and an industrious man." And Baron Bunsen, speaking of the same occasion, said, "Never was heard a more exquisite speech, It flowed like a gentle, translucent stream. We drove back to town in the clearest starlight; Gladstone continuing with unabated animation to pour forth his harmonious thoughts in melodious tone." And Mr. Gladstone himself writes later; "Amidst public business, quite sufficient for a man of my compass, I have, during the whole of the week, perforce, been carrying on with the Bishop of London and with Bunsen a correspondence on, and inquisition into, the Jerusalem design, until I almost reel and stagger under it." And still later he writes: "I am ready individually to brave misconstruction for the sake of union with any Christian men, provided the terms of the union be not contrary to sound principle; and perhaps in this respect might go further, at least in one of the possible directions, than you. But to declare the living constitution of a Christian Church to be of secondary moment is of course in my view equivalent to a denial of a portion of the faith--and I think you will say it is a construction which can not fairly be put upon the design, as far as it exists in fixed rules and articles. It is one thing to attribute this in the way of unfavorable surmise, or as an apprehension of ultimate developments--it is another to publish it to the world as a character ostentatiously assumed." We have evidence also that at this time he was not permitted to forget that he was an author, for he thus writes, April 6, 1842, to his publisher: "Amidst the pressure of more urgent affairs, I have held no consultation with you regarding my books and the sale or no sale of them. As to the third edition of the 'State in its Relations,' I should think that the remaining copies had better be got rid of in whatever summary or ignominious mode you may deem best. They must be dead beyond recall. As to the others, I do not know whether the season of the year has at all revived the demand; and would suggest to you whether it would be well to advertise them a little. I do not think they find their way much into the second-hand shops. With regard to the fourth edition, I do not know whether it would be well to procure any review or notice of it, and I am not a fair judge of its merits, even in comparison with the original form of the work; but my idea is that it is less defective, both in the theoretical and in the historical development, and ought to be worth the notice of those who deemed the earlier editions worth their notice and purchase; that it would really put a reader in possession of the view it was intended to convey, which I fear is more than can with any truth be said of its predecessors. I am not, however, in any state of anxiety or impatience; and I am chiefly moved to refer these suggestions to your judgment from perceiving that the fourth edition is as yet far from having cleared itself." It was from this time that a marked change was observable in the subjects of Mr. Gladstone's Parliamentary addresses. "Instead of speaking on the corporate conscience of the State and the endowments of the Church, the importance of Christian education and the theological unfitness of the Jews to sit in Parliament, he was solving business-like problems about foreign tariffs and the exportation of machinery; waxing eloquent over the regulation of railways and a graduated tax on corn; subtle on the momentary merits of half-farthings and great in the mysterious lore of quassia and cocculus indicus." In the short session of Parliament, in 1841, that which followed the accession of Sir Robert Peel to the office of Prime Minister, he was questioned by his opponents as to his future policy. The Premier declined to state the nature of the measures he intended to present, or which he contemplated making, in the intervening months of the recess of Parliament so near at hand. He wanted time for the arrangement of his plans and the construction of his political programme. An effort was made to embarrass the administration by refusing to vote the necessary supplies, until inquiry should be made into the existing distress, but it was defeated. Three weeks later Parliament was dissolved by Royal commission. In the following sitting of Parliament several measures of high practical character were presented. Sir Robert Peel acceded to office in very critical times. The condition of the country was truly lamentable. Distress and discontent were widespread and the difficulties of the government were greatly enhanced by popular tumults. The Free Trade agitation was already making great headway in the land, and when the Premier brought forward his new sliding scale of duties in the House of Commons it was denounced by Mr. Cobden as an insult to a suffering people. The Premier said that he considered the present not an unfavorable time for discussing the corn laws; that there was no great stock on hand of foreign growth to alarm the farmers; that the recess had been marked by universal calm; that there was no popular violence to interrupt legislation; and that there was a disposition to view any proposal for the adjustment of the question with calmness and moderation. The Premier's view of the situation did not seem to be wholly in accord with the well-known facts, for the Queen even, on her appearance at the London theatres, had been hooted, and the Prime Minister himself was burnt in effigy during a riot at Northampton; great excitement prevailed throughout the country, and Lord John Russell moved as an amendment "That this House, considering the evils which have been caused by the present corn laws and especially by the fluctuation of the graduated or sliding scale, is not prepared to adopt the measure of her Majesty's government, which is founded on the same principles and is likely to be attended by similar results." It was incumbent upon Mr. Gladstone to lead the opposition to this motion. He showed that the proposed plan was not founded on the same principle of the existing one, except that both involved a sliding scale; that the present distress was caused by fluctuation of the seasons and not by the laws; that high prices of food were chargeable to successive failures of the crops; that these unavoidable fluctuations were not aggravated by the corn laws; that Sir Robert Peel's plan of working was far superior to that of Lord John Russell; that the drains upon the currency, caused by bad harvests, were not to be prevented by a fixed duty; that a uniform protection could not be given to corn, as to other articles, because at high prices of corn no duty could be maintained, and that, therefore, at low prices, it was but just to give a duty which would be an effectual protection. The debate which followed was characterized by vigorous speeches from Mr. Roebuck and Lord Palmerston. Lord John Russell's amendment was lost by a large majority. A motion presented by Mr. Villiers, the Free Trade advocate, for the immediate repeal of the corn laws was also lost by a majority of over three hundred. On the 11th of March Sir Robert Peel introduced his budget. The budget for 1842 was produced under depressing circumstances. There was a deficit of £2,750,000, or about $15,000,000, and taxation upon articles of consumption had been pushed to its utmost limit. Peel was a great financier, but the fiscal difficulties by which he was now surrounded were enough to appall the most ingenious of financial ministers. Mr. Gladstone rendered the Premier invaluable service in the preparation both of his budget and of his tariff scheme. The merit of the budget was its taxation of wealth and the relief of the manufacturing industry. The second branch of the financial plan, the revised tariff--a customs duties scheme--was very important, and it was understood to be mainly the work of Mr. Gladstone. Out of nearly 1200 duty-paying articles, a total abolition, or a considerable reduction, was made in no fewer than 750. This was certainly a great step towards the freedom of manufacturers, Sir Robert Peel's boast that he had endeavored to relieve manufacturing industries was more than justified by this great and comprehensive measure. The very best means for relieving the manufacturing industries had been devised. But while this great relief to industry was welcomed the Opposition did not relax their efforts for the abolition of the corn laws, which were continued into the session of 1843. Sir Robert Peel acknowledged, amidst loud cheers from the Opposition, that all were agreed in the general rule that we should purchase in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest; but he added, "If I propose a greater change in the corn laws than that which I submit to the consideration of the House I should only aggravate the distress of the country, and only increase the alarm which prevails among important interests." Mr. Hume hailed with joy the appearance of the Premier and his colleagues as converts to the principles of Free Trade; Mr. Gladstone replied, that, whoever were the authors of the principles on which the government measures rested, he must protest against the statement that the ministry came forward as converts to principles which they had formerly opposed. During the progress of the debate of 1842, on the revised Tariff Bill, Mr. Gladstone's labors were very great. He was called upon to explain or defend the details of the scheme, and had something to say about every article of consumption included in, or excluded from, the list. He spoke one hundred and twenty-nine times, chiefly on themes connected with the new fiscal legislature. He demonstrated his capacity for grasping all the most complicated details of finance, and also the power of comprehending the scope and necessities of the commercial interests of the country. No measure with which his name has since been connected has done him more credit. He spoke incessantly, and amazed the House by his mastery of details, his intimate acquaintance with the commercial needs of the country, and his inexhaustible power of exposition. On March 14th Greville wrote, "Gladstone has already displayed a capacity which makes his admission into the Cabinet indispensable." A commercial minister had appeared on the scene, and the shade of Hoskisson had revived. Though engrossed in schemes of practical legislation, and in all the excitements and interests of office, he could, as he has ever done during his long career, turn aside for the discourse on social and educational questions with much earnestness and eloquence, as if they, and only they, possessed his mind. In January, 1843, he spoke at the opening of the Collegiate Institute of Liverpool, and delivered a powerful plea for the better education of the middle classes, which was one of the most forcible speeches he ever delivered. He said: "We believe that if you could erect a system which should present to mankind all branches of knowledge save the one that is essential, you would only be building up a Tower of Babel, which, when you had completed it, would be the more signal in its fall, and which would bury those who had raised it in its ruins. We believe that if you can take a human being in his youth, and if you can make him an accomplished man in natural philosophy, in mathematics, or in the knowledge necessary for the profession of a merchant, a lawyer, or a physician; that if in any or all of these endowments you could form his mind--yes, if you could endow him with the science and power of a Newton, and so send him forth--and if you had concealed from him, or, rather, had not given him a knowledge and love of the Christian faith--he would go forth into the world, able indeed with reference to those purposes of science, successful with the accumulation of wealth for the multiplication of more, but 'poor, and miserable, and blind, and naked' with reference to everything that constitutes the true and sovereign purposes of our existence--nay, worse, worse--with respect to the sovereign purpose-- than if he had still remained in the ignorance which we all commiserate, and which it is the object of this institution to assist in removing." It was admitted on all hands that great fiscal reforms had been conceived and executed; and speaking of the session of 1842, a writer, not favorable to the Tories, wrote: "The nation saw and felt that its business was understood and accomplished, and the House of Commons was no longer like a sleeper under a nightmare. The long session was a busy one. The Queen wore a cheerful air when she thanked Parliament for their effectual labors. The Opposition was such as could no longer impede the operations of the next session. The condition of the country was fearful enough, but something was done for its future improvement, and the way was now shown to be open for further beneficent legislation." The corn law reformers renewed their efforts, led by Lord Howick, as soon as the parliamentary session of 1843 opened. An inquiry by the whole House was demanded into the causes of the long continued manufacturing depression referred to in the Queen's speech. Mr. Gladstone replied that while the Opposition proposed to repeal the corn laws, they offered no measure of relief in their place. The corn laws were at the root of the distress in the country, but the difficulty was to unite the ranks of the Opposition in opinion as to what ought to follow the repeal of the corn laws. The question between the government and the Opposition was not really so great as the latter wished to make out. It was simply as to the amount of relaxation the country could bear in the duties. It was the intention of the First Lord of the Treasury to attain his object "by increasing the employment of the people, by cheapening the prices of the articles of consumption, as also the articles of industry, by encouraging the means of exchange with foreign nations, and thereby encouraging in return an extension of the export trade; but besides all this, if he understood the measure of the government last year, it was proposed that the relaxation should be practically so limited as to cause no violent shock to existing interests, such as would have the tendency of displacing that labor which should be employed, and which, if displaced, would be unable to find another field." The measure of the previous year had nothing but a beneficial effect, but the repeal of the corn laws would displace a vast mass of labor. Lord Howick's motion was defeated and so were others offered by Mr. Villiers and Lord John Russell, by diminishing majorities, and Mr. Gladstone protested against the constant renewal of uneasiness in the country by successive motions of this kind in Parliament. The year 1843 was one destined to witness a great advance in Mr. Gladstone's progress towards the front rank among statesmen. June 10th, Lord Ripon, who was President of the Board of Trade, left this place for the Board of Control, and Mr. Gladstone was appointed to the position, and thus became a member of the Cabinet at the age of thirty-three Mr. Gladstone now became in name what he had been already in fact--the President of the Board of Trade. He states that "the very first opinion which he was ever called upon to give in Cabinet" was an opinion in favor of withdrawing the bill providing education for children in factories; to which vehement opposition was offered by the Dissenters, on the ground that it was too favorable to the Established Church. It seemed that his position was assured and yet in October he wrote to a friend: "Uneasy, in my opinion, must be the position of every member of Parliament who thinks independently in these times, or in any that are likely to succeed them; and in proportion as a man's course of thought deviates from the ordinary lines his seat must less and less resemble a bed of roses." Mr. Gladstone possibly felt when he penned these lines that the time was at hand when his convictions would force him to take a position that would array against him some of his most ardent friends. During the session of 1844 Mr. Gladstone addressed the House on a variety of subjects, including rail ways, the law of partnership, the agricultural interest, the abolition of the corn laws, the Dissenters' Chapel Bill and the sugar duties. One very valuable bill he had carried was a measure for the abolition of restrictions on the exportation of machinery. Another was the railway bill, to improve the railway system, by which the Board of Trade had conditional power to purchase railways which had not adopted a revised scale of tolls. The bill also compulsorily provided for at least one third-class train per week-day upon every line of railway, to charge but one penny a mile, regulated the speed of traveling, compelled such trains to stop at every station, and arranged for the carrying of children under three years of age for nothing and those under twelve at reduced fares. This measure, conceived so distinctly in the interests of the poorer classes, met with considerable opposition at first from the various railway companies, but it was ultimately passed into law. These were measures passed in the spirit of reform, though by a Conservative government. There was another matter legislated upon which shows how Mr. Gladstone's mind was undergoing changes in the direction of religious toleration. Lady Hewley had originally founded and given to Calvinistic Independents certain charities which had gradually passed to Unitarians, who were ousted from their benefits. A bill was proposed to vest property left to Dissenting bodies in the hands of that religions body with whom it had remained for the preceding twenty years. The measure was passed, but when it was discussed in the House of Commons Mr. Gladstone said that it was a bill which it was incumbent upon the House to endorse; that there was no contrariety between his principles of religious belief and those on which legislation in this case ought to proceed; that there was a great question of justice, viz., whether those who were called Presbyterian Dissenters, and who were a century and a half ago of Trinitarian opinions, ought not to be protected at the present moment in possession of the chapels which they held, with the appurtenances of those chapels? On the question of substantial justice he pronounced the strongest affirmative opinion. "After this speech there were those who thought, and expressed their hope and belief in words, that the 'champion of Free Trade' would ere long become the advocate of the most unrestricted liberty in matters of religion. Their hope, if sanguine as to its immediate fulfillment, was far from groundless." However, in December of the same year Mr. Gladstone wrote to his friend Archdeacon, afterwards Bishop Wilberforce, about the prospects of the Church of England: "I rejoice to see that your views on the whole are hopeful. For my part I heartily go along with you. The fabric consolidates itself more and more, even while the earthquake rocks it; for, with a thousand drawbacks and deductions, love grows larger, zeal warmer, truth firmer among us. It makes the mind sad to speculate upon the question how much better all might have been; but our mourning should be turned into joy and thankfulness when we think also how much worse it _was_." The next event in the life of Mr. Gladstone is marked by a momentous change in his political position. Scarcely had Parliament met in January, 1845, when it was announced to the astonishment of everyone that Mr. Gladstone had resigned his place as President of the Board of Trade in the Cabinet. He set a good deal of speculation at rest by the announcement made in his speech on the address of the Queen, that his resignation was due solely to the government intentions with regard to Maynooth College. Before, however, he had resigned, Mr. Gladstone had completed a second and revised tariff, carrying further the principles of the revision of 1842. In the session of 1844 Sir Robert Peel, in response to the requests of Irish members, had promised that the Government would take up the question of academical education in Ireland, with the view of bringing it more nearly to the standard of England and Scotland, increasing its amount and improving its quality. In fulfillment of this pledge the government, at the beginning of the session of 1845, proposed to establish non-sectarian colleges in Ireland, and to increase the appropriation to Maynooth. The College of Maynooth, which was established for the education of Roman Catholic priests and laymen, had fallen into poverty and decay. In order to gratify the Irish, the government offered to increase the grant already made from $45,000 to $150,000 a year. This appropriation was not to be subject to any annual vote, and the affairs of the College were to be executed by the Board of Works. These proposals placed Mr. Gladstone in a position of great difficulty. He must either support Sir Robert Peel's measure, or retire from the Cabinet into isolation, if not subject to the imputation of eccentricity. He took council with his friends, Archdeacon Manning and Mr. Hope, who advised him to remain, and with Lord Stanley who warned him that his resignation must be followed by resistance of the proposals of the government, which would involve him in a storm of religious agitation. But Mr. Gladstone persisted in his intention, in what seemed like giving up his brilliant prospects, but said it would not necessarily be followed by resistance to the proposal about Maynooth. Mr. Gladstone said that the proposed increase in the Maynooth endowment and the establishment of non-sectarian colleges were at variance with views he had written and uttered upon the relations of the Church and State. "I am sensible how fallible my judgment is," said Mr. Gladstone, "and how easily I might have erred; but still it has been my conviction that although I was not to fetter my judgment as a member of Parliament by a reference to abstract theories, yet, on the other hand, it was absolutely due to the public and due to myself that I should, so far as in me lay, place myself in a position to form an opinion upon a matter of so great importance, that should not only be actually free from all bias or leaning with respect to any consideration whatsoever, but an opinion that should be unsuspected. On that account I have taken a course most painful to myself in respect to personal feelings, and have separated myself from men with whom and under whom I have long acted in public life, and of whom I am bound to say, although I have now no longer the honor of serving my most gracious Sovereign, that I continue to regard them with unaltered sentiments both of public regard and private attachment." Then again he said: "My whole purpose was to place myself in a position in which I should be free to consider any course without being liable to any just suspicion on the ground of personal interest. It is not profane if I now say, '_with a great price obtained I this freedom_.' The political association in which I stood was to me at the time the _alpha_ and _omega_ of public life. The government of Sir Robert Peel was believed to be of immovable strength. My place, as President of the Board of Trade, was at the very kernel of its most interesting operations; for it was in progress from year to year, with continually waxing courage, towards the emancipation of industry, and therein towards the accomplishment of another great and blessed work of public justice. Giving up what I highly prized, aware that male sarta Gratia nequicquam coit, et rescinditur. I felt myself open to the charge of being opinionated and wanting in deference to really great authorities, and I could not but know that I should inevitably be regarded as fastidious and fanciful, fitter for a dreamer, or possibly a schoolman, than for the active purposes of public life in a busy and moving age." There were some of his party angry and others who thought that there was something almost Quixotic in Mr. Gladstone's honorable resignation, because so soon as he felt himself free he gave his support to the Maynooth Bill and also to the scheme for the extension of academical education in Ireland, which latter was described by Sir R. Inglis as a "gigantic scheme of godless education." In Greville's "Memoirs" we find: "Gladstone's explanation is ludicrous. Everybody said that he had only succeeded in showing that his resignation was unnecessary. He was criticised as the possessor of a kind of supernatural virtue that could scarcely be popular with the slaves of party, and he was considered whimsical, fantastic, impracticable, a man whose 'conscience was so tender that he could not go straight,' a visionary not to be relied on--in fact, a character and intellect useless to the political manager." "I am greatly alarmed at Gladstone's resignation. I fear it foretells measures opposed to the Church truth," wrote Wilberforce; and Peel told Gladstone beforehand that his reasons for his resignation would be considered insufficient. But Mr. Gladstone's resignation, when understood, elicited the liveliest expressions of regret from friend and foe, as well as the most flattering testimonies as to his ability and character. His chief, Sir Robert Peel, and Lord John Russell, the leader of the Opposition, were alike complimentary in their remarks. Dr. Russell, the biographer of Mr. Gladstone, says: "Mr. Gladstone's retirement, by impairing his reputation for common sense, threatened serious and lasting injury to his political career, But the whirligig of time brought its revenges even more swiftly than usual. A conjunction of events arose in which he was destined to repair the mischief which the speculative side had wrought; but for the moment the speculative side was uppermost." Mr. Gladstone was fast leaving his Toryism behind. To show how far his views had changed in the course of seven years, it may be said that in his speech on these measures he observed how that exclusive support to the Established Church was a doctrine that was being more and more abandoned. Mr. Burke considered it contrary to wise policy to give exclusive privileges to a negative creed like that of Protestantism. They could not prove their religious scruples for denying this grant to Roman Catholics, because they gave their votes of money to almost every Dissenting seat. He hoped the concession now made--which was a great and liberal gift, because unrestricted and given in a spirit of confidence--would not lead to the renewal of agitation in Ireland by Mr. O'Connell. It might be well for him to reflect that agitation was a two-edged sword. Being conformable to justice and not contrary to principle, he hoped the measure proposed would pass into a law. W.T. Stead, in a recent article, said, in relation to Mr. Gladstone's retirement from the Cabinet, that "It is ridiculous to pretend, with Mr. Gladstone's career before us, that his course has been swayed by calculating self-interest. He has been the very madman of politics from the point of view of Mr. Worldly Wiseman. 'No man,' said he, the other day, 'has ever committed suicide so often as I,' and that witness is true. The first and perhaps the most typical of all his many suicides was his resignation of his seat in Sir Robert Peel's Cabinet, not because he disapproved of the Maynooth Grant, but because, as he had at one time written against it, he was determined that his advocacy of it should be purged of the last taint of self-interest. As Mr. George Russell rightly remarks, 'This was an act of Parliamentary Quixotism too eccentric to be intelligible. It argued a fastidious sensitiveness of conscience, and a nice sense of political propriety so opposed to the sordid selfishness and unblushing tergiversation of the ordinary place-hunter as to be almost offensive.' But as Mr. Gladstone was then, so he has been all his life--the very Quixote of conscience. Judged by every standard of human probability, he has ruined himself over and over and over again. He is always ruining himself, and always rising, like the Phoenix, in renewed youth from the ashes of his funeral pyre. As was said in homely phrase some years ago, he 'always keeps bobbing up again.' What is the secret of this wonderful capacity of revival? How is it that Mr. Gladstone seems to find even his blunders help him, and the affirmation of principles that seem to be destructive to all chance of the success of his policy absolutely helps him to its realization?" From a merely human standpoint it is inexplicable. But 'If right or wrong in this God's world of ours Be leagued with higher powers,' then the mystery is not so insolvable. He believed in the higher powers. He never shrank from putting his faith to the test; and on the whole, who can deny that for his country and for himself he has reason to rejoice in the verification of his working hypothesis? 'We walk by faith and not by sight,' he said once; 'and by no one so much as by those who are in politics is this necessary.' It is the evidence of things not seen, the eternal principles, the great invisible moral sanctions that men are wont to call the laws of God, which alone supply a safe guide through this mortal wilderness. 'Men of a thousand shifts and wiles, look here! See one straightforward conscience put in pawn To win a world; see the obedient sphere By bravery's simple gravitation drawn! Shall we not heed the lesson taught of old, And by the Present's lips repeated still? In our own single manhood to be bold, Fortressed in conscience and impregnable.' "Mr. Gladstone has never hesitated to counter at sharp right angles the passion and the fury of the day. Those who represent him as ever strong upon the strong side, wilfully shut their eyes to half his history. He challenged Lord Palmerston over the Don Pacifico question, and was believed to have wrecked himself almost as completely as when in 1876 he countered even more resolutely the fantastic Jingoism of Lord Beaconsfield. It is easy for those who come after and enter into the spoils gained by sacrifices of which they themselves were incapable to describe the Bulgarian agitation as an astute party move. The party did not think so. Its leaders did not think so. Some of those who now halloo loud enough behind Mr. Gladstone were then bitter enough in their complaint that he had wrecked his party. One at least, who was constrained to say the other thing in public, made up for it by bitter and contemptuous cavilings in private. Now it is easy to see that Lord Beaconsfield was mistaken and that Mr. Gladstone held the winning card all along. But no one knew it at the time when the card had to be played, certainly not Mr. Gladstone himself. He simply saw his duty a dead sure thing, and, like Jim Bludsoe on the burning boat, 'He went for it there and then.' It turned up trumps, but no one knew how heavy were the odds against it save those who went through the stress and the strain of that testing and trying time by his side." In the summer of 1845 Mr. Gladstone proposed to his intimate friend, Mr. J.R. Hope, that they should spend the month of September in a working tour in Ireland, giving evidence of his characteristic desire always to come in personal contact with any question that he had to discuss. He suggests "their eschewing all grandeur, and taking little account even of scenery, compared with the purpose of looking, from close quarters, at the institutions for religion and education of the country, and at the character of the people. It seems ridiculous to talk of supplying the defects of second-hand information by so short a trip; but although a longer time would be much better, yet even a very contracted one does much when it is added to an habitual, though indirect, knowledge." The projected trip, however, had to be abandoned. Towards the close of the year 1845 Mr. Gladstone issued a pamphlet entitled "Remarks upon recent Commercial Legislation," in which he not only discussed the salutary effects of the late commercial policy, but used arguments clearly showing that he was advancing to the position of a free-trader. His general conclusion was that English statesmen should use every effort to disburden of all charges, so far as the law was concerned, the materials of industry, and thus enable the workman to approach his work at home on better terms, as the terms in which he entered foreign markets were altered for the worse against him. While Mr. Gladstone was so willing to deal generously more than ever before with the Irish Roman Catholics, his confidence in the Established Episcopal Church of Ireland was growing less. "I am sorry," he wrote to Bishop Wilberforce, "to express my apprehension that the Irish Church is not in a large sense efficient; the working results of the last ten years have disappointed me. I may be answered, Have faith in the ordinance of God; but then I must see the seal and signature, and these, how can I separate from ecclesiastical descent? The title, in short, is questioned, and vehemently, not only by the Radicalism of the day, but by the Roman Bishops, who claim to hold succession of St. Patrick, and this claim has been alive all along from the Reformation, so that lapse of years does nothing against it." The name of Dr. Döllinger, the distinguished reformed Roman Catholic, has been mentioned already in connection with that of Mr. Gladstone. In the fall of 1845 Mr. Gladstone went to Munich and paid his first visit to Dr. Döllinger. For a week he remained in daily intercourse with this eminent divine, and the foundation was laid of a friendship which was sustained by repeated visits and correspondence, and which lasted until the doctor's death in 1890. In the winter of 1845 Mr. Gladstone met with a painful accident that resulted in a permanent injury to his hand. He was by no means what is termed a sportsman, yet he was somewhat fond of shooting. His gun was prematurely discharged while he was loading it, and shattered the first finger of his left hand, so that amputation was necessary. [Illustration: Loyal Ulster] CHAPTER VII MEMBER FOR OXFORD "Mr. Gladstone's career," says his biographer, G.W.E. Russell, "naturally divides itself into three parts. The first of them ends with his retirement from the representation of Newark. The central part ranges from 1847 to 1868. Happily the third is still incomplete." The first division, according to Dr. Russell, of this remarkable life, we have considered, and we now pass on to the development of the second period. The causes which led up to Mr. Gladstone's retirement from the representation for Newark to that of Oxford we will now proceed to trace. The agitation by the ablest orators against the corn laws had been going on for ten years, when an announcement was made in the "Times" of December 4, 1845, that Parliament would be convened the first week in January, and that the Queen's address would recommend the immediate consideration of the corn laws, preparatory to their total abolition. This startling news took the other daily papers by surprise, for there had been recently a lull in the agitation, and several of them contradicted it positively. Yet the newspapers had noticed the unusual occurrence of four cabinet meetings in one week. The original statement was confirmed. The ministry was pledged to support the measure. The hour had come, the doom of the corn laws was sealed. Mr. Gladstone's thoughts and labors for some years past had been leading him away from Protection, in which he had been brought up, in the direction of Free Trade; and although he was unable to participate in the last part of the struggle in Parliament, because he was not a member of the House, he was yet in harmony with Sir Robert Peel, and indeed is said to have converted the Premier to Free Trade views. Such a change of views was not the sudden impulse of an hour. The next step was to announce his changed convictions. And so upon other occasions in his life, his attitude on the question of the corn laws led to his separation from some old and greatly cherished political and personal friends, and among the first to disapprove of his new departure must have been his own father, who would think his son was going to ruin the country. The Duke of Buccleuch and Lord Stanley informed Sir Robert Peel that they could not support a measure for the repeal of the corn laws, and Sir Robert Peel, being doubtful whether he could carry through the proposed measure in the face of such opposition, tendered his resignation as premier to the Queen. Lord John Russell was called upon to form a new ministry, but, having failed in this, the Queen desired Sir Robert Peel to withdraw his resignation, and resume the head of the government again. It was found when the list of the new Peel Cabinet was published, that Mr. Gladstone was a member of it; having accepted the office of Colonial Secretary, in the place of Lord Stanley, who had resigned because not in sympathy with the proposed movement and of repeal. Accepting office in a ministry pledged to repeal the corn laws led to the retirement of Mr. Gladstone from the House of Commons as the representative for Newark. The Duke of New Castle, the patron and friend of Mr. Gladstone, was an ardent Protectionist, and could not sanction the candidature of a supporter of Free Trade principles. His patronage was therefore necessarily withdrawn from Mr. Gladstone. Indeed, the Duke had turned his own son, Lord Lincoln, out of the representation of Nottinghamshire for accepting office under Sir Robert Peel, and he naturally showed no mercy to the brilliant but wayward politician, whom his favor had made member for Newark. Besides, Mr. Gladstone felt he held opposite principles from those he held when elected, and that unless the constituency had changed with him, he could no longer honorably continue to represent them, even if the influence and friendship of the Duke permitted it. Accordingly he did not offer himself for re-election, but retired and issued an address to the electors of Newark, dated January 5, 1846, of which the following is an extract: "By accepting the office of Secretary of State for the Colonies, I have ceased to be your representative in Parliament. On several accounts I should have been peculiarly desirous at the present time of giving you an opportunity to pronounce your constitutional judgment on my public conduct, by soliciting at your hands a renewal of the trust which I have already received from you on five successive occasions, and held during a period of thirteen years. But as I have good reason to believe that a candidate recommended to your favor through local connections may ask your suffrages, it becomes my very painful duty to announce to you on that ground alone my retirement from a position which has afforded me so much of honor and of satisfaction." Mr. Gladstone further goes on to explain that he accepted office because he held that "it was for those who believed the Government was acting according to the demands of public duty to testify that belief, however limited their sphere might be, by their co-operation." He had acted "in obedience to the clear and imperious call of public obligation." It was in this way that Mr. Gladstone became a voluntary exile from the House of Commons during this important season, and took no part in the debates, his personal powerful advocacy being lost in the consideration of the great measure before the House. He was a member of the Cabinet, but not of the House of Commons. It was no secret, however, that he was the most advanced Free Trader in the Peel Cabinet, and that the policy of the government in regard to this great measure of 1846 was to a large extent moulded by him. It is also known that his representations of the effects of Free Trade on the industry of the country and the general well-being of the people strengthened the Premier in his resolve to sweep away the obnoxious corn laws. His pamphlet on recent commercial legislation had prepared the way for the later momentous changes; and to Mr. Gladstone is due much of the credit for the speedy consummation of the Free Trade policy of the Peel Ministry. Mr. Gladstone may be regarded as the pioneer of the movement. Just at this time a calamity occurred in Ireland which furnished Sir Robert Peel an additional argument for the prompt repeal of the corn laws; namely, a prospective famine, owing to the failure of the potato crop. With threatened famine in Ireland, such as had never been experienced, the Prime Minister saw clearly that corn must be admitted into the country free of duty. The Anti-Corn Law League was growing powerful and even irresistible, while both in England and Ireland many landlords of influence, who did not belong to the League, were in sympathy with the movement started by the Premier and ready to extend to him a hearty support. But the friends of Protection did not leave the Premier without opposition. Knowing that Sir Robert Peel's personal influence was greater than that of any minister who had "virtually governed the empire," they used every means at their command, fair and unfair, to defeat the bill. However, their efforts were destined to failure. Some contended that the presentation and passage of the corn law repeal bill ought to be left to the Liberals. But Free Trade had not received the support of every member of the Liberal party, and Sir Robert Peel was in a position to carry out the measure, and it was not in accordance with the wisdom of practical politics to halt. Indeed, at this very juncture, Mr. Cobden wrote to the Premier that he had the power, and that it would be disastrous to the country for him to hesitate. Writing from Edinburgh, Lord John Russell announced his conversion to total and immediate repeal of the corn laws. Sir Robert Peel hesitated no longer, but, feeling that the crisis had arrived, determined to grapple with it. It was duty to country before and above fancied loyalty to party to be considered. It is strange what remedies some men deem sensible, suggested to prevent famine in Ireland. "Obviously the Government was in difficulties. What those difficulties were it was not hard to guess. In the previous autumn it had become known that, after a long season of sunless wet, the potatoes had everywhere been attacked by an obscure disease. The failure of this crop meant an Irish famine. The steps suggested to meet this impending calamity were strange enough. The head of the English peerage recommended the poor to rely on curry-powder as a nutritious and satisfying food. Another duke thought that the government could show no favor to a population almost in a state of rebellion, but that individuals might get up a subscription. A noble lord, harmonizing materialism and faith, urged the government to encourage the provision of salt fish, and at the same time to appoint a day of public acknowledgment of our dependence on Divine goodness. The council of the Royal Agricultural Society, numbering some of the wealthiest noblemen and squires in England, were not ashamed to lecture the laborers on the sustaining properties of thrice-boiled bones." When Parliament assembled the Premier entered into an explanation of the late ministerial crisis, and unfolded his projected plans. He said that the failure of the potato crop had led to the dissolution of the late government, that matters now could brook no further delay; that prompt action must now be taken on the Corn Laws; that the progress of reason and truth demanded it; that his opinions on the subject of Protection had undergone a great change; that the experience of the past three years confirmed him in his new views; that he could not conceal the knowledge of his convictions, however much it might lay him open to the charge of inconsistency; that, though accused of apathy and neglect, he and his colleagues were even then engaged in the most extensive and arduous inquiries into the true state of Ireland; and that, as these inquiries progressed, he has been forced to the conclusion that the protection policy was unsound and consequently untenable. It is worthy of note that Mr. Disraeli, the future Parliamentary rival of Mr. Gladstone, took part, as a member of the House of Commons, in the discussion of the question under consideration. The following words show his attitude: "To the opinions which I have expressed in this House in favor of Protection I adhere. They sent to this House, and if I had relinquished them I should have relinquished my seat also." "It would be an unprofitable talk," writes Barnett Smith, "to unravel the many inconsistencies of Lord Beaconsfield's career; but with regard to this deliverance upon Protection, the curious in such matters may turn back to the records of 1842, when they will discover that at that time he was quite prepared to advocate measures of a Free Trade character. But we must pass on from this important question of the Corn Laws, with the angry controversy to which it gave rise. Sir Robert Peel brought forward his measure, and after lengthened debate in both Houses, it became law, and grain was admitted into English ports under the new tariff." After all their success in carrying through the important Corn Law Repeal scheme, the ministry of Sir Robert Peel was doomed to fall upon an Irish question. The very day that brought their victory in the passage of the Corn Law Repeal Act in the House of Lords saw the defeat of the ministry in the House of Commons on their bill for the suppression of outrage in Ireland. Sir Robert Peel found himself in a minority of 73 and therefore tendered his resignation. It was accepted and Sir Robert Peel went out of office forever. Lord John Russell was sent for by the Queen, and he succeeded in forming a Whig Ministry. Mr. Gladstone's return to the Cabinet of Sir Robert Peel, as we have seen, cost him his seat in the House of Commons. It was not until the brief session of 1847, that he appeared again in Parliament. The Queen dissolved Parliament in person, July, 23d. The election succeeding turned in many instances upon ecclesiastical questions, and especially upon the Maynooth grant. It was announced early in 1847 that one of the two members of the House of Commons for the University of Oxford intended to retire at the next general election. Mr. Canning had pronounced the representation of the university as the most coveted prize of public life, and Mr. Gladstone himself confessed that he "desired it with an almost passionate fondness." Mr. Gladstone, as a graduate of Oxford, was looked upon not only by his contemporaries, but by his seniors and those who came after him, with feelings of enthusiastic admiration. The feeling then was reciprocal, and he was proposed for the vacant seat. Sir R.N. Inglis was secure in his seat, and so the contest lay between Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Round, who was of the ultra-Protestant and Tory school. The contest excited the keenest interest and was expected on all hands to be very close. Mr. Gladstone in his address to the electors of his _Alma Mater_ confessed that in the earlier part of his public life he had been an advocate for the exclusive support of the national religion of the state, but it had been in vain; the time was against him. He said: "I found that scarcely a year passed without the adoption of some fresh measure involving the national recognition and the national support of various forms of religion, and, in particular, that a recent and fresh provision had been made for the propagation from a public chair of Arian or Socinian doctrines. The question remaining for me was whether, aware of the opposition of the English people, I should set down as equal to nothing, in a matter primarily connected not with our own but with their priesthood, the wishes of the people of Ireland; and whether I should avail myself of the popular feeling in regard to the Roman Catholics for the purpose of enforcing against them a system which we had ceased by common consent to enforce against Arians--a system, above all, of which I must say that it never can be conformable to policy, to justice or even to decency, when it has become avowedly partial and one-sided in its application." This address intensified the determination of those opposed to Mr. Gladstone to defeat him. A great portion of the press was, however, in his favor. Some of the journals that were enthusiastic for Mr. Gladstone were very bitter against Mr. Round. Mr. Gladstone's distinguished talent and industry were lauded, as well as his earnest attachment to the Church of England. He had, however, renounced the exclusiveness of his politico-ecclesiastical principles, and no longer importuned Parliament to ignore all forms of religion but those established by law, or which were exactly coincident with his own belief. "His election," declared one journal, "unlike that of Mr. Round, while it sends an important member to the House of Commons, will certainly be creditable, and may be valuable to the university; and we heartily hope that no negligence or hesitation among his supporters may impede his success." Even outside of church circles the election was regarded with great interest. The nomination took place July 29th. After the usual ceremony, the voting commenced in convocation-house, which was densely crowded. So great was the pressure of the throng that men fainted and had to be carried out. Mr. Coleridge, afterward Lord Coleridge, was the secretary of Mr. Gladstone's committee. Distinguished men, among them Sir Robert Peel, his colleague in the Cabinet, came from a great distance to "plump" for Mr. Gladstone. The venerable Dr. Routh, then nearly ninety-two years old, came forth from his retirement at Magdalen College to vote for him. Mrs. Gladstone, according to Mr. Hope-Scott, was an indefatigable canvasser for her husband. At the close of the poll the vote stood: Inglis, 1700; Gladstone, 997; Round, 824. Of course Sir Robert Inglis, with his "prehistoric Toryism," stood at the head. To the supporters of Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Round must be added 154 who were paired. Mr. Gladstone received a majority of 173 over his ultra-Protestant opponent. The total number of those polled exceeded that registered at any previous election, showing the intense and general interest in the result. This period of Mr. Gladstone's life has been very properly styled by one of his biographers, as the transition period. "On one side the Conservative Free-trader clings fondly and tenaciously to the Toryism of his youth, on another, he is reaching out toward new realms of Liberal thought and action. He opposes marriage with a deceased wife's sister on theological and social grounds, asserting roundly that such marriage is 'contrary to the law of God, declared for three thousand years and upwards.' He deprecates the appointment of a Commission to enquire into the Universities, because it will deter intending benefactors from effecting their munificent intentions. He argues for a second chamber in Australian legislatures, citing, perhaps a little unfortunately, the constitutional example of contemporary France. In all these utterances it is not hard to read the influence of the traditions in which he was reared, or of the ecclesiastical community which he represents in Parliament. "Yet even in the theological domain a tendency towards Liberalism shows itself. His hatred of Erastianism is evinced by his gallant but unsuccessful attempt to secure for the clergy and laity of each colonial diocese the power of self-government. Amid the indignant protests of his Tory allies, and in opposition to his own previous speech and vote, he vindicates the policy of admitting the Jews to Parliament. He defends the establishment of diplomatic relations with the Court of Rome; he supports the alteration of the parliamentary oath; and, though he will not abet an abstract attack on Church Rates, he contends that their maintainance involves a corresponding duty to provide accommodation in the church for the very poorest of the congregation. "On the commercial side his Liberalism is rampant. With even fanatical faith he clings to Free Trade as the best guarantee for our national stability amid the crash of the dynasties and constitutions which went down in '48. He thunders against the insidious dangers of reciprocity. He desires, by reforming the laws which govern navigation, to make the ocean, 'that great highway of nations, as free to the ships that traverse its bosom as to the winds that sweep it.' "And so the three years--1847, 1848, 1849--rolled by, full of stirring events in Europe and in England, in Church and in State, but marked by no special incidents in the life of Mr. Gladstone. For him these years were a period of mental growth, of transition, of development. A change was silently proceeding, which was not completed for twenty years, if, indeed, it has been completed yet. 'There have been,' he wrote in later days to Bishop Wilberforce, 'two great deaths, or transmigrations of spirit, in my political existence--one, very slow, the breaking of ties with my original party.' This was now in progress. The other will be narrated in due course." One of the features of the general election of 1847 that excited the wildest popular comment was the election of Baron Rothschild for the City of London. There was nothing illegal in the election of a Jew, but he was virtually precluded from taking his seat in the House of Commons, because the law required every member to subscribe not only to the Christian religion, but to the Protestant Episcopal faith. To obviate this difficulty, Lord John Russell, soon after Parliament assembled, offered a resolution affirming the eligibility of Jews to all functions and offices to which Roman Catholics were admissible by law. Sir R.H. Inglis opposed the resolution and Mr. Gladstone, his colleague, supported it. Mr. Gladstone inquired whether there were any grounds for the disqualification of the Jews which distinguished them from any other classes in the community. They contended for a "Christian Parliament, but the present measure did not make severance between politics and religion, it only amounted to a declaration that there was no necessity for excluding a Jew, as such, from an assembly in which every man felt sure that a vast and overwhelming majority of its members would always be Christian. It was said that by admitting a few Jews they would un-Christianize Parliament; that was true in word, but not in substance." He had no doubt that the majority of the members who composed it would always perform their obligations on the true faith of a Christian. It was too late to say that the measure was un-Christian, and that it would call down the vengeance of heaven. When he opposed the last law of the removal of Jewish disabilities, he foresaw that if he gave the Jew municipal, magisterial and executive functions, we could not refuse him legislative functions any longer. "The Jew was refused entrance into the House because he would then be a maker of the law; but who made the maker of the law? The constituencies; and into these constituencies had been admitted the Jews. Now were the constituencies Christian constituencies? If they were, was it probable that the Parliament would cease to be a Christian Parliament?" Mr. Gladstone admitted the force of the prayer in Bishop Wilberforce's petition, that in view of this concession measures should be taken to give greater vigor to the Church, and thus operate to the prevention of an organic change in the relations between Church and State. In concluding his defence of Lord John Russell's resolution Mr. Gladstone expressed the opinion that if they admitted Jews into Parliament, prejudice might be awakened for awhile, but the good sense of the people would soon allay it, and members would have the consolation of knowing that in case of difficulty they had yielded to a sense of justice, and by so doing had not disparaged religion or lowered Christianity, but rather had elevated both in all reflecting and well-regulated minds. The logic of this speech could not be controverted, though Mr. Newdegate declared that Mr. Gladstone would never have gained his election for the University of Oxford had his sentiments on the Jewish question been then known. The resolution of Lord John Russell was carried by a large majority, whereupon he announced first a resolution, and then a bill, in accordance with its terms. The year 1848 was a year of excitement and revolution. All Europe was in a state of agitation, and France by a new revolution presented another one of her national surprises. The news of a revolution in France caused the greatest perturbation throughout England, and disturbances in the capital of the country. Great demonstrations were made at Trafalgar Square and Charing Cross, March 6th, but the meetings assumed more of a burlesque than of a serious character. In Glasgow and other parts of the country there were serious riots. Shops were sacked, and the military was called out to quell the disturbance, which was not effected until the soldiers fired with fatal results upon the rioters. There were uprisings and mob violence also at Manchester, Edinburgh, Newcastle, but they were of a less formidable character. A Chartist meeting was held on Kennington Common, March 13th, but, though the meeting had been looked forward to with great apprehensions by all lovers of law and order, yet it passed off without the serious results anticipated. Though great preparations were made in view of the demonstration, yet, fortunately it passed off without loss of life. The meeting however had furnished a pretext for the gathering of a lawless mob, although but few were politically concerned in it. It was deemed necessary, to provide against every emergency, so special constables in great numbers were sworn in previous to the meetings, and it is interesting to observe that amongst the citizens who came forward in London to enroll themselves as preservers of the peace of society were William Ewart Gladstone, the Duke of Norfolk, the Earl of Derby, and Prince Louis Napoleon, afterwards Emperor of France. The people were becoming dissatisfied with the government of the country, particularly with its financial measures. A deficiency of two million pounds appeared, and additional taxation would be necessary owing to the Caffre War. It was therefore proposed to continue the income tax for five years and increase it slightly. Owing to the distress in Ireland it was not proposed to extend the operation of this measure to that country. The property tax was defended on the same principles laid down by Mr. Pitt, and in 1842, by Sir Robert Peel. But this scheme was bitterly opposed and many attributed the depressed condition of the finances to free trade. Sir Robert Peel decided to support the proposed tax for three years. Mr. Disraeli desired the success of Sir Robert Peel's policy, and described himself as a "free-trader, but not a free-booter of the Manchester school;" and he dubbed the blue-book of the Import Duties Committee "the greatest work of imagination that the nineteenth century has produced." He said that the government, by acting upon it, and taking it for a guide, resembled a man smoking a cigar on a barrel of gunpowder. This epigrammatic speech of Mr. Disraeli brought Mr. Gladstone to his feet. He said, by way of introduction, that he could not hope to sustain the lively interest created by the remarkable speech of his predecessor--a display to which he felt himself unequal--he would pass over the matters of a personal description touched upon by the honorable gentleman, and confine himself to defending the policy which had been assailed. Mr. Gladstone then demonstrated, by a series of elaborate statistics, the complete success of Sir Robert Peel's policy. He also said, that the confidence of the public would be greatly shaken by an adverse vote, and he alluded to the unsettled condition of affairs in the Cabinet. "I am sure," said Mr. Gladstone, "that this House of Commons will prove itself to be worthy of the Parliaments which preceded it, worthy of the Sovereign which it has been called to advise, and worthy of the people which it has been chosen to represent, by sustaining this nation, and enabling it to stand firm in the midst of the convulsions that shake European society; by doing all that pertains to us for the purpose of maintaining social order, the stability of trade, and the means of public employment; and by discharging our consciences, on our own part, under the difficult circumstances of the crisis, in the perfect trust that if we set a good example to the nations--for whose interests we are appointed to consult--they, too, will stand firm as they have in other times of almost desperate emergency; and that through their good sense, their moderation, and their attachment to the institutions of the country, we shall see these institutions still exist, a blessing and a benefit to prosperity, whatever alarms and whatever misfortunes may unfortunately befall other portions of civilized Europe." "It was fortunate for the future interests of the country," says Dr. Smith, his biographer, "that the proposals of the government were at this juncture supported by a great majority of the House of Commons. In a moment of unreasoning panic there was some danger of the adoption of a reactionary policy--a step that would have lost to the country those blessings which it subsequently enjoyed as the outcome of Free Trade." May 15, Mr. Labouchere, President of the Board of Trade, proposed a plan for the modification of the navigation laws. Reserving the coasting trade and fisheries of Great Britain and the Colonies, it was proposed "to throw open the whole navigation of the country, of every sort and description." But the Queen claimed the right of putting such restrictions as she saw fit upon the navigation of foreign countries, if those countries did not meet England on equal terms; and that each colony should be allowed to throw open its coasting trade to foreign countries. Mr. Gladstone made a lengthy speech, examining closely the operation of existing laws, and showing the necessity for their repeal. With regard to the power claimed by the Queen in Council, with a view to enforcing reciprocity, Mr. Gladstone said, "I confess it appears to me there is a great objection to conferring such a power as that which is proposed to be given to the Queen in Council." He contended also for a gradual change in the laws. The policy of excluding the coasting trade from the measure he also condemned. "It would have been much more frank to have offered to admit the Americans to our coasting trade if they would admit us to theirs." If England and America concurred in setting an example to the world, he hoped we should "live to see the ocean, that great highway of nations, as free to the ships that traverse its bosom as the winds that sweep it. England would then have achieved another triumph, and have made another powerful contribution to the prosperity of mankind." The bill was postponed until the following year. During the session of 1848 Mr. Gladstone spoke upon the proposed grant of Vancouver's Island to the Hudson's Bay Company; and upon the Sugar Duties Bill; but the most important speech delivered by him at that time was upon a measure to legalize diplomatic relations with the Court of Rome. It was objected that thus recognizing the spiritual governor of Rome and of all the Roman Catholic population of the world, would neither conciliate the affections of the Protestants, nor satisfy the wishes of the Roman Catholics, who had denounced it strongly to the Pope. Mr. Gladstone took broad and comprehensive views of the question. To some features of the Bill he was opposed, but was in favor of its principle. It was unfortunate as to time, owing to the condition of affairs in Italy. England must take one of two positions. If she declined political communication with the See of Rome, she had no right to complain of any steps which the Pope might take with respect to the administration of his own ecclesiastical affairs; but an act so directly in contravention of the laws of the land as the partitioning of the country into archbishoprics and bishoprics was a most unfortunate proceeding; wrong because it was generally and justly offensive to the feelings of the people of England, and totally unnecessary, as he believed, for Roman Catholic purposes, but also because it ill assorted with the grounds on which the Parliament was invited by the present bill to establish definite relations with the See of Rome. For one hundred years after the Reformation the Pope was actually in arms for the purpose of recovering by force his lost dominions in this country. It was only natural, therefore, that we should have prohibited relations with the See of Rome when it attacked the title of the Sovereign of these realms, but there was no such reason for continuing the prohibition at the present moment. Those who have studied Mr. Gladstone's career carefully attest that this speech would have been impossible from his lips ten years before the time it was delivered; and early in the next session of Parliament he delivered another speech which furnishes us an example of the growth of his liberal views in matters of conscience. Lord John Russell proposes further relief upon the matter of oaths to be taken by members of Parliament. Mr. Gladstone said that the civil political claims of the Jew should not be barred, and he deprecated the tendency to degenerate formalism in oaths, but he was glad that the words, "on the true faith of a Christian" in respect to all Christian members of the House of Commons had been retained. He also, later in the session, favored correcting the enormous evils growing out of the Church rate system, with taxation of all the further support of the State Church. He did not believe in imposing an uncompensated burden upon any man. Every man contributing his quota was entitled to demand a free place in the house of his Maker. "But the centre and best parts of the Church were occupied by pews exclusively for the middle classes, while the laboring classes were jealously excluded from almost every part of light and hearing in the Churches, and were treated in a manner most painful to reflect upon." When Mr. Labouchere re-introduced the ministerial bill for the repeal of the Navigation Laws, in the session of 1849, Mr. Gladstone supported generally the measure in a full and exhaustive speech. He favored the bill with certain modifications. The Marquis of Granby expressed fears at the consequences of the change proposed, and Mr. Gladstone answered him: "The noble Marquis," he observed, "desired to expel the vapours and exhalations that had been raised with regard to the principle of political economy, and which vapours and exhalations I find for the most part in the fears with which those changes are regarded. The noble Marquis consequently hoped that the Trojan horse would not be allowed to come within the walls of Parliament. But however applicable the figures may be to other plans, it does not, I submit, apply to the mode of proceeding I venture to recommend to the House, because we follow the precedent of what Mr. Huskisson did before us. Therefore more than one moiety of the Trojan horse has already got within the citadel--it has been there for twenty-five years, and yet what has proceeded from its bowels has only tended to augment the rate of increase in the progress of your shipping. Therefore, let us not be alarmed by vague and dreamy ratiocinations of evil, which had never been wanting on any occasion, and which never will be wanting so long as this is a free State, wherein every man can find full vent and scope for the expression, not only of his principles, but of his prejudices and his fears. Let us not be deterred by those apprehensions from giving a calm and serious examination to this question, connected as it is with the welfare of our country. Let us follow steadily the light of experience, and be convinced that He who preserved us during the past will also be sufficient to sustain us during all the dangers of the future." Mr. Disraeli seized the opportunity to make a caustic speech, in which he fiercely attacked both Mr. Labouchere and Mr. Gladstone, and alluded sarcastically to their "great sacrifices," and said that the latter was about to give up that good development of the principle of reciprocity which the House had waited for with so much suspense. Mr. Gladstone replied, "I am perfectly satisfied to bear his sarcasm, good humoured and brilliant as it is, while I can appeal to his judgment as to whether the step I have taken was unbecoming in one who conscientiously differs with him on the freedom of trade, and has endeavoured to realize it; because, so far from its being the cause of the distress of the country, it has been, under the mercy of God, the most signal and effectual means of mitigating this distress, and accelerating the dawn of the day of returning prosperity." Mr. Gladstone spoke also during the session upon the subject of Colonial Reform which came before the House on several occasions, and especially in connection with riots in Canada; and on a bill for the removal of legal restrictions against marriage with a deceased wife's sister. He opposed the latter measure upon theological, social, and moral grounds, and begged the House to repeat the almost entire sentiment of the country respecting the bill. To do otherwise would be to inflict upon the Church the misfortune of having anarchy introduced among its ministers. He hoped they would do all that in them lay to maintain the strictness of the obligations of marriage, and the purity of the hallowed sphere of domestic life. The bill was rejected. In the Parliamentary session of 1850 one of the chief topics of discussion was the great depression of the agricultural interests of the country. The country was at peace, the revenues were in a good condition, foreign trade had increased, but the farmers still made loud complaints of the disastrous condition, which they attributed to free-trade measures, which they contended had affected the whole of the agricultural interests. Consequently, February 19th, Mr. Disraeli moved for a committee of the whole House to consider such a revision of the Poor Laws of the United Kingdom as might mitigate the distress of the agricultural classes. Some thought that this was a movement against free-trade, but Mr. Gladstone courted the fullest investigation, and seeing no danger in the motion, voted for it. However, the motion of Mr. Disraeli was lost. Mr. Gladstone likewise favored the extension of the benefits of Constitutional government to certain of the colonies,--for example as set forth in the Australian Colonies Government Bill; and twice during the session he addressed the House on questions connected with slavery, and upon motion of Mr. Haywood for an inquiry into the state of the English and Irish universities, and the government unexpectedly gave their consent to the issuing of a Royal Commission for the purpose. Mr. Gladstone said that any person who might be deliberating with himself whether he would devote a portion of his substance for prosecuting the objects of learning, civilization and religion, would be checked by the prospect that at any given time, and under any given circumstances, a minister, who was the creature of a political majority, might institute a state inquiry into the mode in which the funds he might devise were administered. It was not wise to discourage eleemosynary establishments. It would be better for the Crown to see what could be done to improve the colleges by administering existing laws. In reviewing the past ten years we exclaim, truly has the period from 1841 to 1850, in the political life of Mr. Gladstone, been called a memorable decade. It was in the year 1850, as we have seen, that the Gladstones were plunged into domestic sorrow by the death of their little daughter, Catharine Jessy; and it was this same year that brought to Mr. Gladstone another grief from a very different source. This second bereavement was caused by the withdrawal of two of his oldest and most intimate friends, the Archdeacon of Chichester and Mr. J.R. Hope, from the Protestant Episcopal Church of England and their union with the Roman Catholic Church. Mr. Hope, who became Hope-Scott on succeeding to the estate of Abbotsford, was the gentleman who helped Mr. Gladstone in getting through the press his book on Church and State, revising, correcting and reading proof. The Archdeacon, afterwards Cardinal Manning, had, from his undergraduate days, exercised a powerful influence over his contemporaries. He was gifted with maturity of intellect and character, had great shrewdness, much tenacity of will, a cogent, attractive style, combined with an impressive air of authority, to which the natural advantages of person and bearing added force. Besides having these qualifications for leadership, he had fervid devotion, enlarged acquaintance with life and men, and an "unequalled gift of administration;" though a priest, he was essentially a statesman, and had at one time contemplated a political career. He was Mr. Gladstone's most trusted counsellor and most intimate friend. The cause, or rather occasion for these secessions from the Church of England to the Church of Rome, is thus related: "An Evangelical clergyman, the Rev. G.C. Gorham, had been presented to a living in the diocese of Exeter; and that truly formidable prelate, Bishop Phillpotts, refused to institute him, alleging that he held heterodox views on the subject of Holy Baptism. After complicated litigation, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council decided, on March 8, 1850, that the doctrine held by the incriminated clergyman was not such as to bar him from preferment in the Church of England. This decision naturally created great commotion in the Church. Men's minds were rudely shaken. The orthodoxy of the Church of England seemed to be jeopardized, and the supremacy of the Privy Council was in a matter touching religious doctrine felt to be an intolerable burden." Mr. Gladstone, as well as others, was profoundly agitated by these events, and June 4th he expressed his views in a letter to Dr. Blomfield, Bishop of London. The theme of his letter was, "The Royal Supremacy, viewed in the light of Reason, History and the Constitution." He contended that the Royal Supremacy, as settled at the Reformation, was not inconsistent with the spiritual life and inherent jurisdiction of the Church, but the recent establishment of the Privy Council as the ultimate court of appeal in religious causes was "an injurious and even dangerous departure from the Reformation settlement." In this letter Mr. Gladstone said, in summing up: "I find it no part of my duty, my lord, to idolize the Bishops of England and Wales, or to place my conscience in their keeping. I do not presume or dare to speculate upon their particular decisions; but I say that, acting jointly, publicly, solemnly, responsibly, they are the best and most natural organs of the judicial office of the Church in matters of heresy, and, according to reason, history and the constitution, in that subject-matter the fittest and safest counsellors of the Crown." But this view regarding the Church of England did not suit some minds, and among them the two friends with whom Mr. Gladstone had, up to this time, acted in religious matters. These troubles in the Church so powerfully affected them that they withdrew. The following quotation shows Mr. Gladstone's firmness in regard to his own choice of the Protestant Christianity over and above Catholicism, In a letter, written in 1873, to Mrs. Maxwell-Scott, of Abbotsford, the daughter of his friend Hope, he thus writes of an interview had with her father: "It must have been about this time that I had another conversation with him about religion, of which, again, I exactly recollect the spot. Regarding (forgive me) the adoption of the Roman religion by members of the Church of England as nearly the greatest calamity that could befall Christian faith in this country, I rapidly became alarmed when these changes began; and very long before the great luminary, Dr. Newman, drew after him, it may well be said, 'the third part of the stars of Heaven.' This alarm I naturally and freely expressed to the man upon whom I most relied, your father." [Illustration: Gladstone in Wales; addressing a meeting at the foot of Snowden] CHAPTER VIII THE NEAPOLITAN PRISONS In considering Mr. Gladstone's exposure of the cruelties practiced in the prisons of Naples, we are confronted with his attitude in the House of Commons just before, in a case where the same principles seemed to be involved, and in which Mr. Gladstone took the directly opposite course. We refer to the Don Pacifico case. Both were at first merely personal questions, but finally became international. Mr. Gladstone to many appeared to take an inconsistent course in these seemingly similar cases, in that while opposing national intervention in the affairs of Don Pacifico, he tried to stir up all Europe for the relief of the sufferers in the Neapolitan prisons. "It is not a little remarkable that the statesman who had so lately and so vigorously denounced the 'vain conception that we, forsooth, have a mission to be the censors of vice and folly, of abuse and imperfection, among the other countries of the world,' should now have found himself irresistibly impelled by conscience and humanity to undertake a signal and effective crusade against the domestic administration of a friendly power." The most memorable debate in the new chamber of the House of Commons, which was first occupied in 1850, was that associated with the name of Don Pacifico. It is however conceded that the circumstances from which it all proceeded were comparatively trivial in the extreme. Don Pacifico was a Maltese Jew and a British subject, dwelling at Athens. He had made himself distasteful to the people of Athens, and consequently his house was destroyed and robbed by a mob, April 4, 1847. He appealed to the government at Athens for redress, demanding over $150,000 indemnity for the loss of his property, among which "a peculiarly sumptuous bedstead figured largely." Don Pacifico's claim was unheeded, probably because it was exorbitant and the Greek government was poor. Lord Palmerston was then the Foreign Secretary of the English Government. He was rash and independent in his Foreign policy, and often acted, as the Queen complained, without consultation and without the authority of the Sovereign. The Foreign Secretary had had other quarrels with the Government at Athens. Land belonging to an English resident in Athens had been seized without sufficient compensation; Ionian subjects of the English Crown had suffered hardships at the hands of the Greek authorities, and an English Midshipman had been arrested by mistake. Lord Palmerston looked upon these incidents, slight as they were in themselves, as indicative of a plot on the part of the French Minister against the English, and especially as the Greek Government was so dilatory in satisfying the English claims. "This was enough. The outrage on Don Pacifico's bedstead remained the head and front of Greek offending, but Lord Palmerston included all the other slight blunders and delays of justice in one sweeping indictment; made the private claims into a national demand, and peremptorily informed the Greek Government that they must pay what was demanded of them within a given time. The Government hesitated, and the British fleet was ordered to the Piraeus, and seized all the Greek vessels which were found in the waters. Russia and France took umbrage at this high-handed proceeding and championed Greece. Lord Palmerston informed them it was none of their business and stood firm. The French Ambassador was withdrawn from London, and for awhile the peace of Europe was menaced." The execution of the orders of Lord Palmerston was left with Admiral Sir William Parker, who was first to proceed to Athens with the English fleet, and failing to obtain satisfaction was to blockade the Piraeus, which instructions he faithfully obeyed. The debate began in Parliament June 24, 1850. The stability of the Whig administration, then in power, depended upon the results. In the House of Lords, Lord Stanley moved a resolution, which was carried, expressing regret that "various claims against the Greek Government, doubtful in point of justice and exaggerated in amount, have been enforced by coercive measures, directed against the commerce and people of Greece, and calculated to endanger the continuance of our friendly relations with foreign powers." A counter-resolution was necessary in the House of Commons to offset the action of the Lords, so a Radical, Mr. Roebuck, much to the surprise of many, came to the defense of the Government and offered the following motion, which was carried: "That the principles which have hitherto regulated the foreign policy of Her Majesty's Government are such as were required to preserve untarnished the honor and dignity of this country, and, in times of unexampled difficulty, the best calculated to maintain peace between England and the various nations of the world." The debate which followed, and which was prolonged over four nights, was marked on both sides by speeches of unusual oratorical power and brilliancy. The speeches of Lord Palmerston, Sir Robert Peel, Mr. Cockburn, Mr. Cobden, Mr. Disraeli and Mr. Gladstone were pronounced as remarkable orations. Sir Robert Peel made a powerful speech against the Ministers, which was made memorable not only for its eloquence, but because it was his last. Lord Palmerston defended himself vigorously in a speech of five hours' duration. "He spoke," said Mr. Gladstone, "from the dusk of one day to the dawn of the next." He defended his policy at every point. In every step taken he had been influenced by the sole desire that the meanest, the poorest, even the most disreputable subject of the English Crown should be defended by the whole might of England against foreign oppression. He reminded them of all that was implied in the Roman boast, _Civis Romanus sum_, and urged the House to make it clear that a British subject, in whatever land he might be, should feel confident that the watchful eye and the strong arm of England could protect him. This could not be resisted. _Civis Romanus sum_ settled the question. Mr. Gladstone's reply was a masterpiece. It was exhaustive and trenchant, and produced a great effect. He first spoke upon the position of the Government and the constitutional doctrines which they had laid down in regard to it, and then severely condemned the conduct of the Premier for being so heedless of the censure of the House of Lords and in trying to shield himself behind the precedents which are in reality no precedents at all. With reference to the Greek question, he repudiated precedents which involved the conduct of strong countries against weak ones. The Greek Government had put no impediment in the way of arbitration. Instead of trusting and trying the tribunals of the country and employing diplomatic agency simply as a supplemental resource, Lord Palmerston had interspersed authority of foreign power, in contravention both of the particular stipulations of the treaty in force between Greece and England and of the general principles of the law of nations. He had thus set the mischievous example of abandoning the methods of law and order, and resorted to those of force. Non-interference had been laid down as the basis of our conduct towards other nations, but the policy of Lord Palmerston had been characterized by a spirit of active interference. Mr. Gladstone's words were in part as follows: "Does he [Lord Palmerston] make the claim for us [the English] that we are to be lifted upon a platform high above the standing-ground of all other nations?... It is indeed too clear ... that he adopts, in part, the vain conception that we, forsooth, have a mission to be the censors of vice and folly, of abuse and imperfection among the other countries of the world; that we are to be the universal schoolmasters, and that all those who hesitate to recognize our office can be governed only by prejudice or personal animosity, and shall have the blind war of diplomacy forthwith declared against them." Again: "Let us recognize, and recognize with frankness, the equality of the weak with the strong; the principles of brotherhood among nations, and of their sacred independence. When we are asking for the maintenance of the rights which belong to our fellow-subjects, resident in Greece, let us do as we would be done by, and let us pay all respect to a feeble State and to the infancy of free institutions.... Let us refrain from all gratuitous and arbitrary meddling in the internal concerns of other States, even as we should resent the same interference if it were attempted to be practiced toward ourselves." In this address Mr. Gladstone evinces his inclination to appeal to the higher and nobler nature of man, to the principles of brotherhood among nations, to the law of God and nature, and to ask as a test of the foreign policy of the government, not whether it is striking, or brilliant, or successful, but whether it is right. This speech of Mr. Gladstone's was recognized as the finest he had delivered in Parliament, and its power was acknowledged by both sides of the House, by political opponent and friend. Lord Chief Justice Cockburn, then a member of the House, referring in a speech the following evening to Mr. Gladstone and his remarkable speech, uttered these words: "I suppose we are now to consider him as the representative of Lord Stanley in the House--Gladstone _Vice_ Disraeli, am I to say, resigned or superseded?" The government was sustained. We have already stated that it was during this memorable debate that Sir Robert Peel made his last speech.--On the following day, 29th of June, 1850, Sir Robert called at Buckingham Palace for the purpose of leaving his card. On proceeding up Constitution Hill on horse back he met one of Lady Dover's daughters, and exchanged salutations. Immediately afterwards his horse became restive and shying towards the rails of the Green Park, threw Sir Robert sideways on his left shoulder. Medical aid was at hand and was at once administered. Sir Robert groaned when lifted and when asked whether he was much hurt replied, "Yes, very much." He was conveyed home where the meeting with his family was very affecting, and he swooned in the arms of his physician. He was placed upon a sofa in the dining-room from which he never moved. His sufferings were so acute that a minute examination of his injuries could not be made. For two or three days he lingered and then died, July 2d. An examination made after death revealed the fact that the fifth rib on the left side was fractured, the broken rib pressing on the lung, producing effusion and pulmonary engorgement. This was probably the seat of the mortal injury, and was where Sir Robert complained of the greatest pain. The news of Sir Robert's death produced a profound sensation throughout the land. Great and universal were the tokens of respect and grief. There was but one feeling,--that England had lost one of her most illustrious statesmen. Even those who had been in opposition to his views, alluded to the great loss the nation had sustained and paid a fitting tribute to his memory. The House of Commons, on motion of Mr. Hume July 3d, at once adjourned. In the House of Lords the Duke of Wellington and Lord Brougham spoke in appreciative words of the departed statesman. "Such was the leader whom Mr. Gladstone had faithfully followed for many years." Supporting Mr. Hume's motion, Mr. Gladstone said: "I am quite sure that every heart is much too full to allow us, at a period so early, to enter upon a consideration of the amount of that calamity with which the country has been visited in his, I must even now say, premature death; for though he has died full of years and full of honors, yet it is a death which our human eyes will regard as premature; because we had fondly hoped that, in whatever position he was placed, by the weight of his character, by the splendor of his talents, by the purity of his virtues, he would still have been spared to render to his countrymen the most essential services. I will only, sir, quote those most touching and feeling lines which were applied by one of the greatest poets of this country to the memory of a man great indeed, but yet not greater than Sir Robert Peel:" 'Now is the stately column broke, The beacon light is quenched in smoke; The trumpet's silver voice is still; The warder silent on the hill.' "Sir, I will add no more--in saying this I have, perhaps, said too much. It might have been better had I confined myself to seconding the motion. I am sure the tribute of respect which we now offer will be all the more valuable from the silence with which the motion is received, and which I well know has not arisen from the want, but from the excess of feeling on the part of members of this House." Upon the death of Sir Robert Peel began the disintegration of the party distinguished by his name--Peelites. Some of its members united with the Conservatives, and others, such as Sir James Graham, Sidney Herbert, and Mr. Gladstone held themselves aloof from both Whigs and Tories. Conservative traditions still exercised considerable influence over them, but they could not join them, because they were already surrendering to strong liberal tendencies. It is said that Mr. Gladstone at this time, and for a decade thereafter, until the death of Sir James Graham, was greatly indebted to this statesman, not only for the growth of his liberal principles, but for his development as a practical statesman. Sir James wielded great influence over his contemporaries generally, because of his great knowledge of Parliamentary tactics, and the fact that he was the best educated and most thoroughly accomplished statesman of his age. "If he could be prevailed upon to speak in the course of a great debate, his speech was worth fifty votes," so great was his influence and power. "However great may have been the indebtedness of Mr. Gladstone to Sir James Graham, if the former had not been possessed of far wider sympathies--to say nothing of superior special intellectual qualities--than his political mentor, he never could have conceived and executed those important legislative acts for which his name will now chiefly be remembered." The other case occupying the attention of Parliament, to which we have alluded, we must now consider--Mr. Gladstone and the prisons of Naples. Owing to the illness of one of his children, for whom a southern climate was recommended, Mr. Gladstone spent several months of the Winter of 1850-1 in Naples. His brief visit to this city on a purely domestic mission was destined to assume an international importance. It came to his knowledge that a large number of the citizens of Naples, who had been members of the Chamber of Deputies, an actual majority of the representatives of the people, had been exiled or imprisoned by King Ferdinand, because they formed the opposition party to the government, and that between twenty and thirty thousand of that monarch's subjects had been cast into prison on the charge of political disaffection. The sympathies of Mr. Gladstone were at once enlisted in behalf of the oppressed Neapolitans. At first Mr. Gladstone looked at the matter only from a humanitarian and not from a political aspect, and it was only upon the former ground that he felt called and impelled to attempt the redress of the wrongs which were a scandal to the name of civilisation in Europe. And it was not long before England and the Continent were aroused by his denunciations of the Neapolitan system of government. Mr. Gladstone first carefully ascertained the truth of the statements made to him in order to attest their accuracy, and then published two letters on the subject addressed to the Earl of Aberdeen. These letters were soon followed by a third. In the first of these letters, dated April 7, 1851, he brings an elaborate, detailed and horrible indictment against the rulers of Naples, especially as regards their prisons and the treatment of persons confined in them for political offenses. He disclaimed any thought of having gone to Naples for the purpose of political criticism or censorship, to look for defects in the administration of the government, or to hear the grievances of the people, or to propagate ideas belonging to another country. But after a residence of three or four months in their city he had returned home with a deep feeling of the duty upon him to make some endeavor to mitigate the horrors in the midst of which the government of Naples was carried on. There were chiefly three reasons that led him to adopt the present course: "First, that the present practices of the Government of Naples, in reference to real or supposed political offenders, are an outrage upon religion, upon civilization, upon humanity and upon decency. Secondly, that these practices are certainly, and even rapidly, doing the work of Republicanism in that country--a political creed which has little natural or habitual root in the character of the people. Thirdly, that as a member of the Conservative party in one of the great family of European nations, I am compelled to remember that party stands in virtual and real, though perhaps unconscious alliance with all the established Governments of Europe as such; and that, according to the measure of its influence, they suffer more or less of moral detriment from its reverses, and derive strength and encouragement from its successes." He passed over the consideration of the all important question whether the actual Government of the Two Sicilies was one with or without a title, one of law or one of force, and came to the real question at issue. His charge against the Neapolitan Government was not one of mere imperfection, not corruption in low quarters, not occasional severity, but that of incessant, systematic, deliberate violation of the law by the power appointed to watch over and maintain it. Mr. Gladstone, with impassionate language, thus formulates his fearful indictment: "It is such violation of human and written law as this, carried on for the purpose of violating every other law, unwritten and eternal, human and divine; it is the wholesale persecution of virtue, when united with intelligence, operating upon such a scale that entire classes may with truth be said to be its object, so that the Government is in bitter and cruel, as well as utterly illegal hostility to whatever in the nation really lives and moves, and forms the mainspring of practical progress and improvement; it is the awful profanation of public religion, by its notorious alliance in the governing powers with the violation of every moral rule under the stimulants of fear and vengeance; it is the perfect prostitution of the judicial office which has made it, under veils only too threadbare and transparent, the degraded recipient of the vilest and clumsiest forgeries, got up wilfully and deliberately, by the immediate advisers of the Crown, for the purpose of destroying the peace, the freedom, aye, and even, if not by capital sentences, the life of men among the most virtuous, upright, intelligent, distinguished and refined of the whole community; it is the savage and cowardly system of moral as well as in a lower degree of physical torture, through which the sentences obtained from the debased courts of justice are carried into effect. "The effect of all this is a total inversion of all the moral and social ideas. Law, instead of being respected, is odious. Force and not affection is the foundation of government. There is no association, but a violent antagonism between the idea of freedom and that of order. The governing power, which teaches of itself that it is the image of God upon earth, is clothed in the view of the overwhelming majority of the thinking public with all the vices for its attributes. I have seen and heard the strong expression used, 'This is the negation of God erected into a system of Government.'" It was not merely the large numbers imprisoned unjustly, to which public attention was directed, that called for righteous indignation and made Mr. Gladstone's words create such a sensation in Europe, but the mode of procedure was arbitrary in the extreme. The law of Naples required that personal liberty should be inviolable, except under warrant from a court of justice. Yet in utter disregard of this law the authorities watched the people, paid domiciliary visits, ransacked houses, seized papers and effects, and tore up floors at pleasure under pretense of searching for arms, imprisoned men by the score, by the hundred, by the thousand without any warrant whatever, sometimes without even any written authority whatever, or anything beyond the word of a policeman, constantly without any statement whatever of the nature of the offense. Charges were fabricated to get rid of inconvenient persons. Perjury and forgery were resorted to in order to establish charges, and the whole mode of conducting trials was a burlesque of justice. He thus describes the dungeons of Naples, in which some of the prisoners were confined for their political opinions: "The prisons of Naples, as is well known, are another name for the extreme of filth and horror. I have really seen something of them, but not the worst. This I have seen, my Lord: the official doctors not going to the sick prisoners, but the sick prisoners, men almost with death on their faces, toiling up stairs to them at that charnel-house of the Vicaria, because the lower regions of such a palace of darkness are too foul and loathsome to allow it to be expected that professional men should consent to earn bread by entering them." Of some of those sufferers Mr. Gladstone speaks particularly. He names Pironte, formerly a judge, Baron Porcari, and Carlo Poerio, a distinguished patriot. The latter he specially speaks of as a refined and accomplished gentleman, a copious and elegant speaker, a respected and blameless character, yet he had been arrested and condemned for treason. Mr. Gladstone says: "The condemnation of such a man for treason is a proceeding just as conformable to the laws of truth, justice, decency, and fair play, and to the common sense of the community--in fact, just as great and gross an outrage on them all--as would be a like condemnation in this country of any of our best known public men--Lord John Russell, or Lord Lansdowne, or Sir James Graham, or yourself." There was no name dearer to Englishmen than that of Poerio to his Neapolitan fellow-countrymen. Poerio was tried and condemned on the sole accusation of a worthless character named Jerrolino. He would have been acquitted nevertheless, by a division of four to five of his judges, had not Navarro (who sat as a judge while directly concerned in the charge against the prisoner), by the distinct use of intimidation, procured the number necessary for a sentence. A statement is furnished on the authority of an eye-witness, as to the inhumanity with which invalid prisoners were treated by the Grand Criminal Court of Naples; and Mr. Gladstone minutely describes the manner of the imprisonment of Poerio and six of his incarcerated associates. Each prisoner bore a weight of chain amounting to thirty-two pounds and for no purpose whatever were these chains undone. All the prisoners were confined, night and day, in a small room, which may be described as amongst the closest of dungeons; but Poerio was after this condemned to a still lower depth of calamity and suffering. "Never before have I conversed," says Mr. Gladstone, speaking of Poerio, "and never probably shall I converse again, with a cultivated and accomplished gentleman, of whose innocence, obedience to law, and love of his country, I was as firmly and as rationally assured as your lordship's or that of any other man of the very highest character, whilst he stood before me, amidst surrounding felons, and clad in the vile uniform of guilt and shame." But he is now gone where he will scarcely have the opportunity even of such conversation. I cannot honestly suppress my conviction that the object in the case of Poerio, as a man of mental power sufficient to be feared, is to obtain the scaffold's aim by means more cruel than the scaffold, and without the outcry which the scaffold would create. Mr. Gladstone said that it was time for the veil to be lifted from scenes more fit for hell than earth, or that some considerable mitigation should be voluntarily adopted. This letter was published in 1851--the year of the great Exposition in London--and a copy was sent to the representative of the Queen in every court of Europe. Its publication caused a wide-spread indignation in England, a great sensation abroad, and profoundly agitated the court of Naples. In the English Parliament Sir De Lacy Evans put the following question to the Foreign Secretary: "If the British Minister at the court of Naples had been instructed to employ his good offices in the cause of humanity, for the diminution of these lamentable severities, and with what result?" In reply to this question Lord Palmerston accepted and adopted Mr. Gladstone's statement, which had been confirmed from other quarters, expressing keen sympathy and humanitarian feeling with the cause which he had espoused, but Lord Palmerston pointed out that it was impossible to do anything in a matter which related entirely to the domestic affairs of the Government at Naples. He said: "Instead of confining himself to those amusements that abound in Naples, instead of diving into volcanoes, and exploring excavated cities, we see him going into courts of justice, visiting prisons, descending into dungeons, and examining great numbers of the cases of unfortunate victims of illegality and injustice, with the view afterwards to enlist public opinion in the endeavor to remedy those abuses." This announcement by the Foreign Secretary was warmly applauded by the House. "A few days afterwards Lord Palmerston was requested by Prince Castelcicala to forward the reply of the Neapolitan Government to the different European courts to which Mr. Gladstone's pamphlet had been sent. His lordship, with his wonted courage and independent spirit, replied that he 'must decline being accessory to the circulation of a pamphlet which, in my opinion, does no credit to its writer, or the Government which he defends, or to the political party of which he professes to be the champion.' He also informed the Prince that information received from other sources led him to the conclusion that Mr. Gladstone had by no means overstated the various evils which he had described; and he [Lord Palmerston] regretted that the Neapolitan Government had not set to work earnestly and effectually to correct the manifold and grave abuses which clearly existed." The second paper of Mr. Gladstone upon the same subject was a sequel to the first. His wish was that everything possible should be done first in the way of private representation and remonstrance, and he did not regret the course he had taken, though it entailed devious delays. In answer to the natural inquiry why he should simply appear in his personal capacity through the press, instead of inviting to the grave and painful question the attention of the House of Commons, of which he was a member, he said, that he had advisedly abstained from mixing up his statements with any British agency or influences which were official, diplomatic, or political. The claims and interests which he had in view were either wholly null and valueless, or they were broad as the extension of the human race and long-lived as its duration. As to his general charges he had nothing to retract. His representations had not been too strongly stated, for the most disgraceful circumstances were those which rested upon public notoriety, or upon his own personal knowledge. It had been stated that he had overestimated the number of prisoners, and he would give the Neapolitan Government the full benefit of any correction. But the number of political prisoners _in itself_, was a secondary feature of the case, for "if they were fairly and legally arrested, fairly and legally treated before trial--fairly and legally tried, that was the main matter. For the honor of human nature men would at first receive some statements with incredulity. Men ought to be slow to believe that such things could happen, and happen in a Christian country, the seat of almost the oldest European civilization." But those thus disposed in the beginning he hoped would not close their minds to the reception of the truth, however painful to believe. The general probability of his statements could not, unfortunately be gainsaid. Many replies were made to Mr. Gladstone's pamphlet that were violent and abusive. They appeared not only in Naples, Turin, and Paris, but even in London. All these answers, were in truth no replies at all, for they did not disprove the facts. These professed corrections of Mr. Gladstone's statements did not touch the real basis of the question. It was necessary to say something if possible by way of defense, or justice, which had as yet not been done. There was one reply that was put forth that Mr. Gladstone felt demanded some attention, namely, the official answer of the Neapolitan Government to his charges. To this he replied in a letter, in 1852. In his reply he placed, point by point, the answers in the scales along with his own accusations. There was in the Neapolitan answers to the letters really a tacit admission of the accuracy of nine-tenths of Mr. Gladstone's statements, Mr. Gladstone enumerated the few retractions which he had to make, which were five in number. That the prisoner, Settembrine, had not been tortured and confined to double chains for life, as was currently reported and believed; that six judges had been dismissed at Reggio upon presuming to acquit a batch of political prisoners, required modifying to three; that seventeen invalids had not been massacred in the prison of Procida during a revolt, as stated; and that certain prisoners alleged to have been still incarcerated after acquittal had been released after the lapse of two days. These were all the modifications he had to make in his previous statements. And as to the long list of his grave accusations, not one of them rested upon hearsay. He pointed out how small and insignificant a fraction of error had found its way into his papers. He fearlessly reasserted that agonizing corporal punishment was inflicted by the officials in Neapolitan prisons, and that without judicial authority. As to Settembrine, the political prisoner named, he was incarcerated in a small room with eight other prisoners, one of whom boasted that he had murdered, at various times, thirty-five persons. Several of his victims had been his prison companions, and "the murders of this Ergastolo" had exceeded fifty in a single year. It was true that at the massacre at Procida the sick had not been slain in the prisons, yet prisoners who hid under beds were dragged forth and shot in cold blood by the soldiery after order had been restored. The work of slaughter had been twice renewed, and two officers received promotion or honors for that abominable enormity. Mr. Gladstone found in the reply of the Government of Naples no reason to retract his damaging statements in reference to Neapolitan inhumanity, on the other hand he discovered grounds for emphasizing his accusations. And as to his statement regarding the number of the sufferers from Neapolitan injustice and cruelty, he defended at length his statement as to the enormous number of the prisoners. It was clear to all candid minds that all the replies had failed to prove him wrong in any of his substantial changes, which retained their full force. "The arrow has shot deep into the mark," observed Mr. Gladstone, "and cannot be dislodged. But I have sought, in once more entering the field, not only to sum up the state of the facts in the manner nearest to exactitude, but likewise to close the case as I began it, presenting it from first to last in the light of a matter which is not primarily or mainly political, which is better kept apart from Parliamentary discussion, which has no connection whatever with any peculiar idea or separate object or interest of England, but which appertains to the sphere of humanity at large, and well deserves the consideration of every man who feels a concern for the well-being of his race, in its bearings on that well-being; on the elementary demands of individual domestic happiness; on the permanent maintenance of public order; on the stability of thrones; on the solution of that great problem, which, day and night, in its innumerable forms must haunt the reflections of every statesman, both here and elsewhere, how to harmonize the old with the new conditions of society, and to mitigate the increasing stress of time and change upon what remains of this ancient and venerable fabric of the traditional civilization of Europe." Mr. Gladstone also said, that the question had been asked, whether a government "could be induced to change its policy, because some individual or other had by lying accusations held it up to the hatred of mankind," yet he had the satisfaction of knowing that upon the challenge of a mere individual, the government of Naples had been compelled to plead before the tribunal of general opinion, and to admit the jurisdiction of that tribunal. It was to public sentiment that the Neapolitan Government was paying deference when it resolved on the manly course of a judicial reply; and he hoped that further deference would be paid to that public sentiment in the complete reform of its departments and the whole future management of its affairs. After a consideration of the political position of the throne of the Two Sicilies, in connection with its dominions on the mainland, Mr. Gladstone thus concluded his examination of the official reply of the Neapolitan Government: "These pages have been written in the hope that, by thus making, through the press, rather than in another mode, that rejoinder to the Neapolitan reply which was doubtless due from me, I might still, as far as depended on me, keep the question on its true ground, as one not of politics but of morality, and not of England but of Christendom and of mankind. Again I express the hope that this may be my closing word. I express the hope that it may not become a hard necessity to keep this controversy alive until it reaches its one only possible issue, which no power of man can permanently intercept. I express the hope that while there is time, while there is quiet, while dignity may yet be saved in showing mercy, and in the blessed work of restoring Justice to her seat, the Government of Naples may set its hand in earnest to the work of real and searching, however quiet and unostentatious, reform; that it may not become unavoidable to reiterate these appeals from the hand of power to the one common heart of mankind; to produce these painful documents, those harrowing descriptions, which might be supplied in rank abundance, of which I have scarcely given the faintest idea or sketch, and which, if laid from time to time before the world, would bear down like a deluge every effort at apology or palliation, and would cause all that has recently been made known to be forgotten and eclipsed in deeper horrors yet; lest the strength of offended and indignant humanity should rise up as a giant refreshed with wine, and, while sweeping away these abominations from the eye of Heaven, should sweep away along with them things pure and honest, ancient, venerable, salutary to mankind, crowned with the glories of the past and still capable of bearing future fruit." The original purpose of these letters, though at first not gained, was unmistakable in the subsequent revolution which created a regenerated, free and united Italy. The moral influence of such an exposure was incalculable and eventually irresistible. The great Italian patriot and liberator of Italy, General Garibaldi, was known to say that Mr. Gladstone's protest "sounded the first trumpet call of Italian liberty." If France and England had unitedly protested against the Neapolitan abuse of power and violation of law, such a protest would have been heard and redress granted, but such joint action was not taken. The letters reached the fourteenth edition and in this edition Mr. Gladstone said that by a royal decree, issued December 27, 1858, ninety-one political prisoners had their punishment commuted into perpetual exile from the kingdom of the two Sicilies, but that a Ministerial order of January 9, 1859, directed that they should be conveyed to America; that of these ninety-one persons no less than fourteen had died long before in dungeons, and that only sixty-six of them embarked January 16, 1859, and were taken to Cadiz, where they were shipped on board an American sailing vessel, which was to have carried them to New York, but eventually landed them at Cork. "Eleven men were kept behind, either because it was afterwards thought advisable not to release them, as in the case of Longo and Delli Franci, two artillery officers, who were still in the dungeons of Gaeta. Whenever the prisoners were too sick to be moved, as was the case with Pironti, who was paralytic; or because they were in some provincial dungeons too remote from Naples." Such was the fate of some of the patriots officially liberated by Ferdinand's successor, Francis II. The charges of Mr. Gladstone against the Neapolitan Government met with confirmation from another source nearer home. In 1851 Mr. Gladstone translated and published Farini's important and bulky work, entitled, "The Roman State, from 1815 to 1850." The author, Farini, addressed a note to his translator, in which he said that he had dedicated the concluding volume of his work to Mr. Gladstone, who, by his love of Italian letters, and by his deeds of Italian charity, had established a relationship with Italy in the spirit of those great Italian writers who had been their masters in eloquence, in civil philosophy and in national virtue, from Dante and Macchivelli down to Alfieri and Gioberti. Signor Farini endorsed the charges made by Mr. Gladstone against the Neapolitan Government. He wrote: "The scandalous trials for high treason still continue at Naples; accusers, examiners, judges, false witnesses, all are bought; the prisons, those tombs of the living, are full; two thousand citizens of all ranks and conditions are already condemned to the dungeons, as many to confinement, double that number to exile; the majority guilty of no crime but that of having believed in the oaths made by Ferdinand II. But, in truth, nothing more was needed to press home the indictment." At the period of Mr. Gladstone's visit to Naples there was a growing sentiment throughout Italy for Italian independence and union. The infamous measures adopted by the King of Naples to repress in his own dominions every aspiration after freedom, only succeeded in making the people more determined and the liberty for which they sighed surer in the end. His system of misgovernment went on for a few years longer and was the promoting cause of the revolutionary movements which continually disturbed the whole Italian peninsula. A conference was held in Paris upon the Italian question, which failed to accomplish anything, against which failure Count Cavour addressed a protest to the French and British Governments in April, 1856. Afterwards the King of Naples and his Ministers were remonstrated with, but this was of no avail, only drawing forth an assertion that the sovereign had the right to deal with his own subjects as he pleased. France and England finally withdrew their representatives from Naples, and the storm soon afterwards broke. The brilliant success of Garibaldi in 1860 filled Francis II with terror. He was now, like all evil men, ready to make the most lavish promises of liberal reform to escape the consequences of his misdeeds. However, his repentance came too late. The victorious Garibaldi issued a decree ultimately, stating that the Two Sicilies, which had been redeemed by Italian blood, and which had freely elected him their dictator, formed an integral part of one and indivisable Italy, under the constitutional King Victor Emmanuel and his descendants. Francis II was dethroned and expelled from his kingdom by the legitimate fruits of his own hateful policy and that of his predecessor. "Count Cavour was the brain as Garibaldi was the hand of that mighty movement which resulted in the unity of Italy," says an English writer, "but as Englishmen we may take pride in the fact that not the least among the precipitating causes of this movement was the fearless exposure by Mr. Gladstone of the cruelties and tyrannies of the Neapolitan Government." [Illustration: GLADSTONE VISITING NEAPOLITAN PRISONS.] CHAPTER IX THE FIRST BUDGET The precise date at which Mr. Gladstone became a Liberal cannot be determined, but during the Parliamentary sessions of 1851 and 1852 he became finally alienated from the Conservative party, although he did not enter the ranks of the Liberals for some years afterward. He himself stated that so late as 1851 he had not formally left the Tory party, nevertheless his advance towards Liberalism is very pronounced at this period. It is well for us to trace the important events of these two sessions, for they also lead up to the brilliant financial measures of 1853, which caused Mr. Gladstone's name to be classed with those of Pitt and Peel. Mr. Gladstone's trusted leader was dead, and he was gradually coming forward to take the place in debate of the fallen statesman. When Mr. Gladstone returned home from Italy he found England convulsed over renewed papal aggressions. The Pope had, in the preceding September, issued Letters Apostolic, establishing a Roman Catholic Hierarchy in England, and in which he had mapped out the whole country into papal dioceses. This act of aggression produced a storm of public indignation. It was regarded by the people generally as an attempt to wrest from them their liberties and enslave them. It was looked upon by the Protestants indignantly as an attack upon the Reformed Faith. Anglicans resented it as an act which practically denied the jurisdiction and authority of the Church of England, established already by law. Englishmen, faithfully devoted to the British Constitution, which guaranteed the Protestant Religion, were incensed by this interference with the prerogative of the Crown; while all ardent patriots were influenced by the unwarranted and unsolicited interference of a foreign potentate. Every element of combustion being present, meetings were held everywhere, inflammatory speeches were made on every public occasion, and patriotic resolutions were passed. Pulpit and platform rang with repeated cries of "No Popery," and echoed at the Lord Mayor's banquet, at the Guildhall, and even at Covent Garden Theatre in Shakesperian strains. The Prime Minister, Lord John Russell, published his famous Durham letter, addressed to the Bishop of Durham, rebuking and defying the Pope, and charging the whole High Church Party of the Church of England with being the secret allies and fellow-workers of Rome. In the beginning of the Parliamentary session of 1851 Lord John Russell moved for permission to bring in a bill to counteract the aggressive policy of the Church of Rome, on account of which aggression of the Pope the whole country was well-nigh in a condition of panic. The measure was debated for four days, and was entitled the Ecclesiastical Faiths Bill. It was designed to prevent the assumption by Roman Catholic prelates of titles taken from any territory or place in England. Severe penalties were attached to the use of such titles, and all acts done by, and requests made to, persons under them were to be void. The bill was not well received by some, being thought, on one side too mild and on the other as too stringent. Mr. Disraeli and Mr. Gladstone both opposed it; the latter because the change was wanted by English Catholics rather than by the Vatican. He condemned the vanity and boastful spirit of the papal documents, but contended that his fellow Catholic countrymen should not suffer for that. The difficulty of applying it to Ireland, where the system objected to already existed, was pointed out. However the preliminary motion was passed by 395 votes against 63, "this enormous majority," says an English author, "attesting the wide-spread fear of Romish machinations." The measure became a law, but it was a dead letter, and was quietly repealed twenty years afterwards at Mr. Gladstone's request. Before, however, the bill was passed a ministerial crisis had intervened. During this session other difficulties were encountered by the Ministry. The financial as well as this ecclesiastical question was a problem. The Conservatives were strong and compact, and enjoyed the adhesion of the Peelites, while the Ministerial party was to a great extent demoralized. Mr. Disraeli, owing to the deep distress that prevailed in the agricultural districts, renewed his motion upon the burdens on land and the inequalities of taxation, and consequently he presented a resolution that it was the duty of the government to introduce measures for the alleviation of the distress without delay. The government admitted the distress, but denied that it was increasing. They attempted to prove that pauperism had decreased in all parts of the kingdom--England, Ireland and Scotland. Commerce was in a most prosperous condition, while the revenues had reached the unexampled amount of $350,000,000. "Sir James Graham stigmatized the motion as an attempt to turn out the administration, to dissolve Parliament, and to return to Protection." The Ministry was sustained by a small majority, and was successful in some measures, but soon suffered several minor defeats and finally was forced to retire. One of the successful measures was that introduced by Mr. Loche King, and opposed by Lord John Russell, for assimilating the country franchise to that of the boroughs. The budget of the government introduced January 17th was unpopular. It demanded a renewed lease for three years of the obnoxious income-tax, but promised a partial remission of the window duties, which was a tax upon every window in a house, together with some relief to the agriculturists. The first budget having been rejected a second financial statement was offered later in the session. It imposed a house-tax, withdrew the bonus to agriculturists, repealed the window-tax, but re-demanded the income-tax for three years. The main features of the budget were acceptable to the House, but the Government suffered defeat on minor financial questions, which tendered still further to diminish the popularity of the ministry. Upon the resignation of Lord John Russell and his Cabinet, in February, 1851, Lord Stanley was called upon to form a new administration, and Mr. Gladstone was invited to become a member of the Cabinet. Lord Stanley having failed, Lord Aberdeen was invited to form a new Cabinet, by the Queen, with like results. Both these gentlemen having declined the task of forming a new administration, Lord John Russell and his colleagues resumed office, but the reconstructed ministry was soon to receive a fatal blow through Lord Palmerston, the foreign Secretary. On the 2d of December, 1851, Louis Napoleon, Prince President of the French Republic, by a single act of lawless violence, abolished the constitution, and made himself Dictator. The details of this monstrous deed, and of the bloodshed that accompanied it, created a profound sensation in England. The Queen was very anxious that no step should be taken and no word said by her ministry which could be construed into an approval by the English government of what had been done. Indeed the Queen who knew the failing of her Foreign Secretary to act hastily in important matters of State without the consent or advice of Queen or Cabinet, questioned the Premier and was assured that nothing had been done in recognition of the new government in Paris. Indeed the Cabinet had passed a resolution to abstain from the expression of opinions in approval or disapproval of the recent _coup d'état_ in France. But it soon leaked out that Lord Palmerston who thought he understood full well the foreign relations of England, and what her policy should be, had both in public dispatches and private conversation spoken favorably of the policy adopted by Louis Napoleon. He had even expressed to Count Walewski, the French Ambassador in London, his entire approval of the Prince President's act. This was too much for the Queen, who had as early as the August before, in a memorandum sent to the Premier, imperatively protested against the crown's being ignored by the Foreign Secretary, so Lord Palmerston was dismissed from office by Lord John Russell, Christmas Eve, 1851. He bore his discharge with meekness, and even omitted in Parliament to defend himself in points where he was wronged. But Justin McCarthy says: "Lord Palmerston was in the wrong in many if not most of the controversies which had preceded it; that is to say, he was wrong in committing England as he so often did to measures which had not the approval of the sovereign or his colleagues." In February following, 1852, Lord Palmerston enjoyed, as he expressed it, his "tit-for-tat with Johnny Russell" and helped the Tories to defeat his late chief in a measure for reorganizing the militia as a precaution against possible aggression from France. The ministry had not saved itself by the overthrow of Lord Palmerston. Upon the retirement of Lord John Russell from office, in 1852, the Earl of Derby, formerly Lord Stanley, succeeded him as Prime Minister. Mr. Gladstone was invited to become a member of the new Tory Cabinet, but declined, whereupon Lord Malmesbury dubiously remarked, November 28th: "I cannot make out Gladstone, who seems to me a dark horse." Mr. Disraeli was chosen Chancellor of the Exchequer, and became Leader in the House of Commons, entering the Cabinet for the first time. "There was a scarcely disguised intention to revive protection." It was Free Trade or Protection, and the Peelites defended their fallen leader, Peel. "A makeshift budget" was introduced by Mr. Disraeli and passed. It was destined, it seems, that the Derby Administration was not to be supported, but to be driven out of power by Mr. Gladstone, who was to cross swords before the nation with his future parliamentary rival, Disraeli. Mr. Disraeli seemed now bent upon declaring the Free Trade Policy of Sir Robert Peel a failure. Mr. Disraeli's power of forgetfulness of the past is one of the most fortunate ever conferred upon a statesman. During the debate he declared that the main reason why his party had opposed Free Trade was not that it would injure the landlord, nor the farmer, but that "it would prove injurious to the cause of labor." "He also said, though interrupted by cries of astonishment and of 'Oh, oh!' that not a single attempt had been made in the House of Commons to abrogate the measure of 1846." Mr. Sidney Herbert, who was wounded to the quick by the assaults on Sir Robert Peel, rose to defend the great Conservative statesman. His speech contained one passage of scathing invective addressed to Mr. Disraeli. Mr. Herbert said: "The memory of Sir Robert Peel requires no vindication--his memory is embalmed in the grateful recollection of the people of this country; and I say, if ever retribution is wanted--for it is not words that humiliate, but deeds--if a man wants to see humiliation, which God knows is always a painful sight, he need but look there!"--and upon this Mr. Herbert pointed with his finger to Mr. Disraeli sitting on the Treasury Bench. The sting of invective is truth, and Mr. Herbert certainly spoke daggers if he used none; yet the Chancellor of the Exchequer sat impassive as a Sphinx. Parliament was dissolved soon after the formation of the new government, July 1, 1852, and during the recess, September 14, 1852, the Duke of Wellington passed away and a public funeral was given the victor of Waterloo. On the assembling of Parliament Mr. Gladstone delivered a eulogy on the Duke, drawing special lessons from his illustrious career, which had been prolonged to a green old age. Mr. Gladstone said: "While many of the actions of his life, while many of the qualities he possessed, are unattainable by others, there are lessons which we may all derive from the life and actions of that illustrious man. It may never be given to another subject of the British Crown to perform services so brilliant as he performed; it may never be given to another man to hold the sword which was to gain the independence of Europe, to rally the nations around it, and while England saved herself by her constancy, to save Europe by her example; it may never be given to another man, after having attained such eminence, after such an unexampled series of victories, to show equal moderation in peace as he has shown greatness in war, and to devote the remainder of his life to the cause of internal and external peace for that country which he has so well served; it may never be given to another man to have equal authority, both with the Sovereign he served and with the Senate of which he was to the end a venerated member; it may never be given to another man after such a career to preserve, even to the last, the full possession of those great faculties with which he was endowed, and to carry on the services of one of the most important departments of the State with unexampled regularity and success, even to the latest day of his life. These are circumstances, these are qualities, which may never occur again in the history of this country. But these are qualities which the Duke of Wellington displayed, of which we may all act in humble imitation: that sincere and unceasing devotion to our country; that honest and upright determination to act for the benefit of the country on every occasion; that devoted loyalty, which, while it made him ever anxious to serve the Crown, never induced him to conceal from the Sovereign that which he believed to be the truth; that devotedness in the constant performance of duty; that temperance of his life, which enabled him at all times to give his mind and his faculties to the services which he was called on to perform; that regular, consistent, and unceasing piety by which he was distinguished at all times of his life; these are qualities that are attainable by others, and these are qualities which should not be lost as an example." At this session of Parliament Mr. Disraeli brought forward his second budget in a five hour speech. The new Chancellor of the Exchequer proposed to remit a portion of the taxes upon malt, tea, and sugar, but to counterbalance these losses he also proposed to extend the income-tax and house-tax. The debate, which was very personal, was prolonged several days, and Mr. Disraeli, towards its close, bitterly attacked several members, among them Sir James Graham, whom Mr. Gladstone not only defended, but in so doing administered a scathing rebuke to the Chancellor for his bitter invective and personal abuse. Mr. Gladstone's speech at the close of Mr. Disraeli's presentation was crushing, and was generally regarded as giving the death-blow to this financial scheme. Mr. Gladstone told Mr. Disraeli that he was not entitled to charge with insolence men of as high position and of as high character in the House as himself, and when the cheers which had interrupted him had subsided, concluded: "I must tell the right honorable gentleman that he is not entitled to say to my right honorable friend, the member for Carlisle, that he regards but does not respect him. And I must tell him that whatever else he has learnt--and he has learnt much--he has not learnt to keep within those limits of discretion, of moderation, and of forbearance that ought to restrain the conduct and language of every member in this House, the disregard of which, while it is an offence in the meanest amongst us, is an offence of tenfold weight when committed by the leader of the House of Commons." The thrilling scene enacted in the House of Commons on that memorable night is thus described: "In the following month the Chancellor of the Exchequer produced his second budget. It was an ambitious and a skillful attempt to reconcile conflicting interests, and to please all while offending none. The government had come into office pledged to do something for the relief of the agricultural interests. They redeemed their pledge by reducing the duty on malt. This reduction created a deficit; and they repaired the deficit by doubling the duty on inhabited houses. Unluckily, the agricultural interests proved, as usual, ungrateful to its benefactors, and made light of the reduction on malt; while those who were to pay for it in double taxation were naturally indignant. The voices of criticism, 'angry, loud, discordant voices,' were heard simultaneously on every side. The debate waxed fast and furious. In defending his hopeless proposals, Mr. Disraeli gave full scope to his most characteristic gift; he pelted his opponents right and left with sarcasms, taunts, and epigrams, and went as near personal insult as the forms of Parliament permit. He sat down late at night, and Mr. Gladstone rose in a crowded and excited House to deliver an unpremeditated reply which has ever since been celebrated. Even the cold and colorless pages of 'Hansard' show signs of the excitement under which he labored, and of the tumultuous applause and dissent by which his opening sentences were interrupted. 'The speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer,' he said, 'must be answered on the moment. It must be tried by the laws of decency and propriety.'" He indignantly rebuked his rival's language and demeanor. He reminded him of the discretion and decorum due from every member, but pre-eminently due from the leader of the House. He tore his financial scheme to ribbons. It was the beginning of a duel which lasted till death removed one of the combatants from the political arena. 'Those who had thought it impossible that any impression could be made upon the House after the speech of Mr. Disraeli had to acknowledge that a yet greater impression was produced by the unprepared reply of Mr. Gladstone.' The House divided and the government were left in a minority of nineteen. This happened in the early morning of December 17, 1852. Within an hour of the division Lord Derby wrote to the Queen a letter announcing his defeat and the consequences which it must entail, and that evening at Osborne he placed his formal resignation in her majesty's hands. It is related as an evidence of the intense excitement, if not frenzy, that prevailed at the time, that Mr. Gladstone met with indignity at his Club. Greville, in his "Memoirs," says that, "twenty ruffians of the Carleton Club" had given a dinner to Major Beresford, who had been charged with bribery at the Derby election and had escaped with only a censure, and that "after dinner, when they were drunk, they went up stairs and finding Mr. Gladstone alone in the drawing-room, some of them proposed to throw him out of the window. This they did not quite dare to do, but contented themselves with giving some insulting message or order to the waiter and then went away." Mr. Gladstone, however, remained a member of the Club until he joined the Whig administration in 1859. Mr. Gladstone's crushing _exposé_ of the blunders of Mr. Disraeli's budget was almost ludicrous in its completeness, and it was universally felt that the scheme could not survive his brilliant attack. The effect that the merciless criticism of Disraeli's budget was not only the discomfiture of Mr. Disraeli and the overthrow of the Russell administration, but the elevation of Mr. Gladstone to the place vacated by Chancellor Disraeli. The Earl of Aberdeen became Prime Minister. The new government was a coalition of Whigs and Peelites, with a representative of the Radicals in the person of Sir William Molesworth. Mr. Gladstone, the Duke of Newcastle, Sir James Graham and Mr. Sidney Herbert were the Peelites in the Cabinet. Mr. Gladstone was chosen Chancellor of the Exchequer. We may refer here to a letter of Mr. Gladstone, written Christmas, 1851, in order to show his growing Liberalism. The letter was to Dr. Skinner, Bishop of Aberdeen and Primus, on the positions and functions of the laity in the Church. This letter is remarkable, because, as Dr. Charles Wordsworth, Bishop of St. Andrew's, said at the time, "it contained the germ of liberation and the political equality of all religions." The Bishop published a controversial rejoinder, which drew from Dr. Gaisford, Dean of Christ Church, these emphatic words: "You have proved to my satisfaction that this gentleman is unfit to represent the University," meaning the representation for Oxford in Parliament. This feeling was growing, for when the Russell Ministry fell and it became necessary for Mr. Gladstone, because he accepted a place in the Cabinet, to appeal for re-election to his constituents at Oxford, he met with much opposition, because of his Liberalism. Appealing to his university to return him, and endorse his acceptance of office in the new Ministry of the Earl of Aberdeen, Mr. Gladstone soon discovered that he had made many enemies by his manifest tendencies toward Liberal-Conservatism. He had given unmistakable evidence that he held less firmly the old traditions of that unbending Toryism of which he was once the most promising representative. Lord Derby, whom he had deposed, had been elected Chancellor of the University to succeed the Duke of Wellington, deceased. Consequently his return to the House was ardently contested. His opponents looked around for a candidate of strong Conservative principles. The Marquis of Chandos, who was first elected, declined to run in opposition to Mr. Gladstone; but at length a suitable opponent was found in Mr. Dudley Perceval, of Christ Church, son of the Right Hon. Spencer Perceval, who was nominated January 4th. Dr. Hawkins, Provost of Oriel, one of the twenty colleges of Oxford, proposed Mr. Gladstone, and Archdeacon Denison, leader of the High Church party, proposed Mr. Dudley Perceval. According to the custom at university elections, neither candidate was present. It was objected to Mr. Gladstone that he had voted improperly on ecclesiastical questions, and had accepted office in "a hybrid ministry." The "Times" described Mr. Perceval as "a very near relative of our old friend Mrs. Harris. To remove any doubt on this point, let him be exhibited at Exeter Hall with the documentary evidence of his name, existence and history; his first-class, his defeat at Finsbury, his talents, his principles. If we must go to Oxford to record our votes it would at least be something to know that we were voting against a real man and not a mere name." The "Morning Chronicle," on the other hand, affirmed that a section of the Carleton Club were "making a tool of the Oxford Convocation for the purpose of the meanest and smallest political rancor against Mr. Gladstone." Mr. Gladstone, who fought the battle on ecclesiastical lines, wrote, after the nomination, to the chairman of his election committee, as follows: "Unless I had a full and clear conviction that the interests of the Church, whether as relates to the legislative functions of Parliament, or the impartial and wise recommendation of fit persons to her majesty for high ecclesiastical offices, were at least as safe in the hands of Lord Aberdeen as in those of Lord Derby (though I would on no account disparage Lord Derby's personal sentiments towards the Church), I should not have accepted office under Lord Aberdeen. As regards the second, if it be thought that during twenty years of public life, or that during the latter part of them, I have failed to give guarantees of attachment to the interests of the Church--to such as so think I can offer neither apology nor pledge. To those who think otherwise, I tender the assurance that I have not by my recent assumption of office made any change whatever in that particular, or in any principles relating to it." Mr. Gladstone was again elected by a fair majority and returned to Parliament. Seventy-four of the professors voted for Mr. Gladstone and fifteen for Mr. Perceval. When Parliament assembled the Earl of Aberdeen announced in the House of Lords that the measures of the Government would be both Conservative and Liberal,--at home to maintain Free Trade principles and to pursue the commercial and financial system of the late Sir Robert Peel, and abroad to secure the general peace of Europe without relaxing defensive measures. Mr. Gladstone had already proved himself to have a wonderful mastery of figures, and the confused technicalities of finance. He did not disappoint the hopes of his friends in regard to his fiscal abilities. On the contrary, he speedily inaugurated a new and brilliant era in finance. Previous to presenting his first budget, in 1853, Mr. Gladstone brought forward a scheme for the reduction of the national debt, which was approved by Radicals as well as Conservatives, and adopted by the House. The scheme worked most successfully until the breaking out of the Crimean war. During this very short period of two years the public debt was reduced by more than $57,500,000. In consequence of his general reputation and also of this brilliant financial scheme, the first budget of Mr. Gladstone was waited for with intense interest. His first budget was introduced April 18, 1853. It was one of his greatest budgets, and for statesmanlike breadth of conception it has never been surpassed. In bringing it forward Mr. Gladstone spoke five hours, and during that length of time held the House spellbound. The speech was delivered with the greatest ease, and was perspicuity itself throughout. Even when dealing with the most abstruse financial detail his language flowed on without interruption, and he never paused for a word. "Here was an orator who could apply all the resources of a burnished rhetoric to the elucidation of figures; who could make pippins and cheese interesting and tea serious; who could sweep the widest horizon of the financial future and yet stoop to bestow the minutest attention on the microcosm of penny stamps and post-horses. The members on the floor and ladies in the gallery of the House listened attentively and showed no signs of weariness throughout." A contemporary awarded to him the palm for unsurpassed fluency and choice of diction, and says: "The impression produced upon the minds of the crowded and brilliant assembly by Mr. Gladstone's evident mastery and grasp of the subject, was, that England had at length found a skillful financier, upon whom the mantle of Peel had descended. The cheering when the right honorable gentleman sat down was of the most enthusiastic and prolonged character, and his friends and colleagues hastened to tender him their warm congratulations upon the distinguished success he had achieved in his first budget." The budget provided for the gradual reduction of the income tax to expire in 1860; for an increase in the duty on spirits; for the abolition of the soap duties; the reduction of the tax on cabs and hackney coaches; the introduction of the penny receipt stamp and the equalization of the assessed taxes on property. By these provisions it was proposed to make life easier and cheaper for large and numerous classes. The duty on 123 articles was abolished and the duty on 133 others reduced, the total relief amounting to $25,000,000. Mr. Gladstone gave a clear exposition of the income tax, which he declared was never intended to be permanent. It had been the last resort in times of national danger, and he could not consent to retain it as a part of the permanent and ordinary finances of the country. It was objectionable on account of its unequal incidence, of the harassing investigation into private affairs which it entailed and of the frauds to which it inevitably led. The value of the reduction in the necessities of life proposed by Mr. Gladstone is seen from the following from a contemporary writer: "The present budget, more than any other budget within our recollection, is a cupboard budget; otherwise, a poor man's budget. With certain very ugly features, the thing has altogether a good, hopeful aspect, together with very fair proportions. It is not given to any Chancellor of the Exchequer to make a budget fascinating as a fairy tale. Nevertheless, there are visions of wealth and comfort in the present budget that mightily recommend it to us. It seems to add color and fatness to the poor man's beef; to give flavor and richness to the poor man's plum-pudding. The budget is essentially a cupboard budget; and let the name of Gladstone be, for the time at least, musical at the poor man's fireside." It unquestionably established Gladstone as the foremost financier of his day. Greville, in his "Memoirs," says of him: "He spoke for five hours; and by universal consent it was one of the grandest displays and most able financial statements that ever was heard in the House of Commons; a great scheme, boldly and skillfully and honestly devised, disdaining popular clamor and pressure from without, and the execution of its absolute perfection." We reproduce some extracts from this important speech: "Depend upon it, when you come to close quarters with this subject, when you come to measure and test the respective relations of intelligence and labor and property in all their myriad and complex forms, and when you come to represent those relations in arithmetical results, you are undertaking an operation of which I should say it was beyond the power of man to conduct it with satisfaction, but which, at any rate, is an operation to which you ought not constantly to recur; for if, as my noble friend once said with universal applause, this country could not bear a revolution once a year, I will venture to say that it cannot bear a reconstruction of the income tax once a year. "Whatever you do in regard to the income tax, you must be bold, you must be intelligible, you must be decisive. You must not palter with it. If you do, I have striven at least to point out as well as my feeble powers will permit, the almost desecration I would say, certainly the gross breach of duty to your country, of which you will be found guilty, in thus putting to hazard one of the most potent and effective among all its material resources. I believe it to be of vital importance, whether you keep this tax or whether you part with it, that you should either keep it or should leave it in a state in which it will be fit for service on an emergency, and that it will be impossible to do if you break up the basis of your income tax. "If the Committee have followed me, they will understand that we found ourselves on the principle that the income-tax ought to be marked as a temporary measure; that the public feeling that relief should be given to intelligence and skill as compared with property ought to be met, and may be met with justice and with safety, in the manner we have pointed out; that the income tax in its operation ought to be mitigated by every rational means, compatible with its integrity; and, above all, that it should be associated in the last term of its existence, as it was in the first, with those remissions of indirect taxation which have so greatly redoubled to the profit of this country and have set so admirable an example--an example that has already in some quarters proved contagious to the other nations of the earth, These are the principles on which we stand, and these the figures. I have shown you that if you grant us the taxes which we ask, to the moderate amount of £2,500,000 in the whole, much less than that sum for the present year, you, or the Parliament which may be in existence in 1860, will be in the condition, if it shall so think fit, to part with the income tax." Sir, I scarcely dare to look at the clock, shamefully reminding me, as it must, how long, how shamelessly, I have trespassed on the time of the committee. All I can say in apology is that I have endeavored to keep closely to the topics which I had before me-- --immensum spatiis confecimus aequor, Et jam tempus equum fumantia solvere colla. "These are the proposals of the Government. They may be approved or they may be condemned, but I have at least this full and undoubting confidence, that it will on all hands be admitted that we have not sought to evade the difficulties of our position; that we have not concealed those difficulties, either from ourselves or from others; that we have not attempted to counteract them by narrow or flimsy expedients; that we have prepared plans which, if you will adopt them, will go some way to close up many vexed financial questions--questions such as, if not now settled, may be attended with public inconvenience, and even with public danger, in future years and under less favorable circumstances; that we have endeavored, in the plans we have now submitted to you, to make the path of our successors in future years not more arduous but more easy; and I may be permitted to add that, while we have sought to do justice, by the changes we propose in taxation, to intelligence and skill as compared with property--while we have sought to do justice to the great laboring community of England by furthering their relief from indirect taxation, we have not been guided by any desire to put one class against another. We have felt we should best maintain our own honor, that we should best meet the views of Parliament, and best promote the interests of the country, by declining to draw any invidious distinctions between class and class, by adapting it to ourselves as a sacred aim to differ and distribute--burden if we must, benefit if we may--with equal and impartial hand; and we have the consolation of believing that by proposals such as these we contribute, as far as in us lies, not only to develop the material resources of the country, but to knit the hearts of the various classes of this great nation yet more closely than heretofore to that throne and to those institutions under which it is their happiness to live." It is seldom that a venture of such magnitude as Mr. Gladstone's first budget meets with universal success. But from the outset the plan was received with universal favor. Besides the plaudits with which the orator was greeted at the conclusion of his speech, his proposals were received favorably by the whole nation. Being constructed upon Free Trade principles, it was welcomed by the press and the country. It added greatly, not only to the growing reputation of the new Chancellor of the Exchequer as a financier, but also to his popularity. The following anecdote of Mr. Gladstone is told by Walter Jerrold and is appropriate as well as timely here: "During Mr. Gladstone's first tenure of office as Chancellor of the Exchequer, a curious adventure occurred to him in the London offices of the late Mr. W. Lindsay, merchant, shipowner and M.P. There one day entered a brusque and wealthy shipowner of Sunderland, inquiring for Mr. Lindsay. As Mr. Lindsay was out, the visitor was requested to wait in an adjacent room, where he found a person busily engaged in copying some figures. The Sunderland shipowner paced the room several times and took careful note of the writer's doings, and at length said to him, 'Thou writes a bonny hand, thou dost.' "'I am glad you think so,' was the reply. "'Ah, thou dost. Thou makes thy figures weel. Thou'rt just the chap I want.' "'Indeed!' said the Londoner. "'Yes, indeed,' said the Sunderland man. 'I'm a man of few words. Noo, if thou'lt come over to canny ould Sunderland thou seest I'll give thee a hundred and twenty pounds a year, and that's a plum thou dost not meet with every day in thy life, I reckon. Noo then.' "The Londoner replied that he was much obliged for the offer, and would wait till Mr. Lindsay returned, whom he would consult upon the subject. Accordingly, on the return of the latter, he was informed of the shipowner's tempting offer. "'Very well,' said Mr. Lindsay, 'I should be sorry to stand in your way. One hundred and twenty pounds is more than I can afford to pay you in the department in which you are at present placed. You will find my friend a good and kind master, and, under the circumstances, the sooner you know each other the better. Allow me, therefore, Mr.----, to introduce you to the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, Chancellor of the Exchequer.' The Sunderland shipowner was a little taken aback at first, but he soon recovered his self-possession, and enjoyed the joke quite as much as Mr. Gladstone did." CHAPTER X THE CRIMEAN WAR The Crimean War, the great event with which the Aberdeen Cabinet was associated, was a contest between Russia and Turkey, England and France. A dispute which arose between Russia and Turkey as to the possession of the Holy Places of Jerusalem was the precipitating cause. For a long time the Greek and the Latin Churches had contended for the possession of the Holy Land. Russia supported the claim of the Greek Church, and France that of the Papal Church. The Czar claimed a Protectorate over all the Greek subjects of the Porte. Russia sought to extend her conquests south and to seize upon Turkey. France and England sustained Turkey. Sardinia afterwards joined the Anglo-French alliance. The people of England generally favored the war, and evinced much enthusiasm at the prospect of it. Lord Aberdeen and Mr. Gladstone wished England to stand aloof. The Peelite members of the cabinet were generally less inclined to war than the Whigs. Lord Palmerston and Lord John Russell favored England's support of Turkey. Some thought that England could have averted the war by pursuing persistently either of two courses: to inform Turkey that England would give her no aid; or to warn Russia that if she went to war, England would fight for Turkey. But with a ministry halting between two opinions, and the people demanding it, England "drifted into war" with Russia. July 2, 1853, the Russian troops crossed the Pruth and occupied the Danubian Principalities which had been by treaty, in 1849, evacuated by Turkey and Russia, and declared by both powers neutral territory between them. London was startled, October 4, 1853, by a telegram announcing that the Sultan had declared war against Russia. England and France jointly sent an _ultimatum_ to the Czar, to which no answer was returned. March 28, 1854, England declared war. On the 12th of March, while great excitement prevailed and public meetings were held throughout England, declaring for and against war, Mr. Gladstone made an address on the occasion of the inauguration of the statue of Sir Robert Peel, at Manchester. He spoke of the designs of Russia, and described her as a power which threatened to override all other powers, and as a source of danger to the peace of the world. Against such designs, seen in Russia's attempt to overthrow the Ottoman Empire, England had determined to set herself at whatever cost. War was a calamity that the government did not desire to bring upon the country, "a calamity which stained the face of nature with human gore, gave loose rein to crime, and took bread from the people. No doubt negotiation is repugnant to the national impatience at the sight of injustice and oppression; it is beset with delay, intrigue, and chicane; but these are not so horrible as war, if negotiation can be made to result in saving this country from a calamity which deprives the nation of subsistence and arrests the operations of industry. To attain that result ... Her Majesty's Ministers have persevered in exercising that self-command and that self-restraint which impatience may mistake for indifference, feebleness or cowardice, but which are truly the crowning greatness of a great people, and which do not evince the want of readiness to vindicate, when the time comes, the honor of this country." In November a conference of some of the European powers was held at Vienna to avert the war by mediating between Russia and Turkey, but was unsuccessful. Mr. Gladstone said: "Austria urged the two leading states, England and France, to send in their _ultimatum_ to Russia, and promised it her decided support.... Prussia at the critical moment, to speak in homely language, bolted.... In fact, she broke up the European concert, by which France and England had hoped to pull down the stubbornness of the Czar." Mr. Gladstone had opposed the war, not only on humanitarian and Christian grounds, but also because the preparation of a war budget overthrew all his financial schemes and hopes; a new budget was necessary, and he as Chancellor of the Exchequer must prepare it. Knowing that the struggle was inevitable, he therefore bent his energies to the task and conceived a scheme for discharging the expenses of the war out of the current revenue, provided it required no more than ten million pounds extra, so that the country should not be permanently burdened. It would require to do this the imposition of fresh taxes. "It thus fell to the lot of the most pacific of Ministers, the devotee of retrenchment, and the anxious cultivator of all industrial arts, to prepare a war budget, and to meet as well as he might the exigencies of a conflict which had so cruelly dislocated all the ingenious devices of financial optimism." Mr. Gladstone afterwards moved for over six and a half millions of pounds more than already granted, and proposed a further increase in the taxes. Mr. Disraeli opposed Mr. Gladstone's budget. He devised a scheme to borrow and thus increase the debt. He opposed the imposition of new taxes. Mr. Gladstone said: "Every good motive and every bad motive, combated only by the desire of the approval of honorable men and by conscientious rectitude--every motive of ease, comfort, and of certainty spring forward to induce a Chancellor of the Exchequer to become the first man to recommend a loan." Mr. Gladstone was sustained. The war had begun in earnest. The Duke of Newcastle received a telegram on the 21st of September announcing that 25,000 English troops, 25,000 French and 8000 Turks had landed safely at Eupatoria "without meeting with any resistance, and had already begun to march upon Sebastopol." The war was popular with the English people, but the ministry of Lord Aberdeen, which inaugurated it, was becoming unpopular. This became apparent in the autumn of 1854. There were not actual dissensions in the Cabinet, but there was great want of harmony as to the conduct of the war. The Queen knew with what reluctance Lord Aberdeen had entered upon the war, but she had the utmost confidence in him as a man and a statesman. She was most desirous that the war be prosecuted with vigor, and trusted the Premier for the realization of her hopes and those of the nation, but unity in the Cabinet was necessary for the successful prosecution of the war. Parliament assembled December 12, 1854, "under circumstances more stirring and momentous than any which had occurred since the year of Waterloo." The management of the war was the main subject under discussion. The English troops had covered themselves with glory in the battles of Alma, Balaclava and Inkermann. But the sacrifice was great. Thousands were slain and homes made desolate, while the British army was suffering greatly, and the sick and wounded were needing attention. Half a million pounds were subscribed in three months, and Miss Florence Nightingale with thirty-seven lady nurses, soon to be reinforced by fifty more, set out at once for the seat of war to nurse the sick and wounded soldiers. It is recorded that "they reached Scutari on the 5th of November, in time to receive the soldiers who had been wounded at the battle of Balaclava. On the arrival of Miss Nightingale the great hospital at Scutari, in which up to this time all had been chaos and discomfort, was reduced to order, and those tender lenitives which only woman's thought and woman's sympathy can bring to the sick man's couch, were applied to solace and alleviate the agonies of pain or the torture of fever and prostration." It was natural to attribute the want of proper management to the ministry, and hence the Government found itself under fire. In the House of Lords the Earl of Derby condemned the inefficient manner in which the war had been carried on, the whole conduct of the ministry in the war, and the insufficiency of the number of troops sent out to check the power of Russia. The Duke of Newcastle replied, and while not defending all the actions of the ministry during the war, yet contended that the government were prepared to prosecute it with resolve and unflinching firmness. While not standing ready to reject overtures of peace, they would not accept any but an honorable termination of the war. The ministry relied upon the army, the people, and upon their allies with the full confidence of ultimate success. Mr. Disraeli, in the House of Commons, attacked the policy of the ministry from beginning to end. Everything was a blunder or a mishap of some description or other; the government had invaded Russia with 25,000 troops without providing any provision for their support. When the House of Commons assembled, in January, 1855, it became apparent that there was a determination to sift to the bottom the charges that had been made against the ministry regarding their manner of carrying on the war. The Queen expressed her sympathy for Lord Aberdeen, who was in a most unenviable position. Motions hostile to the government were introduced in the House of Lords, while in the House of Commons Mr. Roebuck moved for a select committee "to inquire into the condition of the army before Sebastopol, and into the conduct of those departments of the government whose duty it has been to minister to the wants of the army." Lord John Russell resigned his office and left his colleagues to face the vote. He could not see how Mr. Roebuck's motion could be resisted. This seemed to portend the downfall of the ministry. The Duke of Newcastle, Secretary of War, offered to retire to save the government. Lord Palmerston believed that the breaking up of the ministry would be a calamity to the country, but he doubted the expediency of the retirement of the Duke of Newcastle, and his own fitness for the place of Minister of War, if vacated. Finally the Cabinet resolved to hold together, except Lord John Russell. In the debate it was declared that the condition of things at the seat of war was exaggerated; but the speech of Mr. Stafford caused a great sensation. He described the sufferings which he declared he had himself witnessed. He summed up by quoting the language of a French officer, who said: "You seem, sir, to carry on war according to the system of the Middle Ages." The situation of the ministry was critical before, but this speech seemed to make sure the passage of the resolutions. It was under all these depressing circumstances that Mr. Gladstone rose to defend himself and his colleagues. In a fine passage he thus described what the position of the Cabinet would have been if they had shrunk from their duty: "What sort of epitaph would have been written over their remains? He himself would have written it thus: Here lie the dishonored ashes of a ministry which found England at peace and left it in war, which was content to enjoy the emoluments of office and to wield the sceptre of power so long as no man had the courage to question their existence. They saw the storm gathering over the country; they heard the agonizing accounts which were almost daily received of the state of the sick and wounded in the East. These things did not move them. But as soon as the Honorable Member for Sheffield raised his hand to point the thunderbolt, they became conscience-stricken with a sense of guilt, and, hoping to escape punishment, they ran away from duty." This eloquent passage was received with tumultuous cheers. Mr. Gladstone claimed that there had been many exaggerations as to the state of the army and there were then more than 30,000 British troops under arms before Sebastopol. The administration of the War Department at home was no doubt defective, but he declined to admit that it had not improved, or that it was as bad as to deserve formal censure, and the Duke of Newcastle did not merit the condemnation sought to be cast on him as the head of the War Department. Mr. Disraeli was eagerly heard when he rose to speak. He said that the government admitted that they needed reconstruction, and that now the House was called upon to vote confidence in the administration. It was not the Duke of Newcastle nor the military system, but the policy of the whole Cabinet which he characterized as a "deplorable administration." The result of the vote was a strange surprise to all parties, and one of the greatest ever experienced in Parliamentary history. The vote for Mr. Roebuck's committee was 205; and against it, 148; a majority against the ministry of 157. "The scene was a peculiar and probably an unparalleled one. The cheers which are usually heard from one side or the other of the House on the numbers of a division being announced, were not forthcoming. The members were for a moment spellbound with astonishment, then there came a murmur of amazement and finally a burst of general laughter." The resignation of the Aberdeen ministry was announced February 1st, the Duke of Newcastle stating that it had been his intention to give up the office of Secretary of War whether Mr. Roebuck's resolution had passed or not. Thus was overthrown the famous coalition Cabinet of Lord Aberdeen--one of the most brilliant ever seen--a Cabinet distinguished for its oratorical strength, and for the conspicuous abilities of its chief members. Mr. Gladstone, who was the most distinguished Peelite in the Cabinet, certainly could not, up to this period, be suspected of lukewarmness in the prosecution of the war. Lord Palmerston formed a reconstructed rather than a new Cabinet. Mr. Gladstone and his friends at first declined to serve in the new Cabinet, out of regard for the Duke of Newcastle and Lord Aberdeen, the real victims of the adverse vote. But these noblemen besought Mr. Gladstone not to let his personal feelings stand in the way of his own interests, and not to deprive the country of his great services, so he resumed office as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Lord Palmerston had been regarded as the coming man, and his name carried weight upon the Continent and at home. But the new ministry was surrounded by serious difficulties, and did not pull together very long. The War Minister, Lord Panmure, entered upon his duties with energy, and proposed, February 16th, his remedy for existing evils; but on the 19th of February Mr. Layard in the House of Commons said, "the country stood on the brink of ruin--it had fallen into the abyss of disgrace and become the laughing-stock of Europe." He declared that the new ministry differed little from the last. Lord Palmerston, in answer to inquiries, lamented the sufferings of the army and confessed that mishaps had been made, but the present ministry had come forward in an emergency and from a sense of public duty, and he believed would obtain the confidence of the country. But another strange turn in events was at hand. Mr. Roebuck gave notice of the appointment of his committee. Hostility to the ministry was disclaimed, but Mr. Gladstone, Sir James Graham and Mr. Sidney Herbert took the same view of the question they had previously taken. They were opposed to the investigation as a dangerous breach of a great constitutional principle, and if the committee was granted, it would be a precedent from whose repetition the Executive could never again escape, however unreasonable might be the nature of the demand. They therefore retired from office. The report of the committee, when presented, practically advised a vote of censure upon the Aberdeen Cabinet for the sufferings of the British army, hence the house declined to entertain it by a large majority of 107. As the appointment of the committee, however, was the only way to allay the popular excitement, there were many who thought that the Peelites would have done well to recognize the urgency of the crisis and not to have abandoned the Government. The resignation of Mr. Gladstone made him very unpopular. However, "the wave of unpopularity lasted perhaps for a couple of years, and was afterwards replaced by a long-sustained popularity, which has not been exceeded by any statesman of the country. Greville referred to Gladstone about this time as 'the most unpopular man in the country.'" March 2d the Emperor Nicholas died suddenly, and there were momentary hopes of peace; but his successor, Alexander, resolved to prosecute the struggle rather than yield the positions taken by the late Czar. He issued a warlike proclamation, and though he agreed to take part in the Vienna Conference of European powers, to be held March 15th, there were no signs that he intended to recede from the Russian claims. Lord John Russell was sent to Vienna as English Plenipotentiary. The English aimed to secure the limitation of the preponderance of Russia in the Black Sea, and the acknowledgment of Turkey as one of the great European powers. To gain these points would, it was thought, end the war. Russia "would not consent to limit the number of her ships--if she did so she forfeited her honor, she would be no longer Russia. They did not want Turkey, they would be glad to maintain the Sultan, but they knew it was impossible; he must perish; they were resolved not to let any other power have Constantinople--they must not have that door to their dominions in the Black Sea shut against them." The Conference failed, and Lord John Russell was held responsible for its failure, and was eventually forced out of the Cabinet on that account. The failure of the Vienna negotiations produced great excitement, and the ministry were attacked and defeated in both Houses of Parliament. Mr. Disraeli offered a resolution of dissatisfaction in the House of Commons. Mr. Gladstone spoke during the debate on the failure of the Vienna Conference, and defended the war of the Crimea. He did not consider it a failure, for Russia now agreed to most of the points raised by the allies, and the only matter to be adjusted, was the proposition to limit the power of Russia in the Black Sea. Personally, he had formerly favored the curtailment of Russia's power there, but he now thought that such a proposal implied a great indignity to Russia. He believed that the proposal of Russia to give to Turkey the power of opening and shutting the straits was one calculated to bring about a peaceful settlement. The time was favorable to make peace. Lord John Russell replied vigorously to Mr. Gladstone. The House decided by a majority of 100 to support the ministry in the further prosecution of the war until a safe and honorable peace could be secured. But on the 10th of July Sir E. Bulwer Lytton offered the following resolution: "That the conduct of our Ministry, in the recent negotiations at Vienna, has, in the opinion of this House, shaken the confidence of this country in those to whom its affairs are entrusted." Lord John Russell again declined to face discussion and resigned. During the debate on the motion Mr. Disraeli bitterly attacked Lord John Russell and the Premier, Lord Palmerston. But Mr. Gladstone said that so far from blaming the Ministry for hesitating about the offers of peace at Vienna, he blamed them for not giving the propositions that consideration which their gravity demanded, and for abruptly terminating the Conference and closing the hope of an honorable peace. Mr. Gladstone, on the 3d of August, made another powerful appeal for the cessation of the war. He held that there was now no definite object for continuing the struggle; defended the Austrian proposals; defied the Western powers to control the future destinies of Russia, save for a moment; and he placed "the individual responsibility of the continuance of the war on the head of the Ministry." But while Sebastopol held out there was no prospect of peace with Russia. Finally, in September, that fortress was taken and destroyed, and the Peace of Paris was concluded, March, 1856. [Illustration: HOUSE OF COMMONS.] CHAPTER XI IN OPPOSITION TO THE GOVERNMENT It was in February, 1855, that Mr. Gladstone resigned his seat in the Cabinet. After the Treaty of Paris, March, 1856, which put an end to the Crimean War, Mr. Gladstone found himself in opposition to the Ministry of Lord Palmerston. He had assumed a position of independence, associating politically with neither party. The political parties dreaded criticism and attack from him, for he was not properly constructed for the defense of either. He had himself declared his "sympathies" were "with the Conservatives, and his opinions with the Liberals," and that he and his Peelite colleagues, during this period of political isolation, were like roving icebergs on which men could not land with safety, but with which ships might come into perilous collision. Their weight was too great not to count, but it counted first this way and then that. Mr. Gladstone was conscientious in his opposition. He said: "I greatly felt being turned out of office. I saw great things to do. I longed to do them. I am losing the best years of my life out of my natural service. Yet I have never ceased to rejoice that I am not in office with Palmerston, when I have seen the tricks, the shufflings, the frauds he daily has recourse to as to his business. I rejoice not to sit on the Treasury Bench with him." In August, 1855, Lord Aberdeen said; "Gladstone intends to be Prime Minister. He has great qualifications, but some serious defects. He is supreme in the House of Commons. He is too obstinate; if a man can be too honest, he is too honest. I have told Gladstone that when he is Prime Minister, I will have a seat in his Cabinet, if he desires it, without an office." During 1856, several measures came before Parliament which Mr. Gladstone opposed. He vindicated the freedom of the Belgian press, whose liberty some of the powers would curtail, and opposed resolutions to consider the state of education in England and Wales, as tending to create a central controlling power, involving secular instruction and endless religious quarrels. He also opposed the budget of Sir G.C. Lewis, which imposed more duties upon the tea and sugar of the working-man, and was said to be generally at variance with the policy pursued by every enlightened minister of finance. Besides, he condemned the continuance of the war duties in times of peace. "He was a particularly acute thorn in the side of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and criticised the budget with unsparing vigor. 'Gladstone seems bent on leading Sir George Lewis a weary life,' wrote Mr. Greville. But finance was by no means the only subject of this terrible free-lance." A resolution was offered in the House of Commons expressing disapprobation with the English Cabinet for sanctioning, in 1855 and '56, the violation of international law, by secretly enlisting the subjects of the United States as recruits for the British army, by the intervention of the English Ambassador. Mr. Gladstone said: "It appears to me that the two cardinal aims that we ought to keep in view in the discussion of this question are peace and a thoroughly cordial understanding with America for one, the honor and fame of England for the other. I am bound to say that in regard to neither of these points am I satisfied with the existing state of things, or with the conduct of Her Majesty's Government. A cordial understanding with America has not been preserved, and the honor of this country has been compromised." Lord Palmerston, though very popular with the people, had greatly offended a large portion of the House of Commons by his interference in China. A lorcha, called the _Arrow_, flying the British flag, had been seized by the Chinese, and the question arose as to the right of the vessel to the protection of England. The opponents of the government contended that the vessel was built in China, was captured by pirates, and recaptured by the Chinese, and hence had no claim to British protection. To bring the matter to an issue Mr. Cobden introduced a resolution of inquiry and censure. For five nights the debate was protracted, and many able speeches were made on both sides, but Mr. Gladstone made one of the most effective speeches, against the ministry. He said: "Every man, I trust, will give his vote with the consciousness that it may depend upon his single vote whether the miseries, the crimes, the atrocities that I fear are now proceeding in China are to be discountenanced or not. We have now come to the crisis of the case. England is not yet committed. With you, then, with us, with every one of us, it rests to show that this House, which is the first, the most ancient, and the noblest temple of freedom in the world, is also the temple of that everlasting justice without which freedom itself would only be a name or only a curse to mankind." The Premier ably defended himself, but the resolution of Mr. Cobden was passed. Parliament was dissolved March 21, 1857, and Lord Palmerston appealed to the country. He was victorious at the polls. Among the prominent Liberals who lost their seats were Cobden, Bright, and Milner Gibson. The Peelites suffered loss too, but Mr. Gladstone was again elected for Oxford University. However, Mr. Greville writes, under date of June 3d: "Gladstone hardly ever goes near the House of Commons, and never opens his lips." But his indifference and silence were not to last long. When the Divorce Bill, which originated in the Lords, came up in the Commons, Mr. Gladstone made an impassioned speech against the measure, contending for the equality of woman with man in all the rights pertaining to marriage. He dealt with the question on theological, legal and social grounds. He contended that marriage was not only or chiefly a civil contract, but a "mystery" of the Christian religion. By the law of God it could not be so annulled as to permit of the re-marriage of the parties. "Our Lord," he says, "has emphatically told us that, at and from the beginning, marriage was perpetual, and was on both sides single." He dwelt with pathetic force on the injustice between man and woman of the proposed legislation, which would entitle the husband to divorce from an unfaithful wife, but would give no corresponding protection to the woman; and predicted the gloomiest consequences to the conjugal morality of the country from the erection of this new and odious tribunal. Nevertheless the bill became a law. In 1858 a bill was introduced in the House of Commons by Lord Palmerston, to make conspiracy to murder a felony. It grew out of the attempt of Orsini upon the life of Napoleon III. The bill at first was carried by an immense majority, but the conviction spread that the measure was introduced solely at the dictation of the French Emperor, and hence the proposal was strongly opposed. Mr. Gladstone said: "These times are grave for liberty. We live in the nineteenth century; we talk of progress; we believe we are advancing, but can any man of observation who has watched the events of the last few years in Europe have failed to perceive that there is a movement indeed, but a downward and backward movement? There are few spots in which institutions that claim our sympathy still exist and flourish.... But in these times more than ever does responsibility centre upon the institutions of England, and if it does centre upon England, upon her principles, upon her laws and upon her governors, then I say that a measure passed by this House of Commons--the chief hope of freedom--which attempts to establish a moral complicity between us and those who seek safety in repressive measures, will be a blow and a discouragement to that sacred cause in every country in the world." The bill was defeated by a majority of nineteen, and Lord Palmerston again resigned. He was succeeded by Lord Derby, who once more came into power. Mr. Disraeli again became Chancellor of the Exchequer, and leader of the House of Commons. The new ministry, which existed largely on sufferance, passed some good measures. The one hundredth anniversary of the battle of Plassey was celebrated in England June 23, 1857, to obtain funds for a monument to Lord Clive, who secured India to England. The English then felt secure in the government of that land, yet at that very time one of the most wide-spread, destructive and cruel rebellions was raging, and shaking to its very foundations the English rule in Hindostan. Suddenly the news came of the terrible Indian mutiny and of the indiscriminate slaughter of men, women and children, filling all hearts with horror, and then of the crushing out of the rebellion. Lord Canning, Governor-General, issued a proclamation to the chiefs of Oudh, looking to the confiscation of the possessions of mutineers who failed to return to the allegiance of England. It was meant as clemency. But Lord Ellenborough, the officer in charge of affairs in India, dispatched "a rattling condemnation of the whole proceeding." Says Justin McCarthy: "It was absurd language for a man like Lord Ellenborough to address to a statesman like Lord Canning, who had just succeeded in keeping the fabric of English government in India together during the most terrible trial ever imposed on it by fate." The matter was taken up by Parliament. Lord Shaftesbury moved that the Lords disprove the sending of the dispatch. In the Commons the ministry were arraigned. But Lord Ellenborough took upon himself the sole responsibility of the dispatch, and resigned. Mr. Gladstone was invited to the vacant place, but declined. The most important among the bills passed by Parliament was the India Bill, by which the government of India was transferred from the East India Company to the Crown and the Home government. Mr. Gladstone, who opposed the bill, proposed a clause providing that the Indian troops should not be employed in military operations beyond the frontiers of India. In November, 1858, Mr. Gladstone accepted from the Premier the post of Lord High Commissioner Extraordinary to the Ionian Islands. The people of the Ionian Islands, which in 1800 was formed into the Republic of the Seven Islands, and was under the protection of Great Britain from 1815, were desirous of adding themselves to Greece. But the British government objected to the separation and their union with Greece. Mr. Gladstone was to repair to Corfu for the purpose of reconciling the people to the British protectorate. The Ionians regarded his appointment as a virtual abandonment of the protectorate of Great Britain. Mr. Gladstone, December 3d, addressed the Senate at Corfu in Italian. He had the reputation of being a Greek student, and the inhabitants of the Islands persisted in regarding him not as a Commissioner of a Conservative English Government, but as "Gladstone the Phil-Hellene!" He made a tour of the Islands, holding levees, receiving deputations and delivering harangues, and was received wherever he went with the honors due to a liberator. His path everywhere was made to seem like a triumphal progress. It was in vain he repeated his assurance that he came to reconcile them to the protectorate and not to deliver them from it. But the popular instinct insisted upon regarding him as at least the precursor of their union with the Kingdom of Greece. The legislative assembly met January 27, 1859, and proposed annexation to Greece. Finding that this was their firm wish and determination, Mr. Gladstone despatched to the Queen a copy of the vote, in which the representatives declared that "the single and unanimous will of the Ionian people has been and is for their union with the Kingdom of Greece." Mr. Gladstone returned home in February, 1859. The Ionians continued their agitation, and in 1864 were formally given over to the government of Greece. Parliament was opened February 3, 1859, by the Queen, who in her speech from the throne said that the attention of Parliament would be called to the state of the law regulating the representation of the people. The plan of the government was presented by Mr. Disraeli. "It was a fanciful performance," says an English writer. The ministry proposed not to alter the limits of the franchise, but to introduce into boroughs a new kind of franchise founded on personal property. Mr. Disraeli characterized the government measure as "wise, prudent, adequate, conservative, and framed by men who reverence the past, are proud of the present, and confident of the future." Two members of the Cabinet promptly resigned rather than be parties to these proposals. Mr. Bright objected because the working classes were excluded. An amendment was moved by Lord John Russell condemning interference with the franchise which enabled freeholders in boroughs to vote in counties, and demanding a wider extension of the suffrage in boroughs. Mr. Gladstone, though agreeing with these views, declined to support the amendment, because, if carried, it would upset the government and bring in a weaker administration. He did not propose to support the government, but he desired to see a settlement of the question of reform, and he thought the present opportunity advantageous for such settlement. He pleaded eloquently for the retention of the small boroughs. The bill was lost by a majority of thirty-nine. Lord Derby having advised the Queen to dissolve Parliament, this was done April 3d. The general elections which resulted from the defeat of the Conservatives in the House of Commons on the Reform Bill, resulted in returning the Liberals with a considerable majority. Mr. Gladstone was again returned unopposed for the University of Oxford. The Queen opened the new Parliament June 7th. In reply to the speech from the throne an amendment to the address was moved by Lord Hartington, proposing a vote of want of confidence in the ministers. After three nights debate it was carried on June 10th, by a majority of thirteen, Mr. Gladstone voting with the government. Lord Derby and his colleagues immediately resigned. The Queen being averse to choosing between Lord John Russell and Lord Palmerston, turned to Lord Granville, leader of the Liberal party in the House of Lords. He failed to form a Cabinet, and Lord Palmerston again became Prime Minister. The revolution of the political wheel once more brought Mr. Gladstone into office as Chancellor of the Exchequer. It became necessary in accepting a Cabinet position to again appeal to his constituents at Oxford for re-election. He voted as he did to sustain Lord Derby's administration and to settle the Reform question, yet he was misunderstood and some of his constituents alienated. He was strongly opposed by the Conservative Marquis of Chandos. The Conservatives claimed that he should not be returned, because, as Professor Mansel said, by his "acceptance of office he must now be considered as giving his definite adhesion to the Liberal party, as at present reconstructed, and as approving of the policy of those who overthrew Lord Derby's government." It was found on the conclusion of the poll, which continued for five days, that Mr. Gladstone was returned with a majority of nearly two hundred over his opponent. It is worthy of note that this same year Cambridge conferred upon Mr. Gladstone the honorary degree of D.C.L. [Illustration] CHAPTER XII HOMERIC STUDIES "The plenitude and variety of Mr. Gladstone's intellectual powers," says G. Barnett Smith, "have been the subject of such frequent comment that it would be superfluous to insist upon them here. On the political side of his career his life has been as unresting and active as that of any other great party leader, and if we regard him in the literary aspect we are equally astonished at his energy and versatility. Putting out of view his various works upon Homer, his miscellaneous writings of themselves, with the reading they involve, would entitle their author to take high rank on the score of industry.... We stand amazed at the infinity of topics which have received Mr. Gladstone's attention." To solve the problems associated with Homer has been the chief intellectual recreation, the close and earnest study of Mr. Gladstone's literary life. "The blind old man of Scio's rocky isle" possessed for him an irresistible and a perennial charm. Nor can this occasion surprise, for all who have given themselves up to the consideration and attempted solution of the Homeric poems have found the fascination of the occupation gather in intensity. It is not alone from the poetic point of view that the first great epic of the world attracts students of all ages and of all countries. Homer presents, in addition, and beyond every other writer, a vast field for ethnological, geographical, and historical speculation and research. The ancient world stands revealed in the Homeric poems. Besides, almost numberless volumes have been written based upon the equally debatable questions of the Homeric text and the Homeric unity. Some literary works of Mr. Gladstone have been already noticed. "Studies on Homer and Homeric Age" shows Mr. Gladstone's classic tastes and knowledge as well as his great industry and ability. This work was published in three volumes, in 1858. It is his _magnum opus_ in literature, and exhibits wide and laborious research. "It discusses the Homeric controversy in its broad aspects, the relation of Homer to the Sacred Writings, his place in education, his historic aims, the probable period of the poet's life, the Homeric text, the ethnology of the Greek races, and the politics and poetry of Homer. Among subsequent Greek studies by Mr. Gladstone were his 'Juventus Mundi' and the 'Homeric Synchronism.' There is probably no greater living authority on the text of Homer than Mr. Gladstone, and the Ancient Greek race and literature have exercised over him a perennial fascination." Mr. Gladstone dwells much on the relation of Homer to Christianity. "The standard of humanity of the Greek poet is different, yet many of his ideas almost carry us back to the early morning of our race; the hours of its greater simplicity and purity, and more free intercourse with God.... How is it possible to overvalue this primitive representation of the human race in a form complete, distinct and separate, with its own religion, stories, policy, history, arts, manners, fresh and true to the standard of its nature, like the form of an infant from the hand of the Creator, yet mature, full, and finished, in its own sense, after its own laws, like some masterpiece of the sculptor's art?" The Homeric scene of action is not Paradise, but it is just as far removed from the vices of a later heathenism. Mr. Gladstone compares the "Iliad" and the "Odyssey," which he believed to be the poems of one poet, Homer, with the Old Testament writings, and observes that "Homer can never be put into competition with the Scriptures as touching the great fundamental, invaluable code of truth and hope;" but he shows how one may in a sense be supplementary to the other. As regards the history of the Greek race, it is Homer that furnishes "the point of origin from which all distances are to be measured." He says: "The Mosaic books, and the other historical books of the Old Testament, are not intended to present, and do not present, a picture of human society or of our nature drawn at large. The poems of Homer may be viewed as the complement of the earliest portion of the sacred records." Again: "The Holy Scriptures are like a thin stream, beginning from the very fountain-head of our race, and gradually, but continuously, finding their way through an extended solitude into times otherwise known, and into the general current of the fortunes of mankind. The Homeric poems are like a broad lake, outstretched in the distance, which provides us with a mirror of one particular age and people, alike full and marvelous, but which is entirely disassociated by a period of many generations from any other records, except such as are of the most partial and fragmentary kind. In respect of the influence which they have respectively exercised upon mankind, it might appear almost profane to compare them. In this point of view the Scriptures stand so far apart from every other production, on account of their great offices in relation to the coming of the Redeemer and to the spiritual training of mankind, that there can be nothing either like or second to them." Mr. Gladstone thinks that "the poems of Homer possess extrinsic worth as a faithful and vivid picture of early Grecian life and measures; they have also an intrinsic value which has given their author the first place in that marvelous trinity of genius--Homer, Dante, and Shakespeare." As to the historic aims of Homer, Mr. Gladstone says: "Where other poets sketch, Homer draws; and where they draw he carves. He alone of all the now famous epic writers, moves (in the 'Iliad' especially) subject to the stricter laws of time and place; he alone, while producing an unsurpassed work of the imagination, is also the greatest chronicler that ever lived, and presents to us, from his own single hand, a representation of life, manners, history, of morals, theology, and politics, so vivid and comprehensive, that it may be hard to say whether any of the more refined ages of Greece or Rome, with their clouds of authors and their multiplied forms of historical record, are either more faithfully or more completely conveyed to us." Mr. Gladstone fixes the probable date of Homer within a generation or two of the Trojan war, assigning as his principal reason for so doing the poet's visible identity with the age, the altering but not yet vanishing age of which he sings, and the broad interval in tone and feeling between himself and the very nearest of all that follow him. He presents several arguments to prove the trustworthiness of the text of Homer. In 1877, Mr. Gladstone wrote an article on the "Dominions of the Odysseus," and also wrote a preface to Dr. Henry Schliemann's "Mycenae." One of his most remarkable productions bore the title of, "The Vatican Decrees in their Bearing on Civil Allegiance; a Political Expostulation." This book was an amplification of an article from his own pen, which appeared October, 1874, in the _Contemporary Review_. It created great public excitement and many replies. One hundred and twenty thousand copies were sold. Mr. Higginson says: "The vigor of the style, the learning exhibited, and the source whence it came, all contributed to give it an extraordinary influence.... It was boldly proclaimed in this pamphlet that, since 1870, Rome has substituted for the proud boast of _semper eadem_, a policy of violence and change of faith;... 'that she had equally repudiated modern thought and ancient history;' ... 'that she has reburnished and paraded anew every rusty tool she was thought to have disused,' and 'that Rome requires a convert who now joins her to forfeit his moral and mental freedom, and to place his loyalty and civil duty at the mercy of another.'" Mr. Gladstone issued another pamphlet, entitled "Vaticanism; and Answers to Reproofs and Replies," He reiterated his original charges, saying: "The Vatican decrees do, in the strictest sense, establish for the Pope a supreme command over loyalty and civil duty.... Even in those parts of Christendom where the decrees and the present attitude of the Papal See do not produce or aggravate open broils with the civil power, by undermining moral liberty, they impair moral responsibility, and silently, in the succession of generations, if not in the lifetime of individuals, tend to emasculate the vigor of the mind." Mr. Gladstone published in seven volumes, in 1879, "Gleanings of Past Years." The essay entitled "Kin Beyond the Sea" at first created much excitement. "The Kin Beyond the Sea" was America, of which he says: "She will probably become what we are now, the head servant in the great household of the world, the employer of all employed; because her services will be the most and ablest." Again: "The England and the America of the present are probably the two strongest nations in the world. But there can hardly be a doubt, as between the America and the England of the future, that the daughter, at some no very distant time, will, whether fairer or less fair, be unquestionably yet stronger than the mother." Mr. Gladstone argues in support of this position from the concentrated continuous empire which America possesses, and the enormous progress she has made within a century. In an address at the opening of the Art Loan Exhibition of Chester, August 11, 1879, Mr. Gladstone said: "With the English those two things are quite distinct; but in the oldest times of human industry--that is to say amongst the Greeks--there was no separation whatever, no gap at all, between the idea of beauty and the idea of utility. Whatever the ancient Greek produced he made as useful as he could; and at the same time, reward for work with him was to make it as beautiful as he could. In the industrial productions of America there is very little idea of beauty; for example, an American's axe is not intended to cut away a tree neatly, but quickly. We want a workman to understand that if he can learn to appreciate beauty in industrial productions, he is thereby doing good to himself, first of all in the improvement of his mind, and in the pleasure he derives from his work, and likewise that literally he is increasing his own capital, which is his labor." In his articles on "Ecce Homo" he expresses the hope "that the present tendency to treat the old belief of man with a precipitate, shallow, and unexamining disparagement, is simply a distemper, that inflicts for a time the moral atmosphere, that is due, like plagues and fevers, to our own previous folly and neglect; and that when it has served its work of admonition and reform, will be allowed to pass away." The "Impregnable Rock of Holy Scripture" is the title of a book by Mr. Gladstone, the articles of which were originally published in _The Sunday School Times_, Philadelphia. [Illustration: MR. GLADSTONE'S AXE] CHAPTER XIII GREAT BUDGETS The year 1860 marked the beginning of the second half of Mr. Gladstone's life as a statesman, in which he stood prominently forward as a Reformer. July 18, 1859, as Chancellor in the Liberal government of Lord Palmerston, he brought forward his budget. The budget of 1860 was the greatest of all his financial measures, for a new departure was taken in British commerce and manufactures. Mr. Cobden, in behalf of the English Government, had negotiated with France a treaty based on free trade principles--"a treaty which gave an impetus to the trade of this country, whose far-reaching effects are felt even to our day." The Chancellor explained the various propositions of his financial statements. Speaking of discontent with the income tax he observed: "I speak on general terms. Indeed, I now remember that I myself had, about a fortnight ago, a letter addressed to me complaining of the monstrous injustice and iniquity of the income tax, and proposing that, in consideration thereof, the Chancellor of the Exchequer should be publicly hanged." Mr. Gladstone said that the total reduction of duties would be over £1,000,000, requiring a slight extension of taxation; that by this means nearly £1,000,000 would be returned to the general revenue; that the loss to the revenue by the French Treaty, which was based upon free trade principles, and the reduction of duties, would be half made up by the imposts specified; that the abolition of the paper duty would produce the happiest results from the spread of cheap literature. The reductions proposed would give a total relief to the consumer of nearly £4,000,000, and cause a net loss of the revenue of over £2,000,000, a sum about equivalent to the amount coming in from the cessation of government annuities that year. The total revenue was £70,564,000, and as the total expenses of government was £70,000,000, there remained an estimated surplus of £464,000. Mr. Gladstone concluded; "There were times, now long by, when sovereigns made progress through the land, and when at the proclamation of their heralds, they caused to be scattered whole showers of coin among the people who thronged upon their steps.... Our Sovereign is enabled, through the wisdom of her great council, assembled in Parliament around her, again to scatter blessings among her subjects by means of wise and prudent laws; of laws which do not sap in any respect the foundations of duty or of manhood, but which strike away the shackles from the arm of industry." "It was one of the peculiarities of Mr. Gladstone's budget addresses that they roused curiosity in the outset, and, being delivered in a musical, sonorous, and perfectly modulated voice, kept the listeners interested to the very close. This financial statement of 1860 was admirably arranged for the purpose of awakening and keeping attention, piquing and teasing curiosity, and sustaining desire to hear from the first sentence to the last. It was not a speech, it was an oration, in the form of a great State paper, made eloquent, in which there was a proper restraint over the crowding ideas, the most exact accuracy in the sentences, and even in the very words chosen; the most perfect balancing of parts, and, more than all, there were no errors or omissions; nothing was put wrongly and nothing was overlooked. With a House crowded in every corner, with the strain upon his own mental faculties, and the great physical tax implied in the management of his voice, and the necessity for remaining upon his feet during this long period, 'the observed of all observers,' Mr. Gladstone took all as quietly, we are told, as if he had just risen to address a few observations to Mr. Speaker. Indeed, it was laughingly said that he could address a House for a whole week, and on the Friday evening have taken a new departure, beginning with the observation, 'After these preliminary remarks, I will now proceed to deal with the subject matter of my financial plan.'" The ministry was supported by large majorities, and carried their measures, but when the bill for the repeal of the duty on paper at home, as well as coming into the country, came before the House of Lords, it was rejected. Mr. Gladstone appeared to be confronted by the greatest constitutional crisis of his life. He gave vent to his indignation, and declared that the action of the Lords was a gigantic innovation, and that the House of Commons had the undoubted right of selecting the manner in which the people should be taxed. This speech was pronounced by Lord John Russell "magnificently mad," and Lord Granville said that "it was a toss-up whether Gladstone resigned or not, and that if he did it would break up the Liberal party." Quiet was finally restored, and the following year Mr. Gladstone adroitly brought the same feature before the Lords in a way that compelled acceptance. The budget of 1861 showed a surplus of £2,000,000 over the estimated surplus, and proposed to remit the penny on the income tax, and to repeal the paper duty. Instead of being divided into several bills as in the previous year, the budget was presented as a whole--all included in one. By this device the Lords were forced to acquiesce in the repeal of the paper duty, or take the responsibility of rejecting the whole bill. The Peers grumbled, and some of them were enraged. Lord Robert Cecil, now Marquis of Salisbury, rudely declared that Mr. Gladstone's conduct was only worthy of an attorney. He begged to apologize to the attorneys. They were honorable men and would have scorned the course pursued by the ministers. Another member of the House of Lords protested that the budget gave a mortal stab to the Constitution. Mr. Gladstone retorted: "I want to know, to what Constitution does it give a mortal stab? In my opinion it gives no mortal stab, and no stab at all, to any Constitution that we are bound to care for. But, on the contrary, so far as it alters anything in the most recent course of practice, it alters in the direction of restoring that good old Constitution which took its root in Saxon times, which grew from the Plantagenets, which endured the iron repression of the Tudors, which resisted the aggressions of the Stuarts, and which has come to its full maturity under the House of Brunswick. I think that is the Constitution, if I may presume to say so, which it is our duty to guard, and which--if, indeed, the proceedings of this year can be said to affect it at all--will be all the better for the operation. But the Constitution which my right honorable friend worships is a very different affair." In 1860, Mr. Gladstone was elected Lord Rector of Edinburgh University, and the degree of LL.D. was conferred upon him. Mr. Gladstone, in 1861, introduced one of his most beneficial measures--a bill creating the Post Office Savings Bank. The success of the scheme has gone beyond all expectation. At the close of 1891, the amount deposited was £71,608,002, and growing at the average rate of over £4,000,000 annually. Mr. Gladstone's financial measures for 1862, while not involving such momentous issues as those of the preceding year, nevertheless encountered considerable opposition. The budget was a stationary one, with no surplus, no new taxes, no remission of taxes, no heavier burdens. In October, 1862, Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone made a journey down the Tyne, which is thus described: "It was not possible to show to royal visitors more demonstrations of honor than were showered on the illustrious Commoner and his wife.... At every point, at every bank and hill and factory, in every opening where people could stand or climb, expectant crowds awaited Mr. Gladstone's arrival. Women and children, in all costumes and of all conditions, lined the shores ... as Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone passed. Cannon boomed from every point;... such a succession of cannonading never before greeted a triumphant conqueror on the march." It was during this journey that Mr. Gladstone made the memorable speech, at New Castle, upon the American Civil War, which had broken out the same year. There had been much speculation as to whether the English government would recognize the Confederacy as a separate and independent power, and the utterance of a member of the Cabinet under the circumstances was regarded as entirely unwarranted. Mr. Gladstone himself frankly acknowledged his error in 1867: "I must confess that I was wrong; that I took too much upon myself in expressing such an opinion. Yet the motive was not bad. My sympathies were then--where they had long before been, where they are now--with the whole American people." The session of 1863 was barren of important subjects of debate, and hence unusual interest was centered in the Chancellor's statement, which was another masterly financial presentation, and its leading propositions were cordially received. The whole reduction of taxation for the year was £3,340,000, or counting the total reductions, present and prospective, of £4,601,000. This still left a surplus of £400,000. In four years £8,000,000 had been paid for war with China out of the ordinary revenues. A proposition to subject charities to the income tax, although endorsed by the whole cabinet, led to such powerful opposition throughout the country that it was finally withdrawn. The arguments of the Chancellor were endorsed by many who were opposed to the indiscriminate and mistaken beneficence which was so prevalent on death-beds. A bill was introduced at this session by Sir Morton Peto, entitled the "Dissenters' Burial Bill," the object of which was to enable Nonconformists to have their own religious rites and services, and by their own ministers, in the graveyards of the Established Church. The bill was strongly opposed by Lord Robert Cecil and Mr. Disraeli. Mr. Gladstone favored the measure. The bill was rejected, and Mr. Gladstone at a later period discovered that his progress in ecclesiastical and political opinions was creating a breach between himself and his constituents at Oxford. Mr. Gladstone's financial scheme for 1864 was received with undiminished interest. It was characterized as "a policy of which peace, progress and retrenchment were the watchwords." An available surplus of £2,260,000 enabled him to propose reductions. The subject of reform, which had been coming up in the House of Commons in one way or another and agitating the House and the country since 1859, when the Conservative party was beaten on the question, reappeared in 1864. The question of lowering the borough franchise came up, and Mr. Gladstone startled the House and the country by his declaration upon the subject of reform, which showed the rapid development of his views upon the subject. The Conservative party was filled with alarm, and the hopes of the Reform party correspondingly elated. "The eyes of all Radical Reformers turned to Mr. Gladstone as the future Minister of Reform in Church and State. He became from the same moment an object of distrust, and something approaching to detestation in the eyes of all steady-going Conservatives." Mr. Gladstone said: "I say that every man who is not presentably incapacitated by some consideration of personal unfitness or political danger, is morally entitled to come within the pale of the constitution." This declaration was the first note sounded in a conflict which, twelve months later, was to cost Mr. Gladstone his seat for Oxford University, and finally to culminate in the disruption of the Liberal Government. The general feeling in regard to this speech was that if the Liberal party had failed in its duty on the subject of reform in the existing Parliament after Mr. Gladstone's utterances, that the condition of things must undergo a change, so great was the effect of his speech in the country. The bill, which was presented by a private member and lost, was made memorable by the speech of the Chancellor. The eyes of careful political leaders were again turned towards Mr. Gladstone, and strong predictions made of his coming exaltation to the Premiership. Mr. Speaker Denison said, in October, 1864: "I now anticipate that Mr. Gladstone will be Premier. Neither party has any leader. I hope Mr. Gladstone may get support from the Conservatives who now support Palmerston." And these expectations were known to Mr. Gladstone himself, for Bishop Wilberforce had a conversation with him and writes: "Long talk with Gladstone as to Premiership: he is for acting under John Russell." Again to Mr. Gladstone: "Anything which breaks up, or tends to break up, Palmerston's supremacy, must bring you nearer to the post in which I long to see you, and, if I live, shall see you." Lord Palmerston himself said: "Gladstone will soon have it all his own way; and whenever he gets my place we shall have strange things." The hostile feeling towards the Palmerston government, which had been growing in intensity, chiefly on the ground of its foreign policy, reached its full height in a fierce battle between the Ministry and the Opposition. July 4, 1864, Mr. Disraeli brought forward his motion of "no confidence." Mr. Gladstone replied for the government, and sought to rebut the accusations made by the leader of the Opposition. He said that it was the very first time in which the House of Commons had been called upon to record the degradation of the country, simply for the sake of displacing a ministry. An amusing episode which occurred during this debate is worthy of record here; Mr. Bernard Osborne "grew amusingly sarcastic at the expense of the government, though he paid at the same time a great compliment to Mr. Gladstone. He likened the Cabinet to a museum of curiosities, in which there were some birds of rare and noble plumage, both alive and stuffed. There had been a difficulty, unfortunately, in keeping up the breed, and it was found necessary to cross it with the famous Peelites. 'I will do them the justice to say that they have a very great and noble Minister among them in the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and it is to his measures alone that they owe the little popularity and the little support they get from this Liberal party.' Describing Mr. Milner Gibson, the honorable gentleman said he was like some 'fly in amber,' and the wonder was 'how the devil he got there.' Mr. Cobden and Mr. Bright must have been disappointed in this 'young man from the country.' He had become insolent and almost quarrelsome under the guidance of the noble lord. Should that Parliament decide on terminating its own and their existence, they would find consolation that the funeral oration would be pronounced by Mr. Newdegate, and that some friendly hand would inscribe on their mausoleum, 'Rest and be thankful.'" Mr. Disraeli's motion was lost, and the ministry was sustained. The budget of 1865 represented the country as in a prosperous financial condition. The total reduction was over £5,000,000. Such a financial showing gained the warm approval of the people, and excited but little opposition in the House. It was evident that a master-hand was guiding the national finances, and fortunately the Chancellor's calculations were verified by the continued prosperity of the country. At a later period, in commenting upon the policy of the two parties--Conservative and Liberal--Mr. Gladstone said: "From thence it follows that the policy of the Liberal party has been to reduce the public charges and to keep the expenditure within the estimates, and, as a result, to diminish the taxation of the country and the national debt; that the policy of the Tory government, since they took office in 1866, has been to increase the public charges, and to allow the departments to spend more than their estimates, and, as a result, to create deficits and to render the reduction of taxation impossible. Which policy will the country prefer?" CHAPTER XIV LIBERAL REFORMER AND PRIME MINISTER July, 1865, Parliament having run its allotted course, according to the constitution, was dissolved, and a general election took place, which resulted in the Liberal party being returned again with a majority. Mr. Gladstone's relations with many of his constituents were not harmonious, owing to his pronounced Liberal views, and his seat for Oxford was seriously imperilled. Mr. Gathorne Hardy was nominated to run against him. The High Tory party resolved to defeat him, and he was defeated by a majority of 180. "The electors preferred the uncompromising defender of the Church and Toryism to the brilliant statesman and financier." Almost all of the distinguished residents of Oxford and three-fourths of the tutors and lecturers of the University voted for Mr. Gladstone, and his rejection was entirely owing to the opposing vote of non-residents and the bigotry of the hostile country clergymen of the Church of England. From the Bishop of Oxford Mr. Gladstone received the following indignant protest: "I cannot forbear expressing to you my grief and indignation at the result. It is needless for me to say that everything I could with propriety do I did heartily to save our University this great loss and dishonor, as well from a loving honor of you. You were too great for them." "The enemies of the University," observed the _Times_, "will make the most of her disgrace. It has hitherto been supposed that a learned constituency was to some extent exempt from the vulgar motives of party spirit, and capable of forming a higher estimate of statesmanship than common tradesmen or tenant-farmers." His valedictory address to his former constituents was short: "After an arduous connection of eighteen years, I bid you, respectfully, farewell.... It is one imperative duty, and one alone, which induces me to trouble you with these few parting words, the duty of expressing my profound and lasting gratitude for indulgence as generous, and for support as warm and enthusiastic in itself, and as honorable from the character and distinctions of those who have given it, as has, in my belief, ever been accorded by any constituency to any representative." One event in Parliament, in 1865, contributed much to Mr. Gladstone's defeat: In March, 1865, Mr. Dillwyn, the Radical member for Swansea, moved "that the present position of the Irish Church Establishment is unsatisfactory, and calls for the early attention of her Majesty's Government." Sir Stafford Northcote wrote: "Gladstone made a terribly long stride in his downward progress last night, and denounced the Irish Church in a way which shows how, by and by, he will deal not only with it, but with the Church of England too.... He laid down the doctrines that the tithe was national property, and ought to be dealt with by the State in a manner most advantageous to the people; and that the Church of England was only national because the majority of the people still belong to her." "It was now felt that henceforth Mr. Gladstone must belong to the country, and not to the University." He realized this himself, for driven from Oxford, he went down to South Lancashire, seeking to be returned from there to Parliament, and in the Free Trade Hall, Manchester, said: "At last, my friends, I am come among you, and I am come among you unmuzzled." These words were greeted with loud and prolonged applause. The advanced Liberals seemed to take the same view, and regarded Mr. Gladstone's defeat at Oxford by the Conservatives as his political enfranchisement. His defeat was not wholly unexpected to himself. In 1860 he said: "Without having to complain, I am entirely sick and weary of the terms upon which I hold the seat." Mr. Gladstone felt keenly the separation, for he wrote to the Bishop of Oxford: "There have been two great deaths, or transmigrations of spirit, in my political existence--one, very slow, the breaking of ties with my original party, the other, very short and sharp, the breaking of the tie with Oxford. There will probably be a third, and no more." And in a speech at Liverpool, there was something of pathos in his reference to Oxford, when he said that if he had clung to the representation of the University with desperate fondness, it was because he would not desert a post to which he seemed to have been called. But he had now been dismissed from it, not by academical, but by political agencies. Mr. Gladstone was elected to represent his native district in Parliament, and he was at the head of the poll in Manchester, Liverpool, and all the large towns. The result of the general elections was a considerable gain to the Liberal party, but that party sustained a severe loss by the death of Lord Palmerston, October 18, 1865. A new cabinet was constructed, with Earl Russell as Premier, and Mr. Gladstone as the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Mr. Gladstone became for the first time the recognized leader in the House of Commons, which then meant virtually Prime Minister, for with the aged Premier in the House of Lords, and the youthful Chancellor in the Commons, it meant nothing else. But Earl Russell and his younger colleague were calculated to work in harmonious action, for they were both Reformers. The ardent temperament and the severe conscientiousness of the leader was the cause of much speculation and anxiety as to his management. His first appearance as leader of the House was therefore waited for with much curiosity. The new Parliament was opened February 6, 1866, by the Queen in person, for the first time since the death of Prince Albert. In the speech from the throne it was announced that Parliament would be directed to consider such improvements in the laws which regulate the right of voting in the election of the members of the House of Commons as may tend to strengthen our free institutions, and conduce to the public welfare. Bishop Wilberforce wrote: "Gladstone has risen entirely to his position, and done all his most sanguine friends hoped for as leader.... There is a general feeling of insecurity of the ministry, and the Reform Bill to be launched to-night is thought a bad rock." May 3, 1866, Mr. Gladstone brought forward what was destined to be his last budget for some years. There was a surplus of over a million and a quarter of pounds, which allowed a further and considerable reduction of taxation. The condition of Ireland was very grave at this time, and as apprehensions were felt in regard to the Fenians, a bill suspending the Habeas Corpus Act in Ireland was passed. Mr. Gladstone, in explaining the necessity for the measure, said that the government were ready at any time to consider any measure for the benefit of Ireland, but it was the single duty of the House at the moment to strengthen the hands of the Executive in the preservation of law and order. The bill was renewed by the Derby government, and passed as before, as the result of an anticipated great Fenian uprising under "Head-Centre" Stephens. During a debate on the bill for the abolition of Church rates, Mr. Gladstone said that the law requiring Church rates was _prima facie_ open to great objection, but he could not vote for total abolition. He offered a compromise and proposed that Dissenters be exempted from paying Church rates, and at the same time be disqualified from interfering with funds to which they had not contributed. The compromise was accepted, but failed to become a law. On the subject of reform, mentioned in the address, there were great debates, during the session of 1866. The new Cabinet, known as the Russell-Gladstone Ministry, set themselves to work in earnest upon a question that had baffled all the skill of various administrations. As a part of the reform scheme, Mr. Gladstone brought forward a Franchise Bill in the House of Commons, March 12th. The bill satisfied most of the Liberal party. Mr. Robert Lowe, a Liberal, became one of its most powerful assailants. His enmity to the working classes made him extremely unpopular. Mr. Horseman also joined the Conservatives in opposing the bill. Mr. Bright, in a crushing retort, fastened upon the small party of Liberals, led by these two members in opposition to the bill, the epithet of "Adullamites." Mr. Horseman, Mr. Bright said, had "retired into what may be called his political Cave of Adullam, to which he invited every one who was in distress, and every one who was discontented. He had long been anxious to found a party in this house, and there is scarcely a member at this end of the House who is able to address us with effect or to take much part, whom he has not tried to bring over to his party and his cabal. At last he has succeeded in hooking ... Mr. Lowe. I know it was the opinion many years ago of a member of the Cabinet that two men could make a party. When a party is formed of two men so amiable and so disinterested as the two gentlemen, we may hope to see for the first time in Parliament a party perfectly harmonious and distinguished by mutual and unbroken trust. But there is one difficulty which it is impossible to remove. This party of two is like the Scotch terrier that is so covered with hair that you could not tell which was the head and which was the tail." This sally, which excited immoderate laughter, remains one of the happiest examples of Parliamentary retort and badinage. During this session the Conservative party met at the residence of the Marquis of Salisbury, and decided upon strongly opposing the measure proposed by the Liberal government. Mr. Bright characterized it as "a dirty conspiracy." On the other hand, the country supported the bill, and great meetings were held in its interest. Mr. Gladstone spoke at a great meeting at Liverpool. He said: "Having produced this measure, founded in a spirit of moderation, we hope to support it with decision.... We have passed the Rubicon, we have broken the bridge and burned the boats behind us. We have advisedly cut off the means of retreat, and having done this, we hope that, as far as time is yet permitted, we have done our duty to the Crown and to the nation." This was regarded as the bugle-call to the Liberal party for the coming battle. The debate began April 12th, and continued for eight nights. "On no occasion since, and seldom before, has such a flow of eloquence been heard within the walls of the House of Commons." Mr. Disraeli spoke for three hours against the bill, and in his speech accused Mr. Gladstone of introducing American ideas of Government, and of having once assailed the very principles he now advocated, when in the Oxford Union he spoke against the Reform Bill of 1832. Mr. Gladstone's reply was one of the most noteworthy parts of this famous debate. He rose at one o'clock in the morning to conclude a legislative battle which had begun two weeks before. "At last," Mr. Gladstone said, "we have obtained a declaration from an authoritative source that a bill which, in a country with five millions of adult males, proposes to add to a limited constituency 200,000 of the middle class and 200,000 of the working class, is, in the judgment of the leader of the Tory party, a bill to reconstruct the constitution upon American principles. "The right honorable gentleman, secure in the recollection of his own consistency, has taunted me with the errors of my boyhood. When he addressed the honorable member of Westminster, he showed his magnanimity by declaring that he would not take the philosopher to task for what he wrote twenty-five years ago; but when he caught one who, thirty-six years ago, just emerged from boyhood, and still an undergraduate at Oxford, had expressed an opinion adverse to the Reform Bill of 1832, of which he had so long and bitterly repented, then the right honorable gentleman could not resist the temptation." The bill was put upon its passage. The greatest excitement prevailed. "The house seemed charged with electricity, like a vast thunder-cloud; and now a spark was about to be applied. Strangers rose in their seats, the crowd at the bar pushed half-way up the House, the Royal Princes leaned forward in their standing places, and all was confusion." Presently order was restored, and breathless excitement prevailed while the tellers announced that the bill had been carried by a majority of only five. "Hardly had the words left the teller's lips than there arose a wild, raging, mad-brained shout from floor and gallery, such as has never been heard in the present House of Commons. Dozens of half-frantic Tories stood up in their seats, madly waved their hats and hurrahed at the top of their voices. Strangers in both galleries clapped their hands. The Adullamites on the Ministerial benches, carried away by the delirium of the moment, waved their hats in sympathy with the Opposition, and cheered as loudly as any. Mr. Lowe, the leader, instigator, and prime mover of the conspiracy, stood up in the excitement of the moment--flushed, triumphant, and avenged.... He took off his hat, waved it in wide and triumphant circles over the heads of the very men who had just gone into the lobby against him.... But see, the Chancellor of the Exchequer lifts up his hand to bespeak silence, as if he had something to say in regard to the result of the division. But the more the great orator lifts his hand beseechingly, the more the cheers are renewed and the hats waved. At length the noise comes to an end by the process of exhaustion, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer rises. Then there is a universal hush, and you might hear a pin drop." "Few, if any, could anticipate at this time, that in the course of one short year a Conservative Government would find itself compelled to take up that very question of Reform, whose virtual defeat its opponents now hailed with such intoxicating expressions of delight." However, the bill was unexpectedly wrecked June 18th, by an amendment substituting a ratal instead of a rental basis for the borough franchise. The ministry regarding this as a vital point, could not agree to it, and consequently threw up their measure and resigned office. The Queen was unwilling to accept their resignation. But the ministry felt that they had lost the confidence of the House, so their resignation was announced June 26th. The apathy of the people about reform that Earl Russell thought he perceived, as far as London was concerned, at once disappeared. A great demonstration was made at Trafalgar Square, where some ten thousand people assembled and passed resolutions in favor of reform. A serious riot occurred at Hyde Park in consequence of the prohibition by the Government of the meeting of the Reform League. The Reformers then marched to Carleton House Terrace, the residence of Mr. Gladstone, singing songs in his honor. He was away from home, but Mrs. Gladstone and her family came out on the balcony to acknowledge the tribute paid by the people. It is said that Mr. Gladstone, now for the first time, became a popular hero. Great meetings were held in the interest of reform in the large towns of the North and the Midlands, where his name was received with tumultuous applause. Mr. Gladstone was hailed everywhere as the leader of the Liberal party. Reform demonstrations continued during the whole of the recess. A meeting was held at Brookfields, near Birmingham, which was attended by nearly 250,000 people. The language of some of the ardent friends of reform was not always discreet, but Mr. Gladstone appears to have preserved a calm and dignified attitude. In the summer of 1866, Lord Derby had announced his acceptance of office as Premier, and the formation of a Conservative Cabinet. The demonstrations of the people compelled the Conservatives to introduce measures in Liberal Reform. Accordingly, in 1867, Mr. Disraeli and his colleagues passed a Reform Bill, which, after various modifications, was far more extreme than that presented by the Liberals and defeated. Owing to a division in the ranks of the Liberal members on the pending bill, Mr. Gladstone withdrew from the active leadership of the House, but soon resumed it. Mr. Bright said, at Birmingham, that since 1832, there had been no man of Mr. Gladstone's rank as a statesman who had imported into the Reform question so much of conviction, of earnestness, and of zeal. Not long after this deputations from various parts of the country, accompanied by their representatives in Parliament, called on Mr. Gladstone to present addresses expressive of confidence in him as Liberal leader. Lord Cranborne expressed his astonishment at hearing the bill described as a Conservative triumph. It was right that its real parentage should be established. The bill had been modified by Mr. Gladstone. All his points were conceded. If the adoption on the principles of Mr. Bright could be described as a triumph, then indeed the Conservative party, in the whole history of its previous annals, had won no triumphs so simple as this. In the House of Lords the Duke of Buccleuch declared that the only word in the bill that remained unaltered was the first word, "whereas." "The work of reform was completed in the session of 1868, by the passing of the Scotch and Irish Reform Bills, a Boundary Bill for England and Wales, an Election Petitions and Corrupt Practices Prevention Bill, and the Registration of Voters Bill. The object of the last-named measure was to accelerate the elections, and to enable Parliament to meet before the end of 1868." In the autumn of 1866, Mr. Gladstone and his family again visited Italy, and at Rome had an audience with Pope Pio Nono. It became necessary two years later, owing to this interview, for Mr. Gladstone formally to explain his visit. In February, 1868, Lord Derby, owing to failing health, resigned. The Derby Ministry retired from office, and Mr. Disraeli became Prime Minister. An English author writes: "There was, of course, but one possible Conservative Premier--Mr. Disraeli--he who had served the Conservative party for more than thirty years, who had led it to victory, and who had long been the ruling spirit of the Cabinet." The elevation of Mr. Disraeli to the Premiership before Mr. Gladstone, produced, in some quarters, profound regret and even indignation. But Mr. Disraeli, though in office, was not in power. He was nominally the leader of a House that contained a large majority of his political opponents, now united among themselves. The schism in the Liberal party had been healed by the question of Reform, and they could now defeat the government whenever they chose to do so; consequently Mr. Gladstone took the initiative. His compulsory Church Rates Abolition Bill was introduced and accepted. By this measure all legal proceedings for the recovery of church rates were abolished. The question that overshadowed all others, however, was that of the Irish Church. On the 16th of March Mr. Gladstone struck the first blow in the struggle that was to end in the disestablishment of the Irish Church. Mr. Maguire moved that the House consider the condition of Ireland. Mr. Gladstone said that Ireland had a controversy with England and a long account against England. It was a debt of justice, and he enumerated six particulars, one of which was the Established Episcopal Church. Religious Equality, he contended, must be conceded. He said, in referring to his speech made on the motion of Mr. Dillwyn in 1865: "The opinion I held then and hold now--namely, that in order to the settlement of this question of the Irish Church, that Church, as a State Church must cease to exist." This speech excited feelings of consternation amongst the Ministerialists. Mr. Disraeli bewailed his own unhappy fate at the commencement of his career as Prime Minister, at finding himself face to face with the necessity of settling an account of seven centuries old. He complained that all the elements of the Irish crisis had existed while Mr. Gladstone was in office, but no attempt had been made to deal with them. March 23d Mr. Gladstone proposed resolutions affirming that the Irish Episcopal Church should cease to exist as an establishment, and asking the Queen to place at the disposal of Parliament her interest in the temporalities of the Irish Church. Mr. Gladstone's resolution was carried by a majority of 65, and the Queen replied that she would not suffer her interests to stand in the way of any measures contemplated by Parliament. Consequently Mr. Gladstone brought in his Irish Church Suspensory Bill, which was adopted by the Commons, but rejected by the Lords. During the discussion, ministerial explanations followed; Mr. Disraeli described, in his most pompous vein, his audiences with the Queen. His statement amounted to this--that, in spite of adverse votes, the Ministers intended to hold on till the autumn, and then to appeal to the new electorate created by the Reform Act. Lord Houghton wrote: "Gladstone is the great triumph, but as he owns that he has to drive a four-in-hand, consisting of English Liberals, English Dissenters, Scotch Presbyterians, and Irish Catholics, he requires all his courage to look the difficulties in the face and trust to surmount them." An appeal was now made to the country. The general election that followed, in November, was fought out mainly upon this question. A great Liberal majority was returned to Parliament, which was placed at 115. But there were several individual defeats, among them Mr. Gladstone himself, who was rejected by South Lancaster. This was in part owing to the readjustment of seats according to the Reform Bill. But Mr. Gladstone received an invitation from Greenwich, in the southwestern division, where he was warmly received by the electors. "He spoke everywhere, with all his fiery eloquence, on the monstrous foolishness of a religious establishment which ministered only to a handful of the people." Is the Irish Church to be or not to be? was the question. He was returned for that borough by a large majority over his Conservative opponents. Archbishop Wilberforce wrote in November: "The returns to the House of Commons leave no doubt of the answer of the country to Gladstone's appeal. In a few weeks he will be in office at the head of a majority of something like a hundred, elected on the distinct issue of Gladstone and the Irish Church." The feeling was so enormously great in its preponderance for Mr. Gladstone's policy of Liberal Reform, especially for the disestablishment of the Irish Church, that Mr. Disraeli did not adopt the usual course of waiting for the endorsement of the new Parliament, which he felt sure would be given to Mr. Gladstone, but resigned, and the first Disraeli Cabinet went out of office, December 2d. December 4, 1868, the Queen summoned Mr. Gladstone to Windsor to form a Cabinet. He had now attained the summit of political ambition. He was the first Commoner in the land--the uncrowned king of the British Empire --for such is the English Premier. "All the industry and self-denial of a laborious life, all the anxieties and burdens and battles of five and thirty years of Parliamentary struggle were crowned by this supreme and adequate reward. He was Prime Minister of England--had attained to that goal of the Eton boy's ambition; and, what perhaps was to him of greater consideration, he was looked up to by vast numbers of the people as their great leader." December 9th the new government was completed and the ministers received their seals from the Queen. Mr. Bright, contrary to all expectation, became President of the Board of Trade. In offering themselves for re-election, the members of the new Cabinet found no trouble--all were returned. Mr. Gladstone was returned by Greenwich. With the year 1869 Mr. Gladstone entered upon a great period of Reform. The new Parliament was opened December 10th. On the 11th Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone paid a visit to Lord and Lady Salisbury, at Hatfield. Bishop Wilberforce was there and had opportunity to observe his old and honored friend in the first flush of his new dignity. Here are his comments: "Gladstone, as ever, great, earnest, and honest; as unlike the tricky Disraeli as possible." To Dr. Trench the Bishop wrote: "The nation has decided against our establishment, and we bow to its decision, and on what tenure and conditions it is to be held, remains confessedly open." "But his sagacious and statesmanlike counsel was disregarded. The Irish Bishops ranged themselves in bitter but futile hostility to the change. A frantic outbreak of Protestant violence began in Ireland and spread to England." Bishop Wilberforce notes this conversation at Windsor Castle: "The Queen very affable. 'So sorry Mr. Gladstone started this about the Irish Church, and he is a great friend of yours.'" On the 15th of February Parliament assembled. March 1st Mr. Gladstone introduced his momentous bill in a speech of three hours, his first speech as Prime Minister, which was characterized as "calm, moderate and kindly." It was proposed that on January 1, 1871, the Irish Church should cease to exist as an establishment and should become a free Church. Mr. Disraeli, in the Commons, moved the rejection of the bill. In opposing the measure he objected to disestablishment, because he was in favor of the union of Church and State. Mr. Gladstone eloquently concluded as follows: "As the clock points rapidly towards the dawn, so as rapidly flow out the years, the months, the days, that remain to the existence of the Irish Established Church.... Not now are we opening this great question. Opened, perhaps, it was when the Parliament which expired last year pronounced upon it that emphatic judgment which can never be recalled. Opened it was, further, when in the months of autumn the discussions were held in every quarter of the Irish Church. Prosecuted another stage it was, when the completed elections discovered to us a manifestation of the national verdict more emphatic than, with the rarest exceptions, has been witnessed during the whole of our Parliamentary history. The good cause was further advanced towards its triumphant issue when the silent acknowledgment of the late government, that they declined to contest the question, was given by their retirement from office, and their choosing a less responsible position from which to carry on a more desultory warfare against the policy which they had in the previous session unsuccessfully attempted to resist. Another blow will soon be struck in the same good cause, and I will not intercept it one single moment more." The bill passed by an overwhelming vote--368 against 250--and went up to the Lords, where stirring debates occurred. But there, as well as in the House, the Irish Establishment was doomed. The bill, substantially unaltered, received the Royal assent July 26, 1869. The Annual Register for 1869 declared that the bill "was carried through in the face of a united and powerful opposition, mainly by the resolute will and unflinching energy of the Prime Minister.... Upon the whole, whatever may be thought of its merits or demerits, it can hardly be disputed that the Act of the Disestablishment of the Irish Church, introduced and carried into a law within somewhat less than five months, was the most remarkable legislative achievement of modern times." The parliamentary session of 1870 was rendered memorable by the passing of a scarcely less popular and important measure--the Irish Land Bill. Mr. Gladstone, in speaking of Ireland, had referred to three branches of an Upas tree, to the growth of which her present sad condition was largely owing--the Irish Church, the Irish Land Laws, and the Irish Universities. The first branch had fallen with the disestablishment of the Irish Church, and Mr. Gladstone, pressing on in his reform, now proposed to lop off the second branch by his Irish Land Bill, which was in itself a revolution. It was claimed for Mr. Gladstone's new bill, or Land Scheme, that while it insured for the tenant security of holding, it did not confiscate a single valuable right of the Irish land-owner. Mr. Gladstone remarked that he believed there was a great fund of national wealth in the soil of Ireland as yet undeveloped, and said he trusted that both tenant and landlord would accept the bill because it was just. The bill passed, and received the approval of the Queen, August 1, 1870. [Illustration: The Old Lion] CHAPTER XV THE GOLDEN AGE OF LIBERALISM In what has been denominated the "Golden Age of Liberalism" the Liberal party was united, enthusiastic, victorious, full of energy, confidence and hope. "I have not any misgivings about Gladstone personally," says an English writer, "but as leader of the party to which the folly of the Conservatives and the selfish treachery of Disraeli, bit by bit, allied him, he cannot do what he would, and, with all his vast powers, there is a want of sharp-sighted clearness as to others. But God rules. I do not see how we are, after Disraeli's Reform Bill, long to avoid fundamental changes, both in Church and State." Justin McCarthy has well summed up the aims of Mr. Gladstone and his party on their accession to power: "Nothing in modern English history is like the rush of the extraordinary years of reforming energy on which the new administration had now entered. Mr. Gladstone's government had to grapple with five or six great questions, any one of which might have seemed enough to engage the whole attention of an ordinary administration. The new Prime Minister had pledged himself to abolish the State Church in Ireland, and to reform the Irish Land Tenure system. He had made up his mind to put an end to the purchase of commissions in the army. Recent events and experiences had convinced him that it was necessary to introduce the system of voting by ballot. He accepted for his government the responsibility of originating a complete system of national education." The first great measure of the new administration had been successfully pushed through, and, flushed with triumph, the Liberal leaders were now ready to introduce other important legislation. In 1870, the Elementary Education Act, providing for the establishment of school boards, and securing the benefits of education for the poor in England and Wales was introduced. By it a national and compulsory system of education was established for the first time. "It is important to note that the concessions made during its course to the convictions of Tories and Churchmen, in the matter of religious education, stirred the bitter and abiding wrath of the political Dissenters." The measure was passed, while the half-penny postage for newspapers, and the half-penny post cards were among the benefits secured. In April, 1870, a party of English travelers in Greece were seized by brigands. The ladies were released and also Lord Muncaster, who was sent to Athens to arrange for ransom and a free pardon. But the Greek Government sending soldiers to release the captives and capture the captors, the English were murdered. The English Minister at Athens was in treaty for the release of his countrymen, but the great difficulty was to procure pardon from the Greek government. This terrible affair created a profound sensation in England, and it was brought before Parliament. Mr. Gladstone pleaded for further information before taking decided steps. But for the arrest and execution of most of the brigands, and the extirpation of the band, the diabolical deed went unavenged. In July, war broke out suddenly between France and Germany, which resulted in the dethronement of Napoleon III. England preserved neutrality. However, Mr. Gladstone had his opinion regarding the war and thus represented it: "It is not for me to distribute praise and blame; but I think the war as a whole, and the state of things out of which it has grown, deserve a severer condemnation than any which the nineteenth century has exhibited since the peace of 1815." And later, in an anonymous article, the only one he ever wrote, and which contained the famous phrase, "the streak of silver sea," he "distributed blame with great impartiality between both belligerent powers." Among the business transacted in the session of 1870 was the following: All appointments to situations in all Civil Departments of the State, except the Foreign Office and posts requiring professional knowledge, should be filled by open competition; and the royal prerogative that claimed the General Commanding-in-Chief as the agent of the Crown be abolished, and that distinguished personage was formally declared to be subordinate to the Minister of War. Mr. Gladstone announced the intention of the government to release the Fenian prisoners then undergoing sentences for treason or treason-felony, on condition of their not remaining in or returning to the United Kingdom. The Premier, alluding to the enormity of their offenses, said that the same principles of justice which dictated their sentences would amply sanction the prolongation of their imprisonment if the public security demanded it. The press and country generally approved this decision of the Premier, but some condemned him for the condition he imposed in the amnesty. The religious test imposed upon all students entering at the universities was abolished, and all students of all creeds could now enter the universities on an equal footing. Heretofore special privileges were accorded to members of the Established Episcopal Church, and all others were cut off from the full enjoyment of the universities. A bill to establish secret voting was rejected by the Lords, but was passed the next session. The House of Lords, emboldened by their success in throwing out the voting bill, defeated a bill to abolish the purchase of commissions in the army, but Mr. Gladstone was not to be turned from his purpose, and startled the peers by a new departure--he dispensed with their consent, and accomplished his purpose without the decision of Parliament. Finding that purchase in the army existed only by royal sanction, he, with prompt decision, advised the Queen to issue a royal warrant declaring that on and after November 1, 1871, all regulations attending the purchase of commissions should be cancelled. The purchase of official positions in the army was thus abolished. It was regarded as a high-handed act on the part of the Prime Minister, and a stretch of executive authority, and was denounced by Lords and Commons, friends and foes. Tories and Peers especially were enraged, and regarded themselves as baffled. The condition of affairs in Ireland was alarming. The spread of an agrarian conspiracy at Westmeath compelled the government to move for a committee to inquire into the unlawful combination and confederacy existing. "Mr. Disraeli was severely sarcastic at the expense of the government." The grant proposed by the government to the Princess Louise on her marriage aroused the opposition of some members of the House, who claimed to represent the sentiments of a considerable number of people. It was proposed to grant £30,000 and an annuity of £6,000. The Premier stated that the Queen in marrying her daughter to one of her own subjects, had followed her womanly and motherly instincts. He dwelt upon the political importance of supporting the dignity of the crown in a suitable manner; upon the value of a stable dynasty; and the unwisdom of making minute pecuniary calculations upon such occasions. It was carried by a remarkable majority of 350 votes against 1. In 1871 the treaty of Washington was concluded. But the Geneva awards for the damage done to American shipping by the "Alabama," did much to undermine Mr. Gladstone's popularity with the warlike portion of the British public and there were various indications that the Ministry were becoming unpopular. There were other causes tributary to this effect. His plans of retrenchment had deprived Greenwich of much of its trade, hence his seat was threatened. Mr. Gladstone resolved to face the difficulty boldly, and to meet the murmurers on their own ground, October 28, 1871, he addressed his Greenwich constituents. The air was heavy with murmurs and threats. Twenty thousand people were gathered at Blackheath. It was a cold afternoon when he appeared bare-headed, and defended the whole policy of the administration. "His speech was as long, as methodical, as argumentative, and in parts as eloquent, as if he had been speaking at his ease under the friendly and commodious shelter of the House of Commons." The growing unpopularity of the Government was evidenced in the first reception given to the Premier by his constituents. Groans and cheers were mingled, and his voice at first was drowned by the din. Finally he was heard, and won the day, the people enthusiastically applauding and waving a forest of hats. One cause of unpopularity was what is called "the Ewelme Scandal," and another the elevation of Sir Robert Collin to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. Mr. Gladstone said: "I have a shrewd suspicion in my mind that a very large proportion of the people of England have a sneaking kindness for the hereditary principle. My observation has not been of a very brief period, and what I have observed is this, that wherever there is anything to be, done, or to be given, and there are two candidates for it who are exactly alike--alike in opinions, alike in character, alike in possessions, the one being a commoner and the other a lord--the Englishman is very apt indeed to prefer the lord." He detailed the great advantage which had accrued from the legislation of the past generation, including free-trade, the removal of twenty millions of taxation, a cheap press, and an education bill, Mr. Gladstone thus restored himself to the confidence of his constituents, but the ministry did not wholly regain the popularity they once enjoyed. The Gladstone period had passed its zenith and its decadence had already begun. During the autumn Mr. Gladstone received the freedom of the city of Aberdeen, and made a speech, in which occurred a remarkable reference to "the newly-invented cry of Home Rule." He spoke of the political illusions to which Ireland was periodically subject, the extremes to which England had gone in satisfying her demands, and the removal of all her grievances, except that which related to higher education. He said that any inequalities resting between England and Ireland were in favor of Ireland, and as to Home Rule, if Ireland was entitled to it, Scotland was better entitled, and even more so Wales. Ireland had proved the glory of Mr. Gladstone's administration. Its name had been associated with the most brilliant legislative triumphs of government. But Ireland was also destined to be the government's most serious stumbling-block, and fated to be the immediate measure of its overthrow. In the session of 1873 Mr. Gladstone endeavored to further his plans for Reform, and consequently vigorously attacked the third branch of the "upas tree," to which he had referred. He labored to put the universities on a proper basis, that they might be truly educational centres for the whole of Ireland, and not for a small section of its inhabitants alone. This step followed legitimately after the disestablishment of the Irish Church. He introduced to this end a large and comprehensive measure, but although it was favorably received at the outset, a hostile feeling soon began and manifested itself. Mr. Gladstone pleaded powerfully for the measure, and said: "To mete out justice to Ireland, according to the best view that with human infirmity we could form, has been the work--I will almost say the sacred work--of this Parliament. Having put our hands to the plough, let us not turn back. Let not what we think the fault or perverseness of those whom we are attempting to assist have the slightest effect in turning us, even by a hair's-breadth, from the path on which we have entered. As we begun so let us persevere, even to the end, and with firm and resolute hand let us efface from the law and practice of the country the last--for I believe it is the last--of the religious and social grievances of Ireland." Mr. Disraeli made fun of the bill, stalwart Liberals condemned it, and the Irish members voted against it, hence the bill was defeated by a small majority of three votes. Mr. Gladstone consequently resigned, but Mr. Disraeli positively declined to take office with a majority of the House of Commons against him, and refused to appeal to the country. Mr. Gladstone read an extract from a letter he had addressed to the Queen, in which he contended that Mr. Disraeli's refusal to accept office was contrary to all precedent. But under the extraordinary circumstances he and his colleagues consented to resume office, and they would endeavor to proceed, both with regard to legislation and administration upon the same principle as those which had heretofore regulated their conduct. Mr. Lowe, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, having resigned, Mr. Gladstone assumed the duties of the office himself, thus serving in the double offices of Premier and Chancellor. During the recess various speeches were made in defence of the Ministerial policy, but the government failed to recover its once overwhelming popularity. On the 19th of July, 1873, Mr. Gladstone lost by sudden death one of his oldest and most highly esteemed friends--Samuel Wilberforce, Bishop of Winchester. He was riding to Holmbury with Earl Granville, when he was thrown from his horse and killed instantly. The end of Mr. Gladstone's first ministry was now drawing near. The people no longer desired to keep up with the reforming zeal of the administration. Mr. Disraeli's strongly exaggerated description of the Premier's policy had the effect of forming the popular discontent; Liberal members were deserting him. The Bible was in danger of being left out of the schools, and beer was threatened with taxation. The flag of "Beer and the Bible"--strange combination--having been hoisted by clergy and publicans, the cry against the ministry became irresistible. Deserted by the people and by many of his own party, what was to be done unless to appeal to the country and decide by a general election what was wanted and who would be sustained. January, 1874, Mr. Gladstone issued a manifesto dissolving Parliament. In this document, entitled to be called a State paper for its political and historical importance, Mr. Gladstone stated his reasons for what was regarded by many as a _coup d' tat_. It is impossible to describe the public excitement and confusion which attended the general election thus unexpectedly decreed. Mr. Gladstone, recovering from a cold, appealed with great energy to Greenwich for re-election. The general election resulted in the defeat of the Liberals, and gave to the Conservatives a majority of forty-six in the House. Mr. Gladstone was elected, but Greenwich which returned two members, placed the Premier second on the poll--below a local distiller. Following the example of his predecessor, in 1868, Mr. Gladstone resigned. "Thus was overthrown one of the greatest administrations of the century; indeed, it may be doubted whether any other English Ministry was ever able to show such a splendid record of great legislative acts within so short a period. There was not one measure, but a dozen, which would have shed lustre upon any government; and the six years of Mr. Gladstone's first Premiership are well entitled to the epithet which has been accorded to them of 'the Golden Age of Liberalism.'" Before the next Parliament met Mr. Gladstone was to give the country another surprise. He was now sixty-four years old, had been forty years in active parliamentary labors, and thought himself justified in seeking rest from the arduous duties of public life, at least the pressing cares as leader of one of the great political parties. When his contemplated retirement had before become known to his friends, they induced him for a while longer to act as leader, but in February, 1875, he finally retired from the leadership and indeed appeared but rarely in the House of Commons during that session. "The retirement of Mr. Gladstone from active leadership naturally filled his party with dismay. According to the general law of human life, they only realized their blessings when they had lost them. They had grumbled at their chief and mutinied against him and helped to depose him. But, now that this commanding genius was suddenly withdrawn from their councils they found that they had nothing to put in its place. Their indignation waxed fast and furious, and was not the less keen because they had to some extent, brought their trouble on themselves. They complained with almost a ludicrous pathos that Mr. Gladstone had led them into a wilderness of opposition and left them there to perish. They were as sheep without a shepherd and the ravening wolves of Toryism seemed to have it all their own way." Between the time of Mr. Gladstone's retirement from the Premiership and his resignation of leadership in the House, he had quickly reappeared in the House of Commons and vigorously opposed the Public Worship Regulation Bill. Mr. Gladstone attacked the bill with a power and vehemence which astonished the House. The great objection to it was its interference with liberty, and with the variety of customs which had grown up in different parts of the country. To enforce strict uniformity would be oppressive and inconvenient. The bill became law, however, though it has largely proved inoperative, Mr. Gladstone also opposed the Endowed Schools Act Amendment Bill, which practically gave to the Church of England the control of schools that were thrown open to the whole nation by the policy of the last Parliament. So great a storm was raised over this reactionary bill that Mr. Disraeli was obliged to modify its provisions considerably before it could become a law. Mr. Gladstone was also active at this time in delivering addresses at Liverpool College, the Buckley Institute and the well-known Nonconformist College at Mill Hill. [Illustration: MR. GLADSTONE'S MAIL] CHAPTER XVI THE EASTERN QUESTION During his retirement from the leadership of the Liberal Party, Mr. Gladstone employed his great abilities in theological controversy and literary productions. It was during this period that he collected his miscellaneous writings, entitled "Gleanings from Past Years." A little more than a year had elapsed when he again entered the political arena. "He threw aside polemics and criticisms, he forgot for awhile Homer and the Pope," and "rushed from his library at Hawarden, forgetting alike ancient Greece and modern Rome," as he flung himself with impassioned energy and youthful vigor into a new crusade against Turkey. A quarter of a century before he had aroused all Europe with the story of the Neapolitan barbarities, and now again his keen sense of justice and strong, humanitarian sympathies impel him with righteous indignation to the eloquent defence of another oppressed people, and the denunciation of their wrongs. It was the Eastern Question that at once brought back the Liberal leader into the domain of politics. "The spirit of the war-horse could not be quenched, and the country thrilled with his fiery condemnation of the Bulgarian massacres." His activity was phenomenal. "He made the most impassioned speeches, often in the open air; he published pamphlets which rushed into incredible circulations; he poured letter after letter into the newspapers; he darkened the sky with controversial postcards, and, as soon as Parliament met in February, 1877, he was ready with all his unequalled resources of eloquence, argumentation and inconvenient enquiry, to drive home his great indictment against the Turkish government and its champion, Mr. Disraeli, who had now become Lord Beaconsfield." "The reason of all this passion is not difficult to discover. Mr. Gladstone is a Christian; and in the Turk he saw the great anti-Christian power where it ought not, in the fairest provinces of Christendom, and stained with the record of odious cruelty practised through long centuries on its defenceless subjects who were worshippers of Jesus Christ." Turkish oppression, which had for a long time existed in its worst forms, resulted in an insurrection against Turkey and Herzegovina, July 1, 1875. This, however, was only the beginning, for others suffering under Ottoman oppression rebelled, and all Europe was involved. In January, 1876, the Herzegovinians gained a victory over the Turkish troops. The European powers then suggested a settlement favorable to the insurgents, which was accepted by the Sultan. But early in May another insurrection broke out in several Bulgarian villages, which was quickly followed by the most horrible atrocities. A conference on the Eastern question was held at Berlin in May, and soon afterward the English ministers announced in Parliament that they were unable to assent to the terms agreed upon at the Berlin Conference. This announcement caused much surprise and comment in England. Public feeling already aroused, was not allayed when it became known that the British fleet in the Mediterranean had been ordered to Besiki Bay, seemingly for the protection of the Turkish Empire. June 28th the Bulgarian insurrection was suppressed. On the 10th of July the Sultan, Abdul Aziz, was deposed and was succeeded by Murad V, who declared that he desired to guarantee liberty to all. Mr. Disraeli stated, in the House of Commons, that the steps taken by the Ministry would lead to permanent peace. But within two weeks the _Daily News_ published a letter from Constantinople detailing the massacre in Bulgaria by the Turks, which moved all England with indignation. Innocent men, women and children had been slaughtered by the thousands; at least sixty villages had been utterly destroyed; the most revolting scenes of violence had been enacted; and a district once the most fertile in the Empire had been laid waste and completely ruined. Forty girls were shut up in a straw loft and burnt, and outrages of the most fearful description were committed upon hundreds of defenceless captives. Mr. Disraeli, in the House of Commons, grew "jocular upon the cruelties and sufferings almost unparalleled in the world's history," and expressed his belief that the outrages committed by the Turkish troops had been exaggerated, and sneered at the rumor as "coffee-house babble;" while as to the torture of the impalement, which had caused universal anger and disgust, that an Oriental people have their way of executing malefactors, and generally terminated their connection with culprits in an expeditious manner. In the official report presented to Parliament by Mr. W. Baring, the reported outrages in Bulgaria were corroborated. No fewer than 12,000 persons had perished in the sandjak of Philippopolis! The most fearful tragedy, however, was at Batak, where over 1000 people took refuge in the church and churchyard. The Bashi-Bazouks fired through the windows, and, getting upon the roof, tore off the tiles and threw burning pieces of wood and rags dipped in petroleum among the mass of unhappy human beings inside. At last the door was forced in and the massacre was completed. The inside of the church was then burnt, and hardly one escaped. "The massacre at Batak was the most heinous crime which stained the history of the present century;" and for this exploit the Turkish Commander, Achmet Agha, had bestowed on him the order of the Medjidie. Sir Henry Elliot, the English Ambassador at Constantinople, was directed to lay these facts before the Sultan and to demand the punishment of the offenders. The demand, however, was never enforced. Prince Milan issued a proclamation to his people, declaring that, while professing neutrality, the Sultan had continued to send military forces of savage hordes to the Servian frontier. In June, Prince Milan left Belgrade and joined his army on the frontier. The Montenegrins declared war on Turkey and joined forces with Servia. July 6th the Servians were defeated. Thus was Turkey plunged into war with her Christian provinces, and all through her own misrule in peace and her barbarities in war. Mr. Disraeli in a speech made in the House of Commons, August 11th, explained that he had not denied the existence of the "Bulgarian. Atrocities," but he had no official knowledge of them. He affirmed that Great Britain was not responsible for what occurred in Turkey, nor were the Turks the special _protégés_ of England. He announced that the special duty of the Government at that moment was to preserve the British Empire, and that they would never consent to any step that would hazard the existence of that empire, This speech, which was distinguished by much of his old brilliancy and power, was his last speech in the House. On the morning after this speech it was publicly announced that Mr. Disraeli would immediately be elevated to the peerage under the title of the Earl of Beaconsfield. In September, 1876, deeming it high time that the indignant voice of England should be heard in demonstration of the infamous deeds practiced by the Turk, Mr. Gladstone issued his pamphlet, entitled "Bulgarian Horrors and the Question of the East." It had an enormous circulation. He called for a stop to be put to the anarchy, the misrule and the bloodshed in Bulgaria, and demanded that the Ottoman rule should be excluded, not only from Bosnia and Herzegovina, but also from Bulgaria. The Turks must clear out, "bag and baggage," from the provinces they have desolated and profaned. The pamphlet, and the latter expression especially, produced a great sensation. The pamphlet "brought home to the English people the idea that for these horrors which were going on, they too, as non-interfering allies of Turkey, were in part responsible." Soon after this Mr. Gladstone addressed a large concourse of his constituents at Blackheath, in which he severely arraigned the Government. This address was one of the most impassioned and eloquent of Mr. Gladstone's political orations, and at some points the people were literally carried away with their feelings. November 1st, Turkey was forced by Russia to agree to an armistice of eight weeks. On the 2d the Russian Emperor pledged his word to the English Ambassador that he had no intention of acquiring Constantinople; that if compelled to occupy Bulgaria, it would be only until the safety of the Christian inhabitants be secured; and urged the Ambassador to remove the distrust of Russia prevailing in England. Yet, in the face of all these assurances, Lord Beaconsfield delivered a war-like speech, at the banquet at Guildhall, November 9th. Informed of this speech the Czar declared that if the Porte did not accede to his demands, Russia would then act independently. On the 8th of December there was a great conference at St. James' Hall, London, to discuss the Eastern question. The Duke of Westminster presided at the afternoon meeting. At the evening gathering Lord Shaftesbury occupied the chair. Mr. E. Freeman said: "Perish the interests of England, perish our dominion in India, sooner than we should strike one blow or speak one word on behalf of the wrong against the right." The chief interest of the occasion centered in the speech of Mr. Gladstone who was received with unbounded applause. He declared that there had been no change in public sentiment in England on the question; that the promoters of that meeting had no desire to embarrass the Government; that the power and influence of England had been employed to effect results at variance with the convictions of the country; that Lord Beaconsfield had only recently appeared anxious; and that England had duties towards the Christian subjects of Turkey. Mr. Gladstone continued that he hoped that the instructions given to Lord Salisbury, who had been sent for conference to Constantinople, were not in accordance with the speech at Guildhall, but that he would be left to his own clear insight and generous impulses; that the conference would insist upon the independence of the provinces, or at least would insure them against arbitrary injustice and oppression, and that the work indicated was not merely a worthy deed but an absolute duty. Mr. Gladstone, during the recess of Parliament, delivered speeches upon the burning question of the day all over England. At Hawarden he pleaded that it was the wretched Turkish system that was at fault, and not the Turks themselves, and hoped for a remedy. To the electors of Frome he spoke of the tremendous responsibility of the Ministers. In a speech at the Taunton Railway Station, he said, in reference to the injunction for himself and friends to mind their own business, that the Eastern question was their own business. And when the Constantinople Conference failed he spoke of this "great transaction and woeful failure," and laid all the blame of failure on the Ministry. As to the treaties of 1856 being in force, his opinion was, that Turkey had entirely broken those treaties and trampled them under foot. January 20, 1877, the conference closed. Parliament met February 8, 1877, and the conflict was transferred from the country to that narrower arena. In the House of Lords the Duke of Argyle delivered a powerful speech, to which the Premier, Disraeli, replied, that he believed that any interference directed to the alleviation of the sufferings of the Turkish Christians would only make their sufferings worse. He asked for calm, sagacious and statesmanlike consideration of the whole subject, never forgetting the great interests of England, if it was to have any solution at all. Mr. Gladstone, upon his appearance in the House, was greeted as a Daniel come to judgment. He was taken to task by Mr. Chaplin, who complained that Mr. Gladstone and others of the Liberal party "had endeavored to regulate the foreign policy of the country by pamphlets, by speeches at public meetings, and by a so-called National Conference, instead of leaving it in the hands of the Executive Government," and intimated that Mr. Gladstone was afraid to meet the House in debate upon the question. Mr. Gladstone, rebuking Mr. Chaplain, said that it was the first time in a public career extending over nearly half a century, he had been accused of a disinclination to meet his opponents in a fair fight, and promised him that neither he nor his friends would have reason to complain of his reticence. Tories and Liberals knew he had not shrunk from meeting the public on this question. He was glad that there was a tremendous feeling abroad upon this Eastern question. He had been told that by the pamphlet he wrote and the speech he delivered, he had done all this mischief, and agitated Europe and the world; but if that were the case why did not the honorable gentleman, by writing another pamphlet, and delivering another speech, put the whole thing right? If he (the speaker) had done anything, it was only in the same way that a man applies a match to an enormous mass of fuel already prepared. Mr. Gladstone closed with the following words: "We have, I think, the most solemn and the greatest question to determine that has come before Parliament in my time.... In the original entrance of the Turks into Europe, it may be said to have been a turning point in human history. To a great extent it continues to be the cardinal question, the question which casts into the shade every other question." April 24, 1877, war was declared by Russia against Turkey. The Czar issued a manifesto, assigning as reasons for this war the refusal of guarantee by the Porte for the proposed reforms, the failure of the Conference and the rejection of the Proteol signed on the previous 31st of March. England, France and Italy proclaimed their neutrality. Mr. Gladstone initiated a great debate in the House of Commons, May 7th, which lasted five days. He presented a series of resolutions expressing grave dissatisfaction with the policy of Turkey, and declared that she had forfeited all claim to support, moral and material. Mr. Gladstone asked whether, with regard to the great battle of freedom against oppression then going on, "we in England could lay our hands upon our hearts, and in the face of God and man, say, 'We have well and sufficiently performed our part?'" These resolutions were of course hostile to the Government, and many Liberals refused to vote for them, because they pledged England to a policy of force in connection with Russia. Besides the Government gave assurances to avail themselves of any opportunity of interposing their good offices. The resolutions consequently were lost. Mr. Gladstone was not quite the leader of his party again. Shortly after this debate, and before the close of the session, Mr. Gladstone addressed a large meeting at Birmingham on the Eastern question and the present condition of the Liberal party. Later on he visited Ireland. On his return he addressed, by their request, the people gathered to receive him. He expressed his belief that Turkey would have yielded to the concerted action of Europe; noticed the change in the tone of the ministry from the omission in the Premier's speech of the phrase, "the independence of Turkey;" protested strongly against England being dragged into war, and warmly eulogized the non-conformists for the consistency and unanimity with which they had insisted on justice to the Eastern Christians. Political feeling entered into everything at this time, but as an evidence of the hold Mr. Gladstone retained in the Scottish heart, he was in November elected Lord Rector of Glasgow University by a large majority. Lord Beaconsfield was the retiring Lord Rector, and the Conservatives nominated Sir S. Northcote, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, as Mr. Gladstone's opponent. The war in the East went disastrously for the Ottoman arms. January 23, 1878, the Porte agreed to accept the terms of peace submitted by the Grand Duke Nicholas. Mr. Gladstone was invited January 30, 1878, to attend a meeting of undergraduates at Oxford, held to celebrate the formation of a Liberal Palmerston Club. He strongly condemned the sending of the British fleet into the Dardanelles as a breach of European law; and confessed that he had been an agitator for the past eighteen months, day and night, to counteract what he believed to be the evil purposes of Lord Beaconsfield. In February the House of Commons passed a vote of credit, but on the 3d of March a treaty of peace was signed between Turkey and Russia, at Sanstefano, the terms of which in part were: Turkey to pay a large war indemnity; Servia and Montenegro to be independent and to receive accessions of territory; Bulgaria to be formed into a principality with greatly extended boundaries, and to be governed by a prince elected by the inhabitants; the navigation of the Straits was declared free for merchant vessels, both in times of peace and war; Russian troops to occupy Bulgaria for two years; Batoum, Ardahan, Kars and Bayazid, with their territories, to be ceded to Russia, and Turkey to pay an indemnity to Roumania. The terms of the treaty were regarded oppressive to Turkey by the Beaconsfield Ministry, who proposed that the whole treaty be submitted to a congress at Berlin, to meet in June, 1878. The treaty was approved after some modifications. The English Plenipotentiaries were the Earl of Beaconsfield and Marquis of Salisbury, who, for their share in the treaty, received a popular ovation and rewards from the Queen. Thus was Turkey humiliated and Russia benefited, having obtained her demands. To the people assembled Lord Beaconsfield said from the window of the Foreign Office: "Lord Salisbury and myself have brought you back peace, but a peace, I hope with honor, which may satisfy our Sovereign and tend to the welfare of the country." But at this very time the envoy of Russia, whom the ministry thought to be circumvented, was entering the Afghan capital; so that, although there was peace on the Bosphorus, as a direct result of the Eastern policy, there was war in Afghanistan. The Conservatives were very ready for awhile to use as a watchword the phrase, "Peace and Honor," but before long it became the occasion of ridicule. Parliament was called upon to appropriate £8,000,000 to defray the cost of the Afghan and Zulu wars. When Mr. Gladstone's government retired from office, there was a surplus of over £3,000,000, but the budgets of 1878 and 1879 both showed large deficits. The people had applauded the "imperial policy," "the jingoism" of Lord Beaconsfield's administration during the past two or three years, but they were not so appreciative when they found it so costly a policy to themselves. The depression in business also had its effect upon the country. The unpopularity of the Liberal government, which culminated in its defeat in 1873, was now, in 1879, being shifted to their Conservative opponents, whose term of office was fast drawing to a close. "Mr. Gladstone's resolute and splendid hostility to Lord Beaconsfield's whole system of foreign policy restored him to his paramount place among English politicians. For four years--from 1876 to 1880--he sustained the high and holy strife with an enthusiasm, a versatility, a courage and a resourcefulness which raised the enthusiasm of his followers to the highest pitch, and filled his guilty and baffled antagonists with a rage which went near to frenzy. By frustrating Lord Beaconsfield's design of going to war on behalf of Turkey, he saved England from the indelible disgrace of a second and more gratuitous Crimea. But it was not only in Eastern Europe that his saving influence was felt. In Africa and India, and wherever British honor was involved, he was the resolute and unsparing enemy of that odious system of bluster and swagger and might against right, on which Lord Beaconsfield and his colleagues bestowed the tawdry nickname of Imperialism." [Illustration: MR. GLADSTONE ON HIS WAY HOME] CHAPTER XVII MIDLOTHIAN AND THE SECOND PREMIERSHIP The leadership of the Liberal party had, upon the retirement of Mr. Gladstone, been turned over to Lord Hartington. His sympathies were upon the right side on the Eastern question, but he was a calm, slow-moving man. At the proper time he would have taken the right measures in Parliament, but the temper of the Liberal party and of the people demanded present action and emphatic speech, then Mr. Gladstone came to the rescue, and Lord Hartington found himself pushed aside. Mr. Gladstone was again in fact the leader of the Liberal party, whose standard he had carried aloft during those stirring times when the Eastern question was the all-absorbing topic of debate in Parliament and among the people of the land. The foreign policy of Lord Beaconsfield in 1878 and 1879 found a sleepless critic in Mr. Gladstone. The day after the Parliament of 1878 had adjourned for the Easter recess, it was announced that the Ministry had ordered the Indian Government to dispatch 7000 native troops to the Island of Malta. The order occasioned much discussion--political, legal, and constitutional. It was warmly debated. It was thought that Lord Beaconsfield had transcended his powers and done what could be done only by a vote of Parliament. In the House of Commons Mr. Gladstone condemned the proceedings as unconstitutional, and pointed out the dangers of the Ministerial policy. Lord Beaconsfield received what he calculated upon--the support of the House. For a member to differ from his policy was almost to incur the imputation of disloyalty to Crown and country. Indeed, Mr. Gladstone was seriously accused of treason by a member of the House for an article in the _Nineteenth Century_. Mr. Gladstone undauntedly continued the contest. He addressed a meeting of Liberals in the Drill Hall, Bermondsey, July 20th, in which he said that the Dissolution of Parliament could not long be postponed, and urged the union and organization of all Liberals, and prompt measures to secure such representation as the Liberals deserved in the coming Parliament. Speaking of the Anglo-Turkish treaty, he pointed out the serious obligations which devolved upon England under it. He added, regarding the Turkish Convention, that, possibly it was necessary to sustain the credit of the country, but whether that credit should be sustained at such a price remained for the people to determine at the polls. He rejoiced that these most unwise, extravagant, unwarrantable, unconstitutional and dangerous proceedings had not been the work of the Liberal party, but he was grieved to think that any party should be found in England to perform such transactions. A great debate arose in the House of Commons, extending over the whole range of the Eastern question: The Treaty of Berlin, the Anglo-Turkish Convention, the acquisition of Cyprus, the claims of Greece, etc. It was begun by the Marquis of Hartington, who offered a resolution regretting the grave responsibilities the Ministry had assumed for England with no means of securing their fulfillment, and without the previous knowledge of Parliament. Mr. Gladstone's speech during this debate is described as "a long and eloquent address, unsurpassable for its comprehensive grasp of the subject, its lucidity, point, and the high tone which animated it throughout." Mr. Gladstone denied that his strictures upon the Government in a speech made out of Parliament could be construed as Lord Beaconsfield had taken them as a personal attack and provocation. If criticism of this kind is prohibited the doors of the House might as well be shut. He observed that, "Liberty of speech is the liberty which secures all other liberties, and the abridgment of which would render all other liberties vain and useless possessions." In discussing the Congress at Berlin, Mr. Gladstone said, that he could not shut his eyes to the fact that the Sclavs, looking to Russia had been freed, while the Greeks, looking to England, remained with all their aspirations unsatisfied; that Russia had secured much territory and large indemnity, with the sanction of Europe; that the English Plenipotentiaries at the Congress, Lord Salisbury and Lord Beaconsfield, as a general rule, took the side of servitude, and that opposed to freedom. With regard to the English responsibilities in Asiatic Turkey put upon England at the Convention, he called them an "unheard of," and "mad-undertaking," accomplished "in the dark," by the present Ministry. Dealing with the treaty-making power of the country, he claimed that it rested with Parliament in conjunction with the Executive. The strength and the eloquence were on the side of the opposition, but the votes were for the Government. The resolutions of Lord Hartington were defeated, and the "imperial policy" of the Ministry was sustained. The _Spectator_ said, that, "Reason, prudence, and patriotism have hardly ever in our times been voted down with so little show of argument, and even of plausible suggestion." The next step taken by the Ministry was to undertake war with Afghanistan, in hopes of checking the advances of Russia in that direction and of redressing grievances. England accomplished her purpose in part, but greatly suffered for her exploit. Mr. Gladstone could not remain quiet under the "adventurous policy" of the Premier. He condemned the ministerial policy which had made the Queen an Empress, then manipulated the prerogative in a manner wholly unexampled in this age, and employed it in inaugurating policies about which neither the nation nor the Parliament had ever been consulted. But arguments were of no avail. The Conservative majority in Parliament had imbibed the idea that the honor of England had to be protected. Some thought it had never been assailed, but Lord Beaconsfield declared it was in peril, and men and money were voted to defend it. "So the order was given for distant peoples to be attacked, English blood to be spilled, the burdens of the people, already too heavy, to be swollen, and the future liabilities of this country to be enormously increased." In November, at the Lord Mayor's banquet, Lord Beaconsfield, speaking of Eastern affairs, said that the Government was not afraid of any invasion of India by its northwestern frontier; but the frontier was "haphazard and not a scientific one," and the Government wanted a satisfactory frontier. Mr. Gladstone, in a letter to the Bedford Liberal Association, asked: "What right have we to annex by war, or to menace the territory of our neighbors, in order to make 'scientific' a frontier which is already safe?" In the autumn of 1879 Mr. Gladstone, having resolved to retire from the representation of Greenwich at the next election, paid a farewell visit to his constituents. At a luncheon given by the Liberal Association he dwelt upon the necessity of a Liberal union. The Liberals had, owing to their dissensions, given twenty-six votes to their opponents in 1874, while the Government had been carried on for years by a Conservative majority of less than twenty-six, showing the importance of organization. At night Mr. Gladstone attended a great public meeting in the Plumstead Skating Rink. On his entrance the whole audience rose and cheered for several minutes. An address was presented, expressing regret at his retirement, and the pride they would ever feel at having been associated with his name and fame. Mr. Gladstone alluded to Lord Beaconsfield's phrase respecting "harassed interests," and said he knew of only one harassed interest, and that was the British nation. He protested against the words "personal government" being taken to imply that the Sovereign desired to depart from the traditions of the constitution, yet he charged the advisers of the Crown with having invidiously begun a system intended to narrow the liberties of the people of England and to reduce Parliament to the condition of the French Parliaments before the great Revolution. Mr. Gladstone threw the whole responsibility of the Afghan war on the Ministry, and maintaining that England had departed from the customs of the forefathers, concluded as follows: "It is written in the eternal laws of the universe of God that sin shall be followed by suffering. An unjust war is a tremendous sin. The question which you have to consider is whether this war is just or unjust. So far as I am able to collect the evidence, it is unjust." In December, 1878, the following resolution was offered in the House of Commons: "That this House disapproves the conduct of her Majesty's Government, which has resulted in the war with Afghanistan." Mr. Gladstone strongly condemned the war with Afghanistan and the irritating policy towards the Ameer, and concluded his address with the following eloquent responses to the historical and moral aspects of the Afghan difficulty: "You have made this war in concealment from Parliament, in reversal of the policy of every Indian and Home Government that has existed for the last twenty-five years, in contempt of the supplication of the Ameer and in defiance of the advice of your own agent, and all for the sake of obtaining a scientific frontier." This powerful speech greatly impressed, for the moment, both parties in the House, but the vote of censure was defeated, and the policy of the administration was endorsed. During the debate Mr. Latham made a witty comparison. He said that the Cabinet reminded him of the gentleman, who seeing his horses run away, and being assured by the coachman that they must drive into something, replied, "Then smash into something cheap!" The Ministry presented a motion that the revenues of India should be applied for the purposes of the war. Mr. Gladstone observed that it was the people of England who had had all the glory and all the advantage which resulted from the destruction of the late administration, and the accession of the present Cabinet; and hence it was the people who must measure the _pros_ and the _cons_, and who must be content, after having reaped such innumerable benefits, to encounter the disadvantage of meeting charges which undoubtedly the existing government would leave behind it as a legacy to posterity. England gained her end in the humiliation of Russia, but there were those who felt that the result of the English policy would further the advance of Russia in Europe, and that force would never make friends of the Afghans. In the sessions of 1879 the Greek question came up in the House of Commons on a motion, "That, in the opinion of this House, tranquillity in the East demands that satisfaction be given to the just claims of Greece, and no satisfaction can be considered adequate that does not ensure execution of the recommendations embodied in Protocol 13 of the Berlin Congress." Mr. Gladstone hoped that even in the present House there would be found those who would encourage the first legitimate aspirations of the Hellenic races after freedom. The government had given pledges to advance the claims of Greece that had not been redeemed at Berlin. Not one of the European powers was now averse to the claims of the Greek kingdom, whose successful pleadings depended wholly upon England for favorable answer. But the government objected, and the motion was rejected. In July, Sir Charles Dilke called the attention of the House to the obligations of Turkey under the Treaty of Berlin, when Mr. Gladstone again earnestly enforced the claims of "Greece, weak as she may be, is yet strong in the principles in which she rests." December 29, 1879, Mr. Gladstone attained the seventieth year of his age. His friends in Liverpool, and the Greenwich Liberal Association presented him with congratulatory addresses. The journals paid him warm tributes for his long and eminent public services. But few thought that the veteran that had so successfully gone through one electoral campaign was destined in a few months to pass through another, still more remarkable, and yet be fresh for new triumphs. In the autumn of 1879 Mr. Gladstone resolved upon a very important, and as his enemies thought, a hopeless step. He had retired from the representation of Greenwich, and he now boldly decided to contest the election for Midlothian, the county of Edinburgh. He consequently proceeded to Scotland, in November, where such an ovation was given him as has never been accorded to any man in modern times. During the period of three weeks he addressed meetings numbering seventy-five thousand people, while a quarter of a million of people, with every exhibition of good-will and admiration, took part in some way in the demonstration in his honor. In this canvass of delivering political speeches he performed an oratorical and intellectual feat unparalleled in the history of any statesman who had attained his seventieth year. Mr. Gladstone addressed large concourses of people. When he reached Edinburgh, "his progress was as the progress of a nation's guest, or a king returning to his own again." Midlothian, the scene of Mr. Gladstone's astonishing exertions, was one of the Conservative strongholds, under the dominent influence of the Duke of Buccleuch, whose son, Lord Dalkeith, Mr. Gladstone opposed in contesting for the representation in Parliament. Mr. Gladstone said: "Being a man of Scotch blood, I am very much attached to Scotland, and like even the Scottish accent," and he afterwards said, "and Scotland showed herself equally proud of her son." He spoke at Edinburgh, November 26th, and on the following day at Dalkeith, in the very heart of the Duke of Buccleuch's own property to an audience of three thousand people, mostly agriculturists. At Edinburgh he met nearly five thousand persons at the Corn Exchange, representing more than one hundred Scottish Liberal Associations. In the Waverley Market Mr. Gladstone addressed more than twenty thousand people, one of the largest congregations ever assembled in-doors in Scotland, and met with a reception which for enthusiasm was in keeping with the vastness of the audience. December 5th, at Glasgow, he delivered his address as Lord Rector to the students of the University, and in the evening addressed an immense audience of nearly six thousand in St. Andrew's Hall. He was most enthusiastically received, and he dwelt chiefly on Cyprus, the Suez Canal, India, and Afghanistan. "We had Afghanistan ruined," he urged, "India not advanced, but thrown back in government, subjected to heavy and unjust charges, subjected to what might well be termed, in comparison with the mild government of former years, a system of oppression; and with all this we had at home the law broken and the rights of Parliament invaded." On the 8th of March, 1880, the immediate dissolution of Parliament was announced in both Houses of Parliament, and the news created intense political excitement and activity throughout the land. In his manifesto, in the shape of a letter to the Duke of Marlborough, the Prime Minister referred to the attempt made to sever the constitutional tie between Great Britain and Ireland, and said: "It is to be hoped that all men of light and leading will resist this destructive doctrine. There are some who challenge the expediency of the Imperial character of this realm. Having attempted and failed to enfeeble our colonies by their policy of decomposition, they may now perhaps recognize in the disintegration of the United Kingdom a mode which will not only accomplish, but precipitate, that purpose. Peace rests on the presence, not to say the ascendency, of England in the councils of Europe." Mr. Gladstone and Lord Hartington issued their counter-manifestoes. Mr. Gladstone repudiated Lord Beaconsfield's dark allusion to the repeal of the union and the abandonment of the colonies, characterizing them as base insinuations, the real purpose of which was to hide from view the policy pursued by the Ministry, and its effect upon the condition of the country; and said that public distress had been aggravated by continual shocks from neglected legislation at home, "while abroad they had strained the prerogative by gross misuse, had weakened the Empire by needless wars, and dishonored it in the eyes of Europe by their clandestine acquisition of the Island of Cyprus." Mr. Gladstone began the electoral campaign with a speech at Marylebone on the 10th of March, in which he announced Lord Derby's secession from the Conservative to the Liberal party; and then he left London to enter upon his second Midlothian campaign. At various points on the journey Mr. Gladstone stopped and addressed the people from the cars, and it is a remarkable fact that wherever he delivered an address the Liberals gained a seat. The first address made by Mr. Gladstone on his own account, was delivered on the 17th of March, in the Music Hall, Edinburgh. After dwelling at great length upon various questions of foreign policy, he concluded with the following references personal to his opponents and himself: "I give them credit for patriotic motives; I give them credit for those patriotic motives which are incessantly and gratuitously denied to us. I believe that we are all united, gentlemen--indeed it would be most unnatural if we were not--in a fond attachment, perhaps in something of a proud attachment, to the great country to which we belong." In his final speech at West Calder Mr. Gladstone drew a powerful indictment against the administration, and placed the issue before the country in a strong light. Throughout all the campaign, as the time for the general election was approaching, only one question was submitted to the electors, "Do you approve or condemn Lord Beaconsfield's system of foreign policy?" And the answer was given at Easter, 1880, when the Prime Minister and his colleagues received the most empathic condemnation which had ever been bestowed upon an English Government, and the Liberals were returned in an overwhelming majority of fifty over Tories and Home Rulers combined. Mr. Gladstone succeeded in ousting Lord Dalkeith from the representation of Midlothian by a respectable majority. He was also elected at Leeds, but this seat was afterwards given to his son, Herbert Gladstone. At the conclusion of the election all the journals joined in admiring the indomitable energy and vigor of the orator, who could carry out this great enterprise when he had already passed the age of three-score years and ten. Edinburgh was illuminated in the evening, and everywhere were to be witnessed signs of rejoicing at Mr. Gladstone's victory. The result of the elections throughout the country exceeded the most sanguine expectations of the Liberals. So large a proportion of Liberal members had not been returned to the House of Commons since the days of the first Reform Bill. Lord Beaconsfield, as soon as the result of the election was known, and without waiting for the meeting of Parliament, resigned. The Queen, in conformity with the constitutional custom, summoned Lord Hartington, the titular leader of the Liberal party in the House of Commons, to form a cabinet. But he could do nothing. Then the Queen sent for Lord Granville, who with Lord Hartington, went to Windsor April 23d. They both assured the Queen that the victory was Mr. Gladstone's; that the people had designated him for office, and that the Liberal party would be satisfied with no other, and that he was the inevitable Prime Minister. They returned to London in the afternoon, sought Mr. Gladstone at Harley Street, where he was awaiting the message they brought from the Queen--to repair to Windsor. That evening, without an hour's delay, he went to Windsor, kissed hands, and returned to London Prime Minister for the second time. Mr. Gladstone again filled the double office of Premier and Chancellor of the Exchequer in the new cabinet, which for general ability and debating power was one of the strongest of the century. While some of the cabinet officers were like Mr. Gladstone himself, without title, others were representatives of the oldest nobility of the land. At the very beginning the new administration were confronted by perplexing questions. The Eastern question, chiefly by Mr. Gladstone's influence, had been settled in accordance with the dictates of humanity and religion. But there were other difficulties to be overcome. "At home, his administration did good and useful work, including the extension of the suffrage to the agricultural laborers; but it was seriously, and at length fatally, embarrassed by two controversies which sprang up with little warning, and found the Liberal party and its leaders totally unprepared to deal with them." The first embarrassing question which arose when the new Parliament met was the great deficit of nine million pounds instead of an expected surplus in the Indian Budget, owing to the Afghan war. Foremost among the difficulties encountered was the case of Mr. Charles Bradlaugh, elected a member of Parliament for Northampton. He demanded to be permitted to make a solemn affirmation or declaration of allegiance, instead of taking the usual oath. The question created much discussion and great feeling, and Mr. Bradlaugh's persistence was met by violence. Mr. Bright contended for liberty of conscience. Mr. Gladstone favored permitting Mr. Bradlaugh to affirm on his own responsibility which was finally done, but Mr. Bradlaugh was prosecuted in the courts. The great difficulty arose from Mr. Bradlaugh's atheism. A considerable share of the session of 1880 was occupied in the consideration of the Irish Compensation for Disturbance Bill and other Irish measures. In consequence of the rapid increase of evictions by landlords, this protective measure had become absolutely necessary in the interests of the Irish tenants. After prolonged debate--very prolonged for so short a bill--thirty-five lines only--the bill was passed by the Commons, but defeated by the Lords. The result was "seen in a ghastly record of outrage and murder which stained the following winter." Home Rule for Ireland, which movement was started in the "seventies," was gaining ground, and every election returned to the House more members pledged to its support. Those who were bent upon obtaining Home Rule at any cost used obstructive means against other legislation to gain their object, but as yet the movement was confined to the members who had been elected by Irish constituents. About the close of the session of 1880 the heavy burdens and responsibilities of public service borne by Mr. Gladstone began to tell upon him. At the end of July, while returning from home for the House of Commons, Mr. Gladstone was taken ill. He was prostrated by fever and great fears for his recovery were entertained by his family, his party and a host of admirers throughout the country. A great outburst of popular sympathy was manifested and frequent messages were received from the Queen and many foreign potentates and celebrities. Distinguished callers and telegrams continued to arrive at Downing Street for ten days while the patient was confined to his bed at home. The President of the United States and the King and Queen of the Belgians were among those who sent messages of sympathy. "Rarely indeed, if ever, has there been witnessed such a general and spontaneous expression of the national sympathy towards a distinguished statesman whose life had been imperilled by illness." Mr. Gladstone's large store of vital energy brought him safely through his dangerous illness and on approaching convalescence he took a sea voyage round the entire coast of England in Sir Donald Currie's steamer, "Grantully Castle." Three years after this voyage around England the Premier visited the Orkneys on a similar trip, in the "Pembroke Castle," the poet laureate being of the party on this occasion. From the Orkneys he sailed across to Denmark and suddenly appeared at Copenhagen, where Mr. Gladstone entertained the Czar and Czarina, the King of Greece, and the King and Queen of Denmark, and many others of their relatives who happened to be visiting them at that time. A great meeting was held June 21, 1880, in Her Majesty's opera house, for the purpose of presenting an address from the Liberals of Middlesex to Mr. Herbert Gladstone, who had made a gallant contest in that country at the general election. The entrance of the Premier some time after the meeting began was the signal for an outburst of enthusiasm. Before Mr. Gladstone appeared, the chairman, Mr. Foster, had paid a high tribute to the Premier for his great abilities and his self-denial in the public service. After his son had received the address, the Premier arose to speak, when the whole audience arose to their feet and welcomed him with immense cheering. Mr. Gladstone referred at length to the Midlothian campaign, and paid a tribute to the spirit and energy of the Liberals of the whole country. The sound which went forth from Midlothian reverberated through the land and was felt to be among the powerful operative causes which led to the great triumph of the Liberal party. At the Lord Mayor's banquet, November 9, 1880, Mr. Gladstone's speech was looked forward to with much anxiety, owing to the singularly disturbed condition of Ireland. Referring to the "party of disorder" in Ireland, he said that as anxious as the government was to pass laws for the improvement of the land laws, their prior duty was to so enforce the laws as to secure order. If an increase of power was needed to secure this, they would not fail to ask it. In 1881, at the Lord Mayor's banquet, Mr. Gladstone said that he was glad to discern signs of improvement in Ireland during the last twelve months; but the struggle between the representatives of law and the representatives of lawlessness had rendered necessary an augmentation of the executive power. In August, 1881, at Greenwich, the Liberals of the borough presented Mr. Gladstone with an illustrated address and a carved oak chair as a token of their esteem and a souvenir of his former representation of their borough. On the cushion back of the chair were embossed in gold the arms of Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone, with a motto "Fide et Virtute," and above, in the midst of some wood-carving representing the rose, the thistle, the shamrock, and the leek, was a silver plate, bearing a suitable inscription. The Parliamentary session of 1881 was almost exclusively devoted to Irish affairs. Instead of the contemplated Land Act, the ministry were compelled, on account of the disturbed condition of Ireland, to bring in first a Coercion Act, although the measure was naturally distasteful to such friends of Ireland in the Cabinet as Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Bright. Property and life had become very insecure, and there was a startling increase of agrarian crime that such a measure was deemed necessary. But while passing the Coercion Act, Mr. Gladstone accompanied it by a great and beneficial measure--a second Irish Land Bill, which instituted a court for the purpose of dealing with the differences between landlord and tenant. This bill--one of Mr. Gladstone's greatest measures--became a law August 23, 1881. Mr. Gladstone in his speech remarked that the complaint was made that the bill was an infringement of liberty in Ireland and was aimed at the Land League, but no person or body could be touched by the bill unless they violated the law, and then could only be arrested upon reasonable suspicion of crime committed or of inciting to crime or of interfering with law or order. There would be the fullest freedom of discussion allowed. Dealing with the Land League he said it had been attempted to compare it with the Corn Laws, but Mr. Bright had completely demolished that miserable argument. It was compared also to the trade unions, but they made an onward step in the intelligence and in the love of law and order among the working classes. They had never tainted themselves by word or deed which would bring them into suspicion in connection with the maintenance of law. The leaders of the Land League were now put forward as martyrs on the same platform as O'Connell; but on every occasion of his life-long agitation O'Connell set himself to avoid whatever might tend to a breach of law and order. Then Mr. Gladstone showed the necessity of the Coercion Act from the condition of Ireland, where during the past year there had been a great increase of crime, and the outrages were agrarian, and not connected with the distress. It was a significant fact that the agrarian outrages had risen and fallen with the meetings of the Land League. Nothing could be more idle than to confound the agrarian crime of Ireland with the ordinary crime of England, or even of Ireland. In regard to general crime, Ireland held a high and honorable place, but how different was the case with agrarian crime! He referred to the miscarriage of justice in Ireland, and said that the bill, if passed, would restore to Ireland the first conditions of Christian and civilized existence. But it "only irritated while it failed to terrify." Mr. Gladstone's was a great speech and showed his mastery of details, and his power of expounding and illustrating broad and general principles. He began his exposition by confessing that it was the most difficult question with which he had ever been called upon to deal. He concluded with an eloquent invocation to justice. On the 19th of April, 1881, Lord Beaconsfield died. For many years he and Mr. Gladstone had been at the head of their respective parties. "Their opposition, as one critic has well and tersely put it, like that of Pitt and Fox, was one of temperament and character as well as of genius, position and political opinions." The Premier paid an eloquent tribute to him and proposed a public funeral, which was declined. Mr. Gladstone then moved for a monument in Westminster Abbey to the memory of the deceased Earl. In October, 1881, Mr. Gladstone made a visit to Leeds, for which borough he was returned in 1880, but for which his son Herbert sat. He delivered several important addresses on subjects which then absorbed the public attention, especially dealing with the land question local government, and Free Trade _versus_ Fair Trade. Mr. Gladstone said: "My boyhood was spent at the mouth of the Mersey, and in those days I used to see those beautiful American liners, the packets between New York and Liverpool, which then conducted the bulk and the pick of the trade between the two countries. The Americans were then deemed to be so entirely superior to us in shipbuilding and navigation that they had four-fifths of the whole trade between the two countries in their hands, and that four-fifths was the best of the trade. What is the case now, when free trade has operated and has applied its stimulus to the intelligence of England, and when, on the other hand, the action of the Americans has been restrained by the enactment, the enhancement and the tightening of the protective system? The scales are exactly reversed, and instead of America doing four-fifths and that the best, we do four-fifths of the business, and the Americans pick up the leavings of the British and transact the residue of the trade. Not because they are inferior to us in anything; it would be a fatal error to suppose it; not because they have less intelligence or less perseverance. They are your descendants; they are your kinsmen; and they are fully equal to you in all that goes to make human energy and power; but they are laboring under the delusion from which you yourselves have but recently escaped, and in which some misguided fellow-citizens seek again to entangle you. "I am reminded that I was guilty on a certain occasion of stating in an article--not a political article--that, in my opinion, it was far from improbable that as the volume of the future was unrolled, America, with its vast population and its wonderful resources, and not less with that severe education which, from the high price of labor, America is receiving in the strong necessity of resorting to every description of labor-saving contrivances, and consequent development, not only on a large scale, but down to the smallest scale of mechanical genius of the country--on that account the day may come when that country may claim to possess the commercial primacy of the world, I gave sad offence to many. I at present will say this, that as long as America adheres to the protective system your commercial primacy is secure. Nothing in the world can wrest it from you while America continues to fetter her own strong hands and arms, and with these fettered arms is content to compete with you, who are free, in neutral markets. And as long as America follows the doctrine of protection, or the doctrines now known as those of 'fair trade,' you are perfectly safe, and you need not allow, any of you, even your slightest slumbers to be disturbed by the fear that America will take from you your commercial primacy." After his return to London Mr. Gladstone received an address from the Corporation, setting forth the long services he had rendered to the country. Mr. Gladstone, in his reply, touched upon Irish obstruction, and announced, incidentally, the arrest of Mr. Parnell. Mr. Parnell, the leader of the Irish party, having openly defied the law, had been arrested and imprisoned without trial, under the Coercion Act, passed at the last session. On the opening night of the Parliament, of 1882, Mr. Gladstone laid before the House the proposed new rules of Parliamentary procedure. The _clôture_, by a bare majority, was to be established, in order to secure the power of closing debate by a vote of the House. The House of Lords decided upon the appointment of a Select Committee to inquire into the working of the Land Act, including the alleged total collapse of the clauses relating to purchase, emigration, and arrears. The Prime Minister in the House of Commons introduced a resolution condemning the proposed inquiry as tending to defeat the operation of the Land Act and as injurious to the good government of Ireland. Early in May, 1882, the whole country was startled and terrified by the news of the assassination of Lord Frederick Cavendish, the new chief secretary for Ireland, and Mr. Burke under-secretary, in the Phoenix Park, Dublin. A social revolution was raging in Ireland. Outrages and murders had been fearfully frequent, and such brutal murders as those of Mrs. Smythe and Mr. Herbert had filled England with terror. In the first week of May announcement was made that Earl Cowper had resigned the Viceroyalty. Rather than share the responsibility of releasing Mr. Parnell, Mr. Dillon and Mr. O'Kelly, Mr. Forster left the Cabinet. Lord Spencer was appointed to the Viceroyalty, and Lord Frederick Cavendish succeeded Mr. Forster, and two days thereafter all England was thrilled with sorrow and indignation by the terrible news of the assassination in Phoenix Park. The news shattered the hopes of many concerning Ireland, and fell with special severity upon Mr. Gladstone, because he and Lord Cavendish enjoyed the closest friendship. The government presented a Prevention of Crimes Bill of a very stringent character. In the course of debate warm discussions arose over an "understanding" called, "The Kilmainham Compact," but Mr. Gladstone successfully defended the government in regard to its supposed negotiations with Mr. Parnell. This bill was directed against secret societies and illegal combinations, and it was hoped that as the Land League party had expressed its horror at the Phoenix Park crime, and charged that it was the work of American conspirators, they would allow the measure speedily to become law. Mr. Bright declared that the bill would harm no innocent person, and explained his own doctrine, that "Force is no remedy," was intended to apply not to outrages, but to grievances. For three weeks Mr. Parnell and his followers obstructed legislation in every conceivable way, and were finally suspended for systematic obstruction. The obstructionists removed, the bill was then passed, after a sitting of twenty-eight hours. The measure was passed by the Lords July 7th, and the Queen signed the bill July 12th. A crisis nearly arose between the Lords and the Commons over the Irish Arrears Bill, but the Lords finally yielded. [Illustration: GALLERY OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.] CHAPTER XVIII THIRD ADMINISTRATION AND HOME RULE It is our purpose next to trace the events that led to the overthrow of the Second Administration of Mr. Gladstone, and to the formation of his Third Cabinet. The question that seemed to begin the work of weakening the foundations of his existing government was their policy in regard to Egypt, which began with the occupation of Egypt in 1882. The budget of the session of 1882 was presented by Mr. Gladstone April 24th. It was not expected that anything novel in the way of legislation would be attempted in it. But its main interest was in this, that it proposed a vote of credit for the Egyptian Expedition, which was to be provided for by addition to the income-tax, making it sixpence half-penny in the pound for the year. The financial proposals were agreed to. In the course of the session Mr. Bright resigned his place in the Cabinet on the ground that the intervention in Egypt was a manifest violation of the moral law, that the Government had interfered by force of arms in Egypt, and directed the bombardment of Alexandria. Mr. Gladstone denied that the Ministry were at war with Egypt, and stated that the measures taken at Alexandria were strictly measures of self-defence. In justifying his resignation Mr. Bright said there had been a manifest violation of the moral law; but the Premier, while agreeing with his late colleague generally on the question of the moral law differed from him as to this particular application of it. The Prime Minister attended the Lord Mayor's Banquet at the Mansion House, August 9, 1882. In replying to the toast to Her Majesty's Ministers, after some preliminary remarks, Mr. Gladstone alluded to the campaign in Egypt, which had been so much discussed, and said: "Let it be well understood for what we go and for what we do not go to Egypt. We do not go to make war on its people, but to rescue them from the oppression of a military tyranny which at present extinguishes every free voice and chains every man of the people of that country. We do not go to make war on the Mohammedan religion, for it is amongst the proudest distinctions of Christianity to establish tolerance, and we know that wherever the British rule exists, the same respect which we claim for the exercise of our own conscientious convictions is yielded to the professors of every other faith on the surface of the globe. We do not, my Lord Mayor, go to repress the growth of Egyptian liberties. We wish them well; for we have no other interest in Egypt, which cannot in any other way so well and so effectually attain her own prosperity as by the enjoyment of a well regulated, and an expanding freedom." Mr. Gladstone's confidence respecting the early termination of the war in Egypt was somewhat justified by Sir Garnet Wolseley's victory at Tel-el-Kebir, but the future relations of England with Egypt were still left an open subject of discussion and speculation. Again, November 9th, at the banquet at the Guildhall, to the Cabinet Ministers, Mr. Gladstone spoke. He called attention to the settlement of the troubles in the East of Europe, congratulating his hearers on the removal by the naval and military forces of the Egyptian difficulty, and calling attention to Ireland, compared its condition with that of the previous March and October, 1881, showing a diminution of agrarian crime to the extent of four-fifths. This happy result had been brought about, not by coercive means alone, but by the exercise of remedial measures. "If the people of Ireland were willing to walk in the ways of legality, England was strong, and generous, and free enough to entertain in a friendly and kindly spirit any demand which they might make." On the 13th of December, 1882, Mr. Gladstone's political jubilee was celebrated. Fifty years before, on that day, he had been returned to Parliament as member for Newark. A large number of congratulatory addresses, letters, and telegrams complimenting him on the completion of his fifty years of parliamentary service were received by him. He had entered the first Reformed Parliament as a conservative, had gone ever forward in the path of reform, and was yet to lead in greater measures of reform. The excellent prospects regarding domestic measures with which the session of 1883 was opened were dispelled by prolonged and fruitless debates on measures proposed and on the address from the Queen. But Mr. Gladstone was absent, the state of his health requiring him to pass several weeks at Cannes. He returned home in March greatly invigorated, and at once threw himself with wonted ardour into the parliamentary conflict. Mr. Parnell offered a bill to amend the Irish Land Act of 1887, which was opposed by the Premier and lost. An affirmation bill was introduced at this session by the Government, which provided that members who objected to taking the oath might have the privilege of affirming. The opposition spoke of the measure as a "Bradlaugh Relief Bill." Its rejection was moved, and in its defense Mr. Gladstone made one of his best speeches, which was warmly applauded. He said: "I must painfully record my opinion, that grave injury has been done to religion in many minds--not in instructed minds, but in those which are ill-instructed or partially instructed--in consequence of things which ought never to have occurred. Great mischief has been done in many minds by a resistance offered to the man elected by the constituency of Northampton, which a portion of the people believe to be unjust. When they see the profession of religion and the interests of religion, ostensibly associated with what they are deeply convinced is injustice, it leads to questions about religion itself, which commonly end in impairing those convictions, and that belief, the loss of which I believe to be the most inexpressible calamity which can fall either upon a man or upon a nation." But the measure was lost. During the session of 1883 the Bankruptcy Bill and the Patents Bill were both passed, and effected reforms which had long been felt to be necessary. The Corrupt Practices Act was designed to remove from British parliamentary and borough elections the stigma which attached to them in so many parts of the country. The Government was checked, however, in its policy in the Transvaal, and Mr. Childers' action in regard to the Suez Canal. Mr. Gladstone attended, in March, the celebration of the inauguration of the National Liberal party, predicting for it a useful and brilliant future, if it remained faithful to its time-honored principles and traditions. Sir Stafford Northcote, in the session of 1884, moved a vote of censure, and vigorously attacked the Egyptian policy of the administration. Mr. Gladstone defended the ministerial action with spirit and effect. He declared that the Government had found, and not made, the situation in Egypt and the Soudan. The Prime Minister "traced all the mischief to Lord Salisbury's dual control. Though the motive and object had been to secure a better government for Egypt, a great error had been committed. The British Government had fulfilled all the obligations imposed upon them, and they were acting for the benefit of the civilized world. Reforms had been effected in the judicature, legislature, police, and military organizations of Egypt; and they were resolved to see all the vital points recommended carried out by the Khedive's Government. As to the war in the Soudan, it was hateful to the people of Egypt; and England declined to have anything to do with the reconquest of the Soudan.... General Gordon, whom Mr. Gladstone characterized as a hero and a genius, had been despatched to Khartoum for the purpose of withdrawing, if possible, in safety the 29,000 soldiers of the Khedive scattered over the Soudan. The General's mission was not the reconquest of the Soudan, but its peaceful evacuation, and the reconstruction of the country, by giving back to the Sultan the ancestral power which had been suspended during the Egyptian occupation. The Government had to consider in any steps which they took the danger of thwarting Gordon's peaceful mission and endangering his life." Mr. Gladstone said that the policy of the Government was to "rescue and retire." Sir S. Northcote's resolution was rejected by 311 to 292 votes, showing the growing strength of the Opposition. The pacific mission of General Gordon to Khartoum having failed, there was great solicitude felt for that gallant soldier's welfare and safety. Sir M. Hicks-Beach offered another vote of censure, complaining of the dilatory conduct of the Government for not taking steps to secure the safety of General Gordon. Mr. Gladstone, in reply, admitted the obligations of the Government to General Gordon, and stated that on reasonable proof of danger he would be assisted. "The nation would never grudge adequate efforts for the protection of its agents, but it was the duty of the Government to consider the treasure, the blood, and the honor of the country, together with the circumstances of the time, the season, the climate, and the military difficulties. Conscious of what their obligations were, they would continue to use their best endeavours to fulfil them, unmoved by the threats and the captious criticisms of the Opposition." The proposed censure was defeated. A conference of European powers was held on Egyptian affairs, but was abortive; and Mr. Gladstone while announcing that he wished to get out of Egypt as soon as circumstances would allow, admitted that institutions, however good, were not likely to survive the withdrawal of our troops. Lord Northbrook was next despatched by the government on a mission to Egypt, with the object of rescuing her from her financial embarrassments, and averting the impending dangers of a national bankruptcy. In February, 1884, Mr. Gladstone introduced the Government Franchise Bill in the House of Commons. It was a great measure and proposed to complete the work of parliamentary reform by conferring the suffrage upon every person in the United Kingdom who was the head of a household. Mr. Gladstone said that the results of the bill would be to add to the English constituency upwards of 1,300,000 voters; to the Scotch constituency over 200,000 voters; and to the Irish constituency over 400,000 voters; which would add to the aggregate constituency of the United Kingdom, which was then 3,000,000 voters, 2,000,000 more, or nearly twice as many as were added in 1832. The Premier appealed for union on this great reform, and observed: "Let us hold firmly together, and success will crown our efforts. You will, as much as any former Parliament that has conferred great legislative benefits on the nation, have your reward, and read your history in a nation's eyes; for you will have deserved all the benefits you will have conferred. You will have made a strong nation stronger still--stronger in union without, and stronger against its foes (if and when it has any foes) within; stronger in union between class and class, and in rallying all classes and portions of the community in one solid compact mass round the ancient Throne which it has loved so well, and round the Constitution, now to be more than ever free and more than ever powerful." The measure was warmly debated. Besides this opposition there were, outside of the House, ominous utterances threatening the rejection of the scheme. Mr. Gladstone, referring to these hostile murmurings, said that hitherto the attitude of the government had been, in Shakespeare's words, "Beware of entrance to a quarrel; but, being in, bear it, that the opposer may beware of thee." He deprecated a quarrel and declared that the government had done everything to prevent a collision between the two Houses of Parliament on this question, which would open up a prospect more serious than any he remembered since the first Reform Bill. The House of Lords passed a resolution to the effect that the Lords would not concur in any measure of reform without having the complete bill before them, including the redistribution and registration, as well as an extension of the suffrage. The Premier promised to introduce a Redistribution Bill in the following session, but Lord Salisbury, since the death of Lord Beaconsfield, the leader of the Conservative party, declined to discuss the Redistribution Bill, "with a rope around his neck," by which he meant a franchise act under which his party must appeal to the country. Negotiations followed between the Liberal and Conservative leaders with fruitless results, and the House of Lords finally passed a resolution that it would be desirable for Parliament to have an autumn session, to consider the Representation of the People Bill, in connection with the Redistribution Bill, which the government had brought before Parliament. Public meetings were held at various places throughout the country, and the question of the enlargement of the franchise discussed. The policy of the Tories was strongly condemned at many large and influential public gatherings. In August Mr. Gladstone visited Midlothian and delivered a powerful address in the Edinburgh Corn Exchange. He explained that the special purpose for which he appeared before his constituents was to promote, by every legitimate means in his power, the speedy passage of the Franchise Bill. "The unfortunate rejection of the measure," he observed, "had already drawn in its train other questions of the gravest kind, and the vast proportion of the people would soon be asking whether an organic change was not required in the House of Lords. He, however, did not believe that the House of Lords had as yet placed itself in a position of irretrievable error. He believed that it was possible for it to go back, and to go back with dignity and honor." With regard to the foreign policy of the Government, which had been attacked and compared unfavorably with the Midlothian programme of 1879, Mr. Gladstone defended it with spirit. He expressed his satisfaction with the expansion of Germany abroad, and reviewed the policy of the Government in Eastern Europe, Afghanistan, India and South Africa. As to the Transvaal, he contended that "they were strong and could afford to be merciful," and that it was not possible without the grossest and most shameful breach of faith to persist in holding the Boers to annexation, "when we had pledged ourselves beforehand that they should not be annexed except with their own good will." In reply to the oft-repeated question, "What took you to Egypt?" the Premier said: "Honor and plighted faith." The covenants they were keeping were those entered into by their Tory predecessors, and most unfortunate and most unwise he considered them to be. The Government had respected the sovereignty of the Porte and the title of the European Powers to be concerned in all matters territorially affecting the Turkish Empire; they had discouraged the spirit of aggression as well as they could, and had contracted no embarrassing engagements. Great improvements had been introduced in the administration of Egypt, but he regretted the total failure of the late Conference of the Powers to solve the problem of Egyptian finance. With regard to General Gordon the Government were considering the best means to be adopted for fulfilling their obligations. Parliament met in October, 1884. The Franchise Bill was introduced and sent to the House of Lords, and the Redistribution Bill, upon which a compromise with the Conservatives had been reached, was presented in the House of Commons. The measure, as altered, proposed to disfranchise all boroughs with a population under 15,000, to give only one member to towns with a population between 15,000 and 50,000, and to take one member each from the counties of Rutland and Hereford. By this arrangement one hundred and sixty seats would be "extinguished," which, with the six seats extinguished before, would be revived and distributed as follows: "Eight new boroughs would be created, the representation of London, Liverpool, and other large cities and towns would be greatly increased, while in dealing with the remainder of the seats unappropriated, the Government would apply equal electoral areas throughout the country." The Franchise Bill--a truly democratic bill---was carried through both Houses, and became a law. The Redistribution Bill was carried, January, 1885, after animated debate. Registration measures were also passed for England, Scotland and Ireland, which received the royal assent May 21st. January, 1885, Mr. Gladstone wrote a kindly, serious, yet courtly letter of congratulation to Prince Albert Victor, eldest son of the Prince of Wales and heir presumptive to the Crown, on the attainment of his majority. In the hour of triumph the government was doomed to receive a stunning blow. The news of the fall of Khartoum and the untimely death of General Gordon sent a thrill of horror and indignation throughout England. The government was seriously condemned for its procrastination in not sending timely relief, for the rescue of the imperiled English. But when the facts became fully known it was found that no blame could be attached to Mr. Gladstone, who was himself strongly moved by the death of General Gordon, whose work and character he highly esteemed. The Prime Minister was, however, equal to the emergency, and announced that it was necessary to overthrow the Mahdi at Khartoum, to renew operations against Osman Digna, and to construct a railway from Suakin to Berber with a view to a campaign in the fall. The reserves were called out by royal proclamation. However, these measures met with opposition. Sir Stafford Northcote brought forward a motion affirming that the risks and sacrifices which the government appeared to be ready to encounter could only be justified by a distinct recognition of England's responsibility for Egypt, and those portions of the Soudan which were necessary to its security. An amendment was proposed by Mr. John Morley, but regretting its decision to continue the conflict with the Mahdi. Mr. Gladstone replied forcibly to both motion and amendment, and appealed to the Liberal party to sustain the administration and its policy by an unmistakable vote of confidence. The government was sustained. The Great Powers of Europe, in convention for the settlement of the finances of Egypt, had concluded that it would require a loan of £9,000,000 to save Egypt from bankruptcy. This loan was to be issued on an international guarantee, with an international inquiry at the end of two years into the success of the scheme. This plan of adjustment was agreed to by the House. A short time after this settlement Mr. Gladstone announced a vote of credit to provide against any danger from Russian action, stated that no farther operations would be undertaken either on the Nile or near Suakin, and that General Graham's campaign would be abandoned, as well as the construction of the new railway. Great excitement was created in England by the announcement of the advance of the Russians on the Indian frontier. March 13th Mr. Gladstone stated in the House that as the protests formerly made against the advance of Russia had been allowed to lapse, it had been agreed that pending the delineation of the frontier there should be no further advance on either side. In April, however, a conflict occurred between the Russians and the Afghans, which seemed to indicate that General Komaroff had committed an act of unprovoked aggression on the Ameer. Mr. Gladstone moved a vote of credit on the 27th in a speech, whose eloquence and energy greatly stirred both sides of the House. Happily, the difficulty with Russia was adjusted by conceding Pendjeh to Russia in consideration of the surrender of Zulfiker to the Ameer. The administration of Mr. Gladstone, which had weathered through many storms, was destined to fall in a wholly unexpected way. When the budget for 1885 was produced there was a deficit of upwards of a million pounds, besides the depressed revenue and an estimated expenditure for the current year of not less than £100,000,000. Mr. Childers, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, proposed to make the taxation upon land proportionate to that on personal property, and to augment the duties on spirits and beer. But various interests were antagonized, and opposition was aroused. The country members demanded that no new taxes be put on the land until the promised relief of local taxation had been granted. The agricultural and liquor interests were discontented, as well as the Scotch and Irish members, with the whisky duty. Concessions were made, but they failed to reconcile the opposition. A hostile motion was offered by Sir M. Hicks-Beach, and Mr. Gladstone declared that the Cabinet would resign if defeated. Many Liberals were absent when the vote was taken, regarding a majority for the Ministry as certain, but the amendment was carried June 9th by a vote of 264 to 252, and the Premier and his colleagues resigned. The Liberals were desirous of passing a vote of confidence in the administration, but Mr. Gladstone deprecated this, as he felt the situation to be intolerable, and was desirous of being relieved from the responsibility of office. Misfortunes, both in reference to affairs at home and abroad, had fallen heavily upon the Government, for many of which they were not responsible, and the Cabinet had been held together chiefly by the masterly personality of the Premier. Hence it was not without a feeling of personal satisfaction that Mr. Gladstone transferred the seats of office to his successor, Lord Salisbury. On his retirement from office the Queen offered an Earldom to Mr. Gladstone, which he declined. Its acceptance would have meant burial in the House of Lords, and an end to his progressive action. The events that led to the third administration of Mr. Gladstone will next engage our attention. The first general election under the New Reform Act was held in November, 1885. Mr. Gladstone again appealed to his constituents, and, although nearly seventy-six years of age, spoke with an energy and force far beyond all his contemporaries. His attitude on the question of Dis-establishment drew back many wavering Scotch votes. He discussed the Scotch question at Edinburgh, and said there was no fear of change so long as England dealt liberally, equitably, and prudently with Ireland, but demands must be subject to the condition that the unity of the empire, and all the powers of the Imperial Parliament for maintaining that authority, must be preserved. In another address he stated his conviction, that the day had not come when the Dis-establishment of the Church in Scotland should be made a test question. The question pressing for settlement by the next Parliament was land reform, local government, parliamentary procedure, and the imperial relations between Ireland and England; and every sensible man would admit that it was right to direct attention to them rather than to a matter impossible of immediate solution. At West Calder Mr. Gladstone made an address, in which he "approved Lord Salisbury's action with regard to Servia, complained of the ministerial condemnation of Lord Ripon's Indian administration, ridiculed the idea of benefit resulting from a Royal Commission on trade depression, warned the electors against remedies which were really worse than the disease, and defended Free-Trade principles. He furthur advocated comprehensive land reforms, including free transfer, facility of registration, and the uprooting of mortmain." [Illustration: GLADSTONE'S STUDY AT EDWARDEN.] Mr. Gladstone was returned again for Midlothian by an overwhelming majority. The elections resulted in the return of 333 Liberals, 249 Conservatives, 86 Parnellites, and 2 Independents. The Liberals thus secured a substantial triumph. The agricultural districts were faithful to the Liberals, but they lost in the boroughs. The clergy and the publicans, and the Parnellites were found "arrayed" in "scandalous alliance" against the Liberal cause. The Liberal party was just short of the numbers required to defeat the combined forces of Tories and Parnellites. Lord Salisbury was retained in office, but the Conservatives were disunited, and the life of his administration hung by a thread. The Liberals were strong, hopeful, and united. In Mr. Chamberlain they had a popular champion of great ability and industry. December 17, 1885 England was astonished by the appearance of an anonymous paragraph in the _Times_, affirming that, if Mr. Gladstone returned to power, he would deal with a liberal hand with the demands of Home Rule. The author of the paragraph has never been clearly ascertained, but the atmosphere of mystery with which it was surrounded was not regarded as becoming, either to such an important policy or to the personal dignity of the illustrious statesman. A storm of questions, contradictions, explanations, enthusiasms, and jeremiads followed its appearance. Mr. Gladstone would neither affirm nor deny, but held his peace. The question, he said, was one for a responsible Ministry alone to handle. There was great uncertainty. It was, however, plain that if Mr. Gladstone should favor Home Rule, the Parnellites would support him, and the Tories must leave office. But only twelve months before Lord Shaftesbury wrote: "In a year or so we shall have Home Rule disposed of (at all hazards), to save us from daily and hourly bores." The Parliament of 1886 had scarcely opened before the Salisbury government was defeated upon an amendment to the Queen's address, affirming the necessity for affording facilities to agricultural laborers to obtain allotments and small holdings. Some of the leading Liberals opposed the amendment, but Mr. Gladstone earnestly favored it, as a recognition of the evils arising from the divorce of so large a proportion of the population from the land. The Irish and the Liberals coalesced, and the Government was placed in a minority of seventy-nine, and Lord Salisbury immediately resigned. Late at night, January 29, 1886, Sir Henry Ponsonby arrived at Mr. Gladstone's residence with a summons from the Queen for him to repair to her at Osborne. On the 1st of February Mr. Gladstone "kissed hands," and became for the third time Prime Minister of England. The new Premier was forced to face unusual difficulties, but he finally came to the conclusion that it was impossible to deal with the Irish question upon the old stereotyped lines. He was resolved to treat this subject upon large and generous principles. Accordingly, on the 8th of April, Mr. Gladstone, in the presence of a crowded House, brought forward his Home Rule Bill--his bill for the government of Ireland. With certain imperial reservations and safeguards the bill gave to Ireland what she had long demanded--the right to make her own laws. The interest in the expected legislation was so great that members began to arrive at half-past five in the morning, while sixty of them were so eager to secure seats that they breakfasted at Westminster. Mr. Gladstone's new measure was not only opposed by the Conservatives, but it alienated from the Premier some of the most influential of the Liberal party. Among the Liberals who opposed the measure were those who had been the colleagues of Mr. Gladstone only the June before in the Cabinet--Lord Hartington, Lord Shilborne, Lord Northbrook, Lord Derby and Lord Carlingford. Mr. Gladstone's forces, however, were reinforced by Mr. Morley, Lord Herschell and others. May 10th, Mr. Gladstone denied that he had ever declared Home Rule for Ireland incompatible with Imperial unity. It was a remedy for social disorder. The policy of the opposition was coercion, while that of the government was autonomy. On the 18th of April the Premier presented the Irish Land Purchase Bill, for the buying out of the Irish landlords, which was intended to come into operation on the same day as the Home Rule Bill. The object of this measure was to give to all Irish landowners the option of being bought out on the terms of the Act, and opening towards the exercise of that option where their rent was from agricultural land. The State authority was to be the purchaser, and the occupier was to be the proprietor. The nominal purchase price was fixed at twenty years' purchase of the net rental, ascertained by deducting law charges, bad debts, and cost of management from judicial rent. Where there was no judicial rental the Land Court could, if it chose, make use of Griffiths' valuation for coming to a fair decision. To meet the demand for the means of purchase thus established, Mr. Gladstone proposed to create £50,000,000 three per cents. The repayment of advances would be secured by a Receiver General, appointed by and acting upon British authority. The Land Purchase Bill was also opposed. It was the final cause which led to the retirement from the government of Mr. Chamberlain, "the able and enterprising exponent of the new Radicalism." He was soon followed by Sir George Trevelyan, "who combined the most dignified traditions, social and literary, of the Whig party with a fervent and stable Liberalism which the vicissitudes of twenty years had constantly tried and never found wanting." Mr. Bright also arrayed himself in opposition to the government, and accused Mr. Gladstone of successfully concealing his thoughts upon the Irish question in November. Mr. Gladstone replied that the position of Ireland had changed since 1881. The debate extended over many nights, and the opposition to the Irish bills of so many Liberal leaders in every constituency, soon led to disaffection among the people. What was lost in some districts, however, was to some extent made up, says an English writer, by "the support of that very broken reed, the Irish vote, which was destined to pierce the hand of so many a confiding candidate who leaned upon it." While this debate was in progress a bill directed against the carrying of arms in Ireland was introduced and pushed forward rapidly through both Houses, and became a law. Mr. Gladstone explained the position of the Cabinet on the Home Rule and Land Bills at a meeting of Liberals held at the Foreign Office, May 27th. He stated that the Government at present only asked for an endorsement of the leading principles of the two measures; and in closing the debate afterwards on the second reading of the Home Rule Bill, in the House of Commons, he made an eloquent appeal for Ireland. But all parties were preparing for the conflict, and members of opposite parties were consolidating themselves for opposition. "The Whigs, under Lord Hartington, coalesced with the Radicals, under Mr. Chamberlain, and both together made a working alliance with the Tories. This alliance was admirably organized in London and in the constituencies." It seems that the Premier was deceived by his official counsellors of the Liberal party as to the real condition of affairs respecting Home Rule and the prospects for the passage of his bills. He did not dream of defeat, but if by some mischance they would suffer defeat, then he could appeal to the country with the certainty of being sustained by the popular vote. This was what Mr. Gladstone hoped, and what he thought he had the assurance of. But hopes of success began to give way to fears of defeat as the time drew near to take the vote. However, some still hopeful prophesied a small majority against the bill--only ten votes at the most. The Cabinet desperately resolved not to resign if beaten by so small a majority, but would have some adherent move a vote of confidence. This they argued would be favored by some opposed to Home Rule, and the question be deferred to another session, leaving the Liberals still in office. But these hopes were doomed to be blasted. Early in the morning of June 8th the momentous division took place, and it was found that the Government, instead of getting a majority, was defeated by thirty votes. It was found that ninety-three Liberals had voted with the majority. The Premier at once advised the Queen to dissolve Parliament, and though Her Majesty at first demurred at the trouble of another election within seven months of the last, and begged Mr. Gladstone to reconsider his counsel, yet he argued that a general election would cause less trouble than a year of embittered and fanatical agitation against Home Rule. Besides, as he said to a colleague, "If we did not dissolve we would be showing the white feather." Mr. Gladstone finally had his way, the Queen yielded and Parliament was dissolved June 26, 1886. June 14th Mr. Gladstone issued an address to the electors of Midlothian, and later paid a visit to Edinburgh and Glasgow, where he made powerful addresses. He then spoke at Manchester, and, passing on to Liverpool, he advocated the cause of Ireland, calling upon the people to "ring out the old, ring in the new," and to make Ireland not an enemy but a friend. The result of this appeal to the country was the return of a decided majority of over a hundred against Home Rule, and thus, after a short term of five months in office, the third administration of Mr. Gladstone was brought to a close, and he became again the leader of the Opposition. The dissolution and appeal to the country was a practical blunder, but Mr. Gladstone's address to the people was skilfully worded. He freely admitted that the Irish bills were dead, and asked the constituencies simply to sanction a principle, and that, too, a very plain and reasonable one in itself. He invited the people to vote aye or no to this question: "Whether you will or will not have regard to the prayer of Ireland for the management by herself of the affairs specifically and exclusively her own?" The separation of the bare principle of self-government from the practical difficulties presented by the bills enabled many Liberals who were opposed to the measures to support Mr. Gladstone, but the majority of voters failed to make this distinction, and hence came defeat. The decision of the people was not regarded as final. In 1887 the Jubilee of the Queen was celebrated. Fifty years before Queen Victoria had ascended the throne of England. Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone celebrated the Queen's Jubilee by giving a treat to all the inhabitants of the estates of Hawarden, who were of the Queen's age, which was sixty-eight and upwards. The treat took the shape of a dinner and tea, served in a large tent erected in front of the castle, and the guests numbered upwards of two hundred and fifty. The principal toast, proposed by Mr. Gladstone, was the Queen. He contrasted the jubilee then being celebrated all over the English-speaking world, with that of George the Third, which was "a jubilee of the great folks, a jubilee of corporations and of authorities, a jubilee of the upper classes." On the other hand, he continued, the Victorian Jubilee was one when "the population are better fed, better clothed, and better housed--and by a great deal--than they were fifty years ago, and the great mass of these happy and blessed changes is associated with the name and action of the Queen." In the year of the Queen's Jubilee, 1887, Mr. Gladstone addressed many gatherings, and at Swansea, where he was the guest of Sir Hussey Vivian, he spoke to a vast concourse of people, estimated at one hundred thousand. CHAPTER XIX PRIME MINISTER THE FOURTH TIME When Parliament met in 1887 Mr. Gladstone entered upon "a course of extraordinary physical and intellectual efforts, with voice and pen, in Parliament and on the platform, on behalf of the cause, defeated but not abandoned, of self-government for Ireland." The Tory administration passed a Crimes Prevention Bill for Ireland of great severity. Irish members of Parliament were thrown into prison, but the Act failed of its object--the suppression of the Land League. In December, 1887, Mr. Gladstone visited Italy and made Naples his headquarters. He was received with joy for the service he had rendered to the Italian people. The University of Bologna, in celebrating the eighth century of its existence, conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Arts. In 1888 the House of Commons appointed a Commission to try the "Times" charges against Mr. Parnell. The charges were found to be false. Mr. Gladstone visited Birmingham in November, 1888. After paying a glowing tribute to John Bright, and expressing an earnest desire for his recovery to health, he condemned the Coercion Act. Mr. Gladstone received many handsome presents from the workingmen, and Mrs. Gladstone received from the ladies a medallion cameo portrait of her husband. A great demonstration was made at Bingley Hall, in which were gathered over 20,000 persons. A number of Liberals, who had deserted Mr. Gladstone, returned upon the promise of certain imperial guarantees which were granted, among them Sir George Trevelyan. Mr. Chamberlain, who had asked for these safeguards, did not accept them. July 25, 1889, Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone celebrated their "Golden Wedding." Among the many to offer congratulations were the Queen by telegram, and the Prince of Wales by letter. A pleasant surprise met them at home. A portrait of Mr. Gladstone, by Sir John Millais, was found hanging in the breakfast-room, "A gift from English, Scottish, Welsh and Irish Women." In 1890 trouble came to the Liberal party through the scandal connecting the names of Mr. Parnell and Mrs. O'Shea. Mr. Gladstone announced that the Irish party must choose between himself and Mr. Parnell. In November, 1890, Mr. Parnell was deposed from the chairmanship of the United Irish National Party. This led to a division. Mr. Justin McCarthy was elected leader by the Anti-Parnellites, and the Parnellites selected Mr. John Redmond. Parliament would soon terminate by limitation, so Mr. Gladstone devoted himself to preparing the people for the coming general election. Besides, in February, 1891, he made an address, at the opening of St. Martin's Free Public Library, and in March to the boys at Eton College on Homeric Studies. June 28, 1892, Parliament came to an end. Mr. Gladstone's journey to Edinburgh, in July, was all along the route "a triumphal progress." He was re-elected. The question of the day was Home Rule, and wherever the people had the opportunity of declaring themselves, they pronounced condemnation upon the policy of Lord Salisbury's administration, and in favor of Home Rule for Ireland. The new Parliament met, and, August 12, 1892, a motion was made of "No Confidence" in the Salisbury government. The division was the largest ever taken in the House of Commons, the vote being 350 for the motion and 310 against it--a majority of 40 for Mr. Gladstone. The scene in the House which attended the overthrow of the Salisbury government was less dramatic than that which accompanied the defeat of the Gladstone ministry in 1885, but it was full of exciting episodes. The House was packed to the doors. The excitement was intense, and the confusion great. When the figures were announced, another wild scene of disorder prevailed and there was prolonged cheering. "Ten minutes later the great forum was empty and the excited assembly had found its way to the quiet outside under the stars." Monday, August 15, 1892, Mr. Gladstone repaired to Osborne on the Royal Yacht, and became for the fourth time Prime Minister. Since 1868 he had been the undisputed leader of his party. His main supporters in all his reform measures were the Nonconformists, whose claim for "the absolute religious equality of all denominations before the law of the land," must, in time, it was thought, bring about the disestablishment of the Episcopal Church. In September, 1892, Mr. Gladstone went to Sir E. Watkin's _Chalet_ on Mount Snowdon, Wales, where he made his Boulder Stone speech. To commemorate his visit a slab of gray Aberdeen granite was "let into the actual brown rock," on which is the following inscription in Welsh and in English: "September 13, 1892. Upon this rock the Right Honorable W.E. Gladstone, M.P., when Prime Minister for the fourth time, and eighty-three years old, addressed the people of Eryi upon justice to Wales. The multitude sang Cymric hymns and 'The Land of My Fathers.'" December 29, 1892, Mr. Gladstone celebrated his eighty-third birthday. Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone were at Biarritz. Congratulatory telegrams and messages were received in great numbers, besides many handsome presents. The event was celebrated all over England. The Midlothian Liberals sent congratulations upon the return of the Liberal Party to power under his leadership, and the completion of his sixty years' service in the House. Resolutions were passed deploring the wickedness of the dynamite outrage at Dublin, December 24, and yet avowing the justice of granting to Ireland the right to manage her own affairs. January 31, 1893, Parliament was opened. In the House of Commons there was a brilliant gathering, and nearly all the members were present, many of them standing. Just before noon the Hon. Arthur Wellesley Peel, Speaker, took his seat, and Archdeacon Farrar, Chaplain, offered prayer. When Mr. Gladstone entered from behind the Speaker's chair, every Liberal and Irish Nationalist stood up and greeted him with prolonged and enthusiastic cheers; and when he took the oath as Prime Minister, he received another ovation. The members were then summoned to the House of Lords to hear the Queen's speech, which was read by the Lord High Chancellor, Baron Herschall. The Prince of Wales and his son, the Duke of York, occupied seats on the "cross bench." February 13, the excitement in and about the Parliament Houses was as great as that which prevailed two weeks before. Enthusiastic crowds greeted Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone. When the doors of the House of Commons were opened, there was a "disorderly rush" of the members into the House to obtain seats, "the members shouting and struggling, several being thrown to the floor in the excitement." Peers, Commons, and visitors filled the floor and galleries. The Prince of Wales and other members of the royal family were present. When Mr. Gladstone arose he was greeted with applause. He reminded the House that for seven years the voices which used to plead the cause of Irish government in Irish affairs had been mute within the walls of the House. He then asked permission to introduce a "Bill to Amend the Provision for the Government of Ireland," which was the title of the Home Rule Bill. Mr. Balfour led the opposition to the bill. Mr. Chamberlain declared that the bill would not accomplish its purpose, whereupon Mr. Justin McCarthy, for the anti-Parnellities, replied that the Irish would accept it as a message of everlasting peace, and Mr. John Redmond, for the Parnellites, answered that if disturbances followed in Ireland it would be due to the Conservatives. The Ulster Unionists opposed the bill. The Scotch-Irish Protestants of the north of Ireland declared that they preferred to stand where they did in 1690, when they defeated James II and his Catholic followers, in the battle of the Boyne, and fought for William of Orange for the English throne and liberty and Protestantism. Their opposition to Home Rule for Ireland grew out of their hostility to Roman Catholicism and the fear of its supremacy. After six months of earnest debate in the House of Commons, the Home Rule Bill for Ireland was passed, with slight amendments, September 1, 1893, by a vote of 301 to 267, a majority of thirty-four, The struggle was perhaps the most heated in the history of Parliament. The bill was sent to the House of Lords, where it was defeated, midnight, September 8, by the surprising majority of 419 to 41, after only one week's discussion. Members that never attended were drummed up to vote against the bill. The usual working force of the House of Lords is from thirty to forty members. The vote was the largest ever taken in the Lords. At once the cry, "Down with, the House of Lords!" was heard. The National Liberal Federation issued a circular, in which were the words: "The question of mending or ending the House of Lords ... displaces for awhile all other subjects of reform." Mr. Gladstone was probably aware of the contents of this manifesto before it was issued, and the sentiments were in accord with those uttered by him two years before at New Castle. September 27th, Mr. Gladstone addressed his constituents at Edinburgh. He was received with an outburst of enthusiasm. He said that the People's Chamber had passed the bill. If the nation was determined it would not be baffled by the Peers. If the Commons should go before the country, then the Lords should go too, and if defeated, should do what the Commons would do--clear out. The Queen wanted Mr. Gladstone to appeal to the country, and there was an opinion among some that Mr. Gladstone would be defeated at the polls upon the question; but the Premier intimated to the Queen his intention not to appeal, and announced the readiness of the Cabinet to be dismissed by the Queen. However, the Queen would hardly expose the throne to the danger threatening the Peers. December 29, 1893, Mr. Gladstone attained the eighty-fourth year of his age. When he entered the House of Commons that day his political associates of the Liberal party all rose anta greeted him with cheers. When the applause had subsided, the Conservatives raised their hats and their leader, Mr. Balfour, rose and tendered his congratulations. Mr. Gladstone was much pleased with the demonstrations of his friends, as well as with the graceful compliments of his political opponents. Besides about two hundred congratulatory messages, letters and telegrams were received, those from Queen Victoria, and the Prince and Princess of Wales, being among the first. July 6, 1893, Prince George of Wales, Duke of York, and Princess Mary of Teck were married. The Prince was by inheritance heir, after the Prince of Wales, to the throne of England. Mr. Gladstone attended the wedding, arrayed in the blue and gold uniform of a brother of the Trinity House, with naval epaulettes, and was conducted to the royal pew reserved for him. [Illustration:] Among the great measures proposed at this time by Mr. Gladstone were the Employers' Liability, and the Parish Councils Bills. The latter was as evolutionary and as revolutionary as the Home Rule Bill. Its object was to take the control of 10,000 rural English parishes out of the hands of the squire and the parson and put it into the hands of the people. With its amendments regarding woman suffrage, to which Mr. Gladstone was opposed, it gave to every man and woman in England one vote--and only one--in local affairs. February 21, 1894, when Mr. Gladstone had returned from Biarritz, where he had gone for his health, there was again a notable assemblage in the House of Commons to hear him speak. It was expected that he would make a bitter attack upon the House of Lords, which had attempted to defeat both these bills by amendments. But he calmly spoke of the lamentable divergence between the two branches of the legislature upon the Employers' Liability Bill, and asked that the amendment be rejected, which was done by a majority of 225 to 6. The bill was therefore withdrawn, and the responsibility of its defeat thrown upon the Lords. The House also rejected all the important amendments of the Parish Councils Bill, but concurred in the unimportant changes made by the Lords. It was sent back then to the lords, and finally passed by them. But Mr. Gladstone greatly disappointed many of his political friends by his mild manner of dealing with the House of Lords. The extreme Radicals were angered and condemned severely the Premier for what they called his "backing down" and his "feeble speech." Rumors in reference to Mr. Gladstone's resignation, which had been started by the _Pall Mall Gazette_, while he was yet at Biarritz, were now renewed. February 28, 1894, Mr. Gladstone informed the Queen of his contemplated retirement, giving as reasons his failing eyesight, deafness and age. March 1st, he made an important speech in the House of Commons. He displayed so much vigor and earnestness in his speech that it was thought that he had given up the idea of retiring. But this was his last speech as Premier. March 2d, Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone were summoned to Windsor, where they dined with the Queen, and remained over night. Saturday, March 3, 1894, Mr. Gladstone tendered his resignation as Premier to the Queen, who accepted it with many expressions of favor and regret, and offered him again a peerage, which was declined. On the way to Windsor and return to London, Mr. Gladstone was greeted by a large and enthusiastic crowd. Hundreds of letters and telegrams expressing regret, because of his retirement, were received by the ex-Premier, On Sunday he attended church as usual and was looking well, Mr. Balfour in the Commons, and Lord Salisbury in the Lords, vied with Mr. Gladstone's political friends in speaking his praise, and referring in the highest terms to his character and labors. The press in all parts of the world spoke in glowing terms of his natural endowments, great attainments, invaluable services, pure character and wonderfully vigorous old age. It was quite evident that Mr. Gladstone's retirement was not enforced by mental or physical infirmities, or by his unfitness for the leadership of the House and the Premiership, but that as a wise precaution, and upon the solicitation of his family, he had laid down his power while he was yet able to wield it with astonishing vigor. Thus closed the fourth administration of this remarkable man, the greatest English statesman of his time. In all history there is no parallel case, and no official record such as his. Lord Rosebery was appointed Premier in the place of Mr. Gladstone, and Sir William V. Harcourt became the leader of the Liberal party in the House of Commons. Mr. Gladstone wrote congratulating Lord Rosebery, and promised to aid him whenever his assistance was required. In assuming office Lord Rosebery eulogized Mr. Gladstone, and announced that there would be no change in the policy of reform of the Liberal party under the new administration, and declared for Home Rule for Ireland, the disestablishment of the church in Wales and Scotland, and the reform of the House of Lords. [Illustration:] CHAPTER XX IN PRIVATE LIFE Justin McCarthy, in the closing pages of his Story of Gladstone's Life, says: "The long political struggle was over and done. The heat of the opposition this way and that had gone out forever, and Mr. Gladstone had none left but friends on both sides of the political field. Probably that ceremonial, that installation of the Prince of Wales as Chancellor of the Welsh University, was the last occasion on which Mr. Gladstone would consent to make an appearance on a public platform. It was a graceful close to such a great career." The occasion referred to was the ceremonial at Aberystwith, Wales, June 26, 1896, when the Prince of Wales was installed as Chancellor of the Welsh University, and when the Prince presented to the Princess of Wales and to Mr. Gladstone honorary degrees conferred upon them by the University. The appearance of Mr. Gladstone was the signal for great applause. The Prince in his remarks was very complimentary to Mr. Gladstone, and spoke of the honor paid the University by the presence of the aged scholar and statesman, and also said it was truly one of the proudest moments of his life, when he found himself in the flattering position of being able to confer an academic honor upon one furnishing the rare instance of occupying the highest position as a statesman and who at the same time had attained such distinction in scholarship. But Mr. McCarthy was mistaken about this being the closing public service in the life of Mr. Gladstone. It was very far from his last public appearance. After that event Mr. Gladstone appeared repeatedly. Though his official life had closed, yet he was to emerge from retirement many times, and especially when it became necessary for him to raise his strong voice for humanity. His advocacy of the great causes of Armenian rescue, of Grecian independence, of Arbitration instead of War, and the unity and harmony of the two great English-speaking people, was given with all the old time fire of youth. What Mr. Gladstone did and said with pen and voice since the occasion mentioned, was enough not only for another chapter, but a whole volume, and sufficient alone to immortalize any man. After the great struggle for Home Rule and during the sultry summer of 1893, Mr. Gladstone repaired to his favorite winter resort, Biarritz, in the south of France, It was while he was there that rumors of his resignation were heard, based on the ground of his failing health. Dr. Granger, of Chester, who was also an oculist, was summoned to examine Mr. Gladstone's eyes. He told Mr. Gladstone that a cataract had obliterated the sight of one eye, and that another cataract had begun to form on the other. In other words Mr. Gladstone was threatened with total blindness. The Prime Minister reflected a moment, and then requested--almost ordered--the physician to operate immediately upon his eye. He said: "I wish you to remove the cataract at once." The physician replied that it was not far enough advanced for an operation. "You do not understand me," answered the patient, "it is the old cataract I wish removed. If that is out of the way, I shall still have one good eye, when the new cataract impairs the sight of the other." As the physician still hesitated, Mr. Gladstone continued: "You still seem not to understand me. I want you to perform the operation here and now while I am sitting in this chair." "But it might not be successful," said Dr. Granger. "That is a risk I accept," was the instant reply. However, the physician dared not then undertake it, and afterwards said that Mr. Gladstone's eyes were as good as they were a year before, and that his general health was also good. In May, 1894, Mr. Gladstone's eye was successfully operated upon for cataract. He took no anaesthetic, and was conscious during the time. Every precaution was taken to insure success, and the patient was put to bed for rest and quiet and kept on low diet. Mr. Gladstone's eyes were so improved by judicious treatment that before long he could read ten or twelve hours a day. This could be regarded as complete restoration of sight, and enabled him, upon his retirement from public life, to devote himself to the work he so well loved when at home in his study at Hawarden. Mr. Gladstone's retirement from public life, from the Premiership, the Cabinet, the leadership of the Liberal Party, and from Parliament did not mean his entrance upon a period of inactivity. In the shades of Hawarden and in the quiet of his study he kept up the industry that had characterized his whole life heretofore. It had been the custom for centuries for English statesmen, upon retiring from official life, to devote themselves to the classics. Mr. Gladstone, who was pre-eminently a statesman-scholar, found it very congenial to his mind and habits to follow this old English custom. He first translated and published "The Odes of Horace." Then he took Butler's "Analogy" as a text book, and prepared and published "Studies Subsidiary to the Works of Bishop Butler." The discussion necessarily takes a wide range, treating, among other matters, of Butler's method, its application to the Scriptures, the future life, miracles and the mediation of Christ. Says W.T. Stead: "No one who reads the strenuous arguments with which Mr. Gladstone summarizes the reasoning of Bishop Butler on the future life is conscious of any weakening in the vigorous dialectic which was so often employed with brilliant success in the House of Commons." One of Mr. Gladstone's latest productions was his "Personal Recollections of Arthur H. Hallam," which was written for the "Youth's Companion." It is a tribute to the memory and worth of one of his early friends at Eton. These and other literary works occupied most of his time. But Mr. Gladstone would not content himself with quiet literary work. He had too long and too intensely been active in the world's great movements and on humanity's behalf to stand aloof. Hence it was not long before he was again in the arena, doing valiant service for the Armenian and against the Turk. In 1892 the Sultan, in the execution of a plan devised in 1890, issued an edict against religious freedom. In 1894, he threw off the mask and began to execute his deliberate and preconcerted plan to force all Christian Armenians to become Mohammedans or to die. Robbery, outrage and murder were the means used by the hands of brutal soldiers. In a letter to an indignation meeting held in London, December 17th, 1894, Mr. Gladstone wrote denouncing these outrages of the Turks. The reading of the letter was greeted with prolonged applause. A deputation of Armenian gentlemen, residing in London and in Paris, took occasion on Mr. Gladstone's 85th birthday, December 29th, 1894, to present a silver chalice to Hawarden Church as "a memorial of Mr. Gladstone's sympathy with and assistance to the Armenian people." Mr. Gladstone's address to the deputation was regarded as one of the most peculiar and characteristic acts of his life. He gave himself wholly to the cause of these oppressed people, and was stirred by the outrages and murders perpetrated upon them as he was 18 years before. He said that the Turks should go out as they did go out of Bulgaria "bag and baggage," and he denounced the government of the Sultan as "a disgrace to Mahomet, the prophet whom it professed to follow, a disgrace to civilization at large, and a curse to mankind." He contended that every nation had ever the right and the authority to act "on behalf of humanity and of justice." There were those who condemned Mr. Gladstone's speech, declaring that it might disrupt the peace of Europe, but there were many others who thought that the sooner peace secured at such a cost was disturbed the better. It was but natural for those who wrongfully claimed the sovereign right to oppress their own subjects, to denounce all interference in the affairs of the Sultan. It was reported, March 19, 1895, that Francis Seymour Stevenson, M.P., Chairman of the Anglo-Armenian Association, on behalf of the Tiflis Armenians, would present to Mr. Gladstone, on his return to London, the ancient copy of the Armenian Gospels, inscribed upon vellum, which was to accompany the address to the ex-Premier, then being signed by the Armenians there. In a letter Mr. Gladstone had but recently declared that he had abandoned all hope that the condition of affairs in Armenia would change for the better. The Sultan, he declared, was no longer worthy of the courtesies of diplomatic usage, or of Christian tolerance. Mr. Gladstone promised that when these Gospels were formally presented to him he would deliver a "rattling" address on behalf of the Armenians. When a delegation waited on him, he said, after assuring them of his sympathy, that the danger in the Armenian situation now was that useful action might be abandoned, in view of the promises of the Turkish Government to institute reforms. In June 1895, Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone attended the opening of the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal as guests of Sir Donald Currie, on his steamship Tantallon Castle, returning home on the twenty-fifth. During this trip an effort was made to arrange for an interview between the Ex-Premier and the Prince Bismarck, but the Prince seemed disinclined and the project failed. It was while Mr. Gladstone was at Kiel, that the Rosebery Ministry fell by an accidental defeat of the Liberal Party in Parliament, and which again brought Mr. Gladstone to the front in the public mind. Lord Rosebery telegraphed Mr. Gladstone full particulars of the situation, and Mr. Gladstone strongly advised against the resignation of the Government and urged that a vote of confidence be taken. Mr. Gladstone wrote that the Liberal Party could well afford to stand on its record. The Ministry with but two exceptions, was the same, as that formed by Mr. Gladstone in August 1892, and had his confidence. Nevertheless, the cabinet of Lord Rosebery resigned, and the Marquis of Salisbury again became Prime Minister,--on the very day of Mr. Gladstone's arrival home. However Lord Rosebery retained the leadership of the Liberal Party. There is no doubt that if the wishes of the Liberal Party had been gratified, Mr. Gladstone would have taken the leadership and again become Prime Minister. Subsequent events proved that he would have been equal, at least for a while, to the task of succeeding Lord Rosebery. But Mr. Gladstone was not willing. He refused to re-enter Parliament, and wrote a letter to his old constituents at Midlothian, declining their kind offer to send him to the House and bade them a kind farewell. In his letter he said that the Liberal Party is a party of progress and reform, and urged his constituents to stand by it. He regarded the changes of the century exceedingly beneficial. August 6, 1895, Mr. Gladstone made a great speech at Chester. A meeting was held in the Town Hall to arouse public sentiment against the slaughter of Armenian Christians within the Empire of the Sultan by Turkish soldiers, and to devise some means of putting an end to such crimes, and of punishing the oppressor. The audience was very large, including many Armenians resident in England, and rose with vociferous cheering when Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone, the Duke of Westminster, the Bishop of Chester, and the Mayor of Chester entered the hall. The Bishop of Ripon was already there. The Duke of Westminster presided, and read a letter from the Marquis of Salisbury, the Premier. Mr. Gladstone arose amid an outburst of enthusiastic applause, and addressing the vast audience said: That the massacres in Armenia resulted from intolerable government--perhaps the worst in the world. He offered a resolution pledging the support of the entire nation to the British Government in its efforts to secure for the Armenians such reforms as would guarantee the safety of life, honor, religion and property. Mr. Gladstone said that language failed to describe the horrors of the massacre of Sussoun, which made the blood run cold. The Sultan was responsible, for these barbarities were not the act of the criminal class, such as afflicts every country, the malefactors who usually perpetrate horrible crime, but were perpetrated by the agents of the Sultan--the soldiers and the Kurds, tax-gatherers and police of the Turkish Government. And what had been done, and was daily being done, could be summed up in four awful words--plunder, murder, rape and torture. Plunder and murder were bad enough, but these were almost venial by the side of the work of the ravisher and the torturer. And the victims were defenceless men, women and children--Armenians, one of the oldest Christian civilized races, and one of the most pacific, industrious and intelligent races of the world. There was no exaggeration in the language used to describe the horrible outrages visited upon whole communities of innocent and helpless people. The truth of these terrible charges in their most hideous form, was established by unbiased American testimony, by Dr, Dillon, an eye witness, and by the representatives of England, France and Russia. Nothing but a sense of duty, said Mr. Gladstone, had brought him at his age to resign the repose, which was the last of many great earthly blessings remaining to him, to address them. If the Powers of Europe were to recede before the irrational resistance of the Sultan, they would be disgraced in the eyes of the world, and the Christian population of the Turkish Empire would be doomed to extermination, according to the plan of the Porte. Terrible word, but true in its application. As to the remedy the cleanest was to make the Turk march out of Armenia, as he did out of Bulgaria, "bag and baggage." He cautioned against trusting the promises of the government at Constantinople, which he knew from long experience, were worthless; and declared that the Sultan was bound by no treaty obligation. The word "ought" was not heeded at Constantinople, but the word "must" was understood fully there. Coercion was a word perfectly comprehended there--a drastic dose which never failed. If we have the smallest regard for humanity, he concluded, we shall, with the help of God, demand that which is just and necessary. Mr. Gladstone was frequently and loudly applauded during his speech, at the conclusion of which the resolution was adopted. The most powerful voice in all Britain had been raised with stirring and thrilling power for justice and humanity. The testimony of an eye witness is to the effect, that never did the grand old man seem in finer form. His undimmed eye flashed as he spoke with withering scorn against hypocrisy and with hottest hate against wrong. His natural force was not abated, his health robust, and his conviction unsubdued. His deeply lined and pale face was transfigured with the glow of righteous indignation. The aged statesman was in his old House of Commons vigor. "There was the same facile movement of his body, and the same penetrating look as though he would pierce the very soul of his auditors; the same triumphant march of sentence after sentence to their chosen goal, and yet the same subtle method of introducing qualifying clauses all along the march without loosing the grip of his theme; the same ascent to lofty principles and commanding generalizations, blended with the complete mastery of details; and, above all, the same sublimity of outlook and ringing emphasis of sincerity in every tone." It was an occasion never to be forgotten. A distinguished hearer said: "To read his speech, as thousands will, is much; but to have heard it, to have felt it-oh! that is simply indescribable, and will mark for many, one of the most memorable days of this last decade of this closing century. The sweet cadence of his voice, the fascination of his personality, and, above all, the consecration of his splendid gifts to the cause of plundered men and ravished women, raise the occasion into prominence in the annals of a great people. Chiefly, I feel the triumphs of soul. His utterance of the words 'wives,' 'women,' lifted them into an atmosphere of awe and solemnity, and his tone in speaking of 'rape' and 'torture' gave them an ineffable loathsomeness. It seemed as if so much soul had never been put into a Saxon speech. Keen satire, rasping rebuke, an avalanche of indignation, rapier-like thrusts to the vital fibre of the situation, and withal the invincible cogency of argument against the Turkish Government, gave the oration a primary place amongst the master-pieces of human eloquence." In the course of this famous speech Mr. Gladstone referred to America; once when welcoming the sympathy of the American people with the suffering Armenians, and again as he described the testimony of the United States as a witness that gained enormously in value because it was entirely free from suspicion. A large meeting was held in St. James Hall, London, October 19, 1896, in memory of Christian Martyrs in Turkey. The Bishop of Rochester presided. The hall was packed with an audience of 2,600, while nearly 7,000 applied for admission. Many prominent persons were present. The large audience was in sombre funeral attire. About thirty front seats were occupied by Armenians. It was stated that 60,000 Armenians so far had been murdered with tortures and indignities indescribable. To this meeting Mr. Gladstone addressed a letter which was greeted with the wildest enthusiasm. He said that he hoped the meeting would worthily crown the Armenian meetings of the past two months, which were without a parallel during his political life. The great object, he said, was to strengthen Lord Salisbury's hands and to stop the series of massacres, which were probably still unfinished, and to provide against their renewal. As he believed that Lord Salisbury would use his powerful position for the best, personally he objected in the strongest manner to abridging Lord Salisbury's discretion by laying down this or that as things which he ought not to do. It was a wild paradox, without the support of reason or history, to say that the enforcement of treaty rights to stop systematic massacre, together with effective security against Great Britain's abusing them for selfish ends, would provoke the hostilities of one or more of the powers. To advertise beforehand in the ears of the Great Assassin that Great Britain's action would cut down--what the most backward of the six Powers think to be sufficient--would be the; abandonment of duty and prudence and would be to doom the national movement to disappointment. The concert of Europe was valuable and important, but such an announcement would be certain to be followed by its failure. One of the immediate effects of Mr. Gladstone's denunciation of the Sultan for the Armenian massacres was the resignation by Lord Rosebery of the leadership of the Liberal Party. Mr. Gladstone's return to politics, the agitation of the Turkish question and the differences between these two leaders of the Liberal movement as to the best way of dealing with the Sultan, were assigned as reasons by Lord Rosebery for his resignation. It was then again suggested that Mr. Gladstone assume the leadership of the Liberal Party and accept a peerage and a seat in the House of Lords, so often tendered him by the Queen. Then Sir William Vernon-Harcourt could lead in the House of Commons and bear the burden, while Mr. Gladstone could be at the head of affairs without the worry of the House of Commons. Besides, Mr. Morgan offered to resign his seat in the House of Commons in his favor. But Mr. Gladstone would not agree to any of these plans as far as they pertained to himself. July 22, 1896, Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone returned to London to attend a great social function, the marriage of one of the daughters of the Prince and Princess of Wales to Prince Charles of Denmark. Mr. Gladstone evinced much interest in everything connected with the important event, and was himself the object of much attention. September 23, 1896, Mr. Gladstone wrote a long letter to the Paris Figaro in response to an appeal from its editor, M. Leudet, to Mr. Gladstone to arouse the French press in behalf of the Armenians. After expressing his diffidence in complying with the request, Mr. Gladstone declared his belief that the population of Great Britain were more united in sentiment and more thoroughly aroused by the present outrages in Turkey than they were by the atrocities in Bulgaria in 1876. He said: "The question whether effect can be given to the national indignation is now in the balance, and will probably soon be decided. I have read in some Austrian newspapers an affected scruple against sole action by any one State in a European crisis, but there are two first-class Powers who will not make that scruple their own. One of these is Russia, who in 1878, earned lasting honors by liberating Bulgaria and, helping onward the freedom and security of other Balkan States. The other Power is France, who, in 1840, took up the cause of Egypt and pushed it single handed to the verge of a European war. She wisely forbore to bring about that horrible, transcendent calamity, but I gravely doubt whether she was not right and the combined Powers wrong in their policy of that period." Mr. Gladstone denounced the Sultan as the "Great Assassin," and continued: "For more than a year he has triumphed over the diplomacy of the six Powers, they have been laid prostrate at his feet. There is no parallel in history to the humiliation they have patiently borne. He has therefore had every encouragement to continue a course that has been crowned with such success. The impending question seems to be, not whether, but when and where he will proceed to his next murderous exploits. The question for Europe and each Power is whether he shall be permitted to swell by more myriads the tremendous total of his victims. "In other years when I possessed power I did my best to promote the concert of Europe, but I sorrowfully admit that all the good done in Turkey during the last twenty years was done, not by it, but more nearly despite it." The letter concludes by expressing the hope that the French people would pursue a policy worthy of their greatness, their fame and the high place they have held in European Christian history. September 24, 1896, a meeting was called by the Reform Club, of Liverpool, to protest against the recent massacres of 2000 Armenians at Constantinople at the affair of the Ottoman Bank, and many more throughout the Turkish Empire. Mr. Gladstone was asked to address the meeting. When requested by the agent of the Associated Press for an advanced proof of his speech he declined, but wrote that he would "recommend giving the warmest support to the Queen's government, and would contend that England should act alone if necessary for the fulfillment of the covenants which have been so disgracefully broken." Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone, with their son Herbert, arrived at noon at Liverpool, and were met at the railroad station by 2,000 enthusiastic people. The meeting was held in the vast auditorium of the Circus Building, which was filled. Thousands failed to obtain entrance. Before the arrival of Mr. Gladstone there was a spontaneous outburst of applause, everybody present standing and singing "God save the Queen." When Mr. Gladstone entered, the prolonged roar of applause could be heard for miles, arising from thousands inside and outside the hall. The Earl of Derby, Conservative, presided. He was accompanied by the Countess of Derby, who with many distinguished persons occupied the platform. Mr. Gladstone stepped briskly to the front of the platform at 12.30 p.m. bowing repeatedly in response to the applause. He looked strong and well for a man of his age and labors, and was easily heard. After a few preliminary remarks, he moved the following resolution: "That this meeting trusts that Her Majesty's ministers, realizing to the fullest extent the terrible condition in which their fellow Christians are placed, will do everything possible to obtain for them full security and protection; and this meeting assures Her Majesty's ministers that they may rely upon the cordial support of the citizens of Liverpool in whatever steps they may feel it necessary to take for that purpose." The resolution was received with great cheering. Mr. Gladstone resumed: "We have a just title to threaten Turkey with coercion, but that does not in itself mean war; and I think that the first step should be the recall of our Ambassador, and it should be followed by the dismissal of the Turkish Ambassador from London. Such a course is frequent and would not give the right of complaint to anybody. When diplomatic relations are suspended, England should inform the Sultan that she should consider the means of enforcing her just and humane demands. I do not believe that Europe will make war to insure the continuance of massacres more terrible than ever recorded in the dismal, deplorable history of crime. "Now, as in 1876, to the guilt of massacre is added the impudence of denial, which will continue just as long as Europe is content to listen. I doubt if it is an exaggeration to say that it was in the Sultan's palace, and there only, that the inspiration has been supplied, and the policy devised of the whole series of massacres. When the Sultan carries massacre into his own capital under the eyes of the Ambassadors, he appears to have gained the very acme of what it is possible for him to do. But the weakness of diplomacy, I trust, is about to be strengthened by the echo of this nation's voice." Mr. Gladstone then referred to the supineness of the Ambassadors of the Powers at Constantinople, and continued: "The concert of Europe is an august and useful instrument, but it has not usually succeeded in dealing with the Eastern question, which has arrived at a period when it is necessary to strengthen the hands of the Government by an expression of national opinion. I believe that the continued presence of the Ambassadors at Constantinople has operated as a distinct countenance to the Sultan, who is thus their recognized ally. "But, while urging the Government to act, it does not follow that, even for the sake of the great object in view, Great Britain should transplant Europe into a state of war. On the other hand, however, I deny that England must abandon her own right to independent judgment and allow herself to be domineered over by the other powers." Mr. Gladstone expressed the opinion that the purpose of the meeting was defensive and prospective, saying that no one can hold out the hope that the massacres are ended, although he ventured to anticipate that the words spoken at the meeting would find their way to the palace at Constantinople. "The present movement," he said, "is based on broad grounds of humanity, and is not directed against the Mohammedans, but against the Turkish officials, evidence of whose barbarities rests in credible official reports." Mr. Gladstone declared his adhesion to the principles contained in the resolution, and said he came to the meeting not claiming any authority for sentiments expressed except that of a citizen of Liverpool. "But," he remarked, "the national platform upon which the meeting is based gives greater authority for sentiments universally entertained throughout the length and breadth of the land, and I urge that in this matter party sympathy be renounced. I entertain the lively hope and strong belief that the present deplorable situation is not due to the act or default of the Government of this great country." Mr. Gladstone spoke about twenty minutes and was repeatedly interrupted by applause. He was in good voice, and did not seem fatigued when he had finished. The next day the Turkish Embassy at London telegraphed Mr. Gladstone's speech at Liverpool verbatim to the Sultan. The London Times in an editorial said: "The spectacle of the veteran statesman quitting his retirement to plead the cause of the oppressed is well calculated to move the sympathy and admiration of the nation. The ardor of Mr. Gladstone's feelings on this subject is notorious. All the more striking and significant is the comparative restraint and moderation of the speech." Other questions besides those mentioned were claiming the attention of English statesmen. In the Spring, prior to the great Liverpool meeting, the Venezuela boundary question was agitating the two great English speaking nations to the very verge of war. A large Peace Meeting was held in London, March 3, 1896, to favor arbitration. Mr. Gladstone wrote: "I am glad that the discussion of arbitration is to be separated from the Venezuela question, upon which I do not feel myself in final and full possession of the facts that I should wish. My views on arbitration in place of war were gathered from the part I took in the matter of the Alabama claims. I will only add that my conviction and sentiment on the subject grow in strength from year to year in proportion to the growth of that monstrous and barbarous militarism, in regard to which I consider England has to bear no small responsibility." The meeting favored permanent international arbitration, and an Anglo-American treaty was finally signed by the representatives of the two nations, providing for the settlement of all questions between the two nations by arbitration instead of by war, but the Senate of the United States refused to ratify the treaty. Mr. Gladstone deplored intensely the extraordinary misunderstanding which had prevailed on the subject of the Venezuela frontier. He seemed to think that nothing but a little common sense was needed to secure the pacific settlement of the question at any moment. A hundred square miles more or less on either side of the boundary of British Guiana was to him a matter of supreme indifference. He was extremely anxious to see justice done, and one of his last speeches in the House of Commons was in favor of permanent arbitration between England and the United States. Another one of the absorbing questions that came before the civilized world for consideration, and almost to the exclusion of the Armenian question, was the Cretan Question. Greece heroically sustained the insurrection of the Cretans against the Turkish rule. The scene of Turkish cruelty was now transferred to the isle of Crete. For the time the Armenian massacres were forgotten. The Greeks rushed to the rescue, while all Europe held aloof. Mr. Gladstone sent the following dispatch to the Chronicle: "I do not dare to stimulate Greece when I cannot help her, but I shall profoundly rejoice at her success. I hope the Powers will recollect that they have their own character to redeem." This was in February, 1897, Later he wrote that to expel the Greek troops from Crete and keep as police the butchers of Armenia, would further deepen the disgrace of the Powers of Europe. In March, 1897, Mr. Gladstone addressed a letter, now justly celebrated, on the same subject to the Duke of Westminster in which he expressed his opinion more fully, and which was evidently the sentiment of the English speaking people of the world. The letter was in the form of a pamphlet of 16 pages, published, and entitled The Eastern Crisis. In less than a week after this eloquent manifesto in behalf of the Cretans and of Greece was put forth, it was currently reported that the precise solution of the problem recommended by Mr. Gladstone was likely to be adopted. The Sultan himself, fearful of the effect of the appeal on public opinion in Europe, sought the settlement of the question in the manner suggested. The Greeks still clamored for war. In the war that followed between Greece and Turkey, Greece was defeated and crushed by the Turk. Only by the intervention of the Powers was Greece saved from becoming a part of the Sultan's Empire. After peace had been concluded between Turkey and Greece, Mr. Gladstone undertook to arouse public opinion by a trenchant review of the situation. Looking back over the past two years of England's Eastern policy, he inquires as to what have been the results, and then answers his own question. He thus enumerates: 1. The slaughter of 100,000 Armenian Christians, men, women and children, with no guarantee against a repetition of the crime. 2. The Turkish Umpire stronger than at any time since the Crimean war. 3. Christian Greece weaker than at any time since she became a kingdom. These are facts, Mr. Gladstone claimed, for which the leading Christian nations and statesmen of Europe are responsible. While Mr. Gladstone thus expresses himself, yet his vigorous protests had not been without effect. His voice penetrated into the very palace of the Sultan, and into every Cabinet of Europe, and was heard by every statesman and ruler throughout the world, and aroused the people everywhere. It was a mighty voice lifted for right and against oppression. The Sultan was afraid and was compelled to desist; not that he feared the protests and the warnings of the Christian Nations of Europe, but because that one voice was the expression of the popular feeling of all Christians throughout the world, and to defy such sentiment would be to court the overthrow of his throne, if not of the dominion of the Turk in Europe. In June, 1894, an invitation was extended to Mr. Gladstone to visit the United States, signed by many representative men in public life. But Mr. Gladstone, while acknowledging the compliment, declined because of his age. It would, he thought, be a tremendous undertaking for him. The fatigue of the voyage and the strain of the receptions while in America, would prove greater than his physical condition could bear. Later Mr. Gladstone was waited on at Hawarden by one hundred members of the Philadelphia Manufacturer's Club. He personally escorted them over the Castle grounds and narrated the history of the Castle to them. Greatly pleased with the warmth of their reception, they thanked Mr. Gladstone for his courtesy. They then gave him three cheers. This token of appreciation was very gratifying to Mr. Gladstone, who said that it was the first time he had ever heard American cheers. Saturday afternoon, August 15, 1896, Li Hung Chang, the great Chinese Statesman and Embassador, visited Mr. Gladstone at Hawarden. Probably the three greatest living statesmen of the time were Gladstone, Bismarck and Li Hung Chang. The Embassador and his suite went to Chester in a special train, and were driven in three open carriages to Hawarden. Along the route as, well as at the station, the party was cheered by a large crowd. The Viceroy was sleeping when the train reached Chester and he was allowed to sleep until he awoke. Yet the party was ahead of time in reaching the Castle, but Mr. Gladstone hastened to receive them. The Chinese visitors were received at the door by Mr. Henry Gladstone. Li Hung Chang was escorted into the Library where he was introduced to Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone. The intention of Mr. Gladstone was to have as escort a guard of honor to the Viceroy, the Hawarden corps of the Welsh Fusiliers, which reached the Castle, owing to the visitors being ahead of time, ten minutes after the arrival of the party. The two aged statesmen sat near the window overlooking the terrace, and at once, with the aid of Lo Feug Luh, engaged in conversation, Li asked various questions concerning Mr. Gladstone's career, and was informed by Mr. Gladstone that he had been Prime Minister nearly thirteen years, and in the Cabinet nearly twenty-four years. When complimented upon the service he had rendered to his country, Mr. Gladstone replied that he had done what he could, but he should have done a great deal more. Li observed that British interests and British trade in China were greater than those of all other countries put together. The Viceroy also talked with Mr. Gladstone of free trade, of restrictions upon commerce, of the power of the British Navy, of the greatness of the British Revenues, of the vastness of the Colonial Empire, of the necessity of a railway system to commerce and upon a number of similar subjects. Refreshments were served which Li enjoyed, and then by request he wrote his autograph in three books, using Dorothy Drew's colors for the purpose. Mr. Gladstone and Li were photographed together sitting on chairs outside the porch. Mr. Gladstone presented Li with three books from his library, and then the Chinese visitors departed. On Saturday evening October 10, 1896, the Right Hon. and Most Rev. Edward White Benson, D.D., Archbishop of Canterbury and Primate of all England, arrived at Hawarden with Mrs. Benson on a visit to his old friend Mr. Gladstone. Sunday morning Dr. Benson went with the Gladstone family to Hawarden Church and occupied the Gladstone pew. After the service had commenced a commotion was observed. It was caused by the fall of Dr. Benson In the pew while kneeling in prayer. Attendants removed Dr. Benson to the Rectory, and medical aid was summoned, but death came soon after from apoplexy. The Rev. Stephen Gladstone, rector, proceeded with the service until notified of the death of the Archbishop, when he dismissed the congregation. Mr. Gladstone, who had not attended church from indisposition, was deeply affected by the death of his guest and friend. The morning papers of London, June 1, 1896, printed a long letter from Mr. Gladstone to Cardinal Rampolla for submission to the Pope Leo XIII, in favor of the unity of Christendom by means of a papal declaration in favor of the validity of Anglican orders. It created a great sensation. Shortly after this the Pope issued an Encyclical letter addressed to "all bishops in communion with the Holy See." The theme was the same as that of Mr. Gladstone's letter, to which it was regarded as an answer. The Pope invited all the English people "to return to the religion of the Roman Catholic Church." "This," remarks Mr. Justin McCarthy, "was exactly what any thoughtful person might have expected." While this letter and its answer did not satisfy the clergy of the established Church of England, who were favorably disposed towards Rome, on the other hand it aroused the dissenting Christians of England to reply that they were opposed to all state or established churches, whether Roman Catholic or English Episcopal. On December 29, 1896, the eighty-seventh anniversary of Mr. Gladstone's birth was celebrated at Hawarden, surrounded by his family and friends. There were the usual demonstrations by the villagers, consisting in the ringing of bells and the appointments of deputations to wait upon the aged statesman at the Castle with congratulations. An enormous flow of telegrams and messages continued throughout the day from all parts of the kingdom, the United States and the Continent. Among those sending congratulations were the Prince and Princess of Wales, and Baroness de Rothschild. Mr. Gladstone was in good health, and in the afternoon went out for a walk. May 10, 1897, the Prince and Princess of Wales, accompanied by the Princess Victoria, visited Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone at Hawarden. They were received by Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone in the porch erected in 1889 to commemorate their golden wedding. The mutual greetings were of the heartiest nature. The royal party inspected the ruins of the old castle, Mr. Gladstone acting as escort to the Princess of Wales. An interesting incident occurred on the lawn. The Princess took great interest in inspecting the favorite dogs of the Gladstone family. These were the black Pomeranians. Two puppies were carried in a basket, one of which the Princess accepted as a gift. June 22, 1897, was celebrated with great pomp and rejoicing the Diamond Jubilee of Victoria, the Queen of England and Empress of India, when the Queen reached the 60th anniversary of her reign, which is the longest in English history. Victoria became queen at the age of 19 years, in 1837, and then the British Isles possessed a population of 26,000,000 and they had became 40,000,000. Her Empire has been extended until in India, South, Central and Western Africa, Australia, New Zealand and North America, and including the British Isles, there were 360,000,000 people who owned her sway. And to this greatness and glory Mr. Gladstone had been one to contribute largely, while his influence has been felt more still by far in promoting the moral greatness of the people. Throughout all the Empire the event was celebrated, and the jubilee procession in London was swollen by representatives of all parts of the Queen's domain and all nations on earth which rendered it the greatest pageant ever beheld. Even the Turk was there, but Mr. Gladstone was not there, nor was his name even mentioned for a place in the march on jubilee day. Yet the period of Victoria's reign will often be spoken of in history as the Gladstonian Era. "The public life of a leading statesman," says an eminent writer, "offers the boldest and stateliest outline to the public view. It may be that the most striking and memorable chapters in a future biography of Mr. Gladstone will contain the story of his private affairs and domestic life." His daily life at home was a model of simplicity and regularity, and the great secret of the vast amount of work he accomplished was owing to the fact that every odd five minutes were occupied. He had a deep sense of the preciousness of time and the responsibility which everyone incurs who uses or misuses it. "To such a length did he carry this that at a picnic to a favorite Welsh mountain he has been seen to fling himself on the heather and bury himself in some pamphlet upon a question of the day, until called to lighter things by those who were responsible for the provision basket." Mr. Gladstone was ever a most severe economist of time, a habit acquired as long ago as 1839, when he awed his young wife by filling up all odd bits and scraps of time with study or work. Out of his pocket would come the little classic at every chance opportunity of leisure. This accounts for his ability to get through in one day more than most people do in a week. Then besides, he had the faculty of concentrating the whole power of his mind upon the one thing before him, whether small or great. He was unable to divide the machinery of his mind. Interruption was almost fatal to his train of thought, but he was generally oblivious to conversation buzzing around him. Hence it was some time before a questioner could get an answer--he did not seem to hear, but patience finally secured attention, after the train of absorbing thought was finished. It was this power of concentrating all his faculties upon what he was doing, whether it was work or play, that made Mr. Gladstone one of the ablest as well as happiest of the century. He took the keenest delight in the scholarly and beautiful, and this accounts for his disregard of minor ills and evils. He was too absorbed to be fretful or impatient. But to be absorbed in great things did not mean, in his case, to be neglectful of little things. At one time his mind and time were so completely taken up with the Eastern question, that he could not be induced to spare a thought for Ireland, and afterward it was quite as difficult to get him to think of any political question except that of Ireland. In the daily routine of private life none in the household were more punctual and regular than Mr. Gladstone. At 8 o'clock he was up and in his study. From 1842 he always found time, with all his manifold duties, to go to church regularly, rain or shine, every morning except when ill, at half-past 8 o'clock, He walked along the public road from the castle to Hawarden church. Writes an observer: "The old statesman, with his fine, hale, gentle face, is an interesting figure as he walks lightly and briskly along the country road, silently acknowledging the fervent salutations of his friends--the Hawarden villagers. He wears a long coat, well buttoned up, a long shawl wrapped closely around his neck, and a soft felt hat--a very different figure from that of the Prime Minister as he is known in London." At the Castle prayers were read to the family and household soon after 9 o'clock daily. His customary breakfast was comprised of a hard-boiled egg, a slice of tongue, dry toast and tea. The whole morning whether at home or on a visit was devoted to business. Luncheon at Hawarden was without formality. "Lunch was on the hob," for several hours, to be partaken of when it suited the convenience of the various members of the family. Tea, of which Mr. Gladstone was particularly fond, and of which he could partake at any hour of the day, or night, was served in the afternoon at 5 o'clock,--after which he finished his correspondence. In the afternoon, Mr. Gladstone was accustomed to a walk in the grounds, accompanied by his faithful little black Pomeranian dog, Petz, who was obtained on a trip abroad, and became and remained for many years, an important member of the household, and one of Mr. Gladstone's most devoted followers. Increasing years of over fourscore, prevented finally walks of fifty miles a day once indulged in, and the axes stood unused in their stands in the vestibule and library, but still Mr. Gladstone kept up his walks with his silent companion Petz. After walking for half an hour longer in his library after his return to the Castle, Mr. Gladstone would dress for dinner, which operation usually took him from three to five minutes. At 8 o'clock he joined the family, at dinner, which was a cheerful meal. Like Goethe he ate heartily and enjoyed his meals, but his diet was extremely simple, Mr. Gladstone eating only what was prescribed by his physician. At dinner he talked freely and brilliantly even when none but his family were present. When visitors were present he would enter upon whatever was the subject of conversation, taking his share with others, and pouring a flood of light upon any theme suggested, giving all the benefit of the fund of wisdom and anecdote collected through two generations of unparalleled political and social activity. After dinner, when there were no visitors at Hawarden, Mr. Gladstone would quietly sit reading in his library, or conversing with his family. He never used tobacco. Shortly after 10 o'clock he retired to bed and to sleep. He never allowed himself to think and be sleepless. Mr. Bright had a habit of making his speeches after he had retired to bed, which Mr. Gladstone thought was detrimental to his health. Bight hours was the time Mr. Gladstone permitted himself to sleep. His bed-room was on the second floor and reached by a fine staircase. Everything in the room was plain and homely. On the walls of his bed-room and over the mantlepiece was a text emblazoned, on which at evening and morning he could look, which read: "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee." This not only expresses Mr. Gladstone's trust in God, but doubtless accounts in a large degree for that tranquility of mind so notably his, even in those trying times that prostrated many and carried many more away from their bearings. From the worry or weariness of business, Mr. Gladstone was ever ready to turn for rest to reading, which has thus proved of inestimable value to him. "His family cannot speak without emotion of that look of perfect happiness and peace that beamed from his eye on such occasions." When during the general elections of 1882, this was denied him, he turned with equal readiness to writing and thinking on other subjects. During the Midlothian Campaign and General Election, and through the Cabinet making that followed, he relieved the pressure on his over-burdened brain by writing an article on Home Rule, "written with all the force and freshness of a first shock of discovery;" he was also writing daily on the Psalms; he was preparing a paper for the Oriental Congress which was to startle the educated world by "its originality and ingenuity;" and he was composing with great and careful investigation his Oxford lecture on "The rise and progress of learning in the University of Oxford." All during the morning hours he would sit in the silence of that corner-room on the ground floor reading. There were three writing-desks in the library, and one was chiefly reserved for correspondence of a political nature, and another for his literary work, while the third was used by Mrs. Gladstone. He spent his evenings when at Hawarden in a cosy corner of the library reading. He had a wonderfully constructed lamp so arranged for him for night reading, as to throw the utmost possible light on the pages of the book. It was generally a novel that employed his mind at night. Occasionally he gives Mrs. Drew about two hundred novels to divide the sheep from the goats among them. She divides them into three classes--novels worth keeping, novels to be given away, and novels to be destroyed. Mr. Gladstone generally had three books in course of reading at the same time, changing from one to the other. These books were carefully selected with reference to their character and contents, and he was particular as to their order and variation. For instance at one time he was reading Dr. Laugen's Roman History, in German, in the morning, Virgil in the afternoon, and a novel at night. Scott was his preference among novelists. He read with pencil in hand, and he had an elaborate system of marking a book. Aristotle, St. Augustine, Dante and Bishop Butler were the authors who had the deepest influence upon him, so he himself said. His copy of the Odyssey of Homer he had rebound several times, as he preferred always to use the same copy. Mrs. Drew says of her father: "There could not be a better illustration of his mind than his Temple of Peace--his study, with its extraordinarily methodical arrangement. Away from home he will write an exact description of the key or paper he requires, as: 'Open the left hand drawer of the writing table nearest the fireplace, and at the back of the drawer, in the right hand corner, you will find some keys. You will see three on one string; send me the one with such and such teeth.' His mind is arranged in the same way; he has only to open a particular compartment, labelled so and so, to find the information he requires. His memory in consequence is almost unfailing. It is commonly found that in old age the memory may be perfect as regards times long gone by, but inaccurate and defective as to more recent events. But with Mr. Gladstone the things of the present are as deeply stamped on his brain as the things of the past." Some one has said of Mr. Gladstone that his memory was "terrible." It is evident that he always kept abreast of the times--informing himself of everything new in literature, science and art, and when over eighty years of age was as ready to imbibe fresh ideas as when he was only eighteen, and far more discriminating. Those who entered Mr. Gladstone's official room on a Sunday, during the busiest parliamentary session, could not fail to be struck by the atmosphere of repose, the signs and symbols of the day, the books lying open near the armchair, the deserted writing-table, the absence of papers and newspapers. On Sunday Mr. Gladstone put away all business of a secular nature, occupied his time in reading special books, suitable to the day, and generally attended church twice, never dined out, except he went on a mission of mercy, or to cheer some sorrowful friend. When the Queen invited him to Windsor Castle on Sunday for one night, as she did sometimes, he always arranged to stay in Windsor Saturday. In his dressing room he kept a large open bible in which he daily read. Physically, intellectually and spiritually Mr. Gladstone's Sundays were regarded by his family as a priceless blessing to him, and to have made him the man he was. Mr. Gladstone had strict notions of his duty to his church. Whenever he established himself in London, he always attended the nearest church, and became regular in his attendance, not only on the Sabbath, but daily. With an empire on his shoulders he found time for daily public devotion, and in church-going he was no "gadabout." When he resided at Carlton House Terrace he attended the church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields. Mr. Gladstone's daily correspondence, when Prime Minister, was simply enormous. At first he felt it to be a conscientious duty to deal with the most of it himself, but finally came to trust the bulk of it to secretaries as other ministers did. Some letters came to him daily that he had to answer with his own hand; for example, from ministers or on confidental business, from the court, At the end of every Cabinet Council the Premier has to write a letter with his own hand to his sovereign, giving full information of the business transacted. The same kind of report is required daily from Parliament. Of course Mr. Gladstone, whenever he was Prime Minister, faithfully attended to this duty and dispatched the required letters written with his own hand to the Queen. Mr. Gladstone was remarkable for the strength and endurance of his body as well as for the vigor of his intellect. "Don't talk to me of Mr. Gladstone's mind," said a contemporary; "it is his body which astonishes me." He never had any serious illness in his life, and up to quite recent years were vigorous exercise, sometimes walking when in Scotland 20 miles at a stretch over rough and mountainous country. The physical effort of speaking to twenty thousand people, and being heard in every part of the vast building by the audience, as was the case at Birmingham, in 1889, was remarkable. His power of endurance was wonderful. In 1882, he once sat up through an all-night sitting of the House of Commons, and going back to 10 Downing Street, at 8 o'clock in the morning, for half an hour's rest, again returned to the House and remained until the conclusion of the setting. Tree-cutting, which was with him a frequent recreation until he became a very old man, was chosen "as giving him the maximum of healthy exercise in the minimum of time." This favorite pastime of the great statesman was so closely associated with him that it was deemed the proper thing to do to place on exhibition in the Great Columbian Exposition at Chicago one of the axes of Mr. Gladstone. The Psalmist says, "A man was famous according as he had lifted up axes upon the thick trees." These singular words were written long before Mr. Gladstone's day, but famous as he was for felling the great trees of the forest, the words have a deeper meaning and in more than one sense met their fulfilment in him. His swift and keen axe of reform brought down many hoary headed evils. Mr. Gladstone himself explained why he cultivated this habit of cutting down trees. He said: "I chop wood because I find that it is the only occupation in the world that drives all thought from my mind. When I walk or ride or play cricket, I am still debating important business problems, but when I chop wood I can think of nothing but making the chips fly." The following story illustrates Mr. Gladstone's remarkable powers and the surprise he would spring upon those who met him. Two gentlemen who were invited guests at a table where Mr. Gladstone was expected, made a wager that they would start a conversation on a subject about which even Mr. Gladstone would know nothing. To accomplish this end they "read up" an "ancient" magazine article on some unfamiliar subject connected with Chinese manufactures. When the favorable opportunity came the topic was started, and the two conspirators watched with amusement the growing interest in the subject which Mr. Gladstone's face betrayed. Finally he joined in the conversation, and their amusement was turned into confusion, when Mr. Gladstone said, "Ah, gentlemen, I perceive you have been reading an article I wrote in the ---- Magazine some thirty or forty years ago." CHAPTER XXI CLOSING SCENES OF A LONG AND EVENTFUL LIFE Mr. Gladstone died at Hawarden Castle, at 5 o'clock, Thursday Morning, May 19, 1898. The first intimation of the rapidly approaching end of Mr. Gladstone was conveyed in a bulletin issued at 9 o'clock Tuesday morning, May 17. It read "Mr. Gladstone had a poor and broken sleep last night; he is somewhat exhausted, but suffers no discomfort." The report of the evening before was assuring as to any sudden change, so that the anxiety was increased. For hours no additional information was given, but there were indications outside the Castle of a crisis. Throughout the day could be heard expressions of deep regret among the working people, asking, "How is the old gentleman?" Despite the heavy rain the people collected in groups, and the hush and quiet that prevailed indicated the presence of death. A bulletin at 5 p.m. said: "Mr. Gladstone has taken a serious turn for the worse. His death may be expected in twenty-four hours." All day the condition of the patient had been critical. The doctor doubted that his patient was fully conscious at any time, he answered, "Yes," and "No." He refused all medicine, exclaiming No! No! It was remarked that when addressed in English, Mr. Gladstone would answer in French, and sometimes was praying in French. Later in the evening the servants of the household were admitted to the sick room for a final farewell. They found Mr. Gladstone lying in a deep sleep; each in turn knelt down, kissed his hand and tearfully withdrew. About 9 o'clock the patient rallied a little and fell into a peaceful sleep, which was thought to be his last. The rain had continued to fall during the night, but the villagers had been coming singly and in groups to glance silently at the rain-beaten scrap of paper which was the latest bulletin, and then silently returning to the gate, and disappearing in the darkness only to return later. About 4 o'clock in the morning Mr. Gladstone seemed to be sinking. The scene in the sick-room was painful. The Rev. Stephen Gladstone read prayers and hymns, including Mr. Gladstone's favorite, "Rock of Ages." When this was concluded, Mr. Gladstone murmured, "Our Father." As Mrs. Gladstone leaned over her husband, he turned his head and his lips moved slightly. Though extremely distressed, Mrs. Gladstone bore up with remarkable fortitude. But Mr. Gladstone rallied again, and Wednesday morning he was still living. By his almost superhuman vitality he had fought death away. The morning was beautiful and clear and the sunshine came in at the open window of Mr. Gladstone's room. The aged sufferer was hovering between life and death, and only by the feeble beating of his pulse could it be told he was alive. He was sleeping himself away into eternal day. Mrs. Gladstone sat by the side of his bed, holding his hand, and never leaving except for needed rest. At times he seemed to recognize for a moment some of those with him. He surely knew his wife as she tenderly kissed his hand. It soon became known abroad that Mr. Gladstone was dying. In the House of Commons it caused profound sorrow. Everything else was stopped while members discussed how best to honor him, even by taking steps without, precedent as that of adjourning, because the circumstances were unprecedented. His former colleagues silently watched his last struggle with the relentless foe, to whom, true to himself, he was yielding slowly, inch by inch. Telegrams of inquiry and sympathy came from all parts of the world to the Castle. The Queen wrote making inquiries and tendering assurances of profound sympathy. A long telegram from the Princess of Wales concluded: "I am praying for you." The Prince of Wales wrote: "My thoughts are with you at this trying time., God grant that your father does not suffer." The Duke of Devonshire before the British Empire League referred touchingly to the mournful scenes at Hawarden, when "the greatest of Englishmen was slowly passing away." And all over the land people of all conditions and at all kinds of gatherings, politicians, divines, reformers, and women joined in expressions of grief and sympathy. Many were the messages of regard and condolence that came from other lands. Dr. Dobie furnishes the following picture of the dying man. "His grand face bears a most peaceful and beautiful look. A few days ago the deeply bitten wrinkles that so long marked it were almost gone; but now, strangely enough, they seem strong and deep as ever. He looks too in wonderfully good color." At 2 o'clock in the morning, it was evident that the time had come, and the family gathered about the bed of the aged man, from that time none of them left the room until all was over. The only absentee was little Dorothy Drew, who tearfully complained that her grandfather did not know her. Behind the family circle stood the physicians and the nurses, and the old coachman, who had been unable to be present when the other servants took their farewell, and who was now sent for to witness the closing scene. The end was most peaceful. There were no signs of bodily pain or of mental distress. The Rev. Stephen Gladstone read prayers and repeated hymns. The nurse continued to bathe with spirits the brow of the patient, who showed gratitude by murmuring, "How nice!" While the son was engaged in praying, came the gentle, almost perceptible cessation of life, and the great man was no more. So quietly had he breathed his last, that the family did not know it until it was announced by the medical attendants. The weeping family then filed slowly from the room, Mrs. Gladstone was led into another room and induced to lie down. The only spoken evidence that Mr. Gladstone realized his surroundings in his last moments was when his son recited the litany. Then the dying man murmured, "Amen." This was the last word spoken by Mr. Gladstone and was uttered just before he died. The death of Mr. Gladstone was announced to the people of Hawarden by the tolling of the church bell. The following bulletin was posted at 6 a.m.: "In the natural course of things the funeral will be at Hawarden. Mr. Gladstone expressed a strong wish to have no flowers at his funeral; and the family will be grateful if this desire is strictly respected." There was something indescribably pathetic in the daily bulletins about Mr. Gladstone. All the world knew that he was afflicted with a fatal but slow disease, and all the world was struck with wondering admiration at his sustained fortitude, patience, and resignation. The tragedy of a life, devoted simply and purely to the public service, drawing to an end in so long an agony, was a spectacle that struck home to the heart of the most callous. These bulletins were posted on the front door of the Jubilee Porch, at Hawarden Castle, at 9 a.m., 5 p.m. and 10 o'clock at night daily, and published throughout the world. When the sad event was announced that Mr. Gladstone had passed away, the action of the House of Commons was prompt, decided and sympathetic. The House was crowded Thursday, May 19, when Speaker Gully called upon the government leader, Mr. A. J. Balfour, the First Lord of the Treasury, and all the members uncovering their heads, Mr. Balfour said: "I think it will be felt in all parts of the House that we should do fitting honor to the great man whose long and splendid career closed to-day, by adjourning. "This is not the occasion for uttering the thoughts which naturally suggest themselves. That occasion will present itself to-morrow, when it will be my duty to submit to the House an address to the Queen, praying her to grant the honor of a public funeral, if such honor is not inconsistent with the expressed wishes of himself or of those who have the right to speak in his behalf, and also praying the Queen to direct that a public monument be erected at Westminster with an inscription expressive of the public admiration, attachment and high estimate entertained by the House of Mr. Gladstone's rare and splendid gifts and devoted labors in Parliament and in high offices of State. "Before actually moving the adjournment, I have to propose a formal resolution that the House to-morrow resolve itself into committee to draw up an address, the contents of which I have just indicated." After a word of assent from Sir William Vernon-Harcourt, the Liberal leader, the resolution was adopted and the House adjourned. The House of Commons was crowded again on Friday, and went into committee of the whole to consider the address to the Queen in regard to the interment of the remains of Mr. Gladstone in Westminster Abbey. Not since the introduction of the Home Rule Bill by Mr. Gladstone had there been such an assemblage in the House, members filled every seat, clustered on the steps of the speaker's dais, and occupied every space. The galleries were all filled. In the Peer's gallery were the foremost members of the House of Lords. United States Ambassador Hay and all his staff were present with other Ambassadors. The members of the House were in deep mourning, and all removed their hats, as if in the presence of the dead. An unusual hush overspread all. After the prayer by the chaplain, there was an impressive silence for a quarter of an hour, before Mr. Balfour rose to speak. The whole scene was profoundly affecting. The eulogies of Mr. Gladstone formed an historic episode. All, without respect to party, united in honoring their late illustrious countryman. Mr. Balfour delivered a brilliant panegyric of the dead statesman, and his speech was eloquent and displayed great taste. He was so ill, however, from weakness of heart that he was barely able to totter to his place and to ask the indulgence of the speaker while he rested, before offering his oration. He was too sick for the sad duty imposed upon him, but he preferred to pay this last tribute to his friend. The circumstances were painful, but added a dramatic touch to the scene. His oration was lengthy and his eulogy spoken with evident emotion. He concluded by formally moving the presentation of the address to the Queen. The Liberal Leader, Sir William Vernon-Harcourt, the political as well as the personal friend of Mr. Gladstone, seconded the motion. He paid a heartfelt tribute to the memory of his eminent colleague, and spoke in a vein of lofty and glowing eloquence until overcome with emotion, so that he had to stop thrice to wipe his eyes; finally he completely broke down and was unable to proceed. Mr. Dillon, the Irish leader, in a speech of five minutes duration, and in his most oratorical style, dwelt on Mr. Gladstone's fervid sympathy for the oppressed people of all races, and touched a chord which stirred the House. As Mr. Dillon had spoken for Ireland, so Mr. Abel Thomas followed as the representative of Wales. The address to the Queen was unanimously adopted. In the House of Lords there was also a full attendance of members. The Marquis of Salisbury, Prime Minister, spoke feelingly of Mr. Gladstone, who, he said, "was ever guided in all his efforts by a lofty moral idea". The deceased will be remembered, not so much for his political work as for the great example, hardly paralleled in history, of the great Christian Statesman. The Earl of Kimberly, the liberal leader in the House of Lords, followed in a touching tribute, and the Duke of Devonshire expressed generous appreciation of Mr. Gladstone's services in behalf of the Liberal Unionists, saying their severance from Mr. Gladstone was a most painful incident. But, he added, he could "recall no word from Mr. Gladstone which added unnecessarily to the bitterness of the situation." The Earl of Rosebery delivered an eloquent panegyric. The honors of the occasion were unanimously accorded to him, whose eulogy of his predecessor in the leadership of the liberal party was a masterpiece of its kind. He spoke of the triumphs of life rather than the sorrows of death. Death was not all sadness. His life was full---his memory remains. To all time he is an example for our race and mankind. He instanced as an illustration of the fine courtesy always observed by Mr. Gladstone towards his political opponents, that the last letter he had written with his own hand was a private note to Lady Salisbury, several weeks since, congratulating her and her husband on their providential escape from a carriage accident at Hatfield. Lord Salisbury was visibly touched by Lord Rosebery's reference to this circumstance. The House of Lords then adopted the Resolution to the Queen. The body of Mr. Gladstone, un-coffined, was laid on a couch in the Library of the Castle--the room called the Temple of Peace. He was dressed in a suit of black cloth, over which were the scarlet robes of the university, and by his side the cap was placed. His hands were folded on his breast. He rested on a most beautiful white satin cloth, with a rich border in Eastern embroidery. Above his head in letters of gold were the words sewn into the satin: "Requiescat in pace." There was the beauty of death--the terror was all gone. During Tuesday the body was viewed by the tenants on the estate, the neighbors and friends. On Wednesday morning, May 25th, at 6 o'clock, the remains, having been enclosed in a plain panelled elm coffin, were removed to the village church, where they were lying in state during the day. The body was carried by half-a-dozen old retainers of the family to a bier on wheels, on which it was taken to the church, over the lawn, following the private path Mr. Gladstone used to tread on his way to church, and past the favorite nooks of the deceased in the park. The family--excepting Mrs. Gladstone, who came later, tenants, servants, friends, local officials and neighbors followed in procession, Thousands of people were arriving by public and private conveyances at Hawarden. At eleven o'clock the doors of the church were opened, when men, women and children, from all the surrounding country, and even tourists from abroad, entered to view the remains. All day long a constant stream of people poured into the church, while the streets were filled with people unable to gain admittance. Several ladies fainted from excess of emotion when passing the bier, and many men and women dropped on their knees and silently prayed. At 6 o'clock in the evening the body was removed from Hawarden Church and carried to the station for the journey to London. The procession to bear the remains was composed of the family, representatives of organizations, friends and neighbors. Vast crowds lined the route, afoot and in every kind of vehicle. The cortege stopped at the entrance to the Park--Hawarden Lodge, and sang one of Mr. Gladstone's favorite hymns. Again, when the procession reached the Castle, it paused at the entrance and sang another hymn loved by the late resident of the house, and went on its way to Broughton Hall Station. Every step of the way, after leaving the park, was again lined with sympathetic spectators. While at the station the spectacle was remarkable for the surrounding crush of human beings. A special train was provided for the body and the family. As the body of Mr. Gladstone was placed upon the funeral car the sorrow of the people was manifest. The representatives of the Earl Marshall, of England, took possession of the funeral at this point. Henry and Herbert Gladstone accompanied the body to London and Mrs. Gladstone and family returned to the castle to follow later. All along the route to London grief-stricken people were standing to view the funeral train as it passed at Chester, Crewe, Rugby, Stafford and Farnworth until the darkness and lateness of the night shut out the scene. When the train reached London and passed to Westminster, it was early in the morning. A group of some thirty gentlemen, connected with the ceremonies, was at the station; among them the Duke of Norfolk, About two hundred people looked silently on while the body was removed from the train to the hearse, and the funeral cortege moved on to Westminster Hall at once and entered the Palace Yard just as "Big Ben" tolled the hour of one like a funeral knell. The coffin was placed in position for lying in state in Westminster Hall, and at about 3 o'clock Canon Wilberforce conducted a special service in the presence of Henry and Herbert Gladstone and several members of the House of Commons. The scenes that followed were remarkably impressive and unparalleled. The people began to arrive at Westminster at 2 o'clock in the morning. The line formed was continually augmented by all classes of people,--peers, peeresses, cabinet members, members of the House of Commons, military and naval officers, clergymen, costermongers, old and young, until 6 o'clock, when the doors were opened and the procession commenced to stream into the Hall, and passed the catafalque. This long procession of mourners continued all day Thursday and Friday. Two hundred thousand people, at least, paid homage to the dead statesman. On Friday evening, after the crowd had departed, large delegations, representing Liberal organizations from all parts of the kingdom, visited the Hall, by special arrangement, and fifteen hundred of them paid respect to the memory of their late leader. Saturday morning, May 28, thousands of people assembled in the square outside to witness the passage of the funeral cortege from Westminster Hall, where it was formed, to the Abbey, to find sepulchre in the tomb of kings. The procession passed through two lines of policemen. It was not a military parade, with all its pomp, but a ceremony made glorious by the homage of the people, among them the greatest of the nation. The funeral was in every respect impressive, dignified and lofty, in every way worthy the great civilian, and the nation that accorded him a public burial with its greatest dead. And the people were there. Every spot on which the eye rested swarmed with human beings. They looked from the windows of the hospital, and from the roofs of houses. Everybody was dressed in black. The principal officials had assembled in Westminster Hall at 10 o'clock. The Bishop of London, the Right Rev. Mandell Creighton, D.D., read a brief prayer and at 10.30 o'clock the procession had formed and slowly passed through the crowds who with uncovered heads stood on either side of short pathway, a distance 300 yards, to the western entrance of the Abbey, between two ranks of the Eton Volunteers, the boys of the school where Mr. Gladstone received his early education, in their buff uniforms. The pall-bearers who walked on each side of the coffin were perhaps the personages who attracted the most attention during the day. They were the Prince of Wales, the Duke of York, the Marquis of Salisbury, the Earl of Kimberly, A. J. Balfour, Sir William Vernon-Harcourt, the Duke of Rutland, Lord Rosebery, Baron Rendel and George Armitstead, the two latter being life-long friends of the deceased statesman. When Mrs. Gladstone entered the Abbey the whole assembly rose and remained standing until she was seated. This honor was accorded only once beside--when the Princess of Wales, the Princess Mary and the Duchess of York appeared. The Abbey was filled with people. Every gallery, balcony and niche high up among the rafters held a cluster of deeply interested spectators. Temporary galleries had been erected in long tiers around the open grave, which was in the floor of the Abbey. There were 2,500 persons assembled in the Abbey, all--both men and women--clothed in black, except a few officials whose regalia relieved this sombre background by its brilliancy. The two Houses of Parliament sat facing each other, seated on temporary seats on opposite sides of the grave. About them were the mayors of the principal cities, delegates from Liberal organizations, representatives of other civic and political societies, representatives of the Non-Conformists, while the long nave was crowded with thousands of men and women, among them being most of the celebrities in all branches of English life. In each gallery was a presiding officer with his official mace beside him, whose place was in the centre, and who was its most prominent figure. It was a distinguished assembly in a famous place. Beneath were the illustrious dead; around were the illustrious living. The members of the bereaved family sat in the stall nearest the bier--Mrs. Gladstone, her sons Henry, Herbert and Stephen; with other members of the family, children and grand-children, including little Dorothy Drew, Mr. Gladstone's favorite grand-child, in her new mourning. The Princess of Wales and the Duchess of York occupied the Dean's pew opposite. Other royalties were present in person or by their representatives. Within the chancel stood the Dean of Westminster, and behind him were gathered the cathedral clergy, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the scarlet and white surpliced choir, filling the chapel. It was the wish of the deceased for simplicity, but he was buried with a nation's homage in the tomb of kings. In the northern transept, known as the "Statesmen's Corner", of Westminster Abbey, where England's greatest dead rests, the body of Mr. Gladstone was entombed. His grave is near the graves of Pitt, Palmerston, Canning and Peel, beside that of his life-long political adversary, Lord Beaconsfield (Benjamin Disraeli), whose marble effigy looks down upon it, decked with the regalia Mr. Gladstone had so often refused. Two possible future kings of Great Britain walked besides the great commoner's coffin and stood beside his grave, and all the nobility and learning of the nation surrounded his bier. This state funeral, the first since that of Lord Palmerston, was rendered more imposing by the magnificence of the edifice in which it was solemnized. The coffin rested on an elevated bier before the altar, its plainness hidden beneath a pall of white-and gold embroidered cloth. A choir of one hundred male singers, which had awaited the coffin at the entrance to the Abbey, preceded it along the nave, chanting, "I am the Resurrection and the Life." When the coffin was laid on the bier, Purcell's funeral chant, "Lord, Thou Hast Been Our Refuge," was sung, and Dean Bradley and the whole assemblage sang, "Rock of Ages," and then while the coffin was being borne along the aisle to the grave, sang Mr. Gladstone's favorite hymn, "Praise to the Holiest in the Height." The choir of Westminster Abbey is said to be fine at any time, but for this great occasion special arrangements had been made, and there was a recruiting of the best voices from several of the choirs of London, and many musical instruments beside. The result was to win general praise for the beauty, harmony and perfection of the music. The weird, dismal strains of a quartette of trombones, in a recess far above the heads of the congregation, playing the three splendid "Equali," Beethoven's funeral hymn, swept through the vaulted roof of the Abbey, in pure tones never to be forgotten. When these ceased and finally died away, the great organ and a band of brass instruments took up Schubert's funeral march, booming sonorously; and changed to Beethoven's funeral march with a clash of cymbals in the orchestral accompaniment. A third march being required, owing to the time needed by the procession to reach the Abbey, "Marche Solennelle" was played. The choir, and a large number of bishops and other clergy, joined the procession at the west door and together they all proceeded to the grave. There was no sermon. The service was simple and solemn. The final paean of victory over death and the grave from Paul's great epistle was read, and the last hymn sung was, "Oh God! Our Help in Ages Past." The dean read the appointed appropriate service, committing the body to the earth, and then the Archbishop of Canterbury, in a loud voice, pronounced the benediction. The family and others near the grave kneeled during the concluding ceremonies, and then Mrs. Gladstone was helped from her knees to her unoccupied chair at the head of the grave. After the benediction came one of the saddest moments of the day. Mrs. Gladstone stood, with great courage and composure, throughout the service, supported on the arms of her two sons, Herbert and Stephen, and with other members of her family near the grave. Her face was lifted upward, and her lips were moving as though repeating the lines of the service. She also kept standing during the one official feature of the service; "The Proclamation by Garter, by Norroy, King of Arms, of the Style of the Deceased," as the official programme had it, and in which the various offices which Mr. Gladstone had held in his lifetime, were enumerated. Then, when the final word was spoken, the widow, still supported by her sons, approached the edge of the grave and there took a last, long look and was conducted away. Other relatives followed, and then most of the members of Parliament. Finally the Prince of Wales, the Duke of York and other pall-bearers defiled past the grave, took a last view of the coffin in the deep grave, and when they had been escorted down the nave to entrance, the people slowly departed. The "Dead March" from "Saul" and the "Marche Solennelle" of Schubert was played as the congregation slowly wended its way out of the sacred edifice. Perhaps the most solemn function of all, witnessed by none but the Gladstone family and the officials, was when the casket was opened shortly after midnight on Thursday to allow the Earl Marshal to verify with his own eyes that it really contained the remains of the dead statesman. It was said that the old man's face, seen for the last time by the Duke of Norfolk, who is responsible to England for his sacred charge, was more peaceful and younger looking than it had seemed for years. At the very last moment a small gold Armenian cross, a memento of that nation for which the great statesman worked so zealously, was placed by his side. Then all was sealed. As the deceased statesman was undoubtedly the greatest parliamentarian of our time, the following concise expressions with regard to his character and influence have been collected from a number of representative members of different political parties in both Houses of Parliament: The Marquis of Londonderry said: "What impressed me about Mr. Gladstone was his extraordinary moral influence." Lord George Hamilton: "I doubt whether we ever had a parliamentarian who equalled Mr. Gladstone." The Marquis of Lorne: "I share the universal regret at Mr. Gladstone's death as a personal loss." Sir John Gorst: "One feature, which greatly distinguished Mr. Gladstone, was his remarkable candour in debate. He never affected to misunderstand his opponents' arguments, and spared no pains in trying to make his own meaning understood." Sir Charles Dilke: "I think Mr. Gladstone's leading personal characteristic was his old-fashioned courtesy. Whilst a statesman, his absolute mastery of finance, both in its principles and details, was incomparably superior to that of any of his contemporaries." Mr. Thomas Ellis, the chief Liberal Whip, confessed that the greatest interest of his life in Parliament was to watch Mr. Gladstone's face. "It was like the sea in the fascination of its infinite variety, and of its incalculable reserve and strength. Every motion in his great soul was reflected in his face and form. To have had opportunities of watching that face, and of witnessing one triumph after another, is a precious privilege, for some of the charms of his face, as of his oratory and character, were incommunicable. He more than any man helped to build up and shape the present commercial and political fabric of Britain, but to struggling nations his words and deeds were as the breath of life." Sir Joseph Pease: "His memory will be kept green by a grateful country. Death soon buries the battle-axe of party, and he who devoted a long life and immense intellectual power, coupled with strong convictions on moral and Christian ethics, to the well being of his country and the world, will never be forgotten by the English people." Mr. James Bryce, author of "The American Commonwealth": "This sad event is the most noble and pathetic closing of a great life which we have seen in England in historical memory. I cannot recall any other case in which the whole nation has followed the setting of the sun of life with such sympathy, such regret, and such admiration." Lord Kinnaird: "Few men in public life have been able to draw out such personal love and devotion from his followers and friends. In the midst of an ever-busy life he was always ready to take his part in the conflict of right against wrong, of truth against error, and he earned the gratitude of all patriots, for he was never ashamed of contending that no true progress could be made which left out of sight the moral well-being of the people." Mr. Labouchere: "What impressed me most in Mr. Gladstone was his power of concentrated effort. Once he had decided on a course, action at once followed. Every thought was bent to attain the end, no labour was deemed to arduous. He alone knew how to deal with supporters and opponents. The former he inspired with his own fierce energy." Mr. John Redmond, leader of the Parnellite group of the Irish Nationalists: "The loss to England is absolutely incalculable. I regard Mr. Gladstone as having been the greatest parliamentarian of the age, and the greatest parliamentary orator. Englishmen of all parties ought to be grateful to him for his services in promoting the greatness and prosperity of their empire." John Dillon: "The greatest and most patriotic of Englishmen. If I were asked to say what I think most characteristic of Gladstone, I should say his abiding love for the common people and his faith in the government founded upon them, so that, while he remained the most patriotic of Englishmen, he is to-day mourned with equal intensity throughout the civilized world." Justin McCarthy, M. P.: "The death of Mr. Gladstone closes a career which may be described as absolutely unique in English political history. It was the career of a great statesman, whose statesmanship was first and last inspired, informed and guided by conscience, by principle, and by love of justice. There were great English statesmen before Mr. Gladstone's time and during Mr. Gladstone's time, but we shall look in vain for an example of any statesman in office, who made genius and eloquence, as Mr. Gladstone did, the mere servants of righteousness and conscientious purpose. Into the mind of Gladstone no thought of personal ambition or personal advancement ever entered. He was as conscientious as Burke. In the brilliancy of his gifts he was at least the equal of Bolingbroke. He was as great an orator as either Pitt, and he has left the imprint of his intellect on beneficent political and social legislation. In eloquence he far surpassed Cobden and was the peer of Bright, while his position as Parliamentary leader enabled him to initiate and carry out measures of reform which Bright and Cobden could only support. He was, in short, the greatest and the best Prime Minister known to English history." Michael Davitt: "One can only join with the whole world in admiration of the almost boundless talents of Mr. Gladstone, which were devoted with unparalleled power of charm to the service of his fellow-men. He was probably the greatest British statesman and leaves behind a record of a career unequalled in the annals of English politics. For the magnitude of his national labors and integrity of his personal character, Irishmen will remember him gratefully." The _Daily Chronicle_ heads its editorial with a quotation from Wordsworth: "This is the happy warrior: this is he: That every man in arms should wish to be." The editorial says: "A glorious light has been extinguished in the land; all his life lies in the past, a memory to us and our children; an inspiration and possession forever. The end has come as to a soldier at his post. It found him calm, expectant, faithful, unshaken. Death has come robed in the terrors of mortal pain; but what better can be said than that as he taught his fellows how to live, so he has taught them how to die? "It is impossible at this hour to survey the mighty range of this splendid life. We would assign to him the title. 'The Great Nationalist of the Nineteenth Century;' the greatest of the master-builders of modern England. Timidity had no place in Mr. Gladstone's soul. Ho was a lion among men, endowed with a granite strength of will and purpose, rare indeed in our age of feeble convictions." The _Daily News_ says: "One of his most characteristics qualities was his personal humility. This cannot be explained without the key, for Mr. Gladstone did not in the ordinary meaning of the word, underrate himself. He was not easy to persuade. He paid little attention to other people's opinions when his mind was made up. He was quite aware of his own ascendency in counsel and his supremacy in debate. The secret of his humility was an abiding sense that these things were of no importance compared with the relations between God's creatures and their Creator, Mr. Gladstone once said with characteristic candour that he had a vulnerable temper. He was quickly moved to indignation by whatever he thought injurious either to himself or to others, and was incapable of concealing his emotions, for, if he said nothing, his countenance showed what he felt. More expressive features were never given to man. "Mr. Gladstone's exquisite courtesy, which in and out of Parliament was the model for all, proceeded from the same source. It was essentially Christian. Moreover, nobody laughed more heartily over an anecdote that was really good. He was many men in one; but he impressed all alike with the essential greatness of his character. "He was built mentally and morally on a large scale. Of course it cannot be denied that such a face, such a voice, such natural dignity, and such perfect gesture produced in themselves an immense effect. There was nothing common-place about him. Mr. Gladstone was absolutely simple; and his simplicity was not the least attractive element of his fascinating personality. "His life presented aspects of charm to all minds. His learning captivated the scholar, his eloquence and statesmanship the politician, his financial genius the business man; while his domestic relations and simple human graciousness appealed to all hearts. "'There is a prince and a great man fallen this day in Israel.'" _Public Ledger_, Philadelphia: "To write Gladstone's career is to write the history of the Victorian era and that of the closing years of the reign of William IV, for Gladstone took his seat in Parliament for the first time in 1832, two years after he was out of college, and Victoria's accession took place in 1837. Since that remote day Gladstone has been four times Premier; has delivered numberless speeches of the highest order of excellence; has published a multitude of pamphlets and volumes which attest consummate intellectual gifts, and has been a great force in English statesmanship and scholarship through an exceptionally long life and almost to the very close of it. It has been given to exceedingly few men to play so great, so transcendent a role in any country or at any time." 
27553	----	Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 27553-h.htm or 27553-h.zip: (http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/2/7/5/5/27553/27553-h/27553-h.htm) or (http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/2/7/5/5/27553/27553-h.zip) The Prime Ministers of Queen Victoria Edited by Stuart J. Reid LORD JOHN RUSSELL [Illustration: _Reproduced by permission from an unpublished picture by G. F. Watts, R. A. in the possession of the Dowager Countess Russell at Pembroke Lodge, Richmond_ _Photogravure by Annan & Swan._] The Queen's Prime Ministers A Series of Political Biographies. Edited by Stuart J. Reid Author of 'The Life and Times of Sydney Smith.' _The volumes contain Photogravure Portraits, also copies of Autographs._ I. THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD, K.G. By J. A. FROUDE, D.C.L. (Seventh Edition.) II. VISCOUNT MELBOURNE. By HENRY DUNCKLEY, LL.D. ('Verax.') III. SIR ROBERT PEEL. By JUSTIN MCCARTHY, M.P. IV. THE RIGHT HON. W. E. GLADSTONE, M.P. By G. W. E. RUSSELL. (Twelfth Thousand.) V. THE MARQUIS OF SALISBURY. By H. D. TRAILL, D.C.L. (Second Edition.) VI. VISCOUNT PALMERSTON. By the MARQUIS OF LORNE. (Second Edition.) VII. THE EARL OF DERBY. By GEORGE SAINTSBURY. VIII. THE EARL OF ABERDEEN. By LORD STANMORE. IX. LORD JOHN RUSSELL. By STUART J. REID. * * * A Limited Library Edition of TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY COPIES, each numbered, printed on hand-made paper, parchment binding, gilt top, with facsimile reproductions, in some cases of characteristic notes of Speeches and Letters, which are not included in the ordinary edition, and some additional Portraits. Price for the Complete Set of Nine Volumes, Four Guineas net. No Volumes of this Edition sold separately. * * * * * London: Sampson Low, Marston & Company, Limited, St. Dunstan's House, Fetter Lane, Fleet Street, E.C. LORD JOHN RUSSELL by STUART J. REID I have looked to the happiness of my countrymen as the object to which my efforts ought to be directed _Recollections and Suggestions_ London Sampson Low, Marston & Company _Limited_ St. Dunstan's House Fetter Lane, Fleet Street, E.C. 1895 [All rights reserved] TO THE LADY MARY AGATHA RUSSELL THIS RECORD OF HER FATHER'S CAREER IS WITH TRUE REGARD DEDICATED PREFACE THIS monograph could not have been written--in the intimate sense--if the Dowager Countess Russell had not extended a confidence which, I trust, has in no direction been abused. Lady Russell has not only granted me access to her journal and papers as well as the early note-books of her husband, but in many conversations has added the advantage of her own reminiscences. I am also indebted in greater or less degree to Mrs. Warburton, Lady Georgiana Peel, Lady Agatha Russell, the Hon. Rollo Russell, Mr. G. W. E. Russell, and the Hon. George Elliot. Mr. Elliot's knowledge, as brother-in-law, and for many years as private secretary, touches both the personal and official aspects of Lord John's career, and it has been freely placed at my disposal. Outside the circle of Lord John's relatives I have received hints from the Hon. Charles Gore and Sir Villiers Lister, both of whom, at one period or another in his public life, also served him in the capacity of secretary. I have received some details of Lord John's official life from one who served under him in a more public capacity--not, however, I hasten to add, as Chancellor of the Exchequer--but I am scarcely at liberty in this instance to mention my authority. My thanks are due, in an emphatic sense, to my friend Mr. Spencer Walpole, who, with a generosity rare at all times, has not only allowed me to avail myself of facts contained in his authoritative biography of Lord John Russell, but has also glanced at the proof sheets of these pages, and has given me, in frank comment, the benefit of his own singularly wide and accurate knowledge of the historical and political annals of the reign. It is only right to add that Mr. Walpole is not in any sense responsible for the opinions expressed in a book which is only partially based on his own, is not always in agreement with his conclusions, and which follows independent lines. The letter which the Queen wrote to the Countess Russell immediately after the death of one of her 'first and most distinguished Ministers' is now printed with her Majesty's permission. The late Earl of Selborne and Mr. Lecky were sufficiently interested in my task to place on record for the volume some personal and political reminiscences which speak for themselves, and do so with authority. I am also under obligations of various kinds to the Marquis of Dufferin and Ava, the Earl of Durham, Lord Stanmore, Dr. Anderson of Richmond, and the Rev. James Andrews of Woburn. I desire also to acknowledge the courtesy of Mr. Gladstone, Mr. Andrew Lang, Mr. James Knowles, Mr. Percy Bunting, Mr. Edwin Hodder, Messrs. Longmans, and the proprietors of 'Punch,' for liberty to quote from published books and journals. In Montaigne's words, 'The tales I borrow, I charge upon the consciences of those from whom I have them.' I have gathered cues from all quarters, but in almost every case my indebtedness stands recorded on the passing page. The portrait which forms the frontispiece is for the first time reproduced, with the sanction of the Countess Russell and Mr. G. F. Watts, from an original crayon drawing which hangs on the walls at Pembroke Lodge. It may be as well to anticipate an obvious criticism by stating that the earlier title of the subject of this memoir is retained, not only in deference to the strongly expressed wish of the family at Pembroke Lodge, but also because it suggests nearly half a century spent in the House of Commons in pursuit of liberty. In the closing days of Earl Russell's life his eye was accustomed to brighten, and his manner to relax, when some new acquaintance, in the eagerness of conversation, took the liberty of familiar friendship by addressing the old statesman as 'Lord John.' STUART J. REID. CHISLEHURST: _June 4, 1895_. CONTENTS CHAPTER I EARLY YEARS, EDUCATION, AND TRAVEL 1792-1813 PAGE Rise of the Russells under the Tudors--Childhood and early surroundings of Lord John--Schooldays at Westminster--First journey abroad with Lord Holland--Wellington and the Peninsular campaign--Student days in Edinburgh and speeches at the Speculative Society--Early leanings in politics and literature--Enters the House of Commons as member for Tavistock 1 CHAPTER II IN PARLIAMENT AND FOR THE PEOPLE 1813-1826 The political outlook when Lord John entered the House of Commons--The 'Condition of England' question--The struggle for Parliamentary Reform--Side-lights on Napoleon Bonaparte--The Liverpool Administration in a panic--Lord John comes to the aid of Sir Francis Burdett--Foreign travel--First motion in favour of Reform--Making headway 21 CHAPTER III WINNING HIS SPURS 1826-1830 Defeated and out of harness--Journey to Italy--Back in Parliament--Canning's accession to power--Bribery and corruption--The repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts--The struggle between the Court and the Cabinet over Catholic Emancipation--Defeat of Wellington at the polls--Lord John appointed Paymaster-General 47 CHAPTER IV A FIGHT FOR LIBERTY 1830-1832 Lord Grey and the cause of Reform--Lord Durham's share in the Reform Bill--The voice of the people--Lord John introduces the bill and explains its provisions--The surprise of the Tories--Reform, 'Aye' or 'No'--Lord John in the Cabinet--The bill thrown out--The indignation of the country--Proposed creation of Peers--Wellington and Sidmouth in despair--The bill carried--Lord John's tribute to Althorp 63 CHAPTER V THE DAWN OF A NEW ERA 1833-1838 The turn of the tide with the Whigs--The two voices in the Cabinet--Lord John and Ireland--Althorp and the Poor Law--The Melbourne Administration on the rocks--Peel in power--The question of Irish tithes--Marriage of Lord John--Grievances of Nonconformists--Lord Melbourne's influence over the Queen--Lord Durham's mission to Canada--Personal sorrow 88 CHAPTER VI THE TWO FRONT BENCHES 1840-1845 Lord John's position in the Cabinet and in the Commons--His services to Education--Joseph Lancaster--Lord John's Colonial Policy--Mr. Gladstone's opinion--Lord Stanmore's recollections--The mistakes of the Melbourne Cabinet--The Duke of Wellington's opinion of Lord John--The agitation against the Corn Laws--Lord John's view of Sir Robert Peel--The Edinburgh letter--Peel's dilemma--Lord John's comment on the situation 113 CHAPTER VII FACTION AND FAMINE 1846-1847 Peel and Free Trade--Disraeli and Lord George Bentinck lead the attack--Russell to the rescue--Fall of Peel--Lord John summoned to power--Lord John's position in the Commons and in the country--The Condition of Ireland question--Famine and its deadly work--The Russell Government and measures of relief--Crime and coercion--The Whigs and Education--Factory Bill--The case of Dr. Hampden 136 CHAPTER VIII IN ROUGH WATERS 1848-1852 The People's Charter--Feargus O'Connor and the crowd--Lord Palmerston strikes from his own bat--Lord John's view of the political situation--Death of Peel--Palmerston and the Court--'No Popery'--The Durham Letter--The invasion scare--Lord John's remark about Palmerston--Fall of the Russell Administration 163 CHAPTER IX COALITION BUT NOT UNION 1852-1853 The Aberdeen Ministry--Warring elements--Mr. Gladstone's position--Lord John at the Foreign Office and Leader of the House--Lady Russell's criticisms of Lord Macaulay's statement--A small cloud in the East--Lord Shaftesbury has his doubts 199 CHAPTER X DOWNING STREET AND CONSTANTINOPLE 1853 Causes of the Crimean War--Nicholas seizes his opportunity--The Secret Memorandum--Napoleon and the susceptibilities of the Vatican--Lord Stratford de Redcliffe and the Porte--Prince Menschikoff shows his hand--Lord Aberdeen hopes against hope--Lord Palmerston's opinion of the crisis--The Vienna Note--Lord John grows restive--Sinope arouses England--The deadlock in the Cabinet 213 CHAPTER XI WAR HINDERS REFORM 1854-1855 A Scheme of Reform--Palmerston's attitude--Lord John sore let and hindered--Lord Stratford's diplomatic triumph--The Duke of Newcastle and the War Office--The dash for Sebastopol--Procrastination and its deadly work--The Alma--Inkerman--The Duke's blunder--Famine and frost in the trenches 236 CHAPTER XII THE VIENNA DIFFICULTY 1855 Blunders at home and abroad--Roebuck's motion--'General Février' turns traitor--France and the Crimea--Lord John at Vienna--The pride of the nation is touched--Napoleon's visit to Windsor--Lord John's retirement--The fall of Sebastopol--The treaty of Paris 254 CHAPTER XIII LITERATURE AND EDUCATION Lord John's position in 1855--His constituency in the City--Survey of his work in literature--As man of letters--His historical writings--Hero-worship of Fox--Friendship with Moore--Writes the biography of the poet--'Don Carlos'--A book wrongly attributed to him--Publishes his 'Recollections and Suggestions'--An opinion of Kinglake's--Lord John on his own career--Lord John and National Schools--Joseph Lancaster's tentative efforts--The formation of the Council of Education--Prejudice blocks the way--Mr. Forster's tribute 270 CHAPTER XIV COMING BACK TO POWER 1857-1861 Lord John as an Independent Member--His chance in the City--The Indian Mutiny--Orsini's attempt on the life of Napoleon--The Conspiracy Bill--Lord John and the Jewish Relief Act--Palmerston in power--Lord John at the Foreign Office--Cobden and Bright--Quits the Commons with a Peerage 286 CHAPTER XV UNITED ITALY AND THE DIS-UNITED STATES 1861-1865 Lord John at the Foreign Office--Austria and Italy--Victor Emmanuel and Mazzini--Cavour and Napoleon III.--Lord John's energetic protest--His sympathy with Garibaldi and the struggle for freedom--The gratitude of the Italians--Death of the Prince Consort--The 'Trent' affair--Lord John's remonstrance--The 'Alabama' difficulty--Lord Selborne's statement--The Cotton Famine 299 CHAPTER XVI SECOND PREMIERSHIP 1865-1866 The Polish Revolt--Bismarck's bid for power--The Schleswig-Holstein difficulty--Death of Lord Palmerston--The Queen summons Lord John--The second Russell Administration--Lord John's tribute to Palmerston--Mr. Gladstone introduces Reform--The 'Cave of Adullam'--Defeat of the Russell Government--The people accept Lowe's challenge--The feeling in the country 320 CHAPTER XVII OUT OF HARNESS 1867-1874 Speeches in the House of Lords--Leisured years--Mr. Lecky's reminiscences--The question of the Irish Church--The Independence of Belgium--Lord John on the claims of the Vatican--Letters to Mr. Chichester Fortescue--His scheme for the better government of Ireland--Lord Selborne's estimate of Lord John's public career--Frank admissions--As his private secretaries saw him 334 CHAPTER XVIII PEMBROKE LODGE 1847-1878 Looking back--Society at Pembroke Lodge--Home life--The house and its memories--Charles Dickens's speech at Liverpool--Literary friendships--Lady Russell's description of her husband--A packet of letters--His children's recollections--A glimpse of Carlyle--A witty impromptu--Closing days--Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone--The jubilee of the Repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts--'Punch' on the 'Golden Wedding'--Death--The Queen's letter--Lord Shaftesbury's estimate of Lord John's career--His great qualities 349 INDEX 371 LORD JOHN RUSSELL CHAPTER I EARLY YEARS, EDUCATION, AND TRAVEL 1792-1813 Rise of the Russells under the Tudors--Childhood and early surroundings of Lord John--Schooldays at Westminster--First journey abroad with Lord Holland--Wellington and the Peninsular campaign--Student days in Edinburgh and speeches at the Speculative Society--Early leanings in Politics and Literature--Enters the House of Commons as member for Tavistock. GOVERNMENT by great families was once a reality in England, and when Lord John Russell's long career began the old tradition had not yet lost its ascendency. The ranks of privilege can at least claim to have given at more than one great crisis in the national annals leaders to the cause of progress. It is not necessary in this connection to seek examples outside the House of Bedford, since the name of Lord William Russell in the seventeenth century and that of Lord John in the nineteenth stand foremost amongst the champions of civil and religious liberty. Hugh du Rozel, according to the Battle Roll, crossed from Normandy in the train of the Conqueror. In the reign of Henry III. the first John Russell of note was a small landed proprietor in Dorset, and held the post of Constable of Corfe Castle. William Russell, in the year of Edward II.'s accession, was returned to Parliament, and his lineal descendant, Sir John Russell, was Speaker of the House of Commons in the days of Henry VI. The real founder, however, of the fortunes of the family was the third John Russell who is known to history. He was the son of the Speaker, and came to honour and affluence by a happy chance. Stress of weather drove Philip, Archduke of Austria and, in right of his wife, King of Castile, during a voyage from Flanders to Spain in the year 1506, to take refuge at Weymouth. Sir Thomas Trenchard, Sheriff of Dorset, entertained the unexpected guest, but he knew no Spanish, and Philip of Castile knew no English. In this emergency Sir Thomas sent in hot haste for his cousin, Squire Russell, of Barwick, who had travelled abroad and was able to talk Spanish fluently. The Archduke, greatly pleased with the sense and sensibility of his interpreter, insisted that John Russell must accompany him to the English Court, and Henry VII., no mean judge of men, was in turn impressed with his ability. The result was that, after many important services to the Crown, John Russell became first Earl of Bedford, and, under grants from Henry VIII. and Edward VI., the rich monastic lands of Tavistock and Woburn passed into his possession. The part which the Russells as a family have played in history of course lies outside the province of this volume, which is exclusively concerned with the character and career in recent times of one of the most distinguished statesmen of the present century. Lord John Russell was born on August 18, 1792, at Hertford Street, Mayfair. His father, who was second son of Lord Tavistock, and grandson of the fourth Duke of Bedford, succeeded his brother Francis, as sixth Duke, in 1802, at the age of thirty-six, when his youngest and most famous son was ten years old. Long before his accession to the title, which was, indeed, quite unexpected, the sixth Duke had married the Hon. Georgiana Byng, daughter of Viscount Torrington, and the statesman with whose career these pages are concerned was the third son of this union. He spent his early childhood at Stratton Park, Hampshire. When he was a child of eight, Stratton Park was sold by the Duke of Bedford, and Oakley House, which he never liked so well, became the residence of his father. Although a shy, delicate child, he was sent in the spring of 1800, when only eight, to a private school at Sunbury--only a mile or two away from Richmond, where nearly eighty years later he died. In the autumn of 1801 he lost his mother, to whom he was deeply attached, and almost before the bewildered child had time to realise his loss, his uncle Francis also died, and his father, in consequence, became Duke of Bedford. [Sidenote: SCHOOLDAYS AT WESTMINSTER] From Sunbury the motherless boy was sent with his elder brother to Westminster, in 1803, and the same year the Duke married Lady Georgiana Gordon, a daughter of the fourth Duke of Gordon, and her kindness to her stepchildren was marked and constant. Westminster School at the beginning of the century was an ill-disciplined place, in which fighting and fagging prevailed, and its rough and boisterous life taxed to the utmost the mettle of the plucky little fellow. He seems to have made no complaint, but to have taken his full share in the rough-and-tumble sports of his comrades in a school which has given many distinguished men to the literature and public life of England: as, for instance, the younger Vane--whom Milton extolled--Ben Jonson and Dryden, Prior and Locke, Cowper and Southey, Gibbon and Warren Hastings. He learnt Latin at Westminster, and was kept to the work of translation, but he used to declare somewhat ruefully in after-days that he had as a schoolboy to devote the half-holidays to learning arithmetic and writing, and these homely arts were taught him by a pedagogue who seems to have kept a private school in Great Dean's Yard. Many years later Earl Russell dictated to the Countess some reminiscences of his early days, and since Lady Russell has granted access to them, the following passages transcribed from her own manuscript will be read with interest:--'My education, for various reasons, was not a very regular one. It began, indeed, in the usual English way by my going to a very bad private school at Sunbury, and my being transferred to a public school at Westminster at ten or eleven. But I never entered the upper school. The hard life of a fag--for in those days it was a hard life--and the unwholesome food disagreed with me so much that my stepmother, the Duchess of Bedford, insisted that I should be taken away and sent to a private tutor.' At Westminster School physical hardihood was always encouraged. 'If two boys were engaged to fight during the time of school, those boys who wanted to see the fight had to leave school for the purpose.' At this early period a passion for the theatre possessed him, drawing him to Drury Lane or Covent Garden whenever an opportunity occurred; and this kind of relaxation retained a considerable hold upon him throughout the greater portion of his life. Even as a child he was a bit of a philosopher. In the journal which he began to keep in the year he went to Westminster School is the following entry:--'October 28, 1803.--Very great mist in the morning, but afternoon very fine. There was a grand review to-day by the King in Hyde Park of the Volunteers. I did not go, as there was such a quantity of people that I should have seen nothing, and should have been knocked down.' Most of the entries in the boy's journal are pithy statements of matter of fact, as, for instance:--'Westminster, Monday, October 10.--I was flogged to-day for the first time.' A few days later the young diarist places on record what he calls some of the rules of the school. He states that lessons began every morning at eight, and that usually work was continued till noon, with an interval at nine for breakfast. Lessons were resumed at two on ordinary days, and finished for the day at five. 'All the fellows have verses on Thursdays and Saturdays. We go on Sundays to church in the morning in Henry VII.'s Chapel, and in the evening have prayers in the school.' [Sidenote: DR. CARTWRIGHT AND WOBURN] His 'broken and disturbed' education was next resumed at Woburn Abbey under Dr. Cartwright; the Duke's domestic chaplain, and brother to Major Cartwright, the well-known political reformer. The chaplain at Woburn was a many-sided man. He was not only a scholar and a poet, but also possessed distinct mechanical skill, and afterwards won fame as the inventor of the power-loom. He was quick-witted and accomplished, and it was a happy circumstance that the high-spirited, impressionable lad, who by this time was full of dreams of literary distinction, came under his influence. 'I acquired from Dr. Cartwright,' declared Lord John, 'a taste for Latin poetry which has never left me.' Not merely at work but at play, his new friend came to his rescue. 'He invented the model of a boat which was moved by clockwork and acted upon the water by a paddle underneath. He gave me the model, and I used to make it go across the ponds in the park.' Meanwhile literature was not forgotten, and before long the boy's juvenile effusions filled a manuscript book, which with an amusing flourish of trumpets was dedicated to 'the Right Hon. William Pitt, Chancellor of the Exchequer.' A couple of sentences will reveal its character, and the dawning humour of the youthful scribe:--'This little volume, being graced with your name, will prosper; without it my labour would be all in vain. May you remain at the Helm of State long enough to bestow a pension on your very humble and obedient servant, John Russell.' Between the years 1805 and 1808 Lord John pursued his education under a country parson in Kent. He was placed under the care of Mr. Smith, Vicar of Woodnesborough, near Sandwich, an ardent Whig, who taught a select number of pupils, amongst whom were several cadets of the aristocracy; and to this seminary Lord John now followed his brothers, Lord Tavistock and Lord William Russell. Amongst his schoolfellows at Woodnesborough was the Lord Hartington of that generation, Lord Clare, Lord William Fitzgerald, and a future Duke of Leinster. The vicar in question, worthy Mr. Smith, was nicknamed 'Dean Smigo' by his pupils, but Lord John, looking back in after-years, declared that he was an excellent man, well acquainted with classical authors, both Greek and Latin, though 'without any remarkable qualities either of character or understanding.' He evidently won popularity amongst the boys by joining in their indoor amusements and granting frequent holidays, particularly on occasions when the Whig cause was triumphant in the locality or in Parliament. [Sidenote: SMALL GAME] Rambles inland and on the seashore, pony riding, shooting small birds, cricket, and other sports, as well as winter evening games, filled up the ample leisure from the duties of the schoolroom. One or two extracts from his journal are sufficient to show that, although still weakly, he was not lacking in boyish vivacity and in a healthy desire to emulate his elders. When Grenville and Fox joined their forces and so brought about the Ministry of 'All the Talents' the lads obtained a holiday--a fact which is thus recorded in sprawling schoolboy hand by Lord John in his diary. 'Saturday, February 8, 1806.--... We did no business on Mr. Fox's coming into the Ministry. I shot a couple of larks beyond Southerden.... I went out shooting for the first time with Mr. Smith's gun. I got eight shots at little birds and killed four of them.' On November 5 in the same year we find him writing:--'Eliza's [Miss Smith's] birthday. No business. I went out shooting, but only killed some little birds. I used to shoot much better than I do at present. Always miss now; have not killed a partridge yet.' Poor boy! But he lived to kill two deer and a wild boar. 'Similarity of age led me,' states Lord John, in one of his unpublished notes, 'to form a more intimate friendship with Clare than with any of the others, and our mutual liking grew into a strong attachment on both sides. I only remark this fact as Lord Byron, who had been a friend of Clare's at Harrow, appears to have shown some boyish jealousy when the latter expressed his sorrow at my departure for Spain.' Now and then he turned his gift for composing verses in the direction of a satire on some political celebrity. He also wrote and spoke the prologue at private dramatic performances at Woburn during the holiday season, and took the part of 'Lucy' in 'The Rivals.' A little later, in the brief period of his father's viceroyalty, he wrote another prologue, and on this occasion amused an Irish audience by his assumption of the part of an old woman. The political atmosphere of Woburn and Woodnesborough as well as his father's official position, led the boy of fourteen to take a keen interest in public affairs. His satirical verses on Melville, Pitt, Hawkesbury, and others, together with many passages in his journal, showed that his attention was frequently diverted from grammar and lexicon, field sports and footlights, to politics and Parliament, and the struggle amongst statesmen for place and power. Although little is known of the actual incidents of Lord John's boyhood, such straws at least show the direction in which the current of his life was setting. Whilst Lord John was the guest of Mr. Fox at Stable Yard, the subject of Lord Melville's acquittal by the Peers came up for discussion. Next day the shrewd young critic wrote the following characteristic remark in his journal: 'What a pity that he who steals a penny loaf should be hung, whilst he who steals thousands of the public money should be acquitted!' The brilliant qualities of Fox made a great impression on the lad, and there can be little doubt that his intercourse with the great statesman, slight and passing though it was, did much to awaken political ambition. He also crossed the path of other men of light and leading in the political world, and in this way, boy though he was, he grew familiar with the strife of parties and the great questions of the hour. Holland House opened its hospitable gates to him, and there he met a young clergyman of an unconventional type--the Rev. Sydney Smith--with whom he struck up a friendship that was destined to endure. The young schoolboy has left it on record in that inevitable 'journal' that he found his odd clerical acquaintance 'very amusing.' [Sidenote: WITH LORD HOLLAND IN SPAIN] In the summer of 1807 we learn from his journal that he passed three months with his father and stepmother at the English lakes and in the West of Scotland. With boyish glee he recounts the incidents of the journey, and his delight in visiting Inverary, Edinburgh, and Melrose. Yet it was his rambles and talks with Sir Walter Scott, whom he afterwards described as one of the wonders of the age, that left the most abiding impression upon him. On his way back to Woodnesborough he paid his first visit to the House of Lords, and heard a debate on the Copenhagen expedition, an affair in which, he considered, 'Ministers cut a most despicable figure.' On quitting school life at Woodnesborough, an experience was in store for him which enlarged his mental horizon, and drew out his sympathies for the weak and oppressed. Lord and Lady Holland had taken a fancy to the lad, and the Duke of Bedford consented to their proposal that he should accompany them on their visit to the Peninsula, then the scene of hostilities between the French and the allied armies of England and Spain. The account of this journey is best told in Lord John's own words:-- 'In the autumn of 1808, when only sixteen years of age, I accompanied Lord and Lady Holland to Corunna, and afterwards to Lisbon, Seville, and Cadiz, returning by Lisbon to England in the summer of 1809. They were eager for the success of the Spanish cause, and I joined to sympathy for Spain a boyish hatred of Napoleon, who had treacherously obtained possession of an independent country by force and fraud--force of immense armies, fraud of the lowest kind.' There is in existence at Pembroke Lodge a small parchment-bound volume marked 'Diary, 1808,' which records in his own handwriting Lord John's first impressions of foreign travel. The notes are brief, but they show that the writer even then was keenly alive to the picturesque. The journal ends somewhat abruptly, and Lord John confesses in so many words that he gave up this journal in despair, a statement which is followed by the assertion that the record at least possesses the 'merit of brevity.' Spain was in such a disturbed condition that the tour was full of excitement. War and rumours of war filled the air, and sudden changes of route were often necessary in order to avoid perilous encounters with the French. The travellers were sometimes accompanied by a military escort, but were more frequently left to their devices, and evil tidings of disaster to the Allies--often groundless, but not less alarming--kept the whole party on the alert, and proved, naturally, very exciting to the lad, who under such strange and dramatic circumstances gained his first experience of life abroad. Lord John had, however, taken with him his Virgil, Tacitus, and Cicero, and now and then, forgetful of the turmoil around him, he improved his acquaintance with the classics. He also studied the Spanish language, with the result that he acquired an excellent conversational knowledge of it. The lad had opinions and the courage of them, and when he saw the cause of the Spanish beginning to fail he was exasperated by the apathy of the Whigs at home, and accordingly, with the audacity of youth, wrote to his father:-- 'I take the liberty of informing you and your Opposition friends that the French have not conquered the whole of Spain.... Lord Grey's speech appears to me either a mere attempt to plague Ministers for a few hours or a declaration against the principle of the people's right to depose an infamous despot.... It seems to be the object of the Opposition to prove that Spain is conquered, and that the Spaniards like being robbed and murdered.' It seems, therefore, that Lord John, even in his teens, was inclined to be dogmatic and oracular, but the soundness of his judgment, in this particular instance at least, is not less remarkable than his sturdy mental independence. Like his friend Sydney Smith, he was already becoming a lover of justice and of sympathy towards the oppressed. [Sidenote: THE QUESTION OF A UNIVERSITY] In the summer of 1809, after a short journey to Cadiz, Lord Holland and his party crossed the plains of Estremadura on mules to Lisbon and embarked for England, though not without an unexpected delay caused by a slight attack of fever on the part of Lord John. On the voyage back Lord Holland and his secretary, Mr. Allen, pointed out to him the advantages of going to Edinburgh for the next winter, and in a letter to his father, dated Spithead, August 10, 1809, he adds: 'They say that I am yet too young to go to an English university; that I should learn more there [Edinburgh] in the meantime than I should anywhere else.' He goes on to state that he is convinced by their arguments, in spite of the fact that he had previously expressed 'so much dislike to an academical career in Edinburgh.' The truth is, Lord John wished to follow his elder brother, Lord Tavistock, to Cambridge; but the Duke would not hear of the idea, and bluntly declared that nothing at that time was to be learnt at the English universities. On his return to England it was decided to send Lord John to continue his studies at Edinburgh University. The Northern Athens at that time was full of keen and varied intellectual life, and the young student could scarcely have set foot in it at a more auspicious moment. Other cadets of the English aristocracy, such as Lord Webb Seymour and Lord Henry Petty, were attracted at this period to the Northern university, partly by the restrictive statutes of Oxford and Cambridge, but still more by the genius and learning of men like Dugald Stewart and John Playfair. The Duke of Bedford placed his son under the roof of the latter, who at that time held the chair of mathematics in the university, with the request that he would take a general oversight of his studies. Professor Playfair was a teacher who quickened to a remarkable extent the powers of his pupils, and at the same time by his own estimable qualities won their affection. Looking back in after-years, Lord John declared that 'Professor Playfair was one of the most delightful of men and very zealous lover of liberty.' He adds that the simplicity of the distinguished mathematician, as well as the elevation of his sentiments, was remarkable. It is interesting to learn from Professor Playfair's own statement that he was quickly impressed with the ability of Lord John. Ambition was stirring in the breast of the young Whig, and though he could be idle enough at times, he seems on the whole to have lent his mind with increasing earnestness to the tasks of the hour. He also attended the classes of Professor Dugald Stewart during the three years he spent in the grey metropolis of the North, and the influence of that remarkable man was not merely stimulating at the time, but materially helped to shape his whole philosophy of life. After he had left Edinburgh, Lord John wrote some glowing lines about Dugald Stewart, which follow--afar off, it must be admitted--the style of Pope. We have only space to quote a snatch: 'Twas he gave laws to fancy, grace to thought, Taught virtue's laws, and practised what he taught. [Sidenote: LIFE IN EDINBURGH] Intellectual stimulus came to him through another channel. He was elected in the spring of 1810 a member of the Edinburgh Speculative Society, and during that and the two following years he was zealous in his attendance at its weekly meetings. The Speculative Society was founded early in the reign of George III., and no less distinguished a man than Sir Walter Scott acted for a term of years as its secretary. It sought to unite men of different classes and pursuits, and to bring young students and more experienced thinkers and men of affairs together in friendly but keen debate on historical, philosophical, literary, and political questions. It is certain that Lord John first discovered his powers of debate in the years when he took a prominent part in the Tuesday night discussions in the hall which had been erected for the Speculative Society in 1769 in the grounds of the university. The subjects about which he spoke are at least of passing interest even now as a revelation of character, for they show the drift of his thoughts. He was not content with merely academic themes, such as Queen Elizabeth's treatment of Mary Queen of Scots, or the policy of Alcibiades. Topics of more urgent moment, like the war of 1793, the proceedings of the Spanish Cortes in 1810, the education of the poor, the value of Canada to Great Britain, and one at least of the burning subjects of the day--the imprisonment of Gale Jones in Newgate by order of the House of Commons--claimed his attention and drew forth his powers of argument and oratory. His mind was already turning in the direction of the subject of Parliamentary Reform, and from Edinburgh he forwarded to his father an essay on that subject, which still exists among the family papers. It shows that he was preparing to vindicate even then on a new field the liberal and progressive traditions of the Russells. The Duke of Bedford was never too busy or preoccupied to enter into his son's political speculations. He encouraged him to continue the habit of reasoning and writing on the great questions of the day, and Lord John, who in spite of uncertain health had no lack of energy, cheered by such kindly recognition, was not slow to respond to his father's sensible advice. [Sidenote: WELLINGTON AND THE WAR] Meanwhile the war in the Peninsula was progressing, and it appealed to the Edinburgh undergraduate now with new and even painful interest. His brother, Lord William Russell, had accompanied his regiment to Spain in the summer of 1809, and had been wounded at the battle of Talavera. In the course of the following summer, Lord John states, in a manuscript which is in Lady Russell's possession: 'I went to Cadiz to see my brother William, who was then serving on the staff of Sir Thomas Graham. The head-quarters was in a small town on the Isle of Leon, and the General, who was one of the kindest of men, gave me a bed in his house during the time that I remained there.' Cadiz was at the moment besieged by the French, and Lord John proceeds to describe the strategical points in its defence. Afterwards he accompanied Colonel Stanhope, a member of General Graham's staff, to the head-quarters of Lord Wellington, who had just occupied with his army the lines of Torres Vedras. He thus records his impressions of the great soldier, and of the spectacle which lay before him:--'Standing on the highest point, and looking around him on every side, was the English General, his eyes bright and searching as those of an eagle, his countenance full of hope, beaming with intelligence as he marked with quick perception every movement of troops and every change of circumstance within the sweep of the horizon. On each side of the fort of Sobral rose the entrenchments of the Allies, bristling with guns and alive with the troops who formed the garrison of this fortified position. Far off, on the left, the cliffs rose to a moderate elevation, and the lines of Torres Vedras were prominent in the distance.... There stood the advanced guard of the conquering legions of France; here was the living barrier of England, Spain, and Portugal, prepared to stay the destructive flood, and to preserve from the deluge the liberty and independence of three armed nations. The sight filled me with admiration, with confidence, and with hope.' Wellington told Colonel Stanhope that there was nothing he should like better than to attack the enemy, but since the force which he commanded was England's only army, he did not care to risk a battle. 'In fact, a defeat would have been most disastrous, for the English would have been obliged to retreat upon Lisbon and embark for England, probably after suffering great losses.' Within a fortnight Lord John was back again in London, and over the dinner table at Holland House the enterprising lad of eighteen was able to give Lord Grey an animated account of the prospects of the campaign, and of the appearance of Wellington's soldiers. The desire for Cambridge revived in Lord John with the conclusion of his Edinburgh course. His wishes were, however, overruled by his father, who, as already hinted, held extremely unfavourable views in regard to the characteristics at that period of undergraduate life in the English universities. The 'sciences of horse-racing, fox-hunting, and giving extravagant entertainments' the Duke regarded as the 'chief studies of our youths at Cambridge,' and he made no secret of his opinion that his promising son was better without them. Lord John's father is described by those who knew him as a plain, unpretending man, who talked well in private life, but was reserved in society. He was a great patron of the fine arts, and one of the best farmers in England, and was, moreover, able to hold his own in the debates of the House of Lords. [Sidenote: THE FIELD OF SALAMANCA] Meanwhile, at Woburn, Lord John's military ardour, which at this time was great, found an outlet in the command of a company of the Bedfordshire Militia. But the life of a country gentleman, even when it was varied by military drill, was not to the taste of this roving young Englishman. The passion for foreign travel, which he never afterwards wholly lost, asserted itself, and led him to cast about for congenial companions to accompany him abroad. Mr. George Bridgeman, afterwards Earl of Bradford, and Mr. Robert Clive, the second son of Earl Powis, agreed to accompany him, and with light hearts the three friends started in August 1812, with the intention of travelling through Sicily, Greece, Egypt, and Syria. They had not proceeded far, however, on their way to Southern Italy when tidings reached them that the battle of Salamanca had been fought and that Wellington had entered Madrid. The plans for exploring Sicily, Egypt, and Syria were instantly thrown to the winds, and the young enthusiasts at once bent their steps to the Spanish capital, in order to take part in the rejoicings of the populace at the victory of the Allies. They made the best of their way to Oporto, but were chagrined to find on arriving there that although Salamanca had been added to the list of Wellington's triumphs, the victor had not pushed on to the capital. Under these circumstances, Lord John and his companions determined to make a short tour in the northern part of Portugal before proceeding to Wellington's head-quarters at Burgos. They met with a few mild adventures on the road, and afterwards crossed the frontier and reached the field of Salamanca. The dead still lay unburied, and flocks of vultures rose sullenly as the travellers threaded their way across that terrible scene of carnage. However, neither Lord John's phlegm nor his philosophy deserted him, though the awfulness of the spectacle was not lost upon him. 'The blood spilt on that day will become a real saving of life if it become the means of delivering Spain from French dominion,' was his remark. At Burgos the young civilian renewed his acquaintance with the Commander-in-Chief, and added to his experience of war by being for a short time under fire from the French, who held the neighbouring fortress. Wellington, however, like other good soldiers, did not care for non-combatants at the front, and accordingly the youths started for Madrid. Finding that the French were in possession, they pushed southwards, and spent Christmas at Cadiz. The prolonged campaign decided them to carry out their original scheme. Leaving Cadiz at the end of January they set off, _via_ Gibraltar, Cordova, and Cartagena, for Alicante, where they proposed to embark for Sicily. But on the way reports reached them of French reverses, and they were emboldened once more to move towards Madrid. They had hardly started when other and less reassuring rumours reached them, and Lord John's two companions resolved to return to Alicante; but he himself determined to ride across the country to the head-quarters of the army, at Frenida, a distance of 150 miles. We are indebted to Mr. Bridgeman's published letters for the following account of Lord John's plucky ride:--'Finding the French did not continue the retreat, John Russell, my strange cousin and your ladyship's mad nephew, determined to execute a plan which he had often threatened, but it appeared to Clive and me so very injudicious a one that we never had an idea of his putting it into execution. However, the evening previous to our leaving Almaden, he said, "Well, I shall go to the army and see William, and I will meet you either at Madrid or Alicante." We found he was quite serious, and he then informed us of his intentions.... He would not take his servant, but ordered him to leave out half-a-dozen changes of linen, and his gun loaded. He was dressed in a blue greatcoat, overalls, and sword, and literally took nothing else except his dressing-case, a pair of pantaloons and shoes, a journal and an account book, pens and ink, and a bag of money. He would not carry anything to reload his gun, which he said his principal reason for taking was to sell, should he be short of money, for we had too little to spare him any. The next morning he sold his pony, bought a young horse, and rode the first league with us. Here we parted with each other with much regret, and poor John seemed rather forlorn. God grant he may have reached head-quarters in safety and health, for he had been far from well the last few days he was with us.... Clive and I feel fully persuaded that we shall see him no more till we return to England.' [Sidenote: A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY] The fears entertained for Lord John's safety were well founded. Difficulties of many kinds had to be encountered on the journey, and there was always the risk of being arrested and detained by French piquets. But the 150 miles were traversed without mishap, and in twelve days the 'mad nephew' entered the English quarters. He stayed at Frenida more than a month, probably waiting for an opportunity to see a great battle. But the wish was not gratified. Dictating to Lady Russell in his later life the narrative of his journey in Spain, he said: 'When Lord Wellington left his head-quarters on the frontier of Spain and Portugal for his memorable campaign of Vittoria, I thought that as I was not a soldier I might as well leave Lord Wellington and proceed on a journey of amusement to Madrid.' General Alava gave him introductions, and in the course of his journey he was entertained at dinner by a merry canon at Plasencia, who pressed upon him a liberal supply of wine. When Lord John declined taking any more, his host exclaimed: 'Do you not know the syllogism, "Qui bene bibit, bene dormit; qui bene dormit, non peccat; qui non peccat, salvatus erit"?' At this stage Lord John found it necessary to hire a servant who was capable of acting as guide. He used to say that his whole appearance on these journeys was somewhat grotesque, and in proof of this assertion he was accustomed in relating his adventures to add the following description:--'I wore a blue military cloak and a military cocked hat; I had a sword by my side; my whole luggage was carried in two bags, one on each side of the horse. In one of these I usually carried a leg of mutton, from which I cut two or three slices when I wished to prepare my dinner. My servant had a suit of clothes which had never been of the best, and was then mostly in rags. He, too, wore a cocked hat, and, being tall and thin, stalked before me with great dignity.' Such a description reads almost like a page from Cervantes. Thus attended, Lord John visited the scene of the battle of Talavera, in which his brother had been wounded, and on June 5, two days after the departure of the French, entered Madrid. Before the end of the month news arrived of the battle of Vittoria; and the young Englishman shared in the public rejoicings which greeted the announcement. 'From Talavera,' adds Lord John, 'I proceeded to Madrid, where I met my friends George Bridgeman and Robert Clive. With them I travelled to Valencia, and with them in a ship laden with salt fish to Majorca.' At Palma the travellers found hospitable quarters at the Bishop's palace, and after a brief stay crossed in an open boat to Port Mahon in Minorca--a rather risky trip, as the youths, with their love of adventure, made it by night, and were overtaken on the way by an alarming thunderstorm. Whilst in Minorca Lord John received a letter from his father, informing him of the death of his old friend General Fitzpatrick, and also stating that the Duke meant to use his influence at Tavistock to obtain for his son a seat in the House of Commons. 'He immediately flew home,' remarks his friend Mr. Bridgeman, 'on what wings I know not, but I suppose on those of political ambition.' The Duke's nomination rendered his election in those days of pocket-boroughs a foregone conclusion. As soon as Lord John set foot in England he was greeted with the tidings that he had already been elected member for Tavistock, and so began, at the age of one-and-twenty, a career in the House of Commons which was destined to last for nearly fifty years. CHAPTER II IN PARLIAMENT AND FOR THE PEOPLE 1813-1826 The political outlook when Lord John entered the House of Commons--The 'Condition of England' question--The struggle for Parliamentary Reform--Side-lights on Napoleon Bonaparte--The Liverpool Administration in a panic--Lord John comes to the aid of Sir Francis Burdett--Foreign travel--First motion in favour of Reform--Making headway LORD LIVERPOOL was at the head of affairs when Lord John Russell entered Parliament. His long tenure of power had commenced in the previous summer, and it lasted until the Premier was struck down by serious illness in the opening weeks of 1827. In Lord John's opinion, Lord Liverpool was a 'man of honest but narrow views,' and he probably would have endorsed the cynical description of him as the 'keystone rather than the capital' of his own Cabinet. Lord Castlereagh was at the Foreign Office, Lord Sidmouth was Home Secretary, Mr. Vansittart Chancellor of the Exchequer, Lord Palmerston Secretary at War, and Mr. Peel Secretary for Ireland. The political outlook on all sides was gloomy and menacing. The absorbing subject in Parliament was war and the sinews of war; whilst outside its walls hard-pressed taxpayers were moodily speculating on the probable figures in the nation's 'glory bill.' The two years' war with America was in progress. The battle between the _Shannon_ and the _Chesapeake_ was still the talk of the hour; but there seemed just then no prospect of peace. Napoleon still struggled for the dictatorship of Europe, and Englishmen were wondering to what extent they would have to share in the attempt to foil his ambition. The Peninsular campaign was costly enough to the British taxpayer; but his chagrin vanished--for the moment, at least--when Wellington's victories appealed to his pride. Since the beginning of the century the attention of Parliament and people had been directed mainly to foreign affairs. Domestic legislation was at a standstill. With one important exception--an Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade--scarcely any measure of note, apart from military matters and international questions, had passed the House of Commons. Parliamentary government, so far as it was supposed to be representative of the people, was a delusion. The number of members returned by private patronage for England and Wales amounted to more than three hundred. It was publicly asserted, and not without an appeal to statistics, that one hundred and fifty-four persons, great and small, actually returned no less than three hundred and seven members to the House of Commons. Representation in the boroughs was on a less worthy scale in the reign of George III. than it had been in the days of the Plantagenets, and whatever changes had been made in the franchise since the Tudors had been to the advantage of the privileged rather than to that of the people. [Sidenote: FALLEN BOROUGHS AND FANCY PRICES] Parliament was little more than an assembly of delegates sent by large landowners. Ninety members were returned by forty-six places in which there were less than fifty electors; and seventy members were returned by thirty-five places containing scarcely any electors at all. Places such as Old Sarum--consisting of a mound and a few ruins--returned two members; whilst Manchester, Leeds, and Birmingham, in spite of their great populations, and in spite, too, of keen political intelligence and far-reaching commercial activity, were not yet judged worthy of the least voice in affairs. At Gatton the right of election lay in the hands of freeholders and householders paying scot and lot; but the only elector was Lord Monson, who returned two members. Many of the boroughs were bought at a fancy price by men ambitious to enter Parliament--a method which seems, however, to have had the advantage of economy when the cost of some of the elections is taken into account. An election for Northampton cost the two candidates 30,000_l._ each, whilst Lord Milton and Mr. Lascelles, in 1807, spent between them 200,000_l._ at a contested election for the county of York. Bribery and corruption were of course practised wholesale, and publicans fleeced politicians and made fortunes out of the pockets of aspirants for Westminster. In the 'People's Book' an instance is cited of the way some borough elections were 'managed.' 'The patron of a large town in Ireland, finding, on the approach of an election, that opposition was to be made to his interest, marched a regiment of soldiers into the place from Loughrea, where they were quartered, and caused them to be elected freemen. These military freemen then voted for his friend, who was, of course, returned!' Inequality, inadequacy, unreality, corruption--these were the leading traits of the House of Commons. The House of Commons no more represented the people of the United Kingdom than the parish council of Little Peddleton mirrors the mind of Europe. The statute-book was disfigured by excessive penalities. Men were put in the pillory for perjury, libel, and the like. Forgers, robbers, incendiaries, poachers, and mutilators of cattle were sent to the gallows. Ignorance and brutality prevailed amongst large sections of the people both in town and country, and the privileged classes, in spite of vulgar ostentation and the parade of fine manners, set them an evil example in both directions. Yet, though the Church of England had no vision of the needs of the people and no voice for their wrongs, the great wave of religious life which had followed the preaching of Whitfield and Wesley had not spent its force, nor was it destined to do so before it had awakened in the multitude a spirit of quickened intelligence and self-respect which made them restive under political servitude and in the presence of acknowledged but unredressed grievances. Education, through the disinterested efforts of a group of philanthropists, was, moreover, beginning--in some slight degree, at least--to leaven the mass of ignorance in the country, the power of the press was making itself felt, and other agencies were also beginning to dispel the old apathy born of despair. The French Revolution, with its dramatic overthrow of tyranny and its splendid watchword, 'Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,' made its own appeal to the hope as well as the imagination of the English people, although the sanguinary incidents which marked it retarded the movement for Reform in England, and as a matter of fact sent the Reformers into the wilderness for the space of forty years. More than a quarter of a century before the birth of Lord John Russell, who was destined to carry the first Reform Bill through the House of Commons, Lord Chatham had not hesitated to denounce the borough representation of the country as the 'rotten part of our constitution,' which, he said, resembled a mortified limb; and he had added the significant words, 'If it does not drop, it must be amputated.' He held that it was useless to look for the strength and vigour of the constitution in little pocket-boroughs, and that the nation ought rather to rely on the 'great cities and counties.' Fox, in a debate in 1796, declared that peace could never be secured until the Constitution was amended. He added: 'The voice of the representatives of the people must prevail over the executive ministers of the Crown; the people must be restored to their just rights.' These warnings fell unheeded, until the strain of long-continued war, bad harvests, harsh poor laws, and exorbitant taxes on the necessities of life conspired to goad the people to the verge of open rebellion. [Sidenote: 'FRIENDS OF THE PEOPLE'] Wilkes, Pitt, Burdett, Cartwright, and Grey, again and again returned to the charge, only to find, however, that the strongholds of privilege were not easily overthrown. The year 1792, in which, by a noteworthy coincidence, Lord John Russell was born, was rendered memorable in the history of a movement with which his name will always be associated by the formation of the society of the 'Friends of the People,' an influential association which had its place of meeting at the Freemasons' Tavern. Amongst its first members were Mr. Lambton (father of the first Earl of Durham), Mr. (afterwards Sir James) Mackintosh, Mr. Sheridan, Mr. (afterwards Lord) Erskine, Mr. Charles (afterwards Earl) Grey, and more than twenty other members of Parliament. In the following year Mr. Grey brought forward the celebrated petition of the Friends of the People in the House of Commons. It exposed the abuses of the existing electoral system and presented a powerful argument for Parliamentary Reform. He moved that the petition should be referred to the consideration 'of a committee'; but Pitt, in spite of his own measure on the subject in 1785, was now lukewarm about Reform, and accordingly opposed as 'inopportune' such an inquiry. 'This is not a time,' were his words, 'to make hazardous experiments.' The spirit of anarchy, in his view, was abroad, and Burke's 'Reflections,' had of course increased the panic of the moment. Although Grey pressed the motion, only 141 members supported it, and though four years later he moved for leave to bring in a bill on the subject, justice and common sense were again over-ridden, and, so far as Parliament was concerned, the question slept until 1809, when Sir Francis Burdett revived the agitation. Meanwhile, men of the stamp of Horne Tooke, William Cobbett, Hone, 'Orator' Hunt, and Major Cartwright--brother of Lord John Russell's tutor at Woburn, and the originator of the popular cry, 'One man, one vote'--were in various ways keeping the question steadily before the minds of the people. Hampden Clubs and other democratic associations were also springing up in various parts of the country, sometimes to the advantage of demagogues of damaged reputation rather than to the advancement of the popular cause. Sir Francis Burdett may be said to have represented the Reformers in Parliament during the remainder of the reign of George III., though, just as the old order was changing, Earl Grey, in 1819, publicly renewed his connection with the question, and pledged himself to support any sound and judicious measure which promised to deal effectively with known abuses. In spite of the apathy of Parliament and the sullen opposition of the privileged classes to all projects of the kind, whether great or small, sweeping or partial, the question was slowly ripening in the public mind. Sydney Smith in 1819 declared, 'I think all wise men should begin to turn their minds Reformwards. We shall do it better than Mr. Hunt or Mr. Cobbett. Done it _must_ and _will_ be.' In the following year Lord John Russell, at the age of twenty-eight, became identified with the question of Parliamentary Reform by bringing before the House of Commons a measure for the redress of certain scandalous grievances, chiefly at Grampound. When Lord John's Parliamentary career began, George III. was hopelessly mad and blind, and, as if to heighten the depressing aspect of public affairs, the scandalous conduct of his sons was straining to the breaking-point the loyalty of men of intelligence to the Throne. [Sidenote: LORD JOHN'S MAIDEN SPEECH] Lord John's maiden speech in Parliament was directed against the proposal of the Liverpool Administration to enforce its views in regard to the union of Norway and Sweden. It escaped the attention of Parliamentary reporters and has passed into oblivion. The pages of 'Hansard,' however, give a brief summary of his next speech, which, like its predecessor, was on the side of liberty. It was delivered on July 14, 1814, in opposition to the second reading of the Alien Acts, which in spite of such a protest quickly became law. His comments were concise and characteristic. 'He considered the Act to be one which was very liable to abuse. The present time was that which least called for it; and Ministers, in bringing forward the measure now because it had been necessary before, reminded him of the unfortunate wag mentioned in 'Joe Miller,' who was so fond of rehearsing a joke that he always repeated it at the wrong time.' During the first months of his Parliamentary experience Lord John was elected a member of Grillion's Club, which had been established in Bond Street about twelve months previously, and which became in after-years a favourite haunt of many men of light and leading. It was founded on a somewhat novel basis. Leading members of the Whig and Tory parties met for social purposes. Political discussion was strictly tabooed, and nothing but the amenities of life were cultivated. In after-years the club became to Lord John Russell, as it has also been to many distinguished politicians, a welcome haven from the turmoil of Westminster. Delicate health in the autumn quickened Lord John's desire to renew the pleasures of foreign travel. He accordingly went by sea to Italy, and arrived at Leghorn in the opening days of December. He was still wandering in Southern Europe when Parliament reassembled, and the Christmas Eve of that year was rendered memorable to him by an interview with Napoleon in exile at Elba. [Sidenote: A GLIMPSE OF NAPOLEON] Through the kindness of Lady Russell it is possible here to quote from an old-fashioned leather-bound volume in her husband's handwriting, which gives a detailed account of the incidents of his Italian tour in 1814-15, and of his conversation on this occasion with the banished despot of Europe. Part of what follows has already been published by Mr. Walpole, but much of it has remained for eighty years in the privacy of Lord John's own notebook, from the faded pages of which it is now transcribed:--'Napoleon was dressed in a green coat, with a hat in his hand, very much as he is painted; but, excepting the resemblance of dress, I had a very mistaken idea of him from his portrait. He appears very short, which is partly owing to his being very fat, his hands and legs being quite swollen and unwieldy. That makes him appear awkward, and not unlike the whole-length figure of Gibbon the historian. Besides this, instead of the bold-marked countenance that I expected, he has fat cheeks and rather a turn-up nose, which, to bring in another historian, makes the shape of his face resemble the portraits of Hume. He has a dusky grey eye, which would be called vicious in a horse, and the shape of his mouth expresses contempt and decision. His manner is very good-natured, and seems studied to put one at one's ease by its familiarity; his smile and laugh are very agreeable; he asks a number of questions without object, and often repeats them, a habit which he has, no doubt, acquired during fifteen years of supreme command. He began asking me about my family, the allowance my father gave me, if I ran into debt, drank, played, &c. He asked me if I had been in Spain, and if I was not imprisoned by the Inquisition. I told him that I had seen the abolition of the Inquisition voted, and of the injudicious manner in which it was done.' Napoleon told Lord John that Ferdinand was in the hands of the priests. Spain, like Italy, he added, was a fine country, especially Andalusia and Seville. Lord John admitted this, but spoke of the uncultivated nature of the land. 'Agriculture,' replied Napoleon, 'is neglected because the land is in the hands of the Church.' 'And of the grandees,' suggested his visitor. 'Yes,' was the answer, 'who have privileges contrary to the public prosperity.' Napoleon added that he thought the evil might be remedied by divided property and abolishing hurtful privileges, as was done in France. Afterwards Napoleon asked many questions about the Cortes, and when Lord John told him that many of the members made good speeches on abstract questions, but they failed when any practical debate on finance or war took place, Napoleon drily remarked: 'Oui, faute de l'habitude de gouverner.' Presently the talk drifted to Wellington, or rather Napoleon adroitly led it thither. He described the man who had driven the French out of Spain as a 'grand chasseur,' and asked if Wellington liked Paris. Lord John replied that he thought not, and added that Wellington had said that he should find himself much at a loss as to what to do in time of peace, as he seemed scarcely to like anything but war. Whereupon Napoleon exclaimed, 'La guerre est un grand jeu, une belle occupation.' He expressed his surprise that England should have sent the Duke to Paris, and he added, evidently with a touch of bitterness, 'On n'aime pas l'homme par qui on a été battu.' The Emperor's great anxiety seemed to be to get reliable tidings of the condition of France. Lord John's own words are: 'He inquired if I had seen at Florence many Englishmen who came from there, and when I mentioned Lord Holland, he asked if he thought things went well with the Bourbons. When I answered in the negative he seemed delighted, and asked if Lord Holland thought they would be able to stay there.' On this point Lord John was not able to satisfy him, and Napoleon said that he understood that the Bourbons had neglected the Englishmen who had treated them well in England, and particularly the Duke of Buckingham, and he condemned their lack of gratitude. Lord John suggested that the Bourbons were afraid to be thought to be dependent on the English, but Napoleon brushed this aside by asserting that the English in general were very well received. In a mocking tone he expressed his wish to know whether the army was much attached to the Bourbons. The Vienna Congress was, of course, just then in progress, and Napoleon showed himself nothing loth to talk about it. He said: 'The Powers will disagree, but they will not go to war.' He spoke of the Regent's conduct to the Princess as very impolitic, and he added that it shocked the _bienséances_ by the observance of which his father George III. had become so popular. He declared that our struggle with America was 'une guerre de vengeance,' as the frontier question could not possibly be of any importance. According to Napoleon, the great superiority of England to France lay in her aristocracy. [Sidenote: NAPOLEON'S PREDICTION ABOUT INDIA] Napoleon stated that he had intended to create a new aristocracy in France by marrying his officers to the daughters of the old nobility, and he added that he had reserved a fund from the contributions which he levied when he made treaties with Austria, Prussia, &c., in order to found these new families. Speaking of some of the naval engagements, 'he found great fault with the French admiral who fought the battle of the Nile, and pointed out what he ought to have done; but he found most fault with the admiral who fought Sir R. Calder for not disabling his fleet, and said that if he could have got the Channel clear then, or at any other time, he would have invaded England.' Talleyrand, he declared, had advised the war with Spain, and Napoleon also made out that he had prevented him from saving the Duc d'Enghien. Spain ought to have been conquered, and Napoleon declared that he would have gone there himself if the war with Russia had not occurred. England would repent of bringing the Russians so far, and he added in this connection the remarkable words, 'They will deprive her of India.' After lingering for a while in Vienna, Florence, Rome, Naples, and other cities, Lord John returned home by way of Germany, and on June 5 he spoke in Parliament against the renewal of hostilities. He was one of the small minority in Parliament who refused to regard Napoleon's flight from Elba as a sufficient _casus belli_. Counsels of peace, however, were naturally just then not likely to prevail, and Wellington's victory a fortnight later falsified Lord John's fears. He did not speak again until February 1816, when, in seconding an amendment to the Address, he protested against the continuance of the income-tax as a calamity to the country. He pointed out that, although there had been repeated victories abroad, prosperity at home had vanished; that farmers could not pay their rents nor landlords their taxes; and that everybody who was not paid out of the public purse felt that prosperity was gone. A few weeks later he opposed the Army Estimates, contending that a standing army of 150,000 men 'must alarm every friend of his country and its constitution.' It was probably owing in a measure to the hopelessness of the situation, but also partly to ill-health, that Lord John absented himself to a great extent from Parliament. He was, in truth, chagrined at the course of affairs and discouraged with his own prospects, and in consequence he lapsed for a time into the position of a silent member of the House of Commons. Meanwhile, the summer of 1816 was wet and cold and the harvest was in consequence a disastrous failure. Wheat rose to 103_s._ a quarter, and bread riots broke out in the Eastern Counties. The Luddites, who commenced breaking up machinery in manufacturing towns in 1811, again committed great excesses. Tumults occurred in London, and the Prince Regent was insulted in the streets on his return from opening Parliament. [Sidenote: PANIC-STRICKEN AUTHORITY] The Liverpool Cabinet gave way to panic, and quickly resorted to extreme measures. A secret committee was appointed in each House to investigate the causes of the disaffection of a portion of his Majesty's subjects. Four bills were, as the result of their deliberations, swiftly introduced and passed through Parliament. The first enacted penalties for decoying sailors and soldiers; the second was a pitiful exhibition of lack of confidence, for it aimed at special measures for the protection of the Prince Regent; the third furnished magistrates with unusual powers for the prevention of seditious meetings; and the fourth suspended the Habeas Corpus Act till July 1, giving the Executive authority 'to secure and detain such persons as his Majesty shall suspect are conspiring against his person and Government.' The measures of the Government filled Lord John with indignation, and he assailed the proposal to suspend the Habeas Corpus Act in a vigorous speech, which showed conclusively that his sympathies were on the side of the weak and distressed classes of the community. 'I had not intended,' he said, 'to trouble the House with any observations of mine during the present session of Parliament. Indeed, the state of my health induced me to resolve upon quitting the fatiguing business of this House altogether. But he must have no ordinary mind whose attention is not roused in a singular manner when it is proposed to suspend the rights and liberties of Englishmen, though even for a short period. I am determined, for my own part, that no weakness of frame, no indisposition of body, shall prevent my protesting against the most dangerous precedent which this House ever made. We talk much--I think, a great deal too much--of the wisdom of our ancestors. I wish we could imitate the courage of our ancestors. They were not ready to lay their liberties at the foot of the Crown upon every vain or imaginary alarm.' He begged the majority not to give, by the adoption of a policy of coercion, the opponents of law and order the opportunity of saying, 'When we ask for redress you refuse all innovation; when the Crown asks for protection you sanction a new code.' All protests, as usual, were thrown away, and the bill was passed. Lord John resumed his literary tasks, and as a matter of fact only once addressed the House in the course of the next two years. He repeatedly declared his intention of entirely giving up politics and devoting his time to literature and travel. Many friends urged him to relinquish such an idea. Moore's poetical 'Remonstrance,' which gladdened Lord John not a little at the moment, is so well known that we need scarcely quote more than the closing lines: Thus gifted, thou never canst sleep in the shade; If the stirring of genius, the music of fame, And the charm of thy cause have not power to persuade, Yet think how to freedom thou'rt pledged by thy name. Like the boughs of that laurel, by Delphi's decree Set apart for the fane and its service divine, All the branches that spring from the old Russell tree Are by Liberty claimed for the use of her shrine.' Lord John's literary labours began at this time to be considerable. He also enlarged his knowledge of the world by giving free play to his love of foreign travel. [Sidenote: FEELING HIS WAY] A general election occurred in the summer of 1818, and it proved that though the Tories were weakened they still had a majority. Lord John, with his uncle Lord William Russell, were, however, returned for Tavistock. Public affairs in 1819 were of a kind to draw him from his retirement, and as a matter of fact it was in that year that his speeches began to attract more than passing notice. He spoke briefly in favour of reducing the number of the Lords of the Admiralty, advocated an inquiry into domestic and foreign policy, protested against the surrender of the town of Parga, on the coast of Epirus, to the Turks, and made an energetic speech against the prevailing bribery and corruption which disgraced contested elections. The summer of that year was also rendered memorable in Lord John's career by his first speech on Parliamentary Reform. In July, Sir Francis Burdett, undeterred by previous overwhelming defeats, brought forward his usual sweeping motion demanding universal suffrage, equal electoral districts, vote by ballot, and annual Parliaments. Lord John's criticism was level-headed, and therefore characteristic. He had little sympathy with extreme measures, and he knew, moreover, that it was not merely useless but injurious to the cause of Reform to urge them at such a moment. The opposition was too powerful and too impervious to anything in the nature of an idea to give such proposals just then the least chance of success. Property meant to fight hard for its privileges, and the great landowners looked upon their pocket-boroughs as a goodly heritage as well as a rightful appanage of rank and wealth. As for the great unrepresented towns, they were regarded as hot-beds of sedition, and therefore the people were to be kept in their place, and that meant without a voice in the affairs of the nation. The close corporations and the corrupt boroughs were meanwhile dismissed with a shrug of the shoulders or a laugh of scorn. Lord John was as yet by no means a full-fledged Reformer, but it was something in those days for a duke's son to take sides, even in a modified way, with the party of progress. His speech represented the views not so much of the multitude as of the middle classes. They were alarmed at the truculent violence of mob orators up and down the country; their fund of inherited reverence for the aristocracy was as yet scarcely diminished. They had their own dread of spoliation, and they had not quite recovered from their fright over the French Revolution. They were law abiding, moreover, and the blood and treasure which it had cost the nation to crush Napoleon had allayed in thousands of them the thirst for glory, and turned them into possibly humdrum but very sincere lovers of peace. Lord John's speech was an appeal to the average man in his strength and in his limitations, and men of cautious common-sense everywhere rejoiced that the young Whig--who was liked none the less by farmer and shopkeeper because he was a lord--had struck the nail exactly on the head. The growth of Lord John's influence in Parliament was watched at Woburn with keen interest. 'I have had a good deal of conversation,' wrote the Duke, 'with old Tierney at Cassiobury about you.... I find with pleasure that he has a very high opinion of your debating powers; and says, if you will stick to one branch of politics and not range over too desultory a field, you may become eminently useful and conspicuous in the House of Commons.... The line I should recommend for your selection would be that of foreign politics, and all home politics bearing on civil and religious liberty--a pretty wide range....' As soon as the end of the session brought a respite from his Parliamentary duties Lord John started for the Continent with Moore the poet. The author of 'Lalla Rookh' was at that moment struggling, after the manner of the majority of poets at any moment, with the three-headed monster pounds, shillings, and pence, through the failure of his deputy in an official appointment at Bermuda. The poet's journal contains many allusions to Lord John, and the following passage from it, dated September 4, 1819, speaks for itself:--'Set off with Lord John in his carriage at seven; breakfasted and arrived at Dover to dinner at seven o'clock; the journey very agreeable. Lord John mild and sensible; took off Talma very well. Mentioned Buonaparte having instructed Talma in the part of Nero; correcting him for being in such a bustle in giving his orders, and telling him they ought to be given calmly, as coming from a person used to sovereignty.'[1] After a fortnight in Paris the travellers went on to Milan, where they parted company, Moore going to Venice to visit Byron, and Lord John to Genoa, to renew a pleasant acquaintance with Madame Durazzo, an Italian lady of rank who was at one time well known in English society. [Sidenote: MADAME DURAZZO] Madame Durazzo was a quick-witted and accomplished woman, and her vivacious and sympathetic nature was hardly less remarkable than her personal charm. There is evidence enough that she made a considerable impression upon the young English statesman, who, indeed, wrote a sonnet about her. Lord John's verdict on Italy and the Italians is pithily expressed in a hitherto unpublished extract from his journal:--'Italy is a delightful country for a traveller--every town full of the finest specimens of art, even now, and many marked by remains of antiquity near one another--all different. Easy travelling, books in plenty, living cheap and tolerably good--what can a man wish for but a little grace and good taste in dress amongst women? Men of science abound in Italy--the Papal Government discouraged them at Rome; but the country cannot be said to be behind the world in knowledge. Poets, too, are plenty; I never read their verses.' Meanwhile, the condition of England was becoming critical. Birmingham, Leeds, Manchester, and other great towns were filled with angry discontent, and turbulent mass meetings of the people were held to protest against any further neglect of their just demands for political representation. Major Cartwright advised these great unrepresented communities to 'send a petition in the form of a living man instead of one on parchment or paper,' so that he might state in unmistakable terms their demands to the Speaker. Sir Charles Wolseley, a Staffordshire baronet and a friend of Burdett, was elected with a great flourish of trumpets at Birmingham to act in this capacity, and Manchester determined also to send a representative, and on August 16, 1819, a great open-air meeting was called to give effect to this resolution. The multitude were dispersed by the military, and readers of Bamford's 'Passages in the Life of a Radical' will remember his graphic and detailed description of the scene of tumult and bloodshed which followed, and which is known as the Peterloo Massacre. The carnage inspired Shelley's magnificent 'Mask of Anarchy':-- ... One fled past, a maniac maid, And her name was Hope, she said: But she looked more like Despair, And she cried out in the air: 'My father Time is weak and grey With waiting for a better day.' [Sidenote: OIL AND VINEGAR] In those days Parliament did not sit in August, and the members of the Cabinet were not at hand when the crisis arose. The Prince Regent expressed his approbation of the conduct of the magistrates of Manchester as well as of that of the officers and troops of the cavalry, whose firmness and effectual support of the civil power preserved the peace of the town. The Cabinet also lost no time in giving its emphatic support to the high-handed action of the Lancashire magistrates, and Major Cartwright and other leaders of the popular movement became the heroes of the hour because the Liverpool Administration was foolish enough to turn them into political martyrs by prosecuting them on the charge of sedition. Lord John at this crisis received several letters urging his return home immediately. That his influence was already regarded as of some importance is evident from the terms in which Sir James Mackintosh addressed him. 'You are more wanted than anybody, not only for general service, but because your Reform must be immediately brought forward--if possible, as the act of the party, but at all events as the creed of all Whig Reformers.' Writing to Moore from Genoa on November 9, Lord John says: 'I am just setting off for London. Mackintosh has written me an oily letter, to which I have answered by a vinegar one; but I want you to keep me up in acerbity.' Soon after Parliament met, the famous Six Acts--usually termed the 'Gagging Acts'--were passed, though not without strenuous opposition. These measures were intended to hinder delay in the administration of justice in the case of misdemeanour, to prevent the training of persons to the use of arms, to enable magistrates to seize and detain arms, to prevent seditious meetings, and to bring to punishment the authors of blasphemous and seditious libels. No meeting of more than fifty people was to be held without six days' notice to a magistrate; only freeholders or inhabitants were to be allowed even to attend; and adjournments were forbidden. The time and place of meeting were, if deemed advisable, to be changed by the local authorities, and no banners or flags were to be displayed. The wisdom of Lord Eldon, the patriotism of Lord Castlereagh, and the panic of Lord Sidmouth were responsible for these tyrannical enactments. On December 14 Lord John brought forward his first resolutions in favour of Reform. He proposed (1) that all boroughs in which gross and notorious bribery and corruption should be proved to prevail should cease to return members to Parliament; (2) that the right so taken away should be given to some great town or to the largest counties; (3) that it is the duty of the House to consider of further means to detect and to prevent corruption in Parliamentary elections; (4) that it is expedient that the borough of Grampound should be disfranchised. Even Castlereagh complimented him on the manner in which he had introduced the question, and undertook that, if Lord John would withdraw the resolutions and bring in a bill to disfranchise Grampound, he would not oppose the proposition, and to this arrangement Lord John consented. Shortly before the dissolution of Parliament, consequent upon the death of the King, in January 1820, Lord John obtained leave to bring in a bill for suspending the issue of writs to the corrupt boroughs of Penryn, Camelford, Grampound, and Barnstaple. But the alarm occasioned by the Cato Street Conspiracy threw back the movement and awakened all the old prejudices against even the slightest concession. At the general election of 1820 Lord John was returned for the county of Huntingdon. As soon as possible Lord John returned to the charge, and brought forward his measure for dealing with Grampound and to transfer the right of voting to Leeds, the franchise to be given to occupiers of houses rated at 5_l._ and upwards. In his 'Recollections and Suggestions' Lord John says: 'With a view to work my way to a change, not by eloquence--for I had none--but by patient toil and a plain statement of facts, I brought before the House of Commons the case of Grampound. I obtained an inquiry, and, with the assistance of Mr. Charles Wynn, I forced the solicitors employed in bribery to reveal the secrets of their employers: the case was clear; the borough was convicted.' Whilst the debate was proceeding Queen Caroline arrived in England from the Continent, and was received with much popular enthusiasm. Hostile measures were at once taken in the House of Commons against her, and though the despicable proceedings eventually came to nought, they effectually stopped all further discussion of the question of Reform for the time being. [Sidenote: THE 'FIRST GENTLEMAN OF EUROPE'] Like Canning and Brougham, Lord John took the side of the injured Queen, and he drew up a petition to George IV. begging him to end the further consideration of the Bill of Pains and Penalties against Caroline by proroguing Parliament. Such a request was entirely thrown away on a man of the character of George IV., for the King was bent on a policy of mean revenge; and as only the honour of a woman was concerned, the 'first gentleman of Europe' found the Liverpool Administration obsequious enough to do his bidding. When at length public opinion prevailed and the proceedings against the Queen were withdrawn in November, and whilst rejoicings and illuminations were going on in London at the Queen's deliverance, Lord John went to Paris, remaining there till January. Moore was in Paris, and he was much in his company, and divided the rest of his time between literature and society. He wrote his now forgotten novel, 'The Nun of Arrouca,' during the six weeks which he spent in Paris. A Frenchman, visiting the poet, 'lamented that his friend Lord John showed to so little advantage in society from his extreme taciturnity, and still more from his apparent coldness and indifference to what is said by others. Several here to whom he was introduced had been much disappointed in consequence of this manner.' Lady Blessington, who was at that time living abroad, states that Lord John came and dined with herself and the Earl, and the comments of so beautiful and accomplished a woman of fashion are at least worthy of passing record. 'Lord John was in better health and spirits than when I remember him in England. He is exceedingly well read, and has a quiet dash of humour, that renders his observations very amusing. When the reserve peculiar to him is thawed, he can be very agreeable. Good sense, a considerable power of discrimination, a highly cultivated mind, a great equality of temper, are the characteristics of Lord John Russell, and these peculiarly fit him for taking a distinguished part in public life.' Lady Blessington adds that the only obstacle, in her opinion, to Lord John's success lays in the natural reserve of his manners, which might lead people 'to think him cold and proud.' This is exactly what happened, and only those who knew Lord John intimately were aware of the delicate consideration for others which lurked beneath his somewhat frigid demeanour. [Sidenote: HALF A LOAF OR NO BREAD] Early in the year 1821 Lord John reintroduced his bill for the disfranchisement of Grampound. Several amendments were proposed, and one, brought forward by Mr. Stuart Wortley, limiting the right to vote to 20_l._ householders, was carried. Thereupon Lord John declined to take further charge of the measure. After being altered and pruned by both Houses the bill was passed, in spite of Lord Eldon, 'with tears and doleful predictions,' urging the peers 'to resist this first turn of the helm towards the whirlpool of democracy.' Grampound ceased to exist as a Parliamentary borough, and the county of York gained two members. Although Lord John supported the amended bill--on the principle that half a loaf is better than no bread--he at the same time announced that 'in a future session he proposed to call attention to the claims of large towns to send members to this House.' He was determined to do all in his power to deprive what he termed the 'dead bones of a former state of England' of political influence, and to give representation to what he termed the 'living energy and industry of the England of the nineteenth century, with its steam-engines and its factories, its cotton and woollen cloths, its cutlery and its coal-mines, its wealth and its intelligence.' Whilst the bill about Grampound was being discussed by the Lords he took further action in this direction, and presented four resolutions for the discovery and punishment of bribery, the disfranchisement of corrupt boroughs, and the enfranchisement of wealthy and populous towns. On a division his proposals were defeated by thirty-one votes in a House of 279 members, and this, under all the circumstances, was a better result than he expected. On April 25, 1822, Lord John again tested the feeling of Parliament with his motion 'that the present state of the representation requires serious consideration.' In the course of a speech of three hours he startled the House by proposing that 100 new members should be added, and, in order that the Commons should not be overcrowded, he added another resolution, to the effect that a similar number of the small boroughs should be represented by one member instead of two. Mr. Canning opposed such a scheme, but complimented Lord John on the ability he had displayed in its advocacy, and then added: 'That the noble lord will carry his motion this evening I have no fear; but with the talents which he has shown himself to possess, and with (I sincerely hope) a long and brilliant career of Parliamentary distinction before him, he will, no doubt, renew his efforts hereafter. If, however, he shall persevere, and if his perseverance shall be successful, and if the results of that success shall be such as I cannot help apprehending, his be the triumph to have precipitated those results, be mine the consolation that, to the utmost and to the latest of my power, I have opposed them.'[2] Little persuasion was necessary to win a hostile vote, and in a House of 433 members Lord John found himself in a minority of 164. Next year he renewed his attempt, but with the same result, and in 1826 he once more brought forward his proposals for Reform, to be defeated. Two months afterwards, however--May 26, 1826--undaunted by his repeated failures, he brought in a bill for the discovery and suppression of bribery at elections. The forces arrayed against him again proved too formidable, and Lord John, deeming it useless to proceed, abandoned the bill. He made one more attempt in the expiring Parliament, in a series of resolutions, to arrest political corruption, and when the division was taken the numbers were equal, whereupon the Speaker recorded his vote on Lord John's side. In June the House was dissolved. [Sidenote: A WHIG OF THE NEW GENERATION] The Whigs of the new generation were meanwhile dreaming of projects which had never entered into the calculations of their predecessors. Lord John long afterwards gave expression to the views which were beginning to prevail, such as non-interference in the internal government of other nations, the necessity of peace with America and the acknowledgment of her Independence, the satisfaction of the people of Ireland by the concession of political equality, the advancement of religious liberty, parliamentary reform, and the unrestricted liberty of the press. 'Had these principles,' he declares, 'prevailed from 1770 to 1820, the country would have avoided the American War and the first French Revolutionary War, the rebellion in Ireland in 1798, and the creation of three or four millions of national debt.'[3] Whenever opportunity allowed, Lord John sought in Parliament during the period under review to give practical effect to such convictions. He spoke in favour of the repeal of the Foreign Enlistment Bill, on the question of the evacuation of Spain by the French army, on the Alien Bill, on an inquiry into labourers' wages, on the Irish Insurrection Bill, on Roman Catholic claims and Roman Catholic endowment, and on agricultural distress. During the closing years of George III.'s reign and the inglorious days of his successor, Lord John Russell rose slowly but steadily towards political influence and power. His speeches attracted growing attention, and his courage and common sense were rewarded with the deepening confidence of the nation. Although he was still regarded with some little dread by his 'betters and his elders,' to borrow his own phrase, the people hailed with satisfaction the rise of so honest, clear-headed, and dogged a champion of peace, retrenchment, and Reform. Court and Cabinet might look askance at the young statesman, but the great towns were at his back, and he knew--in spite of all appearances to the contrary--that they, though yet unrepresented, were in reality stronger than all the forces of selfish privilege and senseless prejudice. Lord John had proved himself to be a man of action. The nation was beginning to dream that he would yet prove himself to be a man of mark. FOOTNOTES: [1] _Memoirs, Journal, and Correspondence of Thomas Moore._ Edited by the Right Hon. Lord John Russell, M.P. [2] Canning's Speeches. [3] _Recollections and Suggestions_, p. 43. CHAPTER III WINNING HIS SPURS 1826-1830 Defeated and out of harness--Journey to Italy--Back in Parliament--Canning's accession to power--Bribery and corruption--The repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts--The struggle between the Court and the Cabinet over Catholic Emancipation--Defeat of Wellington at the polls--Lord John appointed Paymaster-General. WHIG optimists in the newspapers at the General Election of 1826 declared that the future welfare of the country would depend much on the intelligence and independence of the new Parliament. Ordinary men accustomed to look facts in the face were not, however, so sanguine, and Albany Fonblanque expressed the more common view amongst Radicals when he asserted that if the national welfare turned on the exhibition in an unreformed House of Commons of such unparliamentary qualities as intelligence and independence, there would be ground not for hope but for despair. He added that he saw no shadow of a reason for supposing that one Parliament under the existing system would differ in any essential degree from another. He maintained that, while the sources of corruption continued to flow, legislation would roll on in the same course. Self-improvement was, in truth, the last thing to be expected from a House of Commons which represented vested rights, and the interests and even the caprices of a few individuals, rather than the convictions or needs of the nation. The Tory party was stubborn and defiant even when the end of the Liverpool Administration was in sight. The Test Acts were unrepealed, prejudice and suspicion shut out the Catholics from the Legislature, and the sacred rights of property triumphed over the terrible wrongs of the slave. The barbarous enactments of the Criminal Code had not yet been entirely swept away, and the municipal corporations, even to contemporary eyes, appeared as nothing less than sinks of corruption. Lord John was defeated in Huntingdonshire, and, to his disappointment, found himself out of harness. He had hoped to bring in his Bribery Bill early in the session, and under the altered circumstances he persuaded Lord Althorp to press the measure forward. In a letter to that statesman which was afterwards printed, he states clearly the evils which he wished to remedy. A sentence or two will show the need of redress: 'A gentleman from London goes down to a borough of which he scarcely before knew the existence. The electors do not ask his political opinions; they do not inquire into his private character; they only require to be satisfied of the impurity of his intentions. If he is elected, no one, in all probability, contests the validity of his return. His opponents are as guilty as he is, and no other person will incur the expense of a petition for the sake of a public benefit. Fifteen days after the meeting of Parliament (this being the limit for the presentation of a petition), a handsome reward is distributed to each of the worthy and independent electors.' [Sidenote: A SARCASTIC APPEAL] In the early autumn Lord John quitted England, with the intention of passing the winter in Italy. The Duke of Bedford felt that his son had struck the nail on the head with his pithy and outspoken letter to Lord Althorp on political bribery, and he was not alone in thinking that Lord John ought not to throw away such an advantage by a prolonged absence on the Continent. Lord William accordingly wrote to his brother to urge a speedy return, and the letter is worth quoting, since incidentally it throws light on another aspect of Lord John's character: 'If you feel any ambition--which you have not; if you give up the charms of Genoa--which you cannot; if you could renounce the dinners and tea-tables and gossips of Rome--which you cannot; if you would cease to care about attending balls and assemblies, and dangling after ladies--which you cannot, there is a noble field of ambition and utility opened to a statesman. It is Ireland, suffering, ill-used Ireland! The gratitude of millions, the applause of the world, would attend the man who would rescue the poor country. The place is open, and must soon be filled up. Ireland cannot remain as she is. The Ministers feel it, and would gladly listen to any man who would point out the way to relieve her. Undertake the task; it is one of great difficulty, but let that be your encouragement. See the Pope's minister; have his opinion on the Catholic question; go to Ireland; find out the causes of her suffering; make yourself master of the subject. Set to work, as you did about Reform, by curing small evils at first.... I am pointing to the way for you to make your name immortal, by doing good to millions and to your country. But you will yawn over this, and go to some good dinner to be agreeable, the height of ambition with the present generation.' Meanwhile, through the influence of the Duke of Devonshire, Lord John was elected in November for the Irish borough of Bandon Bridge, and in February, fresh from prologue-writing for the private theatricals which Lord Normanby was giving that winter in Florence, he took his seat in the House of Commons. Lord Liverpool was struck down with paralysis on February 18, and it quickly became apparent that his case was hopeless. After a few weeks of suspense, which were filled with Cabinet intrigues, Mr. Canning received the King's commands to reconstruct the Ministry; but this was more easily said than done. 'Lord Liverpool's disappearance from the political scene,' says Lord Russell, 'gave rise to a great _débâcle_. The fragments of the old system rushed against each other, and for a time all was confusion.' Six of Canning's colleagues flatly refused to serve under him in the new Cabinet--Peel, Wellington, Eldon, Westmoreland, Bathurst, and Bexley--though the latter afterwards took advantage of his second thoughts and returned to the fold. Although an opponent of Parliamentary reform and of the removal of Nonconformist disabilities, Canning gave his support to Catholic emancipation, to the demand for free trade, and the abolition of slavery. Canning's accession to power threw the Tory ranks into confusion. 'The Tory party,' states Lord Russell, 'which had survived the follies and disasters of the American war, which had borne the defeats and achieved the final glories of the French war, was broken by its separation from Mr. Canning into fragments, which could not easily be reunited.' [Sidenote: CANNING IN POWER] Sydney Smith--who, by the way, had no love for Canning, and failed to a quite noteworthy extent to understand him--like the rest, took a gloomy view of the situation, which he summed up in his own inimitable fashion. 'Politics, domestic and foreign, are very discouraging; Jesuits abroad, Turks in Greece, "No Poperists" in England! A panting to burn B; B fuming to roast C; C miserable that he can't reduce D to ashes; and D consigning to eternal perdition the first three letters of the alphabet.' Canning's tenure of power was brief and uneasy. His opponents were many, his difficulties were great, and, to add to all, his health was failing. 'My position,' was his own confession, 'is not that of gratified ambition.' His Administration only lasted five months, for at the end of that period death cut short the brilliant though erratic and disappointed career of a statesman of courage and capacity, who entered public life as a follower of Pitt, and refused in after years to pin his faith blindly to either political party, and so incurred the suspicions alike of uncompromising Whigs and unbending Tories. During the Canning Administration, Lord John's influence in the House made itself felt, and always along progressive lines. When the annual Indemnity Bill for Dissenters came up for discussion, he, in answer to a taunt that the Whigs were making political capital out of the Catholic question, and at the same time neglecting the claims of the Nonconformists, declared that he was ready to move the repeal of restrictions upon the Dissenters as soon as they themselves were of opinion that the moment was ripe for action. This virtual challenge, as will be presently seen, was recognised by the Nonconformists as a call to arms. Meanwhile cases of flagrant bribery at East Retford and Penryn--two notoriously corrupt boroughs--came before the House, and it was proposed to disenfranchise the former and to give in its place two members to Birmingham. The bill, however, did not get beyond its second reading. Lord John, nothing daunted, proposed in the session of 1828 that Penryn should suffer disenfranchisement, and that Manchester should take its place. This was ultimately carried in the House of Commons; but the Peers fought shy of Manchester, and preferred to 'amend' the bill by widening the right of voting at Penryn to the adjacent Hundred. This refusal to take occasion by the hand and to gratify the political aspirations of the most important unrepresented town in the kingdom, did much to hasten the introduction of a wider scheme of reform. Power slipped for the moment on the death of Canning into the weak hands of Lord Goderich, who tried ineffectually to keep together a Coalition Ministry. Lord John's best friends appear to have been apprehensive at this juncture lest the young statesman, in the general confusion of parties, should lapse into somewhat of a political Laodicean. 'I feel a little anxious,' wrote Moore, 'to know exactly the colour of your politics just now, as from the rumours I hear of some of your brother "watchmen," Althorp, Milton, and the like, I begin sometimes to apprehend that you too may be among the fallers off. Lord Lansdowne tells me, however, you continue quite staunch, and for his sake I hope so.' But Lord John was not a 'faller off.' His eyes were fully open to the anomalous position in which he in common with other members of the party of reform had been placed under Canning and Goderich. Relief, however, came swiftly. Lord Goderich, after four months of feeble semblance of authority, resigned, finding it impossible to adjust differences. As a subaltern, declared one who had narrowly watched his career, Lord Goderich was respectable, but as a chief he proved himself to be despicable. The Duke of Wellington became Prime Minister, with a Tory Cabinet at his back, and with Peel as leader in the House of Commons. Thus the 'great _débâcle_,' which commenced with Canning's accession to power--in spite of the presence in the Cabinet of Palmerston and Huskisson--drew to an end, and a line of cleavage was once more apparent between the Whigs and the Tories. With Wellington, Lord John had of course neither part nor lot, and when the Duke accepted office he promptly ranged himself in the opposite camp. [Sidenote: RELIGIOUS EQUALITY] Ireland was on the verge of rebellion when Wellington and Peel took office, and in the person of O'Connell it possessed a leader of splendid eloquence and courage, who pressed the claims of the Roman Catholics for immediate relief from religious disabilities. Whilst the Government was deliberating upon the policy which they ought to pursue in presence of the stormy and menacing agitation which had arisen in Ireland, the Protestant Dissenters saw their opportunity, and rallied their forces into a powerful organisation for the total repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts. Their cause had been quietly making way, through the Press and the platform, during the dark years for political and religious liberty which divide 1820 from 1828, and the Protestant Society had kept the question steadily before the public mind. Meanwhile that organisation had itself become a distinct force in the State. 'The leaders of the Whig party now formally identified themselves with it. In one year the Duke of Sussex took the chair; in another Lord Holland occupied the same position; Sir James Mackintosh delivered from its platform a defence of religious liberty, such as had scarcely been given to the English people since the time of Locke; and Lord John Russell, boldly identifying himself and his party with the political interests of Dissenters, came forward as chairman in another year, to advocate the full civil and religious rights of the three millions who were now openly connected with one or other of the Free Churches. The period of the Revolution, when Somers, Halifax, Burnet, and their associates laid the foundations of constitutional government, seemed to have returned.'[4] Immediately Parliament assembled, Lord John Russell--backed by many petitions from the Nonconformists--gave notice that on February 26 it was his intention to move the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts. The Test Act compelled all persons holding any office of profit and trust under the Crown to take the oath of allegiance, to partake of the Sacrament according to the rites of the Church of England, and to subscribe the declaration against Transubstantiation. It was an evil legacy from the reign of Charles II., and became law in 1673. The Corporation Act was also placed on the statute-book in the same reign, and in point of time twelve years earlier--namely, in 1661. It was a well-directed blow against the political ascendency of Nonconformists in the cities and towns. It required all public officials to take the Sacrament according to the rites of the Church of England, within twelve months of their appointment, and, whilst it excluded conscientious men, it proved no barrier to unprincipled hypocrites. The repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts had been mooted from time to time, but the forces of prejudice and apathy had hitherto proved invincible. Fox espoused the cause of the Dissenters in 1790, and moved for a committee of the whole House to deal with the question. He urged that men were to be judged not by their opinions, but by their actions, and he asserted that no one could charge the Dissenters with ideas or conduct dangerous to the State. Parliament, he further contended, had practically admitted the injustice of such disqualifications by passing annual Acts of Indemnity. He laid stress on the loyalty which the Dissenters had shown during the Jacobite risings of 1715 and 1745, when the High Church party, which now resisted their just demands, had been 'hostile to the reigning family, and active in exciting tumults, insurrections, and rebellions.' The authority of Pitt and the eloquence of Burke were put forth in opposition to the repeal of the Test Acts, and the panic awakened by the French Revolution threw Parliament into a reactionary mood, which rendered reform in any direction impossible. The result was that the question, so far as the House of Commons was concerned, was shirked from 1790 until 1828, when Lord John Russell took up the advocacy of a cause in which, nearly forty years earlier, the genius of Charles James Fox had been unavailingly enlisted. [Sidenote: THE RIGHTS OF CONSCIENCE] In moving the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, Lord John recapitulated their history and advanced cogent arguments on behalf of the rights of conscience. It could not, he contended, be urged that these laws were necessary for the security of the Church, for they were not in force either in Scotland or in Ireland. The number and variety of offices embraced by the Test Act reduced the measure, so far as its practical working was concerned, to a palpable absurdity, as non-commissioned officers, as well as commissioned excisemen, tide-waiters, and even pedlars, were embraced in its provisions. In theory, at least, the penalties incurred by these different classes of men were neither few nor slight--forfeiture of the office, disqualification for any other under Government, incapacity to maintain a suit at law, to act as guardian or executor, or to inherit a legacy, and even liability to a pecuniary penalty of 500_l._! Of course, such ridiculous penalties were in most cases suspended, but the law which imposed them still disgraced the statute-book, and was acknowledged by all unprejudiced persons to be indefensible. Besides, the most Holy Sacrament of the Christian Church was habitually reduced to a mere civil form imposed by Act of Parliament upon persons who either derided its solemn meaning or might be spiritually unfit to receive it. Was it decent, asked Cowper in his famous 'Expostulation,' thus-- To make the symbols of atoning grace An office-key, a pick-lock to a place? To such a question, put in such a form, only one answer was possible. Under circumstances men took the Communion, declared Lord John, for the purpose of qualifying for office, and with no other intent, and the least worthy were the most unscrupulous. 'Such are the consequences of mixing politics with religion. You embitter and aggravate political dissensions by the venom of theological disputes, and you profane religion with the vices of political ambition, making it both hateful to man and offensive to God.' [Sidenote: THE RARITY OF CHRISTIAN CHARITY] Peel opposed the motion, and professed to regard the grievances of the Dissenters as more sentimental than real. Huskisson and Palmerston followed on the same side, whilst Althorp and Brougham lent their aid to the demand for religious liberty. The result of the division showed a majority of forty-four in favour of the motion, and the bill was accordingly brought in and read a second time without discussion. During the progress of the measure through the House of Lords, the two Archbishops--less fearful for the safety of the Established Church than some of their followers--met Lord John's motion for the repeal of the Acts in a liberal and enlightened manner. 'Religious tests,' said Archbishop Harcourt of York, 'imposed for political purposes, must in themselves be always liable more or less to endanger religious sincerity.' Such an admission, of course, materially strengthened Lord John Russell's hands, and prepared the way for a speedy revision of the law. Many who had hitherto supported the Test Act began to see that such measures were, after all, a failure and a sham. If their terms were so lax that any man could subscribe to them with undisturbed conscience, then they ceased to be any test at all. On the contrary, if they were hard and rigid, then they forced men to the most odious form of dissimulation. A declaration, if required by the Crown, was therefore substituted for the sacramental test, by which a person entering office pledged himself not to use its influence as a means for subverting the Established Church. On the motion of the Bishop of Llandaff, the words 'on the true faith of a Christian' were inserted in the declaration--a clause which, by the way, had the effect, as Lord Holland perceived at the time, of excluding Jews from Parliament until the year 1858. Lord Winchilsea endeavoured by an amendment to shut out Unitarians from the relief thus afforded to conscience, but, happily, such an intolerant proceeding, even in an unreformed Parliament, met with no success. Lord Eldon fiercely attacked the measure--'like a lion,' as he said, 'but with his talons cut off'--but met with little support. It was felt that the great weight of authority as well as argument was in favour of the liberal policy which Lord John Russell advocated, and hence, after a protracted debate, the cause of religious freedom triumphed, and on May 9, 1828, the Test and Corporation Acts were finally repealed. A great and forward impulse was thus given to the cause of religious equality, and under the same energetic leadership the party of progress set themselves with fresh hope to invade other citadels of privilege. The victory came as a surprise not merely to Lord John but also to the Nonconformists. The fact that a Tory Government was in power was responsible for the widespread anticipation of a bitter and protracted struggle. Amongst the congratulations which Lord John received, none perhaps was more significant than Lord Grey's generous admission that 'he had done more than any man now living' on behalf of liberty. 'I am a little anxious,' wrote Moore, 'to know that your glory has done you no harm in the way of health, as I see you are a pretty constant attendant on the House. There is nothing, I fear, worse for a man's constitution than to trouble himself too much about the constitution of Church and State. So pray let me have one line to say how you are.' 'My constitution,' wrote back Lord John, 'is not quite so much improved as the Constitution of the country by late events, but the joy of it will soon revive me. It is really a gratifying thing to force the enemy to give up his first line--that none but Churchmen are worthy to serve the State; I trust we shall soon make him give up the second, that none but Protestants are.' [Sidenote: CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION] Lord Eldon had predicted that Catholic Emancipation would follow on the heels of the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, and the event proved that he was right. The election of Daniel O'Connell for Clare had suddenly raised the question in an acute form. Although the followers of Canning had already left the Ministry, the Duke of Wellington and Peel found themselves powerless to quell the agitation which O'Connell and the Catholic Association had raised in Ireland by any means short of civil war. 'What our Ministry will do,' wrote Lord John, 'Heaven only knows, but I cannot blame O'Connell for being a little impatient, after twenty-seven years of just expectation disappointed.' The allusion was, of course, to Pitt's scheme at the beginning of the century to enable Catholics to sit in Parliament and so to reconcile the Irish people to the Union--a generous project which was brought to nought by the obstinate attitude of George III. Lord John was meditating introducing a measure for Catholic Emancipation, when Peel took the wind from his sails. George IV., however, supported by a majority of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, was as stoutly opposed to concession as George III. Lord John Russell's words on this point are significant 'George III.'s religious scruples, and even his personal prejudices, were respected by the nation, and formed real barriers so long as he did not himself waive them; the religious scruples of George IV. did not meet with ready belief, nor did his personal dislikes inspire national respect nor obtain national acquiescence.' The struggle between the Court and the Cabinet was, however, of brief duration, and Wellington bore down the opposition of the Lords, and on April 13, 1829, the Roman Catholic Emancipation Bill became law. In June the question of Parliamentary reform was brought before Parliament by Lord Blandford, but his resolutions--which were the outcome of Tory panic concerning the probable result of Roman Catholic Emancipation--met with little favour, either then or when they were renewed at the commencement of the session of 1830. Lord Blandford had in truth made himself conspicuous by his opposition to the Catholic claims, and the nation distrusted the sudden zeal of the heir to Blenheim in such a cause. On February 23, 1830, Lord John Russell sought leave to bring in a bill for conferring the franchise upon Manchester, Birmingham, and Leeds, on the plea that they were the three largest unrepresented towns in the country. The moderate proposal was, however, rejected in a House of three hundred and twenty-eight members by a majority of forty-eight. Three months later Mr. O'Connell brought forward a motion for Triennial Parliaments, Universal Suffrage, and the adoption of the Ballot; but this was rejected. But in a House of three hundred and thirty-two members, only thirteen were in favour of it, whilst an amendment by Lord John stating that it was 'expedient to extend the basis of the representation of the people' was also rejected by a majority of ninety-six. On June 26 George IV. died, and a few weeks later Parliament was dissolved. At the General Election, Lord John stood for Bedford, and, much to his chagrin, was defeated by a single vote. After the declaration of the poll in August, he crossed over to Paris, where he prolonged his stay till November. The unconstitutional ordinances of July 25, 1830, had brought about a revolution, and Lord John Russell, who was intimate with the chief statesman concerned, was wishful to study the crisis on the spot, and in the recital of its dramatic incidents to find relief from his own political disappointment. During this visit he used his influence with General Lafayette for the life of Prince de Polignac, who was connected by marriage with a noble English family, and was about to be put on his trial. Lord John was intimately acquainted, not only with Lafayette, but with other leaders in the French political world, and his intercession, on which his friends in England placed much reliance, seems to have carried effectual weight, for the Prince's life was spared. [Sidenote: WELLINGTON'S PROTEST AGAINST REFORM] With distress at home and revolution abroad, signs of the coming change made themselves felt at the General Election. Outside the pocket boroughs, the Ministerialists went almost everywhere to the wall, and 'not a single member of the Duke of Wellington's Cabinet obtained a seat in the new Parliament by anything approaching to free and open election.'[5] The first Parliament of William IV. met on October 26, and two or three days later, in the debate on the King's Speech, Wellington made his now historic statement in answer to Earl Grey, who resented the lack of reference to Reform: 'I am not prepared to bring forward any measure of the description alluded to by the noble lord. I am not only not prepared to bring forward any measure of this nature, but I will at once declare that, as far as I am concerned, as long as I hold any station in the government of the country, I shall always feel it my duty to resist such measures when proposed by others.' This statement produced a feeling of dismay even in the calm atmosphere of the House of Lords, and the Duke, noticing the scarcely suppressed excitement, turned to one of his colleagues and whispered: 'What can I have said which seems to have made so great a disturbance?' Quick came the dry retort of the candid friend: 'You have announced the fall of your Government, that is all.' The consternation was almost comic. 'Never was there an act of more egregious folly, or one so universally condemned,' says Charles Greville. 'I came to town last night (five days after the Duke's speech), and found the town ringing with his imprudence and everybody expecting that a few days would produce his resignation.' Within a fortnight the general expectation was fulfilled, for on November 16 the Duke, making a pretext of an unexpected defeat over Sir H. Parnell's motion regarding the Civil List, threw up the sponge, and Lord Grey was sent for by the King and entrusted with the new Administration. The irony of the situation became complete when Lord Grey made it a stipulation to his acceptance of office that Parliamentary Reform should be a Cabinet measure. Lord John, meanwhile, was a candidate for Tavistock, and when the election was still in progress the new Premier offered him the comparatively unimportant post of Paymaster-General, and, though he might reasonably have expected higher rank in the Government, he accepted the appointment. He was accustomed to assert that the actual duties of the Paymaster were performed by cashiers; and he has left it on record that the only official act of any importance that he performed was the pleasant task of allotting garden-plots at Chelsea to seventy old soldiers, a boon which the pensioners highly appreciated. FOOTNOTES: [4] _History of the Free Churches of England_, pp. 457-458, by H. S. Skeats and C. S. Miall. [5] _The Three Reforms of Parliament_, by William Heaton, chap. ii. p. 38. CHAPTER IV A FIGHT FOR LIBERTY 1830-1832 Lord Grey and the cause of Reform--Lord Durham's share in the Reform Bill--The voice of the people--Lord John introduces the Bill and explains its provisions--The surprise of the Tories--'Reform, Aye or No'--Lord John in the Cabinet--The Bill thrown out--The indignation of the country--Proposed creation of Peers--Wellington and Sidmouth in despair--The Bill carried--Lord John's tribute to Althorp. EARL GREY was a man of sixty-six when he was called to power, and during the whole of his public career he had been identified with the cause of Reform. He, more than any other man, was the founder, in 1792--the year in which Lord John Russell was born--of 'The Friends of the People,' a political association which united the forces of the patriotic societies which just then were struggling into existence in various parts of the land. He was the foe of Pitt and the friend of Fox, and his official career began during the short-lived but glorious Administration of All the Talents. During the dreary quarter of a century which succeeded, when the destinies of England were committed to men of despotic calibre and narrow capacity like Sidmouth, Liverpool, Eldon, and Castlereagh, he remained, through good and evil report, in deed as well as in name, a Friend of the People. As far back as 1793, he declared: 'I am more convinced than ever that a reform in Parliament might now be peaceably effected. I am afraid that we are not wise enough to profit by experience, and what has occasioned the ruin of other Governments will overthrow this--a perseverance in abuse until the people, maddened by excessive injury and roused to a feeling of their own strength, will not stop within the limits of moderate reformation.' The conduct of Ministers during the dark period which followed the fall of the Ministry of All the Talents in 1807, was, in Grey's deliberate opinion, calculated to excite insurrection, since it was a policy of relentless coercion and repression. He made no secret of his conviction that the Government, by issuing proclamations in which whole classes of the community were denounced as seditious, as well as by fulminating against insurrections that only existed in their own guilty imaginations, filled the minds of the people with false alarms, and taught every man to distrust if not to hate his neighbour. There was no more chance of Reform under the existing _régime_ than of 'a thaw in Zembla,' to borrow a famous simile. Cobbett was right in his assertion that the measures and manners of George IV.'s reign did more to shake the long-settled ideas of the people in favour of monarchical government than anything which had happened since the days of Cromwell. The day of the King's funeral--it was early in July and beautifully fine--was marked, of course, by official signs of mourning, but the rank and file of the people rejoiced, and, according to a contemporary record, the merry-making and junketing in the villages round London recalled the scenes of an ordinary Whit Monday. On the whole, the nation accepted the accession of the Sailor King with equanimity, though scarcely with enthusiasm, and for the moment it was not thought that the new reign would bring an immediate change of Ministry. The dull, uncompromising nonsense, however, which Wellington put into the King's lips in the Speech from the Throne at the beginning of November, threatening with punishment the seditious and disaffected, followed as it quickly was by the Duke's own statement in answer to Lord Grey, that no measure of Parliamentary reform should be proposed by the Government as long as he was responsible for its policy, awoke the storm which drove the Tories from power and compelled the King to send for Grey. The distress in the country was universal--riots prevailed, rick-burning was common. Lord Grey's prediction of 1793 seemed about to be fulfilled, for the people, 'maddened by excessive injury and roused to a feeling of their own strength,' seemed about to break the traces and to take the bit between their teeth. The deep and widespread confidence alike in the character and capacity of Lord Grey did more than anything else at that moment to calm the public mind and to turn wild clamour into quiet and resistless enthusiasm. [Sidenote: LORD GREY AS LEADER] Yet in certain respects Lord Grey was out of touch with the new spirit of the nation. If his own political ardour had not cooled, the lapse of years had not widened to any perceptible degree his vision of the issues at stake. He was a man of stately manners and fastidious tastes, and, though admirably qualified to hold the position of leader of the aristocratic Whigs, he had little in common with the toiling masses of the people. He was a conscientious and even chivalrous statesman, but he held himself too much aloof from the rank and file of his party, and thin-skinned Radicals were inclined to think him somewhat cold and even condescending. Lord Grey lacked the warm heart of Fox, and his speeches, in consequence, able and philosophic though they were, were destitute of that unpremeditated and magical eloquence which led Grattan to describe Fox's oratory as 'rolling in, resistless as the waves of the Atlantic.' On one memorable occasion--the second reading of the Reform Bill in the House of Lords--Lord Grey entirely escaped from such oratorical restraints, and even the Peers were moved to unwonted enthusiasm by the strong emotion which pervaded that singularly outspoken appeal. His son-in-law, Lord Durham, on the other hand, had the making of a great popular leader, in spite of his imperious manners and somewhat dictatorial bearing. The head of one of the oldest families in the North of England, Lord Durham entered the House of Commons in the year 1813, at the age of twenty-one, as Mr. John George Lambton, and quickly distinguished himself by his advanced views on questions of foreign policy as well as Parliamentary reform. He married the daughter of Lord Grey in 1816, and gave his support in Parliament to Canning. On the formation of his father-in-law's Cabinet in 1830, he was appointed Lord Privy Seal. His popular sobriquet, 'Radical Jack,' itself attests the admiration of the populace, and when Lambton was raised to the peerage in 1828 he carried to the House of Lords the enthusiastic homage as well as the great expectations of the crowd. Lord Durham was the idol of the Radicals, and his presence in the Grey Administration was justly regarded as a pledge of energetic action. He would unquestionably have had the honour of introducing the Reform Bill in the House of Commons if he had still been a member of that assembly, for he had made the question peculiarly his own, and behind him lay the enthusiasm of the entire party of Reform. Althorp, though leader of the House, and in spite of the confidence which his character inspired, lacked the power of initiative and the Parliamentary courage necessary to steer the Ship of State through such rough waters. When Lord Grey proposed to entrust the measure to Lord John, Brougham pushed the claims of Althorp, and raised objections to Lord John on the ground that the young Paymaster-General was not in the Cabinet; but Durham stoutly opposed him, and urged that Lord John had the first claim, since he had last been in possession of the question. [Sidenote: THE COMMITTEE OF FOUR] An unpublished paper of Lord Durham's, in the possession of the present Earl, throws passing light on the action, at this juncture, of the Ministry, and therefore it may be well to quote it. 'Shortly after the formation of the Government, Lord Grey asked me in the House of Lords if I would assist him in preparing the Reform Bill. I answered that I would do so with the greatest pleasure. He then said, "You can have no objection to consult Lord John Russell?" I replied, "Certainly not, but the reverse."' In consequence of this conversation, Lord Durham goes on to state, he placed himself in communication with Lord John, and they together agreed to summon to their councils Sir James Graham and Lord Duncannon. Thus the famous Committee of Four came into existence. Durham acted as chairman, and in that capacity signed the daily minutes of the proceedings. The meetings were held at his house in Cleveland Row, and he there received, on behalf of Lord Grey, the various deputations from different parts of the kingdom which were flocking up to impress their views of the situation on the new Premier. Since the measure had of necessity to originate in the House of Commons, and Lord John, it was already settled, was to be its first spokesman, Lord Durham suggested that Russell should draw up a plan. This was done, and it was carefully discussed and amended in various directions, and eventually the measure as finally agreed upon was submitted to Lord Grey, with a report which Lord Durham, as chairman, drew up, and which was signed not only by him but by his three colleagues. Lord Durham states, in speaking of the part he took as chairman of the Committee on Reform, that Lord Grey intrusted him with the preparation in the first instance of the measure, and that he called to his aid the three other statesmen. He adds: 'This was no Cabinet secret, for it was necessarily known to hundreds, Lord Grey having referred to me all the memorials from different towns and bodies.' Lord Durham was in advance of his colleagues on this as upon most questions, for he took his stand on household suffrage, vote by ballot and triennial Parliaments, and if he could have carried his original draft of the Reform Bill that measure would have been far more revolutionary than that which became law. His proposals in the House of Commons in 1821 went, in fact, much further than the measure which became law under Lord Grey. Lord Grey announced in the Lords on February 3 that a Reform measure had been framed and would be introduced in the House of Commons on March 1 by Lord John Russell, who, 'having advocated the cause of Parliamentary Reform, with ability and perseverance, in days when it was not popular, ought, in the opinion of the Administration, to be selected, now that the cause was prosperous, to bring forward a measure of full and efficient Reform, instead of the partial measures he had hitherto proposed.' [Sidenote: LEADING THE ATTACK] Petitions in favour of Reform from all parts of the kingdom poured into both Houses. The excitement in the country rose steadily week by week, mingled with expressions of satisfaction that the Bill was to be committed to the charge of such able hands. In Parliament speculations were rife as to the scope of the measure, whilst rumours of dissension in the Cabinet flew around the clubs. Even as late as the middle of February, the Duke of Wellington went about predicting that the Reform question could not be carried, and that the Grey Administration could not stand. Ministers contrived to keep their secret uncommonly well, and when at length the eventful day, March 1, arrived, the House of Commons was packed by a crowd such as had scarcely been seen there in its history. Troops of eager politicians came up from the country and waited at all the inlets of the House, whilst the leading supporters of the Whigs in London society gathered at dinner-parties, and anxiously awaited intelligence from Westminster. Lord John's speech began at six o'clock, and lasted for two hours and a quarter. Beginning in a low voice, he proceeded gradually to unfold his measure, greeted in turns by cheers of approval and shouts of derision. Greville says it was ludicrous to see the faces of the members for those places doomed to disfranchisement, as they were severally announced. Wetherell, a typical Tory of the no-surrender school, began to take notes as the plan was unfolded, but after various contortions and grimaces he threw down his paper, with a look of mingled despair, ridicule, and horror. Lord Durham, seated under the gallery, doubted the reality of the scene passing before his eyes. 'They are mad, they are mad!' was one of the running comments to Lord John's statement. The Opposition, on the whole, seemed inclined to laugh out of court such extravagant proposals, but Peel, on the contrary, looked both grave and angry, for he saw further than most, and knew very well that boldness was the best chance. 'Burdett and I walked home together,' states Hobhouse, 'and agreed that there was very little chance of the measure being carried. We thought our friends in Westminster would oppose the ten-pound franchise.' 'I rise, sir,' Lord John commenced, 'with feelings of the deepest anxiety to bring forward a question which, unparalleled as it is in importance, is as unparalleled in points of difficulty. Nor is my anxiety, in approaching this question, lessened by reflecting that on former occasions I have brought this subject before the consideration of the House. For if, on other occasions, I have invited the attention of the House of Commons to this most important subject, it has been upon my own responsibility--unaided by anyone--and involving no one in the consequences of defeat.... But the measure which I have now to bring forward, is a measure, not of mine but of the Government.... It is, therefore, with the greatest anxiety that I venture to explain their intentions to this House on a subject, the interest of which is shown by the crowded audience who have assembled here, but still more by the deep interest which is felt by millions out of this House, who look with anxiety, with hope, and with expectation, to the result of this day's debate.' [Sidenote: OLD SARUM VERSUS MANCHESTER] In the course of his argument, setting forth the need of Reform, he alluded to the feelings of a foreigner, having heard of British wealth, civilisation, and renown, coming to England to examine our institutions. 'Would not such a foreigner be much astonished if he were taken to a green mound, and informed that it sent two members to the British Parliament; if he were shown a stone wall, and told that it also sent two members to the British Parliament; or, if he walked into a park, without the vestige of a dwelling, and was told that it, too, sent two members to the British Parliament? But if he were surprised at this, how much more would he be astonished if he were carried into the North of England, where he would see large flourishing towns, full of trade, activity, and intelligence, vast magazines of wealth and manufactures, and were told that these places sent no representatives to Parliament. But his wonder would not end here; he would be astonished if he were carried to such a place as Liverpool, and were there told that he might see a specimen of a popular election, what would be the result? He would see bribery employed in the most unblushing manner, he would see every voter receiving a number of guineas in a box as the price of his corruption; and after such a spectacle would he not be indeed surprised that representatives so chosen could possibly perform the functions of legislators, or enjoy respect in any degree?' In speaking of the reasons for giving representatives to Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham, and other large towns, Lord John argued: 'Because Old Sarum sent members to Parliament in the reign of Edward III., when it had a population to be benefited by it, the Government on the same principle deprived that forsaken place of the franchise in order to bestow the privilege where the population was now found.' Lord John explained that by the provisions of the bill sixty boroughs with less than 2,000 inhabitants were to lose the franchise; forty-seven boroughs, returning ninety-four members, were to lose one member each. Of the seats thus placed at the disposal of the Government eight were to be given to London, thirty-four to large towns, fifty-five to English counties, five to Scotland, three to Ireland, and one to Wales. The franchise was to be extended to inhabitants of houses rated at ten pounds a year, and to leaseholders and copyholders of counties. It was reckoned that about half a million persons would be enfranchised by the bill; but the number of members in the House would be reduced by sixty-two. Lord John laid significant stress on the fact that they had come to the deliberate opinion that 'no half-measures would be sufficient, that no trifling, no paltry reform could give stability to the Crown, strength to the Parliament, or satisfaction to the country.' Long afterwards Lord John Russell declared that the measure when thus first placed before the House of Commons awoke feelings of astonishment mingled with joy or with consternation according to the temper of the hearers. 'Some, perhaps many, thought that the measure was a prelude to civil war, which, in point of fact, it averted. But incredulity was the prevailing feeling, both among the moderate Whigs and the great mass of the Tories. The Radicals alone were delighted and triumphant. Joseph Hume, whom I met in the streets a day or two afterwards, assured me of his hearty support of the Government.' There were many Radicals, however, who thought that the measure scarcely went far enough, and one of them happily summed up the situation by saying that, although the Reform Bill did not give the people all they wanted, it broke up the old system and took the weapons from the hands of the enemies of progress. [Sidenote: CAPITULATION OR BOMBARDMENT] Night after night the debate proceeded, and it became plain that the Tories had been completely taken by surprise. Meanwhile outside the House of Commons the people followed the debate with feverish interest. 'Nothing talked of, thought of, dreamt of but Reform,' wrote Greville. 'Every creature one meets asks, "What is said now? How will it go? What is the last news? What do you think?" And so it is from morning till night, in the streets, in the clubs, and in private houses.' After a week of controversy, leave was given to bring in the bill. On March 21, Lord John moved the second reading, but was met by an amendment, that the Reform Bill be read a second time that day six months. The House divided at three o'clock on the morning of the 23rd, and the second reading was carried by a majority of one--333-332--in the fullest House on record. 'It is better to capitulate than to be taken by storm,' was the comment of one of the cynics of the hour. Illuminations took place all over the country. The people were good-humoured but determined, and the Opposition began to recover from its fright and to declare that the Government could not proceed with the measure and were certain to resign. Peel's action--and sometimes his lack of it--was severely criticised by many of his own followers, and not a few of the Tories, unable to forgive the surrender to the claims of the Catholics, met the new crisis in the time-honoured spirit of Gallio. They seemed to have thought not only that the country was fast going to the dogs, but that under all the circumstances, it did not much matter. Parliament met after the usual Easter recess, and on April 18 General Gascoigne moved as an instruction to the committee that the number of members of Parliament ought not to be diminished, and after a debate which lasted till four o'clock in the morning the resolution was carried in a House of 490 members by a majority of eight. The Government thus suddenly placed in a minority saw their opportunity and took it. Lord Grey and his colleagues had begun to realise that it was impossible for them to carry the Reform Bill in the existing House of Commons without modifications which would have robbed the boon of half its worth. The Tories had made a blunder in tactics over Gascoigne's motion, and their opponents took occasion by the forelock, with the result that, after an extraordinary scene in the Lords, Parliament was suddenly dissolved by the King in person. Brougham had given the people their cry, and 'the bill, the whole bill, and nothing but the bill,' was the popular watchword during the tumult of the General Election. On the dissolution of Parliament the Lord Mayor sanctioned the illumination of London, and an angry mob, forgetful of the soldier in the statesman, broke the windows of Apsley House. [Sidenote: THE FLOWING TIDE] Speaking at a political meeting two days after the dissolution, Lord John Russell said that the electors in the approaching struggle were called on not merely to select the best men to defend their rights and interests, but also to give a plain answer to the question, put to the constituencies by the King in dissolving Parliament, Do you approve, aye or no, of the principle of Reform in the representation? Right through the length and breadth of the kingdom his words were caught up, and from hundreds of platforms came the question, 'Reform: Aye or No?' and the response in favour of the measure was emphatic and overwhelming. The country was split into the opposing camps of the Reformers and anti-Reformers, and every other question was thrust aside in the struggle. The political unions proved themselves to be a power in the land, and the operatives and artisans of the great manufacturing centres, though still excluded from citizenship, left no stone unturned to ensure the popular triumph. Lord John was pressed to stand both for Lancashire and Devonshire; he chose the latter county, with which he was closely associated by family traditions as well as by personal friendships, and was triumphantly returned, with Lord Ebrington as colleague. Even in the agricultural districts the ascendency of the old landed families was powerless to arrest the movement, and as the results of the elections became known it was seen that Lord Sefton had caught the situation in his dry remark: 'The county members are tumbling about like ninepins.' Parliament assembled in June, and it became plain at a glance that democratic ideas were working like leaven upon public opinion in England. In spite of rotten boroughs, close corporations, the opposition of the majority of the territorial aristocracy, and the panic of thousands of timid people, who imagined that the British Constitution was imperilled, the Reformers came back in strength, and at least a hundred who had fought the Bill in the late Parliament were shut out from a renewal of the struggle, whilst out of eighty-two county members that were returned, only six were hostile to Reform. On June 24, Lord John Russell, now raised to Cabinet rank, introduced the Second Reform Bill, which was substantially the same as the first, and the measure was carried rapidly through its preliminary stage, and on July 8 it passed the second reading by a majority of 136. The Government, however, in Committee was met night after night by an irritating cross-fire of criticism; repeated motions for adjournment were made; there was a systematic division of labour in the task of obstruction. In order to promote delay, the leaders of the Opposition stood up again and again and repeated the same statements and arguments, and often in almost the same words. 'If Mr. Speaker,' wrote Jekyll, 'outlives the Reform debate, he may defy _la grippe_ and the cholera. I can recommend no books, for the booksellers declare nobody reads or buys in the present fever. The newspapers are furious, the Sunday papers are talking treason by wholesale.... Peel does all he can to make his friends behave like gentlemen. But the nightly vulgarities of the House of Commons furnish new reasons for Reform, and not a ray of talent glimmers among them all. Double-distilled stupidity!'[6] In the midst of it all Russell fell ill, worn out with fatigue and excitement, and as the summer slipped past the people became alarmed and indignant at the dead-lock, and in various parts of the kingdom the attitude of the masses grew not merely restless but menacing. At length the tactics of the Opposition were exhausted, and it was possible to report progress. 'On September 7,' is Lord John's statement, 'the debate was closed, and after much labour, and considerable sacrifice of health, I was able on that night to propose, amid much cheering, that the bill should be reported to the House.' The third reading was carried on September 19 by a majority of fifty-five. Three days later, at five in the morning on September 22, the question was at length put, and in a House of five hundred and eighty-one members the majority for Ministers was one hundred and nine. [Sidenote: LORD GREY ARISES TO THE OCCASION] The bill was promptly sent up to the Peers, and Lord Grey proposed the second reading on October 3 in a speech of sustained eloquence. Lord Grey spoke as if he felt the occasion to be the most critical event in a political career which had extended to nearly half a century. He struck at once the right key-note, the gravity of the situation, the magnitude of the issues involved, the welfare of the nation. He made a modest but dignified allusion to his own life-long association with the question. 'In 1786 I voted for Reform. I supported Mr. Pitt in his motion for shortening the duration of Parliaments. I gave my best assistance to the measure of Reform introduced by Mr. Flood before the French Revolution.[7] On one or two occasions I originated motions on the subject.' Then he turned abruptly from his own personal association with the subject to what he finely termed the 'mighty interests of the State,' and the course which Ministers felt they must take if they were to meet the demands of justice, and not to imperil the safety of the nation. He laid stress on the general discontent which prevailed, on the political agitation of the last twelve months, on the distress that reigned in the manufacturing districts, on the influence of the numerous political associations which had grown powerful because of that distress, on the suffering of the agricultural population, on the 'nightly alarms, burnings, and popular disturbances,' as well as on the 'general feeling of doubt and apprehension observable in every countenance.' He endeavoured to show that the measure was not revolutionary in spirit or subversive of the British Constitution, as many people proclaimed. Lord Grey contended that there was nothing in the measure that was not founded on the principles of English government, nothing that was not perfectly consistent with the ancient practices of the Constitution, and nothing that might not be adopted with absolute safety to the rights and privileges of all orders of the State. He made a scathing allusion to the 'gross and scandalous corruption practised without disguise' at elections, and he declared that the sale of seats in the House of Commons was a matter of equal notoriety with the return of nominees of noble and wealthy persons to that House. He laid stress on the fact that a few individuals under the existing system were able to turn into a means of personal profit privileges which had been conferred in past centuries for the benefit of the nation. 'It is with these views that the Government has considered that the boroughs which are called nomination boroughs ought to be abolished. In looking at these boroughs, we found that some of them were incapable of correction, for it is impossible to extend their constituency. Some of them consisted only of the sites of ancient boroughs, which, however, might perhaps in former times have been very fit places to return members to Parliament; in others, the constituency was insignificantly small, and from their local situation incapable of receiving any increase; so that, upon the whole, this gangrene of our representative system bade defiance to all remedies but that of excision.' After several nights' debate, in which Brougham, according to Lord John, delivered one of the greatest speeches ever heard in the House of Lords, the bill was at length rejected, after an all-night sitting, at twenty minutes past six o'clock on Saturday morning, October 8, by a majority of forty-one (199 to 158), in which majority were twenty-one bishops. Had these prelates voted the other way, the bill would have passed the second reading. As the carriages of the nobility rattled through the streets at daybreak, artisans and labourers trudging to their work learnt with indignation that the demands of the people had been treated with characteristic contempt by the Peers. [Sidenote: THE NATION GROWS INDIGNANT] The next few days were full of wild excitement. The people were exasperated, and their attitude grew suddenly menacing. Even those who had hitherto remained calm and almost apathetic grew indignant. Wild threats prevailed, and it seemed as if there might be at any moment a general outbreak of violence. Even as it was, riots of the most disquieting kind took place at Bristol, Derby, and other places. Nottingham Castle was burnt down by an infuriated mob; newspapers appeared in mourning; the bells of some of the churches rang muffled peals; the Marquis of Londonderry and other Peers who had made themselves peculiarly obnoxious were assaulted in the streets; and the Bishops could not stir abroad without being followed by the jeers and execrations of the multitude. Quiet middle-class people talked of refusing to pay the taxes, and showed unmistakably that they had caught the revolutionary spirit of the hour. Birmingham, which was the head-quarters of the Political Union, held a vast open-air meeting, at which one hundred and fifty thousand people were present, and resolutions were passed, beseeching the King to create as many new Peers as might be necessary to ensure the triumph of Reform. Lord Althorp and Lord John Russell were publicly thanked at this gathering for their action, and the reply of the latter is historic: 'Our prospects are obscured for a moment, but, I trust, only for a moment; it is impossible that the whisper of a faction should prevail against the voice of a nation.' Meanwhile Lord Ebrington, Lord John's colleague in the representation of Devonshire, came to the rescue of the Government with a vote of confidence, which was carried by a sweeping majority. Two days later, on Wednesday, October 12, many of the shops of the metropolis were closed in token of political mourning, and on that day sixty thousand men marched in procession to St. James's Palace, bearing a petition to the King in favour of the retention of the Grey Administration. Hume presented it, and when he returned to the waiting crowd in the Park, he was able to tell them that their prayer would not pass unheeded. No wonder that Croker wrote shortly afterwards: 'The four M's--the Monarch, the Ministry, the Members, and the Multitude--all against us. The King stands on his Government, the Government on the House of Commons, the House of Commons on the people. How can we attack a line thus linked and supported?' Indignation meetings were held in all parts of the country, and at one of them, held at Taunton, Sydney Smith delivered the famous speech in which he compared the attempt of the House of Lords to restrain the rising tide of Democracy to the frantic but futile battle which Dame Partington waged with her mop, during a storm at Sidmouth, when the Atlantic invaded her threshold. 'The Atlantic was roused. Mrs. Partington's spirit was up. But I need not tell you that the contest was unequal. The Atlantic Ocean beat Mrs. Partington. Gentlemen, be at your ease, be quiet and steady; you will beat--Mrs. Partington.' The newspapers carried the witty allusion everywhere. It tickled the public fancy, and did much to relax the bitter mood of the nation, and vapouring heroics were forgotten in laughter, and indignation gave way to amused contempt. Parliament, which had been prorogued towards the end of October, reassembled in the first week of December, and on the 12th of that month Lord John once more introduced--for the third time in twelve months--the Reform Bill. A few alterations had been made in its text, the outcome chiefly of the facts which the new census had brought to light. In order to meet certain anomalies in the original scheme, Ministers, with the help of Thomas Drummond, who shortly afterwards honourably distinguished himself in Irish affairs, drew up two lists of boroughs, one for total disenfranchisement and the other for semi-disenfranchisement; and the principle on which fifty-six towns were included in the first list, and thirty in the second, was determined by the number of houses in each borough and the value of the assessed taxes. Six days later the second reading was passed, after three nights' discussion, by a majority of 324 to 162. The House rose immediately for the Christmas recess, and on January 20 the bill reached the committee stage, and there it remained till March 14. The third reading took place on March 23, and the bill was passed by a majority of 116. Althorp, as the leader of the Commons, and Russell, as the Minister in charge of the measure, carried the Reform Bill promptly to the House of Lords, and made formal request for the 'concurrence of their lordships to the same.' Other men had laboured to bring about this result; but the nation felt that, but for the pluck and persistency of Russell, and the judgment and tact of Althorp, failure would have attended their efforts. [Sidenote: LORD ALTHORP'S TACT] It is difficult now to understand the secret of the influence which Althorp wielded in the Grey Administration, but it was great enough to lead the Premier to ask him to accept a peerage, in order--in the crisis which was now at hand--to bring the Lords to their senses. Althorp was in no sense of the word a great statesman; in fact, his career was the triumph of character rather than capacity. All through the struggle, when controversy grew furious and passion rose high, Althorp kept a cool head, and his adroitness in conciliatory speech was remarkable. He was a moderate man, who never failed to do justice to his opponent's case, and his influence was not merely in the Commons; it made itself felt to good purpose in the Court, as well as in the country. He was a man of chivalrous instincts and unchallenged probity. It was one of his political opponents, Sir Henry Hardinge, who exclaimed, 'Althorp carried the bill. His fine temper did it!' Lord John Russell, like his colleagues, was fully alive to the gravity of the crisis. He made no secret of his conviction that, if another deadlock arose, the consequence would be bloodshed, and the outbreak of a conflict in which the British Constitution would probably perish. Twelve months before, the cry in the country had been, 'What will the Lords do?' but now an altogether different question was on men's lips, 'What must be done with the Lords?' Government knew that the real struggle over the bill would be in Committee, and therefore they refused to be unduly elated when the second reading was carried on April 14 with a majority of nine, in spite of the Duke of Wellington's blustering heroics. Three weeks later, Lord Lyndhurst carried, by a majority of thirty-five, a motion for the mutilation of the bill, in spite of Lord Grey's assurance that it dealt a fatal blow at the measure. The Premier immediately moved the adjournment of the debate, and the situation grew suddenly dramatic. The Cabinet had made its last concession; Ministers determined, in Lord Durham's words, that a 'sufficient creation of Peers was absolutely necessary' if their resignation was not to take immediate effect, and they laid their views before the King. William IV., like his predecessor, lived in a narrow world; he was surrounded by gossips who played upon his fears of revolution, and took care to appeal to his prejudices. His zeal for Reform had already cooled, and Queen Adelaide was hostile to Lord Grey's measure. When, therefore, Lord Grey and Lord Brougham went down to Windsor to urge the creation of new Peers, they met with a chilling reception. The King refused his sanction, and the Ministry had no other alternative than to resign. William IV. took counsel with Lord Lyndhurst, and summoned the Duke of Wellington. Meanwhile the House of Commons at the instance of Lord Ebrington, again passed a vote of confidence in the Grey Administration, and adopted an address to His Majesty, begging him to call to his councils such persons only as 'will carry into effect unimpaired in all its essential provisions that bill for reforming the representation of the people which has recently passed the House of Commons.' Wellington tried to form a Ministry in order to carry out some emasculated scheme of Reform, but Peel was inexorable, and refused to have part or lot in the project. [Sidenote: THE FIERCE CRY OF THE STREETS] Meanwhile the cry rang through the country, 'The bill, the whole bill, and nothing but the bill!' William IV. was hissed as he passed through the streets, and the walls blazed with insulting lampoons and caricatures. Signboards which displayed the King's portrait were framed with crape, and Queen Adelaide's likeness was disfigured with lampblack. Rumours of projected riots filled the town, and whispers of a plot for seizing the wives and children of the aristocracy led the authorities to order the swords of the Scots Greys to be rough-sharpened. At the last moment, when the attitude of the country was menacing, the King yielded, on May 17, and sent for Lord Grey. 'Only think,' wrote Joseph Parkes on May 18, 'that at three yesterday all was gloomy foreboding in the Cabinet, and at twenty-five minutes before five last night Lord Althorp did not know the King's answer till Lord Grey returned at half-past five--"All right." Thus on the decision of one man rests the fate of nations.'[8] Instead of creating new Peers, the King addressed a letter to members of the House of Lords who were hostile to the bill, urging them to withdraw their opposition. A hint from Windsor went further with the aristocracy in those days than any number of appeals, reasonable or just, from the country. About a hundred of the Peers, in angry sullen mood, shook off the dust of Westminster, and, in Lord John's words, 'skulked in clubs and country houses.' Sindbad, to borrow Albany Fonblanque's vigorous simile, was getting rid of the old man of the sea, not permanently, alas! but at least for the occasion. During the progress of these negotiations, the nation, now confident of victory, stood not merely at attention but on the alert. 'I say,' exclaimed Attwood at Birmingham--and the phrase expressed the situation--'the people of England stand at this moment like greyhounds on the slip!' Triumph was only a matter of time. 'Pray beg of Lord Grey to keep well,' wrote Sydney Smith to the Countess; 'I have no doubt of a favourable issue. I see an open sea beyond the icebergs.' At length the open sea was reached, and on June 7 the Reform Bill received the Royal Assent and became the law of the land, and with it the era of government by public opinion began. The mode by which the country at last obtained this great measure of redress did not commend itself to Lord John's judgment. He did not disguise his opinion that the creation of many new Peers favourable to Reform would have been a more dignified proceeding than the request from Windsor to noble lords to dissemble and cloak their disappointment. 'Whether twelve or one hundred be the number requisite to enable the Peers to give their votes in conformity with public opinion,' were his words, 'it seems to me that the House of Lords, sympathising with the people at large, and acting in concurrence with the enlightened state of the prevailing wish, represents far better the dignity of the House, and its share in legislation, than a majority got together by the long supremacy of one party in the State, eager to show its ill-will by rejecting bills of small importance, but afraid to appear, and skulking in clubs and country houses, in face of a measure which has attracted the ardent sympathy of public opinion.' [Sidenote: BOWING BEFORE THE STORM] 'God may and, I hope, will forgive you for this bill,' was Lord Sidmouth's plaintive lament to Earl Grey, 'but I do not think I ever can!' There lives no record of reply. The last protest of the Duke of Wellington, delivered just before the measure became law, was characteristic in many respects, and not least in its blunt honesty. 'Reform, my lords, has triumphed, the barriers of the Constitution are broken down, the waters of destruction have burst the gates of the temple, and the tempest begins to howl. Who can say where its course should stop? who can stay its speed? For my own part, I earnestly hope that my predictions may not be fulfilled, and that my country may not be ruined by the measure which the noble earl and his colleagues have sanctioned.' Lord John Russell, on the contrary, held then the view which he afterwards expressed: 'It is the right of a people to represent its grievances: it is the business of a statesman to devise remedies.' In the first quarter of the present century the people made their grievances known. Lord Grey and his Cabinet in 1831-2 devised remedies, and, in Lord John's memorable phrase, 'popular enthusiasm rose in its strength and converted them into law.' The Reform Bill, as Walter Bagehot has shown, did nothing to remove the worst evils from which the nation suffered, for the simple reason that those evils were not political but economical. But if it left unchallenged the reign of protection and much else in the way of palpable and glaring injustice, it ushered in a new temper in regard to public questions. It recognised the new conditions of English society, and gave the mercantile and manufacturing classes, with their wealth, intelligence, and energy, not only the consciousness of power, but the sense of responsibility. [Sidenote: A GENEROUS TRIBUTE] The political struggle under Pitt had been between the aristocracy and the monarchy, but that under Grey was between the aristocracy and the middle classes, for the claims of the democracy in the broad sense of the word lay outside the scope of the measure. In spite of its halting confidence in the people, men felt that former things of harsh oppression had passed away, and that the Reform Bill rendered their return impossible. It was at best only a half measure, but it broke the old exclusive traditions and diminished to a remarkable degree the power of the landed interest in Parliament. It has been said that it was the business of Lord John Russell at that crisis to save England from copying the example of the French Revolution, and there can be no doubt whatever that the measure was a safety-valve at a moment when political excitement assumed a menacing form. The public rejoicings were inspired as much by hope as by gladness. A new era had dawned, the will of the nation had prevailed, the spirit of progress was abroad, and the multitudes knew that other reforms less showy perhaps but not less substantial, were at hand. 'Look at England before the Reform Bill, and look at it now,' wrote Mr. Froude in 1874. 'Its population almost doubled; its commerce quadrupled; every individual in the kingdom lifted to a high level of comfort and intelligence--the speed quickening every year; the advance so enormous, the increase so splendid, that language turns to rhetoric in describing it.' When due allowance is made for the rhetoric of such a description--for alas! the 'high level of comfort' for every individual in the kingdom is still unattained--the substantial truth of such a statement cannot be gainsaid. When the battle was fought, Lord John was generous enough to say that the success of the Reform Bill in the House of Commons was due mainly to the confidence felt in the integrity and sound judgment of Lord Althorp. At the same time he never concealed his conviction that it was the multitude outside who made the measure resistless. FOOTNOTES: [6] _Correspondence of Mr. Joseph Jekyll_, 1818-1838. Edited, with a brief Memoir, by the Hon. Algernon Bourke. Pp. 272-273. [7] Flood's Reform proposals were made in 1790. His idea was to augment the House of Commons by one hundred members, to be elected by the resident householders of every county. [8] _Life of George Grote_, by Mrs. Grote, p. 80. CHAPTER V THE DAWN OF A NEW ERA 1833-1838 The turn of the tide with the Whigs--The two voices in the Cabinet--Lord John and Ireland--Althorp and the Poor Law--The Melbourne Administration on the rocks--Peel in power--The question of Irish tithes--Marriage of Lord John--Grievances of Nonconformists--Lord Melbourne's influence over the Queen--Lord Durham's mission to Canada--Personal sorrow. HIGH-WATER mark was reached with the Whigs in the spring of 1833, and before the tide turned, two years later, Lord Grey and his colleagues had, in various directions, done much to justify the hopes of their followers. The result of the General Election in the previous December was seen when the first Reformed Parliament assembled at Westminster, on January 29, 1833. Lord Althorp, as Leader of the House of Commons, found himself with 485 members at his back, whilst Sir Robert Peel confronted him with about 170 stalwart Tories. After all, the disparity was hardly as great as it looked, for it was a mixed multitude which followed Althorp, and in its ranks were the elements of conflict and even of revolt. The Whigs had made common cause with the Radicals when the Reform Bill stood in jeopardy every hour, but the triumph of the measure imperilled this grand alliance. Not a few of the Whigs had been faint-hearted during the struggle, and were now somewhat alarmed at its overwhelming success. Their inclination was either to rest on their laurels or to make haste slowly. The Radicals, on the contrary, longed for new worlds to conquer. They were full of energy and enthusiasm, and desired nothing so much as to ride abroad redressing human wrongs. The traditions of the past were dear to the Whigs, but the Radicals thrust such considerations impatiently aside, and boasted that 1832 was the Year 1 of the people. It was impossible that such warring elements should permanently coalesce; the marvel is that they held together so long. [Sidenote: REMEDIAL MEASURES] Even in the Cabinet there were two voices. The Duke of Richmond was at heart a Tory masquerading in the dress of a Whig. Lord Durham was a Radical of an outspoken and uncompromising type, in spite of his aristocratic trappings and his great possessions. Nevertheless, the new era opened, not merely with a flourish of trumpets, but with notable work in the realm of practical statesmanship. Fowell Buxton took up the work of Wilberforce on behalf of the desolate and oppressed, and lived to bring about the abolition of slavery; whilst Shaftesbury's charity began at home with the neglected factory children. Religious toleration was represented in the Commons by the Jewish Relief Bill, and its opposite in the Lords by the defeat of that measure. Althorp amended the Poor Laws, and, though neither he nor his colleagues would admit the fact, the bill rendered, by its alterations in the provisions of settlement and the bold attack which it made on the thraldom of labour, the repeal of the Corn Laws inevitable. Grant renewed the charter of the East India Company, but not its monopoly of the trade with the East. Roebuck brought forward a great scheme of education, whilst Grote sought to introduce the ballot, and Hume, in the interests of economy, but at the cost of much personal odium, assailed sinecures and extravagance in every shape and form. Ward drew attention to the abuses of the Irish Church, and did much by his exertions to lessen them; and Lord John Russell a year or two later brought about a civic revolution by the Municipal Reform Act--a measure which, next to the reform of Parliament, did more to broaden and uplift the political life of the people than any other enactment of the century. Ireland blocked the way of Lord Grey's Ministry, and the wild talk and hectoring attitude of O'Connell, and his bold bid for personal ascendency, made it difficult for responsible statesmen to deal calmly with the problems by which they were confronted. It is true that Lord John was not always on the side of the angels of progress and redress. He blundered occasionally like other men, and sometimes even hesitated strangely to give effect to his convictions, and therefore it would be idle as well as absurd to attempt to make out that he was consistent, much less infallible. The Radicals a little later complained that he talked of finality in reform, and supported the coercive measures of Stanley in Ireland, and opposed Hume in his efforts to secure the abolition of naval and military sinecures. He declined to support a proposed investigation of the pension list. He set his face against Tennyson's scheme for shortening the duration of Parliaments, and Grote had to reckon with his hostility to the adoption of the ballot. But in spite of it all, he was still, in Sydney Smith's happy phrase, to all intents and purposes 'Lord John Reformer.' No one doubted his honesty or challenged his motives. The compass by which Russell steered his course through political life might tremble, but men felt that it remained true. [Sidenote: FIRST VISIT TO IRELAND] Ireland drew forth his sympathies, but he failed to see any way out of the difficulty. 'I wish I knew what to do to help your country,' were his words to Moore, 'but, as I do not, it is of no use giving her smooth words, as O'Connell told me, and I must be silent.' It was not in his nature, however, to sit still with folded hands. He held his peace, but quietly crossed the Channel to study the problem on the spot. It was his first visit to the distressful country for many years, and he wished Moore to accompany him as guide, philosopher, and friend. He assured the poet that he would allow him to be as patriotic as he pleased about 'the first flower of the earth and first gem of the sea' during the proposed sentimental journey. 'Your being a rebel,' were his words, 'may somewhat atone for my being a Cabinet Minister.' Moore, however, was compelled to decline the tempting proposal by the necessity of making ends meet by sticking to the hack work which that universal provider of knowledge, Dr. Lardner, had set him in the interests of the 'Cabinet Encyclopædia'--an enterprise to which men of the calibre of Mackintosh, Southey, Herschell, and even Walter Scott had lent a helping hand. Lord John landed in Ireland in the beginning of September 1833, and went first to Lord Duncannon's place at Bessborough. Afterwards he proceeded to Waterford to visit Lord Ebrington, his colleague in the representation of Devonshire. He next found his way to Cork and Killarney, and he wrote again to Moore urging him to 'hang Dr. Lardner on his tree of knowledge,' and to join him at the eleventh hour. Moore must have been in somewhat reduced circumstances at the moment--for he was a luxurious, pleasure-loving man, who never required much persuasion to throw down his work--since such an appeal availed nothing. Meanwhile Lord John had carried Lord Ebrington back to Dublin, and they went together to the North of Ireland. The visit to Belfast attracted considerable attention; Lord John's services over the Reform Bill were of course fresh in the public mind, and he was entertained in orthodox fashion at a public dinner. This short tour in Ireland did much to open his eyes to the real grievances of the people, and, fresh from the scene of disaffection, he was able to speak with authority when the late autumn compelled the Whig Cabinet to throw everything else aside in order to devise if possible some measure of relief for Ireland. Stanley was Chief Secretary, and, though one of the most brilliant men of his time alike in deed and word, unfortunately his haughty temper and autocratic leanings were a grievous hindrance if a policy of coercion was to be exchanged for the more excellent way of conciliation. O'Connell opposed his policy in scathing terms, and attacked him personally with bitter invective, and in the end there was open war between the two men. [Sidenote: POOR LAW REFORM] Lord Grey, now that Parliamentary Reform had been conceded, was developing into an easy-going aristocratic Whig of somewhat contracted sympathies, and Stanley, though still in the Cabinet, was apparently determined to administer the affairs of Ireland on the most approved Tory principles. Althorp, Russell, and Duncannon were men whose sympathies leaned more or less decidedly in the opposite direction, and therefore, especially with O'Connell thundering at the gates with the Irish people and the English Radicals at his back, a deadlock was inevitable. Durham, in ill health and chagrin, and irritated by the stationary, if not reactionary, attitude of certain members of the Grey Administration, resigned office in the spring of 1833. Goderich became Privy Seal, and this enabled Stanley to exchange the Irish Secretaryship for that of the Colonies. He had driven Ireland to the verge of revolt, but he had nevertheless made an honest attempt to grapple with many practical evils, and his Education Bill was a piece of constructive statesmanship which placed Roman Catholics on an equality with Protestants. Early in the session of 1834 Althorp introduced the Poor Law Amendment Act, and the measure was passed in July. The changes which it brought about were startling, for its enactments were drastic. This great economic measure came to the relief of a nation in which 'one person in every seven was a pauper.' The new law limited relief to destitution, prohibited out-door help to the able-bodied, beyond medical aid, instituted tests to detect imposture, confederated parishes into unions, and substituted large district workhouses for merely local shelters for the destitute. In five years the poor rate was reduced by three millions, and the population, set free by the new interpretation of 'Settlement,' were able, in their own phrase, to follow the work and to congregate accordingly wherever the chance of a livelihood offered. One great question followed hard on the heels of another. In the King's Speech at the opening of Parliament, the consideration of Irish tithes was recommended, for extinguishing 'all just causes of complaint without injury to the rights and property of any class of subjects or to any institution in Church or State.' Mr. Littleton (afterwards Lord Hatherton), who had succeeded Stanley as Irish Secretary accordingly introduced a new Tithe Bill, the object of which was to change the tithe first into a rent-charge payable by the landlord, and eventually into land tax. The measure also proposed that the clergy should be content with a sum which fell short of the amount to which they were entitled by law, so that riot and bloodshed might be avoided by lessened demands. On the second reading of the bill, Lord John frankly avowed the faith that was in him, a circumstance which led to unexpected results. He declared that, as he understood it, the aim of the bill was to determine and secure the amount of the tithe. The question of appropriation was to be kept entirely distinct. If the object of the bill was to grant a certain sum to the Established Church of Ireland, and the question was to end there, his opinion of it might be different. But he understood it to be a bill to secure a certain amount of property and revenue destined by the State to religious and charitable purposes, and if the State should find that it was not appropriated justly to the purposes of religious and moral instruction, it would then be the duty of Parliament to consider the necessity of a different appropriation. His opinion was that the revenues of the Church of Ireland were larger than necessary for the religious and moral instruction of the persons belonging to that Church, and for the stability of the Church itself. Lord John did not think it would be advisable or wise to mix the question of appropriation with the question of amount of the revenues; but when Parliament had vindicated the property in tithes, he should then be prepared to assert his opinion with regard to their appropriation. If, when the revenue was once secured, the assertion of that opinion should lead him to differ and separate from those with whom he was united by political connection, and for whom he entertained the deepest private affection, he should feel much regret; yet he should, at whatever cost and sacrifice, do what he should consider his bounden duty--namely, do justice to Ireland. [Sidenote: UPSETTING THE COACH] He afterwards explained that this speech, which produced a great impression, was prompted by the attitude of Stanley concerning the permanence and inviolability of the Irish Church. He was, in fact, afraid that if Stanley's statement was allowed to pass in silence by his colleagues, the whole Government would be regarded as pledged to the maintenance in their existing shape of the temporalities of an alien institution. Lord John accordingly struck from his own bat, amid the cheers of the Radicals. Stanley expressed to Sir James Graham his view of the situation in the now familiar phrase, 'Johnny has upset the coach.' The truth was, divided counsels existed in the Cabinet on this question of appropriation, and Lord John's blunt deliverance, though it did not wreck the Ministry, placed it in a dilemma. He was urged by some of his colleagues to explain away what he had said, but he had made up his mind and was in no humour to retract. Palmerston, with whom he was destined to have many an encounter in coming days, thought he ought to have been turned out of the Cabinet, and others of his colleagues were hardly less incensed. The independent member, in the person of Mr. Ward, who sat for St. Albans, promptly took advantage of Russell's speech to bring forward a motion to the effect that the Church in Ireland 'exceeds the wants of the population, and ought to be reduced.' This proposition was elbowed out of the way by the appointment of a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the revenues of the Irish Church; but Stanley felt that his position in the Cabinet was now untenable, and therefore retired from office in the company of the Duke of Richmond, Lord Ripon, and Sir James Graham. The Radicals made no secret of their glee. Ward, they held, had been a benefactor to the party beyond their wildest dreams, for he had exorcised the evil spirits of the Grey Administration. Lord Grey had an opportunity at this crisis of infusing fresh vigour into his Ministry by raising to Cabinet rank men of progressive views who stood well with the country. Another course was, however, taken, for the Marquis of Conyngham became Postmaster-General, the Earl of Carlisle Privy Seal, whilst Lord Auckland went to the Admiralty, and Mr. Spring Rice became Colonial Secretary, and so the opportunity of a genuine reconstruction of the Government was lost. The result was, the Government was weakened, and no one was satisfied. 'Whigs, Tories, and Radicals,' wrote Greville, 'join in full cry against them, and the "Times," in a succession of bitter vituperative articles very well done, fires off its contempt and disgust at the paltry patching-up of the Cabinet.' Durham's retirement, though made on the score of ill-health, had not merely cooled the enthusiasm of the Radicals towards the Grey Administration, but had also awakened their suspicions. Lord John was restive, and inclined to kick over the traces; whilst Althorp, whose tastes were bucolic, had also a desire to depart. 'Nature,' he exclaimed, 'intended me to be a grazier; but men will insist on making me a statesman.' He confided to Lord John that he detested office to such an extent that he 'wished himself dead' every morning when he awoke. Meanwhile vested interests here, there, and everywhere, were uniting their forces against the Ministry, and its sins of omission as well as of commission were leaping to light on the platform and in the Press. Wellington found his reputation for political sagacity agreeably recognised, and he fell into the attitude of an oracle whose jeremiads had come true. When Lord Grey proposed the renewal of the Coercion Act without alteration, Lord Althorp expressed a strong objection to such a proceeding. He had assured Littleton that the Act would not be put in force again in its entirety, and the latter, with more candour than discretion, had communicated the intimation to O'Connell, who bruited it abroad. [Sidenote: O'CONNELL THROWS DOWN THE GAUNTLET] Lord John had come to definite convictions about Ireland, and he was determined not to remain in the Cabinet unless he was allowed to speak out. On June 23 the Irish Tithe Bill reached the stage of committee, and Littleton drew attention to the changes which had been introduced into the measure--slight concessions to public opinion which Lord John felt were too paltry to meet the gravity of the case. O'Connell threw down the gauntlet to the Ministry, and asked the House to pass an amendment asserting that the surplus revenues of the Church ought to be applied to purposes of public utility. Peel laid significant stress on the divided counsels in the Ministry, and accused Lord John of asserting that the Irish Church was the greatest grievance of which the nation had ever had to complain. The latter repudiated such a charge, and explained that what he had said was that the revenues of the Church were too great for its stability, thereby implying that he both desired and contemplated its continued existence. Although not unwilling to support a mild Coercion Bill, if it went hand in hand with a determined effort to deal with abuses, he made it clear that repressive enactments without such an effort at Reform were altogether repugnant to his sense of justice. He declared that Coercion Acts were 'peculiarly abhorrent to those who pride themselves on the name of Whigs;' and he added that, when such a necessity arose, Ministers were confronted with the duty of looking 'deeper into the causes of the long-standing and permanent evils' of Ireland. I am not prepared to continue the government of Ireland without fully probing her condition; I am not prepared to propose bills for coercion, and the maintenance of a large force of military and police, without endeavouring to improve, so far as lies in my power, the condition of the people. I will not be a Minister to carry on systems which I think founded on bigotry and prejudice. Be the consequence what it may, I am content to abide by these opinions, to carry them out to their fullest extent, not by any premature declaration of mere opinion, but by going on gradually, from time to time improving our institutions, and, without injuring the ancient and venerable fabrics, rendering them fit and proper mansions for a great, free, and intelligent people.' Such a speech was worthy of Fox, and it recalls a passage in Lord John's biography of that illustrious statesman. Fox did his best in the teeth of prejudice and obloquy to free Ireland from the thraldom which centuries of oppression had created: 'In 1780, in 1793, and in 1829, that which had been denied to reason was granted to force. Ireland triumphed, not because the justice of her claims was apparent, but because the threat of insurrection overcame prejudice, made fear superior to bigotry, and concession triumphant over persecution.'[9] [Sidenote: CROSS CURRENTS] Even O'Connell expressed his admiration of this bold and fearless declaration, and the speech did much to increase Lord John's reputation, both within and without the House of Commons. In answer to a letter of congratulation, he said that his friends would make him, by their encouragement--what he felt he was not by nature--a good speaker. 'There are occasions,' he added, 'on which one must express one's feelings or sink into contempt. I own I have not been easy during the period in which I thought it absolutely necessary to suspend the assertion of my opinions in order to secure peace in this country.' Lord John's attitude on this occasion threw into relief his keen sense of political responsibility, no less than the honesty and courage which were characteristic of the man. A day or two later the Cabinet drifted on to the rocks. The policy of Coercion was reaffirmed in spite of Althorp's protests, and in spite also of Littleton's pledge to the contrary to O'Connell. Generosity was not the strong point of the Irish orator, and, to the confusion of Littleton and the annoyance of Grey, he insisted on taking the world into his confidence from his place in Parliament. This was the last straw. Lord Althorp would no longer serve, and Lord Grey, harassed to death, determined no longer to lead. After all, 'Johnny' was only one of many who upset the coach, which, in truth, turned over because its wheels were rotten. On the evening of June 29 a meeting of the Cabinet was held, and, in Russell's words, 'Lord Grey placed before us the letters containing his own resignation and that of Lord Althorp, which he had sent early in the morning to the King. He likewise laid before us the King's gracious acceptance of his resignation, and he gave to Lord Melbourne a sealed letter from his Majesty. Lord Melbourne, upon opening this letter, found in it an invitation to him to undertake the formation of a Government. Seeing that nothing was to be done that night, I left the Cabinet and went to the Opera.' Lord Melbourne was sent for in July, and took his place at the head of a Cabinet which remained practically unaltered. He had been Home Secretary under Grey, and Duncannon was now called to fill that post. The first Melbourne Administration was short-lived, for when it had existed four months Earl Spencer died, and Althorp, on his succession to the peerage, was compelled to relinquish his leadership of the House of Commons. William IV. cared little for Melbourne, and less for Russell, and, as he wished to pick a quarrel with the Whigs, since their policy excited his alarm, he used Althorp for a pretext. Lord Grey had professed to regard Althorp as indispensable to the Ministry, and the King imagined that Melbourne would adopt the same view. Although reluctant to part with Althorp, who eagerly seized the occasion of his accession to an earldom to retire from official life, Melbourne refused to believe that the heavens would fall because of that fact. There was no pressing conflict of opinion between the King and his advisers, but William IV. nevertheless availed himself of the accident of Althorp's elevation to the peerage to dismiss the Ministry. The reversion of the leadership in the Commons fell naturally to Lord John, and Melbourne was quick to recognise the fact. 'Thus invited,' says Lord John Russell, 'I considered it my duty to accept the task, though I told Lord Melbourne that I could not expect to have the same influence with the House of Commons which Lord Althorp had possessed. In conversation with Mr. Abercromby I said, more in joke than in earnest, that if I were offered the command of the Channel Fleet, and thought it my duty to accept, I should not refuse it.' It was unlike Sydney Smith to treat the remark about taking command of the Channel Fleet seriously, when 'he elaborated a charge' against Lord John on the Deans and Chapters question; but even the witty Canon could lose his temper sometimes. [Sidenote: WILLIAM IV. DEFENDER OF THE FAITH] The King, however, had strong opinions on the subject of Lord John's qualifications, and he expressed in emphatic terms his disapproval. The nation trusted Lord John, and had come to definite and flattering conclusions about him as a statesman, but at Windsor a different opinion prevailed. The King, in fact, made no secret to Lord Melbourne, in the famous interview at Brighton, of his conviction that Lord John Russell had neither the ability nor the influence to qualify him for the task; and he added that he would 'make a wretched figure' when opposed in the Commons by men like Peel and Stanley. His Majesty further volunteered the remark that he did not 'understand that young gentleman,' and could not agree to the arrangement proposed. William, moreover, took occasion to pose as a veritable, as well as titular, Defender of the Faith, for, on the authority of Baron Stockmar, the King 'considered Lord John Russell to have pledged himself to certain encroachments on the Church, which his Majesty had made up his mind and expressed his determination to resist.' As Russell was clearly quite out of the reckoning, Melbourne suggested two other names. But the King had made up his mind on more subjects than one, and next morning, Lord Melbourne found himself in possession of a written paper, which informed him his Majesty had no further occasion either for his services or for those of his colleagues. William IV. acted within his constitutional rights, but such an exercise of the royal prerogative was, to say the least, worthy of George III. in his most uninspired mood. Althorp regarded the King's action as the 'greatest piece of folly ever committed,' and Lord John, in reply to the friendly note which contained this emphatic verdict, summoned his philosophy to his aid in the following characteristic rejoinder: 'I suppose everything is for the best in this world; otherwise the only good which I should see in this event would be that it saves me from being sadly pommelled by Peel and Stanley, to say nothing of O'Connell.' Wellington, who was hastily summoned by the King, suggested that Sir Robert Peel should be entrusted with the formation of a new Government. Sir Robert Peel was accordingly sent for in hot haste from Rome to form a new Ministry. On his arrival in London in December 1834, he at once set about the formation of a Cabinet. This is Jekyll's comment: 'Our crisis has been entertaining, and Peel is expected to-day. I wish he could have remained long enough at Rome to have learnt mosaic, of which parti-coloured materials our Cabinets have been constructed for twenty years, and for want of cement have fallen to pieces. The Whigs squall out, "Let us depart, for the Reformers grow too impatient." The Tories squall out, "Let us come in, and we will be very good boys, and become Reformers ourselves." However, the country is safe by the Reform Bill, for no Minister can remain in office now by corrupt Parliaments; he must act with approbation of the country or lose his Cabinet in a couple of months.' At the General Election which followed, Peel issued his celebrated address to the electors of Tamworth, in which he declared himself favourable to the reform of 'proved abuses,' and to the carrying out of such measures 'gradually, dispassionately, and deliberately,' in order that it might be lasting. Lord John was returned again for South Devon; but on the reassembling of Parliament the Liberal majority had dwindled from 314 to 107. It was during his election tour that he delivered an address at Totnes, which Greville described as not merely 'a very masterly performance,' but 'one of the cleverest and most appropriate speeches' he had ever read, and for which his friends warmly complimented him. It was a powerful and humorous examination of the Tories' professed anxiety for Reform, and of the prospects of any Reform measures being carried out by their instrumentality. [Sidenote: LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION] Lord John now became leader of the Opposition, though the Duke of Bedford dreaded the strain, and expostulated with his son on his acceptance of so irksome and laborious a task. 'You will have to conduct and keep in order a noisy and turbulent pack of hounds which, I think, you will find it quite impossible to restrain.' The Duke of Bedford's fears were not groundless, and Lord John afterwards confessed that, in the whole period during which he had led the Liberal party in the House of Commons, he never had so difficult a task. The forces under his command consisted of a few stalwart Radicals, a number of Whigs of the traditional and somewhat stationary type, and some sixty Irish members. Nevertheless, he promptly assumed an aggressive attitude, and his first victory as leader of the Opposition was won on the question of the choice of a new Speaker, when Mr. Abercromby was placed in the chair in preference to the Ministerial candidate. As the session went on, Lord John's resources in attack grew more and more marked, but he was foiled by the lack of cohesion amongst his followers. It became evident that, unless all sections of the Opposition were united as one man, the Government of Sir Robert Peel could not be overthrown. Alliance with the Radicals and the Irish party, although hateful to the old-fashioned Whigs, was in fact imperative. Lord John summoned a meeting of the Opposition at Lord Lichfield's house; the support of the Radicals and Irish was secured, and then the leader marshalled his forces for what he hoped would prove a decisive victory. His expectations were not disappointed, for early in April he brought forward a motion for the appropriation of the surplus revenues of the Irish Church to general moral and religious purposes, and won with a majority of twenty-seven votes (285 to 258). Sir Robert Peel forthwith resigned, and the Whigs were avenged for their cavalier dismissal by the King. On the day after the Prime Minister's resignation, Lord John Russell was married--April 11, 1835, at St. George's, Hanover Square--to Adelaide, Lady Ribblesdale, the widow of the second bearer of that title. The respite from political strife was of short duration, for at the end of forty-eight hours he was summoned from Woburn to take the seals of the Home Office in the second Melbourne Administration. The members of the new Cabinet presented themselves to their constituents for re-election, and Lord John suffered defeat in Devonshire. A seat was, however, found for him at Stroud, and in May he was back again in the House of Commons. The first measure of importance introduced by him, on June 5, was the Municipal Reform Act--a measure which embodied the results of the Commission on the subject appointed by Lord Grey. The bill swept away a host of antiquated and absurd privileges of corporate cities and towns, abolished the authority of cliques of freemen, rectified a variety of abuses, and entrusted municipal government to the hands of all taxpayers. Lord John piloted the measure through the Commons, and fought almost single-handed the representatives of vested rights. After a long contest with the Opposition and the Lords, he had the satisfaction of passing the bill, in a somewhat modified form, through its final stages in September, though the Peers, as usual, opposed it as long as they dared, and only yielded at last when Peel in the one House and Wellington in the other recommended concession. [Sidenote: A POPULAR OVATION] The Irish Tithes Bill was subsequently introduced, and, though it now included the clauses for the appropriation of certain revenues, it passed the Commons by a majority of thirty-seven. The Lords, however, struck out the appropriation clauses, and the Government in consequence abandoned the measure. The Irish Municipal Bill shared a similar fate, and Lord John's desire to see justice done in Ireland was brought for the moment to naught. The labours of the session had been peculiarly arduous, and in the autumn his health suffered from the prolonged strain. His ability as a leader of the House of Commons, in spite of the dismal predictions of William IV. and the admonitions of paternal solicitude, was now recognised by men of all shades of opinion, though, of course, he had to confront the criticism alike of candid friends and equally outspoken foes. He recruited his energies in the West of England, and, though he had been so recently defeated in Devonshire, wherever he went the people, by way of amends, gave him an ovation. Votes of thanks were accorded to him for his championship of civil and religious liberty, and in November he was entertained at a banquet at Bristol, and presented with a handsome testimonial, raised by the sixpences of ardent Reformers. Parliament, in the Speech from the Throne, when the session of 1836 began, was called upon to take into early consideration various measures of Reform. The programme of the Ministry, like that of many subsequent administrations, was not lacking in ambition. It was proposed to deal with the antiquated and vexatious manner in which from time immemorial the tithes of the English Church had been collected. The question of Irish tithes was also once more to be brought forward for solution; the municipal corporations of Ireland and the relief of its poor were to be dealt with in the light of recent legislation for England in the same direction. Improvements in the practical working of the administration of justice, 'more especially in the Court of Chancery,' were foreshadowed, and it was announced that the early attention of Parliament would also be called to certain 'grievances which affect those who dissent from the doctrines or discipline of the Established Church.' Such a list of measures bore on its very face the unmistakeable stamp of Lord John Russell's zeal for political redress and religious toleration. Early in the session he brought forward two measures for the relief of Nonconformists. One of them legalised marriages in the presence of a registrar in Nonconformist places of worship, and the other provided for a general civil registration of births, marriages, and deaths. His original proposal was that marriage in church as well as chapel should only take place after due notice had been given to the registrar. The bishops refused to entertain such an idea, and the House of Lords gave effect to their objections, with the result that the registrar was bowed out of church, though not out of chapel, where indeed he remains to this day. The Tithe Commutation Act and three other measures--one for equalising the incomes of prelates, rearranging ancient dioceses and creating new sees; another for the better application of the revenues of the Church to its general purposes; and a third to diminish pluralities--bore witness to his ardour for ecclesiastical reform. The first became law in 1836, and the other two respectively in 1838 and 1839. He lent his aid also to the movement for the foundation on a broad and liberal basis of a new university in London with power to confer degrees--a concession to Nonconformist scholarship and liberal culture generally, which was the more appreciated since Oxford and Cambridge still jealously excluded by their religious tests the youth of the Free Churches. The Tithe Commutation Act was passed in June; it provided for the exchange of tithes into a rent-charge upon land payable in money, but according to a sliding scale which varied with the average price of corn during the seven preceding years. In the opinion of Lord Farnborough, to no measure since the Reformation has the Church owed so much peace and security. The Irish Municipal Bill was carried in the course of the session through the Commons, but the Lords rendered the measure impossible; and though the Irish Poor Law Bill was carried, a different fate awaited Irish Tithes. This measure was introduced for the fifth time, but in consequence of the King's death, on June 20, and the dissolution of Parliament which followed, it had to be abandoned. Between 1835 and 1837 Lord John, as Home Secretary, brought about many changes for the better in the regulation of prisons, and especially in the treatment of juvenile offenders. By his directions prisoners in Newgate, from metropolitan counties, were transferred to the gaol of each county. Following in the steps of Sir Samuel Romilly, he also reduced the number of capital crimes, and, later on, brought about various prison reforms, notably the establishment of a reformatory for juvenile offenders. [Sidenote: THE QUEEN'S ACCESSION] The rejoicings over Queen Victoria's accession in the summer of 1837 were quickly followed by a General Election. The result of this appeal to the country was that the Liberal majority in the House of Commons was reduced to less than forty. Lord John was again returned for Stroud, and on that occasion he delivered a speech in which he cleverly contrasted the legislative achievements of the Tories with those of the Whigs. He made a chivalrous allusion to the 'illustrious Princess who has ascended the Throne with purest intentions and the justest desires.' One passage from his speech merits quotation: 'We have had glorious female reigns. Those of Elizabeth and Anne led us to great victories. Let us now hope that we are going to have a female reign illustrious in its deeds of peace--an Elizabeth without her tyranny, an Anne without her weakness.... I trust that we may succeed in making the reign of Victoria celebrated among the nations of the earth and to all posterity, and that England may not forget her precedence of teaching the nations how to live.' [Sidenote: LORD MELBOURNE AND THE COURT] Lord Melbourne had never been a favourite with William, but from the first he stood high in the regard of the young Queen. Her Majesty was but eighteen when she ascended the throne upon which her reign has shed so great a lustre; she had been brought up in comparative seclusion, and her knowledge of public affairs was, of necessity, small. Lord Melbourne at that time was approaching sixty, and the respect which her Majesty gave to his years was heightened by the quick recognition of the fact that the Prime Minister was one of the most experienced statesmen which the country at that moment possessed. He was also a man of ready wit, and endowed with the charm of fine manners, and under his easy nonchalance there lurked more earnest and patriotic conviction than he ever cared to admit. 'I am sorry to hurt any man's feelings,' said Sydney Smith, 'and to brush aside the magnificent fabric of levity and gaiety he has reared; but I accuse our Minister of honesty and diligence.' Ridiculous rumours filled the air during the earliest years of her Majesty's reign concerning the supposed undue influence which Lord Melbourne exerted at Court. The more advanced Radicals complained that he sought to render himself indispensable to the sovereign, and that his plan was to surround her with his friends, relations, and creatures, and so to obtain a prolonged tenure of power. The Tories also grumbled, and made no secret of the same ungenerous suspicions. They knew neither her Majesty nor Lord Melbourne who thus spoke. At the same time, it must be admitted that Lord Melbourne was becoming more and more out of touch with popular aspirations, and the political and social questions which were rapidly coming to the front were treated by him in a somewhat cavalier manner. Russell had his own misgivings, and was by no means inclined to lay too much stress on the opinions of philosophical Radicals of the type of Grote. At the same time, he urged upon Melbourne the desirability of meeting the Radicals as far as possible, and he laid stress on the fact that they, at least, were not seeking for grounds of difference with the Premier. 'There are two things which I think would be more acceptable than any others to this body--the one to make the ballot an open question, the other to remove Tories from the political command of the army.' Lord Melbourne, however, believed that the ballot would create many evils and cure none. Lord John yielded to his chief, but in doing so brought upon himself a good deal of angry criticism, which was intensified by an unadvised declaration in the House of Commons. In his speech on the Address he referred to the question of Reform, and declared that it was quite impossible for him to take part in further measures of Reform. The people of England might revise the Act of 1832, or agitate for a new one; but as for himself, he refused to be associated with any such movement. A storm of expostulation and angry protest broke out; but the advanced Reformers failed to move Lord John from the position which he had taken. So they concentrated their hostility in a harmless nickname, and Lord John for some time forward was called in Radical circles and certain journalistic publications, 'Finality Jack.' This honest but superfluous and embarrassing deliverance brought him taunts and reproaches, as well as a temporary loss of popularity. It was always characteristic of Lord John to speak his mind, and he sometimes did it not wisely but too well. Grote wrote in February 1838: 'The degeneracy of the Liberal party, and their passive acquiescence in everything, good or bad, which emanates from the present Ministry, puts the accomplishment of any political good out of the question; and it is not worth while to undergo the fatigue of a nightly attendance in Parliament for the simple purpose of sustaining Whig Conservatism against Tory Conservatism. I now look back wistfully to my unfinished Greek history.' Yet Lord Brougham, in the year of the Queen's accession, declared that Russell was the 'stoutest Reformer of them all.' [Sidenote: LORD DURHAM AND CANADA] The rebellion in Canada was the first great incident in the new reign, and the Melbourne Cabinet met the crisis by proposals--which were moved by Lord John in the Commons, and adopted--for suspending the Canadian Constitution for the space of four years. The Earl of Durham, at the beginning of 1838, was appointed Governor-General with extraordinary powers, and he reluctantly accepted the difficult post, trusting, as he himself said, to the confidence and support of the Government, and to the forbearance of those who differed from his political views. No one doubts that Durham acted to the best of his judgment, though everyone admits that he exceeded at least the letter of his authority; and no one can challenge, in the light of the subsequent history of Canada, the greatness and far-reaching nature of his services, both to the Crown and to the Dominion. Relying on the forbearance and support, in the faith of which he had accepted his difficult commission, the Governor-General took a high hand with the rebels; but his ordinances were disallowed, and he was practically discredited and openly deserted by the Government. When he was on the point of returning home, a broken-hearted man, in failing health, it was Lord John Russell who at length stood up in Durham's defence. Speaking on the Durham Indemnity Bill, Lord John said: 'I ask you to pass this Bill of Indemnity, telling you that I shall be prepared when the time comes, not indeed to say that the terms or words of the ordinances passed by the Earl of Durham are altogether to be justified, but that, looking at his conduct as a whole, I shall be ready to take part with him. I shall be ready to bear my share of any responsibility which is to be incurred in these difficult circumstances.' The generous nature of this declaration was everywhere recognised, and by none more heartily than Lord Durham. 'I do not conceal from you that my feelings have been deeply wounded by the conduct of the Ministry. From you, however, and you alone of them all, have I received any cordial support personally; and I feel, as I have told you in a former letter, very grateful to you.' Meanwhile Lord John Russell had been called upon to oppose Mr. Grote's motion in favour of the ballot. Although the motion was lost by 315 to 198 votes, the result was peculiarly galling to Lord John, for amongst the majority were those members who were usually opposed to the Government, whilst the minority was made up of Lord Melbourne's followers. But the crisis threatening the Ministry passed away when a motion of want of confidence in Lord Glenelg, the head of the Colonial Office, was defeated by twenty-nine votes. The Irish legislation of the Government as represented by the Tithe Bill did not prosper, and it became evident that, in order to pass the measure, the Appropriation Clause must be abandoned. Although Lord John Russell emphatically declared in 1835 that no Tithe Bill could be effective which did not include an Appropriation Clause, he gave way to the claims of political expediency, and further alienated the Radicals by allowing a measure which had been robbed of its potency to pass through Parliament. Lord Melbourne's Government accomplished during the session something in the direction of Irish Reform by the passage of the Poor Law, but it failed to carry the Municipal Bill, which in many respects was the most important of the three. The autumn, which witnessed on both sides of the Atlantic the excitement over Lord Durham's mission to Canada, was darkened in the home of Lord John by the death at Brighton, on November 1, of his wife. His first impulse was to place the resignation of his office and of leadership in the Commons in the hands of his chief. Urgent appeals from all quarters were made to him to remain at his post, and, though his own health was precarious, cheered by the sympathy of his colleagues and of the country, he resumed his work after a few weeks of quiet at Cassiobury. FOOTNOTES: [9] Russell's _Life of Fox_, vol. i. p. 242. CHAPTER VI THE TWO FRONT BENCHES 1840-1845 Lord John's position in the Cabinet and in the Commons--His services to Education--Joseph Lancaster--Lord John's Colonial Policy--Mr. Gladstone's opinion--Lord Stanmore's recollections--The mistakes of the Melbourne Cabinet--The Duke of Wellington's opinion of Lord John--The agitation against the Corn Laws--Lord John's view of Sir Robert Peel--The Edinburgh Letter--Peel's dilemma--Lord John's comment on the situation. THE truth was, Lord John could not be spared, and his strong sense of duty triumphed over his personal grief. One shrewd contemporary observer of men and movements declared that Melbourne and Russell were the only two men in the Cabinet for whom the country cared a straw. The opinion of the man in the street was summed up in Sydney Smith's assertion that the Melbourne Government could not possibly exist without Lord John, for the simple reason that five minutes after his departure it would be dissolved into 'sparks of liberality and splinters of reform.' In 1839 the Irish policy of the Government was challenged, and, on the motion of Lord Roden, a vote of censure was carried in the House of Lords. When the matter came before the Commons, Lord John delivered a speech so adroit and so skilful that friends and foes alike were satisfied, and even pronounced Radicals forgot to grumble. Lord John's speech averted a Ministerial crisis, and on a division the Government won by twenty-two votes. A month later the affairs of Jamaica came up for discussion, for the Government found itself forced, by the action of the House of Assembly in refusing to adopt the Prisons Act which had been passed by the Imperial Legislature, to ask Parliament to suspend the Constitution of the colony for a period of five years; and on a division they gained their point by a majority of only five votes. The Jamaica Bill was an autocratic measure, which served still further to discredit Lord Melbourne with the party of progress. Chagrined at the narrow majority, the Cabinet submitted its resignation to her Majesty, who assured Lord John that she had 'never felt more pain' than when she learnt the decision of her Ministers. The Queen sent first for Wellington, and afterwards, at his suggestion, for Peel, who undertook to form an Administration; but when her Majesty insisted on retaining the services of the Whig Ladies-in-Waiting, Sir Robert declined to act, and the former Cabinet was recalled to office, though hardly with flying colours. Education, to hark back for a moment, was the next great question with which Lord John dealt, for, in the summer of 1839, he brought in a bill to increase the grant to elementary schools from 20,000_l._ a year to 30,000_l._--first made in 1833--and to place it under the control of the Privy Council, as well as to subject the aided schools to inspection. 'I explained,' was his own statement, 'in the simplest terms, without any exaggeration, the want of education in the country, the deficiencies of religious instruction, and the injustice of subjecting to the penalties of the criminal law persons who had never been taught their duty to God and man.' His proposals, particularly with regard to the establishment of a Normal school, were met with a storm of opposition. This part of the scheme was therefore abandoned; 'but the throwing out of one of our children to the wolf,' remarks Lord John, 'did little to appease his fury!' At length the measure, in its modified shape, was carried in the Commons; but the House of Lords, led on this occasion by the Archbishop of Canterbury, by a majority of more than a hundred, condemned the scheme entirely. Dr. Blomfield, Bishop of London, at this juncture came forward as peacemaker, and, at a private meeting at Lansdowne House, consisting of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishops of London and Salisbury, Lord Lansdowne, and Lord John Russell, the dispute was amicably adjusted, on the basis of the reports of the Inspectors of Schools being sent to the Bishops as well as to the Committee of Privy Council, and co-operation between the Bishops and the Committee in the work of education. [Sidenote: JOSEPH LANCASTER] The Duke of Bedford was one of the first men of position in the country to come to the aid of Joseph Lancaster--a young Quaker philanthropist, who, in spite of poverty and obscurity, did more for the cause of popular education in England in the early years of the century than all the privileged people in the country.[10] Here a floating straw of reminiscence may be cited, since it throws momentary light on the mischievous instincts of a quick-witted boy. Lord John, looking back towards the close of his life, said: 'One of my earliest recollections as a boy at Woburn Abbey is that of putting on Joseph Lancaster's broad hat and mimicking his mode of salutation.' Other changes were imminent. Lord Normanby had proved himself to be a popular Viceroy of Ireland; indeed, O'Connell asserted that he was one of the best Englishmen that had ever been sent across St. George's Channel in an official capacity. He was now Colonial Secretary; and, in spite of his virtues, he was scarcely the man for such a position--at all events, at a crisis in which affairs required firm handling. He managed matters so badly that the Under-Secretary (Mr. Labouchere, afterwards Lord Taunton) was in open revolt. The cards were accordingly shuffled in May 1839, and, amongst other and less significant changes, Normanby and Russell changed places. Lord John quickly made his presence felt at the Colonial Office. He was a patient listener to the permanent officials; indeed, he declared that he meant to give six months to making himself master of the new duties of his position. Like all men of the highest capacity, Lord John was never unwilling to learn. He held that the Imperial Government was bound not merely by honour, but by enlightened self-interest, to protect the rights and to advance the welfare of the Colonies. His words are significant, and it seems well to quote them, since they gather up the policy which he consistently followed: 'If Great Britain gives up her supremacy from a niggardly spirit of parsimony, or from a craven fear of helplessness, other Powers will soon look upon the Empire, not with the regard due to an equal, as she once was, but with jealousy of the height she once held, without the fear she once inspired. To build up an empire extending over every sea, swaying many diverse races, and combining many forms of religion, requires courage and capacity; to allow such an empire to fall to pieces is a task which may be performed by the poor in intellect, and the pusillanimous in conduct.' [Sidenote: COLONIAL POLICY] When Lord John was once asked at the Colonial Office by an official of the French Government how much of Australia was claimed as the dominion of Great Britain, he promptly answered, 'The whole.' The visitor, quite taken aback, found it expedient to take his departure. Lord John vigorously assailed the view that colonies which had their own parliaments, framed on the British model, were virtually independent, and, therefore, had no right to expect more than moral help from the Mother Country. During his tenure of office New Zealand became part of the British dominions. By the treaty of Waitangi, the Queen assumed the sovereignty, and the new colony was assured of the protection of England. Lord John assured the British Provinces of North America that, so long as they wished to remain subjects of the Queen, they might confidently rely on the protection of England in all emergencies. Mr. Gladstone has in recent years done justice to the remarkable prescience, and scarcely less remarkable administrative skill, which Lord John brought to bear at a critical juncture in the conduct of the Colonial policy of the Melbourne Government. He lays stress on the 'unfaltering courage' which Russell displayed in meeting, as far as was then possible, the legitimate demand for responsible self-government. It is not, therefore, surprising that, to borrow Mr. Gladstone's words, 'Lord John Russell substituted harmony for antagonism in the daily conduct of affairs for those Colonies, each of which, in an infancy of irrepressible vigour, was bursting its swaddling clothes. Is it inexcusable to say that by this decision, which was far ahead of the current opinion of the day, he saved the Empire, possibly from disruption, certainly from much embarrassment and much discredit.'[11] Lord John was a man of vision. He saw, beyond most of his contemporaries, the coming magnitude of the Empire, and he did his best to shape on broad lines and to far-reaching issues the policy of England towards her children beyond the seas. Lord John recognised in no churlish or half-hearted spirit the claims of the Colonies, nor did he stand dismayed by the vision of Empire. 'There was a time when we might have stood alone,' are his words. 'That time has passed. We conquered and peopled Canada, we took possession of the whole of Australia, Van Dieman's Land, and New Zealand. We have annexed India to the Crown. There is no going back. For my part, I delight in observing the imitation of our free institutions, and even our habits and manners, in colonies at a distance from the Palace of Westminster.' He trusted the Colonies, and refused to believe that all the wisdom which was profitable to direct their affairs was centred in Downing Street. His attitude was sympathetic and generous, and at the same time it was candid and firm. Lord Stanmore's recollections of his father's colleague go back to this period, and will be read with interest: 'As a boy of ten or twelve I often saw Lord John. His half-sister, Lady Louisa Russell, was the wife of my half-brother, Lord Abercorn, and Lord John was a frequent guest at Lord Abercorn's villa at Stanmore, where my father habitually passed his Saturdays and Sundays during the session, and where I almost wholly lived. My first conscious remembrance of Lord John dates from the summer of 1839, and in that and the following years I often saw him at the Priory. Towards the close of 1839 Lord John lost his first wife, and the picture of his little figure, in deep mourning, walking by the side of my father on the gravel walks about the house in the spring and summer of 1840 is one vividly impressed on my recollection. His manner to children was not unpleasant, and I well remember his pausing, an amused listener to a childish and vehement political discussion between his step-daughter, Miss Lister, and myself--a discussion which he from time to time stirred up to increased animation by playfully mischievous suggestions.' [Sidenote: A HOSTILE RESOLUTION] Early in the session of 1840, the Ministry was met by a vote of want of confidence, and in the course of the discussion Sir James Graham accused Lord John of encouraging sedition by appointing as magistrate one of the leaders of the Chartist agitation at Newport. Lord John, it turned out, had appointed Mr. Frost, the leader in question, on the advice of the Lord-Lieutenant, and he was able to prove that his own speech at Liverpool had been erroneously reported. The hostile resolution was accordingly repelled, and the division resulted in favour of the Government. For six years Turkey and Egypt had been openly hostile to each other, and in 1839 the war had been pushed to such extremities that Great Britain, Austria, Russia, and Prussia entered into a compact to bring about--by compulsion if necessary--a cessation of hostilities. Lord Holland and Lord Clarendon objected to England's share in the Treaty of July 1840, but Lord Palmerston compelled the Cabinet to acquiesce by a threat of resignation, and Lord John, at this crisis, showed that he was strongly in favour of his colleague's policy. The matter, however, was by no means settled, for once more a grave division of opinion in the party arose as to the wisdom of practically throwing away our alliance with France. Althorp--now Lord Spencer--reminded his former colleagues that that nation was most fitted to be our ally of any in Europe, on the threefold ground of situation, institutions, and civilisation. Lord John drew up a memorandum and submitted it to his colleagues, in which he recognised the rights of France, and proposed to summon her, under given conditions, to take measures with the other Powers to preserve the peace of Europe. The personal ascendency of Lord Palmerston on questions of foreign policy was, however, already so marked that Lord Melbourne--now his brother-in-law, was reluctant to insist on moderation. Lord John, however, stood firm, and the breaking up of the Government seemed inevitable. During the crisis which followed, Lord Palmerston, striking, as was his wont, from his own bat, rejected, under circumstances which Mr. Walpole has explained in detail in his Life of Lord John Russell, a proposal for a conference of the allied Powers. Lord John had already entered his protest against any one member of the Cabinet being allowed to conduct affairs as he pleased, without consultation or control, and he now informed Lord Melbourne in a letter dated November 1, 1840--which Mr. Walpole prints--that Palmerston's reply to Austria compelled him to once more consider his position, as he could not defend in the House of Commons measures which he thought wrong. Lord Melbourne promptly recognised that Russell was the only possible leader in the Commons, and he induced Lord Palmerston to admit his mistake over the despatch to Metternich, and in this way the misunderstanding was brought to an end. Meanwhile, the fortunes of the war in the East turned against Ibrahim Pasha, and Palmerston's policy, though not his manner of carrying it out, was justified. [Sidenote: DIVIDED COUNSELS] The closing years of the Melbourne Administration were marked not only by divided counsels, but by actual blunders of policy, and in this connection it is perhaps enough to cite the Opium war against China and the foolhardy invasion of Afghanistan. At home the question of Free Trade was coming rapidly to the front, and the Anti-corn Law League, which was founded in Manchester in 1838, was already beginning to prove itself a power in the land. As far back as 1826, Hume had taken up his parable in Parliament against the Corn Laws as a blight on the trade of the country; and two years after the Reform Bill was passed he had returned to the attack, only to find, however, that the nation was still wedded to Protection. Afterwards, year after year, Mr. Villiers drew attention to the subject, and moved for an inquiry into the working of the Corn Laws. He declared that the existing system was opposed by the industry, the intelligence, and the commerce of the nation, and at length, in a half-hearted fashion, the Government found itself compelled, if it was to exist at all, to make some attempt to deal with the problem. Lord Melbourne, and some at least of his colleagues, were but little interested in the question, and they failed to gauge the feeling of the country. In the spring of 1841 action of some kind grew inevitable, and the Cabinet determined to propose a fixed duty of eight shillings per quarter on wheat, and to reduce the duty on sugar. Lord John opened the debate on the latter proposal in a speech which moved even Greville to enthusiasm; but neither his arguments nor his eloquence produced the desired impression on the House, for the Government was defeated by thirty-six votes. Everyone expected the Ministry at once to face the question of dissolution or resignation; but Melbourne was determined to cling to office as long as possible, in spite of the growing difficulties and even humiliations of his position. On June 4, the day on which Lord John was to bring forward his proposal for a fixed duty on wheat, Sir Robert Peel carried a vote of want of confidence by a majority of one, and, as an appeal to the country was at length inevitable, Parliament was dissolved a few days later. The Melbourne Ministry had outstayed its welcome. The manner in which it had left Lord Durham in the lurch over his ill-advised ordinances had aroused widespread indignation, for the multitude at least could not forget the greatness of his services to the cause of Reform. If the dissolution had come two or three years earlier, the Government might have gone to the country without fear; but in 1841, both at home and abroad, their blunders and their vacillation had alienated confidence, and it was not difficult to forecast the result. The General Election brought Lord John a personal triumph. He was presented with a requisition signed by several thousand persons, asking him to contest the City of London, and after an exciting struggle he was returned, though with only a narrow majority; and during the political vicissitudes of the next eighteen years London was faithful to him. Lord John Russell was essentially a home-loving man, and the gloom which bereavement had cast over his life in the autumn of 1839 was at best only partially dispelled by the close and sympathetic relations with his family. It was, therefore, with satisfaction that all his friends, both on his own account and that of his motherless young children, heard of his approaching second marriage. Immediately after the election for the City, Lord John was married to Lady Fanny Elliot, second daughter of the Earl of Minto, a union which brought him lasting happiness. [Sidenote: 'A HOST IN HIMSELF'] Parliament met in the middle of August, and the Government were defeated on the Address by a majority of ninety-one, and on August 28 Lord John found himself once more out of harness. In his speech in the House of Commons announcing the resignation of the Government, he said that the Whigs under Lord Grey had begun with the Reform Act, and that they were closing their tenure of power by proposals for the relief of commerce. The truth was, the Melbourne Administration had not risen to its opportunities. Its fixed duty on corn was a paltry compromise. The leaders of the party needed to be educated up to the level of the national demands. Opposition was to bring about unexpected political combinations and new political opportunities, and the years of conflict which were dawning were also to bring more clearly into view Lord John Russell's claims to the Liberal leadership. When the Melbourne Administration was manifestly losing the confidence of the nation, Rogers the poet was walking one day with the Duke of Wellington in Hyde Park, and the talk turned on the political situation. Rogers remarked, 'What a powerful band Lord John Russell will have to contend with! There's Peel, Lord Stanley, Sir James Graham----;' and the Duke interrupted him at this point with the laconic reply, 'Lord John Russell is a host in himself.' Protection had triumphed at the General Election, and Sir Robert Peel came to power as champion of the Corn Laws. The Whigs had fallen between two stools, for the country was not in a humour to tolerate vacillation. The Melbourne Cabinet had, in truth, in the years which had witnessed its decline and fall, spoken with the voice of Jacob, but stretched forth the hands of Esau. The Radicals shook their heads, scouted the Ministry's deplorable efforts at finance, and felt, to say the least, lukewarm about their spirited foreign policy. 'I don't thank a man for supporting me when he thinks me right,' was the cynical confession of a statesman of an earlier generation; 'my gratitude is with the man who supports me when he thinks me wrong.' Melbourne was doubtless of the same mind; but the man in the crowd, of Liberal proclivities, was, for the most part, rather disgusted with the turn which affairs had taken, and the polling booths made it plain that he thought the Prime Minister wrong, and, that being the case, he was not obliging enough to return him to power. The big drum had been successfully beaten, moreover, at the General Election by the defenders of all sorts and sizes of vested interests, sinecures, monopolies, and the like, and Sir Robert Peel--though not without personal misgivings--accordingly succeeded Melbourne as First Lord, whilst Stanley, now the hope of stern unbending Tories, took Russell's place as Secretary for the Colonies. The annals of the Peel Administration of course lie outside the province of this monograph; they have already been told with insight and vigour in a companion volume, and the temptation to wander at a tangent into the history of the Queen's reign--especially with Lord John out of office--must be resisted in deference to the exigencies of space. In the Peel Cabinet the men who had revolted under Melbourne, with the exception of the Duke of Richmond, were rewarded with place and power. Lord Ripon, who was spoken of at the time with scarcely disguised contempt as a man of tried inefficiency, became President of the Board of Trade. Sir James Graham, a statesman who was becoming somewhat impervious to new ideas, and who as a Minister displayed little tact in regard to either movements or men, was appointed Home Secretary. Stanley, who had proved himself to be a strong man in the wrong camp, and therefore the evil genius of his party, now carried his unquestionable skill, and his brilliant powers of debate, as well as his imperious temper and contracted views, to the service of the Tories. One other man held a prominent place in Peel's Cabinet, and proved a tower of strength in it--Lord Aberdeen, who was Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and who did much to maintain the peace of Europe when the Tahiti incident and the Spanish marriages threatened embroilment. Lord Aberdeen, from 1841 to 1846, guided the foreign policy of England with ability and discretion, and, as a matter of fact, steered the nation through diplomatic quarrels which, if Lord Palmerston had been at the Foreign Office, would probably have ended in war. This circumstance heightens the irony of his subsequent career. [Sidenote: THE POLITICAL OUTLOOK] The outlook, political and social, when Peel took office and Russell confronted him as leader of the Opposition, was gloomy and full of hazard. The times, in Peel's judgment, were 'out of joint,' and this threw party Government out of joint and raised issues which confused ordinary minds. The old political catchwords 'Peace, retrenchment, and reform,' no longer awoke enthusiasm. Civil and religious liberty were all very well in their way, but they naturally failed to satisfy men and women who were ground down by economic oppression, and were famished through lack of bread. The social condition of England was deplorable, for, though the Reform Bill had brought in its wake measures of relief for the middle classes, it had left the artisans and the peasants almost where it found them. In spite of the new Poor Law and other enactments, the people were burdened with the curse of bitter and hopeless poverty, and the misery and squalor in which they were permitted to live threw a menacing shadow over the fair promise of the opening years of the young Queen's reign. The historians of the period are responsible for the statement that in Manchester, for example, one-tenth of the population lived in cellars; even in the rural districts, the overcrowding, with all its attending horrors in the direction of disease and vice, was scarcely less terrible, for in one parish in Dorset thirty-six persons dwelt, on an average, in each house. The wonder is, not that the Anti-Corn Law League under such circumstances grew strong and the demand for the People's Charter rang through the land, but that the masses in town and country alike bore the harsh servitude of their lot with the patience that was common, and with the heroism that was not rare. [Sidenote: PEEL'S OPEN MIND] Lord John Russell never refused to admit the ability of Peel's Administration. He described it as powerful, popular, and successful. He recognised the honesty of his great rival, his openness of mind, the courage which he displayed in turning a deaf ear to the croakers in his own Cabinet, and the genuine concern which he manifested for the unredressed grievances of the people. In his 'Recollections' he lays stress on the fact that Sir Robert Peel did not hesitate, when he thought such a step essential to the public welfare, to risk the fate of his Ministry on behalf of an unpopular measure. Ireland was a stone of stumbling in his path, and long after he had parted with his old ideas of Protestant ascendency he found himself confronted with the suspicion of the Roman Catholics, who, in Lord John's words, 'obstinately refused favours at Peel's hands, which they would have been willing to accept from a Liberal Administration.' The allusion is, of course, to the Maynooth Grant--a measure of practical relief to the Irish Catholics, which would, without doubt, have thrown Sir Robert Peel out of office if he had been left to the tender mercies of his own supporters. Disraeli was fond of asserting that Peel lacked imagination, and there was a measure of truth in the charge. He was a great patriotic statesman, haunted by no foolish bugbear of consistency, but willing to learn by experience, and courageous enough to follow what he believed to be right, with unpolitical but patriotic scorn of consequence. Men with stereotyped ideas, who persisted in interpreting concession, however just, as weakness, and reform, however urgent, as revolution, were unable to follow such a leader. Peel might lack imagination, but he never lacked courage, and the generosity of vision which imposed on courage great and difficult tasks of statesmanship. He could educate himself--for he kept an open mind--and was swift to seize and to interpret great issues in the affairs of the nation; but it was altogether a different matter for him to educate his party. In the spring of 1845, Sir Robert Peel determined to meet the situation in Ireland by bold proposals for the education of the Catholic priesthood. Almost to the close of the eighteenth century the Catholics were compelled by the existing laws to train young men intended for the work of the priesthood in Ireland in French colleges, since no seminary of the kind was permitted in Ireland. The French Revolution overthrew this arrangement, and in 1795, by an Act of the Irish Parliament, Maynooth College was founded, and was supported by annual grants, which were continued, though not without much opposition, by the Imperial Parliament after the Union. On April 3, Sir Robert Peel brought forward his measure for dealing in a generous manner with the needs and claims of this great institution. He proposed that the annual grant should be raised from 9,000_l._ to upwards of 26,000_l._, that a charter of incorporation should be given, and that the trustees should be allowed to hold land to the value of 3,000_l._ a year. He also proposed that the new endowment should be a charge upon the Consolidated Fund, so that angry discussions of the kind in which bigotry and prejudice delight might be avoided. Moreover, in order to restore and enlarge the college buildings, Sir Robert finally proposed an immediate and separate grant of 30,000_l._ Few statesmen were more sensitive than Peel, but, convinced of the justice of such a concession, he spoke that day amid the angry opposition of the majority of his usual supporters and the approving cheers of his ordinary opponents. Peel was not the man to falter, although his party was in revolt. He had gauged the forces which were arrayed in Ireland against the authority of Parliament; he stated in his final words on the subject that there was in that country a formidable confederacy, which was prepared to go any lengths against a hard interpretation of the supremacy of England. 'I do not believe that you can break it up by force; I believe you can do much by acting in a spirit of kindness, forbearance, and generosity.' At once a great storm of opposition arose in Parliament, on the platform, and in the Press. The Carlton Club found itself brought into sudden and unexpected agreement with many a little Bethel up and down the country, for the champions of 'No Surrender' in Pall Mall were of one mind with those of 'No Popery' in Exeter Hall. Society for the moment, according to Harriet Martineau, seemed to be going mad, and she saw enough to convince her that it was not the extent of the grant that was deprecated so much as an advance in that direction at all. Public indignation ran so high that in some instances members of Parliament were called upon to resign their seats, whilst Dublin--so far at least as its sentiments were represented by the Protestant Operative Association--was for nothing less than the impeachment of the unhappy Prime Minister. Sectarian animosity, whipped into fury by rhetorical appeals to its prejudices, encouraged the paper trade by interminable petitions to Parliament; and three nights were spent in debate in the Lords and six in the Commons over the second reading of the bill. [Sidenote: HOW PEEL TRIUMPHED] Lord John Russell was assailed with threatening letters as soon as it was known that he intended to help Peel to outweather the storm of obloquy which he was called to encounter. Sir Robert's proposals were welcomed by him as a new and worthy departure from the old repressive policy. It was because he thought that such a measure would go far to conciliate the Catholics of Ireland, as well as to prove to them that any question which touched their interests and welfare was not a matter of unconcern to the statesmen and people of England, that he gave--with a loyalty only too rare in public life--his powerful support to a Minister who would otherwise have been driven to bay by his own followers. It was, in fact, owing to Lord John's action that Peel triumphed over the majority of his own party, and his speech in support of the Ministry, though not remarkable for eloquence, was admirable alike in temper and in tact, and was hailed at the moment as a presage of victory. 'Peel lives, moves, and has his being through Lord John Russell,' was Lord Shaftesbury's comment at the moment. Looking back at the crisis from the leisure of retirement, Lord John Russell declared that the Maynooth Act was a work of wisdom and liberality, and one which ought always to be remembered to the honour of the statesman who proposed and carried it. The controversy over the Maynooth Grant revealed how great was the gulf between Peel and the majority of the Tories, and Greville, as usual, in his own incisive way hit off the situation. 'The truth is that the Government is Peel, that Peel is a Reformer and more of a Whig than a Tory, and that the mass of his followers are prejudiced, ignorant, obstinate, and selfish.' Peel declared that he looked with indifference on a storm which he thought partly fanatical and partly religious in its origin, and he added that he was careless as to the consequences which might follow the passing of the Maynooth Bill, so far at least as they concerned his own position. Meanwhile another and far greater question was coming forward with unsuspected rapidity for solution. The summer of 1845 was cold and wet, and its dark skies and drenching showers were followed by a miserable harvest. With the approach of autumn the fields were flooded and the farmers in consequence in despair. Although England and Scotland suffered greatly, the disaster fell with still greater force on Ireland. As the anxious weeks wore on, alarm deepened into actual distress, for there arose a mighty famine in the land. The potato crop proved a disastrous failure, and with the approach of winter starvation joined its eloquence to that of Cobden and Bright in their demand for the repeal of the Corn Laws. In speaking afterwards of that terrible crisis, and of the services which Cobden and himself were enabled to render to the nation, John Bright used these memorable words: 'Do not suppose that I wish you to imagine that he and I were the only persons engaged in this great question. We were not even the first, though afterwards, perhaps, we became before the public the foremost, but there were others before us, and we were joined, not by scores, but by hundreds, and afterwards by thousands, and afterwards by countless multitudes, and afterwards famine itself, against which we had warred, joined us, and a great Minister was converted, and minorities became majorities, and finally the barrier was entirely thrown down.' [Sidenote: COBDEN'S PREDICTION] Quite early in the history of the Anti-Corn-Law League, Cobden had predicted, in spite of the apathy and opposition which the derided Manchester school of politics then encountered, at a time when Peel and Russell alike turned a deaf ear to its appeals, that the repeal of the Corn Laws would be eventually carried in Parliament by a 'statesman of established reputation.' Argument and agitation prepared the way for this great measure of practical relief, but the multitude were not far from the mark when they asserted that it was the rain that destroyed the Corn Laws.[12] The imperative necessity of bringing food from abroad if the people were not to perish for lack of bread brought both Sir Robert Peel and Lord John Russell almost at the same moment to the conclusion that this great economic problem must at once be faced. Peel declared in 1847 that towards the end of 1845 he had reached the conclusion that the repeal of the Corn Laws was indispensable to the public welfare. If that was so, he seems to have kept his opinion to himself, for as late as November 29, in the memorandum which he sent to his colleagues, there is no hint of abolition. On the contrary, Sir Robert, who was always fond of setting forth three alternatives of action, wrote as follows: 'Time presses, and on some definite course we must decide. Shall we undertake without suspension to modify the existing Corn Law? Shall we resolve to maintain the existing Corn Law? Shall we advise the suspension of that law for a limited period? My opinion is for the last course, admitting as I do that it involves the necessity for the immediate consideration of the alterations to be made in the existing Corn Law; such alterations to take effect after the period of suspension. I should rather say it involves the question of the principle and degree of protection to agriculture.'[13] As to the justice of the demand for Free Trade, Peel, there can be no doubt, was already convinced; but his party was regarded as the stronghold of Protection, and he knew enough of the men who sat behind him to be fully alive to the fact that they still clung tenaciously to the fallacies which Adam Smith had exploded. 'We had ill luck,' were Lord Aberdeen's words to the Queen; 'if it had not been for the famine in Ireland, which rendered immediate measures necessary, Sir Robert would have prepared the party gradually for the change.'[14] [Sidenote: THE 'EDINBURGH LETTER'] Cobden, it is only fair to state, made no secret of his conviction that the question of the repeal of the Corn Laws was safer in the hands of Sir Robert than of Lord John. Peel might be less versed in constitutional questions, but he was more in touch with the manufacturing classes, and more familiar with economic conditions. Sir Robert, however, was sore let and hindered by the weaklings of his own Cabinet, and the rats did not disguise their intention of quitting the ship. Lord John Russell, who was spending the autumn in Scotland, was the first 'responsible statesman' to take decisive action, for whilst Peel, hampered by the vacillation and opposition of his colleagues, still hesitated, Russell took the world into his confidence in his historic 'Edinburgh Letter,' dated November 22, 1845, to his constituents in London. It was a bold and uncompromising declaration of policy, for the logic of events had at length convinced Lord John that any further delay was dangerous. He complained that Her Majesty's Ministers had not only met, but separated, without affording the nation any promise of immediate relief. He pointed out that the existing duties on corn were so contrived that, the worse the quality of the wheat, the higher was the duty. 'When good wheat rises to seventy shillings a quarter, the average price of all wheat is fifty-seven or fifty-eight shillings, and the duty fourteen or fifteen shillings a quarter. Thus the corn barometer points to fair, while the ship is bending under a storm.' He reviewed the course of recent legislation on the subject, and declared that he had for years endeavoured to obtain a compromise. He showed that Peel had opposed in 1839, 1840, and 1841, even qualified concession, and he added the stinging allusion to that statesman's attitude on other great questions of still earlier date. 'He met the proposition for diminished Protection in the same way in which he had met the offer of securities for Protestant interests in 1817 and 1825--in the same way in which he met the proposal to allow Manchester, Leeds, and Birmingham to send members to Parliament in 1830.' Finally, Lord John announced his conviction that it was no longer worth while to contend for a fixed duty, and his vigorous attack on the Ministry ended with a call to arms. 'Let us unite to put an end to a system which has been proved to be the blight of commerce, the bane of agriculture, the source of bitter divisions among classes, the cause of penury, fever, mortality, and crime among the people. The Government appear to be waiting for some excuse to give up the present Corn Law. Let the people, by petition, by address, by remonstrance, afford them the excuse they seek.' [Sidenote: THE 'POISONED CHALICE'] Sir Robert, when this manifesto appeared, had almost conquered the reluctance of his own Cabinet to definite action; but his position grew now untenable in consequence of the panic of Stanley and the Duke of Buccleuch. Lord John's speech was quickly followed by a Ministerial crisis, and Peel, beset by fightings without and fears within his Cabinet, had no alternative but resignation. He accordingly relinquished office on December 5, and three days later Lord John, much to his own surprise, was summoned to Windsor and entrusted with the task of forming a new Ministry. He was met by difficulties which, in spite of negotiations, proved insurmountable, for Howick, who had succeeded in the previous summer to his distinguished father's earldom, refused to serve with Palmerston. Lord Grey raised another point which might reasonably have been conceded, for he urged that Cobden, as the leader of the Anti-Corn-Law League, ought to have the offer of a seat in the Cabinet. Lord John was unable to bring about an amicable understanding, and therefore, as the year was closing, he was compelled to inform her Majesty of the fact, and to hand back what Disraeli theatrically described as the 'poisoned chalice' to Sir Robert. 'It is all at an end,' wrote Lord John to his wife. 'Power may come, some day or other, in a less odious shape.' FOOTNOTES: [10] Justice has never yet been done to the founder of the Lancasterian system of education. Joseph Lancaster was a remarkable man who aroused the conscience of the nation, and even the dull intelligence of George III., to the imperative need of popular education. [11] 'The Melbourne Government: its Acts and Persons,' by the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P. _The Nineteenth Century_, January 1890, p. 50. [12] 'The Corn Law of 1815 was a copy of the Corn Law of 1670--so little had economic science grown in England during all those years. The Corn Law of 1670 imposed a duty on the importation of foreign grain which amounted almost literally to a prohibition.'--_Sir Robert Peel_, by Justin McCarthy, M.P., chapter xii. p. 136. [13] _The Croker Papers_, edited by Louis Jennings, vol. iii. p. 35. [14] _Life of the Prince Consort_, by Sir Theodore Martin, vol. i. p. 317. CHAPTER VII FACTION AND FAMINE 1846-1847 Peel and Free Trade--Disraeli and Lord George Bentinck lead the attack--Russell to the rescue--Fall of Peel--Lord John summoned to power--Lord John's position in the Commons and in the country--The Condition of Ireland question--Famine and its deadly work--The Russell Government and measures of relief--Crime and coercion--The Whigs and Education--Factory Bill--The case of Dr. Hampden. LORD STANLEY'S place in the 'organised hypocrisy,' as the Protectionists termed the last Ministry of Sir Robert Peel, was taken by Mr. Gladstone. Sir Robert Peel resumed office in the closing days of December, and all the members of his old Cabinet, on the principle of bowing to the inevitable, returned with him, except the Duke of Buccleuch and Lord Stanley, who resolutely declined to have part or lot in the new departure which the Premier now felt called upon to make. The Duke of Wellington, though hostile to Free Trade, determined to stand by Peel; but he did not disguise the fact that his only reason for remaining in office was for the sake of the Queen. He declared that he acted as the 'retained servant of the monarchy,' for he did not wish her Majesty to be placed under the necessity of taking members of the Anti-Corn-Law League, or, as he put it, 'Cobden & Co.,' for her responsible advisers. [Sidenote: THE QUEEN'S SPEECH] The opening days of 1846 were full of political excitement, and were filled with all kinds of rumours. Wellington, on January 6, wrote: 'I don't despair of the Corn Laws,' and confessed that he did not know what were the intentions of Sir Robert Peel concerning them.[15] Peel kept his own counsel, though the conviction grew that he had persuaded himself that in boldness lay the chance as well as the duty of the hour. Peel, like Russell, was converted to Free Trade by the logic of events, and he determined at all hazards to avow the new faith that was in him. Parliament was opened by the Queen in person on January 22, and the Speech from the Throne laid stress on the privation and suffering in Ireland, and shadowed forth the repeal of prohibitive and the relaxation of protective duties. The debate on the Address was rendered memorable by Peel's explanations of the circumstances under which the recent crisis had arisen. He made a long speech, and the tone of it, according to Lord Malmesbury, was half threatening and half apologetic. It was a manly, straightforward statement of the case, and Sir Robert made it plain that he had accepted the views of the Manchester school on the Corn Laws, and was prepared to act without further hesitation on his convictions. One significant admission was added. He stated before he sat down that it was 'no easy task to insure the harmonious and united action of an ancient monarchy, a proud aristocracy, and a reformed House of Commons.' New interests were, in fact, beginning to find a voice in Parliament, and that meant the beginning of the principle of readjustment which is yet in progress. A few days later the Prime Minister explained his financial plans for the year, and in the course of them he proposed the gradual repeal of the Corn Laws. Free trade in corn was, in fact, to take final effect after an interval of three years. Meanwhile the sliding scale was to be abandoned in favour of a fixed duty of ten shillings the quarter on corn, and other concessions for the relief not only of agriculture but of manufactures and commerce were announced. The principle of Free Trade was, in fact, applied not in one but in many directions, and from that hour its legislative triumph was assured. In the course of the protracted debate which followed, Disraeli, with all the virulence of a disappointed place-hunter, attacked Sir Robert Peel with bitter personalities and barbed sarcasm. On this occasion, throwing decency and good taste to the winds, and, to borrow a phrase of his own, 'intoxicated with the exuberance of his own verbosity,' and with no lack of tawdry rhetoric and melodramatic emphasis, he did his best to cover with ridicule and to reduce to confusion one of the most chivalrous and lofty-minded statesmen of the Queen's reign. [Sidenote: OUTCAST PROTECTIONISTS] Disraeli's audacity in attack did much to revive the drooping courage of the Protectionist party, the leadership of which fell for the moment into the hands of Lord George Bentinck, a nobleman more renowned at Newmarket than at Westminster. Once saddled with authority, Lord George developed some capacity for politics; but his claims as a statesman were never serious, though Disraeli, in the political biography which he published shortly after his friend's sudden death, gives him credit for qualities of mind of which the nation at large saw little evidence. After long and tedious discussion, extending over some twenty nights, the Free Trade Bill was carried through the Commons by a majority of ninety-eight votes, and in the Lords it passed the second reading by forty-seven votes. Croker--true to the dismal suggestion of his name--promptly took up his parable against Sir Robert. He declared that the repeal of the Corn Laws meant a schism in the great landed interest and broad acres, in his view, were the only solid foundation on which the government of the nation could possibly be based. He asked, how was it possible to resist the attack on the Irish Church and the Irish Union after the surrender of the Corn Laws? He wanted to know how primogeniture, the Bishops, the House of Lords, and the Crown itself were to be maintained, now that the leader of the Conservative party had truckled to the League. Sir Robert Peel, he added, had imperilled these institutions of the country more than Cobbett or O'Connell; he had broken up the old interests, divided the great families, and thrown personal hostility into the social life of half the counties of England--and all to propitiate Richard Cobden. Such was the bitter cry of the outcast Protectionist, and similar vapourings arose in cliques and clubs all over the land. The abolition of the Corn Laws was the last measure of Sir Robert Peel's political life, and he owed the victory, which was won amid the murmurs and threats of his own followers, to the support which his political antagonists gave him, under the leadership of Lord John Russell, who recognised both the wisdom and the expediency of Sir Robert's course. Meanwhile the dark winter of discontent which privation had unhappily brought about in Ireland had been marked by many crimes of violence, and at length the Government deemed it imperative to ask Parliament to grant them additional powers for the suppression of outrage. The measure met with the opposition alike of Lord John Russell and Daniel O'Connell. The Government moved the second reading of the Irish Coercion Bill, and the Protectionists, who knew very well not only the views of Daniel O'Connell, but of Smith O'Brien, saw their opportunity and promptly took it. Lord George Bentinck had supported the Coercion Bill on its introduction in the spring, and had done so in the most unmistakable terms. He was not the man, however, to forego the mean luxury of revenge, and neither he nor Disraeli could forgive what they regarded as Sir Robert's great betrayal of the landed interest. He now had the audacity to assert that Peel had lost the confidence of every honest man both within and without the House of Commons, and in spite of his assurances of support he ranged himself for the moment with Russell and O'Connell to crush the Administration. The division took place on June 25, and in a House of 571 members the Ministry was defeated by a majority of 73. The defeat of the Government was so crushing that Whigs and Protectionists alike, on the announcement of the figures, were too much taken aback to cheer. 'Anything,' said Sir Robert, 'is preferable to maintaining ourselves in office without a full measure of the confidence of this House.' [Sidenote: THE RUSSELL CABINET] Lord John had triumphed with the help of the Irish, whom Peel had alienated; but the great Minister's downfall had in part been accomplished by the treachery of those who abandoned him with clamour and evil-speaking in the hour of need. Defeat was followed within a week by resignation, and on July 4 Peel, writing from the leisured seclusion of Drayton Manor, 'in the loveliest weather,' was magnanimous enough to say, 'I have every disposition to forgive my enemies for having conferred on me the blessing of the loss of power.' Lord John was summoned to Windsor, and kissed hands on July 6. He became Prime Minister when the condition of affairs was gloomy and menacing, and the following passage from his wife's journal, written on July 14, conjures up in two or three words a vivid picture of the difficulties of the hour: 'John has much to distress him in the state of the country. God grant him success in his labours to amend it! Famine, fever, trade failing, and discontent growing are evils which it requires all his resolution, sense of duty, and love for the public to face.' Lord Palmerston was, of course, inevitable as Foreign Secretary in the new Administration; Sir Charles Wood became Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Sir George Grey, Home Secretary. Earl Grey's scruples were at length satisfied, and he became Secretary to the Colonies; whilst Lord Clarendon took office as President of the Board of Trade, and Lord Lansdowne became President of the Council. Among the lesser lights of the Ministry were Sir J. C. Hobhouse, Mr. Milner Gibson, Mr. Fox Maule, Lord Morpeth, and Mr. (afterwards Lord) Macaulay. Sir James Graham was offered the Governor-Generalship of India, but he had aspirations at Westminster, which, however, were never fulfilled, and declined the offer. The Tory party was demoralised and split up into cliques by suspicion and indignation. Stanley was in the House of Lords by this time, Peel was in disgrace, and Lord George Bentinck was already beginning to cut a somewhat ridiculous figure, whilst nobody as yet was quite prepared to take Disraeli seriously. 'We are left masters of the field,' wrote Palmerston, with a touch of characteristic humour, 'not only on account of our own merits, which, though we say it ourselves, are great, but by virtue of the absence of any efficient competitors.' The new Ministry began well. Lord John's address to his constituents in the City made an excellent impression, and was worthy of the man and the occasion. 'You may be assured that I shall not desert in office the principles to which I adhered when they were less favourably received. I cannot indeed claim the merit either of having carried measures of Free Trade as a Minister, or of having so prepared the public mind by any exertions of mine as to convert what would have been an impracticable attempt into a certain victory. To others belong those distinctions. But I have endeavoured to do my part in this great work according to my means and convictions, first by proposing a temperate relaxation of the Corn Laws, and afterwards, when that measure has been repeatedly rejected, by declaring in favour of total repeal, and using every influence I could exert to prevent a renewal of the struggle for an object not worth the cost of conflict. The Government of this country ought to behold with an impartial eye the various portions of the community engaged in agriculture, in manufactures, and in commerce. The feeling that any of them is treated with injustice provokes ill-will, disturbs legislation, and diverts attention from many useful and necessary reforms. Great social improvements are required: public education is manifestly imperfect; the treatment of criminals is a problem yet undecided; the sanitary condition of our towns and villages has been grossly neglected. Our recent discussions have laid bare the misery, the discontent, and outrages of Ireland; they are too clearly authenticated to be denied, too extensive to be treated by any but the most comprehensive means.' [Sidenote: EVER A FIGHTER] Lord John had been thirty-three years in the House of Commons when he became for the first time Prime Minister. The distinction of rank and of an historic name gave him in 1813, when government by great families was still more than a phrase, a splendid start. The love of liberty which he inherited as a tradition grew strong within him, partly through his residence in Edinburgh under Dugald Stewart, partly through the generous and stimulating associations of Holland House, but still more, perhaps, because of the tyranny of which he was an eye-witness during his travels as a youth in Italy and Spain at a period when Europe lay under the heel of Napoleon. Lord John was ever a fighter, and the political conflicts of his early manhood against the triple alliance of injustice, bigotry, and selfish apathy in the presence of palpable social abuses lent ardour to his convictions, tenacity to his aims, and boldness to his attitude in public life. Although an old Parliamentary hand, he was in actual years only fifty-four when he came to supreme office in the service of the State, but he had already succeeded in placing great measures on the Statute Book, and he had also won recognition on both sides of the House as a leader of fearless courage, open mind, and great fertility of resource alike in attack and in defence. Peel, his most formidable rival on the floor of the Commons, hinted that Lord John Russell was small in small things, but, he added significantly that, when the issues grew great, he was great also. Everyone who looks at Lord John's career in its length and breadth must admit the justice of such a criticism. On one occasion he himself said, in speaking of the first Lord Halifax, that the favourite of Charles II. had 'too keen a perception of errors and faults to act well with others,' and the remark might have been applied to himself. There were times when Lord John, by acting hastily on the impulse of the moment, landed his colleagues in serious and unlooked for difficulties, and sometimes it happened that in his anxiety to clear his own soul by taking an independent course, he compromised to a serious extent the position of others. Lord Melbourne's cynical remark, to the effect that nobody did anything very foolish except from some strong principle, carries with it a tribute to motive as well as a censure on action, and it is certain that the promptings to which Lord John yielded in the questionable phases of his public career were not due to the adroit and calculating temper of self-interest. His weaknesses were indeed, after all, trivial in comparison to his strength. He rose to the great occasion and was inspired by it. All that was formal and hesitating in manner and speech disappeared, and under the combined influence of the sense of responsibility and the excitement of the hour 'languid Johnny,' to borrow Bulwer Lytton's phrase, 'soared to glorious John.' Palmerston, like Melbourne, was all things to all men. His easy nonchalance, sunny temper, and perfect familiarity with the ways of the world and the weaknesses of average humanity, gave him an advantage which Lord John, with his nervous temperament, indifferent health, fastidious tastes, shy and rather distant bearing, and uncompromising convictions, never possessed. Russell's ethical fervour and practical energetic bent of mind divided him sharply from politicians who lived from hand to mouth, and were never consumed by a zeal for reform in one direction or another; and these qualities sometimes threw him into a position of singular isolation. The wiles and artifices by which less proud and less conscientious men win power, and the opportune compliments and unwatched concessions by which too often they retain it, lay amongst the things to which he refused to stoop. [Sidenote: HIS PRACTICAL SAGACITY] Men might think Lord John taciturn, angular, abrupt, tenacious, and dogmatic, but it was impossible not to recognise his honesty, public spirit, pluck in the presence of difficulty, and high interpretation of the claims of public duty which marked his strenuous and indomitable career. His qualifications for the post of Prime Minister were not open to challenge. He was deeply versed in constitutional problems, and had received a long and varied training in the handling of great affairs. He possessed to an enviable degree the art of lucid exposition, and could render intricate proposals luminous to the public mind. He was a shrewd Parliamentary tactician, as well as a statesman who had worthily gained the confidence of the nation. He was ready in debate, swift to see and to seize the opportunity of the hour. He was full of practical sagacity, and his personal character lent weight to his position in the country. In the more militant stages of his career, and especially when he was fighting the battles of Parliamentary reform and religious liberty, he felt the full brunt of that 'sullen resistance to innovation,' as well as that 'unalterable perseverance in the wisdom of prejudice,' which Burke declared was characteristic of the English race. The natural conservatism of growing years, it must be frankly admitted, led eventually in Lord John's case, as in that of the majority of mankind, to the slackening of interest in the new problems of a younger generation, but to the extreme verge of life he remained far too great a statesman and much too generous a man ever to lapse into the position of a mere _laudator temporis acti_. Lord John did not allow the few remaining weeks of a protracted and exhaustive session to elapse without a vigorous attempt to push the principle of Free Trade to its logical issues. He passed a measure which rendered the repeal of the Corn Laws total and immediate, and he carried, with the support of Peel and in spite of the opposition of Bentinck and Disraeli, the abolition of protection to sugar grown in the British Colonies. Ireland quickly proved itself to be a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence to the new Administration. Lord John's appointment of Lord Bessborough--his old colleague, Duncannon, in the Committee on Reform in 1830--as viceroy was popular, for he was a resident Irish landlord, and a man who was genuinely concerned for the welfare of the people. O'Connell trusted Lord Bessborough, and that, in the disturbed condition of the country, counted for much. The task of the new viceroy was hard, even with such support, and though Bessborough laboured manfully and with admirable tact to better the social condition of the people and to exorcise the spirit of discord, the forces arrayed against him proved resistless when famine came to their aid. As the summer slipped past, crime and outrage increased, and the prospect for the approaching winter grew not merely gloomy but menacing. Peel had been turned out of office because of his Irish Arms Bill, and Bessborough was no sooner installed in Dublin than he made urgent representations to the Cabinet in Downing Street as to the necessity of adopting similar repressive measures, in view of the prevailing lawlessness and the contempt for life and property which in the disaffected districts were only too common. In August the crisis was already so acute that the Government, yielding to the fears of its Irish advisers, stultified itself by proposing the renewal of the Arms Bill until the following spring. The step was ill advised, and provoked much hostile criticism. Lord John did not relish the measure, but Lord Bessborough declared that Ireland could not be governed for the moment without it, and as he also talked of throwing up his appointment, and was supported in this view of the situation by Mr. Labouchere (afterwards Lord Taunton), who at that time was Chief Secretary, the Prime Minister gave way and introduced in the House of Commons proposals which were out of keeping with his own antecedents, and which he personally disliked. In speaking of Sir Robert Peel's Coercion Bill in his published 'Recollections,' Lord John makes no secret of his own attitude towards the measure. 'I objected to the Bill on Irish grounds. I then thought, and I still think, that it is wrong to arrest men and put them in prison on the ground that they _may_ be murderers and housebreakers. They may be, on the other hand, honest labourers going home from their work.' On the contrary, he thought that every means ought to be promptly taken for discovering the perpetrators of crime and bringing them to justice, and he also believed in giving the authorities on the spot ample means of dealing with the reign of terror which agrarian outrages had established. [Sidenote: THE IRONY OF THE SITUATION] If O'Connell had been at Lord John's side at that juncture, England might have sent a practical message of good-will to Ireland instead of falling back on the old policy of coercion. O'Connell had learnt to trust Russell--as far, at least, as it was possible for a leader of the Irish people to trust a Whig statesman--and Russell, on the other hand, was beginning to understand not merely O'Connell, but the forces which lay behind him, and which rendered him, quite apart from his own eloquence and gifts, powerful. Unfortunately, the Liberator was by this time broken in health, and the Young Ireland party were already in revolt against his authority, a circumstance which, in itself, filled the Premier with misgivings, and led him to give way, however reluctantly, to the demand of the viceroy for repressive measures. Lord John was, in fact, only too well aware that force was no remedy. He wished, as much as O'Connell, to root up the causes which produced crime. Young Ireland, however, seemed determined to kick over the traces at the very time when the Liberator was inducing the Whigs to look at the question in a practical manner. Lord John knew, to borrow his own expression, that the 'armoury of penal legislation was full of the weapons of past battles, and yet the victory of order and peace had not been gained.' The Liberal party set its face against coercion in any shape or form, and the Government withdrew a proposal which they ought never to have introduced. This course had scarcely been taken when a new and terrible complication of the social problem in Ireland arose. [Sidenote: THE IRISH FAMINE] Famine suddenly made its presence felt, and did so in a manner which threw the privation and scarcity of the previous winter altogether into the shade. The potato crop was a disastrous failure, and, as the summer waned, the distress of an impoverished and thriftless race grew acute. The calamity was as crushing as it was rapid. 'On July 27,' are Father Mathew's words, 'I passed from Cork to Dublin, and this doomed plant bloomed in all the luxuriance of an abundant harvest. Returning on August 3 I beheld with sorrow one wide waste of putrefying vegetation.' A million and a half of acres were at the moment under cultivation, and the blight only spared a quarter of them, whilst, to make matters worse, the oat crop, by an unhappy coincidence, proved to a startling extent insufficient. The financial loss in that disastrous harvest, in the reckoning of experts, amounted to between fifteen and sixteen millions sterling. Fever and dysentery made fatal inroads on the dwindling strength of the gaunt and famished peasantry, and in one district alone, out of a population of 62,000 inhabitants, no less than 5,000 persons died, directly or indirectly, of starvation in the course of three months. 'All our thoughts,' wrote O'Connell, 'are engrossed with two topics--endeavouring to keep the people from outbreaks, and endeavouring to get food for them.' In many instances the landlords seemed robbed of the characteristics of ordinary humanity, for the ruthless process of eviction was carried on with a high hand, and old men and children were left unsheltered as well as unfed. Property had neglected its duties, but, as usual, did not neglect its rights, and in that terrible crisis it overrode the rights of humanity. Many of the landowners, however, manfully did their best to stay the plague, but anything which they could accomplish seemed a mockery amid the widespread distress. Readers of Sir Gavan Duffy's 'Four Years of Irish History' will recall his vivid description of the manner in which some of the landowners, however, saw their cruel opportunity, and accordingly 'closed on the people with ejectments, turned them on the road, and plucked down their roof-trees,' and also that still more painful passage which describes how women with dead children in their arms were seen begging for a coffin to bury them. Relief committees were, of course, started; the Friends, in particular, busied themselves in practical efforts to cope with the distress, and Mr. W. E. Forster, who went to Ireland to distribute relief, declared that his wonder was, as he passed from village to village, not that the people died, but that so many contrived to live. The Russell Government met the crisis with courage, though scarcely with adequate understanding. Ireland remembered with bitterness their Arms Bill and their repressive measures. Public feeling ran high over some of their proposals, for the people resented Lord John's modification of Sir Robert Peel's plan by which the cost of public works was to be defrayed by the State and district in which employment was given. Lord John determined that the cost should be met in the first instance by Government loans, which were to be repaid with an almost nominal interest by the people of the district. This was interpreted to mean that Ireland was to bear her own burdens, and in her impoverished state was to be saddled with the financial responsibilities inseparable from so pitiable a collapse of prosperity. Bread riots and agrarian disturbances grew common, and the Government met them with rather more than becoming sternness, instead of dealing promptly with the land-tenure system which lay at the root of so much of the misery. At the beginning of the session of 1847 it was stated that 10,000,000_l._ would be required to meet the exigencies of the situation. Lord George Bentinck proposed a grant of 16,000,000_l._ for the construction of Irish railways, but Lord John made the question one of personal confidence in himself, and threatened resignation if it passed. His chief objection to the proposal was based on the fact that seventy-five per cent. of the money spent in railway construction would not reach the labouring classes. Lord George Bentinck's motion was rejected by a sweeping majority, though at a subsequent stage in the session the Government consented to advance a substantial sum to three Irish railways--a concession which exposed them to the usual taunts of inconsistency. [Sidenote: MEASURES OF RELIEF] Measures were also introduced for promoting emigration to the colonies, and for the suspension of certain clauses of the Navigation Laws which hindered the importation of foreign corn. At one time during the distress there were no less than six hundred thousand men employed on public works in Ireland, and the Government found it no easy task to organise this vast army of labour, or to prevent abuses. Lord Bessborough urged that the people should be employed in the improvement of private estates, but Lord John met this proposal with disapproval, though he at length agreed that the drainage of private land should come within the scope of public works. It was further determined to lend money in aid of the improvement of private property, the operation of the Irish Poor Law was also extended, and in other directions energetic measures were taken for the relief of the prevailing destitution. Lord John was a keen observer both of men and of movements, and the characteristics of the peasantry, and more particularly the personal helplessness of the people, and the lack of concerted action among them, impressed him. 'There are some things,' he declared, 'which the Crown cannot grant and which Parliament cannot enact--the spirit of self-reliance and the spirit of co-operation. I must say plainly that I should indeed despair of this task were it not that I think I see symptoms in the Irish people both of greater reliance on their own energies and exertions, and of greater intelligence to co-operate with each other. Happy will it be, indeed, if the Irish take for their maxim, "Help yourselves and Heaven will help you," and then I think they will find there is some use in adversity.' Lord John Russell's Irish policy has often been misunderstood, and not seldom misrepresented, but no one who looks all the facts calmly in the face, or takes into account the difficulties which the famine threw in his path, will be inclined to harsh criticism. Lady Russell's journal at this period reveals how great was her husband's anxiety in view of the evil tidings from Ireland, and one extract may be allowed to speak for itself. After stating that her husband has much to distress him in the state of the country, these words follow: 'God grant him success in his labours to amend it--famine, fever, trade failing, and discontent growing are evils which it requires all his resolution, sense of duty, and love for the public to face. I pray that he may, and believe that he will, one day be looked back to as the greatest benefactor of unhappy Ireland.' When once the nature of the calamity became apparent, Lord John never relaxed his efforts to grapple with the emergency, and, though not a demonstrative man, there is proof enough that he felt acutely for the people, and laboured, not always perhaps wisely, but at least well, for the amelioration of their lot. He was assailed with a good deal of personal abuse, and was credited with vacillation and apathy, especially in Ireland, where his opponents, acting in the capacity of jurymen at inquests on the victims of the famine, sometimes went so far as to bring in a verdict of wilful murder against the Prime Minister. It is easy enough after the event to point out better methods than those devised at the imperious call of the moment by the Russell Administration, but there are few fair-minded people in the present day who would venture to assert that justice and mercy were not in the ascendent during a crisis which taxed to the utmost the resources of practical statesmanship. [Sidenote: LORD CLARENDON IN IRELAND] The new Parliament assembled in November, and a Committee of both Houses was appointed to take into consideration the depressed condition of trade, for symptoms of unmistakable distress were apparent in the great centres of industry. Ireland, moreover, still blocked the way, and Lord Clarendon, who had succeeded to the viceroyalty, alarmed at the condition of affairs, pressed for extraordinary powers. The famine by this time was only a memory, but it had left a large section of the peasantry in a sullen and defiant mood. As a consequence stormy restlessness and open revolt made themselves felt. Armed mobs, sometimes five hundred and even a thousand strong, wandered about in lawless fashion, pounced upon corn and made raids on cattle, and it seemed indeed at times as if life as well as property was imperilled. Lord Clarendon was determined to make the disaffected feel that the law could not be set aside with impunity. He declared that the majority of these disturbers of the peace were not in actual distress, and he made no secret of his opinion that their object was not merely intimidation but plunder. 'I feel,' were his words as the autumn advanced, 'as if I was at the head of a provisional government in a half-conquered country.' It is easy to assert that Lord Clarendon took a panic-stricken view of the situation, and attempts have again and again been made to mitigate, if not to explain away, the dark annals of Irish crime. The facts, however, speak for themselves, and they seemed at the moment to point to such a sinister condition of affairs that Lord John Russell felt he had no option but to adopt repressive measures. Sir George Grey stated in Parliament that the number of cases of fatal bloodshed during the six summer months of 1846 was sixty-eight, whilst in the corresponding period in 1847 it had increased to ninety-six. Shooting with intent to slay, which in the six months of 1846 had numbered fifty-five, now stood at 126. Robbery under arms had also grown with ominous rapidity, for in the contrasted half-years of 1846 and 1847 deeds of violence of this kind were 207 and 530 respectively, whilst outrage in another of its most cruel and despicable forms--the firing of dwelling-houses--revealed, under the same conditions of time, 116 acts of incendiarism in 1847, as against fifty-one in the previous year. The disaffected districts of Clare, Limerick, and Tipperary made the heaviest contribution to this dismal catalogue of crime; but far beyond their borders though with diminished force, the lawless spirit prevailed. Mr. Spencer Walpole, in his standard and authoritative 'Life of Lord John Russell,' has shown, by an appeal to his correspondence with Lord Clarendon, how reluctant the Prime Minister was to bring forward a new Arms Bill. He has also made it plain that it was only the logic of events which finally convinced the Prime Minister of the necessity in any shape for such a measure. Mr. Walpole has also vindicated, at considerable length, Lord John from the familiar charge of having adopted in power the proposals which led to the overthrow of the Peel Administration. He lays stress on the fact that the Arms Bill, which the Government carried at the close of 1847 by a sweeping majority, was, to a noteworthy extent, different from that which Sir Robert sought to impose on Ireland twelve months earlier, and which the Whigs met with strenuous and successful opposition. In Mr. Walpole's words, the new proposals 'did not contain any provision for compensating the victims of outrages at the expense of the ratepayers; they did not render persons congregated in public-houses or carrying arms liable to arrest; above all, they did not comprise the brutal clause which made persons out of doors at night liable to transportation.' The condition of Ireland was, indeed, so menacing that the majority of the English people of all shades of political opinion were of one mind as to the necessity for stern measures. Sir Robert Peel, with no less candour than chivalry, declared that the best reparation which could be made to the last Government would be to assist the present Government in passing such a law. Perhaps still more significant were the admissions of Mr. John Bright. At the General Election the young orator had been returned to Parliament, not for a Sleepy Hollow like Durham, which had first sent him, but for the commanding constituency of Manchester, and almost at once he found himself in opposition to the views of a vast number of the inhabitants. He was requested to present a petition against the bill signed by more than 20,000 persons in Manchester. In doing so he took the opportunity of explaining in the House of Commons the reasons which made it impossible for him--friend of peace and goodwill as he assuredly was--to support its prayer. He declared that the unanimous statements of all the newspapers, the evidence of men of all parties connected with Ireland, as well as the facts which were placed before them with official authority, made it plain beyond a doubt that the ordinary law was utterly powerless, and, therefore, he felt that the case of the Government, so far as the necessity for such a bill was concerned, was both clear and perfect. [Sidenote: JOHN BRIGHT AND IRISH AFFAIRS] Mr. Bright drew attention to the fact that assassinations in Ireland were not looked upon as murders, but rather as executions; and that some of them at least were not due to sudden outbursts of passion, but were planned with deliberation and carried out in cold blood. He saw no reason to doubt that in certain districts public sentiment was 'depraved and thoroughly vitiated;' and he added that, since the ordinary law had failed to meet the emergency the Government had a case for the demand they made for an extension of their present powers, and he thought that the bill before the House was the less to be opposed since, whilst it strengthened the hands of the Executive, it did not greatly exceed or infringe the ordinary law. Mr. Bright at the same time, it is only fair to add, made no secret of his own conviction that the Government had not grappled with sufficient courage with its difficulties, and he complained of the delay which had arisen over promised legislation of a remedial character. Lord John himself was persuaded, some time before Mr. Bright made this speech, that it was useless to attempt to meet the captious and selfish objections on the question of agrarian reform of the landlord class; and, as a matter of fact, he had already drawn up, without consulting anyone, the outline of a measure which he described to Lord Clarendon as a 'plan for giving some security and some provision to the miserable cottiers, who are now treated as brute beasts.' Years before--to be exact, in the spring of 1844--he had declared in the House of Commons that, whilst the Government of England was, as it ought to be, a Government of opinion, the Government of Ireland was notoriously a Government of force. Gradually he was forced to the view that centuries of oppression and misunderstanding, of class hatred and opposite aims, had brought about a social condition which made it necessary that judicial authority should have a voice between landlord and tenant in every case of ejectment. Lord John's difficulties in dealing with Ireland were complicated by the distrust of three-fourths of the people of the good intentions of English statesmanship. Political agitators, great and small, of the Young Ireland school, did their best to deepen the suspicions of an impulsive and ignorant peasantry against the Whigs, and Lord John was personally assailed, until he became a sort of bogie-man to the lively and undisciplined imagination of a sensitive but resentful race. [Sidenote: THE TREASON FELONY ACT] Even educated Irishmen of a later generation have, with scarcely an exception, failed to do justice either to the dull weight of prejudice and opposition with which Lord John had to contend in his efforts to help their country, or to give him due credit for the constructive statesmanship which he brought to a complicated and disheartening task.[16] Lord John Russell was, in fact, in some directions not only in advance of his party but of his times; and, though it has long been the fashion to cavil at his Irish policy, it ought not to be forgotten, in common fairness, that he not only passed the Encumbered Estates Act of 1848, but sought to introduce the principle of compensation to tenants for the improvements which they had made on their holdings. Vested interests proved, however, too powerful, and Ireland stood in her own light by persistent sedition. The revolutionary spirit was abroad in 1848 not only in France, but in other parts of Europe, and the Irish, under Mr. Smith O'Brien, Mr. John Mitchel, and less responsible men, talked at random, with the result that treasonable conspiracy prevailed, and the country was brought to the verge of civil war. The Irish Government was forced by hostile and armed movements to proclaim certain districts in which rebellion was already rampant. The Treason Felony Act made it illegal, and punishable with penal servitude, to write or speak in a manner calculated to provoke rebellion against the Crown. This extreme stipulation was made at the instance of Lord Campbell. Such an invasion of freedom of speech was not allowed to pass unchallenged, and Lord John, who winced under the necessity of repression, admitted the force of the objection, so far as to declare that this form of irksome restraint should not be protracted beyond the necessity of the hour. He was not the man to shirk personal danger, and therefore, in spite of insurrection and panic, and the threats of agitators who were seeking to compass the repeal of the Union by violent measures, he went himself to Dublin to consult with Lord Clarendon, and to gather on the spot his own impressions of the situation. He found the country once more overshadowed by the prospects of famine, and he came to the conclusion that the population was too numerous for the soil, and subsequently passed a measure for promoting aided emigration. He proposed also to assist from the public funds the Roman Catholic clergy, whose livelihood had grown precarious through the national distress; but, in deference to strong Protestant opposition, this method of amelioration had to be abandoned. The leaders of the Young Ireland party set the authorities at defiance, and John Mitchel, a leader who advocated an appeal to physical force, and Smith O'Brien, who talked wildly about the establishment of an Irish Republic, were arrested, convicted, and transported. O'Connell himself declared that Smith O'Brien was an exceedingly weak man, proud and self-conceited and 'impenetrable to advice.' 'You cannot be sure of him for half an hour.' The force of the movement was broken by cliques and quarrels, until the spirit of disaffection was no longer formidable. In August, her Majesty displayed in a marked way her personal interest in her Irish subjects by a State visit to Dublin. The Queen was received with enthusiasm, and her presence did much to weaken still further the already diminishing power of sedition. [Sidenote: SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS] The question of education lay always close to the heart of Lord John Russell, who found time even amid the stress of 1847 to advance it. The Melbourne Administration had vested the management of Parliamentary grants in aid of education in a committee of the Privy Council. In spite of suspicion and hostility, which found expression both in Parliament and in ecclesiastical circles, the movement extended year by year and slowly pervaded with the first beginnings of culture the social life of the people. Lord John had taken an active part in establishing the authority of the Privy Council in education; he had watched the rapid growth of its influence, and had not forgotten to mark the defects which had come to light during the six years' working of the system. He therefore proposed to remodel it, and took steps in doing so to better the position of the teacher, as well as to render primary education more efficient. Paid pupil teachers accordingly took the place of unpaid monitors, and the opportunity of gaining admittance after this practical apprenticeship to training colleges, where they might be equipped for the full discharge of the duties of their calling, was thrown open to them. As a further inducement, teachers who had gone through this collegiate training received a Government grant in addition to the usual salary. Grants were also for the first time given to schools which passed with success through the ordeal of official inspection. The passing of the Factory Bill was another effort in the practical redress of wrongs to which Lord John Russell lent his powerful aid. The measure, which will always be honourably associated with the names of Lord Shaftesbury and Mr. Fielden, was a victory for labour which was hailed with enthusiasm by artisans and operatives throughout the land. It came as a measure of practical relief, not merely to men, but to upwards of three hundred and sixty-three thousand women and children, employed in monotonous tasks in mill and manufactory. Another change which Lord John Russell was directly instrumental in bringing about was the creation of the Poor Law Commission into a Ministerial Department, responsible to Parliament, and able to explain its work and to defend its policy at Westminster, through the lips of the President of the Poor Law Board. Regulations were at the same time made for workhouse control, meetings of guardians, and the like. The great and ever-growing needs of Manchester were recognised in 1847 by the creation of the Bishopric. Parliament was dissolved on July 23, and as the adoption of Free Trade had left the country for the moment without any great question directly before it, no marked political excitement followed the appeal to the people. The Conservative party was in truth demoralised by the downfall of Peel, and the new forces which were soon to shape its course had as yet scarcely revealed themselves, though Lord Stanley, Lord George Bentinck, and Mr. Disraeli were manifestly the coming men in Opposition. If the general election was distinguished by little enthusiasm either on one side or the other, it yet brought with it a personal triumph to Lord John, for he was returned for the City at the head of the poll. The Government itself not only renewed its strength, but increased it as a result of the contest throughout the country. At the same time the hostility of the opponents of Free Trade was seen in the return of two hundred and twenty-six Protectionists, in addition to one hundred and five Conservatives of the new school of Bentinck and Disraeli. [Sidenote: DIFFICULTIES OF A PLAIN ENGLISHMAN] In other directions, meanwhile, difficulties had beset the Government. The proposed appointment of a Broad Churchman of advanced views, in the person of Dr. Hampden, Regius Professor at Oxford, to the vacant see of Hereford filled the High Church party with indignant dismay. Dr. Newman, with the courage and self-sacrifice which were characteristic of the man, had refused by this time to hold any longer an untenable position, and, in spite of his brilliant prospects in the English Church, had yielded to conscience and submitted to Rome. Dr. Pusey, however, remained, and under his skilful leadership the Oxford Movement grew strong, and threw its spell in particular over devout women, whose æsthetic instincts it satisfied, and whose aspirations after a semi-conventual life it met.[17] Lord John had many of the characteristics of the plain Englishman. He understood zealous Protestants, and, as his rejected scheme for aiding the priests in Ireland itself shows, he was also able to apprehend the position of earnest Roman Catholics. He had, however, not so learnt his Catechism or his Prayer Book as to understand that the Reformation, if not a crime, was at least a blunder, and therefore, like other plain Englishmen, he was not prepared to admit the pretensions and assumptions of a new race of nondescript priests. Thirteen prelates took the unusual course of requesting the Prime Minister to reconsider his decision, but Lord John's reply was at once courteous and emphatic. 'I cannot sacrifice the reputation of Dr. Hampden, the rights of the Crown, and what I believe to be the true interests of the Church, to a feeling which I believe to have been founded on misapprehension and fomented by prejudice.' Although Dr. Pusey did not hesitate to declare that the affair was 'a matter of life and death,'[18] ecclesiastical protest availed nothing, and Dr. Hampden was in due time consecrated. Neither agrarian outrages in Ireland nor clerical agitation in England hindered, in the session of 1848, the passing of measures of social improvement. The Public Health Act, which was based on the representations of Sir Edwin Chadwick and Dr. Southwood Smith, grappled with the sanitary question in cities and towns, and thus improved in a variety of directions the social life of the people. It had hitherto been the fashion of Whigs and Tories alike to neglect practical measures of this kind, even though they were so closely linked to the health and welfare of the community. FOOTNOTES: [15] _The Croker Papers_, vol. iii. ch. xxiv. p. 53. [16] Judge O'Connor Morris, in his interesting retrospect, _Memories and Thoughts of a Life_, just published, whilst severely criticising the Whig attitude towards Ireland, admits that Russell's Irish policy was not only 'well-meant,' but in the main successful. [17] The first Anglican Sisterhood was founded by Dr. Pusey in London in the spring of 1845. [18] _Life of E. B. Pusey, D.D._, by H. P. Liddon, D.D., vol. iii. p. 160. CHAPTER VIII IN ROUGH WATERS 1848-1852 The People's Charter--Feargus O'Connor and the crowd--Lord Palmerston strikes from his own bat--Lord John's view of the political situation--Death of Peel--Palmerston and the Court--'No Popery'--The Durham Letter--The invasion scare--Lord John's remark about Palmerston--Fall of the Russell Administration. ENGLAND in 1848 was not destined to escape an outbreak of the revolutionary spirit, though the Chartist movement, in spite of the panic which it awakened, was never really formidable. The overthrow and flight of Louis Philippe, the proclamation in March of the French Republic on the basis of universal suffrage and national workshops, and the revolutionary movements and insurrections in Austria and Italy, filled the artisans and operatives of this country with wild dreams, and led them to rally their scattered and hitherto dispirited forces. Within six years of the passing of the Reform Bill, in fact, in the autumn after the Queen's accession, the working classes had come to the conclusion that their interests had been largely overlooked, and that the expectations they had cherished in the struggle of 1831-32 had been falsified by the apathy and even the reaction which followed the victory. Not in one, but in all the great civil and religious struggles of the century, they had borne the brunt of the battle; and yet they had been thrust aside when it came to the dividing of the spoil. The middle classes were in a different position: their aspirations were satisfied, and they were quite prepared, for the moment at least, to rest and be thankful. The sleek complacency of the shopkeeper, moreover, and his hostility to further agitation, threw into somewhat dramatic relief the restless and sullen attitude of less fortunate conscripts of toil. Food was dear, wages were low, work was slack, and in the great centres of industry the mills were running half-time, and so keen was the struggle for existence that the operatives were at the mercy of their taskmasters, and too often found it cruel. Small wonder if social discontent was widespread, especially when it is remembered that the people were not only hopeless and ill-fed, but housed under conditions which set at defiance even the most elementary laws of health. More than to any other man in the ranks of higher statesmanship the people looked to Lord Durham, the idol of the pitmen of the North, for the redress of their wrongs, and no statesman of that period possessed more courage or more real acquaintance with the actual needs of the people. Lord Durham, though a man of splendid ability, swift vision, and generous sympathy, had, unhappily, the knack of making enemies, and the fiery impetuosity of his spirit brought him more than once into conflict with leaders whose temperament was cold and whose caution was great. The rebellion in Canada withdrew Lord Durham from the arena of English politics at the beginning of 1838. Then it was that the people recognised to the full the temper of the statesmen that were left, and the fact that, if deliverance was to come from political and social thraldom, they must look to themselves and organise their strength. The representatives of the working classes in 1838 formulated their demand for radical political reform in the famous six points of the People's Charter. This declaration claimed manhood suffrage; the division of the country into equal electoral districts; vote by ballot; annual Parliaments; the abolition of property qualification for a seat in the House of Commons; and payment of members of Parliament for their services. The People's Charter took the working classes by storm: it fired their imagination, inspired their hopes, and drew them in every manufacturing town and district into organised association. [Sidenote: A SORRY CHAMPION] The leader of the movement was Feargus O'Connor, an Irish barrister and journalist, who had entered Parliament in 1832 as a follower of O'Connell and as member for Cork. He quarrelled, however, with the Irish leader, a circumstance which was fatal to success as an agitator in his own country. Restless and reckless, he henceforth carried his energy and devoted his eloquence to the Chartist movement in England, and in 1847 the popular vote carried him once more to the House of Commons as member for Nottingham. He copied the tactics of O'Connell, but had neither the judgment nor the strength of the Irish dictator. He seems, indeed, to have been rather a poor creature of the vainglorious, bombastic type. A year or two later he became hopelessly insane, and in the vaporing heroics and parade of gasconade which marked him as the champion of the Chartists in the spring of 1848 it is charitable now to discover the first seeds of his disorder. However that may be, he was a nine-days' wonder, for from All Fools' Day to the morning of April 10 society in London was in a state of abject panic. The troubles in Ireland, the insurrections and rumours of insurrection on the Continent, the revolution in France, the menacing discontent in the provinces, and the threatening attitude of the working men in the metropolis, were enough to cause alarm among the privileged classes, and conscience made cowards, not certainly of them all, but of the majority. Literature enough and to spare, explanatory, declamatory and the like, has grown around a movement which ran like an unfed river, until it lost itself in the sand. Three men of genius took up their parable about what one of them called the 'Condition of England Question,' and in the pages of Carlyle's 'Chartism' and 'Past and Present,' Disraeli's 'Sybil,' and last, but not least, in Kingsley's 'Alton Locke,' the reader of to-day is in possession of sidelights, vivid, picturesque, and dramatic, on English society in the years when the Chartists were coming to their power, and in the year when they lost it. Lord John was at first in favour of allowing the Chartists to demonstrate to their hearts' content. He therefore proposed to permit them to cross Westminster Bridge, so that they might deliver their petition at the doors of Parliament. He thought that the police might then prevent the re-forming of the procession, and scatter the crowd in the direction of Charing Cross. Lord John had done too much for the people to be afraid of them, and he refused to accept the alarmist view of the situation. But the consternation was so widespread, and the panic so general, that the Government felt compelled on April 6 to declare the proposed meeting criminal and illegal, to call upon all peaceably disposed citizens not to attend, and to take extraordinary precautions. It was, however, announced that the right of assembly would be respected; but, on the advice of Wellington, only three of the leaders were to be allowed to cross the bridge. The Bank, the Tower, and the neighbourhood of Kennington Common meanwhile were protected by troops of cavalry and infantry, whilst the approaches to the Houses of Parliament and the Government offices were held by artillery. [Sidenote: LONDON IN TERROR] The morning of the fateful 10th dawned brightly, but no one dared forecast how the evening would close, and for a few hours of suspense there was a reign of terror. Many houses were barricaded, and in the West End the streets were deserted except by the valiant special constables, who stood at every corner in defence of law and order. The shopkeepers, who were not prepared to take joyfully the spoiling of their goods, formed the great mass of this citizen army--one hundred and fifty thousand strong. There were, nevertheless, recruits from all classes, and in the excitement and peril of the hour odd men rubbed shoulders. Lord Shaftesbury, for instance, was on duty in Mount Street, Grosvenor Square, with a sallow young foreigner for companion, who was afterwards to create a more serious disturbance on his own account, and to spring to power as Napoleon III. Thomas Carlyle preferred to play the part of the untrammelled man in the street, and sallied forth in search of food for reflection. He wanted to see the 'revolution' for himself, and strode towards Hyde Park, determined, he tells us, to walk himself into a glow of heat in spite of the 'venomous cold wind' which called forth his anathemas. The Chelsea moralist found London, westward at least, safe and quiet, in spite of 'empty rumours and a hundred and fifty thousand oaths of special constables.' He noticed as he passed Apsley House that even the Duke had taken the affair seriously, in his private as well as his public capacity, for all the iron blinds were down. The Green Park was closed. Mounted Guardsmen stood ready on Constitution Hill. The fashionable carriage had vanished from Piccadilly. Business everywhere was at a standstill, for London knew not what that day might bring forth. Presently the rain began to fall, and then came down in drenching showers. In spite of their patriotic fervour, the special constables grew both damp and depressed. Suddenly a rumour ran along the streets that the great demonstration at Kennington Common had ended in smoke, and by noon the crowd was streaming over Westminster Bridge and along Whitehall, bearing the tidings that the march to the House of Commons had been abandoned. Feargus O'Connor had, in fact, taken fright, and presently the petition rattled ingloriously to Westminster in the safe but modest keeping of a hackney cab. The shower swept the angry and noisy rabble homewards, or into neighbouring public-houses, and ridicule--as the evening filled the town with complacent special constables and their admiring wives and sweethearts--did even more than the rain to quench the Chartist agitation. It had been boldly announced that one hundred and fifty thousand people would meet at Kennington. Less than a third of that number assembled, and a considerable part of the crowd had evidently been attracted by curiosity. Afterwards, when the monster petition with its signatures was examined, it was found to fall short of the boasted 'five million' names by upwards of three millions. Many of those which did appear were palpably fictitious; indeed the rude wit of the London apprentice was responsible for scores of silly signatures. Lord John's comment on the affair was characteristic. After stating that no great numbers followed the cab which contained the petition, and that there was no mob at the door of the House of Commons, he adds: 'London escaped the fate of Paris, Berlin, and Vienna. For my own part, I saw in these proceedings a fresh proof that the people of England were satisfied with the Government under which they had the happiness to live, did not wish to be instructed by their neighbours in the principles of freedom, and did not envy them either the liberty they had enjoyed under Robespierre, or the order which had been established among them by Napoleon the Great.' [Sidenote: PALMERSTON'S OPPORTUNITY] Lord John's allusion to Paris, Berlin, and Vienna suggests foreign politics, and also the growing lack of harmony between Lord Palmerston on the one hand and the Court and Cabinet on the other. Although he long held the highest office under the Crown, Lord Palmerston's chief claim to distinction was won as Foreign Minister. He began his official career as a Tory in the Portland Administration of 1807, and two years later--at the age of five-and-twenty--was appointed Secretary at War in the Perceval Government. He held this post for the long term of eighteen years, and when Canning succeeded to power still retained it, with a seat in the Cabinet. Palmerston was a liberal Tory of the school of Canning, and, when Lord Grey became Premier in 1830, was a man of sufficient mark to be entrusted with the seals of the Foreign Office, though, until his retirement in 1834, Grey exercised a controlling voice in the foreign policy of the nation. It was not until Grey was succeeded by Melbourne that Palmerston began to display both his strength and his weakness in independent action. He saw his opportunity and took it. He knew his own mind and disliked interference, and this made him more and more inclined to be heedless of the aid, and almost of the approval, of his colleagues. Under a provokingly pleasant manner lurked, increasingly, the temper of an autocrat. Melbourne sat lightly to most things, and not least to questions of foreign policy. He was easily bored, and believed in _laissez-faire_ to an extent which has never been matched by any other Prime Minister in the Queen's reign. The consequence was that for seven critical years Palmerston did what was right in his own eyes, until he came to regard himself not merely as the custodian of English interests abroad, but almost as the one man in the Cabinet who was entitled to speak with authority concerning them. If the responsibility of the first Afghan war must rest chiefly on his shoulders, it is only fair to remember that he took the risk of a war with France in order to drive Ibrahim Pacha out of Syria. From first to last, his tenure at the Foreign Office covered a period of nearly twenty years. Though he made serious mistakes, he also made despots in every part of the world afraid of him; whilst struggling nationalities felt that the great English Minister was not oblivious of the claims of justice, or deaf to the appeal for mercy. Early in the Russell Administration Lord Palmerston's high-handed treatment of other members of the Cabinet provoked angry comment, and Sir Robert Peel did not conceal his opinion that Lord John gave his impetuous colleague too much of his own way. The truth was, the Premier's hands, and heart also, were in 1846 and 1847 full of the Irish famine, and Lord Palmerston took advantage of the fact. Moreover, Lord John Russell was, broadly speaking, in substantial agreement with his Foreign Minister, though he cordially disliked his habit of taking swift and almost independent action. [Sidenote: CLIMBING DOWN] At the beginning of 1848 Palmerston seemed determined to pick a quarrel with France, and in February drew up a threatening despatch on the difficulty which had arisen between our Ambassador (Lord Normanby) and Louis Philippe, which brought matters to a crisis. Louis Philippe had acted a dishonourable part over the Spanish marriages, and Palmerston was prepared to go out of his way to humiliate France. At the last moment, the affair came to Lord John's knowledge through Lord Clarendon, with the result that the communication was countermanded. Lord Palmerston appears to have taken the rebuff, humiliating as it was, with characteristic nonchalance, and it produced little more than a momentary effect. The ignominious flight of Louis Philippe quickly followed, and the revolution in France was the signal in Vienna for a revolt of the students and artisans, which drove Metternich to find refuge in England and the Emperor Ferdinand to seek asylum in the Tyrol. Austrians, Hungarians, and Slavs only needed an opportunity, such as the 'year of revolutions' afforded, to display their hostility to one another, and the racial jealousy brought Austria and Hungary to open war. In Milan, in Naples, and Berlin the revolutionary spirit displayed itself, and in these centres, as well as in Switzerland, changes in the direction of liberty took place. Lord John Russell, in an important document, which Mr. Walpole has printed, and which bears date May 1, 1848, has explained his own view of the political situation in Europe at that moment. After a lucid and impressive survey of the changes that had taken place in the map of Europe since the Congress of Vienna, Lord John lays down the principle that it is neither becoming nor expedient for England to proclaim that the Treaties of 1815 were invalid. On the contrary, England ought rather to promote, in the interests of peace and order, the maintenance of the territorial divisions then made. At the same time, England, amid the storm, ought not to persist in clinging to a wreck if a safe spar is within her reach. He recognised that Austria could hardly restore her sway in Italy, and was not in a position to confront the cost of a protracted war, in which France was certain to take sides against her. He, therefore, thought it advisable that English diplomacy should be brought to bear at Vienna, so as to 'produce a frank abandonment of Lombardy and Venice on the part of Austria.' He declared that it was not to the advantage of England to meddle with the internal affairs of Spain; but he thought there was a favourable chance of coming to an understanding with Germany, where the Schleswig-Holstein question already threatened disturbance. 'It is our interest,' are the final words of this significant State paper, 'to use our influence as speedily and as generally as possible to settle the pending questions and to fix the boundaries of States. Otherwise, if war once becomes general, it will spread over Germany, reach Belgium, and finally sweep England into its vortex. Should our efforts for peace succeed, Europe may begin a new career with more or less of hope and of concord; should they fail, we must keep our sword in the scabbard as long as we can, but we cannot hope to be neutral in a great European war. England cannot be indifferent to the supremacy of France over Germany and Italy, or to the advance of Russian armies to Constantinople; still less to the incorporation of Belgium with a new French Empire.' [Sidenote: OUR POLICY ABROAD] As usual, Lord Palmerston had his own ideas and the courage of them. Within three weeks of the Russell Memorandum to the Cabinet he accordingly stood out in his true colours as a frank opportunist. The guiding rule of his foreign policy, he stated, was to promote and advance, as far as lay in his power, the interests of the country as opportunity served and as necessity arose. 'We have no everlasting union with this or that country--no identification of policy with another. We have no natural enemies--no perpetual friends. When we find a Power pursuing that course of policy which we wish also to promote, for the time that Power becomes our ally; and when we find a country whose interests are at variance with our own, we are involved for a time with the Government of that country. We find no fault with other nations for pursuing their interests; and they ought not to find fault with us, if, in pursuing our interests, our course may be different from theirs.' Lord Palmerston held that the real policy of this country was to be the champion of justice and right, though professing no sympathy with the notion that England ought to become, to borrow his own expression, the Quixote of the world. 'I hold that England is a Power sufficiently strong to steer her own course, and not to tie herself as an unnecessary appendage to the policy of any other Government.' He declared that, if he might be allowed to gather into one sentence the principle which he thought ought to guide an English statesman, he would adopt the expression of Canning, and say that with every British Minister the interests of England ought to be the shibboleth of his policy. Unfortunately, Lord Palmerston, in spite of such statements, was too much inclined to throw the moral weight of England into this or that scale on his own responsibility, and, as it often seemed to dispassionate observers, on the mere caprice of the hour. He took up the position that the interests of England were safe in his hands, and magnified his office, sometimes to the annoyance of the Court and often to the chagrin of the Cabinet. No matter what storm raged, Palmerston always contrived to come to the surface again like a cork. He never lost his self-possession, and a profound sense of his own infallibility helped him, under difficulties and rebuffs which would have knocked the spirit out of other men, to adopt the attitude of the patriotic statesman struggling with adversity. When the session of 1849 closed he was in an extremely difficult position, in consequence of the growing dislike in high quarters to his policy, and the coolness which had sprung up between himself and the majority of his colleagues; yet we find him writing a jaunty note to his brother in the strain of a man who had not only deserved success but won it. 'After the trumpetings of attacks that were to demolish first one and then another of the Government--first me, then Grey, then Charles Wood--we have come triumphantly out of the debates and divisions, and end the session stronger than we began it.'[19] [Sidenote: STRAINED RELATIONS] Lord Palmerston's passion for personal ascendency was not to be repressed, and in the electric condition of Europe it proved perilous as well as embarrassing to the Russell Administration. Without the knowledge of the Queen or his colleagues, Lord Palmerston, for instance, sent a letter to Sir H. Bulwer advising an extension of the basis of the Spanish Government, an act of interference which caused so much irritation at Madrid that the Spanish Government requested the British Ambassador to leave the country. Happily, the breach with Madrid was repaired after a few months' anxiety on the part of Palmerston's colleagues. The Queen's sense of the indiscretion was apparent in the request to Lord Palmerston to submit in future all his despatches to the Prime Minister. Other occasions soon arose which increased distrust at Windsor, and further strained friendly relations between the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary. The latter's removal to some less responsible post was contemplated, for her Majesty appeared to disapprove of everything Lord Palmerston did. Without detailing the various circumstances which awakened the Queen's displeasure, it is sufficient to draw attention to one event--known in the annals of diplomacy as the 'Don Pacifico' affair--which threatened the overthrow of the Ministry. Two British subjects demanded in vain compensation from the Greek Government for damage to their property. Lord Palmerston came to their defence, and sent private instructions to the Admiral of the British fleet at the Dardanelles to seize Greek vessels by way of reprisal, which was promptly done. The tidings fell like a thunderbolt upon Downing Street. France and Russia made angry protests, and war was predicted. At length an offer of mediation from Paris was accepted, and the matter was arranged in London. Lord Palmerston, however, omitted to inform the English Minister at Athens of the settlement, and, whilst everyone in England rejoiced that the storm had blown over, the Admiral was laying an embargo on other ships, and at last forced the Greek Government to grant compensation. France, indignant at such cavalier treatment, recalled M. Drouyn de Lhuys from London, and again the war-cloud lowered. Lord Palmerston had the audacity to state in the House of Commons that the French Minister had returned to Paris in order 'presumably to be the medium of communication between the two Governments as to these matters.' The truth came out on the morrow, and Lord John, in the discreet absence of his colleague, was forced to explain as best he might the position of affairs. Although he screened Lord Palmerston as far as he was able, he determined to make a change at the Foreign Office. [Sidenote: PEEL AND PALMERSTON] In June 1850, Lord Stanley challenged the foreign policy of Lord Palmerston in the House of Lords, and carried, by a majority of thirty-seven, a resolution of censure. Mr. Roebuck, in the Commons, met the hostile vote by a resolution of confidence, and, after four nights' debate, secured a majority of forty-six. Lord Palmerston made an able defence of his conduct of affairs, and Lord John Russell, who differed from him not so much in the matter as in the manner of his decisions, not merely refused to leave his colleague in the lurch, but came vigorously to his support. The debate was rendered memorable on other grounds. Sir Robert Peel, in the course of it, delivered his last speech in Parliament. The division, which gave Palmerston a fresh tenure of power, was taken at four o'clock on the morning of Saturday, June 29. Peel left the House to snatch a few hours' sleep before going at noon to a meeting which was to settle the disputed question as to the site of the Great Exhibition. He kept his appointment; but later in the day he was thrown from his horse on Constitution Hill, and received injuries which proved fatal on the night of July 2. His death was a national calamity, for at sixty-two he was still in the fulness of his strength. There will always be a diversity of judgment concerning his career; there is but one opinion about his character. Few statesmen have gone to their grave amid more remarkable expressions of regret. Old and young colleagues, from the Duke of Wellington to Mr. Gladstone, betrayed by their emotion no less than by their words, their grief over the loss of a leader who followed his conscience even at the expense of the collapse of his power. Lord John Russell, the most distinguished, without doubt, of Sir Robert's opponents on the floor of the House, paid a generous tribute to his rival's memory. He declared that posterity would regard Sir Robert Peel as one of the greatest and most patriotic of statesman. He laid stress on that 'long and large experience of public affairs, that profound knowledge, that oratorical power, that copious yet exact memory, with which the House was wont to be enlightened, interested, and guided.' When the offer of a public funeral was declined, in deference to Sir Robert's known wishes, Lord John proposed and carried a resolution for the erection of a statue in Westminster Abbey. He also marked his sense of the loss which the nation had sustained, in the disappearance of an illustrious man, by giving his noble-minded and broken-hearted widow the refusal of a peerage. Meanwhile, Lord Palmerston, on the strength of the vote of confidence in the Commons, was somewhat of a popular hero. People who believe that England can do no wrong, at least abroad, believed in him. His audacity delighted the man in the club. His pluck took the platform and much of the press by storm. The multitude relished his peremptory despatches, and were delighted when he either showed fight or encouraged it in others. In course of time 'Pam' became the typical fine old English gentleman of genial temper but domineering instincts. Prince Albert disliked him; he was too little of a courtier, too much of an off-handed man of affairs. Windsor, of course, received early tidings of the impression which was made at foreign Courts by the most independent and and cavalier Foreign Minister of the century. Occasionally he needlessly offended the susceptibilities of exalted personages abroad as well as at home. At length the Queen, determined no longer to be put in a false position, drew up a sharply-worded memorandum, in which explicit directions were given for the transaction of business between the Crown and the Foreign Office. 'The Queen requires, first, that Lord Palmerston will distinctly state what he proposes in a given case, in order that the Queen may know as distinctly to what she is giving her royal sanction; secondly, having once given her sanction to a measure, that it be not arbitrarily altered or modified by the Minister. Such an act she must consider as failing in sincerity towards the Crown, and justly to be visited by the exercise of her constitutional right of dismissing that Minister. She expects to be kept informed of what passes between him and the Foreign Ministers before important decisions are taken, based upon that intercourse; to receive the foreign despatches in good time; and to have the drafts for her approval sent to her in sufficient time to make herself acquainted with their contents before they must be sent off.' No responsible adviser of the Crown during the reign had received such emphatic censure, and in August 1850 people were talking as if Palmerston was bound to resign. He certainly would have done so if he had merely consulted his own feelings; but he declared that to resign just then would be to play into the hands of the political adversaries whom he had just defeated, and to throw over his supporters at the moment when they had fought a successful battle on his behalf. Lord Palmerston, therefore, accepted the Queen's instructions with unwonted meekness. He assured her Majesty that he would not fail to attend to the directions which the memorandum contained, and for a while harmony was restored. In the autumn of 1851 Louis Kossuth arrived in England, and met with an enthusiastic reception, of the kind which was afterwards accorded in London to another popular hero, in the person of Garibaldi. Lord Palmerston received Kossuth at the Foreign Office, and, contrary to the wishes of the Queen and Prime Minister, deputations were admitted, and addresses were presented, thanking Palmerston for his services in the cause of humanity, whilst in the same breath allusions to the Emperors of Austria and Russia as 'odious and detestable assassins' were made. Almost before the annoyance created by this fresh act of indiscretion had subsided, Lord Palmerston was guilty of a still more serious offence. [Sidenote: THE _COUP D'ÉTAT_] Louis Napoleon had been elected President of the French Republic by five and a half million votes. He was thought to be ambitious rather than able, and he had pledged himself to sustain the existing Constitution. He worked for his own hand, however, and accordingly conciliated first the clergy, then the peasants, and finally the army, by fair promises, popular acts, and a bold policy. On December 2, 1851, when his term of office was expiring, Napoleon suddenly overthrew the Assembly, which had refused a month or two previously to revise the Constitution in order to make the President eligible for re-election, and next morning all Europe was startled with tidings of the _Coup d'État_. Both the English Court and Cabinet felt that absolute neutrality must be observed during the tumult which followed in Paris, and instructions to that effect were accordingly transmitted to Lord Normanby. But when that diplomatist made known this official communication, he was met with the retort that Lord Palmerston, in a conversation with the French Ambassador in London, had already declared that the _Coup d'État_ was an act of self-defence, and in fact was the best thing under the circumstances for France. Lord Palmerston, in a subsequent despatch to Lord Normanby, which was not submitted either to the Queen or the Prime Minister, reiterated his opinion. [Sidenote: 'THERE WAS A PALMERSTON!'] Under these circumstances, Lord John Russell had no alternative except to dismiss Lord Palmerston. He did so, as he explained when Parliament met in February, on the ground that the Foreign Secretary had practically put himself, for the moment, in the place of the Crown. He had given the moral approbation of England to the acts of the President of the Republic of France, though he knew, when he was doing so, that he was acting in direct opposition to the wishes of the sovereign and the policy of the Government. Lord John stated in the House of Commons that he took upon himself the sole and entire responsibility of advising her Majesty to require the resignation of Lord Palmerston. He added that, though the Foreign Secretary had neglected what was due to the Crown and his colleagues, he felt sure that he had not intended any personal disrespect. Greville declared that, in all his experience of scenes in Parliament, he could recall no such triumph as Lord Russell achieved on this occasion, nor had he ever witnessed a discomfiture more complete than that of Palmerston. Lord Dalling, another eye-witness of the episode, has described, from the point of view of a sympathiser with Palmerston, the manner in which he seemed completely taken by surprise by the 'tremendous assault' which Lord John, by a damaging appeal to facts, made against him. In his view, Russell's speech was one of the most powerful to which he had ever listened, and its effect was overwhelming. Disraeli, meeting Lord Dalling by chance next day on the staircase of the Russian Embassy, exclaimed as he passed, with significant emphasis, 'There _was_ a Palmerston!' The common opinion at the clubs found expression in a phrase which passed from lip to lip, 'Palmerston is smashed;' but, though driven for the moment to bay, the dismissed Minister was himself of another mind. Lord Palmerston was offered the Irish Viceroyalty, but he declined to take such an appointment. He accepted his dismissal with a characteristic affectation of indifference, and in the course of a laboured defence of his action in the House of Commons, excused his communication to the French Ambassador on the plea that it was only the expression of an opinion on passing events, common to that 'easy and familiar personal intercourse, which tends so usefully to the maintenance of friendly relations with foreign Governments.' Lady Russell wrote down at the time her own impressions of this crisis in her husband's Cabinet, and the following passage throws a valuable sidelight on a memorable incident in the Queen's reign: 'The breach between John and Lord Palmerston was a calamity to the country, to the Whig party, and to themselves; and, although it had for some months been a threatening danger on the horizon, I cannot but feel that there was accident in its actual occurrence. Had we been in London or at Pembroke Lodge, and not at Woburn Abbey, at the time, they would have met, and talked over the subject of their difference; words spoken might have been equally strong, but would have been less cutting than words written, and conciliatory expressions on John's part would have led the way to promises on Lord Palmerston's.... They two kept up the character of England, as the sturdy guardians of her rights against other nations, and the champions of freedom and independence abroad. They did so both before and after the breach of 1851, which was, happily, closed in the following year, when they were once more colleagues in office. On matters of home policy Lord Palmerston remained the Tory he had been in his earlier days, and this was the cause of many a trial to John.' The Russell Administration, as the Premier himself frankly recognised, was seriously weakened by the dismissal of Lord Palmerston; and its position was not improved when Lord Clarendon, on somewhat paltry grounds, refused the Foreign Office. Lord John's sagacity was shown by the prompt offer of the vacant appointment to Lord Granville, who, at the age of thirty-six, entered the Cabinet, and began a career which was destined to prove a controlling force in the foreign policy of England in the Victorian era. [Sidenote: ROME AND OXFORD] Meanwhile fresh difficulties had arisen. In the autumn of 1850--a year which had already been rendered memorable in ecclesiastical circles by the Gorham case--Pius IX. issued a Bull by which England became a province of the Roman Catholic Church. Dr. Wiseman was created Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, and England was divided into twelve sees with territorial titles. The assumption by Pius IX. of spiritual authority over England was a blunder; indeed, no better proof in recent times of the lack of infallibility at Rome could well be discovered. One swallow, proverbially, does not make a spring; and when Newman took refuge in flight, other leaders of the Oxford Movement refused to accept his logic and to follow his example. Englishmen have always resented anything in the shape of foreign dictation, and deep in the national heart there yet survives a rooted hostility to the claims of the Vatican. Napoleon's _Coup d'État_, which followed quickly on the heels of this dramatic act of Papal aggression, scarcely took the nation more completely by surprise. No Vatican decree could well have proved more unpopular, and even Canon Liddon is obliged to admit that the bishops, with one solitary exception, 'threw the weight of their authority on the side of popular and short-sighted passion.'[20] Pius IX. knew nothing of the English character, but Cardinal Wiseman, at least, could not plead ignorance of the real issues at stake; and therefore his grandiloquent and, under all the circumstances, ridiculous pastoral letter, which he dated 'From out of the Flaminian Gate at Rome,' was justly regarded as an insult to the religious convictions of the vast majority of the English people. Anglicans and Nonconformists alike resented such an authoritative deliverance, and presently the old 'No Popery' cry rang like a clarion through the land. Dr. Newman, with the zeal of a pervert, preached a sermon on the revival of the Catholic Church, and in the course of it he stated that the 'people of England, who for so many years have been separated from the See of Rome, are about, of their own will, to be added to the Holy Church.' The words were, doubtless, spoken in good faith, for the great leader of the Oxford Movement naturally expected that those who had espoused his views, like honest men, would follow his example. Dr. Pusey, however, was a more astute ecclesiastical statesman than Cardinal Wiseman. He was in favour of a 'very moderate' declaration against Rome, for the resources of compromise were evidently in his eyes not exhausted. The truth was, Pusey and Keble, by a course of action which to this day remains a standing riddle to the Papacy on the one hand, and to Protestantism on the other, threw dust in the eyes of Pius IX., and were the real authors of Papal aggression. Lord John Russell saw this quite clearly, and in proof of such an assertion it is only necessary to appeal to his famous Durham Letter. He had watched the drift of ecclesiastical opinion, and had seen with concern that the tide was running swiftly in the direction of Rome. England had renounced the Papal supremacy for the space of 300 years, and had grown strong in the liberty which had followed the downfall of such thraldom. Oxford had taught Rome to tempt England; the leaders of the so-called Anglican revival were responsible for the flourish of trumpets at the Vatican. Lord John's ecclesiastical appointments called forth sharp criticism. He was a Protestant of the old uncompromising type, with leanings towards advanced thought in Biblical criticism. He knew, moreover, what Puritanism had done for the English nation in the seventeenth century, and made no secret of his conviction that it was the Nonconformists, more than any other class, who had rendered civil and religious liberty possible. He moreover knew that in his own time they, more than any other part of the community, had carried the Reform Bill, brought about the abolition of slavery, and established Free Trade. He had been brought into contact with their leaders, and was beginning to perceive, with the nation at large, how paltry and inadequate were the claims of a rigid Churchmanship, since the true apostolical succession is a matter of altitude of spiritual devotion, and borrows none of its rights from the pretensions of clerical caste. [Sidenote: THE DURHAM LETTER] The Durham Letter was written from Downing Street, on November 4, 1850. It gained its name because it was addressed to the Premier's old friend Dr. Maltby, Bishop of Durham, and appeared in the newspapers on the day on which it was dated. Lord John declared that he had not only promoted to the utmost of his power the claims of Roman Catholics to all civil rights, but had deemed it not merely just, but desirable, that that Church should impart religious instruction to the 'numerous Irish immigrants in London and elsewhere, who, without such help, would have been left in heathen ignorance.' He believed that this might have been accomplished without any such innovation as that which the Papacy now contemplated. He laid stress on the assumption of power made in all the documents on the subject which had come from Rome, and he protested against such pretensions as inconsistent with the Queen's supremacy, with the rights of the bishops and clergy, and with the spiritual independence of the nation. He confessed that his alarm was not equal to his indignation, since Englishmen would never again allow any foreign prince or potentate to impose a yoke on their minds and consciences. He hinted at legislative action on the subject, and then proceeded to take up his parable against the Tractarians in the following unmistakeable terms: 'There is a danger, however, which alarms me much more than the aggression of a foreign sovereign. Clergymen of our Church who have subscribed the Thirty-nine Articles and have acknowledged in explicit terms the Queen's supremacy, have been the most forward in leading their flocks, step by step, to the verge of the precipice. The honour paid to saints, the claim of infallibility for the Church, the superstitious use of the sign of the Cross, the muttering of the Liturgy so as to disguise the language in which it was written, the recommendation of auricular confession, and the administration of penance and absolution--all these things are pointed out by clergymen as worthy of adoption, and are now openly reprehended by the Bishop of London in his Charge to the clergy of his diocese. What, then, is the danger to be apprehended from a foreign prince of no power, compared to the danger within the gates from the unworthy sons of the Church of England herself? I have but little hope that the propounders and framers of these innovations will desist from their insidious course; but I rely with confidence on the people of England, and I will not bate a jot of heart or life so long as the glorious principles and the immortal martyrs of the Reformation shall be held in reverence by the great mass of a nation, which look with contempt on the mummeries of superstition, and with scorn at the laborious endeavours which are now being made to confine the intellect and enslave the soul.' [Sidenote: 'NO POPERY'] Lord John's manifesto was as fuel to the flames. All over the kingdom preparations were in progress at the moment for a national carnival--now fallen largely into disrepute. Guy Fawkes was hastily dethroned, and the Pope and Cardinal Wiseman were paraded in effigy through the streets of London, Exeter, and other cities, and burnt at nightfall amid the jeers of the crowd. Petitions began to pour in against Papal aggression, and the literature of the subject, in controversial tract, pamphlet, and volume, grew suddenly not less bewildering than formidable. The arrival in London of Father Gavazzi, an ex-priest of commanding presence and impassioned oratory, helped to arouse still further the Protestant spirit of the nation. The Press, the pulpit, the platform, formed a triple alliance against the Vatican, and the indignant rejection of the Pope's claims may be said to have been carried by acclamation. Clamour ran riot through the land, and spent its force in noisy demonstrations. The Catholics met the tumult, on the whole, with praiseworthy moderation, and presently signs of the inevitable reaction began to appear. Lord John's colleagues were not of one mind as to the wisdom of the Durham Letter, for if there is one taunt before which an ordinary Englishman quails, it is the accusation of religious bigotry. The Durham Letter was an instance in which Lord John's zeal outran his discretion.[21] Lord Shaftesbury, who was in the thick of the tumult, and has left a vivid description of it in his journal,[22] declared that Cardinal Wiseman's manifesto, in spite of its audacity, was likely to prove 'more hurtful to the shooter than to the target.' Looking back at the crisis, after an interval of more than forty years, the same criticism seems to apply with added force to the Durham Letter. Lord John overshot the mark, and his accusations wounded those whom he did not intend to attack, and in the recoil of public opinion his own reputation suffered. He resented, with pardonable warmth, the attitude of the Vatican, and was jealous of any infringement, from that or any other quarter, of the Queen's supremacy in her own realms. The most damaging sentences in the Durham Letter were not directed against the Catholics, either in Rome, England, or Ireland, but against the Tractarian clergymen--men whom he regarded as 'unworthy sons of the Church of England.' The Catholics, incensed at the denial of the Pope's supremacy, were, however, in no mood to make distinctions, and they have interpreted Lord John's strictures on Dr. Pusey and his followers as an attack on their own religious faith. The consequence was that the manifesto was regarded, especially in Ireland, not merely as a protest against the politics of the Vatican, but as a sweeping censure on the creed of Rome. Lord John's character and past services might have shielded him from such a construction being placed upon his words, for he had proved, on more than one historic occasion, his devotion to the cause of religious liberty. Disraeli, writing to his sister in November, said: 'I think John Russell is in a scrape. I understand that his party are furious with him. The Irish are frantic. If he goes on with the Protestant movement he will be thrown over by the Papists; if he shuffles with the Protestants, their blood is too high to be silent now, and they will come to us. I think Johnny is checkmated.'[23] [Sidenote: UNDER WHICH FLAG?] For the moment, however, passion and prejudice everywhere ran riot, and on both sides of the controversy common sense and common fairness were forgotten. A representative Irish politician of a later generation has not failed to observe the irony of the position. 'It was a curious incident in political history,' declares Mr. Justin McCarthy, 'that Lord John Russell, who had more than any Englishman then living been identified with the principles of religious liberty, who had sat at the feet of Fox, and had for his closest friend the Catholic poet Thomas Moore, came to be regarded by Roman Catholics as the bitterest enemy of their creed and their rights of worship.'[24] It is easy to cavil at Lord John Russell's interpretation of the Oxford Movement, and to assert that the accusations of the Durham Letter were due to bigotry and panic. He believed, in common with thousands of other distressed Churchmen, that the Tractarians were foes within the gates of the Establishment. He regarded them, moreover, as ministers of religion who were hostile to the work of the Reformation, and therefore he deemed that they were in a false position in the Anglican Church. Their priestly claims and sacerdotal rites, their obvious sympathies and avowed convictions, separated them sharply from ordinary clergymen, and were difficult to reconcile with adherence to the principles of Protestantism. Like many other men at the time, and still more of to-day, he was at a loss to discover how ecclesiastics of such a stamp could remain in the ministry of the Church of England, when they seemed to ordinary eyes to be in league with Rome. The prelates, almost to a man, were hotly opposed to the Tractarians when Lord John wrote the Durham Letter. They shared his convictions and applauded his action. Since then many things have happened. The Oxford Movement has triumphed, and has done so largely by the self-sacrificing devotion of its adherents. It has summoned to its aid art and music, learning and eloquence; it has appealed to the æsthetic and emotional elements in human nature; it has led captive the imagination of many by its dramatic revival of mediæval ideas and methods; and it has stilled by its assumption of authority the restlessness of souls, too weary to argue, too troubled to rebel. The bishops of to-day have grown either quite friendly towards the Oxford Movement, or else discreetly tolerant. Yet, when all this is admitted, it does nothing towards proving that Lord John Russell was a mistaken alarmist. The Durham Letter and its impassioned protest have been justified by the logic of events. It is easy for men to be charitable who have slipped their convictions. Possibly it was not judicious on Lord John's part to be so zealously affected in the matter. That is, perhaps, open to dispute, but the question remains: Was he mistaken in principle? He saw clergymen of the English Church, Protestant at least in name, 'leading their flocks step by step to the very verge of the precipice,' and he took up his parable against them, and pointed out the danger to the hitherto accepted faith and practice of the English Church. One of the most distinguished prelates of the Anglican Church in the Queen's reign has not hesitated to assert that the tenets against which Lord John Russell protested in the Durham Letter were, in his judgment, of a kind which are 'destructive of all reasonable faith, and reduce worship to a mere belief in spells and priestcraft.' Cardinal Vaughan, it is needless to say, does not sympathise with such a view. He, however, has opinions on the subject which are worthy of the attention of those who think that Lord John was a mere alarmist. His Eminence delivered a suggestive address at Preston on September 10, 1894, on the 'Re-Union of Christendom.' He thinks--and it is idle to deny that he has good ground for thinking--that, in spite of bishops, lawyers, and legislature, Delphic judgments at Lambeth, and spasmodic protests up and down the country, a change in doctrine and ritual is in progress in the Anglican Church which can only be described as a revolution. He asserts that the 'Real Presence, the sacrifice of the Mass, offered for the living and the dead, no infrequent reservation of the Sacrament, regular auricular confession, Extreme Unction, Purgatory, prayers for the dead, devotions to Our Lady, to her Immaculate Conception, the use of her Rosary, and the invocation of saints, are doctrines taught and accepted, with a growing desire and relish for them, in the Church of England.' Cardinal Vaughan also declares that the present churches of the Establishment are 'often distinguishable only with extreme difficulty from those belonging to the Church of Rome.' Such statements are either true or false. If false, they are open to contradiction; if true, they justify in substance the position taken up in the Durham Letter. Towards the close of his life, Lord John told Mr. Lecky that he did not regret his action, and to the last he maintained that he was right in the protest which he made in the Durham Letter. Yet he acknowledged, as he looked back upon the affair, that he might have softened certain expressions in it with advantage. Parliament met on February 4, 1851, and the Queen's Speech contained the following passage: 'The recent assumption of certain ecclesiastical titles conferred by a foreign Power has excited strong feelings in this country; and large bodies of my subjects have presented addresses to me expressing attachment to the Throne, and praying that such assumptions should be resisted. I have assured them of my resolution to maintain the rights of my crown and the independence of the nation against all encroachments, from whatsoever quarter they may proceed.' [Sidenote: THE GIST OF THE WHOLE MATTER] Three days later, Lord John introduced the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill. The measure prohibited the assumption of territorial titles by Roman Catholic bishops; but there is truth in the assertion that no enactment of the kind could prevent other persons from giving the dignitaries of the Catholic Church such titles, and, as a matter of fact, the attempt to deprive them of the distinction led to its ostentatious adoption. The proposal to render null and void gifts or religious endowments acquired by the new prelates was abandoned in the course of the acrimonious debates which followed. Other difficulties arose, and Ireland was declared to be exempt from the operation of the measure. The object of the bill, declared Lord John Russell, was merely to assert the supremacy of the Crown. Nothing was further from his thought than to play the part of a religious persecutor. He merely wished to draw a sharp and unmistakeable line of demarcation between the spiritual jurisdiction of the Pope over the adherents of the Roman Catholic Church in the Queen's realms, and such an act of Papal aggression as was involved in the claim of Pius IX. to grant ecclesiastical titles borrowed from places in the United Kingdom. The bill satisfied neither the friends nor the foes of Roman Catholicism. It was persistently regarded by the one as an attack on religious liberty, and by the other as quite inadequate as a bulwark of Protestantism. Nevertheless it became law, but not before the summer of 1851, when the agitation had spent its force. It was regarded almost as a dead letter from the first, and, though it remained on the Statute-book for twenty years, its repeal was a foregone conclusion. When it was revoked in 1871 the temper of the nation had changed, and no one was inclined to make even a passing protest. John Leech, in a cartoon in _Punch_, caught the droll aspect of the situation with even more than his customary skill. Lord John relished the joke, even though he recognised that it was not likely to prove of service to him at the next General Election. In conversation with a friend he said: 'Do you remember a cartoon in _Punch_ where I was represented as a little boy writing "No Popery" on a wall and running away?' The answer was a smile of assent. 'Well,' he added, 'that was very severe, and did my Government a great deal of harm, but I was so convinced that it was not maliciously meant that I sent for John Leech, and asked him what I could do for him. He said that he should like a nomination for his son to the Charterhouse, and I gave it to him. That is how I used my patronage.' [Sidenote: A MINISTERIAL CRISIS] Meanwhile, when the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill was still under discussion, a Ministerial crisis had arisen. Finance was never the strong point of the first Russell Administration, and Sir Charles Wood's Budget gave widespread dissatisfaction. Mr. Locke King heightened the embarrassment of the moment by bringing forward a motion for placing the county and borough franchise on an equal basis; and before the discussion of the Budget could be renewed this motion was carried against the Government, though in a small House, by a majority of almost two to one. Lord John Russell met the hostile vote by immediate resignation; and Lord Stanley--who four months later became Earl of Derby--was summoned to Windsor and attempted to form a Ministry. His efforts were, however, unsuccessful, for Peel had left the Tory party not merely disorganised but full of warring elements. Lord John, therefore, returned to office in March, and Locke King's measure was promptly thrown out by a majority of more than two hundred. The London season of that year was rendered memorable by the opening of the Great Exhibition, amid universal plaudits and dreams of long-continued peace amongst the nations. As the year closed Lord Palmerston's ill-advised action over the _Coup d'État_ in France brought about, as we have already seen, his dismissal, a circumstance which still further weakened the Russell Cabinet. The year 1852 opened darkly for Lord John. Difficulties, small and great, seemed thickening around him. He had been called to power at a singularly trying moment, and no one who looks dispassionately at the policy which he pursued between the years 1846 and 1852 can fail to recognise that he had at least tried to do his duty. There is a touch of pathos in the harassed statesman's reply to a letter of congratulation which reached him on the threshold of the new year from a near relative, and it is worthy of quotation, since it reveals the attitude of the man on far greater questions than those with which he was beset at the moment: 'I cannot say that the new year is a happy one to me. Political troubles are too thick for my weak sight to penetrate them, but we all rest in the mercy of God, who will dispose of us as He thinks best.'[25] When Parliament met in February, Lord Palmerston's opportunity came. On the heels of the panic about Papal aggression came widespread alarm as to the policy which Napoleon III. might pursue towards this country. The fear of invasion grew strong in the land, and patriotic fervour restlessly clamoured for prompt legislative action. Forty years ago, in every town and village of England there were people who could speak from personal knowledge concerning the reign of terror which the first Napoleon, by his conquering march over Europe and his threatened descent on the English shores, had established, and, as a consequence, though with diminished force, the old consternation suddenly revived. [Sidenote: PALMERSTON'S 'TIT-FOR-TAT'] Lord John Russell had no more real fear of Napoleon than he had of the Pope, but he rose to the occasion and brought before Parliament a measure for the reorganisation of the local Militia. He believed that such a force, with national enthusiasm at its back, was sufficient to repel invasion--a contingency which, in common with other responsible statesmen, he did not regard as more than remote. Lord Palmerston, however, posing as the candid friend of the nation, and the exceptionally well-informed ex-Foreign Minister, professed to see rocks ahead, and there were--at all events for the Russell Administration. In England, any appeal to the Jingo instincts of the populace is certain to meet with a more or less hysterical welcome, and Palmerston more than once took advantage of the fact. He expressed his dissatisfaction with Lord John's Militia Bill, and by a majority of eleven carried an amendment to it. Lord John met the hostile demonstration by resignation, and, though Palmerston professed to be surprised at such a result, his real opinion leaps to light in the historic sentence which he wrote to his brother on February 24: 'I have had my tit-for-tat with John Russell, and I turned him out on Friday last.' One hitherto unpublished reminiscence of that crisis deserves to be recorded, especially as it throws into passing relief Lord John's generosity of temper: 'I remember,' states his brother-in-law and at one time private secretary, the Hon. George Elliot, 'being indignant with Lord Palmerston, after he had been dismissed by Lord John, bringing forward a verbal amendment on the Militia Bill in 1852--a mere pretext by which the Government was overthrown. But Lord John would not at all enter into my feelings, and said, "It's all fair. I dealt him a blow, and he has given me one in return."' Lord John's interest in the question of Parliamentary Reform was life-long. It was one of the subjects on which his views were in complete divergence with those of Lord Palmerston. Just before the 'tit-for-tat' amendment, the Premier brought forward a new scheme on the subject which he had reluctantly waived in 1849 in deference to the wishes of the majority of his colleagues, who then regarded such a proposal as premature. At the beginning of 1852 Lord John had overcome such obstacles, and he accordingly introduced his new Reform Bill, as if anxious to wipe out before his retirement from office the reproach which the sobriquet of 'Finality Jack' had unjustly cast upon him. He proposed to extend the suffrage by reducing the county qualification to 20_l._, and the borough to 5_l._, and by granting the franchise to persons paying forty shillings yearly in direct taxation. He also proposed to abolish the property qualification of English and Irish members of Parliament, and to extend the boundaries of boroughs having less than 500 electors. Lord Palmerston's hostile action of course compelled the abandonment of this measure, and it is worthy of passing remark that, on the night before his defeat, Lord John made a chivalrous and splendid defence of Lord Clarendon, in answer to an attack, not merely on the policy, but on the personal character of the Viceroy of Ireland. [Sidenote: A CONFLICT OF OPINION] Sudden as the fall of the Russell Administration was, it can hardly be described as unexpected, and many causes, most of which have already been indicated in these pages, contributed to bring it about. Albany Fonblanque, one of the shrewdest contemporary observers of men and movements, gathered the political gossip of the moment together in a paragraph which sets forth in graphic fashion the tumult of opinion in the spring of 1852. 'Lord John Russell has fallen, and all are agreed that he is greatly to blame for falling; but hardly any two men agree about the immediate cause of his fall. "It was the Durham Letter," says one. "Not a jot," replies another; "the Durham Letter was quite right, and would have strengthened him prodigiously if it had been followed up by a vigorous anti-Papal measure: it was the paltry bill that destroyed him." "The Ecclesiastical Titles Bill," interposes a third, "did just enough in doing next to nothing: no, it was the house tax in the Budget that did the mischief." "The house tax might have been got over," puts in another, "but the proposal of the income tax, with all its injustices unmitigated, doomed Lord John." "Not a whit," rejoins a Radical reformer, "the income tax is popular, especially with people who don't pay it; Lord John's opposition to Locke King's motion sealed his fate." "Locke King's division was a flea-bite," cries a staunch Protestant, "the Pope has done it all."' Stress has been laid in these pages on the attempts of the Russell Administration to deal with an acute and terrible phase of the eternal Irish problem, as well as to set forth in outline the difficulties which it encountered in regard to its foreign policy through the cavalier attitude and bid for personal ascendency of Lord Palmerston. The five or six years during which Lord John Russell was at the head of affairs were marked by a succession of panics which heightened immeasurably the difficulties of his position. One was purely commercial, but it threw gloom over the country, brought stagnation to trade, and political discontent followed in its train, which in turn reacted on the prospects of the Government. The Irish famine and the rebellion which followed in its wake taxed the resources of the Cabinet to the utmost, and the efforts which were made by the Ministry to grapple with the evil have scarcely received even yet due recognition. The Chartist movement, the agitation over the Papal claims and the fear of invasion, are landmarks in the turbulent and menacing annals of the time. The repeal of the Navigation Act bore witness to Lord John's zealous determination to extend the principles of Free Trade, and the Jewish Disabilities Bill--which was rejected by the House of Lords--is itself a sufficient answer to those who, because of his resistance, not to the spiritual claims, but to the political arrogance of the Vatican, have ventured to charge him with a lack of religious toleration. He himself once declared that as a statesman he had received as much favour as he had deserved; he added that, where his measures had miscarried, he did not attribute the failure to animosity or misrepresentation, but rather to errors which he had himself committed from mistaken judgment or an erroneous interpretation of facts. No one who looks at Lord John Russell's career with simple justice, to say nothing of generosity, can doubt the truth of his words. 'I believe, I may say, that my ends have been honest. I have looked to the happiness of my country as the object to which my efforts ought to be directed.' FOOTNOTES: [19] _Life of Lord Palmerston_, by the Hon. Evelyn Ashley, vol. ii. p. 95. [20] _Life of E. B. Pusey, D.D._, by H. P. Liddon, D.D., vol. iii. p. 292. Longmans & Co. [21] Cobden described it as 'a Guy Fawkes outcry,' and predicted the fall of the Ministry. [22] See _Life and Work of the Seventh Earl of Shaftesbury_, by Edwin Hodder, pp. 429-435. [23] _Lord Beaconsfield's Correspondence with his Sister_ (1832-1852), p. 249. London: John Murray. [24] _History of Our Own Times_, by Justin McCarthy, M.P. vol. ii. pp. 85, 86. [25] _Life of Lord John Russell_, by Spencer Walpole, vol. ii p. 143. CHAPTER IX COALITION BUT NOT UNION 1852-1853 The Aberdeen Ministry--Warring elements--Mr. Gladstone's position--Lord John at the Foreign Office and Leader of the House--Lady Russell's criticism of Lord Macaulay's statement--A small cloud in the East--Lord Shaftesbury has his doubts THERE is no need to linger over the history of the next few months, for in a political sense they were barren and unfruitful. The first Derby Administration possessed no elements of strength, and quickly proved a mere stop-gap Cabinet. Its tenure of power was not only brief but inglorious. The new Ministers took office in February, and they left it in December. Lord Palmerston may be said to have given them their chance, and Mr. Gladstone gave them their _coup de grâce_. The Derby Administration was summoned into existence because Lord Palmerston carried his amendment on the Militia Bill, and it refused to lag superfluous on the stage after the crushing defeat which followed Mr. Gladstone's brilliant attack on the Budget of Mr. Disraeli. The chief legislative achievement of this short-lived Government was an extension of the Bribery Act, which Lord John Russell had introduced in 1841. A measure was now passed providing for a searching investigation of corrupt practices by commissioners appointed by the Crown. The affairs of New Zealand were also placed on a sound political basis. A General Election occurred in the summer, but before the new Parliament met in the autumn the nation was called to mourn the death of the Duke of Wellington. The old soldier had won the crowning victory of Waterloo four years before the Queen's birth, and yet he survived long enough to grace with his presence the opening ceremony of the Great Exhibition--that magnificent triumph of the arts of peace which was held in London in the summer of 1851. The remarkable personal ascendency which the Duke of Wellington achieved because of his splendid record as a soldier, though backed by high personal character, was not thrown on the side of either liberty or progress when the hero transferred his services from the camp to the cabinet. As a soldier, Wellington shone without a rival, but as a statesman he was an obstinate reactionary. Perhaps his solitary claim to political regard is that he, more than any other man, wrung from the weak hands of George IV. a reluctant consent to Catholic Emancipation--a concession which could no longer be refused with safety, and one which had been delayed for the lifetime of a generation through rigid adherence in high places to antiquated prejudices and unreasoning alarm. The strength of parties in the new Parliament proved to be nearly evenly balanced. Indeed, the Liberals were only in a majority of sixteen, if the small but compact phalanx of forty Peelites be left for the moment out of the reckoning. The Conservatives had, in truth, gained ground in the country through the reverses of one kind and another which had overtaken their opponents. Lord Palmerston, always fond, to borrow his own phrase, of striking from his own bat, declared in airy fashion that Lord John had given him with dismissal independence, and, though Lord Derby offered him a seat in his Cabinet, he was too shrewd and far-seeing a statesman to accept it. The Liberal party was divided about Lord Palmerston, and that fact led to vacillation at the polling booths. Ardent Protestants were disappointed that the Durham Letter had been followed by what they regarded as weak and insufficient legislative action, whilst some of the phrases of that outspoken manifesto still rankled in the minds of ardent High Churchmen. The old Conservative party had been smashed by Peel's adoption of Free Trade, and the new Conservative party which was struggling into existence still looked askance at the pretensions of Mr. Disraeli, who, thanks to his own ability and to the persistent advocacy of his claims in earlier years by his now departed friend, Lord George Bentinck, was fairly seated in the saddle, and inclined to use both whip and spurs. [Sidenote: DISRAELI'S POSITION] In the autobiography recently published of the late Sir William Gregory[26] a vivid description will be found of the way in which the aristocracy and the squires 'kicked at the supremacy of one whom they looked at as a mountebank;' and on the same page will be found the remarkable assertion that it was nothing but Mr. Disraeli's claim to lead the Conservative party which prevented Mr. Gladstone from joining it in 1852.[27] Disraeli's borrowed heroics in his pompous oration in the House of Commons on the occasion of the death of Wellington, and his errors in tactics and taste as leader of the House, heightened the prevailing impression that, even if the result of the General Election had been different, the Derby Administration was doomed to failure. All through the autumn the quidnuncs at the clubs were busy predicting the probable course of events, and more or less absurd rumours ran round the town concerning the statesmen who were likely to succeed to power in the event of Derby's resignation. The choice in reality lay between Russell, Palmerston, and Aberdeen, for Lansdowne was out of health, and therefore out of the question. As in a mirror Lady Russell's journal reflects what she calls the alarm in the Whig camp at the rumour of the intended resignation of the Derby Cabinet if Disraeli's financial proposals were defeated, and the hurried consultations which followed between Lord Lansdowne, Lord Aberdeen, and Lord John, Sir James Graham, Mr. Cobden, and Mr. Bright. Two days before the division which overthrew the Government on December 17, Lord John was at Woburn, and his brother, the Duke of Bedford, asked him what course he thought the Queen should adopt in case the Ministry was beaten. He replied that her Majesty, under such circumstances, ought to send for Lord Lansdowne and Lord Aberdeen. This was the course which the Queen adopted, but Lord Lansdowne, old and ill, felt powerless to respond to the summons. Meanwhile, Lord John, who certainly possessed the strongest claims--a circumstance which was recognised at the time by Mr. Gladstone--had determined from a sense of public duty not to press them, for he recognised that neither Palmerston nor the Peelites, who, for the moment, in the nice balance of parties, commanded the situation, would serve under him. He had led the Liberal forces for a long term of years, both in power and in opposition, and neither his devotion nor his ability was open to question, in spite of the offence which he had given, on the one hand to a powerful colleague, and on the other to powerful interests. [Sidenote: LORD ABERDEEN] Lord Aberdeen was regarded by the followers of Peel as their leader. He was a favourite at Court, and a statesman of established reputation of the doctrinaire type, but he was not a man who ever excited, or probably was capable of exciting, popular enthusiasm. On the day after Disraeli's defeat Lord Aberdeen met Lord John by chance in the Park, and the latter, waiving personal ambition, told him that, though he could say nothing decisive for the moment, he thought he should accept office under him. On the morrow Lord Aberdeen was summoned to Osborne, and accepted the task of forming an Administration. Next day her Majesty wrote to Lord John announcing the fact, and the letter ended with the following passage: 'The Queen thinks the moment to have arrived when a popular, efficient, and durable Government could be formed by the sincere and united efforts of all professing Conservative and Liberal opinions. The Queen, knowing that this can only be effected by the patriotic sacrifice of personal interests and feelings to the public, trusts that Lord John Russell will, as far as he is able, give his valuable and powerful assistance to the realisation of this object.' This communication found Lord John halting between two opinions. Palmerston had declined to serve under him, and he might, with even greater propriety, in his turn have refused to serve under Aberdeen. His own health, which was never strong, had suffered through the long strain of office in years which had been marked by famine and rebellion. He had just begun to revel, to quote his own words, in 'all the delights of freedom from red boxes, with the privilege of fresh air and mountain prospects.' [Sidenote: 'SHOEBLACK' TO ABERDEEN] He had already found the recreation of a busy man, and was engrossed in the preparation of the 'Memoirs and Journal' of his friend, Thomas Moore. The poet had died in February of that year, and Lord John, with characteristic goodwill, had undertaken to edit his voluminous papers in order to help a widow without wounding her pride. In fact, on many grounds he might reasonably have stood aside, and he certainly would have done so if personal motives had counted most with him, or if he had been the self-seeker which some of his detractors have imagined. Here Lord Macaulay comes to our help with a vivid account of what he terms an eventful day--one of the dark days before Christmas--on which the possibility of a Coalition Government under Aberdeen was still doubtful. Macaulay states that he went to Lansdowne House, on December 20, on a hasty summons to find its master and Lord John in consultation over the Queen's letter. He was asked his opinion of the document and duly gave it. 'Then Lord John said that of course he should try to help Lord Aberdeen: but how? There were two ways. He might take the lead of the Commons with the Foreign Office, or he might refuse office, and give his support from the back benches. I adjured him not to think of this last course, and I argued it with him during a quarter of an hour with, I thought, a great flow of thoughts and words. I was encouraged by Lord Lansdowne, who nodded, smiled, and rubbed his hands at everything I said. I reminded him that the Duke of Wellington had taken the Foreign Office after having been at the Treasury, and I quoted his own pretty speech to the Duke. "You said, Lord John, that we could not all win battles of Waterloo, but that we might all imitate the old man's patriotism, sense of duty, and indifference to selfish interests; and vanities when the public welfare was concerned; and now is the time for you to make a sacrifice. Your past services and your name give us a right to expect it." He went away, evidently much impressed by what had been said, and promising to consult others. When he was gone, Lord Lansdowne told me that I had come just as opportunely as Blücher did at Waterloo.'[28] It is only right to state that Lady Russell demurs to some parts of this account of her husband's attitude at the crisis. Nothing could be further from the truth than that Lord John's vacillation was due to personal motives, or that his hesitation arose from his reluctance to take any office short of the Premiership. Lady Russell adds 'this never for one moment weighed with him, so that he did not require Lord Macaulay or Lord Lansdowne to argue him out of the objection.' Lord John's difficulty was based upon the 'improbability of agreement in a Cabinet so composed, and therefore the probable evil to the country.' Letters written by Lady Russell at the moment to a relative, of too private a character to quote, give additional weight to this statement. One homely remark made at the time may, however, be cited. Lady Russell declared that her husband would not mind being 'shoeblack to Lord Aberdeen' if it would serve the country. The Aberdeen Ministry came into existence just as the year 1852 was ending. It was, in truth, a strange bit of mosaic work, fashioned with curious art, as the result of negotiations between the Whigs and the Peelites which had extended over a period of nearly six months. It represented the triumph of expediency, but it awakened little enthusiasm in spite of the much-vaunted ability and experience of its members. Derby and Disraeli were left out on the one side and Cobden and Bright on the other, a circumstance, however, which did not prevent men comparing the Coalition Government to the short-lived but famous Ministry of all the Talents. The nation rubbed its eyes and wondered whether good or evil was in store when it saw Peel's lieutenants rowing in the same boat with Russell. The vanished leader, however, was responsible for such a strange turn of the wheel, for everyone recognised that Sir Robert had 'steered his fleet into the enemy's port.' His followers came to power through the dilemma of the moment and the temporary eclipse of politicians of more resolute convictions. The Whigs were divided, and with Ireland they were discredited, whilst the Radicals were still clamouring at the doors of Downing Street with small chance of admission, in spite of their growing power in the country. The little clique of Peelites played their cards adroitly, and though they were, to a large extent, a party without followers, they were masters of the situation, and Russell and Palmerston, in consequence, were the only men of commanding personality, outside their own ranks, who were admitted to the chief seats in the new Cabinet. Russell became Foreign Secretary, whilst Palmerston took control of the Home Office. [Sidenote: ONE OF LIFE'S LITTLE IRONIES] So great was the rush for place that Lord Derby with a smile informed the Queen that, as so many former Ministers expected a seat, he thought that less than thirty-two could hardly be the number of the new Cabinet. Tories of the old school looked on with amazement, and Radicals of the new with suspicion. All things seemed possible in the excitement of parties. 'Tom Baring said to me last night,' Greville remarks, '"Can't you make room for Disraeli in this Coalition Government?" I said: "Why, will you give him to us?" "Oh yes," he said, "you shall have him with pleasure."' Great expectations were, however, ruthlessly nipped in the bud, and the Cabinet, instead of being unwieldy, was uncommonly small, for it consisted only of thirteen members--an unlucky start, if old wives' fables are to be believed. Five of Sir Robert Peel's colleagues--the Premier, the Duke of Newcastle, Sir James Graham, Mr. Sidney Herbert, and Mr. Gladstone--represented the moderately progressive views of their old leader. Russell and Palmerston represented the Whigs, but, thanks to one of life's little ironies, the statesman who passed the Reform Bill was installed for the moment at the Foreign Office, and the Minister who was a Liberal abroad and a Conservative at home was intrusted with the internal affairs of the nation. The truth was, Lord Palmerston was impossible at the Foreign Office if Lord Aberdeen was at the Treasury, for the two men were diametrically opposed in regard to the policy which England ought to adopt in her relations with Europe in general, and Russia in particular. In fact, if Lord John Russell was for the moment out of the reckoning as Premier, Lord Palmerston ought unquestionably to have had the reversion of power. Unfortunately, though growingly popular in the country, he had rendered himself unwelcome at Court, where Lord Aberdeen, on the contrary, had long been a trusted adviser. Even if it be granted that neither Russell nor Palmerston was admissible as leader, it was a palpable blunder to exclude from Cabinet rank men of clean-cut convictions like Cobden and Bright. They had a large following in the country, and had won their spurs in the Anti-Corn-Law struggle. They represented the aspirations of the most active section of the Liberal Party, and they also possessed the spell which eloquence and sincerity never fail to throw over the imagination of the people. They were not judged worthy, however, and Milner Gibson, in spite of his services as a member of the Russell Cabinet, was also debarred from office; whilst Mr. Charles Villiers, whose social claims could not be entirely overlooked, found his not inconsiderable services to the people rewarded by subordinate rank. The view which was taken at Court of the Aberdeen Ministry is recorded in the 'Life of the Prince Consort.' The Queen regarded the Cabinet as 'the realisation of the country's and our own most ardent wishes;'[29] and in her Majesty's view the words 'brilliant' and 'strong' described the new Government. Brilliant it might be, but strong it assuredly was not, for it was pervaded by the spirit of mutual distrust, and circumstances conspired to accentuate the wide divergence of opinion which lurked beneath the surface harmony. However such a union of warring forces might be agreeable to the Queen, the belief that it realised the 'most ardent wishes' of the nation was not widely held outside the Court, for 'England,' to borrow Disraeli's familiar but significant phrase, 'does not love Coalitions.' In the Aberdeen Cabinet, party interests were banded together in office; but the vivifying influences of unity of conviction and common sentiment were absent from its deliberations. After all, as Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton drily remarked when the inevitable crisis arose, there is 'one indisputable element of a Coalition Government, and that is that its members should coalesce.' As a matter of fact, they not only drifted into war but drifted apart. 'It is a powerful team and will require good driving,' was the comment of a shrewd political observer. 'There are some odd tempers and queer ways among them.' [Sidenote: ABERDEEN AS DRIVER] Lord Aberdeen had many virtues, but he was not a good driver, and when the horses grew restive and kicked over the traces, he lacked nerve, hesitated, and was lost. Trained for political life at the side of Pitt,[30] after a distinguished career in diplomacy, which made him known in all the Courts of Europe, he entered the Cabinet of the Duke of Wellington in 1828, and afterwards held the post of Secretary for the Colonies in the first Peel Administration of 1834, and that of Secretary for Foreign Affairs during Sir Robert's final spell of power in the years 1841-46. He never sat in the House of Commons, but, though a Tory peer, he voted for Catholic Emancipation. He swiftly fell into line, however, with his party, and recorded his vote against the Reform Bill. He never, perhaps, quite understood the temper of a popular assembly, for he was a shy, reserved man, sparing in speech and punctilious in manner. Close association with Wellington and Peel had, of course, done much to shape his outlook on affairs, and much acquaintance with the etiquette of foreign Courts had insensibly led him to cultivate the habit of formal reserve. Born in the same year as Palmerston, the Premier possessed neither the openness to new ideas nor the vivacity of his masterful colleague; in fact, Lord Aberdeen at sixty-eight, unlike Lord Palmerston, was an old man in temperament, as well as conservative, in the sense of one not given to change. Yet, it is only fair to add that, if Aberdeen's views of foreign policy were of a somewhat stereotyped kind, he was, at all events at this period in their careers, more progressive on home policy than Palmerston, who was too much inclined not to move for the social welfare of the people before he was compelled. The new Ministry ran well until it was hindered by complications in the East. In the middle of February, a few days after the meeting of Parliament, Lord John retired from the Foreign Office, and led the House through the session with great ability, but without taking office. It is important to remember that he had only accepted the Foreign Office under strong pressure, and as a temporary expedient. It was, however, understood that he was at liberty at any moment to relinquish the Foreign Office in favour of Lord Clarendon, if he found the duties too onerous to discharge in conjunction with the task of leadership in the Commons. The session of 1853 was rendered memorable by the display of Mr. Gladstone's skill in finance; and the first Budget of the new Chancellor of the Exchequer was in every sense in splendid contrast with the miserable fiasco of the previous year, when Mr. Disraeli was responsible for proposals which, as Sir George Cornewall Lewis said, were of a kind that flesh and blood could not stand. The trade of the country had revived, and, with tranquility, some degree of prosperity had returned, even to Ireland. Lord John Russell, true to his policy of religious equality, brought forward the Jewish Disabilities Bill, but the House of Lords, with equal consistency, threw out the measure. The Law of Transportation was altered, and a new India Bill was passed, which threw open the Civil Service to competition. Many financial reforms were introduced, a new proposal was made for a wider extent of elementary education, and much legislative activity in a variety of directions was displayed. [Sidenote: THE COALITION GOVERNMENT] Lord Aberdeen had taken office under pressure and from a sense of duty. It had few attractions for him, and he looked forward with quiet satisfaction to release from its cares. Lord Stanmore's authority can be cited for the statement that in the summer of 1853 his father deemed that the time had come when he might retire in Lord John Russell's favour, in accordance with an arrangement which had been made in general terms when the Cabinet was formed. There were members of the Coalition Government who were opposed to this step; but Lord Aberdeen anticipated no serious difficulty in carrying out the proposal. Suddenly the aspect of affairs grew not merely critical but menacing, and the Prime Minister found himself confronted by complications abroad, from which he felt it would be despicable to retreat by the easy method of personal resignation. There is not the slightest occasion, nor, indeed, is this the place, to recount the vicissitudes of the Aberdeen Administration in its baffled struggles against the alternative of war. The achievements of the Coalition Government, no less than its failures, with much of its secret history, have already been told with praiseworthy candour and intimate knowledge by Lord Stanmore, who as a young man acted as private secretary to his father, Lord Aberdeen, through the stress and storm of those fateful years. It is therefore only necessary in these pages to state the broad outlines of the story, and to indicate Lord John Russell's position in the least popular Cabinet of the Queen's reign. Lord Shaftesbury jotted down in his journal, when the new Ministry came into office, these words, and they sum up pretty accurately the situation, and the common verdict upon it: 'Aberdeen Prime Minister, Lord John Russell Minister for Foreign Affairs. Is it possible that this arrangement should prosper? Can the Liberal policy of Lord John square with the restrictive policy of Lord Aberdeen? I wish them joy and a safe deliverance.' FOOTNOTES: [26] _Sir William Gregory, K.C.M.G.: an Autobiography_, edited by Lady Gregory, pp. 92, 93. [27] Mr. Gladstone's comment on this statement is that it is interesting as coming from an acute contemporary observer. At the same time it expresses an opinion and presents no facts. Mr. Gladstone adds that he is not aware that the question of re-union with the Conservative party was ever presented to him in such a way as to embrace the relations to Mr. Disraeli. [28] _Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay_, by the Right Hon. Sir George Otto Trevelyan, M.P., vol. ii. p. 340. [29] Sir Theodore Martin's _Life of the Prince Consort_, vol. ii. p. 483. [30] Pitt became guardian to the young Lord Haddo in 1792. CHAPTER X DOWNING STREET AND CONSTANTINOPLE 1853 Causes of the Crimean War--Nicholas seizes his opportunity--The Secret Memorandum--Napoleon and the susceptibilities of the Vatican--Lord Stratford de Redcliffe and the Porte--Prince Menschikoff shows his hand--Lord Aberdeen hopes against hope--Lord Palmerston's opinion of the crisis--The Vienna Note--Lord John grows restive--Sinope arouses England--The deadlock in the Cabinet. MANY causes conspired to bring about the war in the Crimea, though the pretext for the quarrel--a dispute between the monks of the Latin and Greek Churches concerning the custody of the Holy Places in Palestine--presents no element of difficulty. It is, however, no easy matter to gather up in a few pages the reasons which led to the war. Amongst the most prominent of them were the ambitious projects of the despotic Emperor Nicholas. The military revolt in his own capital at the period of his accession, and the Polish insurrections of 1830 and 1850, had rendered him harsh and imperious, and disinclined to concessions on any adequate scale to the restless but spasmodic demands for political reform in Russia. Gloomy and reserved though the Autocrat of All the Russias was, he recognised that it would be a mistake to rely for the pacification of his vast empire on the policy of masterly inactivity. His war with Persia, his invasion of Turkey, and the army which he sent to help Austria to settle her quarrel with Hungary, not only appealed to the pride of Russia, but provided so many outlets for the energy and ambition of her ruler. It was in the East that Nicholas saw his opportunity, and his policy was a revival, under the changed conditions of the times, of that of Peter the Great and Catherine II. Nicholas had long secretly chafed at the exclusion of his war-ships--by the provisions of the treaty of 1841--from access through the Black Sea to the Mediterranean, and he dreamed dreams of Constantinople, and saw visions of India. Linked to many lawless instincts, there was in the Emperor's personal character much of the intolerance of the fanatic. Religion and pride alike made the fact rankle in his breast that so many of the Sultan's subjects were Sclavs, and professed the Russian form of Christianity. He was, moreover, astute enough to see that a war which could be construed by the simple and devout peasantry as an attempt to uplift the standard of the Cross in the dominions of the Crescent would appeal at once to the clergy and populace of Holy Russia. Nicholas had persuaded himself that, with Lord Aberdeen at the head of affairs, and Palmerston in a place of safety at the Home Office, England was scarcely in a condition to give practical effect to her traditional jealousy of Russia. In the weakness of her divided counsels he saw his opportunity. It had become a fixed idea with the Emperor that Turkey was in a moribund condition; and neither Orloff nor Nesselrode had been able to disabuse his mind of the notion. [Sidenote: NICHOLAS AND THE 'SICK MAN'] Everyone is aware that in January 1853 the Emperor told the English Ambassador, Sir Hamilton Seymour, that Turkey was the 'sick man' of Europe, and ever since then the phrase has passed current and become historic. It was often on the lips of Nicholas, for he talked freely, and sometimes showed so little discretion that Nesselrode once declared, with fine irony, that the White Czar could not claim to be a diplomatist. The phrase cannot have startled Lord Aberdeen. It must have sounded, indeed, like the echo of words which the Emperor had uttered in London in the summer of 1844. Nicholas, on the occasion of his visit to England in that year, spoke freely about the Eastern Question, not merely to the Duke of Wellington, whose military prowess he greatly admired, but also to Sir Robert Peel and Lord Aberdeen, who was then Minister for Foreign Affairs. He told the latter in so many words that Turkey was a dying man, and did his best to impress the three English statesmen with the necessity for preparation in view of the approaching crisis. He stated that he foresaw that the time was coming when he would have to put his armies in movement, and added that Austria would be compelled to do the same. He protested that he made no claim to an inch of Turkish soil, but was prepared to dispute the right of anyone else to an inch of it--a palpable allusion to the French support of Mehemet Ali. It was too soon to stipulate what should be done when the 'sick man's' last hour had run its course. All he wanted, he maintained, was the basis of an understanding. In Nicholas's opinion England ought to make common cause with Russia and Austria, and he did not disguise his jealousy of France. It was clear that he dreaded the growth of close union between England and France, and for Louis Philippe then, as for Louis Napoleon afterwards, his feeling was one of coldness if not of actual disdain. The Emperor Nicholas won golden opinions amongst all classes during his short stay in England. Sir Theodore Martin's 'Life of the Prince Consort,' and especially the letter which is published in its pages from the Queen to King Leopold, showed the marked impression which was made at Windsor by his handsome presence, his apparently unstudied confidences, the simplicity and charm of his manners, and the adroitness of his well-turned compliments. Whenever the Autocrat of All the Russias appeared in public, at a military review, or the Opera, or at Ascot, he received an ovation, and Baron Stockmar, with dry cynicism, has not failed to record the lavish gifts of 'endless snuff-boxes and large presents' which made his departure memorable to the Court officials. Out of this visit grew, though the world knew nothing of it then, the Secret Memorandum, drawn up by Peel, Wellington, and Aberdeen, and signed by them as well as by the Emperor himself. This document, though it actually committed England to nothing more serious than the recognition in black and white of the desperate straits of the Porte, and the fact that England and Russia were alike concerned in maintaining the _status quo_ in Turkey, dwelt significantly on the fact that, in the event of a crisis in Turkey, Russia and England were to come to an understanding with each other as to what concerted action they should take. The agreement already existing between Russia and Austria was significantly emphasised in the document, and stress was laid on the fact that if England joined the compact, France would have no alternative but to accept the decision. [Sidenote: A FRIEND AT COURT] There can be no question that Nicholas attached an exaggerated importance to this memorandum. It expressed his opinion rather than the determination of the Peel Administration; but a half-barbaric despot not unnaturally imagined that when the responsible advisers of the Crown entered into a secret agreement with him, no matter how vague its terms might appear when subjected to critical analysis, England and himself were practically of one mind. When the Coalition Government was formed, two of the three statesmen, whom the Emperor Nicholas regarded as his friends at Court, were dead, but the third, in the person of Lord Aberdeen, had succeeded, by an unexpected turn of the wheel, to the chief place in the new Ministry. Long before the Imperial visit to London the Emperor had honoured Lord Aberdeen with his friendship, and, now that the Foreign Minister of 1844 was the Prime Minister of 1853, the opportune moment for energetic action seemed to have arrived. Nicholas, accordingly, now hinted that if the 'sick man' died England should seize Egypt and Crete, and that the European provinces of Turkey should be formed into independent states under Russian protection. He met, however, with no response, for the English Cabinet by this time saw that the impending collapse of Turkey, on which Nicholas laid such emphatic stress, was by no means a foregone conclusion. Napoleon and Palmerston had, moreover, drawn France and England into friendly alliance. There was no shadow of doubt that the Christian subjects of Turkey were grossly oppressed, and it is only fair to believe that Nicholas, as the head of the Greek Church, was honestly anxious to rid them of such thraldom. At the same time no one imagined that he was exactly the ruler to expend blood and treasure, in the risks of war, in the _rôle_ of a Defender of the Faith. Count Vitzthum doubts whether the Emperor really contemplated the taking of Constantinople, but it is plain that he meant to crush the Turkish Empire, and England, knowing that the man had masterful instincts and ambitious schemes--that suggest, at all events, a passing comparison with Napoleon Bonaparte--took alarm at his restlessness, and the menace to India, which it seemed to suggest. 'If we do not stop the Russians on the Danube,' said Lord John Russell, 'we shall have to stop them on the Indus.' It is now a matter of common knowledge that, when the Crimean War began, Nicholas had General Duhamel's scheme before him for an invasion of India through Asia. Such an advance, it was foreseen, would cripple England's resources in Europe by compelling her to despatch an army of defence to the East. It certainly looks, therefore, as if Russia, when hostilities in the Crimea actually began, was preparing herself for a sudden descent on Constantinople. Napoleon III., eager to conciliate the religious susceptibilities of his own subjects, as well as to gratify the Vatican, wished the Sultan to make the Latin monks the supreme custodians of the Holy Places. Complications, the issue of which it was impossible to forecast, appeared inevitable, and for the moment there seemed only one man who could grapple with the situation at Constantinople. Lord Palmerston altogether, and Lord John Russell in part, sympathised with the clamour which arose in the Press for the return of the Great Elchi to the Porte. [Sidenote: LORD STRATFORD DE REDCLIFFE] In the entire annals of British diplomacy there is scarcely a more picturesque or virile figure than that of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe. Capacity for public affairs ran in the blood of the Cannings, as the three statues which to-day stand side by side in Westminster Abbey proudly attest. Those marble memorials represent George Canning, the great Foreign Minister, who in the famous, if grandiloquent, phrase 'called the New World into existence to redress the balance of the Old;' his son Charles, Earl Canning, first Viceroy of India; and his cousin, Stratford Canning, Viscount Stratford de Redcliffe, who for a long term of years sought to quicken into newness of social and political life the broken and demoralised forces of the Ottoman Empire, and who practically dictated from Constantinople the policy of England in the East. He was born in 1786 and died in 1880. He entered the public service as a _précis_-writer at the Foreign Office, and rose swiftly in the profession of diplomacy. His acquaintance with Eastern affairs began in 1808, when he was appointed First Secretary to Sir Robert Adair, whom he succeeded two years later at Constantinople as Minister Plenipotentiary. The Treaty of Bucharest, which in 1812 brought the war, then in progress between Russia and Turkey, to an end, was the first of a brilliant series of diplomatic triumphs, which established his reputation in all the Councils of Europe, and made him, in Lord Tennyson's words, 'The voice of England in the East.' After services in Switzerland, in Washington, and at the Congress of Vienna, Canning, in 1825, returned to Constantinople with the rank of Ambassador. He witnessed the overthrow of the Janissaries by Sultan Mahmoud II., and had his own experience of Turkish atrocities in the massacre which followed. He took a prominent part in the creation of the modern kingdom of Greece, and resigned his appointment in 1828, because of a conflict of opinion with Lord Aberdeen in the early stages of that movement. Afterwards, he was gazetted Ambassador to St. Petersburg; but the Emperor Nicholas, who by this time recognised the masterful qualities of the man, refused to receive him--a conspicuous slight, which Lord Stratford, who was as proud and irascible as the Czar, never forgave. Between the years 1842 and 1858 he again filled his old position as Ambassador to Constantinople, and during those years he won a unique ascendency--unmatched in the history of diplomacy--over men and movements in Turkey. He brought about many reforms, and made it his special concern to watch over the interests of the Christian subjects at the Porte, who styled him the 'Padishah of the Shah,' and that title--Sultan of the Sultan--exactly hit off the authority which he wielded, not always wisely, but always with good intent. It was an unfortunate circumstance that Lord Stratford, after his resignation in 1852, should have been summoned back for a further spell of six years' tenure of power exactly at the moment when Nicholas, prompted by the knowledge of the absence from Constantinople of the man who had held him in check, and of the accession to power in Downing Street of a statesman of mild temper and friendly disposition to Russia, was beginning once more to push his claims in the East. Lord Stratford had many virtues, but he had also a violent and uncertain temper. He was a man of inflexible integrity, iron will, undeniable moral courage, and commanding force of character. Yet, for a great Ambassador, he was at times strangely undiplomatic, whilst the keenness of his political judgment and forecasts sometimes suffered eclipse through the strength of his personal antipathies. [Sidenote: FAREWELL TO THE FOREIGN OFFICE] Meanwhile, Lord John Russell, who had expressly stipulated when the Cabinet was formed that he was only to hold the seals of the Foreign Office for a few weeks, convinced already that the position was untenable to a man of his views, insisted on being relieved of the office. The divergent views in the Cabinet on the Eastern Question were making themselves felt, and Lord Aberdeen's eminently charitable interpretation of the Russian demands was little to the minds of men of the stamp of Palmerston and Russell, neither of whom was inclined to pin his faith so completely to the Czar's assurances. When Parliament met in February, Lord John quitted the Foreign Office and led the House of Commons without portfolio. His quick recognition of Mr. Gladstone's great qualities as a responsible statesman was not the least pleasing incident of the moment. In April, Lord Aberdeen once more made no secret of his determination to retire at the end of the session, and this intimation no doubt had its influence with the more restive of his colleagues. When Parliament rose, Lord John Russell's position in the country was admitted on all hands to be one of renewed strength, for, set free from an irksome position, he had thrown himself during the session with ardour into the congenial work of leader of the House of Commons. The resolution of the Cabinet to send Lord Stratford to Constantinople has already been stated. He received his instructions on February 25; in fact, he seems to have dictated them, for Lord Clarendon, who had just succeeded to the Foreign Office, made no secret of the circumstance that they were largely borrowed from the Ambassador's own notes. He was told that he was to proceed first to Paris, and then to Vienna, in order that he might know the minds of France and Austria on the issues at stake. Napoleon III. was to be assured that England relied on his cordial co-operation in maintaining the integrity and independence of the Turkish Empire. The young Emperor of Austria was to be informed that her Majesty's Government gladly recognised the fact that his attitude towards the Porte had not been changed by recent events, and that the policy of Austria in the East was not likely to be altered. Lord Stratford was to warn the Sultan and his advisers that the crisis was one which required the utmost prudence on their part if peace was to be preserved. The Sultan and his Ministers were practically to be told by Lord Stratford that they were the authors of their own misfortunes, and that, if they were to be extricated from them, they must place the 'utmost confidence in the sincerity and soundness of the advice' that he was commissioned to give them. He was further to lay stress on palpable abuses, and to urge the necessity of administrative reforms. 'It remains,' added Lord Clarendon, 'only for me to say that in the event, which her Majesty's Government earnestly hope may not arise, of imminent danger to the existence of the Turkish Government, your Excellency will in such case despatch a messenger to Malta requesting the Admiral to hold himself in readiness; but you will not direct him to approach the Dardanelles without positive instructions from her Majesty's Government.' The etiquette of Courts has to be respected, especially by Ambassadors charged with a difficult mission, but Lord Stratford's diplomatic visits to Paris and Vienna were unduly prolonged, and occupied more time than was desirable at such a crisis. He arrived at Constantinople on April 5, and was received, to his surprise, with a remarkable personal ovation. In Kinglake's phrase, his return was regarded as that 'of a king whose realm had been suffered to fall into danger.' The Czar's envoy, Prince Menschikoff, had already been on the scene for five weeks. If Russia meant peace, the choice of such a representative was unfortunate. Menschikoff was a brusque soldier, rough and impolitic of speech, and by no means inclined to conform to accepted methods of procedure. He refused to place himself in communication with the Foreign Minister of the Porte; and this was interpreted at Stamboul as an insult to the Sultan. The Grand Vizier, rushing to the conclusion that his master was in imminent danger, induced Colonel Rose, the British Chargé d'Affaires, to order the Mediterranean Fleet, then at Malta, to proceed to Vourla. The Admiral, however, refused to lend himself to the panic, and sent back word that he waited instructions from London, a course which was afterwards approved by the Cabinet. The commotion at Stamboul was not lost upon Napoleon, though he knew that the English Cabinet was not anxious to precipitate matters. Eager to display his newly acquired power, he promptly sent instructions to the French Fleet to proceed to Salamis. Meanwhile Prince Menschikoff, who had adopted a more conciliatory attitude on the question of the Holy Places, with the result that negotiations were proceeding satisfactorily, assumed shortly before the arrival of Lord Stratford a more defiant manner, and startled the Porte by the sudden announcement of new demands. He claimed that a formal treaty should be drawn up, recognising in the most ample, not to say abject, terms, the right of Russia to establish a Protectorate over the Christian subjects of the Porte. This meant, as Lord Clarendon pointed out at the time, that fourteen millions of people would henceforth regard the Czar as their defender, whilst their allegiance to the Sultan would become little more than nominal, and the position of the Turkish ruler would inevitably dwindle from independence to vassalage. [Sidenote: TAKING THE BULL BY THE HORNS] Lord Stratford at once took the bull by the horns. Acting on his advice, the Porte refused even to entertain such proposals until the question of the Holy Places was settled. Within a month, through Lord Stratford's firmness, Russia and Turkey came to terms over the original point in dispute; but on the following day Menschikoff placed an ultimatum before the Porte, demanding that, within five days, his master's claim for the acknowledgment of the Russian Protectorate over the Sultan's Greek subjects should be accepted. The Sultan's Ministers, who interpreted the dramatic return of Lord Stratford to mean that they had England at their back, declined to accede, and their refusal was immediately followed by the departure of Prince Menschikoff. Repulsed in diplomacy, the Czar, on July 2, marched forty thousand troops across the frontier river, the Pruth, and occupied Moldavia and Wallachia. The Imperial manifesto stated that it was not the Czar's intention to commence war, but only to obtain such security as would ensure the restoration of the rights of Russia. This was, of course, high ground to take, and a conference of the Great Powers was hastily summoned, with the result that the French view of the situation was embodied by the assembled diplomatists in the Vienna Note, which was despatched simultaneously to Russia and Turkey. Lord John Russell, even before the arrival of Lord Stratford at Constantinople, had come to the conclusion that the Emperor of Russia was determined to pick a quarrel with Turkey; but Lord Aberdeen and his Peelite following were of another mind, and even Lord Clarendon seems for the moment to have been hoodwinked by the Czar's protestations. A month or two later the Foreign Minister saw matters in a different light, for he used in the House of Lords, in the summer of 1853, an expression which has become historic: 'We are drifting into war.' The quarrel at this stage--for the susceptibilities of France and of Rome had been appeased by the settlement of the question of the Holy Places--lay between Russia and Turkey, and England might have compelled the peace of Europe if she had known her own mind, and made both parties recognise in unmistakeable terms what was her policy. Lord John Russell had a policy, but no power to enforce it, whilst Lord Aberdeen had no policy which ordinary mortals could fathom, and had the power to keep the Cabinet--though scarcely Lord Stratford de Redcliffe--from taking any decided course. The Emperor Nicholas, relying on the Protocol which Lord Aberdeen had signed--under circumstances which, however, bore no resemblance to existing conditions--imagined that, with such a statesman at the head of affairs, England would not take up arms against Russia. Lord Aberdeen, to add to the complication, seemed unable to credit the hostile intentions of the Czar, even after the failure of the negotiations which followed the despatch of the Vienna Note. Yet as far back as June 19, Lord John Russell, in a memorandum to his colleagues, made a clear statement of the position of affairs. He held that, if Russia persisted in her demands and invaded Turkey, the interests of England in the East would compel us to aid the Sultan in defending his capital and his throne. On the other hand, if the Czar by a sudden movement seized Constantinople, we must be prepared to make war on Russia herself. In that case, he added, we ought to seek the alliance of France and Austria. France would willingly join; and England and France together might, if it were worth while, obtain the moral weight, if not the material support, of Austria in their favour. [Sidenote: CAUTION HAS ITS PERFECT WORK] Lord Aberdeen responded with characteristic caution. He refused to entertain warlike forecasts, and wished for liberty to meet the emergency when it actually arose. Lord Palmerston, a week or two later, made an ineffectual attempt to persuade the Cabinet to send the Fleet to the Bosphorus without further delay. 'I think our position,' were his words on July 7, 'waiting timidly and submissively at the back door, whilst Russia is violently threatening and arrogantly forcing her way into the house, is unwise, with a view to a peaceful settlement.' Lord Aberdeen believed in the 'moderation' of a despot who took no pains to disguise his sovereign contempt for 'les chiens Turcs.' Lord Palmerston, on the other hand, made no secret of his opinion that it was the invariable policy of Russia to push forward her encroachment 'as fast and as far as the apathy or want of firmness' of other Governments would allow. He held that her plan was to 'stop and retire when she was met with decided resistance,' and then to wait until the next favourable opportunity arose to steal once more a march on Europe. There was, in short, a radical divergence in the Cabinet. When the compromise suggested in the Vienna Note was rejected, the chances of a European war were sensibly quickened, and all the more so because Lord Stratford, with his notorious personal grudge against the Czar, was more than any other man master of the situation. What that situation had become in the early autumn of 1853 is pithily expressed in a letter of Sir George Cornewall Lewis's to Sir Edmund Head: 'Everything is in a perplexed state at Constantinople. Russia is ashamed to recede, but afraid to strike. The Turks have collected a large army, and have blown up their fanaticism, and, reckoning on the support of England and France, are half inclined to try the chances of war. I think that both parties are in the wrong--Russia in making unjust demands, Turkey in resisting a reasonable settlement. War is quite on the cards, but I still persist in thinking it will be averted, unless some accidental spark fires the train.'[31] [Sidenote: THE VIENNA NOTE] The Vienna Note was badly worded, and it failed as a scheme of compromise between the Porte and Russia. When it was sent in a draft form to St. Petersburg the Czar accepted it, doubtless because he saw that its statements were vague in a sense which might be interpreted to his advantage. At Constantinople the document swiftly evoked protest, and the Divan refused to sanction it without alteration. England, France, and Austria recognised the force of the amendments of Turkey, and united in urging Russia to adopt them. The Emperor Nicholas, however, was too proud a man to submit to dictation, especially from the Sultan, with Lord Stratford at his elbow, and declined to accede to the altered proposals. Lord John deemed that Turkey had a just cause of complaint, not in the mere fact of the rejection of her alterations to the Vienna Note, but because they were rejected after they had been submitted to the Czar. He told Lord Aberdeen that he hoped that Turkey would reject the new proposals, but he added that that would not wipe away the shame of their having been made. In a speech at Greenock, on September 19, Lord John said: 'While we endeavour to maintain peace, I certainly should be the last to forget that if peace cannot be maintained with honour, it is no longer peace. It becomes then but a truce--a precarious truce, to be denounced by others whenever they may think fit--whenever they may think that an opportunity has occurred to enforce by arms their unjust demands either upon us or upon our allies.' England and France refused to press the original Vienna Note on Turkey; but as Austria and Prussia thought that their reasons for abandoning negotiations were scarcely of sufficient force, they in turn declined to adopt the same policy. The concert of Europe was, in fact, broken by the failure of the Vienna Note, and the chances of peace grew suddenly remote. There is a saying that a man likes to believe what he wishes to be the fact, and its truth was illustrated at this juncture by both parties to the quarrel. The Czar persuaded himself that Austria and Prussia would give him their aid, and that England, under Aberdeen, was hardly likely to proceed to the extremity of war. The Sultan, on the other hand, emboldened by the movements of the French and English fleets, and still more by the presence and counsels of Lord Stratford, who was, to all intents and purposes, the master spirit at Constantinople, trusted--and with good reason as the issue proved--on the military support of England and France. It was plain enough that Turkey would go to the wall in a struggle with Russia, unless other nations which dreaded the possession of Constantinople by the Czar came, in their own interests, to her help. With the rejection by Russia of the Turkish amendments to the Vienna Note, and the difference of opinion which at once arose between the four mediating Powers as to the policy which it was best under the altered circumstances to pursue, a complete deadlock resulted. [Sidenote: HOSTILITIES ON THE DANUBE] Lord John's view of the situation was expressed in a memorandum which he placed before the Cabinet, and in which he came to these conclusions: 'That if Russia will not make peace on fair terms, we must appear in the field as the auxiliaries of Turkey; that if we are to act in conjunction with France as principals in the war, we must act not for the Sultan, but for the general interests of the population of European Turkey. How, and in what way, requires much further consideration, and concert possibly with Austria, certainly with France.' He desired not merely to resist Russian aggression, but also to make it plain to the Porte that we would in no case support it against its Christian subjects. The Cabinet was not prepared to adopt such a policy, and Lord John made no secret of his opinion that Lord Aberdeen's anxiety for peace and generous attitude toward the Czar were, in reality, provoking war. He believed that the Prime Minister's vacillation was disastrous in its influence, and that he ought, therefore, to retire and make way for a leader with a definite policy. The Danube, for the moment, was the great barrier to war, and both Russia and Turkey were afraid to cross it. Lord John believed that energetic measures in Downing Street at this juncture would have forestalled, and indeed prevented, activity of a less peaceful kind on the Danube. Meanwhile, despatches, projects, and proposals passed rapidly between the Great Powers, for never, as was remarked at the time by a prominent statesman, did any subject produce so much writing. Turkey--perhaps still more than Russia--was eager for war. Tumults in favour of it had broken out at Constantinople; and, what was more to the purpose, the finances and internal government of the country were in a state of confusion. Therefore, when the concert of the four Powers had been shattered, the Turks saw a better chance of drawing both England and France into their quarrel. At length, on October 10, the Porte sent an ultimatum to the commander of the Russian troops which had invaded Moldavia and Wallachia, demanding that they should fall back beyond the Pruth within fifteen days. On October 22 the war-ships of England and France passed the Dardanelles in order to protect and defend Turkish territory from any Russian attack. The Czar met what was virtually a declaration of war by asserting that he would neither retire nor act on the aggressive. Ten days after the expiration of the stipulated time, Omar Pacha, the Ottoman commander in Bulgaria, having crossed the Danube, attacked and vanquished the Russians on November 4 at Oltenitza. The Czar at once accepted the challenge, and declared that he considered his pledge not to act on the offensive was no longer binding. The Russian fleet left Sebastopol, and, sailing into the harbour of Sinope, on the southern coast of the Black Sea, destroyed, on November 30, the Turkish squadron anchored in that port, and slew four thousand men. A significant light is thrown on the crisis in Sir Theodore Martin's 'Life of the Prince Consort,'[32] where it is stated that the Czar addressed an autograph letter to the Queen, 'full of surprise that there should be any misunderstanding between her Majesty's Government and his own as to the affairs of Turkey, and appealing to her Majesty's "good faith" and "wisdom" to decide between them.' This letter, it is added, was at once submitted to Lord Clarendon for his and Lord Aberdeen's opinion. The Queen replied that Russia's interpretation of her treaty obligations in the particular instance in question was, in her Majesty's judgment and in the judgment of those best qualified to advise her, 'not susceptible of the extended meaning' put upon it. The Queen intimated in explicit terms that the demand which the Czar had made was one which the Sultan could hardly concede if he valued his own independence. The letter ended with an admission that the Czar's intentions towards Turkey were 'friendly and disinterested.' Sir Theodore Martin states that this letter, dated November 14, was submitted to Lord Aberdeen and Lord Clarendon, and was by them 'thought excellent.' Scarcely more than a fortnight elapsed when Russia's 'friendly and disinterested' feelings were displayed in her cruel onslaught at Sinope, and the statesmen who had prompted her Majesty's reply received a rude awakening. It became plain in the light of accomplished events that the wisdom which is profitable to direct had deserted her Majesty's chief advisers. [Sidenote: MAKING HASTE SLOWLY] Lord Aberdeen always made haste slowly, and when other statesmen had abandoned hope he continued to lay stress on the resources of diplomacy. He admitted that he had long regarded the possibility of war between England and Russia with the 'utmost incredulity;' but even before Sinope his confidence in a peaceful solution of the difficulty was beginning to waver. He distrusted Lord Stratford, and yet he refused to recall him; he talked about the 'indignity' which Omar Pacha had inflicted on the Czar by his summons to evacuate the Principalities, although nothing could justify the presence of the Russian troops in Moldavia and Wallachia, and they had held their ground there for the space of three months. Even Lord Clarendon admitted that the Turks had displayed no lack of patience under the far greater insult of invasion. The 'indignity' of notice to quit was, in fact, inevitable if the Sultan was to preserve a vestige of self-respect. Lord Aberdeen was calmly drafting fresh plans of pacification, requiring the Porte to abstain from hostilities 'during the progress of the negotiations undertaken on its behalf'[33] a fortnight after Turkey had actually sent her ultimatum to Russia; and the battle of Oltenitza was an affair of history before the despatch reached Constantinople. Lord Stanmore is inclined to blame Lord John Russell for giving the Turks a loophole of escape by inserting in the document the qualifying words 'for a reasonable time;' but his argument falls to the ground when it is remembered that this despatch was written on October 24, whilst the Turkish ultimatum had been sent to Russia on October 10. Sinope was a bitter surprise to Lord Aberdeen, and the 'furious passion' which Lord Stanmore declares it aroused in England went far to discredit the Coalition Ministry. Unfortunately, all through the crisis Lord Aberdeen appears to have attached unmerited weight to the advice of the weak members of his own Cabinet--men who, to borrow a phrase of Lord Palmerston's, were 'inconvenient entities in council,' though hardly conspicuous either in their powers of debate or in their influence in the country. Politicians of the stamp of the Duke of Newcastle, Mr. Sidney Herbert, and Sir James Graham played a great part in Downing Street, whilst for the moment men of superior ability like Palmerston and Russell found their advice unheeded. More than any other man, Sir James Graham, now almost a forgotten statesman, was Lord Aberdeen's trusted colleague, and the wisdom of his advice was by no means always conspicuous; for rashness and timidity were oddly blended in his nature. 'The defeat of the Turks at Sinope upon our element, the sea,' wrote the Prince Consort to Baron Stockmar, 'has made the people furious; it is ascribed to Aberdeen having been bought over by Russia.'[34] The rumour which the Prince mentions about Lord Aberdeen was, of course, absurd, and everyone who knew the lofty personal character of the Prime Minister laughed it at once to scorn. Nevertheless, the fact that the Prince Consort should have thought such a statement worth chronicling is in itself significant; and though no man of brains in the country held such a view, at least two-thirds of the educated opinion of the nation regarded the Prime Minister with increasing disfavour, as a man who had dragged England, through humiliating negotiations, to the verge of war. [Sidenote: ENGLAND RESENTS SINOPE] The destruction of the Turkish squadron at Sinope under the shadow of our fleet touched the pride of England to the quick. The nation lost all patience--as the contemptuous cartoons of 'Punch' show--with the endless parleyings of Aberdeen, and a loud and passionate cry for war filled the country. Lord Stanmore thinks that too much was made in the excitement of the 'massacre' of the Turkish sailors, and perhaps he is right. However that may be, the fact remains that the Russians at Sinope continued to storm with shot and shell the Turkish ships when those on board were no longer able to act on the defensive--a naval engagement which cannot be described as distinguished for valour. Perhaps the indignation might not have been so deep and widespread if the English people had not recognised that the Coalition Government had strained concession to the breaking point in the vain attempt to propitiate the Czar. All through the early autumn Lord Palmerston was aware that those in the Cabinet who were jealous of Russia had to reckon with 'private and verbal communications, given in all honesty, but tinctured by the personal bias of the Prime Minister,' to Baron Brunnow, which were doing 'irreparable mischief' at St. Petersburg.[35] The nation did not relish Lord Aberdeen's personal friendship with the Czar, and now that Russia was beginning to show herself in her true colours, prejudice against a Prime Minister who had sought to explain away difficulties was natural, however unreasonable. The English people, moreover, had not forgotten that Russia ruthlessly crippled Poland in 1831, and lent her aid to the subjugation of Hungary in 1849. If the Sultan was the Lord of Misrule to English imagination in 1853, the Czar was the embodiment of despotism, and even less amenable to the modern ideas of liberty and toleration. The Manchester School, on the other hand, had provoked a reaction. The Great Exhibition had set a large section of the community dreaming, not of the millennium, but of Waterloo. Russia was looked upon as a standing menace to England's widening heritage in the East, and neither the logic of Cobden nor the rhetoric of Bright was of the least avail in stemming the torrent of national indignation. [Sidenote: THE CONCLUSION OF THE WHOLE MATTER] When the Vienna Note became a dead letter Lord Aberdeen ought either to have adopted a clean-cut policy, which neither Russia nor Turkey could mistake, or else have carried out his twice-repeated purpose of resignation. Everyone admits that from the outset his position was one of great difficulty, but he increased it greatly by his practical refusal to grasp the nettle. He was not ambitious of power, but, on the contrary, longed for his quiet retreat at Haddo. He was on the verge of seventy and was essentially a man of few, but scholarly tastes. There can be no doubt that considerable pressure was put upon him both by the Court and the majority of his colleagues in the Cabinet, and this, with the changed aspect of affairs, and the mistaken sense of duty with regard to them, determined his course. His decision 'not to run away from the Eastern complication,' as Prince Albert worded it, placed both himself and Lord John Russell in somewhat of a false position. If Lord Aberdeen had followed his own inclination there is every likelihood that he would have carried out his arrangement to retire in favour of Lord John. His colleagues were not in the dark in regard to this arrangement when they joined the Ministry, and if not prepared to fall in with the proposal, they ought to have stated their objections at the time. There is some conflict of opinion as to the terms of the arrangement; but even if we take it to be what Lord Aberdeen's own friends represent it--not an absolute but a conditional pledge to retire--Lord Aberdeen was surely bound to ascertain at the outset whether the condition was one that could possibly be fulfilled. If the objection of his colleagues to retain office under Lord John as Prime Minister was insurmountable, then the qualified engagement to retire--if the Government would not be broken up by the process--was worthless, and Lord John was being drawn into the Cabinet by assurances given by the Prime Minister alone, but which he was powerless to fulfil without the co-operation of his colleagues. Lord Aberdeen was therefore determined to remain at his post, because Lord John was unpopular with the Cabinet, and Palmerston with the Court, and because he knew that the accession to power of either of them would mean the adoption of a spirited foreign policy. FOOTNOTES: [31] _Letters of Sir George Cornewall Lewis, Bart._, edited by his brother, Canon Frankland Lewis, p. 270. [32] Sir Theodore Martin's _Life of the Prince Consort_, ii. 530, 531. [33] Lord Stanmore's _Earl of Aberdeen_, p. 234. [34] Sir Theodore Martin's _Life of the Prince Consort_, ii. 534. [35] _Life of Lord Palmerston_, by the Hon. Evelyn Ashley, ii. 282. CHAPTER XI WAR HINDERS REFORM 1854-1855 A Scheme of Reform--Palmerston's attitude--Lord John sore let and hindered--Lord Stratford's diplomatic triumph--The Duke of Newcastle and the War Office--The dash for Sebastopol--Procrastination and its deadly work--The Alma--Inkerman--The Duke's blunder--Famine and frost in the trenches. ALL through the autumn of 1854 Lord John Russell was busy with a scheme of Parliamentary reform. The Government stood pledged to bring forward the measure, though a section of the Cabinet, and, notably Lord Palmerston, were opposed to such a course. As leader of the House, Lord John had announced that the question would be introduced to Parliament in the spring, and the Cabinet, therefore, took the subject into consideration when it resumed its meetings in November. A special committee was appointed, and Lord John placed his proposals before it. Every borough with less than three hundred electors was to be disfranchised, and towns with less than five hundred electors were to lose one of their representatives. Seventy seats, he argued, would be gained by this plan, and he suggested that they should be divided between the largest counties and the great towns. He proposed greatly diminishing the qualifications alike in counties and boroughs. He laid stress on the necessity of calling into existence triangular constituencies, in which no elector should have the power to vote for more than two of the three candidates, and wished also to deprive the freemen of their guild qualification. Lord Palmerston had no relish for the subject. His predilections, in fact, leaned in quite the opposite direction. If his manner was genial, his temper was conservative, and he was inclined to smile, if not to scoff, at politicians who met such problems of government with other than a light heart. He was therefore inclined at this juncture to adopt Lord Melbourne's attitude, and to meet Lord John with that statesman's famous remark, 'Why can't you let it alone?' [Sidenote: PALMERSTON AND REFORM] Devotion to one idea, declared Goethe, is the condition of all greatness. Lord John was devoted from youth to age to the idea of Parliamentary reform, and in season and out was never inclined to abandon it. Probably Lord Palmerston would have adopted a less hostile attitude if he had been in his proper element at the Foreign Office; but being Home Secretary, he was inclined to kick against a measure which promised to throw into relief his own stationary position on one of the pet subjects of the party of progress. Whilst the Cabinet was still engaged in thrashing the subject out, tidings of the battle of Sinope reached England, and the popular indignation against Russia, which had been gathering all the autumn, burst forth, as has already been stated, into a fierce outcry against the Czar. Two days after the news of Russia's cowardly attack had been confirmed, Palmerston saw his opportunity, and promptly resigned. Doubtless such a step was determined by mixed motives. Objections to Lord John's proposals for Parliamentary reform at best only half explains the position, and behind such repugnance lay hostility to Lord Aberdeen's vacillating policy on the Eastern Question. The nation accepted Lord Palmerston's resignation in a matter-of-fact manner, which probably surprised no one more than himself. The Derbyites, oddly enough, made the most pother about the affair; but a man on the verge of seventy, and especially one like Lord Palmerston with few illusions, is apt to regard the task of forming a new party as a game which is not worth the candle. The truth is, Palmerston, like other clever men before and since, miscalculated his strength, and on Christmas Eve was back again in office. He had received assurances from his colleagues that the Reform proposals were still open to discussion; and, as the Cabinet had taken in his absence a decision on Turkish affairs which was in harmony with the views that he had persistently advocated, he determined to withdraw his resignation. The new year opened darkly with actual war, and with rumours of it on a far more terrible scale. 'My expectation is,' wrote Sir G. C. Lewis on January 4, 'that before long England and France will be at war with Russia; and as long as war lasts all means of internal improvement must slumber. The Reform Bill must remain on the shelf--if there is war; for a Government about to ask for large supplies and to impose war taxes, cannot propose a measure which is sure to create dispersion and to divide parties.' France, in spite of the action of the Emperor over the question of the Holy Places, had not displayed much interest in the quarrel; but a contemptuous retort which Nicholas made to Napoleon III.'s final letter in the interests of peace put an end to the national indifference. The words 'Russia will prove herself in 1854 what she was in 1812,' cut the national pride to the quick, and the cry on that side of the Channel as on this, was for war with Russia. The Fleets were ordered to enter the Black Sea, and on February 27 England and France sent a joint ultimatum to St. Petersburg, demanding that the Czar's troops should evacuate the Principalities by April 30. [Sidenote: AN INDIGNANT PROTEST] The interval of suspense was seized by Lord John to place the Reform proposals of the Government before the House of Commons; but the nation was by this time restless, dissatisfied, and preoccupied, for the blast of the trumpet seemed already in the air. The second reading of the measure was fixed for the middle of March; but the increasing strain of the Eastern Question led Lord John to announce at the beginning of that month that the Government had decided not to bring forward the second reading until the end of April. This announcement led to a personal attack, and one member, whose name may be left in the oblivion which has overtaken it, had the audacity to hint that the leader of the House had never intended to proceed with the measure. Stung into sudden indignation by the taunt, Lord John promptly expressed his disdain of the opinion of a politician who had no claim whatever to speak in the name of Reform, and went on, with a touch of pardonable pride, to refer to his own lifelong association with the cause. When he turned to his opponent with the words, 'Does the honourable gentleman think he has a right to treat me----,' the House backed and buried his protest with its generous cheers. Lord John Russell, in power or out of it, was always jealous for the reputation of the responsible statesmen of the nation, and he did not let this occasion pass without laying emphasis on that point. 'I should be ashamed of myself if I were to prefer a concern for my own personal reputation to that which I understood to be for the interests of my country. But it seems to me that the character of the men who rule this country--whether they be at the moment in office or in opposition--is a matter of the utmost interest to the people of this country, and that it is of paramount importance that full confidence should be reposed in their character. It is, in fact, on the confidence of the people in the character of public men that the security of this country in a great degree depends.' A few days later it became plain that war was at hand, and a strong feeling prevailed in Parliament that the question of Reform ought to be shelved for a year. Lord John's position was one of great difficulty. He felt himself pledged on the subject, and, though recognising that a great and unexpected emergency had arisen, which altered the whole political outlook, he knew that with Lord Palmerston and others in the Ministry the question was not one of time, but of principle. The sinews of war had to be provided. Mr. Gladstone proposed to double the income tax, and Lord John urged that a period of increased taxation ought to be a period of widened political franchise. He therefore was averse to postponement, unless in a position to assure his Radical following that the Government recognised that it was committed to the question. Lord Aberdeen was only less anxious than Lord John for the adoption of a progressive and enlightened home policy; in fact, his attitude in his closing years on questions like Parliamentary reform was in marked contrast to his rigidly conservative views on foreign policy. He therefore determined to sound the Cabinet advocates of procrastination as to their real feeling about Reform, with the result that he saw clearly that Lord John Russell's fears were not groundless, since Lord Palmerston and Lord Lansdowne bluntly declared that they meant to retire from office if the Government went forward with the Bill. [Sidenote: 'GOD DEFEND THE RIGHT'] Lord John felt that he could not withdraw the Bill unconditionally, and therefore resignation seemed the only honourable course which was left. After deliberate consideration he could see no other choice in the matter, and, on April 8, relinquished his seat in the Cabinet. The Court, the Prime Minister and his colleagues saw at once the gravity of the position, for the Liberal party were restive enough under Lord Aberdeen, without the withdrawal from his Cabinet of a statesman of the first rank, who was not anxious for peace at any price. Lord John's position in the country at the moment rendered it probable that a quarrel with him would bring about the downfall of the Government. His zeal for Reform won him the respect and support of the great towns, and the determination which he shared with Palmerston to resist the intolerable attitude of the Czar made him popular with the crowd. A recent speech, delivered when Nicholas had recalled his Ambassador from London, had caught, moreover, the sympathies of all classes of the community. 'For my part, if most unexpectedly the Emperor of Russia should recede from his former demands, we shall all rejoice to be spared the pain, the efforts, and the burdens of war. But if peace is no longer consistent with our duty to England, with our duty to Europe, with our duty to the world, we can only endeavour to enter into this contest with a stout heart. May God defend the right, and I, for my part, shall be willing to bear my share of the burden and the responsibility.' John Leech, in one of his inimitable cartoons in 'Punch,' caught the situation with a flash of insight which almost amounted to genius, and Lord John became the hero of the hour. One verse out of a spirited poem entitled 'God defend the Right,' which appeared in 'Punch' at the time, may be quoted in passing, especially as it shows the patriotic fervour and the personal enthusiasm which Lord John Russell's speech evoked in the country: 'From humble homes and stately domes the cry goes through the air, With the loftiness of challenge, the lowliness of prayer, Honour to him who spoke the words in the Council of the Land, To find faith in old England's heart, force in old England's hand.' A week before the appearance of these lines, the cartoon in 'Punch' represented Lord Aberdeen, significantly arrayed in Windsor uniform, vainly attempting to hold back the struggling British lion, which sees the Russian bear in the distance, and exclaiming, 'I _must_ let him go.' Lord John's resignation meant much, perhaps everything, to the Government. Great pressure was put upon him. The Queen and the Cabinet alike urged him to abandon his intention of retirement; whilst Lord Palmerston, with that personal chivalry which was characteristic of him, declared that in a moment of European crisis he could be better spared, and was ready to resign if Lord John insisted upon such terms, as the price for his own continuance in office. Every day the situation abroad was becoming more critical, and Lord John saw that it might imperil greater interests than any which were bound up with the progress of a party question to resist such appeals. He, therefore, on April 11 withdrew his resignation, and received an ovation in the House of Commons when he made it plain that he was willing to thrust personal considerations aside in the interests of his colleagues, and for the welfare of his country. Mr. Edward Miall has described the scene. '"If it should be thought that the course he was taking would damage the cause of Reform"--the noble Lord paused, choked with the violence of his own emotions. Then arose a cheer from both sides of the House, loud and long continued.... Every eye was glistening with sudden moisture, and every heart was softened with genuine sympathy.... The effect was electric. Old prejudices long pent up, grudges, accumulated discontents, uncharitable suspicions, all melted away before that sudden outburst of a troubled heart.'[36] [Sidenote: THE PLAN OF CAMPAIGN] Throughout the spring diplomacy was still busy, though it became every week more and more apparent that hostilities were inevitable. Lord Stratford achieved, what Lord Clarendon did not hesitate to term, a 'great diplomatic triumph' when he won consent from the Porte to fresh terms in the interests of peace, which met with the approval, not only of England and France, but also of Austria and Prussia. The Czar began at length to realise the gravity of the situation when Austria moved in February fifty thousand men to the frontier of the territory which Russia had seized. When the Russian troops, a few months later, evacuated the Principalities, Austria and Prussia, whose alliance had been formed in defence of the interests of Germany, were no longer directly concerned in the quarrel. Thus the war which England and France declared at the end of March against Russia was one which they were left to pursue, with the help of Turkey, alone. Lord John Russell urged that it should be short and sharp, and with characteristic promptitude sketched out, with Lord Panmure's help, a plan of campaign. He urged that ten thousand men should at once be raised for the Army, five thousand for the Navy, and that the services of fifteen thousand more be added to the Militia. He laid stress on the importance of securing the active aid of Austria, for he thought that her co-operation might make the difference between a long and a short war. He proposed that Sweden should be drawn into the Alliance, with the view of striking a blow at Russia in the North as well as on her southern frontier. He also proposed that English and French troops should be massed at Constantinople, and submitted a plan of operations for the consideration of the Cabinet. Lord John knew perfectly well that radical changes were imperative in the administration of the Army. The Secretary for War was, oddly enough, Secretary for the Colonies as well, and there was also a Secretary at War, who controlled the finances at the bidding of the Commander-in-Chief. The Ordnance Department was under one management, the Commissariat under another, whilst the Militia fell within the province of a third, in the shape of the Home Office. Lord John Russell had seen enough of the outcome of divided counsels in the Cabinet, and insisted, in emphatic terms, on the necessity of separating the duties of the War and Colonial Departments, and of giving the Minister who held the former post undisputed control over all branches of the executive. It was perhaps an undesigned coincidence, but none the less unfortunate, that the statesmen in the Aberdeen Government who were directly concerned with the war were former colleagues of Sir Robert Peel. Lord Aberdeen's repugnance to hostilities with Russia was so notorious that the other Peelites in the Cabinet fell under the suspicion of apathy; and the nation, exasperated at the Czar's bombastic language and high-handed action, was not in the mood to make fine distinctions. The Duke of Newcastle and his friend, Mr. Sidney Herbert, were regarded, perhaps unjustly, as lukewarm about the approaching campaign; but it was upon the former that the brunt of public censure ultimately fell. The Duke was Secretary for War and the Colonies. It was an odd combination of offices which had existed for more than half a century. The tradition is that it had been brought about in order that the Secretary for the Colonies, who at the beginning of the century had comparatively little to do, but who possessed large patronage, might use that patronage on behalf of deserving military men. [Sidenote: THE DUKE OF NEWCASTLE'S FAILURE] In the immediate prospect of hostilities, it was felt to be imperative that two posts of such responsibility should not be held by the same Minister; but the Duke was adverse to the proposed change. It was, however, brought about in the early summer, and the Duke was given his choice of the two posts. He decided to relinquish the Colonies, and thus the burden of the approaching conflict fell upon him by his own deliberate act. Sir George Grey was appointed to the vacant office. The Duke of Newcastle's ambition outstripped his ability, and the choice which he made was disastrous both to himself and to the nation. Because some men are born great, they have greatness of another kind thrust upon them; and too often it happens that responsibility makes plain the lack of capacity, which the glamour neither of rank nor of place can long conceal. The Duke of Newcastle was born to greatness--for in the middle of the century the highest rank in the Peerage counted for more in politics than it does to-day--but he certainly did not achieve it as War Minister. There is no need to relate here the more than twice-told story of the Crimean War. Its incidents have been described by historians and soldiers; and, of late, gallant officers who took part in it have retraced its course and revived its memories. In one sense it is a glorious chapter in the annals of the Queen's reign, and yet there are circumstances connected with it which every Englishman, worthy of the name, would gladly forget. Although the nation did not take up arms with a light heart, its judgment was clouded by passion; and the first great war since Waterloo caught the imagination of the people, especially as Lord Raglan, one of the old Peninsular heroes, was in command of the Army of Invasion. England and France were not satisfied merely to blockade the Black Sea and crush the commerce of Russia. They determined to strike at the heart of the Czar's power in the East, and therefore the Allies made a dash at the great arsenal and fort of Sebastopol. It did not enter into their reckoning that there might be a protracted siege. What they anticipated was a swift march, a sudden attack, and the capture of the stronghold by bombardment. The allied forces--25,000 English soldiers, 23,000 French, and about 5,000 Turks--landed in the Crimea in September, 1854, and stormed the heights of the Alma on the 20th of that month. Then they hesitated, and their chance of reducing Sebastopol that autumn was lost. 'I have been very slow to enter into this war,' said Lord Aberdeen to an alderman at a banquet in the City. 'Yes,' was the brusque retort, 'and you will be equally slow to get out of it.' [Sidenote: BALACLAVA AND INKERMAN] Divided counsels prevailed in the camp as well as in the Cabinet. Cholera attacked the troops, and stores began to fail. Prince Menschikoff, defeated at Alma, seized the opportunity which the delay gave him to render the harbour of Sebastopol impassable to hostile ships; and General Todleben brought his skill as an engineer to the task of strengthening by earthworks the fortifications of the Russian stronghold. The Allies made the blunder of marching on Sebastopol from the southern instead of the northern side of the harbour, and this gave time to the enemy to receive strong reinforcements, with the result that 120,000 men were massed behind the Russian fortifications. Meanwhile a rumour that Sebastopol had fallen awakened short-lived rejoicings in England and France. The tidings were contradicted in twenty-four hours, but most people thought, on that exciting 3rd of October, that the war was virtually at an end. The Emperor Napoleon announced the imaginary victory of their comrades in arms to his assembled troops. Even Mr. Gladstone was deceived for the moment, and there is a letter of his in existence to one of the most prominent of his colleagues, full of congratulation at such a result. The chagrin of the nation was great when it learnt that the Russians were not merely holding their own, but were acting on the aggressive; whilst the disappointment was quickened by the lack of vigour displayed by the Cabinet. The Allies fought, on October 25, the glorious yet indecisive battle of Balaclava, which was for ever rendered memorable by the useless but superb charge of the Light Brigade. Less than a fortnight later, on November 5, the Russians renewed the attack, and took the English by surprise. A desperate hand-to-hand struggle against overwhelming odds ensued. Then the French came to the aid of the English troops, and the battle of Inkerman was won. As the winter approached, the position of the Allies grew perilous, and it seemed likely that the plans of the invaders would miscarry, and the besieging Allies be reduced to the position of the besieged. Before the middle of November winter set in with severity along the shores of the Black Sea, and a hurricane raged, which destroyed the tents of the troops, and wrecked more than a score of ships, which were carrying stores of ammunition and clothing. As the winter advanced, with bleak winds and blinding snow, the shivering, ill-fed soldiers perished in ever-increasing numbers under the twofold attack of privation and pestilence. The Army had been despatched to the Crimea in the summer, and, as no one imagined that the campaign would last beyond the early autumn, the brave fellows in the trenches of Sebastopol were called to confront the sudden descent of winter without the necessary stores. It was then that the War Office awoke slowly to the terrible nature of the crisis. Lord John Russell had made his protest months before against the dilatory action of that department, and, though he knew that personal odium was sure to follow, endeavoured at the eleventh hour to persuade Lord Aberdeen to take decisive action. 'We are in the midst of a great war,' were his words to the Premier on November 17. 'In order to carry on that war with efficiency, either the Prime Minister must be constantly urging, hastening, completing the military preparations, or the Minister of War must be strong enough to control other departments.' He went on to contend that the Secretary of State for War ought to be in the House of Commons, and that he ought, moreover, to be a man who carried weight in that assembly, and who brought to its debates not only vigour of mind but experience of military details. 'There is only one person belonging to the Government,' added Lord John, 'who combines these advantages. My conclusion is that before Parliament meets Lord Palmerston should be entrusted with the seals of the War Department.' [Sidenote: INCAPACITY IN HIGH PLACES] This was, of course, an unwelcome proposition to Lord Aberdeen, and he met it with the declaration that no one man was competent to undertake the duties of Secretary of State for War and those of Secretary at War. He considered that the latter appointment should be held in connection with the finances of the Army, and in independence of the Secretary for the War Department. Lord John replied that 'either the Prime Minister must himself be the acting and moving spirit of the whole machine, or else the Secretary for War must have delegated authority to control other departments,' and added, 'neither is the case under the present _régime_.' Once more, nothing came of the protest, and, when Parliament met on December 12, to indulge in the luxury of dull debates and bitter personalities, the situation remained unchanged, in spite of the growing sense of disaster abroad and incapacity at home. The Duke of Newcastle in the Lords made a lame defence, and his monotonous and inconclusive speech lasted for the space of three hours. 'The House went to sleep after the first half hour,' was the cynical comment of an Opposition peer. As the year ended the indignation in the country against the Duke of Newcastle grew more and more pronounced, and he, in common with Lord Aberdeen, was thought in many quarters to be starving the war. The truth was, the Duke was not strong enough for the position, and if he had gone to the Colonial Office, when that alternative was offered him, his reputation would not now be associated with the lamentable blunders which, rightly or wrongly, are laid to his charge. It is said that he once boasted that he had often kept out of mischief men who, he frankly admitted, were his superiors in ability. However that may be, the Duke of Newcastle ignominiously failed, at the great crisis in his public career, to keep out of mischief men who were his subordinates in position, and, in consequence, to arrest the fatal confusion which the winter campaign made on the military resources of the nation. Lord Hardinge, who on the death of the Duke of Wellington had succeeded to the post of Commander-in-Chief, assured Lord Malmesbury in January 1855 that the Duke of Newcastle had never consulted him on any subject connected with the war. He added, with considerable heat, that not a single despatch had been submitted to him; in fact, he had been left to gather what the War Minister was doing through the published statements in the newspapers. The Duke of Newcastle was a sensible, well-intentioned man, but allowed himself to be involved in the management of the details of his office, instead of originating a policy and directing the broad course of affairs with vigour and determination. He displayed a degree of industry during the crisis which was praiseworthy in itself, and quite phenomenal in the most exalted branch of the Peerage, but he lacked the power of initiative, and had not sufficient force and decision of character to choose the right men for the emergency. The Cabinet might falter and the War Office dawdle, the faith of the soldiers in the authorities might be shaken and their hopes of personal succour be eclipsed, but the charity of womanhood failed not to respond to the call of the suffering, or to the demands of self-sacrifice. Florence Nightingale, and the nurses who laboured at her side in the hospital at Scutari not only soothed the dying and nursed the sick and wounded, but thrilled the heart of England by their modest heroism and patient devotion. Before Parliament met in December, Lord John Russell, in despair of bringing matters to a practical issue, informed his colleagues that, though he was willing to remain in the Cabinet, and to act as Leader of the House during the short session before Christmas, it was his intention to relinquish office at the close of the year. The objection was raised that it was unconstitutional for him to meet Parliament in a responsible position if he had arrived at this fixed but unannounced resolution. He met this expression of opinion by requesting Lord Aberdeen to submit his resignation to the Queen on December 7. The correspondence between Lord Lansdowne and Lord John, and the important memorandum which the latter drew up on December 30, which Mr. Walpole has printed, speak for themselves.[37] It will be seen that Lord John once more insisted that the Secretary of State for the War Department ought immediately to be invested with all the more important functions hitherto exercised by the Secretary at War, and he again laid stress on the necessity in such a crisis that the War Minister should be a member of the House of Commons. He complained that, though he was responsible in the Commons, Lord Aberdeen did not treat him with the confidence which alone could enable a Leader of the House to carry on the business of the Government with satisfaction. He declared that Lord Grey treated Lord Althorp in a different fashion, and that Lord Melbourne, to bring the matter nearer home, had shown greater consideration towards himself. He added that he felt absolved from the duty of defending acts and appointments upon which he had not been consulted. [Sidenote: LORD LANSDOWNE AS PEACEMAKER] [Sidenote: A FRANK STATEMENT] Lord Lansdowne succeeded for the moment in patching up an unsatisfactory peace, but it was becoming every day more and more obvious that the Aberdeen Government was doomed. The memorandum which Lord John drew up, at the suggestion of Lord Lansdowne, describes in pithy and direct terms the privations of the soldiers, and the mortality amongst men and horses, which was directly due to hunger and neglect. He shows that between the end of September and the middle of November there was at least six weeks when all kinds of supplies might have been landed at Balaclava, and he points out that the stores only needed to be carried seven or eight miles to reach the most distant division of the Army. He protested that there had been great mismanagement, and added: 'Soldiers cannot fight unless they are well fed.' He stated that he understood Lord Raglan had written home at the beginning of October to say that, if the Army was to remain on the heights during the winter, huts would be required, since the barren position which they held did not furnish wood to make them. Nearly three months had, however, passed, and winter in its most terrible form had settled on the Crimea, and yet the huts still appeared not to have reached the troops, though the French had done their best to make good the discreditable breakdown of our commissariat. 'There appears,' concludes Lord John, 'a want of concert among the different departments. When the Navy forward supplies, there is no military authority to receive them; when the military wish to unload a ship, they find that the naval authority has already ordered it away. Lord Raglan and Sir Edmund Lyons should be asked to concert between them the mode of remedying this defect. Neither can see with his own eyes to the performance of all the subordinate duties, but they can choose the best men to do it, and arm them with sufficient authority. For on the due performance of these subordinate duties hangs the welfare of the Army. Lord Raglan should also be informed exactly of the amount of reinforcements ordered to the Crimea, and at what time he may expect them. Having furnished him with all the force in men and material which the Government can send him, the Government is entitled to expect from him in return his opinion as to what can be done by the allied armies to restore the strength and efficiency of the armies for the next campaign. Probably the troops first sent over will require four months' rest before they will be able to move against an enemy.' Procrastination was, however, to have its perfect work, and Lord John, chilled and indignant, told Lord Aberdeen on January 3 that nothing could be less satisfactory than the result of the recent Cabinets. 'Unless,' he added, 'you will direct measures, I see no hope for the efficient prosecution of the war;' for by this time it was perfectly useless, he saw, to urge on Lord Aberdeen the claims of Lord Palmerston. FOOTNOTES: [36] _Life of Edward Miall, M.P._, by A. Miall, p. 179. [37] _Life of Lord John Russell_, by Spencer Walpole, vol. ii. 232-235. CHAPTER XII THE VIENNA DIFFICULTY 1855 Blunders at home and abroad--Roebuck's motion--'General Février turns traitor'--France and the Crimea--Lord John at Vienna--The pride of the nation is touched--Napoleon's visit to Windsor--Lord John's retirement--The fall of Sebastopol--The Treaty of Paris. PARLIAMENT met on January 23, and the general indignation at once found expression in Mr. Roebuck's motion--the notice of which was cheered by Radicals and Tories alike--to 'inquire into the condition of our Army before Sebastopol, and into the conduct of those Departments of the Government whose duty it has been to minister to the wants of that Army.' Lord John, in view of the blunders at home and abroad, did not see how such a motion was to be resisted, and at once tendered to Lord Aberdeen his resignation. His protests, pointed and energetic though they had been, had met with no practical response. Even the reasonable request that the War Minister should be in the Commons to defend his own department had passed unheeded. Peelites, like Sir James Graham and Mr. Sidney Herbert, might make the best of a bad case, but Lord John felt that he could not honestly defend in Parliament a course of action which he had again and again attacked in the Cabinet. Doubtless it would have been better both for himself and for his colleagues if he had adhered to his earlier intention of resigning; and his dramatic retreat at this juncture unquestionably gave a handle to his adversaries. Though prompted by conscientious motives, sudden flight, in the face of what was, to all intents and purposes, a vote of censure, was a grave mistake. Not unnaturally, such a step was regarded as a bid for personal power at the expense of his colleagues. It certainly placed the Cabinet in a most embarrassing position, and it is easy to understand the irritation which it awakened. In fact, it led those who were determined to put the worst possible construction on Lord John's action to hint that he wished to rid himself of responsibility and to stand clear of his colleagues, so that when the nation grew tired of the war he might return to office and make peace. Nothing could well have been further from the truth. [Sidenote: ROEBUCK'S MOTION] Lord John's retirement was certainly inopportune; but it is almost needless to add--now that it is possible to review his whole career, as well as all the circumstances which marked this crisis in it--that he was not actuated by a self-seeking spirit. Looking back in after life, Lord John frankly admitted that he had committed an error in resigning office under Lord Aberdeen at the time and in the manner in which he did it. He qualified this confession, however, by declaring that he had committed a much greater error in agreeing to serve under Lord Aberdeen as Prime Minister: 'I had served under Lord Grey and Lord Melbourne before I became Prime Minister, and I served under Lord Palmerston after I had been Prime Minister. In no one of these cases did I find any difficulty in allying subordination with due counsel and co-operation. But, as it is proverbially said, "Where there is a will there is a way," so in political affairs the converse is true, "Where there is no will there is no way."' He explained his position in a personal statement in the House of Commons on the night of Mr. Roebuck's motion. 'I had to consider whether I could fairly and honestly say, "It is true that evils have arisen. It is true that the brave men who fought at the Alma, at Inkerman, and at Balaclava are perishing, many of them from neglect; it is true that the heart of the whole of England throbs with anxiety and sympathy on this subject; but I can tell you that such arrangements have been made--that a man of such vigour and efficiency has taken the conduct of the War Department, with such a consolidation of offices as to enable him to have the entire control of the whole of the War Offices--so that any supply may be immediately furnished, and any abuse instantly remedied." I felt I could not honestly make such a declaration; I therefore felt that I could come only to one conclusion, and that as I could not resist inquiry--by giving the only assurances which I thought sufficient to prevent it--my duty was not to remain any longer a member of the Government.' In the course of a powerful speech Lord John added that he would always look back with pride on his association with many measures of the Aberdeen Government, and more particularly with the great financial scheme which Mr. Gladstone brought forward in 1853. [Sidenote: OPEN CONFESSION] He refused to admit that the Whigs were an exclusive party, and he thought that such an idea was refuted by the fact that they had consented to serve in a Coalition Government. 'I believe that opinion to have been unjust, and I think that the Whig party during the last two years have fully justified the opinion I entertained. I will venture to say that no set of men ever behaved with greater honour or with more disinterested patriotism than those who have supported the Government of the Earl of Aberdeen. It is my pride, and it will ever be my pride to the last day of my life, to have belonged to a party which, as I consider, upholds the true principles of freedom; and it will ever be my constant endeavour to preserve the principles and to tread in the paths which the Whig party have laid down for the guidance of their conduct.' Lord John made no attempt to disguise the gravity of the crisis, and the following admission might almost be said to have sealed the fate of the Ministry: 'Sir, I must say that there is something, with all the official knowledge to which I have had access, that to me is inexplicable in the state of our army. If I had been told, as a reason against the expedition to the Crimea last year, that your troops would be seven miles from the sea, and that--at that seven miles' distance--they would be in want of food, of clothing, and of shelter to such a degree that they would perish at the rate of from ninety to a hundred a day, I should have considered such a prediction as utterly preposterous, and such a picture of the expedition as entirely fanciful and absurd. We are all, however, forced to confess the notoriety of that melancholy state of things.' Three days later, after a protracted and heated debate, Mr. Roebuck's motion was carried in a House of 453 members by the sweeping majority of 157. 'The division was curious,' wrote Greville. 'Some seventy or eighty Whigs, ordinary supporters of Government, voted against them, and all the Tories except about six or seven.' There was no mistaking the mandate either of Parliament or of the people. Lord Aberdeen on the following day went down to Windsor and laid his resignation before the Queen, and in this sorry fashion the Coalition Government ignominiously collapsed, with hardly an expression of regret and scarcely a claim to remembrance. The Queen's choice fell upon Lord Derby, but his efforts to form an Administration proved unavailing. Lord Lansdowne was next summoned, and he suggested that Lord John Russell should be sent for, but in his case, also, sufficient promises of support were not forthcoming. In the end Her Majesty acquiesced in the strongly-expressed wish of the nation, and Lord Palmerston was called to power on February 5. For the moment Lord John was out of office, and Lord Panmure took the place of the Duke of Newcastle as War Minister, but all the other members of the defeated Administration, except, of course, Lord Aberdeen, entered the new Cabinet. Lord Palmerston knew the feeling of the country, and was not afraid to face it, and, therefore, determined to accept Mr. Roebuck's proposals for a searching investigation of the circumstances which had attended the conduct of the war. Loyalty to their late chief, as well as to their former colleague, the Duke of Newcastle, led Sir James Graham, Mr. Sidney Herbert, Mr. Gladstone, and other Peelites to resign. Lord John, urged by Lord Palmerston, became Colonial Secretary. Palmerston shared Lord Clarendon's view that no Government calling itself Liberal had a chance of standing without Lord John. Sir G. C. Lewis succeeded Mr. Gladstone as Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Sir Charles Wood took Sir James Graham's vacant place at the Admiralty. [Sidenote: 'GENERAL FÉVRIER TURNS TRAITOR'] Changes of a more momentous character quickly followed. Early in the winter, when tidings of the sufferings of the Allies reached St. Petersburg, the Emperor Nicholas declared, with grim humour, that there were two generals who were about to fight for him, 'Janvier et Février;' but the opening month of the year brought terrible privations to the Russian reinforcements as they struggled painfully along the rough winter roads on the long march to the Crimea. The Czar lost a quarter of a million of men before the war ended, and a vast number of them fell before the cold or the pestilence. Omar Pasha defeated the Russian troops at Eupatoria in the middle of February. The fact that his troops had been repulsed by the hated Turks touched the pride of Nicholas to the quick, and is believed to have brought on the fatal illness which seized him a few days later. On February 27, just after the Emperor had left the parade-ground on which he had been reviewing his troops, he was struck down by paralysis, and, after lingering in a hopeless condition for a day or two, died a baffled and disappointed man. The irony of the situation was reflected with sombre and dramatic realism in a political cartoon which appeared in 'Punch.' It represented a skeleton in armour, laying an icy hand, amid the falling snow, on the prostrate Czar's heart. The picture--one of the most powerful that has ever appeared, even in this remarkable mirror of the times--was entitled, 'General Février turned Traitor,' and underneath was the dead Emperor's cruel boast, 'Russia has two generals on whom she can confide--Generals Janvier and Février.' Prior to the resignation of the Peelites the second Congress of Vienna assembled, and Lord John Russell attended it as a plenipotentiary for England; and France, Austria, Turkey, and Russia were also represented. The 'four points' which formed the basis of the negotiations were that Russia should abandon all control over Moldavia, Wallachia, and Servia; that the new Czar, Alexander II., should surrender his claim to command the entrance of the Danube; that all treaties should be annulled which gave Russia supremacy in the Black Sea; and that she should dismiss her pretensions to an exclusive right to protect in her own fashion the Christians in the Ottoman Empire. Nicholas, though at one time favourable to this scheme as a basis of peace, eventually fell back on the assertion that he would not consent to any limitation of his naval power in the Black Sea. Though the parleyings at Vienna after his death were protracted, the old difficulty asserted itself again, with the result that the second Congress proved, as spring gave way to summer, as futile as the first. Although subjects which vitally affected the Turkish Empire were under consideration, the Turkish Ambassador at Vienna had received anything but explicit directions, and Lord John was forced to the conclusion that the negotiations were not regarded as serious at Constantinople. Indeed, he had, in Mr. Spencer Walpole's words, 'reason to suspect that the absence of a properly credited Turk was not due to the dilatory character of the Porte alone but to the perverse action of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe.'[38] Lord Clarendon did not hesitate to declare that Lord Stratford was inclined to thwart any business which was not carried on in Constantinople, and the English Ambassador kept neither Lord John in Vienna nor the Cabinet in Downing Street acquainted with the views of the Porte. Lord John declared that the Turkish representative at Vienna, from whom he expected information about the affairs of his own country, was 'by nature incompetent, and by instruction silent.' Two schemes, in regard to the point which was chiefly in dispute, were before the Congress; they are best stated in Lord John's own words: 'One, called limitation, proposed that only four ships of the line should be maintained in the Black Sea by Russia, and two each by the allies of Turkey. The other mode, proposed by M. Drouyn de Lhuys, contemplated a much further reduction of force--namely, to eight or ten light vessels, intended solely to protect commerce from pirates and perform the police of the coast.' Although a great part of the Russian fleet was at the bottom of the sea, and the rest of it hemmed in in the harbour of Sebastopol, Prince Gortschakoff announced, with the air of a man who was master of the situation, that the Czar entirely refused to limit his power in the Euxine. [Sidenote: COUNT BUOL'S COMPROMISE] At this juncture Count Buol proposed a compromise, to the effect that Russia should maintain in the Black Sea a naval force not greater than that which she had had at her disposal there before the outbreak of the war; that any attempt to evade this limitation should be interpreted as a _casus belli_, by France, England, and Austria, which were to form a triple treaty of alliance to defend the integrity and independence of Turkey in case of aggression. Lord Palmerston believed, to borrow his own phrase, that Austria was playing a treacherous game, but that was not the opinion at the moment either of Lord John Russell or of M. Drouyn de Lhuys. They appear to have thought that the league of Austria with England and France to resist aggression upon Turkey would prove a sufficient check on Russian ambition, and did not lay stress enough on the objections, which at once suggested themselves both in London and Paris. The Prince Consort put the case against Count Buol's scheme in a nutshell: 'The proposal of Austria to engage to make war when the Russian armaments should appear to have become excessive is of no kind of value to the belligerents, who do not wish to establish a case for which to make war hereafter, but to obtain a security upon which they can conclude peace now.' Lord John Russell, in a confidential interview with Count Buol, declared that he was prepared to recommend the English Cabinet to accept the Austrian proposals. It seemed to him that, if Russia was willing to accept the compromise and to abandon the attitude which had led to the war, the presence of the Allies in the Crimea was scarcely justifiable. M. Drouyn de Lhuys took the same view, and both plenipotentiaries hastened back to urge acquiescence in proposals which seemed to promise the termination of a war in which, with little result, blood and treasure had already been lavishly expended. Lord Palmerston and Lord Clarendon, backed by popular sentiment, refused to see in Russia's stubborn demand about her fleet in the Black Sea other than a perpetual menace to Turkey. They argued that England had made too heavy a sacrifice to patch up in this fashion an inglorious and doubtful peace. The attitude of Napoleon III. did more than anything else to confirm this decision. The war in the Crimea had never been as popular in France as it was in England. The throne which Napoleon had seized could only be kept by military success, and there is no doubt whatever that personal ambition, and the prestige of a campaign, with England for a companion-in-arms, determined the despatch of French troops to the Crimea. On his return, Lord John at once saw the difficulty in which his colleagues were landed. The internal tranquility of France was imperilled if the siege of Sebastopol was abandoned. 'The Emperor of the French,' he wrote, 'had been to us the most faithful ally who had ever wielded the sceptre or ruled the destinies of France. Was it possible for the English Government to leave the Emperor to fight unaided the battle of Europe, or to force him to join us in a peace which would have sunk his reputation with his army and his people?' He added, that this consideration seemed to him so weighty that he ceased to urge on Lord Palmerston the acceptance of the Austrian terms, and Lord Clarendon therefore sent a reply in which Count Buol's proposals were rejected by the Cabinet. Lord Palmerston laid great stress on Lord John's presence in his ministry, and Mr. Walpole has shown that the latter only consented to withdraw his resignation after not merely an urgent, but a thrice-repeated personal request from the Premier. [Sidenote: PRESSURE FROM PALMERSTON] He ought unquestionably, at all hazards to Lord Palmerston's Government, to have refused to remain a member of it when his colleagues intimated that they were not in a position to accept his view of the situation without giving mortal offence to the Emperor of the French. Under the circumstances, Lord Palmerston ought not to have put the pressure on Lord John. The latter stayed in order to shield the Government from overthrow by a combined Radical and Tory attack at a moment when Palmerston was compelled to study the susceptibilities of France and Napoleon III.'s fears concerning his throne. There is a published letter, written by the Prince Consort at this juncture to his brother the Duke of Saxe-Coburg, which throws light on the situation. The Prince hints that the prospects of the Allies in the Crimea had become more hopeful, just as diplomatic affairs at Vienna had taken an awkward turn. He states that in General Pélissier the French 'have at last a leader who is determined and enterprising, and who will once more raise the spirit of the army, which has sunk through Canrobert's mildness.' He adds that the English troops 'are again thirty thousand men under arms, and their spirit is excellent. At home, however, Gladstone and the Peelites are taking up the cry for peace, and declaring themselves against all further continuation of the war; whilst Lord Derby and the Protectionists are all for making common cause with Layard and others, in order to overthrow Palmerston's Ministry.' Disraeli, significantly adds the Prince, has been 'chiefly endeavouring to injure' Lord John Russell. Towards the end of May, Mr. Disraeli introduced a resolution condemning the conduct of the Government, and calling attention to Lord John Russell's attitude at the Vienna Conference. Lord John had fulfilled the promise which he had given to Count Buol before leaving Vienna; but Lord Palmerston was determined to maintain the alliance with France, and therefore, as a member of his Government, Lord John's lips were sealed when he rose to defend himself. He stated in a powerful speech the reasons which had led to the failure of the Conference, and ended without any allusion to the Austrian proposals or his own action in regard to them. Irritated at the new turn of affairs, Count Buol disclosed what had passed behind the scenes in Vienna, and Lord John found himself compelled to explain his explanations. He declared that he had believed before leaving Vienna that the Austrian scheme held out the promise of peace, and, with this conviction in his mind, he had on his return to London immediately advised its acceptance by Lord Palmerston. He was not free, of course, to state with equal frankness the true reason of its rejection by the Cabinet, and therefore was compelled to fall back on the somewhat lame plea that it had been fully considered and disallowed by his colleagues. Moreover he felt, as a plenipotentiary, it was his duty to submit to the Government which had sent him to Vienna, and as a member of the Cabinet it was not less his duty to yield to the decision of the majority of his colleagues. [Sidenote: AN EMBARRASSING POSITION] Lord John's explanations were not deemed satisfactory. He was in the position of a man who could only defend himself and make his motives plain to Parliament and the country by statements which would have embarrassed his colleagues and have shattered the French alliance at a moment when, not so much on national as on international grounds, it seemed imperative that it should be sustained. The attacks in the Press were bitter and envenomed; and when Lord John, in July, told Lord Palmerston it was his intention to retire, the latter admitted with an expression of great regret that the storm was too strong to be resisted, though, he added, 'juster feelings will in due time prevail.' A few days later Lord John, in a calm and impressive speech, anticipated Sir E. B. Lytton's hostile motion on the Vienna Conference by announcing his intention to the House. Though he still felt in honour obliged to say nothing on the real cause of his withdrawal, his dignified attitude on that occasion made its own impression, and all the more because of the sweeping abuse to which he was at the moment exposed. It was of this speech that Sir George Cornewall Lewis said that it was listened to with attention and respect by an audience partly hostile and partly prejudiced. He declared that he was convinced it would go far to remove the imputations, founded on error and misrepresentation, under which Lord John laboured. He added, with a generosity which, though characteristic, was rare at that juncture: 'I shall be much surprised if, after a little time and a little reflection, persons do not come to the conclusion that never was so small a matter magnified beyond its true proportions.' Within twenty-four hours of his resignation Lord John had an opportunity of showing that he bore no malice towards former colleagues. Mr. Roebuck, with characteristic denunciations, attacked the Government on the damaging statements contained in the report of the Sebastopol Committee. He proposed a motion censuring in severe terms every member of the Cabinet whose counsels had led to such disastrous results. Whatever construction might be placed on Lord John's conduct of affairs in Vienna, he at least could not be charged with lukewarmness or apathy in regard to the administration of the army and the prosecution of the war. He had, in fact, irritated Lord Aberdeen and the Duke of Newcastle by insisting again and again on the necessity of undivided control of the military departments, and on the need of a complete reorganisation of the commissariat. A less magnanimous man would have seized the opportunity of this renewed attack to declare that he, at least, had done his best at great personal cost to prevent the deplorable confusion and collapse which had overtaken the War Office. He disdained, however, the mean personal motive, and made, what Lord Granville called, a 'magnificent speech,' in which he declared that every member without exception remained responsible for the consequences which had overtaken the Expedition to the Crimea, Mr. Kinglake once asserted that, though Lord John Russell was capable of coming to a bold, abrupt, and hasty decision, not duly concerted with men whose opinions he ought to have weighed, no statesman in Europe surpassed him on the score of courage or high public spirit. The chivalry which he displayed in coming to the help of the Government on the morrow of his own almost compulsory retirement from office was typical of a man who made many mistakes, but was never guilty, even when wounded to the quick, of gratifying the passing resentments of the hour at the expense of the interests of the nation. [Sidenote: WARLIKE COUNSELS PREVAIL] During the summer of 1855 the feeling of the country grew more and more warlike. The failure of the negotiations at Vienna had touched the national pride. The State visit in the spring to the English Court of the Emperor Napoleon, and his determination not to withdraw his troops from the Crimea until some decisive victory was won, had rekindled its enthusiasm. The repulse at the Redan, the death of Lord Raglan, and the vainglorious boast of Prince Gortschakoff, who declared 'that the hour was at hand when the pride of the enemies of Russia would be lowered, and their armies swept from our soil like chaff blown away by the wind,' rendered all dreams of diplomatic solution impossible, and made England, in spite of the preachers of peace at any price, determined to push forward her quarrel to the bitter end. The nation, to borrow the phrase of one of the shrewdest political students of the time, had now begun to consider the war in the Crimea as a 'duel with Russia,' and pride and pluck were more than ever called into play, both at home and abroad, in its maintenance. The war, therefore, took its course. Ample supplies and reinforcements were despatched to the troops, and the Allies, under the command of General Simpson and General Pélissier, pushed forward the campaign with renewed vigour. Sardinia and Sweden had joined the alliance, and on August 16 the troops of the former, acting in concert with the French, drove back the Russians, who had made a sortie along the valley of the Tchernaya. After a month's bombardment by the Allies, the Malakoff, a redoubt which commanded Sebastopol, was taken by the French; but the English troops were twice repulsed in their attack on the Redan. Gortschakoff and Todleben were no longer able to withstand the fierce and daily renewed bombardment. The forts on the south side were, therefore, blown up, the ships were sunk, and the army which had gallantly defended the place retired to a position of greater security with the result that Sebastopol fell on September 8, and the war was virtually over. Sir Evelyn Wood lately drew attention to the fact that forty out of every hundred of the soldiers who served before Sebastopol in the depth of that terrible winter of 1854 lie there, or in the Scutari cemetery--slain, not by the sword, but by privation, exposure, disease, and exertions beyond human endurance. [Sidenote: ALL FOR NAUGHT] France was clamouring for peace, and Napoleon was determined not to prolong the struggle now that his troops had come out of the siege of Sebastopol with flying colours. Russia, on her part, had wellnigh exhausted her resources. Up to the death of the Emperor Nicholas, she had lost nearly a quarter of a million of men, and six months later, so great was the carnage and so insidious the pestilence, that even that ominous number was doubled. The loss of the Allies in the Crimean war was upwards of eighty-seven thousand men, and more than two-thirds of the slain fell to France. Apart from bloodshed, anguish, and pain, the Crimean war bequeathed to England an increase of 41,000,000_l._ in the National Debt. No wonder that overtures for the cessation of hostilities now met with a welcome which had been denied at the Vienna Conference. After various negotiations, the Peace of Paris was signed on March 30, 1856. Russia was compelled to relinquish her control over the Danube and her protectorate over the Principalities, and was also forbidden to build arsenals on the shores of the Black Sea, which was declared open to all ships of commerce, but closed to all ships of war. Turkey, on the other hand, confirmed, on paper at least, the privileges proclaimed in 1839 to Christians resident in the Ottoman Empire; but massacres at Damascus, in the Lebanon, and later in Bulgaria, and recently in Armenia, have followed in dismal sequence in spite of the Treaty of Paris. The neutrality of the Black Sea came to an end a quarter of a century ago, and the substantial gains--never great even at the outset--of a war which was costly in blood and treasure have grown small by degrees until they have almost reached the vanishing point. FOOTNOTES: [38] _Life of Lord John Russell_, vol. ii. p. 251. CHAPTER XIII LITERATURE AND EDUCATION Lord John's position in 1855--His constituency in the City--Survey of his work in literature--As man of letters--His historical writings--Hero-worship of Fox--Friendship with Moore--Writes the biography of the poet--'Don Carlos'--A book wrongly attributed to him--Publishes his 'Recollections and Suggestions'--An opinion of Kinglake's--Lord John on his own career--Lord John and National Schools--Joseph Lancaster's tentative efforts--The formation of the Council of Education--Prejudice blocks the way--Mr. Forster's tribute. MEN talked in the autumn of 1855 as if Lord John Russell's retirement was final, and even his brother, the Duke of Bedford, considered it probable that his career as a responsible statesman was closed. His health had always been more or less delicate, and he was now a man of sixty-three. He had been in Parliament for upwards of forty years, and nearly a quarter of a century had passed since he bore the brunt of the wrath and clamour and evil-speaking of the Tories at the epoch of Reform. He had been leader of his party for a long term of difficult years, and Prime Minister for the space of six, and in that capacity had left on the statute book an impressive record of his zeal on behalf of civil and religious liberty. No statesman of the period had won more distinction in spite of 'gross blunders,' which he himself in so many words admitted. He was certainly entitled to rest on his laurels; but it was nonsense for anyone to suppose that the animosity of the Irish, or the indignation of the Ritualists, or the general chagrin at the collapse--under circumstances for which Lord John was by no means alone responsible--of the Vienna Conference, could condemn a man of so much energy and courage, as well as political prescience, to perpetual banishment from Downing Street. There were people who thought that Lord John was played out in 1855, and there were many more who wished to think so, for he was feared by the incompetent and apathetic of his own party, as well as by those who had occasion to reckon with him in honourable but strenuous political conflict. The great mistake of his life was not the Durham Letter, which has been justified, in spite of its needless bitterness of tone, by the inexorable logic of accomplished events. It was not his attitude towards Ireland in the dark years of famine, which was in reality far more temperate and generous than is commonly supposed. It was not his action over the Vienna Conference, for, now that the facts are known, his reticence in self-defence, under the railing accusations which were brought against him, was magnanimous and patriotic. The truth is, Lord John Russell placed himself in a false position when he yielded to the importunity of the Court and the Peelites by consenting to accept office under Lord Aberdeen. The Crimean War, which he did his best to prevent, only threw into the relief of red letters against a dark sky the radical divergence of opinion which existed in the Coalition Government. [Sidenote: OUT OF OFFICE] For nearly four years after his retirement from office Lord John held an independent political position, and there is evidence enough that he enjoyed to the full this respite from the cares of responsibility. He gave up his house in town, and the quidnuncs thought that they had seen the last of him as a Minister of the Crown, whilst the merchants and the stockbrokers of the City were supposed to scout his name, and to be ready to lift up their heel against him at the next election. Meanwhile, Lord John studied to be quiet, and succeeded. He visited country-houses, and proved a delightful as well as a delighted guest. He travelled abroad, and came back with new political ideas about the trend in foreign politics. He published the final volume of his 'Memoirs and Correspondence of Thomas Moore,' and busied himself over his 'Life and Times of Charles James Fox,' and other congenial literary tasks. He appeared on the platform and addressed four thousand persons in Exeter Hall, in connection with the Young Men's Christian Association, on the causes which had retarded moral and political progress in the nation. He went down to Stroud, and gave his old constituents a philosophic address on the study of history. He spoke at the first meeting of the Social Science Congress at Birmingham, presided over the second at Liverpool, and raised in Parliament the questions of National Education, Jewish Disabilities, the affairs of Italy, besides taking part, as an independent supporter of Lord Palmerston, in the controversies which arose from time to time in the House of Commons. His return to office grew inevitable in the light of the force of his character and the integrity of his aims. [Sidenote: LITERARY WORK] It is, of course, impossible in the scope of this volume to describe at any length Lord John Russell's contributions to literature, even outside the range of letters and articles in the press and that almost forgotten weapon of controversy, the political pamphlet. From youth to age Lord John not merely possessed the pen of a ready writer, but employed it freely in history, biography, criticism, _belles-lettres_, and verse. His first book was published when George III. was King, and his last appeared when almost forty years of Queen Victoria's reign had elapsed. The Liverpool Administration was in power when his biography of his famous ancestor, William, Lord Russell, appeared, and that of Mr. Disraeli when the veteran statesman took the world into his confidence with 'Recollections and Suggestions.' It is amusing now to recall the fact that two years after the battle of Waterloo Lord John Russell feared that he could never stand the strain of a political career, and Tom Moore's well-known poetical 'Remonstrance' was called forth by the young Whig's intention at that time to abandon the Senate for the study. When Lord Grey's Ministry was formed in 1830 to carry Reform, Lord John was the author of several books, grave and gay, and had been seventeen years in Parliament, winning already a considerable reputation within and without its walls. It was a surprise at the moment, and it is not even yet quite clear why Russell was excluded from the Cabinet. Mr. Disraeli has left on record his interpretation of the mystery: 'Lord John Russell was a man of letters, and it is a common opinion that a man cannot at the same time be successful both in meditation and in action.' If this surmise is correct, Lord John's fondness for printer's ink kept him out of Downing Street until he made by force his merit known as a champion of popular rights in the House of Commons. Literature often claimed his pen, for, besides many contributions in prose and verse to periodicals, to say nothing of writings which still remain in manuscript and prefaces to the books of other people, he published about twenty works, great and small. Yet, his strength lay elsewhere. His literary pursuits, with scarcely an exception, represent his hours of relaxation and the manner in which he sought relief from the cares of State. In the pages of 'William, Lord Russell,' which was published in 1819, when political corruption was supreme and social progress all but impossible, Lord John gave forth no uncertain sound. 'In these times, when love of liberty is too generally supposed to be allied with rash innovation, impiety, and anarchy, it seems to me desirable to exhibit to the world at full length the portrait of a man who, heir to wealth and title, was foremost in defending the privileges of the people; who, when busily occupied in the affairs of public life, was revered in his own family as the best of husbands and of fathers; who joined the truest sense of religion with the unqualified assertion of freedom; who, after an honest perseverance in a good cause, at length attested, on the scaffold, his attachment to the ancient principles of the Constitution and the inalienable right of resistance.' The interest of the book consists not merely in its account--gathered in part at least from family papers at Woburn and original letters at Longleat--of Lord Russell, but also in the light which is cast on the period of the Restoration, and the policy of Charles II. and the Duke of York. [Sidenote: A CONFIDENT WHIG] Two years later, Lord John published an 'Essay on the History of the English Government and Constitution,' which, in an expanded form, has passed through several editions, and has also appeared in a French version. The book is concerned with constitutional change in England from the reign of Henry VII. to the beginning of the nineteenth century. Lord John made no secret of his conviction that, whilst the majority of the Powers of Europe needed revolutionary methods to bring them into sympathy with the aspirations of the people, the Government of England was not in such an evil case, since its 'abuses easily admit of reforms consistent with its spirit, capable of being effected without injury or danger, and mainly contributing to its preservation.' The historical reflections which abound in the work, though shrewd, can scarcely be described as remarkable, much less as profound. The 'Essay on English Government' is, in fact, not the confessions of an inquiring spirit entangled in the maze of political speculation, but the conclusions of a young statesman who has made up his mind, with the help of Somers and Fox. Perhaps, however, the most important of Lord John's contributions to the study of the philosophy of history was 'Memoirs of the Affairs of Europe from the Peace of Utrecht.' It describes at considerable length, and often with luminous insight, the negotiations which led to the treaty by which the great War of the Spanish Succession was brought to an end. It also throws light on men and manners during the last days of Louis XIV., and on the condition of affairs in France which followed his death. The closing pages of the second volume are concerned with a survey of the religious state of England during the first half of the eighteenth century. Lord John in this connection pays homage to the work of Churchmen of the stamp of Warburton, Clarke, and Hoadly; but he entirely fails to appreciate at anything like their true value the labours of Whitfield and Wesley, though doing more justice to the great leaders of Puritanism, a circumstance which was perhaps due to the fact that they stand in the direct historical succession, not merely in the assertion of the rights of conscience, but in the ordered growth of freedom and society. Amongst the most noteworthy of Lord John Russell's literary achievements were the two works which he published concerning a statesman whose memory, he declared, ought to be 'consecrated in the heart of every lover of freedom throughout the globe'--Charles James Fox, a master of assemblies, and, according to Burke, perhaps the greatest debater whom the world has ever seen. The books in question are entitled 'Memorials and Correspondence,' which was published in four volumes at intervals between the years 1853 and 1857, and the more important 'Life and Times of Charles James Fox,' which appeared in three volumes between the years 1859 and 1866. This task, like so many others which Lord John accomplished, came unsought at the death of his old friend, Lady Holland, in 1845. It was the ambition of Lord Holland, 'nephew of Fox and friend of Grey,' as he used proudly to style himself, to edit the papers and write the life of his brilliant kinsman. Politics and society and the stately house at Kensington, which, from the end of last century until the opening years of the Queen's reign, was the chief _salon_ of the Whig party, combined, with an easy procrastinating temperament, to block the way, until death ended, in the autumn of 1840, the career of the gracious master of Holland House. The materials which Lord Holland and his physician, librarian, and friend, Dr. John Allen, had accumulated, and which, by the way, passed under the scrutiny of Lord Grey and Rogers, the poet, were edited by Lord John, with the result that he grew fascinated with the subject, and formed the resolution, in consequence, to write 'The Life and Times' of the great Whig statesman. He declared that it was well to have a hero, and a hero with a good many faults and failings. [Sidenote: FOX AND MOORE] Fox did more than any other statesman in the dull reign of George II. to prepare the way for the epoch of Reform, and it was therefore fitting that the statesman who more than any other bore the brunt of the battle in 1830-32 should write his biography. Lord Russell's biography of Fox, though by no means so skilfully written as Sir George Otto Trevelyan's vivacious description of 'The Early History of Charles James Fox,' is on a more extended scale than the latter. Students of the political annals of the eighteenth century are aware of its value as an original and suggestive contribution to the facts and forces which have shaped the relations of the Crown and the Cabinet in modern history. Fox, in Lord John's opinion, gave his life to the defence of English freedom, and hastened his death by his exertion to abolish the African Slave Trade. He lays stress, not only on the great qualities which Fox displayed in public life, but also on the simplicity and kindness of his nature, and the spell which, in spite of grievous faults, he seemed able to cast, without effort, alike over friends and foes. One of the earliest, and certainly one of the closest, friendships of Lord John Russell's life was with Thomas Moore. They saw much of each other for the space of nearly forty years in London society, and were also drawn together in the more familiar intercourse of foreign travel. It was with Lord John that the poet went to Italy in 1819 to avoid arrest for debt, after his deputy at Bermuda had embezzled 6,000_l._ Moore lived, more or less, all his days from hand to mouth, and Lord John Russell, who was always ready in a quiet fashion, in Kingsley's phrase, to help lame dogs over stiles, frequently displayed towards the light-hearted poet throughout their long friendship delicate and generous kindness. He it was who, in conjunction with Lord Lansdowne, obtained for Moore in 1835 a pension of 300_l._ a year, and announced the fact as one which was 'due from any Government, but much more from one some of the members of which are proud to think themselves your friends.' Moore died in 1852, and when his will was read--it had been made when Lord John was still comparatively unknown--it was discovered that he had, to give his own words, 'confided to my valued friend, Lord John Russell (having obtained his kind promise to undertake the service for me), the task of looking over whatever papers, letters, or journals I may leave behind me, for the purpose of forming from them some kind of publication, whether in the shape of memoirs or otherwise, which may afford the means of making some provision for my wife and family.' Although Lord John was sixty, and burdened with the cares of State, if not with the cares of office, he cheerfully accepted the task. Though it must be admitted that he performed some parts of it in rather a perfunctory manner, the eight volumes which appeared between 1853 and 1856 of the 'Memoirs, Journal, and Correspondence of Thomas Moore' represent a severe tax upon friendship, as well as no ordinary labour on the part of a man who was always more or less immersed in public affairs. [Sidenote: 'DON CARLOS'] Lord John also edited the 'Correspondence of John, fourth Duke of Bedford,' and prefaced the letters with a biographical sketch. Quite early in his career he also tried his hand at fiction in 'The Nun of Arrouca,' a story founded on a romantic incident which occurred during his travels in the Peninsula. The book appeared in 1822, and in the same year--he was restless and ambitious of literary distinction at the time, and had not yet found his true sphere in politics--he also published 'Don Carlos,' a tragedy in blank verse, which was in reality not merely a tirade against the cruelties of the Inquisition, but an impassioned protest against religious disabilities in every shape or form. 'Don Carlos,' though now practically forgotten, ran through five editions in twelve months, and the people remembered it when its author became the foremost advocate in the House of Commons of the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts. Amongst other minor writings which belong to the earlier years of Lord John Russell, it is enough to name 'Essays and Sketches of Life and Character,' 'The Establishment of the Turks in Europe,' 'A Translation of the Fifth Book of the Odyssey,' and an imitation of the Thirteenth Satire of Juvenal, as well as an essay on the 'Causes of the French Revolution,' which appeared in 1832. It is still a moot point whether 'Letters Written for the Post, and not for the Press,' an anonymous volume which appeared in 1820, and which consists of descriptions of a tour in Scotland, interspersed with dull moral lectures on the conduct of a wife towards her husband, was from his pen. Mr. George Elliot believes, on internal evidence, too lengthy to quote, that the book--a small octavo volume of more than four hundred pages--is erroneously attributed to his brother-in-law, and the Countess Russell is of the same opinion. Mr. Elliot cites inaccuracies in the book, and adds that the places visited in Scotland do not correspond with those which Lord John had seen when he went thither in company with the Duke and Duchess in 1807; and there is no evidence that he made another pilgrimage north of the Tweed between that date and the appearance of the book. He adds that his father took the trouble to collect everything which was written by Lord John, and the book is certainly not in the library at Minto. Moreover, Mr. Elliot is confident that either Lord Minto or Lord John himself assured him that he might dismiss the idea of the supposed authorship. After his final retirement from office, Lord John published, in 1868, three letters to Mr. Chichester Fortescue on 'The State of Ireland,' and this was followed by a contribution to ecclesiastical history in the shape of a volume of essays on 'The Rise and Progress of the Christian Religion in the West of Europe to the Council of Trent.' The leisure of his closing years was, however, chiefly devoted to the preparation, with valuable introductions, of selections from his own 'Speeches and Despatches;' and this, in turn, was followed, after an interval of five years, by a work entitled 'Recollections and Suggestions, 1813-1873,' which appeared as late as 1875, and which was of singular personal interest as well as of historical importance. It bears on the title-page two lines from Dryden, which were often on Lord John's lips in his closing years: Not Heaven itself upon the past has power, But what has been has been, and I have had my hour. [Sidenote: A RETROSPECT] The old statesman's once tenacious memory was failing when he wrote the book, and there is little evidence of literary arrangement in its contents. If, however, Lord John did not always escape inaccuracy of statement or laboured discursiveness of style, the value not only of his political reminiscences, but also of his shrewd and often pithily expressed verdicts on men and movements, is unquestionable, and, on the whole, the vigour of the book is as remarkable as its noble candour. Mr. Kinglake once declared that 'Lord John Russell wrote so naturally that it recalled the very sound of his voice;' and half the charm of his 'Recollections and Suggestions' consists in the artlessness of a record which will always rank with the original materials of history, between the year in which Wellington fought the battle of Vittoria and that in which, just sixty years later, Napoleon III. died in exile at Chislehurst. In speaking of his own career, Lord Russell, writing at the age of eighty-one, uses words which are not less manly than modest: 'I can only rejoice that I have been allowed to have my share in the task accomplished in the half-century which has elapsed from 1819 to 1869. My capacity, I always felt, was very inferior to that of the men who have attained in past times the foremost place in our Parliament and in the councils of our Sovereign. I have committed many errors, some of them very gross blunders. But the generous people of England are always forbearing and forgiving to those statesmen who have the good of their country at heart. Like my betters, I have been misrepresented and slandered by those who know nothing of me; but I have been more than compensated by the confidence and the friendship of the best men of my own political connection, and by the regard and favourable interpretation of my motives, which I have heard expressed by my generous opponents, from the days of Lord Castlereagh to these of Mr. Disraeli.' There were few questions in which Lord John Russell was more keenly interested from youth to age than that of National Education. As a boy he had met Joseph Lancaster, during a visit of that far-seeing and practical friend of poor children to Woburn, and the impression which the humble Quaker philanthropist made on the Duke of Bedford's quick-witted as well as kind-hearted son was retained, as one of his latest speeches show, to the close of life. At the opening of the new British Schools in Richmond in the summer of 1867, Lord John referred to his father's association with Joseph Lancaster, and added: 'In this way I naturally became initiated into a desire for promoting schools for the working classes, and I must say, from that time to this I never changed my mind upon the subject. I think it is absolutely necessary our schools should not merely be secular, but that they should be provided with religious teaching, and that religious teaching ought not to be sectarian. There will be plenty of time, when these children go to church or chapel, that they should learn either that particular form of doctrine their parents follow or adopt one more consistent with their conscientious feelings; but I think, while they are young boys and girls at school, it ought to be sufficient for them to know what Christ taught, and what the apostles taught; and from those lessons and precepts they may guide their conduct in life.' Lord John put his hand to the plough in the day of small things, and, through good and through evil report, from the days of Lancaster, Bell, and Brougham, to those of Mr. Forster and the great measure of 1870, he never withdrew from a task which lay always near to his heart. It is difficult to believe that at the beginning of the present century there were less than three thousand four hundred schools of all descriptions in the whole of England, or that when the reign of George III. was closing one-half of the children of the nation still ran wild without the least pretence of education. At a still later period the marriage statistics revealed the fact that one-third of the men and one-half of the women were unable to sign the register. The social elevation of the people, so ran the miserable plea of those who assuredly were not given to change, was fraught with peril to the State. Hodge, it was urged, ought to be content to take both the Law and the Commandments from his betters, since a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. As for the noisy, insolent operatives and artisans of the great manufacturing towns, was there not for them the strong hand of authority, and, if they grew too obstreperous, the uplifted sabre of the military as at Peterloo? It was all very well, however, to extol the virtues of patience, contentment, and obedience, but the sense of wrong and of defiance rankled in the masses, and with it--in a dull and confused manner--the sense of power. [Sidenote: THE AWAKENING OF THE PEOPLE] The Reform Bill of 1832 mocked in many directions the hopes of the people, but it at least marked a great social as well as a great political departure, and with it came the dawn of a new day to modern England. As the light broadened, the vision of poets and patriots began to be realised in practical improvements, which came home to men's business and bosom; the standard of intelligence rose, and with it freedom of thought, and the, sometimes passionate, but more often long-suffering demand for political, social, and economic concessions to justice. It was long before the privileged classes began to recognise, except in platform heroics, that it was high time to awake out of sleep and to 'educate our masters;' but the work began when Lord Althorp persuaded the House of Commons to vote a modest sum for the erection of school buildings in England; and that grant of 20,000_l._ in 1832 was the 'handful of corn on the top of the mountains' which has brought about the golden harvest of to-day. The history of the movement does not, of course, fall within the province of these pages, though Lord John Russell's name is associated with it in an honourable and emphatic sense. The formation, chiefly at his instance, in 1839 of a Council of Education paved the way for the existing system of elementary education, and lifted the whole problem to the front rank of national affairs. [Sidenote: POPULAR EDUCATION] He was the first Prime Minister of England to carry a measure which made it possible to secure trained teachers for elementary schools; and his successful effort in 1847 to 'diminish the empire of ignorance,' as he styled it, was one of the events in his public life on which he looked back in after years with the most satisfaction. During the session of 1856 Lord John brought forward in the House of Commons a bold scheme of National Education. He contended that out of four million children of school age only one-half were receiving instruction, whilst not more than one-eighth were attending schools which were subject to inspection. The vast majority were to be found in schools where the standard of education, if not altogether an unknown quantity, was deplorably low. He proposed that the number of inspectors should be increased, and that a rate should be levied by the local authorities for supplying adequate instruction in places where it was unsatisfactory. He contended that the country should be mapped out in school districts, and that the managers should have the power to make provision for religious instruction, and, at the same time, should allow the parents of the children a voice in the matter. Prejudices ecclesiastical and social blocked the way, however, and Lord John was compelled to abandon the scheme, which suggested, and to a large extent anticipated Mr. Forster's far-reaching measure, which in 1870 met with a better fate, and linked the principles of local authority and central supervision in the harmonious working of public education. When the victory was almost won Mr. Forster, with characteristic kindliness, wrote to the old statesman who had laboured for the people's cause in years of supreme discouragement:--'As regards universal compulsory education, I believe we shall soon complete the building. It is hard to see how there would have been a building to complete, if you had not, with great labour and in great difficulty, dug the foundations in 1839.' Happily Lord John lived to witness the crowning of the edifice by the Gladstone Administration. CHAPTER XIV COMING BACK TO POWER 1857-1861 Lord John as an Independent Member--His chance in the City--The Indian Mutiny--Orsini's attempt on the life of Napoleon--The Conspiracy Bill--Lord John and the Jewish Relief Act--Palmerston in power--Lord John at the Foreign Office--Cobden and Bright--Quits the Commons with a Peerage. LORD JOHN came prominently to the front in public affairs in the brief session of 1857, which ended in Lord Palmerston's appeal to the country. He spoke against the Government during the discussions in the House of Commons on the conduct of the Persian War, and he exercised his independence in other directions. Even shrewd and well-informed observers were curiously oblivious, for the moment, of the signs of the times, for Greville wrote on February 27: 'Nobody cares any longer for John Russell, everybody detests Gladstone; Disraeli has no influence in the country, and a very doubtful position with his own party.' Yet scarcely more than a fortnight later this cynical, but frank scribe added: 'Some think a reaction in favour of John Russell has begun. He stands for the City, and is in very good spirits, though his chances of success do not look bright; but he is a gallant little fellow, likes to face danger, and comes out well in times of difficulty.' Between these two statements the unexpected had happened. Cobden had brought forward a motion censuring the conduct of the Government in the affair of the lorcha, 'Arrow,' at Canton, and the three statesmen on whom Greville had contemptuously pronounced judgment--Russell, Gladstone, and Disraeli--had supported the Manchester school, with the result that the Government, on March 4, suffered defeat by a majority of sixteen votes. Parliament was dissolved in the course of the month, and the General Election brought Lord Palmerston back to power, pledged to nothing unless it was a spirited foreign policy. [Sidenote: THE CITY FIGHTS SHY] The personal ascendency of Lord Palmerston, whom Disraeli cleverly styled the Tory chief of a Radical Cabinet, carried the election, for there was a good deal of truth in the assertion that nobody cared a straw for his colleagues. The Peace party suffered defeat at the polls, and, amongst others, Cobden himself was turned out at Huddersfield, and Bright and Milner Gibson were his companions in misfortune at Manchester. A vigorous attempt was made to overthrow Lord John in the City, and his timid friends in the neighbourhood of Lombard Street and the Exchange implored him not to run the risk of a contested election. He was assured in so many words, states Lady Russell, that he had as much chance of being elected Pope as of being elected member for the City; and the statement roused his mettle. He was pitted against a candidate from Northampton, and the latter was brought forward with the powerful support of the Registration Association of the City of London, and in a fashion which was the reverse of complimentary to the old statesman. Lord John was equal to the occasion, and was by no means inclined to throw up the sponge. He went down to the City, and delivered not merely a vigorous, but vivacious speech, and in the course of it he said, with a jocularity which was worthy of Lord Palmerston himself: 'If a gentleman were disposed to part with his butler, his coachman, or his gamekeeper, or if a merchant were disposed to part with an old servant, a warehouseman, a clerk, or even a porter, he would say to him, "John--(laughter)--I think your faculties are somewhat decayed; you are growing old, you have made several mistakes, and I think of putting a young man from Northampton in your place." (Laughter and cheers.) I think a gentleman would behave in that way to his servant, and thereby give John an opportunity of answering that he thought his faculties were not so much decayed, and that he was able to go on, at all events, some five or six years longer. That opportunity was not given to me. The question was decided in my absence, without any intimation to me; and I come now to ask you and the citizens of London to reverse that decision.' He was taken at his word, and the rival candidate from Northampton was duly sent to the neighbouring borough of Coventry. The summer of 1857 was darkened in England by tidings of the Indian Mutiny and of the terrible massacre at Cawnpore. In face of the disaster Lord John not merely gave his hearty support to the Government, but delivered an energetic protest against the attack of the Opposition at such a crisis, and moved an address assuring the Crown of the support of Parliament, which was carried, in spite of Disraeli, without a division. At the same time Lord John in confidential intercourse made it plain that he recognised to the full extent the need of reform in the administration of India, and he did not hesitate to intimate that, in his view, the East India Company was no longer equal to the strain of so great a responsibility. He brought no railing accusations against the Company, but, on the contrary, declared that it must be admitted they had 'conducted their affairs in a wonderful manner, falling into errors that were natural, but displaying merits of a high order. The real ground for change is that the machine is worn out, and, as a manufacturer changes an excellent engine of Watt and Boulton made fifty years ago for a new engine with modern improvements, so it becomes us to find a new machine for the government of India.' [Sidenote: THE ORSINI PLOT] Before the upheaval in India had spent its force fresh difficulties overtook Lord Palmerston's Government. Count Orsini, strong in the conviction that Napoleon III. was the great barrier to the progress of revolution in Italy, determined to rid his countrymen of the man who, beyond all others, seemed bent on thwarting the national aspirations. With other conspirators, he threw three bombs on the night of January 14, 1858, at the carriage of the Emperor and Empress as they were proceeding to the Opera, and, though they escaped unhurt, ten persons were killed and many wounded. The bombs had been manufactured in England, and Orsini--who was captured and executed--had arranged the dastardly outrage in London, and the consequence was a fierce outbreak of indignation on the other side of the Channel. Lord Palmerston, prompted by the French Government, which demanded protection from the machinations of political refugees, brought forward a Conspiracy Bill. The feeling of the country, already hostile to such a measure, grew pronounced when the French army, not content with congratulating the Emperor on his escape, proceeded to refer to England in insulting, and even threatening, terms. Lord John, on high constitutional grounds, protested against the introduction of the measure, and declared that he was determined not to share in such 'shame and humiliation.' The Government were defeated on the Conspiracy Bill, on February 19, by nineteen votes. Amongst the eighty-four Liberals in the majority occur the names, not merely of Lord John Russell and Sir James Graham, but Mr. Cardwell and Mr. Gladstone. Lord Palmerston promptly resigned, and Lord Derby came into office. Disraeli, as Chancellor of the Exchequer and leader of the House of Commons, proceeded with characteristic audacity and a light heart to educate the new Conservative Party in the art of dishing the Whigs. [Sidenote: THE JEWISH RELIEF ACT] The new Ministry was short-lived. Lord Derby was in advance of his party, and old-fashioned Tories listened with alarm to the programme of work which he set before them. For the moment Lord John was not eager for office, and he declared that the 'new Ministers ought not to be recklessly or prematurely opposed.' He added that he would not sanction any cabal among the Liberal party, and that he had no intention whatever of leading an alliance of Radicals and Peelites. Impressed with the magnitude of the issues at stake, he helped Lord Derby to pass the new India Bill, which handed the government of that country over to the Crown. He held that the question was too great to be made a battle-field of party, but thorough-paced adherents of Lord Palmerston did not conceal their indignation at such independent action. Lord John believed at the moment that it was right for him to throw his influence into the scale, and therefore he was indifferent to the passing clamour. The subsequent history of the English in India has amply justified the patriotic step which he took in scorn of party consequences. The Jewish Relief Act became law in 1858, and Lord John at length witnessed the triumph of a cause which he had brought again and again before Parliament since the General Election of 1847, when Baron Rothschild was returned as his colleague in the representation of the City. Scarcely any class of the community showed themselves more constantly mindful of his services on their behalf than the Jews. When one of them took an opportunity of thanking him for helping to free a once oppressed race from legal disabilities, Lord John replied: 'The object of my life has been not to benefit a race alone, but all nationalities that suffered under civil and religious disabilities.' He used to relate with evident appreciation the reply which Lord Lyndhurst once gave to a timid statesman who feared a possible Hebrew invasion of the woolsack. The man who was appointed four times to that exalted seat retorted: 'Well, I see no harm in that; Daniel would have made a good Lord Chancellor.' Everyone recognised that the Derby Administration was a mere stop-gap, and, as months passed on, its struggle for existence became somewhat ludicrous. They felt themselves to be a Ministry on sufferance, and, according to the gossip of the hour, their watchword was 'Anything for a quiet life.' There were rocks ahead, and at the beginning of the session of 1859 they stood revealed in Mr. Disraeli's extraordinary proposals for Reform, and in the war-cloud which was gathering rapidly over Europe in consequence of the quarrel between France and Austria about the affairs of Italy. Mr. Disraeli's Reform Bill taxed the allegiance of his party to the breaking point, and when its provisions were disclosed two of his colleagues resigned--Mr. Spencer Walpole the Home Office, and Mr. Henley the Board of Trade, rather than have part or lot in such a measure. There is no need here to describe in detail a scheme which was foredoomed by its fantastic character to failure. It confused great issues; it brought into play what Mr. Bright called fancy franchises; it did not lower the voting qualification in boroughs; its new property qualifications were of a retrograde character; and it left the working classes where it found them. It frightened staid Tories of the older school, and excited the ridicule, if not the indignation, of all who had seriously grappled with the problem. [Sidenote: LORD GRANVILLE'S IMPOSSIBLE TASK] The immediate effect was to unite all sections of the Liberal Party. Lord John led the attack, and did so on the broad ground that it did not go far enough; and on April 1, after protracted debate, the measure was defeated by a majority of thirty-nine votes in a House of six hundred and twenty-one members. Parliament was prorogued on April 19, and the country was thrown into the turmoil of a General Election. Lord John promptly appealed to his old constituents in the City, and in the course of a vigorous address handled the 'so-called Reform Bill' in no uncertain manner. He declared that amongst the numerous defects of the Bill 'one provision was conspicuous by its presence and another by its absence.' He had deemed it advisable on the second reading to take what seemed to be the 'most clear, manly, and direct' course, and that was the secret of his amendment. The House of Commons had mustered in full force, and the terms of the amendment had been carried. The result of the General Election was that three hundred and fifty Liberals and three hundred and two Conservatives were returned to Westminster. Parliament met on May 31, and Lord Hartington moved an amendment to the Address which amounted to an expression of want of confidence. The amendment was carried by a majority of thirteen on June 12, and Lord Derby's Administration came the same night to an end. The result of the division took both parties somewhat by surprise. The astonishment was heightened when her Majesty sent for Lord Granville, an action which, to say the least, was a left-handed compliment to old and distinguished advisers of the Crown. Happily, though the sovereign may in such high affairs of State propose, it is the country which must finally dispose, and Lord Granville swiftly found that in the exuberance of political youth he had accepted a hopeless commission. He therefore relinquished an impossible task, and the Queen sent for Lord Palmerston. [Sidenote: PALMERSTON'S MIXED MULTITUDE] In the earlier years of Lord John's retirement from office after the Vienna Conference his relations with some of his old colleagues, and more particularly with Lord Clarendon and Lord Palmerston, were somewhat strained. The blunders of the Derby Government, the jeopardy in India, the menacing condition of foreign politics, and, still more, the patriotism and right feeling of both men, gradually drew Palmerston and Russell into more intimate association, with the result that in the early summer of 1859 the frank intercourse of former years was renewed. More than twelve years had elapsed since Lord John had attained the highest rank possible to an English statesman. In the interval he had consented, under strong pressure from the most exalted quarters, to waive his claims by consenting to serve under Lord Aberdeen; and the outcome of that experiment had been humiliating to himself, as well as disastrous to the country. He might fairly have stood on his dignity--a fool's pedestal at the best, and one which Lord John was too sensible ever to mount--at the present juncture, and have declined to return to the responsibilities of office, except as Prime Minister. The leaders of the democracy, Mr. Bright and Mr. Cobden, were much more friendly to him than to Lord Palmerston. Apart from published records, Lady Russell's diary shows that at the beginning of this year Mr. Bright was in close communication with her husband. Lord John good-humouredly protested that Mr. Bright alarmed timid people by his speeches; whereupon the latter replied that he had been much misrepresented, and declared that he was more willing to be lieutenant than general in the approaching struggle for Reform. He explained his scheme, and Lord John found that it had much in common with his own, from which it differed only in degree, except on the question of the ballot. 'There has been a meeting between Bright and Lord John,' was Lord Houghton's comment, 'but I don't know that it has led to anything except a more temperate tone in Bright's last speeches.' Mr. Cobden, it is an open secret, would not have refused to serve under Lord John, but his hostility to Lord Palmerston's policy was too pronounced for him now to accept the offer of a seat in the new Cabinet. He assured Lord John that if he had been at the head of the Administration the result would have been different. Both Mr. Cobden and Mr. Bright felt that Lord Palmerston blocked the way to any adequate readjustment in home politics of the balance of power, and they were inspired by a settled distrust of his foreign policy. Lord John, on the other hand, though he might not move as swiftly as such popular leaders thought desirable, had still a name to conjure with, and was the consistent advocate, though on more cautious lines, of an extension of the franchise. Moreover, Lord John's attack on Palmerston's Government in regard to the conduct of the Chinese war, his vigorous protest against the Conspiracy Bill, and his frank sympathy with Mazzini's dream of a United Italy, helped to bring the old leader, in the long fight for civil and religious liberty, into vital touch with younger men of the stamp of Cobden, Bright, and Gladstone, of whom the people justly expected great things in the not distant future. Lord John knew, however, that the Liberal camp was full of politicians who were neither hot nor cold--men who had slipped into Parliament on easy terms, only to reveal the fact that their prejudices were many and their convictions few. They sheltered themselves under the great prestige of Lord Palmerston, and represented his policy of masterly inactivity, rather than the true sentiments of the nation. Lord Palmerston was as jaunty as ever; but all things are not possible even to the ablest man, at seventy-five. Although Lord John was not willing to serve under Lord Granville, who was his junior by more than a score of years, he saw his chance at the Foreign Office, and therefore consented to join the Administration of Lord Palmerston. In accepting office on such terms in the middle of June, he made it plain to Lord Palmerston that the importance of European affairs at the moment had induced him to throw in his lot with the new Ministry. The deadlock was brought to an end by Lord John's patriotic decision. Mr. Gladstone became Chancellor of the Exchequer, Lord Granville President of the Council; and amongst others in the Cabinet were Sir G. C. Lewis, Mr. Milner Gibson, Sir George Grey, and the Duke of Argyll. Though Cobden would not accept a place in the Government, he rendered it important service by negotiating the commercial treaty with France, which came into force at the beginning of 1860. Next to the abolition of the Corn Laws, which he more than any other man brought about, it was the great achievement of his career. Free Trade, by liberating commerce from the bondage under which it groaned, gave food to starving multitudes, redressed a flagrant and tyrannical abuse of power, shielded a kingdom from the throes of revolution, and added a new and magical impetus to material progress in every quarter of the globe. The commercial treaty with France, by establishing mercantile sympathy and intercourse between two of the most powerful nations of the world, carried forward the work which Free Trade had begun, and, by bringing into play community of interests, helped to give peace a sure foundation. Parliament met on January 24, and in the Speech from the Throne a Reform Bill was promised. It was brought forward by Lord John Russell on March 1--the twenty-ninth anniversary of a red-letter day in his life, the introduction of the first Reform Bill. He proposed to reduce the county franchise to 10_l._ qualification, and the borough to 6_l._; one member was to be taken from each borough with a population of less than seven thousand, and in this way twenty-five seats were obtained for redistribution. Political power was to be given where the people were congregated, and Lord John's scheme of re-distribution gave two seats to the West Riding, and one each to thirty other counties or divisions, and five to boroughs hitherto unrepresented. The claims of Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, and Leeds were recognised by the proposal to add another representative in each case; and the claims of culture were not forgotten, for a member was given to London University. Gallio-like, Lord Palmerston cared for none of these things, and he made no attempt to conceal his indifference. One-half of the Cabinet appear to have shared his distaste for the measure, and two or three of them regarded it with aversion. If Cobden or Bright had been in the Cabinet, affairs might have taken a different course; as it was, Lord John and Mr. Gladstone stood almost alone. The Radicals, though gaining ground in the country, were numerically weak in the House of Commons, and the measure fell to the ground between the opposition of the Tories and the faint praise with which it was damned by the Whigs. Even Lord John was forced to confess that the apathy of the country was undeniable. A more sweeping measure would have had a better chance, but so long as Lord Palmerston was at the head of affairs it was idle to expect it. Lord John recognised the inevitable after a succession of dreary debates, and the measure was withdrawn on June 11. Lord John's first important speech in the House of Commons was made in the year of Peterloo, when he brought forward, thirteen years before the Reform Bill of 1832 was passed, proposals for an extension of the franchise; and his last great speech in the House of Commons at least showed how unmerited was the taunt of 'finality,' for it sought to give the working classes a share in the government of the country. [Sidenote: ACCEPTS A PEERAGE] Early in the following year, Lord John was raised to the peerage as Earl Russell of Kingston-Russell and Viscount Amberley and Ardsalla. 'I cannot despatch,' wrote Mr. Gladstone, 'as I have just done, the Chiltern Hundreds for you, without expressing the strong feelings which even that formal act awakens. They are mixed, as well as strong; for I hope you will be repaid in repose, health, and the power of long-continuing service, for the heavy loss we suffer in the House of Commons. Although you may not hereafter have opportunities of adding to the personal debt I owe you, and of bringing it vividly before my mind by fresh acts of courage and kindness, I assure you, the recollection of it is already indelible.' Hitherto, Lord John--for the old name is the one under which his family and his friends still like to apply to him--had been a poor man; but the death, in the spring of this year, of his brother the Duke of Bedford, with whom, from youth to age, his intercourse had been most cordial, placed him in possession of the Ardsalla Estate, and, indeed, made possible his acceptance of the proffered earldom. Six months later, her Majesty conferred the Garter upon him, as a mark of her 'high approbation of long and distinguished services.' Lord John had almost reached the age of three score and ten when he entered the House of Lords. He had done his work in 'another place,' but he was destined to become once more First Minister of the Crown, and, as Mr. Froude put it, to carry his reputation at length off the scene unspotted by a single act which his biographers are called upon to palliate. CHAPTER XV UNITED ITALY AND THE DIS-UNITED STATES 1861-1865 Lord John at the Foreign Office--Austria and Italy--Victor Emmanuel and Mazzini--Cavour and Napoleon III.--Lord John's energetic protest--His sympathy with Garibaldi and the struggle for freedom--The gratitude of the Italians--Death of the Prince Consort--The 'Trent' affair--Lord John's remonstrance--The 'Alabama' difficulty--Lord Selborne's statement--The Cotton Famine. FOREIGN politics claimed Lord John's undivided attention throughout the four remaining years of the Palmerston Administration. It was well for the nation that a statesman of so much courage and self-reliance, cool sagacity, and wide experience, controlled the Foreign Office in years when wars and rumours of war prevailed alike in Europe and in America. He once declared that it had always been his aim to promote the cause of civil and religious liberty, not merely in England, but in other parts of the world, and events were now looming which were destined to justify such an assertion. It is not possible to enter at length into the complicated problems with which he had to deal during his tenure of the Foreign Office, but the broad principles which animated his policy can, in rough outline at least, be stated. It is well in this connection to fall back upon his own words: 'In my time very difficult questions arose. During the period I held the seals of the Foreign Office I had to discuss the question of the independence of Italy, of a treaty regarding Poland made by Lord Castlereagh, the treaty regarding Denmark made by Lord Malmesbury, the injuries done to England by the republic of Mexico, and, not to mention minor questions, the whole of the transactions arising out of the civil war in America, embittered as they were by the desire of a party in the United States to lay upon England the whole blame of the insurrection, the "irrepressible conflict" of their own fellow-citizens.' Both of these questions were far-reaching and crucial, and in his attitude towards Italy and America, when they were in the throes of revolution, Lord Russell's generous love of liberty and vigour of judgment alike stand revealed. Prince Metternich declared soon after the peace of 1815 that Italy was 'only a geographical expression.' The taunt was true at the time, but even then there was a young dreamer living who was destined to render it false. 'Great ideas,' declared Mazzini, 'create great nations,' and his whole career was devoted to the attempt to bring about a united Italy. The statesmanship of Cavour and the sword of Garibaldi were enlisted in the same sacred cause. The petty governments of the Peninsula grew suddenly impossible, and Italy was freed from native tyranny and foreign domination. Austria, not content with the possession of Lombardy, which was ceded to her by the treaty of 1815, had made her power felt in almost every direction, and even at Naples her authority prevailed. The Austrians were not merely an alien but a hated race, for they stood between the Italian people and their dream of national independence and unity, and native despotism could always count on their aid in quelling any outbreak of the revolutionary spirit. The governments of the country, Austria and the Vatican apart, were rendered contemptible by the character of its tyrannical, incapable, and superstitious rulers, but with the sway of such powers of darkness Sardinia presented a bright contrast. The hopes of patriotic Italians gathered around Victor Emmanuel II., who had fought gallantly at Novara in 1849, and who possessed more public spirit and common-sense than the majority of crowned heads. Victor Emmanuel ascended the throne of Sardinia at the age of twenty-eight, immediately after the crushing disaster which seemed hopelessly to have wrecked the cause of Italian independence. Although he believed, with Mazzini, that there was only room for two kinds of Italians in Italy, the friends and the enemies of Austria, he showed remarkable self-restraint, and adopted a policy of conciliation towards foreign Powers, whilst widening the liberties of his own subjects until all over the land Italians came to regard Sardinia with admiration, and to covet 'liberty as it was in Piedmont.' [Sidenote: COUNT CAVOUR] He gathered around him men who were in sympathy with modern ideas of liberty and progress. Amongst them was Count Cavour, a statesman destined to impress not Italy alone, but Europe, by his honesty of purpose, force of character, and practical sagacity. From 1852 to 1859, when he retired, rather than agree to the humiliating terms of the Treaty of Villafranca, Cavour was supreme in Sardinia. He found Sardinia crippled by defeat, and crushed with debt, the bitter bequest of the Austrian War; but his courage never faltered, and his capacity was equal to the strain. Victor Emmanuel gave him a free hand, and he used it for the consolidation of the kingdom. He repealed the duties on corn, reformed the tariff, and introduced measures of free trade. He encouraged public works, brought about the construction of railways and telegraphs, and advanced perceptibly popular education. He saw that if the nation was to gain her independence, and his sovereign become ruler of a united Italy, it was necessary to propitiate the Western Powers. In pursuance of such a policy, Cavour induced Piedmont to join the Allies in the Crimean War, and the Italian soldiers behaved with conspicuous bravery at the battle of Tchernaya. When the war closed Sardinia was becoming a power in Europe, and Cavour established his right to a seat at the Congress of Paris, where he made known the growing discontent in Italy with the temporal power of the Papacy. In the summer of 1858 Napoleon III. was taking the waters at Plombières, where also Count Cavour was on a visit. The Emperor's mood was leisured and cordial, and Cavour took the opportunity of bringing the Court of Turin into intimate but secret relations with that of the Tuileries. France was to come to the aid of Sardinia under certain conditions in the event of a war with Austria. Napoleon was not, of course, inclined to serve Victor Emmanuel for naught, and he therefore stipulated for Savoy and Nice. Cavour also strengthened the position of Sardinia by arranging a marriage between the Princess Clotilde, daughter of Victor Emmanuel, and the Emperor's cousin, Prince Napoleon. Alarmed at the military preparations in Sardinia, and the growth of the kingdom as a political power in Europe, Austria at the beginning of 1859 addressed an imperious demand for disarmament, which was met by Cavour by a curt refusal. The match had been put to the gunpowder and a fight for liberty took place. The campaign was short but decisive. The Austrian army crossed in force the Ticino, then hesitated and was lost. If they had acted promptly they might have crushed the troops of Piedmont, whom they greatly outnumbered, before the soldiers of France could cross the Alps. The battle of Magenta, and the still more deadly struggle at Solferino between Austria and the Allies, decided the issue, and by the beginning of July Napoleon, for the moment, was master of the situation. [Sidenote: VILLAFRANCA] The French Emperor, with characteristic duplicity, had only half revealed his hand in those confidential talks at Plombières. Italy was the cradle of his race, and he too wished to create, if not a King of Rome, a federation of small States ruled by princes of his own blood. The public rejoicings at Florence, Parma, Modena, and Bologna, and the ardent expression of the populace at such centres for union with Sardinia, made the Emperor wince, and showed him that it was impossible, even with French bayonets, to crush the aspirations of a nation. Napoleon met Francis Joseph at Villafranca, and the preliminaries of peace were arranged on July 11 in a high-handed fashion, and without even the presence of Victor Emmanuel. Lombardy was ceded to Sardinia, though Austria was allowed to keep Venetia and the fortress of Mantua. France afterwards took Nice and Savoy; and the Grand Duke of Tuscany and the Duke of Modena were restored to power. The Treaty of Zürich ratified these terms in the month of November. Meanwhile it was officially announced that the Emperor of Austria and the Emperor of the French would 'favour the creation of an Italian Confederation under the honorary presidency of the Holy Father.' The Countess Martinengo Cesaresco, in a brilliant book published within the last few months on 'The Liberation of Italy,' in describing Lord John Russell's opposition to the terms of peace at Villafranca, and the vigorous protest which, as Foreign Minister, he made on behalf of England, says: 'It was a happy circumstance for Italy that her unity had no better friends than in the English Government during those difficult years. Cavour's words, soon after Villafranca, "It is England's turn now," were not belied.'[39] With Lord John at the Foreign Office, England rose to the occasion. Napoleon III. wished to make a cat's-paw of this country, and was sanguine enough to believe that Her Majesty's Government would take the proposed Italian Confederation under its wing. Lord Palmerston, Mr. Gladstone, and Lord John Russell, were not, however, the men to bow to his behests, and the latter in particular could scarcely conceal his contempt for the scheme of the two emperors. 'We are asked to propose a partition of the peoples of Italy,' he exclaimed, 'as if we had the right to dispose of them.' [Sidenote: FRANCE AND AUSTRIA] Lord John contended that if Austria, by virtue of her presence on Italian soil, was a member of the suggested confederation, she, because of the Vatican, the King of Naples, and the two dukes, would virtually rule the roost. He wrote to the British Minister at Florence in favour of a frank expression on the part of the people of Tuscany of their own wishes in the matter, and declared in the House of Commons that he could have neither part nor lot with any attempt to deprive the people of Italy of their right to choose their own ruler. He protested against the presence in Italy of foreign troops, whether French or Austrian, and in despatches to Paris and Vienna he made the French and Austrian Governments aware that England was altogether opposed to any return to that 'system of foreign interference which for upwards of forty years has been the misfortune of Italy and the danger of Europe.' Lord John urged that France and Austria should agree not to employ armed intervention for the future in the affairs of Italy, unless called upon to do so by the unanimous voice of the five Great Powers of Europe. He further contended that Napoleon III. should arrange with Pius IX. for the evacuation of Rome by the troops of France. He protested in vain against the annexation of Savoy and Nice by France, which he regarded as altogether a retrograde movement. In March 1860, in a speech in the House of Commons, he declared that the course which the Emperor Napoleon had taken was of a kind to produce great distrust all over Europe. He regarded the annexation of Savoy, not merely as in itself an act of aggression, but as one which was likely to 'lead a nation so warlike as the French to call upon its Government from time to time to commit other acts of aggression.' England wished to live on the most friendly terms with France. It was necessary, however, for the nations of Europe to maintain peace, to respect not merely each others' rights, but each others' boundaries, and, above all, to restore, and not to disturb that 'commercial confidence which is the result of peace, which tends to peace, and which ultimately forms the happiness of nations.' When Napoleon patched up a peace with Francis Joseph, which practically ignored the aspirations of the Italian people, their indignation knew no bounds, and they determined to work out their own redemption. Garibaldi had already distinguished himself in the campaign which had culminated at Solferino, and he now took the field against the Bourbons in Naples and Sicily, whilst insurrections broke out in other parts of Italy. France suggested that England should help her in arresting Garibaldi's victorious march, but Lord John was too old a friend of freedom to respond to such a proposal. He held that the Neapolitan Government--the iniquities of which Mr. Gladstone had exposed in an outburst of righteous indignation in 1851--must be left to reap the consequences of 'misgovernment which had no parallel in all Europe.' Garibaldi, carried thither by the enthusiasm of humanity and the justice of his cause, entered Naples in triumph on September 7, 1860, the day after the ignominious flight of Francis II. Victor Emmanuel was proclaimed King of Italy two days later, and when he met the new Parliament of his widened realm at Turin he was able to declare: 'Our country is no more the Italy of the Romans, nor the Italy of the Middle Ages: it is no longer the field for every foreign ambition, it becomes henceforth the Italy of the Italians.' Lord John's part in the struggle did him infinite credit. He held resolutely to the view all through the crisis, and in the face of the censure of Austria, France, Prussia, and Russia, that the Italians were the best judges of their own interests, and that the Italian revolution was as justifiable as the English revolution of 1688. He declared that, far from censuring Victor Emmanuel and Count Cavour, her Majesty's Government preferred to turn its eyes to the 'gratifying prospect of a people building up the edifice of their liberties, and consolidating the work of their independence, amid the sympathies and good wishes of Europe.' Foreign Courts might bluster, protest, or sneer, but England was with her Foreign Minister; and 'Punch' summed up the verdict of the nation in generous words of doggerel verse: 'Well said, Johnny Russell! That latest despatch You have sent to Turin is exactly the thing; And again, my dear John, you come up to the scratch With a pluck that does credit to you and the Ring.' [Sidenote: ITALY'S GRATITUDE] The utmost enthusiasm prevailed in Italy when the terms of Lord John's despatch became known. Count Cavour and General Garibaldi vied with each other in emphatic acknowledgments, and Lord John was assured that he was 'blessed night and morning by twenty millions of Italians.' In the summer of 1864 Garibaldi visited England, and received a greater popular ovation in the streets of the metropolis than that which has been accorded to any crowned head in the Queen's reign. He went down to Pembroke Lodge to thank Lord John in person for the help which he had given to Italy in the hour of her greatest need. Lord John received a beautiful expression of the gratitude of the nation, in the shape of an exquisite marble statue by Carlo Romano, representing Young Italy holding in her outstretched arms a diadem, inscribed with the arms of its united States. During subsequent visits to Florence and San Remo he was received with demonstrations of popular respect, and at the latter place, shortly after his final retirement from office in 1866, he said, in reply to an address: 'I thank you with all my heart for the honour you have done me. I rejoice with you in seeing Italy free and independent, with a monarchical government and under a patriotic king. The Italian nation has all the elements of a prosperous political life, which had been wanting for many centuries. The union of religion, liberty, and civil order will increase the prosperity of this beautiful country.' [Sidenote: THE PRINCE CONSORT] A still more delicate problem of international policy, and one which naturally came much nearer home to English susceptibilities, arose in the autumn of 1861--a year which was rendered memorable on one side of the Atlantic by the outbreak of the Civil War, and on the other by the national sorrow over the unexpected death, at the early age of forty-two, of the Prince Consort. The latter event was not merely an overwhelming and irrevocable loss to the Queen, but in an emphatic sense a misfortune--it might almost be said a disaster--to the nation. It was not until the closing years of his life that the personal nobility and political sagacity of Prince Albert were fully recognised by the English people. Brought up in a small and narrow German Court, the Prince Consort in the early years of her Majesty's reign was somewhat formal in his manners and punctilious in his demands. The published records of the reign show that he was inclined to lean too much to the wisdom, which was not always 'profitable to direct,' of Baron Stockmar, a trusted adviser of the Court, of autocratic instincts and strong prejudices, who failed to understand either the genius of the English constitution or the temper of the English race. It is an open secret that the Prince Consort during the first decade of the reign was by no means popular, either with the classes or the masses. His position was a difficult one, for he was, in the words of one of the chief statesmen of the reign, at once the 'permanent Secretary and the permanent Prime Minister' of the Crown; and there were undoubtedly occasions when in both capacities he magnified his office. Even if the Great Exhibition of 1851 had been memorable for nothing else, it would have been noteworthy as the period which marked a new departure in the Prince's relations with all grades of her Majesty's subjects. It not only brought him into touch with the people, but it brought into view, as well as into play, his practical mastery of affairs, and also his enlightened sympathy with the progress in art and science, no less than in the commercial activities, of the nation. It was not, however, until the closing years of his life, when the dreary escapades of the Coalition Ministry were beginning to be forgotten, that the great qualities of the Prince Consort were appreciated to any adequate degree. From the close of the Crimean War to his untimely death, at the beginning of the Civil War in America, was unquestionably the happiest as well as the most influential period in a life which was at once sensitive and upright. It ought in common fairness to be added that the character of the Prince mellowed visibly during his later years, and that the formality of his earlier manner was exchanged for a more genial attitude towards those with whom he came in contact in the duties and society of the Court. Mr. Disraeli told Count Vitzthum that if the Prince Consort had outlived the 'old stagers' of political life with whom he was surrounded, he would have given to England--though with constitutional guarantees--the 'blessing of absolute government.' Although such a verdict palpably overshot the mark, it is significant in itself and worthy of record, since it points both to the strength and the limitations of an illustrious life. There are passages in Lady Russell's diary, of too personal and too sacred a character to quote, which reveal not only the poignant grief of the Queen, but the manner in which she turned instinctively in her burst of need to an old and trusted adviser of the Crown. High but artless tribute is paid in the same pages to the Queen's devotion to duty under the heart-breaking strain of a loss which overshadowed with sorrow every home in England, as well as the Palace at Windsor, at Christmas, 1861. [Sidenote: THE 'TRENT' AFFAIR] The last act of the Prince Consort of an official kind was to soften certain expressions in the interests of international peace and goodwill in the famous despatch which was sent by the English Government, at the beginning of December, to the British Ambassador at Washington, when a deadlock suddenly arose between England and the United States over the 'Trent' affair, and war seemed imminent. Hostilities had broken out between the North and the South in the previous July, and the opinion of England was sharply divided on the merits of the struggle. The bone of contention, to put the matter concisely, was the refusal of South Carolina and ten other States to submit to the authority of the Central Government of the Union. It was an old quarrel which had existed from the foundation of the American Commonwealth, for the individual States of the Union had always been jealous of any infringement of the right of self-government; but slavery was now the ostensible root of bitterness, and matters were complicated by radical divergences on the subject of tariffs. The Southern States took a high hand against the Federal Government. They seceded from the Union, and announced their independence to the world at large, under the style and title of the Confederate States of America. Flushed by the opening victory which followed the first appeal to the sword, the Confederate Government determined to send envoys to Europe. Messrs. Mason and Slidell embarked at Havana, at the beginning of November, on board the British mail-steamer 'Trent,' as representatives to the English and French Governments respectively. The 'Trent' was stopped on her voyage by the American man-of-war 'San Jacinto,' and Captain Wilkes, her commander, demanded that the Confederate envoys and their secretaries should be handed over to his charge. The captain of the 'Trent' made a vigorous protest against this sort of armed intervention, but he had no alternative except to yield, and Messrs. Mason and Slidell were carried back to America and lodged in a military fortress. The 'Trent' arrived at Southampton on November 27, and when her captain told his story indignation knew no bounds. The law of nations had been set at defiance, and the right of asylum under the British flag had been violated. The clamour of the Press and of the streets grew suddenly fierce and strong, and the universal feeling of the moment found expression in the phrase, 'Bear this, bear all.' Lord John Russell at once addressed a vigorous remonstrance to the American Government on an 'act of violence which was an affront to the British flag and a violation of international law.' He made it plain that her Majesty's Ministers were not prepared to allow such an insult to pass without 'full reparation;' but, at the same time, he refused to believe that it could be the 'deliberate intention' of the Government of the United States to force upon them so grave a question. He therefore expressed the hope that the United States of its own accord would at once 'offer to the British Government such redress as alone could satisfy the British nation.' He added that this must take the form of the liberation of the envoys and their secretaries, in order that they might again be placed under British protection, and that such an act must be accompanied by a suitable apology. President Lincoln and Mr. Seward reluctantly gave way; but their decision was hastened by the war preparations in England, and the protests which France, Austria, Prussia, Russia, and Italy made against so wanton an outrage. The war took its course, and it seemed on more than one occasion as if England must take sides in a struggle which, it soon became apparent, was to be fought out to the bitter end. Thoughts of mediation had occurred, both to Lord Palmerston and Lord Russell, and in 1862 they contemplated the thankless task of mediation, but the project was abandoned as at least premature. Feeling ran high in England over the discussion as to whether the 'great domestic institution' of Negro slavery really lay at the basis of the struggle or not, and public opinion was split into hostile camps. Sympathy with the North was alienated by the marked honours which were paid to the commander of the 'San Jacinto;' and the bravery with which the South fought, for what many people persisted in declaring was merely the right of self-government, kindled enthusiasm for those who struggled against overwhelming odds. In the summer of 1862 a new difficulty arose, and the maintenance of international peace was once more imperilled. The blockade of the Southern ports crippled the Confederate Government, and an armed cruiser was built on the Mersey to wage a war of retaliation on the high seas against the merchant ships of the North. When the 'Alabama' was almost ready the Federal Government got wind of the matter, and formally protested against the ship being allowed to put to sea. [Sidenote: THE 'ALABAMA' DIFFICULTY] The Cabinet submitted the question to the law officers of the Crown; delay followed, and whilst the matter was still under deliberation the 'Alabama,' on the pretext of a trial trip, escaped, and began at once her remarkable career of destruction. The late Lord Selborne, who at that time was Solicitor-General, wrote for these pages the following detailed and, of course, authoritative statement of what transpired, and the facts which he recounts show that Lord Russell, in spite of the generous admission which he himself made in his 'Recollections,' was in reality not responsible for a blunder which almost led to war, and which when submitted to arbitration at Geneva cost England--besides much irritation--the sum of 3,000,000_l._ 'It was when Lord Russell was Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, during the American Civil War, and when I was one of the Law Officers of the Crown, that I first became personally well acquainted with him; and from that time he honoured me with his friendship. In this way I had good opportunities of knowledge on some subjects as to which he has been at times misrepresented or misunderstood; and perhaps I may best do honour to his memory by referring to those subjects. 'There can be no idea more unfounded than that which would call in question his friendliness towards the United States during their contest with the Confederates. But he had a strong sense, both of the duty of strictly observing all obligations incumbent on this country as a neutral Power by the law of nations, and of the danger of innovating upon them by the admission of claims on either side, not warranted by that law as generally understood, and with which, in the then state both of our own and of the American Neutrality Laws, it would have been practically impossible for the Government of a free country to comply. As a general principle, the freedom of commercial dealings between the citizens of a neutral State and belligerents, subject to the right of belligerents to protect themselves against breach of blockade or carriage of contraband, had been universally allowed, and by no nation more insisted on than by the United States. Lord Russell did not think it safe or expedient to endeavour to restrict that liberty. When asked to put in force Acts of Parliament made for the better protection of our neutrality, he took, with promptitude and with absolute good faith, such measures as it would have been proper to take in any case in which our own public interests were concerned; but he thought (and in my judgment he was entirely right in thinking) that it was not the duty of a British Minister, seeking to enforce British statute law, to add to other risks of failure that of unconstitutional disregard of the securities for the liberty of the subject, provided by the system on which British laws generally are administered and enforced. 'It was not through any fault or negligence of Lord Russell that the ship "Alabama," or any other vessel equipped for the war service of the Confederate States, left the ports of this country. The course taken by him in all those cases was the same. He considered that some _prima facie_ evidence of an actual or intended violation either of our own law or of the law of nations (such as might be produced in a court of justice) was necessary, and that in judging whether there was such evidence he ought to be guided by the advice of the Law Officers of the Crown. To obtain such evidence, he did not neglect any means which the law placed in his power. If in any case the Board of Customs may have been ill-advised, and omitted (as Sir Alexander Cockburn thought) to take precautions which they ought otherwise to have taken, this was no fault of Lord Russell; still less was he chargeable with the delay of three or four days which took place in the case of the "Alabama," in consequence of the illness of the Queen's Advocate, Sir John Harding; without which that vessel might never have gone to sea. [Sidenote: LORD SELBORNE'S EXPLANATION] 'Lord Russell stated to Mr. Adams, immediately afterwards, that Sir John Harding's illness was the cause of that delay. No one then called that statement in question, which could not have been made without good foundation. But after a lapse of many years, when almost everybody who had known the exact circumstances was dead, stories inconsistent with it obtained currency. Of these, the most remarkable was published in 1881, in a book widely read, the "Reminiscences" of the late Thomas Mozley. The writer appears to have persuaded himself (certainly without any foundation in fact) that "there was not one of her Majesty's Ministers who was not ready to jump out of his skin for joy when he heard of the escape of the 'Alabama.'"[40] He said that he met Sir John Harding "shortly after the 'Alabama' had got away," and was told by him that he (Sir John) had been expecting a communication from Government anxiously the whole week before, that the expectation had unsettled and unnerved him for other business, and that he had stayed in chambers rather later than usual on Saturday for the chance of hearing at last from them. He had then gone to his house in the country. Returning on Monday, when he was engaged to appear in court, he found a large bundle of documents in a big envelope, without even an accompanying note, that had been dropped into the letter-box on Saturday evening. To all appearance, every letter and every remonstrance and every affidavit, as fast as it arrived from Liverpool, had been piled in a pigeon-hole till four or five o'clock on Saturday, when the Minister, on taking his own departure for the country, had directed a clerk to tie up the whole heap and carry it to Doctors' Commons. 'The facts are, that in the earlier stage of that business, before July 23, the Attorney- and Solicitor-General only were consulted, and Sir John Harding knew nothing at all about it. No part of the statement said by Mr. Mozley to have been made to him could possibly be true; because during the whole time in question Sir John Harding was under care for unsoundness of mind, from which he never even partially recovered, and which prevented him from attending to any kind of business, or going into court, or to his chambers, or to his country house. He was in that condition on July 23, 1862 (Wednesday, not Saturday) when the depositions on which the question of the detention of the "Alabama" turned were received at the Foreign Office. Lord Russell, not knowing that he was ill, and thinking it desirable, from the importance of the matter, to have the opinion of all the three Law Officers (of whom the Queen's Advocate was then senior in rank), sent them on the same day, with the usual covering letter, for that opinion; and they must have been delivered by the messenger, in the ordinary course, at Sir John Harding's house or chambers. There they remained till, the delay causing inquiry, they were recovered and sent to the Attorney-General, who received them on Monday, the 28th, and lost no time in holding a consultation with the Solicitor-General. Their opinion, advising that the ship should be stopped, was in Lord Russell's hands early the next morning; and he sent an order by telegraph to Liverpool to stop her; but before it could be executed she had gone to sea. 'Some of the facts relating to Sir John Harding's illness remained, until lately, in more or less obscurity, and Mr. Mozley's was not the only erroneous version of them which got abroad. One such version having been mentioned, as if authentic, in a debate in the House of Commons on March 17, 1893, I wrote to the "Times" to correct it; and in confirmation of my statement the gentleman who had been Sir John Harding's medical attendant in July 1862 came forward, and by reference to his diary, kept at the time, placed the facts and dates beyond future controversy. [Sidenote: THE QUESTION OF ARBITRATION] 'In the diplomatic correspondence, as to the "Alabama" and other subjects of complaint by the United States, Lord Russell stood firmly upon the ground that Great Britain had not failed in any duty of neutrality; and Lord Lyons, the sagacious Minister who then represented this country at Washington, thought there would be much more danger to our future relations with the United States in any departure from that position than in strict and steady adherence to it. But no sooner was the war ended than new currents of opinion set in. In a debate on the subject in the House of Commons on March 6, 1868, Lord Stanley (then Foreign Secretary), who had never been of the same mind about it with his less cautious friends, said that a "tendency might be detected to be almost too ready to accuse ourselves of faults we had not committed, and to assume that on every doubtful point the decision ought to be against us." The sequel is well known. The Conservative Government consented to refer to arbitration, not all the questions raised by the Government of the United States, but those arising out of the ships alleged to have been equipped or to have received augmentation of force within the British dominions for the war service of the Confederate States; and from that concession no other Government could recede. For a long time the Government or the Senate of the United States objected to any reference so limited, and to the last they refused to go into an open arbitration. They made it a condition, that new Rules should be formulated, not only for future observance, but for retrospective application to their own claims. This condition, unprecedented and open in principle to the gravest objections, was accepted for the sake of peace with a nation so nearly allied to us; not, however, without an express declaration, on the face of the Treaty of Washington, that the British Government could not assent to those new Rules as a statement of principles of international law which were in force when the claims arose. 'While the Commissioners at Washington were engaged in their deliberations, I was in frequent communication both with Lord Granville and other members of the Cabinet, and also with Lord Russell, who could not be brought to approve of that way of settling the controversy. He had an invincible repugnance to the reference of any questions affecting the honour and good faith of this country, or its internal administration, to foreign arbitrators; and he thought those questions would not be excluded by the proposed arrangement. He felt no confidence that any reciprocal advantages to this country would be obtained from the new Rules. Their only effect, in his view, would be to send us handicapped into the arbitration. He did not believe that the United States would follow the example which we had set, by strengthening their Neutrality Laws; or that they would be able, unless they did so, to prevent violations of the Rules by their citizens in any future war in which we might be belligerent and they neutral, any more than they had been able in former times to prevent the equipment of ships within their territory against Spain and Portugal. It was not without difficulty that he restrained himself from giving public expression to those views; but, from generous and patriotic motives, he did so. The sequel is not likely to have convinced him that his apprehensions were groundless. The character of the "Case" presented on the part of the United States, with the "indirect claims," and the arguments used to support them, would have prevented the arbitration from proceeding at all, but for action of an unusual kind taken by the arbitrators. In such of their decisions as were adverse to this country, the arbitrators founded themselves entirely upon the new Rules, without any reference to general international law or historical precedents; and the United States have done nothing, down to this day, to strengthen their Neutrality Laws, though certainly requiring it, at least as much as ours did before 1870.' [Sidenote: THE COTTON FAMINE] Lord Russell then held resolutely to the view that her Majesty's Government had steadily endeavoured to maintain a policy of strict neutrality, and so long as he was in power at the Foreign Office, or at the Treasury, the demands of the United States for compensation were ignored. Meanwhile, there arose a mighty famine in Lancashire through the failure of the cotton supply, and 800,000 operatives were thrown, through no fault of their own, on the charity of the nation, which rose splendidly to meet the occasion. All classes of the community were bound more closely together in the gentle task of philanthropy, as well as in admiration of the uncomplaining heroism with which privation was met by the suffering workpeople. FOOTNOTES: [39] _The Liberation of Italy_, 1815-1870, by the Countess Evelyn Martinengo Cesaresco (Seeley and Co. 1895), p. 252. [40] Second edition, 1892, chap. xcii. CHAPTER XVI SECOND PREMIERSHIP 1865-1866 The Polish Revolt--Bismarck's bid for power--The Schleswig-Holstein difficulty--Death of Lord Palmerston--The Queen summons Lord John--The second Russell Administration--Lord John's tribute to Palmerston--Mr. Gladstone introduces Reform--The 'Cave of Adullam'--Defeat of the Russell Government--The people accept Lowe's challenge--The feeling in the country. LORD JOHN, in his conduct of foreign affairs, acted with generosity towards Italy and with mingled firmness and patience towards America. It was a fortunate circumstance, for the great interests at stake on both sides of the Atlantic, that a man of so much judgment and right feeling was in power at a moment when prejudice was strong and passion ran high. Grote, who was by no means consumed with enthusiasm for the Palmerston Government, did not conceal his admiration of Lord John's sagacity at this crisis. 'The perfect neutrality of England in the destructive civil war now raging in America appears to me almost a phenomenon in political history. No such forbearance has been shown during the political history of the last two centuries. It is the single case in which the English Government and public, generally so meddlesome, have displayed most prudent and commendable forbearance in spite of great temptations to the contrary.' Lord John had opinions, and the courage of them; but at the same time he showed himself fully alive to the fact that no greater calamity could possibly overtake the English-speaking race than a war between England and the United States. Europe was filled at the beginning of 1863 with tidings of a renewed Polish revolt. Russia provoked the outbreak by the stern measures which had been taken in the previous year to repress the growing discontent of the people. The conspiracy was too widespread and too deep-rooted for Alexander II. to deal with, except by concessions to national sentiment, which he was not prepared to make, and, therefore, he fell back on despotic use of power. All able-bodied men suspected of revolutionary tendencies were marked out for service in the Russian army, and in this way, in Lord John's words, the 'so-called conscription was turned into a proscription.' The lot was made to fall on all political suspects, who were to be condemned for life to follow the hated Russian flag. The result was not merely armed resistance, but civil war. Poland, in her struggle for liberty, was joined by Lithuania; but Prussia came to the help of the Czar, and the protests of England, France, and Austria were of no avail. Before the year ended the dreams of self-government in Poland, after months of bloodshed and cruelty, were again ruthlessly dispelled. [Sidenote: BISMARCK SHOWS HIS HAND] One diplomatic difficulty followed another in quick succession. Bismarck was beginning to move the pawns on the chess-board of Europe. He had conciliated Russia by taking sides with her against the Poles in spite of the attitude of London, Paris, and Vienna. He feared the spirit of insurrection would spread to the Poles in Prussia, and had no sympathy with the aspirations of oppressed nationalities. His policy was to make Prussia strong--if need be by 'blood and iron'--so that she might become mistress of Germany. The death of Frederick VII. of Denmark provoked a fresh crisis and revived in an acute form the question of succession to the duchies of Schleswig-Holstein. The Treaty of London in 1852 was supposed to have settled the question, and its terms had been accepted by Austria and Prussia. The integrity of Denmark was recognised, and Prince Christian of Glucksburg was accepted as heir-presumptive of the reigning king. The German Diet did not regard this arrangement as binding, and the feeling in the duchies themselves, especially in Holstein, was against the claims of Denmark. But the Hereditary Prince Frederick of Augustenburg disputed the right of Christian IX. to the Duchies, and Bismarck induced Austria to join Prussia in the occupation of the disputed territory. It is impossible to enter here into the merits of the quarrel, much less to describe the course of the struggle or the complicated diplomatic negotiations which grew out of it. Denmark undoubtedly imagined that the energetic protest of the English Government against her dismemberment would not end in mere words. The language used by both Lord Palmerston and Lord John Russell was of a kind to encourage the idea of the adoption, in the last extremity, of another policy than that of non-intervention. Bismarck, on the other hand, it has been said with truth, had taken up the cause of Schleswig-Holstein, not in the interest of its inhabitants, but in the interests of Germany, and by Germany he meant the Government of Berlin and the House of Hohenzollern. He represented not merely other ideas, but other methods than those which prevailed with statesmen who were old enough to recall the wars of Napoleon and the partition of Europe to which they gave rise. It must be admitted that England did not show to advantage in the Schleswig-Holstein difficulty, in spite of the soundness of her counsels; and Bismarck's triumph in the affair was as complete as the policy on which it was based was bold and adroit. Lord Palmerston and Lord John were embarrassed on the one hand by the apathy of Russia and France and on the other by the cautious, not to say timid, attitude of their own colleagues. 'As to Cabinets,' wrote Lord Palmerston, with dry humour, in reply to a note in which Lord John hinted that if the Prime Minister and himself had been given a free hand they could have kept Austria from war with Denmark, 'if we had had colleagues like those who sat in Pitt's Cabinet, such as Westmoreland and others, or such men as those who were with Peel, like Goulburn and Hardinge, you and I might have had our own way in most things. But when, as is now the case, able men fill every department, such men will have opinions and hold to them. Unfortunately, they are often too busy with their own department to follow up foreign questions so as to be fully masters of them, and their conclusions are generally on the timid side of what might be the best.'[41] [Sidenote: AS SCHOOLMASTER ABROAD] Lord John wrote to Foreign Courts--was Mr. Bagehot's shrewd criticism--much in the same manner as he was accustomed to speak in the House of Commons. In other words, he used great plainness of speech, and, because of the very desire to make his meaning clear, he, was occasionally indiscreetly explicit and even brusque. Sometimes it happened that the intelligent foreigner grew critical at Lord John's expense. Count Vitzthum, for example, laid stress on the fact that Lord John 'looked on the British Constitution as an inimitable masterpiece,' which less-favoured nations ought not only to admire but adopt, if they wished to advance and go forward in the direction of liberty, prosperity, and peace. There was just enough truth in such assertions to render them amusing, though not enough to give them a sting. There were times when Lord John was the 'stormy petrel' of foreign politics, but there never was a time when he ceased to labour in season and out for what he believed to be the honour of England. 'I do not believe that any English foreign statesman, who does his duty faithfully by his own countrymen in difficult circumstances, can escape the blame of foreign statesmen,' were his own words, and he assuredly came in for his full share of abuse in Europe. One of Lord John Russell's subordinates at the Foreign Office, well known and distinguished in the political life of to-day, declares that Lord John, like Lord Clarendon, was accustomed to write many drafts of despatches with his own hand, but as a rule did not go with equal minuteness into the detail of the work. It sometimes happened that he would take sudden resolutions without adequate consideration of the points involved; but he would always listen patiently to objections, and when convinced that he was wrong was perfectly willing to modify his opinion. In most cases, however, Lord John did not make up his mind without due reflection, and under such circumstances he showed no vacillation. No tidings from abroad, however startling or unpleasant, seemed able to disturb his equanimity. He was an extremely considerate chief, but, though always willing to listen to his subordinates, kept his own counsel and seldom took them much into his confidence. [Sidenote: COBDEN AND PALMERSTON] The year 1865 was rendered memorable both in England and America by the death of statesmen of the first rank. In the spring, that great master of reason and economic reform, Richard Cobden, died in London, after a few days' illness, in the prime of life; and almost before the nation realised the greatness of such a loss, tidings came across the Atlantic that President Abraham Lincoln had been assassinated at Washington, in the hour of triumph, by a cowardly fanatic. The summer in England was made restless by a General Election. Though Bright denounced Lord Palmerston, and Mr. Gladstone lost his seat at Oxford, to stand 'unmuzzled' a few days later before the electors of South-West Lancashire, the predicted Conservative reaction was not an accomplished fact. Lord Palmerston's ascendency in the country, though diminished, was still great, and the magic of his name carried the election. 'It is clear,' wrote Lord John to the plucky octogenarian Premier, when the latter, some time before the contest, made a fighting speech in the country, 'that your popularity is a plant of hardy growth and deep roots.' Quite suddenly, in the spring of 1865, Lord Palmerston began to look as old as his years, and as the summer slipped past, it became apparent that the buoyant elasticity of temperament had vanished. On October 18 the great Minister died in harness, and Lord John Russell, who was only eight years younger, was called to the helm. The two men, more than once in mid-career, had serious misunderstandings, and envious lips had done their best to widen their differences. It is pleasant to think now that Palmerston and Russell were on cordial and intimate terms during the critical six years, when the former held for the last time the post of First Minister of the Crown, and the latter was responsible for Foreign Affairs. It is true that they were not of one mind on the question of Parliamentary Reform; but Lord John, after 1860 at least, was content to waive that question, for he saw that the nation, as well as the Prime Minister, was opposed to a forward movement in that direction, and the strain of war abroad and famine at home hindered the calm discussion of constitutional problems. Lord Lyttelton used to say that Palmerston was regarded as a Whig because he belonged to Lord Grey's Government, and had always thrown in his lot with that statesman's political posterity. At the same time, Lord Lyttelton held--even as late as 1865--that a 'more genuine Conservative, especially in home affairs, it would not be easy to find.' Palmerston gave Lord John Russell his active support in the attitude which the latter took up at the Foreign Office on all the great questions which arose, sometimes in a sudden and dramatic form, at a period when the power of Napoleon III., in spite of theatrical display, was declining, and Bismarck was shaping with consummate skill the fortunes of Germany. [Sidenote: PRIME MINISTER] The day after Palmerston's death her Majesty wrote in the following terms to Lord John: 'The melancholy news of Lord Palmerston's death reached the Queen last night. This is another link with the past that is broken, and the Queen feels deeply in her desolate and isolated condition how, one by one, tried servants and advisers are taken from her.... The Queen can turn to no other than Lord Russell, an old and tried friend of hers, to undertake the arduous duties of Prime Minister, and to carry on the Government.' Such a command was met by Lord John with the response that he was willing to act if his colleagues were prepared to serve under him. Mr. Gladstone's position in the country and in the councils of the Liberal Party had been greatly strengthened by his rejection at Oxford, and by the subsequent boldness and fervour of his speeches in Lancashire. He forestalled Lord John's letter by offering, in a frank and generous spirit, to serve under the old Liberal leader. Mr. Gladstone declared that he was quite willing to take his chance under Lord John's 'banner,' and to continue his services as Chancellor of the Exchequer. This offer was of course accepted, and Mr. Gladstone also took Lord Palmerston's place as Leader of the House of Commons. Lord Cranworth became Lord Chancellor, Lord Clarendon took Lord John's place at the Foreign Office, the Duke of Argyll and Sir George Grey resumed their old positions as Lord Privy Seal and Home Secretary. After a short interval, Mr. Goschen and Lord Hartington were raised to Cabinet rank; while Mr. Forster, Lord Dufferin, and Mr. Stansfeld became respectively Under-Secretaries for the Colonies, War, and India; but Lord John, in spite of strong pressure, refused to admit Mr. Lowe to his Cabinet. At the Lord Mayor's banquet in November, Lord John took occasion to pay a warm tribute to Palmerston: 'It is a great loss indeed, because he was a man qualified to conduct the country successfully through all the vicissitudes of war and peace.' He declared that Lord Palmerston displayed resolution, resource, promptitude, and vigour in the conduct of foreign affairs, showed himself also able to maintain internal tranquillity, and, by extending commercial relationships, to give to the country the 'whole fruits of the blessings of peace.' He added that Lord Palmerston's heart never ceased to beat for the honour of England, and that his mind comprehended and his experience embraced the whole field which is covered by the interests of the nation. The new Premier made no secret of his conviction that, if the Ministry was to last, it must be either frankly Liberal or frankly Conservative. As he had the chief voice in the matter, and was bent on a new Reform Bill, it became, after certain changes had been effected, much more progressive than was possible under Palmerston. Parliament was opened on February 1, 1866, by the Queen in person, for the first time since the death of the Prince Consort, and the chief point of interest in the Speech from the Throne was the guarded promise of a Reform Bill. The attention of Parliament was to be called to information concerning the right of voting with a view to such improvements as might tend to strengthen our free institutions and conduce to the public welfare. Lord John determined to make haste slowly, for some of his colleagues were hardly inclined to make haste at all, since they shared Lord Palmerston's views on the subject and distrusted the Radical cry which had arisen since the industrial revolution. The Premier and Mr. Gladstone--for they were a kind of Committee of Two--were content for the moment to propose a revision of the franchise, and to leave in ambush for another session the vexed question involved in a redistribution of seats. 'It was decided,' states Lord John, 'that it would be best to separate the question of the franchise from that of the disfranchisement of boroughs. After much inquiry, we agreed to fix the suffrages of boroughs at an occupation of 7_l._ value.' [Sidenote: THE CAVE OF ADULLAM] The House of Commons was densely packed when Mr. Gladstone introduced the measure on March 12, but, in spite of his powers of exposition and infectious enthusiasm, the Government proposals fell undeniably flat. Broadly stated, they were as follows. The county franchise was to be dropped to 14_l._, and that of the borough, as already stated, to half that amount, whilst compound householders and lodgers paying 10_l._ a year were to possess votes. It was computed at the time that the measure would add four hundred thousand new voters to the existing lists, and that two hundred thousand of these would belong to what Lord John termed the 'best of the working classes.' Mr. Bright, and those whom he represented, not only in Birmingham, but also in every great city and town in the land, gave their support to the Government, on the principle that this was at least an 'honest' measure, and that half a loaf, moreover, was better than no bread. At the same time the country was not greatly stirred one way or another by the scheme, though it stirred to panic-stricken indignation men of the stamp of Mr. Lowe, Mr. Horsman, Lord Elcho, Earl Grosvenor, Lord Dunkellin, and other so-called, but very indifferent, Liberals, who had attached themselves to the party under Lord Palmerston's happy-go-lucky and easy auspices. These were the men who presently distinguished themselves, and extinguished the Russell Administration by their ridiculous fear of the democracy. They retired into what Mr. Bright termed the 'political cave of Adullam,' and, as Lord John said, the 'timid, the selfish, and those who were both selfish and timid' joined the sorry company. The Conservatives saw their opportunity, and, being human, took it. Lord Grosvenor brought forward an amendment calling attention to the omission of a redistribution scheme. A debate, which occupied eight nights, followed, and when it was in progress, Mr. Gladstone, in defending his own conduct as Leader of the House, incidentally paid an impressive tribute to the memorable and protracted services in the Commons of Lord John:-- 'If, sir, I had been the man who, at the very outset of his career, wellnigh half a century ago, had with an almost prophetic foresight fastened upon two great groups of questions, those great historic questions relating to the removal of civil disabilities for religious opinions and to Parliamentary Reform; if I had been the man who, having thus in his early youth, in the very first stage of his political career, fixed upon those questions and made them his own, then went on to prosecute them with sure and unflagging instinct until the triumph in each case had been achieved; if I had been the man whose name had been associated for forty years, and often in the very first place of eminence, with every element of beneficent legislation--in other words, had I been Earl Russell, then there might have been some temptation to pass into excess on the exercise of authority, and some excuse for the endeavour to apply to this House a pressure in itself unjustifiable. But, sir, I am not Earl Russell.' In the end, Lord Grosvenor's amendment was lost by a majority equal only to the fingers of one hand. Such an unmistakeable expression of opinion could not be disregarded, and the Government brought in a Redistribution of Seats Bill at the beginning of May. They proposed that thirty boroughs having a population of less than eight thousand should be deprived of one member, whilst nineteen other seats were obtained by joint representation in smaller boroughs. After running the gauntlet of much hostile criticism, the bill was read a second time, but the Government were forced to refer it and the franchise scheme to a committee, which was empowered to deal with both schemes. Lord Stanley, Mr. Ward Hunt, and Mr. Walpole assailed with successive motions, which were more or less narrowly rejected, various points in the Government proposals, and the opposition grew more and more stubborn. At length Lord Dunkellin (son of the Earl of Clanricarde) moved to substitute rating for rental in the boroughs; and the Government, in a House of six hundred and nineteen members, were defeated on June 18 by a majority of eleven. The excitement which met this announcement was extraordinary, and when it was followed next day by tidings that the Russell Administration was at an end, those who thought that the country cared little about the question found themselves suddenly disillusioned. [Sidenote: FALL OF THE RUSSELL GOVERNMENT] Burke declared that there were moments when it became necessary for the people themselves to interpose on behalf of their rights. The overthrow of the Russell Administration took the nation by surprise. Three days after Lord John's resignation there was a historic gathering in Trafalgar Square. In his speech announcing the resignation of his Ministry, Lord John warned Parliament about the danger of alienating the sympathy of the people from the Crown and the aristocracy. He reminded the Peers that universal suffrage prevailed not only in the United States but in our own Colonies; and he took his stand in the light of the larger needs of the new era, on the assertion of Lord Grey at the time of the Reform Bill that only a large measure was a safe measure. 'We have made the attempt,' added Lord John, 'sincerely and anxiously to perform the duties of reconciling that which is due to the Constitution of the country with that which is due to the growing intelligence, the increasing wealth, and the manifest forbearance, virtue, and order of the people.' He protested against a niggardly and ungenerous treatment of so momentous a question. Lord Russell's words were not lost on Mr. Bradlaugh. He made them the text of his speech to the twenty thousand people who assembled in Trafalgar Square, and afterwards walked in procession to give Mr. Gladstone an ovation in Carlton House Terrace. About three weeks later another great demonstration was announced to take place in Hyde Park, under the auspices of the Reform League. The authorities refused to allow the gathering, and, after a formal protest, the meeting was held at the former rendezvous. The mixed multitude who had followed the procession to the Park gates took the repulse less calmly, with the result that, as much by accident as by design, the Park railings for the space of half a mile were thrown down. Force is no remedy, but a little of it is sometimes a good object-lesson, and the panic which this unpremeditated display occasioned amongst the valiant defenders of law and order was unmistakeable. [Sidenote: 'DISHING THE WHIGS'] Mr. Lowe had flouted the people, and had publicly asserted that those who were without the franchise did not really care to possess it. Forty-three other so-called Liberals in the House of Commons were apparently of the same way of thinking, for the Russell Administration was defeated by forty-four 'Liberal' votes. This in itself shows that Lord John, up to the hour in which he was driven from power, was far in advance of one section of his followers. The great towns, and more particularly Birmingham, Manchester, and Leeds, promptly took up the challenge; and in those three centres alone half a million of people assembled to make energetic protest against the contemptuous dismissal of their claims. The fall of the Park railings appealed to the fear of the classes, and aroused the enthusiasm of the masses. It is scarcely too much to say that if they had been demolished a month earlier the Russell Government would have carried its Reform proposals, and Disraeli would have lost his chance of 'dishing the Whigs.' The defeat of Lord John Russell was a virtual triumph. He was driven from power by a rally of reactionary forces at the very moment when he was fighting the battle of the people.[42] The Tories were only able to hold their own by borrowing a leaf from his book, and bringing in a more drastic measure of reform. FOOTNOTES: [41] _Life and Correspondence of Viscount Palmerston_, by the Hon. Evelyn Ashley, vol. ii. p. 438. [42] In a letter written in the spring of 1867, Lord Houghton refers to Mr. Gladstone as being 'quite awed' for the moment by the 'diabolical cleverness of Dizzy.' He adds: 'Delane says the extreme party for Reform are now the grandees, and that the Dukes are quite ready to follow Beale into Hyde Park.'--_The Life, Letters, and Friendships of Lord Houghton_, by Sir Wemyss Reid, vol. ii. pp. 174-5. CHAPTER XVII OUT OF HARNESS 1867-1874 Speeches in the House of Lords--Leisured years--Mr. Lecky's reminiscences--The question of the Irish Church--The Independence of Belgium--Lord John on the claims of the Vatican--Letters to Mr. Chichester Fortescue--His scheme for the better government of Ireland--Lord Selborne's estimate of Lord John's public career--Frank admissions--As his private secretaries saw him. LORD JOHN never relinquished that high sense of responsibility which was conspicuous in his attitude as a Minister of the Crown. Although out of harness from the summer of 1866 to his death, twelve years later, he retained to the last, undiminished, the sense of public duty. He took, not merely a keen interest, but an appreciable share in public affairs; and some of the speeches which he delivered in the House of Lords after his retirement from office show how vigorous and acute his intellect remained, and how wide and generous were his sympathies. The leisured years which came to Lord John after the fall of the second Russell Administration enabled him to renew old friendships, and gave him the opportunity for making the acquaintance of distinguished men of a younger generation. His own historical studies--the literary passion of a lifetime--made him keenly appreciative of the work of others in that direction, and kindred tastes drew him into intimate relations with Mr. W. E. H. Lecky. Few of the reminiscences, great or small, which have been written for these pages, can compare in interest with the following statement by so philosophic a critic of public affairs and so acute a judge of men:-- [Sidenote: MR. LECKY'S REMINISCENCES] 'It was, I think, in 1866, and in the house of Dean Milman, that I had the privilege of being introduced to Lord Russell. He at once received me with a warmth and kindness I can never forget, and from this time till near the end of his life I saw him very frequently. His Ministerial career had just terminated, but I could trace no failure in his powers, and, whatever difference of opinion there might be about his public career, no one, I believe, who ever came in contact with him failed to recognise his singular charm in private life. His conversation differed from that of some of the more illustrious of his contemporaries. It was not a copious and brilliant stream of words, dazzling, astonishing, or overpowering. It had no tendency to monologue, and it was not remarkable for any striking originalities either of language, metaphor, or thought. Few men steered more clear of paradox, and the charm of his talk lay mainly in his admirable terseness and clearness of expression, in the skill with which, by a few happy words, he could tell a story, or etch out a character, or condense an argument or statement. Beyond all men I have ever known, he had the gift of seizing rapidly in every question the central argument, the essential fact or distinction; and of all his mental characteristics, quickness and soundness of judgment seemed to me the most conspicuous. I have never met with anyone with whom it was so possible to discuss with profit many great questions in a short time. No one, too, could know him intimately without being impressed with his high sense of honour, with his transparent purity of motive, with the fundamental kindliness of his disposition, with the remarkable modesty of his estimate of his own past. He was eminently tolerant of difference of opinion, and he had in private life an imperturbable sweetness of temper that set those about him completely at their ease, and helped much to make them talk their best. Few men had more anecdotes, and no one told them better--tersely, accurately, with a quiet, subdued humour, with a lightness of touch which I should not have expected from his writings. In addition to the experiences of a long and eventful life, his mind was stored with the anecdotes of the brilliant Whig society of Holland House, of which he was one of the last repositories. It is much to be regretted that he did not write down his "Recollections" till a period of life when his once admirable memory was manifestly failing. He was himself sadly conscious of the failure. "I used never to confuse my facts," he once said to me; "I now find that I am beginning to do so." 'He has mentioned in his "Recollections" as one of the great felicities of his life that he retained the friendship of his leading opponents, and his private conversation fully supported this view. Of Sir Robert Peel he always spoke with a special respect, and it was, I think, a matter of peculiar pleasure to him that in his old age his family was closely connected by marriage with that of his illustrious rival. His friendship with Lord Derby, which began when they were colleagues, was unbroken by many contests. He spoke of him, however, as a man of brilliant talent, who had not the judgment or the character suited for the first place; and he maintained that he had done much better both under Lord Grey and under Sir Robert Peel than as Prime Minister. Between Lord Russell and Disraeli there was, I believe, on both sides much kindly feeling, though no two men could be less like, and though there was much in Disraeli's ways of looking at things that must have been peculiarly trying to the Whig mind. Lord Russell told me that he once described him in Parliament by quoting the lines of Dryden:-- 'He was not one on picking work to dwell. He fagotted his notions as they fell; And if they rhymed and rattled, all was well.' [Sidenote: HIS EARLY CHIEFS] 'Of his early chiefs, he used to speak with most reverence of Lord Grey. Lord Melbourne, he said, greatly injured his Government by the manner in which he treated deputations. He never could resist the temptation of bantering and snubbing them. Two men who flourished in his youth surpassed, Lord Russell thought, in eloquence any of the later generation. They were Canning and Plunket, and as an orator the greater of these was Plunket. Among the statesmen of a former generation, he had an especial admiration for Walpole, and was accustomed to maintain that he was a much greater statesman than Pitt. His judgment, indeed, of Pitt always seemed to me much warped by that adoration of Fox which in the early years of the century was almost an article of religion in Whig circles. Lord Russell had also the true Whig reverence for William III., and, I am afraid, he was by no means satisfied with some pages I wrote about that sovereign. 'Speaking of Lord Palmerston, I once said to him that I was struck with the small net result in legislation which he accomplished considering the many years he was in power. "But during all these years," Lord Russell replied, "he kept the honour of England very high; and I think that a great thing." 'The Imperialist sentiment was one of the deepest in his nature, and few things exasperated him more than the school which was advocating the surrender of India and the Colonies. "When I was young," he once said to me, "it was thought the work of a wise statesman that he had turned a small kingdom into a great empire. In my old age it seems to be thought the object of a statesman to turn a great empire into a small kingdom." He thought we had made a grave mistake, when conceding self-government to the Colonies, in not reserving the waste lands and free trade with the Mother Country; and he considered that the right of veto on legislation, which had been reserved, ought to have been always exercised (as he said it was under Lord Grey) when duties were imposed on English goods. In Irish politics he greatly blamed Canning, who agreed with the Whigs about Catholic Emancipation, though he differed from them about Reform. The former question, he said, was then by far the more pressing, and if Canning had insisted on making it a first-class ministerial question he would have carried it in conjunction with the Whigs. "My pride in Irish measures," he once wrote to me, "is in the Poor Law, which I designed, framed, and twice carried." Like Peel, he strongly maintained that the priests ought to have been paid. He would gladly have seen the principle of religious equality in Ireland carried to its furthest consequences, and local government considerably extended; but he told me that any statesman who proposed to repeal the Union ought to be impeached, and in his "Recollections," and in one of his published letters to the present Lord Carlingford, he has expressed in the strongest terms his inflexible hostility to Home Rule. [Sidenote: POLITICAL APPREHENSIONS] 'Though the steadiest of Whigs, Lord Russell was by no means an uncompromising democrat. The great misfortune, he said, of America was that the influence of Jefferson had eclipsed that of Washington. One of her chief advantages was that the Western States furnished a wide and harmless field for restless energy and ambition. In England he was very anxious that progress should move on the lines of the past, and he was under the impression that statesmen of the present generation studied English history less than their predecessors. He was one of the earliest advocates of the Minority Vote, and he certainly looked with very considerable apprehension to the effects of the Democratic Reform Bill of 1867. He said to me that he feared there was too much truth in the saying of one of his friends that "the concessions of the Whigs were once concessions to intelligence, but now concessions to ignorance." 'When the Education Act was carried, he was strongly in favour of the introduction of the Bible, accompanied by purely undenominational teaching. This was, I think, one of his last important declarations on public policy. I recollect a scathing article in the "Saturday Review," demonstrating the absurdity of supposing that such teaching was possible. But the people of England took a different view. The great majority of the School Boards adopted the system which Lord Russell recommended, and it prevailed with almost perfect harmony for more than twenty years. 'In foreign politics he looked with peculiar pleasure to the services he had rendered to the Italian cause. Italy was always very dear to him. He had many valued friends there, and he spoke Italian (as he also did Spanish) with much fluency. Among my most vivid recollections are those of some happy days I spent with him at San Remo.' Two years before the disestablishment of the Irish Church, Lord John Russell, knowing how great a stumbling-block its privileges were to the progress of the people, moved for a Commission to inquire into the expenditure of its revenues. The investigation was, however, staved off, and the larger question was, in consequence, hastened. He supported Mr. Gladstone in a powerful speech in 1870, and showed himself in substantial agreement with Mr. Forster over his great scheme of education, though he thought that some of its provisions bore heavily upon Nonconformists. The outbreak of war between France and Germany seemed at first to threaten the interests of England, and Lord John introduced a Militia Bill, which was only withdrawn when the Government promised to take action. The interests of Belgium were threatened by the struggle on the Continent, and Lord John took occasion to remind the nation that we were bound to defend that country, and had guaranteed by treaty to uphold its independence:-- '... I am persuaded that if it is once manfully declared that England means to stand by her treaties, to perform her engagements--that her honour and her interest would allow nothing else--such a declaration would check the greater part of these intrigues, and that neither France nor Prussia would wish to add a second enemy to the formidable foe which each has to meet.... When the choice is between honour and infamy, I cannot doubt that her Majesty's Government will pursue the course of honour, the only one worthy of the British people.... I consider that if England shrank from the performance of her engagements--if she acted in a faithless manner with respect to this matter--her extinction as a Great Power must very soon follow.' [Sidenote: ATTACKS THE CLAIMS OF PIUS IX.] Lord John's vigorous protest did not go unheeded, and the King of the Belgians sent him an autograph letter in acknowledgment of his generous and opportune words. On the other hand, Lord John Russell resented the determination of Mr. Gladstone to submit the 'Alabama' claims to arbitration, and also opposed the adoption of the Ballot and the abolition of purchase in the Army. The conflict which arose in the autumn of 1872 between the Emperor of Germany and Pius IX. was a matter which appealed to all lovers of liberty of conscience. Lord John, though now in his eighty second year, rose promptly to the occasion, and promised to preside at a great public meeting in London, called to protest against the claims of the Vatican. At the last moment, though the spirit was willing, the flesh was weak, and yielding to medical advice, he contented himself with a written expression of sympathy. This was read to the meeting, and brought him the thanks of the Kaiser and Prince Bismarck. Lord John's letters, declared Mr. Kinglake seem to carry with them the very ring of his voice; and the one which was written from Pembroke Lodge on January 19, 1874, was full of the old fire of enthusiasm and the resolution which springs from clean-cut convictions:--'I hasten to declare with all friends of freedom, and I trust with the great majority of the English nation, that I could no longer call myself a lover of civil and religious liberty were I not to proclaim my sympathy with the Emperor of Germany in the noble struggle in which he is engaged.' Lord John Russell's pamphlets, published in 1868-9--in the shape of letters to Mr. Chichester Fortescue--show that in old age and out of office he was still anxious to see justice done to the legitimate demands of Ireland. He declared that he witnessed with alarm the attempt to involve the whole Irish nation in a charge of disaffection, conspiracy, and treason. He contended that Englishmen ought to seek to rid their minds of exaggerated fears and national animosities, so that they might be in a position to consider patiently all the facts of the case. 'We ought to weigh with care the complaints that are made, and examine with still more care and circumspection the remedies that are proposed, lest in our attempts to cure the disease we give the patient a new and more dangerous disorder.' In his 'Life of Fox' Lord John Russell maintained that the wisest system that could be devised for the conciliation of Ireland had yet to be discovered; and in his third letter to Mr. Chichester Fortescue, published in January 1869, he made a remarkable allusion to Mr. Gladstone as a statesman who might yet seek to 'perform a permanent and immortal service to his country' by endeavouring to reconcile England and Ireland. If, added Lord John, Mr. Gladstone should 'undertake the heroic task of riveting the union of the three kingdoms by affection, even more than by statute; if he should endeavour to efface the stains which proscription and prejudice have affixed on the fair fame of Great Britain, then, though he may not reunite his party ... he will be enrolled among the noblest of England's statesmen, and will have laid the foundations of a great work, which either he or a younger generation will not fail to accomplish.' [Sidenote: IRISH PROPOSALS] The proposals Lord John Russell made in the columns of the 'Times,' on August 9, 1872, for the better government of Ireland have been claimed as a tentative scheme of Home Rule. 'It appears to me, that if Ireland were to be allowed to elect a representative assembly for each of its four provinces of Leinster, Ulster, Munster, and Connaught, and if Scotland in a similar manner were to be divided into Lowlands and Highlands, having for each province a representative assembly, the local wants of Ireland and Scotland might be better provided for than they are at present.' Lord John went on to say that the Imperial Parliament might still retain its hold over local legislation, and added that it was his purpose to explain in a pamphlet a policy which he thought might be adopted to the 'satisfaction of the nation at large.' The pamphlet, however, remained unwritten, and the scheme in its fulness, therefore, was never explained. Evidently Lord Russell's mind was changing in its attitude towards the Irish problem; but, as Mr. Lecky points out in the personal reminiscences with which he has enriched these pages, though in advance of the opinion of the hour he was not prepared to accept the principle of Home Rule. Although Mr. Lecky does not mention the year in which Lord John declared that any statesman who 'proposed to repeal the Union ought to be impeached,' Lord Russell himself in his published 'Recollections' admits that he saw no hope that Ireland would be well and quietly governed by the adoption of Home Rule. In fact, he makes it quite clear that he was in sympathy with the view which Lord Althorp expressed when O'Connell demanded the repeal of the Union--namely, that such a request amounted to a dismemberment of the Empire. On the other hand, Lord John was wont in his latest years to discuss the question in all its bearings with an Irish representative who held opposite views. There can be no doubt that he was feeling his way to a more generous interpretation of the problem than that which is commonly attributed to him. His own words on this point are: 'I should have been very glad if the leaders of popular opinion in Ireland had so modified and mollified their demand for Home Rule as to make it consistent with the unity of the Empire.' His mind, till within a few years of his death, was clear, and did not stand still. Whether he would have gradually become a Home Ruler is open to question, but in 1874 he had gone quite as far in that direction as Mr. Gladstone. Lord John, though the most loyal of subjects, made it plain throughout his career that he was not in the least degree a courtier. His nephew, Mr. George Russell, after stating that Lord John supported, with voice and vote, Mr. Hume's motion for the revision of the Civil List under George IV., and urged in vigorous terms the restoration of Queen Caroline's name to the Liturgy, as well as subscribing to compensate an officer, friendly to the Queen, whom the King's animosity had driven from the army, adds: 'It may well be that some tradition of this early independence, or some playful desire to test the fibre of Whiggery by putting an extreme case, led in much later years to an embarrassing question by an illustrious personage, and gave the opportunity for an apt reply. "Is it true, Lord John, that you hold that a subject is justified, under certain circumstances, in disobeying his Sovereign's will?" "Well," I said, "speaking to a Sovereign of the House of Hanover, I can only say that I suppose it is!"'[43] [Sidenote: IMPULSIVE BUT CHIVALROUS] Looking back in the autumn of last year on the length and breadth of Earl Russell's public career, the late Earl Selborne sent for these pages the following words, which gather up his general, and, alas! final impressions of his old friend and colleague: 'I have tried to imagine in what words an ancient Roman panegyrist might have summed up such a public and private character as that of Lord Russell. "Animosa juventus," and "jucunda senectus," would not inaptly have described his earlier and his latter days. But for the life of long and active public service which came between, it is difficult to find any phrase equally pointed and characteristic. Always patriotic, always faithful to the traditions associated with his name, there was, as Sydney Smith said, nothing which he had not courage to undertake. What he undertook he did energetically, and generally in a noble spirit; though sometimes yielding to too sudden impulses. As time went on, the generosity and sagacity of his nature gained strength; and, though he had not always been patient when the control of affairs was in other hands, a successful rival found in him the most loyal of colleagues. Any estimate of his character would be imperfect which omitted to recognise either his appreciative and sympathetic disposition towards those who differed from him, even on points of importance, when he believed their convictions to be sincere and their conduct upright, or the rare dignity and magnanimity with which, after 1866, he retired from a great position, of which he was neither unambitious nor unworthy, under no pressure from without, and before age or infirmity had made it necessary for him to do so.' Lord Selborne's allusion to Lord John's sympathetic disposition to those who differed from him, even on points of importance, is borne out by the terms in which he referred to Lord Aberdeen in correspondence--which was published first in the 'Times,' and afterwards in a pamphlet--between himself and Sir Arthur Gordon over statements in the first edition of 'Recollections and Suggestions.' Lord John admitted that, through lapse of memory, he had fallen into error, and that his words conveyed a wrong impression concerning Lord Aberdeen. He added: 'I believe no man has entered public life in my time more pure in his personal views, and more free from grasping ambition or selfish consideration. I am much grieved that anything I have written should be liable to an interpretation injurious to Lord Aberdeen.' It is pleasant in this connection to be able to cite a letter, written by Lord Aberdeen to the Duke of Bedford, when the Crimean War was happily only a memory. The Duke had told Lord Aberdeen that his brother admitted his mistake in leaving the Coalition Government in the way in which he did. Lord Aberdeen in his reply declared that he did not doubt that Lord John entered the Government on generous and high-minded motives, or that, in consequence of delay, he might have arrived at the conclusion that he was in a somewhat false position. Any appearance of lack of confidence in Lord John, Lord Aberdeen remarked, was 'entirely the effect of accident and never of intention.' He hints that he sometimes thought Lord John over-sensitive and even rash or impracticable. He adds: 'But these are trifles. We parted with expressions of mutual regard, which on my side were perfectly sincere, as I have no doubt they were on his. These expressions I am happy in having this opportunity to renew; as well as with my admiration of his great powers and noble impulses to assure you that I shall always feel a warm interest in his reputation and honour.' Lord Stanmore states that his father 'steadily maintained that Lord John was the proper head of the Liberal party, and never ceased to desire that he should succeed him as Prime Minister.' Rashness and impatience are hard sayings to one who looks steadily at the annals of the Coalition Government. Lord Aberdeen and the majority of his Cabinet, were, to borrow a phrase from Swift, 'huge idolators of delay.' Their policy of masterly inactivity was disastrous, and, though Lord John made a mistake in quitting the Ministry in face of a hostile vote of censure, his chief mistake arose from the 'generous and high-minded motives' which Lord Aberdeen attributes to him, and which led him to join the Coalition Government. [Sidenote: RELATIONS WITH POLITICAL OPPONENTS] His personal relations with his political opponents, from the Duke of Wellington to Lord Salisbury, were cordial. His friendship with Lord Derby was intimate, and he visited him at Knowsley, and in his closing years he had much pleasant intercourse with Lord Salisbury at Dieppe. His association with Lord Beaconsfield was slight; but one of the kindest letters which Lady Russell received on the death of her husband was written by a statesman with whom Lord Russell had little in common. Sir Robert Peel, in spite of the encounters of party warfare, always maintained towards Lord John the most friendly attitude. 'The idea which the stranger or casual acquaintance,' states his brother-in-law and former private secretary, Mr. George Elliot, 'conceived of Lord Russell was very unlike the real man as seen in his own home or among his intimates. There he was lively, playful, and uniformily good-humoured, full of anecdote, and a good teller of a story.... In conversation he was easy and pleasant, and the reverse of disputatious. Even in the worst of his political difficulties--and he had some pretty hard trials in this way--he had the power of throwing off public cares for the time, and in his house retained his cheerfulness and good-humour.... In matters of business he was an easy master to serve, and the duties of his private secretary were light as compared to others in the same position. He never made work and never was fussy, and even at the busiest times never seemed in a hurry.... Large matters he never neglected, but the difficulty of the private secretary was to get him to attend to the trifling and unimportant ones with which he had chiefly to deal.' The Hon. Charles Gore, who was also private secretary to Lord John when the latter held the Home Office in the Melbourne Administration, gives in the following words his recollections: 'Often members of Parliament and others used to come into my room adjoining, after their interview with Lord John, looking, and seeming, much dissatisfied with their reception. His manner was cold and shy, and, even when he intended to comply with the request made, in his answer he rather implied no than yes. He often used to say to me that he liked to hear the laugh which came to him through the door which separated us, as proof that I had been able to soothe the disappointed feelings with which his interviewer had left him. As a companion, when not feeling shy, no one was more agreeable or full of anecdote than Lord John--simple in his manner, never assuming superiority, and always ready to listen to what others had to say.' This impression is confirmed by Sir Villiers Lister, who served under Lord John at the Foreign Office. He states that his old chief, whilst always quick to seize great problems, was somewhat inclined to treat the humdrum details of official life with fitful attention. FOOTNOTES: [43] _Contemporary Review_, vol. 56, p. 814. CHAPTER XVIII PEMBROKE LODGE 1847-1878 Looking back--Society at Pembroke Lodge--Home life--The house and its memories--Charles Dickens's speech at Liverpool--Literary friendships--Lady Russell's description of her husband--A packet of letters--His children's recollections--A glimpse of Carlyle--A witty impromptu--Closing days--Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone--The jubilee of the Repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts--'Punch' on the 'Golden Wedding'--Death--The Queen's letter--Lord Shaftesbury's estimate of Lord John's career--His great qualities. PEACE with honour--a phrase which Lord John used long before Lord Beaconsfield made it famous--sums up the settled tranquillity and simple dignity of the life at Pembroke Lodge. No man was more entitled to rest on his laurels than Lord John Russell. He was in the House of Commons, and made his first proposals for Parliamentary redress, in the reign of George III. His great victory on behalf of the rights of conscience was won by the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts in the reign of George IV. He had piloted the first Reform Bill through the storms of prejudice and passion which had assailed that great measure in the reign of William IV. He was Home Secretary when Queen Victoria's reign began, and since then he had served her Majesty and the nation with unwearied devotion for almost the life-time of a generation. He was Secretary for the Colonies during a period when the expansion of England brought delicate constitutional questions to the front, and was Minister of Foreign Affairs when struggling nationalities looked to England, and did not seek her help in vain. Twice Prime Minister in periods of storm and stress, he had left his mark, directly or indirectly, on the statute-book in much progressive legislation, and, in spite of mistakes in policy, had at length quitted office with the reputation of an honest and enlightened statesman. Peel at the age of fifty-eight had judged himself worthy of retirement; but Russell was almost seventy-four, and only his indomitable spirit had enabled him to hold his own in public life against uncertain health during the whole course of his career. In this respect, at least, Lord John possessed that 'strong patience which outwearies fate.' He was always delicate, and in his closing years he was accustomed to tell, with great glee, those about him an incident in his own experience, which happened when the century was entering its teens and he was just leaving his own. Three physicians were summoned in consultation, for his life appeared to be hanging on a thread. He described how they carefully thumped him, and put him through the usual ordeal. Then they looked extremely grave and retired to an adjoining room. The young invalid could hear them talking quite plainly, and dreaded their return with the sentence of death. Presently the conversation grew animated, and Lord John found, to his surprise, they were talking about anything in the world except himself. On coming back, all the advice they gave was that he ought to travel abroad for a time. It jumped with his mood, and he took it, and to the end of his days travel never failed to restore his energies. [Sidenote: IN SYLVAN RETREAT] 'For some years after his retirement from Ministerial life,' says Mr. Lecky, 'he gathered round him at Pembroke Lodge a society that could hardly be equalled--certainly not surpassed--in England. In the summer Sunday afternoons there might be seen beneath the shade of those majestic oaks nearly all that was distinguished in English politics and much that was distinguished in English literature, and few eminent foreigners visited England without making a pilgrimage to the old statesman. Unhappily, this did not last to the end. Failing memory and the weakness of extreme old age at last withdrew him completely from the society he was so eminently fitted to adorn, but to those who had known him in his brighter days he has left a memory which can never be effaced.' Pembroke Lodge, on the fringe of Richmond Park, was, for more than thirty years, Lord John Russell's home. In his busiest years, whenever he could escape from town, the rambling, picturesque old house, which the Queen had given him, was his chosen and greatly loved place of retreat. 'Happy days,' records Lady Russell, 'so full of reality. The hours of work so cheerfully got through, the hours of leisure so delightful.' When in office much of each week was of necessity passed at his house in Chesham Place, but he appreciated the freedom and seclusion of Pembroke Lodge, and took a keen delight in its beautiful garden, with its winding walks, magnificent views, and spreading forest trees--truly a haunt of ancient peace, as well as of modern fellowship. There, in old age, Lord Russell loved to wander with wife or child or friend, and there, through the loop-holes of retreat amid his books and flowers, he watched the great world, and occasionally sallied forth, so long as strength remained, to bear his part in its affairs. Lord John Russell in his closing years thoroughly distrusted Turkish rule in Europe. He declared that he had formerly tried with Lord Palmerston's aid to improve the Turks, but came to the conclusion that the task was hopeless, and he witnessed with gladness the various movements to throw off their control in South-Eastern Europe. He was one of the first to call attention to the Bulgarian atrocities, and he joined the national protest with the political ardour which moral indignation was still able to kindle in a statesman who cherished his old ideals at the age of eighty-four. Two passages from Lady Russell's journal in the year 1876 speak for themselves:--'August 18. My dearest husband eighty-four. The year has left its mark upon him, a deeper mark than most years ... but he is happy, even merry. Seventy or eighty of our school children came up and sang in front of his window. They had made a gay flag on which were written four lines of a little poem to him. He was much pleased and moved with the pretty sight and pretty sound. I may say the same of Lord Granville, who happened to be here at the time.' Two months later occurs the following entry: 'Interesting visit from the Bulgarian delegates, who called to thank John for the part he has taken. They utterly deny the probability of civil war or bloodshed between different Christian sects, or between Christian and Mussulman, in case of Bulgaria and the other insurgent provinces obtaining self-government. Their simple, heart-felt words of gratitude to John were touching to us all.' History repeats itself at Pembroke Lodge. On May 16, 1895, a party of Armenian refugees went thither on the ground that 'the name of Lord John Russell is honoured by every Christian under the rule of the Turk.' It recalled to Lady Russell the incident just recorded, and the interview, she states, was 'a heart-breaking one, although gratitude for British sympathy seemed uppermost in what they wished to express. After they were gone I thought, as I have often thought before, how right my husband was in feeling and in saying, as he often did, that Goldsmith was quite wrong in these two lines in "The Traveller": 'How small of all that human hearts endure That part which laws or kings can cause or cure! He often recited them with disapproval when any occurrence made him feel how false they were.' [Sidenote: KINGLAKE'S DESCRIPTION] Lord John's manner of life, like his personal tastes, was simple. He contrived to set the guests who gathered around him at his wife's receptions perfectly at their ease, by his old-fashioned gallantry, happy humour, and bright, vigorous talk. One room in Pembroke Lodge, from the windows of which a glorious view of the wooded valley is obtained, has been rendered famous by Kinglake's description[44] of a certain drowsy summer evening in June 1854, when the Aberdeen Cabinet assembled in it, at the very moment when they were drifting into war. Other rooms in the house are full of memories of Garibaldi and Livingstone, of statesmen, ambassadors, authors, and, indeed, of men distinguished in every walk of life, but chiefly of Lord John himself, in days of intellectual toil, as well as in hours of friendly intercourse and happy relaxation. Charles Dickens, speaking in 1869 at a banquet in Liverpool, held in his honour, over which Lord Dufferin presided, refused to allow what he regarded as a covert sneer against the House of Lords to pass unchallenged. He repelled the insinuation with unusual warmth, and laid stress on his own regard for individual members of that assembly. Then, on the spur of the moment, came an unexpected personal tribute. He declared that 'there was no man in England whom he respected more in his public capacity, loved more in his private capacity, or from whom he had received more remarkable proofs of his honour and love of literature than Lord John Russell.' The compliment took Lord Russell by surprise; but if space allowed, or necessity claimed, it would be easy to prove that it was not undeserved. From the days of his youth, when he lived under the roof of Dr. Playfair, and attended the classes of Professor Dugald Stewart in Edinburgh, and took his part, as a _protégé_ of Lord Holland, in the brilliant society of Holland House, Lord John's leanings towards literature, and friendship with other literary men had been marked. As in the case of other Prime Ministers of the Queen's reign, and notably of Derby, Beaconsfield, and Mr. Gladstone, literature was his pastime, if politics was his pursuit, for his interests were always wider than the question of the hour. He was the friend of Sir James Mackintosh and of Sydney Smith, who playfully termed him 'Lord John Reformer,' of Moore and Rogers, Jeffrey and Macaulay, Dickens and Thackeray, Tyndall and Sir Richard Owen, Motley and Sir Henry Taylor, Browning and Tennyson, to mention only a few representative men. [Sidenote: LITERARY FRIENDSHIPS] When the students of Glasgow University wished, in 1846, to do him honour, Lord John gracefully begged them to appoint as Lord Rector a man of creative genius, like Wordsworth, rather than himself. As Prime Minister he honoured science by selecting Sir John Herschel as Master of the Mint, and literature, by the recommendation of Alfred Tennyson as Poet Laureate. When Sir Walter Scott was creeping back in broken health from Naples to die at Abbotsford it was Lord John who cheered the sad hours of illness in the St. James's Hotel, Jermyn Street, by a delicately worded offer of financial help from the public funds. Leigh Hunt, Christopher North, Sheridan Knowles, Father Mathew, the widow of Dr. Chalmers, and the children of Tom Hood are names which suggest the direction in which he used his patronage as First Minister of the Crown. He was in the habit of enlivening his political dinner parties by invoking the aid of literary men of wit and distinction, and nothing delighted him more than to bring, in this pleasant fashion, literature and politics to close quarters. The final pages of his 'Recollections and Suggestions' were written in Lord Tennyson's study at Aldworth, and his relations with Moore at an earlier stage of his life were even more intimate. Lord John Russell was twice married: first, on April 11, 1835, to Adelaide, daughter of Mr. Thomas Lister, of Armitage Park, Staffordshire, the young widow of Thomas, second Lord Ribblesdale; and second, on July 20, 1841, to Lady Frances Anna Maria Elliot, second daughter of Gilbert, second Earl of Minto. By his first wife he had two daughters, the late Lady Victoria Villiers, and Lady Georgiana Peel; and by his second three sons and one daughter--John, Viscount Amberley, the Hon. George William Gilbert, formerly of the 9th Lancers, the Hon. Francis Albert Rollo, and Lady Mary Agatha. Viscount Amberley married, on November 8, 1864, the fifth daughter of Lord Stanley of Alderley. Lord Amberley died two years before his father, and the peerage descended to the elder of his two sons, the present Earl Russell. Lady Russell states: 'Our way of life during the session, from the time we first settled in Pembroke Lodge till John ceased to take any active part in politics, was to be there from Wednesday to Thursday and from Saturday to Monday. This made him spend much time on the road; but he always said the good it did him to snatch all he could of the delight of his own quiet country home, to breathe its pure air, and be cheered by the sight of his merry children, far outweighed the time and trouble it cost him. When he was able to leave town tolerably early, he used sometimes to ride down all the way; but he oftener drove to Hammersmith Bridge, where his horse, and such of our children as were old enough to ride met him, and how joyfully I used to catch the first sight of the happy riders--he on his roan "Surrey" and they on their pretty ponies--from the little mount in our grounds! He was very fond of riding, and in far later days, when age and infirmity obliged him to give it up, used often to say in a sad tone, pointing to some of his favourite grassy rides, as we drove together in the park, "Ah! what pleasant gallops we used to have along there!"' Lord John was seen to great advantage in his own home and with his children. Even when the cares of State pressed most heavily on him he always seemed to the children about him to have leisure to enter with gay alacrity into their plans and amusements. When at home, no matter how urgent the business in hand, he always saw them either in the house or the garden every day, and took the liveliest interest in the round of their life, alike in work and play. He had conquered the art of bearing care lightly. He seldom allowed public affairs to distract him in moments of leisure. He was able to throw aside the cares of office, and to enter with vivacity and humour into social diversions. His equable temper and placid disposition served him in good stead amid the turmoil and excitement of political life. [Sidenote: A PACKET OF OLD LETTERS] Sorrows, neither few nor light, fell upon the household at Pembroke Lodge in the closing years of Lord Russell's life; but 'trials,' as Lady Russell puts it in her journal, 'had taught Lord John to feel for others, and age had but deepened his religion of love.' In reply to a birthday letter from Mr. Archibald Peel, his son-in-law, and nephew of his great political rival he said: 'Thanks for your good wishes. Happy returns! I always find them, as my children are so affectionate and loving; "many" I cannot expect, but I have played my part.' Two or three extracts from a packet of letters addressed by Lord John to his daughter, Lady Georgiana Peel, will be read with interest. The majority of them are of too intimate and personal a kind for quotation. Yet the whole of them leave the impression that Lord John, who reproaches himself in one instance as a bad correspondent, was at least a singularly good father. They cover a considerable term of years, and though for the most part dealing with private affairs, and often in a spirit of pleasant raillery, here and there allusions to public events occur in passing. In one of them, written from Gotha in the autumn of 1862, when Lord John was in attendance on her Majesty, he says: 'We have been dull here, but the time has never hung heavy on our hands. Four boxes of despatches and then telegrams, all requiring answers, have been our daily food.' He refers touchingly to the Queen's grief, and there is also an allusion to the minor tribulation of a certain little boy in England who had just crossed the threshold of school-life. Probably Lord John was thinking of his own harsh treatment at Westminster, more than sixty years before, when he wrote: 'Poor Willy! He will find a public school a rough place, and the tears will come into his eyes when he thinks of the very soft nest he left at home.' Ecclesiastical affairs never lost their interest to the author of the Durham Letter, and the following comments show his attitude on Church questions. The first is from a letter written on May 23, 1867: 'The Church has been greatly disturbed. The Bishop of Salisbury has claimed for the English clergy all the power of the Roman priests. The question whether they are to wear white surplices, or blue, green, yellow, or red, becomes a minor question in comparison. Of course the Bishop and those who think with him throw off the authority of our excellent Thirty-nine Articles altogether, and ought to leave the Church to the Protestant clergy and laity.' England just then, in Carlyle's judgment, was 'shooting Niagara,' and Disraeli's reform proposals were making a stir in the opposite camp. In the letter above quoted Lord John says: 'Happily, we are about to get rid of the compound householder. I am told Dizzy expects to be the first President of the British Republic.' Mr. Gladstone, according to Lord Houghton, seemed at the same moment 'quite awed with the diabolical cleverness of Dizzy.' The second bears date Woburn Abbey, September 29, 1868: 'Dr. Temple is a man I greatly admire, and he has become more valuable to his country since the death of our admirable Dean of St. Paul's. If I had any voice in the appointment, Temple is the man I should wish to see succeed to Milman; but I suppose the "Essays and Reviews" will tell heavily against him.' 'We lead a very quiet life here and a very happy one. I sometimes regret not seeing my old political friends a little oftener.' 'In June [1869] I expect Dickens to visit us. We went to see him last night in the murder of Nancy by Sikes, and Mrs. Gamp. He acts like a great actor, and writes like a great author. Irish Church is looming very near in the Commons, and, in June, in the Lords. The Archbishops and Bishops do not wish to oppose the second reading, but Lord Cairns is prepared to hack and hew in committee.' [Sidenote: LADY GEORGIANA PEEL] The recollections of Lord John's children reveal, by incidents too trivial in themselves to quote, how completely he entered into their life. Lady Georgiana Peel recalls her childish tears when her father arrived too late from London one evening to see one of the glorious sunsets which he had taught her to admire. 'I can feel now his hand on my forehead in any childish illness, or clasping mine in the garden, as he led me out to forget some trifling sorrow.' She lays stress on his patience and serene temper, on his tender heart, and on the fact that he always found leisure on the busiest day to enter into the daily life of his little girls. Half heartedness, either in work or play, was not to his mind. '_Do_ what you are doing' was the advice he gave to his children. One of the elder children in far-off days at Pembroke Lodge, Mrs. Warburton, Lord John's step-daughter, recalls wet days in the country, when her father would break the tedium of temporary imprisonment indoors by romping with his children. 'I have never forgotten his expression of horror when in a game of hide-and-seek he banged the door accidentally in my elder sister's face and we heard her fall. Looking back to the home life, its regularity always astonishes me. The daily walks, prayers, and meals regular and punctual as a rule.... He was shy and we were shy, but I think we spoke quite freely with him, and he seldom said more than "Foolish child" when we ventured on any startling views on things. Once I remember rousing his indignation when I gave out, with sententious priggishness, that the Duke of Wellington laboured under great difficulties in Spain caused by the "factious opposition at home;" that was beyond "Foolish child," but my discomforted distress was soon soothed by a pat on the cheek, and an amused twinkle in his kind eyes.' Lord Amberley, four days before his death, declared that he had all his life 'met with nothing but kindness and gentleness' from his father. He added: 'I do earnestly hope that at the end of his long and noble life he may be spared the pain of losing a son.' Mr. Rollo Russell says: 'My father was very fond of history, and I can remember his often turning back to Hume, Macaulay, Hallam, and other historical works. He read various books on the French Revolution with great interest. He had several classics always near him, such as Homer and Virgil; and he always carried about with him a small edition of Horace. Of Shakespeare he could repeat much, and knew the plays well, entering into and discussing the characters. He admired Milton very greatly and was fond of reading "Paradise Lost." He was very fond of several Italian and Spanish books, by the greatest authors of those countries. Of lighter reading, he admired most, I think, "Don Quixote," Sir Walter Scott's novels, Miss Evans' ("George Eliot") novels, Miss Austen's, and Dickens and Thackeray. Scott especially he loved to read over again. He told me he bought "Waverley" when it first came out, and was so interested in it that he sat up a great part of the night till he had finished it.' [Sidenote: THE FRIENDSHIP OF BOOKS] Lady Russell states that Grote's 'History of Greece' was one of the last books her husband read, and she adds: 'Many of his friends must have seen its volumes open before him on the desk of his blue armchair in his sitting-room at Pembroke Lodge in the last year or two of his life. It was often exchanged for Jowett's "Plato," in which he took great delight, and which he persevered in trying to read, when, alas! the worn-out brain refused to take in the meaning.' Lord John was a delightful travelling companion, and he liked to journey with his children about him. His cheerfulness and merriment on these occasions is a happy memory. Dr. Anderson, of Richmond, who has been for many years on intimate terms at Pembroke Lodge, and was much abroad with Lord John in the capacity of physician and friend, states that all who came in contact personally with him became deeply attached to him. This arose not only from the charm of his manner and conversation, but from the fact that he felt they trusted him implicitly. 'I never saw anyone laugh so heartily. He seemed almost convulsed with merriment, and he once told me that after a supper with Tom Moore, the recollection of some of the witty things said during the course of the evening so tickled him, that he had to stop and hold by the railings while laughing on his way home. I once asked which of all the merry pictures in "Punch" referring to himself amused him the most, and he at once replied: "The little boy who has written 'No Popery' on a wall and is running away because he sees a policeman coming. I think that was very funny!"' Dr. Anderson says that Lord John was generous to a fault and easily moved to tears, and adds: 'I never knew any one more tender in illness or more anxious to help.' He states that Lord John told him that he had encountered Carlyle one day in Regent Street. He stopped, and asked him if he had seen a paragraph in that morning's 'Times' about the Pope. 'What!' exclaimed Carlyle, 'the Pope, the Pope! The back of ma han' for that auld chimera!' Lady Russell says: 'As far as I recollect he never but once worked after dinner. He always came up to the drawing-room with us, was able to cast off public cares, and chat and laugh, and read and be read to, or join in little games, such as capping verses, of which he was very fond.' Lord John used often to write prologues and epilogues for the drawing-room plays which they were accustomed to perform. Space forbids the quotation of these sparkling and often humorous verses, but the following instance of his ready wit occurred in the drawing-room at Minto, and is given on the authority of Mr. George Elliot. At a game where everyone was required to write some verses, answering the question written on a paper to be handed to him, and bringing in a word written on the same, the paper that fell to the lot of Lord John contained this question: 'Do you admire Sir Robert Peel?' and 'soldier' the word to be brought in. His answer was: 'I ne'er was a soldier of Peel, Or ever yet stood at his back; For while he wriggled on like an eel, I swam straight ahead like a _Jack_.' Mr. Gladstone states that perhaps the finest retort he ever heard in the House of Commons was that of Lord John in reply to Sir Francis Burdett. The latter had abandoned his Radicalism in old age, and was foolish enough to sneer at the 'cant of patriotism.' 'I quite agree, said Lord John, 'with the honourable baronet that the cant of patriotism is a bad thing. But I can tell him a worse--the _re_cant of patriotism--which I will gladly go along with him in reprobating whenever he shows me an example of it.' [Sidenote: LORD DUFFERIN'S RECOLLECTIONS] Lord John Russell once declared that he had no need to go far in search of happiness, as he had it at his own doors, and this was the impression left on every visitor to Pembroke Lodge. Lord Dufferin states that all his recollections gather around Lord John's domestic life. He never possessed a kinder friend or one who was more pleasant in the retirement of his home. Lord Dufferin adds: 'One of his most charming characteristics was that he was so simple, so untheatrical, so genuine, that his existence, at least when I knew him, flowed at a very high level of thought and feeling, but was unmarked by anything very dramatic. His conversation was too delightful, full of anecdote; but then his anecdotes were not like those told by the ordinary _raconteur_, and were simple reminiscences of his own personal experience and intercourse with other distinguished men. Again, his stories were told in such an unpretending way that, though you were delighted with what you had heard, you were still more delighted with the speaker himself.' The closing years of Lord Russell's career were marked by settled peace, the consciousness of great tasks worthily accomplished, the unfaltering devotion of household love, the friendship of the Queen, the confidence of a younger race of statesmen, and the respect of the nation. Deputations of working men found their way to Pembroke Lodge to greet the old leader of the party of progress, and school children gathered about him in summer on the lawn, and were gladdened by his kindly smile and passing word. In good report and in evil report, in days of power and in days of weakness, the Countess Russell cheered, helped, and solaced him, and brought not only rare womanly devotion, but unusual intellectual gifts to his aid at the critical moments of his life, when bearing the strain of public responsibility, and in the simple round of common duty. The nation may recognise the services of its great men, but can never gauge to the full extent the influences which sustained them. The uplifting associations of a singularly happy domestic life must be taken into account in any estimate of the forces which shaped Lord John Russell's career. It is enough to say--indeed, more cannot with propriety be added--that through the political stress and strain of nearly forty years Lady Russell proved herself to be a loyal and noble-hearted wife. There is another subject, which cannot be paraded on the printed page, and yet, since religion was the central principle of Lord John Russell's life, some allusion to his position on the highest of all subjects becomes imperative. His religion was thorough; it ran right through his nature. It was practical, and revealed itself in deeds which spoke louder than words. 'I rest in the faith of Jeremy Taylor,' were his words, 'Barrow, Tillotson, Hoadly, Samuel Clarke, Middleton, Warburton, and Arnold, without attempting to reconcile points of difference between these great men. I prefer the simple words of Christ to any dogmatic interpretation of them.' Dean Stanley, whom he used to call his Pope--always playfully adding, 'but not an infallible one'--declared shortly before Lord Russell's death that 'he was a man who was firmly convinced that in Christianity, whether as held by the National Church or Nonconformist, there was something greater and vaster than each of the particular communions professed and advocated, something which made it worth while to develop those universal principles of religion that are common to all who accept in any real sense the fundamental truths of Christianity.' [Sidenote: MR. SPURGEON'S BLESSING] Mr. Spurgeon, in conversation with the writer of these pages, related an incident concerning Lord John which deserves at least passing record, as an illustration of his swift appreciation of ability and the reality of his recognition of religious equality. Lord John was upwards of sixty at the time, and the famous Baptist preacher, though the rage of the town, was scarcely more than twenty. The Metropolitan Tabernacle had as yet not been built. Mr. Spurgeon was at the Surrey Music Hall, and there the great congregation had gathered around this youthful master of assemblies. One Sunday night, at the close of the service, Lord John Russell came into the vestry to speak a kindly word of encouragement to the young preacher. One of the children of the ex-Prime Minister was with him, and before the interview ended Lord John asked the Nonconformist minister to give his blessing to the child. Mr. Spurgeon never forgot the incident, or the bearing of the man who came to him, amid a crowd of others, on that Sunday night. In opening the new buildings of Cheshunt College in 1871, Lord John alluded to the foundress of that seat of theological learning, Lady Huntingdon, as a woman who was far in advance of her times, since, a century before the abolition of University tests, she made it possible to divinity students to obtain academical training without binding themselves at the outset to any religious community. During the early months of 1878 Lord John's strength failed rapidly, and it became more and more apparent that the plough was nearing the end of the furrow. His old courage and calmness remained to the end. Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone called at Pembroke Lodge on April 20, and he sent down word that he wished to see them. 'I took them to him for a few minutes,' relates Lady Russell. 'Happily, he was clear in his mind, and said to Mr. Gladstone, "I am sorry you are not in the Ministry," and kissed her affectionately, and was so cordial to both that they were greatly touched.' He told Lady Russell that he had enjoyed his life. 'I have made mistakes, but in all I did my object was the public good!' Then after a pause: 'I have sometimes seemed cold to my friends, but it was not in my heart.' A change for the worse set in on May 1, and the last sands of life were slipping quietly through the glass when the Nonconformist deputation came on the 9th of that month to present Lord Russell with an address of congratulation on the occasion of the jubilee of the Repeal of the Corporation and Test Acts.[45] Lady Russell and her children received the Deputation. In the course of her reply to the address Lady Russell said that of all the 'victories won by that great party to which in his later as in his earlier years Lord John had been inseparably attached,' there was none dearer to his memory at that moment than that which they had called to remembrance. 'It was a proud and a sad day,' is the entry in Lady Russell's journal. 'We had hoped some time ago that he might perhaps see the Deputation for a moment in his room, but he was too ill for that to be possible.' A few days later, there appeared in the columns of 'Punch' some commemorative verses entitled 'A Golden Wedding.' They expressed the feeling that was uppermost in the heart of the nation, and two or three verses may here be recorded:-- The Golden Wedding of Lord John and Liberty his love-- 'Twixt the Russells' House and Liberty, 'twas ever hand and glove-- His love in those dark ages, he has lived through with his bride, To look back on them from the sunset of his quiet eventide. His love when he that loved her and sought her for his own Must do more than suit and service, must do battle, trumpet blown, Must slay the fiery dragons that guarded every gate On the roads by which men travelled for work of Church and State. Now time brings its revenges, and all are loud to own How beautiful a bride she was, how fond, how faithful shown; But she knows the man who loved her when lovers were but few, And she hails this golden wedding--fifty years of tried and true. Look and listen, my Lord Russell: 'tis your golden wedding-day; We may not press your brave old hand, but you hear what we've to say. A blessing on the bridal that has known its fifty years, But never known its fallings-out, delusions, doubt, or fears. [Sidenote: VICTORIOUS PEACE] The end came softly. 'I fall back on the faith of my childhood,' were the words he uttered to Dr. Anderson. The closing scene is thus recorded in Mr. Rollo Russell's journal: 'May 28 [1878].--He was better this morning, though still in a very weak state. He spoke more distinctly, called me by my name, and said something which I could not understand. He did not seem to be suffering ... and has, all through his long illness, been cheerful to a degree that surprises everybody about him, not complaining of anything, but seeming to feel that he was being well cared for. About midday he became worse ... but bore it all calmly. My mother was with him continually.... Towards ten he was much worse, and in a few minutes, while my mother was holding his hand, he breathed out gently the remainder of life.' Westminster Abbey was offered as a place of burial, but, in accordance with his own expressed wish, Lord John Russell was gathered to his fathers at Chenies. The Queen's sympathy and her sense of loss were expressed in the following letter:-- 'Balmoral: May 30, 1878. 'DEAR LADY RUSSELL,--It was only yesterday afternoon that I heard through the papers that your dear husband had left this world of sorrows and trials peacefully and full of years the night before, or I would have telegraphed and written sooner. You will believe that I truly regret an old friend of forty years' standing, and whose personal kindness in trying and anxious times I shall _ever_ remember. "Lord John," as I knew him best, was one of my _first_ and _most distinguished_ Ministers, and his departure recalls many eventful times. 'To you, dear Lady Russell, who were ever one of the most devoted of wives, this must be a terrible blow, though you must have for some time been prepared for it. But one is _never_ prepared for the blow when it comes, and you have had such trials and sorrows of late years that I most truly sympathise with you. Your dear and devoted daughter will, I know, be the greatest possible comfort to you, and I trust that your grandsons will grow up to be all you could wish. 'Believe me always, yours affectionately, 'VICTORIA R. AND I.' [Sidenote: HIS GREAT QUALITIES] Lord Shaftesbury wrote in his journal some words about Lord Russell which speak for themselves. After recording that he had reached the ripe age of eighty-six, and that he had been a conspicuous man for more than half a century, he added that to have 'begun with disapprobation, to have fought through many difficulties, to have announced, and acted on, principles new to the day in which he lived, to have filled many important offices, to have made many speeches, and written many books, and in his whole course to have done much with credit, and nothing with dishonour, and so to have sustained and advanced his reputation to the very end, is a mighty commendation.' When some one told Sir Stafford Northcote that Lord John was dead, the tidings were accompanied by the trite but sympathetic comment, 'Poor Lord Russell!' 'Why do you call him poor?' was the quick retort. 'Lord Russell had the chance of doing a great work and--he did it.' Lord John was not faultless, and most assuredly he was not infallible. He made mistakes, and sometimes was inclined to pay too little heed to the claims of others, and not to weigh with sufficient care the force of his own impetuous words. The taunt of 'finality' has seldom been less deserved. In most directions he kept an open mind, and seems, like Coleridge, to have believed that an error is sometimes the shadow of a great truth yet behind the horizon. Mr. Gladstone asserts that his old chief was always ready to stand in the post of difficulty, and possessed an inexhaustible sympathy with human suffering. It is at least certain that Lord John Russell served England--the country whose freedom, he once declared, he 'worshipped'--with unwearied devotion, with a high sense of honour, with a courage which never faltered, with an integrity which has never been impeached. He followed duty to the utmost verge of life, and--full himself of moral susceptibility--he reverenced the conscience of every man. FOOTNOTES: [44] _History of the War in the Crimea_, by A. W, Kinglake, vol. ii. sixth edition, pp. 249-50. Lady Russell states that Lord John used to smile at Kinglake's rhetorical exaggeration of the scene. Her impression is that only two of the Cabinet, and not, as the historian puts it, 'all but a small minority,' fell asleep. The Duke of Argyll or Mr. Gladstone can alone settle the point at issue. [45] Amongst those who assembled in the drawing-room of Pembroke Lodge on that historic occasion were Mr. Henry Richard, M.P., Mr. Samuel Morley, M.P., Mr. Edward Baines, Sir Charles Reed, Mr. Carvell Williams, M.P., who came on behalf of the Protestant Dissenting Deputies. The Congregationalists were represented by such men as the Rev. Baldwin Brown and the Rev. Guinness Rogers; the Baptists by Dr. Underhill; the Presbyterians by Dr. McEwan; and the Unitarians by Mr. Middleton Aspland. INDEX ABERCROMBY, Mr., 103 Aberdeen, Lord, Foreign Secretary in Peel's Cabinet, 125; and the repeal of the Corn Laws, 132; forms the Coalition Government, 203, 206; early political life and characteristics, 209; and the Secret Memorandum, 216, 225; friendly relations with the Emperor Nicholas, 217, 233; belief in the peaceful intentions of Russia, 225, 231; vacillation on the eve of the Crimean War, 229, 234; public prejudice against him, 233; home policy, 240; fall of his Government, 257; relations with Lord John Russell, 346, 347 Adelaide, Queen, 82, 83 'Adullamites,' 329 Afghanistan, invasion of, 121, 170 'Alabama' Case, the, 312-319 Albert, Prince, and Lord Palmerston, 177; letter on the defeat of the Turks at Sinope, 232; and Count Buol's scheme, 261; letter on the position of affairs in the Crimea, 263; death, and characteristics, 308, 309; last official act, 310 Alexander II., 259, 321 Alien Acts, the, 27 All the Talents, Ministry of, 63, 64 Alma, the battle of, 246 Althorp, Lord, 48, 56, 67, 79; and his part in carrying the Reform Bill, 81, 82, 87; characteristics, 81, 82, 88, 92; introduces the Poor Law Amendment Act (Ireland), 93, 96; and the Coercion Act, 96; succeeds to the Peerage as Earl Spencer, 100. _See also_ Spencer, Lord Amberley, Viscount, 356 America, war between England and, 21, 22; Napoleon's opinion of the war, 31; and the 'Trent' affair, 310-312; Civil War, 310, 313; and the Alabama Case, 312-319 Anti-Corn-Law League, its founding 121, 126, 131 Argyll, Duke of, 295, 327 Armenia, massacres in, 269, 353 Arms Bill, 146, 147; of 1847, 154 Auckland, Lord, 96 Austria, revolt in Vienna of 1848, 171; and the retention of Lombardy and Venice, 172, 300; and the Vienna Note, 227; and the Crimean War, 243; proposed alliance with England and France to defend the integrity of Turkey, 261; her power in Italy, 300; campaign against France and Italy, and battles of Magenta and Solferino, 302, 303; and the peace of Villafranca, 303 BAGEHOT, Walter, 86, 323 Ballot, the: Grote's attempts to introduce a bill, 90, 111 Bathurst, Lord, 50 Bedford, fourth Duke of, his 'Correspondence' edited by Lord John Russell, 278 -- Francis, fifth Duke of, 3 -- sixth Duke of, father of Lord John Russell, 3; opinion of English Universities, 11, 16; encouragement given to Lord John in political training, 14, 36; characteristics, 16; and Lord John's leadership of the Opposition, 103; and Joseph Lancaster, 115 -- seventh Duke of, 202 -- first Earl of, 2 Belgium: the question of its independence, 172, 340, 341 Bentinck, Lord George, 138, 140, 141, 150, 160, 201 Bessborough, Lord, 146, 151 Birmingham, unrepresented in the House of Commons, 23, 38, 51, 60, 71; great meeting on the Reform question at, 79, 296 Bismarck, Count, 321-323 Blandford, Lord, 59 Blessington, Lady, 42 Blomfield, Bishop, 115 Bradlaugh, Mr., 332 Bribery and corruption before the era of Reform, 23, 61; Lord John Russell's resolutions for the discovery and punishment of, 43 Bridgeman, Mr. George (afterwards Earl of Bradford), 16, 18, 20 Bright, John, on the influences at work in the repeal of the Corn Laws, 130, 131; on disaffection in Ireland, and the Arms Bill, 155, 156, 202, 206, 208, 287; relations with Lord John Russell, 294, 329; and the 'Adullamites,' 329 Brougham, Lord, 56, 67; and the Reform Bill cry, 74; speech on the second Reform Bill, 78, 83; opinion of Lord John Russell, 110 Buccleuch, Duke of, 134, 136 Bulgaria, massacres in, 269, 352 Bulwer, Sir H., 174 Buol, Count, 261, 263 Burdett, Sir Francis, 25, 26; his motion for universal suffrage, 35; 70 Buxton, Thomas Fowell, 89 Byng, Hon. Georgiana, 3 CAMELFORD, 40 Campbell, Lord, 157 Canada: the rebellion, 110; Earl of Durham appointed Governor-General, 110 Canning, Mr., 43; his Ministry, 50; death, 51 Capital crimes, 107 Cardwell, Mr., 290 Carlisle, Earl of, 96 Carlyle, Thomas, and the Chartists, 166, 167, 358, 362 Caroline, Queen, proceedings against, 41 Cartwright, Dr., 5 Cartwright, Major, 5, 25, 26, 38, 39 Cassiobury, 36, 112 Castlereagh, Lord, 21, 40, 63 Catholics: political restrictions against them, 48; agitation for Emancipation, 58, 59; passing of the Emancipation Bill, 59; and the decree of Pius IX., 182-184; and the Durham Letter, 184-188 Cato Street Conspiracy, 40 'Cave of Adullam,' 329 Cavour, Count, 300, 301, 302 Chadwick, Sir Edwin, 162 Chartist movement, 163; and Feargus O'Connor, 165-168; and its literature, 166 Chatham, Lord, on borough representation, 24, 25, 26 Chelsea Hospital, 62 Cheshunt College, 365 China, opium war against, 121 Church of England, the, and its adoption of Romish practices, 185, 186 Clare, Lord, 6, 7 Clarendon, Lord, 119, 141; his Vice-royalty of Ireland, 153, 182, 196; at the Foreign Office, 221, 224, 231; on Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, 260; Count Buol's proposals, 262, 263, 327 Clive, Mr. Robert, 16, 20 Clubs for the advancement of Reform, 26 Cobbett, William, 26, 64 Cobden, Richard, and the repeal of the Corn Laws, 131, 132, 134; and Wellington, 136, 202, 206, 208, 287; relations with Lord John Russell, 294; negotiates the Commercial Treaty with France, 295, 296; death, 325 Coercion Act: Lord Grey proposes its renewal, 96; Lord John Russell's speech, 97, 98; and O'Connell, 98, 99; Peel's proposal for its renewal, 140 Conspiracy Bill, the, 289, 290 Conyngham, Marquis of, 96 Corn Laws, 121; John Bright on the influences working for their repeal, 130, 131; of 1670 reproduced in 1815, 131 _n._; Sir Robert Peel proposes their gradual repeal, 138; bill for repeal passes both Houses, 139; total repeal carried by Russell, 145 Cranworth, Lord, 327 Crime, excessive penalties for, 24 Crimean War: causes, 213-235; outbreak, 243, 246; Alma, 246; Balaclava and Inkerman, 247; siege of Sebastopol, 246, 247; privation and pestilence amongst the Allies, 248, 252; Roebuck's motion in the House of Commons to inquire into the condition of the army before Sebastopol, and Lord John Russell's speech on the question, 254-257; failure of Vienna Conference and renewal of the campaign, 267; fall of Sebastopol, 268; losses of Russia, and of the Allies, 268; treaty of Paris, 268 Croker, J. W., 80, 139 DALLING, Lord, 180 Denmark and the Schleswig-Holstein Question, 322, 323 Derby, Lord, Administration of, 199, 200, 202, 206; fails to form a Ministry on the resignation of Lord Aberdeen, 258; succeeds to the Premiership on the resignation of Lord Palmerston, 290; resignation, 293 Devonshire, Duke of, 49 Dickens, Charles, his tribute to Lord Russell, 354 Disraeli, Benjamin, and the 'poisoned chalice,' 135; attacks Peel on the proposal to repeal the Corn Laws, 138; and the Coercion Bill, 140, 141, 160; and 'Sybil,' 166; and the dismissal of Lord Palmerston, 180, 181; on Lord John Russell's position after the issue of the Durham Letter, 188; his Budget of 1852, 199, 210; leadership of the Conservative party, 201; resolution condemning the Palmerston Ministry, 264; on the exclusion of Lord John from Lord Grey's Cabinet, 273, 290; his Reform Bill, 291, 292; on the Prince Consort, 309; his 'diabolical cleverness,' 333 _n._ Dissenters. _See_ Nonconformists 'Don Carlos,' by Lord John Russell, 279 'Don Pacifico' affair, the, 175 Dufferin, Lord, 327, 363 Duffy, Sir Gavan, on Irish landowners, 149 Duhamel, General, his scheme for the acquisition of India by Russia, 218 Duncannon, Lord, 67, 91, 92; appointed Home Secretary, 99. _See also_ Bessborough, Lord Dunkellin, Lord, 329, 331 Durazzo, Madame, 37 Durham, Lord, his advanced opinions and popularity with the Radicals, 66, 164; and the preparation of the Reform Bill, 67, 68; and the scene in the House of Commons during the introduction of the bill, 69, 89; resigns office, 92; appointed Governor-General of Canada, 110; defended by Lord John Russell, 111; popularity, 164 Durham Letter, the, 184-189, 191 EAST INDIA COMPANY, 89, 288, 289 East Retford, 51 Ebrington, Lord, 75; moves a vote of confidence in Lord Grey's Government, 79; moves a second vote of confidence, 83, 91, 92 Ecclesiastical Titles Bill, 191-193 'Edinburgh Letter,' the, 133 Edinburgh Speculative Society, 13 -- University, Lord John Russell at, 11-14; and the influence of Professors Dugald Stewart and John Playfair, 12; and the Speculative Society, 13 Education at the beginning of the century, 24; Roebuck's scheme, 89; Bill of 1839, 114, 115; measure for providing competent teachers for elementary schools, 159; Lord John Russell's scheme of National Education, 284; Mr. Forster's measure, 285 Egypt, war between Turkey and, 119 Elcho, Lord, 329 Eldon, Lord, 40, 50; and the proposed repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, 57, 58, 63 Elections, Parliamentary, cost of, 23 Elliot, Hon. George, 195, 279, 347, 362 Encumbered Estates Act, 157 Erskine, Lord, 25 'Essay on the History of the English Government and Constitution,' by Lord John Russell, 274, 275 FACTORY ACT, 159 Famine, Irish, 130, 146, 148, 149 Farnborough, Lord, 107 Fielden, Mr., 159 Fitzpatrick, General, 20 Flood, Mr., and Reform, 77, and _note_ Fonblanque, Albany, 47, 84, 196, 197 Forster, W. E., and the Irish famine, 149; tribute to Lord John Russell for his work in the cause of education, 285, 327 Fortescue, Mr. Chichester, Lord John Russell's 'Letters on the State of Ireland' to, 280, 342 Fox, Charles James, his influence on Lord John Russell, 8; on Parliamentary Representation, 25; and the Test and Corporation Acts, 54, 55; Russell's Biography of him, 98, 272, 277 France: Napoleon's intention to create a new aristocracy, 31; and England's alliance, 120; overthrow and flight of Louis Philippe, 163, 171; and the Spanish marriages, 171; Revolution of 1848, 171; and the 'Don Pacifico' affair, 175; and the Crimean War, 225, 229; the Orsini Conspiracy, 289, 290; Commercial Treaty with England, 295, 296; campaign with Italy, against Austria, 302, 303; annexation of Savoy, 305 Free Trade: the question coming to the front, 121; and Tory opposition, 132; conversion of Peel, 137, 138; and the Commercial Treaty with France, 296 French Revolution, its influence on the English people, 24, 36 Friends of the People, Society of the, 25, 63 Froude, Mr., on the improvements effected by the Reform Bill, 86, 87 'GAGGING ACTS,' the, 39, 40 Garibaldi, General, 300; entry into Naples, 306; visit to Pembroke Lodge, 307 Gascoigne, General, 73 Gatton, 23 Gavazzi, Father, 186 George III., his madness and blindness, 27; and Catholic Emancipation, 59 George IV. and Queen Caroline, 41; and Catholic Emancipation, 59; death, 60, 64 Gibson, Milner, 141, 208, 287, 295 Gladstone, Mr., on the Colonial policy of the Melbourne Government, 117; Colonial Secretary, 136; and Sir Robert Peel, 176; his attack on Disraeli's Budget, 199; and Disraeli's claim to lead the Conservative party, 201 and _note_; and Lord John Russell's claim to the Premiership on the fall of the Derby Government, 202; takes office under Lord Aberdeen, 207; first Budget, 210; and the income tax, 240; resigns office, 258, 290; Chancellor of the Exchequer (1859), 295; tribute to Russell on his accession to the Peerage, 297, 298; unseated at Oxford, 325; Chancellor of the Exchequer under Lord Russell, 327; introduces a Reform Bill, 328; tribute to Lord Russell, 330; ovation at Carlton House Terrace, 332; and the Irish Question, 342, 363, 366 Glenelg, Lord, 112 Goderich, Lord, 52, 93 Gordon, Lady Georgiana, 3 Gore, Hon. Charles, 348 Gorham Case, the, 182 Gortschakoff, Prince, 261, 267 Goschen, Mr., 327 Graham, Sir James, 67; withdraws from Lord Grey's Ministry, 95; accuses Lord John Russell of encouraging sedition, 119; Home Secretary under Peel, 125; declines the Governor-Generalship of India, 141, 202, 207, 232, 254, 258, 290 Grampound, 27, 40, 41; disfranchised, 43 Granville, Lord, appointed Foreign Secretary, 182; on Lord John Russell's speech in defence of his late colleagues, 266; fails to form a Ministry on the defeat of Lord Derby, 293; becomes President of the Council, 295 Great Exhibition of 1851, 193, 200, 234, 308 Greece and the 'Don Pacifico' affair, 175 Greenock, Lord John Russell's speech on the prospects of war, at, 227 Greville, Charles, comments of, 61, 69, 72, 73, 102, 130, 180, 207, 257, 286 Grey, (Charles, second) Lord, 15, 25; and Lord John Russell's efforts on behalf of liberty, 58, 61; forms an Administration, 62, 65; early labours in the cause of Reform, 63, 64; characteristics, 65; announcement in the House of Lords with regard to the introduction of the first Reform Bill, 68; speech on the second Reform Bill, 76-78; resigns office, but resumes power on the inability of the Duke of Wellington to form a Ministry, 83, 92; changes in his Cabinet, 96; proposes the renewal of the Coercion Act, 96; resigns the Premiership, 99 Grey (Henry, third), Lord, 134; Secretary to the Colonies under Lord John Russell, 141 Grey, Sir George, Home Secretary under Lord John Russell, 141; and Irish crime, 153; appointed Colonial Secretary, 245, 295; Home Secretary, 327 Grillion's Club, 27, 28 Grosvenor, Earl, 329, 330 Grote, George, 90, 110, 111, 320 HABEAS CORPUS ACT, suspension of, 33, 34 Hampden, Dr., and the see of Hereford, 161 Hampden Clubs, 26 Harcourt, Archbishop, on religious tests, 57 Harding, Sir John, and the 'Alabama' Case, 315-317 Hardinge, Sir Henry (afterwards Viscount), 82, 249 Hartington, Lord, 292, 327 Henley, Mr., 291 Herbert of Lea, Lord, 232 Herbert, Sidney, 207, 244, 254, 258 Herschel, Sir John, 355 Hobhouse, Sir J. C., 70, 141 Holland, Lord, visit of Lord John Russell to the Peninsula with, 9-11, 30, 53, 57, 119; and the Life of Charles James Fox, 276 Holland House, 8, 15, 143 Holy Places in Palestine, dispute concerning, 213, 218 Horsman, Mr., 329 Houghton, Lord, 294 House of Commons, abuses and defects in representation before the era of Reform, 22, 23; presentation of the petition of the Friends of the People, 25, 26; suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, 33, 34; Sir Francis Burdett's motion for universal suffrage, and Lord John Russell's speech, 35; and the 'Gagging Acts,' 39, 40; Lord John's first resolutions in favour of Reform, 40; Lord John proposes an addition of 100 members, 43; introduction and second reading of the first Reform Bill, 69-73; dissolution, 74; first Reform Bill, 69-73; second Reform Bill, 75, 76; third Reform Bill, 81; the first Reformed Parliament, 88; number of Protectionists in 1847, 160 House of Lords, and the proposed enfranchisement of Manchester, 52; and the Test and Corporation Acts, 56, 57; effect of the Duke of Wellington's declaration against Reform, 61; its rejection of Reform, 78; urged by William IV. to withdraw opposition to the Reform Bill, 84; passing of the Reform Bill, 84; and the Jewish Disabilities Bill, 198, 291 Howick, Lord, 134 Hume, Joseph, 72, 80, 90, 121 Hunt, Mr. Ward, 330 -- 'Orator,' 26 Huskisson, Mr., 56 Hyde Park, Reform demonstration in, 332 INDEMNITY BILL for Dissenters, 51 India, Napoleon's prophecy as to the acquisition by Russia of, 31; Duhamel's scheme for its acquisition by Russia, 218; Mutiny in, 288 India Bills, 210, 290 Inkerman, battle of, 247 Ireland: condition of affairs on the accession of the Duke of Wellington to power, 53; agitation for Catholic Emancipation, 58, 59; and O'Connell, 90; Lord John Russell's visit in 1833, 91, 92; Poor Law Amendment Act, 93, 107; Mr. Littleton's Tithe Bill, 93; Tithe Bill of 1835, 105, 107; Municipal Bill, 105, 112; passing of the Tithe Bill, 112; Maynooth grant, 127, 128; potato famine, 130, 146, 148, 149; Peel's proposal for renewal of Coercion Act, 140; proposed renewal of Arms Bill, 147, 148; revolt of Young Ireland against O'Connell, 147; measures to relieve distress, 150-152; crime, 153, 154; Arms Bill (1847), 154; Treason Felony Act, 157; Encumbered Estates Act, 157; emigration, 158 Irish Church: Mr. Ward's motion, 95; Peel's accusation against Lord John Russell, 97; Lord John's motion of April 1835, 103, 104 Italy: Lord John Russell's impressions, 37; Lord John's second visit, 48, 49; and the retention by Austria of Lombardy and Venice, 172, 300; accession of Victor Emmanuel II. to the throne of Sardinia, 301; campaign, with France, against Austria, 302, 303; the Peace of Villafranca, 303; intervention of England, 304; annexation of Savoy by France, 305; entry of Garibaldi into Naples, and proclamation of Victor Emmanuel as King of Italy, 306 JAMAICA BILL, the, 114 Jews: exclusion from Parliament, 57; rejection in the Lords of bill for their relief, 89, 198, 210; passing of the bill in 1858, 290, 291 Jones, Gale, 13 KEBLE, Dr., 183 Kennington Common, Chartist demonstration on, 166-168 King, Mr. Locke, 193 Kinglake, Mr., 266, 353 Kingsley, Charles, his 'Alton Locke,' 166 Kossuth, Louis, his visit to England, 179 LABOUCHERE, Mr. (afterwards Lord Taunton), 116, 147 Lambton, Mr. (father of the first Earl of Durham), 25 Lancashire Cotton Famine, 319 Lancaster, Joseph, 115 and _note_, 281, 282 Lansdowne, Lord, 52, 141, 202, 205, 240, 251, 258 Lascelles, Mr., 23 Lecky, Mr. W. E. H., his reminiscences of Earl Russell, 335-339 Leech, John, 192, 241 Leeds, unrepresented in the House of Commons, 23, 38, 60, 71, 296 'Letters written for the Post, and not for the Press,' question of authorship of, 279, 280 Lewis, Sir George Cornewall, 210, 226, 238; Chancellor of the Exchequer in Lord Palmerston's Ministry, 258; on Lord John Russell's speech announcing his resignation (1855), 265, 295 Lhuys, M. Drouyn de, 261, 262 Lincoln, President, assassination of, 325 Lister, Sir Villiers, 348 Littleton, Mr. (afterwards Lord Hatherton), and the Irish Title Bill, 93; and the Coercion Act, 97 Liverpool, Lord, 21, 33, 50, 63 Llandaff, Bishop of, and the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, 57 London University, 106, 107; proposed enfranchisement of, 296 Londonderry, Marquis of, 79 Louis Philippe, overthrow and flight of, 163, 171; and the Spanish marriages, 171 Lowe, Mr., 327, 329, 332 Luddites, riots of the, 32 Lyndhurst, Lord, and Jewish Lord Chancellors, 291 Lyons, Sir Edmund, 252 Lytton, Sir Edward Bulwer, 208, 265 MACAULAY, Lord, 141; urges Lord John Russell to take office in the Coalition Ministry, 204 Mackintosh, Sir James, 25, 39, 53 Magenta, battle of, 303 Malmesbury, Lord, 137 Maltby, Dr., Bishop of Durham, and Lord John Russell's 'Durham Letter,' 184 Manchester, unrepresented in the House of Commons, 23, 38, 51, 60, 71, 126, 155; creation of bishopric of, 160, 296 Martineau, Harriet, 129 Maule, Fox, 141 Maynooth College, 127-130 Mazzini, 300 McCarthy, Mr. Justin, on the attitude of the Catholics towards Lord John Russell, 188 Melbourne, Lord, becomes Prime Minister, 99; dismissed by William IV., 100, 101; again Prime Minister, 104; Queen Victoria's regard for him, 108, 109; characteristics, 108, 170; opinion of the ballot, 109; resigns, but is recalled to power, 114; his recognition of Russell's influence as leader in the Commons, 120; blunders of his Government, 122; defeat of his Government, 123, 144 Melville, Lord, 8 'Memoirs of the Affairs of Europe from the Peace of Utrecht,' by Lord John Russell, 275 Memorandum, Secret, 216, 225 Menschikoff, Prince, 223, 224 Metternich, 171, 300 Miall, Edward, 242 Militia Bill, the, 194, 195 Milton, Lord, 23 Mitchel, John, 157, 158 Moldavia and Wallachia, occupation by Russia of, 224, 229, 259 Monson, Lord, 23 Moore, Thomas, his 'Remonstrance,' 34; accompanies Lord John Russell to the Continent, 36; extracts from his journal, 37, 39, 41; anxiety as to Lord John's politics, 52; on Lord John's success with his motion for the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, 58; and Lardner's Encyclopædia, 91; Russell's 'Memoirs and Correspondence' of Moore, 204, 272, 278 Morpeth, Lord, 141 Municipal Reform Act, 90, 104 NAPOLEON I., Lord Russell's boyish hatred of, 9; Lord John's interview with him at Elba, 28-31; his description of Wellington, 30; opinions on European politics, &c., 29-31; and Talma, 37 Napoleon III., 167; and the _Coup d'État_ of 1851, 179; and the fear of his invading England, 194; and the custody of the Holy Places, 218; his alliance with England during the Crimean War, 262; visit to England (1855), 267; interview with Count Cavour, 302; designs with regard to Italy, 303, 304; and the Peace of Villafranca, 303 Navigation Acts, 197 Nesselrode, Count, 214, 215 New Zealand becomes part of the British dominions, 117, 199 Newcastle, Duke of, 207, 232; unpopularity as Secretary for War, 244, 249, 250; incapacity as War Minister, 245 Newman, Dr., 161, 182 Nicholas, Emperor, his ambitious projects, 213, 214; visit to England in 1844 and the Secret Memorandum, 215, 216; friendship with Lord Aberdeen, 217; letter to Queen Victoria, 230; 'Generals Janvier et Février,' 259; death, 259 Nightingale, Miss Florence, 250 Nonconformists: the Indemnity Bill, 51; agitation for repeal of Test and Corporation Acts and their repeal moved and carried by Lord John Russell, 53-57; the Marriage Bill and Registration Act, 106; and the struggle for civil and religious liberty, 184; deputation to Lord Russell, 366 Normanby, Lord, 116, 179, 180 Northcote, Sir Stafford, 369 Nottingham Castle, 79 'Nun of Arrouca, The,' 278 O'BRIEN, Smith, 140, 157, 158 O'Connell, Daniel, 53; his election for Clare, 58, 90, 92; on the revenues of the Irish Church, 97; and the Coercion Bill, 97, 99, 140, 146; and Lord John Russell, 147; and the potato famine, 149, 158 O'Connor, Feargus, 165-168 Old Sarum, 23, 71 Oltenitza, battle of, 230 Omar Pacha, 230 Opium war, the, 121 Orloff, Count, 214 Orsini conspiracy, the, 289, 290 Oxford Movement, the, 161, 182-186, 189 PALMERSTON, Lord, 21, 56, 119; and the despatch to Metternich, 120; Foreign Secretary under Lord John Russell, 141; compared with Russell, 144; early official life and politics, 169; his independent action, 169, 174, 175, 177; his despatch to France on the Spanish marriages, 171; foreign policy, 173, 174; despatch to Sir H. Bulwer at Madrid, 174; and the 'Don Pacifico' affair, 175; popularity, 177; and the Queen's instructions, 178; and the Kossuth incident, 179; and the _Coup d'État_ in Paris (1851), 179; dismissed from the Foreign Office, 180; declines the Irish Viceroyalty, 181; his amendment on the Militia Bill, 195; offered a seat in Lord Derby's Cabinet, 201; Home Secretary under Lord Aberdeen, 207; urges the despatch of the fleet to the Bosphorus, 225; resignation, and its withdrawal, 237, 238; succeeds Lord Aberdeen as Prime Minister, 258; and Count Buol's proposals, 262, 263; defeat on the 'Arrow' question and return to power after the General Election, 287; defeat and resignation on the Conspiracy Bill, 290; renewal of friendly relations with Russell, 293; forms a Ministry on the defeat of Lord Derby, 293, 295; indifference to Reform, 296; on Cabinet opinions, 323; death, 325; Lord Lyttelton's opinion of him, 326 Panmure, Lord, 243, 258 Papal aggression, and the decree of Pius IX., 182-184; and the Durham Letter, 184-188 Paris, Treaty of, 268 Parliamentary representation before the era of Reform, 22, 23 Parnell, Sir H., 62 'Partington, Dame,' and Sydney Smith's speech on Reform, 80 'Peace with honour,' 227, 349 Peel, Lady Georgiana, 357 Peel, Sir Robert, 21, 50; leader of the House of Commons under the Duke of Wellington, 52; opposes the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, 56; and Catholic Emancipation, 58; and the first Reform Bill, 69, 70, 73, 76, 83; Prime Minister, 102; resignation, 104; and the Whig Ladies-in-Waiting, 114; his motion of want of confidence in the Melbourne Administration, 122; again Prime Minister, 123, 124; characteristics, 126, 127; and the grant to Maynooth College, 127, 128, 130; on the state of Ireland, 128; and the repeal of the Corn Laws, 131; resignation and resumption of office, 134, 136; proposes gradual repeal of Corn Laws, 138, 139; defeat and resignation on the Coercion Bill, 140, 155; and Lord Palmerston, 170; death, 176, 177; and the Emperor Nicholas, 215 Pélissier, General, 263, 267 Pembroke Lodge, 307, 351-353, 356, 357 Penal Code, the, before the era of Reform, 24, 48, 107 Peninsular Campaign, its costliness, 22 Penryn, 40, 51, 52 People's Charter, the, 165 Peterloo Massacre, the, 38 Petty, Lord Henry (afterwards third Marquis of Lansdowne), 12 Pius IX., and his decree of 1850, 182, 183 Playfair, Professor John, 12 Polignac, Prince de, 60, 61 Polish revolt of 1863, 321 Poor Law Amendment Act (Ireland), 93, 107, 151 Poor Law Board, 160 Poor Laws, 89, 126 Potato famine, 130, 146, 148, 149 Prisons, regulation of, 107 Protestant Operative Association of Dublin, 129 Prussia and the Vienna Note, 227; and the Crimean War, 243 Public Health Act, 162 'Punch,' cartoons, &c., in, 192, 241, 242, 307, 367 Pusey, Dr., 161 and _note_, 183 RAGLAN, Lord, 246, 252, 267 'Recollections and Suggestions,' publication of, 280 Redistribution of Seats Bill, 330 Redcliffe, Lord Stratford de: skill in diplomacy, and early diplomatic life, 218-220; return to Constantinople, 220, 221; and the second Congress at Vienna, 260 Reform: its early advocates, 25-27; and the Society of the Friends of the People, 25; Lord John Russell's first speech on the subject, 35; Sir Francis Burdett's motion of 1819, 35; Lord John brings forward his first resolutions in the House of Commons, 40; disfranchisement of Grampound, 43; Lord John's motion for an addition of 100 members to the House of Commons, 43; resolutions brought forward by Lord Blandford, 59; rejection of Lord John's Bill for enfranchising Manchester, Birmingham, and Leeds, 60; O'Connell's motion for Triennial Parliaments, &c., 60; declaration of the Duke of Wellington, 61; the Committee of Four and the first Reform Bill, 67, 68; introduction and second reading of the first Bill in the Commons, 69-73; the second Bill, 75-78; public excitement on the rejection of the second Bill by the House of Lords, 79, 80; the third Bill passes the Commons, 81; the Bill passes the House of Lords, and receives the Royal Assent, 84; secured by popular enthusiasm, 85, 87; Lord John's Bill of 1852, 196; Bill of 1854, 236, 237, 239; Disraeli's Bill, 291, 292; Lord John's Bill of 1860, 296; Bill introduced by Mr. Gladstone, 328 Regent, Prince, insulted on returning from opening Parliament, 32; and the Peterloo Massacre, 38 Revolution, French (1848), 171 Rice, Mr. Spring, 96 Richmond, Duke of, 89, 95, 124 Ripon, Lord, 95, 124 Roden, Lord, 113 Roebuck, J. A., and education, 89; moves vote of confidence in the Russell Administration, 176; his motion to inquire into the condition of the Army in the Crimea, 254 Rogers, Samuel, 123, 276 Rothschild, Baron, 291 Russell, Mr. G. W. E., 344 Russell, John, the first Constable of Corfe Castle, 1, 2 Russell, Sir John, Speaker of the House of Commons, 2 Russell, John, the third, and first Earl of Bedford, 2 Russell, Lord John: ancestry, 1, 2; boyhood and education, 3-9; schooldays at Sunbury and Westminster, 3-5; extracts from journal kept at Westminster, 4, 5; passion for the theatre, 4; education under Dr. Cartwright, 5; dedicates a manuscript book to Pitt, 6; schooldays and schoolfellows at Woodnesborough, 6-9; writes satirical verses and dramatic prologues, 7, 8; opinion on the case of Lord Melville, 8; influence of Mr. Fox upon him, 8; at Holland House, 8, 336; friendship with Sydney Smith, 8; visit to the English lakes and Scotland, 9; impressions of Sir Walter Scott, 9; first visit to the House of Lords, 9; visit to the Peninsula with Lord and Lady Holland, 9-11; political predilections and sympathy with Spain, 9-11; goes to Edinburgh University, 11; impressions of Professors Dugald Stewart and John Playfair, 12, 13; his powers of debate at the Edinburgh Speculative Society, 13; early bias towards Parliamentary Reform, 14; second visit to Spain, 14, 15; first impressions of Lord Wellington, 15; commands a company of the Bedfordshire Militia, 16; third visit to Spain, 16-20; on the field of Salamanca, 17; at Wellington's head-quarters, 17; his ride to Frenida, 18; dines with a canon at Plasencia, 19; at Talavera and Madrid, 20; elected member for Tavistock, 20; his opinion of Lord Liverpool, 21; maiden speech in Parliament, 27; speech on the Alien Acts, 27; elected a member of Grillion's Club, 27; his Italian tour of 1814-15, 28-31; interview with Napoleon at Elba, 28-31; speeches in Parliament against the renewal of war with France, against the income-tax and the Army Estimates, 32; on the proposal to suspend the Habeas Corpus Act, 33, 34; proposes to abandon politics, 34; literary labours and travel, 34; returned again for Tavistock at the General Election of 1818, 34; first speech in the House of Commons on Parliamentary Reform, 35; growth of his influence in Parliament, 36; visit to the Continent with Thomas Moore, 36, 37; impressions of Italy, 37; brings forward in Parliament his first resolutions in favour of Reform, 40; his bill for disfranchising Penryn, Camelford, Grampound, and Barnstaple, 40; returned to Parliament for Huntingdon, 40; and the case of Grampound, 40, 41, 42, 43; takes the side of Queen Caroline, 41; writes 'The Nun of Arrouca,' 42; taciturnity in French society, 42; his resolutions for the discovery and punishment of bribery, &c., 43, 44; proposes an addition of 100 members to the House of Commons, 43; increase of his political influence, 45, 46; unseated in Huntingdonshire, and his second visit to Italy, 48, 49; elected for Bandon Bridge, 49; on the condition of the Tory party on Canning's accession to power, 50; and restrictions upon Dissenters, 51; proposal to enfranchise Manchester, 51; moves the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, 55-57; and Catholic Emancipation, 59; rejection of his bill for enfranchising Manchester, Birmingham, and Leeds, 60; defeated at Bedford, 60; visit to Paris, and efforts to save the life of Prince de Polignac, 60, 61; elected for Tavistock, and appointed Paymaster-General, 62; prepares the first Reform Bill in conjunction with Lord Durham and others, 67; introduces the bill, 69-72; moves the second reading of the Bill, 73; returned to Parliament for Devonshire, 75; raised to Cabinet rank, and introduces second Reform Bill, 75; reply to vote of thanks from Birmingham, 79; introduces the third Reform Bill, 80; carries the bill to the Lords, 81; and the Municipal Reform Act, 90, 104; opposition to Radical measures, 90; and the wants of Ireland, 91; visit to Ireland, 91, 92; on Mr. Littleton's Irish Tithe Bill, 94, 95; 'upsets the coach,' 95; on Coercion Acts, 97, 98; allusion to his Biography of Fox, 98; and the leadership in the House of Commons under the first Melbourne Ministry, 100, 101; William IV.'s opinion of him, 101; returned for South Devon on Peel's accession to power, 102; as leader of the Opposition, 103; and the meeting at Lichfield House, 103; defeats the Government with his Irish Church motion, 104; marriage, 104, 355; appointment to the Home Office in the second Melbourne Administration, 104; defeated in Devonshire, and elected for Stroud, 104; presented with a testimonial at Bristol, 105; and the Dissenters' Marriage Bill, 106; and the Tithe Commutation Act, 106, 107; again returned for Stroud, 107; allusion to the accession of the Queen, 108; declines to take part in further measures of Reform, and is called by Radicals 'Finality John,' 110; death of his wife, 112; Education Bill of 1839, 114, 115; as Colonial Secretary, 116-118, 338; his appointment of a Chartist magistrate, 119; and the Corn Laws, 121; returned for the City of London, 122; second marriage, 123; Wellington's opinion of him, 123; his opinion of Peel's Administration, 126; supports Peel on the Maynooth question, 129, 130; and the repeal of the Corn Laws, 131-134, 139; and the 'Edinburgh Letter,' 133; fails to form a Ministry on the resignation of Peel, 134, 135; opposes Peel's proposal for renewal of Coercion Act, 139, 140; succeeds Peel as Prime Minister, 141; address in the City, 142; political qualities, 143, 145; contrasted with Palmerston, 144; his measure for total repeal of Corn Laws, 145; and sugar duties, 146; proposes renewal of Irish Arms Bill, 146; his Irish policy, and anxiety and efforts for the improvement of the people, 151, 152, 156, 157, 158, 338, 342; and the Arms Bill (1847), 154; again visits Ireland, 158; education measures, 159; returned again for the City, 160; his appointment of Dr. Hampden to the see of Hereford, 161; and the Chartist demonstration of 1848, 166, 168; relations with Lord Palmerston, 170; on the political situation in Europe after the French Revolution of 1848, 171, 172; and Palmerston's action in the 'Don Pacifico' affair, 176; tribute to Sir Robert Peel, 177; dismisses Palmerston from the Foreign Office, 180; and the breach with Palmerston, 181; his 'Durham Letter,' 184-191; introduces the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill, 191; resigns the Premiership, but returns to office on the failure of Lord Stanley to form a Ministry, 193; resignation on the vote on the Militia Bill, 195; his Reform Bill of 1852, 196; defence of Lord Clarendon, 196; edits 'Memoirs and Journal of Thomas Moore,' 204; accepts Foreign Secretaryship in the Aberdeen Administration, 206; his vacillation in taking office under Lord Aberdeen not due to personal motives, 205; retires from Foreign Office, 210, 221; on the projects of Russia, 218, 224, 225; and the Vienna Note, 227; speech at Greenock on the prospects of war, 227; memorandum to the Cabinet on the eve of the Crimean War, 228; Reform Bill of 1854, 236, 239, 241; resignation, 241; resumes his seat in the Cabinet, 242; speech in the House of Commons on withdrawing his Reform measure, 242, 243; proposes a rearrangement of the War and Colonial departments, 244, 248, 251; presses Lord Aberdeen to take decisive action with regard to the Crimean War, 248; memorandum on the Crimean War, 251; proposed resignation, 251, 252; resignation on Roebuck's motion to inquire into the condition of the Army in the Crimea, and his speech on the question, 254-257; becomes Colonial Secretary in Palmerston's Government, 258; plenipotentiary at second Congress of Vienna, 259-263; consents at Palmerston's request to remain in the Ministry, 263; explanations in the House of Commons regarding the failure of the Vienna Conference, 264, 265; announces his resignation (1855), 265; speech in defence of his late colleagues against Roebuck's motion of censure, 266; his mistake in joining the Coalition Ministry, 271; leisure, travel, &c., 272; literary labours, 272-281, 354; and the pension for Moore, 278; remarks on his own career in 'Recollections and Suggestions,' 281, 336; allusions to Joseph Lancaster, 282; work in the cause of education, 282-285, 339; scheme of National Education (1856), 284; opposes Lord Palmerston on the 'Arrow' question, 287; speech in the City and re-election, 287, 288; supports Palmerston at the Indian Mutiny crisis, 288; on the Conspiracy Bill, 289, 290; supports Lord Derby in passing the India Bill, 290; thanked by Jews for his aid in removing their disabilities, 291; attacks Disraeli's Reform Bill, 292; renewal of friendly intercourse with Palmerston, 293; relations with Cobden and Bright, 294; joins Palmerston's Administration (1859) as Foreign Secretary, 295; introduces a new Reform Bill, 296; raised to the Peerage, 297; acquires the Ardsalla estate, and receives the Garter, 298; his work at the Foreign Office, 299, 300; intervention in Italian affairs, 304, 339; protests against the annexation of Savoy by France, 305; receives Garibaldi at Pembroke Lodge, 307; his reception in Italy, 307; and the 'Trent' affair, 311; and the 'Alabama' case, 313-319, 341; on the Polish revolt, 321; and the Schleswig-Holstein difficulty, 322, 323; as Foreign Secretary, 323, 324; on Palmerston's vivacity, 325; second Premiership on the death of Palmerston, 325; tribute to Lord Palmerston, 327; defeated on the questions of Reform and Redistribution of Seats, 331; Mr. Lecky's reminiscences of him, 335-339; relations with colleagues and opponents, 336, 337, 347; speech on the maintenance of the independence of Belgium, 340; letter on the claims of the Vatican, 341, 342; letters to the 'Times' on the government of Ireland, 343; and Home Rule, 338, 343, 344; independent attitude towards the throne, 344; relations with Lord Aberdeen, 346, 347; Lord Selborne's impressions of him, 345; his private secretaries' impressions of him, 347, 348; life at Pembroke Lodge, 351-353; stories about doctors, 350; visit of Bulgarian delegates, 352; friendships, 355; his use of patronage, 355; his children, 356; home life, and his children's reminiscences, 356-361; Dr. Anderson's recollections, 361; a meeting with Carlyle, 362; Lord Dufferin's recollections, 363; religious faith, 364; interview with Spurgeon, 365; at Cheshunt College, 365; Nonconformist deputation, 366; 'Golden Wedding,' 367; death, 367; opinion of Lord Shaftesbury, 368; a remark of Sir Stafford Northcote's, 369 Russell, Hon. Rollo, 360, 367 Russell, William, Member of Parliament in the reign of Edward II., 2 Russell, Lord William (of the seventeenth century), 1; Lord John Russell's Biography of him, 274 Russell, Lord William, Lord John Russell's brother, 6; wounded at Talavera, 14, 34; letter to Lord John, 49 Russia, and India, 31, 218; projects and demands with regard to Turkey, 223, 224; occupation of Moldavia and Wallachia, 224, 229; rejection of the Vienna Note, 226; destroys Turkish fleet at Sinope, 230; evacuates the Principalities, 243; operations in the Crimea, 246-252; death of the Emperor Nicholas, 259; fall of Sebastopol, and losses in the war, 268; and the Polish revolt, 321 SALAMANCA, battle of, 16, 17 Sardinia, and the Crimean War, 267 Schleswig-Holstein question, the, 172, 322, 323 Scott, Sir Walter, Lord John Russell's first acquaintance with, 9; and the Edinburgh Speculative Society, 13, 91, 355 Sebastopol, siege and fall of, 246, 247, 268 Secret Memorandum, the, 216, 225 Sefton, Lord, 75 Selborne, Lord, on the 'Alabama' case, 312-319; impressions of Lord Russell, 345 Seymour, Sir Hamilton, 214 Seymour, Lord Webb, 12 Shaftesbury, Lord, and factory children, 89; and Lord John Russell's support of Peel, 129, 130; and the Factory Bill, 159; special constable in 1848, 167; and Cardinal Wiseman's manifesto, 187; on the Coalition Government, 211, 212, 368 'Shannon' and the 'Chesapeake,' battle between the, 22 Shelley and the Peterloo massacre, 38 Sheridan, Mr., 25 Sidmouth, Lord, 21, 40, 63, 85 Simpson, General, 267 Sinope, destruction of Turkish fleet at, 230, 232, 233 Slave trade, 22, 48, 89 Smith, Rev. --, Vicar of Woodnesborough, a tutor of Lord John Russell's, 6 Smith, Dr. Southwood, and the Public Health Act, 162 Smith, Sydney, friendship with Lord John Russell, 8; on Reform, 27; on the political situation after Canning's accession to power, 50, 51; and 'Dame Partington,' 80; hopeful of the triumph of Reform, 84; and 'Lord John Reformer,' 90; on Lord John's influence in the Melbourne Government, 113 Society of the Friends of the People, 25, 63 Solferino, battle of, 303 Spain, Lord John Russell's visit with Lord and Lady Holland, 9-11; Lord John's sympathy, 9, 10; Lord John's second visit, 14, 15; Lord John's third visit and adventures, 16-20; entry of Wellington into Madrid, 16; the Spanish marriages, 171, 172; Lord Palmerston's interference, 174 Spencer, Lord, on the alliance of England with France, 120 Spurgeon, C. H., 365 Stanhope, Colonel, 14, 15 Stanley, Lord, and Irish affairs, 92, 93; Secretary for the Colonies, 93; and the Irish Church, 95; withdraws from Lord Grey's Cabinet, 95; Secretary for the Colonies under Peel, 124, 134; succeeds to the House of Lords, 141; challenges Palmerston's foreign policy, 176; fails to form a Ministry on the resignation of Lord John Russell, 193 Stanmore, Lord, 118, 119, 211, 231, 233, 347 Stansfeld, Mr., 327 Stewart, Dugald, 12 Stockmar, Baron, 101, 216 Sussex, Duke of, and the claims of Dissenters, 53 Sweden, and the Crimean War, 267 Syllogism, a merry canon's, 19 TAHITI incident, the, 125 Tavistock, monastic lands granted to the first Earl of Bedford, 2; election of Lord John Russell as member for, 20, 62 Tavistock, Lord, elder brother of Lord John Russell, 6, 11 Tennyson, Mr., 90 Tennyson, Lord, his appointment as Poet Laureate, 355 Test and Corporation Acts; agitation for their total repeal, 53, 54; speech of Fox, 54, 55; their provisions, 54; jubilee of repeal, 366 Tithe Acts (Ireland): Mr. Littleton's Bill, 93, 94; Bill of 1835, 105, 107; Bill passes through Parliament, 112 Tithe Commutation Act, 106, 107 Tooke, Horne, 26 Trafalgar Square demonstration on the Reform question, 332 Treason Felony Act, 157 Treaty of Paris (1856), 268 'Trent' affair, the, 310-312 Turkey, war with Egypt, 119; and the custody of the Holy Places in Palestine, 213; the 'sick man' of Europe, 214, 215; oppression of Christian subjects, 217; reception of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, 222; and the Vienna Note, 224-227; ultimatum to Russia, 229; destruction of fleet by Russia at Sinope, 230; and the second Congress at Vienna, 259-262; and the Treaty of Paris, 268, 269 UNIVERSITY of London, 106, 107; proposed enfranchisement of, 296 VANSITTART, Mr., 21 Vaughan, Cardinal, on Romish practices in the Anglican Church, 190, 191 Victor Emmanuel II., accession to the throne of Sardinia, and efforts to secure Italian independence, 301; proclaimed King of Italy, 306 Victoria, Queen, accession, 107; her regard for Lord Melbourne, 108, 109; declines to dismiss her Whig Ladies-in-Waiting, 114; visit to Ireland, 158; instructions to Lord Palmerston, 178; letter to Lord John Russell on the formation of a Coalition Government, 203; her view of the Coalition Ministry, 208; reply to letter from the Czar on the eve of the Crimean War, 230; and the death of the Prince Consort, 309; letter to Lord Russell on the death of Palmerston, 326; opens Parliament (1866), 328; letter to Lady Russell on the death of the Earl, 368 Vienna, revolt of (1848), 171; Congress, 224; second Congress, 259-262 Vienna Note, 224-228 Villafranca, Treaty of, 303 Villiers, Mr. Charles, 121, 208 Vittoria, battle of, 20 Vitzthum, Count, 217, 324 WALPOLE, Mr. Spencer, on the Arms Bill of the Russell Administration, 154; retires from the Home Office on the introduction of Disraeli's Reform Bill, 291, 330 Ward, Mr., and the Irish Church, 90, 95 Wellington, Duke of, Lord John Russell's first impressions of, 15, 16, 17; described by Napoleon, 30, 50; becomes Prime Minister, 52; and Catholic Emancipation, 58, 59; his declaration against Reform, 61, 65; resignation, 62; predictions on the Reform question, 69; failure to form a Ministry, 83; lament on the triumph of Reform, 85, 114; opinion of Lord John, 123; and the Anti-Corn-Law agitation, 136, 137; and the demonstration on Kennington Common of 1848, 166, 167; and Sir Robert Peel, 176; death, 200; and the Emperor Nicholas, 215 Wesley, influence of the preaching of, 24 Westminster School, its condition at the beginning of the century, 3; Lord John's experiences at, 3-5; some of its celebrated scholars, 3, 4 Westmoreland, Lord, 50 Wetherell, Mr., and the first Reform Bill, 69 Whitfield, influence of his preaching, 24 Wilberforce, William, 89 William IV., his accession, 61, 64; receives a petition in favour of the Grey Administration, 80; refuses his sanction for the creation of new peers, 83; lampooned, 83; urges the House of Lords to withdraw opposition to the Reform Bill, 84; dismisses the first Melbourne Ministry, 100, 101; his opinion of Lord John Russell, 101 Winchilsea, Lord, 57 Wiseman, Cardinal, 182, 183, 186, 187 Wolseley, Sir Charles, 38 Wood, Sir Charles, 141, 193, 258 Working classes, their condition and claims in 1848, 163-165 Wynn, Mr. Charles, 41 ZÜRICH, Treaty of, 303 _Spottiswoode & Co. Printers, New-street Square, London._ The Queen's Prime Ministers A SERIES OF POLITICAL BIOGRAPHIES EDITED BY STUART J. REID. * * * * * * * * A Limited Library Edition of _Two Hundred and Fifty copies_, each numbered, printed on hand-made paper, parchment binding, gilt top, with facsimile reproductions, in some cases of characteristic notes of Speeches and Letters, which are not included in the ordinary Edition, and some additional Portraits. Price for the Complete Set of NINE VOLUMES, FOUR GUINEAS NETT. NO VOLUMES OF THIS EDITION SOLD SEPARATELY. * * * * * _VOLUMES ALREADY PUBLISHED._ THE EARL OF BEACONSFIELD, K.G. BY JAMES ANTHONY FROUDE, D.C.L. SEVENTH EDITION. With Photogravure Portrait. Crown 8vo. 3_s._ 6_d._ 'There is something in Mr. Froude's account even of these years which will be new to Lord Beaconsfield's admirers as well as to his critics, and will contribute to the final estimate of his place in the annals of our generation.'--TIMES (Leader). 'We believe that Mr. Froude's estimate of Lord Beaconsfield, on the whole, will be the one accepted by posterity.... It is the man's character which interests us; and this, we think, Mr. Froude has exhibited in its true light, and in colours that will not fade.'--STANDARD. LORD MELBOURNE BY HENRY DUNCKLEY ('VERAX'). With Photogravure Portrait. 3_s._ 6_d._ 'It is hard to imagine a better piece of work than this short study of Lord Melbourne by Mr. Dunckley. Amongst some of the most amusing of Mr. Dunckley's pages--and hardly a page of this little book is dull after the preliminary matter is passed by--is his account of Lord Melbourne's dealings with theology and Church preferments.... Of two lives of the Queen's Prime Ministers which have as yet appeared, we certainly give the preference to Mr. Dunckley's over Mr. Froude's. Mr. Froude had the more attractive theme, but Mr. Dunckley has made more of the less interesting theme.'--SPECTATOR. SIR ROBERT PEEL BY JUSTIN McCARTHY, M.P. SECOND EDITION, with an additional Chapter. With Photogravure Portrait. Crown 8vo. 3_s._ 6_d._ 'Mr. McCarthy relates clearly and well the main incidents of Peel's political life, and deals fairly with the great controversies which still rage about his conduct in regard to the Roman Catholic Relief Bill and the Repeal of the Corn Laws.' SATURDAY REVIEW. 'Mr. McCarthy's chapters on Catholic Emancipation are written with admirable impartiality, and he does ample justice to that high-minded administrator, Lord Anglesey.'--ATHENÆUM. * * * * * NEW EDITION. TWELFTH THOUSAND. THE RT. HON. W. E. GLADSTONE, M.P. BY G. W. E. RUSSELL. With Photogravure Portrait. Crown 8vo. 3_s._ 6_d._ 'Written in a manly and independent spirit, which we should expect in one of his lineage ... an honest book.'--WORLD. 'One of the most complete and succinct accounts of his extraordinary career that we have yet received.... A volume which we may specially commend as the most attractive and authoritative history of the man with whom it deals that has yet been given to the world.... Mr. Russell's clear and able sketch of one whom he is justly proud to call his friend.'--SPEAKER. THE MARQUIS OF SALISBURY, K.G. BY H. D. TRAILL, D.C.L. SECOND EDITION. With Photogravure Portrait. Crown 8vo. 3_s._ 6_d._ 'It is a good thing when a book is written as a gentleman should write it; a good thing when it is written as a scholar should write it; a good thing when it is written as a man full of practical and theoretical knowledge of his subject should write it. But it is a very rare thing indeed to find, as we find here, all three merits in combination. The result is not only a remarkable criticism on a man; it is, in part of it at least, the best and ... the most impartial sketch of recent political history that we have recently seen.'--SATURDAY REVIEW. LORD PALMERSTON BY THE MARQUIS OF LORNE. SECOND EDITION. With Photogravure Portrait. Crown 8vo. 3_s._ 6_d._ 'The Marquis of Lorne's little book must be consulted by every student who wishes to get a thorough understanding of European history in the early part of the century. The documents to which the author has obtained access ... are both interesting and authoritative.'--STANDARD. THE EARL OF DERBY BY GEORGE SAINTSBURY. With Photogravure Portrait. Crown 8vo. 3_s._ 6_d._ 'A biography distinguished throughout by scrupulous fairness to its subject.... It is perhaps superfluous to add that the book is written with all Mr. Saintsbury's customary animation of style, and that it abounds in those shrewd and often humorous comments on men and affairs which enliven everything he writes.' SATURDAY REVIEW. THE EARL OF ABERDEEN BY SIR ARTHUR GORDON, G.C.M.G. &c. With Portrait. Crown 8vo. 3_s._ 6_d._ 'This little book, unlike its companion volumes, contains original documents of solid historical importance, and hitherto no authentic biography of Lord Aberdeen has existed, and the editor of the series certainly made a large demand upon Sir Arthur Gordon's good nature when he requested a biography compressed within the limits prescribed. The author, however, has surmounted all difficulties with admirable skill.'--ATHENÆUM. LORD JOHN RUSSELL BY STUART J. REID. With Portrait. Crown 8vo. 3_s._ 6_d._ The book contains a good deal of new material concerning the career of the last of the great Whig statesmen. The Dowager-Countess of Russell has given Mr. Reid access to her own journals, and has personally taken a lively interest in the book; while other relatives, intimate friends, and political associates have lent their assistance. * * * * * London: SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON & COMPANY, LIMITED, St. Dunstan's House, Fetter Lane, Fleet Street, E.C. * * * * * TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: The original punctuation, language and spelling have been retained, except where noted [correction in brackets]. Minor typographical errors have been corrected without note. Pg. 8: atmosphere of Woburn and Woodnesborourgh[Woodnesborough] Pg. 18: and ink, and a bag of money. He woul[would] not carry anything Pg. 74: said that the electors in the approachhing[approaching] Pg. 86: wrote Mr. Froude in in[omitted] 1874. 'Its population Pg. 244: riend[friend], Mr. Sidney Herbert, were regarded, perhaps Pg. 265: a matter magnified beyond its true porportions[proportions].' Pg. 376: and the _Coup d'Etat [d'État]_ of 1851, 179; Pg. 376: and the _Coup d'Etat [d'État]_ in Paris (1851), 179; 
9404	----	Text File produced by Ronald J. Goodden in memory of Royal G. Goodden THE STORY OF THE MALAKAND FIELD FORCE AN EPISODE OF FRONTIER WAR By Sir Winston S. Churchill "They (Frontier Wars) are but the surf that marks the edge and the advance of the wave of civilisation." LORD SALISBURY, Guildhall, 1892 CONTENTS Preface Chapter I: The Theatre of War Chapter II: The Malakand Camps Chapter III: The Outbreak Chapter IV: The Attack on the Malakand Chapter V: The Relief of Chakdara Chapter VI: The Defence of Chakdara Chapter VII: The Gate of Swat Chapter VIII: The Advance Against the Mohmands Chapter IX: Reconnaissance Chapter X: The March to Nawagai Chapter XI: The Action of the Mamund Valley, 16th September Chapter XII: At Inayat Kila Chapter XIII: Nawagai Chapter XIV: Back to the Mamund Valley Chapter XV: The Work of the Cavalry Chapter XVI: Submission Chapter XVII: Military Observations Chapter XVIII: The Riddle of the Frontier Appendix THIS BOOK IS INSCRIBED TO MAJOR-GENERAL SIR BINDON BLOOD, K.C.B. UNDER WHOSE COMMAND THE OPERATIONS THEREIN RECORDED WERE CARRIED OUT; BY WHOSE GENERALSHIP THEY WERE BROUGHT TO A SUCCESSFUL CONCLUSION; AND TO WHOSE KINDNESS THE AUTHOR IS INDEBTED FOR THE MOST VALUABLE AND FASCINATING EXPERIENCE OF HIS LIFE. PREFACE "According to the fair play of the world, Let me have an audience." "King John," Act v., Sc. 2. On general grounds I deprecate prefaces. I have always thought that if an author cannot make friends with the reader, and explain his objects, in two or three hundred pages, he is not likely to do so in fifty lines. And yet the temptation of speaking a few words behind the scenes, as it were, is so strong that few writers are able to resist it. I shall not try. While I was attached to the Malakand Field Force I wrote a series of letters for the London Daily Telegraph. The favourable manner in which these letters were received, encouraged me to attempt a more substantial work. This volume is the result. The original letters have been broken up, and I have freely availed myself of all passages, phrases, and facts, that seemed appropriate. The views they contained have not been altered, though several opinions and expressions, which seemed mild in the invigorating atmosphere of a camp, have been modified, to suit the more temperate climate of peace. I have to thank many gallant officers for the assistance they have given me in the collection of material. They have all asked me not to mention their names, but to accede to this request would be to rob the story of the Malakand Field Force of all its bravest deeds and finest characters. The book does not pretend to deal with the complications of the frontier question, nor to present a complete summary of its phases and features. In the opening chapter I have tried to describe the general character of the numerous and powerful tribes of the Indian Frontier. In the last chapter I have attempted to apply the intelligence of a plain man to the vast mass of expert evidence, which on this subject is so great that it baffles memory and exhausts patience. The rest is narrative, and in it I have only desired to show the reader what it looked like. As I have not been able to describe in the text all the instances of conduct and courage which occurred, I have included in an appendix the official despatches. The impartial critic will at least admit that I have not insulted the British public by writing a party pamphlet on a great Imperial question. I have recorded the facts as they occurred, and the impressions as they arose, without attempting to make a case against any person or any policy. Indeed, I fear that assailing none, I may have offended all. Neutrality may degenerate into an ignominious isolation. An honest and unprejudiced attempt to discern the truth is my sole defence, as the good opinion of the reader has been throughout my chief aspiration, and can be in the end my only support. Winston S. Churchill Cavalry Barracks, Bangalore, 30th December, 1897 CHAPTER I: THE THEATRE OF WAR The Ghilzaie chief wrote answer: "Our paths are narrow and steep. The sun burns fierce in the valleys, and the snow-fed streams run deep; . . . . . . . . . . So a stranger needs safe escort, and the oath of a valiant friend." "The Amir's Message," SIR A. LYALL. All along the north and north-west frontiers of India lie the Himalayas, the greatest disturbance of the earth's surface that the convulsions of chaotic periods have produced. Nearly four hundred miles in breadth and more than sixteen hundred in length, this mountainous region divides the great plains of the south from those of Central Asia, and parts as a channel separates opposing shores, the Eastern Empire of Great Britain from that of Russia. The western end of this tumult of ground is formed by the peaks of the Hindu Kush, to the south of which is the scene of the story these pages contain. The Himalayas are not a line, but a great country of mountains. By one who stands on some lofty pass or commanding point in Dir, Swat or Bajaur, range after range is seen as the long surges of an Atlantic swell, and in the distance some glittering snow peak suggests a white-crested roller, higher than the rest. The drenching rains which fall each year have washed the soil from the sides of the hills until they have become strangely grooved by numberless water-courses, and the black primeval rock is everywhere exposed. The silt and sediment have filled the valleys which lie between, and made their surface sandy, level and broad. Again the rain has cut wide, deep and constantly-changing channels through this soft deposit; great gutters, which are sometimes seventy feet deep and two or three hundred yards across. These are the nullahs. Usually the smaller ones are dry, and the larger occupied only by streams; but in the season of the rains, abundant water pours down all, and in a few hours the brook has become an impassable torrent, and the river swelled into a rolling flood which caves the banks round which it swirls, and cuts the channel deeper year by year. From the level plain of the valleys the hills rise abruptly. Their steep and rugged slopes are thickly strewn with great rocks, and covered with coarse, rank grass. Scattered pines grow on the higher ridges. In the water-courses the chenar, the beautiful eastern variety of the plane tree of the London squares and Paris boulevards, is occasionally found, and when found, is, for its pleasant shade, regarded with grateful respect. Reaching far up the sides of the hills are tiers of narrow terraces, chiefly the work of long-forgotten peoples, which catch the soil that the rain brings down, and support crops of barley and maize. The rice fields along both banks of the stream display a broad, winding strip of vivid green, which gives the eye its only relief from the sombre colours of the mountains. In the spring, indeed, the valleys are brightened by many flowers--wild tulips, peonies, crocuses and several kinds of polyanthus; and among the fruits the water melon, some small grapes and mulberries are excellent, although in their production, nature is unaided by culture. But during the campaign, which these pages describe, the hot sun of the summer had burnt up all the flowers, and only a few splendid butterflies, whose wings of blue and green change colour in the light, like shot silk, contrasted with the sternness of the landscape. The valleys are nevertheless by no means barren. The soil is fertile, the rains plentiful, and a considerable proportion of ground is occupied by cultivation, and amply supplies the wants of the inhabitants. The streams are full of fish, both trout and mahseer. By the banks teal, widgeon and wild duck, and in some places, snipe, are plentiful. Chikor, a variety of partridge, and several sorts of pheasants, are to be obtained on the hills. Among the wild animals of the region the hunter may pursue the black or brown mountain bear, an occasional leopard, markhor, and several varieties of wild goat, sheep and antelope. The smaller quadrupeds include hares and red foxes, not unlike the British breed, only with much brighter coats, and several kinds of rats, some of which are very curious and rare. Destitute of beauty but not without use, the scaly ant-eater is frequently seen; but the most common of all the beasts is an odious species of large lizard, nearly three feet long, which resembles a flabby-skinned crocodile and feeds on carrion. Domestic fowls, goats, sheep and oxen, with the inevitable vulture, and an occasional eagle, complete the fauna. Over all is a bright blue sky and powerful sun. Such is the scenery of the theatre of war. The inhabitants of these wild but wealthy valleys are of many tribes, but of similar character and condition. The abundant crops which a warm sun and copious rains raise from a fertile soil, support a numerous population in a state of warlike leisure. Except at the times of sowing and of harvest, a continual state of feud and strife prevails throughout the land. Tribe wars with tribe. The people of one valley fight with those of the next. To the quarrels of communities are added the combats of individuals. Khan assails khan, each supported by his retainers. Every tribesman has a blood feud with his neighbor. Every man's hand is against the other, and all against the stranger. Nor are these struggles conducted with the weapons which usually belong to the races of such development. To the ferocity of the Zulu are added the craft of the Redskin and the marksmanship of the Boer. The world is presented with that grim spectacle, "the strength of civilisation without its mercy." At a thousand yards the traveller falls wounded by the well-aimed bullet of a breech-loading rifle. His assailant, approaching, hacks him to death with the ferocity of a South-Sea Islander. The weapons of the nineteenth century are in the hands of the savages of the Stone Age. Every influence, every motive, that provokes the spirit of murder among men, impels these mountaineers to deeds of treachery and violence. The strong aboriginal propensity to kill, inherit in all human beings, has in these valleys been preserved in unexampled strength and vigour. That religion, which above all others was founded and propagated by the sword--the tenets and principles of which are instinct with incentives to slaughter and which in three continents has produced fighting breeds of men--stimulates a wild and merciless fanaticism. The love of plunder, always a characteristic of hill tribes, is fostered by the spectacle of opulence and luxury which, to their eyes, the cities and plains of the south display. A code of honour not less punctilious than that of old Spain, is supported by vendettas as implacable as those of Corsica. In such a state of society, all property is held directly by main force. Every man is a soldier. Either he is the retainer of some khan--the man-at-arms of some feudal baron as it were--or he is a unit in the armed force of his village--the burgher of mediaeval history. In such surroundings we may without difficulty trace the rise and fall of an ambitious Pathan. At first he toils with zeal and thrift as an agriculturist on that plot of ground which his family have held since they expelled some former owner. He accumulates in secret a sum of money. With this he buys a rifle from some daring thief, who has risked his life to snatch it from a frontier guard-house. He becomes a man to be feared. Then he builds a tower to his house and overawes those around him in the village. Gradually they submit to his authority. He might now rule the village; but he aspires still higher. He persuades or compels his neighbors to join him in an attack on the castle of a local khan. The attack succeeds. The khan flies or is killed; the castle captured. The retainers make terms with the conqueror. The land tenure is feudal. In return for their acres they follow their new chief to war. Were he to treat them worse than the other khans treated their servants, they would sell their strong arms elsewhere. He treats them well. Others resort to him. He buys more rifles. He conquers two or three neighboring khans. He has now become a power. Many, perhaps all, states have been founded in a similar way, and it is by such steps that civilisation painfully stumbles through her earlier stages. But in these valleys the warlike nature of the people and their hatred of control, arrest the further progress of development. We have watched a man, able, thrifty, brave, fighting his way to power, absorbing, amalgamating, laying the foundations of a more complex and interdependent state of society. He has so far succeeded. But his success is now his ruin. A combination is formed against him. The surrounding chiefs and their adherents are assisted by the village populations. The ambitious Pathan, oppressed by numbers, is destroyed. The victors quarrel over the spoil, and the story closes, as it began, in bloodshed and strife. The conditions of existence, that have been thus indicated, have naturally led to the dwelling-places of these tribes being fortified. If they are in the valley, they are protected by towers and walls loopholed for musketry. If in the hollows of the hills, they are strong by their natural position. In either case they are guarded by a hardy and martial people, well armed, brave, and trained by constant war. This state of continual tumult has produced a habit of mind which recks little of injuries, holds life cheap and embarks on war with careless levity, and the tribesmen of the Afghan border afford the spectacle of a people, who fight without passion, and kill one another without loss of temper. Such a disposition, combined with an absolute lack of reverence for all forms of law and authority, and a complete assurance of equality, is the cause of their frequent quarrels with the British power. A trifle rouses their animosity. They make a sudden attack on some frontier post. They are repulsed. From their point of view the incident is closed. There has been a fair fight in which they have had the worst fortune. What puzzles them is that "the Sirkar" should regard so small an affair in a serious light. Thus the Mohmands cross the frontier and the action of Shabkadr is fought. They are surprised and aggrieved that the Government are not content with the victory, but must needs invade their territories, and impose punishment. Or again, the Mamunds, because a village has been burnt, assail the camp of the Second Brigade by night. It is a drawn game. They are astounded that the troops do not take it in good part. They, when they fight among themselves, bear little malice, and the combatants not infrequently make friends over the corpses of their comrades or suspend operations for a festival or a horse race. At the end of the contest cordial relations are at once re-established. And yet so full of contradictions is their character, that all this is without prejudice to what has been written of their family vendettas and private blood feuds. Their system of ethics, which regards treachery and violence as virtues rather than vices, has produced a code of honour so strange and inconsistent, that it is incomprehensible to a logical mind. I have been told that if a white man could grasp it fully, and were to understand their mental impulses--if he knew, when it was their honour to stand by him, and when it was their honour to betray him; when they were bound to protect and when to kill him--he might, by judging his times and opportunities, pass safely from one end of the mountains to the other. But a civilised European is as little able to accomplish this, as to appreciate the feelings of those strange creatures, which, when a drop of water is examined under a microscope, are revealed amiably gobbling each other up, and being themselves complacently devoured. I remark with pleasure, as an agreeable trait in the character of the Pathans, the immunity, dictated by a rude spirit of chivalry, which in their ceaseless brawling, their women enjoy. Many forts are built at some distance from any pool or spring. When these are besieged, the women are allowed by the assailants to carry water to the foot of the walls by night. In the morning the defenders come out and fetch it--of course under fire--and are enabled to continue their resistance. But passing from the military to the social aspect of their lives, the picture assumes an even darker shade, and is unrelieved by any redeeming virtue. We see them in their squalid, loopholed hovels, amid dirt and ignorance, as degraded a race as any on the fringe of humanity: fierce as the tiger, but less cleanly; as dangerous, not so graceful. Those simple family virtues, which idealists usually ascribe to primitive peoples, are conspicuously absent. Their wives and their womenkind generally, have no position but that of animals. They are freely bought and sold, and are not infrequently bartered for rifles. Truth is unknown among them. A single typical incident displays the standpoint from which they regard an oath. In any dispute about a field boundary, it is customary for both claimants to walk round the boundary he claims, with a Koran in his hand, swearing that all the time he is walking on his own land. To meet the difficulty of a false oath, while he is walking over his neighbor's land, he puts a little dust from his own field into his shoes. As both sides are acquainted with the trick, the dismal farce of swearing is usually soon abandoned, in favor of an appeal to force. All are held in the grip of miserable superstition. The power of the ziarat, or sacred tomb, is wonderful. Sick children are carried on the backs of buffaloes, sometimes sixty or seventy miles, to be deposited in front of such a shrine, after which they are carried back--if they survive the journey--in the same way. It is painful even to think of what the wretched child suffers in being thus jolted over the cattle tracks. But the tribesmen consider the treatment much more efficacious than any infidel prescription. To go to a ziarat and put a stick in the ground is sufficient to ensure the fulfillment of a wish. To sit swinging a stone or coloured glass ball, suspended by a string from a tree, and tied there by some fakir, is a sure method of securing a fine male heir. To make a cow give good milk, a little should be plastered on some favorite stone near the tomb of a holy man. These are but a few instances; but they may suffice to reveal a state of mental development at which civilisation hardly knows whether to laugh or weep. Their superstition exposes them to the rapacity and tyranny of a numerous priesthood--"Mullahs," "Sahibzadas," "Akhundzadas," "Fakirs,"--and a host of wandering Talib-ul-ilms, who correspond with the theological students in Turkey, and live free at the expense of the people. More than this, they enjoy a sort of "droit du seigneur," and no man's wife or daughter is safe from them. Of some of their manners and morals it is impossible to write. As Macaulay has said of Wycherley's plays, "they are protected against the critics as a skunk is protected against the hunters." They are "safe, because they are too filthy to handle, and too noisome even to approach." Yet the life even of these barbarous people is not without moments when the lover of the picturesque might sympathise with their hopes and fears. In the cool of the evening, when the sun has sunk behind the mountains of Afghanistan, and the valleys are filled with a delicious twilight, the elders of the village lead the way to the chenar trees by the water's side, and there, while the men are cleaning their rifles, or smoking their hookas, and the women are making rude ornaments from beads, and cloves, and nuts, the Mullah drones the evening prayer. Few white men have seen, and returned to tell the tale. But we may imagine the conversation passing from the prices of arms and cattle, the prospects of the harvest, or the village gossip, to the great Power, that lies to the southward, and comes nearer year by year. Perhaps some former Sepoy, of Beluchis or Pathans, will recount his adventures in the bazaars of Peshawar, or tell of the white officers he has followed and fought for in the past. He will speak of their careless bravery and their strange sports; of the far-reaching power of the Government, that never forgets to send his pension regularly as the months pass by; and he may even predict to the listening circle the day when their valleys will be involved in the comprehensive grasp of that great machine, and judges, collectors and commissioners shall ride to sessions at Ambeyla, or value the land tax on the soil of Nawagai. Then the Mullah will raise his voice and remind them of other days when the sons of the prophet drove the infidel from the plains of India, and ruled at Delhi, as wide an Empire as the Kafir holds to-day: when the true religion strode proudly through the earth and scorned to lie hidden and neglected among the hills: when mighty princes ruled in Bagdad, and all men knew that there was one God, and Mahomet was His prophet. And the young men hearing these things will grip their Martinis, and pray to Allah, that one day He will bring some Sahib--best prize of all--across their line of sight at seven hundred yards so that, at least, they may strike a blow for insulted and threatened Islam. The general aspect of the country and character of its inhabitants have thus been briefly described. At this stage it is not necessary or desirable to descend to detail. As the account proceeds the reader may derive a more lively impression of the sombre mountains, and of the peoples who dwell beneath their shadow. The tale that I have to tell is one of frontier war. Neither the importance of the issues, nor the numbers of the combatants, are on an European scale. The fate of empires does not hang on the result. Yet the narrative may not be without interest, or material for reflection. In the quarrels of civilised nations, great armies, many thousands strong, collide. Brigades and battalions are hurried forward, and come perhaps within some fire zone, swept by concentrated batteries, or massed musketry. Hundreds or thousands fall killed and wounded. The survivors struggle on blindly, dazed and dumfoundered, to the nearest cover. Fresh troops are continuously poured on from behind. At length one side or the other gives way. In all this tumult, this wholesale slaughter, the individual and his feelings are utterly lost. Only the army has a tale to tell. With events on such a scale, the hopes and fears, the strength and weakness, of man are alike indistinguishable. Amid the din and dust little but destruction can be discerned. But on the frontier, in the clear light of morning, when the mountain side is dotted with smoke puffs, and every ridge sparkles with bright sword blades, the spectator may observe and accurately appreciate all grades of human courage--the wild fanaticism of the Ghazi, the composed fatalism of the Sikh, the stubbornness of the British soldier, and the jaunty daring of his officers. He may remark occasions of devotion and self-sacrifice, of cool cynicism and stern resolve. He may participate in moments of wild enthusiasm, or of savage anger and dismay. The skill of the general, the quality of the troops, the eternal principles of the art of war, will be as clearly displayed as on historic fields. Only the scale of the statistics is reduced. A single glass of champagne imparts a feeling of exhilaration. The nerves are braced, the imagination is agreeably stirred, the wits become more nimble. A bottle produces a contrary effect. Excess causes a comatose insensibility. So it is with war, and the quality of both is best discovered by sipping. I propose to chronicle the military operations of the Malakand Field Force, to trace their political results, and to give, if possible, some picture of the scenery and people of the Indian Highlands. These pages may serve to record the actions of brave and skilful men. They may throw a sidelight on the great drama of frontier war. They may describe an episode in that ceaseless struggle for Empire which seems to be the perpetual inheritance of our race. They may amuse an idle hour. But the ambition I shall associate with them is, that in some measure, however small, they may stimulate that growing interest which the Imperial Democracy of England is beginning to take, in their great estates that lie beyond the seas. CHAPTER II: THE MALAKAND CAMPS Ibam forte via sacra.--HORACE. The town and cantonment of Nowshera was the base from which all the operations of the Malakand Field Force were conducted. It is situated on the India side of the Cabul River and is six hours by rail from Rawal Pindi. In times of peace its garrison consists of one native cavalry regiment, one British, and one native infantry battalion. During the war these troops were employed at the front. The barracks became great hospitals. The whole place was crowded with transport and military stores; and only a slender force remained under the orders of Colonel Schalch, the Base Commandant. The road from Nowshera to the Malakand Pass and camps is forty-seven miles long, and divided into four stages. Usually there is an excellent tonga service, and the distance is covered in about six hours; but while the Field Force was mobilised so much traffic and so many officers passed up and down the line, that the tonga ponies were soon reduced to a terrible condition of sores and emaciation, and could hardly drag the journey out in nine, ten, or even twelve hours. After leaving Nowshera, and crossing the Cabul River, a stage of fifteen miles brings the traveller to Mardan. This place--pronounced "Merdane"--is the permanent station of the Corps of Guides. It is shady and agreeable, though terribly hot in the summer months. It boasts an excellent polo ground and a comfortable rest-house. The passer-by should pause to see the Guides' cemetery, perhaps the only regimental cemetery in the world. To this last resting-place under the palm trees, close to the fields where they have played, and the barracks in which they lived, have been borne the bodies of successive generations of these wardens of the marches, killed in action across the frontier line. It is a green and pleasant spot. Nor is there any place in the world where a soldier might lie in braver company. After Mardan the road becomes more dusty, and the surrounding country barren and arid. [This description applies to the autumn season. In the winter and spring the country for a time is green and the air cold.] The mountains are approached, and as the tonga advances their shapes and colours are more distinctly seen. A few knolls and ridges rising from the level plain, mark the outposts of that great array of hills. Crossing a shallow stream--a tributary of the Cabul River, Jalala, the second stage is reached. In peace time a small mud fort is the only indication, but this is expanded by the proximity of war to a considerable camp, with an entrenchment around it. Stopping only to change ponies, for it is a forsaken spot, the journey is resumed. The avenue of trees on either side has ceased. The road is seen simply as a white streak stretching towards the mountains. It is traversed in a sweltering heat and choking dust. All around the country is red, sterile and burnt up. In front the great wall of hills rises dark and ominous. At length Dargai at the foot of the pass is reached. It is another mud fort, swelled during the operations into an entrenched camp, and surrounded by a network of barbed wire entanglement. The Malakand Pass can now be seen--a great cleft in the line of mountains--and far up the gorge, the outline of the fort that guards it, is distinguishable. The graded road winds up, with many a turn, the long ascent from Dargai to the top of the pass. The driver flogs the wretched, sore-backed ponies tirelessly. At length the summit is neared. The view is one worth stopping to look at. Behind and below, under the haze of the heat, is the wide expanse of open country--smooth, level, stretching away to the dim horizon. The tonga turns the corner and enters a new world. A cooler breeze is blowing. A single step has led from peace to war; from civilisation to savagery; from India to the mountains. On all sides the landscape is wild and rugged. Ridge succeeds ridge. Valley opens into valley. As far as the eye can reach in every direction are ragged peaks and spurs. The country of the plains is left, and we have entered a strange land, as tangled as the maze at Hampton Court, with mountains instead of hedges. So broken and so confused is the ground, that I despair of conveying a clear impression of it. The Malakand is like a great cup, of which the rim is broken into numerous clefts and jagged points. At the bottom of this cup is the "crater" camp. The deepest cleft is the Malakand Pass. The highest of the jagged points is Guides Hill, on a spur of which the fort stands. It needs no technical knowledge to see, that to defend such a place, the rim of the cup must be held. But in the Malakand, the bottom of the cup is too small to contain the necessary garrison. The whole position is therefore, from the military point of view, bad and indefensible. In the revised and improved scheme of defence, arrangements have been made, to command the available approaches, and to block such as cannot be commanded with barbed wire entanglements and other obstructions; and by a judicious system of works much of the rim is now held. But even now I am told by competent judges that the place is a bad one for defence; that the pass could be held by the fort alone, and that the brigade stationed there would be safer and equally useful, if withdrawn to Dargai. At the time this story opens the Malakand South Camp was an impossible place to put troops in. It was easy of access. It was cramped and commanded by neighbouring heights. [Under the arrangements which have been made since the war, the Malakand position and the works at Chakdara and Dargai will be held by two battalions and some details. These will be supported by a flying column, the exact location and composition of which are as yet undetermined.] The small area of the camp on the Kotal necessitated the formation of a second encampment in the plain of Khar. This was close under the north outer edge of the cup. It was called for political reasons North Malakand. As a military position it, also, was radically bad. It was everywhere commanded, and surrounded by ravines and nullahs, which made it easy for an enemy to get in, and difficult for troops to get out. It was, of course, of no strategic value, and was merely used as a habitation for the troops intended to hold Malakand, for whom there was no room in the crater and fort. The north camp has now been definitely abandoned. Nobody, however--least of all those who selected the site--would seem to have contemplated the possibility of an attack. Indeed the whole situation was regarded as purely temporary. The vacillation, caused by the change of parties and policies in England, led to the Malakand garrison remaining for two years in a position which could not be well defended either on paper or in reality. At first, after the Chitral campaign of 1895, it was thought that the retention of the brigade in this advanced post, was only a matter of a few weeks. But as the months passed by the camp began, in spite of the uncertainty, to assume an appearance of permanency. The officers built themselves huts and mess rooms. A good polo ground was discovered near Khar, and under careful management rapidly improved. A race-course was projected. Many officers who were married brought their wives and families to the camp among the mountains, and the whole place was rapidly becoming a regular cantonment. No cases of Ghazi outrage broke the tranquillity. The revolvers, which all persons leaving camp were by regulations obliged to take, were either unloaded or carried by a native groom. Shooting parties were organised to the hills. A well-contested polo tournament was held in Christmas week. Distinguished travellers--even a member of Parliament--visited this outpost of empire, and observed with interest the swiftness and ease with which the Anglo-Saxon adapts every situation to his sports and habits. At the same time the station of the Malakand Brigade was far from being a comfortable one. For two years they lived under canvas or in rude huts. They were exposed to extremes of climate. They were without punkahs or ice in the hot weather. They were nearly fifty miles from the railway, and in respect of companionship and amusements were thrown entirely on their own resources. When the British cavalry officer succeeds, in spite of official opposition, expense and discouragement, in getting on service across the frontier, he is apt to look with envious eyes at the officers of the Frontier Force, who are taken as a matter of course and compelled to do by command, what he would solicit as a favour. But he must remember that this is their compensation for long months of discomfort and monotony in lonely and out-of-the-way stations, and for undergoing hardships which, though honourable and welcome in the face of the enemy, become obnoxious in times of peace. After crossing the Malakand Pass the first turning to the right leads to the Swat Valley. The traveller is now within the mountains. In every direction the view is restricted or terminated by walls of rock. The valley itself is broad, level and fertile. The river flows swiftly through the middle. On either side of it, is a broad strip of rice fields. Other crops occupy the drier ground. Numerous villages, some of which contain large populations, are scattered about. It is a beautiful scene. The cool breezes of the mountains temper the heat of the sun. The abundant rains preserve the verdure of the earth. In ancient times this region was the seat of a Buddhistic kingdom, and was known as Woo-Chang or "Udyana," which means "the Park," and proclaims the appreciation which its former possessors had of their pleasant valley. "The people," says the Chinese pilgrim Fa-hien, who visited the country in the fifth century, "all use the language of Central India, 'Central India' being what we should call the 'Middle Kingdom.' The food and clothes of the common people are the same as in that Central Kingdom. The law of Buddha is very flourishing in Woo-Chang." "The Park," which includes all the country on both banks of the Swat River--then called the Subhavastu--but which perhaps applies more particularly to the upper end of the valley, was famous for its forests, flowers and fruit. But though the valley retains much of its beauty, its forests have been destroyed by the improvidence, and its flowers and fruit have declined through the ignorance, of the fierce conquerors into whose hands it fell. The reputation which its present inhabitants enjoy is evil. Their treacherous character has distinguished them even among peoples notoriously faithless and cruel. Among Pathans it is a common saying: "Swat is heaven, but the Swatis are hell-fiends." For many years they had lain under the stigma of cowardice, and were despised as well as distrusted by the tribes of the border; but their conduct in the recent fighting has cleared them at least from this imputation. Several minor chieftains now divide authority in the Swat Valley, but till 1870 it was governed by a single ruler. The Ahkund of Swat was by origin a cowherd, an office considered most honourable in India. The cow is a sacred beast. His service is acceptable to the Gods and men. Princes glory in the name--though they do not usually carry their enthusiasm further. "Guicowar" translated literally means "cowherd." From such employment the future Ahkund received his inspiration. He sat for many years by the banks of the Indus, and meditated. Thus he became a saint. The longer his riparian reflections were continued, the greater his sanctity became. The fame of his holiness spread throughout all the region. The Swatis besought him to come and live in their valley. After dignified and diplomatic reluctance, he consented to exchange the banks of the Indus for those of the Swat. For some years, he lived in the green valley, and enjoyed the reverence of its people. At the time of the great mutiny, Said Akbar, the King of Swat, died, and the saint succeeded to the temporal as well as the spiritual authority. In 1863 he preached the Jehad against the British, and headed the Swatis and Bunerwals in the Ambeyla campaign. The power which the Sirkar so extravagantly displayed to bring the war to an end, evidently impressed the old man, for at its close he made friends with the Government and received from them many tokens of respect. Before he died in 1870, he summoned his people around him and declared to them that one day their valley would be the scene of a struggle between the Russians and the British. When that came to pass he charged them to fight on our side. The saying is firmly fixed in the hearts of the tribesmen, and is associated with the memory of their famous priest, known to English minds chiefly through the medium of the "Bab Ballads." His two sons are dead, but his two grandsons, [the Mianguls of Swat] both quite young, live on in the valley, and are the owners of the Ahkund's freeholds, which are in every section of the Swat country. They have very little political influence; but their persons and property are respected by the people and by the British for the sake of their grandfather, who sleeps in an odour of sanctity at Saidu, near Mingaora. From the Malakand the signal tower of Chakdara can be seen eight miles away to the eastward. Thither the broad graded road runs like a ribbon across the plain. Seven miles from the Kotal Camp, it crosses the Amandara Pass, a gap in a considerable underfeature, which juts from the southern mountains. After this it turns more to the north and leads to the fortified bridge across the river. I invite the reader to remark this road, for it is historic. It is not only the route by which the Malakand Field Force was able to advance, but it is the very reason of their existence. Without this road there would have been no Malakand Camps, no fighting, no Malakand Field Force, no story. It is the road to Chitral. Here then, at once, the whole vast question of frontier policy is raised. We hold the Malakand Pass to keep the Chitral road open. We keep the Chitral road open because we have retained Chitral. We retain Chitral in accordance with the "Forward Policy." I am thus confronted at the very outset of this book, which was intended to be devoted chiefly to the narration of military events and small incidents, with that wide political question, on which the keenest intellects in England are in doubt, and the most valuable expert evidence in India is divided. The reader must not think me pusillanimous or weak if I postpone the discussion of so great and controversial a matter till a later chapter, when I may perhaps enjoy a larger measure of his sympathy and agreement. After the story has been told, it may not be inappropriate to point the moral. Prudence encourages procrastination. But while the consideration of the advisability of the retention of Chitral may be deferred, a description of the means is convenient, if not necessary, to the present chapter. Nowshera is the railway base of the road. Thence we have followed it to Mardan and across the frontier. Here the new and disputed portion begins. Passing at first through the Lower Ranizai country, it climbs the Malakand Pass, descends into the valley beyond and runs thence through Upper Ranizai territory and Lower Swat to Chakdara. Here it crosses the Swat River by the fine suspension bridge which the fort guards. The three spans of this bridge are together nearly 1500 feet long. It was constructed in 1895, during the operations, in about six weeks, and is a very remarkable piece of military engineering. Beyond the Swat the road runs through the territories of the Khan of Dir, north and east to Sadu, an obscure village thirty-five miles from Malakand. This marks the end of the first section, and further than this wheeled traffic cannot go. The road, now become a camel track, winds along the left bank of the Panjkora River to within five miles of Dir, where it crosses to the right bank by another suspension bridge. Thence it continues to the junction of the Dir stream, along which it finds its way to Dir itself, some fifty miles from Sadu. Beyond Dir camels cannot proceed, and here begins the third section--a path practicable only for mules, and about sixty miles long. From Dir the road is a triumph of engineering. In many places it is carried on wooden galleries perched on the faces of steep and tremendous cliffs, and at others it works round spurs by astounding zig-zags, or is scarped from the mountain side. At the end of the road is Fort Chitral with a garrison of two battalions, one company of sappers, and two mountain guns. The road is maintained and protected by the tribes through whose territories it passes; but the two principal points where it might be closed are held by Imperial garrisons. The Malakand Fort guards the passage of the mountains. Chakdara holds the bridge across the river. The rest is left to the tribal levies. The Ranizai tribe receive an annual subsidy from the Indian Government of 30,000 rupees, out of which they maintain 200 irregulars armed with Sniders, and irreverently called by the British officers, "Catch-'em-alive-Os." These drive away marauders and discourage outrage and murder. The Khan of Dir, through whose territory the road runs for seventy-three miles, also receives a subsidy from Government of 60,000 rupees, in consideration of which he provides 400 irregulars for its service. Until the great rising these arrangements worked admirably. The tribesmen interested in the maintenance of the route, were most reluctant to engage in hostilities against the Government. The Lower Ranizais, south of Malakand, abstained altogether. The elders of the tribe collected all the arms of their hot-headed youths, and forbade them to attack the troops. The Upper Ranizais were nearer the scene of the disturbance, and were induced by superstition and fear to join the Mullah; but very half-heartedly. The Swatis were carried away by fanaticism. The Khan of Dir throughout behaved loyally, as he is entirely dependent on British support, and his people realise the advantages of the subsidy. If the road is interesting its story is more so, and a summary of the events and causes which have led to its construction, may also throw some light on the political history and methods of the border tribes. The uncertainty and insecurity of their power, has always led petty chiefs to seek the support of some powerful suzerain. In 1876 the Mehtar of Chitral, Aman-ul-Mulk, was encouraged to seek the protection, and become the vassal of our vassal, the Maharaja of Cashmere. In accordance with the general scheme of advance, then already adopted by the Indian Government, a British agency was at once established at Gilgit on the Chitral-Cashmere frontier. Aman-ul-Mulk was presented with a certain supply of arms and ammunition, and an annual subsidy of 6000 rupees, afterwards raised to 12,000 rupees. The British thus obtained an interest in Chitral, and a point of observation on its borders. In 1881 the agency was withdrawn, but the influence remained, and in 1889 it was re-established with a much larger garrison. Meanwhile Aman-ul-Mulk ruled in Chitral, showing great respect to the wishes of the Government, and in the enjoyment of his subsidy and comparative peace. But in 1892 he died, leaving many sons, all equally ferocious, ambitious and unscrupulous. One of these, Afzal by name, though not the eldest or acknowledged heir, had the good fortune to be on the spot. He seized the reins of power, and having murdered as many if his brothers as he could catch, proclaimed himself Mehtar, and invited the recognition of the Indian Government. He was acknowledged chief, as he seemed to be "a man of courage and determination," and his rule afforded a prospect of settled government. Surviving brothers fled to neighbouring states. Nizam, the eldest, came to Gilgit and appealed to the British. He got no help. The blessing had already been bestowed. But in November, 1892, Sher Afzul, a brother of the late Aman, returned by stealth to Chitral, whence fraternal affection had driven him, and killed the new Mehtar and another brother, both of whom were his nephews. The "wicked uncle" then ascended the throne, or its equivalent. He was, however, opposed. The Indian Government refused to recognise him. Nizam, at Gilgit, urged his claims, and was finally allowed to go and try to regain his inheritance. The moral support of 250 Cashmere rifles brought him many adherents. He was joined by the people. It was the landing of William of Orange on a reduced scale, and with Cashmere troops instead of Dutch Guards. Twelve hundred men sent by Sher Afzul to oppose him, deserted to his side. The avuncular usurper, realising that it might be dangerous to wait longer, fled to Afghanistan, as James II had fled to France, was received by the ruler with hospitality, and carefully preserved as an element of future disorder. Nizam now became Mehtar according to his desire. But he did not greatly enjoy his power, and may have evolved some trite reflections on the vanity of earthly ambition. From the first he was poor and unpopular. With the support of the Government of India, however, he managed to maintain a weak, squalid rule for a space. To give him countenance, and in accordance with the Policy, Captain Younghusband was sent to the country with a hundred bayonets. The Gilgit garrison was increased by a battalion, and several posts were established between that place and Mastuj. Thus the Imperial forces had entered Chitral. Their position was soon to become one of danger. They were separated from Gilgit by many miles of bad road, and warlike tribesmen. To move troops from Gilgit would always be slow and difficult. Another route was however possible, the route I have described--a route northwards from Peshawar through Dir--shorter and easier, starting from British territory and the railway. Towards this line of communication the Indian Government now looked. If British troops or agents were to be retained in Chitral, if in other words their recognised policy was to be continued, this route must be opened up. They sounded the Home Government. Lord Kimberley replied, deprecating increase of responsibilities, of territory and expenditure, and declining to pledge himself to support such a scheme. At the same time he sanctioned the temporary retention of the troops, and the agent, in the hopes of strengthening Nizam. [Despatch from Secretary of State, No.34, 1st Sept., 1893.] At this point Umra Khan must enter the story. The Gilgit agency report, dated 28th April, 1890, speaks of this chief, who was the Khan of Jandul, but whose influence pervaded the whole of Bajaur as "the most important man between Chitral and Pashawar." To this powerful ruler, another of the sons of Aman, named Amir, had fled from the family massacre which followed his father's death. Umra Khan protected him and determined to turn him to his own advantage. In May, 1894, this youth--he was about twenty years of age--returned to Chitral, professing to have escaped from the hands of Umra Khan. He was kindly received by Nizam, who seems to have been much hampered throughout his career by his virtue. On 1st January, 1895, Amir availed himself of his welcome, to murder his brother, and the principal members of the Chitral Cabinet. He proclaimed himself Mentar and asked for recognition. The Imperial officers, though used to frontier politics, refused to commit themselves to any arrangement with such a villain, until the matter had been considered in India. Umra Khan now advanced with a large force to the head of the Chitral Valley, nominally to assist his dear friend and ally, Amir, to consolidate his rule, really in the hopes of extending his own territories. But Amir, knowing Umra well, and having won his kingdom, did not desire to share it. Fighting ensued. The Chitrals were beaten. As he could not make any use of Amir, Umra Khan invited the wicked uncle to return. Sher Afzul accepted. A bargain was struck. Sher Afzul claimed to be made Mehtar, Umra supported his claims. Both threatened force in the event of opposition. But the Imperial Government rose in wrath, refused to have anything to do with the new claimant, informed him that his language was impertinent, and warned Umra Khan to leave Chitral territory forthwith or take the consequences. The answer was war. The scanty garrisons and scattered parties of British troops were attacked. A company of the 14th Sikhs was cut to pieces. Lieutenants Fowler and Edwards were taken prisoners. Fort Chitral, into which the rest of the Chitral mission and their escort had thrown themselves, was closely and fiercely besieged. To rescue them was imperative. The 1st Division of the Field Army was mobilised. A force of nearly 16,000 men crossed the frontier on the 1st April, from Mardan, to advance to the relief by the shortest route--the route through Swat and Dir--the line of the present Chitral road. The command of the expedition was confided to Sir Robert Low. Sir Bindon Blood was Chief of the Staff. So far the tale has been of the steady increase of British influence, in accordance with an avowed and consistent policy--primarily in Chitral, and ultimately throughout the border tribes. One movement has been followed by another. All have been aimed at a common end. Now suddenly we are confronted with an act by which the Government of India with open eyes placed an obstacle in the path, which they had so long pursued, to follow which they had made so many efforts themselves and demanded so many sacrifices from their subjects. Perhaps from compunction, but probably to soothe the Liberal Government, by appearing to localise the disturbances, and disclaiming any further acquisition of territory, they issued a proclamation to "all the people of Swat and the people of Bajaur, who do not side with Umra Khan," in which they declared that they had "no intention of permanently occupying any territory through which Umra Khan's misconduct" might "force them to pass, or of interfering with the independence of the tribes." [Proclamation, 14th March, 1895.] If this proclamation was intended for political purposes in England, it, from one point of view, succeeded most admirably, for there has been nearly as much written about it as about all the soldiers who have been killed and wounded in the war. It had, however, no effect upon the tribesmen, who were infuriated by the sight if the troops and paid no attention to the protestations of the Government. Had they watched with care the long, steady, deliberate advance, which I have so briefly summarised; had they read the avowed and recorded determination of the Indian Administration "to extend and, by degrees, to consolidate their influence" [Letter from Government of India, No.407, 28th February, 1879.] in the whole drainage system of the Indus, they might have even doubted their sincerity. Instead, and being unable to make fine distinctions, they saw only invasion in the military movements. They gathered accordingly, to oppose the advance of the troops. To the number of 12,000 they occupied the Malakand Pass--a tremendous position. From this they were driven with great slaughter on the 3rd of April, by the two leading brigades of Sir Robert Low's force. Further operations resulted in the passage of the Swat and Panjkora Rivers being effected. The road to Chitral was open. The besiegers of the fort fled, and a small relieving force was able to push through from Gilgit under Colonel Kelly. Umra Khan fled to Afghanistan, and the question of future policy came before the Government of India. Two alternatives presented themselves: either they must "abandon the attempt to keep up any effective control" over Chitral, or they must put a sufficient garrison there. In pursuance of their recognised policy, the Council decided unanimously that to maintain British influence in Chitral was "a matter of first importance." In a despatch [Despatch of Government of India, No.240, 8th May, 1895.] to the Home Government they set forth all their reasons, and at the same time declared that it was impossible to garrison Chitral without keeping up the road from Peshawar, by which the Relief force had advanced. On the 13th of June Lord Rosebery's Cabinet replied decisively, with courage if not with wisdom, that "no military force or European agent should be kept at Chitral, that Chitral should not be fortified, and that no road should be made between Peshawar and Chitral." By this they definitely and finally repudiated the policy which had been consistently followed since 1876. They left Chitral to stew in its own juice. They over-ruled the Government of India. It was a bold and desperate attempt to return to the old frontier line. The Indian Government replied: "We deeply regret but loyally accept decision," and began to gather up the severed strings of their policy and weave another web. But in the nick of time the Liberal Administration fell, and Lord Salisbury's Cabinet reversed their decision. It is interesting, in reading the Blue Books on Indian questions, to watch the emotions of party principles, stirring beneath the uniform mask of official responsibility--which the most reckless of men are compelled to wear as soon as they become ministers. The language, the style, the tone of the correspondence is the same. It is always a great people addressing and instructing their pro-consuls and administrators. But the influence inclines backwards and forwards as the pendulum of politics swings. And as the swing in 1895 was a very great one, a proportionate impulse was given to the policy of advance. "It seemed" to the new ministry "that the policy... continuously pursued by successive Governments ought not to be lightly abandoned unless its maintenance had become clearly impossible." [Despatch, Secretary of State, No.30, 16th Aug., 1895.] Thus the retention of Chitral was sanctioned, and the road which that retention necessitated was completed. I approach with nervousness so great a matter as the "Breach of Faith" question. In a book devoted chiefly to the deeds of soldiers it seems almost presumptuous to discuss an affair which involves the political honour of statesmen. In their unnecessary and gratuitous proclamation the Government of India declared, that they had no intention of interfering with the tribes, or of permanently occupying any territory, the troops might march through; whereas now they do interfere with the tribesmen, and have established garrisons at Dargai, Malakand and Chakdara, all of which are in the territory through which the troops passed. But it takes two to make a bargain or a breach of faith. The tribes took no notice of the proclamation. They did not understand it. They did not believe it. Where there is no faith there can be no breach of faith. The border peoples resisted the advance. That position annulled the proclamation, and proved that it was not credited by the tribesmen. They do not think they have been tricked. They do not regard the road as a "breach of faith." What they do regard it as, is a menace to their independence, and a prelude to annexation. Nor are they wrong. Looking at the road, as I have seen it, and have tried to describe it, running broad and white across the valley; at the soldiers moving along it; at the political officers extending their influence in all directions; at the bridge and fort of Chakdara; and at the growing cantonment on the Malakand Pass, it needs no education to appreciate its significance. Nor can any sophistry obscure it. CHAPTER III: THE OUTBREAK Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum. LUCRETIUS. The historian of great events is always oppressed by the difficulty of tracing the silent, subtle influences, which in all communities precede and prepare the way for violent outbursts and uprisings. He may discover many causes and record them duly, but he will always be sensible that others have escaped him. The changing tides of public opinion, the undercurrents of interest, partisanship and caprice, the whirlpools of illogical sentiment or ignorant prejudice, exert forces so complex and numerous, that to observe and appreciate them all, and to estimate the effect of each in raising the storm, is a task beyond the intellect and industry of man. The chronicler of small things lies under even greater disabilities. He has fewer facts to guide his judgment, nor is it as easy to read small print as capital letters. In an attempt to state the causes of the great tribal upheaval of 1897, these difficulties are increased by the fact that no European can gauge the motives or assume the points of view of Asiatics. It is, however, impossible to pass the question by, and ignoring the detail, I shall endeavour to indicate some at least of the most important and apparent forces, which have led to the formidable combination with which the British power in India has been confronted. The most marked incident in the "Forward Policy" has been the retention of Chitral. The garrisons, the road, the tribal levies have made the tribesmen realise the proximity and the advance of civilisation. It is possible--even probable--that with all their love of independence, the majority of the inhabitants of the mountains would have been willing, until their liberties were actually curtailed, to remain in passive submission, soothed by the increase of material prosperity. During the two years that the British flag had floated over Chakdara and the Malakand the trade of the Swat Valley had nearly doubled. As the sun of civilisation rose above the hills, the fair flowers of commerce unfolded, and the streams of supply and demand, hitherto congealed by the frost of barbarism, were thawed. Most of the native population were content to bask in the genial warmth and enjoy the new-found riches and comforts. For two years reliefs had gone to and from Chitral without a shot being fired. Not a post-bag had been stolen, not a messenger murdered. The political officers riding about freely among the fierce hill men were invited to settle many disputes, which would formerly have been left to armed force. But a single class had viewed with quick intelligence and intense hostility the approach of the British power. The priesthood of the Afghan border instantly recognised the full meaning of the Chitral road. The cause of their antagonism is not hard to discern. Contact with civilisation assails the ignorance, and credulity, on which the wealth and influence of the Mullah depend. A general combination of the religious forces of India against that civilising, educating rule, which unconsciously saps the strength of superstition, is one of the dangers of the future. Here Mahommedanism was threatened and resisted. A vast, but silent agitation was begun. Messengers passed to and fro among the tribes. Whispers of war, a holy war, were breathed to a race intensely passionate and fanatical. Vast and mysterious agencies, the force of which is incomprehensible to rational minds, were employed. More astute brains than the wild valleys of the North produce conducted the preparations. Secret encouragement came from the South--from India itself. Actual support and assistance was given from Cabul. In that strange half light of ignorance and superstition, assailed by supernatural terrors and doubts, and lured by hopes of celestial glory, the tribes were taught to expect prodigious events. Something was coming. A great day for their race and faith was at hand. Presently the moment would arrive. They must watch and be ready. The mountains became as full of explosives as a magazine. Yet the spark was lacking. At length the time came. A strange combination of circumstances operated to improve the opportunity. The victory of the Turks over the Greeks; the circulation of the Amir's book on "Jehad"; his assumption of the position of a Caliph of Islam, and much indiscreet writing in the Anglo-Indian press, [Articles in Anglo-Indian papers on such subjects as "The Recrudescence if Mahommedanism" produce more effect on the educated native mind than the most seditious frothings of the vernacular press.] united to produce a "boom" in Mahommedanism. The moment was propitious; nor was the man wanting. What Peter the Hermit was to the regular bishops and cardinals of the Church, the Mad Mullah was to the ordinary priesthood of the Afghan border. A wild enthusiast, convinced alike of his Divine mission and miraculous powers, preached a crusade, or Jehad, against the infidel. The mine was fired. The flame ran along the ground. The explosions burst forth in all directions. The reverberations have not yet died away. Great and widespread as the preparations were, they were not visible to the watchful diplomatic agents who maintained the relations of the Government with the tribesmen. So extraordinary is the inversion of ideas and motives among those people that it may be said that those who know them best, know them least, and the more logical the mind of the student the less he is able to understand of the subject. In any case among these able men who diligently collected information and observed the state of feeling, there were none who realised the latent forces that were being accumulated on all sides. The strange treachery at Maizar in June was a flash in the pan. Still no one saw the danger. It was not until the early days of July that it was noticed that there was a fanatical movement in Upper Swat. Even then its significance was disregarded and its importance underrated. That a Mad Fakir had arrived was known. His power was still a secret. It did not long remain so. It is, thank heaven, difficult if not impossible for the modern European to fully appreciate the force which fanaticism exercises among an ignorant, warlike and Oriental population. Several generations have elapsed since the nations of the West have drawn the sword in religious controversy, and the evil memories of the gloomy past have soon faded in the strong, clear light of Rationalism and human sympathy. Indeed it is evident that Christianity, however degraded and distorted by cruelty and intolerance, must always exert a modifying influence on men's passions, and protect them from the more violent forms of fanatical fever, as we are protected from smallpox by vaccination. But the Mahommedan religion increases, instead of lessening, the fury of intolerance. It was originally propagated by the sword, and ever since, its votaries have been subject, above the people of all other creeds, to this form of madness. In a moment the fruits of patient toil, the prospects of material prosperity, the fear of death itself, are flung aside. The more emotional Pathans are powerless to resist. All rational considerations are forgotten. Seizing their weapons, they become Ghazis--as dangerous and as sensible as mad dogs: fit only to be treated as such. While the more generous spirits among the tribesmen become convulsed in an ecstasy of religious bloodthirstiness, poorer and more material souls derive additional impulses from the influence of others, the hopes of plunder and the joy of fighting. Thus whole nations are roused to arms. Thus the Turks repel their enemies, the Arabs of the Soudan break the British squares, and the rising on the Indian frontier spreads far and wide. In each case civilisation is confronted with militant Mahommedanism. The forces of progress clash with those of reaction. The religion of blood and war is face to face with that of peace. Luckily the religion of peace is usually the better armed. The extraordinary credulity of the people is hardly conceivable. Had the Mad Mullah called on them to follow him to attack Malakand and Chakdara they would have refused. Instead he worked miracles. He sat at his house, and all who came to visit him, brought him a small offering of food or money, in return for which he gave them a little rice. As his stores were continually replenished, he might claim to have fed thousands. He asserted that he was invisible at night. Looking into his room, they saw no one. At these things they marvelled. Finally he declared he would destroy the infidel. He wanted no help. No one should share the honours. The heavens would open and an army would descend. The more he protested he did not want them, the more exceedingly they came. Incidentally he mentioned that they would be invulnerable; other agents added arguments. I was shown a captured scroll, upon which the tomb of the Ghazi--he who has killed an infidel--is depicted in heaven, no fewer than seven degrees above the Caaba itself. Even after the fighting--when the tribesmen reeled back from the terrible army they had assailed, leaving a quarter of their number on the field--the faith of the survivors was unshaken. Only those who had doubted had perished, said the Mullah, and displayed a bruise which was, he informed them, the sole effect of a twelve-pound shrapnel shell on his sacred person. I pass with relief from the tossing sea of Cause and Theory to the firm ground of Result and Fact. The rumours and reports which reached the Malakand of the agitation in Upper Swat and among the surrounding tribes were fully appreciated by the Pathan Sepoys of the garrison. As July advanced, several commanding officers were warned by their men, that great events were impending. Major Deane, the political agent, watched with great anxiety the daily progress of the fanatical movement. No one desires to be thought an alarmist, least of all on the frontier where there is always danger. At length, however, he felt compelled to officially report the disquieting signs. Warnings were then issued to the officers in charge of the various posts, and the troops were practised in taking up alarm stations. By the 23rd of July all had been informed that the aspect of affairs was threatening, and ordered to observe every precaution. But to the last everybody doubted that there would be a rising, nor did any one imagine that even should one occur, it would lead to more than a skirmish. The natives were friendly and respectful. The valley smiled in fertile prosperity. It was not strange, that none could foresee the changes a week would bring, or guess that in a few days they would be fighting for their lives; that they would carry fire and sword through the peaceful landscape; that the polo ground would be the scene of a cavalry charge, or that the cheery barbarians among whom they had lived quietly for so many months would become maddened and ferocious savages. Never was transformation of scene more complete, or more rapid. And all the while the rumours of coming war grew stronger and stronger. The bazaars of India, like the London coffee-houses of the last century, are always full of marvellous tales--the invention of fertile brains. A single unimportant fact is exaggerated, and distorted, till it becomes unrecognisable. From it, a thousand wild, illogical, and fantastic conclusions are drawn. These again are circulated as facts. So the game goes on. But amid all this falsehood, and idle report, there often lies important information. The bazaar stories not only indicate the state of native opinion, but not infrequently contain the germ of truth. In Eastern lands, news travels by strange channels, and often with unaccountable rapidity. As July advanced the bazaar at Malakand became full of tales of the Mad Fakir. His miracles passed from mouth to mouth, with suitable additions. A great day for Islam was at hand. A mighty man had arisen to lead them. The English would be swept away. By the time of the new moon, not one would remain. The Great Fakir had mighty armies concealed among the mountains. When the moment came these would sally forth--horse, foot and artillery--and destroy the infidel. It was even stated that the Mullah had ordered that no one should go near a certain hill, lest the heavenly hosts should be prematurely revealed. So ran the talk. But among all these frothy fabrications there lay a solemn warning. Though the British military and political officers were compelled to take official notice of the reports received with reference to the tribal gathering, and to make arrangements for the safety of their posts, they privately scouted the idea that any serious events were impending. On the afternoon of the 26th July the subalterns and younger officers of the Malakand garrison proceeded to Khar to play polo. Thither also came Lieutenant Rattray, riding over from Chakdara fort. The game was a good one, and the tribesmen of the neighbouring village watched it as usual in little groups, with a keen interest. Nothing in their demeanour betrayed their thoughts or intentions. The young soldiers saw nothing, knew nothing, and had they known would have cared less. There would be no rising. If there was, so much the better. They were ready for it. The game ended and the officers cantered back to their camps and posts. It was then that a strange incident occurred--an incident eminently characteristic of the frontier tribes. As the syces were putting the rugs and clothing on the polo ponies, and loitering about the ground after the game, the watching natives drew near and advised them to be off home at once, for that there was going to be a fight. They knew, these Pathans, what was coming. The wave of fanaticism was sweeping down the valley. It would carry them away. They were powerless to resist. Like one who feels a fit coming on, they waited. Nor did they care very much. When the Mad Fakir arrived, they would fight and kill the infidels. In the meantime there was no necessity to deprive them of their ponies. And so with motives, partly callous, partly sportsmanlike, and not without some faint suspicion of chivalry, they warned the native grooms, and these taking the hint reached the camp in safety. Late on this same afternoon Major Deane reported to Brigadier-General Meiklejohn, who commanded the Malakand garrison, that matters had assumed a very grave aspect; that a great armed gathering had collected around the Mad Mullah's standard, and that an attack was probable. He advised that the Guides should be called up to reinforce the brigade. A telegram was immediately despatched to Mardan ordering them to march without delay. At 8.30 Lieutenant P. Eliott-Lockhart, who was the senior officer then with the regiment, received the order. At 1.30 A.M. they began their now famous march. After sending for the Guides, the brigadier, at about seven o'clock, interviewed his different commanding officers, and instructed them to be prepared to turn out at any moment. Major Deane now reported that the Mad Mullah and his gathering were advancing down the valley, and recommended that the Amandara Pass, four miles away, should be held. General Meiklejohn accordingly issued orders for a movable column, to be formed as follows:-- 45th Sikhs. 2 Cos. 31st Punjaub Infantry. 2 Guns No. 8 Mountain Battery. 1 Squadron 11th Bengal Lancers. This force, under command of Lieutenant-Colonel McRae, 45th Sikhs, was to start at midnight and would be supported by the rest of the troops under command of the brigadier at 3 A.M. All preparations were swiftly made. At 9.45 a telegram from Chakdara--which got through just before the wire was cut--reported that large forces of Pathans were rapidly moving towards the camps. A quarter of an hour later a Jemadar of the Levies galloped in with the news that, to quote the official despatch: "The Fakir had passed Khar and was advancing on Malakand, that neither Levies nor people would act against him, and that the hills to the east of the camp were covered with Pathans." As soon as the officers had returned from polo, they found plenty of work waiting for them. Bandsmen and boys incapable of carrying arms had to be hurried up to the fort. Indents had to be made out for transport, rations and ammunition. There was much to do, and little time to do it in. At length all was finished, and the troops were in readiness for their early morning start. At 9.30 the officers sat down to dinner, still in their polo kit, which there had been no time to change. At 10 o'clock they were discussing the prospects of the approaching march, and eagerly weighing the chances of a skirmish. The more sanguine asserted that there would be a fight--a small one, it was true--but still a skirmish. Many of those who had never been in action before congratulated themselves on the unlooked-for opportunity. The older and more experienced regarded the matter in the light of a riot. They might have to fire on the tribesmen, but Swatis were such cowards that they would never stand up to the troops. Still it was a chance. Suddenly in the stillness of the night a bugle-call sounded on the parade ground of the "crater" camp. Everyone sprang up. It was the "Assembly." For a moment there was silence while the officers seized their swords and belts and hurriedly fastened them on. Several, thinking that it was merely the warning for the movable column to fall in, waited to light their cigarettes. Then from many quarters the loud explosion of musketry burst forth, a sound which for six days and nights was to know no intermission. The attack on the Malakand and the great frontier war had begun. The noise of firing echoed among the hills. Its echoes are ringing still. One valley caught the waves of sound and passed them to the next, till the whole wide mountain region rocked with the confusion of the tumult. Slender wires and long-drawn cables carried the vibrations to the far-off countries of the West. Distant populations on the Continent of Europe thought that in them they detected the dull, discordant tones of decline and fall. Families in English homes feared that the detonations marked the death of those they loved--sons, brothers or husbands. Diplomatists looked wise, economists anxious, stupid people mysterious and knowledgeable. All turned to have the noise stopped. But that was a task which could not be accomplished until thousands of lives had been sacrificed and millions of money spent. CHAPTER IV: THE ATTACK ON THE MALAKAND Cry "Havoc" and let slip the dogs of war. "JULIUS CAESAR," Act iii., Sc.i. It has long been recognised by soldiers of every nation that, to resist a vigorous onslaught by night, is almost the hardest task that troops can be called upon to perform. Panics, against which few brave men are proof, arise in a moment from such situations. Many a gallant soldier has lost his head. Many an experienced officer has been borne down unheeded by a crowd of fugitives. Regiments that have marched unflinchingly to almost certain death on the battlefield, become in an instant terrified and useless. In the attack on the Malakand camp, all the elements of danger and disorder were displayed. The surprise, the darkness, the confused and broken nature of the ground; the unknown numbers of the enemy; their merciless ferocity; every appalling circumstance was present. But there were men who were equal to the occasion. As soon as the alarm sounded Lieutenant-Colonel McRae of the 45th Sikhs, a holder of the Gold Medal of the Royal Humane Society and of long experience in Afghanistan and on the Indian frontier, ran to the Quarter Guard, and collecting seven or eight men, sent them under command of Major Taylor, of the same regiment, down the Buddhist road to try and check the enemy's advance. Hurriedly assembling another dozen men, and leaving the Adjutant, Lieutenant Barff, with directions to bring on more, he ran with his little party after Taylor in the direction of the entrance gorge of the Kotal camp. Two roads give access to the Malakand camp, from the plain of Khar. At one point the Buddhist road, the higher of the two, passes through a narrow defile then turns a sharp corner. Here, if anywhere, the enemy might be held or at least delayed until the troops got under arms. Overtaking Major Taylor, Colonel McRae led the party, which then amounted to perhaps twenty men, swiftly down the road, It was a race on which the lives of hundreds depended. If the enemy could turn the corner, nothing could check their rush, and the few men who tried to oppose them would be cut to pieces. The Sikhs arrived first, but by a very little. As they turned the corner they met the mass of the enemy, nearly a thousand strong, armed chiefly with swords and knives, creeping silently and stealthily up the gorge, in the hope and assurance of rushing the camp and massacring every soul in it. The whole road was crowded with the wild figures. McRae opened fire at once. Volley after volley was poured into the dense mass, at deadly range. At length the Sikhs fired independently. This checked the enemy, who shouted and yelled in fury at being thus stopped. The small party of soldiers then fell back, pace by pace, firing incessantly, and took up a position in a cutting about fifty yards behind the corner. Their flanks were protected on the left by high rocks, and on the right by boulders and rough ground, over which in the darkness it was impossible to move. The road was about five yards wide. As fast as the tribesmen turned the corner they were shot down. It was a strong position. In that strait path a thousand Might well be stopped by three Being thus effectively checked in their direct advance, the tribesmen began climbing up the hill to the left and throwing down rocks and stones on those who barred their path. They also fired their rifles round the corner, but as they were unable to see the soldiers without exposing themselves, most of their bullets went to the right. The band of Sikhs were closely packed in the cutting, the front rank kneeling to fire. Nearly all were struck by stones and rocks. Major Taylor, displaying great gallantry, was mortally wounded. Several of the Sepoys were killed. Colonel McRae himself was accidentally stabbed in the neck by a bayonet and became covered with blood. But he called upon the men to maintain the good name of "Rattray's Sikhs," and to hold their position till death or till the regiment came up. And the soldiers replied by loudly shouting the Sikh warcry, and defying the enemy to advance. After twenty minutes of desperate fighting, Lieutenant Barff arrived with thirty more men. He was only just in time. The enemy had already worked round Colonel McRae's right, and the destruction of the few soldiers left alive could not long have been delayed. The reinforcement, climbing up the hillside, drove the enemy back and protected the flank. But the remainder of the regiment was now at hand. Colonel McRae then fell back to a more extended position along a ridge about fifty yards further up the road, and reinforcing Lieutenant Barff's party, repulsed all attacks during the night. About 2 A.M. the tribesmen, finding they could make no progress, drew off, leaving many dead. The presence of mind, tactical knowledge and bravery displayed in this affair are thus noticed in the official despatches by General Meiklejohn:-- "There is no doubt that the gallant resistance made by this small body in the gorge, against vastly superior numbers, till the arrival of the rest of the regiment, saved the camp from being rushed on that side, and I cannot speak too highly of the behaviour of Lieutenant-Colonel McRae and Major Taylor on this occasion." While these things were passing on the right, the other attacks of the enemy had met with more success. The camp was assaulted simultaneously on the three sides. The glow of the star shells showed that the north camp was also engaged. The enemy had been checked on the Buddhist road, by Colonel McRae and the 45th Sikhs, but another great mass of men forced their way along the Graded road in the centre of the position. On the first sound of firing the inlying picket of the 24th Punjaub Infantry doubled out to reinforce the pickets on the road, and in the water-gorge. They only arrived in time to find these being driven in by overpowering numbers of the enemy. Hundreds of fierce swordsmen swarmed unto the bazaar and into the serai, a small enclosure which adjoined. Sharpshooters scrambled up the surrounding hills, and particularly from one ragged, rock-strewn peak called Gibraltar, kept up a tremendous fire. The defence of the left and centre or the camp was confided to the 24th Punjaub Infantry. One company of this regiment under Lieutenant Climo, charging across the football ground, cleared the bazaar at the point of the bayonet. The scene at this moment was vivid and terrible. The bazaar was crowded with tribesmen. The soldiers rushing forward amid loud cheers, plunged their bayonets into their furious adversaries. The sound of the hacking of swords, the screams of the unfortunate shopkeepers, the yells of the Ghazis were plainly heard above the ceaseless roll of musketry. The enemy now tried to force their way back into the bazaar, but the entrance was guarded by the troops and held against all assaults till about 10.45. The left flank of the company was then turned, and the pressure became so severe that they were withdrawn to a more interior line of defence, and took up a position along the edge of the "Sappers' and Miners' enclosure." Another company held the approaches from the north camp. The remainder of the regiment and No.5 company Sappers and Miners, were kept in readiness to reinforce any part of the line. It is necessary to record the actual movements of the troops in detail, but I am anxious above all things to give the reader a general idea. The enemy had attacked in tremendous strength along the two roads that gave access on the eastern side to the great cup of the Malakand. On the right road, they were checked by the brilliant movement of Colonel McRae and the courage of his regiment. Pouring in overwhelming force along the left road, they had burst into the camp itself, bearing down all opposition. The defenders, unable to hold the extended line of the rim, had been driven to take up a central position in the bottom of the cup. This central position comprised the "Sappers' and Miners' enclosure," the commissariat lines and the Field Engineer Park. It was commanded on every side by the fire from the rim. But the defenders stood at bay, determined at all costs to hold their ground, bad though it was. Meanwhile the enemy rushed to the attack with wild courage and reckless fury. Careless of life, they charged the slender line of defence. Twice they broke through and penetrated the enclosure. They were met by men as bold as they. The fighting became desperate. The general himself hurried from point to point, animating the soldiers and joining in the defence with sword and revolver. As soon as the enemy broke into the commissariat lines they rushed into the huts and sheds eager for plunder and victims. Lieutenant Manley, the Brigade Commissariat Officer, stuck stubbornly to his post, and with Sergeant Harrington endeavoured to hold the hut in which he lived. The savage tribesmen burst in the door and crowded into the room. What followed reads like a romance. The officer opened fire at once with his revolver. He was instantly cut down and hacked to pieces. In the struggle the lamp was smashed. The room became pitch dark. The sergeant, knocking down his assailants, got free for a moment and stood against the wall motionless. Having killed Manley, the tribesmen now began to search for the sergeant, feeling with their hands along the wall and groping in the darkness. At last, finding no one, they concluded he had escaped, and hurried out to look for others. Sergeant Harrington remained in the hut till it was retaken some hours later, and so saved his life. Another vigorous attack was made upon the Quarter Guard. Lieutenant Watling, who met it with his company of sappers, transfixed a Ghazi with his sword, but such was the fury of the fanatic that as he fell dead he cut at the officer and wounded him severely. The company were driven back. The Quarter Guard was captured, and with it the reserve ammunition of the sappers. Lieutenant Watling was carried in by his men, and, as soon as he reached the dressing station, reported the loss of this important post. Brigadier-General Meiklejohn at once ordered a party of the 24th to retake it from the enemy. Few men could be spared from the line of defence. At length a small but devoted band collected. It consisted of Captain Holland, Lieutenant Climo, Lieutenant Manley, R.E., the general's orderly, a Sepoy of the 45th Sikhs, two or three sappers and three men of the 24th; in all about a dozen. The general placed himself at their head. The officers drew their revolvers. The men were instructed to use the bayonet only. Then they advanced. The ground is by nature broken and confused to an extraordinary degree. Great rocks, undulations and trees rendered all movements difficult. Frequent tents, sheds and other buildings increased the intricacies. Amidst such surroundings were the enemy, numerous and well armed. The twelve men charged. The tribesmen advanced to meet them. The officers shot down man after man with their pistols. The soldiers bayoneted others. The enemy drew off discomfited, but half the party were killed or wounded. The orderly was shot dead. A sapper and a havildar of the 24th were severely wounded. The general himself was struck by a sword on the neck. Luckily the weapon turned in his assailant's hand, and only caused a bruise. Captain Holland was shot through the back at close quarters by a man concealed in a tent. The bullet, which caused four wounds, grazed his spine. The party were now too few to effect anything. The survivors halted. Lieutenant Climo took the wounded officer back, and collecting a dozen more men of the 24th, returned to the attack. The second attempt to regain the Quarter Guard was also unsuccessful, and the soldiers recoiled with further loss; but with that undaunted spirit which refuses to admit defeat they continued their efforts, and at the third charge dashed across the open space, bowling over and crushing back the enemy, and the post was recovered. All the ammunition had, however, been carried off by the enemy, and as the expenditure of that night had already been enormous, it was a serious loss. The commissariat lines were at length cleared of the tribesmen, and such of the garrison as could be spared were employed in putting up a hasty defence across the south entrance of the enclosure, and clearing away the cook-houses and other shelters, which might be seized by the enemy. The next morning no fewer than twenty-nine corpses of tribesmen were found round the cookhouse, and in the open space over which the three charges had taken place. This, when it is remembered that perhaps twice as many had been wounded and had crawled away, enables an estimate to be formed of the desperate nature of the fight for the Quarter Guard. All this time the fire from rim into the cup had been causing severe and continual losses. The enemy surrounding the enclosure on three sides, brought a cross fire to bear on its defenders, and made frequent charges right up to the breastwork. Bullets were flying in all directions, and there was no question of shelter. Major Herbert, D.A.A.G., was hit early in the night. Later on Lieutenant-Colonel Lamb received the dangerous wound in his thigh which caused his death a few days afterwards. Many Sepoys were also killed and wounded. The command of the 24th Punjaub Infantry devolved upon a subaltern officer, Lieutenant Climo. The regiment, however, will never be in better hands. At about one o'clock, during a lull in the firing, the company which was lining the east face of the enclosure heard feeble cries of help. A wounded havildar of the 24th was lying near the bazaar. He had fallen in the first attack, shot in the shoulder. The tribesmen, giving him two or three deep sword cuts to finish him, had left him for dead. He now appealed for help. The football ground on which he lay was swept by the fire of the troops, and overrun by the enemy's swordsmen, yet the cry for help did not pass unheeded. Taking two Sepoys with him, Lieutenant E.W. Costello, 24th Punjaub Infantry, ran out into the deadly space, and, in spite of the heavy fire, brought the wounded soldier in safety. For this heroic action he has since received the Victoria Cross. As the night wore on, the attack of the enemy became so vigorous, that the brigadier decided to call for a reinforcement of a hundred men from the garrison of the fort. This work stood high on a hill, and was impregnable to an enemy unprovided with field guns. Lieutenant Rawlins volunteered to try and reach it with the order. Accompanied by three orderlies, he started. He had to make his way through much broken ground infested by the enemy. One man sprang at him and struck him on the wrist with a sword, but the subaltern, firing his revolver, shot him dead, reached the fort in safety, and brought back the sorely-needed reinforcement. It was thought that the enemy would make a final effort to capture the enclosure before dawn, that being the hour which Afghan tribesmen usually select. But they had lost heavily, and at about 3.30 A.M. began to carry away their dead and wounded. The firing did not, however, lessen until 4.15 A.M., when the sharpshooters withdrew to the heights, and the fusillade dwindled to "sniping" at long range. The first night of the defence of the Malakand camp was over. The enemy, with all the advantages of surprise, position and great numbers, had failed to overcome the slender garrison. Everywhere they had been repulsed with slaughter. But the British losses had been severe. BRITISH OFFICERS. Killed--Hon. Lieutenant L. Manley, Commissariat Department. Wounded dangerously--Major W.W. Taylor, 45th Sikhs. Wounded severely--Lieut.-Colonel J. Lamb, 24th P.I. " " Major L. Herbert, D.A.A.G. " " Captain H.F. Holland, 24th P.I. " " Lieutenant F.W. Watling, Q.O. Sappers and Miners. Of these Lieut.-Colonel Lamb and Major Taylor died of their wounds. NATIVE RANKS. Killed...... 21 Wounded..... 31 As soon as the first light of morning began to grow in the valley, two companies of the 24th advanced and cleared the bazaar of such of the enemy as had remained behind to plunder. The whole place had been thoroughly ransacked, and everything of value destroyed or carried off. The native manager had had a strange experience, and one which few men would envy. He had remained hidden in the back of a tent during the whole night in equal danger and terror of the bullets of the soldiers and the swords of the enemy. Hearing the friendly voices, he emerged uninjured from his retreat. Desultory firing was maintained by the tribesmen all day. While the close and desperate fighting, which has been described, was raging in the south camp, the north camp had not been seriously involved, and had spent a quiet, though anxious night. On the sound of the firing on the Kotal being heard, four guns of No.8 Mountain Battery were moved over to the south-east side of the camp, and several star shells were fired. No large body of the enemy was however discovered. Twice during the night the camp was approached by the tribesmen, but a few rounds of shrapnel were sufficient to drive these away. When General Meiklejohn found that the garrison of the north camp had not been severely engaged, he ordered a force consisting of two guns and the 31st Punjaub Infantry, under Major Gibbs, covered by forty sowars of the 11th Bengal Lancers, and supported by a wing of the 24th, to move out, reconnoitre the valley and clear it, as much as possible, of the enemy. The column advanced in pursuit as far as Bedford Hill. Here they came upon a large gathering of tribesmen, and as it was now evident that a great tribal rising had broken out, Major Gibbs was ordered to return and to bring his stores and troops into the Kotal camp without delay. The infantry and guns thereupon retired and fell back on the camp, covered by the 24th Punjaub Infantry. As this regiment was being withdrawn, a sudden attack was made from the high ground above the Buddhist road, and directed against the left flank of the troops. A front was immediately shown, and the 24th advanced to meet their assailants. Lieutenant Climo, who commanded, detached a company to the right, and by this turning movement drove them off, inflicting some loss and capturing a standard. This officer's skill and conduct in this retirement was again the subject of commendation in despatches. The troops reached their respective camps at about 11 o'clock. Meanwhile the cavalry had been ordered to push on, if possible, to Chakdara and reinforce the garrison at that post. The task was one of considerable danger, but by crossing and recrossing the Swat River, the squadron managed to cut their way through the tribesmen and reached the fort with slight loss. This brilliant ride will receive a fuller description in a later chapter. The evacuation of the north camp proceeded very slowly. The troops packed up their kits with great deliberation, and applications were made for transport. None was, however, available. All the camels were at Dargai, on the Indian side of the mountains. Repeated orders to hurry were sent from the Kotal. All hated leaving their belongings behind, having no confidence in the liberality of a paternal Government. As the afternoon passed, the aspect of the enemy became very threatening and formidable. Great numbers drew near to the camp, and the guns were compelled to fire a good many rounds. At length, at 4 o'clock, imperative orders were sent that the north camp was to be at once abandoned, that the force there was to march to the Kotal, and that all baggage and stores, not yet removed, were to be left where they were. All the tents were struck, but nothing else could be done, and to the deep disgust of all--officers and men--their property was left to the mercies of the enemy. During the night it was all looted and burnt. Many of the officers thus lost every stitch of clothing they possessed. The flames rising from the scene of destruction were visible far and wide, and the tribesmen in the most distant valleys were encouraged to hurry to complete the slaughter of the accursed infidels. It cannot be doubted, however, that the concentration of the troops was a wise and judicious step. The garrison of the Kotal and south camp was insufficient, and, whatever happened, it was better for the troops to stand or fall together. The situation was also aggravated by the appearance of large numbers of tribesmen from the Utman Khel country, who crowded the hills to the west of the camp, and thus compelled the defenders to hold a greatly extended line. The abandonment of the north camp was carried out none too soon, for the enemy pressed the withdrawal of the troops, and they reached the south camp under cover of the fire of the 24th Punjaub Infantry, and the Guides Cavalry. These latter had arrived in camp at 8.30 that morning after marching all night. They found plenty of employment. The telegraph had carried the news of the events of the night to all parts of the world. In England those returning from Goodwood Races read the first details of the fighting on the posters of the evening papers. At Simla, the Government of India awoke to find themselves confronted with another heavy task. Other messages recalled all officers to their regiments, and summoned reinforcements to the scene by road and rail. In the small hours of the 27th, the officers of the 11th Bengal Lancers at Nowshera were aroused by a frantic telegraph operator, who was astounded by the news his machine was clicking out. This man in his shirt sleeves, with a wild eye, and holding an unloaded revolver by the muzzle, ran round waking everyone. The whole country was up. The Malakand garrison was being overwhelmed by thousands of tribesmen. All the troops were to march at once. He brandished copies of the wires he had received. In a few moments official instructions arrived. The 11th Bengal Lancers, the 38th Dogras and the 35th Sikhs started at dawn. No.1 and No.7 British Mountain Batteries were also ordered up. The Guides Cavalry had already arrived. Their infantry under Lieutenant Lockhart reached the Kotal at 7.30 P.M. on the 27th, having, in spite of the intense heat and choking dust, covered thirty-two miles in seventeen and a half hours. This wonderful feat was accomplished without impairing the efficiency of the soldiers, who were sent into the picket line, and became engaged as soon as they arrived. An officer who commanded the Dargai post told me, that, as they passed the guard there, they shouldered arms with parade precision, as if to show that twenty-six miles under the hottest sun in the world would not take the polish off the Corps of Guides. Then they breasted the long ascent to the top of the pass, encouraged by the sound of the firing, which grew louder at every step. Help in plenty was thus approaching as fast as eager men could march, but meanwhile the garrison had to face the danger as best they could alone. As the 31st Punjaub Infantry, who had been the last to leave the north camp, were arriving at the Kotal, about 1000 tribesmen descended in broad daylight and with the greatest boldness, and threatened their left flank. They drove in two pickets of the 24th, and pressed forward vigorously. Lieutenant Climo with two companies advanced up the hill to meet them, supported by the fire of two guns of the Mountain Battery. A bayonet charge was completely successful. The officers were close enough to make effective use of their revolvers. Nine bodies of the enemy were left on the ground, and a standard was captured. The tribesmen then drew off, and the garrison prepared for the attack, which they knew would come with the dark. As the evening drew on the enemy were observed assembling in ever-increasing numbers. Great crowds of them could be seen streaming along the Chakdara road, and thickly dotting the hills with spots of white. They all wore white as yet. The news had not reached Buner, and the sombre-clad warriors of Ambeyla were still absent. The glare of the flames from the north camp was soon to summon them to the attack of their ancient enemies. The spectacle as night fell was strange, ominous, but not unpicturesque. Gay banners of every colour, shape and device, waved from the surrounding hills. The sunset caught the flashing of swordblades behind the spurs and ridges. The numerous figures of the enemy moved busily about preparing for the attack. A dropping fire from the sharpshooters added an appropriate accompaniment. In the middle, at the bottom of the cup, was the "crater" camp and the main enclosure with the smoke of the evening meal rising in the air. The troops moved to their stations, and, as the shadows grew, the firing swelled into a loud, incessant roar. The disposition of the troops on the night of the 27th was as follows:-- 1. On the right Colonel McRae, with 45th Sikhs and two guns supported by 100 men of the Guides Infantry, held almost the same position astride the Buddhist road as before. 2. In the centre the enclosure and Graded road were defended by-- 31st Punjaub Infantry. No.5 Company Q.O. Sappers and Miners. The Guides. Two Guns. 3. On the left the 24th Punjaub Infantry, with the two remaining guns under Lieutenant Climo, held the approaches from the abandoned north camp and the fort. Most of this extended line, which occupied a great part of the rim, was formed by a chain of pickets, detached from one another, and fortified by stone breastworks, with supports in rear. But in the centre the old line of the "Sappers' and Miners' enclosure" was adhered to. The bazaar was left to the enemy, but the serai, about a hundred yards in front of the main entrenchment, was held by a picket of twenty-four men of the 31st Punjaub Infantry, under Subadar Syed Ahmed Shah. Here it was that the tragedy of the night occurred. At eight o'clock, the tribesmen attacked in tremendous force all along the line. The firing at once became intense and continuous. The expenditure of ammunition by the troops was very great, and many thousands of rounds were discharged. On the right Colonel McRae and his Sikhs were repeatedly charged by the swordsmen, many of whom succeeded in forcing their way into the pickets and perished by the bayonet. Others reached the two guns and were cut down while attacking the gunners. All assaults were however beaten off. The tribesmen suffered terrible losses. The casualties among the Sikhs were also severe. In the morning Colonel McRae advanced from his defences, and, covered by the fire of his two guns, cleared the ground in his front of the enemy. The centre was again the scene of severe fighting. The tribesmen poured into the bazaar and attacked the serai on all sides. This post was a mud-walled enclosure about fifty yards square. It was loopholed for musketry, but had no flank defences. The enemy made determined efforts to capture the place for several hours. Meanwhile, so tremendous was the fire of the troops in the main enclosure, that the attack upon the serai was hardly noticed. For six hours the picket there held out against all assaults, but the absence of flank defences enabled the enemy to come close up to the walls. They then began to make holes through them, and to burrow underneath. The little garrison rushed from place to place repelling these attacks. But it was like caulking a sieve. At length the tribesmen burst in from several quarters, and the sheds inside caught fire. When all the defenders except four were killed or wounded, the Subadar, himself struck by a bullet, ordered the place to be evacuated, and the survivors escaped by a ladder over the back wall, carrying their wounded with them. The bodies of the killed were found next morning, extraordinarily mutilated. The defence of this post to the bitter end must be regarded as a fine feat of arms. Subadar Syed Ahmed Shah was originally promoted to a commission for an act of conspicuous bravery, and his gallant conduct on this occasion is the subject of a special paragraph in despatches. [The Subadar and the surviving Sepoys have since received the "Order of Merit."] On the left, the 24th Punjaub Infantry were also hotly engaged, and Lieutenant Costello received his first severe wound from a bullet, which passed through his back and arm. Towards morning the enemy began to press severely. Whereupon Lieutenant Climo, always inclined to bold and vigorous action, advanced from the breastworks to meet them with two companies. The tribesmen held their ground and maintained a continual fire from Martini-Henry rifles. They also rolled down great stones upon the companies. The 24th continued to advance, and drove the enemy from point to point, and position to position, pursuing them for a distance of two miles. "Gallows Tree" hill, against which the first charge of the counter attack was delivered, was held by nearly 1000 tribesmen. On such crowded masses, the fire of the troops was deadly. The enemy left forty dead in the path of Lieutenant Climo's counter attack, and were observed carrying off many wounded. As they retreated, many took refuge in the village of Jalalkot. The guns were hurried up, and ten shells were thrown into their midst, causing great slaughter. The result of this bold stroke was, that the enemy during the rest of the fighting invariably evacuated the hills before daylight enabled the troops to assume the offensive. Thus the onslaught of the tribesmen had again been successfully repelled by the Malakand garrison. Many had been killed and wounded, but all the tribes for a hundred miles around were hurrying to the attack, and their number momentarily increased. The following casualties occurred on the night of the 27th:-- BRITISH OFFICER. Wounded--Lieutenant E.W. Costello. NATIVE RANKS. Killed...... 12 Wounded..... 29 During the day the enemy retired to the plain of Khar to refresh themselves. Great numbers of Bunerwals now joined the gathering. The garrison were able to distinguish these new-comers from the Swatis, Utman Khels, Mamunds, Salarzais and others, by the black or dark-blue clothes they wore. The troops were employed in strengthening the defences, and improving the shelters. The tribesmen kept up a harassing and annoying long-range fire, killing several horses of the Guides Cavalry. Towards evening they advanced to renew the attack, carrying hundreds of standards. As darkness fell, heavy firing recommenced along the whole front. The enemy had apparently plenty of ammunition, and replied with effect to the heavy fire of the troops. The arrangement of the regiments was the same as on the previous night. On the right, Colonel McRae once more held his own against all attacks. In the centre, severe fighting ensued. The enemy charged again and again up to the breastwork of the enclosure. They did not succeed in penetrating. Three officers and several men were however wounded by the fire. Lieutenant Maclean, of the Guides Cavalry, who was attached temporarily to the 31st Punjaub Infantry, had a wonderful escape. A bullet entered his mouth and passed through his cheek without injuring the bone in any way. He continued on duty, and these pages will record his tragic but glorious death a few weeks later at Landakai. Lieutenant Ford was dangerously wounded in the shoulder. The bullet cut the artery, and he was bleeding to death when Surgeon-Lieutenant J.H. Hugo came to his aid. The fire was too hot to allow of lights being used. There was no cover of any sort. It was at the bottom of the cup. Nevertheless the surgeon struck a match at the peril of his life and examined the wound. The match went out amid a splutter of bullets, which kicked up the dust all around, but by its uncertain light he saw the nature of the injury. The officer had already fainted from the loss of blood. The doctor seized the artery, and, as no other ligature was forthcoming, he remained under fire for three hours holding a man's life, between his finger and thumb. When at length it seemed that the enemy had broken into the camp he picked up the still unconscious officer in his arms, and, without relaxing his hold, bore him to a place of safety. His arm was for many hours paralysed with cramp from the effects of the exertion of compressing the artery. I think there are few, whatever may be their views or interests, who will not applaud this splendid act of devotion. The profession of medicine, and surgery, must always rank as the most noble that men can adopt. The spectacle of a doctor in action among soldiers, in equal danger and with equal courage, saving life where all others are taking it, allaying pain where all others are causing it, is one which must always seem glorious, whether to God or man. It is impossible to imagine any situation from which a human being might better leave this world, and embark on the hazards of the Unknown. All through the night, the enemy continued their attacks. They often succeeded in reaching the breastworks--only to die on the bayonets of the defenders. The guns fired case shot, with terrible effect, and when morning dawned the position was still held by the Imperial Forces. The casualties of the night were as follows:-- BRITISH OFFICERS. Wounded severely--Lieutenant H.B. Ford, 31st Punjaub Infantry. " H.L.S. Maclean, the Guides. Wounded slightly--Lieutenant G. Swinley, 31st Punjaub Infantry. NATIVE RANKS. Killed....... 2 Wounded...... 13 On the morning of the 29th signalling communication with Chakdara was for a few moments re-established. The garrison of that post announced their safety, and that all attacks had been repulsed with heavy loss, but they reported that ammunition and food were both running short. During the day the enemy again retired to the plain to rest, and prepare for the great attack, which they intended making that night. The hour would be propitious. It was Jumarat, on which day the prophet watches with especial care over the interests of those who die for the faith. Besides, the moon was full, and had not the Great Fakir declared that this should be the moment of victory? The Mullah exhorted them all to the greatest efforts, and declared that he would himself lead the assault. To-night the infidels would be utterly destroyed. Meanwhile the troops were busily employed, in spite of their terrible fatigues, in strengthening the defences. The bazaar and the serai were levelled. Trees were blown up, and a clear field of fire was obtained in front of the central enclosure. Great bonfires were also prepared on the approaches, to enable the soldiers to take good aim at their assailants, while they were silhouetted against the light. In such occupations the day passed. The tribesmen continued to fire at long range and shot several horses and mules. These sharpshooters enjoyed themselves immensely. After the relief of Chakdara, it was found that many of them had made most comfortable and effective shelters among the rocks. One man, in particular, had ensconced himself behind an enormous boulder, and had built a little wall of stone, conveniently loopholed, to protect himself when firing. The overhanging rock sheltered him from the heat of the sun. By his side were his food and a large box of cartridges. Here for the whole week he had lived, steadily dropping bullets unto the camp and firing at what an officer described as all "objects of interest." What could be more attractive? At four o'clock in the afternoon Major Stuart Beatsen, commanding the 11th Bengal Lancers, arrived with his leading squadron. He brought a small supply of ammunition, which the garrison was in sore need of, the expenditure each night being tremendous, some regiments firing as much as 30,000 rounds. The 35th Sikhs and 38th Dogras under Colonel Reid arrived at Dargai, at the foot of the pass, in the evening. They had marched all day in the most intense heat. How terrible that march must have been, may be judged from the fact, that in the 35th Sikhs twenty-one men actually died on the road of heat apoplexy. The fact that these men marched till they dropped dead, is another proof of the soldierly eagerness displayed by all ranks to get to the front. Brigadier-General Meiklejohn, feeling confidence in his ability to hold his own with the troops he had, ordered them to remain halted at Dargai, and rest the next day. The attack came with the night, but the defences in the centre had been much improved, and the tribesmen were utterly unable to cross the cleared glacis, which now stretched in front of the enclosure. They, however, assailed both flanks with determination, and the firing everywhere became heavy. At 2 A.M. the great attack was delivered. Along the whole front and from every side enormous numbers swarmed to the assault. On the right and left, hand-to-hand fighting took place. Colonel McRae again held his position, but many of the tribesmen died under the very muzzles of the rifles. The 24th Punjaub Infantry on the left were the most severely engaged. The enemy succeeded in breaking into the breastworks, and close fighting ensued, in which Lieutenant Costello was again severely wounded. But the fire of the troops was too hot for anything to live in their front. At 2.30 the Mad Mullah being wounded, another Mullah killed and several hundreds of tribesmen slain, the whole attack collapsed. Nor was it renewed again with vigor. The enemy recognised that their chance of taking the Malakand had passed. The casualties were as follows on the night of the 29th:-- BRITISH OFFICERS. Wounded severely--Lieutenant E.W. Costello, 24th P.I., who had already been severely wounded, but continued to do duty. " " Lieutenant F.A. Wynter, R.A. NATIVE RANKS. Killed...... 1 Wounded..... 17 All the next day the enemy could be seen dragging the dead away, and carrying the wounded over the hills to their villages. Reinforcements, however, joined them, and they renewed their attack, but without much spirit, at 9.30 P.M. They were again repulsed with loss. Once, during a thunderstorm that broke over the camp, they charged the 45th Sikhs' position, and were driven off with the bayonet. Only two men were wounded during the night. In the morning the 38th Dogras and 35th Sikhs marched into the camp. The enemy continued firing into the entrenchments at long range, but without effect. They had evidently realised that the Malakand was too strong to be taken. The troops had a quiet night, and the weary, worn-out men got a little needed sleep. Thus the long and persistent attack on the British frontier station of Malakand languished and ceased. The tribesmen, sick of the slaughter at this point, concentrated their energies on Chakdara, which they believed must fall into their hands. To relieve this hard-pressed post now became the duty of the garrison of Malakand. The chapter, which may now appropriately end, has described in detail, and, necessarily, at length, the defence of an outpost of our Empire. A surprise, followed by a sustained attack, has been resisted. The enemy, repulsed at every point, have abandoned the attempt, but surround and closely watch the defences. The troops will now assume the offensive, and the hour of reprisals will commence. The casualties sustained by the Malakand garrison between 26th July and 1st August were as follows:-- BRITISH OFFICERS KILLED AND DIED OF WOUNDS--3. Lieutenant-Colonel J. Lamb, 24th Punjaub Infantry. Major W.W. Taylor, 45th Sikhs. Lieutenant L. Manley, Commissariat. WOUNDED--10. Major L. Herbert, D.A.A.G. Captain G. Baldwin, D.S.O., Guides Cavalry. Captain H.F. Holland, 24th Punjaub Infantry. Lieutenant F.A. Wynter, R.A. " F.W. Watling, R.E. " E.W. Costello, 24th Punjaub Infantry. " H.B. Ford, 31st Punjaub Infantry. " H.L.S. Maclean, Guides Cavalry. 2nd Lieutenant G. Swinley, 31st Punjaub Infantry. " C.V. Keyes, Guides Cavalry. NATIVE OFFICERS WOUNDED--7. TOTAL OFFICERS KILLED AND WOUNDED--20. BRITISH NON-COMMISSIONED OFFICER KILLED. Sergeant F. Byrne, R.E. NATIVE NON-COMMISSIONED OFFICERS AND PRIVATES. Killed. Wounded. No.8 Bengal Mountain Battery . . 0 5 11th Bengal Lancers . . . 0 3 No.5 Company Q.O. Sappers and Miners. 3 18 24th Punjaub Infantry . . . 3 14 31st " " . . . . 12 32 38th Dogras . . . . . 0 1 45th Sikhs . . . . . 4 28 Q.O. Corps of Guides. . . . 3 27 TOTAL NON-COMMISSIONED OFFICERS AND MEN KILLED AND WOUNDED--153. CHAPTER V: THE RELIEF OF CHAKDARA While the events described in the last chapter had been watched with interest and attention in all parts of the world, they were the subject of anxious consultation in the Council of the Governor-General. It was only natural that the Viceroy, himself, should view with abhorrence the prospect of military operations on a large scale, which must inevitably lead to closer and more involved relations with the tribes of the Afghan border. He belonged to that party in the State which has clung passionately, vainly, and often unwisely to a policy of peace and retrenchment. He was supported in his reluctance to embark on warlike enterprises by the whole force of the economic situation. No moment could have been less fitting: no man more disinclined. That Lord Elgin's Viceroyalty and the Famine year should have been marked by the greatest Frontier War in the history of the British Empire in India, vividly displays how little an individual, however earnest his motives, however great his authority, can really control the course of public affairs. The Council were called upon to decide on matters, which at once raised the widest and most intricate questions of frontier policy; which might involve great expense; which might well influence the development and progress of the great populations committed to their charge. It would be desirable to consider such matters from the most lofty and commanding standpoints; to reduce detail to its just proportions; to examine the past, and to peer into the future. And yet, those who sought to look thus on the whole situation, were immediately confronted with the picture of the rock of Chakdara, fringed and dotted with the white smoke of musketry, encircled by thousands of fierce assailants, its garrison fighting for their lives, but confident they would not be deserted. It was impossible to see further than this. All Governments, all Rulers, meet the same difficulties. Wide considerations of principle, of policy, of consequences or of economics are brushed aside by an impetuous emergency. They have to decide off-hand. The statesman has to deal with events. The historian, who has merely to record them, may amuse his leisure by constructing policies, to explain instances of successful opportunism. On the 30th of July the following order was officially published: "The Governor-General in Council sanctions the despatch of a force, to be styled the Malakand Field Force, for the purpose of holding the Malakand, and the adjacent posts, and of operating against the neighbouring tribes as may be required." The force was composed as follows:-- 1st Brigade. Commanding--Colonel W.H. Meiklejohn, C.B., C.M.G., with the local rank of Brigadier-General. 1st Battalion Royal West Kent Regiment. 24th Punjaub Infantry. 31st Punjaub Infantry. 45th (Rattray's) Sikhs. Sections A and B of No.1 British Field Hospital. No.38 Native Field Hospital. Sections A and B of No.50 Native Field Hospital. 2nd Brigade. Commanding--Brigadier-General P.D. Jeffreys, C.B. 1st Battalion East Kent Regiment (the Buffs). 35th Sikhs. 38th Dogras. Guides Infantry. Sections C and D of No.1 British Field Hospital. No.37 Native Field Hospital. Sections C and D of No.50 Native Field Hospital. Divisional Troops. 4 Squadrons 11th Bengal Lancers. 1 " 10th " " 2 " Guides Cavalry. 22nd Punjaub Infantry. 2 Companies 21st Punjaub Infantry. 10th Field Battery. 6 Guns No.1 British Mountain Battery. 6 " No.7 " " " 6 " No.8 Bengal " " No.5 Company Madras Sappers and Miners. No.3 " Bombay " " " Section B of No.13 British Field Hospital. Sections A and B of No.35 Native Field Hospital. Line of Communications. No.34 Native Field Hospital. Section B of No.1 Native Field Hospital. [This complete division amounted to a total available field strength of 6800 bayonets, 700 lances or sabres, with 24 guns.] The command of this powerful force was entrusted to Brigadier-General Sir Bindon Blood, K.C.B., who was granted the local rank of Major-General. As this officer is the principal character in the tale I have to tell, a digression is necessary to introduce him to the reader. Born of an old Irish family, a clan that has been settled in the west of Ireland for 300 years, and of which he is now the head, Sir Bindon Blood was educated privately, and at the Indian Military College at Addiscombe, and obtained a commission in the Royal Engineers in December, 1860. For the first eleven years he was stationed in England, and it was not until 1871 that he proceeded to India, where he first saw active service in the Jawaki Afridi Expedition (medal with clasp). In 1878 he returned home, but the next year was ordered to the Zulu War. On the conclusion of hostilities, for which he received a second medal and clasp, he again sailed for India and served throughout the Afghan war of 1880, being for some time with the troops at Cabul. In 1882 he accompanied the Army to Egypt, and was with the Highland Brigade, which was the most severely engaged at Tel-el-Kebir. He received the medal and clasp, Khedive's star and the 3rd class of the Medjidie. After the campaign he went home for two years, and in 1885 made another voyage to the East, over which the Russian war-cloud was then hanging. Since then the general has served in India, at first with the Sappers and Miners, with whose reorganisation he was closely associated, and latterly in command of the Agra District. In 1895 he was appointed Chief of the Staff to Sir Robert Low in the Chitral Expedition, and was present at all the actions, including the storming of the Malakand Pass. For his services he received a degree of knighthood of the Military Order of the Bath and the Chitral medal and clasp. He was now marked as a man for high command on the frontier at the first opportunity. That opportunity the great rising of 1897 has presented. Thirty-seven years of soldering, of war in many lands, of sport of every kind, have steeled alike muscle and nerve. Sir Bindon Blood, himself, till warned by the march of time, a keen polo player, is one of those few officers of high rank in the army, who recognise the advantages to soldiers of that splendid game. He has pursued all kinds of wild animals in varied jungles, has killed many pig with the spear and shot every species of Indian game, including thirty tigers to his own rifle. It would not be fitting for me, a subaltern of horse, to offer any criticism, though eulogistic, on the commander under whom I have had the honour to serve in the field. I shall content myself with saying, that the general is one of that type of soldiers and administrators, which the responsibilities and dangers of an Empire produce, a type, which has not been, perhaps, possessed by any nation except the British, since the days when the Senate and the Roman people sent their proconsuls to all parts of the world. Sir Bindon Blood was at Agra, when, on the evening of the 28th of July, he received the telegram from the Adjutant-General in India, appointing him to the command of the Malakand Field Force, and instructing him to proceed at once to assume it. He started immediately, and on the 31st formally took command at Nowshera. At Mardan he halted to make arrangements for the onward march of the troops. Here, at 3 A.M. on the 1st of August, he received a telegram from Army Headquarters informing him, that Chakdara Fort was hard pressed, and directing him to hurry on to Malakand, and attempt its relief at all costs. The great numbers of the enemy, and the shortness of ammunition and supplies from which the garrison were suffering, made the task difficult and the urgency great. Indeed I have been told, that at Simla on the 1st of August it was feared, that Chakdara was doomed, and that sufficient troops to fight their way to its relief could not be concentrated in time. The greatest anxiety prevailed. Sir Bindon Blood replied telegraphically that "knowing the ground" as he did, he "felt serenely confident." He hurried on at once, and, in spite of the disturbed state of the country, reached the Malakand about noon on the 1st of August. The desperate position of the garrison of Chaldara was fully appreciated by their comrades at the Malakand. As the night of the 31st had been comparatively quiet, Brigadier-General Meiklejohn determined to attempt to force his way to their relief the next day. He accordingly formed a column as follows:-- 45th Sikhs. 24th Punjaub Infantry. No.5 Company Sappers and Miners. 4 Guns of No.8 Mountain Battery. At 11 A.M. he sent the cavalry, under Lieutenant-Colonel Adams of the Guides, to make a dash for the Amandara Pass, and if it were unoccupied to seize it. The three squadrons started by the short road to the north camp. As soon as the enemy saw what was going on, they assembled in great numbers to oppose the advance. The ground was most unsuitable for cavalry. Great boulders strewed the surface. Frequent nullahs intersected the plain, and cramped the action of the horsemen. The squadrons soon became hotly engaged. The Guides made several charges. The broken nature of the ground favoured the enemy. Many of them were, however, speared or cut down. In one of these charges Lieutenant Keyes was wounded. While he was attacking one tribesman, another came up from behind, and struck him a heavy blow on the shoulder with a sword. Though these Swatis keep their swords at razor edge, and though the blow was sufficiently severe to render the officer's arm useless for some days, it raised only a thin weal, as if from a cut of a whip. It was a strange and almost an inexplicable escape. The enemy in increasing numbers pressed upon the cavalry, who began to get seriously involved. The tribesmen displayed the greatest boldness and determination. At length Lieut.-Colonel Adams had to order a retirement. It was none too soon. The tribesmen were already working round the left flank and thus threatening the only line of retreat. The squadrons fell back, covering each other by dismounted fire. The 24th Punjaub Infantry protected their flank as they reached the camp. The cavalry losses were as follows:-- BRITISH OFFICERS. Wounded severely--Captain G.M. Baldwin, the Guides. " slightly--Lieutenant C.V. Keyes, the Guides. NATIVE RANKS. Killed Wounded 11th Bengal Lancers.... 0 3 Horses........ 1 4 Guides Cavalry...... 1 10 Horses........ 3 18 Total casualties--16 men and 26 horses. The vigorous resistance which the cavalry had encountered, and the great numbers and confidence that the enemy had displayed, effectually put an end to any idea of relieving Chakdara that day. The tribesmen were much elated by their temporary success, and the garrison, worn and wearied by the incessant strain, both mental and physical, were proportionately cast down. Every one anticipated tremendous fighting on the next day. Make the attempt, they must at all hazards. But there were not wanting those who spoke of "forlorn hopes" and "last chances." Want of sleep and rest had told on all ranks. For a week they had grappled with a savage foe. They were the victors, but they were out of breath. It was at this moment, that Sir Bindon Blood arrived and assumed the command. He found General Meiklejohn busily engaged in organising a force of all arms, which was to move to the relief of Chakdara on the following day. As it was dangerous to denude the Malakand position of troops, this force could not exceed 1000 rifles, the available cavalry and four guns. Of these arrangements Sir Bindon Blood approved. He relieved Brigadier-General Meiklejohn of the charge of the Malakand position, and gave him the command of the relieving column. Colonel Reid was then placed in command of Malakand, and instructed to strengthen the pickets at Castle Rock, as far as possible, and to be ready with a force taken from them, to clear the high ground on the right of the Graded road. The relieving column was composed as follows:-- 400 Rifles 24th Punjaub Infantry. 400 " 45th Sikhs. 200 " Guides Infantry. 2 Squadrons 11th Bengal Lancers (under Lieut.-Col. R.B. Adams.) 2 " Guides Cavalry " " " 4 Guns No.8 Mountain Battery. 50 Sappers of No.5 Company. Hospital details. Sir Bindon Blood ordered General Meiklejohn to assemble this force before dark near the centre of the camp at a grove of trees called "Gretna Green," to bivouac there for the night, and to be ready to start with the first light of morning. During the afternoon the enemy, encouraged by their success with the cavalry in the morning, advanced boldly to the pickets and the firing was continuous. So heavy indeed did it become between eleven and twelve o'clock at night, that the force at "Gretna Green" got under arms. But towards morning the tribesmen retired. The reader may, perhaps, have in his mind the description of the Malakand as a great cup with jagged clefts in the rim. Much of this rim was still held by the enemy. It was necessary for any force trying to get out of the cup, to fight their way along the narrow roads through the clefts, which were commanded by the heights on either side. For a considerable distance it was impossible to deploy. Therein lay the difficulty of the operation, which the General had now to perform. The relieving column was exposed to the danger of being stopped, just as Colonel McRae had stopped the first attack of the tribesmen along the Buddhist road. On the 1st of August the cavalry had avoided these difficulties by going down the road to the North camp, and making a considerable detour. But they thus became involved in bad ground and had to retire. The "Graded" road, if any, was the road by which Chakdara was to be relieved. Looking at the tangled, rugged nature of the country, it seems extraordinary to an untrained eye, that among so many peaks and points, one should be of more importance than another. Yet it is so. On the high ground, in front of the position that Colonel McRae and the 45th Sikhs had held so well, was a prominent spur. This was the key which would unlock the gate and set free the troops, who were cramped up within. Every one realised afterwards how obvious this was and wondered they had not thought of it before. Sir Bindon Blood selected the point as the object of his first attack, and it was against this that he directed Colonel Goldney with a force of about 300 men to move, as soon as he should give the signal to advance. At half-past four in the morning of the 2nd of August he proceeded to "Gretna Green" and found the relieving column fallen in, and ready to march at daybreak. All expected a severe action. Oppressed with fatigue and sleeplessness, there were many who doubted that it would be successful. But though tired, they were determined, and braced themselves for a desperate struggle. The General-in-chief was, as he had said, confident and serene. He summoned the different commanding officers, explained his plans, and shook hands all round. It was a moment of stern and high resolve. Slowly the first faint light of dawn grew in the eastern sky. The brightness of the stars began to pale. Behind the mountains was the promise of the sun. Then the word was given to advance. Immediately the relieving column set off, four deep, down the "Graded" road. Colonel Goldney simultaneously advanced to the attack of the spur, which now bears his name, with 250 men of the 35th Sikhs and 50 of the 38th Dogras. He moved silently towards the stone shelters, that the tribesmen had erected on the crest. He got to within a hundred yards unperceived. The enemy, surprised, opened an irregular and ineffective fire. The Sikhs shouted and dashed forward. The ridge was captured without loss of any kind. The enemy fled in disorder, leaving seven dead and one prisoner on the ground. Then the full significance of the movement was apparent alike to friend and foe. The point now gained, commanded the whole of the "Graded" road, right down to its junction with the road to the North camp. The relieving column, moving down the road, were enabled to deploy without loss or delay. The door was open. The enemy, utterly surprised and dumfoundered by this manoeuvre, were seen running to and fro in the greatest confusion: in the graphic words of Sir Bindon Blood's despatch, "like ants in a disturbed ant-hill." At length they seemed to realise the situation, and, descending from the high ground, took up a position near Bedford Hill in General Meiklejohn's front, and opened a heavy fire at close range. But the troops were now deployed and able to bring their numbers to bear. Without wasting time in firing, they advanced with the bayonet. The leading company of the Guides stormed the hill in their front with a loss of two killed and six wounded. The rest of the troops charged with even less loss. The enemy, thoroughly panic-stricken, began to fly, literally by thousands, along the heights to the right. They left seventy dead behind them. The troops, maddened by the remembrance of their fatigues and sufferings, and inspired by the impulse of victory, pursued them with a merciless vigour. Sir Bindon Blood had with his staff ascended the Castle Rock, to superintend the operations generally. From this position the whole field was visible. On every side, and from every rock, the white figures of the enemy could be seen in full flight. The way was open. The passage was forced. Chakdara was saved. A great and brilliant success had been obtained. A thrill of exultation convulsed every one. In that moment the general, who watched the triumphant issue of his plans, must have experienced as fine an emotion as is given to man on earth. In that moment, we may imagine that the weary years of routine, the long ascent of the lower grades of the service, the frequent subordination to incompetence, the fatigues and dangers of five campaigns, received their compensation. Perhaps, such is the contrariness of circumstances, there was no time for the enjoyment of these reflections. The victory had been gained. It remained to profit by it. The enemy would be compelled to retire across the plain. There at last was the chance of the cavalry. The four squadrons were hurried to the scene. The 11th Bengal Lancers, forming line across the plain, began a merciless pursuit up the valley. The Guides pushed on to seize the Amandara Pass and relieve Chakdara. All among the rice fields and the rocks, the strong horsemen hunted the flying enemy. No quarter was asked or given, and every tribesman caught, was speared or cut down at once. Their bodies lay thickly strewn about the fields, spotting with black and green patches, the bright green of the rice crop. It was a terrible lesson, and one which the inhabitants of Swat and Bajaur will never forget. Since then their terror of Lancers has been extraordinary. A few sowars have frequently been sufficient to drive a hundred of these valiant savages in disorder to the hills, or prevent them descending into the plain for hours. Meanwhile the infantry had been advancing swiftly. The 45th Sikhs stormed the fortified village of Batkhela near the Amandara Pass, which the enemy held desperately. Lieut.-Colonel McRae, who had been relieved from the command of the regiment by the arrival of Colonel Sawyer, was the first man to enter the village. Eighty of the enemy were bayoneted in Batkheka alone. It was a terrible reckoning. I am anxious to finish with this scene of carnage. The spectator, who may gaze unmoved on the bloodshed of the battle, must avert his eyes from the horrors of the pursuit, unless, indeed, joining in it himself, he flings all scruples to the winds, and, carried away by the impetus of the moment, indulges to the full those deep-seated instincts of savagery, over which civilisation has but cast a veil of doubtful thickness. The casualties in the relief of Chakdara were as follows:-- 11th Bengal Lancers--killed and died from wounds, 3; wounded,3. Killed. Wounded. Guides Infantry....... 2 7 35th Sikhs......... 2 3 45th Sikhs......... 0 7 24th Punjaub Infantry..... 0 5 No.8 Bengal Mountain Battery... 0 1 Total Casualties--33 The news of the relief of Chakdara was received with feelings of profound thankfulness throughout India. And in England, in the House of Commons, when the Secretary of State read out the telegram, there were few among the members who did not join in the cheers. Nor need we pay much attention to those few. CHAPTER VI: THE DEFENCE OF CHAKDARA ... That tower of strength Which stood four-square to all the winds that blew. TENNYSON. The episode with which this chapter is concerned is one that has often occurred on the out-post line of civilisation, and which is peculiarly frequent in the history of a people whose widespread Empire is fringed with savage tribes. A small band of soldiers or settlers, armed with the resources of science, and strengthened by the cohesion of mutual trust, are assailed in some isolated post, by thousands of warlike and merciless enemies. Usually the courage and equipment of the garrison enable them to hold out until a relieving force arrives, as at Rorke's Drift, Fort Chitral, Chakdara or Gulistan. But sometimes the defenders are overwhelmed, and, as at Saraghari or Khartoum, none are left to tell the tale. There is something strangely terrible in the spectacle of men, who fight--not for political or patriotic reasons, not for the sake of duty or glory--but for dear life itself; not because they want to, but because they have to. They hold the dykes of social progress against a rising deluge of barbarism, which threatens every moment to overflow the banks and drown them all. The situation is one which will make a coward valorous, and affords to brave men opportunities for the most sublime forms of heroism and devotion. Chakdara holds the passage of the Swat River--a rapid, broad, and at most seasons of the year an unfordable torrent. It is built on a rocky knoll that rises abruptly from the plain about a hundred yards from the mountains. Sketches and photographs usually show only the knoll and buildings on it, and any one looking at them will be struck by the picturesque and impregnable aspect of the little fort, without observing that its proportions are dwarfed, and its defences commanded, by the frowning cliffs, under which it stands. In its construction the principles of defilade have been completely ignored. Standing on the mountain ridge, occupied by the signal tower, it is possible to look or fire right into the fort. Every open space is commanded. Every parapet is exposed. Against an enemy unprovided with artillery, however, it could be held indefinitely; but the fact that all interior communications are open to fire, makes its defence painful to the garrison, and might, by gradually weakening their numbers, lead to its capture. The narrow, swinging, wire bridge across the Swat is nearly 500 yards long. At the southern end it is closed by a massive iron door, loopholed for musketry, and flanked by two stone towers, in one of which a Maxim gun is mounted. On the further side is the fort itself, which consists of the fortified knoll, a strong stone horn-work, an enclosure for horses, protected by a loopholed wall and much tangled barbed wire, and the signal tower, a detached post 200 yards up the cliff. The garrison of the place consisted at the time of the outbreak of twenty sowars of the 11th Bengal Lancers and two strong companies of the 45th Sikhs, in all about 200 men, under the command of Lieutenant H.B. Rattray. [The actual strength was as follows: 11th Bengal Lancers, 20 sabres; 45th Sikhs, 180 rifles; 2 British telegraphists; 1 Hospital Havildar; 1 Provost Naick (24th Punjaub Infantry); 1 Jemadar (Dir Levies). British officers--45th Sikhs, Lieutenants Rattray and Wheatley; Surgeon-Captain V. Hugo; Political Agent, Lieutenant Minchin.] As the rumours of an impending rising grew stronger and stronger, and the end of July approached, this officer practised his men in taking stations in the event of an alarm, and made such preparations as he thought necessary for eventualities. On the 23rd he received an official warning from the D.A.A.G. [Deputy-Assistant-Adjutant-General. Surely this astounding title, with that of the Deputy-Assistant-Quarter-Master-General, might be replaced with advantage by the more sensible and appropriate terms "Brigade Adjutant" and "Brigade Quartermaster"!], Major Herbert, that a tribal rising was "possible but not probable." Every precaution was henceforth taken in the fort. On the 26th, a Sepoy, who was out sketching, hurried in with the news that a large body of tribesmen were advancing down the valley, and that he himself had been robbed of his compass, his field-glasses and some money. But, in spite of the disturbed and threatening situation, the British officers of the Malakand garrison, though they took all military precautions for the defence of their posts, did not abandon their practice of riding freely about the valley, armed only with revolvers. Nor did they cease from their amusements. On the evening of the 26th, Lieutenant Rattray went over to Khar as usual to play polo. Just as the game was ended, he received a letter, brought in haste by two sowars, from Lieutenant Wheatley, the other subaltern at Chakdara, warning him that a great number of Pathans with flags were advancing on the fort. He at once galloped back at full speed, passing close to one large gathering of tribesmen, who for some reason of their own took no notice of him, and so reached the fort in safety, and just in time. Formidable masses of men were then closing in on it. He telegraphed to the staff officer at the Malakand reporting the impending attack. Immediately afterwards the wire was cut by the enemy and the little garrison got under arms. A havildar of the Khan of Dir's Levies had promised the political agent to give warning of any actual assault, by lighting a fire on the opposite hills. At 10.15 a solitary flame shot up. It was the signal. The alarm was sounded. The garrison went to their posts. For a space there was silence, and then out of the darkness began a fusillade, which did not stop until the 2nd of August. Immediately the figures of the tribesmen, as they advanced to the attack on the western face of the fort, became visible. The defenders opened fire with effect. The enemy pressed on vigorously. Their losses were severe. At length they retreated repulsed. A second attack was immediately delivered against the north-east corner and again beaten off by the garrison. At 4 A.M. a third assault was made upon the cavalry enclosure. The tribesmen, carrying scaling ladders, advanced with great determination. They were received with a deadly fire. They then drew off, and the first night of the siege was terminated by desultory firing. The garrison remained at their posts all night, and when it became day the enemy were seen to have retired, to the hills to the north-west, whence they maintained a ceaseless fire. Although the defenders were protected by their stone walls, many had strange escapes from the bullets, which fell incessantly into the interior. Meanwhile, in spite of the vigorous attack that was being made on the Malakand, it had been decided to send some assistance to the little band at Chakdara. Captain Wright and forty sowars of the 11th Bengal Lancers with Captain Baker of the 2nd Bombay Grenadiers and transport officer at the Malakand, started at dawn on the 27th, by the road from the north camp. Before they had gone very far they came under the fire of the enemy on the hills. These did not dare to venture into the plain, but availed themselves of the broken nature of the country. As the squadron reached the road leading to the polo ground, Captain Wright received information that the enemy were collected on the plain and immediately the pace was quickened in the hopes of a charge being possible. But the tribesmen ran to the hills at the sight of the Lancers, and maintained a constant, though luckily, an ill-aimed fire. At length the village of Batkhela was reached, and beyond it the Amandara Pass came in sight. This is a gap in a long spur, which runs from the southern side of the valley to the rapid river in the middle. As the river was then in full flood and unfordable, the only road to Chakdara lay over or through the spur. But the pass was held by the enemy. Captain Wright had by this time realised, what probably no one at the Malakand then knew, that the enemy's numbers were enormous. The whole way from Malakand to Amandara--every ridge and hill was crowned with their banners. Wherever the ground protected them from the horsemen they gathered thickly. Cemeteries [Cemeteries are frequent and prominent features of Frontier landscapes. Some of them are of great extent: all of remarkable sanctity.], nullahs and villages swarmed with men. Their figures could be seen in all directions. Far beyond the Amandara Pass bands of tribesmen, of varying strengths, could be observed hurrying with their standards to the attack. But these formidable signs, far from deterring the cavalry soldier, only added, by displaying how great was the need of Chakdara, to his determination to force his way through at all costs. Under a dropping fire from the cemetery on the right of the road, a brief consultation was held. The Amandara defile was occupied on both sides by the enemy. With the loss of perhaps a dozen men the squadron might gallop through. But this meant leaving all who fell, to perish miserably, by torture and mutilation. To attempt to pick up the wounded, would lead to the annihilation of the squadron. Any alternative was preferable, though if there were no other way, the dash would have to be made, and the wounded left. A Sowar now said there was a path round the rock by the bank of the river. Captain Wright determined to take it. The path was bad. After about half the spur had been passed, it ended abruptly in a steep white rock. It was, in fact, a path leading to a point where the natives were in the habit of floating across the river upon "mussucks" (inflated skins). To go back now was to fail. Without hesitation, the horsemen turned to the right up the hill and among the rocks, trusting to get through somehow. After passing over ground which would be difficult to move across on foot, they saw a gorge to their left which appeared as if it would lead to the open plain, on the other side of the ridge. Down this gorge forty horses huddled together, with no room to pick their way, were scrambling and jumping from rock to rock, apparently as conscious as their riders that their lives depended on their cleverness--when, suddenly, the enemy appeared. As soon as the tribesmen, who were holding the pass, saw the squadron trot off to their right towards the river, they realised that they intended to make a desperate effort to get through to Chakdara. They knew what the ground was like, and confident they would kill them all, if they could get there soon enough, ran swiftly along the spur. It was a race. The leading tribesmen arrived in time to fire on the cavalry, while they were in the gorge. So close were they, that the officers used their revolvers. But the Pathans were out of breath and shot badly. Several horses were hit, including Captain Wright's, but though the large thigh bone was penetrated, the gallant beast held on, and carried his rider to Chakdara safely. By the extraordinary activity of the horses the rocks were cleared before the enemy could collect in any strength. But, to the dismay of all, the gorge was found to lead, not to the plain, but to a branch of the river. A broad, swift channel of water of unknown depth confronted the cavalry. To go back was now, however, out of the question. They plunged in. The 11th Bengal Lancers are perhaps better mounted than any native cavalry regiment in India. Their strong horses just held their own against the current. Several were nearly swept away. Captain Wright was the last to cross. All this time the enemy were firing and approaching. At length the passage was made and the squadron collected on an island of flooded rice fields, in which the horses sank up to their hocks. Beyond this ran another arm of the river about fifty yards wide, and apparently almost as deep as the first. The bullets of the enemy made "watery flashes" on all sides. After passing this second torrent the squadron found themselves again on the same bank of the river as the enemy. They were in swampy ground. Captain Wright dismounted his men and returned the fire. Then he turned back himself, and riding into the stream again, rescued the hospital assistant, whose pony, smaller than the other horses, was being carried off its legs by the force of the water. After this the march was resumed. The squadron kept in the heavy ground, struggling along painfully. The enemy, running along the edge of the rice fields, maintained a continual fire, kneeling down to take good aim. A sowar threw up his hands and fell, shot through the back. Several more horses were hit. Then another man reeled in his saddle and collapsed on the ground. A halt was made. Dismounted fire was opened upon the enemy. The wounded were picked up, and by slow degrees Chakdara was approached, when the Bridgehead Maxim gun compelled the tribesmen to draw off. [For the particulars of this affair I am indebted to Captain Baker, 2nd Bombay Grenadiers, who shared its perils.] Thus the garrison of the fort received a needed reinforcement. I have given a somewhat long description of this gallant ride, because it shows that there are few obstacles that can stop brave men and good horses. Captain Wright now assumed command of Chakdara, but the direction of the defense he still confided to Lieutenant Rattray, as fighting behind walls is a phase of warfare with which the cavalry soldier is little acquainted. At 11.30, in the heat of the day the tribesmen attacked again. They surrounded the north and east sides of the fort, and made strenuous efforts to get in. They suffered heavy losses from the musketry of the defence, and their dead lay scattered thickly on the approaches. Nor were they removed till nightfall. Many Ghazis, mad with fanaticism, pressed on carrying standards, heedless of the fire, until they fell riddled with bullets under the very walls. To communicate with the Malakand was now almost impossible. To heliograph, it was necessary that the operator should be exposed to a terrible fire. In the evening the signal tower was surrounded by men in stone sungars, who kept up an incessant fusillade, and made all exposure, even for an instant, perilous. At midday, after the repulse of the main attack, the guard of the signal tower was reinforced by six men, and food and water were also sent up. This difficult operation was protected by the fire of both the Maxims, and of all the garrison who could be spared from other points. Until the 1st of August, water was sent up daily to the signal tower in this way. The distance was long and the road steep. The enemy's fire was persistent. Looking at the ground it seems wonderful that supplies could have been got through at all. As night approached, the defenders prepared to meet a fresh attack. Lieutenant Wheatley, observing the points behind which the enemy usually assembled, trained the fort Maxim and the 9-pounder gun on them, while daylight lasted. At 11 P.M. the tribesmen advanced with shouts, yells and the beating of drums. The gun and the Maxims were fired, and it is said that no fewer than seventy men perished by the single discharge. At any rate the assault was delayed for an hour and a half. All day long the garrison had remained at their posts. It was hoped they would now get a little rest. But at 1 o'clock the attack was renewed on the north-east corner. Again the enemy brought up scaling ladders and charged with desperate ferocity. They were shot down. Meanwhile every spare moment was devoted to improving the cover of the garrison. Captain Baker applied himself to this task, and used every expedient. Logs, sand bags, stones, boxes filled with earth were piled upon the walls. It is due to these precautions that the loss of life was no larger. Continuous firing occupied the 28th, and at 5.30 P.M. the enemy again assaulted. As in previous attacks, they at first advanced by twos and threes, making little dashes over the open ground, for bits of natural cover, and for the stone sungars they had built all round the fort under cover of darkness. Some of these were within 200 yards of the wall. As they advanced the fire became intense. Then the main rush was delivered. In a great semi-circle round the face of the fort held by the cavalry, and displaying nearly 200 standards whose gay colours were representative of every tribe on the border, they charged right up to the walls. Some of them actually got across the tangled barbed wire and were destroyed in the enclosure. But all efforts were defeated by the garrison, and towards morning the attack melted away, and only the usual sharpshooters remained. Some of these displayed a singular recklessness. One man climbed up into the barbed wire and fired three shots at the defenders at close quarters before he was killed. Thursday morning dawned on similar scenes. The garrison employed such intervals as occurred in strengthening their defences and improving their cover, particularly in the approaches to the Maxim and field gun platforms. At 3 P.M. the enemy came out of Chakdara village, and, carrying ladders to scale the walls, and bundles of grass to throw on the barbed wire, made a formidable effort. They directed the attack mainly against the signal station. This building is a strong, square, stone tower. Its entrance is above six feet from the ground. All around the top runs a machiconlis gallery, a kind of narrow balcony, with holes in the floor to fire through. It is well provided with loopholes. At 4 o'clock it was closely assailed. The garrison of the fort aided the tower guard by their fire. So bold were the enemy in their efforts, that they rushed in under the musketry of the defence, and lighted a great heap of grass about three yards from the doorway. The flames sprang up. A howl of ferocious delight arose. But the tribesmen relapsed into silence, when they saw that no real harm was done. At sunset the fore sight of the fort Maxim was shot away, and the defenders were temporarily deprived of the service of that powerful weapon. They soon managed, however, to rig up a makeshift, which answered all practical purposes. At 8 P.M. the enemy wearied of the struggle, and the firing died away to desultory skirmishing. They toiled all night carrying away their dead, but next morning over fifty bodies were still lying around the signal tower. Their losses had been enormous. The morning of the 30th brought no cessation of the fighting, but the enemy, disheartened by their losses of the previous night, did not attack until 7 P.M. At that hour they advanced and made a fresh effort. They were again repulsed. Perhaps the reader is tired of the long recital of the monotonous succession of assaults and repulses. What must the garrison have been by the reality? Until this day--when they snatched a few hours' sleep--they had been continually fighting and watching for ninety-six hours. Like men in a leaking ship, who toil at the pumps ceaselessly and find their fatigues increasing and the ship sinking hour by hour, they cast anxious, weary eyes in the direction whence help might be expected. But none came. And there are worse deaths than by drowning. Men fell asleep at the loopholes and at the service of the field gun. Even during the progress of the attacks, insulted nature asserted itself, and the soldiers drifted away from the roar of the musketry, and the savage figures of the enemy, to the peaceful unconsciousness of utter exhaustion. The officers, haggard but tireless, aroused them frequently. At other times the brave Sepoys would despair. The fort was ringed with the enemy. The Malakand, too, was assailed. Perhaps it was the same elsewhere. The whole British Raj seemed passing away in a single cataclysm. The officers encouraged them. The Government of the Queen-Empress would never desert them. If they could hold out, they would be relieved. If not, they would be avenged. Trust in the young white men who led them, and perhaps some dim half-idolatrous faith in a mysterious Sovereign across the seas, whose soldiers they were, and who would surely protect them, restored their fainting strength. The fighting continued. During the whole time of the siege the difficulty of maintaining signalling communication with the Malakand was extreme. But for the heroism of the signallers, it would have been insuperable. One man in particular, Sepoy Prem Singh, used every day at the risk of his life to come out through a porthole of the tower, establish his heliograph, and, under a terrible fire from short range, flash urgent messages to the main force. The extreme danger, the delicacy of the operation of obtaining connection with a helio, the time consumed, the composure required, these things combined to make the action as brave as any which these or other pages record. [A proposal has recently been made, to give the Victoria Cross to native soldiers who shall deserve it. It would seem that the value of such a decoration must be enhanced by making it open to all British subjects. The keener the competition, the greater the honor of success. In sport, in courage, and in the sight of heaven, all men meet on equal terms.] Early on Saturday morning a supply of water was sent to the guard of the signal tower. It was the last they got until 4.30 on Monday afternoon. When the attack on the fort began, the enemy numbered perhaps 1500 men. Since then they had been increasing every day, until on the 1st and 2nd, they are estimated to have been between 12,000 and 14,000 strong. Matters now began to assume a still graver aspect. At 5 o'clock on the evening of the 31st a renewed attack was made in tremendous force on the east side of the fort. But it was beaten back with great loss by the Maxims and the field gun. All night long the firing continued, and Sunday morning displayed the enemy in far larger numbers than hitherto. They now captured the Civil Hospital, a detached building, the walls of which they loopholed, and from which they maintained a galling fire. They also occupied the ridge, leading to the signal tower, thus cutting off all communication with its guard. No water reached those unfortunate men that day. The weather was intensely hot. The fire from the ridge made all interior communication difficult and dangerous. The enemy appeared armed to a great extent with Martini-Henry rifles and Sniders, and their musketry was most harassing. The party in the tower kept sending by signal pressing requests for water, which could not be supplied. The situation became critical. I quote the simple words of Lieutenant Rattray's official report:-- "Matters now looked so serious that we decided to send an urgent appeal for help, but owing to the difficulty and danger of signalling we could not send a long message, and made it as short as possible, merely sending the two words, 'Help us.'" Still the garrison displayed a determined aspect, and though the tribesmen occupied the ridge, the Civil Hospital and an adjoining nullah, none set foot within the defences. At length the last day of the struggle came. At daybreak the enemy in tremendous numbers came on to the assault, as if resolute to take the place at any cost. They carried scaling ladders and bundles of grass. The firing became intense. In spite of the cover of the garrison several men were killed and wounded by the hail of bullets which was directed against the fort, and which splashed and scarred the walls in every direction. Then suddenly, as matters were approaching a crisis, the cavalry of the relieving column appeared over the Amandara ridge. The strong horsemen mercilessly pursued and cut down all who opposed them. When they reached the Bridgehead on the side of the river remote from the fort, the enemy began to turn and run. The garrison had held out stubbornly and desperately throughout the siege. Now that relief was at hand, Lieutenant Rattray flung open the gate, and followed by half a dozen men charged the Civil Hospital. Captain Baker and Lieutenant Wheatley followed with a few more. The hospital was recaptured. The enemy occupying it, some thirty in number, were bayoneted. It was a finish in style. Returning, the sallying party found the cavalry--the 11th Bengal Lancers--checked by a sungar full of tribesmen. This they charged in flank, killing most of its occupants, and driving the rest after their comrades in rout and ruin. The last man to leave the sungar shot Lieutenant Rattray in the neck, but that officer, as distinguished for physical prowess as for military conduct, cut him down. This ended the fighting. It is not possible to think of a more fitting conclusion. The casualties in the siege were as follows:-- Killed Wounded 11th B.L...... 1 1 45th Sikhs..... 4 10 Dir Levies..... 1 0 Followers..... 1 2 Total, all ranks--20 This was the loss; but every man in the fort had held death at arm's length, for seven nights, and seven days. It is a significant fact, that, though the cavalry horses were exposed to the enemy's fire the whole time, hardly any were killed or wounded. The tribesmen, feeling sure that the place was theirs, and hoping that these fine beasts would fall unto their hands alive, had abstained from shooting them. As far as could be ascertained by careful official inquiries the enemy lost over 2000 men in the attack upon Chakdara. [The following statistics as to the expenditure of ammunition may be of interest:-- Rounds. 28th July. Maxim...... 843 " Martini-Henry... 7170 29th July. Maxim...... 667 " Martini-Henry... 4020 30th July. Maxim...... 1200 " Martini-Henry... 5530 31st July. Maxim...... 180 " Martini-Henry... 2700 This is approximately twenty rounds per man per diem. The fire control must have been excellent.] CHAPTER VII: THE GATE OF SWAT The Malakand Pass gives access to the valley of the Swat, a long and wide trough running east and west, among the mountains. Six miles further to the east, at Chakdara, the valley bifurcates. One branch runs northward towards Uch, and, turning again to the west, ultimately leads to the Panjkora River and beyond to the great valley of Nawagai. For some distance along this branch lies the road to Chitral, and along it the Malakand Field Force will presently advance against the Mohmands. The other branch prolongs the valley to the eastward. A few miles beyond Chakdara a long spur, jutting from the southern mountains, blocks the valley. Round its base the river has cut a channel. The road passes along a narrow stone causeway between the river and the spur. Here is the Landakai position, or as the tribesmen have for centuries called it, the "Gate of Swat." Beyond this gate is Upper Swat, the ancient, beautiful and mysterious "Udyana." This chapter will describe the forcing of the gate and the expedition to the head of the valley. The severe fighting at the Malakand and Chakdara had shown how formidable was the combination, which had been raised against the British among the hill tribes. The most distant and solitary valleys, the most remote villages, had sent their armed men to join in the destruction of the infidels. All the Banjaur tribes had been well represented in the enemy's ranks. The Bunerwals and the Utman Khels had risen to a man. All Swat had been involved. Instead of the two or three thousand men that had been estimated as the extreme number, who would follow the Mad Fakir, it was now known that over 12,000 were in arms. In consequence of the serious aspect which the military and political situation had assumed, it was decided to mobilise a 3rd and Reserve Brigade composed as follows:-- 3rd Brigade. Commanding--Brigadier-General J.H. Wodehouse, C.B., C.M.G. 2nd Battalion Highland Light Infantry. 1st " Gordon Highlanders. 21st Punjaub Infantry. 2nd Battalion 1st Gurkhas. No. 3 Company Bombay Sappers and Miners. " 14 British Field Hospital. " 45 Native " " " 1 Field Medical Depot. The fighting of the preceding fortnight had left significant and terrible marks on the once smiling landscape. The rice crops were trampled down in all directions. The ruins of the villages which had been burned looked from a distance like blots of ink. The fearful losses which the enemy had sustained, had made an appreciable diminution, not of an army, but of a population. In the attacks upon the Malakand position, about 700 tribesmen had perished. In the siege of Chakdara, where the open ground had afforded opportunity to the modern weapons and Maxim guns, over 2000 had been killed and wounded. Many others had fallen in the relief of Chakdara and in the cavalry pursuit. For days their bodies lay scattered about the country. In the standing crops, in the ruins of villages, and among the rocks, festering bodies lay in the blazing sun, filling the valley with a dreadful smell. To devour these great numbers of vultures quickly assembled and disputed the abundant prey with the odious lizards, which I have mentioned in an earlier chapter, and which emerged from holes and corners to attack the corpses. Although every consideration of decency and health stimulated the energy of the victors in interring the bodies of their enemies, it was some days before this task could be accomplished, and even then, in out-of-the-way places, there remained a good many that had escaped the burying parties. Meanwhile the punishment that the tribesmen of the Swat Valley had received, and their heavy losses, had broken the spirit of many, and several deputations came to make their submission. The Lower Swatis surrendered unconditionally, and were allowed to return to their villages. Of this permission they at once availed themselves, and their figures could be seen moving about their ruined homes and endeavouring to repair the damage. Others sat by the roadside and watched in sullen despair the steady accumulation of troops in their valley, which had been the only result of their appeal to arms. It is no exaggeration to say, that perhaps half the tribesmen who attacked the Malakand, had thought that the soldiers there, were the only troops that the Sirkar [The Government] possessed. "Kill these," they said, "and all is done." What did they know of the distant regiments which the telegraph wires were drawing, from far down in the south of India? Little did they realise they had set the world humming; that military officers were hurrying 7000 miles by sea and land from England, to the camps among the mountains; that long trains were carrying ammunition, material and supplies from distant depots to the front; that astute financiers were considering in what degree their action had affected the ratio between silver and gold, or that sharp politicians were wondering how the outbreak in Swat might be made to influence the impending bye-elections. These ignorant tribesmen had no conception of the sensitiveness of modern civilisation, which thrills and quivers in every part of its vast and complex system at the slightest touch. They only saw the forts and camps on the Malakand Pass and the swinging bridge across the river. While the people of Lower Swat, deserted by the Mad Mullah, and confronted with the two brigades, were completely humbled and subdued, the Upper Swatis, encouraged by their priests, and, as they believed, safe behind their "gate," assumed a much more independent air. They sent to inquire what terms the Government would offer, and said they would consider the matter. Their contumacious attitude, induced the political officers to recommend the movement of troops through their country, to impress them with the determination and power of the Sirkar. The expedition into the Upper Swat Valley was accordingly sanctioned, and Sir Bindon Blood began making the necessary preparations for the advance. The prospects of further fighting were eagerly welcomed by the troops, and especially by those who had arrived too late for the relief of Chakdara, and had had thus far, only long and dusty marches to perform. There was much speculation and excitement as to what units would be selected, every one asserting that his regiment was sure to go; that it was their turn; and that if they were not taken it would be a great shame. Sir Bindon Blood had however already decided. He had concentrated a considerable force at Amandara in view of a possible advance, and as soon as the movement was sanctioned organised the column as follows:-- 1st Brigade. Commanding--Brigadier-General Meiklejohn. Royal West Kent Regiment. 24th Punjaub Infantry. 31st " " 45th Sikhs With the following divisional troops:-- 10th Field Battery. No.7 British Mountain Battery. " 8 Bengal " " " 5 Company Madras Sappers and Miners. 2 Squadrons Guides Cavalry. 4 " 11th Bengal Lancers. This force amounted to an available fighting strength of 3500 rifles and sabres, with eighteen guns. Supplies for twelve days were carried, and the troops proceeded on "the 80 lb. scale" of baggage, which means, that they did not take tents, and a few other comforts and conveniences. Before the force started, a sad event occurred. On the 12th of August, Lieut.-Colonel J. Lamb, who had been wounded on the night of the 26th of July, died. An early amputation might have saved his life; but this was postponed in the expectation that the Rontgen Rays would enable the bullet to be extracted. The Rays arrived from India after some delay. When they reached Malakand, the experiment was at once made. It was found, however, that the apparatus had been damaged in coming up, and no result was obtained. Meanwhile mortification had set in, and the gallant soldier died on the Sunday, from the effects of an amputation which he was then too weak to stand. His thigh bone had been completely shattered by the bullet. He had seen service in Afghanistan and the Zhob Valley and had been twice mentioned in despatches. On the 14th Sir Bindon Blood joined the special force, and moved it on the 16th to Thana, a few miles further up the valley. At the same time he ordered Brigadier-General Wodehouse to detach a small column in the direction of the southern passes of Buner. The Highland Light Infantry, No.3 Company Bombay Sappers and Miners, and one squadron of the 10th Bengal Lancers accordingly marched from Mardan, where the 3rd Brigade then was, to Rustum. By this move they threatened the Bunerwals and distracted their attention from the Upper Swat Valley. Having thus weakened the enemy, Sir Bindon Blood proceeded to force the "Gate of Swat." On the evening of the 16th, a reconnaissance by the 11th Bengal Lancers, under Major Beatson, revealed the fact, that the Landakai position was strongly held by the enemy. Many standards were displayed, and on the approach of the cavalry, shots were fired all along the line. The squadron retired at once, and reported the state of affairs. The general decided to attack at day-break. At 6.30 A.M. on the 17th, the cavalry moved off, and soon came in contact with the tribesmen in some Buddhist ruins near a village, called Jalala. A skirmish ensued. Meanwhile the infantry were approaching. The main position of the enemy was displayed. All along the crest of the spur of Landakai could be seen a fringe of standards, dark against the sky. Beneath them the sword blades of the tribesmen glinted in the sunlight. A long line of stone sungars crowned the ridge, and behind the enemy clustered thickly. It is estimated that over 5000 were present. It is not difficult to realise what a strong position this was. On the left of the troops was an unfordable river. On their right the mountains rose steeply. In front was the long ridge held by the enemy. The only road up the valley was along the causeway, between the ridge and the river. To advance further, it was necessary to dislodge the enemy from the ridge. Sir Bindon Blood rode forward, reconnoitered the ground, and made his dispositions. To capture the position by a frontal attack would involve heavy loss. The enemy were strongly posted, and the troops would be exposed to a heavy fire in advancing. On the other hand, if the ridge could once be captured, the destruction of the tribesmen was assured. Their position was good, only as long as they held it. The moment of defeat would be the moment of ruin. The reason was this. The ground behind the ridge was occupied by swampy rice fields, and the enemy could only retire very slowly over it. Their safe line of retreat lay up the spur, and on to the main line of hills. They were thus formed with their line of retreat in prolongation of their front. This is, of course, tactically one of the worst situations that people can get into. Sir Bindon Blood, who knew what the ground behind the ridge was like, perceived at once how matters stood, and made his plans accordingly. He determined to strike at the enemy's left, thus not only turning their flank, but cutting off their proper line of retreat. If once his troops held the point, where the long ridge ran into the main hills, all the tribesmen who had remained on the ridge would be caught. He accordingly issued orders as follows:-- The Royal West Kent were to mask the front and occupy the attention of the enemy. The rest of the infantry, viz., 24th and 31st Punjaub Infantry and the 45th Sikhs, were to ascend the hills to the right, and deliver a flank attack on the head of the ridge. The cavalry were to be held in readiness to dash forward along the causeway--to repair which a company of sappers was posted--as soon as the enemy were driven off the ridge which commanded it, and pursue them across the rice fields into the open country beyond. The whole of the powerful artillery was to come into action at once. The troops then advanced. The Royal West Kent Regiment began the fight, by driving some of the enemy from the Buddhist ruins on a small spur in advance of the main position. The 10th Field Battery had been left in rear in case the guns might stick in the narrow roads near Thana village. It had, however, arrived safely, and now trotted up, and at 8.50 A.M. opened fire on the enemy's position and at a stone fort, which they occupied strongly. A few minutes later No.7 Mountain Battery came into action from the spur, which the Royal West Kent had taken. A heavy artillery fire thus prepared the way for the attack. The great shells of the Field Artillery astounded the tribesmen, who had never before witnessed the explosion of a twelve-pound projectile. The two mountain batteries added to their discomfiture. Many fled during the first quarter of an hour of the bombardment. All the rest took cover on the reverse slope and behind their sungars. Meanwhile the flank attack was developing. General Meiklejohn and his infantry were climbing up the steep hillside, and moving steadily towards the junction of the ridge with the main hill. At length the tribesmen on the spur perceived the danger that was threatening them. They felt the grip on their line of retreat. They had imagined that the white troops would try and force their path along the causeway, and had massed considerable reserves at the lower end of the ridge. All these now realised that they were in great danger of being cut off. They were on a peninsula, as it were, while the soldiers were securing the isthmus. They accordingly began streaming along the ridge towards the left, at first with an idea of meeting the flank attack, but afterwards, as the shell fire grew hotter, and the musketry increased, only in the hope of retreat. Owing to the great speed with which the mountaineers move about the hills, most of them were able to escape before the flank attack could cut them off. Many however, were shot down as they fled, or were killed by the artillery fire. A few brave men charged the 31st Punjaub Infantry, but were all destroyed. Seeing the enemy in full flight, Sir Bindon Blood ordered the Royal West Kent to advance against the front of the now almost deserted ridge. The British infantry hurrying forward climbed the steep hill and captured the stone sungars. From this position they established touch with the flank attack, and the whole force pursued the flying tribesmen with long-range fire. The "Gate of Swat" had been forced. It was now possible for troops to advance along the causeway. This had, however, been broken in various places by the enemy. The sappers and miners hastened forward to repair it. While this was being done, the cavalry had to wait in mad impatience, knowing that their chance lay in the plains beyond. As soon as the road was sufficiently repaired to allow them to pass in single file, they began struggling along it, and emerged at the other end of the causeway in twos and threes. An incident now ensued, which, though it afforded an opportunity for a splendid act of courage, yet involved an unnecessary loss of life, and must be called disastrous. As the cavalry got clear of the broken ground, the leading horsemen saw the tribesmen swiftly running towards the hills, about a mile distant. Carried away by the excitement of the pursuit, and despising the enemy for their slight resistance, they dashed impetuously forward in the hope of catching them before they could reach the hills. Lieutenant-Colonel Adams, on entering the plain, saw at once that if he could seize a small clump of trees near a cemetery, he would be able to bring effective dismounted fire to bear on the retreating tribesmen. He therefore collected as many men as possible, and with Lieutenant Maclean, and Lord Fincastle, the Times correspondent, rode in the direction of these points. Meanwhile Captain Palmer, who commanded the leading squadron, and Lieutenant Greaves of the Lancashire Fusiliers, who was acting war correspondent of the Times of India, galloped across the rice fields after the enemy. The squadron, unable to keep up, straggled out in a long string, in the swampy ground. At the foot of the hills the ground was firmer, and reaching this, the two officers recklessly dashed in among the enemy. It is the spirit that loses the Empire many lives, but has gained it many battles. But the tribesmen, who had been outmanoeuvred rather than outfought, turned savagely on their pursuers. The whole scene was witnessed by the troops on the ridge. Captain Palmer cut down a standard-bearer. Another man attacked him. Raising his arm for a fresh stroke, his wrist was smashed by a bullet. Another killed his horse. Lieutenant Greaves, shot through the body, fell at the same moment to the ground. The enemy closed around and began hacking him, as he lay, with their swords. Captain Palmer tried to draw his revolver. At this moment two sowars got clear of the swampy rice fields, and at once galloped, shouting, to the rescue, cutting and slashing at the tribesmen. All would have been cut to pieces or shot down. The hillside was covered with the enemy. The wounded officers lay at the foot. They were surrounded. Seeing this Lieutenant-Colonel Adams and Lord Fincastle, with Lieutenant Maclean and two or three sowars, dashed to their assistance. At their charge the tribesmen fell back a little way and opened a heavy fire. Lord Fincastle's horse was immediately shot and he fell to the ground. Rising, he endeavoured to lift the wounded Greaves on to Colonel Adams' saddle, but at this instant a second bullet struck that unfortunate officer, killing him instantly. Colonel Adams was slightly, and Lieutenant Maclean mortally, wounded while giving assistance, and all the horses but two were shot. In spite of the terrible fire, the body of Lieutenant Greaves and the other two wounded officers were rescued and carried to the little clump of trees. For this gallant feat of arms both the surviving officers, Colonel Adams and Lord Fincastle, were recommended for, and have since received, the Victoria Cross. It was also officially announced, that Lieutenant Maclean would have received it, had he not been killed. There are many, especially on the frontier, where he was known as a fine soldier and a good sportsman, who think that the accident of death should not have been allowed to interfere with the reward of valour. The extremes of fortune, which befell Lord Fincastle and Lieutenant Greaves, may well claim a moment's consideration. Neither officer was employed officially with the force. Both had travelled up at their own expense, evading and overcoming all obstacles in an endeavour to see something of war. Knights of the sword and pen, they had nothing to offer but their lives, no troops to lead, no duties to perform, no watchful commanding officer to report their conduct. They played for high stakes, and Fortune never so capricious as on the field of battle, dealt to the one the greatest honour that a soldier can hope for, as some think, the greatest in the gift of the Crown, and to the other Death. The flight of the enemy terminated the action of Landakai. Thus in a few hours and with hardly any loss, the "Gate of Swat," which the tribesmen had regarded as impregnable, had been forced. One squadron of the Guides cavalry, under Captain Brasier Creagh, pursuing the enemy had a successful skirmish near the village of Abueh, and returned to camp about 6.30 in the evening. [This officer was mentioned in despatches for his skill and judgment in this affair; but he is better known on the frontier for his brilliant reconnaissance towards Mamani, a month later, in which in spite of heavy loss he succeeded in carrying out General Hammond's orders and obtained most valuable information.] During the fight about 1000 tribesmen had threatened the baggage column, but these were but poor-spirited fellows, for they retired after a short skirmish with two squadrons of the 11th Bengal Lancers, with a loss of twenty killed and wounded. The total casualties of the day were as follows:-- BRITISH OFFICERS. Killed--Lieutenant R.T. Greaves, Lancs. Fusiliers. " " H.L.S. Maclean, Guides. Wounded severely--Captain M.E. Palmer, Guides. Wounded slightly--Lieutenant-Colonel R.B. Adams, Guides. NATIVE RANKS--Wounded--5. FOLLOWERS--Wounded--2. Total Casualties--11. It must be remembered, that but for the incident which resulted in the deaths of the officers, and which Sir Bindon Blood described in his official despatch as an "unfortunate contretemps," the total casualties would have only been seven wounded. That so strong a position should have been captured with so little loss, is due, firstly, to the dispositions of the general; and secondly, to the power of the artillery which he had concentrated. The account of the first attempt to storm the Dargai position on the 20th of October, before it had been shaken by artillery fire, when the Dorsetshire Regiment suffered severe loss, roused many reflections among those who had witnessed the action of Landakai. The next morning, the 18th, the force continued their march up the valley of the Upper Swat. The natives, thoroughly cowed, offered no further opposition and sued for peace. Their losses at Landakai were ascertained to have exceeded 500, and they realised that they had no chance against the regular troops, when these were enabled to use their powerful weapons. As the troops advanced up the fertile and beautiful valley, all were struck by the numerous ruins of the ancient Buddhists. Here in former times were thriving cities, and civilised men. Here, we learn from Fa-hien, [Record Of Buddhistic Kingdoms. Translated by James Legge, M.A., LL.D.] were "in all 500 Sangharamas," or monasteries. At these monasteries the law of hospitality was thus carried out: "When stranger bhikshus (begging monks) arrive at one of them, their wants are supplied for three days, after which they are told to find a resting-place for themselves." All this is changed by time. The cities are but ruins. Savages have replaced the civilised, bland-looking Buddhists, and the traveller who should apply for hospitality, would be speedily shown "a resting-place," which would relieve his hosts from further trouble concerning him. "There is a tradition," continues the intrepid monk, who travelled through some of the wildest countries of the earth in the darkest ages of its history, "that when Buddha came to North India, he came to this country, and that he left a print of his foot, which is long or short according to the ideas of the beholder." Although the learned Fa-hien asserts that "it exists, and the same thing is true about it at the present day," the various cavalry reconnaissances failed to discover it, and we must regretfully conclude that it has also been obliterated by the tides of time. Here too, says this Buddhistic Baedeker, is still to be seen the rock on which "He dried his clothes; and the place where He converted the wicked dragon (Naga)." "The rock is fourteen cubits high and more than twenty broad, with one side of it smooth." This may well be believed; but there are so many rocks of all dimensions that the soldiers were unable to make certain which was the scene of the dragon's repentance, and Buddha's desiccation. His companions went on ahead towards Jellalabad, or some city in that locality, but Fa-hien, charmed with the green and fertile beauties of "the park," remained in the pleasant valley and "kept the summer retreat." Then he descended into the land of So-hoo-to, which is perhaps Buner. Even in these busy, practical, matter-of-fact, modern times, where nothing is desirable unless economically sound, it is not unprofitable for a moment to raise the veil of the past, and take a glimpse of the world as it was in other days. The fifth century of the Christian era was one of the most gloomy and dismal periods in the history of mankind. The Great Roman Empire was collapsing before the strokes of such as Alaric the Goth, Attila the Hun, and Genseric the Vandal. The art and valour of a classical age had sunk in that deluge of barbarism which submerged Europe. The Church was convulsed by the Arian controversy. That pure religion, which it should have guarded, was defiled with the blood of persecution and degraded by the fears of superstition. Yet, while all these things afflicted the nations of the West, and seemed to foreshadow the decline or destruction of the human species, the wild mountains of Northern India, now overrun by savages more fierce than those who sacked Rome, were occupied by a placid people, thriving, industrious, and intelligent; devoting their lives to the attainment of that serene annihilation which the word nirvana expresses. When we reflect on the revolutions which time effects, and observe how the home of learning and progress changes as the years pass by, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion, perhaps a mournful one, that the sun of civilisation can never shine all over the world at once. On the 19th, the force reached Mingaora, and here for five days they waited in an agreeable camp, to enable Major Deane to receive the submission of the tribes. These appeared much humbled by their defeats, and sought to propitiate the troops by bringing in supplies of grain and forage. Over 800 arms of different descriptions were surrendered during the halt. A few shots were fired into the camp on the night of the arrival at Mingaora, but the villagers, fearing lest they should suffer, turned out and drove the "snipers" away. On the 21st a reconnaissance as far as the Kotke Pass afforded much valuable information as to the nature of the country. All were struck with the beauty of the scenery, and when on the 24th the force marched back to Barikot, they carried away with them the memory of a beautiful valley, where the green of the rice fields was separated from the blue of the sky by the glittering snow peaks of the Himalayas. While the troops rested at Barikot, Sir Bindon Blood personally reconnoitred the Karakar Pass, which leads from the Swat Valley into the country of the Bunerwals. The Bunerwals belong to the Yusaf section, of the Yusafzai tribe. They are a warlike and turbulent people. To their valley, after the suppression of the Indian Mutiny, many of the Sepoys and native officers who had been in revolt fled for refuge. Here, partly by force and partly by persuasion, they established themselves. They married women of the country and made a settlement. In 1863 the Bunerwals came into collision with the British Government and much severe fighting ensued, known to history as the Ambeyla Campaign. The refugees from India renewed their quarrel with the white troops with eagerness, and by their extraordinary courage and ferocity gained the name of the "Hindustani Fanatics." At the cost of thirty-six officers and eight hundred men Buner was subdued. The "Crag Picket" was taken for the last time by the 101st Fusiliers, and held till the end of the operations. Elephants, brought at great expense from India, trampled the crops. Most of the "Hindustani Fanatics" perished in the fighting. The Bunerwals accepted the Government terms, and the troops retired. Since then, in 1868, in 1877 and again in 1884 they raided border villages, but on the threat of an expedition paid a fine and made good the damage. The reputation they have enjoyed since their stout resistance in 1863, has enabled them to take a leading position among the frontier tribes; and they have availed themselves of this to foment and aggravate several outbreaks against the British. Their black and dark-blue clothes had distinguished them from the other assailants of Malakand and Chakdara. They had now withdrawn to their valley and thence defied the Government and refused all terms. As Sir Bindon Blood and his escort approached the top of the pass, a few shots were fired by the watchers there, but there was no opposition. All the Bunerwals had hurried over to defend the southern entrances to their country, which they conceived were in danger of attack from Brigadier-General Wodehouse's force at Rustum. The general reached the Kotal, and saw the whole valley beneath him. Great villages dotted the plains and the aspect was fertile and prosperous. The unguarded Karakar Pass was practicable for troops, and if the Government would give their consent, Buner might be reduced in a fortnight without difficulty, almost without fighting. Telegrams were despatched to India on the subject, and after much delay and hesitation the Viceroy decided against the recommendation of his victorious general. Though the desirability of settling with the Bunerwals was fully admitted, the Government shrank from the risk. The Malakand Field Force thus remained idle for nearly a fortnight. The news, that the Sirkar had feared to attack Buner, spread like wildfire along the frontier, and revived the spirits of the tribes. They fancied they detected a sign of weakness. Nor were they altogether wrong. But the weakness was moral rather than physical. It is now asserted, that the punishment of Buner is only postponed, and that a few months may see its consummation. [Written in 1897.] The opportunity of entering the country without having to force the passes may not, however, recur. On the 26th of August the force returned to Thana, and the expedition into Upper Swat terminated. [The following is the most trustworthy estimate obtainable of loss of life among the tribesmen in the fighting in the Swat Valley from 26th July to 17th August. The figures include wounded, who have since died, and are more than double those killed outright in the actions:-- 1. Lower Swat Pathans... 700 Buried in the graveyards. 2. Upper " " ... 600 " " " " 3. Buner proper . ... 500 " " " " 4. Utman Khel . ... 80 5. Yusafzai. . ... 50 6. Other tribes . ... 150 Total--2080. 1, 2 and 3 are the result of recent inquiry on the spot. 4, 5 and 6 are estimates based on native information. The proportion of killed and died of wounds to wounded would be very high, as the tribes have little surgical or medical knowledge and refused all offers of aid. Assuming that only an equal number were wounded and recovered, the total loss would be approximately 4000. A check is obtained by comparing these figures with the separate estimates for each action:-- Malakand.... 700 Siege of Chakdara.. 2000 Relief " " .. 500 Action of Landakai.. 500 Total--3700. CHAPTER VIII: THE ADVANCE AGAINST THE MOHMANDS The beginning of this chapter must mark a change in the standpoint from which the story is told. Hitherto the course of events has been recorded in the impersonal style of history. But henceforward I am able to rely on my own memory as well as on other people's evidence. [I do not desire to bore the reader or depreciate the story by the introduction of personal matters. It will be sufficient if, in the interests of coherency, I explain my connection with the Malakand Field Force. Having realised, that if a British cavalry officer waits till he is ordered on active service, he is likely to wait a considerable time, I obtained six weeks' leave of absence from my regiment, and on the 2nd of September arrived at Malakand as press correspondent of the PIONEER and DAILY TELEGRAPH, and in the hope of being sooner or later attached to the force in a military capacity.] It may be doubtful whether an historical record gains or loses value when described by an eye-witness. From the personal point of view, all things appear in a gradual perspective, according to the degree in which they affect the individual; and we are so prone to exaggerate the relative importance of incidents, which we see, over those we hear about, that what the narrative gains in accuracy of detail, it may lose in justness of proportion. In so nice a question I shall not pronounce. I remember that the original object with which this book was undertaken, was to present a picture of the war on the North-West Frontier to the Englishmen at home; a picture which should not only exist, but be looked at; and I am inclined to think, that this end will be more easily attained by the adoption of a style of personal narrative. Many facts, too local, too specialised, too insignificant, for an historical record, and yet which may help the reader to form a true impression of the scene and situation, are thus brought within the compass of these pages. The account becomes more graphic if less imposing, more vivid if less judicial. As long as each step down from the "dignity of history" is accompanied by a corresponding increase in interest, we may pursue without compunction that pleasant, if descending, path. The ninth chapter also introduces a new phase of the operations of the force. The Mohmands now become the enemy and the scene is changed from Swat to Bajaur. Before marching into their country, it will be desirable to consider briefly those causes and events which induced the Government of India to despatch an expedition against this powerful and warlike tribe. The tidal wave of fanaticism, which had swept the frontier, had influenced the Mohmands, as all other border peoples. Their situation was, however, in several important respects, different from that of the natives of the Swat Valley. These Mohmands had neither been irritated nor interfered with in any way. No military road ran through their territory. No fortified posts stirred their animosity or threatened their independence. Had they respected in others the isolation which they themselves have so long enjoyed, they might have remained for an indefinite period in that state of degraded barbarism which seems to appeal so strongly to certain people in England. They became, however, the aggressors. In the heart of the wild and dismal mountain region, in which these fierce tribesmen dwell, are the temple and village of Jarobi: the one a consecrated hovel, the other a fortified slum. This obscure and undisturbed retreat was the residence of a priest of great age and of peculiar holiness, known to fame as the Hadda Mullah. His name is Najb-ud-din, but as respect has prevented it being mentioned by the tribesmen for nearly fifty years, it is only preserved in infidel memories and records. The Government of India have, however, had this man's personality brought vividly before them on several occasions. About thirteen years ago he quarrelled with the Amir and raised the Mohmands against him. The Amir replied by summoning his rebellious subject--for Hadda, the Mullah's home and birthplace, is a village of Afghanistan--to answer for his conduct at Cabul. But the crafty priest, who was well acquainted with Afghan legal procedure, declined the invitation, and retired to the independent Mohmand territory, where he has lived ever since. Content with thus inflicting the punishment of exile, the Amir was disposed to forget the offence. In a letter to his Commander-in-Chief, the "Sipah Salar," a great friend of the Mullah, he described him as a "light of Islam." So powerful a light, indeed, he did not desire to have in his own dominions; but across the border it was fitting that respect should be shown to so holy a man. He therefore directed his officials to cherish and honour him. Thus he retained a powerful weapon--to be used when desirable. Whether by instigation or from personal motives, the Hadda Mullah has long been a bitter foe to the British power. In 1895 he sent the fighting men of the Mohmands to resist the Chitral Relief Force. Since then he has been actively engaged, by preaching and by correspondence with other Mullahs, in raising a great combination against the advancing civilisation. In 1896 he terminated a long religious controversy with the Manki Mullah of Nowshera and Spinkhara--a comparatively tame Mullah, who now supports the Indian Government--by publishing a book setting forth his views, and demolishing those of his antagonist. This work was printed in Delhi and had an extensive sale among Mahommedans all over India. Complimentary copies were sent to the "Sipah Salar" and other Afghan notabilities, and the fame of the Hadda Mullah was known throughout the land. Besides increasing his influence, his literary success stimulated his efforts. While the Mad Fakir was rousing Swat and Buner, this powerful priest incited the Mohmands. Though he was known to be a physical coward, his sanctity and the fact that he was their own particular holy man, not less than his eloquence, powerfully moved this savage tribe. A Jehad was proclaimed. How long should Islam be insulted? How long should its followers lurk in the barren lands of the North? He urged them to rise and join in the destruction of the white invaders. Those who fell should become saints; those who lived would be rich, for these Kafirs had money and many other things besides, for which a true believer might find a use. The combined allurements of plunder and paradise proved irresistible. On the 8th of August a great gathering, nearly 6000 strong, crossed the frontier line, invaded British territory, burned the village of Shankargarh, and attacked the fort of Shabkadr. This place is an advanced post in the defensive system of the frontier, and is situated some nineteen miles to the north-west of Peshawar. Its ordinary garrison consists of about fifty Border Police. It is strongly built, and is intended to attract the attention and delay the advance of a raiding-party, until the Peshawar garrison has had time to take the field. Both of these objects it admirably fulfilled in this case. As soon as the news of the incursion of the Mohmands was received in Peshawar, a flying column was mobilised and proceeded under the command of Lieut.-Colonel J.B. Woon, 20th Punjaub Infantry, in the direction of the fort. At dawn on the 9th of August they found the tribesmen in force in a strong position near Shabdakr. The force at Colonel Woon's disposal was small. It consisted of:-- 4 Guns 51st Field Battery. 2 squadrons 13th Bengal Lancers..... 151 lances. 2 Companies Somersetshire Light Infantry.. 186 rifles. 20th Punjaub Infantry ...... 400 " A total of about 750 men. The enemy numbered 6000. Nevertheless it was decided to attack at once. As the action which followed is but remotely connected with the fortunes of the Malakand Field Force, I do not intend to describe it in detail. The infantry in advancing could only attack on a front of 600 yards. The enemy's line, being much longer, quickly turned both flanks. The fire became severe. Numerous casualties occurred. A retirement was ordered. As is usual in Asiatic warfare, it was considerably pressed. The situation at about nine o'clock appeared critical. At this point Brigadier-General Ellis, commanding the Peshawar District, arrived on the field. He immediately ordered the two squadrons of the 13th Bengal Lancers to move well to the right flank, to charge across the front and check the enemy's advance. The "cease fire" sounded as on a field day. Then there was a pause. The movements of the cavalry were concealed from most of the troops, but suddenly all noticed the slackening of the enemy's fire. Then the tribesmen were seen to be in retreat and disorder. The power of cavalry had been strikingly displayed. The two squadrons, ably led, had executed a fine charge over what theorists would call impossible ground for a distance of one and a half miles along the bed of a great nullah, and among rocks and stones that reduced the pace to a trot. The enemy were driven from the field. Sixty were actually speared by the Lancers, and the rest retreated in gloom and disorder to their hills across the frontier. The casualties were as follows:-- British Officers. Wounded severely--Major A. Lumb, Somersetshire Light Infantry. " " Captain S.W. Blacker, R.A. " " 2nd Lieut. E Drummond, Somersetshire Light Infantry. Wounded slightly--Lieut. A.V. Cheyne, 13th Bengal Lancers. British N.C.O.'s and Soldiers. Killed. Wounded. 51st Field Battery, R.A..... 0 2 Somersetshire Light Infantry... 3 9 Native Ranks. 13th Bengal Lancers ..... 1 12 20th Punjaub Infantry..... 5 35 Followers ....... 0 1 Total Casualties, all ranks--72. That such an outrage, as the deliberate violation of British territory by these savages, should remain unpunished, "Forward Policy" or no "Forward Policy," was of course impossible. Yet the vacillation and hesitancy which the Government of India had displayed in the matter of the Bunerwals, and the shocking and disgraceful desertion of the forts in the Khyber Pass, were so fresh in all men's minds, that the order to advance against the Mohmands was received with feelings of the greatest relief throughout the forces. The general plan of the operations as arranged by the Commander-in-Chief was as follows:-- 1. Sir Bindon Blood with two brigades of the Malakand Field Force and due proportions of cavalry and guns was to move through South Bajaur to Nawagai, and on the 15th of September invade the Mohmand country from that place. 2. On the same date Major-General Elles with an equal force would leave Shabkadr, and entering the mountains march northeast to effect a junction. 3. This having been done, the combined forces under the supreme command of Sir Bindon Blood would be brought back through the Mohmands' territories to Shabkadr. Incidentally they would deal with the Hadda Mullah's village of Jarobi, and inflict such punishment on the tribesmen as might be necessary to ensure their submission. The troops would then be available for the Tirah Expedition, which it had by this time been decided to organise. The fact that after leaving Nawagai, nothing was known of the configuration of the country, of which no maps existed; nor of the supplies of food, forage and water available by the way, made the preparations for, and the execution of, these operations somewhat difficult. Wide margins had to be allowed in the matter of rations, and in order to be prepared for all contingencies and obstructions of ground, Sir Bindon Blood equipped his 2nd Brigade entirely with mule transport. The 3rd Brigade with camels would follow if the road was passable. The following was the composition of the forces employed:-- I. MALAKAND FIELD FORCE. Commanding--Major-General Sir Bindon Blood. 2nd Brigade. Brigadier-General Jeffries, C.B. The Buffs. 35th Sikhs. 38th Dogras. Guides Infantry. No.4 Company (Bengal) Sappers and Miners. No.7 Mountain Battery. 3rd Brigade. Brigadier-General Wodehouse. The Queen's Regiment.[This regiment had replaced the Gordon Highlanders in the 3rd Brigade.] 22nd Punjaub Infantry. 39th Punjaub Infantry. No.3 Company (Bombay) Sappers and Miners. No.1 Mountain Battery, R.A. Cavalry--11th Bengal Lancers. Line of Communications. 1st Brigade. Brigadier-General Meiklejohn. Royal West Kent. Highland Light Infantry. 31st Punjaub Infantry. 24th Punjaub Infantry. 45th Sikhs. No.7 British Mountain Battery. And the following additional troops:-- 1 Squadron 10th Bengal Lancers. 2 Squadrons Guides Cavalry. II.THE MOHMAND FIELD FORCE. 1st Brigade. 1st Battalion Somersetshire Light Infantry. Maxim Gun Detachment, 1st Battalion Devonshire Regiment. 20th Punjaub Infantry. 2nd Battalion 1st Gurkhas. Sections A and B No.5 British Field Hospital. Three Sections No.31 Native " " Section A No.45 " " " 2nd Brigade. 2nd Battalion Oxfordshire Light Infantry. 9th Gurkha Rifles. 37th Dogras. Sections C and D No.5 British Field Hospital. No.44 Native Field Hospital. Divisional Troops. 13th Bengal Lancers. No.3 Mountain Battery, Royal Artillery. No.5 (Bombay) Mountain Battery. No.5 Company (Bengal) Sappers and Miners. 28th Bombay Pioneers. 1st Patiala Infantry. Sections C and D No.63 Native Field Hospital. To record the actual movements of troops in a campaign, is among the most important duties of one who undertakes to tell its tale. For the sake of clearness, of brevity, and that the reader who is not interested may find convenience in skipping, I shall at once describe the whole of the marches and manoeuvres, by which Sir Bindon Blood moved his brigades across the Panjkora River, and after the Malakand Field Force is safely camped at Ghosam, the reader will be invited to return to examine the scenery, and remark the incidents of the way. During the end of August, the 2nd Brigade, equipped with mule transport, was at Khar in the Swat Valley. The 3rd Brigade was at Uch. On the 2nd of September, definite orders to advance were received from Simla. In pursuance of these instructions, Sir Bindon Blood ordered Brigadier-General Wodehouse with the 3rd Brigade, which in anticipation had been moved from Uch a few days previously, to take over the bridge across the Panjkora from the Khan of Dir's Levies, and secure the passage. On the 6th, the 3rd Brigade marched from Sarai to Panjkora, and obtained possession of the bridge just in time to prevent it falling into the hands of the enemy, who had already gathered to seize it. The 12-pounder guns of the 10th Field Battery were placed in a strong position commanding the passage, and the brigade camped on the left bank. On the same day, Brigadier-General Jeffries with headquarters marched from Khar to Chakdara. On the 7th he proceeded to Sarai, and on the 8th effected the passage of the Panjkora, and camped on the further bank at Kotkai. On the 10th, both brigades marched to Ghosam, where they concentrated. On the line of communications to the Malakand, stages were established at Chakdara and Sarai, with accommodation for sick and wounded. An advanced depot was formed behind the Panjkora, to guard which and to hold the passage, an additional force was moved from the Swat Valley. This concentration at Ghosam, of which the details had worked out so mechanically, had been necessitated by the attitude of the tribesmen of Bajaur and the adjoining valleys. Great gatherings had collected, and up to the 7th of September there had been every sign of determined opposition. So formidable did the combination appear, that Sir Bindon Blood arranged to have at his disposal a force of six squadrons, nine battalions and three batteries, in the expectation of an action at or near Ghosam, which would perhaps have been on a larger scale than any British engagement since Tel-el-Kebir. [As so many misconceptions exist as to the British casualties in this victory, it is necessary to state that in the twenty minutes' fighting 11 officers and 43 men were killed and 22 officers and 320 men were wounded.] These anticipations were however doomed to disappointment. The methodical, remorseless advance of powerful forces filled the tribesmen with alarm. They made a half-hearted attempt to capture the Panjkora bridge, and finding themselves forestalled, fell again to discussing terms. In this scene of indecision the political officers employed all their arts. And then suddenly the whole huge combination, which had been raised in our path, collapsed as an iceberg, when southern waters have melted its base. Whatever the philanthropist may say, it would appear to have been better policy to have encouraged the tribesmen to oppose the advance in the open, on some well-defined position. Had they done so, there can be no doubt that the two fine brigades, backed by a powerful artillery, and under a victorious commander, who knew and had fought over every inch of the ground, would have defeated them with severe loss. Bajaur would have been settled at a single blow and probably at a far less cost in lives than was afterwards incurred. Instead of this, it was the aim of our diplomacy to dissipate the opposition. The inflammation, which should have been brought to a head and then operated on, was now dispersed throughout the whole system, with what results future chapters will show. Having thus brought the brigades peacefully to Gosham, I ask the reader to return to the Malakand and ride thence with the Headquarters Staff along the line of march. On the 5th of September, Sir Bindon Blood and his staff, which I had the pleasure to accompany, started from the Kotal Camp and proceeded across the plain of Khar to Chakdara. Here we halted for the night, and as the scenery and situation of this picturesque fort have already been described, the march may be continued without delay next morning. From Chakdara to Sarai is a stage of twelve miles. The road runs steadily up the valley until the summit of the Catgalla Pass is reached. "Catgalla" means "Cut-throat," and, indeed, it is not hard to believe that this gloomy defile has been the scene of dark and horrid deeds. Thence a descent of two miles leads to Sarai. On the way, we fell in with the 2nd Brigade, and had to leave the road to avoid the long lines of mules and marching men who toiled along it. The valley at Sarai is about two miles wide, and the mountains rise steeply from it. On every ridge it is possible to distinguish the red brick ruins which were the dwellings of the ancient Buddhists. These relics of an early civilisation, long since overthrown and forgotten, cannot fail to excite interest and awaken reflection. They carry the mind back to the times "when the smoke of sacrifice rose from the Pantheon, and when camelopards and tigers bounded in the Flavian amphitheatre." And they also lead us to speculations of the future, till we wonder whether the traveller shall some day inspect, with unconcerned composure, the few scraps of stone and iron which may indicate the British occupation of India. Few, indeed, the remains would be--for we build for immediate use, not future ostentation in these days, and if we should ever cease to be a force in the world, all traces of us would soon be obliterated by time. Yet, perhaps, if that unborn critic of remote posterity would remember that "in the days of the old British," the rice crop had been more abundant, the number of acres under cultivation greater, the population larger and the death rate lower, than at any period in the history of India--we should not be without a monument more glorious than the pyramids. We camped with the 2nd Brigade on the night of the 6th, and next morning, while the stars were still shining, resumed the march. Five miles from Sarai the road dwindles to a mule track, and henceforward is not fit for wheeled traffic. In spite of this, the 10th Field Battery had succeeded in getting their guns along it, and had brought them safely to Panjkora. But soldiers will accomplish a good deal to get nearer the enemy. The scenery before the gorge of the river is reached is gloomy, but grand. Great cliffs tower up precipitously on the further bank and the path is cut in the face of the rock. The river, which flows swiftly by, plunges into a narrow cleft about a mile below the bridge, and disappears among the mountains. It abounds in fish, but is rapid and dangerous, and while the troops were encamped near it, two gunners lost their lives by falling in, and being carried down. Indeed, watching the dead bodies of several camels being swept along, swirled around, and buffeted against the rocks, it was not hard to understand these accidents. At length, the bridge is reached. It is a frail structure, supported on wire ropes. At each end are gates, flanked by little mud towers. The battery was established on a knoll to the right, and the long muzzles of the guns peered through stone embrasures at the opposite hills. It was round the bases of these hills that much hard fighting took place in the Chitral campaign. About half a mile beyond the bridge, I was shown the place where the Guides had been so hard pressed, and for a whole night had had to stand at bay, their colonel killed, the bridge broken, and the river in flood, against the tribesmen in overwhelming numbers. The field telegraph stopped at the bridge-head, and a small tent with a half-dozen military operators marked the breaking of the slender thread that connected us, across thousands of miles of sea and land, with London. Henceforward a line of signal stations with their flickering helios would be the only links. We were at the end of the wire. I have often stood at the other and watched the tape machine click off the news as it arrives; the movements of the troops; the prospects of action; the fighting; the casualties. How different are the scenes. The club on an autumn evening--its members grouped anxiously around, discussing, wondering, asserting; the noise of the traffic outside; the cigarette smoke and electric lights within. And, only an hour away along the wire, the field, with the bright sunlight shining on the swirling muddy waters; the black forbidding rocks; the white tents of the brigade a mile up the valley; the long streak of vivid green rice crop by the river; and in the foreground the brown-clad armed men. I can never doubt which is the right end to be at. It is better to be making the news than taking it; to be an actor rather than a critic. To cross the bridge, it was necessary to dismount and lead the horses over in single file. Even then the swinging of the whole structure made it difficult to walk. The passage of the transport under such conditions occupied all the day, and the unfortunate officers in charge of the mule trains were working incessantly. The staff passed quickly, however, and riding on about a mile forded the tributary stream of the Jandol, and reached the camp at Kotkai about noon. Thence we proceeded on the following day to Ghosam, but as the road is uninteresting, and I am beginning to think the reader will readily excuse further description, we need not toil along it in the dust and the heat. The narration of the daily movements of troops, unmarked by variety of incident, is dull and wearying. Yet he who would obtain a true idea of the soldier's life on service, must mentally share the fatigues of the march and the monotony of the camp. The fine deeds, the thrilling moments of war, are but the high lights in a picture, of which the background is routine, hard work, and discomfort. At Ghosam the 2nd Brigade remained until joined by the 3rd and pending negotiations between the political officers and the tribal Jirgahs. The use of purely local terms in all writing is to be deprecated. Perhaps the reason that no popular history of India exists, is to be found in the outlandish names of the characters, and the other expressions with which the pages are sprinkled. In this account I have zealously tried to avoid the ugly jargon of a degraded language, and to minimise the use of native names. The term just employed has, however, been so freely used in the newspapers recently, that it is perhaps as well to explain its meaning. A Jirgah is a deputation of tribesmen. It does not necessarily represent the tribe. It may present--and very often does--a minority report. Occasionally it expresses the opinion only of its own members. What has been settled one day is therefore very often overruled the next. The Jirgah may accept terms of peace in the morning, and the camp may be rushed that night. These were, however, genuine, and spoke in the name and with the authority of the tribes. All day they kept arriving and squatting in rows before Major Deane's tent, to hear the Government terms. The chief condition imposed, was the surrender of rifles. A fixed number, based on calculation of wealth and population, was demanded from each clan. This method of punishment is peculiarly galling to people whose life is so full of war. No other course was, however, open but submission, and, promising that the terms should be complied with, the deputations departed. To stimulate their efforts and zeal in collecting their arms, the combined movements were delayed for three days, and the forces remained encamped at Ghosam, near Manda. I avail myself of this halt to touch, albeit with no little trepidation, the tangled and obscure subject of tribal politics in Dir and Bajaur. All the people, incited by their priests, are bitterly hostile to the British Government, except those benefited by the subsidies paid. They were now anxious to fight, and were only restrained by a fear which fury or fanaticism might at any moment overcome. Four principal khans exercise an authority which varies locally, from absolute dominion to a shadowy suzerainty, over the whole region. The Khan of Dir, the most important, is a Government nominee. He is supported by the British influence, and is, as I have already noticed, entrusted with the raising of Levies to protect and keep in repair the Chitral road. For these services he receives pay, and a certain allowance of arms and ammunition. His own subjects are strongly opposed to his rule from dislike of his British sympathies, and he only maintains himself by the assistance which the Government gives him in arms and money. In other words he is a puppet. The Khan of Nawagai is constrained by fear to display a friendly attitude towards the Sirkar. His subjects resent this and his position is insecure. He receives some moral support from the British agents, and as his people are uncertain how far the Government would go to uphold him, and also as they partly realise his difficult position, they have hitherto submitted sullenly to his rule. The position and attitude of the Khan of Jar are similar, but he is a less influential chief. The fourth potentate, the Khan of Khar, is perhaps the most honest and trustworthy. He will appear in a later chapter, and the reader will have the opportunity of judging of his character from his conduct. Thus in these valleys, while the people are all hostile, their rulers find it expedient to preserve a friendly demeanour to the British, and for this they are hated by their subjects. At this stage, the leader of the popular party claims attention. As is usual, he is out of office. After the Chitral expedition of 1895, Umra Khan was expelled from his territories, and escaped to Cabul. There he has remained. The Amir is under an obligation to the British Government to prevent his raising trouble in Bajaur. If the Amir desired war he would send Umra Khan back. This would create a strong faction throughout the whole country--but particularly in the Jandol, Salarzai and Mamund Valleys--hostile to the British and the friendly khans. The Amir hinted at this in a recent letter to the Government of India; and such a step would probably precede his declaration of war, or follow ours. The Afghan sovereign is, however, well aware that he has at present nothing to gain, and many things to lose, by provoking a war with the great power which gave him his throne and has since increased his revenue by subsidies. In the meanwhile, anxious to preserve his influence with the border tribes, and to impress the Indian Government with the fact that he could be a powerful foe, he keeps Umra Khan as a trump card, to be played when the occasion arises. That he may maintain his authority in Bajaur, the exiled khan is well supplied with funds, with which to arm and pay his retainers. The situation I have thus briefly described has been little altered by the operations with which future chapters are concerned. The friendly khans have been fortified in their allegiance and position by the military demonstration and by the severe punishment inflicted on those tribes who resisted. On the other hand, the hostility of the people has been not unnaturally increased by war, and one tribe in particular has gained a reputation for courage, which will give them the power to cause trouble in the future. I shall not, however, anticipate the tale. CHAPTER IX: RECONNAISSANCE While the infantry of both brigades remained halted at Ghosam, near Manda, the cavalry made daily reconnaissances in all directions. Sometimes the object in view was topographical, sometimes military, and at others diplomatic, or to use the Indian application of the term, "political." On the 10th, Major Deane visited the various chiefs in the Jandul Valley. I asked and obtained permission to accompany him. A change from the hot and dusty camp was agreeable to all who could be spared, and quite a party was formed, among whom were some whose names have occurred previously in these pages--Major Beatson, Major Hobday, and Lord Fincastle. A squadron of the 11th Bengal Lancers acted as escort. The valley of the Jandul is about eight miles long and perhaps half as broad. It opens out of the main valley, which extends from the Panjkora to Nawagai, and is on all other sides surrounded by high and precipitous mountains. The bed of the river, although at the time of our visit occupied only by a small stream, is nearly half a mile broad and bordered by rice fields, to which the water is conducted by many artfully contrived dykes and conduits. The plain itself is arid and sandy, but at the winter season yields a moderate crop. The presence of water below the surface is attested by numerous groves of chenar trees. This valley may, in natural and political features, be taken as typical of the Afghan valleys. Seven separate castles formed the strongholds of seven separate khans. Some of these potentates had been implicated in the attack on the Malakand, and our visit to their fastnesses was not wholly of an amicable nature. They had all four days before been bound by the most sacred oaths to fight to the death. The great tribal combination had, however, broken up, and at the last moment they had decided upon peace. But the Pathan does nothing by halves. No black looks, no sullen reserve, marred the geniality of their welcome. As we approached the first fortified village the sovereign and his army rode out to meet us, and with many protestations of fidelity, expressed his joy at our safe arrival. He was a fine-looking man and sat well on a stamping roan stallion. His dress was imposing. A waistcoat of gorgeous crimson, thickly covered with gold lace, displayed flowing sleeves of white linen, buttoned at the wrist. Long, loose, baggy, linen trousers, also fastened above the ankle, and curiously pointed shoes clothed his nether limbs. This striking costume was completed by a small skull-cap, richly embroidered, and an ornamental sabre. He sprang from his horse with grace and agility, to offer his sword to Major Deane, who bade him mount and ride with him. The army, four or five rascally-looking men on shaggy ponies, and armed with rifles of widely different patterns, followed at a distance. The fort was an enclosure about a hundred yards square. Its walls were perhaps twenty feet high and built of rough stones plastered together with mud and interspersed with courses of timber. All along the top was a row of loopholes. At each corner a tall flanking tower enfiladed the approaches. At the gate of this warlike residence some twenty or thirty tribesmen were gathered, headed by the khan's own cousin, an elderly man dressed in long white robes. All saluted us gravely. The escort closed up. A troop trotted off to the right out of the line fire of the fort. The advance scouts, passing round the walls, formed on the farther side. These matters of detail complied with, conversation began. It was conducted in Pushtu, and was naturally unintelligible to every one of our party except the two political officers. Apparently Major Deane reproached the two chiefs for their conduct. He accused them of having seized the bridge across the Panjkora and delivered the passage to the fanatic crowds that had gathered to attack the Malakand. This they admitted readily enough. "Well, why not?" said they; "there was a good fair fight." Now they would make peace. They bore no malice, why should the Sirkar? It was not, however, possible to accept this sportsmanlike view of the situation. They were asked where were the rifles they had been ordered to surrender. At this they looked blank. There were no rifles. There never had been any rifles. Let the soldiers search the fort and see for themselves. The order was given; three or four sowars drew their carbines, dismounted and entered the great and heavy gate, which had been suspiciously opened a little way. The gate gave access to a small courtyard, commanded on every side by an interior defence. In front was a large low room of uncertain dimensions: a kind of guard-house. It simply hummed with men. The outer walls were nearly five feet thick and would have resisted the fire of mountain guns. It was a strong place. The Lancers, accustomed to the operation of hunting for arms, hurriedly searched the likely and usual places, but without success. One thing, however, they noticed, which they immediately reported. There were no women and children in the fort. This had a sinister aspect. Our visit was unexpected and had taken them by surprise, but they were prepared for all emergencies. They had hidden their rifles and cleared for action. The two chiefs smiled in superior virtue. Of course there were no rifles. But matters took, for them, an unexpected turn. They had no rifles--said Major Deane--very well, they should come themselves. He turned to an officer of the Lancers; a section rode forward and surrounded both men. Resistance was useless. Flight was impossible. They were prisoners. Yet they behaved with Oriental composure and calmly accepted the inevitable. They ordered their ponies and, mounting, rode behind us under escort. We pursued our way up the valley. As we approached each fort, a khan and his retainers advanced and greeted us. Against these there was no definite charge, and the relations throughout were amicable. At the head of the valley is Barwa, the home of the most powerful of these princelets. This fort had belonged to Umra Khan, and attested, by superiority of construction, the intellectual development of that remarkable man. After the Chitral expedition it had been given by the Government to its present owner, who, bitterly hated by the other chieftains of the valley, his near relatives mostly, had no choice but loyalty to the British. He received us with courtesy and invited us to enter and see the fort. This, after taking all precautions and posting sentries, we did. It was the best specimen of Afghan architecture I have seen. In this very fort Lieutenants Fowler and Edwards were confined in 1895, when the prisoners of Umra Khan. The new chief showed their room which opened on a balcony, whence a fine view of the whole valley could be obtained. There are many worse places of durance. The fort is carefully defended and completely commands the various approaches. Judicious arrangements of loopholes and towers cover all dead ground. Inside the walls galleries of brushwood enabled the defenders to fire without exposing themselves. In the middle is the keep, which, if Fortune were adverse, would be the last stronghold of the garrison. What a strange system of society is disclosed by all this! Here was this man, his back against the mountains, maintaining himself against the rest of the valley, against all his kin, with the fear of death and the chances of war ever in his mind, and holding his own, partly by force of arms, partly by the support of the British agents, and partly through the incessant feuds of his adversaries. It is "all against all," in these valleys. The two khans who had been arrested would have fled to the hills. They knew they were to be punished. Still they dared not leave their stronghold. A neighbour, a relation, a brother perhaps, would step into the unguarded keep and hold it for his own. Every stone of these forts is blood-stained with treachery; each acre of ground the scene of a murder. In Barwa itself, Umra Khan slew his brother, not in hot anger or open war, but coldly and deliberately from behind. Thus he obtained power, and the moralist might observe with a shudder, that but for the "Forward Policy" he would probably be in full enjoyment to-day. This Umra Khan was a man of much talent, a man intellectually a head and shoulders above his countrymen. He was a great man, which on the frontier means that he was a great murderer, and might have accomplished much with the quick-firing guns he was negotiating for, and the troops he was drilling "on the European model." The career of this Afghan Napoleon was cut short, however, by the intervention of Providence in the guise or disguise of the Indian Government. He might have been made use of. People who know the frontier well, say that a strong man who has felt the grip of the British power is the best tool to work with, and that if Umra Khan, humbled and overawed, had been reinstated, he might have done much to maintain law and order. As long as they fight, these Afghans do not mind much on which side they fight. There are worse men and worse allies helping us to-day. The unpractical may wonder why we, a people who fill some considerable place in the world, should mix in the petty intrigues of these border chieftains, or soil our hands by using such tools at all. Is it fitting that Great Britain should play off one brutal khan against his neighbours, or balance one barbarous tribe against another? It is as much below our Imperial dignity, as it would be for a millionaire to count the lumps in the sugar-basin. If it be necessary for the safety of our possessions that these territories should be occupied, it would be more agreeable to our self-respect that we should take them with a strong hand. It would be more dignified, but nothing costs more to keep up than dignity, and it is perhaps because we have always been guided by sound commercial principles in this respect that we have attained our present proud position. After looking round the fortress and admiring the skill and knowledge with which it was built, we were conducted by the khan to the shade of some beautiful chenar trees, which grew near a little spring not far from the walls of the fort. Here were a number of charpoys, or native bedsteads, very comfortable, but usually full of bugs, and on these we sat. Remembering Maizar, and many other incidents of frontier hospitality, sentries were posted on all the approaches and a sufficient guard kept under arms. Then we had breakfast--a most excellent breakfast. The arrangements for the comfort and convenience of the troops of the Frontier Force are unequalled. They live more pleasantly and with less discomfort on active service than does a British regiment at the Aldershot manoeuvres. Whether the march be long or short, peaceful or opposed, whether the action be successful or the reverse, their commissariat never fails. In fact it is only just to say that they have always lances and bullets for an enemy, and sandwiches and "pegs" for a friend. On this occasion, our provisions were supplemented by the hospitality of the khan. A long row of men appeared, each laden with food. Some carried fruit,--pears or apples; others piles of chupatties, or dishes of pillau. Nor were our troopers forgotten. The Mahommedans among them eagerly accepted the proffered food. But the Sikhs maintained a remorseful silence and declined it. They could not eat what had been prepared by Mussulman hands, and so they sat gazing wistfully at the appetising dishes, and contented themselves with a little fruit. Very austere and admirable they looked, almost painfully conscious of their superior virtue. But I could not help thinking that had we not been spectators the chenar trees might have witnessed the triumph of reason over religious prejudice. During the heat of the day we rested in this pleasant grove, and with sleep and conversation passed the hours away, while the sentries pacing to and fro alone disturbed the illusion that this was some picnic party in a more propitious land. Then, as the shadows lengthened, we started upon our return to camp. On arriving, the political officers were pleased, and the soldiers disappointed, to find that the tribesmen were determined to accept the Government terms. A hundred rifles from the Utman Khels had already been surrendered, and now lay outside Major Deane's tent, surrounded by a crowd of officers, who were busily engaged in examining them. Opinion is divided, and practice has followed opinion as to whether, in a tale of travel or of war, it is preferable to intersperse the narrative with conclusions and discussions, or to collect them all in a final chapter. I shall unhesitatingly embrace the former method. The story shall be told as it happened, and the reader's attention will be directed to such considerations and reflections as arise by the way. It will therefore be convenient to make a digression into the question of the supply of arms to the frontier tribes, while a hundred rifles, probably a representative hundred, are piled in the main street of the camp at Ghosam. The perpetual state of intestine war, in which the border peoples live, naturally creates a keen demand for deadly weapons. A good Martini-Henry rifle will always command a price in these parts of Rs.400 or about 25 British pounds. As the actual value of such a rifle does not exceed Rs.50, it is evident that a very large margin of profit accrues to the enterprising trader. All along the frontier, and from far down into India, rifles are stolen by expert and cunning thieves. One tribe, the Ut Khels, who live in the Laghman Valley, have made the traffic in arms their especial business. Their thieves are the most daring and their agents the most cunning. Some of their methods are highly ingenious. One story is worth repeating. A coffin was presented for railway transport. The relatives of the deceased accompanied it. The dead man, they said, had desired to be buried across the frontier. The smell proclaimed the corpse to be in an advanced state of decomposition. The railway officials afforded every facility for the passage of so unpleasant an object. No one checked its progress. It was unapproachable. It was only when coffin and mourners were safe across the frontier that the police were informed that a dozen rifles had been concealed in the coffin, and that the corpse was represented by a quarter of "well hung" beef! I regret to have to state, that theft is not the only means by which the frontier tribes obtain weapons. Of a hundred rifles, which the Utman Khels had surrendered, nearly a third were condemned Government Martinis, and displayed the Government stamp. Now no such rifles are supposed to exist. As soon as they are condemned, the arsenal authorities are responsible that they are destroyed, and this is in every case carried out under European supervision. The fact, that such rifles are not destroyed and are found in the possession of trans-frontier tribesmen, points to a very grave instance of dishonest and illegal traffic being carried on by some person connected with the arsenal. It need hardly be said that a searching inquiry was instituted. Another point connected with these rifles is that even when they have been officially destroyed, by cutting them in three pieces, the fractions have a marketable value. Several were shown me which had been rejoined by the tribesmen. These were, of course, very dangerous weapons indeed. The rest of the hundred had strange tales to tell. Two or three were Russian military rifles, stolen probably from the distant posts in Central Asia. One was a Snider, taken at Maiwand, and bearing the number of the ill-fated regiment to which it had belonged. Some had come from Europe, perhaps overland through Arabia and Persia; others from the arms factory at Cabul. It was a strange instance of the tireless efforts of Supply to meet Demand. The importance of the arms question cannot be exaggerated. The long-range rifle fire, which has characterised the great frontier war, is a new feature. Hitherto our troops have had to face bold sword charges but comparatively little firing. Against the former, modern weapons are effective. But no discipline and no efficiency can stop bullets hitting men. This is a small part of the question. In the matter of fighting, what is good enough for the tribesmen should be good enough for the soldier. A more serious consideration is raised than that of casualties, which are after all only the inseparable concomitant of glory. Transport in mountainous countries depends entirely on mules and camels. A great number are needed even to supply one brigade. At night these animals have to be packed closely in an entrenched camp. It is not possible to find camping grounds in the valleys which are not commanded by some hill or assailable from some nullah. It is dangerous to put out pickets, as they may be "rushed" or, in the event of a severe attack, shot down, by the fire of their main body. [This applies to Swat and Bajaur, where the sword charge is still to be apprehended.] The result is that the transport animals must be exposed to long-range fire at night. The reader will observe, as the account proceeds, that on two occasions a large number of transport mules were killed in this way. When a certain number are killed, a brigade is as helpless as a locomotive without coal. It cannot move. Unless it be assisted it must starve. Every year the tribesmen will become better marksmen, more completely armed with better rifles. If they recognise the policy of continually firing at our animals, they may bring all operations to a standstill. And so by this road I reach the conclusion that whatever is to be done on the frontier, should be done as quickly as possible. But to return to the story. The next day, the 11th of September, the troops remained halted at Ghosam, and another squadron was ordered to escort the Intelligence Officer, Captain H.E. Stanton, D.S.O., while making a topographical reconnaissance of the passes into the Utman Khel country. The opportunity of making fresh maps and of adding to and correcting the detail of existing maps only occurs when troops are passing through the country, and must not be neglected. The route lay up the main valley which leads to Nawagei. We started early, but the way was long and the sun high before we reached the entrance of the pass. The landscape was one of the strangest I shall ever see. On the opposite bank of the river were the dwellings of the Utman Khels, and in an area seven miles by three, I counted forty-six separate castles, complete with moats, towers and turrets. The impression produced was extraordinary. It suggested Grimm's fairy tales. It almost seemed as if we had left the natural earth and strayed into some strange domain of fancy, the resort of giants or ogres. To reach the pass, we were compelled to traverse a large village, and as the situation in the narrow, winding streets was about as awkward for cavalry as could be imagined, every possible precaution was taken to guard against attack. At length the squadron passed safely through and formed up on the farther side. The steep ascent to the passes became visible. As there were two routes to be reconnoitered, the party was divided, and after a hasty breakfast we commenced the climb. For a considerable distance it was possible to ride. At every difficult turn of the track sowars were posted to secure the retreat, if it should be necessary to come back in a hurry. The head man of the village furnished a guide, a cheery and amusing fellow, who professed much solicitude for our safety. But no reliance could be placed on these people, and on the opposite side of the valley numerous figures could be seen moving along and keeping pace with our advancing party. At length the horses and the greater part of the escort had to be abandoned. I accompanied Captain Stanton, and Captain Cole, who commanded the squadron and was also Reuter's correspondent, with a couple of troopers to the top of the pass. The day was intensely hot, and the arduous climb excited a thirst which there was nothing to allay. At length we gained the summit, and stood on the Kotal. Far below us was a valley, into which perhaps no white man had looked since Alexander crossed the mountains on his march to India. Numerous villages lay dotted about in its depths, while others nestled against the hills. Isolated forts were distinguishable, while large trees showed there was no lack of water. It was a view that repaid the exertions of the climb, even if it did not quench the thirst they had excited. While Captain Stanton was making his sketch,--one of those useful view-sketches, now taking the place of all others, in rapid cavalry reconnaissance, we amused our fancy by naming the drinks we should order, were a nice, clean European waiter at hand to get them. I forget what my selection was, but it was something very long and very cold. Alas! how far imagination lags behind reality. The vivid impressions which we conjured up--the deep glasses, and the clinking ice--did little to dissipate the feelings of discomfort. Our guide meanwhile squatted on the ground and pronounced the names of all the villages, as each one was pointed at. To make sure there was no mistake, the series of questions was repeated. This time he gave to each an entirely different name with an appearance of great confidence and pride. However, one unpronounceable name is as good as another, and the villages of the valley will go down to official history, christened at the caprice of a peasant. But perhaps many records, now accepted as beyond dispute, are derived from such a slender authority. The sketch finished, we commenced the descent and reached our horses without incident. The squadron concentrated near the village, and we heard that the other sketching party had met with more adventures than had fallen to our lot. It was commanded by Lieutenant Hesketh, a young officer, who was severely wounded at the storming of the Malakand Pass in 1895, and who, having again volunteered for active service, was attached to the 11th Bengal Lancers. At the foot of the pass he dismounted his troop and, taking a few men with him, began the climb. The pass was occupied by tribesmen, who threatened to fire on the party if they advanced farther. The subaltern replied, that he only wished to see the country on the other side and did not intend to harm any one. At the same time he pursued his way and the tribesmen, not wishing to bring matters to a crisis, fell back slowly, repeatedly taking aim, but never daring to fire. He reached the top of the pass and Captain Walters, the Assistant Intelligence Officer, was able to make a most valuable sketch of the country beyond. It was a bold act and succeeded more through its boldness than from any other cause; for, had the tribesmen once opened fire, very few of the party could have got down alive. Making a detour to avoid the village, which it was undesirable to traverse a second time, the squadron returned and arrived at the camp at Ghosam as the sun was setting. The service camp of an Anglo-Indian brigade is arranged on regular principles. The infantry and guns are extended in the form of a square. The animals and cavalry are placed inside. In the middle is the camp of the Headquarters staff, with the tent of the brigadier facing that of the general commanding the division. All around the perimeter a parapet is built, varying in height according to the proximity and activity of the enemy. This parapet not only affords cover from random shots, but also makes a line for the men to form on in case of a sudden attack. Behind it the infantry lie down to sleep, a section of each company, as an inlying picket, dressed and accoutred. Their rifles are often laid along the low wall with the bayonets ready fixed. If cavalry have to be used in holding part of the defences, their lances can be arranged in the same way. Sentries every twenty-five yards surround the camp with a line of watchers. To view the scene by moonlight is alone an experience which would repay much travelling. The fires have sunk to red, glowing specks. The bayonets glisten in a regular line of blue-white points. The silence of weariness is broken by the incessant and uneasy shuffling of the animals and the occasional neighing of the horses. All the valley is plunged in gloom and the mountains rise high and black around. Far up their sides, the twinkling watch-fires of the tribesmen can be seen. Overhead is the starry sky, bathed in the pale radiance of the moon. It is a spectacle that may inspire the philosopher no less than the artist. The camp is full of subdued noises. Here is no place for reflection, for quiet or solemn thought. The day may have been an exciting one. The morrow may bring an action. Some may be killed, but in war-time life is only lived in the present. It is sufficient to be tired and to have time to rest, and the camp, if all the various items that compose it can be said to have a personality, shrugs its shoulders and, regarding the past without regret, contemplates the future without alarm. CHAPTER X: THE MARCH TO NAWAGAI After considering such maps and information as to the nature of the country as were available, Sir Bindon Blood decided to enter the territories of the Mohmands by two routes. (1) The 3rd Brigade through the pass of Nawagai. (2) The 2nd Brigade over the Rambat Pass. This would sweep the country more thoroughly, and afford increased facilities for drawing supplies. As the 3rd Brigade had a greater distance to cover, it passed in front of the 2nd, and on the 12th of September, by a march of twelve miles, reached Shumshuk. The 2nd Brigade, which had hitherto been leading, moved by an easy stage of seven miles to Jar, and there camped within supporting distance. The Headquarters staff was now transferred to the 3rd Brigade and marched with them. The road lay for the first five or six miles over the ground, which the cavalry had reconnoitered the day before. Again all were struck by the great array of castles on the Utman Khel side of the valley. Many eager spirits would have liked to stop and blow up some of these fine places. But the Government terms had been complied with and the columns moved slowly by, eyeing the forts, which were covered with the white and blue clad figures of their defenders, with a sour disdain. After riding for a couple of hours, the staff halted for breakfast under a shady tree by the banks of a clear and rapid stream. Two hundred yards away we observed a large flight of teal sitting tamely on the water. Every one became interested. Rifles there were in plenty; but where could a gun be found? Rigorous and hasty search was made. The political officer of the force, Mr. Davis, being consulted, eventually produced a friendly khan, who was the owner of a shot gun. After further delay this weapon was brought. The teal still floated unconcernedly on the water. A gun awakened no sense of danger. Shots in plenty they had heard in the valley, but they were not usually fired at birds. The exciting moment now arrived. Who should shoot? The responsibility was great. Many refused. At length Veterinary-Captain Mann, who was wounded a few days later at Nawagai, volunteered. He took the gun and began a painful stalk. He crawled along cautiously. We watched with suppressed emotion. Suddenly two shots rang out. They were to be the first of many. The men in the marching column 200 yards away became wide awake. The teal rose hurriedly and flew away, but four remained behind, killed or wounded. These birds we picked up with a satisfaction which was fully justified by their excellence that night at dinner. Another mile or so brought us to the Watelai River, a stream about thirty yards broad, which flows into the Jandul, and thence into the Panjkora. Crossing this and climbing the opposite bank, the troops debouched on to the wide level plateau of Khar, perhaps ten miles across and sixteen in length. Standing on the high ground, the great dimensions of the valley were displayed. Looking westward it was possible to see the hills behind the Panjkora, the sites of the former camps, and the entrance of the subsidiary valley of the Jandul. In front, at the further end, an opening in the mountain range showed the pass of Nawagai. Towering on the left was the great mass of the Koh-i-mohr, or "Mountain of Peacocks"--a splendid peak, some 8000 feet high, the top of which is visible from both Peshawar and Malakand. Its name is possibly a corruption. Arrian calls it Mount Meros. At its base the city of Nysa stood in former times, and among many others fell before the arms of Alexander. Its inhabitants, in begging for peace, boasted that they conducted their government "with constitutional order," and that "ivy, which did not grow in the rest of India, grew among them." City, ivy, and constitutional order have alike disappeared. The mountain alone remains. A little to the northward the Ramlat Pass was distinguishable. On the right the smooth plain appeared to flow into the hill country, and a wide bay in the mountains, roughly circular in shape and nearly twelve miles across, opened out of the valley. The prominent spurs which ran from the hills formed many dark ravines and deep hollows, as it were gulfs and inlets of the sea. The entrance was perhaps a mile broad. I remember that, when I first looked into the valley, the black clouds of a passing storm hung gloomily over all, and filled it with a hazy half-light that contrasted with the brilliant sunshine outside. It was the Watelai, or as we got to call it later--the Mamund Valley. The Khan of Khar met the general on the farther bank of the river. He was a tall, fine-looking man with bright eyes, bushy black whiskers and white teeth, which his frequent smiles displayed. He was richly dressed, attended by a dozen horsemen and mounted on a handsome, though vicious dun horse. He saluted Sir Bindon Blood with great respect and ceremony. Some conversation took place, conducted, as the khan only spoke Pushtu, through the political officer. The khan asserted his loyalty and that of his neighbour the Khan of Jar. He would, he said, do his utmost to secure the peaceful passage of the troops. Such supplies as they might need, he would provide, as far as his resources would go. He looked with some alarm at the long lines of marching men and animals. The general reassured him. If the forces were not interfered with or opposed, if the camps were not fired into at night, if stragglers were not cut off and cut up by his people, payment in cash would be made for all the grain and wood it was necessary to requisition. The khan accepted this promise with gratitude and relief, and henceforth during the operations which took place at Nawagai and in the Mamund Valley, he preserved a loyal and honourable behaviour. To the best of his power he restrained his young bloods. As much as he was able, he used his influence to discourage the other tribes from joining the revolt. Every night his pickets watched our camps, and much good sleep was obtained by weary men in consequence. At the end of the fighting he was the intermediary between the Government and the Mamund tribesmen. And on one occasion he rendered a signal service, though one which should hardly have been entrusted to him, by escorting with his own retainers an ammunition convoy to the 2nd Brigade, when troops and cartridges were alike few and sorely needed. Had he proved treacherous in this instance the consequences might have been most grave. Throughout, however, he kept his word with the general, and that in the face of opposition from his own people, and threats of vengeance from his neighbours. He on his part will not complain of British good faith. Although the fighting was continued in the district for nearly a month, not one of his villages was burnt, while all damage done to his crops was liberally compensated. He was guaranteed against reprisals, and at the end of the operations the gift of a considerable sum of money proved to him that the Sirkar could reward its friends, as well as punish its enemies. The camel transport of the 3rd Brigade lagged on the road, and the troops, tired after their long march, had to wait in the blazing sun for a couple of hours without shelter until the baggage came up. At length it arrived, and we proceeded to camp as far as is possible without tents. Shelters were improvised from blankets, from waterproof sheets supported on sticks, or from the green boughs of some adjacent trees. Beneath these scanty coverings the soldiers lay, and waited for the evening. Every one has read of the sufferings of the British troops in having to campaign in the hot weather during the Indian Mutiny. September in these valleys is as hot as it is easy to imagine or elegant to describe, and the exposure to the sun tells severely on the British battalions, as the hospital returns show. Of course, since Mutiny days, many salutary changes have been made in the dress and equipment of the soldier. The small cap with its insufficient puggaree is replaced by the pith helmet, the shade of which is increased by a long quilted covering. The high stock and thick, tight uniforms are gone, and a cool and comfortable khaki kit has been substituted. A spine protector covers the back, and in other ways rational improvements have been effected. But the sun remains unchanged, and all precautions only minimise, without preventing the evils. Slowly the hours pass away. The heat is intense. The air glitters over the scorched plain, as over the funnel of an engine. The wind blows with a fierce warmth, and instead of bringing relief, raises only whirling dust devils, which scatter the shelters and half-choke their occupants. The water is tepid, and fails to quench the thirst. At last the shadows begin to lengthen, as the sun sinks towards the western mountains. Every one revives. Even the animals seem to share the general feeling of relief. The camp turns out to see the sunset and enjoy the twilight. The feelings of savage hatred against the orb of day fade from our minds, and we strive to forget that he will be ready at five o'clock next morning to begin the torment over again. As there were still several days to spare before the Malakand Field Force was due to enter the Mohmand country, Sir Bindon Blood ordered both brigades to remain halted on the 13th: the 3rd Brigade at Shumshuk; the 2nd at Jar. Meanwhile two reconnaissances were to be sent, one to the summit of the Rambat Pass, and the other up the Watelai Valley. The night of the 12th was the first occasion of "sniping," since the advance against the Mohmands had begun. About half a dozen shots were fired into camp, without other result than to disturb light sleepers. Still it marked a beginning. The reconnaissances started next morning. The general accompanied the one to the Rambat pass, to satisfy himself as to the nature of the unexplored country on the other side. Two companies of infantry were ordered to clear the way, and two others remained in support half-way up the pass. Sir Bindon Blood started at six o'clock accompanied by his escort, whose gay pennons combined, with the Union Jack of the Headquarters staff, to add a dash of colour to the scene. After riding for a couple of miles we caught up the infantry and had to halt, to let them get on ahead and work through the broken ground and scrub. A mile further it was necessary to dismount and proceed on foot. No opposition was encountered, though the attitude and demeanour of the natives was most unfriendly. The younger ones retired to the hills. The elder stayed to scowl at, and even curse us. The village cemetery was full of property of all kinds, beds, pitchers, and bags of grain, which the inhabitants had deposited there under the double delusion, that we wanted to plunder, and that in so sacred a spot it would be safe--were such our intention. In spite of their black looks, they were eventually all made to stand up and salute respectfully. The climb was a stiff one and took at least an hour. But the track was everywhere passable, or capable of easily being made passable for mules. The general, trained and hardened by years of shooting of all kinds in the jungles, arrived at the top first, followed by Brigadier-General Wodehouse, and a panting staff. A fine view of the Ambasar Valley was displayed. It was of arid aspect. Villages in plenty could be seen, but no sign of water. This was serious, as information as to wells was unreliable, and it was desirable to see some tanks and streams, before allowing a column to plunge into the unknown dangers of the valley. After some consideration Sir Bindon Blood decided to modify the original plan and send only two battalions of the 2nd Brigade with one squadron over the pass, while the rest were to march to join him at Nawagai. We then returned, reaching camp in time for luncheon. Meanwhile the reconnaissance up the Watelai or Mamund Valley had been of a more interesting nature. Two squadrons of the 11th Bengal Lancers, under Major Beatson, and with Mr. Davis, the political officer, were sent to put some pressure on the Mamunds, to make them carry out the terms agreed upon. They had promised to surrender fifty rifles. This they now showed no intention of doing. They had realised, that the brigades were only marching through the country, and that they had no time to stop, and they were determined to keep their arms as long as possible. As the cavalry approached the first village, about 300 men gathered and, displaying standards, called on the Lancers to stop. An altercation ensued. They were given half an hour to remove their women and children. Then the squadrons advanced. The tribesmen, still menacing, retired slowly towards the hills. Then a small party came up and informed Major Beatson, that in the next village was a troop-horse, which had been captured in the fighting in the Swat Valley. This admission, that the Mamunds had been implicated in the attack on the Malakand, was sufficiently naive. The cavalry rode on to the village. The horse was not to be found, but the officious informers from the first village eagerly pointed out where it had been stabled. In consequence of this information, and to stimulate the tribesmen to carry out the original terms, Mr. Davis decided to make an example and authorised Major Beatson to destroy the house of the owner of the stolen property. This was accordingly done. As soon as the smoke began to rise, the tribesmen, who had waited, half a mile away, opened a dropping fire from Martini-Henry rifles on the cavalry. These, not wishing to engage, retired at a trot. They were followed up, but though the fire was well directed, the range was too great for accurate shooting and the bullets whizzed harmlessly overhead. As the Lancers left the valley, an incident occurred which illustrates what has been said in an earlier chapter, and is characteristic of the daily life of the natives. The people of the first village had directed the attention of the cavalry to the second. Part of the second had been in consequence burnt. The inhabitants of both turned out to discuss the matter with rifles and, when last seen that night, were engaged in a lively skirmish. Apparently, however, they soon forgot their differences. The rumour that the cavalry had been fired on preceded them to camp, and the prospects of some opposition were everywhere hailed with satisfaction. Many had begun to think that the Mohmand expedition was going to be a mere parade, and that the tribesmen were overawed by the powerful forces employed. They were soon to be undeceived. I watched the squadrons return. Behind them the Mamund Valley was already dark with the shadows of the evening and the heavy clouds that had hung over it all day. They were vastly pleased with themselves. Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result. The sowars sat their horses with conscious pride. Some of the younger officers still showed the flush of excitement on their cheeks. But they pretended excellently well to have forgotten all about the matter. They believed a few fellows had "sniped" at them; that was all. But it was by no means all. Whatever is the Afhgan equivalent of the "Fiery Cross" was circulated among the tribes. There was no time for them to gather to attack that night, and the situation of the camp in the open was unsuited to night firing. The other brigade was coming. They would wait. They therefore contented themselves with firing occasional shots, beginning while we were at dinner, and continuing at intervals until daylight. No one was hurt, but we may imagine that the tribesmen, who spent the night prowling about the nullahs, and firing from time to time, returned to their countrymen next morning boasting of what they had done. "Alone, while ye all slumbered and slept, in the night, in the darkness, I, even I, have attacked the camp of the accursed ones and have slain a Sahib. Is it not so, my brothers?" Whereupon the brothers, hoping he would some day corroborate a lie for them, replied, that it was undoubtedly so, and that he had deserved well of the tribe. Such is the reward of the "sniper." Early next morning the 3rd Brigade and three squadrons of the 11th Bengal Lancers moved on to Nawagai and crossed the pass without opposition. The general and Headquarters staff accompanied them, and we found ourselves in a wide and extensive valley, on the far side of which the Bedmanai Pass could be plainly seen. Here, at last, we got definite information of the Mohmands' intentions. The Hadda Mullah with 1000 tribesmen had gathered to oppose the further advance. After all there would be a fight. In the evening Sir Bindon Blood, taking a squadron of cavalry, rode out to reconnoitre the approaches to the pass and the general configuration of the ground. On his return he sent a despatch to the Government of India, that he would force it on the 18th. The soldiers, especially the British troops, who had not yet been engaged, eagerly looked forward to the approaching action. But events were destined to a different course. It was already dusk when we returned from the reconnaissance. The evening was pleasant and we dined in the open air. Still the valley was very dark. The mountains showed a velvet black. Presently the moon rose. I repress the inclination to try to describe the beauty of the scene, as the valley was swiftly flooded with that mysterious light. All the suitable words have probably been employed many times by numerous writers and skipped by countless readers. Indeed I am inclined to think, that these elaborate descriptions convey little to those who have not seen, and are unnecessary to those who have. Nature will not be admired by proxy. In times of war, however, especially of frontier war, the importance of the moon is brought home to everybody. "What time does it rise to-night?" is the question that recurs; for other things--attacks, "sniping," rushes,--besides the tides are influenced by its movements. Meanwhile, as at Nawagai, at a peaceful camp and a quiet dinner we watched the "silvery maiden" swiftly appear over the eastern mountains. She was gazing on a different scene eleven miles away, in the valley we had left. The 2nd Brigade had marched that morning from Jar to the foot of the Rambat Pass, which it was intended to cross the next day. Brigadier-General Jefferys, in anticipation of this movement, sent the Buffs up to hold the Kotal, and camped at the foot with the rest of his force. The situation of the camp, which had been adopted with a view to the advance at daybreak, favored the approach of an enemy. The ground was broken and intersected by numerous small and tortuous nullahs, and strewn with rocks. Any other site would, however, have necessitated a long march the next day, and no attack was thought likely. At 8.15, as the officers were finishing dinner, three shots rang out in the silence. They were a signal. Instantly brisk firing broke out from the nullahs on the face of the square occupied by the Guides Infantry. Bullets whistled all about the camp, ripping through the tents and killing and wounding the animals. The Guides returned the fire with steadiness, and, as the shelter trench they had dug in front of their section of the line was higher than at other parts, no officers or men were hit. At ten o'clock a bugler among the enemy sounded the "Retire," and the fire dwindled to a few dropping shots. All were congratulating themselves on a termination of the event, when at 10.30 the attack was renewed with vigour on the opposite side of the camp, occupied by the 38th Dogras. The enemy, who were largely armed with Martini-Henry rifles, crept up to within 100 yards of the trenches. These were only about eighteen inches high, but afforded sufficient cover to the soldiers. The officers, with a splendid disregard of the danger, exposed themselves freely. Walking coolly up and down in the brilliant moonlight they were excellent targets. The brigadier proceeded himself to the threatened side of the camp, to control the firing and prevent the waste of ammunition. A good many thousand rounds were, however, fired away without much result. Several star shells were also fired by the battery. The ground was so broken that they revealed very little, but the tribesmen were alarmed by the smell they made, thinking it a poisonous gas. The officers were directed to take cover, but the necessity of sending messages and regulating the fire involved a great deal of exposure. And to all who showed above the trench the danger was great. Captain Tomkins of the 38th Dogras was shot through the heart, and a few minutes later the adjutant of the regiment, Lieutenant Bailey, was also killed. In assisting to take these officers to the hospital, where a rough shelter of boxes had been improvised, Lieutenant Harington, an officer attached to the Dogras, received a bullet in the back of the head, which penetrated his brain and inflicted injuries from which he died subsequently. All tents were struck and as much cover as could be made from grain-bags and biscuit-boxes was arranged. At 2.15 the firing ceased and the enemy drew off, taking their killed and wounded with them. They had no mind to be surprised by daylight, away from their hills. But they had already remained a little too long. As soon as the light allowed, the cavalry squadron under Captain Cole started in pursuit. After a long gallop down the valley, he caught one party making for the mountains. Charging immediately, he succeeded in spearing twenty-one of these before they could reach the rocks. The squadron then dismounted and opened fire with their carbines. But the tribesmen turned at once and made a dash in the direction of the led horses. A sowar was wounded and a couple of horses killed. The cavalrymen, threatened in a vital point, ran hurriedly back, and just got into their saddles in time. In the haste of mounting four horses got loose and galloped away, leaving six dismounted men. Captain Cole placed one of them before him on the saddle, and the troopers followed his example. The squadron thus encumbered, retired, and after getting out of range, succeeded in catching their loose horses again. The enemy, seeing the cavalry mounted once more, took refuge on the hills. But it was evident, they were eager for fighting. The casualties in the night attack of Markhanai were as follows:-- BRITISH OFFICERS. Killed--Capt. W.E. Tomkins, 38th Dogras. " Lieut. A.W. Bailey, 38th Dogras. Died of wounds--Lieut. H.A. Harington, attd. 38th Dogras. NATIVE OFFICER. Wounded......... 1 NATIVE SOLDIERS. Killed. Wounded. No.8 Mountain Battery.... 1 1 35th Sikhs....... 1 3 38th Dogras....... 1 0 Guides Infantry...... 0 1 Followers....... 2 2 Total Casualties, 16; and 98 horses and mules. Meanwhile, the 3rd Brigade had passed a tranquil night at Nawagai. Next morning, however, at about six o'clock, a message was heliographed from the Buffs on the Rambat Pass, to the effect that an attack had been made on General Jeffreys' camp; that heavy firing had continued all night, and that several officers were among the casualties. This news set every one agog. While we were breakfasting, a native officer and ten sowars of the 11th Bengal Lancers arrived at speed with full details: six hours' fighting with the Mamunds: three officers killed or mortally wounded; and nearly a hundred animals hit. In consequence of this information, Sir Bindon Blood cancelled the orders for the passage of the Rambat Pass and instructed General Jeffreys to enter the Mamund Valley and thoroughly chastise the tribesmen. I was allowed to go back with the native officer's escort to the 2nd Brigade, in order to witness the operations which had been ordered. Judiciously selecting a few things, which could be carried on the saddle, of which the most important were a cloak, some chocolate and a tooth-brush, I hurried after the escort, who had already started, and overtook them just as they had got through the pass of Nawagai. For the first six miles the road lay through a network of deep ravines, through which the troopers picked their way very carefully. It would have been a bad place for a small party to have been attacked in, but fortunately, though several armed tribesmen were seen, they did not fire at us. At one point the route lay through a deep nullah, along which some of the assailants of the night before had retired. These were probably from the Charmanga Valley. They had evidently suffered losses. Several native beds on which wounded men had been carried lay scattered about. At this place they had probably found some oxen, to which they had transferred their bodies. At length we got clear of the difficult ground, and entering the smooth plain of Nawagai looked out eagerly for the brigade. Seven miles away across the valley was a long brown streak. It was the troops marching from Markhanai to the entrance of the Mamund Valley. The smoke of five burning villages rose in a tall column into the air--blue against the mountains, brown against the sky. An hour's riding brought us to the brigade. Every one was full of the events of the night, and all looked worn from having had no sleep. "You were very lucky to be out of it," they said. "There's plenty more coming." The cavalry soon returned from their pursuit. The points of their lances were covered with dark smears. A sowar displayed his weapon proudly to some Sikhs, who grinned in appreciation. "How many?" was the question asked on all sides. "Twenty-one," replied the officer. "But they're full of fight." Orders were now issued for the brigade to camp on the open ground near Inayat Kila, which, translated, means Fort Grant, and is the name of a considerable stone stronghold belonging to the Khan of Khar. Although the troops were very tired from their march, and the fighting of the preceding night, they began entrenching with alacrity. Besides making an outer wall to the camp, about three and a half feet high, everybody scratched a little hole for himself. In these occupations the afternoon passed. The Buffs came in at sunset, having marched from the top of the Rambat Pass. They had heard the firing of the night and were disappointed at having been absent. It was "just their luck," they said. During the Chitral campaign of 1895, they had had the ill-fortune to miss every engagement. It would be the same now. All tried to reassure them. As soon as it was dark an attack was probable. A dropping fire began after dinner from the great nullah to the north of the camp, and all lights were put out and the tents struck. Every one retired to the soup-plate he had scooped in the earth. But no attack was made. The enemy had informed the political officer through the friendlies, that they were weary and would rest that night. They sent a few "snipers" to fire into the camp, and these kept up a desultory fusillade until about two o'clock, when they drew off. Those who had been deprived of their rest the night before soon dropped off to sleep, in spite of the firing. Others, not overpowered by weariness, found no occupation but to lie in their holes and contemplate the stars--those impartial stars which shine as calmly on Piccadilly Circus as on Inayat Kila. CHAPTER XI: THE ACTION OF THE MAMUND VALLEY, 16TH SEPTEMBER Sound as of bugle in camp, how it rings through the chill air of morning, Bidding the soldier arise, he must wake and be armed ere the light. Firm be your faith and your feet, when the sun's burning rays shall be o'er you. When the rifles are ranging in line, and the clear note of battle is blown. "A Sermon in Lower Bengal," SIR A. LYALL. The story has now reached a point which I cannot help regarding as its climax. The action of the Mamund Valley is recalled to me by so many vivid incidents and enduring memories, that it assumes an importance which is perhaps beyond its true historic proportions. Throughout the reader must make allowances for what I have called the personal perspective. Throughout he must remember, how small is the scale of operations. The panorama is not filled with masses of troops. He will not hear the thunder of a hundred guns. No cavalry brigades whirl by with flashing swords. No infantry divisions are applied at critical points. The looker-on will see only the hillside, and may, if he watches with care, distinguish a few brown clad men moving slowly about it, dwarfed almost to invisibility by the size of the landscape. I hope to take him close enough, to see what these men are doing and suffering; what their conduct is and what their fortunes are. But I would ask him to observe that, in what is written, I rigidly adhere to my role of a spectator. If by any phrase or sentence I am found to depart from this, I shall submit to whatever evil things the ingenuity of malice may suggest. On the morning of the 16th, in pursuance of Sir Bindon Blood's orders, Brigadier-General Jeffreys moved out of his entrenched camp at Inayat Kila, and entered the Mamund Valley. His intentions were, to chastise the tribesmen by burning and blowing up all defensible villages within reach of the troops. It was hoped, that this might be accomplished in a single day, and that the brigade, having asserted its strength, would be able to march on the 17th to Nawagai and take part in the attack on the Bedmanai Pass, which had been fixed for the 18th. Events proved this hope to be vain, but it must be remembered, that up to this time no serious opposition had been offered by the tribesmen to the columns, and that no news of any gathering had been reported to the general. The valley appeared deserted. The villages looked insignificant and defenceless. It was everywhere asserted that the enemy would not stand. Reveille sounded at half-past five, and at six o'clock the brigade marched out. In order to deal with the whole valley at once, the force was divided into three columns, to which were assigned the following tasks:-- I. The right column, under Lieut.-Col. Vivian, consisting of the 38th Dogras and some sappers, was ordered to attack the village of Domodoloh. II. The centre column, under Colonel Goldney, consisting of six companies Buffs, six companies 35th Sikhs, a half-company sappers, four guns of No.8 Mountain Battery and the squadron of the 11th Bengal Lancers, was ordered to proceed to the head of the valley, and destroy the villages of Badelai and Shahi-Tangi (pronounced Shytungy). III. The left column, under Major Campbell, consisting of five companies of the Guides Infantry, and some sappers, was directed against several villages at the western end of the valley. Two guns and two companies from each battalion were left to protect the camp, and a third company of the Guides was detached to protect the survey party. This reduced the strength of the infantry in the field to twenty-three companies, or slightly over 1200 men. Deducting the 300 men of the 38th Dogras who were not engaged, the total force employed in the action was about 1000 men of all arms. It will be convenient to deal with the fortunes of the right column first. Lieut.-Colonel Vivian, after a march of six miles, arrived before the village of Domodoloh at about 9 A.M. He found it strongly held by the enemy, whose aspect was so formidable, that he did not consider himself strong enough to attack without artillery and supports, and with prudence returned to camp, which he reached about 4 P.M. Two men were wounded by long-range fire. The centre column advanced covered by Captain Cole's squadron of Lancers, to which I attached myself. At about seven o'clock we observed the enemy on a conical hill on the northern slopes of the valley. Through the telescope, an instrument often far more useful to cavalry than field-glasses, it was possible to distinguish their figures. Long lines of men clad in blue or white, each with his weapon upright beside him, were squatting on the terraces. Information was immediately sent back to Colonel Goldney. The infantry, eager for action, hurried their march. The cavalry advanced to within 1000 yards of the hills. For some time the tribesmen sat and watched the gradual deployment of the troops, which was developing in the plain below them. Then, as the guns and infantry approached, they turned and began slowly to climb the face of the mountain. In hopes of delaying them or inducing them to fight, the cavalry now trotted to within closer range, and dismounting, opened fire at 7.30 precisely. It was immediately returned. From high up the hillside, from the cornfields at the base, and from the towers of the villages, little puffs of smoke darted. The skirmish continued for an hour without much damage to either side, as the enemy were well covered by the broken ground and the soldiers by the gravestones and trees of a cemetery. Then the infantry began to arrive. The Buffs had been detached from Colonel Goldney's column and were moving against the village of Badelai. The 35th Sikhs proceeded towards the long ridge, round the corner of which Shahi-Tangi stands. As they crossed our front slowly--and rather wearily, for they were fatigued by the rapid marching--the cavalry mounted and rode off in quest of more congenial work with the cavalryman's weapon--the lance. I followed the fortunes of the Sikhs. Very little opposition was encountered. A few daring sharpshooters fired at the leading companies from the high corn. Others fired long-range shots from the mountains. Neither caused any loss. Colonel Goldney now ordered one and a half companies, under Captain Ryder, to clear the conical hill, and protect the right of the regiment from the fire--from the mountains. These men, about seventy-five in number, began climbing the steep slope; nor did I see them again till much later in the day. The remaining four and a half companies continued to advance. The line lay through high crops on terraces, rising one above the other. The troops toiled up these, clearing the enemy out of a few towers they tried to hold. Half a company was left with the dressing station near the cemetery, and two more were posted as supports at the bottom of the hills. The other two commenced the ascent of the long spur which leads to Shahi-Tangi. It is impossible to realise without seeing, how very slowly troops move on hillsides. It was eleven o'clock before the village was reached. The enemy fell back "sniping," and doing hardly any damage. Everybody condemned their pusillanimity in making off without a fight. Part of the village and some stacks of bhoosa, a kind of chopped straw, were set on fire, and the two companies prepared to return to camp. But at about eight the cavalry patrols had reported the enemy in great strength at the northwest end of the valley. In consequence of this Brigadier-General Jeffreys ordered the Guides Infantry to join the main column. [Copy of message showing the time:--"To Officer, Commanding Guides Infantry.--Despatched 8.15 A.M. Received 8.57 A.M. Enemy collecting at Kanra; come up at once on Colonel Goldney's left. C. Powell, Major, D.A.Q.M.G."] Major Campbell at once collected his men, who were engaged in foraging, and hurried towards Colonel Goldney's force. After a march of five miles, he came in contact with the enemy in strength on his left front, and firing at once became heavy. At the sound of the musketry the Buffs were recalled from the village of Badelai and also marched to support the 35th Sikhs. While both these regiments were hurrying to the scene, the sound of loud firing first made us realise that our position at the head of the spur near Shahi-Tangi was one of increasing danger. The pressure on the left threatened the line of retreat, and no supports were available within a mile. A retirement was at once ordered. Up to this moment hardly any of the tribesmen had been seen. It appeared as if the retirement of the two companies was the signal for their attack. I am inclined to think, however, that this was part of the general advance of the enemy, and that even had no retirement been ordered the advanced companies would have been assailed. In any case the aspect of affairs immediately changed. From far up the hillsides men came running swiftly down, dropping from ledge to ledge, and dodging from rock to rock. The firing increased on every hand. Half a company was left to cover the withdrawal. The Sikhs made excellent practice on the advancing enemy, who approached by twos and threes, making little rushes from one patch of cover to another. At length a considerable number had accumulated behind some rocks about a hundred yards away. The firing now became heavy and the half-company, finding its flank threatened, fell back to the next position. A digression is necessary to explain the peculiar configuration of the ground. The spur, at the top of which the village stands, consists of three rocky knolls, each one higher than the other, as the main hill is approached. These are connected by open necks of ground, which are commanded by fire from both flanks. In section the ground resembles a switchback railway. The first of these knolls was evacuated without loss, and the open space to the next quickly traversed. I think a couple of men fell here, and were safely carried away. The second knoll was commanded by the first, on to which the enemy climbed, and from which they began firing. Again the companies retired. Lieutenant Cassells remained behind with about eight men, to hold the knoll until the rest had crossed the open space. As soon as they were clear they shouted to him to retire. He gave the order. Till this time the skirmishing of the morning might have afforded pleasure to the neuropath, experience to the soldier, "copy" to the journalist. Now suddenly black tragedy burst upon the scene, and all excitement died out amid a multitude of vivid trifles. As Lieutenant Cassells rose to leave the knoll, he turned sharply and fell on the ground. Two Sepoys immediately caught hold of him. One fell shot through the leg. A soldier who had continued firing sprang into the air, and, falling, began to bleed with strange and terrible rapidity from his mouth and chest. Another turned on his back kicking and twisting. A fourth lay quite still. Thus in the time it takes to write half the little party were killed or wounded. The enemy had worked round both flanks and had also the command. Their fire was accurate. Two officers, the subadar major, by name Mangol Singh, and three or four Sepoys ran forward from the second knoll, to help in carrying the wounded off. Before they reached the spot, two more men were hit. The subadar major seized Lieutenant Cassells, who was covered with blood and unable to stand, but anxious to remain in the firing line. The others caught hold of the injured and began dragging them roughly over the sharp rocks in spite of their screams and groans. Before we had gone thirty yards from the knoll, the enemy rushed on to it, and began firing. Lieutenant Hughes, the adjutant of the regiment, and one of the most popular officers on the frontier, was killed. The bullets passed in the air with a curious sucking noise, like that produced by drawing the air between the lips. Several men also fell. Lieut.-Colonel Bradshaw ordered two Sepoys to carry the officer's body away. This they began to do. Suddenly a scattered crowd of tribesmen rushed over the crest of the hill and charged sword in hand, hurling great stones. It became impossible to remain an impassive spectator. Several of the wounded were dropped. The subadar major stuck to Lieutenant Cassells, and it is to him the lieutenant owes his life. The men carrying the other officer, dropped him and fled. The body sprawled upon the ground. A tall man in dirty white linen pounced down upon it with a curved sword. It was a horrible sight. Had the swordsmen charged home, they would have cut everybody down. But they did not. These wild men of the mountains were afraid of closing. The retirement continued. Five or six times the two companies, now concentrated, endeavoured to stand. Each time the tribesmen pressed round both flanks. They had the whole advantage of ground, and commanded, as well as out-flanked the Sikhs. At length the bottom of the spur was reached, and the remainder of the two companies turned to bay in the nullah with fixed bayonets. The tribesmen came on impetuously, but stopped thirty yards away, howling, firing and waving their swords. No other troops were in sight, except our cavalry, who could be seen retiring in loose squadron column--probably after their charge. They could give no assistance. The Buffs were nearly a mile away. Things looked grave. Colonel Goldney himself tried to re-form the men. The Sikhs, who now numbered perhaps sixty, were hard pressed, and fired without effect. Then some one--who it was is uncertain--ordered the bugler to sound the "charge." The shrill notes rang out not once but a dozen times. Every one began to shout. The officers waved their swords frantically. Then the Sikhs commenced to move slowly forward towards the enemy, cheering. It was a supreme moment. The tribesmen turned, and began to retreat. Instantly the soldiers opened a steady fire, shooting down their late persecutors with savage energy. Then for the first time, I perceived that the repulse was general along the whole front. What I have described was only an incident. But the reader may learn from the account the explanation of many of our losses in the frontier war. The troops, brave and well-armed, but encumbered with wounded, exhausted by climbing and overpowered by superior force, had been ordered to retire. This is an operation too difficult for a weak force to accomplish. Unless supports are at hand, they must be punished severely, and the small covering parties, who remain to check the enemy, will very often be cut to pieces, or shot down. Afterwards in the Mamund Valley whole battalions were employed to do what these two Sikh companies had attempted. But Sikhs need no one to bear witness to their courage. During the retirement down the spur, I was unable to observe the general aspect of the action, and now in describing it, I have dealt only with the misadventures of one insignificant unit. It is due to the personal perspective. While the two advanced companies were being driven down the hill, a general attack was made along the whole left front of the brigade, by at least 2000 tribesmen, most of whom were armed with rifles. To resist this attack there were the cavalry, the two supporting companies of the 35th Sikhs and five of the Guides Infantry, who were arriving. All became engaged. Displaying their standards, the enemy advanced with great courage in the face of a heavy fire. Many were killed and wounded, but they continued to advance, in a long skirmish line, on the troops. One company of the 35th became seriously involved. Seeing this, Captain Cole moved his squadron forward, and though the ground was broken, charged. The enemy took refuge in the nullah, tumbling into it standards and all, and opened a sharp fire on the cavalry at close range, hitting several horses and men. The squadron fell back. But the moral effect of their advance had been tremendous. The whole attack came to a standstill. The infantry fire continued. Then the tribesmen began to retire, and they were finally repulsed at about twelve o'clock. An opportunity was now presented of breaking off the action. The brigade had started from camp divided, and in expectation that no serious resistance would be offered. It had advanced incautiously. The leading troops had been roughly handled. The enemy had delivered a vigorous counter attack. That attack had been repulsed with slaughter, and the brigade was concentrated. Considering the fatigues to which the infantry had been exposed, it would perhaps have been more prudent to return to camp and begin again next morning. But Brigadier-General Jeffries was determined to complete the destruction of Shahi-Tangi, and to recover the body of Lieutenant Hughes, which remained in the hands of the enemy. It was a bold course. But it was approved by every officer in the force. A second attack was ordered. The Guides were to hold the enemy in check on the left. The Buffs, supported by the 35th Sikhs, were to take the village. Orders were signalled back to camp for all the available troops to reinforce the column in the field, and six fresh companies consequently started. At one o'clock the advance recommenced, the guns came into action on a ridge on the right of the brigade, and shelled the village continuously. Again the enemy fell back "sniping," and very few of them were to be seen. But to climb the hill alone took two hours. The village was occupied at three o'clock, and completely destroyed by the Buffs. At 3.30 orders reached them to return to camp, and the second withdrawal began. Again the enemy pressed with vigour, but this time there were ten companies on the spur instead of two, and the Buffs, who became rear-guard, held everything at a distance with their Lee-Metford rifles. At a quarter to five the troops were clear of the hills and we looked about us. While this second attack was being carried out, the afternoon had slipped away. At about two o'clock Major Campbell and Captain Cole, both officers of great experience on the frontier, had realised the fact, that the debate with the tribesmen could not be carried to a conclusion that day. At their suggestion a message was heliographed up to the General's staff officer on the spur near the guns, as follows: "It is now 2.30. Remember we shall have to fight our way home." But the brigadier had already foreseen this possibility, and had, as described, issued orders for the return march. These orders did not reach Captain Ryder's company on the extreme right until they had become hard pressed by the increasing attack of the enemy. Their wounded delayed their retirement. They had pushed far up the mountain side, apparently with the idea they were to crown the heights, and we now saw them two miles away on the sky line hotly engaged. While I was taking advantage of a temporary halt, to feed and water my pony, Lieutenant MacNaghten of the 16th Lancers pointed them out to me, and we watched them through our glasses. It was a strange sight. Little figures running about confusedly, tiny puffs of smoke, a miniature officer silhouetted against the sky waving his sword. It seemed impossible to believe that they were fighting for their lives, or indeed in any danger. It all looked so small and unreal. They were, however, hard pressed, and had signalled that they were running out of cartridges. It was then five o'clock, and the approach of darkness was accelerated by the heavy thunderclouds which were gathering over the northern mountains. At about 3.30 the brigadier had ordered the Guides to proceed to Ryder's assistance and endeavour to extricate his company. He directed Major Campbell to use his own discretion. It was a difficult problem, but the Guides and their leader were equal to it. They had begun the day on the extreme left. They had hurried to the centre. Now they were ordered to the extreme right. They had already marched sixteen miles, but they were still fresh. We watched them defiling across the front, with admiration. Meanwhile, the retirement of the brigade was delayed. It was necessary that all units should support each other, and the troops had to wait till the Guides had succeeded in extricating Ryder. The enemy now came on in great strength from the north-western end of the valley, which had been swarming with them all day, so that for the first time the action presented a fine spectacle. Across the broad plain the whole of the brigade was in echelon. On the extreme right Ryder's company and the Guides Infantry were both severely engaged. Half a mile away to the left rear the battery, the sappers and two companies of the 35th Sikhs were slowly retiring. Still farther to the left were the remainder of the 35th, and, at an interval of half a mile, the Buffs. The cavalry protected the extreme left flank. This long line of troops, who were visible to each other but divided by the deep broad nullahs which intersected the whole plain, fell back slowly, halting frequently to keep touch. Seven hundred yards away were the enemy, coming on in a great half-moon nearly three miles long and firing continually. Their fire was effective, and among other casualties at this time Lieutenant Crawford, R.A., was killed. Their figures showed in rows of little white dots. The darkness fell swiftly. The smoke puffs became fire flashes. Great black clouds overspread the valley and thunder began to roll. The daylight died away. The picture became obscured, and presently it was pitch dark. All communication, all mutual support, all general control now ceased. Each body of troops closed up and made the best of their way to the camp, which was about seven miles off. A severe thunderstorm broke overhead. The vivid lightning displayed the marching columns and enabled the enemy to aim. Individual tribesmen ran up, shouting insults, to within fifty yards of the Buffs and discharged their rifles. They were answered with such taunts as the limited Pushtu of the British soldier allows and careful volleys. The troops displayed the greatest steadiness. The men were determined, the officers cheery, the shooting accurate. At half-past eight the enemy ceased to worry us. We thought we had driven them off, but they had found a better quarry. The last two miles to camp were painful. After the cessation of the firing the fatigue of the soldiers asserted itself. The Buffs had been marching and fighting continuously for thirteen hours. They had had no food, except their early morning biscuit, since the preceding night. The older and more seasoned amongst them laughed at their troubles, declaring they would have breakfast, dinner and tea together when they got home. The younger ones collapsed in all directions. The officers carried their rifles. Such ponies and mules as were available were laden with exhausted soldiers. Nor was this all. Other troops had passed before us, and more than a dozen Sepoys of different regiments were lying senseless by the roadside. All these were eventually carried in by the rear-guard, and the Buffs reached camp at nine o'clock. Meanwhile, the Guides had performed a brilliant feat of arms, and had rescued the remnants of the isolated company from the clutches of the enemy. After a hurried march they arrived at the foot of the hill down which Ryder's men were retiring. The Sikhs, utterly exhausted by the exertions of the day, were in disorder, and in many cases unable from extreme fatigue even to use their weapons. The tribesmen hung in a crowd on the flanks and rear of the struggling company, firing incessantly and even dashing in and cutting down individual soldiers. Both officers were wounded. Lieutenant Gunning staggered down the hill unaided, struck in three places by bullets and with two deep sword cuts besides. Weary, outnumbered, surrounded on three sides, without unwounded officers or cartridges, the end was only a matter of moments. All must have been cut to pieces. But help was now at hand. The Guides formed line, fixed bayonets and advanced at the double towards the hill. At a short distance from its foot they halted and opened a terrible and crushing fire upon the exulting enemy. The loud detonations of their company volleys were heard and the smoke seen all over the field, and on the left we wondered what was happening. The tribesmen, sharply checked, wavered. The company continued its retreat. Many brave deeds were done as the night closed in. Havildar Ali Gul, of the Afridi Company of the Guides, seized a canvas cartridge carrier, a sort of loose jacket with large pockets, filled it with ammunition from his men's pouches, and rushing across the fire-swept space, which separated the regiment from the Sikhs, distributed the precious packets to the struggling men. Returning he carried a wounded native officer on his back. Seeing this several Afridis in the Guides ran forward, shouting and cheering, to the rescue, and other wounded Sikhs were saved by their gallantry from a fearful fate. At last Ryder's company reached the bottom of the hill and the survivors re-formed under cover of the Guides. These, thrown on their own resources, separated from the rest of the brigade by darkness and distance and assailed on three sides by the enemy, calmly proceeded to fight their way back to camp. Though encumbered with many wounded and amid broken ground, they repulsed every attack, and bore down all the efforts which the tribesmen made to intercept their line of retreat. They reached camp at 9.30 in safety, and not without honour. The skill and experience of their officers, the endurance and spirit of the men, had enabled them to accomplish a task which many had believed impossible, and their conduct in the action of the Mamund Valley fills a brilliant page in the history of the finest and most famous frontier regiment. [The gallantry of the two officers, Captain Hodson and Lieut. Codrington, who commanded the two most exposed companies, was the subject of a special mention in despatches, and the whole regiment were afterwards complimented by Brigadier-General Jeffreys on their fine performance.] As the Buffs reached the camp the rain which had hitherto held off came down. It poured. The darkness was intense. The camp became a sea of mud. In expectation that the enemy would attack it, General Jeffreys had signalled in an order to reduce the perimeter. The camp was therefore closed up to half its original size. Most of the tents had been struck and lay with the baggage piled in confused heaps on the ground. Many of the transport animals were loose and wandering about the crowded space. Dinner or shelter there was none. The soldiers, thoroughly exhausted, lay down supperless in the slush. The condition of the wounded was particularly painful. Among the tents which had been struck were several of the field hospitals. In the darkness and rain it was impossible to do more for the poor fellows than to improve the preliminary dressings and give morphia injections, nor was it till four o'clock on the next afternoon that the last were taken out of the doolies. After about an hour the rain stopped, and while the officers were bustling about making their men get some food before they went to sleep, it was realised that all the troops were not in camp. The general, the battery, the sappers and four companies of infantry were still in the valley. Presently we heard the firing of guns. They were being attacked,--overwhelmed perhaps. To send them assistance was to risk more troops being cut off. The Buffs who were dead beat, the Sikhs who had suffered most severe losses, and the Guides who had been marching and fighting all day, were not to be thought of. The 38th Dogras were, however, tolerably fresh, and Colonel Goldney, who commanded in the absence of the General, at once ordered four companies to parade and march to the relief. Captain Cole volunteered to accompany them with a dozen sowars. The horses were saddled. But the order was countermanded, and no troops left the camp that night. Whether this decision was justified or not the reader shall decide. In the darkness and the broken ground it was probable the relief would never have found the general. It was possible that getting involved among the nullahs they would have been destroyed. The defenders of the camp itself were none too many. The numbers of the enemy were unknown. These were weighty reasons. On the other hand it seemed unsoldierly to lie down to sleep while at intervals the booming of the guns reminded us, that comrades were fighting for their lives a few miles away in the valley. CHAPTER XII: AT INAYAT KILA "Two thousand pounds of education Drops to a ten-rupee jezail. . . . . . . Strike hard who cares. Shoot straight who can. The odds are on the cheaper man." RUDYARD KIPLING. Half an hour before dawn on the 17th, the cavalry were mounted, and as soon as the light was strong enough to find a way through the broken ground, the squadron started in search of the missing troops. We had heard no more of their guns since about two o'clock. We therefore concluded they had beaten off the enemy. There might, of course, be another reason for their silence. As we drew near Bilot, it was possible to distinguish the figures of men moving about the walls and houses. The advanced files rode cautiously forward. Suddenly they cantered up to the wall and we knew some at least were alive. Captain Cole, turning to his squadron, lifted his hand. The sowars, actuated by a common impulse, rose in their stirrups and began to cheer. But there was no response. Nor was this strange. The village was a shambles. In an angle of the outside wall, protected on the third side by a shallow trench, were the survivors of the fight. All around lay the corpses of men and mules. The bodies of five or six native soldiers were being buried in a hurriedly dug grave. It was thought that, as they were Mahommedans, their resting-place would be respected by the tribesmen. [These bodies were afterwards dug up and mutilated by the natives: a foul act which excited the fury and indignation of soldiers of every creed in the force. I draw the reader's attention to this unpleasant subject, only to justify what I have said in an earlier chapter of the degradation of mind in which the savages of the mountains are sunk.] Eighteen wounded men lay side by side in a roofless hut. Their faces, drawn by pain and anxiety, looked ghastly in the pale light of the early morning. Two officers, one with his left hand smashed, the other shot through both legs, were patiently waiting for the moment when the improvised tourniquets could be removed and some relief afforded to their sufferings. The brigadier, his khaki coat stained with the blood from a wound on his head, was talking to his only staff-officer, whose helmet displayed a bullet-hole. The most ardent lover of realism would have been satisfied. Food, doolies, and doctors soon arrived. The wounded were brought to the field hospitals to be attended to. The unwounded hurried back to camp to get breakfast and a bath. In half an hour, the ill-omened spot was occupied only by the few sowars engaged in shooting the wounded mules, and by the vultures who watched the proceedings with an expectant interest. Gradually we learnt the story of the night. The battery, about thirty sappers and half the 35th Sikhs, were returning to camp. At about seven o'clock an order was sent for them to halt and remain out all night, to assist the Guides Infantry, whose firing could be heard and for whose safety the brigadier was above all things anxious. This order reached the battery, and with the sappers as an escort they turned back, recrossed a nullah and met the general with two companies of Sikhs outside the village of Bilot. The half-battalion of the 35th did not apparently receive the order, for they continued their march. Lieutenant Wynter, R.A., was sent back to look for them. He did not find them, but fell in with four fresh companies, two of the Guides and two of the 35th, who, under Major Worlledge, had been sent from camp in response to the general's demand for reinforcements. Lieutenant Wynter brought these back, as an escort to the guns. On arrival at the village, the brigadier at once sent them to the assistance of the Guides. He counted on his own two companies of Sikhs. But when Worlledge had moved off and had already vanished in the night, it was found that these two companies had disappeared. They had lost touch in the darkness, and, not perceiving that the general had halted, had gone on towards camp. Thus the battery was left with no other escort than thirty sappers. A party of twelve men of the Buffs now arrived, and the circumstances which led them to the guns are worth recording. When the Buffs were retiring through the villages, they held a Mahommedan cemetery for a little while, in order to check the enemy's advance. Whilst there, Lieutenant Byron, Orderly Officer to General Jeffreys, rode up and told Major Moody, who commanded the rear companies, that a wounded officer was lying in a dooly a hundred yards up the road, without any escort. He asked for a few men. Moody issued an order, and a dozen soldiers under a corporal started to look for the dooly. They missed it, but while searching, found the general and the battery outside the village. The presence of these twelve brave men--for they fully maintained the honour of their regiment--with their magazine rifles, just turned the scale. Had not the luck of the British army led them to the village, it can hardly be doubted, and certainly was not doubted by any who were there, that the guns would have been captured and the general killed. Fortune, especially in war, uses tiny fulcra for her powerful lever. The general now ordered the battery and sappers to go into the village, but it was so full of burning bhoosa, that this was found to be impossible, and they set to work to entrench themselves outside. The village was soon full of the enemy. From the walls and houses, which on two sides commanded the space occupied by the battery, they began to fire at about thirty yards' range. The troops were as much exposed as if they had been in a racket court, of which the enemy held the walls. They could not move, because they would have had to desert either the guns or the wounded. Fortunately, not many of the tribesmen at this point were armed with rifles. The others threw stones and burning bhoosa into the midst of the little garrison. By its light they took good aim. Everybody got under such cover as was available. There was not much. Gunner Nihala, a gallant native soldier, repeatedly extinguished the burning bhoosa with his cloak at the imminent peril of his life. Lieutenants Watson and Colvin, with their sappers and the twelve men of the Buffs, forced their way into the village, and tried to expel the enemy with the bayonet. The village was too large for so small a party to clear. The tribesmen moved from one part to another, repeatedly firing. They killed and wounded several of the soldiers, and a bullet smashed Lieutenant Watson's hand. He however continued his efforts and did not cease until again shot, this time so severely as to be unable to stand. His men carried him from the village, and it was felt that it would be useless to try again. The attention of the reader is directed to the bravery of this officer. After a long day of marching, and fighting, in the dark, without food and with small numbers, the man who will go on, unshaken and unflinching, after he has received a severe and painful wound, has in respect of personal courage few equals and no superior in the world. It is perhaps as high a form of valour to endure as to dare. The combination of both is sublime. [Both officers have received the Victoria Cross for their conduct on this occasion.] At nine o'clock the rain stopped the firing, as the tribesmen were afraid of wetting their powder, but at about ten they opened again. They now made a great hole in the wall of the village, through which about a dozen men fired with terrible effect. Others began loopholing the walls. The guns fired case shot at twenty yards' range at these fierce pioneers, smashing the walls to pieces and killing many. The enemy replied with bullets, burning bhoosa and showers of stones. So the hours dragged away. The general and Captain Birch were both wounded, early in the night. Lieutenant Wynter, while behaving with distinguished gallantry, was shot through both legs at about 11.30. He was thus twice severely wounded within forty-five days. He now continued to command his guns, until he fainted from loss of blood. A native gunner then shielded him with his body, until he also was hit. The whole scene, the close, desperate fighting, the carcasses of the mules, the officers and men crouching behind them, the flaming stacks of bhoosa, the flashes of the rifles, and over all and around all, the darkness of the night--is worthy of the pencil of De Neuville. At length, at about midnight, help arrived. Worlledge's two companies had gone in search of the Guides, but had not found them. They now returned and, hearing the firing at Bilot, sent an orderly of the 11th Bengal Lancers to ask if the general wanted assistance. This plucky boy--he was only a young recruit--rode coolly up to the village although the enemy were all around, and he stood an almost equal chance of being shot by our own men. He soon brought the two companies to the rescue, and the enemy, balked of their prey, presently drew off in the gloom. How much longer the battery and its defenders could have held out is uncertain. They were losing men steadily, and their numbers were so small that they might have been rushed at any moment. Such was the tale. No operations took place on the 17th. The soldiers rested, casualties were counted, wounds were dressed, confidence was restored. The funerals of the British officers and men, killed the day before, took place at noon. Every one who could, attended; but all the pomp of military obsequies was omitted, and there were no Union Jacks to cover the bodies, nor were volleys fired over the graves, lest the wounded should be disturbed. Somewhere in the camp--exactly where, is now purposely forgotten--the remains of those who had lost, in fighting for their country, all that men can be sure of, were silently interred. No monument marked the spot. The only assurance that it should be undisturbed is, that it remains unknown. Nevertheless, the funerals were impressive. To some the game of war brings prizes, honour, advancement, or experience; to some the consciousness of duty well discharged; and to others--spectators, perhaps--the pleasure of the play and the knowledge of men and things. But here were those who had drawn the evil numbers--who had lost their all, to gain only a soldier's grave. Looking at these shapeless forms, coffined in a regulation blanket, the pride of race, the pomp of empire, the glory of war appeared but the faint and unsubstantial fabric of a dream; and I could not help realising with Burke: "What shadows we are and what shadows we pursue." The actual casualties were, in proportion to the numbers engaged, greater than in any action of the British army in India for many years. Out of a force which at no time exceeded 1000 men, nine British officers, four native officers, and 136 soldiers were either killed or wounded. The following is the full return:-- BRITISH OFFICERS. Killed--Lieutenant and Adjutant V. Hughes, 35th Sikhs. " " A.T. Crawford, R.A. Wounded severely--Captain W.I. Ryder, attd. 35th Sikhs. " " Lieutenant O.G. Gunning, 35th Sikhs. " " " O.R. Cassells, 35th Sikhs. " " " T.C. Watson, R.E. " " " F.A. Wynter, R.A. Wounded slightly--Brigadier-General Jeffreys, Commanding 2nd Bde. M.F.F. " " Captain Birch, R.A. BRITISH SOLDIERS. Killed. Wounded. The Buffs . . . . 2 9 NATIVE RANKS. Killed. Wounded. 11th Bengal Lancers . . 0 2 No.8 Mountain Battery. . 6 21 Guides Infantry. . . 2 10 35th Sikhs. . . . 22 45 38th Dogras. . . . 0 2 Sappers.. . . . 4 15 Total Casualties, 149; with 48 horses and mules. The action of the 16th September is considered by some to have been a reverse. I do not think this view is justified by the facts. The troops accomplished every task they were set. They burned the village of Shahi-Tangi most completely, in spite of all opposition, and they inflicted on the tribesmen a loss of over 200 men. The enemy, though elated by the capture of twenty-two rifles from the bodies of the killed, were impressed by the bravery of the troops. "If," they are reported to have said, "they fight like this when they are divided, we can do nothing." Our losses were undoubtedly heavy and out of all proportion to the advantages gained. They were due to an ignorance, shared by all in the force, of the numbers and fighting power of the Mamunds. No one knew, though there were many who were wise after the event, that these tribesmen were as well armed as the troops, or that they were the brave and formidable adversaries they proved themselves. "Never despise your enemy" is an old lesson, but it has to be learnt afresh, year after year, by every nation that is warlike and brave. Our losses were also due to the isolation of Captain Ryder's company, to extricate which the whole force had to wait till overtaken by darkness. It has been said that war cannot be made without running risks, nor can operations be carried out in the face of an enemy armed with breech-loaders without loss. No tactics can altogether shield men from bullets. Those serene critics who note the errors, and forget the difficulties, who judge in safety of what was done in danger, and from the security of peace, pronounce upon the conduct of war, should remember that the spectacle of a General, wounded, his horse shot, remaining on the field with the last unit, anxious only for the safety of his soldiers, is a spectacle not unworthy of the pages of our military history. The depression, caused by the loss of amiable and gallant comrades, was dispelled by the prospects of immediate action. Sir Bindon Blood, whose position at Nawagai was now one of danger, sent the brigadier, instead of reinforcements, orders to vigorously prosecute the operations against the tribesmen, and on the morning of the 18th the force moved to attack the village of Domodoloh, which the 38th Dogras had found so strongly occupied on the 16th. Again the enemy were numerous. Again they adopted their effective tactics; but this time no chances were given them. The whole brigade marched concentrated to the attack, and formed up on the level ground just out of shot. The general and his staff rode forward and reconnoitered. The village lay in a re-entrant of the hills, from which two long spurs projected like the piers of a harbour. Behind, the mountains rose abruptly to a height of 5000 feet. The ground, embraced by the spurs, was filled with crops of maize and barley. A fort and watch-tower guarded the entrance. At 8.30 the advance was ordered. The enemy did not attempt to hold the fort, and it was promptly seized and blown up. The explosion was a strange, though, during the fighting in the Mamund Valley, not an uncommon sight. A great cloud of thick brown-red dust sprang suddenly into the air, bulging out in all directions. The tower broke in half and toppled over. A series of muffled bangs followed. The dust-cloud cleared away, and nothing but a few ruins remained. The enemy now opened fire from the spurs, both of which became crowned with little circles of white smoke. The 35th Sikhs advancing cleared the right ridge: the 38th Dogras the left. The Guides moved on the village, and up the main re-entrant itself. The Buffs were in reserve. The battery came into action on the left, and began shelling the crests of the opposite hills. Taking the range with their instruments, they fired two shots in rapid succession, each time at slightly different ranges. The little guns exploded with a loud report. Then, far up the mountain side, two balls of smoke appeared, one above the other, and after a few seconds the noise of the bursting shells came faintly back. Usually one would be a little short of--and the other a little over--the point aimed at. The next shot, by dividing the error, would go home, and the dust of the splinters and bullets would show on the peak, from which the tribesmen were firing, and it would become silent and deserted--the scene of an unregarded tragedy. Gradually the spurs were cleared of the enemy and the Guides, passing through the village, climbed up the face of the mountain and established themselves among the great rocks of the steep water-course. Isolated sharpshooters maintained a dropping fire. The company whose operations I watched,--Lieutenant Lockhart's,--killed one of these with a volley, and we found him sitting by a little pool, propped against a stone. He had been an ugly man originally, but now that the bones of his jaw and face were broken in pieces by the bullet, he was hideous to look upon. His only garment was a ragged blue linen cloak fastened at the waist. There he sat--a typical tribesman, ignorant, degraded, and squalid, yet brave and warlike; his only property, his weapon, and that his countrymen had carried off. I could not help contrasting his intrinsic value as a social organism, with that of the officers who had been killed during the week, and those lines of Kipling which appear at the beginning of this chapter were recalled to mind with a strange significance. Indeed I often heard them quoted in the Watelai Valley. The sappers had now entered the village, and were engaged in preparing the hovels of which it consisted for destruction. Their flat roofs are covered with earth, and will not burn properly, unless a hole is made first in each. This took time. Meanwhile the troops held on to the positions they had seized, and maintained a desultory fire with the enemy. At about noon the place was lighted up, and a dense cloud of smoke rose in a high column into the still air. Then the withdrawal of the troops was ordered. Immediately the enemy began their counter attack. But the Guides were handled with much skill. The retirement of each company was covered by the fire of others, judiciously posted farther down the hill. No opportunity was offered to the enemy. By one o'clock all the troops were clear of the broken ground. The Buffs assumed the duty of rear-guard, and were delighted to have a brisk little skirmish--fortunately unattended with loss of life--with the tribesmen, who soon reoccupied the burning village. This continued for, perhaps, half an hour, and meanwhile the rest of the brigade returned to camp. The casualties in this highly successful affair were small. It was the first of six such enterprises, by which Brigadier-General Jeffreys, with stubborn perseverance, broke the spirit of the Mamund tribesmen. Killed. Wounded. 35th Sikhs....... 2 3 Guides Infantry...... 0 1 38th Dogras....... 0 2 Total casualties, 8. The enemy's losses were considerable, but no reliable details could be obtained. On the 19th the troops rested, and only foraging parties left the camp. On the 20th, fighting was renewed. From the position at the entrance to the valley it was possible to see all the villages that lay in the hollows of the hills, and to distinguish not only the scenes of past but also of future actions. The particular village which was selected for chastisement was never mentioned by name, and it was not until the brigade had marched some miles from the camp, that the objective became evident. The tribesmen therefore continued in a state of "glorious uncertainty," and were unable to gather in really large numbers. At 5.30 A.M. the brigade started, and, preceded by the cavalry, marched up the valley--a long brown stream of men. Arrived nearly at the centre, the troops closed up into a more compact formation. Then suddenly the head wheeled to the left, and began marching on the village of Zagai. Immediately from high up on the face of the mountain a long column of smoke shot into the air. It was a signal fire. Other hills answered it. The affair now became a question of time. If the village could be captured and destroyed before the clans had time to gather, then there would be little fighting. But if the force were delayed or became involved, it was impossible to say on what scale the action would be. The village of Zagai stands in a similar situation to that of Domodoloh. On either side long spurs advance into the valley, and the houses are built in terraces on the sides of the hollow so formed. Great chenar trees, growing in all their luxuriant beauty out of the rocky ground by the water-course, mark the hillside with a patch of green in contrast to the background of sombre brown. As the troops approached in fine array, the sound of incessant drumming was faintly heard, varied from time to time by the notes of a bugle. The cavalry reconnoitered and trotted off to watch the flank, after reporting the place strongly occupied. The enemy displayed standards on the crests of the spurs. The advance continued: the Guides on the left, the 38th Dogras in the centre, the Buffs on the right, and the 35th Sikhs in reserve. Firing began on the left at about nine o'clock, and a quarter of an hour later the guns came into action near the centre. The Guides and Buffs now climbed the ridges to the right and left. The enemy fell back according to their custom, "sniping." Then the 38th pushed forward and occupied the village, which was handed over to the sappers to destroy. This they did most thoroughly, and at eleven o'clock a dense white smoke was rising from the houses and the stacks of bhoosa. Then the troops were ordered to withdraw. "Facilis ascensus Averni sed...;" without allowing the quotation to lead me into difficulties, I will explain that while it is usually easy to advance against an Asiatic, all retirements are matters of danger. While the village was being destroyed the enemy had been collecting. Their figures could be distinguished on the top of the mountain--a numerous line of dark dots against the sky; others had tried to come, from the adjoining valleys on the left and right. Those on the right succeeded, and the Buffs were soon sharply engaged. On the left the cavalry again demonstrated the power of their arm. A large force of tribesmen, numbering at least 600 men, endeavoured to reach the scene of action. To get there, however, they had to cross the open ground, and this, in face of the Lancers, they would not do. Many of these same tribesmen had joined in the attack on the Malakand, and had been chased all across the plain of Khar by the fierce Indian horsemen. They were not ambitious to repeat the experience. Every time they tried to cross the space, which separated them from their friends, Captain Cole trotted forward with his squadron, which was only about fifty strong, and the tribesmen immediately scurried back to the hills. For a long time they were delayed, and contented themselves by howling out to the sowars, that they would soon "make mincemeat of them," to which the latter replied that they were welcome to try. At length, realising that they could not escape the cavalry, if they left the hills, they made a long circuit and arrived about half an hour after the village was destroyed and the troops had departed. Nevertheless, as soon as the retirement was seen to be in progress, a general attack was made all along the line. On the left, the Guides were threatened by a force of about 500 men, who advanced displaying standards, and waving swords. They dispersed these and drove them away by a steady long-range fire, killing and wounding a large number. On the right, the Buffs were harassed by being commanded by another spur. Lieutenant Hasler's company, which I accompanied, was protected from this flanking fire by the ground. A great many bullets, however, hummed overhead, and being anxious to see whence these were coming, the lieutenant walked across the crest to the far side. The half-company here was briskly engaged. From a point high up the mountain an accurate fire was directed upon them. We tried to get the range of this point with the Lee-Metford rifles. It was, as nearly as could be determined, 1400 yards. The tribesmen were only armed with Martini-Henrys. They nevertheless made excellent practice. Lieutenant R.E. Power was shot through the arm and, almost immediately afterwards, Lieutenant Keene was severely wounded in the body. Luckily, the bullet struck his sword-hilt first or he would have been killed. Two or three men were also wounded here. Those who know the range and power of the Martini-Henry rifle will appreciate the skill and marksmanship which can inflict loss even at so great a range. As the retirement proceeded, the tribesmen came to closer quarters. The Buffs, however, used their formidable weapon with great effect. I witnessed one striking demonstration of its power. Lieutenant F.S. Reeves remained behind with a dozen men to cover the withdrawal of his company, and in hopes of bringing effective fire to bear on the enemy, who at this time were pressing forward boldly. Three hundred yards away was a nullah, and along this they began running, in hopes of cutting off the small party. At one point, however, the line of their advance was commanded by our fire. Presently a man ran into the open. The section fired immediately. The great advantage of the rifle was that there was no difficulty about guessing the exact range, as the fixed sight could be used. The man dropped--a spot of white. Four others rushed forward. Again there was a volley. All four fell and remained motionless. After this we made good our retreat almost unmolested. As soon as the troops were clear of the hills, the enemy occupied the rocks and ridges, and fired at the retreating soldiers. The Buffs' line of retirement lay over smooth, open ground. For ten minutes the fire was hot. Another officer and seven or eight men dropped. The ground was wet and deep, and the bullets cutting into the soft mud, made strange and curious noises. As soon as the troops got out of range, the firing ceased, as the tribesmen did not dare follow into the open. On the extreme left, considerable bodies of the enemy appeared, and for a moment it seemed that they would leave the hills and come into the plain. The cavalry, however, trotted forward, and they ran back in confusion, bunching together as they did so. The battery immediately exploded two shrapnel shells in their midst with great effect. This ended the affair, and the troops returned to camp. The casualties were as follows:-- BRITISH OFFICERS. Wounded severely--2nd Lieutenant G.N.S. Keene. " slightly--Captain L.I.B. Hulke. " " --Lieutenant R.E. Power. BRITISH SOLDIERS. Killed. Wounded. Buffs. . . . . 1 10 (Died of wounds). Native Ranks. Wounded. 38th Dogras . . .. 2 Total casualties, 16. I shall make the reader no apology for having described at such length, what was after all only a skirmish. The picture of the war on the frontier is essentially one of detail, and it is by the study of the details alone that a true impression can be obtained. On the 22nd and 23rd the villages of Dag and Tangi were respectively captured and destroyed, but as the resistance was slight and the operations were unmarked by any new features, I shall not weary the reader by further description. The casualties were:-- BRITISH OFFICER. Wounded--Major S. Moody, the Buffs. NATIVE RANKS. Killed. Wounded. Guides Infantry. . . 1 2 38th Dogras. . . . 0 2 By these operations the tribesmen of the Mamund Valley had been severely punished. Any exultation which they might have felt over the action of the 16th was completely effaced. The brigade had demonstrated its power to take and burn any village that might be selected, and had inflicted severe loss on all who attempted to impede its action. The tribesmen were now thoroughly disheartened, and on the 21st began to sue for peace. The situation was, however, complicated by the proximity of the Afghan frontier. The western side of the Mamund Valley is bounded by the mountains of the Hindu Raj range, along the summits of which is the Durand line of demarcation with the Amir. On the farther side of this range Gholam Hyder, the Afghan commander-in-chief, lay with a powerful force, which, at the time of the actions I have described, amounted to nine battalions, six squadrons and fourteen mountain guns. During the attack upon Zagai, numerous figures in khaki uniform had been observed on the higher slopes of the hills, and it was alleged that one particular group appeared to be directing the movements of the tribesmen. At any rate, I cannot doubt, nor did any one who was present during the fighting in the Mamund Valley, that the natives were aided by regular soldiers from the Afghan army, and to a greater extent by Afghan tribesmen, not only by the supply of arms and ammunition but by actual intervention. I am not in possession of sufficient evidence to pronounce on the question of the Amir's complicity in the frontier risings. It is certain, that for many years the Afghan policy has consistently been to collect and preserve agents, who might be used in raising a revolt among the Pathan tribes. But the advantages which the Amir would derive from a quarrel with the British are not apparent. It would seem more probable, that he has only tried throughout to make his friendship a matter of more importance to the Indian Government, with a view to the continuance or perhaps the increase of his subsidy. It is possible, that he has this year tested and displayed his power; and that he has desired to show us what a dangerous foe he might be, were he not so useful an ally. The question is a delicate and difficult one. Most of the evidence is contained in Secret State Papers. The inquiry would be profitless; the result possibly unwelcome. Patriotic discretion is a virtue which should at all times be zealously cultivated. I do not see that the facts I have stated diminish or increase the probability of the Amir's complicity. As the American filibusters sympathise with the Cuban insurgents; as the Jameson raiders supported the outlanders of the Transvaal, so also the soldiers and tribesmen of Afghanistan sympathised with and aided their countrymen and coreligionists across the border. Probably the Afghan Colonial Office would have been vindicated by any inquiry. It is no disparagement but rather to the honour of men, that they should be prepared to back with their lives causes which claim their sympathy. It is indeed to such men that human advancement has been due. I do not allude to this matter, to raise hostile feelings against the Afghan tribesmen or their ruler, but only to explain the difficulties encountered in the Mamund Valley by the 2nd Brigade of the Malakand Field Force: to explain how it was that defenders of obscure villages were numbered by thousands, and why the weapons of poverty-stricken agriculturists were excellent Martini-Henry rifles. The Mamunds themselves were now genuinely anxious for peace. Their valley was in our hands; their villages and crops were at our mercy; but their allies, who suffered none of these things, were eager to continue the struggle. They had captured most of the rifles of the dead soldiers on the 16th, and they had no intention of giving them up. On the other hand, it was obvious that the British Raj could not afford to be defied in this matter. We had insisted on the rifles being surrendered, and that expensive factor, Imperial prestige, demanded that we should prosecute operations till we got them, no matter what the cost might be. The rifles were worth little. The men and officers we lost were worth a great deal. It was unsound economics, but Imperialism and economics clash as often as honesty and self-interest. We were therefore committed to the policy of throwing good money after bad in order to keep up our credit; as a man who cannot pay his tradesmen, sends them fresh orders in lieu of settlement. Under these unsatisfactory conditions, the negotiations opened. They did not, however, interfere with the military situation, and the troops continued to forage daily in the valley, and the tribesmen to fire nightly into the camp. At the end of the week a message from the Queen, expressing sympathy with the sufferings of the wounded, and satisfaction at the conduct of the troops, was published in Brigade orders. It caused the most lively pleasure to all, but particularly to the native soldiers, who heard with pride and exultation that their deeds and dangers were not unnoticed by that august Sovereign before whom they know all their princes bow, and to whom the Sirkar itself is but a servant. The cynic and the socialist may sneer after their kind; yet the patriot, who examines with anxious care those forces which tend to the cohesion or disruption of great communities, will observe how much the influence of a loyal sentiment promotes the solidarity of the Empire. The reader must now accompany me to the camp of the 3rd Brigade, twelve miles away, at Nawagai. We shall return to the Mamund Valley and have a further opportunity of studying its people and natural features. CHAPTER XIII: NAWAGAI "When the wild Bajaur mountain men lay choking with their blood, And the Kafirs held their footing..." "A Sermon in Lower Bengal," SIR A. LYALL. Few spectacles in nature are so mournful and so sinister as the implacable cruelty with which a wounded animal is pursued by its fellows. Perhaps it is due to a cold and bracing climate, perhaps to a Christian civilisation, that the Western peoples of the world have to a great extent risen above this low original instinct. Among Europeans power provokes antagonism, and weakness excites pity. All is different in the East. Beyond Suez the bent of men's minds is such, that safety lies only in success, and peace in prosperity. All desert the falling. All turn upon the fallen. The reader may have been struck, in the account of the fighting in the Mamund Valley, with the vigour with which the tribesmen follow up a retreating enemy and press an isolated party. In war this is sound, practical policy. But the hillmen adopt it rather from a natural propensity, than from military knowledge. Their tactics are the outcome of their natures. All their actions, moral, political, strategic, are guided by the same principle. The powerful tribes, who had watched the passage of the troops in sullen fear, only waited for a sign of weakness to rise behind them. As long as the brigades dominated the country, and appeared confident and successful, their communications would be respected, and the risings localised; but a check, a reverse, a retreat would raise tremendous combinations on every side. If the reader will bear this in mind, it will enable him to appreciate the position with which this chapter deals, and may explain many other matters which are beyond the scope of these pages. For it might be well also to remember, that the great drama of frontier war is played before a vast, silent but attentive audience, who fill a theatre, that reaches from Peshawar to Colombo, and from Kurrachee to Rangoon. The strategic and political situation, with which Sir Bindon Blood was confronted at Nawagai on the 17th of September, was one of difficulty and danger. He had advanced into a hostile country. In his front the Mohmands had gathered at the Hadda Mullah's call to oppose his further progress. The single brigade he had with him was not strong enough to force the Bedmanai Pass, which the enemy held. The 2nd Brigade, on which he had counted, was fully employed twelve miles away in the Mamund Valley. The 1st Brigade, nearly four marches distant on the Panjkora River, had not sufficient transport to move. Meanwhile General Elles's division was toiling painfully through the difficult country north-east of Shabkadr, and could not arrive for several days. He was therefore isolated, and behind him was the "network of ravines," through which a retirement would be a matter of the greatest danger and difficulty. Besides this, his line of communications, stretching away through sixty miles of hostile country, or country that at any moment might become hostile, was seriously threatened by the unexpected outbreak in the Mamund Valley. He was between two fires. Nor was this all. The Khan of Nawagai, a chief of great power and influence, was only kept loyal by the presence of Sir Bindon Blood's brigade. Had that brigade marched, as was advocated by the Government of India, back to join Brigadier-General Jeffreys in the Mamund Valley, this powerful chief would have thrown his whole weight against the British. The flame in the Mamund Valley, joining the flame in the Bedmanai Pass, would have produced a mighty conflagration, and have spread far and wide among the inflammable tribesmen. Bajaur would have risen to a man. Swat, in spite of its recent punishment, would have stirred ominously. Dir would have repudiated its ruler and joined the combination. The whole mountain region would have been ablaze. Every valley would have poured forth armed men. General Elles, arriving at Lakarai, would have found, instead of a supporting brigade, a hostile gathering, and might even have had to return to Shabkadr without accomplishing anything. Sir Bindon Blood decided to remain at Nawagai; to cut the Hadda Mullah's gathering from the tribesmen in the Mamund Valley; to hold out a hand to General Elles; to keep the pass open and the khan loyal. Nawagai was the key of the situation. But that key could not be held without much danger. It was a bold course to take, but it succeeded, as bold courses, soundly conceived, usually do. He therefore sent orders to Jeffreys to press operations against the Mamund tribesmen; assured the Khan of Nawagai of the confidence of the Government, and of their determination to "protect" him from all enemies; heliographed to General Elles that he would meet him at Nawagai; entrenched his camp and waited. He did not wait long in peace. The tribesmen, whose tactical instincts have been evolved by centuries of ceaseless war, were not slow to realise that the presence of the 3rd Brigade at Nawagai was fatal to their hopes. They accordingly resolved to attack it. The Suffi and Hadda Mullahs exerted the whole of their influence upon their credulous followers. The former appealed to the hopes of future happiness. Every Ghazi who fell fighting should sit above the Caaba at the very footstool of the throne, and in that exalted situation and august presence should be solaced for his sufferings by the charms of a double allowance of celestial beauty. Mullah Hadda used even more concrete inducements. The muzzles of the guns should be stopped for those who charged home. No bullet should harm them. They should be invulnerable. They should not go to Paradise yet. They should continue to live honoured and respected upon earth. This promise appears to have carried more weight, as the Hadda Mullah's followers had three times as many killed and wounded as the candidates for the pleasures of the world to come. It would almost seem, that in the undeveloped minds of these wild and superstitious sons of the mountains, there lie the embryonic germs of economics and practical philosophy, pledges of latent possibilities of progress. Some for the pleasures of this world, and some Sigh for the prophet's paradise to come. Ah! take the cash and let the credit go, Nor heed the rumble of a distant drum. OMAR KHAYYAM It is the practice of wise commanders in all warfare, to push their cavalry out every evening along the lines of possible attack, to make sure that no enemy has concentrated near the camp in the hopes of attacking at nightfall. On the 18th, Captain Delamain's squadron of the 11th Bengal Lancers came in contact with scattered parties of the enemy coming from the direction of the Bedmanai Pass. Desultory skirmishing ensued, and the cavalry retired to camp. Some firing took place that night, and a soldier of the Queen's Regiment who strayed about fifty yards from his picket, was pulled down and murdered by the savage enemies, who were lurking all around. The next evening the cavalry reconnoitered as usual. The squadron pushed forward protected by its line of advanced scouts across the plain towards the Bedmanai Pass. Suddenly from a nullah a long line of tribesmen rose and fired a volley. A horse was shot. The squadron wheeled about and cantered off, having succeeded in what is technically called "establishing contact." A great gathering of the enemy, some 3000 strong, now appeared in the plain. For about half an hour before sunset they danced, shouted and discharged their rifles. The mountain battery fired a few shells, but the distance was too great to do much good, or shall I say harm? Then it became dark. The whole brigade remained that night in the expectation of an attack, but only a very half-hearted attempt was made. This was easily repulsed, one man in the Queen's Regiment being killed among the troops. On the 20th, however, definite information was received from the Khan of Nawagai, that a determined assault would be made on the camp that night. The cavalry reconnaissance again came in touch with the enemy at nightfall. The officers had dinner an hour earlier, and had just finished, when, at about 8.30, firing began. The position of the camp was commanded, though at long ranges, by the surrounding heights. From these a searching rifle fire was now opened. All the tents were struck. The officers and men not employed in the trenches were directed to lie down. The majority of the bullets, clearing the parapets of the entrenchment on one side, whizzed across without doing any harm to the prostrate figures; but all walking about was perilous, and besides this the plunging fire from the heights was galling to every one. Determined and vigorous sword charges were now delivered on all sides of the camp. The enemy, who numbered about 4000, displayed the greatest valour. They rushed right up to the trenches and fell dead and dying, under the very bayonets of the troops. The brunt of the attack fell upon the British Infantry Regiment, the Queen's. This was fortunate, as many who were in camp that night say, that such was the determination of the enemy in their charges, that had they not been confronted with magazine rifles, they might have got into the entrenchments. The fire of the British was, however, crushing. Their discipline was admirable, and the terrible weapon with which they were armed, with its more terrible bullet, stopped every rush. The soldiers, confident in their power, were under perfect control. When the enemy charged, the order to employ magazine fire was passed along the ranks. The guns fired star shell. These great rockets, bursting into stars in the air, slowly fell to the ground shedding a pale and ghastly light on the swarming figures of the tribesmen as they ran swiftly forward. Then the popping of the musketry became one intense roar as the ten cartridges, which the magazine of the rifle holds, were discharged almost instantaneously. Nothing could live in front of such a fire. Valour, ferocity, fanaticism, availed nothing. All were swept away. The whistles sounded. The independent firing stopped, with machine-like precision, and the steady section volleys were resumed. This happened not once, but a dozen times during the six hours that the attack was maintained. The 20th Punjaub Infantry, and the cavalry also, sustained and repulsed the attacks delivered against their fronts with steadiness. At length the tribesmen sickened of the slaughter, and retired to their hills in gloom and disorder. The experience of all in the camp that night was most unpleasant. Those who were in the trenches were the best off. The others, with nothing to do and nothing to look at, remained for six hours lying down wondering whether the next bullet would hit them or not. Some idea of the severity of the fire may be obtained from the fact that a single tent showed sixteen bullet holes. Brigadier-General Wodehouse was wounded at about eleven o'clock. He had walked round the trenches and conferred with his commanding officers as to the progress of the attack and the expenditure of ammunition, and had just left Sir Bindon Blood's side, after reporting, when a bullet struck him in the leg, inflicting a severe and painful, though fortunately not a dangerous, wound. Considering the great number of bullets that had fallen in the camp, the British loss was surprisingly small. The full return is as follows:-- BRITISH OFFICERS. Wounded severely--Brigadier-General Wodehouse. " slightly--Veterinary-Captain Mann. BRITISH SOLDIERS. Killed. Wounded. Queen's Regiment... 1 3 NATIVE RANKS--Wounded, 20. FOLLOWERS-- " 6. Total, 32 of all ranks. The casualties among the cavalry horses and transport animals were most severe. Over 120 were killed and wounded. The enemy drew off, carrying their dead with them, for the most part, but numerous bodies lying outside the shelter trench attested the valour and vigour of their attack. One man was found the next morning, whose head had been half blown off, by a discharge of case shot from one of the mountain guns. He lay within a yard of the muzzle, the muzzle he had believed would be stopped, a victim to that blind credulity and fanaticism, now happily passing away from the earth, under the combined influences of Rationalism and machine guns. It was of course very difficult to obtain any accurate estimate of the enemy's losses. It was proved, however, that 200 corpses were buried on the following day in the neighbourhood, and large numbers of wounded men were reported to have been carried through the various villages. A rough estimate should place their loss at about 700. The situation was now cleared. The back of the Hadda Mullah's gathering was broken, and it dispersed rapidly. The Khan of Nawagai feverishly protested his unswerving loyalty to the Government. The Mamunds were disheartened. The next day General Elles's leading brigade appeared in the valley. Sir Bindon Blood rode out with his cavalry. The two generals met at Lakarai. It was decided that General Elles should be reinforced by the 3rd Brigade of the Malakand Field Force, and should clear the Bedmanai Pass and complete the discomfiture of the Hadda Mullah. Sir Bindon Blood with the cavalry would join Jeffreys' force in the Mamund Valley, and deal with the situation there. The original plan of taking two brigades from the Malakand to Peshawar was thus discarded; and such troops of Sir Bindon Blood's force as were required for the Tirah expedition would, with the exception of the 3rd Brigade, reach their points of concentration via Nowshera. As will be seen, this plan was still further modified to meet the progress of events. I had rejoined the 3rd Brigade on the morning of the 21st, and in the evening availed myself of an escort, which was proceeding across the valley, to ride over and see General Elles's brigade. The mobilisation of the Mohmand Field Force was marked by the employment, for the first time, of the Imperial Service Troops. The Maharaja of Patiala, and Sir Pertab Singh, were both with the force. The latter was sitting outside his tent, ill with fever, but cheery and brave as ever. The spectacle of this splendid Indian prince, whose magnificent uniform in the Jubilee procession had attracted the attention of all beholders, now clothed in business-like khaki, and on service at the head of his regiment, aroused the most pleasing reflections. With all its cost in men and money, and all its military and political mistakes, the great Frontier War of 1897 has at least shown on what foundations the British rule in India rests, and made clear who are our friends and who our enemies. I could not help thinking, that polo has had a good deal to do with strengthening the good relations of the Indian princes and the British officers. It may seem strange to speak of polo as an Imperial factor, but it would not be the first time in history that national games have played a part in high politics. Polo has been the common ground on which English and Indian gentlemen have met on equal terms, and it is to that meeting that much mutual esteem and respect is due. Besides this, polo has been the salvation of the subaltern in India, and the young officer no longer, as heretofore, has a "centre piece" of brandy on his table night and day. The pony and polo stick have drawn him from his bungalow and mess-room, to play a game which must improve his nerve, his judgment and his temper. The author of the Indian Polity asserts that the day will come when British and native officers will serve together in ordinary seniority, and on the same footing. From what I know of the British officer, I do not myself believe that this is possible; but if it should ever came to pass, the way will have been prepared on the polo ground. The camp of the 3rd Brigade was not attacked again. The tribesmen had learnt a bitter lesson from their experiences of the night before. The trenches were, however, lined at dark, and as small parties of the enemy were said to be moving about across the front, occupied by the Queen's, there was some very excellent volley firing at intervals throughout the night. A few dropping shots came back out of the darkness, but no one was the worse, and the majority of the force made up for the sleep they had lost the night before. The next morning Sir Bindon Blood, his staff and three squadrons of the 11th Bengal Lancers, rode back through the pass of Nawagai, and joined General Jeffreys at Inayat Kila. The 3rd Brigade now left the Malakand Field Force, and passed under the command of General Elles and beyond the proper limits of this chronicle; but for the sake of completeness, and as the reader may be anxious to hear more of the fine regiment, whose astonishing fire relieved the strategic situation at Nawagai, and inflicted such terrible losses on the Hadda Mullah's adherents, I shall briefly trace their further fortunes. After General Wodehouse was wounded the command of the 3rd Brigade devolved upon Colonel Graves. They were present at the forcing of the Bedmanai Pass on the 29th of September, and on the two following days they were employed in destroying the fortified villages in the Mitai and Suran valleys; but as these operations were unattended by much loss of life, the whole brigade reached Shabkadr with only three casualties. Thence the Queen's were despatched to Peshawar to take part in the Tirah expedition, in which they have added to the high reputation they had acquired in the Malakand and Mohmand Field Forces. CHAPTER XIV: BACK TO THE MAMUND VALLEY "Again I revisit the hills where we sported, The streams where we swam, and the fields where we fought." "On a Distant View of Harrow," BYRON. It is with a vague and undefined feeling of satisfaction that I conduct the reader back to the entrenched camp of Inayat Kila at the entrance of the Mamund Valley, where so much happened, and with which so many memories and experiences are associated. Now that the troops are gone, the scene of life and activity has become solitary and silent. The graves of the officers and men who fell there are lost in the level of the plain. Yet the name is still remembered in not a few English homes, nor will the tribesmen, looking at the deserted entrenchment, easily forget the visit of the 2nd Brigade. When, on the afternoon of the 15th, the camp had first been pitched, only a small and hasty shelter-trench surrounded it. But as the weeks passed, the parapets grew higher, the ditches deeper, and the pits more numerous, until the whole place became a redoubt. Traverses were built along the perimeter to protect the defenders from flanking fire. Great walls of earth and stone sheltered the horses and mules. Fifty yards out, round the whole camp, a wire trip was carefully laid, to break a rush, and the paths and tracks leading to the entrances had become beaten, level roads. The aspect of permanency was comforting. Since the action of the 16th September, the 2nd Brigade had been unable to move. Transport--the life and soul of an army--is an even more vital factor here than in less undeveloped countries. The mobility of a brigade depends entirely on its pack animals. On the 14th many mules were killed. On the 16th the field hospitals were filled with wounded. It now became impossible for the camp to move, because the wounded could not be carried. It was impossible to leave them behind, because, deducting an adequate guard, the rest of the brigade would have been too few for fighting. The 2nd Brigade was therefore a fixture. Its striking power was limited to out and home marches. The first step taken by Sir Bindon Blood was to restore its mobility by getting the wounded sent down to the base. Some changes in the constitution of the force were also made. The 11th Bengal Lancers, who now joined the Mohmand Field Force, were succeeded by the Guides Cavalry. The 35th Sikhs, who had suffered such severe losses, were replaced by the 31st Punjaub Infantry from Panjkora. The Buffs, who were full of fever, were exchanged for the Royal West Kent from the Malakand. No.7 British Mountain Battery took the place of No.8, which was now reduced to four guns, having lost in the week's fighting half its officers, a third of its mules, and a quarter of its men. Camels to carry the wounded were sent up from Panjkora. The Buffs escorted the long convoy down the line of communications. Every one in camp was sorry to see the last of them. In the fighting of the week they had made it clear that the British Infantry battalion is the backbone of every mixed brigade, and they shared with the Guides Infantry one of those enviable reputations for steadiness which are so hard to gain and so easy to lose on active service. On the 24th of September Sir Bindon Blood received despatches appointing him to the command of the First Division of the Tirah Expeditionary Force, and as the negotiations with the Mamund Jirgahs were then in progress, and it seemed that a settlement might be reached, he proceeded with his staff to Panjkora. Here he was on the telegraph wire, and could communicate easily and quickly with India, and at the same time watch the progress of events at Inayat Kila. Mr. Davis conducted the diplomatic relations with the Mamunds. On the 26th a Jirgah from the tribe came into camp. They deposited 4000 rupees as a token of submission, and brought in fifty firearms. These, however, were of the oldest and most antiquated types, and were obviously not the weapons with which so many soldiers had been killed and wounded. This was pointed out to the tribal representatives. They protested that they had no others. They were poor men, they said, and their property was at the mercy of the Government. But they had no other arms. The political officer was firm, and his terms were explicit. Either they must give up the twenty-two rifles captured from the 35th Sikhs, on the 16th, or their villages would be destroyed. No other terms would he accept. To this they replied, that they had not got the rifles. They had all been taken, they said, and I think with truth, by the Afghan tribesmen from the Kunar Valley. These would not give them up. Besides--this also with truth--they had been taken in "fair war." One man, who had lived some years in Calcutta, was especially eloquent on the subject, and argued the case with much skill. He was however, crushed by Mr. Davies asking whether there were "no greybeards in the tribe," and why they were "led by a babu" [a native clerk--the Oriental embodiment of Red Tape]. The discussion was extended to the whole question of their quarrel with the British power. They admitted having sent their young men to attack the Malakand and Chakdara. "All the world was going ghaza," they said. They could not stay behind. They also owned to having gone five miles from their valley to attack the camp at Markhanai. Why had the Sirkar burnt their village? they asked. They had only tried to get even--for the sake of their honour. All this showed a most unsatisfactory spirit from the Government point of view, and it was evident that the brigade could not leave the valley until the tribesmen adopted a more submissive attitude. The matter reverted to the crucial point. Would they give up their rifles or not? To this they replied evasively, that they would consult their fellow-tribesmen and return an answer on the next day. This practically amounted to a refusal, and as no reply was received on the 27th, the negotiations ceased. In consequence of this and of the threatening attitude of the tribesmen throughout Dir and Bajaur, Sir Bindon Blood telegraphed to the Government of India and recommended the retention of a large force in these territories. By so doing he virtually resigned the command which awaited him in the Tirah expedition. This disinterested decision caused the liveliest satisfaction throughout the force. The Government accepted the advice of their general. The Tirah force was reconstituted, and Major-General W.P. Symons received the command of its first division. A force of eleven battalions, seven squadrons and three batteries was placed at Sir Bindon Blood's disposal, and he was directed to deal with the local situation as he should see fit. He immediately ordered General Jeffreys to resume the punitive operations against the Mamunds. In pursuance of these orders, the 2nd Brigade, on the 29th, destroyed all the villages in the centre of the valley, some twelve or fourteen in number, and blew up with dynamite upwards of thirty towers and forts. The whole valley was filled with the smoke, which curled upwards in dense and numerous columns, and hung like a cloud over the scene of destruction. The continued explosions of the demolitions resembled a bombardment. The tribesmen, unable to contend with the troops in the open, remained sullenly on the hillsides, and contented themselves with firing from long range at the cavalry patrols. I feel that this is a fitting moment to discuss the questions which village-burning raises. I have described with independent impartiality the progress of the quarrel between the British and the tribesmen. In a similar spirit I approach the examination of the methods of offence employed. Many misconceptions, some of which are caused by an extraordinary ignorance, exist on this subject in England. One member of the House of Commons asked the Secretary of State whether, in the punishment of villages, care was taken that only the houses of the guilty parties should be destroyed. He was gravely told that great care was taken. The spectacle of troops, who have perhaps carried a village with the bayonet and are holding it against a vigorous counter-attack, when every moment means loss of life and increase of danger, going round and carefully discriminating which houses are occupied by "guilty parties," and which by unoffending people, is sufficiently ridiculous. Another member asked, "Whether the villages were destroyed or only the fortifications." "Only the fortifications," replied the minister guilelessly. What is the actual fact? All along the Afghan border every man's house is his castle. The villages are the fortifications, the fortifications are the villages. Every house is loopholed, and whether it has a tower or not depends only on its owner's wealth. A third legislator, in the columns of his amusing weekly journal, discussed the question at some length, and commented on the barbarity of such tactics. They were not only barbarous, he affirmed, but senseless. Where did the inhabitants of the villages go? To the enemy of course! This reveals, perhaps, the most remarkable misconception of the actual facts. The writer seemed to imagine that the tribesmen consisted of a regular army, who fought, and a peaceful, law-abiding population, who remained at their business, and perhaps protested against the excessive military expenditure from time to time. Whereas in reality, throughout these regions, every inhabitant is a soldier from the first day he is old enough to hurl a stone, till the last day he has strength to pull a trigger, after which he is probably murdered as an encumbrance to the community. Equipped with these corrected facts, I invite the reader to examine the question of the legitimacy of village-burning for himself. A camp of a British brigade, moving at the order of the Indian Government and under the acquiescence of the people of the United Kingdom, is attacked at night. Several valuable and expensive officers, soldiers and transport animals are killed and wounded. The assailants retire to the hills. Thither it is impossible to follow them. They cannot be caught. They cannot be punished. Only one remedy remains--their property must be destroyed. [It may be of interest, to consider for a moment the contrast between the effects of village-burning on the Indian Frontier and in Cuba. In Cuba a small section of the population are in revolt; the remainder are sympathisers. To screw these lukewarm partisans up to the fighting-point, the insurgents destroy their villages and burn the sugar-came. This, by placing the alternative of "fight or starve" before the inhabitants, has the effect of driving them to take up arms against the Spaniards, whom they all hate, and join the rebels in the field. Thus in Cuba it is the endeavour of the Government to protect property, and of the rebels to destroy it. It was with the aim of keeping the wavering population loyal, that General Weyler collected them all into the towns, with such painful results. His policy was cruel but sound, and, had it been accompanied by vigorous military operations, might have been successful.] Their villages are made hostages for their good behavior. They are fully aware of this, and when they make an attack on a camp or convoy, they do it because they have considered the cost and think it worth while. Of course, it is cruel and barbarous, as is everything else in war, but it is only an unphilosophic mind that will hold it legitimate to take a man's life, and illegitimate to destroy his property. The burning of mud hovels cannot at any rate be condemned by nations whose customs of war justify the bombardment of the dwelling-houses of a city like Paris, to induce the garrison to surrender by the sufferings of the non-combatants. In official parlance the burning of villages is usually expressed euphemistically as "So many villages were visited and punished," or, again, "The fortifications were demolished." I do not believe in all this circumlocution. The lack of confidence in the good sense of the British democracy, which the Indian Government displays, is one of its least admirable characteristics. Exeter Hall is not all England; and the people of our islands only require to have the matter put fairly before them to arrive at sound, practical conclusions. If this were not so, we should not occupy our present position in the world. To return to the Mamund Valley. The difference between villages in the plains and those in the hills was forcibly demonstrated. On the 29th over a dozen villages in the plains were destroyed without the loss of a single life. On the 30th the tale ran somewhat differently. The village of Agrah adjoins the village of Zagai, the capture of which has already been recorded. It stood in a broad re-entrant of the mountains, and amid ground so tangled and broken, that to move over it is difficult, and to describe it impossible. On the steep face of the mountain great rocks, sometimes thirty feet high, lay tossed about: interspersed with these were huts or narrow terraces, covered with crops, and rising one above the other by great steps of ten or twelve feet each. The attack on such a place was further complicated by the fact that the same re-entrant contained another village called Gat, which had to be occupied at the same time. This compelled the brigade to attack on a broader front than their numbers allowed. It was evident, as the Guides Cavalry approached the hills, that resistance was contemplated. Several red standards were visible to the naked eye, and the field-glasses disclosed numerous figures lining the ridges and spurs. The squadrons, advancing as far as the scrub would allow them, soon drew the fire of isolated skirmishers. Several troops dismounted, and returned the salute with their carbines, and at 8.45 a dropping fire began. The brigade now came into action in the following formation. The cavalry, on the extreme left, covered the head of a considerable valley, from which the flank was threatened; the Guides Infantry and the Royal West Kent Regiment prolonged the line to the centre of the attack; the 31st Punjaub Infantry moved against the spurs to the right of the village, and the 38th Dogras were in reserve. The action was begun by the Guides Infantry storming the ridges to the left of the enemy's position. These were strongly held and fortified by sungars, behind which the defenders were sheltered. The Guides advanced at a brisk pace, and without much firing, across the open ground to the foot of the hills. The tribesmen, shooting from excellent cover, maintained a hot fire. The bullets kicked up the dust in all directions, or whistled viciously through the air; but the distance was short, and it was soon apparent that the enemy did not mean to abide the assault. When the troops got within 100 yards and fixed bayonets, a dozen determined men were still firing from the sungars. The Afridi and Pathan companies of the Guides, uttering shrill cries of exultation, culminating in an extraordinary yell, dashed forward, climbed the hill as only hillmen can climb, and cleared the crest. On the side of the next hill the figures of the retreating tribesmen were visible, and many were shot down before they could find shelter. It was a strange thing, to watch these conspicuous forms toiling up the hillside, dodging this way and that way, as the bullets cut into the earth around them; but with the experience of the previous ten minutes fresh in the memory, pity was not one of the emotions it aroused. A good many fell, subsiding peacefully, and lying quite still. Their fall was greeted by strange little yells of pleasure from the native soldiers. These Afridi and Pathan companies of the Guides Infantry suggest nothing so much as a well-trained pack of hounds. Their cries, their movements, and their natures are similar. The West Kents had now come into line on the Guides' right, and while the latter held the long ridge they had taken, the British regiment moved upon the village. Here the resistance became very severe. The tangled and broken ground, rising in terraces, sometimes ten feet high, and covered with high crops, led to fighting at close quarters with loss on both sides. Loud and continuous grew the musketry fire. The 31st Punjaub Infantry, who had ascended the spur on the right, soon joined hands with the West Kents, and both regiments became hotly engaged. Meantime the Mountain Battery, which had come into action near the centre, began to throw its shells over the heads of the infantry on to the higher slopes, from which the enemy were firing. It soon became evident that the troops were too few for the work. On the left the Guides Infantry were unable to leave the ridge they had captured, lest it should be reoccupied by the enemy, who were showing in great strength. A gap opened in consequence, between the Guides and Royal West Kents, and this enabled the tribesmen to get round the left flank of the British regiment, while the 31st Punjaub Infantry, on the right, were also turned by the enveloping enemy. It is to these circumstances that most of the losses were due. The British regiment forced its way through the village, and encountered the enemy strongly posted in sungars among the rocks above it. Here they were sharply checked. The leading company had stormed one of these fortifications, and the enemy at once retired higher up the hill. About fifteen men were inside the work, and perhaps thirty more just below it. The whole place was commanded by the higher ground. The enemy's fire was accurate and intense. Of those inside, four or five were instantly killed or wounded. The sungar was a regular trap, and the company were ordered to retire. Lieutenant Browne-Clayton remained till the last, to watch the withdrawal, and in so doing was shot dead, the bullet severing the blood-vessels near the heart. The two or three men who remained were handing down his body over the rock wall, when they were charged by about thirty Ghazis and driven down the hill. A hundred and fifty yards away, Major Western had three companies of the West Kents in support. He immediately ordered Captain Styles to retake the sungar, and recover the body. The company charged. Captain Styles was the first to reach the stone wall, and with Lieutenant Jackson cleared it of such of the enemy as remained. Five or six men were wounded in the charge, and others fell in the sungar. The advanced position of this company was soon seen to be untenable, and they were ordered to fall back to the edge of the village, where the whole regiment was hotly engaged. Meanwhile the 31st Punjaub Infantry, who had advanced under Colonel O'Bryen on the right, were exposed to a severe fire from a rocky ridge on their flank. Their attack was directed against a great mass of boulders, some of them of enormous size, which were tenaciously held by the enemy. The fighting soon became close. The two advanced companies were engaged at a distance of under 100 yards. Besides this the cross fire from their right flank added to their difficulties. In such a position the presence of Colonel O'Bryen was invaluable. Moving swiftly from point to point, he directed the fire and animated the spirit of the men, who were devoted to him. It was not long before the enemy's marksmen began to take aim at this prominent figure. But for a considerable period, although bullets struck the ground everywhere around him, he remained unhurt. At last, however, he was shot through the body, and carried mortally wounded from the action. I pause to consider for a moment the conditions, and circumstances, by which the pursuit of a military career differs from all others. In political life, in art, in engineering, the man with talents who behaves with wisdom may steadily improve his position in the world. If he makes no mistakes he will probably achieve success. But the soldier is more dependent upon external influences. The only way he can hope to rise above the others, is by risking his life in frequent campaigns. All his fortunes, whatever they may be, all his position and weight in the world, all his accumulated capital, as it were, must be staked afresh each time he goes into action. He may have seen twenty engagements, and be covered with decorations and medals. He may be marked as a rising soldier. And yet each time he comes under fire his chances of being killed are as great as, and perhaps greater than, those of the youngest subaltern, whose luck is fresh. The statesman, who has put his power to the test, and made a great miscalculation, may yet retrieve his fortunes. But the indiscriminating bullet settles everything. As the poet somewhat grimly has it:-- Stone-dead hath no better. Colonel O'Bryen had been specially selected, while still a young man, for the command of a battalion. He had made several campaigns. Already he had passed through the drudgery of the lower ranks of the service, and all the bigger prizes of the military profession appeared in view: and though the death in action of a colonel at the head of his regiment is as fine an end as a soldier can desire, it is mournful to record the abrupt termination of an honourable career at a point when it might have been of much value to the State. The pressure now became so strong along the whole line that the brigadier, fearing that the troops might get seriously involved, ordered the withdrawal to commence. The village was however burning, and the enemy, who had also suffered severely from the close fighting, did not follow up with their usual vigour. The battery advanced to within 600 yards of the enemy's line, and opened a rapid fire of shrapnel to clear those spurs that commanded the line of retirement. The shells screamed over the heads of the West Kent Regiment, who were now clear of the hills and in front of the guns, and burst in little white puffs of smoke along the crest of the ridge, tearing up the ground into a thick cloud of dust by the hundreds of bullets they contained. A continuous stream of doolies and stretchers commenced to flow from the fighting line. Soon all available conveyances were exhausted, and the bodies of the wounded had to be carried over the rough ground in the arms of their comrades--a very painful process, which extorted many a groan from the suffering men. At length the withdrawal was completed, and the brigade returned to camp. The presence of the cavalry, who covered the rear, deterred the enemy from leaving the hills. Riding back, I observed a gruesome sight. At the head of the column of doolies and stretchers were the bodies of the killed, each tied with cords upon a mule. Their heads dangled on one side and their legs on the other. The long black hair of the Sikhs, which streamed down to the ground, and was draggled with dust and blood, imparted a hideous aspect to these figures. There was no other way, however, and it was better than leaving their remains to be insulted and defiled by the savages with whom we were fighting. At the entrance to the camp a large group of surgeons--their sleeves rolled up--awaited the wounded. Two operating tables, made of medical boxes, and covered with water-proof sheets, were also prepared. There is a side to warfare browner than khaki. The casualties in the attack upon Agrah were as follows:-- BRITISH OFFICERS. Killed--Lieut.-Col. J.L. O'Bryen, 31st Punjaub Infantry. " 2nd Lieut. W.C. Brown-Clayton, Royal West Kent. Wounded severely--Lieutenant H. Isacke, Royal West Kent. " " " E.B. Peacock, 31st Punjaub Infantry. Wounded slightly--Major W.G.B. Western, Royal West Kent. " " Captain R.C. Styles, Royal West Kent. " " " N.H.S. Lowe, Royal West Kent. " " 2nd Lieut. F.A. Jackson, Royal West Kent. BRITISH SOLDIERS. Killed. Wounded. Royal West Kent... 3 20 NATIVE RANKS. Killed. Wounded. Guides Cavalry... 0 4 31st Punjaub Infantry . 7 15 38th Dogras ... 0 4 Total casualties, 61. As soon as Sir Bindon Blood, at his camp on the Panjkora, received the news of the sharp fighting of the 30th, [After the action of the 30th of September, Lieut.-Colonel McRae, of the 45th Sikhs, was sent up to command the 31st Punjaub Infantry in the place of Lieut.-Colonel O'Bryen, and I was myself attached as a temporary measure to fill another of the vacancies. This is, I believe, the first time a British Cavalry officer has been attached to a native infantry regiment. After the kindness and courtesy with which I was treated, I can only hope it will not be the last.] he decided to proceed himself to Inayat Kila with reinforcements. He arrived on the 2nd October, bringing No.8 Mountain Battery; a wing of the 24th Punjaub Infantry; and two troops of the Guides Cavalry; and having also sent orders for the Highland Light Infantry and four guns of the 10th Field Battery to follow him at once. He was determined to make a fresh attack on Agrah, and burn the village of Gat, which had only been partially destroyed. And this attack was fixed for the 5th. By that date the big 12-pounder guns of the Field Battery were to have arrived, and the fire of fourteen pieces would have been concentrated on the enemy's position. Every one was anxious to carry matters to a conclusion with the tribesmen at all costs. On the 3rd, the force was ordered to take and burn the village of Badelai, against which, it may be remembered, the Buffs had advanced on the 16th, and from which they had been recalled in a hurry to support the 35th Sikhs. The attack and destruction of the village presented no new features; the tribesmen offered little resistance, and retired before the troops. But as soon as the brigade began its homeward march, they appeared in much larger numbers than had hitherto been seen. As the cavalry could not work among the nullahs and the broken ground, the enemy advanced boldly into the plain. In a great crescent, nearly four miles long, they followed the retiring troops. A brisk skirmish began at about 800 yards. Both batteries came into action, each firing about 90 shells. The Royal West Kent Regiment made good shooting with their Lee-Metford rifles. All the battalions of the brigade were engaged. The enemy, whose strength was estimated to be over 3000, lost heavily, and drew off at 2.30, when the force returned to camp. Sir Bindon Blood and his staff watched the operations and reconnoitered the valley. The casualties were as follows:-- Royal West Kent--dangerously wounded, 1. Guides Cavalry--wounded, 2. 31st Punjaub Infantry--killed, 1; wounded, 5. Guides Infantry--wounded, 3. 38th Dogras--killed, 1; wounded, 3. Total casualties, 16. The next day the Highland Light Infantry and the field guns arrived. The former marched in over 700 strong, and made a fine appearance. They were nearly equal in numbers to any two battalions in the brigade. Sickness and war soon reduce the fighting strength. The guns had accomplished a great feat in getting over the difficult and roadless country. They had had to make their own track, and in many places the guns had been drawn by hand. The 10th Field Battery had thus gone sixty miles further into the hill country than any other wheeled traffic. They had quite a reception when they arrived. The whole camp turned out to look with satisfaction on the long polished tubes, which could throw twelve pounds a thousand yards further than the mountain guns could throw seven. They were, however, not destined to display their power. The Mamunds had again sued for peace. They were weary of the struggle. Their valley was desolate. The season of sowing the autumn crops approached. The arrival of reinforcements convinced them that the Government were determined to get their terms. Major Deane came up himself to conduct the negotiations. Meanwhile all important operations were suspended, though the foraging and "sniping" continued as usual. The force was now large enough for two brigades to be formed, and on the arrival of Brigadier-General Meiklejohn it was reconstituted as follows:-- 1st Brigade. Commanding--Brigadier-General Meiklejohn, C.B., C.M.G. Highland Light Infantry. 31st Punjaub Infantry. 4 Cos. 24th Punjaub Infantry. 10th Field Battery. No.7 British Mountain Battery. 2nd Brigade. Commanding--Brigadier-General Jeffries, C.B. The Royal West Kent. 38th Dogras. Guides Infantry. No.8 Mountain Battery. The Guides Cavalry. The camp was greatly extended and covered a large area of ground. In the evenings, the main street presented an animated appearance. Before the sun went down, the officers of the different regiments, distinguished by their brightly-coloured field caps, would assemble to listen to the pipes of the Scottish Infantry, or stroll up and down discussing the events of the day and speculating on the chances of the morrow. As the clear atmosphere of the valley became darkened by the shadows of the night, and the colours of the hills faded into an uniform black, the groups would gather round the various mess tents, and with vermuth, cigarettes and conversation pass away the pleasant half-hour before dinner and "sniping" began. I would that it were in my power to convey to the reader, who has not had the fortune to live with troops on service, some just appreciation of the compensations of war. The healthy, open-air life, the vivid incidents, the excitement, not only of realisation, but of anticipation, the generous and cheery friendships, the chances of distinction which are open to all, invest life with keener interests and rarer pleasures. The uncertainty and importance of the present, reduce the past and future to comparative insignificance, and clear the mind of minor worries. And when all is over, memories remain, which few men do not hold precious. As to the hardships, these though severe may be endured. Ascetics and recluses have in their endeavours to look beyond the grave suffered worse things. Nor will the soldier in the pursuit of fame and the enjoyment of the pleasures of war, be exposed to greater discomforts than Diogenes in his tub, or the Trappists in their monastery. Besides all this, his chances of learning about the next world are infinitely greater. And yet, when all has been said, we are confronted with a mournful but stubborn fact. In this contrary life, so prosaic is the mind of man, so material his soul, so poor his spirit, that there is no one who has been six months on active duty who is not delighted to get safe home again, to the comfortable monotonies of peace. CHAPTER XV: THE WORK OF THE CAVALRY The negotiations of the Mamunds had this time opened under more propitious circumstances. The tribesmen were convinced by the arrival of the large reinforcements that the Government were in earnest. The return of "the big general," as they called Sir Bindon Blood, to distinguish him from the brigadiers, impressed them with the fact that the operations would be at once renewed, if they continued recalcitrant. They had still a few villages unburned, and these they were anxious to save. Besides, they disliked the look of the long topes, or field guns, of whose powers they were uncertain. They therefore displayed a much more humble spirit. On the other hand, every one in the force had realised that there were "more kicks than ha'pence" to be got out of the Mamund Valley. All the villages in the plain had been destroyed. Only a few of those in the hollows of the hills remained. To these the enemy had retired. In Arrian's History of Alexander's Conquests we read the following passage: "The men in Bazira [Bazira is the same as Bajaur], despairing of their own affairs, abandoned the city... and fled to the rock, as the other barbarians were doing. For all the inhabitants deserted the cities, and began to fly to the rock which is in their land." Then it was that Alexander's difficulties began. Nor need we wonder, when the historian gravely asserts that "so stupendous is the rock in this land... that it was found impregnable even by Heracles, the son of Zeus." Thus history repeats itself, and the people of Bajaur their tactics. There was, however, no doubt as to the ability of the brigades to take and burn any village they might select. At the same time it was certain that they would encounter relays of Afghan tribesmen, and regular soldiers from the Amir's army, and that they would lose officers and men in the operation. The matter had to be carried to a conclusion at whatever cost, but the sooner the end was reached, the better. But in spite of the auguries of peace, the foraging parties were usually fired upon, and this furnished several opportunities for the display of the value of the cavalry. I shall avail myself of the occasion to review the performances of the mounted arm during the operations. As soon as the brigades entered Bajaur, the 11th Bengal Lancers were employed more and more in that legitimate duty of cavalry--reconnaissance. Major Beatson made daily expeditions towards the various valleys and passes about which information was needed. This use of cavalry is an entirely new one on the frontier--it having been thought that it was dangerous to employ them in this way. Though horsemen need good ground to fight on to advantage, they can easily move over any country, however broken, and where they are boldly used, can collect as much information as is necessary. Reconnaissance is by no means the only opportunity for cavalry employment on the frontier. They are as formidable in offensive tactics as they are useful in collecting intelligence. The task which is usually confided to them in these mountain actions is to protect one of the flanks. The ground hardly ever admits of charging in any formation, and it is necessary for the men to use their carbines. On 30th September the cavalry were so employed. On the left of the hostile position was a wide valley full of scrubby trees, and stone walls, and occupied by large numbers of the enemy. Had these tribesmen been able to debouch from this valley, they would have fallen on the flank of the brigade, and the situation would have become one of danger. For five hours two weak squadrons of the Guides Cavalry were sufficient to hold them in check. The methods they employed are worth noticing. Little groups of six or seven men were dismounted, and these with their carbines replied to the enemy's fire. Other little groups of mounted men remained concealed in nullahs or hollows, or behind obstacles. Whenever the enemy tried to rush one of the dismounted parties, and to do so advanced from the bad ground, the mounted patrols galloped forward and chased them back to cover. The terror that these tribesmen have of cavalry contrasts with their general character. It was a beautiful display of cavalry tactics in this kind of warfare, and, considering the enormous numbers of the enemy, who were thus kept from participating in the main action, it demonstrated the power and value of the mounted arm with convincing force. On the 6th of October, I witnessed some very similar work, though on a smaller scale. A squadron was engaged in covering the operations of a foraging party. A line of patrols, moving rapidly about, presented difficult targets to the enemy's sharpshooters. I found the remainder of the squadron dismounted in rear of a large bank of stones. Twenty sowars with their carbines were engaged in firing at the enemy, who had occupied a morcha--a small stone fort--some 300 yards away. Desultory skirmishing continued for some time, shots being fired from the hills, half a mile away, as well as from the morcha. Bullets kept falling near the bank, but the cover it afforded was good and no one was hurt. At length word was brought that the foraging was finished and that the squadron was to retire under cover of the infantry. Now came a moment of some excitement. The officer in command knew well that the instant his men were mounted they would be fired at from every point which the enemy held. He ordered the first troop to mount, and the second to cover the retirement. The men scrambled into their saddles, and spreading out into an extended line cantered away towards a hollow about 300 yards distant. Immediately there was an outburst of firing. The dust rose in spurts near the horsemen, and the bullets whistled about their ears. No one was however hit. Meanwhile, the remaining troop had been keeping up a rapid fire on the enemy to cover their retirement. It now became their turn to go. Firing a parting volley the men ran to their horses, mounted, and followed the first troop at a hand-gallop, extending into a long line as they did so. Again the enemy opened fire, and again the dusty ground showed that the bullets were well directed. Again, however, nobody was hurt, and the sowars reached the hollow, laughing and talking in high glee. The morning's skirmish had, nevertheless, cost the squadron a man and a horse, both severely wounded. Such affairs as these were of almost daily occurrence during the time that the 2nd Brigade occupied the camp at Inayat Kila. They were of the greatest value in training the soldiers. The Guides Cavalry know all there is to know of frontier war, but there are many other regiments who would be made infinitely more powerful fighting organisations if they were afforded the opportunity for such experience. The great feature which the war of 1897 on the Indian Frontier has displayed is the extraordinary value of cavalry. At Shabkadr a charge of the 13th Bengal Lancers was more than successful. In the Swat Valley, during the relief of Chakdara, the Guides Cavalry and 11th Bengal Lancers inflicted the most terrible loss on the enemy. To quote the words of Sir Bindon Blood's official report to the Adjutant-General, these regiments, "eager for vengeance, pursued, cut up and speared them in every direction, leaving their bodies thickly strewn over the fields." Again, after the action of Landakai, the cavalry made a most vigorous pursuit and killed large numbers of the enemy. While I was with the Malakand Field Force, I was a witness of the constant employment of the cavalry, and was several times informed by general officers that they would gladly have a larger number at their disposal. The reader may recall some of the numerous instances which these pages have recorded of cavalry work. On the morning of the 15th September, it was the cavalry who were able to catch up the enemy before they could reach the hills, and take some revenge for the losses of the night. In the action of the 16th, the charge of Captain Cole's squadron brought the whole attack of the enemy to a standstill, and enabled the infantry by their fire to convert the hesitation of the tribesmen into a retreat. Indeed, in every fight in the Mamund Valley, the cavalry were the first in, and the last out. In the official despatches Sir Bindon Blood thus alludes to the work of the cavalry:--"I would now wish to invite attention to the invaluable nature of the services rendered by the cavalry. At Nawagai, three squadrons of the 11th Bengal Lancers swept the country everywhere that cavalry could go, carrying out reconnaissances, protecting signalling parties and watching every movement of the enemy. In the Mamund Valley a squadron of the same regiment, under Captain E.H. Cole, took part in every engagement that occurred while they were there, establishing such a reputation that the enemy, even when in greatly superior numbers, never dared to face them in the open. Afterwards, when Captain Cole and his men left the Mamund Valley, the Guides Cavalry, under Lieut.-Col. Adams, being in greater strength, acted still more effectually in the same manner, showing tactical skill of a high order, combined with conspicuous gallantry."--Official Despatches. From Gazette of India, 3rd December, 1897. There has been a boom in cavalry. But one section, and that the most important, has been deprived of its share in the good fortune. The authorities have steadily refused to allow any British cavalry to cross the frontier. Of course this is defended on the ground of expense. "British cavalry costs so much," it is said, "and natives do the work just as well." "Better," say some. But it is a poor kind of economy thus to discourage a most expensive and important branch of the service. The ambition that a young officer entering the army ought to set before him, is to lead his own men in action. This ought to inspire his life, and animate his effort. "Stables" will no longer be dull, when he realises that on the fitness of his horses, his life and honour may one day depend. If he thinks that his men may soon be asked to stand beside him at a pinch, he will no longer be bored by their interests and affairs. But when he realises that all is empty display, and that his regiment is a sword too costly to be drawn, he naturally loses keenness and betakes himself to polo as a consolation. It is a good one. It was my fortune to meet many young men in frontier regiments, both cavalry and infantry, who had already served in three, and even four, campaigns. Daring, intelligent and capable, they are proofs of the value of their training, and are fit to lead their men under any conditions, and in any country. Subalterns in British cavalry regiments do occasionally manage to see a little active service as transport officers, signalling officers, war correspondents, or on the staff; but to lead in the field the men they have trained in peace, is a possibility which is never worth contemplating. To the young man who wants to enjoy himself, to spend a few years agreeably in a military companionship, to have an occupation--the British cavalry will be suited. But to the youth who means to make himself a professional soldier, an expert in war, a specialist in practical tactics, who desires a hard life of adventure and a true comradeship in arms, I would recommend the choice of some regiment on the frontier, like those fine ones I have seen, the Guides and the 11th Bengal Lancers. I am aware that those who criticise an existing state of things ought to be prepared with some constructive legislation which would remedy the evils they denounce. Though it is unlikely that the Government of India will take my advice, either wholly or in good part, I hereby exhort them to quit the folly of a "penny wise" policy, and to adhere consistently to the principles of employing British and native troops in India in a regular proportion. That is to say, that when two native cavalry regiments have been sent on service across the frontier, the third cavalry regiment so sent shall be British. Besides this, in order to give cavalry officers as many opportunities of seeing active service as possible, subalterns should be allowed to volunteer for emergency employment with native cavalry. I have talked to several officers who command native cavalry regiments, and they tell me that such an arrangement would work excellently, and that, as they are always short of officers, it would supply a want. I would suggest that subalterns should, with the approval of their colonels, be attached to the native regiment, and after passing in Hindustani and being reported as qualified to serve with the native troops, be considered available for employment as described. I shall be told there are financial difficulties. I do not believe this. There are plenty of cavalry subalterns whose eagerness to see service is so strong, that they would submit to any arrangement that the rapacity of Government might impose. Indeed there is no reason that an actual economy should not be effected. The sums of money that the Indian Government offer, as rewards for officers who can speak Hindustani, have not hitherto tempted many cavalry officers to make a study of the language. Here is an incentive, more powerful and costing nothing. To be technical is, I am aware, a serious offence, and I realise that if this book ever obtained so evil a reputation it would be shunned, as the House of Commons is shunned on a Service night. I have strayed far away from the Malakand Field Force into the tangled paths of military controversy, and I must beg the reader to forgive, as he will surely forget, what has been written. The fighting described in the last chapter, and the continual drain of disease, had again filled the field hospitals, and in order to preserve the mobility of the force, it was decided to send all sick and wounded down to the base at once. The journey--over 100 miles by road--would take nearly a fortnight, and the jolting and heat made such an experience a painful and weary one to injured men. But the stern necessities of war render these things inevitable, and the desire of the men to get nearer home soothes much of their suffering. The convoy of sick and wounded was to be escorted as far as the Panjkora River by the Royal West Kent, who were themselves in need of some recuperation. To campaign in India without tents is always a trial to a British regiment; and when it is moved to the front from some unhealthy station like Peshawar, Delhi, or Mian Mir, and the men are saturated with fever and weakened by the summer heats, the sick list becomes long and serious. Typhoid from drinking surface water, and the other various kinds of fever which follow exposure to the heats of the day or the chills of the night, soon take a hundred men from the fighting strength, and the general of an Indian frontier force has to watch with equal care the movements of the enemy and the fluctuations of the hospital returns. As soon, therefore, as Sir Bindon Blood saw that the Mamunds were desirous of peace, and that no further operations against them were probable, he sent one of his British regiments to their tents near the Panjkora. About sixty wounded men from the actions of 30th September and 3rd October, and the same number of sick, formed the bulk of the convoy. The slight cases are carried on camels, in cradles made by cutting a native bedstead in two, and called "Kajawas." The more serious cases are carried in doolies or litters, protected from the sun by white curtains, and borne by four natives. Those who are well enough ride on mules. The infantry escort is disposed along the line with every precaution that can be suggested, but the danger of an attack upon the long straggling string of doolies and animals in difficult and broken ground is a very real and terrible one. The cheeriness and patience of the wounded men exceeds belief. Perhaps it is due to a realisation of the proximity in which they have stood to death; perhaps partly to that feeling of relief with which a man turns for a spell from war to peace. In any case it is remarkable. A poor fellow--a private in the Buffs--was hit at Zagai, and had his arm amputated at the shoulder. I expressed my sympathy, and he replied, philosophically: "You can't make omelettes without breaking eggs," and after a pause added, with much satisfaction, "The regiment did well that day." He came of a fighting stock, but I could not help speculating on the possible future which awaited him. Discharge from the service as medically unfit, some miserable pension insufficient to command any pleasures but those of drink, a loafer's life, and a pauper's grave. Perhaps the regiment--the officers, that is to say--would succeed in getting him work, and would from their own resources supplement his pension. But what a wretched and discreditable system is that, by which the richest nation in the world neglects the soldiers who have served it well, and which leaves to newspaper philanthropy, to local institutions, and to private charity, a burden which ought to be proudly borne by the State. Starting at six, the column reached Jar, a march of eight miles, at about ten o'clock. Here we were joined by a wing of the 24th Punjaub Infantry, who were coming up to relieve the Royal West Kents. The camp at Jar has the disadvantage of being commanded by a hill to the north, and the Salarzais, another pestilent tribe, whose name alone is an infliction, delight to show their valour by firing at the troops during the night. Of course this could be prevented by moving the camp out of range of this hill. But then, unfortunately, it would be commanded by another hill to the south, from which the Shamozai section of the Utman Khels--to whom my former remarks also apply--would be able to amuse themselves. The inconvenience of the situation had therefore to be faced. We had not been long in camp before the eldest son of the Khan of Jar, who had been comparatively loyal during the operations, came to inform the colonel in command that there would be "sniping" that night. Certain evil men, he said, had declared their intention of destroying the force, but he, the heir-apparent to the Khanate of Jar, and the ally of the Empress, would protect us. Four pickets of his own regular army should watch the camp, that our slumbers might not be disturbed, and when challenged by the sentries, they would reply, "chokidar" (watchman). This all seemed very satisfactory, but we entrenched ourselves as usual, not, as we explained, because we doubted our protector's powers or inclinations, buy merely as a matter of form. At midnight precisely, the camp was awakened by a dozen shots in rapid succession. The khan's pickets could be heard expostulating with the enemy, who replied by jeers and bitter remarks. The firing continued for an hour, when the "snipers," having satisfied their honour, relieved their feelings and expended their cartridges, went away rejoicing. The troops throughout remained silent, and vouchsafed no reply. It may seem difficult to believe that fifty bullets could fall in a camp, only 100 yards square--crowded with animals and men--without any other result than to hit a single mule in the tail. Such was, however, the fact. This shows of what value, a little active service is to the soldier. The first time he is under fire, he imagines himself to be in great danger. He thinks that every bullet is going to hit him, and that every shot is aimed at him. Assuredly he will be killed in a moment. If he goes through this ordeal once or twice, he begins to get some idea of the odds in his favour. He has heard lots of bullets and they have not hurt him. He will get home safely to his tea this evening, just as he did the last time. He becomes a very much more effective fighting machine. From a military point of view, the perpetual frontier wars in one corner or other of the Empire are of the greatest value. This fact may one day be proved, should our soldiers ever be brought into contact with some peace-trained, conscript army, in anything like equal numbers. Though the firing produced very little effect on the troops--most of whom had been through the experience several times before--it was a severe trial to the wounded, whose nerves, shattered by pain and weakness, were unable to bear the strain. The surgeon in charge--Major Tyrell--told me that the poor fellows quivered at every shot as if in anticipation of a blow. A bullet in the leg will made a brave man a coward. A blow on the head will make a wise man a fool. Indeed I have read that a sufficiency of absinthe can make a good man a knave. The triumph of mind over matter does not seem to be quite complete as yet. I saw a strange thing happen, while the firing was going on, which may amuse those who take an interest in the habits and development of animals. Just in front of my tent, which was open, was a clear space, occupied by a flock of goats and sheep. The brilliant moonlight made everything plainly visible. Every time a bullet whistled over them or struck the ground near, they ducked and bobbed in evident terror. An officer, who also noticed this, told me it was the first time they had been under fire; and I have been wondering ever since, whether this explains their fear, or makes it more inexplicable. I have devoted a good deal in this chapter to the account of the "sniping" at Jar on the night of the 9th of October, and, perhaps, a critic may inquire, why so much should be written about so common an incident. It is, however, because this night firing is so common a feature, that I feel no picture of the war on the Indian frontier would be complete without some account of it. The next day we crossed the Panjkora River, and I started to ride down the line of communications to the base at Nowshera. At each stage some of the comforts of civilisation and peace reappeared. At Panjkora we touched the telegraph wire; at Sarai were fresh potatoes; ice was to be had at Chakdara; a comfortable bed at the Malakand; and at length, at Nowshera, the railway. But how little these things matter after all. When they are at hand, they seem indispensable, but when they cannot be obtained, they are hardly missed. A little plain food, and a philosophic temperament, are the only necessities of life. I shall not take the reader farther from the scene of action. He is free and his imagination may lead him back to the highland valleys, where he may continue for a space among camps and men, and observe the conclusion of the drama. CHAPTER XVI: SUBMISSION "Their eyes were sunken and weary With a sort of listless woe, And they looked from their desolate eyrie Over the plains below. "Two had wounds from a sabre, And one from an Enfield Ball." "Rajpoot Rebels," LYALL. At last the negotiations with the Mamunds began to reach a conclusion. The tribe were really desirous of peace, and prepared to make any sacrifices to induce the brigades to leave the valley. The Khan of Khar now proved of valuable assistance. He consistently urged them to make peace with the Sirkar, and assured them that the troops would not go away until they had their rifles back. Finally the Mamunds said they would get the rifles. But the path of repentance was a stony one. On the very night that the tribesmen decided for peace at any price, a thousand warlike Afghans, spoiling for a fight, arrived from the Kunar Valley, on the other side of the mountains, and announced their intention of attacking the camp at once. The Mamunds expostulated with them. The retainers of the Khan of Khar implored them not to be so rash. In the end these unwelcome allies were persuaded to depart. But that night the camp was warned that an attack was probable. The inlying pickets were accordingly doubled, and every man slept in his clothes, so as to be ready. The pathos of the situation was provided by the fact, that the Mamunds were guarding us from our enemies. The wretched tribe, rather than face a renewal of hostilities, had posted pickets all round the camp to drive away "snipers" and other assailants. Their sincerity was beyond suspicion. The next day the first instalment of rifles was surrendered. Fifteen Martini-Henrys taken on the 16th from the 35th Sikhs were brought into camp, by the Khan of Khar's men, and deposited in front of the general's tent. Nearly all were hacked and marked by sword cuts, showing that their owners, the Sikhs, had perished fighting to the last. Perhaps, these firearms had cost more in blood and treasure than any others ever made. The remainder of the twenty-one were promised later, and have since all been surrendered. But the rifles as they lay on the ground were a bitter comment on the economic aspect of the "Forward Policy." These tribes have nothing to surrender but their arms. To extort these few, had taken a month, had cost many lives, and thousands of pounds. It had been as bad a bargain as was ever made. People talk glibly of "the total disarmament of the frontier tribes" as being the obvious policy. No doubt such a result would be most desirable. But to obtain it would be as painful and as tedious an undertaking, as to extract the stings of a swarm of hornets, with naked fingers. After the surrender of the rifles, the discussion of terms proceeded with smoothness. Full jirgahs were sent to the camp from the tribe, and gradually a definite understanding was reached. The tribesmen bewailed the losses they had sustained. Why, they asked, had the Sirkar visited them so heavily? Why, replied Major Deane, had they broken the peace and attacked the camp? The elders of the tribe, following the practice of all communities, threw the blame on their "young men." These had done the evil, they declared. All had paid the penalty. At length definite terms were agreed to, and a full durbar was arranged for the 11th of the month for their ratification. Accordingly on that date, at about one o'clock in the afternoon, a large and representative jirgah of Mamunds, accompanied by the Khans of Khar, Jar and Nawagai, arrived at the village of Nawa Kila, about half a mile from the camp. At three o'clock Sir Bindon Blood, with Major Deane, Chief Political Officer; Mr. Davis, Assistant Political Officer; most of the Headquarters staff, and a few other officers, started, escorted by a troop of the Guides Cavalry, for the durbar. The general on arrival shook hands with the friendly khans, much to their satisfaction, and took a seat which had been provided. The tribesmen formed three sides of a square. The friendly khans were on the left with their retainers. The Mamund jirgahs filled two other sides. Sir Bindon Blood, with Major Deane on his left and his officers around him, occupied the fourth side. Then the Mamunds solemnly tendered their submission. They expressed their deep regret at their action, and deplored the disasters that had befallen them. They declared, they had only fought because they feared annexation. They agreed to expel the followers of Umra Khan from the valley. They gave security for the rifles that had not yet been surrendered. They were then informed that as they had suffered severe punishment and had submitted, the Sirkar would exact no fine or further penalty from them. At this they showed signs of gratification. The durbar, which had lasted fifteen minutes, was ended by the whole of the tribesmen swearing with uplifted hands to adhere to the terms and keep the peace. They were then dismissed. The losses sustained by the Mamunds in the fighting were ascertained to be 350 killed, besides the wounded, with whom the hill villages were all crowded, and who probably amounted to 700 or 800. This estimate takes no account of the casualties among the transfrontier tribesmen, which were presumably considerable, but regarding which no reliable information could be obtained. Sir Bindon Blood offered them medical aid for their wounded, but this they declined. They could not understand the motive, and feared a stratagem. What the sufferings of these wretched men must have been, without antiseptics or anaesthetics, is terrible to think of. Perhaps, however, vigorous constitutions and the keen air of the mountains were Nature's substitutes. Thus the episode of the Mamund Valley came to an end. On the morning of the 12th, the troops moved out of the camp at Inayat Kila for the last time, and the long line of men, guns and transport animals, trailed slowly away across the plain of Khar. The tribesmen gathered on the hills to watch the departure of their enemies, but whatever feelings of satisfaction they may have felt at the spectacle, were dissipated when they turned their eyes towards their valley. Not a tower, not a fort was to be seen. The villages were destroyed. The crops had been trampled down. They had lost heavily in killed and wounded, and the winter was at hand. No defiant shots pursued the retiring column. The ferocious Mamunds were weary of war. And as the soldiers marched away, their reflections could not have been wholly triumphant. For a month they had held Inayat Kila, and during that month they had been constantly fighting. The Mamunds were crushed. The Imperial power had been asserted, but the cost was heavy. Thirty-one officers and 251 men had been killed and wounded out of a fighting force that had on no occasion exceeded 1200 men. The casualties of General Jeffrey's brigade in the Mamund Valley were as follows:-- British Officers.... Killed or died of wounds 7 " " .... Wounded.... 17 " Soldiers.... Killed .... 7 " " .... Wounded.... 41 Native Officers .... Killed .... 0 " " .... Wounded.... 7 " Soldiers .... Killed .... 48 " " .... Wounded.... 147 Followers ...... ..... 8 ---- Total..... 282 Horses and mules..... ..... 150 The main cause of this long list of casualties was, as I have already written, the proximity of the Afghan border. But it would be unjust and ungenerous to deny to the people of the Mamund Valley that reputation for courage, tactical skill and marksmanship, which they have so well deserved. During an indefinite period they had brawled and fought in the unpenetrated gloom of barbarism. At length they struck a blow at civilisation, and civilisation, though compelled to record the odious vices that the fierce light of scientific war exposed, will yet ungrudgingly admit that they are a brave and warlike race. Their name will live in the minds of men for some years, even in this busy century, and there are families in England who will never forget it. But perhaps the tribesmen, sitting sullenly on the hillsides and contemplating the ruin of their habitations, did not realise all this, or if they did, still felt regret at having tried conclusions with the British Raj. Their fame had cost them dear. Indeed, as we have been told, "nothing is so expensive as glory." The troops camped on the night of the 12th at Jar, and on the following day moved up the Salarzai Valley to Matashah. Here they remained for nearly a week. This tribe, terrified by the punishment of the Mamunds, made no regular opposition, though the camp was fired into regularly every night by a few hot-blooded "snipers." Several horses and mules were hit, and a sowar in the Guides Cavalry was wounded. The reconnaissances in force, which were sent out daily to the farther end of the valley, were not resisted in any way, and the tribal jirgahs used every effort to collect the rifles which they had been ordered to surrender. By the 19th all were given up, and on the 20th the troops moved back to Jar. There Sir Bindon Blood received the submission of the Utman Khels, who brought in the weapons demanded from them, and paid a fine as an indemnity for attacking the Malakand and Chakdara. The soldiers, who were still in a fighting mood, watched with impatience the political negotiations which produced so peaceful a triumph. All Indian military commanders, from Lord Clive and Lord Clive's times downwards, have inveighed against the practice of attaching civil officers to field forces. It has been said, frequently with truth, that they hamper the military operations, and by interfering with the generals, infuse a spirit of vacillation into the plans. Although the political officers of the Malakand Field Force were always personally popular with their military comrades, there were many who criticised their official actions, and disapproved of their presence. The duties of the civil officers, in a campaign, are twofold: firstly, to negotiate, and secondly, to collect information. It would seem that for the first of these duties they are indispensable. The difficult language and peculiar characters of the tribesmen are the study of a lifetime. A knowledge of the local conditions, of the power and influence of the khans, or other rulers of the people; of the general history and traditions of the country, is a task which must be entirely specialised. Rough and ready methods are excellent while the tribes resist, but something more is required when they are anxious to submit. Men are needed who understand the whole question, and all the details of the quarrel, between the natives and the Government, and who can in some measure appreciate both points of view. I do not believe that such are to be found in the army. The military profession is alone sufficient to engross the attention of the most able and accomplished man. Besides this I cannot forget how many quiet nights the 2nd Brigade enjoyed at Inayat Kila when the "snipers" were driven away by the friendly pickets; how many fresh eggs and water melons were procured, and how easily letters and messages were carried about the country [As correspondent of the Pioneer, I invariably availed myself of this method of sending the press telegrams to the telegraph office at Panjkora, and though the route lay through twenty miles of the enemy's country, these messages not only never miscarried, but on several occasions arrived before the official despatches or any heliographed news. By similar agency the bodies of Lieutenant-Colonel O'Bryen and Lieutenant Browne-Clayton, killed in the attack upon Agrah on the 30th of September, were safely and swiftly conveyed to Malakand for burial.] through the relations which the political officers, Mr. Davis and Mr. Gunter, maintained, under very difficult circumstances, with these tribesmen, who were not actually fighting us. Respecting the second duty, it is difficult to believe that the collection of information as to the numbers and intentions of the enemy would not be better and more appropriately carried out by the Intelligence Department and the cavalry. Civil officers should not be expected to understand what kind of military information a general requires. It is not their business. I am aware that Mr. Davis procured the most correct intelligence about the great night attack at Nawagai, and thus gave ample warning to Sir Bindon Blood. But on the other hand the scanty information available about the Mamunds, previous to the action of the 16th, was the main cause of the severe loss sustained on that day. Besides, the incessant rumours of a night attack on Inayat Kila, kept the whole force in their boots about three nights each week. Civil officers should discharge diplomatic duties, and military officers the conduct of war. And the collection of information is one of the most important of military duties. Our Pathan Sepoys, the Intelligence Branch, and an enterprising cavalry, should obtain all the facts that a general requires to use in his plans. At least the responsibility can thus be definitely assigned. On one point, however, I have no doubts. The political officers must be under the control of the General directing the operations. There must be no "Imperium in imperio." In a Field Force one man only can command--and all in it must be under his authority. Differences, creating difficulties and leading to disasters, will arise whenever the political officers are empowered to make arrangements with the tribesmen, without consulting and sometimes without even informing the man on whose decisions the success of the war and the lives of the soldiers directly depend. The subject is a difficult one to discuss, without wounding the feelings of those gallant men, who take all the risks of war, while the campaign lasts, and, when it is over, live in equal peril of their lives among the savage populations, whose dispositions they study, and whose tempers they watch. I am glad to have done with it. During the stay of the brigades in Bajaur, there had been several cases of desertion among the Afridi Sepoys. On one occasion five men of the 24th Punjaub Infantry, who were out on picket, departed in a body, and taking their arms with them set off towards Tirah and the Khyber Pass. As I have recorded several instances of gallantry and conduct among the Afridis and Pathans in our ranks, it is only fitting that the reverse of the medal should be shown. The reader, who may be interested in the characters of the subject races of the Empire, and of the native soldiers, on whom so much depends, will perhaps pardon a somewhat long digression on the subject of Pathans and Sikhs. It should not be forgotten by those who make wholesale assertions of treachery and untrustworthiness against the Afridi and Pathan soldiers, that these men are placed in a very strange and false position. They are asked to fight against their countrymen and co-religionists. On the one side are accumulated all the forces of fanaticism, patriotism and natural ties. On the other military associations stand alone. It is no doubt a grievous thing to be false to an oath of allegiance, but there are other obligations not less sacred. To respect an oath is a duty which the individual owes to society. Yet, who would by his evidence send a brother to the gallows? The ties of nature are older and take precedence of all other human laws. When the Pathan is invited to suppress his fellow-countrymen, or even to remain a spectator of their suppression, he finds himself in a situation at which, in the words of Burke, "Morality is perplexed, reason staggered, and from which affrighted nature recoils." There are many on the frontier who realise these things, and who sympathise with the Afridi soldier in his dilemma. An officer of the Guides Infantry, of long experience and considerable distinction, who commands both Sikhs and Afridis, and has led both many times in action, writes as follows: "Personally, I don't blame any Afridis who desert to go and defend their own country, now that we have invaded it, and I think it is only natural and proper that they should want to do so." Such an opinion may be taken as typical of the views of a great number of officers, who have some title to speak on the subject, as it is one on which their lives might at any moment depend. The Sikh is the guardian of the Marches. He was originally invented to combat the Pathan. His religion was designed to be diametrically opposed to Mahommedanism. It was a shrewd act of policy. Fanaticism was met by fanaticism. Religious abhorrence was added to racial hatred. The Pathan invaders were rolled back to the mountains, and the Sikhs established themselves at Lahore and Peshawar. The strong contrast, and much of the animosity, remain to-day. The Sikh wears his hair down to his waist; the Pathan shaves his head. The Sikh drinks what he will; the Pathan is an abstainer. The Sikh is burnt after death; the Pathan would be thus deprived of Paradise. As a soldier the Pathan is a finer shot, a hardier man, a better marcher, especially on the hillside, and possibly an even more brilliant fighter. He relies more on instinct than education: war is in his blood; he is a born marksman, but he is dirty, lazy and a spendthrift. In the Sikh the more civilised man appears. He does not shoot naturally, but he learns by patient practice. He is not so tough as the Pathan, but he delights in feats of strength--wrestling, running, or swimming. He is a much cleaner soldier and more careful. He is frequently parsimonious, and always thrifty, and does not generally feed himself as well as the Pathan. [Indeed in some regiments the pay of very thin Sikhs is given them in the form of food, and they have to be carefully watched by their officers till they get fat and strong.] There are some who say that the Sikh will go on under circumstances which will dishearten and discourage his rival, and that if the latter has more dash he has less stamina. The assertion is not supported by facts. In 1895, when Lieut.-Colonel Battye was killed near the Panjkora River and the Guides were hard pressed, the subadar of the Afridi company, turning to his countrymen, shouted: "Now, then, Afridi folk of the Corps of Guides, the Commanding Officer's killed, now's the time to charge!" and the British officers had the greatest difficulty in restraining these impetuous soldiers from leaving their position, and rushing to certain death. The story recalls the speech of the famous cavalry colonel at the action of Tamai, when the squares were seen to be broken, and an excited and demoralised correspondent galloped wildly up to the squadrons, declaring that all was lost. "How do you mean, 'all's lost'? Don't you see the 10th Hussars are here?" There are men in the world who derive as stern an exultation from the proximity of disaster and ruin as others from success, and who are more magnificent in defeat than others are in victory. Such spirits are undoubtedly to be found among the Afridis and Pathans. I will quote, in concluding this discussion, the opinion of an old Gurkha subadar who had seen much fighting. He said that he liked the Sikhs better, but would sooner have Afridis with him at a pinch than any other breed of men in India. It is comfortable to reflect, that both are among the soldiers of the Queen. Although there were no Gurkhas in the Malakand Field Force, it is impossible to consider Indian fighting races without alluding to these wicked little men. In appearance they resemble a bronze Japanese. Small, active and fierce, ever with a cheery grin on their broad faces, they combine the dash of the Pathan with the discipline of the Sikh. They spend all their money on food, and, unhampered by religion, drink, smoke and swear like the British soldier, in whose eyes they find more favour than any other--as he regards them--breed of "niggers." They are pure mercenaries, and, while they welcome the dangers, they dislike the prolongation of a campaign, being equally eager to get back to their wives and to the big meat meals of peace time. After the Utman Khels had been induced to comply with the terms, the brigades recrossed the Panjkora River, and then marching by easy stages down the line of communications, returned to the Malakand. The Guides, moving back to Mardan, went into cantonments again, and turned in a moment from war to peace. The Buffs, bitterly disappointed at having lost their chance of joining in the Tirah expedition, remained at Malakand in garrison. A considerable force was retained near Jalala, to await the issue of the operations against the Afridis, and to be ready to move against the Bunerwals, should an expedition be necessary. Here we leave the Malakand Field Force. It may be that there is yet another chapter of its history which remains to be written, and that the fine regiments of which it is composed will, under their trusted commander, have other opportunities of playing the great game of war. If that be so, the reader shall decide whether the account shall prolong the tale I have told, or whether the task shall fall to another hand. [It is an excellent instance of the capricious and haphazard manner in which honours and rewards are bestowed in the army, that the operations in the Mamund Valley and throughout Bajaur are commemorated by no distinctive clasp. The losses sustained by the Brigade were indisputably most severe. The result was successful. The conduct of the troops has been officially commended. Yet the soldiers who were engaged in all the rough fighting I have described in the last eight chapters have been excluded from any of the special clasps which have been struck. They share the general clasp with every man who crossed the frontier and with some thousands who never saw a shot fired.] CHAPTER XVII: MILITARY OBSERVATIONS "... And thou hast talk'd Of sallies and retires, of trenches, tents, Of palisadoes, frontiers, parapets, Of basilisks, of cannon, culverin." "Henry IV.," Part I., Act ii., Sc.3. It may at first seem that a chapter wholly devoted to military considerations is inappropriate to a book which, if it is to enjoy any measure of success, must be read by many unconnected with the army. But I remember that in these days it is necessary for every one, who means to be well informed, to have a superficial knowledge of every one else's business. Encouraged also by what Mr. Gladstone has called "the growing militarism of the times," I hope that, avoiding technicalities, it may be of some general interest to glance for a moment at the frontier war from a purely professional point of view. My observations must be taken as applying to the theatre of the war I have described, but I do not doubt that many of them will be applicable to the whole frontier. The first and most important consideration is transport. Nobody who has not seen for himself can realise what a great matter this is. I well recall my amazement, when watching a camel convoy more than a mile and a half long, escorted by half a battalion of infantry. I was informed that it contained only two days' supplies for one brigade. People talk lightly of moving columns hither and thither, as if they were mobile groups of men, who had only to march about the country and fight the enemy wherever found, and very few understand that an army is a ponderous mass which drags painfully after it a long chain of advanced depots, stages, rest camps, and communications, by which it is securely fastened to a stationary base. In these valleys, where wheeled traffic is impossible, the difficulties and cost of moving supplies are enormous; and as none, or very few, are to be obtained within the country, the consideration is paramount. Mule transport is for many reasons superior to camel transport. The mule moves faster and can traverse more difficult ground. He is also more hardy and keeps in better condition. When Sir Bindon Blood began his advance against the Mohmands he equipped his 2nd Brigade entirely with mules. It was thus far more mobile, and was available for any rapid movement that might become necessary. To mix the two--camels and mules--appears to combine the disadvantages of both, and destroy the superiority of either. I have already described the Indian service camp and the "sniping" without which no night across the frontier could be complete. I shall therefore only notice two points, which were previously omitted, as they looked suspiciously technical. As the night firing is sometimes varied by more serious attacks, and even actual assaults and sword rushes, it is thought advisable to have the ditch of the entrenchment towards the enemy. Modern weapons notwithstanding, the ultimate appeal is to the bayonet, and the advantage of being on the higher ground is then considerable. When a battery forms part of the line round a camp, infantry soldiers should be placed between the guns. Artillery officers do not like this; but, though they are very good fellows, there are some things in which it is not well to give way to them. Every one is prone to over-estimate the power of his arm. In the Mamund Valley all the fighting occurred in capturing villages, which lay in rocky and broken ground in the hollows of the mountains, and were defended by a swarm of active riflemen. Against the quickly moving figures of the enemy it proved almost useless to fire volleys. The tribesmen would dart from rock to rock, exposing themselves only for an instant, and before the attention of a section could be directed to them and the rifles aimed, the chance and the target would have vanished together. Better results were obtained by picking out good shots and giving them permission to fire when they saw their opportunity, without waiting for the word of command. But speaking generally, infantry should push on to the attack with the bayonet without wasting much time in firing, which can only result in their being delayed under the fire of a well-posted enemy. After the capture and destruction of the village, the troops had always to return to camp, and a retirement became necessary. The difficulty of executing such an operation in the face of an active and numerous enemy, armed with modern rifles, was great. I had the opportunity of witnessing six of these retirements from the rear companies. Five were fortunate and one was disastrous, but all were attended with loss, and as experienced officers have informed me, with danger. As long as no one is hit everything is successful, but as soon as a few men are wounded, the difficulties begin. No sooner has a point been left--a knoll, a patch of corn, some rocks, or any other incident of ground--than it is seized by the enemy. With their excellent rifles, they kill or wound two or three of the retiring company, whose somewhat close formation makes them a good mark. Now, in civilised war these wounded would be left on the ground, and matters arranged next day by parley. But on the frontier, where no quarter is asked or given, to carry away the wounded is a sacred duty. It is also the strenuous endeavour of every regiment to carry away their dead. The vile and horrid mutilations which the tribesmen inflict on all bodies that fall into their hands, and the insults to which they expose them, add, to unphilosophic minds, another terror to death. Now, it takes at least four men, and very often more, to carry away a body. Observe the result. Every man hit, means five rifles withdrawn from the firing line. Ten men hit, puts a company out of action, as far as fighting power is concerned. The watchful enemy press. The groups of men bearing the injured are excellent targets. Presently the rear-guard is encumbered with wounded. Then a vigorous charge with swords is pushed home. Thus, a disaster occurs. Watching the progress of events, sometimes from one regiment, sometimes from another, I observed several ways by which these difficulties could be avoided. The Guides, long skilled in frontier war, were the most valuable instructors. As the enemy seize every point as soon as it is left, all retirements should be masked by leaving two or three men behind from each company. These keep up a brisk fire, and after the whole company have taken up a new position, or have nearly done so, they run back and join them. Besides this, the fire of one company in retiring should always be arranged to cover another, and at no moment in a withdrawal should the firing ever cease. The covering company should be actually in position before the rear company begins to move, and should open fire at once. I was particularly struck on 18th September by the retirement of the Guides Infantry. These principles were carried out with such skill and thoroughness that, though the enemy pressed severely, only one man was wounded. The way in which Major Campbell, the commanding officer, availed himself of the advantages of retiring down two spurs and bringing a cross fire to bear to cover the alternate retirements, resembled some intricate chess problem, rather than a military evolution. The power of the new Lee-Metford rifle with the new Dum-Dum bullet--it is now called, though not officially, the "ek-dum" [Hindustani for "at once."] bullet--is tremendous. The soldiers who have used it have the utmost confidence in their weapon. Up to 500 yards there is no difficulty about judging the range, as it shoots quite straight, or, technically speaking, has a flat trajectory. This is of the greatest value. Of the bullet it may be said, that its stopping power is all that could be desired. The Dum-Dum bullet, though not explosive, is expansive. The original Lee-Metford bullet was a pellet of lead covered by a nickel case with an opening at the base. In the improved bullet this outer case has been drawn backward, making the hole in the base a little smaller and leaving the lead at the tip exposed. The result is a wonderful and from the technical point of view a beautiful machine. On striking a bone this causes the bullet to "set up" or spread out, and it then tears and splinters everything before it, causing wounds which in the body must be generally mortal and in any limb necessitate amputation. Continental critics have asked whether such a bullet is not a violation of the Geneva or St. Petersburg Conventions; but no clause of these international agreements forbids expansive bullets, and the only provision on the subject is that shells less than a certain size shall not be employed. I would observe that bullets are primarily intended to kill, and that these bullets do their duty most effectually, without causing any more pain to those struck by them, than the ordinary lead variety. As the enemy obtained some Lee-Metford rifles and Dum-Dum ammunition during the progress of the fighting, information on this latter point is forthcoming. The sensation is described as similar to that produced by any bullet--a violent numbing blow, followed by a sense of injury and weakness, but little actual pain at the time. Indeed, now-a-days, very few people are so unfortunate as to suffer much pain from wounds, except during the period of recovery. A man is hit. In a quarter of an hour, that is to say, before the shock has passed away and the pain begins, he is usually at the dressing station. Here he is given morphia injections, which reduce all sensations to a uniform dullness. In this state he remains until he is placed under chloroform and operated on. The necessity for having the officers in the same dress as the men, was apparent to all who watched the operations. The conspicuous figure which a British officer in his helmet presented in contrast to the native soldiers in their turbans, drew a well-aimed fire in his direction. Of course, in British regiments, the difference is not nearly so marked. Nevertheless, at close quarters the keen-eyed tribesmen always made an especial mark of the officers, distinguishing them chiefly, I think, by the fact that they do not carry rifles. The following story may show how evident this was:-- When the Buffs were marching down to Panjkora, they passed the Royal West Kent coming up to relieve them at Inayat Kila. A private in the up-going regiment asked a friend in the Buffs what it was like at the front. "Oh," replied the latter, "you'll be all right so long as you don't go near no officers, nor no white stones." Whether the advice was taken is not recorded, but it was certainly sound, for three days later--on 30th September--in those companies of the Royal West Kent regiment that were engaged in the village of Agrah, eight out of eleven officers were hit or grazed by bullets. The fatigues experienced by troops in mountain warfare are so great, that every effort has to be made to lighten the soldier's load. At the same time the more ammunition he carries on his person the better. Mules laden with cartridge-boxes are very likely to be shot, and fall into the hands of the enemy. In this manner over 6000 rounds were lost on the 16th of September by the two companies of Sikhs whose retirement I have described. The thick leather belts, pouches, and valise equipment of British infantry are unnecessarily heavy. I have heard many officers suggest having them made of web. The argument against this is that the web wears out. That objection could be met by having a large supply of these equipments at the base and issuing fresh ones as soon as the old were unfit for use. It is cheaper to wear out belts than soldiers. Great efforts should be made to give the soldier a piece of chocolate, a small sausage, or something portable and nutritious to carry with him to the field. In a war of long marches, of uncertain fortunes, of retirements often delayed and always pressed, there have been many occasions when regiments and companies have unexpectedly had to stop out all night without food. It is well to remember that the stomach governs the world. The principle of concentrating artillery has long been admitted in Europe. Sir Bindon Blood is the first general who has applied it to mountain warfare in India. It had formerly been the custom to use the guns by twos and threes. As we have seen, at the action of Landakai, the Malakand Field Force had eighteen guns in action, of which twelve were in one line. The fire of this artillery drove the enemy, who were in great strength and an excellent position, from the ground. The infantry attack was accomplished with hardly any loss, and a success was obtained at a cost of a dozen lives which would have been cheap at a hundred. After this, it may seem strange if I say that the artillery fire in the Mamund Valley did very little execution. It is nevertheless a fact. The Mamunds are a puny tribe, but they build their houses in the rocks; and against sharpshooters in broken ground, guns can do little. Through field-glasses it was possible to see the enemy dodging behind their rocks, whenever the puffs of smoke from the guns told them that a shell was on its way. Perhaps smokeless powder would have put a stop to this. But in any case, the targets presented to the artillery were extremely bad. Where they really were of great service, was not so much in killing the enemy, but in keeping them from occupying certain spurs and knolls. On 30th September, when the Royal West Kent and the 31st Punjaub Infantry were retiring under considerable pressure, the British Mountain Battery moved to within 700 yards of the enemy, and opened a rapid fire of shrapnel on the high ground which commanded the line of retreat, killing such of the tribesmen as were there, and absolutely forbidding the hill to their companions. In all rearguard actions among the mountains the employment of artillery is imperative. Even two guns may materially assist the extrication of the infantry from the peaks and crags of the hillside, and prevent by timely shells the tribesmen from seizing each point as soon as it is evacuated. But there is no reason why the artillery should be stinted, and at least two batteries, if available, should accompany a brigade to the attack. Signalling by heliograph was throughout the operations of the greatest value. I had always realised the advantages of a semi-permanent line of signal stations along the communications to the telegraph, but I had doubted the practicability of using such complicated arrangements in action. In this torrid country, where the sun is always shining, the heliograph is always useful. As soon as any hill was taken, communication was established with the brigadier, and no difficulty seemed to be met with, even while the attack was in progress, in sending messages quickly and clearly. In a country intersected by frequent ravines, over which a horse can move but slowly and painfully, it is the surest, the quickest, and indeed the only means of intercommunication. I am delighted to testify to these things, because I had formerly been a scoffer. I have touched on infantry and artillery, and, though a previous chapter has been almost wholly devoted to the cavalry, I cannot resist the desire to get back to the horses and the lances again. The question of sword or lance as the cavalryman's weapon has long been argued, and it may be of interest to consider what are the views of those whose experience is the most recent. Though I have had no opportunity of witnessing the use of the lance, I have heard the opinions of many officers both of the Guides and the 11th Bengal Lancers. All admit or assert that the lance is in this warfare the better weapon. It kills with more certainty and convenience, and there is less danger of the horseman being cut down. As to length, the general opinion seems to be in favour of a shorter spear. This, with a counter poise at the butt, gives as good a reach and is much more useful for close quarters. Major Beatson, one of the most distinguished cavalry officers on the frontier, is a strong advocate of this. Either the pennon should be knotted, or a boss of some sort affixed about eighteen inches below the point. Unless this be done there is a danger of the lance penetrating too far, when it either gets broken or allows the enemy to wriggle up and strike the lancer. This last actually happened on several occasions. Now, in considering the question to what extent a squadron should be armed with lances, the system adopted by the Guides may be of interest. In this warfare it is very often necessary for the cavalryman to dismount and use his carbine. The lance then gets in the way and has to be tied to the saddle. This takes time, and there is usually not much time to spare in cavalry skirmishing. The Guides compromise matters by giving one man in every four a lance. This man, when the others dismount, stays in the saddle and holds their horses. They also give the outer sections of each squadron lances, and these, too, remain mounted, as the drill-book enjoins. But I become too technical. I pass for a moment to combined tactics. In frontier warfare Providence is on the side of the good band-o-bust [arrangements]. There are no scenic effects or great opportunities, and the Brigadier who leaves the mountains with as good a reputation as he entered them has proved himself an able, sensible man. The general who avoids all "dash," who never starts in the morning looking for a fight and without any definite intention, who does not attempt heroic achievements, and who keeps his eye on his watch, will have few casualties and little glory. For the enemy do not become formidable until a mistake has been made. The public who do not believe in military operations without bloodshed may be unattentive. His subordinate officers may complain that they have had no fighting. But in the consciousness of duty skillfully performed and of human life preserved he will find a high reward. A general review of the frontier war will, I think, show the great disadvantages to which regular troops are exposed in fighting an active enterprising enemy that can move faster and shoot better, who knows the country and who knows the ranges. The terrible losses inflicted on the tribesmen in the Swat Valley show how easily disciplined troops can brush away the bravest savages in the open. But on the hillside all is changed, and the observer will be struck by the weakness rather than the strength of modern weapons. Daring riflemen, individually superior to the soldiers, and able to support the greatest fatigues, can always inflict loss, although they cannot bar their path. The military problem with which the Spaniards are confronted in Cuba is in many points similar to that presented in the Afghan valleys; a roadless, broken and undeveloped country; an absence of any strategic points; a well-armed enemy with great mobility and modern rifles, who adopts guerilla tactics. The results in either case are, that the troops can march anywhere, and do anything, except catch the enemy; and that all their movements must be attended with loss. If the question of subduing the tribes be regarded from a purely military standpoint, if time were no object, and there was no danger of a lengthy operation being interrupted by a change of policy at home, it would appear that the efforts of commanders should be, to induce the tribesmen to assume the offensive. On this point I must limit my remarks to the flat-bottomed valleys of Swat and Bajaur. To coerce a tribe like the Mamunds, a mixed brigade might camp at the entrance to the valley, and as at Inayat Kila, entrench itself very strongly. The squadron of cavalry could patrol the valley daily in complete security, as the tribesmen would not dare to leave the hills. All sowing of crops and agricultural work would be stopped. The natives would retaliate by firing into the camp at night. This would cause loss; but if every one were to dig a good hole to sleep in, and if the officers were made to have dinner before sundown, and forbidden to walk about except on duty after dark, there is no reason why the loss should be severe. At length the tribesmen, infuriated by the occupation of their valley, and perhaps rendered desperate by the approach of famine and winter, would make a tremendous attempt to storm the camp. With a strong entrenchment, a wire trip to break a rush, and modern rifles, they would be driven off with great slaughter, and once severely punished would probably beg for terms. If not, the process would be continued until they did so. Such a military policy would cost about the same in money as the vigorous methods I have described, as though smaller numbers of troops might be employed, they would have to remain mobilised and in the field for a longer period. But the loss in personnel would be much less. As good an example of the success of this method as can be found, is provided by Sir Bindon Blood's tactics at Nawagai, when, being too weak to attack the enemy himself, he encouraged them to attack him, and then beat them off with great loss. From the point which we have now reached, it is possible, and perhaps not undesirable, to take a rapid yet sweeping glance of the larger military problems of the day. We have for some years adopted the "short service" system. It is a continental system. It has many disadvantages. Troops raised under it suffer from youth, want of training and lack of regimental associations. But on the Continent it has this one, paramount recommendation: it provides enormous numbers. The active army is merely a machine for manufacturing soldiers quickly, and passing them into the reserves, to be stored until they are wanted. European nations deal with soldiers only in masses. Great armies of men, not necessarily of a high standard of courage and training, but armed with deadly weapons, are directed against one another, under varying strategical conditions. Before they can rebound, thousands are slaughtered and a great battle has been won or lost. The average courage of the two nations may perhaps have been decided. The essence of the continental system is its gigantic scale. We have adopted this system in all respects but one, and that the vital one. We have got the poor quality, without the great quantity. We have, by the short service system, increased our numbers a little, and decreased our standard a good deal. The reason that this system, which is so well adapted to continental requirements, confers no advantages upon us is obvious. Our army is recruited by a voluntary system. Short service and conscription are inseparable. For this reason, several stern soldiers advocate conscription. But many words will have to be spoken, many votes voted, and perhaps many blows struck before the British people would submit to such an abridgment of their liberties, or such a drag upon their commerce. It will be time to make such sacrifices when the English Channel runs dry. Without conscription we cannot have great numbers. It should therefore be our endeavour to have those we possess of the best quality; and our situation and needs enforce this view. Our soldiers are not required to operate in great masses, but very often to fight hand to hand. Their campaigns are not fought in temperate climates and civilised countries. They are sent beyond the seas to Africa or the Indian frontier, and there, under a hot sun and in a pestilential land, they are engaged in individual combat with athletic savages. They are not old enough for the work. Young as they are, their superior weapons and the prestige of the dominant race enable them to maintain their superiority over the native troops. But in the present war several incidents have occurred, unimportant, insignificant, it is true, but which, in the interests of Imperial expediency, are better forgotten. The native regiments are ten years older than the British regiments. Many of their men have seen service and have been under fire. Some of them have several medals. All, of course, are habituated to the natural conditions. It is evident how many advantages they enjoy. It is also apparent how very serious the consequences would be if they imagined they possessed any superiority. That such an assumption should even be possible is a menace to our very existence in India. Intrinsic merit is the only title of a dominant race to its possessions. If we fail in this it is not because our spirit is old and grown weak, but because our soldiers are young, and not yet grown strong. Boys of twenty-one and twenty-two are expected to compete on equal terms with Sikhs and Gurkhas of thirty, fully developed and in the prime of life. It is an unfair test. That they should have held their own is a splendid tribute to the vigour of our race. The experiment is dangerous, and it is also expensive. We continue to make it because the idea is still cherished that British armies will one day again play a part in continental war. When the people of the United Kingdom are foolish enough to allow their little army to be ground to fragments between continental myriads, they will deserve all the misfortunes that will inevitably come upon them. I am aware that these arguments are neither original nor new. I have merely arranged them. I am also aware that there are able, brilliant men who have spent their lives in the service of the State, who do not take the views I have quoted. The question has been regarded from an Indian point of view. There is probably no colonel in India, who commands a British regiment, who would not like to see his men five years older. It may be that the Indian opinion on the subject is based only on partial information, and warped by local circumstances. Still I have thought it right to submit it to the consideration of the public, at a time when the army has been filling such a prominent position, not only in the Jubilee procession and the frontier war, but also in the estimates presented to the House of Commons. Passing from the concrete to the abstract, it may not be unfitting that these pages, which have recorded so many valiant deeds, should contain some brief inquiry into the nature of those motives which induce men to expose themselves to great hazards, and to remain in situations of danger. The circumstances of war contain every element that can shake the nerves. The whizzing of the projectiles; the shouts and yells of a numerous and savage enemy; the piteous aspect of the wounded, covered with blood and sometimes crying out in pain; the spurts of dust which on all sides show where Fate is stepping--these are the sights and sounds which assail soldiers, whose development and education enable them to fully appreciate their significance. And yet the courage of the soldier is the commonest of virtues. Thousands of men, drawn at random from the population, are found to control the instinct of self-preservation. Nor is this courage peculiar to any particular nation. Courage is not only common, but cosmopolitan. But such are the apparent contradictions of life, that this virtue, which so many seem to possess, all hold the highest. There is probably no man, however miserable, who would not writhe at being exposed a coward. Why should the common be precious? What is the explanation? It appears to be this. The courage of the soldier is not really contempt for physical evils and indifference to danger. It is a more or less successful attempt to simulate these habits of mind. Most men aspire to be good actors in the play. There are a few who are so perfect that they do not seem to be actors at all. This is the ideal after which the rest are striving. It is one very rarely attained. Three principal influences combine to assist men in their attempts: preparation, vanity and sentiment. The first includes all the force of discipline and training. The soldier has for years contemplated the possibility of being under fire. He has wondered vaguely what kind of an experience it would be. He has seen many who have gone through it and returned safely. His curiosity is excited. Presently comes the occasion. By road and railway he approaches daily nearer to the scene. His mind becomes familiar with the prospect. His comrades are in the same situation. Habit, behind which force of circumstances is concealed, makes him conform. At length the hour arrives. He observes the darting puffs of smoke in the distance. He listens to the sounds that are in the air. Perhaps he hears something strike with a thud and sees a soldier near him collapse like a shot pheasant. He realises that it may be his turn next. Fear grips him by the throat. Then vanity, the vice which promotes so many virtues, asserts itself. He looks at his comrades and they at him. So far he has shown no sign of weakness. He thinks, they are thinking him brave. The dearly longed-for reputation glitters before his eyes. He executes the orders he receives. But something else is needed to made a hero. Some other influence must help him through the harder trials and more severe ordeals which may befall him. It is sentiment which makes the difference in the end. Those who doubt should stroll to the camp fire one night and listen to the soldiers' songs. Every one clings to something that he thinks is high and noble, or that raises him above the rest of the world in the hour of need. Perhaps he remembers that he is sprung from an ancient stock, and of a race that has always known how to die; or more probably it is something smaller and more intimate; the regiment, whatever it is called--"The Gordons," "The Buffs," "The Queen's,"--and so nursing the name--only the unofficial name of an infantry battalion after all--he accomplishes great things and maintains the honour and the Empire of the British people. It may be worth while, in the matter of names, to observe the advantages to a regiment of a monosyllabic appellation. Every one will remember Lieut.-Colonel Mathias' speech to the Gordons. Imagine for a moment that speech addressed to some regiment saddled with a fantastic title on the territorial system, as, for instance, Mr. Kipling's famous regiment, "The Princess Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen-Anspach's Merthyr Tydvilshire Own Royal Loyal Light Infantry." With the old numbers all started on equal terms. This has been perhaps a cold-blooded chapter. We have considered men as targets; tribesmen, fighting for their homes and hills, have been regarded only as the objective of an attack; killed and wounded human beings, merely as the waste of war. We have even attempted to analyse the high and noble virtue of courage, in the hopes of learning how it may be manufactured. The philosopher may observe with pity, and the philanthropist deplore with pain, that the attention of so many minds should be directed to the scientific destruction of the human species; but practical people in a business-like age will remember that they live in a world of men--not angels--and regulate their conduct accordingly. CHAPTER XVIII. AND LAST.: THE RIDDLE OF THE FRONTIER "Myself when young did eagerly frequent Doctor and saint, and heard great argument About it and about, but evermore Came out by the same door wherein I went." OMAR KHAYYAM. These pages, which have chronicled a variety of small incidents, have hitherto concerned themselves little with the great matters out of which those incidents have arisen. As an opening chapter should lead the reader to expect the considerations that the book contains, so the conclusion should express the opinion he might form from the perusal. When, at an earlier period, I refrained from discussing the question of frontier policy, I declared that its consideration was only postponed until a more propitious moment. That moment now presents itself. There will not be wanting those who will remind me, that in this matter my opinion is not supported by age or experience. To such I shall reply, that if what is written is false or foolish, neither age nor experience should fortify it; and if it is true, it needs no such support. The propositions of Euclid would be no less indisputable were they propounded by an infant or an idiot. The inquirer sees the vast question unfold itself with feelings like those with which the fisherman in the old story watched the genius he had unwittingly released, rise from the bottle in clouds of smoke, which overspread the whole sky. Every moment the subject appears not only wider but deeper. When I reflect on the great number of diverse and often conflicting facts which may be assembled under every head--military, economic, political or moral--and consider the accumulations of specialised and technical knowledge necessary for their proper appreciation, I am convinced that to compass the whole is beyond the mind and memory of man. Of such a question it is difficult to take broad views, and dangerous to generalise. Still less is it possible, as many people appear to imagine, to settle it with a phrase or an epigram. A point is reached where all relation between detail and proportion is lost. It is a picture of such great size that to see it all, it is necessary to stand so far off that neither colours nor figures are distinguishable. By constantly changing the point of view, some true perspective is possible, and even then the conception must be twisted and distorted, by the imperfections of the mental mirror. Sensible of the magnitude of the task, and conscious of my own weakness, I propose to examine in a spirit of cautious inquiry and of tolerance the present "Forward Policy," and thence to approach the main question, to the answer of which that policy is only a guess. I must revert to a period when the British power, having conquered the plains of India and subdued its sovereigns, paused at the foot of the Himalayas and turned its tireless energy to internal progress and development. The "line of the mountains" formed a frontier as plain and intelligible as that which defines the limits of the sea. To the south lay the British Empire in India; to the north were warlike tribes, barbarous, unapproachable, irreclaimable; and far beyond these, lay the other great Power of Asia. It was long the wisdom of Anglo-Indian statesmen to preserve a situation which contained so many elements of finality, and so many guarantees of peace. When the northern savages, impelled by fanaticism or allured by plunder, descended from the mountains and invaded the plains, they were met by equal courage and superior discipline, and driven in disorder to their confines. But this was found to be an inadequate deterrent, and the purely defensive principle had to be modified in favor of that system of punitive expeditions which has been derided as the policy of "Butcher and Bolt." Gradually, as the circumstances altered, the methods of dealing with them changed. The punitive expeditions had awakened an intense hostility among the tribesmen. The intrigues of Russia had for some time been watched with alarm by the Indian Government. As long as the border could remain a "No-man's land"--as it were a "great gulf fixed"--all was well; but if any power was to be supreme, that power must neither be Russia nor Afghanistan. ["We shall consider it from the first incumbent upon the Government of India to prevent, at any cost, the establishment within this outlying country of the political preponderance of any other power."--Letter from Government of India to the Secretary of State, No.49, 28th February, 1879.] The predominance of Russian influence in these territories would give them the power to invade India at their discretion, with what chances of success need not be here discussed. The predominance of Afghan influence would make the Amir master of the situation, and enable him to blackmail the Indian Government indefinitely. A change of policy, a departure from the old frontier line, presented itself with increasing force to responsible men. To-day we see the evils that have resulted from that change. The dangers that inspired it have been modified. For some years the opinion in favour of an advance grew steadily among those in power in India. In 1876 a decisive step was taken. Roused by the efforts of the Amir to obtain the suzerainty of the Pathan tribes, Lord Lytton's Government stretched a hand through Cashmere towards Chitral, and the Mehtar of that State became the vassal, nominally of the Maharaja of Cashmere, but practically of the Imperial Government. The avowed object was to ultimately secure the effectual command of the passes of the Hindu Kush. [Despatch No.17, 11th June, 1877.] The British Ministry, the famous ministry of Lord Beaconsfield, approved the action and endorsed the policy. Again, in 1879, the Vice-regal Government, in an official despatch, declared their intention of acquiring, "through the ruler of Cashmere, the power of making such political and military arrangements as will effectually command the passes of the Hindu Kush." [Despatch No.49, 28th February, 1879.] "If," so runs the despatch, "we *extend and by degrees consolidate our influence* [The italics are mine] over this country, and if we resolve that no foreign interference can be permitted on this side of the mountains or within the drainage system of the Indus, we shall have laid down a natural line of frontier, which is distinct, intelligible and likely to be respected." [Despatch No.49, 28th February, 1879.] No declaration of policy or intention could have been more explicit. The words to "extend and consolidate our influence" can, when applied to barbarous peoples, have no other meaning than ultimate annexation. Thus the scheme of an advance from the plains of India into the mountain region, which had long been maturing in men's minds and which was shaped and outlined by many small emergencies and expedients, was clearly proclaimed. The forward movement had begun. A fresh and powerful impulse was imparted after the termination of Lord Ripon's viceroyalty. The open aggression which characterised the Russian frontier policy of '84 and '85 had been met by a supine apathy and indifference to the interests of the State, which deserved, and which, had the issues been less important, might have received actual punishment. It was natural that his immediate successors should strive to dissociate themselves from the follies and the blunders of those years. The spirit of reaction led to the final abandonment of the venerable policy of non-intervention. Instead of the "line of the mountains," it was now maintained that the passes through them must be held. This is the so-called "Forward Policy." It is a policy which aims at obtaining the frontier--Gilgit, Chitral, Jelalabad, Kandahar. In pursuance of that policy we have been led to build many frontier forts, to construct roads, to annex territories, and to enter upon more intimate relations with the border tribes. The most marked incident in that policy has been the retention of Chitral. This act was regarded by the tribesmen as a menace to their independence, and by the priesthood as the prelude to a general annexation. Nor were they wrong, for such is the avowed aim of the "Forward Policy." The result of the retention of Chitral has been, as I have already described, that the priesthood, knowing that their authority would be weakened by civilisation, have used their religious influence on the people to foment a general rising. It is useless to discuss the Chitral question independently. If the "Forward Policy" be justified, then the annexation of Chitral, its logical outcome, is also justified. The bye and the main plots stand or fall together. So far then we have advanced and have been resisted. The "Forward Policy" has brought an increase of territory, a nearer approach to what is presumably a better frontier line and--war. All this was to have been expected. It may be said of the present system that it precludes the possibility of peace. Isolated posts have been formed in the midst of races notoriously passionate, reckless and warlike. They are challenges. When they are assailed by the tribesmen, relieving and punitive expeditions become necessary. All this is the outcome of a recognised policy, and was doubtless foreseen by those who initiated it. What may be called strange is that the forts should be badly constructed--cramped, as the Malakand positions; commanded, like Chakdara; without flank defences, as at Saraghari; without proper garrisons, as in the Khyber. This is a side issue and accidental. The rest of the situation has been deliberately created. The possibility of a great combination among the border tribes was indeed not contemplated. Separated by distance, and divided by faction, it was anticipated they could be dealt with in detail. On this point we have been undeceived. That period of war and disturbance which was the inevitable first consequence of the "Forward Policy" must in any case have been disturbed and expensive. Regarded from an economic standpoint, the trade of the frontier valleys will never pay a shilling in the pound on the military expenditure necessary to preserve order. Morally, it is unfortunate for the tribesmen that our spheres of influence clash with their spheres of existence. Even on the military question, a purely technical question, as to whether an advanced frontier line is desirable or not, opinion is divided. Lord Roberts says one thing; Mr. Morley another. There is no lack of arguments against the "Forward Policy." There are many who opposed its initiation. There are many who oppose it now; who think that nothing should have lured the Government of India beyond their natural frontier line, and who maintain that it would have been both practical and philosophic had they said: "Over all the plains of India will we cast our rule. There we will place our governors and magistrates; our words shall be respected and our laws obeyed. But that region, where the land rises like the waves of a sea, shall serve us as a channel of stormy waters to divide us from our foes and rivals." But it is futile to engage in the controversies of the past. There are sufficient in the present, and it is with the present we are concerned. We have crossed the Rubicon. In the opinion of all those who know most about the case, the forward movement is now beyond recall. Indeed, when the intense hostility of the Border tribes, the uncertain attitude of the Amir, the possibilities of further Russian aggression and the state of feeling in India are considered, it is difficult to dispute this judgment. Successive Indian Administrations have urged, successive English Cabinets have admitted, the necessity of finding a definite and a defensible frontier. The old line has been left, and between that line and an advanced line continuous with Afghan territory, and south of which all shall be reduced to law and order, there does not appear to be any prospect of a peaceful and permanent settlement. The responsibility of placing us in this position rests with those who first forsook the old frontier policy of holding the "line of the mountains." The historian of the future, with impartial pen and a more complete knowledge, must pronounce on the wisdom of their act. In the meantime it should be remembered of these great men, that they left their public offices amid the applause and admiration of their contemporaries, and, "in the full tide of successful experiment." Nor can so much be said of all those who have assailed them. Those who decided, have accepted the responsibility, and have defended their action. But I am inclined to think that the rulers of India, ten years ago or a hundred years ago, were as much the sport of circumstances as their successors are to-day. Let us return to the present and our own affairs. We have embarked on stormy and perilous waters. The strong current of events forbids return. The sooner the farther shore is reached, the sooner will the dangers and discomforts of the voyage be over. All are anxious to make the land. The suggestions as to the course are numerous. There are some, bad and nervous sailors perhaps, who insist upon returning, although they are told it is impossible, and who would sink the ship sooner than go on, were they not outnumbered by their shipmates. While they are delaying, the current bears us towards more disturbed waters and more rocky landing places. There are others who call out for "Full steam ahead," and would accomplish the passage at once, whatever the risks. But alas! The ship is run out of coal and can only spread its sails to the varying breezes, take advantage of favorable tides, and must needs lie to when the waves are high. But the sensible passenger may, though he knows the difficulties of the voyage and the dangers of the sea, fairly ask the man at the wheel to keep a true and constant course. He may with reason and justice insist that, whatever the delays which the storms or accidents may cause, the head of the vessel shall be consistently pointed towards the distant port, and that come what will she shall not be allowed to drift aimlessly hither and thither on the chance of fetching up somewhere some day. The "Full steam ahead" method would be undoubtedly the most desirable. This is the military view. Mobilise, it is urged, a nice field force, and operate at leisure in the frontier valleys, until they are as safe and civilised as Hyde Park. Nor need this course necessarily involve the extermination of the inhabitants. Military rule is the rule best suited to the character and comprehension of the tribesmen. They will soon recognise the futility of resistance, and will gradually welcome the increase of wealth and comfort that will follow a stable government. Besides this, we shall obtain a definite frontier almost immediately. Only one real objection has been advanced against this plan. But it is a crushing one, and it constitutes the most serious argument against the whole "Forward Policy." It is this: we have neither the troops nor the money to carry it out. The inevitable alternative is the present system, a system which the war has interrupted, but to which we must return at its close; a system of gradual advance, of political intrigue among the tribes, of subsidies and small expeditions. Though this policy is slow, painful and somewhat undignified, there is no reason that it should not be sure and strong. But it must be consistently pursued. Dynamite in the hands of a child is not more dangerous than a strong policy weakly carried out. The reproach which may be justly laid upon the rulers of India, whether at home or abroad, is that while they recognise the facts, they shrink from the legitimate conclusions. They know they cannot turn back. They fully intend to go on. Yet they fear to admit the situation, to frankly lay their case before the country, and trust to the good sense and courage of an ancient democracy. The result is, that they tie their hands by ridiculous and unnecessary proclamations, such as that which preceded the Chitral expedition of 1895. The political officers who watch the frontier tribes are expected to obtain authority by force of personal character, yet strictly according to regulations, and to combine individuality with uniformity. And sometimes this timidity leads to such dismal acts of folly as the desertion of the Khyber forts. But in spite of all obstacles and errors there is a steady advance, which may be accelerated, and made easier, by many small reforms. These questions of detail approach so near the province of the specialist, that I shall not attempt to enumerate or discuss them. It is suggested among other things that wider powers should be given to the political officers, in their ordinary duties of peace. Others advocate occasional demonstrations of troops, to impress the tribesmen with the fact that those they see are not the full strength of the Sirkar. Bolder minds have hinted at transplanting young Pathans, and educating them in India after the custom of the Romans. But this last appears to be suitable to a classic rather than a Christian age. From a general survey of the people and the country, it would seem that silver makes a better weapon than steel. A system of subsidies must tend to improve our relations with the tribes, enlist their interests on the side of law and order, and by increasing their wealth, lessen their barbarism. In the matter of the supply of arms the Government would find it cheaper to enter the market as a purchaser, and have agents to outbid the tribesmen, rather than to employ soldiers. As water finds its own level, so the laws of economics will infallibly bring commodities to the highest bidder. Doubtless there are many other lessons which the present war will have taught. These may lighten a task which, though long and heavy, is not beyond the powers or pluck of the British people. We are at present in a transition stage, nor is the manner nor occasion of the end in sight. Still this is no time to despair. I have often noticed in these Afghan valleys, that they seem to be entirely surrounded by the hills, and to have no exit. But as the column has advanced, a gap gradually becomes visible and a pass appears. Sometimes it is steep and difficult, sometimes it is held by the enemy and must be forced, but I have never seen a valley that had not a way out. That way we shall ultimately find, if we march with the firm but prudent step of men who know the dangers; but, conscious of their skill and discipline, do not doubt their ability to deal with them as they shall arise. In such a spirit I would leave the subject, with one farewell glance. Looking on the story of the great frontier war; at all that has been told, and all that others may tell, there must be many who to-day will only deplore the losses of brave soldiers and hard-earned money. But those who from some future age shall, by steady light of history, dispassionately review the whole situation, its causes, results and occasion, may find other reflections, as serious perhaps, but less mournful. The year 1897, in the annals of the British people, was marked by a declaration to the whole world of their faith in the higher destinies of their race. If a strong man, when the wine sparkles at the feast and the lights are bright, boasts of his prowess, it is well he should have an opportunity of showing in the cold and grey of the morning that he is no idle braggart. And unborn arbiters, with a wider knowledge, and more developed brains, may trace in recent events the influence of that mysterious Power which, directing the progress of our species, and regulating the rise and fall of Empires, has afforded that opportunity to a people, of whom at least it may be said, that they have added to the happiness, the learning and the liberties of mankind. APPENDIX. EXTRACTS FROM OFFICIAL DESPATCHES. THE ATTACK ON THE MALAKAND. 26th July -- 1st August, 1897. FROM THE DESPATCH OF BRIGADIER-GENERAL W.H. MEIKLEJOHN, C.B., C.M.G. FORWARDED TO THE ADJUTANT-GENERAL IN INDIA BY SIR BINDON BLOOD. 43. All have done well, but I should like to bring before His Excellency for favorable consideration the following names of officers and men:-- 24th Punjaub Infantry. Lieut.-Colonel J. Lamb, who, on the first alarm being sounded on the night of the 26th July, had taken prompt action in reinforcing the outpost line held by his regiment, and later was of great assistance in directing the defence of the central enclosure, till he was severely wounded. Captain H.F. Holland showed great courage in assisting to drive a number of the enemy out of the central enclosure, and was severely wounded in doing so. I would especially wish to mention Lieutenant S.H. Climo, who commanded the 24th Punjaub Infantry after Lieut.-Colonel Lamb and Captain Holland had been wounded. This officer has shown soldierly qualities and ability of the highest order. He has commanded the regiment with dash and enterprise, and shown a spirit and example which has been followed by all ranks. I trust His Excellency will be pleased to favourably notice Lieutenant Climo, who has proved himself an officer who will do well in any position, and is well worthy of promotion. Lieutenant A.K. Rawlins has behaved well all through. I would recommend him to His Excellency for the plucky way in which he went to the fort on the 26th July to bring reinforcements, and again for the dash he showed in leading his men on the 27th and 28th, of which Lieutenant Climo speaks most highly. Lieutenant E.W. Costello, 22nd Punjaub Infantry, temporarily attached to the 24th Punjaub Infantry, has behaved exceedingly well, and is the subject of a separate recommendation. 31st Punjaub Infantry. Major M.I. Gibbs, who commanded the regiment in the absence of Major O'Bryen, with skill and in every way to my satisfaction. Lieutenant H.B. Ford, Acting-Adjutant, 31st Punjaub Infantry, rendered valuable assistance in helping to bring in a wounded Sepoy during the withdrawal from north camp. He also behaved with courage in resisting an attack of the enemy on the night of the 28th, when he was severely wounded. Surgeon-Lieutenant J.H. Hugo, attached to 31st Punjaub Infantry, rendered valuable service on the night of the 28th in saving Lieutenant H.B. Ford from bleeding to death. Lieutenant Ford was wounded and a branch of an artery was cut. There were no means of securing the artery, and Surgeon-Lieutenant Hugo for two hours stopped the bleeding by compressing the artery with his fingers. Had he not had the strength to do so, Lieutenant Ford must have died. Early in the morning, thinking that the enemy had effected an entrance into camp, Surgeon-Lieutenant Hugo picked up Lieutenant Ford with one arm, and, still holding the artery with the fingers of the other hand, carried him to a place of safety. 45th (Rattray's) Sikhs. Colonel H.A. Sawyer was away on leave when hostilities broke out, but he returned on the 29th and took over command of the regiment from Lieut.-Colonel McRae, and from that time rendered me every assistance. I would specially bring to the notice of His Excellency the Commander-in-chief the name of Lieut.-Colonel H.N. McRae, who commanded the regiment on the 26th, 27th and 28th. His prompt action in seizing the gorge at the top of the Buddhist road on the night of the 26th, and the gallant way in which he held it, undoubtedly saved the camp from being rushed on that side. For this, and for the able way in which he commanded the regiment during the first three days of the fighting, I would commend him to His Excellency's favorable consideration. Also Lieutenant R.M. Barff, Officiating-Adjutant of the regiment, who, Lieut.-Colonel McRae reports, behaved with great courage and rendered him valuable assistance. The Guides. I also wish to bring the name of Lieut.-Colonel R.B. Adams of the Guides to His Excellency's notice. The prompt way in which the corps mobilised, and their grand march, reflect great credit on him and the corps. Since arrival at the Malakand on the 27th July and till the morning of the 1st August, Lieut.-Colonel Adams was in command of the lower camp, i.e., that occupied by central and left position, and in the execution of this command, and the arrangements he made for improving the defenses, he gave me every satisfaction. I have also to express my appreciation of the way in which he conducted the cavalry reconnaissance on the 1st August, on which occasion his horse was shot under him. Great credit is due to Lieutenant P.C. Eliott-Lockhart, who was in command of the Guides Infantry, for bringing up the regiment from Mardan to Malakand in such good condition after their trying march. Captain G.M. Baldwin, D.S.O., behaved with great courage and coolness during the reconnaissance of the 1st August, and though severely wounded by a sword cut on the head, he remained on the ground and continued to lead his men. Lieutenant H.L.S. Maclean also behaved with courage, and displayed an excellent example on the night of the 28th July, when he was severely wounded. 11th Bengal Lancers. Major S. Beatson commanded the squadron, 11th Bengal Lancers, which arrived at Malakand on the 29th, and led them with great skill and dash on the occasion of the reconnaissance on the 1st August. No.8 Bengal Mountain Battery. Lieutenant F.A. Wynter was the only officer with No.8 Bengal Mountain Battery from the 26th till the 30th July, and he commanded it during that time, when all the severest of the fighting was going on, with great ability, and has proved himself a good soldier. I should like especially to mention him for His Excellency's consideration. The battery did excellent work all through. No.5 Company Queen's Own Madras Sappers and Miners. Lieutenant A.R. Winsloe, R.E., commanded the company from the 27th July till the 1st August to my entire satisfaction. His services in strengthening the defences were invaluable. Lieutenant F.W. Watling, R.E., was in command of the company in the absence of Captain Johnson on the 26th, and commanded it well until he was wounded in gallantly trying to resist a charge of the enemy. After Lieutenant Watling was wounded the command of the company for the remainder of the night of the 26th, and till Lieutenant Winsloe returned on the 27th, devolved on Lieutenant E.N. Manley, R.E. He performed his duties with great credit, and afterwards was of great assistance, by his zeal and his exertions, to Lieutenant Winsloe. Medical Staff. Brigade-Surgeon-Lieut.-Colonel F.A. Smyth was most zealous, and performed his duties to my satisfaction. He volunteered to perform the duties of Provost Marshal, and did so for a short time during the illness of Lieutenant H.E. Cotterill. The arrangements made by Surgeon-Major S. Hassand, Senior Medical Officer, 38th Native Field Hospital, and the indefatigable attention and care with which he devoted himself to the wounded, deserve great praise. The list of casualties is large, and Surgeon-Major Hassand has been untiring in his exertions for their relief. I hope His Excellency will think fit to consider his services favourably. Surgeon-Captain T.A.O. Langston, 38th Native Field Hospital, rendered valuable assistance in attending to the wounded under a heavy fire on the night of the 26th and each following night, and behaved with courage and devotion in carrying out his duties under very exceptional circumstances. Surgeon-Lieutenant W. Carr has worked night and day in the hospitals, in trying to alleviate the sufferings of the wounded, and has most ably and efficiently aided Surgeon-Major Hassand. Brigade Staff. Major L. Herbert, my Deputy Assistant Adjutant and Quartermaster-General, was of the greatest assistance to me by the zeal and energy with which he performed his duties from the moment the news of the approach of the enemy was received till he was severely wounded while standing next to me in the enclosure of the Sappers and Miners' camp on the night of the 26th. Since being wounded, he has carried on all his office duties on his bed. I would wish to commend his gallant conduct for the favorable consideration of the Commander-in-Chief. Although Major H.A. Deane is in no way under my authority, I feel I am under a great obligation to him for the valuable assistance he rendered me with his advice and for volunteering to put himself at my disposal with the object of carrying on the active duties of Deputy Assistant Adjutant-General, when Major Herbert was wounded. He was indefatigable in assisting me in every way he could, and I am anxious to put on record my grateful appreciation of the services he rendered me. 44. The above list of names may appear to be somewhat long; but I would point out that the fighting was almost constant for a week, and was of such a close nature as to demand incessant exertion from every officer in the force, and to elicit constant acts of courage and gallant example which cannot be overlooked. 45. I would not like to close this despatch without paying a tribute to the memory of a fine soldier, and charming companion whose death the whole force deplores. Major W.W. Taylor had behaved with the greatest gallantry and dash in meeting the enemy's first charge with Lieut.-Colonel McRae, and, had he lived, he would undoubtedly distinguished himself in his career. His loss in a heavy one to his regiment, and to the Service, and there is no one in the brigade who does not mourn him as a friend. I have also to deplore the death of Honorary-Lieutenant L. Manley, who as my Commissariat Officer had rendered me great assistance, and who died fighting manfully. His loss is a very serious one to the brigade. 46. I attach separately, for favorable consideration, a list of native officers, non-commissioned officers and men, who have done especially good service; some of whom I have therein recommended for the order of merit. I trust these recommendations will meet with the favorable consideration of His Excellency the Commander-in-Chief. THE RELIEF OF CHAKDARA 2ND AUGUST, 1897 FROM THE DESPATCH OF MAJOR-GENERAL SIR BINDON BLOOD, K.C.B. 19. I have the honour to invite the special attention of His Excellency the Commander-in-Chief in India to the good services of the following officers during the operations described above, namely:-- Brigadier-General W.H. Meiklejohn, C.B., C.M.G., carried out his duties in command of the force which relieved Chakdara Fort with great gallantry and judgment. Colonel A.J.F. Reid, Officiating Colonel on the Staff, Malakand Brigade, afforded me valuable assistance by carrying out the rearrangement of the defensive posts at the Malakand on the 1st August, after the Relieving Force had been drawn from them, and in making the preparations for Colonel T.H. Goldney's attack on the 2nd. Colonel T.H. Goldney, 35th Sikhs, disposed and led the troops on the morning of the 2nd in the successful attack on the hill, since named after him, in a most judicious and satisfactory manner. Major E.A.P. Hobday, R.A., was most energetic and indefatigable in assisting Colonel A.J.F. Reid and me in carrying out the multifarious work which had to be done at the Malakand, and in the Swat Valley on the 1st, 2nd and 3rd. Brigadier-General Meiklejohn reports favourably on the following officers who were under his command during the operations above detailed, viz:-- Captain G.F.H. Dillon, 40th Pathans, who acted as Staff Officer to the Relieving Force, showed great readiness and resource, and his assistance was of the utmost value. Lieutenants C.R. Gaunt, 4th Dragoon Guards, Orderly Officer, and E. Christian, Royal Scots Fusiliers, Signalling Officer, carried out their duties most satisfactorily. Lieut.-Colonel R.B. Adams, Queen's Own Corps of Guides, commanded the cavalry (four squadrons) with the Relieving Force in the most gallant and judicious manner. The following officers commanding units and detachments of the Reliving Force are stated by Brigidier-General Meiklejohn to have carried out their duties in a thoroughly capable and satisfactory manner, viz.:-- Colonel H.A. Sawyer, 45th Sikhs. Major Stuart Beatson, 11th Bengal Lancers. Captain A.H.C. Birch, R.A. (8th Bengal Mountain Battery). Lieutenant G. de H. Smith, 2nd Regiment, Central India Horse, attached to Queen's Own Corps of Guides (cavalry). Lieutenant A.R. Winsloe, R.E. (No.5 Company Queen's Own Sapper's and Miners). Lieutenant P.C. Eliott-Lockhart, Queen's Own Corps of Guides (infantry). Surgeon-General H.F. Whitchurch, V.C., attended to the wounded under fire throughout the fighting. The following officers under Colonel T.H. Goldney's command led their detachments under my own observation with gallantry and judgment, viz.:-- Lieut.-Colonel L.J.E. Bradshaw, 35th Sikhs. Captain L.C.H. Stainforth, 38th Dogras. Jemader Nawab, who commanded two guns of No.8 Bengal Mountain Battery in support of Colonel Goldney's attack, attracted my favorable notice by his smartness, quickness and thorough knowledge of his work. I would also wish to bring to His Excellency's notice the good work done by Major H. Burney, Gordon Highlanders, Assistant Adjutant-General; Major H. Burney, Gordon Highlanders, Assistant Adjutant-General; Major H. Wharry, D.S.O., Chief Commissariat Officer, and Captain A.B. Dunsterville, 1st Battalion East Surrey Regiment, my Aide-de-Camp; the only officers of the Divisional Staff of my force who had arrived at the Malakand on the 2nd August. These officers worked very hard and were of great use to me. 20. Major H.A. Deane, C.S.I., Political Agent, Dir and Swat, was not in any way under my orders during the operations above described, but notwithstanding, I hope I may be permitted to express the obligations under which I lie to him for valuable information and general assistance which he gave me. THE DEFENCE OF CHAKDARA. 26TH JULY--2ND AUGUST, 1897. FROM THE DESPATCH OF MAJOR-GENERAL SIR BINDON BLOOD, K.C.B. 15. During the fighting above described, the conduct of the whole of the garrison, whether fighting men, departmental details, or followers, is reported to have been most gallant. Not the least marked display of courage and constancy was that made by the small detachment in the signal tower, who were without water for the last eighteen hours of the siege. The signallers, under No.2729, Lance-Naik Vir Singh, 45th Sikhs, who set a brilliant example, behaved throughout in a most courageous manner; one of them, No.2829, Sepoy Prem Singh, climbing several times out of a window in the tower with a heliograph, and signaling outside to the Malakand under a hot fire from sungars in every direction. 16. I would beg to recommend all the British and native officers who took part in the defence I have described for the favorable consideration of His Excellency the Commander-in-Chief as under, viz.:-- Captain H. Wright, 11th Bengal Lancers, who, with his detachment of forty sabres of his regiment, made the gallant ride through the enemy from the Malakand to Chakdara Fort, on the morning of the 27th July, and commanded the garrison from that morning till its relief on the 2nd August. Captain D. Baker, 2nd Bombay Infantry, who rode to Chakdara Fort with Captain Wright, and made himself most useful. Lieutenant H.B. Rattray, 45th Sikhs, who commanded the garrison from the commencement of the attack on the 26th July till the arrival of Captain Wright the next day, and is reported by that officer to have been the life and soul of the defence. 2nd Lieutenant J.L. Wheatley, 45th Sikhs, had charge of the gun and Maxim detachments, and it was largely owing to his care and judgment that these weapons were so effective in the defence. Lieutenant A.B. Minchin, 25th Punjaub Infantry, Assistant Political Agent, was in the fort throughout the siege, and was most useful. Ressaidar Tilok Singh, 11th Bengal Lancers, accompanied Captain Wright in his ride of the 27th July, and is very favorably mentioned by that officer. Jemadar Sudama commanded the detachment of the 21st Bengal Lancers who were at Chakdara Fort on the 26th July, and was present throughout the siege, and is also very favorably reported on. Subadar Jwala Singh, 45th Sikhs, was present throughout the siege, and showed great intelligence and readiness of resource, as well as courage and coolness, under fire. Jemadar Ala Singh, 45th Sikhs, had command of the sections on the parapet of the river fort, and showed conspicuous courage and coolness under heavy fire. Lieutenant Rattray reports that No.522 Hospital Assistant Piara Singh, 11th Bengal Lancers, rendered valuable assistance, not only in the sortie on the 2nd, and at other times in bringing up ammunition, etc., to the men on the parapets under fire. 17. I shall further have the honor, in a separate communication, to submit, for the favorable consideration of His Excellency the Commander-in-Chief, the names of several non-commissioned officers and men who distinguished themselves during the siege of Chakdara Fort, in view of their being granted the order of merit, should His Excellency think them deserving of that distinction. From Major-General Sir B. Blood, K.C.B., Commanding the Malakand Field Force, to the Adjutant-General in India,--No.5, "Despatches, Malakand Field Force,"--Dated 27th October, 1897. I regret to find that in my report, "Despatches, Malakand Field Force," No.3, of the 20th August, 1897, I omitted to include the name of Surgeon-Captain E.V. Hugo, Indian Medical Service, amongst those of the officers recommended to the favorable consideration of His Excellency the Commander-in-Chief for their services during the recent defence of Chakdara Fort. I now have great pleasure in stating that Surgeon-General Hugo served with distinction throughout the defence in question, and in recommending him for favorable consideration accordingly. ACTION OF LANDAKAI AND EXPEDITION INTO UPPER SWAT. AUGUST, 1987. FROM THE DESPATCHES OF MAJOR-GENERAL SIR BINDON BLOOD, K.C.B. 32. In concluding this part of my report, I would wish to express my admiration of the fine soldierly qualities exhibited by all ranks of the special force which I led into Upper Swat. They fought the action at Landakai in a brilliant manner, working over high hills, under a burning sun, with the greatest alacrity, and showing everywhere the greatest keenness to close with the enemy. They carried out admirably the trying duties necessitated by marching in hot weather with a transport train of more than 2000 mules, and they endured with perfect cheerfulness the discomforts of several nights' bivouac in heavy rain. The officers of the Divisional Staff and of by personal staff who were with me, [Major H.H. Burney, Assistant Adjutant-General (Gordon Highlanders); Lieut.-Colonel A. Masters, Assistant Quartermaster-General (2nd Regiment Central India Horse); Captain H.E. Stanton, Deputy Assistant Quartermaster-General, Intelligence Branch (Royal Artillery); Colonel W. Aitken, Colonel on the Staff, Royal Artillery; Captain H.D. Grier, Adjutant, R.A.; Major E. Blunt, Senior Officer of Royal Engineers; Captain E.W.M. Norie, Superintendent, Army Signalling (Middlesex Regiment); Captain C.G.F. Edwards, Provost Marshal (5th Punjaub Cavalry); Captain A.B. Dunsterville, A.D.C. (1st Battalion East Surrey Regiment); Captain A.R. Dick, Orderly Officer. BRIGADE STAFF.--Major E.A.P. Hobday, Deputy Assistant Adjutant-General (Royal Artillery); Captain G.F.H. Dillon, Deputy Assistant Quartermaster-General (40th Bengal Infantry); Captain C.H. Beville, Commissariat Transport Department; Captain J.M. Camilleri, in charge of Transport (13th Bengal Infantry); Surgeon-Lieut.-Colonel J.T.B. Bookey, I.M.S.; Lieutenant C.R. Gaunt, Orderly officer, 4th Dragoon Guards. COMMANDING OFFICERS OF DIVISIONAL TROOPS.--Lieut.-Colonel R.B. Adams, Queen's Own Corps of Guides; Major C.A. Anderson, 10th Field Battery, Royal Artillery; Major M.F. Fegan, No.7 Mountain Battery, Royal Artillery; Captain A.H.C. Birch, No.8 Bengal Mountain Battery; Captain E.P. Johnson, No.5 Company Queen's Own Sappers and Miners.] Brigadier-General W.H. Meiklejohn, C.B., C.M.G., and his staff, and the several heads of departments and commanding officers of Divisional Troops, all carried out their duties in an entirely satisfactory manner. Major H.A. Deane, Political Agent, and his assistant, Lieutenant A.B. Minchin, gave valuable assistance in collecting intelligence and supplies. 33. While the operations above described were in progress, a diversion was made towards the southern border of the Buner country from Mardan by the 1st Reserve Brigade, which, on its headquarters leaving Mardan, came under my command as the 3rd Brigade, Malakand Field Force. 34. A force [1st Battalion Highland Light Infantry, under Lieut.-Colonel R.D.B. Rutherford; 39th Garhwal Rifles, under Lieut.-Colonel B.C. Greaves; No.3 Company Bombay Sappers and Miners, under Captain C.E. Baddeley, R.E.; one squadron 10th Bengal Lancers, under Captain W.L. Maxwell; two guns No.1 Mountain Battery, Royal Artillery, under Lieutenant H.L.N. Beynon, R.A.] under Brigadier-General J. Wodehouse, C.B., C.M.G., was concentrated on the 17th August at Rustum, eighteen miles north-east of Mardan, and about four miles from the Buner border, with the object of acting as a containing force, and so preventing the sections of the Bunerwhals who had not already committed themselves against us from joining in opposition to our advance into Upper Swat. 35. The presence of this force had the desired effect, and Brigadier-General Wodehouse and his staff made good use of the time they spent at Rustum in acquiring valuable information about several of the passes in the neighborhood. 36. Brigadier-General Wodehouse states that throughout the operations of his force, which involved considerable fatigue and exposure to heat and rain, the spirit of his troops left nothing to be desired. He makes special mention of the work of No.3 Company Bombay Sappers and Miners, under Captain C.E. Baddeley, R.E. He also reports very favourably on the assistance given him by Lieutenant C.P. Down, Assistant Commissioner, and has expressed to me a high opinion of that officer's abilities and acquirements, particularly of his proficiency in the local vernacular. THE ACTION OF 16TH SEPTEMBER. FROM SIR BINDON BLOOD'S DESPATCH CONTAINING THE SUMMARY OF BRIGADIER-GENERAL JEFFREY'S REPORT OF THE ACTION 27. The behavior of the troops throughout this trying day was very good. The steadiness and discipline shown by the 1st Battalion of the Buffs, under Lieu.-Colonel Ommnanney, were admirable, while Brigadier-General Jeffreys has specially commended the gallantry with which the Guides Infantry, under Major Campbell, brought off Captain Ryder's detachment of the 35th Sikhs, carrying the wounded on their backs under a heavy fire. He has further strongly endorsed Major Campbell's favourable mention of the courage and judgment shown by Captain G.B. Hodson, and Lieutenant H.W. Codrington, of the Guides, who commanded the companies of the battalion which were chiefly in contact with the enemy; the gallantry of Surgeon-Captain J. Fisher, Indian Medical Service, who made a most determined, though unsuccessful, attempt to take medical aid to the wounded of Captain Ryder's detachment through a hot fire; of Surgeon-Lieutenant E.L. Perry, Indian Medical Service; of Jemadar Sikander Khan of the Guides, and of several non-commissioned officers and Sepoys of the same corps, regarding whom I have had the honour to make a separate communication. 28. Brigadier-General Jeffreys has also described in very favorable terms the gallant and valuable work done on this day by Captain Cole and his squadron of the 11th Bengal Lancers. He has commended the conduct of Captain W.I. Ryder and Lieutenant O.G. Gunning, 35th Sikhs, who were both wounded, and of Jemadar Narayan Singh, Havildar Ram Singh and Sepoy Karram Singh [This man's case has formed the subject of a separate communication.] of the same regiment. He has also brought to notice a gallant act of Captain A.H.C. Birch, R.A., commanding No.8 Bengal Mountain Battery, and his trumpeter, Jiwan, in rescuing a wounded Sepoy of the 35th Sikhs, as well as the distinguished gallantry of Jemadars Nawab and Ishar Singh and several non-commissioned officers and men of the same battery, in regard to which I have made separate communications to you. 29. Brigadier-General Jeffreys further refers in the strongest terms of commendation to the gallant conduct of Lieutenants T.C. Watson [twice wounded in attempting to clear the village] and J.M.C. Colvin, R.E., and of the handful of men of the Buffs and No.4 Company Bengal Sappers and Miners, who spent the night of the 16th-17th with him in the village of Bilot. The conduct of these officers and men [of whom six were killed and eighteen wounded on this occasion, out of a total of fifty-four] in entering the village several times in the dark in face of a heavy fire directed upon them at close quarters, seems deserving of the highest recognition, and I have consequently made a special communication to you on the subject. Brigadier-General Jeffreys has also commended the gallant conduct of his Deputy Assistant Adjutant-General, [The remainder of Brigadier-General Jeffrey's staff was with the main body when it got separated from them.] Major E.O.F. Hamilton, 1st Battalion the Queen's Royal West Surrey Regiment; and finally, he has praised the courage and resolution of Lieutenant W.L.S. Churchill, 4th Hussars, the correspondent of the Pioneer Newspaper with the force, who made himself useful at a critical moment. OPERATIONS OF THE MALAKAND FIELD FORCE FROM THE CONCLUDING DESPATCH OF MAJOR-GENERAL SIR BINDON BLOOD, K.C.B. 58. The commissariat arrangements under Major H. Wharry, D.S.O., were most successful. The rations were always abundant, and of uniformly good quality; and I may here observe that in five previous campaigns I have never seen the supply of bread anything like so continuously good, as it has been throughout the operations of the Malakand Field Force. No doubt the excellence of the commissariat arrangements has had a great deal to do with the good state of health of the troops, which I have remarked upon. 59. The transport was most efficient throughout the operations under reference, and its management, under the direction of Captain C.G.R. Thackwell, Divisional Transport Officer, who was most ably and energetically assisted by Veterinary-Captain H.T.W. Mann, Senior Veterinary Officer, was most successful. In proof of this I will cite a report just made to me by Brigadier-General Jeffreys, commanding the 2nd Brigade of my force, that this morning, on inspecting 1265 mules attached his brigade, which have just returned from seven weeks in the field, he found fourteen sore backs, and four animals otherwise unfit for work, or a total of only eighteen disabled animals in all. 60. The medical service was carried out in a very satisfactory manner. Some difficulties arose on the transfer of officers and material to the Tirah Expeditionary Force on its formation, especially as large convoys of sick and wounded were on the line of this force at the time, but these difficulties were successfully overcome by Colonel A.J.F. Reid, commanding the Malakand Brigade, who was in charge of the Line, and matters were ultimately restored to smooth working on the arrival of Surgeon-Colonel J.C.G. Carmichael, Indian Medical Service, who is now Principal Medical Officer of the Force. 61. The telegraph arrangements were well carried out by Lieutenant W. Robertson, R.E., under the direction of Mr. C.E. Pitman, C.I.E. The postal service under Mr. H.C. Sheridan was also satisfactory. 62. The working of the several departments of the Headquarters' staff was most satisfactory and successful. The heads of departments were:-- Major H.H. Burney, Gordon Highlanders, Assistant Adjutant-General. Lieutenant-Colonel A. Masters, 2nd Regiment Central India Horse, Assistant Quartermaster-General. Captain H.E. Stanton, D.S.O., R.A., Deputy Assistant Quartermaster-General (Intelligence). Captain E.W.M. Norie, Middlesex Regiment, Superintendent, Army Signalling. Surgeon-Colonel J.C.G. Carmichael, Indian Medical Service, Principal Medical Officer. Lieutenant-Colonel W. Aitken, C.B., R.A., Commanding Royal Artillery. Colonel J.E. Broadbent, R.E., Commanding Royal Engineers--relieved early in October by Lieutenant-Colonel W. Peacocke, C.M.G., R.E. Captain W.E. Banbury, 25th Madras Infantry, Field Treasure Chest Officer. Captain W.W. Cookson, R.A., Ordnance Officer. Major H. Wharry, D.S.O., Staff Corps, Chief Commissariat Officer. Veterinary-Captain H.T.W. Mann, [Wounded in action, 20th September, 1897.] Army Veterinary Department, Senior Veterinary Officer. Captain C.L. Robertson, R.E., Survey officer. Captain C.G.F. Edwards, 5th Punjaub Cavalry, Provost Marshal. The Rev. L. Klogh, Chaplain. Lieutenant W. Robertson, R.E., in charge of Telegraphs. 63. I am under great obligations to my personal staff--Captain A.B. Dunsterville, 1st Battalion East Surrey Regiment, Aide-de-Camp; Captain A.R. Dick, 2nd Punjaub Cavalry, and Lieutenant Viscount Fincastle, 16th (The Queen's) Lancers. 64. It will have been gathered from the foregoing narrative that the three brigades of the force were ably commanded by Brigadier-Generals W.H. Meiklejohn, C.B., C.M.G., 1st Brigade; P.D. Jeffreys, [Wounded in action, 16th September, 1897.] C.B., 2nd Brigade, and J.H. Wodehouse, C.B., C.M.G., [Wounded in action, 20th September, 1897.] 3rd Brigade, who were efficiently seconded by their staffs. The Line of Communications and the Base were also most efficiently managed by Colonel A.J.F. Reid, Commanding the Malakand Brigade, and by Lieut.-Colonel A.V. Schalch, 11th Bengal Infantry, the Base Commandant, and their respective staffs. 65. In my final report on the conclusion of the operations of the force, I shall have the honour to bring the services of the officers above briefly referred to more fully to the notice of His Excellency the Commander-in-Chief. 66. Major H.A. Deane, C.S.I., Political Agent, Dur, Chitral and Swat, was in separate and independent charge of the political arrangements connected with the operations I have described, as far as Nawagai. He accompanied my headquarters to Ghosam, where I left him on the 12th September, and rejoined me at Inayat Kila on the 4th October. He gave much assistance in arranging for the collection of local supplies. 67. Mr. W.S. Davis was my political officer throughout the operations beyond Nawagai, and in the Mamund Valley prior to Major Deane's return to my headquarters on the 4th October. He carried out his duties to my complete satisfaction. His native assistant, Khan Bahadur Ibrahim Kham, also made himself very useful. END OF TEXT 
3622	----	Loewenstein, M.D. THE DUKE'S CHILDREN by ANTHONY TROLLOPE First published in serial form in _All the Year Round_ in 1879 and 1880 and in book form in 1880 CONTENTS I. When the Duchess Was Dead II. Lady Mary Palliser III. Francis Oliphant Tregear IV. Park Lane V. "It Is Impossible" VI. Major Tifto VII. Conservative Convictions VIII. "He Is a Gentleman" IX. "In Medias Res" X. "Why Not Like Romeo If I Feel Like Romeo?" XI. "Cruel" XII. At Richmond XIII. The Duke's Injustice XIV. The New Member for Silverbridge XV. The Duke Receives a Letter,--and Writes One XVI. "Poor Boy" XVII. The Derby XVIII. One of the Results of the Derby XIX. "No; My Lord, I Do Not" XX. "Then He Will Come Again" XXI. Sir Timothy Beeswax XXII. The Duke in His Study XXIII. Frank Tregear Wants a Friend XXIV. "She Must Be Made to Obey" XXV. A Family Breakfast-Table XXVI. Dinner at the Beargarden XXVII. Major Tifto and the Duke XXVIII. Mrs. Montacute Jones's Garden-Party XXIX. The Lovers Meet XXX. What Came of the Meeting XXXI. Miss Boncassen's River-Party. No. 1 XXXII. Miss Boncassen's River-Party. No. 2 XXXIII. The Langham Hotel XXXIV. Lord Popplecourt XXXV. "Don't You Think--?" XXXVI. Tally-Ho Lodge XXXVII. Grex XXXVIII. Crummie-Toddie XXXIX. Killancodlem XL. "And Then!" XLI. Ischl XLII. Again at Killancodlem XLIII. What Happened at Doncaster XLIV. How It Was Done XLV. "There Shall Not Be Another Word About It" XLVI. Lady Mary's Dream XLVII. Miss Boncassen's Idea of Heaven XLVIII. The Party at Custins Is Broken Up XLIX. The Major's Fate L. The Duke's Arguments LI. The Duke's Guests LII. Miss Boncassen Tells the Truth LIII. "Then I Am As Proud As a Queen" LIV. "I Don't Think She Is a Snake" LV. Polpenno LVI. The News Is Sent to Matching LVII. The Meeting at "The Bobtailed Fox" LVIII. The Major Is Deposed LIX. No One Can Tell What May Come to Pass LX. Lord Gerald in Further Trouble LXI. "Bone of My Bone" LXII. The Brake Country LXIII. "I've Seen 'Em Like That Before" LXIV. "I Believe Him to Be a Worthy Young Man" LXV. "Do You Ever Think What Money Is?" LXVI. The Three Attacks LXVII. "He Is Such a Beast" LXVIII. Brook Street LXIX. "Pert Poppet!" LXX. "Love May Be a Great Misfortune" LXXI. "What Am I to Say, Sir?" LXXII. Carlton Terrace LXXIII. "I Have Never Loved You" LXXIV. "Let Us Drink a Glass of Wine Together" LXXV. The Major's Story LXXVI. On Deportment LXXVII. "Mabel, Good-Bye" LXXVIII. The Duke Returns to Office LXXIX. The First Wedding LXXX. The Second Wedding CHAPTER I When the Duchess Was Dead No one, probably, ever felt himself to be more alone in the world than our old friend, the Duke of Omnium, when the Duchess died. When this sad event happened he had ceased to be Prime Minister. During the first nine months after he had left office he and the Duchess remained in England. Then they had gone abroad, taking with them their three children. The eldest, Lord Silverbridge, had been at Oxford, but had had his career there cut short by some more than ordinary youthful folly, which had induced his father to agree with the college authorities that his name had better be taken off the college books,--all which had been cause of very great sorrow to the Duke. The other boy was to go to Cambridge; but his father had thought it well to give him a twelvemonth's run on the Continent, under his own inspection. Lady Mary, the only daughter, was the youngest of the family, and she also had been with them on the Continent. They remained the full year abroad, travelling with a large accompaniment of tutors, lady's-maids, couriers, and sometimes friends. I do not know that the Duchess or the Duke had enjoyed it much; but the young people had seen something of foreign courts and much of foreign scenery, and had perhaps perfected their French. The Duke had gone to work at his travels with a full determination to create for himself occupation out of a new kind of life. He had studied Dante, and had striven to arouse himself to ecstatic joy amidst the loveliness of the Italian lakes. But through it all he had been aware that he had failed. The Duchess had made no such resolution,--had hardly, perhaps, made any attempt; but, in truth, they had both sighed to be back among the war-trumpets. They had both suffered much among the trumpets, and yet they longed to return. He told himself from day to day, that though he had been banished from the House of Commons, still, as a peer, he had a seat in Parliament, and that, though he was no longer a minister, still he might be useful as a legislator. She, in her career as a leader of fashion, had no doubt met with some trouble,--with some trouble but with no disgrace; and as she had been carried about among the lakes and mountains, among the pictures and statues, among the counts and countesses, she had often felt that there was no happiness except in that dominion which circumstances had enabled her to achieve once, and might enable her to achieve again--in the realms of London society. Then, in the early spring of 187--, they came back to England, having persistently carried out their project, at any rate in regard to time. Lord Gerald, the younger son, was at once sent up to Trinity. For the eldest son a seat was to be found in the House of Commons, and the fact that a dissolution of Parliament was expected served to prevent any prolonged sojourn abroad. Lady Mary Palliser was at that time nineteen, and her entrance into the world was to be her mother's great care and great delight. In March they spent a few days in London, and then went down to Matching Priory. When she left town the Duchess was complaining of cold, sore throat, and debility. A week after their arrival at Matching she was dead. Had the heavens fallen and mixed themselves with the earth, had the people of London risen in rebellion with French ideas of equality, had the Queen persistently declined to comply with the constitutional advice of her ministers, had a majority in the House of Commons lost its influence in the country,--the utter prostration of the bereft husband could not have been more complete. It was not only that his heart was torn to pieces, but that he did not know how to look out into the world. It was as though a man should be suddenly called upon to live without hands or even arms. He was helpless, and knew himself to be helpless. Hitherto he had never specially acknowledged to himself that his wife was necessary to him as a component part of his life. Though he had loved her dearly, and had in all things consulted her welfare and happiness, he had at times been inclined to think that in the exuberance of her spirits she had been a trouble rather than a support to him. But now it was as though all outside appliances were taken away from him. There was no one of whom he could ask a question. For it may be said of this man that, though throughout his life he had had many Honourable and Right Honourable friends, and that though he had entertained guests by the score, and though he had achieved for himself the respect of all good men and the thorough admiration of some few who knew him, he had hardly made for himself a single intimate friend--except that one who had now passed away from him. To her he had been able to say what he thought, even though she would occasionally ridicule him while he was declaring his feelings. But there had been no other human soul to whom he could open himself. There were one or two whom he loved, and perhaps liked; but his loving and his liking had been exclusively political. He had so habituated himself to devote his mind and his heart to the service of his country, that he had almost risen above or sunk below humanity. But she, who had been essentially human, had been a link between him and the world. There were his three children, the youngest of whom was now nearly nineteen, and they surely were links! At the first moment of his bereavement they were felt to be hardly more than burdens. A more loving father there was not in England, but nature had made him so undemonstrative that as yet they had hardly known his love. In all their joys and in all their troubles, in all their desires and all their disappointments, they had ever gone to their mother. She had been conversant with everything about them, from the boys' bills and the girl's gloves to the innermost turn in the heart and the disposition of each. She had known with the utmost accuracy the nature of the scrapes into which Lord Silverbridge had precipitated himself, and had known also how probable it was that Lord Gerald would do the same. The results of such scrapes she, of course, deplored; and therefore she would give good counsel, pointing out how imperative it was that such evil-doings should be avoided; but with the spirit that produced the scrapes she fully sympathised. The father disliked the spirit almost worse than the results; and was therefore often irritated and unhappy. And the difficulties about the girl were almost worse to bear than those about the boys. She had done nothing wrong. She had given no signs of extravagance or other juvenile misconduct. But she was beautiful and young. How was he to bring her out into the world? How was he to decide whom she should or whom she should not marry? How was he to guide her through the shoals and rocks which lay in the path of such a girl before she can achieve matrimony? It was the fate of the family that, with a world of acquaintance, they had not many friends. From all close connection with relatives on the side of the Duchess they had been dissevered by old feelings at first, and afterwards by want of any similitude in the habits of life. She had, when young, been repressed by male and female guardians with an iron hand. Such repression had been needed, and had been perhaps salutary, but it had not left behind it much affection. And then her nearest relatives were not sympathetic with the Duke. He could obtain no assistance in the care of his girl from that source. Nor could he even do it from his own cousins' wives, who were his nearest connections on the side of the Pallisers. They were women to whom he had ever been kind, but to whom he had never opened his heart. When, in the midst of the stunning sorrow of the first week, he tried to think of all this, it seemed to him that there was nobody. There had been one lady, a very dear ally, staying in the house with them when the Duchess died. This was Mrs. Finn, the wife of Phineas Finn, who had been one of the Duke's colleagues when in office. How it had come to pass that Mrs. Finn and the Duchess had become singularly bound together has been told elsewhere. But there had been close bonds,--so close that when the Duchess on their return from the Continent had passed through London on her way to Matching, ill at the time and very comfortless, it had been almost a thing of course, that Mrs. Finn should go with her. And as she had sunk, and then despaired, and then died, it was this woman who had always been at her side, who had ministered to her, and had listened to the fears and the wishes and hopes she had expressed respecting the children. At Matching, amidst the ruins of the old Priory, there is a parish burying-ground, and there, in accordance with her own wish, almost within sight of her own bedroom-window, she was buried. On the day of the funeral a dozen relatives came, Pallisers and M'Closkies, who on such an occasion were bound to show themselves, as members of the family. With them and his two sons the Duke walked across to the graveyard, and then walked back; but even to those who stayed the night at the house he hardly spoke. By noon on the following day they had all left him, and the only stranger in the house was Mrs. Finn. On the afternoon of the day after the funeral the Duke and his guest met, almost for the first time since the sad event. There had been just a pressure of the hand, just a glance of compassion, just some murmur of deep sorrow,--but there had been no real speech between them. Now he had sent for her, and she went down to him in the room in which he commonly sat at work. He was seated at his table when she entered, but there was no book open before him, and no pen ready to his hand. He was dressed of course in black. That, indeed, was usual with him, but now the tailor by his funereal art had added some deeper dye of blackness to his appearance. When he rose and turned to her she thought that he had at once become an old man. His hair was grey in parts, and he had never accustomed himself to use that skill in managing his outside person by which many men are able to preserve for themselves a look, if not of youth, at any rate of freshness. He was thin, of an adust complexion, and had acquired a habit of stooping which, when he was not excited, gave him an appearance of age. All that was common to him; but now it was so much exaggerated that he who was not yet fifty might have been taken to be over sixty. He put out his hand to greet her as she came up to him. "Silverbridge," he said, "tells me that you go back to London to-morrow." "I thought it would be best, Duke. My presence here can be of no comfort to you." "I will not say that anything can be of comfort. But of course it is right that you should go. I can have no excuse for asking you to remain. While there was yet a hope for her--" Then he stopped, unable to say a word further in that direction, and yet there was no sign of a tear and no sound of a sob. "Of course I would stay, Duke, if I could be of any service." "Mr. Finn will expect you to return to him." "Perhaps it would be better that I should say that I would stay were it not that I know that I can be of no real service." "What do you mean by that, Mrs. Finn?" "Lady Mary should have with her at such a time some other friend." "There was none other whom her mother loved as she loved you--none, none." This he said almost with energy. "There was no one lately, Duke, with whom circumstances caused her mother to be so closely intimate. But even that perhaps was unfortunate." "I never thought so." "That is a great compliment. But as to Lady Mary, will it not be as well that she should have with her, as soon as possible, someone,--perhaps someone of her own kindred if it be possible, or, if not that, at least one of her own kind?" "Who is there? Whom do you mean?" "I mean no one. It is hard, Duke, to say what I do mean, but perhaps I had better try. There will be,--probably there have been,--some among your friends who have regretted the great intimacy which chance produced between me and my lost friend. While she was with us no such feeling would have sufficed to drive me from her. She had chosen for herself, and if others disapproved her choice that was nothing to me. But as regards Lady Mary, it will be better, I think, that from the beginning she should be taught to look for friendship and guidance to those--to those who are more naturally connected with her." "I was not thinking of any guidance," said the Duke. "Of course not. But with one so young, where there is intimacy there will be guidance. There should be somebody with her. It was almost the last thought that occupied her mother's mind. I could not tell her, Duke, but I can tell you, that I cannot with advantage to your girl be that somebody." "Cora wished it." "Her wishes, probably, were sudden and hardly fixed." "Who should it be, then?" asked the father, after a pause. "Who am I, Duke, that I should answer such a question?" After that there was another pause, and then the conference was ended by a request from the Duke that Mrs. Finn would stay at Matching for yet two days longer. At dinner they all met,--the father, the three children, and Mrs. Finn. How far the young people among themselves had been able to throw off something of the gloom of death need not here be asked; but in the presence of their father they were sad and sombre, almost as he was. On the next day, early in the morning, the younger lad returned to his college, and Lord Silverbridge went up to London, where he was supposed to have his home. "Perhaps you would not mind reading these letters," the Duke said to Mrs. Finn, when she again went to him, in compliance with a message from him asking for her presence. Then she sat down and read two letters, one from Lady Cantrip, and the other from a Mrs. Jeffrey Palliser, each of which contained an invitation for his daughter, and expressed a hope that Lady Mary would not be unwilling to spend some time with the writer. Lady Cantrip's letter was long, and went minutely into circumstances. If Lady Mary would come to her, she would abstain from having other company in the house till her young friend's spirits should have somewhat recovered themselves. Nothing could be more kind, or proposed in a sweeter fashion. There had, however, been present to the Duke's mind as he read it a feeling that a proposition to a bereaved husband to relieve him of the society of an only daughter, was not one which would usually be made to a father. In such a position a child's company would probably be his best solace. But he knew,--at this moment he painfully remembered,--that he was not as are other men. He acknowledged the truth of this, but he was not the less grieved and irritated by the reminder. The letter from Mrs. Jeffrey Palliser was to the same effect, but was much shorter. If it would suit Mary to come to them for a month or six weeks at their place in Gloucestershire, they would both be delighted. "I should not choose her to go there," said the Duke, as Mrs. Finn refolded the latter letter. "My cousin's wife is a very good woman, but Mary would not be happy with her." "Lady Cantrip is an excellent friend for her." "Excellent. I know no one whom I esteem more than Lady Cantrip." "Would you wish her to go there, Duke?" There came a wistful piteous look over the father's face. Why should he be treated as no other father would be treated? Why should it be supposed that he would desire to send his girl away from him? But yet he felt that it would be better that she should go. It was his present purpose to remain at Matching through a portion of the summer. What could he do to make a girl happy? What comfort would there be in his companionship? "I suppose she ought to go somewhere," he said. "I had not thought of it," said Mrs. Finn. "I understood you to say," replied the Duke, almost angrily, "that she ought to go to someone who would take care of her." "I was thinking of some friend coming to her." "Who would come? Who is there that I could possibly ask? You will not stay." "I certainly would stay, if it were for her good. I was thinking, Duke, that perhaps you might ask the Greys to come to you." "They would not come," he said, after a pause. "When she was told that it was for her sake, she would come, I think." Then there was another pause. "I could not ask them," he said; "for his sake I could not have it put to her in that way. Perhaps Mary had better go to Lady Cantrip. Perhaps I had better be alone here for a time. I do not think that I am fit to have any human being here with me in my sorrow." CHAPTER II Lady Mary Palliser It may as well be said at once that Mrs. Finn knew something of Lady Mary which was not known to the father, and which she was not yet prepared to make known to him. The last winter abroad had been passed at Rome, and there Lady Mary Palliser had become acquainted with a certain Mr. Tregear,--Francis Oliphant Tregear. The Duchess, who had been in constant correspondence with her friend, had asked questions by letter as to Mr. Tregear, of whom she had only known that he was the younger son of a Cornish gentleman, who had become Lord Silverbridge's friend at Oxford. In this there had certainly been but little to recommend him to the intimacy of such a girl as Lady Mary Palliser. Nor had the Duchess, when writing, ever spoken of him as a probable suitor for her daughter's hand. She had never connected the two names together. But Mrs. Finn had been clever enough to perceive that the Duchess had become fond of Mr. Tregear, and would willingly have heard something to his advantage. And she did hear something to his advantage,--something also to his disadvantage. At his mother's death this young man would inherit a property amounting to about fifteen hundred a year. "And I am told," said Mrs. Finn, "that he is quite likely to spend his money before it comes to him." There had been nothing more written specially about Mr. Tregear; but Mrs. Finn had feared not only that the young man loved the girl, but that the young man's love had in some imprudent way been fostered by the mother. Then there had been some fitful confidence during those few days of acute illness. Why should not the girl have the man if he were lovable? And the Duchess referred to her own early days when she had loved, and to the great ruin which had come upon her heart when she had been severed from the man she had loved. "Not but that it has been all for the best," she had said. "Not but that Plantagenet has been to me all that a husband should be. Only if she can be spared what I suffered, let her be spared." Even when these things had been said to her, Mrs. Finn had found herself unable to ask questions. She could not bring herself to inquire whether the girl had in truth given her heart to this young Tregear. The one was nineteen and the other as yet but two-and-twenty! But though she asked no questions she almost knew that it must be so. And she knew also that the father, as yet, was quite in the dark on the matter. How was it possible that in such circumstances she should assume the part of the girl's confidential friend and monitress? Were she to do so she must immediately tell the father everything. In such a position no one could be a better friend than Lady Cantrip, and Mrs. Finn had already almost made up her mind that, should Lady Cantrip occupy the place, she would tell her ladyship all that had passed between herself and the Duchess on the subject. Of what hopes she might have, or what fears, about her girl, the Duchess had said no word to her husband. But when she had believed that the things of the world were fading away from her, and when he was sitting by her bedside,--dumb, because at such a moment he knew not how to express the tenderness of his heart,--holding her hand, and trying so to listen to her words, that he might collect and remember every wish, she had murmured something about the ultimate division of the great wealth with which she herself had been endowed. "She had never," she said, "even tried to remember what arrangements had been made by lawyers, but she hoped that Mary might be so circumstanced, that if her happiness depended on marrying a poor man, want of money need not prevent it." The Duke suspecting nothing, believing this to be a not unnatural expression of maternal interest, had assured her that Mary's fortune would be ample. Mrs. Finn made the proposition to Lady Mary in respect to Lady Cantrip's invitation. Lady Mary was very like her mother, especially in having exactly her mother's tone of voice, her quick manner of speech, and her sharp intelligence. She had also her mother's eyes, large and round, and almost blue, full of life and full of courage, eyes which never seemed to quail, and her mother's dark brown hair, never long but very copious in its thickness. She was, however, taller than her mother, and very much more graceful in her movement. And she could already assume a personal dignity of manner which had never been within her mother's reach. She had become aware of a certain brusqueness of speech in her mother, a certain aptitude to say sharp things without thinking whether the sharpness was becoming to the position which she held, and, taking advantage of the example, the girl had already learned that she might gain more than she would lose by controlling her words. "Papa wants me to go to Lady Cantrip," she said. "I think he would like it,--just for the present, Lady Mary." Though there had been the closest possible intimacy between the Duchess and Mrs. Finn, this had hardly been so as to the intercourse between Mrs. Finn and the children. Of Mrs. Finn it must be acknowledged that she was, perhaps fastidiously, afraid of appearing to take advantage of her friendship with the Duke's family. She would tell herself that though circumstances had compelled her to be the closest and nearest friend of a Duchess, still her natural place was not among dukes and their children, and therefore in her intercourse with the girl she did not at first assume the manner and bearing which her position in the house would have seemed to warrant. Hence the "Lady Mary." "Why does he want to send me away, Mrs. Finn?" "It is not that he wants to send you away, but that he thinks it will be better for you to be with some friend. Here you must be so much alone." "Why don't you stay? But I suppose Mr. Finn wants you to be back in London." "It is not that only, or, to speak the truth, not that at all. Mr. Finn could come here if it were suitable. Or for a week or two he might do very well without me. But there are other reasons. There is no one whom your mother respected more highly than Lady Cantrip." "I never heard her speak a word of Lady Cantrip." "Both he and she are your father's intimate friends." "Does papa want to be--alone here?" "It is you, not himself, of whom he is thinking." "Therefore I must think of him, Mrs. Finn. I do not wish him to be alone. I am sure it would be better that I should stay with him." "He feels that it would not be well that you should live without the companionship of some lady." "Then let him find some lady. You would be the best, because he knows you so well. I, however, am not afraid of being alone. I am sure he ought not to be here quite by himself. If he bids me go, I must go, and then of course I shall go where he sends me; but I won't say that I think it best that I should go, and certainly I do not want to go to Lady Cantrip." This she said with great decision, as though the matter was one on which she had altogether made up her mind. Then she added, in a lower voice: "Why doesn't papa speak to me about it?" "He is thinking only of what may be best for you." "It would be best for me to stay near him. Whom else has he got?" All this Mrs. Finn repeated to the Duke as closely as she could, and then of course the father was obliged to speak to his daughter. "Don't send me away, papa," she said at once. "Your life here, Mary, will be inexpressibly sad." "It must be sad anywhere. I cannot go to college, like Gerald, or live anywhere just as I please, like Silverbridge." "Do you envy them that?" "Sometimes, papa. Only I shall think more of poor mamma by being alone, and I should like to be thinking of her always." He shook his head mournfully. "I do not mean that I shall always be unhappy, as I am now." "No, my dear; you are too young for that. It is only the old who suffer in that way." "You will suffer less if I am with you; won't you, papa? I do not want to go to Lady Cantrip. I hardly remember her at all." "She is very good." "Oh yes. That is what they used to say to mamma about Lady Midlothian. Papa, pray do not send me to Lady Cantrip." Of course it was decided that she should not go to Lady Cantrip at once, or to Mrs. Jeffrey Palliser, and, after a short interval of doubt, it was decided also that Mrs. Finn should remain at Matching for at least a fortnight. The Duke declared that he would be glad to see Mr. Finn, but she knew that in his present mood the society of any one man to whom he would feel himself called upon to devote his time, would be a burden to him, and she plainly said that Mr. Finn had better not come to Matching at present. "There are old associations," she said, "which will enable you to bear with me as you will with your butler or your groom, but you are not as yet quite able to make yourself happy with company." This he bore with perfect equanimity, and then, as it were, handed over his daughter to Mrs. Finn's care. Very quickly there came to be close intimacy between Mrs. Finn and Lady Mary. For a day or two the elder woman, though the place she filled was one of absolute confidence, rather resisted than encouraged the intimacy. She always remembered that the girl was the daughter of a great duke, and that her position in the house had sprung from circumstances which would not, perhaps, in the eyes of the world at large, have recommended her for such friendship. She knew--the reader may possibly know--that nothing had ever been purer, nothing more disinterested than her friendship. But she knew also,--no one knew better,--that the judgment of men and women does not always run parallel with facts. She entertained, too, a conviction in regard to herself, that hard words and hard judgments were to be expected from the world,--were to be accepted by her without any strong feeling of injustice,--because she had been elevated by chance to the possession of more good things than she had merited. She weighed all this with a very fine balance, and even after the encouragement she had received from the Duke, was intent on confining herself to some position about the girl inferior to that which such a friend as Lady Cantrip might have occupied. But the girl's manner, and the girl's speech about her own mother, overcame her. It was the unintentional revelation of the Duchess's constant reference to her,--the way in which Lady Mary would assert that "Mamma used always to say this of you; mamma always knew that you would think so and so; mamma used to say that you had told her." It was the feeling thus conveyed, that the mother who was now dead had in her daily dealings with her own child spoken of her as her nearest friend, which mainly served to conquer the deference of manner which she had assumed. Then gradually there came confidences,--and at last absolute confidence. The whole story about Mr. Tregear was told. Yes; she loved Mr. Tregear. She had given him her heart, and had told him so. "Then, my dear, your father ought to know it," said Mrs. Finn. "No; not yet. Mamma knew it." "Did she know all that you have told me?" "Yes; all. And Mr. Tregear spoke to her, and she said that papa ought not to be told quite yet." Mrs. Finn could not but remember that the friend she had lost was not, among women, the one best able to give a girl good counsel in such a crisis. "Why not yet, dear?" "Well, because--. It is very hard to explain. In the first place, because Mr. Tregear himself does not wish it." "That is a very bad reason; the worst in the world." "Of course you will say so. Of course everybody would say so. But when there is one person whom one loves better than all the rest, for whom one would be ready to die, to whom one is determined that everything shall be devoted, surely the wishes of a person so dear as that ought to have weight." "Not in persuading you to do that which is acknowledged to be wrong." "What wrong? I am going to do nothing wrong." "The very concealment of your love is wrong, after that love has been not only given but declared. A girl's position in such matters is so delicate, especially that of such a girl as you!" "I know all about that," said Lady Mary, with something almost approaching to scorn in her tone. "Of course I have to be--delicate. I don't quite know what the word means. I am not a bit ashamed of being in love with Mr. Tregear. He is a gentleman, highly educated, very clever, of an old family,--older, I believe, than papa's. And he is manly and handsome; just what a young man ought to be. Only he is not rich." "If he be all that you say, ought you not to trust your papa? If he approve of it, he could give you money." "Of course he must be told; but not now. He is nearly broken-hearted about dear mamma. He could not bring himself to care about anything of that kind at present. And then it is Mr. Tregear that should speak to him first." "Not now, Mary." "How do you mean not now?" "If you had a mother you would talk to her about it." "Mamma knew." "If she were still living she would tell your father." "But she didn't tell him though she did know. She didn't mean to tell him quite yet. She wanted to see Mr. Tregear here in England first. Of course I shall do nothing till papa does know." "You will not see him?" "How can I see him here? He will not come here, if you mean that." "You do not correspond with him?" Here for the first time the girl blushed. "Oh, Mary, if you are writing to him your father ought to know it." "I have not written to him; but when he heard how ill poor mamma was, then he wrote to me--twice. You may see his letters. It is all about her. No one worshipped mamma as he did." Gradually the whole story was told. These two young persons considered themselves to be engaged, but had agreed that their engagement should not be made known to the Duke till something had occurred, or some time had arrived, as to which Mr. Tregear was to be the judge. In Mrs. Finn's opinion nothing could be more unwise, and she said much to induce the girl to confess everything to her father at once. But in all her arguments she was opposed by the girl's reference to her mother. "Mamma knew it." And it did certainly seem to Mrs. Finn as though the mother had assented to this imprudent concealment. When she endeavoured, in her own mind, to make excuse for her friend, she felt almost sure that the Duchess, with all her courage, had been afraid to propose to her husband that their daughter should marry a commoner without an income. But in thinking of all that, there could now be nothing gained. What ought she to do--at once? The girl, in telling her, had exacted no promise of secrecy, nor would she have given any such promise; but yet she did not like the idea of telling the tale behind the girl's back. It was evident that Lady Mary had considered herself to be safe in confiding her story to her mother's old friend. Lady Mary no doubt had had her confidences with her mother,--confidences from which it had been intended by both that the father should be excluded; and now she seemed naturally to expect that this new ally should look at this great question as her mother had looked at it. The father had been regarded as a great outside power, which could hardly be overcome, but which might be evaded, or made inoperative by stratagem. It was not that the daughter did not love him. She loved him and venerated him highly,--the veneration perhaps being stronger than the love. The Duchess, too, had loved him dearly,--more dearly in late years than in her early life. But her husband to her had always been an outside power which had in many cases to be evaded. Lady Mary, though she did not express all this, evidently thought that in this new friend she had found a woman whose wishes and aspirations for her would be those which her mother had entertained. But Mrs. Finn was much troubled in her mind, thinking that it was her duty to tell the story to the Duke. It was not only the daughter who had trusted her, but the father also; and the father's confidence had been not only the first but by far the holier of the two. And the question was one so important to the girl's future happiness! There could be no doubt that the peril of her present position was very great. "Mary," she said one morning, when the fortnight was nearly at an end, "your father ought to know all this. I should feel that I had betrayed him were I to go away leaving him in ignorance." "You do not mean to say that you will tell?" said the girl, horrified at the idea of such treachery. "I wish that I could induce you to do so. Every day that he is kept in the dark is an injury to you." "I am doing nothing. What harm can come? It is not as though I were seeing him every day." "This harm will come; your father of course will know that you became engaged to Mr. Tregear in Italy, and that a fact so important to him has been kept back from him." "If there is anything in that, the evil has been done already. Of course poor mamma did mean to tell him." "She cannot tell him now, and therefore you ought to do what she would have done." "I cannot break my promise to him." "Him" always meant Mr. Tregear. "I have told him that I would not do so till I had his consent, and I will not." This was very dreadful to Mrs. Finn, and yet she was most unwilling to take upon herself the part of a stern elder, and declare that under the circumstances she must tell the tale. The story had been told to her under the supposition that she was not a stern elder, that she was regarded as the special friend of the dear mother who was gone, that she might be trusted to assist against the terrible weight of parental authority. She could not endure to be regarded at once as a traitor by this young friend who had sweetly inherited the affection with which the Duchess had regarded her. And yet if she were to be silent how could she forgive herself? "The Duke certainly ought to know at once," said she, repeating her words merely that she might gain some time for thinking, and pluck up courage to declare her purpose, should she resolve on betraying the secret. "If you tell him now, I will never forgive you," said Lady Mary. "I am bound in honour to see that your father knows a thing which is of such vital importance to him and to you. Having heard all this I have no right to keep it from him. If Mr. Tregear really loves you"--Lady Mary smiled at the doubt implied by this suggestion--"he ought to feel that for your sake there should be no secret from your father." Then she paused a moment to think. "Will you let me see Mr. Tregear myself, and talk to him about it?" To this Lady Mary at first demurred, but when she found that in no other way could she prevent Mrs. Finn from going at once to the Duke and telling him everything, she consented. Under Mrs. Finn's directions she wrote a note to her lover, which Mrs. Finn saw, and then undertook to send it, with a letter from herself, to Mr. Tregear's address in London. The note was very short, and was indeed dictated by the elder lady, with some dispute, however, as to certain terms, in which the younger lady had her way. It was as follows: DEAREST FRANK, I wish you to see Mrs. Finn, who, as you know, was dear mamma's most particular friend. Please go to her, as she will ask you to do. When you hear what she says I think you ought to do what she advises. Yours for ever and always, M. P. This Mrs. Finn sent enclosed in an envelope, with a few words from herself, asking the gentleman to call upon her in Park Lane, on a day and at an hour fixed. CHAPTER III Francis Oliphant Tregear Mr. Francis Oliphant Tregear was a young man who might not improbably make a figure in the world, should circumstances be kind to him, but as to whom it might be doubted whether circumstances would be sufficiently kind to enable him to use serviceably his unquestionable talents and great personal gifts. He had taught himself to regard himself as a young English gentleman of the first water, qualified by his birth and position to live with all that was most noble and most elegant; and he could have lived in that sphere naturally and gracefully were it not that the part of the "sphere" which he specially affected requires wealth as well as birth and intellect. Wealth he had not, and yet he did not abandon the sphere. As a consequence of all this, it was possible that the predictions of his friends as to that figure which he was to make in the world might be disappointed. He had been educated at Eton, from whence he had been sent to Christ Church; and both at school and at college had been the most intimate friend of the son and heir of a great and wealthy duke. He and Lord Silverbridge had been always together, and they who were interested in the career of the young nobleman had generally thought he had chosen his friend well. Tregear had gone out in honours, having been a second-class man. His friend Silverbridge, we know, had been allowed to take no degree at all; but the terrible practical joke by which the whole front of the Dean's house had been coloured scarlet in the middle of the night, had been carried on without any assistance from Tregear. The two young men had then been separated for a year; but immediately after taking his degree, Tregear, at the invitation of Lord Silverbridge, had gone to Italy, and had there completely made good his footing with the Duchess,--with what effect on another member of the Palliser family the reader already knows. The young man was certainly clever. When the Duchess found that he could talk without any shyness, that he could speak French fluently, and that after a month in Italy he could chatter Italian, at any rate without reticence or shame; when she perceived that all the women liked the lad's society and impudence, and that all the young men were anxious to know him, she was glad to find that Silverbridge had chosen so valuable a friend. And then he was beautiful to look at,--putting her almost in mind of another man on whom her eyes had once loved to dwell. He was dark, with hair that was almost black, but yet was not black; with clear brown eyes, a nose as regular as Apollo's, and a mouth in which was ever to be found that expression of manliness, which of all characteristics is the one which women love the best. He was five feet ten in height. He was always well dressed, and yet always so dressed as to seem to show that his outside garniture had not been matter of trouble to him. Before the Duchess had dreamed what might take place between this young man and her daughter she had been urgent in her congratulations to her son as to the possession of such a friend. For though she now and then would catch a glimpse of the outer man, which would remind her of that other beautiful one whom she had known in her youth, and though, as these glimpses came, she would remember how poor in spirit and how unmanly that other one had been, though she would confess to herself how terrible had been the heart-shipwreck which that other one had brought upon herself; still she was able completely to assure herself that this man, though not superior in external grace, was altogether different in mind and character. She was old enough now to see all this and to appreciate it. Young Tregear had his own ideas about the politics of the day, and they were ideas with which she sympathised, though they were antagonistic to the politics of her life. He had his ideas about books too, as to manners of life, as to art, and even ethics. Whether or no in all this there was not much that was superficial only, she was not herself deep enough to discover. Nor would she have been deterred from admiring him had she been told that it was tinsel. Such were the acquirements, such the charms, that she loved. Here was a young man who dared to speak, and had always something ready to be spoken; who was not afraid of beauty, nor daunted by superiority of rank; who, if he had not money, could carry himself on equal terms among those who had. In this way he won the Duchess's heart, and having done that, was it odd that he should win the heart of the daughter also? His father was a Cornwall squire of comfortable means, having joined the property of his wife to his own for the period of his own life. She had possessed land also in Cornwall, supposed to be worth fifteen hundred a year, and his own paternal estate at Polwenning was said to be double that value. Being a prudent man, he lived at home as a country gentleman, and thus was able in his county to hold his head as high as richer men. But Frank Tregear was only his second son; and though Frank would hereafter inherit his mother's fortune, he was by no means now in a position to assume the right of living as an idle man. Yet he was idle. The elder brother, who was considerably older than Frank, was an odd man, much addicted to quarrelling with his family, and who spent his time chiefly in travelling about the world. Frank's mother, who was not the mother of the heir also, would sometimes surmise, in Frank's hearing, that the entire property must ultimately come to him. That other Tregear, who was now supposed to be investigating the mountains of Crim Tartary, would surely never marry. And Frank was the favourite also with his father, who paid his debts at Oxford with not much grumbling; who was proud of his friendship with a future duke; who did not urge, as he ought to have urged, that vital question of a profession; and who, when he allowed his son four hundred pounds a year, was almost content with that son's protestations that he knew how to live as a poor man among rich men, without chagrin and without trouble. Such was the young man who now, in lieu of a profession, had taken upon himself the responsibility of an engagement with Lady Mary Palliser. He was tolerably certain that, should he be able to overcome the parental obstacles which he would no doubt find in his path, money would be forthcoming sufficient for the purposes of matrimonial life. The Duke's wealth was fabulous, and as a great part of it, if not the greater, had come from his wife, there would probably be ample provision for the younger children. And when the Duchess had found out how things were going, and had yielded to her daughter, after an opposition which never had the appearance even of being in earnest, she had taken upon herself to say that she would use her influence to prevent any great weight of trouble from pecuniary matters. Frank Tregear, young and bright, and full of hearty ambitions, was certainly not the man to pursue a girl simply because of her fortune; nor was he weak enough to be attracted simply by the glitter of rank; but he was wise enough with worldly wisdom to understand thoroughly the comforts of a good income, and he was sufficiently attached to high position to feel the advantage of marrying a daughter of the Duke of Omnium. When the Duchess was leaving Italy, it had been her declared purpose to tell her husband the story as soon as they were at home in England. And it was on this understanding that Frank Tregear had explained to the girl that he would not as yet ask her father for his permission to be received into the family as a suitor. Everyone concerned had felt that the Duke would not easily be reconciled to such a son-in-law, and that the Duchess should be the one to bell the cat. There was one member of the family who had hitherto been half-hearted in the matter. Lord Silverbridge had vacillated between loyalty to his friend and a certain feeling as to the impropriety of such a match for his sister. He was aware that something very much better should be expected for her, and still was unable to explain his objections to Tregear. He had not at first been admitted into confidence, either by his sister or by Tregear, but had questioned his friend when he saw what was going on. "Certainly I love your sister," Tregear had said; "do you object?" Lord Silverbridge was the weaker of the two, and much subject to the influence of his friend; but he could on occasion be firm, and he did at first object. But he did not object strongly, and allowed himself at last to be content with declaring that the Duke would never give his consent. While Tregear was with his love, or near her, his hopes and fears were sufficient to occupy his mind; and immediately on his return, all the world was nothing to him, except as far as the world was concerned with Lady Mary Palliser. He had come back to England somewhat before the ducal party, and the pleasures and occupations of London life had not abated his love, but enabled him to feel that there was something in life over and beyond his love; whereas to Lady Mary, down at Matching, there had been nothing over and beyond her love--except the infinite grief and desolation produced by her mother's death. Tregear, when he received the note from Mrs. Finn, was staying at the Duke's house in Carlton Terrace. Silverbridge was there, and, on leaving Matching, had asked the Duke's permission to have his friend with him. The Duke at that time was not well pleased with his son as to a matter of politics, and gave his son's friend credit for the evil counsel which had produced this displeasure. But still he had not refused his assent to this proposition. Had he done so, Silverbridge would probably have gone elsewhere; and though there was a matter in respect to Tregear of which the Duke disapproved, it was not a matter, as he thought, which would have justified him in expelling the young man from his house. The young man was a strong Conservative; and now Silverbridge had declared his purpose of entering the House of Commons, if he did enter it, as one of the Conservative party. This had been a terrible blow to the Duke; and he believed that it all came from this young Tregear. Still he must do his duty, and not more than his duty. He knew nothing against Tregear. That a Tregear should be a Conservative was perhaps natural enough--at any rate, was not disgraceful; that he should have his political creed sufficiently at heart to be able to persuade another man, was to his credit. He was a gentleman, well educated, superior in many things to Silverbridge himself. There were those who said that Silverbridge had redeemed himself from contempt--from that sort of contempt which might be supposed to await a young nobleman who had painted scarlet the residence of the Head of his college--by the fact of his having chosen such a friend. The Duke was essentially a just man; and though, at the very moment in which the request was made, his heart was half crushed by his son's apostasy, he gave the permission asked. "You know Mrs. Finn?" Tregear said to his friend one morning at breakfast. "I remember her all my life. She used to be a great deal with my grandfather. I believe he left her a lot of diamonds and money, and that she wouldn't have them. I don't know whether the diamonds are not locked up somewhere now, so that she can take them when she pleases." "What a singular woman!" "It was odd; but she had some fad about it. What makes you ask about Mrs. Finn?" "She wants me to go and see her." "What about?" "I think I have heard your mother speak of her as though she loved her dearly," said Tregear. "I don't know about loving her dearly. They were intimate, and Mrs. Finn used to be with her very much when she was in the country. She was at Matching just now, when my poor mother died. Why does she want to see you?" "She has written to me from Matching. She wants to see me--" "Well?" "To tell you the truth, I do not know what she has to say to me; though I can guess." "What do you guess?" "It is something about your sister." "You will have to give that up, Tregear." "I think not." "Yes, you will; my father will never stand it." "I don't know what there is to stand. I am not noble, nor am I rich; but I am as good a gentleman as he is." "My dear fellow," said the young lord, "you know very well what I think about all that. A fellow is not any better to me because he has got a title, nor yet because he owns half a county. But men have their ideas and feelings about it. My father is a rich man, and of course he'll want his daughter to marry a rich man. My father is noble, and he'll want his daughter to marry a nobleman. You can't very well marry Mary without his permission, and therefore you had better let it alone." "I haven't even asked his permission as yet." "Even my mother was afraid to speak to him about it, and I never knew her to be afraid to say anything else to him." "I shall not be afraid," said Tregear, looking grimly. "I should. That's the difference between us." "He can't very well eat me." "Nor even bite you;--nor will he abuse you. But he can look at you, and he can say a word or two which you will find it very hard to bear. My governor is the quietest man I know, but he has a way of making himself disagreeable when he wishes, that I never saw equalled." "At any rate, I had better go and see your Mrs. Finn." Then Tregear wrote a line to Mrs. Finn, and made his appointment. CHAPTER IV Park Lane From the beginning of the affair Tregear had found the necessity of bolstering himself up inwardly in his great attempt by mottoes, proverbs, and instigations to courage addressed to himself. "None but the brave deserve the fair." "De l'audace, et encore de l'audace, et toujours de l'audace." He was a man naturally of good heart in such matters, who was not afraid of his brother-men, nor yet of women, his sisters. But in this affair he knew very much persistence would be required of him, and that even with such persistence he might probably fail, unless he should find a more than ordinary constancy in the girl. That the Duke could not eat him, indeed that nobody could eat him as long as he carried himself as an honest man and a gentleman, was to him an inward assurance on which he leaned much. And yet he was conscious, almost with a feeling of shame, that in Italy he had not spoken to the Duke about his daughter because he was afraid lest the Duke might eat him. In such an affair he should have been careful from the first to keep his own hands thoroughly clean. Had it not been his duty as a gentleman to communicate with the father, if not before he gained the girl's heart, at any rate as soon as he knew he had done so? He had left Italy thinking that he would certainly meet the Duchess and her daughter in London, and that then he might go to the Duke as though this love of his had arisen from the sweetness of those meetings in London. But all these ideas had been dissipated by the great misfortune of the death of Lady Mary's mother. From all this he was driven to acknowledge to himself that his silence in Italy had been wrong, that he had been weak in allowing himself to be guided by the counsel of the Duchess, and that he had already armed the Duke with one strong argument against him. He did not doubt but that Mrs. Finn would be opposed to him. Of course he could not doubt but that all the world would now be opposed to him,--except the girl herself. He would find no other friend so generous, so romantic, so unworldly as the Duchess had been. It was clear to him that Lady Mary had told the story of her engagement to Mrs. Finn, and that Mrs. Finn had not as yet told it to the Duke. From this he was justified in regarding Mrs. Finn as the girl's friend. The request made was that he should at once do something which Mrs. Finn was to suggest. He could hardly have been so requested, and that in terms of such warm affection, had it been Mrs. Finn's intention to ask him to desist altogether from his courtship. This woman was regarded by Lady Mary as her mother's dearest friend. It was therefore incumbent on him now to induce her to believe in him as the Duchess had believed. He knocked at the door of Mrs. Finn's little house in Park Lane a few minutes before the time appointed, and found himself alone when he was shown into the drawing-room. He had heard much of this lady though he had never seen her, and had heard much also of her husband. There had been a kind of mystery about her. People did not quite understand how it was that she had been so intimate with the Duchess, nor why the late Duke had left to her an enormous legacy, which as yet had never been claimed. There was supposed, too, to have been something especially romantic in her marriage with her present husband. It was believed also that she was very rich. The rumours of all these things together had made her a person of note, and Tregear, when he found himself alone in the drawing-room, looked round about him as though a special interest was to be attached to the belongings of such a woman. It was a pretty room, somewhat dark, because the curtains were almost closed across the windows, but furnished with a pretty taste, and now, in these early April days, filled with flowers. "I have to apologise, Mr. Tregear, for keeping you waiting," she said as she entered the room. "I fear I was before my time." "I know that I am after mine,--a few minutes," said the lady. He told himself that though she was not a young woman, yet she was attractive. She was dark, and still wore her black hair in curls, such as are now seldom seen with ladies. Perhaps the reduced light of the chamber had been regulated with some regard to her complexion and to her age. The effect, however, was good, and Frank Tregear felt at once interested in her. "You have just come up from Matching?" he said. "Yes; only the day before yesterday. It is very good of you to come to me so soon." "Of course I came when you sent for me. I am afraid the Duke felt his loss severely." "How should he not, such a loss as it was? Few people knew how much he trusted her, and how dearly he loved her." "Silverbridge has told me that he is awfully cut up." "You have seen Lord Silverbridge then?" "Just at present I am living with him, at Carlton Terrace." "In the Duke's house?" she asked, with some surprise. "Yes; in the Duke's house. Silverbridge and I have been very intimate. Of course the Duke knows that I am there. Is there any chance of his coming to town?" "Not yet, I fear. He is determined to be alone. I wish it were otherwise, as I am sure he would better bear his sorrow, if he would go about among other men." "No doubt he would suffer less," said Tregear. Then there was a pause. Each wished that the other should introduce the matter which both knew was to be the subject of their conversation. But Tregear would not begin. "When I left them all at Florence," he said, "I little thought that I should never see her again." "You had been intimate with them, Mr. Tregear?" "Yes; I think I may say I have been intimate with them. I had been at Eton and at Christ Church with Silverbridge, and we have always been much together." "I have understood that. Have you and the Duke been good friends?" "We have never been enemies." "I suppose not that." "The Duke, I think, does not much care about young people. I hardly know what he used to do with himself. When I dined with them, I saw him, but I did not often do that. I think he used to read a good deal, and walk about alone. We were always riding." "Lady Mary used to ride?" "Oh yes; and Lord Silverbridge and Lord Gerald. And the Duchess used to drive. One of us would always be with her." "And so you became intimate with the whole family?" "So I became intimate with the whole family." "And especially so with Lady Mary?" This she said in her sweetest possible tone, and with a most gracious smile. "Especially so with Lady Mary," he replied. "It will be very good of you, Mr. Tregear, if you endure and forgive all this cross-questioning from me, who am a perfect stranger to you." "But you are not a perfect stranger to her." "That is it, of course. Now, if you will allow me, I will explain to you exactly what my footing with her is. When the Duchess returned, and when I found her to be so ill as she passed through London, I went down with her into the country,--quite as a matter of course." "So I understand." "And there she died,--in my arms. I will not try to harass you by telling you what those few days were; how absolutely he was struck to the ground, how terrible was the grief of the daughter, how the boys were astonished by the feeling of their loss. After a few days they went away. It was, I think, their father's wish that they should go. And I too was going away,--and had felt, indeed, directly her spirit had parted from her, that I was only in the way in his house. But I stayed at his request, because he did not wish his daughter to be alone." "I can easily understand that, Mrs. Finn." "I wanted her to go to Lady Cantrip who had invited her, but she would not. In that way we were thrown together in the closest intercourse, for two or three weeks. Then she told me the story of your engagement." "That was natural, I suppose." "Surely so. Think of her position, left as she is without a mother! It was incumbent on her to tell someone. There was, however, one other person in whom it would have been much better that she should have confided." "What person?" "Her father." "I rather fancy that it is I who ought to tell him." "As far as I understand these things, Mr. Tregear,--which, indeed, is very imperfectly,--I think it is natural that a girl should at once tell her mother when a gentleman has made her understand that he loves her." "She did so, Mrs. Finn." "And I suppose that generally the mother would tell the father." "She did not." "No; and therefore the position of the young lady is now one of great embarrassment. The Duchess has gone from us, and we must now make up our minds as to what had better be done. It is out of the question that Lady Mary should be allowed to consider herself to be engaged, and that the father should be kept in ignorance of her position." She paused for his reply, but as he said nothing, she continued: "Either you must tell the Duke, or she must do so, or I must do so." "I suppose she told you in confidence." "No doubt. She told it me presuming that I would not betray her; but I shall,--if that be a betrayal. The Duke must know it. It will be infinitely better that he should know it through you, or through her, than through me. But he must be told." "I can't quite see why," said Tregear. "For her sake,--whom I suppose you love." "Certainly I love her." "In order that she may not suffer. I wonder you do not see it, Mr. Tregear. Perhaps you have a sister." "I have no sister as it happens." "But you can imagine what your feelings would be. Should you like to think of a sister as being engaged to a man without the knowledge of any of her family?" "It was not so. The Duchess knew it. The present condition of things is altogether an accident." "It is an accident that must be brought to an end." "Of course it must be brought to an end. I am not such a fool as to suppose that I can make her my wife without telling her father." "I mean at once, Mr. Tregear." "It seems to me that you are rather dictating to me, Mrs. Finn." "I owe you an apology, of course, for meddling in your affairs at all. But as it will be more conducive to your success that the Duke should hear this from you than from me, and as I feel that I am bound by my duty to him and to Lady Mary to see that he be not left in ignorance, I think that I am doing you a service." "I do not like to have a constraint put upon me." "That, Mr. Tregear, is what gentlemen, I fancy, very often feel in regard to ladies. But the constraint of which you speak is necessary for their protection. Are you unwilling to see the Duke?" He was very unwilling, but he would not confess so much. He gave various reasons for delay, urging repeatedly that the question of his marriage was one which he could not press upon the Duke so soon after the death of the Duchess. And when she assured him that this was a matter of importance so great, that even the death of the man's wife should not be held by him to justify delay, he became angry, and for awhile insisted that he must be allowed to follow his own judgment. But he gave her a promise that he would see the Duke before a week was over. Nevertheless he left the house in dudgeon, having told Mrs. Finn more than once that she was taking advantage of Lady Mary's confidence. They hardly parted as friends, and her feeling was, on the whole, hostile to him and to his love. It could not, she thought, be for the happiness of such a one as Lady Mary that she should give herself to one who seemed to have so little to recommend him. He, when he had left her, was angry with his own weakness. He had not only promised that he would make his application to the Duke, but that he would do so within the period of a week. Who was she that she should exact terms from him after this fashion, and prescribe days and hours? And now, because this strange woman had spoken to him, he was compelled to make a journey down to the Duke's country house, and seek an interview in which he would surely be snubbed! This occurred on a Wednesday, and he resolved that he would go down to Matching on the next Monday. He said nothing of his plan to any one, and not a word passed between him and Lord Silverbridge about Lady Mary during the first two or three days. But on the Saturday Silverbridge appeared at breakfast with a letter in his hand. "The governor is coming up to town," he said. "Immediately?" "In the course of next week. He says that he thinks he shall be here on Wednesday." It immediately struck Tregear that this sudden journey must have some reference to Lady Mary and her engagement. "Do you know why he is coming?" "Because of these vacancies in Parliament." "Why should that bring him up?" "I suppose he hopes to be able to talk me into obedience. He wants me to stand for the county--as a Liberal, of course. I intend to stand for the borough as a Conservative, and I have told them so down at Silverbridge. I am very sorry to annoy him, and all that kind of thing. But what the deuce is a fellow to do? If a man has got political convictions of his own, of course, he must stick to them." This the young Lord said with a good deal of self-assurance, as though he, by the light of his own reason, had ascertained on which side the truth lay in political contests of the day. "There is a good deal to be said on both sides of the question, my boy." At this particular moment Tregear felt that the Duke ought to be propitiated. "You wouldn't have me give up my convictions!" "A seat in Parliament is a great thing." "I can probably secure that, whichever side I take. I thought you were so devilish hot against the Radicals." "So I am. But then you are, as it were, bound by family allegiance." "I'll be shot if I am. One never knows how to understand you nowadays. It used to be a great doctrine with you, that nothing should induce a man to vote against his political opinions." "So it is,--if he has really got any. However, as your father is coming to London, I need not go down to Matching." "You don't mean to say that you were going to Matching?" "I had intended to beard the lion in his country den; but now the lion will find me in his own town den, and I must beard him here." Then Tregear wrote a most chilling note to Mrs. Finn, informing her with great precision, that, as the Duke of Omnium intended to be in town one day next week, he would postpone the performance of his promise for a day or two beyond the allotted time. CHAPTER V "It Is Impossible" Down at Matching Lady Mary's life was very dull after Mrs. Finn had left her. She had a horse to ride, but had no one to ride with her. She had a carriage in which to be driven, but no one to be driven with her, and no special places whither to go. Her father would walk daily for two hours, and she would accompany him when he encouraged her to do so; but she had an idea that he preferred taking his walks alone, and when they were together there was no feeling of confidence between them. There could be none on her part, as she knew that she was keeping back information which he was entitled to possess. On this matter she received two letters from Mrs. Finn, in the first of which she was told that Mr. Tregear intended to present himself at Matching within a few days, and was advised in the same letter not to endeavour to see her lover on that occasion; and then, in the second she was informed that this interview with her father was to be sought not at Matching but in London. From this latter letter there was of course some disappointment, though some feeling of relief. Had he come there she might possibly have seen him after the interview. But she would have been subjected to the immediate sternness of her father's anger. That she would now escape. She would not be called on to meet him just when the first blow had fallen upon him. She was quite sure that he would disapprove of the thing. She was quite sure that he would be very angry. She knew that he was a peculiarly just man, and yet she thought that in this he would be unjust. Had she been called upon to sing the praises of her father she would have insisted above all things on the absolute integrity of his mind, and yet, knowing as she did that he would be opposed to her marriage with Mr. Tregear, she assured herself every day and every hour that he had no right to make any such objection. The man she loved was a gentleman, and an honest man, by no means a fool, and subject to no vices. Her father had no right to demand that she should give her heart to a rich man, or to one of high rank. Rank! As for rank, she told herself that she had the most supreme contempt for it. She thought that she had seen it near enough already to be sure that it ought to have no special allurements. What was it doing for her? Simply restraining her choice among comparatively a few who seemed to her by no means the best endowed of God's creatures. Of one thing she was very sure, that under no pressure whatsoever would she abandon her engagement with Mr. Tregear. That to her had become a bond almost as holy as matrimony itself could be. She had told the man that she loved him, and after that there could be no retreat. He had kissed her, and she had returned his caress. He had told her that she was his, as his arm was round her; and she had acknowledged that it was so, that she belonged to him, and could not be taken away from him. All this was to her a compact so sacred that nothing could break it but a desire on his part to have it annulled. No other man had ever whispered a word of love to her, of no other man had an idea entered her mind that it could be pleasant to join her lot in life with his. With her it had been all new and all sacred. Love with her had that religion which nothing but freshness can give it. That freshness, that bloom, may last through a long life. But every change impairs it, and after many changes it has perished for ever. There was no question with her but that she must bear her father's anger, should he be angry; put up with his continued opposition, should he resolutely oppose her; bear all that the countesses of the world might say to her;--for it was thus that she thought of Lady Cantrip now. Any retrogression was beyond her power. She was walking with her father when she first heard of his intended visit to London. At that time she had received Mrs. Finn's first letter, but not the second. "I suppose you'll see Silverbridge," she said. She knew then that Frank Tregear was living with her brother. "I am going up on purpose to see him. He is causing me much annoyance." "Is he extravagant?" "It is not that--at present." He winced even as he said this, for he had in truth suffered somewhat from demands made upon him for money, which had hurt him not so much by their amount as by their nature. Lord Silverbridge had taken upon himself to "own a horse or two," very much to his father's chagrin, and was at this moment part proprietor of an animal supposed to stand well for the Derby. The fact was not announced in the papers with his lordship's name, but his father was aware of it, and did not like it the better because his son held the horse in partnership with a certain Major Tifto, who was well known in the sporting world. "What is it, papa?" "Of course he ought to go into Parliament." "I think he wishes it himself." "Yes, but how? By a piece of extreme good fortune, West Barsetshire is open to him. The two seats are vacant together. There is hardly another agricultural county in England that will return a Liberal, and I fear I am not asserting too much in saying that no other Liberal could carry the seat but one of our family." "You used to sit for Silverbridge, papa." "Yes, I did. In those days the county returned four Conservatives. I cannot explain it all to you, but it is his duty to contest the county on the Liberal side." "But if he is a Conservative himself, papa?" asked Lady Mary, who had had some political ideas suggested to her own mind by her lover. "It is all rubbish. It has come from that young man Tregear, with whom he has been associating." "But, papa," said Lady Mary, who felt that even in this matter she was bound to be firm on what was now her side of the question, "I suppose it is as--as--as respectable to be a Conservative as a Liberal." "I don't know that at all," said the Duke angrily. "I thought that--the two sides were--" She was going to express an opinion that the two parties might be supposed to stand as equal in the respect of the country, when he interrupted her. "The Pallisers have always been Liberal. It will be a blow to me, indeed, if Silverbridge deserts his colours. I know that as yet he himself has had no deep thoughts on the subject, that unfortunately he does not give himself much to thinking, and that in this matter he is being talked over by a young man whose position in life has hardly justified the great intimacy which has existed." This was very far from being comfortable to her, but of course she said nothing in defence of Tregear's politics. Nor at present was she disposed to say anything as to his position in life, though at some future time she might not be so silent. A few days later they were again walking together, when he spoke to her about herself. "I cannot bear that you should be left here alone while I am away," he said. "You will not be long gone, I suppose?" "Only for three or four days now." "I shall not mind that, papa." "But very probably I may have to go into Barsetshire. Would you not be happier if you would let me write to Lady Cantrip, and tell her that you will go to her?" "No, papa, I think not. There are times when one feels that one ought to be almost alone. Don't you feel that?" "I do not wish you to feel it, nor would you do so long if you had other people around you. With me it is different. I am an old man, and cannot look for new pleasures in society. It has been the fault of my life to be too much alone. I do not want to see my children follow me in that." "It is so very short a time as yet," said she, thinking of her mother's death. "But I think that you should be with somebody,--with some woman who would be kind to you. I like to see you with books, but books alone should not be sufficient at your age." How little, she thought, did he know of the state either of her heart or mind! "Do you dislike Lady Cantrip?" "I do not know her. I can't say that I dislike a person whom I don't think I ever spoke to, and never saw above once or twice. But how can I say that I like her?" She did, however, know that Lady Cantrip was a countess all over, and would be shocked at the idea of a daughter of a Duke of Omnium marrying the younger son of a country squire. Nothing further was then said on the matter, and when the Duke went to town Lady Mary was left quite alone, with an understanding that if he went into Barsetshire he should come back and take her with him. He arrived at his own house in Carlton Terrace about five o'clock in the afternoon, and immediately went to his study, intending to dine and spend the evening there alone. His son had already pleaded an engagement for that afternoon, but had consented to devote the following morning to his father's wishes. Of the other sojourner in his house the Duke had thought nothing; but the other sojourner had thought very much of the Duke. Frank Tregear was fully possessed of that courage which induces a man who knows that he must be thrown over a precipice, to choose the first possible moment for his fall. He had sounded Silverbridge about this change in his politics, and had found his friend quite determined not to go back to the family doctrine. Such being the case, the Duke's ill-will and hardness and general severity would probably be enhanced by his interview with his son. Tregear, therefore, thinking that nothing could be got by delay, sent his name in to the Duke before he had been an hour in the house, and asked for an interview. The servant brought back word that his Grace was fatigued, but would see Mr. Tregear if the matter in question was one of importance. Frank's heart quailed for a moment, but only for a moment. He took up a pen and wrote a note. MY DEAR DUKE OF OMNIUM, If your Grace can spare a moment, I think you will find that what I have to say will justify the intrusion. Your very faithful servant, F. O. TREGEAR. Of course the Duke admitted him. There was but one idea in his head as to what was coming. His son had taken this way of making some communication to him respecting his political creed. Some overture or some demand was to be preferred through Tregear. If so, it was proof of a certain anxiety as to the matter on his son's part which was not displeasing to him. But he was not left long in this mistake after Tregear had entered the room. "Sir," he said, speaking quite at once, as soon as the door was closed behind him, but still speaking very slowly, looking beautiful as Apollo as he stood upright before his wished-for father-in-law--"Sir, I have come to you to ask you to give me the hand of your daughter." The few words had been all arranged beforehand, and were now spoken without any appearance of fear or shame. No one hearing them would have imagined that an almost penniless young gentleman was asking in marriage the daughter of the richest and greatest nobleman in England. "The hand of my daughter!" said the Duke, rising from his chair. "I know how very great is the prize," said Frank, "and how unworthy I am of it. But--as she thinks me worthy--" "She! What she?" "Lady Mary." "She think you worthy!" "Yes, your Grace." "I do not believe it." On hearing this, Frank simply bowed his head. "I beg your pardon, Mr. Tregear. I do not mean to say that I do not believe you. I never yet gave the lie to a gentleman, and I hope I never may be driven to do so. But there must be some mistake in this." "I am complying with Lady Mary's wishes in asking your permission to enter your house as her suitor." The Duke stood for a moment biting his lips in silence. "I cannot believe it," he said at last. "I cannot bring myself to believe it. There must be some mistake. My daughter! Lady Mary Palliser!" Again the young man bowed his head. "What are your pretensions?" "Simply her regard." "Of course it is impossible. You are not so ignorant but that you must have known as much when you came to me." There was so much scorn in his words, and in the tone in which they were uttered, that Tregear in his turn was becoming angry. He had prepared himself to bow humbly before the great man, before the Duke, before the Croesus, before the late Prime Minister, before the man who was to be regarded as certainly one of the most exalted of the earth; but he had not prepared himself to be looked at as the Duke looked at him. "The truth, my Lord Duke, is this," he said, "that your daughter loves me, and that we are engaged to each other,--as far as that engagement can be made without your sanction as her father." "It cannot have been made at all," said the Duke. "I can only hope,--we can both of us only hope that a little time may soften--" "It is out of the question. There must be an end of this altogether. You must neither see her, nor hear from her, nor in any way communicate with her. It is altogether impossible. I believe, sir, that you have no means?" "Very little at present, Duke." "How did you think you were to live? But it is altogether unnecessary to speak of such a matter as that. There are so many reasons to make this impossible, that it would be useless to discuss one as being more important than others. Has any other one of my family known of this?" This he added, wishing to ascertain whether Lord Silverbridge had disgraced himself by lending his hand to such a disposition of his sister. "Oh yes," said Tregear. "Who has known it?" "The Duchess, sir. We had all her sympathy and approval." "I do not believe a word of it," said the Duke, becoming extremely red in the face. He was forced to do now that which he had just declared that he had never done in his life,--driven by the desire of his heart to acquit the wife he had lost of the terrible imprudence, worse than imprudence, of which she was now accused. "That is the second time, my Lord, that you have found it necessary to tell me that you have not believed direct assertions which I made you. But, luckily for me, the two assertions are capable of the earliest and most direct proof. You will believe Lady Mary, and she will confirm me in the one and the other." The Duke was almost beside himself with emotion and grief. He did know,--though now at this moment he was most loath to own to himself that it was so,--that his dear wife had been the most imprudent of women. And he recognised in her encouragement of this most pernicious courtship,--if she had encouraged it,--a repetition of that romantic folly by which she had so nearly brought herself to shipwreck in her own early life. If it had been so,--even whether it had been so or not,--he had been wrong to tell the man that he did not believe him. And the man had rebuked him with dignity. "At any rate it is impossible," he repeated. "I cannot allow that it is impossible." "That is for me to judge, sir." "I trust that you will excuse me when I say that I also must hold myself to be in some degree a judge in the matter. If you were in my place, you would feel--" "I could not possibly be in your place." "If your Grace were in my place you would feel that as long as you were assured by the young lady that your affection was valued by her you would not be deterred by the opposition of her father. That you should yield to me, of course I do not expect; that Lady Mary should be persistent in her present feelings, when she knows your mind, perhaps I have no right to hope; but should she be so persistent as to make you feel that her happiness depends, as mine does, on our marriage, then I shall believe that you will yield at last." "Never!" said the Duke. "Never! I shall never believe that my daughter's happiness can be assured by a step which I should regard as disgraceful to her." "Disgraceful is a violent word, my Lord." "It is the only word that will express my meaning." "And one which I must be bold enough to say you are not justified in using. Should she become my wife to-morrow, no one in England would think she had disgraced herself. The Queen would receive her on her marriage. All your friends would hold out their hands to us,--presuming that we had your goodwill." "But you would not have it." "Her disgrace would not depend upon that, my Lord. Should your daughter so dispose of herself, as to disgrace herself,--which I think to be impossible,--your countenance could not set her right. Nor can the withdrawal of your countenance condemn her before the world if she does that with herself which any other lady might do and remain a lady." The Duke, when he heard this, even in the midst of his wrath, which was very violent, and in the midst of his anger, which was very acute, felt that he had to deal with a man,--with one whom he could not put off from him into the gutter, and there leave as buried in the mud. And there came, too, a feeling upon him, which he had no time to analyse, but of which he was part aware, that this terrible indiscretion on the part of his daughter and of his late wife was less wonderful than it had at first appeared to be. But not on that account was he the less determined to make the young man feel that his parental opposition would be invincible. "It is quite impossible, sir. I do not think that I need say anything more." Then, while Tregear was meditating whether to make any reply, the Duke asked a question which had better have been left unasked. The asking of it diminished somewhat from that ducal, grand-ducal, quasi-archducal, almost godlike superiority which he had assumed, and showed the curiosity of a mere man. "Has anybody else been aware of this?" he said, still wishing to know whether he had cause for anger against Silverbridge in the matter. "Mrs. Finn is aware of it," answered Tregear. "Mrs. Finn!" exclaimed the Duke, as though he had been stung by an adder. This was the woman whom he had prayed to remain awhile with his daughter after his wife had been laid in her grave, in order that there might be someone near whom he could trust! And this very woman whom he had so trusted,--whom, in his early associations with her, he had disliked and distrusted, but had taught himself both to like and to trust because his wife had loved her,--this woman was the she-Pandarus who had managed matters between Tregear and his daughter! His wife had been too much subject to her influence. That he had always known. And now, in this last act of her life, she had allowed herself to be persuaded to give up her daughter by the baneful wiles of this most pernicious woman. Such were the workings of the Duke's mind when the young man told him that Mrs. Finn was acquainted with the whole affair. As the reader is aware, nothing could have been more unjust. "I mentioned her name," said Tregear, "because I thought she had been a friend of the family." "That will do, sir. I have been greatly pained as well as surprised by what I have heard. Of the real state of the case I can form no opinion till I see my daughter. You, of course, will hold no further intercourse with her." He paused as though for a promise, but Tregear did not feel himself called upon to say a word in one direction or in the other. "It will be my care that you shall not do so. Good-morning, sir." Tregear, who during the interview had been standing, then bowed, turned upon his heel, and left the room. The Duke seated himself, and, crossing his arms upon his chest, sat for an hour looking up at the ceiling. Why was it that, for him, such a world of misery had been prepared? What wrong had he done, of what imprudence had he been guilty, that, at every turn of life, something should occur so grievous as to make him think himself the most wretched of men? No man had ever loved his wife more dearly than he had done; and yet now, in that very excess of tenderness which her death had occasioned, he was driven to accuse her of a great sin against himself, in that she had kept from him her knowledge of this affair;--for, when he came to turn the matter over in his mind, he did believe Tregear's statement as to her encouragement. Then, too, he had been proud of his daughter. He was a man so reticent and undemonstrative in his manner that he had never known how to make confidential friends of his children. In his sons hitherto he had not taken pride. They were gallant, well-grown, handsome boys, with a certain dash of cleverness,--more like their mother than their father; but they had not as yet done anything as he would have had them do it. But the girl, in the perfection of her beauty, in the quiescence of her manner, in the nature of her studies, and in the general dignity of her bearing, had seemed to be all that he had desired. And now she had engaged herself, behind his back, to the younger son of a little county squire! But his anger against Mrs. Finn was hotter than his anger against any one in his own family. CHAPTER VI Major Tifto Major Tifto had lately become a member of the Beargarden Club, under the auspices of his friend Lord Silverbridge. It was believed, by those who had made some inquiry into the matter, that the Major had really served a campaign as a volunteer in the Carlist army in the north of Spain. When, therefore, it was declared by someone that he was not a major at all, his friends were able to contradict the assertion, and to impute it to slander. Instances were brought up,--declared by these friends to be innumerable, but which did, in truth, amount to three or four,--of English gentlemen who had come home from a former Carlist war, bearing the title of colonel, without any contradiction or invidious remark. Had this gallant officer appeared as Colonel Tifto, perhaps less might have been said about it. There was a little lack of courage in the title which he did choose. But it was accepted at last, and, as Major Tifto, he was proposed, seconded, and elected at the Beargarden. But he had other points in his favour besides the friendship of Lord Silverbridge,--points which had probably led to that friendship. He was, without doubt, one of the best horsemen in England. There were some who said that, across country, he was the very best, and that, as a judge of a hunter, few excelled him. Of late years he had crept into credit as a betting-man. No one supposed that he had much capital to work with; but still, when he lost a bet he paid it. Soon after his return from Spain, he was chosen as Master of the Runnymede Fox-Hounds, and was thus enabled to write the letters M.F.H. after his name. The gentlemen who rode with the Runnymede were not very liberal in their terms, and had lately been compelled to change their Master rather more frequently than was good for that quasi-suburban hunt; but now they had fitted themselves well. How he was to hunt the country five days a fortnight, finding servants and horses, and feeding the hounds, for eight hundred pounds a year, no one could understand. But Major Tifto not only undertook to do it, but did it. And he actually succeeded in obtaining for the Runnymede a degree of popularity which for many years previous it had not possessed. Such a man,--even though no one did know anything of his father or mother, though no one had ever heard him speak of a brother or a sister, though it was believed that he had no real income,--was felt by many to be the very man for the Beargarden; and when his name was brought up at the committee, Lord Silverbridge was able to say so much in his favour that only two blackballs were given against him. Under the mild rule of the club, three would have been necessary to exclude him; and therefore Major Tifto was now as good a member as any one else. He was a well-made little man, good-looking for those who like such good looks. He was light-haired and blue-eyed, with regular and yet not inexpressive features. But his eyes were small and never tranquil, and rarely capable of looking at the person who was speaking to him. He had small well-trimmed, glossy whiskers, with the best-kept moustache, and the best-kept tuft on his chin which were to be seen anywhere. His face still bore the freshness of youth, which was a marvel to many, who declared that, from facts within their knowledge, Tifto must be far on the wrong side of forty. At a first glance you would hardly have called him thirty. No doubt, when, on close inspection, you came to look into his eyes, you could see the hand of time. Even if you believed the common assertion that he painted,--which it was very hard to believe of a man who passed the most of his time in the hunting-field or on a race-course,--yet the paint on his cheeks would not enable him to move with the elasticity which seemed to belong to all his limbs. He rode flat races and steeple chases,--if jump races may still be so called; and with his own hounds and with the Queen's did incredible things on horseback. He could jump over chairs too,--the backs of four chairs in a dining-room after dinner,--a feat which no gentleman of forty-five could perform, even though he painted himself ever so. So much in praise of Major Tifto honesty has compelled the present chronicler to say. But there were traits of character in which he fell off a little, even in the estimation of those whose pursuits endeared him to them. He could not refrain from boasting,--and especially from boasting about women. His desire for glory in that direction knew no bounds, and he would sometimes mention names, and bring himself into trouble. It was told of him that at one period of his life, when misfortune had almost overcome him, when sorrow had produced prostration, and prostration some expression of truth, he had owned to a friend his own conviction that could he have kept his tongue from talking of women, he might have risen to prosperity in his profession. From these misfortunes he had emerged, and, no doubt, had often reflected on what he himself had then said. But we know that the drunkard, though he hates drunkenness, cannot but drink,--that the gambler cannot keep from the dice. Major Tifto still lied about women, and could not keep his tongue from the subject. He would boast, too, about other matters,--much to his own disadvantage. He was, too, very "deep", and some men, who could put up with his other failings, could not endure that. Whatever he wanted to do he would attempt round three corners. Though he could ride straight, he could do nothing else straight. He was full of mysteries. If he wanted to draw Charter Wood he would take his hounds out of the street at Egham directly in the other direction. If he had made up his mind to ride Lord Pottlepot's horse for the great Leamington handicap, he would be sure to tell even his intimate friends that he was almost determined to take the "baronet's" offer of a mount. This he would do even where there was no possible turn in the betting to be affected by such falsehood. So that his companions were apt to complain that there was no knowing where to have Tifto. And then, they who were old enough in the world to have had some experience in men, had perceived that peculiar quality of his eyes, which never allowed him to look any one in the face. That Major Tifto should make money by selling horses was, perhaps, a necessity of his position. No one grumbled at him because he did so, or thought that such a pursuit was incompatible with his character as a sporting gentleman. But there were some who considered that they had suffered unduly under his hands, and in their bargains with him had been made to pay more than a proper amount of tax for the advantages of his general assistance. When a man has perhaps made fifty pounds by using a "straight tip" as to a horse at Newmarket, in doing which he had of course encountered some risks, he feels he ought not to be made to pay the amount back into the pockets of the "tipper," and at the same time to find himself saddled with the possession of a perfectly useless animal. In this way there were rocks in the course through which Tifto was called on to steer his bark. Of course he was anxious, when preying upon his acquaintances, to spare those who were useful friends to him. Now and again he would sell a serviceable animal at a fair price, and would endeavour to make such sale in favour of someone whose countenance would be a rock to him. He knew his business well, but yet there would be mistakes. Now, at this very moment, was the culmination of the Major's life. He was Master of the Runnymede Hounds, he was partner with the eldest son of a Duke in the possession of that magnificent colt, the Prime Minister, and he was a member of the Beargarden. He was a man who had often been despondent about himself, but was now disposed to be a little triumphant. He had finished his season well with the Runnymede, and were it not that, let him work as he would, his expenses always exceeded his means, he would have been fairly comfortable. At eight o'clock Lord Silverbridge and his friend met in the dining-room of the Beargarden. "Have you been here before?" asked the Lord. "Not in here, my Lord. I just looked in at the smoking-room last night. Glasslough and Nidderdale were there. I thought we should have got up a rubber, but they didn't seem to see it." "There is whist here generally. You'll find out all about it before long. Perhaps they are a little afraid of you." "I'm the worst hand at cards, I suppose, in England. A dash at loo for about an hour, and half-a-dozen cuts at blind hookey,--that's about my form. I know I drop more than I pick up. If I knew what I was about I should never touch a card." "Horses; eh, Tifto?" "Horses, yes. They've pretty good claret, here, eh, Silverbridge?" He could never hit off his familiarity quite right. He had my-Lorded his young friend at first, and now brought out the name with a hesitating twang, which the young nobleman appreciated. But then the young nobleman was quite aware that the Major was a friend for club purposes, and sporting purposes, and not for home use. "Everything of that kind is pretty good here," said the Lord. "You were saying--horses." "I dare say you do better with them than with cards." "If I didn't I don't know where I should be, seeing what a lot pass through my hands in the year. Any one of our fellows who has a horse to sell thinks that I am bound to buy him. And I do buy 'em. Last May I had forty-two hunters on my hands." "How many of them have you got now?" "Three. Three of that lot,--though a goodish many have come up since. But what does it amount to? When I have anything that is very good, some fellow that I like gets him from me." "After paying for him." "After paying for him! Yes; I don't mean that I make a fellow a present. But the man who buys has a deal the best of it. Did you ever get anything better than that spotted chestnut in your life?" "What, old Sarcinet?" "You had her for one hundred and sixty pounds. Now, if you were on your oath, what is she worth?" "She suits me, Major, and of course I shouldn't sell her." "I rather think not. I knew what that mare was, well enough. A dealer would have had three hundred and fifty pounds for her. I could have got the money easily if I had taken her down into the shires, and ridden her a day or two myself." "I gave you what you asked." "Yes, you did. It isn't often that I take less than I ask. But the fact is, about horses, I don't know whether I shouldn't do better if I never owned an animal at all but those I want for my own use. When I am dealing with a man I call a friend, I can't bear to make money of him. I don't think fellows give me all the credit they should do for sticking to them." The Major, as he said this, leaned back in his chair, put his hand up to his moustache, and looked sadly away into the vacancy of the room, as though he was meditating sorrowfully on the ingratitude of the world. "I suppose it's all right about Cream Cheese?" asked the Lord. "Well; it ought to be." And now the Major spoke like an oracle, leaning forward on the table, uttering his words in a low voice, but very plainly, so that not a syllable might be lost. "When you remember how he ran at the Craven with 9 st. 12 lb. on him, that it took Archbishop all he knew to beat him with only 9 st. 2 lb., and what the lot at Chester are likely to be, I don't think that there can be seven to one against him. I should be very glad to take it off your hands, only the figures are a little too heavy for me." "I suppose Sunflower'll be the best animal there?" "Not a doubt of it, if he's all right, and if his temper will stand. Think what a course Chester is for an ill-conditioned brute like that! And then he's the most uncertain horse in training. There are times he won't feed. From what I hear, I shouldn't wonder if he don't turn up at all." "Solomon says he's all right." "You won't get Solomon to take four to one against him, nor yet four and a half. I suppose you'll go down, my Lord?" "Well, yes; if there's nothing else doing just then. I don't know how it may be about this electioneering business. I shall go and smoke upstairs." At the Beargarden there were,--I was going to say, two smoking-rooms; but in truth the house was a smoking-room all over. It was, however, the custom of those who habitually played cards, to have their cigars and coffee upstairs. Into this sanctum Major Tifto had not yet been introduced, but now he was taken there under Lord Silverbridge's wing. There were already four or five assembled, among whom was Mr. Adolphus Longstaff, a young man of about thirty-five years of age, who spent very much of his time at the Beargarden. "Do you know my friend Tifto?" said the Lord. "Tifto, this is Mr. Longstaff, whom men within the walls of this asylum sometimes call Dolly." Whereupon the Major bowed and smiled graciously. "I have heard of Major Tifto," said Dolly. "Who has not?" said Lord Nidderdale, another middle-aged young man, who made one of the company. Again the Major bowed. "Last season I was always intending to get down to your country and have a day with the Tiftoes," said Dolly. "Don't they call your hounds the Tiftoes?" "They shall be called so if you like," said the Major. "And why didn't you come?" "It always was such a grind." "Train down from Paddington every day at half-past ten." "That's all very well if you happen to be up. Well, Silverbridge, how's the Prime Minister?" "How is he, Tifto?" asked the noble partner. "I don't think there's a man in England just at present enjoying a very much better state of health," said the Major pleasantly. "Safe to run?" asked Dolly. "Safe to run! Why shouldn't he be safe to run?" "I mean sure to start." "I think we mean him to start, don't we, Silverbridge?" said the Major. There was something perhaps in the tone in which the last remark was made which jarred a little against the young lord's dignity. At any rate he got up and declared his purpose of going to the opera. He should look in, he said, and hear a song from Mdlle Stuffa. Mdlle Stuffa was the nightingale of the season, and Lord Silverbridge, when he had nothing else to do, would sometimes think that he was fond of music. Soon after he was gone Major Tifto had some whisky-and-water, lit his third cigar, and began to feel the glory of belonging to the Beargarden. With Lord Silverbridge, to whom it was essentially necessary that he should make himself agreeable at all times, he was somewhat overweighted as it were. Though he attempted an easy familiarity, he was a little afraid of Lord Silverbridge. With Dolly Longstaff he felt that he might be comfortable,--not, perhaps, understanding that gentleman's character. With Lord Nidderdale he had previously been acquainted, and had found him to be good-natured. So, as he sipped his whisky, he became confidential and comfortable. "I never thought so much about her good looks," he said. They were talking of the singer, the charms of whose voice had carried Lord Silverbridge away. "Did you ever see her off the stage?" asked Nidderdale. "Oh dear yes." "She does not go about very much, I fancy," said someone. "I dare say not," said Tifto. "But she and I have had a day or two together, for all that." "You must have been very much favoured," said Dolly. "We've been pals ever since she has been over here," said Tifto, with an enormous lie. "How do you get on with her husband?" asked Dolly,--in the simplest voice, as though not in the least surprised at his companion's statement. "Husband!" exclaimed the Major; who was not possessed of sufficient presence of mind to suppress all signs of his ignorance. "Ah," said Dolly; "you are not probably aware that your pal has been married to Mr. Thomas Jones for the last year and a half." Soon after that Major Tifto left the club,--with considerably enhanced respect for Mr. Longstaff. CHAPTER VII Conservative Convictions Lord Silverbridge had engaged himself to be with his father the next morning at half-past nine, and he entered the breakfast-room a very few minutes after that hour. He had made up his mind as to what he would say to his father. He meant to call himself a Conservative, and to go into the House of Commons under that denomination. All the men among whom he lived were Conservatives. It was a matter on which, as he thought, his father could have no right to control him. Down in Barsetshire, as well as up in London, there was some little difference of opinion in this matter. The people of Silverbridge declared that they would prefer to have a Conservative member, as indeed they had one for the last Session. They had loyally returned the Duke himself while he was a commoner, but they had returned him as being part and parcel of the Omnium appendages. That was all over now. As a constituency they were not endowed with advanced views, and thought that a Conservative would suit them best. That being so, and as they had been told that the Duke's son was a Conservative, they fancied that by electing him they would be pleasing everybody. But, in truth, by so doing they would by no means please the Duke. He had told them on previous occasions that they might elect whom they pleased, and felt no anger because they had elected a Conservative. They might send up to Parliament the most antediluvian old Tory they could find in England if they wished, only not his son, not a Palliser as a Tory or Conservative. And then, though the little town had gone back in the ways of the world, the county, or the Duke's division of the county, had made so much progress, that a Liberal candidate recommended by him would almost certainly be returned. It was just the occasion on which a Palliser should show himself ready to serve his country. There would be an expense, but he would think nothing of expense in such a matter. Ten thousand pounds spent on such an object would not vex him. The very contest would have given him new life. All this Lord Silverbridge understood, but had said to himself and to all his friends that it was a matter in which he did not intend to be controlled. The Duke had passed a very unhappy night. He had told himself that any such marriage as that spoken of was out of the question. He believed that the matter might be so represented to his girl as to make her feel that it was out of the question. He hardly doubted but that he could stamp it out. Though he should have to take her away into some further corner of the world, he would stamp it out. But she, when this foolish passion of hers should have been thus stamped out, could never be the pure, the bright, the unsullied, unsoiled thing, of the possession of which he had thought so much. He had never spoken of his hopes about her even to his wife, but in the silence of his very silent life he had thought much of the day when he would give her to some noble youth,--noble with all gifts of nobility, including rank and wealth,--who might be fit to receive her. Now, even though no one else should know it,--and all would know it,--she would be the girl who had condescended to love young Tregear. His own Duchess, she whose loss to him now was as though he had lost half his limbs,--had not she in the same way loved a Tregear, or worse than a Tregear, in her early days? Ah yes! And though his Cora had been so much to him, had he not often felt, had he not been feeling all his days, that Fate had robbed him of the sweetest joy that is given to man, in that she had not come to him loving him with her early spring of love, as she had loved that poor ne'er-do-well? How infinite had been his regrets. How often had he told himself that, with all that Fortune had given him, still Fortune had been unjust to him because he had been robbed of that. Not to save his life could he have whispered a word of this to any one, but he had felt it. He had felt it for years. Dear as she had been, she had not been quite what she should have been but for that. And now this girl of his, who was so much dearer to him than anything else left to him, was doing exactly as her mother had done. The young man might be stamped out. He might be made to vanish as that other young man had vanished. But the fact that he had been there, cherished in the girl's heart,--that could not be stamped out. He struggled gallantly to acquit the memory of his wife. He could best do that by leaning with the full weight of his mind on the presumed iniquity of Mrs. Finn. Had he not known from the first that the woman was an adventuress? And had he not declared to himself over and over again that between such a one and himself there should be no intercourse, no common feeling? He had allowed himself to be talked into an intimacy, to be talked almost into an affection. And this was the result! And how should he treat this matter in his coming interview with his son;--or should he make an allusion to it? At first it seemed as though it would be impossible for him to give his mind to that other subject. How could he enforce the merits of political Liberalism, and the duty of adhering to the old family party, while his mind was entirely preoccupied with his daughter? It had suddenly become almost indifferent to him whether Silverbridge should be a Conservative or a Liberal. But as he dressed he told himself that, as a man, he ought to be able to do a plain duty, marked out for him as this had been by his own judgment, without regard to personal suffering. The hedger and ditcher must make his hedge and clean his ditch even though he be tormented by rheumatism. His duty by his son he must do, even though his heart were torn to pieces. During breakfast he tried to be gracious, and condescended to ask his son a question about Prime Minister. Racing was an amusement to which English noblemen had been addicted for many ages, and had been held to be serviceable rather than disgraceful, if conducted in a noble fashion. He did not credit Tifto with much nobility. He knew but little about the Major. He would much have preferred that his son should have owned a horse alone, if he must have anything to do with ownership. "Would it not be better to buy the other share?" asked the Duke. "It would take a deal of money, sir. The Major would ask a couple of thousand, I should think." "That is a great deal." "And then the Major is a very useful man. He thoroughly understands the turf." "I hope he doesn't live by it?" "Oh no; he doesn't live by it. That is, he has a great many irons in the fire." "I do not mind a young man owning a horse, if he can afford the expense,--as you perhaps can do; but I hope you don't bet." "Nothing to speak of." "Nothing to speak of is so apt to grow into that which has to be spoken of." So much the father said at breakfast, hardly giving his mind to the matter discussed,--his mind being on other things. But when their breakfast was eaten, then it was necessary that he should begin. "Silverbridge," he said, "I hope you have thought better of what we were talking about as to these coming elections." "Well, sir;--of course I have thought about it." "And you can do as I would have you?" "You see, sir, a man's political opinion is a kind of thing he can't get rid of." "You can hardly as yet have any very confirmed political opinion. You are still young, and I do not suppose that you have thought much about politics." "Well, sir; I think I have. I've got my own ideas. We've got to protect our position as well as we can against the Radicals and Communists." "I cannot admit that at all, Silverbridge. There is no great political party in this country anxious either for Communism or for revolution. But, putting all that aside for the present, do you think that a man's political opinions should be held in regard to his own individual interests, or to the much wider interests of others, whom we call the public?" "To his own interest," said the young man with decision. "It is simply self-protection then?" "His own and his class. The people will look after themselves, and we must look after ourselves. We are so few and they are so many, that we shall have quite enough to do." Then the Duke gave his son a somewhat lengthy political lecture, which was intended to teach him that the greatest benefit of the greatest number was the object to which all political studies should tend. The son listened to it with attention, and when it was over, expressed his opinion that there was a great deal in what his father had said. "I trust, if you will consider it," said the Duke, "that you will not find yourself obliged to desert the school of politics in which your father has not been an inactive supporter, and to which your family has belonged for many generations." "I could not call myself a Liberal," said the young politician. "Why not?" "Because I am a Conservative." "And you won't stand for the county on the Liberal interest?" "I should be obliged to tell them that I should always give a Conservative vote." "Then you refuse to do what I ask?" "I do not know how I can help refusing. If you wanted me to grow a couple of inches taller I couldn't do it, even though I should be ever so anxious to oblige you." "But a very young man, as you are, may have so much deference for his elders as to be induced to believe that he has been in error." "Oh yes; of course." "You cannot but be aware that the political condition of the country is the one subject to which I have devoted the labour of my life." "I know that very well; and, of course, I know how much they all think of you." "Then my opinion might go for something with you?" "So it does, sir; I shouldn't have doubted at all only for that little. Still, you see, as the thing is,--how am I to help myself?" "You believe that you must be right,--you, who have never given an hour's study to the subject!" "No, sir. In comparison with a great many men, I know that I am a fool. Perhaps it is because I know that, that I am a Conservative. The Radicals are always saying that a Conservative must be a fool. Then a fool ought to be a Conservative." Hereupon the father got up from his chair and turned round, facing the fire, with his back to his son. He was becoming very angry, but endeavoured to restrain his anger. The matter in dispute between them was of so great importance, that he could hardly be justified in abandoning it in consequence of arguments so trifling in themselves as these which his son adduced. As he stood there for some minutes thinking of it all, he was tempted again and again to burst out in wrath and threaten the lad,--to threaten him as to money, as to his amusements, as to the general tenure of his life. The pity was so great that the lad should be so stubborn and so foolish! He would never ask his son to be a slave to the Liberal party, as he had been. But that a Palliser should not be a Liberal,--and his son, as the first recreant Palliser,--was wormwood to him! As he stood there he more than once clenched his fist in eager desire to turn upon the young man; but he restrained himself, telling himself that in justice he should not be angry for such offence as this. To become a Conservative, when the path to Liberalism was so fairly open, might be the part of a fool, but could not fairly be imputed as a crime. To endeavour to be just was the study of his life, and in no condition of life can justice be more imperatively due than from a father to his son. "You mean to stand for Silverbridge?" he said at last. "Not if you object, sir." This made it worse. It became now still more difficult for him to scold the young man. "You are aware that I should not meddle in any way." "That was what I supposed. They will return a Conservative at any rate." "It is not that I care about," said the Duke sadly. "Upon my word, sir, I am very sorry to vex you; but what would you have me do? I will give up Parliament altogether, if you say that you wish it." "No; I do not wish that." "You wouldn't have me tell a lie?" "No." "What can I do then?" "Learn what there is to learn from some master fit to teach you." "There are so many masters." "I believe it to be that most arrogant ill-behaved young man who was with me yesterday who has done this evil." "You mean Frank Tregear?" "I do mean Mr. Tregear." "He's a Conservative, of course; and of course he and I have been much together. Was he with you yesterday, sir?" "Yes, he was." "What was that about?" asked Lord Silverbridge, in a voice that almost betrayed fear, for he knew very well what cause had produced the interview. "He has been speaking to me--" When the Duke had got so far as this he paused, finding himself to be hardly able to declare the disgrace which had fallen upon himself and his family. As he did tell the story, both his face and his voice were altered, so that the son, in truth, was scared. "He has been speaking to me about your sister. Did you know of this?" "I knew there was something between them." "And you encouraged it?" "No, sir; just the contrary. I have told him that I was quite sure it would never do." "And why did you not tell me?" "Well, sir; that was hardly my business, was it?" "Not to guard the honour of your sister?" "You see, sir, how many things have happened all at once." "What things?" "My dear mother, sir, thought well of him." The Duke uttered a deep sigh and turned again round to the fire. "I always told him that you would never consent." "I should think not." "It has come so suddenly. I should have spoken to you about it as soon as--as soon as--" He had meant to say as soon as the husband's grief for the loss of his wife had been in some degree appeased, but he could not speak the words. The Duke, however, perfectly understood him. "In the meantime, they were not seeing each other." "Nor writing?" "I think not." "Mrs. Finn has known it all." "Mrs. Finn!" "Certainly. She has known it all through." "I do not see how it can have been so." "He told me so himself," said the Duke, unwittingly putting words into Tregear's mouth which Tregear had never uttered. "There must be an end of this. I will speak to your sister. In the meantime, the less, I think, you see of Mr. Tregear the better. Of course it is out of the question he should be allowed to remain in this house. You will make him understand that at once, if you please." "Oh, certainly," said Silverbridge. CHAPTER VIII "He Is a Gentleman" The Duke returned to Matching an almost broken-hearted man. He had intended to go down into Barsetshire, in reference to the coming elections;--not with the view of interfering in any unlordly, or rather unpeerlike fashion, but thinking that if his eldest son were to stand for the county in a proper constitutional spirit, as the eldest son of so great a county magnate ought to do, his presence at Gatherum Castle, among his own people, might probably be serviceable, and would certainly be gracious. There would be no question of entertainment. His bereavement would make that impossible. But there would come from his presence a certain savour of proprietorship, and a sense of power, which would be beneficial to his son, and would not, as the Duke thought, be contrary to the spirit of the constitution. But all this was now at an end. He told himself that he did not care how the elections might go;--that he did not care much how anything might go. Silverbridge might stand for Silverbridge if he so pleased. He would give neither assistance nor obstruction, either in the county or in the borough. He wrote to this effect to his agent, Mr. Morton;--but at the same time desired that gentleman to pay Lord Silverbridge's electioneering expenses, feeling it to be his duty as a father to do so much for his son. But though he endeavoured to engage his thoughts in these parliamentary matters, though he tried to make himself believe that this political apostasy was the trouble which vexed him, in truth that other misery was so crushing, as to make the affairs of his son insignificant. How should he express himself to her? That was the thought present to his mind as he went down to Matching. Should he content himself with simply telling her that such a wish on her part was disgraceful, and that it could never be fulfilled; or should he argue the matter with her, endeavouring as he did so to persuade her gently that she was wrong to place her affections so low, and so to obtain from her an assurance that the idea should be abandoned? The latter course would be infinitely the better,--if only he could accomplish it. But he was conscious of his own hardness of manner, and was aware that he had never succeeded in establishing confidence between himself and his daughter. It was a thing for which he had longed,--as a plain girl might long to possess the charms of an acknowledged beauty;--as a poor little fellow, five feet in height, might long to have a cubit added to his stature. Though he was angry with her, how willingly would he take her into his arms and assure her of his forgiveness! How anxious he would be to make her understand that nothing should be spared by him to add beauty and grace to her life! Only, as a matter of course, Mr. Tregear must be abandoned. But he knew of himself that he would not know how to begin to be tender and forgiving. He knew that he would not know how not to be stern and hard. But he must find out the history of it all. No doubt the man had been his son's friend, and had joined his party in Italy at his son's instance. But yet he had come to entertain an idea that Mrs. Finn had been the great promoter of the sin, and he thought that Tregear had told him that that lady had been concerned with the matter from the beginning. In all this there was a craving in his heart to lessen the amount of culpable responsibility which might seem to attach itself to the wife he had lost. He reached Matching about eight, and ordered his dinner to be brought to him in his own study. When Lady Mary came to welcome him, he kissed her forehead and bade her come to him after his dinner. "Shall I not sit with you, papa, whilst you are eating it?" she asked; but he merely told her that he would not trouble her to do that. Even in saying this he was so unusually tender to her that she assured herself that her lover had not as yet told his tale. The Duke's meals were not generally feasts for a Lucullus. No man living, perhaps, cared less what he ate, or knew less what he drank. In such matters he took what was provided for him, making his dinner off the first bit of meat that was brought, and simply ignoring anything offered to him afterwards. And he would drink what wine the servant gave him, mixing it, whatever it might be, with seltzer water. He had never been much given to the pleasures of the table; but this habit of simplicity had grown on him of late, till the Duchess used to tell him that his wants were so few that it was a pity he was not a hermit, vowed to poverty. Very shortly a message was brought to Lady Mary, saying that her father wished to see her. She went at once, and found him seated on a sofa, which stood close along the bookshelves on one side of the room. The table had already been cleared, and he was alone. He not only was alone, but had not even a pamphlet or newspaper in his hand. Then she knew that Tregear must have told the story. As this occurred to her, her legs almost gave way under her. "Come and sit down, Mary," he said, pointing to the seat on the sofa beside himself. She sat down and took one of his hands within her own. Then, as he did not begin at once, she asked a question. "Will Silverbridge stand for the county, papa?" "No, my dear." "But for the town?" "Yes, my dear." "And he won't be a Liberal?" "I am afraid not. It is a cause of great unhappiness to me; but I do not know that I should be justified in any absolute opposition. A man is entitled to his own opinion, even though he be a very young man." "I am so sorry that it should be so, papa, because it vexes you." "I have many things to vex me;--things to break my heart." "Poor mamma!" she exclaimed. "Yes; that above all others. But life and death are in God's hands, and even though we may complain we can alter nothing. But whatever our sorrows are while we are here, we must do our duty." "I suppose he may be a good Member of Parliament, though he has turned Conservative." "I am not thinking about your brother. I am thinking about you." The poor girl gave a little start on the sofa. "Do you know--Mr. Tregear?" he added. "Yes, papa; of course I know him. You used to see him in Italy." "I believe I did; I understand that he was there as a friend of Silverbridge." "His most intimate friend, papa." "I dare say. He came to me, in London yesterday, and told me--! Oh Mary, can it be true?" "Yes, papa," she said, covered up to her forehead with blushes, and with her eyes turned down. In the ordinary affairs of life she was a girl of great courage, who was not given to be shaken from her constancy by the pressure of any present difficulty; but now the terror inspired by her father's voice almost overpowered her. "Do you mean to tell me that you have engaged yourself to that young man without my approval?" "Of course you were to have been asked, papa." "Is that in accordance with your idea of what should be the conduct of a young lady in your position?" "Nobody meant to conceal anything from you, papa." "It has been so far concealed. And yet this young man has the self-confidence to come to me and to demand your hand as though it were a matter of course that I should accede to so trivial a request. It is, as a matter of course, quite impossible. You understand that; do you not?" When she did not answer him at once, he repeated the question. "I ask you whether you do not feel that it is altogether impossible?" "No, papa," she said, in the lowest possible whisper, but still in such a whisper that he could hear the word, and with so much clearness that he could judge from her voice of the obstinacy of her mind. "Then, Mary, it becomes my duty to tell you that it is quite impossible. I will not have it thought of. There must be an end of it." "Why, papa?" "Why! I am astonished that you should ask me why." "I should not have allowed him, papa, to go to you unless I had,--unless I had loved him." "Then you must conquer your love. It is disgraceful and must be conquered." "Disgraceful!" "Yes. I am sorry to use such a word to my own child, but it is so. If you will promise to be guided by me in this matter, if you will undertake not to see him any more, I will,--if not forget it,--at any rate pardon it, and be silent. I will excuse it because you were young, and were thrown imprudently in his way. There has, I believe, been someone at work in the matter with whom I ought to be more angry than with you. Say that you will obey me, and there is nothing within a father's power that I will not do for you, to make your life happy." It was thus that he strove not to be stern. His heart, indeed, was tender enough, but there was nothing tender in the tone of his voice or in the glance of his eye. Though he was very positive in what he said, yet he was shy and shamefaced even with his own daughter. He, too, had blushed when he told her that she must conquer her love. That she should be told that she had disgraced herself was terrible to her. That her father should speak of her marriage with this man as an event that was impossible made her very unhappy. That he should talk of pardoning her, as for some great fault, was in itself a misery. But she had not on that account the least idea of giving up her lover. Young as she was, she had her own peculiar theory on that matter, her own code of conduct and honour, from which she did not mean to be driven. Of course she had not expected that her father would yield at the first word. He, no doubt, would wish that she should make a more exalted marriage. She had known that she would have to encounter opposition, though she had not expected to be told that she had disgraced herself. As she sat there she resolved that under no pretence would she give up her lover;--but she was so far abashed that she could not find words to express herself. He, too, had been silent for a few moments before he again asked her for her promise. "Will you tell me, Mary, that you will not see him again?" "I don't think that I can say that, papa." "Why not?" "Oh papa, how can I, when of all the people in the world I love him the best?" It is not without a pang that any one can be told that she who is of all the dearest has some other one who to her is the dearest. Such pain fathers and mothers have to bear; and though, I think, the arrow is never so blunted but that it leaves something of a wound behind, there is in most cases, if not a perfect salve, still an ample consolation. The mother knows that it is good that her child should love some man better than all the world beside, and that she should be taken away to become a wife and a mother. And the father, when that delight of his eyes ceases to assure him that he is her nearest and dearest, though he abandon the treasure of that nearestness and dearestness with a soft melancholy, still knows that it is as it should be. Of course that other "him" is the person she loves the best in the world. Were it not so how evil a thing it would be that she should marry him! Were it not so with reference to some "him", how void would her life be! But now, to the poor Duke the wound had no salve, no consolation. When he was told that this young Tregear was the owner of his girl's sweet love, was the treasure of her heart, he shrank as though arrows with sharp points were pricking him all over. "I will not hear of such love," he said. "What am I to say, papa?" "Say that you will obey me." Then she sat silent. "Do you not know that he is not fit to be your husband?" "No, papa." "Then you cannot have thought much either of your position or of mine." "He is a gentleman, papa." "So is my private secretary. There is not a clerk in one of our public offices who does not consider himself to be a gentleman. The curate of the parish is a gentleman, and the medical man who comes here from Bradstock. The word is too vague to carry with it any meaning that ought to be serviceable to you in thinking of such a matter." "I do not know any other way of dividing people," said she, showing thereby that she had altogether made up her mind as to what ought to be serviceable to her. "You are not called upon to divide people. That division requires so much experience that you are bound in this matter to rely upon those to whom your obedience is due. I cannot but think you must have known that you were not entitled to give your love to any man without being assured that the man would be approved of by--by--by me." He was going to say, "your parents," but was stopped by the remembrance of his wife's imprudence. She saw it all, and was too noble to plead her mother's authority. But she was not too dutiful to cast a reproach upon him, when he was so stern to her. "You have been so little with me, papa." "That is true," he said, after a pause. "That is true. It has been a fault, and I will mend it. It is a reason for forgiveness, and I will forgive you. But you must tell me that there shall be an end to this." "No, papa." "What do you mean?" "That as I love Mr. Tregear, and as I have told him so, and as I have promised him, I will be true to him. I cannot let there be an end to it." "You do not suppose that you will be allowed to see him again?" "I hope so." "Most assuredly not. Do you write to him?" "No, papa." "Never?" "Never since we have been back in England." "You must promise me that you will not write." She paused a moment before she answered him, and now she was looking him full in the face. "I shall not write to him. I do not think I shall write to him; but I will not promise." "Not promise me,--your father!" "No, papa. It might be that--that I should do it." "You would not wish me so to guard you that you should have no power of sending a letter but by permission?" "I should not like that." "But it will have to be so." "If I do write I will tell you." "And show me what you write?" "No, papa; not that; but I will tell you what I have written." Then it occurred to him that this bargaining was altogether derogatory to his parental authority, and by no means likely to impress upon her mind the conviction that Tregear must be completely banished from her thoughts. He began already to find how difficult it would be for him to have the charge of such a daughter,--how impossible that he should conduct such a charge with sufficient firmness, and yet with sufficient tenderness! At present he had done no good. He had only been made more wretched than ever by her obstinacy. Surely he must pass her over to the charge of some lady,--but of some lady who would be as determined as was he himself that she should not throw herself away by marrying Mr. Tregear. "There shall be no writing," he said, "no visiting, no communication of any kind. As you refuse to obey me now, you had better go to your room." CHAPTER IX "In Medias Res" Perhaps the method of rushing at once "in medias res" is, of all the ways of beginning a story, or a separate branch of a story, the least objectionable. The reader is made to think that the gold lies so near the surface that he will be required to take very little trouble in digging for it. And the writer is enabled,--at any rate for a time, and till his neck has become, as it were, warm to the collar,--to throw off from him the difficulties and dangers, the tedium and prolixity, of description. This rushing "in medias res" has doubtless the charm of ease. "Certainly, when I threw her from the garret window to the stony pavement below, I did not anticipate that she would fall so far without injury to life or limb." When a story has been begun after this fashion, without any prelude, without description of the garret or of the pavement, or of the lady thrown, or of the speaker, a great amount of trouble seems to have been saved. The mind of the reader fills up the blanks,--if erroneously, still satisfactorily. He knows, at least, that the heroine has encountered a terrible danger, and has escaped from it with almost incredible good fortune; that the demon of the piece is a bold demon, not ashamed to speak of his own iniquity, and that the heroine and the demon are so far united that they have been in a garret together. But there is the drawback on the system,--that it is almost impossible to avoid the necessity of doing, sooner or later, that which would naturally be done at first. It answers, perhaps, for half-a-dozen chapters;--and to carry the reader pleasantly for half-a-dozen chapters is a great matter!--but after that a certain nebulous darkness gradually seems to envelope the characters and the incidents. "Is all this going on in the country, or is it in town,--or perhaps in the Colonies? How old was she? Was she tall? Is she fair? Is she heroine-like in her form and gait? And, after all, how high was the garret window?" I have always found that the details would insist on being told at last, and that by rushing "in medias res" I was simply presenting the cart before the horse. But as readers like the cart the best, I will do it once again,--trying it only for a branch of my story,--and will endeavour to let as little as possible of the horse be seen afterwards. "And so poor Frank has been turned out of heaven?" said Lady Mabel Grex to young Lord Silverbridge. "Who told you that? I have said nothing about it to anybody." "Of course he told me himself," said the young beauty. I am aware that, in the word beauty, and perhaps, also, in the word young, a little bit of the horse is appearing; and I am already sure that I shall have to show his head and neck, even if not his very tail. "Poor Frank! Did you hear it all?" "I heard nothing, Lady Mab, and know nothing." "You know that your awful governor won't let him stay any longer in Carlton Terrace?" "Yes, I know that." "And why not?" "Would Lord Grex allow Percival to have his friends living here?" Earl Grex was Lady Mabel's father, Lord Percival was the Earl's son;--and the Earl lived in Belgrave Square. All these are little bits of the horse. "Certainly not. In the first place, I am here." "That makes a difference, certainly." "Of course it makes a difference. They would be wanting to make love to me." "No doubt. I should, I know." "And therefore it wouldn't do for you to live here; and then papa is living here himself. And then the permission never has been given. I suppose Frank did not go there at first without the Duke knowing it." "I daresay that I had mentioned it." "You might as well tell me all about it. We are cousins, you know." Frank Tregear, through his mother's family, was second cousin to Lady Mabel; as was also Lord Silverbridge, one of the Grexes having, at some remote period, married a Palliser. This is another bit of the horse. "The governor merely seemed to think that he would like to have his own house to himself--like other people. What an ass Tregear was to say anything to you about it." "I don't think he was an ass at all. Of course he had to tell us that he was changing his residence. He says that he is going to take a back bedroom somewhere near the Seven Dials." "He has got very nice rooms in Duke Street." "Have you seen him, then?" "Of course I have." "Poor fellow! I wish he had a little money; he is so nice. And now, Lord Silverbridge, do you mean to say that there is not something in the wind about Lady Mary?" "If there were I should not talk about it," said Lord Silverbridge. "You are a very innocent young gentleman." "And you are a very interesting young lady." "You ought to think me so, for I interest myself very much about you. Was the Duke very angry about your not standing for the county?" "He was vexed." "I do think it is so odd that a man should be expected to be this or that in politics because his father happened to be so before him! I don't understand how he should expect that you should remain with a party so utterly snobbish and down in the world as the Radicals. Everybody that is worth anything is leaving them." "He has not left them." "No, I don't suppose he could; but you have." "I never belonged to them, Lady Mab." "And never will, I hope. I always told papa that you would certainly be one of us." All this took place in the drawing-room of Lord Grex's house. There was no Lady Grex alive, but there lived with the Earl a certain elderly lady, reported to be in some distant way a cousin of the family, named Miss Cassewary, who, in the matter of looking after Lady Mab, did what was supposed to be absolutely necessary. She now entered the room with her bonnet on, having just returned from church. "What was the text?" asked Lady Mab at once. "If you had gone to church, as you ought to have done, my dear, you would have heard it." "But as I didn't?" "I don't think the text alone will do you any good." "And probably you forget it." "No, I don't, my dear. How do you do, Lord Silverbridge?" "He is a Conservative, Miss Cass." "Of course he is. I am quite sure that a young nobleman of so much taste and intellect would take the better side." "You forget that all you are saying is against my father and my family, Miss Cassewary." "I dare say it was different when your father was a young man. And your father, too, was, not very long since, at the head of a government which contained many Conservatives. I don't look upon your father as a Radical, though perhaps I should not be justified in calling him a Conservative." "Well; certainly not, I think." "But now it is necessary that all noblemen in England should rally to the defence of their order." Miss Cassewary was a great politician, and was one of those who are always foreseeing the ruin of their country. "My dear, I will go and take my bonnet off. Perhaps you will have tea when I come down." "Don't you go," said Lady Mabel, when Silverbridge got up to take his departure. "I always do when tea comes." "But you are going to dine here?" "Not that I know of. In the first place, nobody has asked me. In the second place, I am engaged. Thirdly, I don't care about having to talk politics to Miss Cass; and fourthly, I hate family dinners on Sunday." "In the first place, I ask you. Secondly, I know you were going to dine with Frank Tregear, at the club. Thirdly, I want you to talk to me, and not to Miss Cass. And fourthly, you are an uncivil young--young,--young,--I should say cub if I dared, to tell me that you don't like dining with me any day of the week." "Of course you know what I mean is, that I don't like troubling your father." "Leave that to me. I shall tell him you are coming, and Frank too. Of course you can bring him. Then he can talk to me when papa goes down to his club, and you can arrange your politics with Miss Cass." So it was settled, and at eight o'clock Lord Silverbridge reappeared in Belgrave Square with Frank Tregear. Earl Grex was a nobleman of very ancient family, the Grexes having held the parish of Grex, in Yorkshire, from some time long prior to the Conquest. In saying all this, I am, I know, allowing the horse to appear wholesale;--but I find that he cannot be kept out. I may as well go on to say that the present Earl was better known at Newmarket and the Beaufort,--where he spent a large part of his life in playing whist,--than in the House of Lords. He was a grey-haired, handsome, worn-out old man, who through a long life of pleasure had greatly impaired a fortune which, for an earl, had never been magnificent, and who now strove hard, but not always successfully, to remedy that evil by gambling. As he could no longer eat and drink as he had used to do, and as he cared no longer for the light that lies in a lady's eye, there was not much left to him in the world but cards and racing. Nevertheless he was a handsome old man, of polished manners, when he chose to use them; a staunch Conservative and much regarded by his party, for whom in his early life he had done some work in the House of Commons. "Silverbridge is all very well," he had said; "but I don't see why that young Tregear is to dine here every night of his life." "This is the second time since he has been up in town, papa." "He was here last week, I know." "Silverbridge wouldn't come without him." "That's d---- nonsense," said the Earl. Miss Cassewary gave a start,--not, we may presume, because she was shocked, for she could not be much shocked, having heard the same word from the same lips very often; but she thought it right always to enter a protest. Then the two young men were announced. Frank Tregear, having been known by the family as a boy, was Frank to all of them,--as was Lady Mabel, Mabel to him, somewhat to the disgust of the father and not altogether with the approbation of Miss Cass. But Lady Mabel had declared that she would not be guilty of the folly of changing old habits. Silverbridge, being Silverbridge to all his own people, hardly seemed to have a Christian name;--his godfathers and godmothers had indeed called him Plantagenet;--but having only become acquainted with the family since his Oxford days he was Lord Silverbridge to Lady Mabel. Lady Mabel had not as yet become Mabel to him, but, as by her very intimate friends she was called Mab, had allowed herself to be addressed by him as Lady Mab. There was thus between them all considerable intimacy. "I'm deuced glad to hear it," said the Earl when dinner was announced. For, though he could not eat much, Lord Grex was always impatient when the time of eating was at hand. Then he walked down alone. Lord Silverbridge followed with his daughter, and Frank Tregear gave his arm to Miss Cassewary. "If that woman can't clear her soup better than that, she might as well go to the d----," said the Earl;--upon which remark no one in the company made any observation. As there were two men-servants in the room when it was made the cook probably had the advantage of it. It may be almost unnecessary to add that though the Earl had polished manners for certain occasions he would sometimes throw them off in the bosom of his own family. "My Lord," said Miss Cassewary--she always called him "My Lord"--"Lord Silverbridge is going to stand for the Duke's borough in the Conservative interest." "I didn't know the Duke had a borough," said the Earl. "He had one till he thought it proper to give it up," said the son, taking his father's part. "And you are going to pay him off for what he has done by standing against him. It's just the sort of thing for a son to do in these days. If I had a borough Percival would go down and make radical speeches there." "There isn't a better Conservative in England than Percival," said Lady Mabel, bridling up. "Nor a worse son," said the father. "I believe he would do anything he could lay his hand on to oppose me." During the past week there had been some little difference of opinion between the father and the son as to the signing of a deed. "My father does not take it in bad part at all," said Silverbridge. "Perhaps he's ratting himself," said the Earl. "When a man lends himself to a coalition he is as good as half gone." "I do not think that in all England there is so thorough a Liberal as my father," said Lord Silverbridge. "And when I say that he doesn't take this badly, I don't mean that it doesn't vex him. I know it vexes him. But he doesn't quarrel with me. He even wrote down to Barsetshire to say that all my expenses at Silverbridge were to be paid." "I call that very bad politics," said the Earl. "It seems to me to be very grand," said Frank. "Perhaps, sir, you don't know what is good or what is bad in politics," said the Earl, trying to snub his guest. But it was difficult to snub Frank. "I know a gentleman when I see him, I think," he said. "Of course Silverbridge is right to be a Conservative. Nobody has a stronger opinion about that than I have. But the Duke is behaving so well that if I were he I should almost regret it." "And so I do," said Silverbridge. When the ladies were gone the old Earl turned himself round to the fire, having filled his glass and pushed the bottles away from him, as though he meant to leave the two young men to themselves. He sat leaning with his head on his hand, looking the picture of woe. It was now only nine o'clock, and there would be no whist at the Beaufort till eleven. There was still more than an hour to be endured before the brougham would come to fetch him. "I suppose we shall have a majority," said Frank, trying to rouse him. "Who does 'We' mean?" asked the Earl. "The Conservatives, of whom I take the liberty to call myself one." "It sounded as though you were a very influential member of the party." "I consider myself to be one of the party, and so I say 'We.'" Upstairs in the drawing-room Miss Cassewary did her duty loyally. It was quite right that young ladies and young gentlemen should be allowed to talk together, and very right indeed that such a young gentleman as Lord Silverbridge should be allowed to talk to such a young lady as Lady Mabel. What could be so nice as a marriage between the heir of the house of Omnium and Lady Mabel Grex? Lady Mabel looked indeed to be the elder,--but they were in truth the same age. All the world acknowledged that Lady Mabel was very clever and very beautiful and fit to be a Duchess. Even the Earl, when Miss Cassewary hinted at the matter to him, grunted an assent. Lady Mabel had already refused one or two not ineligible offers, and it was necessary that something should be done. There had been at one time a fear in Miss Cassewary's bosom lest her charge should fall too deeply in love with Frank Tregear;--but Miss Cassewary knew that whatever danger there might have been in that respect had passed away. Frank was willing to talk to her, while Mabel and Lord Silverbridge were in a corner together. "I shall be on tenterhooks now till I know how it is to be at Silverbridge," said the young lady. "It is very good of you to feel so much interest." "Of course I feel an interest. Are not you one of us? When is it to be?" "They say that the elections will be over before the Derby." "And which do you care for the most?" "I should like to pull off the Derby, I own." "From what papa says, I should think the other event is the more probable." "Doesn't the Earl stand to win on Prime Minister?" "I never know anything about his betting. But,--you know his way,--he said you were going to drop a lot of money like a-- I can't quite tell you what he likened you to." "The Earl may be mistaken." "You are not betting much, I hope." "Not plunging. But I have a little money on." "Don't get into a way of betting." "Why:--what difference does it make,--to you?" "Is that kind, Lord Silverbridge?" "I meant to say that if I did make a mess of it you wouldn't care about it." "Yes, I should. I should care very much. I dare say you could lose a great deal of money and care nothing about it." "Indeed I could not." "What would be a great deal of money to me. But you would want to get it back again. And in that way you would be regularly on the turf." "And why not?" "I want to see better things from you." "You ought not to preach against the turf, Lady Mab." "Because of papa? But I am not preaching against the turf. If I were such as you are I would have a horse or two myself. A man in your position should do a little of everything. You should hunt and have a yacht, and stalk deer and keep your own trainer at Newmarket." "I wish you'd say all that to my father." "Of course I mean if you can afford it. I like a man to like pleasure. But I despise a man who makes a business of his pleasures. When I hear that this man is the best whist-player in London, and that man the best billiard-player, I always know that they can do nothing else, and then I despise them." "You needn't despise me, because I do nothing well," said he, as he got up to take his leave. "I do so hope you'll get the seat,--and win the Derby." These were her last words to him as she wished him good-night. CHAPTER X "Why Not Like Romeo If I Feel Like Romeo?" "That's nonsense, Miss Cass, and I shall," said Lady Mabel. They were together, on the morning after the little dinner-party described in the last chapter, in a small back sitting-room which was supposed to be Lady Mabel's own, and the servant had just announced the fact that Mr. Tregear was below. "Then I shall go down too," said Miss Cassewary. "You'll do nothing of the kind. Will you please to tell me what it is you are afraid of? Do you think that Frank is going to make love to me again?" "No." "Or that if I chose that he should I would let you stop me? He is in love with somebody else,--and perhaps I am too. And we are two paupers." "My lord would not approve of it." "If you know what my lord approves of and what he disapproves you understand him a great deal better than I do. And if you mind what he approves or disapproves, you care for his opinion a great deal more than I do. My cousin is here now to talk to me,--about his own affairs, and I mean to see him,--alone." Then she left the little room, and went down to that in which Frank was waiting for her, without the company of Miss Cassewary. "Do you really mean," she said after they had been together for some minutes, "that you had the courage to ask the Duke for his daughter's hand?" "Why not?" "I believe you would dare do anything." "I couldn't very well take it without asking him." "As I am not acquainted with the young lady I don't know how that might be." "And if I took her so, I should have to take her empty-handed." "Which wouldn't suit;--would it?" "It wouldn't suit for her,--whose comforts and happiness are much more to me than my own." "No doubt! Of course you are terribly in love." "Very thoroughly in love, I think, I am." "For the tenth time, I should say." "For the second only. I don't regard myself as a monument of constancy, but I think I am less fickle than some other people." "Meaning me!" "Not especially." "Frank, that is ill-natured, and almost unmanly,--and false also. When have I been fickle? You say that there was one before with you. I say that there has never really been one with me at all. No one knows that better than yourself. I cannot afford to be in love till I am quite sure that the man is fit to be, and will be, my husband." "I doubt sometimes whether you are capable of being in love with any one." "I think I am," she said, very gently. "But I am at any rate capable of not being in love till I wish it. Come, Frank; do not quarrel with me. You know,--you ought to know,--that I should have loved you had it not been that such love would have been bad for both of us." "It is a kind of self-restraint I do not understand." "Because you are not a woman." "Why did you twit me with changing my love?" "Because I am a woman. Can't you forgive as much as that to me?" "Certainly. Only you must not think that I have been false because I now love her so dearly." "I do not think you are false. I would do anything to help you if there were anything I could do. But when you spoke so like a Romeo of your love--" "Why not like a Romeo, if I feel like a Romeo?" "But I doubt whether Romeo talked much to Rosaline of his love for Juliet. But you shall talk to me of yours for Lady Mary, and I will listen to you patiently and encourage you, and will not even think of those former vows." "The former vows were foolish." "Oh,--of course." "You at least used to say so." "I say so now, and they shall be as though they had been never spoken. So you bearded the Duke in his den, and asked him for Lady Mary's hand,--just as though you had been a young Duke yourself and owned half a county?" "Just the same." "And what did he say?" "He swore that it was impossible.--Of course I knew all that before." "How will it be now? You will not give it up?" "Certainly not." "And Lady Mary?" "One human being can perhaps never answer for another with perfect security." "But you feel sure of her?" "I do." "He, I should think, can be very imperious." "And so can she. The Pallisers are all obstinate." "Is Silverbridge obstinate?" she asked. "Stiff-necked as a bull if he takes it into his head to be so." "I shouldn't have thought it." "No;--because he is so soft in his manner, and often finds it easier to be led by others than to direct himself." Then she remained silent for a few seconds. They were both thinking of the same thing, and both wishing to speak of it. But the words came to her first. "I wonder what he thinks of me." Whereupon Tregear only smiled. "I suppose he has spoken to you about me?" "Why do you ask?" "Why!" "And why should I tell you? Suppose he should have said to me in the confidence of friendship that he thinks you ugly and stupid." "I am sure he has not said that. He has eyes to see and ears to hear. But, though I am neither ugly nor stupid, he needn't like me." "Do you want him to like you?" "Yes, I do. Oh yes; you may laugh; but if I did not think that I could be a good wife to him I would not take his hand even to become Duchess of Omnium." "Do you mean that you love him, Mabel?" "No; I do not mean that. But I would learn to love him. You do not believe that?" Here he smiled again and shook his head. "It is as I said before, because you are not a woman, and do not understand how women are trammelled. Do you think ill of me because I say this?" "No, indeed." "Do not think ill of me if you can help it, because you are almost the only friend that I can trust. I almost trust dear old Cass, but not quite. She is old-fashioned and I shock her. As for other women, there isn't one anywhere to whom I would say a word. Only think how a girl such as I am is placed; or indeed any girl. You, if you see a woman that you fancy, can pursue her, can win her and triumph, or lose her and gnaw your heart;--at any rate you can do something. You can tell her that you love her; can tell her so again and again even though she should scorn you. You can set yourself about the business you have taken in hand and can work hard at it. What can a girl do?" "Girls work hard too sometimes." "Of course they do;--but everybody feels that they are sinning against their sex. Of love, such as a man's is, a woman ought to know nothing. How can she love with passion when she should never give her love till it has been asked, and not then unless her friends tell her that the thing is suitable? Love such as that to me is out of the question. But, as it is fit that I should be married, I wish to be married well." "And you will love him after a fashion?" "Yes;--after a very sterling fashion. I will make his wishes my wishes, his ways my ways, his party my party, his home my home, his ambition my ambition,--his honour my honour." As she said this she stood up with her hands clenched and head erect, and her eyes flashing. "Do you not know me well enough to be sure that I should be loyal to him?" "Yes;--I think that you would be loyal." "Whether I loved him or not, he should love me." "And you think that Silverbridge would do?" "Yes, I think that Silverbridge would do. You, no doubt, will say that I am flying high?" "Not too high. Why should you not fly high? If I can justify myself, surely I cannot accuse you." "It is hardly the same thing, Frank. Of course, there is not a girl in London to whom Lord Silverbridge would not be the best match that she could make. He has the choice of us all." "Most girls would think twice before refusing him." "Very few would think twice before accepting him. Perhaps he wishes to add to his wealth by marrying richly,--as his father did." "No thought on that subject will ever trouble him. That will be all as it happens. As soon as he takes a sufficient fancy to a girl he will ask her straight off. I do not say that he might not change afterwards, but he would mean it at the time." "If he had once said the word to me, he should not change. But then what right have I to expect it? What has he ever said about me?" "Very little. But had he said much I should not tell you." "You are my friend,--but you are his too; and he, perhaps, is more to you than I am. As his friend it may be your duty to tell him all that I am saying. If so, I have been wrong." "Do you think that I shall do that, Mabel?" "I do not know. Men are so strong in their friendships." "Mine with you is the older, and the sweeter. Though we may not be more than friends, I will say that it is the more tender. In my heart of hearts I do not think that Silverbridge could do better." "Thanks for that, Frank." "I shall tell him nothing of you that can set him against you." "And you would be glad to see me his wife?" she said. "As you must be somebody's wife, and not mine." "I cannot be yours, Frank; can I?" "And not mine," he repeated. "I will endeavour to be glad. Who can explain his feelings in such a matter? Though I most truly love the girl I hope to marry, yet my heart goes back to former things and opens itself to past regrets." "I know it all," she whispered. "But you and I must be too wise to permit ourselves to be tormented by such foolish melancholy." As he said this he took her hand, half with the purpose of bidding her good-bye, but partly with the idea of giving some expression to the tenderness of his feelings. But as he did so, the door was opened, and the old Earl shambled into the room. "What the deuce are you doing here?" he said. "I have been talking to Lady Mabel." "For about an hour." "Indeed I do not know for how long." "Papa, he is going to be married." When she said this Frank Tregear turned round and looked at her almost in anger. "Going to be married, is he? Who is the fortunate woman?" "I don't think he will let me tell you." "Not yet, I think," said Frank, gloomily. "There is nothing settled." The old Earl looked puzzled, but Lady Mabel's craft had been successful. If this objectionable young second-cousin had come there to talk about his marriage with another young woman, the conversation must have been innocent. "Where is Miss Cassewary?" asked the Earl. "I asked her not to come down with me because Frank wished to speak to me about his own affairs. You have no objection to his coming, papa?" There had been objections raised to any intimacy with Frank Tregear; but all that was now nearly two years since. He had been assured over and over again by Miss Cassewary that he need not be afraid of Frank Tregear, and had in a sort of way assented to the young man's visits. "I think he might find something better to do with his time than hanging about here all day." Frank, shrugging his shoulders, and having shaken hands both with the daughter and father, took his hat and departed. "Who is the girl?" asked the Earl. "You heard him say that I was not to tell." "Has she got money?" "I believe she will have a great deal." "Then she is a great fool for her pains," said the Earl, shambling off again. Lady Mabel spent the greater part of the afternoon alone, endeavouring to recall to her mind all that she had said to Frank Tregear, and questioning herself as to the wisdom and truth of her own words. She had intended to tell the truth,--but hardly perhaps the whole truth. The life which was before her,--which it was necessary that she should lead,--seemed to her to be so difficult! She could not clearly see her way to be pure and good and feminine, and at the same time wise. She had been false now;--so far false that she had told her friend that she had never been in love. But she was in love;--in love with him, Frank Tregear. She knew it as thoroughly as it was possible for her to know anything;--and had acknowledged it to herself a score of times. But she could not marry him. And it was expected, nay, almost necessary that she should marry someone. To that someone, how good she would be! How she would strive by duty and attention, and if possible by affection, to make up for that misfortune of her early love! And so I hope that I have brought my cart in to its appointed place in the front, without showing too much of the horse. CHAPTER XI "Cruel" For two or three days after the first scene between the Duke and his daughter,--that scene in which she was forbidden either to see or to write to her lover,--not a word was said at Matching about Mr. Tregear, nor were any steps taken towards curtailing her liberty of action. She had said she would not write to him without telling her father, and the Duke was too proud of the honour of his family to believe it to be possible that she should deceive him. Nor was it possible. Not only would her own idea of duty prevent her from writing to her lover, although she had stipulated for the right to do so in some possible emergency,--but, carried far beyond that in her sense of what was right and wrong, she felt it now incumbent on her to have no secret from her father at all. The secret, as long as it had been a secret, had been a legacy from her mother,--and had been kept, at her lover's instance, during that period of mourning for her mother in which it would, she thought, have been indecorous that there should be any question of love or of giving in marriage. It had been a burden to her, though a necessary burden. She had been very clear that the revelation should be made to her father, when it was made, by her lover. That had been done,--and now it was open to her to live without any secrecy,--as was her nature. She meant to cling to her lover. She was quite sure of that. Nothing could divide her from him but his death or hers,--or falseness on his part. But as to marriage, that would not be possible till her father had assented. And as to seeing the man,--ah, yes, if she could do so with her father's assent! She would not be ashamed to own her great desire to see him. She would tell her father that all her happiness depended upon seeing him. She would not be coy in speaking of her love. But she would obey her father. She had a strong idea that she would ultimately prevail,--an idea also that that "ultimately" should not be postponed to some undefined middle-aged period of her life. As she intended to belong to Frank Tregear, she thought it expedient that he should have the best of her days as well as what might be supposed to be the worst; and she therefore resolved that it would be her duty to make her father understand that though she would certainly obey him, she would look to be treated humanely by him, and not to be made miserable for an indefinite term of years. The first word spoken between them on the subject,--the first word after that discussion,--began with him and was caused by his feeling that her present life at Matching must be sad and lonely. Lady Cantrip had again written that she would be delighted to take her;--but Lady Cantrip was in London and must be in London, at any rate when Parliament should again be sitting. A London life would perhaps, at present, hardly suit Lady Mary. Then a plan had been prepared which might be convenient. The Duke had a house at Richmond, on the river, called The Horns. That should be lent to Lady Cantrip, and Mary should there be her guest. So it was settled between the Duke and Lady Cantrip. But as yet Lady Mary knew nothing of the arrangement. "I think I shall go up to town to-morrow," said the Duke to his daughter. "For long?" "I shall be gone only one night. It is on your behalf that I am going." "On my behalf, papa?" "I have been writing to Lady Cantrip." "Not about Mr. Tregear?" "No;--not about Mr. Tregear," said the father with a mixture of anger and solemnity in his tone. "It is my desire to regard Mr. Tregear as though he did not exist." "That is not possible, papa." "I have alluded to the inconvenience of your position here." "Why is it inconvenient?" "You are too young to be without a companion. It is not fit that you should be so much alone." "I do not feel it." "It is very melancholy for you, and cannot be good for you. They will go down to The Horns, so that you will not be absolutely in London, and you will find Lady Cantrip a very nice person." "I don't care for new people just now, papa," she said. But to this he paid but little heed; nor was she prepared to say that she would not do as he directed. When therefore he left Matching, she understood that he was going to prepare a temporary home for her. Nothing further was said about Tregear. She was too proud to ask that no mention of his name should be made to Lady Cantrip. And he when he left the house did not think that he would find himself called upon to allude to the subject. But when Lady Cantrip made some inquiry about the girl and her habits,--asking what were her ordinary occupations, how she was accustomed to pass her hours, to what she chiefly devoted herself,--then at last with much difficulty the Duke did bring himself to tell the story. "Perhaps it is better you should know it all," he said as he told it. "Poor girl! Yes, Duke; upon the whole it is better that I should know it all," said Lady Cantrip. "Of course he will not come here." "Oh dear; I hope not." "Nor to The Horns." "I hope he will never see her again anywhere," said the Duke. "Poor girl!" "Have I not been right? Is it not best to put an end to such a thing at once?" "Certainly at once, if it has to be put an end to,--and can be put an end to." "It must be put an end to," said the Duke, very decidedly. "Do you not see that it must be so? Who is Mr. Tregear?" "I suppose they were allowed to be together." "He was unfortunately intimate with Silverbridge, who took him over to Italy. He has nothing; not even a profession." Lady Cantrip could not but smile when she remembered the immense wealth of the man who was speaking to her;--and the Duke saw the smile and understood it. "You will understand what I mean, Lady Cantrip. If this young man were in other respects suitable, of course I could find an income for them. But he is nothing; just an idle seeker for pleasure without the means of obtaining it." "That is very bad." "As for rank," continued the Duke energetically, "I do not think that I am specially wedded to it. I have found myself as willing to associate with those who are without it as with those who have it. But for my child, I would wish her to mate with one of her own class." "It would be best." "When a young man comes to me who, though I believe him to be what is called a gentleman, has neither rank, nor means, nor profession, nor name, and asks for my daughter, surely I am right to say that such a marriage shall not be thought of. Was I not right?" demanded the Duke persistently. "But it is a pity that it should be so. It is a pity that they should ever have come together." "It is indeed, indeed to be lamented,--and I will own at once that the fault was not hers. Though I must be firm in this, you are not to suppose that I am angry with her. I have myself been to blame." This he said with a resolution that,--as he and his wife had been one flesh,--all faults committed by her should, now that she was dead, be accepted by him as his faults. "It had not occurred to me that as yet she would love any man." "Has it gone deep with her, Duke?" "I fear that all things go deep with her." "Poor girl!" "But they shall be kept apart! As long as your great kindness is continued to her they shall be kept apart!" "I do not think that I should be found good at watching a young lady." "She will require no watching." "Then of course they will not meet. She had better know that you have told me." "She shall know it." "And let her know also that anything I can do to make her happy shall be done. But, Duke, there is but one cure." "Time, you mean." "Yes; time; but I did not mean time." Then she smiled as she went on. "You must not suppose that I am speaking against my own sex if I say that she will not forget Mr. Tregear till someone else has made himself agreeable to her. We must wait till she can go out a little into society. Then she will find out that there are others in the world besides Mr. Tregear. It so often is the case that a girl's love means her sympathy for him who has chanced to be nearest to her." The Duke as he went away thought very much of what Lady Cantrip had said to him;--particularly of those last words. "Till some one else has made himself agreeable to her." Was he to send his girl into the world in order that she might find a lover? There was something in the idea which was thoroughly distasteful to him. He had not given his mind much to the matter, but he felt that a woman should be sought for,--sought for and extracted, cunningly, as it were, from some hiding-place, and not sent out into a market to be exposed as for sale. In his own personal history there had been a misfortune,--a misfortune, the sense of which he could never, at any moment, have expressed to any ears, the memory of which had been always buried in his own bosom,--but a misfortune in that no such cunning extraction on his part had won for him the woman to whose hands had been confided the strings of his heart. His wife had undergone that process of extraction before he had seen her, and his marriage with her had been a matter of sagacious bargaining. He was now told that his daughter must be sent out among young men in order that she might become sufficiently fond of some special one to be regardless of Tregear. There was a feeling that in doing so she must lose something of the freshness of the bloom of her innocence. How was this transfer of her love to be effected? Let her go here because she will meet the heir of this wealthy house who may probably be smitten by her charms; or there because that other young lordling would make a fit husband for her. Let us contrive to throw her into the arms of this man, or put her into the way of that man. Was his girl to be exposed to this? Surely that method of bargaining to which he had owed his own wife would be better than that. Let it be said,--only he himself most certainly could not be the person to say it,--let it be said to some man of rank and means and fairly good character: "Here is a wife for you with so many thousand pounds, with beauty, as you can see for yourself, with rank and belongings of the highest; very good in every respect;--only that as regards her heart she thinks she has given it to a young man named Tregear. No marriage there is possible; but perhaps the young lady might suit you?" It was thus he had been married. There was an absence in it of that romance which, though he had never experienced it in his own life, was always present to his imagination. His wife had often ridiculed him because he could only live among figures and official details; but to her had not been given the power of looking into a man's heart and feeling all that was there. Yes;--in such bargaining for a wife, in such bargaining for a husband, there could be nothing of the tremulous delicacy of feminine romance; but it would be better than standing at a stall in the market till the sufficient purchaser should come. It never occurred to him that the delicacy, the innocence, the romance, the bloom might all be preserved if he would give his girl to the man whom she said she loved. Could he have modelled her future course according to his own wishes, he would have had her live a gentle life for the next three years, with a pencil perhaps in her hand or a music-book before her;--and then come forth, cleaned as it were by such quarantine from the impurity to which she had been subjected. When he was back at Matching he at once told his daughter what he had arranged for her, and then there took place a prolonged discussion both as to his view of her future life and as to her own. "You did tell her then about Mr. Tregear?" she asked. "As she is to have charge of you for a time I thought it best." "Perhaps it is. Perhaps--you were afraid." "No; I was not afraid," he said angrily. "You need not be afraid. I shall do nothing elsewhere that I would not do here, and nothing anywhere without telling you." "I know I can trust you." "But, papa, I shall always intend to marry Mr. Tregear." "No!" he exclaimed. "Yes;--always. I want you to understand exactly how it is. Nothing you can do can separate me from him." "Mary, that is very wicked." "It cannot be wicked to tell the truth, papa. I mean to try to do all that you tell me. I shall not see him, or write to him,--unless there should be some very particular reason. And if I did see him or write to him I would tell you. And of course I should not think of--of marrying without your leave. But I shall expect you to let me marry him." "Never!" "Then I shall think you are--cruel; and you will break my heart." "You should not call your father cruel." "I hope you will not be cruel." "I can never permit you to marry this man. It would be altogether improper. I cannot allow you to say that I am cruel because I do what I feel to be my duty. You will see other people." "A great many perhaps." "And will learn to,--to,--to forget him." "Never! I will not forget him. I should hate myself if I thought it possible. What would love be worth if it could be forgotten in that way?" As he heard this he reflected whether his own wife, this girl's mother, had ever forgotten her early love for that Burgo Fitzgerald whom in her girlhood she had wished to marry. When he was leaving her she called him back again. "There is one other thing I think I ought to say, papa. If Lady Cantrip speaks to me about Mr. Tregear, I can only tell her what I have told you. I shall never give him up." When he heard this he turned angrily from her, almost stamping his foot upon the ground, when she quietly left the room. Cruel! She had told him that he would be cruel, if he opposed her love. He thought he knew of himself that he could not be cruel,--even to a fly, even to a political opponent. There could be no cruelty without dishonesty, and did he not always struggle to be honest? Cruel to his own daughter! CHAPTER XII At Richmond The pity of it! The pity of it! It was thus that Lady Cantrip looked at it. From what the girl's father had said to her she was disposed to believe that the malady had gone deep with her. "All things go deep with her," he had said. And she too from other sources had heard something of this girl. She was afraid that it would go deep. It was a thousand pities! Then she asked herself whether the marriage ought to be regarded as impossible. The Duke had been very positive,--had declared again and again that it was quite impossible, had so expressed himself as to make her aware that he intended her to understand that he would not yield whatever the sufferings of the girl might be. But Lady Cantrip knew the world well and was aware that in such matters daughters are apt to be stronger than their fathers. He had declared Tregear to be a young man with very small means, and intent on such pleasures as require great means for their enjoyment. No worse character could be given to a gentleman who had proposed himself as a son-in-law. But Lady Cantrip thought it possible that the Duke might be mistaken in this. She had never seen Mr. Tregear, but she fancied that she had heard his name, and that the name had been connected with a character different from that which the Duke had given him. Lady Cantrip, who at this time was a young-looking woman, not much above forty, had two daughters, both of whom were married. The younger about a year since had become the wife of Lord Nidderdale, a middle-aged young man who had been long about town, a cousin of the late Duchess, the heir to a marquisate, and a Member of Parliament. The marriage had not been considered to be very brilliant; but the husband was himself good-natured and pleasant, and Lady Cantrip was fond of him. In the first place she went to him for information. "Oh yes, I know him. He's one of our set at the Beargarden." "Not your set, now, I hope," she said laughing. "Well;--I don't see so much of them as I used to do. Tregear is not a bad fellow at all. He's always with Silverbridge. When Silverbridge does what Tregear tells him, he goes along pretty straight. But unfortunately there's another man called Tifto, and when Tifto is in the ascendant then Silverbridge is apt to get a little astray." "He's not in debt, then?" "Who?--Tregear? I should think he's the last man in the world to owe a penny to any one." "Is he a betting man?" "Oh dear no; quite the other way up. He's a severe, sarcastic, bookish sort of fellow,--a chap who knows everything and turns up his nose at people who know nothing." "Has he got anything of his own?" "Not much, I should say. If he had had any money he would have married Lady Mab Grex last year." Lady Cantrip was inclined from what she now learned to think that the Duke must be wrong about the young man. But before Lady Mary joined her she made further inquiry. She too knew Lady Mabel, and knowing Lady Mabel, she knew Miss Cassewary. She contrived to find herself alone with Miss Cassewary, and asked some further questions about Mr. Tregear. "He is a cousin of my Lord's," said Miss Cass. "So I thought. I wonder what sort of a young man he is. He is a good deal with Lord Silverbridge." Then Miss Cassewary spoke her opinion very plainly. "If Lord Silverbridge had nobody worse about him than Mr. Tregear he would not come to much harm." "I suppose he's not very well off." "No;--certainly not. He will have a property of some kind, I believe, when his mother dies. I think very well of Mr. Tregear;--only I wish that he had a profession. But why are you asking about him, Lady Cantrip?" "Nidderdale was talking to me about him and saying that he was so much with Lord Silverbridge. Lord Silverbridge is going into Parliament now, and, as it were, beginning the world, and it would be a thousand pities that he should get into bad hands." It may, however, be doubted whether Miss Cassewary was hoodwinked by this little story. Early in the second week in May the Duke brought his daughter up to The Horns, and at the same time expressed his intention of remaining in London. When he did so Lady Mary at once asked whether she might not be with him,--but he would not permit it. The house in London would, he said, be more gloomy even than Matching. "I am quite ashamed of giving you so much trouble," Lady Mary said to her new friend. "We are delighted to have you, my dear." "But I know that you have been obliged to leave London because I am with you." "There is nothing I like so much as this place, which your father has been kind enough to lend us. As for London, there is nothing now to make me like being there. Both my girls are married, and therefore I regard myself as an old woman who has done her work. Don't you think this place very much nicer than London at this time of the year?" "I don't know London at all. I had only just been brought out when poor mamma went abroad." The life they led was very quiet, and must probably have been felt to be dull by Lady Cantrip, in spite of her old age and desire for retirement. But the place itself was very lovely. May of all the months of the year is in England the most insidious, the most dangerous, and the most inclement. A greatcoat cannot be endured, and without a greatcoat who can endure a May wind and live? But of all months it is the prettiest. The grasses are then the greenest, and the young foliage of the trees, while it has all the glory and all the colour of spring vegetation, does not hide the form of the branches as do the heavy masses of the larger leaves which come in the advancing summer. And of all villas near London The Horns was the sweetest. The broad green lawn swept down to the very margin of the Thames, which absolutely washed the fringe of grass when the tide was high. And here, along the bank, was a row of flowering ashes, the drooping boughs of which in places touched the water. It was one of those spots which when they are first seen make the beholder feel that to be able to live there and look at it always would be happiness enough for life. At the end of the week there came a visitor to see Lady Mary. A very pretty carriage was driven up to the door of The Horns, and the servant asked for Lady Mary Palliser. The owner of that carriage was Mrs. Finn. Now it must be explained to the reader that there had never been any friendship between Mrs. Finn and Lady Cantrip, though the ladies had met each other. The great political intimacy which had existed between the Duke and Lord Cantrip had created some intimacy also between their wives. The Duchess and Lady Cantrip had been friends,--after a fashion. But Mrs. Finn had never been cordially accepted by those among whom Lady Cantrip chiefly lived. When therefore the name was announced, the servant expressly stating that the visitor had asked for Lady Mary, Lady Cantrip, who was with her guest, had to bethink herself what she would do. The Duke, who was at this time very full of wrath against Mrs. Finn, had not mentioned this lady's name when delivering up the charge of his daughter to Lady Cantrip. At this moment it occurred to her that not improbably Mrs. Finn would cease to be included in the intimacies of the Palliser family from the time of the death of the Duchess,--that the Duke would not care to maintain the old relations, and that he would be as little anxious to do it for his daughter as for himself. If so, could it be right that Mrs. Finn should come down here, to a house which was now in the occupation of a lady with whom she was not on inviting terms, in order that she might thus force herself on the Duke's daughter? Mrs. Finn had not left her carriage, but had sent in to ask if Lady Mary could see her. In all this there was considerable embarrassment. She looked round at her guest, who had at once risen from her chair. "Would you wish to see her?" asked Lady Cantrip. "Oh yes; certainly." "Have you seen her since,--since you came home from Italy?" "Oh dear, yes! She was down at Matching when poor mamma died. And papa persuaded her to remain afterwards. Of course I will see her." Then the servant was desired to ask Mrs. Finn to come in;--and while this was being done Lady Cantrip retired. Mrs. Finn embraced her young friend, and asked after her welfare, and after the welfare of the house in which she was staying,--a house with which Mrs. Finn herself had been well acquainted,--and said half-a-dozen pretty little things in her own quiet pretty way, before she spoke of the matter which had really brought her to The Horns on that day. "I have had a correspondence with your father, Mary." "Indeed." "And unfortunately one that has been far from agreeable to me." "I am sorry for that, Mrs. Finn." "So am I, very sorry. I may say with perfect truth that there is no man in the world, except my own husband, for whom I feel so perfect an esteem as I do for your father. If it were not that I do not like to be carried away by strong language I would speak of more than esteem. Through your dear mother I have watched his conduct closely, and have come to think that there is perhaps no other man at the same time so just and so patriotic. Now he is very angry with me,--and most unjustly angry." "Is it about me?" "Yes;--it is about you. Had it not been altogether about you I would not have troubled you." "And about--?" "Yes;--about Mr. Tregear also. When I tell you that there has been a correspondence I must explain that I have written one long letter to the Duke, and that in answer I have received a very short one. That has been the whole correspondence. Here is your father's letter to me." Then she brought out of her pocket a note, which Lady Mary read,--covered with blushes as she did so. The note was as follows: The Duke of Omnium understands from Mrs. Finn's letter that Mrs. Finn, while she was the Duke's guest at Matching, was aware of a certain circumstance affecting the Duke's honour and happiness,--which circumstance she certainly did not communicate to the Duke. The Duke thinks that the trust which had been placed in Mrs. Finn should have made such a communication imperative. The Duke feels that no further correspondence between himself and Mrs. Finn on the matter could lead to any good result. "Do you understand it?" asked Mrs. Finn. "I think so." "It simply means this,--that when at Matching he had thought me worthy of having for a time the charge of you and of your welfare, that he had trusted me, who was the friend of your dear mother, to take for a time in regard to you the place which had been so unhappily left vacant by her death; and it means also that I deceived him and betrayed that trust by being privy to an engagement on your part, of which he disapproves, and of which he was not then aware." "I suppose he does mean that." "Yes, Lady Mary; that is what he means. And he means further to let me know that as I did so foully betray the trust which he had placed in me,--that as I had consented to play the part of assistant to you in that secret engagement,--therefore he casts me off as altogether unworthy of his esteem and acquaintance. It is as though he had told me in so many words that among women he had known none more vile or more false than I." "Not that, Mrs. Finn." "Yes, that;--all of that. He tells me that, and then says that there shall be no more words spoken or written about it. I can hardly submit to so stern a judgment. You know the truth, Lady Mary." "Do not call me Lady Mary. Do not quarrel with me." "If your father has quarrelled with me, it would not be fit that you and I should be friends. Your duty to him would forbid it. I should not have come to you now did I not feel that I am bound to justify myself. The thing of which I am accused is so repugnant to me, that I am obliged to do something and to say something, even though the subject itself be one on which I would so willingly be silent." "What can I do, Mrs. Finn?" "It was Mr. Tregear who first told me that your father was angry with me. He knew what I had done and why, and he was bound to tell me in order that I might have an opportunity of setting myself right with the Duke. Then I wrote and explained everything,--how you had told me of the engagement, and how I had then urged Mr. Tregear that he should not keep such a matter secret from your father. In answer to my letter I have received--that." "Shall I write and tell papa?" "He should be made to understand that from the moment in which I heard of the engagement I was urgent with you and with Mr. Tregear that he should be informed of it. You will remember what passed." "I remember it all." "I did not conceive it to be my duty to tell the Duke myself, but I did conceive it to be my duty to see he should be told. Now he writes as though I had known the secret from the first, and as though I had been concealing it from him at the very moment in which he was asking me to remain at Matching on your behalf. That I consider to be hard,--and unjust. I cannot deny what he says. I did know of it while I was at Matching, for it was at Matching that you told me. But he implies that I knew it before. When you told me your story I did feel that it was my duty to see that the matter was not kept longer from him;--and I did my duty. Now your father takes upon himself to rebuke me,--and takes upon himself at the same time to forbid me to write to him again!" "I will tell him all, Mrs. Finn." "Let him understand this. I do not wish to write to him again. After what has passed I cannot say I wish to see him again. But I think he should acknowledge to me that he has been mistaken. He need not then fear that I shall trouble him with any reply. But I shall know that he has acquitted me of a fault of which I cannot bear to think I should be accused." Then she took a somewhat formal though still an affectionate farewell of the girl. "I want to see papa as soon as possible," said Lady Mary when she was again with Lady Cantrip. The reason for her wish was soon given, and then the whole story told. "You do not think that she should have gone to papa at once?" Lady Mary asked. It was a point of moral law on which the elder woman, who had had girls of her own, found it hard to give an immediate answer. It certainly is expedient that parents should know at once of any engagement by which their daughters may seek to contract themselves. It is expedient that they should be able to prevent any secret contracts. Lady Cantrip felt strongly that Mrs. Finn having accepted the confidential charge of the daughter could not, without gross betrayal of trust, allow herself to be the depositary of such a secret. "But she did not allow herself," said Lady Mary, pleading for her friend. "But she left the house without telling him, my dear." "But it was because of what she did that he was told." "That is true; but I doubt whether she should have left him an hour in ignorance." "But it was I who told her. She would have betrayed me." "She was not a fit recipient for your confidence, Mary. But I do not wish to accuse her. She seems to be a high-minded woman, and I think that your papa has been hard upon her." "And mamma knew it always," said Mary. To this Lady Cantrip could give no answer. Whatever cause for anger the Duke might have against Mrs. Finn, there had been cause for much more against his wife. But she had freed herself from all accusation by death. Lady Mary wrote to her father, declaring that she was most particularly anxious to see him and talk to him about Mrs. Finn. CHAPTER XIII The Duke's Injustice No advantage whatever was obtained by Lady Mary's interview with her father. He persisted that Mrs. Finn had been untrue to him when she left Matching without telling him all that she knew of his daughter's engagement with Mr. Tregear. No doubt by degrees that idea which he at first entertained was expelled from his head,--the idea that she had been cognisant of the whole thing before she came to Matching; but even this was done so slowly that there was no moment at which he became aware of any lessened feeling of indignation. To his thinking she had betrayed her trust, and he could not be got by his daughter to say that he would forgive her. He certainly could not be got to say that he would apologise for the accusation he had made. It was nothing less that his daughter asked; and he could hardly refrain himself from anger when she asked it. "There should not have been a moment," he said, "before she came to me and told me all." Poor Lady Mary's position was certainly uncomfortable enough. The great sin,--the sin which was so great that to have known it for a day without revealing it was in itself a damning sin on the part of Mrs. Finn,--was Lady Mary's sin. And she differed so entirely from her father as to think that this sin of her own was a virtue, and that to have spoken of it to him would have been, on the part of Mrs. Finn, a treachery so deep that no woman ought to have forgiven it! When he spoke of a matter which deeply affected his honour,--she could hardly refrain from asserting that his honour was quite safe in his daughter's hands. And when in his heart he declared that it should have been Mrs. Finn's first care to save him from disgrace, Lady Mary did break out. "Papa, there could be no disgrace." "That for a moment shall be laid aside," he said, with that manner by which even his peers in council had never been able not to be awed, "but if you communicate with Mrs. Finn at all you must make her understand that I regard her conduct as inexcusable." Nothing had been gained, and poor Lady Mary was compelled to write a few lines which were to her most painful in writing. MY DEAR MRS. FINN, I have seen papa, and he thinks that you ought to have told him when I told you. It occurs to me that that would have been a cruel thing to do, and most unfair to Mr. Tregear, who was quite willing to go to papa, and had only put off doing so because of poor mamma's death. As I had told mamma, of course it was right that he should tell papa. Then I told you, because you were so kind to me! I am so sorry that I have got you into this trouble; but what can I do? I told him I must write to you. I suppose it is better that I should, although what I have to say is so unpleasant. I hope it will all blow over in time, because I love you dearly. You may be quite sure of one thing,--that I shall never change. [In this assurance the writer was alluding not to her friendship for her friend but her love for her lover,--and so the friend understood her.] I hope things will be settled some day, and then we may be able to meet. Your very affectionate Friend, MARY PALLISER. Mrs. Finn, when she received this, was alone in her house in Park Lane. Her husband was down in the North of England. On this subject she had not spoken to him, fearing that he would feel himself bound to take some steps to support his wife under the treatment she had received. Even though she must quarrel with the Duke, she was most anxious that her husband should not be compelled to do so. Their connection had been political rather than personal. There were many reasons why there should be no open cause of disruption between them. But her husband was hot-headed, and, were all this to be told him and that letter shown to him which the Duke had written, there would be words between him and the Duke which would probably make impossible any further connection between them. It troubled her very much. She was by no means not alive to the honour of the Duke's friendship. Throughout her intimacy with the Duchess she had abstained from pressing herself on him, not because she had been indifferent about him, but that she had perceived that she might make her way with him better by standing aloof than by thrusting herself forward. And she had known that she had been successful. She could tell herself with pride that her conduct towards him had been always such as would become a lady of high spirit and fine feeling. She knew that she had deserved well of him, that in all her intercourse with him, with his uncle, and with his wife, she had given much and had taken little. She was the last woman in the world to let a word on such a matter pass her lips; but not the less was she conscious of her merit towards him. And she had been led to act as she had done by sincere admiration for the man. In all their political troubles, she had understood him better than the Duchess had done. Looking on from a distance she had understood the man's character as it had come to her both from his wife and from her own husband. That he was unjust to her,--cruelly unjust, she was quite sure. He accused her of intentional privity to a secret which it behoved him to know, and of being a party to that secrecy. Whereas from the moment in which she had heard the secret she had determined that it must be made known to him. She felt that she had deserved his good opinion in all things, but in nothing more than in the way in which she had acted in this matter. And yet he had treated her with an imperious harshness which amounted to insolence. What a letter it was that he had written to her! The very tips of her ears tingled with heat as she read it again to herself. None of the ordinary courtesies of epistle-craft had been preserved either in the beginning or in the end. It was worse even than if he had called her Madam without an epithet. "The Duke understands--" "The Duke thinks--" "The Duke feels--" feels that he should not be troubled with either letters or conversation; the upshot of it all being that the Duke declared her to have shown herself unworthy of being treated like a lady! And this after all that she had done! She would not bear it. That at present was all that she could say to herself. She was not angry with Lady Mary. She did not doubt but that the girl had done the best in her power to bring her father to reason. But because Lady Mary had failed, she, Mrs. Finn, was not going to put up with so grievous an injury. And she was forced to bear all this alone! There was none with whom she could communicate;--no one from whom she could ask advice. She would not bring her husband into a quarrel which might be prejudicial to his position as a member of his political party. There was no one else to whom she would tell the secret of Lady Mary's love. And yet she could not bear this injustice done to her. Then she wrote as follows to the Duke: Mrs. Finn presents her compliments to the Duke of Omnium. Mrs. Finn finds it to be essential to her that she should see the Duke in reference to his letter to her. If his Grace will let her know on what day and at what hour he will be kind enough to call on her, Mrs. Finn will be at home to receive him. Park Lane. Thursday, 12th May, 18--. CHAPTER XIV The New Member for Silverbridge Lord Silverbridge was informed that it would be right that he should go down to Silverbridge a few days before the election, to make himself known to the electors. As the day for the election drew near it was understood that there would be no other candidate. The Conservative side was the popular side among the tradesmen of Silverbridge. Silverbridge had been proud to be honoured by the services of the heir of the house of Omnium, even while that heir had been a Liberal,--had regarded it as so much a matter of course that the borough should be at his disposal that no question as to politics had ever arisen while he retained the seat. And had the Duke chosen to continue to send them Liberals, one after another, when he went into the House of Lords, there would have been no question as to the fitness of the man or men so sent. Silverbridge had been supposed to be a Liberal as a matter of course,--because the Pallisers were Liberals. But when the matter was remitted to themselves,--when the Duke declared that he would not interfere any more, for it was thus that the borough had obtained its freedom,--then the borough began to feel Conservative predilections. "If his Grace really does mean us to do just what we please ourselves, which is a thing we never thought of asking from his Grace, then we find, having turned the matter over among ourselves, that we are upon the whole Conservative." In this spirit the borough had elected a certain Mr. Fletcher; but in doing so the borough had still a shade of fear that it would offend the Duke. The house of Palliser, Gatherum Castle, the Duke of Omnium, and this special Duke himself, were all so great in the eyes of the borough, that the first and only strong feeling in the borough was the one of duty. The borough did not altogether enjoy being enfranchised. But when the Duke had spoken once, twice, and thrice, then with a hesitating heart the borough returned Mr. Fletcher. Now Mr. Fletcher was wanted elsewhere, having been persuaded to stand for the county, and it was a comfort to the borough that it could resettle itself beneath the warmth of the wings of the Pallisers. So the matter stood when Lord Silverbridge was told that his presence in the borough for a few hours would be taken as a compliment. Hitherto no one knew him at Silverbridge. During his boyhood he had not been much at Gatherum Castle, and had done his best to eschew the place since he had ceased to be a boy. All the Pallisers took a pride in Gatherum Castle, but they all disliked it. "Oh yes; I'll go down," he said to Mr. Morton, who was up in town. "I needn't go to the great barrack I suppose." The great barrack was the Castle. "I'll put up at the Inn." Mr. Morton begged the heir to come to his own house; but Silverbridge declared that he would prefer the Inn, and so the matter was settled. He was to meet sundry politicians,--Mr. Sprugeon and Mr. Sprout and Mr. Du Boung,--who would like to be thanked for what they had done. But who was to go with him? He would naturally have asked Tregear, but from Tregear he had for the last week or two been, not perhaps estranged, but separated. He had been much taken up with racing. He had gone down to Chester with Major Tifto, and under the Major's auspicious influences had won a little money;--and now he was very anxiously preparing himself for the Newmarket Second Spring Meeting. He had therefore passed much of his time with Major Tifto. And when this visit to Silverbridge was pressed on him he thoughtlessly asked Tifto to go with him. Tifto was delighted. Lord Silverbridge was to be met at Silverbridge by various well-known politicians from the neighbourhood, and Major Tifto was greatly elated by the prospect of such an introduction into the political world. But no sooner had the offer been made by Lord Silverbridge than he saw his own indiscretion. Tifto was very well for Chester or Newmarket, very well perhaps for the Beargarden, but not very well for an electioneering expedition. An idea came to the young nobleman that if it should be his fate to represent Silverbridge in Parliament for the next twenty years, it would be well that Silverbridge should entertain respecting him some exalted estimation,--that Silverbridge should be taught to regard him as a fit son of his father and a worthy specimen of the British political nobility. Struck by serious reflections of this nature he did open his mind to Tregear. "I am very fond of Tifto," he said, "but I don't know whether he's just the sort of fellow to take down to an election." "I should think not," said Tregear very decidedly. "He's a very good fellow, you know," said Silverbridge. "I don't know an honester man than Tifto anywhere." "I dare say. Or rather, I don't dare say. I know nothing about the Major's honesty, and I doubt whether you do. He rides very well." "What has that to do with it?" "Nothing on earth. Therefore I advise you not to take him to Silverbridge." "You needn't preach." "You may call it what you like. Tifto would not hold his tongue, and there is nothing he could say there which would not be to your prejudice." "Will you go?" "If you wish it," said Tregear. "What will the governor say?" "That must be your look-out. In a political point of view I shall not disgrace you. I shall hold my tongue and look like a gentleman,--neither of which is in Tifto's power." And so it was settled, that on the day but one after this conversation Lord Silverbridge and Tregear should go together to Silverbridge. But the Major, when on the same night his noble friend's altered plans were explained to him, did not bear the disappointment with equanimity. "Isn't that a little strange?" he said, becoming very red in the face. "What do you call strange?" said the Lord. "Well;--I'd made all my arrangements. When a man has been asked to do a thing like that, he doesn't like to be put off." "The truth is, Tifto, when I came to think of it, I saw that, going down to these fellows about Parliament and all that sort of thing, I ought to have a political atmosphere, and not a racing or a betting or a hunting atmosphere." "There isn't a man in London who cares more about politics than I do;--and not very many perhaps who understand them better. To tell you the truth, my Lord, I think you are throwing me over." "I'll make it up to you," said Silverbridge, meaning to be kind. "I'll go down to Newmarket with you and stick to you like wax." "No doubt you'll do that," said Tifto, who, like a fool, failed to see where his advantage lay. "I can be useful at Newmarket, and so you'll stick to me." "Look here, Major Tifto," said Silverbridge; "if you are dissatisfied, you and I can easily separate ourselves." "I am not dissatisfied," said the little man, almost crying. "Then don't talk as though you were. As to Silverbridge, I shall not want you there. When I asked you I was only thinking what would be pleasant to both of us; but since that I have remembered that business must be business." Even this did not reconcile the angry little man, who as he turned away declared within his own little bosom that he would "take it out of Silverbridge for that." Lord Silverbridge and Tregear went down to the borough together, and on the journey something was said about Lady Mary,--and something also about Lady Mabel. "From the first, you know," said Lady Mary's brother, "I never thought it would answer." "Why not answer?" "Because I knew the governor would not have it. Money and rank and those sort of things are not particularly charming to me. But still things should go together. It is all very well for you and me to be pals, but of course it will be expected that Mary should marry some--" "Some swell?" "Some swell, if you will have it." "You mean to call yourself a swell?" "Yes I do," said Silverbridge, with considerable resolution. "You ought not to make yourself disagreeable, because you understand all about it as well as anybody. Chance has made me the eldest son of a Duke and heir to an enormous fortune. Chance has made my sister the daughter of a Duke, and an heiress also. My intimacy with you ought to be proof at any rate to you that I don't on that account set myself up above other fellows. But when you come to talk of marriage, of course it is a serious thing." "But you have told me more than once that you have no objection on your own score." "Nor have I." "You are only saying what the Duke will think." "I am telling you that it is impossible, and I told you so before. You and she will be kept apart, and so--" "And so she'll forget me." "Something of that kind." "Of course I have to trust to her for that. If she forgets me, well and good." "She needn't forget you. Lord bless me! you talk as though the thing were not done every day. You'll hear some morning that she is going to marry some fellow who has a lot of money and a good position; and what difference will it make then whether she has forgotten you or not?" It might almost have been supposed that the young man had been acquainted with his mother's history. After this there was a pause, and there arose conversation about other things, and a cigar was smoked. Then Tregear returned once more to the subject. "There is one thing I wish to say about it all." "What is that?" "I want you to understand that nothing else will turn me away from my intention but such a marriage on her part as that of which you speak. Nothing that your father can do will turn me." "She can't marry without his leave." "Perhaps not." "That he'll never give,--and I don't suppose you look forward to waiting till his death." "If he sees that her happiness really depends on it he will give his leave. It all depends on that. If I judge your father rightly, he's just as soft-hearted as other people. The man who holds out is not the man of the firmest opinion, but the man of the hardest heart." "Somebody will talk Mary over." "If so, the thing is over. It all depends on her." Then he went on to tell his friend that he had spoken of his engagement to Lady Mabel. "I have mentioned it to no soul but to your father and to her." "Why to her?" "Because we were friends together as children. I never had a sister, but she has been more like a sister to me than any one else. Do you object to her knowing it?" "Not particularly. It seems to me now that everybody knows everything. There are no longer any secrets." "But she is a special friend." "Of yours," said Silverbridge. "And of yours," said Tregear. "Well, yes;--in a sort of way. She is the jolliest girl I know." "Take her all round, for beauty, intellect, good sense, and fun at the same time, I don't know any one equal to her." "It's a pity you didn't fall in love with her." "We knew each other too early for that. And then she has not a shilling. I should think myself dishonest if I did not tell you that I could not afford to love any girl who hadn't money. A man must live,--and a woman too." At the station they were met by Mr. Sprugeon and Mr. Sprout, who, with many apologies for the meanness of such entertainment, took them up to the George and Vulture, which was supposed for the nonce to be the Conservative hotel in the town. Here they were met by other men of importance in the borough, and among them by Mr. Du Boung. Now Mr. Sprout and Mr. Sprugeon were Conservatives, but Mr. Du Boung was a strong Liberal. "We are, all of us, particularly glad to see your Lordship among us," said Mr. Du Boung. "I have told his Lordship how perfectly satisfied you are to see the borough in his Lordship's hands," said Mr. Sprugeon. "I am sure it could not be in better," said Mr. Du Boung. "For myself I am quite willing to postpone any peculiar shade of politics to the advantage of having your father's son as our representative." This Mr. Du Boung said with much intention of imparting both grace and dignity to the occasion. He thought that he was doing a great thing for the house of Omnium, and that the house of Omnium ought to know it. "That's very kind of you," said Lord Silverbridge, who had not read as carefully as he should have done the letters which had been sent to him, and did not therefore quite understand the position. "Mr. Du Boung had intended to stand himself," said Mr. Sprout. "But retired in your Lordship's favour," said Mr. Sprugeon. "In doing which I considered that I studied the interest of the borough," said Mr. Du Boung. "I thought you gave it up because there was hardly a footing for a Liberal," said his Lordship, very imprudently. "The borough was always Liberal till the last election," said Mr. Du Boung, drawing himself up. "The borough wishes on this occasion to be magnanimous," said Mr. Sprout, probably having on his mind some confusion between magnanimity and unanimity. "As your Lordship is coming among us, the borough is anxious to sink politics altogether for the moment," said Mr. Sprugeon. There had no doubt been a compact between the Sprugeon and Sprout party and the Du Boung party in accordance with which it had been arranged that Mr. Du Boung should be entitled to a certain amount of glorification in the presence of Lord Silverbridge. "And it was in compliance with that wish on the part of the borough, my Lord," said Mr. Du Boung,--"as to which my own feelings were quite as strong as that of any other gentleman in the borough,--that I conceived it to be my duty to give way." "His Lordship is quite aware how much he owes to Mr. Du Boung," said Tregear. Whereupon Lord Silverbridge bowed. "And now what are we to do?" said Lord Silverbridge. Then there was a little whispering between Mr. Sprout and Mr. Sprugeon. "Perhaps, Mr. Du Boung," said Sprugeon, "his Lordship had better call first on Dr. Tempest." "Perhaps," said the injured brewer, "as it is to be a party affair after all I had better retire from the scene." "I thought all that was to be given up," said Tregear. "Oh, certainly," said Sprout. "Suppose we go to Mr. Walker first?" "I'm up to anything," said Lord Silverbridge; "but of course everybody understands that I am a Conservative." "Oh dear, yes," said Sprugeon. "We are all aware of that," said Sprout. "And very glad we've all of us been to hear it," said the landlord. "Though there are some in the borough who could have wished, my Lord, that you had stuck to the old Palliser politics," said Mr. Du Boung. "But I haven't stuck to the Palliser politics. Just at present I think that order and all that sort of thing should be maintained." "Hear, hear!" said the landlord. "And now, as I have expressed my views generally, I am willing to go anywhere." "Then we'll go to Mr. Walker first," said Sprugeon. Now it was understood that in the borough, among those who really had opinions of their own, Mr. Walker the old attorney stood first as a Liberal, and Dr. Tempest the old rector first as a Conservative. "I am glad to see your Lordship in the town which gives you its name," said Mr. Walker, who was a hale old gentleman with silvery-white hair, over seventy years of age. "I proposed your father for this borough on, I think, six or seven different occasions. They used to go in and out then whenever they changed their offices." "We hope you'll propose Lord Silverbridge now," said Mr. Sprugeon. "Oh; well;--yes. He's his father's son, and I never knew anything but good of the family. I wish you were going to sit on the same side, my Lord." "Times are changed a little, perhaps," said his Lordship. "The matter is not to be discussed now," said the old attorney. "I understand that. Only I hope you'll excuse me if I say that a man ought to get up very early in the morning if he means to see further into politics than your father." "Very early indeed," said Mr. Du Boung, shaking his head. "That's all right," said Lord Silverbridge. "I'll propose you, my Lord. I need not wish you success, because there is no one to stand against you." Then they went to Dr. Tempest, who was also an old man. "Yes, my Lord, I shall be proud to second you," said the rector. "I didn't think that I should ever do that to one of your name in Silverbridge." "I hope you think I've made a change for the better," said the candidate. "You've come over to my school of course, and I suppose I am bound to think that a change for the better. Nevertheless I have a kind of idea that certain people ought to be Tories and that other certain people ought to be Whigs. What does your father say about it?" "My father wishes me to be in the House, and that he has not quarrelled with me you may know by the fact that had there been a contest he would have paid my expenses." "A father generally has to do that whether he approves of what his son is about or not," said the caustic old gentleman. There was nothing else to be done. They all went back to the hotel, and Mr. Sprugeon with Mr. Sprout and the landlord drank a glass of sherry at the candidate's expense, wishing him political long life and prosperity. There was no one else whom it was thought necessary that the candidate should visit, and the next day he returned to town with the understanding that on the day appointed in the next week he should come back again to be elected. And on the day appointed the two young men again went to Silverbridge, and after he had been declared duly elected, the new Member of Parliament made his first speech. There was a meeting in the town-hall and many were assembled anxious to hear,--not the lad's opinions, for which probably nobody cared much,--but the tone of his voice and to see his manner. Of what sort was the eldest son of the man of whom the neighbourhood had been so proud? For the county was in truth proud of their Duke. Of this son whom they had now made a Member of Parliament they at present only knew that he had been sent away from Oxford,--not so very long ago,--for painting the Dean's house scarlet. The speech was not very brilliant. He told them that he was very much obliged to them for the honour they had done him. Though he could not follow exactly his father's political opinions,--he would always have before his eyes his father's political honesty and independence. He broke down two or three times and blushed, and repeated himself, and knocked his words a great deal too quickly one on the top of another. But it was taken very well, and was better than was expected. When it was over he wrote a line to the Duke. MY DEAR FATHER, I am Member of Parliament for Silverbridge,--as you used to be in the days which I can first remember. I hope you won't think that it does not make me unhappy to have differed from you. Indeed it does. I don't think that anybody has ever done so well in politics as you have. But when a man does take up an opinion I don't see how he can help himself. Of course I could have kept myself quiet;--but then you wished me to be in the House. They were all very civil to me at Silverbridge, but there was very little said. Your affectionate Son, SILVERBRIDGE. CHAPTER XV The Duke Receives a Letter,--and Writes One The Duke, when he received Mrs. Finn's note, demanding an interview, thought much upon the matter before he replied. She had made her demand as though the Duke had been no more than any other gentleman, almost as though she had a right to call upon him to wait upon her. He understood and admired the courage of this;--but nevertheless he would not go to her. He had trusted her with that which of all things was the most sacred to him, and she had deceived him! He wrote to her as follows: The Duke of Omnium presents his compliments to Mrs. Finn. As the Duke thinks that no good could result either to Mrs. Finn or to himself from an interview, he is obliged to say that he would rather not do as Mrs. Finn has requested. But for the strength of this conviction the Duke would have waited upon Mrs. Finn most willingly. Mrs. Finn when she received this was not surprised. She had felt sure that such would be the nature of the Duke's answer; but she was also sure that if such an answer did come she would not let the matter rest. The accusation was so bitter to her that she would spare nothing in defending herself,--nothing in labour and nothing in time. She would make him know that she was in earnest. As she could not succeed in getting into his presence she must do this by letter,--and she wrote her letter, taking two days to think of her words. May 18, 18--. MY DEAR DUKE OF OMNIUM, As you will not come to me, I must trouble your Grace to read what I fear will be a long letter. For it is absolutely necessary that I should explain my conduct to you. That you have condemned me I am sure you will not deny;--nor that you have punished me as far as the power of punishment was in your hands. If I can succeed in making you see that you have judged me wrongly, I think you will admit your error and beg my pardon. You are not one who from your nature can be brought easily to do this; but you are one who will certainly do it if you can be made to feel that by not doing so you would be unjust. I am myself so clear as to my own rectitude of purpose and conduct, and am so well aware of your perspicuity, that I venture to believe that if you will read this letter I shall convince you. Before I go any further I will confess that the matter is one,--I was going to say almost of life and death to me. Circumstances, not of my own seeking, have for some years past thrown me so closely into intercourse with your family that now to be cast off, and to be put on one side as a disgraced person,--and that so quickly after the death of her who loved me so dearly and who was so dear to me,--is such an affront as I cannot bear and hold up my head afterwards. I have come to be known as her whom your uncle trusted and loved, as her whom your wife trusted and loved,--obscure as I was before;--and as her whom, may I not say, you yourself trusted? As there was much of honour and very much of pleasure in this, so also was there something of misfortune. Friendships are safest when the friends are of the same standing. I have always felt there was danger, and now the thing I feared has come home to me. Now I will plead my case. I fancy, that when first you heard that I had been cognisant of your daughter's engagement, you imagined that I was aware of it before I went to Matching. Had I been so, I should have been guilty of that treachery of which you accuse me. I did know nothing of it till Lady Mary told me on the day before I left Matching. That she should tell me was natural enough. Her mother had known it, and for the moment,--if I am not assuming too much in saying so,--I was filling her mother's place. But, in reference to you, I could not exercise the discretion which a mother might have used, and I told her at once, most decidedly, that you must be made acquainted with the fact. Then Lady Mary expressed to me her wish,--not that this matter should be kept any longer from you, for that it should be told she was as anxious as I was myself,--but that it should be told to you by Mr. Tregear. It was not for me to raise any question as to Mr. Tregear's fitness or unfitness,--as to which indeed I could know nothing. All I could do was to say that if Mr. Tregear would make the communication at once, I should feel that I had done my duty. The upshot was that Mr. Tregear came to me immediately on my return to London, and agreeing with me that it was imperative that you be informed, went to you and did inform you. In all of that, if I have told the story truly, where has been my offence? I suppose you will believe me, but your daughter can give evidence as to every word that I have written. I think that you have got it into your mind that I have befriended Mr. Tregear's suit, and that, having received this impression, you hold it with the tenacity which is usual to you. There never was a greater mistake. I went to Matching as the friend of my dear friend;--but I stayed there at your request, as your friend. Had I been, when you asked me to do so, a participator in that secret I could not have honestly remained in the position you assigned to me. Had I done so, I should have deserved your ill opinion. As it is I have not deserved it, and your condemnation of me has been altogether unjust. Should I not now receive from you a full withdrawal of all charge against me, I shall be driven to think that after all the insight which circumstances have given me into your character, I have nevertheless been mistaken in the reading of it. I remain, Dear Duke of Omnium, Yours truly, M. FINN. I find on looking over my letter that I must add one word further. It might seem that I am asking for a return of your friendship. Such is not my purpose. Neither can you forget that you have accused me,--nor can I. What I expect is that you should tell me that you in your conduct to me have been wrong and that I in mine to you have been right. I must be enabled to feel that the separation between us has come from injury done to me, and not by me. He did read the letter more than once, and read it with tingling ears, and hot cheeks, and a knitted brow. As the letter went on, and as the woman's sense of wrong grew hot from her own telling of her own story, her words became stronger and still stronger, till at last they were almost insolent in their strength. Were it not that they came from one who did think herself to have been wronged, then certainly they would be insolent. A sense of injury, a burning conviction of wrong sustained, will justify language which otherwise would be unbearable. The Duke felt that, and though his ears were tingling and his brow knitted, he could have forgiven the language, if only he could have admitted the argument. He understood every word of it. When she spoke of tenacity she intended to charge him with obstinacy. Though she had dwelt but lightly on her own services she had made her thoughts on the matter clear enough. "I, Mrs. Finn, who am nobody, have done much to succour and assist you, the Duke of Omnium; and this is the return which I have received!" And then she told him to his face that unless he did something which it would be impossible that he should do, she would revoke her opinion of his honesty! He tried to persuade himself that her opinion about his honesty was nothing to him;--but he failed. Her opinion was very much to him. Though in his anger he had determined to throw her off from him, he knew her to be one whose good opinion was worth having. Not a word of overt accusation had been made against his wife. Every allusion to her was full of love. But yet how heavy a charge was really made! That such a secret should be kept from him, the father, was acknowledged to be a heinous fault;--but the wife had known the secret and had kept it from him, the father! And then how wretched a thing it was for him that any one should dare to write to him about the wife that had been taken away from him! In spite of all her faults her name was so holy to him that it had never once passed his lips since her death, except in low whispers to himself,--low whispers made in the perfect, double-guarded seclusion of his own chamber. "Cora, Cora," he had murmured, so that the sense of the sound and not the sound itself had come to him from his own lips. And now this woman wrote to him about her freely, as though there were nothing sacred, no religion in the memory of her. "It was not for me to raise any question as to Mr. Tregear's fitness." Was it not palpable to all the world that he was unfit? Unfit! How could a man be more unfit? He was asking for the hand of one who was second only to royalty--who was possessed of everything, who was beautiful, well-born, rich, who was the daughter of the Duke of Omnium, and he had absolutely nothing of his own to offer. But it was necessary that he should at last come to the consideration of the actual point as to which she had written to him so forcibly. He tried to set himself to the task in perfect honesty. He certainly had condemned her. He had condemned her and had no doubt punished her to the extent of his power. And if he could be brought to see that he had done this unjustly, then certainly must he beg her pardon. And when he considered it all, he had to own that her intimacy with his uncle and his wife had not been so much of her seeking as of theirs. It grieved him now that it should have been so, but so it was. And after all this,--after the affectionate surrender of herself to his wife's caprices which the woman had made,--he had turned upon her and driven her away with ignominy. That was all true. As he thought of it he became hot, and was conscious of a quivering feeling round his heart. These were bonds indeed; but they were bonds of such a nature as to be capable of being rescinded and cut away altogether by absolute bad conduct. If he could make it good to himself that in a matter of such magnitude as the charge of his daughter she had been untrue to him and had leagued herself against him, with an unworthy lover, then, then--all bonds would be rescinded! Then would his wrath be altogether justified! Then would it have been impossible that he should have done aught else than cast her out! As he thought of this he felt sure that she had betrayed him! How great would be the ignominy to him should he be driven to own to himself that she had not betrayed him! "There should not have been a moment," he said to himself over and over again,--"not a moment!" Yes;--she certainly had betrayed him. There might still be safety for him in that confident assertion of "not a moment;" but had there been anything of that conspiracy of which he had certainly at first judged her to be guilty? She had told her story, and had then appealed to Lady Mary for evidence. After five minutes of perfect stillness,--but five minutes of misery, five minutes during which great beads of perspiration broke out from him and stood upon his brow, he had to confess to himself that he did not want any evidence. He did believe her story. When he allowed himself to think she had been in league with Tregear he had wronged her. He wiped away the beads from his brow, and again repeated to himself those words which were now his only comfort, "There should not have been a moment;--not a moment!" It was thus and only thus that he was enabled to assure himself that there need be no acknowledgment of wrong done on his part. Having settled this in his own mind he forced himself to attend a meeting at which his assistance had been asked as to a complex question on Law Reform. The Duke endeavoured to give himself up entirely to the matter; but through it all there was the picture before him of Mrs. Finn waiting for an answer to her letter. If he should confirm himself in his opinion that he had been right, then would any answer be necessary? He might just acknowledge the letter, after the fashion which has come up in official life, than which silence is an insult much more bearable. But he did not wish to insult, nor to punish her further. He would willingly have withdrawn the punishment under which she was groaning could he have done so without self-abasement. Or he might write as she had done,--advocating his own cause with all his strength, using that last one strong argument,--"there should not have been a moment." But there would be something repulsive to his personal dignity in the continued correspondence which this would produce. "The Duke of Omnium regrets to say, in answer to Mrs. Finn's letter, that he thinks no good can be attained by a prolonged correspondence." Such, or of such kind, he thought must be his answer. But would this be a fair return for the solicitude shown by her to his uncle, for the love which had made her so patient a friend to his wife, for the nobility of her own conduct in many things? Then his mind reverted to certain jewels,--supposed to be of enormous value,--which were still in his possession though they were the property of this woman. They had been left to her by his uncle, and she had obstinately refused to take them. Now they were lying packed in the cellars of certain bankers,--but still they were in his custody. What should he now do in this matter? Hitherto, perhaps once in every six months, he had notified to her that he was keeping them as her curator, and she had always repeated that it was a charge from which she could not relieve him. It had become almost a joke between them. But how could he joke with a woman with whom he had quarrelled after this internecine fashion? What if he were to consult Lady Cantrip? He could not do so without a pang that would be very bitter to him,--but any agony would be better than that arising from a fear that he had been unjust to one who had deserved well of him. No doubt Lady Cantrip would see it in the same light as he had done. And then he would be able to support himself by the assurance that that which he had judged to be right was approved of by one whom the world would acknowledge to be a good judge on such a matter. When he got home he found his son's letter telling him of the election at Silverbridge. There was something in it which softened his heart to the young man,--or perhaps it was that in the midst of his many discomforts he wished to find something which at least was not painful to him. That his son and his heir should insist on entering political life in opposition to him was of course a source of pain; but, putting that aside, the thing had been done pleasantly enough, and the young member's letter had been written with some good feeling. So he answered the letter as pleasantly as he knew how. MY DEAR SILVERBRIDGE, I am glad that you are in Parliament and am glad also that you should have been returned by the old borough; though I would that you could have reconciled yourself to adhering to the politics of your family. But there is nothing disgraceful in such a change, and I am able to congratulate you as a father should a son and to wish you long life and success as a legislator. There are one or two things I would ask you to remember;--and firstly this, that as you have voluntarily undertaken certain duties you are bound as an honest man to perform them as scrupulously as though you were paid for doing them. There was no obligation in you to seek the post;--but having sought it and acquired it you cannot neglect the work attached to it without being untrue to the covenant you have made. It is necessary that a young member of Parliament should bear this in his mind, and especially a member who has not worked his way up to notoriety outside the House, because to him there will be great facility for idleness and neglect. And then I would have you always remember the purport for which there is a Parliament elected in this happy and free country. It is not that some men may shine there, that some may acquire power, or that all may plume themselves on being the elect of the nation. It often appears to me that some members of Parliament so regard their success in life,--as the fellows of our colleges do too often, thinking that their fellowships were awarded for their comfort and not for the furtherance of any object as education or religion. I have known gentlemen who have felt that in becoming members of Parliament they had achieved an object for themselves instead of thinking that they had put themselves in the way of achieving something for others. A member of Parliament should feel himself to be the servant of his country,--and like every other servant, he should serve. If this be distasteful to a man he need not go into Parliament. If the harness gall him he need not wear it. But if he takes the trappings, then he should draw the coach. You are there as the guardian of your fellow-countrymen,--that they may be safe, that they may be prosperous, that they may be well governed and lightly burdened,--above all that they may be free. If you cannot feel this to be your duty, you should not be there at all. And I would have you remember also that the work of a member of Parliament can seldom be of that brilliant nature which is of itself charming; and that the young member should think of such brilliancy as being possible to him only at a distance. It should be your first care to sit and listen so that the forms and methods of the House may as it were soak into you gradually. And then you must bear in mind that speaking in the House is but a very small part of a member's work, perhaps that part which he may lay aside altogether with the least strain on his conscience. A good member of Parliament will be good upstairs in the Committee Rooms, good down-stairs to make and to keep a House, good to vote, for his party if it may be nothing better, but for the measures also which he believes to be for the good of his country. Gradually, if you will give your thoughts to it, and above all your time, the theory of legislation will sink into your mind, and you will find that there will come upon you the ineffable delight of having served your country to the best of your ability. It is the only pleasure in life which has been enjoyed without alloy by your affectionate father, OMNIUM. The Duke in writing this letter was able for a few moments to forget Mrs. Finn, and to enjoy the work which he had on hand. CHAPTER XVI "Poor Boy" The new member for Silverbridge, when he entered the House to take the oath, was supported on the right and left by two staunch old Tories. Mr. Monk had seen him a few minutes previously,--Mr. Monk who of all Liberals was the firmest and than whom no one had been more staunch to the Duke,--and had congratulated him on his election, expressing at the same time some gentle regrets. "I only wish you could have come among us on the other side," he said. "But I couldn't," said the young Lord. "I am sure nothing but a conscientious feeling would have separated you from your father's friends," said the old Liberal. And then they were parted, and the member for Silverbridge was bustled up to the table between two staunch Tories. Of what else was done on that occasion nothing shall be said here. No political work was required from him, except that of helping for an hour or two to crowd the Government benches. But we will follow him as he left the House. There were one or two others quite as anxious as to his political career as any staunch old Liberal. At any rate one other. He had promised that as soon as he could get away from the House he would go to Belgrave Square and tell Lady Mabel Grex all about it. When he reached the square it was past seven, but Lady Mabel and Miss Cassewary were still in the drawing-room. "There seemed to be a great deal of bustle, and I didn't understand much about it," said the member. "But you heard the speeches?" These were the speeches made on the proposing and seconding of the address. "Oh, yes;--Lupton did it very well. Lord George didn't seem to be quite so good. Then Sir Timothy Beeswax made a speech, and then Mr. Monk. After that I saw other fellows going away, so I bolted too." "If I were a member of Parliament I would never leave it while the House was sitting," said Miss Cassewary. "If all were like that there wouldn't be seats for them to sit upon," said Silverbridge. "A persistent member will always find a seat," continued the positive old lady. "I am sure that Lord Silverbridge means to do his duty," said Lady Mabel. "Oh yes;--I've thought a good deal about it, and I mean to try. As long as a man isn't called upon to speak I don't see why it shouldn't be easy enough." "I'm so glad to hear you say so! Of course after a little time you will speak. I should so like to hear you make your first speech." "If I thought you were there, I'm sure I should not make it at all." Just at this period Miss Cassewary, saying something as to the necessity of dressing, and cautioning her young friend that there was not much time to be lost, left the room. "Dressing does not take me more than ten minutes," said Lady Mabel. Miss Cassewary declared this to be nonsense, but she nevertheless left the room. Whether she would have done so if Lord Silverbridge had not been Lord Silverbridge, but had been some young man with whom it would not have been expedient that Lady Mabel should fall in love, may perhaps be doubted. But then it may be taken as certain that under such circumstances Lady Mabel herself would not have remained. She had quite realised the duties of life, had had her little romance,--and had acknowledged that it was foolish. "I do so hope that you will do well," she said, going back to the parliamentary duties. "I don't think I shall ever do much. I shall never be like my father." "I don't see why not." "There never was anybody like him. I am always amusing myself, but he never cared for amusement." "You are very young." "As far as I can learn he was just as he is now at my age. My mother has told me that long before she married him he used to spend all his time in the House. I wonder whether you would mind reading the letter he wrote me when he heard of my election." Then he took the epistle out of his pocket and handed it to Lady Mabel. "He means all that he says." "He always does that." "And he really hopes that you will put your shoulder to the wheel;--even though you must do so in opposition to him." "That makes no difference. I think my father is a very fine fellow." "Shall you do all that he tells you?" "Well;--I suppose not;--except that he advises me to hold my tongue. I think that I shall do that. I mean to go down there, you know, and I daresay I shall be much the same as others." "Has he talked to you much about it?" "No;--he never talks much. Every now and then he will give me a downright lecture, or he will write me a letter like that; but he never talks to any of us." "How very odd." "Yes; he is odd. He seems to be fretful when we are with him. A good many things make him unhappy." "Your poor mother's death." "That first;--and then there are other things. I suppose he didn't like the way I came to an end at Oxford." "You were a boy then." "Of course I was very sorry for it,--though I hated Oxford. It was neither one thing nor another. You were your own master and yet you were not." "Now you must be your own master." "I suppose so." "You must marry, and become a lord of the Treasury. When I was a child I acted as a child. You know all about that." "Oh yes. And now I must throw off childish things. You mean that I mustn't paint any man's house? Eh, Lady Mab." "That and the rest of it. You are a legislator now." "So is Popplecourt, who took his seat in the House of Lords two or three months ago. He's the biggest young fool I know out. He couldn't even paint a house." "He is not an elected legislator. It makes all the difference. I quite agree with what the Duke says. Lord Popplecourt can't help himself. Whether he's an idle young scamp or not, he must be a legislator. But when a man goes in for it himself, as you have done, he should make up his mind to be useful." "I shall vote with my party of course." "More than that; much more than that. If you didn't care for politics you couldn't have taken a line of your own." When she said this she knew that he had been talked into what he had done by Tregear,--by Tregear, who had ambition, and intelligence, and capacity for forming an opinion of his own. "If you do not do it for your own sake, you will for the sake of those who,--who,--who are your friends," she said at last, not feeling quite able to tell him that he must do it for the sake of those who loved him. "There are not very many I suppose who care about it." "Your father." "Oh yes,--my father." "And Tregear." "Tregear has got his own fish to fry." "Are there none others? Do you think we care nothing about it here?" "Miss Cassewary?" "Well;--Miss Cassewary! A man might have a worse friend than Miss Cassewary;--and my father." "I don't suppose Lord Grex cares a straw about me." "Indeed he does,--a great many straws. And so do I. Do you think I don't care a straw about it?" "I don't know why you should." "Because it is my nature to be earnest. A girl comes out into the world so young that she becomes serious, and steady as it were, so much sooner than a man does." "I always think that nobody is so full of chaff as you are, Lady Mab." "I am not chaffing now in recommending you to go to work in the world like a man." As she said this they were sitting on the same sofa, but with some space between them. When Miss Cassewary had left the room Lord Silverbridge was standing, but after a little he had fallen into the seat, at the extreme corner, and had gradually come a little nearer to her. Now in her energy she put out her hand, meaning perhaps to touch lightly the sleeve of his coat, meaning perhaps not quite to touch him at all. But as she did so he put out his hand and took hold of hers. She drew it away, not seeming to allow it to remain in his grasp for a moment; but she did so, not angrily, or hurriedly, or with any flurry. She did it as though it were natural that he should take her hand and as natural that she should recover it. "Indeed I have hardly more than ten minutes left for dressing," she said, rising from her seat. "If you will say that you care about it, you yourself, I will do my best." As he made this declaration blushes covered his cheeks and forehead. "I do care about it,--very much; I myself," said Lady Mabel, not blushing at all. Then there was a knock at the door, and Lady Mabel's maid, putting her head in, declared that my Lord had come in and had already been some time in his dressing-room. "Good-bye, Lord Silverbridge," she said quite gaily, and rather more aloud than would have been necessary, had she not intended that the maid also should hear her. "Poor boy!" she said to herself as she was dressing. "Poor boy!" Then, when the evening was over she spoke to herself again about him. "Dear sweet boy!" And then she sat and thought. How was it that she was so old a woman, while he was so little more than a child? How fair he was, how far removed from conceit, how capable of being made into a man--in the process of time! What might not be expected from him if he could be kept in good hands for the next ten years! But in whose hands? What would she be in ten years, she who already seemed to know the town and all its belongings so well? And yet she was as young in years as he. He, as she knew, had passed his twenty-second birthday,--and so had she. That was all. It might be good for her that she should marry him. She was ambitious. And such a marriage would satisfy her ambition. Through her father's fault, and her brother's, she was likely to be poor. This man would certainly be rich. Many of those who were buzzing around her from day to day, were distasteful to her. From among them she knew that she could not take a husband, let their rank and wealth be what it might. She was too fastidious, too proud, too prone to think that things should be with her as she liked them! This last was in all things pleasant to her. Though he was but a boy, there was a certain boyish manliness about him. The very way in which he had grasped at her hand and had then blushed ruby-red at his own daring, had gone far with her. How gracious he was to look at! Dear sweet boy! Love him? No;--she did not know that she loved him. That dream was over. She was sure however that she liked him. But how would it be with him? It might be well for her to become his wife, but could it be well for him that he should become her husband? Did she not feel that it would be better for him that he should become a man before he married at all? Perhaps so;--but then if she desisted would others desist? If she did not put out her bait would there not be other hooks,--others and worse? Would not such a one, so soft, so easy, so prone to be caught and so desirable for the catching, be sure to be made prey of by some snare? But could she love him? That a woman should not marry a man without loving him, she partly knew. But she thought she knew also that there must be exceptions. She would do her very best to love him. That other man should be banished from her very thoughts. She would be such a wife to him that he should never know that he lacked anything. Poor boy! Sweet dear boy! He, as he went away to his dinner, had his thoughts also about her. Of all the girls he knew she was the jolliest,--and of all his friends she was the pleasantest. As she was anxious that he should go to work in the House of Commons he would go to work there. As for loving her! Well;--of course he must marry someone, and why not Lady Mab as well as any one else? CHAPTER XVII The Derby An attendance at the Newmarket Second Spring Meeting had unfortunately not been compatible with the Silverbridge election. Major Tifto had therefore been obliged to look after the affair alone. "A very useful mare," as Tifto had been in the habit of calling a leggy, thoroughbred, meagre-looking brute named Coalition, was on this occasion confided to the Major's sole care and judgment. But Coalition failed, as coalitions always do, and Tifto had to report to his noble patron that they had not pulled off the event. It had been a match for four hundred pounds, made indeed by Lord Silverbridge, but made at the suggestion of Tifto;--and now Tifto wrote in a very bad humour about it. It had been altogether his Lordship's fault in submitting to carry two pounds more than Tifto had thought to be fair and equitable. The match had been lost. Would Lord Silverbridge be so good as to pay the money to Mr. Green Griffin and debit him, Tifto, with the share of his loss? We must acknowledge that the unpleasant tone of the Major's letter was due quite as much to the ill-usage he had received in reference to that journey to Silverbridge, as to the loss of the race. Within that little body there was a high-mounting heart, and that heart had been greatly wounded by his Lordship's treatment. Tifto had felt himself to have been treated like a servant. Hardly an excuse had even been made. He had been simply told that he was not wanted. He was apt sometimes to tell himself that he knew on which side his bread was buttered. But perhaps he hardly knew how best to keep the butter going. There was a little pride about him which was antagonistic to the best interests of such a trade as his. Perhaps it was well that he should inwardly suffer when injured. But it could not be well that he should declare to such men as Nidderdale, and Dolly Longstaff, and Popplecourt that he didn't mean to put up with that sort of thing. He certainly should not have spoken in this strain before Tregear. Of all men living he hated and feared him the most. And he knew that no other man loved Silverbridge as did Tregear. Had he been thinking of his bread-and-butter, instead of giving way to the mighty anger of his little bosom, he would have hardly declared openly at the club that he would let Lord Silverbridge know that he did not mean to stand any man's airs. But these extravagances were due perhaps to whisky-and-water, and that kind of intoxication which comes to certain men from momentary triumphs. Tifto could always be got to make a fool of himself when surrounded by three or four men of rank who, for the occasion, would talk to him as an equal. He almost declared that Coalition had lost his match because he had not been taken down to Silverbridge. "Tifto is in a deuce of a way with you," said Dolly Longstaff to the young member. "I know all about it," said Silverbridge, who had had an interview with his partner since the race. "If you don't take care he'll dismiss you." Silverbridge did not care much about this, knowing that words of wisdom did not ordinarily fall from the mouth of Dolly Longstaff. But he was more moved when his friend Tregear spoke to him. "I wish you knew the kind of things that fellow Tifto says behind your back." "As if I cared!" "But you ought to care." "Do you care what every fellow says about you?" "I care very much what those say whom I choose to live with me. Whatever Tifto might say about me would be quite indifferent to me, because we have nothing in common. But you and he are bound together." "We have a horse or two in common; that's all." "But that is a great deal. The truth is he's a nasty, brawling, boasting, ill-conditioned little reptile." Silverbridge of course did not acknowledge that this was true. But he felt it, and almost repented of his trust in Tifto. But still Prime Minister stood very well for the Derby. He was second favourite, the odds against him being only four to one. The glory of being part owner of a probable winner of the Derby was so much to him that he could not bring himself to be altogether angry with Tifto. There was no doubt that the horse's present condition was due entirely to Tifto's care. Tifto spent in these few days just before the race the greatest part of his time in the close vicinity of the horse, only running up to London now and then, as a fish comes up to the surface, for a breath of air. It was impossible that Lord Silverbridge should separate himself from the Major,--at any rate till after the Epsom meeting. He had paid the money for the match without a word of reproach to his partner, but still with a feeling that things were not quite as they ought to be. In money matters his father had been liberal, but not very definite. He had been told that he ought not to spend above two thousand pounds a year, and had been reminded that there was a house for him to use both in town and in the country. But he had been given to understand also that any application made to Mr. Morton, if not very unreasonable, would be attended with success. A solemn promise had been exacted from him that he would have no dealings with money-lenders;--and then he had been set afloat. There had been a rather frequent correspondence with Mr. Morton, who had once or twice submitted a total of the money paid on behalf of his correspondent. Lord Silverbridge, who imagined himself to be anything but extravagant, had wondered how the figures could mount up so rapidly. But the money needed was always forthcoming, and the raising of objections never seemed to be carried back beyond Mr. Morton. His promise to his father about the money-lenders had been scrupulously kept. As long as ready money can be made to be forthcoming without any charge for interest, a young man must be very foolish who will prefer to borrow it at twenty-five per cent. Now had come the night before the Derby, and it must be acknowledged that the young Lord was much fluttered by the greatness of the coming struggle. Tifto, having seen his horse conveyed to Epsom, had come up to London in order that he might dine with his partner and hear what was being said about the race at the Beargarden. The party dining there consisted of Silverbridge, Dolly Longstaff, Popplecourt, and Tifto. Nidderdale was to have joined them, but he told them on the day before, with a sigh, that domestic duties were too strong for him. Lady Nidderdale,--or if not Lady Nidderdale herself, then Lady Nidderdale's mother,--was so far potent over the young nobleman as to induce him to confine his Derby jovialities to the Derby Day. Another guest had also been expected, the reason for whose non-appearance must be explained somewhat at length. Lord Gerald Palliser, the Duke's second son, was at this time at Cambridge,--being almost as popular at Trinity as his brother had been at Christ Church. It was to him quite a matter of course that he should see his brother's horse run for the Derby. But, unfortunately, in this very year a stand was being made by the University pundits against a practice which they thought had become too general. For the last year or two it had been considered almost as much a matter of course that a Cambridge undergraduate should go to the Derby as that a Member of Parliament should do so. Against this three or four rigid disciplinarians had raised their voices,--and as a result, no young man up at Trinity could get leave to be away on the Derby pretext. Lord Gerald raged against the restriction very loudly. He at first proclaimed his intention of ignoring the college authorities altogether. Of course he would be expelled. But the order itself was to his thinking so absurd,--the idea that he should not see his brother's horse run was so extravagant,--that he argued that his father could not be angry with him for incurring dismissal in so excellent a cause. But his brother saw things in a different light. He knew how his father had looked at him when he had been sent away from Oxford, and he counselled moderation. Gerald should see the Derby, but should not encounter that heaviest wrath of all which comes from a man's not sleeping beneath his college roof. There was a train which left Cambridge at an early hour, and would bring him into London in time to accompany his friends to the race-course;--and another train, a special, which would take him down after dinner, so that he and others should reach Cambridge before the college gates were shut. The dinner at the Beargarden was very joyous. Of course the state of the betting in regard to Prime Minister was the subject generally popular for the night. Mr. Lupton came in, a gentleman well known in all fashionable circles, parliamentary, social, and racing, who was rather older than his company on this occasion, but still not so much so as to be found to be an incumbrance. Lord Glasslough too, and others joined them, and a good deal was said about the horse. "I never keep these things dark," said Tifto. "Of course he's an uncertain horse." "Most horses are," said Lupton. "Just so, Mr. Lupton. What I mean is, the Minister has got a bit of temper. But if he likes to do his best I don't think any three-year-old in England can get his nose past him." "For half a mile he'd be nowhere with the Provence filly," said Glasslough. "I'm speaking of a Derby distance, my Lord." "That's a kind of thing nobody really knows," said Lupton. "I've seen him 'ave his gallops," said the little man, who in his moments of excitement would sometimes fall away from that exact pronunciation which had been one of the studies of his life, "and have measured his stride. I think I know what pace means. Of course I'm not going to answer for the 'orse. He's a temper, but if things go favourably, no animal that ever showed on the Downs was more likely to do the trick. Is there any gentleman here who would like to bet me fifteen to one in hundreds against the two events,--the Derby and the Leger?" The desired odds were at once offered by Mr. Lupton, and the bet was booked. This gave rise to other betting, and before the evening was over Lord Silverbridge had taken three-and-a-half to one against his horse to such an extent that he stood to lose twelve hundred pounds. The champagne which he had drunk, and the news that Quousque, the first favourite, had so gone to pieces that now there was a question which was the first favourite, had so inflated him that, had he been left alone, he would almost have wagered even money on his horse. In the midst of his excitement there came to him a feeling that he was allowing himself to do just that which he had intended to avoid. But then the occasion was so peculiar! How often can it happen to a man in his life that he shall own a favourite for the Derby? The affair was one in which it was almost necessary that he should risk a little money. Tifto, when he got into his bed, was altogether happy. He had added whisky-and-water to his champagne, and feared nothing. If Prime Minister should win the Derby he would be able to pay all that he owed, and to make a start with money in his pocket. And then there would be attached to him all the infinite glory of being the owner of a winner of the Derby. The horse was run in his name. Thoughts as to great successes crowded themselves upon his heated brain. What might not be open to him? Parliament! The Jockey Club! The mastership of one of the crack shire packs! Might it not come to pass that he should some day become the great authority in England upon races, racehorses, and hunters? If he could be the winner of a Derby and Leger he thought that Glasslough and Lupton would snub him no longer, that even Tregear would speak to him, and that his pal the Duke's son would never throw him aside again. Lord Silverbridge had bought a drag with all its appendages. There was a coach, the four bay horses, the harness, and the two regulation grooms. When making this purchase he had condescended to say a word to his father on the subject. "Everybody belongs to the four-in-hand club now," said the son. "I never did," said the Duke. "Ah,--if I could be like you!" The Duke had said that he would think about it, and then had told Mr. Morton that he was to pay the bill for this new toy. He had thought about it, and had assured himself that driving a coach and four was at present regarded as a fitting amusement for young men of rank and wealth. He did not understand it himself. It seemed to him to be as unnatural as though a gentleman should turn blacksmith and make horseshoes for his amusement. Driving four horses was hard work. But the same might be said of rowing. There were men, he knew, who would spend their days standing at a lathe, making little boxes for their recreation. He did not sympathise with it. But the fact was so, and this driving of coaches was regarded with favour. He had been a little touched by that word his son had spoken. "Ah,--if I could be like you!" So he had given the permission; the drag, horses, harness, and grooms had come into the possession of Lord Silverbridge; and now they were put into requisition to take their triumphant owner and his party down to Epsom. Dolly Longstaff's team was sent down to meet them half-way. Gerald Palliser, who had come up from Cambridge that morning, was allowed to drive the first stage out of town to compensate him for the cruelty done to him by the University pundits. Tifto, with a cigar in his mouth, with a white hat and a blue veil, and a new light-coloured coat, was by no means the least happy of the party. How that race was run, and how both Prime Minister and Quousque were beaten by an outsider named Fishknife, Prime Minister, however, coming in a good second, the present writer having no aptitude in that way, cannot describe. Such, however, were the facts, and then Dolly Longstaff and Lord Silverbridge drove the coach back to London. The coming back was not so triumphant, though the young fellows bore their failure well. Dolly Longstaff had lost a "pot of money", Silverbridge would have to draw upon that inexhaustible Mr. Morton for something over two thousand pounds,--in regard to which he had no doubt as to the certainty with which the money would be forthcoming, but he feared that it would give rise to special notice from his father. Even the poor younger brother had lost a couple of hundred pounds, for which he would have to make his own special application to Mr. Morton. But Tifto felt it more than any one. The horse ought to have won. Fishknife had been favoured by such a series of accidents that the whole affair had been a miracle. Tifto had these circumstances at his fingers' ends, and in the course of the afternoon and evening explained them accurately to all who would listen to him. He had this to say on his own behalf,--that before the party had left the course their horse stood first favourite for the Leger. But Tifto was unhappy as he came back to town, and in spite of the lunch, which had been very glorious, sat moody and sometimes even silent within his gay apparel. "It was the unfairest start I ever saw," said Tifto, almost getting up from his seat on the coach so as to address Dolly and Silverbridge on the box. "What the ---- is the good of that?" said Dolly from the coach-box. "Take your licking and don't squeal." "That's all very well. I can take my licking as well as another man. But one has to look to the causes of these things. I never saw Peppermint ride so badly. Before he got round the corner I wished I'd been on the horse myself." "I don't believe it was Peppermint's fault a bit," said Silverbridge. "Well;--perhaps not. Only I did think that I was a pretty good judge of riding." Then Tifto again settled down into silence. But though much money had been lost, and a great deal of disappointment had to be endured by our party in reference to the Derby, the most injurious and most deplorable event in the day's history had not occurred yet. Dinner had been ordered at the Beargarden at seven,--an hour earlier than would have been named had it not been that Lord Gerald must be at the Eastern Counties Railway Station at nine P.M. An hour and a half for dinner and a cigar afterwards, and half an hour to get to the railway station would not be more than time enough. But of all men alive Dolly Longstaff was the most unpunctual. He did not arrive till eight. The others were not there before half-past seven, and it was nearly eight before any of them sat down. At half-past eight Silverbridge began to be very anxious about his brother, and told him that he ought to start without further delay. A hansom cab was waiting at the door, but Lord Gerald still delayed. He knew, he said, that the special would not start till half-past nine. There were a lot of fellows who were dining about everywhere, and they would never get to the station by the hour fixed. It became apparent to the elder brother that Gerald would stay altogether unless he were forced to go, and at last he did get up and pushed the young fellow out. "Drive like the very devil," he said to the cabman, explaining to him something of the circumstances. The cabman did do his best, but a cab cannot be made to travel from the Beargarden, which as all the world knows is close to St. James's Street, to Liverpool Street in the City in ten minutes. When Lord Gerald reached the station the train had started. At twenty minutes to ten the young man reappeared at the club. "Why on earth didn't you take a special for yourself?" exclaimed Silverbridge. "They wouldn't give me one." After that it was apparent to all of them that what had just happened had done more to ruffle our hero's temper than his failure and loss at the races. "I wouldn't have had it happen for any money you could name," said the elder brother to the younger, as he took him home to Carlton Terrace. "If they do send me down, what's the odds?" said the younger brother, who was not quite as sober as he might have been. "After what happened to me it will almost break the governor's heart," said the heir. CHAPTER XVIII One of the Results of the Derby On the following morning at about eleven Silverbridge and his brother were at breakfast at an hotel in Jermyn Street. They had slept in Carlton Terrace, but Lord Gerald had done so without the knowledge of the Duke. Lord Silverbridge, as he was putting himself to bed, had made up his mind to tell the story to the Duke at once, but when the morning came his courage failed him. The two young men therefore slunk out of the house, and as there was no breakfasting at the Beargarden they went to this hotel. They were both rather gloomy, but the elder brother was the more sad of the two. "I'd give anything I have in the world," he said, "that you hadn't come up at all." "Things have been so unfortunate!" "Why the deuce wouldn't you go when I told you?" "Who on earth would have thought that they'd have been so punctual? They never are punctual on the Great Eastern. It was an infernal shame. I think I shall go at once to Harnage and tell him all about it." Mr. Harnage was Lord Gerald's tutor. "But you've been in ever so many rows before." "Well,--I've been gated, and once when they'd gated me I came right upon Harnage on the bridge at King's." "What sort of a fellow is he?" "He used to be good-natured. Now he has taken ever so many crotchets into his head. It was he who began all this about none of the men going to the Derby." "Did you ask him yourself for leave?" "Yes. And when I told him about your owning Prime Minister he got savage and declared that was the very reason why I shouldn't go." "You didn't tell me that." "I was determined I would go. I wasn't going to be made a child of." At last it was decided that the two brothers should go down to Cambridge together. Silverbridge would be able to come back to London the same evening, so as to take his drag down to the Oaks on the Friday,--a duty from which even his present misery would not deter him. They reached Cambridge at about three, and Lord Silverbridge at once called at the Master's lodge and sent in his card. The Master of Trinity is so great that he cannot be supposed to see all comers, but on this occasion Lord Silverbridge was fortunate. With much trepidation he told his story. Such being the circumstances, could anything be done to moderate the vials of wrath which must doubtless be poured out over the head of his unfortunate brother? "Why come to me?" said the Master. "From what you say yourself, it is evident that you know that this must rest with the College tutor." "I thought, sir, if you would say a word." "Do you think it would be right that I should interfere for one special man, and that a man of special rank?" "Nobody thinks that would count for anything. But--" "But what?" asked the Master. "If you knew my father, sir!" "Everybody knows your father;--every Englishman I mean. Of course I know your father,--as a public man, and I know how much the country owes to him." "Yes, it does. But it is not that I mean. If you knew how this would,--would,--would break his heart." Then there came a tear into the young man's eye,--and there was something almost like a tear in the eye of the old man too. "Of course it was my fault. I got him to come. He hadn't the slightest intention of staying. I think you will believe what I say about that, sir." "I believe every word you say, my Lord." "I got into a row at Oxford. I daresay you heard. There never was anything so stupid. That was a great grief to my father,--a very great grief. It is so hard upon him because he never did anything foolish himself." "You should try to imitate him." Silverbridge shook his head. "Or at least not to grieve him." "That is it. He has got over the affair about me. As I'm the eldest son I've got into Parliament, and he thinks perhaps that all has been forgotten. An eldest son may, I fancy, be a greater ass than his younger brother." The Master could not but smile as he thought of the selection which had been made of a legislator. "But if Gerald is sent down, I don't know how he'll get over it." And now the tears absolutely rolled down the young man's face, so that he was forced to wipe them from his eyes. The Master was much moved. That a young man should pray for himself would be nothing to him. The discipline of the college was not in his hands, and such prayers would avail nothing with him. Nor would a brother praying simply for a brother avail much. A father asking for his son might be resisted. But the brother asking pardon for the brother on behalf of the father was almost irresistible. But this man had long been in a position in which he knew that no such prayers should ever prevail at all. In the first place it was not his business. If he did anything, it would only be by asking a favour when he knew that no favour should be granted;--and a favour which he of all men should not ask, because to him of all men it could not be refused. And then the very altitude of the great statesman whom he was invited to befriend,--the position of this Duke who had been so powerful and might be powerful again, was against any such interference. Of himself he might be sure that he would certainly have done this as readily for any Mr. Jones as for the Duke of Omnium; but were he to do it, it would be said of him that it had been done because the man was Duke of Omnium. There are positions exalted beyond the reach of benevolence, because benevolence would seem to be self-seeking. "Your father, if he were here," said he, "would know that I could not interfere." "And will he be sent down?" "I do not know all the circumstances. From your own showing the case seems to be one of great insubordination. To tell the truth, Lord Silverbridge, I ought not to have spoken to you on the subject at all." "You mean that I should not have spoken to you." "Well; I did not say so. And if you have been indiscreet I can pardon that. I wish I could have served you; but I fear that it is not in my power." Then Lord Silverbridge took his leave, and going to his brother's rooms waited there till Lord Gerald had returned from his interview with the tutor. "It's all up," said he, chucking down his cap, striving to be at his ease. "I may pack up and go--just where I please. He says that on no account will he have anything more to do with me. I asked him what I was to do, and he said that the governor had better take my name off the books of the college. I did ask whether I couldn't go over to Maclean." "Who is Maclean?" "One of the other tutors. But the brute only smiled." "He thought you meant it for chaff." "Well;--I suppose I did mean to show him that I was not going to be exterminated by him. He will write to the governor to-day. And you will have to talk to the governor." Yes! As Lord Silverbridge went back that afternoon to London he thought very much of that talking to the governor! Never yet had he been able to say anything very pleasant to "the governor." He had himself been always in disgrace at Eton, and had been sent away from Oxford. He had introduced Tregear into the family, which of all the troubles perhaps was the worst. He had changed his politics. He had spent more money than he ought to have done, and now at this very moment must ask for a large sum. And he had brought Gerald up to see the Derby, thereby causing him to be sent away from Cambridge! And through it all there was present to him a feeling that by no words which he could use would he be able to make his father understand how deeply he felt all this. He could not bring himself to see the Duke that evening, and the next morning he was sent for before he was out of bed. He found his father at breakfast with the tutor's letter before him. "Do you know anything about this?" asked the Duke very calmly. "Gerald ran up to see the Derby, and in the evening missed the train." "Mr. Harnage tells me that he had been expressly ordered not to go to these races." "I suppose he was, sir." Then there was silence between them for some minutes. "You might as well sit down and eat your breakfast," said the father. Then Lord Silverbridge did sit down and poured himself out a cup of tea. There was no servant in the room, and he dreaded to ring the bell. "Is there anything you want?" asked the Duke. There was a small dish of fried bacon on the table, and some cold mutton on the sideboard. Silverbridge, declaring that he had everything that was necessary, got up and helped himself to the cold mutton. Then again there was silence, during which the Duke crunched his toast and made an attempt at reading the newspaper. But, soon pushing that aside, he again took up Mr. Harnage's letter. Silverbridge watched every motion of his father as he slowly made his way through the slice of cold mutton. "It seems that Gerald is to be sent away altogether." "I fear so, sir." "He has profited by your example at Oxford. Did you persuade him to come to these races?" "I am afraid I did." "Though you knew the orders which had been given?" "I thought it was meant that he should not be away the night." "He had asked permission to go to the Derby and had been positively refused. Did you know that?" Silverbridge sat for some moments considering. He could not at first quite remember what he had known and what he had not known. Perhaps he entertained some faint hope that the question would be allowed to pass unanswered. He saw, however, from his father's eye that that was impossible. And then he did remember it all. "I suppose I did know it." "And you were willing to imperil your brother's position in life, and my happiness, in order that he might see a horse, of which I believe you call yourself part owner, run a race?" "I thought there would be no risk if he got back the same night. I don't suppose there is any good in my saying it, but I never was so sorry for anything in all my life. I feel as if I could go and hang myself." "That is absurd,--and unmanly," said the Duke. The expression of sorrow, as it had been made, might be absurd and unmanly, but nevertheless it had touched him. He was severe because he did not know how far his severity wounded. "It is a great blow,--another great blow! Races! A congregation of all the worst blackguards in the country mixed with the greatest fools." "Lord Cantrip was there," said Silverbridge; "and I saw Sir Timothy Beeswax." "If the presence of Sir Timothy be an allurement to you, I pity you indeed. I have nothing further to say about it. You have ruined your brother." He had been driven to further anger by this reference to one man whom he respected, and to another whom he despised. "Don't say that, sir." "What am I to say?" "Let him be an attaché, or something of that sort." "Do you believe it possible that he should pass any examination? I think that my children between them will bring me to the grave. You had better go now. I suppose you will want to be--at the races again." Then the young man crept out of the room, and going to his own part of the house shut himself up alone for nearly an hour. What had he better do to give his father some comfort? Should he abandon racing altogether, sell his share of Prime Minister and Coalition, and go in hard and strong for committees, debates, and divisions? Should he get rid of his drag, and resolve to read up parliamentary literature? He was resolved upon one thing at any rate. He would not go to the Oaks that day. And then he was resolved on another thing. He would call on Lady Mab Grex and ask her advice. He felt so disconsolate and insufficient for himself that he wanted advice from someone whom he could trust. He found Tifto, Dolly Longstaff, and one or two others at the stables, from whence it was intended that the drag should start. They were waiting, and rather angry because they had been kept waiting. But the news, when it came, was very sad indeed. "You wouldn't mind taking the team down and back yourself; would you, Dolly?" he said to Longstaff. "You aren't going!" said Dolly, assuming a look of much heroic horror. "No;--I am not going to-day." "What's up?" asked Popplecourt. "That's rather sudden; isn't it?" asked the Major. "Well; yes; I suppose it is sudden." "It's throwing us over a little, isn't it?" "Not that I see. You've got the trap and the horses." "Yes;--we've got the trap and the horses," said Dolly, "and I vote we make a start." "As you are not going yourself, perhaps I'd better drive your horses," said Tifto. "Dolly will take the team," said his Lordship. "Yes;--decidedly. I will take the team," said Dolly. "There isn't a deal of driving wanted on the road to Epsom, but a man should know how to hold his reins." This of course gave rise to some angry words, but Silverbridge did not stop to hear them. The poor Duke had no one to whom he could go for advice and consolation. When his son left him he turned to his newspaper, and tried to read it--in vain. His mind was too ill at ease to admit of political matters. He was greatly grieved by this new misfortune as to Gerald, and by Lord Silverbridge's propensity to racing. But though these sorrows were heavy, there was a sorrow heavier than these. Lady Cantrip had expressed an opinion almost in favour of Tregear--and had certainly expressed an opinion in favour of Mrs. Finn. The whole affair in regard to Mrs. Finn had been explained to her, and she had told the Duke that, according to her thinking, Mrs. Finn had behaved well! When the Duke, with an energy which was by no means customary with him, had asked that question, on the answer to which so much depended, "Should there have been a moment lost?" Lady Cantrip had assured him that not a moment had been lost. Mrs. Finn had at once gone to work, and had arranged that the whole affair should be told to him, the Duke, in the proper way. "I think she did," said Lady Cantrip, "what I myself should have done in similar circumstances." If Lady Cantrip was right, then must his apology to Mrs. Finn be ample and abject. Perhaps it was this feeling which at the moment was most vexatious to him. CHAPTER XIX "No; My Lord, I Do Not" Between two and three o'clock Lord Silverbridge, in spite of his sorrow, found himself able to eat his lunch at his club. The place was deserted, the Beargarden world having gone to the races. As he sat eating cold lamb and drinking soda-and-brandy he did confirm himself in certain modified resolutions, which might be more probably kept than those sterner laws of absolute renunciation to which he had thought of pledging himself in his half-starved morning condition. His father had spoken in very strong language against racing,--saying that those who went were either fools or rascals. He was sure that this was exaggerated. Half the House of Lords and two-thirds of the House of Commons were to be seen at the Derby; but no doubt there were many rascals and fools, and he could not associate with the legislators without finding himself among the fools and rascals. He would,--as soon as he could,--separate himself from the Major. And he would not bet. It was on that side of the sport that the rascals and the fools showed themselves. Of what service could betting be to him whom Providence had provided with all things wanted to make life pleasant? As to the drag, his father had in a certain measure approved of that, and he would keep the drag, as he must have some relaxation. But his great effort of all should be made in the House of Commons. He would endeavour to make his father perceive that he had appreciated that letter. He would always be in the House soon after four, and would remain there,--for, if possible, as long as the Speaker sat in the chair. He had already begun to feel that there was a difficulty in keeping his seat upon those benches. The half-hours there would be so much longer than elsewhere! An irresistible desire of sauntering out would come upon him. There were men the very sound of whose voices was already odious to him. There had come upon him a feeling in regard to certain orators, that when once they had begun there was no reason why they should ever stop. Words of some sort were always forthcoming, like spiders' webs. He did not think that he could learn to take a pleasure in sitting in the House; but he hoped that he might be man enough to do it, though it was not pleasant. He would begin to-day, instead of going to the Oaks. But before he went to the House he would see Lady Mabel Grex. And here it may be well to state that in making his resolutions as to a better life, he had considered much whether it would not be well for him to take a wife. His father had once told him that when he married, the house in Carlton Terrace should be his own. "I will be a lodger if you will have me," said the Duke; "or if your wife should not like that, I will find a lodging elsewhere." This had been in the sadness and tenderness which had immediately followed the death of the Duchess. Marriage would steady him. Were he a married man, Tifto would of course disappear. Upon the whole he thought it would be good that he should marry. And, if so, who could be so nice as Lady Mabel? That his father would be contented with Lady Mab, he was inclined to believe. There was no better blood in England. And Lady Mabel was known to be clever, beautiful, and, in her peculiar circumstances, very wise. He was aware, however, of a certain drawback. Lady Mabel as his wife would be his superior, and in some degree his master. Though not older she was wiser than he,--and not only wiser but more powerful also. And he was not quite sure but that she regarded him as a boy. He thought that she did love him,--or would do so if he asked her,--but that her love would be bestowed upon him as on an inferior creature. He was already jealous of his own dignity, and fearful lest he should miss the glory of being loved by this lovely one for his own sake,--for his own manhood, and his own gifts and his own character. And yet his attraction to her was so great that now in the day of his sorrow he could think of no solace but what was to be found in her company. "Not at the Oaks!" she said as soon as he was shown into the drawing-room. "No;--not at the Oaks. Lord Grex is there, I suppose?" "Oh yes;--that is a matter of course. Why are you a recreant?" "The House sits to-day." "How virtuous! Is it coming to that,--that when the House sits you will never be absent?" "That's the kind of life I'm going to lead. You haven't heard about Gerald?" "About your brother?" "Yes--you haven't heard?" "Not a word. I hope there is no misfortune." "But indeed there is,--a most terrible misfortune." Then he told the whole story. How Gerald had been kept in London, and how he had gone down to Cambridge,--all in vain; how his father had taken the matter to heart, telling him that he had ruined his brother; and how he, in consequence, had determined not to go to the races. "Then he said," continued Silverbridge, "that his children between them would bring him to his grave." "That was terrible." "Very terrible." "But what did he mean by that?" asked Lady Mabel, anxious to hear something about Lady Mary and Tregear. "Well; of course what I did at Oxford made him unhappy; and now there is this affair of Gerald's." "He did not allude to your sister?" "Yes he did. You have heard of all that. Tregear told you." "He told me something." "Of course my father does not like it." "Do you approve of it?" "No," said he--curtly and sturdily. "Why not? You like Tregear." "Certainly I like Tregear. He is the friend, among men, whom I like the best. I have only two real friends." "Who are they?" she asked, sinking her voice very low. "He is one;--and you are the other. You know that." "I hoped that I was one," she said. "But if you love Tregear so dearly, why do you not approve of him for your sister?" "I always knew it would not do." "But why not?" "Mary ought to marry a man of higher standing." "Of higher rank you mean. The daughters of Dukes have married commoners before." "It is not exactly that. I don't like to talk of it in that way. I knew it would make my father unhappy. In point of fact he can't marry her. What is the good of approving of a thing that is impossible?" "I wish I knew your sister. Is she--firm?" "Indeed she is." "I am not so sure that you are." "No," said he, after considering awhile; "nor am I. But she is not like Gerald or me. She is more obstinate." "Less fickle perhaps." "Yes, if you choose to call it fickle. I don't know that I am fickle. If I were in love with a girl I should be true to her." "Are you sure of that?" "Quite sure. If I were really in love with her I certainly should not change. It is possible that I might be bullied out of it." "But she will not be bullied out of it?" "Mary? No. That is just it. She will stick to it if he does." "I would if I were she. Where will you find any young man equal to Frank Tregear?" "Perhaps you mean to cut poor Mary out." "That isn't a nice thing for you to say, Lord Silverbridge. Frank is my cousin,--as indeed you are also; but it so happens that I have seen a great deal of him all my life. And, though I don't want to cut your sister out, as you so prettily say, I love him well enough to understand that any girl whom he loves ought to be true to him." So far what she said was very well, but she afterwards added a word which might have been wisely omitted. "Frank and I are almost beggars." "What an accursed thing money is," he exclaimed, jumping up from his chair. "I don't agree with you at all. It is a very comfortable thing." "How is anybody who has got it to know if anybody cares for him?" "You must find that out. There is such a thing I suppose as real sympathy." "You tell me to my face that you and Tregear would have been lovers only that you are both poor." "I never said anything of the kind." "And that he is to be passed on to my sister because it is supposed that she will have some money." "You are putting words into my mouth which I never spoke, and ideas into my mind which I never thought." "And of course I feel the same about myself. How can a fellow help it? I wish you had a lot of money, I know." "It is very kind of you;--but why?" "Well;--I can't explain myself," he said, blushing as was his wont. "I daresay it wouldn't make any difference." "It would make a great difference to me. As it is, having none, and knowing as I do that papa and Percival are getting things into a worse mess every day, I am obliged to hope that I may some day marry a man who has got an income." "I suppose so," said he, still blushing, but frowning at the same time. "You see I can be very frank with a real friend. But I am sure of myself in this,--that I will never marry a man I do not love. A girl needn't love a man unless she likes it, I suppose. She doesn't tumble into love as she does into the fire. It would not suit me to marry a poor man, and so I don't mean to fall in love with a poor man." "But you do mean to fall in love with a rich one?" "That remains to be seen, Lord Silverbridge. The rich man will at any rate have to fall in love with me first. If you know of any one you need not tell him to be too sure because he has a good income." "There's Popplecourt. He's his own master, and, fool as he is, he knows how to keep his money." "I don't want a fool. You must do better for me than Lord Popplecourt." "What do you say to Dolly Longstaff?" "He would be just the man, only he never would take the trouble to come out and be married." "Or Glasslough?" "I'm afraid he is cross, and wouldn't let me have my own way." "I can only think of one other;--but you would not take him." "Then you had better not mention him. It is no good crowding the list with impossibles." "I was thinking of--myself." "You are certainly one of the impossibles." "Why, Lady Mab?" "For twenty reasons. You are too young, and you are bound to oblige your father, and you are to be wedded to Parliament,--at any rate for the next ten years. And altogether it wouldn't do,--for a great many reasons." "I suppose you don't like me well enough?" "What a question to ask! No; my Lord, I do not. There; that's what you may call an answer. Don't you pretend to look offended, because if you do, I shall laugh at you. If you may have your joke surely I may have mine." "I don't see any joke in it." "But I do. Suppose I were to say the other thing. Oh, Lord Silverbridge, you do me so much honour! And now I come to think about it, there is no one in the world I am so fond of as you. Would that suit you?" "Exactly." "But it wouldn't suit me. There's papa. Don't run away." "It's ever so much past five," said the legislator, "and I had intended to be in the House more than an hour ago. Good-bye. Give my love to Miss Cassewary." "Certainly. Miss Cassewary is your most devoted friend. Won't you bring your sister to see me some day?" "When she is in town I will." "I should so like to know her. Good-bye." As he hurried down to the House in a hansom he thought over it all, and told himself that he feared it would not do. She might perhaps accept him, but if so, she would do it simply in order that she might become Duchess of Omnium. She might, he thought, have accepted him then, had she chosen. He had spoken plainly enough. But she had laughed at him. He felt that if she loved him, there ought to have been something of that feminine tremor, of that doubting, hesitating half-avowal of which he had perhaps read in novels, and which his own instincts taught him to desire. But there had been no tremor nor hesitating. "No; my Lord, I do not," she had said when he asked her to her face whether she liked him well enough to be his wife. "No; my Lord, I do not." It was not the refusal conveyed in these words which annoyed him. He did believe that if he were to press his suit with the usual forms she would accept him. But it was that there should be such a total absence of trepidation in her words and manner. Before her he blushed and hesitated and felt that he did not know how to express himself. If she would only have done the same, then there would have been an equality. Then he could have seized her in his arms and sworn that never, never, never would he care for any one but her. In truth he saw everything as it was only too truly. Though she might choose to marry him if he pressed his request, she would never subject herself to him as he would have the girl do whom he loved. She was his superior, and in every word uttered between them showed that it was so. But yet how beautiful she was;--how much more beautiful than any other thing he had ever seen! He sat on one of the high seats behind Sir Timothy Beeswax and Sir Orlando Drought, listening, or pretending to listen, to the speeches of three or four gentlemen respecting sugar, thinking of all this till half-past seven;--and then he went to dine with the proud consciousness of having done his duty. The forms and methods of the House were, he flattered himself, soaking into him gradually,--as his father had desired. The theory of legislation was sinking into his mind. The welfare of the nation depended chiefly on sugar. But he thought that, after all, his own welfare must depend on the possession of Mab Grex. CHAPTER XX "Then He Will Come Again" Lady Mabel, when her young lover left her, was for a time freed from the necessity of thinking about him by her father. He had returned from the Oaks in a very bad humour. Lord Grex had been very badly treated by his son, whom he hated worse than any one else in the world. On the Derby Day he had won a large sum of money, which had been to him at the time a matter of intense delight,--for he was in great want of money. But on this day he had discovered that his son and heir had lost more than he had won, and an arrangement had been suggested to him that his winnings should go to pay Percival's losings. This was a mode of settling affairs to which the Earl would not listen for a moment, had he possessed the power of putting a veto upon it. But there had been a transaction lately between him and his son with reference to the cutting off a certain entail under which money was to be paid to Lord Percival. This money had not yet been forthcoming, and therefore the Earl was constrained to assent. This was very distasteful to the Earl, and he came home therefore in a bad humour, and said a great many disagreeable things to his daughter. "You know, papa, if I could do anything I would." This she said in answer to a threat, which he had made often before and now repeated, of getting rid altogether of the house in Belgrave Square. Whenever he made this threat he did not scruple to tell her that the house had to be kept up solely for her welfare. "I don't see why the deuce you don't get married. You'll have to do it sooner or later." That was not a pleasant speech for a daughter to hear from her father. "As to that," she said, "it must come or not as chance will have it. If you want me to sign anything I will sign it;"--for she had been asked to sign papers, or in other words to surrender rights;--"but for that other matter it must be left to myself." Then he had been very disagreeable indeed. They dined out together,--of course with all the luxury that wealth can give. There was a well-appointed carriage to take them backwards and forwards to the next square, such as an Earl should have. She was splendidly dressed, as became an Earl's daughter, and he was brilliant with some star which had been accorded to him by his sovereign's grateful minister in return for staunch parliamentary support. No one looking at them could have imagined that such a father could have told such a daughter that she must marry herself out of the way because as an unmarried girl she was a burden. During the dinner she was very gay. To be gay was the habit,--we may almost say the work,--of her life. It so chanced that she sat between Sir Timothy Beeswax, who in these days was a very great man indeed, and that very Dolly Longstaff, whom Silverbridge in his irony had proposed to her as a fitting suitor for her hand. "Isn't Lord Silverbridge a cousin of yours?" asked Sir Timothy. "A very distant one." "He has come over to us, you know. It is such a triumph." "I was so sorry to hear it." This, however, as the reader knows, was a fib. "Sorry!" said Sir Timothy. "Surely Lord Grex's daughter must be a Conservative." "Oh yes;--I am a Conservative because I was born one. I think that people in politics should remain as they are born,--unless they are very wise indeed. When men come to be statesmen and all that kind of thing, of course they can change backwards and forwards." "I hope that is not intended for me, Lady Mabel." "Certainly not. I don't know enough about it to be personal." That, however, was again not quite true. "But I have the greatest possible respect for the Duke, and I think it a pity that he should be made unhappy by his son. Don't you like the Duke?" "Well;--yes;--in a way. He is a most respectable man; and has been a good public servant." "All our lot are ruined, you know," said Dolly, talking of the races. "Who are your lot, Mr. Longstaff?" "I'm one myself." "I suppose so." "I'm utterly smashed. Then there's Percival." "I hope he has not lost much. Of course you know he's my brother." "Oh laws;--so he is. I always put my foot in it. Well;--he has lost a lot. And so have Silverbridge and Tifto. Perhaps you don't know Tifto." "I have not the pleasure of knowing Mr. Tifto." "He is a major. I think you'd like Major Tifto. He's a sort of racing coach to Silverbridge. You ought to know Tifto. And Tregear is pretty nearly cleared out." "Mr. Tregear! Frank Tregear!" "I'm told he has been hit very heavy. I hope he's not a friend of yours, Lady Mabel." "Indeed he is;--a very dear friend and a cousin." "That's what I hear. He's very much with Silverbridge you know." "I cannot think that Mr. Tregear has lost money." "I hope he hasn't. I know I have. I wish someone would stick up for me, and say that it was impossible." "But that is not Mr. Tregear's way of living. I can understand that Lord Silverbridge or Percival should lose money." "Or me?" "Or you, if you like to say so." "Or Tifto?" "I don't know anything about Mr. Tifto." "Major Tifto." "Or Major Tifto;--what does it signify?" "No;--of course. We inferior people may lose our money just as we please. But a man who can look as clever as Mr. Tregear ought to win always." "I told you just now that he was a friend of mine." "But don't you think that he does look clever?" There could be no question but that Tregear, when he disliked his company, could show his dislike by his countenance; and it was not improbable that he had done so in the presence of Mr. Adolphus Longstaff. "Now tell the truth, Lady Mabel; does he not look conceited sometimes?" "He generally looks as if he knew what he was talking about, which is more than some other people do." "Of course he is a great deal more clever than I am. I know that. But I don't think even he can be so clever as he looks. 'Or you so stupid,' that's what you ought to say now." "Sometimes, Mr. Longstaff, I deny myself the pleasure of saying what I think." When all this was over she was very angry with herself for the anxiety she had expressed about Tregear. This Mr. Longstaff was, she thought, exactly the man to report all she had said in the public room at the club. But she had been annoyed by what she had heard as to her friend. She knew that he of all men should keep himself free from such follies. Those others had, as it were, a right to make fools of themselves. It had seemed so natural that the young men of her own class should dissipate their fortunes and their reputations by every kind of extravagance! Her father had done so, and she had never even ventured to hope that her brother would not follow her father's example. But Tregear, if he gave way to such follies as these, would soon fall headlong into a pit from which there would be no escape. And if he did fall, she knew herself well enough to be aware that she could not stifle, nor even conceal, the misery which this would occasion her. As long as he stood well before the world she would be well able to assume indifference. But were he to be precipitated into some bottomless misfortunes then she could only throw herself after him. She could see him marry, and smile,--and perhaps even like his wife. And while he was doing so, she could also marry, and resolve that the husband whom she took should be made to think that he had a loving wife. But were Frank to die,--then must she fall upon his body as though he had been known by all the world to be her lover. Something of this feeling came upon her now, when she heard that he had been betting and had been unfortunate. She had been unable so to subdue herself as to seem to be perfectly careless about it. She had begun by saying that she had not believed it;--but she had believed it. It was so natural that Tregear should have done as the others did with whom he lived! But then the misfortune would be to him so terrible,--so irremediable! The reader, however, may as well know at once that there was not a word of truth in the assertion. After the dinner she went home alone. There were other festivities to be attended, had she pleased to attend them; and poor Miss Cassewary was dressed ready to go with her as chaperone;--but Miss Cassewary was quite satisfied to be allowed to go to bed in lieu of Mrs. Montacute Jones's great ball. And she had gone to her bedroom when Lady Mabel went to her. "I am glad you are alone," she said, "because I want to speak to you." "Is anything wrong?" "Everything is wrong. Papa says he must give up this house." "He says that almost always when he comes back from the races, and very often when he comes back from the club." "Percival has lost ever so much." "I don't think my Lord will hamper himself for your brother." "I can't explain it, but there is some horrible money complication. It is hard upon you and me." "Who am I?" said Miss Cassewary. "About the dearest friend that ever a poor girl had. It is hard upon you,--and upon me. I have given up everything,--and what good have I done?" "It is hard, my dear." "But after all I do not care much for all that. The thing has been going on so long that one is used to it." "What is it then?" "Ah;--yes;--what is it? How am I to tell you?" "Surely you can tell me," said the old woman, putting out her hand so as to caress the arm of the younger one. "I could tell no one else; I am sure of that. Frank Tregear has taken to gambling,--like the rest of them." "Who says so?" "He has lost a lot of money at these races. A man who sat next me at dinner,--one of those stupid do-nothing fools that one meets everywhere,--told me so. He is one of the Beargarden set, and of course he knows all about it." "Did he say how much?" "How is he to pay anything? Of all things that men do this is the worst. A man who would think himself disgraced for ever if he accepted a present of money will not scruple to use all his wits to rob his friend of everything that he has by studying the run of cards or by watching the paces of some brutes of horses! And they consider themselves to be fine gentlemen! A real gentleman should never want the money out of another man's pocket;--should never think of money at all." "I don't know how that is to be helped, my dear. You have got to think of money." "Yes; I have to think of it, and do think of it; and because I do so I am not what I call a gentleman." "No;--my dear; you're a lady." "Psha! you know what I mean. I might have had the feelings of a gentleman as well as the best man that ever was born. I haven't; but I have never done anything so mean as gambling. Now I have got something else to tell you." "What is it? You do frighten me so when you look like that." "You may well be frightened,--for if this all comes round I shall very soon be able to dispense with you altogether. His Royal Highness Lord Silverbridge--" "What do you mean, Mabel?" "He's next door to a Royal Highness at any rate, and a much more topping man than most of them. Well then;--His Serene Highness the heir of the Duke of Omnium has done me the inexpressible honour of asking me--to marry him." "No!" "You may well say, No. And to tell the truth exactly, he didn't." "Then why do you say he did?" "I don't think he did quite ask me, but he gave me to understand that he would do so if I gave him any encouragement." "Did he mean it?" "Yes;--poor boy! He meant it. With a word;--with a look, he would have been down there kneeling. He asked me whether I liked him well enough. What do you think I did?" "What did you do?" "I spared him;--out of sheer downright Christian charity! I said to myself 'Love your neighbours.' 'Don't be selfish.' 'Do unto him as you would he should do unto you,'--that is, think of his welfare. Though I had him in my net, I let him go. Shall I go to heaven for doing that?" "I don't know," said Miss Cassewary, who was so much perturbed by the news she had heard as to be unable to come to any opinion on the point just raised. "Or mayn't I rather go to the other place? From how much embarrassment should I have relieved my father! What a friend I should have made for Percival! How much I might have been able to do for Frank! And then what a wife I should have made him!" "I think you would." "He'll never get another half so good; and he'll be sure to get one before long. It is a sort of tenderness that is quite inefficacious. He will become a prey, as I should have made him a prey. But where is there another who will treat him so well?" "I cannot bear to hear you speak of yourself in that way." "But it is true. I know the sort of girl he should marry. In the first place she should be two years younger, and four years fresher. She should be able not only to like him and love him, but to worship him. How well I can see her! She should have fair hair, and bright green-gray eyes, with the sweetest complexion, and the prettiest little dimples;--two inches shorter than me, and the delight of her life should be to hang with two hands on his arm. She should have a feeling that her Silverbridge is an Apollo upon earth. To me he is a rather foolish, but very, very sweet-tempered young man;--anything rather than a god. If I thought that he would get the fresh young girl with the dimples then I ought to abstain." "If he was in earnest," said Miss Cassewary, throwing aside all this badinage and thinking of the main point, "if he was in earnest he will come again." "He was quite in earnest." "Then he will come again." "I don't think he will," said Lady Mabel. "I told him that I was too old for him, and I tried to laugh him out of it. He does not like being laughed at. He has been saved, and he will know it." "But if he should come again?" "I shall not spare him again. No;--not twice. I felt it to be hard to do so once, because I so nearly love him! There are so many of them who are odious to me, as to whom the idea of marrying them seems to be mixed somehow with an idea of suicide." "Oh, Mabel!" "But he is as sweet as a rose. If I were his sister, or his servant, or his dog, I could be devoted to him. I can fancy that his comfort and his success and his name should be everything to me." "That is what a wife ought to feel." "But I could never feel him to be my superior. That is what a wife ought in truth to feel. Think of those two young men and the difference between them! Well;--don't look like that at me. I don't often give way, and I dare say after all I shall live to be the Duchess of Omnium." Then she kissed her friend and went away to her own room. CHAPTER XXI Sir Timothy Beeswax There had lately been a great Conservative reaction in the country, brought about in part by the industry and good management of gentlemen who were strong on that side;--but due also in part to the blunders and quarrels of their opponents. That these opponents should have blundered and quarrelled, being men active and in earnest, was to have been expected. Such blunderings and quarrellings have been a matter of course since politics have been politics, and since religion has been religion. When men combine to do nothing, how should there be disagreement? When men combine to do much, how should there not be disagreement? Thirty men can sit still, each as like the other as peas. But put your thirty men up to run a race, and they will soon assume different forms. And in doing nothing, you can hardly do amiss. Let the doers of nothing have something of action forced upon them, and they, too, will blunder and quarrel. The wonder is that there should ever be in a reforming party enough of consentaneous action to carry any reform. The reforming or Liberal party in British politics had thus stumbled,--and stumbled till it fell. And now there had been a great Conservative reaction! Many of the most Liberal constituencies in the country had been untrue to their old political convictions. And, as the result, Lord Drummond was Prime Minister in the House of Lords,--with Sir Timothy Beeswax acting as first man in the House of Commons. It cannot be denied that Sir Timothy had his good points as a politician. He was industrious, patient, clear-sighted, intelligent, courageous, and determined. Long before he had had a seat in the House, when he was simply making his way up to the probability of a seat by making a reputation as an advocate, he had resolved that he would be more than an Attorney-General, more than a judge,--more, as he thought it, than a Chief Justice; but at any rate something different. This plan he had all but gained,--and it must be acknowledged that he had been moved by a grand and manly ambition. But there were drawbacks to the utility and beauty of Sir Timothy's character as a statesman. He had no idea as to the necessity or non-necessity of any measure whatever in reference to the well-being of the country. It may, indeed, be said that all such ideas were to him absurd, and the fact that they should be held by his friends and supporters was an inconvenience. He was not in accord with those who declare that a Parliament is a collection of windbags which puff, and blow, and crack to the annoyance of honest men. But to him Parliament was a debating place, by having a majority in which, and by no other means, he,--or another,--might become the great man of the day. By no other than parliamentary means could such a one as he come to be the chief man. And this use of Parliament, either on his own behalf or on behalf of others, had been for so many years present to his mind, that there seemed to be nothing absurd in an institution supported for such a purpose. Parliament was a club so eligible in its nature that all Englishmen wished to belong to it. They who succeeded were acknowledged to be the cream of the land. They who dominated in it were the cream of the cream. Those two who were elected to be the chiefs of the two parties had more of cream in their composition than any others. But he who could be the chief of the strongest party, and who therefore, in accordance with the prevailing arrangements of the country, should have the power of making dukes, and bestowing garters and appointing bishops, he who by attaining the first seat should achieve the right of snubbing all before him, whether friends or foes, he, according to the feelings of Sir Timothy, would have gained an Elysium of creaminess not to be found in any other position on the earth's surface. No man was more warmly attached to parliamentary government than Sir Timothy Beeswax; but I do not think that he ever cared much for legislation. Parliamentary management was his forte. There have been various rocks on which men have shattered their barks in their attempts to sail successfully into the harbours of parliamentary management. There is the great Senator who declares to himself that personally he will have neither friend nor foe. There is his country before him and its welfare. Within his bosom is the fire of patriotism, and within his mind the examples of all past time. He knows that he can be just, he teaches himself to be eloquent, and he strives to be wise. But he will not bend;--and at last, in some great solitude, though closely surrounded by those whose love he had neglected to acquire,--he breaks his heart. Then there is he who seeing the misfortune of that great one, tells himself that patriotism, judgment, industry, and eloquence will not suffice for him unless he himself can be loved. To do great things a man must have a great following, and to achieve that he must be popular. So he smiles and learns the necessary wiles. He is all for his country and his friends,--but for his friends first. He too must be eloquent and well instructed in the ways of Parliament, must be wise and diligent; but in all that he does and all that he says he must first study his party. It is well with him for a time;--but he has closed the door of his Elysium too rigidly. Those without gradually become stronger than his friends within, and so he falls. But may not the door be occasionally opened to an outsider, so that the exterior force be diminished? We know how great is the pressure of water; and how the peril of an overwhelming weight of it may be removed by opening the way for a small current. There comes therefore the Statesman who acknowledges to himself that he will be pregnable. That, as a Statesman, he should have enemies is a matter of course. Against moderate enemies he will hold his own. But when there comes one immoderately forcible, violently inimical, then to that man he will open his bosom. He will tempt into his camp with an offer of high command any foe that may be worth his purchase. This too has answered well; but there is a Nemesis. The loyalty of officers so procured must be open to suspicion. The man who has said bitter things against you will never sit at your feet in contented submission, nor will your friend of old standing long endure to be superseded by such converts. All these dangers Sir Timothy had seen and studied, and for each of them he had hoped to be able to provide an antidote. Love cannot do all. Fear may do more. Fear acknowledges a superior. Love desires an equal. Love is to be created by benefits done, and means gratitude, which we all know to be weak. But hope, which refers itself to benefits to come, is of all our feelings the strongest. And Sir Timothy had parliamentary doctrines concealed in the depths of his own bosom more important even than these. The Statesman who falls is he who does much, and thus injures many. The Statesman who stands the longest is he who does nothing and injures no one. He soon knew that the work which he had taken in hand required all the art of a great conjuror. He must be possessed of tricks so marvellous that not even they who sat nearest to him might know how they were performed. For the executive or legislative business of the country he cared little. The one should be left in the hands of men who liked work;--of the other there should be little, or, if possible, none. But Parliament must be managed,--and his party. Of patriotism he did not know the meaning;--few, perhaps, do, beyond a feeling that they would like to lick the Russians, or to get the better of the Americans in a matter of fisheries or frontiers. But he invented a pseudo-patriotic conjuring phraseology which no one understood but which many admired. He was ambitious that it should be said of him that he was far-and-away the cleverest of his party. He knew himself to be clever. But he could only be far-and-away the cleverest by saying and doing that which no one could understand. If he could become master of some great hocus-pocus system which could be made to be graceful to the ears and eyes of many, which might for awhile seem to have within it some semi-divine attribute, which should have all but divine power of mastering the loaves and fishes, then would they who followed him believe in him more firmly than other followers who had believed in their leaders. When you see a young woman read a closed book placed on her dorsal vertebræ,--if you do believe that she so reads it, you think that she is endowed with a wonderful faculty! And should you also be made to believe that the same young woman had direct communication with Abraham, by means of some invisible wire, you would be apt to do a great many things as that young woman might tell you. Conjuring, when not known to be conjuring, is very effective. Much, no doubt, of Sir Timothy's power had come from his praiseworthy industry. Though he cared nothing for the making of laws, though he knew nothing of finance, though he had abandoned his legal studies, still he worked hard. And because he had worked harder in a special direction than others around him, therefore he was enabled to lead them. The management of a party is a very great work in itself; and when to that is added the management of the House of Commons, a man has enough upon his hands even though he neglects altogether the ordinary pursuits of a Statesman. Those around Sir Timothy were fond of their party; but they were for the most part men who had not condescended to put their shoulders to the wheel as he had done. Had there been any very great light among them, had there been a Pitt or a Peel, Sir Timothy would have probably become Attorney-General and have made his way to the bench;--but there had been no Pitt and no Peel, and he had seen his opening. He had studied the ways of Members. Parliamentary practice had become familiar to him. He had shown himself to be ready at all hours to fight the battle of the party he had joined. And no man knew so well as did Sir Timothy how to elevate a simple legislative attempt into a good faction fight. He had so mastered his tricks of conjuring that no one could get to the bottom of them, and had assumed a look of preternatural gravity which made many young Members think that Sir Timothy was born to be a king of men. There were no doubt some among his older supporters who felt their thraldom grievously. There were some lords in the Upper House and some sons of the lords in the Lower,--with pedigrees going back far enough for pride,--who found it irksome to recognise Sir Timothy as a master. No doubt he had worked very hard, and had worked for them. No doubt he knew how to do the work, and they did not. There was no other man among them to whom the lead could be conveniently transferred. But yet they were uncomfortable,--and perhaps a little ashamed. It had arisen partly from this cause, that there had been something of a counter-reaction at the last general election. When the Houses met, the Ministers had indeed a majority, but a much lessened majority. The old Liberal constituencies had returned to an expression of their real feeling. This reassertion of the progress of the tide, this recovery from the partial ebb which checks the violence of every flow, is common enough in politics; but at the present moment there were many who said that all this had been accelerated by a feeling in the country that Sir Timothy was hardly all that the country required as the leader of the country party. CHAPTER XXII The Duke in His Study It was natural that at such a time, when success greater than had been expected had attended the efforts of the Liberals, when some dozen unexpected votes had been acquired, the leading politicians of that party should have found themselves compelled to look about them and see how these good things might be utilised. In February they certainly had not expected to be called to power in the course of the existing Session. Perhaps they did not expect it yet. There was still a Conservative majority,--though but a small majority. But the strength of the minority consisted, not in the fact that the majority against them was small, but that it was decreasing. How quickly does the snowball grow into hugeness as it is rolled on,--but when the change comes in the weather how quickly does it melt, and before it is gone become a thing ugly, weak, and formless! Where is the individual who does not assert to himself that he would be more loyal to a falling than to a rising friend? Such is perhaps the nature of each one of us. But when any large number of men act together, the falling friend is apt to be deserted. There was a general feeling among politicians that Lord Drummond's ministry,--or Sir Timothy's--was failing, and the Liberals, though they could not yet count the votes by which they might hope to be supported in power, nevertheless felt that they ought to be looking to their arms. There had been a coalition. They who are well read in the political literature of their country will remember all about that. It had perhaps succeeded in doing that for which it had been intended. The Queen's government had been carried on for two or three years. The Duke of Omnium had been the head of that Ministry; but during those years had suffered so much as to have become utterly ashamed of the coalition,--so much as to have said often to himself that under no circumstances would he again join any Ministry. At this time there was no idea of another coalition. That is a state of things which cannot come about frequently,--which can only be reproduced by men who have never hitherto felt the mean insipidity of such a condition. But they who had served on the Liberal side in that coalition must again put their shoulders to the wheel. Of course it was in every man's mouth that the Duke must be induced to forget his miseries and once more to take upon himself the duties of an active servant of the State. But they who were most anxious on the subject, such men as Lord Cantrip, Mr. Monk, our old friend Phineas Finn, and a few others, were almost afraid to approach him. At the moment when the coalition was broken up he had been very bitter in spirit, apparently almost arrogant, holding himself aloof from his late colleagues,--and since that, troubles had come to him, which had aggravated the soreness of his heart. His wife had died, and he had suffered much through his children. What Lord Silverbridge had done at Oxford was matter of general conversation, and also what he had not done. That the heir of the family should have become a renegade in politics was supposed greatly to have affected the father. Now Lord Gerald had been expelled from Cambridge, and Silverbridge was on the turf in conjunction with Major Tifto! Something, too, had oozed out into general ears about Lady Mary,--something which should have been kept secret as the grave. It had therefore come to pass that it was difficult even to address the Duke. There was one man, and but one, who could do this with ease to himself;--and that man was at last put into motion at the instance of the leaders of the party. The old Duke of St. Bungay wrote the following letter to the Duke of Omnium. The letter purported to be an excuse for the writer's own defalcation. But the chief object of the writer was to induce the younger Duke once more to submit to harness. Longroyston, 3rd June, 187--. DEAR DUKE OF OMNIUM, How quickly the things come round! I had thought that I should never again have been called upon even to think of the formation of another Liberal Ministry; and now, though it was but yesterday that we were all telling ourselves that we were thoroughly manumitted from our labours by the altered opinions of the country, sundry of our old friends are again putting their heads together. Did they not do so they would neglect a manifest duty. Nothing is more essential to the political well-being of the country than that the leaders on both sides in politics should be prepared for their duties. But for myself, I am bound at last to put in the old plea with a determination that it shall be respected. "Solve senescentem." It is now, if I calculate rightly, exactly fifty years since I first entered public life in obedience to the advice of Lord Grey. I had then already sat five years in the House of Commons. I assisted humbly in the emancipation of the Roman Catholics, and have learned by the legislative troubles of just half a century that those whom we then invited to sit with us in Parliament have been in all things our worst enemies. But what then? Had we benefited only those who love us, would not the sinners also,--or even the Tories,--have done as much as that? But such memories are of no avail now. I write to say that after so much of active political life, I will at last retire. My friends when they see me inspecting a pigsty or picking a peach are apt to remind me that I can still stand on my legs, and with more of compliment than of kindness will argue therefore that I ought still to undertake active duties in Parliament. I can select my own hours for pigs and peaches, and should I, through the dotage of age, make mistakes as to the breeding of the one or the flavour of the other, the harm done will not go far. In politics I have done my work. What you and others in the arena do will interest me more than all other things of this world, I think and hope, to my dying day. But I will not trouble the workers with the querulousness of old age. So much for myself. And now let me, as I go, say a parting word to him with whom in politics I have been for many years more in accord than with any other leading man. As nothing but age or infirmity would to my own mind have justified me in retiring, so do I think that you, who can plead neither age nor infirmity, will find yourself at last to want self-justification, if you permit yourself to be driven from the task either by pride or by indifference. I should express my feelings better were I to say by pride and diffidence. I look to our old friendship, to the authority given to me by my age, and to the thorough goodness of your heart for pardon in thus accusing you. That little men should have ventured to ill-use you, has hurt your pride. That these little men should have been able to do so has created your diffidence. Put you to a piece of work that a man may do, you have less false pride as to the way in which you may do it than any man I have known; and, let the way be open to you, as little diffidence as any. But in this political mill of ours in England, a man cannot always find the way open to do things. It does not often happen that an English statesman can go in and make a great score off his own bat. But not the less is he bound to play the game and to go to the wicket when he finds that his time has come. There are, I think, two things for you to consider in this matter, and two only. The first is your capacity, and the other is your duty. A man may have found by experience that he is unfitted for public life. You and I have known men in regard to whom we have thoroughly wished that such experience had been reached. But this is a matter in which a man who doubts himself is bound to take the evidence of those around him. The whole party is most anxious for your co-operation. If this be so,--and I make you the assurance from most conclusive evidence,--you are bound to accept the common consent of your political friends on that matter. You perhaps think that at a certain period of your life you failed. They all agree with me that you did not fail. It is a matter on which you should be bound by our opinion rather than by your own. As to that matter of duty I shall have less difficulty in carrying you with me. Though this renewed task may be personally disagreeable to you, even though your tastes should lead you to some other life,--which I think is not the case,--still if your country wants you, you should serve your country. It is a work as to which such a one as you has no option. Of most of those who choose public life,--it may be said that were they not there, there would be others as serviceable. But when a man such as you has shown himself to be necessary, as long as health and age permit he cannot recede without breach of manifest duty. The work to be done is so important, the numbers to be benefited are so great, that he cannot be justified in even remembering that he has a self. As I have said before, I trust that my own age and your goodness will induce you to pardon this great interference. But whether pardoned or not I shall always be Your most affectionate friend, ST. BUNGAY. The Duke,--our Duke,--on reading this letter was by no means pleased by its contents. He could ill bear to be reminded either of his pride or of his diffidence. And yet the accusations which others made against him were as nothing to those with which he charged himself. He would do this till at last he was forced to defend himself against himself by asking himself whether he could be other than as God had made him. It is the last and the poorest makeshift of a defence to which a man can be brought in his own court! Was it his fault that he was so thin-skinned that all things hurt him? When some coarse man said to him that which ought not to have been said, was it his fault that at every word a penknife had stabbed him? Other men had borne these buffets without shrinking, and had shown themselves thereby to be more useful, much more efficacious; but he could no more imitate them than he could procure for himself the skin of a rhinoceros or the tusk of an elephant. And this shrinking was what men called pride,--was the pride of which his old friend wrote! "Have I ever been haughty, unless in my own defence?" he asked himself, remembering certain passages of humility in his life,--and certain passages of haughtiness also. And the Duke told him also that he was diffident. Of course he was diffident. Was it not one and the same thing? The very pride of which he was accused was no more than that shrinking which comes from the want of trust in oneself. He was a shy man. All his friends and all his enemies knew that;--it was thus that he still discoursed with himself;--a shy, self-conscious, timid, shrinking, thin-skinned man! Of course he was diffident. Then why urge him on to tasks for which he was by nature unfitted? And yet there was much in his old friend's letter which moved him. There were certain words which he kept on repeating to himself. "He cannot be justified in even remembering that he has a self." It was a hard thing to say of any man, but yet a true thing of such a man as his correspondent had described. His correspondent had spoken of a man who should know himself to be capable of serving the State. If a man were capable, and was sure within his own bosom of his own capacity, it would be his duty. But what if he were not so satisfied? What if he felt that any labours of his would be vain, and all self-abnegation useless? His friend had told him that on that matter he was bound to take the opinion of others. Perhaps so. But if so, had not that opinion been given to him very plainly when he was told that he was both proud and diffident? That he was called upon to serve his country by good service, if such were within his power, he did acknowledge freely; but not that he should allow himself to be stuck up as a ninepin only to be knocked down! There are politicians for whom such occupation seems to be proper;--and who like it too. A little office, a little power, a little rank, a little pay, a little niche in the ephemeral history of the year will reward many men adequately for being knocked down. And yet he loved power, and even when thinking of all this allowed his mind from time to time to run away into a dreamland of prosperous political labours. He thought what it would be to be an all-beneficent Prime Minister, with a loyal majority, with a well-conditioned unanimous cabinet, with a grateful people, and an appreciative Sovereign. How well might a man spend himself night and day, even to death, in the midst of labours such as these. Half an hour after receiving the Duke's letter he suddenly jumped up and sat himself down at his desk. He felt it to be necessary that he should at once write to his old friend;--and the more necessary that he should do so at once, because he had resolved that he would do so before he had made up his mind on the chief subject of that letter. It did not suit him to say either that he would or that he would not do as his friend advised him. The reply was made in a very few words. "As to myself," he said, after expressing his regret that the Duke should find it necessary to retire from public life--"as to myself, pray understand that whatever I may do I shall never cease to be grateful for your affectionate and high-spirited counsels." Then his mind recurred to a more immediate and, for the moment, a heavier trouble. He had as yet given no answer to that letter from Mrs. Finn, which the reader will perhaps remember. It might indeed be passed over without an answer; but to him that was impossible. She had accused him in the very strongest language of injustice, and had made him understand that if he were unjust to her, then would he be most ungrateful. He, looking at the matter with his own lights, had thought that he had been right, but had resolved to submit the question to another person. As judge in the matter he had chosen Lady Cantrip, and Lady Cantrip had given judgment against him. He had pressed Lady Cantrip for a decided opinion, and she had told him that she, in the same position, would have done just as Mrs. Finn had done. He had constituted Lady Cantrip his judge, and had resolved that her judgment should be final. He declared to himself that he did not understand it. If a man's house be on fire, do you think of certain rules of etiquette before you bid him send for the engines? If a wild beast be loose, do you go through some ceremony before you caution the wanderers abroad? There should not have been a moment! But, nevertheless, it was now necessary that he should conform himself to the opinion of Lady Cantrip, and in doing so he must apologise for the bitter scorn with which he had allowed himself to treat his wife's most loyal and loving friend. The few words to the Duke had not been difficult, but this letter seemed to be an Herculean task. It was made infinitely more difficult by the fact that Lady Cantrip had not seemed to think that this marriage was impossible. "Young people when they have set their minds upon it do so generally prevail at last!" These had been her words, and they discomforted him greatly. She had thought the marriage to be possible. Had she not almost expressed an opinion that they ought to be allowed to marry? And if so, would it not be his duty to take his girl away from Lady Cantrip? As to the idea that young people, because they have declared themselves to be in love, were to have just what they wanted,--with that he did not agree at all. Lady Cantrip had told him that young people generally did prevail at last. He knew the story of one young person, whose position in her youth had been very much the same as that of his daughter now, and she had not prevailed. And in her case had not the opposition which had been made to her wishes been most fortunate? That young person had become his wife, his Glencora, his Duchess. Had she been allowed to have her own way when she was a child, what would have been her fate? Ah what! Then he had to think of it all. Might she not have been alive now, and perhaps happier than she had ever been with him? And had he remained always unmarried, devoted simply to politics, would not the troubles of the world have been lighter on him? But what had that to do with it? In these matters it was not the happiness of this or that individual which should be considered. There is a propriety in things;--and only by an adherence to that propriety on the part of individuals can the general welfare be maintained. A King in this country, or the heir or the possible heir to the throne, is debarred from what might possibly be a happy marriage by regard to the good of his subjects. To the Duke's thinking the maintenance of the aristocracy of the country was second only in importance to the maintenance of the Crown. How should the aristocracy be maintained if its wealth were allowed to fall into the hands of an adventurer! Such were the opinions with regard to his own order of one who was as truly Liberal in his ideas as any man in England, and who had argued out these ideas to their consequences. As by the spread of education and increase of general well-being every proletaire was brought nearer to a Duke, so by such action would the Duke be brought nearer to a proletaire. Such drawing-nearer of the classes was the object to which all this man's political action tended. And yet it was a dreadful thing to him that his own daughter should desire to marry a man so much beneath her own rank and fortune as Frank Tregear. He would not allow himself to believe that the young people could ever prevail; but nevertheless, as the idea of the thing had not alarmed Lady Cantrip as it had him, it was necessary that he should make some apology to Mrs. Finn. Each moment of procrastination was a prick to his conscience. He now therefore dragged out from the secrecy of some close drawer Mrs. Finn's letter and read it through to himself once again. Yes--it was true that he had condemned her, and that he had punished her. Though he had done nothing to her, and said nothing, and written but very little, still he had punished her most severely. She had written as though the matter was almost one of life and death to her. He could understand that too. His uncle's conduct to this woman, and his wife's, had created the intimacy which had existed. Through their efforts she had become almost as one of the family. And now to be dismissed, like a servant who had misbehaved herself! And then her arguments in her own defence were all so good,--if only that which Lady Cantrip had laid down as law was to be held as law. He was aware now that she had had no knowledge of the matter till his daughter had told her of the engagement at Matching. Then it was evident also that she had sent this Tregear to him immediately on her return to London. And at the end of the letter she accused him of what she had been pleased to call his usual tenacity in believing ill of her! He had been obstinate,--too obstinate in this respect, but he did not love her the better for having told him of it. At last he did put his apology into words. MY DEAR MRS. FINN, I believe I had better acknowledge to you at once that I have been wrong in my judgment as to your conduct in a certain matter. You tell me that I owe it to you to make this acknowledgment,--and I make it. The subject is, as you may imagine, so painful that I will spare myself, if possible, any further allusion to it. I believe I did you a wrong, and therefore I write to ask your pardon. I should perhaps apologise also for delay in my reply. I have had much to think of in this matter, and have many others also on my mind. Believe me to be, Yours faithfully, OMNIUM. It was very short, and as being short was infinitely less troublesome at the moment than a fuller epistle; but he was angry with himself, knowing that it was too short, feeling that it was ungracious. He should have expressed a hope that he might soon see her again,--only he had no such wish. There had been times at which he had liked her, but he knew that he did not like her now. And yet he was bound to be her friend! If he could only do some great thing for her, and thus satisfy his feeling of indebtedness towards her! But all the favours had been from her to him and his. CHAPTER XXIII Frank Tregear Wants a Friend Six or seven weeks had passed since Tregear had made his communication to the Duke, and during that time he had heard not a word about the girl he loved. He knew, indeed, that she was at The Horns, and probably had reason to suppose that she was being guarded there, as it were, out of his reach. This did not surprise him; nor did he regard it as a hardship. It was to be expected that she should be kept out of his sight. But this was a state of things to which, as he thought, there should not be more than a moderate amount of submission. Six weeks was not a very long period, but it was perhaps long enough for evincing that respect which he owed to the young lady's father. Something must be done some day. How could he expect her to be true to him unless he took some means of showing himself to be true to her? In these days he did not live very much with her brother. He not only disliked, but distrusted Major Tifto, and had so expressed himself as to give rise to angry words. Silverbridge had said that he knew how to take care of himself. Tregear had replied that he had his doubts on that matter. Then the Member of Parliament had declared that at any rate he did not intend to be taken care of by Frank Tregear! In such a state of things it was not possible that there should be any close confidence as to Lady Mary. Nor does it often come to pass that the brother is the confidant of the sister's lover. Brothers hardly like their sisters to have lovers, though they are often well satisfied that their sisters should find husbands. Tregear's want of rank and wealth added something to this feeling in the mind of this brother; so that Silverbridge, though he felt himself to be deterred by friendship from any open opposition, still was almost inimical. "It won't do, you know," he had said to his brother Gerald, shaking his head. Tregear, however, was determined to be active in the matter, to make some effort, to speak to somebody. But how to make an effort,--and to whom should he speak? Thinking of all this he remembered that Mrs. Finn had sent for him and had told him to go with his love story to the Duke. She had been almost severe with him;--but after the interview was over, he had felt that she had acted well and wisely. He therefore determined that he would go to Mrs. Finn. She had as yet received no answer from the Duke, though nearly a fortnight had elapsed since she had written her letter. During that time she had become very angry. She felt that he was not treating her as a gentleman should treat a lady, and certainly not as the husband of her late friend should have treated the friend of his late wife. She had a proud consciousness of having behaved well to the Pallisers, and now this head of the Pallisers was rewarding her by evil treatment. She had been generous; he was ungenerous. She had been honest; he was deficient even in that honesty for which she had given him credit. And she had been unable to obtain any of that consolation which could have come to her from talking of her wrongs. She could not complain to her husband, because there were reasons that made it essential that her husband should not quarrel with the Duke. She was hot with indignation at the very moment in which Tregear was announced. He began by apologising for his intrusion, and she of course assured him that he was welcome. "After the liberty which I took with you, Mr. Tregear, I am only too well pleased that you should come to see me." "I am afraid," he said, "that I was a little rough." "A little warm;--but that was to be expected. A gentleman never likes to be interfered with on such a matter." "The position was and is difficult, Mrs. Finn." "And I am bound to acknowledge the very ready way in which you did what I asked you to do." "And now, Mrs. Finn, what is to come next?" "Ah!" "Something must be done! You know of course that the Duke did not receive me with any great favour." "I did not suppose he would." "Nor did I. Of course he would object to such a marriage. But a man in these days cannot dictate to his daughter what husband she should marry." "Perhaps he can dictate to her what husband she shall not marry." "Hardly that. He may put impediments in the way; and the Duke will do so. But if I am happy enough to have won the affections of his daughter,--so as to make it essential to her happiness that she should become my wife,--he will give way." "What am I to say, Mr. Tregear?" "Just what you think." "Why should I be made to say what I think on so delicate a matter? Or of what use would be my thoughts? Remember how far I am removed from her." "You are his friend." "Not at all! No one less so!" As she said this she could not hinder the colour from coming into her face. "I was her friend,--Lady Glencora's; but with the death of my friend there was an end of all that." "You were staying with him,--at his request. You told me so yourself." "I shall never stay with him again. But all that, Mr. Tregear, is of no matter. I do not mean to say a word against him;--not a word. But if you wish to interest any one as being the Duke's friend, then I can assure you I am the last person in London to whom you should come. I know no one to whom the Duke is likely to entertain feelings so little kind as towards me." This she said in a peculiarly solemn way that startled Tregear. But before he could answer her a servant entered the room with a letter. She recognised at once the Duke's handwriting. Here was the answer for which she had been so long waiting in silent expectation! She could not keep it unread till he was gone. "Will you allow me a moment?" she whispered, and then she opened the envelope. As she read the few words her eyes became laden with tears. They quite sufficed to relieve the injured pride which had sat so heavy at her heart. "I believe I did you a wrong, and therefore I ask your pardon!" It was so like what she had believed the man to be! She could not be longer angry with him. And yet the very last words she had spoken were words complaining of his conduct. "This is from the Duke," she said, putting the letter back into its envelope. "Oh, indeed." "It is odd that it should have come while you were here." "Is it,--is it,--about Lady Mary?" "No;--at least,--not directly. I perhaps spoke more harshly about him than I should have done. The truth is I had expected a line from him, and it had not come. Now it is here; but I do not suppose I shall ever see much of him. My intimacy was with her. But I would not wish you to remember what I said just now, if--if--" "If what, Mrs. Finn? You mean, perhaps, if I should ever be allowed to call myself his son-in-law. It may seem to you to be arrogant, but it is an honour which I expect to win." "Faint heart,--you know, Mr. Tregear." "Exactly. One has to tell oneself that very often. You will help me?" "Certainly not," she said, as though she were much startled. "How can I help you?" "By telling me what I should do. I suppose if I were to go down to Richmond I should not be admitted." "If you ask me, I think not;--not to see Lady Mary. Lady Cantrip would perhaps see you." "She is acting the part of--duenna." "As I should do also, if Lady Mary were staying with me. You don't suppose that if she were here I would let her see you in my house without her father's leave?" "I suppose not." "Certainly not; and therefore I conceive that Lady Cantrip will not do so either." "I wish she were here." "It would be of no use. I should be a dragon in guarding her." "I wish you would let me feel that you were like a sister to me in this matter." "But I am not your sister, nor yet your aunt, nor yet your grandmother. What I mean is that I cannot be on your side." "Can you not?" "No, Mr. Tregear. Think how long I have known these other people." "But just now you said that he was your enemy." "I did say so; but as I have unsaid it since, you as a gentleman will not remember my words. At any rate I cannot help you in this." "I shall write to her." "It can be nothing to me. If you write she will show your letter either to her father or to Lady Cantrip." "But she will read it first." "I cannot tell how that may be. In fact I am the very last person in the world to whom you should come for assistance in this matter. If I gave any assistance to anybody I should be bound to give it to the Duke." "I cannot understand that, Mrs. Finn." "Nor can I explain it, but it would be so. I shall always be very glad to see you, and I do feel that we ought to be friends,--because I took such a liberty with you. But in this matter I cannot help you." When she said this he had to take his leave. It was impossible that he should further press his case upon her, though he would have been very glad to extract from her some kindly word. It is such a help in a difficulty to have somebody who will express even a hope that the difficulty is perhaps not invincible! He had no one to comfort him in this matter. There was one dear friend,--as a friend dearer than any other,--to whom he might go, and who would after some fashion bid him prosper. Mabel would encourage him. She had said that she would do so. But in making that promise she had told him that Romeo would not have spoken of his love for Juliet to Rosaline, whom he had loved before he saw Juliet. No doubt she had gone on to tell him that he might come to her and talk freely of his love for Lady Mary,--but after what had been said before, he felt that he could not do so without leaving a sting behind. When a man's love goes well with him,--so well as to be in some degree oppressive to him even by its prosperity,--when the young lady has jumped into his arms and the father and mother have been quite willing, then he wants no confidant. He does not care to speak very much of the matter which among his friends is apt to become a subject for raillery. When you call a man Benedick he does not come to you with ecstatic descriptions of the beauty and the wit of his Beatrice. But no one was likely to call him Benedick in reference to Lady Mary. In spite of his manner, in spite of his apparent self-sufficiency, this man was very soft within. Less than two years back he had been willing to sacrifice all the world for his cousin Mabel, and his cousin Mabel had told him that he was wrong. "It does not pay to sacrifice the world for love." So cousin Mabel had said, and had added something as to its being necessary that she should marry a rich man, and expedient that he should marry a rich woman. He had thought much about it, and had declared to himself that on no account would he marry a woman for her money. Then he had encountered Lady Mary Palliser. There had been no doubt, no resolution after that, no thinking about it;--but downright love. There was nothing left of real regret for his cousin in his bosom. She had been right. That love had been impossible. But this would be possible,--ah, so deliciously possible,--if only her father and mother would assist! The mother, imprudent in this as in all things, had assented. The reader knows the rest. It was in every way possible. "She will have money enough," the Duchess had said, "if only her father can be brought to give it you." So Tregear had set his heart upon it, and had said to himself that the thing was to be done. Then his friend the Duchess had died, and the real difficulties had commenced. From that day he had not seen his love, or heard from her. How was he to know whether she would be true to him? And where was he to seek for that sympathy which he felt to be so necessary to him? A wild idea had come into his head that Mrs. Finn would be his friend;--but she had repudiated him. He went straight home and at once wrote to the girl. The letter was a simple love-letter, and as such need not be given here. In what sweetest language he could find he assured her that even though he should never be allowed to see her or to hear from her, that still he should cling to her. And then he added this passage: "If your love for me be what I think it to be, no one can have a right to keep us apart. Pray be sure that I shall not change. If you change let me know it;--but I shall as soon expect the heavens to fall." CHAPTER XXIV "She Must Be Made to Obey" Lady Mary Palliser down at The Horns had as much liberty allowed to her as is usually given to young ladies in these very free days. There was indeed no restriction placed upon her at all. Had Tregear gone down to Richmond and asked for the young lady, and had Lady Cantrip at the time been out and the young lady at home, it would have depended altogether upon the young lady whether she would have seen her lover or not. Nevertheless Lady Cantrip kept her eyes open, and when the letter came from Tregear she was aware that the letter had come. But the letter found its way into Lady Mary's hands and was read in the seclusion of her own bed-room. "I wonder whether you would mind reading that," she said very shortly afterwards to Lady Cantrip. "What answer ought I to make?" "Do you think any answer ought to be made, my dear?" "Oh yes; I must answer him." "Would your papa wish it?" "I told papa that I would not promise not to write to him. I think I told him that he should see any letters that there were. But if I show them to you, I suppose that will do as well." "You had better keep your word to him absolutely." "I am not afraid of doing so, if you mean that. I cannot bear to give him pain, but this is a matter in which I mean to have my own way." "Mean to have your own way!" said Lady Cantrip, much surprised by the determined tone of the young lady. "Certainly I do. I want you to understand so much! I suppose papa can keep us from marrying for ever and ever if he pleases, but he never will make me say that I will give up Mr. Tregear. And if he does not yield I shall think him cruel. Why should he wish to make me unhappy all my life?" "He certainly does not wish that, my dear." "But he will do it." "I cannot go against your father, Mary." "No, I suppose not. I shall write to Mr. Tregear, and then I will show you what I have written. Papa shall see it too if he pleases. I will do nothing secret, but I will never give up Mr. Tregear." Lord Cantrip came down to Richmond that evening, and his wife told him that in her opinion it would be best that the Duke should allow the young people to marry, and should give them money enough to live upon. "Is not that a strong order?" asked the Earl. The Countess acknowledged that it was a "strong order," but suggested that for the happiness of them all it might as well be done at first as at last. The next morning Lady Mary showed her a copy of the reply which she had already sent to her lover. DEAR FRANK, You may be quite sure that I shall never give you up. I will not write more at present because papa does not wish me to do so. I shall show papa your letter and my answer. Your own most affectionate MARY. "Has it gone?" asked the Countess. "I put it myself into the pillar letter-box." Then Lady Cantrip felt that she had to deal with a very self-willed young lady indeed. That afternoon Lady Cantrip asked Lady Mary whether she might be allowed to take the two letters up to town with the express purpose of showing them to the Duke. "Oh yes," said Mary, "I think it would be so much the best. Give papa my kindest love, and tell him from me that if he wants to make his poor little girl happy he will forgive her and be kind to her in all this." Then the Countess made some attempt to argue the matter. There were proprieties! High rank might be a blessing or might be the reverse--as people thought of it;--but all men acknowledged that much was due to it. "Noblesse oblige." It was often the case in life that women were called upon by circumstances to sacrifice their inclinations! What right had a gentleman to talk of marriage who had no means? These things she said and very many more, but it was to no purpose. The young lady asserted that as the gentleman was a gentleman there need be no question as to rank, and that in regard to money there need be no difficulty if one of them had sufficient. "But you have none but what your father may give you," said Lady Cantrip. "Papa can give it us without any trouble," said Lady Mary. This child had a clear idea of what she thought to be her own rights. Being the child of rich parents she had the right to money. Being a woman she had a right to a husband. Having been born free she had a right to choose one for herself. Having had a man's love given to her she had a right to keep it. "One doesn't know which she is most like, her father or her mother," Lady Cantrip said afterwards to her husband. "She has his cool determination, and her hot-headed obstinacy." She did show the letters to the Duke, and in answer to a word or two from him explained that she could not take upon herself to debar her guest from the use of the post. "But she will write nothing without letting you know it." "She ought to write nothing at all." "What she feels is much worse than what she writes." "If there were no intercourse she would forget him." "Ah; I don't know," said the Countess sorrowfully; "I thought so once." "All children are determined as long as they are allowed to have their own way." "I mean to say that it is the nature of her character to be obstinate. Most girls are prone to yield. They have not character enough to stand against opposition. I am not speaking now only of affairs like this. It would be the same with her in any thing. Have you not always found it so?" Then he had to acknowledge to himself that he had never found out anything in reference to his daughter's character. She had been properly educated;--at least he hoped so. He had seen her grow up, pretty, sweet, affectionate, always obedient to him;--the most charming plaything in the world on the few occasions in which he had allowed himself to play. But as to her actual disposition, he had never taken any trouble to inform himself. She had been left to her mother,--as other girls are left. And his sons had been left to their tutors. And now he had no control over any of them. "She must be made to obey like others," he said at last, speaking through his teeth. There was something in this which almost frightened Lady Cantrip. She could not bear to hear him say that the girl must be made to yield, with that spirit of despotic power under which women were restrained in years now passed. If she could have spoken her own mind it would have been to this effect: "Let us do what we can to lead her away from this desire of hers; and in order that we may do so, let us tell her that her marriage with Mr. Tregear is out of the question. But if we do not succeed,--say in the course of the next twelve months,--let us give way. Let us make it a matter of joy that the young man himself is so acceptable and well-behaved." That was her idea, and with that she would have indoctrined the Duke had she been able. But his was different. "She must be made to obey," he said. And, as he said it, he seemed to be indifferent as to the sorrow which such enforced obedience might bring upon his child. In answer to this she could only shake her head. "What do you mean?" he asked. "Do you think we ought to yield?" "Not at once, certainly." "But at last?" "What can you do, Duke? If she be as firm as you, can you bear to see her pine away in her misery?" "Girls do not do like that," he said. "Girls, like men, are very different. They generally will yield to external influences. English girls, though they become the most loving wives in the world, do not generally become so riven by an attachment as to become deep sufferers when it is disallowed. But here, I fear, we have to deal with one who will suffer after this fashion." "Why should she not be like others?" "It may be so. We will try. But you see what she says in her letter to him. She writes as though your authority were to be nothing in that matter of giving up. In all that she says to me there is the same spirit. If she is firm, Duke, you must yield." "Never! She shall never marry him with my sanction." There was nothing more to be said, and Lady Cantrip went her way. But the Duke, though he could say nothing more, continued to think of it hour after hour. He went down to the House of Lords to listen to a debate in which it was intended to cover the ministers with heavy disgrace. But the Duke could not listen even to his own friends. He could listen to nothing as he thought of the condition of his children. He had been asked whether he could bear to see his girl suffer, as though he were indifferent to the sufferings of his child. Did he not know of himself that there was no father who would do more for the welfare of his daughter? Was he not sure of the tenderness of his own heart? In all that he was doing was he governed by anything but a sense of duty? Was it personal pride or love of personal aggrandisement? He thought that he could assure himself that he was open to no such charge. Would he not die for her,--or for them,--if he could so serve them? Surely this woman had accused him most wrongfully when she had intimated that he could see his girl suffer without caring for it. In his indignation he determined--for awhile--that he would remove her from the custody of Lady Cantrip. But then, where should he place her? He was aware that his own house would be like a grave to a girl just fit to come out into the world. In this coming autumn she must go somewhere,--with someone. He himself, in his present frame of mind, would be but a sorry travelling companion. Lady Cantrip had said that the best hope of escape would lie in the prospect of another lover. The prescription was disagreeable, but it had availed in the case of his own wife. Before he had ever seen her as Lady Glencora McCloskie she had been desirous of giving herself and all her wealth to one Burgo Fitzgerald, who had been altogether unworthy. The Duke could remember well how a certain old Lady Midlothian had first hinted to him that Lady Glencora's property was very large, and had then added that the young lady herself was very beautiful. And he could remember how his uncle, the late Duke, who had seldom taken much trouble in merely human affairs, had said a word or two--"I have heard a whisper about you and Lady Glencora McCloskie; nothing could be better." The result had been undoubtedly good. His Cora and all her money had been saved from a worthless spendthrift. He had found a wife who he now thought had made him happy. And she had found at any rate a respectable husband. The idea when picked to pieces is not a nice idea. "Let us look out for a husband for this girl, so that we may get her married,--out of the way of her lover." It is not nice. But it had succeeded in one case, and why should it not succeed in another? But how was it to be done? Who should do it? Whom should he select to play the part which he had undertaken in that other arrangement? No worse person could be found than himself for managing such an affair. When the idea had first been raised he had thought that Lady Cantrip would do it all; but now he was angry with Lady Cantrip. How was it to be done? How should it be commenced? How had it been commenced in his own case? He did not in the least know how he had been chosen. Was it possible that his uncle, who was the proudest man in England, should have condescended to make a bargain with an old dowager whom everybody had despised? And in what way had he been selected? No doubt he had been known to be the heir-apparent to a dukedom and to ducal revenues. In his case old Lady Midlothian had begun the matter with him. It occurred to him that in royal marriages such beginnings are quite common. But who should be the happy man? Then he began to count up the requisite attributes. He must be of high rank, and an eldest son, and the possessor of, or the heir to, a good estate. He did despise himself when he found that he put these things first,--as a matter of course. Nevertheless he did put them first. He was ejecting this other man because he possessed none of these attributes. He hurried himself on to add that the man must be of good character, and such as a young girl might learn to love. But yet he was aware that he added these things for his conscience's sake. Tregear's character was good, and certainly the girl loved him. But was it not clear to all who knew anything of such matters that Mr. Francis Tregear should not have dared even to think of marrying the daughter of the Duke of Omnium? Who should be the happy man? There were so many who evidently were unfit. Young Lord Percival was heir to a ruined estate and a beggared peerage. Lord Glasslough was odious to all men. There were three or four others of whom he thought that he knew some fatal objection. But when he remembered Lord Popplecourt there seemed to be no objection which need be fatal. Lord Popplecourt was a young peer whose father had died two years since and whose estates were large and unembarrassed. The late lord, who had been a Whig of the old fashion, had been the Duke's friend. They had been at Oxford and in the House of Commons together, and Lord Popplecourt had always been true to his party. As to the son, the Duke remembered to have heard lately that he was not given to waste his money. He drove a coach about London a good deal, but had as yet not done anything very foolish. He had taken his degree at Oxford, thereby showing himself to be better than Silverbridge. He had also taken his seat in the House of Lords and had once opened his mouth. He had not indeed appeared often again; but at Lord Popplecourt's age much legislation is not to be expected from a young peer. Then he thought of the man's appearance. Popplecourt was not specially attractive, whereas Tregear was a very handsome man. But so also had been Burgo Fitzgerald,--almost abnormally beautiful, while he, Plantagenet Palliser, as he was then, had been quite as insignificant in appearance as Lord Popplecourt. Lord Popplecourt might possibly do. But then how should the matter be spoken of to the young man? After all, would it not be best that he should trust Lady Cantrip? CHAPTER XXV A Family Breakfast-Table Lord Silverbridge had paid all his Derby losses without any difficulty. They had not been very heavy for a man in his position, and the money had come without remonstrance. When asking for it he was half ashamed of himself, but could still find consolation by remembering how much worse had befallen many young men whom he knew. He had never "plunged." In fact he had made the most prudent book in the world; and had so managed affairs that even now the horse which had been beaten was worth more than all he had lost and paid. "This is getting serious," he had said to his partner when, on making out a rough account, he had brought the Major in a debtor to him of more than a thousand pounds. The Major had remarked that as he was half-owner of the horses his partner had good security for the money. Then something of an unwritten arrangement was made. The "Prime Minister" was now one of the favourites for the Leger. If the horse won that race there would be money enough for everything. If that race were lost, then there should be a settlement by the transfer of the stud to the younger partner. "He's safe to pull it off," said the Major. At this time both his sons were living with the Duke in London. It had been found impracticable to send Lord Gerald back to Cambridge. The doors of Trinity were closed against him. But some interest had been made in his favour, and he was to be transferred to Oxford. All the truth had been told, and there had been a feeling that the lad should be allowed another chance. He could not however go to his new Alma Mater till after the long vacation. In the meantime he was to be taken by a tutor down to a cottage on Dartmoor and there be made to read,--with such amusement in the meantime as might be got from fishing, and playing cricket with the West Devon county club. "It isn't a very bright look-out for the summer," his brother had said to him, "but it's better than breaking out on the loose altogether. You be a credit to the family and all that sort of thing. Then I'll give up the borough to you. But mind you stick to the Liberals. I've made an ass of myself." However in these early days of June Lord Gerald had not yet got his tutor. Though the father and the two young men were living together they did not see very much of each other. The Duke breakfasted at nine and the repast was a very simple one. When they failed to appear, he did not scold,--but would simply be disappointed. At dinner they never met. It was supposed that Lord Gerald passed his mornings in reading, and some little attempts were made in that direction. It is to be feared they did not come to much. Silverbridge was very kind to Gerald, feeling an increased tenderness for him on account of that Cambridge mishap. Now they were much together, and occasionally, by a strong effort, would grace their father's breakfast-table with their company. It was not often that he either reproached them or preached to them. Though he could not live with them on almost equal terms, as some fathers can live with their sons, though he could not laugh at their fun or make them laugh at his wit, he knew that it would have been better both for him and them if he had possessed this capacity. Though the life which they lived was distasteful to him,--though racehorses were an abomination to him, and the driving of coaches a folly, and club-life a manifest waste of time, still he recognised these things as being, if not necessary, yet unavoidable evils. To Gerald he would talk about Oxford, avoiding all allusions to past Cambridge misfortunes; but in the presence of Silverbridge, whose Oxford career had been so peculiarly unfortunate, he would make no allusion to either of the universities. To his eldest son he would talk of Parliament, which of all subjects would have been the most congenial had they agreed in politics. As it was he could speak more freely to him on that than any other matter. One Thursday night as the two brothers went to bed on returning from the Beargarden, at a not very late hour, they agreed that they would "give the governor a turn" the next morning,--by which they meant that they would drag themselves out of bed in time to breakfast with him. "The worst of it is that he never will let them get anything to eat," said Gerald. But Silverbridge explained that he had taken that matter into his own hands, and had specially ordered broiled salmon and stewed kidneys. "He won't like it, you know," said Gerald. "I'm sure he thinks it wicked to eat anything but toasted bacon before lunch." At a very little after nine Silverbridge was in the breakfast-room, and there found his father. "I suppose Gerald is not up yet," said the Duke almost crossly. "Oh yes he is, sir. He'll be here directly." "Have you seen him this morning?" "No; I haven't seen him. But I know he'll be here. He said he would, last night." "You speak of it as if it were an undertaking." "No, not that, sir. But we are not always quite up to time." "No; indeed you are not. Perhaps you sit late at the House." "Sometimes I do," said the young member, with a feeling almost akin to shame as he remembered all the hours spent at the Beargarden. "I have had Gerald there in the Gallery sometimes. It is just as well he should know what is being done." "Quite as well." "I shouldn't wonder if he gets a seat some day." "I don't know how that may be." "He won't change as I have done. He'll stick to your side. Indeed I think he'd do better in the House than I shall. He has more gift of the gab." "That is not the first thing requisite." "I know all that, sir. I've read your letter more than once, and I showed it to him." There was something sweet and pleasant in the young man's manner by which the father could hardly not be captivated. They had now sat down, and the servant had brought in the unusual accessories for a morning feast. "What is all that?" asked the Duke. "Gerald and I are so awfully hungry of a morning," said the son, apologising. "Well;--it's a very good thing to be hungry;--that is if you can get plenty to eat. Salmon, is it? I don't think I'll have any myself. Kidneys! Not for me. I think I'll take a bit of fried bacon. I also am hungry, but not awfully hungry." "You never seem to me to eat anything, sir." "Eating is an occupation from which I think a man takes the more pleasure the less he considers it. A rural labourer who sits on the ditch-side with his bread and cheese and an onion has more enjoyment out of it than any Lucullus." "But he likes a good deal of it." "I do not think he ever over-eats himself,--which Lucullus does. I have envied a ploughman his power,--his dura ilia,--but never an epicure the appreciative skill of his palate. If Gerald does not make haste he will have to exercise neither the one nor the other upon that fish." "I will leave a bit for him, sir,--and here he is. You are twenty minutes late, Gerald. My father says that bread and cheese and onions would be better for you than salmon and stewed kidneys." "No, Silverbridge;--I said no such thing; but that if he were a hedger and ditcher the bread and cheese and onions would be as good." "I should not mind trying them at all," said Gerald. "Only one never does have such things for breakfast. Last winter a lot of us skated to Ely, and we ate two or three loaves of bread and a whole cheese at a pot-house! And as for beer, we drank the public dry." "It was because for the time you had been a hedger and ditcher." "Proby was a ditcher I know, when he went right through into one of the dykes. Just push on that dish, Silverbridge. It's no good you having the trouble of helping me half-a-dozen times. I don't think things are a bit the nicer because they cost a lot of money. I suppose that is what you mean, sir." "Something of that kind, Gerald. Not to have money for your wants;--that must be troublesome." "Very bad indeed," said Silverbridge, shaking his head wisely, as a Member of Parliament might do who felt that something should be done to put down such a lamentable state of things. "I don't complain," said Gerald. "No fellow ever had less right to complain. But I never felt that I had quite enough. Of course it was my own fault." "I should say so, my boy. But then there are a great many like you. Let their means be what they may, they never have quite enough. To be in any difficulty with regard to money,--to owe what you cannot pay, or even to have to abstain from things which you have told yourself are necessary to yourself or to those who depend on you,--creates a feeling of meanness." "That is what I have always felt," said Silverbridge. "I cannot bear to think that I should like to have a thing and that I cannot afford it." "You do not quite understand me, I fear. The only case in which you can be justified in desiring that which you cannot afford is when the thing is necessary;--as bread may be, or clothes." "As when a fellow wants a lot of new breeches before he has paid his tailor's bill." "As when a poor man," said the Duke impressively, "may long to give his wife a new gown, or his children boots to keep their feet from the mud and snow." Then he paused a moment, but the serious tone of his voice and the energy of his words had sent Gerald headlong among his kidneys. "I say that in such cases money must be regarded as a blessing." "A ten-pound note will do so much," said Silverbridge. "But beyond that it ought to have no power of conferring happiness, and certainly cannot drive away sorrow. Not though you build palaces out into the deep, can that help you. You read your Horace, I hope. 'Scandunt eodum quo dominus minæ.'" "I recollect that," said Gerald. "Black care sits behind the horseman." "Even though he have a groom riding after him beautiful with exquisite boots. As far as I have been able to look out into the world--" "I suppose you know it as well as anybody," said Silverbridge,--who was simply desirous of making himself pleasant to the "dear old governor." "As far as my experience goes, the happiest man is he who, being above the troubles which money brings, has his hands the fullest of work. If I were to name the class of men whose lives are spent with the most thorough enjoyment, I think I should name that of barristers who are in large practice and also in Parliament." "Isn't it a great grind, sir?" asked Silverbridge. "A very great grind, as you call it. And there may be the grind and not the success. But--" He had now got up from his seat at the table and was standing with his back against the chimney-piece, and as he went on with his lecture,--as the word "But" came from his lips--he struck the fingers of one hand lightly on the palm of the other as he had been known to do at some happy flight of oratory in the House of Commons. "But it is the grind that makes the happiness. To feel that your hours are filled to overflowing, that you can barely steal minutes enough for sleep, that the welfare of many is entrusted to you, that the world looks on and approves, that some good is always being done to others,--above all things some good to your country;--that is happiness. For myself I can conceive none other." "Books," suggested Gerald, as he put the last morsel of the last kidney into his mouth. "Yes, books! Cicero and Ovid have told us that to literature only could they look for consolation in their banishment. But then they speak of a remedy for sorrow, not of a source of joy. No young man should dare to neglect literature. At some period of his life he will surely need consolation. And he may be certain that should he live to be an old man, there will be none other,--except religion. But for that feeling of self-contentment, which creates happiness--hard work, and hard work alone, can give it to you." "Books are hard work themselves sometimes," said Gerald. "As for money," continued the father, not caring to notice this interruption, "if it be regarded in any other light than as a shield against want, as a rampart under the protection of which you may carry on your battle, it will fail you. I was born a rich man." "Few people have cared so little about it as you," said the elder son. "And you, both of you, have been born to be rich." This assertion did not take the elder brother by surprise. It was a matter of course. But Lord Gerald, who had never as yet heard anything as to his future destiny from his father, was interested by the statement. "When I think of all this,--of what constitutes happiness,--I am almost tempted to grieve that it should be so." "If a large fortune were really a bad thing," said Gerald, "a man could I suppose get rid of it." "No;--it is a thing of which a man cannot get rid,--unless by shameful means. It is a burden which he must carry to the end." "Does anybody wish to get rid of it, as Sindbad did of the Old Man?" asked Gerald pertinaciously. "At any rate I have enjoyed the kidneys." "You assured us just now that the bread and cheese at Ely were just as good." The Duke as he said this looked as though he knew that he had taken all the wind out of his adversary's sails. "Though you add carriage to carriage, you will not be carried more comfortably." "A second horse out hunting is a comfort," said Silverbridge. "Then at any rate don't desire a third for show. But such comforts will cease to be joys when they become matters of course. That a boy who does not see a pudding once a year should enjoy a pudding when it comes I can understand; but the daily pudding, or the pudding twice a day, is soon no more than simple daily bread,--which will or will not be sweet as it shall or shall not have been earned." Then he went slowly to the door, but, as he stood with the handle of it in his hand, he turned round and spoke another word. "When, hereafter, Gerald, you may chance to think of that bread and cheese at Ely, always remember that you had skated from Cambridge." The two brothers then took themselves to some remote part of the house where arrangements had been made for smoking, and there they finished the conversation. "I was very glad to hear what he said about you, old boy." This of course came from Silverbridge. "I didn't quite understand him." "He meant you to understand that you wouldn't be like other younger brothers." "Then what I have will be taken from you." "There is lots for three or four of us. I do agree that if a fellow has as much as he can spend he ought not to want anything more. Morton was telling me the other day something about the settled estates. I sat in that office with him all one morning. I could not understand it all, but I observed that he said nothing about the Scotch property. You'll be a laird, and I wish you joy with all my heart. The governor will tell you all about it before long. He's going to have two eldest sons." "What an unnatural piece of cruelty to me;--and so unnecessary!" "Why?" "He says that a property is no better than a burden. But I'll try and bear it." CHAPTER XXVI Dinner at the Beargarden The Duke was in the gallery of the House of Commons which is devoted to the use of peers, and Silverbridge, having heard that his father was there, had come up to him. It was then about half-past five, and the House had settled down to business. Prayers had been read, petitions had been presented, and Ministers had gone through their course of baiting with that equanimity and air of superiority which always belongs to a well-trained occupant of the Treasury bench. The Duke was very anxious that his son should attend to his parliamentary duties, but he was too proud a man and too generous to come to the House as a spy. It was his present habit always to be in his own place when the Lords were sitting, and to remain there while the Lords sat. It was not, for many reasons, an altogether satisfactory occupation, but it was the best which his life afforded him. He would never, however, come across into the other House, without letting his son know of his coming, and Lord Silverbridge had on this occasion been on the look-out, and had come up to his father at once. "Don't let me take you away," said the Duke, "if you are particularly interested in your Chief's defence," for Sir Timothy Beeswax was defending some measure of legal reform in which he was said to have fallen into trouble. "I can hear it up here, you know, sir." "Hardly if you are talking to me." "To tell the truth it's a matter I don't care much about. They've got into some mess as to the number of Judges and what they ought to do. Finn was saying that they had so arranged that there was one Judge who never could possibly do anything." "If Mr. Finn said so it would probably be so, with some little allowance for Irish exaggeration. He is a clever man, with less of his country's hyperbole than others;--but still not without his share." "You know him well, I suppose." "Yes;--as one man does know another in the political world." "But he is a friend of yours? I don't mean an 'honourable friend,' which is great bosh; but you know him at home." "Oh yes;--certainly. He has been staying with me at Matching. In public life such intimacies come from politics." "You don't care very much about him then." The Duke paused a moment before he answered. "Yes I do;--and in what I said just now perhaps I wronged him. I have been under obligations to Mr. Finn,--in a matter as to which he behaved very well. I have found him to be a gentleman. If you come across him in the House I would wish you to be courteous to him. I have not seen him since we came from abroad. I have been able to see nobody. But if ever again I should entertain my friends at my table, Mr. Finn would be one who would always be welcome there." This he said with a sadly serious air as though wishing that his words should be noted. At the present moment he was remembering that he owed recompense to Mrs. Finn, and was making an effort to pay the debt. "But your leader is striking out into unwonted eloquence. Surely we ought to listen to him." Sir Timothy was a fluent speaker, and when there was nothing to be said was possessed of great plenty of words. And he was gifted with that peculiar power which enables a man to have the last word in every encounter,--a power which we are apt to call repartee, which is in truth the readiness which comes from continual practice. You shall meet two men of whom you shall know the one to be endowed with the brilliancy of true genius, and the other to be possessed of but moderate parts, and shall find the former never able to hold his own against the latter. In a debate, the man of moderate parts will seem to be greater than the man of genius. But this skill of tongue, this glibness of speech is hardly an affair of intellect at all. It is,--as is style to the writer,--not the wares which he has to take to market, but the vehicle in which they may be carried. Of what avail to you is it to have filled granaries with corn if you cannot get your corn to the consumer? Now Sir Timothy was a great vehicle, but he had not in truth much corn to send. He could turn a laugh against an adversary;--no man better. He could seize, at the moment, every advantage which the opportunity might give him. The Treasury Bench on which he sat and the big box on the table before him were to him fortifications of which he knew how to use every stone. The cheers and the jeers of the House had been so measured by him that he knew the value and force of every sound. Politics had never been to him a study; but to parliamentary strategy he had devoted all his faculties. No one knew so well as Sir Timothy how to make arrangements for business, so that every detail should be troublesome to his opponents. He could foresee a month beforehand that on a certain day a Royal concert would make the House empty, and would generously give that day to a less observant adversary. He knew how to blind the eyes of members to the truth. Those on the opposite side of the House would find themselves checkmated by his astuteness,--when, with all their pieces on the board, there should be none which they could move. And this to him was Government! It was to these purposes that he conceived that a great Statesman should devote himself! Parliamentary management! That, in his mind, was under this Constitution of ours the one act essential for Government. In all this he was very great; but when it might fall to his duty either to suggest or to defend any real piece of proposed legislation he was less happy. On this occasion he had been driven to take the matter in hand because he had previously been concerned in it as a lawyer. He had allowed himself to wax angry as he endeavoured to answer certain personal criticisms. Now Sir Timothy was never stronger than when he simulated anger. His mock indignation was perhaps his most powerful weapon. But real anger is a passion which few men can use with judgment. And now Sir Timothy was really angry, and condescended to speak of our old friend Phineas who had made the onslaught as a bellicose Irishman. There was an over-true story as to our friend having once been seduced into fighting a duel, and those who wished to decry him sometimes alluded to the adventure. Sir Timothy had been called to order, but the Speaker had ruled that "bellicose Irishman" was not beyond the latitude of parliamentary animadversion. Then Sir Timothy had repeated the phrase with emphasis, and the Duke hearing it in the gallery had made his remark as to the unwonted eloquence of his son's parliamentary chief. "Surely we ought to listen to him," said the Duke. And for a short time they did listen. "Sir Timothy is not a man I like, you know," said the son, feeling himself obliged to apologise for his subjection to such a chief. "I never particularly loved him myself." "They say that he is a sort of necessity." "A Conservative Fate," said the Duke. "Well, yes; he is so,--so awfully clever! We all feel that we could not get on without him. When you were in, he was one of your party." "Oh yes;--he was one of us. I have no right to complain of you for using him. But when you say you could not get on without him, does it not occur to you that should he,--let us say be taken up to heaven,--you would have to get on without him." "Then he would be,--out of the way, sir." "What you mean perhaps is that you do not know how to get rid of him." "Of course I don't pretend to understand much about it; but they all think that he does know how to keep the party together. I don't think we are proud of him." "Hardly that." "He is awfully useful. A man has to look out so sharp to be always ready for those other fellows! I beg your pardon, sir, but I mean your side." "I understand who the other fellows are." "And it isn't everybody who will go through such a grind. A man to do it must be always ready. He has so many little things to think of. As far as I can see we all feel that we could not get along very well without him." Upon the whole the Duke was pleased with what he heard from his son. The young man's ideas about politics were boyish, but they were the ideas of a clear-headed boy. Silverbridge had picked up some of the ways of the place, though he had not yet formed any sound political opinions. Then Sir Timothy finished a long speech with a flowery peroration, in which he declared that if Parliament were desirous of keeping the realms of Her Majesty free from the invasions of foreigners it must be done by maintaining the dignity of the Judicial bench. There were some clamours at this; and although it was now dinner-time Phineas Finn, who had been called a bellicose Irishman, was able to say a word or two. "The Right Honourable gentleman no doubt means," said Phineas, "that we must carry ourselves with some increased external dignity. The world is bewigging itself, and we must buy a bigger wig than any we have got, in order to confront the world with proper self-respect. Turveydrop and deportment will suffice for us against any odds." About half-past seven the House became very empty. "Where are you going to dine, sir?" asked Silverbridge. The Duke, with something like a sigh, said he supposed he should dine at home. "You never were at the Beargarden;--were you, sir?" asked Silverbridge suddenly. "Never," said the Duke. "Come and dine with me." "I am not a member of the club." "We don't care at all about that. Anybody can take in anybody." "Does not that make it promiscuous?" "Well;--no; I don't know that it does. It seems to go on very well. I daresay there are some cads there sometimes. But I don't know where one doesn't meet cads. There are plenty in the House of Commons." "There is something in that, Silverbridge, which makes me think that you have not realised the difference between private and public life. In the former you choose your own associates and are responsible for your choice. In the latter you are concerned with others for the good of the State; and though, even for the State's sake, you would not willingly be closely allied with those whom you think dishonest, the outward manners and fashions of life need create no barriers. I should not turn up my nose at the House of Commons because some constituency might send them an illiterate shoemaker; but I might probably find the illiterate shoemaker an unprofitable companion for my private hours." "I don't think there will be any shoemakers at the Beargarden." "Even if there were I would go and dine with you. I shall be glad to see the place where you, I suppose, pass many hours." "I find it a very good shop to dine at. The place at the House is so stuffy and nasty. Besides, one likes to get away for a little time." "Certainly. I never was an advocate for living in the House. One should always change the atmosphere." Then they got into a cab and went to the club. Silverbridge was a little afraid of what he was doing. The invitation had come from him on the spur of the moment, and he hardly ventured to think that his father would accept it. And now he did not quite know how the Duke would go through the ceremony. "The other fellows" would all come and stare at a man whom they had all been taught to regard as the most un-Beargardenish of men. But he was especially anxious to make things pleasant for his father. "What shall I order?" said the son as he took the Duke into a dressing-room to wash his hands. The Duke suggested that anything sufficient for his son would certainly be sufficient for him. Nothing especial occurred during the dinner, which the Duke appeared to enjoy very much. "Yes; I think it is very good soup," he said. "I don't think they ever give me any soup at home." Then the son expressed his opinion that unless his father looked about rather more sharply, "they" very soon would provide no dinner at all, remarking that experience had taught him that the less people demanded the more they were "sat upon." The Duke did like his dinner,--or rather he liked the feeling that he was dining with his son. A report that the Duke of Omnium was with Lord Silverbridge soon went round the room, and they who were justified by some previous acquaintance came up to greet him. To all who did so he was very gracious, and was specially so to Lord Popplecourt, who happened to pass close by the table. "I think he is a fool," whispered Silverbridge as soon as Popplecourt had passed. "What makes you think so?" "We thought him an ass at Eton." "He has done pretty well, however." "Oh yes, in a way." "Somebody has told me that he is a careful man about his property." "I believe he is all that," said Silverbridge. "Then I don't see why you should think him a fool." To this Silverbridge made no reply; partly perhaps because he had nothing to say,--but hindered also by the coming in of Tregear. This was an accident, the possibility of which had not crossed him. Unfortunately too the Duke's back was turned, so that Tregear, as he walked up the room, could not see who was sitting at his friend's table. Tregear coming up stood close to the Duke's elbow before he recognised the man, and spoke some word or two to Silverbridge. "How do you do, Mr. Tregear," said the Duke, turning round. "Oh, my Lord, I did not know that it was you." "You hardly would. I am quite a stranger here. Silverbridge and I came up from the House together, and he has been hospitable enough to give me a dinner. I will tell you an odd thing for a London man, Mr. Tregear. I have not dined at a London club for fifteen years before this." "I hope you like it, sir," said Silverbridge. "Very much indeed. Good-evening, Mr. Tregear. I suppose you have to go to your dinner now." Then they went into one of the rooms upstairs to have coffee, the son declining to go into the smoking-room, and assuring his father that he did not in the least care about a cigar after dinner. "You would be smothered, sir." The Duke did as he was bidden and went upstairs. There was in truth a strong reason for avoiding the publicity of the smoking-room. When bringing his father to the club he had thought nothing about Tregear but he had thought about Tifto. As he entered he had seen Tifto at a table dining alone, and had bobbed his head at him. Then he had taken the Duke to the further end of the room, and had trusted that fear would keep the Major in his place. Fear had kept the Major in his place. When the Major learned who the stranger was, he had become silent and reserved. Before the father and son had finished their dinner, Tifto had gone to his cigar; and so that danger was over. "By George, there's Silverbridge has got his governor to dinner," said Tifto, standing in the middle of the room, and looking round as though he were announcing some confusion of the heavens and earth. "Why shouldn't Lord Silverbridge have his father to dine with him?" asked Mr. Lupton. "I believe I know Silverbridge as well as any man, and by George it is the very last thing of the kind that I should have expected. There have been no end of quarrels." "There has been no quarrel at all," said Tregear, who had then just entered the room. "Nothing on earth would make Silverbridge quarrel with his father, and I think it would break the Duke's heart to quarrel with his son." Tifto endeavoured to argue the matter out; but Tregear having made the assertion on behalf of his friend would not allow himself to be enticed into further speech. Nevertheless there was a good deal said by others, during which the Major drank two glasses of whisky-and-water. In the dining-room he had been struck with awe by the Duke's presence, and had certainly no idea of presenting himself personally to the great man. But Bacchus lent him aid, and when the discussion was over and the whisky had been swallowed, it occurred to him that he would go upstairs and ask to be introduced. In the meantime the Duke and his son were seated in close conversation on one of the upstairs sofas. It was a rule at the Beargarden that men might smoke all over the house except in the dining-room;--but there was one small chamber called the library, in which the practice was not often followed. The room was generally deserted, and at this moment the father and son were the only occupants. "A club," said the Duke, as he sipped his coffee, "is a comfortable and economical residence. A man gets what he wants well-served, and gets it cheap. But it has its drawbacks." "You always see the same fellows," said Silverbridge. "A man who lives much at a club is apt to fall into a selfish mode of life. He is taught to think that his own comfort should always be the first object. A man can never be happy unless his first objects are outside himself. Personal self-indulgence begets a sense of meanness which sticks to a man even when he has got beyond all hope of rescue. It is for that reason,--among others,--that marriage is so desirable." "A man should marry, I suppose." "Unless a man has on his shoulders the burden of a wife and children he should, I think, feel that he has shirked out of school. He is not doing his share of the work of the Commonwealth." "Pitt was not married, sir." "No;--and a great many other good men have remained unmarried. Do you mean to be another Pitt?" "I don't intend to be a Prime Minister." "I would not recommend you to entertain that ambition. Pitt perhaps hardly had time for marriage. You may be more lucky." "I suppose I shall marry some day." "I should be glad to see you marry early," said the Duke, speaking in a low voice, almost solemnly, but in his quietest, sweetest tone of voice. "You are peculiarly situated. Though as yet you are only the heir to the property and honours of our family, still, were you married, almost everything would be at your disposal. There is so much which I should only be too ready to give up to you!" "I can't bear to hear you talking of giving up anything," said Silverbridge energetically. Then the father looked round the room furtively, and seeing that the door was shut, and that they were assuredly alone, he put out his hand and gently stroked the young man's hair. It was almost a caress,--as though he would have said to himself, "Were he my daughter, I would kiss him." "There is much I would fain give up," he said. "If you were a married man the house in Carlton Terrace would be fitter for you than for me. I have disqualified myself for taking that part in society which should be filled by the head of our family. You who have inherited so much from your mother would, if you married pleasantly, do all that right well." He paused for a moment and then asked a straightforward question, very quickly--"You have never thought of any one yet, I suppose?" Silverbridge had thought very much of somebody. He was quite aware that he had almost made an offer to Lady Mabel. She certainly had not given him any encouragement; but the very fact that she had not done so allured him the more. He did believe that he was thoroughly in love with Lady Mabel. She had told him that he was too young,--but he was older than Lady Mab herself by a week. She was beautiful;--that was certain. It was acknowledged by all that she was clever. As for blood, of which he believed his father thought much, there was perhaps none better in England. He had heard it said of her,--as he now well remembered, in his father's presence,--that she had behaved remarkably well in trying circumstances. She had no fortune;--everybody knew that; but then he did not want fortune. Would not this be a good opportunity for breaking the matter to his father? "You have never thought of any one?" said the Duke,--again very sweetly, very softly. "But I have!" Lord Silverbridge as he made the announcement blushed up to the eyes. Then there came over the father something almost of fear. If he was to be told, how would it be if he could not approve? "Yes I have," said Silverbridge, recovering himself. "If you wish it, I will tell you who it is." "Nay, my boy;--as to that consult your own feelings. Are you sure of yourself?" "Oh yes." "Have you spoken to her?" "Well;--yes, in part. She has not accepted me, if you mean that. Rather the contrary." Now the Duke would have been very unwilling to say that his son would certainly be accepted by any girl in England to whom he might choose to offer his hand. But when the idea of a doubt was suggested to him, it did seem odd that his son should ask in vain. What other young man was there who could offer so much, and who was at the same time so likely to be loved for his own sake? He smiled however and was silent. "I suppose I may as well out with it," continued Silverbridge. "You know Lady Mabel Grex?" "Lady Mabel Grex? Yes;--I know her." "Is there any objection?" "Is she not your senior?" "No, sir; no; she is younger than I am." "Her father is not a man I esteem." "But she has always been so good!" Then the Duke was again silent. "Have you not heard that, sir?" "I think I have." "Is not that a great deal?" "A very great deal. To be good must of all qualities be the best. She is very beautiful." "I think so, sir. Of course she has no money." "It is not needed. It is not needed. I have no objection to make. If you are sure of your own mind--" "I am quite sure of that, sir." "Then I will raise no objection. Lady Mabel Grex! Her father, I fear, is not a worthy man. I hear that he is a gambler." "He is so poor!" "That makes it worse, Silverbridge. A man who gambles because he has money that he can afford to lose is, to my thinking, a fool. But he who gambles because he has none, is--well, let us hope the best of him. You may give her my love." "She has not accepted me." "But should she do so, you may." "She almost rejected me. But I am not sure that she was in earnest, and I mean to try again." Just at that moment the door was opened and Major Tifto walked into the room. CHAPTER XXVII Major Tifto and the Duke "I beg your pardon, Silverbridge," said the Major, entering the room, "but I was looking for Longstaff." "He isn't here," said Silverbridge, who did not wish to be interrupted by his racing friend. "Your father, I believe?" said Tifto. He was red in the face but was in other respects perhaps improved in appearance by his liquor. In his more sober moments he was not always able to assume that appearance of equality with his companions which it was the ambition of his soul to achieve. But a second glass of whisky-and-water would always enable him to cock his tail and bark before the company with all the courage of my lady's pug. "Would you do me the great honour to introduce me to his Grace?" Silverbridge was not prone to turn his back upon a friend because he was low in the world. He had begun to understand that he had made a mistake by connecting himself with the Major, but at the club he always defended his partner. Though he not unfrequently found himself obliged to snub the Major himself, he always countenanced the little Master of Hounds, and was true to his own idea of "standing to a fellow." Nevertheless he did not wish to introduce his friend to his father. The Duke saw it all at a glance, and felt that the introduction should be made. "Perhaps," said he, getting up from his chair, "this is Major Tifto." "Yes;--my Lord Duke. I am Major Tifto." The Duke bowed graciously. "My father and I were engaged about private matters," said Silverbridge. "I beg ten thousand pardons," exclaimed the Major. "I did not intend to intrude." "I think we had done," said the Duke. "Pray sit down, Major Tifto." The Major sat down. "Though now I bethink myself, I have to beg your pardon;--that I a stranger should ask you to sit down in your own club." "Don't mention it, my Lord Duke." "I am so unused to clubs, that I forgot where I was." "Quite so, my Lord Duke. I hope you think that Silverbridge is looking well?" "Yes;--yes. I think so." Silverbridge bit his lips and turned his face away to the door. "We didn't make a very good thing of our Derby nag the other day. Perhaps your Grace has heard all that?" "I did hear that the horse in which you are both interested had failed to win the race." "Yes, he did. The Prime Minister, we call him, your Grace,--out of compliment to a certain Ministry which I wish it was going on to-day instead of the seedy lot we've got in. I think, my Lord Duke, that any one you may ask will tell you that I know what running is. Well;--I can assure you,--your Grace, that is,--that since I've seen 'orses I've never seen a 'orse fitter than him. When he got his canter that morning, it was nearly even betting. Not that I or Silverbridge were fools enough to put on anything at that rate. But I never saw a 'orse so bad ridden. I don't mean to say anything, my Lord Duke, against the man. But if that fellow hadn't been squared, or else wasn't drunk, or else wasn't off his head, that 'orse must have won,--my Lord Duke." "I do not know anything about racing, Major Tifto." "I suppose not, your Grace. But as I and Silverbridge are together in this matter I thought I'd just let your Grace know that we ought to have had a very good thing. I thought that perhaps your Grace might like to know that." "Tifto, you are making an ass of yourself," said Silverbridge. "Making an ass of myself!" exclaimed the Major. "Yes;--considerably." "I think you are a little hard upon your friend," said the Duke, with an attempt at a laugh. "It is not to be supposed that he should know how utterly indifferent I am to everything connected with the turf." "I thought, my Lord Duke, you might care about learning how Silverbridge was going on." This the poor little man said almost with a whine. His partner's roughness had knocked out of him nearly all the courage which Bacchus had given him. "So I do; anything that interests him, interests me. But perhaps of all his pursuits racing is the one to which I am least able to lend an attentive ear. That every horse has a head, and that all did have tails till they were ill-used, is the extent of my stable knowledge." "Very good indeed, my Lord Duke; very good indeed! Ha, ha, ha!--all horses have heads, and all have tails! Heads and tails. Upon my word that is the best thing I have heard for a long time. I will do myself the honour of wishing your Grace good-night. By-bye, Silverbridge." Then he left the room, having been made supremely happy by what he considered to have been the Duke's joke. Nevertheless he would remember the snubbing and would be even with Silverbridge some day. Did Lord Silverbridge think that he was going to look after his Lordship's 'orses, and do this always on the square, and then be snubbed for doing it! "I am very sorry that he should have come in to trouble you," said the son. "He has not troubled me much. I do not know whether he has troubled you. If you are coming down to the House again I will walk with you." Silverbridge of course had to go down to the House again, and they started together. "That man did not trouble me, Silverbridge; but the question is whether such an acquaintance must not be troublesome to you." "I'm not very proud of him, sir." "But I think one ought to be proud of one's friends." "He isn't my friend in that way at all." "In what way then?" "He understands racing." "He is the partner of your pleasure then;--the man in whose society you love to enjoy the recreation of the race-course." "It is, sir, because he understands it." "I thought that a gentleman on the turf would have a trainer for that purpose;--not a companion. You mean to imply that you can save money by leaguing yourself with Major Tifto?" "No, sir,--indeed." "If you associate with him, not for pleasure, then it surely must be for profit. That you should do the former would be to me so surprising that I must regard it as impossible. That you should do the latter--is, I think, a reproach." This he said with no tone of anger in his voice,--so gently that Silverbridge at first hardly understood it. But gradually all that was meant came in upon him, and he felt himself to be ashamed of himself. "He is bad," he said at last. "Whether he be bad I will not say; but I am sure that you can gain nothing by his companionship." "I will get rid of him," said Silverbridge, after a considerable pause. "I cannot do so at once, but I will do it." "It will be better, I think." "Tregear has been telling me the same thing." "Is he objectionable to Mr. Tregear?" asked the Duke. "Oh yes. Tregear cannot bear him. You treated him a great deal better than Tregear ever does." "I do not deny that he is entitled to be treated well;--but so also is your groom. Let us say no more about him. And so it is to be Mabel Grex?" "I did not say so, sir. How can I answer for her? Only it was so pleasant for me to know that you would approve if it should come off." "Yes;--I will approve. When she has accepted you--" "But I don't think she will." "If she should, tell her that I will go to her at once. It will be much to have a new daughter;--very much that you should have a wife. Where would she like to live?" "Oh, sir, we haven't got as far as that yet." "I dare say not; I dare say not," said the Duke. "Gatherum is always thought to be dull." "She wouldn't like Gatherum, I'm sure." "Have you asked her?" "No, sir. But nobody ever did like Gatherum." "I suppose not. And yet, Silverbridge, what a sum of money it cost!" "I believe it did." "All vanity; and vexation of spirit!" The Duke no doubt was thinking of certain scenes passed at the great house in question, which scenes had not been delightful to him. "No, I don't suppose she would wish to live at Gatherum. The Horns was given expressly by my uncle to your dear mother, and I should like Mary to have the place." "Certainly." "You should live among your tenantry. I don't care so very much for Matching." "It is the one place you do like, sir." "However, we can manage all that. Carlton Terrace I do not particularly like; but it is a good house, and there you should hang up your hat when in London. When it is settled, let me know at once." "But if it should never be settled?" "I will ask no questions; but if it be settled, tell me." Then in Palace Yard he was turning to go, but before he did so, he said another word leaning on his son's shoulder. "I do not think that Mabel Grex and Major Tifto would do well together at all." "There shall be an end to that, sir." "God bless you, my boy!" said the Duke. Lord Silverbridge sat in the House--or, to speak more accurately, in the smoking-room of the House--for about an hour thinking over all that had passed between himself and his father. He certainly had not intended to say anything about Lady Mab, but on the spur of the moment it had all come out. Now at any rate it was decided for him that he must, in set terms, ask her to be his wife. The scene which had just occurred had made him thoroughly sick of Major Tifto. He must get rid of the Major, and there could be no way of doing this at once so easy and so little open to observation as marriage. If he were but once engaged to Mabel Grex the dismissal of Tifto would be quite a matter of course. He would see Lady Mabel again on the morrow and ask her in direct language to be his wife. CHAPTER XXVIII Mrs. Montacute Jones's Garden-Party It was known to all the world that Mrs. Montacute Jones's first great garden-party was to come off on Wednesday, 16th June, at Roehampton. Mrs. Montacute Jones, who lived in Grosvenor Place and had a country house in Gloucestershire, and a place for young men to shoot at in Scotland, also kept a suburban elysium at Roehampton, in order that she might give two garden-parties every year. When it is said that all these costly luxuries appertained to Mrs. Montacute Jones, it is to be understood that they did in truth belong to Mr. Jones, of whom nobody heard much. But of Mrs. Jones,--that is, Mrs. Montacute Jones,--everybody heard a great deal. She was an old lady who devoted her life to the amusement of--not only her friends, but very many who were not her friends. No doubt she was fond of Lords and Countesses, and worked very hard to get round her all the rank and fashion of the day. It must be acknowledged that she was a worldly old woman. But no more good-natured old woman lived in London, and everybody liked to be asked to her garden-parties. On this occasion there was to be a considerable infusion of royal blood,--German, Belgian, French, Spanish, and of native growth. Everybody who was asked would go, and everybody had been asked,--who was anybody. Lord Silverbridge had been asked, and Lord Silverbridge intended to be there. Lady Mary, his sister, could not even be asked, because her mother was hardly more than three months dead; but it is understood in the world that women mourn longer than men. Silverbridge had mounted a private hansom cab in which he could be taken about rapidly,--and, as he said himself, without being shut up in a coffin. In this vehicle he had himself taken to Roehampton, purporting to kill two birds with one stone. He had not as yet seen his sister since she had been with Lady Cantrip. He would on this day come back by The Horns. He was well aware that Lady Mab would be at the garden-party. What place could be better for putting the question he had to ask? He was by no means so confident as the heir to so many good things might perhaps have been without overdue self-confidence. Entering through the house into the lawn he encountered Mrs. Montacute Jones, who, with a seat behind her on the terrace, surrounded by flowers, was going through the immense labour of receiving her guests. "How very good of you to come all this way, Lord Silverbridge, to eat my strawberries." "How very good of you to ask me! I did not come to eat your strawberries but to see your friends." "You ought to have said you came to see me, you know. Have you met Miss Boncassen yet?" "The American beauty? No. Is she here?" "Yes; and she particularly wants to be introduced to you; you won't betray me, will you?" "Certainly not; I am as true as steel." "She wanted, she said, to see if the eldest son of the Duke of Omnium really did look like any other man." "Then I don't want to see her," said Silverbridge, with a look of vexation. "There you are wrong, for there was real downright fun in the way she said it. There they are, and I shall introduce you." Then Mrs. Montacute Jones absolutely left her post for a minute or two, and taking the young lord down the steps of the terrace did introduce him to Mr. Boncassen, who was standing there amidst a crowd, and to Miss Boncassen the daughter. Mr. Boncassen was an American who had lately arrived in England with the object of carrying out certain literary pursuits in which he was engaged within the British Museum. He was an American who had nothing to do with politics and nothing to do with trade. He was a man of wealth and a man of letters. And he had a daughter who was said to be the prettiest young woman either in Europe or in America at the present time. Isabel Boncassen was certainly a very pretty girl. I wish that my reader would believe my simple assurance. But no such simple assurance was ever believed, and I doubt even whether any description will procure for me from the reader that amount of faith which I desire to achieve. But I must make the attempt. General opinion generally considered Miss Boncassen to be small, but she was in truth something above the average height of English women. She was slight, without that look of slimness which is common to girls, and especially to American girls. That her figure was perfect the reader must believe on my word, as any detailed description of her arms, feet, bust, and waist, would be altogether ineffective. Her hair was dark brown and plentiful; but it added but little to her charms, which depended on other matters. Perhaps what struck the beholder first was the excessive brilliancy of her complexion. No pink was ever pinker, no alabaster whiteness was ever more like alabaster; but under and around and through it all there was a constantly changing hue which gave a vitality to her countenance which no fixed colours can produce. Her eyes, too, were full of life and brilliancy, and even when she was silent her mouth would speak. Nor was there a fault within the oval of her face upon which the hypercritics of mature age could set a finger. Her teeth were excellent both in form and colour, but were seen but seldom. Who does not know that look of ubiquitous ivory produced by teeth which are too perfect in a face which is otherwise poor? Her nose at the base spread a little,--so that it was not purely Grecian. But who has ever seen a nose to be eloquent and expressive, which did not so spread? It was, I think, the vitality of her countenance,--the way in which she could speak with every feature, the command which she had of pathos, of humour, of sympathy, of satire, the assurance which she gave by every glance of her eye, every elevation of her brow, every curl of her lip, that she was alive to all that was going on,--it was all this rather than those feminine charms which can be catalogued and labelled that made all acknowledge that she was beautiful. "Lord Silverbridge," said Mr. Boncassen, speaking a little through his nose, "I am proud to make your acquaintance, sir. Your father is a man for whom we in our country have a great respect. I think, sir, you must be proud of such a father." "Oh yes,--no doubt," said Silverbridge awkwardly. Then Mr. Boncassen continued his discourse with the gentlemen around him. Upon this our friend turned to the young lady. "Have you been long in England, Miss Boncassen?" "Long enough to have heard about you and your father," she said, speaking with no slightest twang. "I hope you have not heard any evil of me." "Well!" "I'm sure you can't have heard much good." "I know you didn't win the Derby." "You've been long enough to hear that?" "Do you suppose we don't interest ourselves about the Derby in New York? Why, when we arrived at Queenstown I was leaning over the taffrail so that I might ask the first man on board the tender whether the Prime Minister had won." "And he said he hadn't." "I can't conceive why you of all men should call your horse by such a name. If my father had been President of the United States, I don't think I'd call a horse President." "I didn't name the horse." "I'd have changed it. But is it not very impudent in me to be finding fault with you the first time I have ever seen you? Shall you have a horse at Ascot?" "There will be something going, I suppose. Nothing that I care about." Lord Silverbridge had made up his mind that he would go to no races with Tifto before the Leger. The Leger would be an affair of such moment as to demand his presence. After that should come the complete rupture between him and Tifto. Then there was a movement among the elders, and Lord Silverbridge soon found himself walking alone with Miss Boncassen. It seemed to her to be quite natural to do so, and there certainly was no reason why he should decline anything so pleasant. It was thus that he had intended to walk with Mabel Grex;--only as yet he had not found her. "Oh yes," said Miss Boncassen, when they had been together about twenty minutes; "we shall be here all the summer, and all the fall, and all the winter. Indeed father means to read every book in the British Museum before he goes back." "He'll have something to do." "He reads by steam, and he has two or three young men with him to take it all down and make other books out of it;--just as you'll see a lady take a lace shawl and turn it all about till she has trimmed a petticoat with it. It is the same lace all through,--and so I tell father it's the same knowledge." "But he puts it where more people will find it." "The lady endeavours to do the same with the lace. That depends on whether people look up or down. Father however is a very learned man. You mustn't suppose that I am laughing at him. He is going to write a very learned book. Only everybody will be dead before it can be half finished." They still went on together, and then he gave her his arm and took her into the place where the strawberries and cream were prepared. As he was going in he saw Mabel Grex walking with Tregear, and she bowed to him pleasantly and playfully. "Is that lady a great friend of yours?" asked Miss Boncassen. "A very great friend indeed." "She is very beautiful." "And clever as well,--and good as gold." "Dear me! Do tell me who it is that owns all these qualities." "Lady Mabel Grex. She is daughter of Lord Grex. That man with her is my particular friend. His name is Frank Tregear, and they are cousins." "I am so glad they are cousins." "Why glad?" "Because his being with her won't make you unhappy." "Supposing I was in love with her,--which I am not,--do you suppose it would make me jealous to see her with another man?" "In our country it would not. A young lady may walk about with a young gentleman just as she might with another young lady; but I thought it was different here. Do you know, judging by English ways, I believe I am behaving very improperly in walking about with you so long. Ought I not to tell you to go away?" "Pray do not." "As I am going to stay here so long I wish to behave well to English eyes." "People know who you are, and discount all that." "If the difference be very marked they do. For instance, I needn't wear a hideous long bit of cloth over my face in Constantinople because I am a woman. But when the discrepancies are small, then they have to be attended to. So I shan't walk about with you any more." "Oh yes, you will," said Silverbridge, who began to think that he liked walking about with Miss Boncassen. "Certainly not. There is Mr. Sprottle. He is father's secretary. He will take me back." "Cannot I take you back as well as Mr. Sprottle?" "Indeed no;--I am not going to monopolise such a man as you. Do you think that I don't understand that everybody will be making remarks upon the American girl who won't leave the son of the Duke of Omnium alone? There is your particular friend Lady Mabel, and here is my particular friend Mr. Sprottle." "May I come and call?" "Certainly. Father will only be too proud,--and I shall be prouder. Mother will be the proudest of all. Mother very seldom goes out. Till we get a house we are at The Langham. Thank you, Mr. Sprottle. I think we'll go and find father." Lord Silverbridge found himself close to Lady Mabel and Tregear, and also to Miss Cassewary, who had now joined Lady Mabel. He had been much struck with the American beauty, but was not on that account the less anxious to carry out his great plan. It was essentially necessary that he should do so at once, because the matter had been settled between him and his father. He was anxious to assure her that if she would consent, then the Duke would be ready to pour out all kinds of paternal blessings on their heads. "Come and take a turn among the haycocks," he said. "Frank declares," said Lady Mabel, "that the hay is hired for the occasion. I wonder whether that is true." "Anybody can see," said Tregear, "that it has not been cut off the grass it stands upon." "If I could find Mrs. Montacute Jones I'd ask her where she got it," said Lady Mabel. "Are you coming?" asked Silverbridge impatiently. "I don't think I am. I have been walking round the haycocks till I am tired of them." "Anywhere else then?" "There isn't anywhere else. What have you done with your American beauty? The truth is, Lord Silverbridge, you ask me for my company when she won't give you hers any longer. Doesn't it look like it, Miss Cassewary?" "I don't think Lord Silverbridge is the man to forget an old friend for a new one." "Not though the new friend be as lovely as Miss Boncassen?" "I don't know that I ever saw a prettier girl," said Tregear. "I quite admit it," said Lady Mabel. "But that is no salve for my injured feelings I have heard so much about Miss Boncassen's beauty for the last week, that I mean to get up a company of British females, limited, for the express purpose of putting her down. Who is Miss Boncassen that we are all to be put on one side for her?" Of course he knew that she was joking, but he hardly knew how to take her joke. There is a manner of joking which carries with it much serious intention. He did feel that Lady Mabel was not gracious to him because he had spent half an hour with this new beauty, and he was half inclined to be angry with her. Was it fitting that she should be cross with him, seeing that he was resolved to throw at her feet all the good things that he had in the world? "Bother Miss Boncassen," he said; "you might as well come and take a turn with a fellow." "Come along, Miss Cassewary," said she. "We will go round the haycocks yet once again." So they turned and the two ladies accompanied Lord Silverbridge. But this was not what he wanted. He could not say what he had to say in the presence of Miss Cassewary,--nor could he ask her to take herself off in another direction. Nor could he take himself off. Now that he had joined himself to these two ladies he must make with them the tour of the gardens. All this made him cross. "These kind of things are a great bore," he said. "I dare say you would rather be in the House of Commons;--or, better still, at the Beargarden." "You mean to be ill-natured when you say that, Lady Mab." "You ask us to come and walk with you, and then you tell us that we are bores!" "I did nothing of the kind." "I should have thought that you would be particularly pleased with yourself for coming here to-day, seeing that you have made Miss Boncassen's acquaintance. To be allowed to walk half an hour alone with the acknowledged beauty of the two hemispheres ought to be enough even for Lord Silverbridge." "That is nonsense, Lady Mab." "Nothing gives so much zest to admiration as novelty. A republican charmer must be exciting after all the blasées habituées of the London drawing-rooms." "How can you talk such nonsense, Mabel?" said Miss Cassewary. "But it is so. I feel that people must be sick of seeing me. I know I am very often sick of seeing them. Here is something fresh,--and not only unlike, but so much more lovely. I quite acknowledge that I may be jealous, but no one can say that I am spiteful. I wish that some republican Adonis or Apollo would crop up,--so that we might have our turn. But I don't think the republican gentlemen are equal to the republican ladies. Do you, Lord Silverbridge?" "I haven't thought about it." "Mr. Sprottle for instance." "I have not the pleasure of knowing Mr. Sprottle." "Now we've been round the haycocks, and really, Lord Silverbridge, I don't think we have gained much by it. Those forced marches never do any good." And so they parted. He was thinking with a bitter spirit of the ill-result of his morning's work when he again found himself close to Miss Boncassen in the crowd of departing people on the terrace. "Mind you keep your word," she said. And then she turned to her father. "Lord Silverbridge has promised to call." "Mrs. Boncassen will be delighted to make his acquaintance." He got into his cab and was driven off towards Richmond. As he went he began to think of the two young women with whom he had passed his morning. Mabel had certainly behaved badly to him. Even if she suspected nothing of his object, did she not owe it to their friendship to be more courteous to him than she had been? And if she suspected that object, should she not at any rate have given him the opportunity? Or could it be that she was really jealous of the American girl? No;--that idea he rejected instantly. It was not compatible with the innate modesty of his disposition. But no doubt the American girl was very lovely. Merely as a thing to be looked at she was superior to Mabel. He did feel that as to mere personal beauty she was in truth superior to anything he had ever seen before. And she was clever too;--and good-humoured;--whereas Mabel had been both ill-natured and unpleasant. CHAPTER XXIX The Lovers Meet Lord Silverbridge found his sister alone. "I particularly want you," said he, "to come and call on Mabel Grex. She wishes to know you, and I am sure you would like her." "But I haven't been out anywhere yet," she said. "I don't feel as though I wanted to go anywhere." Nevertheless she was very anxious to know Lady Mabel Grex, of whom she had heard much. A girl if she has had a former love passage says nothing of it to her new lover; but a man is not so reticent. Frank Tregear had perhaps not told her everything, but he had told her something. "I was very fond of her;--very fond of her," he had said. "And so I am still," he had added. "As you are my love of loves, she is my friend of friends." Lady Mary had been satisfied by the assurance, but had become anxious to see the friend of friends. She resisted at first her brother's entreaties. She felt that her father in delivering her over to the seclusion of The Horns had intended to preclude her from showing herself in London. She was conscious that she was being treated with cruelty, and had a certain pride in her martyrdom. She would obey her father to the letter; she would give him no right to call her conduct in question; but he and any other to whom he might entrust the care of her, should be made to know that she thought him cruel. He had his power to which she must submit. But she also had hers,--to which it was possible he might be made to submit. "I do not know that papa would wish me to go," she said. "But it is just what he would wish. He thinks a good deal about Mabel." "Why should he think about her at all?" "I can't exactly explain," said Silverbridge, "but he does." "If you mean to tell me that Mabel Grex is anything particular to you, and that papa approves of it, I will go all round the world to see her." But he had not meant to tell her this. The request had been made at Lady Mabel's instance. When his sister had spoken of her father's possible objection, then he had become eager in explaining the Duke's feeling, not remembering that such anxiety might betray himself. At that moment Lady Cantrip came in, and the question was referred to her. She did not see any objection to such a visit, and expressed her opinion that it would be a good thing that Mary should be taken out. "She should begin to go somewhere," said Lady Cantrip. And so it was decided. On the next Friday he would come down early in his hansom and drive her up to Belgrave Square. Then he would take her to Carlton Terrace, and Lady Cantrip's carriage should pick her up there and bring her home. He would arrange it all. "What did you think of the American beauty?" asked Lady Cantrip when that was settled. "I thought she was a beauty." "So I perceived. You had eyes for nobody else," said Lady Cantrip, who had been at the garden-party. "Somebody introduced her to me, and then I had to walk about the grounds with her. That's the kind of thing one always does in those places." "Just so. That is what 'those places' are meant for, I suppose. But it was not apparently a great infliction." Lord Silverbridge had to explain that it was not an infliction;--that it was a privilege, seeing that Miss Boncassen was both clever and lovely; but that it did not mean anything in particular. When he took his leave he asked his sister to go out into the grounds with him for a moment. This she did almost unwillingly, fearing that he was about to speak to her of Tregear. But he had no such purpose on his mind. "Of course you know," he began, "all that was nonsense you were saying about Mabel." "I did not know." "I was afraid you might blurt out something before her." "I should not be so imprudent." "Girls do make such fools of themselves sometimes. They are always thinking about people being in love. But it is the truth that my father said to me the other day how very much he liked what he had heard of her, and that he would like you to know her." On that same evening Silverbridge wrote from the Beargarden the shortest possible note to Lady Mabel, telling her what he had arranged. "I and Mary propose to call in B. Square on Friday at two. I must be early because of the House. You will give us lunch. S." There was no word of endearment,--none even of those ordinary words which people who hate each other use to one another. But he received the next day at home a much more kindly-written note from her: DEAR LORD SILVERBRIDGE, You are so good! You always do just what you think people will like best. Nothing could please me so much as seeing your sister, of whom of course I have heard very very much. There shall be nobody here but Miss Cass. Yours most sincerely, M. G. "How I do wish I were a man!" his sister said to him when they were in the hansom together. "You'd have a great deal more trouble." "But I'd have a hansom of my own, and go where I pleased. How would you like to be shut up at a place like The Horns?" "You can go out if you like it." "Not like you. Papa thinks it's the proper place for me to live in, and so I must live there. I don't think a woman ever chooses how or where she shall live herself." "You are not going to take up woman's rights, I hope." "I think I shall if I stay at The Horns much longer. What would papa say if he heard that I was going to give a lecture at an Institute?" "The governor has had so many things to bear that a trifle such as that would make but little difference." "Poor papa!" "He was dreadfully cut up about Gerald. And then he is so good! He said more to me about Gerald than he ever did about my own little misfortune at Oxford; but to Gerald himself he said almost nothing. Now he has forgiven me because he thinks I am constant at the House." "And are you?" "Not so much as he thinks. I do go there,--for his sake. He has been so good about my changing sides." "I think you were quite right there." "I am beginning to think I was quite wrong. What did it matter to me?" "I suppose it did make papa unhappy." "Of course it did;--and then this affair of yours." As soon as this was said Lady Mary at once hardened her heart against her father. Whether Silverbridge was or was not entitled to his own political opinions,--seeing that the Pallisers had for ages been known as staunch Whigs and Liberals,--might be a matter for question. But that she had a right to her own lover she thought that there could be no question. As they were sitting in the cab he could hardly see her face, but he was aware that she was in some fashion arming herself against opposition. "I am sure that this makes him very unhappy," continued Silverbridge. "It cannot be altered," she said. "It will have to be altered." "Nothing can alter it. He might die, indeed;--or so might I." "Or he might see that it is no good,--and change his mind," suggested Silverbridge. "Of course that is possible," said Lady Mary very curtly,--showing plainly by her manner that the subject was one which she did not choose to discuss any further. "It is very good of you to come to me," said Lady Mabel, kissing her new acquaintance. "I have heard so much about you." "And I also of you." "I, you know, am one of your brother's stern Mentors. There are three or four of us determined to make him a pattern young legislator. Miss Cassewary is another. Only she is not quite so stern as I am." "He ought to be very much obliged." "But he is not,--not a bit. Are you, Lord Silverbridge?" "Not so much as I ought to be, perhaps." "Of course there is an opposing force. There are the race-horses, and the drag, and Major Tifto. No doubt you have heard of Major Tifto. The Major is the Mr. Worldly-Wiseman who won't let Christian go to the Strait Gate. I am afraid he hasn't read his Pilgrim's Progress. But we shall prevail, Lady Mary, and he will get to the beautiful city at last." "What is the beautiful city?" he asked. "A seat in the Cabinet, I suppose,--or that general respect which a young nobleman achieves when he has shown himself able to sit on a bench for six consecutive hours without appearing to go to sleep." Then they went to lunch, and Lady Mary did find herself to be happy with her new acquaintance. Her life since her mother's death had been so sad, that this short escape from it was a relief to her. Now for awhile she found herself almost gay. There was an easy liveliness about Lady Mabel,--a grain of humour and playfulness conjoined,--which made her feel at home at once. And it seemed to her as though her brother was at home. He called the girl Lady Mab, and Queen Mab, and once plain Mabel, and the old woman he called Miss Cass. It surely, she thought, must be the case that Lady Mabel and her brother were engaged. "Come upstairs into my own room,--it is nicer than this," said Lady Mabel, and they went from the dining-room into a pretty little sitting-room with which Silverbridge was very well acquainted. "Have you heard of Miss Boncassen?" Mary said she had heard something of Miss Boncassen's great beauty. "Everybody is talking about her. Your brother met her at Mrs. Montacute Jones's garden-party, and was made a conquest of instantly." "I wasn't made a conquest of at all," said Silverbridge. "Then he ought to have been made a conquest of. I should be if I were a man. I think she is the loveliest person to look at and the nicest person to listen to that I ever came across. We all feel that, as far as this season is concerned, we are cut out. But we don't mind it so much because she is a foreigner." Then just as she said this the door was opened and Frank Tregear was announced. Everybody there present knew as well as does the reader, what was the connexion between Tregear and Lady Mary Palliser. And each knew that the other knew it. It was therefore impossible for them not to feel themselves guilty among themselves. The two lovers had not seen each other since they had been together in Italy. Now they were brought face to face in this unexpected manner! And nobody except Tregear was at first quite sure whether somebody had not done something to arrange the meeting. Mary might naturally suspect that Lady Mabel had done this in the interest of her friend Tregear, and Silverbridge could not but suspect that it was so. Lady Mabel, who had never before met the other girl, could hardly refrain from thinking that there had been some underhand communication,--and Miss Cassewary was clearly of opinion that there had been some understanding. Silverbridge was the first to speak. "Halloo, Tregear, I didn't know that we were to see you." "Nor I, that I should see you," said he. Then of course there was a shaking of hands all round, in the course of which ceremony he came to Mary the last. She gave him her hand, but had not a word to say to him. "If I had known that you were here," he said, "I should not have come; but I need hardly say how glad I am to see you,--even in this way." Then the two girls were convinced that the meeting was accidental; but Miss Cass still had her doubts. Conversation became at once very difficult. Tregear seated himself near, but not very near, to Lady Mary, and made some attempt to talk to both the girls at once. Lady Mabel plainly showed that she was not at her ease;--whereas Mary seemed to be stricken dumb by the presence of her lover. Silverbridge was so much annoyed by a feeling that this interview was a treason to his father, that he sat cudgelling his brain to think how he should bring it to an end. Miss Cassewary was dumbfounded by the occasion. She was the one elder in the company who ought to see that no wrong was committed. She was not directly responsible to the Duke of Omnium, but she was thoroughly permeated by a feeling that it was her duty to take care that there should be no clandestine love meetings in Lord Grex's house. At last Silverbridge jumped up from his chair. "Upon my word, Tregear, I think you had better go," said he. "So do I," said Miss Cassewary. "If it is an accident--" "Of course it is an accident," said Tregear angrily,--looking round at Mary, who blushed up to her eyes. "I did not mean to doubt it," said the old lady. "But as it has occurred, Mabel, don't you think that he had better go?" "He won't bite anybody, Miss Cass." "She would not have come if she had expected it," said Silverbridge. "Certainly not," said Mary, speaking for the first time. "But now he is here--" Then she stopped herself, rose from the sofa, sat down, and then rising again, stepped up to her lover, who rose at the same moment,--and threw herself into his arms and put up her lips to be kissed. "This won't do at all," said Silverbridge. Miss Cassewary clasped her hands together and looked up to heaven. She probably had never seen such a thing done before. Lady Mabel's eyes were filled with tears, and though in all this there was much to cause her anguish, still in her heart of hearts she admired the brave girl who could thus show her truth to her lover. "Now go," said Mary, through her sobs. "My own one," ejaculated Tregear. "Yes, yes, yes; always your own. Go,--go; go." She was weeping and sobbing as she said this, and hiding her face with her handkerchief. He stood for a moment irresolute, and then left the room without a word of adieu to any one. "You have behaved very badly," said the brother. "She has behaved like an angel," said Mabel, throwing her arms round Mary as she spoke, "like an angel. If there had been a girl whom you loved and who loved you, would you not have wished it? Would you not have worshipped her for showing that she was not ashamed of her love?" "I am not a bit ashamed," said Mary. "And I say that you have no cause. No one knows him as I do. How good he is, and how worthy!" Immediately after that Silverbridge took his sister away, and Lady Mabel, escaping from Miss Cass, was alone. "She loves him almost as I have loved him," she said to herself. "I wonder whether he can love her as he did me?" CHAPTER XXX What Came of the Meeting Not a word was said in the cab as Lord Silverbridge took his sister to Carlton Terrace, and he was leaving her without any reference to the scene which had taken place, when an idea struck him that this would be cruel. "Mary," he said, "I was very sorry for all that." "It was not my doing." "I suppose it was nobody's doing. But I am very sorry that it occurred. I think that you should have controlled yourself." "No!" she almost shouted. "I think so." "No;--if you mean by controlling myself, holding my tongue. He is the man I love,--whom I have promised to marry." "But, Mary,--do ladies generally embrace their lovers in public?" "No;--nor should I. I never did such a thing in my life before. But as he was there I had to show that I was not ashamed of him! Do you think I should have done it if you all had not been there?" Then again she burst into tears. He did not quite know what to make of it. Mabel Grex had declared that she had behaved like an angel. But yet, as he thought of what he had seen, he shuddered with vexation. "I was thinking of the governor," he said. "He shall be told everything." "That you met Tregear?" "Certainly; and that I--kissed him. I will do nothing that I am ashamed to tell everybody." "He will be very angry." "I cannot help it. He should not treat me as he is doing. Mr. Tregear is a gentleman. Why did he let him come? Why did you bring him? But it is of no use. The thing is settled. Papa can break my heart, but he cannot make me say that I am not engaged to Mr. Tregear." On that night Mary told the whole of her story to Lady Cantrip. There was nothing that she tried to conceal. "I got up," she said, "and threw my arms round him. Is he not all the world to me?" "Had it been planned?" asked Lady Cantrip. "No;--no! Nothing had been planned. They are cousins and very intimate, and he goes there constantly. Now I want you to tell papa all about it." Lady Cantrip began to think that it had been an evil day for her when she had agreed to take charge of this very determined young lady; but she consented at once to write to the Duke. As the girl was in her hands she must take care not to lay herself open to reproaches. As this objectionable lover had either contrived a meeting, or had met her without contriving, it was necessary that the Duke should be informed. "I would rather you wrote the letter," said Lady Mary. "But pray tell him that all along I have meant him to know all about it." Till Lady Cantrip seated herself at her writing-table she did not know how great the difficulty would be. It cannot in any circumstance be easy to write to a father as to his daughter's love for an objectionable lover; but the Duke's character added much to the severity of the task. And then that embrace! She knew that the Duke would be struck with horror as he read of such a tale, and she found herself almost struck with horror as she attempted to write it. When she came to the point she found she could not write it. "I fear there was a good deal of warmth shown on both sides," she said, feeling that she was calumniating the man, as to whose warmth she had heard nothing. "It is quite clear," she added, "that this is not a passing fancy on her part." It was impossible that the Duke should be made to understand exactly what had occurred. That Silverbridge had taken Mary he did understand, and that they had together gone to Lord Grex's house. He understood also that the meeting had taken place in the presence of Silverbridge and of Lady Mabel. "No doubt it was all an accident," Lady Cantrip wrote. How could it be an accident? "You had Mary up in town on Friday," he said to his son on the following Sunday morning. "Yes, sir." "And that friend of yours came in?" "Yes, sir." "Do you not know what my wishes are?" "Certainly I do;--but I could not help his coming. You do not suppose that anybody had planned it?" "I hope not." "It was simply an accident. Such an accident as must occur over and over again,--unless Mary is to be locked up." "Who talks of locking anybody up? What right have you to speak in that way?" "I only meant that of course they will stumble across each other in London." "I think I will go abroad," said the Duke. He was silent for awhile, and then repeated his words. "I think I will go abroad." "Not for long, I hope, sir." "Yes;--to live there. Why should I stay here? What good can I do here? Everything I see and everything I hear is a pain to me." The young man of course could not but go back in his mind to the last interview which he had had with his father, when the Duke had been so gracious and apparently so well pleased. "Is there anything else wrong,--except about Mary?" Silverbridge asked. "I am told that Gerald owes about fifteen hundred pounds at Cambridge." "So much as that! I knew he had a few horses there." "It is not the money, but the absence of principle,--that a young man should have no feeling that he ought to live within certain prescribed means! Do you know what you have had from Mr. Morton?" "Not exactly, sir." "It is different with you. But a man, let him be who he may, should live within certain means. As for your sister, I think she will break my heart." Silverbridge found it to be quite impossible to say anything in answer to this. "Are you going to church?" asked the Duke. "I was not thinking of doing so particularly." "Do you not ever go?" "Yes;--sometimes. I will go with you now, if you like it, sir." "I had thought of going, but my mind is too much harassed. I do not see why you should not go." But Silverbridge, though he had been willing to sacrifice his morning to his father,--for it was, I fear, in that way that he had looked at it,--did not see any reason for performing a duty which his father himself omitted. And there were various matters also which harassed him. On the previous evening, after dinner, he had allowed himself to back the Prime Minister for the Leger to a very serious amount. In fact he had plunged, and now stood to lose some twenty thousand pounds on the doings of the last night. And he had made these bets under the influence of Major Tifto. It was the remembrance of this, after the promise made to his father, that annoyed him the most. He was imbued with a feeling that it behoved him as a man to "pull himself together," as he would have said himself, and to live in accordance with certain rules. He could make the rules easily enough, but he had never yet succeeded in keeping any one of them. He had determined to sever himself from Tifto, and, in doing that, had intended to sever himself from affairs of the turf generally. This resolution was not yet a week old. It was on that evening that he had resolved that Tifto should no longer be his companion; and now he had to confess to himself that because he had drunk three or four glasses of champagne he had been induced by Tifto to make those wretched bets. And he had told his father that he intended to ask Mabel Grex to be his wife. He had so committed himself that the offer must now be made. He did not specially regret that, though he wished that he had been more reticent. "What a fool a man is to blurt out everything!" he said to himself. A wife would be a good thing for him; and where could he possibly find a better wife than Mabel Grex? In beauty she was no doubt inferior to Miss Boncassen. There was something about Miss Boncassen which made it impossible to forget her. But Miss Boncassen was an American, and on many accounts out of the question. It did not occur to him that he would fall in love with Miss Boncassen; but still it seemed hard to him that this intention of marriage should stand in his way of having a good time with Miss Boncassen for a few weeks. No doubt there were objections to marriage. It clipped a fellow's wings. But then, if he were married, he might be sure that Tifto would be laid aside. It was such a great thing to have got his father's assured consent to a marriage. It meant complete independence in money matters. Then his mind ran away to a review of his father's affairs. It was a genuine trouble to him that his father should be so unhappy. Of all the griefs which weighed upon the Duke's mind, that in reference to his sister was the heaviest. The money which Gerald owed at Cambridge would be nothing if that other sorrow could be conquered. Nor had Tifto and his own extravagance caused the Duke any incurable wounds. If Tregear could be got out of the way, his father, he thought, might be reconciled to other things. He felt very tender-hearted about his father; but he had no remorse in regard to his sister as he made up his mind that he would speak very seriously to Tregear. He had wandered into St. James's Park, and had lighted by this time half-a-dozen cigarettes one after another, as he sat on one of the benches. He was a handsome youth, all but six feet high, with light hair, with round blue eyes, and with all that aristocratic look, which had belonged so peculiarly to the late Duke but which was less conspicuous in the present head of the family. He was a young man whom you would hardly pass in a crowd without observing,--but of whom you would say, after due observation, that he had not as yet put off all his childish ways. He now sat with his legs stretched out, with his cane in his hands, looking down upon the water. He was trying to think. He worked hard at thinking. But the bench was hard and, upon the whole, he was not satisfied with his position. He had just made up his mind that he would look up Tregear, when Tregear himself appeared on the path before him. "Tregear!" exclaimed Silverbridge. "Silverbridge!" exclaimed Tregear. "What on earth makes you walk about here on a Sunday morning?" "What on earth makes you sit there? That I should walk here, which I often do, does not seem to me odd. But that I should find you is marvellous. Do you often come?" "Never was here in my life before. I strolled in because I had things to think of." "Questions to be asked in Parliament? Notices of motions, Amendments in Committee, and that kind of thing?" "Go on, old fellow." "Or perhaps Major Tifto has made important revelations." "D---- Major Tifto." "With all my heart," said Tregear. "Sit down here," said Silverbridge. "As it happened, at the moment when you came up I was thinking of you." "That was kind." "And I was determined to go to you. All this about my sister must be given up." "Must be given up?" "It can never lead to any good. I mean that there never can be a marriage." Then he paused, but Tregear was determined to hear him out. "It is making my father so miserable that you would pity him if you could see him." "I dare say I should. When I see people unhappy I always pity them. What I would ask you to think of is this. If I were to commission you to tell your sister that everything between us should be given up, would not she be so unhappy that you would have to pity her?" "She would get over it." "And so will your father." "He has a right to have his own opinion on such a matter." "And so have I. And so has she. His rights in this matter are very clear and very potential. I am quite ready to admit that we cannot marry for many years to come, unless he will provide the money. You are quite at liberty to tell him that I say so. I have no right to ask your father for a penny, and I will never do so. The power is all in his hands. As far as I know my own purposes, I shall not make any immediate attempt even to see her. We did meet, as you saw, the other day, by the merest chance. After that, do you think that your sister wishes me to give her up?" "As for supposing that girls are to have what they wish, that is nonsense." "For young men I suppose equally so. Life ought to be a life of self-denial, no doubt. Perhaps it might be my duty to retire from this affair, if by doing so I should sacrifice only myself. The one person of whom I am bound to think in this matter is the girl I love." "That is just what she would say about you." "I hope so." "In that way you support each other. If it were any other man circumstanced just like you are, and any other girl placed like Mary, you would be the first to say that the man was behaving badly. I don't like to use hard language to you, but in such a case you would be the first to say of another man--that he was looking after the girl's money." Silverbridge as he said this looked forward steadfastly on to the water, regretting much that cause for quarrel should have arisen, but thinking that Tregear would find himself obliged to quarrel. But Tregear, after a few moments' silence, having thought it out, determined that he would not quarrel. "I think I probably might," he said, laying his hand on Silverbridge's arm. "I think I perhaps might express such an opinion." "Well then!" "I have to examine myself, and find out whether I am guilty of the meanness which I might perhaps be too ready to impute to another. I have done so, and I am quite sure that I am not drawn to your sister by any desire for her money. I did not seek her because she was a rich man's daughter, nor,--because she is a rich man's daughter,--will I give her up. She shall be mistress of the occasion. Nothing but a word from her shall induce me to leave her;--but a word from her, if it comes from her own lips,--shall do so." Then he took his friend's hand in his, and, having grasped it, walked away without saying another word. CHAPTER XXXI Miss Boncassen's River-Party. No. 1 Thrice within the next three weeks did Lord Silverbridge go forth to ask Mabel to be his wife, but thrice in vain. On one occasion she would talk on other things. On the second Miss Cassewary would not leave her. On the third the conversation turned in a very disagreeable way on Miss Boncassen, as to whom Lord Silverbridge could not but think that Lady Mabel said some very ill-natured things. It was no doubt true that he, during the last three weeks, had often been in Miss Boncassen's company, that he had danced with her, ridden with her, taken her to the House of Lords and to the House of Commons, and was now engaged to attend upon her at a river-party up above Maidenhead. But Mabel had certainly no right to complain. Had he not thrice during the same period come there to lay his coronet at her feet;--and now, at this very moment, was it not her fault that he was not going through the ceremony? "I suppose," she said, laughing, "that it is all settled." "What is all settled?" "About you and the American beauty." "I am not aware that anything particular has been settled." "Then it ought to be,--oughtn't it? For her sake, I mean." "That is so like an English woman," said Lord Silverbridge. "Because you cannot understand a manner of life a little different from your own you will impute evil." "I have imputed no evil, Lord Silverbridge, and you have no right to say so." "If you mean to assert," said Miss Cass, "that the manners of American young ladies are freer than those of English young ladies, it is you that are taking away their characters." "I don't say it would be at all bad," continued Lady Mabel. "She is a beautiful girl, and very clever, and would make a charming Duchess. And then it would be such a delicious change to have an American Duchess." "She wouldn't be a Duchess." "Well, Countess, with Duchessship before her in the remote future. Wouldn't it be a change, Miss Cass?" "Oh decidedly!" said Miss Cass. "And very much for the better. Quite a case of new blood, you know. Pray don't suppose that I mean to object. Everybody who talks about it approves. I haven't heard a dissentient voice. Only as it has gone so far, and as English people are too stupid, you know, to understand all these new ways,--don't you think perhaps--?" "No, I don't think. I don't think anything except that you are very ill-natured." Then he got up and, after making formal adieux to both the ladies, left the house. As soon as he was gone Lady Mabel began to laugh, but the least apprehensive ears would have perceived that the laughter was affected. Miss Cassewary did not laugh at all, but sat bolt upright and looked very serious. "Upon my honour," said the younger lady, "he is the most beautifully simple-minded human being I ever knew in my life." "Then I wouldn't laugh at him." "How can one help it? But of course I do it with a purpose." "What purpose?" "I think he is making a fool of himself. If somebody does not interfere he will go so far that he will not be able to draw back without misbehaving." "I thought," said Miss Cassewary, in a very low voice, almost whispering, "I thought that he was looking for a wife elsewhere." "You need not think of that again," said Lady Mab, jumping up from her seat. "I had thought of it too. But as I told you before, I spared him. He did not really mean it with me;--nor does he mean it with this American girl. Such young men seldom mean. They drift into matrimony. But she will not spare him. It would be a national triumph. All the States would sing a pæan of glory. Fancy a New York belle having compassed a Duke!" "I don't think it possible. It would be too horrid." "I think it quite possible. As for me, I could teach myself to think it best as it is, were I not so sure that I should be better for him than so many others. But I shouldn't love him." "Why not love him?" "He is such a boy. I should always treat him like a boy,--spoiling him and petting him, but never respecting him. Don't run away with any idea that I should refuse him from conscientious motives, if he were really to ask me. I too should like to be a Duchess. I should like to bring all this misery at home to an end." "But you did refuse him." "Not exactly;--because he never asked me. For the moment I was weak, and so I let him have another chance. I shall not have been a good friend to him if it ends in his marrying this Yankee." Lord Silverbridge went out of the house in a very ill humour,--which however left him when in the course of the afternoon he found himself up at Maidenhead with Miss Boncassen. Miss Boncassen at any rate did not laugh at him. And then she was so pleasant, so full of common sense, and so completely intelligent! "I like you," she had said, "because I feel that you will not think that you ought to make love to me. There is nothing I hate so much as the idea that a young man and a young woman can't be acquainted with each other without some such tomfoolery as that." This had exactly expressed his own feeling. Nothing could be so pleasant as his intimacy with Isabel Boncassen. Mrs. Boncassen seemed to be a homely person, with no desire either to speak, or to be spoken to. She went out but seldom, and on those rare occasions did not in any way interfere with her daughter. Mr. Boncassen filled a prouder situation. Everybody knew that Miss Boncassen was in England because it suited Mr. Boncassen to spend many hours in the British Museum. But still the daughter hardly seemed to be under control from the father. She went alone where she liked; talked to those she liked; and did what she liked. Some of the young ladies of the day thought that there was a good deal to be said in favour of the freedom which she enjoyed. There is however a good deal to be said against it. All young ladies cannot be Miss Boncassens, with such an assurance of admirers as to be free from all fear of loneliness. There is a comfort for a young lady in having a pied-à-terre to which she may retreat in case of need. In American circles, where girls congregate without their mothers, there is a danger felt by young men that if a lady be once taken in hand, there will be no possibility of getting rid of her,--no mamma to whom she may be taken and under whose wings she may be dropped. "My dear," said an old gentleman the other day walking through an American ball-room, and addressing himself to a girl whom he knew well,--"My dear--" But the girl bowed and passed on, still clinging to the arm of the young man who accompanied her. But the old gentleman was cruel, and possessed of a determined purpose. "My dear," said he again, catching the young man tight by the collar and holding him fast. "Don't be afraid; I've got him; he shan't desert you; I'll hold him here till you have told me how your father does." The young lady looked as if she didn't like it, and the sight of her misery gave rise to a feeling that, after all, mammas perhaps may be a comfort. But in her present phase of life Miss Boncassen suffered no misfortune of this kind. It had become a privilege to be allowed to attend upon Miss Boncassen, and the feeling of this privilege had been enhanced by the manner in which Lord Silverbridge had devoted himself to her. Fashion of course makes fashion. Had not Lord Silverbridge been so very much struck by the charm of the young lady, Lords Glasslough and Popplecourt would not perhaps have found it necessary to run after her. As it was, even that most unenergetic of young men, Dolly Longstaff, was moved to profound admiration. On this occasion they were all up the river at Maidenhead. Mr. Boncassen had looked about for some means of returning the civilities offered to him, and had been instigated by Mrs. Montacute Jones to do it after this fashion. There was a magnificent banquet spread in a summer-house on the river bank. There were boats, and there was a band, and there was a sward for dancing. There was lawn-tennis, and fishing-rods,--which nobody used,--and better still, long shady secluded walks in which gentlemen might stroll,--and ladies too, if they were kind enough. The whole thing had been arranged by Mrs. Montacute Jones. As the day was fine, as many of the old people had abstained from coming, as there were plenty of young men of the best sort, and as nothing had been spared in reference to external comforts, the party promised to be a success. Every most lovely girl in London of course was there,--except Lady Mabel Grex. Lady Mabel was in the habit of going everywhere, but on this occasion she had refused Mrs. Boncassen's invitation. "I don't want to see her triumphs," she had said to Miss Cass. Everybody went down by railway of course, and innumerable flies and carriages had been provided to take them to the scene of action. Some immediately got into boats and rowed themselves up from the bridge,--which, as the thermometer was standing at eighty in the shade, was an inconsiderate proceeding. "I don't think I am quite up to that," said Dolly Longstaff, when it was proposed to him to take an oar. "Miss Amazon will do it. She rows so well, and is so strong." Whereupon Miss Amazon, not at all abashed, did take the oar; and as Lord Silverbridge was on the seat behind her with the other oar she probably enjoyed her task. "What a very nice sort of person Lady Cantrip is." This was said to Silverbridge by that generally silent young nobleman Lord Popplecourt. The remark was the more singular because Lady Cantrip was not at the party,--and the more so again because, as Silverbridge thought, there could be but little in common between the Countess who had his sister in charge and the young lord beside him, who was not fast only because he did not like to risk his money. "Well,--yes; I dare say she is." "I thought so, peculiarly. I was at that place at Richmond yesterday." "The devil you were! What were you doing at The Horns?" "Lady Cantrip's grandmother was,--I don't quite know what she was, but something to us. I know I've got a picture of her at Popplecourt. Lady Cantrip wanted to ask me something about it, and so I went down. I was so glad to make acquaintance with your sister." "You saw Mary, did you?" "Oh yes; I lunched there. I'm to go down and meet the Duke some day." "Meet the Duke!" "Why not?" "No reason on earth,--only I can't imagine the governor going to Richmond for his dinner. Well! I am very glad to hear it. I hope you'll get on well with him." "I was so much struck with your sister." "Yes; I dare say," said Silverbridge, turning away into the path where he saw Miss Boncassen standing with some other ladies. It certainly did not occur to him that Popplecourt was to be brought forward as a suitor for his sister's hand. "I believe this is the most lovely place in the world," Miss Boncassen said to him. "We are so much the more obliged to you for bringing us here." "We don't bring you. You allow us to come with you and see all that is pretty and lovely." "Is it not your party?" "Father will pay the bill, I suppose,--as far as that goes. And mother's name was put on the cards. But of course we know what that means. It is because you and a few others like you have been so kind to us, that we are able to be here at all." "Everybody, I should think, must be kind to you." "I do have a good time pretty much; but nowhere so good as here. I fear that when I get back I shall not like New York." "I have heard you say, Miss Boncassen, that Americans were more likeable than the English." "Have you? Well, yes; I think I have said so. And I think it is so. I'd sooner have to dance with a bank clerk in New York, than with a bank clerk here." "Do you ever dance with bank clerks?" "Oh dear yes. At least I suppose so. I dance with whoever comes up. We haven't got lords in America, you know!" "You have got gentlemen?" "Plenty of them;--but they are not so easily defined as lords. I do like lords." "Do you?" "Oh yes,--and ladies;--Countesses I mean and women of that sort. Your Lady Mabel Grex is not here. Why wouldn't she come?" "Perhaps you didn't ask her." "Oh yes I did;--especially for your sake." "She is not my Lady Mabel Grex," said Lord Silverbridge with unnecessary energy. "But she will be." "What makes you think that?" "You are devoted to her." "Much more to you, Miss Boncassen." "That is nonsense, Lord Silverbridge." "Not at all." "It is also--untrue." "Surely I must be the best judge of that myself." "Not a doubt; a judge not only whether it be true, but if true whether expedient,--or even possible. What did I say to you when we first began to know each other?" "What did you say?" "That I liked knowing you;--that was frank enough;--that I liked knowing you because I knew that there would be no tomfoolery of love-making." Then she paused; but he did not quite know how to go on with the conversation at once, and she continued her speech. "When you condescend to tell me that you are devoted to me, as though that were the kind of thing that I expect to have said when I take a walk with a young man in a wood, is not that the tomfoolery of love-making?" She stopped and looked at him, so that he was obliged to answer. "Then why do you ask me if I am devoted to Lady Mabel? Would not that be tomfoolery too?" "No. If I thought so, I would not have asked the question. I did specially invite her to come here because I thought you would like it. You have got to marry somebody." "Some day, perhaps." "And why not her?" "If you come to that, why not you?" He felt himself to be getting into deep waters as he said this,--but he had a meaning to express if only he could find the words to express it. "I don't say whether it is tomfoolery, as you call it, or not; but whatever it is, you began it." "Yes;--yes. I see. You punish me for my unpremeditated impertinence in suggesting that you are devoted to Lady Mabel by the premeditated impertinence of pretending to be devoted to me." "Stop a moment. I cannot follow that." Then she laughed. "I will swear that I did not intend to be impertinent." "I hope not." "I am devoted to you." "Lord Silverbridge!" "I think you are--" "Stop, stop. Do not say it." "Well I won't;--not now. But there has been no tomfoolery." "May I ask a question, Lord Silverbridge? You will not be angry? I would not have you angry with me." "I will not be angry," he said. "Are you not engaged to marry Lady Mabel Grex?" "No." "Then I beg your pardon. I was told that you were engaged to her. And I thought your choice was so fortunate, so happy! I have seen no girl here that I admire half so much. She almost comes up to my idea of what a young woman should be." "Almost!" "Now I am sure that if not engaged to her you must be in love with her, or my praise would have sufficed." "Though one knows a Lady Mabel Grex, one may become acquainted with a Miss Boncassen." There are moments in which stupid people say clever things, obtuse people say sharp things, and good-natured people say ill-natured things. "Lord Silverbridge," she said, "I did not expect that from you." "Expect what? I meant it simply." "I have no doubt you meant it simply. We Americans think ourselves sharp, but I have long since found out that we may meet more than our matches over here. I think we will go back. Mother means to try to get up a quadrille." "You will dance with me?" "I think not. I have been walking with you, and I had better dance with someone else." "You can let me have one dance." "I think not. There will not be many." "Are you angry with me?" "Yes, I am; there." But as she said this she smiled. "The truth is, I thought I was getting the better of you, and you turned round and gave me a pat on the head to show me that you could be master when it pleased you. You have defended your intelligence at the expense of your good-nature." "I'll be shot if I know what it all means," he said, just as he was parting with her. CHAPTER XXXII Miss Boncassen's River-Party. No. 2 Lord Silverbridge made up his mind that as he could not dance with Miss Boncassen he would not dance at all. He was not angry at being rejected, and when he saw her stand up with Dolly Longstaff he felt no jealousy. She had refused to dance with him not because she did not like him, but because she did not wish to show that she liked him. He could understand that, though he had not quite followed all the ins and outs of her little accusations against him. She had flattered him--without any intention of flattery on her part. She had spoken of his intelligence and had complained that he had been too sharp to her. Mabel Grex when most sweet to him, when most loving, always made him feel that he was her inferior. She took no trouble to hide her conviction of his youthfulness. This was anything but flattering. Miss Boncassen, on the other hand, professed herself to be almost afraid of him. "There shall be no tomfoolery of love-making," she had said. But what if it were not tomfoolery at all? What if it were good, genuine, earnest love-making? He certainly was not pledged to Lady Mabel. As regarded his father there would be a difficulty. In the first place he had been fool enough to tell his father that he was going to make an offer to Mabel Grex. And then his father would surely refuse his consent to a marriage with an American stranger. In such case there would be no unlimited income, no immediate pleasantness of magnificent life such as he knew would be poured out upon him if he were to marry Mabel Grex. As he thought of this, however, he told himself that he would not sell himself for money and magnificence. He could afford to be independent, and gratify his own taste. Just at this moment he was of opinion that Isabel Boncassen would be the sweeter companion of the two. He had sauntered down to the place where they were dancing and stood by, saying a few words to Mrs. Boncassen. "Why are you not dancing, my Lord?" she asked. "There are enough without me." "I guess you young aristocrats are never over-fond of doing much with your own arms and legs." "I don't know about that; polo, you know, for the legs, and lawn-tennis for the arms, is hard work enough." "But it must always be something new-fangled; and after all it isn't of much account. Our young men like to have quite a time at dancing." It all came through her nose! And she looked so common! What would the Duke say to her, or Mary, or even Gerald? The father was by no means so objectionable. He was a tall, straight, ungainly man, who always wore black clothes. He had dark, stiff, short hair, a long nose, and a forehead that was both high and broad. Ezekiel Boncassen was the very man,--from his appearance,--for a President of the United States; and there were men who talked of him for that high office. That he had never attended to politics was supposed to be in his favour. He had the reputation of being the most learned man in the States, and reputation itself often suffices to give a man dignity of manner. He, too, spoke through his nose, but the peculiar twang coming from a man would be supposed to be virile and incisive. From a woman, Lord Silverbridge thought it to be unbearable. But as to Isabel, had she been born within the confines of some lordly park in Hertfordshire, she could not have been more completely free from the abomination. "I am sorry that you should not be enjoying yourself," said Mr. Boncassen, coming to his wife's relief. "Nothing could have been nicer. To tell the truth, I am standing idle by way of showing my anger against your daughter, who would not dance with me." "I am sure she would have felt herself honoured," said Mr. Boncassen. "Who is the gentleman with her?" asked the mother. "A particular friend of mine--Dolly Longstaff." "Dolly!" ejaculated Mrs. Boncassen. "Everybody calls him so. His real name I believe to be Adolphus." "Is he,--is he--just anybody?" asked the anxious mother. "He is a very great deal,--as people go here. Everybody knows him. He is asked everywhere, but he goes nowhere. The greatest compliment paid to you here is his presence." "Nay, my Lord, there are the Countess Montague, and the Marchioness of Capulet, and Lord Tybalt, and--" "They go everywhere. They are nobodies. It is a charity to even invite them. But to have had Dolly Longstaff once is a triumph for life." "Laws!" said Mrs. Boncassen, looking hard at the young man who was dancing. "What has he done?" "He never did anything in his life." "I suppose he's very rich." "I don't know. I should think not. I don't know anything about his riches, but I can assure you that having had him down here will quite give a character to the day." In the meantime Dolly Longstaff was in a state of great excitement. Some part of the character assigned to him by Lord Silverbridge was true. He very rarely did go anywhere, and yet was asked to a great many places. He was a young man,--though not a very young man,--with a fortune of his own and the expectation of a future fortune. Few men living could have done less for the world than Dolly Longstaff,--and yet he had a position of his own. Now he had taken it into his head to fall in love with Miss Boncassen. This was an accident which had probably never happened to him before, and which had disturbed him much. He had known Miss Boncassen a week or two before Lord Silverbridge had seen her, having by some chance dined out and sat next to her. From that moment he had become changed, and had gone hither and thither in pursuit of the American beauty. His passion having become suspected by his companions had excited their ridicule. Nevertheless he had persevered;--and now he was absolutely dancing with the lady out in the open air. "If this goes on, your friends will have to look after you and put you somewhere," Mr. Lupton had said to him in one of the intervals of the dance. Dolly had turned round and scowled, and suggested that if Mr. Lupton would mind his own affairs it would be as well for the world at large. At the present crisis Dolly was very much excited. When the dance was over, as a matter of course, he offered the lady his arm, and as a matter of course she accepted it. "You'll take a turn; won't you?" he said. "It must be a very short turn," she said,--"as I am expected to make myself busy." "Oh, bother that." "It bothers me; but it has to be done." "You have set everything going now. They'll begin dancing again without your telling them." "I hope so." "And I've got something I want to say." "Dear me; what is it?" They were now on a path close to the riverside, in which there were many loungers. "Would you mind coming up to the temple?" he said. "What temple?" "Oh such a beautiful place. The Temple of the Winds, I think they call it, or Venus;--or--or--Mrs. Arthur de Bever." "Was she a goddess?" "It is something built to her memory. Such a view of the river! I was here once before and they took me up there. Everybody who comes here goes and sees Mrs. Arthur de Bever. They ought to have told you." "Let us go then," said Miss Boncassen. "Only it must not be long." "Five minutes will do it all." Then he walked rather quickly up a flight of rural steps. "Lovely spot; isn't it?" "Yes, indeed." "That's Maidenhead Bridge;--that's--somebody's place;--and now I've got something to say to you." "You're not going to murder me now you've got me up here alone?" said Miss Boncassen, laughing. "Murder you!" said Dolly, throwing himself into an attitude that was intended to express devoted affection. "Oh no!" "I am glad of that." "Miss Boncassen!" "Mr. Longstaff! If you sigh like that you'll burst yourself." "I'll--what?" "Burst yourself!" and she nodded her head at him. Then he clapped his hands together, and turned his head away from her towards the little temple. "I wonder whether she knows what love is," he said, as though he were addressing himself to Mrs. Arthur de Bever. "No, she don't," said Miss Boncassen. "But I do," he shouted, turning back towards her. "I do. If any man were ever absolutely, actually, really in love, I am the man." "Are you indeed, Mr. Longstaff? Isn't it pleasant?" "Pleasant;--pleasant? Oh, it could be so pleasant." "But who is the lady? Perhaps you don't mean to tell me that." "You mean to say you don't know?" "Haven't the least idea in life." "Let me tell you then that it could only be one person. It never was but one person. It never could have been but one person. It is you." Then he put his hand well on his heart. "Me!" said Miss Boncassen, choosing to be ungrammatical in order that he might be more absurd. "Of course it is you. Do you think that I should have brought you all the way up here to tell you that I was in love with anybody else?" "I thought I was brought to see Mrs. de Somebody, and the view." "Not at all," said Dolly emphatically. "Then you have deceived me." "I will never deceive you. Only say that you will love me, and I will be as true to you as the North Pole." "Is that true to me?" "You know what I mean." "But if I don't love you?" "Yes, you do!" "Do I?" "I beg your pardon," said Dolly. "I didn't mean to say that. Of course a man shouldn't make sure of a thing." "Not in this case, Mr. Longstaff; because really I entertain no such feeling." "But you can if you please. Just let me tell you who I am." "That will do no good whatever, Mr. Longstaff." "Let me tell you at any rate. I have a very good income of my own as it is." "Money can have nothing to do with it." "But I want you to know that I can afford it. You might perhaps have thought that I wanted your money." "I will attribute nothing evil to you, Mr. Longstaff. Only it is quite out of the question that I should--respond as I suppose you wish me to; and therefore, pray, do not say anything further." She went to the head of the little steps but he interrupted her. "You ought to hear me," he said. "I have heard you." "I can give you as good a position as any man without a title in England." "Mr. Longstaff, I rather fancy that wherever I may be I can make a position for myself. At any rate I shall not marry with the view of getting one. If my husband were an English Duke I should think myself nothing, unless I was something as Isabel Boncassen." When she said this she did not bethink herself that Lord Silverbridge would in the course of nature become an English Duke. But the allusion to an English Duke told intensely on Dolly, who had suspected that he had a noble rival. "English Dukes aren't so easily got," he said. "Very likely not. I might have expressed my meaning better had I said an English Prince." "That's quite out of the question," said Dolly. "They can't do it,--by Act of Parliament,--except in a hugger-mugger left-handed way, that wouldn't suit you at all." "Mr. Longstaff,--you must forgive me--if I say--that of all the gentlemen--I have ever met in this country or in any other--you are the--most obtuse." This she brought out in little disjointed sentences, not with any hesitation, but in a way to make every word she uttered more clear to an intelligence which she did not believe to be bright. But in this belief she did some injustice to Dolly. He was quite alive to the disgrace of being called obtuse, and quick enough to avenge himself at the moment. "Am I?" said he. "How humble-minded you must be when you think me a fool because I have fallen in love with such a one as yourself." "I like you for that," she replied laughing, "and withdraw the epithet as not being applicable. Now we are quits and can forget and forgive;--only let there be the forgetting." "Never!" said Dolly, with his hand again on his heart. "Then let it be a little dream of your youth,--that you once met a pretty American girl who was foolish enough to refuse all that you would have given her." "So pretty! So awfully pretty!" Thereupon she curtsied. "I have seen all the handsome women in England going for the last ten years, and there has not been one who has made me think that it would be worth my while to get off my perch for her." "And now you would desert your perch for me!" "I have already." "But you can get up again. Let it be all a dream. I know men like to have had such dreams. And in order that the dream may be pleasant the last word between us shall be kind. Such admiration from such a one as you is an honour,--and I will reckon it among my honours. But it can be no more than a dream." Then she gave him her hand. "It shall be so;--shall it not?" Then she paused. "It must be so, Mr. Longstaff." "Must it?" "That and no more. Now I wish to go down. Will you come with me? It will be better. Don't you think it is going to rain?" Dolly looked up at the clouds. "I wish it would with all my heart." "I know you are not so ill-natured. It would spoil all." "You have spoiled all." "No, no. I have spoiled nothing. It will only be a little dream about 'that strange American girl, who really did make me feel queer for half an hour.' Look at that. A great big drop--and the cloud has come over us as black as Erebus. Do hurry down." He was leading the way. "What shall we do for carriages to get us to the inn?" "There's the summer-house." "It will hold about half of us. And think what it will be to be in there waiting till the rain shall be over! Everybody has been so good-humoured and now they will be so cross!" The rain was falling in big heavy drops, slow and far between, but almost black with their size. And the heaviness of the cloud which had gathered over them made everything black. "Will you have my arm?" said Silverbridge, who saw Miss Boncassen scudding along, with Dolly Longstaff following as fast as he could. "Oh dear no. I have got to mind my dress. There;--I have gone right into a puddle. Oh dear!" So she ran on, and Silverbridge followed close behind her, leaving Dolly Longstaff in the distance. It was not only Miss Boncassen who got her feet into a puddle and splashed her stockings. Many did so who were not obliged by their position to maintain good-humour under their misfortunes. The storm had come on with such unexpected quickness that there had been a general stampede to the summer-house. As Isabel had said, there was comfortable room for not more than half of them. In a few minutes people were crushed who never ought to be crushed. A Countess for whom treble-piled sofas were hardly good enough was seated on the corner of a table till some younger and less gorgeous lady could be made to give way. And the Marchioness was declaring she was as wet through as though she had been dragged in a river. Mrs. Boncassen was so absolutely quelled as to have retired into the kitchen attached to the summer-house. Mr. Boncassen, with all his country's pluck and pride, was proving to a knot of gentlemen round him on the verandah, that such treachery in the weather was a thing unknown in his happier country. Miss Boncassen had to do her best to console the splashed ladies. "Oh Mrs. Jones, is it not a pity! What can I do for you?" "We must bear it, my dear. It often does rain, but why on this special day should it come down out of buckets?" "I never was so wet in all my life," said Dolly Longstaff, poking in his head. "There's somebody smoking," said the Countess angrily. There was a crowd of men smoking out on the verandah. "I never knew anything so nasty," the Countess continued, leaving it in doubt whether she spoke of the rain, or the smoke, or the party generally. Damp gauzes, splashed stockings, trampled muslins, and features which have perhaps known something of rouge and certainly encountered something of rain may be made, but can only, by supreme high breeding, be made compatible with good-humour. To be moist, muddy, rumpled and smeared, when by the very nature of your position it is your duty to be clear-starched up to the pellucidity of crystal, to be spotless as the lily, to be crisp as the ivy-leaf, and as clear in complexion as a rose,--is it not, O gentle readers, felt to be a disgrace? It came to pass, therefore, that many were now very cross. Carriages were ordered under the idea that some improvement might be made at the inn which was nearly a mile distant. Very few, however, had their own carriages, and there was jockeying for the vehicles. In the midst of all this Silverbridge remained as near to Miss Boncassen as circumstances would admit. "You are not waiting for me," she said. "Yes, I am. We might as well go up to town together." "Leave me with father and mother. Like the captain of a ship, I must be the last to leave the wreck." "But I'll be the gallant sailor of the day who always at the risk of his life sticks to the skipper to the last moment." "Not at all;--just because there will be no gallantry. But come and see us to-morrow and find out whether we have got through it alive." CHAPTER XXXIII The Langham Hotel "What an abominable climate," Mrs. Boncassen had said when they were quite alone at Maidenhead. "My dear, you didn't think you were to bring New York along with you when you came here," replied her husband. "I wish I was going back to-morrow." "That's a foolish thing to say. People here are very kind, and you are seeing a great deal more of the world than you would ever see at home. I am having a very good time. What do you say, Bell?" "I wish I could have kept my stockings clean." "But what about the young men?" "Young men are pretty much the same everywhere, I guess. They never have their wits about them. They never mean what they say, because they don't understand the use of words. They are generally half impudent and half timid. When in love they do not at all understand what has befallen them. What they want they try to compass as a cow does when it stands stretching out its head towards a stack of hay which it cannot reach. Indeed there is no such thing as a young man, for a man is not really a man till he is middle-aged. But take them at their worst they are a deal too good for us, for they become men some day, whereas we must only be women to the end." "My word, Bella!" exclaimed the mother. "You have managed to be tolerably heavy upon God's creatures, taking them in a lump," said the father. "Boys, girls, and cows! Something has gone wrong with you besides the rain." "Nothing on earth, sir,--except the boredom." "Some young man has been talking to you, Bella." "One or two, mother; and I got to be thinking if any one of them should ask me to marry him, and if moved by some evil destiny I were to take him, whether I should murder him, or myself, or run away with one of the others." "Couldn't you bear with him till, according to your own theory, he would grow out of his folly?" said the father. "Being a woman,--no. The present moment is always everything to me. When that horrid old harridan halloaed out that somebody was smoking, I thought I should have died. It was very bad just then." "Awful!" said Mrs. Boncassen, shaking her head. "I didn't seem to feel it much," said the father. "One doesn't look to have everything just what one wants always. If I did I should go nowhere;--but my total life would be less enjoyable. If ever you do get married, Bell, you should remember that." "I mean to get married some day, so that I shouldn't be made love to any longer." "I hope it will have that effect," said the father. "Mr. Boncassen!" ejaculated the mother. "What I say is true. I hope it will have that effect. It had with you, my dear." "I don't know that people didn't think of me as much as of anybody else, even though I was married." "Then, my dear, I never knew it." Miss Boncassen, though she had behaved serenely and with good temper during the process of Dolly's proposal, had not liked it. She had a very high opinion of herself, and was certainly entitled to have it by the undisguised admiration of all that came near her. She was not more indifferent to the admiration of young men than are other young ladies. But she was not proud of the admiration of Dolly Longstaff. She was here among strangers whose ways were unknown to her, whose rank and standing in the world were vague to her, and wonderful in their dimness. She knew that she was associating with men very different from those at home where young men were supposed to be under the necessity of earning their bread. At New York she would dance, as she had said, with bank clerks. She was not prepared to admit that a young London lord was better than a New York bank clerk. Judging the men on their own individual merits she might find the bank clerk to be the better of the two. But a certain sweetness of the aroma of rank was beginning to permeate her republican senses. The softness of a life in which no occupation was compulsory had its charms for her. Though she had complained of the insufficient intelligence of young men she was alive to the delight of having nothings said to her pleasantly. All this had affected her so strongly that she had almost felt that a life among these English luxuries would be a pleasant life. Like most Americans who do not as yet know the country, she had come with an inward feeling that as an American and a republican she might probably be despised. There is not uncommonly a savageness of self-assertion about Americans which arises from a too great anxiety to be admitted to fellowship with Britons. She had felt this, and conscious of reputation already made by herself in the social life of New York, she had half trusted that she would be well received in London, and had half convinced herself that she would be rejected. She had not been rejected. She must have become quite aware of that. She had dropped very quickly the idea that she would be scorned. Ignorant as she had been of English life, she perceived that she had at once become popular. And this had been so in spite of her mother's homeliness and her father's awkwardness. By herself and by her own gifts she had done it. She had found out concerning herself that she had that which would commend her to other society than that of the Fifth Avenue. Those lords of whom she had heard were as plenty with her as blackberries. Young Lord Silverbridge, of whom she was told that of all the young lords of the day he stood first in rank and wealth, was peculiarly her friend. Her brain was firmer than that of most girls, but even her brain was a little turned. She never told herself that it would be well for her to become the wife of such a one. In her more thoughtful moments she told herself that it would not be well. But still the allurement was strong upon her. Park Lane was sweeter than the Fifth Avenue. Lord Silverbridge was nicer than the bank clerk. But Dolly Longstaff was not. She would certainly prefer the bank clerk to Dolly Longstaff. And yet Dolly Longstaff was the one among her English admirers who had come forward and spoken out. She did not desire that any one should come forward and speak out. But it was an annoyance to her that this special man should have done so. The waiter at the Langham understood American ways perfectly, and when a young man called between three and four o'clock, asking for Mrs. Boncassen, said that Miss Boncassen was at home. The young man took off his hat, brushed up his hair, and followed the waiter up to the sitting-room. The door was opened and the young man was announced. "Mr. Longstaff." Miss Boncassen was rather disgusted. She had had enough of this English lover. Why should he have come after what had occurred yesterday? He ought to have felt that he was absolved from the necessity of making personal inquiries. "I am glad to see that you got home safe," she said as she gave him her hand. "And you too, I hope?" "Well;--so, so; with my clothes a good deal damaged and my temper rather worse." "I am so sorry." "It should not rain on such days. Mother has gone to church." "Oh;--indeed. I like going to church myself sometimes." "Do you now?" "I know what would make me like to go to church." "And father is at the Athenæum. He goes there to do a little light reading in the library on Sunday afternoon." "I shall never forget yesterday, Miss Boncassen." "You wouldn't if your clothes had been spoilt as mine were." "Money will repair that." "Well; yes; but when I've had a petticoat flounced particularly to order I don't like to see it ill-treated. There are emotions of the heart which money can't touch." "Just so;--emotions of the heart! That's the very phrase." She was determined if possible to prevent a repetition of the scene which had taken place up at Mrs. de Bever's temple. "All my emotions are about my dress." "All?" "Well; yes; all. I guess I don't care much for eating and drinking." In saying this she actually contrived to produce something of a nasal twang. "Eating and drinking!" said Dolly. "Of course they are necessities;--and so are clothes." "But new things are such ducks!" "Trowsers may be," said Dolly. Then she took a prolonged gaze at him, wondering whether he was or was not such a fool as he looked. "How funny you are," she said. "A man does not generally feel funny after going through what I suffered yesterday, Miss Boncassen." "Would you mind ringing the bell?" "Must it be done quite at once?" "Quite,--quite," she said. "I can do it myself for the matter of that." And she rang the bell somewhat violently. Dolly sank back again into his seat, remarking in his usual apathetic way that he had intended to obey her behest but had not understood that she was in so great a hurry. "I am always in a hurry," she said. "I like things to be done--sharp." And she hit the table a crack. "Please bring me some iced water," this of course was addressed to the waiter. "And a glass for Mr. Longstaff." "None for me, thank you." "Perhaps you'd like soda and brandy?" "Oh dear no;--nothing of the kind. But I am so much obliged to you all the same." As the water-bottle was in fact standing in the room, and as the waiter had only to hand the glass, all this created but little obstacle. Still it had its effect, and Dolly, when the man had retired, felt that there was a difficulty in proceeding. "I have called to-day--" he began. "That has been so kind of you. But mother has gone to church." "I am very glad that she has gone to church, because I wish to--" "Oh laws! There's a horse has tumbled down in the street. I heard it." "He has got up again," said Dolly, looking leisurely out of the window. "But as I was saying--" "I don't think that the water we Americans drink can be good. It makes the women become ugly so young." "You will never become ugly." She got up and curtsied to him, and then, still standing, made him a speech. "Mr. Longstaff, it would be absurd of me to pretend not to understand what you mean. But I won't have any more of it. Whether you are making fun of me, or whether you are in earnest, it is just the same." "Making fun of you!" "It does not signify. I don't care which it is. But I won't have it. There!" "A gentleman should be allowed to express his feelings and to explain his position." "You have expressed and explained more than enough, and I won't have any more. If you will sit down and talk about something else, or else go away, there shall be an end of it;--but if you go on, I will ring the bell again. What can a man gain by going on when a girl has spoken as I have done?" They were both at this time standing up, and he was now as angry as she was. "I've paid you the greatest compliment a man can pay a woman," he began. "Very well. If I remember rightly I thanked you for it yesterday. If you wish it, I will thank you again to-day. But it is a compliment which becomes very much the reverse if it be repeated too often. You are sharp enough to understand that I have done everything in my power to save us both from this trouble." "What makes you so fierce, Miss Boncassen?" "What makes you so foolish?" "I suppose it must be something peculiar to American ladies." "Just that;--something peculiar to American ladies. They don't like--well; I don't want to say anything more that can be called fierce." At this moment the door was again opened and Lord Silverbridge was announced. "Halloa, Dolly, are you here?" "It seems that I am." "And I am here too," said Miss Boncassen, smiling her prettiest. "None the worse for yesterday's troubles, I hope?" "A good deal the worse. I have been explaining all that to Mr. Longstaff, who has been quite sympathetic with me about my things." "A terrible pity that shower," said Dolly. "For you," said Silverbridge, "because, if I remember right, Miss Boncassen was walking with you;--but I was rather glad of it." "Lord Silverbridge!" "I regarded it as a direct interposition of Providence, because you would not dance with me." "Any news to-day, Silverbridge?" asked Dolly. "Nothing particular. They say that Coalheaver can't run for the Leger." "What's the matter?" asked Dolly vigorously. "Broke down at Ascot. But I daresay it's a lie." "Sure to be a lie," said Dolly. "What do you think of Madame Scholzdam, Miss Boncassen?" "I am not a good judge." "Never heard anything equal to it yet in this world," said Dolly. "I wonder whether that's true about Coalheaver?" "Tifto says so." "Which at the present moment," asked Miss Boncassen, "is the greater favourite with the public, Madame Scholzdam or Coalheaver?" "Coalheaver is a horse, Miss Boncassen." "Oh,--a horse!" "Perhaps I ought to say a colt." "Oh,--a colt." "Do you suppose, Dolly, that Miss Boncassen doesn't know all that?" asked Silverbridge. "He supposes that my American ferocity has never been sufficiently softened for the reception of polite erudition." "You two have been quarrelling, I fear." "I never quarrel with a woman," said Dolly. "Nor with a man in my presence, I hope," said Miss Boncassen. "Somebody does seem to have got out of bed at the wrong side," said Silverbridge. "I did," said Miss Boncassen. "I got out of bed at the wrong side. I am cross. I can't get over the spoiling of my flounces. I think you had better both go away and leave me. If I could walk about the room for half an hour and stamp my feet, I should get better." Silverbridge thought that as he had come last, he certainly ought to be left last. Miss Boncassen felt that, at any rate, Mr. Longstaff should go. Dolly felt that his manhood required him to remain. After what had taken place he was not going to leave the field vacant for another. Therefore he made no effort to move. "That seems rather hard upon me," said Silverbridge. "You told me to come." "I told you to come and ask after us all. You have come and asked after us, and have been informed that we are very bad. What more can I say? You accuse me of getting out of bed the wrong side, and I own that I did." "I meant to say that Dolly Longstaff had done so." "And I say it was Silverbridge," said Dolly. "We aren't very agreeable together, are we? Upon my word I think you'd better both go." Silverbridge immediately got up from his chair; upon which Dolly also moved. "What the mischief is up?" asked Silverbridge, when they were under the porch together. "The truth is, you never can tell what you are to do with those American girls." "I suppose you have been making up to her." "Nothing in earnest. She seemed to me to like admiration; so I told her I admired her." "What did she say then?" "Upon my word, you seem to be very great at cross-examining. Perhaps you had better go back and ask her." "I will, next time I see her." Then he stepped into his cab, and in a loud voice ordered the man to drive him to the Zoo. But when he had gone a little way up Portland Place, he stopped the driver and desired he might be taken back again to the hotel. As he left the vehicle he looked round for Dolly, but Dolly had certainly gone. Then he told the waiter to take his card to Miss Boncassen, and explain that he had something to say which he had forgotten. "So you have come back again?" said Miss Boncassen, laughing. "Of course I have. You didn't suppose I was going to let that fellow get the better of me. Why should I be turned out because he had made an ass of himself!" "Who said he made an ass of himself?" "But he had; hadn't he?" "No;--by no means," said she after a little pause. "Tell me what he had been saying." "Indeed I shall do nothing of the kind. If I told you all he said, then I should have to tell the next man all that you may say. Would that be fair?" "I should not mind," said Silverbridge. "I dare say not, because you have nothing particular to say. But the principle is the same. Lawyers and doctors and parsons talk of privileged communications. Why should not a young lady have her privileged communications?" "But I have something particular to say." "I hope not." "Why should you hope not?" "I hate having things said particularly. Nobody likes conversation so well as I do; but it should never be particular." "I was going to tell you that I came back to London yesterday in the same carriage with old Lady Clanfiddle, and that she swore that no consideration on earth would ever induce her to go to Maidenhead again." "That isn't particular." "She went on to say;--you won't tell of me; will you?" "It shall all be privileged." "She went on to say that Americans couldn't be expected to understand English manners." "Perhaps they may be all the better for that." "Then I spoke up. I swore I was awfully in love with you." "You didn't." "I did;--that you were, out and away, the finest girl I ever saw in my life. Of course you understand that her two daughters were there. And that as for manners,--unless the rain could be attributed to American manners,--I did not think anything had gone wrong." "What about the smoking?" "I told her they were all Englishmen, and that if she had been giving the party herself they would have smoked just as much. You must understand that she never does give any parties." "How could you be so ill-natured?" "There was ever so much more of it. And it ended in her telling me that I was a schoolboy. I found out the cause of it all. A great spout of rain had come upon her daughter's hat, and that had produced a most melancholy catastrophe." "I would have given her mine willingly." "An American hat;--to be worn by Lady Violet Clanfiddle!" "It came from Paris last week, sir." "But must have been contaminated by American contact." "Now, Lord Silverbridge," said she, getting up, "if I had a stick I'd whip you." "It was such fun." "And you come here and tell it all to me?" "Of course I do. It was a deal too good to keep it to myself. 'American manners!'" As he said this he almost succeeded in looking like Lady Clanfiddle. At that moment Mr. Boncassen entered the room, and was immediately appealed to by his daughter. "Father, you must turn Lord Silverbridge out of the room." "Dear me! If I must,--of course I must. But why?" "He is saying everything horrid he can about Americans." After this they settled down for a few minutes to general conversation, and then Lord Silverbridge again took his leave. When he was gone Isabel Boncassen almost regretted that the "something particular" which he had threatened to say had not been less comic in its nature. CHAPTER XXXIV Lord Popplecourt When the reader was told that Lord Popplecourt had found Lady Cantrip very agreeable it is to be hoped that the reader was disgusted. Lord Popplecourt would certainly not have given a second thought to Lady Cantrip unless he had been specially flattered. And why should such a man have been flattered by a woman who was in all respects his superior? The reader will understand. It had been settled by the wisdom of the elders that it would be a good thing that Lord Popplecourt should marry Lady Mary Palliser. The mutual assent which leads to marriage should no doubt be spontaneous. Who does not feel that? Young love should speak from its first doubtful unconscious spark,--a spark which any breath of air may quench or cherish,--till it becomes a flame which nothing can satisfy but the union of the two lovers. No one should be told to love, or bidden to marry, this man or that woman. The theory of this is plain to us all, and till we have sons or daughters whom we feel imperatively obliged to control, the theory is unassailable. But the duty is so imperative! The Duke had taught himself to believe that as his wife would have been thrown away on the world had she been allowed to marry Burgo Fitzgerald, so would his daughter be thrown away were she allowed to marry Mr. Tregear. Therefore the theory of spontaneous love must in this case be set aside. Therefore the spark,--would that it had been no more!--must be quenched. Therefore there could be no union of two lovers;--but simply a prudent and perhaps splendid marriage. Lord Popplecourt was a man in possession of a large estate which was unencumbered. His rank in the peerage was not high; but his barony was of an old date,--and, if things went well with him, something higher in rank might be open to him. He had good looks of that sort which recommend themselves to pastors and masters, to elders and betters. He had regular features. He looked as though he were steady. He was not impatient nor rollicking. Silverbridge was also good-looking;--but his good looks were such as would give a pang to the hearts of anxious mothers of daughters. Tregear was the handsomest man of the three;--but then he looked as though he had no betters and did not care for his elders. Lord Popplecourt, though a very young man, had once stammered through half-a-dozen words in the House of Lords, and had been known to dine with the "Benevolent Funds." Lord Silverbridge had declared him to be a fool. No one thought him to be bright. But in the eyes of the Duke,--and of Lady Cantrip,--he had his good qualities. But the work was very disagreeable. It was the more hard upon Lady Cantrip because she did not believe in it. If it could be done, it would be expedient. But she felt very strongly that it could not be done. No doubt that Lady Glencora had been turned from her evil destiny; but Lady Glencora had been younger than her daughter was now, and possessed of less character. Nor was Lady Cantrip blind to the difference between a poor man with a bad character, such as that Burgo had been, and a poor man with a good character, such as was Tregear. Nevertheless she undertook to aid the work, and condescended to pretend to be so interested in the portrait of some common ancestor as to persuade the young man to have it photographed, in order that the bringing down of the photograph might lead to something. He took the photograph, and Lady Cantrip said very much to him about his grandmother, who was the old lady in question. "She could," she said, "just remember the features of the dear old woman." She was not habitually a hypocrite, and she hated herself for what she was doing, and yet her object was simply good,--to bring together two young people who might advantageously marry each other. The mere talking about the old woman would be of no service. She longed to bring out the offer plainly, and say, "There is Lady Mary Palliser. Don't you think she'd make a good wife for you?" But she could not, as yet, bring herself to be so indelicately plain. "You haven't seen the Duke since?" she asked. "He spoke to me only yesterday in the House. I like the Duke." "If I may be allowed to say so, it would be for your advantage that he should like you;--that is, if you mean to take a part in politics." "I suppose I shall," said Popplecourt. "There isn't much else to do." "You don't go to races?" He shook his head. "I am glad of that," said Lady Cantrip. "Nothing is so bad as the turf. I fear Lord Silverbridge is devoting himself to the turf." "I don't think it can be good for any man to have much to do with Major Tifto. I suppose Silverbridge knows what he's about." Here was an opportunity which might have been used. It would have been so easy for her to glide from the imperfections of the brother to the perfections of the sister. But she could not bring herself to do it quite at once. She approached the matter however as nearly as she could without making her grand proposition. She shook her head sadly in reference to Silverbridge, and then spoke of the Duke. "His father is so anxious about him." "I dare say." "I don't know any man who is more painfully anxious about his children. He feels the responsibility so much since his wife's death. There is Lady Mary." "She's all right, I should say." "All right! oh yes. But when a girl is possessed of so many things,--rank, beauty, intelligence, large fortune,--" "Will Lady Mary have much?" "A large portion of her mother's money, I should say. When all these things are joined together, a father of course feels most anxious as to their disposal." "I suppose she is clever." "Very clever," said Lady Cantrip. "I think a girl may be too clever, you know," said Lord Popplecourt. "Perhaps she may. But I know more who are too foolish. I am so much obliged to you for the photograph." "Don't mention it." "I really did mean that you should send a man down." On that occasion the two young people did not see each other. Lady Mary did not come down, and Lady Cantrip lacked the courage to send for her. As it was, might it not be possible that the young man should be induced to make himself agreeable to the young lady without any further explanation? But love-making between young people cannot well take place unless they be brought together. There was a difficulty in bringing them together at Richmond. The Duke had indeed spoken of meeting Lord Popplecourt at dinner there;--but this was to have followed the proposition which Lady Cantrip should make to him. She could not yet make the proposition, and therefore she hardly knew how to arrange the dinner. She was obliged at last to let the wished-for lover go away without arranging anything. When the Duke should have settled his autumn plans, then an attempt must be made to induce Lord Popplecourt to travel in the same direction. That evening Lady Cantrip said a few words to Mary respecting the proposed suitor. "There is nothing I have such a horror of as gambling," she said. "It is dreadful." "I am very glad to think that Nidderdale does not do anything of that sort." It was perhaps on the cards that Nidderdale should do things of which she knew nothing. "I hope Silverbridge does not bet." "I don't think he does." "There's Lord Popplecourt,--quite a young man,--with everything at his own disposal, and a very large estate. Think of the evil he might do if he were given that way." "Does he gamble?" "Not at all. It must be such a comfort to his mother!" "He looks to me as though he never would do anything," said Lady Mary. Then the subject was dropped. It was a week after this, towards the end of July, that the Duke wrote a line to Lady Cantrip, apologising for what he had done, but explaining that he had asked Lord Popplecourt to dine at The Horns on a certain Sunday. He had, he said, been assured by Lord Cantrip that such an arrangement would be quite convenient. It was clear from his letter that he was much in earnest. Of course there was no reason why the dinner should not be eaten. Only the speciality of the invitation to Lord Popplecourt must not be so glaring that he himself should be struck by the strangeness of it. There must be a little party made up. Lord Nidderdale and his wife were therefore bidden to come down, and Silverbridge, who at first consented rather unwillingly,--and Lady Mabel Grex, as to whom the Duke made a special request that she might be asked. This last invitation was sent express from Lady Mary, and included Miss Cass. So the party was made up. The careful reader will perceive that there were to be ten of them. "Isn't it odd papa wanting to have Lady Mabel?" Mary said to Lady Cantrip. "Does he not know her, my dear?" "He hardly ever spoke to her. I'll tell you what; I expect Silverbridge is going to marry her." "Why shouldn't he?" "I don't know why he shouldn't. She is very beautiful, and very clever. But if so, papa must know all about it. It does seem so odd that papa of all people should turn match-maker, or even that he should think of it." "So much is thrown upon him now," said Lady Cantrip "Poor papa!" Then she remembered herself, and spoke with a little start. "Of course I am not thinking of myself. Arranging a marriage is very different from preventing any one from marrying." "Whatever he may think to be his duty he will be sure to do it," said the elder lady very solemnly. Lady Mabel was surprised by the invitation, but she was not slow to accept it. "Papa will be here and will be so glad to meet you," Lady Mary had said. Why should the Duke of Omnium wish to meet her? "Silverbridge will be here too," Mary had gone on to say. "It is just a family party. Papa, you know, is not going anywhere; nor am I." By all this Lady Mabel's thoughts were much stirred, and her bosom somewhat moved. And Silverbridge also was moved by it. Of course he could not but remember that he had pledged himself to his father to ask Lady Mabel to be his wife. He had faltered since. She had been, he thought, unkind to him, or at any rate indifferent. He had surely said enough to her to make her know what he meant; and yet she had taken no trouble to meet him half way. And then Isabel Boncassen had intervened. Now he was asked to dinner in a most unusual manner! Of all the guests invited Lord Popplecourt was perhaps the least disturbed. He was quite alive to the honour of being noticed by the Duke of Omnium, and alive also to the flattering courtesy shown to him by Lady Cantrip. But justice would not be done him unless it were acknowledged that he had as yet flattered himself with no hopes in regard to Lady Mary Palliser. He, when he prepared himself for his journey down to Richmond, thought much more of the Duke than of the Duke's daughter. "Oh yes, I can drive you down if you like that kind of thing," Silverbridge said to him on the Saturday evening. "And bring me back?" "If you will come when I am coming. I hate waiting for a fellow." "Suppose we leave at half-past ten." "I won't fix any time; but if we can't make it suit there'll be the governor's carriage." "Will the Duke go down in his carriage?" "I suppose so. It's quicker and less trouble than the railway." Then Lord Popplecourt reflected that he would certainly come back with the Duke if he could so manage it, and there floated before his eyes visions of under-secretaryships, all of which might owe their origin to this proposed drive up from Richmond. At six o'clock on the Sunday evening Silverbridge called for Lord Popplecourt. "Upon my word," said he, "I didn't ever expect to see you in my cab." "Why not me especially?" "Because you're not one of our lot." "You'd sooner have Tifto, I dare say." "No, I wouldn't. Tifto is not at all a pleasant companion, though he understands horses. You're going in for heavy politics, I suppose." "Not particularly heavy." "If not, why on earth does my governor take you up? You won't mind my smoking, I dare say." After this there was no conversation between them. CHAPTER XXXV "Don't You Think--?" It was pretty to see the Duke's reception of Lady Mabel. "I knew your mother many years ago," he said, "when I was young myself. Her mother and my mother were first cousins and dear friends." He held her hand as he spoke and looked at her as though he meant to love her. Lady Mabel saw that it was so. Could it be possible that the Duke had heard anything;--that he should wish to receive her? She had told herself and had told Miss Cassewary that though she had spared Silverbridge, yet she knew that she would make him a good wife. If the Duke thought so also, then surely she need not doubt. "I knew we were cousins," she said, "and have been so proud of the connection! Lord Silverbridge does come and see us sometimes." Soon after that Silverbridge and Popplecourt came in. If the story of the old woman in the portrait may be taken as evidence of a family connexion between Lady Cantrip and Lord Popplecourt, everybody there was more or less connected with everybody else. Nidderdale had been a first cousin of Lady Glencora, and he had married a daughter of Lady Cantrip. They were manifestly a family party,--thanks to the old woman in the picture. It is a point of conscience among the--perhaps not ten thousand, but say one thousand of bluest blood,--that everybody should know who everybody is. Our Duke, though he had not given his mind much to the pursuit, had nevertheless learned his lesson. It is a knowledge which the possession of the blue blood itself produces. There are countries with bluer blood than our own in which to be without such knowledge is a crime. When the old lady in the portrait had been discussed, Popplecourt was close to Lady Mary. They two had no idea why such vicinity had been planned. The Duke knew, of course, and Lady Cantrip. Lady Cantrip had whispered to her daughter that such a marriage would be suitable, and the daughter had hinted it to her husband. Lord Cantrip of course was not in the dark. Lady Mabel had expressed a hint on the matter to Miss Cass, who had not repudiated it. Even Silverbridge had suggested to himself that something of the kind might be in the wind, thinking that, if so, none of them knew much about his sister Mary. But Popplecourt himself was divinely innocent. His ideas of marriage had as yet gone no farther than a conviction that girls generally were things which would be pressed on him, and against which he must arm himself with some shield. Marriage would have to come, no doubt; but not the less was it his duty to live as though it were a pit towards which he would be tempted by female allurements. But that a net should be spread over him here he was much too humble-minded to imagine. "Very hot," he said to Lady Mary. "We found it warm in church to-day." "I dare say. I came down here with your brother in his hansom cab. What a very odd thing to have a hansom cab!" "I should like one." "Should you indeed?" "Particularly if I could drive it myself. Silverbridge does, at night, when he thinks people won't see him." "Drive the cab in the streets! What does he do with his man?" "Puts him inside. He was out once without the man and took up a fare,--an old woman, he said. And when she was going to pay him he touched his hat and said he never took money from ladies." "Do you believe that?" "Oh yes. I call that good fun, because it did no harm. He had his lark. The lady was taken where she wanted to go, and she saved her money." "Suppose he had upset her," said Lord Popplecourt, looking as an old philosopher might have looked when he had found some clenching answer to another philosopher's argument. "The real cabman might have upset her worse," said Lady Mary. "Don't you feel it odd that we should meet here?" said Lord Silverbridge to his neighbour, Lady Mabel. "Anything unexpected is odd," said Lady Mabel. It seemed to her to be very odd,--unless certain people had made up their minds as to the expediency of a certain event. "That is what you call logic;--isn't it? Anything unexpected is odd!" "Lord Silverbridge, I won't be laughed at. You have been at Oxford and ought to know what logic is." "That at any rate is ill-natured," he replied, turning very red in the face. "You don't think I meant it. Oh, Lord Silverbridge, say that you don't think I meant it. You cannot think I would willingly wound you. Indeed, indeed, I was not thinking." It had in truth been an accident. She could not speak aloud because they were closely surrounded by others, but she looked up in his face to see whether he were angry with her. "Say that you do not think I meant it." "I do not think you meant it." "I would not say a word to hurt you,--oh, for more than I can tell you." "It is all bosh, of course," he said laughing; "but I do not like to hear the old place named. I have always made a fool of myself. Some men do it and don't care about it. But I do it, and yet it makes me miserable." "If that be so you will soon give over making--what you call a fool of yourself. For myself I like the idea of wild oats. I look upon them like measles. Only you should have a doctor ready when the disease shows itself." "What sort of a doctor ought I to have?" "Ah;--you must find out that yourself. That sort of feeling which makes you feel miserable;--that is a doctor itself." "Or a wife?" "Or a wife,--if you can find a good one. There are wives, you know, who aggravate the disease. If I had a fast husband I should make him faster by being fast myself. There is nothing I envy so much as the power of doing half-mad things." "Women can do that too." "But they go to the dogs. We are dreadfully restricted. If you like champagne you can have a bucketful. I am obliged to pretend that I only want a very little. You can bet thousands. I must confine myself to gloves. You can flirt with any woman you please. I must wait till somebody comes,--and put up with it if nobody does come." "Plenty come, no doubt." "But I want to pick and choose. A man turns the girls over one after another as one does the papers when one is fitting up a room, or rolls them out as one rolls out the carpets. A very careful young man like Lord Popplecourt might reject a young woman because her hair didn't suit the colour of his furniture." "I don't think that I shall choose my wife as I would papers and carpets." The Duke, who sat between Lady Cantrip and her daughter, did his best to make himself agreeable. The conversation had been semi-political,--political to the usual feminine extent, and had consisted chiefly of sarcasms from Lady Cantrip against Sir Timothy Beeswax. "That England should put up with such a man," Lady Cantrip had said, "is to me shocking! There used to be a feeling in favour of gentlemen." To this the Duke had responded by asserting that Sir Timothy had displayed great aptitude for parliamentary life, and knew the House of Commons better than most men. He said nothing against his foe, and very much in his foe's praise. But Lady Cantrip perceived that she had succeeded in pleasing him. When the ladies were gone the politics became more serious. "That unfortunate quarrel is to go on the same as ever, I suppose," said the Duke, addressing himself to the two young men who had seats in the House of Commons. They were both on the Conservative side in politics. The three peers present were all Liberals. "Till next Session, I think, sir," said Silverbridge. "Sir Timothy, though he did lose his temper, has managed it well," said Lord Cantrip. "Phineas Finn lost his temper worse than Sir Timothy," said Lord Nidderdale. "But yet I think he had the feeling of the House with him," said the Duke. "I happened to be present in the gallery at the time." "Yes," said Nidderdale, "because he 'owned up.' The fact is if you 'own up' in a genial sort of way the House will forgive anything. If I were to murder my grandmother, and when questioned about it were to acknowledge that I had done it--" Then Lord Nidderdale stood up and made his speech as he might have made it in the House of Commons. "'I regret to say, sir, that the old woman did get in my way when I was in a passion. Unfortunately I had a heavy stick in my hand and I did strike her over the head. Nobody can regret it so much as I do! Nobody can feel so acutely the position in which I am placed! I have sat in this House for many years, and many gentlemen know me well. I think, Sir, that they will acknowledge that I am a man not deficient in filial piety or general humanity. Sir, I am sorry for what I did in a moment of heat. I have now spoken the truth, and I shall leave myself in the hands of the House.' My belief is I should get such a round of applause as I certainly shall never achieve in any other way. It is not only that a popular man may do it,--like Phineas Finn,--but the most unpopular man in the House may make himself liked by owning freely that he has done something that he ought to be ashamed of." Nidderdale's unwonted eloquence was received in good part by the assembled legislators. "Taking it altogether," said the Duke, "I know of no assembly in any country in which good-humour prevails so generally, in which the members behave to each other so well, in which rules are so universally followed, or in which the president is so thoroughly sustained by the feeling of the members." "I hear men say that it isn't quite what it used to be," said Silverbridge. "Nothing will ever be quite what it used to be." "Changes for the worse, I mean. Men are doing all kinds of things, just because the rules of the House allow them." "If they be within rule," said the Duke, "I don't know who is to blame them. In my time, if any man stretched a rule too far the House would not put up with it." "That's just it," said Nidderdale. "The House puts up with anything now. There is a great deal of good feeling no doubt, but there's no earnestness about anything. I think you are more earnest than we; but then you are such horrid bores. And each earnest man is in earnest about something that nobody else cares for." When they were again in the drawing-room, Lord Popplecourt was seated next to Lady Mary. "Where are you going this autumn?" he asked. "I don't know in the least. Papa said something about going abroad." "You won't be at Custins?" Custins was Lord Cantrip's country seat in Dorsetshire. "I know nothing about myself as yet. But I don't think I shall go anywhere unless papa goes too." "Lady Cantrip has asked me to be at Custins in the middle of October. They say it is about the best pheasant-shooting in England." "Do you shoot much?" "A great deal. I shall be in Scotland on the Twelfth. I and Reginald Dobbes have a place together. I shall get to my own partridges on the 1st of September. I always manage that. Popplecourt is in Suffolk, and I don't think any man in England can beat me for partridges." "What do you do with all you slay?" "Leadenhall Market. I make it pay,--or very nearly. Then I shall run back to Scotland for the end of the stalking, and I can easily manage to be at Custins by the middle of October. I never touch my own pheasants till November." "Why are you so abstemious?" "The birds are heavier and it answers better. But if I thought you would be at Custins it would be much nicer." Lady Mary again told him that as yet she knew nothing of her father's autumn movements. But at the same time the Duke was arranging his autumn movements, or at any rate those of his daughter. Lady Cantrip had told him that the desirable son-in-law had promised to go to Custins, and suggested that he and Mary should also be there. In his daughter's name he promised, but he would not bind himself. Would it not be better that he should be absent? Now that the doing of this thing was brought nearer to him so that he could see and feel its details, he was disgusted by it. And yet it had answered so well with his wife! "Is Lord Popplecourt intimate here?" Lady Mabel asked her friend, Lord Silverbridge. "I don't know. I am not." "Lady Cantrip seems to think a great deal about him." "I dare say. I don't." "Your father seems to like him." "That's possible too. They're going back to London together in the governor's carriage. My father will talk high politics all the way, and Popplecourt will agree with everything." "He isn't intended to--to--? You know what I mean." "I can't say that I do." "To cut out poor Frank." "It's quite possible." "Poor Frank!" "You had a great deal better say poor Popplecourt!--or poor governor, or poor Lady Cantrip." "But a hundred countesses can't make your sister marry a man she doesn't like." "Just that. They don't go the right way about it." "What would you do?" "Leave her alone. Let her find out gradually that what she wants can't be done." "And so linger on for years," said Lady Mabel reproachfully. "I say nothing about that. The man is my friend." "And you ought to be proud of him." "I never knew anybody yet that was proud of his friends. I like him well enough, but I can quite understand that the governor should object." "Yes, we all know that," said she sadly. "What would your father say if you wanted to marry someone who hadn't a shilling?" "I should object myself,--without waiting for my father. But then,--neither have I a shilling. If I had money, do you think I wouldn't like to give it to the man I loved?" "But this is a case of giving somebody else's money. They won't make her give it up by bringing such a young ass as that down here. If my father has persistency enough to let her cry her eyes out, he'll succeed." "And break her heart. Could you do that?" "Certainly not. But then I'm soft. I can't refuse." "Can't you?" "Not if the person who asks me is in my good books. You try me." "What shall I ask for?" "Anything." "Give me that ring off your finger," she said. He at once took it off his hand. "Of course you know I am in joke. You don't imagine that I would take it from you?" He still held it towards her. "Lord Silverbridge, I expect that with you I may say a foolish word without being brought to sorrow by it. I know that that ring belonged to your great-uncle,--and to fifty Pallisers before." "What would it matter?" "And it would be wholly useless to me, as I could not wear it." "Of course it would be too big," said he, replacing the ring on his own finger. "But when I talk of any one being in my good books, I don't mean a thing like that. Don't you know there is nobody on earth I--" there he paused and blushed, and she sat motionless, looking at him expecting, with her colour too somewhat raised,--"whom I like so well as I do you?" It was a lame conclusion. She felt it to be lame. But as regarded him, the lameness at the moment had come from a timidity which forbade him to say the word "love" even though he had meant to say it. She recovered herself instantly. "I do believe it," she said. "I do think that we are real friends." "Would you not take a ring from a--real friend?" "Not that ring;--nor a ring at all after I had asked for it in joke. You understand it all. But to go back to what we were talking about,--if you can do anything for Frank, pray do. You know it will break her heart. A man of course bears it better, but he does not perhaps suffer the less. It is all his life to him. He can do nothing while this is going on. Are you not true enough to your friendship to exert yourself for him?" Silverbridge put his hand up and rubbed his head as though he were vexed. "Your aid would turn everything in his favour." "You do not know my father." "Is he so inexorable?" "It is not that, Mabel. But he is so unhappy. I cannot add to his unhappiness by taking part against him." In another part of the room Lady Cantrip was busy with Lord Popplecourt. She had talked about pheasants, and had talked about grouse, had talked about moving the address in the House of Lords in some coming Session, and the great value of political alliances early in life, till the young peer began to think that Lady Cantrip was the nicest of women. Then after a short pause she changed the subject. "Don't you think Lady Mary very beautiful?" "Uncommon," said his Lordship. "And her manners so perfect. She has all her mother's ease without any of that-- You know what I mean." "Quite so," said his Lordship. "And then she has got so much in her." "Has she though?" "I don't know any girl of her age so thoroughly well educated. The Duke seems to take to you." "Well, yes;--the Duke is very kind." "Don't you think--?" "Eh!" "You have heard of her mother's fortune?" "Tremendous!" "She will have, I take it, quite a third of it. Whatever I say I'm sure you will take in confidence; but she is a dear dear girl; and I am anxious for her happiness almost as though she belonged to me." Lord Popplecourt went back to town in the Duke's carriage, but was unable to say a word about politics. His mind was altogether filled with the wonderful words that had been spoken to him. Could it be that Lady Mary had fallen violently in love with him? He would not at once give himself up to the pleasing idea, having so thoroughly grounded himself in the belief that female nets were to be avoided. But when he got home he did think favourably of it. The daughter of a Duke,--and such a Duke! So lovely a girl, and with such gifts! And then a fortune which would make a material addition to his own large property! CHAPTER XXXVI Tally-Ho Lodge We all know that very clever distich concerning the great fleas and the little fleas which tells us that no animal is too humble to have its parasite. Even Major Tifto had his inferior friend. This was a certain Captain Green,--for the friend also affected military honours. He was a man somewhat older than Tifto, of whose antecedents no one was supposed to know anything. It was presumed of him that he lived by betting, and it was boasted by those who wished to defend his character that when he lost he paid his money like a gentleman. Tifto during the last year or two had been anxious to support Captain Green, and had always made use of this argument: "Where the d---- he gets his money I don't know;--but when he loses, there it is." Major Tifto had a little "box" of his own in the neighbourhood of Egham, at which he had a set of stables a little bigger than his house, and a set of kennels a little bigger than his stables. It was here he kept his horses and hounds, and himself too when business connected with his sporting life did not take him to town. It was now the middle of August and he had come to Tally-ho Lodge, there to look after his establishments, to make arrangements for cub-hunting, and to prepare for the autumn racing campaign. On this occasion Captain Green was enjoying his hospitality and assisting him by sage counsels. Behind the little box was a little garden,--a garden that was very little; but, still, thus close to the parlour window, there was room for a small table to be put on the grass-plat, and for a couple of armchairs. Here the Major and the Captain were seated about eight o'clock one evening, with convivial good things within their reach. The good things were gin-and-water and pipes. The two gentlemen had not dressed strictly for dinner. They had spent a great part of the day handling the hounds and the horses, dressing wounds, curing sores, and ministering to canine ailments, and had been detained over their work too long to think of their toilet. As it was they had an eye to business. The stables at one corner and the kennels at the other were close to the little garden, and the doings of a man and a boy who were still at work among the animals could be directed from the armchairs on which the two sportsmen were sitting. It must be explained that ever since the Silverbridge election there had been a growing feeling in Tifto's mind that he had been ill-treated by his partner. The feeling was strengthened by the admirable condition of Prime Minister. Surely more consideration had been due to a man who had produced such a state of things! "I wouldn't quarrel with him, but I'd make him pay his way," said the prudent Captain. "As for that, of course he does pay--his share." "Who does all the work?" "That's true." "The fact is, Tifto, you don't make enough out of it. When a small man like you has to deal with a big man like that, he may take it out of him in one of two ways. But he must be deuced clever if he can get it both ways." "What are you driving at?" asked Tifto, who did not like being called a small man, feeling himself to be every inch a Master of foxhounds. "Why, this!--Look at that d---- fellow fretting that 'orse with a switch. If you can't strap a 'orse without a stick in your hand, don't you strap him at all, you--" Then there came a volley of abuse out of the Captain's mouth, in the middle of which the man threw down the rubber he was using and walked away. "You come back," halloed Tifto, jumping up from his seat with his pipe in his mouth. Then there was a general quarrel between the man and his two masters, in which the man at last was victorious. And the horse was taken into the stable in an unfinished condition. "It's all very well to say 'Get rid of him,' but where am I to get anybody better? It has come to such a pass that now if you speak to a fellow he walks out of the yard." They then returned to the state of affairs, as it was between Tifto and Lord Silverbridge. "What I was saying is this," continued the Captain. "If you choose to put yourself up to live with a fellow like that on equal terms--" "One gentleman with another, you mean?" "Put it so. It don't quite hit it off, but put it so. Why then you get your wages when you take his arm and call him Silverbridge." "I don't want wages from any man," said the indignant Major. "That comes from not knowing what wages is. I do want wages. If I do a thing I like to be paid for it. You are paid for it after one fashion, I prefer the other." "Do you mean he should give me--a salary?" "I'd have it out of him some way. What's the good of young chaps of that sort if they aren't made to pay? You've got this young swell in tow. He's going to be about the richest man in England;--and what the deuce better are you for it?" Tifto sat meditating, thinking of the wisdom which was being spoken. The same ideas had occurred to him. The happy chance which had made him intimate with Lord Silverbridge had not yet enriched him. "What is the good of chaps of that sort if they are not made to pay?" The words were wise words. But yet how glorious he had been when he was elected at the Beargarden, and had entered the club as the special friend of the heir of the Duke of Omnium. After a short pause, Captain Green pursued his discourse. "You said salary." "I did mention the word." "Salary and wages is one. A salary is a nice thing if it's paid regular. I had a salary once myself for looking after a stud of 'orses at Newmarket, only the gentleman broke up and it never went very far." "Was that Marley Bullock?" "Yes; that was Marley Bullock. He's abroad somewhere now with nothing a year paid quarterly to live on. I think he does a little at cards. He'd had a good bit of money once, but most of it was gone when he came my way." "You didn't make by him?" "I didn't lose nothing. I didn't have a lot of 'orses under me without getting something out of it." "What am I to do?" asked Tifto. "I can sell him a horse now and again. But if I give him anything good there isn't much to come out of that." "Very little I should say. Don't he put his money on his 'orses?" "Not very free. I think he's coming out freer now." "What did he stand to win on the Derby?" "A thousand or two perhaps." "There may be something got handsome out of that," said the Captain, not venturing to allow his voice to rise above a whisper. Major Tifto looked hard at him but said nothing. "Of course you must see your way." "I don't quite understand." "Race 'orses are expensive animals,--and races generally is expensive." "That's true." "When so much is dropped, somebody has to pick it up. That's what I've always said to myself. I'm as honest as another man." "That's of course," said the Major civilly. "But if I don't keep my mouth shut, somebody 'll have my teeth out of my head. Every one for himself and God for us all. I suppose there's a deal of money flying about. He'll put a lot of money on this 'orse of yours for the Leger if he's managed right. There's more to be got out of that than calling him Silverbridge and walking arm-in-arm. Business is business. I don't know whether I make myself understood." The gentleman did not quite make himself understood; but Tifto endeavoured to read the riddle. He must in some way make money out of his friend Lord Silverbridge. Hitherto he had contented himself with the brilliancy of the connection; but now his brilliant friend had taken to snubbing him, and had on more than one occasion made himself disagreeable. It seemed to him that Captain Green counselled him to put up with that, but counselled him at the same time to--pick up some of his friend's money. He didn't think that he could ask Lord Silverbridge for a salary--he who was a Master of Fox-hounds, and a member of the Beargarden. Then his friend had suggested something about the young lord's bets. He was endeavouring to unriddle all this with a brain that was already somewhat muddled with alcohol, when Captain Green got up from his chair and standing over the Major spoke his last words for that night as from an oracle. "Square is all very well, as long as others are square to you;--but when they aren't, then I say square be d----. Square! what comes of it? Work your heart out, and then it's no good." The Major thought about it much that night, and was thinking about it still when he awoke on the next morning. He would like to make Lord Silverbridge pay for his late insolence. It would answer his purpose to make a little money,--as he told himself,--in any honest way. At the present moment he was in want of money, and on looking into his affairs declared to himself that he had certainly impoverished himself by his devotion to Lord Silverbridge's interests. At breakfast on the following morning he endeavoured to bring his friend back to the subject. But the Captain was cross, rather than oracular. "Everybody," he said, "ought to know his own business. He wasn't going to meddle or make. What he had said had been taken amiss." This was hard upon Tifto, who had taken nothing amiss. "Square be d----!" There was a great deal in the lesson there enunciated which demanded consideration. Hitherto the Major had fought his battles with a certain adherence to squareness. If his angles had not all been perfect angles, still there had always been an attempt at geometrical accuracy. He might now and again have told a lie about a horse--but who that deals in horses has not done that? He had been alive to the value of underhand information from racing-stables, but who won't use a tip if he can get it? He had lied about the expense of his hounds, in order to enhance the subscription of his members. Those were things which everybody did in his line. But Green had meant something beyond this. As far as he could see out in the world at large, nobody was square. You had to keep your mouth shut, or your teeth would be stolen out of it. He didn't look into a paper without seeing that on all sides of him men had abandoned the idea of squareness. Chairmen, directors, members of Parliament, ambassadors,--all the world, as he told himself,--were trying to get on by their wits. He didn't see why he should be more square than anybody else. Why hadn't Silverbridge taken him down to Scotland for the grouse? CHAPTER XXXVII Grex Far away from all known places, in the northern limit of the Craven district, on the borders of Westmorland but in Yorkshire, there stands a large, rambling, most picturesque old house called Grex. The people around call it the Castle, but it is not a castle. It is an old brick building supposed to have been erected in the days of James the First, having oriel windows, twisted chimneys, long galleries, gable ends, a quadrangle of which the house surrounds three sides, terraces, sun-dials, and fish-ponds. But it is so sadly out of repair as to be altogether unfit for the residence of a gentleman and his family. It stands not in a park, for the land about it is divided into paddocks by low stone walls, but in the midst of lovely scenery, the ground rising all round it in low irregular hills or fells, and close to it, a quarter of a mile from the back of the house, there is a small dark lake, not serenely lovely as are some of the lakes in Westmorland, but attractive by the darkness of its waters and the gloom of the woods around it. This is the country seat of Earl Grex,--which however he had not visited for some years. Gradually the place had got into such a condition that his absence is not surprising. An owner of Grex, with large means at his disposal and with a taste for the picturesque to gratify,--one who could afford to pay for memories and who was willing to pay dearly for such luxuries, might no doubt restore Grex. But the Earl had neither the money nor the taste. Lord Grex had latterly never gone near the place, nor was his son Lord Percival fond of looking upon the ruin of his property. But Lady Mabel loved it with a fond love. With all her lightness of spirit she was prone to memories, prone to melancholy, prone at times almost to seek the gratification of sorrow. Year after year when the London season was over she would come down to Grex and spend a week or two amidst its desolation. She was now going on to a seat in Scotland belonging to Mrs. Montacute Jones called Killancodlem; but she was in the meanwhile passing a desolate fortnight at Grex in company with Miss Cassewary. The gardens were let,--and being let of course were not kept in further order than as profit might require. The man who rented them lived in the big house with his wife, and they on such occasions as this would cook and wait upon Lady Mabel. Lady Mabel was at the home of her ancestors, and the faithful Miss Cass was with her. But at the moment and at the spot at which the reader shall see her, Miss Cass was not with her. She was sitting on a rock about twelve feet above the lake looking upon the black water; and on another rock a few feet from her was seated Frank Tregear. "No," she said, "you should not have come. Nothing can justify it. Of course as you are here I could not refuse to come out with you. To make a fuss about it would be the worst of all. But you should not have come." "Why not? Whom does it hurt? It is a pleasure to me. If it be the reverse to you, I will go." "Men are so unmanly. They take such mean advantages. You know it is a pleasure to me to see you." "I had hoped so." "But it is a pleasure I ought not to have,--at least not here." "That is what I do not understand," said he. "In London, where the Earl could bark at me if he happened to find me, I could see the inconvenience of it. But here, where there is nobody but Miss Cass--" "There are a great many others. There are the rooks, and stones, and old women;--all of which have ears." "But of what is there to be ashamed? There is nothing in the world to me so pleasant as the companionship of my friends." "Then go after Silverbridge." "I mean to do so;--but I am taking you by the way." "It is all unmanly," she said, rising from her stone; "you know that it is so. Friends! Do you mean to say that it would make no difference whether you were here with me or with Miss Cass?" "The greatest difference in the world." "Because she is an old woman and I am a young one, and because in intercourse between young men and young women there is something dangerous to the women and therefore pleasant to the men." "I never heard anything more unjust. You cannot think I desire anything injurious to you." "I do think so." She was still standing and spoke now with great vehemence. "I do think so. You force me to throw aside the reticence I ought to keep. Would it help me in my prospects if your friend Lord Silverbridge knew that I was here?" "How should he know?" "But if he did? Do you suppose that I want to have visits paid to me of which I am afraid to speak? Would you dare to tell Lady Mary that you had been sitting alone with me on the rocks at Grex?" "Certainly I would." "Then it would be because you have not dared to tell her certain other things which have gone before. You have sworn to her no doubt that you love her better than all the world." "I have." "And you have taken the trouble to come here to tell me that,--to wound me to the core by saying so; to show me that, though I may still be sick, you have recovered,--that is if you ever suffered! Go your way and let me go mine. I do not want you." "Mabel!" "I do not want you. I know you will not help me, but you need not destroy me." "You know that you are wronging me." "No! You understand it all though you look so calm. I hate your Lady Mary Palliser. There! But if by anything I could do I could secure her to you I would do it,--because you want it." "She will be your sister-in-law,--probably." "Never. It will never be so." "Why do you hate her?" "There again! You are so little of a man that you can ask me why!" Then she turned away as though she intended to go down to the marge of the lake. But he rose up and stopped her. "Let us have this out, Mabel, before we go," he said. "Unmanly is a heavy word to hear from you, and you have used it a dozen times." "It is because I have thought it a thousand times. Go and get her if you can;--but why tell me about it?" "You said you would help me." "So I would, as I would help you do anything you might want; but you can hardly think that after what has passed I can wish to hear about her." "It was you spoke of her." "I told you you should not be here,--because of her and because of me. And I tell you again, I hate her. Do you think I can hear you speak of her as though she were the only woman you had ever seen without feeling it? Did you ever swear that you loved any one else?" "Certainly, I have so sworn." "Have you ever said that nothing could alter that love?" "Indeed I have." "But it is altered. It has all gone. It has been transferred to one who has more advantages of beauty, youth, wealth, and position." "Oh Mabel, Mabel!" "But it is so." "When you say this do you not think of yourself?" "Yes. But I have never been false to any one. You are false to me." "Have I not offered to face all the world with you?" "You would not offer it now?" "No," he said, after a pause,--"not now. Were I to do so, I should be false. You bade me take my love elsewhere, and I did so." "With the greatest ease." "We agreed it should be so; and you have done the same." "That is false. Look me in the face and tell me whether you do not know it to be false!" "And yet I am told that I am injuring you with Silverbridge." "Oh,--so unmanly again! Of course I have to marry. Who does not know it? Do you want to see me begging my bread about the streets? You have bread; or if not, you might earn it. If you marry for money--" "The accusation is altogether unjustifiable." "Allow me to finish what I have to say. If you marry for money you will do that which is in itself bad, and which is also unnecessary. What other course would you recommend me to take? No one goes into the gutter while there is a clean path open. If there be no escape but through the gutter, one has to take it." "You mean that my duty to you should have kept me from marrying all my life." "Not that;--but a little while, Frank; just a little while. Your bloom is not fading; your charms are not running from you. Have you not a strength which I cannot have? Do you not feel that you are a tree, standing firm in the ground, while I am a bit of ivy that will be trodden in the dirt unless it can be made to cling to something? You should not liken yourself to me, Frank." "If I could do you any good!" "Good! What is the meaning of good? If you love, it is good to be loved again. It is good not to have your heart torn in pieces. You know that I love you." He was standing close to her, and put out his hand as though he would twine his arm round her waist. "Not for worlds," she said. "It belongs to that Palliser girl. And as I have taught myself to think that what there is left of me may perhaps belong to some other one, worthless as it is, I will keep it for him. I love you,--but there can be none of that softness of love between us." Then there was a pause, but as he did not speak she went on. "But remember, Frank,--our position is not equal. You have got over your little complaint. It probably did not go deep with you, and you have found a cure. Perhaps there is a satisfaction in finding that two young women love you." "You are trying to be cruel to me." "Why else should you be here? You know I love you,--with all my heart, with all my strength, and that I would give the world to cure myself. Knowing this, you come and talk to me of your passion for this other girl." "I had hoped we might both talk rationally as friends." "Friends! Frank Tregear, I have been bold enough to tell you I love you; but you are not my friend, and cannot be my friend. If I have before asked you to help me in this mean catastrophe of mine, in my attack upon that poor boy, I withdraw my request. I think I will go back to the house now." "I will walk back to Ledburgh if you wish it without going to the house again." "No; I will have nothing that looks like being ashamed. You ought not to have come, but you need not run away." Then they walked back to the house together and found Miss Cassewary on the terrace. "We have been to the lake," said Mabel, "and have been talking of old days. I have but one ambition now in the world." Of course Miss Cassewary asked what the remaining ambition was. "To get money enough to purchase this place from the ruins of the Grex property. If I could own the house and the lake, and the paddocks about, and had enough income to keep one servant and bread for us to eat--of course including you, Miss Cass--" "Thank'ee, my dear; but I am not sure I should like it." "Yes; you would. Frank would come and see us perhaps once a year. I don't suppose anybody else cares about the place, but to me it is the dearest spot in the world." So she went on in almost high spirits, though alluding to the general decadence of the Grex family, till Tregear took his leave. "I wish he had not come," said Miss Cassewary when he was gone. "Why should you wish that? There is not so much here to amuse me that you should begrudge me a stray visitor." "I don't think that I grudge you anything in the way of pleasure, my dear; but still he should not have come. My Lord, if he knew it, would be angry." "Then let him be angry. Papa does not do so much for me that I am bound to think of him at every turn." "But I am,--or rather I am bound to think of myself, if I take his bread." "Bread!" "Well;--I do take his bread, and I take it on the understanding that I will be to you what a mother might be,--or an aunt." "Well,--and if so! Had I a mother living would not Frank Tregear have come to visit her, and in visiting her, would he not have seen me,--and should we not have walked out together?" "Not after all that has come and gone." "But you are not a mother nor yet an aunt, and you have to do just what I tell you. And don't I know that you trust me in all things? And am I not trustworthy?" "I think you are trustworthy." "I know what my duty is and I mean to do it. No one shall ever have to say of me that I have given way to self-indulgence. I couldn't help his coming, you know." That same night, after Miss Cassewary had gone to bed, when the moon was high in the heavens and the world around her was all asleep, Lady Mabel again wandered out to the lake, and again seated herself on the same rock, and there she sat thinking of her past life and trying to think of that before her. It is so much easier to think of the past than of the future,--to remember what has been than to resolve what shall be! She had reminded him of the offer which he had made and repeated to her more than once,--to share with her all his chances in life. There would have been almost no income for them. All the world would have been against her. She would have caused his ruin. Her light on the matter had been so clear that it had not taken her very long to decide that such a thing must not be thought of. She had at last been quite stern in her decision. Now she was broken-hearted because she found that he had left her in very truth. Oh yes;--she would marry the boy, if she could so arrange. Since that meeting at Richmond he had sent her the ring reset. She was to meet him down in Scotland within a week or two from the present time. Mrs. Montacute Jones had managed that. He had all but offered to her a second time at Richmond. But all that would not serve to make her happy. She declared to herself that she did not wish to see Frank Tregear again; but still it was a misery to her that his heart should in truth be given to another woman. CHAPTER XXXVIII Crummie-Toddie Almost at the last moment Silverbridge and his brother Gerald were induced to join Lord Popplecourt's shooting-party in Scotland. The party perhaps might more properly be called the party of Reginald Dobbes, who was a man knowing in such matters. It was he who made the party up. Popplecourt and Silverbridge were to share the expense between them, each bringing three guns. Silverbridge brought his brother and Frank Tregear,--having refused a most piteous petition on the subject from Major Tifto. With Popplecourt of course came Reginald Dobbes, who was, in truth, to manage everything, and Lord Nidderdale, whose wife had generously permitted him this recreation. The shooting was in the west of Perthshire, known as Crummie-Toddie, and comprised an enormous acreage of so-called forest and moor. Mr. Dobbes declared that nothing like it had as yet been produced in Scotland. Everything had been made to give way to deer and grouse. The thing had been managed so well that the tourist nuisance had been considerably abated. There was hardly a potato patch left in the district, nor a head of cattle to be seen. There were no inhabitants remaining, or so few that they could be absorbed in game-preserving or cognate duties. Reginald Dobbes, who was very great at grouse, and supposed to be capable of outwitting a deer by venatical wiles more perfectly than any other sportsman in Great Britain, regarded Crummie-Toddie as the nearest thing there was to a Paradise on earth. Could he have been allowed to pass one or two special laws for his own protection, there might still have been improvement. He would like the right to have all intruders thrashed by the gillies within an inch of their lives; and he would have had a clause in his lease against the making of any new roads, opening of footpaths, or building of bridges. He had seen somewhere in print a plan for running a railway from Callender to Fort Augustus right through Crummie-Toddie! If this were done in his time the beauty of the world would be over. Reginald Dobbes was a man of about forty, strong, active, well-made, about five feet ten in height, with broad shoulders and greatly-developed legs. He was not a handsome man, having a protrusive nose, high cheek-bones, and long upper lip; but there was a manliness about his face which redeemed it. Sport was the business of his life, and he thoroughly despised all who were not sportsmen. He fished and shot and hunted during nine or ten months of the year, filling up his time as best he might with coaching polo, and pigeon-shooting. He regarded it as a great duty to keep his body in the firmest possible condition. All his eating and all his drinking was done upon a system, and he would consider himself to be guilty of weak self-indulgence were he to allow himself to break through sanitary rules. But it never occurred to him that his whole life was one of self-indulgence. He could walk his thirty miles with his gun on his shoulder as well now as he could ten years ago; and being sure of this, was thoroughly contented with himself. He had a patrimony amounting to perhaps £1000 a year, which he husbanded so as to enjoy all his amusements to perfection. No one had ever heard of his sponging on his friends. Of money he rarely spoke, sport being in his estimation the only subject worthy of a man's words. Such was Reginald Dobbes, who was now to be the master of the shooting at Crummie-Toddie. Crummie-Toddie was but twelve miles from Killancodlem, Mrs. Montacute Jones's highland seat; and it was this vicinity which first induced Lord Silverbridge to join the party. Mabel Grex was to be at Killancodlem, and, determined as he still was to ask her to be his wife, he would make this his opportunity. Of real opportunity there had been none at Richmond. Since he had had his ring altered and had sent it to her there had come but a word or two of answer. "What am I to say? You unkindest of men! To keep it or to send it back would make me equally miserable. I shall keep it till you are married, and then give it to your wife." This affair of the ring had made him more intent than ever. After that he heard that Isabel Boncassen would also be at Killancodlem, having been induced to join Mrs. Montacute Jones's swarm of visitors. Though he was dangerously devoid of experience, still he felt that this was unfortunate. He intended to marry Mabel Grex. And he could assure himself that he thoroughly loved her. Nevertheless he liked making love to Isabel Boncassen. He was quite willing to marry and settle down, and looked forward with satisfaction to having Mabel Grex for his wife. But it would be pleasant to have a six-months run of flirting and love-making before this settlement, and he had certainly never seen any one with whom this would be so delightful as with Miss Boncassen. But that the two ladies should be at the same house was unfortunate. He and Gerald reached Crummie-Toddie late on the evening of August 11th, and found Reginald Dobbes alone. That was on Wednesday. Popplecourt and Nidderdale ought to have made their appearance on that morning, but had telegraphed to say that they would be detained two days on their route. Tregear, whom hitherto Dobbes had never seen, had left his arrival uncertain. This carelessness on such matters was very offensive to Mr. Dobbes, who loved discipline and exactitude. He ought to have received the two young men with open arms because they were punctual; but he had been somewhat angered by what he considered the extreme youth of Lord Gerald. Boys who could not shoot were, he thought, putting themselves forward before their time. And Silverbridge himself was by no means a first-rate shot. Such a one as Silverbridge had to be endured because from his position and wealth he could facilitate such arrangements as these. It was much to have to do with a man who would not complain if an extra fifty pounds were wanted. But he ought to have understood that he was bound in honour to bring down competent friends. Of Tregear's shooting Dobbes had been able to learn nothing. Lord Gerald was a lad from the Universities; and Dobbes hated University lads. Popplecourt and Nidderdale were known to be efficient. They were men who could work hard and do their part of the required slaughter. Dobbes proudly knew that he could make up for some deficiency by his own prowess; but he could not struggle against three bad guns. What was the use of so perfecting Crummie-Toddie as to make it the best bit of ground for grouse and deer in Scotland, if the men who came there failed by their own incapacity to bring up the grand total of killed to a figure which would render Dobbes and Crummie-Toddie famous throughout the whole shooting world? He had been hard at work on other matters. Dogs had gone amiss,--or guns, and he had been made angry by the champagne which Popplecourt caused to be sent down. He knew what champagne meant. Whisky-and-water, and not much of it, was the liquor which Reginald Dobbes loved in the mountains. "Don't you call this a very ugly country?" Silverbridge asked as soon as he arrived. Now it is the case that the traveller who travels into Argyllshire, Perthshire, and Inverness, expects to find lovely scenery; and it was also true that the country through which they had passed for the last twenty miles had been not only bleak and barren, but uninteresting and ugly. It was all rough open moorland, never rising into mountains, and graced by no running streams, by no forest scenery, almost by no foliage. The lodge itself did indeed stand close upon a little river, and was reached by a bridge that crossed it; but there was nothing pretty either in the river or the bridge. It was a placid black little streamlet, which in that portion of its course was hurried by no steepness, had no broken rocks in its bed, no trees on its low banks, and played none of those gambols which make running water beautiful. The bridge was a simple low construction with a low parapet, carrying an ordinary roadway up to the hall door. The lodge itself was as ugly as a house could be, white, of two stories, with the door in the middle and windows on each side, with a slate roof, and without a tree near it. It was in the middle of the shooting, and did not create a town around itself as do sumptuous mansions, to the great detriment of that seclusion which is favourable to game. "Look at Killancodlem," Dobbes had been heard to say--"a very fine house for ladies to flirt in; but if you find a deer within six miles of it I will eat him first and shoot him afterwards." There was a Spartan simplicity about Crummie-Toddie which pleased the Spartan mind of Reginald Dobbes. "Ugly, do you call it?" "Infernally ugly," said Lord Gerald. "What did you expect to find? A big hotel, and a lot of cockneys? If you come after grouse, you must come to what the grouse thinks pretty." "Nevertheless, it is ugly," said Silverbridge, who did not choose to be "sat upon." "I have been at shootings in Scotland before, and sometimes they are not ugly. This I call beastly." Whereupon Reginald Dobbes turned upon his heel and walked away. "Can you shoot?" he said afterwards to Lord Gerald. "I can fire off a gun, if you mean that," said Gerald. "You have never shot much?" "Not what you call very much. I'm not so old as you are, you know. Everything must have a beginning." Mr. Dobbes wished "the beginning" might have taken place elsewhere; but there had been some truth in the remark. "What on earth made you tell him crammers like that?" asked Silverbridge, as the brothers sat together afterwards smoking on the wall of the bridge. "Because he made an ass of himself; asking me whether I could shoot." On the next morning they started at seven. Dobbes had determined to be cross, because, as he thought, the young men would certainly keep him waiting; and was cross because by their punctuality they robbed him of any just cause for offence. During the morning on the moor they were hardly ever near enough each other for much conversation, and very little was said. According to arrangement made they returned to the house for lunch, it being their purpose not to go far from home till their numbers were complete. As they came over the bridge and put down their guns near the door, Mr. Dobbes spoke the first good-humoured word they had heard from his lips. "Why did you tell me such an infernal--, I would say lie, only perhaps you mightn't like it?" "I told you no lie," said Gerald. "You've only missed two birds all the morning, and you have shot forty-two. That's uncommonly good sport." "What have you done?" "Only forty," and Mr. Dobbes seemed for the moment to be gratified by his own inferiority. "You are a deuced sight better than your brother." "Gerald's about the best shot I know," said Silverbridge. "Why didn't he tell?" "Because you were angry when we said the place was ugly." "I see all about it," said Dobbes. "Nevertheless when a fellow comes to shoot he shouldn't complain because a place isn't pretty. What you want is a decent house as near as you can have it to your ground. If there is anything in Scotland to beat Crummie-Toddie I don't know where to find it. Shooting is shooting you know, and touring is touring." Upon that he took very kindly to Lord Gerald, who, even after the arrival of the other men, was second only in skill to Dobbes himself. With Nidderdale, who was an old companion, he got on very well. Nidderdale ate and drank too much, and refused to be driven beyond a certain amount of labour, but was in other respects obedient and knew what he was about. Popplecourt was disagreeable, but he was a fairly good shot and understood what was expected of him. Silverbridge was so good-humoured, that even his manifest faults,--shooting carelessly, lying in bed and wanting his dinner,--were, if not forgiven, at least endured. But Tregear was an abomination. He could shoot well enough and was active, and when he was at the work seemed to like it;--but he would stay away whole days by himself, and when spoken to would answer in a manner which seemed to Dobbes to be flat mutiny. "We are not doing it for our bread," said Tregear. "I don't know what you mean." "There's no duty in killing a certain number of these animals." They had been driving deer on the day before and were to continue the work on the day in question. "I'm not paid fifteen shillings a week for doing it." "I suppose if you undertake to do a thing you mean to do it. Of course you're not wanted. We can make the double party without you." "Then why the mischief should you growl at me?" "Because I think a man should do what he undertakes to do. A man who gets tired after three days' work of this kind would become tired if he were earning his bread." "Who says I am tired? I came here to amuse myself." "Amuse yourself!" "And as long as it amuses me I shall shoot, and when it does not I shall give it up." This vexed the governor of Crummie-Toddie much. He had learned to regard himself as the arbiter of the fate of men while they were sojourning under the same autumnal roof as himself. But a defalcation which occurred immediately afterwards was worse. Silverbridge declared his intention of going over one morning to Killancodlem. Reginald Dobbes muttered a curse between his teeth, which was visible by the anger on his brow to all the party. "I shall be back to-night, you know," said Silverbridge. "A lot of men and women who pretend to come there for shooting," said Dobbes angrily, "but do all the mischief they can." "One must go and see one's friends, you know." "Some girl!" said Dobbes. But worse happened than the evil so lightly mentioned. Silverbridge did go over to Killancodlem; and presently there came back a man with a cart, who was to return with a certain not small proportion of his luggage. "It's hardly honest, you know," said Reginald Dobbes. CHAPTER XXXIX Killancodlem Mr. Dobbes was probably right in his opinion that hotels, tourists, and congregations of men are detrimental to shooting. Crummie-Toddie was in all respects suited for sport. Killancodlem, though it had the name of a shooting-place, certainly was not so. Men going there took their guns. Gamekeepers were provided and gillies,--and, in a moderate quantity, game. On certain grand days a deer or two might be shot,--and would be very much talked about afterwards. But a glance at the place would suffice to show that Killancodlem was not intended for sport. It was a fine castellated mansion, with beautiful though narrow grounds, standing in the valley of the Archay River, with a mountain behind and the river in front. Between the gates and the river there was a public road on which a stage-coach ran, with loud-blown horns and the noise of many tourists. A mile beyond the Castle was the famous Killancodlem hotel which made up a hundred and twenty beds, and at which half as many more guests would sleep on occasions under the tables. And there was the Killancodlem post-office halfway between the two. At Crummie-Toddie they had to send nine miles for their letters and newspapers. At Killancodlem there was lawn-tennis and a billiard-room and dancing every night. The costumes of the ladies were lovely, and those of the gentlemen, who were wonderful in knickerbockers, picturesque hats and variegated stockings, hardly less so. And then there were carriages and saddle-horses, and paths had been made hither and thither through the rocks and hills for the sake of the scenery. Scenery! To hear Mr. Dobbes utter the single word was as good as a play. Was it for such cockney purposes as those that Scotland had been created, fit mother for grouse and deer? Silverbridge arrived just before lunch, and was soon made to understand that it was impossible that he should go back that day. Mrs. Jones was very great on that occasion. "You are afraid of Reginald Dobbes," she said severely. "I think I am rather." "Of course you are. How came it to pass that you of all men should submit yourself to such a tyrant?" "Good shooting, you know," said Silverbridge. "But you dare not call an hour your own--or your soul. Mr. Dobbes and I are sworn enemies. We both like Scotland, and unfortunately we have fallen into the same neighbourhood. He looks upon me as the genius of sloth. I regard him as the incarnation of tyranny. He once said there should be no women in Scotland,--just an old one here and there, who would know how to cook grouse. I offered to go and cook his grouse! "Any friend of mine," continued Mrs. Jones, "who comes down to Crummie-Toddie without staying a day or two with me,--will never be my friend any more. I do not hesitate to tell you, Lord Silverbridge, that I call for your surrender, in order that I may show my power over Reginald Dobbes. Are you a Dobbite?" "Not thorough-going," said Silverbridge. "Then be a Montacute Jones-ite; or a Boncassenite, if, as is possible, you prefer a young woman to an old one." At this moment Isabel Boncassen was standing close to them. "Killancodlem against Crummie-Toddie for ever!" said Miss Boncassen, waving her handkerchief. As a matter of course a messenger was sent back to Crummie-Toddie for the young lord's wearing apparel. The whole of that afternoon he spent playing lawn-tennis with Miss Boncassen. Lady Mabel was asked to join the party, but she refused, having promised to take a walk to a distant waterfall where the Codlem falls into the Archay. A gentleman in knickerbockers was to have gone with her, and two other young ladies; but when the time came she was weary, she said,--and she sat almost the entire afternoon looking at the game from a distance. Silverbridge played well, but not so well as the pretty American. With them were joined two others somewhat inferior, so that Silverbridge and Miss Boncassen were on different sides. They played game after game, and Miss Boncassen's side always won. Very little was said between Silverbridge and Miss Boncassen which did not refer to the game. But Lady Mabel, looking on, told herself that they were making love to each other before her eyes. And why shouldn't they? She asked herself that question in perfect good faith. Why should they not be lovers? Was ever anything prettier than the girl in her country dress, active as a fawn and as graceful? Or could anything be more handsome, more attractive to a girl, more good-humoured, or better bred in his playful emulation than Silverbridge? "When youth and pleasure meet, To chase the glowing hours with flying feet!" she said to herself over and over again. But why had he sent her the ring? She would certainly give him back the ring and bid him bestow it at once upon Miss Boncassen. Inconstant boy! Then she would get up and wander away for a time and rebuke herself. What right had she even to think of inconstancy? Could she be so irrational, so unjust, as to be sick for his love, as to be angry with him because he seemed to prefer another? Was she not well aware that she herself did not love him;--but that she did love another man? She had made up her mind to marry him in order that she might be a duchess, and because she could give herself to him without any of that horror which would be her fate in submitting to matrimony with one or another of the young men around her. There might be disappointment. If he escaped her there would be bitter disappointment. But seeing how it was, had she any further ground for hope? She certainly had no ground for anger! It was thus, within her own bosom, she put questions to herself. And yet all this before her was simply a game of play in which the girl and the young man were as eager for victory as though they were children. They were thinking neither of love nor love-making. That the girl should be so lovely was no doubt a pleasure to him;--and perhaps to her also that he should be joyous to look at and sweet of voice. But he, could he have been made to tell all the truth within him, would have still owned that it was his purpose to make Mabel his wife. When the game was over and the propositions made for further matches and the like,--Miss Boncassen said that she would betake herself to her own room. "I never worked so hard in my life before," she said. "And I feel like a navvie. I could drink beer out of a jug and eat bread and cheese. I won't play with you any more, Lord Silverbridge, because I am beginning to think it is unladylike to exert myself." "Are you not glad you came over?" said Lady Mabel to him as he was going off the ground almost without seeing her. "Pretty well," he said. "Is not that better than stalking?" "Lawn-tennis?" "Yes;--lawn-tennis,--with Miss Boncassen." "She plays uncommonly well." "And so do you." "Ah, she has such an eye for distances." "And you,--what have you an eye for? Will you answer me a question?" "Well;--yes; I think so." "Truly." "Certainly; if I do answer it." "Do you not think her the most beautiful creature you ever saw in your life?" He pushed back his cap and looked at her without making any immediate answer. "I do. Now tell me what you think." "I think that perhaps she is." "I knew you would say so. You are so honest that you could not bring yourself to tell a fib,--even to me about that. Come here and sit down for a moment." Of course he sat down by her. "You know that Frank came to see me at Grex?" "He never mentioned it." "Dear me;--how odd!" "It was odd," said he in a voice which showed that he was angry. She could hardly explain to herself why she told him this at the present moment. It came partly from jealousy, as though she had said to herself, "Though he may neglect me, he shall know that there is someone who does not;"--and partly from an eager half-angry feeling that she would have nothing concealed. There were moments with her in which she thought that she could arrange her future life in accordance with certain wise rules over which her heart should have no influence. There were others, many others, in which her feelings completely got the better of her. And now she told herself that she would be afraid of nothing. There should be no deceit, no lies! "He went to see you at Grex!" said Silverbridge. "Why should he not have come to me at Grex?" "Only it is so odd that he did not mention it. It seems to me that he is always having secrets with you of some kind." "Poor Frank! There is no one else who would come to see me at that tumbledown old place. But I have another thing to say to you. You have behaved badly to me." "Have I?" "Yes, sir. After my folly about that ring you should have known better than to send it to me. You must take it back again." "You shall do exactly what you said you would. You shall give it to my wife,--when I have one." "That did very well for me to say in a note. I did not want to send my anger to you over a distance of two or three hundred miles by the postman. But now that we are together you must take it back." "I will do no such thing," said he sturdily. "You speak as though this were a matter in which you can have your own way." "I mean to have mine about that." "Any lady then must be forced to take any present that a gentleman may send her! Allow me to assure you that the usages of society do not run in that direction. Here is the ring. I knew that you would come over to see--well, to see someone here, and I have kept it ready in my pocket." "I came over to see you." "Lord Silverbridge! But we know that in certain employments all things are fair." He looked at her not knowing what were the employments to which she alluded. "At any rate you will oblige me by--by--by not being troublesome, and putting this little trinket into your pocket." "Never! Nothing on earth shall make me do it." At Killancodlem they did not dine till half-past eight. Twilight was now stealing on these two, who were still out in the garden, all the others having gone in to dress. She looked round to see that no other eyes were watching them as she still held the ring. "It is there," she said, putting it on the bench between them. Then she prepared to rise from the seat so that she might leave it with him. But he was too quick for her, and was away at a distance before she had collected her dress. And from a distance he spoke again, "If you choose that it shall be lost, so be it." "You had better take it," said she, following him slowly. But he would not turn back;--nor would she. They met again in the hall for a moment. "I should be sorry it should be lost," said he, "because it belonged to my great-uncle. And I had hoped that I might live to see it very often." "You can fetch it," she said, as she went to her room. He however would not fetch it. She had accepted it, and he would not take it back again, let the fate of the gem be what it might. But to the feminine and more cautious mind the very value of the trinket made its position out there on the bench, within the grasp of any dishonest gardener, a burden to her. She could not reconcile it to her conscience that it should be so left. The diamond was a large one, and she had heard it spoken of as a stone of great value,--so much so, that Silverbridge had been blamed for wearing it ordinarily. She had asked for it in joke, regarding it as a thing which could not be given away. She could not go down herself and take it up again; but neither could she allow it to remain. As she went to her room she met Mrs. Jones already coming from hers. "You will keep us all waiting," said the hostess. "Oh no;--nobody ever dressed so quickly. But, Mrs. Jones, will you do me a favour?" "Certainly." "And will you let me explain something?" "Anything you like,--from a hopeless engagement down to a broken garter." "I am suffering neither from one or the other. But there is a most valuable ring lying out in the garden. Will you send for it?" Then of course the story had to be told. "You will, I hope, understand how I came to ask for it foolishly. It was because it was the one thing which I was sure he would not give away." "Why not take it?" "Can't you understand? I wouldn't for the world. But you will be good enough,--won't you, to see that there is nothing else in it?" "Nothing of love?" "Nothing in the least. He and I are excellent friends. We are cousins, and intimate, and all that. I thought I might have had my joke, and now I am punished for it. As for love, don't you see he is over head and ears in love with Miss Boncassen?" This was very imprudent on the part of Lady Mabel, who, had she been capable of clinging fast to her policy, would not now in a moment of strong feeling have done so much to raise obstacles in her own way. "But you will send for it, won't you, and have it put on his dressing-table to-night?" When he went to bed Lord Silverbridge found it on his table. But before that time came he had twice danced with Miss Boncassen, Lady Mabel having refused to dance with him. "No," she said, "I am angry with you. You ought to have felt that it did not become you as a gentleman to subject me to inconvenience by throwing upon me the charge of that diamond. You may be foolish enough to be indifferent about its value, but as you have mixed me up with it I cannot afford to have it lost." "It is yours." "No, sir; it is not mine, nor will it ever be mine. But I wish you to understand that you have offended me." This made him so unhappy for the time that he almost told the story to Miss Boncassen. "If I were to give you a ring," he said, "would not you accept it?" "What a question!" "What I mean is, don't you think all those conventional rules about men and women are absurd?" "As a progressive American, of course I am bound to think all conventional rules are an abomination." "If you had a brother and I gave him a stick he'd take it." "Not across his back, I hope." "Or if I gave your father a book?" "He'd take books to any extent, I should say." "And why not you a ring?" "Who said I wouldn't? But after all this you mustn't try me." "I was not thinking of it." "I'm so glad of that! Well;--if you'll promise that you'll never offer me one, I'll promise that I'll take it when it comes. But what does all this mean?" "It is not worth talking about." "You have offered somebody a ring, and somebody hasn't taken it. May I guess?" "I had rather you did not." "I could, you know." "Never mind about that. Now come and have a turn. I am bound not to give you a ring; but you are bound to accept anything else I may offer." "No, Lord Silverbridge;--not at all. Nevertheless we'll have a turn." That night before he went up to his room he had told Isabel Boncassen that he loved her. And when he spoke he was telling her the truth. It had seemed to him that Mabel had become hard to him, and had over and over again rejected the approaches to tenderness which he had attempted to make in his intercourse with her. Even though she were to accept him, what would that be worth to him if she did not love him? So many things had been added together! Why had Tregear gone to Grex, and having gone there why had he kept his journey a secret? Tregear he knew was engaged to his sister;--but for all that, there was a closer intimacy between Mabel and Tregear than between Mabel and himself. And surely she might have taken his ring! And then Isabel Boncassen was so perfect! Since he had first met her he had heard her loveliness talked of on all sides. It seemed to be admitted everywhere that so beautiful a creature had never before been seen in London. There is even a certain dignity attached to that which is praised by all lips. Miss Boncassen as an American girl, had she been judged to be beautiful only by his own eyes, might perhaps have seemed to him to be beneath his serious notice. In such a case he might have felt himself unable to justify so extraordinary a choice. But there was an acclamation of assent as to this girl! Then came the dancing,--the one dance after another; the pressure of the hand, the entreaty that she would not, just on this occasion, dance with any other man, the attendance on her when she took her glass of wine, the whispered encouragement of Mrs. Montacute Jones, the half-resisting and yet half-yielding conduct of the girl. "I shall not dance at all again," she said when he asked her to stand up for another. "Think of all that lawn-tennis this morning." "But you will play to-morrow?" "I thought you were going." "Of course I shall stay now," he said, and as he said it he put his hand on her hand, which was on his arm. She drew it away at once. "I love you so dearly," he whispered to her; "so dearly." "Lord Silverbridge!" "I do. I do. Can you say that you will love me in return?" "I cannot," she said slowly. "I have never dreamed of such a thing. I hardly know now whether you are in earnest." "Indeed, indeed I am." "Then I will say good-night, and think about it. Everybody is going. We will have our game to-morrow at any rate." When he went to his room he found the ring on his dressing-table. CHAPTER XL "And Then!" On the next morning Miss Boncassen did not appear at breakfast. Word came that she had been so fatigued by the lawn-tennis as not to be able to leave her bed. "I have been to her," said Mrs. Montacute Jones, whispering to Lord Silverbridge, as though he were particularly interested. "There's nothing really the matter. She will be down to lunch." "I was afraid she might be ill," said Silverbridge, who was now hardly anxious to hide his admiration. "Oh no;--nothing of that sort; but she will not be able to play again to-day. It was your fault. You should not have made her dance last night." After that Mrs. Jones said a word about it all to Lady Mabel. "I hope the Duke will not be angry with me." "Why should he be angry with you?" "I don't suppose he will approve of it, and perhaps he'll say I brought them together on purpose." Soon afterwards Mabel asked Silverbridge to walk with her to the waterfall. She had worked herself into such a state of mind that she hardly knew what to do, what to wish, or how to act. At one moment she would tell herself that it was better in every respect that she should cease to think of being Duchess of Omnium. It was not fit that she should think of it. She herself cared but little for the young man, and he--she would tell herself--now appeared to care as little for her. And yet to be Duchess of Omnium! But was it not clear that he was absolutely in love with this other girl? She had played her cards so badly that the game was now beyond her powers. Then other thoughts would come. Was it beyond her powers? Had he not told her in London that he loved her? Had he not given her the ring which she well knew he valued? Ah;--if she could but have been aware of all that had passed between Silverbridge and the Duke, how different would have been her feelings! And then would it not be so much better for him that he should marry her, one of his own class, than this American girl, of whom nobody knew anything? And then,--to be the daughter of the Duke of Omnium, to be the future Duchess, to escape from all the cares which her father's vices and follies had brought upon her, to have come to an end of all her troubles! Would it not be sweet? She had made her mind up to nothing when she asked him to walk up to the waterfall. There was present to her only the glimmer of an idea that she ought to caution him not to play with the American girl's feelings. She knew herself to be aware that, when the time for her own action came, her feminine feelings would get the better of her purpose. She could not craftily bring him to the necessity of bestowing himself upon her. Had that been within the compass of her powers, opportunities had not been lacking to her. On such occasions she had always "spared him." And should the opportunity come again, again she would spare him. But she might perhaps do some good,--not to herself, that was now out of the question,--but to him, by showing him how wrong he was in trifling with this girl's feelings. And so they started for their walk. He of course would have avoided it had it been possible. When men in such matters have two strings to their bow, much inconvenience is felt when the two become entangled. Silverbridge no doubt had come over to Killancodlem for the sake of making love to Mabel Grex, and instead of doing so he had made love to Isabel Boncassen. And during the watches of the night, and as he had dressed himself in the morning, and while Mrs. Jones had been whispering to him her little bulletin as to the state of the young lady's health, he had not repented himself of the change. Mabel had been, he thought, so little gracious to him that he would have given up that notion earlier, but for his indiscreet declaration to his father. On the other hand, making love to Isabel Boncassen seemed to him to possess some divine afflatus of joy which made it of all imaginable occupations the sweetest and most charming. She had admitted of no embrace. Indeed he had attempted none, unless that touch of the hand might be so called, from which she had immediately withdrawn. Her conduct had been such that he had felt it to be incumbent on him, at the very moment, to justify the touch by a declaration of love. Then she had told him that she would not promise to love him in return. And yet it had been so sweet, so heavenly sweet! During the morning he had almost forgotten Mabel. When Mrs. Jones told him that Isabel would keep her room, he longed to ask for leave to go and make some inquiry at the door. She would not play lawn-tennis with him. Well;--he did not now care much for that. After what he had said to her she must at any rate give him some answer. She had been so gracious to him that his hopes ran very high. It never occurred to him to fancy that she might be gracious to him because he was heir to the Dukedom of Omnium. She herself was so infinitely superior to all wealth, to all rank, to all sublunary arrangements, conventions, and considerations, that there was no room for confidence of that nature. But he was confident because her smile had been sweet, and her eyes bright,--and because he was conscious, though unconsciously conscious, of something of the sympathy of love. But he had to go to the waterfall with Mabel. Lady Mabel was always dressed perfectly,--having great gifts of her own in that direction. There was a freshness about her which made her morning costume more charming than that of the evening, and never did she look so well as when arrayed for a walk. On this occasion she had certainly done her best. But he, poor blind idiot, saw nothing of this. The white gauzy fabric which had covered Isabel's satin petticoat on the previous evening still filled his eyes. Those perfect boots, the little glimpses of party-coloured stockings above them, the looped-up skirt, the jacket fitting but never binding that lovely body and waist, the jaunty hat with its small fresh feathers, all were nothing to him. Nor was the bright honest face beneath the hat anything to him now;--for it was an honest face, though misfortunes which had come had somewhat marred the honesty of the heart. At first the conversation was about indifferent things,--Killancodlem and Mrs. Jones, Crummie-Toddie and Reginald Dobbes. They had gone along the high-road as far as the post-office, and had turned up through the wood and reached a seat whence there was a beautiful view down upon the Archay, before a word was said affecting either Miss Boncassen or the ring. "You got the ring safe?" she said. "Oh yes." "How could you be so foolish as to risk it?" "I did not regard it as mine. You had accepted it,--I thought." "But if I had, and then repented of my fault in doing so, should you not have been willing to help me in setting myself right with myself? Of course, after what had passed, it was a trouble to me when it came. What was I to do? For a day or two I thought I would take it, not as liking to take it, but as getting rid of the trouble in that way. Then I remembered its value, its history, the fact that all who knew you would want to know what had become of it,--and I felt that it should be given back. There is only one person to whom you must give it." "Who is that?" he said quickly. "Your wife;--or to her who is to become your wife. No other woman can be justified in accepting such a present." "There has been a great deal more said about it than it's worth," said he, not anxious at the present moment to discuss any matrimonial projects with her. "Shall we go on to the Fall?" Then she got up and led the way till they came to the little bridge from which they could see the Falls of the Codlem below them. "I call that very pretty," he said. "I thought you would like it." "I never saw anything of that kind more jolly. Do you care for scenery, Mabel?" "Very much. I know no pleasure equal to it. You have never seen Grex?" "Is it like this?" "Not in the least. It is wilder than this, and there are not so many trees; but to my eyes it is very beautiful. I wish you had seen it." "Perhaps I may some day." "That is not likely now," she said. "The house is in ruins. If I had just money enough to keep it for myself, I think I could live alone there and be happy." "You;--alone! Of course you mean to marry?" "Mean to marry! Do persons marry because they mean it? With nineteen men out of twenty the idea of marrying them would convey the idea of hating them. You can mean to marry. No doubt you do mean it." "I suppose I shall,--some day. How very well the house looks from here." It was incumbent upon him at the present moment to turn the conversation. But when she had a project in her head it was not so easy to turn her away. "Yes, indeed," she said, "very well. But as I was saying,--you can mean to marry." "Anybody can mean it." "But you can carry out a purpose. What are you thinking of doing now?" "Upon my honour, Mabel, that is unfair." "Are we not friends?" "I think so." "Dear friends?" "I hope so." "Then may I not tell you what I think? If you do not mean to marry that American young lady you should not raise false hopes." "False--hopes!" He had hopes, but he had never thought that Isabel could have any. "False hopes;--certainly. Do you not know that everyone was looking at you last night?" "Certainly not." "And that that old woman is going about talking of it as her doing, pretending to be afraid of your father, whereas nothing would please her better than to humble a family so high as yours." "Humble!" exclaimed Lord Silverbridge. "Do you think your father would like it? Would you think that another man would be doing well for himself by marrying Miss Boncassen?" "I do," said he energetically. "Then you must be very much in love with her." "I say nothing about that." "If you are so much in love with her that you mean to face the displeasure of all your friends--" "I do not say what I mean. I could talk more freely to you than to any one else, but I won't talk about that even to you. As regards Miss Boncassen, I think that any man might marry her, without discredit. I won't have it said that she can be inferior to me,--or to anybody." There was a steady manliness in this which took Lady Mabel by surprise. She was convinced that he intended to offer his hand to the girl, and now was actuated chiefly by a feeling that his doing so would be an outrage to all English propriety. If a word might have an effect it would be her duty to speak that word. "I think you are wrong there, Lord Silverbridge." "I am sure I am right." "What have you yourself felt about your sister and Mr. Tregear?" "It is altogether different;--altogether. Frank's wife will be simply his wife. Mine, should I outlive my father, will be Duchess of Omnium." "But your father? I have heard you speak with bitter regret of this affair of Lady Mary's, because it vexes him. Would your marriage with an American lady vex him less?" "Why should it vex him at all? Is she vulgar, or ill to look at, or stupid?" "Think of her mother." "I am not going to marry her mother. Nor for the matter of that am I going to marry her. You are taking all that for granted in a most unfair way." "How can I help it after what I saw yesterday?" "I will not talk any more about it. We had better go down or we shall get no lunch." Lady Mabel, as she followed him, tried to make herself believe that all her sorrow came from regret that so fine a scion of the British nobility should throw himself away upon an American adventuress. The guests were still at lunch when they entered the dining-room, and Isabel was seated close to Mrs. Jones. Silverbridge at once went up to her,--and place was made for him as though he had almost a right to be next to her. Miss Boncassen herself bore her honours well, seeming to regard the little change at table as though it was of no moment. "I became so eager about that game," she said, "that I went on too long." "I hope you are now none the worse." "At six o'clock this morning I thought I should never use my legs again." "Were you awake at six?" said Silverbridge, with pitying voice. "That was it. I could not sleep. Now I begin to hope that sooner or later I shall unstiffen." During every moment, at every word that he uttered, he was thinking of the declaration of love which he had made to her. But it seemed to him as though the matter had not dwelt on her mind. When they drew their chairs away from the table he thought that not a moment was to be lost before some further explanation of their feelings for each other should be made. Was not the matter which had been so far discussed of vital importance for both of them? And, glorious as she was above all other women, the offer which he had made must have some weight with her. He did not think that he proposed to give more than she deserved, but still, that which he was so willing to give was not a little. Or was it possible that she had not understood his meaning? If so, he would not willingly lose a moment before he made it plain to her. But she seemed content to hang about with the other women, and when she sauntered about the grounds seated herself on a garden-chair with Lady Mabel, and discussed with great eloquence the general beauty of Scottish scenery. An hour went on in this way. Could it be that she knew that he had offered to make her his wife? During this time he went and returned more than once, but still she was there, on the same garden-seat, talking to those who came in her way. Then on a sudden she got up and put her hand on his arm. "Come and take a turn with me," she said. "Lord Silverbridge, do you remember anything of last night?" "Remember!" "I thought for a while this morning that I would let it pass as though it had been mere trifling." "It would have wanted two to let it pass in that way," he said, almost indignantly. On hearing this she looked up at him, and there came over her face that brilliant smile, which to him was perhaps the most potent of her spells. "What do you mean by--wanting two?" "I must have a voice in that as well as you." "And what is your voice?" "My voice is this. I told you last night that I loved you. This morning I ask you to be my wife." "It is a very clear voice," she said,--almost in a whisper; but in a tone so serious that it startled him. "It ought to be clear," he said doggedly. "Do you think I don't know that? Do you think that if I liked you well last night I don't like you better now?" "But do you--like me?" "That is just the thing I am going to say nothing about." "Isabel!" "Just the one thing I will not allude to. Now you must listen to me." "Certainly." "I know a great deal about you. We Americans are an inquiring people, and I have found out pretty much everything." His mind misgave him as he felt she had ascertained his former purpose respecting Mabel. "You," she said, "among young men in England are about the foremost, and therefore,--as I think,--about the foremost in the world. And you have all personal gifts;--youth and spirits-- Well, I will not go on and name the others. You are, no doubt, supposed to be entitled to the best and sweetest of God's feminine creatures." "You are she." "Whether you be entitled to me or not I cannot yet say. Now I will tell you something of myself. My father's father came to New York as a labourer from Holland, and worked upon the quays in that city. Then he built houses, and became rich, and was almost a miser;--with the good sense, however, to educate his only son. What my father is you see. To me he is sterling gold, but he is not like your people. My dear mother is not at all like your ladies. She is not a lady in your sense,--though with her unselfish devotion to others she is something infinitely better. For myself I am,--well, meaning to speak honestly, I will call myself pretty and smart. I think I know how to be true." "I am sure you do." "But what right have you to suppose I shall know how to be a Duchess?" "I am sure you will." "Now listen to me. Go to your friends and ask them. Ask that Lady Mabel;--ask your father;--ask that Lady Cantrip. And above all, ask yourself. And allow me to require you to take three months to do this. Do not come to see me for three months." "And then?" "What may happen then I cannot tell, for I want three months also to think of it myself. Till then, good-bye." She gave him her hand and left it in his for a few seconds. He tried to draw her to him; but she resisted him, still smiling. Then she left him. CHAPTER XLI Ischl It was a custom with Mrs. Finn almost every autumn to go off to Vienna, where she possessed considerable property, and there to inspect the circumstances of her estate. Sometimes her husband would accompany her, and he did so in this year of which we are now speaking. One morning in September they were together at an hotel at Ischl, whither they had come from Vienna, when as they went through the hall into the courtyard, they came, in the very doorway, upon the Duke of Omnium and his daughter. The Duke and Lady Mary had just arrived, having passed through the mountains from the salt-mine district, and were about to take up their residence in the hotel for a few days. They had travelled very slowly, for Lady Mary had been ill, and the Duke had expressed his determination to see a doctor at Ischl. There is no greater mistake than in supposing that only the young blush. But the blushes of middle life are luckily not seen through the tan which has come from the sun and the gas and the work and the wiles of the world. Both the Duke and Phineas blushed; and though their blushes were hidden, that peculiar glance of the eye which always accompanies a blush was visible enough from one to the other. The elder lady kept her countenance admirably, and the younger one had no occasion for blushing. She at once ran forward and kissed her friend. The Duke stood with his hat off waiting to give his hand to the lady, and then took that of his late colleague. "How odd that we should meet here," he said, turning to Mrs. Finn. "Odd enough to us that your Grace should be here," she said, "because we had heard nothing of your intended coming." "It is so nice to find you," said Lady Mary. "We are this moment come. Don't say that you are this moment going." "At this moment we are only going as far as Halstadt." "And are coming back to dinner? Of course they will dine with us. Will they not, papa?" The Duke said that he hoped they would. To declare that you are engaged at an hotel, unless there be some real engagement, is almost an impossibility. There was no escape, and before they were allowed to get into their carriage they had promised they would dine with the Duke and his daughter. "I don't know that it is especially a bore," Mrs. Finn said to her husband in the carriage. "You may be quite sure that of whatever trouble there may be in it, he has much more than his share." "His share should be the whole," said her husband. "No one else has done anything wrong." When the Duke's apology had reached her, so that there was no longer any ground for absolute hostility, then she had told the whole story to her husband. He at first was very indignant. What right had the Duke to expect that any ordinary friend should act duenna over his daughter in accordance with his caprices? This was said and much more of the kind. But any humour towards quarrelling which Phineas Finn might have felt for a day or two was quieted by his wife's prudence. "A man," she said, "can do no more than apologise. After that there is no room for reproach." At dinner the conversation turned at first on British politics, in which Mrs. Finn was quite able to take her part. Phineas was decidedly of opinion that Sir Timothy Beeswax and Lord Drummond could not live another Session. And on this subject a good deal was said. Later in the evening the Duke found himself sitting with Mrs. Finn in the broad verandah over the hotel garden, while Lady Mary was playing to Phineas within. "How do you think she is looking?" asked the father. "Of course I see that she has been ill. She tells me that she was far from well at Salzburg." "Yes;--indeed for three or four days she frightened me much. She suffered terribly from headaches." "Nervous headaches?" "So they said there. I feel quite angry with myself because I did not bring a doctor with us. The trouble and ceremony of such an accompaniment is no doubt disagreeable." "And I suppose seemed when you started to be unnecessary?" "Quite unnecessary." "Does she complain again now?" "She did to-day--a little." The next day Lady Mary could not leave her bed; and the Duke in his sorrow was obliged to apply to Mrs. Finn. After what had passed on the previous day Mrs. Finn of course called, and was shown at once up to her young friend's room. There she found the girl in great pain, lying with her two thin hands up to her head, and hardly able to utter more than a word. Shortly after that Mrs. Finn was alone with the Duke, and then there took place a conversation between them which the lady thought to be very remarkable. "Had I better send for a doctor from England?" he asked. In answer to this Mrs. Finn expressed her opinion that such a measure was hardly necessary, that the gentleman from the town who had been called in seemed to know what he was about, and that the illness, lamentable as it was, did not seem to be in any way dangerous. "One cannot tell what it comes from," said the Duke dubiously. "Young people, I fancy, are often subject to such maladies." "It must come from something wrong." "That may be said of all sickness." "And therefore one tries to find out the cause. She says that she is unhappy." These last words he spoke slowly and in a low voice. To this Mrs. Finn could make no reply. She did not doubt but that the girl was unhappy, and she knew well why; but the source of Lady Mary's misery was one to which she could not very well allude. "You know all the misery about that young man." "That is a trouble that requires time to cure it," she said,--not meaning to imply that time would cure it by enabling the girl to forget her lover; but because in truth she had not known what else to say. "If time will cure it." "Time, they say, cures all sorrows." "But what should I do to help time? There is no sacrifice I would not make,--no sacrifice! Of myself I mean. I would devote myself to her,--leave everything else on one side. We purpose being back in England in October; but I would remain here if I thought it better for her comfort." "I cannot tell, Duke." "Neither can I. But you are a woman and might know better than I do. It is so hard that a man should be left with a charge of which from its very nature he cannot understand the duties." Then he paused, but she could find no words which would suit at the moment. It was almost incredible to her that after what had passed he should speak to her at all as to the condition of his daughter. "I cannot, you know," he said very seriously, "encourage a hope that she should be allowed to marry that man." "I do not know." "You yourself, Mrs. Finn, felt that when she told you about it at Matching." "I felt that you would disapprove of it." "Disapprove of it! How could it be otherwise? Of course you felt that. There are ranks in life in which the first comer that suits a maiden's eye may be accepted as a fitting lover. I will not say but that they who are born to such a life may be the happier. They are, I am sure, free from troubles to which they are incident whom fate has called to a different sphere. But duty is--duty;--and whatever pang it may cost, duty should be performed." "Certainly." "Certainly;--certainly; certainly," he said, re-echoing her word. "But then, Duke, one has to be so sure what duty requires. In many matters this is easy enough, and the only difficulty comes from temptation. There are cases in which it is so hard to know." "Is this one of them?" "I think so." "Then the maiden should--in any class of life--be allowed to take the man--that just suits her eye?" As he said this his mind was intent on his Glencora and on Burgo Fitzgerald. "I have not said so. A man may be bad, vicious, a spendthrift,--eaten up by bad habits." Then he frowned, thinking that she also had her mind intent on his Glencora and on that Burgo Fitzgerald, and being most unwilling to have the difference between Burgo and Frank Tregear pointed out to him. "Nor have I said," she continued, "that even were none of these faults apparent in the character of a suitor, the lady should in all cases be advised to accept a young man because he has made himself agreeable to her. There may be discrepancies." "There are," said he, still with a low voice, but with infinite energy,--"insurmountable discrepancies." "I only said that this was a case in which it might be difficult for you to see your duty plainly." "Why should it be?" "You would not have her--break her heart?" Then he was silent for awhile, turning over in his mind the proposition which now seemed to have been made to him. If the question came to that,--should she be allowed to break her heart and die, or should he save her from that fate by sanctioning her marriage with Tregear? If the choice could be put to him plainly by some supernal power, what then would he choose? If duty required him to prevent this marriage, his duty could not be altered by the fact that his girl would avenge herself upon him by dying! If such a marriage were in itself wrong, that wrong could not be made right by the fear of such a catastrophe. Was it not often the case that duty required that someone should die? And yet as he thought of it,--thought that the someone whom his mind had suggested was the one female creature now left belonging to him,--he put his hand up to his brow and trembled with agony. If he knew, if in truth he believed that such would be the result of firmness on his part,--then he would be infirm, then he must yield. Sooner than that, he must welcome this Tregear to his house. But why should he think that she would die? This woman had now asked him whether he would be willing to break his girl's heart. It was a frightful question; but he could see that it had come naturally in the sequence of the conversation which he had forced upon her. Did girls break their hearts in such emergencies? Was it not all romance? "Men have died and worms have eaten them,--but not for love." He remembered it all and carried on the argument in his mind, though the pause was but for a minute. There might be suffering, no doubt. The higher the duties the keener the pangs! But would it become him to be deterred from doing right because she for a time might find that she had made the world bitter to herself? And were there not feminine wiles,--tricks by which women learn to have their way in opposition to the judgment of their lords and masters? He did not think that his Mary was wilfully guilty of any scheme. The suffering he knew was true suffering. But not the less did it become him to be on his guard against attacks of this nature. "No," he said at last; "I would not have her break her heart,--if I understand what such words mean. They are generally, I think, used fantastically." "You would not wish to see her overwhelmed by sorrow?" "Wish it! What a question to ask a father!" "I must be more plain in my language, Duke. Though such a marriage be distasteful to you, it might perhaps be preferable to seeing her sorrowing always." "Why should it? I have to sorrow always. We are told that man is born to sorrow as surely as the sparks fly upwards." "Then I can say nothing further." "You think I am cruel." "If I am to say what I really think I shall offend you." "No;--not unless you mean offence." "I shall never do that to you, Duke. When you talk as you do now you hardly know yourself. You think you could see her suffering, and not be moved by it. But were it to be continued long you would give way. Though we know that there is an infinity of grief in this life, still we struggle to save those we love from grieving. If she be steadfast enough to cling to her affection for this man, then at last you will have to yield." He looked at her frowning, but did not say a word. "Then it will perhaps be a comfort for you to know that the man himself is trustworthy and honest." There was a terrible rebuke in this; but still, as he had called it down upon himself, he would not resent it, even in his heart. "Thank you," he said, rising from his chair. "Perhaps you will see her again this afternoon." Of course she assented, and, as the interview had taken place in his rooms, she took her leave. This which Mrs. Finn had said to him was all to the same effect as that which had come from Lady Cantrip; only it was said with a higher spirit. Both the women saw the matter in the same light. There must be a fight between him and his girl; but she, if she could hold out for a certain time, would be the conqueror. He might take her away and try what absence would do, or he might have recourse to that specific which had answered so well in reference to his own wife; but if she continued to sorrow during absence, and if she would have nothing to do with the other lover,--then he must at last give way! He had declared that he was willing to sacrifice himself,--meaning thereby that if a lengthened visit to the cities of China, or a prolonged sojourn in the Western States of America would wean her from her love, he would go to China or to the Western States. At present his self-banishment had been carried no farther than Vienna. During their travels hitherto Tregear's name had not once been mentioned. The Duke had come away from home resolved not to mention it,--and she was minded to keep it in reserve till some seeming catastrophe should justify a declaration of her purpose. But from first to last she had been sad, and latterly she had been ill. When asked as to her complaint she would simply say that she was not happy. To go on with this through the Chinese cities could hardly be good for either of them. She would not wake herself to any enthusiasm in regard to scenery, costume, pictures, or even discomforts. Wherever she was taken it was all barren to her. As their plans stood at present, they were to return to England so as to enable her to be at Custins by the middle of October. Had he taught himself to hope that any good could be done by prolonged travelling he would readily have thrown over Custins and Lord Popplecourt. He could not bring himself to trust much to the Popplecourt scheme. But the same contrivance had answered on that former occasion. When he spoke to her about their plans, she expressed herself quite ready to go back to England. When he suggested those Chinese cities, her face became very long and she was immediately attacked by paroxysms of headaches. "I think I should take her to some place on the seashore in England," said Mrs. Finn. "Custins is close to the sea," he replied. "It is Lord Cantrip's place in Dorsetshire. It was partly settled that she was to go there." "I suppose she likes Lady Cantrip." "Why should she not?" "She has not said a word to me to the contrary. I only fear she would feel that she was being sent there,--as to a convent." "What ought I to do then?" "How can I venture to answer that? What she would like best, I think, would be to return to Matching with you, and to settle down in a quiet way for the winter." The Duke shook his head. That would be worse than travelling. She would still have headaches and still tell him that she was unhappy. "Of course I do not know what your plans are, and pray believe me that I should not obtrude my advice if you did not ask me." "I know it," he said. "I know how good you are and how reasonable. I know how much you have to forgive." "Oh, no." "And, if I have not said so as I should have done, it has not been from want of feeling. I do believe you did what you thought best when Mary told you that story at Matching." "Why should your Grace go back to that?" "Only that I may acknowledge my indebtedness to you, and say to you somewhat fuller than I could do in my letter that I am sorry for the pain which I gave you." "All that is over now,--and shall be forgotten." Then he spoke of his immediate plans. He would at once go back to England by slow stages,--by very slow stages,--staying a day or two at Salzburg, at Ratisbon, at Nuremberg, at Frankfort, and so on. In this way he would reach England about the 10th of October, and Mary would then be ready to go to Custins by the time appointed. In a day or two Lady Mary was better. "It is terrible while it lasts," she said, speaking to Mrs. Finn of her headache, "but when it has gone then I am quite well. Only"--she added after a pause--"only I can never be happy again while papa thinks as he does now." Then there was a party made up before they separated for an excursion to the Hintersee and the Obersee. On this occasion Lady Mary seemed to enjoy herself, as she liked the companionship of Mrs. Finn. Against Lady Cantrip she never said a word. But Lady Cantrip was always a duenna to her, whereas Mrs. Finn was a friend. While the Duke and Phineas were discussing politics together--thoroughly enjoying the weakness of Lord Drummond and the iniquity of Sir Timothy--which they did with augmented vehemence from their ponies' backs, the two women in lower voices talked over their own affairs. "I dare say you will be happy at Custins," said Mrs. Finn. "No; I shall not. There will be people there whom I don't know, and I don't want to know. Have you heard anything about him, Mrs. Finn?" Mrs. Finn turned round and looked at her,--for a moment almost angrily. Then her heart relented. "Do you mean--Mr. Tregear?" "Yes, Mr. Tregear." "I think I heard that he was shooting with Lord Silverbridge." "I am glad of that," said Mary. "It will be pleasant for both of them." "I am very glad they should be together. While I know that, I feel that we are not altogether separated. I will never give it up, Mrs. Finn,--never; never. It is no use taking me to China." In that Mrs. Finn quite agreed with her. CHAPTER XLII Again at Killancodlem Silverbridge remained at Crummie-Toddie under the dominion of Reginald Dobbes till the second week in September. Popplecourt, Nidderdale, and Gerald Palliser were there also, very obedient, and upon the whole efficient. Tregear was intractable, occasional, and untrustworthy. He was the cause of much trouble to Mr. Dobbes. He would entertain a most heterodox and injurious idea that, as he had come to Crummie-Toddie for amusement, he was not bound to do anything that did not amuse him. He would not understand that in sport as in other matters there was an ambition, driving a man on to excel always and be ahead of others. In spite of this Mr. Dobbes had cause for much triumph. It was going to be the greatest thing ever done by six guns in Scotland. As for Gerald, whom he had regarded as a boy, and who had offended him by saying that Crummie-Toddie was ugly,--he was ready to go round the world for him. He had indoctrinated Gerald with all his ideas of a sportsman,--even to a contempt for champagne and a conviction that tobacco should be moderated. The three lords too had proved themselves efficient, and the thing was going to be a success. But just when a day was of vital importance, when it was essential that there should be a strong party for a drive, Silverbridge found it absolutely necessary that he should go over to Killancodlem. "She has gone," said Nidderdale. "Who the ---- is she?" asked Silverbridge, almost angrily. "Everybody knows who she is," said Popplecourt. "It will be a good thing when some She has got hold of you, my boy, so as to keep you in your proper place." "If you cannot withstand that sort of attraction you ought not to go in for shooting at all," said Dobbes. "I shouldn't wonder at his going," continued Nidderdale, "if we didn't all know that the American is no longer there. She has gone to--Bath I think they say." "I suppose it's Mrs. Jones herself," said Popplecourt. "My dear boys," said Silverbridge, "you may be quite sure that when I say that I am going to Killancodlem I mean to go to Killancodlem, and that no chaff about young ladies,--which I think very disgusting,--will stop me. I shall be sorry if Dobbes's roll of the killed should be lessened by a single hand, seeing that his ambition sets that way. Considering the amount of slaughter we have perpetrated, I really think that we need not be over anxious." After this nothing further was said. Tregear, who knew that Mabel Grex was still at Killancodlem, had not spoken. In truth Mabel had sent for Lord Silverbridge, and this had been her letter: DEAR LORD SILVERBRIDGE, Mrs. Montacute Jones is cut to the heart because you have not been over to see her again, and she says that it is lamentable to think that such a man as Reginald Dobbes should have so much power over you. "Only twelve miles," she says, "and he knows that we are here!" I told her that you knew Miss Boncassen was gone. But though Miss Boncassen has left us we are a very pleasant party, and surely you must be tired of such a place as Crummie-Toddie. If only for the sake of getting a good dinner once in a way do come over again. I shall be here yet for ten days. As they will not let me go back to Grex I don't know where I could be more happy. I have been asked to go to Custins, and suppose I shall turn up there some time in the autumn. And now shall I tell you what I expect? I do expect that you will come over to--see me. "I did see her the other day," you will say, "and she did not make herself pleasant." I know that. How was I to make myself pleasant when I found myself so completely snuffed out by your American beauty? Now she is away, and Richard will be himself. Do come, because in truth I want to see you. Yours always sincerely, MABEL GREX. On receiving this he at once made up his mind to go to Killancodlem, but he could not make up his mind why it was that she had asked him. He was sure of two things; sure in the first place that she had intended to let him know that she did not care about him; and then sure that she was aware of his intention in regard to Miss Boncassen. Everybody at Killancodlem had seen it,--to his disgust; but still that it was so had been manifest. And he had consoled himself, feeling that it would matter nothing should he be accepted. She had made an attempt to talk him out of his purpose. Could it be that she thought it possible a second attempt might be successful? If so, she did not know him. She had in truth thought not only that this, but that something further than this, might be possible. Of course the prize loomed larger before her eyes as the prospects of obtaining it became less. She could not doubt that he had intended to offer her his hand when he had spoken to her of his love in London. Then she had stopped him;--had "spared him," as she had told her friend. Certainly she had then been swayed by some feeling that it would be ungenerous in her to seize greedily the first opportunity he had given her. But he had again made an effort. He surely would not have sent her the ring had he not intended her to regard him as her lover. When she received the ring her heart had beat very high. Then she had sent that little note, saying that she would keep it till she could give it to his wife. When she wrote that she had intended the ring should be her own. And other things pressed upon her mind. Why had she been asked to the dinner at Richmond? Why was she invited to Custins? Little hints had reached her of the Duke's goodwill towards her. If on that side the marriage were approved, why should she destroy her own hopes? Then she had seen him with Miss Boncassen, and in her pique had forced the ring back upon him. During that long game on the lawn her feelings had been very bitter. Of course the girl was the lovelier of the two. All the world was raving of her beauty. And there was no doubt as to the charm of her wit and manner. And then she had no touch of that blasé used-up way of life of which Lady Mabel was conscious herself. It was natural that it should be so. And was she, Mabel Grex, the girl to stand in his way and to force herself upon him, if he loved another? Certainly not,--though there might be a triple ducal coronet to be had. But were there not other considerations? Could it be well that the heir of the house of Omnium should marry an American girl, as to whose humble birth whispers were already afloat? As his friend, would it not be right that she should tell him what the world would say? As his friend, therefore, she had given him her counsel. When he was gone the whole thing weighed heavily upon her mind. Why should she lose the prize if it might still be her own? To be Duchess of Omnium! She had read of many of the other sex, and of one or two of her own, who by settled resolution had achieved greatness in opposition to all obstacles. Was this thing beyond her reach? To hunt him, and catch him, and marry him to his own injury,--that would be impossible to her. She was sure of herself there. But how infinitely better would this be for him! Would she not have all his family with her,--and all the world of England? In how short a time would he not repent his marriage with Miss Boncassen! Whereas, were she his wife, she would so stir herself for his joys, for his good, for his honour, that there should be no possibility of repentance. And he certainly had loved her. Why else had he followed her, and spoken such words to her? Of course he had loved her! But then there had come this blaze of beauty and had carried off,--not his heart but his imagination. Because he had yielded to such fascination, was she to desert him, and also to desert herself? From day to day she thought of it, and then she wrote that letter. She hardly knew what she would do, what she might say; but she would trust to the opportunity to do and say something. "If you have no room for me," he said to Mrs. Jones, "you must scold Lady Mab. She has told me that you told her to invite me." "Of course I did. Do you think I would not sleep in the stables, and give you up my own bed if there were no other? It is so good of you to come!" "So good of you, Mrs. Jones, to ask me." "So very kind to come when all the attraction has gone!" Then he blushed and stammered, and was just able to say that his only object in life was to pour out his adoration at the feet of Mrs. Montacute Jones herself. There was a certain Lady Fawn,--a pretty mincing married woman of about twenty-five, with a husband much older, who liked mild flirtations with mild young men. "I am afraid we've lost your great attraction," she whispered to him. "Certainly not as long as Lady Fawn is here," he said, seating himself close to her on a garden bench, and seizing suddenly hold of her hand. She gave a little scream and a jerk, and so relieved herself from him. "You see," said he, "people do make such mistakes about a man's feelings." "Lord Silverbridge!" "It's quite true, but I'll tell you all about it another time," and so he left her. All these little troubles, his experience in the "House," the necessity of snubbing Tifto, the choice of a wife, and his battle with Reginald Dobbes, were giving him by degrees age and flavour. Lady Mabel had fluttered about him on his first coming, and had been very gracious, doing the part of an old friend. "There is to be a big shooting to-morrow," she said, in the presence of Mrs. Jones. "If it is to come to that," he said, "I might as well go back to Dobbydom." "You may shoot if you like," said Lady Mabel. "I haven't even brought a gun with me." "Then we'll have a walk,--a whole lot of us," she said. In the evening, about an hour before dinner, Silverbridge and Lady Mabel were seated together on the bank of a little stream which ran on the other side of the road, but on a spot not more than a furlong from the hall-door. She had brought him there, but she had done so without any definite scheme. She had made no plan of campaign for the evening, having felt relieved when she found herself able to postpone the project of her attack till the morrow. Of course there must be an attack, but how it should be made she had never had the courage to tell herself. The great women of the world, the Semiramises, the Pocahontas, the Ida Pfeiffers, and the Charlotte Cordays, had never been wanting to themselves when the moment for action came. Now she was pleased to have this opportunity added to her; this pleasant minute in which some soft preparatory word might be spoken; but the great effort should be made on the morrow. "Is not this nicer than shooting with Mr. Dobbes?" she asked. "A great deal nicer. Of course I am bound to say so." "But in truth, I want to find out what you really like. Men are so different. You need not pay me any compliment; you know that well enough." "I like you better than Dobbes,--if you mean that." "Even so much is something." "But I am fond of shooting." "Only a man may have enough of it." "Too much, if he is subject to Dobbes, as Dobbes likes them to be. Gerald likes it." "Did you think it odd," she said after a pause, "that I should ask you to come over again?" "Was it odd?" he replied. "That is as you may take it. There is certainly no other man in the world to whom I would have done it." "Not to Tregear?" "Yes," she said; "yes,--to Tregear, could I have been as sure of a welcome for him as I am for you. Frank is in all respects the same as a brother to me. That would not have seemed odd;--I mean to myself." "And has this been--odd,--to yourself?" "Yes. Not that anybody else has felt it so. Only I,--and perhaps you. You felt it so?" "Not especially. I thought you were a very good fellow. I have always thought that;--except when you made me take back the ring." "Does that still fret you?" "No man likes to take back a thing. It makes him seem to have been awkward and stupid in giving it." "It was the value--" "You should have left me to judge of that." "If I have offended you I will beg your pardon. Give me anything else, anything but that, and I will take it." "But why not that?" said he. "Now that you have fitted it for a lady's finger it should go to your wife. No one else should have it." Upon this he brought the ring once more out of his pocket and again offered it to her. "No; anything but that. That your wife must have." Then he put the ring back again. "It would have been nicer for you had Miss Boncassen been here." In saying this she followed no plan. It came rather from pique. It was almost as though she had asked him whether Miss Boncassen was to have the ring. "What makes you say that?" "But it would." "Yes, it would," he replied stoutly, turning round as he lay on the ground and facing her. "Has it come to that?" "Come to what? You ask me a question and I answer you truly." "You cannot be happy without her?" "I did not say so. You ask me whether I should like to have her here,--and I say Yes. What would you think of me if I said No?" "My being here is not enough?" This should not have been said, of course, but the little speech came from the exquisite pain of the moment. She had meant to have said hardly anything. She had intended to be happy with him, just touching lightly on things which might lead to that attack which must be made on the morrow. But words will often lead whither the speaker has not intended. So it was now, and in the soreness of her heart she spoke. "My being here is not enough?" "It would be enough," he said, jumping on his feet, "if you understood all, and would be kind to me." "I will at any rate be kind to you," she replied, as she sat upon the bank looking at the running water. "I have asked Miss Boncassen to be my wife." "And she has accepted?" "No; not as yet. She is to take three months to think of it. Of course I love her best of all. If you will sympathise with me in that, then I will be as happy with you as the day is long." "No," said she, "I cannot. I will not." "Very well." "There should be no such marriage. If you have told me in confidence--" "Of course I have told you in confidence." "It will go no farther; but there can be no sympathy between us. It--it--it is not,--is not--" Then she burst into tears. "Mabel!" "No, sir, no; no! What did you mean? But never mind. I have no questions to ask, not a word to say. Why should I? Only this,--that such a marriage will disgrace your family. To me it is no more than to anybody else. But it will disgrace your family." How she got back to the house she hardly knew; nor did he. That evening they did not again speak to each other, and on the following morning there was no walk to the mountains. Before dinner he drove himself back to Crummie-Toddie, and when he was taking his leave she shook hands with him with her usual pleasant smile. CHAPTER XLIII What Happened at Doncaster The Leger this year was to be run on the 14th September, and while Lord Silverbridge was amusing himself with the deer at Crummie-Toddie and at Killancodlem with the more easily pursued young ladies, the indefatigable Major was hard at work in the stables. This came a little hard on him. There was the cub-hunting to be looked after, which made his presence at Runnymede necessary, and then that "pig-headed fellow, Silverbridge" would not have the horses trained anywhere but at Newmarket. How was he to be in two places at once? Yet he was in two places almost at once: cub-hunting in the morning at Egham and Bagshot, and sitting on the same evening at the stable-door at Newmarket, with his eyes fixed upon Prime Minister. Gradually had he and Captain Green come to understand each other, and though they did at last understand each other, Tifto would talk as though there were no such correct intelligence;--when for instance he would abuse Lord Silverbridge for being pig-headed. On such occasions the Captain's remark would generally be short. "That be blowed!" he would say, implying that that state of things between the two partners, in which such complaints might be natural, had now been brought to an end. But on one occasion, about a week before the race, he spoke out a little plainer. "What's the use of your going on with all that before me? It's settled what you've got to do." "I don't know that anything is settled," said the Major. "Ain't it? I thought it was. If it ain't you'll find yourself in the wrong box. You've as straight a tip as a man need wish for, but if you back out you'll come to grief. Your money's all on the other way already." On the Friday before the race Silverbridge dined with Tifto at the Beargarden. On the next morning they went down to Newmarket to see the horse get a gallop, and came back the same evening. During all this time, Tifto was more than ordinarily pleasant to his patron. The horse and the certainty of the horse's success were the only subjects mooted. "It isn't what I say," repeated Tifto, "but look at the betting. You can't get five to four against him. They tell me that if you want to do anything on the Sunday the pull will be the other way." "I stand to lose over £20,000 already," said Silverbridge, almost frightened by the amount. "But how much are you on to win?" said Tifto. "I suppose you could sell your bets for £5,000 down." "I wish I knew how to do it," said Silverbridge. But this was an arrangement, which, if made just now, would not suit the Major's views. They went to Newmarket, and there they met Captain Green. "Tifto," said the young Lord, "I won't have that fellow with us when the horse is galloping." "There isn't an honester man, or a man who understands a horse's paces better in all England," said Tifto. "I won't have him standing alongside of me on the Heath," said his Lordship. "I don't know how I'm to help it." "If he's there I'll send the horse in;--that's all." Then Tifto found it best to say a few words to Captain Green. But the Captain also said a few words to himself. "D---- young fool; he don't know what he's dropping into." Which assertion, if you lay aside the unnecessary expletive, was true to the letter. Lord Silverbridge was a young fool, and did not at all know into what a mess he was being dropped by the united experience, perspicuity, and energy of the man whose company on the Heath he had declined. The horse was quite a "picture to look at." Mr. Pook the trainer assured his Lordship that for health and condition he had never seen anything better. "Stout all over," said Mr. Pook, "and not an ounce of what you may call flesh. And bright! just feel his coat, my Lord! That's 'ealth,--that is; not dressing, nor yet macassar!" And then there were various evidences produced of his pace,--how he had beaten that horse, giving him two pounds; how he had been beaten by that, but only on a mile course; the Leger distance was just the thing for Prime Minister; how by a lucky chance that marvellous quick rat of a thing that had won the Derby had not been entered for the autumn race; how Coalheaver was known to have had bad feet. "He's a stout 'orse, no doubt,--is the 'Eaver," said Mr. Pook, "and that's why the betting-men have stuck to him. But he'll be nowhere on Wednesday. They're beginning to see it now, my Lord. I wish they wasn't so sharp-sighted." In the course of the day, however, they met a gentleman who was of a different opinion. He said loudly that he looked on the Heaver as the best three-year-old in England. Of course as matters stood he wasn't going to back the Heaver at even money;--but he'd take twenty-five to thirty in hundreds between the two. All this ended in the bet being accepted and duly booked by Lord Silverbridge. And in this way Silverbridge added two thousand four hundred pounds to his responsibilities. But there was worse than this coming. On the Sunday afternoon he went down to Doncaster, of course in company with the Major. He was alive to the necessity of ridding himself of the Major; but it had been acknowledged that that duty could not be performed till after this race had been run. As he sat opposite to his friend on their journey to Doncaster, he thought of this in the train. It should be done immediately on their return to London after the race. But the horse, his Prime Minister, was by this time so dear to him that he intended if possible to keep possession of the animal. When they reached Doncaster the racing-men were all occupied with Prime Minister. The horse and Mr. Pook had arrived that day from Newmarket, via Cambridge and Peterborough. Tifto, Silverbridge, and Mr. Pook visited him together three times that afternoon and evening;--and the Captain also visited the horse, though not in company with Lord Silverbridge. To do Mr. Pook justice, no one could be more careful. When the Captain came round with the Major, Mr. Pook was there. But Captain Green did not enter the box,--had no wish to do so, was of opinion that on such occasions no one whose business did not carry him there should go near a horse. His only object seemed to be to compliment Mr. Pook as to his care, skill, and good fortune. It was on the Tuesday evening that the chief mischief was done. There was a club at which many of the racing-men dined, and there Lord Silverbridge spent his evening. He was the hero of the hour, and everybody flattered him. It must be acknowledged that his head was turned. They dined at eight and much wine was drunk. No one was tipsy, but many were elated; and much confidence in their favourite animals was imparted to men who had been sufficiently cautious before dinner. Then cigars and soda-and-brandy became common and our young friend was not more abstemious than others. Large sums were named, and at last in three successive bets Lord Silverbridge backed his horse for more than forty thousand pounds. As he was making the second bet Mr. Lupton came across to him and begged him to hold his hand. "It will be a nasty sum for you to lose, and winning it will be nothing to you," he said. Silverbridge took it good-humouredly, but said that he knew what he was about. "These men will pay," whispered Lupton; "but you can't be quite sure what they're at." The young man's brow was covered with perspiration. He was smoking quick and had already smoked more than was good for him. "All right," he said. "I'll mind what I'm about." Mr. Lupton could do no more, and retired. Before the night was over bets had been booked to the amount stated, and the Duke's son, who had promised that he would never plunge, stood to lose about seventy thousand pounds upon the race. While this was going on Tifto sat not far from his patron, but completely silent. During the day and early in the evening a few sparks of the glory which scintillated from the favourite horse flew in his direction. But he was on this occasion unlike himself, and though the horse was to be run in his name had very little to say in the matter. Not a boast came out of his mouth during dinner or after dinner. He was so moody that his partner, who was generally anxious to keep him quiet, more than once endeavoured to encourage him. But he was unable to rouse himself. It was still within his power to run straight; to be on the square, if not with Captain Green, at any rate with Lord Silverbridge. But to do so he must make a clean breast with his Lordship and confess the intended sin. As he heard all that was being done, his conscience troubled him sorely. With pitch of this sort he had never soiled himself before. He was to have three thousand pounds from Green, and then there would be the bets he himself had laid against the horse,--by Green's assistance! It would be the making of him. Of what use had been all his "square" work to him? And then Silverbridge had behaved so badly to him! But still, as he sat there during the evening, he would have given a hand to have been free from the attempt. He had had no conception before that he could become subject to such misery from such a cause. He would make it straight with Silverbridge this very night,--but that Silverbridge was ever lighting fresh cigars and ever having his glass refilled. It was clear to him that on this night Silverbridge could not be made to understand anything about it. And the deed in which he himself was to be the chief actor was to be done very early in the following morning. At last he slunk away to bed. On the following morning, the morning of the day on which the race was to be run, the Major tapped at his patron's door about seven o'clock. Of course there was no answer, though the knock was repeated. When young men overnight drink as much brandy-and-water as Silverbridge had done, and smoke as many cigars, they are apt not to hear knocks at their door made at seven o'clock. Nor was his Lordship's servant up,--so that Tifto had no means of getting at him except by personal invasion of the sanctity of his bedroom. But there was no time, not a minute, to be lost. Now, within this minute that was pressing on him, Tifto must choose his course. He opened the door and was standing at the young man's head. "What the d---- does this mean?" said his Lordship angrily, as soon as his visitor had succeeded in waking him. Tifto muttered something about the horse which Silverbridge failed to understand. The young man's condition was by no means pleasant. His mouth was furred by the fumes of tobacco. His head was aching. He was heavy with sleep, and this intrusion seemed to him to be a final indignity offered to him by the man whom he now hated. "What business have you to come in here?" he said, leaning on his elbow. "I don't care a straw for the horse. If you have anything to say send my servant. Get out!" "Oh;--very well," said Tifto;--and Tifto got out. It was about an hour afterwards that Tifto returned, and on this occasion a groom from the stables, and the young Lord's own servant, and two or three other men were with him. Tifto had been made to understand that the news now to be communicated, must be communicated by himself, whether his Lordship were angry or not. Indeed, after what had been done his Lordship's anger was not of much moment. In his present visit he was only carrying out the pleasant little plan which had been arranged for him by Captain Green. "What the mischief is up?" said Silverbridge, rising in his bed. Then Tifto told his story, sullenly, doggedly, but still in a perspicuous manner, and with words which admitted of no doubt. But before he told the story he had excluded all but himself and the groom. He and the groom had taken the horse out of the stable, it being the animal's nature to eat his corn better after slight exercise, and while doing so a nail had been picked up. "Is it much?" asked Silverbridge, jumping still higher in his bed. Then he was told that it was very much,--that the iron had driven itself into the horse's frog, and that there was actually no possibility that the horse should run on that day. "He can't walk, my Lord," said the groom, in that authoritative voice which grooms use when they desire to have their own way, and to make their masters understand that they at any rate are not to have theirs. "Where is Pook?" asked Silverbridge. But Mr. Pook was also still in bed. It was soon known to Lord Silverbridge as a fact that in very truth the horse could not run. Then sick with headache, with a stomach suffering unutterable things, he had, as he dressed himself, to think of his seventy thousand pounds. Of course the money would be forthcoming. But how would his father look at him? How would it be between him and his father now? After such a misfortune how would he be able to break that other matter to the Duke, and say that he had changed his mind about his marriage,--that he was going to abandon Lady Mabel Grex, and give his hand and a future Duchess's coronet to an American girl whose grandfather had been a porter? A nail in his foot! Well! He had heard of such things before. He knew that such accidents had happened. What an ass must he have been to risk such a sum on the well-being and safety of an animal who might any day pick up a nail in his foot? Then he thought of the caution which Lupton had given him. What good would the money have done him had he won it? What more could he have than he now enjoyed? But to lose such a sum of money! With all his advantages of wealth he felt himself to be as forlorn and wretched as though he had nothing left in the world before him. CHAPTER XLIV How It Was Done The story was soon about the town, and was the one matter for discussion in all racing quarters. About the town! It was about England, about all Europe. It had travelled to America and the Indies, to Australia and the Chinese cities before two hours were over. Before the race was run the accident was discussed and something like the truth surmised in Cairo, Calcutta, Melbourne, and San Francisco. But at Doncaster it was so all-pervading a matter that down to the tradesmen's daughters and the boys at the free-school the town was divided into two parties, one party believing it to have been a "plant," and the other holding that the cause had been natural. It is hardly necessary to say that the ring, as a rule, belonged to the former party. The ring always suspects. It did not behove even those who would win by the transaction to stand up for its honesty. The intention had been to take the horse round a portion of the outside of the course near to which his stable stood. A boy rode him and the groom and Tifto went with him. At a certain spot on their return Tifto had exclaimed that the horse was going lame in his off fore-foot. As to this exclamation the boy and the two men were agreed. The boy was then made to dismount and run for Mr. Pook; and as he started Tifto commenced to examine the horse's foot. The boy saw him raise the off fore-leg. He himself had not found the horse lame under him, but had been so hustled and hurried out of the saddle by Tifto and the groom that he had not thought on that matter till he was questioned. So far the story told by Tifto and the groom was corroborated by the boy,--except as to the horse's actual lameness. So far the story was believed by all men,--except in regard to the actual lameness. And so far it was true. Then, according to Tifto and the groom, the other foot was looked at, but nothing was seen. This other foot, the near fore-foot, was examined by the groom, who declared himself to be so flurried by the lameness of such a horse at such a time, that he hardly knew what he saw or what he did not see. At any rate then in his confusion he found no cause of lameness, but the horse was led into the stable as lame as a tree. Here Tifto found the nail inserted into the very cleft of the frog of the near fore-foot, and so inserted that he could not extract it till the farrier came. That the farrier had extracted the nail from the part of the foot indicated was certainly a fact. Then there was the nail. Only those who were most peculiarly privileged were allowed to see the nail. But it was buzzed about the racing quarters that the head of the nail,--an old rusty, straight, and well-pointed nail,--bore on it the mark of a recent hammer. In answer to this it was alleged that the blacksmith in extracting the nail with his pincers, had of course operated on its head, had removed certain particles of rust, and might easily have given it the appearance of having been struck. But in answer to this the farrier, who was a sharp fellow, and quite beyond suspicion in the matter, declared that he had very particularly looked at the nail before he extracted it,--had looked at it with the feeling on his mind that something base might too probably have been done,--and that he was ready to swear that the clear mark on the head of the nail was there before he touched it. And then not in the stable, but lying under the little dung-heap away from the stable-door, there was found a small piece of broken iron bar, about a foot long, which might have answered for a hammer,--a rusty bit of iron; and amidst the rust of this was found such traces as might have been left had it been used in striking such a nail. There were some who declared that neither on the nail nor on the iron could they see anything. And among these was the Major. But Mr. Lupton brought a strong magnifying-glass to bear, and the world of examiners was satisfied that the marks were there. It seemed however to be agreed that nothing could be done. Silverbridge would not lend himself at all to those who suspected mischief. He was miserable enough, but in this great trouble he would not separate himself from Tifto. "I don't believe a word of all that," he said to Mr. Lupton. "It ought to be investigated at any rate," said Lupton. "Mr. Pook may do as he likes, but I will have nothing to do with it." Then Tifto came to him swaggering. Tifto had to go through a considerable amount of acting, for which he was not very well adapted. The Captain would have done it better. He would have endeavoured to put himself altogether into the same boat with his partner, and would have imagined neither suspicion or enmity on his partner's part till suspicion or enmity had been shown. But Tifto, who had not expected that the matter would be allowed to pass over without some inquiry, began by assuming that Silverbridge would think evil of him. Tifto, who at this moment would have given all that he had in the world not to have done the deed, who now hated the instigator of the deed, and felt something almost akin to love for Silverbridge, found himself to be forced by circumstances to defend himself by swaggering. "I don't understand all this that's going on, my Lord," he said. "Neither do I," replied Silverbridge. "Any horse is subject to an accident. I am, I suppose, as great a sufferer as you are, and a deuced sight less able to bear it." "Who has said anything to the contrary? As for bearing it, we must take it as it comes,--both of us. You may as well know now as later that I have done with racing--for ever." "What do you tell me that for? You can do as you like and I can do as I like about that. If I had had my way about the horse this never would have happened. Taking a horse out at that time in the morning,--before a race!" "Why, you went with him yourself." "Yes;--by Pook's orders. You allowed Pook to do just as he pleased. I should like to know what money Pook has got on it, and which way he laid it." This disgusted Silverbridge so much that he turned away and would have no more to say to Tifto. Before one o'clock, at which hour it was stated nominally that the races would commence, general opinion had formed itself,--and general opinion had nearly hit the truth. General opinion declared that the nail had been driven in wilfully,--that it had been done by Tifto himself, and that Tifto had been instigated by Captain Green. Captain Green perhaps over-acted his part a little. His intimacy with the Major was well known, and yet, in all this turmoil, he kept himself apart as though he had no interest in the matter. "I have got my little money on, and what little I have I lose," he said in answer to inquiries. But everyone knew that he could not but have a great interest in a race, as to which the half owner of the favourite was a peculiarly intimate friend of his own. Had he come down to the stables and been seen about the place with Tifto it might have been better. As it was, though he was very quiet, his name was soon mixed up in the matter. There was one man who asserted it as a fact known to himself that Green and Villiers,--one Gilbert Villiers,--were in partnership together. It was very well known that Gilbert Villiers would win two thousand five hundred pounds from Lord Silverbridge. Then minute investigation was made into the betting of certain individuals. Of course there would be great plunder, and where would the plunder go? Who would get the money which poor Silverbridge would lose? It was said that one at least of the large bets made on that Tuesday evening could be traced to the same Villiers though not actually made by him. More would be learned when the settling-day should come. But there was quite enough already to show that there were many men determined to get to the bottom of it all if possible. There came upon Silverbridge in his trouble a keen sense of his position and a feeling of the dignity which he ought to support. He clung during great part of the morning to Mr. Lupton. Mr. Lupton was much his senior and they had never been intimate; but now there was comfort in his society. "I am afraid you are hit heavily," said Mr. Lupton. "Something over seventy thousand pounds!" "Looking at what will be your property it is of course nothing. But if--" "If what?" "If you go to the Jews for it then it will become a great deal." "I shall certainly not do that." "Then you may regard it as a trifle," said Lupton. "No, I can't. It is not a trifle. I must tell my father. He'll find the money." "There is no doubt about that." "He will. But I feel at present that I would rather change places with the poorest gentleman I know than have to tell him. I have done with races, Lupton." "If so, this will have been a happy day for you. A man in your position can hardly make money by it, but he may lose so much! If a man really likes the amusement,--as I do,--and risks no more than what he has in his pocket, that may be very well." "At any rate I have done with it." Nevertheless he went to see the race run, and everybody seemed to be touched with pity for him. He carried himself well, saying as little as he could of his own horse, and taking, or affecting to take, great interest in the race. After the race he managed to see all those to whom he had lost heavy stakes,--having to own to himself, as he did so, that not one of them was a gentleman to whom he should like to give his hand. To them he explained that his father was abroad,--that probably his liabilities could not be settled till after his father's return. He however would consult his father's agent and would then appear on settling-day. They were all full of the blandest courtesies. There was not one of them who had any doubt as to getting his money,--unless the whole thing might be disputed on the score of Tifto's villany. Even then payment could not be disputed, unless it was proved that he who demanded the money had been one of the actual conspirators. After having seen his creditors he went away up alone to London. When in London he went to Carlton Terrace and spent the night in absolute solitude. It had been his plan to join Gerald for some partridge-shooting at Matching, and then to go yachting till such time as he should be enabled to renew his suit to Miss Boncassen. Early in November he would again ask her to be his wife. These had been his plans. But now it seemed that everything was changed. Partridge-shooting and yachting must be out of the question till this terrible load was taken off his shoulders. Soon after his arrival at the house two telegrams followed him from Doncaster. One was from Gerald. "What is all this about Prime Minister? Is it a sell? I am so unhappy." The other was from Lady Mabel,--for among other luxuries Mrs. Montacute Jones had her own telegraph-wire at Killancodlem. "Can this be true? We are all so miserable. I do hope it is not much." From which he learned that his misfortune was already known to all his friends. And now what was he to do? He ate his supper, and then without hesitating for a moment,--feeling that if he did hesitate the task would not be done on that night,--he sat down and wrote the following letter: Carlton Terrace, Sept. 14, 18--. MY DEAR MR. MORETON, I have just come up from Doncaster. You have probably heard what has been Prime Minister's fate. I don't know whether any horse has ever been such a favourite for the Leger. Early in the morning he was taken out and picked up a nail. The consequence was he could not run. Now I must come to the bad part of my story. I have lost seventy thousand pounds! It is no use beating about the bush. The sum is something over that. What am I to do? If I tell you that I shall give up racing altogether I dare say you will not believe me. It is a sort of thing a man always says when he wants money; but I feel now I cannot help saying it. But what shall I do? Perhaps, if it be not too much trouble, you will come up to town and see me. You can send me a word by the wires. You may be sure of this, I shall make no attempt to raise the money elsewhere, unless I find that my father will not help me. You will understand that of course it must be paid. You will understand also what I must feel about telling my father, but I shall do so at once. I only wait till I can hear from you. Yours faithfully, SILVERBRIDGE. During the next day two despatches reached Lord Silverbridge, both of them coming as he sat down to his solitary dinner. The first consisted of a short but very civil note. Messrs. Comfort and Criball present their compliments to the Earl of Silverbridge. Messrs. C. and C. beg to offer their apologies for interfering, but desire to inform his Lordship that should cash be wanting to any amount in consequence of the late races, they will be happy to accommodate his Lordship on most reasonable terms at a moment's notice, upon his Lordship's single bond. Lord Silverbridge may be sure of absolute secrecy. Crasham Court, Crutched Friars, Sept. 15, 18--. The other despatch was a telegram from Mr. Moreton saying that he would be in Carlton Terrace by noon on the following day. CHAPTER XLV "There Shall Not Be Another Word About It" Early in October the Duke was at Matching with his daughter, and Phineas Finn and his wife were both with them. On the day after they parted at Ischl the first news respecting Prime Minister had reached him,--namely, that his son's horse had lost the race. This would not have annoyed him at all, but that the papers which he read contained some vague charge of swindling against somebody, and hinted that Lord Silverbridge had been a victim. Even this would not have troubled him,--might in some sort have comforted him,--were it not made evident to him that his son had been closely associated with swindlers in these transactions. If it were a mere question of money, that might be settled without difficulty. Even though the sum lost might have grown out of what he might have expected into some few thousands, still he would bear it without a word, if only he could separate his boy from bad companions. Then came Mr. Moreton's letter telling the whole. At the meeting which took place between Silverbridge and his father's agent at Carlton Terrace it was settled that Mr. Moreton should write the letter. Silverbridge tried and found that he could not do it. He did not know how to humiliate himself sufficiently, and yet could not keep himself from making attempts to prove that according to all recognised chances his bets had been good bets. Mr. Moreton was better able to accomplish the task. He knew the Duke's mind. A very large discretion had been left in Mr. Moreton's hands in regard to moneys which might be needed on behalf of that dangerous heir!--so large that he had been able to tell Lord Silverbridge that if the money was in truth lost according to Jockey Club rules, it should all be forthcoming on the settling-day,--certainly without assistance from Messrs. Comfort and Criball. The Duke had been nervously afraid of such men of business as Comfort and Criball, and from the earliest days of his son's semi-manhood had been on his guard against them. Let any sacrifice be made so that his son might be kept clear from Comforts and Criballs. To Mr. Moreton he had been very explicit. His own pecuniary resources were so great that they could bear some ravaging without serious detriment. It was for his son's character and standing in the world, for his future respectability and dignity, that his fears were so keen, and not for his own money. By one so excitable, so fond of pleasure as Lord Silverbridge, some ravaging would probably be made. Let it be met by ready money. Such had been the Duke's instructions to his own trusted man of business, and, acting on these instructions, Mr. Moreton was able to tell the heir that the money should be forthcoming. Mr. Moreton, after detailing the extent and the nature of the loss, and the steps which he had decided upon taking, went on to explain the circumstances as best he could. He had made some inquiry, and felt no doubt that a gigantic swindle had been perpetrated by Major Tifto and others. The swindle had been successful. Mr. Moreton had consulted certain gentlemen of high character versed in affairs of the turf. He mentioned Mr. Lupton among others,--and had been assured that though the swindle was undoubted, the money had better be paid. It was thought to be impossible to connect the men who had made the bets with the perpetrators of the fraud;--and if Lord Silverbridge were to abstain from paying his bets because his own partner had ruined the animal which belonged to them jointly, the feeling would be against him rather than in his favour. In fact the Jockey Club could not sustain him in such refusal. Therefore the money would be paid. Mr. Moreton, with some expressions of doubt, trusted that he might be thought to have exercised a wise discretion. Then he went on to express his own opinion in regard to the lasting effect which the matter would have upon the young man. "I think," said he, "that his Lordship is heartily sickened of racing, and that he will never return to it." The Duke was of course very wretched when these tidings first reached him. Though he was a rich man, and of all men the least careful of his riches, still he felt that seventy thousand pounds was a large sum of money to throw away among a nest of swindlers. And then it was excessively grievous to him that his son should have been mixed up with such men. Wishing to screen his son, even from his own anger, he was careful to remember that the promise made that Tifto should be dismissed, was not to take effect till after this race had been run. There had been no deceit in that. But then Silverbridge had promised that he would not "plunge." There are, however, promises which from their very nature may be broken without falsehood. Plunging is a doubtful word, and the path down to it, like all doubtful paths,--is slippery and easy! If that assurance with which Mr. Moreton ended his letter could only be made true, he could bring himself to forgive even this offence. The boy must be made to settle himself in life. The Duke resolved that his only revenge should be to press on that marriage with Mabel Grex. At Coblenz, on their way home, the Duke and his daughter were caught up by Mr. and Mrs. Finn, and the matter of the young man's losses was discussed. Phineas had heard all about it, and was loud in denunciations against Tifto, Captain Green, Gilbert Villiers, and others whose names had reached him. The money, he thought, should never have been paid. The Duke however declared that the money would not cause a moment's regret, if only the whole thing could be got rid of at that cost. It had reached Finn's ears that Tifto was already at loggerheads with his associates. There was some hope that the whole thing might be brought to light by this means. For all that the Duke cared nothing. If only Silverbridge and Tifto could for the future be kept apart, as far as he and his were concerned, good would have been done rather than harm. While they were in this way together on the Rhine it was decided that very soon after their return to England Phineas and Mrs. Finn should go down to Matching. When the Duke arrived in London his sons were not there. Gerald had gone back to Oxford, and Silverbridge had merely left an address. Then his sister wrote him a very short letter. "Papa will be so glad if you will come to Matching. Do come." Of course he came, and presented himself some few days after the Duke's arrival. But he dreaded this meeting with his father which, however, let it be postponed for ever so long, must come at last. In reference to this he made a great resolution,--that he would go instantly as soon as he might be sent for. When the summons came he started; but, though he was by courtesy an Earl, and by fact was not only a man but a Member of Parliament, though he was half engaged to marry one young lady and ought to have been engaged to marry another, though he had come to an age at which Pitt was a great minister and Pope a great poet, still his heart was in his boots, as a schoolboy's might be, when he was driven up to the house at Matching. In two minutes, before he had washed the dust from his face and hands, he was with his father. "I am glad to see you, Silverbridge," said the Duke, putting out his hand. "I hope I see you well, sir." "Fairly well. Thank you. Travelling I think agrees with me. I miss, not my comforts, but a certain knowledge of how things are going on, which comes to us I think through our skins when we are at home. A feeling of absence pervades me. Otherwise I like it. And you;--what have you been doing?" "Shooting a little," said Silverbridge, in a mooncalf tone. "Shooting a great deal, if what I see in the newspapers be true about Mr. Reginald Dobbes and his party. I presume it is a religion to offer up hecatombs to the autumnal gods,--who must surely take a keener delight in blood and slaughter than those bloodthirsty gods of old." "You should talk to Gerald about that, sir." "Has Gerald been so great at his sacrifices? How will that suit with Plato? What does Mr. Simcox say?" "Of course they were all to have a holiday just at that time. But Gerald is reading. I fancy that Gerald is clever." "And he is a great Nimrod?" "As to hunting." "Nimrod I fancy got his game in any way that he could compass it. I do not doubt but that he trapped foxes." "With a rifle at deer, say for four hundred yards, I would back Gerald against any man of his age in England or Scotland." "As for backing, Silverbridge, do not you think that we had better have done with that?" This was said hardly in a tone of reproach, with something even of banter in it; and as the question was asked the Duke was smiling. But in a moment all that sense of joyousness which the young man had felt in singing his brother's praises was expelled. His face fell, and he stood before his father almost like a culprit. "We might as well have it out about this racing," continued the Duke. "Something has to be said about it. You have lost an enormous sum of money." The Duke's tone in saying this became terribly severe. Such at least was its sound in his son's ears. He did not mean to be severe. But when he did speak of that which displeased him his voice naturally assumed that tone of indignation with which in days of yore he had been wont to denounce the public extravagance of his opponents in the House of Commons. The father paused, but the son could not speak at the moment. "And worse than that," continued the Duke; "you have lost it in as bad company as you could have found had you picked all England through." "Mr. Lupton, and Sir Henry Playfair, and Lord Stirling were in the room when the bets were made." "Were the gentlemen you name concerned with Major Tifto?" "No, sir." "Who can tell with whom he may be in a room? Though rooms of that kind are, I think, best avoided." Then the Duke paused again, but Silverbridge was now sobbing so that he could hardly speak. "I am sorry that you should be so grieved," continued the father, "but such delights cannot, I think, lead to much real joy." "It is for you, sir," said the son, rubbing his eyes with the hand which supported his head. "My grief in the matter might soon be cured." "How shall I cure it? I will do anything to cure it." "Let Major Tifto and the horses go." "They are gone," said Silverbridge energetically, jumping from his chair as he spoke. "I will never own a horse again, or a part of a horse. I will have nothing more to do with races. You will believe me?" "I will believe anything that you tell me." "I won't say I will not go to another race, because--" "No; no. I would not have you hamper yourself. Nor shall you bind yourself by any further promises. You have done with racing." "Indeed, indeed I have, sir." Then the father came up to the son and put his arms round the young man's shoulders and embraced him. "Of course it made me unhappy." "I knew it would." "But if you are cured of this evil, the money is nothing. What is it all for but for you and your brother and sister? It was a large sum, but that shall not grieve me. The thing itself is so dangerous that, if with that much of loss we can escape, I will think that we have made not a bad market. Who owns the horse now?" "The horses shall be sold." "For anything they may fetch so that we may get clear of this dirt. And the Major?" "I know nothing of him. I have not seen him since that day." "Has he claims on you?" "Not a shilling. It is all the other way." "Let it go then. Be quit of him, however it may be. Send a messenger so that he may understand that you have abandoned racing altogether. Mr. Moreton might perhaps see him." That his father should forgive so readily and yet himself suffer so deeply, affected the son's feelings so strongly that for a time he could hardly repress his sobs. "And now there shall not be a word more said about it," said the Duke suddenly. Silverbridge in his confusion could make no answer. "There shall not be another word said about it," said the Duke again. "And now what do you mean to do with yourself immediately?" "I'll stay here, sir, as long as you do. Finn, and Warburton, and I have still a few coverts to shoot." "That's a good reason for staying anywhere." "I meant that I would remain while you remained, sir." "That at any rate is a good reason, as far as I am concerned. But we go to Custins next week." "There's a deal of shooting to be done at Gatherum," said the heir. "You speak of it as if it were the business of your life,--on which your bread depended." "One can't expect game to be kept up if nobody goes to shoot it." "Can't one? I didn't know. I should have thought that the less was shot the more there would be to shoot; but I am ignorant in such matters." Silverbridge then broke forth into a long explanation as to coverts, gamekeepers, poachers, breeding, and the expectations of the neighbourhood at large, in the middle of which he was interrupted by the Duke. "I am afraid, my dear boy, that I am too old to learn. But as it is so manifestly a duty, go and perform it like a man. Who will go with you?" "I will ask Mr. Finn to be one." "He will be very hard upon you in the way of politics." "I can answer him better than I can you, sir. Mr. Lupton said he would come for a day or two. He'll stand to me." After that his father stopped him as he was about to leave the room. "One more word, Silverbridge. Do you remember what you were saying when you walked down to the House with me from your club that night?" Silverbridge remembered very well what he had said. He had undertaken to ask Mabel Grex to be his wife, and had received his father's ready approval to the proposition. But at this moment he was unwilling to refer to that matter. "I have thought about it very much since that," said the Duke. "I may say that I have been thinking of it every day. If there were anything to tell me, you would let me know;--would you not?" "Yes, sir." "Then there is nothing to be told? I hope you have not changed your mind." Silverbridge paused a moment, trusting that he might be able to escape the making of any answer;--but the Duke evidently intended to have an answer. "It appeared to me, sir, that it did not seem to suit her," said the hardly-driven young man. He could not now say that Mabel had shown a disposition to reject his offer, because as they had been sitting by the brookside at Killancodlem, even he, with all his self-diffidence, had been forced to see what were her wishes. Her confusion, and too evident despair when she heard of the offer to the American girl, had plainly told her tale. He could not now plead to his father that Mabel Grex would refuse his offer. But his self-defence, when first he found that he had lost himself in love for the American, had been based on that idea. He had done his best to make Mabel understand him. If he had not actually offered to her, he had done the next thing to it. And he had run after her, till he was ashamed of such running. She had given him no encouragement;--and therefore he had been justified. No doubt he must have been mistaken; that he now perceived; but still he felt himself to be justified. It was impossible that he should explain all this to his father. One thing he certainly could not say,--just at present. After his folly in regard to those heavy debts he could not at once risk his father's renewed anger by proposing to him an American daughter-in-law. That must stand over, at any rate till the girl had accepted him positively. "I am afraid it won't come off, sir," he said at last. "Then I am to presume that you have changed your mind?" "I told you when we were speaking of it that I was not confident." "She has not--" "I can't explain it all, sir,--but I fear it won't come off." Then the Duke, who had been sitting, got up from his chair and with his back to the fire made a final little speech. "We decided just now, Silverbridge, that nothing more should be said about that unpleasant racing business, and nothing more shall be said by me. But you must not be surprised if I am anxious to see you settled in life. No young man could be more bound by duty to marry early than you are. In the first place you have to repair the injury done by my inaptitude for society. You have explained to me that it is your duty to have the Barsetshire coverts properly shot, and I have acceded to your views. Surely it must be equally your duty to see your Barsetshire neighbours. And you are a young man every feature of whose character would be improved by matrimony. As far as means are concerned you are almost as free to make arrangements as though you were already the head of the family." "No, sir." "I could never bring myself to dictate to a son in regard to his choice of a wife. But I will own that when you told me that you had chosen I was much gratified. Try and think again when you are pausing amidst your sacrifices at Gatherum, whether that be possible. If it be not, still I would wish you to bear in mind what is my idea as to your duty." Silverbridge said that he would bear this in mind, and then escaped from the room. CHAPTER XLVI Lady Mary's Dream When the Duke and his daughter reached Custins they found a large party assembled, and were somewhat surprised at the crowd. Lord and Lady Nidderdale were there, which might have been expected as they were part of the family. With Lord Popplecourt had come his recent friend Adolphus Longstaff. That too might have been natural. Mr. and Miss Boncassen were there also, who at this moment were quite strangers to the Duke; and Mr. Lupton. The Duke also found Lady Chiltern, whose father-in-law had more than once sat in the same Cabinet with himself, and Mr. Monk, who was generally spoken of as the head of the coming Liberal Government, and the Ladies Adelaide and Flora FitzHoward, the still unmarried but not very juvenile daughters of the Duke of St. Bungay. These with a few others made a large party, and rather confused the Duke, who had hardly reflected that discreet and profitable love-making was more likely to go on among numbers, than if the two young people were thrown together with no other companions. Lord Popplecourt had been made to understand what was expected of him, and after some hesitation had submitted himself to the conspiracy. There would not be less at any rate than two hundred thousand pounds;--and the connexion would be made with one of the highest families in Great Britain. Though Lady Cantrip had said very few words, those words had been expressive; and the young bachelor peer had given in his adhesion. Some vague half-defined tale had been told him,--not about Tregear, as Tregear's name had not been mentioned,--but respecting some dream of a young man who had flitted across the girl's path during her mother's lifetime. "All girls have such dreams," Lady Cantrip had suggested. Whereupon Lord Popplecourt said that he supposed it was so. "But a softer, purer, more unsullied flower never waited on its stalk till the proper fingers should come to pluck it," said Lady Cantrip, rising to unaccustomed poetry on behalf of her friend the Duke. Lord Popplecourt accepted the poetry and was ready to do his best to pluck the flower. Soon after the Duke's arrival Lord Popplecourt found himself in one of the drawing-rooms with Lady Cantrip and his proposed father-in-law. A hint had been given him that he might as well be home early from shooting, so as to be in the way. As the hour in which he was to make himself specially agreeable, both to the father and to the daughter, had drawn nigh, he became somewhat nervous, and now, at this moment, was not altogether comfortable. Though he had been concerned in no such matter before, he had an idea that love was a soft kind of thing which ought to steal on one unawares and come and go without trouble. In his case it came upon him with a rough demand for immediate hard work. He had not previously thought that he was to be subjected to such labours, and at this moment almost resented the interference with his ease. He was already a little angry with Lady Cantrip, but at the same time felt himself to be so much in subjection to her that he could not rebel. The Duke himself when he saw the young man was hardly more comfortable. He had brought his daughter to Custins, feeling that it was his duty to be with her; but he would have preferred to leave the whole operation to the care of Lady Cantrip. He hardly liked to look at the fish whom he wished to catch for his daughter. Whenever this aspect of affairs presented itself to him, he would endeavour to console himself by remembering the past success of a similar transaction. He thought of his own first interview with his wife. "You have heard," he had said, "what our friends wish." She had pouted her lips, and when gently pressed had at last muttered, with her shoulder turned to him, that she supposed it was to be so. Very much more coercion had been used to her then than either himself or Lady Cantrip had dared to apply to his daughter. He did not think that his girl in her present condition of mind would signify to Lord Popplecourt that "she supposed it was to be so." Now that the time for the transaction was present he felt almost sure it would never be transacted. But still he must go on with it. Were he now to abandon his scheme, would it not be tantamount to abandoning everything? So he wreathed his face in smiles,--or made some attempt at it,--as he greeted the young man. "I hope you and Lady Mary had a pleasant journey abroad," said Lord Popplecourt. Lord Popplecourt, being aware that he had been chosen as a son-in-law, felt himself called upon to be familiar as well as pleasant. "I often thought of you and Lady Mary, and wondered what you were about." "We were visiting lakes and mountains, churches and picture galleries, cities and salt-mines," said the Duke. "Does Lady Mary like that sort of thing?" "I think she was pleased with what she saw." "She has been abroad a great deal before, I believe. It depends so much on whom you meet when abroad." This was unfortunate, because it recalled Tregear to the Duke's mind. "We saw very few people whom we knew," he said. "I've been shooting in Scotland with Silverbridge, and Gerald, and Reginald Dobbes, and Nidderdale,--and that fellow Tregear, who is so thick with Silverbridge." "Indeed!" "I'm told that Lord Gerald is going to be the great shot of his day," said Lady Cantrip. "It is a distinction," said the Duke bitterly. "He did not beat me by so much," continued Popplecourt. "I think Tregear did the best with his rifle. One morning he potted three. Dobbes was disgusted. He hated Tregear." "Isn't it stupid,--half-a-dozen men getting together in that way?" asked Lady Cantrip. "Nidderdale is always jolly." "I am glad to hear that," said the mother-in-law. "And Gerald is a regular brick." The Duke bowed. "Silverbridge used always to be going off to Killancodlem, where there were a lot of ladies. He is very sweet, you know, on this American girl whom you have here." Again the Duke winced. "Dobbes is awfully good as to making out the shooting, but then he is a tyrant. Nevertheless I agree with him, if you mean to do a thing you should do it." "Certainly," said the Duke. "But you should make up your mind first whether the thing is worth doing." "Just so," said Popplecourt. "And as grouse and deer together are about the best things out, most of us made up our minds that it was worth doing. But that fellow Tregear would argue it out. He said a gentleman oughtn't to play billiards as well as a marker." "I think he was right," said the Duke. "Do you know Mr. Tregear, Duke?" "I have met him--with my son." "Do you like him?" "I have seen very little of him." "I cannot say I do. He thinks so much of himself. Of course he is very intimate with Silverbridge, and that is all that any one knows of him." The Duke bowed almost haughtily, though why he bowed he could hardly have explained to himself. Lady Cantrip bit her lips in disgust. "He's just the fellow," continued Popplecourt, "to think that some princess has fallen in love with him." Then the Duke left the room. "You had better not talk to him about Mr. Tregear," said Lady Cantrip. "Why not?" "I don't know whether he approves of the intimacy between him and Lord Silverbridge." "I should think not;--a man without any position or a shilling in the world." "The Duke is peculiar. If a subject is distasteful to him he does not like it to be mentioned. You had better not mention Mr. Tregear." Lady Cantrip, as she said this, blushed inwardly at her own hypocrisy. It was of course contrived at dinner that Lord Popplecourt should take out Lady Mary. It is impossible to discover how such things get wind, but there was already an idea prevalent at Custins that Lord Popplecourt had matrimonial views, and that these views were looked upon favourably. "You may be quite sure of it, Mr. Lupton," Lady Adelaide FitzHoward had said. "I'll make a bet they're married before this time next year." "It will be a terrible case of Beauty and the Beast," said Lupton. Lady Chiltern had whispered a suspicion of the same kind, and had expressed a hope that the lover would be worthy of the girl. And Dolly Longstaff had chaffed his friend Popplecourt on the subject, Popplecourt having laid himself open by indiscreet allusions to Dolly's love for Miss Boncassen. "Everybody can't have it as easily arranged for him as you,--a Duke's daughter and a pot of money without so much as the trouble of asking for it!" "What do you know about the Duke's children?" "That's what it is to be a lord and not to have a father." Popplecourt tried to show that he was disgusted; but he felt himself all the more strongly bound to go on with his project. It was therefore a matter of course that these should-be lovers would be sent out of the room together. "You'll give your arm to Mary," Lady Cantrip said, dropping the ceremonial prefix. Lady Mary of course went out as she was bidden. Though everybody else knew it, no idea of what was intended had yet come across her mind. The should-be lover immediately reverted to the Austrian tour, expressing a hope that his neighbour had enjoyed herself. "There's nothing I like so much myself," said he, remembering some of the Duke's words, "as mountains, cities, salt-mines, and all that kind of thing. There's such a lot of interest about it." "Did you ever see a salt-mine?" "Well,--not exactly a salt-mine; but I have coal-mines on my property in Staffordshire. I'm very fond of coal. I hope you like coal." "I like salt a great deal better--to look at." "But which do you think pays best? I don't mind telling you,--though it's a kind of thing I never talk about to strangers,--the royalties from the Blogownie and Toodlem mines go up regularly two thousand pounds every year." "I thought we were talking about what was pretty to look at." "So we were. I'm as fond of pretty things as anybody. Do you know Reginald Dobbes?" "No, I don't. Is he pretty?" "He used to be so angry with Silverbridge, because Silverbridge would say Crummie-Toddie was ugly." "Was Crummie-Toddie ugly?" "Just a plain house on a moor." "That sounds ugly." "I suppose your family like pretty things?" "I hope so." "I do, I know." Lord Popplecourt endeavoured to look as though he intended her to understand that she was the pretty thing which he most particularly liked. She partly conceived his meaning, and was disgusted accordingly. On the other side of her sat Mr. Boncassen, to whom she had been introduced in the drawing-room,--and who had said a few words to her about some Norwegian poet. She turned round to him, and asked him some questions about the Skald, and so, getting into conversation with him, managed to turn her shoulder to her suitor. On the other side of him sat Lady Rosina de Courcy, to whom, as being an old woman and an old maid, he felt very little inclined to be courteous. She said a word, asking him whether he did not think the weather was treacherous. He answered her very curtly, and sat bolt upright, looking forward on the table, and taking his dinner as it came to him. He had been put there in order that Lady Mary Palliser might talk to him, and he regarded interference on the part of that old American as being ungentlemanlike. But the old American disregarded him, and went on with his quotations from the Scandinavian bard. But Mr. Boncassen sat next to Lady Cantrip, and when at last he was called upon to give his ear to the Countess, Lady Mary was again vacant for Popplecourt's attentions. "Are you very fond of poetry?" he asked. "Very fond." "So am I. Which do you like best, Tennyson or Shakespeare?" "They are very unlike." "Yes;--they are unlike. Or Moore's Melodies? I am very fond of 'When in death I shall calm recline.' I think this equal to anything. Reginald Dobbes would have it that poetry is all bosh." "Then I think that Mr. Reginald Dobbes must be all bosh himself." "There was a man there named Tregear who had brought some books." Then there was a pause. Lady Mary had not a word to say. "Dobbes used to declare that he was always pretending to read poetry." "Mr. Tregear never pretends anything." "Do you know him?" asked the rival. "He is my brother's most particular friend." "Ah! yes. I dare say Silverbridge has talked to you about him. I think he's a stuck-up sort of fellow." To this there was not a word of reply. "Where did your brother pick him up?" "They were at Oxford together." "I must say I think he gives himself airs;--because, you know, he's nobody." "I don't know anything of the kind," said Lady Mary, becoming very red. "And as he is my brother's most particular friend,--his very friend of friends,--I think you had better not abuse him to me." "I don't think the Duke is very fond of him." "I don't care who is fond of him. I am very fond of Silverbridge, and I won't hear his friend ill-spoken of. I dare say he had some books with him. He is not at all the sort of a man to go to a place and satisfy himself with doing nothing but killing animals." "Do you know him, Lady Mary?" "I have seen him, and of course I have heard a great deal of him from Silverbridge. I would rather not talk any more about him." "You seem to be very fond of Mr. Tregear," he said angrily. "It is no business of yours, Lord Popplecourt, whether I am fond of anybody or not. I have told you that Mr. Tregear is my brother's friend, and that ought to be enough." Lord Popplecourt was a young man possessed of a certain amount of ingenuity. It was said of him that he knew on which side his bread was buttered, and that if you wished to take him in you must get up early. After dinner and during the night he pondered a good deal on what he had heard. Lady Cantrip had told him there had been a--dream. What was he to believe about that dream? Had he not better avoid the error of putting too fine a point upon it, and tell himself at once that a dream in this instance meant a--lover? Lady Mary had already been troubled by a lover! He was disposed to believe that young ladies often do have objectionable lovers, and that things get themselves right afterwards. Young ladies can be made to understand the beauty of coal-mines almost as readily as young gentlemen. There would be the two hundred thousand pounds; and there was the girl, beautiful, well-born, and thoroughly well-mannered. But what if this Tregear and the dream were one and the same? If so, had he not received plenty of evidence that the dream had not yet passed away? A remnant of affection for the dream would not have been a fatal barrier, had not the girl been so fierce with him in defence of her dream. He remembered, too, what the Duke had said about Tregear, and Lady Cantrip's advice to him to be silent in respect to this man. And then do girls generally defend their brothers' friends as she had defended Tregear? He thought not. Putting all these things together on the following morning he came to an uncomfortable belief that Tregear was the dream. Soon after that he found himself near to Dolly Longstaff as they were shooting. "You know that fellow Tregear, don't you?" "Oh Lord, yes. He is Silverbridge's pal." "Did you ever hear anything about him?" "What sort of thing?" "Was he ever--ever in love with any one?" "I fancy he used to be awfully spooney on Mab Grex. I remember hearing that they were to have been married, only that neither of them had sixpence." "Oh--Lady Mabel Grex! That's a horse of another colour." "And which is the horse of your colour?" "I haven't got a horse," said Lord Popplecourt, going away to his own corner. CHAPTER XLVII Miss Boncassen's Idea of Heaven It was generally known that Dolly Longstaff had been heavily smitten by the charms of Miss Boncassen; but the world hardly gave him credit for the earnestness of his affection. Dolly had never been known to be in earnest in anything;--but now he was in very truth in love. He had agreed to be Popplecourt's companion at Custins because he had heard that Miss Boncassen would be there. He had thought over the matter with more consideration than he had ever before given to any subject. He had gone so far as to see his own man of business, with a view of ascertaining what settlements he could make and what income he might be able to spend. He had told himself over and over again that he was not the "sort of fellow" that ought to marry; but it was all of no avail. He confessed to himself that he was completely "bowled over,"--"knocked off his pins!" "Is a fellow to have no chance?" he said to Miss Boncassen at Custins. "If I understand what a fellow means, I am afraid not." "No man alive was ever more in earnest than I am." "Well, Mr. Longstaff, I do not suppose that you have been trying to take me in all this time." "I hope you do not think ill of me." "I may think well of a great many gentlemen without wishing to marry them." "But does love go for nothing?" said Dolly, putting his hand upon his heart. "Perhaps there are so many that love you." "Not above half-a-dozen or so." "You can make a joke of it, when I--. But I don't think, Miss Boncassen, you at all realise what I feel. As to settlements and all that, your father could do what he likes with me." "My father has nothing to do with it, and I don't know what settlements mean. We never think anything of settlements in our country. If two young people love each other they go and get married." "Let us do the same here." "But the two young people don't love each other. Look here, Mr. Longstaff; it's my opinion that a young woman ought not to be pestered." "Pestered!" "You force me to speak in that way. I've given you an answer ever so many times. I will not be made to do it over and over again." "It's that d---- fellow, Silverbridge," he exclaimed almost angrily. On hearing this Miss Boncassen left the room without speaking another word, and Dolly Longstaff found himself alone. He saw what he had done as soon as she was gone. After that he could hardly venture to persevere again--here at Custins. He weighed it over in his mind for a long time, almost coming to a resolution in favour of hard drink. He had never felt anything like this before. He was so uncomfortable that he couldn't eat his luncheon, though in accordance with his usual habit he had breakfasted off soda-and-brandy and a morsel of devilled toast. He did not know himself in his changed character. "I wonder whether she understands that I have four thousand pounds a year of my own, and shall have twelve thousand pounds more when my governor goes! She was so headstrong that it was impossible to explain anything to her." "I'm off to London," he said to Popplecourt that afternoon. "Nonsense! you said you'd stay for ten days." "All the same, I'm going at once. I've sent to Bridport for a trap, and I shall sleep to-night at Dorchester." "What's the meaning of it all?" "I've had some words with somebody. Don't mind asking any more." "Not with the Duke?" "The Duke! No; I haven't spoken to him." "Or Lord Cantrip?" "I wish you wouldn't ask questions." "If you've quarrelled with anybody you ought to consult a friend." "It's nothing of that kind." "Then it's a lady. It's the American girl!" "Don't I tell you I don't want to talk about it? I'm going. I've told Lady Cantrip that my mother wasn't well and wants to see me. You'll stop your time out, I suppose?" "I don't know." "You've got it all square, no doubt. I wish I'd a handle to my name. I never cared for it before." "I'm sorry you're so down in the mouth. Why don't you try again? The thing is to stick to 'em like wax. If ten times of asking won't do, go in twenty times." Dolly shook his head despondently. "What can you do when a girl walks out of the room and slams the door in your face? She'll get it hot and heavy before she has done. I know what she's after. She might as well cry for the moon." And so Dolly got into the trap and went to Bridport, and slept that night at the hotel at Dorchester. Lord Popplecourt, though he could give such excellent advice to his friend, had been able as yet to do very little in his own case. He had been a week at Custins, and had said not a word to denote his passion. Day after day he had prepared himself for the encounter, but the lady had never given him the opportunity. When he sat next to her at dinner she would be very silent. If he stayed at home on a morning she was not visible. During the short evenings he could never get her attention. And he made no progress with the Duke. The Duke had been very courteous to him at Richmond, but here he was monosyllabic and almost sullen. Once or twice Lord Popplecourt had a little conversation with Lady Cantrip. "Dear girl!" said her ladyship. "She is so little given to seeking admiration." "I dare say." "Girls are so different, Lord Popplecourt. With some of them it seems that a gentleman need have no trouble in explaining what it is that he wishes." "I don't think Lady Mary is like that at all." "Not in the least. Any one who addresses her must be prepared to explain himself fully. Nor ought he to hope to get much encouragement at first. I do not think that Lady Mary will bestow her heart till she is sure she can give it with safety." There was an amount of falsehood in this which was proof at any rate of very strong friendship on the part of Lady Cantrip. After a few days Lady Mary became more intimate with the American and his daughter than with any others of the party. Perhaps she liked to talk about the Scandinavian poets, of whom Mr. Boncassen was so fond. Perhaps she felt sure that her transatlantic friend would not make love to her. Perhaps it was that she yielded to the various allurements of Miss Boncassen. Miss Boncassen saw the Duke of Omnium for the first time at Custins, and there had the first opportunity of asking herself how such a man as that would receive from his son and heir such an announcement as Lord Silverbridge would have to make him should she at the end of three months accept his offer. She was quite aware that Lord Silverbridge need not repeat the offer unless he were so pleased. But she thought that he would come again. He had so spoken that she was sure of his love; and had so spoken as to obtain hers. Yes;--she was sure that she loved him. She had never seen anything like him before;--so glorious in his beauty, so gentle in his manhood, so powerful and yet so little imperious, so great in condition, and yet so little confident in his own greatness, so bolstered up with external advantages, and so little apt to trust anything but his own heart and his own voice. In asking for her love he had put forward no claim but his own love. She was glad he was what he was. She counted at their full value all his natural advantages. To be an English Duchess! Oh--yes; her ambition understood it all! But she loved him, because in the expression of his love no hint had fallen from him of the greatness of the benefits which he could confer upon her. Yes, she would like to be a Duchess; but not to be a Duchess would she become the wife of a man who should begin his courtship by assuming a superiority. Now the chances of society had brought her into the company of his nearest friends. She was in the house with his father and with his sister. Now and again the Duke spoke a few words to her, and always did so with a peculiar courtesy. But she was sure that the Duke had heard nothing of his son's courtship. And she was equally sure that the matter had not reached Lady Mary's ears. She perceived that the Duke and her father would often converse together. Mr. Boncassen would discuss republicanism generally, and the Duke would explain that theory of monarchy as it prevails in England, which but very few Americans have ever been made to understand. All this Miss Boncassen watched with pleasure. She was still of opinion that it would not become her to force her way into a family which would endeavour to repudiate her. She would not become this young man's wife if all connected with the young man were resolved to reject the contact. But if she could conquer them,--then,--then she thought that she could put her little hand into that young man's grasp with a happy heart. It was in this frame of mind that she laid herself out not unsuccessfully to win the esteem of Lady Mary Palliser. "I do not know whether you approve it," Lady Cantrip said to the Duke; "but Mary has become very intimate with our new American friend." At this time Lady Cantrip had become very nervous,--so as almost to wish that Lady Mary's difficulties might be unravelled elsewhere than at Custins. "They seem to be sensible people," said the Duke. "I don't know when I have met a man with higher ideas on politics than Mr. Boncassen." "His daughter is popular with everybody." "A nice ladylike girl," said the Duke, "and appears to have been well educated." It was now near the end of October, and the weather was peculiarly fine. Perhaps in our climate, October would of all months be the most delightful if something of its charms were not detracted from by the feeling that with it will depart the last relics of the delights of summer. The leaves are still there with their gorgeous colouring, but they are going. The last rose still lingers on the bush, but it is the last. The woodland walks are still pleasant to the feet, but caution is heard on every side as to the coming winter. The park at Custins, which was spacious, had many woodland walks attached to it, from which, through vistas of the timber, distant glimpses of the sea were caught. Within half a mile of the house the woods were reached, and within a mile the open sea was in sight,--and yet the wanderers might walk for miles without going over the same ground. Here, without other companions, Lady Mary and Miss Boncassen found themselves one afternoon, and here the latter told her story to her lover's sister. "I so long to tell you something," she said. "Is it a secret?" asked Lady Mary. "Well; yes; it is,--if you will keep it so. I would rather you should keep it a secret. But I will tell you." Then she stood still, looking into the other's face. "I wonder how you will take it." "What can it be?" "Your brother has asked me to be his wife." "Silverbridge!" "Yes;--Lord Silverbridge. You are astonished." Lady Mary was very much astonished,--so much astonished that words escaped from her, which she regretted afterwards. "I thought there was someone else." "Who else?" "Lady Mabel Grex. But I know nothing." "I think not," said Miss Boncassen slowly. "I have seen them together and I think not. There might be somebody, though I think not her. But why do I say that? Why do I malign him, and make so little of myself? There is no one else, Lady Mary. Is he not true?" "I think he is true." "I am sure he is true. And he has asked me to be his wife." "What did you say?" "Well;--what do you think? What is it probable that such a girl as I would say when such a man as your brother asks her to be his wife? Is he not such a man as a girl would love?" "Oh yes." "Is he not handsome as a god?" Mary stared at her with all her eyes. "And sweeter than any god those pagan races knew? And is he not good-tempered, and loving; and has he not that perfection of manly dash without which I do not think I could give my heart to any man?" "Then you have accepted him?" "And his rank and his wealth! The highest position in all the world in my eyes." "I do not think you should take him for that." "Does it not all help? Can you put yourself in my place? Why should I refuse him? No, not for that. I would not take him for that. But if I love him,--because he is all that my imagination tells me that a man ought to be;--if to be his wife seems to me to be the greatest bliss that could happen to a woman; if I feel that I could die to serve him, that I could live to worship him, that his touch would be sweet to me, his voice music, his strength the only support in the world on which I would care to lean,--what then?" "Is it so?" "Yes, it is so. It is after that fashion that I love him. He is my hero;--and not the less so because there is none higher than he among the nobles of the greatest land under the sun. Would you have me for a sister?" Lady Mary could not answer all at once. She had to think of her father;--and then she thought of her own lover. Why should not Silverbridge be as well entitled to his choice as she considered herself to be? And yet how would it be with her father? Silverbridge would in process of time be the head of the family. Would it be proper that he should marry an American? "You would not like me for a sister?" "I was thinking of my father. For myself I like you." "Shall I tell you what I said to him?" "If you will." "I told him that he must ask his friends;--that I would not be his wife to be rejected by them all. Nor will I. Though it be heaven I will not creep there through a hole. If I cannot go in with my head upright, I will not go even there." Then she turned round as though she were prepared in her emotion to walk back to the house alone. But Lady Mary ran after her, and having caught her, put her arm round her waist and kissed her. "I at any rate will love you," said Lady Mary. "I will do as I have said," continued Miss Boncassen. "I will do as I have said. Though I love your brother down to the ground he shall not marry me without his father's consent." Then they returned arm-in-arm close together; but very little more was said between them. When Lady Mary entered the house she was told that Lady Cantrip wished to see her in her own room. CHAPTER XLVIII The Party at Custins Is Broken Up The message was given to Lady Mary after so solemn a fashion that she was sure some important communication was to be made to her. Her mind at that moment had been filled with her new friend's story. She felt that she required some time to meditate before she could determine what she herself would wish; but when she was going to her own room, in order that she might think it over, she was summoned to Lady Cantrip. "My dear," said the Countess, "I wish you to do something to oblige me." "Of course I will." "Lord Popplecourt wants to speak to you." "Who?" "Lord Popplecourt." "What can Lord Popplecourt have to say to me?" "Can you not guess? Lord Popplecourt is a young nobleman, standing very high in the world, possessed of ample means, just in that position in which it behoves such a man to look about for a wife." Lady Mary pressed her lips together, and clenched her two hands. "Can you not imagine what such a gentleman may have to say?" Then there was a pause, but she made no immediate answer. "I am to tell you, my dear, that your father would approve of it." "Approve of what?" "He approves of Lord Popplecourt as a suitor for your hand." "How can he?" "Why not, Mary? Of course he has made it his business to ascertain all particulars as to Lord Popplecourt's character and property." "Papa knows that I love somebody else." "My dear Mary, that is all vanity." "I don't think that papa can want to see me married to a man when he knows that with all my heart and soul--" "Oh Mary!" "When he knows," continued Mary, who would not be put down, "that I love another man with all my heart. What will Lord Popplecourt say if I tell him that? If he says anything to me, I shall tell him. Lord Popplecourt! He cares for nothing but his coal-mines. Of course, if you bid me see him I will; but it can do no good. I despise him, and if he troubles me I shall hate him. As for marrying him,--I would sooner die this minute." After this Lady Cantrip did not insist on the interview. She expressed her regret that things should be as they were,--explained in sweetly innocent phrases that in a certain rank of life young ladies could not always marry the gentlemen to whom their fancies might attach them, but must, not unfrequently, postpone their youthful inclinations to the will of their elders,--or in less delicate language, that though they might love in one direction they must marry in another; and then expressed a hope that her dear Mary would think over these things and try to please her father. "Why does he not try to please me?" said Mary. Then Lady Cantrip was obliged to see Lord Popplecourt, a necessity which was a great nuisance to her. "Yes;--she understands what you mean. But she is not prepared for it yet. You must wait awhile." "I don't see why I am to wait." "She is very young,--and so are you, indeed. There is plenty of time." "There is somebody else I suppose." "I told you," said Lady Cantrip, in her softest voice, "that there has been a dream across her path." "It's that Tregear!" "I am not prepared to mention names," said Lady Cantrip, astonished that he should know so much. "But indeed you must wait." "I don't see it, Lady Cantrip." "What can I say more? If you think that such a girl as Lady Mary Palliser, the daughter of the Duke of Omnium, possessed of fortune, beauty, and every good gift, is to come like a bird to your call, you will find yourself mistaken. All that her friends can do for you will be done. The rest must remain with yourself." During that evening Lord Popplecourt endeavoured to make himself pleasant to one of the FitzHoward young ladies, and on the next morning he took his leave of Custins. "I will never interfere again in reference to anybody else's child as long as I live," Lady Cantrip said to her husband that night. Lady Mary was very much tempted to open her heart to Miss Boncassen. It would be delightful to her to have a friend; but were she to engage Miss Boncassen's sympathies on her behalf, she must of course sympathise with Miss Boncassen in return. And what if, after all, Silverbridge were not devoted to the American beauty! What if it should turn out that he was going to marry Lady Mabel Grex! "I wish you would call me Isabel," her friend said to her. "It is so odd,--since I have left New York I have never heard my name from any lips except father's and mother's." "Has not Silverbridge ever called you by your Christian name?" "I think not. I am sure he never has." But he had, though it had passed by her at the moment without attention. "It all came from him so suddenly. And yet I expected it. But it was too sudden for Christian names and pretty talk. I do not even know what his name is." "Plantagenet;--but we always call him Silverbridge." "Plantagenet is very much prettier. I shall always call him Plantagenet. But I recall that. You will not remember that against me?" "I will remember nothing that you do not wish." "I mean that if,--if all the grandeurs of all the Pallisers could consent to put up with poor me, if heaven were opened to me with a straight gate, so that I could walk out of our republic into your aristocracy with my head erect, with the stars and stripes waving proudly round me till I had been accepted into the shelter of the Omnium griffins,--then I would call him--" "There's one Palliser would welcome you." "Would you, dear? Then I will love you so dearly. May I call you Mary?" "Of course you may." "Mary is the prettiest name under the sun. But Plantagenet is so grand! Which of the kings did you branch off from?" "I know nothing about it. From none of them, I should think. There is some story about a Sir Guy who was a king's friend. I never trouble myself about it. I hate aristocracy." "Do you, dear?" "Yes," said Mary, full of her own grievances. "It is an abominable bondage, and I do not see that it does any good at all." "I think it is so glorious," said the American. "There is no such mischievous nonsense in all the world as equality. That is what father says. What men ought to want is liberty." "It is terrible to be tied up in a small circle," said the Duke's daughter. "What do you mean, Lady Mary?" "I thought you were to call me Mary. What I mean is this. Suppose that Silverbridge loves you better than all the world." "I hope he does. I think he does." "And suppose he cannot marry you, because of his--aristocracy?" "But he can." "I thought you were saying yourself--" "Saying what? That he could not marry me! No, indeed! But that under certain circumstances I would not marry him. You don't suppose that I think he would be disgraced? If so I would go away at once, and he should never again see my face or hear my voice. I think myself good enough for the best man God ever made. But if others think differently, and those others are so closely concerned with him, and would be so closely concerned with me, as to trouble our joint lives,--then will I neither subject him to such sorrow nor will I encounter it myself." "It all comes from what you call aristocracy." "No, dear;--but from the prejudices of an aristocracy. To tell the truth, Mary, the more difficult a place is to get into, the more the right of going in is valued. If everybody could be a Duchess and a Palliser, I should not perhaps think so much about it." "I thought it was because you loved him." "So I do. I love him entirely. I have said not a word of that to him;--but I do, if I know at all what love is. But if you love a star, the pride you have in your star will enhance your love. Though you know that you must die of your love, still you must love your star." And yet Mary could not tell her tale in return. She could not show the reverse picture;--that she being a star was anxious to dispose of herself after the fashion of poor human rushlights. It was not that she was ashamed of her love, but that she could not bring herself to yield altogether in reference to the great descent which Silverbridge would have to make. On the day after this,--the last day of the Duke's sojourn at Custins, the last also of the Boncassens' visit,--it came to pass that the Duke and Mr. Boncassen, with Lady Mary and Isabel, were all walking in the woods together. And it so happened when they were at a little distance from the house, each of the girls was walking with the other girl's father. Isabel had calculated what she would say to the Duke should a time for speaking come to her. She could not tell him of his son's love. She could not ask his permission. She could not explain to him all her feelings, or tell him what she thought of her proper way of getting into heaven. That must come afterwards if it should ever come at all. But there was something that she could tell. "We are so different from you," she said, speaking of her own country. "And yet so like," said the Duke, smiling;--"your language, your laws, your habits!" "But still there is such a difference! I do not think there is a man in the whole Union more respected than father." "I dare say not." "Many people think that if he would only allow himself to be put in nomination, he might be the next president." "The choice, I am sure, would do your country honour." "And yet his father was a poor labourer who earned his bread among the shipping at New York. That kind of thing would be impossible here." "My dear young lady, there you wrong us." "Do I?" "Certainly! A Prime Minister with us might as easily come from the same class." "Here you think so much of rank. You are--a Duke." "But a Prime Minister can make a Duke; and if a man can raise himself by his own intellect to that position, no one will think of his father or his grandfather. The sons of merchants have with us been Prime Ministers more than once, and no Englishmen ever were more honoured among their countrymen. Our peerage is being continually recruited from the ranks of the people, and hence it gets its strength." "Is it so?" "There is no greater mistake than to suppose that inferiority of birth is a barrier to success in this country." She listened to this and to much more on the same subject with attentive ears,--not shaken in her ideas as to the English aristocracy in general, but thinking that she was perhaps learning something of his own individual opinions. If he were more liberal than others, on that liberality might perhaps be based her own happiness and fortune. He, in all this, was quite unconscious of the working of her mind. Nor in discussing such matters generally did he ever mingle his own private feelings, his own pride of race and name, his own ideas of what was due to his ancient rank with the political creed by which his conduct in public life was governed. The peer who sat next to him in the House of Lords, whose grandmother had been a washerwoman and whose father an innkeeper, was to him every whit as good a peer as himself. And he would as soon sit in counsel with Mr. Monk, whose father had risen from a mechanic to be a merchant, as with any nobleman who could count ancestors against himself. But there was an inner feeling in his bosom as to his own family, his own name, his own children, and his own personal self, which was kept altogether apart from his grand political theories. It was a subject on which he never spoke; but the feeling had come to him as a part of his birthright. And he conceived that it would pass through him to his children after the same fashion. It was this which made the idea of a marriage between his daughter and Tregear intolerable to him, and which would operate as strongly in regard to any marriage which his son might contemplate. Lord Grex was not a man with whom he would wish to form any intimacy. He was, we may say, a wretched unprincipled old man, bad all round; and such the Duke knew him to be. But the blue blood and the rank were there; and as the girl was good herself, he would have been quite contented that his son should marry the daughter of Lord Grex. That one and the same man should have been in one part of himself so unlike the other part,--that he should have one set of opinions so contrary to another set,--poor Isabel Boncassen did not understand. CHAPTER XLIX The Major's Fate The affair of Prime Minister and the nail was not allowed to fade away into obscurity. Through September and October it was made matter for pungent inquiry. The Jockey Club was alive. Mr. Pook was very instant,--with many Pookites anxious to free themselves from suspicion. Sporting men declared that the honour of the turf required that every detail of the case should be laid open. But by the end of October, though every detail had been surmised, nothing had in truth been discovered. Nobody doubted but that Tifto had driven the nail into the horse's foot, and that Green and Gilbert Villiers had shared the bulk of the plunder. They had gone off on their travels together, and the fact that each of them had been in possession of about twenty thousand pounds was proved. But then there is no law against two gentlemen having such a sum of money. It was notorious that Captain Green and Mr. Gilbert Villiers had enriched themselves to this extent by the failure of Prime Minister. But yet nothing was proved! That the Major had either himself driven in the nail or seen it done, all racing men were agreed. He had been out with the horse in the morning and had been the first to declare that the animal was lame. And he had been with the horse till the farrier had come. But he had concocted a story for himself. He did not dispute that the horse had been lamed by the machinations of Green and Villiers,--with the assistance of the groom. No doubt, he said, these men, who had been afraid to face an inquiry, had contrived and had carried out the iniquity. How the lameness had been caused he could not pretend to say. The groom who was at the horse's head, and who evidently knew how these things were done, might have struck a nerve in the horse's foot with his boot. But when the horse was got into the stable he, Tifto,--so he declared,--at once ran out to send for the farrier. During the minutes so occupied the operation must have been made with the nail. That was Tifto's story,--and as he kept his ground, there were some few who believed it. But though the story was so far good, he had at moments been imprudent, and had talked when he should have been silent. The whole matter had been a torment to him. In the first place his conscience made him miserable. As long as it had been possible to prevent the evil he had hoped to make a clean breast of it to Lord Silverbridge. Up to this period of his life everything had been "square" with him. He had betted "square," and had ridden "square," and had run horses "square." He had taken a pride in this, as though it had been a great virtue. It was not without great inward grief that he had deprived himself of the consolations of these reflections! But when he had approached his noble partner, his noble partner snubbed him at every turn,--and he did the deed. His reward was to be three thousand pounds,--and he got his money. The money was very much to him,--would perhaps have been almost enough to comfort him in his misery, had not those other rascals got so much more. When he heard that the groom's fee was higher than his own, it almost broke his heart. Green and Villiers, men of infinitely lower standing,--men at whom the Beargarden would not have looked,--had absolutely netted fortunes on which they could live in comfort. No doubt they had run away while Tifto still stood his ground;--but he soon began to doubt whether to have run away with twenty thousand pounds was not better than to remain with such small plunder as had fallen to his lot, among such faces as those which now looked upon him! Then when he had drunk a few glasses of whisky-and-water, he said something very foolish as to his power of punishing that swindler Green. An attempt had been made to induce Silverbridge to delay the payment of his bets;--but he had been very eager that they should be paid. Under the joint auspices of Mr. Lupton and Mr. Moreton the horses were sold, and the establishment was annihilated,--with considerable loss, but with great despatch. The Duke had been urgent. The Jockey Club, and the racing world, and the horsey fraternity generally, might do what seemed to them good,--so that Silverbridge was extricated from the matter. Silverbridge was extricated,--and the Duke cared nothing for the rest. But Silverbridge could not get out of the mess quite so easily as his father wished. Two questions arose about Major Tifto, outside the racing world, but within the domain of the world of sport and pleasure generally, as to one of which it was impossible that Silverbridge should not express an opinion. The first question had reference to the Mastership of the Runnymede hounds. In this our young friend was not bound to concern himself. The other affected the Beargarden Club; and, as Lord Silverbridge had introduced the Major, he could hardly forbear from the expression of an opinion. There was a meeting of the subscribers to the hunt in the last week of October. At that meeting Major Tifto told his story. There he was, to answer any charge which might be brought against him. If he had made money by losing the race,--where was it and whence had it come? Was it not clear that a conspiracy might have been made without his knowledge;--and clear also that the real conspirators had levanted? He had not levanted! The hounds were his own. He had undertaken to hunt the country for this season, and they had undertaken to pay him a certain sum of money. He should expect and demand that sum of money. If they chose to make any other arrangement for the year following they could do so. Then he sat down and the meeting was adjourned,--the secretary having declared that he would not act in that capacity any longer, nor collect the funds. A farmer had also asserted that he and his friends had resolved that Major Tifto should not ride over their fields. On the next day the Major had his hounds out, and some of the London men, with a few of the neighbours, joined him. Gates were locked; but the hounds ran, and those who chose to ride managed to follow them. There are men who will stick to their sport though Apollyon himself should carry the horn. Who cares whether the lady who fills a theatre be or be not a moral young woman, or whether the bandmaster who keeps such excellent time in a ball has or has not paid his debts? There were men of this sort who supported Major Tifto;--but then there was a general opinion that the Runnymede hunt would come to an end unless a new Master could be found. Then in the first week in November a special meeting was called at the Beargarden, at which Lord Silverbridge was asked to attend. "It is impossible that he should be allowed to remain in the club." This was said to Lord Silverbridge by Mr. Lupton. "Either he must go or the club must be broken up." Silverbridge was very unhappy on the occasion. He had at last been reasoned into believing that the horse had been made the victim of foul play; but he persisted in saying that there was no conclusive evidence against Tifto. The matter was argued with him. Tifto had laid bets against the horse; Tifto had been hand-and-glove with Green; Tifto could not have been absent from the horse above two minutes; the thing could not have been arranged without Tifto. As he had brought Tifto into the club, and had been his partner on the turf, it was his business to look into the matter. "But for all that," said he, "I'm not going to jump on a man when he's down, unless I feel sure that he's guilty." Then the meeting was held, and Tifto himself appeared. When the accusation was made by Mr. Lupton, who proposed that he should be expelled, he burst into tears. The whole story was repeated,--the nail, and the hammer, and the lameness; and the moments were counted up, and poor Tifto's bets and friendship with Green were made apparent,--and the case was submitted to the club. An old gentleman who had been connected with the turf all his life, and who would not have scrupled, by square betting, to rob his dearest friend of his last shilling, seconded the proposition,--telling all the story over again. Then Major Tifto was asked whether he wished to say anything. "I've got to say that I'm here," said Tifto, still crying, "and if I'd done anything of that kind, of course I'd have gone with the rest of 'em. I put it to Lord Silverbridge to say whether I'm that sort of fellow." Then he sat down. Upon this there was a pause, and the club was manifestly of opinion that Lord Silverbridge ought to say something. "I think that Major Tifto should not have betted against the horse," said Silverbridge. "I can explain that," said the Major. "Let me explain that. Everybody knows that I'm a man of small means. I wanted to 'edge, I only wanted to 'edge." Mr. Lupton shook his head. "Why have you not shown me your book?" "I told you before that it was stolen. Green got hold of it. I did win a little. I never said I didn't. But what has that to do with hammering a nail into a horse's foot? I have always been true to you, Lord Silverbridge, and you ought to stick up for me now." "I will have nothing further to do with the matter," said Silverbridge, "one way or the other," and he walked out of the room,--and out of the club. The affair was ended by a magnanimous declaration on the part of Major Tifto that he would not remain in a club in which he was suspected, and by a consent on the part of the meeting to receive the Major's instant resignation. CHAPTER L The Duke's Arguments The Duke before he left Custins had an interview with Lady Cantrip, at which that lady found herself called upon to speak her mind freely. "I don't think she cares about Lord Popplecourt," Lady Cantrip said. "I am sure I don't know why she should," said the Duke, who was often very aggravating even to his friend. "But as we had thought--" "She ought to do as she is told," said the Duke, remembering how obedient his Glencora had been. "Has he spoken to her?" "I think not." "Then how can we tell?" "I asked her to see him, but she expressed so much dislike that I could not press it. I am afraid, Duke, that you will find it difficult to deal with her." "I have found it very difficult!" "As you have trusted me so much--" "Yes;--I have trusted you, and do trust you. I hope you understand that I appreciate your kindness." "Perhaps then you will let me say what I think." "Certainly, Lady Cantrip." "Mary is a very peculiar girl,--with great gifts,--but--" "But what?" "She is obstinate. Perhaps it would be fairer to say that she has great firmness of character. It is within your power to separate her from Mr. Tregear. It would be foreign to her character to--to--leave you, except with your approbation." "You mean, she will not run away." "She will do nothing without your permission. But she will remain unmarried unless she be allowed to marry Mr. Tregear." "What do you advise then?" "That you should yield. As regards money, you could give them what they want. Let him go into public life. You could manage that for him." "He is Conservative!" "What does that matter when the question is one of your daughter's happiness? Everybody tells me that he is clever and well conducted." He betrayed nothing by his face as this was said to him. But as he got into the carriage he was a miserable man. It is very well to tell a man that he should yield, but there is nothing so wretched to a man as yielding. Young people and women have to yield,--but for such a man as this, to yield is in itself a misery. In this matter the Duke was quite certain of the propriety of his judgment. To yield would be not only to mortify himself, but to do wrong at the same time. He had convinced himself that the Popplecourt arrangement would come to nothing. Nor had he and Lady Cantrip combined been able to exercise over her the sort of power to which Lady Glencora had been subjected. If he persevered,--and he still was sure, almost sure, that he would persevere,--his object must be achieved after a different fashion. There must be infinite suffering,--suffering both to him and to her. Could she have been made to consent to marry someone else, terrible as the rupture might have been, she would have reconciled herself at last to her new life. So it had been with his Glencora, after a time. Now the misery must go on from day to day beneath his eyes, with the knowledge on his part that he was crushing all joy out of her young life, and the conviction on her part that she was being treated with continued cruelty by her father! It was a terrible prospect! But if it was manifestly his duty to act after this fashion, must he not do his duty? If he were to find that by persevering in this course he would doom her to death, or perchance to madness,--what then? If it were right, he must still do it. He must still do it, if the weakness incident to his human nature did not rob him of the necessary firmness. If every foolish girl were indulged, all restraint would be lost, and there would be an end to those rules as to birth and position by which he thought his world was kept straight. And then, mixed with all this, was his feeling of the young man's arrogance in looking for such a match. Here was a man without a shilling, whose manifest duty it was to go to work so that he might earn his bread, who instead of doing so, had hoped to raise himself to wealth and position by entrapping the heart of an unwary girl! There was something to the Duke's thinking base in this, and much more base because the unwary girl was his own daughter. That such a man as Tregear should make an attack upon him and select his rank, his wealth, and his child as the stepping-stones by which he intended to rise! What could be so mean as that a man should seek to live by looking out for a wife with money? But what so impudent, so arrogant, so unblushingly disregardful of propriety, as that he should endeavour to select his victim from such a family as that of the Pallisers, and that he should lay his impious hand on the very daughter of the Duke of Omnium? But together with all this there came upon him moments of ineffable tenderness. He felt as though he longed to take her in his arms and tell her, that if she were unhappy, so would he be unhappy too,--to make her understand that a hard necessity had made this sorrow common to them both. He thought that, if she would only allow it, he could speak of her love as a calamity which had befallen them, as from the hand of fate, and not as a fault. If he could make a partnership in misery with her, so that each might believe that each was acting for the best, then he could endure all that might come. But, as he was well aware, she regarded him as being simply cruel to her. She did not understand that he was performing an imperative duty. She had set her heart upon a certain object, and having taught herself that in that way happiness might be reached, had no conception that there should be something in the world, some idea of personal dignity, more valuable to her than the fruition of her own desires! And yet every word he spoke to her was affectionate. He knew that she was bruised, and if it might be possible he would pour oil into her wounds,--even though she would not recognise the hand which relieved her. They slept one night in town,--where they encountered Silverbridge soon after his retreat from the Beargarden. "I cannot quite make up my mind, sir, about that fellow Tifto," he said to his father. "I hope you have made up your mind that he is no fit companion for yourself." "That's over. Everybody understands that, sir." "Is anything more necessary?" "I don't like feeling that he has been ill-used. They have made him resign the club, and I fancy they won't have him at the hunt." "He has lost no money by you?" "Oh no." "Then I think you may be indifferent. From all that I hear I think he must have won money,--which will probably be a consolation to him." "I think they have been hard upon him," continued Silverbridge. "Of course he is not a good man, nor a gentleman, nor possessed of very high feelings. But a man is not to be sacrificed altogether for that. There are so many men who are not gentlemen, and so many gentlemen who are bad fellows." "I have no doubt Mr. Lupton knew what he was about," replied the Duke. On the next morning the Duke and Lady Mary went down to Matching, and as they sat together in the carriage after leaving the railway the father endeavoured to make himself pleasant to his daughter. "I suppose we shall stay at Matching now till Christmas," he said. "I hope so." "Whom would you like to have here?" "I don't want any one, papa." "You will be very sad without somebody. Would you like the Finns?" "If you please, papa. I like her. He never talks anything but politics." "He is none the worse for that, Mary. I wonder whether Lady Mabel Grex would come." "Lady Mabel Grex!" "Do you not like her?" "Oh yes, I like her;--but what made you think of her, papa?" "Perhaps Silverbridge would come to us then." Lady Mary thought that she knew a great deal more about that than her father did. "Is he fond of Lady Mabel, papa?" "Well,--I don't know. There are secrets which should not be told. I think they are very good friends. I would not have her asked unless it would please you." "I like her very much, papa." "And perhaps we might get the Boncassens to come to us. I did say a word to him about it." Now, as Mary felt, difficulty was heaping itself upon difficulty. "I have seldom met a man in whose company I could take more pleasure than in that of Mr. Boncassen; and the young lady seems to be worthy of her father." Mary was silent, feeling the complication of the difficulties. "Do you not like her?" asked the Duke. "Very much indeed," said Mary. "Then let us fix a day and ask them. If you will come to me after dinner with an almanac we will arrange it. Of course you will invite that Miss Cassewary too?" The complication seemed to be very bad indeed. In the first place was it not clear that she, Lady Mary, ought not to be a party to asking Miss Boncassen to meet her brother at Matching? Would it not be imperative on her part to tell her father the whole story? And yet how could she do that? It had been told her in confidence, and she remembered what her own feelings had been when Mrs. Finn had suggested the propriety of telling the story which had been told to her! And how would it be possible to ask Lady Mabel to come to Matching to meet Miss Boncassen in the presence of Silverbridge? If the party could be made up without Silverbridge things might run smoothly. As she was thinking of this in her own room, thinking also how happy she could be if one other name might be added to the list of guests, the Duke had gone alone into his library. There a pile of letters reached him, among which he found one marked "Private," and addressed in a hand which he did not recognise. This he opened suddenly,--with a conviction that it would contain a thorn,--and, turning over the page, found the signature to it was "Francis Tregear." The man's name was wormwood to him. He at once felt that he would wish to have his dinner, his fragment of a dinner, brought to him in that solitary room, and that he might remain secluded for the rest of the evening. But still he must read the letter;--and he read it. MY DEAR LORD DUKE, If my mode of addressing your Grace be too familiar I hope you will excuse it. It seems to me that if I were to use one more distant, I should myself be detracting something from my right to make the claim which I intend to put forward. You know what my feelings are in reference to your daughter. I do not pretend to suppose that they should have the least weight with you. But you know also what her feelings are for me. A man seems to be vain when he expresses his conviction of a woman's love for himself. But this matter is so important to her as well as to me that I am compelled to lay aside all pretence. If she do not love me as I love her, then the whole thing drops to the ground. Then it will be for me to take myself off from out of your notice,--and from hers, and to keep to myself whatever heart-breaking I may have to undergo. But if she be as steadfast in this matter as I am,--if her happiness be fixed on marrying me as mine is on marrying her,--then, I think, I am entitled to ask you whether you are justified in keeping us apart. I know well what are the discrepancies. Speaking from my own feeling I regard very little those of rank. I believe myself to be as good a gentleman as though my father's forefathers had sat for centuries past in the House of Lords. I believe that you would have thought so also, had you and I been brought in contact on any other subject. The discrepancy in regard to money is, I own, a great trouble to me. Having no wealth of my own I wish that your daughter were so circumstanced that I could go out into the world and earn bread for her. I know myself so well that I dare say positively that her money,--if it be that she will have money,--had no attractions for me when I first became acquainted with her, and adds nothing now to the persistency with which I claim her hand. But I venture to ask whether you can dare to keep us apart if her happiness depends on her love for me? It is now more than six months since I called upon you in London and explained my wishes. You will understand me when I say that I cannot be contented to sit idle, trusting simply to the assurance which I have of her affection. Did I doubt it, my way would be more clear. I should feel in that case that she would yield to your wishes, and I should then, as I have said before, just take myself out of the way. But if it be not so, then I am bound to do something,--on her behalf as well as my own. What am I to do? Any endeavour to meet her clandestinely is against my instincts, and would certainly be rejected by her. A secret correspondence would be equally distasteful to both of us. Whatever I do in this matter, I wish you to know that I do it. Yours always, Most faithfully, and with the greatest respect, FRANCIS TREGEAR. He read the letter very carefully, and at first was simply astonished by what he considered to be the unparalleled arrogance of the young man. In regard to rank this young gentleman thought himself to be as good as anybody else! In regard to money he did acknowledge some inferiority. But that was a misfortune, and could not be helped! Not only was the letter arrogant;--but the fact that he should dare to write any letter on such a subject was proof of most unpardonable arrogance. The Duke walked about the room thinking of it till he was almost in a passion. Then he read the letter again and was gradually pervaded by a feeling of its manliness. Its arrogance remained, but with its arrogance there was a certain boldness which induced respect. Whether I am such a son-in-law as you would like or not, it is your duty to accept me, if by refusing to do so you will render your daughter miserable. That was Mr. Tregear's argument. He himself might be prepared to argue in answer that it was his duty to reject such a son-in-law, even though by rejecting him he might make his daughter miserable. He was not shaken; but with his condemnation of the young man there was mingled something of respect. He continued to digest the letter before the hour of dinner, and when the almanac was brought to him he fixed on certain days. The Boncassens he knew would be free from engagements in ten days' time. As to Lady Mabel, he seemed to think it almost certain that she would come. "I believe she is always going about from one house to another at this time of the year," said Mary. "I think she will come to us if it be possible," said the Duke. "And you must write to Silverbridge." "And what about Mr. and Mrs. Finn?" "She promised she would come again, you know. They are at their own place in Surrey. They will come unless they have friends with them. They have no shooting, and nothing brings people together now except shooting. I suppose there are things here to be shot. And be sure you write to Silverbridge." CHAPTER LI The Duke's Guests "The Duke of Omnium presents his compliments to Mr. Francis Tregear, and begs to acknowledge the receipt of Mr. Tregear's letter of ----. The Duke has no other communication to make to Mr. Tregear, and must beg to decline any further correspondence." This was the reply which the Duke wrote to the applicant for his daughter's hand. And he wrote it at once. He had acknowledged to himself that Tregear had shown a certain manliness in his appeal; but not on that account was such a man to have all that he demanded! It seemed to the Duke that there was no alternative between such a note as that given above and a total surrender. But the post did not go out during the night, and the note lay hidden in the Duke's private drawer till the morning. There was still that "locus poenitentiæ" which should be accorded to all letters written in anger. During the day he thought over it all constantly, not in any spirit of yielding, not descending a single step from that altitude of conviction which made him feel that it might be his duty absolutely to sacrifice his daughter,--but asking himself whether it might not be well that he should explain the whole matter at length to the young man. He thought he could put the matter strongly. It was not by his own doing that he belonged to an aristocracy which, if all exclusiveness were banished from it, must cease to exist. But being what he was, having been born to such privileges and such limitations, was he not bound in duty to maintain a certain exclusiveness? He would appeal to the young man himself to say whether marriage ought to be free between all classes of the community. And if not between all, who was to maintain the limits but they to whom authority in such matters is given? So much in regard to rank! And then he would ask this young man whether he thought it fitting that a young man whose duty, according to all known principles, it must be to earn his bread, should avoid that manifest duty by taking a wife who could maintain him. As he roamed about his park alone he felt that he could write such a letter as would make an impression even upon a lover. But when he had come back to his study, other reflections came to his aid. Though he might write the most appropriate letter in the world, would there not certainly be a reply? As to conviction, had he ever known an instance of a man who had been convinced by an adversary? Of course there would be a reply,--and replies. And to such a correspondence there would be no visible end. Words when once written remain, or may remain, in testimony for ever. So at last when the moment came he sent off those three lines, with his uncourteous compliments and his demand that there should be no further correspondence. At dinner he endeavoured to make up for this harshness by increased tenderness to his daughter, who was altogether ignorant of the correspondence. "Have you written your letters, dear?" She said she had written them. "I hope the people will come." "If it will make you comfortable, papa!" "It is for your sake I wish them to be here. I think that Lady Mabel and Miss Boncassen are just such girls as you would like." "I do like them; only--" "Only what?" "Miss Boncassen is an American." "Is that an objection? According to my ideas it is desirable to become acquainted with persons of various nations. I have heard, no doubt, many stories of the awkward manners displayed by American ladies. If you look for them you may probably find American women who are not polished. I do not think I shall calumniate my own country if I say the same of English women. It should be our object to select for our own acquaintances the best we can find of all countries. It seems to me that Miss Boncassen is a young lady with whom any other young lady might be glad to form an acquaintance." This was a little sermon which Mary was quite contented to endure in silence. She was, in truth, fond of the young American beauty, and had felt a pleasure in the intimacy which the girl had proposed to her. But she thought it inexpedient that Miss Boncassen, Lady Mabel, and Silverbridge should be at Matching together. Therefore she made a reply to her father's sermon which hardly seemed to go to the point at issue. "She is so beautiful!" she said. "Very beautiful," said the Duke. "But what has that to do with it? My girl need not be jealous of any girl's beauty." Mary laughed and shook her head. "What is it, then?" "Perhaps Silverbridge might admire her." "I have no doubt he would,--or does, for I am aware that they have met. But why should he not admire her?" "I don't know," said Lady Mary sheepishly. "I fancy that there is no danger in that direction. I think Silverbridge understands what is expected from him." Had not Silverbridge plainly shown that he understood what was expected from him when he selected Lady Mabel? Nothing could have been more proper, and the Duke had been altogether satisfied. That in such a matter there should have been a change in so short a time did not occur to him. Poor Mary was now completely silenced. She had been told that Silverbridge understood what was expected from him; and of course could not fail to carry home to herself an accusation that she failed to understand what was expected from her. She had written her letters, but had not as yet sent them. Those to Mrs. Finn and to the two young ladies had been easy enough. Could Mr. and Mrs. Finn come to Matching on the 20th of November? "Papa says that you promised to return, and thinks this time will perhaps suit you." And then to Lady Mabel: "Do come if you can; and papa particularly says that he hopes Miss Cassewary will come also." To Miss Boncassen she had written a long letter, but that too had been written very easily. "I write to you instead of your mamma, because I know you. You must tell her that, and then she will not be angry. I am only papa's messenger, and I am to say how much he hopes that you will come on the 20th. Mr. Boncassen is to bring the whole British Museum if he wishes." Then there was a little postscript which showed that there was already considerable intimacy between the two young ladies. "We won't have either Mr. L. or Lord P." Not a word was said about Lord Silverbridge. There was not even an initial to indicate his name. But the letter to her brother was more difficult. In her epistles to those others she had so framed her words as if possible to bring them to Matching. But in writing to her brother, she was anxious so to write as to deter him from coming. She was bound to obey her father's commands. He had desired that Silverbridge should be asked to come,--and he was asked to come. But she craftily endeavoured so to word the invitation that he should be induced to remain away. "It is all papa's doing," she said; "and I am glad that he should like to have people here. I have asked the Finns, with whom papa seems to have made up everything. Mr. Warburton will be here of course, and I think Mr. Moreton is coming. He seems to think that a certain amount of shooting ought to be done. Then I have invited Lady Mabel Grex and Miss Cassewary,--all of papa's choosing, and the Boncassens. Now you will know whether the set will suit you. Papa has particularly begged that you will come,--apparently because of Lady Mabel. I don't at all know what that means. Perhaps you do. As I like Lady Mabel, I hope she will come." Surely Silverbridge would not run himself into the jaws of the lion. When he heard that he was specially expected by his father to come to Matching in order that he might make himself agreeable to one young lady, he would hardly venture to come, seeing that he would be bound to make love to another young lady! To Mary's great horror, all the invitations were accepted. Mr. and Mrs. Finn were quite at the Duke's disposal. That she had expected. The Boncassens would all come. This was signified in a note from Isabel, which covered four sides of the paper and was full of fun. But under her signature had been written a few words,--not in fun,--words which Lady Mary perfectly understood. "I wonder, I wonder, I wonder!" Did the Duke when inviting her know anything of his son's inclinations? Would he be made to know them now, during this visit? And what would he say when he did know them? That the Boncassens would come was a matter of course; but Mary had thought that Lady Mabel would refuse. She had told Lady Mabel that the Boncassens had been asked, and to her thinking it had not been improbable that the young lady would be unwilling to meet her rival at Matching. But the invitation was accepted. But it was her brother's ready acquiescence which troubled Mary chiefly. He wrote as though there were no doubt about the matter. "Of course there is a deal of shooting to be done," he said, "and I consider myself bound to look after it. There ought not to be less than four guns,--particularly if Warburton is to be one of them. I like Warburton very much, and I think he shoots badly to ingratiate himself with the governor. I wonder whether the governor would get leave for Gerald for a week. He has been sticking to his work like a brick. If not, would he mind my bringing someone? You ask the governor and let me know. I'll be there on the 20th. I wonder whether they'll let me hear what goes on among them about politics. I'm sure there is not one of them hates Sir Timothy worse than I do. Lady Mab is a brick, and I'm glad you have asked her. I don't think she'll come, as she likes shutting herself up at Grex. Miss Boncassen is another brick. And if you can manage about Gerald I will say that you are a third." This would have been all very well had she not known that secret. Could it be that Miss Boncassen had been mistaken? She was forced to write again to say that her father did not think it right that Gerald should be brought away from his studies for the sake of shooting, and that the necessary fourth gun would be there in the person of one Barrington Erle. Then she added: "Lady Mabel Grex is coming, and so is Miss Boncassen." But to this she received no reply. Though Silverbridge had written to his sister in his usual careless style, he had considered the matter much. The three months were over. He had no idea of any hesitation on his part. He had asked her to be his wife, and he was determined to go on with his suit. Had he ever been enabled to make the same request to Mabel Grex, or had she answered him when he did half make it in a serious manner, he would have been true to her. He had not told his father, or his sister, or his friends, as Isabel had suggested. He would not do so till he should have received some more certain answer from her. But in respect to his love he was prepared to be quite as obstinate as his sister. It was a matter for his own consideration, and he would choose for himself. The three months were over, and it was now his business to present himself to the lady again. That Lady Mabel should also be at Matching, would certainly be a misfortune. He thought it probable that she, knowing that Isabel Boncassen and he would be there together, would refuse the invitation. Surely she ought to do so. That was his opinion when he wrote to his sister. When he heard afterwards that she intended to be there, he could only suppose that she was prepared to accept the circumstances as they stood. CHAPTER LII Miss Boncassen Tells the Truth On the 20th of the month all the guests came rattling in at Matching one after another. The Boncassens were the first, but Lady Mabel with Miss Cassewary followed them quickly. Then came the Finns, and with them Barrington Erle. Lord Silverbridge was the last. He arrived by a train which reached the station at 7 P.M., and only entered the house as his father was taking Mrs. Boncassen into the dining-room. He dressed himself in ten minutes, and joined the party as they had finished their fish. "I am awfully sorry," he said, rushing up to his father, "but I thought that I should just hit it." "There is no occasion for awe," said the Duke, "as a sufficiency of dinner is left. But how you should have hit it, as you say,--seeing that the train is not due at Bridstock till 7.05, I do not know." "I've done it often, sir," said Silverbridge, taking the seat left vacant for him next to Lady Mabel. "We've had a political caucus of the party,--all the members who could be got together in London,--at Sir Timothy's, and I was bound to attend." "We've all heard of that," said Phineas Finn. "And we pretty well know all the points of Sir Timothy's eloquence," said Barrington Erle. "I am not going to tell any of the secrets. I have no doubt that there were reporters present, and you will see the whole of it in the papers to-morrow." Then Silverbridge turned to his neighbour. "Well, Lady Mab, and how are you this long time?" "But how are you? Think what you have gone through since we were at Killancodlem!" "Don't talk of it." "I suppose it is not to be talked of." "Though upon the whole it has happened very luckily. I have got rid of the accursed horses, and my governor has shown what a brick he can be. I don't think there is another man in England who would have done as he did." "There are not many who could." "There are fewer who would. When they came into my bedroom that morning and told me that the horse could not run, I thought I should have broken my heart. Seventy thousand pounds gone!" "Seventy thousand pounds!" "And the honour and glory of winning the race! And then the feeling that one had been so awfully swindled! Of course I had to look as though I did not care a straw about it, and to go and see the race, with a jaunty air and a cigar in my mouth. That is what I call hard work." "But you did it!" "I tried. I wish I could explain to you my state of mind that day. In the first place the money had to be got. Though it was to go into the hands of swindlers, still it had to be paid. I don't know how your father and Percival get on together;--but I felt very like the prodigal son." "It is very different with papa." "I suppose so. I felt very like hanging myself when I was alone that evening. And now everything is right again." "I am glad that everything is right," she said, with a strong emphasis on the "everything." "I have done with racing, at any rate. The feeling of being in the power of a lot of low blackguards is so terrible! I did love the poor brute so dearly. And now what have you been doing?" "Just nothing;--and have seen nobody. I went back to Grex after leaving Killancodlem, and shut myself up in my misery." "Why misery?" "Why misery! What a question for you to ask! Though I love Grex, I am not altogether fond of living alone; and though Grex has its charms, they are of a melancholy kind. And when I think of the state of our family affairs, that is not reassuring. Your father has just paid seventy thousand pounds for you. My father has been good enough to take something less than a quarter of that sum from me;--but still it was all that I was ever to have." "Girls don't want money." "Don't they? When I look forward it seems to me that a time will come when I shall want it very much." "You will marry," he said. She turned round for a moment and looked at him, full in the face, after such a fashion that he did not dare to promise her further comfort in that direction. "Things always do come right, somehow." "Let us hope so. Only nothing has ever come right with me yet. What is Frank doing?" "I haven't seen him since he left Crummie-Toddie." "And your sister?" she whispered. "I know nothing about it at all." "And you? I have told you everything about myself." "As for me, I think of nothing but politics now. I have told you about my racing experiences. Just at present shooting is up. Before Christmas I shall go into Chiltern's country for a little hunting." "You can hunt here?" "I shan't stay long enough to make it worth while to have my horses down. If Tregear will go with me to the Brake, I can mount him for a day or two. But I dare say you know more of his plans than I do. He went to see you at Grex." "And you did not." "I was not asked." "Nor was he." "Then all I can say is," replied Silverbridge, speaking in a low voice, but with considerable energy, "that he can use a freedom with Lady Mabel Grex upon which I cannot venture." "I believe you begrudge me his friendship. If you had no one else belonging to you with whom you could have any sympathy, would not you find comfort in a relation who could be almost as near to you as a brother?" "I do not grudge him to you." "Yes; you do. And what business have you to interfere?" "None at all;--certainly. I will never do it again." "Don't say that, Lord Silverbridge. You ought to have more mercy on me. You ought to put up with anything from me,--knowing how much I suffer." "I will put up with anything," said he. "Do, do. And now I will try to talk to Mr. Erle." Miss Boncassen was sitting on the other side of the table, between Mr. Monk and Phineas Finn, and throughout the dinner talked mock politics with the greatest liveliness. Silverbridge when he entered the room had gone round the table and had shaken hands with everyone. But there had been no other greeting between him and Isabel, nor had any sign passed from one to the other. No such greeting or sign had been possible. Nothing had been left undone which she had expected, or hoped. But, though she was lively, nevertheless she kept her eye upon her lover and Lady Mabel. Lady Mary had said that she thought her brother was in love with Lady Mabel. Could it be possible? In her own land she had heard absurd stories,--stories which seemed to her to be absurd,--of the treachery of lords and countesses, of the baseness of aristocrats, of the iniquities of high life in London. But her father had told her that, go where she might, she would find people in the main to be very like each other. It had seemed to her that nothing could be more ingenuous than this young man had been in the declaration of his love. No simplest republican could have spoken more plainly. But now, at this moment, she could not doubt but that her lover was very intimate with this other girl. Of course he was free. When she had refused to say a word to him of her own love or want of love, she had necessarily left him his liberty. When she had put him off for three months, of course he was to be his own master. But what must she think of him if it were so? And how could he have the courage to face her in his father's house if he intended to treat her in such a fashion? But of all this she showed nothing, nor was there a tone in her voice which betrayed her. She said her last word to Mr. Monk with so sweet a smile that that old bachelor wished he were younger for her sake. In the evening after dinner there was music. It was discovered that Miss Boncassen sang divinely, and both Lady Mabel and Lady Mary accompanied her. Mr. Erle, and Mr. Warburton, and Mr. Monk, all of whom were unmarried, stood by enraptured. But Lord Silverbridge kept himself apart, and interested himself in a description which Mrs. Boncassen gave him of their young men and their young ladies in the States. He had hardly spoken to Miss Boncassen,--till he offered her sherry or soda-water before she retired for the night. She refused his courtesy with her usual smile, but showed no more emotion than though they two had now met for the first time in their lives. He had quite made up his mind as to what he would do. When the opportunity should come in his way he would simply remind her that the three months were passed. But he was shy of talking to her in the presence of Lady Mabel and his father. He was quite determined that the thing should be done at once, but he certainly wished that Lady Mabel had not been there. In what she had said to him at the dinner-table she had made him understand that she would be a trouble to him. He remembered her look when he told her she would marry. It was as though she had declared to him that it was he who ought to be her husband. It referred back to that proffer of love which he had once made to her. Of course all this was disagreeable. Of course it made things difficult for him. But not the less was it a thing quite assured that he would press his suit to Miss Boncassen. When he was talking to Mrs. Boncassen he was thinking of nothing else. When he was offering Isabel the glass of sherry he was telling himself that he would find his opportunity on the morrow,--though now, at that moment, it was impossible that he should make a sign. She, as she went to bed, asked herself whether it were possible that there should be such treachery;--whether it were possible that he should pass it all by as though he had never said a word to her! During the whole of the next day, which was Sunday, he was equally silent. Immediately after breakfast, on the Monday, shooting commenced, and he could not find a moment in which to speak. It seemed to him that she purposely kept out of his way. With Mabel he did find himself for a few minutes alone, and was then interrupted by his sister and Isabel. "I hope you have killed a lot of things," said Miss Boncassen. "Pretty well, among us all." "What an odd amusement it seems, going out to commit wholesale slaughter. However it is the proper thing, no doubt." "Quite the proper thing," said Lord Silverbridge, and that was all. On the next morning he dressed himself for shooting,--and then sent out the party without him. He had heard, he said, of a young horse for sale in the neighbourhood, and had sent to desire that it might be brought to him. And now he found his occasion. "Come and play a game of billiards," he said to Isabel, as the three girls with the other ladies were together in the drawing-room. She got up very slowly from her seat, and very slowly crept away to the door. Then she looked round as though expecting the others to follow her. None of them did follow her. Mary felt that she ought to do so; but, knowing all that she knew, did not dare. And what good could she have done by one such interruption? Lady Mabel would fain have gone too;--but neither did she quite dare. Had there been no special reason why she should or should not have gone with them, the thing would have been easy enough. When two people go to play billiards, a third may surely accompany them. But now, Lady Mabel found that she could not stir. Mrs. Finn, Mrs. Boncassen, and Miss Cassewary were all in the room, but none of them moved. Silverbridge led the way quickly across the hall, and Isabel Boncassen followed him very slowly. When she entered the room she found him standing with a cue in his hand. He at once shut the door, and walking up to her dropped the butt of the cue on the floor and spoke one word. "Well!" he said. "What does 'well' mean?" "The three months are over." "Certainly they are 'over.'" "And I have been a model of patience." "Perhaps your patience is more remarkable than your constancy. Is not Lady Mabel Grex in the ascendant just now?" "What do you mean by that? Why do you ask that? You told me to wait for three months. I have waited, and here I am." "How very--very--downright you are." "Is not that the proper thing?" "I thought I was downright,--but you beat me hollow. Yes, the three months are over. And now what have you got to say?" He put down his cue, and stretched out his arms as though he were going to take her and hold her to his heart. "No;--no; not that," she said laughing. "But if you will speak, I will hear you." "You know what I said before. Will you love me, Isabel?" "And you know what I said before. Do they know that you love me? Does your father know it, and your sister? Why did they ask me to come here?" "Nobody knows it. But say that you love me, and everyone shall know it at once. Yes; one person knows it. Why did you mention Lady Mabel's name? She knows it." "Did you tell her?" "Yes. I went again to Killancodlem after you were gone, and then I told her." "But why her? Come, Lord Silverbridge. You are straightforward with me, and I will be the same with you. You have told Lady Mabel; I have told Lady Mary." "My sister!" "Yes;--your sister. And I am sure she disapproves it. She did not say so; but I am sure it is so. And then she told me something." "What did she tell you?" "Has there never been reason to think that you intended to offer your hand to Lady Mabel Grex?" "Did she tell you so?" "You should answer my question, Lord Silverbridge. It is surely one which I have a right to ask." Then she stood waiting for his reply, keeping herself at some little distance from him as though she were afraid that he would fly upon her. And indeed there seemed to be cause for such fear from the frequent gestures of his hands. "Why do you not answer me? Has there been reason for such expectations?" "Yes;--there has." "There has!" "I thought of it,--not knowing myself; before I had seen you. You shall know it all if you will only say that you love me." "I should like to know it all first." "You do know it all;--almost. I have told you that she knows what I said to you at Killancodlem. Is not that enough?" "And she approves!" "What has that to do with it? Lady Mabel is my friend, but not my guardian." "Has she a right to expect that she should be your wife?" "No;--certainly not. Why should you ask all this? Do you love me? Come, Isabel; say that you love me. Will you call me vain if I say that I almost think you do? You cannot doubt about my love;--not now." "No;--not now." "You needn't. Why won't you be as honest to me? If you hate me, say so;--but if you love me--!" "I do not hate you, Lord Silverbridge." "And is that all?" "You asked me the question." "But you do love me? By George, I thought you would be more honest and straightforward." Then she dropped her badinage and answered him seriously. "I thought I had been honest and straightforward. When I found that you were in earnest at Killancodlem--" "Why did you ever doubt me?" "When I felt that you were in earnest, then I had to be in earnest too. And I thought so much about it that I lay awake nearly all that night. Shall I tell you what I thought?" "Tell me something that I should like to hear." "I will tell you the truth. 'Is it possible,' I said to myself, 'that such a man as that can want me to be his wife; he an Englishman, of the highest rank and the greatest wealth, and one that any girl in the world would love?'" "Psha!" he exclaimed. "That is what I said to myself." Then she paused, and looking into her face he saw that there was a glimmer of a tear in each eye. "One that any girl must love when asked for her love;--because he is so sweet, so good, and so pleasant." "I know that you are chaffing." "Then I went on asking myself questions. And is it possible that I, who by all his friends will be regarded as a nobody, who am an American,--with merely human workaday blood in my veins,--that such a one as I should become his wife? Then I told myself that it was not possible. It was not in accordance with the fitness of things. All the dukes in England would rise up against it, and especially that duke whose good-will would be imperative." "Why should he rise up against it?" "You know he will. But I will go on with my story of myself. When I had settled that in my mind, I just cried myself to sleep. It had been a dream. I had come across one who in his own self seemed to combine all that I had ever thought of as being lovable in a man--" "Isabel!" "And in his outward circumstances soared as much above my thoughts as the heaven is above the earth. And he had whispered to me soft, loving, heavenly words. No;--no, you shall not touch me. But you shall listen to me. In my sleep I could be happy again and not see the barriers. But when I woke I made up my mind. 'If he comes to me again,' I said--'if it should be that he should come to me again, I will tell him that he shall be my heaven on earth,--if,--if,--if the ill-will of his friends would not make that heaven a hell to both of us.' I did not tell you quite all that." "You told me nothing but that I was to come again in three months." "I said more than that. I bade you ask your father. Now you have come again. You cannot understand a girl's fears and doubts. How should you? I thought perhaps you would not come. When I saw you whispering to that highly-born well-bred beauty, and remembered what I was myself, I thought that--you would not come." "Then you must love me." "Love you! Oh, my darling!--No, no, no," she said, as she retreated from him round the corner of the billiard-table, and stood guarding herself from him with her little hands. "You ask if I love you. You are entitled to know the truth. From the sole of your foot to the crown of your head I love you as I think a man would wish to be loved by the girl he loves. You have come across my life, and have swallowed me up, and made me all your own. But I will not marry you to be rejected by your people. No; nor shall there be a kiss between us till I know that it will not be so." "May I speak to your father?" "For what good? I have not spoken to father or mother because I have known that it must depend upon your father. Lord Silverbridge, if he will tell me that I shall be his daughter, I will become your wife,--oh, with such perfect joy, with such perfect truth! If it can never be so, then let us be torn apart,--with whatever struggle, still at once. In that case I will get myself back to my own country as best I may, and will pray to God that all this may be forgotten." Then she made her way round to the door, leaving him fixed to the spot in which she had been standing. But as she went she made a little prayer to him. "Do not delay my fate. It is all in all to me." And so he was left alone in the billiard-room. CHAPTER LIII "Then I Am As Proud As a Queen" During the next day or two the shooting went on without much interruption from love-making. The love-making was not prosperous all round. Poor Lady Mary had nothing to comfort her. Could she have been allowed to see the letter which her lover had written to her father, the comfort would have been, if not ample, still very great. Mary told herself again and again that she was quite sure of Tregear;--but it was hard upon her that she could not be made certain that her certainty was well grounded. Had she known that Tregear had written, though she had not seen a word of his letter, it would have comforted her. But she had heard nothing of the letter. In June last she had seen him, by chance, for a few minutes, in Lady Mabel's drawing-room. Since that she had not heard from him or of him. That was now more than five months since. How could her love serve her,--how could her very life serve her, if things were to go on like that? How was she to bear it? Thinking of this she resolved--she almost resolved--that she would go boldly to her father and desire that she might be given up to her lover. Her brother, though more triumphant,--for how could he fail to triumph after such words as Isabel had spoken to him?--still felt his difficulties very seriously. She had imbued him with a strong sense of her own firmness, and she had declared that she would go away and leave him altogether if the Duke should be unwilling to receive her. He knew that the Duke would be unwilling. The Duke, who certainly was not handy in those duties of match-making which seemed to have fallen upon him at the death of his wife, showed by a hundred little signs his anxiety that his son and heir should arrange his affairs with Lady Mabel. These signs were manifest to Mary,--were disagreeably manifest to Silverbridge,--were unfortunately manifest to Lady Mabel herself. They were manifest to Mrs. Finn, who was clever enough to perceive that the inclinations of the young heir were turned in another direction. And gradually they became manifest to Isabel Boncassen. The host himself, as host, was courteous to all his guests. They had been of his own selection, and he did his best to make himself pleasant to them all. But he selected two for his peculiar notice,--and those two were Miss Boncassen and Lady Mabel. While he would himself walk, and talk, and argue after his own peculiar fashion with the American beauty,--explaining to her matters political and social, till he persuaded her to promise to read his pamphlet upon decimal coinage,--he was always making awkward efforts to throw Silverbridge and Lady Mabel together. The two girls saw it all and knew well how the matter was,--knew that they were rivals, and knew each the ground on which she herself and on which the other stood. But neither was satisfied with her advantage, or nearly satisfied. Isabel would not take the prize without the Duke's consent;--and Mabel could not have it without that other consent. "If you want to marry an English Duke," she once said to Isabel in that anger which she was unable to restrain, "there is the Duke himself. I never saw a man more absolutely in love." "But I do not want to marry an English Duke," said Isabel, "and I pity any girl who has any idea of marriage except that which comes from a wish to give back love for love." Through it all the father never suspected the real state of his son's mind. He was too simple to think it possible that the purpose which Silverbridge had declared to him as they walked together from the Beargarden had already been thrown to the winds. He did not like to ask why the thing was not settled. Young men, he thought, were sometimes shy, and young ladies not always ready to give immediate encouragement. But, when he saw them together, he concluded that matters were going in the right direction. It was, however, an opinion which he had all to himself. During the three or four days which followed the scene in the billiard-room Isabel kept herself out of her lover's way. She had explained to him that which she wished him to do, and she left him to do it. Day by day she watched the circumstances of the life around her, and knew that it had not been done. She was sure that it could not have been done while the Duke was explaining to her the beauty of quints, and expatiating on the horrors of twelve pennies, and twelve inches, and twelve ounces,--variegated in some matters by sixteen and fourteen! He could not know that she was ambitious of becoming his daughter-in-law, while he was opening out to her the mysteries of the House of Lords, and explaining how it came to pass that while he was a member of one House of Parliament, his son should be sitting as a member of another;--how it was that a nobleman could be a commoner, and how a peer of one part of the Empire could sit as the representative of a borough in another part. She was an apt scholar. Had there been a question of any other young man marrying her, he would probably have thought that no other young man could have done better. Silverbridge was discontented with himself. The greatest misfortune was that Lady Mabel should be there. While she was present to his father's eyes he did not know how to declare his altered wishes. Every now and then she would say to him some little word indicating her feelings of the absurdity of his passion. "I declare I don't know whether it is you or your father that Miss Boncassen most affects," she said. But to this and to other similar speeches he would make no answer. She had extracted his secret from him at Killancodlem, and might use it against him if she pleased. In his present frame of mind he was not disposed to joke with her upon the subject. On that second Sunday,--the Boncassens were to return to London on the following Tuesday,--he found himself alone with Isabel's father. The American had been brought out at his own request to see the stables, and had been accompanied round the premises by Silverbridge and by Mr. Warburton, by Isabel and by Lady Mary. As they got out into the park the party were divided, and Silverbridge found himself with Mr. Boncassen. Then it occurred to him that the proper thing for a young man in love was to go, not to his own father, but to the lady's father. Why should not he do as others always did? Isabel no doubt had suggested a different course. But that which Isabel had suggested was at the present moment impossible to him. Now, at this instant, without a moment's forethought, he determined to tell his story to Isabel's father,--as any other lover might tell it to any other father. "I am very glad to find ourselves alone, Mr. Boncassen," he said. Mr. Boncassen bowed and showed himself prepared to listen. Though so many at Matching had seen the whole play, Mr. Boncassen had seen nothing of it. "I don't know whether you are aware of what I have got to say." "I cannot quite say that I am, my Lord. But whatever it is, I am sure I shall be delighted to hear it." "I want to marry your daughter," said Silverbridge. Isabel had told him that he was downright, and in such a matter he had hardly as yet learned how to express himself with those paraphrases in which the world delights. Mr. Boncassen stood stock still, and in the excitement of the moment pulled off his hat. "The proper thing is to ask your permission to go on with it." "You want to marry my daughter!" "Yes. That is what I have got to say." "Is she aware of your--intention?" "Quite aware. I believe I may say that if other things go straight, she will consent." "And your father--the Duke?" "He knows nothing about it,--as yet." "Really this takes me quite by surprise. I am afraid you have not given enough thought to the matter." "I have been thinking about it for the last three months," said Lord Silverbridge. "Marriage is a very serious thing." "Of course it is." "And men generally like to marry their equals." "I don't know about that. I don't think that counts for much. People don't always know who are their equals." "That is quite true. If I were speaking to you or to your father theoretically I should perhaps be unwilling to admit superiority on your side because of your rank and wealth. I could make an argument in favour of any equality with the best Briton that ever lived,--as would become a true-born Republican." "That is just what I mean." "But when the question becomes one of practising,--a question for our lives, for our happiness, for our own conduct, then, knowing what must be the feelings of an aristocracy in such a country as this, I am prepared to admit that your father would be as well justified in objecting to a marriage between a child of his and a child of mine, as I should be in objecting to one between my child and the son of some mechanic in our native city." "He wouldn't be a gentleman," said Silverbridge. "That is a word of which I don't quite know the meaning." "I do," said Silverbridge confidently. "But you could not define it. If a man be well educated, and can keep a good house over his head, perhaps you may call him a gentleman. But there are many such with whom your father would not wish to be so closely connected as you propose." "But I may have your sanction?" Mr. Boncassen again took off his hat and walked along thoughtfully. "I hope you don't object to me personally." "My dear young lord, your father has gone out of his way to be civil to me. Am I to return his courtesy by bringing a great trouble upon him?" "He seems to be very fond of Miss Boncassen." "Will he continue to be fond of her when he has heard this? What does Isabel say?" "She says the same as you, of course." "Why of course;--except that it is evident to you as it is to me that she could not with propriety say anything else." "I think she would,--would like it, you know." "She would like to be your wife!" "Well;--yes. If it were all serene, I think she would consent." "I dare say she would consent,--if it were all serene. Why should she not? Do not try her too hard, Lord Silverbridge. You say you love her." "I do, indeed." "Then think of the position in which you are placing her. You are struggling to win her heart." Silverbridge as he heard this assured himself that there was no need for any further struggling in that direction. "Perhaps you have won it. Yet she may feel that she cannot become your wife. She may well say to herself that this which is offered to her is so great, that she does not know how to refuse it; and may yet have to say, at the same time, that she cannot accept it without disgrace. You would not put one that you love into such a position?" "As for disgrace,--that is nonsense. I beg your pardon, Mr. Boncassen." "Would it be no disgrace that she should be known here, in England, to be your wife, and that none of those of your rank,--of what would then be her own rank,--should welcome her into her new world?" "That would be out of the question." "If your own father refused to welcome her, would not others follow suit?" "You don't know my father." "You seem to know him well enough to fear that he would object." "Yes;--that is true." "What more do I want to know?" "If she were once my wife he would not reject her. Of all human beings he is in truth the kindest and most affectionate." "And therefore you would try him after this fashion? No, my Lord; I cannot see my way through these difficulties. You can say what you please to him as to your own wishes. But you must not tell him that you have any sanction from me." That evening the story was told to Mrs. Boncassen, and the matter was discussed among the family. Isabel in talking to them made no scruple of declaring her own feelings; and though in speaking to Lord Silverbridge she had spoken very much as her father had done afterwards, yet in this family conclave she took her lover's part. "That is all very well, father," she said; "I told him the same thing myself. But if he is man enough to be firm I shall not throw him over,--not for all the dukes in Europe. I shall not stay here to be pointed at. I will go back home. If he follows me then I shall choose to forget all about his rank. If he loves me well enough to show that he is in earnest, I shall not disappoint him for the sake of pleasing his father." To this neither Mr. nor Mrs. Boncassen was able to make any efficient answer. Mrs. Boncassen, dear good woman, could see no reason why two young people who loved each other should not be married at once. Dukes and duchesses were nothing to her. If they couldn't be happy in England, then let them come and live in New York. She didn't understand that anybody could be too good for her daughter. Was there not an idea that Mr. Boncassen would be the next President? And was not the President of the United States as good as the Queen of England? Lord Silverbridge, when he left Mr. Boncassen, wandered about the park by himself. King Cophetua married the beggar's daughter. He was sure of that. King Cophetua probably had not a father; and the beggar, probably, was not high-minded. But the discrepancy in that case was much greater. He intended to persevere, trusting much to a belief that when once he was married his father would "come round." His father always did come round. But the more he thought of it, the more impossible it seemed to him that he should ask his father's consent at the present moment. Lady Mabel's presence in the house was an insuperable obstacle. He thought that he could do it if he and his father were alone together, or comparatively alone. He must be prepared for an opposition, at any rate of some days, which opposition would make his father quite unable to entertain his guests while it lasted. But as he could not declare his wishes to his father, and was thus disobeying Isabel's behests, he must explain the difficulty to her. He felt already that she would despise him for his cowardice,--that she would not perceive the difficulties in his way, or understand that he might injure his cause by precipitation. Then he considered whether he might not possibly make some bargain with his father. How would it be if he should consent to go back to the Liberal party on being allowed to marry the girl he loved? As far as his political feelings were concerned he did not think that he would much object to make the change. There was only one thing certain,--that he must explain his condition to Miss Boncassen before she went. He found no difficulty now in getting the opportunity. She was equally anxious, and as well disposed to acknowledge her anxiety. After what had passed between them she was not desirous of pretending that the matter was one of small moment to herself. She had told him that it was all the world to her, and had begged him to let her know her fate as quickly as possible. On that last Monday morning they were in the grounds together, and Lady Mabel, who was walking with Mrs. Finn, saw them pass through a little gate which led from the gardens into the Priory ruins. "It all means nothing," Mabel said with a little laugh to her companion. "If so, I am sorry for the young lady," said Mrs. Finn. "Don't you think that one always has to be sorry for the young ladies? Young ladies generally have a bad time of it. Did you ever hear of a gentleman who had always to roll a stone to the top of a hill, but it would always come back upon him?" "That gentleman I believe never succeeded," said Mrs. Finn. "The young ladies I suppose do sometimes." In the meantime Isabel and Silverbridge were among the ruins together. "This is where the old Pallisers used to be buried," he said. "Oh, indeed. And married, I suppose." "I dare say. They had a priest of their own, no doubt, which must have been convenient. This block of a fellow without any legs left is supposed to represent Sir Guy. He ran away with half-a-dozen heiresses, they say. I wish things were as easily done now." "Nobody should have run away with me. I have no idea of going on such a journey except on terms of equality,--just step and step alike." Then she took hold of his arm and put out one foot. "Are you ready?" "I am very willing." "But are you ready,--for a straightforward walk off to church before all the world? None of your private chaplains, such as Sir Guy had at his command. Just the registrar, if there is nothing better,--so that it be public, before all the world." "I wish we could start this instant." "But we can't,--can we?" "No, dear. So many things have to be settled." "And what have you settled on since you last spoke to me?" "I have told your father everything." "Yes;--I know that. What good does that do? Father is not a Duke of Omnium. No one supposed that he would object." "But he did," said Silverbridge. "Yes;--as I do,--for the same reason; because he would not have his daughter creep in at a hole. But to your own father you have not ventured to speak." Then he told his story, as best he knew how. It was not that he feared his father, but that he felt that the present moment was not fit. "He wishes you to marry that Lady Mabel Grex," she said. He nodded his head. "And you will marry her?" "Never! I might have done so, had I not seen you. I should have done so, if she had been willing. But now I never can,--never, never." Her hand had dropped from his arm, but now she put it up again for a moment, so that he might feel the pressure of her fingers. "Say that you believe me." "I think I do." "You know I love you." "I think you do. I am sure I hope you do. If you don't, then I am--a miserable wretch." "With all my heart I do." "Then I am as proud as a queen. You will tell him soon?" "As soon as you are gone. As soon as we are alone together. I will;--and then I will follow you to London. Now shall we not say, Good-bye?" "Good-bye, my own," she whispered. "You will let me have one kiss?" Her hand was in his, and she looked about as though to see that no eyes were watching them. But then, as the thoughts came rushing to her mind, she changed her purpose. "No," she said. "What is it but a trifle! It is nothing in itself. But I have bound myself to myself by certain promises, and you must not ask me to break them. You are as sweet to me as I can be to you, but there shall be no kissing till I know that I shall be your wife. Now take me back." CHAPTER LIV "I Don't Think She Is a Snake" On the following day, Tuesday, the Boncassens went, and then there were none of the guests left but Mrs. Finn and Lady Mabel Grex,--with of course Miss Cassewary. The Duke had especially asked both Mrs. Finn and Lady Mabel to remain, the former, through his anxiety to show his repentance for the injustice he had formerly done her, and the latter in the hope that something might be settled as soon as the crowd of visitors should have gone. He had never spoken quite distinctly to Mabel. He had felt that the manner in which he had learned his son's purpose,--that which once had been his son's purpose,--forbade him to do so. But he had so spoken as to make Lady Mabel quite aware of his wish. He would not have told her how sure he was that Silverbridge would keep no more racehorses, how he trusted that Silverbridge had done with betting, how he believed that the young member would take a real interest in the House of Commons, had he not intended that she should take a special interest in the young man. And then he had spoken about the house in London. It was to be made over to Silverbridge as soon as Silverbridge should marry. And there was Gatherum Castle. Gatherum was rather a trouble than otherwise. He had ever felt it to be so, but had nevertheless always kept it open perhaps for a month in the year. His uncle had always resided there for a fortnight at Christmas. When Silverbridge was married it would become the young man's duty to do something of the same kind. Gatherum was the White Elephant of the family, and Silverbridge must enter in upon his share of the trouble. He did not know that in saying all this he was offering his son as a husband to Lady Mabel, but she understood it as thoroughly as though he had spoken the words. But she knew the son's mind also. He had indeed himself told her all his mind. "Of course I love her best of all," he had said. When he told her of it she had been so overcome that she had wept in her despair;--had wept in his presence. She had declared to him her secret,--that it had been her intention to become his wife, and then he had rejected her! It had all been shame, and sorrow, and disappointment to her. And she could not but remember that there had been a moment when she might have secured him by a word. A look would have done it; a touch of her finger on that morning. She had known then that he had intended to be in earnest,--that he only waited for encouragement. She had not given it because she had not wished to grasp too eagerly at the prize,--and now the prize was gone! She had said that she had spared him;--but then she could afford to joke, thinking that he would surely come back to her. She had begun her world with so fatal a mistake! When she was quite young, when she was little more than a child but still not a child, she had given all her love to a man whom she soon found that it would be impossible she should ever marry. He had offered to face the world with her, promising to do the best to smooth the rough places, and to soften the stones for her feet. But she, young as she was, had felt that both he and she belonged to a class which could hardly endure poverty with contentment. The grinding need for money, the absolute necessity of luxurious living, had been pressed upon her from her childhood. She had seen it and acknowledged it, and had told him, with precocious wisdom, that that which he offered to do for her sake would be a folly for them both. She had not stinted the assurance of her love, but had told him that they must both turn aside and learn to love elsewhere. He had done so, with too complete readiness! She had dreamed of a second love, which should obliterate the first,--which might still leave to her the memory of the romance of her early passion. Then this boy had come in her way! With him all her ambition might have been satisfied. She desired high rank and great wealth. With him she might have had it all. And then, too, though there would always be the memory of that early passion, yet she could in another fashion love this youth. He was pleasant to her, and gracious;--and she had told herself that if it should be so that this great fortune might be hers, she would atone to him fully for that past romance by the wife-like devotion of her life. The cup had come within the reach of her fingers, but she had not grasped it. Her happiness, her triumphs, her great success had been there, present to her, and she had dallied with her fortune. There had been a day on which he had been all but at her feet, and on the next he had been prostrate at the feet of another. He had even dared to tell her so,--saying of that American that "of course he loved her the best!" Over and over again since that, she had asked herself whether there was no chance. Though he had loved that other one best she would take him if it were possible. When the invitation came from the Duke she would not lose a chance. She had told him that it was impossible that he, the heir to the Duke of Omnium, should marry an American. All his family, all his friends, all his world would be against him. And then he was so young,--and, as she thought, so easily led. He was lovable and prone to love;--but surely his love could not be very strong, or he would not have changed so easily. She did not hesitate to own to herself that this American was very lovely. She too, herself, was beautiful. She too had a reputation for grace, loveliness, and feminine high-bred charm. She knew all that, but she knew also that her attractions were not so bright as those of her rival. She could not smile or laugh and throw sparks of brilliance around her as did the American girl. Miss Boncassen could be graceful as a nymph in doing the awkwardest thing! When she had pretended to walk stiffly along, to some imaginary marriage ceremony, with her foot stuck out before her, with her chin in the air, and one arm akimbo, Silverbridge had been all afire with admiration. Lady Mabel understood it all. The American girl must be taken away,--from out of the reach of the young man's senses,--and then the struggle must be made. Lady Mabel had not been long at Matching before she learned that she had much in her favour. She perceived that the Duke himself had no suspicion of what was going on, and that he was strongly disposed in her favour. She unravelled it all in her own mind. There must have been some agreement, between the father and the son, when the son had all but made his offer to her. More than once she was half-minded to speak openly to the Duke, to tell him all that Silverbridge had said to her and all that he had not said, and to ask the father's help in scheming against that rival. But she could not find the words with which to begin. And then, might he not despise her, and, despising her, reject her, were she to declare her desire to marry a man who had given his heart to another woman? And so, when the Duke asked her to remain after the departure of the other guests, she decided that it would be best to bide her time. The Duke, as she assented, kissed her hand, and she knew that this sign of grace was given to his intended daughter-in-law. In all this she half-confided her thoughts and her prospects to her old friend, Miss Cassewary. "That girl has gone at last," she said to Miss Cass. "I fear she has left her spells behind her, my dear." "Of course she has. The venom out of the snake's tooth will poison all the blood; but still the poor bitten wretch does not always die." "I don't think she is a snake." "Don't be moral, Cass. She is a snake in my sense. She has got her weapons, and of course it is natural enough that she should use them. If I want to be Duchess of Omnium, why shouldn't she?" "I hate to hear you talk of yourself in that way." "Because you have enough of the old school about you to like conventional falsehood. This young man did in fact ask me to be his wife. Of course I meant to accept him,--but I didn't. Then comes this convict's granddaughter." "Not a convict's!" "You know what I mean. Had he been a convict it would have been all the same. I take upon myself to say that, had the world been informed that an alliance had been arranged between the eldest son of the Duke of Omnium and the daughter of Earl Grex,--the world would have been satisfied. Every unmarried daughter of every peer in England would have envied me,--but it would have been comme il faut." "Certainly, my dear." "But what would be the feeling as to the convict's granddaughter?" "You don't suppose that I would approve it;--but it seems to me that in these days young men do just what they please." "He shall do what he pleases, but he must be made to be pleased with me." So much she said to Miss Cassewary; but she did not divulge any plan. The Boncassens had just gone off to the station, and Silverbridge was out shooting. If anything could be done here at Matching, it must be done quickly, as Silverbridge would soon take his departure. She did not know it, but, in truth, he was remaining in order that he might, as he said, "have all this out with the governor." She tried to realise for herself some plan, but when the evening came nothing was fixed. For a quarter of an hour, just as the sun was setting, the Duke joined her in the gardens,--and spoke to her more plainly than he had ever spoken before. "Has Silverbridge come home?" he asked. "I have not seen him." "I hope you and Mary get on well together." "I think so, Duke. I am sure we should if we saw more of each other." "I sincerely hope you may. There is nothing I wish for Mary so much as that she should have a sister. And there is no one whom I would be so glad to hear her call by that name as yourself." How could he have spoken plainer? The ladies were all together in the drawing-room when Silverbridge came bursting in rather late. "Where's the governor?" he asked, turning to his sister. "Dressing, I should think; but what is the matter?" "I want to see him. I must be off to Cornwall to-morrow morning." "To Cornwall!" said Miss Cassewary. "Why to Cornwall?" asked Lady Mabel. But Mary, connecting Cornwall with Frank Tregear, held her peace. "I can't explain it all now, but I must start very early to-morrow." Then he went off to his father's study, and finding the Duke still there explained the cause of his intended journey. The member for Polpenno had died, and Frank Tregear had been invited to stand for the borough. He had written to his friend to ask him to come and assist in the struggle. "Years ago there used to be always a Tregear in for Polpenno," said Silverbridge. "But he is a younger son." "I don't know anything about it," said Silverbridge, "but as he has asked me to go I think I ought to do it." The Duke, who was by no means the man to make light of the political obligations of friendship, raised no objection. "I wish," said he, "that something could have been arranged between you and Mabel before you went." The young man stood in the gloom of the dark room aghast. This was certainly not the moment for explaining everything to his father. "I have set my heart very much upon it, and you ought to be gratified by knowing that I quite approve your choice." All that had been years ago,--in last June;--before Mrs. Montacute Jones's garden-party, before that day in the rain at Maidenhead, before the brightness of Killancodlem, before the glories of Miss Boncassen had been revealed to him. "There is no time for that kind of thing now," he said weakly. "I thought that when you were here together--" "I must dress now, sir; but I will tell you all about it when I get back from Cornwall. I will come back direct to Matching, and will explain everything." So he escaped. It was clear to Lady Mabel that there was no opportunity now for any scheme. Whatever might be possible must be postponed till after this Cornish business had been completed. Perhaps it might be better so. She had thought that she would appeal to himself, that she would tell him of his father's wishes, of her love for him,--of the authority which he had once given her for loving him,--and of the absolute impossibility of his marriage with the American. She thought that she could do it, if not efficiently at any rate effectively. But it could not be done on the very day on which the American had gone. It came out in the course of the evening that he was going to assist Frank Tregear in his canvass. The matter was not spoken of openly, as Tregear's name could hardly be mentioned. But everybody knew it, and it gave occasion to Mabel for a few words apart with Silverbridge. "I am so glad you are going to him," she said in a little whisper. "Of course I go when he wishes me. I don't know that I can do him any good." "The greatest good in the world. Your name will go so far! It will be everything to him to be in Parliament. And when are we to meet again?" she said. "I shall turn up somewhere," he replied as he gave her his hand to wish her good-bye. On the following morning the Duke proposed to Lady Mabel that she should stay at Matching for yet another fortnight,--or even for a month if it might be possible. Lady Mabel, whose father was still abroad, was not sorry to accept the invitation. CHAPTER LV Polpenno Polwenning, the seat of Mr. Tregear, Frank's father, was close to the borough of Polpenno,--so close that the gates of the grounds opened into the town. As Silverbridge had told his father, many of the Tregear family had sat for the borough. Then there had come changes, and strangers had made themselves welcome by their money. When the vacancy now occurred a deputation waited upon Squire Tregear and asked him to stand. The deputation would guarantee that the expense should not exceed--a certain limited sum. Mr. Tregear for himself had no such ambition. His eldest son was abroad and was not at all such a man as one would choose to make into a Member of Parliament. After much consideration in the family, Frank was invited to present himself to the constituency. Frank's aspirations in regard to Lady Mary Palliser were known at Polwenning, and it was thought that they would have a better chance of success if he could write the letters M.P. after his name. Frank acceded, and as he was starting wrote to ask the assistance of his friend Lord Silverbridge. At that time there were only nine days more before the election, and Mr. Carbottle, the Liberal candidate, was already living in great style at the Camborne Arms. Mr. and Mrs. Tregear and an elder sister of Frank's, who quite acknowledged herself to be an old maid, were very glad to welcome Frank's friend. On the first morning of course they discussed the candidates' prospects. "My best chance of success," said Frank, "arises from the fact that Mr. Carbottle is fatter than the people here seem to approve." "If his purse be fat," said old Mr. Tregear, "that will carry off any personal defect." Lord Silverbridge asked whether the candidate was not too fat to make speeches. Miss Tregear declared that he had made three speeches daily for the last week, and that Mr. Williams the rector, who had heard him, declared him to be a godless dissenter. Mrs. Tregear thought that it would be much better that the place should be disfranchised altogether than that such a horrid man should be brought into the neighbourhood. "A godless dissenter!" she said, holding up her hands in dismay. Frank thought that they had better abstain from allusion to their opponent's religion. Then Mr. Tregear made a little speech. "We used," he said, "to endeavour to get someone to represent us in Parliament, who would agree with us on vital subjects, such as the Church of England and the necessity of religion. Now it seems to be considered ill-mannered to make any allusion to such subjects!" From which it may be seen that this old Tregear was very conservative indeed. When the old people were gone to bed the two young men discussed the matter. "I hope you'll get in," said Silverbridge. "And if I can do anything for you of course I will." "It is always good to have a real member along with one," said Tregear. "But I begin to think I am a very shaky Conservative myself." "I am sorry for that." "Sir Timothy is such a beast," said Silverbridge. "Is that your notion of a political opinion? Are you to be this or that in accordance with your own liking or disliking for some particular man? One is supposed to have opinions of one's own." "Your father would be down on a man because he is a dissenter." "Of course my father is old-fashioned." "It does seem so hard to me," said Silverbridge, "to find any difference between the two sets. You who are a true Conservative are much more like to my father, who is a Liberal, than to your own, who is on the same side as yourself." "It may be so, and still I may be a good Conservative." "It seems to me in the House to mean nothing more than choosing one set of companions or choosing another. There are some awful cads who sit along with Mr. Monk;--fellows that make you sick to hear them, and whom I couldn't be civil to. But I don't think there is anybody I hate so much as old Beeswax. He has a contemptuous way with his nose which makes me long to pull it." "And you mean to go over in order that you may be justified in doing so. I think I soar a little higher," said Tregear. "Oh, of course. You're a clever fellow," said Silverbridge, not without a touch of sarcasm. "A man may soar higher than that without being very clever. If the party that calls itself Liberal were to have all its own way who is there that doesn't believe that the church would go at once, then all distinction between boroughs, the House of Lords immediately afterwards, and after that the Crown?" "Those are not my governor's ideas." "Your governor couldn't help himself. A Liberal party, with plenipotentiary power, must go on right away to the logical conclusion of its arguments. It is only the conservative feeling of the country which saves such men as your father from being carried headlong to ruin by their own machinery. You have read Carlyle's French Revolution." "Yes, I have read that." "Wasn't it so there? There were a lot of honest men who thought they could do a deal of good by making everybody equal. A good many were made equal by having their heads cut off. That's why I mean to be member for Polpenno and to send Mr. Carbottle back to London. Carbottle probably doesn't want to cut anybody's head off." "I dare say he's as conservative as anybody." "But he wants to be a member of Parliament; and, as he hasn't thought much about anything, he is quite willing to lend a hand to communism, radicalism, socialism, chopping people's heads off, or anything else." "That's all very well," said Silverbridge, "but where should we have been if there had been no Liberals? Robespierre and his pals cut off a lot of heads, but Louis XIV and Louis XV locked up more in prison." And so he had the last word in the argument. The whole of the next morning was spent in canvassing, and the whole of the afternoon. In the evening there was a great meeting at the Polwenning Assembly Room, which at the present moment was in the hands of the Conservative party. Here Frank Tregear made an oration, in which he declared his political convictions. The whole speech was said at the time to be very good; but the portion of it which was apparently esteemed the most, had direct reference to Mr. Carbottle. Who was Mr. Carbottle? Why had he come to Polpenno? Who had sent for him? Why Mr. Carbottle rather than anybody else? Did not the people of Polpenno think that it might be as well to send Mr. Carbottle back to the place from whence he had come? These questions, which seemed to Silverbridge to be as easy as they were attractive, almost made him desirous of making a speech himself. Then Mr. Williams, the rector, followed, a gentleman who had many staunch friends and many bitter enemies in the town. He addressed himself chiefly to that bane of the whole country,--as he conceived them,--the godless dissenters; and was felt by Tregear to be injuring the cause by every word he spoke. It was necessary that Mr. Williams should liberate his own mind, and therefore he persevered with the godless dissenters at great length,--not explaining, however, how a man who thought enough about his religion to be a dissenter could be godless, or how a godless man should care enough about religion to be a dissenter. Mr. Williams was heard with impatience, and then there was a clamour for the young lord. He was the son of an ex-Prime Minister, and therefore of course he could speak. He was himself a member of Parliament, and therefore could speak. He had boldly severed himself from the faulty political tenets of his family, and therefore on such an occasion as this was peculiarly entitled to speak. When a man goes electioneering, he must speak. At a dinner-table to refuse is possible:--or in any assembly convened for a semi-private purpose, a gentleman may declare that he is not prepared for the occasion. But in such an emergency as this, a man,--and a member of Parliament,--cannot plead that he is not prepared. A son of a former Prime Minister who had already taken so strong a part in politics as to have severed himself from his father, not prepared to address the voters of a borough whom he had come to canvass! The plea was so absurd, that he was thrust on to his feet before he knew what he was about. It was in truth his first public speech. At Silverbridge he had attempted to repeat a few words, and in his failure had been covered by the Sprugeons and the Sprouts. But now he was on his legs in a great room, in an unknown town, with all the aristocracy of the place before him! His eyes at first swam a little, and there was a moment in which he thought he would run away. But, on that morning, as he was dressing, there had come to his mind the idea of the possibility of such a moment as this, and a few words had occurred to him. "My friend Frank Tregear," he began, rushing at once at his subject, "is a very good fellow, and I hope you'll elect him." Then he paused, not remembering what was to come next; but the sentiment which he had uttered appeared to his auditors to be so good in itself and so well-delivered, that they filled up a long pause with continued clappings and exclamations. "Yes," continued the young member of Parliament, encouraged by the kindness of the crowd, "I have known Frank Tregear ever so long, and I don't think you could find a better member of Parliament anywhere." There were many ladies present and they thought that the Duke's son was just the person who ought to come electioneering among them. His voice was much pleasanter to their ears than that of old Mr. Williams. The women waved their handkerchiefs and the men stamped their feet. Here was an orator come among them! "You all know all about it just as well as I do," continued the orator, "and I am sure you feel that he ought to be member for Polpenno." There could be no doubt about that as far as the opinion of the audience went. "There can't be a better fellow than Frank Tregear, and I ask you all to give three cheers for the new member." Ten times three cheers were given, and the Carbottleites outside the door who had come to report what was going on at the Tregear meeting were quite of opinion that this eldest son of the former Prime Minister was a tower of strength. "I don't know anything about Mr. Carbottle," continued Silverbridge, who was almost growing to like the sound of his own voice. "Perhaps he's a good fellow too." "No; no, no. A very bad fellow indeed," was heard from different parts of the room. "I don't know anything about him. I wasn't at school with Carbottle." This was taken as a stroke of the keenest wit, and was received with infinite cheering. Silverbridge was in the pride of his youth, and Carbottle was sixty at the least. Nothing could have been funnier. "He seems to be a stout old party, but I don't think he's the man for Polpenno. I think you'll return Frank Tregear. I was at school with him;--and I tell you, that you can't find a better fellow anywhere than Frank Tregear." Then he sat down, and I am afraid he felt that he had made the speech of the evening. "We are so much obliged to you, Lord Silverbridge," Miss Tregear said as they were walking home together. "That's just the sort of thing that the people like. So reassuring, you know. What Mr. Williams says about the dissenters is of course true; but it isn't reassuring." "I hope I didn't make a fool of myself to-night," Silverbridge said when he was alone with Tregear,--probably with some little pride in his heart. "I ought to say that you did, seeing that you praised me so violently. But, whatever it was, it was well taken. I don't know whether they will elect me; but had you come down as a candidate, I am quite sure they would have elected you." Silverbridge was hardly satisfied with this. He wished to have been told that he had spoken well. He did not, however, resent his friend's coldness. "Perhaps, after all, I did make a fool of myself," he said to himself as he went to bed. On the next day, after breakfast, it was found to be raining heavily. Canvassing was of course the business of the hour, and canvassing is a business which cannot be done indoors. It was soon decided that the rain should go for nothing. Could an agreement have been come to with the Carbottleites it might have been decided that both parties should abstain, but as that was impossible the Tregear party could not afford to lose the day. As Mr. Carbottle, by reason of his fatness and natural slowness, would perhaps be specially averse to walking about in the slush and mud, it might be that they would gain something; so after breakfast they started with umbrellas,--Tregear, Silverbridge, Mr. Newcomb the curate, Mr. Pinebott the conservative attorney, with four or five followers who were armed with books and pencils, and who ticked off on the list of the voters the names of the friendly, the doubtful, and the inimical. Parliamentary canvassing is not a pleasant occupation. Perhaps nothing more disagreeable, more squalid, more revolting to the senses, more opposed to personal dignity, can be conceived. The same words have to be repeated over and over again in the cottages, hovels, and lodgings of poor men and women who only understand that the time has come round in which they are to be flattered instead of being the flatterers. "I think I am right in supposing that your husband's principles are Conservative, Mrs. Bubbs." "I don't know nothing about it. You'd better call again and see Bubbs hissel." "Certainly I will do so. I shouldn't at all like to leave the borough without seeing Mr. Bubbs. I hope we shall have your influence, Mrs. Bubbs." "I don't know nothing about it. My folk at home allays vote buff; and I think Bubbs ought to go buff too. Only mind this; Bubbs don't never come home to his dinner. You must come arter six, and I hope he's to have some'at for his trouble. He won't have my word to vote unless he have some'at." Such is the conversation in which the candidate takes a part, while his cortège at the door is criticising his very imperfect mode of securing Mrs. Bubbs' good wishes. Then he goes on to the next house, and the same thing with some variation is endured again. Some guide, philosopher, and friend, who accompanies him, and who is the chief of the cortège, has calculated on his behalf that he ought to make twenty such visitations an hour, and to call on two hundred constituents in the course of the day. As he is always falling behind in his number, he is always being driven on by his philosopher, till he comes to hate the poor creatures to whom he is forced to address himself, with a most cordial hatred. It is a nuisance to which no man should subject himself in any weather. But when it rains there is superadded a squalor and an ill humour to all the party which makes it almost impossible for them not to quarrel before the day is over. To talk politics to Mrs. Bubbs under any circumstances is bad, but to do so with the conviction that the moisture is penetrating from your greatcoat through your shirt to your bones, and that while so employed you are breathing the steam from those seven other wet men at the door, is abominable. To have to go through this is enough to take away all the pride which a man might otherwise take from becoming a member of Parliament. But to go through it and then not to become a member is base indeed! To go through it and to feel that you are probably paying at the rate of a hundred pounds a day for the privilege is most disheartening. Silverbridge, as he backed up Tregear in the uncomfortable work, congratulated himself on the comfort of having a Mr. Sprugeon and a Mr. Sprout who could manage his borough for him without a contest. They worked on that day all the morning till one, when they took luncheon, all reeking with wet, at the King's Head,--so that a little money might be legitimately spent in the cause. Then, at two, they sallied out again, vainly endeavouring to make their twenty calls within the hour. About four, when it was beginning to be dusk, they were very tired, and Silverbridge had ventured to suggest that as they were all wet through, and as there was to be another meeting in the Assembly Room that night, and as nobody in that part of the town seemed to be at home, they might perhaps be allowed to adjourn for the present. He was thinking how nice it would be to have a glass of hot brandy-and-water and then lounge till dinner-time. But the philosophers received the proposition with stern disdain. Was his Lordship aware that Mr. Carbottle had been out all day from eight in the morning, and was still at work; that the Carbottleites had already sent for lanterns and were determined to go on till eight o'clock among the artisans who would then have returned from their work? When a man had put his hand to the plough, the philosophers thought that that man should complete the furrow! The philosophers' view had just carried the day, the discussion having been held under seven or eight wet umbrellas at the corner of a dirty little lane leading into the High Street; when suddenly, on the other side of the way, Mr. Carbottle's cortège made its appearance. The philosophers at once informed them that on such occasions it was customary that the rival candidates should be introduced. "It will take ten minutes," said the philosophers; "but then it will take them ten minutes too." Upon this Tregear, as being the younger of the two, crossed over the road, and the introduction was made. There was something comfortable in it to the Tregear party, as no imagination could conceive anything more wretched than the appearance of Mr. Carbottle. He was a very stout man of sixty, and seemed to be almost carried along by his companions. He had pulled his coat-collar up and his hat down till very little of his face was visible, and in attempting to look at Tregear and Silverbridge he had to lift up his chin till the rain ran off his hat on to his nose. He had an umbrella in one hand and a stick in the other, and was wet through to his very skin. What were his own feelings cannot be told, but his philosophers, guides, and friends would allow him no rest. "Very hard work, Mr. Tregear," he said, shaking his head. "Very hard indeed, Mr. Carbottle." Then the two parties went on, each their own way, without another word. CHAPTER LVI The News Is Sent to Matching There were nine days of this work, during which Lord Silverbridge became very popular and made many speeches. Tregear did not win half so many hearts, or recommend himself so thoroughly to the political predilections of the borough;--but nevertheless he was returned. It would probably be unjust to attribute this success chiefly to the young Lord's eloquence. It certainly was not due to the strong religious feelings of the rector. It is to be feared that even the thoughtful political convictions of the candidate did not altogether produce the result. It was that chief man among the candidate's guides and friends, that leading philosopher who would not allow anybody to go home from the rain, and who kept his eyes so sharply open to the pecuniary doings of the Carbottleites, that Mr. Carbottle's guides and friends had hardly dared to spend a shilling;--it was he who had in truth been efficacious. In every attempt they had made to spend their money they had been looked into and circumvented. As Mr. Carbottle had been brought down to Polpenno on purpose that he might spend money,--as he had nothing but his money to recommend him, and as he had not spent it,--the free and independent electors of the borough had not seen their way to vote for him. Therefore the Conservatives were very elate with their triumph. There was a great Conservative reaction. But the electioneering guide, philosopher, and friend, in the humble retirement of his own home,--he was a tailor in the town, whose assistance at such periods had long been in requisition,--he knew very well how the seat had been secured. Ten shillings a head would have sent three hundred true Liberals to the ballot-boxes! The mode of distributing the money had been arranged; but the Conservative tailor had been too acute, and not half-a-sovereign could be passed. The tailor got twenty-five pounds for his work, and that was smuggled in among the bills for printing. Mr. Williams, however, was sure that he had so opened out the iniquities of the dissenters as to have convinced the borough. Yes; every Salem and Zion and Ebenezer in his large parish would be closed. "It is a great thing for the country," said Mr. Williams. "He'll make a capital member," said Silverbridge, clapping his friend on the back. "I hope he'll never forget," said Mr. Williams, "that he owes his seat to the Protestant and Church-of-England principles which have sunk so deeply into the minds of the thoughtful portion of the inhabitants of this borough." "Whom should they elect but a Tregear?" said the mother, feeling that her rector took too much of the praise to himself. "I think you have done more for us than any one else," whispered Miss Tregear to the young Lord. "What you said was so reassuring!" The father before he went to bed expressed to his son, with some trepidation, a hope that all this would lead to no great permanent increase of expenditure. That evening before he went to bed Lord Silverbridge wrote to his father an account of what had taken place at Polpenno. Polwenning, 15th December. MY DEAR FATHER, Among us all we have managed to return Tregear. I am afraid you will not be quite pleased because it will be a vote lost to your party. But I really think that he is just the fellow to be in Parliament. If he were on your side I'm sure he's the kind of man you'd like to bring into office. He is always thinking about those sort of things. He says that, if there were no Conservatives, such Liberals as you and Mr. Monk would be destroyed by the Jacobins. There is something in that. Whether a man is a Conservative or not himself, I suppose there ought to be Conservatives. The Duke as he read this made a memorandum in his own mind that he would explain to his son that every carriage should have a drag to its wheels, but that an ambitious soul would choose to be the coachman rather than the drag. It was beastly work! The Duke made another memorandum to instruct his son that no gentleman above the age of a schoolboy should allow himself to use such a word in such a sense. We had to go about in the rain up to our knees in mud for eight or nine days, always saying the same thing. And of course all that we said was bosh. Another memorandum--or rather two, one as to the slang, and another as to the expediency of teaching something to the poor voters on such occasions. Our only comfort was that the Carbottle people were quite as badly off as us. Another memorandum as to the grammar. The absence of Christian charity did not at the moment affect the Duke. I made ever so many speeches, till at last it seemed to be quite easy. Here there was a very grave memorandum. Speeches easy to young speakers are generally very difficult to old listeners. But of course it was all bosh. This required no separate memorandum. I have promised to go up to town with Tregear for a day or two. After that I will stick to my purpose of going to Matching again. I will be there about the 22nd, and will then stay over Christmas. After that I am going into the Brake country for some hunting. It is such a shame to have a lot of horses and never to ride them! Your most affectionate Son, SILVERBRIDGE. The last sentence gave rise in the Duke's mind to the necessity of a very elaborate memorandum on the subject of amusements generally. By the same post another letter went from Polpenno to Matching which also gave rise to some mental memoranda. It was as follows: MY DEAR MABEL, I am a Member of the British House of Commons! I have sometimes regarded myself as being one of the most peculiarly unfortunate men in the world, and yet now I have achieved that which all commoners in England think to be the greatest honour within their reach, and have done so at an age at which very few achieve it but the sons of the wealthy and the powerful. I now come to my misfortunes. I know that as a poor man I ought not to be a member of Parliament. I ought to be earning my bread as a lawyer or a doctor. I have no business to be what I am, and when I am forty I shall find that I have eaten up all my good things instead of having them to eat. I have one chance before me. You know very well what that is. Tell her that my pride in being a member of Parliament is much more on her behalf than on my own. The man who dares to love her ought at any rate to be something in the world. If it might be,--if ever it may be,--I should wish to be something for her sake. I am sure you will be glad of my success yourself, for my own sake. Your affectionate Friend and Cousin, FRANCIS TREGEAR. The first mental memorandum in regard to this came from the writer's assertion that he at forty would have eaten up all his good things. No! He being a man might make his way to good things though he was not born to them. He surely would win his good things for himself. But what good things were in store for her? What chance of success was there for her? But the reflection which was the most bitter to her of all came from her assurance that his love for that other girl was so genuine. Even when he was writing to her there was no spark left of the old romance! Some hint of a recollection of past feelings, some half-concealed reference to the former passion might have been allowed to him! She as a woman,--as a woman all whose fortune must depend on marriage,--could indulge in no such allusions; but surely he need not have been so hard! But still there was another memorandum. At the present moment she would do all that he desired as far as it was in her power. She was anxious that he should marry Lady Mary Palliser, though so anxious also that something of his love should remain with herself! She was quite willing to convey that message,--if it might be done without offence to the Duke. She was there with the object of ingratiating herself with the Duke. She must not impede her favour with the Duke by making herself the medium of any secret communications between Mary and her lover. But how should she serve Tregear without risk of offending the Duke? She read the letter again and again, and thinking it to be a good letter she determined to show it to the Duke. "Mr. Tregear has got in at Polpenno," she said on the day on which she and the Duke had received their letters. "So I hear from Silverbridge." "It will be a good thing for him, I suppose." "I do not know," said the Duke coldly. "He is my cousin, and I have always been interested in his welfare." "That is natural." "And a seat in Parliament will give him something to do." "Certainly it ought," said the Duke. "I do not think that he is an idle man." To this the Duke made no answer. He did not wish to be made to talk about Tregear. "May I tell you why I say all this?" she asked softly, pressing her hand on the Duke's arm ever so gently. To this the Duke assented, but still coldly. "Because I want to know what I ought to do. Would you mind reading that letter? Of course you will remember that Frank and I have been brought up almost as brother and sister." The Duke took the letter in his hand and did read it, very slowly. "What he says about young men without means going into Parliament is true enough." This was not encouraging, but as the Duke went on reading, Mabel did not think it necessary to argue the matter. He had to read the last paragraph twice before he understood it. He did read it twice, and then folding the letter very slowly gave it back to his companion. "What ought I to do?" asked Lady Mabel. "As you and I, my dear, are friends, I think that any carrying of a message to Mary would be breaking confidence. I think that you should not speak to Mary about Mr. Tregear." Then he changed the subject. Lady Mabel of course understood that after that she could not say a word to Mary about the election at Polpenno. CHAPTER LVII The Meeting at "The Bobtailed Fox" It was now the middle of December, and matters were not comfortable in the Runnymede country. The Major with much pluck had carried on his operations in opposition to the wishes of the resident members of the hunt. The owners of coverts had protested, and farmers had sworn that he should not ride over their lands. There had even been some talk among the younger men of thrashing him if he persevered. But he did persevere, and had managed to have one or two good runs. Now it was the fortune of the Runnymede hunt that many of those who rode with the hounds were strangers to the country,--men who came down by train from London, gentlemen of perhaps no great distinction, who could ride hard, but as to whom it was thought that as they did not provide the land to ride over, or the fences to be destroyed, or the coverts for the foxes, or the greater part of the subscription, they ought not to oppose those by whom all these things were supplied. But the Major, knowing where his strength lay, had managed to get a party to support him. The contract to hunt the country had been made with him in last March, and was good for one year. Having the kennels and the hounds under his command he did hunt the country; but he did so amidst a storm of contumely and ill will. At last it was decided that a general meeting of the members of the hunt should be called together with the express object of getting rid of the Major. The gentlemen of the neighbourhood felt that the Major was not to be borne, and the farmers were very much stronger against him than the gentlemen. It had now become a settled belief among sporting men in England that the Major had with his own hands driven the nail into the horse's foot. Was it to be endured that the Runnymede farmers should ride to hounds under a Master who had been guilty of such an iniquity as that? "The Staines and Egham Gazette," which had always supported the Runnymede hunt, declared in very plain terms that all who rode with the Major were enjoying their sport out of the plunder which had been extracted from Lord Silverbridge. Then a meeting was called for Saturday, the 18th December, to be held at that well-known sporting little inn The Bobtailed Fox. The members of the hunt were earnestly called upon to attend. It was,--so said the printed document which was issued,--the only means by which the hunt could be preserved. If gentlemen who were interested did not put their shoulders to the wheel, the Runnymede hunt must be regarded as a thing of the past. One of the documents was sent to the Major with an intimation that if he wished to attend no objection would be made to his presence. The chair would be taken at half-past twelve punctually by that popular and well-known old sportsman Mr. Mahogany Topps. Was ever the Master of a hunt treated in such a way! His presence not objected to! As a rule the Master of a hunt does not attend hunt meetings, because the matter to be discussed is generally that of the money to be subscribed for him, as to which it is as well he should not hear the pros and cons. But it is presumed that he is to be the hero of the hour, and that he is to be treated to his face, and spoken of behind his back, with love, admiration, and respect. But now this Master was told his presence would be allowed! And then this fox-hunting meeting was summoned for half-past twelve on a hunting-day;--when, as all the world knew, the hounds were to meet at eleven, twelve miles off! Was ever anything so base? said the Major to himself. But he resolved that he would be equal to the occasion. He immediately issued cards to all the members, stating that on that day the meet had been changed from Croppingham Bushes, which was ever so much on the other side of Bagshot, to The Bobtailed Fox,--for the benefit of the hunt at large, said the card,--and that the hounds would be there at half-past one. Whatever might happen, he must show a spirit. In all this there were one or two of the London brigade who stood fast to him. "Cock your tail, Tifto," said one hard-riding supporter, "and show 'em you aren't afraid of nothing." So Tifto cocked his tail and went to the meeting in his best new scarlet coat, with his whitest breeches, his pinkest boots, and his neatest little bows at his knees. He entered the room with his horn in his hand, as a symbol of authority, and took off his hunting-cap to salute the assembly with a jaunty air. He had taken two glasses of cherry brandy, and as long as the stimulant lasted would no doubt be able to support himself with audacity. Old Mr. Topps, in rising from his chair, did not say very much. He had been hunting in the Runnymede country for nearly fifty years, and had never seen anything so sad as this before. It made him, he knew, very unhappy. As for foxes, there were always plenty of foxes in his coverts. His friend Mr. Jawstock, on the right, would explain what all this was about. All he wanted was to see the Runnymede hunt properly kept up. Then he sat down, and Mr. Jawstock rose to his legs. Mr. Jawstock was a gentleman well known in the Runnymede country, who had himself been instrumental in bringing Major Tifto into these parts. There is often someone in a hunting country who never becomes a Master of hounds himself, but who has almost as much to say about the business as the Master himself. Sometimes at hunt meetings he is rather unpopular, as he is always inclined to talk. But there are occasions on which his services are felt to be valuable,--as were Mr. Jawstock's at present. He was about forty-five years of age, was not much given to riding, owned no coverts himself, and was not a man of wealth; but he understood the nature of hunting, knew all its laws, and was a judge of horses, of hounds,--and of men; and could say a thing when he had to say it. Mr. Jawstock sat on the right hand of Mr. Topps, and a place was left for the Master opposite. The task to be performed was neither easy nor pleasant. It was necessary that the orator should accuse the gentleman opposite to him,--a man with whom he himself had been very intimate,--of iniquity so gross and so mean, that nothing worse can be conceived. "You are a swindler, a cheat, a rascal of the very deepest dye;--a rogue so mean that it is revolting to be in the same room with you!" That was what Mr. Jawstock had to say. And he said it. Looking round the room, occasionally appealing to Mr. Topps, who on these occasions would lift up his hands in horror, but never letting his eye fall for a moment on the Major, Mr. Jawstock told his story. "I did not see it done," said he. "I know nothing about it. I never was at Doncaster in my life. But you have evidence of what the Jockey Club thinks. The Master of our Hunt has been banished from racecourses." Here there was considerable opposition, and a few short but excited little dialogues were maintained;--throughout all which Tifto restrained himself like a Spartan. "At any rate he has been thoroughly disgraced," continued Mr. Jawstock, "as a sporting man. He has been driven out of the Beargarden Club." "He resigned in disgust at their treatment," said a friend of the Major's. "Then let him resign in disgust at ours," said Mr. Jawstock, "for we won't have him here. Cæsar wouldn't keep a wife who was suspected of infidelity, nor will the Runnymede country endure a Master of Hounds who is supposed to have driven a nail into a horse's foot." Two or three other gentlemen had something to say before the Major was allowed to speak,--the upshot of the discourse of all of them being the same. The Major must go. Then the Major got up, and certainly as far as attention went he had full justice done him. However clamorous they might intend to be afterwards that amount of fair play they were all determined to afford him. The Major was not excellent at speaking, but he did perhaps better than might have been expected. "This is a very disagreeable position," he said, "very disagreeable indeed. As for the nail in the horse's foot I know no more about it than the babe unborn. But I've got two things to say, and I'll say what aren't the most consequence first. These hounds belong to me." Here he paused, and a loud contradiction came from many parts of the room. Mr. Jawstock, however, proposed that the Major should be heard to the end. "I say they belong to me," repeated the Major. "If anybody tries his hand at anything else the law will soon set that to rights. But that aren't of much consequence. What I've got to say is this. Let the matter be referred. If that 'orse had a nail run into his foot,--and I don't say he hadn't,--who was the man most injured? Why, Lord Silverbridge. Everybody knows that. I suppose he dropped well on to eighty thousand pounds! I propose to leave it to him. Let him say. He ought to know more about it than any one. He and I were partners in the horse. His Lordship aren't very sweet upon me just at present. Nobody need fear that he'll do me a good turn. I say leave it to him." In this matter the Major had certainly been well advised. A rumour had become prevalent among sporting circles that Silverbridge had refused to condemn the Major. It was known that he had paid his bets without delay, and that he had, to some extent, declined to take advice from the leaders of the Jockey Club. The Major's friends were informed that the young lord had refused to vote against him at the club. Was it not more than probable that if this matter were referred to him he would refuse to give a verdict against his late partner? The Major sat down, put on his cap, and folded his arms akimbo, with his horn sticking out from his left hand. For a time there was general silence, broken, however, by murmurs in different parts of the room. Then Mr. Jawstock whispered something into the ear of the Chairman, and Mr. Topps, rising from his seat, suggested to Tifto that he should retire. "I think so," said Mr. Jawstock. "The proposition you have made can be discussed only in your absence." Then the Major held a consultation with one of his friends, and after that did retire. When he was gone the real hubbub of the meeting commenced. There were some there who understood the nature of Lord Silverbridge's feelings in the matter. "He would be the last man in England to declare him guilty," said Mr. Jawstock. "Whatever my lord says, he shan't ride across my land," said a farmer in the background. "I don't think any gentleman ever made a fairer proposition,--since anything was anything," said a friend of the Major's, a gentleman who kept livery stables in Long Acre. "We won't have him here," said another farmer,--whereupon Mr. Topps shook his head sadly. "I don't think any gentleman ought to be condemned without a 'earing," said one of Tifto's admirers, "and where you're to get any one to hunt the country like him, I don't know as any body is prepared to say." "We'll manage that," said a young gentleman from the neighbourhood of Bagshot, who thought that he could hunt the country himself quite as well as Major Tifto. "He must go from here; that's the long and the short of it," said Mr. Jawstock. "Put it to the vote, Mr. Jawstock," said the livery-stable keeper. Mr. Topps, who had had great experience in public meetings, hereupon expressed an opinion that they might as well go to a vote. No doubt he was right if the matter was one which must sooner or later be decided in that manner. Mr. Jawstock looked round the room trying to calculate what might be the effect of a show of hands. The majority was with him; but he was well aware that of this majority some few would be drawn away by the apparent justice of Tifto's proposition. And what was the use of voting? Let them vote as they might, it was out of the question that Tifto should remain Master of the hunt. But the chairman had acceded, and on such occasions it is difficult to go against the chairman. Then there came a show of hands,--first for those who desired to refer the matter to Lord Silverbridge, and afterwards for Tifto's direct enemies,--for those who were anxious to banish Tifto out of hand, without reference to any one. At last the matter was settled. To the great annoyance of Mr. Jawstock and the farmers, the meeting voted that Lord Silverbridge should be invited to give his opinion as to the innocence or guilt of his late partner. The Major's friends carried the discussion out to him as he sat on horseback, as though he had altogether gained the battle and was secure in his position as Master of the Runnymede Hunt for the next dozen years. But at the same time there came a message from Mr. Mahogany Topps. It was now half-past two, and Mr. Topps expressed a hope that Major Tifto would not draw the country on the present occasion. The Major, thinking that it might be as well to conciliate his enemies, rode solemnly and slowly home to Tallyho Lodge in the middle of his hounds. CHAPTER LVIII The Major Is Deposed When Silverbridge undertook to return with Tregear to London instead of going off direct to Matching, it is to be feared that he was simply actuated by a desire to postpone his further visit to his father's house. He had thought that Lady Mabel would surely be gone before his task at Polpenno was completed. As soon as he should again find himself in his father's presence he would at once declare his intention of marrying Isabel Boncassen. But he could not see his way to doing it while Lady Mabel should be in the house. "I think you will find Mabel still at Matching," said Tregear on their way up. "She will wait for you, I fancy." "I don't know why she should wait for me," said Silverbridge almost angrily. "I thought that you and she were fast friends." "I suppose we are--after a fashion. She might wait for you perhaps." "I think she would,--if I could go there." "You are much thicker with her than I ever was. You went to see her at Grex,--when nobody else was there." "Is Miss Cassewary nobody?" "Next door to it," said Silverbridge, half jealous of the favours shown to Tregear. "I thought," said Tregear, "that there would be a closer intimacy between you and her." "I don't know why you should think so." "Had you never any such idea yourself?" "I haven't any now,--so there may be an end of it. I don't think a fellow ought to be cross-questioned on such a subject." "Then I am very sorry for Mabel," said Tregear. This was uttered solemnly, so that Silverbridge found himself debarred from making any flippant answer. He could not altogether defend himself. He had been quite justified, he thought, in changing his mind, but he did not like to own that he had changed it so quickly. "I think we had better not talk any more about it," he said, after pausing for a few moments. After that nothing more was said between them on the subject. Up in town Silverbridge spent two or three days pleasantly enough, while a thunderbolt was being prepared for him, or rather, in truth, two thunderbolts. During these days he was much with Tregear; and though he could not speak freely of his own matrimonial projects, still he was brought round to give some sort of assent to the engagement between Tregear and his sister. This new position which his friend had won for himself did in some degree operate on his judgment. It was not perhaps that he himself imagined that Tregear as a member of Parliament would be worthier, but that he fancied that such would be the Duke's feelings. The Duke had declared that Tregear was nobody. That could hardly be said of a man who had a seat in the House of Commons;--certainly could not be said by so staunch a politician as the Duke. But had he known of those two thunderbolts he would not have enjoyed his time at the Beargarden. The thunderbolts fell upon him in the shape of two letters which reached his hands at the same time, and were as follows: The Bobtailed Fox. Egham. 18th December. MY LORD, At a meeting held in this house to-day in reference to the hunting of the Runnymede country, it was proposed that the management of the hounds should be taken out of the hands of Major Tifto, in consequence of certain conduct of which it is alleged that he was guilty at the last Doncaster races. Major Tifto was present, and requested that your Lordship's opinion should be asked as to his guilt. I do not know myself that we are warranted in troubling your Lordship on the subject. I am, however, commissioned by the majority of the gentlemen who were present to ask you whether you think that Major Tifto's conduct on that occasion was of such a nature as to make him unfit to be the depositary of that influence, authority, and intimacy which ought to be at the command of a Master of Hounds. I feel myself bound to inform your Lordship that the hunt generally will be inclined to place great weight upon your opinion; but that it does not undertake to reinstate Major Tifto, even should your opinion be in his favour. I have the honour to be, My Lord, Your Lordship's most obedient Servant, JEREMIAH JAWSTOCK. Juniper Lodge, Staines. Mr. Jawstock, when he had written this letter, was proud of his own language, but still felt that the application was a very lame one. Why ask any man for an opinion, and tell him at the same time that his opinion might probably not be taken? And yet no other alternative had been left to him. The meeting had decided that the application should be made; but Mr. Jawstock was well aware that let the young Lord's answer be what it might, the Major would not be endured as Master in the Runnymede country. Mr. Jawstock felt that the passage in which he explained that a Master of Hounds should be a depositary of influence and intimacy, was good;--but yet the application was lame, very lame. Lord Silverbridge as he read it thought that it was very unfair. It was a most disagreeable thunderbolt. Then he opened the second letter, of which he well knew the handwriting. It was from the Major. Tifto's letters were very legible, but the writing was cramped, showing that the operation had been performed with difficulty. Silverbridge had hoped that he might never receive another epistle from his late partner. The letter, as follows, had been drawn out for Tifto in rough by the livery-stable keeper in Long Acre. MY DEAR LORD SILVERBRIDGE, I venture respectfully to appeal to your Lordship for an act of justice. Nobody has more of a true-born Englishman's feeling of fair play between man and man than your Lordship; and as you and me have been a good deal together, and your Lordship ought to know me pretty well, I venture to appeal to your Lordship for a good word. All that story from Doncaster has got down into the country where I am M.F.H. Nobody could have been more sorry than me that your Lordship dropped your money. Would not I have been prouder than anything to have a horse in my name win the race! Was it likely I should lame him? Anyways I didn't, and I don't think your Lordship thinks it was me. Of course your Lordship and me is two now;--but that don't alter the facts. What I want is your Lordship to send me a line, just stating your Lordship's opinion that I didn't do it, and didn't have nothing to do with it;--which I didn't. There was a meeting at The Bobtailed Fox yesterday, and the gentlemen was all of one mind to go by what your Lordship would say. I couldn't desire nothing fairer. So I hope your Lordship will stand to me now, and write something that will pull me through. With all respects I beg to remain, Your Lordship's most dutiful Servant, T. TIFTO. There was something in this letter which the Major himself did not quite approve. There was an absence of familiarity about it which annoyed him. He would have liked to call upon his late partner to declare that a more honourable man than Major Tifto had never been known on the turf. But he felt himself to be so far down in the world that it was not safe for him to hold an opinion of his own, even against the livery-stable keeper! Silverbridge was for a time in doubt whether he should answer the letters at all, and if so how he should answer them. In regard to Mr. Jawstock and the meeting at large, he regarded the application as an impertinence. But as to Tifto himself he vacillated much between pity, contempt, and absolute condemnation. Everybody had assured him that the man had certainly been guilty. The fact that he had made bets against their joint horse,--bets as to which he had said nothing till after the race was over,--had been admitted by himself. And yet it was possible that the man might not be such a rascal as to be unfit to manage the Runnymede hounds. Having himself got rid of Tifto, he would have been glad that the poor wretch should have been left with his hunting honours. But he did not think that he could write to his late partner any letter that would preserve those honours to him. At Tregear's advice he referred the matter to Mr. Lupton. Mr. Lupton was of opinion that both the letters should be answered, but that the answer to each should be very short. "There is a prejudice about the world just at present," said Mr. Lupton, "in favour of answering letters. I don't see why I am to be subjected to an annoyance because another man has taken a liberty. But it is better to submit to public opinion. Public opinion thinks that letters should be answered." Then Mr. Lupton dictated the answers. "Lord Silverbridge presents his compliments to Mr. Jawstock, and begs to say that he does not feel himself called upon to express any opinion as to Major Tifto's conduct at Doncaster." That was the first. The second was rather less simple, but not much longer. SIR, I do not feel myself called upon to express any opinion either to you or to others as to your conduct at Doncaster. Having received a letter on the subject from Mr. Jawstock I have written to him to this effect. Your obedient Servant, SILVERBRIDGE. To T. Tifto, Esq., Tallyho Lodge. Poor Tifto, when he got this very curt epistle, was broken-hearted. He did not dare to show it. Day after day he told the livery-stable keeper that he had received no reply, and at last asserted that his appeal had remained altogether unanswered. Even this he thought was better than acknowledging the rebuff which had reached him. As regarded the meeting which had been held,--and any further meetings which might be held,--at The Bobtailed Fox, he did not see the necessity, as he explained to the livery-stable keeper, of acknowledging that he had written any letter to Lord Silverbridge. The letter to Mr. Jawstock was of course brought forward. Another meeting at The Bobtailed Fox was convened. But in the meantime hunting had been discontinued in the Runnymede country. The Major with all his pluck, with infinite cherry brandy, could not do it. Men who had a few weeks since been on very friendly terms, and who had called each other Dick and Harry when the squabble first began, were now talking of "punching" each other's heads. Special whips had been procured by men who intended to ride, and special bludgeons by the young farmers who intended that nobody should ride as long as Major Tifto kept the hounds. It was said that the police would interfere. It was whispered that the hounds would be shot,--though Mr. Topps, Mr. Jawstock, and others declared that no crime so heinous as that had ever been contemplated in the Runnymede country. The difficulties were too many for poor Tifto, and the hounds were not brought out again under his influence. A second meeting was summoned, and an invitation was sent to the Major similar to that which he had before received;--but on this occasion he did not appear. Nor were there many of the gentlemen down from London. This second meeting might almost have been called select. Mr. Mahogany Topps was there of course, in the chair, and Mr. Jawstock took the place of honour and of difficulty on his right hand. There was the young gentleman from Bagshot, who considered himself quite fit to take Tifto's place if somebody else would pay the bills and settle the money, and there was the sporting old parson from Croppingham. Three or four other members of the hunt were present, and perhaps half-a-dozen farmers, ready to declare that Major Tifto should never be allowed to cross their fields again. But there was no opposition. Mr. Jawstock read the young lord's note, and declared that it was quite as much as he expected. He considered that the note, short as it was, must be decisive. Major Tifto, in appealing to Lord Silverbridge, had agreed to abide by his Lordship's answer, and that answer was now before them. Mr. Jawstock ventured to propose that Major Tifto should be declared to be no longer Master of the Runnymede Hounds. The parson from Croppingham seconded the proposition, and Major Tifto was formally deposed. CHAPTER LIX No One Can Tell What May Come to Pass Then Lord Silverbridge necessarily went down to Matching, knowing that he must meet Mabel Grex. Why should she have prolonged her visit? No doubt it might be very pleasant for her to be his father's guest at Matching, but she had been there above a month! He could understand that his father should ask her to remain. His father was still brooding over that foolish communication which had been made to him on the night of the dinner at the Beargarden. His father was still intending to take Mabel to his arms as a daughter-in-law. But Lady Mabel herself knew that it could not be so! The whole truth had been told to her. Why should she remain at Matching for the sake of being mixed up in a scene the acting of which could not fail to be disagreeable to her? He found the house very quiet and nearly empty. Mrs. Finn was there with the two girls, and Mr. Warburton had come back. Miss Cassewary had gone to a brother's house. Other guests to make Christmas merry there were none. As he looked round at the large rooms he reflected that he himself was there only for a special purpose. It was his duty to break the news of his intended marriage to his father. As he stood before the fire, thinking how best he might do this, it occurred to him that a letter from a distance would have been the ready and simple way. But then it had occurred to him also, when at a distance, that a declaration of his purpose face to face was the simplest and readiest way. If you have to go headlong into the water you should take your plunge without hesitating. So he told himself, making up his mind that he would have it all out that evening. At dinner Lady Mabel sat next to his father, and he could watch the special courtesy with which the Duke treated the girl whom he was so desirous of introducing to his house. Silverbridge could not talk about the election at Polpenno because all conversation about Tregear was interdicted in the presence of his sister. He could say nothing as to the Runnymede hunt and the two thunderbolts which had fallen on him, as Major Tifto was not a subject on which he could expatiate in the presence of his father. He asked a few questions about the shooting, and referred with great regret to his absence from the Brake country. "I am sure Mr. Cassewary could spare you for another fortnight," the Duke said to his neighbour, alluding to a visit which she now intended to make. "If so he would have to spare me altogether," said Mabel, "for I must meet my father in London in the middle of January." "Could you not put it off to another year?" "You would think I had taken root and was growing at Matching." "Of all our products you would be the most delightful, and the most charming,--and we would hope the most permanent," said the courteous Duke. "After being here so long I need hardly say that I like Matching better than any place in the world. I suppose it is the contrast to Grex." "Grex was a palace," said the Duke, "before a wall of this house had been built." "Grex is very old, and very wild,--and very uncomfortable. But I love it dearly. Matching is the very reverse of Grex." "Not I hope in your affections." "I did not mean that. I think one likes a contrast. But I must go, say on the first of January, to pick up Miss Cassewary." It was certain, therefore, that she was going on the first of January. How would it be if he put off the telling of his story for yet another week, till she should be gone? Then he looked around and bethought himself that the time would hang very heavy with him. And his father would daily expect from him a declaration exactly opposed to that which he had to make. He had no horses to ride. As he went on listening he almost convinced himself that the proper thing to do would be to go back to London and thence write to his father. He made no confession to his father on that night. On the next morning there was a heavy fall of snow, but nevertheless everybody managed to go to church. The Duke, as he looked at Lady Mabel tripping along over the swept paths in her furs and short petticoats and well-made boots, thought that his son was a lucky fellow to have the chance of winning the love of such a girl. No remembrance of Miss Boncassen came across his mind as he saw them close together. It was so important that Silverbridge should marry and thus be kept from further follies! And it was so momentous to the fortunes of the Palliser family generally that he should marry well! In thinking so it did not occur to him that the granddaughter of an American labourer might be offered to him. A young lady fit to be Duchess of Omnium was not to be found everywhere. But this girl, he thought as he saw her walking briskly and strongly through the snow, with every mark of health about her, with every sign of high breeding, very beautiful, exquisite in manner, gracious as a goddess, was fit to be a Duchess! Silverbridge at this moment was walking close to her side,--in good looks, in gracious manner, in high breeding her equal,--in worldly gifts infinitely her superior. Surely she would not despise him! Silverbridge at the moment was expressing a hope that the sermon would not be very long. After lunch Mabel came suddenly behind the chair on which Silverbridge was sitting and asked him to take a walk with her. Was she not afraid of the snow? "Perhaps you are," she said laughing. "I do not mind it in the least." When they were but a few yards from the front door, she put her hand upon his arm, and spoke to him as though she had arranged the walk with reference to that special question, "And now tell me all about Frank." She had arranged everything. She had a plan before her now, and had determined in accordance with that plan that she would say nothing to disturb him on this occasion. If she could succeed in bringing him into good humour with herself, that should be sufficient for to-day. "Now tell me everything about Frank." "Frank is member of Parliament for Polpenno. That is all." "That is so like a man and so unlike a woman. What did he say? What did he do? How did he look? What did you say? What did you do? How did you look?" "We looked very miserable, when we got wet through, walking about all day in the rain." "Was that necessary?" "Quite necessary. We looked so mean and draggled that nobody would have voted for us, only that poor Mr. Carbottle looked meaner and more draggled." "The Duke says you made ever so many speeches." "I should think I did. It is very easy to make speeches down at a place like that. Tregear spoke like a book." "He spoke well?" "Awfully well. He told them that all the good things that had ever been done in Parliament had been carried by the Tories. He went back to Pitt's time, and had it all at his fingers' ends." "And quite true." "That's just what it was not. It was all a crammer. But it did as well." "I am glad he is a member. Don't you think the Duke will come round a little now?" When Tregear and the election had been sufficiently discussed, they came by degrees to Major Tifto and the two thunderbolts. Silverbridge, when he perceived that nothing was to be said about Isabel Boncassen, or his own freedom in the matter of love-making, was not sorry to have a friend from whom he could find sympathy for himself in his own troubles. With some encouragement from Mabel the whole story was told. "Was it not a great impertinence?" she asked. "It was an awful bore. What could I say? I was not going to pronounce judgment against the poor devil. I daresay he was good enough for Mr. Jawstock." "But I suppose he did cheat horribly." "I daresay he did. A great many of them do cheat. But what of that? I was not bound to give him a character, bad or good." "Certainly not." "He had not been my servant. It was such a letter. I'll show it you when we get in!--asking whether Tifto was fit to be the depositary of the intimacy of the Runnymede hunt! And then Tif's letter;--I almost wept over that." "How could he have had the audacity to write at all?" "He said that 'him and me had been a good deal together.' Unfortunately that was true. Even now I am not quite sure that he lamed the horse himself." "Everybody thinks he did. Percival says there is no doubt about it." "Percival knows nothing about it. Three of the gang ran away, and he stood his ground. That's about all we do know." "What did you say to him?" "I had to address him as Sir, and beg him not to write to me any more. Of course they mean to get rid of him, and I couldn't do him any good. Poor Tifto! Upon the whole I think I hate Jawstock worse than Tifto." Lady Mabel was content with her afternoon's work. When they had been at Matching before the Polpenno election, there had apparently been no friendship between them,--at any rate no confidential friendship. Miss Boncassen had been there, and he had had neither ears nor eyes for any one else. But now something like the feeling of old days had been restored. She had not done much towards her great object;--but then she had known that nothing could be done till he should again be in a good humour with her. On the Sunday, the Monday, and the Tuesday they were again together. In some of these interviews Silverbridge described the Polpenno people, and told her how Miss Tregear had been reassured by his eloquence. He also read to her the Jawstock and Tifto correspondence, and was complimented by her as to his prudence and foresight. "To tell the truth I consulted Mr. Lupton," he said, not liking to take credit for wisdom which had not been his own. Then they talked about Grex, and Killancodlem, about Gerald and the shooting, about Mary's love for Tregear, and about the work of the coming Session. On all these subjects they were comfortable and confidential,--Miss Boncassen's name never having been as yet so much as mentioned. But still the real work was before her. She had not hoped to bring him round to kneel once more at her feet by such gentle measures as these. She had not dared to dream that he could in this way be taught to forget the past autumn and all its charms. She knew well that there was something very difficult before her. But, if that difficult thing might be done at all, these were the preparations which must be made for the doing of it. It was arranged that she should leave Matching on Saturday, the first day of the new year. Things had gone on in the manner described till the Thursday had come. The Duke had been impatient but had restrained himself. He had seen that they were much together and that they were apparently friends. He too told himself that there were two more days, and that before the end of those days everything might be pleasantly settled! It had become a matter of course that Silverbridge and Mabel should walk together in the afternoon. He himself had felt that there was danger in this,--not danger that he should be untrue to Isabel, but that he should make others think that he was true to Mabel. But he excused himself on the plea that he and Mabel had been intimate friends,--were still intimate friends, and that she was going away in a day or two. Mary, who watched it all, was sure that misery was being prepared for someone. She was aware that by this time her father was anxious to welcome Mabel as his daughter-in-law. She strongly suspected that something had been said between her father and her brother on the subject. But then she had Isabel Boncassen's direct assurance that Silverbridge was engaged to her! Now when Isabel's back was turned, Silverbridge and Mabel were always together. On the Thursday after lunch they were again out together. It had become so much a habit that the walk repeated itself without an effort. It had been part of Mabel's scheme that it should be so. During all this morning she had been thinking of her scheme. It was all but hopeless. So much she had declared to herself. But forlorn hopes do sometimes end in splendid triumphs. That which she might gain was so much! And what could she lose? The sweet bloom of her maiden shame? That, she told herself, with bitterest inward tears, was already gone from her. Frank Tregear at any rate knew where her heart had been given. Frank Tregear knew that having lost her heart to one man she was anxious to marry another. He knew that she was willing to accept the coronet of a duchess as her consolation. That bloom of her maiden shame, of which she quite understood the sweetness, the charm, the value--was gone when she had brought herself to such a state that any human being should know that, loving one man, she should be willing to marry another. The sweet treasure was gone from her. Its aroma was fled. It behoved her now to be ambitious, cautious,--and if possible successful. When first she had so resolved, success seemed to be easily within her reach. Of all the golden youths that crossed her path no one was so pleasant to her eye, to her ear, to her feelings generally as this Duke's young heir. There was a coming manliness about him which she liked,--and she liked even the slight want of present manliness. Putting aside Frank Tregear she could go nearer to loving him than any other man she had ever seen. With him she would not be turned from her duties by disgust, by dislike, or dismay. She could even think that the time would come when she might really love him. Then she had all but succeeded, and she might have succeeded altogether had she been but a little more prudent. But she had allowed her great prize to escape from her fingers. But the prize was not yet utterly beyond her grasp. To recover it,--to recover even the smallest chance of recovering it, there would be need of great exertion. She must be bold, sudden, unwomanlike,--and yet with such display of woman's charm that he at least should discover no want. She must be false, but false with such perfect deceit, that he must regard her as a pearl of truth. If anything could lure him back it must be his conviction of her passionate love. And she must be strong;--so strong as to overcome not only his weakness, but all that was strong in him. She knew that he did love that other girl,--and she must overcome even that. And to do this she must prostrate herself at his feet,--as, since the world began, it has been man's province to prostrate himself at the feet of the woman he loves. To do this she must indeed bid adieu to the sweet bloom of her maiden shame! But had she not done so already when, by the side of the brook at Killancodlem, she had declared to him plainly enough her despair at hearing that he loved that other girl? Though she were to grovel at his feet she could not speak more plainly than she had spoken then. She could not tell her story now more plainly than she had done then; but,--though the chances were small,--perchance she might tell it more effectually. "Perhaps this will be our last walk," she said. "Come down to the seat over the river." "Why should it be the last? You'll be here to-morrow." "There are so many slips in such things," she said laughing. "You may get a letter from your constituents that will want all the day to answer. Or your father may have a political communication to make to me. But at any rate come." So they went to the seat. It was a spot in the park from whence there was a distant view over many lands, and low beneath the bench, which stood on the edge of a steep bank, ran a stream which made a sweeping bend in this place, so that a reach of the little river might be seen both to the right and to the left. Though the sun was shining, the snow under their feet was hard with frost. It was an air such as one sometimes finds in England, and often in America. Though the cold was very perceptible, though water in the shade was freezing at this moment, there was no feeling of damp, no sense of bitter wind. It was a sweet and jocund air, such as would make young people prone to run and skip. "You are not going to sit down with all the snow on the bench," said Silverbridge. On their way thither she had not said a word that would disturb him. She had spoken to him of the coming Session, and had managed to display to him the interest which she took in his parliamentary career. In doing this she had flattered him to the top of his bent. If he would return to his father's politics, then would she too become a renegade. Would he speak in the next Session? She hoped he would speak. And if he did, might she be there to hear him? She was cautious not to say a word of Frank Tregear, understanding something of that strange jealousy which could exist even when he who was jealous did not love the woman who caused it. "No," she said, "I do not think we can sit. But still I like to be here with you. All that some day will be your own." Then she stretched her hands out to the far view. "Some of it, I suppose. I don't think it is all ours. As for that, if we cared for extent of acres, one ought to go to Barsetshire." "Is that larger?" "Twice as large, I believe, and yet none of the family like being there. The rental is very well." "And the borough," she said, leaning on his arm and looking up into his face. "What a happy fellow you ought to be." "Bar Tifto,--and Mr. Jawstock." "You have got rid of Tifto and all those troubles very easily." "Thanks to the governor." "Yes, indeed. I do love your father so dearly." "So do I--rather." "May I tell you something about him?" As she asked the question she was standing very close to him, leaning upon his arm, with her left hand crossed upon her right. Had others been there, of course she would not have stood in such a guise. She knew that,--and he knew it too. Of course there was something in it of declared affection,--of that kind of love which most of us have been happy enough to give and receive, without intending to show more than true friendship will allow at special moments. "Don't tell me anything about him I shan't like to hear." "Ah;--that is so hard to know. I wish you would like to hear it." "What can it be?" "I cannot tell you now." "Why not? And why did you offer?" "Because-- Oh, Silverbridge." He certainly as yet did not understand it. It had never occurred to him that she would know what were his father's wishes. Perhaps he was slow of comprehension as he urged her to tell him what this was about his father. "What can you tell me about him, that I should not like to hear?" "You do not know? Oh, Silverbridge, I think you know." Then there came upon him a glimmering of the truth. "You do know." And she stood apart looking him full in the face. "I do not know what you can have to tell me." "No;--no. It is not I that should tell you. But yet it is so. Silverbridge, what did you say to me when you came to me that morning in the Square?" "What did I say?" "Was I not entitled to think that you--loved me?" To this he had nothing to reply, but stood before her silent and frowning. "Think of it, Silverbridge. Was it not so? And because I did not at once tell you all the truth, because I did not there say that my heart was all yours, were you right to leave me?" "You only laughed at me." "No;--no; no; I never laughed at you. How could I laugh when you were all the world to me? Ask Frank;--he knew. Ask Miss Cass;--she knew. And can you say you did not know; you, you, you yourself? Can any girl suppose that such words as these are to mean nothing when they have been spoken? You knew I loved you." "No;--no." "You must have known it. I will never believe but that you knew it. Why should your father be so sure of it?" "He never was sure of it." "Yes, Silverbridge; yes. There is not one in the house who does not see that he treats me as though he expected me to be his son's wife. Do you not know that he wishes it?" He fain would not have answered this; but she paused for his answer and then repeated her question. "Do you not know that he wishes it?" "I think he does," said Silverbridge; "but it can never be so." "Oh, Silverbridge;--oh, my loved one! Do not say that to me! Do not kill me at once!" Now she placed her hands one on each arm as she stood opposite to him and looked up into his face. "You said you loved me once. Why do you desert me now? Have you a right to treat me like that;--when I tell you that you have all my heart?" The tears were now streaming down her face, and they were not counterfeit tears. "You know," he said, submitting to her hands, but not lifting his arm to embrace her. "What do I know?" "That I have given all I have to give to another." As he said this he looked away sternly, over her shoulder, to the distance. "That American girl!" she exclaimed, starting back, with some show of sternness also on her brow. "Yes;--that American girl," said Silverbridge. Then she recovered herself immediately. Indignation, natural indignation, would not serve her turn in the present emergency. "You know that cannot be. You ought to know it. What will your father say? You have not dared to tell him. That is so natural," she added, trying to appease his frown. "How possibly can it be told to him? I will not say a word against her." "No; do not do that." "But there are fitnesses of things which such a one as you cannot disregard without preparing for yourself a whole life of repentance." "Look here, Mabel." "Well?" "I will tell you the truth." "Well?" "I would sooner lose all;--the rank I have; the rank that I am to have; all these lands that you have been looking on; my father's wealth, my seat in Parliament,--everything that fortune has done for me,--I would give them all up, sooner than lose her." Now at any rate he was a man. She was sure of that now. This was more, very much more, not only than she had expected from him, but more than she had thought it possible that his character should have produced. His strength reduced her to weakness. "And I am nothing," she said. "Yes, indeed; you are Lady Mabel Grex,--whom all women envy, and whom all men honour." "The poorest wretch this day under the sun." "Do not say that. You should take shame to say that." "I do take shame;--and I do say it. Sir, do you not feel what you owe me? Do you not know that you have made me the wretch I am? How did you dare to talk to me as you did talk when you were in London? You tell me that I am Lady Mabel Grex;--and yet you come to me with a lie on your lips,--with such a lie as that! You must have taken me for some nursemaid on whom you had condescended to cast your eye! It cannot be that even you should have dared to treat Lady Mabel Grex after such a fashion as that! And now you have cast your eye on this other girl. You can never marry her!" "I shall endeavour to do so." "You can never marry her," she said, stamping her foot. She had now lost all the caution which she had taught herself for the prosecution of her scheme,--all the care with which she had burdened herself. Now she was natural enough. "No,--you can never marry her. You could not show yourself after it in your clubs, or in Parliament, or in the world. Come home, do you say? No, I will not go to your home. It is not my home. Cold;--of course I am cold;--cold through to the heart." "I cannot leave you alone here," he said, for she had now turned from him, and was walking with hurried steps and short turns on the edge of the bank, which at this place was almost a precipice. "You have left me,--utterly in the cold--more desolate than I am here even though I should spend the night among the trees. But I will go back, and will tell your father everything. If my father were other than he is,--if my brother were better to me, you would not have done this." "If you had a legion of brothers it would have been the same," he said, turning sharp upon her. They walked on together, but without a word till the house was in sight. Then she looked round at him, and stopped him on the path as she caught his eye. "Silverbridge!" she said. "Lady Mabel." "Call me Mabel. At any rate call me Mabel. If I have said anything to offend you--I beg your pardon." "I am not offended--but unhappy." "If you are unhappy, what must I be? What have I to look forward to? Give me your hand, and say that we are friends." "Certainly we are friends," he said, as he gave her his hand. "Who can tell what may come to pass?" To this he would make no answer, as it seemed to imply that some division between himself and Isabel Boncassen might possibly come to pass. "You will not tell any one that I love you?" "I tell such a thing as that!" "But never forget it yourself. No one can tell what may come to pass." Lady Mabel at once went up to her room. She had played her scene, but was well aware that she had played it altogether unsuccessfully. CHAPTER LX Lord Gerald in Further Trouble When Silverbridge got back to the house he was by no means well pleased with himself. In the first place he was unhappy to think that Mabel was unhappy, and that he had made her so. And then she had told him that he would not have dared to have acted as he had done, but that her father and her brother were careless to defend her. He had replied fiercely that a legion of brothers, ready to act on her behalf, would not have altered his conduct; but not the less did he feel that he had behaved badly to her. It could not now be altered. He could not now be untrue to Isabel. But certainly he had said a word or two to Mabel which he could not remember without regret. He had not thought that a word from him could have been so powerful. Now, when that word was recalled to his memory by the girl to whom it had been spoken, he could not quite acquit himself. And Mabel had declared to him that she would at once appeal to his father. There was an absurdity in this at which he could not but smile,--that the girl should complain to his father because he would not marry her! But even in doing this she might cause him great vexation. He could not bring himself to ask her not to tell her story to the Duke. He must take all that as it might come. While he was thinking of all this in his own room a servant brought him two letters. From the first which he opened he soon perceived that it contained an account of more troubles. It was from his brother Gerald, and was written from Auld Reikie, the name of a house in Scotland belonging to Lord Nidderdale's people. DEAR SILVER, I have got into a most awful scrape. That fellow Percival is here, and Dolly Longstaff, and Nidderdale, and Popplecourt, and Jack Hindes, and Perry who is in the Coldstreams, and one or two more, and there has been a lot of cards, and I have lost ever so much money. I wouldn't mind it so much but Percival has won it all,--a fellow I hate; and now I owe him--three thousand four hundred pounds! He has just told me he is hard up and that he wants the money before the week is over. He can't be hard up because he has won from everybody;--but of course I had to tell him that I would pay him. Can you help me? Of course I know that I have been a fool. Percival knows what he is about and plays regularly for money. When I began I didn't think that I could lose above twenty or thirty pounds. But it got on from one thing to another, and when I woke this morning I felt I didn't know what to do with myself. You can't think how the luck went against me. Everybody says that they never saw such cards. And now do tell me how I am to get out of it. Could you manage it with Mr. Moreton? Of course I will make it all right with you some day. Moreton always lets you have whatever you want. But perhaps you couldn't do this without letting the governor know. I would rather anything than that. There is some money owing at Oxford also, which of course he must know. I was thinking that perhaps I might get it from some of those fellows in London. There are people called Comfort and Criball, who let men have money constantly. I know two or three up at Oxford who have had it from them. Of course I couldn't go to them as you could do, for, in spite of what the governor said to us up in London one day, there is nothing that must come to me. But you could do anything in that way, and of course I would stand to it. I know you won't throw me over, because you always have been such a brick. But above all things don't tell the governor. Percival is such a nasty fellow, otherwise I shouldn't mind it. He spoke this morning as though I was treating him badly,--though the money was only lost last night; and he looked at me in a way that made me long to kick him. I told him not to flurry himself, and that he should have his money. If he speaks to me like that again I will kick him. I will be at Matching as soon as possible, but I cannot go till this is settled. Nid--[meaning Lord Nidderdale]--is a brick. Your affectionate Brother, GERALD. The other was from Nidderdale, and referred to the same subject. DEAR SILVERBRIDGE, Here has been a terrible nuisance. Last night some of the men got to playing cards, and Gerald lost a terribly large sum to Percival. I did all that I could to stop it, because I saw that Percival was going in for a big thing. I fancy that he got as much from Dolly Longstaff as he did from Gerald;--but it won't matter much to Dolly; or if it does, nobody cares. Gerald told me he was writing to you about it, so I am not betraying him. What is to be done? Of course Percival is behaving badly. He always does. I can't turn him out of the house, and he seems to intend to stick to Gerald till he has got the money. He has taken a cheque from Dolly dated two months hence. I am in an awful funk for fear Gerald should pitch into him. He will, in a minute, if anything rough is said to him. I suppose the straightest thing would be to go to the Duke at once, but Gerald won't hear of it. I hope you won't think me wrong to tell you. If I could help him I would. You know what a bad doctor I am for that sort of complaint. Yours always, NIDDERDALE. The dinner-bell had rung before Silverbridge had come to an end of thinking of this new vexation, and he had not as yet made up his mind what he had better do for his brother. There was one thing as to which he was determined,--that it should not be done by him, nor, if he could prevent it, by Gerald. There should be no dealings with Comfort and Criball. The Duke had succeeded, at any rate, in filling his son's mind with a horror of aid of that sort. Nidderdale had suggested that the "straightest" thing would be to go direct to the Duke. That no doubt would be straight,--and efficacious. The Duke would not have allowed a boy of his to be a debtor to Lord Percival for a day, let the debt have been contracted how it might. But Gerald had declared against this course,--and Silverbridge himself would have been most unwilling to adopt it. How could he have told that story to the Duke, while there was that other infinitely more important story of his own, which must be told at once? In the midst of all these troubles he went down to dinner. "Lady Mabel," said the Duke, "tells me that you two have been to see Sir Guy's look-out." She was standing close to the Duke and whispered a word into his ear. "You said you would call me Mabel." "Yes, sir," said Silverbridge, "and I have made up my mind that Sir Guy never stayed there very long in winter. It was awfully cold." "I had furs on," said Mabel. "What a lovely spot it is, even in this weather." Then dinner was announced. She had not been cold. She could still feel the tingling heat of her blood as she had implored him to love her. Silverbridge felt that he must write to his brother by the first post. The communication was of a nature that would bear no delay. If his hands had been free he would himself have gone off to Auld Reikie. At last he made up his mind. The first letter he wrote was neither to Nidderdale nor to Gerald, but to Lord Percival himself. DEAR PERCIVAL, Gerald writes me word that he has lost to you at cards £3,400, and he wants me to get him the money. It is a terrible nuisance, and he has been an ass. But of course I shall stand to him for anything he wants. I haven't got £3,400 in my pocket, and I don't know any one who has;--that is among our set. But I send you my I.O.U. for the amount, and will promise to get you the money in two months. I suppose that will be sufficient, and that you will not bother Gerald any more about it. Yours truly, SILVERBRIDGE. Then he copied this letter and enclosed the copy in another which he wrote to his brother. DEAR GERALD, What an ass you have been! But I don't suppose you are worse than I was at Doncaster. I will have nothing to do with such people as Comfort and Criball. That is the sure way to the D----! As for telling Moreton, that is only a polite and roundabout way of telling the governor. He would immediately ask the governor what was to be done. You will see what I have done. Of course I must tell the governor before the end of February, as I cannot get the money in any other way. But that I will do. It does seem hard upon him. Not that the money will hurt him much; but that he would so like to have a steady-going son. I suppose Percival won't make any bother about the I.O.U. He'll be a fool if he does. I wouldn't kick him if I were you,--unless he says anything very bad. You would be sure to come to grief somehow. He is a beast. Your affectionate Brother, SILVERBRIDGE. With these letters that special grief was removed from his mind for awhile. Looking over the dark river of possible trouble which seemed to run between the present moment and the time at which the money must be procured, he thought that he had driven off this calamity of Gerald's to infinite distance. But into that dark river he must now plunge almost at once. On the next day, he managed so that there should be no walk with Mabel. In the evening he could see that the Duke was uneasy;--but not a word was said to him. On the following morning Lady Mabel took her departure. When she went from the door, both the Duke and Silverbridge were there to bid her farewell. She smiled and was as gracious as though everything had gone according to her heart's delight. "Dear Duke, I am so obliged to you for your kindness," she said, as she put up her cheek for him to kiss. Then she gave her hand to Silverbridge. "Of course you will come and see me in town." And she smiled upon them all;--having courage enough to keep down all her sufferings. "Come in here a moment, Silverbridge," said the father as they returned into the house together. "How is it now between you and her?" CHAPTER LXI "Bone of My Bone" "How is it now between you and her?" That was the question which the Duke put to his son as soon as he had closed the door of the study. Lady Mabel had just been dismissed from the front door on her journey, and there could be no doubt as to the "her" intended. No such question would have been asked had not Silverbridge himself declared to his father his purpose of making Lady Mabel his wife. On that subject the Duke, without such authority, would not have interfered. But he had been consulted, had acceded, and had encouraged the idea by excessive liberality on his part. He had never dropped it out of his mind for a moment. But when he found that the girl was leaving his house without any explanation, then he became restless and inquisitive. They say that perfect love casteth out fear. If it be so the love of children to their parents is seldom altogether perfect,--and perhaps had better not be quite perfect. With this young man it was not that he feared anything which his father could do to him, that he believed that in consequence of the declaration which he had to make his comforts and pleasures would be curtailed, or his independence diminished. He knew his father too well to dread such punishment. But he feared that he would make his father unhappy, and he was conscious that he had so often sinned in that way. He had stumbled so frequently! Though in action he would so often be thoughtless,--yet he understood perfectly the effect which had been produced on his father's mind by his conduct. He had it at heart "to be good to the governor," to gratify that most loving of all possible friends, who, as he knew well, was always thinking of his welfare. And yet he never had been "good to the governor";--nor had Gerald;--and to all this was added his sister's determined perversity. It was thus he feared his father. He paused for a moment, while the Duke stood with his back to the fire looking at him. "I'm afraid that it is all over, sir," he said. "All over!" "I am afraid so." "Why is it all over? Has she refused you?" "Well, sir;--it isn't quite that." Then he paused again. It was so difficult to begin about Isabel Boncassen. "I am sorry for that," said the Duke, almost hesitating; "very sorry. You will understand, I hope, that I should make no inquiry in such a matter, unless I had felt myself warranted in doing so by what you had yourself told me in London." "I understand all that." "I have been very anxious about it, and have even gone so far as to make some preparations for what I had hoped would be your early marriage." "Preparations!" exclaimed Silverbridge, thinking of church bells, bride cake, and wedding presents. "As to the property. I am so anxious that you should enjoy all the settled independence which can belong to an English gentleman. I never plough or sow. I know no more of sheep and bulls than of the extinct animals of earlier ages. I would not have it so with you. I would fain see you surrounded by those things which ought to interest a nobleman in this country. Why is it all over with Lady Mabel Grex?" The young man looked imploringly at his father, as though earnestly begging that nothing more might be said about Mabel. "I had changed my mind before I found out that she was really in love with me!" He could not say that. He could not hint that he might still have Mabel if he would. The only thing for him was to tell everything about Isabel Boncassen. He felt that in doing this he must begin with himself. "I have rather changed my mind, sir," he said, "since we were walking together in London that night." "Have you quarrelled with Lady Mabel?" "Oh dear no. I am very fond of Mabel;--only not just like that." "Not just like what?" "I had better tell the whole truth at once." "Certainly tell the truth, Silverbridge. I cannot say that you are bound in duty to tell the whole truth even to your father in such a matter." "But I mean to tell you everything. Mabel did not seem to care for me much--in London. And then I saw someone,--someone I liked better." Then he stopped, but as the Duke did not ask any questions he plunged on. "It was Miss Boncassen." "Miss Boncassen!" "Yes, sir," said Silverbridge, with a little access of decision. "The American young lady?" "Yes, sir." "Do you know anything of her family?" "I think I know all about her family. It is not much in the way of--family." "You have not spoken to her about it?" "Yes, sir;--I have settled it all with her, on condition--" "Settled it with her that she is to be your wife!" "Yes, sir,--on condition that you will approve." "Did you go to her, Silverbridge, with such a stipulation as that?" "It was not like that." "How was it then?" "She stipulated. She will marry me if you will consent." "It was she then who thought of my wishes and my feeling;--not you?" "I knew that I loved her. What is a man to do when he feels like that? Of course I meant to tell you." The Duke was now looking very black. "I thought you liked her, sir." "Liked her! I did like her. I do like her. What has that to do with it? Do you think I like none but those with whom I should think it fitting to ally myself in marriage? Is there to be no duty in such matters, no restraint, no feeling of what is due to your own name, and to others who bear it? The lad out there who is sweeping the walks can marry the first girl that pleases his eye if she will take him. Perhaps his lot is the happier because he owns such liberty. Have you the same freedom?" "I suppose I have,--by law." "Do you recognise no duty but what the laws impose upon you? Should you be disposed to eat and drink in bestial excess, because the laws would not hinder you? Should you lie and sleep all the day, the law would say nothing! Should you neglect every duty which your position imposes on you, the law could not interfere! To such a one as you the law can be no guide. You should so live as not to come near the law,--or to have the law to come near to you. From all evil against which the law bars you, you should be barred, at an infinite distance, by honour, by conscience, and nobility. Does the law require patriotism, philanthropy, self-abnegation, public service, purity of purpose, devotion to the needs of others who have been placed in the world below you? The law is a great thing,--because men are poor and weak, and bad. And it is great, because where it exists in its strength, no tyrant can be above it. But between you and me there should be no mention of law as the guide of conduct. Speak to me of honour, of duty, and of nobility; and tell me what they require of you." Silverbridge listened in silence and with something of true admiration in his heart. But he felt the strong necessity of declaring his own convictions on one special point here, at once, in this new crisis of the conversation. That accident in regard to the colour of the Dean's lodge had stood in the way of his logical studies,--so that he was unable to put his argument into proper shape; but there belonged to him a certain natural astuteness which told him that he must put in his rejoinder at this particular point. "I think I am bound in honour and in duty to marry Miss Boncassen," he said. "And, if I understand what you mean, by nobility just as much." "Because you have promised." "Not only for that. I have promised and therefore I am bound. She has--well, she has said that she loves me, and therefore of course I am bound. But it is not only that." "What do you mean?" "I suppose a man ought to marry the woman he loves,--if he can get her." "No; no; not so; not always so. Do you think that love is a passion that cannot be withstood?" "But here we are both of one mind, sir. When I saw how you seemed to take to her--" "Take to her! Can I not interest myself in human beings without wishing to make them flesh of my flesh, bone of my bone? What am I to think of you? It was but the other day that all that you are now telling me of Miss Boncassen, you were telling me of Lady Mabel Grex." Here poor Silverbridge bit his lips and shook his head, and looked down upon the ground. This was the weak part of his case. He could not tell his father the whole story about Mabel,--that she had coyed his love, so that he had been justified in thinking himself free from any claim in that direction when he had encountered the infinitely sweeter charms of Isabel Boncassen. "You are weak as water," said the unhappy father. "I am not weak in this." "Did you not say exactly the same about Lady Mabel?" There was a pause, so that he was driven to reply. "I found her as I thought indifferent, and then--I changed my mind." "Indifferent! What does she think about it now? Does she know of this? How does it stand between you two at the present moment?" "She knows that I am engaged to--Miss Boncassen." "Does she approve of it?" "Why should I ask her, sir? I have not asked her." "Then why did you tell her? She could not but have spoken her mind when you told her. There must have been much between you when this was talked of." The unfortunate young man was obliged to take some time before he could answer this appeal. He had to own that his father had some justice on his side, but at the same time he could reveal nothing of Mabel's secret. "I told her because we were friends. I did not ask her approval; but she did disapprove. She thought that your son should not marry an American girl without family." "Of course she would feel that." "Now I have told you what she said, and I hope you will ask me no further questions about her. I cannot make Lady Mabel my wife;--though, for the matter of that, I ought not to presume that she would take me if I wished it. I had intended to ask you to-day to consent to my marriage with Miss Boncassen." "I cannot give you my consent." "Then I am very unhappy." "How can I believe as to your unhappiness when you would have said the same about Lady Mabel Grex a few weeks ago?" "Nearly eight months," said Silverbridge. "What is the difference? It is not the time, but the disposition of the man! I cannot give you my consent. The young lady sees it in the right light, and that will make your escape easy." "I do not want to escape." "She has indicated the cause which will separate you." "I will not be separated from her," said Silverbridge, who was beginning to feel that he was subjugated to tyranny. If he chose to marry Isabel, no one could have a right to hinder him. "I can only hope that you will think better of it, and that when next you speak to me on that or any other subject you will answer me with less arrogance." This rebuke was terrible to the son, whose mind at the present moment was filled with two ideas, that of constancy to Isabel Boncassen, and then of respect and affection for his father. "Indeed, sir," he said, "I am not arrogant, and if I have answered improperly I beg your pardon. But my mind is made up about this, and I thought you had better know how it is." "I do not see that I can say anything else to you now." "I think of going to Harrington this afternoon." Then the Duke, with further very visible annoyance, asked where Harrington was. It was explained that Harrington was Lord Chiltern's seat, Lord Chiltern being the Master of the Brake hounds;--that it was his son's purpose to remain six weeks among the Brake hounds, but that he should stay only a day or two with Lord Chiltern. Then it appeared that Silverbridge intended to put himself up at a hunting inn in the neighbourhood, and the Duke did not at all like the plan. That his son should choose to live at an inn, when the comforts of an English country house were open to him, was distasteful and almost offensive to the Duke. And the matter was not improved when he was made to understand that all this was to be done for the sake of hunting. There had been the shooting in Scotland; then the racing,--ah, alas! yes,--the racing, and the betting at Doncaster! Then the shooting at Matching had been made to appear to be the chief reason why he himself had been living in his own house! And now his son was going away to live at an inn in order that more time might be devoted to hunting! "Why can't you hunt here at home, if you must hunt?" "It is all woodland," said Silverbridge. "I thought you wanted woods. Lord Chiltern is always troubling me about Trumpington Wood." This breeze about the hunting enabled the son to escape without any further allusion to Miss Boncassen. He did escape, and proceeded to turn over in his mind all that had been said. His tale had been told. A great burden was thus taken off his shoulders. He could tell Isabel so much, and thus free himself from the suspicion of having been afraid to declare his purpose. She should know what he had done, and should be made to understand that he had been firm. He had, he thought, been very firm and gave himself some credit on that head. His father, no doubt, had been firm too, but that he had expected. His father had said much. All that about honour and duty had been very good; but this was certain,--that when a young man had promised a young woman he ought to keep his word. And he thought that there were certain changes going on in the management of the world which his father did not quite understand. Fathers never do quite understand the changes which are manifest to their sons. Some years ago it might have been improper that an American girl should be elevated to the rank of an English Duchess; but now all that was altered. The Duke spent the rest of the day alone, and was not happy in his solitude. All that Silverbridge had told him was sad to him. He had taught himself to think that he could love Lady Mabel as an affectionate father wishes to love his son's wife. He had set himself to wish to like her, and had been successful. Being most anxious that his son should marry he had prepared himself to be more than ordinarily liberal,--to be in every way gracious. His children were now everything to him, and among his children his son and heir was the chief. From the moment in which he had heard from Silverbridge that Lady Mabel was chosen he had given himself up to considering how he might best promote their interests,--how he might best enable them to live, with that dignity and splendour which he himself had unwisely despised. That the son who was to come after him should be worthy of the place assigned to his name had been, of personal objects, the nearest to his heart. There had been failures, but still there had been left room for hope. The boy had been unfortunate at Eton;--but how many unfortunate boys had become great men! He had disgraced himself by his folly at college,--but, though some lads will be men at twenty, others are then little more than children. The fruit that ripens the soonest is seldom the best. Then had come Tifto and the racing mania. Nothing could be worse than Tifto and race-horses. But from that evil Silverbridge had seemed to be made free by the very disgust which the vileness of the circumstance had produced. Perhaps Tifto driving a nail into his horse's foot had on the whole been serviceable. That apostasy from the political creed of the Pallisers had been a blow,--much more felt than the loss of the seventy thousand pounds;--but even under that blow he had consoled himself by thinking that a Conservative patriotic nobleman may serve his country,--even as a Conservative. In the midst of this he had felt that the surest resource for his son against evil would be in an early marriage. If he would marry becomingly, then might everything still be made pleasant. If his son would marry becomingly nothing which a father could do should be wanting to add splendour and dignity to his son's life. In thinking of all this he had by no means regarded his own mode of life with favour. He knew how jejune his life had been,--how devoid of other interests than that of the public service to which he had devoted himself. He was thinking of this when he told his son that he had neither ploughed and sowed or been the owner of sheep or oxen. He often thought of this, when he heard those around him talking of the sports, which, though he condemned them as the employments of a life, he now regarded wistfully, hopelessly as far as he himself was concerned, as proper recreations for a man of wealth. Silverbridge should have it all, if he could arrange it. The one thing necessary was a fitting wife;--and the fitting wife had been absolutely chosen by Silverbridge himself. It may be conceived, therefore, that he was again unhappy. He had already been driven to acknowledge that these children of his,--thoughtless, restless, though they seemed to be,--still had a will of their own. In all which how like they were to their mother! With her, however, his word, though it might be resisted, had never lost its authority. When he had declared that a thing should not be done, she had never persisted in saying that she would do it. But with his children it was otherwise. What power had he over Silverbridge,--or for the matter of that, even over his daughter? They had only to be firm and he knew that he must be conquered. "I thought that you liked her," Silverbridge had said to him. How utterly unconscious, thought the Duke, must the young man have been of all that his position required of him when he used such an argument! Liked her! He did like her. She was clever, accomplished, beautiful, well-mannered,--as far as he knew endowed with all good qualities! Would not many an old Roman have said as much for some favourite Greek slave,--for some freedman whom he would admit to his very heart? But what old Roman ever dreamed of giving his daughter to the son of a Greek bondsman! Had he done so, what would have become of the name of a Roman citizen? And was it not his duty to fortify and maintain that higher, smaller, more precious pinnacle of rank on which Fortune had placed him and his children? Like her! Yes! he liked her certainly. He had by no means always found that he best liked the companionship of his own order. He had liked to feel around him the free battle of the House of Commons. He liked the power of attack and defence in carrying on which an English politician cares nothing for rank. He liked to remember that the son of any tradesman might, by his own merits, become a peer of Parliament. He would have liked to think that his son should share all these tastes with him. Yes,--he liked Isabel Boncassen. But how different was that liking from a desire that she should be bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh! CHAPTER LXII The Brake Country "What does your father mean to do about Trumpington Wood?" That was the first word from Lord Chiltern after he had shaken hands with his guest. "Isn't it all right yet?" "All right? No! How can a wood like that be all right without a man about the place who knows anything of the nature of a fox? In your grandfather's time--" "My great-uncle you mean." "Well;--your great-uncle!--they used to trap the foxes there. There was a fellow named Fothergill who used to come there for shooting. Now it is worse than ever. Nobody shoots there because there is nothing to shoot. There isn't a keeper. Every scamp is allowed to go where he pleases, and of course there isn't a fox in the whole place. My huntsman laughs at me when I ask him to draw it." As the indignant Master of the Brake Hounds said this the very fire flashed from his eyes. "My dear," said Lady Chiltern expostulating, "Lord Silverbridge hasn't been in the house above half an hour." "What does that matter? When a thing has to be said it had better be said at once." Phineas Finn was staying at Harrington with his intimate friends the Chilterns, as were also a certain Mr. and Mrs. Maule, both of whom were addicted to hunting,--the lady, whose maiden name had been Palliser, being a cousin to Lord Silverbridge. On that day also a certain Mr. and Mrs. Spooner dined at Harrington. Mr. and Mrs. Spooner were both very much given to hunting, as seemed to be necessarily the case with everybody admitted to that house. Mr. Spooner was a gentleman who might be on the wrong side of fifty, with a red nose, very vigorous, and submissive in regard to all things but port-wine. His wife was perhaps something more than half his age, a stout, hard-riding, handsome woman. She had been the penniless daughter of a retired officer,--but yet had managed to ride on whatever animal any one would lend her. Then Mr. Spooner, who had for many years been part and parcel of the Brake hunt, and who was much in want of a wife, had, luckily for her, cast his eyes upon Miss Leatherside. It was thought that upon the whole she made him a good wife. She hunted four days a week, and he could afford to keep horses for her. She never flirted, and wanted no one to open gates. Tom Spooner himself was not always so forward as he used to be; but his wife was always there and would tell him all that he did not see himself. And she was a good housewife, taking care that nothing should be spent lavishly, except upon the stable. Of him, too, and of his health, she was careful, never scrupling to say a word in season when he was likely to hurt himself, either among the fences or among the decanters. "You ain't so young as you were, Tom. Don't think of doing it." This she would say to him with a loud voice when she would find him pausing at a fence. Then she would hop over herself and he would go round. She was "quite a providence to him," as her mother, old Mrs. Leatherside, would say. She was hardly the woman that one would have expected to meet as a friend in the drawing-room of Lady Chiltern. Lord Chiltern was perhaps a little rough, but Lady Chiltern was all that a mother, a wife, and a lady ought to be. She probably felt that some little apology ought to be made for Mrs. Spooner. "I hope you like hunting," she said to Silverbridge. "Best of all things," said he, enthusiastically. "Because you know this is Castle Nimrod, in which nothing is allowed to interfere with the one great business of life." "It's like that; is it?" "Quite like that. Lord Chiltern has taken up hunting as his duty in life, and he does it with his might and main. Not to have a good day is a misery to him;--not for himself but because he feels that he is responsible. We had one blank day last year, and I thought that he never would recover it. It was that unfortunate Trumpington Wood." "How he will hate me." "Not if you will praise the hounds judiciously. And then there is a Mr. Spooner coming here to-night. He is the first-lieutenant. He understands all about the foxes, and all about the farmers. He has got a wife." "Does she understand anything?" "She understands him. She is coming too. They have not been married long, and he never goes anywhere without her." "Does she ride?" "Well; yes. I never go out myself now because I have so much of it all at home. But I fancy she does ride a good deal. She will talk hunting too. If Chiltern were to leave the country I think they ought to make her master. Perhaps you'll think her rather odd; but really she is a very good woman." "I am sure I shall like her." "I hope you will. You know Mr. Finn. He is here. He and my husband are very old friends. And Adelaide Maule is your cousin. She hunts too. And so does Mr. Maule,--only not quite so energetically. I think that is all we shall have." Immediately after that all the guests came in at once, and a discussion was heard as they were passing through the hall. "No;--that wasn't it," said Mrs. Spooner loudly. "I don't care what Dick said." Dick Rabbit was the first whip, and seemed to have been much exercised with the matter now under dispute. "The fox never went into Grobby Gorse at all. I was there and saw Sappho give him a line down the bank." "I think he must have gone into the gorse, my dear," said her husband. "The earth was open, you know." "I tell you she didn't. You weren't there, and you can't know. I'm sure it was a vixen by her running. We ought to have killed that fox, my Lord." Then Mrs. Spooner made her obeisance to her hostess. Perhaps she was rather slow in doing this, but the greatness of the subject had been the cause. These are matters so important, that the ordinary civilities of the world should not stand in their way. "What do you say, Chiltern?" asked the husband. "I say that Mrs. Spooner isn't very often wrong, and that Dick Rabbit isn't very often right about a fox." "It was a pretty run," said Phineas. "Just thirty-four minutes," said Mr. Spooner. "Thirty-two up to Grobby Gorse," asserted Mrs. Spooner. "The hounds never hunted a yard after that. Dick hurried them into the gorse, and the old hound wouldn't stick to his line when she found that no one believed her." This was on a Monday evening, and the Brake hounds went out generally five days a week. "You'll hunt to-morrow, I suppose?" Lady Chiltern said to Silverbridge. "I hope so." "You must hunt to-morrow. Indeed there is nothing else to do. Chiltern has taken such a dislike to shooting-men, that he won't shoot pheasants himself. We don't hunt on Wednesdays or Sundays, and then everybody lies in bed. Here is Mr. Maule, he lies in bed on other mornings as well, and spends the rest of his day riding about the country looking for the hounds." "Does he ever find them?" "What did become of you all to-day?" said Mr. Maule, as he took his place at the dinner-table. "You can't have drawn any of the coverts regularly." "Then we found our foxes without drawing them," said the Master. "We chopped one at Bromleys," said Mr. Spooner. "I went there." "Then you ought to have known better," said Mrs. Spooner. "When a man loses the hounds in that country, he ought to go direct to Brackett's Wood. If you had come on to Brackett's, you'd have seen as good a thirty-two minutes as ever you wished to ride." When the ladies went out of the room Mrs. Spooner gave a parting word of advice to her husband, and to the host. "Now, Tom, don't you drink port-wine. Lord Chiltern, look after him, and don't let him have port-wine." Then there began an altogether different phase of hunting conversation. As long as the ladies were there it was all very well to talk of hunting as an amusement; good sport, a thirty minutes or so, the delight of having a friend in a ditch, or the glory of a stiff-built rail were fitting subjects for a lighter hour. But now the business of the night was to begin. The difficulties, the enmities, the precautions, the resolutions, the resources of the Brake hunt were to be discussed. And from thence the conversation of these devotees strayed away to the perils at large to which hunting in these modern days is subjected;--not the perils of broken necks and crushed ribs, which can be reduced to an average, and so an end made of that small matter; but the perils from outsiders, the perils from new-fangled prejudices, the perils from more modern sports, the perils from over-cultivation, the perils from extended population, the perils from increasing railroads, the perils from literary ignorances, the perils from intruding cads, the perils from indifferent magnates,--the Duke of Omnium, for instance;--and that peril of perils, the peril of decrease of funds and increase of expenditure! The jaunty gentleman who puts on his dainty breeches, and his pair of boots, and on his single horse rides out on a pleasant morning to some neighbouring meet, thinking himself a sportsman, has but a faint idea of the troubles which a few staunch workmen endure in order that he may not be made to think that his boots, and his breeches, and his horse, have been in vain. A word or two further was at first said about that unfortunate wood for which Silverbridge at the present felt himself responsible. Finn said that he was sure the Duke would look to it, if Silverbridge would mention it. Chiltern simply groaned. Silverbridge said nothing, remembering how many troubles he had on hand at this moment. Then by degrees their solicitude worked itself round to the cares of a neighbouring hunt. The A. R. U. had lost their Master. One Captain Glomax was going, and the county had been driven to the necessity of advertising for a successor. "When hunting comes to that," said Lord Chiltern, "one begins to think that it is in a bad way." It may always be observed that when hunting-men speak seriously of their sport, they speak despondingly. Everything is going wrong. Perhaps the same thing may be remarked in other pursuits. Farmers are generally on the verge of ruin. Trade is always bad. The Church is in danger. The House of Lords isn't worth a dozen years' purchase. The throne totters. "An itinerant Master with a carpet-bag never can carry on a country," said Mr. Spooner. "You ought really to have a gentleman of property in the county," said Lord Chiltern, in a self-deprecating tone. His father's acres lay elsewhere. "It should be someone who has a real stake in the country," replied Mr. Spooner,--"whom the farmers can respect. Glomax understood hunting no doubt, but the farmers didn't care for him. If you don't have the farmers with you you can't have hunting." Then he filled a glass of port. "If you don't approve of Glomax, what do you think of a man like Major Tifto?" asked Mr. Maule. "That was in the Runnymede," said Spooner contemptuously. "Who is Major Tifto?" asked Lord Chiltern. "He is the man," said Silverbridge, boldly, "who owned Prime Minister with me, when he didn't win the Leger last September." "There was a deuce of a row," said Maule. Then Mr. Spooner, who read his "Bell's Life" and "Field" very religiously, and who never missed an article in "Bayley's," proceeded to give them an account of everything that had taken place in the Runnymede Hunt. It mattered but little that he was wrong in all his details. Narrations always are. The result to which he came was nearly right when he declared that the Major had been turned off, that a committee had been appointed, and that Messrs. Topps and Jawstock had been threatened with a lawsuit. "That comes," said Lord Chiltern solemnly, "of employing men like Major Tifto in places for which they are radically unfit. I dare say Major Tifto knew how to handle a pack of hounds,--perhaps almost as well as my huntsman, Fowler. But I don't think a county would get on very well which appointed Fowler Master of Hounds. He is an honest man, and therefore would be better than Tifto. But--it would not do. It is a position in which a man should at any rate be a gentleman. If he be not, all those who should be concerned in maintaining the hunt will turn their backs upon him. When I take my hounds over this man's ground, and that man's ground, certainly without doing him any good, I have to think of a great many things. I have to understand that those whom I cannot compensate by money, I have to compensate by courtesy. When I shake hands with a farmer and express my obligation to him because he does not lock his gates, he is gratified. I don't think any decent farmer would care much for shaking hands with Major Tifto. If we fall into that kind of thing there must soon be an end of hunting. Major Tiftos are cheap no doubt; but in hunting, as in most other things, cheap and nasty go together. If men don't choose to put their hands in their pockets they had better say so, and give the thing up altogether. If you won't take any more wine, we'll go to the ladies. Silverbridge, the trap will start from the door to-morrow morning precisely at 9.30 A.M. Grantingham Cross is fourteen miles." Then they all left their chairs,--but as they did so Mr. Spooner finished the bottle of port-wine. "I never heard Chiltern speak so much like a book before," said Spooner to his wife, as she drove him home that night. The next morning everybody was ready for a start at half-past nine, except Mr. Maule,--as to whom his wife declared that she had left him in bed when she came down to breakfast. "He can never get there if we don't take him," said Lord Chiltern, who was in truth the most good-natured man in the world. Five minutes were allowed him, and then he came down with a large sandwich in one hand and a button-hook in the other, with which he was prepared to complete his toilet. "What the deuce makes you always in such a hurry?" were the first words he spoke as Lord Chiltern got on the box. The Master knew him too well to argue the point. "Well;--he always is in a hurry," said the sinner, when his wife accused him of ingratitude. "Where's Spooner?" asked the Master when he saw Mrs. Spooner without her husband at the meet. "I knew how it would be when I saw the port-wine," she said in a whisper that could be heard all round. "He has got it this time sharp,--in his great toe. We shan't find at Grantingham. They were cutting wood there last week. If I were you, my Lord, I'd go away to the Spinnies at once." "I must draw the country regularly," muttered the Master. The country was drawn regularly, but in vain till about two o'clock. Not only was there no fox at Grantingham Wood, but none even at the Spinnies. And at two, Fowler, with an anxious face, held a consultation with his more anxious Master. Trumpington Wood lay on their right, and that no doubt would have been the proper draw. "I suppose we must try it," said Lord Chiltern. Old Fowler looked very sour. "You might as well look for a fox under my wife's bed, my Lord." "I dare say we should find one there," said one of the wags of the hunt. Fowler shook his head, feeling that this was no time for joking. "It ought to be drawn," said Chiltern. "Of course you know best, my Lord. I wouldn't touch it,--never no more. Let 'em all know what the Duke's Wood is." "This is Lord Silverbridge, the Duke's son," said Chiltern, laughing. "I beg your Lordship's pardon," said Fowler, taking off his cap. "We shall have a good time coming, some day. Let me trot 'em off to Michaelmas Daisies, my Lord. I'll be there in thirty minutes." In the neighbouring parish of St. Michael de Dezier there was a favourite little gorse which among hunting-men had acquired this unreasonable name. After a little consideration the Master yielded, and away they trotted. "You'll cross the ford, Fowler?" asked Mrs. Spooner. "Oh yes, ma'am; we couldn't draw the Daisies this afternoon if we didn't." "It'll be up to the horses' bellies." "Those who don't like it can go round." "They'd never be there in time, Fowler." "There's a many, ma'am, as don't mind that. You won't be one to stay behind." The water was up to the horses' bellies, but, nevertheless, Mrs. Spooner was at the gorse side when the Daisies were drawn. They found and were away in a minute. It was all done so quickly that Fowler, who had alone gone into the gorse, had hardly time to get out with his hounds. The fox ran right back, as though he were making for the Duke's pernicious wood. In the first field or two there was a succession of gates, and there was not much to do in the way of jumping. Then the fox, keeping straight ahead, deviated from the line by which they had come, making for the brook by a more direct course. The ruck of the horsemen, understanding the matter very well, left the hounds, and went to the right, riding for the ford. The ford was of such a nature that but one horse could pass it at a time, and that one had to scramble through deep mud. "There'll be the devil to pay there," said Lord Chiltern, going straight with his hounds. Phineas Finn and Dick Rabbit were close after him. Old Fowler had craftily gone to the ford; but Mrs. Spooner, who did not intend to be shaken off, followed the Master, and close with her was Lord Silverbridge. "Lord Chiltern hasn't got it right," she said. "He can't do it among these bushes." As she spoke the Master put his horse at the bushes and then--disappeared. The lady had been right. There was no ground at that spot to take off from, and the bushes had impeded him. Lord Chiltern got over, but his horse was in the water. Dick Rabbit and poor Phineas Finn were stopped in their course by the necessity of helping the Master in his trouble. But Mrs. Spooner, the judicious Mrs. Spooner, rode at the stream where it was, indeed, a little wider, but at a place in which the horse could see what he was about, and where he could jump from and to firm ground. Lord Silverbridge followed her gallantly. They both jumped the brook well, and then were together. "You'll beat me in pace," said the lady as he rode alongside of her. "Take the fence ahead straight, and then turn sharp to your right." With all her faults Mrs. Spooner was a thorough sportsman. He did take the fence ahead,--or rather tried to do so. It was a bank and a double ditch,--not very great in itself, but requiring a horse to land on the top and go off with a second spring. Our young friend's nag, not quite understanding the nature of the impediment, endeavoured to "swallow it whole," as hard-riding men say, and came down in the further ditch. Silverbridge came down on his head, but the horse pursued his course,--across a heavily-ploughed field. This was very disagreeable. He was not in the least hurt, but it became his duty to run after his horse. A very few furrows of that work suffice to make a man think that hunting altogether is a "beastly sort of thing." Mrs. Spooner's horse, who had shown himself to be a little less quick of foot than his own, had known all about the bank and the double ditch, and had, apparently of his own accord, turned down to the right, either seeing or hearing the hounds, and knowing that the ploughed ground was to be avoided. But his rider soon changed his course. She went straight after the riderless horse, and when Silverbridge had reduced himself to utter speechlessness by his exertions, brought him back his steed. "I am,--I am, I am--so sorry," he struggled to say,--and then as she held his horse for him he struggled up into the saddle. "Keep down this furrow," said Mrs. Spooner, "and we shall be with them in the second field. There's nobody near them yet." CHAPTER LXIII "I've Seen 'Em Like That Before" On this occasion Silverbridge stayed only a few days at Harrington, having promised Tregear to entertain him at The Baldfaced Stag. It was here that his horses were standing, and he now intended, by limiting himself to one horse a day, to mount his friend for a couple of weeks. It was settled at last that Tregear should ride his friend's horse one day, hire the next, and so on. "I wonder what you'll think of Mrs. Spooner?" he said. "Why should I think anything of her?" "Because I doubt whether you ever saw such a woman before. She does nothing but hunt." "Then I certainly shan't want to see her again." "And she talks as I never heard a lady talk before." "Then I don't care if I never see her at all." "But she is the most plucky and most good-natured human being I ever saw in my life. After all, hunting is very good fun." "Very; if you don't do it so often as to be sick of it." "Long as I have known you I don't think I ever saw you ride yet." "We used to have hunting down in Cornwall, and thought we did it pretty well. And I have ridden in South Wales, which I can assure you isn't an easy thing to do. But you mustn't expect much from me." They were both out the Monday and Tuesday in that week, and then again on the Thursday without anything special in the way of sport. Lord Chiltern, who had found Silverbridge to be a young man after his own heart, was anxious that he should come back to Harrington and bring Tregear with him. But to this Tregear would not assent, alleging that he should feel himself to be a burden both to Lord and Lady Chiltern. On the Friday Tregear did not go out, saying that he would avoid the expense, and on that day there was a good run. "It is always the way," said Silverbridge. "If you miss a day, it is sure to be the best thing of the season. An hour and a quarter with hardly anything you could call a check! It is the only very good thing I have seen since I have been here. Mrs. Spooner was with them all through." "And I suppose you were with Mrs. Spooner." "I wasn't far off. I wish you had been there." On the next day the meet was at the kennels, close to Harrington, and Silverbridge drove his friend over in a gig. The Master and Lady Chiltern, Spooner and Mrs. Spooner, Maule and Mrs. Maule, Phineas Finn, and a host of others condoled with the unfortunate young man because he had not seen the good thing yesterday. "We've had it a little faster once or twice," said Mrs. Spooner with deliberation, "but never for so long. Then it was straight as a line, and a real open kill. No changing, you know. We did go through the Daisies, but I'll swear to its being the same fox." All of which set Tregear wondering. How could she swear to her fox? And if they had changed, what did it matter? And if it had been a little crooked, why would it have been less enjoyable? And was she really so exact a judge of pace as she pretended to be? "I'm afraid we shan't have anything like that to-day," she continued. "The wind's in the west, and I never do like a westerly wind." "A little to the north," said her husband, looking round the compass. "My dear," said the lady, "you never know where the wind comes from. Now don't you think of taking off your comforter. I won't have it." Tregear was riding his friend's favourite hunter, a thoroughbred bay horse, very much more than up to his rider's weight, and supposed to be peculiarly good at timber, water, or any well-defined kind of fence, however high or however broad. They found at a covert near the kennels, and killed their fox after a burst of a few minutes. They found again, and having lost their fox, all declared that there was not a yard of scent. "I always know what a west wind means," said Mrs. Spooner. Then they lunched, and smoked, and trotted about with an apparent acknowledgement that there wasn't much to be done. It was not right that they should expect much after so good a thing as they had had yesterday. At half-past two Mr. Spooner had been sent home by his Providence, and Mrs. Spooner was calculating that she would be able to ride her horse again on the Tuesday, when on a sudden the hounds were on a fox. It turned out afterwards that Dick Rabbit had absolutely ridden him up among the stubble, and that the hounds had nearly killed him before he had gone a yard. But the astute animal, making the best use of his legs till he could get the advantage of the first ditch, ran, and crept, and jumped absolutely through the pack. Then there was shouting, and yelling, and riding. The men who were idly smoking threw away their cigars. Those who were loitering at a distance lost their chance. But the real sportsmen, always on the alert, always thinking of the business in hand, always mindful that there may be at any moment a fox just before the hounds, had a glorious opportunity of getting "well away." Among these no one was more intent, or, when the moment came, "better away," than Mrs. Spooner. Silverbridge had been talking to her and had the full advantage of her care. Tregear was riding behind with Lord Chiltern, who had been pressing him to come with his friend to Harrington. As soon as the shouting was heard Chiltern was off like a rocket. It was not only that he was anxious to "get well away," but that a sense of duty compelled him to see how the thing was being done. Old Fowler certainly was a little slow, and Dick Rabbit, with the true bloody-minded instinct of a whip, was a little apt to bustle a fox back into covert. And then, when a run commences with a fast rush, riders are apt to over-ride the hounds, and then the hounds will over-run the fox. All of which has to be seen to by a Master who knows his business. Tregear followed, and being mounted on a fast horse was soon as forward as a judicious rider would desire. "Now, Runks, don't you press on and spoil it all," said Mrs. Spooner to the hard-riding, objectionable son of old Runks the vet from Rufford. But young Runks did press on till the Master spoke a word. The word shall not be repeated, but it was efficacious. At that moment there had been a check,--as there is generally after a short spurt, when fox, hounds, and horsemen get off together, and not always in the order in which they have been placed here. There is too much bustle, and the pack becomes disconcerted. But it enabled Fowler to get up, and by dint of growling at the men and conciliating his hounds, he soon picked up the scent. "If they'd all stand still for two minutes and be ---- to them," he muttered aloud to himself, "they'd 'ave some'at to ride arter. They might go then, and there's some of 'em 'd soon be nowhere." But in spite of Fowler's denunciations there was, of course, another rush. Runks had slunk away, but by making a little distance was now again ahead of the hounds. And unfortunately there was half-a-dozen with him. Lord Chiltern was very wrath. "When he's like that," said Mrs. Spooner to Tregear, "it's always well to give him a wide berth." But as the hounds were now running fast it was necessary that even in taking this precaution due regard should be had to the fox's line. "He's back for Harrington bushes," said Mrs. Spooner. And as she said so, she rode at a bank, with a rail at the top of it perhaps a foot-and-a-half high, with a deep drop into the field beyond. It was not a very nice place, but it was apparently the only available spot in the fence. She seemed to know it well, for as she got close to it she brought her horse almost to a stand and so took it. The horse cleared the rail, seemed just to touch the bank on the other side, while she threw herself back almost on to his crupper, and so came down with perfect ease. But she, knowing that it would not be easy to all horses, paused a moment to see what would happen. Tregear was next to her and was intending to "fly" the fence. But when he saw Mrs. Spooner pull her horse and pause, he also had to pull his horse. This he did so as to enable her to take her leap without danger or encumbrance from him, but hardly so as to bring his horse to the bank in the same way. It may be doubted whether the animal he was riding would have known enough and been quiet enough to have performed the acrobatic manoeuvre which had carried Mrs. Spooner so pleasantly over the peril. He had some idea of this, for the thought occurred to him that he would turn and ride fast at the jump. But before he could turn he saw that Silverbridge was pressing on him. It was thus his only resource to do as Mrs. Spooner had done. He was too close to the rail, but still he tried it. The horse attempted to jump, caught his foot against the bar, and of course went over head-foremost. This probably would have been nothing, had not Silverbridge with his rushing beast been immediately after them. When the young lord saw that his friend was down it was too late for him to stop his course. His horse was determined to have the fence,--and did have it. He touched nothing, and would have skimmed in glory over the next field had he not come right down on Tregear and Tregear's steed. There they were, four of them, two men and two horses in one confused heap. The first person with them was Mrs. Spooner, who was off her horse in a minute. And Silverbridge too was very soon on his legs. He at any rate was unhurt, and the two horses were up before Mrs. Spooner was out of her saddle. But Tregear did not move. "What are we to do?" said Lord Silverbridge, kneeling down over his friend. "Oh, Mrs. Spooner, what are we to do?" The hunt had passed on and no one else was immediately with them. But at this moment Dick Rabbit, who had been left behind to bring up his hounds, appeared above the bank. "Leave your horse and come down," said Mrs. Spooner. "Here is a gentleman who has hurt himself." Dick wouldn't leave his horse, but was soon on the scene, having found his way through another part of the fence. "No; he ain't dead," said Dick--"I've seen 'em like that before, and they wurn't dead. But he's had a hawful squeege." Then he passed his hand over the man's neck and chest. "There's a lot of 'em is broke," said he. "We must get him into farmer Tooby's." After awhile he was got into farmer Tooby's, when that surgeon came who is always in attendance on a hunting-field. The surgeon declared that he had broken his collar-bone, two of his ribs, and his left arm. And then one of the animals had struck him on the chest as he raised himself. A little brandy was poured down his throat, but even under that operation he gave no sign of life. "No, missis, he aren't dead," said Dick to Mrs. Tooby; "no more he won't die this bout; but he's got it very nasty." That night Silverbridge was sitting by his friend's bedside at ten o'clock in Lord Chiltern's house. Tregear had spoken a few words, and the bones had been set. But the doctor had not felt himself justified in speaking with that assurance which Dick had expressed. The man's whole body had been bruised by the horse which had fallen on him. The agony of Silverbridge was extreme, for he knew that it had been his doing. "You were a little too close," Mrs. Spooner had said to him, "but nobody saw it and we'll hold our tongues." Silverbridge however would not hold his tongue. He told everybody how it had happened, how he had been unable to stop his horse, how he had jumped upon his friend, and perhaps killed him. "I don't know what I am to do. I am so miserable," he said to Lady Chiltern with the tears running down his face. The two remained at Harrington and their luggage was brought over from The Baldfaced Stag. The accident had happened on a Saturday. On the Sunday there was no comfort. On the Monday the patient's recollection and mind were re-established, and the doctor thought that perhaps, with great care, his constitution would pull him through. On that day the consternation at Harrington was so great that Mrs. Spooner would not go to the meet. She came over from Spoon Hall, and spent a considerable part of the day in the sick man's room. "It's sure to come right if it's above the vitals," she said, expressing an opinion which had come from much experience. "That is," she added, "unless the neck's broke. When poor old Jack Stubbs drove his head into his cap and dislocated his wertebury, of course it was all up with him." The patient heard this and was seen to smile. On the Tuesday there arose the question of family communication. As the accident would make its way into the papers a message had been sent to Polwenning to say that various bones had been broken, but that the patient was upon the whole doing well. Then there had been different messages backwards and forwards, in all of which there had been an attempt to comfort old Mrs. Tregear. But on the Tuesday letters were written. Silverbridge, sitting in his friend's room, sent a long account of the accident to Mrs. Tregear, giving a list of the injuries done. "Your sister," whispered the poor fellow from his pillow. "Yes,--yes;--yes, I will." "And Mabel Grex." Silverbridge nodded assent and again went to the writing-table. He did write to his sister, and in plain words told her everything. "The doctor says he is not now in danger." Then he added a postscript. "As long as I am here I will let you know how he is." CHAPTER LXIV "I Believe Him to Be a Worthy Young Man" Lady Mary and Mrs. Finn were alone when the tidings came from Silverbridge. The Duke had been absent, having gone to spend an unpleasant week in Barsetshire. Mary had taken the opportunity of his absence to discuss her own prospects at full length. "My dear," said Mrs. Finn, "I will not express an opinion. How can I after all that has passed? I have told the Duke the same. I cannot be heart and hand with either without being false to the other." But still Lady Mary continued to talk about Tregear. "I don't think papa has a right to treat me in this way," she said. "He wouldn't be allowed to kill me, and this is killing me." "While there is life there is hope," said Mrs. Finn. "Yes; while there is life there is hope. But one doesn't want to grow old first." "There is no danger of that yet, Mary." "I feel very old. What is the use of life without something to make it sweet? I am not even allowed to hear anything that he is doing. If he were to ask me, I think I would go away with him to-morrow." "He would not be foolish enough for that." "Because he does not suffer as I do. He has his borough, and his public life, and a hundred things to think of. I have got nothing but him. I know he is true;--quite as true as I am. But it is I that have the suffering in all this. A man can never be like a girl. Papa ought not to make me suffer like this." That took place on the Monday. On the Tuesday Mrs. Finn received a letter from her husband giving his account of the accident. "As far as I can learn," he said, "Silverbridge will write about it to-morrow." Then he went on to give a by no means good account of the state of the patient. The doctor had declared him to be out of immediate danger, and had set the broken bones. As tidings would be sent on the next day she had better say nothing about the accident to Lady Mary. This letter reached Matching on Tuesday and made the position of Mrs. Finn very disagreeable. She was bound to carry herself as though nothing was amiss, knowing, as she did so, the condition of Mary's lover. On the evening of that day Lady Mary was more lively than usual, though her liveliness was hardly of a happy nature. "I don't know what papa can expect. I've heard him say a hundred times that to be in Parliament is the highest place a gentleman can fill, and now Frank is in Parliament." Mrs. Finn looked at her with beseeching eyes, as though begging her not to speak of Tregear. "And then to think of their having that Lord Popplecourt there! I shall always hate Lady Cantrip, for it was her place. That she should have thought it possible! Lord Popplecourt! Such a creature! Hyperion to a satyr. Isn't it true? Oh, that papa should have thought it possible!" Then she got up, and walked about the room, beating her hands together. All this time Mrs. Finn knew that Tregear was lying at Harrington with half his bones broken, and in danger of his life! On the next morning Lady Mary received her letters. There were two lying before her plate when she came into breakfast, one from her father and the other from Silverbridge. She read that from the Duke first while Mrs. Finn was watching her. "Papa will be home on Saturday," she said. "He declares that the people in the borough are quite delighted with Silverbridge for a member. And he is quite jocose. 'They used to be delighted with me once,' he says, 'but I suppose everybody changes.'" Then she began to pour out the tea before she opened her brother's letter. Mrs. Finn's eyes were still on her anxiously. "I wonder what Silverbridge has got to say about the Brake Hunt." Then she opened her letter. "Oh;--oh!" she exclaimed,--"Frank has killed himself." "Killed himself! Not that. It is not so bad as that." "You had heard it before?" "How is he, Mary?" "Oh, heavens! I cannot read it. Do you read it. Tell me all. Tell me the truth. What am I to do? Where shall I go?" Then she threw up her hands, and with a loud scream fell on her knees with her head upon the chair. In the next moment Mrs. Finn was down beside her on the floor. "Read it; why do you not read it? If you will not read it, give it to me." Mrs. Finn did read the letter, which was very short, but still giving by no means an unfavourable account of the patient. "I am sorry to say he has broken ever so many bones, and we were very much frightened about him." Then the writer went into details, from which a reader who did not read the words carefully might well imagine that the man's life was still in danger. Mrs. Finn did read it all, and did her best to comfort her friend. "It has been a bad accident," she said, "but it is clear that he is getting better. Men do so often break their bones, and then seem to think nothing of it afterwards." "Silverbridge says it was his fault. What does he mean?" "I suppose he was riding too close to Mr. Tregear, and that they came down together. Of course it is distressing, but I do not think you need make yourself positively unhappy about it." "Would you not be unhappy if it were Mr. Finn?" said Mary, jumping up from her knees. "I shall go to him. I should go mad if I were to remain here and know nothing about it but what Silverbridge will tell me." "I will telegraph to Mr. Finn." "Mr. Finn won't care. Men are so heartless. They write about each other just as though it did not signify in the least whether anybody were dead or alive. I shall go to him." "You cannot do that." "I don't care now what anybody may think. I choose to be considered as belonging to him, and if papa were here I would say the same." It was of course not difficult to make her understand that she could not go to Harrington, but it was by no means easy to keep her tranquil. She would send a telegram herself. This was debated for a long time, till at last Lady Mary insisted that she was not subject to Mrs. Finn's authority. "If papa were here, even then I would send it." And she did send it, in her own name, regardless of the fact pointed out to her by Mrs. Finn, that the people at the post-office would thus know her secret. "It is no secret," she said. "I don't want it to be a secret." The telegram went in the following words: "I have heard it. I am so wretched. Send me one word to say how you are." She got an answer back, with Tregear's own name to it, on that afternoon. "Do not be unhappy. I am doing well. Silverbridge is with me." On the Thursday Gerald came home from Scotland. He had arranged his little affair with Lord Percival, not however without some difficulty. Lord Percival had declared he did not understand I.O.U.'s in an affair of that kind. He had always thought that gentlemen did not play for stakes which they could not pay at once. This was not said to Gerald himself;--or the result would have been calamitous. Nidderdale was the go-between, and at last arranged it,--not however till he had pointed out that Percival, having won so large a sum of money from a lad under twenty-one years of age, was very lucky in receiving substantial security for its payment. Gerald had chosen the period of his father's absence for his return. It was necessary that the story of the gambling debt should be told the Duke in February. Silverbridge had explained that to him, and he had quite understood it. He, indeed, would be up at Oxford in February, and, in that case, the first horror of the thing would be left to poor Silverbridge! Thinking of this, Gerald felt that he was bound to tell his father himself. He resolved that he would do so, but was anxious to postpone the evil day. He lingered therefore in Scotland till he knew that his father was in Barsetshire. On his arrival he was told of Tregear's accident. "Oh, Gerald; have you heard?" said his sister. He had not as yet heard, and then the history was repeated to him. Mary did not attempt to conceal her own feelings. She was as open with her brother as she had been with Mrs. Finn. "I suppose he'll get over it," said Gerald. "Is that all you say?" she asked. "What can I say better? I suppose he will. Fellows always do get over that kind of thing. Herbert de Burgh smashed both his thighs, and now he can move about again,--of course with crutches." "Gerald! How can you be so unfeeling!" "I don't know what you mean. I always liked Tregear, and I am very sorry for him. If you would take it a little quieter, I think it would be better." "I could not take it quietly. How can I take it quietly when he is more than all the world to me?" "You should keep that to yourself." "Yes,--and so let people think that I didn't care, till I broke my heart! I shall say just the same to papa when he comes home." After that the brother and sister were not on very good terms with each other for the remainder of the day. On the Saturday there was a letter from Silverbridge to Mrs. Finn. Tregear was better; but was unhappy because it had been decided that he could not be moved for the next month. This entailed two misfortunes on him;--first that of being the enforced guest of persons who were not,--or, hitherto had not been, his own friends,--and then his absence from the first meeting of Parliament. When a gentleman has been in Parliament some years he may be able to reconcile himself to an obligatory vacation with a calm mind. But when the honours and glory are new, and the tedium of the benches has not yet been experienced, then such an accident is felt to be a grievance. But the young member was out of danger, and was, as Silverbridge declared, in the very best quarters which could be provided for a man in such a position. Phineas Finn told him all the politics; Mrs. Spooner related to him, on Sundays and Wednesdays, all the hunting details; while Lady Chiltern read to him light literature, because he was not allowed to hold a book in his hand. "I wish it were me," said Gerald. "I wish I were there to read to him," said Mary. Then the Duke came home. "Mary," said he, "I have been distressed to hear of this accident." This seemed to her to be the kindest word she had heard from him for a long time. "I believe him to be a worthy young man. I am sorry that he should be the cause of so much sorrow to you--and to me." "Of course I was sorry for his accident," she replied, after pausing awhile; "but now that he is better I will not call him a cause of sorrow--to me." Then the Duke said nothing further about Tregear; nor did she. "So you have come at last," he said to Gerald. That was the first greeting,--to which the son responded by an awkward smile. But in the course of the evening he walked straight up to his father--"I have something to tell you, sir," said he. "Something to tell me?" "Something that will make you very angry." CHAPTER LXV "Do You Ever Think What Money Is?" Gerald told his story, standing bolt upright, and looking his father full in the face as he told it. "You lost three thousand four hundred pounds at one sitting to Lord Percival--at cards!" "Yes, sir." "In Lord Nidderdale's house?" "Yes, sir. Nidderdale wasn't playing. It wasn't his fault." "Who were playing?" "Percival, and Dolly Longstaff, and Jack Hindes,--and I. Popplecourt was playing at first." "Lord Popplecourt!" "Yes, sir. But he went away when he began to lose." "Three thousand four hundred pounds! How old are you?" "I am just twenty-one." "You are beginning the world well, Gerald! What is the engagement which Silverbridge has made with Lord Percival?" "To pay him the money at the end of next month." "What had Silverbridge to do with it?" "Nothing, sir. I wrote to Silverbridge because I didn't know what to do. I knew he would stand to me." "Who is to stand to either of you if you go on thus I do not know." To this Gerald of course made no reply, but an idea came across his mind that he knew who would stand both to himself and his brother. "How did Silverbridge mean to get the money?" "He said he would ask you. But I thought that I ought to tell you." "Is that all?" "All what, sir?" "Are there other debts?" To this Gerald made no reply. "Other gambling debts." "No, sir;--not a shilling of that kind. I have never played before." "Does it ever occur to you that going on at that rate you may very soon lose all the fortune that will ever come to you? You were not yet of age and you lost three thousand four hundred pounds at cards to a man whom you probably knew to be a professed gambler!" The Duke seemed to wait for a reply, but poor Gerald had not a word to say. "Can you explain to me what benefit you proposed to yourself when you played for such stakes as that?" "I hoped to win back what I had lost." "Facilis descensus Averni!" said the Duke, shaking his head. "Noctes atque dies patet atri janua Ditis." No doubt, he thought, that as his son was at Oxford, admonitions in Latin would serve him better than in his native tongue. But Gerald, when he heard the grand hexameter rolled out in his father's grandest tone, entertained a comfortable feeling that the worst of the interview was over. "Win back what you had lost! Do you think that that is the common fortune of young gamblers when they fall among those who are more experienced than themselves?" "One goes on, sir, without reflecting." "Go on without reflecting! Yes; and where to? where to? Oh Gerald, where to? Whither will such progress without reflection take you?" "He means--to the devil," the lad said inwardly to himself, without moving his lips. "There is but one goal for such going on as that. I can pay three thousand four hundred pounds for you certainly. I think it hard that I should have to do so; but I can do it,--and I will do it." "Thank you, sir," murmured Gerald. "But how can I wash your young mind clean from the foul stain which has already defiled it? Why did you sit down to play? Was it to win the money which these men had in their pockets?" "Not particularly." "It cannot be that a rational being should consent to risk the money he has himself,--to risk even the money which he has not himself,--without a desire to win that which as yet belongs to his opponents. You desired to win." "I suppose I did hope to win." "And why? Why did you want to extract their property from their pockets, and to put it into your own? That the footpad on the road should have such desire when, with his pistol, he stops the traveller on his journey we all understand. And we know what we think of the footpad,--and what we do to him. He is a poor creature, who from his youth upwards has had no good thing done for him, uneducated, an outcast, whom we should pity more than we despise him. We take him as a pest which we cannot endure, and lock him up where he can harm us no more. On my word, Gerald, I think that the so-called gentleman who sits down with the deliberate intention of extracting money from the pockets of his antagonists, who lays out for himself that way of repairing the shortcomings of fortune, who looks to that resource as an aid to his means,--is worse, much worse, than the public robber! He is meaner, more cowardly, and has I think in his bosom less of the feelings of an honest man. And he probably has been educated,--as you have been. He calls himself a gentleman. He should know black from white. It is considered terrible to cheat at cards." "There was nothing of that, sir." "The man who plays and cheats has fallen low indeed." "I understand that, sir." "He who plays that he may make an income, but does not cheat, has fallen nearly as low. Do you ever think what money is?" The Duke paused so long, collecting his own thoughts and thinking of his own words, that Gerald found himself obliged to answer. "Cheques, and sovereigns, and bank-notes," he replied with much hesitation. "Money is the reward of labour," said the Duke, "or rather, in the shape it reaches you, it is your representation of that reward. You may earn it yourself, or, as is, I am afraid, more likely to be the case with you, you may possess it honestly as prepared for you by the labour of others who have stored it up for you. But it is a commodity of which you are bound to see that the source is not only clean but noble. You would not let Lord Percival give you money." "He wouldn't do that, sir, I am sure." "Nor would you take it. There is nothing so comfortable as money,--but nothing so defiling if it be come by unworthily; nothing so comfortable, but nothing so noxious if the mind be allowed to dwell upon it constantly. If a man have enough, let him spend it freely. If he wants it, let him earn it honestly. Let him do something for it, so that the man who pays it to him may get its value. But to think that it may be got by gambling, to hope to live after that fashion, to sit down with your fingers almost in your neighbour's pockets, with your eye on his purse, trusting that you may know better than he some studied calculations as to the pips concealed in your hands, praying to the only god you worship that some special card may be vouchsafed to you,--that I say is to have left far, far behind you, all nobility, all gentleness, all manhood! Write me down Lord Percival's address and I will send him the money." Then the Duke wrote a cheque for the money claimed and sent it with a note, as follows:--"The Duke of Omnium presents his compliments to Lord Percival. The Duke has been informed by Lord Gerald Palliser that Lord Percival has won at cards from him the sum of three thousand four hundred pounds. The Duke now encloses a cheque for that amount, and requests that the document which Lord Percival holds from Lord Silverbridge as security for the amount, may be returned to Lord Gerald." Let the noble gambler have his prey. He was little solicitous about that. If he could only so operate on the mind of this son,--so operate on the minds of both his sons, as to make them see the foolishness of folly, the ugliness of what is mean, the squalor and dirt of ignoble pursuits, then he could easily pardon past faults. If it were half his wealth, what would it signify if he could teach his children to accept those lessons without which no man can live as a gentleman, let his rank be the highest known, let his wealth be as the sands, his fashion unrivalled? The word or two which his daughter had said to him, declaring that she still took pride in her lover's love, and then this new misfortune on Gerald's part, upset him greatly. He almost sickened of politics when he thought of his domestic bereavement and his domestic misfortunes. How completely had he failed to indoctrinate his children with the ideas by which his own mind was fortified and controlled! Nothing was so base to him as a gambler, and they had both commenced their career by gambling. From their young boyhood nothing had seemed so desirable to him as that they should be accustomed by early training to devote themselves to the service of their country. He saw other young noblemen around him who at eighteen were known as debaters at their colleges, or at twenty-five were already deep in politics, social science, and educational projects. What good would all his wealth or all his position do for his children if their minds could rise to nothing beyond the shooting of deer and the hunting of foxes? There was young Lord Buttercup, the son of the Earl of Woolantallow, only a few months older than Silverbridge,--who was already a junior lord, and as constant at his office, or during the Session on the Treasury Bench, as though there were not a pack of hounds or a card-table in Great Britain! Lord Buttercup, too, had already written an article in "The Fortnightly" on the subject of Turkish finance. How long would it be before Silverbridge would write an article, or Gerald sign his name in the service of the public? And then those proposed marriages,--as to which he was beginning to know that his children would be too strong for him! Anxious as he was that both his sons should be permeated by Liberal politics, studious as he had ever been to teach them that the highest duty of those high in rank was to use their authority to elevate those beneath them, still he was hardly less anxious to make them understand that their second duty required them to maintain their own position. It was by feeling this second duty,--by feeling it and performing it,--that they would be enabled to perform the rest. And now both Silverbridge and his girl were bent upon marriages by which they would depart out of their own order! Let Silverbridge marry whom he might, he could not be other than heir to the honours of his family. But by his marriage he might either support or derogate from these honours. And now, having at first made a choice that was good, he had altered his mind from simple freak, captivated by a pair of bright eyes and an arch smile; and without a feeling in regard to his family, was anxious to take to his bosom the granddaughter of an American day-labourer! And then his girl,--of whose beauty he was so proud, from whose manners, and tastes, and modes of life he had expected to reap those good things, in a feminine degree, which his sons as young men seemed so little fitted to give him! By slow degrees he had been brought round to acknowledge that the young man was worthy. Tregear's conduct had been felt by the Duke to be manly. The letter he had written was a good letter. And then he had won for himself a seat in the House of Commons. When forced to speak of him to this girl he had been driven by justice to call him worthy. But how could he serve to support and strengthen that nobility, the endurance and perpetuation of which should be the peculiar care of every Palliser? And yet as the Duke walked about his room he felt that his opposition either to the one marriage or to the other was vain. Of course they would marry according to their wills. That same night Gerald wrote to his brother before he went to bed, as follows: DEAR SILVER,--I was awfully obliged to you for sending me the I.O.U. for that brute Percival. He only sneered when he took it, and would have said something disagreeable, but that he saw that I was in earnest. I know he did say something to Nid, only I can't find out what. Nid is an easy-going fellow, and, as I saw, didn't want to have a rumpus. But now what do you think I've done? Directly I got home I told the governor all about it! As I was in the train I made up my mind that I would. I went slap at it. If there is anything that never does any good, it's craning. I did it all at one rush, just as though I was swallowing a dose of physic. I wish I could tell you all that the governor said, because it was really tip-top. What is a fellow to get by playing high,--a fellow like you and me? I didn't want any of that beast's money. I don't suppose he had any. But one's dander gets up, and one doesn't like to be done, and so it goes on. I shall cut that kind of thing altogether. You should have heard the governor spouting Latin! And then the way he sat upon Percival, without mentioning the fellow's name! I do think it mean to set yourself to work to win money at cards,--and it is awfully mean to lose more than you have got to pay. Then at the end the governor said he'd send the beast a cheque for the amount. You know his way of finishing up, just like two fellows fighting;--when one has awfully punished the other he goes up and shakes hands with him. He did pitch into me,--not abusing me, nor even saying a word about the money, which he at once promised to pay, but laying it on to gambling with a regular cat-o'-nine-tails. And then there was an end of it. He just asked the fellow's address and said that he would send him the money. I will say this;--I don't think there's a greater brick than the governor out anywhere. I am awfully sorry about Tregear. I can't quite make out how it happened. I suppose you were too near him, and Melrose always does rush at his fences. One fellow shouldn't be too near another fellow,--only it so often happens that it can't be helped. It's just like anything else, if nothing comes of it then it's all right. But if anybody comes to grief then he has got to be pitched into. Do you remember when I nearly cut over old Sir Simon Slobody? Didn't I hear about it! I am awfully glad you didn't smash up Tregear altogether, because of Mary. I am quite sure it is no good anybody setting up his back against that. It's one of the things that have got to be. You always have said that he is a good fellow. If so, what's the harm? At any rate it has got to be. Your affectionate Brother, GERALD. I go up in about a week. CHAPTER LXVI The Three Attacks During the following week the communications between Harrington and Matching were very frequent. There were no further direct messages between Tregear and Lady Mary, but she heard daily of his progress. The Duke was conscious of the special interest which existed in his house as to the condition of the young man, but, after his arrival, not a word was spoken for some days between him and his daughter on the subject. Then Gerald went back to his college, and the Duke made his preparations for going up to town and making some attempt at parliamentary activity. It was by no concert that an attack was made upon him from three quarters at once as he was preparing to leave Matching. On the Sunday morning during church time,--for on that day Lady Mary went to her devotions alone,--Mrs. Finn was closeted for an hour with the Duke in his study. "I think you ought to be aware," she said to the Duke, "that though I trust Mary implicitly and know her to be thoroughly high principled, I cannot be responsible for her, if I remain with her here." "I do not quite follow your meaning." "Of course there is but one matter on which there can, probably, be any difference between us. If she should choose to write to Mr. Tregear, or to send him a message, or even to go to him, I could not prevent it." "Go to him!" exclaimed the horrified Duke. "I merely suggest such a thing in order to make you understand that I have absolutely no control over her." "What control have I?" "Nay; I cannot define that. You are her father, and she acknowledges your authority. She regards me as a friend--and as such treats me with the sweetest affection. Nothing can be more gratifying than her manner to me personally." "It ought to be so." "She has thoroughly won my heart. But still I know that if there were a difference between us she would not obey me. Why should she?" "Because you hold my deputed authority." "Oh, Duke, that goes for very little anywhere. No one can depute authority. It comes too much from personal accidents, and too little from reason or law to be handed over to others. Besides, I fear, that on one matter concerning her you and I are not agreed." "I shall be sorry if it be so." "I feel that I am bound to tell you my opinion." "Oh yes." "You think that in the end Lady Mary will allow herself to be separated from Tregear. I think that in the end they will become man and wife." This seemed to the Duke to be not quite so bad as it might have been. Any speculation as to results were very different from an expressed opinion as to propriety. Were he to tell the truth as to his own mind, he might perhaps have said the same thing. But one is not to relax in one's endeavours to prevent that which is wrong, because one fears that the wrong may be ultimately perpetrated. "Let that be as it may," he said, "it cannot alter my duty." "Nor mine, Duke, if I may presume to think that I have a duty in this matter." "That you should encounter the burden of the duty binds me to you for ever." "If it be that they will certainly be married one day--" "Who has said that? Who has admitted that?" "If it be so; if it seems to me that it must be so,--then how can I be anxious to prolong her sufferings? She does suffer terribly." Upon this the Duke frowned, but there was more of tenderness in his frown than in the hard smile which he had hitherto worn. "I do not know whether you see it all." He well remembered all that he had seen when he and Mary were travelling together. "I see it; and I do not pass half an hour with her without sorrowing for her." On hearing this he sighed and turned his face away. "Girls are so different! There are many who though they be genuinely in love, though their natures are sweet and affectionate, are not strong enough to support their own feelings in resistance to the will of those who have authority over them." Had it been so with his wife? At this moment all the former history passed through his mind. "They yield to that which seems to be inevitable, and allow themselves to be fashioned by the purposes of others. It is well for them often that they are so plastic. Whether it would be better for her that she should be so I will not say." "It would be better," said the Duke doggedly. "But such is not her nature. She is as determined as ever." "I may be determined too." "But if at last it will be of no use,--if it be her fate either to be married to this man or die of a broken heart--" "What justifies you in saying that? How can you torture me by such a threat?" "If I think so, Duke, I am justified. Of late I have been with her daily,--almost hourly. I do not say that this will kill her now,--in her youth. It is not often, I fancy, that women die after that fashion. But a broken heart may bring the sufferer to the grave after a lapse of many years. How will it be with you if she should live like a ghost beside you for the next twenty years, and you should then see her die, faded and withered before her time,--all her life gone without a joy,--because she had loved a man whose position in life was displeasing to you? Would the ground on which the sacrifice had been made then justify itself to you? In thus performing your duty to your order would you feel satisfied that you had performed that to your child?" She had come there determined to say it all,--to liberate her own soul as it were,--but had much doubted the spirit in which the Duke would listen to her. That he would listen to her she was sure,--and then if he chose to cast her out, she would endure his wrath. It would not be to her now as it had been when he accused her of treachery. But, nevertheless, bold as she was and independent, he had imbued her, as he did all those around him, with so strong a sense of his personal dignity, that when she had finished she almost trembled as she looked in his face. Since he had asked her how she could justify to herself the threats which she was using he had sat still with his eyes fixed upon her. Now, when she had done, he was in no hurry to speak. He rose slowly and walking towards the fireplace stood with his back towards her, looking down upon the fire. She was the first to speak again. "Shall I leave you now?" she said in a low voice. "Perhaps it will be better," he answered. His voice, too, was very low. In truth he was so moved that he hardly knew how to speak at all. Then she rose and was already on her way to the door when he followed her. "One moment, if you please," he said almost sternly. "I am under a debt of gratitude to you of which I cannot express my sense in words. How far I may agree with you, and where I may disagree, I will not attempt to point out to you now." "Oh no." "But all that you have troubled yourself to think and to feel in this matter, and all that true friendship has compelled you to say to me, shall be written down in the tablets of my memory." "Duke!" "My child has at any rate been fortunate in securing the friendship of such a friend." Then he turned back to the fireplace, and she was constrained to leave the room without another word. She had determined to make the best plea in her power for Mary; and while she was making the plea had been almost surprised by her own vehemence; but the greater had been her vehemence, the stronger, she thought, would have been the Duke's anger. And as she had watched the workings of his face she had felt for a moment that the vials of his wrath were about to be poured out upon her. Even when she left the room she almost believed that had he not taken those moments for consideration at the fireplace his parting words would have been different. But, as it was, there could be no question now of her departure. No power was left to her of separating herself from Lady Mary. Though the Duke had not as yet acknowledged himself to be conquered, there was no doubt to her now but that he would be conquered. And she, either here or in London, must be the girl's nearest friend up to the day when she should be given over to Mr. Tregear. That was one of the three attacks which were made upon the Duke before he went up to his parliamentary duties. The second was as follows: Among the letters on the following morning one was brought to him from Tregear. It is hoped that the reader will remember the lover's former letter and the very unsatisfactory answer which had been sent to it. Nothing could have been colder, less propitious, or more inveterately hostile than the reply. As he lay in bed with his broken bones at Harrington he had ample time for thinking over all this. He knew every word of the Duke's distressing note by heart, and had often lashed himself to rage as he had repeated it. But he could effect nothing by showing his anger. He must go on and still do something. Since the writing of that letter he had done something. He had got his seat in Parliament. And he had secured the interest of his friend Silverbridge. This had been partially done at Polwenning; but the accident in the Brake country had completed the work. The brother had at last declared himself in his friend's favour. "Of course I should be glad to see it," he had said while sitting by Tregear's bedside. "The worst is that everything does seem to go against the poor governor." Then Tregear made up his mind that he would write another letter. Personally he was not in the best condition for doing this as he was lying in bed with his left arm tied up, and with straps and bandages all round his body. But he could sit up in bed, and his right hand and arm were free. So he declared to Lady Chiltern his purpose of writing a letter. She tried to dissuade him gently and offered to be his secretary. But when he assured her that no secretary could write this letter for him she understood pretty well what would be the subject of the letter. With considerable difficulty Tregear wrote his letter. MY LORD DUKE,--[On this occasion he left out the epithet which he had before used] Your Grace's reply to my last letter was not encouraging, but in spite of your prohibition I venture to write to you again. If I had the slightest reason for thinking that your daughter was estranged from me, I would not persecute either you or her. But if it be true that she is as devoted to me as I am to her, can I be wrong in pleading my cause? Is it not evident to you that she is made of such stuff that she will not be controlled in her choice,--even by your will? I have had an accident in the hunting-field and am now writing from Lord Chiltern's house, where I am confined to bed. But I think you will understand me when I say that even in this helpless condition I feel myself constrained to do something. Of course I ask for nothing from you on my own behalf,--but on her behalf may I not add my prayers to hers? I have the honour to be, Your Grace's very faithful Servant, FRANCIS TREGEAR. This coming alone would perhaps have had no effect. The Duke had desired the young man not to address him again; and the young man had disobeyed him. No mere courtesy would now have constrained him to send any reply to this further letter. But coming as it did while his heart was still throbbing with the effects of Mrs. Finn's words, it was allowed to have a certain force. The argument used was a true argument. His girl was devoted to the man who sought her hand. Mrs. Finn had told him that sooner or later he must yield,--unless he was prepared to see his child wither and fade at his side. He had once thought that he would be prepared even for that. He had endeavoured to strengthen his own will by arguing with himself that when he saw a duty plainly before him, he should cleave to that let the results be what they might. But that picture of her face withered and wan after twenty years of sorrowing had had its effect upon his heart. He even made excuses within his own breast in the young man's favour. He was in Parliament now, and what may not be done for a young man in Parliament? Altogether the young man appeared to him in a light different from that through which he had viewed the presumptuous, arrogant, utterly unjustifiable suitor who had come to him, now nearly a year since, in Carlton Terrace. He went to breakfast with Tregear's letter in his pocket, and was then gracious to Mrs. Finn, and tender to his daughter. "When do you go, papa?" Mary asked. "I shall take the 11.45 train. I have ordered the carriage at a quarter before eleven." "May I go to the train with you, papa?" "Certainly; I shall be delighted." "Papa!" Mary said as soon as she found herself seated beside her father in the carriage. "My dear." "Oh, papa!" and she threw herself on to his breast. He put his arm round her and kissed her,--as he would have had so much delight in doing, as he would have done so often before, had there not been this ground of discord. She was very sweet to him. It had never seemed to him that she had disgraced herself by loving Tregear--but that a great misfortune had fallen upon her. Silverbridge when he had gone into a racing partnership with Tifto, and Gerald when he had played for money which he did not possess, had--degraded themselves in his estimation. He would not have used such a word; but it was his feeling. They were less noble, less pure than they might have been, had they kept themselves free from such stain. But this girl,--whether she should live and fade by his side, or whether she should give her hand to some fitting noble suitor,--or even though she might at last become the wife of this man who loved her, would always have been pure. It was sweet to him to have something to caress. Now in the solitude of his life, as years were coming on him, he felt how necessary it was that he should have someone who would love him. Since his wife had left him he had been debarred from these caresses by the necessity of showing his antagonism to her dearest wishes. It had been his duty to be stern. In all his words to his daughter he had been governed by a conviction that he never ought to allow the duty of separating her from her lover to be absent from his mind. He was not prepared to acknowledge that that duty had ceased;--but yet there had crept over him a feeling that as he was half conquered, why should he not seek some recompense in his daughter's love? "Papa," she said, "you do not hate me?" "Hate you, my darling?" "Because I am disobedient. Oh, papa, I cannot help it. He should not have come. He should not have been let to come." He had not a word to say to her. He could not as yet bring himself to tell her,--that it should be as she desired. Much less could he now argue with her as to the impossibility of such a marriage as he had done on former occasions when the matter had been discussed. He could only press his arm tightly round her waist, and be silent. "It cannot be altered now, papa. Look at me. Tell me that you love me." "Have you doubted my love?" "No, papa,--but I would do anything to make you happy; anything that I could do. Papa, you do not want me to marry Lord Popplecourt?" "I would not have you marry any man without loving him." "I never can love anybody else. That is what I wanted you to know, papa." To this he made no reply, nor was there anything else said upon the subject before the carriage drove up to the railway station. "Do not get out, dear," he said, seeing that her eyes had been filled with tears. "It is not worth while. God bless you, my child! You will be up in London I hope in a fortnight, and we must try to make the house a little less dull for you." And so he had encountered the third attack. Lady Mary, as she was driven home, recovered her spirits wonderfully. Not a word had fallen from her father which she could use hereafter as a refuge from her embarrassments. He had made her no promise. He had assented to nothing. But there had been something in his manner, in his gait, in his eye, in the pressure of his arm, which made her feel that her troubles would soon be at an end. "I do love you so much," she said to Mrs. Finn late on that afternoon. "I am glad of that, dear." "I shall always love you,--because you have been on my side all through." "No, Mary;--that is not so." "I know it is so. Of course you have to be wise because you are older. And papa would not have you here with me if you were not wise. But I know you are on my side,--and papa knows it too. And someone else shall know it some day." CHAPTER LXVII "He Is Such a Beast" Lord Silverbridge remained hunting in the Brake country till a few days before the meeting of Parliament, and had he been left to himself he would have had another week in the country and might probably have overstayed the opening day; but he had not been left to himself. In the last week in January an important despatch reached his hands, from no less important a person than Sir Timothy Beeswax, suggesting to him that he should undertake the duty of seconding the address in the House of Commons. When the proposition first reached him it made his hair stand on end. He had never yet risen to his feet in the House. He had spoken at those election meetings in Cornwall, and had found it easy enough. After the first or second time he had thought it good fun. But he knew that standing up in the House of Commons would be different from that. Then there would be the dress! "I should so hate to fig myself out and look like a guy," he said to Tregear, to whom of course he confided the offer that was made to him. Tregear was very anxious that he should accept it. "A man should never refuse anything of that kind which comes in his way," Tregear said. "It is only because I am the governor's son," Silverbridge pleaded. "Partly so perhaps. But if it be altogether so, what of that? Take the goods the gods provide you. Of course all these things which our ambition covets are easier to Duke's sons than to others. But not on that account should a Duke's son refuse them. A man when he sees a rung vacant on the ladder should always put his feet there." "I'll tell you what," said Silverbridge. "If I thought this was all fair sailing I'd do it. I should feel certain that I should come a cropper, but still I'd try it. As you say, a fellow should try. But it's all meant as a blow at the governor. Old Beeswax thinks that if he can get me up to swear that he and his crew are real first-chop hands, that will hit the governor hard. It's as much as saying to the governor,--'This chap belongs to me, not to you.' That's a thing I won't go in for." Then Tregear counselled him to write to his father for advice, and at the same time to ask Sir Timothy to allow him a day or two for consideration. This counsel he took. His letter reached his father two days before he left Matching. In answer to it there came first a telegram begging Silverbridge to be in London on the Monday, and then a letter, in which the Duke expressed himself as being anxious to see his son before giving a final answer to the question. Thus it was that Silverbridge had been taken away from his hunting. Isabel Boncassen, however, was now in London, and from her it was possible that he might find consolation. He had written to her soon after reaching Harrington, telling her that he had had it all out with the governor. "There is a good deal that I can only tell you when I see you," he said. Then he assured her with many lover's protestations that he was and always would be till death altogether her own most loving S. To this he had received an answer by return of post. She would be delighted to see him up in town,--as would her father and mother. They had now got a comfortable house in Brook Street. And then she signed herself his sincere friend, Isabel. Silverbridge thought that it was cold, and remembered certain scraps in another feminine handwriting in which more passion was expressed. Perhaps this was the way with American young ladies when they were in love. "Yes," said the Duke, "I am glad that you have come up at once, as Sir Timothy should have his answer without further delay." "But what shall I say?" The Duke, though he had already considered the matter very seriously, nevertheless took a few minutes to consider it again. "The offer," said he, "must be acknowledged as very flattering." "But the circumstances are not usual." "It cannot often be the case that a minister should ask the son of his keenest political opponent to render him such a service. But, however, we will put that aside." "Not quite, sir." "For the present we will put that on one side. Not looking at the party which you may be called upon to support, having for the moment no regard to this or that line in politics, there is no opening to the real duties of parliamentary life which I would sooner see accorded to you than this." "But if I were to break down?" Talking to his father he could not quite venture to ask what might happen if he were to "come a cropper." "None but the brave deserve the fair," said the Duke slapping his hands upon the table. "Why, if we fail, 'We fail! But screw your courage to the sticking place, And we'll not fail.' What high point would ever be reached if caution such as that were allowed to prevail? What young men have done before cannot you do? I have no doubt of your capacity. None." "Haven't you, sir?" said Silverbridge, considerably gratified,--and also surprised. "None in the least. But, perhaps, some of your diligence." "I could learn it by heart, sir,--if you mean that." "But I don't mean that; or rather I mean much more than that. You have first to realise in your mind the thing to be said, and then the words in which you should say it, before you come to learning by heart." "Some of them I suppose would tell me what to say." "No doubt with your inexperience it would be unfit that you should be left entirely to yourself. But I would wish you to know,--perhaps I should say to feel,--that the sentiments to be expressed by you were just." "I should have to praise Sir Timothy." "Not that necessarily. But you would have to advocate that course in Parliament which Sir Timothy and his friends have taken and propose to take." "But I hate him like poison." "There need be no personal feeling in the matter. I remember that when I moved the address in your house Mr. Mildmay was Prime Minister,--a man for whom my regard and esteem were unbounded,--who had been in political matters the preceptor of my youth, whom as a patriotic statesman I almost worshipped, whom I now remember as a man whose departure from the arena of politics left the country very destitute. No one has sprung up since like to him,--or hardly second to him. But in speaking on so large a subject as the policy of a party, I thought it beneath me to eulogise a man. The same policy reversed may keep you silent respecting Sir Timothy." "I needn't of course say what I think about him." "I suppose you do agree with Sir Timothy as to his general policy? On no other condition can you undertake such a duty." "Of course I have voted with him." "So I have observed,--not so regularly perhaps as Mr. Roby would have desired." Mr. Roby was the Conservative whip. "And I suppose the people at Silverbridge expect me to support him." "I hardly know how that may be. They used to be contented with my poor services. No doubt they feel they have changed for the better." "You shouldn't say that, sir." "I am bound to suppose that they think so, because when the matter was left in their own hands they at once elected a Conservative. You need not fear that you will offend them by seconding the address. They will probably feel proud to see their young member brought forward on such an occasion; as I shall be proud to see my son." "You would if it were on the other side, sir." "Yes, Silverbridge, yes; I should be very proud if it were on the other side. But there is a useful old adage which bids us not cry for spilt milk. You have a right to your opinions, though perhaps I may think that in adopting what I must call new opinions you were a little precipitate. We cannot act together in politics. But not the less on that account do I wish to see you take an active and useful part on that side to which you have attached yourself." As he said this he rose from his seat and spoke with emphasis, as though he were addressing some imaginary Speaker or a house of legislators around. "I shall be proud to hear you second the address. If you do it as gracefully and as fitly as I am sure you may if you will give yourself the trouble, I shall hear you do it with infinite satisfaction, even though I shall feel at the same time anxious to answer all your arguments and to disprove all your assertions. I should be listening no doubt to my opponent;--but I should be proud to feel that I was listening to my son. My advice to you is to do as Sir Timothy has asked you." "He is such a beast, sir," said Silverbridge. "Pray do not speak in that way on matters so serious." "I do not think you quite understand it, sir." "Perhaps not. Can you enlighten me?" "I believe he has done this only to annoy you." The Duke, who had again seated himself, and was leaning back in his chair, raised himself up, placed his hands on the table before him, and looked his son hard in the face. The idea which Silverbridge had just expressed had certainly occurred to himself. He remembered well all the circumstances of the time when he and Sir Timothy Beeswax had been members of the same government;--and he remembered how animosities had grown, and how treacherous he had thought the man. From the moment in which he had read the minister's letter to the young member, he had felt that the offer had too probably come from a desire to make the political separation between himself and his son complete. But he had thought that in counselling his son he was bound to ignore such a feeling; and it certainly had not occurred to him that Silverbridge would be astute enough to perceive the same thing. "What makes you fancy that?" said the Duke, striving to conceal by his manner, but not altogether successful in concealing, the gratification which he certainly felt. "Well, sir, I am not sure that I can explain it. Of course it is putting you in a different boat from me." "You have already chosen your boat." "Perhaps he thinks I may get out again. I dislike the skipper so much, that I am not sure that I shall not." "Oh, Silverbridge,--that is such a fault! So much is included in that which is unstatesmanlike, unpatriotic, almost dishonest! Do you mean to say that you would be this or that in politics according to your personal liking for an individual?" "When you don't trust the leader, you can't believe very firmly in the followers," said Silverbridge doggedly. "I won't say, sir, what I may do. Though I dare say that what I think is not of much account, I do think a good deal about it." "I am glad of that." "And as I think it not at all improbable that I may go back again, if you don't mind it, I will refuse." Of course after that the Duke had no further arguments to use in favour of Sir Timothy's proposition. CHAPTER LXVIII Brook Street Silverbridge had now a week on his hands which he felt he might devote to the lady of his love. It was a comfort to him that he need have nothing to do with the address. To have to go, day after day, to the Treasury in order that he might learn his lesson, would have been disagreeable to him. He did not quite know how the lesson would have been communicated, but fancied it would have come from "Old Roby," whom he did not love much better than Sir Timothy. Then the speech must have been composed, and afterwards submitted to someone,--probably to old Roby again, by whom no doubt it would be cut and slashed, and made quite a different speech than he had intended. If he had not praised Sir Timothy himself, Roby,--or whatever other tutor might have been assigned to him,--would have put the praise in. And then how many hours it would have taken to learn "the horrid thing" by heart. He proudly felt that he had not been prompted by idleness to decline the task; but not the less was he glad to have shuffled the burden from off his shoulders. Early the next morning he was in Brook Street, having sent a note to say he would call, and having even named the hour. And yet when he knocked at the door, he was told with the utmost indifference by a London footman, that Miss Boncassen was not at home,--also that Mrs. Boncassen was not at home;--also that Mr. Boncassen was not at home. When he asked at what hour Miss Boncassen was expected home, the man answered him, just as though he had been anybody else, that he knew nothing about it. He turned away in disgust, and had himself driven to the Beargarden. In his misery he had recourse to game-pie and a pint of champagne for his lunch. "Halloa, old fellow, what is this I hear about you?" said Nidderdale, coming in and sitting opposite to him. "I don't know what you have heard." "You are going to second the address. What made them pick you out from the lot of us?" "It is just what I am not going to do." "I saw it all in the papers." "I dare say;--and yet it isn't true. I shouldn't wonder if they ask you." At this moment a waiter handed a large official letter to Lord Nidderdale, saying that the messenger who had brought it was waiting for an answer in the hall. The letter bore the important signature of T. Beeswax on the corner of the envelope, and so disturbed Lord Nidderdale that he called at once for a glass of soda-and-brandy. When opened it was found to be very nearly a counterpart of that which Silverbridge had received down in the country. There was, however, added a little prayer that Lord Nidderdale would at once come down to the Treasury Chambers. "They must be very hard up," said Lord Nidderdale. "But I shall do it. Cantrip is always at me to do something, and you see if I don't butter them up properly." Then having fortified himself with game-pie and a glass of brown sherry he went away at once to the Treasury Chambers. Silverbridge felt himself a little better after his lunch,--better still when he had smoked a couple of cigarettes walking about the empty smoking-room. And as he walked he collected his thoughts. She could hardly have meant to slight him. No doubt her letter down to him at Harrington had been very cold. No doubt he had been ill-treated in being sent away so unceremoniously from the door. But yet she could hardly intend that everything between them should be over. Even an American girl could not be so unreasonable as that. He remembered the passionate way in which she had assured him of her love. All that could not have been forgotten! He had done nothing by which he could have forfeited her esteem. She had desired him to tell the whole affair to her father, and he had done so. Mr. Boncassen might perhaps have objected. It might be that this American was so prejudiced against English aristocrats as to desire no commerce with them. There were not many Englishmen who would not have welcomed him as son-in-law, but Americans might be different. Still,--still Isabel would hardly have shown her obedience to her father in this way. She was too independent to obey her father in a matter concerning her own heart. And if he had not been the possessor of her heart at that last interview, then she must have been false indeed! So he got once more into his hansom and had himself taken back to Brook Street. Mrs. Boncassen was in the drawing-room alone. "I am so sorry," said the lady, "but Mr. Boncassen has, I think, just gone out." "Indeed! and where is Isabel?" "Isabel is downstairs,--that is if she hasn't gone out too. She did talk of going with her father to the Museum. She is getting quite bookish. She has got a ticket, and goes there, and has all the things brought to her just like the other learned folks." "I am anxious to see her, Mrs. Boncassen." "My! If she has gone out it will be a pity. She was only saying yesterday she wouldn't wonder if you shouldn't turn up." "Of course I've turned up, Mrs. Boncassen. I was here an hour ago." "Was it you who called and asked all them questions? My! We couldn't make out who it was. The man said it was a flurried young gentleman who wouldn't leave a card,--but who wanted to see Mr. Boncassen most especial." "It was Isabel I wanted to see. Didn't I leave a card? No; I don't think I did. I felt so--almost at home, that I didn't think of a card." "That's very kind of you, Lord Silverbridge." "I hope you are going to be my friend, Mrs. Boncassen." "I am sure I don't know, Lord Silverbridge. Isabel is most used to having her own way, I guess. I think when hearts are joined almost nothing ought to stand between them. But Mr. Boncassen does have doubts. He don't wish as Isabel should force herself anywhere. But here she is, and now she can speak for herself." Whereupon not only did Isabel enter the room, but at the same time Mrs. Boncassen most discreetly left it. It must be confessed that American mothers are not afraid of their daughters. Silverbridge, when the door was closed, stood looking at the girl for a moment and thought that she was more lovely than ever. She was dressed for walking. She still had on her fur jacket, but had taken off her hat. "I was in the parlour downstairs," she said, "when you came in, with papa; and we were going out together; but when I heard who was here, I made him go alone. Was I not good?" He had not thought of a word to say, or a thing to do;--but he felt as he looked at her that the only thing in the world worth living for, was to have her for his own. For a moment he was half abashed. Then in the next she was close in his arms with his lips pressed to hers. He had been so sudden that she had been unable, at any rate thought that she had been unable, to repress him. "Lord Silverbridge," she said, "I told you I would not have it. You have offended me." "Isabel!" "Yes; Isabel! Isabel is offended with you. Why did you do it?" Why did he do it? It seemed to him to be the most unnecessary question. "I want you to know how I love you." "Will that tell me? That only tells me how little you think of me." "Then it tells you a falsehood;--for I am thinking of you always. And I always think of you as being the best and dearest and sweetest thing in the world. And now I think you dearer and sweeter than ever." Upon this she tried to frown; but her frown at once broke out into a smile. "When I wrote to say that I was coming why did you not stay at home for me this morning?" "I got no letter, Lord Silverbridge." "Why didn't you get it?" "That I cannot say, Lord Silverbridge." "Isabel, if you are so formal, you will kill me." "Lord Silverbridge, if you are so forward, you will offend me." Then it turned out that no letter from him had reached the house; and as the letter had been addressed to Bruton Street instead of Brook Street, the failure on the part of the post-office was not surprising. Whether or no she were offended or he killed he remained with her the whole of that afternoon. "Of course I love you," she said. "Do you suppose I should be here with you if I did not, or that you could have remained in the house after what you did just now? I am not given to run into rhapsodies quite so much as you are,--and being a woman perhaps it is as well that I don't. But I think I can be quite as true to you as you are to me." "I am so much obliged to you for that," he said, grasping at her hand. "But I am sure that rhapsodies won't do any good. Now I'll tell you my mind." "You know mine," said Silverbridge. "I will take it for granted that I do. Your mind is to marry me will ye nill ye, as the people say." He answered this by merely nodding his head and getting a little nearer to her. "That is all very well in its way, and I am not going to say but what I am gratified." Then he did grasp her hand. "If it pleases you to hear me say so, Lord Silverbridge--" "Not Lord!" "Then I shall call you Plantagenet;--only it sounds so horribly historical. Why are you not Thomas or Abraham? But if it will please you to hear me say so, I am ready to acknowledge that nothing in all my life ever came near to the delight I have in your love." Hereupon he almost succeeded in getting his arm round her waist. But she was strong, and seized his hand and held it. "And I speak no rhapsodies. I tell you a truth which I want you to know and to keep in your heart,--so that you may be always, always sure of it." "I never will doubt it." "But that marrying will ye nill ye, will not suit me. There is so much wanted for happiness in life." "I will do all that I can." "Yes. Even though it be hazardous, I am willing to trust you. If you were as other men are, if you could do as you please as lower men may do, I would leave father and mother and my own country,--that I might be your wife. I would do that because I love you. But what will my life be here, if they who are your friends turn their backs upon me? What will your life be, if, through all that, you continue to love me?" "That will all come right." "And what will your life be, or mine," she said, going on with her own thoughts without seeming to have heard his last words, "if in such a condition as that you did not continue to love me?" "I should always love you." "It might be very hard:--and if once felt to be hard, then impossible. You have not looked at it as I have done. Why should you? Even with a wife that was a trouble to you--" "Oh, Isabel!" His arm was now round her waist, but she continued speaking as though she were not aware of the embrace. "Yes, a trouble! I shall not be always just what I am now. Now I can be bright and pretty and hold my own with others because I am so. But are you sure,--I am not,--that I am such stuff as an English lady should be made of? If in ten years' time you found that others did not think so,--that, worse again, you did not think so yourself, would you be true to me then?" "I will always be true to you." She gently extricated herself, as though she had done so that she might better turn round and look into his face. "Oh, my own one, who can say of himself that it would be so? How could it be so, when you would have all the world against you? You would still be what you are,--with a clog round your leg while at home. In Parliament, among your friends, at your clubs, you would be just what you are. You would be that Lord Silverbridge who had all good things at his disposal,--except that he had been unfortunate in his marriage! But what should I be?" Though she paused he could not answer her,--not yet. There was a solemnity in her speech which made it necessary that he should hear her to the end. "I, too, have my friends in my own country. It is no disgrace to me there that my grandfather worked on the quays. No one holds her head higher than I do, or is more sure of being able to hold it. I have there that assurance of esteem and honour which you have here. I would lose it all to do you a good. But I will not lose it to do you an injury." "I don't know about injuries," he said, getting up and walking about the room. "But I am sure of this. You will have to be my wife." "If your father will take me by the hand and say that I shall be his daughter, I will risk all the rest. Even then it might not be wise; but we love each other too well not to run some peril. Do you think that I want anything better than to preside in your home, to soften your cares, to welcome your joys, to be the mother perhaps of your children, and to know that you are proud that I should be so? No, my darling. I can see a Paradise;--only, only, I may not be fit to enter it. I must use some judgment better than my own, sounder, dear, than yours. Tell the Duke what I say;--tell him with what language a son may use to his father. And remember that all you ask for yourself you will ask doubly for me." "I will ask him so that he cannot refuse me." "If you do I shall be contented. And now go. I have said ever so much, and I am tired." "Isabel! Oh, my love!" "Yes; Isabel;--your love! I am that at any rate for the present,--and proud to be so as a queen. Well, if it must be, this once,--as I have been so hard to you." Then she gave him her cheek to kiss, but of course he took more than she gave. When he got out into the street it was dark and there was still standing the faithful cab. But he felt that at the present moment it would be impossible to sit still, and he dismissed the equipage. He walked rapidly along Brook Street into Park Lane, and from thence to the park, hardly knowing whither he went in the enthusiasm of the moment. He walked back to the Marble Arch, and thence round by the drive to the Guard House and the bridge over the Serpentine, by the Knightsbridge Barracks to Hyde Park Corner. Though he should give up everything and go and live in her own country with her, he would marry her. His politics, his hunting, his address to the Queen, his horses, his guns, his father's wealth, and his own rank,--what were they all to Isabel Boncassen? In meeting her he had met the one human being in all the world who could really be anything to him either in friendship or in love. When she had told him what she would do for him to make his home happy, it had seemed to him that all other delights must fade away from him for ever. How odious were Tifto and his racehorses, how unmeaning the noise of his club, how terrible the tedium of those parliamentary benches! He could not tell his love as she had told hers! He acknowledged to himself that his words could not be as her words,--nor his intellect as hers. But his heart could be as true. She had spoken to him of his name, his rank, and all his outside world around him. He would make her understand at last that they were nothing to him in comparison with her. When he had got round to Hyde Park Corner, he felt that he was almost compelled to go back again to Brook Street. In no other place could there be anything to interest him;--nowhere else could there be light, or warmth, or joy! But what would she think of him? To go back hot, and soiled with mud, in order that he might say one more adieu,--that possibly he might ravish one more kiss,--would hardly be manly. He must postpone all that for the morrow. On the morrow of course he would be there. But his work was all before him! That prayer had to be made to his father; or rather some wonderful effort of eloquence must be made by which his father might be convinced that this girl was so infinitely superior to anything of feminine creation that had ever hitherto been seen or heard of, that all ideas as to birth, country, rank, or name ought in this instance to count for nothing. He did believe himself that he had found such a pearl, that no question of setting need be taken into consideration. If the Duke would not see it the fault would be in the Duke's eyes, or perhaps in his own words,--but certainly not in the pearl. Then he compared her to poor Lady Mabel, and in doing so did arrive at something near the truth in his inward delineation of the two characters. Lady Mabel with all her grace, with all her beauty, with all her talent, was a creature of efforts, or, as it might be called, a manufactured article. She strove to be graceful, to be lovely, to be agreeable and clever. Isabel was all this and infinitely more without any struggle. When he was most fond of Mabel, most anxious to make her his wife, there had always been present to him a feeling that she was old. Though he knew her age to a day,--and knew her to be younger than himself, yet she was old. Something had gone of her native bloom, something had been scratched and chipped from the first fair surface, and this had been repaired by varnish and veneering. Though he had loved her he had never been altogether satisfied with her. But Isabel was as young as Hebe. He knew nothing of her actual years, but he did know that to have seemed younger, or to have seemed older,--to have seemed in any way different from what she was,--would have been to be less perfect. CHAPTER LXIX "Pert Poppet!" On a Sunday morning,--while Lord Silverbridge was alone in a certain apartment in the house in Carlton Terrace which was called his own sitting-room, the name was brought him of a gentleman who was anxious to see him. He had seen his father and had used all the eloquence of which he was master,--but not quite with the effect which he had desired. His father had been very kind, but he, too, had been eloquent;--and had, as is often the case with orators, been apparently more moved by his own words than by those of his adversary. If he had not absolutely declared himself as irrevocably hostile to Miss Boncassen he had not said a word that might be supposed to give token of assent. Silverbridge, therefore, was moody, contemplative, and desirous of solitude. Nothing that the Duke had said had shaken him. He was still sure of his pearl, and quite determined that he would wear it. Various thoughts were running through his brain. What if he were to abdicate the title and become a republican? He was inclined to think that he could not abdicate, but he was quite sure that no one could prevent him from going to America and calling himself Mr. Palliser. That his father would forgive him and accept the daughter-in-law brought to him, were he in the first place to marry without sanction, he felt quite sure. What was there that his father would not forgive? But then Isabel would not assent to this. He was turning it all in his head and ever and anon trying to relieve his mind by "Clarissa," which he was reading in conformity with his father's advice, when the gentleman's card was put into his hand. "Whatever does he want here?" he said to himself; and then he ordered that the gentleman might be shown up. The gentleman in question was our old friend Dolly Longstaff. Dolly Longstaff and Silverbridge had been intimate as young men are. But they were not friends, nor, as far as Silverbridge knew, had Dolly ever set his foot in that house before. "Well, Dolly," said he, "what's the matter now?" "I suppose you are surprised to see me?" "I didn't think that you were ever up so early." It was at this time almost noon. "Oh, come now, that's nonsense. I can get up as early as anybody else. I have changed all that for the last four months. I was at breakfast this morning very soon after ten." "What a miracle! Is there anything I can do for you?" "Well yes,--there is. Of course you are surprised to see me?" "You never were here before; and therefore it is odd." "It is odd; I felt that myself. And when I tell you what I have come about you will think it more odd. I know I can trust you with a secret." "That depends, Dolly." "What I mean is, I know you are good-natured. There are ever so many fellows that are one's most intimate friends, that would say anything on earth they could that was ill-natured." "I hope they are not my friends." "Oh yes, they are. Think of Glasslough, or Popplecourt, or Hindes! If they knew anything about you that you didn't want to have known,--about a young lady or anything of that kind,--don't you think they'd tell everybody?" "A man can't tell anything he doesn't know." "That's true. I had thought of that myself. But then there's a particular reason for my telling you this. It is about a young lady! You won't tell; will you?" "No, I won't. But I can't see why on earth you should come to me. You are ever so many years older than I am." "I had thought of that too. But you are just the person I must tell. I want you to help me." These last words were said in a whisper, and Dolly as he said them had drawn nearer to his friend. Silverbridge remained in suspense, saying nothing by way of encouragement. Dolly, either in love with his own mystery or doubtful of his own purpose, sat still, looking eagerly at his companion. "What the mischief is it?" asked Silverbridge impatiently. "I have quite made up my own mind." "That's a good thing at any rate." "I am not what you would have called a marrying sort of man." "I should have said,--no. But I suppose most men do marry sooner or later." "That's just what I said to myself. It has to be done, you know. There are three different properties coming to me. At least one has come already." "You're a lucky fellow." "I've made up my mind; and when I say a thing I mean to do it." "But what can I do?" "That's just what I'm coming to. If a man does marry I think he ought to be attached to her." To this, as a broad proposition, Silverbridge was ready to accede. But, regarding Dolly as a middle-aged sort of fellow, one of those men who marry because it is convenient to have a house kept for them, he simply nodded his head. "I am awfully attached to her," Dolly went on to say. "That's all right." "Of course there are fellows who marry girls for their money. I've known men who have married their grandmothers." "Not really!" "That kind of thing. When a woman is old it does not much matter who she is. But my one! She's not old!" "Nor rich?" "Well; I don't know about that. But I'm not after her money. Pray understand that. It's because I'm downright fond of her. She's an American." "A what!" said Silverbridge, startled. "You know her. That's the reason I've come to you. It's Miss Boncassen." A dark frown came across the young man's face. That all this should be said to him was disgusting. That an owl like that should dare to talk of loving Miss Boncassen was offensive to him. "It's because you know her that I've come to you. She thinks that you're after her." Dolly as he said this lifted himself quickly up in his seat, and nodded his head mysteriously as he looked into his companion's face. It was as much as though he should say, "I see you are surprised, but so it is." Then he went on. "She does, the pert poppet!" This was almost too much for Silverbridge; but still he contained himself. "She won't look at me because she has got it into her head that perhaps some day she may be Duchess of Omnium! That of course is out of the question." "Upon my word all this seems to me to be so very--very,--distasteful that I think you had better say nothing more about it." "It is distasteful," said Dolly; "but the truth is I am so downright,--what you may call enamoured--" "Don't talk such stuff as that here," said Silverbridge, jumping up. "I won't have it." "But I am. There is nothing I wouldn't do to get her. Of course it's a good match for her. I've got three separate properties; and when the governor goes off I shall have a clear fifteen thousand a year." "Oh, bother!" "Of course that's nothing to you, but it is a very tidy income for a commoner. And how is she to do better?" "I don't know how she could do much worse," said Silverbridge in a transport of rage. Then he pulled his moustache in vexation, angry with himself that he should have allowed himself to say even a word on so preposterous a supposition. Isabel Boncassen and Dolly Longstaff! It was Titania and Bottom over again. It was absolutely necessary that he should get rid of this intruder, and he began to be afraid that he could not do this without using language which would be uncivil. "Upon my word," he said, "I think you had better not talk about it any more. The young lady is one for whom I have a very great respect." "I mean to marry her," said Dolly, thinking thus to vindicate himself. "You might as well think of marrying one of the stars." "One of the stars!" "Or a royal princess!" "Well! Perhaps that is your opinion, but I can't say that I agree with you. I don't see why she shouldn't take me. I can give her a position which you may call Al out of the Peerage. I can bring her into society. I can make an English lady of her." "You can't make anything of her,--except to insult her,--and me too by talking of her." "I don't quite understand this," said the unfortunate lover, getting up from his seat. "Very likely she won't have me. Perhaps she has told you so." "She never mentioned your name to me in her life. I don't suppose she remembers your existence." "But I say that there can be no insult in such a one as me asking such a one as her to be my wife. To say that she doesn't remember my existence is absurd." "Why should I be troubled with all this?" "Because I think you're making a fool of her, and because I'm honest. That's why," said Dolly with much energy. There was something in this which partly reconciled Silverbridge to his despised rival. There was a touch of truth about the man, though he was so utterly mistaken in his ideas. "I want you to give over in order that I may try again. I don't think you ought to keep a girl from her promotion, merely for the fun of a flirtation. Perhaps you're fond of her;--but you won't marry her. I am fond of her, and I shall." After a minute's pause Silverbridge resolved that he would be magnanimous. "Miss Boncassen is going to be my wife," he said. "Your wife!" "Yes;--my wife. And now I think you will see that nothing further can be said about this matter." "Duchess of Omnium!" "She will be Lady Silverbridge." "Oh; of course she'll be that first. Then I've got nothing further to say. I'm not going to enter myself to run against you. Only I shouldn't have believed it if anybody else had told me." "Such is my good fortune." "Oh ah,--yes; of course. That is one way of looking at it. Well; Silverbridge, I'll tell you what I shall do; I shall hook it." "No; no, not you." "Yes, I shall. I dare say you won't believe me, but I've got such a feeling about me here"--as he said this he laid his hand upon his heart,--"that if I stayed I should go in for hard drinking. I shall take the great Asiatic tour. I know a fellow that wants to go, but he hasn't got any money. I dare say I shall be off before the end of next month. You don't know any fellow that would buy half-a-dozen hunters; do you?" Silverbridge shook his head. "Good-bye," said Dolly in a melancholy tone; "I am sure I am very much obliged to you for telling me. If I'd known you'd meant it, I shouldn't have meddled, of course. Duchess of Omnium!" "Look here, Dolly, I have told you what I should not have told any one, but I wanted to screen the young lady's name." "It was so kind of you." "Do not repeat it. It is a kind of thing that ladies are particular about. They choose their own time for letting everybody know." Then Dolly promised to be as mute as a fish, and took his departure. Silverbridge had felt, towards the end of the interview, that he had been arrogant to the unfortunate man,--particularly in saying that the young lady would not remember the existence of such a suitor,--and had also recognised a certain honesty in the man's purpose, which had not been the less honest because it was so absurd. Actuated by the consciousness of this, he had swallowed his anger, and had told the whole truth. Nevertheless things had been said which were horrible to him. This buffoon of a man had called his Isabel a--pert poppet! How was he to get over the remembrance of such an offence? And then the wretch had declared that he was--enamoured! There was sacrilege in the term when applied by such a man to Isabel Boncassen. He had thoughts of days to come, when everything would be settled, when he might sit close to her, and call her pretty names,--when he might in sweet familiarity tell her that she was a little Yankee and a fierce republican, and "chaff" her about the stars and stripes; and then, as he pictured the scene to himself in his imagination, she would lean upon him and would give him back his chaff, and would call him an aristocrat and would laugh at his titles. As he thought of all this he would be proud with the feeling that such privileges would be his own. And now this wretched man had called her a pert poppet! There was a sanctity about her,--a divinity which made it almost a profanity to have talked about her at all to such a one as Dolly Longstaff. She was his Holy of Holies, at which vulgar eyes should not even be allowed to gaze. It had been a most unfortunate interview. But this was clear; that, as he had announced his engagement to such a one as Dolly Longstaff, the matter now would admit of no delay. He would explain to his father that as tidings of the engagement had got abroad, honour to the young lady would compel him to come forward openly as her suitor at once. If this argument might serve him, then perhaps this intrusion would not have been altogether a misfortune. CHAPTER LXX "Love May Be a Great Misfortune" Silverbridge when he reached Brook Street that day was surprised to find that a large party was going to lunch there. Isabel had asked him to come, and he had thought her the dearest girl in the world for doing so. But now his gratitude for that favour was considerably abated. He did not care just now for the honour of eating his lunch in the presence of Mr. Gotobed, the American minister, whom he found there already in the drawing-room with Mrs. Gotobed, nor with Ezekiel Sevenkings, the great American poet from the far West, who sat silent and stared at him in an unpleasant way. When Sir Timothy Beeswax was announced, with Lady Beeswax and her daughter, his gratification certainly was not increased. And the last comer,--who did not arrive indeed till they were all seated at the table,--almost made him start from his chair and take his departure suddenly. That last comer was no other than Mr. Adolphus Longstaff. As it happened he was seated next to Dolly, with Lady Beeswax on the other side of him. Whereas his Holy of Holies was on the other side of Dolly! The arrangement made seemed to him to have been monstrous. He had endeavoured to get next to Isabel; but she had so manoeuvred that there should be a vacant chair between them. He had not much regarded this because a vacant chair may be pushed on one side. But before he had made all his calculations Dolly Longstaff was sitting there! He almost thought that Dolly winked at him in triumph,--that very Dolly who an hour ago had promised to take himself off upon his Asiatic travels! Sir Timothy and the minister kept up the conversation very much between them, Sir Timothy flattering everything that was American, and the minister finding fault with very many things that were English. Now and then Mr. Boncassen would put in a word to soften the severe honesty of his countryman, or to correct the euphemistic falsehoods of Sir Timothy. The poet seemed always to be biding his time. Dolly ventured to whisper a word to his neighbour. It was but to say that the frost had broken up. But Silverbridge heard it and looked daggers at everyone. Then Lady Beeswax expressed to him a hope that he was going to do great things in Parliament this Session. "I don't mean to go near the place," he said, not at all conveying any purpose to which he had really come, but driven by the stress of the moment to say something that should express his general hatred of everybody. Mr. Lupton was there, on the other side of Isabel, and was soon engaged with her in a pleasant familiar conversation. Then Silverbridge remembered that he had always thought Lupton to be a most conceited prig. Nobody gave himself so many airs, or was so careful as to the dyeing of his whiskers. It was astonishing that Isabel should allow herself to be amused by such an antiquated coxcomb. When they had finished eating they moved about and changed their places, Mr. Boncassen being rather anxious to stop the flood of American eloquence which came from his friend Mr. Gotobed. British viands had become subject to his criticism, and Mr. Gotobed had declared to Mr. Lupton that he didn't believe that London could produce a dish of squash or tomatoes. He was quite sure you couldn't have sweet corn. Then there had been a moving of seats in which the minister was shuffled off to Lady Beeswax, and the poet found himself by the side of Isabel. "Do you not regret our mountains and our prairies," said the poet; "our great waters and our green savannahs?" "I think more perhaps of Fifth Avenue," said Miss Boncassen. Silverbridge, who at this moment was being interrogated by Sir Timothy, heard every word of it. "I was so sorry, Lord Silverbridge," said Sir Timothy, "that you could not accede to our little request." "I did not quite see my way," said Silverbridge, with his eye upon Isabel. "So I understood, but I hope that things will make themselves clearer to you shortly. There is nothing that I desire so much as the support of young men such as yourself,--the very cream, I may say, of the whole country. It is to the young conservative thoughtfulness and the truly British spirit of our springing aristocracy that I look for that reaction which I am sure will at last carry us safely over the rocks and shoals of communistic propensities." "I shouldn't wonder if it did," said Silverbridge. They didn't think that he was going to remain down there talking politics to an old humbug like Sir Timothy when the sun, and moon, and all the stars had gone up into the drawing-room! For at that moment Isabel was making her way to the door. But Sir Timothy had buttonholed him. "Of course it is late now to say anything further about the address. We have arranged that. Not quite as I would have wished, for I had set my heart upon initiating you into the rapturous pleasure of parliamentary debate. But I hope that a good time is coming. And pray remember this, Lord Silverbridge;--there is no member sitting on our side of the House, and I need hardly say on the other, whom I would go farther to oblige than your father's son." "I'm sure that's very kind," said Silverbridge, absolutely using a little force as he disengaged himself. Then he at once followed the ladies upstairs, passing the poet on the stairs. "You have hardly spoken to me," he whispered to Isabel. He knew that to whisper to her now, with the eyes of many upon him, with the ears of many open, was an absurdity; but he could not refrain himself. "There are so many to be,--entertained, as people say! I don't think I ought to have to entertain you," she answered, laughing. No one heard her but Silverbridge, yet she did not seem to whisper. She left him, however, at once, and was soon engaged in conversation with Sir Timothy. A convivial lunch I hold to be altogether bad, but the worst of its many evils is that vacillating mind which does not know when to take its owner off. Silverbridge was on this occasion quite determined not to take himself off at all. As it was only a lunch the people must go, and then he would be left with Isabel. But the vacillation of the others was distressing to him. Mr. Lupton went, and poor Dolly got away apparently without a word. But the Beeswaxes and the Gotobeds would not go, and the poet sat staring immovably. In the meanwhile Silverbridge endeavoured to make the time pass lightly by talking to Mrs. Boncassen. He had been so determined to accept Isabel with all her adjuncts that he had come almost to like Mrs. Boncassen, and would certainly have taken her part violently had any one spoken ill of her in his presence. Then suddenly he found that the room was nearly empty. The Beeswaxes and the Gotobeds were gone; and at last the poet himself, with a final glare of admiration at Isabel, had taken his departure. When Silverbridge looked round, Isabel also was gone. Then too Mrs. Boncassen had left the room suddenly. At the same instant Mr. Boncassen entered by another door, and the two men were alone together. "My dear Lord Silverbridge," said the father, "I want to have a few words with you." Of course there was nothing for him but to submit. "You remember what you said to me down at Matching?" "Oh yes; I remember that." "You did me the great honour of expressing a wish to make my child your wife." "I was asking for a very great favour." "That also;--for there is no greater favour I could do to any man than to give him my daughter. Nevertheless, you were doing me a great honour,--and you did it, as you do everything, with an honest grace that went far to win my heart. I am not at all surprised, sir, that you should have won hers." The young man as he heard this could only blush and look foolish. "If I know my girl, neither your money nor your title would go for anything." "I think much more of her love, Mr. Boncassen, than I do of anything else in the world." "But love, my Lord, may be a great misfortune." As he said this the tone of his voice was altered, and there was a melancholy solemnity not only in his words but in his countenance. "I take it that young people when they love rarely think of more than the present moment. If they did so the bloom would be gone from their romance. But others have to do this for them. If Isabel had come to me saying that she loved a poor man, there would not have been much to disquiet me. A poor man may earn bread for himself and his wife, and if he failed I could have found them bread. Nor, had she loved somewhat below her own degree, should I have opposed her. So long as her husband had been an educated man, there might have been no future punishment to fear." "I don't think she could have done that," said Silverbridge. "At any rate she has not done so. But how am I to look upon this that she has done?" "I'll do my best for her, Mr. Boncassen." "I believe you would. But even your love can't make her an Englishwoman. You can make her a Duchess." "Not that, sir." "But you can't give her a parentage fit for a Duchess;--not fit at least in the opinion of those with whom you will pass your life, with whom,--or perhaps without whom,--she will be destined to pass her life, if she becomes your wife! Unfortunately it does not suffice that you should think it fit. Though you loved each other as well as any man and woman that ever were brought into each other's arms by the beneficence of God, you cannot make her happy,--unless you can assure her the respect of those around her." "All the world will respect her." "Her conduct,--yes. I think the world, your world, would learn to do that. I do not think it could help itself. But that would not suffice. I may respect the man who cleans my boots. But he would be a wretched man if he were thrown on me for society. I would not give him my society. Will your Duchesses and your Countesses give her theirs?" "Certainly they will." "I do not ask for it as thinking it to be of more value than that of others; but were she to become your wife she would be so abnormally placed as to require it for her comfort. She would have become a lady of high rank,--not because she loves rank, but because she loves you." "Yes, yes, yes," said Silverbridge, hardly himself knowing why he became impetuous. "But having removed herself into that position, being as she would be, a Countess, or a Duchess, or what not, how could she be happy if she were excluded from the community of Countesses and Duchesses?" "They are not like that," said Silverbridge. "I will not say that they are, but I do not know. Having Anglican tendencies, I have been wont to contradict my countrymen when they have told me of the narrow exclusiveness of your nobles. Having found your nobles and your commoners all alike in their courtesy,--which is a cold word; in their hospitable friendships,--I would now not only contradict, but would laugh to scorn any such charge,"--so far he spoke somewhat loudly, and then dropped his voice as he concluded,--"were it anything less than the happiness of my child that is in question." "What am I to say, sir? I only know this; I am not going to lose her." "You are a fine fellow. I was going to say that I wished you were an American, so that Isabel need not lose you. But, my boy, I have told you that I do not know how it might be. Of all whom you know, who could best tell me the truth on such a subject? Who is there whose age will have given him experience, whose rank will have made him familiar with this matter, who from friendship to you would be least likely to decide against your wishes, who from his own native honesty would be most sure to tell the truth?" "You mean my father," said Silverbridge. "I do mean your father. Happily he has taken no dislike to the girl herself. I have seen enough of him to feel sure that he is devoted to his own children." "Indeed he is." "A just and a liberal man;--one I should say not carried away by prejudices! Well,--my girl and I have just put our heads together, and we have come to a conclusion. If the Duke of Omnium will tell us that she would be safe as your wife,--safe from the contempt of those around her,--you shall have her. And I shall rejoice to give her to you,--not because you are Lord Silverbridge, not because of your rank and wealth; but because you are--that individual human being whom I now hold by the hand." When the American had come to an end, Silverbridge was too much moved to make any immediate answer. He had an idea in his own mind that the appeal was not altogether fair. His father was a just man,--just, affectionate, and liberal. But then it will so often happen that fathers do not want their sons to marry those very girls on whom the sons have set their hearts. He could only say that he would speak to his father again on the subject. "Let him tell me that he is contented," said Mr. Boncassen, "and I will tell him that I am contented. Now, my friend, good-bye." Silverbridge begged that he might be allowed to see Isabel before he was turned out; but Isabel had left the house in company with her mother. CHAPTER LXXI "What Am I to Say, Sir?" When Silverbridge left Mr. Boncassen's house he was resolved to go to his father without an hour's delay, and represent to the Duke exactly how the case stood. He would be urgent, piteous, submissive, and eloquent. In any other matter he would promise to make whatever arrangements his father might desire. He would make his father understand that all his happiness depended on this marriage. When once married he would settle down, even at Gatherum Castle if the Duke should wish it. He would not think of race-horses, he would desert the Beargarden, he would learn blue-books by heart, and only do as much shooting and hunting as would become a young nobleman in his position. All this he would say as eagerly and as pleasantly as it might be said. But he would add to all this an assurance of his unchangeable intention. It was his purpose to marry Isabel Boncassen. If he could do this with his father's good will,--so best. But at any rate he would marry her! The world at this time was altogether busy with political rumours; and it was supposed that Sir Timothy Beeswax would do something very clever. It was supposed also that he would sever himself from some of his present companions. On that point everybody was agreed,--and on that point only everybody was right. Lord Drummond, who was the titular Prime Minister, and Sir Timothy, had, during a considerable part of the last Session, and through the whole vacation, so belarded each other with praise in all their public expressions that it was quite manifest that they had quarrelled. When any body of statesmen make public asseverations by one or various voices, that there is no discord among them, not a dissentient voice on any subject, people are apt to suppose that they cannot hang together much longer. It is the man who has no peace at home that declares abroad that his wife is an angel. He who lives on comfortable terms with the partner of his troubles can afford to acknowledge the ordinary rubs of life. Old Mr. Mildmay, who was Prime Minister for so many years, and whom his party worshipped, used to say that he had never found a gentleman who had quite agreed with him all round; but Sir Timothy has always been in exact accord with all his colleagues,--till he has left them, or they him. Never had there been such concord as of late,--and men, clubs, and newspapers now protested that as a natural consequence there would soon be a break-up. But not on that account would it perhaps be necessary that Sir Timothy should resign,--or not necessary that his resignation should be permanent. The Conservative majority had dwindled,--but still there was a majority. It certainly was the case that Lord Drummond could not get on without Sir Timothy. But might it not be possible that Sir Timothy should get on without Lord Drummond? If so he must begin his action in this direction by resigning. He would have to place his resignation, no doubt with infinite regret, in the hands of Lord Drummond. But if such a step were to be taken now, just as Parliament was about to assemble, what would become of the Queen's speech, of the address, and of the noble peers and noble and other commoners who were to propose and second it in the two Houses of Parliament? There were those who said that such a trick played at the last moment would be very shabby. But then again there were those who foresaw that the shabbiness would be made to rest anywhere rather than on the shoulders of Sir Timothy. If it should turn out that he had striven manfully to make things run smoothly;--that the Premier's incompetence, or the Chancellor's obstinacy, or this or that Secretary's peculiarity of temper had done it all;--might not Sir Timothy then be able to emerge from the confused flood, and swim along pleasantly with his head higher than ever above the waters? In these great matters parliamentary management goes for so much! If a man be really clever and handy at his trade, if he can work hard and knows what he is about, if he can give and take and be not thin-skinned or sore-bored, if he can ask pardon for a peccadillo and seem to be sorry with a good grace, if above all things he be able to surround himself with the prestige of success, then so much will be forgiven him! Great gifts of eloquence are hardly wanted, or a deep-seated patriotism which is capable of strong indignation. A party has to be managed, and he who can manage it best, will probably be its best leader. The subordinate task of legislation and of executive government may well fall into the inferior hands of less astute practitioners. It was admitted on both sides that there was no man like Sir Timothy for managing the House or coercing a party, and there was therefore a general feeling that it would be a pity that Sir Timothy should be squeezed out. He knew all the little secrets of the business;--could arrange, let the cause be what it might, to get a full House for himself and his friends, and empty benches for his opponents,--could foresee a thousand little things to which even a Walpole would have been blind, which a Pitt would not have condescended to regard, but with which his familiarity made him a very comfortable leader of the House of Commons. There were various ideas prevalent as to the politics of the coming Session; but the prevailing idea was in favour of Sir Timothy. The Duke was at Longroyston, the seat of his old political ally the Duke of St. Bungay, and had been absent from Sunday the 6th till the morning of Friday the 11th, on which day Parliament was to meet. On that morning at about noon a letter came to the son saying that his father had returned and would be glad to see him. Silverbridge was going to the House on that day and was not without his own political anxieties. If Lord Drummond remained in, he thought that he must, for the present, stand by the party which he had adopted. If, however, Sir Timothy should become Prime Minister there would be a loophole for escape. There were some three or four besides himself who detested Sir Timothy, and in such case he might perhaps have company in his desertion. All this was on his mind; but through all this he was aware that there was a matter of much deeper moment which required his energies. When his father's message was brought to him he told himself at once that now was the time for his eloquence. "Well, Silverbridge," said the Duke, "how are matters going on with you?" There seemed to be something in his father's manner more than ordinarily jocund and good-humoured. "With me, sir?" "I don't mean to ask any party secrets. If you and Sir Timothy understand each other, of course you will be discreet." "I can't be discreet, sir, because I don't know anything about him." "When I heard," said the Duke smiling, "of your being in close conference with Sir Timothy--" "I, sir?" "Yes, you. Mr. Boncassen told me that you and he were so deeply taken up with each other at his house, that nobody could get a word with either of you." "Have you seen Mr. Boncassen?" asked the son, whose attention was immediately diverted from his father's political badinage. "Yes;--I have seen him. I happened to meet him where I was dining last Sunday, and he walked home with me. He was so intent upon what he was saying that I fear he allowed me to take him out of his way." "What was he talking about?" said Silverbridge. All his preparations, all his eloquence, all his method, now seemed to have departed from him. "He was talking about you," said the Duke. "He had told me that he wanted to see you. What did he say, sir?" "I suppose you can guess what he said. He wished to know what I thought of the offer you have made to his daughter." The great subject had come up so easily, so readily, that he was almost aghast when he found himself in the middle of it. And yet he must speak of the matter, and that at once. "I hope you raised no objection, sir," he said. "The objection came mainly from him; and I am bound to say that every word that fell from him was spoken with wisdom." "But still he asked you to consent." "By no means. He told me his opinion,--and then he asked me a question." "I am sure he did not say that we ought not to be married." "He did say that he thought you ought not to be married, if--" "If what, sir?" "If there were probability that his daughter would not be well received as your wife. Then he asked me what would be my reception of her." Silverbridge looked up into his father's face with beseeching imploring eyes as though everything now depended on the next few words that he might utter. "I shall think it an unwise marriage," continued the Duke. Silverbridge when he heard this at once knew that he had gained his cause. His father had spoken of the marriage as a thing that was to happen. A joyous light dawned in his eyes, and the look of pain went from his brow, all which the Duke was not slow to perceive. "I shall think it an unwise marriage," he continued, repeating his words; "but I was bound to tell him that were Miss Boncassen to become your wife she would also become my daughter." "Oh, sir." "I told him why the marriage would be distasteful to me. Whether I may be wrong or right I think it to be for the good of our country, for the good of our order, for the good of our individual families, that we should support each other by marriage. It is not as though we were a narrow class, already too closely bound together by family alliances. The room for choice might be wide enough for you without going across the Atlantic to look for her who is to be the mother of your children. To this Mr. Boncassen replied that he was to look solely to his daughter's happiness. He meant me to understand that he cared nothing for my feelings. Why should he? That which to me is deep wisdom is to him an empty prejudice. He asked me then how others would receive her." "I am sure that everybody would like her," said Silverbridge. "I like her. I like her very much." "I am so glad." "But still all this is a sorrow to me. When however he put that question to me about the world around her,--as to those among whom her lot would be cast, I could not say that I thought she would be rejected." "Oh no!" The idea of rejecting Isabel! "She has a brightness and a grace all her own," continued the Duke, "which will ensure her acceptance in all societies." "Yes, yes;--it is just that, sir." "You will be a nine days' wonder,--the foolish young nobleman who chose to marry an American." "I think it will be just the other way up, sir,--among the men." "But her place will I think be secure to her. That is what I told Mr. Boncassen." "It is all right with him then,--now?" "If you call it all right. You will understand of course that you are acting in opposition to my advice,--and my wishes." "What am I to say, sir?" exclaimed Silverbridge, almost in despair. "When I love the girl better than my life, and when you tell me that she can be mine if I choose to take her; when I have asked her to be my wife, and have got her to say that she likes me; when her father has given way, and all the rest of it, would it be possible that I should say now that I will give her up?" "My opinion is to go for nothing,--in anything!" The Duke as he said this knew that he was expressing aloud a feeling which should have been restrained within his own bosom. It was natural that there should have been such plaints. The same suffering must be encountered in regard to Tregear and his daughter. In every way he had been thwarted. In every direction he was driven to yield. And yet now he had to undergo rebuke from his own son, because one of those inward plaints would force itself from his lips! Of course this girl was to be taken in among the Pallisers and treated with an idolatrous love,--as perfect as though "all the blood of all the Howards" were running in her veins. What further inch of ground was there for a fight? And if the fight were over, why should he rob his boy of one sparkle from off the joy of his triumph? Silverbridge was now standing before him abashed by that plaint, inwardly sustained no doubt by the conviction of his great success, but subdued by his father's wailing. "However,--perhaps we had better let that pass," said the Duke, with a long sigh. Then Silverbridge took his father's hand, and looked up in his face. "I most sincerely hope that she may make you a good and loving wife," said the Duke, "and that she may do her duty by you in that not easy sphere of life to which she will be called." "I am quite sure she will," said Silverbridge, whose ideas as to Isabel's duties were confined at present to a feeling that she would now have to give him kisses without stint. "What I have seen of her personally recommends her to me," said the Duke. "Some girls are fools--" "That's quite true, sir." "Who think that the world is to be nothing but dancing, and going to parties." "Many have been doing it for so many years," said Silverbridge, "that they can't understand that there should be an end of it." "A wife ought to feel the great responsibility of her position. I hope she will." "And the sooner she begins the better," said Silverbridge stoutly. "And now," said the Duke, looking at his watch, "we might as well have lunch and go down to the House. I will walk with you if you please. It will be about time for each of us." Then the son was forced to go down and witness the somewhat faded ceremony of seeing Parliament opened by three Lords sitting in commission before the throne. Whereas but for such stress as his father had laid upon him, he would have disregarded his parliamentary duties and have rushed at once up to Brook Street. As it was he was so handed over from one political pundit to another, was so buttonholed by Sir Timothy, so chaffed as to the address by Phineas Finn, and at last so occupied with the whole matter that he was compelled to sit in his place till he had heard Nidderdale make his speech. This the young Scotch Lord did so well, and received so much praise for the doing of it, and looked so well in his uniform, that Silverbridge almost regretted the opportunity he had lost. At seven the sitting was over, the speeches, though full of interest, having been shorter than usual. They had been full of interest, but nobody understood in the least what was going to happen. "I don't know anything about the Prime Minister," said Mr. Lupton as he left the House with our hero and another not very staunch supporter of the Government, "but I'll back Sir Timothy to be the Leader of the House on the last day of the Session, against all comers. I don't think it much matters who is Prime Minister nowadays." At half-past seven Silverbridge was at the door in Brook Street. Yes; Miss Boncassen was at home. The servant thought that she was upstairs dressing. Then Silverbridge made his way without further invitation into the drawing-room. There he remained alone for ten minutes. At last the door opened, and Mrs. Boncassen entered. "Dear Lord Silverbridge, who ever dreamed of seeing you? I thought all you Parliament gentlemen were going through your ceremonies. Isabel had a ticket and went down, and saw your father." "Where is Isabel?" "She's gone." "Gone! Where on earth has she gone to?" asked Silverbridge, as though fearing lest she had been carried off to the other side of the Atlantic. Then Mrs. Boncassen explained. Within the last three minutes Mrs. Montacute Jones had called and carried Isabel off to the play. Mrs. Jones was up in town for a week, and this had been a very old engagement. "I hope you did not want her very particularly," said Mrs. Boncassen. "But I did,--most particularly," said Lord Silverbridge. The door was opened and Mr. Boncassen entered the room. "I beg your pardon for coming at such a time," said the lover, "but I did so want to see Isabel." "I rather think she wants to see you," said the father. "I shall go to the theatre after her." "That might be awkward,--particularly as I doubt whether anybody knows what theatre they are gone to. Can I receive a message for her, my lord?" This was certainly not what Lord Silverbridge had intended. "You know, perhaps, that I have seen the Duke." "Oh yes;--and I have seen him. Everything is settled." "That is the only message she will want to hear when she comes home. She is a happy girl and I am proud to think that I should live to call such a grand young Briton as you my son-in-law." Then the American took the young man's two hands and shook them cordially, while Mrs. Boncassen bursting into tears insisted on kissing him. "Indeed she is a happy girl," said she; "but I hope Isabel won't be carried away too high and mighty." CHAPTER LXXII Carlton Terrace Three days after this it was arranged that Isabel should be taken to Carlton Terrace to be accepted there into the full good graces of her future father-in-law, and to go through the pleasant ceremony of seeing the house in which it was to be her destiny to live as mistress. What can be more interesting to a girl than this first visit to her future home? And now Isabel Boncassen was to make her first visit to the house in Carlton Terrace, which the Duke had already declared his purpose of surrendering to the young couple. She was going among very grand things,--so grand that those whose affairs in life are less magnificent may think that her mind should have soared altogether above chairs and tables, and reposed itself among diamonds, gold and silver ornaments, rich necklaces, the old masters, and alabaster statuary. But Dukes and Duchesses must sit upon chairs,--or at any rate on sofas,--as well as their poorer brethren, and probably have the same regard for their comfort. Isabel was not above her future furniture, or the rooms that were to be her rooms, or the stairs which she would have to tread, or the pillow on which her head must rest. She had never yet seen even the outside of the house in which she was to live, and was now prepared to make her visit with as much enthusiasm as though her future abode was to be prepared for her in a small house in a small street beyond Islington. But the Duke was no doubt more than the house, the father-in-law more than the tables. Isabel, in the ordinary way of society, he had already known almost with intimacy. She, the while, had been well aware that if all things could possibly be made to run smoothly with her, this lordly host, who was so pleasantly courteous to her, would become her father-in-law. But she had known also that he, in his courtesy, had been altogether unaware of any such intention on her part, and that she would now present herself to him in an aspect very different from that in which she had hitherto been regarded. She was well aware that the Duke had not wished to take her into his family,--would not himself have chosen her for his son's wife. She had seen enough to make her sure that he had even chosen another bride for his heir. She had been too clever not to perceive that Lady Mabel Grex had been not only selected,--but almost accepted as though the thing had been certain. She had learned nearly the whole truth from Silverbridge, who was not good at keeping a secret from one to whom his heart was open. That story had been all but read by her with exactness. "I cannot lose you now," she had said to him, leaning on his arm;--"I cannot afford to lose you now. But I fear that someone else is losing you." To this he answered nothing, but simply pressed her closer to his side. "Someone else," she continued, "who perhaps may have reason to think that you have injured her." "No," he said boldly; "no; there is no such person." For he had never ceased to assure himself that in all that matter with Mabel Grex he had been guilty of no treachery. There had been a moment, indeed, in which she might have taken him; but she had chosen to let it pass from her. All of which, or nearly all of which,--Isabel now saw, and had seen also that the Duke had been a consenting party to that other arrangement. She had reason therefore to doubt the manner of her acceptance. But she had been accepted. She had made such acceptance by him a stipulation in her acceptance of his son. She was sure of the ground on which she trod and was determined to carry herself, if not with pride, yet with dignity. There might be difficulties before her, but it should not be her fault if she were not as good a Countess, and,--when time would have it so,--as good a Duchess as another. The visit was made not quite in the fashion in which Silverbridge himself had wished. His idea had been to call for Isabel in his cab and take her down to Carlton Terrace. "Mother must go with me," she had said. Then he looked blank,--as he could look when he was disappointed, as he had looked when she would not talk to him at the lunch, when she told him that it was not her business to entertain him. "Don't be selfish," she added, laughing. "Do you think that mother will not want to have seen the house that I am to live in?" "She shall come afterwards as often as she likes." "What,--paying me morning visits from New York! She must come now, if you please. Love me, love my mother." "I am awfully fond of her," said Silverbridge, who felt that he really had behaved well to the old lady. "So am I,--and therefore she shall go and see the house now. You are as good as gold,--and do everything just as I tell you. But a good time is coming, when I shall have to do everything that you tell me." Then it was arranged that Mrs. and Miss Boncassen were to be taken down to the house in their own carriage, and were to be received at the door by Lord Silverbridge. Another arrangement had also been made. Isabel was to be taken to the Duke immediately upon her arrival and to be left for awhile with him, alone, so that he might express himself as he might find fit to do to this newly-adopted child. It was a matter to him of such importance that nothing remaining to him in his life could equal it. It was not simply that she was to be the wife of his son,--though that in itself was a consideration very sacred. Had it been Gerald who was bringing to him a bride, the occasion would have had less of awe. But this girl, this American girl, was to be the mother and grandmother of future Dukes of Omnium,--the ancestress, it was to be hoped, of all future Dukes of Omnium! By what she might be, by what she might have in her of mental fibre, of high or low quality, of true or untrue womanliness, were to be fashioned those who in days to come might be amongst the strongest and most faithful bulwarks of the constitution. An England without a Duke of Omnium,--or at any rate without any Duke,--what would it be? And yet he knew that with bad Dukes his country would be in worse stress than though she had none at all. An aristocracy;--yes; but an aristocracy that shall be of the very best! He believed himself thoroughly in his order; but if his order, or many of his order, should become as was now Lord Grex, then, he thought, that his order not only must go to the wall but that, in the cause of humanity, it had better do so. With all this daily, hourly, always in his mind, this matter of the choice of a wife for his heir was to him of solemn importance. When they arrived Silverbridge was there and led them first of all into the dining-room. "My!" said Mrs. Boncassen, as she looked around her. "I thought that our Fifth Avenue parlours whipped everything in the way of city houses." "What a nice little room for Darby and Joan to sit down to eat a mutton-chop in," said Isabel. "It's a beastly great barrack," said Silverbridge;--"but the best of it is that we never use it. We'll have a cosy little place for Darby and Joan;--you'll see. Now come to the governor. I've got to leave you with him." "Oh me! I am in such a fright." "He can't eat you," said Mrs. Boncassen. "And he won't even bite," said Silverbridge. "I should not mind that because I could bite again. But if he looks as though he thought I shouldn't do, I shall drop." "My belief is that he's almost as much in love with you as I am," said Silverbridge, as he took her to the door of the Duke's room. "Here we are, sir." "My dear," said the Duke, rising up and coming to her, "I am very glad to see you. It is good of you to come to me." Then he took her in both his hands and kissed her forehead and her lips. She, as she put her face up to him, stood quite still in his embrace, but her eyes were bright with pleasure. "Shall I leave her?" said Silverbridge. "For a few minutes." "Don't keep her too long, for I want to take her all over the house." "A few minutes,--and then I will bring her up to the drawing-room." Upon this the door was closed, and Isabel was alone with her new father. "And so, my dear, you are to be my child." "If you will have me." "Come here and sit down by me. Your father has already told you that;--has he not?" "He has told me that you had consented." "And Silverbridge has said as much?" "I would sooner hear it from you than from either of them." "Then hear it from me. You shall be my child. And if you will love me you shall be very dear to me. You shall be my own child,--as dear as my own. I must either love his wife very dearly, or else I must be an unhappy man. And she must love me dearly, or I must be unhappy." "I will love you," she said, pressing his hand. "And now let me say some few words to you, only let there be no bitterness in them to your young heart. When I say that I take you to my heart, you may be sure that I do so thoroughly. You shall be as dear to me and as near as though you had been all English." "Shall I?" "There shall no difference be made. My boy's wife shall be my daughter in very deed. But I had not wished it to be so." "I knew that;--but could I have given him up?" "He at any rate could not give you up. There were little prejudices;--you can understand that." "Oh yes." "We who wear black coats could not bring ourselves readily to put on scarlet garments; nor should we sit comfortably with our legs crossed like Turks." "I am your scarlet coat and your cross-legged Turk," she said, with feigned self-reproach in her voice, but with a sparkle of mirth in her eye. "But when I have once got into my scarlet coat I can be very proud of it, and when I am once seated in my divan I shall find it of all postures the easiest. Do you understand me?" "I think so." "Not a shade of any prejudice shall be left to darken my mind. There shall be no feeling but that you are in truth his chosen wife. After all neither can country, nor race, nor rank, nor wealth, make a good woman. Education can do much. But nature must have done much also." "Do not expect too much of me." "I will so expect that all shall be taken for the best. You know, I think, that I have liked you since I first saw you." "I know that you have always been good to me." "I have liked you from the first. That you are lovely perhaps is no merit; though, to speak the truth, I am well pleased that Silverbridge should have found so much beauty." "That is all a matter of taste, I suppose," she said, laughing. "But there is much that a young woman may do for herself which I think you have done. A silly girl, though she had been a second Helen, would hardly have satisfied me." "Or perhaps him," said Isabel. "Or him; and it is in that feeling that I find my chief satisfaction,--that he should have had the sense to have liked such a one as you better than others. Now I have said it. As not being one of us I did at first object to his choice. As being what you are yourself, I am altogether reconciled to it. Do not keep him long waiting." "I do not think he likes to be kept waiting for anything." "I dare say not. I dare say not. And now there is one thing else." Then the Duke unlocked a little drawer that was close to his hand, and taking out a ring put it on her finger. It was a bar of diamonds, perhaps a dozen of them, fixed in a little circlet of gold. "This must never leave you," he said. "It never shall,--having come from you." "It was the first present that I gave to my wife, and it is the first that I give to you. You may imagine how sacred it is to me. On no other hand could it be worn without something which to me would be akin to sacrilege. Now I must not keep you longer or Silverbridge will be storming about the house. He of course will tell me when it is to be; but do not you keep him long waiting." Then he kissed her and led her up into the drawing-room. When he had spoken a word of greeting to Mrs. Boncassen, he left them to their own devices. After that they spent the best part of an hour in going over the house; but even that was done in a manner unsatisfactory to Silverbridge. Wherever Isabel went, there Mrs. Boncassen went also. There might have been some fun in showing even the back kitchens to his bride-elect, by herself;--but there was none in wandering about those vast underground regions with a stout lady who was really interested with the cooking apparatus and the wash-houses. The bedrooms one after another became tedious to him when Mrs. Boncassen would make communications respecting each of them to her daughter. "That is Gerald's room," said Silverbridge. "You have never seen Gerald. He is such a brick." Mrs. Boncassen was charmed with the whips and sticks and boxing-gloves in Gerald's room, and expressed an opinion that young men in the States mostly carried their knick-knacks about with them to the Universities. When she was told that he had another collection of "knick-knacks" at Matching, and another at Oxford, she thought that he was a very extravagant young man. Isabel, who had heard all about the gambling in Scotland, looked round at her lover and smiled. "Well, my dear," said Mrs. Boncassen, as they took their leave, "it is a very grand house, and I hope with all my heart you may have your health there and be happy. But I don't know that you'll be any happier because it's so big." "Wait till you see Gatherum," said Silverbridge. "That, I own, does make me unhappy. It has been calculated that three months at Gatherum Castle would drive a philosopher mad." In all this there had been a certain amount of disappointment for Silverbridge; but on that evening, before dinner in Brook Street, he received compensation. As the day was one somewhat peculiar in its nature he decided that it should be kept altogether as a holiday, and he did not therefore go down to the House. And not going to the House of course he spent the time with the Boncassens. "You know you ought to go," Isabel said to him when they found themselves alone together in the back drawing-room. "Of course I ought." "Then go. Do you think I would keep a Briton from his duties?" "Not though the constitution should fall in ruins. Do you suppose that a man wants no rest after inspecting all the pots and pans in that establishment? A woman, I believe, could go on doing that kind of thing all day long." "You should remember at least that the--woman was interesting herself about your pots and pans." "And now, Bella, tell me what the governor said to you." Then she showed him the ring. "Did he give you that?" She nodded her head in assent. "I did not think he would ever have parted with that." "It was your mother's." "She wore it always. I almost think that I never saw her hand without it. He would not have given you that unless he had meant to be very good to you." "He was very good to me. Silverbridge, I have a great deal to do, to learn to be your wife." "I'll teach you." "Yes; you'll teach me. But will you teach me right? There is something almost awful in your father's serious dignity and solemn appreciation of the responsibilities of his position. Will you ever come to that?" "I shall never be a great man as he is." "It seems to me that life to him is a load;--which he does not object to carry, but which he knows must be carried with a great struggle." "I suppose it ought to be so with everyone." "Yes," she said, "but the higher you put your foot on the ladder the more constant should be your thought that your stepping requires care. I fear that I am climbing too high." "You can't come down now, my young woman." "I have to go on now,--and do it as best I can. I will try to do my best. I will try to do my best. I told him so, and now I tell you so. I will try to do my best." "Perhaps after all I am only a 'pert poppet'," she said half an hour afterwards, for Silverbridge had told her of that terrible mistake made by poor Dolly Longstaff. "Brute!" he exclaimed. "Not at all. And when we are settled down in the real Darby-and-Joan way I shall hope to see Mr. Longstaff very often. I daresay he won't call me a pert poppet, and I shall not remind him of the word. But I shall always think of it; and remembering the way in which my character struck an educated Englishman,--who was not altogether ill-disposed towards me,--I may hope to improve myself." CHAPTER LXXIII "I Have Never Loved You" Silverbridge had now been in town three or four weeks, and Lady Mabel Grex had also been in London all that time, and yet he had not seen her. She had told him that she loved him and had asked him plainly to make her his wife. He had told her that he could not do so,--that he was altogether resolved to make another woman his wife. Then she had rebuked him, and had demanded from him how he had dared to treat her as he had done. His conscience was clear. He had his own code of morals as to such matters, and had, as he regarded it, kept within the law. But she thought that she was badly treated, and had declared that she was now left out in the cold for ever through his treachery. Then her last word had been almost the worst of all, "Who can tell what may come to pass?"--showing too plainly that she would not even now give up her hope. Before the month was up she wrote to him as follows: DEAR LORD SILVERBRIDGE, Why do you not come and see me? Are friends so plentiful with you that one so staunch as I may be thrown over? But of course I know why you do not come. Put all that aside,--and come. I cannot hurt you. I have learned to feel that certain things which the world regards as too awful to be talked of,--except in the way of scandal, may be discussed and then laid aside just like other subjects. What though I wear a wig or a wooden leg, I may still be fairly comfortable among my companions unless I crucify myself by trying to hide my misfortune. It is not the presence of the skeleton that crushes us. Not even that will hurt us much if we let him go about the house as he lists. It is the everlasting effort which the horror makes to peep out of his cupboard that robs us of our ease. At any rate come and see me. Of course I know that you are to be married to Miss Boncassen. Who does not know it? The trumpeters have been at work for the last week. Your very sincere friend, MABEL. He wished that she had not written. Of course he must go to her. And though there was a word or two in her letter which angered him, his feelings towards her were kindly. Had not that American angel flown across the Atlantic to his arms he could have been well content to make her his wife. But the interview at the present moment could hardly be other than painful. She could, she said, talk of her own misfortunes, but the subject would be very painful to him. It was not to him a skeleton, to be locked out of sight; but it had been a misfortune, and the sooner that such misfortunes could be forgotten the better. He knew what she meant about trumpeters. She had intended to signify that Isabel in her pride had boasted of her matrimonial prospects. Of course there had been trumpets. Are there not always trumpets when a marriage is contemplated, magnificent enough to be called an alliance? As for that he himself had blown the trumpets. He had told everybody that he was going to be married to Miss Boncassen. Isabel had blown no trumpets. In her own straightforward way she had told the truth to whom it concerned. Of course he would go and see Lady Mabel, but he trusted that for her own sake nothing would be said about trumpets. "So you have come at last," Mabel said when he entered the room. "No;--Miss Cassewary is not here. As I wanted to see you alone I got her to go out this morning. Why did you not come before?" "You said in your letter that you knew why." "But in saying so I was accusing you of cowardice;--was I not?" "It was not cowardice." "Why then did you not come?" "I thought you would hardly wish to see me so soon,--after what passed." "That is honest at any rate. You felt that I must be too much ashamed of what I said to be able to look you in the face." "Not that exactly." "Any other man would have felt the same, but no other man would be honest enough to tell me so. I do not think that ever in your life you have constrained yourself to the civility of a lie." "I hope not." "To be civil and false is often better than to be harsh and true. I may be soothed by the courtesy and yet not deceived by the lie. But what I told you in my letter,--which I hope you have destroyed--" "I will destroy it." "Do. It was not intended for the partner of your future joys. As I told you then, I can talk freely. Why not? We know it,--both of us. How your conscience may be I cannot tell; but mine is clear from that soil with which you think it should be smirched." "I think nothing of the sort." "Yes, Silverbridge, you do. You have said to yourself this;--That girl has determined to get me, and she has not scrupled as to how she would do it." "No such idea has ever crossed my mind." "But you have never told yourself of the encouragement which you gave me. Such condemnation as I have spoken of would have been just if my efforts had been sanctioned by no words, no looks, no deeds from you. Did you give me warrant for thinking that you were my lover?" That theory by which he had justified himself to himself seemed to fall away from him under her questioning. He could not now remember his words to her in those old days before Miss Boncassen had crossed his path; but he did know that he had once intended to make her understand that he loved her. She had not understood him;--or, understanding, had not accepted his words; and therefore he had thought himself free. But it now seemed that he had not been entitled so to regard himself. There she sat, looking at him, waiting for his answer; and he who had been so sure that he had committed no sin against her, had not a word to say to her. "I want your answer to that, Lord Silverbridge. I have told you that I would have no skeleton in the cupboard. Down at Matching, and before that at Killancodlem, I appealed to you, asking you to take me as your wife." "Hardly that." "Altogether that! I will have nothing denied that I have done,--nor will I be ashamed of anything. I did do so,--even after this infatuation. I thought then that one so volatile might perhaps fly back again." "I shall not do that," said he, frowning at her. "You need trouble yourself with no assurance, my friend. Let us understand each other now. I am not now supposing that you can fly back again. You have found your perch, and you must settle on it like a good domestic barn-door fowl." Again he scowled. If she were too hard upon him he would certainly turn upon her. "No; you will not fly back again now;--but was I, or was I not, justified when you came to Killancodlem in thinking that my lover had come there?" "How can I tell? It is my own justification I am thinking of." "I see all that. But we cannot both be justified. Did you mean me to suppose that you were speaking to me words in earnest when there,--sitting in that very spot,--you spoke to me of your love." "Did I speak of my love?" "Did you speak of your love! And now, Silverbridge,--for if there be an English gentleman on earth I think that you are one,--as a gentleman tell me this. Did you not even tell your father that I should be your wife? I know you did." "Did he tell you?" "Men such as you and he, who cannot even lie with your eyelids, who will not condescend to cover up a secret by a moment of feigned inanimation, have many voices. He did tell me; but he broke no confidence. He told me, but did not mean to tell me. Now you also have told me." "I did. I told him so. And then I changed my mind." "I know you changed your mind. Men often do. A pinker pink, a whiter white,--a finger that will press you just half an ounce the closer,--a cheek that will consent to let itself come just a little nearer--!" "No; no; no!" It was because Isabel had not easily consented to such approaches! "Trifles such as these will do it;--and some such trifles have done it with you. It would be beneath me to make comparisons where I might seem to be the gainer. I grant her beauty. She is very lovely. She has succeeded." "I have succeeded." "But--I am justified, and you are condemned. Is it not so? Tell me like a man." "You are justified." "And you are condemned? When you told me that I should be your wife, and then told your father the same story, was I to think it all meant nothing! Have you deceived me?" "I did not mean it." "Have you deceived me? What; you cannot deny it, and yet have not the manliness to own it to a poor woman who can only save herself from humiliation by extorting the truth from you!" "Oh, Mabel, I am so sorry it should be so." "I believe you are,--with a sorrow that will last till she is again sitting close to you. Nor, Silverbridge, do I wish it to be longer. No;--no;--no. Your fault after all has not been great. You deceived, but did not mean to deceive me?" "Never; never." "And I fancy you have never known how much you bore about with you. Your modesty has been so perfect that you have not thought of yourself as more than other men. You have forgotten that you have had in your hand the disposal to some one woman of a throne in Paradise." "I don't suppose you thought of that." "But I did. Why should I tell falsehoods now? I have determined that you should know everything,--but I could better confess to you my own sins when I had shown that you too have not been innocent. Not think of it! Do not men think of high titles and great wealth and power and place? And if men, why should not women? Do not men try to get them;--and are they not even applauded for their energy? A woman has but one way to try. I tried." "I do not think it was all for that." "How shall I answer that without a confession which even I am not hardened enough to make? In truth, Silverbridge, I have never loved you." He drew himself up slowly before he answered her, and gradually assumed a look very different from that easy boyish smile which was customary to him. "I am glad of that," he said. "Why are you glad?" "Now I can have no regrets." "You need have none. It was necessary to me that I should have my little triumph;--that I should show you that I knew how far you had wronged me! But now I wish that you should know everything. I have never loved you." "There is an end of it then." "But I have liked you so well,--so much better than all others! A dozen men have asked me to marry them. And though they might be nothing till they made that request, then they became--things of horror to me. But you were not a thing of horror. I could have become your wife, and I think that I could have learned to love you." "It is best as it is." "I ought to say so too; but I have a doubt I should have liked to be Duchess of Omnium, and perhaps I might have fitted the place better than one who can as yet know but little of its duties or its privileges. I may, perhaps, think that that other arrangement would have been better even for you." "I can take care of myself in that." "I should have married you without loving you, but I should have done so determined to serve you with a devotion which a woman who does love hardly thinks necessary. I would have so done my duty that you should never have guessed that my heart had been in the keeping of another man." "Another man!" "Yes; of course. If there had been no other man, why not you? Am I so hard, do you think that I can love no one? Are you not such a one that a girl would naturally love,--were she not preoccupied? That a woman should love seems as necessary as that a man should not." "A man can love too." "No;--hardly. He can admire, and he can like, and he can fondle and be fond. He can admire, and approve, and perhaps worship. He can know of a woman that she is part of himself, the most sacred part, and therefore will protect her from the very winds. But all that will not make love. It does not come to a man that to be separated from a woman is to be dislocated from his very self. A man has but one centre, and that is himself. A woman has two. Though the second may never be seen by her, may live in the arms of another, may do all for that other that man can do for woman,--still, still, though he be half the globe asunder from her, still he is to her the half of her existence. If she really love, there is, I fancy, no end of it. To the end of time I shall love Frank Tregear." "Tregear!" "Who else?" "He is engaged to Mary." "Of course he is. Why not;--to her or whomsoever else he might like best? He is as true I doubt not to your sister as you are to your American beauty,--or as you would have been to me had fancy held. He used to love me." "You were always friends." "Always;--dear friends. And he would have loved me if a man were capable of loving. But he could sever himself from me easily, just when he was told to do so. I thought that I could do the same. But I cannot. A jackal is born a jackal, and not a lion, and cannot help himself. So is a woman born--a woman. They are clinging, parasite things, which cannot but adhere; though they destroy themselves by adhering. Do not suppose that I take a pride in it. I would give one of my eyes to be able to disregard him." "Time will do it." "Yes; time,--that brings wrinkles and rouge-pots and rheumatism. Though I have so hated those men as to be unable to endure them, still I want some man's house, and his name,--some man's bread and wine,--some man's jewels and titles and woods and parks and gardens,--if I can get them. Time can help a man in his sorrow. If he begins at forty to make speeches, or to win races, or to breed oxen, he can yet live a prosperous life. Time is but a poor consoler for a young woman who has to be married." "Oh, Mabel." "And now let there be not a word more about it. I know--that I can trust you." "Indeed you may." "Though you will tell her everything else you will not tell her this." "No;--not this." "And surely you will not tell your sister!" "I shall tell no one." "It is because you are so true that I have dared to trust you. I had to justify myself,--and then to confess. Had I at that one moment taken you at your word, you would never have known anything of all this. 'There is a tide in the affairs of men--!' But I let the flood go by! I shall not see you again now before you are married; but come to me afterwards." CHAPTER LXXIV "Let Us Drink a Glass of Wine Together" Silverbridge pondered it all much as he went home. What a terrible story was that he had heard! The horror to him was chiefly in this,--that she should yet be driven to marry some man without even fancying that she could love him! And this was Lady Mabel Grex, who, on his own first entrance into London life, now not much more than twelve months ago, had seemed to him to stand above all other girls in beauty, charm, and popularity! As he opened the door of the house with his latch-key, who should be coming out but Frank Tregear,--Frank Tregear with his arm in a sling, but still with an unmistakable look of general satisfaction. "When on earth did you come up?" asked Silverbridge. Tregear told him that he had arrived on the previous evening from Harrington. "And why? The doctor would not have let you come if he could have helped it." "When he found he could not help it, he did let me come. I am nearly all right. If I had been nearly all wrong I should have had to come." "And what are you doing here?" "Well; if you'll allow me I'll go back with you for a moment. What do you think I have been doing?" "Have you seen my sister?" "Yes, I have seen your sister. And I have done better than that. I have seen your father. Lord Silverbridge,--behold your brother-in-law." "You don't mean to say that it is arranged?" "I do." "What did he say?" "He made me understand by most unanswerable arguments, that I had no business to think of such a thing. I did not fight the point with him,--but simply stood there, as conclusive evidence of my business. He told me that we should have nothing to live on unless he gave us an income. I assured him that I would never ask him for a shilling. 'But I cannot allow her to marry a man without an income,' he said." "I know his way so well." "I had just two facts to go upon,--that I would not give her up, and that she would not give me up. When I pointed that out he tore his hair,--in a mild way, and said that he did not understand that kind of thing at all." "And yet he gave way." "Of course he did. They say that when a king of old would consent to see a petitioner for his life, he was bound by his royalty to mercy. So it was with the Duke. Then, very early in the argument, he forgot himself, and called her--Mary. I knew he had thrown up the sponge then." "How did he give way at last?" "He asked me what were my ideas about life in general. I said that I thought Parliament was a good sort of thing, that I was lucky enough to have a seat, and that I should take lodgings somewhere in Westminster till--. 'Till what?' he asked. 'Till something is settled,' I replied. Then he turned away from me and remained silent. 'May I see Lady Mary?' I asked. 'Yes; you may see her,' he replied, as he rang the bell. Then when the servant was gone he stopped me. 'I love her too dearly to see her grieve,' he said. 'I hope you will show that you can be worthy of her.' Then I made some sort of protestation and went upstairs. While I was with Mary there came a message to me, telling me to come to dinner." "The Boncassens are all dining here." "Then we shall be a family party. So far I suppose I may say it is settled. When he will let us marry heaven only knows. Mary declares that she will not press him. I certainly cannot do so. It is all a matter of money." "He won't care about that." "But he may perhaps think that a little patience will do us good. You will have to soften him." Then Silverbridge told all that he knew about himself. He was to be married in May, was to go to Matching for a week or two after his wedding, was then to see the Session to an end, and after that to travel with his wife in the United States. "I don't suppose we shall be allowed to run about the world together so soon as that," said Tregear, "but I am too well satisfied with my day's work to complain." "Did he say what he meant to give her?" "Oh dear no;--nor even that he meant to give her anything. I should not dream of asking a question about it. Nor when he makes any proposition shall I think of having any opinion of my own." "He'll make it all right;--for her sake, you know." "My chief object as regards him, is that he should not think that I have been looking after her money. Well; good-bye. I suppose we shall all meet at dinner?" When Tregear left him, Silverbridge went to his father's room. He was anxious that they should understand each other as to Mary's engagement. "I thought you were at the House," said the Duke. "I was going there, but I met Tregear at the door. He tells me you have accepted him for Mary." "I wish that he had never seen her. Do you think that a man can be thwarted in everything and not feel it?" "I thought--you had reconciled yourself--to Isabel." "If it were that alone I could do so the more easily, because personally she wins upon me. And this man, too;--it is not that I find fault with himself." "He is in all respects a high-minded gentleman." "I hope so. But yet, had he a right to set his heart there, where he could make his fortune,--having none of his own?" "He did not think of that." "He should have thought of it. A man does not allow himself to love without any consideration or purpose. You say that he is a gentleman. A gentleman should not look to live on means brought to him by a wife. You say that he did not." "He did not think of it." "A gentleman should do more than not think of it. He should think that it shall not be so. A man should own his means or should earn them." "How many men, sir, do neither?" "Yes; I know," said the Duke. "Such a doctrine nowadays is caviare to the general. One must live as others live around one, I suppose. I could not see her suffer. It was too much for me. When I became convinced that this was no temporary passion, no romantic love which time might banish, that she was of such a temperament that she could not change,--then I had to give way. Gerald, I suppose, will bring me some kitchen-maid for his wife." "Oh, sir, you should not say that to me." "No;--I should not have said it to you. I beg your pardon, Silverbridge." Then he paused a moment, turning over certain thoughts within his own bosom. "Perhaps, after all, it is well that a pride of which I am conscious should be rebuked. And it may be that the rebuke has come in such a form that I should be thankful. I know that I can love Isabel." "That to me will be everything." "And this young man has nothing that should revolt me. I think he has been wrong. But now that I have said it I will let all that pass from me. He will dine with us to-day." Silverbridge then went up to see his sister. "So you have settled your little business, Mary?" "Oh, Silverbridge, you will wish me joy?" "Certainly. Why not?" "Papa is so stern with me. Of course he has given way, and of course I am grateful. But he looks at me as though I had done something to be forgiven." "Take the good the gods provide you, Mary. That will all come right." "But I have not done anything wrong. Have I?" "That is a matter of opinion. How can I answer about you when I don't quite know whether I have done anything wrong or not myself? I am going to marry the girl I have chosen. That's enough for me." "But you did change." "We need not say anything about that." "But I have never changed. Papa just told me that he would consent, and that I might write to him. So I did write, and he came. But papa looks at me as though I had broken his heart." "I tell you what it is, Mary. You expect too much from him. He has not had his own way with either of us, and of course he feels it." As Tregear had said, there was quite a family party in Carlton Terrace, though as yet the family was not bound together by family ties. All the Boncassens were there, the father, the mother, and the promised bride. Mr. Boncassen bore himself with more ease than any one in the company, having at his command a gift of manliness which enabled him to regard this marriage exactly as he would have done any other. America was not so far distant but what he would be able to see his girl occasionally. He liked the young man and he believed in the comfort of wealth. Therefore he was satisfied. But when the marriage was spoken of, or written of, as "an alliance," then he would say a hard word or two about dukes and lords in general. On such an occasion as this he was happy and at his ease. So much could not be said for his wife, with whom the Duke attempted to place himself on terms of family equality. But in doing this he failed to hide the attempt even from her, and she broke down under it. Had he simply walked into the room with her as he would have done on any other occasion, and then remarked that the frost was keen or the thaw disagreeable, it would have been better for her. But when he told her that he hoped she would often make herself at home in that house, and looked, as he said it, as though he were asking her to take a place among the goddesses of Olympus, she was troubled as to her answer. "Oh, my Lord Duke," she said, "when I think of Isabel living here and being called by such a name, it almost upsets me." Isabel had all her father's courage, but she was more sensitive; and though she would have borne her honours well, was oppressed by the feeling that the weight was too much for her mother. She could not keep her ear from listening to her mother's words, or her eye from watching her mother's motions. She was prepared to carry her mother everywhere. "As other girls have to be taken with their belongings, so must I, if I be taken at all." This she had said plainly enough. There should be no division between her and her mother. But still, knowing that her mother was not quite at ease, she was hardly at ease herself. Silverbridge came in at the last moment, and of course occupied a chair next to Isabel. As the House was sitting, it was natural that he should come up in a flurry. "I left Phineas," he said, "pounding away in his old style at Sir Timothy. By-the-bye, Isabel, you must come down some day and hear Sir Timothy badgered. I must be back again about ten. Well, Gerald, how are they all at Lazarus?" He made an effort to be free and easy, but even he soon found that it was an effort. Gerald had come up from Oxford for the occasion that he might make acquaintance with the Boncassens. He had taken Isabel in to dinner, but had been turned out of his place when his brother came in. He had been a little confused by the first impression made upon him by Mrs. Boncassen, and had involuntarily watched his father. "Silver is going to have an odd sort of a mother-in-law," he said afterwards to Mary, who remarked in reply that this would not signify, as the mother-in-law would be in New York. Tregear's part was very difficult to play. He could not but feel that though he had succeeded, still he was as yet looked upon askance. Silverbridge had told him that by degrees the Duke would be won round, but that it was not to be expected that he should swallow at once all his regrets. The truth of this could not but be accepted. The immediate inconvenience, however, was not the less felt. Each and everyone there knew the position of each and everyone;--but Tregear felt it difficult to act up to his. He could not play the well-pleased lover openly, as did Silverbridge. Mary herself was disposed to be very silent. The heart-breaking tedium of her dull life had been removed. Her determination had been rewarded. All that she had wanted had been granted to her, and she was happy. But she was not prepared to show off her happiness before others. And she was aware that she was thought to have done evil by introducing her lover into her august family. But it was the Duke who made the greatest efforts, and with the least success. He had told himself again and again that he was bound by every sense of duty to swallow all regrets. He had taken himself to task on this matter. He had done so even out loud to his son. He had declared that he would "let it all pass from him." But who does not know how hard it is for a man in such matters to keep his word to himself? Who has not said to himself at the very moment of his own delinquency, "Now,--it is now,--at this very instant of time, that I should crush, and quench, and kill the evil spirit within me; it is now that I should abate my greed, or smother my ill-humour, or abandon my hatred. It is now, and here, that I should drive out the fiend, as I have sworn to myself that I would do,"--and yet has failed? That it would be done, would be done at last, by this man was very certain. When Silverbridge assured his sister that "it would come all right very soon," he had understood his father's character. But it could not be completed quite at once. Had he been required to take Isabel only to his heart, it would have been comparatively easy. There are men, who do not seem at first sight very susceptible to feminine attractions, who nevertheless are dominated by the grace of flounces, who succumb to petticoats unconsciously, and who are half in love with every woman merely for her womanhood. So it was with the Duke. He had given way in regard to Isabel with less than half the effort that Frank Tregear was likely to cost him. "You were not at the House, sir," said Silverbridge when he felt that there was a pause. "No, not to-day." Then there was a pause again. "I think that we shall beat Cambridge this year to a moral," said Gerald, who was sitting at the round table opposite to his father. Mr. Boncassen, who was next to him, asked, in irony probably rather than in ignorance, whether the victory was to be achieved by mathematical or classical proficiency. Gerald turned and looked at him. "Do you mean to say that you have never heard of the University boat-races?" "Papa, you have disgraced yourself for ever," said Isabel. "Have I, my dear? Yes, I have heard of them. But I thought Lord Gerald's protestation was too great for a mere aquatic triumph." "Now you are poking your fun at me," said Gerald. "Well he may," said the Duke sententiously. "We have laid ourselves very open to having fun poked at us in this matter." "I think, sir," said Tregear, "that they are learning to do the same sort of thing at the American Universities." "Oh, indeed," said the Duke in a solemn, dry, funereal tone. And then all the little life which Gerald's remark about the boat-race had produced, was quenched at once. The Duke was not angry with Tregear for his little word of defence,--but he was not able to bring himself into harmony with this one guest, and was almost savage to him without meaning it. He was continually asking himself why Destiny had been so hard upon him as to force him to receive there at his table as his son-in-law a man who was distasteful to him. And he was endeavouring to answer the question, taking himself to task and telling himself that his destiny had done him no injury, and that the pride which had been wounded was a false pride. He was making a brave fight; but during the fight he was hardly fit to be the genial father and father-in-law of young people who were going to be married to one another. But before the dinner was over he made a great effort. "Tregear," he said,--and even that was an effort, for he had never hitherto mentioned the man's name without the formal Mister,--"Tregear, as this is the first time you have sat at my table, let me be old-fashioned, and ask you to drink a glass of wine with me." The glass of wine was drunk and the ceremony afforded infinite satisfaction at least to one person there. Mary could not keep herself from some expression of joy by pressing her finger for a moment against her lover's arm. He, though not usually given to such manifestations, blushed up to his eyes. But the feeling produced on the company was solemn rather than jovial. Everyone there understood it all. Mr. Boncassen could read the Duke's mind down to the last line. Even Mrs. Boncassen was aware that an act of reconciliation had been intended. "When the governor drank that glass of wine it seemed as though half the marriage ceremony had been performed," Gerald said to his brother that evening. When the Duke's glass was replaced on the table, he himself was conscious of the solemnity of what he had done, and was half ashamed of it. When the ladies had gone upstairs the conversation became political and lively. The Duke could talk freely about the state of things to Mr. Boncassen, and was able gradually to include Tregear in the badinage with which he attacked the Conservatism of his son. And so the half-hour passed well. Upstairs the two girls immediately came together, leaving Mrs. Boncassen to chew the cud of the grandeur around her in the sleepy comfort of an arm-chair. "And so everything is settled for both of us," said Isabel. "Of course I knew it was to be settled for you. You told me so at Custins." "I did not know it myself then. I only told you that he had asked me. And you hardly believed me." "I certainly believed you." "But you knew about--Lady Mabel Grex." "I only suspected something, and now I know it was a mistake. It has never been more than a suspicion." "And why, when we were at Custins, did you not tell me about yourself?" "I had nothing to tell." "I can understand that. But is it not joyful that it should all be settled? Only poor Lady Mabel! You have got no Lady Mabel to trouble your conscience." From which it was evident that Silverbridge had not told all. CHAPTER LXXV The Major's Story By the end of March Isabel was in Paris, whither she had forbidden her lover to follow her. Silverbridge was therefore reduced to the shifts of a bachelor's life, in which his friends seemed to think that he ought now to take special delight. Perhaps he did not take much delight in them. He was no doubt impatient to commence that steady married life for which he had prepared himself. But nevertheless, just at present, he lived a good deal at the Beargarden. Where was he to live? The Boncassens were in Paris, his sister was at Matching with a houseful of other Pallisers, and his father was again deep in politics. Of course he was much in the House of Commons, but that also was stupid. Indeed everything would be stupid till Isabel came back. Perhaps dinner was more comfortable at the club than at the House. And then, as everybody knew, it was a good thing to change the scene. Therefore he dined at the club, and though he would keep his hansom and go down to the House again in the course of the evening, he spent many long hours at the Beargarden. "There'll very soon be an end of this as far as you are concerned," said Mr. Lupton to him one evening as they were sitting in the smoking-room after dinner. "The sooner the better as far as this place is concerned." "This place is as good as any other. For the matter of that I like the Beargarden since we got rid of two or three not very charming characters." "You mean my poor friend Tifto," said Silverbridge. "No;--I was not thinking of Tifto. There were one or two here who were quite as bad as Tifto. I wonder what has become of that poor devil?" "I don't know in the least. You heard of that row about the hounds?" "And his letter to you." "He wrote to me,--and I answered him, as you know. But whither he vanished, or what he is doing, or how he is living, I have not the least idea." "Gone to join those other fellows abroad, I should say. Among them they got a lot of money,--as the Duke ought to remember." "He is not with them," said Silverbridge, as though he were in some degree mourning over the fate of his unfortunate friend. "I suppose Captain Green was the leader in all that?" "Now it is all done and gone I own to a certain regard for the Major. He was true to me till he thought I snubbed him. I would not let him go down to Silverbridge with me. I always thought that I drove the poor Major to his malpractices." At this moment Dolly Longstaff sauntered into the room and came up to them. It may be remembered that Dolly had declared his purpose of emigrating. As soon as he heard that the Duke's heir had serious thoughts of marrying the lady whom he loved he withdrew at once from the contest, but, as he did so, he acknowledged that there could be no longer a home for him in the country which Isabel was to inhabit as the wife of another man. Gradually, however, better thoughts returned to him. After all, what was she but a "pert poppet"? He determined that marriage "clips a fellow's wings confoundedly," and so he set himself to enjoy life after his old fashion. There was perhaps a little swagger as he threw himself into a chair and addressed the happy lover. "I'll be shot if I didn't meet Tifto at the corner of the street." "Tifto!" "Yes, Tifto. He looked awfully seedy, with a greatcoat buttoned up to his chin, a shabby hat and old gloves." "Did he speak to you?" asked Silverbridge. "No;--nor I to him. He hadn't time to think whether he would speak or not, and you may be sure I didn't." Nothing further was said about the man, but Silverbridge was uneasy and silent. When his cigar was finished he got up, saying that he should go back to the House. As he left the club he looked about him as though expecting to see his old friend, and when he had passed through the first street and had got into the Haymarket there he was! The Major came up to him, touched his hat, asked to be allowed to say a few words. "I don't think it can do any good," said Silverbridge. The man had not attempted to shake hands with him, or affected familiarity; but seemed to be thoroughly humiliated. "I don't think I can be of any service to you, and therefore I had rather decline." "I don't want you to be of any service, my Lord." "Then what's the good?" "I have something to say. May I come to you to-morrow?" Then Silverbridge allowed himself to make an appointment, and an hour was named at which Tifto might call in Carlton Terrace. He felt that he almost owed some reparation to the wretched man,--whom he had unfortunately admitted among his friends, whom he had used, and to whom he had been uncourteous. Exactly at the hour named the Major was shown into his room. Dolly had said that he was shabby,--but the man was altered rather than shabby. He still had rings on his fingers and studs in his shirt, and a jewelled pin in his cravat;--but he had shaven off his moustache and the tuft from his chin, and his hair had been cut short, and in spite of his jewellery there was a hang-dog look about him. "I've got something that I particularly want to say to you, my Lord." Silverbridge would not shake hands with him, but could not refrain from offering him a chair. "Well;--you can say it now." "Yes;--but it isn't so very easy to be said. There are some things, though you want to say them ever so, you don't quite know how to do it." "You have your choice, Major Tifto. You can speak or hold your tongue." Then there was a pause, during which Silverbridge sat with his hands in his pockets trying to look unconcerned. "But if you've got it here, and feel it as I do,"--the poor man as he said this put his hand upon his heart,--"you can't sleep in your bed till it's out. I did that thing that they said I did." "What thing?" "Why, the nail! It was I lamed the horse." "I am sorry for it. I can say nothing else." "You ain't so sorry for it as I am. Oh no; you can never be that, my Lord. After all, what does it matter to you?" "Very little. I meant that I was sorry for your sake." "I believe you are, my Lord. For though you could be rough you was always kind. Now I will tell you everything, and then you can do as you please." "I wish to do nothing. As far as I am concerned the matter is over. It made me sick of horses, and I do not wish to have to think of it again." "Nevertheless, my Lord, I've got to tell it. It was Green who put me up to it. He did it just for the plunder. As God is my judge it was not for the money I did it." "Then it was revenge." "It was the devil got hold of me, my Lord. Up to that I had always been square,--square as a die! I got to think that your Lordship was upsetting. I don't know whether your Lordship remembers, but you did put me down once or twice rather uncommon." "I hope I was not unjust." "I don't say you was, my Lord. But I got a feeling on me that you wanted to get rid of me, and I all the time doing the best I could for the 'orses. I did do the best I could up to that very morning at Doncaster. Well;--it was Green put me up to it. I don't say I was to get nothing; but it wasn't so much more than I could have got by the 'orse winning. And I've lost pretty nearly all that I did get. Do you remember, my Lord,"--and now the Major sank his voice to a whisper,--"when I come up to your bedroom that morning?" "I remember it." "The first time?" "Yes; I remember it." "Because I came twice, my Lord. When I came first it hadn't been done. You turned me out." "That is true, Major Tifto." "You was very rough then. Wasn't you rough?" "A man's bedroom is generally supposed to be private." "Yes, my Lord,--that's true. I ought to have sent your man in first. I came then to confess it all, before it was done." "Then why couldn't you let the horse alone?" "I was in their hands. And then you was so rough with me! So I said to myself I might as well do it;--and I did it." "What do you want me to say? As far as my forgiveness goes, you have it!" "That's saying a great deal, my Lord,--a great deal," said Tifto, now in tears. "But I ain't said it all yet. He's here; in London!" "Who's here?" "Green. He's here. He doesn't think that I know, but I could lay my hand on him to-morrow." "There is no human being alive, Major Tifto, whose presence or absence could be a matter of more indifference to me." "I'll tell you what I'll do, my Lord. I'll go before any judge, or magistrate, or police-officer in the country, and tell the truth. I won't ask even for a pardon. They shall punish me and him too. I'm in that state of mind that any change would be for the better. But he,--he ought to have it heavy." "It won't be done by me, Major Tifto. Look here, Major Tifto; you have come here to confess that you have done me a great injury?" "Yes, I have." "And you say you are sorry for it." "Indeed I am." "And I have forgiven you. There is only one way in which you can show your gratitude. Hold your tongue about it. Let it be as a thing done and gone. The money has been paid. The horse has been sold. The whole thing has gone out of my mind, and I don't want to have it brought back again." "And nothing is to be done to Green!" "I should say nothing,--on that score." "And he has got they say five-and-twenty thousand pounds clear money." "It is a pity, but it cannot be helped. I will have nothing further to do with it. Of course I cannot bind you, but I have told you my wishes." The poor wretch was silent, but still it seemed as though he did not wish to go quite yet. "If you have said what you have got to say, Major Tifto, I may as well tell you that my time is engaged." "And must that be all?" "What else?" "I am in such a state of mind, Lord Silverbridge, that it would be a satisfaction to tell it all, even against myself." "I can't prevent you." Then Tifto got up from his chair, as though he were going. "I wish I knew what I was going to do with myself." "I don't know that I can help you, Major Tifto." "I suppose not, my Lord. I haven't twenty pounds left in all the world. It's the only thing that wasn't square that ever I did in all my life. Your Lordship couldn't do anything for me? We was very much together at one time, my Lord." "Yes, Major Tifto, we were." "Of course I was a villain. But it was only once; and your Lordship was so rough to me! I am not saying but what I was a villain. Think of what I did for myself by that one piece of wickedness! Master of hounds! member of the club! And the horse would have run in my name and won the Leger! And everybody knew as your Lordship and me was together in him!" Then he burst out into a paroxysm of tears and sobbing. The young Lord certainly could not take the man into partnership again, nor could he restore to him either the hounds or his club,--or his clean hands. Nor did he know in what way he could serve the man, except by putting his hand into his pocket,--which he did. Tifto accepted the gratuity, and ultimately became an annual pensioner on his former noble partner, living on the allowance made him in some obscure corner of South Wales. CHAPTER LXXVI On Deportment Frank Tregear had come up to town at the end of February. He remained in London, with an understanding that he was not to see Lady Mary again till the Easter holidays. He was then to pay a visit to Matching, and to enter in, it may be presumed, on the full fruition of his advantages as accepted suitor. All this had been arranged with a good deal of precision,--as though there had still been a hope left that Lady Mary might change her mind. Of course there was no such hope. When the Duke asked the young man to dine with him, when he invited him to drink that memorable glass of wine, when the young man was allowed, in the presence of the Boncassens, to sit next Lady Mary, it was of course settled. But the father probably found some relief in yielding by slow degrees. "I would rather that there should be no correspondence till then," he had said both to Tregear and to his daughter. And they had promised there should be no correspondence. At Easter they would meet. After Easter Mary was to come up to London to be present at her brother's wedding, to which also Tregear had been formally invited; and it was hoped that then something might be settled as to their own marriage. Tregear, with the surgeon's permission, took his seat in Parliament. He was introduced by two leading Members on the Conservative side, but immediately afterwards found himself seated next to his friend Silverbridge on the top bench behind the ministers. The House was very full, as there was a feverish report abroad that Sir Timothy Beeswax intended to make a statement. No one quite knew what the statement was to be; but every politician in the House and out of it thought that he knew that the statement would be a bid for higher power on the part of Sir Timothy himself. If there had been dissensions in the Cabinet, the secret of them had been well kept. To Tregear who was not as yet familiar with the House there was no special appearance of activity; but Silverbridge could see that there was more than wonted animation. That the Treasury bench should be full at this time was a thing of custom. A whole broadside of questions would be fired off, one after another, like a rattle of musketry down the ranks, when as nearly as possible the report of each gun is made to follow close upon that of the gun before,--with this exception, that in such case each little sound is intended to be as like as possible to the preceding; whereas with the rattle of the questions and answers, each question and each answer becomes a little more authoritative and less courteous than the last. The Treasury bench was ready for its usual responsive firing, as the questioners were of course in their places. The opposition front bench was also crowded, and those behind were nearly equally full. There were many Peers in the gallery, and a general feeling of sensation prevailed. All this Silverbridge had been long enough in the House to appreciate;--but to Tregear the House was simply the House. "It's odd enough we should have a row the very first day you come," said Silverbridge. "You think there will be a row?" "Beeswax has something special to say. He's not here yet, you see. They've left about six inches for him there between Roper and Sir Orlando. You'll have the privilege of looking just down on the top of his head when he does come. I shan't stay much longer after that." "Where are you going?" "I don't mean to-day. But I should not have been here now,--in this very place I mean,--but I want to stick to you just at first. I shall move down below the gangway; and not improbably creep over to the other side before long." "You don't mean it?" "I think I shall. I begin to feel I've made a mistake." "In coming to this side at all?" "I think I have. After all it is not very important." "What is not important? I think it very important." "Perhaps it may be to you, and perhaps you may be able to keep it up. But the more I think of it the less excuse I seem to have for deserting the old ways of the family. What is there in those fellows down there to make a fellow feel that he ought to bind himself to them neck and heels?" "Their principles." "Yes, their principles! I believe I have some vague idea as to supporting property and land and all that kind of thing. I don't know that anybody wants to attack anything." "Somebody soon would want to attack it if there were no defenders." "I suppose there is an outside power,--the people, or public opinion, or whatever they choose to call it. And the country will have to go very much as that outside power chooses. Here, in Parliament, everybody will be as Conservative as the outside will let them. I don't think it matters on which side you sit;--but it does matter that you shouldn't have to act with those who go against the grain with you." "I never heard a worse political argument in my life." "I dare say not. However, here's Sir Timothy. When he looks in that way, all buckram, deportment, and solemnity, I know he's going to pitch into somebody." At this moment the Leader of the House came in from behind the Speaker's chair and took his place between Mr. Roper and Sir Orlando Drought. Silverbridge had been right in saying that Sir Timothy's air was solemn. When a man has to declare a solemn purpose on a solemn occasion in a solemn place, it is needful that he should be solemn himself. And though the solemnity which befits a man best will be that which the importance of the moment may produce, without thought given by himself to his own outward person, still, who is there can refrain himself from some attempt? Who can boast, who that has been versed in the ways and duties of high places, that he has kept himself free from all study of grace, of feature, of attitude, of gait--or even of dress? For most of our bishops, for most of our judges, of our statesmen, our orators, our generals, for many even of our doctors and our parsons, even our attorneys, our tax-gatherers, and certainly our butlers and our coachmen, Mr. Turveydrop, the great professor of deportment, has done much. But there should always be the art to underlie and protect the art;--the art that can hide the art. The really clever archbishop,--the really potent chief justice, the man who, as a politician, will succeed in becoming a king of men, should know how to carry his buckram without showing it. It was in this that Sir Timothy perhaps failed a little. There are men who look as though they were born to wear blue ribbons. It has come, probably, from study, but it seems to be natural. Sir Timothy did not impose on those who looked at him as do these men. You could see a little of the paint, you could hear the crumple of the starch and the padding; you could trace something of uneasiness in the would-be composed grandeur of the brow. "Turveydrop!" the spectator would say to himself. But after all it may be a question whether a man be open to reproach for not doing that well which the greatest among us,--if we could find one great enough,--would not do at all. For I think we must hold that true personal dignity should be achieved,--must, if it be quite true, have been achieved,--without any personal effort. Though it be evinced, in part, by the carriage of the body, that carriage should be the fruit of the operation of the mind. Even when it be assisted by external garniture such as special clothes, and wigs, and ornaments, such garniture should have been prescribed by the sovereign or by custom, and should not have been selected by the wearer. In regard to speech a man may study all that which may make him suasive, but if he go beyond that he will trench on those histrionic efforts which he will know to be wrong because he will be ashamed to acknowledge them. It is good to be beautiful, but it should come of God and not of the hairdresser. And personal dignity is a great possession; but a man should struggle for it no more than he would for beauty. Many, however, do struggle for it, and with such success that, though they do not achieve quite the real thing, still they get something on which they can bolster themselves up and be mighty. Others, older men than Silverbridge, saw as much as did our young friend, but they were more complaisant and more reasonable. They, too, heard the crackle of the buckram, and were aware that the last touch of awe had come upon that brow just as its owner was emerging from the shadow of the Speaker's chair;--but to them it was a thing of course. A real Cæsar is not to be found every day, nor can we always have a Pitt to control our debates. That kind of thing, that last touch has its effect. Of course it is all paint,--but how would the poor girl look before the gaslights if there were no paint? The House of Commons likes a little deportment on occasions. If a special man looks bigger than you, you can console yourself by reflecting that he also looks bigger than your fellows. Sir Timothy probably knew what he was about, and did himself on the whole more good than harm by his little tricks. As soon as Sir Timothy had taken his seat, Mr. Rattler got up from the opposition bench to ask him some question on a matter of finance. The brewers were anxious about publican licences. Could the Chancellor of the Exchequer say a word on the matter? Notice had of course been given, and the questioner had stated a quarter of an hour previously that he would postpone his query till the Chancellor of the Exchequer was in the House. Sir Timothy rose from his seat, and in his blandest manner began by apologising for his late appearance. He was sorry that he had been prevented by public business from being in his place to answer the honourable gentleman's question in its proper turn. And even now, he feared that he must decline to give any answer which could be supposed to be satisfactory. It would probably be his duty to make a statement to the House on the following day,--a statement which he was not quite prepared to make at the present moment. But in the existing state of things he was unwilling to make any reply to any question by which he might seem to bind the government to any opinion. Then he sat down. And rising again not long afterwards, when the House had gone through certain formal duties, he moved that it should be adjourned till the next day. Then all the members trooped out, and with the others Tregear and Lord Silverbridge. "So that is the end of your first day of Parliament," said Silverbridge. "What does it all mean?" "Let us go to the Carlton and hear what the fellows are saying." On that evening both the young men dined at Mr. Boncassen's house. Though Tregear had been cautioned not to write to Lady Mary, and though he was not to see her before Easter, still it was so completely understood that he was about to become her husband, that he was entertained in that capacity by all those who were concerned in the family. "And so they will all go out," said Mr. Boncassen. "That seems to be the general idea," said the expectant son-in-law. "When two men want to be first and neither will give way, they can't very well get on in the same boat together." Then he expatiated angrily on the treachery of Sir Timothy, and Tregear in a more moderate way joined in the same opinion. "Upon my word, young men, I doubt whether you are right," said Mr. Boncassen. "Whether it can be possible that a man should have risen to such a position with so little patriotism as you attribute to our friend, I will not pretend to say. I should think that in England it was impossible. But of this I am sure, that the facility which exists here for a minister or ministers to go out of office without disturbance of the Crown, is a great blessing. You say the other party will come in." "That is most probable," said Silverbridge. "With us the other party never comes in,--never has a chance of coming in,--except once in four years, when the President is elected. That one event binds us all for four years." "But you do change your ministers," said Tregear. "A secretary may quarrel with the President, or he may have the gout, or be convicted of peculation." "And yet you think yourselves more nearly free than we are." "I am not so sure of that. We have had a pretty difficult task, that of carrying on a government in a new country, which is nevertheless more populous than almost any old country. The influxions are so rapid, that every ten years the nature of the people is changed. It isn't easy; and though I think on the whole we've done pretty well, I am not going to boast that Washington is as yet the seat of a political Paradise." CHAPTER LXXVII "Mabel, Good-Bye" When Tregear first came to town with his arm in a sling, and bandages all round him,--in order that he might be formally accepted by the Duke,--he had himself taken to one other house besides the house in Carlton Terrace. He went to Belgrave Square, to announce his fate to Lady Mabel Grex;--but Lady Mabel Grex was not there. The Earl was ill at Brighton, and Lady Mabel had gone down to nurse him. The old woman who came to him in the hall told him that the Earl was very ill;--he had been attacked by the gout, but in spite of the gout, and in spite of the doctors, he had insisted on being taken to his club. Then he had been removed to Brighton, under the doctor's advice, chiefly in order that he might be kept out of the way of temptation. Now he was supposed to be very ill indeed. "My Lord is so imprudent!" said the old woman, shaking her old head in real unhappiness. For though the Earl had been a tyrant to everyone near him, yet when a poor woman becomes old it is something to have a tyrant to protect her. "My Lord" always had been imprudent. Tregear knew that it had been the theory of my Lord's life that to eat and drink and die was better than to abstain and live. Then Tregear wrote to his friend as follows: MY DEAR MABEL, I am up in town again as you will perceive, although I am still in a helpless condition and hardly able to write even this letter. I called to-day and was very sorry to hear so bad an account of your father. Had I been able to travel I should have come down to you. When I am able I will do so if you would wish to see me. In the meantime pray tell me how he is, and how you are. My news is this. The Duke has accepted me. It is great news to me, and I hope will be acceptable to you. I do believe that if ever a friend has been anxious for a friend's welfare you have been anxious for mine,--as I have been and ever shall be for yours. Of course this thing will be very much to me. I will not speak now of my love for the girl who is to become my wife. You might again call me Romeo. Nor do I like to say much of what may now be pecuniary prospects. I did not ask Mary to become my wife because I supposed she would be rich. But I could not have married her or any one else who had not money. What are the Duke's intentions I have not the slightest idea, nor shall I ask him. I am to go down to Matching at Easter, and shall endeavour to have some time fixed. I suppose the Duke will say something about money. If he does not, I shall not. Pray write to me at once, and tell me when I shall see you. Your affectionate Cousin, F. O. TREGEAR. In answer to this there came a note in a very few words. She congratulated him,--not very warmly,--but expressed a hope that she might see him soon. But she told him not to come to Brighton. The Earl was better but very cross, and she would be up in town before long. Towards the end of the month it became suddenly known in London that Lord Grex had died at Brighton. There was a Garter to be given away, and everybody was filled with regret that such an ornament to the Peerage should have departed from them. The Conservative papers remembered how excellent a politician he had been in his younger days, and the world was informed that the family of Grex of Grex was about the oldest in Great Britain of which authentic records were in existence. Then there came another note from Lady Mabel to Tregear. "I shall be in town on the 31st in the old house, with Miss Cassewary, and will see you if you can come on the 1st. Come early, at eleven, if you can." On the day named and at the hour fixed he was in Belgrave Square. He had known this house since he was a boy, and could well remember how, when he first entered it, he had thought with some awe of the grandeur of the Earl. The Earl had then not paid much attention to him, but he had become very much taken by the grace and good-nature of the girl who had owned him as a cousin. "You are my cousin Frank," she had said; "I am so glad to have a cousin." He could remember the words now as though they had been spoken only yesterday. Then there had quickly grown to be friendship between him and this, as he thought, sweetest of all girls. At that time he had just gone to Eton; but before he left Eton they had sworn to love each other. And so it had been and the thing had grown, till at last, just when he had taken his degree, two matters had been settled between them; the first was that each loved the other irretrievably, irrevocably, passionately; the second, that it was altogether out of the question that they should ever marry each other. It is but fair to Tregear to say that this last decision originated with the lady. He had told her that he certainly would hold himself engaged to marry her at some future time; but she had thrown this aside at once. How was it possible, she said, that two such beings, brought up in luxury, and taught to enjoy all the good things of the world, should expect to live and be happy together without an income? He offered to go to the bar;--but she asked him whether he thought it well that such a one as she should wait say a dozen years for such a process. "When the time comes, I should be an old woman and you would be a wretched man." She released him,--declared her own purpose of marrying well; and then, though there had been a moment in which her own assurance of her own love had been passionate enough, she went so far as to tell him that she was heart-whole. "We have been two foolish children but we cannot be children any longer," she said. "There must be an end of it." What had hitherto been the result of this the reader knows,--and Tregear knew also. He had taken the privilege given to him, and had made so complete a use of it that he had in truth transferred his heart as well as his allegiance. Where is the young man who cannot do so;--how few are there who do not do so when their first fit of passion has come on them at one-and-twenty? And he had thought that she would do the same. But gradually he found that she had not done so, did not do so, could not do so! When she first heard of Lady Mary she had not reprimanded him,--but she could not keep herself from showing the bitterness of her disappointment. Though she would still boast of her own strength and of her own purpose, yet it was too clear to him that she was wounded and very sore. She would have liked him to remain single at any rate till she herself were married. But the permission had been hardly given before he availed himself of it. And then he talked to her not only of the brilliancy of his prospects,--which she could have forgiven,--but of his love--his love! Then she had refused one offer after another, and he had known it all. There was nothing in which she was concerned that she did not tell him. Then young Silverbridge had come across her, and she had determined that he should be her husband. She had been nearly successful,--so nearly that at moments she had felt sure of success. But the prize had slipped from her through her own fault. She knew well enough that it was her own fault. When a girl submits to play such a game as that, she should not stand on too nice scruples. She had told herself this many a time since;--but the prize was gone. All this Tregear knew, and knowing it almost dreaded the coming interview. He could not without actual cruelty have avoided her. Had he done so before he could not have continued to do so now, when she was left alone in the world. Her father had not been much to her, but still his presence had enabled her to put herself before the world as being somebody. Now she would be almost nobody. And she had lost her rich prize, while he,--out of the same treasury as it were,--had won his! The door was opened to him by the same old woman, and he was shown, at a funereal pace, up into the drawing-room which he had known so well. He was told that Lady Mabel would be down to him directly. As he looked about him he could see that already had been commenced that work of division of spoil which is sure to follow the death of most of us. Things were already gone which used to be familiar to his eyes, and the room, though not dismantled, had been deprived of many of its little prettinesses and was ugly. In about ten minutes she came down to him,--with so soft a step that he would not have been aware of her entrance had he not seen her form in the mirror. Then, when he turned round to greet her, he was astonished by the blackness of her appearance. She looked as though she had become ten years older since he had last seen her. As she came up to him she was grave and almost solemn in her gait, but there was no sign of any tears. Why should there have been a tear? Women weep, and men too, not from grief, but from emotion. Indeed, grave and slow as was her step, and serious, almost solemn, as was her gait, there was something of a smile on her mouth as she gave him her hand. And yet her face was very sad, declaring to him too plainly something of the hopelessness of her heart. "And so the Duke has consented," she said. He had told her that in his letter, but, since that, her father had died, and she had been left, he did not as yet know how far impoverished, but, he feared, with no pleasant worldly prospects before her. "Yes, Mabel;--that I suppose will be settled. I have been so shocked to hear all this." "It has been very sad;--has it not? Sit down, Frank. You and I have a good deal to say to each other now that we have met. It was no good your going down to Brighton. He would not have seen you, and at last I never left him." "Was Percival there?" She only shook her head. "That was dreadful." "It was not Percival's fault. He would not see him; nor till the last hour or two would he believe in his own danger. Nor was he ever frightened for a moment,--not even then." "Was he good to you?" "Good to me! Well;--he liked my being there. Poor papa! It had gone so far with him that he could not be good to any one. I think that he felt that it would be unmanly not to be the same to the end." "He would not see Percival." "When it was suggested he would only ask what good Percival could do him. I did send for him at last, in my terror, but he did not see his father alive. When he did come he only told me how badly his father had treated him! It was very dreadful!" "I did so feel for you." "I am sure you did, and will. After all, Frank, I think that the pious godly people have the best of it in this world. Let them be ever so covetous, ever so false, ever so hard-hearted, the mere fact that they must keep up appearances, makes them comfortable to those around them. Poor papa was not comfortable to me. A little hypocrisy, a little sacrifice to the feelings of the world, may be such a blessing." "I am sorry that you should feel it so." "Yes; it is sad. But you;--everything is smiling with you! Let us talk about your plans." "Another time will do for that. I had come to hear about your own affairs." "There they are," she said, pointing round the room. "I have no other affairs. You see that I am going from here." "And where are you going?" She shook her head. "With whom will you live?" "With Miss Cass,--two old maids together! I know nothing further." "But about money? That is if I am justified in asking." "What would you not be justified in asking? Do you not know that I would tell you every secret of my heart,--if my heart had a secret? It seems that I have given up what was to have been my fortune. There was a claim of £12,000 on Grex. But I have abandoned it." "And there is nothing?" "There will be scrapings they tell me,--unless Percival refuses to agree. This house is mortgaged, but not for its value. And there are some jewels. But all that is detestable,--a mere grovelling among mean hundreds; whereas you,--you will soar among--" "Oh Mabel! do not say hard things to me." "No, indeed! why should I,--I who have been preaching that comfortable doctrine of hypocrisy? I will say nothing hard. But I would sooner talk of your good things than of my evil ones." "I would not." "Then you must talk about them for my sake. How was it that the Duke came round at last?" "I hardly know. She sent for me." "A fine high-spirited girl. These Pallisers have more courage about them than one expects from their outward manner. Silverbridge has plenty of it." "I remember telling you he could be obstinate." "And I remember that I did not believe you. Now I know it. He has the sort of pluck which enables a man to break a girl's heart,--or to destroy a girl's hopes,--without wincing. He can tell a girl to her face that she can go to the--mischief for him. There are so many men who can't do that, from cowardice, though their hearts be ever so well inclined. 'I have changed my mind.' There is something great in the courage of a man who can say that to a woman in so many words. Most of them, when they escape, escape by lies and subterfuges. Or they run away and won't allow themselves to be heard of. They trust to a chapter of accidents, and leave things to arrange themselves. But when a man can look a girl in the face with those seemingly soft eyes, and say with that seemingly soft mouth,--'I have changed my mind,'--though she would look him dead in return if she could, still she must admire him." "Are you speaking of Silverbridge now?" "Of course I am speaking of Silverbridge. I suppose I ought to hide it all and not to tell you. But as you are the only person I do tell, you must put up with me. Yes;--when I taxed him with his falsehood,--for he had been false,--he answered me with those very words! 'I have changed my mind.' He could not lie. To speak the truth was a necessity to him, even at the expense of his gallantry, almost of his humanity." "Has he been false to you, Mabel?" "Of course he has. But there is nothing to quarrel about, if you mean that. People do not quarrel now about such things. A girl has to fight her own battle with her own pluck and her own wits. As with these weapons she is generally stronger than her enemy, she succeeds sometimes although everything else is against her. I think I am courageous, but his courage beat mine. I craned at the first fence. When he was willing to swallow my bait, my hand was not firm enough to strike the hook in his jaws. Had I not quailed then I think I should have--'had him'." "It is horrid to hear you talk like this." She was leaning over from her seat, looking, black as she was, so much older than her wont, with something about her of that unworldly serious thoughtfulness which a mourning garb always gives. And yet her words were so worldly, so unfeminine! "I have got to tell the truth to somebody. It was so, just as I have said. Of course I did not love him. How could I love him after what has passed? But there need have been nothing much in that. I don't suppose that Dukes' eldest sons often get married for love." "Miss Boncassen loves him." "I dare say the beggar's daughter loved King Cophetua. When you come to distances such as that, there can be love. The very fact that a man should have descended so far in quest of beauty,--the flattery of it alone,--will produce love. When the angels came after the daughters of men of course the daughters of men loved them. The distance between him and me is not great enough to have produced that sort of worship. There was no reason why Lady Mabel Grex should not be good enough wife for the son of the Duke of Omnium." "Certainly not." "And therefore I was not struck, as by the shining of a light from heaven. I cannot say I loved him. Frank,--I am beyond worshipping even an angel from heaven!" "Then I do not know that you could blame him," he said very seriously. "Just so;--and as I have chosen to be honest I have told him everything. But I had my revenge first." "I would have said nothing." "You would have recommended--delicacy! No doubt you think that women should be delicate, let them suffer what they may. A woman should not let it be known that she has any human nature in her. I had him on the hip, and for a moment I used my power. He had certainly done me a wrong. He had asked for my love,--and with the delicacy which you commend, I had not at once grasped at all that such a request conveyed. Then, as he told me so frankly, 'he changed his mind!' Did he not wrong me?" "He should not have raised false hopes." "He told me that--he had changed his mind. I think I loved him then as nearly as ever I did,--because he looked me full in the face. Then,--I told him I had never cared for him, and that he need have nothing on his conscience. But I doubt whether he was glad to hear it. Men are so vain! I have talked too much of myself. And so you are to be the Duke's son-in-law. And she will have hundreds of thousands." "Thousands perhaps, but I do not think very much about it. I feel that he will provide for her." "And that you, having secured her, can creep under his wing like an additional ducal chick. It is very comfortable. The Duke will be quite a Providence to you. I wonder that all young gentlemen do not marry heiresses;--it is so easy. And you have got your seat in Parliament too! Oh, your luck! When I look back upon it all it seems so hard to me! It was for you,--for you that I used to be anxious. Now it is I who have not an inch of ground to stand upon." Then he approached her and put out his hand to her. "No," she said, putting both her hands behind her back, "for God's sake let there be no tenderness. But is it not cruel? Think of my advantages at that moment when you and I agreed that our paths should be separate. My fortune then had not been made quite shipwreck by my father and brother. I had before me all that society could offer. I was called handsome and clever. Where was there a girl more likely to make her way to the top?" "You may do so still." "No;--no;--I cannot. And you at least should not tell me so. I did not know then the virulence of the malady which had fallen on me. I did not know then that, because of you, other men would be abhorrent to me. I thought that I was as easy-hearted as you have proved yourself." "How cruel you can be." "Have I done anything to interfere with you? Have I said a word even to that young lad, when I might have said a word? Yes; to him I did say something; but I waited, and would not say it, while a word could hurt you. Shall I tell you what I told him? Just everything that has ever happened between you and me." "You did?" "Yes;--because I saw that I could trust him. I told him because I wanted him to be quite sure that I had never loved him. But, Frank, I have put no spoke in your wheel. There has not been a moment since you told me of your love for this rich young lady in which I would not have helped you had help been in my power. Whomever I may have harmed, I have never harmed you." "Am I not as clear from blame towards you?" "No, Frank. You have done me the terrible evil of ceasing to love me." "It was at your own bidding." "Certainly! but if I were to bid you to cut my throat, would you do it?" "Was it not you who decided that we could not wait for each other?" "And should it not have been for you to decide that you would wait?" "You also would have married." "It almost angers me that you should not see the difference. A girl unless she marries becomes nothing, as I have become nothing now. A man does not want a pillar on which to lean. A man, when he has done as you had done with me, and made a girl's heart all his own, even though his own heart had been flexible and plastic as yours is, should have been true to her, at least for a while. Did it never occur to you that you owed something to me?" "I have always owed you very much." "There should have been some touch of chivalry if not of love to make you feel that a second passion should have been postponed for a year or two. You could wait without growing old. You might have allowed yourself a little space to dwell--I was going to say on the sweetness of your memories. But they were not sweet, Frank; they were not sweet to you." "These rebukes, Mabel, will rob them of their sweetness,--for a time." "It is gone; all gone," she said, shaking her head,--"gone from me because I have been so easily deserted; gone from you because the change has been so easy to you. How long was it, Frank, after you had left me before you were basking happily in the smiles of Lady Mary Palliser?" "It was not very long, as months go." "Say days, Frank." "I have to defend myself, and I will do so with truth. It was not very long,--as months go; but why should it have been less long, whether for months or days? I had to cure myself of a wound." "To put a plaster on a scratch, Frank." "And the sooner a man can do that the more manly he is. Is it a sign of strength to wail under a sorrow that cannot be cured,--or of truth to perpetuate the appearance of a woe?" "Has it been an appearance with me?" "I am speaking of myself now. I am driven to speak of myself by the bitterness of your words. It was you who decided." "You accepted my decision easily." "Because it was based not only on my unfitness for such a marriage, but on yours. When I saw that there would be perhaps some years of misery for you, of course I accepted your decision. The sweetness had been very sweet to me." "Oh Frank, was it ever sweet to you?" "And the triumph of it had been very great. I had been assured of the love of her who among all the high ones of the world seemed to me to be the highest. Then came your decision. Do you really believe that I could abandon the sweetness, that I could be robbed of my triumph, that I could think I could never again be allowed to put my arm round your waist, never again to feel your cheek close to mine, that I should lose all that had seemed left to me among the gods, without feeling it?" "Frank, Frank!" she said, rising to her feet, and stretching out her hands as though she were going to give him back all these joys. "Of course I felt it. I did not then know what was before me." When he said this she sank back immediately upon her seat. "I was wretched enough. I had lost a limb and could not walk; my eyes, and must always hereafter be blind; my fitness to be among men, and must always hereafter be secluded. It is so that a man is stricken down when some terrible trouble comes upon him. But it is given to him to retrick his beams." "You have retricked yours." "Yes;--and the strong man will show his strength by doing it quickly. Mabel, I sorrowed for myself greatly when that word was spoken, partly because I thought that your love could so easily be taken from me. And, since I have found that it has not been so, I have sorrowed for you also. But I do not blame myself, and--and I will not submit to have blame even from you." She stared him in the face as he said this. "A man should never submit to blame." "But if he has deserved it?" "Who is to be the judge? But why should we contest this? You do not really wish to trample on me!" "No;--not that." "Nor to disgrace me; nor to make me feel myself disgraced in my own judgment?" Then there was a pause for some moments as though he had left her without another word to say. "Shall I go now?" he asked. "Oh Frank!" "I fear that my presence only makes you unhappy." "Then what will your absence do? When shall I see you again? But, no; I will not see you again. Not for many days,--not for years. Why should I? Frank, is it wicked that I should love you?" He could only shake his head in answer to this. "If it be so wicked that I must be punished for it eternally, still I love you. I can never, never, never love another. You cannot understand it. Oh God,--that I had never understood it myself! I think, I think, that I would go with you now anywhere, facing all misery, all judgments, all disgrace. You know, do you not, that if it were possible, I should not say so. But as I know that you would not stir a step with me, I do say so." "I know it is not meant." "It is meant, though it could not be done. Frank, I must not see her, not for awhile; not for years. I do not wish to hate her, but how can I help it? Do you remember when she flew into your arms in this room?" "I remember it." "Of course you do. It is your great joy now to remember that, and such like. She must be very good! Though I hate her!" "Do not say that you hate her, Mabel." "Though I hate her she must be good. It was a fine and a brave thing to do. I have done it; but never before the world like that; have I, Frank? Oh, Frank, I shall never do it again. Go now, and do not touch me. Let us both pray that in ten years we may meet as passionless friends." He came to her hardly knowing what he meant, but purposing, as though by instinct, to take her hand as he parted from her. But she, putting both her hands before her face, and throwing herself on to the sofa, buried her head among the cushions. "Is there not to be another word?" he said. Lying as she did, she still was able to make a movement of dissent, and he left her, muttering just one word between his teeth, "Mabel, good-bye." CHAPTER LXXVIII The Duke Returns to Office That farewell took place on the Friday morning. Tregear as he walked out of the Square knew now that he had been the cause of a great shipwreck. At first when that passionate love had been declared,--he could hardly remember whether with the fullest passion by him or by her,--he had been as a god walking upon air. That she who seemed to be so much above him should have owned that she was all his own seemed then to be world enough for him. For a few weeks he lived a hero to himself, and was able to tell himself that for him the glory of a passion was sufficient. In those halcyon moments no common human care is allowed to intrude itself. To one who has thus entered in upon the heroism of romance his own daily work, his dinners, clothes, income, father and mother, sisters and brothers, his own street and house are nothing. Hunting, shooting, rowing, Alpine-climbing, even speeches in Parliament,--if they perchance have been attained to,--all become leather or prunella. The heavens have been opened to him, and he walks among them like a god. So it had been with Tregear. Then had come the second phase of his passion,--which is also not uncommon to young men who soar high in their first assaults. He was told that it would not do; and was not so told by a hard-hearted parent, but by the young lady herself. And she had spoken so reasonably, that he had yielded, and had walked away with that sudden feeling of a vile return to his own mean belongings, to his lodgings, and his income, which not a few ambitious young men have experienced. But she had convinced him. Then had come the journey to Italy, and the reader knows all the rest. He certainly had not derogated in transferring his affections,--but it may be doubted whether in his second love he had walked among the stars as in the first. A man can hardly mount twice among the stars. But he had been as eager,--and as true. And he had succeeded, without any flaw on his conscience. It had been agreed, when that first disruption took place, that he and Mabel should be friends; and, as to a friend, he had told her of his hopes. When first she had mingled something of sarcasm with her congratulations, though it had annoyed him, it had hardly made him unhappy. When she called him Romeo and spoke of herself as Rosaline, he took her remark as indicating some petulance rather than an enduring love. That had been womanly and he could forgive it. He had his other great and solid happiness to support him. Then he had believed that she would soon marry, if not Silverbridge, then some other fitting young nobleman, and that all would be well. But now things were very far from well. The storm which was now howling round her afflicted him much. Perhaps the bitterest feeling of all was that her love should have been so much stronger, so much more enduring than his own. He could not but remember how in his first agony he had blamed her because she had declared that they should be severed. He had then told himself that such severing would be to him impossible, and that had her nature been as high as his, it would have been as impossible to her. Which nature must he now regard as the higher? She had done her best to rid herself of the load of her passion and had failed. But he had freed himself with convenient haste. All that he had said as to the manliness of conquering grief had been wise enough. But still he could not quit himself of some feeling of disgrace in that he had changed and she had not. He tried to comfort himself with reflecting that Mary was all his own,--that in that matter he had been victorious and happy;--but for an hour or two he thought more of Mabel than of Mary. When the time came in which he could employ himself he called for Silverbridge, and they walked together across the park to Westminster. Silverbridge was gay and full of eagerness as to the coming ministerial statement, but Tregear could not turn his mind from the work of the morning. "I don't seem to care very much about it," he said at last. "I do care very much," said Silverbridge. "What difference will it make?" "I breakfasted with the governor this morning, and I have not seen him in such good spirits since--, well, for a long time." The date to which Silverbridge would have referred, had he not checked himself, was that of the evening on which it had been agreed between him and his father that Mabel Grex should be promoted to the seat of highest honour in the house of Palliser,--but that was a matter which must henceforward be buried in silence. "He did not say as much, but I feel perfectly sure that he and Mr. Monk have arranged a new government." "I don't see any matter for joy in that to Conservatives like you and me." "He is my father,--and as he is going to be your father-in-law I should have thought that you might have been pleased." "Oh, yes;--if he likes it. But I have heard so often of the crushing cares of office, and I had thought that of all living men he had been the most crushed by them." All that had to be done in the House of Commons on that afternoon was finished before five o'clock. By half-past five the House, and all the purlieus of the House, were deserted. And yet at four, immediately after prayers, there had been such a crowd that members had been unable to find seats! Tregear and Silverbridge having been early had succeeded, but those who had been less careful were obliged to listen as best they could in the galleries. The stretching out of necks and the holding of hands behind the ears did not last long. Sir Timothy had not had much to say, but what he did say was spoken with a dignity which seemed to anticipate future exaltation rather than present downfall. There had arisen a question in regard to revenue,--he need hardly tell them that it was that question in reference to brewers' licences to which the honourable gentleman opposite had alluded on the previous day,--as to which unfortunately he was not in accord with his noble friend the Prime Minister. Under the circumstances it was hardly possible that they should at once proceed to business, and he therefore moved that the House should stand adjourned till Tuesday next. That was the whole statement. Not very long afterwards the Prime Minister made another statement in the House of Lords. As the Chancellor of the Exchequer had very suddenly resigned and had thereby broken up the Ministry, he had found himself compelled to place his resignation in the hands of her Majesty. Then that House was also adjourned. On that afternoon all the clubs were alive with admiration at the great cleverness displayed by Sir Timothy in this transaction. It was not only that he had succeeded in breaking up the Ministry, and that he had done this without incurring violent disgrace; but he had so done it as to throw all the reproach upon his late unfortunate colleague. It was thus that Mr. Lupton explained it. Sir Timothy had been at the pains to ascertain on what matters connected with the Revenue, Lord Drummond,--or Lord Drummond's closest advisers,--had opinions of their own, opinions strong enough not to be abandoned; and having discovered that, he also discovered arguments on which to found an exactly contrary opinion. But as the Revenue had been entrusted specially to his unworthy hands, he was entitled to his own opinion on this matter. "The majority of the House," said Mr. Lupton, "and the entire public, will no doubt give him credit for great self-abnegation." All this happened on the Friday. During the Saturday it was considered probable that the Cabinet would come to terms with itself, and that internal wounds would be healed. The general opinion was that Lord Drummond would give way. But on the Sunday morning it was understood that Lord Drummond would not yield. It was reported that Lord Drummond was willing to purchase his separation from Sir Timothy even at the expense of his office. That Sir Timothy should give way seemed to be impossible. Had he done so it would have been impossible for him to recover the respect of the House. Then it was rumoured that two or three others had gone with Sir Timothy. And on Monday morning it was proclaimed that the Prime Minister was not in a condition to withdraw his resignation. On the Tuesday the House met and Mr. Monk announced, still from the Opposition benches, that he had that morning been with the Queen. Then there was another adjournment, and all the Liberals knew that the gates of Paradise were again about to be opened to them. This is only interesting to us as affecting the happiness and character of our Duke. He had consented to assist Mr. Monk in forming a government, and to take office under Mr. Monk's leadership. He had had many contests with himself before he could bring himself to this submission. He knew that if anything could once again make him contented it would be work; he knew that if he could serve his country it was his duty to serve it; and he knew also that it was only by the adhesion of such men as himself that the traditions of his party could be maintained. But he had been Prime Minister,--and he was sure he could never be Prime Minister again. There are in all matters certain little, almost hidden, signs, by which we can measure within our own bosoms the extent of our successes and our failures. Our Duke's friends had told him that his Ministry had been serviceable to the country; but no one had ever suggested to him that he would again be asked to fill the place which he had filled. He had stopped a gap. He would beforehand have declared himself willing to serve his country even in this way; but having done so,--having done that and no more than that,--he felt that he had failed. He had in his soreness declared to himself that he would never more take office. He had much to do to overcome this promise to himself;--but when he had brought himself to submit, he was certainly a happier man. There was no going to see the Queen. That on the present occasion was done simply by Mr. Monk. But on the Wednesday morning his name appeared in the list of the new Cabinet as President of the Council. He was perhaps a little fidgety, a little too anxious to employ himself and to be employed, a little too desirous of immediate work;--but still he was happy and gracious to those around him. "I suppose you like that particular office," Silverbridge said to him. "Well; yes;--not best of all, you know," and he smiled as he made this admission. "You mean Prime Minister?" "No, indeed I don't. I am inclined to think that the Premier should always sit in your House. No, Silverbridge. If I could have my way,--which is of course impossible, for I cannot put off my honours,--I would return to my old place. I would return to the Exchequer where the work is hard and certain, where a man can do, or at any rate attempt to do, some special thing. A man there if he sticks to that and does not travel beyond it, need not be popular, need not be a partisan, need not be eloquent, need not be a courtier. He should understand his profession, as should a lawyer or a doctor. If he does that thoroughly he can serve his country without recourse to that parliamentary strategy for which I know that I am unfit." "You can't do that in the House of Lords, sir." "No; no. I wish the title could have passed over my head, Silverbridge, and gone to you at once. I think we both should have been suited better. But there are things which one should not consider. Even in this place I may perhaps do something. Shall you attack us very bitterly?" "I am the only man who does not mean to make any change." "How so?" "I shall stay where I am,--on the Government side of the House." "Are you clear about that, my boy?" "Quite clear." "Such changes should not be made without very much consideration." "I have already written to them at Silverbridge and have had three or four answers. Mr. De Boung says that the borough is more than grateful. Mr. Sprout regrets it much, and suggests a few months' consideration. Mr. Sprugeon seems to think it does not signify." "That is hardly complimentary." "No,--not to me. But he is very civil to the family. As long as a Palliser represents the borough, Mr. Sprugeon thinks that it does not matter much on which side he may sit. I have had my little vagary, and I don't think that I shall change again." "I suppose it is your republican bride-elect that has done that," said the Duke, laughing. CHAPTER LXXIX The First Wedding As Easter Sunday fell on the 17th April, and as the arrangement of the new Cabinet, with its inferior offices, was not completed till the 6th of that month, there was only just time for the new elections before the holidays. Mr. Monk sat on his bench so comfortably that he hardly seemed ever to have been off it. And Phineas Finn resumed the peculiar ministerial tone of voice just as though he had never allowed himself to use the free and indignant strains of opposition. As to a majority,--nothing as yet was known about that. Some few besides Silverbridge might probably transfer themselves to the Government. None of the ministers lost their seats at the new elections. The opposite party seemed for a while to have been paralysed by the defection of Sir Timothy, and men who liked a quiet life were able to comfort themselves with the reflection that nothing could be done this Session. For our lovers this was convenient. Neither of them would have allowed their parliamentary energies to have interfered at such a crisis with his domestic affairs; but still it was well to have time at command. The day for the marriage of Isabel and Silverbridge had been now fixed. That was to take place on the Wednesday after Easter, and was to be celebrated by special royal favour in the chapel at Whitehall. All the Pallisers would be there, and all the relations of all the Pallisers, all the ambassadors, and of course all the Americans in London. It would be a "wretched grind," as Silverbridge said, but it had to be done. In the meantime the whole party, including the new President of the Council, were down at Matching. Even Isabel, though it must be presumed that she had much to do in looking after her bridal garments, was able to be there for a day or two. But Tregear was the person to whom this visit was of the greatest importance. He had been allowed to see Lady Mary in London, but hardly to do more than see her. With her he had been alone for about five minutes, and then cruel circumstances,--circumstances, however, which were not permanently cruel,--had separated them. All their great difficulties had been settled, and no doubt they were happy. Tregear, though he had been as it were received into grace by that glass of wine, still had not entered into the intimacies of the house. This he felt himself. He had been told that he had better restrain himself from writing to Mary, and he had restrained himself. He had therefore no immediate opportunity of creeping into that perfect intimacy with the house and household which is generally accorded to a promised son-in-law. On this occasion he travelled down alone, and as he approached the house he, who was not by nature timid, felt himself to be somewhat cowed. That the Duke should not be cold to him was almost impossible. Of course he was there in opposition to the Duke's wishes. Even Silverbridge had never quite liked the match. Of course he was to have all that he desired. Of course he was the most fortunate of men. Of course no man had ever stronger reason to be contented with the girl he loved. But still his heart was a little low as he was driven up to the door. The first person whom he saw was the Duke himself, who, as the fly from the station arrived, was returning from his walk. "You are welcome to Matching," he said, taking off his hat with something of ceremony. This was said before the servants, but Tregear was then led into the study and the door was closed. "I never do anything by halves, Mr. Tregear," he said. "Since it is to be so you shall be the same to me as though you had come under other auspices. Of yourself personally I hear all that is good. Consider yourself at home here, and in all things use me as your friend." Tregear endeavoured to make some reply, but could not find words that were fitting. "I think that the young people are out," continued the Duke. "Mr. Warburton will help you to find them if you like to go upon the search." The words had been very gracious, but still there was something in the manner of the man which made Tregear find it almost impossible to regard him as he might have regarded another father-in-law. He had often heard the Duke spoken of as a man who could become awful if he pleased, almost without an effort. He had been told of the man's mingled simplicity, courtesy, and self-assertion against which no impudence or raillery could prevail. And now he seemed to understand it. He was not driven to go under the private secretary's escort in quest of the young people. Mary had understood her business much better than that. "If you please, sir, Lady Mary is in the little drawing-room," said a well-arrayed young girl to him as soon as the Duke's door was closed. This was Lady Mary's own maid who had been on the look-out for the fly. Lady Mary had known all details, as to the arrival of the trains and the length of the journey from the station, and had not been walking with the other young people when the Duke had intercepted her lover. Even that delay she had thought was hard. The discreet maid opened the door of the little drawing-room,--and discreetly closed it instantly. "At last!" she said, throwing herself into his arms. "Yes,--at last." On this occasion time did not envy them. The long afternoons of spring had come, and as Tregear had reached the house between four and five they were able to go out together before the sun set. "No," she said when he came to inquire as to her life during the last twelve months; "you had not much to be afraid of as to my forgetting." "But when everything was against me?" "One thing was not against you. You ought to have been sure of that." "And so I was. And yet I felt that I ought not to have been sure. Sometimes, in my solitude, I used to think that I myself had been wrong. I began to doubt whether under any circumstances I could have been justified in asking your father's daughter to be my wife." "Because of his rank?" "Not so much his rank as his money." "Ought that to be considered?" "A poor man who marries a rich woman will always be suspected." "Because people are so mean and poor-spirited; and because they think that money is more than anything else. It should be nothing at all in such matters. I don't know how it can be anything. They have been saying that to me all along,--as though one were to stop to think whether one was rich or poor." Tregear, when this was said, could not but remember that at a time not very much prior to that at which Mary had not stopped to think, neither for a while had he and Mabel. "I suppose it was worse for me than for you," she added. "I hope not." "But it was, Frank; and therefore I ought to have it made up to me now. It was very bad to be alone here, particularly when I felt that papa always looked at me as though I were a sinner. He did not mean it, but he could not help looking at me like that. And there was nobody to whom I could say a word." "It was pretty much the same with me." "Yes; but you were not offending a father who could not keep himself from looking reproaches at you. I was like a boy at school who had been put into Coventry. And then they sent me to Lady Cantrip!" "Was that very bad?" "I do believe that if I were a young woman with a well-ordered mind, I should feel myself very much indebted to Lady Cantrip. She had a terrible task of it. But I could not teach myself to like her. I believe she knew all through that I should get my way at last." "That ought to have made you friends." "But yet she tried everything she could. And when I told her about that meeting up at Lord Grex's, she was so shocked! Do you remember that?" "Do I remember it!" "Were not you shocked?" This question was not to be answered by any word. "I was," she continued. "It was an awful thing to do; but I was determined to show them all that I was in earnest. Do you remember how Miss Cassewary looked?" "Miss Cassewary knew all about it." "I daresay she did. And so I suppose did Mabel Grex. I had thought that perhaps I might make Mabel a confidante, but--" Then she looked up into his face. "But what?" "You like Mabel, do you not? I do." "I like her very, very much." "Perhaps you have liked her too well for that, eh, Frank?" "Too well for what?" "That she should have heard all that I had to say about you with sympathy. If so, I am so sorry." "You need not fear that I have ever for a moment been untrue either to her or you." "I am sure you have not to me. Poor Mabel! Then they took me to Custins. That was worst of all. I cannot quite tell you what happened there." Of course he asked her,--but, as she had said, she could not quite tell him about Lord Popplecourt. The next morning the Duke asked his guest in a playful tone what was his Christian name. It could hardly be that he should not have known, but yet he asked the question. "Francis Oliphant," said Tregear. "Those are two Christian names I suppose, but what do they call you at home?" "Frank," whispered Mary, who was with them. "Then I will call you Frank, if you will allow me. The use of Christian names is, I think, pleasant and hardly common enough among us. I almost forget my own boy's name because the practice has grown up of calling him by a title." "I am going to call him Abraham," said Isabel. "Abraham is a good name, only I do not think he got it from his godfathers and godmothers." "Who can call a man Plantagenet? I should as soon think of calling my father-in-law Coeur de Lion." "So he is," said Mary. Whereupon the Duke kissed the two girls and went his way,--showing that by this time he had adopted the one and the proposed husband of the other into his heart. The day before the Duke started for London to be present at the grand marriage he sent for Frank. "I suppose," said he, "that you would wish that some time should be fixed for your own marriage." To this the accepted suitor of course assented. "But before we can do that something must be settled about--money." Tregear when he heard this became hot all over, and felt that he could not restrain his blushes. Such must be the feeling of a man when he finds himself compelled to own to a girl's father that he intends to live upon her money and not upon his own. "I do not like to be troublesome," continued the Duke, "or to ask questions which might seem to be impertinent." "Oh no! Of course I feel my position. I can only say that it was not because your daughter might probably have money that I first sought her love." "It shall be so received. And now-- But perhaps it will be best that you should arrange all this with my man of business. Mr. Moreton shall be instructed. Mr. Moreton lives near my place in Barsetshire, but is now in London. If you will call on him he shall tell you what I would suggest. I hope you will find that your affairs will be comfortable. And now as to the time." Isabel's wedding was declared by the newspapers to have been one of the most brilliant remembered in the metropolis. There were six bridesmaids, of whom of course Mary was one,--and of whom poor Lady Mabel Grex was equally of course not another. Poor Lady Mabel was at this time with Miss Cassewary at Grex, paying what she believed would be a last visit to the old family home. Among the others were two American girls, brought into that august society for the sake of courtesy rather than of personal love. And there were two other Palliser girls and a Scotch McCloskie cousin. The breakfast was of course given by Mr. Boncassen at his house in Brook Street, where the bridal presents were displayed. And not only were they displayed; but a list of them, with an approximating statement as to their value, appeared in one or two of the next day's newspapers;--as to which terrible sin against good taste neither was Mr. or Mrs. Boncassen guilty. But in these days, in which such splendid things were done on so very splendid a scale, a young lady cannot herself lay out her friends' gifts so as to be properly seen by her friends. Some well-skilled, well-paid hand is needed even for that, and hence comes this public information on affairs which should surely be private. In our grandmothers' time the happy bride's happy mother herself compounded the cake;--or at any rate the trusted housekeeper. But we all know that terrible tower of silver which now stands niddle-noddling with its appendages of flags and spears on the modern wedding breakfast-table. It will come to pass with some of us soon that we must deny ourselves the pleasure of having young friends, because their marriage presents are so costly. Poor Mrs. Boncassen had not perhaps a happy time with her august guests on that morning; but when she retired to give Isabel her last kiss in privacy she did feel proud to think that her daughter would some day be an English Duchess. CHAPTER LXXX The Second Wedding November is not altogether an hymeneal month, but it was not till November that Lady Mary Palliser became the wife of Frank Tregear. It was postponed a little, perhaps, in order that the Silverbridges,--as they were now called,--might be present. The Silverbridges, who were now quite Darby and Joan, had gone to the States when the Session had been brought to a close early in August, and had remained there nearly three months. Isabel had taken infinite pleasure in showing her English husband to her American friends, and the American friends had no doubt taken a pride in seeing so glorious a British husband in the hands of an American wife. Everything was new to Silverbridge, and he was happy in his new possession. She too enjoyed it infinitely, and so it happened that they had been unwilling to curtail their sojourn. But in November they had to return, because Mary had declared that her marriage should be postponed till it could be graced by the presence of her elder brother. The marriage of Silverbridge had been August. There had been a manifest intention that it should be so. Nobody knew with whom this originated. Mrs. Boncassen had probably been told that it ought to be so, and Mr. Boncassen had been willing to pay the bill. External forces had perhaps operated. The Duke had simply been passive and obedient. There had however been a general feeling that the bride of the heir of the house of Omnium should be produced to the world amidst a blare of trumpets and a glare of torches. So it had been. But both the Duke and Mary were determined that this other wedding should be different. It was to take place at Matching, and none would be present but they who were staying in the house, or who lived around,--such as tenants and dependants. Four clergymen united their forces to tie Isabel to her husband, one of whom was a bishop, one a canon, and the two others royal chaplains; but there was only to be the Vicar of the parish at Matching. And indeed there were no guests in the house except the two bridesmaids and Mr. and Mrs. Finn. As to Mrs. Finn, Mary had made a request, and then the Duke had suggested that the husband should be asked to accompany his wife. It was very pretty. The church itself is pretty, standing in the park, close to the ruins of the old Priory, not above three hundred yards from the house. And they all walked, taking the broad pathway through the ruins, going under that figure of Sir Guy which Silverbridge had pointed out to Isabel when they had been whispering there together. The Duke led the way with his girl upon his arm. The two bridesmaids followed. Then Silverbridge and his wife, with Phineas and his wife. Gerald and the bridegroom accompanied them, belonging as it were to the same party! It was very rustic;--almost improper! "This is altogether wrong, you know," said Gerald. "You should appear coming from some other part of the world, as if you were almost unexpected. You ought not to have been in the house at all, and certainly should have gone under some disguise." There had been rich presents too on this occasion, but they were shown to none except to Mrs. Finn and the bridesmaids,--and perhaps to the favoured servants in the house. At any rate there was nothing said of them in the newspapers. One present there was,--given not to the bride but to the bridegroom,--which he showed to no one except to her. This came to him only on the morning of his marriage, and the envelope containing it bore the postmark of Sedbergh. He knew the handwriting well before he opened the parcel. It contained a small signet-ring with his crest, and with it there were but a few words written on a scrap of paper. "I pray that you may be happy. This was to have been given to you long ago, but I kept it back because of that decision." He showed the ring to Mary and told her it had come from Lady Mabel;--but the scrap of paper no one saw but himself. Perhaps the matter most remarkable in the wedding was the hilarity of the Duke. One who did not know him well might have said that he was a man with few cares, and who now took special joy in the happiness of his children,--who was thoroughly contented to see them marry after their own hearts. And yet, as he stood there on the altar-steps giving his daughter to that new son and looking first at his girl, and then at his married son, he was reminding himself of all that he had suffered. After the breakfast,--which was by no means a grand repast and at which the cake did not look so like an ill-soldered silver castle as that other construction had done,--the happy couple were sent away in a modest chariot to the railway station, and not above half-a-dozen slippers were thrown after them. There were enough for luck,--or perhaps there might have been luck even without them, for the wife thoroughly respected her husband, as did the husband his wife. Mrs. Finn, when she was alone with Phineas, said a word or two about Frank Tregear. "When she first told me of her engagement I did not think it possible that she should marry him. But after he had been with me I felt sure that he would succeed." "Well, sir," said Silverbridge to the Duke when they were out together in the park that afternoon, "what do you think about him?" "I think he is a manly young man." "He is certainly that. And then he knows things and understands them. It was never a surprise to me that Mary should have been so fond of him." "I do not know that one ought to be surprised at anything. Perhaps what surprised me most was that he should have looked so high. There seemed to be so little to justify it. But now I will accept that as courage which I before regarded as arrogance." 
2158	----	and revised by Joseph E. Loewenstein, M.D. THE PRIME MINISTER by ANTHONY TROLLOPE First published in monthly installments in 1875 and 1876 and in book form in 1876 CONTENTS VOLUME I I. Ferdinand Lopez II. Everett Wharton III. Mr. Abel Wharton, Q.C. IV. Mrs. Roby V. "No One Knows Anything About Him" VI. An Old Friend Goes to Windsor VII. Another Old Friend VIII. The Beginning of a New Career IX. Mrs. Dick's Dinner Party.--No. I X. Mrs. Dick's Dinner Party.--No. II XI. Carlton Terrace XII. The Gathering of Clouds XIII. Mr. Wharton Complains XIV. A Lover's Perseverance XV. Arthur Fletcher XVI. Never Run Away! XVII. Good-Bye XVIII. The Duke of Omnium Thinks of Himself XIX. Vulgarity XX. Sir Orlando's Policy XXI. The Duchess's New Swan XXII. St. James's Park XXIII. Surrender XXIV. The Marriage XXV. The Beginning of the Honeymoon XXVI. The End of the Honeymoon XXVII. The Duke's Misery XXVIII. The Duchess Is Much Troubled XXIX. The Two Candidates for Silverbridge XXX. "Yes;--a Lie!" XXXI. "Yes;--with a Horsewhip in My Hand" XXXII. "What Business Is It of Yours?" XXXIII. Showing That a Man Should Not Howl XXXIV. The Silverbridge Election XXXV. Lopez Back in London XXXVI. The Jolly Blackbird XXXVII. The Horns XXXVIII. Sir Orlando Retires XXXIX. "Get Round Him" XL. "Come and Try It" VOLUME II XLI. The Value of a Thick Skin XLII. Retribution XLIII. Kauri Gum XLIV. Mr. Wharton Intends to Make a New Will XLV. Mrs. Sexty Parker XLVI. "He Wants to Get Rich Too Quick" XLVII. As for Love! XLVIII. "Has He Ill-treated You?" XLIX. "Where Is Guatemala?" L. Mr. Slide's Revenge LI. Coddling the Prime Minister LII. "I Can Sleep Here To-night, I Suppose?" LIII. Mr. Hartlepod LIV. Lizzie LV. Mrs. Parker's Sorrows LVI. What the Duchess Thought of Her Husband LVII. The Explanation LVIII. "Quite Settled" LIX. "The First and the Last" LX. The Tenway Junction LXI. The Widow and Her Friends LXII. Phineas Finn Has a Book to Read LXIII. The Duchess and Her Friend LXIV. The New K.G. LXV. "There Must Be Time" LXVI. The End of the Session LXVII. Mrs. Lopez Prepares to Move LXVIII. The Prime Minister's Political Creed LXIX. Mrs. Parker's Fate LXX. At Wharton LXXI. The Ladies at Longbarns Doubt LXXII. "He Thinks That Our Days Are Numbered" LXXIII. Only the Duke of Omnium LXXIV. "I Am Disgraced and Shamed" LXXV. The Great Wharton Alliance LXXVI. Who Will It Be? LXXVII. The Duchess in Manchester Square LXXVIII. The New Ministry LXXIX. The Wharton Wedding LXXX. The Last Meeting at Matching VOLUME I CHAPTER I Ferdinand Lopez It is certainly of service to a man to know who were his grandfathers and who were his grandmothers if he entertain an ambition to move in the upper circles of society, and also of service to be able to speak of them as of persons who were themselves somebodies in their time. No doubt we all entertain great respect for those who by their own energies have raised themselves in the world; and when we hear that the son of a washerwoman has become Lord Chancellor or Archbishop of Canterbury we do, theoretically and abstractedly, feel a higher reverence for such self-made magnate than for one who has been as it were born into forensic or ecclesiastical purple. But not the less must the offspring of the washerwoman have had very much trouble on the subject of his birth, unless he has been, when young as well as when old, a very great man indeed. After the goal has been absolutely reached, and the honour and the titles and the wealth actually won, a man may talk with some humour, even with some affection, of the maternal tub;--but while the struggle is going on, with the conviction strong upon the struggler that he cannot be altogether successful unless he be esteemed a gentleman, not to be ashamed, not to conceal the old family circumstances, not at any rate to be silent, is difficult. And the difficulty is certainly not less if fortunate circumstances rather than hard work and intrinsic merit have raised above his natural place an aspirant to high social position. Can it be expected that such a one when dining with a duchess shall speak of his father's small shop, or bring into the light of day his grandfather's cobbler's awl? And yet it is difficult to be altogether silent! It may not be necessary for any of us to be always talking of our own parentage. We may be generally reticent as to our uncles and aunts, and may drop even our brothers and sisters in our ordinary conversation. But if a man never mentions his belongings among those with whom he lives, he becomes mysterious, and almost open to suspicion. It begins to be known that nobody knows anything of such a man, and even friends become afraid. It is certainly convenient to be able to allude, if it be but once in a year, to some blood relation. Ferdinand Lopez, who in other respects had much in his circumstances on which to congratulate himself, suffered trouble in his mind respecting his ancestors such as I have endeavoured to describe. He did not know very much himself, but what little he did know he kept altogether to himself. He had no father or mother, no uncle, aunt, brother or sister, no cousin even whom he could mention in a cursory way to his dearest friend. He suffered, no doubt;--but with Spartan consistency he so hid his trouble from the world that no one knew that he suffered. Those with whom he lived, and who speculated often and wondered much as to who he was, never dreamed that the silent man's reticence was a burden to himself. At no special conjuncture of his life, at no period which could be marked with the finger of the observer, did he glaringly abstain from any statement which at the moment might be natural. He never hesitated, blushed, or palpably laboured at concealment; but the fact remained that though a great many men and not a few women knew Ferdinand Lopez very well, none of them knew whence he had come, or what was his family. He was a man, however, naturally reticent, who never alluded to his own affairs unless in pursuit of some object the way to which was clear before his eyes. Silence therefore on a matter which is common in the mouths of most men was less difficult to him than to another, and the result less embarrassing. Dear old Jones, who tells his friends at the club of every pound that he loses or wins at the races, who boasts of Mary's favours and mourns over Lucy's coldness almost in public, who issues bulletins on the state of his purse, his stomach, his stable, and his debts, could not with any amount of care keep from us the fact that his father was an attorney's clerk, and made his first money by discounting small bills. Everybody knows it, and Jones, who likes popularity, grieves at the unfortunate publicity. But Jones is relieved from a burden which would have broken his poor shoulders, and which even Ferdinand Lopez, who is a strong man, often finds it hard to bear without wincing. It was admitted on all sides that Ferdinand Lopez was a "gentleman." Johnson says that any other derivation of this difficult word than that which causes it to signify "a man of ancestry" is whimsical. There are many, who in defining the term for their own use, still adhere to Johnson's dictum;--but they adhere to it with certain unexpressed allowances for possible exceptions. The chances are very much in favour of the well-born man, but exceptions may exist. It was not generally believed that Ferdinand Lopez was well born;--but he was a gentleman. And this most precious rank was acceded to him although he was employed,--or at least had been employed,--on business which does not of itself give such a warrant of position as is supposed to be afforded by the bar and the church, by the military services and by physic. He had been on the Stock Exchange, and still in some manner, not clearly understood by his friends, did business in the City. At the time with which we are now concerned Ferdinand Lopez was thirty-three years old, and as he had begun life early he had been long before the world. It was known of him that he had been at a good English private school, and it was reported, on the solitary evidence of one who had there been his schoolfellow, that a rumour was current in the school that his school bills were paid by an old gentleman who was not related to him. Thence at the age of seventeen he had been sent to a German University, and at the age of twenty-one had appeared in London, in a stockbroker's office, where he was soon known as an accomplished linguist, and as a very clever fellow,--precocious, not given to many pleasures, apt for work, but hardly trustworthy by employers, not as being dishonest, but as having a taste for being a master rather than a servant. Indeed his period of servitude was very short. It was not in his nature to be active on behalf of others. He was soon active for himself, and at one time it was supposed that he was making a fortune. Then it was known that he had left his regular business, and it was supposed that he had lost all that he had ever made or had ever possessed. But nobody, not even his own bankers or his own lawyer,--not even the old woman who looked after his linen,--ever really knew the state of his affairs. He was certainly a handsome man,--his beauty being of a sort which men are apt to deny and women to admit lavishly. He was nearly six feet tall, very dark, and very thin, with regular, well-cut features indicating little to the physiognomist unless it be the great gift of self-possession. His hair was cut short, and he wore no beard beyond an absolutely black moustache. His teeth were perfect in form and whiteness,--a characteristic which, though it may be a valued item in a general catalogue of personal attraction, does not generally recommend a man to the unconscious judgment of his acquaintance. But about the mouth and chin of this man there was a something of softness, perhaps in the play of the lips, perhaps in the dimple, which in some degree lessened the feeling of hardness which was produced by the square brow and bold, unflinching, combative eyes. They who knew him and liked him were reconciled by the lower face. The greater number who knew him and did not like him felt and resented,--even though in nine cases out of ten they might express no resentment even to themselves,--the pugnacity of his steady glance. For he was essentially one of those men who are always, in the inner workings of their minds, defending themselves and attacking others. He could not give a penny to a woman at a crossing without a look which argued at full length her injustice in making her demand, and his freedom from all liability let him walk the crossing as often as he might. He could not seat himself in a railway carriage without a lesson to his opposite neighbour that in all the mutual affairs of travelling, arrangement of feet, disposition of bags, and opening of windows, it would be that neighbour's duty to submit and his to exact. It was, however, for the spirit rather than for the thing itself that he combatted. The woman with the broom got her penny. The opposite gentleman when once by a glance he had expressed submission was allowed his own way with his legs and with the window. I would not say that Ferdinand Lopez was prone to do ill-natured things; but he was imperious, and he had learned to carry his empire in his eye. The reader must submit to be told one or two further and still smaller details respecting the man, and then the man shall be allowed to make his own way. No one of those around him knew how much care he took to dress himself well, or how careful he was that no one should know it. His very tailor regarded him as being simply extravagant in the number of his coats and trousers, and his friends looked upon him as one of those fortunate beings to whose nature belongs a facility of being well dressed, or almost an impossibility of being ill dressed. We all know the man,--a little man generally who moves seldom and softly,--who looks always as though he had just been sent home in a bandbox. Ferdinand Lopez was not a little man, and moved freely enough; but never, at any moment,--going into the city or coming out of it, on horseback or on foot, at home over his book or after the mazes of the dance,--was he dressed otherwise than with perfect care. Money and time did it, but folk thought that it grew with him, as did his hair and his nails. And he always rode a horse which charmed good judges of what a park nag should be;--not a prancing, restless, giggling, sideway-going, useless garran, but an animal well made, well bitted, with perfect paces, on whom a rider if it pleased him could be as quiet as a statue on a monument. It often did please Ferdinand Lopez to be quiet on horseback; and yet he did not look like a statue, for it was acknowledged through all London that he was a good horseman. He lived luxuriously too,--though whether at his ease or not nobody knew,--for he kept a brougham of his own, and during the hunting season he had two horses down at Leighton. There had once been a belief abroad that he was ruined, but they who interest themselves in such matters had found out,--or at any rate believed that they had found out,--that he paid his tailor regularly: and now there prevailed an opinion that Ferdinand Lopez was a monied man. It was known to some few that he occupied rooms in a flat at Westminster,--but to very few exactly where the rooms were situate. Among all his friends no one was known to have entered them. In a moderate way he was given to hospitality,--that is to infrequent but, when the occasion came, to graceful hospitality. Some club, however, or tavern, or perhaps, in the summer, some river bank would be chosen as the scene of these festivities. To a few,--if, as suggested, amidst summer flowers on the water's edge to men and women mixed,--he would be a courtly and efficient host; for he had the rare gift of doing such things well. Hunting was over, and the east wind was still blowing, and a great portion of the London world was out of town taking its Easter holiday, when, on an unpleasant morning, Ferdinand Lopez travelled into the city by the Metropolitan railway from Westminster Bridge. It was his custom to go thither when he did go,--not daily like a man of business, but as chance might require, like a capitalist or a man of pleasure,--in his own brougham. But on this occasion he walked down to the river side, and then walked from the Mansion House into a dingy little court called Little Tankard Yard, near the Bank of England, and going through a narrow dark long passage got into a little office at the back of a building, in which there sat at a desk a greasy gentleman with a new hat on one side of his head, who might perhaps be about forty years old. The place was very dark, and the man was turning over the leaves of a ledger. A stranger to city ways might probably have said that he was idle, but he was no doubt filling his mind with that erudition which would enable him to earn his bread. On the other side of the desk there was a little boy copying letters. These were Mr. Sextus Parker,--commonly called Sexty Parker,--and his clerk. Mr. Parker was a gentleman very well known and at the present moment favourably esteemed on the Stock Exchange. "What, Lopez!" said he. "Uncommon glad to see you. What can I do for you?" "Just come inside,--will you?" said Lopez. Now within Mr. Parker's very small office there was a smaller office in which there were a safe, a small rickety Pembroke table, two chairs, and an old washing-stand with a tumbled towel. Lopez led the way into this sanctum as though he knew the place well, and Sexty Parker followed him. "Beastly day, isn't it?" said Sexty. "Yes,--a nasty east wind." "Cutting one in two, with a hot sun at the same time. One ought to hybernate at this time of the year." "Then why don't you hybernate?" said Lopez. "Business is too good. That's about it. A man has to stick to it when it does come. Everybody can't do like you;--give up regular work, and make a better thing of an hour now and an hour then, just as it pleases you. I shouldn't dare go in for that kind of thing." "I don't suppose you or any one else know what I go in for," said Lopez, with a look that indicated offence. "Nor don't care," said Sexty;--"only hope it's something good for your sake." Sexty Parker had known Mr. Lopez well, now for some years, and being an overbearing man himself,--somewhat even of a bully if the truth be spoken,--and by no means apt to give way unless hard pressed, had often tried his "hand" on his friend, as he himself would have said. But I doubt whether he could remember any instance in which he could congratulate himself on success. He was trying his hand again now, but did it with a faltering voice, having caught a glance of his friend's eye. "I dare say not," said Lopez. Then he continued without changing his voice or the nature of the glance of his eye, "I'll tell you what I want you to do now. I want your name to this bill for three months." Sexty Parker opened his mouth and his eyes, and took the bit of paper that was tendered to him. It was a promissory note for £750, which, if signed by him, would at the end of the specified period make him liable for that sum were it not otherwise paid. His friend Mr. Lopez was indeed applying to him for the assistance of his name in raising a loan to the amount of the sum named. This was a kind of favour which a man should ask almost on his knees,--and which, if so asked, Mr. Sextus Parker would certainly refuse. And here was Ferdinand Lopez asking it,--whom Sextus Parker had latterly regarded as an opulent man,--and asking it not at all on his knees, but, as one might say, at the muzzle of a pistol. "Accommodation bill!" said Sexty. "Why, you ain't hard up; are you?" "I'm not going just at present to tell you much about my affairs, and yet I expect you to do what I ask you. I don't suppose you doubt my ability to raise £750." "Oh, dear, no," said Sexty, who had been looked at and who had not borne the inspection well. "And I don't suppose you would refuse me even if I were hard up, as you call it." There had been affairs before between the two men in which Lopez had probably been the stronger, and the memory of them, added to the inspection which was still going on, was heavy upon poor Sexty. "Oh, dear, no;--I wasn't thinking of refusing. I suppose a fellow may be a little surprised at such a thing." "I don't know why you need be surprised, as such things are very common. I happen to have taken a share in a loan a little beyond my immediate means, and therefore want a few hundreds. There is no one I can ask with a better grace than you. If you ain't--afraid about it, just sign it." "Oh, I ain't afraid," said Sexty, taking his pen and writing his name across the bill. But even before the signature was finished, when his eye was taken away from the face of his companion and fixed upon the disagreeable piece of paper beneath his hand, he repented of what he was doing. He almost arrested his signature half-way. He did hesitate, but had not pluck enough to stop his hand. "It does seem to be a d----d odd transaction all the same," he said as he leaned back in his chair. "It's the commonest thing in the world," said Lopez picking up the bill in a leisurely way, folding it and putting it into his pocket-book. "Have our names never been together on a bit of paper before?" "When we both had something to make by it." "You've nothing to make and nothing to lose by this. Good day and many thanks;--though I don't think so much of the affair as you seem to do." Then Ferdinand Lopez took his departure and Sexty Parker was left alone in his bewilderment. "By George,--that's queer," he said to himself. "Who'd have thought of Lopez being hard up for a few hundred pounds? But it must be all right. He wouldn't have come in that fashion, if it hadn't been all right. I oughtn't to have done it though! A man ought never to do that kind of thing;--never,--never!" And Mr. Sextus Parker was much discontented with himself, so that when he got home that evening to the wife of his bosom and his little family at Ponders End, he by no means made himself agreeable to them. For that sum of £750 sat upon his bosom as he ate his supper, and lay upon his chest as he slept,--like a nightmare. CHAPTER II Everett Wharton On that same day Lopez dined with his friend Everett Wharton at a new club called the Progress, of which they were both members. The Progress was certainly a new club, having as yet been open hardly more than three years; but still it was old enough to have seen many of the hopes of its early youth become dim with age and inaction. For the Progress had intended to do great things for the Liberal party,--or rather for political liberality in general,--and had in truth done little or nothing. It had been got up with considerable enthusiasm, and for a while certain fiery politicians had believed that through the instrumentality of this institution men of genius, and spirit, and natural power, but without wealth,--meaning always themselves,--would be supplied with sure seats in Parliament and a probable share in the Government. But no such results had been achieved. There had been a want of something,--some deficiency felt but not yet defined,--which had hitherto been fatal. The young men said it was because no old stager who knew the way of pulling the wires would come forward and put the club in the proper groove. The old men said it was because the young men were pretentious puppies. It was, however, not to be doubted that the party of Progress had become slack, and that the Liberal politicians of the country, although a special new club had been opened for the furtherance of their views, were not at present making much way. "What we want is organization," said one of the leading young men. But the organization was not as yet forthcoming. The club, nevertheless, went on its way, like other clubs, and men dined and smoked and played billiards and pretended to read. Some few energetic members still hoped that a good day would come in which their grand ideas might be realised,--but as regarded the members generally, they were content to eat and drink and play billiards. It was a fairly good club,--with a sprinkling of Liberal lordlings, a couple of dozen of members of Parliament who had been made to believe that they would neglect their party duties unless they paid their money, and the usual assortment of barristers, attorneys, city merchants and idle men. It was good enough at any rate for Ferdinand Lopez, who was particular about his dinner, and had an opinion of his own about wines. He had been heard to assert that, for real quiet comfort, there was not a club in London equal to it; but his hearers were not aware that in past days he had been blackballed at the T---- and the G----. These were accidents which Lopez had a gift of keeping in the background. His present companion, Everett Wharton, had, as well as himself, been an original member;--and Wharton had been one of those who had hoped to find in the club a stepping-stone to high political life, and who now talked often with idle energy of the need of organization. "For myself," said Lopez, "I can conceive no vainer object of ambition than a seat in the British Parliament. What does any man gain by it? The few who are successful work very hard for little pay and no thanks,--or nearly equally hard for no pay and as little thanks. The many who fail sit idly for hours, undergoing the weary task of listening to platitudes, and enjoy in return the now absolutely valueless privilege of having M.P. written on their letters." "Somebody must make laws for the country." "I don't see the necessity. I think the country would do uncommonly well if it were to know that no old law would be altered or new law made for the next twenty years." "You wouldn't have repealed the corn laws?" "There are no corn laws to repeal now." "Nor modify the income tax?" "I would modify nothing. But at any rate, whether laws are to be altered or to be left, it is a comfort to me that I need not put my finger into that pie. There is one benefit indeed in being in the House." "You can't be arrested." "Well;--that, as far as it goes; and one other. It assists a man in getting a seat as the director of certain Companies. People are still such asses that they trust a Board of Directors made up of members of Parliament, and therefore of course members are made welcome. But if you want to get into the House why don't you arrange it with your father, instead of waiting for what the club may do for you?" "My father wouldn't pay a shilling for such a purpose. He was never in the House himself." "And therefore despises it." "A little of that, perhaps. No man ever worked harder than he did, or, in his way, more successfully; and having seen one after another of his juniors become members of Parliament, while he stuck to the attorneys, there is perhaps a little jealousy about it." "From what I see of the way you live at home, I should think your father would do anything for you,--with proper management. There is no doubt, I suppose, that he could afford it?" "My father never in his life said anything to me about his own money affairs, though he says a great deal about mine. No man ever was closer than my father. But I believe that he could afford almost anything." "I wish I had such a father," said Ferdinand Lopez. "I think that I should succeed in ascertaining the extent of his capabilities, and in making some use of them too." Wharton nearly asked his friend,--almost summoned courage to ask him,--whether his father had done much for him. They were very intimate; and on one subject, in which Lopez was much interested, their confidence had been very close. But the younger and the weaker man of the two could not quite bring himself to the point of making an inquiry which he thought would be disagreeable. Lopez had never before, in all their intercourse, hinted at the possibility of his having or having had filial aspirations. He had been as though he had been created self-sufficient, independent of mother's milk or father's money. Now the question might have been asked almost naturally. But it was not asked. Everett Wharton was a trouble to his father,--but not an agonizing trouble, as are some sons. His faults were not of a nature to rob his father's cup of all its sweetness and to bring his grey hairs with sorrow to the grave. Old Wharton had never had to ask himself whether he should now, at length, let his son fall into the lowest abysses, or whether he should yet again struggle to put him on his legs, again forgive him, again pay his debts, again endeavour to forget dishonour, and place it all to the score of thoughtless youth. Had it been so, I think that, if not on the first or second fall, certainly on the third, the young man would have gone into the abyss; for Mr. Wharton was a stern man, and capable of coming to a clear conclusion on things that were nearest and even dearest to himself. But Everett Wharton had simply shown himself to be inefficient to earn his own bread. He had never declined even to do this,--but had simply been inefficient. He had not declared either by words or actions that as his father was a rich man, and as he was an only son, he would therefore do nothing. But he had tried his hand thrice, and in each case, after but short trial, had assured his father and his friends that the thing had not suited him. Leaving Oxford without a degree,--for the reading of the schools did not suit him,--he had gone into a banking-house, by no means as a mere clerk, but with an expressed proposition from his father, backed by the assent of a partner, that he should work his way up to wealth and a great commercial position. But six months taught him that banking was "an abomination," and he at once went into a course of reading with a barrister. He remained at this till he was called,--for a man may be called with very little continuous work. But after he was called the solitude of his chambers was too much for him, and at twenty-five he found that the Stock Exchange was the mart in the world for such talents and energies as he possessed. What was the nature of his failure during the year that he went into the city, was known only to himself and his father,--unless Ferdinand Lopez knew something of it also. But at six-and-twenty the Stock Exchange was also abandoned; and now, at eight-and-twenty, Everett Wharton had discovered that a parliamentary career was that for which nature and his special genius had intended him. He had probably suggested this to his father, and had met with some cold rebuff. Everett Wharton was a good-looking, manly fellow, six feet high, with broad shoulders, with light hair, wearing a large silky bushy beard, which made him look older than his years, who neither by his speech nor by his appearance would ever be taken for a fool, but who showed by the very actions of his body as well as by the play of his face, that he lacked firmness of purpose. He certainly was no fool. He had read much, and, though he generally forgot what he read, there were left with him from his readings certain nebulous lights, begotten by other men's thinking, which enabled him to talk on most subjects. It cannot be said of him that he did much thinking for himself;--but he thought that he thought. He believed of himself that he had gone rather deep into politics, and that he was entitled to call many statesmen asses because they did not see the things which he saw. He had the great question of labour, and all that refers to unions, strikes, and lock-outs, quite at his fingers' ends. He knew how the Church of England should be disestablished and recomposed. He was quite clear on questions of finance, and saw to a "t" how progress should be made towards communism, so that no violence should disturb that progress, and that in the due course of centuries all desire for personal property should be conquered and annihilated by a philanthropy so general as hardly to be accounted a virtue. In the meantime he could never contrive to pay his tailor's bill regularly out of the allowance of £400 a year which his father made him, and was always dreaming of the comforts of a handsome income. He was a popular man certainly,--very popular with women, to whom he was always courteous, and generally liked by men, to whom he was genial and good-natured. Though he was not himself aware of the fact, he was very dear to his father, who in his own silent way almost admired and certainly liked the openness and guileless freedom of a character which was very opposite to his own. The father, though he had never said a word to flatter the son, did in truth give his offspring credit for greater talent than he possessed, and, even when appearing to scorn them, would listen to the young man's diatribes almost with satisfaction. And Everett was very dear also to a sister, who was the only other living member of this branch of the Wharton family. Much will be said of her in these pages, and it is hoped that the reader may take an interest in her fate. But here, in speaking of the brother, it may suffice to say, that the sister, who was endowed with infinitely finer gifts than his, did give credit to the somewhat pretentious claims of her less noble brother. Indeed it had been perhaps a misfortune with Everett Wharton that some people had believed in him,--and a further misfortune that some others had thought it worth their while to pretend to believe in him. Among the latter might probably be reckoned the friend with whom he was now dining at the Progress. A man may flatter another, as Lopez occasionally did flatter Wharton, without preconcerted falsehood. It suits one man to be well with another, and the one learns gradually and perhaps unconsciously the way to take advantage of the foibles of the other. Now it was most material to Lopez that he should stand well with all the members of the Wharton family, as he aspired to the hand of the daughter of the house. Of her regard he had already thought himself nearly sure. Of the father's sanction to such a marriage he had reason to be almost more than doubtful. But the brother was his friend,--and in such circumstances a man is almost justified in flattering a brother. "I'll tell you what it is, Lopez," said Wharton, as they strolled out of the club together, a little after ten o'clock, "the men of the present day won't give themselves the trouble to occupy their minds with matters which have, or should have, real interest. Pope knew all about it when he said that 'The proper study of mankind is man.' But people don't read Pope now, or if they do they don't take the trouble to understand him." "Men are too busy making money, my dear fellow." "That's just it. Money's a very nice thing." "Very nice," said Lopez. "But the search after it is debasing. If a man could make money for four, or six, or even eight hours a day, and then wash his mind of the pursuit, as a clerk in an office washes the copies and ledgers out of his mind, then--" "He would never make money in that way,--and keep it." "And therefore the whole thing is debasing. A man ceases to care for the great interests of the world, or even to be aware of their existence, when his whole soul is in Spanish bonds. They wanted to make a banker of me, but I found that it would kill me." "It would kill me, I think, if I had to confine myself to Spanish bonds." "You know what I mean. You at any rate can understand me, though I fear you are too far gone to abandon the idea of making a fortune." "I would abandon it to-morrow if I could come into a fortune ready made. A man must at any rate eat." "Yes;--he must eat. But I am not quite sure," said Wharton thoughtfully, "that he need think about what he eats." "Unless the beef is sent up without horse radish!" It had happened that when the two men sat down to their dinner the insufficient quantity of that vegetable supplied by the steward of the club had been all consumed, and Wharton had complained of the grievance. "A man has a right to that for which he has paid," said Wharton, with mock solemnity, "and if he passes over laches of that nature without observation he does an injury to humanity at large. I'm not going to be caught in a trap, you know, because I like horse radish with my beef. Well, I can't go farther out of my way, as I have a deal of reading to do before I court my Morpheus. If you'll take my advice you'll go straight to the governor. Whatever Emily may feel I don't think she'll say much to encourage you unless you go about it after that fashion. She has prim notions of her own, which perhaps are not after all so much amiss when a man wants to marry a girl." "God forbid that I should think that anything about your sister was amiss!" "I don't think there is much myself. Women are generally superficial,--but some are honestly superficial and some dishonestly. Emily at any rate is honest." "Stop half a moment." Then they sauntered arm in arm down the broad pavement leading from Pall Mall to the Duke of York's column. "I wish I could make out your father more clearly. He is always civil to me, but he has a cold way of looking at me which makes me think I am not in his good books." "He is like that to everybody." "I never seem to get beyond the skin with him. You must have heard him speak of me in my absence?" "He never says very much about anybody." "But a word would let me know how the land lies. You know me well enough to be aware that I am the last man to be curious as to what others think of me. Indeed I do not care about it as much as a man should do. I am utterly indifferent to the opinion of the world at large, and would never object to the company of a pleasant person because the pleasant person abused me behind my back. What I value is the pleasantness of the man and not his liking or disliking for myself. But here the dearest aim of my life is concerned, and I might be guided either this way or that, to my great advantage, by knowing whether I stand well or ill with him." "You have dined three times within the last three months in Manchester Square, and I don't know any other man,--certainly no other young man,--who has had such strong proof of intimacy from my father." "Yes, and I know my advantages. But I have been there as your friend, not as his." "He doesn't care twopence about my friends. I wanted to give Charlie Skate a dinner, but my father wouldn't have him at any price." "Charlie Skate is out at elbows, and bets at billiards. I am respectable,--or at any rate your father thinks so. Your father is more anxious about you than you are aware of, and wishes to make his house pleasant to you as long as he can do so to your advantage. As far as you are concerned he rather approves of me, fancying that my turn for making money is stronger than my turn for spending it. Nevertheless, he looks upon me as a friend of yours rather than his own. Though he has given me three dinners in three months,--and I own the greatness of his hospitality,--I don't suppose he ever said a word in my favour. I wish I knew what he does say." "He says he knows nothing about you." "Oh;--that's it, is it? Then he can know no harm. When next he says so ask him of how many of the men who dine at his house he can say as much. Good night;--I won't keep you any longer. But I can tell you this;--if between us we can manage to handle him rightly, you may get your seat in Parliament and I may get my wife;--that is, of course, if she will have me." Then they parted, but Lopez remained in the pathway, walking up and down by the side of the old military club, thinking of things. He certainly knew his friend, the younger Wharton, intimately, appreciating the man's good qualities, and being fully aware of the man's weakness. By his questions he had extracted quite enough to assure himself that Emily's father would be adverse to his proposition. He had not felt much doubt before, but now he was certain. "He doesn't know much about me," he said, musing to himself. "Well, no; he doesn't;--and there isn't very much that I can tell him. Of course he's wise,--as wisdom goes. But then, wise men do do foolish things at intervals. The discreetest of city bankers are talked out of their money; the most scrupulous of matrons are talked out of their virtue; the most experienced of statesmen are talked out of their principles. And who can really calculate chances? Men who lead forlorn hopes generally push through without being wounded;--and the fifth or sixth heir comes to a title." So much he said, palpably, though to himself, with his inner voice. Then,--impalpably, with no even inner voice,--he asked himself what chance he might have of prevailing with the girl herself; and he almost ventured to tell himself that in that direction he need not despair. In very truth he loved the girl and reverenced her, believing her to be better and higher and nobler than other human beings,--as a man does when he is in love; and so believing, he had those doubts as to his own success which such reverence produces. CHAPTER III Mr. Abel Wharton, Q.C. Lopez was not a man to let grass grow under his feet when he had anything to do. When he was tired of walking backwards and forwards over the same bit of pavement, subject all the while to a cold east wind, he went home and thought of the same matter while he lay in bed. Even were he to get the girl's assurances of love, without the father's consent he might find himself farther from his object than ever. Mr. Wharton was a man of old fashions, who would think himself ill-used and his daughter ill-used, and who would think also that a general offence would have been committed against good social manners, if his daughter were to be asked for her hand without his previous consent. Should he absolutely refuse,--why then the battle, though it would be a desperate battle, might perhaps be fought with other strategy; but, giving to the matter his best consideration, Lopez thought it expedient to go at once to the father. In doing this he would have no silly tremors. Whatever he might feel in speaking to the girl, he had sufficient self-confidence to be able to ask the father, if not with assurance, at any rate without trepidation. It was, he thought, probable that the father, at the first attack, would neither altogether accede, or altogether refuse. The disposition of the man was averse to the probability of an absolute reply at the first moment. The lover imagined that it might be possible for him to take advantage of the period of doubt which would thus be created. Mr. Wharton was and had for a great many years been a barrister practising in the Equity Courts,--or rather in one Equity Court, for throughout a life's work now extending to nearly fifty years, he had hardly ever gone out of the single Vice-Chancellor's Court which was much better known by Mr. Wharton's name than by that of the less eminent judge who now sat there. His had been a very peculiar, a very toilsome, but yet probably a very satisfactory life. He had begun his practice early, and had worked in a stuff gown till he was nearly sixty. At that time he had amassed a large fortune, mainly from his profession, but partly also by the careful use of his own small patrimony and by his wife's money. Men knew that he was rich, but no one knew the extent of his wealth. When he submitted to take a silk gown, he declared among his friends that he did so as a step preparatory to his retirement. The altered method of work would not suit him at his age, nor,--as he said,--would it be profitable. He would take his silk as an honour for his declining years, so that he might become a bencher at his Inn. But he had now been working for the last twelve or fourteen years with his silk gown,--almost as hard as in younger days, and with pecuniary results almost as serviceable; and though from month to month he declared his intention of taking no fresh briefs, and though he did now occasionally refuse work, still he was there with his mind as clear as ever, and with his body apparently as little affected by fatigue. Mr. Wharton had not married till he was forty, and his wife had now been two years dead. He had had six children,--of whom but two were now left to make a household for his old age. He had been nearly fifty when his youngest daughter was born, and was therefore now an old father of a young child. But he was one of those men who, as in youth they are never very young, so in age are they never very old. He could still ride his cob in the park jauntily; and did so carefully every morning in his life, after an early cup of tea and before his breakfast. And he could walk home from his chambers every day, and on Sundays could do the round of the parks on foot. Twice a week, on Wednesdays and Saturdays, he dined at that old law club, the Eldon, and played whist after dinner till twelve o'clock. This was the great dissipation and, I think, the chief charm of his life. In the middle of August he and his daughter usually went for a month to Wharton Hall in Herefordshire, the seat of his cousin Sir Alured Wharton;--and this was the one duty of his life which was a burthen to him. But he had been made to believe that it was essential to his health, and to his wife's, and then to his girl's health, that he should every summer leave town for a time,--and where else was he to go? Sir Alured was a relation and a gentleman. Emily liked Wharton Hall. It was the proper thing. He hated Wharton Hall, but then he did not know any place out of London that he would not hate worse. He had once been induced to go up the Rhine, but had never repeated the experiment of foreign travel. Emily sometimes went abroad with her cousins, during which periods it was supposed that the old lawyer spent a good deal of his time at the Eldon. He was a spare, thin, strongly made man, with spare light brown hair, hardly yet grizzled, with small grey whiskers, clear eyes, bushy eyebrows, with a long ugly nose, on which young barristers had been heard to declare that you might hang a small kettle, and with considerable vehemence of talk when he was opposed in argument. For, with all his well-known coolness of temper, Mr. Wharton could become very hot in an argument, when the nature of the case in hand required heat. On one subject all who knew him were agreed. He was a thorough lawyer. Many doubted his eloquence, and some declared that he had known well the extent of his own powers in abstaining from seeking the higher honours of his profession; but no one doubted his law. He had once written a book,--on the mortgage of stocks in trade; but that had been in early life, and he had never since dabbled in literature. He was certainly a man of whom men were generally afraid. At the whist-table no one would venture to scold him. In the court no one ever contradicted him. In his own house, though he was very quiet, the servants dreaded to offend him, and were attentive to his slightest behests. When he condescended to ride with any acquaintance in the park, it was always acknowledged that old Wharton was to regulate the pace. His name was Abel, and all his life he had been known as able Abe;--a silent, far-seeing, close-fisted, just old man, who was not, however, by any means deficient in sympathy either with the sufferings or with the joys of humanity. It was Easter time and the courts were not sitting, but Mr. Wharton was in his chamber as a matter of course at ten o'clock. He knew no real homely comforts elsewhere,--unless at the whist-table at the Eldon. He ate and drank and slept in his own house in Manchester Square, but he could hardly be said to live there. It was not there that his mind was awake, and that the powers of the man were exercised. When he came up from the dining-room to join his daughter after dinner he would get her to sing him a song, and would then seat himself with a book. But he never read in his own house, invariably falling into a sweet and placid slumber, from which he was never disturbed till his daughter kissed him as she went to bed. Then he would walk about the room, and look at his watch, and shuffle uneasily through half-an-hour till his conscience allowed him to take himself to his chamber. He was a man of no pursuits in his own house. But from ten in the morning till five, or often till six, in the evening, his mind was active in some work. It was not now all law, as it used to be. In the drawer of the old piece of furniture which stood just at the right hand of his own arm-chair there were various books hidden away, which he was sometimes ashamed to have seen by his clients,--poetry and novels and even fairy tales. For there was nothing Mr. Wharton could not read in his chambers, though there was nothing that he could read in his own house. He had a large pleasant room in which to sit, looking out from the ground floor of Stone Buildings on to the gardens belonging to the Inn,--and here, in the centre of the metropolis, but in perfect quiet as far as the outside world was concerned, he had lived and still lived his life. At about noon on the day following that on which Lopez had made his sudden swoop on Mr. Parker and had then dined with Everett Wharton, he called at Stone Buildings and was shown into the lawyer's room. His quick eye at once discovered the book which Mr. Wharton half hid away, and saw upon it Mr. Mudie's suspicious ticket. Barristers certainly never get their law books from Mudie, and Lopez at once knew that his hoped-for father-in-law had been reading a novel. He had not suspected such weakness, but argued well from it for the business he had in hand. There must be a soft spot to be found about the heart of an old lawyer who spent his mornings in such occupation. "How do you do, sir?" said Mr. Wharton rising from his seat. "I hope I see you well, sir." Though he had been reading a novel his tone and manner were very cold. Lopez had never been in Stone Buildings before, and was not quite sure that he might not have committed some offence in coming there. "Take a seat, Mr. Lopez. Is there anything I can do for you in my way?" There was a great deal that could be done "in his way" as father;--but how was it to be introduced and the case made clear? Lopez did not know whether the old man had as yet ever suspected such a feeling as that which he now intended to declare. He had been intimate at the house in Manchester Square, and had certainly ingratiated himself very closely with a certain Mrs. Roby, who had been Mrs. Wharton's sister and constant companion, who lived in Berkeley Street, close round the corner from Manchester Square, and spent very much of her time with Emily Wharton. They were together daily, as though Mrs. Roby had assumed the part of a second mother, and Lopez was well aware that Mrs. Roby knew of his love. If there was real confidence between Mrs. Roby and the old lawyer, the old lawyer must know it also;--but as to that Lopez felt that he was in the dark. The task of speaking to an old father is not unpleasant when the lover knows that he has been smiled upon, and, in fact, approved for the last six months. He is going to be patted on the back, and made much of, and received into the family. He is to be told that his Mary or his Augusta has been the best daughter in the world and will therefore certainly be the best wife, and he himself will probably on that special occasion be spoken of with unqualified praise,--and all will be pleasant. But the subject is one very difficult to broach when no previous light has been thrown on it. Ferdinand Lopez, however, was not the man to stand shivering on the brink when a plunge was necessary,--and therefore he made his plunge. "Mr. Wharton, I have taken the liberty to call upon you here, because I want to speak to you about your daughter." "About my daughter!" The old man's surprise was quite genuine. Of course when he had given himself a moment to think, he knew what must be the nature of his visitor's communication. But up to that moment he had never mixed his daughter and Ferdinand Lopez in his thoughts together. And now, the idea having come upon him, he looked at the aspirant with severe and unpleasant eyes. It was manifest to the aspirant that the first flash of the thing was painful to the father. "Yes, sir. I know how great is my presumption. But, yet, having ventured, I will hardly say to entertain a hope, but to have come to such a state that I can only be happy by hoping, I have thought it best to come to you at once." "Does she know anything of this?" "Of my visit to you? Nothing." "Of your intentions;--of your suit generally? Am I to understand that this has any sanction from her?" "None at all." "Have you told her anything of it?" "Not a word. I come to ask you for your permission to address her." "You mean that she has no knowledge whatever of your--your preference for her." "I cannot say that. It is hardly possible that I should have learned to love her as I do without some consciousness on her part that it is so." "What I mean is, without any beating about the bush,--have you been making love to her?" "Who is to say in what making love consists, Mr. Wharton?" "D---- it, sir, a gentleman knows. A gentleman knows whether he has been playing on a girl's feelings, and a gentleman, when he is asked as I have asked you, will at any rate tell the truth. I don't want any definitions. Have you been making love to her?" "I think, Mr. Wharton, that I have behaved like a gentleman; and that you will acknowledge at least so much when you come to know exactly what I have done and what I have not done. I have endeavoured to commend myself to your daughter, but I have never spoken a word of love to her." "Does Everett know of all this?" "Yes." "And has he encouraged it?" "He knows of it, because he is my most intimate friend. Whoever the lady might have been, I should have told him. He is attached to me, and would not, I think, on his own account, object to call me his brother. I spoke to him yesterday on the matter very plainly, and he told me that I ought certainly to see you first. I quite agreed with him, and therefore I am here. There has certainly been nothing in his conduct to make you angry, and I do not think that there has been anything in mine." There was a dignity of demeanour and a quiet assured courage which had its effect upon the old lawyer. He felt that he could not storm and talk in ambiguous language of what a "gentleman" would or would not do. He might disapprove of this man altogether as a son-in-law,--and at the present moment he thought that he did,--but still the man was entitled to a civil answer. How were lovers to approach the ladies of their love in any manner more respectful than this? "Mr. Lopez," he said, "you must forgive me if I say that you are comparatively a stranger to us." "That is an accident which would be easily cured if your will in that direction were as good as mine." "But, perhaps, it isn't. One has to be explicit in these matters. A daughter's happiness is a very serious consideration,--and some people, among whom I confess that I am one, consider that like should marry like. I should wish to see my daughter marry,--not only in my own sphere, neither higher nor lower,--but with some one of my own class." "I hardly know, Mr. Wharton, whether that is intended to exclude me." "Well,--to tell you the truth I know nothing about you. I don't know who your father was,--whether he was an Englishman, whether he was a Christian, whether he was a Protestant,--not even whether he was a gentleman. These are questions which I should not dream of asking under any other circumstances;--would be matters with which I should have no possible concern, if you were simply an acquaintance. But when you talk to a man about his daughter--!" "I acknowledge freely your right of inquiry." "And I know nothing of your means;--nothing whatever. I understand that you live as a man of fortune, but I presume that you earn your bread. I know nothing of the way in which you earn it, nothing of the certainty or amount of your means." "Those things are of course matters for inquiry; but may I presume that you have no objection which satisfactory answers to such questions may not remove?" "I shall never willingly give my daughter to any one who is not the son of an English gentleman. It may be a prejudice, but that is my feeling." "My father was certainly not an English gentleman. He was a Portuguese." In admitting this, and in thus subjecting himself at once to one clearly-stated ground of objection,--the objection being one which, though admitted, carried with itself neither fault nor disgrace,--Lopez felt that he had got a certain advantage. He could not get over the fact that he was the son of a Portuguese parent, but by admitting that openly he thought he might avoid present discussion on matters which might, perhaps, be more disagreeable, but to which he need not allude if the accident of his birth were to be taken by the father as settling the question. "My mother was an English lady," he added, "but my father certainly was not an Englishman. I never had the common happiness of knowing either of them. I was an orphan before I understood what it was to have a parent." This was said with a pathos which for the moment stopped the expression of any further harsh criticism from the lawyer. Mr. Wharton could not instantly repeat his objection to a parentage which was matter for such melancholy reflections; but he felt at the same time that as he had luckily landed himself on a positive and undeniable ground of objection to a match which was distasteful to him, it would be unwise for him to go to other matters in which he might be less successful. By doing so, he would seem to abandon the ground which he had already made good. He thought it probable that the man might have an adequate income, and yet he did not wish to welcome him as a son-in-law. He thought it possible that the Portuguese father might be a Portuguese nobleman, and therefore one whom he would be driven to admit to have been in some sort a gentleman;--but yet this man who was now in his presence and whom he continued to scan with the closest observation, was not what he called a gentleman. The foreign blood was proved, and that would suffice. As he looked at Lopez he thought that he detected Jewish signs, but he was afraid to make any allusion to religion, lest Lopez should declare that his ancestors had been noted as Christians since St. James first preached in the Peninsula. "I was educated altogether in England," continued Lopez, "till I was sent to a German university in the idea that the languages of the continent are not generally well learned in this country. I can never be sufficiently thankful to my guardian for doing so." "I dare say;--I dare say. French and German are very useful. I have a prejudice of my own in favour of Greek and Latin." "But I rather fancy I picked up more Greek and Latin at Bohn than I should have got here, had I stuck to nothing else." "I dare say;--I dare say. You may be an Admirable Crichton for what I know." "I have not intended to make any boast, sir, but simply to vindicate those who had the care of my education. If you have no objection except that founded on my birth, which is an accident--" "When one man is a peer and another a ploughman, that is an accident. One doesn't find fault with the ploughman, but one doesn't ask him to dinner." "But my accident," said Lopez smiling, "is one which you would hardly discover unless you were told. Had I called myself Talbot you would not know but that I was as good an Englishman as yourself." "A man of course may be taken in by falsehoods," said the lawyer. "If you have no other objection than that raised, I hope you will allow me to visit in Manchester Square." "There may be ten thousand other objections, Mr. Lopez, but I really think that the one is enough. Of course I know nothing of my daughter's feelings. I should imagine that the matter is as strange to her as it is to me. But I cannot give you anything like encouragement. If I am ever to have a son-in-law I should wish to have an English son-in-law. I do not even know what your profession is." "I am engaged in foreign loans." "Very precarious I should think. A sort of gambling; isn't it?" "It is the business by which many of the greatest mercantile houses in the city have been made." "I dare say;--I dare say;--and by which they come to ruin. I have the greatest respect in the world for mercantile enterprise, and have had as much to do as most men with mercantile questions. But I ain't sure that I wish to marry my daughter in the City. Of course it's all prejudice. I won't deny that on general subjects I can give as much latitude as any man; but when one's own hearth is attacked--" "Surely such a proposition as mine, Mr. Wharton, is no attack!" "In my sense it is. When a man proposes to assault and invade the very kernel of another man's heart, to share with him, and indeed to take from him, the very dearest of his possessions, to become part and parcel with him either for infinite good or infinite evil, then a man has a right to guard even his prejudices as precious bulwarks." Mr. Wharton as he said this was walking about the room with his hands in his trowsers pockets. "I have always been for absolute toleration in matters of religion,--have always advocated admission of Roman Catholics and Jews into Parliament, and even to the Bench. In ordinary life I never question a man's religion. It is nothing to me whether he believes in Mahomet, or has no belief at all. But when a man comes to me for my daughter--" "I have always belonged to the Church of England," said Ferdinand Lopez. "Lopez is at any rate a bad name to go to a Protestant church with, and I don't want my daughter to bear it. I am very frank with you, as in such a matter men ought to understand each other. Personally I have liked you well enough and have been glad to see you at my house. Everett and you have seemed to be friends, and I have had no objection to make. But marrying into a family is a very serious thing indeed." "No man feels that more strongly than I do, Mr. Wharton." "There had better be an end of it." "Even though I should be happy enough to obtain her favour?" "I can't think that she cares about you. I don't think it for a moment. You say you haven't spoken to her, and I am sure she's not a girl to throw herself at a man's head. I don't approve it, and I think it had better fall to the ground. It must fall to the ground." "I wish you would give me a reason." "Because you are not English." "But I am English. My father was a foreigner." "It doesn't suit my ideas. I suppose I may have my own ideas about my own family, Mr. Lopez? I feel perfectly certain that my child will do nothing to displease me, and this would displease me. If we were to talk for an hour I could say nothing further." "I hope that I may be able to present things to you in an aspect so altered," said Lopez as he prepared to take his leave, "as to make you change your mind." "Possibly;--possibly," said Wharton, "but I do not think it probable. Good morning to you, sir. If I have said anything that has seemed to be unkind, put it down to my anxiety as a father and not to my conduct as a man." Then the door was closed behind his visitor, and Mr. Wharton was left walking up and down his room alone. He was by no means satisfied with himself. He felt that he had been rude and at the same time not decisive. He had not explained to the man as he would wish to have done, that it was monstrous and out of the question that a daughter of the Whartons, one of the oldest families in England, should be given to a friendless Portuguese,--a probable Jew,--about whom nobody knew anything. Then he remembered that sooner or later his girl would have at least £60,000, a fact of which no human being but himself was aware. Would it not be well that somebody should be made aware of it, so that his girl might have the chance of suitors preferable to this swarthy son of Judah? He began to be afraid, as he thought of it, that he was not managing his matters well. How would it be with him if he should find that the girl was really in love with this swarthy son of Judah? He had never inquired about his girl's heart, though there was one to whom he hoped that his girl's heart might some day be given. He almost made up his mind to go home at once, so anxious was he. But the prospect of having to spend an entire afternoon in Manchester Square was too much for him, and he remained in his chamber till the usual hour. Lopez, as he returned from Lincoln's Inn, westward to his club, was, on the whole, contented with the interview. He had expected opposition. He had not thought that the cherry would fall easily into his mouth. But the conversation generally had not taken those turns which he had thought would be most detrimental to him. CHAPTER IV Mrs. Roby Mr. Wharton, as he walked home, remembered that Mrs. Roby was to dine at his house on that evening. During the remainder of the day, after the departure of Lopez, he had been unable to take his mind from the consideration of the proposition made to him. He had tried the novel, and he had tried Huggins _v._ the Trustees of the Charity of St. Ambox, a case of undeniable importance in which he was engaged on the part of Huggins, but neither was sufficiently powerful to divert his thoughts. Throughout the morning he was imagining what he would say to Emily about this lover of hers,--in what way he would commence the conversation, and how he would express his own opinion should he find that she was in any degree favourable to the man. Should she altogether ignore the man's pretensions, there would be no difficulty. But if she hesitated,--if, as was certainly possible, she should show any partiality for the man, then there would be a knot which would require untying. Hitherto the intercourse between the father and daughter had been simple and pleasant. He had given her everything she asked for, and she had obeyed him in all the very few matters as to which he had demanded obedience. Questions of discipline, as far as there had been any discipline, had generally been left to Mrs. Roby. Mrs. Roby was to dine in Manchester Square to-day, and perhaps it would be well that he should have a few words with Mrs. Roby before he spoke to his daughter. Mrs. Roby had a husband, but Mr. Roby had not been asked to dine in the Square on this occasion. Mrs. Roby dined in the Square very often, but Mr. Roby very seldom,--not probably above once a year, on some special occasion. He and Mr. Wharton had married sisters, but they were quite unlike in character and had never become friends. Mrs. Wharton had been nearly twenty years younger than her husband; Mrs. Roby had been six or seven years younger than her sister; and Mr. Roby was a year or two younger than his wife. The two men therefore belonged to different periods of life, Mr. Roby at the present time being a florid youth of forty. He had a moderate fortune, inherited from his mother, of which he was sufficiently careful; but he loved races, and read sporting papers; he was addicted to hunting and billiards; he shot pigeons, and,--so Mr. Wharton had declared calumniously more than once to an intimate friend,--had not an H in his vocabulary. The poor man did drop an aspirate now and again; but he knew his defect and strove hard, and with fair average success, to overcome it. But Mr. Wharton did not love him, and they were not friends. Perhaps neither did Mrs. Roby love him very ardently. She was at any rate almost always willing to leave her own house to come to the Square, and on such occasions Mr. Roby was always willing to dine at the Nimrod, the club which it delighted him to frequent. Mr. Wharton, on entering his own house, met his son on the staircase. "Do you dine at home to-day, Everett?" "Well, sir; no, sir. I don't think I do. I think I half promised to dine with a fellow at the club." "Don't you think you'd make things meet more easily about the end of the year if you dined oftener here, where you have nothing to pay, and less frequently at the club, where you pay for everything?" "But what I should save you would lose, sir. That's the way I look at it." "Then I advise you to look at it the other way, and leave me to take care of myself. Come in here, I want to speak to you." Everett followed his father into a dingy back parlour, which was fitted up with book shelves and was generally called the study, but which was gloomy and comfortless because it was seldom used. "I have had your friend Lopez with me at my chambers to-day. I don't like your friend Lopez." "I am sorry for that, sir." "He is a man as to whom I should wish to have a good deal of evidence before I would trust him to be what he seems to be. I dare say he's clever." "I think he's more than clever." "I dare say;--and well instructed in some respects." "I believe him to be a thorough linguist, sir." "I dare say. I remember a waiter at an hotel in Holborn who could speak seven languages. It's an accomplishment very necessary for a Courier or a Queen's Messenger." "You don't mean to say, sir, that you disregard foreign languages?" "I have said nothing of the kind. But in my estimation they don't stand in the place of principles, or a profession, or birth, or country. I fancy there has been some conversation between you about your sister." "Certainly there has." "A young man should be very chary how he speaks to another man, to a stranger, about his sister. A sister's name should be too sacred for club talk." "Club talk! Good heavens, sir; you don't think that I have spoken of Emily in that way? There isn't a man in London has a higher respect for his sister than I have for mine. This man, by no means in a light way but with all seriousness, has told me that he was attached to Emily; and I, believing him to be a gentleman and well to do in the world, have referred him to you. Can that have been wrong?" "I don't know how he's 'to do', as you call it. I haven't asked, and I don't mean to ask. But I doubt his being a gentleman. He is not an English gentleman. What was his father?" "I haven't the least idea." "Or his mother?" "He has never mentioned her to me." "Nor his family; nor anything of their antecedents? He is a man fallen out of the moon. All that is nothing to us as passing acquaintances. Between men such ignorance should I think bar absolute intimacy;--but that may be a matter of taste. But it should be held to be utterly antagonistic to any such alliance as that of marriage. He seems to be a friend of yours. You had better make him understand that it is quite out of the question. I have told him so, and you had better repeat it." So saying, Mr. Wharton went upstairs to dress, and Everett, having received his father's instructions, went away to the club. When Mr. Wharton reached the drawing-room, he found Mrs. Roby alone, and he at once resolved to discuss the matter with her before he spoke to his daughter. "Harriet," he said abruptly, "do you know anything of one Mr. Lopez?" "Mr. Lopez! Oh yes, I know him." "Do you mean that he is an intimate friend?" "As friends go in London, he is. He comes to our house, and I think that he hunts with Dick." Dick was Mr. Roby. "That's a recommendation." "Well, Mr. Wharton, I hardly know what you mean by that," said Mrs. Roby, smiling. "I don't think, my husband will do Mr. Lopez any harm; and I am sure Mr. Lopez won't do my husband any." "I dare say not. But that's not the question. Roby can take care of himself." "Quite so." "And so I dare say can Mr. Lopez." At this moment Emily entered the room. "My dear," said her father, "I am speaking to your aunt. Would you mind going downstairs and waiting for us? Tell them we shall be ready for dinner in ten minutes." Then Emily passed out of the room, and Mrs. Roby assumed a grave demeanour. "The man we are speaking of has been to me and has made an offer for Emily." As he said this he looked anxiously into his sister-in-law's face, in order that he might tell from that how far she favoured the idea of such a marriage,--and he thought that he perceived at once that she was not averse to it. "You know it is quite out of the question," he continued. "I don't know why it should be out of the question. But of course your opinion would have great weight with Emily." "Great weight! Well;--I should hope so. If not, I do not know whose opinion is to have weight. In the first place the man is a foreigner." "Oh, no;--he is English. But if he were a foreigner: many English girls marry foreigners." "My daughter shall not;--not with my permission. You have not encouraged him, I hope." "I have not interfered at all," said Mrs. Roby. But this was a lie. Mrs. Roby had interfered. Mrs. Roby, in discussing the merits and character of the lover with the young lady, had always lent herself to the lover's aid,--and had condescended to accept from the lover various presents which she could hardly have taken had she been hostile to him. "And now tell me about herself. Has she seen him often?" "Why, Mr. Wharton, he has dined here, in the house, over and over again. I thought that you were encouraging him." "Heavens and earth!" "Of course she has seen him. When a man dines at a house he is bound to call. Of course he has called,--I don't know how often. And she has met him round the corner."--"Round the corner," in Manchester Square, meant Mrs. Roby's house in Berkeley Street.--"Last Sunday they were at the Zoo together. Dick got them tickets. I thought you knew all about it." "Do you mean that my daughter went to the Zoological Gardens alone with this man?" the father asked in dismay. "Dick was with them. I should have gone, only I had a headache. Did you not know she went?" "Yes;--I heard about the Gardens. But I heard nothing of the man." "I thought, Mr. Wharton, you were all in his favour." "I am not at all in his favour. I dislike him particularly. For anything I know he may have sold pencils about the streets like any other Jew-boy." "He goes to church just as you do,--that is, if he goes anywhere; which I dare say he does about as often as yourself, Mr. Wharton." Now Mr. Wharton, though he was a thorough and perhaps a bigoted member of the Church of England, was not fond of going to church. "Do you mean to tell me," he said, pressing his hands together, and looking very seriously into his sister-in-law's face; "do you mean to tell me that she--likes him?" "Yes;--I think she does like him." "You don't mean to say--she's in love with him?" "She has never told me that she is. Young ladies are shy of making such assertions as to their own feelings before the due time for doing so has come. I think she prefers him to anybody else; and that were he to propose to herself, she would give him her consent to go to you." "He shall never enter this house again," said Mr. Wharton passionately. "You must arrange that with her. If you have so strong an objection to him, I wonder that you should have had him here at all." "How was I to know? God bless my soul!--just because a man was allowed to dine here once or twice! Upon my word, it's too bad!" "Papa, won't you and aunt come down to dinner?" said Emily, opening the door gently. Then they went down to dinner, and during the meal nothing was said about Mr. Lopez. But they were not very merry together, and poor Emily felt sure that her own affairs had been discussed in a troublesome manner. CHAPTER V "No One Knows Anything About Him" Neither at dinner, on that evening at Manchester Square, nor after dinner, as long as Mrs. Roby remained in the house, was a word said about Lopez by Mr. Wharton. He remained longer than usual with his bottle of port wine in the dining-room; and when he went upstairs, he sat himself down and fell asleep, almost without a sign. He did not ask for a song, nor did Emily offer to sing. But as soon as Mrs. Roby was gone,--and Mrs. Roby went home, round the corner, somewhat earlier than usual,--then Mr. Wharton woke up instantly and made inquiry of his daughter. There had, however, been a few words spoken on the subject between Mrs. Roby and her niece which had served to prepare Emily for what was coming. "Lopez has been to your father," said Mrs. Roby, in a voice not specially encouraging for such an occasion. Then she paused a moment; but her niece said nothing, and she continued, "Yes,--and your father has been blaming me,--as if I had done anything! If he did not mean you to choose for yourself, why didn't he keep a closer look-out?" "I haven't chosen any one, Aunt Harriet." "Well;--to speak fairly, I thought you had; and I have nothing to say against your choice. As young men go, I think Mr. Lopez is as good as the best of them. I don't know why you shouldn't have him. Of course you'll have money, but then I suppose he makes a large income himself. As to Mr. Fletcher, you don't care a bit about him." "Not in that way, certainly." "No doubt your papa will have it out with you just now; so you had better make up your mind what you will say to him. If you really like the man, I don't see why you shouldn't say so, and stick to it. He has made a regular offer, and girls in these days are not expected to be their father's slaves." Emily said nothing further to her aunt on that occasion, but finding that she must in truth "have it out" with her father presently, gave herself up to reflection. It might probably be the case that the whole condition of her future life would depend on the way in which she might now "have it out" with her father. I would not wish the reader to be prejudiced against Miss Wharton by the not unnatural feeling which may perhaps be felt in regard to the aunt. Mrs. Roby was pleased with little intrigues, was addicted to the amusement of fostering love affairs, was fond of being thought to be useful in such matters, and was not averse to having presents given to her. She had married a vulgar man; and, though she had not become like the man, she had become vulgar. She was not an eligible companion for Mr. Wharton's daughter,--a matter as to which the father had not given himself proper opportunities of learning the facts. An aunt in his close neighbourhood was so great a comfort to him,--so ready and so natural an assistance to him in his difficulties! But Emily Wharton was not in the least like her aunt, nor had Mrs. Wharton been at all like Mrs. Roby. No doubt the contact was dangerous. Injury had perhaps already been done. It may be that some slightest soil had already marred the pure white of the girl's natural character. But if so, the stain was as yet too impalpable to be visible to ordinary eyes. Emily Wharton was a tall, fair girl, with grey eyes, rather exceeding the average proportions as well as height of women. Her features were regular and handsome, and her form was perfect; but it was by her manner and her voice that she conquered, rather than by her beauty,--by those gifts and by a clearness of intellect joined with that feminine sweetness which has its most frequent foundation in self-denial. Those who knew her well, and had become attached to her, were apt to endow her with all virtues, and to give her credit for a loveliness which strangers did not find on her face. But as we do not light up our houses with our brightest lamps for all comers, so neither did she emit from her eyes their brightest sparks till special occasion for such shining had arisen. To those who were allowed to love her no woman was more lovable. There was innate in her an appreciation of her own position as a woman, and with it a principle of self-denial as a human being, which it was beyond the power of any Mrs. Roby to destroy or even to defile by small stains. Like other girls she had been taught to presume that it was her destiny to be married, and like other girls she had thought much about her destiny. A young man generally regards it as his destiny either to succeed or to fail in the world, and he thinks about that. To him marriage, when it comes, is an accident to which he has hardly as yet given a thought. But to the girl the matrimony which is or is not to be her destiny contains within itself the only success or failure which she anticipates. The young man may become Lord Chancellor, or at any rate earn his bread comfortably as a county court judge. But the girl can look forward to little else than the chance of having a good man for her husband;--a good man, or if her tastes lie in that direction, a rich man. Emily Wharton had doubtless thought about these things, and she sincerely believed that she had found the good man in Ferdinand Lopez. The man, certainly, was one strangely endowed with the power of creating a belief. When going to Mr. Wharton at his chambers he had not intended to cheat the lawyer into any erroneous idea about his family, but he had resolved that he would so discuss the questions of his own condition, which would probably be raised, as to leave upon the old man's mind an unfounded conviction that in regard to money and income he had no reason to fear question. Not a word had been said about his money or his income. And Mr. Wharton had felt himself bound to abstain from allusion to such matters from an assured feeling that he could not in that direction plant an enduring objection. In this way Lopez had carried his point with Mr. Wharton. He had convinced Mrs. Roby that among all the girl's attractions the greatest attraction for him was the fact that she was Mrs. Roby's niece. He had made Emily herself believe that the one strong passion of his life was his love for her, and this he had done without ever having asked for her love. And he had even taken the trouble to allure Dick, and had listened to and had talked whole pages out of _Bell's Life_. On his own behalf it must be acknowledged that he did love the girl, as well perhaps as he was capable of loving any one;--but he had found out many particulars as to Mr. Wharton's money before he had allowed himself to love her. As soon as Mrs. Roby had gathered up her knitting, and declared, as she always did on such occasions, that she could go round the corner without having any one to look after her, Mr. Wharton began. "Emily, my dear, come here." Then she came and sat on a footstool at his feet, and looked up into his face. "Do you know what I am going to speak to you about, my darling?" "Yes, papa; I think I do. It is about--Mr. Lopez." "Your aunt has told you, I suppose. Yes; it is about Mr. Lopez. I have been very much astonished to-day by Mr. Lopez,--a man of whom I have seen very little and know less. He came to me to-day and asked for my permission--to address you." She sat perfectly quiet, still looking at him, but she did not say a word. "Of course I did not give him permission." "Why of course, papa?" "Because he is a stranger and a foreigner. Would you have wished me to tell him that he might come?" "Yes, papa." He was sitting on a sofa and shrank back a little from her as she made this free avowal. "In that case I could have judged for myself. I suppose every girl would like to do that." "But should you have accepted him?" "I think I should have consulted you before I did that. But I should have wished to accept him. Papa, I do love him. I have never said so before to any one. I would not say so to you now, if he had not--spoken to you as he has done." "Emily, it must not be." "Why not, papa? If you say it shall not be so, it shall not. I will do as you bid me." Then he put out his hand and caressed her, stroking down her hair. "But I think you ought to tell me why it must not be,--as I do love him." "He is a foreigner." "But is he? And why should not a foreigner be as good as an Englishman? His name is foreign, but he talks English and lives as an Englishman." "He has no relatives, no family, no belongings. He is what we call an adventurer. Marriage, my dear, is a most serious thing." "Yes, papa, I know that." "One is bound to be very careful. How can I give you to a man I know nothing about,--an adventurer? What would they say in Herefordshire?" "I don't know why they should say anything, but if they did I shouldn't much care." "I should, my dear. I should care very much. One is bound to think of one's family. Suppose it should turn out afterwards that he was--disreputable!" "You may say that of any man, papa." "But when a man has connexions, a father and mother, or uncles and aunts, people that everybody knows about, then there is some guarantee of security. Did you ever hear this man speak of his father?" "I don't know that I ever did." "Or his mother,--or his family? Don't you think that is suspicious?" "I will ask him, papa, if you wish." "No, I would have you ask him nothing. I would not wish that there should be opportunity for such asking. If there has been intimacy between you, such information should have come naturally,--as a thing of course. You have made him no promise?" "Oh no, papa." "Nor spoken to him--of your regard for him?" "Never;--not a word. Nor he to me,--except in such words as one understands even though they say nothing." "I wish he had never seen you." "Is he a bad man, papa?" "Who knows? I cannot tell. He may be ever so bad. How is one to know whether a man be bad or good when one knows nothing about him?" At this point the father got up and walked about the room. "The long and the short of it is that you must not see him any more." "Did you tell him so?" "Yes;--well; I don't know whether I said exactly that, but I told him that the whole thing must come to an end. And it must. Luckily it seems that nothing has been said on either side." "But, papa--; is there to be no reason?" "Haven't I given reasons? I will not have my daughter encourage an adventurer,--a man of whom nobody knows anything. That is reason sufficient." "He has a business, and he lives with gentlemen. He is Everett's friend. He is well educated;--oh, so much better than most men that one meets. And he is clever. Papa, I wish you knew him better than you do." "I do not want to know him better." "Is not that prejudice, papa?" "My dear Emily," said Mr. Wharton, striving to wax into anger that he might be firm against her, "I don't think that it becomes you to ask your father such a question as that. You ought to believe that it is the chief object of my life to do the best I can for my children." "I am sure it is." "And you ought to feel that, as I have had a long experience in the world, my judgment about a young man might be trusted." That was a statement which Miss Wharton was not prepared to admit. She had already professed herself willing to submit to her father's judgment, and did not now by any means contemplate rebellion against parental authority. But she did feel that on a matter so vital to her she had a right to plead her cause before judgment should be given, and she was not slow to assure herself, even as this interview went on, that her love for the man was strong enough to entitle her to assure her father that her happiness depended on his reversal of the sentence already pronounced. "You know, papa, that I trust you," she said. "And I have promised you that I will not disobey you. If you tell me that I am never to see Mr. Lopez again, I will not see him." "You are a good girl. You were always a good girl." "But I think that you ought to hear me." Then he stood still with his hands in his trowsers pockets looking at her. He did not want to hear a word, but he felt that he would be a tyrant if he refused. "If you tell me that I am not to see him, I shall not see him. But I shall be very unhappy. I do love him, and I shall never love any one else in the same way." "That is nonsense, Emily. There is Arthur Fletcher." "I am sure you will never ask me to marry a man I do not love, and I shall never love Arthur Fletcher. If this is to be as you say, it will make me very, very wretched. It is right that you should know the truth. If it is only because Mr. Lopez has a foreign name--" "It isn't only that; no one knows anything about him, or where to inquire even." "I think you should inquire, papa, and be quite certain before you pronounce such a sentence against me. It will be a crushing blow." He looked at her, and saw that there was a fixed purpose in her countenance of which he had never before seen similar signs. "You claim a right to my obedience, and I acknowledge it. I am sure you believe me when I promise not to see him without your permission." "I do believe you. Of course I believe you." "But if I do that for you, papa, I think that you ought to be very sure, on my account, that I haven't to bear such unhappiness for nothing. You'll think about it, papa,--will you not, before you quite decide?" She leaned against him as she spoke, and he kissed her. "Good night, now, papa. You will think about it?" "I will. I will. Of course I will." And he began the process of thinking about it immediately,--before the door was closed behind her. But what was there to think about? Nothing that she had said altered in the least his idea about the man. He was as convinced as ever that unless there was much to conceal there would not be so much concealment. But a feeling began to grow upon him already that his daughter had a mode of pleading with him which he would not ultimately be able to resist. He had the power, he knew, of putting an end to the thing altogether. He had only to say resolutely and unchangeably that the thing shouldn't be, and it wouldn't be. If he could steel his heart against his daughter's sorrow for, say, a twelvemonth, the victory would be won. But he already began to fear that he lacked the power to steel his heart against his daughter. CHAPTER VI An Old Friend Goes to Windsor "And what are they going to make you now?" This question was asked of her husband by a lady with whom perhaps the readers of this volume may have already formed some acquaintance. Chronicles of her early life have been written, at any rate copiously. The lady was the Duchess of Omnium, and her husband was of course the Duke. In order that the nature of the question asked by the duchess may be explained, it must be stated that just at this time the political affairs of the nation had got themselves tied up into one of those truly desperate knots from which even the wisdom and experience of septuagenarian statesmen can see no unravelment. The heads of parties were at a standstill. In the House of Commons there was, so to say, no majority on either side. The minds of members were so astray that, according to the best calculation that could be made, there would be a majority of about ten against any possible Cabinet. There would certainly be a majority against either of those well-tried but, at this moment, little-trusted Prime Ministers, Mr. Gresham and Mr. Daubeny. There were certain men, nominally belonging to this or to the other party, who would certainly within a week of the nomination of a Cabinet in the House, oppose the Cabinet which they ought to support. Mr. Daubeny had been in power,--nay, was in power, though he had twice resigned. Mr. Gresham had been twice sent for to Windsor, and had on one occasion undertaken and on another had refused to undertake to form a Ministry. Mr. Daubeny had tried two or three combinations, and had been at his wits' end. He was no doubt still in power,--could appoint bishops, and make peers, and give away ribbons. But he couldn't pass a law, and certainly continued to hold his present uncomfortable position by no will of his own. But a Prime Minister cannot escape till he has succeeded in finding a successor; and though the successor be found and consents to make an attempt, the old unfortunate cannot be allowed to go free when that attempt is shown to be a failure. He has not absolutely given up the keys of his boxes, and no one will take them from him. Even a sovereign can abdicate; but the Prime Minister of a constitutional government is in bonds. The reader may therefore understand that the Duchess was asking her husband what place among the political rulers of the country had been offered to him by the last aspirant to the leadership of the Government. But the reader should understand more than this, and may perhaps do so, if he has ever seen those former chronicles to which allusion has been made. The Duke, before he became a duke, had held very high office, having been Chancellor of the Exchequer. When he was transferred, perforce, to the House of Lords, he had,--as is not uncommon in such cases,--accepted a lower political station. This had displeased the Duchess, who was ambitious both on her own behalf and that of her lord,--and who thought that a Duke of Omnium should be nothing in the Government if not at any rate near the top. But after that, with the simple and single object of doing some special piece of work for the nation,--something which he fancied that nobody else would do if he didn't do it,--his Grace, of his own motion, at his own solicitation, had encountered further official degradation, very much to the disgust of the Duchess. And it was not the way with her Grace to hide such sorrows in the depth of her bosom. When affronted she would speak out, whether to her husband, or to another,--using irony rather than argument to support her cause and to vindicate her ways. The shafts of ridicule hurled by her against her husband in regard to his voluntary abasement had been many and sharp. They stung him, but never for a moment influenced him. And though they stung him, they did not even anger him. It was her nature to say such things,--and he knew that they came rather from her uncontrolled spirit than from any malice. She was his wife too, and he had an idea that of little injuries of that sort there should be no end of bearing on the part of a husband. Sometimes he would endeavour to explain to her the motives which actuated him; but he had come to fear that they were and must ever be unintelligible to her. But he credited her with less than her real intelligence. She did understand the nature of his work and his reasons for doing it; and, after her own fashion, did what she conceived to be her own work in endeavouring to create within his bosom a desire for higher things. "Surely," she said to herself, "if a man of his rank is to be a minister he should be a great minister;--at any rate as great as his circumstances will make him. A man never can save his country by degrading himself." In this he would probably have agreed; but his idea of degradation and hers hardly tallied. When therefore she asked him what they were going to make him, it was as though some sarcastic housekeeper in a great establishment should ask the butler,--some butler too prone to yield in such matters,--whether the master had appointed him lately to the cleaning of shoes or the carrying of coals. Since these knots had become so very tight, and since the journeys to Windsor had become so very frequent, her Grace had asked many such questions, and had received but very indifferent replies. The Duke had sometimes declared that the matter was not ripe enough to allow him to make any answer. "Of course," said the Duchess, "you should keep the secret. The editors of the evening papers haven't known it for above an hour." At another time he told her that he had undertaken to give Mr. Gresham his assistance in any way in which it might be asked. "Joint Under-Secretary with Lord Fawn, I should say," answered the Duchess. Then he told her that he believed an attempt would be made at a mixed ministry, but that he did not in the least know to whom the work of doing so would be confided. "You will be about the last man who will be told," replied the Duchess. Now, at this moment, he had, as she knew, come direct from the house of Mr. Gresham, and she asked her question in her usual spirit. "And what are they going to make you now?" But he did not answer the question in his usual manner. He would customarily smile gently at her badinage, and perhaps say a word intended to show that he was not in the least moved by her raillery. But in this instance he was very grave, and stood before her a moment making no answer at all, looking at her in a sad and almost solemn manner. "They have told you that they can do without you," she said, breaking out almost into a passion. "I knew how it would be. Men are always valued by others as they value themselves." "I wish it were so," he replied. "I should sleep easier to-night." "What is it, Plantagenet?" she exclaimed, jumping up from her chair. "I never cared for your ridicule hitherto, Cora; but now I feel that I want your sympathy." "If you are going to do anything,--to do really anything, you shall have it. Oh, how you shall have it!" "I have received her Majesty's orders to go down to Windsor at once. I must start within half-an-hour." "You are going to be Prime Minister!" she exclaimed. As she spoke she threw her arms up, and then rushed into his embrace. Never since their first union had she been so demonstrative either of love or admiration. "Oh, Plantagenet," she said, "if I can only do anything I will slave for you." As he put his arm round her waist he already felt the pleasantness of her altered way to him. She had never worshipped him yet, and therefore her worship when it did come had all the delight to him which it ordinarily has to the newly married hero. "Stop a moment, Cora. I do not know how it may be yet. But this I know, that if without cowardice I could avoid this task, I would certainly avoid it." "Oh no! And there would be cowardice; of course there would," said the Duchess, not much caring what might be the bonds which bound him to the task so long as he should certainly feel himself to be bound. "He has told me that he thinks it my duty to make the attempt." "Who is he?" "Mr. Gresham. I do not know that I should have felt myself bound by him, but the Duke said so also." This duke was our duke's old friend, the Duke of St. Bungay. "Was he there? And who else?" "No one else. It is no case for exultation, Cora, for the chances are that I shall fail. The Duke has promised to help me, on condition that one or two he has named are included, and that one or two whom he has also named are not. In each case I should myself have done exactly as he proposes." "And Mr. Gresham?" "He will retire. That is a matter of course. He will intend to support us; but all that is veiled in the obscurity which is always, I think, darker as to the future of politics than any other future. Clouds arise, one knows not why or whence, and create darkness when one expected light. But as yet, you must understand, nothing is settled. I cannot even say what answer I may make to her Majesty, till I know what commands her Majesty may lay upon me." "You must keep a hold of it now, Plantagenet," said the Duchess, clenching her own fist. "I will not even close a finger on it with any personal ambition," said the Duke. "If I could be relieved from the burden this moment it would be an ease to my heart. I remember once," he said,--and as he spoke he again put his arm around her waist, "when I was debarred from taking office by a domestic circumstance." "I remember that too," she said, speaking very gently and looking up at him. "It was a grief to me at the time, though it turned out so well,--because the office then suggested to me was one which I thought I could fill with credit to the country. I believed in myself then as far as that work went. But for this attempt I have no belief in myself. I doubt whether I have any gift for governing men." "It will come." "It may be that I must try;--and it may be that I must break my heart because I fail. But I shall make the attempt if I am directed to do so in any manner that shall seem feasible. I must be off now. The Duke is to be here this evening. They had better have dinner ready for me whenever I may be able to eat it." Then he took his departure before she could say another word. When the Duchess was alone she took to thinking of the whole thing in a manner which they who best knew her would have thought to be very unusual with her. She already possessed all that rank and wealth could give her, and together with those good things a peculiar position of her own, of which she was proud, and which she had made her own not by her wealth or rank, but by a certain fearless energy and power of raillery which never deserted her. Many feared her and she was afraid of none, and many also loved her,--whom she also loved, for her nature was affectionate. She was happy with her children, happy with her friends, in the enjoyment of perfect health, and capable of taking an exaggerated interest in anything that might come uppermost for the moment. One would have been inclined to say that politics were altogether unnecessary to her, and that as Duchess of Omnium, lately known as Lady Glencora Palliser, she had a wider and a pleasanter influence than could belong to any woman as wife of a Prime Minister. And she was essentially one of those women who are not contented to be known simply as the wives of their husbands. She had a celebrity of her own, quite independent of his position, and which could not be enhanced by any glory or any power added to him. Nevertheless, when he left her to go down to the Queen with the prospect of being called upon to act as chief of the incoming ministry, her heart throbbed with excitement. It had come at last, and he would be, to her thinking, the leading man in the greatest kingdom in the world. But she felt in regard to him somewhat as did Lady Macbeth towards her lord. "What thou would'st highly, That would'st thou holily." She knew him to be full of scruples, unable to bend when aught was to be got by bending, unwilling to domineer when men might be brought to subjection only by domination. The first duty never could be taught to him. To win support by smiles when his heart was bitter within him would never be within the power of her husband. He could never be brought to buy an enemy by political gifts,--would never be prone to silence his keenest opponent by making him his right hand supporter. But the other lesson was easier and might she thought be learned. Power is so pleasant that men quickly learn to be greedy in the enjoyment of it, and to flatter themselves that patriotism requires them to be imperious. She would be constant with him day and night to make him understand that his duty to his country required him to be in very truth its chief ruler. And then with some knowledge of things as they are,--and also with much ignorance,--she reflected that he had at his command a means of obtaining popularity and securing power, which had not belonged to his immediate predecessors, and had perhaps never to the same extent been at the command of any minister in England. His wealth as Duke of Omnium had been great; but hers, as available for immediate purposes, had been greater even than his. After some fashion, of which she was profoundly ignorant, her own property was separated from his and reserved to herself and her children. Since her marriage she had never said a word to him about her money,--unless it were to ask that something out of the common course might be spent on some, generally absurd, object. But now had come the time for squandering money. She was not only rich but she had a popularity that was exclusively her own. The new Prime Minister and the new Prime Minister's wife should entertain after a fashion that had never yet been known even among the nobility of England. Both in town and country those great mansions should be kept open which were now rarely much used because she had found them dull, cold, and comfortless. In London there should not be a Member of Parliament whom she would not herself know and influence by her flattery and grace,--or if there were men whom she could not influence, they should live as men tabooed and unfortunate. Money mattered nothing. Their income was enormous, and for a series of years,--for half-a-dozen years if the game could be kept up so long,--they could spend treble what they called their income without real injury to their children. Visions passed through her brain of wondrous things which might be done,--if only her husband would be true to his own greatness. The Duke had left her about two. She did not stir out of the house that day, but in the course of the afternoon she wrote a line to a friend who lived not very far from her. The Duchess dwelt in Carlton Terrace, and her friend in Park Lane. The note was as follows:-- DEAR M., Come to me at once. I am too excited to go to you. Yours, G. This was addressed to one Mrs. Finn, a lady as to whom chronicles also have been written, and who has been known to the readers of such chronicles as a friend dearly loved by the Duchess. As quickly as she could put on her carriage garments and get herself taken to Carlton Terrace, Mrs. Finn was there. "Well, my dear, how do you think it's all settled at last?" said the Duchess. It will probably be felt that the new Prime Minister's wife was indiscreet, and hardly worthy of the confidence placed in her by her husband. But surely we all have some one friend to whom we tell everything, and with the Duchess Mrs. Finn was that one friend. "Is the Duke to be Prime Minister?" "How on earth should you have guessed that?" "What else could make you so excited? Besides, it is by no means strange. I understand that they have gone on trying the two old stagers till it is useless to try them any longer; and if there is to be a fresh man, no one would be more likely than the Duke." "Do you think so?" "Certainly. Why not?" "He has frittered away his political position by such meaningless concessions. And then he had never done anything to put himself forward,--at any rate since he left the House of Commons. Perhaps I haven't read things right,--but I was surprised, very much surprised." "And gratified?" "Oh yes. I can tell you everything, because you will neither misunderstand me nor tell tales of me. Yes,--I shall like him to be Prime Minister, though I know that I shall have a bad time of it myself." "Why a bad time?" "He is so hard to manage. Of course I don't mean about politics. Of course it must be a mixed kind of thing at first, and I don't care a straw whether it run to Radicalism or Toryism. The country goes on its own way, either for better or for worse, whichever of them are in. I don't think it makes any difference as to what sort of laws are passed. But among ourselves, in our set, it makes a deal of difference who gets the garters, and the counties, who are made barons and then earls, and whose name stands at the head of everything." "That is your way of looking at politics?" "I own it to you;--and I must teach it to him." "You never will do that, Lady Glen." "Never is a long word. I mean to try. For look back and tell me of any Prime Minister who has become sick of his power. They become sick of the want of power when it's falling away from them,--and then they affect to disdain and put aside the thing they can no longer enjoy. Love of power is a kind of feeling which comes to a man as he grows older." "Politics with the Duke have been simple patriotism," said Mrs. Finn. "The patriotism may remain, my dear, but not the simplicity. I don't want him to sell his country to Germany, or to turn it into an American republic in order that he may be president. But when he gets the reins in his hands, I want him to keep them there. If he's so much honester than other people, of course he's the best man for the place. We must make him believe that the very existence of the country depends on his firmness." "To tell you the truth, Lady Glen, I don't think you'll ever make the Duke believe anything. What he believes, he believes either from very old habit, or from the working of his own mind." "You're always singing his praises, Marie." "I don't know that there is any special praise in what I say; but as far as I can see, it is the man's character." "Mr. Finn will come in, of course," said the Duchess. "Mr. Finn will be like the Duke in one thing. He'll take his own way as to being in or out quite independently of his wife." "You'd like him to be in office?" "No, indeed! Why should I? He would be more often at the House, and keep later hours, and be always away all the morning into the bargain. But I shall like him to do as he likes himself." "Fancy thinking of all that. I'd sit up all night every night of my life.--I'd listen to every debate in the House myself,--to have Plantagenet Prime Minister. I like to be busy. Well now, if it does come off--" "It isn't settled, then?" "How can one hope that a single journey will settle it, when those other men have been going backwards and forwards between Windsor and London, like buckets in a well, for the last three weeks? But if it is settled, I mean to have a cabinet of my own, and I mean that you shall do the foreign affairs." "You'd better let me be at the exchequer. I'm very good at accounts." "I'll do that myself. The accounts that I intend to set a-going would frighten any one less audacious. And I mean to be my own home secretary, and to keep my own conscience,--and to be my own master of the ceremonies certainly. I think a small cabinet gets on best. Do you know,--I should like to put the Queen down." "What on earth do you mean?" "No treason; nothing of that kind. But I should like to make Buckingham Palace second-rate; and I'm not quite sure but I can. I dare say you don't quite understand me." "I don't think that I do, Lady Glen." "You will some of these days. Come in to-morrow before lunch. I suppose I shall know all about it then, and shall have found that my basket of crockery has been kicked over and every thing smashed." CHAPTER VII Another Old Friend At about nine the Duke had returned, and was eating his very simple dinner in the breakfast-room,--a beefsteak and a potato, with a glass of sherry and Apollinaris water. No man more easily satisfied as to what he eat and drank lived in London in those days. As regarded the eating and drinking he dined alone, but his wife sat with him and waited on him, having sent the servant out of the room. "I have told her Majesty that I would do the best I could," said the Duke. "Then you are Prime Minister." "Not at all. Mr. Daubeny is Prime Minister. I have undertaken to form a ministry, if I find it practicable, with the assistance of such friends as I possess. I never felt before that I had to lean so entirely on others as I do now." "Lean on yourself only. Be enough for yourself." "Those are empty words, Cora;--words that are quite empty. In one sense a man should always be enough for himself. He should have enough of principle and enough of conscience to restrain him from doing what he knows to be wrong. But can a ship-builder build his ship single-handed, or the watchmaker make his watch without assistance? On former occasions such as this, I could say, with little or no help from without, whether I would or would not undertake the work that was proposed to me, because I had only a bit of the ship to build, or a wheel of the watch to make. My own efficacy for my present task depends entirely on the co-operation of others, and unfortunately upon that of some others with whom I have no sympathy, nor have they with me." "Leave them out," said the Duchess boldly. "But they are men who will not be left out, and whose services the country has a right to expect." "Then bring them in, and think no more about it. It is no good crying for pain that cannot be cured." "Co-operation is difficult without community of feeling. I find myself to be too stubborn-hearted for the place. It was nothing to me to sit in the same Cabinet with a man I disliked when I had not put him there myself. But now--. As I have travelled up I have almost felt that I could not do it! I did not know before how much I might dislike a man." "Who is the one man?" "Nay;--whoever he be, he will have to be a friend now, and therefore I will not name him, even to you. But it is not one only. If it were one, absolutely marked and recognised, I might avoid him. But my friends, real friends, are so few! Who is there besides the Duke on whom I can lean with both confidence and love?" "Lord Cantrip." "Hardly so, Cora. But Lord Cantrip goes out with Mr. Gresham. They will always cling together." "You used to like Mr. Mildmay." "Mr. Mildmay,--yes! If there could be a Mr. Mildmay in the Cabinet, this trouble would not come upon my shoulders." "Then I'm very glad that there can't be a Mr. Mildmay. Why shouldn't there be as good fish in the sea as ever were caught out of it?" "When you've got a good fish you like to make as much of it as you can." "I suppose Mr. Monk will join you." "I think we shall ask him. But I am not prepared to discuss men's names as yet." "You must discuss them with the Duke immediately." "Probably;--but I had better discuss them with him before I fix my own mind by naming them even to you." "You'll bring Mr. Finn in, Plantagenet?" "Mr. Finn!" "Yes;--Phineas Finn,--the man who was tried." "My dear Cora, we haven't come down to that yet. We need not at any rate trouble ourselves about the small fishes till we are sure that we can get big fishes to join us." "I don't know why he should be a small fish. No man has done better than he has; and if you want a man to stick to you--" "I don't want a man to stick to me. I want a man to stick to his country." "You were talking about sympathy." "Well, yes;--I was. But do not name any one else just at present. The Duke will be here soon, and I would be alone till he comes." "There is one thing I want to say, Plantagenet." "What is it?" "One favour I want to ask." "Pray do not ask anything for any man just at present." "It is not anything for any man." "Nor for any woman." "It is for a woman,--but one whom I think you would wish to oblige." "Who is it?" Then she curtseyed, smiling at him drolly, and put her hand upon her breast. "Something for you! What on earth can you want that I can do for you?" "Will you do it,--if it be reasonable?" "If I think it reasonable, I certainly will do it." Then her manner changed altogether, and she became serious and almost solemn. "If, as I suppose, all the great places about her Majesty be changed, I should like to be Mistress of the Robes." "You!" said he, almost startled out of his usual quiet demeanour. "Why not I? Is not my rank high enough?" "You burden yourself with the intricacies and subserviences, with the tedium and pomposities of Court life! Cora, you do not know what you are talking about, or what you are proposing for yourself." "If I am willing to try to undertake a duty, why should I be debarred from it any more than you?" "Because I have put myself into a groove, and ground myself into a mould, and clipped and pared and pinched myself all round,--very ineffectually, as I fear,--to fit myself for this thing. You have lived as free as air. You have disdained,--and though I may have grumbled I have still been proud to see you disdain,--to wrap yourself in the swaddling bandages of Court life. You have ridiculed all those who have been near her Majesty as Court ladies." "The individuals, Plantagenet, perhaps; but not the office. I am getting older now, and I do not see why I should not begin a new life." She had been somewhat quelled by his unexpected energy, and was at the moment hardly able to answer him with her usual spirit. "Do not think of it, my dear. You asked whether your rank was high enough. It must be so, as there is, as it happens, none higher. But your position, should it come to pass that your husband is the head of the Government, will be too high. I may say that in no condition should I wish my wife to be subject to other restraint than that which is common to all married women. I should not choose that she should have any duties unconnected with our joint family and home. But as First Minister of the Crown I would altogether object to her holding an office believed to be at my disposal." She looked at him with her large eyes wide open, and then left him without a word. She had no other way of showing her displeasure, for she knew that when he spoke as he had spoken now all argument was unavailing. The Duke remained an hour alone before he was joined by the other Duke, during which he did not for a moment apply his mind to the subject which might be thought to be most prominent in his thoughts,--the filling up, namely, of a list of his new government. All that he could do in that direction without further assistance had been already done very easily. There were four or five certain names,--names that is of certain political friends, and three or four almost equally certain of men who had been political enemies, but who would now clearly be asked to join the ministry. Sir Gregory Grogram, the late Attorney-General, would of course be asked to resume his place; but Sir Timothy Beeswax, who was up to this moment Solicitor-General for the Conservatives, would also be invited to retain that which he held. Many details were known, not only to the two dukes who were about to patch up the ministry between them, but to the political world at large,--and were facts upon which the newspapers were able to display their wonderful foresight and general omniscience with their usual confidence. And as to the points which were in doubt,--whether or not, for instance, that consistent old Tory Sir Orlando Drought should be asked to put up with the Post-office or should be allowed to remain at the Colonies,--the younger Duke did not care to trouble himself till the elder should have come to his assistance. But his own position and his questionable capacity for filling it,--that occupied all his mind. If nominally first he would be really first. Of so much it seemed to him that his honour required him to assure himself. To be a _fainéant_ ruler was in direct antagonism both to his conscience and his predilections. To call himself by a great name before the world, and then to be something infinitely less than that name, would be to him a degradation. But though he felt fixed as to that, he was by no means assured as to that other point, which to most men firm in their resolves as he was, and backed up as he had been by the confidence of others, would be cause of small hesitation. He did doubt his ability to fill that place which it would now be his duty to occupy. He more than doubted. He told himself again and again that there was wanting to him a certain noble capacity for commanding support and homage from other men. With things and facts he could deal, but human beings had not opened themselves to him. But now it was too late! and yet,--as he said to his wife,--to fail would break his heart! No ambition had prompted him. He was sure of himself there. One only consideration had forced him into this great danger, and that had been the assurance of others that it was his manifest duty to encounter it. And now there was clearly no escape,--no escape compatible with that clean-handed truth from which it was not possible for him to swerve. He might create difficulties in order that through them a way might still be opened to him of restoring to the Queen the commission which had been entrusted to him. He might insist on this or that impossible concession. But the memory of escape such as that would break his heart as surely as the failure. When the Duke was announced he rose to greet his old friend almost with fervour. "It is a shame," he said, "to bring you out so late. I ought to have gone to you." "Not at all. It is always the rule in these cases that the man who has most to do should fix himself as well as he can where others may be able to find him." The Duke of St. Bungay was an old man, between seventy and eighty, with hair nearly white, and who on entering the room had to unfold himself out of various coats and comforters. But he was in full possession not only of his intellects but of his bodily power, showing, as many politicians do show, that the cares of the nation may sit upon a man's shoulders for many years without breaking or even bending them. For the Duke had belonged to ministries for nearly the last half century. As the chronicles have also dealt with him, no further records of his past life shall now be given. He had said something about the Queen, expressing gracious wishes for the comfort of her Majesty in all these matters, something of the inconvenience of these political journeys to and fro, something also of the delicacy and difficulty of the operations on hand which were enhanced by the necessity of bringing men together as cordial allies who had hitherto acted with bitter animosity one to another, before the younger Duke said a word. "We may as well," said the elder, "make out some small provisional list, and you can ask those you name to be with you early to-morrow. But perhaps you have already made a list." "No indeed. I have not even had a pencil in my hand." "We may as well begin then," said the elder, facing the table when he saw that his less-experienced companion made no attempt at beginning. "There is something horrible to me in the idea of writing down men's names for such a work as this, just as boys at school used to draw out the elevens for a cricket match." The old stager turned round and stared at the younger politician. "The thing itself is so momentous that one ought to have aid from heaven." Plantagenet Palliser was the last man from whom the Duke of St. Bungay would have expected romance at any time, and, least of all, at such a time as this. "Aid from heaven you may have," he said, "by saying your prayers; and I don't doubt you ask it for this and all other things generally. But an angel won't come to tell you who ought to be Chancellor of the Exchequer." "No angel will, and therefore I wish that I could wash my hands of it." His old friend still stared at him. "It is like sacrilege to me, attempting this without feeling one's own fitness for the work. It unmans me,--this necessity of doing that which I know I cannot do with fitting judgment." "Your mind has been a little too hard at work to-day." "It hasn't been at work at all. I've had nothing to do, and have been unable really to think of work. But I feel that chance circumstances have put me into a position for which I am unfit, and which yet I have been unable to avoid. How much better would it be that you should do this alone,--you yourself." "Utterly out of the question. I do know and think that I always have known my own powers. Neither has my aptitude in debate nor my capacity for work justified me in looking to the premiership. But that, forgive me, is now not worthy of consideration. It is because you do work and can work, and because you have fitted yourself for that continued course of lucid explanation which we now call debate, that men on both sides have called upon you as the best man to come forward in this difficulty. Excuse me, my friend, again, if I say that I expect to find your manliness equal to your capacity." "If I could only escape from it!" "Psha;--nonsense!" said the old Duke, getting up. "There is such a thing as a conscience with so fine an edge that it will allow a man to do nothing. You've got to serve your country. On such assistance as I can give you you know that you may depend with absolute assurance. Now let us get to work. I suppose you would wish that I should take the chair at the Council." "Certainly;--of course," said the Duke of Omnium, turning to the table. The one practical suggestion had fixed him, and from that moment he gave himself to the work in hand with all his energies. It was not very difficult, nor did it take them a very long time. If the future Prime Minister had not his names at his fingers' ends, the future President of the Council had them. Eight men were soon named whom it was thought well that the Duke of Omnium should consult early in the morning as to their willingness to fill certain places. "Each one of them may have some other one or some two whom he may insist on bringing with him," said the elder Duke; "and though of course you cannot yield to the pressure in every such case, it will be wise to allow yourself scope for some amount of concession. You'll find they'll shake down after the usual amount of resistance and compliance. No;--don't you leave your house to-morrow to see anybody unless it be Mr. Daubeny or her Majesty. I'll come to you at two, and if her Grace will give me luncheon, I'll lunch with her. Good night, and don't think too much of the bigness of the thing. I remember dear old Lord Brock telling me how much more difficult it was to find a good coachman than a good Secretary of State." The Duke of Omnium, as he sat thinking of things for the next hour in his chair, succeeded only in proving to himself that Lord Brock never ought to have been Prime Minister of England after having ventured to make so poor a joke on so solemn a subject. CHAPTER VIII The Beginning of a New Career By the time that the Easter holidays were over,--holidays which had been used so conveniently for the making of a new government,--the work of getting a team together had been accomplished by the united energy of the two dukes and other friends. The filling up of the great places had been by no means so difficult or so tedious,--nor indeed the cause of half so many heartburns,--as the completion of the list of the subordinates. _Noblesse oblige._ The Secretaries of State, and the Chancellors, and the First Lords, selected from this or the other party, felt that the eyes of mankind were upon them, and that it behoved them to assume a virtue if they had it not. They were habitually indifferent to self-exaltation, and allowed themselves to be thrust into this or that unfitting role, professing that the Queen's Government and the good of the country were their only considerations. Lord Thrift made way for Sir Orlando Drought at the Admiralty, because it was felt on all sides that Sir Orlando could not join the new composite party without high place. And the same grace was shown in regard to Lord Drummond, who remained at the Colonies, keeping the office to which he had been lately transferred under Mr. Daubeny. And Sir Gregory Grogram said not a word, whatever he may have thought, when he was told that Mr. Daubeny's Lord Chancellor, Lord Ramsden, was to keep the seals. Sir Gregory did, no doubt, think very much about it; for legal offices have a signification differing much from that which attaches itself to places simply political. A Lord Chancellor becomes a peer, and on going out of office enjoys a large pension. When the woolsack has been reached there comes an end of doubt, and a beginning of ease. Sir Gregory was not a young man, and this was a terrible blow. But he bore it manfully, saying not a word when the Duke spoke to him; but he became convinced from that moment that no more inefficient lawyer ever sat upon the English bench, or a more presumptuous politician in the British Parliament, than Lord Ramsden. The real struggle, however, lay in the appropriate distribution of the Rattlers and the Robys, the Fitzgibbons and the Macphersons among the subordinate offices of State. Mr. Macpherson and Mr. Roby, with a host of others who had belonged to Mr. Daubeny, were prepared, as they declared from the first, to lend their assistance to the Duke. They had consulted Mr. Daubeny on the subject, and Mr. Daubeny told them that their duty lay in that direction. At the first blush of the matter the arrangement took the form of a gracious tender from themselves to a statesman called upon to act in very difficult circumstances,--and they were thanked accordingly by the Duke, with something of real cordial gratitude. But when the actual adjustment of things was in hand, the Duke, having but little power of assuming a soft countenance and using soft words while his heart was bitter, felt on more than one occasion inclined to withdraw his thanks. He was astounded not so much by the pretensions as by the unblushing assertion of these pretensions in reference to places which he had been innocent enough to think were always bestowed at any rate without direct application. He had measured himself rightly when he told the older duke in one of those anxious conversations which had been held before the attempt was made, that long as he had been in office himself he did not know what was the way of bestowing office. "Two gentlemen have been here this morning," he said one day to the Duke of St. Bungay, "one on the heels of the other, each assuring me not only that the whole stability of the enterprise depends on my giving a certain office to him,--but actually telling me to my face that I had promised it to him!" The old statesman laughed. "To be told within the same half-hour by two men that I had made promises to each of them inconsistent with each other!" "Who were the two men?" "Mr. Rattler and Mr. Roby." "I am assured that they are inseparable since the work was begun. They always had a leaning to each other, and now I hear they pass their time between the steps of the Carlton and Reform Clubs." "But what am I to do? One must be Patronage Secretary, no doubt." "They're both good men in their way, you know." "But why do they come to me with their mouths open, like dogs craving a bone? It used not to be so. Of course men were always anxious for office as they are now." "Well; yes. We've heard of that before to-day, I think." "But I don't think any man ever ventured to ask Mr. Mildmay." "Time had done much for him in consolidating his authority, and perhaps the present world is less reticent in its eagerness than it was in his younger days. I doubt, however, whether it is more dishonest, and whether struggles were not made quite as disgraceful to the strugglers as anything that is done now. You can't alter the men, and you must use them." The younger Duke sat down and sighed over the degenerate patriotism of the age. But at last even the Rattlers and Robys were fixed, if not satisfied, and a complete list of the ministry appeared in all the newspapers. Though the thing had been long a-doing, still it had come suddenly,--so that at the first proposition to form a coalition ministry, the newspapers had hardly known whether to assist or to oppose the scheme. There was no doubt, in the minds of all these editors and contributors, the teaching of a tradition that coalitions of this kind have been generally feeble, sometimes disastrous, and on occasions even disgraceful. When a man, perhaps through a long political life, has bound himself to a certain code of opinions, how can he change that code at a moment? And when at the same moment, together with the change, he secures power, patronage, and pay, how shall the public voice absolve him? But then again men, who have by the work of their lives grown into a certain position in the country, and have unconsciously but not therefore less actually made themselves indispensable either to this side in politics or to that, cannot free themselves altogether from the responsibility of managing them when a period comes such as that now reached. This also the newspapers perceived; and having, since the commencement of the Session, been very loud in exposing the disgraceful collapse of government affairs, could hardly refuse their support to any attempt at a feasible arrangement. When it was first known that the Duke of Omnium had consented to make the attempt, they had both on one side and the other been loud in his praise, going so far as to say that he was the only man in England who could do the work. It was probably this encouragement which had enabled the new Premier to go on with an undertaking which was personally distasteful to him, and for which from day to day he believed himself to be less and less fit. But when the newspapers told him that he was the only man for the occasion, how could he be justified in crediting himself in preference to them? The work in Parliament began under the new auspices with great tranquillity. That there would soon come causes of hot blood,--the English Church, the county suffrage, the income tax, and further education questions,--all men knew who knew anything. But for the moment, for the month even, perhaps for the Session, there was to be peace, with full latitude for the performance of routine duties. There was so to say no opposition, and at first it seemed that one special bench in the House of Commons would remain unoccupied. But after a day or two,--on one of which Mr. Daubeny had been seen sitting just below the gangway,--that gentleman returned to the place usually held by the Prime Minister's rival, saying with a smile that it might be for the convenience of the House that the seat should be utilised. Mr. Gresham at this time had, with declared purpose, asked and obtained the Speaker's leave of absence and was abroad. Who should lead the House? That had been a great question, caused by the fact that the Prime Minister was in the House of Lords;--and what office should the Leader hold? Mr. Monk had consented to take the Exchequer, but the right to sit opposite to the Treasury Box and to consider himself for the time the principal spirit in that chamber was at last assigned to Sir Orlando Drought. "It will never do," said Mr. Rattler to Mr. Roby. "I don't mean to say anything against Drought, who has always been a very useful man to your party;--but he lacks something of the position." "The fact is," said Roby, "that we've trusted to two men so long that we don't know how to suppose any one else big enough to fill their places. Monk wouldn't have done. The House doesn't care about Monk." "I always thought it should be Wilson, and so I told the Duke. He had an idea that it should be one of your men." "I think he's right there," said Roby. "There ought to be something like a fair division. Individuals might be content, but the party would be dissatisfied. For myself, I'd have sooner stayed out as an independent member, but Daubeny said that he thought I was bound to make myself useful." "I told the Duke from the beginning," said Rattler, "that I didn't think that I could be of any service to him. Of course, I would support him, but I had been too thoroughly a party man for a new movement of this kind. But he said just the same!--that he considered I was bound to join him. I asked Gresham, and when Gresham said so too, of course I had no help for it." Neither of these excellent public servants had told a lie in this. Some such conversations as those reported had passed;--but a man doesn't lie when he exaggerates an emphasis, or even when he gives by a tone a meaning to a man's words exactly opposite to that which another tone would convey. Or, if he does lie in doing so, he does not know that he lies. Mr. Rattler had gone back to his old office at the Treasury and Mr. Roby had been forced to content himself with the Secretaryship at the Admiralty. But, as the old Duke had said, they were close friends, and prepared to fight together any battle which might keep them in their present position. Many of the cares of office the Prime Minister did succeed in shuffling off altogether on to the shoulders of his elder friend. He would not concern himself with the appointment of ladies, about whom he said he knew nothing, and as to whose fitness and claims he professed himself to be as ignorant as the office messenger. The offers were of course made in the usual form, as though coming direct from the Queen, through the Prime Minister;--but the selections were in truth effected by the old Duke in council with--an illustrious personage. The matter affected our Duke,--only in so far that he could not get out of his mind that strange application from his own wife. "That she should have even dreamed of it!" he would say to himself, not yet having acquired sufficient experience of his fellow creatures to be aware how wonderfully temptations will affect even those who appear to be least subject to them. The town horse, used to gaudy trappings, no doubt despises the work of his country brother; but yet, now and again, there comes upon him a sudden desire to plough. The desire for ploughing had come upon the Duchess, but the Duke could not understand it. He perceived, however, in spite of the multiplicity of his official work, that his refusal sat heavily on his wife's breast, and that, though she spoke no further word, she brooded over her injury. And his heart was sad within him when he thought that he had vexed her,--loving her as he did with all his heart, but with a heart that was never demonstrative. When she was unhappy he was miserable, though he would hardly know the cause of his misery. Her ridicule and raillery he could bear, though they stung him; but her sorrow, if ever she were sorrowful, or her sullenness, if ever she were sullen, upset him altogether. He was in truth so soft of heart that he could not bear the discomfort of the one person in the world who seemed to him to be near to him. He had expressly asked her for her sympathy in the business he had on hand,--thereby going much beyond his usual coldness of manner. She, with an eagerness which might have been expected from her, had promised that she would slave for him, if slavery were necessary. Then she had made her request, had been refused, and was now moody. "The Duchess of ---- is to be Mistress of the Robes," he said to her one day. He had gone to her, up to her own room, before he dressed for dinner, having devoted much more time than as Prime Minister he ought to have done to a resolution that he would make things straight with her, and to the best way of doing it. "So I am told. She ought to know her way about the place, as I remember she was at the same work when I was a girl of eleven." "That's not so very long ago, Cora." "Silverbridge is older now than I was then, and I think that makes it a very long time ago." Lord Silverbridge was the Duke's eldest son. "But what does it matter? If she began her career in the time of George the Fourth, what is it to you?" "Nothing on earth,--only that she did in truth begin her career in the time of George the Third. I'm sure she's nearer sixty than fifty." "I'm glad to see you remember your dates so well." "It's a pity she should not remember hers in the way she dresses," said the Duchess. This was marvellous to him,--that his wife, who as Lady Glencora Palliser had been so conspicuous for a wild disregard of social rules as to be looked upon by many as an enemy of her own class, should be so depressed by not being allowed to be the Queen's head servant as to descend to personal invective! "I'm afraid," said he, attempting to smile, "that it won't come within the compass of my office to effect or even to propose any radical change in her Grace's apparel. But don't you think that you and I can afford to ignore all that?" "I can certainly. She may be an antiquated Eve for me." "I hope, Cora, you are not still disappointed because I did not agree with you when you spoke about the place for yourself." "Not because you did not agree with me,--but because you did not think me fit to be trusted with any judgment of my own. I don't know why I'm always to be looked upon as different from other women,--as though I were half a savage." "You are what you have made yourself, and I have always rejoiced that you are as you are, fresh, untrammelled, without many prejudices which afflict other ladies, and free from bonds by which they are cramped and confined. Of course such a turn of character is subject to certain dangers of its own." "There is no doubt about the dangers. The chances are that when I see her Grace I shall tell her what I think about her." "You will I am sure say nothing unkind to a lady who is supposed to be in the place she now fills by my authority. But do not let us quarrel about an old woman." "I won't quarrel with you even about a young one." "I cannot be at ease within myself while I think you are resenting my refusal. You do not know how constantly I carry you about with me." "You carry a very unnecessary burden then," she said. But he could tell at once from the altered tone of her voice, and from the light of her eye as he glanced into her face, that her anger about "The Robes" was appeased. "I have done as you asked about a friend of yours," he said. This occurred just before the final and perfected list of the new men had appeared in all the newspapers. "What friend?" "Mr. Finn is to go to Ireland." "Go to Ireland!--How do you mean?" "It is looked upon as being very great promotion. Indeed I am told that he is considered to be the luckiest man in all the scramble." "You don't mean as Chief Secretary?" "Yes, I do. He certainly couldn't go as Lord Lieutenant." "But they said that Barrington Erle was going to Ireland." "Well; yes. I don't know that you'd be interested by all the ins and outs of it. But Mr. Erle declined. It seems that Mr. Erle is after all the one man in Parliament modest enough not to consider himself to be fit for any place that can be offered to him." "Poor Barrington! He does not like the idea of crossing the Channel so often. I quite sympathise with him. And so Phineas is to be Secretary for Ireland! Not in the Cabinet?" "No;--not in the Cabinet. It is not by any means usual that he should be." "That is promotion, and I am glad! Poor Phineas! I hope they won't murder him, or anything of that kind. They do murder people, you know, sometimes." "He's an Irishman himself." "That's just the reason why they should. He must put up with that of course. I wonder whether she'll like going. They'll be able to spend money, which they always like, over there. He comes backwards and forwards every week,--doesn't he?" "Not quite that, I believe." "I shall miss her, if she has to stay away long. I know you don't like her." "I do like her. She has always behaved well, both to me and to my uncle." "She was an angel to him,--and to you too, if you only knew it. I dare say you're sending him to Ireland so as to get her away from me." This she said with a smile, as though not meaning it altogether, but yet half meaning it. "I have asked him to undertake the office," said the Duke solemnly, "because I am told that he is fit for it. But I did have some pleasure in proposing it to him because I thought that it would please you." "It does please me, and I won't be cross any more, and the Duchess of ---- may wear her clothes just as she pleases, or go without them. And as for Mrs. Finn, I don't see why she should be with him always when he goes. You can quite understand how necessary she is to me. But she is in truth the only woman in London to whom I can say what I think. And it is a comfort, you know, to have some one." In this way the domestic peace of the Prime Minister was readjusted, and that sympathy and co-operation for which he had first asked was accorded to him. It may be a question whether on the whole the Duchess did not work harder than he did. She did not at first dare to expound to him those grand ideas which she had conceived in regard to magnificence and hospitality. She said nothing of any extraordinary expenditure of money. But she set herself to work after her own fashion, making to him suggestions as to dinners and evening receptions, to which he objected only on the score of time. "You must eat your dinner somewhere," she said, "and you need only come in just before we sit down, and go into your own room if you please without coming upstairs at all. I can at any rate do that part of it for you." And she did do that part of it with marvellous energy all through the month of May,--so that by the end of the month, within six weeks of the time at which she first heard of the Coalition Ministry, all the world had begun to talk of the Prime Minister's dinners, and of the receptions given by the Prime Minister's wife. CHAPTER IX Mrs. Dick's Dinner Party.--No. I Our readers must not forget the troubles of poor Emily Wharton amidst the gorgeous festivities of the new Prime Minister. Throughout April and May she did not see Ferdinand Lopez. It may be remembered that on the night when the matter was discussed between her and her father, she promised him that she would not do so without his permission,--saying, however, at the same time very openly that her happiness depended on such permission being given to her. For two or three weeks not a word further was said between her and her father on the subject, and he had endeavoured to banish the subject from his mind,--feeling no doubt that if nothing further were ever said it would be so much the better. But then his daughter referred to the matter,--very plainly, with a simple question, and without disguise of her own feeling, but still in a manner which he could not bring himself to rebuke. "Aunt Harriet has asked me once or twice to go there of an evening, when you have been out. I have declined because I thought Mr. Lopez would be there. Must I tell her that I am not to meet Mr. Lopez, papa?" "If she has him there on purpose to throw him in your way, I shall think very badly of her." "But he has been in the habit of being there, papa. Of course if you are decided about this, it is better that I should not see him." "Did I not tell you that I was decided?" "You said you would make some further inquiry and speak to me again." Now Mr. Wharton had made inquiry, but had learned nothing to reassure himself;--neither had he been able to learn any fact, putting his finger on which he could point out to his daughter clearly that the marriage would be unsuitable for her. Of the man's ability and position, as certainly also of his manners, the world at large seemed to speak well. He had been blackballed at two clubs, but apparently without any defined reason. He lived as though he possessed a handsome income, and yet was in no degree fast or flashy. He was supposed to be an intimate friend of Mr. Mills Happerton, one of the partners in the world-famous commercial house of Hunky and Sons, which dealt in millions. Indeed there had been at one time a rumour that he was going to be taken into the house of Hunky and Sons as a junior partner. It was evident that many people had been favourably impressed by his outward demeanour, by his mode of talk, and by his way of living. But no one knew anything about him. With regard to his material position Mr. Wharton could of course ask direct questions if he pleased, and require evidence as to alleged property. But he felt that by doing so he would abandon his right to object to the man as being a Portuguese stranger, and he did not wish to have Ferdinand Lopez as a son-in-law, even though he should be a partner in Hunky and Sons, and able to maintain a gorgeous palace at South Kensington. "I have made inquiry." "Well, papa?" "I don't know anything about him. Nobody knows anything about him." "Could you not ask himself anything you want to know? If I might see him I would ask him." "That would not do at all." "It comes to this, papa, that I am to sever myself from a man to whom I am attached, and whom you must admit that I have been allowed to meet from day to day with no caution that his intimacy was unpleasant to you, because he is called--Lopez." "It isn't that at all. There are English people of that name; but he isn't an Englishman." "Of course, if you say so, papa, it must be so. I have told Aunt Harriet that I consider myself to be prohibited from meeting Mr. Lopez by what you have said; but I think, papa, you are a little--cruel to me." "Cruel to you!" said Mr. Wharton, almost bursting into tears. "I am as ready to obey as a child;--but, not being a child, I think I ought to have a reason." To this Mr. Wharton made no further immediate answer, but pulled his hair, and shuffled his feet about, and then escaped out of the room. A few days afterwards his sister-in-law attacked him. "Are we to understand, Mr. Wharton, that Emily is not to meet Mr. Lopez again? It makes it very unpleasant, because he has been intimate at our house." "I never said a word about her not meeting him. Of course I do not wish that any meeting should be contrived between them." "As it stands now it is prejudicial to her. Of course it cannot but be observed, and it is so odd that a young lady should be forbidden to meet a certain man. It looks so unpleasant for her,--as though she had misbehaved herself." "I have never thought so for a moment." "Of course you have not. How could you have thought so, Mr. Wharton?" "I say that I never did." "What must he think when he knows,--as of course he does know,--that she has been forbidden to meet him? It must make him fancy that he is made very much of. All that is so very bad for a girl! Indeed it is, Mr. Wharton." Of course there was absolute dishonesty in all this on the part of Mrs. Roby. She was true enough to Emily's lover,--too true to him; but she was false to Emily's father. If Emily would have yielded to her she would have arranged meetings at her own house between the lovers altogether in opposition to the father. Nevertheless there was a show of reason about what she said which Mr. Wharton was unable to overcome. And at the same time there was a reality about his girl's sorrow which overcame him. He had never hitherto consulted any one about anything in his family, having always found his own information and intellect sufficient for his own affairs. But now he felt grievously in want of some pillar,--some female pillar,--on which he could lean. He did not know all Mrs. Roby's iniquities; but still he felt that she was not the pillar of which he was in need. There was no such pillar for his use, and he was driven to acknowledge to himself that in this distressing position he must be guided by his own strength, and his own lights. He thought it all out as well as he could in his own chamber, allowing his book or his brief to lie idle beside him for many a half-hour. But he was much puzzled both as to the extent of his own authority and the manner in which it should be used. He certainly had not desired his daughter not to meet the man. He could understand that unless some affront had been offered such an edict enforced as to the conduct of a young lady would induce all her acquaintance to suppose that she was either very much in love or else very prone to misbehave herself. He feared, indeed, that she was very much in love, but it would not be prudent to tell her secret to all the world. Perhaps it would be better that she should meet him,--always with the understanding that she was not to accept from him any peculiar attention. If she would be obedient in one particular, she would probably be so in the other;--and, indeed, he did not at all doubt her obedience. She would obey, but would take care to show him that she was made miserable by obeying. He began to foresee that he had a bad time before him. And then as he still sat idle, thinking of it all, his mind wandered off to another view of the subject. Could he be happy, or even comfortable, if she were unhappy? Of course he endeavoured to convince himself that if he were bold, determined, and dictatorial with her, it would only be in order that her future happiness might be secured. A parent is often bound to disregard the immediate comfort of a child. But then was he sure that he was right? He of course had his own way of looking at life, but was it reasonable that he should force his girl to look at things with his eyes? The man was distasteful to him as being unlike his idea of an English gentleman, and as being without those far-reaching fibres and roots by which he thought that the solidity and stability of a human tree should be assured. But the world was changing around him every day. Royalty was marrying out of its degree. Peers' sons were looking only for money. And, more than that, peers' daughters were bestowing themselves on Jews and shopkeepers. Had he not better make the usual inquiry about the man's means, and, if satisfied on that head, let the girl do as she would? Added to all this there was growing on him a feeling that ultimately youth would as usual triumph over age, and that he would be beaten. If that were so, why worry himself, or why worry her? On the day after Mrs. Roby's attack upon him he again saw that lady, having on this occasion sent round to ask her to come to him. "I want you to understand that I put no embargo on Emily as to meeting Mr. Lopez. I can trust her fully. I do not wish her to encourage his attentions, but I by no means wish her to avoid him." "Am I to tell Emily what you say?" "I will tell her myself. I think it better to say as much to you, as you seemed to be embarrassed by the fear that they might happen to see each other in your drawing-room." "It was rather awkward;--wasn't it?" "I have spoken now because you seemed to think so." His manner to her was not very pleasant, but Mrs. Roby had known him for many years, and did not care very much for his manner. She had an object to gain, and could put up with a good deal for the sake of her object. "Very well. Then I shall know how to act. But, Mr. Wharton, I must say this, you know Emily has a will of her own, and you must not hold me responsible for anything that may occur." As soon as he heard this he almost resolved to withdraw the concession he had made;--but he did not do so. Very soon after this there came a special invitation from Mr. and Mrs. Roby, asking the Whartons, father and daughter, to dine with them round the corner. It was quite a special invitation, because it came in the form of a card,--which was unusual between the two families. But the dinner was too, in some degree, a special dinner,--as Emily was enabled to explain to her father, the whole speciality having been fully detailed to herself by her aunt. Mr. Roby, whose belongings were not generally aristocratic, had one great connexion with whom, after many years of quarrelling, he had lately come into amity. This was his half-brother, considerably older than himself, and was no other than that Mr. Roby who was now Secretary to the Admiralty, and who in the last Conservative Government had been one of the Secretaries to the Treasury. The oldest Mr. Roby of all, now long since gathered to his fathers, had had two wives and two sons. The elder son had not been left as well off as friends, or perhaps as he himself, could have wished. But he had risen in the world by his wits, had made his way into Parliament, and had become, as all readers of these chronicles know, a staff of great strength to his party. But he had always been a poor man. His periods of office had been much shorter than those of his friend Rattler, and his other sources of income had not been certain. His younger half-brother, who, as far as the great world was concerned, had none of his elder brother's advantages, had been endowed with some fortune from his mother, and,--in an evil hour for both of them,--had lent the politician money. As one consequence of this transaction, they had not spoken to each other for years. On this quarrel Mrs. Roby was always harping with her own husband,--not taking his part. Her Roby, her Dick, had indeed the means of supporting her with a fair comfort, but had, of his own, no power of introducing her to that sort of society for which her soul craved. But Mr. Thomas Roby was a great man,--though unfortunately poor,--and moved in high circles. Because they had lent their money,--which no doubt was lost for ever,--why should they also lose the advantages of such a connexion? Would it not be wiser rather to take the debt as a basis whereon to found a claim for special fraternal observation and kindred social intercourse? Dick, who was fond of his money, would not for a long time look at the matter in this light, but harassed his brother from time to time by applications which were quite useless, and which by the acerbity of their language altogether shut Mrs. Roby out from the good things which might have accrued to her from so distinguished a brother-in-law. But when it came to pass that Thomas Roby was confirmed in office by the coalition which has been mentioned, Mrs. Dick became very energetic. She went herself to the official hero and told him how desirous she was of peace. Nothing more should be said about the money,--at any rate for the present. Let brothers be brothers. And so it came to pass that the Secretary to the Admiralty with his wife were to dine in Berkeley Street, and that Mr. Wharton was asked to meet them. "I don't particularly want to meet Mr. Thomas Roby," the old barrister said. "They want you to come," said Emily, "because there has been some family reconciliation. You usually do go once or twice a year." "I suppose it may as well be done," said Mr. Wharton. "I think, papa, that they mean to ask Mr. Lopez," said Emily demurely. "I told you before that I don't want to have you banished from your aunt's home by any man," said the father. So the matter was settled, and the invitation was accepted. This was just at the end of May, at which time people were beginning to say that the coalition was a success, and some wise men to predict that at last fortuitous parliamentary atoms had so come together by accidental connexion, that a ministry had been formed which might endure for a dozen years. Indeed there was no reason why there should be any end to a ministry built on such a foundation. Of course this was very comfortable to such men as Mr. Roby, so that the Admiralty Secretary when he entered his sister-in-law's drawing-room was suffused with that rosy hue of human bliss which a feeling of triumph bestows. "Yes," said he, in answer to some would-be facetious remark from his brother, "I think we have weathered that storm pretty well. It does seem rather odd, my sitting cheek by jowl with Mr. Monk and gentlemen of that kidney; but they don't bite. I've got one of our own set at the head of our own office, and he leads the House. I think upon the whole we've got a little the best of it." This was listened to by Mr. Wharton with great disgust,--for Mr. Wharton was a Tory of the old school, who hated compromises, and abhorred in his heart the class of politicians to whom politics were a profession rather than a creed. Mr. Roby senior, having escaped from the House, was of course the last, and had indeed kept all the other guests waiting half-an-hour,--as becomes a parliamentary magnate in the heat of the Session. Mr. Wharton, who had been early, saw all the other guests arrive, and among them Mr. Ferdinand Lopez. There was also Mr. Mills Happerton,--partner in Hunky and Sons,--with his wife, respecting whom Mr. Wharton at once concluded that he was there as being the friend of Ferdinand Lopez. If so, how much influence must Ferdinand Lopez have in that house! Nevertheless, Mr. Mills Happerton was in his way a great man, and a credit to Mrs. Roby. And there were Sir Damask and Lady Monogram, who were people moving quite in the first circles. Sir Damask shot pigeons, and so did also Dick Roby,--whence had perhaps arisen an intimacy. But Lady Monogram was not at all a person to dine with Mrs. Dick Roby without other cause than this. But a great official among one's acquaintance can do so much for one! It was probable that Lady Monogram's presence was among the first fruits of the happy family reconciliation that had taken place. Then there was Mrs. Leslie, a pretty widow, rather poor, who was glad to receive civilities from Mrs. Roby, and was Emily Wharton's pet aversion. Mrs. Leslie had said impertinent things to her about Ferdinand Lopez, and she had snubbed Mrs. Leslie. But Mrs. Leslie was serviceable to Mrs. Roby, and had now been asked to her great dinner party. But the two most illustrious guests have not yet been mentioned. Mrs. Roby had secured a lord,--an absolute peer of Parliament! This was no less a man than Lord Mongrober, whose father had been a great judge in the early part of the century, and had been made a peer. The Mongrober estates were not supposed to be large, nor was the Mongrober influence at this time extensive. But this nobleman was seen about a good deal in society when the dinners given were supposed to be worth eating. He was a fat, silent, red-faced, elderly gentleman, who said very little, and who when he did speak seemed always to be in an ill-humour. He would now and then make ill-natured remarks about his friends' wines, as suggesting '68 when a man would boast of his '48 claret; and when costly dainties were supplied for his use, would remark that such and such a dish was very well at some other time of the year. So that ladies attentive to their tables and hosts proud of their cellars would almost shake in their shoes before Lord Mongrober. And it may also be said that Lord Mongrober never gave any chance of retaliation by return dinners. There lived not the man or woman who had dined with Lord Mongrober. But yet the Robys of London were glad to entertain him; and the Mrs. Robys, when he was coming, would urge their cooks to superhuman energies by the mention of his name. And there was Lady Eustace! Of Lady Eustace it was impossible to say whether her beauty, her wit, her wealth, or the remarkable history of her past life, most recommended her to such hosts and hostesses as Mr. and Mrs. Roby. As her history may be already known to some, no details of it shall be repeated here. At this moment she was free from all marital persecution, and was very much run after by a certain set in society. There were others again who declared that no decent man or woman ought to meet her. On the score of lovers there was really little or nothing to be said against her; but she had implicated herself in an unfortunate second marriage, and then there was that old story about the jewels! But there was no doubt about her money and her good looks, and some considered her to be clever. These completed the list of Mrs. Roby's great dinner party. Mr. Wharton, who had arrived early, could not but take notice that Lopez, who soon followed him into the room, had at once fallen into conversation with Emily, as though there had never been any difficulty in the matter. The father, standing on the rug and pretending to answer the remarks made to him by Dick Roby, could see that Emily said but little. The man, however, was so much at his ease that there was no necessity for her to exert herself. Mr. Wharton hated him for being at his ease. Had he appeared to have been rebuffed by the circumstances of his position the prejudices of the old man would have been lessened. By degrees the guests came. Lord Mongrober stood also on the rug, dumb, with a look of intense impatience for his food, hardly ever condescending to answer the little attempts at conversation made by Mrs. Dick. Lady Eustace gushed into the room, kissing Mrs. Dick and afterwards kissing her great friend of the moment, Mrs. Leslie, who followed. She then looked as though she meant to kiss Lord Mongrober, whom she playfully and almost familiarly addressed. But Lord Mongrober only grunted. Then came Sir Damask and Lady Monogram, and Dick at once began about his pigeons. Sir Damask, who was the most good-natured man in the world, interested himself at once and became energetic; but Lady Monogram looked round the room carefully, and seeing Lady Eustace, turned up her nose, nor did she care much for meeting Lord Mongrober. If she had been taken in as to the Admiralty Robys, then would she let the junior Robys know what she thought about it. Mills Happerton, with his wife, caused the frown on Lady Monogram's brow to loosen itself a little, for, so great was the wealth and power of the house of Hunky and Sons, that Mr. Mills Happerton was no doubt a feature at any dinner party. Then came the Admiralty Secretary with his wife, and the order for dinner was given. CHAPTER X Mrs. Dick's Dinner Party.--No. II Dick walked downstairs with Lady Monogram. There had been some doubt whether of right he should not have taken Lady Eustace, but it was held by Mrs. Dick that her ladyship had somewhat impaired her rights by the eccentricities of her career, and also that she would amiably pardon any little wrong against her of that kind,--whereas Lady Monogram was a person to be much considered. Then followed Sir Damask with Lady Eustace. They seemed to be paired so well together that there could be no doubt about them. The ministerial Roby, who was really the hero of the night, took Mrs. Happerton, and our friend Mr. Wharton took the Secretary's wife. All that had been easy,--so easy that fate had good-naturedly arranged things which are sometimes difficult of management. But then there came an embarrassment. Of course it would in a usual way be right that a married man as was Mr. Happerton should be assigned to the widow Mrs. Leslie, and that the only two "young" people,--in the usual sense of the word,--should go down to dinner together. But Mrs. Roby was at first afraid of Mr. Wharton, and planned it otherwise. When, however, the last moment came she plucked up courage, gave Mrs. Leslie to the great commercial man, and with a brave smile asked Lopez to give his arm to the lady he loved. It is sometimes so hard to manage these "little things," said she to Lord Mongrober as she put her hand upon his arm. His lordship had been kept standing in that odious drawing-room for more than half-an-hour waiting for a man whom he regarded as a poor Treasury hack, and was by no means in a good humour. Dick Roby's wine was no doubt good, but he was not prepared to purchase it at such a price as this. "Things always get confused when you have waited an hour for any one," he said. "What can one do, you know, when the House is sitting?" said the lady apologetically. "Of course you lords can get away, but then you have nothing to do." Lord Mongrober grunted, meaning to imply by his grunt that any one would be very much mistaken who supposed that he had any work to do because he was a peer of Parliament. Lopez and Emily were seated next to each other, and immediately opposite to them was Mr. Wharton. Certainly nothing fraudulent had been intended on this occasion,--or it would have been arranged that the father should sit on the same side of the table with the lover, so that he should see nothing of what was going on. But it seemed to Mr. Wharton as though he had been positively swindled by his sister-in-law. There they sat opposite to him, talking to each other apparently with thoroughly mutual confidence, the very two persons whom he most especially desired to keep apart. He had not a word to say to either of the ladies near him. He endeavoured to keep his eyes away from his daughter as much as possible, and to divert his ears from their conversation;--but he could not but look and he could not but listen. Not that he really heard a sentence. Emily's voice hardly reached him, and Lopez understood the game he was playing much too well to allow his voice to travel. And he looked as though his position were the most commonplace in the world, and as though he had nothing of more than ordinary interest to say to his neighbour. Mr. Wharton, as he sat there, almost made up his mind that he would leave his practice, give up his chambers, abandon even his club, and take his daughter at once to--to;--it did not matter where, so that the place should be very distant from Manchester Square. There could be no other remedy for this evil. Lopez, though he talked throughout the whole of dinner,--turning sometimes indeed to Mrs. Leslie who sat at his left hand,--said very little that all the world might not have heard. But he did say one such word. "It has been so dreary to me, the last month!" Emily of course had no answer to make to this. She could not tell him that her desolation had been infinitely worse than his, and that she had sometimes felt as though her very heart would break. "I wonder whether it must always be like this with me," he said,--and then he went back to the theatres, and other ordinary conversation. "I suppose you've got to the bottom of that champagne you used to have," said Lord Mongrober, roaring across the table to his host, holding his glass in his hand, and with strong marks of disapprobation on his face. "The very same wine as we were drinking when your lordship last did me the honour of dining here," said Dick. Lord Mongrober raised his eyebrows, shook his head and put down the glass. "Shall we try another bottle?" asked Mrs. Dick with solicitude. "Oh, no;--it'd be all the same, I know. I'll just take a little dry sherry if you have it." The man came with the decanter. "No, dry sherry;--dry sherry," said his lordship. The man was confounded, Mrs. Dick was at her wits' ends, and everything was in confusion. Lord Mongrober was not the man to be kept waiting by a government subordinate without exacting some penalty for such ill-treatment. "'Is lordship is a little out of sorts," whispered Dick to Lady Monogram. "Very much out of sorts, it seems." "And the worst of it is, there isn't a better glass of wine in London, and 'is lordship knows it." "I suppose that's what he comes for," said Lady Monogram, being quite as uncivil in her way as the nobleman. "'E's like a good many others. He knows where he can get a good dinner. After all, there's no attraction like that. Of course, a 'ansome woman won't admit that, Lady Monogram." "I will not admit it, at any rate, Mr. Roby." "But I don't doubt Monogram is as careful as any one else to get the best cook he can, and takes a good deal of trouble about his wine too. Mongrober is very unfair about that champagne. It came out of Madame Cliquot's cellars before the war, and I gave Sprott and Burlinghammer 110s. for it." "Indeed!" "I don't think there are a dozen men in London can give you such a glass of wine as that. What do you say about that champagne, Monogram?" "Very tidy wine," said Sir Damask. "I should think it is. I gave 110s. for it before the war. 'Is lordship's got a fit of the gout coming, I suppose." But Sir Damask was engaged with his neighbour, Lady Eustace. "Of all things I should so like to see a pigeon match," said Lady Eustace. "I have heard about them all my life. Only I suppose it isn't quite proper for a lady." "Oh, dear, yes." "The darling little pigeons! They do sometimes escape, don't they? I hope they escape sometimes. I'll go any day you'll make up a party,--if Lady Monogram will join us." Sir Damask said that he would arrange it, making up his mind, however, at the same time, that this last stipulation, if insisted on, would make the thing impracticable. Roby the ministerialist, sitting at the end of the table between his sister-in-law and Mrs. Happerton, was very confidential respecting the Government and parliamentary affairs in general. "Yes, indeed;--of course it's a coalition, but I don't see why we shouldn't go on very well. As to the Duke, I've always had the greatest possible respect for him. The truth is, there's nothing special to be done at the present moment, and there's no reason why we shouldn't agree and divide the good things between us. The Duke has got some craze of his own about decimal coinage. He'll amuse himself with that; but it won't come to anything, and it won't hurt us." "Isn't the Duchess giving a great many parties?" asked Mrs. Happerton. "Well;--yes. That kind of thing used to be done in old Lady Brock's time, and the Duchess is repeating it. There's no end to their money, you know. But it's rather a bore for the persons who have to go." The ministerial Roby knew well how he would make his sister-in-law's mouth water by such an allusion as this to the great privilege of entering the Prime Minister's mansion in Carlton Terrace. "I suppose you in the Government are always asked." "We are expected to go too, and are watched pretty close. Lady Glen, as we used to call her, has the eyes of Argus. And of course we who used to be on the other side are especially bound to pay her observance." "Don't you like the Duchess?" asked Mrs. Happerton. "Oh, yes;--I like her very well. She's mad, you know,--mad as a hatter,--and no one can ever guess what freak may come next. One always feels that she'll do something sooner or later that will startle all the world." "There was a queer story once,--wasn't there?" asked Mrs. Dick. "I never quite believed that," said Roby. "It was something about some lover she had before she was married. She went off to Switzerland. But the Duke,--he was Mr. Palliser then,--followed her very soon and it all came right." "When ladies are going to be duchesses, things do come right; don't they?" said Mrs. Happerton. On the other side of Mrs. Happerton was Mr. Wharton, quite unable to talk to his right-hand neighbour, the Secretary's wife. The elder Mrs. Roby had not, indeed, much to say for herself, and he during the whole dinner was in misery. He had resolved that there should be no intimacy of any kind between his daughter and Ferdinand Lopez,--nothing more than the merest acquaintance; and there they were, talking together before his very eyes, with more evident signs of understanding each other than were exhibited by any other two persons at the table. And yet he had no just ground of complaint against either of them. If people dine together at the same house, it may of course happen that they shall sit next to each other. And if people sit next to each other at dinner, it is expected that they shall talk. Nobody could accuse Emily of flirting; but then she was a girl who under no circumstances would condescend to flirt. But she had declared boldly to her father that she loved this man, and there she was in close conversation with him! Would it not be better for him to give up any further trouble, and let her marry the man? She would certainly do so sooner or later. When the ladies went upstairs that misery was over for a time, but Mr. Wharton was still not happy. Dick came round and took his wife's chair, so that he sat between the lord and his brother. Lopez and Happerton fell into city conversation, and Sir Damask tried to amuse himself with Mr. Wharton. But the task was hopeless,--as it always is when the elements of a party have been ill-mixed. Mr. Wharton had not even heard of the new Aldershot coach which Sir Damask had just started with Colonel Buskin and Sir Alfonso Blackbird. And when Sir Damask declared that he drove the coach up and down twice a week himself, Mr. Wharton at any rate affected to believe that such a thing was impossible. Then when Sir Damask gave his opinion as to the cause of the failure of a certain horse at Northampton, Mr. Wharton gave him no encouragement whatever. "I never was at a racecourse in my life," said the barrister. After that Sir Damask drank his wine in silence. "You remember that claret, my lord?" said Dick, thinking that some little compensation was due to him for what had been said about the champagne. But Lord Mongrober's dinner had not yet had the effect of mollifying the man sufficiently for Dick's purposes. "Oh, yes, I remember the wine. You call it '57, don't you?" "And it is '57;--'57, Leoville." "Very likely,--very likely. If it hadn't been heated before the fire--" "It hasn't been near the fire," said Dick. "Or put into a hot decanter--" "Nothing of the kind." "Or treated after some other damnable fashion, it would be very good wine, I dare say." "You are hard to please, my lord, to-day," said Dick, who was put beyond his bearing. "What is a man to say? If you will talk about your wine, I can only tell you what I think. Any man may get good wine,--that is if he can afford to pay the price,--but it isn't one out of ten who knows how to put it on the table." Dick felt this to be very hard. When a man pays 110s. a dozen for his champagne, and then gives it to guests like Lord Mongrober who are not even expected to return the favour, then that man ought to be allowed to talk about his wine without fear of rebuke. One doesn't have an agreement to that effect written down on parchment and sealed; but it is as well understood and ought to be as faithfully kept as any legal contract. Dick, who could on occasions be awakened to a touch of manliness, gave the bottle a shove and threw himself back in his chair. "If you ask me, I can only tell you," repeated Lord Mongrober. "I don't believe you ever had a bottle of wine put before you in better order in all your life," said Dick. His lordship's face became very square and very red as he looked round at his host. "And as for talking about my wine, of course I talk to a man about what he understands. I talk to Monogram about pigeons, to Tom there about politics, to Apperton and Lopez about the price of consols, and to you about wine. If I asked you what you thought of the last new book, your lordship would be a little surprised." Lord Mongrober grunted and looked redder and squarer than ever; but he made no attempt at reply, and the victory was evidently left with Dick,--very much to the general exaltation of his character. And he was proud of himself. "We had a little tiff, me and Mongrober," he said to his wife that night. "'E's a very good fellow, and of course he's a lord and all that. But he has to be put down occasionally, and, by George, I did it to-night. You ask Lopez." There were two drawing-rooms up-stairs, opening into each other, but still distinct. Emily had escaped into the back room, avoiding the gushing sentiments and equivocal morals of Lady Eustace and Mrs. Leslie,--and here she was followed by Ferdinand Lopez. Mr. Wharton was in the front room, and though on entering it he did look round furtively for his daughter, he was ashamed to wander about in order that he might watch her. And there were others in the back room,--Dick and Monogram standing on the rug, and the elder Mrs. Roby seated in a corner;--so that there was nothing peculiar in the position of the two lovers. "Must I understand," said he, "that I am banished from Manchester Square?" "Has papa banished you?" "That's what I want you to tell me." "I know you had an interview with him, Mr. Lopez." "Yes. I had." "And you must know best what he told you." "He would explain himself better to you than he did to me." "I doubt that very much. Papa, when he has anything to say, generally says it plainly. However, I do think that he did intend to banish you. I do not know why I should not tell you the truth." "I do not know either." "I think he did--intend to banish you." "And you?" "I shall be guided by him in all things,--as far as I can." "Then I am banished by you also?" "I did not say so. But if papa says that you are not to come there, of course I cannot ask you to do so." "But I may see you here?" "Mr. Lopez, I will not be asked some questions. I will not indeed." "You know why I ask them. You know that to me you are more than all the world." She stood still for a moment after hearing this, and then without any reply walked away into the other room. She felt half ashamed of herself in that she had not rebuked him for speaking to her in that fashion after his interview with her father, and yet his words had filled her heart with delight. He had never before plainly declared his love to her,--though she had been driven by her father's questions to declare her own love to herself. She was quite sure of herself,--that the man was and would always be to her the one being whom she would prefer to all others. Her fate was in her father's hands. If he chose to make her wretched he must do so. But on one point she had quite made up her mind. She would make no concealment. To the world at large she had nothing to say on the matter. But with her father there should be no attempt on her part to keep back the truth. Were he to question her on the subject she would tell him, as far as her memory would serve her, the very words which Lopez had spoken to her this evening. She would ask nothing from him. He had already told her that the man was to be rejected, and had refused to give any other reason than his dislike to the absence of any English connexion. She would not again ask even for a reason. But she would make her father understand that though she obeyed him she regarded the exercise of his authority as tyrannical and irrational. They left the house before any of the other guests and walked round the corner together into the Square. "What a very vulgar set of people!" said Mr. Wharton as soon as they were down the steps. "Some of them were," said Emily, making a mental reservation of her own. "Upon my word I don't know where to make the exception. Why on earth any one should want to know such a person as Lord Mongrober I can't understand. What does he bring into society?" "A title." "But what does that do of itself? He is an insolent, bloated brute." "Papa, you are using strong language to-night." "And that Lady Eustace! Heaven and earth! Am I to be told that that creature is a lady?" They had now come to their own door, and while that was being opened and as they went up into their own drawing-room, nothing was said, but then Emily began again. "I wonder why you go to Aunt Harriet's at all. You don't like the people?" "I didn't like any of them to-day." "Why do you go there? You don't like Aunt Harriet herself. You don't like Uncle Dick. You don't like Mr. Lopez." "Certainly I do not." "I don't know who it is you do like." "I like Mr. Fletcher." "It's no use saying that to me, papa." "You ask me a question, and I choose to answer it. I like Arthur Fletcher, because he is a gentleman,--because he is a gentleman of the class to which I belong myself; because he works; because I know all about him, so that I can be sure of him; because he had a decent father and mother; because I am safe with him, being quite sure that he will say to me neither awkward things nor impertinent things. He will not talk to me about driving a mail coach like that foolish baronet, nor tell me the price of all his wines like your uncle." Nor would Ferdinand Lopez do so, thought Emily to herself. "But in all such matters, my dear, the great thing is like to like. I have spoken of a young person, merely because I wish you to understand that I can sympathise with others besides those of my own age. But to-night there was no one there at all like myself,--or, as I hope, like you. That man Roby is a chattering ass. How such a man can be useful to any government I can't conceive. Happerton was the best, but what had he to say for himself? I've always thought that there was very little wit wanted to make a fortune in the City." In this frame of mind Mr. Wharton went off to bed, but not a word more was spoken about Ferdinand Lopez. CHAPTER XI Carlton Terrace Certainly the thing was done very well by Lady Glen,--as many in the political world persisted in calling her even in these days. She had not as yet quite carried out her plan,--the doing of which would have required her to reconcile her husband to some excessive abnormal expenditure, and to have obtained from him a deliberate sanction for appropriation and probable sale of property. She never could find the proper moment for doing this, having, with all her courage,--low down in some corner of her heart,--a wholesome fear of a certain quiet power which her husband possessed. She could not bring herself to make her proposition;--but she almost acted as though it had been made and approved. Her house was always gorgeous with flowers. Of course there would be the bill;--and he, when he saw the exotics, and the whole place turned into a bower of ever fresh blooming floral glories, must know that there would be the bill. And when he found that there was an archducal dinner-party every week, and an almost imperial reception twice a week; that at these receptions a banquet was always provided; when he was asked whether she might buy a magnificent pair of bay carriage-horses, as to which she assured him that nothing so lovely had ever as yet been seen stepping in the streets of London,--of course he must know that the bills would come. It was better, perhaps, to do it in this way, than to make any direct proposition. And then, early in June, she spoke to him as to the guests to be invited to Gatherum Castle in August. "Do you want to go to Gatherum in August?" he asked in surprise. For she hated the place, and had hardly been content to spend ten days there every year at Christmas. "I think it should be done," she said solemnly. "One cannot quite consider just now what one likes oneself." "Why not?" "You would hardly go to a small place like Matching in your present position. There are so many people whom you should entertain! You would probably have two or three of the foreign ministers down for a time." "We always used to find plenty of room at Matching." "But you did not always use to be Prime Minister. It is only for such a time as this that such a house as Gatherum is serviceable." He was silent for a moment, thinking about it, and then gave way without another word. She was probably right. There was the huge pile of magnificent buildings; and somebody, at any rate, had thought that it behoved a Duke of Omnium to live in such a palace. If it ought to be done at any time, it ought to be done now. In that his wife had been right. "Very well. Then let us go there." "I'll manage it all," said the Duchess,--"I and Locock." Locock was the house-steward. "I remember once," said the Duke, and he smiled as he spoke with a peculiarly sweet expression, which would at times come across his generally inexpressive face,--"I remember once that some First Minister of the Crown gave evidence as to the amount of his salary, saying that his place entailed upon him expenses higher than his stipend would defray. I begin to think that my experience will be the same." "Does that fret you?" "No, Cora;--it certainly does not fret me, or I should not allow it. But I think there should be a limit. No man is ever rich enough to squander." Though they were to squander her fortune,--the money which she had brought,--for the next ten years at a much greater rate than she contemplated, they might do so without touching the Palliser property. Of that she was quite sure. And the squandering was to be all for his glory,--so that he might retain his position as a popular Prime Minister. For an instant it occurred to her that she would tell him all this. But she checked herself, and the idea of what she had been about to say brought the blood into her face. Never yet had she in talking to him alluded to her own wealth. "Of course we are spending money," she said. "If you give me a hint to hold my hand, I will hold it." He had looked at her, and read it all in her face. "God knows," he said, "you've a right to do it if it pleases you." "For your sake!" Then he stooped down and kissed her twice, and left her to arrange her parties as she pleased. After that she congratulated herself that she had not made the direct proposition, knowing that she might now do pretty much what she pleased. Then there were solemn cabinets held, at which she presided, and Mrs. Finn and Locock assisted. At other cabinets it is supposed that, let a leader be ever so autocratic by disposition and superior by intelligence, still he must not unfrequently yield to the opinion of his colleagues. But in this cabinet the Duchess always had her own way, though she was very persistent in asking for counsel. Locock was frightened about the money. Hitherto money had come without a word, out of the common, spoken to the Duke. The Duke had always signed certain cheques, but they had been normal cheques; and the money in its natural course had flown in to meet them;--but now he must be asked to sign abnormal cheques. That, indeed, had already been done; but still the money had been there. A large balance, such as had always stood to his credit, would stand a bigger racket than had yet been made. But Locock was quite sure that the balance ought not to be much further reduced,--and that steps must be taken. Something must be sold! The idea of selling anything was dreadful to the mind of Locock! Or else money must be borrowed! Now the management of the Palliser property had always been conducted on principles antagonistic to borrowing. "But his Grace has never spent his income," said the Duchess. That was true. But the money, as it showed a tendency to heap itself up, had been used for the purchase of other bits of property, or for the amelioration of the estates generally. "You don't mean to say that we can't get money if we want it!" Locock was profuse in his assurances that any amount of money could be obtained,--only that something must be done. "Then let something be done," said the Duchess, going on with her general plans. "Many people are rich," said the Duchess afterwards to her friend, "and some people are very rich indeed; but nobody seems to be rich enough to have ready money to do just what he wishes. It all goes into a grand sum total, which is never to be touched without a feeling of sacrifice. I suppose you have always enough for everything." It was well known that the present Mrs. Finn, as Madame Goesler, had been a wealthy woman. "Indeed, no;--very far from that. I haven't a shilling." "What has happened?" asked the Duchess, pretending to be frightened. "You forget that I've got a husband of my own, and that he has to be consulted." "That must be nonsense. But don't you think women are fools to marry when they've got anything of their own, and could be their own mistresses? I couldn't have been. I was made to marry before I was old enough to assert myself." "And how well they did for you!" "Pas si mal.--He's Prime Minister, which is a great thing, and I begin to find myself filled to the full with political ambition. I feel myself to be a Lady Macbeth, prepared for the murder of any Duncan or any Daubeny who may stand in my lord's way. In the meantime, like Lady Macbeth herself, we must attend to the banqueting. Her lord appeared and misbehaved himself; my lord won't show himself at all,--which I think is worse." Our old friend Phineas Finn, who had now reached a higher place in politics than even his political dreams had assigned to him, though he was a Member of Parliament, was much away from London in these days. New brooms sweep clean; and official new brooms, I think, sweep cleaner than any other. Who has not watched at the commencement of a Ministry some Secretary, some Lord, or some Commissioner, who intends by fresh Herculean labours to cleanse the Augean stables just committed to his care? Who does not know the gentleman at the Home Office, who means to reform the police and put an end to malefactors; or the new Minister at the Board of Works, who is to make London beautiful as by a magician's stroke,--or, above all, the new First Lord, who is resolved that he will really build us a fleet, purge the dock-yards, and save us half a million a year at the same time? Phineas Finn was bent on unriddling the Irish sphinx. Surely something might be done to prove to his susceptible countrymen that at the present moment no curse could be laid upon them so heavy as that of having to rule themselves apart from England; and he thought that this might be the easier, as he became from day to day more thoroughly convinced that those Home Rulers who were all around him in the House were altogether of the same opinion. Had some inscrutable decree of fate ordained and made it certain,--with a certainty not to be disturbed,--that no candidate could be returned to Parliament who would not assert the earth to be triangular, there would rise immediately a clamorous assertion of triangularity among political aspirants. The test would be innocent. Candidates have swallowed, and daily do swallow, many a worse one. As might be this doctrine of a great triangle, so is the doctrine of Home Rule. Why is a gentleman of property to be kept out in the cold by some O'Mullins because he will not mutter an unmeaning shibboleth? "Triangular? Yes,--or lozenge-shaped, if you please; but, gentlemen, I am the man for Tipperary." Phineas Finn, having seen, or thought that he had seen, all this, began, from the very first moment of his appointment, to consider painfully within himself whether the genuine services of an honest and patriotic man might not compass some remedy for the present ill-boding ferment of the country. What was it that the Irish really did want;--what that they wanted, and had not got, and which might with propriety be conceded to them? What was it that the English really would refuse to sanction, even though it might not be wanted? He found himself beating about among rocks as to Catholic education and Papal interference, the passage among which might be made clearer to him in Irish atmosphere than in that of Westminster. Therefore he was away a good deal in these days, travelling backwards and forwards as he might be wanted for any debate. But as his wife did not accompany him on these fitful journeys, she was able to give her time very much to the Duchess. The Duchess was on the whole very successful with her parties. There were people who complained that she had everybody; that there was no selection whatever as to politics, principles, rank, morals,--or even manners. But in such a work as the Duchess had now taken in hand, it was impossible that she should escape censure. They who really knew what was being done were aware that nobody was asked to that house without an idea that his or her presence might be desirable,--in however remote a degree. Paragraphs in newspapers go for much, and therefore the writers and editors of such paragraphs were there,--sometimes with their wives. Mr. Broune, of the "Breakfast Table," was to be seen there constantly, with his wife Lady Carbury, and poor old Booker of the "Literary Chronicle." City men can make a budget popular or the reverse, and therefore the Mills Happertons of the day were welcome. Rising barristers might be wanted to become Solicitors-General. The pet Orpheus of the hour, the young tragic actor who was thought to have a real Hamlet within him, the old painter who was growing rich on his reputation, and the young painter who was still strong with hope, even the little trilling poet, though he trilled never so faintly, and the somewhat wooden novelist, all had tongues of their own, and certain modes of expression, which might assist or injure the Palliser Coalition,--as the Duke's Ministry was now called. "Who is that man? I've seen him here before. The Duchess was talking to him ever so long just now." The question was asked by Mr. Rattler of Mr. Roby. About half-an-hour before this time Mr. Rattler had essayed to get a few words with the Duchess, beginning with the communication of some small political secret. But the Duchess did not care much for the Rattlers attached to her husband's Government. They were men whose services could be had for a certain payment,--and when paid for were, the Duchess thought, at the Premier's command without further trouble. Of course they came to the receptions, and were entitled to a smile apiece as they entered. But they were entitled to nothing more, and on this occasion Rattler had felt himself to be snubbed. It did not occur to him to abuse the Duchess. The Duchess was too necessary for abuse,--just at present. But any friend of the Duchess,--any favourite for the moment,--was, of course, open to remark. "He is a man named Lopez," said Roby, "a friend of Happerton;--a very clever fellow, they say." "Did you ever see him anywhere else?" "Well, yes;--I have met him at dinner." "He was never in the House. What does he do?" Rattler was distressed to think that any drone should have made its way into the hive of working bees. "Oh;--money, I fancy." "He's not a partner in Hunky's, is he?" "I fancy not. I think I should have known if he was." "She ought to remember that people make a use of coming here," said Rattler. She was, of course, the Duchess. "It's not like a private house. And whatever influence outsiders get by coming, so much she loses. Somebody ought to explain that to her." "I don't think you or I could do that," replied Mr. Roby. "I'll tell the Duke in a minute," said Rattler. Perhaps he thought he could tell the Duke, but we may be allowed to doubt whether his prowess would not have fallen below the necessary pitch when he met the Duke's eye. Lopez was there for the third time, about the middle of June, and had certainly contrived to make himself personally known to the Duchess. There had been a deputation from the City to the Prime Minister asking for a subsidised mail, via San Francisco, to Japan, and Lopez, though he had no interest in Japan, had contrived to be one of the number. He had contrived also, as the deputation was departing, to say a word on his own account to the Minister, and had ingratiated himself. The Duke had remembered him, and had suggested that he should have a card. And now he was among the flowers and the greatness, the beauty, the politics, and the fashion of the Duchess's gatherings for the third time. "It is very well done,--very well, indeed," said Mr. Boffin to him. Lopez had been dining with Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, and had now again encountered his late host and hostess. Mr. Boffin was a gentleman who had belonged to the late Ministry, but had somewhat out-Heroded Herod in his Conservatism, so as to have been considered to be unfit for the Coalition. Of course, he was proud of his own staunchness, and a little inclined to criticise the lax principles of men who, for the sake of carrying on her Majesty's Government, could be Conservatives one day and Liberals the next. He was a laborious, honest man,--but hardly of calibre sufficient not to regret his own honesty in such an emergency as the present. It is easy for most of us to keep our hands from picking and stealing when picking and stealing plainly lead to prison diet and prison garments. But when silks and satins come of it, and with the silks and satins general respect, the net result of honesty does not seem to be so secure. Whence will come the reward, and when? On whom the punishment, and where? A man will not, surely, be damned for belonging to a Coalition Ministry! Boffin was a little puzzled as he thought on all this, but in the meantime was very proud of his own consistency. "I think it is so lovely!" said Mrs. Boffin. "You look down through an Elysium of rhododendrons into a Paradise of mirrors. I don't think there was ever anything like it in London before." "I don't know that we ever had anybody at the same time rich enough to do this kind of thing as it is done now," said Boffin, "and powerful enough to get such people together. If the country can be ruled by flowers and looking-glasses, of course it is very well." "Flowers and looking-glasses won't prevent the country being ruled well," said Lopez. "I'm not so sure of that," continued Boffin. "We all know what bread and the games came to in Rome." "What did they come to?" asked Mrs. Boffin. "To a man burning Rome, my dear, for his amusement, dressed in a satin petticoat and a wreath of roses." "I don't think the Duke will dress himself like that," said Mrs. Boffin. "And I don't think," said Lopez, "that the graceful expenditure of wealth in a rich man's house has any tendency to demoralise the people." "The attempt here," said Boffin severely, "is to demoralise the rulers of the people. I am glad to have come once to see how the thing is done; but as an independent member of the House of Commons I should not wish to be known to frequent the saloon of the Duchess." Then Mr. Boffin took away Mrs. Boffin, much to that lady's regret. "This is fairy land," said Lopez to the Duchess, as he left the room. "Come and be a fairy then," she answered, very graciously. "We are always on the wing about this hour on Wednesday night." The words contained a general invitation for the season, and were esteemed by Lopez as an indication of great favour. It must be acknowledged of the Duchess that she was prone to make favourites, perhaps without adequate cause; though it must be conceded to her that she rarely altogether threw off from her any one whom she had once taken to her good graces. It must also be confessed that when she had allowed herself to hate either a man or a woman, she generally hated on to the end. No Paradise could be too charming for her friends; no Pandemonium too frightful for her enemies. In reference to Mr. Lopez she would have said, if interrogated, that she had taken the man up in obedience to her husband. But in truth she had liked the look and the voice of the man. Her husband before now had recommended men to her notice and kindness, whom at the first trial she had rejected from her good-will, and whom she had continued to reject ever afterwards, let her husband's urgency be what it might. Another old friend, of whom former chronicles were not silent, was at the Duchess's that night, and there came across Mrs. Finn. This was Barrington Erle, a politician of long standing, who was still looked upon by many as a young man, because he had always been known as a young man, and because he had never done anything to compromise his position in that respect. He had not married, or settled himself down in a house of his own, or become subject to gout, or given up being careful about the fitting of his clothes. No doubt the grey hairs were getting the better of the black hairs, both on his head and face, and marks of coming crows' feet were to be seen if you looked close at him, and he had become careful about his great-coat and umbrella. He was in truth much nearer fifty than forty;--nevertheless he was felt in the House and among Cabinet Ministers, and among the wives of members and Cabinet Ministers, to be a young man still. And when he was invited to become Secretary for Ireland it was generally felt that he was too young for the place. He declined it, however; and when he went to the Post-office, the gentlemen there all felt that they had had a boy put over them. Phineas Finn, who had become Secretary for Ireland, was in truth ten years his junior. But Phineas Finn had been twice married, and had gone through other phases of life, such as make a man old. "How does Phineas like it?" Erle asked. Phineas Finn and Barrington Erle had gone through some political struggles together, and had been very intimate. "I hope not very much," said the lady. "Why so? Because he's away so much?" "No;--not that. I should not grudge his absence if the work satisfied him. But I know him so well. The more he takes to it now,--the more sanguine he is as to some special thing to be done,--the more bitter will be the disappointment when he is disappointed. For there never really is anything special to be done;--is there, Mr. Erle?" "I think there is always a little too much zeal about Finn." "Of course there is. And then with zeal there always goes a thin skin,--and unjustifiable expectations, and biting despair, and contempt of others, and all the elements of unhappiness." "That is a sad programme for your husband." "He has recuperative faculties which bring him round at last:--but I really doubt whether he was made for a politician in this country. You remember Lord Brock?" "Dear old Brock;--of course I do. How should I not, if you remember him?" "Young men are boys at college, rowing in boats, when women have been ever so long out in the world. He was the very model of an English statesman. He loved his country dearly, and wished her to be, as he believed her to be, first among nations. But he had no belief in perpetuating her greatness by any grand improvements. Let things take their way naturally,--with a slight direction hither or thither as things might require. That was his method of ruling. He believed in men rather than measures. As long as he had loyalty around him, he could be personally happy, and quite confident as to the country. He never broke his heart because he could not carry this or that reform. What would have hurt him would have been to be worsted in personal conflict. But he could always hold his own, and he was always happy. Your man with a thin skin, a vehement ambition, a scrupulous conscience, and a sanguine desire for rapid improvement, is never a happy, and seldom a fortunate politician." "Mrs. Finn, you understand it all better than any one else that I ever knew." "I have been watching it a long time, and of course very closely since I have been married." "But you have an eye trained to see it all. What a useful member you would have been in a government!" "But I should never have had patience to sit all night upon that bench in the House of Commons. How men can do it! They mustn't read. They can't think because of the speaking. It doesn't do for them to talk. I don't believe they ever listen. It isn't in human nature to listen hour after hour to such platitudes. I believe they fall into a habit of half-wakeful sleeping, which carries them through the hours; but even that can't be pleasant. I look upon the Treasury Bench in July as a sort of casual-ward which we know to be necessary, but is almost too horrid to be contemplated." "Men do get bread and skilly there certainly; but, Mrs. Finn, we can go into the library and smoking-room." "Oh, yes;--and a clerk in an office can read the newspapers instead of doing his duty. But there is a certain surveillance exercised, and a certain quantity of work exacted. I have met Lords of the Treasury out at dinner on Mondays and Thursdays, but we all regard them as boys who have shirked out of school. I think upon the whole, Mr. Erle, we women have the best of it." "I don't suppose you will go in for your 'rights'." "Not by Act of Parliament, or by platform meeting. I have a great idea of a woman's rights; but that is the way, I think, to throw them away. What do you think of the Duchess's evenings?" "Lady Glen is in her way as great a woman as you are;--perhaps greater, because nothing ever stops her." "Whereas I have scruples." "Her Grace has none. She has feelings and convictions which keep her straight, but no scruples. Look at her now talking to Sir Orlando Drought, a man whom she both hates and despises. I am sure she is looking forward to some happy time in which the Duke may pitch Sir Orlando overboard, and rule supreme, with me or some other subordinate leading the House of Commons simply as lieutenant. Such a time will never come, but that is her idea. But she is talking to Sir Orlando now as if she were pouring her full confidence into his ear, and Sir Orlando is believing her. Sir Orlando is in a seventh heaven, and she is measuring his credulity inch by inch." "She makes the place very bright." "And is spending an enormous deal of money," said Barrington Erle. "What does it matter?" "Well, no;--if the Duke likes it. I had an idea that the Duke would not like the display of the thing. There he is. Do you see him in the corner with his brother duke? He doesn't look as if he were happy; does he? No one would think he was the master of everything here. He has got himself hidden almost behind the screen. I'm sure he doesn't like it." "He tries to like whatever she likes," said Mrs. Finn. As her husband was away in Ireland, Mrs. Finn was staying in the house in Carlton Gardens. The Duchess at present required so much of her time that this was found to be convenient. When, therefore, the guests on the present occasion had all gone, the Duchess and Mrs. Finn were left together. "Did you ever see anything so hopeless as he is?" said the Duchess. "Who is hopeless?" "Heavens and earth! Plantagenet;--who else? Is there another man in the world would come into his own house, among his own guests, and speak only to one person? And, then, think of it! Popularity is the staff on which alone Ministers can lean in this country with security." "Political but not social popularity." "You know as well as I do that the two go together. We've seen enough of that even in our day. What broke up Mr. Gresham's Ministry? If he had stayed away people might have thought that he was reading blue-books, or calculating coinage, or preparing a speech. That would have been much better. But he comes in and sits for half-an-hour whispering to another duke! I hate dukes!" "He talks to the Duke of St. Bungay because there is no one he trusts so much. A few years ago it would have been Mr. Mildmay." "My dear," said the Duchess angrily, "you treat me as though I were a child. Of course I know why he chooses that old man out of all the crowd. I don't suppose he does it from any stupid pride of rank. I know very well what set of ideas govern him. But that isn't the point. He has to reflect what others think of it, and to endeavour to do what will please them. There was I telling tarradiddles by the yard to that old oaf, Sir Orlando Drought, when a confidential word from Plantagenet would have had ten times more effect. And why can't he speak a word to the people's wives? They wouldn't bite him. He has got to say a few words to you sometimes,--to whom it doesn't signify, my dear--" "I don't know about that." "But he never speaks to another woman. He was here this evening for exactly forty minutes, and he didn't open his lips to a female creature. I watched him. How on earth am I to pull him through if he goes on in that way? Yes, Locock, I'll go to bed, and I don't think I'll get up for a week." CHAPTER XII The Gathering of Clouds Throughout June and the first week of July the affairs of the Ministry went on successfully, in spite of the social sins of the Duke and the occasional despair of the Duchess. There had been many politicians who had thought, or had, at any rate, predicted, that the Coalition Ministry would not live a month. There had been men, such as Lord Fawn on one side and Mr. Boffin on the other, who had found themselves stranded disagreeably,--with no certain position,--unwilling to sit immediately behind a Treasury bench from which they were excluded, and too shy to place themselves immediately opposite. Seats beneath the gangway were, of course, open to such of them as were members of the Lower House, and those seats had to be used; but they were not accustomed to sit beneath the gangway. These gentlemen had expected that the seeds of weakness, of which they had perceived the scattering, would grow at once into an enormous crop of blunders, difficulties, and complications; but, for a while, the Ministry were saved from these dangers either by the energy of the Prime Minister, or the popularity of his wife, or perhaps by the sagacity of the elder Duke;--so that there grew up an idea that the Coalition was really the proper thing. In one respect it certainly was successful. The Home Rulers, or Irish party generally, were left without an inch of standing ground. Their support was not needed, and therefore they were not courted. For the moment there was not even a necessity to pretend that Home Rule was anything but an absurdity from beginning to end;--so much so that one or two leading Home Rulers, men who had taken up the cause not only that they might become Members of Parliament, but with some further ideas of speech-making and popularity, declared that the Coalition had been formed merely with a view of putting down Ireland. This capability of dispensing with a generally untractable element of support was felt to be a great comfort. Then, too, there was a set in the House,--at the moment not a very numerous set,--who had been troublesome friends to the old Liberal party, and which the Coalition was able, if not to ignore, at any rate to disregard. These were the staunch economists, and argumentative philosophical Radicals,--men of standing and repute, who are always in doubtful times individually flattered by Ministers, who have great privileges accorded to them of speaking and dividing, and who are not unfrequently even thanked for their rods by the very owners of the backs which bear the scourges. These men could not be quite set aside by the Coalition as were the Home Rulers. It was not even yet, perhaps, wise to count them out, or to leave them to talk to benches absolutely empty;--but the tone of flattery with which they had been addressed became gradually less warm; and when the scourges were wielded, ministerial backs took themselves out of the way. There grew up unconsciously a feeling of security against attack which was distasteful to these gentlemen, and was in itself perhaps a little dangerous. Gentlemen bound to support the Government, when they perceived that there was comparatively but little to do, and that that little might be easily done, became careless, and, perhaps, a little contemptuous. So that the great popular orator, Mr. Turnbull, found himself compelled to rise in his seat, and ask whether the noble Duke at the head of the Government thought himself strong enough to rule without attention to Parliamentary details. The question was asked with an air of inexorable severity, and was intended to have deep signification. Mr. Turnbull had disliked the Coalition from the beginning; but then Mr. Turnbull always disliked everything. He had so accustomed himself to wield the constitutional cat-of-nine-tails, that heaven will hardly be happy to him unless he be allowed to flog the cherubim. Though the party with which he was presumed to act had generally been in power since he had been in the House, he had never allowed himself to agree with a Minister on any point. And as he had never been satisfied with a Liberal Government, it was not probable that he should endure a Coalition in silence. At the end of a rather lengthy speech, he repeated his question, and then sat down, taking his place with all that constitutional indignation which becomes the parliamentary flagellator of the day. The little jokes with which Sir Orlando answered him were very well in their way. Mr. Turnbull did not care much whether he were answered or not. Perhaps the jauntiness of Sir Orlando, which implied that the Coalition was too strong to regard attack, somewhat irritated outsiders. But there certainly grew up from that moment a feeling among such men as Erle and Rattler that care was necessary, that the House, taken as a whole, was not in a condition to be manipulated with easy freedom, and that Sir Orlando must be made to understand that he was not strong enough to depend upon jauntiness. The jaunty statesman must be very sure of his personal following. There was a general opinion that Sir Orlando had not brought the Coalition well out of the first real attack which had been made upon it. "Well, Phineas; how do you like the Phoenix?" Phineas Finn had flown back to London at the instigation probably of Mr. Rattler, and was now standing at the window of Brooks's club with Barrington Erle. It was near nine one Thursday evening, and they were both about to return to the House. "I don't like the Castle, if you mean that." "Tyrone isn't troublesome, surely?" The Marquis of Tyrone was the Lord Lieutenant of the day, and had in his time been a very strong Conservative. "He finds me troublesome, I fear." "I don't wonder at that, Phineas." "How should it be otherwise? What can he and I have in sympathy with one another? He has been brought up with all an Orangeman's hatred for a Papist. Now that he is in high office, he can abandon the display of the feeling,--perhaps the feeling itself as regards the country at large. He knows that it doesn't become a Lord Lieutenant to be Orange. But how can he put himself into a boat with me?" "All that kind of thing vanishes when a man is in office." "Yes, as a rule; because men go together into office with the same general predilections. Is it too hot to walk down?" "I'll walk a little way,--till you make me hot by arguing." "I haven't an argument left in me," said Phineas. "Of course everything over there seems easy enough now,--so easy that Lord Tyrone evidently imagines that the good times are coming back in which governors may govern and not be governed." "You are pretty quiet in Ireland now, I suppose;--no martial law, suspension of the habeas corpus, or anything of that kind, just at present?" "No; thank goodness!" said Phineas. "I'm not quite sure whether a general suspension of the habeas corpus would not upon the whole be the most comfortable state of things for Irishmen themselves. But whether good or bad, you've nothing of that kind of thing now. You've no great measure that you wish to pass?" "But they've a great measure that they wish to pass." "They know better than that. They don't want to kill their golden goose." "The people, who are infinitely ignorant of all political work, do want it. There are counties in which, if you were to poll the people, Home Rule would carry nearly every voter,--except the members themselves." "You wouldn't give it them?" "Certainly not;--any more than I would allow a son to ruin himself because he asked me. But I would endeavour to teach them that they can get nothing by Home Rule,--that their taxes would be heavier, their property less secure, their lives less safe, their general position more debased, and their chances of national success more remote than ever." "You can never teach them, except by the slow lesson of habit. The Heptarchy didn't mould itself into a nation in a day." "Men were governed then, and could be and were moulded. I feel sure that even in Ireland there is a stratum of men, above the working peasants, who would understand, and make those below them understand, the position of the country, if they could only be got to give up fighting about religion. Even now Home Rule is regarded by the multitude as a weapon to be used against Protestantism on behalf of the Pope." "I suppose the Pope is the great sinner?" "They got over the Pope in France,--even in early days, before religion had become a farce in the country. They have done so in Italy." "Yes;--they've got over the Pope in Italy, certainly." "And yet," said Phineas, "the bulk of the people are staunch Catholics. Of course the same attempt to maintain a temporal influence, with the hope of recovering temporal power, is made in other countries. But while we see the attempt failing elsewhere,--so that we know that the power of the Church is going to the wall,--yet in Ireland it is infinitely stronger now than it was fifty, or even twenty years ago." "Because we have been removing restraints on Papal aggression, while other nations have been imposing restraints. There are those at Rome who believe all England to be Romish at heart, because here in England a Roman Catholic can say what he will, and print what he will." "And yet," said Phineas, "all England does not return one Catholic to the House, while we have Jews in plenty. You have a Jew among your English judges, but at present not a single Roman Catholic. What do you suppose are the comparative numbers of the population here in England?" "And you are going to cure all this;--while Tyrone thinks it ought to be left as it is? I rather agree with Tyrone." "No," said Phineas, wearily; "I doubt whether I shall ever cure anything, or even make any real attempt. My patriotism just goes far enough to make me unhappy, and Lord Tyrone thinks that while Dublin ladies dance at the Castle, and the list of agrarian murders is kept low, the country is admirably managed. I don't quite agree with him;--that's all." Then there arose a legal difficulty, which caused much trouble to the Coalition Ministry. There fell vacant a certain seat on the bench of judges,--a seat of considerable dignity and importance, but not quite of the highest rank. Sir Gregory Grogram, who was a rich, energetic man, determined to have a peerage, and convinced that, should the Coalition fall to pieces, the Liberal element would be in the ascendant,--so that the woolsack would then be opened to him,--declined to occupy the place. Sir Timothy Beeswax, the Solicitor-General, saw that it was exactly suited for him, and had no hesitation in expressing his opinion to that effect. But the place was not given to Sir Timothy. It was explained to Sir Timothy that the old rule,--or rather custom,--of offering certain high positions to the law officers of the Crown had been abrogated. Some Prime Minister, or, more probably, some collection of Cabinet Ministers, had asserted the custom to be a bad one,--and, as far as right went, Sir Timothy was declared not to have a leg to stand upon. He was informed that his services in the House were too valuable to be so lost. Some people said that his temper was against him. Others were of opinion that he had risen from the ranks too quickly, and that Lord Ramsden, who had come from the same party, thought that Sir Timothy had not yet won his spurs. The Solicitor-General resigned in a huff, and then withdrew his resignation. Sir Gregory thought the withdrawal should not be accepted, having found Sir Timothy to be an unsympathetic colleague. Our Duke consulted the old Duke, among whose theories of official life forbearance to all colleagues and subordinates was conspicuous. The withdrawal was, therefore, allowed,--but the Coalition could not after that be said to be strong in regard to its Law Officers. But the first concerted attack against the Ministry was made in reference to the budget. Mr. Monk, who had consented to undertake the duties of Chancellor of the Exchequer under the urgent entreaties of the two dukes, was of course late with his budget. It was April before the Coalition had been formed. The budget when produced had been very popular. Budgets, like babies, are always little loves when first born. But as their infancy passes away, they also become subject to many stripes. The details are less pleasing than was the whole in the hands of the nurse. There was a certain "interest," very influential both by general wealth and by the presence of many members in the House, which thought that Mr. Monk had disregarded its just claims. Mr. Monk had refused to relieve the Brewers from their licences. Now the Brewers had for some years been agitating about their licences,--and it is acknowledged in politics that any measure is to be carried, or to be left out in the cold uncarried and neglected, according to the number of deputations which may be got to press a Minister on the subject. Now the Brewers had had deputation after deputation to many Chancellors of the Exchequer; and these deputations had been most respectable,--we may almost say imperative. It was quite usual for a deputation to have four or five County members among its body, all Brewers; and the average wealth of a deputation of Brewers would buy up half London. All the Brewers in the House had been among the supporters of the Coalition, the number of Liberal and Conservative Brewers having been about equal. But now there was a fear that the "interest" might put itself into opposition. Mr. Monk had been firm. More than one of the Ministry had wished to yield;--but he had discussed the matter with his Chief, and they were both very firm. The Duke had never doubted. Mr. Monk had never doubted. From day to day certain organs of the Press expressed an opinion, gradually increasing in strength, that however strong might be the Coalition as a body, it was weak as to finance. This was hard, because not very many years ago the Duke himself had been known as a particularly strong Minister of Finance. An amendment was moved in Committee as to the Brewers' Licences, and there was almost a general opinion that the Coalition would be broken up. Mr. Monk would certainly not remain in office if the Brewers were to be relieved from their licences. Then it was that Phineas Finn was recalled from Ireland in red-hot haste. The measure was debated for a couple of nights, and Mr. Monk carried his point. The Brewers' Licences were allowed to remain, as one great gentleman from Burton declared, a "disgrace to the fiscal sagacity of the country." The Coalition was so far victorious;--but there arose a general feeling that its strength had been impaired. CHAPTER XIII Mr. Wharton Complains "I think you have betrayed me." This accusation was brought by Mr. Wharton against Mrs. Roby in that lady's drawing-room, and was occasioned by a report that had been made to the old lawyer by his daughter. He was very angry and almost violent;--so much so that by his manner he gave a considerable advantage to the lady whom he was accusing. Mrs. Roby undoubtedly had betrayed her brother-in-law. She had been false to the trust reposed in her. He had explained his wishes to her in regard to his daughter, to whom she had in some sort assumed to stand in place of a mother, and she, while pretending to act in accordance with his wishes, had directly opposed them. But it was not likely that he would be able to prove her treachery though he might be sure of it. He had desired that his girl should see as little as possible of Ferdinand Lopez, but had hesitated to give a positive order that she should not meet him. He had indeed himself taken her to a dinner party at which he knew that she would meet him. But Mrs. Roby had betrayed him. Since the dinner party she had arranged a meeting at her own house on behalf of the lover,--as to which arrangement Emily Wharton had herself been altogether innocent. Emily had met the man in her aunt's house, not expecting to meet him, and the lover had had an opportunity of speaking his mind freely. She also had spoken hers freely. She would not engage herself to him without her father's consent. With that consent she would do so,--oh, so willingly! She did not coy her love. He might be certain that she would give herself to no one else. Her heart was entirely his. But she had pledged herself to her father, and on no consideration would she break that pledge. She went on to say that after what had passed she thought that they had better not meet. In such meetings there could be no satisfaction, and must be much pain. But he had her full permission to use any arguments that he could use with her father. On the evening of that day she told her father all that had passed,--omitting no detail either of what she had said or of what had been said to her,--adding a positive assurance of obedience, but doing so with a severe solemnity and apparent consciousness of ill-usage which almost broke her father's heart. "Your aunt must have had him there on purpose," Mr. Wharton had said. But Emily would neither accuse nor defend her aunt. "I at least knew nothing of it," she said. "I know that," Mr. Wharton had ejaculated. "I know that. I don't accuse you of anything, my dear,--except of thinking that you understand the world better than I do." Then Emily had retired and Mr. Wharton had been left to pass half the night in a perplexed reverie, feeling that he would be forced ultimately to give way, and yet certain that by doing so he would endanger his child's happiness. He was very angry with his sister-in-law, and on the next day, early in the morning, he attacked her. "I think you have betrayed me," he said. "What do you mean by that, Mr. Wharton?" "You have had this man here on purpose that he might make love to Emily." "I have done no such thing. You told me yourself that they were not to be kept apart. He comes here, and it would be very odd indeed if I were to tell the servants that he is not to be admitted. If you want to quarrel with me, of course you can. I have always endeavoured to be a good friend to Emily." "It is not being a good friend to her, bringing her and this adventurer together." "I don't know why you call him an adventurer. But you are so very odd in your ideas! He is received everywhere, and is always at the Duchess of Omnium's." "I don't care a fig about the Duchess." "I dare say not. Only the Duke happens to be Prime Minister, and his house is considered to have the very best society that England, or indeed Europe, can give. And I think it is something in a young man's favour when it is known that he associates with such persons as the Duke of Omnium. I believe that most fathers would have a regard to the company which a man keeps when they think of their daughter's marrying." "I ain't thinking of her marrying. I don't want her to marry;--not this man at least. And I fancy the Duchess of Omnium is just as likely to have scamps in her drawing-room as any other lady in London." "And do such men as Mr. Happerton associate with scamps?" "I don't know anything about Mr. Happerton,--and I don't care anything about him." "He has £20,000 a year out of his business. And does Everett associate with scamps?" "Very likely." "I never knew any one so much prejudiced as you are, Mr. Wharton. When you have a point to carry there's nothing you won't say. I suppose it comes from being in the courts." "The long and the short of it is this," said the lawyer; "if I find that Emily is brought here to meet Mr. Lopez, I must forbid her to come at all." "You must do as you please about that. But to tell you the truth, Mr. Wharton, I think the mischief is done. Such a girl as Emily, when she has taken it into her head to love a man, is not likely to give him up." "She has promised to have nothing to say to him without my sanction." "We all know what that means. You'll have to give way. You'll find that it will be so. The stern parent who dooms his daughter to perpetual seclusion because she won't marry the man he likes, doesn't belong to this age." "Who talks about seclusion?" "Do you suppose that she'll give up the man she loves because you don't like him? Is that the way girls live now-a-days? She won't run away with him, because she's not one of that sort; but unless you're harder-hearted than I take you to be, she'll make your life a burden to you. And as for betraying you, that's nonsense. You've no right to say it. I'm not going to quarrel with you whatever you may say, but you've no right to say it." Mr. Wharton, as he went away to Lincoln's Inn, bewailed himself because he knew that he was not hard-hearted. What his sister-in-law had said to him in that respect was true enough. If he could only rid himself of a certain internal ague which made him feel that his life was, indeed, a burden to him while his daughter was unhappy, he need only remain passive and simply not give the permission without which his daughter would not ever engage herself to this man. But the ague troubled every hour of his present life. That sister-in-law of his was a silly, vulgar, worldly, and most untrustworthy woman;--but she had understood what she was saying. And there had been something in that argument about the Duchess of Omnium's parties, and Mr. Happerton, which had its effect. If the man did live with the great and wealthy, it must be because they thought well of him and of his position. The fact of his being a "nasty foreigner," and probably of Jewish descent, remained. To him, Wharton, the man must always be distasteful. But he could hardly maintain his opposition to one of whom the choice spirits of the world thought well. And he tried to be fair on the subject. It might be that it was a prejudice. Others probably did not find a man to be odious because he was of foreign extraction and known by a foreign name. Others would not suspect a man of being of Jewish blood because he was swarthy, or even object to him if he were a Jew by descent. But it was wonderful to him that his girl should like such a man,--should like such a man well enough to choose him as the one companion of her life. She had been brought up to prefer English men, and English thinking, and English ways,--and English ways, too, somewhat of a past time. He thought as did Brabantio, that it could not be that without magic his daughter who had shunned-- "The wealthy curled darlings of our nation, Would ever have, to incur a general mock, Run from her guardage to the sooty bosom Of such a thing as"-- this distasteful Portuguese. That evening he said nothing further to his daughter, but sat with her, silent and disconsolate. Later in the evening, after she had gone to her room, Everett came in while the old man was still walking up and down the drawing-room. "Where have you been?" asked the father,--not caring a straw as to any reply when he asked the question, but roused almost to anger by the answer when it came. "I have been dining with Lopez at the club." "I believe you live with that man." "Is there any reason, sir, why I should not?" "You know that there is a good reason why there should be no peculiar intimacy. But I don't suppose that my wishes, or your sister's welfare, will interest you." "That is severe, sir." "I am not such a fool as to suppose that you are to quarrel with a man because I don't approve his addressing your sister; but I do think that while this is going on, and while he perseveres in opposition to my distinct refusal, you need not associate with him in any special manner." "I don't understand your objection to him, sir." "I dare say not. There are a great many things you don't understand. But I do object." "He's a very rising man. Mr. Roby was saying to me just now--" "Who cares a straw what a fool like Roby says?" "I don't mean Uncle Dick, but his brother,--who, I suppose, is somebody in the world. He was saying to me just now that he wondered why Lopez does not go into the House;--that he would be sure to get a seat if he chose, and safe to make a mark when he got there." "I dare say he could get into the House. I don't know any well-to-do blackguard of whom you might not predict as much. A seat in the House of Commons doesn't make a man a gentleman as far as I can see." "I think every one allows that Ferdinand Lopez is a gentleman." "Who was his father?" "I didn't happen to know him, sir." "And who was his mother? I don't suppose you will credit anything because I say it, but as far as my experience goes, a man doesn't often become a gentleman in the first generation. A man may be very worthy, very clever, very rich,--very well worth knowing, if you will;--but when one talks of admitting a man into close family communion by marriage, one would, I fancy, wish to know something of his father and mother." Then Everett escaped, and Mr. Wharton was again left to his own meditations. Oh, what a peril, what a trouble, what a labyrinth of difficulties was a daughter! He must either be known as a stern, hard-hearted parent, utterly indifferent to his child's feelings, using with tyranny the power over her which came to him only from her sense of filial duty,--or else he must give up his own judgment, and yield to her in a matter as to which he believed that such yielding would be most pernicious to her own interests. Hitherto he really knew nothing of the man's means;--nor, if he could have his own way, did he want such information. But, as things were going now, he began to feel that if he could hear anything averse to the man he might thus strengthen his hands against him. On the following day he went into the city, and called on an old friend, a banker,--one whom he had known for nearly half a century, and of whom, therefore, he was not afraid to ask a question. For Mr. Wharton was a man not prone, in the ordinary intercourse of life, either to ask or to answer questions. "You don't know anything, do you, of a man named Ferdinand Lopez?" "I have heard of him. But why do you ask?" "Well; I have a reason for asking. I don't know that I quite wish to say what my reason is." "I have heard of him as connected with Hunky's house," said the banker,--"or rather with one of the partners in the house." "Is he a man of means?" "I imagine him to be so;--but I know nothing. He has rather large dealings, I take it, in foreign stocks. Is he after my old friend, Miss Wharton?" "Well;--yes." "You had better get more information than I can give you. But, of course, before anything of that kind was done you would see that money was settled." This was all he heard in the city, and this was not satisfactory. He had not liked to tell his friend that he wished to hear that the foreigner was a needy adventurer,--altogether untrustworthy; but that had really been his desire. Then he thought of the £60,000 which he himself destined for his girl. If the man were to his liking there would be money enough. Though he had been careful to save money, he was not a greedy man, even for his children. Should his daughter insist on marrying this man he could take care that she should never want a sufficient income. As a first step,--a thing to be done almost at once,--he must take her away from London. It was now July, and the custom of the family was that the house in Manchester Square should be left for two months, and that the flitting should take place about the middle of August. Mr. Wharton usually liked to postpone the flitting, as he also liked to hasten the return. But now it was a question whether he had not better start at once,--start somewhither, and probably for a much longer period than the usual vacation. Should he take the bull by the horns, and declare his purpose of living for the next twelvemonth at--; well, it did not much matter where; Dresden, he thought, was a long way off, and would do as well as any place. Then it occurred to him that his cousin, Sir Alured, was in town, and that he had better see his cousin before he came to any decision. They were, as usual, expected at Wharton Hall this autumn, and that arrangement could not be abandoned without explanation. Sir Alured Wharton was a baronet, with a handsome old family place on the Wye in Herefordshire, whose forefathers had been baronets since baronets were first created, and whose earlier forefathers had lived at Wharton Hall much before that time. It may be imagined, therefore, that Sir Alured was proud of his name, of his estate, and of his rank. But there were drawbacks to his happiness. As regarded his name, it was to descend to a nephew whom he specially disliked,--and with good cause. As to his estate, delightful as it was in many respects, it was hardly sufficient to maintain his position with that plentiful hospitality which he would have loved;--and other property he had none. And as to his rank, he had almost become ashamed of it, since,--as he was wont to declare was now the case,--every prosperous tallow-chandler throughout the country was made a baronet as a matter of course. So he lived at home through the year with his wife and daughters, not pretending to the luxury of a season in London for which his modest three or four thousand a year did not suffice;--and so living, apart from all the friction of clubs, parliaments, and mixed society, he did veritably believe that his dear country was going utterly to the dogs. He was so staunch in politics, that during the doings of the last quarter of a century,--from the repeal of the Corn Laws down to the Ballot,--he had honestly declared one side to be as bad as the other. Thus he felt that all his happiness was to be drawn from the past. There was nothing of joy or glory to which he could look forward either on behalf of his country or his family. His nephew,--and alas, his heir,--was a needy spendthrift, with whom he would hold no communication. The family settlement for his wife and daughters would leave them but poorly off; and though he did struggle to save something, the duty of living as Sir Alured Wharton of Wharton Hall should live made those struggles very ineffective. He was a melancholy, proud, ignorant man, who could not endure a personal liberty, and who thought the assertion of social equality on the part of men of lower rank to amount to the taking of personal liberty;--who read little or nothing, and thought that he knew the history of his country because he was aware that Charles I had had his head cut off, and that the Georges had come from Hanover. If Charles I had never had his head cut off, and if the Georges had never come from Hanover, the Whartons would now probably be great people and Britain a great nation. But the Evil One had been allowed to prevail, and everything had gone astray, and Sir Alured now had nothing of this world to console him but a hazy retrospect of past glories, and a delight in the beauty of his own river, his own park, and his own house. Sir Alured, with all his foibles and with all his faults, was a pure-minded, simple gentleman, who could not tell a lie, who could not do a wrong, and who was earnest in his desire to make those who were dependent on him comfortable, and, if possible, happy. Once a year he came up to London for a week, to see his lawyers, and get measured for a coat, and go to the dentist. These were the excuses which he gave, but it was fancied by some that his wig was the great moving cause. Sir Alured and Mr. Wharton were second cousins, and close friends. Sir Alured trusted his cousin altogether in all things, believing him to be the great legal luminary of Great Britain, and Mr. Wharton returned his cousin's affection, entertaining something akin to reverence for the man who was the head of his family. He dearly loved Sir Alured,--and loved Sir Alured's wife and two daughters. Nevertheless, the second week at Wharton Hall became always tedious to him, and the fourth, fifth, and sixth weeks frightful with ennui. Perhaps it was with some unconscious dread of this tedium that he made a sudden suggestion to Sir Alured in reference to Dresden. Sir Alured had come to him at his chambers, and the two old men were sitting together near the open window. Sir Alured delighted in the privilege of sitting there, which seemed to confer upon him something of an insight into the inner ways of London life beyond what he could get at his hotel or his wigmaker's. "Go to Dresden;--for the winter!" he exclaimed. "Not only for the winter. We should go at once." "Not before you come to Wharton!" said the amazed baronet. Mr. Wharton replied in a low, sad voice, "In that case we should not go down to Herefordshire at all." The baronet looked hurt as well as unhappy. "Yes, I know what you will say, and how kind you are." "It isn't kindness at all. You always come. It would be breaking up everything." "Everything has to be broken up sooner or later. One feels that as one grows older." "You and I, Abel, are just of an age. Why should you talk to me like this? You are strong enough, whatever I am. Why shouldn't you come? Dresden! I never heard of such a thing. I suppose it's some nonsense of Emily's." Then Mr. Wharton told his whole story. "Nonsense of Emily's!" he began. "Yes, it is nonsense,--worse than you think. But she doesn't want to go abroad." The father's plaint needn't be repeated to the reader as it was told to the baronet. Though it was necessary that he should explain himself, yet he tried to be reticent. Sir Alured listened in silence. He loved his cousin Emily, and, knowing that she would be rich, knowing her advantages of birth, and recognizing her beauty, had expected that she would make a match creditable to the Wharton family. But a Portuguese Jew! A man who had never been even known to allude to his own father! For by degrees Mr. Wharton had been driven to confess all the sins of the lover, though he had endeavoured to conceal the extent of his daughter's love. "Do you mean that Emily--favours him?" "I am afraid so." "And would she--would she--do anything without your sanction?" He was always thinking of the disgrace attaching to himself by reason of his nephew's vileness, and now, if a daughter of the family should also go astray, so as to be exiled from the bosom of the Whartons, how manifest would it be that all the glory was departing from their house! "No! She will do nothing without my sanction. She has given her word,--which is gospel." As he spoke the old lawyer struck his hand upon the table. "Then why should you run away to Dresden?" "Because she is unhappy. She will not marry him,--or even see him, if I forbid it. But she is near him." "Herefordshire is a long way off," said the baronet, pleading. "Change of scene is what she should have," said the father. "There can't be more of a change than she'd get at Wharton. She always did like Wharton. It was there that she met Arthur Fletcher." The father only shook his head as Arthur Fletcher's name was mentioned. "Well,--that is sad. I always thought she'd give way about Arthur at last." "It is impossible to understand a young woman," said the lawyer. With such an English gentleman as Arthur Fletcher on one side, and with this Portuguese Jew on the other, it was to him Hyperion to a Satyr. A darkness had fallen over his girl's eyes, and for a time her power of judgment had left her. "But I don't see why Wharton should not do just as well as Dresden," continued the baronet. Mr. Wharton found himself quite unable to make his cousin understand that the greater disruption caused by a residence abroad, the feeling that a new kind of life had been considered necessary for her, and that she must submit to the new kind of life, might be gradually effective, while the journeyings and scenes which had been common to her year after year would have no effect. Nevertheless he gave way. They could hardly start to Germany at once, but the visit to Wharton might be accelerated; and the details of the residence abroad might be there arranged. It was fixed, therefore, that Mr. Wharton and Emily should go down to Wharton Hall at any rate before the end of July. "Why do you go earlier than usual, papa?" Emily asked him afterwards. "Because I think it best," he replied angrily. She ought at any rate to understand the reason. "Of course I shall be ready, papa. You know that I always like Wharton. There is no place on earth I like so much, and this year it will be especially pleasant to me to go out of town. But--" "But what?" "I can't bear to think that I shall be taking you away." "I've got to bear worse things than that, my dear." "Oh, papa, do not speak to me like that! Of course I know what you mean. There is no real reason for your going. If you wish it I will promise you that I will not see him." He only shook his head,--meaning to imply that a promise which could go no farther than that would not make him happy. "It will be just the same, papa,--either here, or at Wharton, or elsewhere. You need not be afraid of me." "I am not afraid of you;--but I am afraid for you. I fear for your happiness,--and for my own." "So do I, papa. But what can be done? I suppose sometimes people must be unhappy. I can't change myself, and I can't change you. I find myself to be as much bound to Mr. Lopez as though I were his wife." "No, no! you shouldn't say so. You've no right to say so." "But I have given you a promise, and I certainly will keep it. If we must be unhappy, still we need not,--need not quarrel; need we, papa?" Then she came up to him and kissed him,--whereupon he went out of the room wiping his eyes. That evening he again spoke to her, saying merely a word. "I think, my dear, we'll have it fixed that we go on the 30th. Sir Alured seemed to wish it." "Very well, papa;--I shall be quite ready." CHAPTER XIV A Lover's Perseverance Ferdinand Lopez learned immediately through Mrs. Roby that the early departure for Herefordshire had been fixed. "I should go to him and speak to him very plainly," said Mrs. Roby. "He can't bite you." "I'm not in the least afraid of his biting me." "You can talk so well! I should tell him everything, especially about money,--which I'm sure is all right." "Yes,--that is all right," said Lopez, smiling. "And about your people." "Which I've no doubt you think is all wrong." "I don't know anything about it," said Mrs. Roby, "and I don't much care. He has old-world notions. At any rate you should say something, so that he should not be able to complain to her that you had kept him in the dark. If there is anything to be known, it's much better to have it known." "But there is nothing to be known." "Then tell him nothing;--but still tell it to him. After that you must trust to her. I don't suppose she'd go off with you." "I'm sure she wouldn't." "But she's as obstinate as a mule. She'll get the better of him if you really mean it." He assured her that he really did mean it, and determined that he would take her advice as to seeing, or endeavouring to see, Mr. Wharton once again. But before doing so he thought it to be expedient to put his house into order, so that he might be able to make a statement of his affairs if asked to do so. Whether they were flourishing or the reverse, it might be necessary that he should have to speak of them,--with, at any rate, apparent candour. The reader may, perhaps, remember that in the month of April Ferdinand Lopez had managed to extract a certain signature from his unfortunate city friend, Sexty Parker, which made that gentleman responsible for the payment of a considerable sum of money before the end of July. The transaction had been one of an unmixed painful nature to Mr. Parker. As soon as he came to think of it, after Lopez had left him, he could not prevail upon himself to forgive himself for his folly. That he,--he, Sextus Parker,--should have been induced by a few empty words to give his name for seven hundred and fifty pounds without any consideration or possibility of benefit! And the more he thought of it the more sure he was that the money was lost. The next day he confirmed his own fears, and before a week was gone he had written down the sum as gone. He told nobody. He did not like to confess his folly. But he made some inquiry about his friend,--which was absolutely futile. No one that he knew seemed to know anything of the man's affairs. But he saw his friend from time to time in the city, shining as only successful men do shine, and he heard of him as one whose name was becoming known in the city. Still he suffered grievously. His money was surely gone. A man does not fly a kite in that fashion till things with him have reached a bad pass. So it was with Mr. Parker all through May and to the end of June,--the load ever growing heavier and heavier as the time became nearer. Then, while he was still afflicted with a heaviness of spirits which had never left him since that fatal day, who but Ferdinand Lopez should walk into his office, wearing the gayest smile and with a hat splendid as hats are splendid only in the city. And nothing could be more "jolly" than his friend's manner,--so much so that Sexty was almost lifted up into temporary jollity himself. Lopez, seating himself, almost at once began to describe a certain speculation into which he was going rather deeply, and as to which he invited his friend Parker's co-operation. He was intending, evidently, not to ask, but to confer, a favour. "I rather think that steady business is best," said Parker. "I hope it's all right about that £750." "Ah; yes;--I meant to have told you. I didn't want the money, as it turned out, for much above a fortnight, and as there was no use in letting the bill run out, I settled it." So saying he took out a pocket-book, extracted the bill, and showed it to Sexty. Sexty's heart fluttered in his bosom. There was his name still on the bit of paper, and it might still be used. Having it shown to him after this fashion in its mid career, of course he had strong ground for hope. But he could not bring himself to put out his hand for it. "As to what you say about steady business, of course that's very well," said Lopez. "It depends upon whether a man wants to make a small income or a large fortune." He still held the bill as though he were going to fold it up again, and the importance of it was so present to Sexty's mind that he could hardly digest the argument about the steady business. "I own that I am not satisfied with the former," continued Lopez, "and that I go in for the fortune." As he spoke he tore the bill into three or four bits, apparently without thinking of it, and let the fragments fall upon the floor. It was as though a mountain had been taken off Sexty's bosom. He felt almost inclined to send out for a bottle of champagne on the moment, and the arguments of his friend rang in his ears with quite a different sound. The allurements of a steady income paled before his eyes, and he too began to tell himself, as he had often told himself before, that if he would only keep his eyes open and his heart high there was no reason why he too should not become a city millionaire. But on that occasion Lopez left him soon, without saying very much about his favourite speculation. In a few days, however, the same matter was brought before Sexty's eyes from another direction. He learned from a side wind that the house of Hunky and Sons was concerned largely in this business,--or at any rate he thought that he had so learned. The ease with which Lopez had destroyed that bill six weeks before it was due had had great effect upon him. Those arguments about a large fortune or a small income still clung to him. Lopez had come to him about the business in the first instance, but it was now necessary that he should go to Lopez. He was, however, very cautious. He managed to happen to meet Lopez in the street, and introduced the subject in his own slap-dash, aery manner,--the result of which was, that he had gone rather deep into two or three American mines before the end of July. But he had already made some money out of them, and, though he would find himself sometimes trembling before he had taken his daily allowance of port wine and brandy-and-water, still he was buoyant, and hopeful of living in a park, with a palace at the West End, and a seat in Parliament. Knowing also, as he did, that his friend Lopez was intimate with the Duchess of Omnium, he had much immediate satisfaction in the intimacy which these relations created. He was getting in the thin edge of the wedge, and would calculate as he went home to Ponder's End how long it must be before he could ask his friend to propose him at some West End club. On one halcyon summer evening Lopez had dined with him at Ponder's End, had smiled on Mrs. Parker, and played with the hopeful little Parkers. On that occasion Sexty had assured his wife that he regarded his friendship with Ferdinand Lopez as the most fortunate circumstance of his life. "Do be careful, Sexty," the poor woman had said. But Parker had simply told her that she understood nothing about business. On that evening Lopez had thoroughly imbued him with the conviction that if you will only set your mind that way, it is quite as easy to amass a large fortune as to earn a small income. About a week before the departure of the Whartons for Herefordshire, Lopez, in compliance with Mrs. Roby's counsels, called at the chambers in Stone Buildings. It is difficult to say that you will not see a man, when the man is standing just on the other side of an open door;--nor, in this case, was Mr. Wharton quite clear that he had better decline to see the man. But while he was doubting,--at any rate before he had resolved upon denying his presence,--the man was there, inside his room. Mr. Wharton got up from his chair, hesitated a moment, and then gave his hand to the intruder in that half-unwilling, unsatisfactory manner which most of us have experienced when shaking hands with some cold-blooded, ungenial acquaintance. "Well, Mr. Lopez,--what can I do for you?" he said, as he reseated himself. He looked as though he were at his ease and master of the situation. He had control over himself sufficient for assuming such a manner. But his heart was not high within his bosom. The more he looked at the man the less he liked him. "There is one thing, and one thing only, you can do for me," said Lopez. His voice was peculiarly sweet, and when he spoke his words seemed to mean more than when they came from other mouths. But Mr. Wharton did not like sweet voices and mellow, soft words,--at least not from men's mouths. "I do not think that I can do anything for you, Mr. Lopez," he said. There was a slight pause, during which the visitor put down his hat and seemed to hesitate. "I think your coming here can be of no avail. Did I not explain myself when I saw you before?" "But, I fear, I did not explain myself. I hardly told my story." "You can tell it, of course,--if you think the telling will do you any good." "I was not able to say then, as I can say now, that your daughter has accepted my love." "You ought not to have spoken to my daughter on the subject after what passed between us. I told you my mind frankly." "Ah, Mr. Wharton, how was obedience in such a matter possible? What would you yourself think of a man who in such a position would be obedient? I did not seek her secretly. I did nothing underhand. Before I had once directly asked her for her love, I came to you." "What's the use of that, if you go to her immediately afterwards in manifest opposition to my wishes? You found yourself bound, as would any gentleman, to ask a father's leave, and when it was refused, you went on just as though it had been granted! Don't you call that a mockery?" "I can say now, sir, what I could not say then. We love each other. And I am as sure of her as I am of myself when I assert that we shall be true to each other. You must know her well enough to be sure of that also." "I am sure of nothing but of this;--that I will not give her my consent to become your wife." "What is your objection, Mr. Wharton?" "I explained it before as far as I found myself called upon to explain it." "Are we both to be sacrificed for some reason that we neither of us understand?" "How dare you take upon yourself to say that she doesn't understand! Because I refuse to be more explicit to you, a stranger, do you suppose that I am equally silent to my own child?" "In regard to money and social rank I am able to place your daughter as my wife in a position as good as she now holds as Miss Wharton." "I care nothing about money, Mr. Lopez, and our ideas of social rank are perhaps different. I have nothing further to say to you, and I do not think that you can have anything further to say to me that can be of any avail." Then, having finished his speech, he got up from his chair and stood upright, thereby demanding of his visitor that he should depart. "I think it no more than honest, Mr. Wharton, to declare this one thing. I regard myself as irrevocably engaged to your daughter; and she, although she has refused to bind herself to me by that special word, is, I am certain, as firmly fixed in her choice as I am in mine. My happiness, as a matter of course, can be nothing to you." "Not much," said the lawyer, with angry impatience. Lopez smiled, but he put down the word in his memory and determined that he would treasure it there. "Not much, at any rate as yet," he said. "But her happiness must be much to you." "It is everything. But in thinking of her happiness I must look beyond what might be the satisfaction of the present day. You must excuse me, Mr. Lopez, if I say that I would rather not discuss the matter with you any further." Then he rang the bell and passed quickly into an inner room. When the clerk came Lopez of course marched out of the chambers and went his way. Mr. Wharton had been very firm, and yet he was shaken. It was by degrees becoming a fixed idea in his mind that the man's material prosperity was assured. He was afraid even to allude to the subject when talking to the man himself, lest he should be overwhelmed by evidence on that subject. Then the man's manner, though it was distasteful to Wharton himself, would, he well knew, recommend him to others. He was good-looking, he lived with people who were highly regarded, he could speak up for himself, and he was a favoured guest at Carlton House Terrace. So great had been the fame of the Duchess and her hospitality during the last two months, that the fact of the man's success in this respect had come home even to Mr. Wharton. He feared that the world would be against him, and he already began to dread the joint opposition of the world and his own child. The world of this day did not, he thought, care whether its daughters' husbands had or had not any fathers or mothers. The world as it was now didn't care whether its sons-in-law were Christian or Jewish;--whether they had the fair skin and bold eyes and uncertain words of an English gentleman, or the swarthy colour and false grimace and glib tongue of some inferior Latin race. But he cared for these things;--and it was dreadful to him to think that his daughter should not care for them. "I suppose I had better die and leave them to look after themselves," he said, as he returned to his arm-chair. Lopez himself was not altogether ill-satisfied with the interview, not having expected that Mr. Wharton would have given way at once, and bestowed upon him then and there the kind father-in-law's "bless you,--bless you!" Something yet had to be done before the blessing would come, or the girl,--or the money. He had to-day asserted his own material success, speaking of himself as of a moneyed man,--and the statement had been received with no contradiction,--even without the suggestion of a doubt. He did not therefore suppose that the difficulty was over; but he was clever enough to perceive that the aversion to him on another score might help to tide him over that difficulty. And if once he could call the girl his wife, he did not doubt but that he could build himself up with the old barrister's money. After leaving Lincoln's Inn he went at once to Berkeley Street, and was soon closeted with Mrs. Roby. "You can get her here before they go?" he said. "She wouldn't come;--and if we arranged it without letting her know that you were to be here, she would tell her father. She hasn't a particle of female intrigue in her." "So much the better," said the lover. "That's all very well for you to say, but when a man makes such a tyrant of himself as Mr. Wharton is doing, a girl is bound to look after herself. If it was me I'd go off with my young man before I'd stand such treatment." "You could give her a letter." "She'd only show it her father. She is so perverse that I sometimes feel inclined to say that I'll have nothing further to do with her." "You'll give her a message at any rate?" "Yes,--I can do that;--because I can do it in a way that won't seem to make it important." "But I want my message to be very important. Tell her that I've seen her father, and have offered to explain all my affairs to him,--so that he may know that there is nothing to fear on her behalf." "It isn't any thought of money that is troubling him." "But tell her what I say. He, however, would listen to nothing. Then I assured him that no consideration on earth would induce me to surrender her, and that I was as sure of her as I am of myself. Tell her that;--and tell her that I think she owes it to me to say one word to me before she goes into the country." CHAPTER XV Arthur Fletcher It may, I think, be a question whether the two old men acted wisely in having Arthur Fletcher at Wharton Hall when Emily arrived there. The story of his love for Miss Wharton, as far as it had as yet gone, must be shortly told. He had been the second son, as he was now the second brother, of a Herefordshire squire endowed with much larger property than that belonging to Sir Alured. John Fletcher, Esq., of Longbarns, some twelve miles from Wharton, was a considerable man in Herefordshire. This present squire had married Sir Alured's eldest daughter, and the younger brother had, almost since they were children together, been known to be in love with Emily Wharton. All the Fletchers and everything belonging to them were almost worshipped at Wharton Hall. There had been marriages between the two families certainly as far back as the time of Henry VII, and they were accustomed to speak, if not of alliances, at any rate of friendships, much anterior to that. As regards family, therefore, the pretensions of a Fletcher would always be held to be good by a Wharton. But this Fletcher was the very pearl of the Fletcher tribe. Though a younger brother, he had a very pleasant little fortune of his own. Though born to comfortable circumstances, he had worked so hard in his young days as to have already made for himself a name at the bar. He was a fair-haired, handsome fellow, with sharp, eager eyes, with an aquiline nose, and just that shape of mouth and chin which such men as Abel Wharton regarded as characteristic of good blood. He was rather thin, about five feet ten in height, and had the character of being one of the best horsemen in the county. He was one of the most popular men in Herefordshire, and at Longbarns was almost as much thought of as the squire himself. He certainly was not the man to be taken, from his appearance, for a forlorn lover. He looked like one of those happy sons of the gods who are born to success. No young man of his age was more courted both by men and women. There was no one who in his youth had suffered fewer troubles from those causes of trouble which visit English young men,--occasional impecuniosity, sternness of parents, native shyness, fear of ridicule, inability of speech, and a general pervading sense of inferiority combined with an ardent desire to rise to a feeling of conscious superiority. So much had been done for him by nature that he was never called upon to pretend to anything. Throughout the county those were the lucky men,--and those too were the happy girls,--who were allowed to call him Arthur. And yet this paragon was vainly in love with Emily Wharton, who, in the way of love, would have nothing to say to him, preferring,--as her father once said in his extremest wrath,--a greasy Jew adventurer out of the gutter! And now it had been thought expedient to have him down to Wharton, although the lawyers' regular summer vacation had not yet commenced. But there was some excuse made for this, over and above the emergency of his own love, in the fact that his brother John, with Mrs. Fletcher, was also to be at the Hall,--so that there was gathered there a great family party of the Whartons and Fletchers; for there was present there also old Mrs. Fletcher, a magnificently aristocratic and high-minded old lady, with snow-white hair, and lace worth fifty guineas a yard, who was as anxious as everybody else that her younger son should marry Emily Wharton. Something of the truth as to Emily Wharton's £60,000 was, of course, known to the Longbarns people. Not that I would have it inferred that they wanted their darling to sell himself for money. The Fletchers were great people, with great spirits, too good in every way for such baseness. But when love, old friendship, good birth, together with every other propriety as to age, manners, and conduct, can be joined to money, such a combination will always be thought pleasant. When Arthur reached the Hall it was felt to be necessary that a word should be said to him as to that wretched interloper, Ferdinand Lopez. Arthur had not of late been often in Manchester Square. Though always most cordially welcomed there by old Wharton, and treated with every kindness by Emily Wharton short of that love which he desired, he had during the last three or four months abstained from frequenting the house. During the past winter, and early in the spring, he had pressed his suit,--but had been rejected, with warmest assurances of all friendship short of love. It had then been arranged between him and the elder Whartons that they should all meet down at the Hall, and there had been sympathetic expressions of hope that all might yet be well. But at that time little or nothing had been known of Ferdinand Lopez. But now the old baronet spoke to him, the father having deputed the loathsome task to his friend,--being unwilling himself even to hint his daughter's disgrace. "Oh, yes, I've heard of him," said Arthur Fletcher. "I met him with Everett, and I don't think I ever took a stronger dislike to a man. Everett seems very fond of him." The baronet mournfully shook his head. It was sad to find that Whartons could go so far astray. "He goes to Carlton Terrace,--to the Duchess's," continued the young man. "I don't think that that is very much in his favour," said the baronet. "I don't know that it is, sir;--only they try to catch all fish in that net that are of any use." "Do you go there, Arthur?" "I should if I were asked, I suppose. I don't know who wouldn't. You see it's a Coalition affair, so that everybody is able to feel that he is supporting his party by going to the Duchess's." "I hate Coalitions," said the baronet. "I think they are disgraceful." "Well;--yes; I don't know. The coach has to be driven somehow. You mustn't stick in the mud, you know. And after all, sir, the Duke of Omnium is a respectable man, though he is a Liberal. A Duke of Omnium can't want to send the country to the dogs." The old man shook his head. He did not understand much about it, but he felt convinced that the Duke and his colleagues were sending the country to the dogs, whatever might be their wishes. "I shan't think of politics for the next ten years, and so I don't trouble myself about the Duchess's parties, but I suppose I should go if I were asked." Sir Alured felt that he had not as yet begun even to approach the difficult subject. "I'm glad you don't like that man," he said. "I don't like him at all. Tell me, Sir Alured;--why is he always going to Manchester Square?" "Ah;--that is it." "He has been there constantly;--has he not?" "No;--no. I don't think that. Mr. Wharton doesn't love him a bit better than you do. My cousin thinks him a most objectionable young man." "But Emily?" "Ah--. That's where it is." "You don't mean to say she--cares about that man!" "He has been encouraged by that aunt of hers, who, as far as I can make out, is a very unfit sort of person to be much with such a girl as our dear Emily. I never saw her but once, and then I didn't like her at all." "A vulgar, good-natured woman. But what can she have done? She can't have twisted Emily round her finger." "I don't suppose there is very much in it, but I thought it better to tell you. Girls take fancies into their heads,--just for a time." "He's a handsome fellow, too," said Arthur Fletcher, musing in his sorrow. "My cousin says he's a nasty Jew-looking man." "He's not that, Sir Alured. He's a handsome man, with a fine voice;--dark, and not just like an Englishman; but still I can fancy--. That's bad news for me, Sir Alured." "I think she'll forget all about him down here." "She never forgets anything. I shall ask her, straight away. She knows my feeling about her, and I haven't a doubt but she'll tell me. She's too honest to be able to lie. Has he got any money?" "My cousin seems to think that he's rich." "I suppose he is. Oh, Lord! That's a blow. I wish I could have the pleasure of shooting him as a man might a few years ago. But what would be the good? The girl would only hate me the more after it. The best thing to do would be to shoot myself." "Don't talk like that, Arthur." "I shan't throw up the sponge as long as there's a chance left, Sir Alured. But it will go badly with me if I'm beat at last. I shouldn't have thought it possible that I should have felt anything so much." Then he pulled his hair, and thrust his hand into his waistcoat; and turned away, so that his old friend might not see the tear in his eye. His old friend also was much moved. It was dreadful to him that the happiness of a Fletcher, and the comfort of the Whartons generally, should be marred by a man with such a name as Ferdinand Lopez. "She'll never marry him without her father's consent," said Sir Alured. "If she means it, of course he'll consent." "That I'm sure he won't. He doesn't like the man a bit better than you do." Fletcher shook his head. "And he's as fond of you as though you were already his son." "What does it matter? If a girl sets her heart on marrying a man, of course she will marry him. If he had no money it might be different. But if he's well off, of course he'll succeed. Well--; I suppose other men have borne the same sort of thing before and it hasn't killed them." "Let us hope, my boy. I think of her quite as much as of you." "Yes,--we can hope. I shan't give it up. As for her, I dare say she knows what will suit her best. I've nothing to say against the man,--excepting that I should like to cut him into four quarters." "But a foreigner!" "Girls don't think about that,--not as you do and Mr. Wharton. And I think they like dark, greasy men with slippery voices, who are up to dodges and full of secrets. Well, sir, I shall go to her at once and have it out." "You'll speak to my cousin?" "Certainly I will. He has always been one of the best friends I ever had in my life. I know it hasn't been his fault. But what can a man do? Girls won't marry this man or that because they're told." Fletcher did speak to Emily's father, and learned more from him than had been told him by Sir Alured. Indeed he learned the whole truth. Lopez had been twice with the father pressing his suit and had been twice repulsed, with as absolute denial as words could convey. Emily, however, had declared her own feeling openly, expressing her wish to marry the odious man, promising not to do so without her father's consent, but evidently feeling that that consent ought not to be withheld from her. All this Mr. Wharton told very plainly, walking with Arthur a little before dinner along a shaded, lonely path, which for half a mile ran along the very marge of the Wye at the bottom of the park. And then he went on to speak other words which seemed to rob his young friend of all hope. The old man was walking slowly, with his hands clasped behind his back and with his eyes fixed on the path as he went;--and he spoke slowly, evidently weighing his words as he uttered them, bringing home to his hearer a conviction that the matter discussed was one of supreme importance to the speaker,--as to which he had thought much, so as to be able to express his settled resolutions. "I've told you all now, Arthur;--only this. I do not know how long I may be able to resist this man's claim if it be backed by Emily's entreaties. I am thinking very much about it. I do not know that I have really been able to think of anything else for the last two months. It is all the world to me,--what she and Everett do with themselves; and what she may do in this matter of marriage is of infinitely greater importance than anything that can befall him. If he makes a mistake, it may be put right. But with a woman's marrying--, vestigia nulla retrorsum. She has put off all her old bonds and taken new ones, which must be her bonds for life. Feeling this very strongly, and disliking this man greatly,--disliking him, that is to say, in the view of this close relation,--I have felt myself to be justified in so far opposing my child by the use of a high hand. I have refused my sanction to the marriage both to him and to her,--though in truth I have been hard set to find any adequate reason for doing so. I have no right to fashion my girl's life by my prejudices. My life has been lived. Hers is to come. In this matter I should be cruel and unnatural were I to allow myself to be governed by any selfish inclination. Though I were to know that she would be lost to me for ever, I must give way,--if once brought to a conviction that by not giving way I should sacrifice her young happiness. In this matter, Arthur, I must not even think of you, though I love you well. I must consider only my child's welfare;--and in doing so I must try to sift my own feelings and my own judgment, and ascertain, if it be possible, whether my distaste to the man is reasonable or irrational;--whether I should serve her or sacrifice her by obstinacy of refusal. I can speak to you more plainly than to her. Indeed I have laid bare to you my whole heart and my whole mind. You have all my wishes, but you will understand that I do not promise you my continued assistance." When he had so spoken he put out his hand and pressed his companion's arm. Then he turned slowly into a little by-path which led across the park up to the house, and left Arthur Fletcher standing alone by the river's bank. And so by degrees the blow had come full home to him. He had been twice refused. Then rumours had reached him,--not at first that he had a rival, but that there was a man who might possibly become so. And now this rivalry, and its success, were declared to him plainly. He told himself from this moment that he had not a chance. Looking forward he could see it all. He understood the girl's character sufficiently to be sure that she would not be wafted about, from one lover to another, by change of scene. Taking her to Dresden,--or to New Zealand,--would only confirm in her passion such a girl as Emily Wharton. Nothing could shake her but the ascertained unworthiness of the man,--and not that unless it were ascertained beneath her own eyes. And then years must pass by before she would yield to another lover. There was a further question, too, which he did not fail to ask himself. Was the man necessarily unworthy because his name was Lopez, and because he had not come of English blood? As he strove to think of this, if not coolly yet rationally, he sat himself down on the river's side and began to pitch stones off the path in among the rocks, among which at that spot the water made its way rapidly. There had been moments in which he had been almost ashamed of his love,--and now he did not know whether to be most ashamed or most proud of it. But he recognised the fact that it was crucifying him, and that it would continue to crucify him. He knew himself in London to be a popular man,--one of those for whom, according to general opinion, girls should sigh, rather than one who should break his heart sighing for a girl. He had often told himself that it was beneath his manliness to be despondent; that he should let such a trouble run from him like water from a duck's back, consoling himself with the reflection that if the girl had such bad taste she could hardly be worthy of him. He had almost tried to belong to that school which throws the heart away and rules by the head alone. He knew that others,--perhaps not those who knew him best, but who nevertheless were the companions of many of his hours,--gave him the credit for such power. Why should a man afflict himself by the inward burden of an unsatisfied craving, and allow his heart to sink into his very feet because a girl would not smile when he wooed her? "If she be not fair for me, what care I how fair she be!" He had repeated the lines to himself a score of times, and had been ashamed of himself because he could not make them come true to himself. They had not come true in the least. There he was, Arthur Fletcher, whom all the world courted, with his heart in his very boots! There was a miserable load within him, absolutely palpable to his outward feeling,--a very physical pain,--which he could not shake off. As he threw the stones into the water he told himself that it must be so with him always. Though the world did pet him, though he was liked at his club, and courted in the hunting-field, and loved at balls and archery meetings, and reputed by old men to be a rising star, he told himself that he was so maimed and mutilated as to be only half a man. He could not reason about it. Nature had afflicted him with a certain weakness. One man has a hump;--another can hardly see out of his imperfect eyes;--a third can barely utter a few disjointed words. It was his fate to be constructed with some weak arrangement of the blood-vessels which left him in this plight. "The whole damned thing is nothing to me," he said bursting out into absolute tears, after vainly trying to reassure himself by a recollection of the good things which the world still had in store for him. Then he strove to console himself by thinking that he might take a pride in his love even though it were so intolerable a burden to him. Was it not something to be able to love as he loved? Was it not something at any rate that she to whom he had condescended to stoop was worthy of all love? But even here he could get no comfort,--being in truth unable to see very clearly into the condition of the thing. It was a disgrace to him,--to him within his own bosom,--that she should have preferred to him such a one as Ferdinand Lopez, and this disgrace he exaggerated, ignoring the fact that the girl herself might be deficient in judgment, or led away in her love by falsehood and counterfeit attractions. To him she was such a goddess that she must be right,--and therefore his own inferiority to such a one as Ferdinand Lopez was proved. He could take no pride in his rejected love. He would rid himself of it at a moment's notice if he knew the way. He would throw himself at the feet of some second-rate, tawdry, well-born, well-known beauty of the day,--only that there was not now left to him strength to pretend the feeling that would be necessary. Then he heard steps, and jumping up from his seat, stood just in the way of Emily Wharton and her cousin Mary. "Ain't you going to dress for dinner, young man?" said the latter. "I shall have time if you have, any way," said Arthur, endeavouring to pluck up his spirits. "That's nice of him;--isn't it?" said Mary. "Why, we are dressed. What more do you want? We came out to look for you, though we didn't mean to come as far as this. It's past seven now, and we are supposed to dine at a quarter past." "Five minutes will do for me." "But you've got to get to the house. You needn't be in a tremendous hurry, because papa has only just come in from haymaking. They've got up the last load, and there has been the usual ceremony. Emily and I have been looking at them." "I wish I'd been here all the time," said Emily. "I do so hate London in July." "So do I," said Arthur,--"in July and all other times." "You hate London!" said Mary. "Yes,--and Herefordshire,--and other places generally. If I've got to dress I'd better get across the park as quick as I can go," and so he left them. Mary turned round and looked at her cousin, but at the moment said nothing. Arthur's passion was well known to Mary Wharton, but Mary had as yet heard nothing of Ferdinand Lopez. CHAPTER XVI Never Run Away! During the whole of that evening there was a forced attempt on the part of all the party at Wharton Hall to be merry,--which, however, as is the case whenever such attempts are forced, was a failure. There had been a hay-making harvest-home which was supposed to give the special occasion for mirth, as Sir Alured farmed the land around the park himself, and was great in hay. "I don't think it pays very well," he said with a gentle smile, "but I like to employ some of the people myself. I think the old people find it easier with me than with the tenants." "I shouldn't wonder," said his cousin;--"but that's charity; not employment." "No, no," exclaimed the baronet. "They work for their wages and do their best. Powell sees to that." Powell was the bailiff, who knew the length of his master's foot to a quarter of an inch, and was quite aware that the Wharton haymakers were not to be overtasked. "Powell doesn't keep any cats about the place, but what catch mice. But I am not quite sure that haymaking does pay." "How do the tenants manage?" "Of course they look to things closer. You wouldn't wish me to let the land up to the house door." "I think," said old Mrs. Fletcher, "that a landlord should consent to lose a little by his own farming. It does good in the long run." Both Mr. Wharton and Sir Alured felt that this might be very well at Longbarns, though it could hardly be afforded at Wharton. "I don't think I lose much by my farming," said the squire of Longbarns. "I have about four hundred acres on hand, and I keep my accounts pretty regularly." "Johnson is a very good man, I dare say," said the baronet. "Like most of the others," continued the squire, "he's very well as long as he's looked after. I think I know as much about it as Johnson. Of course, I don't expect a farmer's profit; but I do expect my rent, and I get it." "I don't think I manage it quite that way," said the baronet in a melancholy tone. "I'm afraid not," said the barrister. "John is as hard upon the men as any one of the tenants," said John's wife, Mrs. Fletcher of Longbarns. "I'm not hard at all," said John, "and you understand nothing about it. I'm paying three shillings a week more to every man, and eighteen pence a week more to every woman, than I did three years ago." "That's because of the Unions," said the barrister. "I don't care a straw for the Unions. If the Unions interfered with my comfort I'd let the land and leave the place." "Oh, John!" ejaculated John's mother. "I would not consent to be made a slave even for the sake of the country. But the wages had to be raised,--and having raised them I expect to get proper value for my money. If anything has to be given away, let it be given away,--so that the people should know what it is that they receive." "That's just what we don't want to do here," said Lady Wharton, who did not often join in any of these arguments. "You're wrong, my lady," said her stepson. "You're only breeding idleness when you teach people to think that they are earning wages without working for their money. Whatever you do with 'em let 'em know and feel the truth. It'll be the best in the long run." "I'm sometimes happy when I think that I shan't live to see the long run," said the baronet. This was the manner in which they tried to be merry that evening after dinner at Wharton Hall. The two girls sat listening to their seniors in contented silence,--listening or perhaps thinking of their own peculiar troubles, while Arthur Fletcher held some book in his hand which he strove to read with all his might. There was not one there in the room who did not know that it was the wish of the united families that Arthur Fletcher should marry Emily Wharton, and also that Emily had refused him. To Arthur of course the feeling that it was so could not but be an additional vexation; but the knowledge had grown up and had become common in the two families without any power on his part to prevent so disagreeable a condition of affairs. There was not one in that room, unless it was Mary Wharton, who was not more or less angry with Emily, thinking her to be perverse and unreasonable. Even to Mary her cousin's strange obstinacy was matter of surprise and sorrow,--for to her Arthur Fletcher was one of those demigods, who should never be refused, who are not expected to do more than express a wish and be accepted. Her own heart had not strayed that way because she thought but little of herself, knowing herself to be portionless, and believing from long thought on the subject that it was not her destiny to be the wife of any man. She regarded Arthur Fletcher as being of all men the most lovable,--though, knowing her own condition, she did not dream of loving him. It did not become her to be angry with another girl on such a cause;--but she was amazed that Arthur Fletcher should sigh in vain. The girl's folly and perverseness on this head were known to them all,--but as yet her greater folly and worse perverseness, her vitiated taste and dreadful partiality for the Portuguese adventurer, were known but to the two old men and to poor Arthur himself. When that sternly magnificent old lady, Mrs. Fletcher,--whose ancestors had been Welsh kings in the time of the Romans,--when she should hear this story, the roof of the old hall would hardly be able to hold her wrath and her dismay! The old kings had died away, but the Fletchers, and the Vaughans,--of whom she had been one,--and the Whartons remained, a peculiar people in an age that was then surrendering itself to quick perdition, and with peculiar duties. Among these duties, the chiefest of them incumbent on females was that of so restraining their affections that they should never damage the good cause by leaving it. They might marry within the pale,--or remain single, as might be their lot. She would not take upon herself to say that Emily Wharton was bound to accept Arthur Fletcher, merely because such a marriage was fitting,--although she did think that there was much perverseness in the girl, who might have taught herself, had she not been stubborn, to comply with the wishes of the families. But to love one below herself, a man without a father, a foreigner, a black Portuguese nameless Jew, merely because he had a bright eye, and a hook nose, and a glib tongue,--that a girl from the Whartons should do this--! It was so unnatural to Mrs. Fletcher that it would be hardly possible to her to be civil to the girl after she had heard that her mind and taste were so astray. All this Sir Alured knew and the barrister knew it,--and they feared her indignation the more because they sympathised with the old lady's feelings. "Emily Wharton doesn't seem to me to be a bit more gracious than she used to be," Mrs. Fletcher said to Lady Wharton that night. The two old ladies were sitting together upstairs, and Mrs. John Fletcher was with them. In such conferences Mrs. Fletcher always domineered,--to the perfect contentment of old Lady Wharton, but not equally so to that of her daughter-in-law. "I'm afraid she is not very happy," said Lady Wharton. "She has everything that ought to make a girl happy, and I don't know what it is she wants. It makes me quite angry to see her so discontented. She doesn't say a word, but sits there as glum as death. If I were Arthur I would leave her for six months, and never speak to her during the time." "I suppose, mother," said the younger Mrs. Fletcher,--who called her husband's mother, mother, and her own mother, mamma,--"a girl needn't marry a man unless she likes him." "But she should try to like him if it is suitable in other respects. I don't mean to take any trouble about it. Arthur needn't beg for any favour. Only I wouldn't have come here if I had thought that she had intended to sit silent like that always." "It makes her unhappy, I suppose," said Lady Wharton, "because she can't do what we all want." "Fall, lall! She'd have wanted it herself if nobody else had wished it. I'm surprised that Arthur should be so much taken with her." "You'd better say nothing more about it, mother." "I don't mean to say anything more about it. It's nothing to me. Arthur can do very well in the world without Emily Wharton. Only a girl like that will sometimes make a disgraceful match; and we should all feel that." "I don't think Emily will do anything disgraceful," said Lady Wharton. And so they parted. In the meantime the two brothers were smoking their pipes in the housekeeper's room, which, at Wharton, when the Fletchers or Everett were there, was freely used for that purpose. "Isn't it rather quaint of you," said the elder brother, "coming down here in the middle of term time?" "It doesn't matter much." "I should have thought it would matter;--that is, if you mean to go on with it." "I'm not going to make a slave of myself about it, if you mean that. I don't suppose I shall ever marry,--and as for rising to be a swell in the profession, I don't care about it." "You used to care about it,--very much. You used to say that if you didn't get to the top it shouldn't be your own fault." "And I have worked;--and I do work. But things get changed somehow. I've half a mind to give it all up,--to raise a lot of money, and to start off with a resolution to see every corner of the world. I suppose a man could do it in about thirty years if he lived so long. It's the kind of thing would suit me." "Exactly. I don't know any fellow who has been more into society, and therefore you are exactly the man to live alone for the rest of your life. You've always worked hard, I will say that for you;--and therefore you're just the man to be contented with idleness. You've always been ambitious and self-confident, and therefore it will suit you to a T, to be nobody and to do nothing." Arthur sat silent, smoking his pipe with all his might, and his brother continued,--"Besides,--you read sometimes, I fancy." "I should read all the more." "Very likely. But what you have read, in the old plays, for instance, must have taught you that when a man is cut up about a woman,--which I suppose is your case just at present,--he never does get over it. He never gets all right after a time,--does he? Such a one had better go and turn monk at once, as the world is over for him altogether;--isn't it? Men don't recover after a month or two, and go on just the same. You've never seen that kind of thing yourself?" "I'm not going to cut my throat or turn monk either." "No. There are so many steamboats and railways now that travelling seems easier. Suppose you go as far as St. Petersburg, and see if that does you any good. If it don't, you needn't go on, because it will be hopeless. If it does,--why, you can come back, because the second journey will do the rest." "There never was anything, John, that wasn't matter for chaff with you." "And I hope there never will be. People understand it when logic would be thrown away. I suppose the truth is the girl cares for somebody else." Arthur nodded his head. "Who is it? Any one I know?" "I think not." "Any one you know?" "I have met the man." "Decent?" "Disgustingly indecent, I should say." John looked very black, for even with him the feeling about the Whartons and the Vaughans and the Fletchers was very strong. "He's a man I should say you wouldn't let into Longbarns." "There might be various reasons for that. It might be that you wouldn't care to meet him." "Well;--no,--I don't suppose I should. But without that you wouldn't like him. I don't think he's an Englishman." "A foreigner!" "He has got a foreign name." "An Italian nobleman?" "I don't think he's noble in any country." "Who the d---- is he?" "His name is--Lopez." "Everett's friend?" "Yes;--Everett's friend. I ain't very much obliged to Master Everett for what he has done." "I've seen the man. Indeed, I may say I know him,--for I dined with him once in Manchester Square. Old Wharton himself must have asked him there." "He was there as Everett's friend. I only heard all this to-day, you know;--though I had heard about it before." "And therefore you want to set out on your travels. As far as I saw I should say he is a clever fellow." "I don't doubt that." "And a gentleman." "I don't know that he is not," said Arthur. "I've no right to say a word against him. From what Wharton says I suppose he's rich." "He's good looking too;--at least he's the sort of man that women like to look at." "Just so. I've no cause of quarrel with him,--nor with her. But--." "Yes, my friend, I see it all," said the elder brother. "I think I know all about it. But running away is not the thing. One may be pretty nearly sure that one is right when one says that a man shouldn't run away from anything." "The thing is to be happy if you can," said Arthur. "No;--that is not the thing. I'm not much of a philosopher, but as far as I can see there are two philosophies in the world. The one is to make one's self happy, and the other is to make other people happy. The latter answers the best." "I can't add to her happiness by hanging about London." "That's a quibble. It isn't her happiness we are talking about,--nor yet your hanging about London. Gird yourself up and go on with what you've got to do. Put your work before your feelings. What does a poor man do, who goes out hedging and ditching with a dead child lying in his house? If you get a blow in the face, return it if it ought to be returned, but never complain of the pain. If you must have your vitals eaten into,--have them eaten into like a man. But, mind you,--these ain't your vitals." "It goes pretty near." "These ain't your vitals. A man gets cured of it,--almost always. I believe always; though some men get hit so hard they can never bring themselves to try it again. But tell me this. Has old Wharton given his consent?" "No. He has refused," said Arthur with strong emphasis. "How is it to be, then?" "He has dealt very fairly by me. He has done all he could to get rid of the man,--both with him and with her. He has told Emily that he will have nothing to do with the man. And she will do nothing without his sanction." "Then it will remain just as it is." "No, John; it will not. He has gone on to say that though he has refused,--and has refused roughly enough,--he must give way if he sees that she has really set her heart upon him. And she has." "Has she told you so?" "No;--but he has told me. I shall have it out with her to-morrow, if I can. And then I shall be off." "You'll be here for shooting on the 1st?" "No. I dare say you're right in what you say about sticking to my work. It does seem unmanly to run away because of a girl." "Because of anything! Stop and face it, whatever it is." "Just so;--but I can't stop and face her. It would do no good. For all our sakes I should be better away. I can get shooting with Musgrave and Carnegie in Perthshire. I dare say I shall go there, and take a share with them." "That's better than going into all the quarters of the globe." "I didn't mean that I was to surrender and start at once. You take a fellow up so short. I shall do very well, I've no doubt, and shall be hunting here as jolly as ever at Christmas. But a fellow must say it all to somebody." The elder brother put his hand out and laid it affectionately upon the younger one's arm. "I'm not going to whimper about the world like a whipped dog. The worst of it is so many people have known of this." "You mean down here." "Oh;--everywhere. I have never told them. It has been a kind of family affair and thought to be fit for general discussions." "That'll wear away." "In the meantime it's a bore. But that shall be the end of it. Don't you say another word to me about it, and I won't to you. And tell mother not to, or Sarah." Sarah was John Fletcher's wife. "It has got to be dropped, and let us drop it as quickly as we can. If she does marry this man I don't suppose she'll be much at Longbarns or Wharton." "Not at Longbarns certainly, I should say," replied John. "Fancy mother having to curtsey to her as Mrs. Lopez! And I doubt whether Sir Alured would like him. He isn't of our sort. He's too clever, too cosmopolitan,--a sort of man white-washed of all prejudices, who wouldn't mind whether he ate horseflesh or beef if horseflesh were as good as beef, and never had an association in his life. I'm not sure that he's not on the safest side. Good night, old fellow. Pluck up, and send us plenty of grouse if you do go to Scotland." John Fletcher, as I hope may have been already seen, was by no means a weak man or an indifferent brother. He was warm-hearted, sharp-witted, and, though perhaps a little self-opinionated, considered throughout the county to be one of the most prudent in it. Indeed no one ever ventured to doubt his wisdom on all practical matters,--save his mother, who seeing him almost every day, had a stronger bias towards her younger son. "Arthur has been hit hard about that girl," he said to his wife that night. "Emily Wharton?" "Yes;--your cousin Emily. Don't say anything to him, but be as good to him as you know how." "Good to Arthur! Am I not always good to him?" "Be a little more than usually tender with him. It makes one almost cry to see such a fellow hurt like that. I can understand it, though I never had anything of it myself." "You never had, John," said the wife leaning close upon the husband's breast as she spoke. "It all came very easily to you;--too easily perhaps." "If any girl had ever refused me, I should have taken her at her word, I can tell you. There would have been no second 'hop' to that ball." "Then I suppose I was right to catch it the first time?" "I don't say how that may be." "I was right. Oh, dear me!--Suppose I had doubted, just for once, and you had gone off. You would have tried once more;--wouldn't you?" "You'd have gone about like a broken-winged old hen, and have softened me that way." "And now poor Arthur has had his wing broken." "You mustn't let on to know that it's broken, and the wing will be healed in due time. But what fools girls are!" "Indeed they are, John;--particularly me." "Fancy a girl like Emily Wharton," said he, not condescending to notice her little joke, "throwing over a fellow like Arthur for a greasy, black foreigner." "A foreigner!" "Yes;--a man named Lopez. Don't say anything about it at present. Won't she live to find out the difference, and to know what she has done! I can tell her of one that won't pity her." CHAPTER XVII Good-Bye Arthur Fletcher received his brother's teaching as true, and took his brother's advice in good part;--so that, before the morning following, he had resolved that however deep the wound might be, he would so live before the world, that the world should not see his wound. What people already knew they must know,--but they should learn nothing further either by words or signs from him. He would, as he had said to his brother, "have it out with Emily"; and then, if she told him plainly that she loved the man, he would bid her adieu, simply expressing regret that their course for life should be divided. He was confident that she would tell him the entire truth. She would be restrained neither by false modesty, nor by any assumed unwillingness to discuss her own affairs with a friend so true to her as he had been. He knew her well enough to be sure that she recognised the value of his love though she could not bring herself to accept it. There are rejected lovers who, merely because they are lovers, become subject to the scorn and even to the disgust of the girls they love. But again there are men who, even when they are rejected, are almost loved, who are considered to be worthy of all reverence, almost of worship;--and yet the worshippers will not love them. Not analysing all this, but somewhat conscious of the light in which this girl regarded him, he knew that what he might say would be treated with deference. As to shaking her,--as to talking her out of one purpose and into another,--that to him did not for a moment seem to be practicable. There was no hope of that. He hardly knew why he should endeavour to say a word to her before he left Wharton. And yet he felt that it must be said. Were he to allow her to be married to this man, without any further previous word between them, it would appear that he had resolved to quarrel with her for ever. But now, at this very moment of time, as he lay in his bed, as he dressed himself in the morning, as he sauntered about among the new hay-stacks with his pipe in his mouth after breakfast, he came to some conclusion in his mind very much averse to such quarrelling. He had loved her with all his heart. It had not been a mere drawing-room love begotten between a couple of waltzes, and fostered by five minutes in a crush. He knew himself to be a man of the world, and he did not wish to be other than he was. He could talk among men as men talked, and act as men acted;--and he could do the same with women. But there was one person who had been to him above all, and round everything, and under everything. There had been a private nook within him into which there had been no entrance but for the one image. There had been a holy of holies, which he had guarded within himself, keeping it free from all outer contamination for his own use. He had cherished the idea of a clear fountain of ever-running water which would at last be his, always ready for the comfort of his own lips. Now all his hope was shattered, his trust was gone, and his longing disappointed. But the person was the same person, though she could not be his. The nook was there, though she would not fill it. The holy of holies was not less holy, though he himself might not dare to lift the curtain. The fountain would still run,--still the clearest fountain of all,--though he might not put his lips to it. He would never allow himself to think of it with lessened reverence, or with changed ideas as to her nature. And then, as he stood leaning against a ladder which still kept its place against one of the hay-ricks, and filled his second pipe unconsciously, he had to realise to himself the probable condition of his future life. Of course she would marry this man with very little further delay. Her father had already declared himself to be too weak to interfere much longer with her wishes. Of course Mr. Wharton would give way. He had himself declared that he would give way. And then,--what sort of life would be her life? No one knew anything about the man. There was an idea that he was rich,--but wealth such as his, wealth that is subject to speculation, will fly away at a moment's notice. He might be cruel, a mere adventurer, or a thorough ruffian for all that was known of him. There should, thought Arthur Fletcher to himself, be more stability in the giving and taking of wives than could be reckoned upon here. He became old in that half-hour, taking home to himself and appreciating many saws of wisdom and finger-directions of experience which hitherto had been to him matters almost of ridicule. But he could only come to this conclusion,--that as she was still to be to him his holy of holies though he might not lay his hand upon the altar, his fountain though he might not drink of it, the one image which alone could have filled that nook, he would not cease to regard her happiness when she should have become the wife of this stranger. With the stranger himself he never could be on friendly terms;--but for the stranger's wife there should always be a friend, if the friend were needed. About an hour before lunch, John Fletcher, who had been hanging about the house all the morning in a manner very unusual to him, caught Emily Wharton as she was passing through the hall, and told her that Arthur was in a certain part of the grounds and wished to speak to her. "Alone?" she asked. "Yes, certainly alone." "Ought I to go to him, John?" she asked again. "Certainly I think you ought." Then he had done his commission and was able to apply himself to whatever business he had on hand. Emily at once put on her hat, took her parasol, and left the house. There was something distasteful to her in the idea of this going out at a lover's bidding, to meet him; but like all Whartons and all Fletchers, she trusted John Fletcher. And then she was aware that there were circumstances which might make such a meeting as this serviceable. She knew nothing of what had taken place during the last four-and-twenty hours. She had no idea that in consequence of words spoken to him by her father and his brother, Arthur Fletcher was about to abandon his suit. There would have been no doubt about her going to meet him had she thought this. She supposed that she would have to hear again the old story. If so, she would hear it, and would then have an opportunity of telling him that her heart had been given entirely to another. She knew all that she owed to him. After a fashion she did love him. He was entitled to all kindest consideration from her hands. But he should be told the truth. As she entered the shrubbery he came out to meet her, giving her his hand with a frank, easy air and a pleasant smile. His smile was as bright as the ripple of the sea, and his eye would then gleam, and the slightest sparkle of his white teeth would be seen between his lips, and the dimple of his chin would show itself deeper than at other times. "It is very good of you. I thought you'd come. John asked you, I suppose." "Yes;--he told me you were here, and he said I ought to come." "I don't know about ought, but I think it better. Will you mind walking on, as I've got something that I want to say?" Then he turned and she turned with him into the little wood. "I'm not going to bother you any more, my darling," he said. "You are still my darling, though I will not call you so after this." Her heart sank almost in her bosom as she heard this,--though it was exactly what she would have wished to hear. But now there must be some close understanding between them and some tenderness. She knew how much she had owed him, how good he had been to her, how true had been his love; and she felt that words would fail her to say that which ought to be said. "So you have given yourself to--one Ferdinand Lopez!" "Yes," she said, in a hard, dry voice. "Yes; I have. I do not know who told you; but I have." "Your father told me. It was better,--was it not?--that I should know. You are not sorry that I should know?" "It is better." "I am not going to say a word against him." "No;--do not do that." "Nor against you. I am simply here now to let you know that--I retire." "You will not quarrel with me, Arthur?" "Quarrel with you! I could not quarrel with you, if I would. No;--there shall be no quarrel. But I do not suppose we shall see each other very often." "I hope we may." "Sometimes, perhaps. A man should not, I think, affect to be friends with a successful rival. I dare say he is an excellent fellow, but how is it possible that he and I should get on together? But you will always have one,--one besides him,--who will love you best in this world." "No;--no;--no." "It must be so. There will be nothing wrong in that. Every one has some dearest friend, and you will always be mine. If anything of evil should ever happen to you,--which of course there won't,--there would be some one who would--. But I don't want to talk buncum; I only want you to believe me. Good-bye, and God bless you." Then he put out his right hand, holding his hat under his left arm. "You are not going away?" "To-morrow, perhaps. But I will say my real good-bye to you here, now, to-day. I hope you may be happy. I hope it with all my heart. Good-bye. God bless you!" "Oh, Arthur!" Then she put her hand in his. "Oh, I have loved you so dearly. It has been with my whole heart. You have never quite understood me, but it has been as true as heaven. I have thought sometimes that had I been a little less earnest about it, I should have been a little less stupid. A man shouldn't let it get the better of him, as I have done. Say good-bye to me, Emily." "Good-bye," she said, still leaving her hand in his. "I suppose that's about all. Don't let them quarrel with you here if you can help it. Of course at Longbarns they won't like it for a time. Oh,--if it could have been different!" Then he dropped her hand, and turning his back quickly upon her, went away along the path. She had expected and had almost wished that he should kiss her. A girl's cheek is never so holy to herself as it is to her lover,--if he do love her. There would have been something of reconciliation, something of a promise of future kindness in a kiss, which even Ferdinand would not have grudged. It would, for her, have robbed the parting of that bitterness of pain which his words had given to it. As to all that, he had made no calculation; but the bitterness was there for him, and he could have done nothing that would have expelled it. She wept bitterly as she returned to the house. There might have been cause for joy. It was clear enough that her father, though he had shown no sign to her of yielding, was nevertheless prepared to yield. It was her father who had caused Arthur Fletcher to take himself off, as a lover really dismissed. But, at this moment, she could not bring herself to look at that aspect of the affair. Her mind would revert to all those choicest moments in her early years in which she had been happy with Arthur Fletcher; in which she had first learned to love him, and had then taught herself to understand by some confused and perplexed lesson that she did not love him as men and women love. But why should she not so have loved him? Would she not have done so could she then have understood how true and firm he was? And then, independently of herself, throwing herself aside for the time as she was bound to do when thinking of one so good to her as Arthur Fletcher, she found that no personal joy could drown the grief which she shared with him. For a moment the idea of a comparison between the two men forced itself upon her,--but she drove it from her as she hurried back to the house. CHAPTER XVIII The Duke of Omnium Thinks of Himself The blaze made by the Duchess of Omnium during the three months of the season up in London had been very great, but it was little in comparison with the social coruscation expected to be achieved at Gatherum Castle,--little at least as far as public report went, and the general opinion of the day. No doubt the house in Carlton Gardens had been thrown open as the house of no Prime Minister, perhaps of no duke, had been opened before in this country; but it had been done by degrees, and had not been accompanied by such a blowing of trumpets as was sounded with reference to the entertainments at Gatherum. I would not have it supposed that the trumpets were blown by the direct order of the Duchess. The trumpets were blown by the customary trumpeters as it became known that great things were to be done,--all newspapers and very many tongues lending their assistance, till the sounds of the instruments almost frightened the Duchess herself. "Isn't it odd," she said to her friend, Mrs. Finn, "that one can't have a few friends down in the country without such a fuss about it as the people are making?" Mrs. Finn did not think that it was odd, and so she said. Thousands of pounds were being spent in a very conspicuous way. Invitations to the place even for a couple of days,--for twenty-four hours,--had been begged for abjectly. It was understood everywhere that the Prime Minister was bidding for greatness and popularity. Of course the trumpets were blown very loudly. "If people don't take care," said the Duchess, "I'll put everybody off and have the whole place shut up. I'd do it for sixpence, now." Perhaps of all the persons, much or little concerned, the one who heard the least of the trumpets,--or rather who was the last to hear them,--was the Duke himself. He could not fail to see something in the newspapers, but what he did see did not attract him so frequently or so strongly as it did others. It was a pity, he thought, that a man's social and private life should be made subject to so many remarks, but this misfortune was one of those to which wealth and rank are liable. He had long recognised that fact, and for a time endeavoured to believe that his intended sojourn at Gatherum Castle was not more public than are the autumn doings of other dukes and other prime ministers. But gradually the trumpets did reach even his ears. Blind as he was to many things himself, he always had near to him that other duke who was never blind to anything. "You are going to do great things at Gatherum this year," said the Duke. "Nothing particular, I hope," said the Prime Minister, with an inward trepidation,--for gradually there had crept upon him a fear that his wife was making a mistake. "I thought it was going to be very particular." "It's Glencora's doing." "I don't doubt but that her Grace is right. Don't suppose that I am criticizing your hospitality. We are to be at Gatherum ourselves about the end of the month. It will be the first time I shall have seen the place since your uncle's time." The Prime Minister at this moment was sitting in his own particular room at the Treasury Chambers, and before the entrance of his friend had been conscientiously endeavouring to define for himself, not a future policy, but the past policy of the last month or two. It had not been for him a very happy occupation. He had become the Head of the Government,--and had not failed, for there he was, still the Head of the Government, with a majority at his back, and the six months' vacation before him. They who were entitled to speak to him confidentially as to his position, were almost vehement in declaring his success. Mr. Rattler, about a week ago, had not seen any reason why the Ministry should not endure at least for the next four years. Mr. Roby, from the other side, was equally confident. But, on looking back at what he had done, and indeed on looking forward into his future intentions, he could not see why he, of all men, should be Prime Minister. He had once been Chancellor of the Exchequer, filling that office through two halcyon Sessions, and he had known the reason why he had held it. He had ventured to assure himself at the time that he was the best man whom his party could then have found for that office, and he had been satisfied. But he had none of that satisfaction now. There were men under him who were really at work. The Lord Chancellor had legal reforms on foot. Mr. Monk was busy, heart and soul, in regard to income tax and brewers' licences,--making our poor Prime Minister's mouth water. Lord Drummond was active among the colonies. Phineas Finn had at any rate his ideas about Ireland. But with the Prime Minister,--so at least the Duke told himself,--it was all a blank. The policy confided to him and expected at his hands was that of keeping together a Coalition Ministry. That was a task that did not satisfy him. And now, gradually,--very slowly indeed at first, but still with a sure step,--there was creeping upon him the idea that his power of cohesion was sought for, and perhaps found, not in his political capacity, but in his rank and wealth. It might, in fact, be the case that it was his wife the Duchess,--that Lady Glencora of whose wild impulses and general impracticability he had always been in dread,--that she with her dinner parties and receptions, with her crowded saloons, her music, her picnics, and social temptations, was Prime Minister rather than he himself. It might be that this had been understood by the coalesced parties,--by everybody, in fact, except himself. It had, perhaps, been found that in the state of things then existing, a ministry could be best kept together, not by parliamentary capacity, but by social arrangements, such as his Duchess, and his Duchess alone, could carry out. She and she only would have the spirit and the money and the sort of cleverness required. In such a state of things he of course, as her husband, must be the nominal Prime Minister. There was no anger in his bosom as he thought of this. It would be hardly just to say that there was jealousy. His nature was essentially free from jealousy. But there was shame,--and self-accusation at having accepted so great an office with so little fixed purpose as to great work. It might be his duty to subordinate even his pride to the service of his country, and to consent to be a fainéant minister, a gilded Treasury log, because by remaining in that position he would enable the Government to be carried on. But how base the position, how mean, how repugnant to that grand idea of public work which had hitherto been the motive power of all his life! How would he continue to live if this thing were to go on from year to year,--he pretending to govern while others governed,--stalking about from one public hall to another in a blue ribbon, taking the highest place at all tables, receiving mock reverence, and known to all men as fainéant First Lord of the Treasury? Now, as he had been thinking of all this, the most trusted of his friends had come to him, and had at once alluded to the very circumstances which had been pressing so heavily on his mind. "I was delighted," continued the elder Duke, "when I heard that you had determined to go to Gatherum Castle this year." "If a man has a big house I suppose he ought to live in it, sometimes." "Certainly. It was for such purposes as this now intended that your uncle built it. He never became a public man, and therefore, though he went there, every year I believe, he never really used it." "He hated it,--in his heart. And so do I. And so does Glencora. I don't see why any man should have his private life interrupted by being made to keep a huge caravansary open for persons he doesn't care a straw about." "You would not like to live alone." "Alone,--with my wife and children,--I would certainly, during a portion of the year at least." "I doubt whether such a life, even for a month, even for a week, is compatible with your duties. You would hardly find it possible. Could you do without your private secretaries? Would you know enough of what is going on, if you did not discuss matters with others? A man cannot be both private and public at the same time." "And therefore one has to be chopped up, like 'a reed out of the river,' as the poet said, 'and yet not give sweet music afterwards.'" The Duke of St. Bungay said nothing in answer to this, as he did not understand the chopping of the reed. "I'm afraid I've been wrong about this collection of people down at Gatherum," continued the younger Duke. "Glencora is impulsive, and has overdone the thing. Just look at that." And he handed a letter to his friend. The old Duke put on his spectacles and read the letter through,--which ran as follows: Private. MY LORD DUKE,-- I do not doubt but that your Grace is aware of my position in regard to the public press of the country, and I beg to assure your Grace that my present proposition is made, not on account of the great honour and pleasure which would be conferred upon myself should your Grace accede to it, but because I feel assured that I might so be best enabled to discharge an important duty for the benefit of the public generally. Your Grace is about to receive the whole fashionable world of England and many distinguished foreign ambassadors at your ancestral halls, not solely for social delight,--for a man in your Grace's high position is not able to think only of a pleasant life,--but in order that the prestige of your combined Ministry may be so best maintained. That your Grace is thereby doing a duty to your country no man who understands the country can doubt. But it must be the case that the country at large should interest itself in your festivities, and should demand to have accounts of the gala doings of your ducal palace. Your Grace will probably agree with me that these records could be better given by one empowered by yourself to give them, by one who had been present, and who would write in your Grace's interest, than by some interloper who would receive his tale only at second hand. It is my purport now to inform your Grace that should I be honoured by an invitation to your Grace's party at Gatherum, I should obey such a call with the greatest alacrity, and would devote my pen and the public organ which is at my disposal to your Grace's service with the readiest good-will. I have the honour to be, My Lord Duke, Your Grace's most obedient And very humble servant, QUINTUS SLIDE. The old Duke, when he had read the letter, laughed heartily. "Isn't that a terribly bad sign of the times?" said the younger. "Well;--hardly that, I think. The man is both a fool and a blackguard; but I don't think we are therefore to suppose that there are many fools and blackguards like him. I wonder what he really has wanted." "He has wanted me to ask him to Gatherum." "He can hardly have expected that. I don't think he can have been such a fool. He may have thought that there was a possible off chance, and that he would not lose even that for want of asking. Of course you won't notice it." "I have asked Warburton to write to him, saying that he cannot be received at my house. I have all letters answered unless they seem to have come from insane persons. Would it not shock you if your private arrangements were invaded in that way?" "He can't invade you." "Yes he can. He does. That is an invasion. And whether he is there or not, he can and will write about my house. And though no one else will make himself such a fool as he has done by his letter, nevertheless even that is a sign of what others are doing. You yourself were saying just now that we were going to do something,--something particular, you said." "It was your word, and I echoed it. I suppose you are going to have a great many people?" "I am afraid Glencora has overdone it. I don't know why I should trouble you by saying so, but it makes me uneasy." "I can't see why." "I fear she has got some idea into her head of astounding the world by display." "I think she has got an idea of conquering the world by graciousness and hospitality." "It is as bad. It is, indeed, the same thing. Why should she want to conquer what we call the world? She ought to want to entertain my friends because they are my friends; and if from my public position I have more so-called friends than would trouble me in a happier condition of private life, why, then, she must entertain more people. There should be nothing beyond that. The idea of conquering people, as you call it, by feeding them, is to me abominable. If it goes on it will drive me mad. I shall have to give up everything, because I cannot bear the burden." This he said with more excitement, with stronger passion, than his friend had ever seen in him before; so much so that the old Duke was frightened. "I ought never to have been where I am," said the Prime Minister, getting up from his chair and walking about the room. "Allow me to assure you that in that you are decidedly mistaken," said his Grace of St. Bungay. "I cannot make even you see the inside of my heart in such a matter as this," said his Grace of Omnium. "I think I do. It may be that in saying so I claim for myself greater power than I possess, but I think I do. But let your heart say what it may on the subject, I am sure of this,--that when the Sovereign, by the advice of two outgoing Ministers, and with the unequivocally expressed assent of the House of Commons, calls on a man to serve her and the country, that man cannot be justified in refusing, merely by doubts about his own fitness. If your health is failing you, you may know it, and say so. Or it may be that your honour,--your faith to others,--should forbid you to accept the position. But of your own general fitness you must take the verdict given by such general consent. They have seen clearer than you have done what is required, and know better than you can know how that which is wanted is to be secured." "If I am to be here and do nothing, must I remain?" "A man cannot keep together the Government of a country and do nothing. Do not trouble yourself about this crowd at Gatherum. The Duchess, easily, almost without exertion, will do that which to you, or to me either, would be impossible. Let her have her way, and take no notice of the Quintus Slides." The Prime Minister smiled, as though this repeated allusion to Mr. Slide's letter had brought back his good humour, and said nothing further then as to his difficulties. There were a few words to be spoken as to some future Cabinet meeting, something perhaps to be settled as to some man's work or position, a hint to be given, and a lesson to be learned,--for of these inner Cabinet Councils between these two statesmen there was frequent use; and then the Duke of St. Bungay took his leave. Our Duke, as soon as his friend had left him, rang for his private secretary, and went to work diligently, as though nothing had disturbed him. I do not know that his labours on that occasion were of a very high order. Unless there be some special effort of lawmaking before the country, some reform bill to be passed, some attempt at education to be made, some fetters to be forged or to be relaxed, a Prime Minister is not driven hard by the work of his portfolio,--as are his colleagues. But many men were in want of many things, and contrived by many means to make their wants known to the Prime Minister. A dean would fain be a bishop, or a judge a chief justice, or a commissioner a chairman, or a secretary a commissioner. Knights would fain be baronets, baronets barons, and barons earls. In one guise or another the wants of gentlemen were made known, and there was work to be done. A ribbon cannot be given away without breaking the hearts of, perhaps, three gentlemen and of their wives and daughters. And then he went down to the House of Lords,--for the last time this Session as far as work was concerned. On the morrow legislative work would be over, and the gentlemen of Parliament would be sent to their country houses, and to their pleasant country joys. It had been arranged that on the day after the prorogation of Parliament the Duchess of Omnium should go down to Gatherum to prepare for the coming of the people, which was to commence about three days later, taking her ministers, Mrs. Finn and Locock, with her; and that her husband with his private secretaries and dispatch boxes was to go for those three days to Matching, a smaller place than Gatherum, but one to which they were much better accustomed. If, as the Duchess thought to be not unlikely, the Duke should prolong his stay for a few days at Matching, she felt confident that she would be able to bear the burden of the Castle on her own shoulders. She had thought it to be very probable that he would prolong his stay at Matching, and if the absence were not too long, this might be well explained to the assembled company. In the Duchess's estimation a Prime Minister would lose nothing by pleading the nature of his business as an excuse for such absence,--or by having such a plea made for him. Of course he must appear at last. But as to that she had no fear. His timidity, and his conscience also, would both be too potent to allow him to shirk the nuisance of Gatherum altogether. He would come, she was sure; but she did not much care how long he deferred his coming. She was, therefore, not a little surprised when he announced to her an alteration in his plans. This he did not many hours after the Duke of St. Bungay had left him at the Treasury Chambers. "I think I shall go down with you at once to Gatherum," he said. "What is the meaning of that?" The Duchess was not skilled in hiding her feelings, at any rate from him, and declared to him at once by her voice and eye that the proposed change was not gratifying to her. "It will be better. I had thought that I would get a quiet day or two at Matching. But as the thing has to be done, it may as well be done at first. A man ought to receive his own guests. I can't say that I look forward to any great pleasure in doing so on this occasion;--but I shall do it." It was very easy to understand also the tone of his voice. There was in it something of offended dignity, something of future marital intentions,--something also of the weakness of distress. She did not want him to come at once to Gatherum. A great deal of money was being spent, and the absolute spending was not yet quite perfected. There might still be possibility of interference. The tents were not all pitched. The lamps were not as yet all hung in the conservatories. Waggons would still be coming in and workmen still be going out. He would think less of what had been done if he could be kept from seeing it while it was being done. And the greater crowd which would be gathered there by the end of the first week would carry off the vastness of the preparations. As to money, he had given her almost carte blanche, having at one vacillatory period of his Prime Ministership been talked by her into some agreement with her own plans. And in regard to money he would say to himself that he ought not to interfere with any whim of hers on that score, unless he thought it right to crush the whim on some other score. Half what he possessed had been hers, and even if during this year he were to spend more than his income,--if he were to double or even treble the expenditure of past years,--he could not consume the additions to his wealth which had accrued and heaped themselves up since his marriage. He had therefore written a line to his banker, and a line to his lawyer, and he had himself seen Locock, and his wife's hands had been loosened. "I didn't think, your Grace," said Locock, "that his Grace would be so very--very--very--" "Very what, Locock?" "So very free, your Grace." The Duchess, as she thought of it, declared to herself that her husband was the truest nobleman in all England. She revered, admired, and almost loved him. She knew him to be infinitely better than herself. But she could hardly sympathise with him, and was quite sure that he did not sympathise with her. He was so good about the money! But yet it was necessary that he should be kept in the dark as to the spending of a good deal of it. Now he was going to upset a portion of her plans by coming to Gatherum before he was wanted. She knew him to be obstinate, but it might be possible to turn him back to his old purpose by clever manipulation. "Of course it would be much nicer for me," she said. "That alone would be sufficient." "Thanks, dear. But we had arranged for people to come at first whom I thought you would not specially care to meet. Sir Orlando and Mr. Rattler will be there with their wives." "I have become quite used to Sir Orlando and Mr. Rattler." "No doubt, and therefore I wanted to spare you something of their company. The Duke, whom you really do like, isn't coming yet. I thought, too, you would have your work to finish off." "I fear it is of a kind that won't bear finishing off. However, I have made up my mind, and have already told Locock to send word to the people at Matching to say that I shall not be there yet. How long will all this last at Gatherum?" "Who can say?" "I should have thought you could. People are not coming, I suppose, for an indefinite time." "As one set leaves, one asks others." "Haven't you asked enough as yet? I should like to know when we may expect to get away from the place." "You needn't stay till the end, you know." "But you must." "Certainly." "And I should wish you to go with me, when we do go to Matching." "Oh, Plantagenet," said the wife, "what a Darby and Joan kind of thing you like to have it!" "Yes, I do. The Darby and Joan kind of thing is what I like." "Only Darby is to be in an office all day, and in Parliament all night,--and Joan is to stay at home." "Would you wish me not to be in an office, and not to be in Parliament? But don't let us misunderstand each other. You are doing the best you can to further what you think to be my interests." "I am," said the Duchess. "I love you the better for it, day by day." This so surprised her, that as she took him by the arm, her eyes were filled with tears. "I know that you are working for me quite as hard as I work myself, and that you are doing so with the pure ambition of seeing your husband a great man." "And myself a great man's wife." "It is the same thing. But I would not have you overdo your work. I would not have you make yourself conspicuous by anything like display. There are ill-natured people who will say things that you do not expect, and to which I should be more sensitive than I ought to be. Spare me such pain as this, if you can." He still held her hand as he spoke, and she answered him only by nodding her head. "I will go down with you to Gatherum on Friday." Then he left her. CHAPTER XIX Vulgarity The Duke and Duchess with their children and personal servants reached Gatherum Castle the day before the first crowd of visitors was expected. It was on a lovely autumn afternoon, and the Duke, who had endeavoured to make himself pleasant during the journey, had suggested that as soon as the heat would allow them they would saunter about the grounds and see what was being done. They could dine late, at half-past eight or nine, so that they might be walking from seven to eight. But the Duchess when she reached the Castle declined to fall into this arrangement. The journey had been hot and dusty and she was a little cross. They reached the place about five, and then she declared that she would have a cup of tea and lie down; she was too tired to walk; and the sun, she said, was still scorchingly hot. He then asked that the children might go with him; but the two little girls were weary and travel-worn, and the two boys, the elder of whom was home from Eton and the younger from some minor Eton, were already out about the place after their own pleasures. So the Duke started for his walk alone. The Duchess certainly did not wish to have to inspect the works in conjunction with her husband. She knew how much there was that she ought still to do herself, how many things that she herself ought to see. But she could neither do anything nor see anything to any purpose under his wing. As to lying down, that she knew to be quite out of the question. She had already found out that the life which she had adopted was one of incessant work. But she was neither weak nor idle. She was quite prepared to work,--if only she might work after her own fashion and with companions chosen by herself. Had not her husband been so perverse, she would have travelled down with Mrs. Finn, whose coming was now postponed for two days, and Locock would have been with her. The Duke had given directions which made it necessary that Locock's coming should be postponed for a day, and this was another grievance. She was put out a good deal, and began to speculate whether her husband was doing it on purpose to torment her. Nevertheless, as soon as she knew that he was out of the way, she went to her work. She could not go out among the tents and lawns and conservatories, as she would probably meet him. But she gave orders as to bedchambers, saw to the adornments of the reception-rooms, had an eye to the banners and martial trophies suspended in the vast hall, and the busts and statues which adorned the corners, looked in on the plate which was being prepared for the great dining-room, and superintended the moving about of chairs, sofas, and tables generally. "You may take it as certain, Mrs. Pritchard," she said to the housekeeper, "that there will never be less than forty for the next two months." "Forty to sleep, my lady?" To Pritchard the Duchess had for many years been Lady Glencora, and she perhaps understood that her mistress liked the old appellation. "Yes, forty to sleep, and forty to eat, and forty to drink. But that's nothing. Forty to push through twenty-four hours every day! Do you think you've got everything that you want?" "It depends, my lady, how long each of 'em stays." "One night! No,--say two nights on an average." "That makes shifting the beds very often;--doesn't it, my lady?" "Send up to Puddick's for sheets to-morrow. Why wasn't that thought of before?" "It was, my lady,--and I think we shall do. We've got the steam-washery put up." "Towels!" suggested the Duchess. "Oh yes, my lady. Puddick's did send a great many things;--a whole waggon load there was come from the station. But the tablecloths ain't, none of 'em, long enough for the big table." The Duchess's face fell. "Of course there must be two. On them very long tables, my lady, there always is two." "Why didn't you tell me, so that I could have had them made? It's impossible,--impossible that one brain should think of it all. Are you sure you've got enough hands in the kitchen?" "Well, my lady;--we couldn't do with more; and they ain't an atom of use,--only just in the way,--if you don't know something about 'em. I suppose Mr. Millepois will be down soon." This name, which Mrs. Pritchard called Milleypoise, indicated a French cook who was as yet unknown at the Castle. "He'll be here to-night." "I wish he could have been here a day or two sooner, my lady, so as just to see about him." "And how should we have got our dinner in town? He won't make any difficulties. The confectioner did come?" "Yes, my lady; and to tell the truth out at once, he was that drunk last night that--; oh, dear, we didn't know what to do with him." "I don't mind that before the affair begins. I don't suppose he'll get tipsy while he has to work for all these people. You've plenty of eggs?" These questions went on so rapidly that in addition to the asking of them the Duchess was able to go through all the rooms before she dressed for dinner, and in every room she saw something to speak of, noting either perfection or imperfection. In the meantime the Duke had gone out alone. It was still hot, but he had made up his mind that he would enjoy his first holiday out of town by walking about his own grounds, and he would not allow the heat to interrupt him. He went out through the vast hall, and the huge front door, which was so huge and so grand that it was very seldom used. But it was now open by chance, owing to some incident of this festival time, and he passed through it and stood upon the grand terrace, with the well-known and much-lauded portico over head. Up to the terrace, though it was very high, there ran a road, constructed upon arches, so that grand guests could drive almost into the house. The Duke, who was never grand himself, as he stood there looking at the far-stretching view before him, could not remember that he had ever but once before placed himself on that spot. Of what use had been the portico, and the marbles, and the huge pile of stone,--of what use the enormous hall just behind him, cutting the house in two, declaring aloud by its own aspect and proportions that it had been built altogether for show and in no degree for use or comfort? And now as he stood there he could already see that men were at work about the place, that ground had been moved here, and grass laid down there, and a new gravel road constructed in another place. Was it not possible that his friends should be entertained without all these changes in the gardens? Then he perceived the tents, and descending from the terrace and turning to the left towards the end of the house he came upon a new conservatory. The exotics with which it was to be filled were at this moment being brought in on great barrows. He stood for a moment and looked, but said not a word to the men. They gazed at him but evidently did not know him. How should they know him,--him, who was so seldom there, and who when there never showed himself about the place? Then he went farther afield from the house and came across more and more men. A great ha-ha fence had been made, enclosing on three sides a large flat and turfed parallelogram of ground, taken out of the park and open at one end to the gardens, containing, as he thought, about an acre. "What are you doing this for?" he said to one of the labourers. The man stared at him, and at first seemed hardly inclined to make him an answer. "It be for the quality to shoot their bows and harrows," he said at last, as he continued the easy task of patting with his spade the completed work. He evidently regarded this stranger as an intruder who was not entitled to ask questions, even if he were permitted to wander about the grounds. From one place he went on to another and found changes, and new erections, and some device for throwing away money everywhere. It angered him to think that there was so little of simplicity left in the world that a man could not entertain his friends without such a fuss as this. His mind applied itself frequently to the consideration of the money, not that he grudged the loss of it, but the spending of it in such a cause. And then perhaps there occurred to him an idea that all this should not have been done without a word of consent from himself. Had she come to him with some scheme for changing everything about the place, making him think that the alterations were a matter of taste or of mere personal pleasure, he would probably have given his assent at once, thinking nothing of the money. But all this was sheer display. Then he walked up and saw the flag waving over the Castle, indicating that he, the Lord Lieutenant of the County, was present there on his own soil. That was right. That was as it should be, because the flag was waving in compliance with an acknowledged ordinance. Of all that properly belonged to his rank and station he could be very proud, and would allow no diminution of that outward respect to which they were entitled. Were they to be trenched on by his fault in his person, the rights of others to their enjoyment would be endangered, and the benefits accruing to his country from established marks of reverence would be imperilled. But here was an assumed and preposterous grandeur that was as much within the reach of some rich swindler or of some prosperous haberdasher as of himself,--having, too, a look of raw newness about it which was very distasteful to him. And then, too, he knew that nothing of all this would have been done unless he had become Prime Minister. Why on earth should a man's grounds be knocked about because he becomes Prime Minister? He walked on arguing this within his own bosom, till he had worked himself almost up to anger. It was clear that he must henceforth take things more into his own hands, or he would be made to be absurd before the world. Indifference he knew he could bear. Harsh criticism he thought he could endure. But to ridicule he was aware that he was pervious. Suppose the papers were to say of him that he built a new conservatory and made an archery ground for the sake of maintaining the Coalition! When he got back to the house he found his wife alone in the small room in which they intended to dine. After all her labours she was now reclining for the few minutes her husband's absence might allow her, knowing that after dinner there were a score of letters for her to write. "I don't think," said she, "I was ever so tired in my life." "It isn't such a very long journey after all." "But it's a very big house, and I've been, I think, into every room since I have been here, and I've moved most of the furniture in the drawing-rooms with my own hand, and I've counted the pounds of butter, and inspected the sheets and tablecloths." "Was that necessary, Glencora?" "If I had gone to bed instead, the world, I suppose, would have gone on, and Sir Orlando Drought would still have led the House of Commons;--but things should be looked after, I suppose." "There are people to do it. You are like Martha, troubling yourself with many things." "I always felt that Martha was very ill-used. If there were no Marthas there would never be anything fit to eat. But it's odd how sure a wife is to be scolded. If I did nothing at all, that wouldn't please a busy, hard-working man like you." "I don't know that I have scolded,--not as yet." "Are you going to begin?" "Not to scold, my dear. Looking back, can you remember that I ever scolded you?" "I can remember a great many times when you ought." "But to tell you the truth, I don't like all that you have done here. I cannot see that it was necessary." "People make changes in their gardens without necessity sometimes." "But these changes are made because of your guests. Had they been made to gratify your own taste I would have said nothing,--although even in that case I think you might have told me what you proposed to do." "What;--when you are so burdened with work that you do not know how to turn?" "I am never so burdened that I cannot turn to you. But, as you know, that is not what I complain of. If it were done for yourself, though it were the wildest vagary, I would learn to like it. But it distresses me to think that what might have been good enough for our friends before should be thought to be insufficient because of the office I hold. There is a--a--a--I was almost going to say vulgarity about it which distresses me." "Vulgarity!" she exclaimed, jumping up from her sofa. "I retract the word. I would not for the world say anything that should annoy you;--but pray, pray do not go on with it." Then again he left her. Vulgarity! There was no other word in the language so hard to bear as that. He had, indeed, been careful to say that he did not accuse her of vulgarity,--but nevertheless the accusation had been made. Could you call your friend a liar more plainly than by saying to him that you would not say that he lied? They dined together, the two boys, also, dining with them, but very little was said at dinner. The horrid word was clinging to the lady's ears, and the remembrance of having uttered the word was heavy on the man's conscience. He had told himself very plainly that the thing was vulgar, but he had not meant to use the word. When uttered it came even upon himself as a surprise. But it had been uttered; and, let what apology there may be made, a word uttered cannot be retracted. As he looked across the table at his wife, he saw that the word had been taken in deep dudgeon. She escaped, to the writing of her letters she said, almost before the meal was done. "Vulgarity!" She uttered the word aloud to herself, as she sat herself down in the little room up-stairs which she had assigned to herself for her own use. But though she was very angry with him, she did not, even in her own mind, contradict him. Perhaps it was vulgar. But why shouldn't she be vulgar, if she could most surely get what she wanted by vulgarity? What was the meaning of the word vulgarity? Of course she was prepared to do things,--was daily doing things,--which would have been odious to her had not her husband been a public man. She submitted, without unwillingness, to constant contact with disagreeable people. She lavished her smiles,--so she now said to herself,--on butchers and tinkers. What she said, what she read, what she wrote, what she did, whither she went, to whom she was kind and to whom unkind,--was it not all said and done and arranged with reference to his and her own popularity? When a man wants to be Prime Minister he has to submit to vulgarity, and must give up his ambition if the task be too disagreeable to him. The Duchess thought that that had been understood, at any rate ever since the days of Coriolanus. "The old Duke kept out of it," she said to herself, "and chose to live in the other way. He had his choice. He wants it to be done. And when I do it for him because he can't do it for himself, he calls it by an ugly name!" Then it occurred to her that the world tells lies every day,--telling on the whole much more lies than truth,--but that the world has wisely agreed that the world shall not be accused of lying. One doesn't venture to express open disbelief even of one's wife; and with the world at large a word spoken, whether lie or not, is presumed to be true of course,--because spoken. Jones has said it, and therefore Smith,--who has known the lie to be a lie,--has asserted his assured belief, lying again. But in this way the world is able to live pleasantly. How was she to live pleasantly if her husband accused her of vulgarity? Of course it was all vulgar, but why should he tell her so? She did not do it from any pleasure that she got from it. The letters remained long unwritten, and then there came a moment in which she resolved that they should not be written. The work was very hard, and what good would come from it? Why should she make her hands dirty, so that even her husband accused her of vulgarity? Would it not be better to give it all up, and be a great woman, une grande dame, of another kind,--difficult of access, sparing of her favours, aristocratic to the backbone,--a very Duchess of duchesses? The role would be one very easy to play. It required rank, money, and a little manner,--and these she possessed. The old Duke had done it with ease, without the slightest trouble to himself, and had been treated almost like a god because he had secluded himself. She could make the change even yet,--and as her husband told her that she was vulgar, she thought she would make it. But at last, before she had abandoned her desk and paper, there had come to her another thought. Nothing to her was so distasteful as failure. She had known that there would be difficulties, and had assured herself that she would be firm and brave in overcoming them. Was not this accusation of vulgarity simply one of the difficulties which she had to overcome? Was her courage already gone from her? Was she so weak that a single word should knock her over,--and a word evidently repented of as soon as uttered? Vulgar! Well;--let her be vulgar as long as she gained her object. There had been no penalty of everlasting punishment denounced against vulgarity. And then a higher idea touched her, not without effect,--an idea which she could not analyse, but which was hardly on that account the less effective. She did believe thoroughly in her husband, to the extent of thinking him the fittest man in all the country to be its Prime Minister. His fame was dear to her. Her nature was loyal; and though she might, perhaps, in her younger days have been able to lean upon him with a more loving heart had he been other than he was, brighter, more gay, given to pleasures, and fond of trifles, still, she could recognise merits with which her sympathy was imperfect. It was good that he should be England's Prime Minister, and therefore she would do all she could to keep him in that place. The vulgarity was a necessary essential. He might not acknowledge this,--might even, if the choice were left to him, refuse to be Prime Minister on such terms. But she need not, therefore, give way. Having in this way thought it all out, she took up her pen and completed the batch of letters before she allowed herself to go to bed. CHAPTER XX Sir Orlando's Policy When the guests began to arrive our friend the Duchess had apparently got through her little difficulties, for she received them with that open, genial hospitality which is so delightful as coming evidently from the heart. There had not been another word between her and her husband as to the manner in which the thing was to be done, and she had determined that the offensive word should pass altogether out of her memory. The first comer was Mrs. Finn,--who came indeed rather as an assistant hostess than as a mere guest, and to her the Duchess uttered a few half-playful hints as to her troubles. "Considering the time, haven't we done marvels? Because it does look nice,--doesn't it? There are no dirt heaps about, and it's all as green as though it had been there since the Conquest. He doesn't like it because it looks new. And we've got forty-five bedrooms made up. The servants are all turned out over the stables somewhere,--quite comfortable, I assure you. Indeed they like it. And by knocking down the ends of two passages we've brought everything together. And the rooms are all numbered just like an inn. It was the only way. And I keep one book myself, and Locock has another. I have everybody's room, and where it is, and how long the tenant is to be allowed to occupy it. And here's the way everybody is to take everybody down to dinner for the next fortnight. Of course that must be altered, but it is easier when we have a sort of settled basis. And I have some private notes as to who should flirt with whom." "You'd better not let that lie about." "Nobody could understand a word of it if they had it. A. B. always means X. Y. Z. And this is the code of the Gatherum Archery Ground. I never drew a bow in my life,--not a real bow in the flesh, that is, my dear,--and yet I've made 'em all out, and had them printed. The way to make a thing go down is to give it some special importance. And I've gone through the bill of fare for the first week with Millepois, who is a perfect gentleman,--perfect." Then she gave a little sigh as she remembered that word from her husband, which had so wounded her. "I used to think that Plantagenet worked hard when he was doing his decimal coinage; but I don't think he ever stuck to it as I have done." "What does the Duke say to it all?" "Ah; well, upon the whole he behaves like an angel. He behaves so well that half my time I think I'll shut it all up and have done with it,--for his sake. And then, the other half, I'm determined to go on with it,--also for his sake." "He has not been displeased?" "Ask no questions, my dear, and you'll hear no stories. You haven't been married twice without knowing that women can't have everything smooth. He only said one word. It was rather hard to bear, but it has passed away." That afternoon there was quite a crowd. Among the first comers were Mr. and Mrs. Roby, and Mr. and Mrs. Rattler. And there were Sir Orlando and Lady Drought, Lord Ramsden, and Sir Timothy Beeswax. These gentlemen with their wives represented, for the time, the Ministry of which the Duke was the head, and had been asked in order that their fealty and submission might be thus riveted. There were also there Mr. and Mrs. Boffin, with Lord Thrift and his daughter Angelica, who had belonged to former Ministries,--one on the Liberal and the other on the Conservative side,--and who were now among the Duke's guests, in order that they and others might see how wide the Duke wished to open his hands. And there was our friend Ferdinand Lopez, who had certainly made the best use of his opportunities in securing for himself so great a social advantage as an invitation to Gatherum Castle. How could any father, who was simply a barrister, refuse to receive as his son-in-law a man who had been a guest at the Duke of Omnium's country house? And then there were certain people from the neighbourhood;--Frank Gresham of Greshamsbury, with his wife and daughter, the master of the hounds in those parts, a rich squire of old blood, and head of the family to which one of the aspirant Prime Ministers of the day belonged. And Lord Chiltern, another master of fox hounds, two counties off,--and also an old friend of ours,--had been asked to meet him, and had brought his wife. And there was Lady Rosina De Courcy, an old maid, the sister of the present Earl De Courcy, who lived not far off and had been accustomed to come to Gatherum Castle on state occasions for the last thirty years,--the only relic in those parts of a family which had lived there for many years in great pride of place; for her elder brother, the Earl, was a ruined man, and her younger brothers were living with their wives abroad, and her sisters had married, rather lowly in the world, and her mother now was dead, and Lady Rosina lived alone in a little cottage outside the old park palings, and still held fast within her bosom all the old pride of the De Courcys. And then there were Captain Gunner and Major Pountney, two middle-aged young men, presumably belonging to the army, whom the Duchess had lately enlisted among her followers as being useful in their way. They could eat their dinners without being shy, dance on occasions, though very unwillingly, talk a little, and run on messages;--and they knew the peerage by heart, and could tell the details of every unfortunate marriage for the last twenty years. Each thought himself, especially since this last promotion, to be indispensably necessary to the formation of London society, and was comfortable in a conviction that he had thoroughly succeeded in life by acquiring the privilege of sitting down to dinner three times a week with peers and peeresses. The list of guests has by no means been made as complete here as it was to be found in the county newspapers, and in the "Morning Post" of the time; but enough of names has been given to show of what nature was the party. "The Duchess has got rather a rough lot to begin with," said the Major to the Captain. "Oh, yes. I knew that. She wanted me to be useful, so of course I came. I shall stay here this week, and then be back in September." Up to this moment Captain Gunner had not received any invitation for September, but then there was no reason why he should not do so. "I've been getting up that archery code with her," said Pountney, "and I was pledged to come down and set it going. That little Gresham girl isn't a bad looking thing." "Rather flabby," said Captain Gunner. "Very nice colour. She'll have a lot of money, you know." "There's a brother," said the Captain. "Oh, yes; there's a brother, who will have the Greshamsbury property, but she's to have her mother's money. There's a very odd story about all that, you know." Then the Major told the story, and told every particular of it wrongly. "A man might do worse than look there," said the Major. A man might have done worse, because Miss Gresham was a very nice girl; but of course the Major was all wrong about the money. "Well;--now you've tried it, what do you think about it?" This question was put by Sir Timothy to Sir Orlando as they sat in a corner of the archery ground, under the shelter of a tent, looking on while Major Pountney taught Mrs. Boffin how to fix an arrow to her bowstring. It was quite understood that Sir Timothy was inimical to the Coalition though he still belonged to it, and that he would assist in breaking it up if only there were a fair chance of his belonging to the party which would remain in power. Sir Timothy had been badly treated, and did not forget it. Now Sir Orlando had also of late shown some symptoms of a disturbed ambition. He was the Leader of the House of Commons, and it had become an almost recognised law of the Constitution that the Leader of the House of Commons should be the First Minister of the Crown. It was at least understood by many that such was Sir Orlando's reading of the laws of the Constitution. "We've got along, you know," said Sir Orlando. "Yes;--yes. We've got along. Can you imagine any possible concatenation of circumstances in which we should not get along? There's always too much good sense in the House for an absolute collapse. But are you contented?" "I won't say I'm not," said the cautious baronet. "I didn't look for very great things from a Coalition, and I didn't look for very great things from the Duke." "It seems to me that the one achievement to which we've all looked has been the reaching the end of the Session in safety. We've done that certainly." "It is a great thing to do, Sir Timothy. Of course the main work of Parliament is to raise supplies;--and, when that has been done with ease, when all the money wanted has been voted without a break-down, of course Ministers are very glad to get rid of the Parliament. It is as much a matter of course that a Minister should dislike Parliament now as that a Stuart King should have done so two hundred and fifty years ago. To get a Session over and done with is an achievement and a delight." "No Ministry can go on long on that far niente principle, and no minister who accedes to it will remain long in any ministry." Sir Timothy in saying this might be alluding to the Duke, or the reference might be to Sir Orlando himself. "Of course, I'm not in the Cabinet, and am not entitled to say a word; but I think that if I were in the Cabinet, and if I were anxious,--which I confess I'm not,--for a continuation of the present state of things, I should endeavour to obtain from the Duke some idea of his policy for the next Session." Sir Orlando was a man of certain parts. He could speak volubly,--and yet slowly,--so that reporters and others could hear him. He was patient, both in the House and in his office, and had the great gift of doing what he was told by men who understood things better than he did himself. He never went very far astray in his official business, because he always obeyed the clerks and followed precedents. He had been a useful man,--and would still have remained so had he not been lifted a little too high. Had he been only one in the ruck on the Treasury Bench he would have been useful to the end; but special honour and special place had been assigned to him, and therefore he desired still bigger things. The Duke's mediocrity of talent and of energy and of general governing power had been so often mentioned of late in Sir Orlando's hearing, that Sir Orlando had gradually come to think that he was the Duke's equal in the Cabinet, and that perhaps it behoved him to lead the Duke. At the commencement of their joint operations he had held the Duke in some awe, and perhaps something of that feeling in reference to the Duke personally still restrained him. The Dukes of Omnium had always been big people. But still it might be his duty to say a word to the Duke. Sir Orlando assured himself that if ever convinced of the propriety of doing so, he could say a word even to the Duke of Omnium. "I am confident that we should not go on quite as we are at present," said Sir Timothy as he closed the conversation. "Where did they pick him up?" said the Major to the Captain, pointing with his head to Ferdinand Lopez, who was shooting with Angelica Thrift and Mr. Boffin and one of the Duke's private secretaries. "The Duchess found him somewhere. He's one of those fabulously rich fellows out of the City who make a hundred thousand pounds at a blow. They say his people were grandees of Spain." "Does anybody know him?" asked the Major. "Everybody soon will know him," answered the Captain. "I think I heard that he's going to stand for some place in the Duke's interest. He don't look the sort of fellow I like; but he's got money and he comes here, and he's good looking,--and therefore he'll be a success." In answer to this the Major only grunted. The Major was a year or two older than the Captain, and therefore less willing even than his friend to admit the claims of new comers to social honours. Just at this moment the Duchess walked across the ground up to the shooters, accompanied by Mrs. Finn and Lady Chiltern. She had not been seen in the gardens before that day, and of course a little concourse was made round her. The Major and the Captain, who had been driven away by the success of Ferdinand Lopez, returned with their sweetest smiles. Mr. Boffin put down his treatise on the nature of Franchises, which he was studying in order that he might lead an opposition against the Ministry next Session, and even Sir Timothy Beeswax, who had done his work with Sir Orlando, joined the throng. "Now I do hope," said the Duchess, "that you are all shooting by the new code. That is, and is to be, the Gatherum Archery Code, and I shall break my heart if anybody rebels." "There are one or two men," said Major Pountney very gravely, "who won't take the trouble to understand it." "Mr. Lopez," said the Duchess, pointing with her finger at our friend, "are you that rebel?" "I fear I did suggest--" began Mr. Lopez. "I will have no suggestions,--nothing but obedience. Here are Sir Timothy Beeswax and Mr. Boffin, and Sir Orlando Drought is not far off; and here is Mr. Rattler, than whom no authority on such a subject can be better. Ask them whether in other matters suggestions are wanted." "Of course not," said Major Pountney. "Now, Mr. Lopez, will you or will you not be guided by a strict and close interpretation of the Gatherum Code? Because, if not, I'm afraid we shall feel constrained to accept your resignation." "I won't resign, and I will obey," said Lopez. "A good ministerial reply," said the Duchess. "I don't doubt but that in time you'll ascend to high office and become a pillar of the Gatherum constitution. How does he shoot, Miss Thrift?" "He will shoot very well indeed, Duchess, if he goes on and practises," said Angelica, whose life for the last seven years had been devoted to archery. Major Pountney retired far away into the park, a full quarter of a mile off, and smoked a cigar under a tree. Was it for this that he had absolutely given up a month to drawing out this code of rules, going backwards and forwards two or three times to the printers in his desire to carry out the Duchess's wishes? "Women are so d---- ungrateful!" he said aloud in his solitude, as he turned himself on the hard ground. "And some men are so d---- lucky!" This fellow, Lopez, had absolutely been allowed to make a good score off his own intractable disobedience. The Duchess's little joke about the Ministers generally, and the advantages of submission on their part to their chief, was thought by some who heard it not to have been made in good taste. The joke was just such a joke as the Duchess would be sure to make,--meaning very little but still not altogether pointless. It was levelled rather at her husband than at her husband's colleagues who were present, and was so understood by those who really knew her,--as did Mrs. Finn, and Mr. Warburton, the private secretary. But Sir Orlando and Sir Timothy and Mr. Rattler, who were all within hearing, thought that the Duchess had intended to allude to the servile nature of their position; and Mr. Boffin, who heard it, rejoiced within himself, comforting himself with the reflection that his withers were unwrung, and thinking with what pleasure he might carry the anecdote into the farthest corners of the clubs. Poor Duchess! 'Tis pitiful to think that after such Herculean labours she should injure the cause by one slight unconsidered word, more, perhaps, than she had advanced it by all her energy. During this time the Duke was at the Castle, but he showed himself seldom to his guests,--so acting, as the reader will I hope understand, from no sense of the importance of his own personal presence, but influenced by a conviction that a public man should not waste his time. He breakfasted in his own room, because he could thus eat his breakfast in ten minutes. He read all the papers in solitude, because he was thus enabled to give his mind to their contents. Life had always been too serious to him to be wasted. Every afternoon he walked for the sake of exercise, and would have accepted any companion if any companion had especially offered himself. But he went off by some side-door, finding the side-door to be convenient, and therefore when seen by others was supposed to desire to remain unseen. "I had no idea there was so much pride about the Duke," Mr. Boffin said to his old colleague, Sir Orlando. "Is it pride?" asked Sir Orlando. "It may be shyness," said the wise Boffin. "The two things are so alike you can never tell the difference. But the man who is cursed by either should hardly be a Prime Minister." It was on the day after this that Sir Orlando thought that the moment had come in which it was his duty to say that salutary word to the Duke which it was clearly necessary that some colleague should say, and which no colleague could have so good a right to say as he who was the Leader of the House of Commons. He understood clearly that though they were gathered together then at Gatherum Castle for festive purposes, yet that no time was unfit for the discussion of State matters. Does not all the world know that when in autumn the Bismarcks of the world, or they who are bigger than Bismarcks, meet at this or that delicious haunt of salubrity, the affairs of the world are then settled in little conclaves, with greater ease, rapidity, and certainty than in large parliaments or the dull chambers of public offices? Emperor meets Emperor, and King meets King, and as they wander among rural glades in fraternal intimacy, wars are arranged, and swelling territories are enjoyed in anticipation. Sir Orlando hitherto had known all this, but had hardly as yet enjoyed it. He had been long in office, but these sweet confidences can of their very nature belong only to a very few. But now the time had manifestly come. It was Sunday afternoon, and Sir Orlando caught the Duke in the very act of leaving the house for his walk. There was no archery, and many of the inmates of the Castle were asleep. There had been a question as to the propriety of Sabbath archery, in discussing which reference had been made to Laud's book of sports, and the growing idea that the National Gallery should be opened on the Lord's-day. But the Duchess would not have the archery. "We are just the people who shouldn't prejudge the question," said the Duchess. The Duchess with various ladies, with the Pountneys and Gunners, and other obedient male followers, had been to church. None of the Ministers had of course been able to leave the swollen pouches which are always sent out from London on Saturday night, probably,--we cannot but think,--as arranged excuses for such defalcation, and had passed their mornings comfortably dozing over new novels. The Duke, always right in his purpose but generally wrong in his practice, had stayed at home working all the morning, thereby scandalising the strict, and had gone to church alone in the afternoon, thereby offending the social. The church was close to the house, and he had gone back to change his coat and hat, and to get his stick. But as he was stealing out of the little side-gate, Sir Orlando was down upon him. "If your Grace is going for a walk, and will admit of company, I shall be delighted to attend you," said Sir Orlando. The Duke professed himself to be well pleased, and in truth was pleased. He would be glad to increase his personal intimacy with his colleagues if it might be done pleasantly. They had gone nearly a mile across the park, watching the stately movements of the herds of deer, and talking of this and that trifle, before Sir Orlando could bring about an opportunity for uttering his word. At last he did it somewhat abruptly. "I think upon the whole we did pretty well last Session," he said, standing still under an old oak-tree. "Pretty well," re-echoed the Duke. "And I suppose we have not much to be afraid of next Session?" "I am afraid of nothing," said the Duke. "But--;" then Sir Orlando hesitated. The Duke, however, said not a word to help him on. Sir Orlando thought that the Duke looked more ducal than he had ever seen him look before. Sir Orlando remembered the old Duke, and suddenly found that the uncle and nephew were very like each other. But it does not become the Leader of the House of Commons to be afraid of any one. "Don't you think," continued Sir Orlando, "we should try and arrange among ourselves something of a policy? I am not quite sure that a ministry without a distinct course of action before it can long enjoy the confidence of the country. Take the last half century. There have been various policies, commanding more or less of general assent; free trade--." Here Sir Orlando gave a kindly wave of his hand, showing that on behalf of his companion he was willing to place at the head of the list a policy which had not always commanded his own assent;--"continued reform in Parliament, to which I have, with my whole heart, given my poor assistance." The Duke remembered how the bathers' clothes were stolen, and that Sir Orlando had been one of the most nimble-fingered of the thieves. "No popery, Irish grievances, the ballot, retrenchment, efficiency of the public service, all have had their time." "Things to be done offer themselves, I suppose, because they are in themselves desirable; not because it is desirable to have something to do." "Just so;--no doubt. But still, if you will think of it, no ministry can endure without a policy. During the latter part of the last Session it was understood that we had to get ourselves in harness together, and nothing more was expected from us; but I think we should be prepared with a distinct policy for the coming year. I fear that nothing can be done in Ireland." "Mr. Finn has ideas--." "Ah, yes;--well, your Grace. Mr. Finn is a very clever young man certainly; but I don't think we can support ourselves by his plan of Irish reform." Sir Orlando had been a little carried away by his own eloquence and the Duke's tameness, and had interrupted the Duke. The Duke again looked ducal, but on this occasion Sir Orlando did not observe his countenance. "For myself, I think, I am in favour of increased armaments. I have been applying my mind to the subject, and I think I see that the people of this country do not object to a slightly rising scale of estimates in that direction. Of course there is the county suffrage--" "I will think of what you have been saying," said the Duke. "As to the county suffrage--" "I will think it over," said the Duke. "You see that oak. That is the largest tree we have here at Gatherum; and I doubt whether there be a larger one in this part of England." The Duke's voice and words were not uncourteous, but there was something in them which hindered Sir Orlando from referring again on that occasion to county suffrages or increased armaments. CHAPTER XXI The Duchess's New Swan When the party had been about a week collected at Gatherum Castle, Ferdinand Lopez had manifestly become the favourite of the Duchess for the time, and had, at her instance, promised to remain there for some further days. He had hardly spoken to the Duke since he had been in the house,--but then but few of that motley assembly did talk much with the Duke. Gunner and Pountney had gone away,--the Captain having declared his dislike of the upstart Portuguese to be so strong that he could not stay in the same house with him any longer, and the Major, who was of stronger mind, having resolved that he would put the intruder down. "It is horrible to think what power money has in these days," said the Captain. The Captain had shaken the dust of Gatherum altogether from his feet, but the Major had so arranged that a bed was to be found for him again in October,--for another happy week; but he was not to return till bidden by the Duchess. "You won't forget;--now will you, Duchess?" he said, imploring her to remember him as he took his leave. "I did take a deal of trouble about the code;--didn't I?" "They don't seem to me to care for the code," said the Duchess, "but, nevertheless, I'll remember." "Who, in the name of all that's wonderful, was that I saw you with in the garden?" the Duchess said to her husband one afternoon. "It was Lady Rosina De Courcy, I suppose." "Heaven and earth!--what a companion for you to choose." "Why not?--why shouldn't I talk to Lady Rosina De Courcy?" "I'm not jealous a bit, if you mean that. I don't think Lady Rosina will steal your heart from me. But why you should pick her out of all the people here, when there are so many would think their fortunes made if you would only take a turn with them, I cannot imagine." "But I don't want to make any one's fortune," said the Duke; "and certainly not in that way." "What could you be saying to her?" "She was talking about her family. I rather like Lady Rosina. She is living all alone, it seems, and almost in poverty. Perhaps there is nothing so sad in the world as the female scions of a noble but impoverished stock." "Nothing so dull, certainly." "People are not dull to me, if they are real. I pity that poor lady. She is proud of her blood and yet not ashamed of her poverty." "Whatever might come of her blood, she has been all her life willing enough to get rid of her poverty. It isn't above three years since she was trying her best to marry that brewer at Silverbridge. I wish you could give your time a little to some of the other people." "To go and shoot arrows?" "No;--I don't want you to shoot arrows. You might act the part of host without shooting. Can't you walk about with anybody except Lady Rosina De Courcy?" "I was walking about with Sir Orlando Drought last Sunday, and I very much prefer Lady Rosina." "There has been no quarrel?" asked the Duchess sharply. "Oh dear, no." "Of course he's an empty-headed idiot. Everybody has always known that. And he's put above his place in the House. But it wouldn't do to quarrel with him now." "I don't think I am a quarrelsome man, Cora. I don't remember at this moment that I have ever quarrelled with anybody to your knowledge. But I may perhaps be permitted to--" "Snub a man, you mean. Well, I wouldn't even snub Sir Orlando very much, if I were you; though I can understand that it might be both pleasant and easy." "I wish you wouldn't put slang phrases into my mouth, Cora. If I think that a man intrudes upon me, I am of course bound to let him know my opinion." "Sir Orlando has--intruded!" "By no means. He is in a position which justifies his saying many things to me which another might not say. But then, again, he is a man whose opinion does not go far with me, and I have not the knack of seeming to agree with a man while I let his words pass idly by me." "That is quite true, Plantagenet." "And, therefore, I was uncomfortable with Sir Orlando, while I was able to sympathise with Lady Rosina." "What do you think of Ferdinand Lopez?" asked the Duchess, with studied abruptness. "Think of Mr. Lopez! I haven't thought of him at all. Why should I think of him?" "I want you to think of him. I think he's a very pleasant fellow, and I'm sure he's a rising man." "You might think the latter, and perhaps feel sure of the former." "Very well. Then, to oblige you, I'll think the latter and feel sure of the former. I suppose it's true that Mr. Grey is going on this mission to Persia?" Mr. Grey was the Duke's intimate friend, and was at this time member for the neighbouring borough of Silverbridge. "I think he will go. I've no doubt about it. He is to go after Christmas." "And will give up his seat?" The Duke did not answer her immediately. It had only just been decided,--decided by his friend himself,--that the seat should be given up when the journey to Persia was undertaken. Mr. Grey, somewhat in opposition to the Duke's advice, had resolved that he could not be in Persia and do his duty in the House of Commons at the same time. But this resolution had only now been made known to the Duke, and he was rather puzzled to think how the Duchess had been able to be so quick upon him. He had, indeed, kept the matter back from the Duchess, feeling that she would have something to say about it, which might possibly be unpleasant, as soon as the tidings should reach her. "Yes," he said, "I think he will give up his seat. That is his purpose, though I think it is unnecessary." "Let Mr. Lopez have it." "Mr. Lopez!" "Yes;--he is a clever man, a rising man, a man that is sure to do well, and who will be of use to you. Just take the trouble to talk to him. It is assistance of that kind that you want. You Ministers go on shuffling the old cards till they are so worn out and dirty that one can hardly tell the pips on them." "I am one of the dirty old cards myself," said the Duke. "That's nonsense, you know. A man who is at the head of affairs as you are can't be included among the pack I am speaking of. What you want is new blood, or new wood, or new metal, or whatever you may choose to call it. Take my advice and try this man. He isn't a pauper. It isn't money that he wants." "Cora, your geese are all swans." "That's not fair. I have never brought to you a goose yet. My swans have been swans. Who was it brought you and your pet swan of all, Mr. Grey, together? I won't name any names, but it is your swans have been geese." "It is not for me to return a member for Silverbridge." When he said this, she gave him a look which almost upset even his gravity, a look which was almost the same as asking him whether he would not--"tell that to the marines." "You don't quite understand these things, Cora," he continued. "The influence which owners of property may have in boroughs is decreasing every day, and there arises the question whether a conscientious man will any longer use such influence." "I don't think you'd like to see a man from Silverbridge opposing you in the House." "I may have to bear worse even than that." "Well;--there it is. The man is here and you have the opportunity of knowing him. Of course I have not hinted at the matter to him. If there were any Palliser wanted the borough I wouldn't say a word. What more patriotic thing can a patron do with his borough than to select a man who is unknown to him, not related to him, a perfect stranger, merely for his worth?" "But I do not know what may be the worth of Mr. Lopez." "I will guarantee that," said the Duchess. Whereupon the Duke laughed, and then left her. The Duchess had spoken with absolute truth when she told her husband that she had not said a word to Mr. Lopez about Silverbridge, but it was not long before she did say a word. On that same day she found herself alone with him in the garden,--or so much alone as to be able to speak with him privately. He had certainly made the best use of his time since he had been at the Castle, having secured the good-will of many of the ladies, and the displeasure of most of the men. "You have never been in Parliament, I think," said the Duchess. "I have never even tried to get there." "Perhaps you dislike the idea of that kind of life." "No, indeed," he said. "So far from it, that I regard it as the highest kind of life there is in England. A seat in Parliament gives a man a status in this country which it has never done elsewhere." "Then why don't you try it?" "Because I've got into another groove. I've become essentially a city man,--one of those who take up the trade of making money generally." "And does that content you?" "No, Duchess;--certainly not. Instead of contenting me it disgusts me. Not but that I like the money,--only it is so insufficient a use of one's life. I suppose I shall try to get into Parliament some day. Seats in Parliament don't grow like blackberries on bushes." "Pretty nearly," said the Duchess. "Not in my part of the country. These good things seem to be appointed to fall in the way of some men, and not of others. If there were a general election going on to-morrow, I should not know how to look for a seat." "They are to be found sometimes even without a general election," said the Duchess. "Are you alluding to anything now?" "Well;--yes, I am. But I'm very discreet, and do not like to do more than allude. I fancy that Mr. Grey, the member for Silverbridge, is going to Persia. Mr. Grey is a Member of Parliament. Members of Parliament ought to be in London and not in Persia. It is generally supposed that no man in England is more prone to do what he ought to do than Mr. Grey. Therefore, Mr. Grey will cease to be Member for Silverbridge. That's logic; isn't it?" "Has your Grace any logic equally strong to prove that I can follow him in the borough?" "No;--or if I have, the logic that I should use in that matter must for the present be kept to myself." She certainly had a little syllogism in her head as to the Duke ruling the borough, the Duke's wife ruling the Duke, and therefore the Duke's wife ruling the borough; but she did not think it prudent to utter this on the present occasion. "I think it much better that men in Parliament should be unmarried," said the Duchess. "But I am going to be married," said he. "Going to be married, are you?" "I have no right to say so, because the lady's father has rejected me." Then he told her the whole story, and so told it as to secure her entire sympathy. In telling it he never said that he was a rich man, he never boasted that that search after wealth of which he had spoken, had been successful; but he gave her to understand that there was no objection to him at all on the score of money. "You may have heard of the family," he said. "I have heard of the Whartons of course, and know that there is a baronet,--but I know nothing more of them. He is not a man of large property, I think." "My Miss Wharton,--the one I would fain call mine,--is the daughter of a London barrister. He, I believe, is rich." "Then she will be an heiress." "I suppose so;--but that consideration has had no weight with me. I have always regarded myself as the architect of my own fortune, and have no wish to owe my material comfort to a wife." "Sheer love!" suggested the Duchess. "Yes, I think so. It's very ridiculous; is it not?" "And why does the rich barrister object?" "The rich barrister, Duchess, is an out and out old Tory, who thinks that his daughter ought to marry no one but an English Tory. I am not exactly that." "A man does not hamper his daughter in these days by politics, when she is falling in love." "There are other cognate reasons. He does not like a foreigner. Now I am an Englishman, but I have a foreign name. He does not think that a name so grandly Saxon as Wharton should be changed to one so meanly Latin as Lopez." "The lady does not object to the Latinity?" "I fancy not." "Or to the bearer of it?" "Ah;--there I must not boast. But in simple truth there is only the father's ill-will between us." "With plenty of money on both sides?" asked the Duchess. Lopez shrugged his shoulders. A shrug at such a time may mean anything, but the Duchess took this shrug as signifying that the question was so surely settled as to admit of no difficulty. "Then," said the Duchess, "the old gentleman may as well give way at once. Of course his daughter will be too many for him." In this way the Duchess of Omnium became the fast friend of Ferdinand Lopez. CHAPTER XXII St. James's Park Towards the end of September Everett Wharton and Ferdinand Lopez were in town together, and as no one else was in town,--so at least they both professed to say,--they saw a good deal of each other. Lopez, as we know, had spent a portion of the preceding month at Gatherum Castle, and had made good use of his time, but Everett Wharton had been less fortunate. He had been a little cross with his father, and perhaps a little cross with all the Whartons generally, who did not, he thought, make quite enough of him. In the event of "anything happening" to that ne'er-do-well nephew, he himself would be the heir; and he reflected not unfrequently that something very probably might happen to the nephew. He did not often see this particular cousin, but he always heard of him as being drunk, overwhelmed with debt and difficulty, and altogether in that position of life in which it is probable that something will "happen." There was always of course the danger that the young man might marry and have a child;--but in the meantime surely he, Everett Wharton, should have been as much thought of on the banks of the Wye as Arthur Fletcher. He had been asked down to Wharton Hall,--but he had been asked in a way which he had not thought to be flattering and had declined to go. Then there had been a plan for joining Arthur Fletcher in a certain shooting, but that had failed in consequence of a few words between himself and Arthur respecting Lopez. Arthur had wanted him to say that Lopez was an unpardonable intruder,--but he had taken the part of Lopez, and therefore, when the time came round, he had nothing to do with the shooting. He had stayed in town till the middle of August, and had then started by himself across the continent with some keen intention of studying German politics; but he had found perhaps that German politics do not manifest themselves in the autumn, or that a foreign country cannot be well studied in solitude,--and he had returned. Late in the summer, just before his father and sister had left town, he had had some words with the old barrister. There had been a few bills to be paid, and Everett's allowance had been insufficient. It often was insufficient, and then ready money for his German tour was absolutely necessary. Mr. Wharton might probably have said less about the money had not his son accompanied his petition by a further allusion to Parliament. "There are some fellows at last really getting themselves together at the Progress, and of course it will be necessary to know who will be ready to come forward at the next general election." "I think I know one who won't," said the father, "judging from the manner in which he seems at present to manage his own money affairs." There was more severity in this than the old man had intended, for he had often thought within his own bosom whether it would not be well that he should encourage his son to stand for some seat. And the money that he had now been asked to advance had not been very much,--not more, in truth, than he expected to be called upon to pay in addition to the modest sum which he professed to allow his son. He was a rich man, who was not in truth made unhappy by parting with his money. But there had been, he thought, an impudence in the conjoint attack which it was his duty to punish. Therefore he had given his son very little encouragement. "Of course, sir, if you tell me that you are not inclined to pay anything beyond the allowance you make me, there is an end of it." "I rather think that you have just asked me to pay a considerable sum beyond your allowance, and that I have consented." Everett argued the matter no further, but he permitted his mind to entertain an idea that he was ill-used by his father. The time would come when he would probably be heir not only to his father's money, but also to the Wharton title and the Wharton property,--when his position in the country would really be, as he frequently told himself, quite considerable. Was it possible that he should refrain from blaming his father for not allowing him to obtain, early in life, that parliamentary education which would fit him to be an ornament to the House of Commons, and a safeguard to his country in future years? Now he and Lopez were at the Progress together, and they were almost the only men in the club. Lopez was quite contented with his own present sojourn in London. He had not only been at Gatherum Castle but was going there again. And then he had brilliant hopes before him,--so brilliant that they began, he thought, to assume the shape of certainties. He had corresponded with the Duchess, and he had gathered from her somewhat dubious words that the Duke would probably accede to her wishes in the matter of Silverbridge. The vacancy had not yet been declared. Mr. Grey was deterred, no doubt by certain high State purposes, from applying for the stewardship of the Chiltern Hundreds, and thereby releasing himself from his seat in Parliament, and enabling himself to perform, with a clear conscience, duties in a distant part of the world which he did not feel to be compatible with that seat. The seekers after seats were, no doubt, already on the track; but the Duchess had thought that as far as the Duke's good word went, it might possibly be given in favour of Mr. Lopez. The happy aspirant had taken this to be almost as good as a promise. There were also certain pecuniary speculations on foot, which could not be kept quite quiet even in September, as to which he did not like to trust entirely to the unaided energy of Mr. Sextus Parker, or to the boasted alliance of Mr. Mills Happerton. Sextus Parker's whole heart and soul were now in the matter, but Mr. Mills Happerton, an undoubted partner in Hunky and Sons, had blown a little coldly on the affair. But in spite of this Ferdinand Lopez was happy. Was it probable that Mr. Wharton should continue his opposition to a marriage which would make his daughter the wife of a member of Parliament and of a special friend of the Duchess of Omnium? He had said a word about his own prospects in reference to the marriage, but Everett had been at first too full of his own affairs to attend much to a matter which was comparatively so trifling. "Upon my word," he said, "I am beginning to feel angry with the governor, which is a kind of thing I don't like at all." "I can understand that when he's angry with you, you shouldn't like it." "I don't mind that half so much. He'll come round. However unjust he may be now, at the moment, he's the last man in the world to do an injustice in his will. I have thorough confidence in him. But I find myself driven into hostility to him by a conviction that he won't let me take any real step in life, till my life has been half frittered away." "You're thinking of Parliament." "Of course I am. I don't say you ain't an Englishman, but you are not quite enough of an Englishman to understand what Parliament is to us." "I hope to be,--some of these days," said Lopez. "Perhaps you may. I won't say but what you may get yourself educated to it when you've been married a dozen years to an English wife, and have half-a-dozen English children of your own. But, in the meantime, look at my position. I am twenty-eight years old." "I am four years your senior." "It does not matter a straw to you," continued Everett. "But a few years are everything with me. I have a right to suppose that I may be able to represent the county,--say in twenty years. I shall probably then be the head of the family and a rich man. Consider what a parliamentary education would be to me! And then it is just the life for which I have laid myself out, and in which I could make myself useful. You don't sympathise with me, but you might understand me." "I do both. I think of going into the House myself." "You!" "Yes; I do." "You must have changed your ideas very much then within the last month or two." "I have changed my ideas. My one chief object in life is, as you know, to marry your sister; and if I were a Member of Parliament I think that some difficulties would be cleared away." "But there won't be an election for the next three years at any rate," said Everett Wharton, staring at his friend. "You don't mean to keep Emily waiting for a dissolution?" "There are occasional vacancies," said Lopez. "Is there a chance of anything of that kind falling in your way?" "I think there is. I can't quite tell you all the particulars because other people are concerned, but I don't think it improbable that I may be in the House before--; well, say in three months' time." "In three months' time!" exclaimed Everett, whose mouth was watering at the prospects of his friend. "That is what comes from going to stay with the Prime Minister, I suppose." Lopez shrugged his shoulders. "Upon my word I can't understand you," continued the other. "It was only the other day you were arguing in this very room as to the absurdity of a parliamentary career,--pitching into me, by George, like the very mischief, because I had said something in its favour,--and now you are going in for it yourself in some sort of mysterious way that a fellow can't understand." It was quite clear that Everett Wharton thought himself ill-used by his friend's success. "There is no mystery;--only I can't tell people's names." "What is the borough?" "I cannot tell you that at present." "Are you sure there will be a vacancy?" "I think I am sure." "And that you will be invited to stand?" "I am not sure of that." "Of course anybody can stand whether invited or not." "If I come forward for this place I shall do so on the very best interest. Don't mention it. I tell you because I already regard my connection with you as being so close as to call upon me to tell you anything of that kind." "And yet you do not tell me the details." "I tell you all that I can in honour tell." Everett Wharton certainly felt aggrieved by his friend's news, and plainly showed that he did so. It was so hard that if a stray seat in Parliament were going a-begging, it should be thrown in the way of this man who didn't care for it, and couldn't use it to any good purpose, instead of in his own way! Why should any one want Ferdinand Lopez to be in Parliament? Ferdinand Lopez had paid no attention to the great political questions of the Commonwealth. He knew nothing of Labour and Capital, of Unions, Strikes, and Lock-outs. But because he was rich, and, by being rich, had made his way among great people, he was to have a seat in Parliament! As for the wealth, it might be at his own command also,--if only his father could be got to see the matter in a proper light. And as for the friendship of great people,--Prime Ministers, Duchesses, and such like,--Everett Wharton was quite confident that he was at any rate as well qualified to shine among them as Ferdinand Lopez. He was of too good a nature to be stirred to injustice against his friend by the soreness of this feeling. He did not wish to rob his friend of his wealth, of his Duchesses, or of his embryo seat in Parliament. But for the moment there came upon him a doubt whether Ferdinand was so very clever, or so peculiarly gentlemanlike or in any way very remarkable, and almost a conviction that he was very far from being good-looking. They dined together, and quite late in the evening they strolled out into St. James's Park. There was nobody in London, and there was nothing for either of them to do, and therefore they agreed to walk round the park, dark and gloomy as they knew the park would be. Lopez had seen and had quite understood the bitterness of spirit by which Everett had been oppressed, and with that peculiarly imperturbable good humour which made a part of his character bore it all, even with tenderness. He was a man, as are many of his race, who could bear contradictions, unjust suspicions, and social ill-treatment without a shadow of resentment, but who, if he had a purpose, could carry it out without a shadow of a scruple. Everett Wharton had on this occasion made himself very unpleasant, and Lopez had borne with him as an angel would hardly have done; but should Wharton ever stand in his friend's way, his friend would sacrifice him without compunction. As it was, Lopez bore with him, simply noting in his own mind that Everett Wharton was a greater ass than he had taken him to be. It was Wharton's idea that they should walk round the park, and Lopez for a time had discouraged the suggestion. "It is a wretchedly dark place at night, and you don't know whom you may meet there." "You don't mean to say that you are afraid to walk round St. James's Park with me, because it's dark!" said Wharton. "I certainly should be afraid by myself, but I don't know that I am afraid with you. But what's the good?" "It's better than sitting here doing nothing, without a soul to speak to. I've already smoked half-a-dozen cigars, till I'm so muddled I don't know what I'm about. It's so hot one can't walk in the day, and this is just the time for exercise." Lopez yielded, being willing to yield in almost anything at present to the brother of Emily Wharton; and, though the thing seemed to him to be very foolish, they entered the park by St. James's Palace, and started to walk round it, turning to the right and going in front of Buckingham Palace. As they went on Wharton still continued his accusation against his father and said also some sharp things against Lopez himself, till his companion began to think that the wine he had drunk had been as bad as the cigars. "I can't understand your wanting to go into Parliament," he said. "What do you know about it?" "If I get there, I can learn like anybody else, I suppose." "Half of those who go there don't learn. They are, as it were, born to it, and they do very well to support this party or that." "And why shouldn't I support this party,--or that?" "I don't suppose you know which party you would support,--except that you'd vote for the Duke, if, as I suppose, you are to get in under the Duke's influence. If I went into the House I should go with a fixed and settled purpose of my own." "I'm not there yet," said Lopez, willing to drop the subject. "It will be a great expense to you, and will stand altogether in the way of your profession. As far as Emily is concerned, I should think my father would be dead against it." "Then he would be unreasonable." "Not at all, if he thought you would injure your professional prospects. It is a d---- piece of folly; that's the long and the short of it." This certainly was very uncivil, and it almost made Lopez angry. But he had made up his mind that his friend was a little the worse for the wine he had drunk, and therefore he did not resent even this. "Never mind politics and Parliament now," he said, "but let us get home. I am beginning to be sick of this. It's so awfully dark, and whenever I do hear a step, I think somebody is coming to rob us. Let us get on a bit." "What the deuce are you afraid of?" said Everett. They had then come up the greater part of the length of the Birdcage Walk, and the lights at Storey's Gate were just visible, but the road on which they were then walking was very dark. The trees were black over their head, and not a step was heard near them. At this time it was just midnight. Now, certainly, among the faults which might be justly attributed to Lopez, personal cowardice could not be reckoned. On this evening he had twice spoken of being afraid, but the fear had simply been that which ordinary caution indicates; and his object had been that of hindering Wharton in the first place from coming into the park, and then of getting him out of it as quickly as possible. "Come along," said Lopez. "By George, you are in a blue funk," said the other. "I can hear your teeth chattering." Lopez, who was beginning to be angry, walked on and said nothing. It was too absurd, he thought, for real anger, but he kept a little in front of Wharton, intending to show that he was displeased. "You had better run away at once," said Wharton. "Upon my word, I shall begin to think that you're tipsy," said Lopez. "Tipsy!" said the other. "How dare you say such a thing to me? You never in your life saw me in the least altered by any thing I had drunk." Lopez knew that at any rate this was untrue. "I've seen you as drunk as Cloe before now," said he. "That's a lie," said Everett Wharton. "Come, Wharton," said the other, "do not disgrace yourself by conduct such as that. Something has put you out, and you do not know what you are saying. I can hardly imagine that you should wish to insult me." "It was you who insulted me. You said I was drunk. When you said it you knew it was untrue." Lopez walked on a little way in silence, thinking over this most absurd quarrel. Then he turned round and spoke. "This is all the greatest nonsense I ever heard in the world. I'll go on and go to bed, and to-morrow morning you'll think better of it. But pray remember that under no circumstances should you call a man a liar, unless on cool consideration you are determined to quarrel with him for lying, and determined also to see the quarrel out." "I am quite ready to see this quarrel out." "Good night," said Lopez, starting off at a quick pace. They were then close to the turn in the park, and Lopez went on till he had nearly reached the park front of the new offices. As he had walked he had listened to the footfall of his friend, and after a while had perceived, or had thought that he had perceived, that the sound was discontinued. It seemed to him that Wharton had altogether lost his senses;--the insult to himself had been so determined and so absolutely groundless! He had striven his best to conquer the man's ill-humour by good-natured forbearance, and had only suggested that Wharton was perhaps tipsy in order to give him some excuse. But if his companion were really drunk, as he now began to think, could it be right to leave him unprotected in the park? The man's manner had been strange the whole evening, but there had been no sign of the effect of wine till after they had left the club. But Lopez had heard of men who had been apparently sober, becoming drunk as soon as they got out into the air. It might have been so in this case, though Wharton's voice and gait had not been those of a drunken man. At any rate, he would turn back and look after him; and as he did turn back, he resolved that whatever Wharton might say to him on this night he would not notice. He was too wise to raise a further impediment to his marriage by quarrelling with Emily's brother. As soon as he paused he was sure that he heard footsteps behind him which were not those of Everett Wharton. Indeed, he was sure that he heard the footsteps of more than one person. He stood still for a moment to listen, and then he distinctly heard a rush and a scuffle. He ran back to the spot at which he had left his friend, and at first thought that he perceived a mob of people in the dusk. But as he got nearer, he saw that there were a man and two women. Wharton was on the ground, on his back, and the man was apparently kneeling on his neck and head while the women were rifling his pockets. Lopez, hardly knowing how he was acting, was upon them in a moment, flying in the first place at the man, who had jumped up to meet him as he came. He received at once a heavy blow on his head from some weapon, which, however, his hat so far stopped as to save him from being felled or stunned, and then he felt another blow from behind on the ear, which he afterwards conceived to have been given him by one of the women. But before he could well look about him, or well know how the whole thing had happened, the man and the two women had taken to their legs, and Wharton was standing on his feet leaning against the iron railings. The whole thing had occupied a very short space of time, and yet the effects were very grave. At the first moment Lopez looked round and endeavoured to listen, hoping that some assistance might be near,--some policeman, or, if not that, some wanderer by night who might be honest enough to help him. But he could hear or see no one, In this condition of things it was not possible for him to pursue the ruffians, as he could not leave his friend leaning against the park rails. It was at once manifest to him that Wharton had been much hurt, or at any rate incapacitated for immediate exertion, by the blows he had received;--and as he put his hand up to his own head, from which in the scuffle his hat had fallen, he was not certain that he was not severely hurt himself. Lopez could see that Wharton was very pale, that his cravat had been almost wrenched from his neck by pressure, that his waistcoat was torn open and the front of his shirt soiled,--and he could see also that a fragment of the watch-chain was hanging loose, showing that the watch was gone. "Are you hurt much?" he said, coming close up and taking a tender hold of his friend's arm. Wharton smiled and shook his head, but spoke not a word. He was in truth more shaken, stunned, and bewildered than actually injured. The ruffian's fist had been at his throat, twisting his cravat, and for half a minute he had felt that he was choked. As he had struggled while one woman pulled at his watch and the other searched for his purse,--struggling, alas! unsuccessfully,--the man had endeavoured to quiet him by kneeling on his chest, strangling him with his own necktie, and pressing hard on his gullet. It is a treatment which, after a few seconds of vigorous practice, is apt to leave the patient for a while disconcerted and unwilling to speak. "Say a word if you can," whispered Lopez, looking into the other man's face with anxious eyes. At the moment there came across Wharton's mind a remembrance that he had behaved very badly to his friend, and some sort of vague misty doubt whether all this evil had not befallen him because of his misconduct. But he knew at the same time that Lopez was not responsible for the evil, and dismayed as he had been, still he recalled enough of the nature of the struggle in which he had been engaged, to be aware that Lopez had befriended him gallantly. He could not even yet speak; but he saw the blood trickling down his friend's temple and forehead, and lifting up his hand, touched the spot with his fingers. Lopez also put his hand up, and drew it away covered with blood. "Oh," said he, "that does not signify in the least. I got a knock, I know, and I am afraid I have lost my hat, but I'm not hurt." "Oh, dear!" The word was uttered with a low sigh. Then there was a pause, during which Lopez supported the sufferer. "I thought that it was all over with me at one moment." "You will be better now." "Oh, yes. My watch is gone!" "I fear it is," said Lopez. "And my purse," said Wharton, collecting his strength together sufficiently to search for his treasures. "I had eight £5 notes in it." "Never mind your money or your watch if your bones are not broken." "It's a bore all the same to lose every shilling that one has." Then they walked very slowly away towards the steps at the Duke of York's column, Wharton regaining his strength as he went, but still able to progress but leisurely. Lopez had not found his hat, and, being covered with blood, was, as far as appearances went, in a worse plight than the other. At the foot of the steps they met a policeman, to whom they told their story, and who, as a matter of course, was filled with an immediate desire to arrest them both. To the policeman's mind it was most distressing that a bloody-faced man without a hat, with a companion almost too weak to walk, should not be conveyed to a police-station. But after ten minutes' parley, during which Wharton sat on the bottom step and Lopez explained all the circumstances, he consented to get them a cab, to take their address, and then to go alone to the station and make his report. That the thieves had got off with their plunder was only too manifest. Lopez took the injured man home to the house in Manchester Square, and then returned in the same cab, hatless, to his own lodgings. As he returned he applied his mind to think how he could turn the events of the evening to his own use. He did not believe that Everett Wharton was severely hurt. Indeed there might be a question whether in the morning his own injury would not be the most severe. But the immediate effect on the flustered and despoiled unfortunate one had been great enough to justify Lopez in taking strong steps if strong steps could in any way benefit himself. Would it be best to publish this affair on the house-tops, or to bury it in the shade, as nearly as it might be buried? He had determined in his own mind that his friend certainly had been tipsy. In no other way could his conduct be understood. And a row with a tipsy man at midnight in the park is not, at first sight, creditable. But it could be made to have a better appearance if told by himself, than if published from other quarters. The old housekeeper at Manchester Square must know something about it, and would, of course, tell what she knew, and the loss of the money and the watch must in all probability be made known. Before he had reached his own door he had quite made up his mind that he himself would tell the story after his own fashion. And he told it, before he went to bed that night. He washed the blood from his face and head, and cut away a part of the clotted hair, and then wrote a letter to old Mr. Wharton at Wharton Hall. And between three and four o'clock in the morning he went out and posted his letter in the nearest pillar, so that it might go down by the day mail and certainly be preceded by no other written tidings. The letter which he sent was as follows:-- DEAR MR. WHARTON, I regret to have to send you an account of a rather serious accident which has happened to Everett. I am now writing at 3 A.M., having just taken him home, and it occurred at about midnight. You may be quite sure that there is no danger or I should have advertised you by telegram. There is nothing doing in town, and therefore, as the night was fine, we, very foolishly, agreed to walk round St. James's Park late after dinner. It is a kind of thing that nobody does;--but we did it. When we had nearly got round I was in a hurry, whereas Everett was for strolling slowly, and so I went on before him. But I was hardly two hundred yards in front of him before he was attacked by three persons, a man and two women. The man I presume came upon him from behind, but he has not sufficiently collected his thoughts to remember exactly what occurred. I heard the scuffle and of course turned back,--and was luckily in time to get up before he was seriously hurt. I think the man would otherwise have strangled him. I am sorry to say that he lost both his watch and purse. He undoubtedly has been very much shaken, and altogether "knocked out of time," as people say. Excuse the phrase, because I think it will best explain what I want you to understand. The man's hand at his throat must have stopped his breathing for some seconds. He certainly has received no permanent injury, but I should not wonder if he should be unwell for some days. I tell you all exactly as it occurred, as it strikes me that you may like to run up to town for a day just to look at him. But you need not do so on the score of any danger. Of course he will see a doctor to-morrow. There did not seem to be any necessity for calling one up to-night. We did give notice to the police as we were coming home, but I fear the ruffians had ample time for escape. He was too weak, and I was too fully employed with him, to think of pursuing them at the time. Of course he is at Manchester Square. Most faithfully yours, FERDINAND LOPEZ. He did not say a word about Emily, but he knew that Emily would see the letter and would perceive that he had been the means of preserving her brother; and, in regard to the old barrister himself, Lopez thought that the old man could not but feel grateful for his conduct. He had in truth behaved very well to Everett. He had received a heavy blow on the head in young Wharton's defence,--of which he was determined to make good use, though he had thought it expedient to say nothing about the blow in his letter. Surely it would all help. Surely the paternal mind would be softened towards him when the father should be made to understand how great had been his service to the son. That Everett would make little of what had been done for him he did not in the least fear. Everett Wharton was sometimes silly but was never ungenerous. In spite of his night's work Lopez was in Manchester Square before nine on the following morning, and on the side of his brow he bore a great patch of black plaster. "My head is very thick," he said laughing, when Everett asked after his wound. "But it would have gone badly with me if the ruffian had struck an inch lower. I suppose my hat saved me, though I remember very little. Yes, old fellow, I have written to your father, and I think he will come up. It was better that it should be so." "There is nothing the matter with me," said Everett. "One didn't quite know last night whether there was or no. At any rate his coming won't hurt you. It's always well to have your banker near you, when your funds are low." Then after a pause Everett made his apology,--"I know I made a great ass of myself last night." "Don't think about it." "I used a word I shouldn't have used, and I beg your pardon." "Not another word, Everett. Between you and me things can't go wrong. We love each other too well." CHAPTER XXIII Surrender The letter given in the previous chapter was received at Wharton Hall late in the evening of the day on which it was written, and was discussed among all the Whartons that night. Of course there was no doubt as to the father's going up to town on the morrow. The letter was just such a letter as would surely make a man run to his son's bedside. Had the son written himself it would have been different; but the fact that the letter had come from another man seemed to be evidence that the poor sufferer could not write. Perhaps the urgency with which Lopez had sent off his dispatch, getting his account of the fray ready for the very early day mail, though the fray had not taken place till midnight, did not impress them sufficiently when they accepted this as evidence of Everett's dangerous condition. At this conference at Wharton very little was said about Lopez, but there was a general feeling that he had behaved well. "It was very odd that they should have parted in the park," said Sir Alured. "But very lucky that they should not have parted sooner," said John Fletcher. If a grain of suspicion against Lopez might have been set afloat in their minds by Sir Alured's suggestion, it was altogether dissipated by John Fletcher's reply;--for everybody there knew that John Fletcher carried common sense for the two families. Of course they all hated Ferdinand Lopez, but nothing could be extracted from the incident, as far as its details were yet known to them, which could be turned to his injury. While they sat together discussing the matter in the drawing-room Emily Wharton hardly said a word. She uttered a little shriek when the account of the affair was first read to her, and then listened with silent attention to what was said around her. When there had seemed for a moment to be a doubt,--or rather a question, for there had been no doubt,--whether her father should go at once to London, she had spoken just a word. "Of course you will go, papa." After that, she said nothing till she came to him in his own room. "Of course I will go with you to-morrow, papa." "I don't think that will be necessary." "Oh, yes. Think how wretched I should be." "I would telegraph to you immediately." "And I shouldn't believe the telegraph. Don't you know how it always is? Besides we have been more than the usual time. We were to go to town in ten days, and you would not think of returning to fetch me. Of course I will go with you. I have already begun to pack my things, and Jane is now at it." Her father, not knowing how to oppose her, yielded, and Emily before she went to bed had made the ladies of the house aware that she also intended to start the next morning at eight o'clock. During the first part of the journey very little was said between Mr. Wharton and Emily. There were other persons in the carriage, and she, though she had determined in some vague way that she would speak some words to her father before she reached their own house, had still wanted time to resolve what those words should be. But before she had reached Gloucester she had made up her mind, and going on from Gloucester she found herself for a time alone with her father. She was sitting opposite to him, and after conversing for a while she touched his knee with her hand. "Papa," she said, "I suppose I must now have to meet Mr. Lopez in Manchester Square?" "Why should you have to meet Mr. Lopez in Manchester Square?" "Of course he will come there to see Everett. After what has occurred you can hardly forbid him the house. He has saved Everett's life." "I don't know that he has done anything of the kind," said Mr. Wharton, who was vacillating between different opinions. He did in his heart believe that the Portuguese whom he so hated had saved his son from the thieves, and he also had almost come to the conviction that he must give his daughter to the man,--but at the same time he could not as yet bring himself to abandon his opposition to the marriage. "Perhaps you think the story is not true." "I don't doubt the story in the least. Of course one man sticks to another in such an affair, and I have no doubt that Mr. Lopez behaved as any English gentleman would." "Any English gentleman, papa, would have to come afterwards and see the friend he had saved. Don't you think so?" "Oh, yes;--he might call." "And Mr. Lopez will have an additional reason for calling,--and I know he will come. Don't you think he will come?" "I don't want to think anything about it," said the father. "But I want you to think about it, papa. Papa, I know you are not indifferent to my happiness." "I hope you know it." "I do know it. I am quite sure of it. And therefore I don't think you ought to be afraid to talk to me about what must concern my happiness so greatly. As far as my own self and my own will are concerned I consider myself given away to Mr. Lopez already. Nothing but his marrying some other woman,--or his death,--would make me think of myself otherwise than as belonging to him. I am not a bit ashamed of owning my love--to you; nor to him, if the opportunity were allowed me. I don't think there should be concealment about anything so important between people who are dear to each other. I have told you that I will do whatever you bid me about him. If you say that I shall not speak to him or see him, I will not speak to him or see him--willingly. You certainly need not be afraid that I should marry him without your leave." "I am not in the least afraid of it." "But I think you should think over what you are doing. And I am quite sure of this,--that you must tell me what I am to do in regard to receiving Mr. Lopez in Manchester Square." Mr. Wharton listened attentively to what his daughter said to him, shaking his head from time to time as though almost equally distracted by her passive obedience and by her passionate protestations of love; but he said nothing. When she had completed her supplication he threw himself back in his seat and after a while took his book. It may be doubted whether he read much, for the question as to his girl's happiness was quite as near his heart as she could wish it to be. It was late in the afternoon before they reached Manchester Square, and they were both happy to find that they were not troubled by Mr. Lopez at the first moment. Everett was at home and in bed, and had not indeed as yet recovered from the effect of the man's knuckles at his windpipe; but he was well enough to assure his father and sister that they need not have disturbed themselves or hurried their return from Herefordshire on his account. "To tell the truth," said he, "Ferdinand Lopez was hurt worse than I was." "He said nothing of being hurt himself," said Mr. Wharton. "How was he hurt?" asked Emily in the quietest, stillest voice. "The fact is," said Everett, beginning to tell the whole story after his own fashion, "if he hadn't been at hand then, there would have been an end of me. We had separated, you know,--" "What could make two men separate from each other in the darkness of St. James's Park?" "Well,--to tell the truth, we had quarrelled. I had made an ass of myself. You need not go into that any further, except that you should know that it was all my fault. Of course it wasn't a real quarrel,"--when he said this Emily, who was sitting close to his bed-head, pressed his arm under the clothes with her hand,--"but I had said something rough, and he had gone on just to put an end to it." "It was uncommonly foolish," said old Wharton. "It was very foolish going round the park at all at that time of night." "No doubt, sir;--but it was my doing. And if he had not gone with me, I should have gone alone." Here there was another pressure. "I was a little low in spirits, and wanted the walk." "But how is he hurt?" asked the father. "The man who was kneeling on me and squeezing the life out of me jumped up when he heard Lopez coming, and struck him over the head with a bludgeon. I heard the blow, though I was pretty well done for at the time myself. I don't think they hit me, but they got something round my neck, and I was half strangled before I knew what they were doing. Poor Lopez bled horribly, but he says he is none the worse for it." Here there was another little pressure under the bed-clothes; for Emily felt that her brother was pleading for her in every word that he said. About ten on the following morning Lopez came and asked for Mr. Wharton. He was shown into the study, where he found the old man, and at once began to give his account of the whole concern in an easy, unconcerned manner. He had the large black patch on the side of his head, which had been so put on as almost to become him. But it was so conspicuous as to force a question respecting it from Mr. Wharton. "I am afraid you got rather a sharp knock yourself, Mr. Lopez?" "I did get a knock, certainly;--but the odd part of it is that I knew nothing about it till I found the blood in my eyes after they had decamped. But I lost my hat, and there is a rather long cut just above the temple. It hasn't done me the slightest harm. The worst of it was that they got off with Everett's watch and money." "Had he much money?" "Forty pounds!" And Lopez shook his head, thereby signifying that forty pounds at the present moment was more than Everett Wharton could afford to lose. Upon the whole he carried himself very well, ingratiating himself with the father, raising no question about the daughter, and saying as little as possible of himself. He asked whether he could go up and see his friend, and of course was allowed to do so. A minute before he entered the room Emily left it. They did not see each other. At any rate he did not see her. But there was a feeling with both of them that the other was close,--and there was something present to them, almost amounting to conviction, that the accident of the park robbery would be good for them. "He certainly did save Everett's life," Emily said to her father the next day. "Whether he did or not, he did his best," said Mr. Wharton. "When one's dearest relation is concerned," said Emily, "and when his life has been saved, one feels that one has to be grateful even if it has been an accident. I hope he knows, at any rate, that I am grateful." The old man had not been a week in London before he knew that he had absolutely lost the game. Mrs. Roby came back to her house round the corner, ostensibly with the object of assisting her relatives in nursing Everett,--a purpose for which she certainly was not needed; but, as the matter progressed, Mr. Wharton was not without suspicion that her return had been arranged by Ferdinand Lopez. She took upon herself, at any rate, to be loud in the praise of the man who had saved the life of her "darling nephew,"--and to see that others also should be loud in his praise. In a little time all London had heard of the affair, and it had been discussed out of London. Down at Gatherum Castle the matter had been known, or partly known,--but the telling of it had always been to the great honour and glory of the hero. Major Pountney had almost broken his heart over it, and Captain Gunner, writing to his friend from the Curragh, had asserted his knowledge that it was all a "got-up thing" between the two men. The "Breakfast Table" and the "Evening Pulpit" had been loud in praise of Lopez; but the "People's Banner," under the management of Mr. Quintus Slide, had naturally thrown much suspicion on the incident when it became known to the Editor that Ferdinand Lopez had been entertained by the Duke and Duchess of Omnium. "We have always felt some slight doubts as to the details of the affair said to have happened about a fortnight ago, just at midnight, in St. James's Park. We should be glad to know whether the policemen have succeeded in tracing any of the stolen property, or whether any real attempt to trace it has been made." This was one of the paragraphs, and it was hinted still more plainly afterwards that Everett Wharton, being short of money, had arranged the plan with the view of opening his father's purse. But the general effect was certainly serviceable to Lopez. Emily Wharton did believe him to be a hero. Everett was beyond measure grateful to him,--not only for having saved him from the thieves, but also for having told nothing of his previous folly. Mrs. Roby always alluded to the matter as if, for all coming ages, every Wharton ought to acknowledge that gratitude to a Lopez was the very first duty of life. The old man felt the absurdity of much of this, but still it affected him. When Lopez came he could not be rough to the man who had done a service to his son. And then he found himself compelled to do something. He must either take his daughter away, or he must yield. But his power of taking his daughter away seemed to be less than it had been. There was an air of quiet, unmerited suffering about her, which quelled him. And so he yielded. It was after this fashion. Whether affected by the violence of the attack made on him, or from other cause, Everett had been unwell after the affair, and had kept his room for a fortnight. During this time Lopez came to see him daily, and daily Emily Wharton had to take herself out of the man's way, and hide herself from the man's sight. This she did with much tact and with lady-like quietness, but not without an air of martyrdom, which cut her father to the quick. "My dear," he said to her one evening, as she was preparing to leave the drawing-room on hearing his knock, "stop and see him if you like it." "Papa!" "I don't want to make you wretched. If I could have died first, and got out of the way, perhaps it would have been better." "Papa, you will kill me if you speak in that way! If there is anything to say to him, do you say it." And then she escaped. Well! It was an added bitterness, but no doubt it was his duty. If he did intend to consent to the marriage, it certainly was for him to signify that consent to the man. It would not be sufficient that he should get out of the way and leave his girl to act for herself as though she had no friend in the world. The surrender which he had made to his daughter had come from a sudden impulse at the moment, but it could not now be withdrawn. So he stood out on the staircase, and when Lopez came up on his way to Everett's bedroom, he took him by the arm and led him into the drawing-room. "Mr. Lopez," he said, "you know that I have not been willing to welcome you into my house as a son-in-law. There are reasons on my mind,--perhaps prejudices,--which are strong against it. They are as strong now as ever. But she wishes it, and I have the utmost reliance on her constancy." "So have I," said Lopez. "Stop a moment, if you please, sir. In such a position a father's thought is only as to his daughter's happiness and prosperity. It is not his own that he should consider. I hear you well spoken of in the outer world, and I do not know that I have a right to demand of my daughter that she should tear you from her affections, because--because you are not just such as I would have her husband to be. You have my permission to see her." Then, before Lopez could say a word, he left the room, and took his hat and hurried away to his club. As he went he was aware that he had made no terms at all;--but then he was inclined to think that no terms should be made. There seemed to be a general understanding that Lopez was doing well in the world,--in a profession of the working of which Mr. Wharton himself knew absolutely nothing. He had a large fortune at his own bestowal,--intended for his daughter,--which would have been forthcoming at the moment and paid down on the nail, had she married Arthur Fletcher. The very way in which the money should be invested and tied up and made to be safe and comfortable to the Fletcher-cum-Wharton interests generally, had been fully settled among them. But now this other man, this stranger, this Portuguese, had entered in upon the inheritance. But the stranger, the Portuguese, must wait. Mr. Wharton knew himself to be an old man. She was his child, and he would not wrong her. But she should have her money closely settled upon herself on his death,--and on her children, should she then have any. It should be done by his will. He would say nothing about money to Lopez, and if Lopez should, as was probable, ask after his daughter's fortune, he would answer to this effect. Thus he almost resolved that he would give his daughter to the man without any inquiry as to the man's means. The thing had to be done, and he would take no further trouble about it. The comfort of his life was gone. His home would no longer be a home to him. His daughter could not now be his companion. The sooner that death came to him the better, but till death should come he must console himself as well as he could by playing whist at the Eldon. It was after this fashion that Mr. Wharton thought of the coming marriage between his daughter and her lover. "I have your father's consent to marry your sister," said Ferdinand immediately on entering Everett's room. "I knew it must come soon," said the invalid. "I cannot say that it has been given in the most gracious manner,--but it has been given very clearly. I have his express permission to see her. Those were his last words." Then there was a sending of notes between the sick-room and the sick man's sister's room. Everett wrote and Ferdinand wrote, and Emily wrote,--short lines each of them,--a few words scrawled. The last from Emily was as follows:--"Let him go into the drawing-room. E. W." And so Ferdinand went down, to meet his love,--to encounter her for the first time as her recognised future husband and engaged lover. Passionate, declared, and thorough as was her love for this man, the familiar intercourse between them had hitherto been very limited. There had been little,--we may perhaps say none,--of that dalliance between them which is so delightful to the man and so wondrous to the girl till custom has staled the edge of it. He had never sat with his arm round her waist. He had rarely held even her hand in his for a happy recognised pause of a few seconds. He had never kissed even her brow. And there she was now, standing before him, all his own, absolutely given to him, with the fullest assurance of love on her part, and with the declared consent of her father. Even he had been a little confused as he opened the door,--even he, as he paused to close it behind him, had had to think how he would address her, and perhaps had thought in vain. But he had not a moment for any thought after entering the room. Whether it was his doing or hers he hardly knew; but she was in his arms, and her lips were pressed to his, and his arm was tight round her waist, holding her close to his breast. It seemed as though all that was wanting had been understood in a moment, and as though they had lived together and loved for the last twelve months with the fullest mutual confidence. And she was the first to speak:-- "Ferdinand, I am so happy! Are you happy?" "My love; my darling!" "You have never doubted me, I know,--since you first knew it." "Doubted you, my girl!" "That I would be firm! And now papa has been good to me, and how quickly one's sorrow is over. I am yours, my love, for ever and ever. You knew it before, but I like to tell you. I will be true to you in everything! Oh, my love!" He had but little to say to her, but we know that for "lovers lacking matter, the cleanliest shift is to kiss." In such moments silence charms, and almost any words are unsuitable except those soft, bird-like murmurings of love which, sweet as they are to the ear, can hardly be so written as to be sweet to the reader. CHAPTER XXIV The Marriage The engagement was made in October, and the marriage took place in the latter part of November. When Lopez pressed for an early day,--which he did very strongly,--Emily raised no difficulties in the way of his wishes. The father, foolishly enough, would at first have postponed it, and made himself so unpleasant to Lopez by his manner of doing this, that the bride was driven to take her lover's part. As the thing was to be done, what was to be gained by delay? It could not be made a joy to him; nor, looking at the matter as he looked at it, could he make a joy even of her presence during the few intervening weeks. Lopez proposed to take his bride into Italy for the winter months, and to stay there at any rate through December and January, alleging that he must be back in town by the beginning of February;--and this was taken as a fair plea for hastening the marriage. When the matter was settled, he went back to Gatherum Castle, as he had arranged to do with the Duchess, and managed to interest her Grace in all his proceedings. She promised that she would call on his bride in town, and even went so far as to send her a costly wedding present. "You are sure she has got money?" said the Duchess. "I am not sure of anything," said Lopez,--"except this, that I do not mean to ask a single question about it. If he says nothing to me about money, I certainly shall say nothing to him. My feeling is this, Duchess; I am not marrying Miss Wharton for her money. The money, if there be any, has had nothing to do with it. But of course it will be a pleasure added if it be there." The Duchess complimented him, and told him that this was exactly as it should be. But there was some delay as to the seat for Silverbridge. Mr. Grey's departure for Persia had been postponed,--the Duchess thought only for a month or six weeks. The Duke, however, was of opinion that Mr. Grey should not vacate his seat till the day of his going was at any rate fixed. The Duke, moreover, had not made any promise of supporting his wife's favourite. "Don't set your heart upon it too much, Mr. Lopez," the Duchess had said; "but you may be sure I will not forget you." Then it had been settled between them that the marriage should not be postponed, or the proposed trip to Italy abandoned, because of the probable vacancy at Silverbridge. Should the vacancy occur during his absence, and should the Duke consent, he could return at once. All this occurred in the last week or two before his marriage. There were various little incidents which did not tend to make the happiness of Emily Wharton complete. She wrote to her cousin Mary Wharton, and also to Lady Wharton;--and her father wrote to Sir Alured; but the folk at Wharton Hall did not give in their adherence. Old Mrs. Fletcher was still there, but John Fletcher had gone home to Longbarns. The obduracy of the Whartons might probably be owing to these two accidents. Mrs. Fletcher declared aloud, as soon as the tidings reached her, that she never wished to see or hear anything more of Emily Wharton. "She must be a girl," said Mrs. Fletcher, "of an ingrained vulgar taste." Sir Alured, whose letter from Mr. Wharton had been very short, replied as shortly to his cousin. "Dear Abel,--We all hope that Emily will be happy, though of course we regret the marriage." The father, though he had not himself written triumphantly, or even hopefully,--as fathers are wont to write when their daughters are given away in marriage,--was wounded by the curtness and unkindness of the baronet's reply, and at the moment declared to himself that he would never go to Herefordshire any more. But on the following day there came a worse blow than Sir Alured's single line. Emily, not in the least doubting but that her request would be received with the usual ready assent, had asked Mary Wharton to be one of her bridesmaids. It must be supposed that the answer to this was written, if not under the dictation, at any rate under the inspiration, of Mrs. Fletcher. It was as follows:-- DEAR EMILY, Of course we all wish you to be very happy in your marriage, but equally of course we are all disappointed. We had taught ourselves to think that you would have bound yourself closer with us down here, instead of separating yourself entirely from us. Under all the circumstances mamma thinks it would not be wise for me to go up to London as one of your bridesmaids. Your affectionate Cousin, MARY WHARTON. This letter made poor Emily very angry for a day or two. "It is as unreasonable as it is ill-natured," she said to her brother. "What else could you expect from a stiff-necked, prejudiced set of provincial ignoramuses?" "What Mary says is not true. She did not think that I was going to bind myself closer with them, as she calls it. I have been quite open with her, and have always told her that I could not be Arthur Fletcher's wife." "Why on earth should you marry to please them?" "Because they don't know Ferdinand they are determined to insult him. It is an insult never to mention even his name. And to refuse to come to my marriage! The world is wide and there is room for us and them; but it makes me unhappy,--very unhappy,--that I should have to break with them." And then the tears came into her eyes. It was intended, no doubt, to be a complete breach, for not a single wedding present was sent from Wharton Hall to the bride. But from Longbarns,--from John Fletcher himself,--there did come an elaborate coffee-pot, which, in spite of its inutility and ugliness, was very valuable to Emily. But there was one other of her old Herefordshire friends who received the tidings of her marriage without quarrelling with her. She herself had written to her old lover. MY DEAR ARTHUR, There has been so much true friendship and affection between us that I do not like that you should hear from any one but myself the news that I am going to be married to Mr. Lopez. We are to be married on the 28th of November,--this day month. Yours affectionately, EMILY WHARTON. To this she received a very short reply;-- DEAR EMILY, I am as I always have been. Yours, A. F. He sent her no present, nor did he say a word to her beyond this; but in her anger against the Herefordshire people she never included Arthur Fletcher. She pored over the little note a score of times, and wept over it, and treasured it up among her inmost treasures, and told herself that it was a thousand pities. She could talk, and did talk, to Ferdinand about the Whartons, and about old Mrs. Fletcher, and described to him the arrogance and the stiffness and the ignorance of the Herefordshire squirearchy generally; but she never spoke to him of Arthur Fletcher,--except in that one narrative of her past life, in which, girl-like, she told her lover of the one other lover who had loved her. But these things of course gave a certain melancholy to the occasion which perhaps was increased by the season of the year,--by the November fogs, and by the emptiness and general sadness of the town. And added to this was the melancholy of old Mr. Wharton himself. After he had given his consent to the marriage he admitted a certain amount of intimacy with his son-in-law, asking him to dinner, and discussing with him matters of general interest,--but never, in truth, opening his heart to him. Indeed, how can any man open his heart to one whom he dislikes? At best he can only pretend to open his heart, and even this Mr. Wharton would not do. And very soon after the engagement Lopez left London and went to the Duke's place in the country. His objects in doing this and his aspirations in regard to a seat in Parliament were all made known to his future wife,--but he said not a word on the subject to her father; and she, acting under his instructions, was equally reticent. "He will get to know me in time," he said to her, "and his manner will be softened towards me. But till that time shall come, I can hardly expect him to take a real interest in my welfare." When Lopez left London not a word had been said between him and his father-in-law as to money. Mr. Wharton was content with such silence, not wishing to make any promise as to immediate income from himself, pretending to look at the matter as though he should say that, as his daughter had made for herself her own bed, she must lie on it, such as it might be. And this silence certainly suited Ferdinand Lopez at the time. To tell the truth of him,--though he was not absolutely penniless, he was altogether propertyless. He had been speculating in money without capital, and though he had now and again been successful, he had also now and again failed. He had contrived that his name should be mentioned here and there with the names of well-known wealthy commercial men, and had for the last twelve months made up a somewhat intimate alliance with that very sound commercial man, Mr. Mills Happerton. But his dealings with Mr. Sextus Parker were in truth much more confidential than those with Mr. Mills Happerton, and at the present moment poor Sexty Parker was alternately between triumph and despair as things went this way or that. It was not, therefore, surprising that Ferdinand Lopez should volunteer no statements to the old lawyer about money, and that he should make no inquiries. He was quite confident that Mr. Wharton had the wealth which was supposed to belong to him, and was willing to trust to his power of obtaining a fair portion of it as soon as he should in truth be Mr. Wharton's son-in-law. Situated as he was, of course he must run some risk. And then, too, he had spoken of himself with a grain of truth when he had told the Duchess that he was not marrying for money. Ferdinand Lopez was not an honest man or a good man. He was a self-seeking, intriguing adventurer, who did not know honesty from dishonesty when he saw them together. But he had at any rate this good about him, that he did love the girl whom he was about to marry. He was willing to cheat all the world,--so that he might succeed, and make a fortune, and become a big and a rich man; but he did not wish to cheat her. It was his ambition now to carry her up with him, and he thought how he might best teach her to assist him in doing so,--how he might win her to help him in his cheating, especially in regard to her own father. For to himself, to his own thinking, that which we call cheating was not dishonesty. To his thinking there was something bold, grand, picturesque, and almost beautiful in the battle which such a one as himself must wage with the world before he could make his way up in it. He would not pick a pocket, or turn a false card, or, as he thought, forge a name. That which he did, and desired to do, took with him the name of speculation. When he persuaded poor Sexty Parker to hazard his all, knowing well that he induced the unfortunate man to believe what was false, and to trust what was utterly untrustworthy, he did not himself think that he was going beyond the lines of fair enterprise. Now, in his marriage, he had in truth joined himself to real wealth. Could he only command at once that which he thought ought to be his wife's share of the lawyer's money, he did not doubt but that he could make a rapid fortune. It would not do for him to seem to be desirous of the money a day before the time;--but, when the time should come, would not his wife help him in his great career? But before she could do so she must be made to understand something of the nature of that career, and of the need of such aid. Of course there arose the question where they should live. But he was ready with an immediate answer to this question. He had been to look at a flat,--a set of rooms,--in the Belgrave Mansions, in Pimlico, or Belgravia you ought more probably to call it. He proposed to take them furnished till they could look about at their leisure and get a house that should suit them. Would she like a flat? She would have liked a cellar with him, and so she told him. Then they went to look at the flat, and old Mr. Wharton condescended to go with them. Though his heart was not in the business, still he thought that he was bound to look after his daughter's comfort. "They are very handsome rooms," said Mr. Wharton, looking round upon the rather gorgeous furniture. "Oh, Ferdinand, are they not too grand?" said Emily. "Perhaps they are a little more than we quite want just at present," he said. "But I'll tell you, sir, just how it has happened. A man I know wanted to let them for one year, just as they are, and offered them to me for £450,--if I could pay the money in advance, at the moment. And so I paid it." "You have taken them, then?" said Mr. Wharton. "Is it all settled?" said Emily, almost with disappointment. "I have paid the money, and I have so far taken them. But it is by no means settled. You have only to say you don't like them, and you shall never be asked to put your foot in them again." "But I do like them," she whispered to him. "The truth is, sir, that there is not the slightest difficulty in parting with them. So that when the chance came in my way I thought it best to secure the thing. It had all to be done, so to say, in an hour. My friend,--as far as he was a friend, for I don't know much about him,--wanted the money and wanted to be off. So here they are, and Emily can do as she likes." Of course the rooms were regarded from that moment as the home for the next twelve months of Mr. and Mrs. Ferdinand Lopez. And then they were married. The marriage was by no means a gay affair, the chief management of it falling into the hands of Mrs. Dick Roby. Mrs. Dick indeed provided not only the breakfast,--or saw rather that it was provided, for of course Mr. Wharton paid the bill,--but the four bridesmaids also, and all the company. They were married in the church in Vere Street, then went back to the house in Manchester Square, and within a couple of hours were on their road to Dover. Through it all not a word was said about money. At the last moment,--when he was free from fear as to any questions about his own affairs,--Lopez had hoped that the old man would say something. "You will find so many thousand pounds at your bankers';"--or, "You may look to me for so many hundreds a year." But there was not a word. The girl had come to him without the assurance of a single shilling. In his great endeavour to get her he had been successful. As he thought of this in the carriage, he pressed his arm close round her waist. If the worst were to come to the worst, he would fight the world for her. But if this old man should be stubborn, close-fisted, and absolutely resolved to bestow all his money upon his son because of this marriage,--ah!--how should he be able to bear such a wrong as that? Half-a-dozen times during that journey to Dover he resolved to think nothing further about it, at any rate for a fortnight; and yet, before he reached Dover, he had said a word to her. "I wonder what your father means to do about money? He never told you?" "Not a word." "It is very odd that he should never have said anything." "Does it matter, dear?" "Not in the least. But of course I have to talk about everything to you;--and it is odd." CHAPTER XXV The Beginning of the Honeymoon On the morning of his marriage, before he went to the altar, Lopez made one or two resolutions as to his future conduct. The first was that he would give himself a fortnight from his marriage day in which he would not even think of money. He had made certain arrangements, in the course of which he had caused Sextus Parker to stare with surprise and to sweat with dismay, but which nevertheless were successfully concluded. Bills were drawn to run over to February, and ready money to a moderate extent was forthcoming, and fiscal tranquillity was insured for a certain short period. The confidence which Sextus Parker had once felt in his friend's own resources was somewhat on the decline, but he still believed in his friend's skill and genius, and, after due inquiry, he believed entirely in his friend's father-in-law. Sextus Parker still thought that things would come round. Ferdinand,--he always now called his friend by his Christian name,--Ferdinand was beautifully, seraphically confident. And Sexty, who had been in a manner magnetised by Ferdinand, was confident too--at certain periods of the day. He was very confident when he had had his two or three glasses of sherry at luncheon, and he was often delightfully confident with his cigar and brandy-and-water at night. But there were periods in the morning in which he would shake with fear and sweat with dismay. But Lopez himself, having with his friend's assistance arranged his affairs comfortably for a month or two, had, as a first resolution, promised himself a fortnight's freedom from all carking cares. His second resolution had been that at the end of the fortnight he would commence his operations on Mr. Wharton. Up to the last moment he had hoped,--had almost expected,--that a sum of money would have been paid to him. Even a couple of thousand pounds for the time would have been of great use to him;--but no tender of any kind had been made. Not a word had been said. Things could not of course go on in that way. He was not going to play the coward with his father-in-law. Then he bethought himself how he would act if his father-in-law were sternly to refuse to do anything for him, and he assured himself that in such circumstances he would make himself very disagreeable to his father-in-law. And then his third resolution had reference to his wife. She must be instructed in his ways. She must learn to look at the world with his eyes. She must be taught the great importance of money,--not in a griping, hard-fisted, prosaic spirit; but that she might participate in that feeling of his own which had in it so much that was grand, so much that was delightful, so much that was picturesque. He would never ask her to be parsimonious,--never even to be economical. He would take a glory in seeing her well dressed and well attended, with her own carriage and her own jewels. But she must learn that the enjoyment of these things must be built upon a conviction that the most important pursuit in the world was the acquiring of money. And she must be made to understand, first of all, that she had a right to at any rate a half of her father's fortune. He had perceived that she had much influence with her father, and she must be taught to use this influence unscrupulously on her husband's behalf. We have already seen that under the pressure of his thoughts he did break his first resolution within an hour or two of his marriage. It is easy for a man to say that he will banish care, so that he may enjoy to the full the delights of the moment. But this is a power which none but a savage possesses,--or perhaps an Irishman. We have learned the lesson from the divines, the philosophers, and the poets. Post equitem sedet atra cura. Thus was Ferdinand Lopez mounted high on his horse,--for he had triumphed greatly in his marriage, and really felt that the world could give him no delight so great as to have her beside him, and her as his own. But the inky devil sat close upon his shoulders. Where would he be at the end of three months if Mr. Wharton would do nothing for him,--and if a certain venture in guano, to which he had tempted Sexty Parker, should not turn out the right way? He believed in the guano and he believed in Mr. Wharton, but it is a terrible thing to have one's whole position in the world hanging upon either an unwilling father-in-law or a probable rise in the value of manure! And then how would he reconcile himself to her if both father-in-law and guano should go against him, and how should he endure her misery? The inky devil had forced him to ask the question even before they had reached Dover. "Does it matter?" she had asked. Then for the time he had repudiated his solicitude, and had declared that no question of money was of much consequence to him,--thereby making his future task with her so much the more difficult. After that he said nothing to her on the subject on that their wedding day,--but he could not prevent himself from thinking of it. Had he gone to the depth of ruin without a wife, what would it have mattered? For years past he had been at the same kind of work,--but while he was unmarried there had been a charm in the very danger. And as a single man he had succeeded, being sometimes utterly impecunious, but still with a capacity of living. Now he had laden himself with a burden of which the very intensity of his love immensely increased the weight. As for not thinking of it, that was impossible. Of course she must help him. Of course she must be taught how imperative it was that she should help him at once. "Is there anything troubles you?" she said, as she sat leaning against him after their dinner in the hotel at Dover. "What should trouble me on such a day as this?" "If there is anything, tell it me. I do not mean to say now, at this moment,--unless you wish it. Whatever may be your troubles, it shall be my greatest happiness, as it is my first duty, to lessen them if I can." The promise was very well. It all went in the right direction. It showed him that she was at any rate prepared to take a part in the joint work of their life. But, nevertheless, she should be spared for the moment. "When there is trouble, you shall be told everything," he said, pressing his lips to her brow, "but there is nothing that need trouble you yet." He smiled as he said this, but there was something in the tone of his voice which told her that there would be trouble. When he was in Paris he received a letter from Parker, to whom he had been obliged to intrust a running address, but from whom he had enforced a promise that there should be no letter-writing unless under very pressing circumstances. The circumstances had not been pressing. The letter contained only one paragraph of any importance, and that was due to what Lopez tried to regard as fidgety cowardice on the part of his ally. "Please to bear in mind that I can't and won't arrange for the bills for £1500 due 3rd February." That was the paragraph. Who had asked him to arrange for these bills? And yet Lopez was well aware that he intended that poor Sexty should "arrange" for them, in the event of his failure to make arrangements with Mr. Wharton. At last he was quite unable to let the fortnight pass by without beginning the lessons which his wife had to learn. As for that first intention as to driving his cares out of his own mind for that time, he had long since abandoned even the attempt. It was necessary to him that a considerable sum of money should be extracted from the father-in-law, at any rate before the end of January, and a week or even a day might be of importance. They had hurried on southwards from Paris, and before the end of the first week had passed over the Simplon, and were at a pleasant inn on the shores of Como. Everything in their travels had been as yet delightful to Emily. This man, of whom she knew in truth so little, had certain good gifts,--gifts of intellect, gifts of temper, gifts of voice and manner and outward appearance,--which had hitherto satisfied her. A husband who is also an eager lover must be delightful to a young bride. And hitherto no lover could have been more tender than Lopez. Every word and every act, every look and every touch, had been loving. Had she known the world better she might have felt, perhaps, that something was expected where so much was given. Perhaps a rougher manner, with some little touch of marital self-assertion, might be a safer commencement of married life,--safer to the wife as coming from her husband. Arthur Fletcher by this time would have asked her to bring him his slippers, taking infinite pride in having his little behests obeyed by so sweet a servitor. That also would have been pleasant to her had her heart in the first instance followed his image; but now also the idolatry of Ferdinand Lopez had been very pleasant. But the moment for the first lesson had come. "Your father has not written to you since you started?" he said. "Not a line. He has not known our address. He is never very good at letter-writing. I did write to him from Paris, and I scribbled a few words to Everett yesterday." "It is very odd that he should never have written to me." "Did you expect him to write?" "To tell you the truth, I rather did. Not that I should have dreamed of his corresponding with me had he spoken to me on a certain subject. But as, on that subject, he never opened his mouth to me, I almost thought he would write." "Do you mean about money?" she asked in a very low voice. "Well;--yes; I do mean about money. Things hitherto have gone so very strangely between us. Sit down, dear, till we have a real domestic talk." "Tell me everything," she said, as she nestled herself close to his side. "You know how it was at first between him and me. He objected to me violently,--I mean openly, to my face. But he based his objection solely on my nationality,--nationality and blood. As to my condition in the world, fortune, or income, he never asked a word. That was strange." "I suppose he thought he knew." "He could not have thought he knew, dearest. But it was not for me to force the subject upon him. You can see that." "I am sure whatever you did was right, Ferdinand." "He is indisputably a rich man,--one who might be supposed to be able and willing to give an only daughter a considerable fortune. Now I certainly had never thought of marrying for money." Here she rubbed her face upon his arm. "I felt that it was not for me to speak of money. If he chose to be reticent, I could be so equally. Had he asked me, I should have told him that I had no fortune, but was making a large though precarious income. It would then be for him to declare what he intended to do. That would, I think, have been preferable. As it is we are all in doubt. In my position a knowledge of what your father intends to do would be most valuable to me." "Should you not ask him?" "I believe there has always been a perfect confidence between you and him?" "Certainly,--as to all our ways of living. But he never said a word to me about money in his life." "And yet, my darling, money is most important." "Of course it is. I know that, Ferdinand." "Would you mind asking?" She did not answer him at once, but sat thinking. And he also paused before he went on with his lesson. But, in order that the lesson should be efficacious, it would be as well that he should tell her as much as he could even at this first lecture. "To tell you the truth, this is quite essential to me at present,--very much more than I had thought it would be when we fixed the day for our marriage." Her mind within her recoiled at this, though she was very careful that he should not feel any such motion in her body. "My business is precarious." "What is your business, Ferdinand?" Poor girl! That she should have been allowed to marry a man, and then have to ask such a question! "It is generally commercial. I buy and sell on speculation. The world, which is shy of new words, has not yet given it a name. I am a good deal at present in the South American trade." She listened, but received no glimmering of an idea from his words. "When we were engaged everything was as bright as roses with me." "Why did you not tell me this before,--so that we might have been more prudent?" "Such prudence would have been horrid to me. But the fact is that I should not now have spoken to you at all, but that since we left England I have had letters from a sort of partner of mine. In our business things will go astray sometimes. It would be of great service to me if I could learn what are your father's intentions." "You want him to give you some money at once." "It would not be unusual, dear,--when there is money to be given. But I want you specially to ask him what he himself would propose to do. He knows already that I have taken a home for you and paid for it, and he knows--. But it does not signify going into that." "Tell me everything." "He is aware that there are many expenses. Of course if he were a poor man there would not be a word about it. I can with absolute truth declare that had he been penniless it would have made no difference as to my suit to you. But it would possibly have made some difference as to our after plans. He is a thorough man of the world, and he must know all that. I am sure he must feel that something is due to you,--and to me as your husband. But he is odd-tempered, and, as I have not spoken to him, he chooses to be silent to me. Now, my darling, you and I cannot afford to wait to see who can be silent the longest." "What do you want me to do?" "To write to him." "And ask him for money?" "Not exactly in that way. I think you should say that we should be glad to know what he intends to do, also saying that a certain sum of money would at present be of use to me." "Would it not be better from you? I only ask, Ferdinand. I never have even spoken to him about money, and of course he would know that you had dictated what I said." "No doubt he would. It is natural that I should do so. I hope the time may come when I may write quite freely to your father myself, but hitherto he has hardly been courteous to me. I would rather that you should write,--if you do not mind it. Write your own letter, and show it me. If there is anything too much or anything too little I will tell you." And so the first lesson was taught. The poor young wife did not at all like the lesson. Even within her own bosom she found no fault with her husband. But she began to understand that the life before her was not to be a life of roses. The first word spoken to her in the train, before it reached Dover, had explained something of this to her. She had felt at once that there would be trouble about money. And now, though she did not at all understand what might be the nature of those troubles, though she had derived no information whatever from her husband's hints about the South American trade, though she was as ignorant as ever of his affairs, yet she felt that the troubles would come soon. But never for a moment did it seem to her that he had been unjust in bringing her into troubled waters. They had loved each other, and therefore, whatever might be the troubles, it was right that they should marry each other. There was not a spark of anger against him in her bosom;--but she was unhappy. He demanded from her the writing of the letter almost immediately after the conversation which has been given above, and of course the letter was written,--written and recopied, for the paragraph about the money was, of course, at last of his wording. And she could not make the remainder of the letter pleasant. The feeling that she was making a demand for money on her father ran through it all. But the reader need only see the passage in which Ferdinand Lopez made his demand,--through her hand. "Ferdinand has been speaking to me about my fortune." It had gone much against the grain with her to write these words, "my fortune." "But I have no fortune," she said. He insisted however, explaining to her that she was entitled to use these words by her father's undoubted wealth. And so, with an aching heart, she wrote them. "Ferdinand has been speaking to me about my fortune. Of course, I told him that I knew nothing, and that as he had never spoken to me about money before our marriage, I had never asked about it. He says that it would be of great service to him to know what are your intentions; and also that he hopes you may find it convenient to allow him to draw upon you for some portion of it at present. He says that £3000 would be of great use to him in his business." That was the paragraph, and the work of writing it was so distasteful to her that she could hardly bring herself to form the letters. It seemed as though she were seizing the advantage of the first moment of her freedom to take a violent liberty with her father. "It is altogether his own fault, my pet," he said to her. "I have the greatest respect in the world for your father, but he has allowed himself to fall into the habit of keeping all his affairs secret from his children; and, of course, as they go out into the world, this secrecy must in some degree be invaded. There is precisely the same thing going on between him and Everett; only Everett is a great deal rougher to him than you are likely to be. He never will let Everett know whether he is to regard himself as a rich man or a poor man." "He gives him an allowance." "Because he cannot help himself. To you he does not do even as much as that, because he can help himself. I have chosen to leave it to him and he has done nothing. But this is not quite fair, and he must be told so. I don't think he could be told in more dutiful language." Emily did not like the idea of telling her father anything which he might not like to hear; but her husband's behests were to her in these, her early married days, quite imperative. CHAPTER XXVI The End of the Honeymoon Mrs. Lopez had begged her father to address his reply to her at Florence, where,--as she explained to him,--they expected to find themselves within a fortnight from the date of her writing. They had reached the lake about the end of November, when the weather had still been fine, but they intended to pass the winter months of December and January within the warmth of the cities. That intervening fortnight was to her a period of painful anticipation. She feared to see her father's handwriting, feeling almost sure that he would be bitterly angry with her. During this time her husband frequently spoke to her about the letter,--about her own letter and her father's expected reply. It was necessary that she should learn her lesson, and she could only do so by having the subject of money made familiar to her ears. It was not a part of his plan to tell her anything of the means by which he hoped to make himself a wealthy man. The less she knew of that the better. But the fact that her father absolutely owed to him a large amount of money as her fortune could not be made too clear to her. He was very desirous to do this in such a manner as not to make her think that he was accusing her,--or that he would accuse her if the money were not forthcoming. But she must learn the fact, and must be imbued with the conviction that her husband would be the most ill-treated of men unless the money were forthcoming. "I am a little nervous about it too," said he, alluding to the expected letter;--"not so much as to the money itself, though that is important; but as to his conduct. If he chooses simply to ignore us after our marriage he will be behaving very badly." She had no answer to make to this. She could not defend her father, because by doing so she would offend her husband. And yet her whole life-long trust in her father could not allow her to think it possible that he should behave ill to them. On their arrival at Florence he went at once to the post-office, but there was as yet no letter. The fortnight, however, which had been named had only just run itself out. They went on from day to day inspecting buildings, looking at pictures, making for themselves a taste in marble and bronze, visiting the lovely villages which cluster on the hills round the city,--doing precisely in this respect as do all young married couples who devote a part of their honeymoon to Florence;--but in all their little journeyings and in all their work of pleasure the inky devil sat not only behind him but behind her also. The heavy care of life was already beginning to work furrows on her face. She would already sit, knitting her brow, as she thought of coming troubles. Would not her father certainly refuse? And would not her husband then begin to be less loving and less gracious to herself? Every day for a week he called at the post-office when he went out with her, and still the letter did not come. "It can hardly be possible," he said at last to her, "that he should decline to answer his own daughter's letter." "Perhaps he is ill," she replied. "If there were anything of that kind Everett would tell us." "Perhaps he has gone back to Herefordshire?" "Of course his letter would go after him. I own it is very singular to me that he should not write. It looks as though he were determined to cast you off from him altogether because you have married against his wishes." "Not that, Ferdinand;--do not say that!" "Well; we shall see." And on the next day they did see. He went to the post-office before breakfast, and on this day he returned with a letter in his hand. She was sitting waiting for him with a book in her lap, and saw the letter at once. "Is it from papa?" she said. He nodded his head as he handed it to her. "Open it and read it, Ferdinand. I have got to be so nervous about it, that I cannot do it. It seems to be so important." "Yes;--it is important," he said with a grim smile, and then he opened the letter. She watched his face closely as he read it, and at first she could tell nothing from it. Then, in that moment, it first occurred to her that he had a wonderful command of his features. All this, however, lasted but half a minute. Then he chucked the letter, lightly, in among the tea-cups, and coming to her took her closely in his arms and almost hurt her by the violence of his repeated kisses. "Has he written kindly?" she said, as soon as she could find her breath to speak. "By George, he's a brick after all. I own I did not think it. My darling, how much I owe you for all the trouble I have given you." "Oh, Ferdinand! if he has been good to you I shall be so happy." "He has been awfully good. Ha, ha, ha!" And then he began walking about the room as he laughed in an unnatural way. "Upon my word it is a pity we didn't say four thousand, or five. Think of his taking me just at my word. It's a great deal better than I expected; that's all I can say. And at the present moment it is of the utmost importance to me." All this did not take above a minute or two, but during that minute or two she had been so bewildered by his manner as almost to fancy that the expressions of his delight had been ironical. He had been so unlike himself as she had known him that she almost doubted the reality of his joy. But when she took the letter and read it, she found that his joy was true enough. The letter was very short, and was as follows:-- MY DEAR EMILY, What you have said under your husband's instruction about money, I find upon consideration to be fair enough. I think he should have spoken to me before his marriage; but then again perhaps I ought to have spoken to him. As it is, I am willing to give him the sum he requires, and I will pay £3000 to his account, if he would tell me where he would have it lodged. Then I shall think I have done my duty by him. What I shall do with the remainder of any money that I may have, I do not think he is entitled to ask. Everett is well again, and as idle as ever. Your aunt Roby is making a fool of herself at Harrogate. I have heard nothing from Herefordshire. Everything is very quiet and lonely here. Your affectionate father, A. WHARTON. As he had dined at the Eldon every day since his daughter had left him, and had played on an average a dozen rubbers of whist daily, he was not justified in complaining of the loneliness of London. The letter seemed to Emily herself to be very cold, and had not her husband rejoiced over it so warmly she would have considered it to be unsatisfactory. No doubt the £3000 would be given; but that, as far as she could understand her father's words, was to be the whole of her fortune. She had never known anything of her father's affairs or of his intentions, but she had certainly supposed that her fortune would be very much more than this. She had learned in some indirect way that a large sum of money would have gone with her hand to Arthur Fletcher, could she have brought herself to marry that suitor favoured by her family. And now, having learned, as she had learned, that money was of vital importance to her husband, she was dismayed at what seemed to her to be parental parsimony. But he was overjoyed,--so much so that for a while he lost that restraint over himself which was habitual to him. He ate his breakfast in a state of exultation, and talked,--not alluding specially to this £3000,--as though he had the command of almost unlimited means. He ordered a carriage and drove her out, and bought presents for her,--things as to which they had both before decided that they should not be bought because of the expense. "Pray don't spend your money for me," she said to him. "It is nice to have you giving me things, but it would be nicer to me even than that to think that I could save you expense." But he was not in a mood to be denied. "You don't understand," he said. "I don't want to be saved from little extravagances of this sort. Owing to circumstances, your father's money was at this moment of importance to me;--but he has answered to the whip and the money is there, and that trouble is over. We can enjoy ourselves now. Other troubles will spring up, no doubt, before long." She did not quite like being told that her father had "answered to the whip,"--but she was willing to believe that it was a phrase common among men to which it would be prudish to make objection. There was, also, something in her husband's elation which was distasteful to her. Could it be that reverses of fortune with reference to moderate sums of money, such as this which was now coming into his hands, would always affect him in the same way? Was it not almost unmanly, or at any rate was it not undignified? And yet she tried to make the best of it, and lent herself to his holiday mood as well as she was able. "Shall I write and thank papa?" she said that evening. "I have been thinking of that," he said. "You can write if you like, and of course you will. But I also will write, and had better do so a post or two before you. As he has come round I suppose I ought to show myself civil. What he says about the rest of his money is of course absurd. I shall ask him nothing about it, but no doubt after a bit he will make permanent arrangements." Everything in the business wounded her more or less. She now perceived that he regarded this £3000 only as the first instalment of what he might get, and that his joy was due simply to this temporary success. And then he called her father absurd to her face. For a moment she thought that she would defend her father; but she could not as yet bring herself to question her husband's words even on such a subject as that. He did write to Mr. Wharton, but in doing so he altogether laid aside that flighty manner which for a while had annoyed her. He thoroughly understood that the wording of the letter might be very important to him, and he took much trouble with it. It must be now the great work of his life to ingratiate himself with this old man, so that, at any rate at the old man's death, he might possess at least half of the old man's money. He must take care that there should be no division between his wife and her father of such a nature as to make the father think that his son ought to enjoy any special privilege of primogeniture or of male inheritance. And if it could be so managed that the daughter should, before the old man's death, become his favourite child, that also would be well. He was therefore very careful about the letter, which was as follows:-- MY DEAR MR. WHARTON, I cannot let your letter to Emily pass without thanking you myself for the very liberal response made by you to what was of course a request from myself. Let me in the first place assure you that had you, before our marriage, made any inquiry about my money affairs, I would have told you everything with accuracy; but as you did not do so I thought that I should seem to intrude upon you, if I introduced the subject. It is too long for a letter, but whenever you may like to allude to it, you will find that I will be quite open with you. I am engaged in business which often requires the use of a considerable amount of capital. It has so happened that even since we were married the immediate use of a sum of money became essential to me to save me from sacrificing a cargo of guano which will be of greatly increased value in three months' time, but which otherwise must have gone for what it would now fetch. Your kindness will see me through that difficulty. Of course there is something precarious in such a business as mine;--but I am endeavouring to make it less so from day to day, and hope very shortly to bring it into that humdrum groove which best befits a married man. Should I ask further assistance from you in doing this, perhaps you will not refuse it if I can succeed in making the matter clear to you. As it is I thank you sincerely for what you have done. I will ask you to pay the £3000 you have so kindly promised, to my account at Messrs. Hunky and Sons, Lombard Street. They are not regular bankers, but I have an account there. We are wandering about and enjoying ourselves mightily in the properly romantic manner. Emily sometimes seems to think that she would like to give up business, and London, and all sublunary troubles, in order that she might settle herself for life under an Italian sky. But the idea does not generally remain with her very long. Already she is beginning to show symptoms of home sickness in regard to Manchester Square. Yours always most faithfully, FERDINAND LOPEZ. To this letter Lopez received no reply;--nor did he expect one. Between Emily and her father a few letters passed, not very long; nor, as regarded those from Mr. Wharton, were they very interesting. In none of them, however, was there any mention of money. But early in January Lopez received a most pressing,--we might almost say an agonising letter from his friend Parker. The gist of the letter was to make Lopez understand that Parker must at once sell certain interests in a coming cargo of guano,--at whatever sacrifice,--unless he could be certified as to that money which must be paid in February, and which he, Parker, must pay, should Ferdinand Lopez be at that moment unable to meet his bond. The answer sent to Parker shall be given to the reader. MY DEAR OLD AWFULLY SILLY, AND ABSURDLY IMPATIENT FRIEND, You are always like a toad under a harrow, and that without the slightest cause. I have money lying at Hunky's more than double enough for the bills. Why can't you trust a man? If you won't trust me in saying so, you can go to Mills Happerton and ask him. But, remember, I shall be very much annoyed if you do so,--and that such an inquiry cannot but be injurious to me. If, however, you won't believe me, you can go and ask. At any rate, don't meddle with the guano. We should lose over £1000 each of us, if you were to do so. By George, a man should neither marry, nor leave London for a day, if he has to do with a fellow so nervous as you are. As it is I think I shall be back a week or two before my time is properly up, lest you and one or two others should think that I have levanted altogether. I have no hesitation in saying that more fortunes are lost in business by trembling cowardice than by any amount of imprudence or extravagance. My hair stands on end when you talk of parting with guano in December because there are bills which have to be met in February. Pluck up your heart, man, and look around, and see what is done by men with good courage. Yours always, FERDINAND LOPEZ. These were the only communications between our married couple and their friends at home with which I need trouble my readers. Nor need I tell any further tales of their honeymoon. If the time was not one of complete and unalloyed joy to Emily,--and we must fear that it was not,--it is to be remembered that but very little complete and unalloyed joy is allowed to sojourners in this vale of tears, even though they have been but two months married. In the first week in February they appeared in the Belgrave mansion, and Emily Lopez took possession of her new home with a heart as full of love for her husband as it had been when she walked out of the church in Vere Street, though it may be that some of her sweetest illusions had already been dispelled. CHAPTER XXVII The Duke's Misery We must go back for a while to Gatherum Castle and see the guests whom the Duchess had collected there for her Christmas festivities. The hospitality of the Duke's house had been maintained almost throughout the autumn. Just at the end of October they went to Matching, for what the Duchess called a quiet month,--which, however, at the Duke's urgent request became six weeks. But even here the house was full all the time, though from deficiency of bedrooms the guests were very much less numerous. But at Matching the Duchess had been uneasy and almost cross. Mrs. Finn had gone with her husband to Ireland, and she had taught herself to fancy that she could not live without Mrs. Finn. And her husband had insisted upon having round him politicians of his own sort, men who really preferred work to archery, or even to hunting, and who discussed the evils of direct taxation absolutely in the drawing-room. The Duchess was assured that the country could not be governed by the support of such men as these, and was very glad to get back to Gatherum,--whither also came Phineas Finn with his wife, and the St. Bungay people, and Barrington Erle, and Mr. Monk, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, with Lord and Lady Cantrip, and Lord and Lady Drummond,--Lord Drummond being the only representative of the other or coalesced party. And Major Pountney was there, having been urgent with the Duchess,--and having fully explained to his friend Captain Gunner that he had acceded to the wishes of his hostess only on the assurance of her Grace that the house would not be again troubled by the presence of Ferdinand Lopez. Such assurances were common between the two friends, but were innocent, as, of course, neither believed the other. And Lady Rosina was again there,--with many others. The melancholy poverty of Lady Rosina had captivated the Duke. "She shall come and live here, if you like," the Duchess had said in answer to a request from her husband on his new friend's behalf,--"I've no doubt she will be willing." The place was not crowded as it had been before; but still about thirty guests sat down to dinner daily, and Locock, Millepois, and Mrs. Pritchard were all kept hard at work. Nor was our Duchess idle. She was always making up the party,--meaning the coalition,--doing something to strengthen the buttresses, writing little letters to little people, who, little as they were, might become big by amalgamation. "One has always to be binding one's fagot," she said to Mrs. Finn, having read her �sop not altogether in vain. "Where should we have been without you?" she had whispered to Sir Orlando Drought when that gentleman was leaving Gatherum at the termination of his second visit. She had particularly disliked Sir Orlando, and was aware that her husband had on this occasion been hardly as gracious as he should have been, in true policy, to so powerful a colleague. Her husband had been peculiarly shy of Sir Orlando since the day on which they had walked together in the park,--and, consequently, the Duchess had whispered to him. "Don't bind your fagot too conspicuously," Mrs. Finn had said to her. Then the Duchess had fallen to a seat almost exhausted by labour, mingled with regrets, and by the doubts which from time to time pervaded even her audacious spirit. "I'm not a god," she said, "or a Pitt, or an Italian with a long name beginning with M., that I should be able to do these things without ever making a mistake. And yet they must be done. And as for him,--he does not help me in the least. He wanders about among the clouds of the multiplication table, and thinks that a majority will drop into his mouth because he does not shut it. Can you tie the fagot any better?" "I think I would leave it untied," said Mrs. Finn. "You would not do anything of the kind. You'd be just as fussy as I am." And thus the game was carried on at Gatherum Castle from week to week. "But you won't leave him?" This was said to Phineas Finn by his wife a day or two before Christmas, and the question was intended to ask whether Phineas thought of giving up his place. "Not if I can help it." "You like the work." "That has but little to do with the question, unfortunately. I certainly like having something to do. I like earning money." "I don't know why you like that especially," said the wife, laughing. "I do at any rate,--and, in a certain sense, I like authority. But in serving with the Duke I find a lack of that sympathy which one should have with one's chief. He would never say a word to me unless I spoke to him. And when I do speak, though he is studiously civil,--much too courteous,--I know that he is bored. He has nothing to say to me about the country. When he has anything to communicate, he prefers to write a minute for Warburton, who then writes to Morton,--and so it reaches me." "Doesn't it do as well?" "It may do with me. There are reasons which bind me to him, which will not bind other men. Men don't talk to me about it, because they know that I am bound to him through you. But I am aware of the feeling which exists. You can't be really loyal to a king if you never see him,--if he be always locked up in some almost divine recess." "A king may make himself too common, Phineas." "No doubt. A king has to know where to draw the line. But the Duke draws no intentional line at all. He is not by nature gregarious or communicative, and is therefore hardly fitted to be the head of a ministry." "It will break her heart if anything goes wrong." "She ought to remember that Ministries seldom live very long," said Phineas. "But she'll recover even if she does break her heart. She is too full of vitality to be much repressed by any calamity. Have you heard what is to be done about Silverbridge?" "The Duchess wants to get it for this man, Ferdinand Lopez." "But it has not been promised yet?" "The seat is not vacant," said Mrs. Finn, "and I don't know when it will be vacant. I think there is a hitch about it,--and I think the Duchess is going to be made very angry." Throughout the autumn the Duke had been an unhappy man. While the absolute work of the Session had lasted he had found something to console him; but now, though he was surrounded by private secretaries, and though dispatch-boxes went and came twice a day, though there were dozens of letters as to which he had to give some instruction,--yet, there was in truth nothing for him to do. It seemed to him that all the real work of the Government had been filched from him by his colleagues, and that he was stuck up in pretended authority,--a kind of wooden Prime Minister, from whom no real ministration was demanded. His first fear had been that he was himself unfit;--but now he was uneasy, fearing that others thought him to be unfit. There was Mr. Monk with his budget, and Lord Drummond with his three or four dozen half rebellious colonies, and Sir Orlando Drought with the House to lead and a ship to build, and Phineas Finn with his scheme of municipal Home Rule for Ireland, and Lord Ramsden with a codified Statute Book,--all full of work, all with something special to be done. But for him,--he had to arrange who should attend the Queen, what ribbons should be given away, and what middle-aged young man should move the address. He sighed as he thought of those happy days in which he used to fear that his mind and body would both give way under the pressure of decimal coinage. But Phineas Finn had read the Duke's character rightly in saying that he was neither gregarious nor communicative, and therefore but little fitted to rule Englishmen. He had thought that it was so himself, and now from day to day he was becoming more assured of his own deficiency. He could not throw himself into cordial relations with the Sir Orlando Droughts, or even with the Mr. Monks. But, though he had never wished to be put into his present high office, now that he was there he dreaded the sense of failure which would follow his descent from it. It is this feeling rather than genuine ambition, rather than the love of power or patronage or pay, which induces men to cling to place. The absence of real work, and the quantity of mock work, both alike made the life wearisome to him; but he could not endure the idea that it should be written in history that he had allowed himself to be made a fainéant Prime Minister, and then had failed even in that. History would forget what he had done as a working Minister in recording the feebleness of the Ministry which would bear his name. The one man with whom he could talk freely, and from whom he could take advice, was now with him, here at his Castle. He was shy at first even with the Duke of St. Bungay, but that shyness he could generally overcome, after a few words. But though he was always sure of his old friend's sympathy and of his old friend's wisdom, yet he doubted his old friend's capacity to understand himself. The young Duke felt the old Duke to be thicker-skinned than himself and therefore unable to appreciate the thorns which so sorely worried his own flesh. "They talk to me about a policy," said the host. They were closeted at this time in the Prime Minister's own sanctum, and there yet remained an hour before they need dress for dinner. "Who talks about a policy?" "Sir Orlando Drought especially." For the Duke of Omnium had never forgotten the arrogance of that advice given in the park. "Sir Orlando is of course entitled to speak, though I do not know that he is likely to say anything very well worth the hearing. What is his special policy?" "If he had any, of course, I would hear him. It is not that he wants any special thing to be done, but he thinks that I should get up some special thing in order that Parliament may be satisfied." "If you wanted to create a majority that might be true. Just listen to him and have done with it." "I cannot go on in that way. I cannot submit to what amounts to complaint from the gentlemen who are acting with me. Nor would they submit long to my silence. I am beginning to feel that I have been wrong." "I don't think you have been wrong at all." "A man is wrong if he attempts to carry a weight too great for his strength." "A certain nervous sensitiveness, from which you should free yourself as from a disease, is your only source of weakness. Think about your business as a shoemaker thinks of his. Do your best, and then let your customers judge for themselves. Caveat emptor. A man should never endeavour to price himself, but should accept the price which others put on him,--only being careful that he should learn what that price is. Your policy should be to keep your government together by a strong majority. After all, the making of new laws is too often but an unfortunate necessity laid on us by the impatience of the people. A lengthened period of quiet and therefore good government with a minimum of new laws would be the greatest benefit the country could receive. When I recommended you to comply with the Queen's behest I did so because I thought that you might inaugurate such a period more certainly than any other one man." This old Duke was quite content with a state of things such as he described. He had been a Cabinet Minister for more than half his life. He liked being a Cabinet Minister. He thought it well for the country generally that his party should be in power,--and if not his party in its entirety, then as much of his party as might be possible. He did not expect to be written of as a Pitt or a Somers, but he thought that memoirs would speak of him as a useful nobleman,--and he was contented. He was not only not ambitious himself, but the effervescence and general turbulence of ambition in other men was distasteful to him. Loyalty was second nature to him, and the power of submitting to defeat without either shame or sorrow had become perfect with him by long practice. He would have made his brother Duke such as he was himself,--had not his brother Duke been so lamentably thin-skinned. "I suppose we must try it for another Session?" said the Duke of Omnium with a lachrymose voice. "Of course we must,--and for others after that, I both hope and trust," said the Duke of St. Bungay, getting up. "If I don't go up-stairs I shall be late, and then her Grace will look at me with unforgiving eyes." On the following day after lunch the Prime Minister took a walk with Lady Rosina De Courcy. He had fallen into a habit of walking with Lady Rosina almost every day of his life, till the people in the Castle began to believe that Lady Rosina was the mistress of some deep policy of her own. For there were many there who did in truth think that statecraft could never be absent from a minister's mind, day or night. But in truth Lady Rosina chiefly made herself agreeable to the Prime Minister by never making any most distant allusion to public affairs. It might be doubted whether she even knew that the man who paid her so much honour was the Head of the British Government as well as the Duke of Omnium. She was a tall, thin, shrivelled-up old woman,--not very old, fifty perhaps, but looking at least ten years more,--very melancholy, and sometimes very cross. She had been notably religious, but that was gradually wearing off as she advanced in years. The rigid strictness of Sabbatarian practice requires the full energy of middle life. She had been left entirely alone in the world, with a very small income, and not many friends who were in any way interested in her existence. But she knew herself to be Lady Rosina De Courcy, and felt that the possession of that name ought to be more to her than money and friends, or even than brothers and sisters. "The weather is not frightening you," said the Duke. Snow had fallen, and the paths, even where they had been swept, were wet and sloppy. "Weather never frightens me, your Grace. I always have thick boots;--I am very particular about that;--and cork soles." "Cork soles are admirable." "I think I owe my life to cork soles," said Lady Rosina enthusiastically. "There is a man named Sprout in Silverbridge who makes them. Did your Grace ever try him for boots?" "I don't think I ever did," said the Prime Minister. "Then you had better. He's very good and very cheap too. Those London tradesmen never think they can charge you enough. I find I can wear Sprout's boots the whole winter through and then have them resoled. I don't suppose you ever think of such things?" "I like to have my feet dry." "I have got to calculate what they cost." They then passed Major Pountney, who was coming and going between the stables and the house, and who took off his hat and who saluted the host and his companion with perhaps more flowing courtesy than was necessary. "I never have found out what that gentleman's name is yet," said Lady Rosina. "Pountney, I think. I believe they call him Major Pountney." "Oh, Pountney! There are Pountneys in Leicestershire. Perhaps he is one of them?" "I don't know where he comes from," said the Duke,--"nor, to tell the truth, where he goes to." Lady Rosina looked up at him with an interested air. "He seems to be one of those idle men who get into people's houses heaven knows why, and never do anything." "I suppose you asked him?" said Lady Rosina. "The Duchess did, I dare say." "How odd it would be if she were to suppose that you had asked him." "The Duchess, no doubt, knows all about it." Then there was a little pause. "She is obliged to have all sorts of people," said the Duke apologetically. "I suppose so,--when you have so many coming and going. I am sorry to say that my time is up to-morrow, so that I shall make way for somebody else." "I hope you won't think of going, Lady Rosina,--unless you are engaged elsewhere. We are delighted to have you." "The Duchess has been very kind, but--" "The Duchess, I fear, is almost too much engaged to see as much of her guests individually as she ought to do. To me your being here is a great pleasure." "You are too good to me,--much too good. But I shall have stayed out my time, and I think, Duke, I will go to-morrow. I am very methodical, you know, and always act by rule. I have walked my two miles now, and I will go in. If you do want boots with cork soles mind you go to Sprout's. Dear me; there is that Major Pountney again. That is four times he has been up and down that path since we have been walking here." Lady Rosina went in, and the Duke turned back, thinking of his friend and perhaps thinking of the cork soles of which she had to be so careful and which were so important to her comfort. It could not be that he fancied Lady Rosina to be clever, nor can we imagine that her conversation satisfied any of those wants to which he and all of us are subject. But nevertheless he liked Lady Rosina, and was never bored by her. She was natural, and she wanted nothing from him. When she talked about cork soles she meant cork soles. And then she did not tread on any of his numerous corns. As he walked on he determined that he would induce his wife to persuade Lady Rosina to stay a little longer at the Castle. In meditating upon this he made another turn in the grounds, and again came upon Major Pountney as that gentleman was returning from the stables. "A very cold afternoon," he said, feeling it to be ungracious to pass one of his own guests in his own grounds without a word of salutation. "Very cold indeed, your Grace,--very cold." The Duke had intended to pass on, but the Major managed to stop him by standing in the pathway. The Major did not in the least know his man. He had heard that the Duke was shy, and therefore thought that he was timid. He had not hitherto been spoken to by the Duke,--a condition of things which he attributed to the Duke's shyness and timidity. But, with much thought on the subject, he had resolved that he would have a few words with his host, and had therefore passed backwards and forwards between the house and the stables rather frequently. "Very cold, indeed, but yet we've had beautiful weather. I don't know when I have enjoyed myself so much altogether as I have at Gatherum Castle." The Duke bowed, and made a little but a vain effort to get on. "A splendid pile!" said the Major, stretching his hand gracefully towards the building. "It is a big house," said the Duke. "A noble mansion;--perhaps the noblest mansion in the three kingdoms," said Major Pountney. "I have seen a great many of the best country residences in England, but nothing that at all equals Gatherum." Then the Duke made a little effort at progression, but was still stopped by the daring Major. "By-the-by, your Grace, if your Grace has a few minutes to spare,--just half a minute,--I wish you would allow me to say something." The Duke assumed a look of disturbance, but he bowed and walked on, allowing the Major to walk by his side. "I have the greatest possible desire, my Lord Duke, to enter public life." "I thought you were already in the army," said the Duke. "So I am;--was on Sir Bartholomew Bone's staff in Canada for two years, and have seen as much of what I call home service as any man going. One of my chief objects is to take up the army." "It seems that you have taken it up." "I mean in Parliament, your Grace. I am very fairly off as regards private means, and would stand all the racket of the expense of a contest myself,--if there were one. But the difficulty is to get a seat, and, of course, if it can be privately managed, it is very comfortable." The Duke looked at him again,--this time without bowing. But the Major, who was not observant, rushed on to his destruction. "We all know that Silverbridge will soon be vacant. Let me assure your Grace that if it might be consistent with your Grace's plans in other respects to turn your kind countenance towards me, you would find that you would have a supporter than whom none would be more staunch, and perhaps I may say, one who in the House would not be the least useful!" That portion of the Major's speech which referred to the Duke's kind countenance had been learned by heart, and was thrown trippingly off the tongue with a kind of twang. The Major had perceived that he had not been at once interrupted when he began to open the budget of his political aspirations, and had allowed himself to indulge in pleasing auguries. "Nothing ask and nothing have," had been adopted as the motto of his life, and more than once he had expressed to Captain Gunner his conviction that,--"By George, if you've only cheek enough, there is nothing you cannot get." On this emergency the Major certainly was not deficient in cheek. "If I might be allowed to consider myself your Grace's candidate, I should indeed be a happy man," said the Major. "I think, sir," said the Duke, "that your proposition is the most unbecoming and the most impertinent that ever was addressed to me." The Major's mouth fell, and he stared with all his eyes as he looked up into the Duke's face. "Good afternoon," said the Duke, turning quickly round and walking away. The Major stood for a while transfixed to the place, and, cold as was the weather, was bathed in perspiration. A keen sense of having "put his foot into it" almost crushed him for a time. Then he assured himself that, after all, the Duke "could not eat him," and with that consolatory reflection he crept back to the house and up to his own room. To put the man down had of course been an easy task to the Duke, but he was not satisfied with that. To the Major it seemed that the Duke had passed on with easy indifference;--but in truth he was very far from being easy. The man's insolent request had wounded him at many points. It was grievous to him that he should have as a guest in his own house a man whom he had been forced to insult. It was grievous to him that he himself should not have been held in personal respect high enough to protect him from such an insult. It was grievous to him that he should be openly addressed,--addressed by an absolute stranger,--as a borough-mongering lord, who would not scruple to give away a seat in Parliament as seats were given away in former days. And it was especially grievous to him that all these misfortunes should have come upon him as a part of the results of his wife's manner of exercising his hospitality. If this was to be Prime Minister he certainly would not be Prime Minister much longer! Had any aspirant to political life ever dared so to address Lord Brock, or Lord De Terrier, or Mr. Mildmay, the old Premiers whom he remembered? He thought not. They had managed differently. They had been able to defend themselves from such attacks by personal dignity. And would it have been possible that any man should have dared so to speak to his uncle, the late Duke? He thought not. As he shut himself up in his own room he grieved inwardly with a deep grief. After a while he walked off to his wife's room, still perturbed in spirit. The perturbation had indeed increased from minute to minute. He would rather give up politics altogether and shut himself up in absolute seclusion than find himself subject to the insolence of any Pountney that might address him. With his wife he found Mrs. Finn. Now for this lady personally he entertained what for him was a warm regard. In various matters of much importance he and she had been brought together, and she had, to his thinking, invariably behaved well. And an intimacy had been established which had enabled him to be at ease with her,--so that her presence was often a comfort to him. But at the present moment he had not wished to find any one with his wife, and felt that she was in his way. "Perhaps I am disturbing you," he said in a tone of voice that was solemn and almost funereal. "Not at all," said the Duchess, who was in high spirits. "I want to get your promise now about Silverbridge. Don't mind her. Of course she knows everything." To be told that any body knew everything was another shock to him. "I have just got a letter from Mr. Lopez." Could it be right that his wife should be corresponding on such a subject with a person so little known as this Mr. Lopez? "May I tell him that he shall have your interest when the seat is vacant?" "Certainly not," said the Duke, with a scowl that was terrible even to his wife. "I wished to speak to you, but I wished to speak to you alone." "I beg a thousand pardons," said Mrs. Finn, preparing to go. "Don't stir, Marie," said the Duchess; "he is going to be cross." "If Mrs. Finn will allow me, with every feeling of the most perfect respect and sincerest regard, to ask her to leave me with you for a few minutes, I shall be obliged. And if, with her usual hearty kindness, she will pardon my abruptness--" Then he could not go on, his emotion being too great; but he put out his hand, and taking hers raised it to his lips and kissed it. The moment had become too solemn for any further hesitation as to the lady's going. The Duchess for a moment was struck dumb, and Mrs. Finn, of course, left the room. "In the name of heaven, Plantagenet, what is the matter?" "Who is Major Pountney?" "Who is Major Pountney! How on earth should I know? He is--Major Pountney. He is about everywhere." "Do not let him be asked into any house of mine again. But that is a trifle." "Anything about Major Pountney must, I should think, be a trifle. Have tidings come that the heavens are going to fall? Nothing short of that could make you so solemn." "In the first place, Glencora, let me ask you not to speak to me again about the seat for Silverbridge. I am not at present prepared to argue the matter with you, but I have resolved that I will know nothing about the election. As soon as the seat is vacant, if it should be vacated, I shall take care that my determination be known in Silverbridge." "Why should you abandon your privileges in that way? It is sheer weakness." "The interference of any peer is unconstitutional." "There is Braxon," said the Duchess energetically, "where the Marquis of Crumber returns the member regularly, in spite of all their Reform bills; and Bamford, and Cobblersborough;--and look at Lord Lumley with a whole county in his pocket, not to speak of two boroughs! What nonsense, Plantagenet! Anything is constitutional, or anything is unconstitutional, just as you choose to look at it." It was clear that the Duchess had really studied the subject carefully. "Very well, my dear, let it be nonsense. I only beg to assure you that it is my intention, and I request you to act accordingly. And there is another thing I have to say to you. I shall be sorry to interfere in any way with the pleasure which you may derive from society, but as long as I am burdened with the office which has been imposed upon me, I will not again entertain any guests in my own house." "Plantagenet!" "You cannot turn the people out who are here now; but I beg that they may be allowed to go as the time comes, and that their places may not be filled by further invitations." "But further invitations have gone out ever so long ago, and have been accepted. You must be ill, my dear." "Ill at ease,--yes. At any rate let none others be sent out." Then he remembered a kindly purpose which he had formed early in the day, and fell back upon that. "I should, however, be glad if you would ask Lady Rosina De Courcy to remain here." The Duchess stared at him, really thinking now that something was amiss with him. "The whole thing is a failure and I will have no more of it. It is degrading me." Then without allowing her a moment in which to answer him, he marched back to his own room. But even here his spirit was not as yet at rest. That Major must not go unpunished. Though he hated all fuss and noise he must do something. So he wrote as follows to the Major:-- The Duke of Omnium trusts that Major Pountney will not find it inconvenient to leave Gatherum Castle shortly. Should Major Pountney wish to remain at the Castle over the night, the Duke of Omnium hopes that he will not object to be served with his dinner and with his breakfast in his own room. A carriage and horses will be ready for Major Pountney's use, to take him to Silverbridge, as soon as Major Pountney may express to the servants his wish to that effect. Gatherum Castle, -- December, 18--. This note the Duke sent by the hands of his own servant, having said enough to the man as to the carriage and the possible dinner in the Major's bedroom, to make the man understand almost exactly what had occurred. A note from the Major was brought to the Duke while he was dressing. The Duke having glanced at the note threw it into the fire; and the Major that evening eat his dinner at the Palliser Arms Inn at Silverbridge. CHAPTER XXVIII The Duchess Is Much Troubled It is hardly possible that one man should turn another out of his house without many people knowing it; and when the one person is a Prime Minister and the other such a Major as Major Pountney, the affair is apt to be talked about very widely. The Duke of course never opened his mouth on the subject, except in answer to questions from the Duchess; but all the servants knew it. "Pritchard tells me that you have sent that wretched man out of the house with a flea in his ear," said the Duchess. "I sent him out of the house, certainly." "He was hardly worth your anger." "He is not at all worth my anger;--but I could not sit down to dinner with a man who had insulted me." "What did he say, Plantagenet? I know it was something about Silverbridge." To this question the Duke gave no answer, but in respect to Silverbridge he was stern as adamant. Two days after the departure of the Major it was known to Silverbridge generally that in the event of there being an election the Duke's agent would not as usual suggest a nominee. There was a paragraph on the subject in the County paper, and another in the London "Evening Pulpit." The Duke of Omnium,--that he might show his respect to the law, not only as to the letter of the law, but as to the spirit also,--had made it known to his tenantry in and round Silverbridge generally that he would in no way influence their choice of a candidate in the event of an election. But these newspapers did not say a word about Major Pountney. The clubs of course knew all about it, and no man at any club ever knew more than Captain Gunner. Soon after Christmas he met his friend the Major on the steps of the new military club, The Active Service, which was declared by many men in the army to have left all the other military clubs "absolutely nowhere." "Halloa, Punt!" he said, "you seem to have made a mess of it at last down at the Duchess's." "I wonder what you know about it." "You had to come away pretty quick, I take it." "Of course I came away pretty quick." So much as that the Major was aware must be known. There were details which he could deny safely, as it would be impossible that they should be supported by evidence, but there were matters which must be admitted. "I'll bet a fiver that beyond that you know nothing about it." "The Duke ordered you off, I take it." "After a fashion he did. There are circumstances in which a man cannot help himself." This was diplomatical, because it left the Captain to suppose that the Duke was the man who could not help himself. "Of course I was not there," said Gunner, "and I can't absolutely know, but I suppose you had been interfering with the Duchess about Silverbridge. Glencora will bear a great deal,--but since she has taken up politics, by George, you had better not touch her there." At last it came to be believed that the Major had been turned out by the order of the Duchess, because he had ventured to put himself forward as an opponent to Ferdinand Lopez, and the Major felt himself really grateful to his friend the Captain for this arrangement of the story. And there came at last to be mixed up with the story some half-understood innuendo that the Major's jealousy against Lopez had been of a double nature,--in reference both to the Duchess and the borough,--so that he escaped from much of that disgrace which naturally attaches itself to a man who has been kicked out of another man's house. There was a mystery;--and when there is a mystery a man should never be condemned. Where there is a woman in the case a man cannot be expected to tell the truth. As for calling out or in any way punishing the Prime Minister, that of course was out of the question. And so it went on till at last the Major was almost proud of what he had done, and talked about it willingly with mysterious hints, in which practice made him perfect. But with the Duchess the affair was very serious, so much so that she was driven to call in advice,--not only from her constant friend, Mrs. Finn, but afterwards from Barrington Erle, from Phineas Finn, and lastly even from the Duke of St. Bungay, to whom she was hardly willing to subject herself, the Duke being the special friend of her husband. But the matter became so important to her that she was unable to trifle with it. At Gatherum the expulsion of Major Pountney soon became a forgotten affair. When the Duchess learned the truth she quite approved of the expulsion, only hinting to Barrington Erle that the act of kicking out should have been more absolutely practical. And the loss of Silverbridge, though it hurt her sorely, could be endured. She must write to her friend Ferdinand Lopez, when the time should come, excusing herself as best she might, and must lose the exquisite delight of making a Member of Parliament out of her own hand. The newspapers, however, had taken that matter up in the proper spirit, and political capital might to some extent be made of it. The loss of Silverbridge, though it bruised, broke no bones. But the Duke had again expressed himself with unusual sternness respecting her ducal hospitalities, and had reiterated the declaration of his intention to live out the remainder of his period of office in republican simplicity. "We have tried it and it has failed, and let there be an end of it," he said to her. Simple and direct disobedience to such an order was as little in her way as simple or direct obedience. She knew her husband well, and knew how he could be managed and how he could not be managed. When he declared that there should be an "end of it,"--meaning an end of the very system by which she hoped to perpetuate his power,--she did not dare to argue with him. And yet he was so wrong! The trial had been no failure. The thing had been done and well done, and had succeeded. Was failure to be presumed because one impertinent puppy had found his way into the house? And then to abandon the system at once, whether it had failed or whether it had succeeded, would be to call the attention of all the world to an acknowledged failure,--to a failure so disreputable that its acknowledgment must lead to the loss of everything! It was known now,--so argued the Duchess to herself,--that she had devoted herself to the work of cementing and consolidating the Coalition by the graceful hospitality which the wealth of herself and her husband enabled her to dispense. She had made herself a Prime Ministress by the manner in which she opened her saloons, her banqueting halls, and her gardens. It had never been done before, and now it had been well done. There had been no failure. And yet everything was to be broken down because his nerves had received a shock! "Let it die out," Mrs. Finn had said. "The people will come here and will go away, and then, when you are up in London, you will soon fall into your old ways." But this did not suit the new ambition of the Duchess. She had so fed her mind with daring hopes that she could not bear that it should "die out." She had arranged a course of things in her own mind by which she should come to be known as the great Prime Minister's wife; and she had, perhaps unconsciously, applied the epithet more to herself than to her husband. She, too, wished to be written of in memoirs, and to make a niche for herself in history. And now she was told that she was to let it "die out!" "I suppose he is a little bilious," Barrington Erle had said. "Don't you think he'll forget all about it when he gets up to London?" The Duchess was sure that her husband would not forget anything. He never did forget anything. "I want him to be told," said the Duchess, "that everybody thinks that he is doing very well. I don't mean about politics exactly, but as to keeping the party together. Don't you think that we have succeeded?" Barrington Erle thought that upon the whole they had succeeded; but suggested at the same time that there were seeds of weakness. "Sir Orlando and Sir Timothy Beeswax are not sound, you know," said Barrington Erle. "He can't make them sounder by shutting himself up like a hermit," said the Duchess. Barrington Erle, who had peculiar privileges of his own, promised that if he could by any means make an occasion, he would let the Duke know that their side of the Coalition was more than contented with the way in which he did his work. "You don't think we've made a mess of it?" she said to Phineas, asking him a question. "I don't think that the Duke has made a mess of it,--or you," said Phineas, who had come to love the Duchess because his wife loved her. "But it won't go on for ever, Duchess." "You know what I've done," said the Duchess, who took it for granted that Mr. Finn knew all that his wife knew. "Has it answered?" Phineas was silent for a moment. "Of course you will tell me the truth. You won't be so bad as to flatter me now that I am so much in earnest." "I almost think," said Phineas, "that the time has gone by for what one may call drawing-room influences. They used to be very great. Old Lord Brock used them extensively, though by no means as your Grace has done. But the spirit of the world has changed since then." "The spirit of the world never changes," said the Duchess, in her soreness. But her strongest dependence was on the old Duke. The party at the Castle was almost broken up when she consulted him. She had been so far true to her husband as not to ask another guest to the house since his command;--but they who had been asked before came and went as had been arranged. Then, when the place was nearly empty, and when Locock and Millepois and Pritchard were wondering among themselves at this general collapse, she asked her husband's leave to invite their old friend again for a day or two. "I do so want to see him, and I think he'll come," said the Duchess. The Duke gave his permission with a ready smile,--not because the proposed visitor was his own confidential friend, but because it suited his spirit to grant such a request as to any one after the order that he had given. Had she named Major Pountney, I think he would have smiled and acceded. The Duke came, and to him she poured out her whole soul. "It has been for him and for his honour that I have done it;--that men and women might know how really gracious he is, and how good. Of course, there has been money spent, but he can afford it without hurting the children. It has been so necessary that with a Coalition people should know each other! There was some little absurd row here. A man who was a mere nobody, one of the travelling butterfly men that fill up spaces and talk to girls, got hold of him and was impertinent. He is so thin-skinned that he could not shake the creature into the dust as you would have done. It annoyed him,--that, and, I think, seeing so many strange faces,--so that he came to me and declared, that as long as he remained in office he would not have another person in the house, either here or in London. He meant it literally, and he meant me to understand it literally. I had to get special leave before I could ask so dear an old friend as your Grace." "I don't think he would object to me," said the Duke, laughing. "Of course not. He was only too glad to think you would come. But he took the request as being quite the proper thing. It will kill me if this is to be carried out. After all that I have done, I could show myself nowhere. And it will be so injurious to him! Could not you tell him, Duke? No one else in the world can tell him but you. Nothing unfair has been attempted. No job has been done. I have endeavoured to make his house pleasant to people, in order that they might look upon him with grace and favour. Is that wrong? Is that unbecoming a wife?" The old Duke patted her on the head as though she were a little girl, and was more comforting to her than her other counsellors. He would say nothing to her husband now;--but they must both be up in London at the meeting of Parliament, and then he would tell his friend that, in his opinion, no sudden change should be made. "This husband of yours is a very peculiar man," he said, smiling. "His honesty is not like the honesty of other men. It is more downright;--more absolutely honest; less capable of bearing even the shadow which the stain from another's dishonesty might throw upon it. Give him credit for all that, and remember that you cannot find everything combined in the same person. He is very practical in some things, but the question is, whether he is not too scrupulous to be practical in all things." At the close of the interview the Duchess kissed him and promised to be guided by him. The occurrences of the last few weeks had softened the Duchess much. CHAPTER XXIX The Two Candidates for Silverbridge On his arrival in London Ferdinand Lopez found a letter waiting for him from the Duchess. This came into his hand immediately on his reaching the rooms in Belgrave Mansions, and was of course the first object of his care. "That contains my fate," he said to his wife, putting his hand down upon the letter. He had talked to her much of the chance that had come in his way, and had shown himself to be very ambitious of the honour offered to him. She of course had sympathised with him, and was willing to think all good things both of the Duchess and of the Duke, if they would between them put her husband into Parliament. He paused a moment, still holding the letter under his hand. "You would hardly think that I should be such a coward that I don't like to open it," he said. "You've got to do it." "Unless I make you do it for me," he said, holding out the letter to her. "You will have to learn how weak I am. When I am really anxious I become like a child." "I do not think you are ever weak," she said, caressing him. "If there were a thing to be done you would do it at once. But I'll open it if you like." Then he tore off the envelope with an air of comic importance and stood for a few minutes while he read it. "What I first perceive is that there has been a row about it," he said. "A row about it! What sort of a row?" "My dear friend the Duchess has not quite hit it off with my less dear friend the Duke." "She does not say so?" "Oh dear, no! My friend the Duchess is much too discreet for that;--but I can see that it has been so." "Are you to be the new member? If that is arranged I don't care a bit about the Duke and Duchess." "These things do not settle themselves quite so easily as that. I am not to have the seat at any rate without fighting for it. There's the letter." The Duchess's letter to her new adherent shall be given, but it must first be understood that many different ideas had passed through the writer's mind between the writing of the letter and the order given by the Prime Minister to his wife concerning the borough. She of course became aware at once that Mr. Lopez must be informed that she could not do for him what she had suggested that she would do. But there was no necessity of writing at the instant. Mr. Grey had not yet vacated the seat, and Mr. Lopez was away on his travels. The month of January was passed in comparative quiet at the Castle, and during that time it became known at Silverbridge that the election would be open. The Duke would not even make a suggestion, and would neither express, nor feel, resentment should a member be returned altogether hostile to his Ministry. By degrees the Duchess accustomed herself to this condition of affairs, and as the consternation caused by her husband's very imperious conduct wore off, she began to ask herself whether even yet she need quite give up the game. She could not make a Member of Parliament altogether out of her own hand, as she had once fondly hoped she might do; but still she might do something. She would in nothing disobey her husband, but if Mr. Lopez were to stand for Silverbridge, it could not but be known in the borough that Mr. Lopez was her friend. Therefore she wrote the following letter:-- Gatherum, -- January, 18--. MY DEAR MR. LOPEZ, I remember that you said that you would be home at this time, and therefore I write to you about the borough. Things are changed since you went away, and, I fear, not changed for your advantage. We understand that Mr. Grey will apply for the Chiltern Hundreds at the end of March, and that the election will take place in April. No candidate will appear as favoured from hence. We used to run a favourite, and our favourite would sometimes win,--would sometimes even have a walk over; but those good times are gone. All the good times are going, I think. There is no reason that I know why you should not stand as well as any one else. You can be early in the field;--because it is only now known that there will be no Gatherum interest. And I fancy it has already leaked out that you would have been the favourite if there had been a favourite;--which might be beneficial. I need hardly say that I do not wish my name to be mentioned in the matter. Sincerely yours, GLENCORA OMNIUM. Sprugeon, the ironmonger, would, I do not doubt, be proud to nominate you. "I don't understand much about it," said Emily. "I dare say not. It is not meant that any novice should understand much about it. Of course you will not mention her Grace's letter." "Certainly not." "She intends to do the very best she can for me. I have no doubt that some understrapper from the Castle has had some communication with Mr. Sprugeon. The fact is that the Duke won't be seen in it, but that the Duchess does not mean that the borough shall quite slip through their fingers." "Shall you try it?" "If I do I must send an agent down to see Mr. Sprugeon on the sly, and the sooner I do so the better. I wonder what your father will say about it?" "He is an old Conservative." "But would he not like his son-in-law to be in Parliament?" "I don't know that he would care about it very much. He seems always to laugh at people who want to get into Parliament. But if you have set your heart upon it, Ferdinand--" "I have not set my heart on spending a great deal of money. When I first thought of Silverbridge the expense would have been almost nothing. It would have been a walk over, as the Duchess calls it. But now there will certainly be a contest." "Give it up if you cannot afford it." "Nothing venture nothing have. You don't think your father would help me in doing it? It would add almost as much to your position as to mine." Emily shook her head. She had always heard her father ridicule the folly of men who spent more than they could afford in the vanity of writing two letters after their name, and she now explained that it had always been so with him. "You would not mind asking him," he said. "I will ask him if you wish it, certainly." Ever since their marriage he had been teaching her,--intentionally teaching her,--that it would be the duty of both of them to get all they could from her father. She had learned the lesson, but it had been very distasteful to her. It had not induced her to think ill of her husband. She was too much engrossed with him, too much in love with him for that. But she was beginning to feel that the world in general was hard and greedy and uncomfortable. If it was proper that a father should give his daughter money when she was married, why did not her father do so without waiting to be asked? And yet, if he were unwilling to do so, would it not be better to leave him to his pleasure in the matter? But now she began to perceive that her father was to be regarded as a milch cow, and that she was to be the dairy-maid. Her husband at times would become terribly anxious on the subject. On receiving the promise of £3000 he had been elated, but since that he had continually talked of what more her father ought to do for them. "Perhaps I had better take the bull by the horns," he said, "and do it myself. Then I shall find out whether he really has our interest at heart, or whether he looks on you as a stranger because you've gone away from him." "I don't think he will look upon me as a stranger." "We'll see," said Lopez. It was not long before he made the experiment. He had called himself a coward as to the opening of the Duchess's letter, but he had in truth always courage for perils of this nature. On the day of their arrival they dined with Mr. Wharton in Manchester Square, and certainly the old man had received his daughter with great delight. He had been courteous also to Lopez, and Emily, amidst the pleasure of his welcome, had forgotten some of her troubles. The three were alone together, and when Emily had asked after her brother, Mr. Wharton had laughed and said that Everett was an ass. "You have not quarrelled with him?" she said. He ridiculed the idea of any quarrel, but again said that Everett was an ass. After dinner Mr. Wharton and Lopez were left together, as the old man, whether alone or in company, always sat for an hour sipping port wine after the manner of his forefathers. Lopez had already determined that he would not let the opportunity escape him, and began his attack at once. "I have been invited, sir," he said with his sweetest smile, "to stand for Silverbridge." "You too!" said Mr. Wharton. But, though there was a certain amount of satire in the exclamation, it had been good-humoured satire. "Yes, sir. We all get bit sooner or later, I suppose." "I never was bit." "Your sagacity and philosophy have been the wonder of the world, sir. There can be no doubt that in my profession a seat in the House would be of the greatest possible advantage to me. It enables a man to do a great many things which he could not touch without it." "It may be so. I don't know anything about it." "And then it is a great honour." "That depends on how you get it, and how you use it;--very much also on whether you are fit for it." "I shall get it honestly if I do get it. I hope I may use it well. And as for my fitness, I must leave that to be ascertained when I am there. I am sorry to say there will probably be a contest." "I suppose so. A seat in Parliament without a contest does not drop into every young man's mouth." "It very nearly dropped into mine." Then he told his father-in-law almost all the particulars of the offer which had been made him, and of the manner in which the seat was now suggested to him. He somewhat hesitated in the use of the name of the Duchess, leaving an impression on Mr. Wharton that the offer had in truth come from the Duke. "Should there be a contest, would you help me?" "In what way? I could not canvass at Silverbridge, if you mean that." "I was not thinking of giving you personal trouble." "I don't know a soul in the place. I shouldn't know that there was such a place except that it returns a member of Parliament." "I meant with money, sir." "To pay the election bills! No; certainly not. Why should I?" "For Emily's sake." "I don't think it would do Emily any good, or you either. It would certainly do me none. It is a kind of luxury that a man should not attempt to enjoy unless he can afford it easily." "A luxury!" "Yes, a luxury; just as much as a four-in-hand coach or a yacht. Men go into Parliament because it gives them fashion, position, and power." "I should go to serve my country." "Success in your profession I thought you said was your object. Of course you must do as you please. If you ask me for advice, I advise you not to try it. But certainly I will not help you with money. That ass Everett is quarrelling with me at this moment because I won't give him money to go and stand somewhere." "Not at Silverbridge!" "I'm sure I can't say. But don't let me do him an injury. To give him his due, he is more reasonable than you, and only wants a promise from me that I will pay electioneering bills for him at the next general election. I have refused him,--though for reasons which I need not mention I think him better fitted for Parliament than you. I must certainly also refuse you. I cannot imagine any circumstances which would induce me to pay a shilling towards getting you into Parliament. If you won't drink any more wine, we'll join Emily upstairs." This had been very plain speaking, and by no means comfortable to Lopez. What of personal discourtesy there had been in the lawyer's words,--and they had not certainly been flattering,--he could throw off from him as meaning nothing. As he could not afford to quarrel with his father-in-law, he thought it probable that he might have to bear a good deal of incivility from the old man. He was quite prepared to bear it as long as he could see a chance of a reward;--though, should there be no such chance, he would be ready to avenge it. But there had been a decision in the present refusal which made him quite sure that it would be vain to repeat his request. "I shall find out, sir," he said, "whether it may probably be a costly affair, and if so I shall give it up. You are rather hard upon me as to my motives." "I only repeated what you told me yourself." "I am quite sure of my own intentions, and know that I need not be ashamed of them." "Not if you have plenty of money. It all depends on that. If you have plenty of money, and your fancy goes that way, it is all very well. Come, we'll go upstairs." The next day he saw Everett Wharton, who welcomed him back with warm affection. "He'll do nothing for me;--nothing at all. I am almost beginning to doubt whether he'll ever speak to me again." "Nonsense!" "I tell you everything, you know," said Everett. "In January I lost a little money at whist. They got plunging at the club, and I was in it. I had to tell him, of course. He keeps me so short that I can't stand any blow without going to him like a school-boy." "Was it much?" "No;--to him no more than half-a-crown to you. I had to ask him for a hundred and fifty." "He refused it!" "No;--he didn't do that. Had it been ten times as much, if I owed the money, he would pay it. But he blew me up, and talked about gambling,--and--and--" "I should have taken that as a matter of course." "But I'm not a gambler. A man now and then may fall into a thing of that kind, and if he's decently well off and don't do it often, he can bear it." "I thought your quarrel had been altogether about Parliament." "Oh no! He has been always the same about that. He told me that I was going head foremost to the dogs, and I couldn't stand that. I shouldn't be surprised if he hasn't lost more at cards than I have during the last two years." Lopez made an offer to act as go-between, to effect a reconciliation; but Everett declined the offer. "It would be making too much of an absurdity," he said. "When he wants to see me, I suppose he'll send for me." Lopez did dispatch an agent down to Mr. Sprugeon at Silverbridge, and the agent found that Mr. Sprugeon was a very discreet man. Mr. Sprugeon at first knew little or nothing,--seemed hardly to be aware that there was a member of Parliament for Silverbridge, and declared himself to be indifferent as to the parliamentary character of the borough. But at last he melted a little, and by degrees, over a glass of hot brandy-and-water with the agent at the Palliser Arms, confessed to a shade of an opinion that the return of Mr. Lopez for the borough would not be disagreeable to some person or persons who did not live quite a hundred miles away. The instructions given by Lopez to his agent were of the most cautious kind. The agent was merely to feel the ground, make a few inquiries, and do nothing. His client did not intend to stand unless he could see the way to almost certain success with very little outlay. But the agent, perhaps liking the job, did a little outstep his employer's orders. Mr. Sprugeon, when the frost of his first modesty had been thawed, introduced the agent to Mr. Sprout, the maker of cork soles, and Mr. Sprugeon and Mr. Sprout between them had soon decided that Mr. Ferdinand Lopez should be run for the borough as the "Castle" candidate. "The Duke won't interfere," said Sprugeon; "and, of course, the Duke's man of business can't do anything openly;--but the Duke's people will know." Then Mr. Sprout told the agent that there was already another candidate in the field, and in a whisper communicated the gentleman's name. When the agent got back to London, he gave Lopez to understand that he must certainly put himself forward. The borough expected him. Sprugeon and Sprout considered themselves pledged to bring him forward and support him,--on behalf of the Castle. Sprugeon was quite sure that the Castle influence was predominant. The Duke's name had never been mentioned at Silverbridge,--hardly even that of the Duchess. Since the Duke's declaration "The Castle" had taken the part which the old Duke used to play. The agent was quite sure that no one could get in for Silverbridge without having the Castle on his side. No doubt the Duke's declaration had had the ill effect of bringing up a competitor, and thus of causing expense. That could not now be helped. The agent was of opinion that the Duke had had no alternative. The agent hinted that times were changing, and that though dukes were still dukes, and could still exercise ducal influences, they were driven by these changes to act in an altered form. The proclamation had been especially necessary because the Duke was Prime Minister. The agent did not think that Mr. Lopez should be in the least angry with the Duke. Everything would be done that the Castle could do, and Lopez would be no doubt returned,--though, unfortunately, not without some expense. How much would it cost? Any accurate answer to such a question would be impossible, but probably about £600. It might be £800;--could not possibly be above £1000. Lopez winced as he heard these sums named, but he did not decline the contest. Then the name of the opposition candidate was whispered to Lopez. It was Arthur Fletcher! Lopez started, and asked some questions as to Mr. Fletcher's interest in the neighbourhood. The Fletchers were connected with the De Courcys, and as soon as the declaration of the Duke had been made known, the De Courcy interest had aroused itself, and had invited that rising young barrister, Arthur Fletcher, to stand for the borough on strictly conservative views. Arthur Fletcher had acceded, and a printed declaration of his purpose and political principles had been just published. "I have beaten him once," said Lopez to himself, "and I think I can beat him again." CHAPTER XXX "Yes;--a Lie!" "So you went to Happerton after all," said Lopez to his ally, Mr. Sextus Parker. "You couldn't believe me when I told you the money was all right! What a cur you are!" "That's right;--abuse me." "Well, it was horrid. Didn't I tell you that it must necessarily injure me with the house? How are two fellows to get on together unless they can put some trust in each other? Even if I did run you into a difficulty, do you really think I'm ruffian enough to tell you that the money was there if it were untrue?" Sexty looked like a cur and felt like a cur, as he was being thus abused. He was not angry with his friend for calling him bad names, but only anxious to excuse himself. "I was out of sorts," he said, "and so d----d hippish I didn't know what I was about." "Brandy-and-soda!" suggested Lopez. "Perhaps a little of that;--though, by Jove, it isn't often I do that kind of thing. I don't know a fellow who works harder for his wife and children than I do. But when one sees such things all round one,--a fellow utterly smashed here who had a string of hunters yesterday, and another fellow buying a house in Piccadilly and pulling it down because it isn't big enough, who was contented with a little box at Hornsey last summer, one doesn't quite know how to keep one's legs." "If you want to learn a lesson look at the two men, and see where the difference lies. The one has had some heart about him, and the other has been a coward." Parker scratched his head, balanced himself on the hind legs of his stool, and tacitly acknowledged the truth of all that his enterprising friend said to him. "Has old Wharton come down well?" at last he asked. "I have never said a word to old Wharton about money," Lopez replied,--"except as to the cost of this election I was telling you of." "And he wouldn't do anything in that?" "He doesn't approve of the thing itself. I don't doubt but that the old gentleman and I shall understand each other before long." "You've got the length of his foot." "But I don't mean to drive him. I can get along without that. He's an old man, and he can't take his money along with him when he goes the great journey." "There's a brother, Lopez,--isn't there?" "Yes,--there's a brother; but Wharton has enough for two; and if he were to put either out of his will it wouldn't be my wife. Old men don't like parting with their money, and he's like other old men. If it were not so I shouldn't bother myself coming into the city at all." "Has he enough for that, Lopez?" "I suppose he's worth a quarter of a million." "By Jove! And where did he get it?" "Perseverance, sir. Put by a shilling a day, and let it have its natural increase, and see what it will come to at the end of fifty years. I suppose old Wharton has been putting by two or three thousand out of his professional income, at any rate for the last thirty years, and never for a moment forgetting its natural increase. That's one way to make a fortune." "It ain't rapid enough for you and me, Lopez." "No. That was the old-fashioned way, and the most sure. But, as you say, it is not rapid enough; and it robs a man of the power of enjoying his money when he has made it. But it's a very good thing to be closely connected with a man who has already done that kind of thing. There's no doubt about the money when it is there. It does not take to itself wings and fly away." "But the man who has it sticks to it uncommon hard." "Of course he does;--but he can't take it away with him." "He can leave it to hospitals, Lopez. That's the devil!" "Sexty, my boy, I see you have taken an outlook into human life which does you credit. Yes, he can leave it to hospitals. But why does he leave it to hospitals?" "Something of being afraid about his soul, I suppose." "No; I don't believe in that. Such a man as this, who has been hard-fisted all his life, and who has had his eyes thoroughly open, who has made his own money in the sharp intercourse of man to man, and who keeps it to the last gasp,--he doesn't believe that he'll do his soul any good by giving it to hospitals when he can't keep it himself any longer. His mind has freed itself from those cobwebs long since. He gives his money to hospitals because the last pleasure of which he is capable is that of spiting his relations. And it is a great pleasure to an old man, when his relations have been disgusted with him for being old and loving his money. I rather think I should do it myself." "I'd give myself a chance of going to heaven, I think," said Parker. "Don't you know that men will rob and cheat on their death-beds, and say their prayers all the time? Old Wharton won't leave his money to hospitals if he's well handled by those about him." "And you'll handle him well;--eh, Lopez?" "I won't quarrel with him, or tell him that he's a curmudgeon because he doesn't do all that I want him. He's over seventy, and he can't carry his money with him." All this left so vivid an impression of the wisdom of his friend on the mind of Sextus Parker, that in spite of the harrowing fears by which he had been tormented on more than one occasion already, he allowed himself to be persuaded into certain fiscal arrangements, by which Lopez would find himself put at ease with reference to money at any rate for the next four months. He had at once told himself that this election would cost him £1000. When various sums were mentioned in reference to such an affair, safety could alone be found in taking the outside sum;--perhaps might generally be more surely found by adding fifty per cent. to that. He knew that he was wrong about the election, but he assured himself that he had had no alternative. The misfortune had been that the Duke should have made his proclamation about the borough immediately after the offer made by the Duchess. He had been almost forced to send the agent down to inquire;--and the agent, when making his inquiries, had compromised him. He must go on with it now. Perhaps some idea of the pleasantness of increased intimacy with the Duchess of Omnium encouraged him in this way of thinking. The Duchess was up in town in February, and Lopez left a card in Carlton Terrace. On the very next day the card of the Duchess was left for Mrs. Lopez at the Belgrave Mansions. Lopez went into the city every day, leaving home at about eleven o'clock, and not returning much before dinner. The young wife at first found that she hardly knew what to do with her time. Her aunt, Mrs. Roby, was distasteful to her. She had already learned from her husband that he had but little respect for Mrs. Roby. "You remember the sapphire brooch," he had said once. "That was part of the price I had to pay for being allowed to approach you." He was sitting at the time with his arm round her waist, looking out on beautiful scenery and talking of his old difficulties. She could not find it in her heart to be angry with him, but the idea brought to her mind was disagreeable to her. And she was thoroughly angry with Mrs. Roby. Of course in these days Mrs. Roby came to see her, and of course when she was up in Manchester Square, she went to the house round the corner,--but there was no close intimacy between the aunt and the niece. And many of her father's friends,--whom she regarded as the Herefordshire set,--were very cold to her. She had not made herself a glory to Herefordshire, and,--as all these people said,--had broken the heart of the best Herefordshire young man of the day. This made a great falling-off in her acquaintance, which was the more felt as she had never been, as a girl, devoted to a large circle of dearest female friends. She whom she had loved best had been Mary Wharton, and Mary Wharton had refused to be her bridesmaid almost without an expression of regret. She saw her father occasionally. Once he came and dined with them at their rooms, on which occasion Lopez struggled hard to make up a well-sounding party. There were Roby from the Admiralty, and the Happertons, and Sir Timothy Beeswax, with whom Lopez had become acquainted at Gatherum, and old Lord Mongrober. But the barrister, who had dined out a good deal in his time, perceived the effort. Who, that ever with difficulty scraped his dinner guests together, was able afterwards to obliterate the signs of the struggle? It was, however, a first attempt, and Lopez, whose courage was good, thought that he might do better before long. If he could get into the House and make his mark there people then would dine with him fast enough. But while this was going on Emily's life was rather dull. He had provided her with a brougham, and everything around her was even luxurious, but there came upon her gradually a feeling that by her marriage she had divided herself from her own people. She did not for a moment allow this feeling to interfere with her loyalty to him. Had she not known that this division would surely take place? Had she not married him because she loved him better than her own people? So she sat herself down to read Dante,--for they had studied Italian together during their honeymoon, and she had found that he knew the language well. And she was busy with her needle. And she already began to anticipate the happiness which would come to her when a child of his should be lying in her arms. She was of course much interested about the election. Nothing could as yet be done, because as yet there was no vacancy; but still the subject was discussed daily between them. "Who do you think is going to stand against me?" he said one day with a smile. "A very old friend of yours." She knew at once who the man was, and the blood came to her face. "I think he might as well have left it alone, you know," he said. "Did he know?" she asked in a whisper. "Know;--of course he knew. He is doing it on purpose. But I beat him once, old girl, didn't I? And I'll beat him again." She liked him to call her old girl. She loved the perfect intimacy with which he treated her. But there was something which grated against her feelings in this allusion by him to the other man who had loved her. Of course she had told him the whole story. She had conceived it to be her duty to do so. But then the thing should have been over. It was necessary, perhaps, that he should tell her who was his opponent. It was impossible that she should not know when the fight came. But she did not like to hear him boast that he had beaten Arthur Fletcher once, and that he would beat him again. By doing so he likened the sweet fragrance of her love to the dirty turmoil of an electioneering contest. He did not understand,--how should he?--that though she had never loved Arthur Fletcher, had never been able to bring herself to love him when all her friends had wished it, her feelings to him were nevertheless those of affectionate friendship;--that she regarded him as being perfect in his way, a thorough gentleman, a man who would not for worlds tell a lie, as most generous among the generous, most noble among the noble. When the other Whartons had thrown her off, he had not been cold to her. That very day, as soon as her husband had left her, she looked again at that little note. "I am as I always have been!" And she remembered that farewell down by the banks of the Wye. "You will always have one,--one besides him,--who will love you best in the world." They were dangerous words for her to remember; but in recalling them to her memory she had often assured herself that they should not be dangerous to her. She was too sure of her own heart to be afraid of danger. She had loved the one man and had not loved the other;--but yet, now, when her husband talked of beating this man again, she could not but remember the words. She did not think,--or rather had not thought,--that Arthur Fletcher would willingly stand against her husband. It had occurred to her at once that he must first have become a candidate without knowing who would be his opponent. But Ferdinand had assured her as a matter of fact that Fletcher had known all about it. "I suppose in politics men are different," she said to herself. Her husband had evidently supposed that Arthur Fletcher had proposed himself as a candidate for Silverbridge, with the express object of doing an injury to the man who had carried off his love. And she repeated to herself her husband's words, "He is doing it on purpose." She did not like to differ from her husband, but she could hardly bring herself to believe that revenge of this kind should have recommended itself to Arthur Fletcher. Some little time after this, when she had been settled in London about a month, a letter was brought her, and she at once recognised Arthur Fletcher's writing. She was alone at the time, and it occurred to her at first that perhaps she ought not to open any communication from him without showing it to her husband. But then it seemed that such a hesitation would imply a doubt of the man, and almost a doubt of herself. Why should she fear what any man might write to her? So she opened the letter, and read it,--with infinite pleasure. It was as follows:-- MY DEAR MRS. LOPEZ, I think it best to make an explanation to you as to a certain coincidence which might possibly be misunderstood unless explained. I find that your husband and I are to be opponents at Silverbridge. I wish to say that I had pledged myself to the borough before I had heard his name as connected with it. I have very old associations with the neighbourhood, and was invited to stand by friends who had known me all my life as soon as it was understood that there would be an open contest. I cannot retire now without breaking faith with my party, nor do I know that there is any reason why I should do so. I should not, however, have come forward had I known that Mr. Lopez was to stand. I think you had better tell him so, and tell him also, with my compliments, that I hope we may fight our political battle with mutual good-fellowship and good-feeling. Yours very sincerely, ARTHUR FLETCHER. Emily was very much pleased by this letter, and yet she wept over it. She felt that she understood accurately all the motives that were at work within the man's breast when he was writing it. As to its truth,--of course the letter was gospel to her. Oh,--if the man could become her husband's friend how sweet it would be! Of course she wished, thoroughly wished, that her husband should succeed at Silverbridge. But she could understand that such a contest as this might be carried on without personal animosity. The letter was so like Arthur Fletcher,--so good, so noble, so generous, so true! The moment her husband came in she showed it to him with delight. "I was sure," she said as he was reading the letter, "that he had not known that you were to stand." "He knew it as well as I did," he replied, and as he spoke there came a dark scowl across his brow. "His writing to you is a piece of infernal impudence." "Oh, Ferdinand!" "You don't understand, but I do. He deserves to be horsewhipped for daring to write to you, and if I can come across him he shall have it." "Oh,--for heaven's sake!" "A man who was your rejected lover,--who has been trying to marry you for the last two years, presuming to commence a correspondence with you without your husband's sanction!" "He meant you to see it. He says I am to tell you." "Psha! That is simple cowardice. He meant you not to tell me; and then when you had answered him without telling me, he would have had the whip-hand of you." "Oh, Ferdinand, what evil thoughts you have!" "You are a child, my dear, and must allow me to dictate to you what you ought to think in such a matter as this. I tell you he knew all about my candidature, and that what he has said here to the contrary is a mere lie;--yes, a lie." He repeated the word because he saw that she shrank at hearing it; but he did not understand why she shrank,--that the idea of such an accusation against Arthur Fletcher was intolerable to her. "I have never heard of such a thing," he continued. "Do you suppose it is common for men who have been thrown over to write to the ladies who have rejected them immediately after their marriage?" "Do not the circumstances justify it?" "No;--they make it infinitely worse. He should have felt himself to be debarred from writing to you, both as being my wife and as being the wife of the man whom he intends to oppose at Silverbridge." This he said with so much anger that he frightened her. "It is not my fault," she said. "No; it is not your fault. But you should regard it as a great fault committed by him." "What am I to do?" "Give me the letter. You, of course, can do nothing." "You will not quarrel with him?" "Certainly I will. I have quarrelled with him already. Do you think I will allow any man to insult my wife without quarrelling with him? What I shall do I cannot yet say, and whatever I may do, you had better not know. I never thought much of these Herefordshire swells who believe themselves to be the very cream of the earth, and now I think less of them than ever." He was then silent, and slowly she took herself out of the room, and went away to dress. All this was very terrible. He had never been rough to her before, and she could not at all understand why he had been so rough to her now. Surely it was impossible that he should be jealous because her old lover had written to her such a letter as that which she had shown him! And then she was almost stunned by the opinions he had expressed about Fletcher, opinions which she knew,--was sure that she knew,--to be absolutely erroneous. A liar! Oh, heavens! And then the letter itself was so ingenuous and so honest! Anxious as she was to do all that her husband bade her, she could not be guided by him in this matter. And then she remembered his words: "You must allow me to dictate to you what you ought to think." Could it be that marriage meant as much as that,--that a husband was to claim to dictate to his wife what opinions she was to form about this and that person,--about a person she had known so well, whom he had never known? Surely she could only think in accordance with her own experience and her own intelligence! She was certain that Arthur Fletcher was no liar. Not even her own husband could make her think that. CHAPTER XXXI "Yes;--with a Horsewhip in My Hand" Emily Lopez, when she crept out of her own room and joined her husband just before dinner, was hardly able to speak to him, so thoroughly was she dismayed, and troubled, and horrified, by the manner in which he had taken Arthur Fletcher's letter. While she had been alone she had thought it all over, anxious if possible to bring herself into sympathy with her husband; but the more she thought of it the more evident did it become to her that he was altogether wrong. He was so wrong that it seemed to her that she would be a hypocrite if she pretended to agree with him. There were half-a-dozen accusations conveyed against Mr. Fletcher by her husband's view of the matter. He was a liar, giving a false account of his candidature;--and he was a coward; and an enemy to her, who had laid a plot by which he had hoped to make her act fraudulently towards her own husband, who had endeavoured to creep into a correspondence with her, and so to compromise her! All this, which her husband's mind had so easily conceived, was not only impossible to her, but so horrible that she could not refrain from disgust at her husband's conception. The letter had been left with him, but she remembered every word of it. She was sure that it was an honest letter, meaning no more than had been said,--simply intending to explain to her that he would not willingly have stood in the way of a friend whom he had loved, by interfering with her husband's prospects. And yet she was told that she was to think as her husband bade her think! She could not think so. She could not say that she thought so. If her husband would not credit her judgment, let the matter be referred to her father. Ferdinand would at any rate acknowledge that her father could understand such a matter even if she could not. During dinner he said nothing on the subject, nor did she. They were attended by a page in buttons whom he had hired to wait upon her, and the meal passed off almost in silence. She looked up at him frequently and saw that his brow was still black. As soon as they were alone she spoke to him, having studied during dinner what words she would first say: "Are you going down to the club to-night?" He had told her that the matter of this election had been taken up at the Progress, and that possibly he might have to meet two or three persons there on this evening. There had been a proposition that the club should bear a part of the expenditure, and he was very solicitous that such an arrangement should be made. "No," said he, "I shall not go out to-night. I am not sufficiently light-hearted." "What makes you heavy-hearted, Ferdinand?" "I should have thought you would have known." "I suppose I do know,--but I don't know why it should. I don't know why you should be displeased. At any rate, I have done nothing wrong." "No;--not as to the letter. But it astonishes me that you should be so--so bound to this man that--" "Bound to him, Ferdinand!" "No;--you are bound to me. But that you have so much regard for him as not to see that he has grossly insulted you." "I have a regard for him." "And you dare to tell me so?" "Dare! What should I be if I had any feeling which I did not dare to tell you? There is no harm in regarding a man with friendly feelings whom I have known since I was a child, and whom all my family have loved." "Your family wanted you to marry him!" "They did. But I have married you, because I loved you. But I need not think badly of an old friend, because I did not love him. Why should you be angry with him? What can you have to be afraid of?" Then she came and sat on his knee and caressed him. "It is he that shall be afraid of me," said Lopez. "Let him give the borough up if he means what he says." "Who could ask him to do that?" "Not you,--certainly." "Oh, no." "I can ask him." "Could you, Ferdinand?" "Yes;--with a horsewhip in my hand." "Indeed, indeed you do not know him. Will you do this;--will you tell my father everything, and leave it to him to say whether Mr. Fletcher has behaved badly to you?" "Certainly not. I will not have any interference from your father between you and me. If I had listened to your father, you would not have been here now. Your father is not as yet a friend of mine. When he comes to know what I can do for myself, and that I can rise higher than these Herefordshire people, then perhaps he may become my friend. But I will consult him in nothing so peculiar to myself as my own wife. And you must understand that in coming to me all obligation from you to him became extinct. Of course he is your father; but in such a matter as this he has no more to say to you than any stranger." After that he hardly spoke to her; but sat for an hour with a book in his hand, and then rose and said that he would go down to the club. "There is so much villainy about," he said, "that a man if he means to do anything must keep himself on the watch." When she was alone she at once burst into tears; but she soon dried her eyes, and putting down her work, settled herself to think of it all. What did it mean? Why was he thus changed to her? Could it be that he was the same Ferdinand to whom she had given herself without a doubt as to his personal merit? Every word that he had spoken since she had shown him the letter from Arthur Fletcher had been injurious to her, and offensive. It almost seemed as though he had determined to show himself to be a tyrant to her, and had only put off playing the part till the first convenient opportunity after their honeymoon. But through all this, her ideas were loyal to him. She would obey him in all things where obedience was possible, and would love him better than all the world. Oh yes;--for was he not her husband? Were he to prove himself the worst of men she would still love him. It had been for better or for worse; and as she had repeated the words to herself, she had sworn that if the worst should come, she would still be true. But she could not bring herself to say that Arthur Fletcher had behaved badly. She could not lie. She knew well that his conduct had been noble and generous. Then unconsciously and involuntarily,--or rather in opposition to her own will and inward efforts,--her mind would draw comparisons between her husband and Arthur Fletcher. There was some peculiar gift, or grace, or acquirement belonging without dispute to the one, and which the other lacked. What was it? She had heard her father say when talking of gentlemen,--of that race of gentlemen with whom it had been his lot to live,--that you could not make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. The use of the proverb had offended her much, for she had known well whom he had then regarded as a silk purse and whom as a sow's ear. But now she perceived that there had been truth in all this, though she was as anxious as ever to think well of her husband, and to endow him with all possible virtues. She had once ventured to form a doctrine for herself, to preach to herself a sermon of her own, and to tell herself that this gift of gentle blood and of gentle nurture, of which her father thought so much, and to which something of divinity was attributed down in Herefordshire, was after all but a weak, spiritless quality. It could exist without intellect, without heart, and with very moderate culture. It was compatible with many littlenesses and with many vices. As for that love of honest, courageous truth which her father was wont to attribute to it, she regarded his theory as based upon legends, as in earlier years was the theory of the courage, and constancy, and loyalty of the knights of those days. The beau ideal of a man which she then pictured to herself was graced, first with intelligence, then with affection, and lastly with ambition. She knew no reason why such a hero as her fancy created should be born of lords and ladies rather than of working mechanics, should be English rather than Spanish or French. The man could not be her hero without education, without attributes to be attained no doubt more easily by the rich than by the poor; but, with that granted, with those attained, she did not see why she, or why the world, should go back beyond the man's own self. Such had been her theories as to men and their attributes, and acting on that, she had given herself and all her happiness into the keeping of Ferdinand Lopez. Now, there was gradually coming upon her a change in her convictions,--a change that was most unwelcome, that she strove to reject,--one which she would not acknowledge that she had adopted even while adopting it. But now,--ay, from the very hour of her marriage,--she had commenced to learn what it was that her father had meant when he spoke of the pleasure of living with gentlemen. Arthur Fletcher certainly was a gentleman. He would not have entertained the suspicion which her husband had expressed. He could not have failed to believe such assertions as had been made. He could never have suggested to his own wife that another man had endeavoured to entrap her into a secret correspondence. She seemed to hear the tones of Arthur Fletcher's voice, as those of her husband still rang in her ear when he bade her remember that she was now removed from her father's control. Every now and then the tears would come to her eyes, and she would sit pondering, listless, and low in heart. Then she would suddenly rouse herself with a shake, and take up her book with a resolve that she would read steadily, would assure herself as she did so that her husband should still be her hero. The intelligence at any rate was there, and, in spite of his roughness, the affection which she craved. And the ambition, too, was there. But, alas, alas! why should such vile suspicions have fouled his mind? He was late that night, but when he came he kissed her brow as she lay in bed, and she knew that his temper was again smooth. She feigned to be sleepy, though not asleep, as she just put her hand up to his cheek. She did not wish to speak to him again that night, but she was glad to know that in the morning he would smile on her. "Be early at breakfast," he said to her as he left her the next morning, "for I'm going down to Silverbridge to-day." Then she started up. "To-day!" "Yes;--by the 11.20. There is plenty of time, only don't be unusually late." Of course she was something more than usually early, and when she came out she found him reading his paper. "It's all settled now," he said. "Grey has applied for the Hundreds, and Mr. Rattler is to move for the new writ to-morrow. It has come rather sudden at last, as these things always do after long delays. But they say the suddenness is rather in my favour." "When will the election take place?" "I suppose in about a fortnight;--perhaps a little longer." "And must you be at Silverbridge all that time?" "Oh dear no. I shall stay there to-night, and perhaps to-morrow night. Of course I shall telegraph to you directly I find how it is to be. I shall see the principal inhabitants, and probably make a speech or two." "I do so wish I could hear you." "You'd find it awfully dull work, my girl. And I shall find it awfully dull too. I do not imagine that Mr. Sprugeon and Mr. Sprout will be pleasant companions. Well; I shall stay there a day or two and settle when I am to go down for the absolute canvass. I shall have to go with my hat in my hand to every blessed inhabitant in that dirty little town, and ask them all to be kind enough to drop in a paper for the most humble of their servants, Ferdinand Lopez." "I suppose all candidates have to do the same." "Oh yes;--your friend, Master Fletcher, will have to do it." She winced at this. Arthur Fletcher was her friend, but at the present moment he ought not so to have spoken of him. "And from all I hear, he is just the sort of fellow that will like the doing of it. It is odious to me to ask a fellow that I despise for anything." "Why should you despise them?" "Low, ignorant, greasy cads, who have no idea of the real meaning of political privileges;--men who would all sell their votes for thirty shillings each, if that game had not been made a little too hot!" "If they are like that I would not represent them." "Oh yes, you would;--when you came to understand the world. It's a fine thing to be in Parliament, and that is the way to get in. However, on this visit I shall only see the great men of the town,--the Sprouts and Sprugeons." "Shall you go to Gatherum Castle?" "Oh, heavens, no! I may go anywhere now rather than there. The Duke is supposed to be in absolute ignorance of the very names of the candidates, or whether there are candidates. I don't suppose that the word Silverbridge will be even whispered in his ear till the thing is over." "But you are to get in by his friendship." "Or by hers;--at least I hope so. I have no doubt that the Sprouts and the Sprugeons have been given to understand by the Lococks and the Pritchards what are the Duchess's wishes, and that it has also been intimated in some subtle way that the Duke is willing to oblige the Duchess. There are ever so many ways, you know, of killing a cat." "And the expense?" suggested Emily. "Oh,--ah; the expense. When you come to talk of the expense things are not so pleasant. I never saw such a set of meaningless asses in my life as those men at the club. They talk and talk, but there is not one of them who knows how to do anything. Now at the club over the way they do arrange matters. It's a common cause, and I don't see what right they have to expect that one man should bear all the expense. I've a deuced good mind to leave them in the lurch." "Don't do it, Ferdinand, if you can't afford it." "I shall go on with it now. I can't help feeling that I've been a little let in among them. When the Duchess first promised me it was to be a simple walk over. Now that they've got their candidate, they go back from that and open the thing to any comer. I can't tell you what I think of Fletcher for taking advantage of such a chance. And then the political committee at the club coolly say that they've got no money. It isn't honest, you know." "I don't understand all that," said Emily sadly. Every word that he said about Fletcher cut her to the heart;--not because it grieved her that Fletcher should be abused, but that her husband should condescend to abuse him. She escaped from further conflict at the moment by proclaiming her ignorance of the whole matter; but she knew enough of it to be well aware that Arthur Fletcher had as good a right to stand as her husband, and that her husband lowered himself by personal animosity to the man. Then Lopez took his departure. "Oh, Ferdinand," she said, "I do so hope you may be successful." "I don't think he can have a chance. From what people say, he must be a fool to try. That is, if the Castle is true to me. I shall know more about it when I come back." That afternoon she dined with her father, and there met Mrs. Roby. It was of course known that Lopez had gone down to Silverbridge, and Emily learned in Manchester Square that Everett had gone with him. "From all I hear, they're two fools for their pains," said the lawyer. "Why, papa?" "The Duke has given the thing up." "But still his interest remains." "No such thing! If there is an honest man in England it is the Duke of Omnium, and when he says a thing he means it. Left to themselves, the people of a little town like Silverbridge are sure to return a Conservative. They are half of them small farmers, and of course will go that way if not made to go the other. If the club mean to pay the cost--" "The club will pay nothing, papa." "Then I can only hope that Lopez is doing well in his business!" After that, nothing further was said about the election, but she perceived that her father was altogether opposed to the idea of her husband being in Parliament, and that his sympathies and even his wishes were on the other side. When Mrs. Roby suggested that it would be a very nice thing for them all to have Ferdinand in Parliament,--she always called him Ferdinand now,--Mr. Wharton railed at her. "Why should it be a nice thing? I wonder whether you have any idea of a meaning in your head when you say that. Do you suppose that a man gets £1000 a year by going into Parliament?" "Laws, Mr. Wharton; how uncivil you are! Of course I know that members of Parliament ain't paid." "Where's the niceness then? If a man has his time at his command and has studied the art of legislation it may be nice, because he will be doing his duty;--or if he wants to get into the government ruck like your brother-in-law, it may be nice;--or if he be an idle man with a large fortune it may be nice to have some place to go to. But why it should be nice for Ferdinand Lopez I cannot understand. Everett has some idea in his head when he talks about Parliament,--though I cannot say that I agree with him." It may easily be understood that after this Emily would say nothing further in Manchester Square as to her husband's prospects at Silverbridge. Lopez was at Silverbridge for a couple of days, and then returned, as his wife thought, by no means confident of success. He remained in town nearly a week, and during that time he managed to see the Duchess. He had written to her saying that he would do himself the honour of calling on her, and when he came was admitted. But the account he gave to his wife of the visit did not express much satisfaction. It was quite late in the evening before he told her whither he had been. He had intended to keep the matter to himself, and at last spoke of it,--guided by the feeling which induces all men to tell their secrets to their wives,--because it was a comfort to him to talk to some one who would not openly contradict him. "She's a sly creature after all," he said. "I had always thought that she was too open rather than sly," said his wife. "People always try to get a character just opposite to what they deserve. When I hear that a man is always to be believed, I know that he is the most dangerous liar going. She hummed and hawed and would not say a word about the borough. She went so far as to tell me that I wasn't to say a word about it to her." "Wasn't that best if her husband wished her not to talk of it?" "It is all humbug and falsehood to the very bottom. She knows that I am spending money about it, and she ought to be on the square with me. She ought to tell me what she can do and what she can't. When I asked her whether Sprugeon might be trusted, she said that she really wished that I wouldn't say anything more to her about it. I call that dishonest and sly. I shouldn't at all wonder but that Fletcher has been with the Duke. If I find that out, won't I expose them both!" CHAPTER XXXII "What Business Is It of Yours?" Things had not gone altogether smoothly with the Duchess herself since the breaking up of the party at Gatherum Castle,--nor perhaps quite smoothly with the Duke. It was now March. The House was again sitting, and they were both in London,--but till they came to town they had remained at the Castle, and that huge mansion had not been found to be more comfortable by either of them as it became empty. For a time the Duchess had been cowed by her husband's stern decision; but as he again became gentle to her,--almost seeming by his manner to apologise for his unwonted roughness,--she plucked up her spirit and declared to herself that she would not give up the battle. All that she did,--was it not for his sake? And why should she not have her ambition in life as well as he his? And had she not succeeded in all that she had done? Could it be right that she should be asked to abandon everything, to own herself to have been defeated, to be shown to have failed before all the world, because such a one as Major Pountney had made a fool of himself? She attributed it all to Major Pountney;--very wrongly. When a man's mind is veering towards some decision, some conclusion which he has been perhaps slow in reaching, it is probably a little thing which at last fixes his mind and clenches his thoughts. The Duke had been gradually teaching himself to hate the crowd around him and to reprobate his wife's strategy, before he had known that there was a Major Pountney under his roof. Others had offended him, and first and foremost among them his own colleague, Sir Orlando. The Duchess hardly read his character aright, and certainly did not understand his present motives, when she thought that all might be forgotten as soon as the disagreeable savour of the Major should have passed away. But in nothing, as she thought, had her husband been so silly as in his abandonment of Silverbridge. When she heard that the day was fixed for declaring the vacancy, she ventured to ask him a question. His manner to her lately had been more than urbane, more than affectionate;--it had almost been that of a lover. He had petted her and caressed her when they met, and once even said that nothing should really trouble him as long as he had her with him. Such a speech as that never in his life had he made before to her! So she plucked up her courage and asked her question,--not exactly on that occasion, but soon afterwards; "May not I say a word to Sprugeon about the election?" "Not a word!" And he looked at her as he had looked on that day when he had told her of the Major's sins. She tossed her head and pouted her lips and walked on without speaking. If it was to be so, then indeed would she have failed. And, therefore, though in his general manner he was loving to her, things were not going smooth with her. And things were not going smooth with him because there had reached him a most troublous dispatch from Sir Orlando Drought only two days before the Cabinet meeting at which the points to be made in the Queen's speech were to be decided. It had been already agreed that a proposition should be made to Parliament by the Government, for an extension of the county suffrage, with some slight redistribution of seats. The towns with less than 20,000 inhabitants were to take in some increased portions of the country parishes around. But there was not enough of a policy in this to satisfy Sir Orlando, nor was the conduct of the bill through the House to be placed in his hands. That was to be intrusted to Mr. Monk, and Mr. Monk would be, if not nominally the Leader, yet the chief man of the Government in the House of Commons. This was displeasing to Sir Orlando, and he had, therefore, demanded from the Prime Minister more of a "policy." Sir Orlando's present idea of a policy was the building four bigger ships of war than had ever been built before,--with larger guns, and more men, and thicker iron plates, and, above all, with a greater expenditure of money. He had even gone so far as to say, though not in his semi-official letter to the Prime Minister, that he thought that "The Salvation of the Empire" should be the cry of the Coalition party. "After all," he said, "what the people care about is the Salvation of the Empire!" Sir Orlando was at the head of the Admiralty; and if glory was to be achieved by the four ships, it would rest first on the head of Sir Orlando. Now the Duke thought that the Empire was safe, and had been throughout his political life averse to increasing the army and navy estimates. He regarded the four ships as altogether unnecessary,--and when reminded that he might in this way consolidate the Coalition, said that he would rather do without the Coalition and the four ships than have to do with both of them together,--an opinion which was thought by some to be almost traitorous to the party as now organised. The secrets of Cabinets are not to be disclosed lightly, but it came to be understood,--as what is done at Cabinet meetings generally does come to be understood,--that there was something like a disagreement. The Prime Minister, the Duke of St. Bungay, and Mr. Monk were altogether against the four ships. Sir Orlando was supported by Lord Drummond and another of his old friends. At the advice of the elder Duke, a paragraph was hatched, in which it was declared that her Majesty, "having regard to the safety of the nation and the possible, though happily not probable, chances of war, thought that the present strength of the navy should be considered." "It will give him scope for a new gun-boat on an altered principle," said the Duke of St. Bungay. But the Prime Minister, could he have had his own way, would have given Sir Orlando no scope whatever. He would have let the Coalition have gone to the dogs and have fallen himself into infinite political ruin, but that he did not dare that men should hereafter say of him that this attempt at government had failed because he was stubborn, imperious, and self-confident. He had known when he took his present place that he must yield to others; but he had not known how terrible it is to have to yield when a principle is in question,--how great is the suffering when a man finds himself compelled to do that which he thinks should not be done! Therefore, though he had been strangely loving to his wife, the time had not gone smoothly with him. In direct disobedience to her husband the Duchess did speak a word to Mr. Sprugeon. When at the Castle she was frequently driven through Silverbridge, and on one occasion had her carriage stopped at the ironmonger's door. Out came Mr. Sprugeon, and there were at first half-a-dozen standing by who could hear what she said. Millepois, the cook, wanted to have some new kind of iron plate erected in the kitchen. Of course she had provided herself beforehand with her excuse. As a rule, when the cook wanted anything done, he did not send word to the tradesman by the Duchess. But on this occasion the Duchess was personally most anxious. She wanted to see how the iron plate would work. It was to be a particular kind of iron plate. Then, having watched her opportunity, she said her word, "I suppose we shall be safe with Mr. Lopez?" When Mr. Sprugeon was about to reply, she shook her head and went on about the iron plate. This would be quite enough to let Mr. Sprugeon understand that she was still anxious about the borough. Mr. Sprugeon was an intelligent man, and possessed of discretion to a certain extent. As soon as he saw the little frown and the shake of the head, he understood it all. He and the Duchess had a secret together. Would not everything about the Castle in which a morsel of iron was employed want renewing? And would not the Duchess take care that it should all be renewed by Sprugeon? But then he must be active, and his activity would be of no avail unless others helped him. So he whispered a word to Sprout, and it soon became known that the Castle interest was all alive. But unfortunately the Duke was also on the alert. The Duke had been very much in earnest when he made up his mind that the old custom should be abandoned at Silverbridge and had endeavoured to impress that determination of his upon his wife. The Duke knew more about his property and was better acquainted with its details than his wife or others believed. He heard that in spite of all his orders the Castle interest was being maintained, and a word was said to him which seemed to imply that this was his wife's doings. It was then about the middle of February, and arrangements were in process for the removal of the family to London. The Duke had already been up to London for the meeting of Parliament, and had now come back to Gatherum, purporting to return to London with his wife. Then it was that it was hinted to him that her Grace was still anxious as to the election,--and had manifested her anxiety. The rumour hurt him, though he did not in the least believe it. It showed to him, as he thought, not that his wife had been false to him,--as in truth she had been,--but that even her name could not be kept free from slander. And when he spoke to her on the subject, he did so rather with the view of proving to her how necessary it was that she should keep herself altogether aloof from such matters, than with any wish to make further inquiry. But he elicited the whole truth. "It is so hard to kill an old established evil," he said. "What evil have you failed to kill now?" "Those people at Silverbridge still say that I want to return a member for them." "Oh; that's the evil! You know I think that instead of killing an evil, you have murdered an excellent institution." This at any rate was very imprudent on the part of the Duchess. After that disobedient word spoken to Mr. Sprugeon, she should have been more on her guard. "As to that, Glencora, I must judge for myself." "Oh yes,--you have been jury, and judge, and executioner." "I have done as I thought right to do. I am sorry that I should fail to carry you with me in such a matter, but even failing in that I must do my duty. You will at any rate agree with me that when I say the thing should be done, it should be done." "If you wanted to destroy the house, and cut down all the trees, and turn the place into a wilderness, I suppose you would only have to speak. Of course I know it would be wrong that I should have an opinion. As 'man' you are of course to have your own way." She was in one of her most aggravating moods. Though he might compel her to obey, he could not compel her to hold her tongue. "Glencora, I don't think you know how much you add to my troubles, or you would not speak to me like that." "What am I to say? It seems to me that any more suicidal thing than throwing away the borough never was done. Who will thank you? What additional support will you get? How will it increase your power? It's like King Lear throwing off his clothes in the storm because his daughters turned him out. And you didn't do it because you thought it right." "Yes, I did," he said, scowling. "You did it because Major Pountney disgusted you. You kicked him out. Why wouldn't that satisfy you without sacrificing the borough? It isn't what I think or say about it, but that everybody is thinking and saying the same thing." "I choose that it shall be so." "Very well." "And I don't choose that your name shall be mixed up in it. They say in Silverbridge that you are canvassing for Mr. Lopez." "Who says so?" "I presume it's not true." "Who says so, Plantagenet?" "It matters not who has said so, if it be untrue. I presume it to be false." "Of course it is false." Then the Duchess remembered her word to Mr. Sprugeon, and the cowardice of the lie was heavy on her. I doubt whether she would have been so shocked by the idea of a falsehood as to have been kept back from it had she before resolved that it would save her; but she was not in her practice a false woman, her courage being too high for falsehood. It now seemed to her that by this lie she was owning herself to be quelled and brought into absolute subjection by her husband. So she burst out into truth. "Now I think of it, I did say a word to Mr. Sprugeon. I told him that--that I hoped Mr. Lopez would be returned. I don't know whether you call that canvassing." "I desired you not to speak to Mr. Sprugeon," he thundered forth. "That's all very well, Plantagenet, but if you desire me to hold my tongue altogether, what am I to do?" "What business is this of yours?" "I suppose I may have my political sympathies as well as another. Really you are becoming so autocratic that I shall have to go in for women's rights." "You mean me to understand then that you intend to put yourself in opposition to me." "What a fuss you make about it all!" she said. "Nothing that one can do is right! You make me wish that I was a milkmaid or a farmer's wife." So saying she bounced out of the room, leaving the Duke sick at heart, low in spirit, and doubtful whether he were right or wrong in his attempts to manage his wife. Surely he must be right in feeling that in his high office a clearer conduct and cleaner way of walking was expected from him than from other men! Noblesse oblige! To his uncle the privilege of returning a member to Parliament had been a thing of course; and when the Radical newspapers of the day abused his uncle, his uncle took that abuse as a thing of course. The old Duke acted after his kind, and did not care what others said of him. And he himself, when he first came to his dukedom, was not as he was now. Duties, though they were heavy enough, were lighter then. Serious matters were less serious. There was this and that matter of public policy on which he was intent, but, thinking humbly of himself, he had not yet learned to conceive that he must fit his public conduct in all things to a straight rule of patriotic justice. Now it was different with him, and though the change was painful, he felt it to be imperative. He would fain have been as other men, but he could not. But in this change it was so needful to him that he should carry with him the full sympathies of one person;--that she who was the nearest to him of all should act with him! And now she had not only disobeyed him, but had told him, as some grocer's wife might tell her husband, that he was "making a fuss about it all!" And then, as he thought of the scene which has been described, he could not quite approve of himself. He knew that he was too self-conscious,--that he was thinking too much about his own conduct and the conduct of others to him. The phrase had been odious to him, but still he could not acquit himself of "making a fuss." Of one thing only was he sure,--that a grievous calamity had befallen him when circumstances compelled him to become the Queen's Prime Minister. He said nothing further to his wife till they were in London together, and then he was tempted to caress her again, to be loving to her, and to show her that he had forgiven her. But she was brusque to him, as though she did not wish to be forgiven. "Cora," he said, "do not separate yourself from me." "Separate myself! What on earth do you mean? I have not dreamed of such a thing." The Duchess answered him as though he had alluded to some actual separation. "I do not mean that. God forbid that a misfortune such as that should ever happen! Do not disjoin yourself from me in all these troubles." "What am I to do when you scold me? You must know pretty well by this time that I don't like to be scolded. 'I desired you not to speak to Mr. Sprugeon!'" As she repeated his words she imitated his manner and voice closely. "I shouldn't dream of addressing the children with such magnificence of anger. 'What business is it of yours?' No woman likes that sort of thing, and I'm not sure that I am acquainted with any woman who likes it much less than--Glencora, Duchess of Omnium." As she said these last words in a low whisper, she curtseyed down to the ground. "You know how anxious I am," he began, "that you should share everything with me,--even in politics. But in all things there must at last be one voice that shall be the ruling voice." "And that is to be yours,--of course." "In such a matter as this it must be." "And, therefore, I like to do a little business of my own behind your back. It's human nature, and you've got to put up with it. I wish you had a better wife. I dare say there are many who would be better. There's the Duchess of St. Bungay who never troubles her husband about politics, but only scolds him because the wind blows from the east. It is just possible there might be worse." "Oh, Glencora!" "You had better make the best you can of your bargain and not expect too much from her. And don't ride over her with a very high horse. And let her have her own way a little if you really believe that she has your interest at heart." After this he was quite aware that she had got the better of him altogether. On that occasion he smiled and kissed her, and went his way. But he was by no means satisfied. That he should be thwarted by her, ate into his very heart;--and it was a wretched thing to him that he could not make her understand his feeling in this respect. If it were to go on he must throw up everything. Ruat coelum, fiat--proper subordination from his wife in regard to public matters! No wife had a fuller allowance of privilege, or more complete power in her hands, as to things fit for women's management. But it was intolerable to him that she should seek to interfere with him in matters of a public nature. And she was constantly doing so. She had always this or that aspirant for office on hand;--this or that job to be carried, though the jobs were not perhaps much in themselves;--this or that affair to be managed by her own political allies, such as Barrington Erle and Phineas Finn. And in his heart he suspected her of a design of managing the Government in her own way, with her own particular friend, Mrs. Finn, for her Prime Minister. If he could in no other way put an end to such evils as these, he must put an end to his own political life. Ruat coelum, fiat justitia. Now "justitia" to him was not compatible with feminine interference in his own special work. It may therefore be understood that things were not going very smoothly with the Duke and Duchess; and it may also be understood why the Duchess had had very little to say to Mr. Lopez about the election. She was aware that she owed something to Mr. Lopez, whom she had certainly encouraged to stand for the borough, and she had therefore sent her card to his wife and was prepared to invite them both to her parties;--but just at present she was a little tired of Ferdinand Lopez, and perhaps unjustly disposed to couple him with that unfortunate wretch, Major Pountney. CHAPTER XXXIII Showing That a Man Should Not Howl Arthur Fletcher, in his letter to Mrs. Lopez, had told her that when he found out who was to be his antagonist at Silverbridge, it was too late for him to give up the contest. He was, he said, bound in faith to continue it by what had passed between himself and others. But in truth he had not reached his conclusion without some persuasion from others. He had been at Longbarns with his brother when he first heard that Lopez intended to stand, and he at once signified his desire to give way. The information reached him from Mr. Frank Gresham, of Greshamsbury, a gentleman connected with the De Courcys who was now supposed to represent the De Courcy interest in the county, and who had first suggested to Arthur that he should come forward. It was held at Longbarns that Arthur was bound in honour to Mr. Gresham and to Mr. Gresham's friends, and to this opinion he had yielded. Since Emily Wharton's marriage her name had never been mentioned at Longbarns in Arthur's presence. When he was away,--and of course his life was chiefly passed in London,--old Mrs. Fletcher was free enough in her abuse of the silly creature who had allowed herself to be taken out of her own rank by a Portuguese Jew. But she had been made to understand by her elder son, the lord of Longbarns, that not a word was to be said when Arthur was there. "I think he ought to be taught to forget her," Mrs. Fletcher had said. But John in his own quiet but imperious way, had declared that there were some men to whom such lessons could not be taught, and that Arthur was one of them. "Is he never to get a wife, then?" Mrs. Fletcher had asked. John wouldn't pretend to answer that question, but was quite sure that his brother would not be tempted into other matrimonial arrangements by anything that could be said against Emily Lopez. When Mrs. Fletcher declared in her extreme anger that Arthur was a fool for his trouble, John did not contradict her, but declared that the folly was of a nature to require tender treatment. Matters were in this condition at Longbarns when Arthur communicated to his brother the contents of Mr. Gresham's letter, and expressed his own purpose of giving up Silverbridge. "I don't quite see that," said John. "No;--and it is impossible that you should be expected to see it. I don't quite know how to talk about it even to you, though I think you are about the softest-hearted fellow out." "I don't acknowledge the soft heart;--but go on." "I don't want to interfere with that man. I have a sort of feeling that as he has got her he might as well have the seat too." "The seat, as you call it, is not there for his gratification or for yours. The seat is there in order that the people of Silverbridge may be represented in Parliament." "Let them get somebody else. I don't want to put myself in opposition to him, and I certainly do not want to oppose her." "They can't change their candidate in that way at a day's notice. You would be throwing Gresham over, and, if you ask me, I think that is a thing you have no right to do. This objection of yours is sentimental, and there is nothing of which a man should be so much in dread as sentimentalism. It is not your fault that you oppose Mr. Lopez. You were in the field first, and you must go on with it." John Fletcher, when he spoke in this way, was, at Longbarns, always supposed to be right; and on the present occasion he, as usual, prevailed. Then Arthur Fletcher wrote his letter to the lady. He would not have liked to have had it known that the composition and copying of that little note had cost him an hour. He had wished that she should understand his feelings, and yet it was necessary that he should address her in words that should be perfectly free from affection or emotion. He must let her know that, though he wrote to her, the letter was for her husband as well as for herself, and he must do this in a manner which would not imply any fear that his writing to her would be taken amiss. The letter when completed was at any rate simple and true; and yet, as we know, it was taken very much amiss. Arthur Fletcher had by no means recovered from the blow he had received that day when Emily had told him everything down by the river side; but then, it must be said of him, that he had no intention of recovery. He was as a man who, having taken a burden on his back, declares to himself that he will, for certain reasons, carry it throughout his life. The man knows that with the burden he cannot walk as men walk who are unencumbered, but for those reasons of his he has chosen to lade himself, and having done so he abandons regret and submits to his circumstances. So had it been with him. He would make no attempt to throw off the load. It was now far back in his life, as much at least as three years, since he had first assured himself of his desire to make Emily Wharton the companion of his life. From that day she had been the pivot on which his whole existence had moved. She had refused his offers more than once, but had done so with so much tender kindness, that, though he had found himself to be wounded and bruised, he had never abandoned his object. Her father and all his own friends encouraged him. He was continually told that her coldness was due to the simple fact that she had not yet learned to give her heart away. And so he had persevered, being ever thoroughly intent on his purpose, till he was told by herself that her love was given to this other man. Then he knew that it behoved him to set some altered course of life before him. He could not shoot his rival or knock him over the head, nor could he carry off his girl, as used to be done in rougher times. There was nothing now for a man in such a catastrophe as this but submission. But he might submit and shake off his burden, or submit and carry it hopelessly. He told himself that he would do the latter. She had been his goddess, and he would not now worship at another shrine. And then ideas came into his head,--not hopes, or purposes, or a belief even in any possibility,--but vague ideas, mere castles in the air, that a time might come in which it might be in his power to serve her, and to prove to her beyond doubting what had been the nature of his love. Like others of his family, he thought ill of Lopez, believing the man to be an adventurer, one who would too probably fall into misfortune, however high he might now seem to hold his head. He was certainly a man not standing on the solid basis of land, or of Three per Cents,--those solidities to which such as the Whartons and Fletchers are wont to trust. No doubt, should there be such fall, the man's wife would have other help than that of her rejected lover. She had a father, brother, and cousins, who would also be there to aid her. The idea was, therefore, but a castle in the air. And yet it was dear to him. At any rate he resolved that he would live for it, and that the woman should still be his goddess, though she was the wife of another man, and might now perhaps never even be seen by him. Then there came upon him, immediately almost after her marriage, the necessity of writing to her. The task was one which, of course, he did not perform lightly. He never said a word of this to anybody else;--but his brother understood it all, and in a somewhat silent fashion fully sympathised with him. John could not talk to him about love, or mark passages of poetry for him to read, or deal with him at all romantically; but he could take care that his brother had the best horses to ride, and the warmest corner out shooting, and that everything in the house should be done for his brother's comfort. As the squire looked and spoke at Longbarns, others looked and spoke,--so that everybody knew that Mr. Arthur was to be contradicted in nothing. Had he, just at this period, ordered a tree in the park to be cut down, it would, I think, have been cut down, without reference to the master! But, perhaps, John's power was most felt in the way in which he repressed the expressions of his mother's high indignation. "Mean slut!" she once said, speaking of Emily in her eldest son's hearing. For the girl, to her thinking, had been mean and had been a slut. She had not known,--so Mrs. Fletcher thought,--what birth and blood required of her. "Mother," John Fletcher had said, "you would break Arthur's heart if he heard you speak in that way, and I am sure you would drive him from Longbarns. Keep it to yourself." The old woman had shaken her head angrily, but she had endeavoured to do as she had been bid. "Isn't your brother riding that horse a little rashly?" Reginald Cotgrave said to John Fletcher in the hunting field one day. "I didn't observe," said John; "but whatever horse he's on, he always rides rashly." Arthur was mounted on a long, raking thorough-bred black animal, which he had bought himself about a month ago, and which, having been run at steeplechases, rushed at every fence as though he were going to swallow it. His brother had begged him to put some rough-rider up till the horse could be got to go quietly, but Arthur had persevered. And during the whole of this day the squire had been in a tremor, lest there should be some accident. "He used to have a little more judgment, I think," said Cotgrave. "He went at that double just now as hard as the brute could tear. If the horse hadn't done it all, where would he have been?" "In the further ditch, I suppose. But you see the horse did do it all." This was all very well as an answer to Reginald Cotgrave,--to whom it was not necessary that Fletcher should explain the circumstances. But the squire had known as well as Cotgrave that his brother had been riding rashly, and he had understood the reason why. "I don't think a man ought to break his neck," he said, "because he can't get everything that he wishes." The two brothers were standing then together before the fire in the squire's own room, having just come in from hunting. "Who is going to break his neck?" "They tell me that you tried to to-day." "Because I was riding a pulling horse. I'll back him to be the biggest leaper and the quickest horse in Herefordshire." "I dare say,--though for the matter of that the chances are very much against it. But a man shouldn't ride so as to have those things said of him." "What is a fellow to do if he can't hold a horse?" "Get off him." "That's nonsense, John!" "No, it's not. You know what I mean very well. If I were to lose half my property to-morrow, don't you think it would cut me up a good deal?" "It would me, I know." "But what would you think of me if I howled about it?" "Do I howl?" asked Arthur angrily. "Every man howls who is driven out of his ordinary course by any trouble. A man howls if he goes about frowning always." "Do I frown?" "Or laughing." "Do I laugh?" "Or galloping over the country like a mad devil who wants to get rid of his debts by breaking his neck. �quam memento--. You remember all that, don't you?" "I remember it; but it isn't so easy to do it." "Try. There are other things to be done in life except getting married. You are going into Parliament." "I don't know that." "Gresham tells me there isn't a doubt about it. Think of that. Fix your mind upon it. Don't take it only as an accident, but as the thing you're to live for. If you'll do that,--if you'll so manage that there shall be something to be done in Parliament which only you can do, you won't ride a runaway horse as you did that brute to-day." Arthur looked up into his brother's face almost weeping. "We expect much of you, you know. I'm not a man to do anything except be a good steward for the family property, and keep the old house from falling down. You're a clever fellow,--so that between us, if we both do our duty, the Fletchers may still thrive in the land. My house shall be your house, and my wife your wife, and my children your children. And then the honour you win shall be my honour. Hold up your head,--and sell that beast." Arthur Fletcher squeezed his brother's hand and went away to dress. CHAPTER XXXIV The Silverbridge Election About a month after this affair with the runaway horse Arthur Fletcher went to Greshamsbury, preparatory to his final sojourn at Silverbridge for the week previous to his election. Greshamsbury, the seat of Francis Gresham, Esq., who was a great man in these parts, was about twenty miles from Silverbridge, and the tedious work of canvassing the electors could not therefore be done from thence;--but he spent a couple of pleasant days with his old friend, and learned what was being said and what was being done in and about the borough. Mr. Gresham was a man, not as yet quite forty years of age, very popular, with a large family, of great wealth, and master of the county hounds. His father had been an embarrassed man, with a large estate; but this Gresham had married a lady with immense wealth, and had prospered in the world. He was not an active politician. He did not himself care for Parliament, or for the good things which political power can give, and was on this account averse to the Coalition. He thought that Sir Orlando Drought and the others were touching pitch and had defiled themselves. But he was conscious that in so thinking he was one of but a small minority; and, bad as the world around him certainly was, terrible as had been the fall of the glory of old England, he was nevertheless content to live without loud grumbling as long as the farmers paid him their rent, and the labourers in his part of the country did not strike for wages, and the land when sold would fetch thirty years' purchase. He had not therefore been careful to ascertain that Arthur Fletcher would pledge himself to oppose the Coalition before he proffered his assistance in this matter of the borough. It would not be easy to find such a candidate, or perhaps possible to bring him in when found. The Fletchers had always been good Conservatives, and were proper people to be in Parliament. A Conservative in Parliament is, of course, obliged to promote a great many things which he does not really approve. Mr. Gresham quite understood that. You can't have tests and qualifications, rotten boroughs and the divine right of kings, back again. But as the glorious institutions of the country are made to perish, one after the other, it is better that they should receive the coup de grâce tenderly from loving hands than be roughly throttled by Radicals. Mr. Gresham would thank his stars that he could still preserve foxes down in his own country, instead of doing any of this dirty work,--for let the best be made of such work, still it was dirty,--and was willing, now as always, to give his assistance, and if necessary to spend a little money, to put a Fletcher into Parliament and to keep a Lopez out. There was to be a third candidate. That was the first news that Fletcher heard. "It will do us all the good in the world," said Mr. Gresham. "The Rads in the borough are not satisfied with Mr. Lopez. They say they don't know him. As long as a certain set could make it be believed that he was the Duke's nominee they were content to accept him;--even though he was not proposed directly by the Duke's people in the usual way. But the Duke has made himself understood at last. You have seen the Duke's letter?" Arthur had not seen the Duke's letter, which had only been published in the "Silverbridge Gazette" of that week, and he now read it, sitting in Mr. Gresham's magistrate's-room, as a certain chamber in the house had been called since the days of the present squire's great-grandfather. The Duke's letter was addressed to his recognised man of business in those parts, and was as follows:-- Carlton Terrace, -- March, 187--. MY DEAR MR. MORETON, [Mr. Moreton was the successor of one Mr. Fothergill, who had reigned supreme in those parts under the old Duke.] I am afraid that my wishes with regard to the borough and the forthcoming election there of a member of Parliament are not yet clearly understood, although I endeavoured to declare them when I was at Gatherum Castle. I trust that no elector will vote for this or that gentleman with an idea that the return of any special candidate will please me. The ballot will of course prevent me or any other man from knowing how an elector may vote;--but I beg to assure the electors generally that should they think fit to return a member pledged to oppose the Government of which I form a part, it would not in any way change my cordial feelings towards the town. I may perhaps be allowed to add that, in my opinion, no elector can do his duty except by voting for the candidate whom he thinks best qualified to serve the country. In regard to the gentlemen who are now before the constituency, I have no feeling for one rather than for the other; and had I any such feeling I should not wish it to actuate the vote of a single elector. I should be glad if this letter could be published so as to be brought under the eyes of the electors generally. Yours faithfully, OMNIUM. When the Duke said that he feared that his wishes were not understood, and spoke of the inefficacy of his former declaration, he was alluding of course to the Duchess and to Mr. Sprugeon. Mr. Sprugeon guessed that it might be so, and, still wishing to have the Duchess for his good friend, was at once assiduous in explaining to his friends in the borough that even this letter did not mean anything. A Prime Minister was bound to say that kind of thing! But the borough, if it wished to please the Duke, must return Lopez in spite of the Duke's letter. Such was Mr. Sprugeon's doctrine. But he did not carry Mr. Sprout with him. Mr. Sprout at once saw his opportunity, and suggested to Mr. Du Boung, the local brewer, that he should come forward. Du Boung was a man rapidly growing into provincial eminence, and jumped at the offer. Consequently there were three candidates. Du Boung came forward as a Conservative prepared to give a cautious, but very cautious, support to the Coalition. Mr. Du Boung, in his printed address, said very sweet things of the Duke generally. The borough was blessed by the vicinity of the Duke. But, looking at the present perhaps unprecedented crisis in affairs, Mr. Du Boung was prepared to give no more than a very cautious support to the Duke's Government. Arthur Fletcher read Mr. Du Boung's address immediately after the Duke's letter. "The more the merrier," said Arthur. "Just so. Du Boung will not rob you of a vote, but he will cut the ground altogether from under the other man's feet. You see that as far as actual political programme goes there isn't much to choose between any of you. You are all Government men." "With a difference." "One man in these days is so like another," continued Gresham sarcastically, "that it requires good eyes to see the shades of the colours." "Then you'd better support Du Boung," said Arthur. "I think you've just a turn in your favour. Besides, I couldn't really carry a vote myself. As for Du Boung, I'd sooner have him than a foreign cad like Lopez." Then Arthur Fletcher frowned and Mr. Gresham became confused, remembering the catastrophe about the young lady whose story he had heard. "Du Boung used to be plain English as Bung before he got rich and made his name beautiful," continued Gresham, "but I suppose Mr. Lopez does come of foreign extraction." "I don't know what he comes from," said Arthur moodily. "They tell me he's a gentleman. However, as we are to have a contest, I hope he mayn't win." "Of course you do. And he shan't win. Nor shall the great Du Boung. You shall win, and become Prime Minister, and make me a peer. Would you like papa to be Lord Greshamsbury?" he said to a little girl, who then rushed into the room. "No, I wouldn't. I'd like papa to give me the pony which the man wants to sell out in the yard." "She's quite right, Fletcher," said the squire. "I'm much more likely to be able to buy them ponies as simple Frank Gresham than I should be if I had a lord's coronet to pay for." This was on a Saturday, and on the following Monday Mr. Gresham drove the candidate over to Silverbridge and started him on his work of canvassing. Mr. Du Boung had been busy ever since Mr. Sprout's brilliant suggestion had been made, and Lopez had been in the field even before him. Each one of the candidates called at the house of every elector in the borough,--and every man in the borough was an elector. When they had been at work for four or five days each candidate assured the borough that he had already received promises of votes sufficient to insure his success, and each candidate was as anxious as ever,--nay, was more rabidly anxious than ever,--to secure the promise of a single vote. Hints were made by honest citizens of the pleasure they would have in supporting this or that gentleman,--for the honest citizens assured one gentleman after the other of the satisfaction they had in seeing so all-sufficient a candidate in the borough,--if the smallest pecuniary help were given them, even a day's pay, so that their poor children might not be injured by their going to the poll. But the candidates and their agents were stern in their replies to such temptations. "That's a dodge of that rascal Sprout," said Sprugeon to Mr. Lopez. "That's one of Sprout's men. If he could get half-a-crown from you it would be all up with us." But though Sprugeon called Sprout a rascal, he laid the same bait both for Du Boung and for Fletcher;--but laid it in vain. Everybody said that it was a very clean election. "A brewer standing, and devil a glass of beer!" said one old elector who had remembered better things when the borough never heard of a contest. On the third day of his canvass Arthur Fletcher with his gang of agents and followers behind him met Lopez with his gang in the street. It was probable that they would so meet, and Fletcher had resolved what he would do when such a meeting took place. He walked up to Lopez, and with a kindly smile offered his hand. The two men, though they had never been intimate, had known each other, and Fletcher was determined to show that he would not quarrel with a man because that man had been his favoured rival. In comparison with that other matter this affair of the candidature was of course trivial. But Lopez who had, as the reader may remember, made some threat about a horsewhip, had come to a resolution of a very different nature. He put his arms a-kimbo, resting his hands on his hips, and altogether declined the proffered civility. "You had better walk on," he said, and then stood, scowling, on the spot till the other should pass by. Fletcher looked at him for a moment, then bowed and passed on. At least a dozen men saw what had taken place, and were aware that Mr. Lopez had expressed his determination to quarrel personally with Mr. Fletcher, in opposition to Mr. Fletcher's expressed wish for amity. And before they had gone to bed that night all the dozen knew the reason why. Of course there was some one then at Silverbridge clever enough to find out that Arthur Fletcher had been in love with Miss Wharton, but that Miss Wharton had lately been married to Mr. Lopez. No doubt the incident added a pleasurable emotion to the excitement caused by the election at Silverbridge generally. A personal quarrel is attractive everywhere. The expectation of such an occurrence will bring together the whole House of Commons. And of course this quarrel was very attractive in Silverbridge. There were some Fletcherites and Lopezites in the quarrel; as there were also Du Boungites, who maintained that when gentlemen could not canvass without quarrelling in the streets they were manifestly unfit to represent such a borough as Silverbridge in Parliament;--and that therefore Mr. Du Boung should be returned. Mr. Gresham was in the town that day, though not till after the occurrence, and Fletcher could not avoid speaking of it. "The man must be a cur," said Gresham. "It would make no difference in the world to me," said Arthur, struggling hard to prevent signs of emotion from showing themselves in his face, "were it not that he has married a lady whom I have long known and whom I greatly esteem." He felt that he could hardly avoid all mention of the marriage, and yet was determined that he would say no word that his brother would call "howling." "There has been no previous quarrel, or offence?" asked Gresham. "None in the least." When Arthur so spoke he forgot altogether the letter he had written; nor, had he then remembered it, would he have thought it possible that that letter should have given offence. He had been the sufferer, not Lopez. This man had robbed him of his happiness; and, though it would have been foolish in him to make a quarrel for a grievance such as that, there might have been some excuse had he done so. It had taken him some time to perceive that greatly as this man had injured him, there had been no injustice done to him, and that therefore there should be no complaint made by him. But that this other man should complain was to him unintelligible. "He is not worth your notice," said Mr. Gresham. "He is simply not a gentleman, and does not know how to behave himself. I am very sorry for the young lady;--that's all." At this allusion to Emily Arthur felt that his face became red with the rising blood; and he felt also that his friend should not have spoken thus openly,--thus irreverently,--on so sacred a subject. But at the moment he said nothing further. As far as his canvass was concerned it had been successful, and he was beginning to feel sure that he would be the new member. He endeavoured therefore to drown his sorrow in this coming triumph. But Lopez had been by no means gratified with his canvass or with the conduct of the borough generally. He had already begun to feel that the Duchess and Mr. Sprugeon and the borough had thrown him over shamefully. Immediately on his arrival in Silverbridge a local attorney had with the blandest possible smile asked him for a cheque for £500. Of course there must be money spent at once, and of course the money must come out of the candidate's pocket. He had known all this beforehand, and yet the demand for the money had come upon him as an injury. He gave the cheque, but showed clearly by his manner that he resented the application. This did not tend to bind to him more closely the services of those who were present when the demand was made. And then, as he began his canvass, he found that he could not conjure at all with the name of the Duke, or even with that of the Duchess; and was told on the second day by Mr. Sprugeon himself that he had better fight the battle "on his own hook." Now his own hook in Silverbridge was certainly not a strong hook. Mr. Sprugeon was still of opinion that a good deal might be done by judicious manipulation, and went so far as to suggest that another cheque for £500 in the hands of Mr. Wise, the lawyer, would be effective. But Lopez did not give the other cheque, and Sprugeon whispered to him that the Duke had been too many for the Duchess. Still he had persevered, and a set of understrappers around him, who would make nothing out of the election without his candidature, assured him from time to time that he would even yet come out all right at the ballot. With such a hope still existing he had not scrupled to affirm in his speeches that the success of his canvass had been complete. But, on the morning of the day on which he met Fletcher in the street, Mr. Du Boung had called upon him accompanied by two of the Du Boung agents and by Mr. Sprugeon himself,--and had suggested that he, Lopez, should withdraw from the contest, so that Du Boung might be returned, and that the "Liberal interests" of the borough might not be sacrificed. This was a heavy blow, and one which Ferdinand Lopez was not the man to bear with equanimity. From the moment in which the Duchess had mentioned the borough to him, he had regarded the thing as certain. After a while he had understood that his return must be accompanied by more trouble and greater expense than he had at first anticipated;--but still he had thought that it was all but sure. He had altogether misunderstood the nature of the influence exercised by the Duchess, and the nature also of the Duke's resolution. Mr. Sprugeon had of course wished to have a candidate, and had allured him. Perhaps he had in some degree been ill-treated by the borough. But he was a man whom the feeling of injustice to himself would drive almost to frenzy, though he never measured the amount of his own injustice to others. When the proposition was made to him, he scowled at them all, and declared that he would fight the borough to the last. "Then you'll let Mr. Fletcher in to a certainty," said Mr. Sprout. Now there was an idea in the borough that, although all the candidates were ready to support the Duke's government, Mr. Du Boung and Mr. Lopez were the two Liberals. Mr. Du Boung was sitting in the room when the appeal was made, and declared that he feared that such would be the result. "I'll tell you what I'll do," said Lopez; "I'll toss up which of us retires." Mr. Sprout, on behalf of Mr. Du Boung, protested against that proposition. Mr. Du Boung, who was a gentleman of great local influence, was in possession of four-fifths of the Liberal interests of the borough. Even were he to retire Mr. Lopez could not get in. Mr. Sprout declared that this was known to all the borough at large. He, Sprout, was sorry that a gentleman like Mr. Lopez should have been brought down there under false ideas. He had all through told Mr. Sprugeon that the Duke had been in earnest, but Mr. Sprugeon had not comprehended the position. It had been a pity. But anybody who understood the borough could see with one eye that Mr. Lopez had not a chance. If Mr. Lopez would retire Mr. Du Boung would no doubt be returned. If Mr. Lopez went to the poll, Mr. Fletcher would probably be the new member. This was the picture as it was painted by Mr. Sprout,--who had, even then, heard something of the loves of the two candidates, and who had thought that Lopez would be glad to injure Arthur Fletcher's chances of success. So far he was not wrong;--but the sense of the injury done to himself oppressed Lopez so much that he could not guide himself by reason. The idea of retiring was very painful to him, and he did not believe these men. He thought it to be quite possible that they were there to facilitate the return of Arthur Fletcher. He had never even heard of Du Boung till he had come to Silverbridge two or three days ago. He still could not believe that Du Boung would be returned. He thought over it all for a moment, and then he gave his answer. "I've been brought down here to fight, and I'll fight it to the last," he said. "Then you'll hand over the borough to Mr. Fletcher," said Sprout, getting up and ushering Mr. Du Boung out of the room. It was after that, but on the same day, that Lopez and Fletcher met each other in the street. The affair did not take a minute, and then they parted, each on his own way. In the course of that evening Mr. Sprugeon told his candidate that he, Sprugeon, could not concern himself any further in that election. He was very sorry for what had occurred;--very sorry indeed. It was no doubt a pity that the Duke had been so firm. "But,"--and Mr. Sprugeon shrugged his shoulders as he spoke,--"when a nobleman like the Duke chooses to have a way of his own, he must have it." Mr. Sprugeon went on to declare that any further candidature would be waste of money, waste of time, and waste of energy, and then signified his intention of retiring, as far as this election went, into private life. When asked, he acknowledged that they who had been acting with him had come to the same resolve. Mr. Lopez had in fact come there as the Duke's nominee, and as the Duke had no nominee, Mr. Lopez was in fact "nowhere." "I don't suppose that any man was ever so treated before, since members were first returned to Parliament," said Lopez. "Well, sir;--yes, sir; it is a little hard. But, you see, sir, her Grace meant the best. Her Grace did mean the best, no doubt. It may be, sir, there was a little misunderstanding;--a little misunderstanding at the Castle, sir." Then Mr. Sprugeon retired, and Lopez understood that he was to see nothing more of the ironmonger. Of course there was nothing for him now but to retire;--to shake the dust off his feet and get out of Silverbridge as quickly as he could. But his friends had all deserted him and he did not know how to retire. He had paid £500, and he had a strong opinion that a portion at least of the money should be returned to him. He had a keen sense of ill-usage, and at the same time a feeling that he ought not to run out of the borough like a whipt dog, without showing his face to any one. But his strongest sensation at this moment was one of hatred against Arthur Fletcher. He was sure that Arthur Fletcher would be the new member. He did not put the least trust in Mr. Du Boung. He had taught himself really to think that Fletcher had insulted him by writing to his wife, and that a further insult had been offered to him by that meeting in the street. He had told his wife that he would ask Fletcher to give up the borough, and that he would make that request with a horsewhip in his hand. It was too late now to say anything of the borough, but it might not be too late for the horsewhip. He had a great desire to make good that threat as far as the horsewhip was concerned,--having an idea that he would thus lower Fletcher in his wife's eyes. It was not that he was jealous,--not jealous according to the ordinary meaning of the word. His wife's love to himself had been too recently given and too warmly maintained for such a feeling as that. But there was a rancorous hatred in his heart against the man, and a conviction that his wife at any rate esteemed the man whom he hated. And then would he not make his retreat from the borough with more honour if before he left he could horsewhip his successful antagonist? We, who know the feeling of Englishmen generally better than Mr. Lopez did, would say--certainly not. We would think that such an incident would by no means redound to the credit of Mr. Lopez. And he himself, probably, at cooler moments, would have seen the folly of such an idea. But anger about the borough had driven him mad, and now in his wretchedness the suggestion had for him a certain charm. The man had outraged all propriety by writing to his wife. Of course he would be justified in horsewhipping him. But there were difficulties. A man is not horsewhipped simply because you wish to horsewhip him. In the evening, as he was sitting alone, he got a note from Mr. Sprugeon. "Mr. Sprugeon's compliments. Doesn't Mr. Lopez think an address to the electors should appear in to-morrow's 'Gazette,'--very short and easy;--something like the following." Then Mr. Sprugeon added a very "short and easy letter" to the electors of the borough of Silverbridge, in which Mr. Lopez was supposed to tell them that although his canvass promised to him every success, he felt that he owed it to the borough to retire, lest he should injure the borough by splitting the Liberal interest with their much respected fellow-townsman, Mr. Du Boung. In the course of the evening he did copy that letter, and sent it out to the newspaper office. He must retire, and it was better for him that he should retire after some recognised fashion. But he wrote another letter also, and sent it over to the opposition hotel. The other letter was as follows:-- SIR,-- Before this election began you were guilty of gross impertinence in writing a letter to my wife,--to her extreme annoyance and to my most justifiable anger. Any gentleman would think that the treatment you had already received at her hands would have served to save her from such insult, but there are men who will never take a lesson without a beating. And now, since you have been here, you have presumed to offer to shake hands with me in the street, though you ought to have known that I should not choose to meet you on friendly terms after what has taken place. I now write to tell you that I shall carry a horsewhip while I am here, and that if I meet you in the streets again before I leave the town I shall use it. FERDINAND LOPEZ. Mr. Arthur Fletcher. This letter he sent at once to his enemy, and then sat late into the night thinking of his threat and of the manner in which he would follow it up. If he could only get one fair blow at Fletcher his purpose, he thought, would be achieved. In any matter of horsewhipping the truth hardly ever gets itself correctly known. The man who has given the first blow is generally supposed to have thrashed the other. What might follow, though it might be inconvenient, must be borne. The man had insulted him by writing to his wife, and the sympathies of the world, he thought, would be with him. To give him his due, it must be owned that he had no personal fear as to the encounter. That night Arthur Fletcher had gone over to Greshamsbury, and on the following morning he returned with Mr. Gresham. "For heaven's sake, look at that!" he said, handing the letter to his friend. "Did you ever write to his wife?" asked Gresham, when he read it. "Yes;--I did. All this is dreadful to me;--dreadful. Well;--you know how it used to be with me. I need not go into all that; need I?" "Don't say a word more than you think necessary." "When you asked me to stand for the place I had not heard that he thought of being a candidate. I wrote and told her so, and told her also that had I known it before I would not have come here." "I don't quite see that," said Gresham. "Perhaps not;--perhaps I was a fool. But we needn't go into that. At any rate there was no insult to him. I wrote in the simplest language." "Looking at it all round I think you had better not have written." "You wouldn't say so if you saw the letter. I'm sure you wouldn't. I had known her all my life. My brother is married to her cousin. Oh heavens! we had been all but engaged. I would have done anything for her. Was it not natural that I should tell her? As far as the language was concerned the letter was one to be read at Charing Cross." "He says that she was annoyed and insulted." "Impossible! It was a letter that any man might have written to any woman." "Well;--you have got to take care of yourself at any rate. What will you do?" "What ought I to do?" "Go to the police." Mr. Gresham had himself once, when young, thrashed a man who had offended him and had then thought himself much aggrieved because the police had been called in. But that had been twenty years ago, and Mr. Gresham's opinions had been matured and, perhaps, corrected by age. "No; I won't do that," said Arthur Fletcher. "That's what you ought to do." "I couldn't do that." "Then take no notice of the letter and carry a fairly big stick. It should be big enough to hurt him a good deal, but not to do him any serious damage." At that moment an agent came in with news of the man's retirement from the contest. "Has he left the town?" asked Gresham. No;--he had not left the town, nor had he been seen by any one that morning. "You had better let me go out and get the stick, before you show yourself," said Gresham. And so the stick was selected. As the two walked down the street together, almost the first thing they saw was Lopez standing at his hotel door with a cutting whip in his hand. He was at that moment quite alone, but on the opposite side of the street there was a policeman,--one of the borough constables,--very slowly making his way along the pavement. His movement, indeed, was so slow that any one watching him would have come to the conclusion that that particular part of the High Street had some attraction for him at that special moment. Alas, alas! How age will alter the spirit of a man! Twenty years since Frank Gresham would have thought any one to be a mean miscreant who would have interposed a policeman between him and his foe. But it is to be feared that while selecting that stick he had said a word which was causing the constable to loiter on the pavement! But Gresham turned no eye to the policeman as he walked on with his friend, and Fletcher did not see the man. "What an ass he is!" said Fletcher,--as he got the handle of the stick well into his hand. Then Lopez advanced to them with his whip raised; but as he did so the policeman came across the street quickly, but very quietly, and stood right before him. The man was so thoroughly in the way of the aggrieved wretch that it was out of the question that he should touch Fletcher with his whip. "Do you usually walk about attended by a policeman?" said Lopez, with all the scorn which he knew how to throw into his voice. "I didn't know that the man was here," said Fletcher. "You may tell that to the marines. All the borough shall know what a coward you are." Then he turned round and addressed the street, but still under the shadow, as it were, of the policeman's helmet. "This man who presumes to offer himself as a candidate to represent Silverbridge in Parliament has insulted my wife. And now, because he fears that I shall horsewhip him, he goes about the street under the care of a policeman." "This is intolerable," said Fletcher, turning to his friend. "Mr. Lopez," said Gresham. "I am sorry to say that I must give you in charge;--unless you will undertake to leave the town without interfering further with Mr. Fletcher either by word or deed." "I will undertake nothing," said Lopez. "The man has insulted my wife, and is a coward." About two o'clock on the afternoon of that day Mr. Lopez appeared before the Silverbridge bench of magistrates, and was there sworn to keep the peace to Mr. Fletcher for the next six months. After that he was allowed to leave the town, and was back in London, with his wife in Belgrave Mansions, to dinner that evening. On the day but one after this the ballot was taken, and at eight o'clock on the evening of that day Arthur Fletcher was declared to be duly elected. But Mr. Du Boung ran him very hard. The numbers were-- FLETCHER 315 DU BOUNG 308 Mr. Du Boung's friends during these two last days had not hesitated to make what use they could on behalf of their own candidate of the Lopez and Fletcher quarrel. If Mr. Fletcher had insulted the other man's wife, surely he could not be a proper member for Silverbridge. And then the row was declared to have been altogether discreditable. Two strangers had come into this peaceful town and had absolutely quarrelled with sticks and whips in the street, calling each other opprobrious names. Would it not be better that they should elect their own respectable townsman? All this was nearly effective. But, in spite of all, Arthur Fletcher was at last returned. CHAPTER XXXV Lopez Back in London Lopez, as he returned to town, recovered something of his senses, though he still fancied that Arthur Fletcher had done him a positive injury by writing to his wife. But something of that madness left him which had come from his deep sense of injury, both as to the letter and as to the borough, and he began to feel that he had been wrong about the horsewhip. He was very low in spirits on this return journey. The money which he had spent had been material to him, and the loss of it for the moment left him nearly bare. While he had had before his eyes the hope of being a member of Parliament he had been able to buoy himself up. The position itself would have gone very far with Sexty Parker, and would, he thought, have had some effect even with his father-in-law. But now he was returning a beaten man. Who is there that has not felt that fall from high hope to utter despair which comes from some single failure? As he thought of this he was conscious that his anger had led him into great imprudence at Silverbridge. He had not been circumspect, as it specially behoved a man to be surrounded by such difficulties as his. All his life he had been schooling his temper so as to keep it under control,--sometimes with great difficulty, but always with a consciousness that in his life everything might depend on it. Now he had, alas, allowed it to get the better of him. No doubt he had been insulted;--but, nevertheless, he had been wrong to speak of a horsewhip. His one great object must now be to conciliate his father-in-law, and he had certainly increased his difficulty in doing this by his squabble down at Silverbridge. Of course the whole thing would be reported in the London papers, and of course the story would be told against him, as the respectabilities of the town had been opposed to him. But he knew himself to be clever, and he still hoped that he might overcome these difficulties. Then it occurred to him that in doing this he must take care to have his wife entirely on his side. He did not doubt her love; he did not in the least doubt her rectitude;--but there was the lamentable fact that she thought well of Arthur Fletcher. It might be that he had been a little too imperious with his wife. It suited his disposition to be imperious within his own household;--to be imperious out of it, if that were possible;--but he was conscious of having had a fall at Silverbridge, and he must for a while take in some sail. He had telegraphed to her, acquainting her with his defeat, and telling her to expect his return. "Oh, Ferdinand," she said, "I am so unhappy about this. It has made me so wretched!" "Better luck next time," he said with his sweetest smile. "It is no good groaning over spilt milk. They haven't treated me really well,--have they?" "I suppose not,--though I do not quite understand it all." He was burning to abuse Arthur Fletcher, but he abstained. He would abstain at any rate for the present moment. "Dukes and duchesses are no doubt very grand people," he said, "but it is a pity they should not know how to behave honestly, as they expect others to behave to them. The Duchess has thrown me over in the most infernal way. I really can't understand it. When I think of it I am lost in wonder. The truth, I suppose, is, that there has been some quarrel between him and her." "Who will get in?" "Oh, Du Boung, no doubt." He did not think so, but he could not bring himself to declare the success of his enemy to her. "The people there know him. Your old friend is as much a stranger there as I am. By-the-way, he and I had a little row in the place." "A row, Ferdinand!" "You needn't look like that, my pet. I haven't killed him. But he came up to speak to me in the street, and I told him what I thought about his writing to you." On hearing this Emily looked very wretched. "I could not restrain myself from doing that. Come;--you must admit that he shouldn't have written." "He meant it in kindness." "Then he shouldn't have meant it. Just think of it. Suppose that I had been making up to any girl,--which by-the-by I never did but to one in my life,"--then he put his arm round her waist and kissed her, "and she were to have married some one else. What would have been said of me if I had begun to correspond with her immediately? Don't suppose I am blaming you, dear." "Certainly I do not suppose that," said Emily. "But you must admit that it were rather strong." He paused, but she said nothing. "Only I suppose you can bring yourself to admit nothing against him. However, so it was. There was a row, and a policeman came up, and they made me give a promise that I didn't mean to shoot him or anything of that kind." As she heard this she turned pale, but said nothing. "Of course I didn't want to shoot him. I wished him to know what I thought about it, and I told him. I hate to trouble you with all this, but I couldn't bear that you shouldn't know it all." "It is very sad!" "Sad enough! I have had plenty to bear, I can tell you. Everybody seemed to turn away from me there. Everybody deserted me." As he said this he could perceive that he must obtain her sympathy by recounting his own miseries and not Arthur Fletcher's sins. "I was all alone and hardly knew how to hold up my head against so much wretchedness. And then I found myself called upon to pay an enormous sum for my expenses." "Oh, Ferdinand!" "Think of their demanding £500!" "Did you pay it?" "Yes, indeed. I had no alternative. Of course they took care to come for that before they talked of my resigning. I believe it was all planned beforehand. The whole thing seems to me to have been a swindle from beginning to end. By heaven, I'm almost inclined to think that the Duchess knew all about it herself!" "About the £500!" "Perhaps not the exact sum, but the way in which the thing was to be done. In these days one doesn't know whom to trust. Men, and women too, have become so dishonest that nobody is safe anywhere. It has been awfully hard upon me,--awfully hard. I don't suppose that there was ever a moment in my life when the loss of £500 would have been so much to me as it is now. The question is, what will your father do for us?" Emily could not but remember her husband's intense desire to obtain money from her father not yet three months since, as though all the world depended on his getting it,--and his subsequent elation, as though all his sorrows were over for ever, because the money had been promised. And now,--almost immediately,--he was again in the same position. She endeavoured to judge him kindly, but a feeling of insecurity in reference to his affairs struck her at once and made her heart cold. Everything had been achieved, then, by a gift of £3000,--surely a small sum to effect such a result with a man living as her husband lived. And now the whole £3000 was gone;--surely a large sum to have vanished in so short a time! Something of the uncertainty of business she could understand, but a business must be perilously uncertain if subject to such vicissitudes as these! But as ideas of this nature crowded themselves into her mind she told herself again and again that she had taken him for better and for worse. If the worse were already coming she would still be true to her promise. "You had better tell papa everything," she said. "Had it not better come from you?" "No, Ferdinand. Of course I will do as you bid me. I will do anything that I can do. But you had better tell him. His nature is such that he will respect you more if it come from yourself. And then it is so necessary that he should know all;--all." She put whatever emphasis she knew how to use upon this word. "You could tell him--all, as well as I." "You would not bring yourself to tell it to me, nor could I understand it. He will understand everything, and if he thinks that you have told him everything, he will at any rate respect you." He sat silent for a while meditating, feeling always and most acutely that he had been ill-used,--never thinking for an instant that he had ill-used others. "£3000, you know, was no fortune for your father to give you!" She had no answer to make, but she groaned in spirit as she heard the accusation. "Don't you feel that yourself?" "I know nothing about money, Ferdinand. If you had told me to speak to him about it before we were married I would have done so." "He ought to have spoken to me. It is marvellous how close-fisted an old man can be. He can't take it with him." Then he sat for half-an-hour in moody silence, during which she was busy with her needle. After that he jumped up, with a manner altogether altered,--gay, only that the attempt was too visible to deceive even her,--and shook himself, as though he were ridding himself of his trouble. "You are right, old girl. You are always right,--almost. I will go to your father to-morrow, and tell him everything. It isn't so very much that I want him to do. Things will all come right again. I'm ashamed that you should have seen me in this way;--but I have been disappointed about the election, and troubled about that Mr. Fletcher. You shall not see me give way again like this. Give me a kiss, old girl." She kissed him, but she could not even pretend to recover herself as he had done. "Had we not better give up the brougham?" she said. "Certainly not. For heaven's sake do not speak in that way! You do not understand things." "No; certainly I do not." "It isn't that I haven't the means of living, but that in my business money is so often required for instant use. And situated as I am at present an addition to my capital would enable me to do so much!" She certainly did not understand it, but she had sufficient knowledge of the world and sufficient common sense to be aware that their present rate of expenditure ought to be matter of importance to a man who felt the loss of £500 as he felt that loss at Silverbridge. On the next morning Lopez was at Mr. Wharton's chambers early,--so early that the lawyer had not yet reached them. He had resolved,--not that he would tell everything, for such men never even intend to tell everything,--but that he would tell a good deal. He must, if possible, affect the mind of the old man in two ways. He must ingratiate himself;--and at the same time make it understood that Emily's comfort in life would depend very much on her father's generosity. The first must be first accomplished, if possible,--and then the second, as to which he could certainly produce at any rate belief. He had not married a rich man's daughter without an intention of getting the rich man's money! Mr. Wharton would understand that. If the worst came to the worst, Mr. Wharton must of course maintain his daughter,--and his daughter's husband! But things had not come to the worst as yet, and he did not intend on the present occasion to represent that view of his affairs to his father-in-law. Mr. Wharton when he entered his chambers found Lopez seated there. He was himself at this moment very unhappy. He had renewed his quarrel with Everett,--or Everett rather had renewed the quarrel with him. There had been words between them about money lost at cards. Hard words had been used, and Everett had told his father that if either of them were a gambler it was not he. Mr. Wharton had resented this bitterly and had driven his son from his presence,--and now the quarrel made him very wretched. He certainly was sorry that he had called his son a gambler, but his son had been, as he thought, inexcusable in the retort which he had made. He was a man to whom his friends gave credit for much sternness;--but still he was one who certainly had no happiness in the world independent of his children. His daughter had left him, not, as he thought, under happy auspices,--and he was now, at this moment, soft-hearted and tender in his regards as to her. What was there in the world for him but his children? And now he felt himself to be alone and destitute. He was already tired of whist at the Eldon. That which had been a delight to him once or twice a week, became almost loathsome when it was renewed from day to day;--and not the less when his son told him that he also was a gambler. "So you have come back from Silverbridge?" he said. "Yes, sir; I have come back, not exactly triumphant. A man should not expect to win always." Lopez had resolved to pluck up his spirit and carry himself like a man. "You seem to have got into some scrape down there, besides losing your election." "Oh; you have seen that in the papers already. I have come to tell you of it. As Emily is concerned in it you ought to know." "Emily concerned! How is she concerned?" Then Lopez told the whole story,--after his own fashion, and yet with no palpable lie. Fletcher had written to her a letter which he had thought to be very offensive. On hearing this, Mr. Wharton looked very grave, and asked for the letter. Lopez said that he had destroyed it, not thinking that such a document should be preserved. Then he went on to explain that it had had reference to the election, and that he had thought it to be highly improper that Fletcher should write to his wife on that or on any other subject. "It depends very much on the letter," said the old man. "But on any subject,--after what has passed." "They were very old friends." "Of course I will not argue with you, Mr. Wharton; but I own that it angered me. It angered me very much,--very much indeed. I took it to be an insult to her, and when he accosted me in the street down at Silverbridge I told him so. I may not have been very wise, but I did it on her behalf. Surely you can understand that such a letter might make a man angry." "What did he say?" "That he would do anything for her sake,--even retire from Silverbridge if his friends would let him." Mr. Wharton scratched his head, and Lopez saw that he was perplexed. "Should he have offered to do anything for her sake, after what had passed?" "I know the man so well," said Mr. Wharton, "that I cannot and do not believe him to have harboured an improper thought in reference to my child." "Perhaps it was an indiscretion only." "Perhaps so. I cannot say. And then they took you before the magistrates?" "Yes;--in my anger I had threatened him. Then there was a policeman and a row. And I had to swear that I would not hurt him. Of course I have no wish to hurt him." "I suppose it ruined your chance at Silverbridge?" "I suppose it did." This was a lie, as Lopez had retired before the row took place. "What I care for most now is that you should not think that I have misbehaved myself." The story had been told very well, and Mr. Wharton was almost disposed to sympathise with his son-in-law. That Arthur Fletcher had meant nothing that could be regarded as offensive to his daughter he was quite sure;--but it might be that in making an offer intended to be generous he had used language which the condition of the persons concerned made indiscreet. "I suppose," he said, "that you spent a lot of money at Silverbridge?" This gave Lopez the opening that he wanted, and he described the manner in which the £500 had been extracted from him. "You can't play that game for nothing," said Mr. Wharton. "And just at present I could very ill afford it. I should not have done it had I not felt it a pity to neglect such a chance of rising in the world. After all, a seat in the British House of Commons is an honour." "Yes;--yes;--yes." "And the Duchess, when she spoke to me about it, was so certain." "I will pay the £500," said Mr. Wharton. "Oh, sir, that is generous!" Then he got up and took the old man's hands. "Some day, when you are at liberty, I hope that you will allow me to explain to you the exact state of my affairs. When I wrote to you from Como I told you that I would wish to do so. You do not object?" "No;" said the lawyer,--but with infinite hesitation in his voice. "No; I don't object. But I do not know how I could serve them. I shall be busy just now, but I will give you the cheque. And if you and Emily have nothing better to do, come and dine to-morrow." Lopez with real tears in his eyes took the cheque, and promised to come on the morrow. "And in the meantime I wish you would see Everett." Of course he promised that he would see Everett. Again he was exalted, on this occasion not so much by the acquisition of the money as by the growing conviction that his father-in-law was a cow capable of being milked. And the quarrel between Everett and his father might clearly be useful to him. He might either serve the old man by reducing Everett to proper submission, or he might manage to creep into the empty space which the son's defection would make in the father's heart and the father's life. He might at any rate make himself necessary to the old man, and become such a part of the household in Manchester Square as to be indispensable. Then the old man would every day become older and more in want of assistance. He thought that he saw the way to worm himself into confidence, and, soon, into possession. The old man was not a man of iron as he had feared, but quite human, and if properly managed, soft and malleable. He saw Sexty Parker in the city that day, and used his cheque for £500 in some triumphant way, partly cajoling and partly bullying his poor victim. To Sexty also he had to tell his own story about the row down at Silverbridge. He had threatened to thrash the fellow in the street, and the fellow had not dared to come out of his house without a policeman. Yes;--he had lost his election. The swindling of those fellows at Silverbridge had been too much for him. But he flattered himself that he had got the better of Master Fletcher. That was the tone in which he told the story to his friend in the city. Then, before dinner, he found Everett at the club. Everett Wharton was to be found there now almost every day. His excuse to himself lay in the political character of the institution. The club intended to do great things,--to find Liberal candidates for all the boroughs and counties in England which were not hitherto furnished, and then to supply the candidates with money. Such was the great purpose of the Progress. It had not as yet sent out many candidates or collected much money. As yet it was, politically, almost quiescent. And therefore Everett Wharton, whose sense of duty took him there, spent his afternoons either in the whist-room or at the billiard-table. The story of the Silverbridge row had to be told again, and was told nearly with the same incidents as had been narrated to the father. He could of course abuse Arthur Fletcher more roundly, and be more confident in his assertion that Fletcher had insulted his wife. But he came as quickly as he could to the task which he had on hand. "What's all this between you and your father?" "Simply this. I sometimes play a game of whist, and therefore he called me a gambler. Then I reminded him that he also sometimes played a game of whist, and I asked him what deduction was to be drawn." "He is awfully angry with you." "Of course I was a fool. My father has the whip-hand of me, because he has money and I have none, and it was simply kicking against the pricks to speak as I did. And then too there isn't a fellow in London has a higher respect for his father than I have, nor yet a warmer affection. But it is hard to be driven in that way. Gambler is a nasty word." "Yes, it is; very nasty. But I suppose a man does gamble when he loses so much money that he has to ask his father to pay it for him." "If he does so often, he gambles. I never asked him for money to pay what I had lost before in my life." "I wonder you told him." "I never lie to him, and he ought to know that. But he is just the man to be harder to his own son than to anybody else in the world. What does he want me to do now?" "I don't know that he wants you to do anything," said Lopez. "Did he send you to me?" "Well;--no; I can't say that he did. I told him I should see you as a matter of course, and he said something rough,--about your being an ass." "I dare say he did." "But if you ask me," said Lopez, "I think he would take it kindly of you if you were to go and see him. Come and dine to-day, just as if nothing had happened." "I could not do that,--unless he asked me." "I can't say that he asked you, Everett. I would say so, in spite of its being a lie, if I didn't fear that your father might say something unkind, so that the lie would be detected by both of you." "And yet you ask me to go and dine there!" "Yes, I do. It's only going away if he does cut up rough. And if he takes it well,--why then,--the whole thing is done." "If he wants me, he can ask me." "You talk about it, my boy, just as if a father were the same as anybody else. If I had a father with a lot of money, by George he should knock me about with his stick if he liked, and I would be just the same the next day." "Unfortunately I am of a stiffer nature," said Everett, taking some pride to himself for his stiffness, and being perhaps as little "stiff" as any young man of his day. That evening, after dinner in Manchester Square, the conversation between the father-in-law and the son-in-law turned almost exclusively on the son and brother-in-law. Little or nothing was said about the election, and the name of Arthur Fletcher was not mentioned. But out of his full heart the father spoke. He was wretched about Everett. Did Everett mean to cut him? "He wants you to withdraw some name you called him," said Lopez. "Withdraw some name,--as he might ask some hot-headed fellow to do, of his own age, like himself; some fellow that he had quarrelled with! Does he expect his father to send him a written apology? He had been gambling, and I told him that he was a gambler. Is that too much for a father to say?" Lopez shrugged his shoulders, and declared that it was a pity. "He will break my heart if he goes on like this," said the old man. "I asked him to come and dine to-day, but he didn't seem to like it." "Like it! No. He likes nothing but that infernal club." When the evening was over Lopez felt that he had done a good stroke of work. He had not exactly made up his mind to keep the father and son apart. That was not a part of his strategy,--at any rate as yet. But he did intend to make himself necessary to the old man,--to become the old man's son, and if possible the favourite son. And now he thought that he had already done much towards the achievement of his object. CHAPTER XXXVI The Jolly Blackbird There was great triumph at Longbarns when the news of Arthur's victory reached the place;--and when he arrived there himself with his friend, Mr. Gresham, he was received as a conquering hero. But of course the tidings of "the row" had gone before him, and it was necessary that both he and Mr. Gresham should tell the story;--nor could it be told privately. Sir Alured Wharton was there, and Mrs. Fletcher. The old lady had heard of the row, and of course required to be told all the particulars. This was not pleasant to the hero, as in talking of the man it was impossible for them not to talk of the man's wife. "What a terrible misfortune for poor Mr. Wharton," said the old lady, nodding her head at Sir Alured. Sir Alured sighed and said nothing. Certainly a terrible misfortune, and one which affected more or less the whole family of Whartons! "Do you mean to say that he was going to attack Arthur with a whip?" asked John Fletcher. "I only know that he was standing there with a whip in his hand," said Mr. Gresham. "I think he would have had the worst of that." "You would have laughed," said Arthur, "to see me walking majestically along the High Street with a cudgel which Gresham had just bought for me as being of the proper medium size. I don't doubt he meant to have a fight. And then you should have seen the policeman sloping over and putting himself in the way. I never quite understood where that policeman came from." "They are very well off for policemen in Silverbridge," said Gresham. "They've always got them going about." "He must be mad," said John. "Poor unfortunate young woman!" said Mrs. Fletcher, holding up both her hands. "I must say that I cannot but blame Mr. Wharton. If he had been firm, it never would have come to that. I wonder whether he ever sees him." "Of course he does," said John. "Why shouldn't he see him? You'd see him if he'd married a daughter of yours." "Never!" exclaimed the old woman. "If I had had a child so lost to all respect as that, I do not say that I would not have seen her. Human nature might have prevailed. But I would never willingly have put myself into contact with one who had so degraded me and mine." "I shall be very anxious to know what Mr. Wharton does about his money," said John. Arthur allowed himself but a couple of days among his friends, and then hurried up to London to take his seat. When there he was astonished to find how many questions were asked him about "the row," and how much was known about it,--and at the same time how little was really known. Everybody had heard that there had been a row, and everybody knew that there had been a lady in the case. But there seemed to be a general idea that the lady had been in some way misused, and that Arthur Fletcher had come forward like a Paladin to protect her. A letter had been written, and the husband, ogre-like, had intercepted the letter. The lady was the most unfortunate of human beings,--or would have been but for that consolation which she must have in the constancy of her old lover. As to all these matters the stories varied; but everybody was agreed on one point. All the world knew that Arthur Fletcher had gone to Silverbridge, had stood for the borough, and had taken the seat away from his rival,--because that rival had robbed him of his bride. How the robbery had been effected the world could not quite say. The world was still of opinion that the lady was violently attached to the man she had not married. But Captain Gunner explained it all clearly to Major Pountney by asserting that the poor girl had been coerced into the marriage by her father. And thus Arthur Fletcher found himself almost as much a hero in London as at Longbarns. Fletcher had not been above a week in town, and had become heartily sick of the rumours which in various shapes made their way round to his own ears, when he received an invitation from Mr. Wharton to go and dine with him at a tavern called the Jolly Blackbird. The invitation surprised him,--that he should be asked by such a man to dine at such a place,--but he accepted it as a matter of course. He was indeed much interested in a Bill for the drainage of common lands which was to be discussed in the House that night; there was a good deal of common land round Silverbridge, and he had some idea of making his first speech,--but he calculated that he might get his dinner and yet be back in time for the debate. So he went to the Jolly Blackbird,--a very quaint, old-fashioned law dining-house in the neighbourhood of Portugal Street, which had managed not to get itself pulled down a dozen years ago on behalf of the Law Courts which are to bless some coming generation. Arthur had never been there before and was surprised at the black wainscoting, the black tables, the old-fashioned grate, the two candles on the table, and the silent waiter. "I wanted to see you, Arthur," said the old man, pressing his hand in a melancholy way, "but I couldn't ask you to Manchester Square. They come in sometimes in the evening, and it might have been unpleasant. At your young men's clubs they let strangers dine. We haven't anything of that kind at the Eldon. You'll find they'll give you a very good bit of fish here, and a fairish steak." Arthur declared that he thought it a capital place,--the best fun in the world. "And they've a very good bottle of claret;--better than we get at the Eldon, I think. I don't know that I can say much for their champagne. We'll try it. You young fellows always drink champagne." "I hardly ever touch it," said Arthur. "Sherry and claret are my wines." "Very well;--very well. I did want to see you, my boy. Things haven't turned out just as we wished--have they?" "Not exactly, sir." "No indeed. You know the old saying, 'God disposes it all.' I have to make the best of it,--and so no doubt do you." "There's no doubt about it, sir," said Arthur, speaking in a low but almost angry voice. They were not in a room by themselves, but in a recess which separated them from the room. "I don't know that I want to talk about it, but to me it is one of those things for which there is no remedy. When a man loses his leg, he hobbles on, and sometimes has a good time of it at last;--but there he is, without a leg." "It wasn't my fault, Arthur." "There has been no fault but my own. I went in for the running and got distanced. That's simply all about it, and there's no more to be said." "You ain't surprised that I should wish to see you." "I'm ever so much obliged. I think it's very kind of you." "I can't go in for a new life as you can. I can't take up politics and Parliament. It's too late for me." "I'm going to. There's a Bill coming on this very night that I'm interested about. You mustn't be angry if I rush off a little before ten. We are going to lend money to the parishes on the security of the rates for draining bits of common land. Then we shall sell the land and endow the unions, so as to lessen the poor rates, and increase the cereal products of the country. We think we can bring 300,000 acres under the plough in three years, which now produce almost nothing, and in five years would pay all the expenses. Putting the value of the land at £25 an acre, which is low, we shall have created property to the value of seven millions and a half. That's something, you know." "Oh, yes," said Mr. Wharton, who felt himself quite unable to follow with any interest the aspirations of the young legislator. "Of course it's complicated," continued Arthur, "but when you come to look into it it comes out clear enough. It is one of the instances of the omnipotence of capital. Parliament can do such a thing, not because it has any creative power of its own, but because it has the command of unlimited capital." Mr. Wharton looked at him, sighing inwardly as he reflected that unrequited love should have brought a clear-headed young barrister into mists so thick and labyrinths so mazy as these. "A very good beefsteak indeed," said Arthur. "I don't know when I ate a better one. Thank you, no;--I'll stick to the claret." Mr. Wharton had offered him Madeira. "Claret and brown meat always go well together. Pancake! I don't object to a pancake. A pancake's a very good thing. Now would you believe it, sir; they can't make a pancake at the House." "And yet they sometimes fall very flat too," said the lawyer, making a real lawyer's joke. "It's all in the mixing, sir," said Arthur, carrying it on. "We've mixture enough just at present, but it isn't of the proper sort;--too much of the flour, and not enough of the egg." But Mr. Wharton had still something to say, though he hardly knew how to say it. "You must come and see us in the Square after a bit." "Oh;--of course." "I wouldn't ask you to dine there to-day, because I thought we should be less melancholy here;--but you mustn't cut us altogether. You haven't seen Everett since you've been in town?" "No, sir. I believe he lives a good deal,--a good deal with--Mr. Lopez. There was a little row down at Silverbridge. Of course it will wear off, but just at present his lines and my lines don't converge." "I'm very unhappy about him, Arthur." "There's nothing the matter?" "My girl has married that man. I've nothing to say against him;--but of course it wasn't to my taste; and I feel it as a separation. And now Everett has quarrelled with me." "Quarrelled with you!" Then the father told the story as well as he knew how. His son had lost some money, and he had called his son a gambler;--and consequently his son would not come near him. "It is bad to lose them both, Arthur." "That is so unlike Everett." "It seems to me that everybody has changed,--except myself. Who would have dreamed that she would have married that man? Not that I have anything to say against him except that he was not of our sort. He has been very good about Everett, and is very good about him. But Everett will not come to me unless I--withdraw the word;--say that I was wrong to call him a gambler. That is a proposition that no son should make to a father." "It is very unlike Everett," repeated the other. "Has he written to that effect?" "He has not written a word." "Why don't you see him yourself, and have it out with him?" "Am I to go to that club after him?" said the father. "Write to him and bid him come to you. I'll give up my seat if he don't come to you. Everett was always a quaint fellow, a little idle, you know,--mooning about after ideas--" "He's no fool, you know," said the father. "Not at all;--only vague. But he's the last man in the world to have nasty vulgar ideas of his own importance as distinguished from yours." "Lopez says--" "I wouldn't quite trust Lopez." "He isn't a bad fellow in his way, Arthur. Of course he is not what I would have liked for a son-in-law. I needn't tell you that. But he is kind and gentle-mannered, and has always been attached to Everett. You know he saved Everett's life at the risk of his own." Arthur could not but smile as he perceived how the old man was being won round by the son-in-law, whom he had treated so violently before the man had become his son-in-law. "By-the-way, what was all that about a letter you wrote to him?" "Emily,--I mean Mrs. Lopez,--will tell you if you ask her." "I don't want to ask her. I don't want to appear to set the wife against the husband. I am sure, my boy, you would write nothing that could affront her." "I think not, Mr. Wharton. If I know myself at all, or my own nature, it is not probable that I should affront your daughter." "No; no; no. I know that, my dear boy. I was always sure of that. Take some more wine." "No more, thank you. I must be off because I'm so anxious about this Bill." "I couldn't ask Emily about this letter. Now that they are married I have to make the best of it,--for her sake. I couldn't bring myself to say anything to her which might seem to accuse him." "I thought it right, sir, to explain to her that were I not in the hands of other people I would not do anything to interfere with her happiness by opposing her husband. My language was most guarded." "He destroyed the letter." "I have a copy of it, if it comes to that," said Arthur. "It will be best, perhaps, to say nothing further about it. Well;--good night, my boy, if you must go." Then Fletcher went off to the House, wondering as he went at the change which had apparently come over the character of his old friend. Mr. Wharton had always been a strong man, and now he seemed to be as weak as water. As to Everett, Fletcher was sure that there was something wrong, but he could not see his way to interfere himself. For the present he was divided from the family. Nevertheless he told himself again and again that that division should not be permanent. Of all the world she must always be to him the dearest. CHAPTER XXXVII The Horns The first months of the Session went on very much as the last Session had gone. The ministry did nothing brilliant. As far as the outer world could see, they seemed to be firm enough. There was no opposing party in the House strong enough to get a vote against them on any subject. Outsiders, who only studied politics in the columns of their newspapers, imagined the Coalition to be very strong. But they who were inside, members themselves, and the club quidnuncs who were always rubbing their shoulders against members, knew better. The opposition to the Coalition was within the Coalition itself. Sir Orlando Drought had not been allowed to build his four ships, and was consequently eager in his fears that the country would be invaded by the combined forces of Germany and France, that India would be sold by those powers to Russia, that Canada would be annexed to the States, that a great independent Roman Catholic hierarchy would be established in Ireland, and that Malta and Gibraltar would be taken away from us;--all which evils would be averted by the building of four big ships. A wet blanket of so terrible a size was in itself pernicious to the Cabinet, and heartrending to the poor Duke. But Sir Orlando could do worse even than this. As he was not to build his four ships, neither should Mr. Monk be allowed to readjust the county suffrage. When the skeleton of Mr. Monk's scheme was discussed in the Cabinet, Sir Orlando would not agree to it. The gentlemen, he said, who had joined the present Government with him, would never consent to a measure which would be so utterly destructive of the county interest. If Mr. Monk insisted on his measure in its proposed form, he must, with very great regret, place his resignation in the Duke's hands, and he believed that his friends would find themselves compelled to follow the same course. Then our Duke consulted the old Duke. The old Duke's advice was the same as ever. The Queen's Government was the main object. The present ministry enjoyed the support of the country, and he considered it the duty of the First Lord of the Treasury to remain at his post. The country was in no hurry, and the question of suffrages in the counties might be well delayed. Then he added a little counsel which might be called quite private, as it was certainly intended for no other ears than those of his younger friend. "Give Sir Orlando rope enough and he'll hang himself. His own party are becoming tired of him. If you quarrel with him this Session, Drummond, and Ramsden, and Beeswax, would go out with him, and the Government would be broken up; but next Session you may get rid of him safely." "I wish it were broken up," said the Prime Minister. "You have your duty to do by the country and by the Queen, and you mustn't regard your own wishes. Next Session let Monk be ready with his Bill again,--the same measure exactly. Let Sir Orlando resign then if he will. Should he do so I doubt whether any one would go with him. Drummond does not like him much better than you and I do." The poor Prime Minister was forced to obey. The old Duke was his only trusted counsellor, and he found himself constrained by his conscience to do as that counsellor counselled him. When, however, Sir Orlando, in his place as Leader of the House, in answer to some question from a hot and disappointed Radical, averred that the whole of her Majesty's Government had been quite in unison on this question of the county suffrage, he was hardly able to restrain himself. "If there be differences of opinion they must be kept in the background," said the Duke of St. Bungay. "Nothing can justify a direct falsehood," said the Duke of Omnium. Thus it came to pass that the only real measure which the Government had in hand was one by which Phineas Finn hoped so to increase the power of Irish municipalities as to make the Home Rulers believe that a certain amount of Home Rule was being conceded to them. It was not a great measure, and poor Phineas himself hardly believed in it. And thus the Duke's ministry came to be called the Faineants. But the Duchess, though she had been much snubbed, still persevered. Now and again she would declare herself to be broken-hearted, and would say that things might go their own way, that she would send in her resignation, that she would retire into private life and milk cows, that she would shake hands with no more parliamentary cads and "caddesses,"--a word which her Grace condescended to coin for her own use; that she would spend the next three years in travelling about the world; and lastly, that, let there come of it whatever might, Sir Orlando Drought should never again be invited into any house of which she was the mistress. This last threat, which was perhaps the most indiscreet of them all, she absolutely made good,--thereby adding very greatly to her husband's difficulties. But by the middle of June the parties at the house in Carlton Terrace were as frequent and as large as ever. Indeed it was all party with her. The Duchess possessed a pretty little villa down at Richmond, on the river, called The Horns, and gave parties there when there were none in London. She had picnics, and flower parties, and tea parties, and afternoons, and evenings, on the lawn,--till half London was always on its way to Richmond or back again. How she worked! And yet from day to day she swore that the world was ungrateful, and that she would work no more! I think that the world was ungrateful. Everybody went. She was so far successful that nobody thought of despising her parties. It was quite the thing to go to the Duchess's, whether at Richmond or in London. But people abused her and laughed at her. They said that she intrigued to get political support for her husband,--and, worse than that, they said that she failed. She did not fail altogether. The world was not taken captive as she had intended. Young members of Parliament did not become hotly enthusiastic in support of her and her husband as she had hoped that they would do. She had not become an institution of granite, as her dreams had fondly told her might be possible;--for there had been moments in which she had almost thought that she could rule England by giving dinner and supper parties, by ices and champagne. But in a dull, phlegmatic way, they who ate the ices and drank the champagne were true to her. There was a feeling abroad that "Glencora" was a "good sort of fellow" and ought to be supported. And when the ridicule became too strong, or the abuse too sharp, men would take up the cudgels for her, and fight her battles;--a little too openly, perhaps, as they would do it under her eyes, and in her hearing, and would tell her what they had done, mistaking on such occasions her good humour for sympathy. There was just enough of success to prevent that abandonment of her project which she so often threatened, but not enough to make her triumphant. She was too clever not to see that she was ridiculed. She knew that men called her Glencora among themselves. She was herself quite alive to the fact that she herself was wanting in dignity, and that with all the means at her disposal, with all her courage and all her talent, she did not quite play the part of the really great lady. But she did not fail to tell herself that labour continued would at last be successful, and she was strong to bear the buffets of the ill-natured. She did not think that she brought first-class materials to her work, but she believed,--a belief as erroneous as, alas, it is common,--that first-rate results might be achieved by second-rate means. "We had such a battle about your Grace last night," Captain Gunner said to her. "And were you my knight?" "Indeed I was. I never heard such nonsense." "What were they saying?" "Oh, the old story;--that you were like Martha, busying yourself about many things." "Why shouldn't I busy myself about many things? It is a pity, Captain Gunner, that some of you men have not something to busy yourselves about." All this was unpleasant. She could on such an occasion make up her mind to drop any Captain Gunner who had ventured to take too much upon himself; but she felt that in the efforts which she had made after popularity, she had submitted herself to unpleasant familiarities;--and though persistent in her course, she was still angry with herself. When she had begun her campaign as the Prime Minister's wife, one of her difficulties had been with regard to money. An abnormal expenditure became necessary, for which her husband's express sanction must be obtained, and steps taken in which his personal assistance would be necessary;--but this had been done, and there was now no further impediment in that direction. It seemed to be understood that she was to spend what money she pleased. There had been various contests between them, but in every contest she had gained something. He had been majestically indignant with her in reference to the candidature at Silverbridge,--but, as is usual with many of us, had been unable to maintain his anger about two things at the same time. Or, rather, in the majesty of his anger about her interference, he had disdained to descend to the smaller faults of her extravagance. He had seemed to concede everything else to her, on condition that he should be allowed to be imperious in reference to the borough. In that matter she had given way, never having opened her mouth about it after that one unfortunate word to Mr. Sprugeon. But, having done so, she was entitled to squander her thousands without remorse,--and she squandered them. "It is your five-and-twenty thousand pounds, my dear," she once said to Mrs. Finn, who often took upon herself to question the prudence of all this expenditure. This referred to a certain sum of money which had been left by the old Duke to Madame Goesler, as she was then called,--a legacy which that lady had repudiated. The money had, in truth, been given away to a relation of the Duke's by the joint consent of the lady and of the Duke himself, but the Duchess was pleased to refer to it occasionally as a still existing property. "My five-and-twenty thousand pounds, as you call it, would not go very far." "What's the use of money if you don't spend it? The Duke would go on collecting it and buying more property, which always means more trouble,--not because he is avaricious, but because for the time that comes easier than spending. Supposing he had married a woman without a shilling, he would still have been a rich man. As it is, my property was more even than his own. If we can do any good by spending the money, why shouldn't it be spent?" "If you can do any good!" "It all comes round to that. It isn't because I like always to live in a windmill! I have come to hate it. At this moment I would give worlds to be down at Matching with no one but the children, and to go about in a straw hat and a muslin gown. I have a fancy that I could sit under a tree and read a sermon, and think it the sweetest recreation. But I've made the attempt to do all this, and it is so mean to fail!" "But where is to be the end of it?" "There shall be no end as long as he is Prime Minister. He is the first man in England. Some people would say the first in Europe,--or in the world. A Prince should entertain like a Prince." "He need not be always entertaining." "Hospitality should run from a man with his wealth and his position, like water from a fountain. As his hand is known to be full, so it should be known to be open. When the delight of his friends is in question he should know nothing of cost. Pearls should drop from him as from a fairy. But I don't think you understand me." "Not when the pearls are to be picked up by Captain Gunners, Lady Glen." "I can't make the men any better,--nor yet the women. They are poor mean creatures. The world is made up of such. I don't know that Captain Gunner is worse than Sir Orlando Drought or Sir Timothy Beeswax. People seen by the mind are exactly different to things seen by the eye. They grow smaller and smaller as you come nearer down to them, whereas things become bigger. I remember when I used to think that members of the Cabinet were almost gods, and now they seem to be no bigger than the shoeblacks,--only less picturesque. He told me the other day of the time when he gave up going into power for the sake of taking me abroad. Ah me! how much was happening then,--and how much has happened since that! We didn't know you then." "He has been a good husband to you." "And I have been a good wife to him! I have never had him for an hour out of my heart since that, or ever for a moment forgotten his interest. I can't live with him because he shuts himself up reading blue-books, and is always at his office or in the House;--but I would if I could. Am I not doing it all for him? You don't think that the Captain Gunners are particularly pleasant to me! Think of your life and of mine. You have had lovers." "One in my life,--when I was quite entitled to have one." "Well; I am Duchess of Omnium, and I am the wife of the Prime Minister, and I had a larger property of my own than any other young woman that ever was born; and I am myself too,--Glencora M'Cluskie that was, and I've made for myself a character that I'm not ashamed of. But I'd be the curate's wife to-morrow, and make puddings, if I could only have my own husband and my own children with me. What's the use of it all? I like you better than anybody else, but you do nothing but scold me." Still the parties went on, and the Duchess laboured hard among her guests, and wore her jewels, and stood on her feet all the night, night after night, being civil to one person, bright to a second, confidential to a third, and sarcastic to an unfortunate fourth;--and in the morning she would work hard with her lists, seeing who had come to her and who had stayed away, and arranging who should be asked and who should be omitted. In the meantime the Duke altogether avoided these things. At first he had been content to show himself, and escape as soon as possible;--but now he was never seen at all in his own house, except at certain heavy dinners. To Richmond he never went at all, and in his own house in town very rarely even passed through the door that led into the reception rooms. He had not time for ordinary society. So said the Duchess. And many, perhaps the majority of those who frequented the house, really believed that his official duties were too onerous to leave him time for conversation. But in truth the hours went heavily with him as he sat alone in his study, sighing for some sweet parliamentary task, and regretting the days in which he was privileged to sit in the House of Commons till two o'clock in the morning, in the hope that he might get a clause or two passed in his Bill for decimal coinage. It was at the Horns at an afternoon party, given there in the gardens by the Duchess, early in July, that Arthur Fletcher first saw Emily after her marriage, and Lopez after the occurrence in Silverbridge. As it happened he came out upon the lawn close after them, and found them speaking to the Duchess as they passed on. She had put herself out of the way to be civil to Mr. and Mrs. Lopez, feeling that she had in some degree injured him in reference to the election, and had therefore invited both him and his wife on more than one occasion. Arthur Fletcher was there as a young man well known in the world, and as a supporter of the Duke's Government. The Duchess had taken up Arthur Fletcher,--as she was wont to take up new men, and had personally become tired of Lopez. Of course she had heard of the election, and had been told that Lopez had behaved badly. Of Mr. Lopez she did not know enough to care anything, one way or the other;--but she still encouraged him because she had caused him disappointment. She had now detained them a minute on the terrace before the windows while she said a word, and Arthur Fletcher became one of the little party before he knew whom he was meeting. "I am delighted," she said, "that you two Silverbridge heroes should meet together here as friends." It was almost incumbent on her to say something, though it would have been better for her not to have alluded to their heroism. Mrs. Lopez put out her hand, and Arthur Fletcher of course took it. Then the two men bowed slightly to each other, raising their hats. Arthur paused a moment with them, as they passed on from the Duchess, thinking that he would say something in a friendly tone. But he was silenced by the frown on the husband's face, and was almost constrained to go away without a word. It was very difficult for him even to be silent, as her greeting had been kind. But yet it was impossible for him to ignore the displeasure displayed in the man's countenance. So he touched his hat, and asking her to remember him affectionately to her father, turned off the path and went away. "Why did you shake hands with that man?" said Lopez. It was the first time since their marriage that his voice had been that of an angry man and an offended husband. "Why not, Ferdinand? He and I are very old friends, and we have not quarrelled." "You must take up your husband's friendships and your husband's quarrels. Did I not tell you that he had insulted you?" "He never insulted me." "Emily, you must allow me to be the judge of that. He insulted you, and then he behaved like a poltroon down at Silverbridge, and I will not have you know him any more. When I say so I suppose that will be enough." He waited for a reply, but she said nothing. "I ask you to tell me that you will obey me in this." "Of course he will not come to my house, nor should I think of going to his, if you disapproved." "Going to his house! He is unmarried." "Supposing he had a wife! Ferdinand, perhaps it will be better that you and I should not talk about him." "By G----," said Lopez, "there shall be no subject on which I will be afraid to talk to my own wife. I insist on your assuring me that you will never speak to him again." He had taken her along one of the upper walks because it was desolate, and he could there speak to her, as he thought, without being heard. She had, almost unconsciously, made a faint attempt to lead him down upon the lawn, no doubt feeling averse to private conversation at the moment; but he had persevered, and had resented the little effort. The idea in his mind that she was unwilling to hear him abuse Arthur Fletcher, unwilling to renounce the man, anxious to escape his order for such renunciation, added fuel to his jealousy. It was not enough for him that she had rejected this man and had accepted him. The man had been her lover, and she should be made to denounce the man. It might be necessary for him to control his feelings before old Wharton;--but he knew enough of his wife to be sure that she would not speak evil of him or betray him to her father. Her loyalty to him, which he could understand though not appreciate, enabled him to be a tyrant to her. So now he repeated his order to her, pausing in the path, with a voice unintentionally loud, and frowning down upon her as he spoke. "You must tell me, Emily, that you will never speak to him again." She was silent, looking up into his face, not with tremulous eyes, but with infinite woe written in them, had he been able to read the writing. She knew that he was disgracing himself, and yet he was the man whom she loved! "If you bid me not to speak to him, I will not;--but he must know the reason why." "He shall know nothing from you. You do not mean to say that you would write to him?" "Papa must tell him." "I will not have it so. In this matter, Emily, I will be master,--as it is fit that I should be. I will not have you talk to your father about Mr. Fletcher." "Why not, Ferdinand?" "Because I have so decided. He is an old family friend. I can understand that, and do not therefore wish to interfere between him and your father. But he has taken upon himself to write an insolent letter to you as my wife, and to interfere in my affairs. As to what should be done between you and him I must be the judge, and not your father." "And must I not speak to papa about it?" "No!" "Ferdinand, you make too little, I think, of the associations and affections of a whole life." "I will hear nothing about affection," he said angrily. "You cannot mean that--that--you doubt me?" "Certainly not. I think too much of myself and too little of him." It did not occur to him to tell her that he thought too well of her for that. "But the man who has offended me must be held to have offended you also." "You might say the same if it were my father." He paused at this, but only for a moment. "Certainly I might. It is not probable, but no doubt I might do so. If your father were to quarrel with me, you would not, I suppose, hesitate between us?" "Nothing on earth could divide me from you." "Nor me from you. In this very matter I am only taking your part, if you did but know it." They had now passed on, and had met other persons, having made their way through a little shrubbery on to a further lawn; and she had hoped, as they were surrounded by people, that he would allow the matter to drop. She had been unable as yet to make up her mind as to what she would say if he pressed her hard. But if it could be passed by,--if nothing more were demanded from her,--she would endeavour to forget it all, saying to herself that it had come from sudden passion. But he was too resolute for such a termination as that, and too keenly alive to the expediency of making her thoroughly subject to him. So he turned her round and took her back through the shrubbery, and in the middle of it stopped her again and renewed his demand. "Promise me that you will not speak again to Mr. Fletcher." "Then I must tell papa." "No;--you shall tell him nothing." "Ferdinand, if you exact a promise from me that I will not speak to Mr. Fletcher or bow to him should circumstances bring us together as they did just now, I must explain to my father why I have done so." "You will wilfully disobey me?" "In that I must." He glared at her, almost as though he were going to strike her, but she bore his look without flinching. "I have left all my old friends, Ferdinand, and have given myself heart and soul to you. No woman did so with a truer love or more devoted intention of doing her duty to her husband. Your affairs shall be my affairs." "Well; yes; rather." She was endeavouring to assure him of her truth, but could understand the sneer which was conveyed in his acknowledgement. "But you cannot, nor can I for your sake, abolish the things which have been." "I wish to abolish nothing that has been. I speak of the future." "Between our family and that of Mr. Fletcher there has been old friendship which is still very dear to my father,--the memory of which is still very dear to me. At your request I am willing to put all that aside from me. There is no reason why I should ever see any of the Fletchers again. Our lives will be apart. Should we meet our greeting would be very slight. The separation can be effected without words. But if you demand an absolute promise,--I must tell my father." "We will go home at once," he said instantly, and aloud. And home they went, back to London, without exchanging a word on the journey. He was absolutely black with rage, and she was content to remain silent. The promise was not given, nor, indeed, was it exacted under the conditions which the wife had imposed upon it. He was most desirous to make her subject to his will in all things, and quite prepared to exercise tyranny over her to any extent,--so that her father should know nothing of it. He could not afford to quarrel with Mr. Wharton. "You had better go to bed," he said, when he got her back to town;--and she went, if not to bed, at any rate into her own room. CHAPTER XXXVIII Sir Orlando Retires "He is a horrid man. He came here and quarrelled with the other man in my house, or rather down at Richmond, and made a fool of himself, and then quarrelled with his wife and took her away. What fools, what asses, what horrors men are! How impossible it is to be civil and gracious without getting into a mess. I am tempted to say that I will never know anybody any more." Such was the complaint made by the Duchess to Mrs. Finn a few days after the Richmond party, and from this it was evident that the latter affair had not passed without notice. "Did he make a noise about it?" asked Mrs. Finn. "There was not a row, but there was enough of a quarrel to be visible and audible. He walked about and talked loud to the poor woman. Of course it was my own fault. But the man was clever and I liked him, and people told me that he was of the right sort." "The Duke heard of it?" "No;--and I hope he won't. It would be such a triumph for him, after all the fuss at Silverbridge. But he never hears of anything. If two men fought a duel in his own dining-room he would be the last man in London to know it." "Then say nothing about it, and don't ask the men any more." "You may be sure I won't ask the man with the wife any more. The other man is in Parliament and can't be thrown over so easily--and it wasn't his fault. But I'm getting so sick of it all! I'm told that Sir Orlando has complained to Plantagenet that he isn't asked to the dinners." "Impossible!" "Don't you mention it, but he has. Warburton has told me so." Warburton was one of the Duke's private secretaries. "What did the Duke say?" "I don't quite know. Warburton is one of my familiars, but I didn't like to ask him for more than he chose to tell me. Warburton suggested that I should invite Sir Orlando at once; but there I was obdurate. Of course, if Plantagenet tells me I'll ask the man to come every day of the week;--but it is one of those things that I shall need to be told directly. My idea is, you know, that they had better get rid of Sir Orlando,--and that if Sir Orlando chooses to kick over the traces, he may be turned loose without any danger. One has little birds that give one all manner of information, and one little bird has told me that Sir Orlando and Mr. Roby don't speak. Mr. Roby is not very much himself, but he is a good straw to show which way the wind blows. Plantagenet certainly sent no message about Sir Orlando, and I'm afraid the gentleman must look for his dinners elsewhere." The Duke had in truth expressed himself very plainly to Mr. Warburton; but with so much indiscreet fretfulness that the discreet private secretary had not told it even to the Duchess. "This kind of thing argues a want of cordiality that may be fatal to us," Sir Orlando had said somewhat grandiloquently to the Duke, and the Duke had made--almost no reply. "I suppose I may ask my own guests in my own house," he had said afterwards to Mr. Warburton, "though in public life I am everybody's slave." Mr. Warburton, anxious of course to maintain the unity of the party, had told the Duchess so much as would, he thought, induce her to give way; but he had not repeated the Duke's own observations, which were, Mr. Warburton thought, hostile to the interests of the party. The Duchess had only smiled and made a little grimace, with which the private secretary was already well acquainted. And Sir Orlando received no invitation. In those days Sir Orlando was unhappy and irritable, doubtful of further success as regarded the Coalition, but quite resolved to pull the house down about the ears of the inhabitants rather than to leave it with gentle resignation. To him it seemed to be impossible that the Coalition should exist without him. He too had had moments of high-vaulting ambition, in which he had almost felt himself to be the great man required by the country, the one ruler who could gather together in his grasp the reins of government and drive the State coach single-handed safe through its difficulties for the next half-dozen years. There are men who cannot conceive of themselves that anything should be difficult for them, and again others who cannot bring themselves so to trust themselves as to think that they can ever achieve anything great. Samples of each sort from time to time rise high in political life, carried thither apparently by Epicurean concourse of atoms; and it often happens that the more confident samples are by no means the most capable. The concourse of atoms had carried Sir Orlando so high that he could not but think himself intended for something higher. But the Duke, who had really been wafted to the very top, had always doubted himself, believing himself capable of doing some one thing by dint of industry, but with no further confidence in his own powers. Sir Orlando had perceived something of his Leader's weakness, and had thought that he might profit by it. He was not only a distinguished member of the Cabinet, but even the recognised Leader of the House of Commons. He looked out the facts and found that for five-and-twenty years out of the last thirty the Leader of the House of Commons had been the Head of the Government. He felt that he would be mean not to stretch out his hand and take the prize destined for him. The Duke was a poor timid man who had very little to say for himself. Then came the little episode about the dinners. It had become very evident to all the world that the Duchess of Omnium had cut Sir Orlando Drought,--that the Prime Minister's wife, who was great in hospitality, would not admit the First Lord of the Admiralty into her house. The doings at Gatherum Castle, and in Carlton Terrace, and at the Horns were watched much too closely by the world at large to allow such omissions to be otherwise than conspicuous. Since the commencement of the Session there had been a series of articles in the "People's Banner" violently abusive of the Prime Minister, and in one or two of these the indecency of these exclusions had been exposed with great strength of language. And the Editor of the "People's Banner" had discovered that Sir Orlando Drought was the one man in Parliament fit to rule the nation. Till Parliament should discover this fact, or at least acknowledge it,--the discovery having been happily made by the "People's Banner,"--the Editor of the "People's Banner" thought that there could be no hope for the country. Sir Orlando of course saw all these articles, and in his very heart believed that a man had at length sprung up among them fit to conduct a newspaper. The Duke also unfortunately saw the "People's Banner." In his old happy days two papers a day, one in the morning and the other before dinner, sufficed to tell him all that he wanted to know. Now he felt it necessary to see almost every rag that was published. And he would skim through them all till he found the lines in which he himself was maligned, and then, with sore heart and irritated nerves, would pause over every contumelious word. He would have bitten his tongue out rather than have spoken of the tortures he endured, but he was tortured and did endure. He knew the cause of the bitter personal attacks made on him,--of the abuse with which he was loaded, and of the ridicule, infinitely more painful to him, with which his wife's social splendour was bespattered. He remembered well the attempt which Mr. Quintus Slide had made to obtain an entrance into his house, and his own scornful rejection of that gentleman's overtures. He knew,--no man knew better,--the real value of that able Editor's opinion. And yet every word of it was gall and wormwood to him. In every paragraph there was a scourge which hit him on the raw and opened wounds which he could show to no kind surgeon, for which he could find solace in no friendly treatment. Not even to his wife could he condescend to say that Mr. Quintus Slide had hurt him. Then Sir Orlando had come himself. Sir Orlando explained himself gracefully. He of course could understand that no gentleman had a right to complain because he was not asked to another gentleman's house. But the affairs of the country were above private considerations; and he, actuated by public feelings, would condescend to do that which under other circumstances would be impossible. The public press, which was ever vigilant, had suggested that there was some official estrangement, because he, Sir Orlando, had not been included in the list of guests invited by his Grace. Did not his Grace think that there might be seeds of,--he would not quite say decay for the Coalition, in such a state of things? The Duke paused a moment, and then said that he thought there were no such seeds. Sir Orlando bowed haughtily and withdrew--swearing at the moment that the Coalition should be made to fall into a thousand shivers. This had all taken place a fortnight before the party at the Horns from which poor Mrs. Lopez had been withdrawn so hastily. But Sir Orlando, when he commenced the proceedings consequent on this resolution, did not find all that support which he had expected. Unfortunately there had been an uncomfortable word or two between him and Mr. Roby, the political Secretary at the Admiralty. Mr. Roby had never quite seconded Sir Orlando's ardour in that matter of the four ships, and Sir Orlando in his pride of place had ventured to snub Mr. Roby. Now Mr. Roby could bear a snubbing perhaps as well as any other official subordinate,--but he was one who would study the question and assure himself that it was, or that it was not, worth his while to bear it. He, too, had discussed with his friends the condition of the Coalition, and had come to conclusions rather adverse to Sir Orlando than otherwise. When, therefore, the First Secretary sounded him as to the expediency of some step in the direction of a firmer political combination than that at present existing,--by which of course was meant the dethronement of the present Prime Minister,--Mr. Roby had snubbed him! Then there had been slight official criminations and recriminations, till a state of things had come to pass which almost justified the statement made by the Duchess to Mrs. Finn. The Coalition had many component parts, some coalescing without difficulty, but with no special cordiality. Such was the condition of things between the very conservative Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland and his somewhat radical Chief Secretary, Mr. Finn,--between probably the larger number of those who were contented with the duties of their own offices and the pleasures and profits arising therefrom. Some by this time hardly coalesced at all, as was the case with Sir Gregory Grogram and Sir Timothy Beeswax, the Attorney-General and Solicitor-General;--and was especially the case with the Prime Minister and Sir Orlando Drought. But in one or two happy cases the Coalition was sincere and loyal,--and in no case was this more so than with regard to Mr. Rattler and Mr. Roby. Mr. Rattler and Mr. Roby had throughout their long parliamentary lives belonged to opposite parties, and had been accustomed to regard each other with mutual jealousy and almost with mutual hatred. But now they had come to see how equal, how alike, and how sympathetic were their tastes, and how well each might help the other. As long as Mr. Rattler could keep his old place at the Treasury,--and his ambition never stirred him to aught higher,--he was quite contented that his old rival should be happy at the Admiralty. And that old rival, when he looked about him and felt his present comfort, when he remembered how short-lived had been the good things which had hitherto come in his way, and how little probable it was that long-lived good things should be his when the Coalition was broken up, manfully determined that loyalty to the present Head of the Government was his duty. He had sat for too many years on the same bench with Sir Orlando to believe much in his power of governing the country. Therefore, when Sir Orlando dropped his hint Mr. Roby did not take it. "I wonder whether it's true that Sir Orlando complained to the Duke that he was not asked to dinner?" said Mr. Roby to Mr. Rattler. "I should hardly think so. I can't fancy that he would have the pluck," said Mr. Rattler. "The Duke isn't the easiest man in the world to speak to about such a thing as that." "It would be a monstrous thing for a man to do! But Drought's head is quite turned. You can see that." "We never thought very much about him, you know, on our side." "It was what your side thought about him," rejoined Roby, "that put him where he is now." "It was the fate of accidents, Roby, which puts so many of us in our places, and arranges our work for us, and makes us little men or big men. There are other men besides Drought who have been tossed up in a blanket till they don't know whether their heads or their heels are highest." "I quite believe in the Duke," said Mr. Roby, almost alarmed by the suggestion which his new friend had seemed to make. "So do I, Roby. He has not the obduracy of Lord Brock, nor the ineffable manner of Mr. Mildmay, nor the brilliant intellect of Mr. Gresham." "Nor the picturesque imagination of Mr. Daubeny," said Mr. Roby, feeling himself bound to support the character of his late chief. "Nor his audacity," said Mr. Rattler. "But he has peculiar gifts of his own, and gifts fitted for the peculiar combination of circumstances, if he will only be content to use them. He is a just, unambitious, intelligent man, in whom after a while the country would come to have implicit confidence. But he is thin-skinned and ungenial." "I have got into his boat," said Roby, enthusiastically, "and he will find that I shall be true to him." "There is no better boat to be in at present," said the slightly sarcastic Rattler. "As to the Drought pinnace, it will be more difficult to get it afloat than the four ships themselves. To tell the truth honestly, Roby, we have to rid ourselves of Sir Orlando. I have a great regard for the man." "I can't say I ever liked him," said Roby. "I don't talk about liking,--but he has achieved success, and is to be regarded. Now he has lost his head, and he is bound to get a fall. The question is,--who shall fall with him?" "I do not feel myself at all bound to sacrifice myself." "I don't know who does. Sir Timothy Beeswax, I suppose, will resent the injury done to him. But I can hardly think that a strong government can be formed by Sir Orlando Drought and Sir Timothy Beeswax. Any secession is a weakness,--of course; but I think he may survive it." And so Mr. Rattler and Mr. Roby made up their minds that the First Lord of the Admiralty might be thrown overboard without much danger to the Queen's ship. Sir Orlando, however, was quite in earnest. The man had spirit enough to feel that no alternative was left to him after he had condescended to suggest that he should be asked to dinner and had been refused. He tried Mr. Roby, and found that Mr. Roby was a mean fellow, wedded, as he told himself, to his salary. Then he sounded Lord Drummond, urging various reasons. The country was not safe without more ships. Mr. Monk was altogether wrong about revenue. Mr. Finn's ideas about Ireland were revolutionary. But Lord Drummond thought that, upon the whole, the present Ministry served the country well, and considered himself bound to adhere to it. "He cannot bear the idea of being out of power," said Sir Orlando to himself. He next said a word to Sir Timothy; but Sir Timothy was not the man to be led by the nose by Sir Orlando. Sir Timothy had his grievances and meant to have his revenge, but he knew how to choose his own time. "The Duke's not a bad fellow," said Sir Timothy,--"perhaps a little weak, but well-meaning. I think we ought to stand by him a little longer. As for Finn's Irish Bill, I haven't troubled myself about it." Then Sir Orlando declared to himself that Sir Timothy was a coward, and resolved that he would act alone. About the middle of July he went to the Duke at the Treasury, was closeted with him, and in a very long narration of his own differences, difficulties, opinions, and grievances, explained to the Duke that his conscience called upon him to resign. The Duke listened and bowed his head, and with one or two very gently-uttered words expressed his regret. Then Sir Orlando, in another long speech, laid bare his bosom to the Chief whom he was leaving, declaring the inexpressible sorrow with which he had found himself called upon to take a step which he feared might be prejudicial to the political status of a man whom he honoured so much as he did the Duke of Omnium. Then the Duke bowed again, but said nothing. The man had been guilty of the impropriety of questioning the way in which the Duke's private hospitality was exercised, and the Duke could not bring himself to be genially civil to such an offender. Sir Orlando went on to say that he would of course explain his views in the Cabinet, but that he had thought it right to make them known to the Duke as soon as they were formed. "The best friends must part, Duke," he said as he took his leave. "I hope not, Sir Orlando; I hope not," said the Duke. But Sir Orlando had been too full of himself and of the words he was to speak, and of the thing he was about to do, to understand either the Duke's words or his silence. And so Sir Orlando resigned, and thus supplied the only morsel of political interest which the Session produced. "Take no more notice of him than if your footman was going," had been the advice of the old Duke. Of course there was a Cabinet meeting on the occasion, but even there the commotion was very slight, as every member knew before entering the room what it was that Sir Orlando intended to do. Lord Drummond said that the step was one to be much lamented. "Very much, indeed," said the Duke of St. Bungay. His words themselves were false and hypocritical, but the tone of his voice took away all the deceit. "I am afraid," said the Prime Minister, "from what Sir Orlando has said to me privately, that we cannot hope that he will change his mind." "That I certainly cannot do," said Sir Orlando, with all the dignified courage of a modern martyr. On the next morning the papers were full of the political fact, and were blessed with a subject on which they could excercise their prophetical sagacity. The remarks made were generally favourable to the Government. Three or four of the morning papers were of opinion that though Sir Orlando had been a strong man, and a good public servant, the Ministry might exist without him. But the "People's Banner" was able to expound to the people at large that the only grain of salt by which the Ministry had been kept from putrefaction had been now cast out, and that mortification, death, and corruption, must ensue. It was one of Mr. Quintus Slide's greatest efforts. CHAPTER XXXIX "Get Round Him" Ferdinand Lopez maintained his anger against his wife for more than a week after the scene at Richmond, feeding it with reflections on what he called her disobedience. Nor was it a make-believe anger. She had declared her intention to act in opposition to his expressed orders. He felt that his present condition was prejudicial to his interests, and that he must take his wife back into favour, in order that he might make progress with her father, but could hardly bring himself to swallow his wrath. He thought that it was her duty to obey him in everything,--and that disobedience on a matter touching her old lover was an abominable offence, to be visited with severest marital displeasure, and with a succession of scowls that should make her miserable for a month at least. Nor on her behalf would he have hesitated, though the misery might have continued for three months. But then the old man was the main hope of his life, and must be made its mainstay. Brilliant prospects were before him. He had used to think that Mr. Wharton was a hale man, with some terribly vexatious term of life before him. But now, now that he was seen more closely, he appeared to be very old. He would sit half bent in the arm-chair in Stone Buildings, and look as though he were near a hundred. And from day to day he seemed to lean more upon his son-in-law, whose visits to him were continued, and always well taken. The constant subject of discourse between them was Everett Wharton, who had not yet seen his father since the misfortune of their quarrel. Everett had declared to Lopez a dozen times that he would go to his father if his father wished it, and Lopez as often reported to the father that Everett would not go to him unless the father expressed such a wish. And so they had been kept apart. Lopez did not suppose that the old man would disinherit his son altogether,--did not, perhaps, wish it. But he thought that the condition of the old man's mind would affect the partition of his property, and that the old man would surely make some new will in the present state of his affairs. The old man always asked after his daughter, begging that she would come to him, and at last it was necessary that an evening should be fixed. "We shall be delighted to come to-day or to-morrow," Lopez said. "We had better say to-morrow. There would be nothing to eat to-day. The house isn't now what it used to be." It was therefore expedient that Lopez should drop his anger when he got home, and prepare his wife to dine in Manchester Square in a proper frame of mind. Her misery had been extreme;--very much more bitter than he had imagined. It was not only that his displeasure made her life for the time wearisome, and robbed the only society she had of all its charms. It was not only that her heart was wounded by his anger. Those evils might have been short-lived. But she had seen,--she could not fail to see,--that his conduct was unworthy of her and of her deep love. Though she struggled hard against the feeling, she could not but despise the meanness of his jealousy. She knew thoroughly well that there had been no grain of offence in that letter from Arthur Fletcher,--and she knew that no man, no true man, would have taken offence at it. She tried to quench her judgment, and to silence the verdict which her intellect gave against him, but her intellect was too strong even for her heart. She was beginning to learn that the god of her idolatry was but a little human creature, and that she should not have worshipped at so poor a shrine. But nevertheless the love should be continued, and, if possible, the worship, though the idol had been already found to have feet of clay. He was her husband, and she would be true to him. As morning after morning he left her, still with that harsh, unmanly frown upon his face, she would look up at him with entreating eyes, and when he returned would receive him with her fondest smile. At length he, too, smiled. He came to her after that interview with Mr. Wharton and told her, speaking with the soft yet incisive voice which she used to love so well, that they were to dine in the Square on the following day. "Let there be an end of all this," he said, taking her in his arms and kissing her. Of course she did not tell him that "all this" had sprung from his ill-humour and not from hers. "I own I have been angry," he continued. "I will say nothing more about it now; but that man did vex me." "I have been so sorry that you should have been vexed." "Well;--let it pass away. I don't think your father is looking very well." "He is not ill?" "Oh no. He feels the loss of your society. He is so much alone. You must be more with him." "Has he not seen Everett yet?" "No. Everett is not behaving altogether well." Emily was made unhappy by this and showed it. "He is the best fellow in the world. I may safely say there is no other man whom I regard so warmly as I do your brother. But he takes wrong ideas into his head, and nothing will knock them out. I wonder what your father has done about his will." "I have not an idea. Nothing you may be sure will make him unjust to Everett." "Ah!--You don't happen to know whether he ever made a will?" "Not at all. He would be sure to say nothing about it to me,--or to anybody." "That is a kind of secrecy which I think wrong. It leads to so much uncertainty. You wouldn't like to ask him?" "No;--certainly." "It is astonishing to me how afraid you are of your father. He hasn't any land, has he?" "Land!" "Real estate. You know what I mean. He couldn't well have landed property without your knowing it." She shook her head. "It might make an immense difference to us, you know." "Why so?" "If he were to die without a will, any land,--houses and that kind of property,--would go to Everett. I never knew a man who told his children so little. I want to make you understand these things. You and I will be badly off if he doesn't do something for us." "You don't think he is really ill?" "No;--not ill. Men above seventy are apt to die, you know." "Oh, Ferdinand,--what a way to talk of it!" "Well, my love, the thing is so seriously matter-of-fact, that it is better to look at it in a matter-of-fact way. I don't want your father to die." "I hope not. I hope not." "But I should be very glad to learn what he means to do while he lives. I want to get you into sympathy with me in this matter;--but it is so difficult." "Indeed I sympathise with you." "The truth is he has taken an aversion to Everett." "God forbid!" "I am doing all I can to prevent it. But if he does throw Everett over we ought to have the advantage of it. There is no harm in saying as much as that. Think what it would be if he should take it into his head to leave his money to hospitals. My G----; fancy what my condition would be if I were to hear of such a will as that! If he destroyed an old will, partly because he didn't like our marriage, and partly in anger against Everett, and then died without making another, the property would be divided,--unless he had bought land. You see how many dangers there are. Oh dear! I can look forward and see myself mad,--or else see myself so proudly triumphant!" All this horrified her, but he did not see her horror. He knew that she disliked it, but thought that she disliked the trouble, and that she dreaded her father. "Now I do think that you could help me a little," he continued. "What can I do?" "Get round him when he's a little down in the mouth. That is the way in which old men are conquered." How utterly ignorant he was of the very nature of her mind and disposition! To be told by her husband that she was to "get round" her father! "You should see him every day. He would be delighted if you would go to him at his chambers. Or you could take care to be in the Square when he comes home. I don't know whether we had not better leave this and go and live near him. Would you mind that?" "I would do anything you would suggest as to living anywhere." "But you won't do anything I suggest as to your father." "As to being with him, if I thought he wished it,--though I had to walk my feet off, I would go to him." "There's no need of hurting your feet. There's the brougham." "I do so wish, Ferdinand, you would discontinue the brougham. I don't at all want it. I don't at all dislike cabs. And I was only joking about walking. I walk very well." "Certainly not. You fail altogether to understand my ideas about things. If things were going bad with us, I would infinitely prefer getting a pair of horses for you to putting down the one you have." She certainly did not understand his ideas. "Whatever we do we must hold our heads up. I think he is coming round to cotton to me. He is very close, but I can see that he likes my going to him. Of course, as he grows older from day to day, he'll constantly want some one to lean on more than heretofore." "I would go and stay with him if he wanted me." "I have thought of that too. Now that would be a saving,--without any fall. And if we were both there we could hardly fail to know what he was doing. You could offer that, couldn't you? You could say as much as that?" "I could ask him if he wished it." "Just so. Say that it occurs to you that he is lonely by himself, and that we will both go to the Square at a moment's notice if he thinks it will make him comfortable. I feel sure that that will be the best step to take. I have already had an offer for these rooms, and could get rid of the things we have bought to advantage." This, too, was terrible to her, and at the same time altogether unintelligible. She had been invited to buy little treasures to make their home comfortable, and had already learned to take that delight in her belongings which is one of the greatest pleasures of a young married woman's life. A girl in her old home, before she is given up to a husband, has many sources of interest, and probably from day to day sees many people. And the man just married goes out to his work, and occupies his time, and has his thickly-peopled world around him. But the bride, when the bridal honours of the honeymoon are over, when the sweet care of the first cradle has not yet come to her, is apt to be lonely and to be driven to the contemplation of the pretty things with which her husband and her friends have surrounded her. It had certainly been so with this young bride, whose husband left her in the morning and only returned for their late dinner. And now she was told that her household gods had had a price put upon them and that they were to be sold. She had intended to suggest that she would pay her father a visit, and her husband immediately proposed that they should quarter themselves permanently on the old man! She was ready to give up her brougham, though she liked the comfort of it well enough; but to that he would not consent because the possession of it gave him an air of wealth; but without a moment's hesitation he could catch at the idea of throwing upon her father the burden of maintaining both her and himself! She understood the meaning of this. She could read his mind so far. She endeavoured not to read the book too closely,--but there it was, opened to her wider day by day, and she knew that the lessons which it taught were vulgar and damnable. And yet she had to hide from him her own perception of himself! She had to sympathise with his desires and yet to abstain from doing that which his desires demanded from her. Alas, poor girl! She soon knew that her marriage had been a mistake. There was probably no one moment in which she made the confession to herself. But the conviction was there, in her mind, as though the confession had been made. Then there would come upon her unbidden, unwelcome reminiscences of Arthur Fletcher,--thoughts that she would struggle to banish, accusing herself of some heinous crime because the thoughts would come back to her. She remembered his light wavy hair, which she had loved as one loves the beauty of a dog, which had seemed to her young imagination, to her in the ignorance of her early years, to lack something of a dreamed-of manliness. She remembered his eager, boyish, honest entreaties to herself, which to her had been without that dignity of a superior being which a husband should possess. She became aware that she had thought the less of him because he had thought the more of her. She had worshipped this other man because he had assumed superiority and had told her that he was big enough to be her master. But now,--now that it was all too late,--the veil had fallen from her eyes. She could now see the difference between manliness and "deportment." Ah,--that she should ever have been so blind, she who had given herself credit for seeing so much clearer than they who were her elders! And now, though at last she did see clearly, she could not have the consolation of telling any one what she had seen. She must bear it all in silence, and live with it, and still love this god of clay that she had chosen. And, above all, she must never allow herself even to think of that other man with the wavy light hair,--that man who was rising in the world, of whom all people said all good things, who was showing himself to be a man by the work he did, and whose true tenderness she could never doubt. Her father was left to her. She could still love her father. It might be that it would be best for him that she should go back to her old home, and take care of his old age. If he should wish it, she would make no difficulty of parting with the things around her. Of what concern were the prettinesses of life to one whose inner soul was hampered with such ugliness? It might be better that they should live in Manchester Square,--if her father wished it. It was clear to her now that her husband was in urgent want of money, though of his affairs, even of his way of making money, she knew nothing. As that was the case, of course she would consent to any practicable retrenchment which he would propose. And then she thought of other coming joys and coming troubles,--of how in future years she might have to teach a girl falsely to believe that her father was a good man, and to train a boy to honest purposes whatever parental lessons might come from the other side. But the mistake she had made was acknowledged. The man who could enjoin her to "get round" her father could never have been worthy of the love she had given him. CHAPTER XL "Come and Try It" The husband was almost jovial when he came home just in time to take his young wife to dine with their father. "I've had such a day in the city," he said, laughing. "I wish I could introduce you to my friend, Mr. Sextus Parker." "Cannot you do so?" "Well, no; not exactly. Of course you'd like him because he is such a wonderful character, but he'd hardly do for your drawing-room. He's the vulgarest little creature you ever put your eyes on; and yet in a certain way he's my partner." "Then I suppose you trust him?" "Indeed I don't;--but I make him useful. Poor little Sexty! I do trust him to a degree, because he believes in me and thinks he can do best by sticking to me. The old saying of 'honour among thieves' isn't without a dash of truth in it. When two men are in a boat together they must be true to each other, else neither will get to the shore." "You don't attribute high motives to your friend." "I'm afraid there are not very many high motives in the world, my girl, especially in the city;--nor yet at Westminster. It can hardly be from high motives when a lot of men, thinking differently on every possible subject, come together for the sake of pay and power. I don't know whether, after all, Sextus Parker mayn't have as high motives as the Duke of Omnium. I don't suppose any one ever had lower motives than the Duchess when she chiselled me about Silverbridge. Never mind;--it'll all be one a hundred years hence. Get ready, for I want you to be with your father a little before dinner." Then, when they were in the brougham together, he began a course of very plain instructions. "Look here, dear; you had better get him to talk to you before dinner. I dare say Mrs. Roby will be there, and I will get her on one side. At any rate you can manage it because we shall be early, and I'll take up a book while you are talking to him." "What do you wish me to say to him, Ferdinand?" "I have been thinking of your own proposal, and I am quite sure that we had better join him in the Square. The thing is, I am in a little mess about the rooms, and can't stay on without paying very dearly for them." "I thought you had paid for them." "Well;--yes; in one sense I had; but you don't understand about business. You had better not interrupt me now as I have got a good deal to say before we get to the Square. It will suit me to give up the rooms. I don't like them, and they are very dear. As you yourself said, it will be a capital thing for us to go and stay with your father." "I meant only for a visit." "It will be for a visit,--and we'll make it a long visit." It was odd that the man should have been so devoid of right feeling himself as not to have known that the ideas which he expressed were revolting! "You can sound him. Begin by saying that you are afraid he is desolate. He told me himself that he was desolate, and you can refer to that. Then tell him that we are both of us prepared to do anything that we can to relieve him. Put your arm over him, and kiss him, and all that sort of thing." She shrunk from him into the corner of the brougham, and yet he did not perceive it. "Then say that you think he would be happier if we were to join him here for a time. You can make him understand that there would be no difficulty about the apartments. But don't say it all in a set speech, as though it were prepared,--though of course you can let him know that you have suggested it to me and that I am willing. Be sure to let him understand that the idea began with you." "But it did not." "You proposed to go and stay with him. Tell him just that. And you should explain to him that he can dine at the club just as much as he likes. When you were alone with him here, of course he had to come home; but he needn't do that now unless he chooses. Of course the brougham would be my affair. And if he should say anything about sharing the house expenses, you can tell him that I would do anything he might propose." Her father to share the household expenses in his own house, and with his own children! "You say as much as you can of all this before dinner, so that when we are sitting below he may suggest it if he pleases. It would suit me to get in there next week if possible." And so the lesson had been given. She had said little or nothing in reply, and he had only finished as they entered the Square. She had hardly a minute allowed her to think how far she might follow, and in what she must ignore, her husband's instructions. If she might use her own judgment she would tell her father at once that a residence for a time beneath his roof would be a service to them pecuniarily. But this she might not do. She understood that her duty to her husband did forbid her to proclaim his poverty in opposition to his wishes. She would tell nothing that he did not wish her to tell,--but then no duty could require her to say what was false. She would make the suggestion about their change of residence, and would make it with proper affection;--but as regarded themselves she would simply say that it would suit their views to give up their rooms if it suited him. Mr. Wharton was all alone when they entered the drawing-room,--but, as Lopez had surmised, had asked his sister-in-law round the corner to come to dinner. "Roby always likes an excuse to get to his club," said the old man, "and Harriet likes an excuse to go anywhere." It was not long before Lopez began to play his part by seating himself close to the open window and looking out into the Square; and Emily when she found herself close to her father, with her hand in his, could hardly divest herself of a feeling that she also was playing her part. "I see so very little of you," said the old man plaintively. "I'd come up oftener if I thought you'd like it." "It isn't liking, my dear. Of course you have to live with your husband. Isn't this sad about Everett?" "Very sad. But Everett hasn't lived here for ever so long." "I don't know why he shouldn't. He was a fool to go away when he did. Does he go to you?" "Yes;--sometimes." "And what does he say?" "I'm sure he would be with you at once if you would ask him." "I have asked him. I've sent word by Lopez over and over again. If he means that I am to write to him and say that I'm sorry for offending him, I won't. Don't talk of him any more. It makes me so angry that I sometimes feel inclined to do things which I know I should repent when dying." "Not anything to injure Everett, papa!" "I wonder whether he ever thinks that I am an old man and all alone, and that his brother-in-law is daily with me. But he's a fool, and thinks of nothing. I know it is very sad being here night after night by myself." Mr. Wharton forgot, no doubt, at the moment, that he passed the majority of his evenings at the Eldon,--though, had he been reminded of it, he might have declared with perfect truth that the delights of his club were not satisfactory. "Papa," said Emily, "would you like us to come and live here?" "What,--you and Lopez;--here, in the Square?" "Yes;--for a time. He is thinking of giving up the place in Belgrave Mansions." "I thought he had them for--for ever so many months." "He does not like them, and they are expensive, and he can give them up. If you would wish it, we would come here,--for a time." He turned round and looked at her almost suspiciously; and she,--she blushed as she remembered how accurately she was obeying her husband's orders. "It would be such a joy to me to be near you again." There was something in her voice which instantly reassured him. "Well--;" he said; "come and try it if it will suit him. The house is big enough. It will ease his pocket and be a comfort to me. Come and try it." It astonished her that the thing should be done so easily. Here was all that her husband had proposed to arrange by deep diplomacy settled in three words. And yet she felt ashamed of herself,--as though she had taken her father in. That terrible behest to "get round him" still grated on her ears. Had she got round him? Had she cheated him into this? "Papa," she said, "do not do this unless you feel sure that you will like it." "How is anybody to feel sure of anything, my dear?" "But if you doubt, do not do it." "I feel sure of one thing, that it will be a great saving to your husband, and I am nearly sure that that ought not to be a matter of indifference to him. There is plenty of room here, and it will at any rate be a comfort to me to see you sometimes." Just at this moment Mrs. Roby came in, and the old man began to tell his news aloud. "Emily has not gone away for long. She's coming back like a bad shilling." "Not to live in the Square?" said Mrs. Roby, looking round at Lopez. "Why not? There's room here for them, and it will be just as well to save expense. When will you come, my dear?" "Whenever the house may be ready, papa." "It's ready now. You ought to know that. I am not going to refurnish the rooms for you, or anything of that kind. Lopez can come in and hang up his hat whenever it pleases him." During this time Lopez had hardly known how to speak or what to say. He had been very anxious that his wife should pave the way, as he would have called it. He had been urgent with her to break the ice to her father. But it had not occurred to him that the matter would be settled without any reference to himself. Of course he had heard every word that had been spoken, and was aware that his own poverty had been suggested as the cause for such a proceeding. It was a great thing for him in every way. He would live for nothing, and would also have almost unlimited power of being with Mr. Wharton as old age grew on him. This ready compliance with his wishes was a benefit far too precious to be lost. But yet he felt that his own dignity required some reference to himself. It was distasteful to him that his father-in-law should regard him,--or, at any rate, that he should speak of him,--as a pauper, unable to provide a home for his own wife. "Emily's notion in suggesting it, sir," he said, "has been her care for your comfort." The barrister turned round and looked at him, and Lopez did not quite like the look. "It was she thought of it first, and she certainly had no other idea than that. When she mentioned it to me, I was delighted to agree." Emily heard it all and blushed. It was not absolutely untrue in words,--this assertion of her husband's,--but altogether false in spirit. And yet she could not contradict him. "I don't see why it should not do very well, indeed," said Mrs. Roby. "I hope it may," said the barrister. "Come, Emily, I must take you down to dinner to-day. You are not at home yet, you know. As you are to come, the sooner the better." During dinner not a word was said on the subject. Lopez exerted himself to be pleasant, and told all that he had heard as to the difficulties of the Cabinet. Sir Orlando had resigned, and the general opinion was that the Coalition was going to pieces. Had Mr. Wharton seen the last article in the "People's Banner" about the Duke? Lopez was strongly of the opinion that Mr. Wharton ought to see that article. "I never had the 'People's Banner' within my fingers in my life," said the barrister angrily, "and I certainly never will." "Ah, sir; this is an exception. You should see this. When Slide really means to cut a fellow up, he can do it. There's no one like him. And the Duke has deserved it. He's a poor, vacillating creature, led by the Duchess; and she,--according to all that one hears,--she isn't much better than she should be." "I thought the Duchess was a great friend of yours," said Mr. Wharton. "I don't care much for such friendship. She threw me over most shamefully." "And therefore, of course, you are justified in taking away her character. I never saw the Duchess of Omnium in my life, and should probably be very uncomfortable if I found myself in her society; but I believe her to be a good sort of woman in her way." Emily sat perfectly silent, knowing that her husband had been rebuked, but feeling that he had deserved it. He, however, was not abashed; but changed the conversation, dashing into city rumours, and legal reforms. The old man from time to time said sharp little things, showing that his intellect was not senile, all of which his son-in-law bore imperturbably. It was not that he liked it, or was indifferent, but that he knew that he could not get the good things which Mr. Wharton could do for him without making some kind of payment. He must take the sharp words of the old man,--and take all that he could get besides. When the two men were alone together after dinner, Mr. Wharton used a different tone. "If you are to come," he said, "you might as well do it as soon as possible." "A day or two will be enough for us." "There are one or two things you should understand. I shall be very happy to see your friends at any time, but I shall like to know when they are coming before they come." "Of course, sir." "I dine out a good deal." "At the club," suggested Lopez. "Well;--at the club or elsewhere. It doesn't matter. There will always be dinner here for you and Emily, just as though I were at home. I say this, so that there need be no questionings or doubts about it hereafter. And don't let there ever be any question of money between us." "Certainly not." "Everett has an allowance, and this will be tantamount to an allowance to Emily. You have also had £3500. I hope it has been well expended;--except the £500 at that election, which has, of course, been thrown away." "The other was brought into the business." "I don't know what the business is. But you and Emily must understand that the money has been given as her fortune." "Oh, quite so;--part of it, you mean." "I mean just what I say." "I call it part of it, because, as you observed just now, our living here will be the same as though you made Emily an allowance." "Ah;--well; you can look at it in that light if you please. John has the key of the cellar. He's a man I can trust. As a rule I have port and sherry at table every day. If you like claret I will get some a little cheaper than what I use when friends are here." "What wine I have is quite indifferent to me." "I like it good, and I have it good. I always breakfast at 9.30. You can have yours earlier if you please. I don't know that there's anything else to be said. I hope we shall get into the way of understanding each other, and being mutually comfortable. Shall we go upstairs to Emily and Mrs. Roby?" And so it was determined that Emily was to come back to her old house about eight months after her marriage. Mr. Wharton himself sat late into the night, all alone, thinking about it. What he had done, he had done in a morose way, and he was aware that it was so. He had not beamed with smiles, and opened his arms lovingly, and, bidding God bless his dearest children, told them that if they would only come and sit round his hearth he should be the happiest old man in London. He had said little or nothing of his own affection even for his daughter, but had spoken of the matter as one of which the pecuniary aspect alone was important. He had found out that the saving so effected would be material to Lopez, and had resolved that there should be no shirking of the truth in what he was prepared to do. He had been almost asked to take the young married couple in, and feed them,--so that they might live free of expense. He was willing to do it,--but was not willing that there should be any soft-worded, high-toned false pretension. He almost read Lopez to the bottom,--not, however, giving the man credit for dishonesty so deep or cleverness so great as he possessed. But as regarded Emily, he was also actuated by a personal desire to have her back again as an element of happiness to himself. He had pined for her since he had been left alone, hardly knowing what it was that he had wanted. And now as he thought of it all, he was angry with himself that he had not been more loving and softer in his manner to her. She at any rate was honest. No doubt of that crossed his mind. And now he had been bitter to her,--bitter in his manner,--simply because he had not wished to appear to have been taken in by her husband. Thinking of all this, he got up, and went to his desk, and wrote her a note, which she would receive on the following morning after her husband had left her. It was very short. DEAREST E. I am so overjoyed that you are coming back to me. A. W. He had judged her quite rightly. The manner in which the thing had been arranged had made her very wretched. There had been no love in it;--nothing apparently but assertions on one side that much was being given, and on the other acknowledgments that much was to be received. She was aware that in this her father had condemned her husband. She also had condemned him;--and felt, alas, that she also had been condemned. But this little letter took away that sting. She could read in her father's note all the action of his mind. He had known that he was bound to acquit her, and he had done so with one of the old long-valued expressions of his love. VOLUME II CHAPTER XLI The Value of a Thick Skin Sir Orlando Drought must have felt bitterly the quiescence with which he sank into obscurity on the second bench on the opposite side of the House. One great occasion he had on which it was his privilege to explain to four or five hundred gentlemen the insuperable reasons which caused him to break away from those right honourable friends to act with whom had been his comfort and his duty, his great joy and his unalloyed satisfaction. Then he occupied the best part of an hour in abusing those friends and all their measures. This no doubt had been a pleasure, as practice had made the manipulation of words easy to him,--and he was able to revel in that absence of responsibility which must be as a fresh perfumed bath to a minister just freed from the trammels of office. But the pleasure was surely followed by much suffering when Mr. Monk,--Mr. Monk who was to assume his place as Leader of the House,--only took five minutes to answer him, saying that he and his colleagues regretted much the loss of the Right Honourable Baronet's services, but that it would hardly be necessary for him to defend the Ministry on all those points on which it had been attacked, as, were he to do so, he would have to repeat the arguments by which every measure brought forward by the present Ministry had been supported. Then Mr. Monk sat down, and the business of the House went on just as if Sir Orlando Drought had not moved his seat at all. "What makes everybody and everything so dead?" said Sir Orlando to his old friend Mr. Boffin as they walked home together from the House that night. They had in former days been staunch friends, sitting night after night close together, united in opposition, and sometimes, for a few halcyon months, in the happier bonds of office. But when Sir Orlando had joined the Coalition, and when the sterner spirit of Mr. Boffin had preferred principles to place,--to use the language in which he was wont to speak to himself and to his wife and family of his own abnegation,--there had come a coolness between them. Mr. Boffin, who was not a rich man, nor by any means indifferent to the comforts of office, had felt keenly the injury done to him when he was left hopelessly in the cold by the desertion of his old friends. It had come to pass that there had been no salt left in the opposition. Mr. Boffin in all his parliamentary experience had known nothing like it. Mr. Boffin had been sure that British honour was going to the dogs and that British greatness was at an end. But the secession of Sir Orlando gave a little fillip to his life. At any rate he could walk home with his old friend and talk of the horrors of the present day. "Well, Drought, if you ask me, you know, I can only speak as I feel. Everything must be dead when men holding different opinions on every subject under the sun come together in order that they may carry on a government as they would a trade business. The work may be done, but it must be done without spirit." "But it may be all important that the work should be done," said the Baronet, apologising for his past misconduct. "No doubt;--and I am very far from judging those who make the attempt. It has been made more than once before, and has, I think, always failed. I don't believe in it myself, and I think that the death-like torpor of which you speak is one of its worst consequences." After that Mr. Boffin admitted Sir Orlando back into his heart of hearts. Then the end of the Session came, very quietly and very early. By the end of July there was nothing left to be done, and the world of London was allowed to go down into the country almost a fortnight before its usual time. With many men, both in and out of Parliament, it became a question whether all this was for good or evil. The Boffinites had of course much to say for themselves. Everything was torpid. There was no interest in the newspapers,--except when Mr. Slide took the tomahawk into his hands. A member of Parliament this Session had not been by half so much bigger than another man as in times of hot political warfare. One of the most moving sources of our national excitement seemed to have vanished from life. We all know what happens to stagnant waters. So said the Boffinites, and so also now said Sir Orlando. But the Government was carried on and the country was prosperous. A few useful measures had been passed by unambitious men, and the Duke of St. Bungay declared that he had never known a Session of Parliament more thoroughly satisfactory to the ministers. But the old Duke in so saying had spoken as it were his public opinion,--giving, truly enough, to a few of his colleagues, such as Lord Drummond, Sir Gregory Grogram and others, the results of his general experience; but in his own bosom and with a private friend he was compelled to confess that there was a cloud in the heavens. The Prime Minister had become so moody, so irritable, and so unhappy, that the old Duke was forced to doubt whether things could go on much longer as they were. He was wont to talk of these things to his friend Lord Cantrip, who was not a member of the Government, but who had been a colleague of both the Dukes, and whom the old Duke regarded with peculiar confidence. "I cannot explain it to you," he said to Lord Cantrip. "There is nothing that ought to give him a moment's uneasiness. Since he took office there hasn't once been a majority against him in either House on any question that the Government has made its own. I don't remember such a state of things,--so easy for the Prime Minister,--since the days of Lord Liverpool. He had one thorn in his side, our friend who was at the Admiralty, and that thorn like other thorns has worked itself out. Yet at this moment it is impossible to get him to consent to the nomination of a successor to Sir Orlando." This was said a week before the Session had closed. "I suppose it is his health," said Lord Cantrip. "He's well enough as far as I can see;--though he will be ill unless he can relieve himself from the strain on his nerves." "Do you mean by resigning?" "Not necessarily. The fault is that he takes things too seriously. If he could be got to believe that he might eat, and sleep, and go to bed, and amuse himself like other men, he might be a very good Prime Minister. He is over troubled by his conscience. I have seen a good many Prime Ministers, Cantrip, and I've taught myself to think that they are not very different from other men. One wants in a Prime Minister a good many things, but not very great things. He should be clever but need not be a genius; he should be conscientious but by no means strait-laced; he should be cautious but never timid, bold but never venturesome; he should have a good digestion, genial manners, and, above all, a thick skin. These are the gifts we want, but we can't always get them, and have to do without them. For my own part, I find that though Smith be a very good Minister, the best perhaps to be had at the time, when he breaks down Jones does nearly as well." "There will be a Jones, then, if your Smith does break down?" "No doubt. England wouldn't come to an end because the Duke of Omnium shut himself up at Matching. But I love the man, and, with some few exceptions, am contented with the party. We can't do better, and it cuts me to the heart when I see him suffering, knowing how much I did myself to make him undertake the work." "Is he going to Gatherum Castle?" "No;--to Matching. There is some discomfort about that." "I suppose," said Lord Cantrip,--speaking almost in a whisper, although they were closeted together,--"I suppose the Duchess is a little troublesome." "She's the dearest woman in the world," said the Duke of St. Bungay. "I love her almost as I do my own daughter. And she is most zealous to serve him." "I fancy she overdoes it." "No doubt." "And that he suffers from perceiving it," said Lord Cantrip. "But a man hasn't a right to suppose that he shall have no annoyances. The best horse in the world has some fault. He pulls, or he shies, or is slow at his fences, or doesn't like heavy ground. He has no right to expect that his wife shall know everything and do everything without a mistake. And then he has such faults of his own! His skin is so thin. Do you remember dear old Brock? By heavens;--there was a covering, a hide impervious to fire or steel! He wouldn't have gone into tantrums because his wife asked too many people to the house. Nevertheless, I won't give up all hope." "A man's skin may be thickened, I suppose." "No doubt;--as a blacksmith's arm." But the Duke of St. Bungay, though he declared that he wouldn't give up hope, was very uneasy on the matter. "Why won't you let me go?" the other Duke had said to him. "What;--because such a man as Sir Orlando Drought throws up his office?" But in truth the Duke of Omnium had not been instigated to ask the question by the resignation of Sir Orlando. At that very moment the "People's Banner" had been put out of sight at the bottom of a heap of other newspapers behind the Prime Minister's chair, and his present misery had been produced by Mr. Quintus Slide. To have a festering wound and to be able to show the wound to no surgeon, is wretchedness indeed! "It's not Sir Orlando, but a sense of general failure," said the Prime Minister. Then his old friend had made use of that argument of the ever-recurring majorities to prove that there had been no failure. "There seems to have come a lethargy upon the country," said the poor victim. Then the Duke of St. Bungay knew that his friend had read that pernicious article in the "People's Banner," for the Duke had also read it and remembered that phrase of a "lethargy on the country," and understood at once how the poison had rankled. It was a week before he would consent to ask any man to fill the vacancy made by Sir Orlando. He would not allow suggestions to be made to him and yet would name no one himself. The old Duke, indeed, did make a suggestion, and anything coming from him was of course borne with patience. Barrington Erle, he thought, would do for the Admiralty. But the Prime Minister shook his head. "In the first place he would refuse, and that would be a great blow to me." "I could sound him," said the old Duke. But the Prime Minister again shook his head and turned the subject. With all his timidity he was becoming autocratic and peevishly imperious. Then he went to Lord Cantrip, and when Lord Cantrip, with all the kindness which he could throw into his words, stated the reasons which induced him at present to decline office, he was again in despair. At last he asked Phineas Finn to move to the Admiralty, and, when our old friend somewhat reluctantly obeyed, of course he had the same difficulty in filling the office Finn had held. Other changes and other complications became necessary, and Mr. Quintus Slide, who hated Phineas Finn even worse than the poor Duke, found ample scope for his patriotic indignation. This all took place in the closing week of the Session, filling our poor Prime Minister with trouble and dismay, just when other people were complaining that there was nothing to think of and nothing to do. Men do not really like leaving London before the grouse calls them,--the grouse, or rather the fashion of the grouse. And some ladies were very angry at being separated so soon from their swains in the city. The tradesmen too were displeased,--so that there were voices to re-echo the abuse of the "People's Banner." The Duchess had done her best to prolong the Session by another week, telling her husband of the evil consequences above suggested, but he had thrown wide his arms and asked her with affected dismay whether he was to keep Parliament sitting in order that more ribbons might be sold! "There is nothing to be done," said the Duke almost angrily. "Then you should make something to be done," said the Duchess, mimicking him. CHAPTER XLII Retribution The Duchess had been at work with her husband for the last two months in the hope of renewing her autumnal festivities, but had been lamentably unsuccessful. The Duke had declared that there should be no more rural crowds, no repetition of what he called London turned loose on his own grounds. He could not forget the necessity which had been imposed upon him of turning Major Pountney out of his house, or the change that had been made in his gardens, or his wife's attempt to conquer him at Silverbridge. "Do you mean," she said, "that we are to have nobody?" He replied that he thought it would be best to go to Matching. "And live a Darby and Joan life?" said the Duchess. "I said nothing of Darby and Joan. Whatever may be my feelings I hardly think that you are fitted for that kind of thing. Matching is not so big as Gatherum, but it is not a cottage. Of course you can ask your own friends." "I don't know what you mean by my own friends. I endeavour always to ask yours." "I don't know that Major Pountney, and Captain Gunner, and Mr. Lopez were ever among the number of my friends." "I suppose you mean Lady Rosina?" said the Duchess. "I shall be happy to have her at Matching if you wish it." "I should like to see Lady Rosina De Courcy at Matching very much." "And is there to be nobody else? I'm afraid I should find it rather dull while you two were opening your hearts to each other." Here he looked at her angrily. "Can you think of anybody besides Lady Rosina?" "I suppose you will wish to have Mrs. Finn?" "What an arrangement! Lady Rosina for you to flirt with, and Mrs. Finn for me to grumble to." "That is an odious word," said the Prime Minister. "What;--flirting? I don't see anything bad about the word. The thing is dangerous. But you are quite at liberty if you don't go beyond Lady Rosina. I should like to know whether you would wish anybody else to come?" Of course he made no becoming answer to this question, and of course no becoming answer was expected. He knew that she was trying to provoke him because he would not let her do this year as she had done last. The house, he had no doubt, would be full to overflowing when he got there. He could not help that. But as compared with Gatherum Castle the house at Matching was small, and his domestic authority sufficed at any rate for shutting up Gatherum for the time. I do not know whether at times her sufferings were not as acute as his own. He, at any rate, was Prime Minister, and it seemed to her that she was to be reduced to nothing. At the beginning of it all he had, with unwonted tenderness, asked her for her sympathy in his undertaking, and, according to her powers, she had given it to him with her whole heart. She had thought that she had seen a way by which she might assist him in his great employment, and she had worked at it like a slave. Every day she told herself that she did not, herself, love the Captain Gunners and Major Pountneys, nor the Sir Orlandos, nor, indeed, the Lady Rosinas. She had not followed the bent of her own inclination when she had descended to sheets and towels, and busied herself to establish an archery-ground. She had not shot an arrow during the whole season, nor had she cared who had won and who had lost. It had not been for her own personal delight that she had kept open house for forty persons throughout four months of the year, in doing which he had never taken an ounce of the labour off her shoulders by any single word or deed! It had all been done for his sake,--that his reign might be long and triumphant, that the world might say that his hospitality was noble and full, that his name might be in men's mouths, and that he might prosper as a British Minister. Such, at least, were the assertions which she made to herself, when she thought of her own grievances and her own troubles. And now she was angry with her husband. It was very well for him to ask for her sympathy, but he had none to give her in return! He could not pity her failures,--even though he had himself caused them! If he had a grain of intelligence about him he must, she thought, understand well enough how sore it must be for her to descend from her princely entertainments to solitude at Matching, and thus to own before all the world that she was beaten. Then when she asked him for advice, when she was really anxious to know how far she might go in filling her house without offending him, he told her to ask Lady Rosina De Courcy! If he chose to be ridiculous he might. She would ask Lady Rosina De Courcy. In her active anger she did write to Lady Rosina De Courcy a formal letter, in which she said that the Duke hoped to have the pleasure of her ladyship's company at Matching Park on the 1st of August. It was an absurd letter, somewhat long, written very much in the Duke's name, with overwhelming expressions of affection, instigated in the writer's mind partly by the fun of the supposition that such a man as her husband should flirt with such a woman as Lady Rosina. There was something too of anger in what she wrote, some touch of revenge. She sent off this invitation, and she sent no other. Lady Rosina took it all in good part, and replied saying that she should have the greatest pleasure in going to Matching. She had declared to herself that she would ask none but those he had named, and in accordance with her resolution she sent out no other written invitations. He had also told her to ask Mrs. Finn. Now this had become almost a matter of course. There had grown up from accidental circumstances so strong a bond between these two women, that it was taken for granted by both their husbands that they should be nearly always within reach of one another. And the two husbands were also on kindly, if not affectionate, terms with each other. The nature of the Duke's character was such that, with a most loving heart, he was hardly capable of that opening out of himself to another which is necessary for positive friendship. There was a stiff reserve about him, of which he was himself only too conscious, which almost prohibited friendship. But he liked Mr. Finn both as a man and a member of his party, and was always satisfied to have him as a guest. The Duchess, therefore, had taken it for granted that Mrs. Finn would come to her,--and that Mr. Finn would come also during any time that he might be able to escape from Ireland. But, when the invitation was verbally conveyed, Mr. Finn had gone to the Admiralty, and had already made his arrangements for going to sea, as a gallant sailor should. "We are going away in the 'Black Watch' for a couple of months," said Mrs. Finn. Now the "Black Watch" was the Admiralty yacht. "Heavens and earth!" ejaculated the Duchess. "It is always done. The First Lord would have his epaulets stripped if he didn't go to sea in August." "And must you go with him?" "I have promised." "I think it very unkind,--very hard upon me. Of course you knew that I should want you." "But if my husband wants me too?" "Bother your husband! I wish with all my heart I had never helped to make up the match." "It would have been made up just the same, Lady Glen." "You know that I cannot get on without you. And he ought to know it too. There isn't another person in the world that I can really say a thing to." "Why don't you have Mrs. Grey?" "She's going to Persia after her husband. And then she is not wicked enough. She always lectured me, and she does it still. What do you think is going to happen?" "Nothing terrible, I hope," said Mrs. Finn, mindful of her husband's new honours at the Admiralty, and hoping that the Duke might not have repeated his threat of resigning. "We are going to Matching." "So I supposed." "And whom do you think we are going to have?" "Not Major Pountney?" "No;--not at my asking." "Nor Mr. Lopez?" "Nor yet Mr. Lopez. Guess again." "I suppose there will be a dozen to guess." "No," shrieked the Duchess. "There will only be one. I have asked one,--at his special desire,--and as you won't come I shall ask nobody else. When I pressed him to name a second he named you. I'll obey him to the letter. Now, my dear, who do you think is the chosen one,--the one person who is to solace the perturbed spirit of the Prime Minister for the three months of the autumn?" "Mr. Warburton, I should say." "Oh, Mr. Warburton! No doubt Mr. Warburton will come as a part of his luggage, and possibly half-a-dozen Treasury clerks. He declares, however, that there is nothing to do, and therefore Mr. Warburton's strength may alone suffice to help him to do it. There is to be one unnecessary guest,--unnecessary, that is, for official purpose; though,--oh,--so much needed for his social happiness. Guess once more." "Knowing the spirit of mischief that is in you,--perhaps it is Lady Rosina." "Of course it is Lady Rosina," said the Duchess, clapping her hands together. "And I should like to know what you mean by a spirit of mischief! I asked him, and he himself said that he particularly wished to have Lady Rosina at Matching. Now, I'm not a jealous woman,--am I?" "Not of Lady Rosina." "I don't think they'll do any harm together, but it is particular, you know. However, she is to come. And nobody else is to come. I did count upon you." Then Mrs. Finn counselled her very seriously as to the bad taste of such a joke, explaining to her that the Duke had certainly not intended that her invitations should be confined to Lady Rosina. But it was not all joke with the Duchess. She had been driven almost to despair, and was very angry with her husband. He had brought the thing upon himself, and must now make the best of it. She would ask nobody else. She declared that there was nobody whom she could ask with propriety. She was tired of asking. Let her ask whom she would, he was dissatisfied. The only two people he cared to see were Lady Rosina and the old Duke. She had asked Lady Rosina for his sake. Let him ask his old friend himself if he pleased. The Duke and Duchess with all the family went down together, and Mr. Warburton went with them. The Duchess had said not a word more to her husband about his guests, nor had he alluded to the subject. But each was labouring under a conviction that the other was misbehaving, and with that feeling it was impossible that there should be confidence between them. He busied himself with books and papers,--always turning over those piles of newspapers to see what evil was said of himself,--and speaking only now and again to his private Secretary. She engaged herself with the children or pretended to read a novel. Her heart was sore within her. She had wished to punish him, but in truth she was punishing herself. On the day of their arrival, the father and mother, with Lord Silverbridge, the eldest son, who was home from Eton, and the private Secretary dined together. As the Duke sat at table, he began to think how long it was since such a state of things had happened to him before, and his heart softened towards her. Instead of being made angry by the strangeness of her proceeding, he took delight in it, and in the course of the evening spoke a word to signify his satisfaction. "I'm afraid it won't last long," she said, "for Lady Rosina comes to-morrow." "Oh, indeed." "You bid me ask her yourself." Then he perceived it all;--how she had taken advantage of his former answer to her and had acted upon it in a spirit of contradictory petulance. But he resolved that he would forgive it and endeavour to bring her back to him. "I thought we were both joking," he said good-humouredly. "Oh, no! I never suspected you of a joke. At any rate she is coming." "She will do neither of us any harm. And Mrs. Finn?" "You have sent her to sea." "She may be at sea,--and he too; but it is without my sending. The First Lord, I believe, usually does go a cruise. Is there nobody else?" "Nobody else,--unless you have asked any one." "Not a creature. Well;--so much the better. I dare say Lady Rosina will get on very well." "You will have to talk to her," said the Duchess. "I will do my best," said the Duke. Lady Rosina came and no doubt did think it odd. But she did not say so, and it really did seem to the Duchess as though all her vengeance had been blown away by the winds. And she too laughed at the matter--to herself, and began to feel less cross and less perverse. The world did not come to an end because she and her husband with Lady Rosina and her boy and the private Secretary sat down to dinner every day together. The parish clergyman with the neighbouring squire and his wife and daughter did come one day,--to the relief of M. Millepois, who had begun to feel that the world had collapsed. And every day at a certain hour the Duke and Lady Rosina walked together for an hour and a half in the park. The Duchess would have enjoyed it, instead of suffering, could she only have had her friend, Mrs. Finn, to hear her jokes. "Now, Plantagenet," she said, "do tell me one thing. What does she talk about?" "The troubles of her family generally, I think." "That can't last for ever." "She wears cork soles to her boots and she thinks a good deal about them." "And you listen to her?" "Why not? I can talk about cork soles as well as anything else. Anything that may do material good to the world at large, or even to yourself privately, is a fit subject for conversation to rational people." "I suppose I never was one of them." "But I can talk upon anything," continued the Duke, "as long as the talker talks in good faith and does not say things that should not be said, or deal with matters that are offensive. I could talk for an hour about bankers' accounts, but I should not expect a stranger to ask me the state of my own. She has almost persuaded me to send to Mr. Sprout of Silverbridge and get some cork soles myself." "Don't do anything of the kind," said the Duchess with animation;--as though she had secret knowledge that cork soles were specially fatal to the family of the Pallisers. "Why not, my dear?" "He was the man who especially, above all others, threw me over at Silverbridge." Then again there came upon his brow that angry frown which during the last few days had been dissipated by the innocence of Lady Rosina's conversation. "Of course I don't mean to ask you to take any interest in the borough again. You have said that you wouldn't, and you are always as good as your word." "I hope so." "But I certainly would not employ a tradesman just at your elbow who has directly opposed what was generally understood in the town to be your interests." "What did Mr. Sprout do? This is the first I have heard of it." "He got Mr. Du Boung to stand against Mr. Lopez." "I am very glad for the sake of the borough that Mr. Lopez did not get in." "So am I. But that is nothing to do with it. Mr. Sprout knew at any rate what my wishes were, and went directly against them." "You were not entitled to have wishes in the matter, Glencora." "That's all very well;--but I had, and he knew it. As for the future, of course, the thing is over. But you have done everything for the borough." "You mean that the borough has done much for me." "I know what I mean very well;--and I shall take it very ill if a shilling out of the Castle ever goes into Mr. Sprout's pocket again." It is needless to trouble the reader at length with the sermon which he preached her on the occasion,--showing the utter corruption which must come from the mixing up of politics with trade, or with the scorn which she threw into the few words with which she interrupted him from time to time. "Whether a man makes good shoes, and at a reasonable price, and charges for them honestly,--that is what you have to consider," said the Duke impressively. "I'd rather pay double for bad shoes to a man who did not thwart me." "You should not condescend to be thwarted in such a matter. You lower yourself by admitting such a feeling." And yet he writhed himself under the lashes of Mr. Slide! "I know an enemy when I see him," said the Duchess, "and as long as I live I'll treat an enemy as an enemy." There was ever so much of it, in the course of which the Duke declared his purpose of sending at once to Mr. Sprout for ever so many cork soles, and the Duchess,--most imprudently,--declared her purpose of ruining Mr. Sprout. There was something in this threat which grated terribly against the Duke's sense of honour;--that his wife should threaten to ruin a poor tradesman, that she should do so in reference to the political affairs of the borough which he all but owned,--that she should do so in declared opposition to him! Of course he ought to have known that her sin consisted simply in her determination to vex him at the moment. A more good-natured woman did not live;--or one less prone to ruin any one. But any reference to the Silverbridge election brought back upon him the remembrance of the cruel attacks which had been made upon him, and rendered him for the time moody, morose, and wretched. So they again parted ill friends, and hardly spoke when they met at dinner. The next morning there reached Matching a letter which greatly added to his bitterness of spirit against the world in general and against her in particular. The letter, though marked "private," had been opened, as were all his letters, by Mr. Warburton, but the private Secretary thought it necessary to show the letter to the Prime Minister. He, when he had read it, told Warburton that it did not signify, and maintained for half-an-hour an attitude of quiescence. Then he walked forth, having the letter hidden in his hand, and finding his wife alone, gave it her to read. "See what you have brought upon me," he said, "by your interference and disobedience." The letter was as follows:-- Manchester Square, August 3, 187--. MY LORD DUKE, I consider myself entitled to complain to your Grace of the conduct with which I was treated at the last election at Silverbridge, whereby I was led into very heavy expenditure without the least chance of being returned for the borough. I am aware that I had no direct conversation with your Grace on the subject, and that your Grace can plead that, as between man and man, I had no authority from yourself for supposing that I should receive your Grace's support. But I was distinctly asked by the Duchess to stand, and was assured by her that if I did so I should have all the assistance that your Grace's influence could procure for me;--and it was also explained to me that your Grace's official position made it inexpedient that your Grace on this special occasion should have any personal conference with your own candidate. Under these circumstances I submit to your Grace that I am entitled to complain of the hardship I have suffered. I had not been long in the borough before I found that my position was hopeless. Influential men in the town who had been represented to me as being altogether devoted to your Grace's interests started a third candidate,--a Liberal as myself,--and the natural consequence was that neither of us succeeded, though my return as your Grace's candidate would have been certain had not this been done. That all this was preconcerted there can be no doubt, but, before the mine was sprung on me,--immediately, indeed, on my arrival, if I remember rightly,--an application was made to me for £500, so that the money might be exacted before the truth was known to me. Of course I should not have paid the £500 had I known that your Grace's usual agents in the town,--I may name Mr. Sprout especially,--were prepared to act against me. But I did pay the money, and I think your Grace will agree with me that a very opprobrious term might be applied without injustice to the transaction. My Lord Duke, I am a poor man;--ambitious I will own, whether that be a sin or a virtue,--and willing, perhaps, to incur expenditure which can hardly be justified in pursuit of certain public objects. But I must say, with the most lively respect for your Grace personally, that I do not feel inclined to sit down tamely under such a loss as this. I should not have dreamed of interfering in the election at Silverbridge had not the Duchess exhorted me to do so. I would not even have run the risk of a doubtful contest. But I came forward at the suggestion of the Duchess, backed by her personal assurance that the seat was certain as being in your Grace's hands. It was no doubt understood that your Grace would not yourself interfere, but it was equally well understood that your Grace's influence was for the time deputed to the Duchess. The Duchess herself will, I am sure, confirm my statement that I had her direct authority for regarding myself as your Grace's candidate. I can of course bring an action against Mr. Wise, the gentleman to whom I paid the money, but I feel that as a gentleman I should not do so without reference to your Grace, as circumstances might possibly be brought out in evidence,--I will not say prejudicial to your Grace,--but which would be unbecoming. I cannot, however, think that your Grace will be willing that a poor man like myself, in his search for an entrance into public life, should be mulcted to so heavy an extent in consequence of an error on the part of the Duchess. Should your Grace be able to assist me in my view of getting into Parliament for any other seat I shall be willing to abide the loss I have incurred. I hardly, however, dare to hope for such assistance. In this case I think your Grace ought to see that I am reimbursed. I have the honour to be, My Lord Duke, Your Grace's very faithful Servant, FERDINAND LOPEZ. The Duke stood over her in her own room upstairs, with his back to the fireplace and his eyes fixed upon her while she was reading this letter. He gave her ample time, and she did not read it very quickly. Much of it indeed she perused twice, turning very red in the face as she did so. She was thus studious partly because the letter astounded even her, and partly because she wanted time to consider how she would meet his wrath. "Well," said he, "what do you say to that?" "The man is a blackguard,--of course." "He is so;--though I do not know that I wish to hear him called such a name by your lips. Let him be what he may he was your friend." "He was my acquaintance." "He was the man whom you selected to be your candidate for the borough in opposition to my wishes, and whom you continued to support in direct disobedience to my orders." "Surely, Plantagenet, we have had all that about disobedience out before." "You cannot have such things 'out,'--as you call it. Evil-doing will not bury itself out of the way and be done with. Do you feel no shame at having your name mentioned a score of times with reprobation as that man mentions it;--at being written about by such a man as that?" "Do you want to make me roll in the gutter because I mistook him for a gentleman?" "That was not all,--nor half. In your eagerness to serve such a miserable creature as this you forgot my entreaties, my commands, my position! I explained to you why I, of all men, and you, of all women, as a part of me, should not do this thing; and yet you did it, mistaking such a cur as that for a man! What am I to do? How am I to free myself from the impediments which you make for me? My enemies I can overcome,--but I cannot escape the pitfalls which are made for me by my own wife. I can only retire into private life and hope to console myself with my children and my books." There was a reality of tragedy about him which for the moment overcame her. She had no joke ready, no sarcasm, no feminine counter-grumble. Little as she agreed with him when he spoke of the necessity of retiring into private life because a man had written to him such a letter as this, incapable as she was of understanding fully the nature of the irritation which tormented him, still she knew that he was suffering, and acknowledged to herself that she had been the cause of the agony. "I am sorry," she ejaculated at last. "What more can I say?" "What am I to do? What can be said to the man? Warburton read the letter, and gave it me in silence. He could see the terrible difficulty." "Tear it in pieces, and then let there be an end of it." "I do not feel sure but that he has right on his side. He is, as you say, certainly a blackguard, or he would not make such a claim. He is taking advantage of the mistake made by a good-natured woman through her folly and her vanity;"--as he said this the Duchess gave an absurd little pout, but luckily he did not see it,--"and he knows very well that he is doing so. But still he has a show of justice on his side. There was, I suppose, no chance for him at Silverbridge after I had made myself fully understood. The money was absolutely wasted. It was your persuasion and then your continued encouragement that led him on to spend the money." "Pay it then. The loss will not hurt you." "Ah;--if we could but get out of our difficulties by paying! Suppose that I do pay it. I begin to think that I must pay it;--that after all I cannot allow such a plea to remain unanswered. But when it is paid;--what then? Do you think such a payment made by the Queen's Minister will not be known to all the newspapers, and that I shall escape the charge of having bribed the man to hold his tongue?" "It will be no bribe if you pay him because you think you ought." "But how shall I excuse it? There are things done which are holy as the heavens,--which are clear before God as the light of the sun, which leave no stain on the conscience, and which yet the malignity of man can invest with the very blackness of hell! I shall know why I pay this £500. Because she who of all the world is the nearest and the dearest to me,"--she looked up into his face with amazement, as he stood stretching out both his arms in his energy,--"has in her impetuous folly committed a grievous blunder, from which she would not allow her husband to save her, this sum must be paid to the wretched craven. But I cannot tell the world that. I cannot say abroad that this small sacrifice of money was the justest means of retrieving the injury which you had done." "Say it abroad. Say it everywhere." "No, Glencora." "Do you think that I would have you spare me if it was my fault? And how would it hurt me? Will it be new to any one that I have done a foolish thing? Will the newspapers disturb my peace? I sometimes think, Plantagenet, that I should have been the man, my skin is so thick; and that you should have been the woman, yours is so tender." "But it is not so." "Take the advantage, nevertheless, of my toughness. Send him the £500 without a word,--or make Warburton do so, or Mr. Moreton. Make no secret of it. Then if the papers talk about it--" "A question might be asked about it in the House." "Or if questioned in any way,--say that I did it. Tell the exact truth. You are always saying that nothing but truth ever serves. Let the truth serve now. I shall not blench. Your saying it all in the House of Lords won't wound me half so much as your looking at me as you did just now." "Did I wound you? God knows I would not hurt you willingly." "Never mind. Go on. I know you think that I have brought it all on myself by my own wickedness. Pay this man the money, and then if anything be said about it, explain that it was my fault, and say that you paid the money because I had done wrong." When he came in she had been seated on a sofa, which she constantly used herself, and he had stood over her, masterful, imperious, and almost tyrannical. She had felt his tyranny, but had resented it less than usual,--or rather had been less determined in holding her own against him and asserting herself as his equal,--because she confessed to herself that she had injured him. She had, she thought, done but little, but that which she had done had produced this injury. So she had sat and endured the oppression of his standing posture. But now he sat down by her, very close to her, and put his hand upon her shoulder,--almost round her waist. "Cora," he said, "you do not quite understand it." "I never understand anything, I think," she answered. "Not in this case,--perhaps never,--what it is that a husband feels about his wife. Do you think that I could say a word against you, even to a friend?" "Why not?" "I never did. I never could. If my anger were at the hottest I would not confess to a human being that you were not perfect,--except to yourself." "Oh, thank you! If you were to scold me vicariously I should feel it less." "Do not joke with me now, for I am so much in earnest! And if I could not consent that your conduct should be called in question even by a friend, do you suppose it possible that I could contrive an escape from public censure by laying the blame publicly on you?" "Stick to the truth;--that's what you always say." "I certainly shall stick to the truth. A man and his wife are one. For what she does he is responsible." "They couldn't hang you, you know, because I committed a murder." "I should be willing that they should do so. No;--if I pay this money I shall take the consequences. I shall not do it in any way under the rose. But I wish you would remember--" "Remember what? I know I shall never forget all this trouble about that dirty little town, which I never will enter again as long as I live." "I wish you would think that in all that you do you are dealing with my feelings, with my heartstrings, with my reputation. You cannot divide yourself from me; nor, for the value of it all, would I wish that such division were possible. You say that I am thin-skinned." "Certainly you are. What people call a delicate organisation,--whereas I am rough and thick and monstrously commonplace." "Then should you too be thin-skinned for my sake." "I wish I could make you thick-skinned for your own. It's the only way to be decently comfortable in such a coarse, rough-and-tumble world as this is." "Let us both do our best," he said, now putting his arm round her and kissing her. "I think I shall send the man his money at once. It is the least of two evils. And now let there never be a word more about it between us." Then he left her and went back,--not to the study in which he was wont, when at Matching, to work with his private Secretary,--but to a small inner closet of his own, in which many a bitter moment was spent while he thought over that abortive system of decimal coinage by which he had once hoped to make himself one of the great benefactors of his nation, revolving in his mind the troubles which his wife brought upon him, and regretting the golden inanity of the coronet which in the very prime of life had expelled him from the House of Commons. Here he seated himself, and for an hour neither stirred from his seat, nor touched a pen, nor opened a book. He was trying to calculate in his mind what might be the consequences of paying the money to Mr. Lopez. But when the calculation slipped from him,--as it did,--then he demanded of himself whether strict high-minded justice did not call upon him to pay the money let the consequences be what they might. And here his mind was truer to him, and he was able to fix himself to a purpose,--though the resolution to which he came was not, perhaps, wise. When the hour was over he went to his desk, drew a cheque for £500 in favour of Ferdinand Lopez, and then caused his Secretary to send it in the following note:-- Matching, August 4, 187--. SIR,-- The Duke of Omnium has read the letter you have addressed to him, dated the 3rd instant. The Duke of Omnium, feeling that you may have been induced to undertake the late contest at Silverbridge by misrepresentations made to you at Gatherum Castle, directs me to enclose a cheque for £500, that being the sum stated by you to have been expended in carrying on the contest at Silverbridge. I am, sir, Your obedient servant, ARTHUR WARBURTON. Ferdinand Lopez, Esq. CHAPTER XLIII Kauri Gum The reader will no doubt think that Ferdinand Lopez must have been very hardly driven indeed by circumstances before he would have made such an appeal to the Duke as that given in the last chapter. But it was not want of money only that had brought it about. It may be remembered that the £500 had already been once repaid him by his father-in-law,--that special sum having been given to him for that special purpose. And Lopez, when he wrote to the Duke, assured himself that if, by any miracle, his letter should produce pecuniary results in the shape of a payment from the Duke, he would refund the money so obtained to Mr. Wharton. But when he wrote the letter he did not expect to get money,--nor, indeed, did he expect that aid towards another seat, to which he alluded at the close of his letter. He expected probably nothing but to vex the Duke, and to drive the Duke into a correspondence with him. Though this man had lived nearly all his life in England, he had not quite acquired that knowledge of the way in which things are done which is so general among men of a certain class, and so rare among those beneath them. He had not understood that the Duchess's promise of her assistance at Silverbridge might be taken by him for what it was worth, and that her aid might be used as far as it went,--but, that in the event of its failing him, he was bound in honour to take the result without complaining, whatever that result might be. He felt that a grievous injury had been done him, and that it behoved him to resent that injury,--even though it were against a woman. He just knew that he could not very well write to the Duchess herself,--though there was sometimes present to his mind a plan for attacking her in public, and telling her what evil she had done him. He had half resolved that he would do so in her own garden at the Horns;--but on that occasion the apparition of Arthur Fletcher had disturbed him, and he had vented his anger in another direction. But still his wrath against the Duke and Duchess remained, and he was wont to indulge it with very violent language as he sat upon one of the chairs in Sexty Parker's office, talking somewhat loudly of his own position, of the things that he would do, and of the injury done him. Sexty Parker sympathised with him to the full,--especially as that first £500, which he had received from Mr. Wharton, had gone into Sexty's coffers. At that time Lopez and Sexty were together committed to large speculations in the guano trade, and Sexty's mind was by no means easy in the early periods of the day. As he went into town by his train, he would think of his wife and family and of the terrible things that might happen to them. But yet, up to this period, money had always been forthcoming from Lopez when absolutely wanted, and Sexty was quite alive to the fact that he was living with a freedom of expenditure in his own household that he had never known before, and that without apparent damage. Whenever, therefore, at some critical moment, a much-needed sum of money was produced, Sexty would become light-hearted, triumphant, and very sympathetic. "Well;--I never heard such a story," he had said when Lopez was insisting on his wrongs. "That's what the Dukes and Duchesses call honour among thieves! Well, Ferdy, my boy, if you stand that you'll stand anything." In these latter days Sexty had become very intimate indeed with his partner. "I don't mean to stand it," Lopez had replied, and then on the spot had written the letter which he had dated from Manchester Square. He had certainly contrived to make that letter as oppressive as possible. He had been clever enough to put into it words which were sure to wound the poor Duke and to confound the Duchess. And having written it he was very careful to keep the first draft, so that if occasion came he might use it again and push his vengeance farther. But he certainly had not expected such a result as it produced. When he received the private Secretary's letter with the money he was sitting opposite to his father-in-law at breakfast, while his wife was making the tea. Not many of his letters came to Manchester Square. Sexty Parker's office or his club were more convenient addresses; but in this case he had thought that Manchester Square would have a better sound and appearance. When he opened the letter the cheque of course appeared bearing the Duke's own signature. He had seen that and the amount before he had read the letter, and as he saw it his eye travelled quickly across the table to his father-in-law's face. Mr. Wharton might certainly have seen the cheque and even the amount, probably also the signature, without the slightest suspicion as to the nature of the payment made. As it was, he was eating his toast, and had thought nothing about the letter. Lopez, having concealed the cheque, read the few words which the private Secretary had written, and then put the document with its contents into his pocket. "So you think, sir, of going down to Herefordshire on the 15th," he said in a very cheery voice. The cheery voice was still pleasant to the old man, but the young wife had already come to distrust it. She had learned, though she was hardly conscious how the lesson had come to her, that a certain tone of cheeriness indicated, if not deceit, at any rate the concealment of something. It grated against her spirit; and when this tone reached her ears a frown or look of sorrow would cross her brow. And her husband also had perceived that it was so, and knew at such times that he was rebuked. He was hardly aware what doings, and especially what feelings, were imputed to him as faults,--not understanding the lines which separated right from wrong; but he knew that he was often condemned by his wife, and he lived in fear that he should also be condemned by his wife's father. Had it been his wife only, he thought that he could soon have quenched her condemnation. He would soon have made her tired of showing her disapproval. But he had put himself into the old man's house, where the old man could see not only him but his treatment of his wife, and the old man's good-will and good opinion were essential to him. Yet he could not restrain one glance of anger at her when he saw that look upon her face. "I suppose I shall," said the barrister. "I must go somewhere. My going need not disturb you." "I think we have made up our mind," said Lopez, "to take a cottage at Dovercourt. It is not a very lively place, nor yet fashionable. But it is very healthy, and I can run up to town easily. Unfortunately my business won't let me be altogether away this autumn." "I wish my business would keep me," said the barrister. "I did not understand that you had made up your mind to go to Dovercourt," said Emily. He had spoken to Mr. Wharton of their joint action in the matter, and as the place had only once been named by him to her, she resented what seemed to be a falsehood. She knew that she was to be taken or left as it suited him. If he had said boldly,--"We'll go to Dovercourt. That's what I've settled on. That's what will suit me," she would have been contented. She quite understood that he meant to have his own way in such things. But it seemed to her that he wanted to be a tyrant without having the courage necessary for tyranny. "I thought you seemed to like it," he said. "I don't dislike it at all." "Then, as it suits my business, we might as well consider it settled." So saying, he left the room and went off to the city. The old man was still sipping his tea and lingering over his breakfast in a way that was not usual with him. He was generally anxious to get away to Lincoln's Inn, and on most mornings had left the house before his son-in-law. Emily of course remained with him, sitting silent in her place opposite to the teapot, meditating perhaps on her prospects of happiness at Dovercourt,--a place of which she had never heard even the name two days ago, and in which it was hardly possible that she should find even an acquaintance. In former years these autumn months, passed in Herefordshire, had been the delight of her life. Mr. Wharton also had seen the cloud on his daughter's face, and had understood the nature of the little dialogue about Dovercourt. And he was aware,--had been aware since they had both come into his house,--that the young wife's manner and tone to her husband was not that of perfect conjugal sympathy. He had already said to himself more than once that she had made her bed for herself, and must lie upon it. She was the man's wife, and must take her husband as he was. If she suffered under this man's mode and manner of life, he, as her father, could not assist her,--could do nothing for her, unless the man should become absolutely cruel. He had settled that within his own mind already; but yet his heart yearned towards her, and when he thought that she was unhappy he longed to comfort her and tell her that she still had a father. But the time had not come as yet in which he could comfort her by sympathising with her against her husband. There had never fallen from her lips a syllable of complaint. When she had spoken to him a chance word respecting her husband, it had always carried with it some tone of affection. But still he longed to say to her something which might tell her that his heart was soft towards her. "Do you like the idea of going to this place?" he said. "I don't at all know what it will be like. Ferdinand says it will be cheap." "Is that of such vital consequence?" "Ah;--yes; I fear it is." This was very sad to him. Lopez had already had from him a considerable sum of money, having not yet been married twelve months, and was now living in London almost free of expense. Before his marriage he had always spoken of himself, and had contrived to be spoken of, as a wealthy man, and now he was obliged to choose some small English seaside place to which to retreat, because thus he might live at a low rate! Had they married as poor people there would have been nothing to regret in this;--there would be nothing that might not be done with entire satisfaction. But, as it was, it told a bad tale for the future! "Do you understand his money matters, Emily?" "Not at all, papa." "I do not in the least mean to make inquiry. Perhaps I should have asked before;--but if I did make inquiry now it would be of him. But I think a wife should know." "I know nothing." "What is his business?" "I have no idea. I used to think he was connected with Mr. Mills Happerton and with Messrs. Hunky and Sons." "Is he not connected with Hunky's house?" "I think not. He has a partner of the name of Parker, who is,--who is not, I think, quite--quite a gentleman. I never saw him." "What does he do with Mr. Parker?" "I believe they buy guano." "Ah;--that, I fancy, was only one affair." "I'm afraid he lost money, papa, by that election at Silverbridge." "I paid that," said Mr. Wharton sternly. Surely he should have told his wife that he had received that money from her family! "Did you? That was very kind. I am afraid, papa, we are a great burden on you." "I should not mind it, my dear, if there were confidence and happiness. What matter would it be to me whether you had your money now or hereafter, so that you might have it in the manner that would be most beneficial to you? I wish he would be open with me, and tell me everything." "Shall I let him know that you say so?" He thought for a minute or two before he answered her. Perhaps the man would be more impressed if the message came to him through his wife. "If you think that he will not be annoyed with you, you may do so." "I don't know why he should,--but if it be right, that must be borne. I am not afraid to say anything to him." "Then tell him so. Tell him that it will be better that he should let me know the whole condition of his affairs. God bless you, dear." Then he stooped over her, and kissed her, and went his way to Stone Buildings. It was not as he sat at the breakfast table that Ferdinand Lopez made up his mind to pocket the Duke's money and to say nothing about it to Mr. Wharton. He had been careful to conceal the cheque, but he had done so with the feeling that the matter was one to be considered in his own mind before he took any step. As he left the house, already considering it, he was inclined to think that the money must be surrendered. Mr. Wharton had very generously paid his electioneering expenses, but had not done so simply with the view of making him a present of money. He wished the Duke had not taken him at his word. In handing this cheque over to Mr. Wharton he would be forced to tell the story of his letter to the Duke, and he was sure that Mr. Wharton would not approve of his having written such a letter. How could any one approve of his having applied for a sum of money which had already been paid to him? How could such a one as Mr. Wharton,--an old-fashioned English gentleman,--approve of such an application being made under any circumstances? Mr. Wharton would very probably insist on having the cheque sent back to the Duke,--which would be a sorry end to the triumph as at present achieved. And the more he thought of it the more sure he was that it would be imprudent to mention to Mr. Wharton his application to the Duke. The old men of the present day were, he said to himself, such fools that they understood nothing. And then the money was very convenient to him. He was intent on obtaining Sexty Parker's consent to a large speculation, and knew that he could not do so without a show of funds. By the time, therefore, that he had reached the city he had resolved that at any rate for the present he would use the money and say nothing about it to Mr. Wharton. Was it not spoil got from the enemy by his own courage and cleverness? When he was writing his acknowledgement for the money to Warburton he had taught himself to look upon the sum extracted from the Duke as a matter quite distinct from the payment made to him by his father-in-law. It was evident on that day to Sexty Parker that his partner was a man of great resources. Though things sometimes looked very bad, yet money always "turned up." Some of their buyings and sellings had answered pretty well. Some had been great failures. No great stroke had been made as yet, but then the great stroke was always being expected. Sexty's fears were greatly exaggerated by the feeling that the coffee and guano were not always real coffee and guano. His partner, indeed, was of opinion that in such a trade as this they were following there was no need at all of real coffee and real guano, and explained his theory with considerable eloquence. "If I buy a ton of coffee and keep it six weeks, why do I buy it and keep it, and why does the seller sell it instead of keeping it? The seller sells it because he thinks he can do best by parting with it now at a certain price. I buy it because I think I can make money by keeping it. It is just the same as though we were to back our opinions. He backs the fall. I back the rise. You needn't have coffee and you needn't have guano to do this. Indeed the possession of the coffee or the guano is only a very clumsy addition to the trouble of your profession. I make it my study to watch the markets;--but I needn't buy everything I see in order to make money by my labour and intelligence." Sexty Parker before his lunch always thought that his partner was wrong, but after that ceremony he almost daily became a convert to the great doctrine. Coffee and guano still had to be bought because the world was dull and would not learn the tricks of trade as taught by Ferdinand Lopez,--also possibly because somebody might want such articles,--but our enterprising hero looked for a time in which no such dull burden should be imposed on him. On this day, when the Duke's £500 was turned into the business, Sexty yielded in a large matter which his partner had been pressing upon him for the last week. They bought a cargo of Kauri gum, coming from New Zealand. Lopez had reasons for thinking that Kauri gum must have a great rise. There was an immense demand for amber, and Kauri gum might be used as a substitute, and in six months' time would be double its present value. This unfortunately was a real cargo. He could not find an individual so enterprising as to venture to deal in a cargo of Kauri gum after his fashion. But the next best thing was done. The real cargo was bought, and his name and Sexty's name were on the bills given for the goods. On that day he returned home in high spirits, for he did believe in his own intelligence and good fortune. CHAPTER XLIV Mr. Wharton Intends to Make a New Will On that afternoon, immediately on the husband's return to the house, his wife spoke to him as her father had desired. On that evening Mr. Wharton was dining at his club, and therefore there was the whole evening before them; but the thing to be done was disagreeable, and therefore she did it at once,--rushing into the matter almost before he had seated himself in the arm-chair which he had appropriated to his use in the drawing-room. "Papa was talking about our affairs after you left this morning, and he thinks that it would be so much better if you would tell him all about them." "What made him talk of that to-day?" he said, turning at her almost angrily and thinking at once of the Duke's cheque. "I suppose it is natural that he should be anxious about us, Ferdinand;--and the more natural as he has money to give if he chooses to give it." "I have asked him for nothing lately;--though, by George, I intend to ask him and that very roundly. Three thousand pounds isn't much of a sum of money for your father to have given you." "And he paid the election bill;--didn't he?" "He has been complaining of that behind my back,--has he? I didn't ask him for it. He offered it. I wasn't such a fool as to refuse, but he needn't bring that up as a grievance to you." "It wasn't brought up as a grievance. I was saying that your standing had been a heavy expenditure--" "Why did you say so? What made you talk about it at all? Why should you be discussing my affairs behind my back?" "To my own father! And that too when you are telling me every day that I am to induce him to help you!" "Not by complaining that I am poor. But how did it all begin?" She had to think for a moment before she could recollect how it did begin. "There has been something," he said, "which you are ashamed to tell me." "There is nothing that I am ashamed to tell you. There never has been and never will be anything." And she stood up as she spoke, with open eyes and extended nostrils. "Whatever may come, however wretched it may be, I shall not be ashamed of myself." "But of me!" "Why do you say so? Why do you try to make unhappiness between us?" "You have been talking of--my poverty." "My father asked why you should go to Dovercourt,--and whether it was because it would save expense." "You want to go somewhere?" "Not at all. I am contented to stay in London. But I said that I thought the expense had a good deal to do with it. Of course it has." "Where do you want to be taken? I suppose Dovercourt is not fashionable." "I want nothing." "If you are thinking of travelling abroad, I can't spare the time. It isn't an affair of money, and you had no business to say so. I thought of the place because it is quiet and because I can get up and down easily. I am sorry that I ever came to live in this house." "Why do you say that, Ferdinand?" "Because you and your father make cabals behind my back. If there is anything I hate it is that kind of thing." "You are very unjust," she said to him sobbing. "I have never caballed. I have never done anything against you. Of course papa ought to know." "Why ought he to know? Why is your father to have the right of inquiry into all my private affairs?" "Because you want his assistance. It is only natural. You always tell me to get him to assist you. He spoke most kindly, saying that he would like to know how the things are." "Then he won't know. As for wanting his assistance, of course I want the fortune which he ought to give you. He is man of the world enough to know that as I am in business capital must be useful to me. I should have thought that you would understand as much as that yourself." "I do understand it, I suppose." "Then why don't you act as my friend rather than his? Why don't you take my part? It seems to me that you are much more his daughter than my wife." "That is most unfair." "If you had any pluck you would make him understand that for your sake he ought to say what he means to do, so that I might have the advantage of the fortune which I suppose he means to give you some day. If you had the slightest anxiety to help me you could influence him. Instead of that you talk to him about my poverty. I don't want him to think that I am a pauper. That's not the way to get round a man like your father, who is rich himself and who thinks it a disgrace in other men not to be rich too." "I can't tell him in the same breath that you are rich and that you want money." "Money is the means by which men make money. If he was confident of my business he'd shell out his cash quick enough! It is because he has been taught to think that I am in a small way. He'll find his mistake some day." "You won't speak to him then?" "I don't say that at all. If I find that it will answer my own purpose I shall speak to him. But it would be very much easier to me if I could get you to be cordial in helping me." Emily by this time quite knew what such cordiality meant. He had been so free in his words to her that there could be no mistake. He had instructed her to "get round" her father. And now again he spoke of her influence over her father. Although her illusions were all melting away,--oh, so quickly vanishing,--still she knew that it was her duty to be true to her husband, and to be his wife rather than her father's daughter. But what could she say on his behalf, knowing nothing of his affairs? She had no idea what was his business, what was his income, what amount of money she ought to spend as his wife. As far as she could see,--and her common sense in seeing such things was good,--he had no regular income, and was justified in no expenditure. On her own account she would ask for no information. She was too proud to request that from him which should be given to her without any request. But in her own defence she must tell him that she could use no influence with her father as she knew none of the circumstances by which her father would be guided. "I cannot help you in the manner you mean," she said, "because I know nothing myself." "You know that you can trust me to do the best with your money if I could get hold of it, I suppose?" She certainly did not know this, and held her tongue. "You could assure him of that?" "I could only tell him to judge for himself." "What you mean is that you'd see me d----d before you would open your mouth for me to the old man!" He had never sworn at her before, and now she burst out into a flood of tears. It was to her a terrible outrage. I do not know that a woman is very much the worse because her husband may forget himself on an occasion and "rap out an oath at her," as he would call it when making the best of his own sin. Such an offence is compatible with uniform kindness and most affectionate consideration. I have known ladies who would think little or nothing about it,--who would go no farther than the mildest protest,--"Do remember where you are!" or, "My dear John!"--if no stranger were present. But then a wife should be initiated into it by degrees; and there are different tones of bad language, of which by far the most general is the good-humoured tone. We all of us know men who never damn their servants, or any inferiors, or strangers, or women,--who in fact keep it all for their bosom friends; and if a little does sometimes flow over in the freedom of domestic life, the wife is apt to remember that she is the bosomest of her husband's friends, and so to pardon the transgression. But here the word had been uttered with all its foulest violence, with virulence and vulgarity. It seemed to the victim to be the sign of a terrible crisis in her early married life,--as though the man who had so spoken to her could never again love her, never again be kind to her, never again be sweetly gentle and like a lover. And as he spoke it he looked at her as though he would like to tear her limbs asunder. She was frightened as well as horrified and astounded. She had not a word to say to him. She did not know in what language to make her complaint of such treatment. She burst into tears, and throwing herself on the sofa hid her face in her hands. "You provoke me to be violent," he said. But still she could not speak to him. "I come away from the city, tired with work and troubled with a thousand things, and you have not a kind word to say to me." Then there was a pause, during which she still sobbed. "If your father has anything to say to me, let him say it. I shall not run away. But as to going to him of my own accord with a story as long as my arm about my own affairs, I don't mean to do it." Then he paused a moment again. "Come, old girl, cheer up! Don't pretend to be broken-hearted because I used a hard word. There are worse things than that to be borne in the world." "I--I--I was so startled, Ferdinand." "A man can't always remember that he isn't with another man. Don't think anything more about it; but do bear this in mind,--that, situated as we are, your influence with your father may be the making or the marring of me." And so he left the room. She sat for the next ten minutes thinking of it all. The words which he had spoken were so horrible that she could not get them out of her mind,--could not bring herself to look upon them as a trifle. The darkness of his countenance still dwelt with her,--and that absence of all tenderness, that coarse un-marital and yet marital roughness, which should not at any rate have come to him so soon. The whole man too was so different from what she had thought him to be. Before their marriage no word as to money had ever reached her ears from his lips. He had talked to her of books,--and especially of poetry. Shakespeare and Moliere, Dante and Goethe, had been or had seemed to be dear to him. And he had been full of fine ideas about women, and about men in their intercourse with women. For his sake she had separated herself from all her old friends. For his sake she had hurried into a marriage altogether distasteful to her father. For his sake she had closed her heart against that other lover. Trusting altogether in him she had ventured to think that she had known what was good for her better than all those who had been her counsellors, and had given herself to him utterly. Now she was awake; her dream was over, and the natural language of the man was still ringing in her ears! They met together at dinner and passed the evening without a further allusion to the scene which had been acted. He sat with a magazine in his hand, every now and then making some remark intended to be pleasant but which grated on her ears as being fictitious. She would answer him,--because it was her duty to do so, and because she would not condescend to sulk; but she could not bring herself even to say to herself that all should be with her as though that horrid word had not been spoken. She sat over her work till ten, answering him when he spoke in a voice which was also fictitious, and then took herself off to her bed that she might weep alone. It would, she knew, be late before he would come to her. On the next morning there came a message to him as he was dressing. Mr. Wharton wished to speak to him. Would he come down before breakfast, or would he call on Mr. Wharton in Stone Buildings? He sent down word that he would do the latter at an hour he fixed, and then did not show himself in the breakfast-room till Mr. Wharton was gone. "I've got to go to your father to-day," he said to his wife, "and I thought it best not to begin till we come to the regular business. I hope he does not mean to be unreasonable." To this she made no answer. "Of course you think the want of reason will be all on my side." "I don't know why you should say so." "Because I can read your mind. You do think so. You've been in the same boat with your father all your life, and you can't get out of that boat and get into mine. I was wrong to come and live here. Of course it was not the way to withdraw you from his influence." She had nothing to say that would not anger him, and was therefore silent. "Well; I must do the best I can by myself, I suppose. Good-bye," and so he was off. "I want to know," said Mr. Wharton, on whom was thrown by premeditation on the part of Lopez the task of beginning the conversation,--"I want to know what is the nature of your operation. I have never been quite able to understand it." "I do not know that I quite understand it myself," said Lopez, laughing. "No man alive," continued the old barrister almost solemnly, "has a greater objection to thrust himself into another man's affairs than I have. And as I didn't ask the question before your marriage,--as perhaps I ought to have done,--I should not do so now, were it not that the disposition of some part of the earnings of my life must depend on the condition of your affairs." Lopez immediately perceived that it behoved him to be very much on the alert. It might be that if he showed himself to be very poor, his father-in-law would see the necessity of assisting him at once; or, it might be, that unless he could show himself to be in prosperous circumstances, his father-in-law would not assist him at all. "To tell you the plain truth, I am minded to make a new will. I had of course made arrangements as to my property before Emily's marriage. Those arrangements I think I shall now alter. I am greatly distressed with Everett; and from what I see and from a few words which have dropped from Emily, I am not, to tell you the truth, quite happy as to your position. If I understand rightly you are a general merchant, buying and selling goods in the market?" "That's about it, sir." "What capital have you in the business?" "What capital?" "Yes;--how much did you put into it at starting?" Lopez paused a moment. He had got his wife. The marriage could not be undone. Mr. Wharton had money enough for them all, and would not certainly discard his daughter. Mr. Wharton could place him on a really firm footing, and might not improbably do so if he could be made to feel some confidence in his son-in-law. At this moment there was much doubt with the son-in-law whether he had better not tell the simple truth. "It has gone in by degrees," he said. "Altogether I have had about £8000 in it." In truth he had never been possessed of a shilling. "Does that include the £3000 you had from me?" "Yes; it does." "Then you have married my girl and started into the world with a business based on £5000, and which had so far miscarried that within a month or two after your marriage you were driven to apply to me for funds!" "I wanted money for a certain purpose." "Have you any partner, Mr. Lopez?" This address was felt to be very ominous. "Yes. I have a partner who is possessed of capital. His name is Parker." "Then his capital is your capital." "Well;--I can't explain it, but it is not so." "What is the name of your firm?" "We haven't a registered name." "Have you a place of business?" "Parker has a place of business in Little Tankard Yard." Mr. Wharton turned to a directory and found out Parker's name. "Mr. Parker is a stockbroker. Are you also a stockbroker?" "No,--I am not." "Then, sir, it seems to me that you are a commercial adventurer." "I am not at all ashamed of the name, Mr. Wharton. According to your manner of reckoning, half the business in the City of London is done by commercial adventurers. I watch the markets and buy goods,--and sell them at a profit. Mr. Parker is a moneyed man, who happens also to be a stockbroker. We can very easily call ourselves merchants, and put up the names of Lopez and Parker over the door." "Do you sign bills together?" "Yes." "As Lopez and Parker?" "No. I sign them and he signs them. I trade also by myself, and so, I believe, does he." "One other question, Mr. Lopez. On what income have you paid income-tax for the last three years?" "On £2000 a-year," said Lopez. This was a direct lie. "Can you make out any schedule showing your exact assets and liabilities at the present time?" "Certainly I can." "Then do so, and send it to me before I go into Herefordshire. My will as it stands at present would not be to your advantage. But I cannot change it till I know more of your circumstances than I do now." And so the interview was over. CHAPTER XLV Mrs. Sexty Parker Though Mr. Wharton and Lopez met every day for the next week, nothing more was said about the schedule. The old man was thinking about it every day, and so also was Lopez. But Mr. Wharton had made his demand, and, as he thought, nothing more was to be said on the subject. He could not continue the subject as he would have done with his son. But as day after day passed by he became more and more convinced that his son-in-law's affairs were not in a state which could bear to see the light. He had declared his purpose of altering his will in the man's favour, if the man would satisfy him. And yet nothing was done and nothing was said. Lopez had come among them and robbed him of his daughter. Since the man had become intimate in his house he had not known an hour's happiness. The man had destroyed all the plans of his life, broken through into his castle, and violated his very hearth. No doubt he himself had vacillated. He was aware of that, and in his present mood was severe enough in judging himself. In his desolation he had tried to take the man to his heart,--had been kind to him, and had even opened his house to him. He had told himself that as the man was the husband of his daughter he had better make the best of it. He had endeavoured to make the best of it, but between him and the man there were such differences that they were poles asunder. And now it became clear to him that the man was, as he had declared to the man's face, no better than an adventurer! By his will as it at present stood he had left two-thirds of his property to Everett, and one-third to his daughter, with arrangements for settling her share on her children, should she be married and have children at the time of his death. This will had been made many years ago, and he had long since determined to alter it, in order that he might divide his property equally between his children;--but he had postponed the matter, intending to give a large portion of Emily's share to her directly on her marriage with Arthur Fletcher. She had not married Arthur Fletcher;--but still it was necessary that a new will should be made. When he left town for Herefordshire he had not yet made up his mind how this should be done. He had at one time thought that he would give some considerable sum to Lopez at once, knowing that to a man in business such assistance would be useful. And he had not altogether abandoned that idea, even when he had asked for the schedule. He did not relish the thought of giving his hard-earned money to Lopez, but, still, the man's wife was his daughter, and he must do the best that he could for her. Her taste in marrying the man was inexplicable to him. But that was done;--and now how might he best arrange his affairs so as to serve her interests? About the middle of August he went to Herefordshire and she to the seaside in Essex,--to the little place which Lopez had selected. Before the end of the month the father-in-law wrote a line to his son-in-law. DEAR LOPEZ, [not without premeditation had he departed from the sternness of that "Mr. Lopez," which in his anger he had used at his chambers]-- When we were discussing your affairs I asked you for a schedule of your assets and liabilities. I can make no new arrangement of my property till I receive this. Should I die leaving my present will as the instrument under which my property would be conveyed to my heirs, Emily's share would go into the hands of trustees for the use of herself and her possible children. I tell you this that you may understand that it is for your own interest to comply with my requisition. Yours, A. WHARTON. Of course questions were asked him as to how the newly married couple were getting on. At Wharton these questions were mild and easily put off. Sir Alured was contented with a slight shake of his head, and Lady Wharton only remarked for the fifth or sixth time that "it was a pity." But when they all went to Longbarns, the difficulty became greater. Arthur was not there, and old Mrs. Fletcher was in full strength. "So the Lopezes have come to live with you in Manchester Square?" Mr. Wharton acknowledged that it was so with an affirmative grunt. "I hope he's a pleasant inmate." There was a scorn in the old woman's voice as she said this, which ought to have provoked any man. "More so than most men would be," said Mr. Wharton. "Oh, indeed!" "He is courteous and forbearing, and does not think that everything around him should be suited to his own peculiar fancies." "I am glad that you are contented with the marriage, Mr. Wharton." "Who has said that I am contented with it? No one ought to understand or to share my discontent so cordially as yourself, Mrs. Fletcher;--and no one ought to be more chary of speaking of it. You and I had hoped other things, and old people do not like to be disappointed. But I needn't paint the devil blacker than he is." "I'm afraid that, as usual, he is rather black." "Mother," said John Fletcher, "the thing has been done and you might as well let it be. We are all sorry that Emily has not come nearer to us; but she has had a right to choose for herself, and I for one wish,--as does my brother also,--that she may be happy in the lot she has chosen." "His conduct to Arthur at Silverbridge was so nice!" said the pertinacious old woman. "Never mind his conduct, mother. What is it to us?" "That's all very well, John; but according to that nobody is to talk about anybody." "I would much prefer, at any rate," said Mr. Wharton, "that you would not talk about Mr. Lopez in my hearing." "Oh; if that is to be so, let it be so. And now I understand where I am." Then the old woman shook herself, and endeavoured to look as though Mr. Wharton's soreness on the subject were an injury to her as robbing her of a useful topic. "I don't like Lopez, you know," Mr. Wharton said to John Fletcher afterwards. "How would it be possible that I should like such a man? But there can be no good got by complaints. It is not what your mother suffers, or what even I may suffer,--or worse again, what Arthur may suffer, that makes the sadness of all this. What will be her life? That is the question. And it is too near me, too important to me, for the endurance either of scorn or pity. I was glad that you asked your mother to be silent." "I can understand it," said John. "I do not think that she will trouble you again." In the mean time Lopez received Mr. Wharton's letter at Dovercourt, and had to consider what answer he should give to it. No answer could be satisfactory,--unless he could impose a false answer on his father-in-law so as to make it credible. The more he thought of it, the more he believed that this would be impossible. The cautious old lawyer would not accept unverified statements. A certain sum of money,--by no means illiberal as a present,--he had already extracted from the old man. What he wanted was a further and a much larger grant. Though Mr. Wharton was old he did not want to have to wait for the death even of an old man. The next two or three years,--probably the very next year,--might be the turning-point of his life. He had married the girl, and ought to have the girl's fortune,--down on the nail! That was his idea; and the old man was robbing him in not acting up to it. As he thought of this he cursed his ill luck. The husbands of other girls had their fortunes conveyed to them immediately on their marriage. What would not £20,000 do for him, if he could get it into his hand? And so he taught himself to regard the old man as a robber and himself as a victim. Who among us is there that does not teach himself the same lesson? And then too how cruelly, how damnably he had been used by the Duchess of Omnium! And now Sexty Parker, whose fortune he was making for him, whose fortune he at any rate intended to make, was troubling him in various ways. "We're in a boat together," Sexty had said. "You've had the use of my money, and by heavens you have it still. I don't see why you should be so stiff. Do you bring your missus to Dovercourt, and I'll take mine, and let 'em know each other." There was a little argument on the subject, but Sexty Parker had the best of it, and in this way the trip to Dovercourt was arranged. Lopez was in a very good humour when he took his wife down, and he walked her round the terraces and esplanades of that not sufficiently well-known marine paradise, now bidding her admire the sea and now laughing at the finery of the people, till she became gradually filled with an idea that as he was making himself pleasant, she also ought to do the same. Of course she was not happy. The gilding had so completely and so rapidly been washed off her idol that she could not be very happy. But she also could be good-humoured. "And now," said he, smiling, "I have got something for you to do for me,--something that you will find very disagreeable." "What is it? It won't be very bad, I'm sure." "It will be very bad, I'm afraid. My excellent but horribly vulgar partner, Mr. Sextus Parker, when he found that I was coming here, insisted on bringing his wife and children here also. I want you to know them." "Is that all? She must be very bad indeed if I can't put up with that." "In one sense she isn't bad at all. I believe her to be an excellent woman, intent on spoiling her children and giving her husband a good dinner every day. But I think you'll find that she is,--well,--not quite what you call a lady." "I shan't mind that in the least. I'll help her to spoil the children." "You can get a lesson there, you know," he said, looking into her face. The little joke was one which a young wife might take with pleasure from her husband, but her life had already been too much embittered for any such delight. Yes; the time was coming when that trouble also would be added to her. She dreaded she knew not what, and had often told herself that it would be better that she should be childless. "Do you like him?" she said. "Like him. No;--I can't say I like him. He is useful, and in one sense honest." "Is he not honest in all senses?" "That's a large order. To tell you the truth, I don't know any man who is." "Everett is honest." "He loses money at play which he can't pay without assistance from his father. If his father had refused, where would then have been his honesty? Sexty is as honest as others, I dare say, but I shouldn't like to trust him much farther than I can see him. I shan't go up to town to-morrow, and we'll both look in on them after luncheon." In the afternoon the call was made. The Parkers, having children, had dined early, and he was sitting out in a little porch smoking his pipe, drinking whisky and water, and looking at the sea. His eldest girl was standing between his legs, and his wife, with the other three children round her, was sitting on the doorstep. "I've brought my wife to see you," said Lopez, holding out his hand to Mrs. Parker, as she rose from the ground. "I told her that you'd be coming," said Sexty, "and she wanted me to put off my pipe and little drop of drink; but I said that if Mrs. Lopez was the lady I took her to be she wouldn't begrudge a hard-working fellow his pipe and glass on a holiday." There was a soundness of sense in this which mollified any feeling of disgust which Emily might have felt at the man's vulgarity. "I think you are quite right, Mr. Parker. I should be very sorry if,--if--" "If I was to put my pipe out. Well, I won't. You'll take a glass of sherry, Lopez? Though I'm drinking spirits myself, I brought down a hamper of sherry wine. Oh, nonsense;--you must take something. That's right, Jane. Let us have the stuff and the glasses, and then they can do as they like." Lopez lit a cigar, and allowed his host to pour out for him a glass of "sherry wine," while Mrs. Lopez went into the house with Mrs. Parker and the children. Mrs. Parker opened herself out to her new friend immediately. She hoped that they two might see "a deal of each other;--that is, if you don't think me too pushing." Sextus, she said, was so much away, coming down to Dovercourt only every other day! And then, within the half hour which was consumed by Lopez with his cigar, the poor woman got upon the general troubles of her life. Did Mrs. Lopez think that "all this speckelation was just the right thing?" "I don't think that I know anything about it, Mrs. Parker." "But you ought;--oughtn't you, now? Don't you think that a wife ought to know what it is that her husband is after;--specially if there's children? A good bit of the money was mine, Mrs. Lopez; and though I don't begrudge it, not one bit, if any good is to come out of it to him or them, a woman doesn't like what her father has given her should be made ducks and drakes of." "But are they making ducks and drakes?" "When he don't tell me I'm always afeard. And I'll tell you what I know just as well as two and two. When he comes home a little flustered, and then takes more than his regular allowance, he's been at something as don't quite satisfy him. He's never that way when he's done a good day's work at his regular business. He takes to the children then, and has one glass after his dinner, and tells me all about it,--down to the shillings and pence. But it's very seldom he's that way now." "You may think it very odd, Mrs. Parker, but I don't in the least know what my husband is--in business." "And you never ask?" "I haven't been very long married, you know;--only about ten months." "I'd had my fust by that time." "Only nine months, I think, indeed." "Well; I wasn't very long after that. But I took care to know what it was he was a-doing of in the city long before that time. And I did use to know everything, till--" She was going to say, till Lopez had come upon the scene. But she did not wish, at any rate as yet, to be harsh to her new friend. "I hope it is all right," said Emily. "Sometimes he's as though the Bank of England was all his own. And there's been more money come into the house;--that I must say. And there isn't an open-handeder one than Sexty anywhere. He'd like to see me in a silk gown every day of my life;--and as for the children, there's nothing smart enough for them. Only I'd sooner have a little and safe, than anything ever so fine, and never be sure whether it wasn't going to come to an end." "There I agree with you, quite." "I don't suppose men feels it as we do; but, oh, Mrs. Lopez, give me a little, safe, so that I may know that I shan't see my children want. When I thinks what it would be to have them darlings' little bellies empty, and nothing in the cupboard, I get that low that I'm nigh fit for Bedlam." In the mean time the two men outside the porch were discussing their affairs in somewhat the same spirit. At last Lopez showed his friend Wharton's letter, and told him of the expected schedule. "Schedule be d----d, you know," said Lopez. "How am I to put down a rise of 12s. 6d. a ton on Kauri gum in a schedule? But when you come to 2000 tons it's £1250." "He's very old;--isn't he?" "But as strong as a horse." "He's got the money?" "Yes;--he has got it safe enough. There's no doubt about the money." "What he talks about is only a will. Now you want the money at once." "Of course I do;--and he talks to me as if I were some old fogy with an estate of my own. I must concoct a letter and explain my views; and the more I can make him understand how things really are the better. I don't suppose he wants to see his daughter come to grief." "Then the sooner you write it the better," said Mr. Parker. CHAPTER XLVI "He Wants to Get Rich Too Quick" As they strolled home Lopez told his wife that he had accepted an invitation to dine the next day at the Parkers' cottage. In doing this his manner was not quite so gentle as when he had asked her to call on them. He had been a little ruffled by what had been said, and now exhibited his temper. "I don't suppose it will be very nice," he said, "but we may have to put up with worse things than that." "I have made no objection." "But you don't seem to take to it very cordially." "I had thought that I got on very well with Mrs. Parker. If you can eat your dinner with them, I'm sure that I can. You do not seem to like him altogether, and I wish you had got a partner more to your taste." "Taste, indeed! When you come to this kind of thing it isn't a matter of taste. The fact is that I am in that fellow's hands to an extent I don't like to think of, and don't see my way out of it unless your father will do as he ought to do. You altogether refuse to help me with your father, and you must, therefore, put up with Sexty Parker and his wife. It is quite on the cards that worse things may come even than Sexty Parker." To this she made no immediate answer, but walked on, increasing her pace, not only unhappy, but also very angry. It was becoming a matter of doubt to her whether she could continue to bear these repeated attacks about her father's money. "I see how it is," he continued. "You think that a husband should bear all the troubles of life, and that a wife should never be made to hear of them." "Ferdinand," she said, "I declare I did not think that any man could be so unfair to a woman as you are to me." "Of course! Because I haven't got thousands a year to spend on you I am unfair." "I am content to live in any way that you may direct. If you are poor, I am satisfied to be poor. If you are even ruined, I am content to be ruined." "Who is talking about ruin?" "If you are in want of everything, I also will be in want and will never complain. Whatever our joint lot may bring to us I will endure, and will endeavour to endure with cheerfulness. But I will not ask my father for money, either for you or for myself. He knows what he ought to do. I trust him implicitly." "And me not at all." "He is, I know, in communication with you about what should be done. I can only say,--tell him everything." "My dear, that is a matter in which it may be possible that I understand my own interest best." "Very likely. I certainly understand nothing, for I do not even know the nature of your business. How can I tell him that he ought to give you money?" "You might ask him for your own." "I have got nothing. Did I ever tell you that I had?" "You ought to have known." "Do you mean that when you asked me to marry you I should have refused you because I did not know what money papa would give me? Why did you not ask papa?" "Had I known him then as well as I do now you may be quite sure that I should have done so." "Ferdinand, it will be better that we should not speak about my father. I will in all things strive to do as you would have me, but I cannot hear him abused. If you have anything to say, go to Everett." "Yes;--when he is such a gambler that your father won't even speak to him. Your father will be found dead in his bed some day, and all his money will have been left to some cursed hospital." They were at their own door when this was said, and she, without further answer, went up to her bedroom. All these bitter things had been said, not because Lopez had thought that he could further his own views by saying them;--he knew indeed that he was injuring himself by every display of ill-temper;--but she was in his power, and Sexty Parker was rebelling. He thought a good deal that day on the delight he would have in "kicking that ill-conditioned cur," if only he could afford to kick him. But his wife was his own, and she must be taught to endure his will, and must be made to know that though she was not to be kicked, yet she was to be tormented and ill-used. And it might be possible that he should so cow her spirit as to bring her to act as he should direct. Still, as he walked alone along the sea-shore, he knew that it would be better for him to control his temper. On that evening he did write to Mr. Wharton,--as follows,--and he dated his letter from Little Tankard Yard, so that Mr. Wharton might suppose that that was really his own place of business, and that he was there, at his work:-- MY DEAR SIR, You have asked for a schedule of my affairs, and I have found it quite impossible to give it. As it was with the merchants whom Shakespeare and the other dramatists described,--so it is with me. My caravels are out at sea, and will not always come home in time. My property at this moment consists of certain shares of cargoes of jute, Kauri gum, guano, and sulphur, worth altogether at the present moment something over £26,000, of which Mr. Parker possesses the half;--but then of this property only a portion is paid for,--perhaps something more than a half. For the other half our bills are in the market. But in February next these articles will probably be sold for considerably more than £30,000. If I had £5000 placed to my credit now, I should be worth about £15,000 by the end of next February. I am engaged in sundry other smaller ventures, all returning profits;--but in such a condition of things it is impossible that I should make a schedule. I am undoubtedly in the condition of a man trading beyond his capital. I have been tempted by fair offers, and what I think I may call something beyond an average understanding of such matters, to go into ventures beyond my means. I have stretched my arm out too far. In such a position it is not perhaps unnatural that I should ask a wealthy father-in-law to assist me. It is certainly not unnatural that I should wish him to do so. I do not think that I am a mercenary man. When I married your daughter I raised no question as to her fortune. Being embarked in trade I no doubt thought that her means,--whatever they might be,--would be joined to my own. I know that a sum of £20,000, with my experience in the use of money, would give us a noble income. But I would not condescend to ask a question which might lead to a supposition that I was marrying her for her money and not because I loved her. You now know, I think, all that I can tell you. If there be any other questions I would willingly answer them. It is certainly the case that Emily's fortune, whatever you may choose to give her, would be of infinitely greater use to me now,--and consequently to her,--than at a future date which I sincerely pray may be very long deferred. Believe me to be, Your affectionate son-in-law, FERDINAND LOPEZ. A. Wharton, Esq. This letter he himself took up to town on the following day, and there posted, addressing it to Wharton Hall. He did not expect very great results from it. As he read it over, he was painfully aware that all his trash about caravels and cargoes of sulphur would not go far with Mr. Wharton. But it might go farther than nothing. He was bound not to neglect Mr. Wharton's letter to him. When a man is in difficulty about money, even a lie,--even a lie that is sure to be found out to be a lie,--will serve his immediate turn better than silence. There is nothing that the courts hate so much as contempt;--not even perjury. And Lopez felt that Mr. Wharton was the judge before whom he was bound to plead. He returned to Dovercourt on that day, and he and his wife dined with the Parkers. No woman of her age had known better what were the manners of ladies and gentlemen than Emily Wharton. She had thoroughly understood that when in Herefordshire she was surrounded by people of that class, and that when she was with her aunt, Mrs. Roby, she was not quite so happily placed. No doubt she had been terribly deceived by her husband,--but the deceit had come from the fact that his manners gave no indication of his character. When she found herself in Mrs. Parker's little sitting-room, with Mr. Parker making florid speeches to her, she knew that she had fallen among people for whose society she had not been intended. But this was a part, and only a very trifling part, of the punishment which she felt that she deserved. If that, and things like that, were all, she would bear them without a murmur. "Now I call Dovercourt a dooced nice little place," said Mr. Parker, as he helped her to the "bit of fish," which he told her he had brought down with him from London. "It is very healthy, I should think." "Just the thing for the children, ma'am. You've none of your own, Mrs. Lopez, but there's a good time coming. You were up to-day, weren't you, Lopez? Any news?" "Things seemed to be very quiet in the city." "Too quiet, I'm afraid. I hate having 'em quiet. You must come and see me in Little Tankard Yard some of these days, Mrs. Lopez. We can give you a glass of cham. and the wing of a chicken;--can't we, Lopez?" "I don't know. It's more than you ever gave me," said Lopez, trying to look good-humoured. "But you ain't a lady." "Or me," said Mrs. Parker. "You're only a wife. If Mrs. Lopez will make a day of it we'll treat her well in the city;--won't we, Ferdinand?" A black cloud came across "Ferdinand's" face, but he said nothing. Emily of a sudden drew herself up, unconsciously,--and then at once relaxed her features and smiled. If her husband chose that it should be so, she would make no objection. "Upon my honour, Sexty, you are very familiar," said Mrs. Parker. "It's a way we have in the city," said Sexty. Sexty knew what he was about. His partner called him Sexty, and why shouldn't he call his partner Ferdinand? "He'll call you Emily before long," said Lopez. "When you call my wife Jane, I shall,--and I've no objection in life. I don't see why people ain't to call each other by their Christian names. Take a glass of champagne, Mrs. Lopez. I brought down half-a-dozen to-day so that we might be jolly. Care killed a cat. Whatever we call each other, I'm very glad to see you here, Mrs. Lopez, and I hope it's the first of a great many. Here's your health." It was all his ordering, and if he bade her dine with a crossing-sweeper she would do it. But she could not but remember that not long since he had told her that his partner was not a person with whom she could fitly associate; and she did not fail to perceive that he must be going down in the world to admit such association for her after he had so spoken. And as she sipped the mixture which Sexty called champagne, she thought of Herefordshire and the banks of the Wye, and,--alas, alas,--she thought of Arthur Fletcher. Nevertheless, come what might, she would do her duty, even though it might call upon her to sit at dinner with Mr. Parker three days in the week. Lopez was her husband, and would be the father of her child, and she would make herself one with him. It mattered not what people might call him,--or even her. She had acted on her own judgment in marrying him, and had been a fool; and now she would bear the punishment without complaint. When dinner was over Mrs. Parker helped the servant to remove the dinner things from the single sitting-room, and the two men went out to smoke their cigars in the covered porch. Mrs. Parker herself took out the whisky and hot water, and sugar and lemons, and then returned to have a little matronly discourse with her guest. "Does Mr. Lopez ever take a drop too much?" she asked. "Never," said Mrs. Lopez. "Perhaps it don't affect him as it do Sexty. He ain't a drinker;--certainly not. And he's one that works hard every day of his life. But he's getting fond of it these last twelve months, and though he don't take very much it hurries him and flurries him. If I speaks at night he gets cross;--and in the morning when he gets up, which he always do regular, though it's ever so bad with him, then I haven't the heart to scold him. It's very hard sometimes for a wife to know what to do, Mrs. Lopez." "Yes, indeed." Emily could not but think how soon she herself had learned that lesson. "Of course I'd do anything for Sexty,--the father of my bairns, and has always been a good husband to me. You don't know him, of course, but I do. A right good man at bottom;--but so weak!" "If he,--if he,--injures his health, shouldn't you talk to him quietly about it?" "It isn't the drink as is the evil, Mrs. Lopez, but that which makes him drink. He's not one as goes a mucker merely for the pleasure. When things are going right he'll sit out in our arbour at home, and smoke pipe after pipe, playing with the children, and one glass of gin and water cold will see him to bed. Tobacco, dry, do agree with him, I think. But when he comes to three or four goes of hot toddy, I know it's not as it should be." "You should restrain him, Mrs. Parker." "Of course I should;--but how? Am I to walk off with the bottle and disgrace him before the servant girl? Or am I to let the children know as their father takes too much? If I was as much as to make one fight of it, it'd be all over Ponder's End that he's a drunkard;--which he ain't. Restrain him;--oh, yes! If I could restrain that gambling instead of regular business! That's what I'd like to restrain." "Does he gamble?" "What is it but gambling that he and Mr. Lopez is a-doing together? Of course, ma'am, I don't know you, and you are different from me. I ain't foolish enough not to know all that. My father stood in Smithfield and sold hay, and your father is a gentleman as has been high up in the Courts all his life. But it's your husband is a-doing this." "Oh, Mrs. Parker!" "He is then. And if he brings Sexty and my little ones to the workhouse, what'll be the good then of his guano and his gum?" "Is it not all in the fair way of commerce?" "I'm sure I don't know about commerce, Mrs. Lopez, because I'm only a woman; but it can't be fair. They goes and buys things that they haven't got the money to pay for, and then waits to see if they'll turn up trumps. Isn't that gambling?" "I cannot say. I do not know." She felt now that her husband had been accused, and that part of the accusation had been levelled at herself. There was something in her manner of saying these few words which the poor complaining woman perceived, feeling immediately that she had been inhospitable and perhaps unjust. She put out her hand softly, touching the other woman's arm, and looking up into her guest's face. "If this is so, it is terrible," said Emily. "Perhaps I oughtn't to speak so free." "Oh, yes;--for your children, and yourself, and your husband." "It's them,--and him. Of course it's not your doing, and Mr. Lopez, I'm sure, is a very fine gentleman. And if he gets wrong one way, he'll get himself right in another." Upon hearing this Emily shook her head. "Your papa is a rich man, and won't see you and yours come to want. There's nothing more to come to me or Sexty let it be ever so." "Why does he do it?" "Why does who do it?" "Your husband. Why don't you speak to him as you do to me, and tell him to mind only his proper business?" "Now you are angry with me." "Angry! No;--indeed I am not angry. Every word that you say is good, and true, and just what you ought to say. I am not angry, but I am terrified. I know nothing of my husband's business. I cannot tell you that you should trust to it. He is very clever, but--" "But--what, ma'am?" "Perhaps I should say that he is ambitious." "You mean he wants to get rich too quick, ma'am." "I'm afraid so." "Then it's just the same with Sexty. He's ambitious too. But what's the good of being ambitious, Mrs. Lopez, if you never know whether you're on your head or your heels? And what's the good of being ambitious if you're to get into the workhouse? I know what that means. There's one or two of them sort of men gets into Parliament, and has houses as big as the Queen's palace, while hundreds of them has their wives and children in the gutter. Who ever hears of them? Nobody. It don't become any man to be ambitious who has got a wife and family. If he's a bachelor, why, of course, he can go to the Colonies. There's Mary Jane and the two little ones right down on the sea, with their feet in the salt water. Shall we put on our hats, Mrs. Lopez, and go and look after them?" To this proposition Emily assented, and the two ladies went out after the children. "Mix yourself another glass," said Sexty to his partner. "I'd rather not. Don't ask me again. You know I never drink, and I don't like being pressed." "By George!--You are particular." "What's the use of teasing a fellow to do a thing he doesn't like?" "You won't mind me having another?" "Fifty if you please, so that I'm not forced to join you." "Forced! It's liberty 'all here, and you can do as you please. Only when a fellow will take a drop with me he's better company." "Then I'm d---- bad company, and you'd better get somebody else to be jolly with. To tell you the truth, Sexty, I suit you better at business than at this sort of thing. I'm like Shylock, you know." "I don't know about Shylock, but I'm blessed if I think you suit me very well at anything. I'm putting up with a deal of ill-usage, and when I try to be happy with you, you won't drink, and you tell me about Shylock. He was a Jew, wasn't he?" "That is the general idea." "Then you ain't very much like him, for they're a sort of people that always have money about 'em." "How do you suppose he made his money to begin with? What an ass you are!" "That's true. I am. Ever since I began putting my name on the same bit of paper with yours I've been an ass." "You'll have to be one a bit longer yet;--unless you mean to throw up everything. At this present moment you are six or seven thousand pounds richer than you were before you first met me." "I wish I could see the money." "That's like you. What's the use of money you can see? How are you to make money out of money by looking at it? I like to know that my money is fructifying." "I like to know that it's all there,--and I did know it before I ever saw you. I'm blessed if I know it now. Go down and join the ladies, will you? You ain't much of a companion up here." Shortly after that Lopez told Mrs. Parker that he had already bade adieu to her husband, and then he took his wife to their own lodgings. CHAPTER XLVII As for Love! The time spent by Mrs. Lopez at Dovercourt was by no means one of complete happiness. Her husband did not come down very frequently, alleging that his business kept him in town, and that the journey was too long. When he did come he annoyed her either by moroseness and tyranny, or by an affectation of loving good-humour, which was the more disagreeable alternative of the two. She knew that he had no right to be good-humoured, and she was quite able to appreciate the difference between fictitious love and love that was real. He did not while she was at Dovercourt speak to her again directly about her father's money,--but he gave her to understand that he required from her very close economy. Then again she referred to the brougham which she knew was to be in readiness on her return to London; but he told her that he was the best judge of that. The economy which he demanded was that comfortless heart-rending economy which nips the practiser at every turn, but does not betray itself to the world at large. He would have her save out of her washerwoman and linendraper, and yet have a smart gown and go in a brougham. He begrudged her postage stamps, and stopped the subscription at Mudie's, though he insisted on a front seat in the Dovercourt church, paying half a guinea more for it than he would for a place at the side. And then before their sojourn at the place had come to an end he left her for awhile absolutely penniless, so that when the butcher and baker called for their money she could not pay them. That was a dreadful calamity to her, and of which she was hardly able to measure the real worth. It had never happened to her before to have to refuse an application for money that was due. In her father's house such a thing, as far as she knew, had never happened. She had sometimes heard that Everett was impecunious, but that had simply indicated an additional call upon her father. When the butcher came the second time she wrote to her husband in an agony. Should she write to her father for a supply? She was sure that her father would not leave them in actual want. Then he sent her a cheque, enclosed in a very angry letter. Apply to her father! Had she not learned as yet that she was not to lean on her father any longer, but simply on him? And was she such a fool as to suppose that a tradesman could not wait a month for his money? During all this time she had no friend,--no person to whom she could speak,--except Mrs. Parker. Mrs. Parker was very open and very confidential about the business, really knowing very much more about it than did Mrs. Lopez. There was some sympathy and confidence between her and her husband, though they had latterly been much lessened by Sexty's conduct. Mrs. Parker talked daily about the business now that her mouth had been opened, and was very clearly of opinion that it was not a good business. "Sexty don't think it good himself," she said. "Then why does he go on with it?" "Business is a thing, Mrs. Lopez, as people can't drop out of just at a moment. A man gets hisself entangled, and must free hisself as best he can. I know he's terribly afeard;--and sometimes he does say such things of your husband!" Emily shrunk almost into herself as she heard this. "You mustn't be angry, for indeed it's better you should know all." "I'm not angry; only very unhappy. Surely Mr. Parker could separate himself from Mr. Lopez if he pleased?" "That's what I say to him. Give it up, though it be ever so much as you've to lose by him. Give it up, and begin again. You've always got your experience, and if it's only a crust you can earn, that's sure and safe. But then he declares that he means to pull through yet. I know what men are at when they talk of pulling through, Mrs. Lopez. There shouldn't be no need of pulling through. It should all come just of its own accord,--little and little; but safe." Then, when the days of their marine holiday were coming to an end,--in the first week in October,--the day before the return of the Parkers to Ponder's End, she made a strong appeal to her new friend. "You ain't afraid of him; are you?" "Of my husband?" said Mrs. Lopez. "I hope not. Why should you ask?" "Believe me, a woman should never be afraid of 'em. I never would give in to be bullied and made little of by Sexty. I'd do a'most anything to make him comfortable, I'm that soft-hearted. And why not, when he's the father of my children? But I'm not going not to say a thing if I thinks it right, because I'm afeard." "I think I could say anything if I thought it right." "Then tell him of me and my babes,--as how I can never have a quiet night while this is going on. It isn't that they two men are fond of one another. Nothing of the sort! Now you;--I've got to be downright fond of you, though, of course, you think me common." Mrs. Lopez would not contradict her, but stooped forward and kissed her cheek. "I'm downright fond of you, I am," continued Mrs. Parker, snuffling and sobbing, "but they two men are only together because Mr. Lopez wants to gamble, and Parker has got a little money to gamble with." This aspect of the thing was so terrible to Mrs. Lopez that she could only weep and hide her face. "Now, if you would tell him just the truth! Tell him what I say, and that I've been a-saying it! Tell him it's for my children I'm a-speaking, who won't have bread in their very mouths if their father's squeezed dry like a sponge! Sure, if you'd tell him this, he wouldn't go on!" Then she paused a moment, looking up into the other woman's face. "He'd have some bowels of compassion;--wouldn't he now?" "I'll try," said Mrs. Lopez. "I know you're good and kind-hearted, my dear. I saw it in your eyes from the very first. But them men, when they get on at money-making,--or money-losing, which makes 'em worse,--are like tigers clawing one another. They don't care how many they kills, so that they has the least bit for themselves. There ain't no fear of God in it, nor yet no mercy, nor ere a morsel of heart. It ain't what I call manly,--not that longing after other folks' money. When it's come by hard work, as I tell Sexty,--by the very sweat of his brow,--oh,--it's sweet as sweet. When he'd tell me that he'd made his three pound, or his five pound, or, perhaps, his ten pound in a day, and'd calculate it up, how much it'd come to if he did that every day, and where we could go to, and what we could do for the children, I loved to hear him talk about his money. But now--! why, it's altered the looks of the man altogether. It's just as though he was a-thirsting for blood." Thirsting for blood! Yes, indeed. It was the very idea that had occurred to Mrs. Lopez herself when her husband had bade her to "get round her father." No;--it certainly was not manly. There certainly was neither fear of God in it, nor mercy. Yes;--she would try. But as for bowels of compassion in Ferdinand Lopez--; she, the young wife, had already seen enough of her husband to think that he was not to be moved by any prayers on that side. Then the two women bade each other farewell. "Parker has been talking of my going to Manchester Square," said Mrs. Parker, "but I shan't. What'd I be in Manchester Square? And, besides, there'd better be an end of it. Mr. Lopez'd turn Sexty and me out of the house at a moment's notice if it wasn't for the money." "It's papa's house," said Mrs. Lopez, not, however, meaning to make an attack on her husband. "I suppose so, but I shan't come to trouble no one; and we live ever so far away, at Ponder's End,--out of your line altogether, Mrs. Lopez. But I've taken to you, and will never think ill of you any way;--only do as you said you would." "I will try," said Mrs. Lopez. In the meantime Lopez had received from Mr. Wharton an answer to his letter about the missing caravels, which did not please him. Here is the letter:-- MY DEAR LOPEZ, I cannot say that your statement is satisfactory, nor can I reconcile it to your assurance to me that you have made a trade income for some years past of £2000 a year. I do not know much of business, but I cannot imagine such a result from such a condition of things as you describe. Have you any books; and, if so, will you allow them to be inspected by any accountant I may name? You say that a sum of £20,000 would suit your business better now than when I'm dead. Very likely. But with such an account of the business as that you have given me, I do not know that I feel disposed to confide the savings of my life to assist so very doubtful an enterprise. Of course whatever I may do to your advantage will be done for the sake of Emily and her children, should she have any. As far as I can see at present, I shall best do my duty to her, by leaving what I may have to leave to her, to trustees, for her benefit and that of her children. Yours truly, A. WHARTON. This, of course, did not tend to mollify the spirit of the man to whom it was written, or to make him gracious towards his wife. He received the letter three weeks before the lodgings at Dovercourt were given up,--but during these three weeks he was very little at the place, and when there did not mention the letter. On these occasions he said nothing about business, but satisfied himself with giving strict injunctions as to economy. Then he took her back to town on the day after her promise to Mrs. Parker that she would "try." Mrs. Parker had told her that no woman ought to be afraid to speak to her husband, and, if necessary, to speak roundly on such subjects. Mrs. Parker was certainly not a highly educated lady, but she had impressed Emily with an admiration for her practical good sense and proper feeling. The lady who was a lady had begun to feel that in the troubles of her life she might find a much less satisfactory companion than the lady who was not a lady. She would do as Mrs. Parker had told her. She would not be afraid. Of course it was right that she should speak on such a matter. She knew herself to be an obedient wife. She had borne all her unexpected sorrows without a complaint, with a resolve that she would bear all for his sake,--not because she loved him, but because she had made herself his wife. Into whatever calamities he might fall, she would share them. Though he should bring her utterly into the dirt, she would remain in the dirt with him. It seemed probable to her that it might be so,--that they might have to go into the dirt;--and if it were so, she would still be true to him. She had chosen to marry him, and she would be his true wife. But, as such, she would not be afraid of him. Mrs. Parker had told her that "a woman should never be afraid of 'em," and she believed in Mrs. Parker. In this case, too, it was clearly her duty to speak,--for the injury being done was terrible, and might too probably become tragical. How could she endure to think of that woman and her children, should she come to know that the husband of the woman and the father of the children had been ruined by her husband? Yes,--she would speak to him. But she did fear. It is all very well for a woman to tell herself that she will encounter some anticipated difficulty without fear,--or for a man either. The fear cannot be overcome by will. The thing, however, may be done, whether it be leading a forlorn hope, or speaking to an angry husband,--in spite of fear. She would do it; but when the moment for doing it came, her very heart trembled within her. He had been so masterful with her, so persistent in repudiating her interference, so exacting in his demands for obedience, so capable of making her miserable by his moroseness when she failed to comply with his wishes, that she could not go to her task without fear. But she did feel that she ought not to be afraid, or that her fears, at any rate, should not be allowed to restrain her. A wife, she knew, should be prepared to yield, but yet was entitled to be her husband's counsellor. And it was now the case that in this matter she was conversant with circumstances which were unknown to her husband. It was to her that Mrs. Parker's appeal had been made, and with a direct request from the poor woman that it should be repeated to her husband's partner. She found that she could not do it on the journey home from Dovercourt, nor yet on that evening. Mrs. Dick Roby, who had come back from a sojourn at Boulogne, was with them in the Square, and brought her dear friend Mrs. Leslie with her, and also Lady Eustace. The reader may remember that Mr. Wharton had met these ladies at Mrs. Dick's house some months before his daughter's marriage, but he certainly had never asked them into his own. On this occasion Emily had given them no invitation, but had been told by her husband that her aunt would probably bring them in with her. "Mrs. Leslie and Lady Eustace!" she exclaimed with a little shudder. "I suppose your aunt may bring a couple of friends with her to see you, though it is your father's house?" he had replied. She had said no more, not daring to have a fight on that subject at present, while the other matter was pressing on her mind. The evening had passed away pleasantly enough, she thought, to all except herself. Mrs. Leslie and Lady Eustace had talked a great deal, and her husband had borne himself quite as though he had been a wealthy man and the owner of the house in Manchester Square. In the course of the evening Dick Roby came in and Major Pountney, who since the late affairs at Silverbridge had become intimate with Lopez. So that there was quite a party; and Emily was astonished to hear her husband declare that he was only watching the opportunity of another vacancy in order that he might get into the House, and expose the miserable duplicity of the Duke of Omnium. And yet this man, within the last month, had taken away her subscription at Mudie's, and told her that she shouldn't wear things that wanted washing! But he was able to say ever so many pretty little things to Lady Eustace, and had given a new fan to Mrs. Dick, and talked of taking a box for Mrs. Leslie at The Gaiety. But on the next morning before breakfast she began. "Ferdinand," she said, "while I was at Dovercourt I saw a good deal of Mrs. Parker." "I could not help that. Or rather you might have helped it if you pleased. It was necessary that you should meet, but I didn't tell you that you were to see a great deal of her." "I liked her very much." "Then I must say you've got a very odd taste. Did you like him?" "No. I did not see so much of him, and I think that the manners of women are less objectionable than those of men. But I want to tell you what passed between her and me." "If it is about her husband's business she ought to have held her tongue, and you had better hold yours now." This was not a happy beginning, but still she was determined to go on. "It was I think more about your business than his." "Then it was infernal impudence on her part, and you should not have listened to her for a moment." "You do not want to ruin her and her children!" "What have I to do with her and her children? I did not marry her, and I am not their father. He has got to look to that." "She thinks that you are enticing him into risks which he cannot afford." "Am I doing anything for him that I ain't doing for myself! If there is money made, will not he share it? If money has to be lost, of course he must do the same." Lopez in stating his case omitted to say that whatever capital was now being used belonged to his partner. "But women when they get together talk all manner of nonsense. Is it likely that I shall alter my course of action because you tell me that she tells you that he tells her that he is losing money? He is a half-hearted fellow who quails at every turn against him. And when he is crying drunk I dare say he makes a poor mouth to her." "I think, Ferdinand, it is more than that. She says that--" "To tell you the truth, Emily, I don't care a d---- what she says. Now give me some tea." The roughness of this absolutely quelled her. It was not now that she was afraid of him,--not at this moment, but that she was knocked down as though by a blow. She had been altogether so unused to such language that she could not get on with her matter in hand, letting the bad word pass by her as an unmeaning expletive. She wearily poured out the cup of tea and sat herself down silent. The man was too strong for her, and would be so always. She told herself at this moment that language such as that must always absolutely silence her. Then, within a few minutes, he desired her, quite cheerfully, to ask her uncle and aunt to dinner the day but one following, and also to ask Lady Eustace and Mrs. Leslie. "I will pick up a couple of men, which will make us all right," he said. This was in every way horrible to her. Her father had been back in town, had not been very well, and had been recommended to return to the country. He had consequently removed himself,--not to Herefordshire,--but to Brighton, and was now living at an hotel, almost within an hour of London. Had he been at home he certainly would not have invited Mrs. Leslie and Lady Eustace to his house. He had often expressed a feeling of dislike to the former lady in the hearing of his son-in-law, and had ridiculed his sister-in-law for allowing herself to be made acquainted with Lady Eustace, whose name had at one time been very common in the mouths of people. Emily also felt that she was hardly entitled to give a dinner-party in his house in his absence. And, after all that she had lately heard about her husband's poverty, she could not understand how he should wish to incur the expense. "You would not ask Mrs. Leslie here!" she said. "Why should we not ask Mrs. Leslie?" "Papa dislikes her." "But 'papa,' as you call him, isn't going to meet her." "He has said that he doesn't know what day he may be home. And he does more than dislike her. He disapproves of her." "Nonsense! She is your aunt's friend. Because your father once heard some cock-and-bull story about her, and because he has always taken upon himself to criticise your aunt's friends, I am not to be civil to a person I like." "But, Ferdinand, I do not like her myself. She never was in this house till the other night." "Look here, my dear, Lady Eustace can be useful to me, and I cannot ask Lady Eustace without asking her friend. You do as I bid you,--or else I shall do it myself." She paused for a moment, and then she positively refused. "I cannot bring myself to ask Mrs. Leslie to dine in this house. If she comes to dine with you, of course I shall sit at the table, but she will be sure to see that she is not welcome." "It seems to me that you are determined to go against me in everything I propose." "I don't think you would say that if you knew how miserable you made me." "I tell you that that other woman can be very useful to me." "In what way useful?" "Are you jealous, my dear?" "Certainly not of Lady Eustace,--nor of any woman. But it seems so odd that such a person's services should be required." "Will you do as I tell you, and ask them? You can go round and tell your aunt about it. She knows that I mean to ask them. Lady Eustace is a very rich woman, and is disposed to do a little in commerce. Now do you understand?" "Not in the least," said Emily. "Why shouldn't a woman who has money buy coffee as well as buy shares?" "Does she buy shares?" "By George, Emily, I think that you're a fool." "I dare say I am, Ferdinand. I do not in the least know what it all means. But I do know this, that you ought not, in papa's absence, to ask people to dine here whom he particularly dislikes, and whom he would not wish to have in his house." "You think that I am to be governed by you in such a matter as that?" "I do not want to govern you." "You think that a wife should dictate to a husband as to the way in which he is to do his work, and the partners he may be allowed to have in his business, and the persons whom he may ask to dinner! Because you have been dictating to me on all these matters. Now, look here, my dear. As to my business, you had better never speak to me about it any more. I have endeavoured to take you into my confidence and to get you to act with me, but you have declined that, and have preferred to stick to your father. As to my partners, whether I may choose to have Sexty Parker or Lady Eustace, I am a better judge than you. And as to asking Mrs. Leslie and Lady Eustace or any other persons to dinner, as I am obliged to make even the recreations of life subservient to its work, I must claim permission to have my own way." She had listened, but when he paused she made no reply. "Do you mean to do as I bid you and ask these ladies?" "I cannot do that. I know that it ought not to be done. This is papa's house, and we are living here as his guests." "D---- your papa!" he said as he burst out of the room. After a quarter of an hour he put his head again into the room and saw her sitting, like a statue, exactly where he had left her. "I have written the notes both to Lady Eustace and to Mrs. Leslie," he said. "You can't think it any sin at any rate to ask your aunt." "I will see my aunt," she said. "And remember I am not going to be your father's guest, as you call it. I mean to pay for the dinner myself, and to send in my own wines. Your father shall have nothing to complain of on that head." "Could you not ask them to Richmond, or to some hotel?" she said. "What; in October! If you think that I am going to live in a house in which I can't invite a friend to dinner, you are mistaken." And with that he took his departure. The whole thing had now become so horrible to her that she felt unable any longer to hold up her head. It seemed to her to be sacrilege that these women should come and sit in her father's room; but when she spoke of her father her husband had cursed him with scorn! Lopez was going to send food and wine into the house, which would be gall and wormwood to her father. At one time she thought she would at once write to her father and tell him of it all,--or perhaps telegraph to him; but she could not do so without letting her husband know what she had done, and then he would have justice on his side in calling her disobedient. Were she to do that, then it would indeed be necessary that she should take part against her husband. She had brought all this misery on herself and on her father because she had been obstinate in thinking that she could with certainty read a lover's character. As for love,--that of course had died away in her heart,--imperceptibly, though, alas, so quickly! It was impossible that she could continue to love a man who from day to day was teaching her mean lessons, and who was ever doing mean things, the meanness of which was so little apparent to himself that he did not scruple to divulge them to her. How could she love a man who would make no sacrifice either to her comfort, her pride, or her conscience? But still she might obey him,--if she could feel sure that obedience to him was a duty. Could it be a duty to sin against her father's wishes, and to assist in profaning his house and abusing his hospitality after this fashion? Then her mind again went back to the troubles of Mrs. Parker, and her absolute inefficiency in that matter. It seemed to her that she had given herself over body and soul and mind to some evil genius, and that there was no escape. "Of course we'll come," Mrs. Roby had said to her when she went round the corner into Berkeley Street early in the day. "Lopez spoke to me about it before." "What will papa say about it, Aunt Harriet?" "I suppose he and Lopez understand each other." "I do not think papa will understand this." "I am sure Mr. Wharton would not lend his house to his son-in-law, and then object to the man he had lent it to asking a friend to dine with him. And I am sure that Mr. Lopez would not consent to occupy a house on those terms. If you don't like it, of course we won't come." "Pray don't say that. As these other women are to come, pray do not desert me. But I cannot say I think it is right." Mrs. Dick, however, only laughed at her scruples. In the course of the evening Emily got letters addressed to herself from Lady Eustace and Mrs. Leslie, informing her that they would have very much pleasure in dining with her on the day named. And Lady Eustace went on to say, with much pleasantry, that she always regarded little parties, got up without any ceremony, as being the pleasantest, and that she should come on this occasion without any ceremonial observance. Then Emily was aware that her husband had not only written the notes in her name, but had put into her mouth some studied apology as to the shortness of the invitation. Well! She was the man's wife, and she supposed that he was entitled to put any words that he pleased into her mouth. CHAPTER XLVIII "Has He Ill-treated You?" Lopez relieved his wife from all care as to provision for his guests. "I've been to a shop in Wigmore Street," he said, "and everything will be done. They'll send in a cook to make the things hot, and your father won't have to pay even for a crust of bread." "Papa doesn't mind paying for anything," she said in her indignation. "It is all very pretty for you to say so, but my experience of him goes just the other way. At any rate there will be nothing to be paid for. Stewam and Sugarscraps will send in everything, if you'll only tell the old fogies downstairs not to interfere." Then she made a little request. Might she ask Everett, who was now in town? "I've already got Major Pountney and Captain Gunner," he said. She pleaded that one more would make no difference. "But that's just what one more always does. It destroys everything, and turns a pretty little dinner into an awkward feed. We won't have him this time. Pountney'll take you, and I'll take her ladyship. Dick will take Mrs. Leslie, and Gunner will have Aunt Harriet. Dick will sit opposite to me, and the four ladies will sit at the four corners. We shall be very pleasant, but one more would spoil us." She did speak to the "old fogies" downstairs,--the housekeeper, who had lived with her father since she was a child, and the butler, who had been there still longer, and the cook, who, having been in her place only three years, resigned impetuously within half-an-hour after the advent of Mr. Sugarscraps' head man. The "fogies" were indignant. The butler expressed his intention of locking himself up in his own peculiar pantry, and the housekeeper took upon herself to tell her young mistress that "Master wouldn't like it." Since she had known Mr. Wharton such a thing as cooked food being sent into the house from a shop had never been so much as heard of. Emily, who had hitherto been regarded in the house as a rather strong-minded young woman, could only break down and weep. Why, oh why, had she consented to bring herself and her misery into her father's house? She could at any rate have prevented that by explaining to her father the unfitness of such an arrangement. The "party" came. There was Major Pountney, very fine, rather loud, very intimate with the host, whom on one occasion he called "Ferdy, my boy," and very full of abuse of the Duke and Duchess of Omnium. "And yet she was a good creature when I knew her," said Lady Eustace. Pountney suggested that the Duchess had not then taken up politics. "I've got out of her way," said Lady Eustace, "since she did that." And there was Captain Gunner, who defended the Duchess, but who acknowledged that the Duke was the "most consumedly stuck-up cox-comb" then existing. "And the most dishonest," said Lopez, who had told his new friends nothing about the repayment of the election expenses. And Dick was there. He liked these little parties, in which a good deal of wine could be drunk, and at which ladies were not supposed to be very stiff. The Major and the Captain, and Mrs. Leslie and Lady Eustace, were such people as he liked,--all within the pale, but having a piquant relish of fastness and impropriety. Dick was wont to declare that he hated the world in buckram. Aunt Harriet was triumphant in a manner which disgusted Emily, and which she thought to be most disrespectful to her father;--but in truth Aunt Harriet did not now care very much for Mr. Wharton, preferring the friendship of Mr. Wharton's son-in-law. Mrs. Leslie came in gorgeous clothes, which, as she was known to be very poor, and to have attached herself lately with almost more than feminine affection to Lady Eustace, were at any rate open to suspicious cavil. In former days Mrs. Leslie had taken upon herself to say bitter things about Mr. Lopez, which Emily could now have repeated, to that lady's discomfiture, had such a mode of revenge suited her disposition. With Mrs. Leslie there was Lady Eustace, pretty as ever, and sharp and witty, with the old passion for some excitement, the old proneness to pretend to trust everybody, and the old incapacity for trusting anybody. Ferdinand Lopez had lately been at her feet, and had fired her imagination with stories of the grand things to be done in trade. Ladies do it? Yes; why not women as well as men? Any one might do it who had money in his pocket and experience to tell him, or to tell her, what to buy and what to sell. And the experience, luckily, might be vicarious. At the present moment half the jewels worn in London were,--if Ferdinand Lopez knew anything about it,--bought from the proceeds of such commerce. Of course there were misfortunes. But these came from a want of that experience which Ferdinand Lopez possessed, and which he was quite willing to place at the service of one whom he admired so thoroughly as he did Lady Eustace. Lady Eustace had been charmed, had seen her way into a new and most delightful life,--but had not yet put any of her money into the hands of Ferdinand Lopez. I cannot say that the dinner was good. It may be a doubt whether such tradesmen as Messrs. Stewam and Sugarscraps do ever produce good food;--or whether, with all the will in the world to do so, such a result is within their power. It is certain, I think, that the humblest mutton chop is better eating than any "Supreme of chicken after martial manner,"--as I have seen the dish named in a French bill of fare, translated by a French pastrycook for the benefit of his English customers,--when sent in from Messrs. Stewam and Sugarscraps even with their best exertions. Nor can it be said that the wine was good, though Mr. Sugarscraps, when he contracted for the whole entertainment, was eager in his assurance that he procured the very best that London could produce. But the outside look of things was handsome, and there were many dishes, and enough of servants to hand them, and the wines, if not good, were various. Probably Pountney and Gunner did not know good wines. Roby did, but was contented on this occasion to drink them bad. And everything went pleasantly, with perhaps a little too much noise;--everything except the hostess, who was allowed by general consent to be sad and silent;--till there came a loud double-rap at the door. "There's papa," said Emily, jumping up from her seat. Mrs. Dick looked at Lopez, and saw at a glance that for a moment his courage had failed him. But he recovered himself quickly. "Hadn't you better keep your seat, my dear?" he said to his wife. "The servants will attend to Mr. Wharton, and I will go to him presently." "Oh, no," said Emily, who by this time was almost at the door. "You didn't expect him,--did you?" asked Dick Roby. "Nobody knew when he was coming. I think he told Emily that he might be here any day." "He's the most uncertain man alive," said Mrs. Dick, who was a good deal scared by the arrival, though determined to hold up her head and exhibit no fear. "I suppose the old gentleman will come in and have some dinner," whispered Captain Gunner to his neighbour Mrs. Leslie. "Not if he knows I'm here," replied Mrs. Leslie, tittering. "He thinks that I am,--oh, something a great deal worse than I can tell you." "Is he given to be cross?" asked Lady Eustace, also affecting to whisper. "Never saw him in my life," answered the Major, "but I shouldn't wonder if he was. Old gentlemen generally are cross. Gout, and that kind of thing, you know." For a minute or two the servants stopped their ministrations, and things were very uncomfortable; but Lopez, as soon as he had recovered himself, directed Mr. Sugarscraps' men to proceed with the banquet. "We can eat our dinner, I suppose, though my father-in-law has come back," he said. "I wish my wife was not so fussy, though that is a kind of thing, Lady Eustace, that one has to expect from young wives." The banquet did go on, but the feeling was general that a misfortune had come upon them, and that something dreadful might possibly happen. Emily, when she rushed out, met her father in the hall, and ran into his arms. "Oh, papa!" she exclaimed. "What's all this about?" he asked, and as he spoke he passed on through the hall to his own room at the back of the house. There were of course many evidences on all sides of the party,--the strange servants, the dishes going in and out, the clatter of glasses, and the smell of viands. "You've got a dinner-party," he said. "Had you not better go back to your friends?" "No, papa." "What is the matter, Emily? You are unhappy." "Oh, so unhappy!" "What is it all about? Who are they? Whose doing is it,--yours or his? What makes you unhappy?" He was now seated in his arm-chair, and she threw herself on her knees at his feet. "He would have them. You mustn't be angry with me. You won't be angry with me;--will you?" He put his hand upon her head, and stroked her hair. "Why should I be angry with you because your husband has asked friends to dinner?" She was so unlike her usual self that he knew not what to make of it. It had not been her nature to kneel and to ask for pardon, or to be timid and submissive. "What is it, Emily, that makes you like this?" "He shouldn't have had the people." "Well;--granted. But it does not signify much. Is your aunt Harriet there?" "Yes." "It can't be very bad, then." "Mrs. Leslie is there, and Lady Eustace,--and two men I don't like." "Is Everett here?" "No;--he wouldn't have Everett." "Oughtn't you to go to them?" "Don't make me go. I should only cry. I have been crying all day, and the whole of yesterday." Then she buried her face upon his knees, and sobbed as though she would break her heart. He couldn't at all understand it. Though he distrusted his son-in-law, and certainly did not love him, he had not as yet learned to hold him in aversion. When the connection was once made he had determined to make the best of it, and had declared to himself that as far as manners went the man was well enough. He had not as yet seen the inside of the man, as it had been the sad fate of the poor wife to see him. It had never occurred to him that his daughter's love had failed her, or that she could already be repenting what she had done. And now, when she was weeping at his feet and deploring the sin of the dinner-party,--which, after all, was a trifling sin,--he could not comprehend the feelings which were actuating her. "I suppose your aunt Harriet made up the party," he said. "He did it." "Your husband?" "Yes;--he did it. He wrote to the women in my name when I refused." Then Mr. Wharton began to perceive that there had been a quarrel. "I told him Mrs. Leslie oughtn't to come here." "I don't love Mrs. Leslie,--nor, for the matter of that, Lady Eustace. But they won't hurt the house, my dear." "And he has had the dinner sent in from a shop." "Why couldn't he let Mrs. Williams do it?" As he said this, the tone of his voice became for the first time angry. "Cook has gone away. She wouldn't stand it. And Mrs. Williams is very angry. And Barker wouldn't wait at table." "What's the meaning of it all?" "He would have it so. Oh, papa, you don't know what I've undergone. I wish,--I wish we had not come here. It would have been better anywhere else." "What would have been better, dear?" "Everything. Whether we lived or died, it would have been better. Why should I bring my misery to you? Oh, papa, you do not know,--you can never know." "But I must know. Is there more than this dinner to disturb you?" "Oh, yes;--more than that. Only I couldn't bear that it should be done in your house." "Has he--ill-treated you?" Then she got up, and stood before him. "I do not mean to complain. I should have said nothing only that you have found us in this way. For myself I will bear it all, whatever it may be. But, papa, I want you to tell him that we must leave this house." "He has got no other home for you." "He must find one. I will go anywhere. I don't care where it is. But I won't stay here. I have done it myself, but I won't bring it upon you. I could bear it all if I thought that you would never see me again." "Emily!" "Yes;--if you would never see me again. I know it all, and that would be best." She was now walking about the room. "Why should you see it all?" "See what, my love?" "See his ruin, and my unhappiness, and my baby. Oh,--oh,--oh!" "I think so very differently, Emily, that under no circumstances will I have you taken to another home. I cannot understand much of all this yet, but I suppose I shall come to see it. If Lopez be, as you say, ruined, it is well that I have still enough for us to live on. This is a bad time just now to talk about your husband's affairs." "I did not mean to talk about them, papa." "What would you like best to do now,--now at once. Can you go down again to your husband's friends?" "No;--no;--no." "As for the dinner, never mind about that. I can't blame him for making use of my house in my absence, as far as that goes,--though I wish he could have contented himself with such a dinner as my servants could have prepared for him. I will have some tea here." "Let me stay with you, papa, and make it for you." "Very well, dear. I do not mean to be ashamed to enter my own dining-room. I shall, therefore, go in and make your apologies." Thereupon Mr. Wharton walked slowly forth and marched into the dining-room. "Oh, Mr. Wharton," said Mrs. Dick, "we didn't expect you." "Have you dined yet, sir?" asked Lopez. "I dined early," said Mr. Wharton. "I should not now have come in to disturb you, but that I have found Mrs. Lopez unwell, and she has begged me to ask you to excuse her." "I will go to her," said Lopez, rising. "It is not necessary," said Wharton. "She is not ill, but hardly able to take her place at table." Then Mrs. Dick proposed to go to her dear niece; but Mr. Wharton would not allow it, and left the room, having succeeded in persuading them to go on with their dinner. Lopez certainly was not happy during the evening, but he was strong enough to hide his misgivings, and to do his duty as host with seeming cheerfulness. CHAPTER XLIX "Where Is Guatemala?" Though his daughter's words to him had been very wild they did almost more to convince Mr. Wharton that he should not give his money to his son-in-law than even the letters which had passed between them. To Emily herself he spoke very little as to what had occurred that evening. "Papa," she said, "do not ask me anything more about it. I was very miserable,--because of the dinner." Nor did he at that time ask her any questions, contenting himself with assuring her that, at any rate at present, and till after her baby should have been born, she must remain in Manchester Square. "He won't hurt me," said Mr. Wharton, and then added with a smile, "He won't have to have any more dinner-parties while I am here." Nor did he make any complaint to Lopez as to what had been done, or even allude to the dinner. But when he had been back about a week he announced to his son-in-law his final determination as to money. "I had better tell you, Lopez, what I mean to do, so that you may not be left in doubt. I shall not intrust any further sum of money into your hands on behalf of Emily." "You can do as you please, sir,--of course." "Just so. You have had what to me is a very considerable sum,--though I fear that it did not go for much in your large concerns." "It was not very much, Mr. Wharton." "I dare say not. Opinions on such a matter differ, you know. At any rate, there will be no more. At present I wish Emily to live here, and you, of course, are welcome here also. If things are not going well with you, this will, at any rate, relieve you from immediate expense." "My calculations, sir, have never descended to that." "Mine are more minute. The necessities of my life have caused me to think of these little things. When I am dead there will be provision for Emily made by my will,--the income going to trustees for her benefit, and the capital to her children after her death. I thought it only fair to you that this should be explained." "And you will do nothing for me?" "Nothing;--if that is nothing. I should have thought that your present maintenance and the future support of your wife and children would have been regarded as something." "It is nothing;--nothing!" "Then let it be nothing. Good morning." Two days after that Lopez recurred to the subject. "You were very explicit with me the other day, sir." "I meant to be so." "And I will be equally so to you now. Both I and your daughter are absolutely ruined unless you reconsider your purpose." "If you mean money by reconsideration,--present money to be given to you,--I certainly shall not reconsider it. You may take my solemn assurance that I will give you nothing that can be of any service to you in trade." "Then, sir,--I must tell you my purpose, and give you my assurance, which is equally solemn. Under those circumstances I must leave England, and try my fortune in Central America. There is an opening for me at Guatemala, though not a very hopeful one." "Guatemala!" "Yes;--friends of mine have a connection there. I have not broken it to Emily yet, but under these circumstances she will have to go." "You will not take her to Guatemala!" "Not take my wife, sir? Indeed I shall. Do you suppose that I would go away and leave my wife a pensioner on your bounty? Do you think that she would wish to desert her husband? I don't think you know your daughter." "I wish you had never known her." "That is neither here nor there, sir. If I cannot succeed in this country I must go elsewhere. As I have told you before, £20,000 at the present moment would enable me to surmount all my difficulties, and make me a very wealthy man. But unless I can command some such sum by Christmas everything here must be sacrificed." "Never in my life did I hear so base a proposition," said Mr. Wharton. "Why is it base? I can only tell you the truth." "So be it. You will find that I mean what I have said." "So do I, Mr. Wharton." "As to my daughter, she must, of course, do as she thinks fit." "She must do as I think fit, Mr. Wharton." "I will not argue with you. Alas, alas; poor girl!" "Poor girl, indeed! She is likely to be a poor girl if she is treated in this way by her father. As I understand that you intend to use, or to try to use, authority over her, I shall take steps for removing her at once from your house." And so the interview was ended. Lopez had thought the matter over, and had determined to "brazen it out," as he himself called it. Nothing further was, he thought, to be got by civility and obedience. Now he must use his power. His idea of going to Guatemala was not an invention of the moment, nor was it devoid of a certain basis of truth. Such a suggestion had been made to him some time since by Mr. Mills Happerton. There were mines in Guatemala which wanted, or at some future day might want, a resident director. The proposition had been made to Lopez before his marriage, and Mr. Happerton probably had now forgotten all about it;--but the thing was of service now. He broke the matter very suddenly to his wife. "Has your father been speaking to you of my plans?" "Not lately;--not that I remember." "He could not speak of them without your remembering, I should think. Has he told you that I am going to Guatemala?" "Guatemala! Where is Guatemala, Ferdinand?" "You can answer my question though your geography is deficient." "He has said nothing about your going anywhere." "You will have to go,--as soon after Christmas as you may be fit." "But where is Guatemala;--and for how long, Ferdinand?" "Guatemala is in Central America, and we shall probably settle there for the rest of our lives. I have got nothing to live on here." During the next two months this plan of seeking a distant home and a strange country was constantly spoken of in Manchester Square, and did receive corroboration from Mr. Happerton himself. Lopez renewed his application and received a letter from that gentleman saying that the thing might probably be arranged if he were in earnest. "I am quite in earnest," Lopez said as he showed this letter to Mr. Wharton. "I suppose Emily will be able to start two months after her confinement. They tell me that babies do very well at sea." During this time, in spite of his threat, he continued to live with Mr. Wharton in Manchester Square, and went every day into the city,--whether to make arrangements and receive instructions as to Guatemala, or to carry on his old business, neither Emily nor her father knew. He never at this time spoke about his affairs to either of them, but daily referred to her future expatriation as a thing that was certain. At last there came up the actual question,--whether she were to go or not. Her father told her that though she was doubtless bound by law to obey her husband, in such a matter as this she might defy the law. "I do not think that he can actually force you on board the ship," her father said. "But if he tells me that I must go?" "Stay here with me," said the father. "Stay here with your baby. I'll fight it out for you. I'll so manage that you shall have all the world on your side." Emily at that moment came to no decision, but on the following day she discussed the matter with Lopez himself. "Of course you will go with me," he said, when she asked the question. "You mean that I must, whether I wish to go or not." "Certainly you must. Good G----! where is a wife's place? Am I to go out without my child, and without you, while you are enjoying all the comforts of your father's wealth at home? That is not my idea of life." "Ferdinand, I have been thinking about it very much. I must beg you to allow me to remain. I ask it of you as if I were asking my life." "Your father has put you up to this." "No;--not to this." "To what then?" "My father thinks that I should refuse to go." "He does, does he?" "But I shall not refuse. I shall go if you insist upon it. There shall be no contest between us about that." "Well; I should hope not." "But I do implore you to spare me." "That is very selfish, Emily." "Yes,"--she said, "yes. I cannot contradict that. But so is the man selfish who prays the judge to spare his life." "But you do not think of me. I must go." "I shall not make you happier, Ferdinand." "Do you think that it is a fine thing for a man to live in such a country as that all alone?" "I think he would be better so than with a wife he does not--love." "Who says I do not love you?" "Or with one who does--not--love him." This she said very slowly, very softly, but looking up into his eyes as she said it. "Do you tell me that to my face?" "Yes;--what good can I do now by lying? You have not been to me as I thought you would be." "And so, because you have built up some castle in the air that has fallen to pieces, you tell your husband to his face that you do not love him, and that you prefer not to live with him. Is that your idea of duty?" "Why have you been so cruel?" "Cruel! What have I done? Tell me what cruelty. Have I beat you? Have you been starved? Have I not asked and implored your assistance,--only to be refused? The fact is that your father and you have found out that I am not a rich man, and you want to be rid of me. Is that true or false?" "It is not true that I want to be rid of you because you are poor." "I do not mean to be rid of you. You will have to settle down and do your work as my wife in whatever place it may suit me to live. Your father is a rich man, but you shall not have the advantage of his wealth unless it comes to you, as it ought to come, through my hands. If your father would give me the fortune which ought to be yours there need be no going abroad. He cannot bear to part with his money, and therefore we must go. Now you know all about it." She was then turning to leave him, when he asked her a direct question. "Am I to understand that you intend to resist my right to take you with me?" "If you bid me go,--I shall go." "It will be better, as you will save both trouble and exposure." Of course she told her father what had taken place, but he could only shake his head, and sit groaning over his misery in his chambers. He had explained to her what he was willing to do on her behalf, but she declined his aid. He could not tell her that she was wrong. She was the man's wife, and out of that terrible destiny she could not now escape. The only question with him was whether it would not be best to buy the man,--give him a sum of money to go, and to go alone. Could he have been quit of the man even for £20,000, he would willingly have paid the money. But the man would either not go, or would come back as soon as he had got the money. His own life, as he passed it now, with this man in the house with him, was horrible to him. For Lopez, though he had more than once threatened that he would carry his wife to another home, had taken no steps towards getting that other home ready for her. During all this time Mr. Wharton had not seen his son. Everett had gone abroad just as his father returned to London from Brighton, and was still on the continent. He received his allowance punctually, and that was the only intercourse which took place between them. But Emily had written to him, not telling him much of her troubles,--only saying that she believed that her husband would take her to Central America early in the spring, and begging him to come home before she went. Just before Christmas her baby was born, but the poor child did not live a couple of days. She herself at the time was so worn with care, so thin and wan and wretched, that looking in the glass she hardly knew her own face. "Ferdinand," she said to him, "I know he will not live. The Doctor says so." "Nothing thrives that I have to do with," he answered gloomily. "Will you not look at him?" "Well; yes. I have looked at him, have I not? I wish to God that where he is going I could go with him." "I wish I was;--I wish I was going," said the poor mother. Then the father went out, and before he had returned to the house the child was dead. "Oh, Ferdinand, speak one kind word to me now," she said. "What kind word can I speak when you have told me that you do not love me? Do you think that I can forget that because--because he has gone?" "A woman's love may always be won back again by kindness." "Psha! How am I to kiss and make pretty speeches with my mind harassed as it is now?" But he did touch her brow with his lips before he went away. The infant was buried, and then there was not much show of mourning in the house. The poor mother would sit gloomily alone day after day, telling herself that it was perhaps better that she should have been robbed of her treasure than have gone forth with him into the wide, unknown, harsh world with such a father as she had given him. Then she would look at all the preparations she had made,--the happy work of her fingers when her thoughts of their future use were her sweetest consolation,--and weep till she would herself feel that there never could be an end to her tears. The second week in January had come and yet nothing further had been settled as to this Guatemala project. Lopez talked about it as though it was certain, and even told his wife that as they would move so soon it would not be now worth while for him to take other lodgings for her. But when she asked as to her own preparations,--the wardrobe necessary for the long voyage and her general outfit,--he told her that three weeks or a fortnight would be enough for all, and that he would give her sufficient notice. "Upon my word he is very kind to honour my poor house as he does," said Mr. Wharton. "Papa, we will go at once if you wish it," said his daughter. "Nay, Emily; do not turn upon me. I cannot but be sensible to the insult of his daily presence; but even that is better than losing you." Then there occurred a ludicrous incident,--or combination of incidents,--which, in spite of their absurdity, drove Mr. Wharton almost frantic. First there came to him the bill from Messrs. Stewam and Sugarscraps for the dinner. At this time he kept nothing back from his daughter. "Look at that!" he said. The bill was absolutely made out in his name. "It is a mistake, papa." "Not at all. The dinner was given in my house, and I must pay for it. I would sooner do so than that he should pay it,--even if he had the means." So he paid Messrs. Stewam and Sugarscraps £25 9s. 6d., begging them as he did so never to send another dinner into his house, and observing that he was in the habit of entertaining his friends at less than three guineas a head. "But Château Yquem and Côte d'Or!" said Mr. Sugarscraps. "Château fiddlesticks!" said Mr. Wharton, walking out of the house with his receipt. Then came the bill for the brougham,--for the brougham from the very day of their return to town after their wedding trip. This he showed to Lopez. Indeed the bill had been made out to Lopez and sent to Mr. Wharton with an apologetic note. "I didn't tell him to send it," said Lopez. "But will you pay it?" "I certainly shall not ask you to pay it." But Mr. Wharton at last did pay it, and he also paid the rent of the rooms in the Belgrave Mansions, and between £30 and £40 for dresses which Emily had got at Lewes and Allenby's under her husband's orders in the first days of their married life in London. "Oh, papa, I wish I had not gone there," she said. "My dear, anything that you may have had I do not grudge in the least. And even for him, if he would let you remain here, I would pay willingly. I would supply all his wants if he would only--go away." CHAPTER L Mr. Slide's Revenge "Do you mean to say, my lady, that the Duke paid his electioneering bill down at Silverbridge?" "I do mean to say so, Mr. Slide." Lady Eustace nodded her head, and Mr. Quintus Slide opened his mouth. "Goodness gracious!" said Mrs. Leslie, who was sitting with them. They were in Lady Eustace's drawing-room, and the patriotic editor of the "People's Banner" was obtaining from a new ally information which might be useful to the country. "But 'ow do you know, Lady Eustace? You'll pardon the persistency of my inquiries, but when you come to public information accuracy is everything. I never trust myself to mere report. I always travel up to the very fountain 'ead of truth." "I know it," said Lizzy Eustace oracularly. "Um--m!" The Editor as he ejaculated the sound looked at her ladyship with admiring eyes,--with eyes that were intended to flatter. But Lizzie had been looked at so often in so many ways, and was so well accustomed to admiration, that this had no effect on her at all. "'E didn't tell you himself; did 'e, now?" "Can you tell me the truth as to trusting him with my money?" "Yes, I can." "Shall I be safe if I take the papers which he calls bills of sale?" "One good turn deserves another, my lady." "I don't want to make a secret of it, Mr. Slide. Pountney found it out. You know the Major?" "Yes, I know Major Pountney. He was at Gatherum 'imself, and got a little bit of cold shoulder;--didn't he?" "I dare say he did. What has that to do with it? You may be sure that Lopez applied to the Duke for his expenses at Silverbridge, and that the Duke sent him the money." "There's no doubt about it, Mr. Slide," said Mrs. Leslie. "We got it all from Major Pountney. There was some bet between him and Pountney, and he had to show Pountney the cheque." "Pountney saw the money," said Lady Eustace. Mr. Slide stroked his hand over his mouth and chin as he sat thinking of the tremendous national importance of this communication. The man who had paid the money was the Prime Minister of England,--and was, moreover, Mr. Slide's enemy! "When the right 'and of fellowship has been rejected, I never forgive," Mr. Slide has been heard to say. Even Lady Eustace, who was not particular as to the appearance of people, remarked afterwards to her friend that Mr. Slide had looked like the devil as he was stroking his face. "It's very remarkable," said Mr. Slide; "very remarkable!" "You won't tell the Major that we told you," said her Ladyship. "Oh dear, no. I only just wanted to 'ear how it was. And as to embarking your money, my lady, with Ferdinand Lopez,--I wouldn't do it." "Not if I get the bills of sale? It's for rum, and they say rum will go up to any price." "Don't, Lady Eustace. I can't say any more,--but don't. I never mention names. But don't." Then Mr. Slide went at once in search of Major Pountney, and having found the Major at his club extracted from him all that he knew about the Silverbridge payment. Pountney had really seen the Duke's cheque for £500. "There was some bet,--eh, Major?" asked Mr. Slide. "No, there wasn't. I know who has been telling you. That's Lizzie Eustace, and just like her mischief. The way of it was this;--Lopez, who was very angry, had boasted that he would bring the Duke down on his marrow-bones. I was laughing at him as we sat at dinner one day afterwards, and he took out the cheque and showed it me. There was the Duke's own signature for £500,--'Omnium,' as plain as letters could make it." Armed with this full information, Mr. Slide felt that he had done all that the most punctilious devotion to accuracy could demand of him, and immediately shut himself up in his cage at the "People's Banner" office and went to work. This occurred about the first week in January. The Duke was then at Matching with his wife and a very small party. The singular arrangement which had been effected by the Duchess in the early autumn had passed off without any wonderful effects. It had been done by her in pique, and the result had been apparently so absurd that it had at first frightened her. But in the end it answered very well. The Duke took great pleasure in Lady Rosina's company, and enjoyed the comparative solitude which enabled him to work all day without interruption. His wife protested that it was just what she liked, though it must be feared that she soon became weary of it. To Lady Rosina it was of course a Paradise on earth. In September, Phineas Finn and his wife came to them, and in October there were other relaxations and other business. The Prime Minister and his wife visited their Sovereign, and he made some very useful speeches through the country on his old favourite subject of decimal coinage. At Christmas, for a fortnight, they went to Gatherum Castle and entertained the neighbourhood,--the nobility and squirearchy dining there on one day, and the tenants and other farmers on another. All this went very smoothly, and the Duke did not become outrageously unhappy because the "People's Banner" made sundry severe remarks on the absence of Cabinet Councils through the autumn. After Christmas they returned to Matching, and had some of their old friends with them. There was the Duke of St. Bungay and the Duchess, and Phineas Finn and his wife, and Lord and Lady Cantrip, Barrington Erle, and one or two others. But at this period there came a great trouble. One morning as the Duke sat in his own room after breakfast he read an article in the "People's Banner," of which the following sentences were a part. "We wish to know by whom were paid the expenses incurred by Mr. Ferdinand Lopez during the late contest at Silverbridge. It may be that they were paid by that gentleman himself,--in which case we shall have nothing further to say, not caring at the present moment to inquire whether those expenses were or were not excessive. It may be that they were paid by subscription among his political friends,--and if so, again we shall be satisfied. Or it is possible that funds were supplied by a new political club of which we have lately heard much, and with the action of such a body we of course have nothing to do. If an assurance can be given to us by Mr. Lopez or his friends that such was the case we shall be satisfied. "But a report has reached us, and we may say more than a report, which makes it our duty to ask this question. Were those expenses paid out of the private pocket of the present Prime Minister? If so, we maintain that we have discovered a blot in that nobleman's character which it is our duty to the public to expose. We will go farther and say that if it be so,--if these expenses were paid out of the private pocket of the Duke of Omnium, it is not fit that that nobleman should any longer hold the high office which he now fills. "We know that a peer should not interfere in elections for the House of Commons. We certainly know that a Minister of the Crown should not attempt to purchase parliamentary support. We happen to know also the almost more than public manner,--are we not justified in saying the ostentation?--with which at the last election the Duke repudiated all that influence with the borough which his predecessors, and we believe he himself, had so long exercised. He came forward telling us that he, at least, meant to have clean hands;--that he would not do as his forefathers had done;--that he would not even do as he himself had done in former years. What are we to think of the Duke of Omnium as a Minister of this country, if, after such assurances, he has out of his own pocket paid the electioneering expenses of a candidate at Silverbridge?" There was much more in the article, but the passages quoted will suffice to give the reader a sufficient idea of the accusation made, and which the Duke read in the retirement of his own chamber. He read it twice before he allowed himself to think of the matter. The statement made was at any rate true to the letter. He had paid the man's electioneering expenses. That he had done so from the purest motives he knew and the reader knows;--but he could not even explain those motives without exposing his wife. Since the cheque was sent he had never spoken of the occurrence to any human being,--but he had thought of it very often. At the time his private Secretary, with much hesitation, almost with trepidation, had counselled him not to send the money. The Duke was a man with whom it was very easy to work, whose courtesy to all dependent on him was almost exaggerated, who never found fault, and was anxious as far as possible to do everything for himself. The comfort of those around him was always matter of interest to him. Everything he held, he held as it were in trust for the enjoyment of others. But he was a man whom it was very difficult to advise. He did not like advice. He was so thin-skinned that any counsel offered to him took the form of criticism. When cautioned what shoes he should wear,--as had been done by Lady Rosina, or what wine or what horses he should buy, as was done by his butler and coachman, he was thankful, taking no pride to himself for knowledge as to shoes, wine, or horses. But as to his own conduct, private or public, as to any question of politics, as to his opinions and resolutions, he was jealous of interference. Mr. Warburton therefore had almost trembled when asking the Duke whether he was quite sure about sending the money to Lopez. "Quite sure," the Duke had answered, having at that time made up his mind. Mr. Warburton had not dared to express a further doubt, and the money had been sent. But from the moment of sending it doubts had repeated themselves in the Prime Minister's mind. Now he sat with the newspaper in his hand thinking of it. Of course it was open to him to take no notice of the matter,--to go on as though he had not seen the article, and to let the thing die if it would die. But he knew Mr. Quintus Slide and his paper well enough to be sure that it would not die. The charge would be repeated in the "People's Banner" till it was copied into other papers; and then the further question would be asked,--why had the Prime Minister allowed such an accusation to remain unanswered? But if he did notice it, what notice should he take of it? It was true. And surely he had a right to do what he liked with his own money so long as he disobeyed no law. He had bribed no one. He had spent his money with no corrupt purpose. His sense of honour had taught him to think that the man had received injury through his wife's imprudence, and that he therefore was responsible as far as the pecuniary loss was concerned. He was not ashamed of the thing he had done;--but yet he was ashamed that it should be discussed in public. Why had he allowed himself to be put into a position in which he was subject to such grievous annoyance? Since he had held his office he had not had a happy day, nor,--so he told himself,--had he received from it any slightest gratification, nor could he buoy himself up with the idea that he was doing good service for his country. After a while he walked into the next room and showed the paper to Mr. Warburton. "Perhaps you were right," he said, "when you told me not to send that money." "It will matter nothing," said the private Secretary when he had read it,--thinking, however, that it might matter much, but wishing to spare the Duke. "I was obliged to repay the man as the Duchess had--had encouraged him. The Duchess had not quite--quite understood my wishes." Mr. Warburton knew the whole history now, having discussed it all with the Duchess more than once. "I think your Grace should take no notice of the article." No notice was taken of it, but three days afterwards there appeared a short paragraph in large type,--beginning with a question. "Does the Duke of Omnium intend to answer the question asked by us last Friday? Is it true that he paid the expenses of Mr. Lopez when that gentleman stood for Silverbridge? The Duke may be assured that the question shall be repeated till it is answered." This the Duke also saw and took to his private Secretary. "I would do nothing at any rate till it be noticed in some other paper," said the private Secretary. "The 'People's Banner' is known to be scandalous." "Of course it is scandalous. And, moreover, I know the motives and the malice of the wretched man who is the editor. But the paper is read, and the foul charge if repeated will become known, and the allegation made is true. I did pay the man's election expenses;--and, moreover, to tell the truth openly as I do not scruple to do to you, I am not prepared to state publicly the reason why I did so. And nothing but that reason could justify me." "Then I think your Grace should state it." "I cannot do so." "The Duke of St. Bungay is here. Would it not be well to tell the whole affair to him?" "I will think of it. I do not know why I should have troubled you." "Oh, my lord!" "Except that there is always some comfort in speaking even of one's trouble. I will think about it. In the meantime you need perhaps not mention it again." "Who? I? Oh, certainly not." "I did not mean to others,--but to myself. I will turn it in my mind and speak of it when I have decided anything." And he did think about it,--thinking of it so much that he could hardly get the matter out of his mind day or night. To his wife he did not allude to it at all. Why trouble her with it? She had caused the evil, and he had cautioned her as to the future. She could not help him out of the difficulty she had created. He continued to turn the matter over in his thoughts till he so magnified it, and built it up into such proportions, that he again began to think that he must resign. It was, he thought, true that a man should not remain in office as Prime Minister who in such a matter could not clear his own conduct. Then there was a third attack in the "People's Banner," and after that the matter was noticed in the "Evening Pulpit." This notice the Duke of St. Bungay saw and mentioned to Mr. Warburton. "Has the Duke spoken to you of some allegations made in the press as to the expenses of the late election at Silverbridge?" The old Duke was at this time, and had been for some months, in a state of nervous anxiety about his friend. He had almost admitted to himself that he had been wrong in recommending a politician so weakly organised to take the office of Prime Minister. He had expected the man to be more manly,--had perhaps expected him to be less conscientiously scrupulous. But now, as the thing had been done, it must be maintained. Who else was there to take the office? Mr. Gresham would not. To keep Mr. Daubeny out was the very essence of the Duke of St. Bungay's life,--the turning-point of his political creed, the one grand duty the idea of which was always present to him. And he had, moreover, a most true and most affectionate regard for the man whom he now supported, appreciating the sweetness of his character,--believing still in the Minister's patriotism, intelligence, devotion, and honesty; though he was forced to own to himself that the strength of a man's heart was wanting. "Yes," said Warburton; "he did mention it." "Does it trouble him?" "Perhaps you had better speak to him about it." Both the old Duke and the private Secretary were as fearful and nervous about the Prime Minister as a mother is for a weakly child. They could hardly tell their opinions to each other, but they understood one another, and between them they coddled their Prime Minister. They were specially nervous as to what might be done by the Prime Minister's wife, nervous as to what was done by every one who came in contact with him. It had been once suggested by the private Secretary that Lady Rosina should be sent for, as she had a soothing effect upon the Prime Minister's spirit. "Has it irritated him?" asked the Duke. "Well;--yes, it has;--a little, you know. I think your Grace had better speak to him;--and not perhaps mention my name." The Duke of St. Bungay nodded his head, and said that he would speak to the great man and would not mention any one's name. And he did speak. "Has any one said anything to you about it?" asked the Prime Minister. "I saw it in the 'Evening Pulpit' myself. I have not heard it mentioned anywhere." "I did pay the man's expenses." "You did!" "Yes,--when the election was over, and, as far as I can remember, some time after it was over. He wrote to me saying that he had incurred such and such expenses, and asking me to repay him. I sent him a cheque for the amount." "But why?" "I was bound in honour to do it." "But why?" There was a short pause before this second question was answered. "The man had been induced to stand by representations made to him from my house. He had been, I fear, promised certain support which certainly was not given him when the time came." "You had not promised it?" "No;--not I." "Was it the Duchess?" "Upon the whole, my friend, I think I would rather not discuss it further, even with you. It is right that you should know that I did pay the money,--and also why I paid it. It may also be necessary that we should consider whether there may be any further probable result from my doing so. But the money has been paid, by me myself,--and was paid for the reason I have stated." "A question might be asked in the House." "If so, it must be answered as I have answered you. I certainly shall not shirk any responsibility that may be attached to me." "You would not like Warburton to write a line to the newspaper?" "What;--to the 'People's Banner!'" "It began there, did it? No, not to the 'People's Banner,' but to the 'Evening Pulpit.' He could say, you know, that the money was paid by you, and that the payment had been made because your agents had misapprehended your instructions." "It would not be true," said the Prime Minister, slowly. "As far as I can understand that was what occurred," said the other Duke. "My instructions were not misapprehended. They were disobeyed. I think that perhaps we had better say no more about it." "Do not think that I wish to press you," said the old man, tenderly; "but I fear that something ought to be done;--I mean for your own comfort." "My comfort!" said the Prime Minister. "That has vanished long ago;--and my peace of mind, and my happiness." "There has been nothing done which cannot be explained with perfect truth. There has been no impropriety." "I do not know." "The money was paid simply from an over-nice sense of honour." "It cannot be explained. I cannot explain it even to you, and how then can I do it to all the gaping fools of the country who are ready to trample upon a man simply because he is in some way conspicuous among them?" After that the old Duke again spoke to Mr. Warburton, but Mr. Warburton was very loyal to his chief. "Could one do anything by speaking to the Duchess?" said the old Duke. "I think not." "I suppose it was her Grace who did it all." "I cannot say. My own impression is that he had better wait till the Houses meet, and then, if any question is asked, let it be answered. He himself would do it in the House of Lords, or Mr. Finn or Barrington Erle, in our House. It would surely be enough to explain that his Grace had been made to believe that the man had received encouragement at Silverbridge from his own agents, which he himself had not intended should be given, and that therefore he had thought it right to pay the money. After such an explanation what more could any one say?" "You might do it yourself." "I never speak." "But in such a case as that you might do so; and then there would be no necessity for him to talk to another person on the matter." So the affair was left for the present, though the allusions to it in the "People's Banner" were still continued. Nor did any other of the Prime Minister's colleagues dare to speak to him on the subject. Barrington Erle and Phineas Finn talked of it among themselves, but they did not mention it even to the Duchess. She would have gone to her husband at once; and they were too careful of him to risk such a proceeding. It certainly was the case that among them they coddled the Prime Minister. CHAPTER LI Coddling the Prime Minister Parliament was to meet on the 12th of February, and it was of course necessary that there should be a Cabinet Council before that time. The Prime Minister, about the end of the third week in January, was prepared to name a day for this, and did so, most unwillingly. But he was then ill, and talked both to his friend the old Duke and his private Secretary of having the meeting held without him. "Impossible!" said the old Duke. "If I could not go it would have to be possible." "We could all come here if it were necessary." "Bring fourteen or fifteen ministers out of town because a poor creature such as I am is ill!" But in truth the Duke of St. Bungay hardly believed in this illness. The Prime Minister was unhappy rather than ill. By this time everybody in the House,--and almost everybody in the country who read the newspapers,--had heard of Mr. Lopez and his election expenses,--except the Duchess. No one had yet dared to tell her. She saw the newspapers daily, but probably did not read them very attentively. Nevertheless she knew that something was wrong. Mr. Warburton hovered about the Prime Minister more tenderly than usual; the Duke of St. Bungay was more concerned; the world around her was more mysterious, and her husband more wretched. "What is it that's going on?" she said one day to Phineas Finn. "Everything,--in the same dull way as usual." "If you don't tell me, I'll never speak to you again. I know there is something wrong." "The Duke, I'm afraid, is not quite well." "What makes him ill? I know well when he's ill and when he's well. He's troubled by something." "I think he is, Duchess. But as he has not spoken to me I am loath to make guesses. If there be anything, I can only guess at it." Then she questioned Mrs. Finn, and got an answer which, if not satisfactory, was at any rate explanatory. "I think he is uneasy about that Silverbridge affair." "What Silverbridge affair?" "You know that he paid the expenses which that man Lopez says that he incurred." "Yes;--I know that." "And you know that that other man Slide has found it out, and published it all in the 'People's Banner'?" "No!" "Yes, indeed. And a whole army of accusations has been brought against him. I have never liked to tell you, and yet I do not think that you should be left in the dark." "Everybody deceives me," said the Duchess angrily. "Nay;--there has been no deceit." "Everybody keeps things from me. I think you will kill me among you. It was my doing. Why do they attack him? I will write to the papers. I encouraged the man after Plantagenet had determined that he should not be assisted,--and, because I had done so, he paid the man his beggarly money. What is there to hurt him in that? Let me bear it. My back is broad enough." "The Duke is very sensitive." "I hate people to be sensitive. It makes them cowards. A man when he is afraid of being blamed, dares not at last even show himself, and has to be wrapped up in lamb's wool." "Of course men are differently organised." "Yes;--but the worst of it is, that when they suffer from this weakness, which you call sensitiveness, they think that they are made of finer material than other people. Men shouldn't be made of Sèvres china, but of good stone earthenware. However, I don't want to abuse him, poor fellow." "I don't think you ought." "I know what that means. You do want to abuse me. So they've been bullying him about the money he paid to that man Lopez. How did anybody know anything about it?" "Lopez must have told of it," said Mrs. Finn. "The worst, my dear, of trying to know a great many people is, that you are sure to get hold of some that are very bad. Now that man is very bad. Yet they say he has married a nice wife." "That's often the case, Duchess." "And the contrary;--isn't it, my dear? But I shall have it out with Plantagenet. If I have to write letters to all the newspapers myself, I'll put it right." She certainly coddled her husband less than the others; and, indeed, in her heart of hearts disapproved altogether of the coddling system. But she was wont at this particular time to be somewhat tender to him because she was aware that she herself had been imprudent. Since he had discovered her interference at Silverbridge, and had made her understand its pernicious results, she had been,--not, perhaps, shamefaced, for that word describes a condition to which hardly any series of misfortunes could have reduced the Duchess of Omnium,--but inclined to quiescence by feelings of penitence. She was less disposed than heretofore to attack him with what the world of yesterday calls "chaff," or with what the world of to-day calls "cheek." She would not admit to herself that she was cowed;--but the greatness of the game and the high interest attached to her husband's position did in some degree dismay her. Nevertheless she executed her purpose of "having it out with Plantagenet." "I have just heard," she said, having knocked at the door of his own room, and having found him alone,--"I have just heard, for the first time, that there is a row about the money you paid to Mr. Lopez." "Who told you?" "Nobody told me,--in the usual sense of the word. I presumed that something was the matter, and then I got it out from Marie. Why had you not told me?" "Why should I tell you?" "But why not? If anything troubled me I should tell you. That is, if it troubled me much." "You take it for granted that this does trouble me much." He was smiling as he said this, but the smile passed very quickly from his face. "I will not, however, deceive you. It does trouble me." "I knew very well that something was wrong." "I have not complained." "One can see as much as that without words. What is it that you fear? What can the man do to you? What matter is it to you if such a one as that pours out his malice on you? Let it run off like the rain from the housetops. You are too big even to be stung by such a reptile as that." He looked into her face, admiring the energy with which she spoke to him. "As for answering him," she continued to say, "that may or may not be proper. If it should be done, there are people to do it. But I am speaking of your own inner self. You have a shield against your equals, and a sword to attack them with if necessary. Have you no armour of proof against such a creature as that? Have you nothing inside you to make you feel that he is too contemptible to be regarded?" "Nothing," he said. "Oh, Plantagenet!" "Cora, there are different natures which have each their own excellencies and their own defects. I will not admit that I am a coward, believing as I do that I could dare to face necessary danger. But I cannot endure to have my character impugned,--even by Mr. Slide and Mr. Lopez." "What matter,--if you are in the right? Why blench if your conscience accuses you of no fault? I would not blench even if it did. What;--is a man to be put in the front of everything, and then to be judged as though he could give all his time to the picking of his steps?" "Just so! And he must pick them more warily than another." "I do not believe it. You see all this with jaundiced eyes. I read somewhere the other day that the great ships have always little worms attached to them, but that the great ships swim on and know nothing of the worms." "The worms conquer at last." "They shouldn't conquer me! After all, what is it that they say about the money? That you ought not to have paid it?" "I begin to think that I was wrong to pay it." "You certainly were not wrong. I had led the man on. I had been mistaken. I had thought that he was a gentleman. Having led him on at first, before you had spoken to me, I did not like to go back from my word. I did go to the man at Silverbridge who sells the pots, and no doubt the man, when thus encouraged, told it all to Lopez. When Lopez went to the town he did suppose that he would have what the people call the Castle interest." "And I had done so much to prevent it!" "What's the use of going back to that now, unless you want me to put my neck down to be trodden on? I am confessing my own sins as fast as I can." "God knows I would not have you trodden on." "I am willing,--if it be necessary. Then came the question;--as I had done this evil, how was it to be rectified? Any man with a particle of spirit would have taken his rubs and said nothing about it. But as this man asked for the money, it was right that he should have it. If it is all made public he won't get very well out of it." "What does that matter to me?" "Nor shall I;--only luckily I do not mind it." "But I mind it for you." "You must throw me to the whale. Let somebody say in so many words that the Duchess did so and so. It was very wicked no doubt; but they can't kill me,--nor yet dismiss me. And I won't resign. In point of fact I shan't be a penny the worse for it." "But I should resign." "If all the Ministers in England were to give up as soon as their wives do foolish things, that question about the Queen's Government would become very difficult." "They may do foolish things, dear; and yet--" "And yet what?" "And yet not interfere in politics." "That's all you know about it, Plantagenet. Doesn't everybody know that Mrs. Daubeny got Dr. MacFuzlem made a bishop, and that Mrs. Gresham got her husband to make that hazy speech about women's rights, so that nobody should know which way he meant to go? There are others just as bad as me, only I don't think they get blown up so much. You do now as I ask you." "I couldn't do it, Cora. Though the stain were but a little spot, and the thing to be avoided political destruction, I could not ride out of the punishment by fixing that stain on my wife. I will not have your name mentioned. A man's wife should be talked about by no one." "That's high-foluting, Plantagenet." "Glencora, in these matters you must allow me to judge for myself, and I will judge. I will never say that I didn't do it;--but that it was my wife who did." "Adam said so,--because he chose to tell the truth." "And Adam has been despised ever since,--not because he ate the apple, but because he imputed the eating of it to a woman. I will not do it. We have had enough of this now." Then she turned to go away,--but he called her back. "Kiss me, dear," he said. Then she stooped over him and kissed him. "Do not think I am angry with you because the thing vexes me. I am dreaming always of some day when we may go away together with the children, and rest in some pretty spot, and live as other people live." "It would be very stupid," she muttered to herself as she left the room. He did go up to town for the Cabinet meeting. Whatever may have been done at that august assembly there was certainly no resignation, or the world would have heard it. It is probable, too, that nothing was said about these newspaper articles. Things if left to themselves will generally die at last. The old Duke and Phineas Finn and Barrington Erle were all of opinion that the best plan for the present was to do nothing. "Has anything been settled?" the Duchess asked Phineas when he came back. "Oh yes;--the Queen's Speech. But there isn't very much in it." "But about the payment of this money?" "I haven't heard a word about it," said Phineas. "You're just as bad as all the rest, Mr. Finn, with your pretended secrecy. A girl with her first sweetheart isn't half so fussy as a young Cabinet Minister." "The Cabinet Ministers get used to it sooner, I think," said Phineas Finn. Parliament had already met before Mr. Slide had quite determined in what way he would carry on the war. He could indeed go on writing pernicious articles about the Prime Minister _ad infinitum_,--from year's end to year's end. It was an occupation in which he took delight, and for which he imagined himself to be peculiarly well suited. But readers will become tired even of abuse if it be not varied. And the very continuation of such attacks would seem to imply that they were not much heeded. Other papers had indeed taken the matter up,--but they had taken it up only to drop it. The subject had not been their own. The little discovery had been due not to their acumen, and did not therefore bear with them the highest interest. It had almost seemed as though nothing would come of it;--for Mr. Slide in his wildest ambition could have hardly imagined the vexation and hesitation, the nervousness and serious discussions which his words had occasioned among the great people at Matching. But certainly the thing must not be allowed to pass away as a matter of no moment. Mr. Slide had almost worked his mind up to real horror as he thought of it. What! A prime minister, a peer, a great duke,--put a man forward as a candidate for a borough, and, when the man was beaten, pay his expenses! Was this to be done,--to be done and found out and then nothing come of it in these days of purity, when a private member of Parliament, some mere nobody, loses his seat because he has given away a few bushels of coals or a score or two of rabbits! Mr. Slide's energetic love of public virtue was scandalised as he thought of the probability of such a catastrophe. To his thinking, public virtue consisted in carping at men high placed, in abusing ministers and judges and bishops--and especially in finding out something for which they might be abused. His own public virtue was in this matter very great, for it was he who had ferreted out the secret. For his intelligence and energy in that matter the country owed him much. But the country would pay him nothing, would give him none of the credit he desired, would rob him of this special opportunity of declaring a dozen times that the "People's Banner" was the surest guardian of the people's liberty,--unless he could succeed in forcing the matter further into public notice. "How terrible is the apathy of the people at large," said Mr. Slide to himself, "when they cannot be wakened by such a revelation as this!" Mr. Slide knew very well what ought to be the next step. Proper notice should be given and a question should be asked in Parliament. Some gentleman should declare that he had noticed such and such statements in the public press, and that he thought it right to ask whether such and such payments had been made by the Prime Minister. In his meditations Mr. Slide went so far as to arrange the very words which the indignant gentleman should utter, among which words was a graceful allusion to a certain public-spirited newspaper. He did even go so far as to arrange a compliment to the editor,--but in doing so he knew that he was thinking only of that which ought to be, and not of that which would be. The time had not come as yet in which the editor of a newspaper in this country received a tithe of the honour due to him. But the question in any form, with or without a compliment to the "People's Banner," would be the thing that was now desirable. Who was to ask the question? If public spirit were really strong in the country there would be no difficulty on that point. The crime committed had been so horrible that all the great politicians of the country ought to compete for the honour of asking it. What greater service can be trusted to the hands of a great man than that of exposing the sins of the rulers of the nation? So thought Mr. Slide. But he knew that he was in advance of the people, and that the matter would not be seen in the proper light by those who ought so to see it. There might be a difficulty in getting any peer to ask the question in the House in which the Prime Minister himself sat, and even in the other House there was now but little of that acrid, indignant opposition upon which, in Mr. Slide's opinion, the safety of the nation altogether depends. When the statement was first made in the "People's Banner," Lopez had come to Mr. Slide at once and had demanded his authority for making it. Lopez had found the statement to be most injurious to himself. He had been paid his election expenses twice over, making a clear profit of £500 by the transaction; and, though the matter had at one time troubled his conscience, he had already taught himself to regard it as one of those bygones to which a wise man seldom refers. But now Mr. Wharton would know that he had been cheated, should this statement reach him. "Who gave you authority to publish all this?" asked Lopez, who at this time had become intimate with Mr. Slide. "Is it true, Lopez?" asked the editor. "Whatever was done was done in private,--between me and the Duke." "Dukes, my dear fellow, can't be private, and certainly not when they are Prime Ministers." "But you've no right to publish these things about me." "Is it true? If it's true I have got every right to publish it. If it's not true, I've got the right to ask the question. If you will 'ave to do with Prime Ministers you can't 'ide yourself under a bushel. Tell me this;--is it true? You might as well go 'and in 'and with me in the matter. You can't 'urt yourself. And if you oppose me,--why, I shall oppose you." "You can't say anything of me." "Well;--I don't know about that. I can generally 'it pretty 'ard if I feel inclined. But I don't want to 'it you. As regards you I can tell the story one way,--or the other, just as you please." Lopez, seeing it in the same light, at last agreed that the story should be told in a manner not inimical to himself. The present project of his life was to leave his troubles in England,--Sexty Parker being the worst of them,--and get away to Guatemala. In arranging this the good word of Mr. Slide might not benefit him, but his ill word might injure him. And then, let him do what he would, the matter must be made public. Should Mr. Wharton hear of it,--as of course he would,--it must be brazened out. He could not keep it from Mr. Wharton's ears by quarrelling with Quintus Slide. "It was true," said Lopez. "I knew it before just as well as though I had seen it. I ain't often very wrong in these things. You asked him for the money,--and threatened him." "I don't know about threatening him." "'E wouldn't have sent it else." "I told him that I had been deceived by his people in the borough, and that I had been put to expense through the misrepresentations of the Duchess. I don't think I did ask for the money. But he sent a cheque, and of course I took it." "Of course;--of course. You couldn't give me a copy of your letter?" "Never kept a copy." He had a copy in his breast coat-pocket at that moment, and Slide did not for a moment believe the statement made. But in such discussions one man hardly expects truth from another. Mr. Slide certainly never expected truth from any man. "He sent the cheque almost without a word," said Lopez. "He did write a note, I suppose?" "Just a few words." "Could you let me 'ave that note?" "I destroyed it at once." This was also in his breast-pocket at the time. "Did 'e write it 'imself?" "I think it was his private Secretary, Mr. Warburton." "You must be sure, you know. Which was it?" "It was Mr. Warburton." "Was it civil?" "Yes, it was. If it had been uncivil I should have sent it back. I'm not the man to take impudence even from a duke." "If you'll give me those two letters, Lopez, I'll stick to you through thick and thin. By heavens I will! Think what the 'People's Banner' is. You may come to want that kind of thing some of these days." Lopez remained silent, looking into the other man's eager face. "I shouldn't publish them, you know; but it would be so much to me to have the evidence in my hands. You might do worse, you know, than make a friend of me." "You won't publish them?" "Certainly not. I shall only refer to them." Then Lopez pulled a bundle of papers out of his pocket. "There they are," he said. "Well," said Slide, when he had read them; "it is one of the rummest transactions I ever 'eard of. Why did 'e send the money? That's what I want to know. As far as the claim goes, you 'adn't a leg to stand on." "Not legally." "You 'adn't a leg to stand on any way. But that doesn't much matter. He sent the money, and the sending of the money was corrupt. Who shall I get to ask the question? I suppose young Fletcher wouldn't do it?" "They're birds of a feather," said Lopez. "Birds of a feather do fall out sometimes. Or Sir Orlando Drought? I wonder whether Sir Orlando would do it. If any man ever 'ated another, Sir Orlando Drought must 'ate the Duke of Omnium." "I don't think he'd let himself down to that kind of thing." "Let 'imself down! I don't see any letting down in it. But those men who have been in cabinets do stick to one another even when they are enemies. They think themselves so mighty that they oughtn't to be 'andled like other men. But I'll let 'em know that I'll 'andle 'em. A Cabinet Minister or a cowboy is the same to Quintus Slide when he has got his pen in 'is 'and." On the next morning there came out another article in the "People's Banner," in which the writer declared that he had in his own possession the damnatory correspondence between the Prime Minister and the late candidate at Silverbridge. "The Prime Minister may deny the fact," said the article. "We do not think it probable, but it is possible. We wish to be fair and above-board in everything. And therefore we at once inform the noble Duke that the entire correspondence is in our hands." In saying this Mr. Quintus Slide thought that he had quite kept the promise which he made when he said that he would only refer to the letters. CHAPTER LII "I Can Sleep Here To-night, I Suppose?" That scheme of going to Guatemala had been in the first instance propounded by Lopez with the object of frightening Mr. Wharton into terms. There had, indeed, been some previous thoughts on the subject,--some plan projected before his marriage; but it had been resuscitated mainly with the hope that it might be efficacious to extract money. When by degrees the son-in-law began to feel that even this would not be operative on his father-in-law's purse,--when under this threat neither Wharton nor Emily gave way,--and when, with the view of strengthening his threat, he renewed his inquiries as to Guatemala and found that there might still be an opening for him in that direction,--the threat took the shape of a true purpose, and he began to think that he would in real earnest try his fortunes in a new world. From day to day things did not go well with him, and from day to day Sexty Parker became more unendurable. It was impossible for him to keep from his partner this plan of emigration,--but he endeavoured to make Parker believe that the thing, if done at all, was not to be done till all his affairs were settled,--or in other words all his embarrassments cleared by downright money payments, and that Mr. Wharton was to make these payments on the condition that he thus expatriated himself. But Mr. Wharton had made no such promise. Though the threatened day came nearer and nearer he could not bring himself to purchase a short respite for his daughter by paying money to a scoundrel,--which payment he felt sure would be of no permanent service. During all this time Mr. Wharton was very wretched. If he could have freed his daughter from her marriage by half his fortune he would have done it without a second thought. If he could have assuredly purchased the permanent absence of her husband, he would have done it at a large price. But let him pay what he would, he could see his way to no security. From day to day he became more strongly convinced of the rascality of this man who was his son-in-law, and who was still an inmate in his own house. Of course he had accusations enough to make within his own breast against his daughter, who, when the choice was open to her, would not take the altogether fitting husband provided for her, but had declared herself to be broken-hearted for ever unless she were allowed to throw herself away upon this wretched creature. But he blamed himself almost as much as he did her. Why had he allowed himself to be so enervated by her prayers at last as to surrender everything,--as he had done? How could he presume to think that he should be allowed to escape, when he had done so little to prevent this misery? He spoke to Emily about it,--not often indeed, but with great earnestness. "I have done it myself," she said, "and I will bear it." "Tell him you cannot go till you know to what home you are going." "That is for him to consider. I have begged him to let me remain, and I can say no more. If he chooses to take me, I shall go." Then he spoke to her about money. "Of course I have money," he said. "Of course I have enough both for you and Everett. If I could do any good by giving it to him, he should have it." "Papa," she answered, "I will never again ask you to give him a single penny. That must be altogether between you and him. He is what they call a speculator. Money is not safe with him." "I shall have to send it you when you are in want." "When I am--dead there will be no more to be sent. Do not look like that, papa. I know what I have done, and I must bear it. I have thrown away my life. It is just that. If baby had lived it would have been different." This was about the end of January, and then Mr. Wharton heard of the great attack made by Mr. Quintus Slide against the Prime Minister, and heard, of course, of the payment alleged to have been made to Ferdinand Lopez by the Duke on the score of the election at Silverbridge. Some persons spoke to him on the subject. One or two friends at the club asked him what he supposed to be the truth in the matter, and Mrs. Roby inquired of him on the subject. "I have asked Lopez," she said, "and I am sure from his manner that he did get the money." "I don't know anything about it," said Mr. Wharton. "If he did get it I think he was very clever." It was well known at this time to Mrs. Roby that the Lopez marriage had been a failure, that Lopez was not a rich man, and that Emily, as well as her father, was discontented and unhappy. She had latterly heard of the Guatemala scheme, and had of course expressed her horror. But she sympathised with Lopez rather than with his wife, thinking that if Mr. Wharton would only open his pockets wide enough things might still be right. "It was all the Duchess's fault, you know," she said to the old man. "I know nothing about it, and when I want to know I certainly shall not come to you. The misery he has brought upon me is so great that it makes me wish that I had never seen any one who knew him." "It was Everett who introduced him to your house." "It was you who introduced him to Everett." "There you are wrong,--as you so often are, Mr. Wharton. Everett met him first at the club." "What's the use of arguing about it? It was at your house that Emily met him. It was you that did it. I wonder you can have the face to mention his name to me." "And the man living all the time in your own house!" Up to this time Mr. Wharton had not mentioned to a single person the fact that he had paid his son-in-law's election expenses at Silverbridge. He had given him the cheque without much consideration, with the feeling that by doing so he would in some degree benefit his daughter; and had since regretted the act, finding that no such payment from him could be of any service to Emily. But the thing had been done,--and there had been, so far, an end of it. In no subsequent discussion would Mr. Wharton have alluded to it, had not circumstances now as it were driven it back upon his mind. And since the day on which he had paid that money he had been, as he declared to himself, swindled over and over again by his son-in-law. There was the dinner in Manchester Square, and after that the brougham, and the rent, and a score of bills, some of which he had paid and some declined to pay! And yet he had said but little to the man himself of all these injuries. Of what use was it to say anything? Lopez would simply reply that he had asked him to pay nothing. "What is it all," Lopez had once said, "to the fortune I had a right to expect with your daughter?" "You had no right to expect a shilling," Wharton had said. Then Lopez had shrugged his shoulders, and there had been an end of it. But now, if this rumour were true, there had been positive dishonesty. From whichever source the man might have got the money first, if the money had been twice got, the second payment had been fraudulently obtained. Surely if the accusation had been untrue Lopez would have come to him and declared it to be false, knowing what must otherwise be his thoughts. Lately, in the daily worry of his life, he had avoided all conversation with the man. He would not allow his mind to contemplate clearly what was coming. He entertained some irrational, undefined hope that something would at last save his daughter from the threatened banishment. It might be, if he held his own hand tight enough, that there would not be money enough even to pay for her passage out. As for her outfit, Lopez would of course order what he wanted and have the bills sent to Manchester Square. Whether or not this was being done neither he nor Emily knew. And thus matters went on without much speech between the two men. But now the old barrister thought that he was bound to speak. He therefore waited on a certain morning till Lopez had come down, having previously desired his daughter to leave the room. "Lopez," he asked, "what is this that the newspapers are saying about your expenses at Silverbridge?" Lopez had expected the attack and had endeavoured to prepare himself for it. "I should have thought, sir, that you would not have paid much attention to such statements in a newspaper." "When they concern myself, I do. I paid your electioneering expenses." "You certainly subscribed £500 towards them, Mr. Wharton." "I subscribed nothing, sir. There was no question of a subscription,--by which you intend to imply contribution from various sources; You told me that the contest cost you £500 and that sum I handed to you, with the full understanding on your part, as well as on mine, that I was paying for the whole. Was that so?" "Have it your own way, sir." "If you are not more precise, I shall think that you have defrauded me." "Defrauded you!" "Yes, sir;--defrauded me, or the Duke of Omnium. The money is gone, and it matters little which. But if that be so I shall know that either from him or from me you have raised money under false pretences." "Of course, Mr. Wharton, from you I must bear whatever you may choose to say." "Is it true that you have applied to the Duke of Omnium for money on account of your expenses at Silverbridge, and is it true that he has paid you money on that score?" "Mr. Wharton, as I said just now, I am bound to hear and to bear from you anything that you may choose to say. Your connection with my wife and your age alike restrain my resentment. But I am not bound to answer your questions when they are accompanied by such language as you have chosen to use, and I refuse to answer any further questions on this subject." "Of course I know that you have taken the money from the Duke." "Then why do you ask me?" "And of course I know that you are as well aware as I am of the nature of the transaction. That you can brazen it out without a blush only proves to me that you have got beyond the reach of shame!" "Very well, sir." "And you have no further explanation to make?" "What do you expect me to say? Without knowing any of the facts of the case,--except the one, that you contributed £500 to my election expenses,--you take upon yourself to tell me that I am a shameless, fraudulent swindler. And then you ask for a further explanation! In such a position is it likely that I shall explain anything;--that I can be in a humour to be explanatory? Just turn it all over in your mind, and ask yourself the question." "I have turned it over in my own mind, and I have asked myself the question, and I do not think it probable that you should wish to explain anything. I shall take steps to let the Duke know that I as your father-in-law had paid the full sum which you had stated that you had spent at Silverbridge." "Much the Duke will care about that." "And after what has passed I am obliged to say that the sooner you leave this house the better I shall be pleased." "Very well, sir. Of course I shall take my wife with me." "That must be as she pleases." "No, Mr. Wharton. That must be as I please. She belongs to me,--not to you or to herself. Under your influence she has forgotten much of what belongs to the duty of a wife, but I do not think that she will so far have forgotten herself as to give me more trouble than to bid her come with me when I desire it." "Let that be as it may, I must request that you, sir, will absent yourself. I will not entertain as my guest a man who has acted as you have done in this matter,--even though he be my son-in-law." "I can sleep here to-night, I suppose?" "Or to-morrow if it suits you. As for Emily, she can remain here, if you will allow her to do so." "That will not suit me," said Lopez. "In that case, as far as I am concerned, I shall do whatever she may ask me to do. Good morning." Mr. Wharton left the room, but did not leave the house. Before he did so he would see his daughter; and, thinking it probable that Lopez would also choose to see his wife, he prepared to wait in his own room. But, in about ten minutes, Lopez started from the hall door in a cab, and did so without going upstairs. Mr. Wharton had reason to believe that his son-in-law was almost destitute of money for immediate purposes. Whatever he might have would at any rate be serviceable to him before he started. Any home for Emily must be expensive; and no home in their present circumstances could be so reputable for her as one under her father's roof. He therefore almost hoped that she might still be left with him till that horrid day should come,--if it ever did come,--in which she would be taken away from him for ever. "Of course, papa, I shall go if he bids me," she said, when he told her all that he thought right to tell her of that morning's interview. "I hardly know how to advise you," said the father, meaning in truth to bring himself round to the giving of some advice adverse to her husband's will. "I want no advice, papa." "Want no advice! I never knew a woman who wanted it more." "No, papa. I am bound to do as he tells me. I know what I have done. When some poor wretch has got himself into perpetual prison by his misdeeds, no advice can serve him then. So it is with me." "You can at any rate escape from your prison." "No;--no. I have a feeling of pride which tells me that as I chose to become the wife of my husband,--as I insisted on it in opposition to all my friends,--as I would judge for myself,--I am bound to put up with my choice. If this had come upon me through the authority of others, if I had been constrained to marry him, I think I could have reconciled myself to deserting him. But I did it myself, and I will abide by it. When he bids me go, I shall go." Poor Mr. Wharton went to his chambers, and sat there the whole day without taking a book or a paper into his hands. Could there be no rescue, no protection, no relief! He turned over in his head various plans, but in a vague and useless manner. What if the Duke were to prosecute Lopez for the fraud! What if he could induce Lopez to abandon his wife,--pledging himself by some deed not to return to her,--for, say, twenty or even thirty thousand pounds! What if he himself were to carry his daughter away to the continent, half forcing and half persuading her to make the journey! Surely there might be some means found by which the man might be frightened into compliance. But there he sat,--and did nothing. And in the evening he ate a solitary mutton chop at The Jolly Blackbird, because he could not bear to face even his club, and then returned to his chambers,--to the great disgust of the old woman who had them in charge at nights. And at about midnight he crept away to his own house, a wretched old man. Lopez when he left Manchester Square did not go in search of a new home for himself and his wife, nor during the whole of the day did he trouble himself on that subject. He spent most of the day at the rooms in Coleman Street of the San Juan Mining Association, of which Mr. Mills Happerton had once been Chairman. There was now another Chairman and other Directors; but Mr. Mills Happerton's influence had so far remained with the Company as to enable Lopez to become well known in the Company's offices, and acknowledged as a claimant for the office of resident Manager at San Juan in Guatemala. Now the present project was this,--that Lopez was to start on behalf of the Company early in May, that the Company was to pay his own personal expenses out to Guatemala, and that they should allow him while there a salary of £1000 a year for managing the affairs of the mine. As far as this offer went, the thing was true enough. It was true that Lopez had absolutely secured the place. But he had done so subject to the burden of one very serious stipulation. He was to become proprietor of 50 shares in the mine, and to pay up £100 each on those shares. It was considered that the man who was to get £1000 a year in Guatemala for managing the affair, should at any rate assist the affair, and show his confidence in the affair to an extent as great as that. Of course the holder of these 50 shares would be as fully entitled as any other shareholder to that 20 per cent. which those who promoted the mine promised as the immediate result of the speculation. At first Lopez had hoped that he might be enabled to defer the actual payment of the £5000 till after he had sailed. When once out in Guatemala as manager, as manager he would doubtless remain. But by degrees he found that the payment must actually be made in advance. Now there was nobody to whom he could apply but Mr. Wharton. He was, indeed, forced to declare at the office that the money was to come from Mr. Wharton, and had given some excellent but fictitious reason why Mr. Wharton would not pay the money till February. And in spite of all that had come and gone he still did hope that if the need to go were actually there he might even yet get the money from Mr. Wharton. Surely Mr. Wharton would sooner pay such a sum than be troubled at home with such a son-in-law. Should the worst come to the worst, of course he could raise the money by consenting to leave his wife at home. But this was not part of his plan, if he could avoid it. £5000 would be a very low price at which to sell his wife, and all that he might get from his connection with her. As long as he kept her with him he was in possession at any rate of all that Mr. Wharton would do for her. He had not therefore as yet made his final application to his father-in-law for the money, having found it possible to postpone the payment till the middle of February. His quarrel with Mr. Wharton this morning he regarded as having little or no effect upon his circumstances. Mr. Wharton would not give him the money because he loved him, nor yet from personal respect, nor from any sense of duty as to what he might owe to a son-in-law. It would be simply given as the price by which his absence might be purchased, and his absence would not be the less desirable because of this morning's quarrel. But, even yet, he was not quite resolved as to going to Guatemala. Sexty Parker had been sucked nearly dry, and was in truth at this moment so violent with indignation and fear and remorse that Lopez did not dare to show himself in Little Tankard Yard; but still there were, even yet, certain hopes in that direction from which great results might come. If a certain new spirit which had just been concocted from the bark of trees in Central Africa, and which was called Bios, could only be made to go up in the market, everything might be satisfactorily arranged. The hoardings of London were already telling the public that if it wished to get drunk without any of the usual troubles of intoxication it must drink Bios. The public no doubt does read the literature of the hoardings, but then it reads so slowly! This Bios had hardly been twelve months on the boards as yet! But they were now increasing the size of the letters in the advertisements and the jocundity of the pictures,--and the thing might be done. There was, too, another hope,--another hope of instant moneys by which Guatemala might be staved off, as to which further explanation shall be given in a further chapter. "I suppose I shall find Dixon a decent sort of a fellow?" said Lopez to the Secretary of the Association in Coleman Street. "Rough, you know." "But honest?" "Oh, yes;--he's all that." "If he's honest, and what I call loyal, I don't care a straw for anything else. One doesn't expect West-end manners in Guatemala. But I shall have a deal to do with him,--and I hate a fellow that you can't depend on." "Mr. Happerton used to think a great deal of Dixon." "That's all right," said Lopez. Mr. Dixon was the underground manager out at the San Juan mine, and was perhaps as anxious for a loyal and honest colleague as was Mr. Lopez. If so, Mr. Dixon was very much in the way to be disappointed. Lopez stayed at the office all the day studying the affairs of the San Juan mine, and then went to the Progress for his dinner. Hitherto he had taken no steps whatever as to getting lodgings for himself or for his wife. CHAPTER LIII Mr. Hartlepod When the time came at which Lopez should have left Manchester Square he was still there. Mr. Wharton, in discussing the matter with his daughter,--when wishing to persuade her that she might remain in his house even in opposition to her husband,--had not told her that he had actually desired Lopez to leave it. He had then felt sure that the man would go and would take his wife with him, but he did not even yet know the obduracy and the cleverness and the impregnability of his son-in-law. When the time came, when he saw his daughter in the morning after the notice had been given, he could not bring himself even yet to say to her that he had issued an order for his banishment. Days went by and Lopez was still there, and the old barrister said no further word on the subject. The two men never met;--or met simply in the hall or passages. Wharton himself studiously avoided such meetings, thus denying himself the commonest uses of his own house. At last Emily told him that her husband had fixed the day for her departure. The next Indian mail-packet by which they would leave England would start from Southampton on the 2nd of April, and she was to be ready to go on that day. "How is it to be till then?" the father asked in a low, uncertain voice. "I suppose I may remain with you." "And your husband?" "He will be here too,--I suppose." "Such a misery,--such a destruction of everything no man ever heard of before!" said Mr. Wharton. To this she made no reply, but continued working at some necessary preparation for her final departure. "Emily," he said, "I will make any sacrifice to prevent it. What can be done? Short of injuring Everett's interests I will do anything." "I do not know," she said. "You must understand something of his affairs." "Nothing whatever. He has told me nothing of them. In earlier days,--soon after our marriage,--he bade me get money from you." "When you wrote to me for money from Italy?" "And after that. I have refused to do anything;--to say a word. I told him that it must be between you and him. What else could I say? And now he tells me nothing." "I cannot think that he should want you to go with him." Then there was again a pause. "Is it because he loves you?" "Not that, papa." "Why then should he burden himself with a companion? His money, whatever he has, would go further without such impediment." "Perhaps he thinks, papa, that while I am with him he has a hold upon you." "He shall have a stronger hold by leaving you. What is he to gain? If I could only know his price." "Ask him, papa." "I do not even know how I am to speak to him again." Then again there was a pause. "Papa," she said after a while, "I have done it myself. Let me go. You will still have Everett. And it may be that after a time I shall come back to you. He will not kill me, and it may be that I shall not die." "By God!" said Mr. Wharton, rising from his chair suddenly, "if there were money to be made by it, I believe that he would murder you without scruple." Thus it was that within eighteen months of her marriage the father spoke to his daughter of her husband. "What am I to take with me?" she said to her husband a few days later. "You had better ask your father." "Why should I ask him, Ferdinand? How should he know?" "And how should I?" "I should have thought that you would interest yourself about it." "Upon my word I have enough to interest me just at present, without thinking of your finery. I suppose you mean what clothes you should have?" "I was not thinking of myself only." "You need think of nothing else. Ask him what he pleases to allow you to spend, and then I will tell you what to get." "I will never ask him for anything, Ferdinand." "Then you may go without anything. You might as well do it at once, for you will have to do it sooner or later. Or, if you please, go to his tradesmen and say nothing to him about it. They will give you credit. You see how it is, my dear. He has cheated me in a most rascally manner. He has allowed me to marry his daughter, and because I did not make a bargain with him as another man would have done, he denies me the fortune I had a right to expect with you. You know that the Israelites despoiled the Egyptians, and it was taken as a merit on their part. Your father is an Egyptian to me, and I will despoil him. You can tell him that I say so if you please." And so the days went on till the first week of February had passed, and Parliament had met. Both Lopez and his wife were still living in Manchester Square. Not another word had been said as to that notice to quit, nor an allusion made to it. It was supposed to be a settled thing that Lopez was to start with his wife for Guatemala in the first week in April. Mr. Wharton had himself felt that difficulty as to his daughter's outfit, and had told her that she might get whatever it pleased her on his credit. "For yourself, my dear." "Papa, I will get nothing till he bids me." "But you can't go across the world without anything. What are you to do in such a place as that unless you have the things you want?" "What do poor people do who have to go? What should I do if you had cast me off because of my disobedience?" "But I have not cast you off." "Tell him that you will give him so much, and then, if he bids me, I will spend it." "Let it be so. I will tell him." Upon that Mr. Wharton did speak to his son-in-law;--coming upon him suddenly one morning in the dining-room. "Emily will want an outfit if she is to go to this place." "Like other people she wants many things that she cannot get." "I will tell my tradesmen to furnish her with what she wants, up to,--well,--suppose I say £200. I have spoken to her and she wants your sanction." "My sanction for spending your money? She can have that very quickly." "You can tell her so;--or I will do so." Upon that Mr. Wharton was going, but Lopez stopped him. It was now essential that the money for the shares in the San Juan mine should be paid up, and his father-in-law's pocket was still the source from which the enterprising son-in-law hoped to procure it. Lopez had fully made up his mind to demand it, and thought that the time had now come. And he was resolved that he would not ask it as a favour on bended knee. He was beginning to feel his own power, and trusted that he might prevail by other means than begging. "Mr. Wharton," he said, "you and I have not been very good friends lately." "No, indeed." "There was a time,--a very short time,--during which I thought that we might hit it off together, and I did my best. You do not, I fancy, like men of my class." "Well;--well! You had better go on if there be anything to say." "I have much to say, and I will go on. You are a rich man, and I am your son-in-law." Mr. Wharton put his left hand up to his forehead, brushing the few hairs back from his head, but he said nothing. "Had I received from you during the last most vital year that assistance which I think I had a right to expect, I also might have been a rich man now. It is no good going back to that." Then he paused, but still Mr. Wharton said nothing. "Now you know what has come to me and to your daughter. We are to be expatriated." "Is that my fault?" "I think it is, but I mean to say nothing further of that. This Company which is sending me out, and which will probably be the most thriving thing of the kind which has come up within these twenty years, is to pay me a salary of £1000 a year as resident manager at San Juan." "So I understand." "The salary alone would be a beggarly thing. Guatemala, I take it, is not the cheapest country in the world in which a man can live. But I am to go out as the owner of fifty shares on which £100 each must be paid up, and I am entitled to draw another £1000 a year as dividend on the profit of those shares." "That will be twenty per cent." "Exactly." "And will double your salary." "Just so. But there is one little ceremony to be perfected before I can be allowed to enter upon so halcyon a state of existence. The £100 a share must be paid up." Mr. Wharton simply stared at him. "I must have the £5000 to invest in the undertaking before I can start." "Well!" "Now I have not got £5000 myself, nor any part of it. You do not wish, I suppose, to see either me or your daughter starve. And as for me, I hardly flatter myself when I say that you are very anxious to be rid of me. £5000 is not very much for me to ask of you, as I regard it." "Such consummate impudence I never met in my life before!" "Nor perhaps so much unprevaricating downright truth. At any rate such is the condition of my affairs. If I am to go the money must be paid this week. I have, perhaps foolishly, put off mentioning the matter till I was sure that I could not raise the sum elsewhere. Though I feel my claim on you to be good, Mr. Wharton, it is not pleasant to me to make it." "You are asking me for £5000 down!" "Certainly I am." "What security am I to have?" "Security?" "Yes;--that if I pay it I shall not be troubled again by the meanest scoundrel that it has ever been my misfortune to meet. How am I to know that you will not come back to-morrow? How am I to know that you will go at all? Do you think it probable that I will give you £5000 on your own simple word?" "Then the scoundrel will stay in England,--and will generally find it convenient to live in Manchester Square." "I'll be d----d if he does. Look here, sir. Between you and me there can be a bargain, and nothing but a bargain. I will pay the £5000,--on certain conditions." "I didn't doubt at all that you would pay it." "I will go with you to the office of this Company, and will pay for the shares if I can receive assurance there that the matter is as you say, and that the shares will not be placed in your power before you have reached Guatemala." "You can come to-day, sir, and receive all that assurance." "And I must have a written undertaking from you,--a document which my daughter can show if it be necessary,--that you will never claim her society again or trouble her with any application." "You mistake me, Mr. Wharton. My wife goes with me to Guatemala." "Then I will not pay one penny. Why should I? What is your presence or absence to me except as it concerns her? Do you think that I care for your threats of remaining here? The police will set that right." "Wherever I go, my wife goes." "We'll see to that too. If you want the money, you must leave her. Good morning." Mr. Wharton as he went to his chambers thought the matter over. He was certainly willing to risk the £5000 demanded if he could rid himself and his daughter of this terrible incubus, even if it were only for a time. If Lopez would but once go to Guatemala, leaving his wife behind him, it would be comparatively easy to keep them apart should he ever return. The difficulty now was not in him but in her. The man's conduct had been so outrageous, so bare-faced, so cruel, that the lawyer did not doubt but that he could turn the husband out of his house, and keep the wife, even now, were it not that she was determined to obey the man whom she, in opposition to all her friends, had taken as her master. "I have done it myself, and I will bear it," was all the answer she would make when her father strove to persuade her to separate herself from her husband. "You have got Everett," she would say. "When a girl is married she is divided from her family;--and I am divided." But she would willingly stay if Lopez would bid her stay. It now seemed that he could not go without the £5000; and, when the pressure came upon him, surely he would go and leave his wife. In the course of that day Mr. Wharton went to the offices of the San Juan mine and asked to see the Director. He was shown up into a half-furnished room, two stories high, in Coleman Street, where he found two clerks sitting upon stools;--and when he asked for the Director was shown into the back room in which sat the Secretary. The Secretary was a dark, plump little man with a greasy face, who had the gift of assuming an air of great importance as he twisted his chair round to face visitors who came to inquire about the San Juan Mining Company. His name was Hartlepod; and if the San Juan mine "turned out trumps," as he intended that it should, Mr. Hartlepod meant to be a great man in the City. To Mr. Hartlepod Mr. Wharton, with considerable embarrassment, explained as much of the joint history of himself and Lopez as he found to be absolutely necessary. "He has only left the office about half-an-hour," said Mr. Hartlepod. "Of course you understand that he is my son-in-law." "He has mentioned your name to us, Mr. Wharton, before now." "And he is going out to Guatemala?" "Oh yes;--he's going out. Has he not told you as much himself?" "Certainly, sir. And he has told me that he is desirous of buying certain shares in the Company before he starts." "Probably, Mr. Wharton." "Indeed, I believe he cannot go unless he buys them." "That may be so, Mr. Wharton. No doubt he has told you all that himself." "The fact is, Mr. Hartlepod, I am willing, under certain stipulations, to advance him the money." Mr. Hartlepod bowed. "I need not trouble you with private affairs between myself and my son-in-law." Again the Secretary bowed. "But it seems to be for his interest that he should go." "A very great opening indeed, Mr. Wharton. I don't see how a man is to have a better opening. A fine salary! His expenses out paid! One of the very best things that has come up for many years! And as for the capital he is to embark in the affair, he is as safe to get 20 per cent. on it,--as safe,--as safe as the Bank of England." "He'll have the shares?" "Oh yes;--the scrip will be handed to him at once." "And,--and--" "If you mean about the mine, Mr. Wharton, you may take my word that it's all real. It's not one of those sham things that melt away like snow and leave the shareholders nowhere. There's the prospectus, Mr. Wharton. Perhaps you have not seen that before. Take it away and cast your eye over it at your leisure." Mr. Wharton put the somewhat lengthy pamphlet into his pocket. "Look at the list of Directors. We've three members of Parliament, a baronet, and one or two City names that are as good--as good as the Bank of England. If that prospectus won't make a man confident I don't know what will. Why, Mr. Wharton, you don't think that your son-in-law would get those fifty shares at par unless he was going out as our general local manager. The shares ain't to be had. It's a large concern as far as capital goes. You'll see if you look. About a quarter of a million paid up. But it's all in a box as one may say. It's among ourselves. The shares ain't in the market. Of course it's not for me to say what should be done between you and your son-in-law. Lopez is a friend of mine, and a man I esteem, and all that. Nevertheless I shouldn't think of advising you to do this or that,--or not to do it. But when you talk of safety, Mr. Wharton,--why, Mr. Wharton, I don't scruple to tell you as a man who knows what these things are, that this is an opportunity that doesn't come in a man's way perhaps twice in his life." Mr. Wharton found that he had nothing more to say, and went back to Lincoln's Inn. He knew very well that Mr. Hartlepod's assurances were not worth much. Mr. Hartlepod himself and his belongings, the clerks in his office, the look of the rooms, and the very nature of the praises which he had sung, all of them inspired anything but confidence. Mr. Wharton was a man of the world; and, though he knew nothing of City ways, was quite aware that no man in his senses would lay out £5000 on the mere word of Mr. Hartlepod. But still he was inclined to make the payment. If only he could secure the absence of Lopez,--if he could be sure that Lopez would in truth go to Guatemala, and if also he could induce the man to go without his wife, he would risk the money. The money would, of course, be thrown away,--but he would throw it away. Lopez no doubt had declared that he would not go without his wife, even though the money were paid for him. But the money was an alluring sum! As the pressure upon the man became greater, Mr. Wharton thought he would probably consent to leave his wife behind him. In his emergency the barrister went to his attorney and told him everything. The two lawyers were closeted together for an hour, and Mr. Wharton's last words to his old friend were as follows:--"I will risk the money, Walker, or rather I will consent absolutely to throw it away,--as it will be thrown away,--if it can be managed that he shall in truth go to this place without his wife." CHAPTER LIV Lizzie It cannot be supposed that Ferdinand Lopez at this time was a very happy man. He had, at any rate, once loved his wife, and would have loved her still could he have trained her to think as he thought, to share his wishes, and "to put herself into the same boat with him,"--as he was wont to describe the unison and sympathy which he required from her. To give him his due, he did not know that he was a villain. When he was exhorting her to "get round her father" he was not aware that he was giving her lessons which must shock a well-conditioned girl. He did not understand that everything that she had discovered of his moral disposition since her marriage was of a nature to disgust her. And, not understanding all this, he conceived that he was grievously wronged by her in that she adhered to her father rather than to him. This made him unhappy, and doubly disappointed him. He had neither got the wife that he had expected nor the fortune. But he still thought that the fortune must come if he would only hold on to the wife which he had got. And then everything had gone badly with him since his marriage. He was apt, when thinking over his affairs, to attribute all this to the fears and hesitation and parsimony of Sexty Parker. None of his late ventures with Sexty Parker had been successful. And now Sexty was in a bad condition, very violent, drinking hard, declaring himself to be a ruined man, and swearing that if this and that were not done he would have bitter revenge. Sexty still believed in the wealth of his partner's father-in-law, and still had some hope of salvation from that source. Lopez would declare to him, and up to this very time persevered in protesting, that salvation was to be found in Bios. If Sexty would only risk two or three thousand pounds more upon Bios,--or his credit to that amount, failing the immediate money,--things might still be right. "Bios be d----," said Sexty, uttering a string of heavy imprecations. On that morning he had been trusting to native produce rather than to the new African spirit. But now as the Guatemala scheme really took form and loomed on Lopez's eyesight as a thing that might be real, he endeavoured to keep out of Sexty's way. But in vain; Sexty too had heard of Guatemala, and in his misery hunted Lopez about the city. "By G----, I believe you're afraid to come to Little Tankard Yard," he said one day, having caught his victim under the equestrian statue in front of the Exchange. "What is the good of my coming when you will do nothing when I am there?" "I'll tell you what it is, Lopez,--you're not going out of the country about this mining business, if I know it." "Who said I was?" "I'll put a spoke in your wheel there, my man. I'll give a written account of all the dealings between us to the Directors. By G----, they shall know their man." "You're an ass, Sexty, and always were. Look here. If I can carry on as though I were going to this place, I can draw £5000 from old Wharton. He has already offered it. He has treated me with a stinginess that I never knew equalled. Had he done what I had a right to expect, you and I would have been rich men now. But at last I have got a hold upon him up to £5000. As you and I stand, pretty nearly the whole of that will go to you. But don't you spoil it all by making an ass of yourself." Sexty, who was three parts drunk, looked up into his face for a few seconds, and then made his reply. "I'm d----d if I believe a word of it." Upon this Lopez affected to laugh, and then made his escape. All this, as I have said, did not tend to make his life happy. Though he had impudence enough, and callousness of conscience enough, to get his bills paid by Mr. Wharton as often as he could, he was not quite easy in his mind while doing so. His ambition had never been high, but it had soared higher than that. He had had great hopes. He had lived with some high people. He had dined with lords and ladies. He had been the guest of a Duchess. He had married the daughter of a gentleman. He had nearly been a member of Parliament. He still belonged to what he considered to be a first-rate club. From a great altitude he looked down upon Sexty Parker and men of Sexty's class, because of his social successes, and because he knew how to talk and to look like a gentleman. It was unpleasant to him, therefore, to be driven to the life he was now living. And the idea of going out to Guatemala and burying himself in a mine in Central America was not to him a happy idea. In spite of all that he had done he had still some hope that he might avoid that banishment. He had spoken the truth to Sexty Parker in saying that he intended to get the £5000 from Mr. Wharton without that terrible personal sacrifice, though he had hardly spoken the truth when he assured his friend that the greater portion of that money would go to him. There were many schemes fluctuating through his brain, and all accompanied by many doubts. If he could get Mr. Wharton's money by giving up his wife, should he consent to give her up? In either case should he stay or should he go? Should he run one further great chance with Bios,--and if so, by whose assistance? And if he should at last decide that he would do so by the aid of a certain friend that was yet left to him, should he throw himself at that friend's feet, the friend being a lady, and propose to desert his wife and begin the world again with her? For the lady in question was a lady in possession, as he believed, of very large means. Or should he cut his throat and have done at once with all his troubles, acknowledging to himself that his career had been a failure, and that, therefore, it might be brought with advantage to an end? "After all," said he to himself, "that may be the best way of winding up a bankrupt concern." Our old friend Lady Eustace, in these days, lived in a very small house in a very small street bordering upon May Fair; but the street, though very small, and having disagreeable relations with a mews, still had an air of fashion about it. And with her lived the widow, Mrs. Leslie, who had introduced her to Mrs. Dick Roby, and through Mrs. Roby to Ferdinand Lopez. Lady Eustace was in the enjoyment of a handsome income, as I hope that some of my readers may remember,--and this income, during the last year or two, she had learned to foster, if not with much discretion, at any rate with great zeal. During her short life she had had many aspirations. Love, poetry, sport, religion, fashion, Bohemianism had all been tried; but in each crisis there had been a certain care for wealth which had saved her from the folly of squandering what she had won by her early energies in the pursuit of her then prevailing passion. She had given her money to no lover, had not lost it on race-courses, or in building churches;--nor even had she materially damaged her resources by servants and equipages. At the present time she was still young, and still pretty,--though her hair and complexion took rather more time than in the days when she won Sir Florian Eustace. She still liked a lover,--or perhaps two,--though she had thoroughly convinced herself that a lover may be bought too dear. She could still ride a horse, though hunting regularly was too expensive for her. She could talk religion if she could find herself close to a well-got-up clergyman,--being quite indifferent as to the denomination of the religion. But perhaps a wild dash for a time into fast vulgarity was what in her heart of hearts she liked best,--only that it was so difficult to enjoy that pleasure without risk of losing everything. And then, together with these passions, and perhaps above them all, there had lately sprung up in the heart of Lady Eustace a desire to multiply her means by successful speculation. This was the friend with whom Lopez had lately become intimate, and by whose aid he hoped to extricate himself from some of his difficulties. Poor as he was he had contrived to bribe Mrs. Leslie by handsome presents out of Bond Street;--for, as he still lived in Manchester Square, and was the undoubted son-in-law of Mr. Wharton, his credit was not altogether gone. In the giving of these gifts no purport was, of course, named, but Mrs. Leslie was probably aware that her good word with her friend was expected. "I only know what I used to hear from Mrs. Roby," Mrs. Leslie said to her friend. "He was mixed up with Hunkey's people, who roll in money; Old Wharton wouldn't have given him his daughter if he had not been doing well." "It's very hard to be sure," said Lizzie Eustace. "He looks like a man who'd know how to feather his own nest," said Mrs. Leslie. "Don't you think he's very handsome?" "I don't know that he's likely to do the better for that." "Well; no; but there are men of whom you are sure, when you look at them, that they'll be successful. I don't suppose he was anything to begin with, but see where he is now!" "I believe you are in love with him, my dear," said Lizzie Eustace. "Not exactly. I don't know that he has given me any provocation. But I don't see why a woman shouldn't be in love with him if she likes. He is a deal nicer than those fair-haired men who haven't got a word to say to you, and yet look as though you ought to jump down their mouths;--like that fellow you were trying to talk to last night;--that Mr. Fletcher. He could just jerk out three words at a time, and yet he was proud as Lucifer. I like a man who if he likes me is neither ashamed nor afraid to say so." "There is a romance there, you know. Mr. Fletcher was in love with Emily Wharton, and she threw him over for Lopez. They say he has not held up his head since." "She was quite right," said Mrs. Leslie. "But she is one of those stiff-necked creatures who are set up with pride though they have nothing to be proud of. I suppose she had a lot of money. Lopez would never have taken her without." When, therefore, Lopez called one day at the little house in the little street he was not an unwelcome visitor. Mrs. Leslie was in the drawing-room, but soon left it after his arrival. He had of late been often there, and when he at once introduced the subject on which he was himself intent it was not unexpected. "Seven thousand five hundred pounds!" said Lizzie, after listening to the proposition which he had come to make. "That is a very large sum of money!" "Yes;--it's a large sum of money. It's a large affair. I'm in it to rather more than that, I believe." "How are you to get people to drink it?" she asked after a pause. "By telling them that they ought to drink it. Advertise it. It has become a certainty now that if you will only advertise sufficiently you may make a fortune by selling anything. Only the interest on the money expended increases in so large a ratio in accordance with the magnitude of the operation! If you spend a few hundreds in advertising you throw them away. A hundred thousand pounds well laid out makes a certainty of anything." "What am I to get to show for my money;--I mean immediately, you know?" "Registered shares in the Company." "The Bios Company?" "No;--we did propose to call ourselves Parker and Co., limited. I think we shall change the name. They will probably use my name. Lopez and Co., limited." "But it's all for Bios?" "Oh yes;--all for Bios." "And it's to come from Central Africa?" "It will be rectified in London, you know. Some English spirit will perhaps be mixed. But I must not tell you the secrets of the trade till you join us. That Bios is distilled from the bark of the Duffer-tree is a certainty." "Have you drank any?" "I've tasted it." "Is it nice?" "Very nice;--rather sweet, you know, and will be the better for mixing." "Gin?" suggested her ladyship. "Perhaps so,--or whisky. I think I may say that you can't do very much better with your money. You know I would not say this to you were it not true. In such a matter I treat you just as if,--as if you were my sister." "I know how good you are,--but seven thousand five hundred! I couldn't raise so much as that just at present." "There are to be six shares," said Lopez, "making £45,000 capital. Would you consent to take a share jointly with me? That would be three thousand seven hundred and fifty." "But you have a share already," said Lizzie suspiciously. "I should then divide that with Mr. Parker. We intend to register at any rate as many as nine partners. Would you object to hold it with me?" Lopez, as he asked the question, looked at her as though he were offering her half his heart. "No," said Lizzie, slowly, "I don't suppose I should object to that." "I should be doubly eager about the affair if I were in partnership with you." "It's such a venture." "Nothing venture nothing have." "But I've got something as it is, Mr. Lopez, and I don't want to lose it all." "There's no chance of that if you join us." "You think Bios is so sure!" "Quite safe," said Lopez. "You must give me a little more time to think about it," said Lady Eustace at last, panting with anxiety, struggling with herself, anxious for the excitement which would come to her from dealing in Bios, but still fearing to risk her money. This had taken place immediately after Mr. Wharton's offer of the £5000, in making which he had stipulated that Emily should be left at home. Then a few days went by, and Lopez was pressed for his money at the office of the San Juan mine. Did he or did he not mean to take up the mining shares allotted to him? If he did mean to do so, he must do it at once. He swore by all his gods that of course he meant to take them up. Had not Mr. Wharton himself been at the office saying that he intended to pay for them? Was not that sufficient guarantee? They knew well enough that Mr. Wharton was a man to whom the raising of £5000 could be a matter of no difficulty. But they did not know, never could know, how impossible it was to get anything done by Mr. Wharton. But Mr. Wharton had promised to pay for the shares, and when money was concerned his word would surely suffice. Mr. Hartlepod, backed by two of the Directors, said that if the thing was to go on at all, the money must really be paid at once. But the conference was ended by allowing the new local manager another fortnight in which to complete the arrangement. Lopez allowed four days to pass by, during each of which he was closeted for a time with Lady Eustace, and then made an attempt to get at Mr. Wharton through his wife. "Your father has said that he will pay the money for me," said Lopez. "If he has said so he certainly will do it." "But he has promised it on the condition that you should remain at home. Do you wish to desert your husband?" To this she made no immediate answer. "Are you already anxious to be rid of me?" "I should prefer to remain at home," she said in a very low voice. "Then you do wish to desert your husband?" "What is the use of all this, Ferdinand? You do not love me. You did not marry me because I loved you." "By heaven I did;--for that and that only." "And how have you treated me?" "What have I done to you?" "But I do not mean to make accusations, Ferdinand. I should only add to our miseries by that. We should be happier apart." "Not I. Nor is that my idea of marriage. Tell your father that you wish to go with me, and then he will let us have the money." "I will tell him no lie, Ferdinand. If you bid me go, I will go. Where you find a home I must find one too if it be your pleasure to take me. But I will not ask my father to give you money because it is my pleasure to go. Were I to say so he would not believe me." "It is you who have told him to give it me only on the condition of your staying." "I have told him nothing. He knows that I do not wish to go. He cannot but know that. But he knows that I mean to go if you require it." "And you will do nothing for me?" "Nothing,--in regard to my father." He raised his fist with the thought of striking her, and she saw the motion. But his arm fell again to his side. He had not quite come to that yet. "Surely you will have the charity to tell me whether I am to go, if it be fixed," she said. "Have I not told you so twenty times?" "Then it is fixed." "Yes;--it is fixed. Your father will tell you about your things. He has promised you some beggarly sum,--about as much as a tallow-chandler would give his daughter." "Whatever he does for me will be sufficient for me. I am not afraid of my father, Ferdinand." "You shall be afraid of me before I have done with you," said he, leaving the room. Then as he sat at his club, dining there alone, there came across his mind ideas of what the world would be like to him if he could leave his wife at home and take Lizzie Eustace with him to Guatemala. Guatemala was very distant, and it would matter little there whether the woman he brought with him was his wife or no. It was clear enough to him that his wife desired no more of his company. What were the conventions of the world to him? This other woman had money at her own command. He could not make it his own because he could not marry her, but he fancied that it might be possible to bring her so far under his control as to make the money almost as good as his own. Mr. Wharton's money was very hard to reach, and would be as hard to reach,--perhaps harder,--when Mr. Wharton was dead, as now, during his life. He had said a good deal to the lady since the interview of which a report has been given. She had declared herself to be afraid of Bios. She did not in the least doubt that great things might be ultimately done with Bios, but she did not quite see the way with her small capital,--thus humbly did she speak of her wealth,--to be one of those who should take the initiative in the matter. Bios evidently required a great deal of advertisement, and Lizzie Eustace had a short-sighted objection to expend what money she had saved on the hoardings of London. Then he opened to her the glories of Guatemala, not contenting himself with describing the certainty of the 20 per cent., but enlarging on the luxurious happiness of life in a country so golden, so green, so gorgeous, and so grand. It had been the very apple of the eye of the old Spaniards. In Guatemala, he said, Cortez and Pizarro had met and embraced. They might have done so for anything Lizzie Eustace knew to the contrary. And here our hero took advantage of his name. Don Diego di Lopez had been the first to raise the banner of freedom in Guatemala when the kings of Spain became tyrants to their American subjects. All is fair in love and war, and Lizzie amidst the hard business of her life still loved a dash of romance. Yes, he was about to change the scene and try his fortune in that golden, green, and gorgeous country. "You will take your wife of course," Lady Eustace had said. Then Lopez had smiled, and shrugging his shoulders had left the room. It was certainly the fact that she could not eat him. Other men before Lopez have had to pick up what courage they could in their attacks upon women by remembering that fact. She had flirted with him in a very pleasant way, mixing up her prettiness and her percentages in a manner that was peculiar to herself. He did not know her, and he knew that he did not know her;--but still there was the chance. She had thrown his wife more than once in his face, after the fashion of women when they are wooed by married men since the days of Cleopatra downwards. But he had taken that simply as encouragement. He had already let her know that his wife was a vixen who troubled his life. Lizzie had given him her sympathy, and had almost given him a tear. "But I am not a man to be broken-hearted because I have made a mistake," said Lopez. "Marriage vows are very well, but they shall never bind me to misery." "Marriage vows are not very well. They may be very ill," Lizzie had replied, remembering certain passages in her own life. There was no doubt about her money, and certainly she could not eat him. The fortnight allowed him by the San Juan Company had nearly gone by when he called at the little house in the little street, resolved to push his fortune in that direction without fear and without hesitation. Mrs. Leslie again took her departure, leaving them together, and Lizzie allowed her friend to go, although the last words that Lopez had spoken had been, as he thought, a fair prelude to the words he intended to speak to-day. "And what do you think of it?" he said, taking both her hands in his. "Think of what?" "Of our Spanish venture." "Have you given up Bios, my friend?" "No; certainly not," said Lopez, seating himself beside her. "I have not taken the other half share, but I have kept my old venture in the scheme. I believe in Bios, you know." "Ah;--it is so nice to believe." "But I believe more firmly in the country to which I am going." "You are going then?" "Yes, my friend;--I am going. The allurements are too strong to be resisted. Think of that climate and of this." He probably had not heard of the mosquitoes of Central America when he so spoke. "Remember that an income which gives you comfort here will there produce for you every luxury which wealth can purchase. It is to be a king there, or to be but very common among commoners here." "And yet England is a dear old country." "Have you found it so? Think of the wrongs which you have endured;--of the injuries which you have suffered." "Yes, indeed." For Lizzie Eustace had gone through hard days in her time. "I certainly will fly from such a country to those golden shores on which man may be free and unshackled." "And your wife?" "Oh, Lizzie!" It was the first time that he had called her Lizzie, and she was apparently neither shocked nor abashed. Perhaps he thought too much of this, not knowing how many men had called her Lizzie in her time. "Do not you at least understand that a man or a woman may undergo that tie, and yet be justified in disregarding it altogether?" "Oh, yes;--if there has been bigamy, or divorce, or anything of that kind." Now Lizzie had convicted her second husband of bigamy, and had freed herself after that fashion. "To h---- with their prurient laws," said Lopez, rising suddenly from his chair. "I will neither appeal to them nor will I obey them. And I expect from you as little subservience as I myself am prepared to pay. Lizzie Eustace, will you go with me, to that land of the sun, _Where the rage of the vulture, the love of the turtle, Now melt into sorrow, now madden to crime?_ Will you dare to escape with me from the cold conventionalities, from the miserable thraldom of this country bound in swaddling cloths? Lizzie Eustace, if you will say the word, I will take you to that land of glorious happiness." But Lizzie Eustace had £4000 a year and a balance at her banker's. "Mr. Lopez," she said. "What answer have you to make me?" "Mr. Lopez, I think you must be a fool." He did at last succeed in getting himself into the street, and at any rate she had not eaten him. CHAPTER LV Mrs. Parker's Sorrows The end of February had come, and as far as Mrs. Lopez knew she was to start for Guatemala in a month's time. And yet there was so much of indecision in her husband's manner, and apparently so little done by him in regard to personal preparation, that she could hardly bring herself to feel certain that she would have to make the journey. From day to day her father would ask her whether she had made her intended purchases, and she would tell him that she had still postponed the work. Then he would say no more, for he himself was hesitating, doubtful what he would do, and still thinking that when at last the time should come, he would buy his daughter's release at any price that might be demanded. Mr. Walker, the attorney, had as yet been able to manage nothing. He had seen Lopez more than once, and had also seen Mr. Hartlepod. Mr. Hartlepod had simply told him that he would be very happy to register the shares on behalf of Lopez as soon as the money was paid. Lopez had been almost insolent in his bearing. "Did Mr. Wharton think," he asked, "that he was going to sell his wife for £5000?" "I think you'll have to raise your offer," Mr. Walker had said to Mr. Wharton. That was all very well. Mr. Wharton was willing enough to raise his offer. He would have doubled his offer could he thereby have secured the annihilation of Lopez. "I will raise it if he will go without his wife, and give her a written assurance that he will never trouble her again." But the arrangement was one which Mr. Walker found it very difficult to carry out. So things went on till the end of February had come. And during all this time Lopez was still resident in Mr. Wharton's house. "Papa," she said to him one day, "this is the cruellest thing of all. Why don't you tell him that he must go?" "Because he would take you with him." "It would be better so. I could come to see you." "I did tell him to go,--in my passion. I repented of it instantly, because I should have lost you. But what did my telling matter to him? He was very indignant, and yet he is still here." "You told him to go?" "Yes;--but I am glad that he did not obey me. There must be an end to this soon, I suppose." "I do not know, papa." "Do you think that he will not go?" "I feel that I know nothing, papa. You must not let him stay here always, you know." "And what will become of you when he goes?" "I must go with him. Why should you be sacrificed also? I will tell him that he must leave the house. I am not afraid of him, papa." "Not yet, my dear;--not yet. We will see." At this time Lopez declared his purpose one day of dining at the Progress, and Mr. Wharton took advantage of the occasion to remain at home with his daughter. Everett was now expected, and there was a probability that he might come on this evening. Mr. Wharton therefore returned from his chambers early; but when he reached the house he was told that there was a woman in the dining-room with Mrs. Lopez. The servant did not know what woman. She had asked to see Mrs. Lopez, and Mrs. Lopez had gone down to her. The woman in the dining-room was Mrs. Parker. She had called at the house at about half-past five, and Emily had at once come down when summoned by tidings that a "lady" wanted to see her. Servants have a way of announcing a woman as a lady, which clearly expresses their own opinion that the person in question is not a lady. So it had been on the present occasion, but Mrs. Lopez had at once gone to her visitor. "Oh, Mrs. Parker, I am so glad to see you. I hope you are well." "Indeed, then, Mrs. Lopez, I am very far from well. No poor woman, who is the mother of five children, was ever farther from being well than I am." "Is anything wrong?" "Wrong, ma'am! Everything is wrong. When is Mr. Lopez going to pay my husband all the money he has took from him?" "Has he taken money?" "Taken! he has taken everything. He has shorn my husband as bare as a board. We're ruined, Mrs. Lopez, and it's your husband has done it. When we were at Dovercourt, I told you how it was going to be. His business has left him, and now there is nothing. What are we to do?" The woman was seated on a chair, leaning forward with her two hands on her knees. The day was wet, the streets were half mud and half snow, and the poor woman, who had made her way through the slush, was soiled and wet. "I look to you to tell me what me and my children is to do. He's your husband, Mrs. Lopez." "Yes, Mrs. Parker; he is my husband." "Why couldn't he let Sexty alone? Why should the like of him be taking the bread out of my children's mouths? What had we ever done to him? You're rich." "Indeed I am not, Mrs. Parker." "Yes, you are. You're living here in a grand house, and your father's made of money. You'll know nothing of want, let the worst come to the worst. What are we to do, Mrs. Lopez? I'm the wife of that poor creature, and you're the wife of the man that has ruined him. What are we to do, Mrs. Lopez?" "I do not understand my husband's business, Mrs. Parker." "You're one with him, ain't you? If anybody had ever come to me and said my husband had robbed him, I'd never have stopped till I knew the truth of it. If any woman had ever said to me that Parker had taken the bread out of her children's mouths, do you think that I'd sit as you are sitting? I tell you that Lopez has robbed us,--has robbed us, and taken everything." "What can I say, Mrs. Parker;--what can I do?" "Where is he?" "He is not here. He is dining at his club." "Where is that? I will go there and shame him before them all. Don't you feel no shame? Because you've got things comfortable here, I suppose it's all nothing to you. You don't care, though my children were starving in the gutter,--as they will do." "If you knew me, Mrs. Parker, you wouldn't speak to me like that." "Know you! Of course I know you. You're a lady, and your father's a rich man, and your husband thinks no end of himself. And we're poor people, so it don't matter whether we're robbed and ruined or not. That's about it." "If I had anything, I'd give you all that I had." "And he's taken to drinking that hard that he's never rightly sober from morning to night." As she told this story of her husband's disgrace, the poor woman burst into tears. "Who's to trust him with business now? He's that broken-hearted that he don't know which way to turn,--only to the bottle. And Lopez has done it all,--done it all! I haven't got a father, ma'am, who has got a house over his head for me and my babies. Only think if you was turned out into the street with your babby, as I am like to be." "I have no baby," said the wretched woman through her tears and sobs. "Haven't you, Mrs. Lopez? Oh dear!" exclaimed the soft-hearted woman, reduced at once to pity. "How was it then?" "He died, Mrs. Parker,--just a few days after he was born." "Did he now? Well, well. We all have our troubles, I suppose." "I have mine, I know," said Emily, "and very, very heavy they are. I cannot tell you what I have to suffer." "Isn't he good to you?" "I cannot talk about it, Mrs. Parker. What you tell me about yourself has added greatly to my sorrows. My husband is talking of going away,--to live out of England." "Yes, at a place they call--I forget what they call it, but I heard it." "Guatemala,--in America." "I know. Sexty told me. He has no business to go anywhere, while he owes Sexty such a lot of money. He has taken everything, and now he's going to Kattymaly!" At this moment Mr. Wharton knocked at the door and entered the room. As he did so Mrs. Parker got up and curtseyed. "This is my father, Mrs. Parker," said Emily. "Papa, this is Mrs. Parker. She is the wife of Mr. Parker, who was Ferdinand's partner. She has come here with bad news." "Very bad news indeed, sir," said Mrs. Parker, curtseying again. Mr. Wharton frowned, not as being angry with the woman, but feeling that some further horror was to be told him of his son-in-law. "I can't help coming, sir," continued Mrs. Parker. "Where am I to go if I don't come? Mr. Lopez, sir, has ruined us root and branch,--root and branch." "That at any rate is not my fault," said Mr. Wharton. "But she is his wife, sir. Where am I to go if not to where he lives? Am I to put up with everything gone, and my poor husband in the right way to go to Bedlam, and not to say a word about it to the grand relations of him who did it all?" "He is a bad man," said Mr. Wharton. "I cannot make him otherwise." "Will he do nothing for us?" "I will tell you all I know about him." Then Mr. Wharton did tell her all that he knew, as to the appointment at Guatemala and the amount of salary which was to be attached to it. "Whether he will do anything for you, I cannot say;--I should think not, unless he be forced. I should advise you to go to the offices of the Company in Coleman Street and try to make some terms there. But I fear,--I fear it will be all useless." "Then we may starve." "It is not her fault," said Mr. Wharton, pointing to his daughter. "She has had no hand in it. She knows less of it all than you do." "It is my fault," said Emily, bursting out into self-reproach,--"my fault that I married him." "Whether married or single he would have preyed upon Mr. Parker to the same extent." "Like enough," said the poor wife. "He'd prey upon anybody as he could get a-hold of. And so, Mr. Wharton, you think that you can do nothing for me." "If your want be immediate I can relieve it," said the barrister. Mrs. Parker did not like the idea of accepting direct charity, but, nevertheless, on going away did take the five sovereigns which Mr. Wharton offered to her. After such an interview as that the dinner between the father and the daughter was not very happy. She was eaten up by remorse. Gradually she had learned how frightful was the thing she had done in giving herself to a man of whom she had known nothing. And it was not only that she had degraded herself by loving such a man, but that she had been persistent in clinging to him though her father and all his friends had told her of the danger which she was running. And now it seemed that she had destroyed her father as well as herself! All that she could do was to be persistent in her prayer that he would let her go. "I have done it," she said that night, "and I could bear it better, if you would let me bear it alone." But he only kissed her, and sobbed over her, and held her close to his heart with his clinging arms,--in a manner in which he had never held her in their old happy days. He took himself to his own rooms before Lopez returned, but she of course had to bear her husband's presence. As she had declared to her father more than once, she was not afraid of him. Even though he should strike her,--though he should kill her,--she would not be afraid of him. He had already done worse to her than anything that could follow. "Mrs. Parker has been here to-day," she said to him that night. "And what had Mrs. Parker to say?" "That you had ruined her husband." "Exactly. When a man speculates and doesn't win of course he throws the blame on some one else. And when he is too much of a cur to come himself, he sends his wife." "She says you owe him money." "What business have you to listen to what she says? If she comes again, do not see her. Do you understand me?" "Yes, I understand. She saw papa also. If you owe him money, should it not be paid?" "My dearest love, everybody who owes anything to anybody should always pay it. That is so self-evident that one would almost suppose that it might be understood without being enunciated. But the virtue of paying your debts is incompatible with an absence of money. Now, if you please, we will not say anything more about Mrs. Parker. She is not at any rate a fit companion for you." "It was you who introduced me to her." "Hold your tongue about her,--and let that be an end of it. I little knew what a world of torment I was preparing for myself when I allowed you to come and live in your father's house." CHAPTER LVI What the Duchess Thought of Her Husband When the Session began it was understood in the political world that a very strong opposition was to be organised against the Government under the guidance of Sir Orlando Drought, and that the great sin to be imputed to the Cabinet was an utter indifference to the safety and honour of Great Britain, as manifested by their neglect of the navy. All the world knew that Sir Orlando had deserted the Coalition because he was not allowed to build new ships, and of course Sir Orlando would make the most of his grievance. With him was joined Mr. Boffin, the patriotic Conservative who had never listened to the voice of the seducer, and the staunch remainder of the old Tory party. And with them the more violent of the Radicals were prepared to act, not desirous, indeed, that new ships should be built, or that a Conservative Government should be established,--or, indeed, that anything should be done,--but animated by intense disgust that so mild a politician as the Duke of Omnium should be Prime Minister. The fight began at once, Sir Orlando objecting violently to certain passages in the Queen's Speech. It was all very well to say that the country was at present at peace with all the world; but how was peace to be maintained without a fleet? Then Sir Orlando paid a great many compliments to the Duke, and ended his speech by declaring him to be the most absolutely fainéant minister that had disgraced the country since the days of the Duke of Newcastle. Mr. Monk defended the Coalition, and assured the House that the navy was not only the most powerful navy existing, but that it was the most powerful that ever had existed in the possession of this or any other country, and was probably in absolute efficiency superior to the combined navies of all the world. The House was not shocked by statements so absolutely at variance with each other, coming from two gentlemen who had lately been members of the same Government, and who must be supposed to know what they were talking about, but seemed to think that upon the whole Sir Orlando had done his duty. For though there was complete confidence in the navy as a navy, and though a very small minority would have voted for any considerably increased expense, still it was well that there should be an opposition. And how can there be an opposition without some subject for grumbling,--some matter on which a minister may be attacked? No one really thought that the Prussians and French combined would invade our shores and devastate our fields, and plunder London, and carry our daughters away into captivity. The state of the funds showed very plainly that there was no such fear. But a good cry is a very good thing,--and it is always well to rub up the officials of the Admiralty by a little wholesome abuse. Sir Orlando was thought to have done his business well. Of course he did not risk a division upon the address. Had he done so he would have been "nowhere." But, as it was, he was proud of his achievement. The ministers generally would have been indifferent to the very hard words that were said of them, knowing what they were worth, and feeling aware that a ministry which had everything too easy must lose its interest in the country, had it not been that their chief was very sore on the subject. The old Duke's work at this time consisted almost altogether in nursing the younger Duke. It did sometimes occur to his elder Grace that it might be well to let his brother retire, and that a Prime Minister, malgré lui, could not be a successful Prime Minister, or a useful one. But if the Duke of Omnium went the Coalition must go too, and the Coalition had been the offspring of the old statesman. The country was thriving under the Coalition, and there was no real reason why it should not last for the next ten years. He continued, therefore, his system of coddling, and was ready at any moment, or at every moment, to pour, if not comfort, at any rate consolation into the ears of his unhappy friend. In the present emergency, it was the falsehood and general baseness of Sir Orlando which nearly broke the heart of the Prime Minister. "How is one to live," he said, "if one has to do with men of that kind?" "But you haven't to do with him any longer," said the Duke of St. Bungay. "When I see a man who is supposed to have earned the name of a statesman, and been high in the councils of his sovereign, induced by personal jealousy to do as he is doing, it makes me feel that an honest man should not place himself where he may have to deal with such persons." "According to that the honest men are to desert their country in order that the dishonest men may have everything their own way." Our Duke could not answer this, and therefore for the moment he yielded. But he was unhappy, saturnine, and generally silent except when closeted with his ancient mentor. And he knew that he was saturnine and silent, and that it behoved him as a leader of men to be genial and communicative,--listening to counsel even if he did not follow it, and at any rate appearing to have confidence in his colleagues. During this time Mr. Slide was not inactive, and in his heart of hearts the Prime Minister was more afraid of Mr. Slide's attacks than of those made upon him by Sir Orlando Drought. Now that Parliament was sitting, and the minds of men were stirred to political feeling by the renewed energy of the House, a great deal was being said in many quarters about the last Silverbridge election. The papers had taken the matter up generally, some accusing the Prime Minister and some defending. But the defence was almost as unpalatable to him as the accusation. It was admitted on all sides that the Duke, both as a peer and as a Prime Minister, should have abstained from any interference whatever in the election. And it was also admitted on all sides that he had not so abstained,--if there was any truth at all in the allegation that he had paid money for Mr. Lopez. But it was pleaded on his behalf that the Dukes of Omnium had always interfered at Silverbridge, and that no Reform Bill had ever had any effect in reducing their influence in that borough. Frequent allusion was made to the cautious Dod who, year after year, had reported that the Duke of Omnium exercised considerable influence in the borough. And then the friendly newspapers went on to explain that the Duke had in this instance stayed his hand, and that the money, if paid at all, had been paid because the candidate who was to have been his nominee had been thrown over, when the Duke at the last moment made up his mind that he would abandon the privilege which had hitherto been always exercised by the head of his family, and which had been exercised more than once or twice in his own favour. But Mr. Slide, day after day, repeated his question, "We want to know whether the Prime Minister did or did not pay the election expenses of Mr. Lopez at the last Silverbridge election, and if so, why he paid them. We shall continue to ask this question till it has been answered, and when asking it we again say that the actual correspondence on the subject between the Duke and Mr. Lopez is in our own hands." And then, after a while, allusions were made to the Duchess;--for Mr. Slide had learned all the facts of the case from Lopez himself. When Mr. Slide found how hard it was "to draw his badger," as he expressed himself concerning his own operations, he at last openly alluded to the Duchess, running the risk of any punishment that might fall upon him by action for libel or by severe reprehension from his colleagues of the Press. "We have as yet," he said, "received no answers to the questions which we have felt ourselves called upon to ask in reference to the conduct of the Prime Minister at the Silverbridge election. We are of opinion that all interference by peers with the constituencies of the country should be put down by the strong hand of the law as thoroughly and unmercifully as we are putting down ordinary bribery. But when the offending peer is also the Prime Minister of this great country, it becomes doubly the duty of those who watch over the public safety,"--Mr. Slide was always speaking of himself as watching over the public safety,--"to animadvert upon his crime till it has been assoiled, or at any rate repented. From what we now hear we have reason to believe that the crime itself is acknowledged. Had the payment on behalf of Mr. Lopez not been made,--as it certainly was made, or the letters in our hand would be impudent forgeries,--the charge would long since have been denied. Silence in such a matter amounts to confession. But we understand that the Duke intends to escape under the plea that he has a second self, powerful as he is to exercise the baneful influence which his territorial wealth unfortunately gives him, but for the actions of which second self he, as a Peer of Parliament and as Prime Minister, is not responsible. In other words we are informed that the privilege belonging to the Palliser family at Silverbridge was exercised, not by the Duke himself, but by the Duchess;--and that the Duke paid the money when he found that the Duchess had promised more than she could perform. We should hardly have thought that even a man so notoriously weak as the Duke of Omnium would have endeavoured to ride out of responsibility by throwing the blame upon his wife; but he will certainly find that the attempt, if made, will fail. "Against the Duchess herself we wish to say not a word. She is known as exercising a wide if not a discriminate hospitality. We believe her to be a kind-hearted, bustling, ambitious lady, to whom any little faults may easily be forgiven on account of her good-nature and generosity. But we cannot accept her indiscretion as an excuse for a most unconstitutional act performed by the Prime Minister of this country." Latterly the Duchess had taken in her own copy of the "People's Banner." Since she had found that those around her were endeavouring to keep from her what was being said of her husband in regard to the borough, she had been determined to see it all. She therefore read the article from which two or three paragraphs have just been given,--and having read it she handed it to her friend Mrs. Finn. "I wonder that you trouble yourself with such trash," her friend said to her. "That is all very well, my dear, from you; but we poor wretches who are the slaves of the people have to regard what is said of us in the 'People's Banner.'" "It would be much better for you to neglect it." "Just as authors are told not to read the criticisms;--but I never would believe any author who told me that he didn't read what was said about him. I wonder when the man found out that I was good-natured. He wouldn't find me good-natured if I could get hold of him." "You are not going to allow it to torment you!" "For my own sake, not a moment. I fancy that if I might be permitted to have my own way I could answer him very easily. Indeed with these dregs of the newspapers, these gutter-slanderers, if one would be open and say all the truth aloud, what would one have to fear? After all, what is it that I did? I disobeyed my husband because I thought that he was too scrupulous. Let me say as much, out loud to the public,--saying also that I am sorry for it, as I am,--and who would be against me? Who would have a word to say after that? I should be the most popular woman in England for a month,--and, as regards Plantagenet, Mr. Slide and his articles would all sink into silence. But even though he were to continue this from day to day for a twelvemonth it would not hurt me,--but that I know how it scorches him. This mention of my name will make it more intolerable to him than ever. I doubt that you know him even yet." "I thought that I did." "Though in manner he is as dry as a stick, though all his pursuits are opposite to the very idea of romance, though he passes his days and nights in thinking how he may take a halfpenny in the pound off the taxes of the people without robbing the revenue, there is a dash of chivalry about him worthy of the old poets. To him a woman, particularly his own woman, is a thing so fine and so precious that the winds of heaven should hardly be allowed to blow upon her. He cannot bear to think that people should even talk of his wife. And yet, Heaven knows, poor fellow, I have given people occasion enough to talk of me. And he has a much higher chivalry than that of the old poets. They, or their heroes, watched their women because they did not want to have trouble about them,--shut them up in castles, kept them in ignorance, and held them as far as they could out of harm's way." "I hardly think they succeeded," said Mrs. Finn. "But in pure selfishness they tried all they could. But he is too proud to watch. If you and I were hatching treason against him in the dark, and chance had brought him there, he would stop his ears with his fingers. He is all trust, even when he knows that he is being deceived. He is honour complete from head to foot. Ah, it was before you knew me when I tried him the hardest. I never could quite tell you that story, and I won't try it now; but he behaved like a god. I could never tell him what I felt,--but I felt it." "You ought to love him." "I do;--but what's the use of it? He is a god, but I am not a goddess;--and then, though he is a god, he is a dry, silent, uncongenial and uncomfortable god. It would have suited me much better to have married a sinner. But then the sinner that I would have married was so irredeemable a scapegrace." "I do not believe in a woman marrying a bad man in the hope of making him good." "Especially not when the woman is naturally inclined to evil herself. It will half kill him when he reads all this about me. He has read it already, and it has already half killed him. For myself I do not mind it in the least, but for his sake I mind it much. It will rob him of his only possible answer to the accusation. The very thing which this wretch in the newspaper says he will say, and that he will be disgraced by saying, is the very thing that he ought to say. And there would be no disgrace in it,--beyond what I might well bear for my little fault, and which I could bear so easily." "Shall you speak to him about it?" "No; I dare not. In this matter it has gone beyond speaking. I suppose he does talk it over with the old Duke; but he will say nothing to me about it,--unless he were to tell me that he had resigned, and that we were to start off and live in Minorca for the next ten years. I was so proud when they made him Prime Minister; but I think that I am beginning to regret it now." Then there was a pause, and the Duchess went on with her newspapers; but she soon resumed her discourse. Her heart was full, and out of a full heart the mouth speaks. "They should have made me Prime Minister, and have let him be Chancellor of the Exchequer. I begin to see the ways of Government now. I could have done all the dirty work. I could have given away garters and ribbons, and made my bargains while giving them. I could select sleek, easy bishops who wouldn't be troublesome. I could give pensions or withhold them, and make the stupid men peers. I could have the big noblemen at my feet, praying to be Lieutenants of Counties. I could dole out secretaryships and lordships, and never a one without getting something in return. I could brazen out a job and let the 'People's Banners' and the Slides make their worst of it. And I think I could make myself popular with my party, and do the high-flowing patriotic talk for the benefit of the Provinces. A man at a regular office has to work. That's what Plantagenet is fit for. He wants always to be doing something that shall be really useful, and a man has to toil at that and really to know things. But a Prime Minister should never go beyond generalities about commerce, agriculture, peace, and general philanthropy. Of course he should have the gift of the gab, and that Plantagenet hasn't got. He never wants to say anything unless he has got something to say. I could do a Mansion House dinner to a marvel!" "I don't doubt that you could speak at all times, Lady Glen." "Oh, I do so wish that I had the opportunity," said the Duchess. Of course the Duke had read the article in the privacy of his own room, and of course the article had nearly maddened him with anger and grief. As the Duchess had said, the article had taken from him the very ground on which his friends had told him that he could stand. He had never consented, and never would consent, to lay the blame publicly on his wife; but he had begun to think that he must take notice of the charge made against him, and deputize some one to explain for him in the House of Commons that the injury had been done at Silverbridge by the indiscretion of an agent who had not fulfilled his employer's intentions, and that the Duke had thought it right afterwards to pay the money in consequence of this indiscretion. He had not agreed to this, but he had brought himself to think that he must agree to it. But now, of course, the question would follow:--Who was the indiscreet agent? Was the Duchess the person for whose indiscretion he had had to pay £500 to Mr. Lopez? And in this matter did he not find himself in accord even with Mr. Slide? "We should hardly have thought that even a man so notoriously weak as the Duke of Omnium would have endeavoured to ride out of responsibility by throwing the blame upon his wife." He read and reread these words till he knew them by heart. For a few moments it seemed to him to be an evil in the Constitution that the Prime Minister should not have the power of instantly crucifying so foul a slanderer;--and yet it was the very truth of the words that crushed him. He was weak,--he told himself;--notoriously weak, it must be; and it would be most mean in him to ride out of responsibility by throwing blame upon his wife. But what else was he to do? There seemed to him to be but one course,--to get up in the House of Lords and declare that he paid the money because he had thought it right to do so under circumstances which he could not explain, and to declare that it was not his intention to say another word on the subject, or to have another word said on his behalf. There was a Cabinet Council held that day, but no one ventured to speak to the Prime Minister as to the accusation. Though he considered himself to be weak, his colleagues were all more or less afraid of him. There was a certain silent dignity about the man which saved him from the evils, as it also debarred him from the advantages, of familiarity. He had spoken on the subject to Mr. Monk and to Phineas Finn, and, as the reader knows, very often to his old mentor. He had also mentioned it to his friend Lord Cantrip, who was not in the Cabinet. Coming away from the Cabinet he took Mr. Monk's arm, and led him away to his own room in the Treasury Chambers. "Have you happened to see an article in the 'People's Banner' this morning?" he asked. "I never see the 'People's Banner,'" said Mr. Monk. "There it is;--just look at that." Whereupon Mr. Monk read the article. "You understand what people call constitutional practice as well as any one I know. As I told you before, I did pay that man's expenses. Did I do anything unconstitutional?" "That would depend, Duke, upon the circumstances. If you were to back a man up by your wealth in an expensive contest, I think it would be unconstitutional. If you set yourself to work in that way, and cared not what you spent, you might materially influence the elections, and buy parliamentary support for yourself." "But in this case the payment was made after the man had failed, and certainly had not been promised either by me or by any one on my behalf." "I think it was unfortunate," said Mr. Monk. "Certainly, certainly; but I am not asking as to that," said the Duke impatiently. "The man had been injured by indiscreet persons acting on my behalf and in opposition to my wishes." He said not a word about the Duchess; but Mr. Monk no doubt knew that her Grace had been at any rate one of the indiscreet persons. "He applied to me for the money, alleging that he had been injured by my agents. That being so,--presuming that my story be correct,--did I act unconstitutionally?" "I think not," said Mr. Monk, "and I think that the circumstances, when explained, will bear you harmless." "Thank you; thank you. I did not want to trouble you about that just at present." CHAPTER LVII The Explanation Mr. Monk had been altogether unable to decipher the Duke's purpose in the question he had asked. About an hour afterwards they walked down to the Houses together, Mr. Monk having been kept at his office. "I hope I was not a little short with you just now," said the Duke. "I did not find it out," said Mr. Monk, smiling. "You read what was in the papers, and you may imagine that it is of a nature to irritate a man. I knew that no one could answer my question so correctly as you, and therefore I was a little eager to keep directly to the question. It occurred to me afterwards that I had been--perhaps uncourteous." "Not at all, Duke." "If I was, your goodness will excuse an irritated man. If a question were asked about this in the House of Commons, who would be the best man to answer it? Would you do it?" Mr. Monk considered awhile. "I think," he said, "that Mr. Finn would do it with a better grace. Of course I will do it if you wish it. But he has tact in such matters, and it is known that his wife is much regarded by her Grace." "I will not have the Duchess's name mentioned," said the Duke, turning short upon his companion. "I did not allude to that, but I thought that the intimacy which existed might make it pleasant to you to employ Mr. Finn as the exponent of your wishes." "I have the greatest confidence in Mr. Finn, certainly, and am on most friendly personal terms with him. It shall be so, if I decide on answering any question in your House on a matter so purely personal to myself." "I would suggest that you should have the question asked in a friendly way. Get some independent member, such as Mr. Beverley or Sir James Deering, to ask it. The matter would then be brought forward in no carping spirit, and you would be enabled, through Mr. Finn, to set the matter at rest. You have probably spoken to the Duke about it." "I have mentioned it to him." "Is not that what he would recommend?" The old Duke had recommended that the entire truth should be told, and that the Duchess's operations should be made public. Here was our poor Prime Minister's great difficulty. He and his Mentor were at variance. His Mentor was advising that the real naked truth should be told, whereas Telemachus was intent upon keeping the name of the actual culprit in the background. "I will think it all over," said the Prime Minister as the two parted company at Palace Yard. That evening he spoke to Lord Cantrip on the subject. Though the matter was so odious to him, he could not keep his mind from it for a moment. Had Lord Cantrip seen the article in the "People's Banner"? Lord Cantrip, like Mr. Monk, declared that the paper in question did not constitute part of his usual morning's recreation. "I won't ask you to read it," said the Duke;--"but it contains a very bitter attack upon me,--the bitterest that has yet been made. I suppose I ought to notice the matter?" "If I were you," said Lord Cantrip, "I should put myself into the hands of the Duke of St. Bungay, and do exactly what he advises. There is no man in England knows so well as he does what should be done in such a case as this." The Prime Minister frowned and said nothing. "My dear Duke," continued Lord Cantrip, "I can give you no other advice. Who is there that has your personal interest and your honour at heart so entirely as his Grace;--and what man can be a more sagacious or more experienced adviser?" "I was thinking that you might ask a question about it in our House." "I?" "You would do it for me in a manner that--that would be free from all offence." "If I did it at all, I should certainly strive to do that. But it has never occurred to me that you would make such a suggestion. Would you give me a few moments to think about it?" "I couldn't do it," Lord Cantrip said afterwards. "By taking such a step, even at your request, I should certainly express the opinion that the matter was one on which Parliament was entitled to expect that you should make an explanation. But my own opinion is that Parliament has no business to meddle in the matter. I do not think that every action of a minister's life should be made matter of inquiry because a newspaper may choose to make allusions to it. At any rate, if any word is said about it, it should, I think, be said in the other House." "The Duke of St. Bungay thinks that something should be said." "I could not myself consent even to appear to desire information on a matter so entirely personal to yourself." The Duke bowed, and smiled with a cold, glittering, uncomfortable smile which would sometimes cross his face when he was not pleased, and no more was then said upon the subject. Attempts were made to have the question asked in a far different spirit by some hostile member of the House of Commons. Sir Orlando Drought was sounded, and he for a while did give ear to the suggestion. But, as he came to have the matter full before him, he could not do it. The Duke had spurned his advice as a minister, and had refused to sanction a measure which he, as the head of a branch of the Government, had proposed. The Duke had so offended him that he conceived himself bound to regard the Duke as his enemy. But he knew,--and he could not escape from the knowledge,--that England did not contain a more honourable man than the Duke. He was delighted that the Duke should be vexed, and thwarted, and called ill names in the matter. To be gratified at this discomfiture of his enemy was in the nature of parliamentary opposition. Any blow that might weaken his opponent was a blow in his favour. But this was a blow which he could not strike with his own hands. There were things in parliamentary tactics which even Sir Orlando could not do. Arthur Fletcher was also asked to undertake the task. He was the successful candidate, the man who had opposed Lopez, and who was declared in the "People's Banner" to have emancipated that borough by his noble conduct from the tyranny of the House of Palliser. And it was thought that he might like an opportunity of making himself known in the House. But he was simply indignant when the suggestion was made to him. "What is it to me," he said, "who paid the blackguard's expenses?" This went on for some weeks after Parliament had met, and for some days even after the article in which direct allusion was made to the Duchess. The Prime Minister could not be got to consent that no notice should be taken of the matter, let the papers or the public say what they would, nor could he be induced to let the matter be handled in the manner proposed by the elder Duke. And during this time he was in such a fever that those about him felt that something must be done. Mr. Monk suggested that if everybody held his tongue,--meaning all the Duke's friends,--the thing would wear itself out. But it was apparent to those who were nearest to the minister, to Mr. Warburton, for instance, and the Duke of St. Bungay, that the man himself would be worn out first. The happy possessor of a thick skin can hardly understand how one not so blessed may be hurt by the thong of a little whip! At last the matter was arranged. At the instigation of Mr. Monk, Sir James Deering, who was really the father of the House, an independent member, but one who generally voted with the Coalition, consented to ask the question in the House of Commons. And Phineas Finn was instructed by the Duke as to the answer that was to be given. The Duke of Omnium in giving these instructions made a mystery of the matter which he by no means himself intended. But he was so sore that he could not be simple in what he said. "Mr. Finn," he said, "you must promise me this,--that the name of the Duchess shall not be mentioned." "Certainly not by me, if you tell me that I am not to mention it." "No one else can do so. The matter will take the form of a simple question, and though the conduct of a minister may no doubt be made the subject of debate,--and it is not improbable that my conduct may do so in this instance,--it is, I think, impossible that any member should make an allusion to my wife. The privilege or power of returning a member for the borough has undoubtedly been exercised by our family since as well as previous to both the Reform Bills. At the last election I thought it right to abandon that privilege, and notified to those about me my intention. But that which a man has the power of doing he cannot always do without the interference of those around him. There was a misconception, and among my,--my adherents,--there were some who injudiciously advised Mr. Lopez to stand on my interest. But he did not get my interest, and was beaten;--and therefore when he asked me for the money which he had spent, I paid it to him. That is all. I think the House can hardly avoid to see that my effort was made to discontinue an unconstitutional proceeding." Sir James Deering asked the question. "He trusted," he said, "that the House would not think that the question of which he had given notice and which he was about to ask was instigated by any personal desire on his part to inquire into the conduct of the Prime Minister. He was one who believed that the Duke of Omnium was as little likely as any man in England to offend by unconstitutional practice on his own part. But a great deal had been talked and written lately about the late election at Silverbridge, and there were those who thought,--and he was one of them,--that something should be said to stop the mouths of cavillers. With this object he would ask the Right Honourable Gentleman who led the House, and who was perhaps first in standing among the noble Duke's colleagues in that House, whether the noble Duke was prepared to have any statement on the subject made." The House was full to the very corners of the galleries. Of course it was known to everybody that the question was to be asked and to be answered. There were some who thought that the matter was so serious that the Prime Minister could not get over it. Others had heard in the clubs that Lady Glen, as the Duchess was still called, was to be made the scapegoat. Men of all classes were open-mouthed in their denunciation of the meanness of Lopez,--though no one but Mr. Wharton knew half his villainy, as he alone knew that the expenses had been paid twice over. In one corner of the reporters' gallery sat Mr. Slide, pencil in hand, prepared to revert to his old work on so momentous an occasion. It was a great day for him. He by his own unassisted energy had brought a Prime Minister to book, and had created all this turmoil. It might be his happy lot to be the means of turning that Prime Minister out of office. It was he who had watched over the nation! The Duchess had been most anxious to be present,--but had not ventured to come without asking her husband's leave, which he had most peremptorily refused to give. "I cannot understand, Glencora, how you can suggest such a thing," he had said. "You make so much of everything," she had replied petulantly; but she had remained at home. The ladies' gallery was, however, quite full. Mrs. Finn was there, of course, anxious not only for her friend, but eager to hear how her husband would acquit himself in his task. The wives and daughters of all the ministers were there,--excepting the wife of the Prime Minister. There never had been, in the memory of them all, a matter that was so interesting to them, for it was the only matter they remembered in which a woman's conduct might probably be called in question in the House of Commons. And the seats appropriated to peers were so crammed that above a dozen grey-headed old lords were standing in the passage which divides them from the common strangers. After all it was not, in truth, much of an affair. A very little man indeed had calumniated the conduct of a minister of the Crown, till it had been thought well that the minister should defend himself. No one really believed that the Duke had committed any great offence. At the worst it was no more than indiscretion, which was noticeable only because a Prime Minister should never be indiscreet. Had the taxation of the whole country for the next year been in dispute, there would have been no such interest felt. Had the welfare of the Indian Empire occupied the House, the House would have been empty. But the hope that a certain woman's name would have to be mentioned, crammed it from the floor to the ceiling. The reader need not be told that that name was not mentioned. Our old friend Phineas, on rising to his legs, first apologised for doing so in place of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. But perhaps the House would accept a statement from him, as the noble Duke at the head of the Government had asked him to make it. Then he made his statement. "Perhaps," he said, "no falser accusation than this had ever been brought forward against a minister of the Crown, for it specially charged his noble friend with resorting to the employment of unconstitutional practices to bolster up his parliamentary support, whereas it was known by everybody that there would have been no matter for accusation at all had not the Duke of his own motion abandoned a recognised privilege, because, in his opinion, the exercise of that privilege was opposed to the spirit of the Constitution. Had the noble Duke simply nominated a candidate, as candidates had been nominated at Silverbridge for centuries past, that candidate would have been returned with absolute certainty, and there would have been no word spoken on the subject. It was not, perhaps, for him, who had the honour of serving under his Grace, and who, as being a part of his Grace's Government, was for the time one with his Grace, to expatiate at length on the nobility of the sacrifice here made. But they all knew there at what rate was valued a seat in that House. Thank God that privilege could not now be rated at any money price. It could not be bought and sold. But this privilege which his noble friend had so magnanimously resigned from purely patriotic motives, was, he believed, still in existence, and he would ask those few who were still in the happy, or, perhaps, he had better say in the envied, position of being able to send their friends to that House, what was their estimation of the conduct of the Duke in this matter? It might be that there were one or two such present, and who now heard him,--or, perhaps, one or two who owed their seats to the exercise of such a privilege. They might marvel at the magnitude of the surrender. They might even question the sagacity of the man who could abandon so much without a price. But he hardly thought that even they would regard it as unconstitutional. "This was what the Prime Minister had done,--acting not as Prime Minister, but as an English nobleman, in the management of his own property and privileges. And now he would come to the gist of the accusation made; in making which, the thing which the Duke had really done had been altogether ignored. When the vacancy had been declared by the acceptance of the Chiltern Hundreds by a gentleman whose absence from the House they all regretted, the Duke had signified to his agents his intention of retiring altogether from the exercise of any privilege or power in the matter. But the Duke was then, as he was also now, and would, it was to be hoped, long continue to be, Prime Minister of England. He need hardly remind gentlemen in that House that the Prime Minister was not in a position to devote his undivided time to the management of his own property, or even to the interests of the Borough of Silverbridge. That his Grace had been earnest in his instructions to his agents, the sequel fully proved; but that earnestness his agents had misinterpreted." Then there was heard a voice in the House, "What agents?" and from another voice, "Name them." For there were present some who thought it to be shameful that the excitement of the occasion should be lowered by keeping back all allusion to the Duchess. "I have not distinguished," said Phineas, assuming an indignant tone, "the honourable gentlemen from whom those questions have come, and therefore I have the less compunction in telling them that it is no part of my duty on this occasion to gratify a morbid and an indecent curiosity." Then there was a cry of "Order," and an appeal to the Speaker. Certain gentlemen wished to know whether indecent was parliamentary. The Speaker, with some hesitation, expressed his opinion that the word, as then used, was not open to objection from him. He thought that it was within the scope of a member's rights to charge another member with indecent curiosity. "If," said Phineas, rising again to his legs, for he had sat down for a moment, "the gentleman who called for a name will rise in his place and repeat the demand, I will recall the word indecent and substitute another,--or others. I will tell him that he is one who, regardless of the real conduct of the Prime Minister, either as a man or as a servant of the Crown, is only anxious to inflict an unmanly wound in order that he may be gratified by seeing the pain which he inflicts." Then he paused, but as no further question was asked, he continued his statement. "A candidate had been brought forward," he said, "by those interested in the Duke's affairs. A man whom he would not name, but who, he trusted, would never succeed in his ambition to occupy a seat in that House, had been brought forward, and certain tradesmen in Silverbridge had been asked to support him as the Duke's nominee. There was no doubt about it. The House perhaps could understand that the local adherents and neighbours of a man so high in rank and wealth as the Duke of Omnium would not gladly see the privileges of their lord diminished. Perhaps, too, it occurred to them that a Prime Minister could not have his eye everywhere. There would always be worthy men in boroughs who liked to exercise some second-hand authority. At any rate it was the case that this candidate was encouraged. Then the Duke had heard it, and had put his foot upon the little mutiny, and had stamped it out at once. He might perhaps here," he said, "congratulate the House on the acquisition it had received by the failure of that candidate. So far, at any rate," he thought, "it must be admitted that the Duke had been free from blame;--but now he came to the gravamen of the charge." The gravamen of the charge is so well known to the reader that the simple account which Phineas gave of it need not be repeated. The Duke had paid the money, when asked for it, because he felt that the man had been injured by incorrect representations made to him. "I need hardly pause to stigmatise the meanness of that application," said Phineas, "but I may perhaps conclude by saying that whether the last act done by the Duke in this matter was or was not indiscreet, I shall probably have the House with me when I say that it savours much more strongly of nobility than of indiscretion." When Phineas Finn sat down no one arose to say another word on the subject. It was afterwards felt that it would only have been graceful had Sir Orlando risen and expressed his opinion that the House had heard the statement just made with perfect satisfaction. But he did not do so, and after a short pause the ordinary business of the day was recommenced. Then there was a speedy descent from the galleries, and the ladies trooped out of their cage, and the grey-headed old peers went back to their own chamber, and the members themselves quickly jostled out through the doors, and Mr. Monk was left to explain his proposed alteration in the dog tax to a thin House of seventy or eighty members. The thing was then over, and people were astonished that so great a thing should be over with so little fuss. It really seemed that after Phineas Finn's speech there was nothing more to be said on the matter. Everybody of course knew that the Duchess had been the chief of the agents to whom he had alluded, but they had known as much as that before. It was, however, felt by everybody that the matter had been brought to an end. The game, such as it was, had been played out. Perhaps the only person who heard Mr. Finn's speech throughout, and still hoped that the spark could be again fanned into a flame, was Quintus Slide. He went out and wrote another article about the Duchess. If a man was so unable to rule his affairs at home, he was certainly unfit to be Prime Minister. But even Quintus Slide, as he wrote his article, felt that he was hoping against hope. The charge might be referred to hereafter as one that had never been satisfactorily cleared up. That game is always open to the opponents of a minister. After the lapse of a few months an old accusation can be serviceably used, whether at the time it was proved or disproved. Mr. Slide published his article, but he felt that for the present the Silverbridge election papers had better be put by among the properties of the "People's Banner," and brought out, if necessary, for further use at some future time. "Mr. Finn," said the Duke, "I feel indebted to you for the trouble you have taken." "It was only a pleasant duty." "I am grateful to you for the manner in which it was performed." This was all the Duke said, and Phineas felt it to be cold. The Duke, in truth, was grateful; but gratitude with him always failed to exhibit itself readily. From the world at large Phineas Finn received great praise for the manner in which he had performed his task. CHAPTER LVIII "Quite Settled" The abuse which was now publicly heaped on the name of Ferdinand Lopez hit the man very hard; but not so hard perhaps as his rejection by Lady Eustace. That was an episode in his life of which even he felt ashamed, and of which he was unable to shake the disgrace from his memory. He had no inner appreciation whatsoever of what was really good or what was really bad in a man's conduct. He did not know that he had done evil in applying to the Duke for the money. He had only meant to attack the Duke; and when the money had come it had been regarded as justifiable prey. And when after receiving the Duke's money, he had kept also Mr. Wharton's money, he had justified himself again by reminding himself that Mr. Wharton certainly owed him much more than that. In a sense he was what is called a gentleman. He knew how to speak, and how to look, how to use a knife and fork, how to dress himself, and how to walk. But he had not the faintest notion of the feelings of a gentleman. He had, however, a very keen conception of the evil of being generally ill spoken of. Even now, though he was making up his mind to leave England for a long term of years, he understood the disadvantage of leaving it under so heavy a cloud;--and he understood also that the cloud might possibly impede his going altogether. Even in Coleman Street they were looking black upon him, and Mr. Hartlepod went so far as to say to Lopez himself, that, "by Jove, he had put his foot in it." He had endeavoured to be courageous under his burden, and every day walked into the offices of the Mining Company, endeavouring to look as though he had committed no fault of which he had to be ashamed. But after the second day he found that nothing was said to him of the affairs of the Company, and on the fourth day Mr. Hartlepod informed him that the time allowed for paying up his shares had passed by, and that another local manager would be appointed. "The time is not over till to-morrow," said Lopez angrily. "I tell you what I am told to tell you," said Mr. Hartlepod. "You will only waste your time by coming here any more." He had not once seen Mr. Wharton since the statement made in Parliament, although he had lived in the same house with him. Everett Wharton had come home, and they two had met;--but the meeting had been stormy. "It seems to me, Lopez, that you are a scoundrel," Everett said to him one day after having heard the whole story,--or rather many stories,--from his father. This took place not in Manchester Square, but at the club, where Everett had endeavoured to cut his brother-in-law. It need hardly be said that at this time Lopez was not popular at his club. On the next day a meeting of the whole club was to be held that the propriety of expelling him might be discussed. But he had resolved that he would not be cowed, that he would still show himself, and still defend his conduct. He did not know, however, that Everett Wharton had already made known to the Committee of the club all the facts of the double payment. He had addressed Everett in that solicitude to which a man should never be reduced of seeking to be recognised by at any rate one acquaintance,--and now his brother-in-law had called him a scoundrel in the presence of other men. He raised his arm as though to use the cane in his hands, but he was cowed by the feeling that all there were his adversaries. "How dare you use that language to me!" he said very weakly. "It is the language that I must use if you speak to me." "I am your brother-in-law, and that restrains me." "Unfortunately you are." "And am living in your father's house." "That, again, is a misfortune which it appears difficult to remedy. You have been told to go, and you won't go." "Your ingratitude, sir, is marvellous! Who saved your life when you were attacked in the park, and were too drunk to take care of yourself? Who has stood your friend with your close-fisted old father when you have lost money at play that you could not pay? But you are one of those who would turn away from any benefactor in his misfortune." "I must certainly turn away from a man who has disgraced himself as you have done," said Everett, leaving the room. Lopez threw himself into an easy-chair, and rang the bell loudly for a cup of coffee, and lit a cigar. He had not been turned out of the club as yet, and the servant at any rate was bound to attend to him. That night he waited up for his father-in-law in Manchester Square. He would certainly go to Guatemala now,--if it were not too late. He would go though he were forced to leave his wife behind him, and thus surrender any further hope for money from Mr. Wharton beyond the sum which he would receive as the price of his banishment. It was true that the fortnight allowed to him by the Company was only at an end that day, and that, therefore, the following morning might be taken as the last day named for the payment of the money. No doubt, also, Mr. Wharton's bill at a few days' date would be accepted if that gentleman could not at the moment give a cheque for so large a sum as was required. And the appointment had been distinctly promised to him with no other stipulation than that the money required for the shares should be paid. He did not believe in Mr. Hartlepod's threat. It was impossible, he thought, that he should be treated in so infamous a manner merely because he had had his election expenses repaid him by the Duke of Omnium! He would, therefore, ask for the money, and--renounce the society of his wife. As he made this resolve something like real love returned to his heart, and he became for a while sick with regret. He assured himself that he had loved her, and that he could love her still;--but why had she not been true to him? Why had she clung to her father instead of clinging to her husband? Why had she not learned his ways,--as a wife is bound to learn the ways of the man she marries? Why had she not helped him in his devices, fallen into his plans, been regardful of his fortunes, and made herself one with him? There had been present to him at times an idea that if he could take her away with him to that distant country to which he thought to go, and thus remove her from the upas influence of her father's roof-tree, she would then fall into his views and become his wife indeed. Then he would again be tender to her, again love her, again endeavour to make the world soft to her. But it was too late now for that. He had failed in everything as far as England was concerned, and it was chiefly by her fault that he had failed. He would consent to leave her;--but, as he thought of it in his solitude, his eyes became moist with regret. In these days Mr. Wharton never came home till about midnight, and then passed rapidly through the hall to his own room,--and in the morning had his breakfast brought to him in the same room, so that he might not even see his son-in-law. His daughter would go to him when at breakfast, and there, together for some half-hour, they would endeavour to look forward to their future fate. But hitherto they had never been able to look forward in accord, as she still persisted in declaring that if her husband bade her to go with him,--she would go. On this night Lopez sat up in the dining-room, and as soon as he heard Mr. Wharton's key in the door, he placed himself in the hall. "I wish to speak to you to-night, sir," he said. "Would you object to come in for a few moments?" Then Mr. Wharton followed him into the room. "As we live now," continued Lopez, "I have not much opportunity of speaking to you, even on business." "Well, sir; you can speak now,--if you have anything to say." "The £5000 you promised me must be paid to-morrow. It is the last day." "I promised it only on certain conditions. Had you complied with them the money would have been paid before this." "Just so. The conditions are very hard, Mr. Wharton. It surprises me that such a one as you should think it right to separate a husband from his wife." "I think it right, sir, to separate my daughter from such a one as you are. I thought so before, but I think so doubly now. If I can secure your absence in Guatemala by the payment of this money, and if you will give me a document that shall be prepared by Mr. Walker and signed by yourself, assuring your wife that you will not hereafter call upon her to live with you, the money shall be paid." "All that will take time, Mr. Wharton." "I will not pay a penny without it. I can meet you at the office in Coleman Street to-morrow, and doubtless they will accept my written assurance to pay the money as soon as those stipulations shall be complied with." "That would disgrace me in the office, Mr. Wharton." "And are you not disgraced there already? Can you tell me that they have not heard of your conduct in Coleman Street, or that hearing it they disregard it?" His son-in-law stood frowning at him, but did not at the moment say a word. "Nevertheless, I will meet you there if you please, at any time that you may name, and if they do not object to employ such a man as their manager, I shall not object on their behalf." "To the last you are hard and cruel to me," said Lopez;--"but I will meet you in Coleman Street at eleven to-morrow." Then Mr. Wharton left the room, and Lopez was there alone amidst the gloom of the heavy curtains and the dark paper. A London dining-room at night is always dark, cavernous, and unlovely. The very pictures on the walls lack brightness, and the furniture is black and heavy. This room was large, but old-fashioned and very dark. Here Lopez walked up and down after Mr. Wharton had left him, trying to think how far Fate and how far he himself were responsible for his present misfortunes. No doubt he had begun the world well. His father had been little better than a travelling pedlar, but had made some money by selling jewellery, and had educated his son. Lopez could on no score impute blame to his father for what had happened to him. And, when he thought of the means at his disposal in his early youth, he felt that he had a right to boast of some success. He had worked hard, and had won his way upwards, and had almost lodged himself securely among those people with whom it had been his ambition to live. Early in life he had found himself among those who were called gentlemen and ladies. He had been able to assume their manners, and had lived with them on equal terms. When thinking of his past life he never forgot to remind himself that he had been a guest at the house of the Duke of Omnium! And yet how was it with him now? He was penniless. He was rejected by his father-in-law. He was feared, and, as he thought, detested by his wife. He was expelled from his club. He was cut by his old friends. And he had been told very plainly by the Secretary in Coleman Street that his presence there was no longer desired. What should he do with himself if Mr. Wharton's money were now refused, and if the appointment in Guatemala were denied to him? And then he thought of poor Sexty Parker and his family. He was not naturally an ill-natured man. Though he could upbraid his wife for alluding to Mrs. Parker's misery, declaring that Mrs. Parker must take the rubs of the world just as others took them, still the misfortunes which he had brought on her and on her children did add something to the weight of his own misfortunes. If he could not go to Guatemala, what should he do with himself;--where should he go? Thus he walked up and down the room for an hour. Would not a pistol or a razor give him the best solution for all his difficulties? On the following morning he kept his appointment at the office in Coleman Street, as did Mr. Wharton also. The latter was there first by some minutes, and explained to Mr. Hartlepod that he had come there to meet his son-in-law. Mr. Hartlepod was civil, but very cold. Mr. Wharton saw at the first glance that the services of Ferdinand Lopez were no longer in request by the San Juan Mining Company; but he sat down and waited. Now that he was there, however painful the interview would be, he would go through it. At ten minutes past eleven he made up his mind that he would wait till the half-hour,--and then go, with the fixed resolution that he would never willingly spend another shilling on behalf of that wretched man. But at a quarter past eleven the wretched man came,--swaggering into the office, though it had not, hitherto, been his custom to swagger. But misfortune masters all but the great men, and upsets the best-learned lesson of even a long life. "I hope I have not kept you waiting, Mr. Wharton. Well, Hartlepod, how are you to-day? So this little affair is to be settled at last, and now these shares shall be bought and paid for." Mr. Wharton did not say a word, not even rising from his chair, or greeting his son-in-law by a word. "I dare say Mr. Wharton has already explained himself," said Lopez. "I don't know that there is any necessity," said Mr. Hartlepod. "Well,--I suppose it's simple enough," continued Lopez. "Mr. Wharton, I believe I am right in saying that you are ready to pay the money at once." "Yes;--I am ready to pay the money as soon as I am assured that you are on your route to Guatemala. I will not pay a penny till I know that as a fact." Then Mr. Hartlepod rose from his seat and spoke. "Gentlemen," he said, "the matter within the last few days has assumed a different complexion." "As how?" exclaimed Lopez. "The Directors have changed their mind as to sending out Mr. Lopez as their local manager. The Directors intend to appoint another gentleman. I had already acquainted Mr. Lopez with the Directors' intention." "Then the matter is settled?" said Mr. Wharton. "Quite settled," said Mr. Hartlepod. As a matter of course Lopez began to fume and to be furious. What!--after all that had been done did the Directors mean to go back from their word? After he had been induced to abandon his business in his own country, was he to be thrown over in that way? If the Company intended to treat him like that, the Company would very soon hear from him. Thank God there were laws in the land. "Yesterday was the last day fixed for the payment of the money," said Mr. Hartlepod. "It is at any rate certain that Mr. Lopez is not to go to Guatemala?" asked Mr. Wharton. "Quite certain," said Mr. Hartlepod. Then Mr. Wharton rose from his chair and quitted the room. "By G----, you have ruined me among you," said Lopez;--"ruined me in the most shameful manner. There is no mercy, no friendship, no kindness, no forbearance anywhere! Why am I to be treated in this manner?" "If you have any complaint to make," said Mr. Hartlepod, "you had better write to the Directors. I have nothing to do but my duty." "By heavens, the Directors shall hear of it!" said Lopez as he left the office. Mr. Wharton went to his chambers and endeavoured to make up his mind what step he must now take in reference to this dreadful incubus. Of course he could turn the man out of his house, but in so doing it might well be that he would also turn out his own daughter. He believed Lopez to be utterly without means, and a man so destitute would generally be glad to be relieved from the burden of his wife's support. But this man would care nothing for his wife's comfort; nothing even, as Mr. Wharton believed, for his wife's life. He would simply use his wife as best he might as a means for obtaining money. There was nothing to be done but to buy him off, by so much money down, and by so much at stated intervals as long as he should keep away. Mr. Walker must manage it, but it was quite clear to Mr. Wharton that the Guatemala scheme was altogether at an end. In the meantime a certain sum must be offered to the man at once, on condition that he would leave the house and do so without taking his wife with him. So far Mr. Wharton had a plan, and a plan that was at least feasible. Wretched as he was, miserable, as he thought of the fate which had befallen his daughter,--there was still a prospect of some relief. But Lopez as he walked out of the office had nothing to which he could look for comfort. He slowly made his way to Little Tankard Yard, and there he found Sexty Parker balancing himself on the back legs of his chair, with a small decanter of public-house sherry before him. "What; you here?" he said. "Yes;--I have come to say good-bye." "Where are you going then? You shan't start to Guatemala if I know it." "That's all over, my boy," said Lopez, smiling. "What is it you mean?" said Sexty, sitting square on his chair and looking very serious. "I am not going to Guatemala or anywhere else. I thought I'd just look in to tell you that I'm just done for,--that I haven't a hope of a shilling now or hereafter. You told me the other day that I was afraid to come here. You see that as soon as anything is fixed, I come and tell you everything at once." "What is fixed?" "That I am ruined. That there isn't a penny to come from any source." "Wharton has got money," said Sexty. "And there is money in the Bank of England,--but I cannot get at it." "What are you going to do, Lopez?" "Ah; that's the question. What am I going to do? I can say nothing about that, but I can say, Sexty, that our affairs are at an end. I'm very sorry for it, old boy. We ought to have made fortunes, but we didn't. As far as the work went, I did my best. Good-bye, old fellow. You'll do well some of these days yet, I don't doubt. Don't teach the bairns to curse me. As for Mrs. P. I have no hope there, I know." Then he went, leaving Sexty Parker quite aghast. CHAPTER LIX "The First and the Last" When Mr. Wharton was in Coleman Street, having his final interview with Mr. Hartlepod, there came a visitor to Mrs. Lopez in Manchester Square. Up to this date there had been great doubt with Mr. Wharton whether at last the banishment to Guatemala would become a fact. From day to day his mind had changed. It had been an infinite benefit that Lopez should go, if he could be got to go alone, but as great an evil if at last he should take his wife with him. But the father had never dared to express these doubts to her, and she had taught herself to think that absolute banishment with a man whom she certainly no longer loved, was the punishment she had to pay for the evil she had done. It was now March, and the second or third of April had been fixed for her departure. Of course, she had endeavoured from time to time to learn all that was to be learned from her husband. Sometimes he would be almost communicative to her; at other times she could get hardly a word from him. But, through it all, he gave her to believe that she would have to go. Nor did her father make any great effort to turn his mind the other way. If it must be so, of what use would be such false kindness on his part? She had therefore gone to work to make her purchases, studying that economy which must henceforth be the great duty of her life, and reminding herself as to everything she bought that it would have to be worn with tears and used in sorrow. And then she sent a message to Arthur Fletcher. It so happened that Sir Alured Wharton was up in London at this time with his daughter Mary. Sir Alured did not come to Manchester Square. There was nothing that the old baronet could say in the midst of all this misery,--no comfort that he could give. It was well-known now to all the Whartons and all the Fletchers that this Lopez, who had married her who was to have been the pearl of the two families, had proved himself to be a scoundrel. The two old Whartons met no doubt at some club, or perhaps in Stone Buildings, and spoke some few bitter words to each other; but Sir Alured did not see the unfortunate young woman who had disgraced herself by so wretched a marriage. But Mary came, and by her a message was sent to Arthur Fletcher. "Tell him that I am going," said Emily. "Tell him not to come; but give him my love. He was always one of my kindest friends." "Why,--why,--why did you not take him?" said Mary, moved by the excitement of the moment to suggestions which were quite at variance with the fixed propriety of her general ideas. "Why should you speak of that?" said the other. "I never speak of him,--never think of him. But, if you see him, tell him what I say." Arthur Fletcher was of course in the Square on the following day,--on that very day on which Mr. Wharton learned that, whatever might be his daughter's fate, she would not, at any rate, be taken to Guatemala. They two had never met since the day on which they had been brought together for a moment at the Duchess's party at Richmond. It had of course been understood by both of them that they were not to be allowed to see each other. Her husband had made a pretext of an act of friendship on his part to establish a quarrel, and both of them had been bound by that quarrel. When a husband declares that his wife shall not know a man, that edict must be obeyed,--or, if disobeyed, must be subverted by intrigue. In this case there had been no inclination to intrigue on either side. The order had been obeyed, and as far as the wife was concerned, had been only a small part of the terrible punishment which had come upon her as the result of her marriage. But now, when Arthur Fletcher sent up his name, she did not hesitate as to seeing him. No doubt she had thought it probable that she might see him when she gave her message to her cousin. "I could not let you go without coming to you," he said. "It is very good of you. Yes;--I suppose we are going. Guatemala sounds a long way off, Arthur, does it not? But they tell me it is a beautiful country." She spoke with a cheerful voice, almost as though she liked the idea of her journey; but he looked at her with beseeching, anxious, sorrow-laden eyes. "After all, what is a journey of a few weeks? Why should I not be as happy in Guatemala as in London? As to friends, I do not know that it will make much difference,--except papa." "It seems to me to make a difference," said he. "I never see anybody now,--neither your people, nor the Wharton Whartons. Indeed, I see nobody. If it were not for papa I should be glad to go. I am told that it is a charming country. I have not found Manchester Square very charming. I am inclined to think that all the world is very much alike, and that it does not matter very much where one lives,--or, perhaps, what one does. But at any rate I am going, and I am very glad to be able to say good-bye to you before I start." All this she said rapidly, in a manner unlike herself. She was forcing herself to speak so that she might save herself, if possible, from breaking down in his presence. "Of course I came when Mary told me." "Yes;--she was here. Sir Alured did not come. I don't wonder at that, however. And your mother was in town some time ago,--but I didn't expect her to come. Why should they come? I don't know whether you might not have better stayed away. Of course I am a Pariah now; but Pariah as I am, I shall be as good as any one else in Guatemala. You have seen Everett since he has been in town, perhaps?" "Yes;--I have seen him." "I hope they won't quarrel with Everett because of what I have done. I have felt that more than all,--that both papa and he have suffered because of it. Do you know, I think people are hard. They might have thrown me off without being unkind to them. It is that that has killed me, Arthur;--that they should have suffered." He sat looking at her, not knowing how to interrupt her, or what to say. There was much that he meant to say, but he did not know how to begin it, or how to frame his words. "When I am gone, perhaps, it will be all right," she continued. "When he told me that I was to go, that was my comfort. I think I have taught myself to think nothing of myself, to bear it all as a necessity, to put up with it, whatever it may be, as men bear thirst in the desert. Thank God, Arthur, I have no baby to suffer with me. Here,--here, it is still very bad. When I think of papa creeping in and out of his house, I sometimes feel that I must kill myself. But our going will put an end to all that. It is much better that we should go. I wish we might start to-morrow." Then she looked up at him, and saw that the tears were running down his face, and as she looked she heard his sobs. "Why should you cry, Arthur? He never cries,--nor do I. When baby died I cried,--but very little. Tears are vain, foolish things. It has to be borne, and there is an end of it. When one makes up one's mind to that, one does not cry. There was a poor woman here the other day whose husband he had ruined. She wept and bewailed herself till I pitied her almost more than myself;--but then she had children." "Oh, Emily!" "You mustn't call me by my name, because he would be angry. I have to do, you know, as he tells me. And I do so strive to do it! Through it all I have an idea that if I do my duty it will be better for me. There are things, you know, which a husband may tell you to do, but you cannot do. If he tells me to rob, I am not to rob;--am I? And now I think of it, you ought not to be here. He would be very much displeased. But it has been so pleasant once more to see an old friend." "I care nothing for his anger," said Arthur moodily. "Ah, but I do. I have to care for it." "Leave him! Why don't you leave him?" "What!" "You cannot deceive me. You do not try to deceive me. You know that he is altogether unworthy of you." "I will hear nothing of the kind, sir." "How can I speak otherwise when you yourself tell me of your own misery? Is it possible that I should not know what he is? Would you have me pretend to think well of him?" "You can hold your tongue, Arthur." "No;--I cannot hold my tongue. Have I not held my tongue ever since you married? And if I am to speak at all, must I not speak now?" "There is nothing to be said that can serve us at all." "Then it shall be said without serving. When I bid you leave him, it is not that you may come to me. Though I love you better than all the world put together, I do not mean that." "Oh, Arthur, Arthur!" "But let your father save you. Only tell him that you will stay with him, and he will do it. Though I should never see you again, I could hope to protect you. Of course, I know,--and you know. He is--a scoundrel!" "I will not hear it," said she, rising from her seat on the sofa with her hands up to her forehead, but still coming nearer to him as she moved. "Does not your father say the same thing? I will advise nothing that he does not advise. I would not say a word to you that he might not hear. I do love you. I have always loved you. But do you think that I would hurt you with my love?" "No;--no;--no!" "No, indeed;--but I would have you feel that those who loved you of old are still anxious for your welfare. You said just now that you had been neglected." "I spoke of papa and Everett. For myself,--of course I have separated myself from everybody." "Never from me. You may be ten times his wife, but you cannot separate yourself from me. Getting up in the morning and going to bed at night I still tell myself that you are the one woman that I love. Stay with us, and you shall be honoured,--as that man's wife of course, but still as the dearest friend we have." "I cannot stay," she said. "He has told me that I am to go, and I am in his hands. When you have a wife, Arthur, you will wish her to do your bidding. I hope she will do it for your sake, without the pain I have in doing his. Good-bye, dear friend." She put her hand out and he grasped it, and stood for a moment looking at her. Then he seized her in his arms and kissed her brow and her lips. "Oh, Emily, why were you not my wife? My darling, my darling!" She had hardly extricated herself when the door opened, and Lopez stood in the room. "Mr. Fletcher," he said, very calmly, "what is the meaning of this?" "He has come to bid me farewell," said Emily. "When going on so long a journey one likes to see one's old friends,--perhaps for the last time." There was something of indifference to his anger in her tone, and something also of scorn. Lopez looked from one to the other, affecting an air of great displeasure. "You know, sir," he said, "that you cannot be welcome here." "But he has been welcome," said his wife. "And I look upon your coming as a base act. You are here with the intention of creating discord between me and my wife." "I am here to tell her that she has a friend to trust to if she ever wants a friend," said Fletcher. "And you think that such trust as that would be safer than trust in her husband? I cannot turn you out of this house, sir, because it does not belong to me, but I desire you to leave at once the room which is occupied by my wife." Fletcher paused a moment to say good-bye to the poor woman, while Lopez continued with increased indignation, "If you do not go at once you will force me to desire her to retire. She shall not remain in the same room with you." "Good-bye, Mr. Fletcher," she said, again putting out her hand. But Lopez struck it up, not violently, so as to hurt her, but still with eager roughness. "Not in my presence," he said. "Go, sir, when I desire you." "God bless you, my friend," said Arthur Fletcher. "I pray that I may live to see you back in the old country." "He was--kissing you," said Lopez, as soon as the door was shut. "He was," said Emily. "And you tell me so to my face, with such an air as that!" "What am I to tell you when you ask me? I did not bid him kiss me." "But afterwards you took his part as his friend." "Why not? I should lie to you if I pretended that I was angry with him for what he did." "Perhaps you will tell me that you love him." "Of course I love him. There are different kinds of love, Ferdinand. There is that which a woman gives to a man when she would fain mate with him. It is the sweetest love of all, if it would only last. And there is another love,--which is not given, but which is won, perhaps through long years, by old friends. I have none older than Arthur Fletcher, and none who are dearer to me." "And you think it right that he should take you in his arms and kiss you?" "On such an occasion I could not blame him." "You were ready enough to receive it, perhaps." "Well; I was. He has loved me well, and I shall never see him again. He is very dear to me, and I was parting from him for ever. It was the first and the last, and I did not grudge it to him. You must remember, Ferdinand, that you are taking me across the world from all my friends." "Psha," he said, "that is all over. You are not going anywhere that I know of,--unless it be out into the streets when your father shuts his door on you." And so saying he left the room without another word. CHAPTER LX The Tenway Junction And thus the knowledge was conveyed to Mrs. Lopez that her fate in life was not to carry her to Guatemala. At the very moment in which she had been summoned to meet Arthur Fletcher she had been busy with her needle preparing that almost endless collection of garments necessary for a journey of many days at sea. And now she was informed, by a chance expression, by a word aside, as it were, that the journey was not to be made. "That is all over," he had said,--and then had left her, telling her nothing further. Of course she stayed her needle. Whether the last word had been true or false, she could not work again, at any rate till it had been contradicted. If it were so, what was to be her fate? One thing was certain to her;--that she could not remain under her father's roof. It was impossible that an arrangement so utterly distasteful as the present one, both to her father and to herself, should be continued. But where then should they live,--and of what nature would her life be if she should be separated from her father? That evening she saw her father, and he corroborated her husband's statement. "It is all over now," he said,--"that scheme of his of going to superintend the mines. The mines don't want him, and won't have him. I can't say that I wonder at it." "What are we to do, papa?" "Ah;--that I cannot say. I suppose he will condescend still to honour me with his company. I do not know why he should wish to go to Guatemala or elsewhere. He has everything here that he can want." "You know, papa, that that is impossible." "I cannot say what with him is possible or impossible. He is bound by none of the ordinary rules of mankind." That evening Lopez returned to his dinner in Manchester Square, which was still regularly served for him and his wife, though the servants who attended upon him did so under silent and oft-repeated protest. He said not a word more as to Arthur Fletcher, nor did he seek any ground of quarrel with his wife. But that her continued melancholy and dejection made anything like good-humour impossible, even on his part, he would have been good-humoured. When they were alone she asked him as to their future destiny. "Papa tells me you are not going," she began by saying. "Did I not tell you so this morning?" "Yes;--you said so. But I did not know you were earnest. Is it all over?" "All over,--I suppose." "I should have thought that you would have told me with more--more seriousness." "I don't know what you would have. I was serious enough. The fact is, that your father has delayed so long the payment of the promised money that the thing has fallen through of necessity. I do not know that I can blame the Company." Then there was a pause. "And now," she said, "what do you mean to do?" "Upon my word I cannot say. I am quite as much in the dark as you can be." "That is nonsense, Ferdinand." "Thank you! Let it be nonsense if you will. It seems to me that there is a great deal of nonsense going on in the world; but very little of it as true as what I say now." "But it is your duty to know. Of course you cannot stay here." "Nor you, I suppose,--without me." "I am not speaking of myself. If you choose, I can remain here." "And--just throw me overboard altogether." "If you provide another home for me, I will go to it. However poor it may be I will go to it, if you bid me. But for you,--of course you cannot stay here." "Has your father told you to say so to me?" "No;--but I can say so without his telling me. You are banishing him from his own house. He has put up with it while he thought that you were going to this foreign country; but there must be an end of that now. You must have some scheme of life?" "Upon my soul I have none." "You must have some intentions for the future?" "None in the least. I have had intentions, and they have failed;--from want of that support which I had a right to expect. I have struggled and I have failed, and now I have got no intentions. What are yours?" "It is not my duty to have any purpose, as what I do must depend on your commands." Then again there was a silence, during which he lit a cigar, although he was sitting in the drawing-room. This was a profanation of the room on which even he had never ventured before, but at the present moment she was unable to notice it by any words. "I must tell papa," she said after a while, "what our plans are." "You can tell him what you please. I have literally nothing to say to him. If he will settle an adequate income on us, payable of course to me, I will go and live elsewhere. If he turns me into the street without provision, he must turn you too. That is all that I have got to say. It will come better from you than from me. I am sorry, of course, that things have gone wrong with me. When I found myself the son-in-law of a very rich man I thought that I might spread my wings a bit. But my rich father-in-law threw me over, and now I am helpless. You are not very cheerful, my dear, and I think I'll go down to the club." He went out of the house and did go down to the Progress. The committee which was to be held with the view of judging whether he was or was not a proper person to remain a member of that assemblage had not yet been held, and there was nothing to impede his entrance to the club, or the execution of the command which he gave for tea and buttered toast. But no one spoke to him; nor, though he affected a look of comfort, did he find himself much at his ease. Among the members of the club there was a much divided opinion whether he should be expelled or not. There was a strong party who declared that his conduct socially, morally, and politically, had been so bad that nothing short of expulsion would meet the case. But there were others who said that no act had been proved against him which the club ought to notice. He had, no doubt, shown himself to be a blackguard, a man without a spark of honour or honesty. But then,--as they said who thought his position in the club to be unassailable,--what had the club to do with that? "If you turn out all the blackguards and all the dishonourable men, where will the club be?" was a question asked with a great deal of vigour by one middle-aged gentleman who was supposed to know the club-world very thoroughly. He had committed no offence which the law could recognise and punish, nor had he sinned against the club rules. "He is not required to be a man of honour by any regulation of which I am aware," said the middle-aged gentleman. The general opinion seemed to be that he should be asked to go, and that, if he declined, no one should speak to him. This penalty was already inflicted on him, for on the evening in question no one did speak to him. He drank his tea and ate his toast and read a magazine, striving to look as comfortable and as much at his ease as men at their clubs generally are. He was not a bad actor, and those who saw him and made reports as to his conduct on the following day declared that he had apparently been quite indifferent to the disagreeable incidents of his position. But his indifference had been mere acting. His careless manner with his wife had been all assumed. Selfish as he was, void as he was of all principle, utterly unmanly and even unconscious of the worth of manliness, still he was alive to the opinions of others. He thought that the world was wrong to condemn him,--that the world did not understand the facts of his case, and that the world generally would have done as he had done in similar circumstances. He did not know that there was such a quality as honesty, nor did he understand what the word meant. But he did know that some men, an unfortunate class, became subject to evil report from others who were more successful, and he was aware that he had become one of those unfortunates. Nor could he see any remedy for his position. It was all blank and black before him. It may be doubted whether he got much instruction or amusement from the pages of the magazine which he turned. At about twelve o'clock he left the club and took his way homewards. But he did not go straight home. It was a nasty cold March night, with a catching wind, and occasional short showers of something between snow and rain,--as disagreeable a night for a gentleman to walk in as one could well conceive. But he went round by Trafalgar Square, and along the Strand, and up some dirty streets by the small theatres, and so on to Holborn and by Bloomsbury Square up to Tottenham Court Road, then through some unused street into Portland Place, along the Marylebone Road, and back to Manchester Square by Baker Street. He had more than doubled the distance,--apparently without any object. He had been spoken to frequently by unfortunates of both sexes, but had answered a word to no one. He had trudged on and on with his umbrella over his head, but almost unconscious of the cold and wet. And yet he was a man sedulously attentive to his own personal comfort and health, who had at any rate shown this virtue in his mode of living, that he had never subjected himself to danger by imprudence. But now the working of his mind kept him warm, and, if not dry, at least indifferent to the damp. He had thrown aside with affected nonchalance those questions which his wife had asked him, but still it was necessary that he should answer them. He did not suppose that he could continue to live in Manchester Square in his present condition. Nor, if it was necessary that he should wander forth into the world, could he force his wife to wander with him. If he would consent to leave her, his father-in-law would probably give him something,--some allowance on which he might exist. But then of what sort would be his life? He did not fail to remind himself over and over again that he had nearly succeeded. He had been the guest of the Prime Minister, and had been the nominee chosen by a Duchess to represent her husband's borough in Parliament. He had been intimate with Mills Happerton who was fast becoming a millionaire. He had married much above himself in every way. He had achieved a certain popularity and was conscious of intellect. But at the present moment two or three sovereigns in his pocket were the extent of his worldly wealth and his character was utterly ruined. He regarded his fate as does a card-player who day after day holds sixes and sevens when other men have the aces and kings. Fate was against him. He saw no reason why he should not have had the aces and kings continually, especially as fate had given him perhaps more than his share of them at first. He had, however, lost rubber after rubber,--not paying his stakes for some of the last rubbers lost,--till the players would play with him no longer. The misfortune might have happened to any man;--but it had happened to him. There was no beginning again. A possible small allowance and some very retired and solitary life, in which there would be no show of honour, no flattery coming to him, was all that was left to him. He let himself in at the house, and found his wife still awake. "I am wet to the skin," he said. "I made up my mind to walk, and I would do it;--but I am a fool for my pains." She made him some feeble answer, affecting to be half asleep, and merely turned in her bed. "I must be out early in the morning. Mind you make them dry my things. They never do anything for my telling." "You don't want them dried to-night?" "Not to-night, of course;--but after I am gone to-morrow. They'll leave them there without putting a hand to them, if you don't speak. I must be off before breakfast to-morrow." "Where are you going? Do you want anything packed?" "No; nothing. I shall be back to dinner. But I must go down to Birmingham, to see a friend of Happerton's on business. I will breakfast at the station. As you said to-day, something must be done. If it's to sweep a crossing, I must sweep it." As she lay awake while he slept, she thought that those last words were the best she had heard him speak since they were married. There seemed to be some indication of a purpose in them. If he would only sweep a crossing as a man should sweep it, she would stand by him, and at any rate do her duty to him, in spite of all that had happened. Alas! she was not old enough to have learned that a dishonest man cannot begin even to sweep a crossing honestly till he have in very truth repented of his former dishonesty. The lazy man may become lazy no longer, but there must have been first a process through his mind whereby laziness has become odious to him. And that process can hardly be the immediate result of misfortune arising from misconduct. Had Lopez found his crossing at Birmingham he would hardly have swept it well. Early on the following morning he was up, and before he left his room he kissed his wife. "Good-bye, old girl," he said; "don't be down-hearted." "If you have anything before you to do, I will not be down-hearted," she said. "I shall have something to do before night, I think. Tell your father, when you see him, that I will not trouble him here much longer. But tell him, also, that I have no thanks to give him for his hospitality." "I will not tell him that, Ferdinand." "He shall know it, though. But I do not mean to be cross to you. Good-bye, love." Then he stooped over her and kissed her again;--and so he took his leave of her. It was raining hard, and when he got into the street he looked about for a cab, but there was none to be found. In Baker Street he got an omnibus which took him down to the underground railway, and by that he went to Gower Street. Through the rain he walked up to the Euston Station, and there he ordered breakfast. Could he have a mutton chop and some tea? And he was very particular that the mutton chop should be well cooked. He was a good-looking man, of fashionable appearance, and the young lady who attended him noticed him and was courteous to him. He condescended even to have a little light conversation with her, and, on the whole, he seemed to enjoy his breakfast. "Upon my word, I should like to breakfast here every day of my life," he said. The young lady assured him that, as far as she could see, there was no objection to such an arrangement. "Only it's a bore, you know, coming out in the rain when there are no cabs," he said. Then there were various little jokes between them, till the young lady was quite impressed with the gentleman's pleasant affability. After a while he went back into the hall and took a first-class return ticket, not for Birmingham, but for the Tenway Junction. It is quite unnecessary to describe the Tenway Junction, as everybody knows it. From this spot, some six or seven miles distant from London, lines diverge east, west, and north, north-east, and north-west, round the metropolis in every direction, and with direct communication with every other line in and out of London. It is a marvellous place, quite unintelligible to the uninitiated, and yet daily used by thousands who only know that when they get there, they are to do what some one tells them. The space occupied by the convergent rails seems to be sufficient for a large farm. And these rails always run one into another with sloping points, and cross passages, and mysterious meandering sidings, till it seems to the thoughtful stranger to be impossible that the best trained engine should know its own line. Here and there and around there is ever a wilderness of waggons, some loaded, some empty, some smoking with close-packed oxen, and others furlongs in length black with coals, which look as though they had been stranded there by chance, and were never destined to get again into the right path of traffic. Not a minute passes without a train going here or there, some rushing by without noticing Tenway in the least, crashing through like flashes of substantial lightning, and others stopping, disgorging and taking up passengers by the hundreds. Men and women,--especially the men, for the women knowing their ignorance are generally willing to trust to the pundits of the place,--look doubtful, uneasy, and bewildered. But they all do get properly placed and unplaced, so that the spectator at last acknowledges that over all this apparent chaos there is presiding a great genius of order. From dusky morn to dark night, and indeed almost throughout the night, the air is loaded with a succession of shrieks. The theory goes that each separate shriek,--if there can be any separation where the sound is so nearly continuous,--is a separate notice to separate ears of the coming or going of a separate train. The stranger, as he speculates on these pandemoniac noises, is able to realise the idea that were they discontinued the excitement necessary for the minds of the pundits might be lowered, and that activity might be lessened, and evil results might follow. But he cannot bring himself to credit that theory of individual notices. At Tenway Junction there are half-a-dozen long platforms, on which men and women and luggage are crowded. On one of these for a while Ferdinand Lopez walked backwards and forwards as though waiting for the coming of some especial train. The crowd is ever so great that a man might be supposed to walk there from morning to night without exciting special notice. But the pundits are very clever, and have much experience in men and women. A well-taught pundit, who has exercised authority for a year or two at such a station as that of Tenway, will know within a minute of the appearance of each stranger what is his purpose there,--whether he be going or has just come, whether he is himself on the way or waiting for others, whether he should be treated with civility or with some curt command,--so that if his purport be honest all necessary assistance may be rendered him. As Lopez was walking up and down, with smiling face and leisurely pace, now reading an advertisement and now watching the contortions of some amazed passenger, a certain pundit asked him his business. He was waiting, he said, for a train from Liverpool, intending, when his friend arrived, to go with him to Dulwich by a train which went round the west of London. It was all feasible, and the pundit told him that the stopping train from Liverpool was due there in six minutes, but that the express from the north would pass first. Lopez thanked the pundit and gave him sixpence,--which made the pundit suspicious. A pundit hopes to be paid when he handles luggage, but has no such expectation when he merely gives information. The pundit still had his eye on our friend when the shriek and the whirr of the express from the north was heard. Lopez walked quickly up towards the edge of the platform, when the pundit followed him, telling him that this was not his train. Lopez then ran a few yards along the platform, not noticing the man, reaching a spot that was unoccupied;--and there he stood fixed. And as he stood the express flashed by. "I am fond of seeing them pass like that," said Lopez to the man who had followed him. "But you shouldn't do it, sir," said the suspicious pundit. "No one isn't allowed to stand near like that. The very hair of it might take you off your legs when you're not used to it." "All right, old fellow," said Lopez, retreating. The next train was the Liverpool train; and it seemed that our friend's friend had not come, for when the Liverpool passengers had cleared themselves off, he was still walking up and down the platform. "He'll come by the next," said Lopez to the pundit, who now followed him about and kept an eye on him. "There ain't another from Liverpool stopping here till the 2.20," said the pundit. "You had better come again if you mean to meet him by that." "He has come on part of the way, and will reach this by some other train," said Lopez. "There ain't nothing he can come by," said the pundit. "Gentlemen can't wait here all day, sir. The horders is against waiting on the platform." "All right," said Lopez, moving away as though to make his exit through the station. Now Tenway Junction is so big a place, and so scattered, that it is impossible that all the pundits should by any combined activity maintain to the letter that order of which our special pundit had spoken. Lopez, departing from the platform which he had hitherto occupied, was soon to be seen on another, walking up and down, and again waiting. But the old pundit had had his eye upon him, and had followed him round. At that moment there came a shriek louder than all the other shrieks, and the morning express down from Euston to Inverness was seen coming round the curve at a thousand miles an hour. Lopez turned round and looked at it, and again walked towards the edge of the platform. But now it was not exactly the edge that he neared, but a descent to a pathway,--an inclined plane leading down to the level of the rails, and made there for certain purposes of traffic. As he did so the pundit called to him, and then made a rush at him,--for our friend's back was turned to the coming train. But Lopez heeded not the call, and the rush was too late. With quick, but still with gentle and apparently unhurried steps, he walked down before the flying engine--and in a moment had been knocked into bloody atoms. CHAPTER LXI The Widow and Her Friends The catastrophe described in the last chapter had taken place during the first week in March. By the end of that month old Mr. Wharton had probably reconciled himself to the tragedy, although in fact it had affected him very deeply. In the first days after the news had reached him he seemed to be bowed to the ground. Stone Buildings were neglected, and the Eldon saw nothing of him. Indeed, he barely left the house from which he had been so long banished by the presence of his son-in-law. It seemed to Everett, who now came to live with him and his sister, as though his father were overcome by the horror of the affair. But after awhile he recovered himself, and appeared one morning in court with his wig and gown, and argued a case,--which was now unusual with him,--as though to show the world that a dreadful episode in his life was passed, and should be thought of no more. At this period, three or four weeks after the occurrence,--he rarely spoke to his daughter about Lopez; but to Everett the man's name would be often on his tongue. "I do not know that there could have been any other deliverance," he said to his son one day. "I thought it would have killed me when I first heard it, and it nearly killed her. But, at any rate, now there is peace." But the widow seemed to feel it more as time went on. At first she was stunned, and for a while absolutely senseless. It was not till two days after the occurrence that the fact became known to her,--nor known as a certainty to her father and brother. It seemed as though the man had been careful to carry with him no record of identity, the nature of which would permit it to outlive the crash of the train. No card was found, no scrap of paper with his name; and it was discovered at last that when he left the house on the fatal morning he had been careful to dress himself in shirt and socks, with handkerchief and collar that had been newly purchased for his proposed journey and which bore no mark. The fragments of his body set identity at defiance, and even his watch had been crumpled into ashes. Of course the fact became certain with no great delay. The man himself was missing, and was accurately described both by the young lady from the refreshment room, and by the suspicious pundit who had actually seen the thing done. There was first belief that it was so, which was not communicated to Emily,--and then certainty. There was an inquest held of course,--well, we will say on the body,--and, singularly enough, great difference of opinion as to the manner, though of course none as to the immediate cause of the death. Had it been accidental, or premeditated? The pundit, who in the performance of his duties on the Tenway platforms was so efficient and valuable, gave half-a-dozen opinions in half-a-dozen minutes when subjected to the questions of the Coroner. In his own mind he had not the least doubt in the world as to what had happened. But he was made to believe that he was not to speak his own mind. The gentleman, he said, certainly might have walked down by accident. The gentleman's back was turned, and it was possible that the gentleman did not hear the train. He was quite certain the gentleman knew of the train; but yet he could not say. The gentleman walked down before the train o' purpose; but perhaps he didn't mean to do himself an injury. There was a deal of this, till the Coroner, putting all his wrath into his brow, told the man that he was a disgrace to the service, and expressed a hope that the Company would no longer employ a man so evidently unfit for his position. But the man was in truth a conscientious and useful railway pundit, with a large family, and evident capabilities for his business. At last a verdict was given,--that the man's name was Ferdinand Lopez, that he had been crushed by an express train on the London and North Western Line, and that there was no evidence to show how his presence on the line had been occasioned. Of course Mr. Wharton had employed counsel, and of course the counsel's object had been to avoid a verdict of felo de se. Appended to the verdict was a recommendation from the jury that the Railway Company should be advised to signalise their express trains more clearly at the Tenway Junction Station. When these tidings were told to the widow she had already given way to many fears. Lopez had gone, purporting,--as he said,--to be back to dinner. He had not come then, nor on the following morning; nor had he written. Then she remembered all that he had done and said;--how he had kissed her, and left a parting malediction for her father. She did not at first imagine that he had destroyed himself, but that he had gone away, intending to vanish as other men before now have vanished. As she thought of this something almost like love came back upon her heart. Of course he was bad. Even in her sorrow, even when alarmed as to his fate, she could not deny that. But her oath to him had not been to love him only while he was good. She had made herself a part of him, and was she not bound to be true to him, whether good or bad? She implored her father and she implored her brother to be ceaseless in their endeavours to trace him,--sometimes seeming almost to fear that in this respect she could not fully trust them. Then she discerned from their manner a doubt as to her husband's fate. "Oh, papa, if you think anything, tell me what you think," she said late on the evening of the second day. He was then nearly sure that the man who had been killed at Tenway was Ferdinand Lopez;--but he was not quite sure, and he would not tell her. But on the following morning, somewhat before noon, having himself gone out early to Euston Square, he came back to his own house,--and then he told her all. For the first hour she did not shed a tear or lose her consciousness of the horror of the thing;--but sat still and silent, gazing at nothing, casting back her mind over the history of her life, and the misery which she had brought on all who belonged to her. Then at last she gave way, fell into tears, hysteric sobbings, convulsions so violent as for a time to take the appearance of epileptic fits, and was at last exhausted and, happily for herself, unconscious. After that she was ill for many weeks,--so ill that at times both her father and her brother thought that she would die. When the first month or six weeks had passed by she would often speak of her husband, especially to her father, and always speaking of him as though she had brought him to his untimely fate. Nor could she endure at this time that her father should say a word against him, even when she obliged the old man to speak of one whose conduct had been so infamous. It had all been her doing! Had she not married him there would have been no misfortune! She did not say that he had been noble, true, or honest,--but she asserted that all the evils which had come upon him had been produced by herself. "My dear," her father said to her one evening, "it is a matter which we cannot forget, but on which it is well that we should be silent." "I shall always know what that silence means," she replied. "It will never mean condemnation of you by me," said he. "But I have destroyed your life,--and his. I know I ought not to have married him, because you bade me not. And I know that I should have been gentler with him, and more obedient, when I was his wife. I sometimes wish that I were a Catholic, and that I could go into a convent, and bury it all amidst sackcloths and ashes." "That would not bury it," said her father. "But I should at least be buried. If I were out of sight, you might forget it all." She once stirred Everett up to speak more plainly than her father ever dared to do, and then also she herself used language that was very plain. "My darling," said her brother once, when she had been trying to make out that her husband had been more sinned against than sinning,--"he was a bad man. It is better that the truth should be told." "And who is a good man?" she said, raising herself in her bed and looking him full in the face with her deep-sunken eyes. "If there be any truth in our religion, are we not all bad? Who is to tell the shades of difference in badness? He was not a drunkard, or a gambler. Through it all he was true to his wife." She, poor creature, was of course ignorant of that little scene in the little street near May Fair, in which Lopez had offered to carry Lizzie Eustace away with him to Guatemala. "He was industrious. His ideas about money were not the same as yours or papa's. How was he worse than others? It happened that his faults were distasteful to you--and so, perhaps, were his virtues." "His faults, such as they were, brought all these miseries." "He would have been successful now if he had never seen me. But why should we talk of it? We shall never agree. And you, Everett, can never understand all that has passed through my mind during the last two years." There were two or three persons who attempted to see her at this period, but she avoided them all. First came Mrs. Roby, who, as her nearest neighbour, as her aunt, and as an aunt who had been so nearly allied to her, had almost a right to demand admittance. But she would not see Mrs. Roby. She sent down word to say that she was too ill. And when Mrs. Roby wrote to her, she got her father to answer the notes. "You had better let it drop," the old man said at last to his sister-in-law. "Of course she remembers that it was you who brought them together." "But I didn't bring them together, Mr. Wharton. How often am I to tell you so? It was Everett who brought Mr. Lopez here." "The marriage was made up in your house, and it has destroyed me and my child. I will not quarrel with my wife's sister if I can help it, but at present you had better keep apart." Then he had left her abruptly, and Mrs. Roby had not dared either to write or to call again. At this time Arthur Fletcher saw both Everett and Mr. Wharton frequently, but he did not go to the Square, contenting himself with asking whether he might be allowed to do so. "Not yet, Arthur," said the old man. "I am sure she thinks of you as one of her best friends, but she could not see you yet." "She would have nothing to fear," said Arthur. "We knew each other when we were children, and I should be now only as I was then." "Not yet, Arthur;--not yet," said the barrister. Then there came a letter, or rather two letters, from Mary Wharton;--one to Mr. Wharton and the other to Emily. To tell the truth as to these letters, they contained the combined wisdom and tenderness of Wharton Hall and Longbarns. As soon as the fate of Lopez had been ascertained and thoroughly discussed in Herefordshire, there went forth an edict that Emily had suffered punishment sufficient and was to be forgiven. Old Mrs. Fletcher did not come to this at once,--having some deep-seated feeling which she did not dare to express even to her son, though she muttered it to her daughter-in-law, that Arthur would be disgraced for ever were he to marry the widow of such a man as Ferdinand Lopez. But when this question of receiving Emily back into family favour was mooted in the Longbarns Parliament no one alluded to the possibility of such a marriage. There was the fact that she whom they had all loved had been freed by a great tragedy from the husband whom they had all condemned,--and also the knowledge that the poor victim had suffered greatly during the period of her married life. Mrs. Fletcher had frowned, and shaken her head, and made a little speech about the duties of women, and the necessarily fatal consequences when those duties are neglected. There were present there, with the old lady, John Fletcher and his wife, Sir Alured and Lady Wharton, and Mary Wharton. Arthur was not in the county, nor could the discussion have been held in his presence. "I can only say," said John, getting up and looking away from his mother, "that she shall always find a home at Longbarns when she chooses to come here, and I hope Sir Alured will say the same as to Wharton Hall." After all, John Fletcher was king in these parts, and Mrs. Fletcher, with many noddings and some sobbing, had to give way to King John. The end of all this was that Mary Wharton wrote her letters. In that to Mr. Wharton she asked whether it would not be better that her cousin should change the scene and come at once into the country. Let her come and stay a month at Wharton, and then go on to Longbarns. She might be sure that there would be no company in either house. In June the Fletchers would go up to town for a week, and then Emily might return to Wharton Hall. It was a long letter, and Mary gave many reasons why the poor sufferer would be better in the country than in town. The letter to Emily herself was shorter but full of affection. "Do, do, do come. You know how we all love you. Let it be as it used to be. You always liked the country. I will devote myself to try and comfort you." But Emily could not as yet submit to receive devotion even from her cousin Mary. Through it all, and under it all,--though she would ever defend her husband because he was dead,--she knew that she had disgraced the Whartons and brought a load of sorrow upon the Fletchers, and she was too proud to be forgiven so quickly. Then she received another tender of affection from a quarter whence she certainly did not expect it. The Duchess of Omnium wrote to her. The Duchess, though she had lately been considerably restrained by the condition of the Duke's mind, and by the effects of her own political and social mistakes, still from time to time made renewed efforts to keep together the Coalition by giving dinners, balls, and garden parties, and by binding to herself the gratitude and worship of young parliamentary aspirants. In carrying out her plans, she had lately showered her courtesies upon Arthur Fletcher, who had been made welcome even by the Duke as the sitting member for Silverbridge. With Arthur she had of course discussed the conduct of Lopez as to the election bills, and had been very loud in condemning him. And from Arthur also she had heard something of the sorrows of Emily Lopez. Arthur had been very desirous that the Duchess, who had received them both at her house, should distinguish between the husband and the wife. Then had come the tragedy, to which the notoriety of the man's conduct of course gave additional interest. It was believed that Lopez had destroyed himself because of the disgrace which had fallen upon him from the Silverbridge affair. And for much of that Silverbridge affair the Duchess herself was responsible. She waited till a couple of months had gone by, and then, in the beginning of May, sent to the widow what was intended to be, and indeed was, a very kind note. The Duchess had heard the sad story with the greatest grief. She hoped that Mrs. Lopez would permit her to avail herself of a short acquaintance to express her sincere sympathy. She would not venture to call as yet, but hoped that before long she might be allowed to come to Manchester Square. This note touched the poor woman to whom it was written, not because she herself was solicitous to be acquainted with the Duchess of Omnium, but because the application seemed to her to contain something like an acquittal, or at any rate a pardon, of her husband. His sin in that measure of the Silverbridge election,--a sin which her father had been loud in denouncing before the wretch had destroyed himself,--had been especially against the Duke of Omnium. And now the Duchess came forward to say that it should be forgiven and forgotten. When she showed the letter to her father, and asked him what she should say in answer to it, he only shook his head. "It is meant for kindness, papa." "Yes;--I think it is. There are people who have no right to be kind to me. If a man stopped me in the street and offered me half-a-crown it might be kindness;--but I don't want the man's half-crown." "I don't think it is the same, papa. There is a reason here." "Perhaps so, my dear; but I do not see the reason." She became very red, but even to him she would not explain her ideas. "I think I shall answer it." "Certainly answer it. Your compliments to the Duchess and thank her for her kind inquiries." "But she says she will come here." "I should not notice that." "Very well, papa. If you think so, of course I will not. Perhaps it would be an inconvenience, if she were really to come." On the next day she did write a note, not quite so cold as that which her father proposed, but still saying nothing as to the offered visit. She felt, she said, very grateful for the Duchess's kind remembrance of her. The Duchess would perhaps understand that at present her sorrow overwhelmed her. And there was one other tender of kindness which was more surprising than even that from the Duchess. The reader may perhaps remember that Ferdinand Lopez and Lady Eustace had not parted when they last saw each other on the pleasantest terms. He had been very affectionate, but when he had proposed to devote his whole life to her and to carry her off to Guatemala she had simply told him that he was--a fool. Then he had escaped from her house and had never again seen Lizzie Eustace. She had not thought very much about it. Had he returned to her the next day with some more tempting proposition for making money she would have listened to him,--and had he begged her pardon for what had taken place on the former day she would have merely laughed. She was not more offended than she would have been had he asked her for half her fortune instead of her person and her honour. But, as it was, he had escaped and had never again shown himself in the little street near May Fair. Then she had the tidings of his death, first seeing the account in a very sensational article from the pen of Mr. Quintus Slide himself. She was immediately filled with an intense interest which was infinitely increased by the fact that the man had but a few days before declared himself to be her lover. It was bringing her almost as near to the event as though she had seen it! She was, perhaps, entitled to think that she had caused it! Nay;--in one sense she had caused it, for he certainly would not have destroyed himself had she consented to go with him to Guatemala or elsewhere. And she knew his wife. An uninteresting, dowdy creature she had called her. But, nevertheless, they had been in company together more than once. So she presented her compliments, and expressed her sorrow, and hoped that she might be allowed to call. There had been no one for whom she had felt more sincere respect and esteem than for her late friend Mr. Ferdinand Lopez. To this note there was sent an answer written by Mr. Wharton himself. MADAM, My daughter is too ill to see even her own friends. I am, Madam, Your obedient servant, ABEL WHARTON. After this, life went on in a very quiet way at Manchester Square for many weeks. Gradually Mrs. Lopez recovered her capability of attending to the duties of life. Gradually she became again able to interest herself in her brother's pursuits and in her father's comforts, and the house returned to its old form as it had been before these terrible two years, in which the happiness of the Wharton and Fletcher families had been marred, and scotched, and almost destroyed for ever by the interference of Ferdinand Lopez. But Mrs. Lopez never for a moment forgot that she had done the mischief,--and that the black enduring cloud had been created solely by her own perversity and self-will. Though she would still defend her late husband if any attack were made upon his memory, not the less did she feel that hers had been the fault, though the punishment had come upon them all. CHAPTER LXII Phineas Finn Has a Book to Read The sensation created by the man's death was by no means confined to Manchester Square, but was very general in the metropolis, and, indeed, throughout the country. As the catastrophe became the subject of general conversation, many people learned that the Silverbridge affair had not, in truth, had much to do with it. The man had killed himself, as many other men have done before him, because he had run through his money and had no chance left of redeeming himself. But to the world at large, the disgrace brought upon him by the explanation given in Parliament was the apparent cause of his self-immolation, and there were not wanting those who felt and expressed a sympathy for a man who could feel so acutely the effect of his own wrong-doing. No doubt he had done wrong in asking the Duke for the money. But the request, though wrong, might almost be justified. There could be no doubt, these apologists said, that he had been ill-treated between the Duke and the Duchess. No doubt Phineas Finn, who was now described by some opponents as the Duke's creature, had been able to make out a story in the Duke's favour. But all the world knew what was the worth and what was the truth of ministerial explanations! The Coalition was very strong; and even the question in the House, which should have been hostile, had been asked in a friendly spirit. In this way there came to be a party who spoke and wrote of Ferdinand Lopez as though he had been a martyr. Of course Mr. Quintus Slide was in the front rank of these accusers. He may be said to have led the little army which made this matter a pretext for a special attack upon the Ministry. Mr. Slide was especially hostile to the Prime Minister, but he was not less hotly the enemy of Phineas Finn. Against Phineas Finn he had old grudges, which, however, age had never cooled. He could, therefore, write with a most powerful pen when discussing the death of that unfortunate man, the late candidate for Silverbridge, crushing his two foes in the single grasp of his journalistic fist. Phineas had certainly said some hard things against Lopez, though he had not mentioned the man's name. He had congratulated the House that it had not been contaminated by the presence of so base a creature, and he had said that he would not pause to stigmatise the meanness of the application for money which Lopez had made. Had Lopez continued to live and to endure "the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune," no one would have ventured to say that these words would have inflicted too severe a punishment. But death wipes out many faults, and a self-inflicted death caused by remorse will, in the minds of many, wash a blackamoor almost white. Thus it came to pass that some heavy weapons were hurled at Phineas Finn, but none so heavy as those hurled by Quintus Slide. Should not this Irish knight, who was so ready with his lance in the defence of the Prime Minister, asked Mr. Slide, have remembered the past events of his own rather peculiar life? Had not he, too, been poor, and driven in his poverty to rather questionable straits? Had not he been abject in his petition for office,--and in what degree were such petitions less disgraceful than a request for money which had been hopelessly expended on an impossible object, attempted at the instance of the great Croesus who, when asked to pay it, had at once acknowledged the necessity of doing so? Could not Mr. Finn remember that he himself had stood in danger of his life before a British jury, and that, though he had been, no doubt properly, acquitted of the crime imputed to him, circumstances had come out against him during the trial which, if not as criminal, were at any rate almost as disgraceful? Could he not have had some mercy on a broken political adventurer who, in his aspirations for public life, had shown none of that greed by which Mr. Phineas Finn had been characterised in all the relations of life? As for the Prime Minister, "We," as Mr. Quintus Slide always described himself,--"We do not wish to add to the agony which the fate of Mr. Lopez must have brought upon him. He has hounded that poor man to his death in revenge for the trifling sum of money which he was called on to pay for him. It may be that the first blame lay not with the Prime Minister himself, but with the Prime Minister's wife. With that we have nothing to do. The whole thing lies in a nutshell. The bare mention of the name of her Grace the Duchess in Parliament would have saved the Duke, at any rate as effectually as he has been saved by the services of his man-of-all-work, Phineas Finn, and would have saved him without driving poor Ferdinand Lopez to insanity. But rather than do this he allowed his servant to make statements about mysterious agents, which we are justified in stigmatizing as untrue, and to throw the whole blame where but least of the blame was due. We all know the result. It was found in those gory shreds and tatters of a poor human being with which the Tenway Railway Station was bespattered." Of course such an article had considerable effect. It was apparent at once that there was ample room for an action for libel against the newspaper, on the part of Phineas Finn if not on that of the Duke. But it was equally apparent that Mr. Quintus Slide must have been very well aware of this when he wrote the article. Such an action, even if successful, may bring with it to the man punished more of good than of evil. Any pecuniary penalty might be more than recouped by the largeness of the advertisement which such an action would produce. Mr. Slide no doubt calculated that he would carry with him a great body of public feeling by the mere fact that he had attacked a Prime Minister and a Duke. If he could only get all the publicans in London to take his paper because of his patriotic and bold conduct, the fortune of the paper would be made. There is no better trade than that of martyrdom, if the would-be martyr knows how far he may judiciously go, and in what direction. All this Mr. Quintus Slide was supposed to have considered very well. And Phineas Finn knew that his enemy had also considered the nature of the matters which he would have been able to drag into Court if there should be a trial. Allusions, very strong allusions, had been made to former periods of Mr. Finn's life. And though there was but little, if anything, in the past circumstances of which he was ashamed,--but little, if anything, which he thought would subject him personally to the odium of good men, could they be made accurately known in all their details,--it would, he was well aware, be impossible that such accuracy should be achieved. And the story if told inaccurately would not suit him. And then, there was a reason against any public proceeding much stronger even than this. Whether the telling of the story would or would not suit him, it certainly would not suit others. As has been before remarked, there are former chronicles respecting Phineas Finn, and in them may be found adequate cause for this conviction on his part. To no outsider was this history known better than to Mr. Quintus Slide, and therefore Mr. Quintus Slide could dare almost to defy the law. But not the less on this account were there many who told Phineas that he ought to bring the action. Among these none were more eager than his old friend Lord Chiltern, the Master of the Brake hounds, a man who really loved Phineas, who also loved the abstract idea of justice, and who could not endure the thought that a miscreant should go unpunished. Hunting was over for the season in the Brake country, and Lord Chiltern rushed up to London, having this object among others of a very pressing nature on his mind. His saddler had to be seen,--and threatened,--on a certain matter touching the horses' backs. A draught of hounds were being sent down to a friend in Scotland. And there was a Committee of Masters to sit on a moot question concerning a neutral covert in the XXX country, of which Committee he was one. But the desire to punish Slide was almost as strong in his indignant mind as those other matters referring more especially to the profession of his life. "Phineas," he said, "you are bound to do it. If you will allow a fellow like that to say such things of you, why, by heaven, any man may say anything of anybody." Now Phineas could hardly explain to Lord Chiltern his objection to the proposed action. A lady was closely concerned, and that lady was Lord Chiltern's sister. "I certainly shall not," said Phineas. "And why?" "Just because he wishes me to do it. I should be falling into the little pit that he has dug for me." "He couldn't hurt you. What have you got to be afraid of? Ruat coelum." "There are certain angels, Chiltern, living up in that heaven which you wish me to pull about our ears, as to whom, if all their heart and all their wishes and all their doings could be known, nothing but praise could be spoken; but who would still be dragged with soiled wings through the dirt if this man were empowered to bring witness after witness into court. My wife would be named. For aught I know, your wife." "By G----, he'd find himself wrong there." "Leave a chimney-sweep alone when you see him, Chiltern. Should he run against you, then remember that it is one of the necessary penalties of clean linen that it is apt to be soiled." "I'm d----d if I'd let him off." "Yes you would, old fellow. When you come to see clearly what you would gain and what you would lose, you would not meddle with him." His wife was at first inclined to think that an action should be taken, but she was more easily convinced than Lord Chiltern. "I had not thought," she said, "of poor Lady Laura. But is it not horrible that a man should be able to go on like that, and that there should be no punishment?" In answer to this he only shrugged his shoulders. But the greatest pressure came upon him from another source. He did not in truth suffer much himself from what was said in the "People's Banner." He had become used to the "People's Banner" and had found out that in no relation of life was he less pleasantly situated because of the maledictions heaped upon him in the columns of that newspaper. His position in public life did not seem to be weakened by them. His personal friends did not fall off because of them. Those who loved him did not love him less. It had not been so with him always, but now, at last, he was hardened against Mr. Quintus Slide. But the poor Duke was by no means equally strong. This attack upon him, this denunciation of his cruelty, this assurance that he had caused the death of Ferdinand Lopez, was very grievous to him. It was not that he really felt himself to be guilty of the man's blood, but that any one should say that he was guilty. It was of no use to point out to him that other newspapers had sufficiently vindicated his conduct in that respect, that it was already publicly known that Lopez had received payment for those election expenses from Mr. Wharton before the application had been made to him, and that therefore the man's dishonesty was patent to all the world. It was equally futile to explain to him that the man's last act had been in no degree caused by what had been said in Parliament, but had been the result of his continued failures in life and final absolute ruin. He fretted and fumed and was very wretched,--and at last expressed his opinion that legal steps should be taken to punish the "People's Banner." Now it had been already acknowledged, on the dictum of no less a man than Sir Gregory Grogram, the Attorney-General, that the action for libel, if taken at all, must be taken, not on the part of the Prime Minister, but on that of Phineas Finn. Sir Timothy Beeswax had indeed doubted, but it had come to be understood by all the members of the Coalition that Sir Timothy Beeswax always did doubt whatever was said by Sir Gregory Grogram. "The Duke thinks that something should be done," said Mr. Warburton, the Duke's private Secretary, to Phineas Finn. "Not by me, I hope," said Phineas. "Nobody else can do it. That is to say it must be done in your name. Of course it would be a Government matter, as far as expense goes, and all that." "I am sorry the Duke should think so." "I don't see that it could hurt you." "I am sorry the Duke should think so," repeated Phineas,--"because nothing can be done in my name. I have made up my mind about it. I think the Duke is wrong in wishing it, and I believe that were any action taken, we should only be playing into the hands of that wretched fellow, Quintus Slide. I have long been conversant with Mr. Quintus Slide, and have quite made up my mind that I will never play upon his pipe. And you may tell the Duke that there are other reasons. The man has referred to my past life, and in seeking to justify those remarks he would be enabled to drag before the public circumstances and stories, and perhaps persons, in a manner that I personally should disregard, but which, for the sake of others, I am bound to prevent. You will explain all this to the Duke?" "I am afraid you will find the Duke very urgent." "I must then express my great sorrow that I cannot oblige the Duke. I trust I need hardly say that the Duke has no colleague more devoted to his interest than I am. Were he to wish me to change my office, or to abandon it, or to undertake any political duty within the compass of my small powers, he would find me ready to obey his behests. But in this matter others are concerned, and I cannot make my judgment subordinate to his." The private Secretary looked very serious, and simply said that he would do his best to explain these objections to his Grace. That the Duke would take his refusal in bad part Phineas felt nearly certain. He had been a little surprised at the coldness of the Minister's manner to him after the statement he had made in the house, and had mentioned the matter to his wife. "You hardly know him," she had said, "as well as I do." "Certainly not. You ought to know him very intimately, and I have had but little personal friendship with him. But it was a moment in which the man might, for the moment, have been cordial." "It was not a moment for his cordiality. The Duchess says that if you want to get a really genial smile from him you must talk to him about cork soles. I know exactly what she means. He loves to be simple, but he does not know how to show people that he likes it. Lady Rosina found him out by accident." "Don't suppose that I am in the least aggrieved," he had said. And now he spoke again to his wife in the same spirit. "Warburton clearly thinks that he will be offended, and Warburton, I suppose, knows his mind." "I don't see why he should. I have been reading it longer, and I still find it very difficult. Lady Glen has been at the work for the last fifteen years, and sometimes owns that there are passages she has not mastered yet. I fancy Mr. Warburton is afraid of him, and is a little given to fancy that everybody should bow down to him. Now if there is anything certain about the Duke it is this,--that he doesn't want any one to bow down to him. He hates all bowing down." "I don't think he loves those who oppose him." "It is not the opposition he hates, but the cause in the man's mind which may produce it. When Sir Orlando opposed him, and he thought that Sir Orlando's opposition was founded on jealousy, then he despised Sir Orlando. But had he believed in Sir Orlando's belief in the new ships, he would have been capable of pressing Sir Orlando to his bosom, although he might have been forced to oppose Sir Orlando's ships in the Cabinet." "He is a Sir Bayard to you," said Phineas, laughing. "Rather a Don Quixote, whom I take to have been the better man of the two. I'll tell you what he is, Phineas, and how he is better than all the real knights of whom I have ever read in story. He is a man altogether without guile, and entirely devoted to his country. Do not quarrel with him, if you can help it." Phineas had not the slightest desire to quarrel with his chief; but he did think it to be not improbable that his chief would quarrel with him. It was notorious to him as a member of the Cabinet,--as a colleague living with other colleagues by whom the Prime Minister was coddled, and especially as the husband of his wife, who lived almost continually with the Prime Minister's wife,--that the Duke was cut to the quick by the accusation that he had hounded Ferdinand Lopez to his death. The Prime Minister had defended himself in the House against the first charge by means of Phineas Finn, and now required Phineas to defend him from the second charge in another way. This he was obliged to refuse to do. And then the Minister's private Secretary looked very grave, and left him with the impression that the Duke would be much annoyed, if not offended. And already there had grown up an idea that the Duke would have on the list of his colleagues none who were personally disagreeable to himself. Though he was by no means a strong Minister in regard to political measures, or the proper dominion of his party, still men were afraid of him. It was not that he would call upon them to resign, but that, if aggrieved, he would resign himself. Sir Orlando Drought had rebelled and had tried a fall with the Prime Minister,--and had greatly failed. Phineas determined that if frowned upon he would resign, but that he certainly would bring no action for libel against the "People's Banner." A week passed after he had seen Warburton before he by chance found himself alone with the Prime Minister. This occurred at the house in Carlton Gardens, at which he was a frequent visitor,--and could hardly have ceased to be so without being noticed, as his wife spent half her time there. It was evident to him then that the occasion was sought for by the Duke. "Mr. Finn," said the Duke, "I wanted to have a word or two with you." "Certainly," said Phineas, arresting his steps. "Warburton spoke to you about that--that newspaper." "Yes, Duke. He seemed to think that there should be an action for libel." "I thought so too. It was very bad, you know." "Yes;--it was bad. I have known the 'People's Banner' for some time, and it is always bad." "No doubt;--no doubt. It is bad, very bad. Is it not sad that there should be such dishonesty, and that nothing can be done to stop it? Warburton says that you won't hear of an action in your name." "There are reasons, Duke." "No doubt;--no doubt. Well;--there's an end of it. I own I think the man should be punished. I am not often vindictive, but I think that he should be punished. However, I suppose it cannot be." "I don't see the way." "So be it. So be it. It must be entirely for you to judge. Are you not longing to get into the country, Mr. Finn?" "Hardly yet," said Phineas, surprised. "It's only June, and we have two months more of it. What is the use of longing yet?" "Two months more!" said the Duke. "Two months certainly. But even two months will come to an end. We go down to Matching quietly,--very quietly,--when the time does come. You must promise that you'll come with us. Eh? I make a point of it, Mr. Finn." Phineas did promise, and thought that he had succeeded in mastering one of the difficult passages in that book. CHAPTER LXIII The Duchess and Her Friend But the Duke, though he was by far too magnanimous to be angry with Phineas Finn because Phineas would not fall into his views respecting the proposed action, was not the less tormented and goaded by what the newspaper said. The assertion that he had hounded Ferdinand Lopez to his death, that by his defence of himself he had brought the man's blood on his head, was made and repeated till those around him did not dare to mention the name of Lopez in his hearing. Even his wife was restrained and became fearful, and in her heart of hearts began almost to wish for that retirement to which he had occasionally alluded as a distant Elysium which he should never be allowed to reach. He was beginning to have the worn look of an old man. His scanty hair was turning grey, and his long thin cheeks longer and thinner. Of what he did when sitting alone in his chamber, either at home or at the Treasury Chamber, she knew less and less from day to day, and she began to think that much of his sorrow arose from the fact that among them they would allow him to do nothing. There was no special subject now which stirred him to eagerness and brought upon herself explanations which were tedious and unintelligible to her, but evidently delightful to him. There were no quints or semi-tenths now, no aspirations for decimal perfection, no delightfully fatiguing hours spent in the manipulation of the multiplication table. And she could not but observe that the old Duke now spoke to her much less frequently of her husband's political position than had been his habit. Through the first year and a half of the present ministerial arrangement he had been constant in his advice to her, and had always, even when things were difficult, been cheery and full of hope. He still came frequently to the house, but did not often see her. And when he did see her he seemed to avoid all allusion either to the political successes or the political reverses of the Coalition. And even her other special allies seemed to labour under unusual restraint with her. Barrington Erle seldom told her any news. Mr. Rattler never had a word for her. Warburton, who had ever been discreet, became almost petrified by discretion. And even Phineas Finn had grown to be solemn, silent, and uncommunicative. "Have you heard who is the new Prime Minister?" she said to Mrs. Finn one day. "Has there been a change?" "I suppose so. Everything has become so quiet that I cannot imagine that Plantagenet is still in office. Do you know what anybody is doing?" "The world is going on very smoothly, I take it." "I hate smoothness. It always means treachery and danger. I feel sure that there will be a great blow up before long. I smell it in the air. Don't you tremble for your husband?" "Why should I? He likes being in office because it gives him something to do; but he would never be an idle man. As long as he has a seat in Parliament, I shall be contented." "To have been Prime Minister is something after all, and they can't rob him of that," said the Duchess, recurring again to her own husband. "I half fancy sometimes that the charm of the thing is growing upon him." "Upon the Duke?" "Yes. He is always talking of the delight he will have in giving it up. He is always Cincinnatus, going back to his peaches and his ploughs. But I fear he is beginning to feel that the salt would be gone out of his life if he ceased to be the first man in the kingdom. He has never said so, but there is a nervousness about him when I suggest to him the name of this or that man as his successor which alarms me. And I think he is becoming a tyrant with his own men. He spoke the other day of Lord Drummond almost as though he meant to have him whipped. It isn't what one expected from him;--is it?" "The weight of the load on his mind makes him irritable." "Either that, or having no load. If he had really much to do he wouldn't surely have time to think so much of that poor wretch who destroyed himself. Such sensitiveness is simply a disease. One can never punish any fault in the world if the sinner can revenge himself upon us by rushing into eternity. Sometimes I see him shiver and shudder, and then I know that he is thinking of Lopez." "I can understand all that, Lady Glen." "It isn't as it should be, though you can understand it. I'll bet you a guinea that Sir Timothy Beeswax has to go out before the beginning of next Session." "I've no objection. But why Sir Timothy?" "He mentioned Lopez' name the other day before Plantagenet. I heard him. Plantagenet pulled that long face of his, looking as though he meant to impose silence on the whole world for the next six weeks. But Sir Timothy is brass itself, a sounding cymbal of brass that nothing can silence. He went on to declare with that loud voice of his that the death of Lopez was a good riddance of bad rubbish. Plantagenet turned away and left the room and shut himself up. He didn't declare to himself that he'd dismiss Sir Timothy, because that's not the way of his mind. But you'll see that Sir Timothy will have to go." "That, at any rate, will be a good riddance of bad rubbish," said Mrs. Finn, who did not love Sir Timothy Beeswax. Soon after that the Duchess made up her mind that she would interrogate the Duke of St. Bungay as to the present state of affairs. It was then the end of June, and nearly one of those long and tedious months had gone by of which the Duke spoke so feelingly when he asked Phineas Finn to come down to Matching. Hope had been expressed in more than one quarter that this would be a short Session. Such hopes are much more common in June than in July, and, though rarely verified, serve to keep up the drooping spirits of languid senators. "I suppose we shall be early out of town, Duke," she said one day. "I think so. I don't see what there is to keep us. It often happens that ministers are a great deal better in the country than in London, and I fancy it will be so this year." "You never think of the poor girls who haven't got their husbands yet." "They should make better use of their time. Besides, they can get their husbands in the country." "It's quite true that they never get to the end of their labours. They are not like you members of Parliament who can shut up your portfolios and go and shoot grouse. They have to keep at their work spring and summer, autumn and winter,--year after year! How they must hate the men they persecute!" "I don't think we can put off going for their sake." "Men are always selfish, I know. What do you think of Plantagenet lately?" The question was put very abruptly, without a moment's notice, and there was no avoiding it. "Think of him!" "Yes;--what do you think of his condition;--of his happiness, his health, his capacity of endurance? Will he be able to go on much longer? Now, my dear Duke, don't stare at me like that. You know, and I know, that you haven't spoken a word to me for the last two months. And you know, and I know, how many things there are of which we are both thinking in common. You haven't quarrelled with Plantagenet?" "Quarrelled with him! Good heavens, no." "Of course I know you still call him your noble colleague, and your noble friend, and make one of the same team with him and all that. But it used to be so much more than that." "It is still more than that;--very much more." "It was you who made him Prime Minister." "No, no, no;--and again no. He made himself Prime Minister by obtaining the confidence of the House of Commons. There is no other possible way in which a man can become Prime Minister in this country." "If I were not very serious at this moment, Duke, I should make an allusion to the--Marines." No other human being could have said this to the Duke of St. Bungay, except the young woman whom he had petted all his life as Lady Glencora. "But I am very serious," she continued, "and I may say not very happy. Of course the big wigs of a party have to settle among themselves who shall be their leader, and when this party was formed they settled, at your advice, that Plantagenet should be the man." "My dear Lady Glen, I cannot allow that to pass without contradiction." "Do not suppose that I am finding fault, or even that I am ungrateful. No one rejoiced as I rejoiced. No one still feels so much pride in it as I feel. I would have given ten years of my life to make him Prime Minister, and now I would give five to keep him so. It is like it was to be king, when men struggled among themselves who should be king. Whatever he may be, I am ambitious. I love to think that other men should look to him as being above them, and that something of this should come down upon me as his wife. I do not know whether it was not the happiest moment of my life when he told me that the Queen had sent for him." "It was not so with him." "No, Duke,--no! He and I are very different. He only wants to be useful. At any rate, that was all he did want." "He is still the same." "A man cannot always be carrying a huge load up a hill without having his back bent." "I don't know that the load need be so heavy, Duchess." "Ah, but what is the load? It is not going to the Treasury Chambers at eleven or twelve in the morning, and sitting four or five times a week in the House of Lords till seven or eight o'clock. He was never ill when he would remain in the House of Commons till two in the morning, and not have a decent dinner above twice in the week. The load I speak of isn't work." "What is it then?" said the Duke, who in truth understood it all nearly as well as the Duchess herself. "It is hard to explain, but it is very heavy." "Responsibility, my dear, will always be heavy." "But it is hardly that;--certainly not that alone. It is the feeling that so many people blame him for so many things, and the doubt in his own mind whether he may not deserve it. And then he becomes fretful, and conscious that such fretfulness is beneath him and injurious to his honour. He condemns men in his mind, and condemns himself for condescending to condemn them. He spends one quarter of an hour in thinking that as he is Prime Minister he will be Prime Minister down to his fingers' ends, and the next in resolving that he never ought to have been Prime Minister at all." Here something like a frown passed across the old man's brow, which was, however, no indication, of anger. "Dear Duke," she said, "you must not be angry with me. Who is there to whom I can speak but you?" "Angry, my dear! No, indeed!" "Because you looked as though you would scold me." At this he smiled. "And of course all this tells upon his health." "Do you think he is ill?" "He never says so. There is no special illness. But he is thin and wan and careworn. He does not eat and he does not sleep. Of course I watch him." "Does his doctor see him?" "Never. When I asked him once to say a word to Sir James Thorax,--for he was getting hoarse, you know,--he only shook his head and turned on his heels. When he was in the other House, and speaking every night, he would see Thorax constantly, and do just what he was told. He used to like opening his mouth and having Sir James to look down it. But now he won't let any one touch him." "What would you have me do, Lady Glen?" "I don't know." "Do you think that he is so far out of health that he ought to give it up?" "I don't say that. I don't dare to say it. I don't dare to recommend anything. No consideration of health would tell with him at all. If he were to die to-morrow as the penalty of doing something useful to-night, he wouldn't think twice about it. If you wanted to make him stay where he is, the way to do it would be to tell him that his health was failing him. I don't know that he does want to give up now." "The autumn months will do everything for him;--only let him be quiet." "You are coming to Matching, Duke?" "I suppose so,--if you ask me,--for a week or two." "You must come. I am quite nervous if you desert us. I think he becomes more estranged every day from all the others. I know you won't do a mischief by repeating what I say." "I hope not." "He seems to me to turn his nose up at everybody. He used to like Mr. Monk; but he envies Mr. Monk, because Mr. Monk is Chancellor of the Exchequer. I asked him whether we shouldn't have Lord Drummond at Matching, and he told me angrily that I might ask all the Government if I liked." "Drummond contradicted him the other day." "I knew there was something. He has got to be like a bear with a sore head, Duke. You should have seen his face the other day, when Mr. Rattler made some suggestion to him about the proper way of dividing farms." "I don't think he ever liked Rattler." "What of that? Don't I have to smile upon men whom I hate like poison;--and women too, which is worse? Do you think that I love old Lady Ramsden, or Mrs. MacPherson? He used to be so fond of Lord Cantrip." "I think he likes Lord Cantrip," said the Duke. "He asked his lordship to do something, and Lord Cantrip declined." "I know all about that," said the Duke. "And now he looks gloomy at Lord Cantrip. His friends won't stand that kind of thing, you know, for ever." "He is always courteous to Finn," said the Duke. "Yes;--just now he is on good terms with Mr. Finn. He would never be harsh to Mr. Finn, because he knows that Mrs. Finn is the one really intimate female friend whom I have in the world. After all, Duke, besides Plantagenet and the children, there are only two persons in the world whom I really love. There are only you and she. She will never desert me;--and you must not desert me either." Then he put his hand behind her waist, and stooped over her and kissed her brow, and swore to her that he would never desert her. But what was he to do? He knew, without being told by the Duchess, that his colleague and chief was becoming, from day to day, more difficult to manage. He had been right enough in laying it down as a general rule that Prime Ministers are selected for that position by the general confidence of the House of Commons;--but he was aware at the same time that it had hardly been so in the present instance. There had come to be a dead-lock in affairs, during which neither of the two old and well-recognised leaders of parties could command a sufficient following for the carrying on of the Government. With unusual patience these two gentlemen had now for the greater part of three Sessions sat by, offering but little opposition to the Coalition, but of course biding their time. They, too, called themselves,--perhaps thought themselves,--Cincinnatuses. But their ploughs and peaches did not suffice to them, and they longed again to be in every mouth, and to have, if not their deeds, then even their omissions blazoned in every paragraph. The palate accustomed to Cayenne pepper can hardly be gratified by simple salt. When that dead-lock had come, politicians who were really anxious for the country had been forced to look about for a Premier,--and in the search the old Duke had been the foremost. The Duchess had hardly said more than the truth when she declared that her husband's promotion had been effected by their old friend. But it is sometimes easier to make than to unmake. Perhaps the time had now in truth come, in which it would be better for the country that the usual state of things should again exist. Perhaps,--nay, the Duke now thought that he saw that it was so,--Mr. Gresham might again have a Liberal majority at his back if the Duke of Omnium could find some graceful mode of retiring. But who was to tell all this to the Duke of Omnium? There was only one man in all England to whom such a task was possible, and that was the old Duke himself,--who during the last two years had been constantly urgent with his friend not to retire! How often since he had taken office had the conscientious and timid Minister begged of his friend permission to abandon his high office! But that permission had always been refused, and now, for the last three months, the request had not been repeated. The Duchess probably was right in saying that her husband "didn't want to give it up now." But he, the Duke of St. Bungay, had brought his friend into the trouble, and it was certainly his duty to extricate him from it. The admonition might come in the rude shape of repeated minorities in the House of Commons. Hitherto the number of votes at the command of the Ministry had not been very much impaired. A few always fall off as time goes on. Aristides becomes too just, and the mind of man is greedy of novelty. Sir Orlando, also, had taken with him a few, and it may be that two or three had told themselves that there could not be all that smoke raised by the "People's Banner" without some fire below it. But there was a good working majority,--very much at Mr. Monk's command,--and Mr. Monk was moved by none of that feeling of rebellion which had urged Sir Orlando on to his destruction. It was difficult to find a cause for resignation. And yet the Duke of St. Bungay, who had watched the House of Commons closely for nearly half a century, was aware that the Coalition which he had created had done its work, and was almost convinced that it would not be permitted to remain very much longer in power. He had seen symptoms of impatience in Mr. Daubeny, and Mr. Gresham had snorted once or twice, as though eager for the battle. CHAPTER LXIV The New K.G. Early in June had died the Marquis of Mount Fidgett. In all England there was no older family than that of the Fichy Fidgetts, whose baronial castle of Fichy Fellows is still kept up, the glory of archaeologists and the charm of tourists. Some people declare it to be the most perfect castle residence in the country. It is admitted to have been completed in the time of Edward VI, and is thought to have been commenced in the days of Edward I. It has always belonged to the Fichy Fidgett family, who with a persistence that is becoming rarer every day, has clung to every acre that it ever owned, and has added acre to acre in every age. The consequence has been that the existing Marquis of Mount Fidgett has always been possessed of great territorial influence, and has been flattered, cajoled, and revered by one Prime Minister after another. Now the late Marquis had been, as was the custom with the Fichy Fidgetts, a man of pleasure. If the truth may be spoken openly, it should be admitted that he had been a man of sin. The duty of keeping together the family property he had performed with a perfect zeal. It had always been acknowledged on behalf of the existing Marquis, that in whatever manner he might spend his money, however base might be the gullies into which his wealth descended, he never spent more than he had to spend. Perhaps there was but little praise in this, as he could hardly have got beyond his enormous income unless he had thrown it away on race-courses and roulette tables. But it had long been remarked of the Mount Fidgett marquises that they were too wise to gamble. The family had not been an honour to the country, but had nevertheless been honoured by the country. The man who had just died had perhaps been as selfish and as sensual a brute as had ever disgraced humanity;--but nevertheless he had been a Knight of the Garter. He had been possessed of considerable parliamentary interest, and the Prime Minister of the day had not dared not to make him a Knight of the Garter. All the Marquises of Mount Fidgett had for many years past been Knights of the Garter. On the last occasion a good deal had been said about it. A feeling had even then begun to prevail that the highest personal honour in the gift of the Crown should not be bestowed upon a man whose whole life was a disgrace, and who did indeed seem to deserve every punishment which human or divine wrath could inflict. He had a large family, but they were all illegitimate. Wives generally he liked, but of his own wife he very soon broke the heart. Of all the companies with which he consorted he was the admitted king, but his subjects could do no man any honour. The Castle of Fichy Fellows was visited by the world at large, but no man or woman with a character to lose went into any house really inhabited by the Marquis. And yet he had become a Knight of the Garter, and was therefore, presumably, one of those noble Englishmen to whom the majesty of the day was willing to confide the honour, and glory, and safety of the Crown. There were many who disliked this. That a base reprobate should become a Marquis and a peer of Parliament was in accordance with the constitution of the country. Marquises and peers are not as a rule reprobates, and the misfortune was one which could not be avoided. He might have ill-used his own wife and other wives' husbands without special remark, had he not been made a Knight of the Garter. The Minister of the day, however, had known the value of the man's support, and, being thick-skinned, had lived through the reproaches uttered without much damage to himself. Now the wicked Marquis was dead, and it was the privilege and the duty of the Duke of Omnium to select another Knight. There was a good deal said about it at the time. There was a rumour,--no doubt a false rumour,--that the Crown insisted in this instance on dictating a choice to the Duke of Omnium. But even were it so, the Duke could not have been very much aggrieved, as the choice dictated was supposed to be that of himself. The late Duke had been a Knight, and when he had died, it was thought that his successor would succeed also to the ribbon. The new Duke had been at that time in the Cabinet, and had remained there, but had accepted an office inferior in rank to that which he had formerly filled. The whole history of these things has been written, and may be read by the curious. The Duchess, newly a duchess then and very keen in reference to her husband's rank, had instigated him to demand the ribbon as his right. This he had not only declined to do, but had gone out of the way to say that he thought it should be bestowed elsewhere. It had been bestowed elsewhere, and there had been a very general feeling that he had been passed over because his easy temperament in such matters had been seen and utilised. Now, whether the Crown interfered or not,--a matter on which no one short of a writer of newspaper articles dares to make a suggestion till time shall have made mellow the doings of sovereigns and their ministers,--the suggestion was made. The Duke of St. Bungay ventured to say to his friend that no other selection was possible. "Recommend her Majesty to give it to myself!" said the Prime Minister. "You will find it to be her Majesty's wish. It has been very common. Sir Robert Walpole had it." "I am not Sir Robert Walpole." The Duke named other examples of Prime Ministers who had been gartered by themselves. But our Prime Minister declared it to be out of the question. No honour of that description should be conferred upon him as long as he held his present position. The old Duke was much in earnest, and there was a great deal said on the subject,--but at last it became clear, not only to him, but to the members of the Cabinet generally, and then to the outside world, that the Prime Minister would not consent to accept the vacant honour. For nearly a month after this the question subsided. A Minister is not bound to bestow a Garter the day after it becomes vacant. There are other Knights to guard the throne, and one may be spared for a short interval. But during that interval many eyes were turned towards the stall in St. George's Chapel. A good thing should be given away like a clap of thunder if envy, hatred, and malice are to be avoided. A broad blue ribbon across the chest is of all decorations the most becoming, or, at any rate, the most desired. And there was, I fear, an impression on the minds of some men that the Duke in such matters was weak and might be persuaded. Then there came to him an application in the form of a letter from the new Marquis of Mount Fidgett,--a man whom he had never seen, and of whom he had never heard. The new Marquis had hitherto resided in Italy, and men only knew of him that he was odious to his uncle. But he had inherited all the Fichy Fidgett estates, and was now possessed of immense wealth and great honour. He ventured, he said, to represent to the Prime Minister that for generations past the Marquises of Mount Fidgett had been honoured by the Garter. His political status in the country was exactly that enjoyed by his late uncle; but he intended that his political career should be very different. He was quite prepared to support the Coalition. "What is he that he should expect to be made a Knight of the Garter?" said our Duke to the old Duke. "He is the Marquis of Mount Fidgett, and next to yourself, perhaps, the richest peer of Great Britain." "Have riches anything to do with it?" "Something certainly. You would not name a pauper peer." "Yes;--if he was a man whose career had been highly honourable to the country. Such a man, of course, could not be a pauper, but I do not think his want of wealth should stand in the way of his being honoured by the Garter." "Wealth, rank, and territorial influence have been generally thought to have something to do with it." "And character nothing!" "My dear Duke, I have not said so." "Something very much like it, my friend, if you advocate the claim of the Marquis of Mount Fidgett. Did you approve of the selection of the late Marquis?" "I was in the Cabinet at the time, and will therefore say nothing against it. But I have never heard anything against this man's character." "Nor in favour of it. To my thinking he has as much claim, and no more, as that man who just opened the door. He was never seen in the Lower House." "Surely that cannot signify." "You think, then, that he should have it?" "You know what I think," said the elder statesman thoughtfully. "In my opinion there is no doubt that you would best consult the honour of the country by allowing her Majesty to bestow this act of grace upon a subject who has deserved so well from her Majesty as yourself." "It is quite impossible." "It seems to me," said the Duke, not appearing to notice the refusal of his friend, "that in this peculiar position you should allow yourself to be persuaded to lay aside your own feeling. No man of high character is desirous of securing to himself decorations which he may bestow upon others." "Just so." "But here the decoration bestowed upon the chief whom we all follow, would confer a wider honour upon many than it could do if given to any one else." "The same may be said of any Prime Minister." "Not so. A commoner, without high permanent rank or large fortune, is not lowered in the world's esteem by not being of the Order. You will permit me to say--that a Duke of Omnium has not reached that position which he ought to enjoy unless he be a Knight of the Garter." It must be borne in mind that the old Duke, who used this argument, had himself worn the ribbon for the last thirty years. "But if--" "Well;--well." "But if you are,--I must call it obstinate." "I am obstinate in that respect." "Then," said the Duke of St. Bungay, "I should recommend her Majesty to give it to the Marquis." "Never," said the Prime Minister, with very unaccustomed energy. "I will never sanction the payment of such a price for services which should never be bought or sold." "It would give no offence." "That is not enough, my friend. Here is a man of whom I only know that he has bought a great many marble statues. He has done nothing for his country, and nothing for his sovereign." "If you are determined to look to what you call desert alone, I would name Lord Drummond." The Prime Minister frowned and looked unhappy. It was quite true that Lord Drummond had contradicted him, and that he had felt the injury grievously. "Lord Drummond has been very true to us." "Yes;--true to us! What is that?" "He is in every respect a man of character, and well looked upon in the country. There would be some enmity and a good deal of envy--which might be avoided by either of the courses I have proposed; but those courses you will not take. I take it for granted that you are anxious to secure the support of those who generally act with Lord Drummond." "I don't know that I am." The old Duke shrugged his shoulders. "What I mean is, that I do not think that we ought to pay an increased price for their support. His lordship is very well as the Head of an Office; but he is not nearly so great a man as my friend Lord Cantrip." "Cantrip would not join us. There is no evil in politics so great as that of seeming to buy the men who will not come without buying. These rewards are fairly given for political support." "I had not, in truth, thought of Lord Cantrip." "He does not expect it any more than my butler." "I only named him as having a claim stronger than any that Lord Drummond can put forward. I have a man in my mind to whom I think such an honour is fairly due. What do you say to Lord Earlybird?" The old Duke opened his mouth and lifted up his hands in unaffected surprise. The Earl of Earlybird was an old man of a very peculiar character. He had never opened his mouth in the House of Lords and had never sat in the House of Commons. The political world knew him not at all. He had a house in town, but very rarely lived there. Early Park, in the parish of Bird, had been his residence since he first came to the title forty years ago, and had been the scene of all his labours. He was a nobleman possessed of a moderate fortune, and, as men said of him, of a moderate intellect. He had married early in life and was blessed with a large family. But he had certainly not been an idle man. For nearly half a century he had devoted himself to the improvement of the labouring classes, especially in reference to their abodes and education, and had gradually, without any desire on his own part, worked himself up into public notice. He was not an eloquent man, but he would take the chair at meeting after meeting, and sit with admirable patience for long hours to hear the eloquence of others. He was a man very simple in his tastes, and had brought up his family to follow his habits. He had therefore been able to do munificent things with moderate means, and in the long course of years had failed in hiding his munificence from the public. Lord Earlybird, till after middle life, had not been much considered, but gradually there had grown up a feeling that there were not very many better men in the country. He was a fat, bald-headed old man, who was always pulling his spectacles on and off, nearly blind, very awkward, and altogether indifferent to appearance. Probably he had no more idea of the Garter in his own mind than he had of a Cardinal's hat. But he had grown into fame, and had not escaped the notice of the Prime Minister. "Do you know anything against Lord Earlybird?" asked the Prime Minister. "Certainly nothing against him, Duke." "Nor anything in his favour?" "I know him very well,--I think I may say intimately. There isn't a better man breathing." "An honour to the peerage!" said the Prime Minister. "An honour to humanity rather," said the other, "as being of all men the least selfish and most philanthropical." "What more can be said of a man?" "But according to my view he is not the sort of person whom one would wish to see made a Knight of the Garter. If he had the ribbon he would never wear it." "The honour surely does not consist in its outward sign. I am entitled to wear some kind of coronet, but I do not walk about with it on my head. He is a man of a great heart and of many virtues. Surely the country, and her Majesty on behalf of the country, should delight to honour such a man." "I really doubt whether you look at the matter in the right light," said the ancient statesman, who was in truth frightened at what was being proposed. "You must not be angry with me if I speak plainly." "My friend, I do not think that it is within your power to make me angry." "Well then,--I will get you for a moment to listen to my view on the matter. There are certain great prizes in the gift of the Crown and of the Ministers of the Crown,--the greatest of which are now traditionally at the disposal of the Prime Minister. These are always given to party friends. I may perhaps agree with you that party support should not be looked to alone. Let us acknowledge that character and services should be taken into account. But the very theory of our Government will be overset by a reversal of the rule which I have attempted to describe. You will offend all your own friends, and only incur the ridicule of your opponents. It is no doubt desirable that the high seats of the country should be filled by men of both parties. I would not wish to see every Lord-Lieutenant of a county a Whig." In his enthusiasm the old Duke went back to his old phraseology. "But I know that my opponents when their turn comes will appoint their friends to the Lieutenancies, and that so the balance will be maintained. If you or I appoint their friends, they won't appoint ours. Lord Earlybird's proxy has been in the hands of the Conservative Leader of the House of Lords ever since he succeeded his father." Then the old man paused, but his friend waited to listen whether the lecture were finished before he spoke, and the Duke of St. Bungay continued. "And, moreover, though Lord Earlybird is a very good man,--so much so that many of us may well envy him,--he is not just the man fitted for this destination. A Knight of the Garter should be a man prone to show himself, a public man, one whose work in the country has brought him face to face with his fellows. There is an aptness, a propriety, a fitness in these things which one can understand perhaps better than explain." "Those fitnesses and aptnesses change, I think, from day to day. There was a time when a knight should be a fighting man." "That has gone by." "And the aptnesses and fitnesses in accordance with which the sovereign of the day was induced to grace with the Garter such a man as the late Marquis of Mount Fidgett have, I hope, gone by. You will admit that?" "There is no such man proposed." "And other fitnesses and aptnesses will go by, till the time will come when the man to be selected as Lieutenant of a county will be the man whose selection will be most beneficial to the county, and Knights of the Garter will be chosen for their real virtues." "I think you are Quixotic. A Prime Minister is of all men bound to follow the traditions of his country, or, when he leaves them, to leave them with very gradual steps." "And if he break that law and throw over all that thraldom;--what then?" "He will lose the confidence which has made him what he is." "It is well that I know the penalty. It is hardly heavy enough to enforce strict obedience. As for the matter in dispute, it had better stand over yet for a few days." When the Prime Minister said this the old Duke knew very well that he intended to have his own way. And so it was. A week passed by, and then the younger Duke wrote to the elder Duke saying that he had given to the matter all the consideration in his power, and that he had at last resolved to recommend her Majesty to bestow the ribbon on Lord Earlybird. He would not, however, take any step for a few days so that his friend might have an opportunity of making further remonstrance if he pleased. No further remonstrance was made, and Lord Earlybird, much to his own amazement, was nominated to the vacant Garter. The appointment was one certainly not popular with any of the Prime Minister's friends. With some, such as Lord Drummond, it indicated a determination on the part of the Duke to declare his freedom from all those bonds which had hitherto been binding on the Heads of Government. Had the Duke selected himself, certainly no offence would have been given. Had the Marquis of Mount Fidgett been the happy man, excuses would have been made. But it was unpardonable to Lord Drummond that he should have been passed over and that the Garter should have been given to Lord Earlybird. To the poor old Duke the offence was of a different nature. He had intended to use a very strong word when he told his friend that his proposed conduct would be Quixotic. The Duke of Omnium would surely know that the Duke of St. Bungay could not support a Quixotic Prime Minister. And yet the younger Duke, the Telemachus of the last two years,--after hearing that word,--had rebelled against his Mentor, and had obstinately adhered to his Quixotism! The greed of power had fallen upon the man,--so said the dear old Duke to himself,--and the man's fall was certain. Alas, alas; had he been allowed to go before the poison had entered his veins, how much less would have been his suffering! CHAPTER LXV "There Must Be Time" At the end of the third week in July, when the Session was still sitting, and when no day had been absolutely as yet fixed for the escape of members, Mr. Wharton received a letter from his friend Arthur Fletcher which certainly surprised him very much, and which left him for a day or two unable to decide what answer ought to be given. It will be remembered that Ferdinand Lopez destroyed himself in March, now three months since. The act had been more than a nine days' wonder, having been kept in the memory of many men by the sedulous efforts of Quintus Slide, and by the fact that the name of so great a man as the Prime Minister was concerned in the matter. But gradually the feeling about Ferdinand Lopez had died away, and his fate, though it had outlived the nominal nine days, had sunk into general oblivion before the end of the ninth week. The Prime Minister had not forgotten the man, nor had Quintus Slide. The name was still common in the columns of the "People's Banner," and was never mentioned without being read by the unfortunate Duke. But others had ceased to talk of Ferdinand Lopez. To the mind, however, of Arthur Fletcher the fact of the man's death was always present. A dreadful incubus had come upon his life, blighting all his prospects, obscuring all his sun by a great cloud, covering up all his hopes, and changing for him all his outlook into the world. It was not only that Emily Wharton should not have become his wife, but that the woman whom he loved with so perfect a love should have been sacrificed to so vile a creature as this man. He never blamed her,--but looked upon his fate as Fate. Then on a sudden he heard that the incubus was removed. The man who had made him and her wretched had by a sudden stroke been taken away and annihilated. There was nothing now between him and her,--but a memory. He could certainly forgive, if she could forget. Of course he had felt at the first moment that time must pass by. He had become certain that her mad love for the man had perished. He had been made sure that she had repented her own deed in sackcloth and ashes. It had been acknowledged to him by her father that she had been anxious to be separated from her husband, if her husband would consent to such a separation. And then, remembering as he did his last interview with her, having in his mind as he did every circumstance of that caress which he had given her,--down to the very quiver of the fingers he had pressed,--he could not but flatter himself that at last he had touched her heart. But there must be time! The conventions of the world operate on all hearts, especially on the female heart, and teach that new vows, too quickly given, are disgraceful. The world has seemed to decide that a widow should take two years before she can bestow herself on a second man without a touch of scandal. But the two years is to include everything, the courtship of the second as well as the burial of the first,--and not only the courtship, but the preparation of the dresses and the wedding itself. And then this case was different from all others. Of course there must be time, but surely not here a full period of two years! Why should the life of two young persons be so wasted, if it were the case that they loved each other? There was horror here, remorse, pity, perhaps pardon; but there was no love,--none of that love which is always for a time increased in its fervour by the loss of the loved object; none of that passionate devotion which must at first make the very idea of another man's love intolerable. There had been a great escape,--an escape which could not but be inwardly acknowledged, however little prone the tongue might be to confess it. Of course there must be time;--but how much time? He argued it in his mind daily, and at each daily argument the time considered by him to be appropriate was shortened. Three months had passed and he had not yet seen her. He had resolved that he would not even attempt to see her till her father should consent. But surely a period had passed sufficient to justify him in applying for that permission. And then he bethought himself that it would be best in applying for that permission to tell everything to Mr. Wharton. He well knew that he would be telling no secret. Mr. Wharton knew the state of his feelings as well as he knew it himself. If ever there was a case in which time might be abridged, this was one; and therefore he wrote his letter,--as follows:-- 3, ---- Court, Temple, 24th July, 187--. MY DEAR MR. WHARTON, It is a matter of great regret to me that we should see so little of each other,--and especially of regret that I should never now see Emily. I may as well rush into the matter at once. Of course this letter will not be shown to her, and therefore I may write as I would speak if I were with you. The wretched man whom she married is gone, and my love for her is the same as it was before she had ever seen him, and as it has always been from that day to this. I could not address you or even think of her as yet, did I not know that that marriage had been unfortunate. But it has not altered her to me in the least. It has been a dreadful trouble to us all,--to her, to you, to me, and to all connected with us. But it is over, and I think that it should be looked back upon as a black chasm which we have bridged and got over, and to which we need never cast back our eyes. I have no right to think that, though she might some day love another man, she would, therefore, love me; but I think that I have a right to try, and I know that I should have your good-will. It is a question of time, but if I let time go by, some one else may slip in. Who can tell? I would not be thought to press indecently, but I do feel that here the ordinary rules which govern men and women are not to be followed. He made her unhappy almost from the first day. She had made a mistake which you and she and all acknowledged. She has been punished; and so have I,--very severely I can assure you. Wouldn't it be a good thing to bring all this to an end as soon as possible,--if it can be brought to an end in the way I want? Pray tell me what you think. I would propose that you should ask her to see me, and then say just as much as you please. Of course I should not press her at first. You might ask me to dinner, and all that kind of thing, and so she would get used to me. It is not as though we had not been very, very old friends. But I know you will do the best. I have put off writing to you till I sometimes think that I shall go mad over it if I sit still any longer. Your affectionate friend, ARTHUR FLETCHER. When Mr. Wharton got this letter he was very much puzzled. Could he have had his wish, he too would have left the chasm behind him as proposed by his young friend, and have never cast an eye back upon the frightful abyss. He would willingly have allowed the whole Lopez incident to be passed over as an episode in their lives, which, if it could not be forgotten, should at any rate never be mentioned. They had all been severely punished, as Fletcher had said, and if the matter could end there he would be well content to bear on his own shoulders all that remained of that punishment, and to let everything begin again. But he knew very well it could not be so with her. Even yet it was impossible to induce Emily to think of her husband without regret. It had been only too manifest during the last year of their married life that she had felt horror rather than love towards him. When there had been a question of his leaving her behind, should he go to Central America, she had always expressed herself more than willing to comply with such an arrangement. She would go with him should he order her to do so, but would infinitely sooner remain in England. And then, too, she had spoken of him while alive with disdain and disgust, and had submitted to hear her father describe him as infamous. Her life had been one long misery, under which she had seemed gradually to be perishing. Now she was relieved, and her health was re-established. A certain amount of unjoyous cheerfulness was returning to her. It was impossible to doubt that she must have known that a great burden had fallen from her back. And yet she would never allow his name to be mentioned without giving some outward sign of affection for his memory. If he was bad, so were others bad. There were many worse than he. Such were the excuses she made for her late husband. Old Mr. Wharton, who really thought that in all his experience he had never known any one worse than his son-in-law, would sometimes become testy, and at last resolved that he would altogether hold his tongue. But he could hardly hold his tongue now. He, no doubt, had already formed his hopes in regard to Arthur Fletcher. He had trusted that the man whom he had taught himself some years since to regard as his wished-for son-in-law, might be constant and strong enough in his love to forget all that was past, and to be still willing to redeem his daughter from misery. But as days had crept on since the scene at the Tenway Junction, he had become aware that time must do much before such relief would be accepted. It was, however, still possible that the presence of the man might do something. Hitherto, since the deed had been done, no stranger had dined in Manchester Square. She herself had seen no visitor. She had hardly left the house except to go to church, and then had been enveloped in the deepest crape. Once or twice she had allowed herself to be driven out in a carriage, and, when she had done so, her father had always accompanied her. No widow, since the seclusion of widows was first ordained, had been more strict in maintaining the restraints of widowhood as enjoined. How then could he bid her receive a new lover,--or how suggest to her that a lover was possible? And yet he did not like to answer Arthur Fletcher without naming some period for the present mourning,--some time at which he might at least show himself in Manchester Square. "I have had a letter from Arthur Fletcher," he said to his daughter a day or two after he had received it. He was sitting after dinner, and Everett was also in the room. "Is he in Herefordshire?" she asked. "No;--he is up in town, attending to the House of Commons, I suppose. He had something to say to me, and as we are not in the way of meeting he wrote. He wants to come and see you." "Not yet, papa." "He talked of coming and dining here." "Oh yes; pray let him come." "You would not mind that?" "I would dine early and be out of the way. I should be so glad if you would have somebody sometimes. I shouldn't think then that I was such a--such a restraint to you." But this was not what Mr. Wharton desired. "I shouldn't like that, my dear. Of course he would know that you were in the house." "Upon my word, I think you might meet an old friend like that," said Everett. She looked at her brother, and then at her father, and burst into tears. "Of course you shall not be pressed if it would be irksome to you," said her father. "It is the first plunge that hurts," said Everett. "If you could once bring yourself to do it, you would find afterwards that you were more comfortable." "Papa," she said slowly, "I know what it means. His goodness I shall always remember. You may tell him I say so. But I cannot meet him yet." Then they pressed her no further. Of course she had understood. Her father could not even ask her to say a word which might give comfort to Arthur as to some long distant time. He went down to the House of Commons the next day, and saw his young friend there. Then they walked up and down Westminster Hall for nearly an hour, talking over the matter with the most absolute freedom. "It cannot be for the benefit of any one," said Arthur Fletcher, "that she should immolate herself like an Indian widow,--and for the sake of such a man as that! Of course I have no right to dictate to you,--hardly, perhaps, to give an opinion." "Yes, yes, yes." "It does seem to me, then, that you ought to force her out of that kind of thing. Why should she not go down to Herefordshire?" "In time, Arthur,--in time." "But people's lives are running away." "My dear fellow, if you were to see her you would know how vain it would be to try to hurry her. There must be time." CHAPTER LXVI The End of the Session The Duke of St. Bungay had been very much disappointed. He had contradicted with a repetition of noes the assertion of the Duchess that he had been the Warwick who had placed the Prime Minister's crown on the head of the Duke of Omnium, but no doubt he felt in his heart that he had done so much towards it that his advice respecting the vacant Garter, when given with so much weight, should have been followed. He was an old man, and had known the secrets of Cabinet Councils when his younger friend was a little boy. He had given advice to Lord John, and had been one of the first to congratulate Sir Robert Peel when that statesman became a free-trader. He had sat in conclave with THE Duke, and had listened to the bold Liberalism of old Earl Grey, both in the Lower and the Upper House. He had been always great in council, never giving his advice unasked, nor throwing his pearls before swine, and cautious at all times to avoid excesses on this side or on that. He had never allowed himself a hobby horse of his own to ride, had never been ambitious, had never sought to be the ostensible leader of men. But he did now think that when, with all his experience, he spoke very much in earnest, some attention should be paid to what he said. When he had described a certain line of conduct as Quixotic he had been very much in earnest. He did not usually indulge in strong language, and Quixotic, when applied to the conduct of a Prime Minister, was, to his ideas, very strong. The thing described as Quixotic had now been done, and the Duke of St. Bungay was a disappointed man. For an hour or two he thought that he must gently secede from all private councils with the Prime Minister. To resign, or to put impediments in the way of his own chief, did not belong to his character. That line of strategy had come into fashion since he had learnt his political rudiments, and was very odious to him. But in all party compacts there must be inner parties, peculiar bonds, and confidences stricter, stronger, and also sweeter than those which bind together the twenty or thirty gentlemen who form a Government. From those closer ties which had hitherto bound him to the Duke of Omnium he thought, for a while, that he must divorce himself. Surely on such a subject as the nomination of a Knight of the Garter his advice might have been taken,--if only because it had come from him! And so he kept himself apart for a day or two, and even in the House of Lords ceased to whisper kindly, cheerful words into the ears of his next neighbour. But various remembrances crowded in upon him by degrees, compelling him to moderate and at last to abandon his purpose. Among these the first was the memory of the kiss which he had given the Duchess. The woman had told him that she loved him, that he was one of the very few whom she did love,--and the word had gone straight into his old heart. She had bade him not to desert her; and he had not only given her his promise, but he had converted that promise to a sacred pledge by a kiss. He had known well why she had exacted the promise. The turmoil in her husband's mind, the agony which he sometimes endured when people spoke ill of him, the aversion which he had at first genuinely felt to an office for which he hardly thought himself fit, and now the gradual love of power created by the exercise of power, had all been seen by her, and had created that solicitude which had induced her to ask for the promise. The old Duke had known them both well, but had hardly as yet given the Duchess credit for so true a devotion to her husband. It now seemed to him that though she had failed to love the man, she had given her entire heart to the Prime Minister. He sympathised with her altogether, and, at any rate could not go back from his promise. And then he remembered, too, that if this man did anything amiss in the high office which he had been made to fill, he who had induced him to fill it was responsible. What right had he, the Duke of St. Bungay, to be angry because his friend was not all-wise at all points? Let the Droughts and the Drummonds and the Beeswaxes quarrel among themselves or with their colleagues. He belonged to a different school, in the teachings of which there was less perhaps of excitement and more of long-suffering;--but surely, also, more of nobility. He was, at any rate, too old to change, and he would therefore be true to his friend through evil and through good. Having thought this all out he again whispered some cheery word to the Prime Minister, as they sat listening to the denunciations of Lord Fawn, a Liberal lord, much used to business, but who had not been received into the Coalition. The first whisper and the second whisper the Prime Minister received very coldly. He had fully appreciated the discontinuance of the whispers, and was aware of the cause. He had made a selection on his own unassisted judgment in opposition to his old friend's advice, and this was the result. Let it be so! All his friends were turning away from him and he would have to stand alone. If so, he would stand alone till the pendulum of the House of Commons had told him that it was time for him to retire. But gradually the determined good-humour of the old man prevailed. "He has a wonderful gift of saying nothing with second-rate dignity," whispered the repentant friend, speaking of Lord Fawn. "A very honest man," said the Prime Minister in return. "A sort of bastard honesty,--by precept out of stupidity. There is no real conviction in it, begotten by thought." This little bit of criticism, harsh as it was, had the effect, and the Prime Minister became less miserable than he had been. But Lord Drummond forgave nothing. He still held his office, but more than once he was seen in private conference with both Sir Orlando and Mr. Boffin. He did not attempt to conceal his anger. Lord Earlybird! An old woman! One whom no other man in England would have thought of making a Knight of the Garter! It was not, he said, personal disappointment in himself. There were half-a-dozen peers whom he would willingly have seen so graced without the slightest chagrin. But this must have been done simply to show the Duke's power, and to let the world understand that he owed nothing and would pay nothing to his supporters. It was almost a disgrace, said Lord Drummond, to belong to a Government the Head of which could so commit himself! The Session was nearly at an end, and Lord Drummond thought that no step could be conveniently taken now. But it was quite clear to him that this state of things could not be continued. It was observed that Lord Drummond and the Prime Minister never spoke to each other in the House, and that the Secretary of State for the Colonies,--that being the office which he held,--never rose in his place after Lord Earlybird's nomination, unless to say a word or two as to his own peculiar duties. It was very soon known to all the world that there was war to the knife between Lord Drummond and the Prime Minister. And, strange to say, there seemed to be some feeling of general discontent on this very trifling subject. When Aristides has been much too just the oyster-shells become numerous. It was said that the Duke had been guilty of pretentious love of virtue in taking Lord Earlybird out of his own path of life and forcing him to write K.G. after his name. There came out an article, of course in the "People's Banner," headed, "Our Prime Minister's Good Works," in which poor Lord Earlybird was ridiculed in a very unbecoming manner, and in which it was asserted that the thing was done as a counterpoise to the iniquity displayed in "hounding Ferdinand Lopez to his death." Whenever Ferdinand Lopez was mentioned he had always been hounded. And then the article went on to declare that either the Prime Minister had quarrelled with all his colleagues, or else that all his colleagues had quarrelled with the Prime Minister. Mr. Slide did not care which it might be, but, whichever it might be, the poor country had to suffer when such a state of things was permitted. It was notorious that neither the Duke of St. Bungay nor Lord Drummond would now even speak to their own chief, so thoroughly were they disgusted with his conduct. Indeed it seemed that the only ally the Prime Minister had in his own Cabinet was the Irish adventurer, Mr. Phineas Finn. Lord Earlybird never read a word of all this, and was altogether undisturbed as he sat in his chair in Exeter Hall,--or just at this time of the year more frequently in the provinces. But the Duke of Omnium read it all. After what had passed he did not dare to show it to his brother Duke. He did not dare to tell his friend that it was said in the newspapers that they did not speak to each other. But every word from Mr. Slide's pen settled on his own memory, and added to his torments. It came to be a fixed idea in the Duke's mind that Mr. Slide was a gadfly sent to the earth for the express purpose of worrying him. And as a matter of course the Prime Minister in his own mind blamed himself for what he had done. It is the chief torment of a person constituted as he was that strong as may be the determination to do a thing, fixed as may be the conviction that that thing ought to be done, no sooner has it been perfected than the objections of others, which before had been inefficacious, become suddenly endowed with truth and force. He did not like being told by Mr. Slide that he ought not to have set his Cabinet against him, but when he had in fact done so, then he believed what Mr. Slide told him. As soon almost as the irrevocable letter had been winged on its way to Lord Earlybird, he saw the absurdity of sending it. Who was he that he should venture to set aside all the traditions of office? A Pitt or a Peel or a Palmerston might have done so, because they had been abnormally strong. They had been Prime Ministers by the work of their own hands, holding their powers against the whole world. But he,--he told himself daily that he was only there by sufferance, because at the moment no one else could be found to take it. In such a condition should he not have been bound by the traditions of office, bound by the advice of one so experienced and so true as the Duke of St. Bungay? And for whom had he broken through these traditions and thrown away this advice? For a man who had no power whatever to help him or any other Minister of the Crown;--for one whose every pursuit in life was at variance with the acquisition of such honours as that now thrust upon him! He could see his own obstinacy, and could even hate the pretentious love of virtue which he had himself displayed. "Have you seen Lord Earlybird with his ribbon?" his wife said to him. "I do not know Lord Earlybird by sight," he replied angrily. "Nor any one else either. But he would have come and shown himself to you, if he had had a spark of gratitude in his composition. As far as I can learn you have sacrificed the Ministry for his sake." "I did my duty as best I knew how to do it," said the Duke, almost with ferocity, "and it little becomes you to taunt me with any deficiency." "Plantagenet!" "I am driven," he said, "almost beyond myself, and it kills me when you take part against me." "Take part against you! Surely there was very little in what I said." And yet, as she spoke, she repented bitterly that she had at the moment allowed herself to relapse into the sort of badinage which had been usual with her before she had understood the extent of his sufferings. "If I trouble you by what I say, I will certainly hold my tongue." "Don't repeat to me what that man says in the newspaper." "You shouldn't regard the man, Plantagenet. You shouldn't allow the paper to come into your hands." "Am I to be afraid of seeing what men say of me? Never! But you need not repeat it, at any rate if it be false." She had not seen the article in question or she certainly would not have repeated the accusation which it contained. "I have quarrelled with no colleague. If such a one as Lord Drummond chooses to think himself injured, am I to stoop to him? Nothing strikes me so much in all this as the ill-nature of the world at large. When they used to bait a bear tied to a stake, every one around would cheer the dogs and help to torment the helpless animal. It is much the same now, only they have a man instead of a bear for their pleasure." "I will never help the dogs again," she said, coming up to him and clinging within the embrace of his arm. He knew that he had been Quixotic, and he would sit in his chair repeating the word to himself aloud, till he himself began to fear that he would do it in company. But the thing had been done and could not be undone. He had had the bestowal of one Garter, and he had given it to Lord Earlybird! It was,--he told himself, but not correctly,--the only thing that he had done on his own undivided responsibility since he had been Prime Minister. The last days of July had passed, and it had been at last decided that the Session should close on the 11th of August. Now the 11th of August was thought to be a great deal too near the 12th to allow of such an arrangement being considered satisfactory. A great many members were very angry at the arrangement. It had been said all through June and into July that it was to be an early Session, and yet things had been so mismanaged that when the end came everything could not be finished without keeping members of Parliament in town up to the 11th of August! In the memory of present legislators there had never been anything so awkward. The fault, if there was a fault, was attributable to Mr. Monk. In all probability the delay was unavoidable. A minister cannot control long-winded gentlemen, and when gentlemen are very long-winded there must be delay. No doubt a strong minister can exercise some control, and it is certain that long-winded gentlemen find an unusual scope for their breath when the reigning dynasty is weak. In that way Mr. Monk and the Duke may have been responsible, but they were blamed as though they, for their own special amusement, detained gentlemen in town. Indeed the gentlemen were not detained. They grumbled and growled and then fled,--but their grumblings and growlings were heard even after their departure. "Well;--what do you think of it all?" the Duke said one day to Mr. Monk, at the Treasury, affecting an air of cheery good-humour. "I think," said Mr. Monk, "that the country is very prosperous. I don't know that I ever remember trade to have been more evenly satisfactory." "Ah, yes. That's very well for the country, and ought, I suppose, to satisfy us." "It satisfies me," said Mr. Monk. "And me, in a way. But if you were walking about in a very tight pair of boots, in an agony with your feet, would you be able just then to relish the news that agricultural wages in that parish had gone up sixpence a week?" "I'd take my boots off, and then try," said Mr. Monk. "That's just what I'm thinking of doing. If I had my boots off all that prosperity would be so pleasant to me! But you see you can't take your boots off in company. And it may be that you have a walk before you, and that no boots will be worse for your feet even than tight ones." "We'll have our boots off soon, Duke," said Mr. Monk, speaking of the recess. "And when shall we be quit of them altogether? Joking apart, they have to be worn if the country requires it." "Certainly, Duke." "And it may be that you and I think that upon the whole they may be worn with advantage. What does the country say to that?" "The country has never said the reverse. We have not had a majority against us this Session on any Government question." "But we have had narrowing majorities. What will the House do as to the Lords' amendments on the Bankruptcy Bill?" There was a Bill that had gone down from the House of Commons, but had not originated with the Government. It had, however, been fostered by Ministers in the House of Lords, and had been sent back with certain amendments for which the Lord Chancellor had made himself responsible. It was therefore now almost a Government measure. The manipulation of this measure had been one of the causes of the prolonged sitting of the Houses. "Grogram says they will take the amendments." "And if they don't?" "Why then," said Mr. Monk, "the Lords must take our rejection." "And we shall have been beaten," said the Duke. "Undoubtedly." "And beaten simply because the House desires to beat us. I am told that Sir Timothy Beeswax intends to speak and vote against the amendments." "What,--Sir Timothy on one side, and Sir Gregory on the other?" "So Lord Ramsden tells me," said the Duke. "If it be so, what are we to do?" "Certainly not go out in August," said Mr. Monk. When the time came for the consideration of the Lords' amendments in the House of Commons,--and it did not come till the 8th of August,--the matter was exactly as the Duke had said. Sir Gregory Grogram, with a great deal of earnestness, supported the Lords' amendment,--as he was in honour bound to do. The amendment had come from his chief, the Lord Chancellor, and had indeed been discussed with Sir Gregory before it had been proposed. He was very much in earnest;--but it was evident from Sir Gregory's earnestness that he expected a violent opposition. Immediately after him rose Sir Timothy. Now Sir Timothy was a pretentious man, who assumed to be not only an advocate but a lawyer. And he assumed also to be a political magnate. He went into the matter at great length. He began by saying that it was not a party question. The Bill, which he had had the honour of supporting before it went from their own House, had been a private Bill. As such it had received a general support from the Government. It had been materially altered in the other House under the auspices of his noble friend on the woolsack, but from those alterations he was obliged to dissent. Then he said some very heavy things against the Lord Chancellor, and increased in acerbity as he described what he called the altered mind of his honourable and learned friend the Attorney-General. He then made some very uncomplimentary allusions to the Prime Minister, whom he accused of being more than ordinarily reserved with his subordinates. The speech was manifestly arranged and delivered with the express view of damaging the Coalition, of which at the time he himself made a part. Men observed that things were very much altered when such a course as that was taken in the House of Commons. But that was the course taken on this occasion by Sir Timothy Beeswax, and was so far taken with success that the Lords' amendments were rejected and the Government was beaten in a thin House, by a large majority,--composed partly of its own men. "What am I to do?" asked the Prime Minister of the old Duke. The old Duke's answer was exactly the same as that given by Mr. Monk. "We cannot resign in August." And then he went on. "We must wait and see how things go at the beginning of next Session. The chief question is whether Sir Timothy should not be asked to resign." Then the Session was at an end, and they who had been staunch to the last got out of town as quick as the trains could carry them. CHAPTER LXVII Mrs. Lopez Prepares to Move The Duchess of Omnium was not the most discreet woman in the world. That was admitted by her best friends, and was the great sin alleged against her by her worst enemies. In her desire to say sharp things, she would say the sharp thing in the wrong place, and in her wish to be good-natured she was apt to run into offences. Just as she was about to leave town, which did not take place for some days after Parliament had risen, she made an indiscreet proposition to her husband. "Should you mind my asking Mrs. Lopez down to Matching? We shall only be a very small party." Now the very name of Lopez was terrible to the Duke's ears. Anything which recalled the wretch and that wretched tragedy to the Duke's mind gave him a stab. The Duchess ought to have felt that any communication between her husband and even the man's widow was to be avoided rather than sought. "Quite out of the question!" said the Duke, drawing himself up. "Why out of the question?" "There are a thousand reasons. I could not have it." "Then I will say nothing more about it. But there is a romance there,--something quite touching." "You don't mean that she has--a lover?" "Well;--yes." "And she lost her husband only the other day,--lost him in so terrible a manner! If that is so, certainly I do not wish to see her again." "Ah, that is because you don't know the story." "I don't wish to know it." "The man who now wants to marry her knew her long before she had seen Lopez, and had offered to her ever so many times. He is a fine fellow, and you know him." "I had rather not hear any more about it," said the Duke, walking away. There was an end to the Duchess's scheme of getting Emily down to Matching,--a scheme which could hardly have been successful even had the Duke not objected to it. But yet the Duchess would not abandon her project of befriending the widow. She had injured Lopez. She had liked what she had seen of Mrs. Lopez. And she was now endeavouring to take Arthur Fletcher by the hand. She called therefore at Manchester Square on the day before she started for Matching, and left a card and a note. This was on the 15th of August, when London was as empty as it ever is. The streets at the West End were deserted. The houses were shut up. The very sweepers of the crossings seemed to have gone out of town. The public offices were manned by one or two unfortunates each, who consoled themselves by reading novels at their desks. Half the cab-drivers had gone apparently to the seaside,--or to bed. The shops were still open, but all the respectable shopkeepers were either in Switzerland or at their marine villas. The travelling world had divided itself into Cookites and Hookites;--those who escaped trouble under the auspices of Mr. Cook, and those who boldly combated the extortions of foreign innkeepers and the anti-Anglican tendencies of foreign railway officials "on their own hooks." The Duchess of Omnium was nevertheless in town, and the Duke might still be seen going in at the back entrance of the Treasury Chambers every day at eleven o'clock. Mr. Warburton thought it very hard, for he, too, could shoot grouse; but he would have perished rather than have spoken a word. The Duchess did not ask to see Mrs. Lopez, but left her card and a note. She had not liked, she said, to leave town without calling, though she would not seek to be admitted. She hoped that Mrs. Lopez was recovering her health, and trusted that on her return to town she might be allowed to renew her acquaintance. The note was very simple, and could not be taken as other than friendly. If she had been simply Mrs. Palliser, and her husband had been a junior clerk in the Treasury, such a visit would have been a courtesy; and it was not less so because it was made by the Duchess of Omnium and by the wife of the Prime Minister. But yet among all the poor widow's acquaintances she was the only one who had ventured to call since Lopez had destroyed himself. Mrs. Roby had been told not to come. Lady Eustace had been sternly rejected. Even old Mrs. Fletcher when she had been up in town had, after a very solemn meeting with Mr. Wharton, contented herself with sending her love. It had come to pass that the idea of being immured was growing to be natural to Emily herself. The longer that it was continued the more did it seem to be impossible to her that she should break from her seclusion. But yet she was gratified by the note from the Duchess. "She means to be civil, papa." "Oh yes;--but there are people whose civility I don't want." "Certainly. I did not want the civility of that horrid Lady Eustace. But I can understand this. She thinks that she did Ferdinand an injury." "When you begin, my dear,--and I hope it will be soon,--to get back to the world, you will find it more comfortable, I think, to find yourself among your own people." "I don't want to go back," she said, sobbing bitterly. "But I want you to go back. All who know you want you to go back. Only don't begin at that end." "You don't suppose, papa, that I wish to go to the Duchess?" "I wish you to go somewhere. It can't be good for you to remain here. Indeed I shall think it wicked, or at any rate weak, if you continue to seclude yourself." "Where shall I go?" she said, imploringly. "To Wharton. I certainly think you ought to go there first." "If you would go, papa, and leave me here,--just this once. Next year I will go,--if they ask me." "When I may be dead, for aught that any of us know." "Do not say that, papa. Of course any one may die." "I certainly shall not go without you. You may take that as certain. Is it likely that I should leave you alone in August and September in this great gloomy house? If you stay, I shall stay." Now this meant a great deal more than it had meant in former years. Since Lopez had died Mr. Wharton had not once dined at the Eldon. He came home regularly at six o'clock, sat with his daughter an hour before dinner, and then remained with her all the evening. It seemed as though he were determined to force her out of her solitude by her natural consideration for him. She would implore him to go to his club and have his rubber, but he would never give way. No;--he didn't care for the Eldon, and disliked whist. So he said. Till at last he spoke more plainly. "You are dull enough here all day, and I will not leave you in the evenings." There was a pertinacious tenderness in this which she had not expected from the antecedents of his life. When, therefore, he told her that he would not go into the country without her, she felt herself almost constrained to yield. And she would have yielded at once but for one fear. How could she insure to herself that Arthur Fletcher should not be there? Of course he would be at Longbarns, and how could she prevent his coming over from Longbarns to Wharton? She could hardly bring herself to ask the question of her father. But she felt an insuperable objection to finding herself in Arthur's presence. Of course she loved him. Of course in all the world he was of all the dearest to her. Of course if she could wipe out the past as with a wet towel, if she could put the crape off her mind as well as from her limbs, she would become his wife with the greatest joy. But the very feeling that she loved him was disgraceful to her in her own thoughts. She had allowed his caress while Lopez was still her husband,--the husband who had ill-used her and betrayed her, who had sought to drag her down to his own depth of baseness. But now she could not endure to think that that other man should even touch her. It was forbidden to her, she believed, by all the canons of womanhood even to think of love again. There ought to be nothing left for her but crape and weepers. She had done it all by her own obstinacy, and she could make no compensation either to her family, or to the world, or to her own feelings, but by drinking the cup of her misery down to the very dregs. Even to think of joy would in her be a treason. On that occasion she did not yield to her father, conquering him as she had conquered him before by the pleading of her looks rather than of her words. But a day or two afterwards he came to her with arguments of a very different kind. He at any rate must go to Wharton immediately, in reference to a letter of vital importance which he had received from Sir Alured. The reader may perhaps remember that Sir Alured's heir,--the heir to the title and property,--was a nephew for whom he entertained no affection whatever. This Wharton had been discarded by all the Whartons as a profligate drunkard. Some years ago Sir Alured had endeavoured to reclaim the man, and had spent perhaps more money than he had been justified in doing in the endeavour, seeing that, as present occupier of the property, he was bound to provide for his own daughters, and that at his death every acre must go to this ne'er-do-well. The money had been allowed to flow like water for a twelvemonth, and had done no good whatever. There had then been no hope. The man was strong and likely to live,--and after a while married a wife, some woman that he took from the very streets. This had been his last known achievement, and from that moment not even had his name been mentioned at Wharton. Now there came the tidings of his death. It was said that he had perished in some attempt to cross some glaciers in Switzerland;--but by degrees it appeared that the glacier itself had been less dangerous than the brandy which he had swallowed whilst on his journey. At any rate he was dead. As to that Sir Alured's letter was certain. And he was equally certain that he had left no son. These tidings were quite as important to Mr. Wharton as to Sir Alured,--more important to Everett Wharton than to either of them, as he would inherit all after the death of those two old men. At this moment he was away yachting with a friend, and even his address was unknown. Letters for him were to be sent to Oban, and might, or might not, reach him in the course of a month. But in a man of Sir Alured's feelings, this catastrophe produced a great change. The heir to his title and property was one whom he was bound to regard with affection and almost with reverence,--if it were only possible for him to do so. With his late heir it had been impossible. But Everett Wharton he had always liked. Everett had not been quite all that his father and uncle had wished. But his faults had been exactly those which would be cured,--or would almost be made virtues,--by the possession of a title and property. Distaste for a profession and aptitude for Parliament would become a young man who was heir not only to the Wharton estates, but to half his father's money. Sir Alured in his letter expressed a hope that Everett might be informed instantly. He would have written himself had he known Everett's address. But he did know that his elder cousin was in town, and he besought his elder cousin to come at once,--quite at once,--to Wharton. Emily, he said, would of course accompany her father on such an occasion. Then there were long letters from Mary Wharton, and even from Lady Wharton, to Emily. The Whartons must have been very much moved when Lady Wharton could be induced to write a long letter. The Whartons were very much moved. They were in a state of enthusiasm at these news, amounting almost to fury. It seemed as though they thought that every tenant and labourer on the estate, and every tenant and labourer's wife, would be in an abnormal condition and unfit for the duties of life, till they should have seen Everett as heir of the property. Lady Wharton went so far as to tell Emily which bedroom was being prepared for Everett,--a bedroom very different in honour from any by the occupation of which he had as yet been graced. And there were twenty points as to new wills and new deeds as to which the present baronet wanted the immediate advice of his cousin. There were a score of things which could now be done which were before impossible. Trees could be cut down, and buildings put up; and a little bit of land sold, and a little bit of land bought;--the doing of all which would give new life to Sir Alured. A life interest in an estate is a much pleasanter thing when the heir is a friend who can be walked about the property, than when he is an enemy who must be kept at arm's length. All these delights could now be Sir Alured's,--if the old heir would give him his counsel and the young one his assistance. This change in affairs occasioned some flutter also in Manchester Square. It could not make much difference personally to old Mr. Wharton. He was, in fact, as old as the baronet, and did not pay much regard to his own chance of succession. But the position was one which would suit his son admirably, and he was now on good terms with his son. He had convinced himself that Lopez had done all that he could to separate them, and therefore found himself to be more bound to his son than ever. "We must go at once," he said to his daughter, speaking almost as though he had forgotten her misery for the moment. "I suppose you and Everett ought to be there." "Heaven knows where Everett is. I ought to be there, and I suppose that on such an occasion as this you will condescend to go with me." "Condescend, papa;--what does that mean?" "You know I cannot go alone. It is out of the question that I should leave you here." "Why, papa?" "And at such a time the family ought to come together. Of course they will take it very much amiss if you refuse. What will Lady Wharton think if you refuse after her writing such a letter as that? It is my duty to tell you that you ought to go. You cannot think that it is right to throw over every friend that you have in the world." There was a great deal more said in which it almost seemed that the father's tenderness had been worn out. His words were much rougher and more imperious than any that he had yet spoken since his daughter had become a widow, but they were also more efficacious, and therefore probably more salutary. After twenty-four hours of this she found that she was obliged to yield, and a telegram was sent to Wharton,--by no means the first telegram that had been sent since the news had arrived,--saying that Emily would accompany her father. They were to occupy themselves for two days further in preparations for their journey. These preparations to Emily were so sad as almost to break her heart. She had never as yet packed up her widow's weeds. She had never as yet even contemplated the necessity of coming down to dinner in them before other eyes than those of her father and brother. She had as yet made none of those struggles with which widows seek to lessen the deformity of their costume. It was incumbent on her now to get a ribbon or two less ghastly than those weepers which had, for the last five months, hung about her face and shoulders. And then how should she look if he were to be there? It was not to be expected that the Whartons should seclude themselves because of her grief. This very change in the circumstances of the property would be sure, of itself, to bring the Fletchers to Wharton,--and then how should she look at him, how answer him, if he spoke to her tenderly? It is very hard for a woman to tell a lie to a man when she loves him. She may speak the words. She may be able to assure him that he is indifferent to her. But when a woman really loves a man, as she loved this man, there is a desire to touch him which quivers at her fingers' ends, a longing to look at him which she cannot keep out of her eyes, an inclination to be near him which affects every motion of her body. She cannot refrain herself from excessive attention to his words. She has a god to worship, and she cannot control her admiration. Of all this Emily herself felt much,--but felt at the same time that she would never pardon herself if she betrayed her love by a gleam of her eye, by the tone of a word, or the movement of a finger. What,--should she be known to love again after such a mistake as hers, after such a catastrophe? The evening before they started who should bustle into the house but Everett himself. It was then about six o'clock, and he was going to leave London by the night mail. That he should be a little given to bustle on such an occasion may perhaps be forgiven him. He had heard the news down on the Scotch coast, and had flown up to London, telegraphing as he did so backwards and forwards to Wharton. Of course he felt that the destruction of his cousin among the glaciers,--whether by brandy or ice he did not much care,--had made him for the nonce one of the important people of the world. The young man who would not so feel might be the better philosopher, but one might doubt whether he would be the better young man. He quite agreed with his father that it was his sister's duty to go to Wharton, and he was now in a position to speak with authority as to the duties of members of his family. He could not wait, even for one night, in order that he might travel with them. Sir Alured was impatient. Sir Alured wanted him in Herefordshire. Sir Alured had said that on such an occasion he, the heir, ought to be on the property with the shortest possible delay. His father smiled;--but with an approving smile. Everett therefore started by the night mail, leaving his father and sister to follow him on the morrow. CHAPTER LXVIII The Prime Minister's Political Creed The Duke, before he went to Matching, twice reminded Phineas Finn that he was expected there in a day or two. "The Duchess says that your wife is coming to-morrow," the Duke said on the day of his departure. But Phineas could not go then. His services to his country were required among the dockyards and ships, and he postponed his visit till the end of September. Then he started for Matching, having the double pleasure before him of meeting his wife and his noble host and hostess. He found a small party there, but not so small as the Duchess had once suggested to him. "Your wife will be there, of course, Mr. Finn. She is too good to desert me in my troubles. And there will probably be Lady Rosina De Courcy. Lady Rosina is to the Duke what your wife is to me. I don't suppose there will be anybody else,--except, perhaps, Mr. Warburton." But Lady Rosina was not there. In place of Lady Rosina there were the Duke and Duchess of St. Bungay, with their daughters, two or three Palliser offshoots, with their wives, and Barrington Erle. There were, too, the Bishop of the diocese with his wife, and three or four others, coming and going, so that the party never seemed to be too small. "We asked Mr. Rattler," said the Duchess in a whisper to Phineas, "but he declined, with a string of florid compliments. When Mr. Rattler won't come to the Prime Minister's house, you may depend that something is going to happen. It is like pigs carrying straws in their mouths. Mr. Rattler is my pig." Phineas only laughed and said that he did not believe Rattler to be a better pig than any one else. It was soon apparent to Phineas that the Duke's manner to him was entirely altered, so much so that he was compelled to acknowledge to himself that he had not hitherto read the Duke's character aright. Hitherto he had never found the Duke pleasant in conversation. Looking back he could hardly remember that he had in truth ever conversed with the Duke. The man had seemed to shut himself up as soon as he had uttered certain words which the circumstances of the moment had demanded. Whether it was arrogance or shyness Phineas had not known. His wife had said that the Duke was shy. Had he been arrogant the effect would have been the same. He was unbending, hard, and lucid only when he spoke on some detail of business, or on some point of policy. But now he smiled, and though hesitating a little at first, very soon fell into the ways of a pleasant country host. "You shoot," said the Duke. Phineas did shoot but cared very little about it. "But you hunt." Phineas was very fond of riding to hounds. "I am beginning to think," said the Duke, "that I have made a mistake in not caring for such things. When I was very young I gave them up, because it appeared that other men devoted too much time to them. One might as well not eat because some men are gluttons." "Only that you would die if you did not eat." "Bread, I suppose, would keep me alive, but still one eats meat without being a glutton. I very often regret the want of amusements, and particularly of those which would throw me more among my fellow-creatures. A man is alone when reading, alone when writing, alone when thinking. Even sitting in Parliament he is very much alone, though there be a crowd around him. Now a man can hardly be thoroughly useful unless he knows his fellow-men, and how is he to know them if he shuts himself up? If I had to begin again I think I would cultivate the amusements of the time." Not long after this the Duke asked him whether he was going to join the shooting men on that morning. Phineas declared that his hands were too full of business for any amusement before lunch. "Then," said the Duke, "will you walk with me in the afternoon? There is nothing I really like so much as a walk. There are some very pretty points where the river skirts the park. And I will show you the spot on which Sir Guy de Palliser performed the feat for which the king gave him this property. It was a grand time when a man could get half-a-dozen parishes because he tickled the king's fancy." "But suppose he didn't tickle the king's fancy?" "Ah, then indeed, it might go otherwise with him. But I am glad to say that Sir Guy was an accomplished courtier." The walk was taken, and the pretty bends of the river were seen; but they were looked at without much earnestness, and Sir Guy's great deed was not again mentioned. The conversation went away to other matters. Of course it was not long before the Prime Minister was deep in discussing the probabilities of the next Session. It was soon apparent to Phineas that the Duke was no longer desirous of resigning, though he spoke very freely of the probable necessity there might be for him to do so. At the present moment he was in his best humour. His feet were on his own property. He could see the prosperity around him. The spot was the one which he loved best in all the world. He liked his present companion, who was one to whom he was entitled to speak with freedom. But there was still present to him the sense of some injury from which he could not free himself. Of course he did not know that he had been haughty to Sir Orlando, to Sir Timothy, and others. But he did know that he had intended to be true, and he thought that they had been treacherous. Twelve months ago there had been a goal before him which he might attain, a winning-post which was still within his reach. There was in store for him the tranquillity of retirement which he would enjoy as soon as a sense of duty would permit him to seize it. But now the prospect of that happiness had gradually vanished from him. That retirement was no longer a winning-post for him. The poison of place and power and dignity had got into his blood. As he looked forward he feared rather than sighed for retirement. "You think it will go against us," he said. Phineas did think so. There was hardly a man high up in the party who did not think so. When one branch of a Coalition has gradually dropped off, the other branch will hardly flourish long. And then the tints of a political Coalition are so neutral and unalluring that men will only endure them when they feel that no more pronounced colours are within their reach. "After all," said Phineas, "the innings has not been a bad one. It has been of service to the country, and has lasted longer than most men expected." "If it has been of service to the country, that is everything. It should at least be everything. With the statesman to whom it is not everything there must be something wrong." The Duke, as he said this, was preaching to himself. He was telling himself that, though he saw the better way, he was allowing himself to walk on in that which was worse. For it was not only Phineas who could see the change,--or the old Duke, or the Duchess. It was apparent to the man himself, though he could not prevent it. "I sometimes think," he said, "that we whom chance has led to be meddlers in the game of politics sometimes give ourselves hardly time enough to think what we are about." "A man may have to work so hard," said Phineas, "that he has no time for thinking." "Or more probably, may be so eager in party conflict that he will hardly keep his mind cool enough for thought. It seems to me that many men,--men whom you and I know,--embrace the profession of politics not only without political convictions, but without seeing that it is proper that they should entertain them. Chance brings a young man under the guidance of this or that elder man. He has come of a Whig family, as was my case,--or from some old Tory stock; and loyalty keeps him true to the interests which have first pushed him forward into the world. There is no conviction there." "Convictions grow." "Yes;--the conviction that it is the man's duty to be a staunch Liberal, but not the reason why. Or a man sees his opening on this side or on that,--as is the case with the lawyers. Or he has a body of men at his back ready to support him on this side or on that, as we see with commercial men. Or perhaps he has some vague idea that aristocracy is pleasant, and he becomes a Conservative,--or that democracy is prospering, and he becomes a Liberal. You are a Liberal, Mr. Finn." "Certainly, Duke." "Why?" "Well;--after what you have said I will not boast of myself. Experience, however, seems to show me that Liberalism is demanded by the country." "So, perhaps, at certain epochs, may the Devil and all his works; but you will hardly say that you will carry the Devil's colours because the country may like the Devil. It is not sufficient, I think, to say that Liberalism is demanded. You should first know what Liberalism means, and then assure yourself that the thing itself is good. I dare say you have done so; but I see some who never make the inquiry." "I will not claim to be better than my neighbours,--I mean my real neighbours." "I understand; I understand," said the Duke laughing. "You prefer some good Samaritan on the opposition benches to Sir Timothy and the Pharisees. It is hard to come wounded out of the fight, and then to see him who should be your friend not only walking by on the other side, but flinging a stone at you as he goes. But I did not mean just now to allude to the details of recent misfortunes, though there is no one to whom I could do so more openly than to you. I was trying yesterday to explain to myself why I have, all my life, sat on what is called the Liberal side of the House to which I have belonged." "Did you succeed?" "I began life with the misfortune of a ready-made political creed. There was a seat in the House for me when I was twenty-one. Nobody took the trouble to ask me my opinions. It was a matter of course that I should be a Liberal. My uncle, whom nothing could ever induce to move in politics himself, took it for granted that I should run straight,--as he would have said. It was a tradition of the family, and was as inseparable from it as any of the titles which he had inherited. The property might be sold or squandered,--but the political creed was fixed as adamant. I don't know that I ever had a wish to rebel, but I think that I took it at first very much as a matter of course." "A man seldom inquires very deeply at twenty-one." "And if he does it is ten to one but he comes to a wrong conclusion. But since then I have satisfied myself that chance put me into the right course. It has been, I dare say, the same with you as with me. We both went into office early, and the anxiety to do special duties well probably deterred us both from thinking much of the great question. When a man has to be on the alert to keep Ireland quiet, or to prevent peculation in the dockyards, or to raise the revenue while he lowers the taxes, he feels himself to be saved from the necessity of investigating principles. In this way I sometimes think that ministers, or they who have been ministers and who have to watch ministers from the opposition benches, have less opportunity of becoming real politicians than the men who sit in Parliament with empty hands and with time at their own disposal. But when a man has been placed by circumstances as I am now, he does begin to think." "And yet you have not empty hands." "They are not so full, perhaps, as you think. At any rate I cannot content myself with a single branch of the public service as I used to do in old days. Do not suppose that I claim to have made any grand political invention, but I think that I have at least labelled my own thoughts. I suppose what we all desire is to improve the condition of the people by whom we are employed, and to advance our country, or at any rate to save it from retrogression." "That of course." "So much is of course. I give credit to my opponents in Parliament for that desire quite as readily as I do to my colleagues or to myself. The idea that political virtue is all on one side is both mischievous and absurd. We allow ourselves to talk in that way because indignation, scorn, and sometimes, I fear, vituperation, are the fuel with which the necessary heat of debate is maintained." "There are some men who are very fond of poking the fire," said Phineas. "Well; I won't name any one at present," said the Duke, "but I have seen gentlemen of your country very handy with the pokers." Phineas laughed, knowing that he had been considered by some to have been a little violent when defending the Duke. "But we put all that aside when we really think, and can give the Conservative credit for philanthropy and patriotism as readily as the Liberal. The Conservative who has had any idea of the meaning of the name which he carries, wishes, I suppose, to maintain the differences and the distances which separate the highly placed from their lower brethren. He thinks that God has divided the world as he finds it divided, and that he may best do his duty by making the inferior man happy and contented in his position, teaching him that the place which he holds is his by God's ordinance." "And it is so." "Hardly in the sense that I mean. But that is the great Conservative lesson. That lesson seems to me to be hardly compatible with continual improvement in the condition of the lower man. But with the Conservative all such improvement is to be based on the idea of the maintenance of those distances. I as a Duke am to be kept as far apart from the man who drives my horses as was my ancestor from the man who drove his, or who rode after him to the wars,--and that is to go on for ever. There is much to be said for such a scheme. Let the lords be, all of them, men with loving hearts, and clear intellect, and noble instincts, and it is possible that they should use their powers so beneficently as to spread happiness over the earth. It is one of the millenniums which the mind of man can conceive, and seems to be that which the Conservative mind does conceive." "But the other men who are not lords don't want that kind of happiness." "If such happiness were attainable it might be well to constrain men to accept it. But the lords of this world are fallible men; and though as units they ought to be and perhaps are better than those others who have fewer advantages, they are much more likely as units to go astray in opinion than the bodies of men whom they would seek to govern. We know that power does corrupt, and that we cannot trust kings to have loving hearts, and clear intellects, and noble instincts. Men as they come to think about it and to look forward, and to look back, will not believe in such a millennium as that." "Do they believe in any millennium?" "I think they do after a fashion, and I think that I do myself. That is my idea of Conservatism. The doctrine of Liberalism is, of course, the reverse. The Liberal, if he have any fixed idea at all, must, I think, have conceived the idea of lessening distances,--of bringing the coachman and the duke nearer together,--nearer and nearer, till a millennium shall be reached by--" "By equality?" asked Phineas, eagerly interrupting the Prime Minister, and showing his dissent by the tone of his voice. "I did not use the word, which is open to many objections. In the first place the millennium, which I have perhaps rashly named, is so distant that we need not even think of it as possible. Men's intellects are at present so various that we cannot even realise the idea of equality, and here in England we have been taught to hate the word by the evil effects of those absurd attempts which have been made elsewhere to proclaim it as a fact accomplished by the scratch of a pen or by a chisel on a stone. We have been injured in that, because a good word signifying a grand idea has been driven out of the vocabulary of good men. Equality would be a heaven, if we could attain it. How can we to whom so much has been given dare to think otherwise? How can you look at the bowed back and bent legs and abject face of that poor ploughman, who winter and summer has to drag his rheumatic limbs to his work, while you go a-hunting or sit in pride of place among the foremost few of your country, and say that it all is as it ought to be? You are a Liberal because you know that it is not all as it ought to be, and because you would still march on to some nearer approach to equality; though the thing itself is so great, so glorious, so godlike,--nay, so absolutely divine,--that you have been disgusted by the very promise of it, because its perfection is unattainable. Men have asserted a mock equality till the very idea of equality stinks in men's nostrils." The Duke in his enthusiasm had thrown off his hat, and was sitting on a wooden seat which they had reached, looking up among the clouds. His left hand was clenched, and from time to time with his right he rubbed the thin hairs on his brow. He had begun in a low voice, with a somewhat slipshod enunciation of his words, but had gradually become clear, resonant, and even eloquent. Phineas knew that there were stories told of certain bursts of words which had come from him in former days in the House of Commons. These had occasionally surprised men and induced them to declare that Planty Pall,--as he was then often called,--was a dark horse. But they had been few and far between, and Phineas had never heard them. Now he gazed at his companion in silence, wondering whether the speaker would go on with his speech. But the face changed on a sudden, and the Duke with an awkward motion snatched up his hat. "I hope you ain't cold," he said. "Not at all," said Phineas. "I came here because of that bend of the river. I am always very fond of that bend. We don't go over the river. That is Mr. Upjohn's property." "The member for the county?" "Yes; and a very good member he is too, though he doesn't support us;--an old-school Tory, but a great friend of my uncle, who after all had a good deal of the Tory about him. I wonder whether he is at home. I must remind the Duchess to ask him to dinner. You know him, of course." "Only by just seeing him in the House." "You'd like him very much. When in the country he always wears knee-breeches and gaiters, which I think a very comfortable dress." "Troublesome, Duke; isn't it?" "I never tried it, and I shouldn't dare now. Goodness, me; it's past five o'clock, and we've got two miles to get home. I haven't looked at a letter, and Warburton will think that I've thrown myself into the river because of Sir Timothy Beeswax." Then they started to go home at a fast pace. "I shan't forget, Duke," said Phineas, "your definition of Conservatives and Liberals." "I don't think I ventured on a definition;--only a few loose ideas which had been troubling me lately. I say, Finn!" "Your Grace?" "Don't you go and tell Ramsden and Drummond that I have been preaching equality, or we shall have a pretty mess. I don't know that it would serve me with my dear friend, the Duke." "I will be discretion itself." "Equality is a dream. But sometimes one likes to dream,--especially as there is no danger that Matching will fly from me in a dream. I doubt whether I could bear the test that has been attempted in other countries." "That poor ploughman would hardly get his share, Duke." "No;--that's where it is. We can only do a little and a little to bring it nearer to us;--so little that it won't touch Matching in our day. Here is her ladyship and the ponies. I don't think her ladyship would like to lose her ponies by my doctrine." The two wives of the two men were in the pony carriage, and the little Lady Glencora, the Duchess's eldest daughter, was sitting between them. "Mr. Warburton has sent three messengers to demand your presence," said the Duchess, "and, as I live by bread, I believe that you and Mr. Finn have been amusing yourselves!" "We have been talking politics," said the Duke. "Of course. What other amusement was possible? But what business have you to indulge in idle talk when Mr. Warburton wants you in the library? There has come a box," she said, "big enough to contain the resignations of all the traitors of the party." This was strong language, and the Duke frowned;--but there was no one there to hear it but Phineas Finn and his wife, and they, at least, were trustworthy. The Duke suggested that he had better get back to the house as soon as possible. There might be something to be done requiring time before dinner. Mr. Warburton might, at any rate, want to smoke a tranquil cigar after his day's work. The Duchess therefore left the carriage, as did Mrs. Finn, and the Duke undertook to drive the little girl back to the house. "He'll surely go against a tree," said the Duchess. But,--as a fact,--the Duke did take himself and the child home in safety. "And what do you think about it, Mr. Finn?" said her Grace. "I suppose you and the Duke have been settling what is to be done." "We have certainly settled nothing." "Then you must have disagreed." "That we as certainly have not done. We have in truth not once been out of cloud-land." "Ah;--then there is no hope. When once grown-up politicians get into cloud-land it is because the realities of the world have no longer any charm for them." The big box did not contain the resignations of any of the objectionable members of the Coalition. Ministers do not often resign in September,--nor would it be expedient that they should do so. Lord Drummond and Sir Timothy were safe, at any rate, till next February, and might live without any show either of obedience or mutiny. The Duke remained in comparative quiet at Matching. There was not very much to do, except to prepare the work for the next Session. The great work of the coming year was to be the assimilation, or something very near to the assimilation, of the county suffrages with those of the boroughs. The measure was one which had now been promised by statesmen for the last two years,--promised at first with that half promise which would mean nothing, were it not that such promises always lead to more defined assurances. The Duke of St. Bungay, Lord Drummond, and other Ministers had wished to stave it off. Mr. Monk was eager for its adoption, and was of course supported by Phineas Finn. The Prime Minister had at first been inclined to be led by the old Duke. There was no doubt to him but that the measure was desirable and would come, but there might well be a question as to the time at which it should be made to come. The old Duke knew that the measure would come,--but believing it to be wholly undesirable, thought that he was doing good work in postponing it from year to year. But Mr. Monk had become urgent, and the old Duke had admitted the necessity. There must surely have been a shade of melancholy on that old man's mind as, year after year, he assisted in pulling down institutions which he in truth regarded as the safeguards of the nation;--but which he knew that, as a Liberal, he was bound to assist in destroying! It must have occurred to him, from time to time, that it would be well for him to depart and be at peace before everything was gone. When he went from Matching Mr. Monk took his place, and Phineas Finn, who had gone up to London for a while, returned; and then the three between them, with assistance from Mr. Warburton and others, worked out the proposed scheme of the new county franchise, with the new divisions and the new constituencies. But it could hardly have been hearty work, as they all of them felt that whatever might be their first proposition they would be beat upon it in a House of Commons which thought that this Aristides had been long enough at the Treasury. CHAPTER LXIX Mrs. Parker's Fate Lopez had now been dead more than five months, and not a word had been heard by his widow of Mrs. Parker and her children. Her own sorrows had been so great that she had hardly thought of those of the poor woman who had come to her but a few days before her husband's death, telling her of ruin caused by her husband's treachery. But late on the evening before her departure for Herefordshire,--very shortly after Everett had left the house,--there was a ring at the door, and a poorly-clad female asked to see Mrs. Lopez. The poorly-clad female was Sexty Parker's wife. The servant, who did not remember her, would not leave her alone in the hall, having an eye to the coats and umbrellas, but called up one of the maids to carry the message. The poor woman understood the insult and resented it in her heart. But Mrs. Lopez recognised the name in a moment, and went down to her in the parlour, leaving Mr. Wharton upstairs. Mrs. Parker, smarting from her present grievance, had bent her mind on complaining at once of the treatment she had received from the servant, but the sight of the widow's weeds quelled her. Emily had never been much given to fine clothes, either as a girl or as a married woman; but it had always been her husband's pleasure that she should be well dressed,--though he had never carried his trouble so far as to pay the bills; and Mrs. Parker's remembrance of her friend at Dovercourt had been that of a fine lady in bright apparel. Now a black shade,--something almost like a dark ghost,--glided into the room, and Mrs. Parker forgot her recent injury. Emily came forward and offered her hand, and was the first to speak. "I have had a great sorrow since we met," she said. "Yes, indeed, Mrs. Lopez. I don't think there is anything left in the world now except sorrow." "I hope Mr. Parker is well. Will you not sit down, Mrs. Parker?" "Thank you, ma'am. Indeed, then, he is not well at all. How should he be well? Everything,--everything has been taken away from him." Poor Emily groaned as she heard this. "I wouldn't say a word against them as is gone, Mrs. Lopez, if I could help it. I know it is bad to bear when him who once loved you isn't no more. And perhaps it is all the worse when things didn't go well with him, and it was, maybe, his own fault. I wouldn't do it, Mrs. Lopez, if I could help it." "Let me hear what you have to say," said Emily, determined to suffer everything patiently. "Well;--it is just this. He has left us that bare that there is nothing left. And that, they say, isn't the worst of all,--though what can be worse than doing that, how is a woman to think? Parker was that soft, and he had that way with him of talking, that he has talked me and mine out of the very linen on our backs." "What do you mean by saying that that is not the worst?" "They've come upon Sexty for a bill for four hundred and fifty,--something to do with that stuff they call Bios,--and Sexty says it isn't his name at all. But he's been in that state he don't hardly know how to swear to anything. But he's sure he didn't sign it. The bill was brought to him by Lopez, and there was words between them, and he wouldn't have nothing to do with it. How is he to go to law? And it don't make much difference neither, for they can't take much more from him than they have taken." Emily as she heard all this sat shivering, trying to repress her groans. "Only," continued Mrs. Parker, "they hadn't sold the furniture, and I was thinking they might let me stay in the house, and try to do with letting lodgings,--and now they're seizing everything along of this bill. Sexty is like a madman, swearing this and swearing that;--but what can he do, Mrs. Lopez? It's as like his hand as two peas; but he was clever at everything was--was--you know who I mean, ma'am." Then Emily covered her face with her hands and burst into violent tears. She had not determined whether she did or did not believe this last accusation made against her husband. She had had hardly time to realise the criminality of the offence imputed. But she did believe that the woman before her had been ruined by her husband's speculations. "It's very bad, ma'am; isn't it?" said Mrs. Parker, crying for company. "It's bad all round. If you had five children as hadn't bread you'd know how it is that I feel. I've got to go back by the 10.15 to-night, and when I've paid for a third-class ticket I shan't have but twopence left in the world." This utter depth of immediate poverty, this want of bread for the morrow and the next day, Emily could relieve out of her own pocket. And, thinking of this and remembering that her purse was not with her at the moment, she started up with the idea of getting it. But it occurred to her that that would not suffice; that her duty required more of her than that. And yet, by her own power, she could do no more. From month to month, almost from week to week, since her husband's death, her father had been called upon to satisfy claims for money which he would not resist, lest by doing so he should add to her misery. She had felt that she ought to bind herself to the strictest personal economy because of the miserable losses to which she had subjected him by her ill-starred marriage. "What would you wish me to do?" she said, resuming her seat. "You are rich," said Mrs. Parker. Emily shook her head. "They say your papa is rich. I thought you would not like to see me in want like this." "Indeed, indeed, it makes me very unhappy." "Wouldn't your papa do something? It wasn't Sexty's fault nigh so much as it was his. I wouldn't say it to you if it wasn't for starving. I wouldn't say it to you if it wasn't for the children. I'd lie in the ditch and die if it was only myself, because--because I know what your feelings is. But what wouldn't you do, and what wouldn't you say, if you had five children at home as hadn't a loaf of bread among 'em?" Hereupon Emily got up and left the room, bidding her visitor wait for a few minutes. Presently the offensive butler came in, who had wronged Mrs. Parker by watching his master's coats, and brought a tray with meat and wine. Mr. Wharton, said the altered man, hoped that Mrs. Parker would take a little refreshment, and he would be down himself very soon. Mrs. Parker, knowing that strength for her journey home would be necessary to her, remembering that she would have to walk all through the city to the Bishopsgate Street station, did take some refreshment, and permitted herself to drink the glass of sherry that her late enemy had benignantly poured out for her. Emily had been nearly half-an-hour with her father before Mr. Wharton's heavy step was heard upon the stairs. And when he reached the dining-room door he paused a moment before he ventured to turn the lock. He had not told Emily what he would do, and had hardly as yet made up his own mind. As every fresh call was made upon him, his hatred for the memory of the man who had stepped in and disturbed his whole life, and turned all the mellow satisfaction of his evening into storm and gloom, was of course increased. The scoundrel's name was so odious to him that he could hardly keep himself from shuddering visibly before his daughter even when the servants called her by it. But yet he had determined that he would devote himself to save her from further suffering. It had been her fault, no doubt. But she was expiating it in very sackcloth and ashes, and he would add nothing to the burden on her back. He would pay, and pay, and pay, merely remembering that what he paid must be deducted from her share of his property. He had never intended to make what is called an elder son of Everett, and now there was less necessity than ever that he should do so, as Everett had become an elder son in another direction. He could satisfy almost any demand that might be made without material injury to himself. But these demands, one after another, scalded him by their frequency, and by the baseness of the man who had occasioned them. His daughter had now repeated to him with sobbings and wailings the whole story as it had been told to her by the woman downstairs. "Papa," she had said, "I don't know how to tell you or how not." Then he had encouraged her, and had listened without saying a word. He had endeavoured not even to shrink as the charge of forgery was repeated to him by his own child,--the widow of the guilty man. He endeavoured not to remember at the moment that she had claimed this wretch as the chosen one of her maiden heart, in opposition to all his wishes. It hardly occurred to him to disbelieve the accusation. It was so probable! What was there to hinder the man from forgery, if he could only make it believed that his victim had signed the bill when intoxicated? He heard it all;--kissed his daughter, and then went down to the dining-room. Mrs. Parker, when she saw him, got up, and curtsied low, and then sat down again. Old Wharton looked at her from under his bushy eyebrows before he spoke, and then sat opposite to her. "Madam," he said, "this is a very sad story that I have heard." Mrs. Parker again rose, again curtsied, and put her handkerchief to her face. "It is of no use talking any more about it here." "No, sir," said Mrs. Parker. "I and my daughter leave town early to-morrow morning." "Indeed, sir. Mrs. Lopez didn't tell me." "My clerk will be in London, at No. 12, Stone Buildings, Lincoln's Inn, till I come back. Do you think you can find the place? I have written it there." "Yes, sir, I can find it," said Mrs. Parker, just raising herself from her chair at every word she spoke. "I have written his name, you see. Mr. Crumpy." "Yes, sir." "If you will permit me, I will give you two sovereigns now." "Thank you, sir." "And if you can make it convenient to call on Mr. Crumpy every Thursday morning about twelve, he will pay you two sovereigns a week till I come back to town. Then I will see about it." "God Almighty bless you, sir!" "And as to the furniture, I will write to my attorney, Mr. Walker. You need not trouble yourself by going to him." "No, sir." "If necessary, he will send to you, and he will see what can be done. Good night, Mrs. Parker." Then he walked across the room with two sovereigns which he dropped in her hand. Mrs. Parker, with many sobs, bade him farewell, and Mr. Wharton stood in the hall immovable till the front door had been closed behind her. "I have settled it," he said to Emily. "I'll tell you to-morrow, or some day. Don't worry yourself now, but go to bed." She looked wistfully,--so sadly, up into his face, and then did as he bade her. But Mr. Wharton could not go to bed without further trouble. It was incumbent on him to write full particulars that very night both to Mr. Walker and to Mr. Crumpy. And the odious letters in the writing became very long;--odious because he had to confess in them over and over again that his daughter, the very apple of his eye, had been the wife of a scoundrel. To Mr. Walker he had to tell the whole story of the alleged forgery, and in doing so could not abstain from the use of hard words. "I don't suppose that it can be proved, but there is every reason to believe that it's true." And again--"I believe the man to have been as vile a scoundrel as ever was made by the love of money." Even to Mr. Crumpy he could not be reticent. "She is an object of pity," he said. "Her husband was ruined by the infamous speculations of Mr. Lopez." Then he betook himself to bed. Oh, how happy would he be to pay the two pounds weekly,--even to add to that the amount of the forged bill, if by doing so he might be saved from ever again hearing the name of Lopez. The amount of the bill was ultimately lost by the bankers who had advanced money on it. As for Mrs. Sexty Parker, from week to week, and from month to month, and at last from year to year, she and her children,--and probably her husband also,--were supported by the weekly pension of two sovereigns which she always received on Thursday morning from the hands of Mr. Crumpy himself. In a little time the one excitement of her life was the weekly journey to Mr. Crumpy, whom she came to regard as a man appointed by Providence to supply her with 40s. on Thursday morning. As to poor Sexty Parker,--it is to be feared that he never again became a prosperous man. "You will tell me what you did for that poor woman, papa," said Emily, leaning over her father in the train. "I have settled it, my dear." "You said you'd tell me." "Crumpy will pay her two pounds a week till we know more about it." Emily pressed her father's hand and that was an end. No one ever did know any more about it, and Crumpy continued to pay the money. CHAPTER LXX At Wharton When Mr. Wharton and his daughter reached Wharton Hall there were at any rate no Fletchers there as yet. Emily, as she was driven from the station to the house, had not dared to ask a question or even to prompt her father to do so. He would probably have told her that on such an occasion there was but little chance that she would find any visitors, and none at all that she would find Arthur Fletcher. But she was too confused and too ill at ease to think of probabilities, and to the last was in trepidation, specially lest she should meet her lover. She found, however, at Wharton Hall none but Whartons, and she found also to her great relief that this change in the heir relieved her of much of the attention which must otherwise have added to her troubles. At the first glance her dress and demeanour struck them so forcibly that they could not avoid showing their feeling. Of course they had expected to see her in black,--had expected to see her in widow's weeds. But, with her, her very face and limbs had so adapted themselves to her crape, that she looked like a monument of bereaved woe. Lady Wharton took the mourner up into her own room, and there made her a little speech. "We have all wept for you," she said, "and grieve for you still. But excessive grief is wicked, especially in the young. We will do our best to make you happy, and hope we shall succeed. All this about dear Everett ought to be a comfort to you." Emily promised that she would do her best, not, however, taking much immediate comfort from the prospects of dear Everett. Lady Wharton certainly had never in her life spoken of dear Everett while the wicked cousin was alive. Then Mary Wharton also made her little speech. "Dear Emily, I will do all that I can. Pray try to believe in me." But Everett was so much the hero of the hour, that there was not much room for general attention to any one else. There was very much room for triumph in regard to Everett. It had already been ascertained that the Wharton who was now dead had had a child,--but that the child was a daughter. Oh,--what salvation or destruction there may be to an English gentleman in the sex of an infant! This poor baby was now little better than a beggar brat, unless the relatives who were utterly disregardful of its fate, should choose, in their charity, to make some small allowance for its maintenance. Had it by chance been a boy, Everett Wharton would have been nobody; and the child, rescued from the iniquities of his parents, would have been nursed in the best bedroom of Wharton Hall, and cherished with the warmest kisses, and would have been the centre of all the hopes of all the Whartons. But the Wharton lawyer by use of reckless telegrams had certified himself that the infant was a girl, and Everett was the hero of the day. He found himself to be possessed of a thousand graces, even in his father's eyesight. It seemed to be taken as a mark of his special good fortune that he had not clung to any business. To have been a banker immersed in the making of money, or even a lawyer attached to his circuit and his court, would have lessened his fitness, or at any rate his readiness, for the duties which he would have to perform. He would never be a very rich man, but he would have a command of ready money, and of course he would go into Parliament. In his new position as,--not quite head of his family, but head expectant,--it seemed to him to be his duty to lecture his sister. It might be well that some one should lecture her with more severity than her father used. Undoubtedly she was succumbing to the wretchedness of her position in a manner that was repugnant to humanity generally. There is no power so useful to man as that capacity of recovering himself after a fall, which belongs especially to those who possess a healthy mind in a healthy body. It is not rare to see one,--generally a woman,--whom a sorrow gradually kills; and there are those among us, who hardly perhaps envy, but certainly admire, a spirit so delicate as to be snuffed out by a woe. But it is the weakness of the heart rather than the strength of the feeling which has in such cases most often produced the destruction. Some endurance of fibre has been wanting, which power of endurance is a noble attribute. Everett Wharton saw something of this, and being, now, the heir apparent of the family, took his sister to task. "Emily," he said, "you make us all unhappy when we look at you." "Do I?" she said. "I am sorry for that;--but why should you look at me?" "Because you are one of us. Of course we cannot shake you off. We would not if we could. We have all been very unhappy because,--because of what has happened. But don't you think you ought to make some sacrifice to us,--to our father, I mean, and to Sir Alured and Lady Wharton? When you go on weeping, other people have to weep too. I have an idea that people ought to be happy if it be only for the sake of their neighbours." "What am I to do, Everett?" "Talk to people a little, and smile sometimes. Move about quicker. Don't look when you come into a room as if you were consecrating it to tears. And, if I may venture to say so, drop something of the heaviness of your mourning." "Do you mean that I am a hypocrite?" "No;--I mean nothing of the kind. You know I don't. But you may exert yourself for the benefit of others without being untrue to your own memories. I am sure you know what I mean. Make a struggle and see if you cannot do something." She did make a struggle, and she did do something. No one, not well versed in the mysteries of feminine dress, could say very accurately what it was that she had done; but every one felt that something of the weight was reduced. At first, as her brother's words came upon her ear, and as she felt the blows which they inflicted on her, she accused him in her heart of cruelty. They were very hard to bear. There was a moment in which she was almost tempted to turn upon him and tell him that he knew nothing of her sorrows. But she restrained herself, and when she was alone she acknowledged to herself that he had spoken the truth. No one has a right to go about the world as a Niobe, damping all joys with selfish tears. What did she not owe to her father, who had warned her so often against the evil she had contemplated, and had then, from the first moment after the fault was done, forgiven her the doing of it? She had at any rate learned from her misfortunes the infinite tenderness of his heart, which in the days of their unalloyed prosperity he had never felt the necessity of exposing to her. So she struggled and did do something. She pressed Lady Wharton's hand, and kissed her cousin Mary, and throwing herself into her father's arms when they were alone, whispered to him that she would try. "What you told me, Everett, was quite right," she said afterwards to her brother. "I didn't mean to be savage," he answered with a smile. "It was quite right, and I have thought of it, and I will do my best. I will keep it to myself if I can. It is not quite, perhaps, what you think it is, but I will keep it to myself." She fancied that they did not understand her, and perhaps she was right. It was not only that he had died and left her a young widow;--nor even that his end had been so harsh a tragedy and so foul a disgrace! It was not only that her love had been misbestowed,--not only that she had made so grievous an error in the one great act of her life which she had chosen to perform on her own judgment! Perhaps the most crushing memory of all was that which told her that she, who had through all her youth been regarded as a bright star in the family, had been the one person to bring a reproach upon the name of all these people who were so good to her. How shall a person conscious of disgrace, with a mind capable of feeling the crushing weight of personal disgrace, move and look and speak as though that disgrace had been washed away? But she made the struggle, and did not altogether fail. As regarded Sir Alured, in spite of this poor widow's crape, he was very happy at this time, and his joy did in some degree communicate itself to the old barrister. Everett was taken round to every tenant and introduced as the heir. Mr. Wharton had already declared his purpose of abdicating any possible possession of the property. Should he outlive Sir Alured he must be the baronet; but when that sad event should take place, whether Mr. Wharton should then be alive or no, Everett should at once be the possessor of Wharton Hall. Sir Alured, under these circumstances, discussed his own death with extreme satisfaction, and insisted on having it discussed by the others. That he should have gone and left everything at the mercy of the spendthrift had been terrible to his old heart;--but now, the man coming to the property would have £60,000 with which to support and foster Wharton, with which to mend, as it were, the crevices, and stop up the holes of the estate. He seemed to be almost impatient for Everett's ownership, giving many hints as to what should be done when he himself was gone. He must surely have thought that he would return to Wharton as a spirit, and take a ghostly share in the prosperity of the farms. "You will find John Griffith a very good man," said the baronet. John Griffith had been a tenant on the estate for the last half-century, and was an older man than his landlord; but the baronet spoke of all this as though he himself were about to leave Wharton for ever in the course of the next week. "John Griffith has been a good man, and if not always quite ready with his rent, has never been much behind. You won't be hard on John Griffith?" "I hope I mayn't have the opportunity, sir." "Well;--well;--well; that's as may be. But I don't quite know what to say about young John. The farm has gone from father to son, and there's never been a word of a lease." "Is there anything wrong about the young man?" "He's a little given to poaching." "Oh dear!" "I've always got him off for his father's sake. They say he's going to marry Sally Jones. That may take it out of him. I do like the farms to go from father to son, Everett. It's the way that everything should go. Of course there's no right." "Nothing of that kind, I suppose," said Everett, who was in his way a reformer, and had Radical notions with which he would not for worlds have disturbed the baronet at present. "No;--nothing of that kind. God in his mercy forbid that a landlord in England should ever be robbed after that fashion." Sir Alured, when he was uttering this prayer, was thinking of what he had heard of an Irish Land Bill, the details of which, however, had been altogether incomprehensible to him. "But I have a feeling about it, Everett; and I hope you will share it. It is good that things should go from father to son. I never make a promise; but the tenants know what I think about it, and then the father works for the son. Why should he work for a stranger? Sally Jones is a very good young woman, and perhaps young John will do better." There was not a field or a fence that he did not show to his heir;--hardly a tree which he left without a word. "That bit of woodland coming in there,--they call it Barnton Spinnies,--doesn't belong to the estate at all." This he said in a melancholy tone. "Doesn't it, really?" "And it comes right in between Lane's farm and Puddock's. They've always let me have the shooting as a compliment. Not that there's ever anything in it. It's only seven acres. But I like the civility." "Who does it belong to?" "It belongs to Benet." "What; Corpus Christi?" "Yes, yes;--they've changed the name. It used to be Benet in my days. Walker says the College would certainly sell, but you'd have to pay for the land and the wood separately. I don't know that you'd get much out of it; but it's very unsightly,--on the survey map, I mean." "We'll buy it, by all means," said Everett, who was already jingling his £60,000 in his pocket. "I never had the money, but I think it should be bought." And Sir Alured rejoiced in the idea that when his ghost should look at the survey map, that hiatus of Barnton Spinnies would not trouble his spectral eyes. In this way months ran on at Wharton. Our Whartons had come down in the latter half of August, and at the beginning of September Mr. Wharton returned to London. Everett, of course, remained, as he was still learning the lesson of which he was in truth becoming a little weary; and at last Emily had also been persuaded to stay in Herefordshire. Her father promised to return, not mentioning any precise time, but giving her to understand that he would come before the winter. He went, and probably found that his taste for the Eldon and for whist had returned to him. In the middle of November old Mrs. Fletcher arrived. Emily was not aware of what was being done; but, in truth, the Fletchers and Whartons combined were conspiring with the view of bringing her back to her former self. Mrs. Fletcher had not yielded without some difficulty,--for it was a part of this conspiracy that Arthur was to be allowed to marry the widow. But John had prevailed. "He'll do it any way, mother," he had said, "whether you and I like it or not. And why on earth shouldn't he do as he pleases?" "Think what the man was, John!" "It's more to the purpose to think what the woman is. Arthur has made up his mind, and, if I know him, he's not the man to be talked out of it." And so the old woman had given in, and had at last consented to go forward as the advanced guard of the Fletchers, and lay siege to the affections of the woman whom she had once so thoroughly discarded from her heart. "My dear," she said, when they first met, "if there has been anything wrong between you and me, let it be among the things that are past. You always used to kiss me. Give me a kiss now." Of course Emily kissed her; and after that Mrs. Fletcher patted her and petted her, and gave her lozenges, which she declared in private to be "the sovereignest thing on earth" for debilitated nerves. And then it came out by degrees that John Fletcher and his wife and all the little Fletchers were coming to Wharton for the Christmas weeks. Everett had gone, but was also to be back for Christmas, and Mr. Wharton's visit was also postponed. It was absolutely necessary that Everett should be at Wharton for the Christmas festivities, and expedient that Everett's father should be there to see them. In this way Emily had no means of escape. Her father wrote telling her of his plans, saying that he would bring her back after Christmas. Everett's heirship had made these Christmas festivities,--which were, however, to be confined to the two families,--quite a necessity. In all this not a word was said about Arthur, nor did she dare to ask whether he was expected. The younger Mrs. Fletcher, John's wife, opened her arms to the widow in a manner that almost plainly said that she regarded Emily as her future sister-in-law. John Fletcher talked to her about Longbarns, and the children,--complete Fletcher talk,--as though she were already one of them, never, however, mentioning Arthur's name. The old lady got down a fresh supply of the lozenges from London because those she had by her might perhaps be a little stale. And then there was another sign which after a while became plain to Emily. No one in either family ever mentioned her name. It was not singular that none of them should call her Mrs. Lopez, as she was Emily to all of them. But they never so described her even in speaking to the servants. And the servants themselves, as far as was possible, avoided the odious word. The thing was to be buried, if not in oblivion, yet in some speechless grave. And it seemed that her father was joined in this attempt. When writing to her he usually made some excuse for writing also to Everett, or, in Everett's absence, to the baronet,--so that the letter for his daughter might be enclosed and addressed simply to "Emily". She understood it all, and though she was moved to continual solitary tears by this ineffable tenderness, yet she rebelled against them. They should never cheat her back into happiness by such wiles as that! It was not fit that she should yield to them. As a woman utterly disgraced it could not become her again to laugh and be joyful, to give and take loving embraces, to sit and smile, perhaps a happy mother, at another man's hearth. For their love she was grateful. For his love she was more than grateful. How constant must be his heart, how grand his nature, how more than manly his strength of character, when he was thus true to her through all the evil she had done! Love him! Yes;--she would pray for him, worship him, fill the remainder of her days with thinking of him, hoping for him, and making his interests her own. Should he ever be married,--and she would pray that he might,--his wife, if possible, should be her friend, his children should be her darlings; and he should always be her hero. But they should not, with all their schemes, cheat her into disgracing him by marrying him. At last her father came, and it was he who told her that Arthur was expected on the day before Christmas. "Why did you not tell me before, papa, so that I might have asked you to take me away?" "Because I thought, my dear, that it was better that you should be constrained to meet him. You would not wish to live all your life in terror of seeing Arthur Fletcher?" "Not all my life." "Take the plunge and it will be over. They have all been very good to you." "Too good, papa. I didn't want it." "They are our oldest friends. There isn't a young man in England I think so highly of as John Fletcher. When I am gone, where are you to look for friends?" "I'm not ungrateful, papa." "You can't know them all, and yet keep yourself altogether separated from Arthur. Think what it would be to me never to be able to ask him to the house. He is the only one of the family that lives in London, and now it seems that Everett will spend most of his time down here. Of course it is better that you should meet him and have done with it." There was no answer to be made to this, but still she was fixed in her resolution that she would never meet him as her lover. Then came the morning of the day on which he was to arrive, and his coming was for the first time spoken openly of at breakfast. "How is Arthur to be brought from the station?" asked old Mrs. Fletcher. "I'm going to take the dog-cart," said Everett. "Giles will go for the luggage with the pony. He is bringing down a lot of things;--a new saddle, and a gun for me." It had all been arranged for her, this question and answer, and Emily blushed as she felt that it was so. "We shall be so glad to see Arthur," said young Mrs. Fletcher to her. "Of course you will." "He has not been down since the Session was over, and he has got to be quite a speaking man now. I do so hope he'll become something some day." "I'm sure he will," said Emily. "Not a judge, however. I hate wigs. Perhaps he might be Lord Chancellor in time." Mrs. Fletcher was not more ignorant than some other ladies in being unaware of the Lord Chancellor's wig and exact position. At last he came. The 9 A.M. express for Hereford,--express, at least, for the first two or three hours out of London,--brought passengers for Wharton to the nearest station at 3 P.M., and the distance was not above five miles. Before four o'clock Arthur was standing before the drawing-room fire, with a cup of tea in his hand, surrounded by Fletchers and Whartons, and being made much of as the young family member of Parliament. But Emily was not in the room. She had studied her Bradshaw, and learned the hours of the trains, and was now in her bedroom. He had looked around the moment he entered the room, but had not dared to ask for her suddenly. He had said one word about her to Everett in the cart, and that had been all. She was in the house, and he must, at any rate, see her before dinner. Emily, in order that she might not seem to escape abruptly, had retired early to her solitude. But she, too, knew that the meeting could not be long postponed. She sat thinking of it all, and at last heard the wheels of the vehicle before the door. She paused, listening with all her ears, that she might recognise his voice, or possibly his footstep. She stood near the window, behind the curtain, with her hand pressed to her heart. She heard Everett's voice plainly as he gave some direction to the groom, but from Arthur she heard nothing. Yet she was sure that he was come. The very manner of the approach and her brother's word made her certain that there had been no disappointment. She stood thinking for a quarter of an hour, making up her mind how best they might meet. Then suddenly, with slow but certain step, she walked down into the drawing-room. No one expected her then, or something perhaps might have been done to encourage her coming. It had been thought that she must meet him before dinner, and her absence till then was to be excused. But now she opened the door, and with much dignity of mien walked into the middle of the room. Arthur at that moment was discussing the Duke's chance for the next Session, and Sir Alured was asking with rapture whether the old Conservative party would not come in. Arthur Fletcher heard the step, turned round, and saw the woman he loved. He went at once to meet her, very quickly, and put out both his hands. She gave him hers, of course. There was no excuse for her refusal. He stood for an instant pressing them, looking eagerly into her sad face, and then he spoke. "God bless you, Emily!" he said, "God bless you!" He had thought of no words, and at the moment nothing else occurred to him to be said. The colour had covered all his face, and his heart beat so strongly that he was hardly his own master. She let him hold her two hands, perhaps for a minute, and then, bursting into tears, tore herself from him, and, hurrying out of the room, made her way again into her own chamber. "It will be better so," said old Mrs. Fletcher. "It will be better so. Do not let any one follow her." On that day John Fletcher took her out to dinner, and Arthur did not sit near her. In the evening he came to her as she was working close to his mother, and seated himself on a low chair close to her knees. "We are all so glad to see you; are we not, mother?" "Yes, indeed," said Mrs. Fletcher. Then, after a while, the old woman got up to make a rubber at whist with the two old men and her eldest son, leaving Arthur sitting at the widow's knee. She would willingly have escaped, but it was impossible that she should move. "You need not be afraid of me," he said, not whispering, but in a voice which no one else could hear. "Do not seem to avoid me, and I will say nothing to trouble you. I think that you must wish that we should be friends." "Oh, yes." "Come out, then, to-morrow, when we are walking. In that way we shall get used to each other. You are troubled now, and I will go." Then he left her, and she felt herself to be bound to him by infinite gratitude. A week went on and she had become used to his company. A week passed and he had spoken no word to her that a brother might not have spoken. They had walked together when no one else had been within hearing, and yet he had spared her. She had begun to think that he would spare her altogether, and she was certainly grateful. Might it not be that she had misunderstood him, and had misunderstood the meaning of them all? Might it not be that she had troubled herself with false anticipations? Surely it was so; for how could it be that such a man should wish to make such a woman his wife? "Well, Arthur?" said his brother to him one day. "I have nothing to say about it," said Arthur. "You haven't changed your mind?" "Never! Upon my word, to me, in that dress, she is more beautiful than ever." "I wish you would make her take it off." "I dare not ask her yet." "You know what they say about widows generally, my boy." "That is all very well when one talks about widows in general. It is easy to chaff about women when one hasn't got any woman in one's mind. But as it is now, having her here, loving her as I do,--by heaven! I cannot hurry her. I don't dare to speak to her after that fashion. I shall do it in time, I suppose;--but I must wait till the time comes." CHAPTER LXXI The Ladies at Longbarns Doubt It came at last to be decided among them that when old Mr. Wharton returned to town,--and he had now been at Wharton longer than he had ever been known to remain there before,--Emily should still remain in Herefordshire, and that at some period not then fixed she should go for a month to Longbarns. There were various reasons which induced her to consent to this change of plans. In the first place she found herself to be infinitely more comfortable in the country than in town. She could go out and move about and bestir herself, whereas in Manchester Square she could only sit and mope at home. Her father had assured her that he thought that it would be better that she should be away from the reminiscences of the house in town. And then when the first week of February was past Arthur would be up in town, and she would be far away from him at Longbarns, whereas in London she would be close within his reach. Many little schemes were laid and struggles made both by herself and the others before at last their plans were settled. Mr. Wharton was to return to London in the middle of January. It was quite impossible that he could remain longer away either from Stone Buildings or from the Eldon, and then at the same time, or a day or two following, Mrs. Fletcher was to go back to Longbarns. John Fletcher and his wife and children were already gone,--and Arthur also had been at Longbarns. The two brothers and Everett had been backwards and forwards. Emily was anxious to remain at Wharton at any rate till Parliament should have met, so that she might not be at home with Arthur in his own house. But matters would not arrange themselves exactly as she wished. It was at last settled that she should go to Longbarns with Mary Wharton under the charge of John Fletcher in the first week in February. As arrangements were already in progress for the purchase of Barnton Spinnies, Sir Alured could not possibly leave his own house. Not to have walked through the wood on the first day that it became a part of the Wharton property would to him have been treason to the estate. His experience ought to have told him that there was no chance of a lawyer and a college dealing together with such rapidity; but in the present state of things he could not bear to absent himself. Orders had already been given for the cutting down of certain trees which could not have been touched had the reprobate lived, and it was indispensable that if a tree fell at Wharton he should see the fall. It thus came to pass that there was a week during which Emily would be forced to live under the roof of the Fletchers together with Arthur Fletcher. The week came and she was absolutely received by Arthur at the door of Longbarns. She had not been at the house since it had first been intimated to the Fletchers that she was disposed to receive with favour the addresses of Ferdinand Lopez. As she remembered this it seemed to her to be an age ago since that man had induced her to believe that of all men she had ever met he was the nearest to a hero. She never spoke of him now, but of course her thoughts of him were never ending,--as also of herself in that she had allowed herself to be so deceived. She would recall to her mind with bitter inward sobbings all those lessons of iniquity which he had striven to teach her, and which had first opened her eyes to his true character,--how sedulously he had endeavoured to persuade her that it was her duty to rob her father on his behalf, how continually he had endeavoured to make her think that appearance in the world was everything, and that, being in truth poor adventurers, it behoved them to cheat the world into thinking them rich and respectable. Every hint that had been so given had been a wound to her, and those wounds were all now remembered. Though since his death she had never allowed a word to be spoken in her presence against him, she could not but hate his memory. How glorious was that other man in her eyes, as he stood there at the door welcoming her to Longbarns, fair-haired, open-eyed, with bronzed brow and cheek, and surely the honestest face that a loving woman ever loved to gaze on. During the various lessons she had learned in her married life, she had become gradually but surely aware that the face of that other man had been dishonest. She had learned the false meaning of every glance of his eyes, the subtlety of his mouth, the counterfeit manoeuvres of his body,--the deceit even of his dress. He had been all a lie from head to foot; and he had thrown her love aside as useless when she also would not be a liar. And here was this man,--spotless in her estimation, compounded of all good qualities, which she could now see and take at their proper value. She hated herself for the simplicity with which she had been cheated by soft words and a false demeanour into so great a sacrifice. Life at Longbarns was very quiet during the days which she passed there before he left them. She was frequently alone with him, but he, if he still loved her, did not speak of his love. He explained it all one day to his mother. "If it is to be," said the old lady, "I don't see the use of more delay. Of course the marriage ought not to be till March twelvemonths. But if it is understood that it is to be, she might alter her dress by degrees,--and alter her manner of living. Those things should always be done by degrees. I think it had better be settled, Arthur, if it is to be settled." "I am afraid, mother." "Dear me! I didn't think you were the man ever to be afraid of a woman. What can she say to you?" "Refuse me." "Then you'd better know it at once. But I don't think she'll be fool enough for that." "Perhaps you hardly understand her, mother." Mrs. Fletcher shook her head with a look of considerable annoyance. "Perhaps not. But, to tell the truth, I don't like young women whom I can't understand. Young women shouldn't be mysterious. I like people of whom I can give a pretty good guess what they'll do. I'm sure I never could have guessed that she would have married that man." "If you love me, mother, do not let that be mentioned between us again. When I said that you did not understand her, I did not mean that she was mysterious. I think that before he died, and since his death, she learned of what sort that man was. I will not say that she hates his memory, but she hates herself for what she has done." "So she ought," said Mrs. Fletcher. "She has not yet brought herself to think that her life should be anything but one long period of mourning, not for him, but for her own mistake. You may be quite sure that I am in earnest. It is not because I doubt of myself that I put it off. But I fear that if once she asserts to me her resolution to remain as she is, she will feel herself bound to keep her word." "I suppose she is very much the same as other women, after all, my dear," said Mrs. Fletcher, who was almost jealous of the peculiar superiority of sentiment which her son seemed to attribute to this woman. "Circumstances, mother, make people different," he replied. "So you are going without having anything fixed," his elder brother said to him the day before he started. "Yes, old fellow. It seems to be rather slack;--doesn't it?" "I dare say you know best what you're about. But if you have set your mind on it--" "You may take your oath on that." "Then I don't see why one word shouldn't put it all right. There never is any place so good for that kind of thing as a country house." "I don't think that with her it will make much difference where the house is, or what the circumstances." "She knows what you mean as well as I do." "I dare say she does, John. She must have a very bad idea of me if she doesn't. But she may know what I mean and not mean the same thing herself." "How are you to know if you don't ask her?" "You may be sure that I shall ask her as soon as I can hope that my doing so may give her more pleasure than pain. Remember, I have had all this out with her father. I have determined that I will wait till twelve months have passed since that wretched man perished." On that afternoon before dinner he was alone with her in the library some minutes before they went up to dress for dinner. "I shall hardly see you to-morrow," he said, "as I must leave this at half-past eight. I breakfast at eight. I don't suppose any one will be down except my mother." "I am generally as early as that. I will come down and see you start." "I am so glad that you have been here, Emily." "So am I. Everybody has been so good to me." "It has been like old days,--almost." "It will never quite be like old days again, I think. But I have been very glad to be here,--and at Wharton. I sometimes almost wish that I were never going back to London again,--only for papa." "I like London myself." "You! Yes, of course you like London. You have everything in life before you. You have things to do, and much to hope for. It is all beginning for you, Arthur." "I am five years older than you are." "What does that matter? It seems to me that age does not go by years. It is long since I have felt myself to be an old woman. But you are quite young. Everybody is proud of you, and you ought to be happy." "I don't know," said he. "It is hard to say what makes a person happy." He almost made up his mind to speak to her then; but he had made up his mind before to put it off still for a little time, and he would not allow himself to be changed on the spur of the moment. He had thought of it much, and he had almost taught himself to think that it would be better for herself that she should not accept another man's love so soon. "I shall come and see you in town," he said. "You must come and see papa. It seems that Everett is to be a great deal at Wharton. I had better go up to dress now, or I shall be keeping them waiting." He put out his hand to her, and wished her good-bye, excusing himself by saying that they should not be alone together again before he started. She saw him go on the next morning,--and then she almost felt herself to be abandoned, almost deserted. It was a fine crisp winter day, dry and fresh and clear, but with the frost still on the ground. After breakfast she went out to walk by herself in the long shrubbery paths which went round the house, and here she remained for above an hour. She told herself that she was very thankful to him for not having spoken to her on a subject so unfit for her ears as love. She strengthened herself in her determination never again to listen to a man willingly on that subject. She had made herself unfit to have any dealings of that nature. It was not that she could not love. Oh, no! She knew well enough that she did love,--love with all her heart. If it were not that she were so torn to rags that she was not fit to be worn again, she could now have thrown herself into his arms with a whole heaven of joy before her. A woman, she told herself, had no right to a second chance in life, after having made such a shipwreck of herself in the first. But the danger of being seduced from her judgment by Arthur Fletcher was all over. He had been near her for the last week and had not spoken a word. He had been in the same house with her for the last ten days and had been with her as a brother might be with his sister. It was not only she who had seen the propriety of this. He also had acknowledged it, and she was--grateful to him. As she endeavoured in her solitude to express her gratitude in spoken words the tears rolled down her cheeks. She was glad, she told herself, very glad that it was so. How much trouble and pain to both of them would thus be spared! And yet her tears were bitter tears. It was better as it was;--and yet one word of love would have been very sweet. She almost thought that she would have liked to tell him that for his sake, for his dear sake, she would refuse--that which now would never be offered to her. She was quite clear as to the rectitude of her own judgment, clear as ever. And yet her heart was heavy with disappointment. It was the end of March before she left Herefordshire for London, having spent the greater part of the time at Longbarns. The ladies at that place were moved by many doubts as to what would be the end of all this. Mrs. Fletcher the elder at last almost taught herself to believe that there would be no marriage, and having got back to that belief, was again opposed to the idea of a marriage. Anything and everything that Arthur wanted he ought to have. The old lady felt no doubt as to that. When convinced that he did want to have this widow,--this woman whose life had hitherto been so unfortunate,--she had for his sake taken the woman again by the hand, and had assisted in making her one of themselves. But how much better it would be that Arthur should think better of it! It was the maddest constancy,--this clinging to the widow of such a man as Ferdinand Lopez! If there were any doubt, then she would be prepared to do all she could to prevent the marriage. Emily had been forgiven, and the pardon bestowed must of course be continued. But she might be pardoned without being made Mrs. Arthur Fletcher. While Emily was still at Longbarns the old lady almost talked over her daughter-in-law to this way of thinking,--till John Fletcher put his foot upon it altogether. "I don't pretend to say what she may do," he said. "Oh, John," said the mother, "to hear a man like you talk like that is absurd. She'd jump at him if he looked at her with half an eye." "What she may do," he continued saying, without appearing to listen to his mother, "I cannot say. But that he will ask her to be his wife is as certain as that I stand here." CHAPTER LXXII "He Thinks That Our Days Are Numbered" All the details of the new County Suffrage Bill were settled at Matching during the recess between Mr. Monk, Phineas Finn, and a very experienced gentleman from the Treasury, one Mr. Prime, who was supposed to know more about such things than any man living, and was consequently called Constitution Charlie. He was an elderly man, over sixty years of age, who remembered the first Reform Bill, and had been engaged in the doctoring of constituencies ever since. The Bill, if passed, would be mainly his Bill, and yet the world would never hear his name as connected with it. Let us hope that he was comfortable at Matching, and that he found his consolation in the smiles of the Duchess. During this time the old Duke was away, and even the Prime Minister was absent for some days. He would fain have busied himself about the Bill himself, but was hardly allowed by his colleagues to have any hand in framing it. The great points of the measure had of course been arranged in the Cabinet,--where, however, Mr. Monk's views had been adopted almost without a change. It may not perhaps be too much to assume that one or two members of the Cabinet did not quite understand the full scope of every suggested clause. The effects which clauses will produce, the dangers which may be expected from this or that change, the manner in which this or that proposition will come out in the washing, do not strike even Cabinet Ministers at a glance. A little study in a man's own cabinet, after the reading perhaps of a few leading articles, and perhaps a short conversation with an astute friend or two, will enable a statesman to be strong at a given time for, or even, if necessary, against a measure, who has listened in silence, and has perhaps given his personal assent, to the original suggestion. I doubt whether Lord Drummond, when he sat silent in the Cabinet, had realised those fears which weighed upon him so strongly afterwards, or had then foreseen that the adoption of a nearly similar franchise for the counties and boroughs must inevitably lead to the American system of numerical representation. But when time had been given him, and he and Sir Timothy had talked it all over, the mind of no man was ever clearer than that of Lord Drummond. The Prime Minister, with the diligence which belonged to him, had mastered all the details of Mr. Monk's Bill before it was discussed in the Cabinet, and yet he found that his assistance was hardly needed in the absolute preparation. Had they allowed him he would have done it all himself. But it was assumed that he would not trouble himself with such work, and he perceived that he was not wanted. Nothing of moment was settled without a reference to him. He required that everything should be explained as it went on, down to the extension of every borough boundary; but he knew that he was not doing it himself, and that Mr. Monk and Constitution Charlie had the prize between them. Nor did he dare to ask Mr. Monk what would be the fate of the Bill. To devote all one's time and mind and industry to a measure which one knows will fall to the ground must be sad. Work under such circumstances must be very grievous. But such is often the fate of statesmen. Whether Mr. Monk laboured under such a conviction the Prime Minister did not know, though he saw his friend and colleague almost daily. In truth no one dared to tell him exactly what he thought. Even the old Duke had become partially reticent, and taken himself off to his own woods at Long Royston. To Phineas Finn the Prime Minister would sometimes say a word, but would say even that timidly. On any abstract question, such as that which he had discussed when they had been walking together, he could talk freely enough. But on the matter of the day, those affairs which were of infinite importance to himself, and on which one would suppose he would take delight in speaking to a trusted colleague, he could not bring himself to be open. "It must be a long Bill, I suppose?" he said to Phineas one day. "I'm afraid so, Duke. It will run, I fear, to over a hundred clauses." "It will take you the best part of the Session to get through it?" "If we can have the second reading early in March, we hope to send it up to you in the first week in June. That will give us ample time." "Yes;--yes. I suppose so." But he did not dare to ask Phineas Finn whether he thought that the House of Commons would assent to the second reading. It was known at this time that the Prime Minister was painfully anxious as to the fate of the Ministry. It seemed to be but the other day that everybody connected with the Government was living in fear lest he should resign. His threats in that direction had always been made to his old friend the Duke of St. Bungay; but a great man cannot whisper his thoughts without having them carried in the air. In all the clubs it had been declared that that was the rock by which the Coalition would probably be wrecked. The newspapers had repeated the story, and the "People's Banner" had assured the world that if it were so the Duke of Omnium would thus do for his country the only good service which it was possible that he should render it. That was at the time when Sir Orlando was mutinous and when Lopez had destroyed himself. But now no such threat came from the Duke, and the "People's Banner" was already accusing him of clinging to power with pertinacious and unconstitutional tenacity. Had not Sir Orlando deserted him? Was it not well known that Lord Drummond and Sir Timothy Beeswax were only restrained from doing so by a mistaken loyalty? Everybody came up to town, Mr. Monk having his Bill in his pocket, and the Queen's speech was read, promising the County Suffrage Bill. The address was voted with a very few words from either side. The battle was not to be fought then. Indeed, the state of things was so abnormal that there could hardly be said to be any sides in the House. A stranger in the gallery, not knowing the condition of affairs, would have thought that no minister had for many years commanded so large a majority, as the crowd of members was always on the Government side of the House; but the opposition which Mr. Monk expected would, he knew, come from those who sat around him, behind him, and even at his very elbow. About a week after Parliament met the Bill was read for the first time, and the second reading was appointed for an early day in March. The Duke had suggested to Mr. Monk the expedience of some further delay, giving as his reason the necessity of getting through certain routine work, should the rejection of the Bill create the confusion of a resignation. No one who knew the Duke could ever suspect him of giving a false reason. But it seemed that in this the Prime Minister was allowing himself to be harassed by fears of the future. Mr. Monk thought that any delay would be injurious and open to suspicion after what had been said and done, and was urgent in his arguments. The Duke gave way, but he did so almost sullenly, signifying his acquiescence with haughty silence. "I am sorry," said Mr. Monk, "to differ from your Grace, but my opinion in the matter is so strong that I do not dare to abstain from expressing it." The Duke bowed again and smiled. He had intended that the smile should be acquiescent, but it had been as cold as steel. He knew that he was misbehaving, but was not sufficiently master of his own manner to be gracious. He told himself on the spot,--though he was quite wrong in so telling himself,--that he had now made an enemy also of Mr. Monk, and through Mr. Monk of Phineas Finn. And now he felt that he had no friend left in whom to trust,--for the old Duke had become cold and indifferent. The old Duke, he thought, was tired of his work and anxious for rest. It was the old Duke who had brought him into this hornets' nest; had fixed upon his back the unwilling load; had compelled him to assume the place which now to lose would be a disgrace,--and the old Duke was now deserting him! He was sore all over, angry with every one, ungracious even with his private Secretary and his wife,--and especially miserable because he was thoroughly aware of his own faults. And yet, through it all, there was present to him a desire to fight on to the very last. Let his colleagues do what they might, and say what they might, he would remain Prime Minister of England as long as he was supported by a majority of the House of Commons. "I do not know any greater step than this," Phineas said to him pleasantly one day, speaking of their new measure, "towards that millennium of which we were talking at Matching, if we can only accomplish it." "Those moral speculations, Mr. Finn," he said, "will hardly bear the wear and tear of real life." The words of the answer, combined with the manner in which they were spoken, were stern and almost uncivil. Phineas, at any rate, had done nothing to offend him. The Duke paused, trying to find some expression by which he might correct the injury he had done; but, not finding any, passed on without further speech. Phineas shrugged his shoulders and went his way, telling himself that he had received one further injunction not to put his trust in princes. "We shall be beaten, certainly," said Mr. Monk to Phineas, not long afterwards. "What makes you so sure?" "I smell it in the air. I see it in men's faces." "And yet it's a moderate Bill. They'll have to pass something stronger before long if they throw it out now." "It's not the Bill that they'll reject, but us. We have served our turn, and we ought to go." "The House is tired of the Duke?" "The Duke is so good a man that I hardly like to admit even that;--but I fear it is so. He is fretful and he makes enemies." "I sometimes think that he is ill." "He is ill at ease and sick at heart. He cannot hide his chagrin, and then is doubly wretched because he has betrayed it. I do not know that I ever respected and, at the same time, pitied a man more thoroughly." "He snubbed me awfully yesterday," said Phineas, laughing. "He cannot help himself. He snubs me at every word that he speaks, and yet I believe that he is most anxious to be civil to me. His ministry has been of great service to the country. For myself, I shall never regret having joined it. But I think that to him it has been a continual sorrow." The system on which the Duchess had commenced her career as wife of the Prime Minister had now been completely abandoned. In the first place, she had herself become so weary of it that she had been unable to continue the exertion. She had, too, become in some degree ashamed of her failures. The names of Major Pountney and Mr. Lopez were not now pleasant to her ears, nor did she look back with satisfaction on the courtesies she had lavished on Sir Orlando or the smiles she had given to Sir Timothy Beeswax. "I've known a good many vulgar people in my time," she said one day to Mrs. Finn, "but none ever so vulgar as our ministerial supporters. You don't remember Mr. Bott, my dear. He was before your time;--one of the arithmetical men, and a great friend of Plantagenet's. He was very bad, but there have come up worse since him. Sometimes, I think, I like a little vulgarity for a change; but, upon my honour, when we get rid of all this it will be a pleasure to go back to ladies and gentlemen." This the Duchess said in her extreme bitterness. "It seems to me that you have pretty well got rid of 'all this' already." "But I haven't got anybody else in their place. I have almost made up my mind not to ask any one into the house for the next twelve months. I used to think that nothing would ever knock me up, but now I feel that I'm almost done for. I hardly dare open my mouth to Plantagenet. The Duke of St. Bungay has cut me. Mr. Monk looks as ominous as an owl; and your husband hasn't a word to say left. Barrington Erle hides his face and passes by when he sees me. Mr. Rattler did try to comfort me the other day by saying that everything was at sixes and sevens, and I really took it almost as a compliment to be spoken to. Don't you think Plantagenet is ill?" "He is careworn." "A man may be worn by care till there comes to be nothing left of him. But he never speaks of giving up now. The old Bishop of St. Austell talks of resigning, and he has already made up his mind who is to have the see. He used to consult the Duke about all these things, but I don't think he ever consults any one now. He never forgave the Duke about Lord Earlybird. Certainly, if a man wants to quarrel with all his friends, and to double the hatred of all his enemies, he had better become Prime Minister." "Are you really sorry that such was his fate, Lady Glen?" "Ah,--I sometimes ask myself that question, but I never get at an answer. I should have thought him a poltroon if he had declined. It is to be the greatest man in the greatest country in the world. Do ever so little and the men who write history must write about you. And no man has ever tried to be nobler than he till,--till--." "Make no exception. If he be careworn and ill and weary, his manners cannot be the same as they were, but his purity is the same as ever." "I don't know that it would remain so. I believe in him, Marie, more than in any man,--but I believe in none thoroughly. There is a devil creeps in upon them when their hands are strengthened. I do not know what I would have wished. Whenever I do wish, I always wish wrong. Ah, me; when I think of all those people I had down at Gatherum,--of the trouble I took, and of the glorious anticipations in which I revelled, I do feel ashamed of myself. Do you remember when I was determined that that wretch should be member for Silverbridge?" "You haven't seen her since, Duchess?" "No; but I mean to see her. I couldn't make her first husband member, and therefore the man who is member is to be her second husband. But I'm almost sick of schemes. Oh, dear, I wish I knew something that was really pleasant to do. I have never really enjoyed anything since I was in love, and I only liked that because it was wicked." The Duchess was wrong in saying that the Duke of St. Bungay had cut them. The old man still remembered the kiss and still remembered the pledge. But he had found it very difficult to maintain his old relations with his friend. It was his opinion that the Coalition had done all that was wanted from it, and that now had come the time when they might retire gracefully. It is, no doubt, hard for a Prime Minister to find an excuse for going. But if the Duke of Omnium would have been content to acknowledge that he was not the man to alter the County Suffrage, an excuse might have been found that would have been injurious to no one. Mr. Monk and Mr. Gresham might have joined, and the present Prime Minister might have resigned, explaining that he had done all that he had been appointed to accomplish. He had, however, yielded at once to Mr. Monk, and now it was to be feared that the House of Commons would not accept the Bill from his hands. In such a state of things,--especially after that disagreement about Lord Earlybird,--it was difficult for the old Duke to tender his advice. He was at every Cabinet Council; he always came when his presence was required; he was invariably good-humoured;--but it seemed to him that his work was done. He could hardly volunteer to tell his chief and his colleague that he would certainly be beaten in the House of Commons, and that therefore there was little more now to be done than to arrange the circumstances of their retirement. Nevertheless, as the period for the second reading of the Bill came on, he resolved that he would discuss the matter with his friend. He owed it to himself to do so, and he also owed it to the man whom he had certainly placed in his present position. On himself politics had imposed a burden very much lighter than that which they had inflicted on his more energetic and much less practical colleague. Through his long life he had either been in office, or in such a position that men were sure that he would soon return to it. He had taken it, when it had come, willingly, and had always left it without a regret. As a man cuts in and out at a whist table, and enjoys both the game and the rest from the game, so had the Duke of St. Bungay been well pleased in either position. He was patriotic, but his patriotism did not disturb his digestion. He had been ambitious,--but moderately ambitious, and his ambition had been gratified. It never occurred to him to be unhappy because he or his party were beaten on a measure. When President of the Council, he could do his duty and enjoy London life. When in opposition, he could linger in Italy till May and devote his leisure to his trees and his bullocks. He was always esteemed, always self-satisfied, and always Duke of St. Bungay. But with our Duke it was very different. Patriotism with him was a fever, and the public service an exacting mistress. As long as this had been all he had still been happy. Not trusting much in himself, he had never aspired to great power. But now, now at last, ambition had laid hold of him,--and the feeling, not perhaps uncommon with such men, that personal dishonour would be attached to political failure. What would his future life be if he had so carried himself in his great office as to have shown himself to be unfit to resume it? Hitherto any office had sufficed him in which he might be useful;--but now he must either be Prime Minister, or a silent, obscure, and humbled man! DEAR DUKE, I will be with you to-morrow morning at 11 A.M., if you can give me half-an-hour. Yours affectionately, ST. B. The Prime Minister received this note one afternoon, a day or two before that appointed for the second reading, and meeting his friend within an hour in the House of Lords, confirmed the appointment. "Shall I not rather come to you?" he said. But the old Duke, who lived in St. James's Square, declared that Carlton Terrace would be in his way to Downing Street; and so the matter was settled. Exactly at eleven the two Ministers met. "I don't like troubling you," said the old man, "when I know that you have so much to think of." "On the contrary, I have but little to think of,--and my thoughts must be very much engaged, indeed, when they shall be too full to admit of my seeing you." "Of course we are all anxious about this Bill." The Prime Minister smiled. Anxious! Yes, indeed. His anxiety was of such a nature that it kept him awake all night, and never for a moment left his mind free by day. "And of course we must be prepared as to what shall be done either in the event of success or of failure." "You might as well read that," said the other. "It only reached me this morning, or I should have told you of it." The letter was a communication from the Solicitor-General containing his resignation. He had now studied the County Suffrage Bill closely, and regretted to say that he could not give it a conscientious support. It was a matter of sincerest sorrow to him that relations so pleasant should be broken, but he must resign his place, unless, indeed, the clauses as to redistribution could be withdrawn. Of course he did not say this as expecting that any such concession would be made to his opinion, but merely as indicating the matter on which his objection was so strong as to over-rule all other considerations. All this he explained at great length. "The pleasantness of the relations must have been on one side," said the veteran. "He ought to have gone long since." "And Lord Drummond has already as good as said that unless we will abandon the same clauses, he must oppose the Bill in the Lords." "And resign, of course." "He meant that, I presume. Lord Ramsden has not spoken to me." "The clauses will not stick in his throat. Nor ought they. If the lawyers have their own way about law they should be contented." "The question is, whether in these circumstances we should postpone the second reading?" asked the Prime Minister. "Certainly not," said the other Duke. "As to the Solicitor-General you will have no difficulty. Sir Timothy was only placed there as a concession to his party. Drummond will no doubt continue to hold his office till we see what is done in the Lower House. If the second reading be lost there,--why then his lordship can go with the rest of us." "Rattler says we shall have a majority. He and Roby are quite agreed about it. Between them they must know," said the Prime Minister, unintentionally pleading for himself. "They ought to know, if any men do;--but the crisis is exceptional. I suppose you think that if the second reading is lost we should resign?" "Oh,--certainly." "Or, after that, if the Bill be much mutilated in Committee? I don't know that I shall personally break my own heart about the Bill. The existing difference in the suffrages is rather in accordance with my prejudices. But the country desires the measure, and I suppose we cannot consent to any such material alteration as these men suggest." As he spoke he laid his hand on Sir Timothy's letter. "Mr. Monk would not hear of it," said the Prime Minister. "Of course not. And you and I in this measure must stick to Mr. Monk. My great, indeed my only strong desire in the matter, is to act in strict unison with you." "You are always good and true, Duke." "For my own part I shall not in the least regret to find in all this an opportunity of resigning. We have done our work, and if, as I believe, a majority of the House would again support either Gresham or Monk as the head of the entire Liberal party, I think that that arrangement would be for the welfare of the country." "Why should it make any difference to you? Why should you not return to the Council?" "I should not do so;--certainly not at once; probably never. But you,--who are in the very prime of your life--" The Prime Minister did not smile now. He knit his brows and a dark shadow came across his face. "I don't think I could do that," he said. "Cæsar could hardly have led a legion under Pompey." "It has been done, greatly to the service of the country, and without the slightest loss of honour or character in him who did it." "We need hardly talk of that, Duke. You think then that we shall fail;--fail, I mean, in the House of Commons. I do not know that failure in our House should be regarded as fatal." "In three cases we should fail. The loss of any material clause in Committee would be as bad as the loss of the Bill." "Oh, yes." "And then, in spite of Messrs. Rattler and Roby,--who have been wrong before and may be wrong now,--we may lose the second reading." "And the third chance against us?" "You would not probably try to carry on the Bill with a very small majority." "Not with three or four." "Nor, I think, with six or seven. It would be useless. My own belief is that we shall never carry the Bill into Committee." "I have always known you to be right, Duke." "I think that general opinion has set in that direction, and general opinion is generally right. Having come to that conclusion I thought it best to tell you, in order that we might have our house in order." The Duke of Omnium, who with all his haughtiness and all his reserve, was the simplest man in the world and the least apt to pretend to be that which he was not, sighed deeply when he heard this. "For my own part," continued his elder, "I feel no regret that it should be so." "It is the first large measure that we have tried to carry." "We did not come in to carry large measures, my friend. Look back and see how many large measures Pitt carried,--but he took the country safely through its most dangerous crisis." "What have we done?" "Carried on the Queen's Government prosperously for three years. Is that nothing for a minister to do? I have never been a friend of great measures, knowing that when they come fast, one after another, more is broken in the rattle than is repaired by the reform. We have done what Parliament and the country expected us to do, and to my poor judgment we have done it well." "I do not feel much self-satisfaction, Duke. Well;--we must see it out, and if it is as you anticipate, I shall be ready. Of course I have prepared myself for it. And if, of late, my mind has been less turned to retirement than it used to be, it has only been because I have become wedded to this measure, and have wished that it should be carried under our auspices." Then the old Duke took his leave, and the Prime Minister was left alone to consider the announcement that had been made to him. He had said that he had prepared himself, but, in so saying, he had hardly known himself. Hitherto, though he had been troubled by many doubts, he had still hoped. The report made to him by Mr. Rattler, backed as it had been by Mr. Roby's assurances, had almost sufficed to give him confidence. But Mr. Rattler and Mr. Roby combined were as nothing to the Duke of St. Bungay. The Prime Minister knew now,--he felt that he knew, that his days were numbered. The resignation of that lingering old bishop was not completed, and the person in whom he believed would not have the see. He had meditated the making of a peer or two, having hitherto been very cautious in that respect, but he would do nothing of the kind if called upon by the House of Commons to resign with an uncompleted measure. But his thoughts soon ran away from the present to the future. What was now to come of himself? How should he use his future life,--he who as yet had not passed his forty-seventh year? He regretted much having made that apparently pretentious speech about Cæsar, though he knew his old friend well enough to be sure that it would never be used against him. Who was he that he should class himself among the big ones of the world? A man may indeed measure small things by great, but the measurer should be careful to declare his own littleness when he illustrates his position by that of the topping ones of the earth. But the thing said had been true. Let the Pompey be who he might, he, the little Cæsar of the day, could never now command another legion. He had once told Phineas Finn that he regretted that he had abstained from the ordinary amusements of English gentlemen. But he had abstained also from their ordinary occupations,--except so far as politics is one of them. He cared nothing for oxen or for furrows. In regard to his own land he hardly knew whether the farms were large or small. He had been a scholar, and after a certain fitful fashion he had maintained his scholarship, but the literature to which he had been really attached had been that of blue-books and newspapers. What was he to do with himself when called upon to resign? And he understood,--or thought that he understood,--his position too well to expect that after a while, with the usual interval, he might return to power. He had been Prime Minister, not as the leading politician on either side, not as the king of a party, but,--so he told himself,--as a stop-gap. There could be nothing for him now till the insipidity of life should gradually fade away into the grave. After a while he got up and went off to his wife's apartment, the room in which she used to prepare her triumphs and where now she contemplated her disappointments. "I have had the Duke with me," he said. "What;--at last?" "I do not know that he could have done any good by coming sooner." "And what does his Grace say?" "He thinks that our days are numbered." "Psha!--is that all? I could have told him that ever so long ago. It was hardly necessary that he should disturb himself at last to come and tell us such well-ventilated news. There isn't a porter at one of the clubs who doesn't know it." "Then there will be the less surprise,--and to those who are concerned perhaps the less mortification." "Did he tell you who was to succeed you?" asked the Duchess. "Not precisely." "He ought to have done that, as I am sure he knows. Everybody knows except you, Plantagenet." "If you know, you can tell me." "Of course, I can. It will be Mr. Monk." "With all my heart, Glencora. Mr. Monk is a very good man." "I wonder whether he'll do anything for us. Think how destitute we shall be! What if I were to ask him for a place! Would he not give it us?" "Will it make you unhappy, Cora?" "What;--your going?" "Yes;--the change altogether." She looked him in the face for a moment before she answered, with a peculiar smile in her eyes to which he was well used,--a smile half ludicrous and half pathetic,--having in it also a dash of sarcasm. "I can dare to tell the truth," she said, "which you can't. I can be honest and straightforward. Yes, it will make me unhappy. And you?" "Do you think that I cannot be honest too,--at any rate to you? It does fret me. I do not like to think that I shall be without work." "Yes;--Othello's occupation will be gone,--for awhile; for awhile." Then she came up to him and put both her hands on his breast. "But yet, Othello, I shall not be all unhappy." "Where will be your contentment?" "In you. It was making you ill. Rough people, whom the tenderness of your nature could not well endure, trod upon you, and worried you with their teeth and wounded you everywhere. I could have turned at them again with my teeth, and given them worry for worry;--but you could not. Now you will be saved from them, and so I shall not be discontented." All this she said looking up into his face, still with that smile which was half pathetic and half ludicrous. "Then I will be contented too," he said as he kissed her. CHAPTER LXXIII Only the Duke of Omnium The night of the debate arrived, but before the debate was commenced Sir Timothy Beeswax got up to make a personal explanation. He thought it right to state to the House how it came to pass that he found himself bound to leave the Ministry at so important a crisis in its existence. Then an observation was made by an honourable member of the Government,--presumably in a whisper, but still loud enough to catch the sharp ears of Sir Timothy, who now sat just below the gangway. It was said afterwards that the gentleman who made the observation,--an Irish gentleman named Fitzgibbon, conspicuous rather for his loyalty to his party than his steadiness,--had purposely taken the place in which he then sat, that Sir Timothy might hear the whisper. The whisper suggested that falling houses were often left by certain animals. It was certainly a very loud whisper,--but, if gentlemen are to be allowed to whisper at all, it is almost impossible to restrain the volume of the voice. To restrain Mr. Fitzgibbon had always been found difficult. Sir Timothy, who did not lack pluck, turned at once upon his assailant, and declared that words had been used with reference to himself which the honourable member did not dare to get upon his legs and repeat. Larry Fitzgibbon, as the gentleman was called, looked him full in the face, but did not move his hat from his head or stir a limb. It was a pleasant little episode in the evening's work, and afforded satisfaction to the House generally. Then Sir Timothy went on with his explanation. The details of this measure, as soon as they were made known to him, appeared to him, he said, to be fraught with the gravest and most pernicious consequences. He was sure that the members of her Majesty's Government, who were hurrying on this measure with what he thought was indecent haste,--ministers are always either indecent in their haste or treacherous in their delay,--had not considered what they were doing, or, if they had considered, were blind as to its results. He then attempted to discuss the details of the measure, but was called to order. A personal explanation could not be allowed to give him an opportunity of anticipating the debate. He contrived, however, before he sat down, to say some very heavy things against his late chief, and especially to congratulate the Duke on the services of the honourable gentleman, the member for Mayo,--meaning thereby Mr. Laurence Fitzgibbon. It would perhaps have been well for everybody if the measure could have been withdrawn and the Ministry could have resigned without the debate,--as everybody was convinced what would be the end of it. Let the second reading go as it might, the Bill could not be carried. There are measures which require the hopeful heartiness of a new Ministry, and the thorough-going energy of a young Parliament,--and this was one of them. The House was as fully agreed that this change was necessary, as it ever is agreed on any subject,--but still the thing could not be done. Even Mr. Monk, who was the most earnest of men, felt the general slackness of all around him. The commotion and excitement which would be caused by a change of Ministry might restore its proper tone to the House, but in its present condition it was unfit for the work. Nevertheless Mr. Monk made his speech, and put all his arguments into lucid order. He knew it was for nothing, but nevertheless it must be done. For hour after hour he went on,--for it was necessary to give every detail of his contemplated proposition. He went through it as sedulously as though he had expected to succeed, and sat down about nine o'clock in the evening. Then Sir Orlando moved the adjournment of the House till the morrow, giving as his reason for doing so the expedience of considering the details he had heard. To this no opposition was made, and the House was adjourned. On the following day the clubs were all alive with rumours as to the coming debate. It was known that a strong party had been formed under the auspices of Sir Orlando, and that with him Sir Timothy and other politicians were in close council. It was of course necessary that they should impart to many the secrets of their conclave, so that it was known early in the afternoon that it was the intention of the Opposition not to discuss the Bill, but to move that it be read a second time that day six months. The Ministry had hardly expected this, as the Bill was undoubtedly popular both in the House and the country; and if the Opposition should be beaten in such a course, that defeat would tend greatly to strengthen the hands of the Government. But if the foe could succeed in carrying a positive veto on the second reading, it would under all the circumstances be tantamount to a vote of want of confidence. "I'm afraid they know almost more than we do as to the feeling of members," said Mr. Roby to Mr. Rattler. "There isn't a man in the House whose feeling in the matter I don't know," said Rattler, "but I'm not quite so sure of their principles. On our own side, in our old party, there are a score of men who detest the Duke, though they would fain be true to the Government. They have voted with him through thick and thin, and he has not spoken a word to one of them since he became Prime Minister. What are you to do with such a man? How are you to act with him?" "Lupton wrote to him the other day about something," answered the other, "I forget what, and he got a note back from Warburton as cold as ice,--an absolute slap in the face. Fancy treating a man like Lupton in that way,--one of the most popular men in the House, related to half the peerage, and a man who thinks so much of himself! I shouldn't wonder if he were to vote against us;--I shouldn't indeed." "It has all been the old Duke's doing," said Rattler, "and no doubt it was intended for the best; but the thing has been a failure from the beginning to the end. I knew it would be so. I don't think there has been a single man who has understood what a Ministerial Coalition really means except you and I. From the very beginning all your men were averse to it in spirit." "Look how they were treated!" said Mr. Roby. "Was it likely that they should be very staunch when Mr. Monk became Leader of the House?" There was a Cabinet Council that day which lasted but a few minutes, and it may easily be presumed that the Ministers decided that they would all resign at once if Sir Orlando should carry his amendment. It is not unlikely that they were agreed to do the same if he should nearly carry it,--leaving probably the Prime Minister to judge what narrow majority would constitute nearness. On this occasion all the gentlemen assembled were jocund in their manner, and apparently well satisfied,--as though they saw before them an end to all their troubles. The Spartan boy did not even make a grimace when the wolf bit him beneath his frock, and these were all Spartan boys. Even the Prime Minister, who had fortified himself for the occasion, and who never wept in any company but that of his wife and his old friend, was pleasant in his manner and almost affable. "We shan't make this step towards the millennium just at present," he said to Phineas Finn as they left the room together,--referring to words which Phineas had spoken on a former occasion, and which then had not been very well taken. "But we shall have made a step towards the step," said Phineas, "and in getting to a millennium even that is something." "I suppose we are all too anxious," said the Duke, "to see some great effects come from our own little doings. Good-day. We shall know all about it tolerably early. Monk seems to think that it will be an attack on the Ministry and not on the Bill, and that it will be best to get a vote with as little delay as possible." "I'll bet an even five-pound note," said Mr. Lupton at the Carlton, "that the present Ministry is out to-morrow, and another that no one names five members of the next Cabinet." "You can help to win your first bet," said Mr. Beauchamp, a very old member, who, like many other Conservatives, had supported the Coalition. "I shall not do that," said Lupton, "though I think I ought. I won't vote against the man in his misfortunes, though, upon my soul, I don't love him very dearly. I shall vote neither way, but I hope that Sir Orlando may succeed." "If he do, who is to come in?" said the other. "I suppose you don't want to serve under Sir Orlando?" "Nor certainly under the Duke of Omnium. We shall not want a Prime Minister as long as there are as good fish in the sea as have been caught out of it." There had lately been formed a new Liberal club, established on a broader basis than the Progress, and perhaps with a greater amount of aristocratic support. This had come up since the Duke had been Prime Minister. Certain busy men had never been quite contented with the existing state of things, and had thought that the Liberal party, with such assistance as such a club could give it, would be strong enough to rule alone. That the great Liberal party should be impeded in its work and its triumph by such men as Sir Orlando Drought and Sir Timothy Beeswax was odious to the club. All the Pallisers had, from time immemorial, run straight as Liberals, and therefore the club had been unwilling to oppose the Duke personally, though he was the chief of the Coalition. And certain members of the Government, Phineas Finn, for instance, Barrington Erle, and Mr. Rattler were on the committee of the club. But the club, as a club, was not averse to a discontinuance of the present state of things. Mr. Gresham might again become Prime Minister, if he would condescend so far, or Mr. Monk. It might be possible that the great Liberal triumph contemplated by the club might not be achieved by the present House;--but the present House must go shortly, and then, with that assistance from a well-organised club, which had lately been so terribly wanting,--the lack of which had made the Coalition necessary,--no doubt the British constituencies would do their duty, and a Liberal Prime Minister, pure and simple, might reign,--almost for ever. With this great future before it, the club was very lukewarm in its support of the present Bill. "I shall go down and vote for them of course," said Mr. O'Mahony, "just for the look of the thing." In saying this Mr. O'Mahony expressed the feeling of the club, and the feeling of the Liberal party generally. There was something due to the Duke, but not enough to make it incumbent on his friends to maintain him in his position as Prime Minister. It was a great day for Sir Orlando. At half-past four the House was full,--not from any desire to hear Sir Orlando's arguments against the Bill, but because it was felt that a good deal of personal interest would be attached to the debate. If one were asked in these days what gift should a Prime Minister ask first from the fairies, one would name the power of attracting personal friends. Eloquence, if it be too easy, may become almost a curse. Patriotism is suspected, and sometimes sinks almost to pedantry. A Jove-born intellect is hardly wanted, and clashes with the inferiorities. Industry is exacting. Honesty is unpractical. Truth is easily offended. Dignity will not bend. But the man who can be all things to all men, who has ever a kind word to speak, a pleasant joke to crack, who can forgive all sins, who is ever prepared for friend or foe but never very bitter to the latter, who forgets not men's names, and is always ready with little words,--he is the man who will be supported at a crisis such as this that was now in the course of passing. It is for him that men will struggle, and talk, and, if needs be, fight, as though the very existence of the country depended on his political security. The present man would receive no such defence;--but still the violent deposition of a Prime Minister is always a memorable occasion. Sir Orlando made his speech, and, as had been anticipated, it had very little to do with the Bill, and was almost exclusively an attack upon his late chief. He thought, he said, that this was an occasion on which they had better come to a direct issue with as little delay as possible. If he rightly read the feeling of the House, no Bill of this magnitude coming from the present Ministry would be likely to be passed in an efficient condition. The Duke had frittered away his support in that House, and as a Minister had lost that confidence which a majority of the House had once been willing to place in him. We need not follow Sir Orlando through his speech. He alluded to his own services, and declared that he was obliged to withdraw them because the Duke would not trust him with the management of his own office. He had reason to believe that other gentlemen who had attached themselves to the Duke's Ministry had found themselves equally crippled by this passion for autocratic rule. Hereupon a loud chorus of disapprobation came from the Treasury bench, which was fully answered by opposing noises from the other side of the House. Sir Orlando declared that he need only point to the fact that the Ministry had been already shivered by the secession of various gentlemen. "Only two," said a voice. Sir Orlando was turning round to contradict the voice when he was greeted by another. "And those the weakest," said the other voice, which was indubitably that of Larry Fitzgibbon. "I will not speak of myself," said Sir Orlando pompously; "but I am authorised to tell the House that the noble lord who is now Secretary of State for the Colonies only holds his office till this crisis shall have passed." After that there was some sparring of a very bitter kind between Sir Timothy and Phineas Finn, till at last it seemed that the debate was to degenerate into a war of man against man. Phineas, and Erle, and Laurence Fitzgibbon allowed themselves to be lashed into anger, and, as far as words went, had the best of it. But of what use could it be? Every man there had come into the House prepared to vote for or against the Duke of Omnium,--or resolved, like Mr. Lupton, not to vote at all; and it was hardly on the cards that a single vote should be turned this way or that by any violence of speaking. "Let it pass," said Mr. Monk in a whisper to Phineas. "The fire is not worth the fuel." "I know the Duke's faults," said Phineas; "but these men know nothing of his virtues, and when I hear them abuse him I cannot stand it." Early in the night,--before twelve o'clock,--the House divided, and even at the moment of the division no one quite knew how it would go. There would be many who would of course vote against the amendment as being simply desirous of recording their opinion in favour of the Bill generally. And there were some who thought that Sir Orlando and his followers had been too forward, and too confident of their own standing in the House, in trying so violent a mode of opposition. It would have been better, these men thought, to have insured success by a gradual and persistent opposition to the Bill itself. But they hardly knew how thoroughly men may be alienated by silence and a cold demeanour. Sir Orlando on the division was beaten, but was beaten only by nine. "He can't go on with his Bill," said Rattler in one of the lobbies of the House. "I defy him. The House wouldn't stand it, you know." "No minister," said Roby, "could carry a measure like that with a majority of nine on a vote of confidence!" The House was of course adjourned, and Mr. Monk went at once to Carlton Terrace. "I wish it had only been three or four," said the Duke, laughing. "Why so?" "Because there would have been less doubt." "Is there any at present?" "Less possibility for doubt, I will say. You would not wish to make the attempt with such a majority?" "I could not do it, Duke!" "I quite agree with you. But there will be those who will say that the attempt might be made,--who will accuse us of being faint-hearted because we do not make it." "They will be men who understand nothing of the temper of the House." "Very likely. But still, I wish the majority had only been two or three. There is little more to be said, I suppose." "Very little, your Grace." "We had better meet to-morrow at two, and, if possible, I will see her Majesty in the afternoon. Good night, Mr. Monk." "Good night, Duke." "My reign is ended. You are a good deal an older man than I, and yet probably yours has yet to begin." Mr. Monk smiled and shook his head as he left the room, not trusting himself to discuss so large a subject at so late an hour of the night. Without waiting a moment after his colleague's departure, the Prime Minister,--for he was still Prime Minister,--went into his wife's room, knowing that she was waiting up till she should hear the result of the division, and there he found Mrs. Finn with her. "Is it over?" asked the Duchess. "Yes;--there has been a division. Mr. Monk has just been with me." "Well!" "We have beaten them, of course, as we always do," said the Duke, attempting to be pleasant. "You didn't suppose there was anything to fear? Your husband has always bid you keep up your courage;--has he not, Mrs. Finn?" "My husband has lost his senses, I think," she said. "He has taken to such storming and raving about his political enemies that I hardly dare to open my mouth." "Tell me what has been done, Plantagenet," ejaculated the Duchess. "Don't you be as unreasonable as Mrs. Finn, Cora. The House has voted against Sir Orlando's amendment by a majority of nine." "Only nine!" "And I shall cease to be Prime Minister to-morrow." "You don't mean to say that it's settled?" "Quite settled. The play has been played, and the curtain has fallen, and the lights are being put out, and the poor weary actors may go home to bed." "But on such an amendment surely any majority would have done." "No, my dear. I will not name a number, but nine certainly would not do." "And it is all over?" "My Ministry is all over, if you mean that." "Then everything is over for me. I shall settle down in the country and build cottages, and mix draughts. You, Marie, will still be going up the tree. If Mr. Finn manages well he may come to be Prime Minister some day." "He has hardly such ambition, Lady Glen." "The ambition will come fast enough;--will it not, Plantagenet? Let him once begin to dream of it as possible, and the desire will soon be strong enough. How should you feel if it were so?" "It is quite impossible," said Mrs. Finn, gravely. "I don't see why anything is impossible. Sir Orlando will be Prime Minister now, and Sir Timothy Beeswax Lord Chancellor. After that anybody may hope to be anything. Well,--I suppose we may go to bed. Is your carriage here, my dear?" "I hope so." "Ring the bell, Plantagenet, for somebody to see her down. Come to lunch to-morrow because I shall have so many groans to utter. What beasts, what brutes, what ungrateful wretches men are!--worse than women when they get together in numbers enough to be bold. Why have they deserted you? What have we not done for them? Think of all the new bedroom furniture that we sent to Gatherum merely to keep the party together. There were thousands of yards of linen, and it has all been of no use. Don't you feel like Wolsey, Plantagenet?" "Not in the least, my dear. No one will take anything away from me that is my own." "For me, I am almost as much divorced as Catherine, and have had my head cut off as completely as Anne Bullen and the rest of them. Go away, Marie, because I am going to have a cry by myself." The Duke himself on that night put Mrs. Finn into her carriage; and as he walked with her downstairs he asked her whether she believed the Duchess to be in earnest in her sorrow. "She so mixes up her mirth and woe together," said the Duke, "that I myself sometimes can hardly understand her." "I think she does regret it, Duke." "She told me but the other day that she would be contented." "A few weeks will make her so. As for your Grace, I hope I may congratulate you." "Oh yes;--I think so. We none of us like to be beaten when we have taken a thing in hand. There is always a little disappointment at first. But, upon the whole, it is better as it is. I hope it will not make your husband unhappy." "Not for his own sake. He will go again into the middle of the scramble and fight on one side or the other. For my own part I think opposition the pleasantest. Good night, Duke. I am so sorry that I should have troubled you." Then he went alone to his own room, and sat there without moving for a couple of hours. Surely it was a great thing to have been Prime Minister of England for three years,--a prize of which nothing now could rob him. He ought not to be unhappy; and yet he knew himself to be wretched and disappointed. It had never occurred to him to be proud of being a duke, or to think of his wealth otherwise than a chance incident of his life, advantageous indeed, but by no means a source of honour. And he had been aware that he had owed his first seat in Parliament to his birth, and probably also his first introduction to official life. An heir to a dukedom, if he will only work hard, may almost with certainty find himself received into one or the other regiment in Downing Street. It had not in his early days been with him as it had with his friends Mr. Monk and Phineas Finn, who had worked their way from the very ranks. But even a duke cannot become Prime Minister by favour. Surely he had done something of which he might be proud. And so he tried to console himself. But to have done something was nothing to him,--nothing to his personal happiness,--unless there was also something left for him to do. How should it be with him now,--how for the future? Would men ever listen to him again, or allow him again to work in their behoof, as he used to do in his happy days in the House of Commons? He feared that it was all over for him, and that for the rest of his days he must simply be the Duke of Omnium. CHAPTER LXXIV "I Am Disgraced and Shamed" Soon after the commencement of the Session Arthur Fletcher became a constant visitor in Manchester Square, dining with the old barrister almost constantly on Sundays, and not unfrequently on other days when the House and his general engagements would permit it. Between him and Emily's father there was no secret and no misunderstanding. Mr. Wharton quite understood that the young member of Parliament was earnestly purposed to marry his daughter, and Fletcher was sure of all the assistance and support which Mr. Wharton could give him. The name of Lopez was very rarely used between them. It had been tacitly agreed that there was no need that it should be mentioned. The man had come like a destroying angel between them and their fondest hopes. Neither could ever be what he would have been had that man never appeared to destroy their happiness. But the man had gone away, not without a tragedy that was appalling;--and each thought that, as regarded him, he and the tragedy might be, if not forgotten at least put aside, if only that other person in whom they were interested could be taught to seem to forget him. "It is not love," said the father, "but a feeling of shame." Arthur Fletcher shook his head, not quite agreeing with this. It was not that he feared that she loved the memory of her late husband. Such love was, he thought, impossible. But there was, he believed, something more than the feeling which her father described as shame. There was pride also;--a determination in her own bosom not to confess the fault she had made in giving herself to him whom she must now think to have been so much the least worthy of her two suitors. "Her fortune will not be what I once promised you," said the old man plaintively. "I do not remember that I ever asked you as to her fortune," Arthur replied. "Certainly not. If you had I should not have told you. But as I named a sum, it is right that I should explain to you that that man succeeded in lessening it by six or seven thousand pounds." "If that were all!" "And I have promised Sir Alured that Everett, as his heir, should have the use of a considerable portion of his share without waiting for my death. It is odd that the one of my children from whom I certainly expected the greater trouble should have fallen so entirely on his feet; and that the other--; well, let us hope for the best. Everett seems to have taken up with Wharton as though it belonged to him already. And Emily--! Well, my dear boy, let us hope that it may come right yet. You are not drinking your wine. Yes,--pass the bottle; I'll have another glass before I go upstairs." In this way the time went by till Emily returned to town. The Ministry had just then resigned, but I think that "this great reactionary success," as it was called by the writer in the "People's Banner," affected one member of the Lower House much less than the return to London of Mrs. Lopez. Arthur Fletcher had determined that he would renew his suit as soon as a year should have expired since the tragedy which had made his love a widow,--and that year had now passed away. He had known the day well,--as had she, when she passed the morning weeping in her own room at Wharton. Now he questioned himself whether a year would suffice,--whether both in mercy to her and with the view of realizing his own hopes he should give her some longer time for recovery. But he had told himself that it should be done at the end of a year, and as he had allowed no one to talk him out of his word, so neither would he be untrue to it himself. But it became with him a deep matter of business, a question of great difficulty, how he should arrange the necessary interview,--whether he should plead his case with her at their first meeting, or whether he had better allow her to become accustomed to his presence in the house. His mother had attempted to ridicule him, because he was, as she said, afraid of a woman. He well remembered that he had never been afraid of Emily Wharton when they had been quite young,--little more than a boy and girl together. Then he had told her of his love over and over again, and had found almost a comfortable luxury in urging her to say a word, which she had never indeed said, but which probably in those days he still hoped that she would say. And occasionally he had feigned to be angry with her, and had tempted her on to little quarrels with a boyish idea that quick reconciliation would perhaps throw her into his arms. But now it seemed to him that an age had passed since those days. His love had certainly not faded. There had never been a moment when that had been on the wing. But now the azure plumage of his love had become grey as the wings of a dove, and the gorgeousness of his dreams had sobered into hopes and fears which were a constant burden to his heart. There was time enough, still time enough for happiness if she would yield;--and time enough for the dull pressure of unsatisfied aspirations should she persist in her refusal. At last he saw her, almost by accident, and that meeting certainly was not fit for the purpose of his suit. He called at Stone Buildings the day after her arrival, and found her at her father's chambers. She had come there keeping some appointment with him, and certainly had not expected to meet her lover. He was confused and hardly able to say a word to account for his presence, but she greeted him with almost sisterly affection, saying some word of Longbarns and his family, telling him how Everett, to Sir Alured's great delight, had been sworn in as a magistrate for the County, and how at the last hunt meeting John Fletcher had been asked to take the County hounds, because old Lord Weobly at seventy-five had declared himself to be unable any longer to ride as a master of hounds ought to ride. All these things Arthur had of course heard, such news being too important to be kept long from him; but on none of these subjects had he much to say. He stuttered and stammered, and quickly went away;--not, however, before he had promised to come and dine as usual on the next Sunday, and not without observing that the anniversary of that fatal day of release had done something to lighten the sombre load of mourning which the widow had hitherto worn. Yes;--he would dine there on the Sunday, but how would it be with him then? Mr. Wharton never went out of the house on a Sunday evening, and could hardly be expected to leave his own drawing-room for the sake of giving a lover an opportunity. No;--he must wait till that evening should have passed, and then make the occasion for himself as best he might. The Sunday came and the dinner was eaten, and after dinner there was the single bottle of port and the single bottle of claret. "How do you think she is looking?" asked the father. "She was as pale as death before we got her down into the country." "Upon my word, sir," said he, "I've hardly looked at her. It is not a matter of looks now, as it used to be. It has got beyond that. It is not that I am indifferent to seeing a pretty face, or that I have no longer an opinion of my own about a woman's figure. But there grows up, I think, a longing which almost kills that consideration." "To me she is as beautiful as ever," said the father proudly. Fletcher did manage, when in the drawing-room, to talk for a while about John and the hounds, and then went away, having resolved that he would come again on the very next day. Surely she would not give an order that he should be denied admittance. She had been too calm, too even, too confident in herself for that. Yes;--he would come and tell her plainly what he had to say. He would tell it with all the solemnity of which he was capable, with a few words, and those the strongest which he could use. Should she refuse him,--as he almost knew that she would at first,--then he would tell her of her father and of the wishes of all their joint friends. "Nothing," he would say to her, "nothing but personal dislike can justify you in refusing to heal so many wounds." As he fixed on these words he failed to remember how little probable it is that a lover should ever be able to use the phrases he arranges. On Monday he came, and asked for Mrs. Lopez, slurring over the word as best he could. The butler said his mistress was at home. Since the death of the man he had so thoroughly despised, the old servant had never called her Mrs. Lopez. Arthur was shown upstairs, and found the lady he sought,--but he found Mrs. Roby also. It may be remembered that Mrs. Roby, after the tragedy, had been refused admittance into Mr. Wharton's house. Since that there had been some correspondence, and a feeling had prevailed that the woman was not to be quarrelled with for ever. "I did not do it, papa, because of her," Emily had said with some scorn, and that scorn had procured Mrs. Roby's pardon. She was now making a morning call, and suiting her conversation to the black dress of her niece. Arthur was horrified at seeing her. Mrs. Roby had always been to him odious, not only as a personal enemy but as a vulgar woman. He, at any rate, attributed to her a great part of the evil that had been done, feeling sure that had there been no house round the corner, Emily Wharton would never have become Mrs. Lopez. As it was he was forced to shake hands with her, and forced to listen to the funereal tone in which Mrs. Roby asked him if he did not think that Mrs. Lopez looked much improved by her sojourn in Herefordshire. He shrank at the sound, and then, in order that it might not be repeated, took occasion to show that he was allowed to call his early playmate by her Christian name. Mrs. Roby, thinking that she ought to check him, remarked that Mrs. Lopez's return was a great thing for Mr. Wharton. Thereupon Arthur Fletcher seized his hat off the ground, wished them both good-bye, and hurried out of the room. "What a very odd manner he has taken up since he became a member of Parliament," said Mrs. Roby. Emily was silent for a moment, and then with an effort,--with intense pain,--she said a word or two which she thought had better be at once spoken. "He went because he does not like to hear that name." "Good gracious!" "And papa does not like it. Don't say a word about it, aunt; pray don't;--but call me Emily." "Are you going to be ashamed of your name?" "Never mind, aunt. If you think it wrong you must stay away;--but I will not have papa wounded." "Oh;--if Mr. Wharton wishes it;--of course." That evening Mrs. Roby told Dick Roby, her husband, what an old fool Mr. Wharton was. The next day, quite early, Fletcher was again at the house and was again admitted upstairs. The butler, no doubt, knew well enough why he came, and also knew that the purport of his coming had at any rate the sanction of Mr. Wharton. The room was empty when he was shown into it, but she came to him very soon. "I went away yesterday rather abruptly," he said. "I hope you did not think me rude." "Oh no." "Your aunt was here, and I had something I wished to say but could not say very well before her." "I knew that she had driven you away. You and Aunt Harriet were never great friends." "Never;--but I will forgive her everything. I will forgive all the injuries that have been done me if you now will do as I ask you." Of course she knew what it was that he was about to ask. When he had left her at Longbarns without saying a word of his love, without giving her any hint whereby she might allow herself to think that he intended to renew his suit, then she had wept because it was so. Though her resolution had been quite firm as to the duty which was incumbent on her of remaining in her desolate condition of almost nameless widowhood, yet she had been unable to refrain from bitter tears because he also had seemed to see that such was her duty. But now again, knowing that the request was coming, feeling once more confident of the constancy of his love, she was urgent with herself as to that heavy duty. She would be unwomanly, dead to all shame, almost inhuman, were she to allow herself again to indulge in love after all the havoc she had made. She had been little more than a bride when that husband, for whom she had so often been forced to blush, had been driven by the weight of his misfortunes and disgraces to destroy himself! By the marriage she had made she had overwhelmed her whole family with dishonour. She had done it with a persistency of perverse self-will which she herself could not now look back upon without wonder and horror. She, too, should have died as well as he,--only that death had not been within the compass of her powers as of his. How then could she forget it all, and wipe it away from her mind, as she would figures from a slate with a wet towel? How could it be fit that she should again be a bride with such a spectre of a husband haunting her memory? She had known that the request was to be made when he had come so quickly, and had not doubted it for a moment when he took his sudden departure. She had known it well, when just now the servant told her that Mr. Fletcher was in the drawing-room below. But she was quite certain of the answer she must make. "I should be sorry you should ask me anything I cannot do," she said in a very low voice. "I will ask you for nothing for which I have not your father's sanction." "The time has gone by, Arthur, in which I might well have been guided by my father. There comes a time when personal feelings must be stronger than a father's authority. Papa cannot see me with my own eyes; he cannot understand what I feel. It is simply this,--that he would have me to be other than I am. But I am what I have made myself." "You have not heard me as yet. You will hear me?" "Oh, yes." "I have loved you ever since I was a boy." He paused as though he expected that she would make some answer to this; but of course there was nothing that she could say. "I have been true to you since we were together almost as children." "It is your nature to be true." "In this matter, at any rate, I shall never change. I never for a moment had a doubt about my love. There never has been any one else whom I have ventured to compare with you. Then came that great trouble. Emily, you must let me speak freely this once, as so much, to me at least, depends on it." "Say what you will, Arthur. Do not wound me more than you can help." "God knows how willingly I would heal every wound without a word if it could be done. I don't know whether you ever thought what I suffered when he came among us and robbed me,--well, I will not say robbed me of your love, because it was not mine--but took away with him that which I had been trying to win." "I did not think a man would feel it like that." "Why shouldn't a man feel as well as a woman? I had set my heart on having you for my wife. Can any desire be dearer to a man than that? Then he came. Well, dearest; surely I may say that he was not worthy of you." "We were neither of us worthy," she said. "I need not tell you that we all grieved. It seemed to us down in Herefordshire as though a black cloud had come upon us. We could not speak of you, nor yet could we be altogether silent." "Of course you condemned me,--as an outcast." "Did I write to you as though you were an outcast? Did I treat you when I saw you as an outcast? When I come to you to-day, is that proof that I think you to be an outcast? I have never deceived you, Emily." "Never." "Then you will believe me when I say that through it all not one word of reproach or contumely has ever passed my lips in regard to you. That you should have given yourself to one whom I could not think to be worthy of you was, of course, a great sorrow. Had he been a prince of men it would, of course, have been a sorrow to me. How it went with you during your married life I will not ask." "I was unhappy. I would tell you everything if I could. I was very unhappy." "Then came--the end." She was now weeping, with her face buried in her handkerchief. "I would spare you if I knew how, but there are some things which must be said." "No;--no. I will bear it all--from you." "Well! His success had not lessened my love. Though then I could have no hope,--though you were utterly removed from me,--all that could not change me. There it was,--as though my arm or my leg had been taken from me. It was bad to live without an arm or leg, but there was no help. I went on with my life and tried not to look like a whipped cur;--though John from time to time would tell me that I failed. But now;--now that it has again all changed,--what would you have me do now? It may be that after all my limb may be restored to me, that I may be again as other men are, whole, and sound, and happy;--so happy! When it may possibly be within my reach am I not to look for my happiness?" He paused, but she wept on without speaking a word. "There are those who will say that I should wait till all these signs of woe have been laid aside. But why should I wait? There has come a great blot upon your life, and is it not well that it should be covered as quickly as possible?" "It can never be covered." "You mean that it can never be forgotten. No doubt there are passages in our life which we cannot forget, though we bury them in the deepest silence. All this can never be driven out of your memory,--nor from mine. But it need not therefore blacken all our lives. In such a condition we should not be ruled by what the world thinks." "Not at all. I care nothing for what the world thinks. I am below all that. It is what I think: I myself,--of myself." "Will you think of no one else? Are any of your thoughts for me,--or for your father?" "Oh, yes;--for my father." "I need hardly tell you what he wishes. You must know how you can best give him back the comfort he has lost." "But, Arthur, even for him I cannot do everything." "There is one question to be asked," he said, rising from her feet and standing before her;--"but one; and what you do should depend entirely on the answer which you may be able truly to make to that." This he said so solemnly that he startled her. "What question, Arthur?" "Do you love me?" To this question at the moment she could make no reply. "Of course I know that you did not love me when you married him." "Love is not all of one kind." "You know what love I mean. You did not love me then. You could not have loved me,--though, perhaps, I thought I had deserved your love. But love will change, and memory will sometimes bring back old fancies when the world has been stern and hard. When we were very young I think you loved me. Do you remember seven years ago at Longbarns, when they parted us and sent me away, because--because we were so young? They did not tell us then, but I think you knew. I know that I knew, and went nigh to swear that I would drown myself. You loved me then, Emily." "I was a child then." "Now you are not a child. Do you love me now,--to-day? If so, give me your hand, and let the past be buried in silence. All this has come, and gone, and has nearly made us old. But there is life before us yet, and if you are to me as I am to you it is better that our lives should be lived together." Then he stood before her with his hand stretched out. "I cannot do it," she said. "And why?" "I cannot be other than the wretched thing I have made myself." "But do you love me?" "I cannot analyse my heart. Love you;--yes! I have always loved you. Everything about you is dear to me. I can triumph in your triumphs, rejoice at your joy, weep at your sorrows, be ever anxious that all good things may come to you;--but, Arthur, I cannot be your wife." "Not though it would make us happy,--Fletchers and Whartons all alike?" "Do you think I have not thought it over? Do you think that I have forgotten your first letter? Knowing your heart, as I do know it, do you imagine that I have spent a day, an hour, for months past, without asking myself what answer I should make to you if the sweet constancy of your nature should bring you again to me? I have trembled when I have heard your voice. My heart has beat at the sound of your footstep as though it would burst! Do you think I have never told myself what I had thrown away? But it is gone, and it is not now within my reach." "It is; it is," he said, throwing himself on his knees, and twining his arms round her. "No;--no;--no;--never. I am disgraced and shamed. I have lain among the pots till I am foul and blackened. Take your arms away. They shall not be defiled," she said as she sprang to her feet. "You shall not have the thing that he has left." "Emily,--it is the only thing in the world that I crave." "Be a man and conquer your love,--as I will. Get it under your feet and press it to death. Tell yourself that it is shameful and must be abandoned. That you, Arthur Fletcher, should marry the widow of that man,--the woman that he had thrust so far into the mire that she can never again be clean;--you, the chosen one, the bright star among us all;--you, whose wife should be the fairest, the purest, the tenderest of us all, a flower that has yet been hardly breathed on! While I-- Arthur," she said, "I know my duty better than that. I will not seek an escape from my punishment in that way,--nor will I allow you to destroy yourself. You have my word as a woman that it shall not be so. Now I do not mind your knowing whether I love you or no." He stood silent before her, not able for the moment to go on with his prayer. "And now, go," she said. "God bless you, and give you some day a fair and happy wife. And, Arthur, do not come again to me. If you will let it be so, I shall have a delight in seeing you;--but not if you come as you have come now. And, Arthur, spare me with papa. Do not let him think that it is all my fault that I cannot do the thing which he wishes." Then she left the room before he could say another word to her. But it was all her fault. No;--in that direction he could not spare her. It must be told to her father, though he doubted his own power of describing all that had been said. "Do not come again to me," she had said. At the moment he had been left speechless; but if there was one thing fixed in his mind, it was the determination to come again. He was sure now, not only of love that might have sufficed,--but of hot, passionate love. She had told him that her heart had beat at his footsteps, and that she had trembled as she listened to his voice;--and yet she expected that he would not come again! But there was a violence of decision about the woman which made him dread that he might still come in vain. She was so warped from herself by the conviction of her great mistake, so prone to take shame to herself for her own error, so keenly alive to the degradation to which she had been submitted, that it might yet be impossible to teach her that, though her husband had been vile and she mistaken, yet she had not been soiled by his baseness. He went at once to the old barrister's chambers and told him the result of the meeting. "She is still a fool," said the father, not understanding at second-hand the depths of his daughter's feeling. "No, sir,--not that. She feels herself degraded by his degradation. If it be possible we must save her from that." "She did degrade herself." "Not as she means it. She is not degraded in my eyes." "Why should she not take the only means in her power of rescuing herself and rescuing us all from the evil that she did? She owes it to you, to me, and to her brother." "I would hardly wish her to come to me in payment of such a debt." "There is no room left," said Mr. Wharton angrily, "for soft sentimentality. Well;--she must take her bed as she makes it. It is very hard on me, I know. Considering what she used to be, it is marvellous to me that she should have so little idea left of doing her duty to others." Arthur Fletcher found that the barrister was at the moment too angry to hear reason, or to be made to understand anything of the feelings of mixed love and admiration with which he himself was animated at the moment. He was obliged therefore to content himself with assuring the father that he did not intend to give up the pursuit of his daughter. CHAPTER LXXV The Great Wharton Alliance When Mr. Wharton got home on that day he said not a word to Emily as to Arthur Fletcher. He had resolved to take various courses,--first to tell her roundly that she was neglecting her duty to herself and to her family, and that he would no longer take her part and be her good friend unless she would consent to marry the man whom she had confessed that she loved. But as he thought of this he became aware,--first that he could not carry out such a threat, and then that he would lack even the firmness to make it. There was something in her face, something even in her dress, something in her whole manner to himself, which softened him and reduced him to vassalage directly he saw her. Then he determined to throw himself on her compassion and to implore her to put an end to all this misery by making herself happy. But as he drew near home he found himself unable to do even this. How is a father to beseech his widowed daughter to give herself away in a second marriage? And therefore when he entered the house and found her waiting for him, he said nothing. At first she looked at him wistfully,--anxious to learn by his face whether her lover had been with him. But when he spoke not a word, simply kissing her in his usual quiet way, she became cheerful in manner and communicative. "Papa," she said, "I have had a letter from Mary." "Well, my dear." "Just a nice chatty letter,--full of Everett, of course." "Everett is a great man now." "I am sure that you are very glad that he is what he is. Will you see Mary's letter?" Mr. Wharton was not specially given to reading young ladies' correspondence, and did not know why this particular letter should be offered to him. "You don't suspect anything at Wharton, do you?" she asked. "Suspect anything! No; I don't suspect anything." But now, having had his curiosity aroused, he took the letter which was offered to him and read it. The letter was as follows:-- Wharton, Thursday. DEAREST EMILY,-- We all hope that you had a pleasant journey up to London, and that Mr. Wharton is quite well. Your brother Everett came over to Longbarns the day after you started and drove me back to Wharton in the dog-cart. It was such a pleasant journey, though, now I remember, it rained all the way. But Everett has always so much to say that I didn't mind the rain. I think it will end in John taking the hounds. He says he won't, because he does not wish to be the slave of the whole county;--but he says it in that sort of way that we all think he means to do it. Everett tells him that he ought, because he is the only hunting man on this side of the county who can afford to do it without feeling it much; and of course what Everett says will go a long way with him. Sarah [Sarah was John Fletcher's wife] is rather against it. But if he makes up his mind she'll be sure to turn round. Of course it makes us all very anxious at present to know how it is to end, for the Master of the Hounds always is the leading man in our part of the world. Papa went to the bench at Ross yesterday and took Everett with him. It was the first time that Everett had sat there. He says I am to tell his father he has not hung anybody as yet. They have already begun to cut down, or what they call stubb up, Barnton Spinnies. Everett said that it is no good keeping it as a wood, and papa agreed. So it is to go into the home farm, and Griffiths is to pay rent for it. I don't like having it cut down as the boys always used to get nuts there, but Everett says it won't do to keep woods for little boys to get nuts. Mary Stocking has been very ill since you went, and I'm afraid she won't last long. When they get to be so very bad with rheumatism I almost think it's wrong to pray for them, because they are in so much pain. We thought at one time that mamma's ointment had done her good, but when we came to inquire, we found she had swallowed it. Wasn't it dreadful? But it didn't seem to do her any harm. Everett says that it wouldn't make any difference which she did. Papa is beginning to be afraid that Everett is a Radical. But I'm sure he's not. He says he is as good a Conservative as there is in all Herefordshire, only that he likes to know what is to be conserved. Papa said after dinner yesterday that everything English ought to be maintained. Everett said that according to that we should have kept the Star Chamber. "Of course I would," said papa. Then they went at it, hammer and tongs. Everett had the best of it. At any rate he talked the longest. But I do hope he is not a Radical. No country gentleman ought to be a Radical. Ought he, dear? Mrs. Fletcher says you are to get the lozenges at Squire's in Oxford Street, and be sure to ask for the Vade mecum lozenges. She is all in a flutter about the hounds. She says she hopes John will do nothing of the kind because of the expense; but we all know that she would like him to have them. The subscription is not very good, only £1500, and it would cost him ever so much a year. But everybody says that he is very rich and that he ought to do it. If you see Arthur give him our love. Of course a member of Parliament is too busy to write letters. But I don't think Arthur ever was good at writing. Everett says that men never ought to write letters. Give my love to Mr. Wharton. I am, dearest Emily, Your most affectionate Cousin, MARY WHARTON. "Everett is a fool," said Mr. Wharton as soon as he had read the letter. "Why is he a fool, papa?" "Because he will quarrel with Sir Alured about politics before he knows where he is. What business has a young fellow like that to have an opinion either one side or the other, before his betters?" "But Everett always had strong opinions." "It didn't matter as long as he only talked nonsense at a club in London, but now he'll break that old man's heart." "But, papa, don't you see anything else?" "I see that John Fletcher is going to make an ass of himself and spend a thousand a year in keeping up a pack of hounds for other people to ride after." "I think I see something else besides that." "What do you see?" "Would it annoy you if Everett were to become engaged to Mary?" Then Mr. Wharton whistled. "To be sure she does put his name into every line of her letter. No; it wouldn't annoy me. I don't see why he shouldn't marry his second cousin if he likes. Only if he is engaged to her, I think it odd that he shouldn't write and tell us." "I'm sure he's not engaged to her yet. She wouldn't write at all in that way if they were engaged. Everybody would be told at once, and Sir Alured would never be able to keep it a secret. Why should there be a secret? But I'm sure she is very fond of him. Mary would never write about any man in that way unless she were beginning to be attached to him." About ten days after this there came two letters from Wharton Hall to Manchester Square, the shortest of which shall be given first. It ran as follows:-- MY DEAR FATHER,-- I have proposed to my cousin Mary, and she has accepted me. Everybody here seems to like the idea. I hope it will not displease you. Of course you and Emily will come down. I will tell you when the day is fixed. Your affectionate son, EVERETT WHARTON. This the old man read as he sat at breakfast with his daughter opposite to him, while Emily was reading a very much longer letter from the same house. "So it's going to be just as you guessed," he said. "I was quite sure of it, papa. Is that from Everett? Is he very happy?" "Upon my word, I can't say whether he's happy or not. If he had got a new horse he would have written at much greater length about it. It seems, however, to be quite fixed." "Oh, yes. This is from Mary. She is happy at any rate. I suppose men never say so much about these things as women." "May I see Mary's letter?" "I don't think it would be quite fair, papa. It's only a girl's rhapsody about the man she loves,--very nice and womanly, but not intended for any one but me. It does not seem that they mean to wait very long." "Why should they wait? Is any day fixed?" "Mary says that Everett talks about the middle of May. Of course you will go down." "We must both go." "You will at any rate. Don't promise for me just at present. It must make Sir Alured very happy. It is almost the same as finding himself at last with a son of his own. I suppose they will live at Wharton altogether now,--unless Everett gets into Parliament." But the reader may see the young lady's letter, though her future father-in-law was not permitted to do so, and will perceive that there was a paragraph at the close of it which perhaps was more conducive to Emily's secrecy than her feelings as to the sacred obligations of female correspondence. Monday, Wharton. DEAREST EMILY,-- I wonder whether you will be much surprised at the news I have to tell you. You cannot be more so than I am at having to write it. It has all been so very sudden that I almost feel ashamed of myself. Everett has proposed to me, and I have accepted him. There;--now you know it all. Though you never can know how very dearly I love him and how thoroughly I admire him. I do think that he is everything that a man ought to be, and that I am the most fortunate young woman in the world. Only isn't it odd that I should always have to live all my life in the same house, and never change my name,--just like a man, or an old maid? But I don't mind that because I do love him so dearly and because he is so good. I hope he will write to you and tell you that he likes me. He has written to Mr. Wharton, I know. I was sitting by him and his letter didn't take him a minute. But he says that long letters about such things only give trouble. I hope you won't think my letter troublesome. He is not sitting by me now but has gone over to Longbarns to help to settle about the hounds. John is going to have them after all. I wish it hadn't happened just at this time because all the gentlemen do think so much about it. Of course Everett is one of the committee. Papa and mamma are both very, very glad of it. Of course it is nice for them as it will keep Everett and me here. If I had married anybody else,--though I am sure I never should,--she would have been very lonely. And of course papa likes to think that Everett is already one of us. I hope they never will quarrel about politics; but, as Everett says, the world does change as it goes on, and young men and old men never will think quite the same about things. Everett told papa the other day that if he could be put back a century he would be a Radical. Then there were ever so many words. But Everett always laughs, and at last papa comes round. I can't tell you, my dear, what a fuss we are in already about it all. Everett wants to have our marriage early in May, so that we may have two months in Switzerland before London is what he calls turned loose. And papa says that there is no use in delaying, because he gets older every day. Of course that is true of everybody. So that we are all in a flutter about getting things. Mamma did talk of going up to town, but I believe they have things now quite as good at Hereford. Sarah, when she was married, had all her things from London, but they say that there has been a great change since that. I am sure that I think that you may get anything you want at Muddocks and Cramble's. But mamma says I am to have my veil from Howell and James's. Of course you and Mr. Wharton will come. I shan't think it any marriage without. Papa and mamma talk of it as quite of course. You know how fond papa is of the bishop. I think he will marry us. I own I should like to be married by a bishop. It would make it so sweet and so solemn. Mr. Higgenbottom could of course assist;--but he is such an odd old man, with his snuff and his spectacles always tumbling off, that I shouldn't like to have no one else. I have often thought that if it were only for marrying people we ought to have a nicer rector at Wharton. Almost all the tenants have been to wish me joy. They are very fond of Everett already, and now they feel that there will never be any very great change. I do think it is the very best thing that could be done, even if it were not that I am so thoroughly in love with him. I didn't think I should ever be able to own that I was in love with a man; but now I feel quite proud of it. I don't mind telling you because he is your brother, and I think that you will be glad of it. He talks very often about you. Of course you know what it is that we all wish. I love Arthur Fletcher almost as much as if he were my brother. He is my sister's brother-in-law, and if he could become my husband's brother-in-law too, I should be so happy. Of course we all know that he wishes it. Write immediately to wish me joy. Perhaps you could go to Howell and James's about the veil. And promise to come to us in May. Sarah says the veil ought to cost about thirty pounds. Dearest, dearest Emily, I shall so soon be your most affectionate sister, MARY WHARTON. Emily's answer was full of warm, affectionate congratulations. She had much to say in favour of Everett. She promised to use all her little skill at Howell and James's. She expressed a hope that the overtures to be made in regard to the bishop might be successful. And she made kind remarks even as to Muddocks and Cramble. But she would not promise that she herself would be at Wharton on the happy day. "Dear Mary," she said, "remember what I have suffered, and that I cannot be quite as other people are. I could not stand at your marriage in black clothes,--nor should I have the courage even if I had the will to dress myself in others." None of the Whartons had come to her wedding. There was no feeling of anger now left as to that. She was quite aware that they had done right to stay away. But the very fact that it had been right that they should stay away would make it wrong that the widow of Ferdinand Lopez should now assist at the marriage of one Wharton to another. This was all that a marriage ought to be; whereas that had been--all that a marriage ought not to be. In answer to the paragraph about Arthur Fletcher Emily Lopez had not a word to say. Soon after this, early in April, Everett came up to town. Though his bride might be content to get her bridal clothes in Hereford, none but a London tailor could decorate him properly for such an occasion. During these last weeks Arthur Fletcher had not been seen in Manchester Square; nor had his name been mentioned there by Mr. Wharton. Of anything that may have passed between them Emily was altogether ignorant. She observed, or thought that she observed, that her father was more silent with her,--perhaps less tender than he had been since the day on which her husband had perished. His manner of life was the same. He almost always dined at home in order that she might not be alone, and made no complaint as to her conduct. But she could see that he was unhappy, and she knew the cause of his grief. "I think, papa," she said one day, "that it would be better that I should go away." This was on the day before Everett's arrival,--of which, however, he had given no notice. "Go away! Where would you go to?" "It does not matter. I do not make you happy." "What do you mean? Who says that I am not happy? Why do you talk like that?" "Do not be angry with me. Nobody says so. I can see it well enough. I know how good you are to me, but I am making your life wretched. I am a wet blanket to you, and yet I cannot help myself. If I could only go somewhere, where I could be of use." "I don't know what you mean. This is your proper home." "No;--it is not my home. I ought to have forfeited it. I ought to go where I could work and be of some use in the world." "You might be of use if you chose, my dear. Your proper career is before you if you would condescend to accept it. It is not for me to persuade you, but I can see and feel the truth. Till you bring yourself to do that, your days will be blighted,--and so will mine. You have made one great mistake in life. Stop a moment. I do not speak often, but I wish you to listen to me now. Such mistakes do generally produce misery and ruin to all who are concerned. With you it chances that it may be otherwise. You can put your foot again upon the firm ground and recover everything. Of course there must be a struggle. One person has to struggle with circumstances, another with his foes, and a third with his own feelings. I can understand that there should be such a struggle with you; but it ought to be made. You ought to be brave enough and strong enough to conquer your regrets, and to begin again. In no other way can you do anything for me or for yourself. To talk of going away is childish nonsense. Whither would you go? I shall not urge you any more, but I would not have you talk to me in that way." Then he got up and left the room and the house, and went down to his club,--in order that she might think of what he had said in solitude. And she did think of it;--but still continually with an assurance to herself that her father did not understand her feelings. The career of which he spoke was no doubt open to her, but she could not regard it as that which it was proper that she should fulfil, as he did. When she told her lover that she had lain among the pots till she was black and defiled, she expressed in the strongest language that which was her real conviction. He did not think her to have been defiled,--or at any rate thought that she might again bear the wings of a dove; but she felt it, and therefore knew herself to be unfit. She had said it all to her lover in the strongest words she could find, but she could not repeat them to her father. The next morning when he came into the parlour where she was already sitting, she looked up at him almost reproachfully. Did he think that a woman was a piece of furniture which you can mend, and revarnish, and fit out with new ornaments, and then send out for use, second-hand indeed, but for all purposes as good as new? Then, while she was in this frame of mind, Everett came in upon her unawares, and with his almost boisterous happiness succeeded for a while in changing the current of her thoughts. He was of course now uppermost in his own thoughts. The last few months had made so much of him that he might be excused for being unable to sink himself in the presence of others. He was the heir to the baronetcy,--and to the double fortunes of the two old men. And he was going to be married in a manner as every one told him to increase the glory and stability of the family. "It's all nonsense about your not coming down," he said. She smiled and shook her head. "I can only tell you that it will give the greatest offence to every one. If you knew how much they talk about you down there I don't think you would like to hurt them." "Of course I would not like to hurt them." "And considering that you have no other brother--" "Oh, Everett!" "I think more about it, perhaps, than you do. I think you owe it me to come down. You will never probably have another chance of being present at your brother's marriage." This he said in a tone that was almost lachrymose. "A wedding, Everett, should be merry." "I don't know about that. It is a very serious sort of thing to my way of thinking. When Mary got your letter it nearly broke her heart. I think I have a right to expect it, and if you don't come I shall feel myself injured. I don't see what is the use of having a family if the members of it do not stick together. What would you think if I were to desert you?" "Desert you, Everett?" "Well, yes;--it is something of the kind. I have made my request, and you can comply with it or not as you please." "I will go," she said very slowly. Then she left him and went to her own room to think in what description of garment she could appear at a wedding with the least violence to the conditions of her life. "I have got her to say she'll come," he said to his father that evening. "If you leave her to me, I'll bring her round." Soon after that,--within a day or two,--there came out a paragraph in one of the fashionable newspapers of the day, saying that an alliance had been arranged between the heir to the Wharton title and property and the daughter of the present baronet. I think that this had probably originated in the club gossip. I trust it did not spring directly from the activity or ambition of Everett himself. CHAPTER LXXVI Who Will It Be? For the first day or two after the resignation of the Ministry the Duchess appeared to take no further notice of the matter. An ungrateful world had repudiated her and her husband, and he had foolishly assisted and given way to the repudiation. All her grand aspirations were at an end. All her triumphs were over. And worse than that, there was present to her a conviction that she never had really triumphed. There never had come the happy moment in which she had felt herself to be dominant over other women. She had toiled and struggled, she had battled and occasionally submitted; and yet there was present to her a feeling that she had stood higher in public estimation as Lady Glencora Palliser,--whose position had been all her own and had not depended on her husband,--than now she had done as Duchess of Omnium, and wife of the Prime Minister of England. She had meant to be something, she knew not what, greater than had been the wives of other Prime Ministers and other Dukes; and now she felt that in her failure she had been almost ridiculous. And the failure, she thought, had been his,--or hers,--rather than that of circumstances. If he had been less scrupulous and more persistent it might have been different,--or if she had been more discreet. Sometimes she felt her own failing so violently as to acquit him almost entirely. At other times she was almost beside herself with anger because all her losses seemed to have arisen from want of stubbornness on his part. When he had told her that he and his followers had determined to resign because they had beaten their foes by a majority only of nine, she took it into her head that he was in fault. Why should he go while his supporters were more numerous than his opponents? It was useless to bid him think it over again. Though she was far from understanding all the circumstances of the game, she did know that he could not remain after having arranged with his colleagues that he would go. So she became cross and sullen; and while he was going to Windsor and back and setting his house in order, and preparing the way for his successor,--whoever that successor might be,--she was moody and silent, dreaming over some impossible condition of things in accordance with which he might have remained Prime Minister--almost for ever. On the Sunday after the fatal division,--the division which the Duchess would not allow to have been fatal,--she came across him somewhere in the house. She had hardly spoken to him since he had come into her room that night and told her that all was over. She had said that she was unwell and had kept out of sight; and he had been here and there, between Windsor and the Treasury Chambers, and had been glad to escape from her ill-humour. But she could not endure any longer the annoyance of having to get all her news through Mrs. Finn,--second hand, or third hand, and now found herself driven to capitulate. "Well," she said; "how is it all going to be? I suppose you do not know or you would have told me?" "There is very little to tell." "Mr. Monk is to be Prime Minister?" she asked. "I did not say so. But it is not impossible." "Has the Queen sent for him?" "Not as yet. Her Majesty has seen both Mr. Gresham and Mr. Daubeny as well as myself. It does not seem a very easy thing to make a Ministry just at present." "Why should not you go back?" "I do not think that is on the cards." "Why not? Ever so many men have done it, after going out,--and why not you? I remember Mr. Mildmay doing it twice. It is always the thing when the man who has been sent for makes a mess of it, for the old minister to have another chance." "But what if the old minister will not take the chance?" "Then it is the old minister's fault. Why shouldn't you take the chance as well as another? It isn't many days ago since you were quite anxious to remain in. I thought you were going to break your heart because people even talked of your going." "I was going to break my heart, as you call it," he said, smiling, "not because people talked of my ceasing to be minister, but because the feeling of the House of Commons justified people in so saying. I hope you see the difference." "No, I don't. And there is no difference. The people we are talking about are the members,--and they have supported you. You could go on if you chose. I'm sure Mr. Monk wouldn't leave you." "It is just what Mr. Monk would do, and ought to do. No one is less likely than Mr. Monk to behave badly in such an emergency. The more I see of Mr. Monk, the higher I think of him." "He has his own game to play as well as others." "I think he has no game to play but that of his country. It is no use our discussing it, Cora." "Of course I understand nothing, because I'm a woman." "You understand a great deal,--but not quite all. You may at any rate understand this,--that our troubles are at an end. You were saying but the other day that the labours of being a Prime Minister's wife had been almost too many for you." "I never said so. As long as you didn't give way no labour was too much for me. I would have done anything,--slaved morning and night,--so that we might have succeeded. I hate being beat. I'd sooner be cut in pieces." "There is no help for it now, Cora. The Lord Mayor, you know, is only Lord Mayor for one year, and must then go back to private life." "But men have been Prime Ministers for ten years at a time. If you have made up your mind, I suppose we may as well give up. I shall always think it your own fault." He still smiled. "I shall," she said. "Oh, Cora!" "I can only speak as I feel." "I don't think you would speak as you do, if you knew how much your words hurt me. In such a matter as this I should not be justified in allowing your opinions to have weight with me. But your sympathy would be so much to me!" "When I thought it was making you ill, I wished that you might be spared." "My illness would be nothing, but my honour is everything. I, too, have something to bear as well as you, and if you cannot approve of what I do, at any rate be silent." "Yes;--I can be silent." Then he slowly left her. As he went she was almost tempted to yield, and to throw herself into his arms, and to promise that she would be soft to him, and to say that she was sure that all he did was for the best. But she could not bring herself as yet to be good-humoured. If he had only been a little stronger, a little thicker-skinned, made of clay a little coarser, a little other than he was, it might all have been so different! Early on that Sunday afternoon she had herself driven to Mrs. Finn's house in Park Lane, instead of waiting for her friend. Latterly she had but seldom done this, finding that her presence at home was much wanted. She had been filled with, perhaps, foolish ideas of the necessity of doing something,--of adding something to the strength of her husband's position,--and had certainly been diligent in her work. But now she might run about like any other woman. "This is an honour, Duchess," said Mrs. Finn. "Don't be sarcastic, Marie. We have nothing further to do with the bestowal of honours. Why didn't he make everybody a peer or a baronet while he was about it? Lord Finn! I don't see why he shouldn't have been Lord Finn. I'm sure he deserved it for the way in which he attacked Sir Timothy Beeswax." "I don't think he'd like it." "They all say so, but I suppose they do like it, or they wouldn't take it. And I'd have made Locock a knight;--Sir James Locock. He'd make a more knightly knight than Sir Timothy. When a man has power he ought to use it. It makes people respect him. Mr. Daubeny made a duke, and people think more of that than anything he did. Is Mr. Finn going to join the new ministry?" "If you can tell me, Duchess, who is to be the new minister, I can give a guess." "Mr. Monk." "Then he certainly will." "Or Mr. Daubeny." "Then he certainly won't." "Or Mr. Gresham." "That I could not answer." "Or the Duke of Omnium." "That would depend upon his Grace, If the Duke came back, Mr. Finn's services would be at his disposal, whether in or out of office." "Very prettily said, my dear. I never look round this room without thinking of the first time I came here. Do you remember, when I found the old man sitting there?" The old man alluded to was the late Duke. "I am not likely to forget it, Duchess." "How I hated you when I saw you! What a fright I thought you were! I pictured you to myself as a sort of ogre, willing to eat up everybody for the gratification of your own vanity." "I was very vain, but there was a little pride with it." "And now it has come to pass that I can't very well live without you. How he did love you!" "His Grace was very good to me." "It would have done no great harm, after all, if he had made you Duchess of Omnium." "Very great harm to me, Lady Glen. As it is I got a friend that I loved dearly, and a husband that I love dearly too. In the other case I should have had neither. Perhaps I may say, that in that other case my life would not have been brightened by the affection of the present Duchess." "One can't tell how it would have gone, but I well remember the state I was in then." The door was opened and Phineas Finn entered the room. "What, Mr. Finn, are you at home? I thought everybody was crowding down at the clubs, to know who is to be what. We are settled. We are quiet. We have nothing to do to disturb ourselves. But you ought to be in all the flutter of renewed expectation." "I am waiting my destiny in calm seclusion. I hope the Duke is well?" "As well as can be expected. He doesn't walk about his room with a poniard in his hand,--ready for himself or Sir Orlando; nor is he sitting crowned like Bacchus, drinking the health of the new Ministry with Lord Drummond and Sir Timothy. He is probably sipping a cup of coffee over a blue-book in dignified retirement. You should go and see him." "I should be unwilling to trouble him when he is so much occupied." "That is just what has done him all the harm in the world. Everybody presumes that he has so much to think of that nobody goes near him. Then he is left to boody over everything by himself till he becomes a sort of political hermit, or ministerial Lama, whom human eyes are not to look upon. It doesn't matter now; does it?" Visitor after visitor came in, and the Duchess chatted to them all, leaving the impression on everybody that heard her that she at least was not sorry to be relieved from the troubles attending her husband's late position. She sat there over an hour, and as she was taking her leave she had a few words to whisper to Mrs. Finn. "When this is all over," she said, "I mean to call on that Mrs. Lopez." "I thought you did go there." "That was soon after the poor man had killed himself,--when she was going away. Of course I only left a card. But I shall see her now if I can. We want to get her out of her melancholy if possible. I have a sort of feeling, you know, that among us we made the train run over him." "I don't think that." "He got so horribly abused for what he did at Silverbridge; and I really don't see why he wasn't to have his money. It was I that made him spend it." "He was, I fancy, a thoroughly bad man." "But a wife doesn't always want to be made a widow even if her husband be bad. I think I owe her something, and I would pay my debt if I knew how. I shall go and see her, and if she will marry this other man we'll take her by the hand. Good-bye, dear. You'd better come to me early to-morrow, as I suppose we shall know something by eleven o'clock." In the course of that evening the Duke of St. Bungay came to Carlton Terrace and was closeted for some time with the late Prime Minister. He had been engaged during that and the last two previous days in lending his aid to various political manoeuvres and ministerial attempts, from which our Duke had kept himself altogether aloof. He did not go to Windsor, but as each successive competitor journeyed thither and returned, some one either sent for the old Duke or went to seek his counsel. He was the Nestor of the occasion, and strove heartily to compose all quarrels, and so to arrange matters that a wholesome, moderately Liberal Ministry might be again installed for the good of the country and the comfort of all true Whigs. In such moments he almost ascended to the grand heights of patriotism, being always indifferent as to himself. Now he came to his late chief with a new project. Mr. Gresham would attempt to form a Ministry if the Duke of Omnium would join him. "It is impossible," said the younger politician, folding his hands together and throwing himself back in his chair. "Listen to me before you answer me with such certainty. There are three or four gentlemen who, after the work of the last three years, bearing in mind the manner in which our defeat has just been accomplished, feel themselves disinclined to join Mr. Gresham unless you will do so also. I may specially name Mr. Monk and Mr. Finn. I might perhaps add myself, were it not that I had hoped that in any event I might at length regard myself as exempt from further service. The old horse should be left to graze out his last days, Ne peccet ad extremum ridendus. But you can't consider yourself absolved on that score." "There are other reasons." "But the Queen's service should count before everything. Gresham and Cantrip with their own friends can hardly make a Ministry as things are now unless Mr. Monk will join them. I do not think that any other Chancellor of the Exchequer is at present possible." "I will beseech Mr. Monk not to let any feeling as to me stand in his way. Why should it?" "It is not only what you may think and he may think,--but what others will think and say. The Coalition will have done all that ought to have been expected from it if our party in it can now join Mr. Gresham." "By all means. But I could give them no strength. They may be sure at any rate of what little I can do for them out of office." "Mr. Gresham has made his acceptance of office,--well, I will not say strictly conditional on your joining him. That would hardly be correct. But he has expressed himself quite willing to make the attempt with your aid, and doubtful whether he can succeed without it. He suggests that you should join him as President of the Council." "And you?" "If I were wanted at all I should take the Privy Seal." "Certainly not, my friend. If there were any question of my return we would reverse the offices. But I think I may say that my mind is fixed. If you wish it I will see Mr. Monk, and do all that I can to get him to go with you. But for myself,--I feel that it would be useless." At last, at the Duke's pressing request, he agreed to take twenty-four hours before he gave his final answer to the proposition. CHAPTER LXXVII The Duchess in Manchester Square The Duke said not a word to his wife as to this new proposition, and when she asked him what tidings their old friend had brought as to the state of affairs, he almost told a fib in his anxiety to escape from her persecution. "He is in some doubt what he means to do himself," said the Duke. The Duchess asked many questions, but got no satisfactory reply to any of them. Nor did Mrs. Finn learn anything from her husband, whom, however, she did not interrogate very closely. She would be contented to know when the proper time might come for ladies to be informed. The Duke, however, was determined to take his twenty-four hours all alone,--or at any rate not to be driven to his decision by feminine interference. In the meantime the Duchess went to Manchester Square intent on performing certain good offices on behalf of the poor widow. It may be doubted whether she had clearly made up her mind what it was that she could do, though she was clear that some debt was due by her to Mrs. Lopez. And she knew too in what direction assistance might be serviceable, if only it could in this case be given. She had heard that the present member for Silverbridge had been the lady's lover long before Mr. Lopez had come upon the scene, and with those feminine wiles of which she was a perfect mistress she had extracted from him a confession that his mind was unaltered. She liked Arthur Fletcher,--as indeed she had for a time liked Ferdinand Lopez,--and felt that her conscience would be easier if she could assist in this good work. She built castles in the air as to the presence of the bride and bridegroom at Matching, thinking how she might thus repair the evil she had done. But her heart misgave her a little as she drew near to the house, and remembered how very slight was her acquaintance and how extremely delicate the mission on which she had come. But she was not the woman to turn back when she had once put her foot to any work; and she was driven up to the door in Manchester Square without any expressed hesitation on her own part. "Yes,--his mistress was at home," said the butler, still shrinking at the sound of the name which he hated. The Duchess was then shown upstairs, and was left alone for some minutes in the drawing-room. It was a large handsome apartment, hung round with valuable pictures, and having signs of considerable wealth. Since she had first invited Lopez to stand for Silverbridge she had heard much about him, and had wondered how he had gained possession of such a girl as Emily Wharton. And now, as she looked about, her wonder was increased. She knew enough of such people as the Whartons and the Fletchers to be aware that as a class they are more impregnable, more closely guarded by their feelings and prejudices against strangers than any other. None keep their daughters to themselves with greater care, or are less willing to see their rules of life changed or abolished. And yet this man, half foreigner half Jew,--and as it now appeared, whole pauper,--had stepped in and carried off a prize for which such a one as Arthur Fletcher was contending! The Duchess had never seen Emily but once,--so as to observe her well,--and had then thought her to be a very handsome woman. It had been at the garden party at Richmond, and Lopez had then insisted that his wife should be well dressed. It would perhaps have been impossible in the whole of that assembly to find a more beautiful woman than Mrs. Lopez then was,--or one who carried herself with a finer air. Now when she entered the room in her deep mourning it would have been difficult to recognise her. Her face was much thinner, her eyes apparently larger, and her colour faded. And there had come a settled seriousness on her face which seemed to rob her of her youth. Arthur Fletcher had declared that as he saw her now she was more beautiful than ever. But Arthur Fletcher, in looking at her, saw more than her mere features. To his eyes there was a tenderness added by her sorrow which had its own attraction for him. And he was so well versed in every line of her countenance, that he could see there the old loveliness behind the sorrow; the loveliness which would come forth again, as bright as ever, if the sorrow could be removed. But the Duchess, though she remembered the woman's beauty as she might that of any other lady, now saw nothing but a thing of woe wrapped in customary widow's weeds. "I hope," she said, "I am not intruding in coming to you; but I have been anxious to renew our acquaintance for reasons which I am sure you will understand." Emily at the moment hardly knew how to address her august visitor. Though her father had lived all his life in what is called good society, he had not consorted much with dukes and duchesses. She herself had indeed on one occasion been for an hour or two the guest of this grand lady, but on that occasion she had hardly been called upon to talk to her. Now she doubted how to name the Duchess, and with some show of hesitation decided at last upon not naming her at all. "It is very good of you to come," she said in a faltering voice. "I told you that I would when I wrote, you know. That is many months ago, but I have not forgotten it. You have been in the country since that, I think?" "Yes, in Herefordshire. Herefordshire is our county." "I know all about it," said the Duchess, smiling. She generally did contrive to learn "all about" the people whom she chose to take by the hand. "We have a Herefordshire gentleman sitting for,--I must not say our borough of Silverbridge." She was anxious to make some allusion to Arthur Fletcher; but it was difficult to travel on that Silverbridge ground, as Lopez had been her chosen candidate when she still wished to claim the borough as an appanage of the Palliser family. Emily, however, kept her countenance and did not show by any sign that her thoughts were running in that direction. "And though we don't presume to regard Mr. Fletcher," continued the Duchess, "as in any way connected with our local interests, he has always supported the Duke, and I hope has become a friend of ours. I think he is a neighbour of yours in the country." "Oh, yes. My cousin is married to his brother." "I knew there was something of that kind. He told me that there was some close alliance." The Duchess as she looked at the woman to whom she wanted to be kind did not as yet dare to express a wish that there might at some not very distant time be a closer alliance. She had come there intending to do so; and had still some hope that she might do it before the interview was over. But at any rate she would not do it yet. "Have I not heard," she said, "something of another marriage?" "My brother is going to marry his cousin, Sir Alured Wharton's daughter." "Ah;--I thought it had been one of the Fletchers. It was our member who told me, and he spoke as though they were all his very dear friends." "They are dear friends,--very." Poor Emily still didn't know whether to call her Duchess, my Lady, or your Grace,--and yet felt the need of calling her by some special name. "Exactly. I supposed it was so. They tell me Mr. Fletcher will become quite a favourite in the House. At this present moment nobody knows on which side anybody is going to sit to-morrow. It may be that Mr. Fletcher will become the dire enemy of all the Duke's friends." "I hope not." "Of course I'm speaking of political enemies. Political enemies are often the best friends in the world; and I can assure you from my own experience that political friends are often the bitterest enemies. I never hated any people so much as some of our supporters." The Duchess made a grimace, and Emily could not refrain from smiling. "Yes, indeed. There's an old saying that misfortune makes strange bedfellows, but political friendship makes stranger alliances than misfortune. Perhaps you never met Sir Timothy Beeswax." "Never." "Well;--don't. But, as I was saying, there is no knowing who may support whom now. If I were asked who would be Prime Minister to-morrow, I should take half-a-dozen names and shake them in a bag." "It is not settled then?" "Settled! No, indeed. Nothing is settled." At that moment indeed everything was settled, though the Duchess did not know it. "And so we none of us can tell how Mr. Fletcher may stand with us when things are arranged. I suppose he calls himself a Conservative?" "Oh, yes!" "All the Whartons, I suppose, are Conservatives,--and all the Fletchers." "Very nearly. Papa calls himself a Tory." "A very much better name, to my thinking. We are all Whigs, of course. A Palliser who was not a Whig would be held to have disgraced himself for ever. Are not politics odd? A few years ago I only barely knew what the word meant, and that not correctly. Lately I have been so eager about it, that there hardly seems to be anything else left worth living for. I suppose it's wrong, but a state of pugnacity seems to me the greatest bliss which we can reach here on earth." "I shouldn't like to be always fighting." "That's because you haven't known Sir Timothy Beeswax and two or three other gentlemen whom I could name. The day will come, I dare say, when you will care for politics." Emily was about to answer, hardly knowing what to say, when the door was opened and Mrs. Roby came into the room. The lady was not announced, and Emily had heard no knock at the door. She was forced to go through some ceremony of introduction. "This is my aunt, Mrs. Roby," she said. "Aunt Harriet, the Duchess of Omnium." Mrs. Roby was beside herself,--not all with joy. That feeling would come afterwards as she would boast to her friends of her new acquaintance. At present there was the embarrassment of not quite knowing how to behave herself. The Duchess bowed from her seat, and smiled sweetly,--as she had learned to smile since her husband had become Prime Minister. Mrs. Roby curtsied, and then remembered that in these days only housemaids ought to curtsey. "Anything to our Mr. Roby?" said the Duchess, continuing her smile,--"ours as he was till yesterday at least." This she said in an absurd wail of mock sorrow. "My brother-in-law, your Grace," said Mrs. Roby, delighted. "Oh indeed. And what does Mr. Roby think about it, I wonder? But I dare say you have found, Mrs. Roby, that when a crisis comes,--a real crisis,--the ladies are told nothing. I have." "I don't think, your Grace, that Mr. Roby ever divulges political secrets." "Doesn't he indeed! What a dull man your brother-in-law must be to live with,--that is as a politician! Good-bye, Mrs. Lopez. You must come and see me and let me come to you again. I hope, you know,--I hope the time may come when things may once more be bright with you." These last words she murmured almost in a whisper, as she held the hand of the woman she wished to befriend. Then she bowed to Mrs. Roby, and left the room. "What was it she said to you?" asked Mrs. Roby. "Nothing in particular, Aunt Harriet." "She seems to be very friendly. What made her come?" "She wrote some time ago to say she would call." "But why?" "I cannot tell you. I don't know. Don't ask me, aunt, about things that are passed. You cannot do it without wounding me." "I don't want to wound you, Emily, but I really think that that is nonsense. She is a very nice woman;--though I don't think she ought to have said that Mr. Roby is dull. Did Mr. Wharton know that she was coming?" "He knew that she said she would come," replied Emily very sternly, so that Mrs. Roby found herself compelled to pass on to some other subject. Mrs. Roby had heard the wish expressed that something "once more might be bright," and when she got home told her husband that she was sure that Emily Lopez was going to marry Arthur Fletcher. "And why the d---- shouldn't she?" said Dick. "And that poor man destroying himself not much more than twelve months ago! I couldn't do it," said Mrs. Roby. "I don't mean to give you the chance," said Dick. The Duchess when she went away suffered under a sense of failure. She had intended to bring about some crisis of female tenderness in which she might have rushed into future hopes and joyous anticipations, and with the freedom which will come from ebullitions of feeling, have told the widow that the peculiar circumstances of her position would not only justify her in marrying this other man but absolutely called upon her to do it. Unfortunately she had failed in her attempt to bring the interview to a condition in which this would have been possible, and while she was still making the attempt that odious aunt had come in. "I have been on my mission," she said to Mrs. Finn afterwards. "Have you done any good?" "I don't think I've done any harm. Women, you know, are so very different! There are some who would delight to have an opportunity of opening their hearts to a Duchess, and who might almost be talked into anything in an ecstasy." "Hardly women of the best sort, Lady Glen." "Not of the best sort. But then one doesn't come across the very best, very often. But that kind of thing does have an effect; and as I only wanted to do good, I wish she had been one of the sort for the occasion." "Was she--offended?" "Oh dear, no. You don't suppose I attacked her with a husband at the first word. Indeed, I didn't attack her at all. She didn't give me an opportunity. Such a Niobe you never saw." "Was she weeping?" "Not actual tears. But her gown, and her cap, and her strings were weeping. Her voice wept, and her hair, and her nose, and her mouth. Don't you know that look of subdued mourning? And yet they say that that man is dying for love. How beautiful it is to see that there is such a thing as constancy left in the world." When she got home she found that her husband had just returned from the old Duke's house, where he had met Mr. Monk, Mr. Gresham, and Lord Cantrip. "It's all settled at last," he said cheerfully. CHAPTER LXXVIII The New Ministry When the ex-Prime Minister was left by himself after the departure of his old friend his first feeling had been one of regret that he had been weak enough to doubt at all. He had long since made up his mind that after all that had passed he could not return to office as a subordinate. That feeling as to the impropriety of Cæsar descending to serve under others which he had been foolish enough to express, had been strong with him from the very commencement of his Ministry. When first asked to take the place which he had filled the reason strong against it had been the conviction that it would probably exclude him from political work during the latter half of his life. The man who has written Q.C. after his name must abandon his practice behind the bar. As he then was, although he had already been driven by the unhappy circumstance of his peerage from the House of Commons which he loved so well, there were still open to him many fields of political work. But if he should once consent to stand on the top rung of the ladder, he could not, he thought, take a lower place without degradation. Till he should have been placed quite at the top no shifting his place from this higher to that lower office would injure him in his own estimation. The exigencies of the service and not defeat would produce such changes as that. But he could not go down from being Prime Minister and serve under some other chief without acknowledging himself to have been unfit for the place he had filled. Of all that he had quite assured himself. And yet he had allowed the old Duke to talk him into a doubt! As he sat considering the question he acknowledged that there might have been room for doubt, though in the present emergency there certainly was none. He could imagine circumstances in which the experience of an individual in some special branch of his country's service might be of such paramount importance to the country as to make it incumbent on a man to sacrifice all personal feeling. But it was not so with him. There was nothing now which he could do, which another might not do as well. That blessed task of introducing decimals into all the commercial relations of British life, which had once kept him aloft in the air, floating as upon eagle's wings, had been denied him. If ever done it must be done from the House of Commons; and the people of the country had become deaf to the charms of that great reform. Othello's occupation was, in truth, altogether gone, and there was no reason by which he could justify to himself the step down in the world which the old Duke had proposed to him. Early on the following morning he left Carlton Terrace on foot and walked as far as Mr. Monk's house, which was close to St. James's Street. Here at eleven o'clock he found his late Chancellor of the Exchequer in that state of tedious agitation in which a man is kept who does not yet know whether he is or is not to be one of the actors in the play just about to be performed. The Duke had never before been in Mr. Monk's very humble abode, and now caused some surprise. Mr. Monk knew that he might probably be sent for, but had not expected that any of the ex-Prime Ministers of the day would come to him. People had said that not improbably he himself might be the man,--but he himself had indulged in no such dream. Office had had no great charms for him;--and if there was one man of the late Government who could lay it down without a personal regret, it was Mr. Monk. "I wish you to come with me to the Duke's house in St. James's Square," said the late Prime Minister. "I think we shall find him at home." "Certainly. I will come this moment." Then there was not a word spoken till the two men were in the street together. "Of course I am a little anxious," said Mr. Monk. "Have you anything to tell me before we get there?" "You of course must return to office, Mr. Monk." "With your Grace--I certainly will do so." "And without, if there be the need. They who are wanted should be forthcoming. But perhaps you will let me postpone what I have to say till we see the Duke. What a charming morning;--is it not? How sweet it would be down in the country." March had gone out like a lamb, and even in London the early April days were sweet,--to be followed, no doubt, by the usual nipping inclemency of May. "I never can get over the feeling," continued the Duke, "that Parliament should sit for the six winter months, instead of in summer. If we met on the first of October, how glorious it would be to get away for the early spring!" "Nothing less strong than grouse could break up Parliament," said Mr. Monk; "and then what would the pheasants and the foxes say?" "It is giving up almost too much to our amusements. I used to think that I should like to move for a return of the number of hunting and shooting gentlemen in both Houses. I believe it would be a small minority." "But their sons shoot, and their daughters hunt, and all their hangers-on would be against it." "Custom is against us, Mr. Monk; that is it. Here we are. I hope my friend will not be out, looking up young Lords of the Treasury." The Duke of St. Bungay was not in search of cadets for the Government, but was at this very moment closeted with Mr. Gresham, and Mr. Gresham's especial friend Lord Cantrip. He had been at this work so long and so constantly that his very servants had their ministerial-crisis manners and felt and enjoyed the importance of the occasion. The two newcomers were soon allowed to enter the august conclave, and the five great senators greeted each other cordially. "I hope we have not come inopportunely," said the Duke of Omnium. Mr. Gresham assured him almost with hilarity that nothing could be less inopportune;--and then the Duke was sure that Mr. Gresham was to be the new Prime Minister, whoever might join him or whoever might refuse to do so. "I told my friend here," continued our Duke, laying his hand upon the old man's arm, "that I would give him his answer to a proposition he made me within twenty-four hours. But I find that I can do so without that delay." "I trust your Grace's answer may be favourable to us," said Mr. Gresham,--who indeed did not doubt much that it would be so, seeing that Mr. Monk had accompanied him. "I do not think that it will be unfavourable, though I cannot do as my friend has proposed." "Any practicable arrangement--" began Mr. Gresham, with a frown, however, on his brow. "The most practicable arrangement, I am sure, will be for you to form your Government without hampering yourself with a beaten predecessor." "Not beaten," said Lord Cantrip. "Certainly not," said the other Duke. "It is because of your success that I ask your services," said Mr. Gresham. "I have none to give,--none that I cannot better bestow out of office than in. I must ask you, gentlemen, to believe that I am quite fixed. Coming here with my friend Mr. Monk, I did not state my purpose to him; but I begged him to accompany me, fearing lest in my absence he should feel it incumbent on himself to sail in the same boat with his late colleague." "I should prefer to do so," said Mr. Monk. "Of course it is not for me to say what may be Mr. Gresham's ideas; but as my friend here suggested to me that, were I to return to office, Mr. Monk would do so also, I cannot be wrong in surmising that his services are desired." Mr. Gresham bowed assent. "I shall therefore take the liberty of telling Mr. Monk that I think he is bound to give his aid in the present emergency. Were I as happily placed as he is in being the possessor of a seat in the House of Commons, I too should hope that I might do something." The four gentlemen, with eager pressure, begged the Duke to reconsider his decision. He could take this office and do nothing in it,--there being, as we all know, offices the holders of which are not called upon for work,--or he could take that place which would require him to labour like a galley slave. Would he be Privy Seal? Would he undertake the India Board? But the Duke of Omnium was at last resolute. Of this administration he would not at any rate be a member. Whether Cæsar might or might not at some future time condescend to command a legion, he could not do so when the purple had been but that moment stripped from his shoulders. He soon afterwards left the house with a repeated request to Mr. Monk that he would not follow his late chief's example. "I regret it greatly," said Mr. Gresham when he was gone. "There is no man," said Lord Cantrip, "whom all who know him more thoroughly respect." "He has been worried," said the old Duke, "and must take time to recover himself. He has but one fault,--he is a little too conscientious, a little too scrupulous." Mr. Monk, of course, did join them, making one or two stipulations as he did so. He required that his friend Phineas Finn should be included in the Government. Mr. Gresham yielded, though poor Phineas was not among the most favoured friends of that statesman. And so the Government was formed, and the crisis was again over, and the lists which all the newspapers had been publishing for the last three days were republished in an amended and nearly correct condition. The triumph of the "People's Banner," as to the omission of the Duke, was of course complete. The editor had no hesitation in declaring that he, by his own sagacity and persistency, had made certain the exclusion of that very unfit and very pressing candidate for office. The list was filled up after the usual fashion. For a while the dilettanti politicians of the clubs, and the strong-minded women who take an interest in such things, and the writers in newspapers, had almost doubted whether, in the emergency which had been supposed to be so peculiar, any Government could be formed. There had been,--so they had said,--peculiarities so peculiar that it might be that the much-dreaded deadlock had come at last. A Coalition had been possible and, though antagonistic to British feelings generally, had carried on the Government. But what might succeed the Coalition, nobody had known. The Radicals and Liberals together would be too strong for Mr. Daubeny and Sir Orlando. Mr. Gresham had no longer a party of his own at his back, and a second Coalition would be generally spurned. In this way there had been much political excitement, and a fair amount of consequent enjoyment. But after a few days the old men had rattled into their old places,--or, generally, old men into new places,--and it was understood that Mr. Gresham would be again supported by a majority. As we grow old it is a matter of interest to watch how the natural gaps are filled in the two ranks of parliamentary workmen by whom the Government is carried on, either in the one interest or the other. Of course there must be gaps. Some men become too old,--though that is rarely the case. A Peel may perish, or even a Palmerston must die. Some men, though long supported by interest, family connection, or the loyalty of colleagues, are weighed down at last by their own incapacity and sink into peerages. Now and again a man cannot bear the bondage of office, and flies into rebellion and independence which would have been more respectable had it not been the result of discontent. Then the gaps must be filled. Whether on this side or on that, the candidates are first looked for among the sons of Earls and Dukes,--and not unnaturally, as the sons of Earls and Dukes may be educated for such work almost from their infancy. A few rise by the slow process of acknowledged fitness,--men who probably at first have not thought of office but are chosen because they are wanted, and whose careers are grudged them, not by their opponents or rivals, but by the Browns and Joneses of the world who cannot bear to see a Smith or a Walker become something so different to themselves. These men have a great weight to carry, and cannot always shake off the burden of their origin and live among begotten statesmen as though they too had been born to the manner. But perhaps the most wonderful ministerial phenomenon,--though now almost too common to be longer called a phenomenon,--is he who rises high in power and place by having made himself thoroughly detested and also,--alas for parliamentary cowardice!--thoroughly feared. Given sufficient audacity, a thick skin, and power to bear for a few years the evil looks and cold shoulders of his comrades, and that is the man most sure to make his way to some high seat. But the skin must be thicker than that of any animal known, and the audacity must be complete. To the man who will once shrink at the idea of being looked at askance for treachery, or hated for his ill condition, the career is impossible. But let him be obdurate, and the bid will come. "Not because I want him, do I ask for him," says some groaning chief of a party,--to himself, and also sufficiently aloud for others' ears,--"but because he stings me and goads me, and will drive me to madness as a foe." Then the pachydermatous one enters into the other's heaven, probably with the resolution already formed of ousting that unhappy angel. And so it was in the present instance. When Mr. Gresham's completed list was published to the world, the world was astonished to find that Sir Timothy was to be Mr. Gresham's Attorney-General. Sir Gregory Grogram became Lord Chancellor, and the Liberal chief was content to borrow his senior law adviser from the Conservative side of the late Coalition. It could not be that Mr. Gresham was very fond of Sir Timothy;--but Sir Timothy in the late debates had shown himself to be a man of whom a minister might well be afraid. Immediately on leaving the old Duke's house, the late Premier went home to his wife, and, finding that she was out, waited for her return. Now that he had put his own decision beyond his own power he was anxious to let her know how it was to be with them. "I think it is settled at last," he said. "And you are coming back?" "Certainly not that. I believe I may say that Mr. Gresham is Prime Minister." "Then he oughtn't to be," said the Duchess crossly. "I am sorry that I must differ from you, my dear, because I think he is the fittest man in England for the place." "And you?" "I am a private gentleman who will now be able to devote more of his time to his wife and children than has hitherto been possible with him." "How very nice! Do you mean to say that you like it?" "I am sure that I ought to like it. At the present moment I am thinking more of what you will like." "If you ask me, Plantagenet, you know I shall tell the truth." "Then tell the truth." "After drinking brandy so long I hardly think that 12s. claret will agree with my stomach. You ask for the truth, and there it is,--very plainly." "Plain enough!" "You asked, you know." "And I am glad to have been told, even though that which you tell me is not pleasant hearing. When a man has been drinking too much brandy, it may be well that he should be put on a course of 12s. claret." "He won't like it; and then,--it's kill or cure." "I don't think you're gone so far, Cora, that we need fear that the remedy will be fatal." "I am thinking of you rather than myself. I can make myself generally disagreeable, and get excitement in that way. But what will you do? It's all very well to talk of me and the children, but you can't bring in a Bill for reforming us. You can't make us go by decimals. You can't increase our consumption by lowering our taxation. I wish you had gone back to some Board." This she said looking up into his face with an anxiety which was half real and half burlesque. "I had made up my mind to go back to no Board,--for the present. I was thinking that we could spend some months in Italy, Cora." "What; for the summer;--so as to be in Rome in July! After that we could utilise the winter by visiting Norway." "We might take Norway first." "And be eaten up by mosquitoes! I've got to be too old to like travelling." "What do you like, dear?" "Nothing;--except being the Prime Minister's wife; and upon my word there were times when I didn't like that very much. I don't know anything else that I'm fit for. I wonder whether Mr. Gresham would let me go to him as housekeeper? Only we should have to lend him Gatherum, or there would be no room for the display of my abilities. Is Mr. Monk in?" "He keeps his old office." "And Mr. Finn?" "I believe so; but in what place I don't know." "And who else?" "Our old friend the Duke, and Lord Cantrip, and Mr. Wilson,--and Sir Gregory will be Lord Chancellor." "Just the old stupid Liberal team. Put their names in a bag and shake them, and you can always get a ministry. Well, Plantagenet;--I'll go anywhere you like to take me. I'll have something for the malaria at Rome, and something for the mosquitoes in Norway, and will make the best of it. But I don't see why you should run away in the middle of the Session. I would stay and pitch into them, all round, like a true ex-minister and independent member of Parliament." Then as he was leaving her she fired a last shot. "I hope you made Sir Orlando and Sir Timothy peers before you gave up." It was not till two days after this that she read in one of the daily papers that Sir Timothy Beeswax was to be Attorney-General, and then her patience almost deserted her. To tell the truth, her husband had not dared to mention the appointment when he first saw her after hearing it. Her explosion first fell on the head of Phineas Finn, whom she found at home with his wife, deploring the necessity which had fallen upon him of filling the fainéant office of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. "Mr. Finn," she said, "I congratulate you on your colleagues." "Your Grace is very good. I was at any rate introduced to many of them under the Duke's auspices." "And ought, I think, to have seen enough of them to be ashamed of them. Such a regiment to march through Coventry with!" "I do not doubt that we shall be good enough men for any enemies we may meet." "It cannot but be that you should conquer all the world with such a hero among you as Sir Timothy Beeswax. The idea of Sir Timothy coming back again! What do you feel about it?" "Very indifferent, Duchess. He won't interfere much with me, as I have an Attorney-General of my own. You see I'm especially safe." "I do believe men would do anything," said the Duchess, turning to Mrs. Finn. "Of course I mean in the way of politics! But I did not think it possible that the Duke of St. Bungay should again be in the same Government with Sir Timothy Beeswax." CHAPTER LXXIX The Wharton Wedding It was at last settled that the Wharton marriage should take place during the second week in June. There were various reasons for the postponement. In the first place Mary Wharton, after a few preliminary inquiries, found herself forced to declare that Messrs. Muddocks and Cramble could not send her forth equipped as she ought to be equipped for such a husband in so short a time. "Perhaps they do it quicker in London," she said to Everett with a soft regret, remembering the metropolitan glories of her sister's wedding. And then Arthur Fletcher could be present during the Whitsuntide holidays; and the presence of Arthur Fletcher was essential. And it was not only his presence at the altar that was needed;--Parliament was not so exacting but that he might have given that;--but it was considered by the united families to be highly desirable that he should on this occasion remain some days in the country. Emily had promised to attend the wedding, and would of course be at Wharton for at least a week. As soon as Everett had succeeded in wresting a promise from his sister, the tidings were conveyed to Fletcher. It was a great step gained. When in London she was her own mistress; but surrounded as she would be down in Herefordshire by Fletchers and Whartons, she must be stubborn indeed if she should still refuse to be taken back into the flock, and be made once more happy by marrying the man whom she confessed that she loved with her whole heart. The letter to Arthur Fletcher containing the news was from his brother John, and was written in a very business-like fashion. "We have put off Mary's marriage a few days, so that you and she should be down here together. If you mean to go on with it, now is your time." Arthur, in answer to this, merely said he would spend the Whitsuntide holidays at Longbarns. It is probable that Emily herself had some idea in her own mind of what was being done to entrap her. Her brother's words to her had been so strong, and the occasion of his marriage was itself so sacred to her, that she had not been able to refuse his request. But from the moment that she had made the promise, she felt that she had greatly added to her own difficulties. That she could yield to Arthur never occurred to her. She was certain of her own persistency. Whatever might be the wishes of others, the fitness of things required that Arthur Fletcher's wife should not have been the widow of Ferdinand Lopez,--and required also that the woman who had married Ferdinand Lopez should bear the results of her own folly. Though since his death she had never spoken a syllable against him,--if those passionate words be excepted which Arthur himself had drawn from her,--still she had not refrained from acknowledging the truth to herself. He had been a man disgraced,--and she as his wife, having become his wife in opposition to the wishes of all her friends, was disgraced also. Let them do what they will with her, she would not soil Arthur Fletcher's name with this infamy. Such was still her steadfast resolution; but she knew that it would be, not endangered, but increased in difficulty by this visit to Herefordshire. And then there were other troubles. "Papa," she said, "I must get a dress for Everett's marriage." "Why not?" "I can't bear, after all that I have cost you, putting you to such useless expense." "It is not useless, and such expenses as that I can surely afford without groaning. Do it handsomely and you will please me best." Then she went forth and chose her dress,--a grey silk, light enough not to throw quite a gloom on the brightness of the day, and yet dark enough to declare that she was not as other women are. The very act of purchasing this, almost blushing at her own request as she sat at the counter in her widow's weeds, was a pain to her. But she had no one whom she could employ. On such an occasion she could not ask her aunt Harriet to act for her, as her aunt was distrusted and disliked. And then there was the fitting on of the dress,--very grievous to her, as it was the first time since the heavy black mourning came home that she had clothed herself in other garments. The day before that fixed for the marriage she and her father went down to Herefordshire together, the conversation on the way being all in respect to Everett. Where was he to live? What was he to do? What income would he require till he should inherit the good things which destiny had in store for him? The old man seemed to feel that Providence, having been so very good to his son in killing that other heir, had put rather a heavy burden on himself. "He'll want a house of his own, of course," he said, in a somewhat lachrymose tone. "I suppose he'll spend a good deal of his time at Wharton." "He won't be content to live in another man's house altogether, my dear; and Sir Alured can allow him nothing. It means, of course, that I must give him a thousand a year. It seems very natural to him, I dare say, but he might have asked the question before he took a wife to himself." "You won't be angry with him, papa!" "It's no good being angry. No;--I'm not angry. Only it seems that everybody is uncommonly well pleased without thinking who has to pay for the piper." On that evening, at Wharton, Emily still wore her mourning dress. No one, indeed, dared to speak to her on the subject, and Mary was even afraid lest she might appear in black on the following day. We all know in what condition is a house on the eve of a marriage,--how the bride feels that all the world is going to be changed, and that therefore everything is for the moment disjointed; and how the rest of the household, including the servants, are led to share the feeling. Everett was of course away. He was over at Longbarns with the Fletchers, and was to be brought to Wharton Church on the following morning. Old Mrs. Fletcher was at Wharton Hall,--and the bishop, whose services had been happily secured. He was formally introduced to Mrs. Lopez, the use of the name for the occasion being absolutely necessary, and with all the smiling urbanity which as a bishop he was bound to possess, he was hardly able not to be funereal as he looked at her and remembered her story. Before the evening was over Mrs. Fletcher did venture to give a hint. "We are so glad you have come, my dear." "I could not stay away when Everett said he wished it." "It would have been wrong; yes, my dear,--wrong. It is your duty, and the duty of us all, to subordinate our feelings to those of others. Even sorrow may be selfish." Poor Emily listened but could make no reply. "It is sometimes harder for us to be mindful of others in our grief than in our joy. You should remember, dear, that there are some who will never be light-hearted again till they see you smile." "Do not say that, Mrs. Fletcher." "It is quite true;--and right that you should think of it. It will be particularly necessary that you should think of it to-morrow. You will have to wear a light dress, and--" "I have come provided," said the widow. "Try then to make your heart as light as your frock. You will be doing it for Everett's sake, and for your father's, and for Mary's sake--and Arthur's. You will be doing it for the sake of all of us on a day that should be joyous." She could not make any promise in reply to this homily, but in her heart of hearts she acknowledged that it was true, and declared to herself that she would make the effort required of her. On the following morning the house was of course in confusion. There was to be a breakfast after the service, and after the breakfast the bride was to be taken away in a carriage and four as far as Hereford on her route to Paris;--but before the great breakfast there was of course a subsidiary breakfast,--or how could bishop, bride, or bridesmaids have sustained the ceremony? At this meal Emily did not appear, having begged for a cup of tea in her own room. The carriages to take the party to the church, which was but the other side of the park, were ordered at eleven, and at a quarter before eleven she appeared for the first time in her grey silk dress, and without a widow's cap. Everything was very plain, but the alteration was so great that it was impossible not to look at her. Even her father had not seen the change before. Not a word was said, though old Mrs. Fletcher's thanks were implied by the graciousness of her smile. As there were four bridesmaids and four other ladies besides the bride herself, in a few minutes she became obscured by the brightness of the others;--and then they were all packed in their carriages and taken to the church. The eyes which she most dreaded did not meet hers till they were all standing round the altar. It was only then that she saw Arthur Fletcher, who was there as her brother's best man, and it was then that he took her hand and held it for half a minute as though he never meant to part with it, hidden behind the wide-spread glories of the bridesmaids' finery. The marriage was as sweet and solemn as a kind-hearted bishop could make it, and all the ladies looked particularly well. The veil from London,--with the orange wreath, also metropolitan,--was perfect, and as for the dress, I doubt whether any woman would have known it to be provincial. Everett looked the rising baronet, every inch of him, and the old barrister smiled and seemed, at least, to be well pleased. Then came the breakfast, and the speech-making, in which Arthur Fletcher shone triumphantly. It was a very nice wedding, and Mary Wharton,--as she had been and still was,--felt herself for a moment to be a heroine. But, through it all, there was present to the hearts of most of them a feeling that much more was to be effected, if possible, than this simple and cosy marriage, and that the fate of Mary Wharton was hardly so important to them as that of Emily Lopez. When the carriage and four was gone there came upon the household the difficulty usual on such occasions of getting through the rest of the day. The bridesmaids retired and repacked their splendours so that they might come out fresh for other second-rate needs, and with the bridesmaids went the widow. Arthur Fletcher remained at Wharton with all the other Fletchers for the night, and was prepared to renew his suit on that very day, if an opportunity were given him; but Emily did not again show herself till a few minutes before dinner, and then she came down with all the appurtenances of mourning which she usually wore. The grey silk had been put on for the marriage ceremony and for that only. "You should have kept your dress at any rate for the day," said Mrs. Fletcher. She replied that she had changed it for Everett, and that as Everett was gone there was no further need for her to wear clothes unfitted to her position. Arthur would have cared very little for the clothes could he have had his way with the woman who wore them,--could he have had his way even so far as to have found himself alone with her for half-an-hour. But no such chance was his. She retreated from the party early, and did not show herself on the following morning till after he had started for Longbarns. All the Fletchers went back,--not, however, with any intention on the part of Arthur to abandon his immediate attempt. The distance between the houses was not so great but that he could drive himself over at any time. "I shall go now," he said to Mr. Wharton, "because I have promised John to fish with him to-morrow, but I shall come over on Monday or Tuesday, and stay till I go back to town. I hope she will at any rate let me speak to her." The father said he would do his best, but that that obstinate resumption of her weeds on her brother's very wedding day had nearly broken his heart. When the Fletchers were back at Longbarns, the two ladies were very severe on her. "It was downright obstinacy," said the squire's wife, "and it almost makes me think it would serve her right to leave her as she is." "It's pride," said the old lady. "She won't give way. I said ever so much to her,--but it's no use. I feel it the more because we have all gone so much out of the way to be good to her after she had made such a fool of herself. If it goes on much longer, I shall never forgive her again." "You'll have to forgive her, mother," said her eldest son, "let her sins be what they may,--or else you'll have to quarrel with Arthur." "I do think it's very hard," said the old lady, taking herself out of the room. And it was hard. The offence in the first instance had been very great, and the forgiveness very difficult. But Mrs. Fletcher had lived long enough to know that when sons are thoroughly respectable a widowed mother has to do their bidding. Emily, through the whole wedding day, and the next day, and day after day, remembered Mrs. Fletcher's words. "There are some who will never be light-hearted again till they see you smile." And the old woman had named her dearest friends, and had ended by naming Arthur Fletcher. She had then acknowledged to herself that it was her duty to smile in order that others might smile also. But how is one to smile with a heavy heart? Should one smile and lie? And how long and to what good purpose can such forced contentment last? She had marred her whole life. In former days she had been proud of all her virgin glories,--proud of her intellect, proud of her beauty, proud of that obeisance which beauty, birth, and intellect combined, exact from all comers. She had been ambitious as to her future life;--had intended to be careful not to surrender herself to some empty fool;--had thought herself well qualified to pick her own steps. And this had come of it! They told her that she might still make everything right, annul the past and begin the world again as fresh as ever,--if she would only smile and study to forget! Do it for the sake of others, they said, and then it will be done for yourself also. But she could not conquer the past. The fire and water of repentance, adequate as they may be for eternity, cannot burn out or wash away the remorse of this life. They scorch and choke;--and unless it be so there is no repentance. So she told herself,--and yet it was her duty to be light-hearted that others around her might not be made miserable by her sorrow! If she could be in truth light-hearted, then would she know herself to be unfeeling and worthless. On the third day after the marriage Arthur Fletcher came back to Wharton with the declared intention of remaining there till the end of the holidays. She could make no objection to such an arrangement, nor could she hasten her own return to London. That had been fixed before her departure and was to be made together with her father. She felt that she was being attacked with unfair weapons, and that undue advantage was taken of the sacrifice which she had made for her brother's sake. And yet,--yet how good to her they all were! How wonderful was it that after the thing she had done, after the disgrace she had brought on herself and them, after the destruction of all that pride which had once been hers, they should still wish to have her among them! As for him,--of whom she was always thinking,--of what nature must be his love, when he was willing to take to himself as his wife such a thing as she had made herself! But, thinking of this, she would only tell herself that as he would not protect himself, she was bound to be his protector. Yes;--she would protect him, though she could dream of a world of joy that might be hers if she could dare to do as he would ask her. He caught her at last and forced her to come out with him into the grounds. He could tell his tale better as he walked by her side than sitting restlessly on a chair or moving awkwardly about the room as on such an occasion he would be sure to do. Within four walls she would have some advantage over him. She could sit still and be dignified in her stillness. But in the open air, when they would both be on their legs, she might not be so powerful with him, and he perhaps might be stronger with her. She could not refuse him when he asked her to walk with him. And why should she refuse him? Of course he must be allowed to utter his prayer,--and then she must be allowed to make her answer. "I think the marriage went off very well," he said. "Very well. Everett ought to be a happy man." "No doubt he will be,--when he settles down to something. Everything will come right for him. With some people things seem to go smooth; don't they? They have not hitherto gone smoothly with you and me, Emily." "You are prosperous. You have everything before you that a man can wish, if only you will allow yourself to think so. Your profession is successful, and you are in Parliament, and everyone likes you." "It is all nothing." "That is the general discontent of the world." "It is all nothing,--unless I have you too. Remember that I had said so long before I was successful, when I did not dream of Parliament; before we had heard of the name of the man who came between me and my happiness. I think I am entitled to be believed when I say so. I think I know my own mind. There are many men who would have been changed by the episode of such a marriage." "You ought to have been changed by it,--and by its result." "It had no such effect. Here I am, after it all, telling you as I used to tell you before, that I have to look to you for my happiness." "You should be ashamed to confess it, Arthur." "Never;--not to you, nor to all the world. I know what it has been. I know you are not now as you were then. You have been his wife, and are now his widow." "That should be enough." "But, such as you are, my happiness is in your hands. If it were not so, do you think that all my family as well as yours would join in wishing that you may become my wife? There is nothing to conceal. When you married that man you know what my mother thought of it; and what John thought of it, and his wife. They had wanted you to be my wife; and they want it now,--because they are anxious for my happiness. And your father wishes it, and your brother wishes it,--because they trust me, and think that I should be a good husband to you." "Good!" she exclaimed, hardly knowing what she meant by repeating the word. "After that you have no right to set yourself up to judge what may be best for my happiness. They who know how to judge are all united. Whatever you may have been, they believe that it will be good for me that you should now be my wife. After that you must talk about me no longer, unless you will talk of my wishes." "Do you think I am not anxious for your happiness?" "I do not know;--but I shall find out in time. That is what I have to say about myself. And as to you, is it not much the same? I know you love me. Whatever the feeling was that overcame you as to that other man,--it has gone. I cannot now stop to be tender and soft in my words. The thing to be said is too serious to me. And every friend you have wants you to marry the man you love and to put an end to the desolation which you have brought on yourself. There is not one among us all, Fletchers and Whartons, whose comfort does not more or less depend on your sacrificing the luxury of your own woe." "Luxury!" "Yes; luxury. No man ever had a right to say more positively to a woman that it was her duty to marry him, than I have to you. And I do say it. I say it on behalf of all of us, that it is your duty. I won't talk of my own love now, because you know it. You cannot doubt it. I won't even talk of yours, because I am sure of it. But I say that it is your duty to give up drowning us all in tears, burying us in desolation. You are one of us, and should do as all of us wish you. If, indeed, you could not love me it would be different. There! I have said what I've got to say. You are crying, and I will not take your answer now. I will come to you again to-morrow, and then you shall answer me. But, remember when you do so that the happiness of many people depends on what you say." Then he left her very suddenly and hurried back to the house by himself. He had been very rough with her,--had not once attempted to touch her hand or even her arm, had spoken no soft word to her, speaking of his own love as a thing too certain to need further words; and he had declared himself to be so assured of her love that there was no favour for him now to ask, nothing for which he was bound to pray as a lover. All that was past. He had simply declared it to be her duty to marry him, and had told her so with much sternness. He had walked fast, compelling her to accompany him, had frowned at her, and had more than once stamped his foot upon the ground. During the whole interview she had been so near to weeping that she could hardly speak. Once or twice she had almost thought him to be cruel;--but he had forced her to acknowledge to herself that all that he had said was true and unanswerable. Had he pressed her for an answer at the moment she would not have known in what words to couch a refusal. And yet as she made her way alone back to the house she assured herself that she would have refused. He had given her four-and-twenty hours, and at the end of that time she would be bound to give him her answer,--an answer which must then be final. And as she said this to herself she found that she was admitting a doubt. She hardly knew how not to doubt, knowing, as she did, that all whom she loved were on one side, while on the other was nothing but the stubbornness of her own convictions. But still the conviction was left to her. Over and over again she declared to herself that it was not fit, meaning thereby to assure herself that a higher duty even than that which she owed to her friends, demanded from her that she should be true to her convictions. She met him that day at dinner, but he hardly spoke to her. They sat together in the same room during the evening, but she hardly once heard his voice. It seemed to her that he avoided even looking at her. When they separated for the night he parted from her almost as though they had been strangers. Surely he was angry with her because she was stubborn,--thought evil of her because she would not do as others wished her! She lay awake during the long night thinking of it all. If it might be so! Oh;--if it might be so! If it might be done without utter ruin to her own self-respect as a woman! In the morning she was down early,--not having anything to say, with no clear purpose as yet before her,--but still with a feeling that perhaps that morning might alter all things for her. He was the latest of the party, not coming in for prayers as did all the others, but taking his seat when the others had half finished their breakfast. As he sat down he gave a general half-uttered greeting to them all, but spoke no special word to any of them. It chanced that his seat was next to hers, but to her he did not address himself at all. Then the meal was over, and the chairs were withdrawn, and the party grouped itself about with vague, uncertain movements, as men and women do before they leave the breakfast table for the work of the day. She meditated her escape, but felt that she could not leave the room before Lady Wharton or Mrs. Fletcher,--who had remained at Wharton to keep her mother company for a while. At last they went;--but then, just as she was escaping, he put his hand upon her and reminded her of her appointment. "I shall be in the hall in a quarter of an hour," he said. "Will you meet me there?" Then she bowed her head to him and passed on. She was there at the time named and found him standing by the hall door, waiting for her. His hat was already on his head and his back was almost turned to her. He opened the door, and, allowing her to pass out first, led the way to the shrubbery. He did not speak to her till he had closed behind her the little iron gate which separated the walk from the garden, and then he turned upon her with one word. "Well?" he said. She was silent for a moment, and then he repeated his eager question: "Well;--well?" "I should disgrace you," she said, not firmly as before, but whispering the words. He waited for no other assent. The form of the words told him that he had won the day. In a moment his arms were round her, and her veil was off, and his lips were pressed to hers;--and when she could see his countenance the whole form of his face was altered to her. It was bright as it used to be bright in old days, and he was smiling on her as he used to smile. "My own," he said;--"my wife--my own!" And she had no longer the power to deny him. "Not yet, Arthur; not yet," was all that she could say. CHAPTER LXXX The Last Meeting at Matching The ex-Prime Minister did not carry out his purpose of leaving London in the middle of the season and travelling either to Italy or Norway. He was away from London at Whitsuntide longer perhaps than he might have been if still in office, and during this period regarded himself as a man from whose hands all work had been taken,--as one who had been found unfit to carry any longer a burden serviceably; but before June was over he and the Duchess were back in London, and gradually he allowed himself to open his mouth on this or that subject in the House of Lords,--not pitching into everybody all round, as his wife had recommended, but expressing an opinion now and again, generally in support of his friends, with the dignity which should belong to a retired Prime Minister. The Duchess too recovered much of her good temper,--as far at least as the outward show went. One or two who knew her, especially Mrs. Finn, were aware that her hatred and her ideas of revenge were not laid aside; but she went on from day to day anathematizing her special enemies and abstained from reproaching her husband for his pusillanimity. Then came the question as to the autumn. "Let's have everybody down at Gatherum, just as we had before," said the Duchess. The proposition almost took away the Duke's breath. "Why do you want a crowd, like that?" "Just to show them that we are not beaten because we are turned out." "But, inasmuch as we were turned out, we were beaten. And what has a gathering of people at my private house to do with a political manoeuvre? Do you especially want to go to Gatherum?" "I hate the place. You know I do." "Then why should you propose to go there?" He hardly yet knew his wife well enough to understand that the suggestion had been a joke. "If you don't wish to go abroad--" "I hate going abroad." "Then we'll remain at Matching. You don't hate Matching." "Ah dear! There are memories there too. But you like it." "My books are there." "Blue-books," said the Duchess. "And there is plenty of room if you wish to have friends." "I suppose we must have somebody. You can't live without your Mentor." "You can ask whom you please," he said almost fretfully. "Lady Rosina, of course," suggested the Duchess. Then he turned to the papers before him and wouldn't say another word. The matter ended in a party much as usual being collected at Matching about the middle of October,--Telemachus having spent the early part of the autumn with Mentor at Long Royston. There might perhaps be a dozen guests in the house, and among them of course were Phineas Finn and his wife. And Mr. Grey was there, having come back from his eastern mission,--whose unfortunate abandonment of his seat at Silverbridge had caused so many troubles,--and Mrs. Grey, who in days now long passed had been almost as necessary to Lady Glencora as was now her later friend Mrs. Finn,--and the Cantrips, and for a short time the St. Bungays. But Lady Rosina De Courcy on this occasion was not present. There were few there whom my patient readers have not seen at Matching before; but among those few was Arthur Fletcher. "So it is to be," said the Duchess to the member for Silverbridge one morning. She had by this time become intimate with "her member," as she would sometimes call him in joke, and had concerned herself much as to his matrimonial prospects. "Yes, Duchess; it is to be,--unless some unforeseen circumstance should arise." "What circumstance?" "Ladies and gentlemen sometimes do change their minds;--but in this case I do not think it likely." "And why ain't you being married now, Mr. Fletcher?" "We have agreed to postpone it till next year;--so that we may be quite sure of our own minds." "I know you are laughing at me; but nevertheless I am very glad that it is settled. Pray tell her from me that I shall call again as soon as ever she is Mrs. Fletcher, though I don't think she repaid either of the last two visits I made her." "You must make excuses for her, Duchess." "Of course. I know. After all she is a most fortunate woman. And as for you,--I regard you as a hero among lovers." "I'm getting used to it," she said one day to Mrs. Finn. "Of course you'll get used to it. We get used to anything that chance sends us in a marvellously short time." "What I mean is that I can go to bed, and sleep, and get up and eat my meals without missing the sound of the trumpets so much as I did at first. I remember hearing of people who lived in a mill, and couldn't sleep when the mill stopped. It was like that with me when our mill stopped at first. I had got myself so used to the excitement of it, that I could hardly live without it." "You might have all the excitement still, if you pleased. You need not be dead to politics because your husband is not Prime Minister." "No; never again,--unless he should come back. If any one had told me ten years ago that I should have taken an interest in this or that man being in the Government, I should have laughed him to scorn. It did not seem possible to me then that I should care what became of such men as Sir Timothy Beeswax and Mr. Roby. But I did get to be anxious about it when Plantagenet was shifted from one office to another." "Of course you did. Do you think I am not anxious about Phineas?" "But when he became Prime Minister, I gave myself up to it altogether. I shall never forget what I felt when he came to me and told me that perhaps it might be so;--but told me also that he would escape from it if it were possible. I was the Lady Macbeth of the occasion all over;--whereas he was so scrupulous, so burdened with conscience! As for me, I would have taken it by any means. Then it was that the old Duke played the part of the three witches to a nicety. Well, there hasn't been any absolute murder, and I haven't quite gone mad." "Nor need you be afraid, though all the woods of Gatherum should come to Matching." "God forbid! I will never see anything of Gatherum again. What annoys me most is, and always was, that he wouldn't understand what I felt about it;--how proud I was that he should be Prime Minister, how anxious that he should be great and noble in his office;--how I worked for him, and not at all for any pleasure of my own." "I think he did feel it." "No;--not as I did. At last he liked the power,--or rather feared the disgrace of losing it. But he had no idea of the personal grandeur of the place. He never understood that to be Prime Minister in England is as much as to be an Emperor in France, and much more than being President in America. Oh, how I did labour for him,--and how he did scold me for it with those quiet little stinging words of his! I was vulgar!" "Is that a quiet word?" "Yes;--as he used it;--and indiscreet, and ignorant, and stupid. I bore it all, though sometimes I was dying with vexation. Now it's all over, and here we are as humdrum as any one else. And the Beeswaxes, and the Robys, and the Droughts, and the Pountneys, and the Lopezes, have all passed over the scene! Do you remember that Pountney affair, and how he turned the poor man out of the house?" "It served him right." "It would have served them all right to be turned out,--only they were there for a purpose. I did like it in a way, and it makes me sad to think that the feeling can never come again. Even if they should have him back again, it would be a very lame affair to me then. I can never again rouse myself to the effort of preparing food and lodging for half the Parliament and their wives. I shall never again think that I can help to rule England by coaxing unpleasant men. It is done and gone, and can never come back again." Not long after this the Duke took Mr. Monk, who had come down to Matching for a few days, out to the very spot on which he had sat when he indulged himself in lecturing Phineas Finn on Conservatism and Liberalism generally, and then asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what he thought of the present state of public affairs. He himself had supported Mr. Gresham's government, and did not belong to it because he could not at present reconcile himself to filling any office. Mr. Monk did not scruple to say that in his opinion the present legitimate division of parties was preferable to the Coalition which had existed for three years. "In such an arrangement," said Mr. Monk, "there must always be a certain amount of distrust, and such a feeling is fatal to any great work." "I think I distrusted no one till separation came,--and when it did come it was not caused by me." "I am not blaming any one now," said the other; "but men who have been brought up with opinions altogether different, even with different instincts as to politics, who from their mother's milk have been nourished on codes of thought altogether opposed to each other, cannot work together with confidence even though they may desire the same thing. The very ideas which are sweet as honey to the one are bitter as gall to the other." "You think, then, that we made a great mistake?" "I will not say that," said Mr. Monk. "There was a difficulty at the time, and that difficulty was overcome. The Government was carried on, and was on the whole respected. History will give you credit for patriotism, patience, and courage. No man could have done it better than you did;--probably no other man of the day so well." "But it was not a great part to play?" The Duke in his nervousness, as he said this, could not avoid the use of that questioning tone which requires an answer. "Great enough to satisfy the heart of a man who has fortified himself against the evil side of ambition. After all, what is it that the Prime Minister of such a country as this should chiefly regard? Is it not the prosperity of the country? It is not often that we want great measures, or new arrangements that shall be vital to the country. Politicians now look for grievances, not because the grievances are heavy, but trusting that the honour of abolishing them may be great. It is the old story of the needy knife-grinder who, if left to himself, would have no grievance of which to complain." "But there are grievances," said the Duke. "Look at monetary denominations. Look at our weights and measures." "Well; yes. I will not say that everything has as yet been reduced to divine order. But when we took office three years ago we certainly did not intend to settle those difficulties." "No, indeed," said the Duke, sadly. "But we did do all that we meant to do. For my own part, there is only one thing in it that I regret, and one only which you should regret also till you have resolved to remedy it." "What thing is that?" "Your own retirement from official life. If the country is to lose your services for the long course of years during which you will probably sit in Parliament, then I shall think that the country has lost more than it has gained by the Coalition." The Duke sat for a while silent, looking at the view, and, before answering Mr. Monk,--while arranging his answer,--once or twice in a half-absent way, called his companion's attention to the scene before him. But during this time he was going through an act of painful repentance. He was condemning himself for a word or two that had been ill-spoken by himself, and which, since the moment of its utterance, he had never ceased to remember with shame. He told himself now, after his own secret fashion, that he must do penance for these words by the humiliation of a direct contradiction of them. He must declare that Cæsar would at some future time be prepared to serve under Pompey. Then he made his answer. "Mr. Monk," he said, "I should be false if I were to deny that it pleases me to hear you say so. I have thought much of all that for the last two or three months. You may probably have seen that I am not a man endowed with that fortitude which enables many to bear vexations with an easy spirit. I am given to fretting, and I am inclined to think that a popular minister in a free country should be so constituted as to be free from that infirmity. I shall certainly never desire to be at the head of a Government again. For a few years I would prefer to remain out of office. But I will endeavour to look forward to a time when I may again perhaps be of some humble use." 
21091	----	[Illustration: Walker and Cockrell Photo Sir John Gladstone _from a painting by William Bradley_] THE LIFE OF WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE BY JOHN MORLEY _IN THREE VOLUMES--VOL. I_ (_1809-1859_) TORONTO GEORGE N. MORANG & COMPANY, LIMITED 1903 COPYRIGHT, 1903, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Set up, electrotyped, and published October, 1903. Reprinted October, November, 1903. Norwood Press J. S. Cushing & Co.--Berwick & Smith Co. Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. TO THE ELECTORS OF THE MONTROSE BURGHS I BEG LEAVE TO INSCRIBE THIS BOOK IN GRATEFUL RECOGNITION OF THE CONFIDENCE AND FRIENDSHIP WITH WHICH THEY HAVE HONOURED ME NOTE The material on which this biography is founded consists mainly, of course, of the papers collected at Hawarden. Besides that vast accumulation, I have been favoured with several thousands of other pieces from the legion of Mr. Gladstone's correspondents. Between two and three hundred thousand written papers of one sort or another must have passed under my view. To some important journals and papers from other sources I have enjoyed free access, and my warm thanks are due to those who have generously lent me this valuable aid. I am especially indebted to the King for the liberality with which his Majesty has been graciously pleased to sanction the use of certain documents, in cases where the permission of the Sovereign was required. When I submitted an application for the same purpose to Queen Victoria, in readily promising her favourable consideration, the Queen added a message strongly impressing on me that the work I was about to undertake should not be handled in the narrow way of party. This injunction represents my own clear view of the spirit in which the history of a career so memorable as Mr. Gladstone's should be composed. That, to be sure, is not at all inconsistent with our regarding party feeling in its honourable sense, as entirely the reverse of an infirmity. The diaries from which I have often quoted consist of forty little books in double columns, intended to do little more than record persons seen, or books read, or letters written as the days passed by. From these diaries come several of the mottoes prefixed to our chapters; such mottoes are marked by an asterisk. The trustees and other members of Mr. Gladstone's family have extended to me a uniform kindness and consideration and an absolutely unstinted confidence, for which I can never cease to owe them my heartiest acknowledgment. They left with the writer an unqualified and undivided responsibility for these pages, and for the use of the material that they entrusted to him. Whatever may prove to be amiss, whether in leaving out or putting in or putting wrong, the blame is wholly mine. J. M. 1903. CONTENTS _BOOK I_ (_1809-1831_) CHAPTER PAGE INTRODUCTORY 1 I. CHILDHOOD 7 II. ETON 26 III. OXFORD 48 _BOOK II_ (_1832-1846_) I. ENTERS PARLIAMENT. 86 II. THE NEW CONSERVATISM AND OFFICE 116 III. PROGRESS IN PUBLIC LIFE. 131 IV. THE CHURCH 152 V. HIS FIRST BOOK 169 VI. CHARACTERISTICS 184 VII. CLOSE OF APPRENTICESHIP 219 VIII. PEEL'S GOVERNMENT 247 IX. MAYNOOTH 270 X. TRIUMPH OF POLICY AND FALL OF THE MINISTER 282 XI. THE TRACTARIAN CATASTROPHE 303 _BOOK III_ (_1847-1852_) CHAPTER PAGE I. MEMBER FOR OXFORD 327 II. THE HAWARDEN ESTATE 337 III. PARTY EVOLUTION--NEW COLONIAL POLICY 350 IV. DEATH OF SIR ROBERT PEEL 366 V. GORHAM CASE--SECESSION OF FRIENDS 375 VI. NAPLES 389 VII. RELIGIOUS TORNADO--PEELITE DIFFICULTIES 405 VIII. END OF PROTECTION 425 _BOOK IV_ (_1853-1859_) I. THE COALITION 443 II. THE TRIUMPH OF 1853 457 III. THE CRIMEAN WAR 476 IV. OXFORD REFORM--OPEN CIVIL SERVICE 496 V. WAR FINANCE--TAX OR LOAN 513 VI. CRISIS OF 1855 AND BREAK-UP OF THE PEELITES 521 VII. POLITICAL ISOLATION 544 VIII. GENERAL ELECTION--NEW MARRIAGE LAW 558 IX. THE SECOND DERBY GOVERNMENT 574 X. THE IONIAN ISLANDS 594 XI. JUNCTION WITH THE LIBERALS 621 APPENDIX 635 CHRONOLOGY 654 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS SIR JOHN GLADSTONE _Frontispiece._ _From a painting by William Bradley._ WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE _to face page_ 86 _From a painting by William Bradley._ CATHERINE GLADSTONE " 223 _From a painting._ HAWARDEN CASTLE " 337 Book I _1809-1831_ INTRODUCTORY I am well aware that to try to write Mr. Gladstone's life at all--the life of a man who held an imposing place in many high national transactions, whose character and career may be regarded in such various lights, whose interests were so manifold, and whose years bridged so long a span of time--is a stroke of temerity. To try to write his life to-day, is to push temerity still further. The ashes of controversy, in which he was much concerned, are still hot; perspective, scale, relation, must all while we stand so near be difficult to adjust. Not all particulars, more especially of the latest marches in his wide campaign, can be disclosed without risk of unjust pain to persons now alive. Yet to defer the task for thirty or forty years has plain drawbacks too. Interest grows less vivid; truth becomes harder to find out; memories pale and colour fades. And if in one sense a statesman's contemporaries, even after death has abated the storm and temper of faction, can scarcely judge him, yet in another sense they who breathe the same air as he breathed, who know at close quarters the problems that faced him, the materials with which he had to work, the limitations of his time--such must be the best, if not the only true memorialists and recorders. Every reader will perceive that perhaps the sharpest of all the many difficulties of my task has been to draw the line between history and biography--between the fortunes of the community and the exploits, thoughts, and purposes of the individual who had so marked a share in them. In the case of men of letters, in whose lives our literature is admirably rich, this difficulty happily for their authors and for our delight does not arise. But where the subject is a man who was four times at the head of the government--no phantom, but dictator--and who held this office of first minister for a longer time than any other statesman in the reign of the Queen, how can we tell the story of his works and days without reference, and ample reference, to the course of events over whose unrolling he presided, and out of which he made history? It is true that what interests the world in Mr. Gladstone is even more what he was, than what he did; his brilliancy, charm, and power; the endless surprises; his dualism or more than dualism; his vicissitudes of opinion; his subtleties of mental progress; his strange union of qualities never elsewhere found together; his striking unlikeness to other men in whom great and free nations have for long periods placed their trust. I am not sure that the incessant search for clues through this labyrinth would not end in analysis and disquisition, that might be no great improvement even upon political history. Mr. Gladstone said of reconstruction of the income-tax that he only did not call the task herculean, because Hercules could not have done it. Assuredly, I am not presumptuous enough to suppose that this difficulty of fixing the precise scale between history and biography has been successfully overcome by me. It may be that Hercules himself would have succeeded little better. Some may think in this connection that I have made the preponderance of politics excessive in the story of a genius of signal versatility, to whom politics were only one interest among many. No doubt speeches, debates, bills, divisions, motions, and manoeuvres of party, like the manna that fed the children of Israel in the wilderness, lose their savour and power of nutriment on the second day. Yet after all it was to his thoughts, his purposes, his ideals, his performances as statesman, in all the widest significance of that lofty and honourable designation, that Mr. Gladstone owes the lasting substance of his fame. His life was ever '_greatly absorbed_,' he said, '_in working the institutions of his country_.' Here we mark a signal trait. Not for two centuries, since the historic strife of anglican and puritan, had our island produced a ruler in whom the religious motive was paramount in the like degree. He was not only a political force but a moral force. He strove to use all the powers of his own genius and the powers of the state for moral purposes and religious. Nevertheless his mission in all its forms was action. He had none of that detachment, often found among superior minds, which we honour for its disinterestedness, even while we lament its impotence in result. The track in which he moved, the instruments that he employed, were the track and the instruments, the sword and the trowel, of political action; and what is called the Gladstonian era was distinctively a political era. On this I will permit myself a few words more. The detailed history of Mr. Gladstone as theologian and churchman will not be found in these pages, and nobody is more sensible than their writer of the gap. Mr. Gladstone cared as much for the church as he cared for the state; he thought of the church as the soul of the state; he believed the attainment by the magistrate of the ends of government to depend upon religion; and he was sure that the strength of a state corresponds to the religious strength and soundness of the community of which the state is the civil organ. I should have been wholly wanting in biographical fidelity, not to make this clear and superabundantly clear. Still a writer inside Mr. Gladstone's church and in full and active sympathy with him on this side of mundane and supramundane things, would undoubtedly have treated the subject differently from any writer outside. No amount of candour or good faith--and in these essentials I believe that I have not fallen short--can be a substitute for the confidence and ardour of an adherent, in the heart of those to whom the church stands first. Here is one of the difficulties of this complex case. Yet here, too, there may be some trace of compensation. If the reader has been drawn into the whirlpools of the political Charybdis, he might not even in far worthier hands than mine have escaped the rocky headlands of the ecclesiastic Scylla. For churches also have their parties. Lord Salisbury, the distinguished man who followed Mr. Gladstone in a longer tenure of power than his, called him 'a great Christian'; and nothing could be more true or better worth saying. He not only accepted the doctrines of that faith as he believed them to be held by his own communion; he sedulously strove to apply the noblest moralities of it to the affairs both of his own nation and of the commonwealth of nations. It was a supreme experiment. People will perhaps some day wonder that many of those who derided the experiment and reproached its author, failed to see that they were making manifest in this a wholesale scepticism as to truths that they professed to prize, far deeper and more destructive than the doubts and disbeliefs of the gentiles in the outer courts. The epoch, as the reader knows, was what Mr. Gladstone called 'an agitated and expectant age.' Some stages of his career mark stages of the first importance in the history of English party, on which so much in the working of our constitution hangs. His name is associated with a record of arduous and fruitful legislative work and administrative improvement, equalled by none of the great men who have grasped the helm of the British state. The intensity of his mind, and the length of years through which he held presiding office, enabled him to impress for good in all the departments of government his own severe standard of public duty and personal exactitude. He was the chief force, propelling, restraining, guiding his country at many decisive moments. Then how many surprises and what seeming paradox. Devotedly attached to the church, he was the agent in the overthrow of establishment in one of the three kingdoms, and in an attempt to overthrow it in the Principality. Entering public life with vehement aversion to the recent dislodgment of the landed aristocracy as the mainspring of parliamentary power, he lent himself to two further enormously extensive changes in the constitutional centre of gravity. With a lifelong belief in parliamentary deliberation as the grand security for judicious laws and national control over executive act, he yet at a certain stage betook himself with magical result to direct and individual appeal to the great masses of his countrymen, and the world beheld the astonishing spectacle of a politician with the microscopic subtlety of a thirteenth century schoolman wielding at will the new democracy in what has been called 'the country of plain men.' A firm and trained economist, and no friend to socialism, yet by his legislation upon land in 1870 and 1881 he wrote the opening chapter in a volume on which many an unexpected page in the history of Property is destined to be inscribed. Statesmen do far less than they suppose, far less than is implied in their resounding fame, to augment the material prosperity of nations, but in this province Mr. Gladstone's name stands at the topmost height. Yet no ruler that ever lived felt more deeply the truth--for which I know no better words than Channing's--that to improve man's outward condition is not to improve man himself; this must come from each man's endeavour within his own breast; without that there can be little ground for social hope. Well was it said to him, 'You have so lived and wrought that you have kept the soul alive in England.' Not in England only was this felt. He was sometimes charged with lowering the sentiment, the lofty and fortifying sentiment, of national pride. At least it is a ground for national pride that he, the son of English training, practised through long years in the habit and tradition of English public life, standing for long years foremost in accepted authority and renown before the eye of England, so conquered imagination and attachment in other lands, that when the end came it was thought no extravagance for one not an Englishman to say, 'On the day that Mr. Gladstone died, the world has lost its greatest citizen.' The reader who revolves all this will know why I began by speaking of temerity. That my book should be a biography without trace of bias, no reader will expect. There is at least no bias against the truth; but indifferent neutrality in a work produced, as this is, in the spirit of loyal and affectionate remembrance, would be distasteful, discordant, and impossible. I should be heartily sorry if there were no signs of partiality and no evidence of prepossession. On the other hand there is, I trust, no importunate advocacy or tedious assentation. He was great man enough to stand in need of neither. Still less has it been needed, in order to exalt him, to disparage others with whom he came into strong collision. His own funeral orations from time to time on some who were in one degree or another his antagonists, prove that this petty and ungenerous method would have been to him of all men most repugnant. Then to pretend that for sixty years, with all 'the varying weather of the mind,' he traversed in every zone the restless ocean of a great nation's shifting and complex politics, without many a faulty tack and many a wrong reckoning, would indeed be idle. No such claim is set up by rational men for Pym, Cromwell, Walpole, Washington, or either Pitt. It is not set up for any of the three contemporaries of Mr. Gladstone whose names live with the three most momentous transactions of his age--Cavour, Lincoln, Bismarck. To suppose, again, that in every one of the many subjects touched by him, besides exhibiting the range of his powers and the diversity of his interests, he made abiding contributions to thought and knowledge, is to ignore the jealous conditions under which such contributions come. To say so much as this is to make but a small deduction from the total of a grand account. I have not reproduced the full text of Letters in the proportion customary in English biography. The existing mass of his letters is enormous. But then an enormous proportion of them touch on affairs of public business, on which they shed little new light. Even when he writes in his kindest and most cordial vein to friends to whom he is most warmly attached, it is usually a letter of business. He deals freely and genially with the points in hand, and then without play of gossip, salutation, or compliment, he passes on his way. He has in his letters little of that spirit in which his talk often abounded, of disengagement, pleasant colloquy, happy raillery, and all the other undefined things that make the correspondence of so many men whose business was literature, such delightful reading for the idler hour of an industrious day. It is perhaps worth adding that the asterisks denoting an omitted passage hide no piquant hit, no personality, no indiscretion; the omission is in every case due to consideration of space. Without these asterisks and, other omissions, nothing would have been easier than to expand these three volumes into a hundred. I think nothing relevant is lost. Nobody ever had fewer secrets, nobody ever lived and wrought in fuller sunlight. CHAPTER I CHILDHOOD (_1809-1821_) I know not why commerce in England should not have its old families, rejoicing to be connected with commerce from generation to generation. It has been so in other countries; I trust it will be so in this country.--GLADSTONE. The dawn of the life of the great and famous man who is our subject in these memoirs has been depicted with homely simplicity by his own hand. With this fragment of a record it is perhaps best for me to begin our journey. 'I was born,' he says, 'on December 29, 1809,' at 62 Rodney Street, Liverpool. 'I was baptized, I believe, in the parish church of St. Peter. My godmother was my elder sister Anne, then just seven years old, who died a perfect saint in the beginning of the year 1829. In her later years she lived in close relations with me, and I must have been much worse but for her. Of my godfathers, one was a Scotch episcopalian, Mr. Fraser of ----, whom I hardly ever saw or heard of; the other a presbyterian, Mr. G. Grant, a junior partner of my father's.' The child was named William Ewart, after his father's friend, an immigrant Scot and a merchant like himself, and father of a younger William Ewart, who became member for Liverpool, and did good public service in parliament. Before proceeding to the period of my childhood, properly so-called, I will here insert a few words about my family. My maternal grandfather was known as Provost Robertson of Dingwall, a man held, I believe, in the highest respect. His wife was a Mackenzie of [Coul]. His circumstances must have been good. Of his three sons, one went into the army, and I recollect him as Captain Robertson (I have a seal which he gave me, a three-sided cairngorm. Cost him 7½ guineas). The other two took mercantile positions. When my parents made a Scotch tour in 1820-21 with, I think, their four sons, the freedom of Dingwall was presented to us all,[1] with my father; and there was large visiting at the houses of the Ross-shire gentry. I think the line of my grandmother was stoutly episcopalian and Jacobite; but, coming outside the western highlands, the first at least was soon rubbed down. The provost, I think, came from a younger branch of the Robertsons of Struan. On my father's side the matter is more complex. The history of the family has been traced at the desire of my eldest brother and my own, by Sir William Fraser, the highest living authority.[2] He has carried us up to a rather remote period, I think before Elizabeth, but has not yet been able to connect us with the earliest known holders of the name, which with the aid of charter-chests he hopes to do. Some things are plain and not without interest. They were a race of borderers. There is still an old Gledstanes or Gladstone castle. They formed a family in Sweden in the seventeenth century. The explanation of this may have been that, when the union of the crowns led to the extinction of border fighting they took service like Sir Dugald Dalgetty under Gustavus Adolphus, and in this case passed from service to settlement. I have never heard of them in Scotland until after the Restoration, otherwise than as persons of family. At that period there are traces of their having been fined by public authority, but not for any ordinary criminal offence. From this time forward I find no trace of their gentility. During the eighteenth century they are, I think, principally traced by a line of maltsters (no doubt a small business then) in Lanarkshire. Their names are recorded on tombstones in the churchyard of Biggar. I remember going as a child or boy to see the representative of that branch, either in 1820 or some years earlier, who was a small watchmaker in that town. He was of the same generation as my father, but came, I understood, from a senior brother of the family. I do not know whether his line is extinct. There also seem to be some stray Gladstones who are found at Yarmouth and in Yorkshire.[3] ANCESTRY My father's father seems from his letters to have been an excellent man and a wise parent: his wife a woman of energy. There are pictures of them at Fasque, by Raeburn. He was a merchant, in Scotch phrase; that is to say, a shopkeeper dealing in corn and stores, and my father as a lad served in his shop. But he also sent a ship or ships to the Baltic; and I believe that my father, whose energy soon began to outtop that of all the very large family, went in one of these ships at a very early age as a supercargo, an appointment then, I think, common. But he soon quitted a nest too small to hold him. He was born in December 1764: and I have (at Hawarden) a reprint of the _Liverpool Directory_ for 178-, in which his name appears as a partner in the firm of Messrs. Corrie, corn merchants. Here his force soon began to be felt as a prominent and then a foremost member of the community. A liberal in the early period of the century, he drew to Mr. Canning, and brought that statesman as candidate to Liverpool in 1812, by personally offering to guarantee his expenses at a time when, though prosperous, he could hardly have been a rich man. His services to the town were testified by gifts of plate, now in the possession of the elder lines of his descendants, and by a remarkable subscription of six thousand pounds raised to enable him to contest the borough of Lancaster, for which he sat in the parliament of 1818. At his demise, in December 1851, the value of his estate was, I think, near £600,000. My father was a successful merchant, but considering his long life and means of accumulation, the result represents a success secondary in comparison with that of others whom in native talent and energy he much surpassed. It was a large and strong nature, simple though hasty, profoundly affectionate and capable of the highest devotion in the lines of duty and of love. I think that his intellect was a little intemperate, though not his character. In his old age, spent mainly in retirement, he was our constant [centre of] social and domestic life. My mother, a beautiful and admirable woman, failed in health and left him a widower in 1835, when she was 62. He then turns to the records of his own childhood, a period that he regarded as closing in September 1821, when he was sent to Eton. He begins with one or two juvenile performances, in no way differing from those of any other infant,--_navita projectus humi_, the mariner flung by force of the waves naked and helpless ashore. He believes that he was strong and healthy, and came well through his childish ailments. My next recollection belongs to the period of Mr. Canning's first election for Liverpool, in the month of October of the year 1812. Much entertaining went on in my father's house, where Mr. Canning himself was a guest; and on a day of a great dinner I was taken down to the dining room. I was set upon one of the chairs, standing, and directed to say to the company 'Ladies and gentlemen.' I have, thirdly, a group of recollections which refer to Scotland. Thither my father and mother took me on a journey which they made, I think, in a post-chaise to Edinburgh and Glasgow as its principal points. At Edinburgh our sojourn was in the Royal Hotel, Princes Street. I well remember the rattling of the windows when the castle guns were fired on some great occasion, probably the abdication of Napoleon, for the date of the journey was, I think, the spring of 1814. EARLY RECOLLECTIONS In this journey the situation of Sanquhar, in a close Dumfriesshire valley, impressed itself on my recollection. I never saw Sanquhar again until in the autumn of 1863 (as I believe). As I was whirled along the Glasgow and South-Western railway I witnessed just beneath me lines of building in just such a valley, and said that must be Sanquhar, which it was. My local memory has always been good and very impressible by scenery. I seem to myself never to have forgotten a scene. I have one other early recollection to record. It must, I think, have been in the year 1815 that my father and mother took me with them on either one or two more journeys. The objective points were Cambridge and London respectively. My father had built, under the very niggard and discouraging laws which repressed rather than encouraged the erection of new churches at that period, the church of St. Thomas at Seaforth, and he wanted a clergyman for it.[4] Guided in these matters very much by the deeply religious temper of my mother, he went with her to Cambridge to obtain a recommendation of a suitable person from Mr. Simeon, whom I saw at the time.[5] I remember his appearance distinctly. He was a venerable man, and although only a fellow of a college, was more ecclesiastically got up than many a dean, or even here and there, perhaps, a bishop of the present less costumed if more ritualistic period. Mr. Simeon, I believe, recommended Mr. Jones, an excellent specimen of the excellent evangelical school of those days. We went to Leicester to hear him preach in a large church, and his text was '_Grow in grace_.' He became eventually archdeacon of Liverpool, and died in great honour a few years ago at much past 90. On the strength of this visit to Cambridge I lately boasted there, even during the lifetime of the aged Provost Okes, that I had been in the university before any one of them. I think it was at this time that in London we were domiciled in Russell Square, in the house of a brother of my mother, Mr. Colin Robertson; and I was vexed and put about by being forbidden to run freely at my own will into and about the streets, as I had done in Liverpool. But the main event was this: we went to a great service of public thanksgiving at Saint Paul's, and sat in a small gallery annexed to the choir, just over the place where was the Regent, and looking down upon him from behind. I recollect nothing more of the service, nor was I ever present at any public thanksgiving after this in Saint Paul's, until the service held in that cathedral, under my advice as the prime minister, after the highly dangerous illness of the Prince of Wales. Before quitting the subject of early recollections I must name one which involves another person of some note. My mother took me in 181--to Barley Wood Cottage, near Bristol. Here lived Miss Hannah More, with some of her coeval sisters. I am sure they loved my mother, who was love-worthy indeed. And I cannot help here deviating for a moment into the later portion of the story to record that in 1833 I had the honour of breakfasting with Mr. Wilberforce a few days before his death,[6] and when I entered the house, immediately after the salutation, he said to me in his silvery tones, 'How is your sweet mother?' He had been a guest in my father's house some twelve years before. During the afternoon visit at Barley Wood, Miss Hannah More took me aside and presented to me a little book. It was a copy of her _Sacred Dramas_, and it now remains in my possession, with my name written in it by her. She very graciously accompanied it with a little speech, of which I cannot recollect the conclusion (or apodosis), but it began, 'As you have just come into the world, and I am just going out of it, I therefore,' etc. I wish that in reviewing my childhood I could regard it as presenting those features of innocence and beauty which I have often seen elsewhere, and indeed, thanks be to God, within the limits of my own home. The best I can say for it is that I do not think it was a vicious childhood. I do not think, trying to look at the past impartially, that I had a strong natural propensity then developed to what are termed the mortal sins. But truth obliges me to record this against myself. I have no recollection of being a loving or a winning child; or an earnest or diligent or knowledge-loving child. God forgive me. And what pains and shames me most of all is to remember that at most and at best I was, like the sailor in Juvenal, digitis a morte remotus, Quatuor aut septem;[7] the plank between me and all the sins was so very thin. I do not indeed intend in these notes to give a history of the inner life, which I think has been with me extraordinarily dubious, vacillating, and above all complex. I reserve them, perhaps, for a more private and personal document; and I may in this way relieve myself from some at least of the risks of falling into an odious Pharisaism. I cannot in truth have been an interesting child, and the only presumption the other way which I can gather from my review is that there was probably something in me worth the seeing, or my father and mother would not so much have singled me out to be taken with them on their journeys. I was not a devotional child. I have no recollection of early love for the House of God and for divine service: though after my father built the church at Seaforth in 1815, I remember cherishing a hope that he would bequeath it to me, and that I might live in it. I have a very early recollection of hearing preaching in St. George's, Liverpool, but it is this: that I turned quickly to my mother and said, 'When will he have done?' The _Pilgrim's Progress_ undoubtedly took a great and fascinating hold upon me, so that anything which I wrote was insensibly moulded in its style; but it was by the force of the allegory addressing itself to the fancy, and was very like a strong impression received from the _Arabian Nights_, and from another work called _Tales of the Genii_. I think it was about the same time that Miss Porter's _Scottish Chiefs_, and especially the life and death of Wallace, used to make me weep profusely. This would be when I was about ten years old. At a much earlier period, say six or seven, I remember praying earnestly, but it was for no higher object than to be spared from the loss of a tooth. Here, however, it may be mentioned in mitigation that the local dentist of those days, in our case a certain Dr. P. of ---- Street, Liverpool, was a kind of savage at his work (possibly a very good-natured man too), with no ideas except to smash and crash. My religious recollections, then, are a sad blank. Neither was I a popular boy, though not egregiously otherwise. If I was not a bad boy, I think that I was a boy with a great absence of goodness. I was a child of slow, in some points I think of singularly slow, development. There was more in me perhaps than in the average boy, but it required greatly more time to set itself in order: and just so in adult, and in middle and later life, I acquired very tardily any knowledge of the world, and that simultaneous conspectus of the relations of persons and things which is necessary for the proper performance of duties in the world. I may mention another matter in extenuation. I received, unless my memory deceives me, very little benefit from teaching. My father was too much occupied, my mother's health was broken. We, the four brothers, had no quarrelling among ourselves: but neither can I recollect any influence flowing down at this time upon me, the junior. One odd incident seems to show that I was meek, which I should not have supposed, not less than thrifty and penurious, a leaning which lay deep, I think, in my nature, and which has required effort and battle to control it. It was this. By some process not easy to explain I had, when I was _probably_ seven or eight, and my elder brothers from ten or eleven to fourteen or thereabouts, accumulated no less than twenty shillings in silver. My brothers judged it right to appropriate this fund, and I do not recollect either annoyance or resistance or complaint. But I recollect that they employed the principal part of it in the purchase of four knives, and that they broke the points from the tops of the blades of my knife, lest I should cut my fingers. Where was the official or appointed teacher all this time? He was the Rev. Mr. Rawson of Cambridge, who had, I suppose, been passed by Mr. Simeon and become private tutor in my father's house. But as he was to be incumbent of the church, the bishop required a parsonage and that he should live in it. Out of this grew a very small school of about twelve boys, to which I went, with some senior brother or brothers remaining for a while. Mr. Rawson was a good man, of high no-popery opinions. His school afterwards rose into considerable repute, and it had Dean Stanley and the sons of one or more other Cheshire families for pupils. But I think this was not so much due to its intellectual stamina as to the extreme salubrity of the situation on the pure dry sands of the Mersey's mouth, with all the advantages of the strong tidal action and the fresh and frequent north-west winds. At five miles from Liverpool Exchange, the sands, delicious for riding, were one absolute solitude, and only one house looked down on them between us and the town. To return to Mr. Rawson. Everything was unobjectionable. I suppose I learnt something there. But I have no recollection of being under any moral or personal influence whatever, and I doubt whether the preaching had any adaptation whatever to children. As to intellectual training, I believe that, like the other boys, I shirked my work as much as I could. I went to Eton in 1821 after a pretty long spell, in a very middling state of preparation, and wholly without any knowledge or other enthusiasm, unless it were a priggish love of argument which I had begun to develop. I had lived upon a rabbit warren: and what a rabbit warren of a life it is that I have been surveying. My brother John, three years older than myself, and of a moral character more manly and on a higher level, had chosen the navy, and went off to the preparatory college at Portsmouth. But he evidently underwent persecution for righteousness' sake at the college, which was then (say about 1820) in a bad condition. Of this, though he was never querulous, his letters bore the traces, and I cannot but think they must have exercised upon me some kind of influence for good. As to miscellaneous notices, I had a great affinity with the trades of joiners and of bricklayers. Physically I must have been rather tough, for my brother John took me down at about ten years old to wrestle in the stables with an older lad of that region, whom I threw. Among our greatest enjoyments were undoubtedly the annual Guy Fawkes bonfires, for which we had always liberal allowances of wreck timber and a tar-barrel. I remember seeing, when about eight or nine, my first case of a dead body. It was the child of the head gardener Derbyshire, and was laid in the cottage bed by tender hands, with nice and clean accompaniments. It seemed to me pleasing, and in no way repelled me; but it made no deep impression. And now I remember that I used to teach pretty regularly on Sundays in the Sunday-school built by my father near the Primrose bridge. It was, I think, a duty done not under constraint, but I can recollect nothing which associates it with a seriously religious life in myself.[8] II GENEALOGY To these fragments no long supplement is needed. Little of interest can be certainly established about his far-off ancestral origins, and the ordinary twilight of genealogy overhangs the case of the Glaidstanes, Gledstanes, Gladstanes, Gladstones, whose name is to be found on tombstones and parish rolls, in charter-chests and royal certificates, on the southern border of Scotland. The explorations of the genealogist tell of recognitions of their nobility by Scottish kings in dim ages, but the links are sometimes broken, title-deeds are lost, the same name is attached to estates in different counties, Roxburgh, Peebles, Lanark, and in short until the close of the seventeenth century we linger, in the old poet's phrase, among dreams of shadows. As we have just been told, during the eighteenth century no traces of their gentility survives, and apparently they glided down from moderate lairds to small maltsters. Thomas Gladstones, grandfather of him with whom we are concerned, made his way from Biggar to Leith, and there set up in a modest way as corndealer, wholesale and retail. His wife was a Neilson of Springfield. To them sixteen children were born, and John Gladstones (b. Dec. 11, 1764) was their eldest son. Having established himself in Liverpool, he married in 1792 Jane Hall, a lady of that city, who died without children six years later. In 1800 he took for his second wife Anne Robertson of Dingwall. Her father was of the clan Donnachaidh, and her mother was of kin with Mackenzies, Munros, and other highland stocks.[9] Their son, therefore, was of unmixed Scottish origins, half highland, half lowland borderer.[10] With the possible exception of Lord Mansfield--the rival of Chatham in parliament, one of the loftiest names among great judges, and chief builder of the commercial law of the English world, a man who might have been prime minister if he had chosen.--Mr. Gladstone stands out as far the most conspicuous and powerful of all the public leaders in our history, who have sprung from the northern half of our island. When he had grown to be the most famous man in the realm of the Queen, he said, 'I am not slow to claim the name of Scotsman, and even if I were, there is the fact staring me in the face that not a drop of blood runs in my veins except what is derived from a Scottish ancestry.'[11] An illustrious opponent once described him, by way of hitting his singular duality of disposition, as an ardent Italian in the custody of a Scotsman. It is easy to make too much of race, but when we are puzzled by Mr. Gladstone's seeming contrarieties of temperament, his union of impulse with caution, of passion with circumspection, of pride and fire with self-control, of Ossianic flight with a steady foothold on the solid earth, we may perhaps find a sort of explanation in thinking of him as a highlander in the custody of a lowlander. Of John Gladstone something more remains to be said. About 1783 he was made a partner by his father in the business at Leith, and here he saved five hundred pounds. Four years later, probably after a short period of service, he was admitted to a partnership with two corn-merchants at Liverpool, his contribution to the total capital of four thousand pounds being fifteen hundred, of which his father lent him five hundred, and a friend another five at five per cent. In 1787 he thought the plural ending of his name sounded awkwardly in the style of the firm, Corrie, Gladstones, and Bradshaw, so he dropped the _s_.[12] He visited London to enlarge his knowledge of the corn trade in Mark Lane, and here became acquainted with Sir Claude Scott, the banker (not yet, however, a baronet). Scott was so impressed by his extraordinary vigour and shrewdness as to talk of a partnership, but Gladstone's existing arrangement in Liverpool was settled for fourteen years. Sometime in the nineties he was sent to America to purchase corn, with unlimited confidence from Sir Claude Scott. On his arrival, he found a severe scarcity and enormous prices. A large number of vessels had been chartered for the enterprise, and were on their way to him for cargoes. To send them back in ballast would be a disaster. Thrown entirely on his own resources, he travelled south from New York, making the best purchases of all sorts that he could; then loaded his ships with timber and other commodities, one only of them with flour; and the loss on the venture, which might have meant ruin, did not exceed a few hundred pounds. Energy and resource of this kind made fortune secure, and when the fourteen years of partnership expired, Gladstone continued business on his own account, with a prosperity that was never broken. He brought his brothers to Liverpool, but it was to provide for them, not to assist himself, says Mr. Gladstone; 'and he provided for many young men in the same way. I never knew him reject any kind of work in aid of others that offered itself to him.' JOHN GLADSTONE It was John Gladstone's habit, we are told, to discuss all sorts of questions with his children, and nothing was ever taken for granted between him and his sons. 'He could not understand,' says the illustrious one among them, 'nor tolerate those who, perceiving an object to be good, did not at once and actively pursue it; and with all this energy he joined a corresponding warmth and, so to speak, eagerness of affection, a keen appreciation of humour, in which he found a rest, and an indescribable frankness and simplicity of character, which, crowning his other qualities, made him, I think (and I strive to think impartially), the most interesting old man I have ever known.'[13] To his father's person and memory, Mr. Gladstone's fervid and affectionate devotion remained unbroken. 'One morning,' writes a female relative of his, 'when I was breakfasting alone with Mr. Gladstone at Carlton House Terrace something led to his speaking of his father. I seem to see him now, rising from his chair, standing in front of the chimneypiece, and in strains of fervid eloquence dwelling on the grandeur, the breadth and depth of his character, his generosity, his nobleness, last and greatest of all--his loving nature. His eyes filled with tears as he exclaimed: "None but his children can know what torrents of tenderness flowed from his heart."' The successful merchant was also the active-minded citizen. 'His force,' says his son, 'soon began to be felt as a prominent and then a foremost member of the community.' He had something of his descendant's inextinguishable passion for pamphleteering, and the copious effusion of public letters and articles. As was inevitable in a Scotsman of his social position at that day, when tory rule of a more tyrannic stamp than was ever known in England since the Revolution of 1688, had reduced constitutional liberty in Scotland to a shadow, John Gladstone came to Liverpool a whig, and a whig he remained until Canning raised the flag of a new party inside the entrenchments of Eldonian toryism. In 1812 Canning, who had just refused Lord Liverpool's proffer of the foreign office because he would not serve under Castlereagh as leader in the House of Commons, was invited by John Gladstone to stand for Liverpool. He was elected in triumph over Brougham, and held the seat through four elections, down to 1822, when he was succeeded by Huskisson, whom he described to the constituency as the best man of business in England, and one of the ablest practical statesmen that could engage in the concerns of a commercial country. The speeches made to his constituents during the ten years for which he served them are excellent specimens of Canning's rich, gay, aspiring eloquence. In substance they abound in much pure toryism, and his speech after the Peterloo massacre, and upon the topics relating to public meetings, sedition, and parliamentary reform, though by sonorous splendour and a superb plausibility fascinating to the political neophyte, is by no means free from froth, without much relation either to social facts or to popular principles. On catholic emancipation he followed Pitt, as he did in an enlarged view of commercial policy. At Liverpool he made his famous declaration that his political allegiance was buried in Pitt's grave. At one at least of these performances the youthful William Gladstone was present, but it was at home that he learned Canningite doctrine. At Seaforth House Canning spent the days between the death of Castlereagh and his own recall to power, while he was waiting for the date fixed for his voyage to take up the viceroyalty of India. CANNING As from whig John Gladstone turned Canningite, so from presbyterian also he turned churchman. He paid the penalty of men who change their party, and was watched with a critical eye by old friends; but he was a liberal giver for beneficent public purposes, and in 1811 he was honoured by the freedom of Liverpool. His ambition naturally pointed to parliament, and he was elected first for Lancaster in 1818, and next for Woodstock in 1820, two boroughs of extremely easy political virtue. Lancaster cost him twelve thousand pounds, towards which his friends in Liverpool contributed one-half. In 1826 he was chosen at Berwick, but was unseated the year after. His few performances in the House were not remarkable. He voted with ministers, and on the open question of catholic emancipation he went with Canning and Plunket. He was one of the majority who by six carried Plunket's catholic motion in 1821, and the matter figures in the earliest of the hundreds of surviving letters from his youngest son, then over eleven, and on the eve of his departure for Eton:-- _Seaforth, Mar._ 10, 1821. I address these few lines to you to know how my dear mother is, to thank you for your kind letter, and to know whether Edward may get two padlocks for the wicket and large shore gate. They are now open, and the people make a thoroughfare of the green walk and the carriage road. I read Mr. Plunket's speech, and I admire it exceedingly. I enclose a letter from Mr. Rawson to you. He told me to-day that Mrs. R. was a great deal better. Write to me again as soon as you can.--Ever your most affectionate and dutiful son, W. E. GLADSTONE. In after years he was fond of recalling how the Liverpool with which he had been most familiar (1810-20), though the second commercial town in the kingdom, did not exceed 100,000 of population, and how the silver cloud of smoke that floated above her resembled that which might now appear over any secondary borough or village of the country. 'I have seen wild roses growing upon the very ground that is now the centre of the borough of Bootle. All that land is now partly covered with residences and partly with places of business and industry; but in my time but one single house stood upon the space between Primrose brook and the town of Liverpool.' Among his early recollections was 'the extraordinarily beautiful spectacle of a dock delivery on the Mersey after a long prevalence of westerly winds followed by a change. Liverpool cannot imitate that now [1892], at least not for the eye.' III JOHN GLADSTONE AS SLAVEHOLDER The Gladstone firm was mainly an East India house, but in the last ten years of his mercantile course John Gladstone became the owner of extensive plantations of sugar and coffee in the West Indies, some in Jamaica, others in British Guiana or Demerara. The infamy of the slave-trade had been abolished in 1807, but slave labour remained, and the Liverpool merchant, like a host of other men of equal respectability and higher dignity, including many peers and even some bishops, was a slaveholder. Everybody who has ever read one of the most honourable and glorious chapters in our English history knows the case of the missionary John Smith.[14] In 1823 an outbreak of the slaves occurred in Demerara, and one of John Gladstone's plantations happened to be its centre. The rising was stamped out with great cruelty in three days. Martial law, the savage instrument of race passion, was kept in force for over five months. Fifty negroes were hanged, many were shot down in the thickets, others were torn in pieces by the lash of the cart-whip. Smith was arrested, although he had in fact done his best to stop the rising. Tried before a court in which every rule of evidence was tyrannically set aside, he was convicted on hearsay and condemned to death. Before the atrocious sentence could be commuted by the home authorities, the fiery heat and noisome vapours of his prison killed him. The death of the Demerara missionary, it has been truly said, was an event as fatal to slavery in the West Indies, as the execution of John Brown was its deathblow in the United States.[15] Brougham in 1824 brought the case before the House of Commons, and in the various discussions upon it the Gladstone estates made rather a prominent figure. John Gladstone became involved in a heated and prolonged controversy as to the management of his plantations; as we shall see, it did not finally die down till 1841. He was an indomitable man. In a newspaper discussion through a long series of letters, he did not defend slavery in the abstract, but protested against the abuse levelled at the planters by all 'the intemperate, credulous, designing, or interested individuals who followed the lead of that well-meaning but mistaken man, Mr. Wilberforce.' He denounced the missionaries as hired emissaries, whose object seemed to be rather to revolutionise the colonies than to diffuse religion among the people. In 1830 he published a pamphlet, in the form of a letter to Sir Robert Peel,[16] to explain that negroes were happier when forced to work; that, as their labour was essential to the welfare of the colonies, he considered the difficulties in the way of emancipation insurmountable; that it was not for him to seek to destroy a system that an over-ruling Providence had seen fit to permit in certain climates since the very formation of society; and finally with a Parthian bolt, he hinted that the public would do better to look to the condition of the lower classes at home than to the negroes in the colonies. The pamphlet made its mark, and was admitted by the abolitionists to be an attempt of unusual ingenuity to varnish the most heinous of national crimes. Three years later, when emancipation came, and the twenty million pounds of compensation were distributed, John Gladstone appears to have received, individually and apart from his partnerships, a little over seventy-five thousand pounds for 1609 slaves.[17] It is as well, though in anticipation of the order of time, to complete our sketch. In view of the approach of full abolition, John Gladstone induced Lord Glenelg, the whig secretary of state, to issue an order in council (1837) permitting the West Indian planters to ship coolies from India on terms drawn up by the planters themselves. Objections were made with no effect by the governor at Demerara, a humane and vigorous man, who had done much work as military engineer under Wellington, and who, after abolishing the flogging of female slaves in the Bahamas, now set such an iron yoke upon the planters and their agents in Demerara, that he said 'he could sleep satisfied that no person in the colony could be punished without his knowledge and sanction.'[18] The importation of coolies raised old questions in new forms. The voyage from India was declared to reproduce the horrors of the middle passage of the vanished Guinea slavers; the condition of the coolie on the sugar plantations was drawn in a light only less lurid than the case of the African negro; and John Gladstone was again in hot water. Thomas Gladstone, his eldest son, defended him in parliament (Aug. 3, 1839), and commissioners sent to inquire into the condition of the various Gladstone plantations reported that the coolies on Vreedestein appeared contented and happy on the whole; no one had ever maltreated or beaten them except in one case; and those on Vreedenhoop appeared perfectly contented. The interpreter, who had abused them, had been fined, punished, and dismissed. Upon the motion of W. E. Gladstone, these reports were laid upon the table of the House in 1840.[19] We shall have not unimportant glimpses, as our story unfolds itself, of all these transactions. Meanwhile, it is interesting to note that the statesman whose great ensign was to be human freedom, was thus born in a family where the palliation of slavery must have made a daily topic. The union, moreover, of fervid evangelical religion with antagonism to abolition must in those days have been rare, and in spite of his devoted faith in his father the youthful Gladstone may well have had uneasy moments. If so, he perhaps consoled himself with the authority of Canning. Canning, in 1823, had formally laid down the neutral principles common to the statesmen of the day: that amelioration of the lot of the negro slave was the utmost limit of action, and that his freedom as a result of amelioration was the object of a pious hope, and no more. Canning described the negro as a being with the form of a man and the intellect of a child. 'To turn him loose in the manhood of his physical strength, in the maturity of his physical passions, but in the infancy of his uninstructed reason, would be to raise up a creature resembling the splendid fiction of a recent romance,[20] the hero of which constructs a human form with all the corporal capabilities of a man, but being unable to impart to the work of his hands a perception of right and wrong, he finds too late that he has only created a more than mortal power of doing mischief.' 'I was bred,' said Mr. Gladstone when risen to meridian splendour, 'under the shadow of the great name of Canning; every influence connected with that name governed the politics of my childhood and of my youth; with Canning, I rejoiced in the removal of religious disabilities, and in the character which he gave to our policy abroad; with Canning, I rejoiced in the opening he made towards the establishment of free commercial interchanges between nations; with Canning, and under the shadow of the yet more venerable name of Burke, my youthful mind and imagination were impressed.'[21] On slavery and even the slave trade, Burke too had argued against total abolition. 'I confess,' he said, 'I trust infinitely more (according to the sound principles of those who ever have at any time meliorated the state of mankind) to the effect and influence of religion than to all the rest of the regulations put together.'[22] FOOTNOTES: [1] The freedom was formally bestowed on him in 1863. [2] Sir William Fraser died in 1898. [3] Researches into the ancestry of the Gladstone family have been made by Sir William Fraser, Professor John Veitch, and Mrs. Oliver of Thornwood. Besides his special investigation of the genealogy of the family, Sir W. Fraser devoted some pages in the _Douglas Book_ to the Gledstanes of Gledstanes. The surname of Gledstanes occurs at a very early period in the records of Scotland. Families of that name acquired considerable landed estates in the counties of Lanark, Peebles, Roxburgh, and Dumfries. The old castle of Gledstanes, now in ruins, was the principal mansion of the family. The first of the name who has been found on record is Herbert de Gledstanes, who swore fealty to Edward I. in 1296 for lands in the county of Lanark. The Gledstanes long held the office of bailie under the Earls of Douglas, and the connection between the two families seems to have lasted until the fall of the Douglas family. The Gledstanes still continued to figure for many generations on the border. About the middle of the eighteenth century two branches of the family--the Gledstanes of Cocklaw and of Craigs--failed in the direct male line. Mr. Gladstone was descended from a third branch, the Gledstanes of Arthurshiel in Lanarkshire. The first of this line who has been traced is William Gledstanes, who in the year 1551 was laird of Arthurshiel. His lineal descendants continued as owners of that property till William Gledstanes disposed of it and went to live in the town of Biggar about the year 1679. This William Gledstanes was Mr. Gladstone's great-great-grandfather. The connection between these three branches and Herbert de Gledstanes of 1296 has not been ascertained, but he was probably the common ancestor of them all. [4] John Gladstone built St. Thomas's Church, Seaforth, 1814-15; St. Andrew's, Liverpool, about 1816; the church at Leith; the Episcopal chapel at Fasque built and endowed about 1847. [5] Charles Simeon (1759-1836), who played as conspicuous a part in low church thought as Newman afterwards in high. [6] See below, pp. 106-7. [7] XII 58--'Removed from death by four or maybe seven fingers' breadth.' [8] The fragment is undated. [9] One or two further genealogical _nugæ_ are among the papers. A correspondent wrote to Mr. Gladstone in 1887: Among the donors to the Craftsman's Hospital, Aberdeen, established in 1833, occurs the name of 'Georg Gladstaines, pewterer, 300 merks' (£16, 13s. 4d. sterling), 1698. George joined the Hammerman Craft in 1656, when he would have been about 25 years of age. His signature is still in existence appended to the burgess oath. Very few craftsmen could sign their names at that period--not one in twenty--so that George must have been fairly well educated. Mr. Gladstone replied that it was the first time that he had heard of the name so far north, and that the pewterer was probably one planted out. At Dundee (1890) he mentioned that others of his name and blood appeared on the burgess-roll as early as the fifteenth century. As for his maternal grandfather, the _Inverness Courier_ (March 2, year not given) has the following:--'Provost Robertson of Dingwall was a descendant of the ancient family of the Robertsons of Inshes, of whose early settlement in the north the following particulars are known: The first was a member of the family of Struan, Perthshire, and was a merchant in Inverness in 1420. In the battle of _Blair-na-leine_, fought at the west end of Loch-Lochy in 1544, John Robertson, a descendant of the above, acted as standard-bearer to Lord Lovat. This battle was fought between the Frasers and Macdonalds of Clanranald, and derived its appellation from the circumstance of the combatants fighting only in their shirts. The contest was carried on with such bloody determination, foot to foot and claymore to claymore, that only _four_ of the Frasers and _ten_ of the Macdonalds returned to tell the tale. The former family was well nigh extirpated; tradition, however, states that sixteen widows of the Frasers who had been slain, shortly afterwards, as a providential succour, gave birth to sixteen sons! From the bloody onslaught at Loch-Lochy young Robertson returned home scaithless, and his brave and gallant conduct was the theme of praise with all. Some time thereafter he married the second daughter of Paterson of Wester and Easter Inshes, the eldest being married to Cuthbert of Macbeth's Castlehill, now known as the Crown lands, possessed by Mr. Fraser of Abertarff. On the death of Paterson, his father-in-law, Wester Inshes became the property of young Robertson, and Easter Inshes that of the Cuthberts, who, for the sake of distinction, changed the name to Castlehill. The Robertsons, in regular succession until the present time, possess the fine estate of Inshes; while that of Castlehill, which belonged to the powerful Cuthberts for so many generations, knows them no more. The family of Inshes, in all ages, stood high in respect throughout the highlands, and many of them had signalised themselves in upholding the rights of their country; and the worthy Provost Robertson of Dingwall had no less distinguished himself, who, with other important reforms, had cleared away the last burdensome relic of feudal times in that ancient burgh.' [10] The other sons and daughters of this marriage were Thomas, _d._ 1889; Robertson, _d._ 1875; John Neilson, _d._ 1863; Anne, _d._ 1829; Helen Jane, _d._ 1880. [11] At Dundee, Oct. 29, 1890. [12] In 1835 formal difficulties arose in connection with the purchase of a government annuity, and then he seems to have taken out letters patent authorising the change in the name. [13] _Memoirs of J. R. Hope-Scott_, ii. p. 290. [14] The story of John Smith is excellently told in Walpole (iii. p. 178), and in Miss Martineau's _Hist. of the Peace_ (bk. II. ch. iv.). But Mr. Robbins has worked it out with diligence and precision in special reference to John Gladstone: _Early Life_, pp. 36-47. [15] Trevelyan's _Macaulay_, i. p. 111, where the reader will also find a fine passage from Macaulay's speech before the Anti-Slavery Society upon the matter--the first speech he ever made. [16] 'A statement of facts connected with the present state of slavery in the British sugar and coffee colonies, and in the United States of America, together with a view of the present situation of the lower classes in the United Kingdom.' [17] In Demerara the average price of slaves from 1822 to 1830 had been £114, 11s. 5¼d. The rate of compensation per slave averaged £51, 17s. ½d., but it is of interest to note that the slaves on the Vreedenhoop estate were valued at £53, 15s. 6d. [18] _Dict. Nat. Biog._, Sir James Carmichael Smyth. [19] He took Follett's opinion (Aug. 5, 1841) on the question of applying for a criminal information against the publisher of an article stating how many slaves had been worked to death on his father's plantations. The great advocate wisely recommended him to leave it alone. [20] _Frankenstein_ was published in 1818. [21] House of Commons, April 27, 1866. [22] _Letter to Dundas, with a sketch of a Negro Code_, 1792. But see _Life of W. Wilberforce_, v. p. 157. CHAPTER II ETON (_1821-1827_) It is in her public schools and universities that the youth of England are, by a discipline which shallow judgments have sometimes attempted to undervalue, prepared for the duties of public life. There are rare and splendid exceptions, to be sure, but in my conscience I believe, that England would not be what she is without her system of public education, and that no other country can become what England is, without the advantages of such a system.--CANNING. It is difficult to discern the true dimensions of objects in that mirage which covers the studies of one's youth.--GLADSTONE. In September 1821, the young Gladstone was sent to Eton. Life at Eton lasted over six years, until the Christmas of 1827. It impressed images that never faded, and left traces in heart and mind that the waves of time never effaced,--so profound is the early writing on our opening page. Canning's words at the head of our present chapter set forth a superstition that had a powerful hold on the English governing class of that day, and the new Etonian never shook it off. His attachment to Eton grew with the lapse of years; to him it was ever 'the queen of all schools.' 'I went,' he says, 'under the wing of my eldest brother, then in the upper division, and this helped my start and much mitigated the sense of isolation that attends the first launch at a public school.' The door of his dame's house looked down the Long Walk, while the windows looked into the very crowded churchyard: from this he never received the smallest inconvenience, though it was his custom (when master of the room) to sleep with his window open both summer and winter. The school, said the new scholar, has only about four hundred and ninety fellows in it, which was considered uncommonly small. He likes his tutor so much that he would not exchange him for any ten. He has various rows with Mrs. Shurey, his dame, and it is really a great shame the way they are fed. He and his brother have far the best room in the dame's house. His captain is very good-natured. Fighting is a favourite diversion, hardly a day passing without one, two, three, or even four more or less mortal combats. MANNERS AT ETON You will be glad to hear, he writes to his Highland aunt Johanna (November 13, 1821), of an instance of the highest and most honourable spirit in a highlander labouring under great disadvantages. His name is Macdonald (he once had a brother here remarkably clever, and a capital fighter). He is tough as iron, and about the strongest fellow in the school of his size. Being pushed out of his seat in school by a fellow of the name of Arthur, he airily asked him to give it him again, which being refused, with the additional insult that he might try what he could do to take it from him, Macdonald very properly took him at his word, and began to push him out of his seat. Arthur struck at him with all his might, and gave him so violent a blow that Macdonald was almost knocked backwards, but disdaining to take a blow from even a fellow much bigger than himself, he returned Arthur's blow with interest; they began to fight; after Macdonald had made him bleed at both his nose and his mouth, he finished the affair very triumphantly by knocking the arrogant Arthur backwards over the form without receiving a single blow of any consequence. He also labours under the additional disadvantage of being a new fellow, and of not knowing any one here. Arthur in a former battle put his finger out of joint, and as soon as it is recovered they are to have a regular battle in the playing fields. Other encounters are described with equal zest, especially one where 'the honour of Liverpool was bravely sustained,' superior weight and size having such an advantage over toughness and strength, that the foe of Liverpool was too badly bruised and knocked about to appear in school. On another occasion, 'to the great joy' of the narrator, an oppidan vanquished a colleger, though the colleger fought so furiously that he put his fingers out of joint, and went back to the classic studies that soften manners, with a face broken and quite black. The Windsor and Slough coaches used to stop under the wall of the playing fields to watch these desperate affrays, and once at least in these times a boy was killed. With plenty of fighting went on plenty of flogging; for the headmaster was the redoubtable Dr. Keate, with whom the appointed instrument of moral regeneration in the childish soul was the birch rod; who on heroic occasions was known to have flogged over eighty boys on a single summer day; and whose one mellow regret in the evening of his life was that he had not flogged far more. Religious instruction, as we may suppose, was under these circumstances reduced to zero; there was no trace of the influence of the evangelical party, at that moment the most active of all the religious sections; and the ancient and pious munificence of Henry VI. now inspired a scene that was essentially little better than pagan, modified by an official church of England varnish. At Eton, Mr. Gladstone wrote of this period forty years after, 'the actual teaching of Christianity was all but dead, though happily none of its forms had been surrendered.'[23] Science even in its rudiments fared as ill as its eternal rival, theology. There was a mathematical master, but nobody learned anything from him, or took any notice of him. In his anxiety for position the unfortunate man asked Keate if he might wear a cap and gown. 'That's as you please,' said Keate. 'Must the boys touch their hats to me?' 'That's as they please,' replied the genial doctor.[24] Gladstone first picked up a little mathematics, not at Eton, but during the holidays, going to Liverpool for the purpose, first in 1824 and more seriously in 1827. He seems to have paid much attention to French, and even then to have attained considerable proficiency. 'When I was at Eton,' Mr. Gladstone said, 'we knew very little indeed, but we knew it accurately.' 'There were many shades of distinction,' he observed, 'among the fellows who received what was supposed to be, and was in many respects, their education. Some of those shades of distinction were extremely questionable, and the comparative measures of honour allotted to talent, industry, and idleness were undoubtedly such as philosophy would not justify. But no boy was ever estimated either more or less because he had much money to spend. It added nothing to him if he had much, it took nothing from him if he had little.' A sharp fellow who worked, and a stupid fellow who was idle, were both of them in good odour enough, but a stupid boy who presumed to work was held to be an insufferable solecism.[25] KNOWLEDGE AT ETON My tutor was the Rev. H. H. Knapp (practically all tutors were clergymen in those days). He was a reputed whig, an easy and kind-tempered man with a sense of scholarship, but no power of discipline, and no energy of desire to impress himself upon his pupils. I recollect but one piece of advice received later from him. It was that I should form my poetical taste upon Darwin, whose poems (the 'Botanic Garden' and 'Loves of the Plants') I obediently read through in consequence. I was placed in the middle remove fourth form, a place slightly better than the common run, but inferior to what a boy of good preparation or real excellence would have taken. My nearest friend of the first period was W. W. Parr, a boy of intelligence, something over my age, next above me in the school. At this time there was not in me any desire to know or to excel. My first pursuits were football and then cricket; the first I did not long pursue, and in the second I never managed to rise above mediocrity and what was termed 'the twenty-two.' There was a barrister named Henry Hall Joy, a connection of my father through his first wife, and a man who had taken a first-class at Oxford. He was very kind to me, and had made some efforts to inspire me with a love of books, if not of knowledge. Indeed I had read Froissart, and Hume with Smollett, but only for the battles, and always skipping when I came to the sections headed 'A Parliament.' Joy had a taste for classics, and made visions for me of honours at Oxford. But the subject only danced before my eyes as a will-of-the-wisp, and without attracting me. I remained stagnant without heart or hope. A change however arrived about Easter 1822. My 'remove' was then under Hawtrey (afterwards head-master and provost), who was always on the lookout for any bud which he could warm with a little sunshine. He always described Hawtrey as the life of the school, the man to whom Eton owed more than to any of her sons during the century. Though not his pupil, it was from him that Gladstone, when in the fourth form, received for the first time incentives to exertion. 'It was entirely due to Hawtrey,' he records in a fragment, 'that I first owed the reception of a spark, the _divinae particulam aurae_, and conceived a dim idea, that in some time, manner, and degree, I might come to know. Even then, as I had really no instructor, my efforts at Eton, down to 1827, were perhaps of the purest plodding ever known.' Evidently he was not a boy of special mark during the first three years at Eaton. In the evening he played chess and cards, and usually lost. He claimed in after life that he had once taken a drive in a hired tandem, but Etonians who knew him as a schoolboy decided that an aspiring memory here made him boast of crimes that were not his. He was assiduous in the Eton practice of working a small boat, whether skiff, funny, or wherry, single-handed. In the masquerade of Montem he figured complacently in all the glories of the costume of a Greek patriot, for he was a faithful Canningite; the heroic struggle against the Turk was at its fiercest, and it was the year when Byron died at Missolonghi. Of Montem as an institution he thought extremely ill, 'the whole thing a wretched waste of time and money, a most ingenious contrivance to exhibit us as baboons, a bore in the full sense of the word.' He did not stand aside from the harmless gaieties of boyish life, but he rigidly refused any part in boyish indecorums. He was, in short, just the diligent, cheerful, healthy-minded schoolboy that any good father would have his son to be. He enjoys himself with his brother at the Christopher, and is glad to record that 'Keate did not make any jaw about being so late.' Half a dozen of them met every whole holiday or half, and went up Salt Hill to bully the fat waiter, eat toasted cheese, and drink egg-wine. SCHOOL DAYS He started, as we have already seen, in middle fourth form. In the spring of 1822 Hawtrey said to him: 'Continue to do as well as this, and I will send you up for good again before the fourth of June.' Before the end of June, he tells his sailor brother of his success: 'It far exceeds the most sanguine expectations I ever entertained. I have got into the remove between the fourth and fifth forms. I have been sent up for good a second time, and have taken seven places.' In the summer of 1823 he announces that he has got into the fifth form after taking sixteen places, and here instead of fagging he acquires the blessed power himself to fag. In passing he launches, for the first recorded time, against the master of the remove from which he has just been promoted, an invective that in volume and intensity anticipates the wrath of later attacks on Neapolitan kings and Turkish sultans. His letters written from Eton breathe in every line the warm breath of family affection, and of all those natural pieties that had so firm a root in him from the beginning to the end. Of the later store of genius and force that the touch of time was so soon to kindle into full glow, they gave but little indication. We smile at the precocious _copia fandi_ that at thirteen describes the language of an admonishing acquaintance as 'so friendly, manly, sound, and disinterested that notwithstanding his faults I must always think well of him.' He sends contributions to his brother's scrap-book, and one of the first of them, oddly enough, in view of one of the great preoccupations of his later life, is a copy of Lord Edward Fitzgerald's stanzas on the night of his arrest:-- 'O Ireland, my country, the hour Of thy pride and thy splendour has passed. And the chain which was spurned in thy moment of power, Hangs heavy around thee at last.' The temper and dialect of evangelical religion are always there. A friend of the family dies, and the boy pours out his regret, but after all what is the merely natural death of Dr. N. compared with the awful state of a certain clergyman, also an intimate friend, who has not only been guilty of attending a fancy ball, but has followed that vicious prelude by even worse enormities, unnamed, that surely cannot escape the vigilance and the reproof of his bishop? His father is the steady centre of his life. 'My father,' he writes to his brother, 'is as active in mind and projects as ever; he has two principal plans now in embryo. One of these is a railroad between Liverpool and Manchester for the conveyance of goods by locomotive-steam-engine. The other is for building a bridge over the Mersey at Runcorn.' In May 1827, the Gloucester and Berkeley canal is opened: 'a great and enterprising undertaking, but still there is no fear of it beating Liverpool.' Meanwhile, 'what prodigiously quick travelling to leave Eton at twelve on Monday, and reach home at eight on Tuesday!' 'I have,' he says in 1826, 'lately been writing several letters in the _Liverpool Courier_.' His father had been attacked in the local prints for sundry economic inconsistencies, and the controversial pen that was to know no rest for more than seventy years to come, was now first employed, like the pious �neas bearing off Anchises, in the filial duty of repelling his sire's assailants. Ignorant of his nameless champion, John Gladstone was much amused and interested by the anonymous 'Friend to Fair Dealing,' while the son was equally diverted by the criticisms and conjectures of the parent. YOUTHFUL READING With the formidable Keate the boy seems to have fared remarkably well, and there are stories that he was even one of the tyrant's favourites.[26] His school work was diligently supplemented. His daily reading in 1826 covers a good deal of miscellaneous ground, including Molière and Racine, Blair's _Sermons_ ('not very substantial'), _Tom Jones_, Tomline's _Life of Pitt_, Waterland's _Commentaries_, Leslie _on Deism_, Locke's _Defence of The Reasonableness of Christianity_, which he finds excellent; _Paradise Lost_, Milton's _Latin Poems_ and _Epitaphium Damonis_ ('exquisite'), Massinger's _Fatal Dowry_ ('most excellent'), Ben Jonson's _Alchemist_; Scott, including the _Bride of Lammermoor_ ('a beautiful tale, indeed,' and in after life his favourite of them all), Burke, Clarendon, and others of the shining host whose very names are music to a scholar's ear. In the same year he reads 'a most violent article on Milton by Macaulay, fair and unfair, clever and silly, allegorical and bombastic, republican and anti-episcopal--a strange composition, indeed.' In 1827 he went steadily through the second half of Gibbon, whom he pronounces, 'elegant and acute as he is, not so clear, so able, so attractive as Hume; does not impress my mind so much.' In the same year he reads Coxe's _Walpole_, _Don Quixote_, Hallam's _Constitutional History_, _Measure for Measure_ and _Much Ado_, Massinger's _Grand Duke of Florence_, Ford's _Love's Melancholy_ ('much of it good, the end remarkably beautiful') and _Broken Heart_ (which he liked better than either the other or _'Tis Pity_), Locke _on Toleration_ ('much repetition'). There is, of course, a steady refrain of Greek iambics, Greek anapæsts, 'an easy and nice metre,' 'a hodge-podge lot of hendecasyllables,' and thirty alcaic stanzas for a holiday task. Mention is made of many sermons on 'Redeeming the time,' 'Weighed in the balance and found wanting,' 'Cease to do evil, learn to do well,' and the other ever unexhausted texts. One constant entry, we may be sure, is 'Read Bible,' with Mant's notes. In a mood of deep piety he is prepared for confirmation. His appearance at this time was recalled by one who had been his fag, 'as a good-looking, rather delicate youth, with a pale face and brown curling hair, always tidy and well dressed.'[27] He became captain of the fifth at the end of October 1826, and on February 20, 1827, Keate put him into the sixth. 'Was very civil, indeed; told me to take pains, etc.: to be careful in using my authority, etc.' He finds the sixth very preferable to all other parts of the school, both as regards pleasure and opportunity for improvement. They are more directly under the eye of Keate; he treats them with more civility and speaks to them differently. So the days follow one another very much alike--studious, cheerful, sociable, sedulous. The debates in parliament take up a good deal of his time, and he is overwhelmed by the horrible news of the defeat of the catholics in the House of Commons (March 8,1827). On a summer's day in 1826, 'Mr. Canning here; inquired after me and missed me.' He was not at Eton but at home when he heard of Mr. Canning's death. 'Personally I must remember his kindness and condescension, especially when he spoke to me of some verses which H. Joy had injudiciously mentioned to him.' II DEBATING SOCIETY Youthful intellect is imitative, and in a great school so impregnated as Eton with the spirit of public life and political association, the few boys with active minds mimicked the strife of parliament in their debating society, and copied the arts of journalism in the _Eton Miscellany_. In both fields the young Gladstone took a leading part. The debating society was afflicted with 'the premonitory lethargy of death,' but the assiduous energy of Gaskell, seconded by the gifts of Gladstone, Hallam, and Doyle, soon sent a new pulse beating through it. The politics of the hour, that is to say everything not fifty years off, were forbidden ground; but the execution of Strafford or of his royal master, the deposition of Richard II., the last four years of the reign of Queen Anne, the Peerage bill of 1719, the characters of Harley and Bolingbroke, were themes that could be made by ingenious youth to admit a hundred cunning sidelights upon the catholic question, the struggle of the Greeks for independence, the hard case of Queen Caroline, and the unlawfulness of swamping the tories in the House of Lords. On duller afternoons they argued on the relative claims of mathematics and metaphysics to be the better discipline of the human mind; whether duelling is or is not inconsistent with the character that we ought to seek; or whether the education of the poor is on the whole beneficial. It was on this last question (October 29, 1825) that the orator who made his last speech seventy years later, now made his first. 'Made my first or maiden speech at the society,' he enters in his diary, 'on education of the poor; funked less than I thought I should, by much.' It is a curious but a characteristic circumstance not that so many of his Eton speeches were written out, but that the manuscript should have been thriftily preserved by him all through the long space of intervening years. 'Mr. President,' it begins, 'in this land of liberty, in this age of increased and gradually increasing civilization, we shall hope to find few, if indeed any, among the higher classes who are eager or willing to obstruct the moral instruction and mental improvement of their fellow creatures in the humbler walks of life. If such there are, let them at length remember that the poor are endowed with the same reason, though not blessed with the same temporal advantages. Let them but admit, what I think no one can deny, that they are placed in an elevated situation principally for the purpose of doing good to their fellow creatures. Then by what argument can they repel, by what pretence can they evade the duty?' And so forth and so forth. Already we seem to hear the born speaker in the amplitude of rhetorical form in which, juvenile though it may be, a commonplace is cast. 'Is human grandeur so stable that they may deny to others that which they would in an humble situation desire themselves? Or has human pride reached such a pitch of arrogance that they have learned to defy both right and reason, to reject the laws of natural kindness that ought to reign in the breast of all, and to look on their fellow countrymen as the refuse of mankind?... Is it morally just or politically expedient to keep down the industry and genius of the artisan, to blast his rising hopes, to quell his spirit? A thirst for knowledge has arisen in the minds of the poor; let them satisfy it with wholesome nutriment and beware lest driven to despair,' et cetera. Crude enough, if we please; but the year was 1826, and we may feel that the boyish speaker is already on the generous side and has the gift of fruitful sympathies. In the spacious tournaments of old history, we may smile to hear debating forms and ceremony applied to everlasting controversies. 'Sir,' he opens on one occasion, 'I declare that as far as regards myself, I shall have very little difficulty in stating my grounds on which I give my vote for James Graham [the Marquis of Montrose]. It is because I look upon him as a hero, not merely endowed with that animal ferocity which has often been the sole qualification which has obtained men that appellation from the multitude--I should be sorry indeed if he had no testimonials of his merits, save such as arise from the mad and thoughtless exclamations of popular applause.' In the same gallant style (Jan. 26, 1826) he votes for Marcus Aurelius, in answer to the question whether Trajan has any equal among the Roman emperors from Augustus onwards. Another time the question was between John Hampden and Clarendon. 'Sir, I look back with pleasure to the time when we unanimously declared our disapprobation of the impeachment of the Earl of Strafford. I wish I could hope for the same unanimity now, but I will endeavour to regulate myself by the same principles as directed me then.... Now, sir, with regard to the impeachment of the five members, it is really a little extraordinary to hear the honourable opener talking of the violence offered by the king, and the terror of the parliament. Sir, do we not all know that the king at that time had neither friends nor wealth?... Did the return of these members with a triumphant mob accompanying them indicate terror? Did the demands of the parliament or the insolence of their language show it?' So he proceeds through all the well-worn arguments; and 'therefore it is,' he concludes, 'that I give my vote to the Earl of Clarendon, because he gave his support to the falling cause of monarchy; because he stood by his church and his king; because he adopted the part which loyalty, reason, and moderation combined to dictate.... Poverty, banishment, and disgrace he endured without a murmur; he still adhered to the cause of justice, he still denounced the advocates of rebellion, and if he failed in his reward in life, oh, sir, let us not deny it to him after death. In him, sir, I admire the sound philosopher, the rigid moralist, the upright statesman, the candid historian.... In Hampden I see the splendour of patriotic bravery obscured by the darkness of rebellion, and the faculties by which he might have been a real hero and real martyr, prostituted in the cause,' and so on, with all the promise of the _os magna soniturum_, of which time was to prove the resources so inexhaustible. On one great man he passed a final judgment that years did not change:--'Debate on Sir R. Walpole: Hallam, Gaskell, Pickering, and Doyle spoke. Voted for him. Last time, when I was almost entirely ignorant of the subject, against him. There were sundry considerable blots, but nothing to overbalance or to spoil the great merit of being the bulwark of the protestant succession, his commercial measures, and in general his pacific policy.'[28] ETON MISCELLANY As for the _Eton Miscellany_, which was meant to follow earlier attempts in the same line, the best-natured critic cannot honestly count it dazzling. Such things rarely are; for youth, though the most adorable of our human stages, cannot yet have knowledge or practice enough, whether in life or books, to make either good prose or stirring verse, unless by a miracle of genius, and even that inspiration is but occasional. The _Microcosm_ (1786-87) and the _Etonian_ (1818), with such hands as Canning and Frere, Moultrie and Praed, were well enough. The newcomer was a long way behind these in the freshness, brilliance, daring, by which only such juvenile performances can either please or interest. George Selwyn and Gladstone were joint editors, and each provided pretty copious effusions. 'I cannot keep my temper,' he wrote afterwards in his diary in 1835, on turning over the _Miscellany_, 'in perusing my own (with few exceptions) execrable productions.' Certainly his contributions have no particular promise or savour, no hint of the strong pinions into which the half-fledged wings were in time to expand. Their motion, such as it is, must be pronounced mechanical; their phrase and cadence conventional. Even when sincere feelings were deeply stirred, the flight cannot be called high. The most moving public event in his schooldays was undoubtedly the death of Canning, and to Gladstone the stroke was almost personal. In September 1827 he tells his mother that he has for the first time visited Westminster Abbey,--his object, an eager pilgrimage to the newly tenanted grave of his hero, and in the _Miscellany_ he pays a double tribute. In the prose we hear sonorous things about meridian splendour, premature extinction, and inscrutable wisdom; about falling, like his great master Pitt, a victim to his proud and exalted station; about being firm in principle and conciliatory in action, the friend of improvement and the enemy of innovation. Nor are the versified reflections in Westminster Abbey much more striking:-- Oft in the sculptured aisle and swelling dome, The yawning grave hath given the proud a home; Yet never welcomed from his bright career A mightier victim than it welcomed here: Again the tomb may yawn--again may death Claim the last forfeit of departing breath; Yet ne'er enshrine in slumber dark and deep A nobler, loftier prey than where thine ashes sleep. Excellent in feeling, to be sure; but as a trial of poetic delicacy or power, wanting the true note, and only worth recalling for an instant as we go. III FRIENDS As nearly always happens, it was less by school work or spoken addresses in juvenile debate, or early attempts in the great and difficult art of written composition, than by blithe and congenial comradeship that the mind of the young Gladstone was stimulated, opened, strengthened. In after days he commemorated among his friends George Selwyn, afterwards bishop of New Zealand and of Lichfield, 'a man whose character is summed up, from alpha to omega, in the single word, noble, and whose high office, in a large measure, it was to reintroduce among the anglican clergy the pure heroic type.' Another was Francis Doyle, 'whose genial character supplied a most pleasant introduction for his unquestionable poetic genius.' A third was James Milnes Gaskell, a youth endowed with precocious ripeness of political faculty, an enthusiast, and with a vivacious humour that enthusiasts often miss. Doyle said of him that his nurse must have lulled him to sleep by parliamentary reports, and his first cries on awaking in his cradle must have been 'hear, hear'! Proximity of rooms 'gave occasion or aid to the formation of another very valuable friendship, that with Gerald Wellesley, afterwards dean of Windsor, which lasted, to my great profit, for some sixty years, until that light was put out.' In Gaskell's room four or five of them would meet, and discuss without restraint the questions of politics that were too modern to be tolerated in public debate. Most of them were friendly to catholic emancipation, and to the steps by which Huskisson, supported by Canning, was cautiously treading in the path towards free trade. The brightest star in this cheerful constellation was the rare youth who, though his shining course was run in two-and-twenty years, yet in that scanty span was able to impress with his vigorous understanding and graceful imagination more than one of the loftiest minds of his time.[29] Arthur Hallam was a couple of years younger than Gladstone, no narrow gulf at that age; but such was the sympathy of genius, such the affinities of intellectual interest and aspiration spoken and unspoken, such the charm and the power of the younger with the elder, that rapid instinct made them close comrades. They clubbed together their rolls and butter, and breakfasted in one another's rooms. Hallam was not strong enough for boating, so the more sinewy Gladstone used to scull him up to the Shallows, and he regarded this toilsome carrying of an idle passenger up stream as proof positive of no common value set upon his passenger's company. They took walks together, often to the monument of Gray, close by the churchyard of the elegy; arguing about the articles and the creeds; about Wordsworth, Byron, Shelley; about free will, for Hallam was precociously full of Jonathan Edwards; about politics, old and new, living and dead; about Pitt and Fox, and Canning and Peel, for Gladstone was a tory and Hallam pure whig. Hallam was described by Mr. Gladstone in his old age as one who 'enjoyed work, enjoyed society; and games which he did not enjoy he left contentedly aside. His temper was as sweet as his manners were winning. His conduct was without a spot or even a speck. He was that rare and blessed creature, _anima naturaliter Christiana_. He read largely, and though not superficial, yet with an extraordinary speed. He had no high or exclusive ways.' Thus, as so many have known in that happy dawn of life, before any of the imps of disorder and confusion have found their way into the garden, it was the most careless hours,--careless of all save truth and beauty,--that were the hours best filled. ARTHUR HALLAM Youth will commonly do anything rather than write letters, but the friendship of this pair stood even that test. The pages are redolent of a living taste for good books and serious thoughts, and amply redeemed from strain or affectation by touches of gay irony and the collegian's banter. Hallam applies to Gladstone Diomede's lines about Odysseus, of eager heart and spirit so manful in all manner of toils, as the only comrade whom a man would choose.[30] But the Greek hero was no doubt a complex character, and the parallel is taken by Gladstone as an equivocal compliment. So Hallam begs him at any rate to accept the other description, how when he uttered his mighty voice from his chest, and words fell like flakes of snow in winter, then could no mortal man contend with Odysseus.[31] As happy a forecast for the great orator of their generation, as when in 1829 he told Gladstone that Tennyson promised fair to be its greatest poet. Hallam's share in the correspondence reminds us of the friendship of two other Etonians ninety years before, of the letters and verses that Gray wrote to Richard West; there is the same literary sensibility, the same kindness, but there is what Gray and West felt not, the breath of a busy and changing age. Each of these two had the advantage of coming from a home where politics were not mere gossip about persons and paragraphs, but were matters of trained and continued interest. The son of one of the most eminent of the brilliant band of the whig writers of that day, Hallam passes glowing eulogies on the patriotism and wisdom of the whigs in coalescing with Canning against the bigotry of the king and the blunders of Wellington and Peel; he contrasts this famous crisis with a similar crisis in the early part of the reign of George III.; and observes how much higher all parties stood in the balance of disinterestedness and public virtue. He goes to the opera and finds Zucchelli admirable, Coradori divine. He wonders (1826) about Sir Walter's forthcoming life of Napoleon, how with his ultra principles Scott will manage to make a hero of the Corsican. He asks if Gladstone has read 'the new _Vivian Grey_' (1827)--the second part of that amazing fiction into which an author, not much older than themselves and destined to strange historic relations with one of them, had the year before burst upon the world. Hallam is not without the graceful melancholy of youth, so different from that other melancholy of ripe years and the deepening twilight. Under all is the recurrent note of a grave refrain that fatal issues made pathetic. 'Never since the time when I first knew you,' Hallam wrote to Gladstone (June 23, 1830), 'have I ceased to love and respect your character ... It will be my proudest thought that I may henceforth act worthily of their affection who, like yourself, have influenced my mind for good in the earliest season of its development. Circumstance, my dear Gladstone, has indeed separated our paths, but it can never do away with what has been. The stamp of each of our minds is on the other. Many a habit of thought in each is modified, many a feeling is associated, which never would have existed in that combination, had it not been for the old familiar days when we lived together.' In the summer of 1827 Hallam quitted Eton for the journey to Italy that set so important a mark on his literary growth, and he bade his friend farewell in words of characteristic affection. 'Perhaps you will pardon my doing by writing what I hardly dare trust myself to do by words. I received your superb Burke yesterday; and hope to find it a memorial of past and a pledge for future friendship through both our lives. It is perhaps rather bold in me to ask a favour immediately on acknowledging so great a one; but you would please me, and oblige me greatly, if you will accept this copy of my father's book. It may serve when I am separated from you, to remind you of one, whose warmest pleasure it will always be to subscribe himself, Your most faithful friend, A. H. H.' A few entries from the schoolboy's diary may serve to bring the daily scene before us, and show what his life was like:-- _October 3, 1826._--Holiday. Walk with Hallam. Wrote over theme. Read Clarendon. Wrote speech for Saturday week. Poor enough. Did punishment set by Keate to all the fifth form for being late in church. _October 6._--Fin. second Olympiad of Pindar.... Clarendon. Did an abstract of about 100 pages. Wrote speech for to-morrow in favour of Cæsar. _November 13._--Play. Breakfast with Hallam. Read a little Clarendon. Read over tenth Satire of Juvenal and read the fifth, making quotations to it and some other places. Did a few verses. _November 14._--Holiday. Wrote over theme. Did verses. Walked with Hallam and Doyle. Read papers and debates.... Read 200 lines of _Trachiniae_. A little _Gil Blas_ in French, and a little Clarendon. _November 18._--Play. Read papers, etc. Finished Blair's _Dissertation on Ossian_. Finished _Trachiniae_. Did 3 props. of Euclid. Question: Was deposition of Richard II. justifiable? Voted no. Good debate. Finished the delightful oration _Pro Milone_. _November 21._--Holiday.... Part of article in _Edinburgh Review_ on _Icon Basilike_. Read Herodotus, Clarendon. Did 3 props. Scrambling and leaping expedition with Hallam, Doyle, and Gaskell. _November 30._--Holiday. Read Herodotus. Breakfasted with Gaskell. He and Hallam drank wine with me after 4. Walked with Hallam. Did verses. Finished first book of Euclid. Read a little _Charles XII_. _February 27_, 1827.--Holiday. Dressed (knee-breeches, etc.) and went into school with Selwyn. Found myself not at all in a funk, and went through my performance with tolerable comfort. Durnford followed me, then Selwyn, who spoke well. Horrors of speaking chiefly in the name. _March 20._--My father has lost his seat, and Berwick a representative ten times too good for it. Wrote to my father, no longer M.P.; when we have forgotten the manner, the matter is not so bad. _March 24._--Half-holiday. Play and learning it. Walked with Hallam, read papers. Hallam drank wine with me after dinner. Finished 8th vol. of Gibbon; read account of Palmyra in second volume; did more verses on it. Much jaw about nothing at Society, and absurd violence. _May 31._--Finished iambics. Wrote over for tutor. Played cricket in the Upper Club, and had tea in poet's walk [an entry repeated this summer]. _June 26._--Wrote over theme. Read _Iphigenie_. Called up in Homer. Sculled Hallam to Surly after 6. Went to see a cricket match after 4. FAREWELL TO ETON Gladstone's farewell to Eton came with Christmas (1827). He writes to his sister his last Etonian letter (December 2) before departure, and 'melancholy that departure is.' On the day before, he had made his valedictory speech to the Society, and the empty shelves and dismantled walls, the table strewn with papers, the books packed away in their boxes, have the effect of 'mingling in one lengthened mass all the boyish hopes and solicitudes and pleasures' of his Eton life. 'I have long ago made up my mind that I have of late been enjoying what will in all probability be, as far as my own individual case is concerned, the happiest years of my life. And they have fled! From these few facts do we not draw a train of reflections awfully important in their nature and extremely powerful in their impression on the mind?' DR. KEATE Two reminiscences of Eton always gave him, and those who listened to him, much diversion whenever chance brought them to his mind, and he has set them down in an autobiographic fragment, for which this is the place:-- To Dr. Keate nature had accorded a stature of only about five feet, or say five feet one; but by costume, voice, manner (including a little swagger), and character he made himself in every way the capital figure on the Eton stage, and his departure marked, I imagine, the departure of the old race of English public school masters, as the name of Dr. Busby seems to mark its introduction. In connection with his name I shall give two anecdotes separated by a considerable interval of years. About the year 1820, the eloquence of Dr. Edward Irving drew crowds to his church in London, which was presbyterian. It required careful previous arrangements to secure comfortable accommodation. The preacher was solemn, majestic (notwithstanding the squint), and impressive; carrying all the appearance of devoted earnestness. My father had on a certain occasion, when I was still a small Eton boy, taken time by the forelock, and secured the use of a convenient pew in the first rank of the gallery. From this elevated situation we surveyed at ease and leisure the struggling crowds below. The crush was everywhere great, but greatest of all in the centre aisle. Here the mass of human beings, mercilessly compressed, swayed continually backwards and forwards. There was I, looking down with infinite complacency and satisfaction from this honourable vantage ground upon the floor of the church, filled and packed as one of our public meetings is, with people standing and pushing. What was my emotion, my joy, my exultation, when I espied among this humiliated mass, struggling and buffeted--whom but Keate! Keate the master of our existence, the tyrant of our days! Pure, unalloyed, unadulterated rapture! Such a [Greek: peripeteia], such a reversal of human conditions of being, as that now exhibited between the Eton lower boy uplifted to the luxurious gallery pew, and the head-master of Eton, whom I was accustomed to see in the roomy deck of the upper school with vacant space and terror all around him, it must be hard for any one to conceive, except the two who were the subjects of it. Never, never, have I forgotten that moment.[32] I will now, after the manner of novelists, ask my reader to effect along with me, a transition of some eighteen years, and to witness another, and if not a more complete yet a worthier, turning of the tables. In the year 1841 there was a very special Eton dinner held in Willis's Rooms to commemorate the fourth centenary of the ancient school. Lord Morpeth, afterwards Lord Carlisle, was in the chair. On his right, not far off him, was Dr. Keate, to whom I chanced to have a seat almost immediately opposite. In those days, at public dinners, cheering was marked by gradations. As the Queen was suspected of sympathy with the liberal government of Lord Melbourne which advised her, the toast of the sovereign was naturally received with a moderate amount of acclamation, decently and thriftily doled out. On the other hand the Queen Dowager either was, or was believed to be, conservative; and her health consequently figured as the toast of the evening, and drew forth, as a matter of course, by far its loudest acclamation. So much was routine; and we went through it as usual. But the real toast of the evening was yet to come. I suppose it to be beyond doubt that of the assembled company the vastly preponderating majority had been under his sway at Eton; and if, when in that condition, any one of them had been asked how he liked Dr. Keate, he would beyond question have answered, 'Keate? Oh, I hate him.' It is equally beyond doubt that to the persons of the whole of them, with the rarest exceptions, it had been the ease of Dr. Keate to administer the salutary correction of the birch. But upon this occasion, when his name had been announced the scene was indescribable. Queen and Queen Dowager alike vanished into insignificance. The roar of cheering had a beginning, but never knew satiety or end. Like the huge waves at Biarritz, the floods of cheering continually recommenced; the whole process was such that we seemed all to have lost our self-possession and to be hardly able to keep our seats. When at length it became possible Keate rose: that is to say, his head was projected slightly over the heads of his two neighbours. He struggled to speak; I will not say I heard every syllable, for there were no syllables; speak he could not. He tried in vain to mumble a word or two, but wholly failed, recommenced the vain struggle and sat down. It was certainly one of the most moving spectacles that in my whole life I have witnessed. IV AT WILMSLOW Some months passed between leaving Eton and going to Oxford. In January 1828, Gladstone went to reside with Dr. Turner at Wilmslow in Cheshire, and remained there until Turner was made Bishop of Calcutta. The bishop's pupil afterwards testified to his amiability, refinement, and devoutness; but the days of his energy were past, and 'the religious condition of the parish was depressing.' Among the neighbouring families, with whom he made acquaintance while at Wilmslow, were the Gregs of Quarry Bank, a refined and philanthropic household, including among the sons William R. Greg (born in the same year as Mr. Gladstone), that ingenious, urbane, interesting, and independent mind, whose speculations, dissolvent and other, were afterwards to take an effective place in the writings of the time. 'I fear he is a unitarian,' the young churchman mentions to his father, and gives sundry reasons for that sombre apprehension; it was, indeed, only too well founded. While at Wilmslow (Feb. 5, 1828) Gladstone was taken to dine with the rector of Alderley--'an extremely gentlemanly and said to be a very clever man,'--afterwards to be known as the liberal and enlightened Edward Stanley, Bishop of Norwich, and father of Arthur Stanley, the famous dean. Him, on this occasion, the young Gladstone seems to have seen for the first time. Arthur Stanley was six years his junior, and there was then some idea of sending him to Eton. As it happened, he too was a pupil at Rawson's at Seaforth, and in the summer after the meeting at Alderley the two lads met again. The younger of them has described how he was invited to breakfast with William Gladstone at Seaforth House; in what grand style they breakfasted, how he devoured strawberries, swam the Newfoundland dog in the pond, looked at books and pictures, and talked to W. Gladstone 'almost all the time about all sorts of things. He is so very good-natured, and I like him very much. He talked a great deal about Eton, and said that it was a very good place for those who liked boating and Latin verses. He was very good-natured to us all the time, and lent me books to read when we went away.'[33] A few months later, as all the world knows, Stanley, happily for himself and for all of us, went not to Eton but to Rugby, where Arnold had just entered on his bold and noble task of changing the face of education in England. FOOTNOTES: [23] _Gleanings_, vii. p. 138. [24] A story sometimes told of Provost Goodall. [25] At Marlborough, Feb. 3, 1877; at Mill Hill School, June 11, 1879. [26] Doyle tells a story of the boy being flogged for bringing wine into his study. When questioned on this, Mr. Gladstone said, 'I _was_ flogged, but not for anything connected in any way with wine, of which, by the by, my father supplied me with a small amount, and insisted upon my drinking it, or some of it, all the time that I was at Eton. The reason why I was flogged was this. I was præpostor of the remove on a certain day, and from kindness or good nature was induced to omit from the list of boys against whom H. [the master] had complained, and who ought to have been flogged next day, the names of three offenders. The three boys in question got round me with a story that their friends were coming down from London to see them, and that if they were put down on the flogging list they could not meet their friends. Next day when I went into school H. roared out in a voice of thunder, "Gladstone, put down your own name on the list of boys to be flogged."' Mr. Gladstone on this occasion told another tale of this worthy's 'humour.' 'One day H. called out to the præpostor, "Write down Hamilton's name to be flogged for breaking my window." "I never broke your window, sir," exclaimed Hamilton. "Præpostor," retorted H., "write down Hamilton's name for breaking my window and lying." "Upon my soul, sir, I did not do it," ejaculated the boy, with increased emphasis. "Præpostor, write down Hamilton's name for breaking my window, lying, and swearing." Against this final sentence there was no appeal, and, accordingly, Hamilton was flogged (I believe unjustly) next day.'--F. Lawley in _Daily Telegraph_, May 20, 1898. [27] _Temple Bar_, Feb. 1883. [28] Feb. 10, 1827. [29] Mr. Gladstone fixed on two of the elegies of _In Memoriam_ as most directly conveying the image of Arthur Hallam, cviii. and cxxviii. [30] _Iliad_, iii. 221. [31] _Ibid._ x. 242. [32] I have heard him tell this story, and Garrick himself could not have reproduced a schoolboy's glee with more admirable accent and gesture. [33] Prothero's _Life of Dean Stanley_, 1. p. 22. CHAPTER III OXFORD (_October 1828-December 1831_) Steeped in sentiment as she lies, spreading her gardens to the moonlight, and whispering from her towers the last enchantments of the Middle Age, who will deny that Oxford, by her ineffable charm, keeps ever calling us nearer to the true goal of all of us, to the ideal, to perfection--to beauty, in a word, which is only truth seen from another side?--M. ARNOLD. Glorious to most are the days of life in a great school, but it is at college that aspiring talent first enters on its inheritance. Oxford was slowly awakening from a long age of lethargy. Toryism of a stolid clownish type still held the thrones of collegiate power. Yet the eye of an imaginative scholar as he gazed upon the grey walls, reared by piety, munificence, and love of learning in a far-off time, might well discern behind an unattractive screen of academic sloth, the venerable past, not dim and cold, but in its traditions rich, nourishing, and alive. Such an one could see before him present days of honourable emulation and stirring acquisition--fit prelude of a man's part to play in a strenuous future. It is from Gladstone's introduction into this enchanted and inspiring world, that we recognise the beginning of the wonderful course that was to show how great a thing the life of a man may be made. CHRIST CHURCH The Eton boy became the Christ Church man, and there began residence, October 10, 1828. Mr. Gladstone's rooms, during most of his undergraduate life, were on the right hand, and on the first floor of the staircase on the right, as one enters by the Canterbury gate. He tells his mother that they are in a very fashionable part of the college, and mentions as a delightful fact, that Gaskell and Seymer have rooms on the same floor. Samuel Smith was head until 1831, when he was succeeded by the more celebrated Dr. Gaisford, always described by Mr. Gladstone as a splendid scholar, but a bad dean. Gaisford's excellent services to the Greek learning of his day are unquestioned, and he had the signal merit of speech, Spartan brevity. For a short time in 1806 he had been tutor to Peel. When Lord Liverpool offered him the Greek professorship, with profuse compliments on his erudition, the learned man replied, 'My Lord, I have received your letter, and accede to the contents.--Yours, T. G.' And to the complaining parent of an undergraduate he wrote, 'Dear Sir,--Such letters as yours are a great annoyance to your obedient servant T. Gaisford.'[34] This laconic gift the dean evidently had not time to transmit to all of his flock. Christ Church in those days was infested with some rowdyism, and in one bear-fight an undergraduate was actually killed. In the chapel the new undergraduate found little satisfaction, for the service was scarcely performed with common decency. There seems, however, to have been no irreconcilable prejudice against reading, and in the schools the college was at the top of its academic fame. The influence of Cyril Jackson, the dean in Peel's time, whose advice to Peel and, other pupils to work like a tiger, and not to be afraid of killing one's self by work, was still operative.[35] At the summer examination of 1830, Christ Church won five first classes out of ten. Most commoners, according to a letter of Gaskell's, had from three hundred and fifty to five hundred pounds a year; but gentlemen commoners like Acland and Gaskell had from five to six hundred. At the end of 1829, Mr. Gladstone received a studentship _honoris causa_, by nomination of the dean--a system that would not be approved in our epoch of competitive examination, but still an advance upon the time-honoured practice of deans and canons disposing of studentships on grounds of private partiality without reference to desert. We may assume that the dean was not indifferent to academic promise when he told Gladstone, very good-naturedly and civilly, that he had determined to offer him his nomination. The student designate wrote a theme, read it out before the chapter, passed a nominal, or even farcical, examination in Homer and Virgil, was elected as matter of course by the chapter, and after chapel on the morning of Christmas eve, having taken several oaths, was formally admitted in the name of the Holy Trinity. Mr. Biscoe, his classical tutor, was a successful lecturer on Aristotle, especially on the Rhetoric. With Charles Wordsworth, son of the master of Trinity at Cambridge, and afterwards Bishop of Saint Andrews, he read for scholarship, apparently not wholly to his own satisfaction. While still an undergraduate, he writes to his father (Nov. 2, 1830), 'I am wretchedly deficient in the knowledge of modern languages, literature, and history; and the classical knowledge acquired here, though sound, accurate, and useful, yet is not such as to _complete_ an education.' It looked, in truth, as if the caustic saying of a brilliant colleague of his in later years were not at the time unjust, as now it would happily be, that it was a battle between Eton and education, and Eton had won. Mr. Gladstone never to the end of his days ceased to be grateful that Oxford was chosen for his university. At Cambridge, as he said in discussing Hallam's choice, the pure refinements of scholarship were more in fashion than the study of the great masterpieces of antiquity in their substance and spirit. The classical examination at Oxford, on the other hand, was divided into the three elastic departments of scholarship and poetry, history, and philosophy. In this list, history somewhat outweighed the scholarship, and philosophy was somewhat more regarded than history. In each case the examination turned more on contents than on form, and the influence of Butler was at its climax. CHARACTER OF OXFORD TEACHING If Mr. Gladstone had gone to Oxford ten years earlier, he would have found the Ethics and the Rhetoric treated, only much less effectively, in the Cambridge method, like dramatists and orators, as pieces of literature. As it was, Whately's common sense had set a new fashion, and Aristotle was studied as the master of those who know how to teach us the right way about the real world.[36] Aristotle, Butler, and logic were the new acquisitions, but in none of the three as yet did the teaching go deep compared with modern standards. Oxford scholars of our own day question whether there was even one single tutor in 1830, with the possible exception of Hampden, who could expound Aristotle as a whole--so utterly had the Oxford tradition perished.[37] The time was in truth the eve of an epoch of illumination, and in these epochs it is not old academic systems that the new light is wont to strike with its first rays. The summer of 1831 is the date of Sir William Hamilton's memorable exposure,[38] in his most trenchant and terrifying style and with a learning all his own, of the corruption and 'vampire oppression of Oxford'; its sacrifice of the public interests to private advantage; its unhallowed disregard of every moral and religious bond; the systematic perjury so naturalised in a great seminary of religious education; the apathy with which the injustice was tolerated by the state and the impiety tolerated by the church. Copleston made a wretched reply, but more than twenty years passed before the spirit of reform overthrew the entrenchments of academic abuse. In that overthrow, when the time came, Mr. Gladstone was called to play a part, though hardly at first a very zealous one. This was not for a quarter of a century; for, as we shall soon see, both the revival of learning and the reform of institutions at Oxford were sharply turned aside from their expected course by the startling theological movement that now proceeded from her venerable walls. What interests us here is not the system but the man; and never was vital temperament more admirably fitted by its vigour, sincerity, conscience, compass, for whatever good seed from the hand of any sower might be cast upon it. In an entry in his diary in the usual strain of evangelical devotion (April 25, 1830) is a sentence that reveals what was in Mr. Gladstone the nourishing principle of growth: 'In practice the great end is that the love of God may become the _habit_ of my soul, and particularly these things are to be sought;--1. The spirit of love. 2. Of self-sacrifice. 3. Of purity. 4. Of energy.' Just as truly as if we were recalling some hero of the seventeenth or any earlier century, is this the biographic clue. Gladstone constantly reproaches himself for natural indolence, and for a year and a half he took his college course pretty easily. Then he changed. 'The time for half-measures and trifling and pottering, in which I have so long indulged myself, is now gone by, and I must do or die.' His really hard work did not begin until the summer of 1830, when he returned to Cuddesdon to read mathematics with Saunders, a man who had the reputation of being singularly able and stimulating to his pupils, and with whom he had done some rudiments before going into residence at Christ Church. In his description of this gentleman to his father, we may hear for the first time the redundant roll that was for many long years to be so familiar and so famous. Saunders' disposition, it appears, 'is one certainly of extreme benevolence, and of a benevolence which is by no means less strong and full when purely gratuitous and spontaneous, than when he seems to be under the tie of some definite and positive obligation.' Dr. Gaisford would perhaps have put it that the tutor was no kinder where his kindness was paid for, than where it was not. CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION The catholic question, that was helping many another and older thing to divide England from Ireland, after having for a whole generation played havoc with the fortunes of party and the careers of statesmen, was now drawing swiftly to its close. The Christ Church student had a glimpse of one of the opening scenes of the last act. He writes to his brother (Feb. 6th, 1829):-- I saw yesterday a most interesting scene in the Convocation house. The occasion was the debate on the anti-catholic petition, which it has long been the practice of the university to send up year by year. This time it was worded in the most gentle and moderate terms possible. All the ordinary business there, is transacted in Latin; I mean such things as putting the question, speaking, etc., and this rule, I assure you, stops many a mouth, and I dare say saves the Roman catholics many a hard word. There were rather above two hundred doctors and masters of arts present. Three speeches were made, two against and one in favour of sending up the petition. Instead of aye and no they had _placet_ and _non-placet_, and in place of a member dividing the House, the question was, "_Petitne aliquis scrutinium?_" which was answered by "_Peto!_" "_Peto!_" from many quarters. However, when the scrutiny took place, it was found that the petition was carried by 156 to 48.... After the division, however, came the most interesting part of the whole. A letter from Peel, resigning the seat for the university, was read before the assembly. It was addressed to the vice-chancellor and had arrived just before, it was understood; and I suppose brought hither the first positive and indubitable announcement of the government's intention to emancipate the catholics. A few days later, Peel accepted the Chiltern Hundreds, and after some deliberation allowed himself to be again brought forward for re-election. He was beaten by 755 votes to 609. The relics of the contest, the figures and the inscriptions on the walls, soon disappeared, but panic did not abate. On Gladstone's way to Oxford (April 30, 1829), a farmer's wife got into the coach, and in communicative vein informed him how frightened they had all been about catholic emancipation, but she did not see that so much had come of it as yet. The college scout declared himself much troubled for the king's conscience, observing that if we make an oath at baptism, we ought to hold by it. 'The bed-makers,' Gladstone writes home, 'seem to continue in a great fright, and mine was asking me this morning whether it would not be a very good thing if we were to give them [the Irish] a king and a parliament of their own, and so to have no more to do with them. The old egg-woman is no whit easier, and wonders how Mr. Peel, who was always such a well-behaved man here, can be so foolish as to think of letting in the Roman catholics.' The unthinking and the ignorant of all classes were much alike. Arthur Hallam went to see _King John_ in 1827, and he tells his friend how the lines about the Italian priest (Act III. Sc. 1) provoked rounds of clapping, while a gentleman in the next box cried out at the top of his voice, 'Bravo! Bravo! No Pope!' The same correspondent told Gladstone of the father of a common Eton friend, who had challenged him with the overwhelming question, 'Could I say that any papist had ever at any time done any good to the world?' A still stormier conflict than even the emancipation of the catholics was now to shake Oxford and the country to the depths, before Mr. Gladstone took his degree. II OXFORD FRIENDSHIPS His friendships at Oxford Mr. Gladstone did not consider to have been as a rule very intimate. Principal among them were Frederick Rogers, long afterwards Lord Blachford; Doyle; Gaskell; Bruce, afterwards Lord Elgin; Charles Canning, afterwards Lord Canning; the two Denisons; Lord Lincoln. These had all been his friends at Eton. Among new acquisitions to the circle of his intimates at one time or another of his Oxford life, were the two Aclands, Thomas and Arthur; Hamilton, afterwards Bishop of Salisbury; Phillimore, destined to close and life-long friendship; F. D. Maurice, then of Exeter College, a name destined to stir so many minds in the coming generation. Of Maurice, Arthur Hallam had written to Gladstone (June 1830) exhorting him to cultivate his acquaintance. 'I know many,' says Hallam, 'whom Maurice has moulded like a second nature, and these too, men eminent for intellectual power, to whom the presence of a commanding spirit would in all other cases be a signal rather for rivalry than reverential acknowledgment.' 'I knew Maurice well,' says Mr. Gladstone in one of his notes of reminiscence, 'had heard superlative accounts of him from Cambridge, and really strove hard to make them all realities to myself. One Sunday morning we walked to Marsh Baldon to hear Mr. Porter, the incumbent, a calvinist independent of the _clique_, and a man of remarkable power as we both thought. I think he and other friends did me good, but I got little solid meat from him, as I found him difficult to catch and still more difficult to hold.' Sidney Herbert, afterwards so dear to him, now at Oriel, here first became an acquaintance. Manning, though they both read with the same tutor, and one succeeded the other as president of the Union, he did not at this time know well. The lists of his guests at wines and breakfasts do not even contain the name of James Hope; indeed, Mr. Gladstone tells us that he certainly was not more than an acquaintance. In the account of intimates is the unexpected name of Tupper, who, in days to come, acquired for a time a grander reputation than he deserved by his _Proverbial Philosophy_, and on whom the public by and by avenged its own foolishness by severer doses of mockery than he had earned.[39] The friend who seems most to have affected him in the deepest things was Anstice, whom he describes to his father (June 4, 1830) as 'a very clever man, and more than a clever man, a man of excellent principle and of perfect self-command, and of great industry. If any circumstances could confer upon me the inestimable blessing of fixed habits and unremitting industry, these [the example of such a man] will be they.' The diary tells how, in August (1830), Mr. Gladstone conversed with Anstice in a walk from Oxford to Cuddesdon on subjects of the highest importance. 'Thoughts then first sprang up in my soul (obvious as they may appear to many) which may powerfully influence my destiny. O for a light from on high! I have no power, none, to discern the right path for myself.' They afterwards had long talks together, 'about that awful subject which has lately almost engrossed my mind.' Another day--'Conversation of an hour and a half with Anstice on practical religion, particularly as regards our own situation. I bless and praise God for his presence here.' 'Long talk with Anstice; would I were more worthy to be his companion.' 'Conversation with Anstice; he talked much with Saunders on the motive of actions, contending for the love of God, _not_ selfishness even in its most refined form.'[40] EVANGELICAL IN RELIGION In the matter of his own school of religion, Mr. Gladstone was always certain that Oxford in his undergraduate days had no part in turning him from an evangelical into a high churchman. The tone and dialect of his diary and letters at the time show how just this impression was. We find him in 1830 expressing his satisfaction that a number of Hannah More's tracts have been put on the list of the Christian Knowledge Society. In 1831 he bitterly deplores such ecclesiastical appointments as those of Sydney Smith and Dr. Maltby, 'both of them, I believe, regular latitudinarians.' He remembered his shock at Butler's laudation of Nature. He was scandalised by a sermon in which Calvin was placed upon the same level among heresiarchs as Socinus and other like aliens from gospel truth. He was delighted (March 1830) with a university sermon against Milman's _History of the Jews_, and hopes it may be useful as an antidote, 'for Milman, though I do think without intentions directly evil, does go far enough to be justly called a bane. For instance, he says that had Moses never existed, the Hebrew nation would have remained a degraded pariah tribe or been lost in the mass of the Egyptian population--and this notwithstanding the promise.' In all his letters in the period from Eton to the end of Oxford and later, a language noble and exalted even in these youthful days is not seldom copiously streaked with a vein that, to eyes not trained to evangelical light and to minds not tolerant of the expansion that comes to religious natures in the days of adolescence, may seem unpleasantly strained and excessive. The fashion of such words undergoes transfiguration as the epochs pass. Yet in all their fashions, even the crudest, they deserve much tenderness. He consults a clergyman (1829) on the practice of prayer meetings in his rooms. His correspondent answers, that as the wicked have their orgies and meet to gamble and to drink, so they that fear the Lord should speak often to one another concerning Him; that prayer meetings are not for the cultivation or exhibition of gifts, nor to enable noisy and forward young men to pose as leaders of a school of prophets; but if a few young men of like tastes feel the withering influence of mere scholastic learning, and the necessity of mutual stimulation and refreshment, then such prayer meetings would be a safe and natural remedy. The student's attention to all religious observances was close and unbroken, the most living part of his existence. The movement that was to convulse the church had not yet begun. 'You may smile,' Mr. Gladstone said long after, 'when told that when I was at Oxford, Dr. Hampden was regarded as a model of orthodoxy; that Dr. Newman was eyed with suspicion as a low churchman, and Dr. Pusey as leaning to rationalism.' What Mr. Gladstone afterwards described as a steady, clear, but dry anglican orthodoxy bore sway, 'and frowned this way or that, on the first indication of any tendency to diverge from the beaten path.'[41] He hears Whately preach a controversial sermon (1831) just after he had been made Archbishop of Dublin. 'Doubtless he is a man of much power and many excellences, but his anti-sabbatical doctrine is, I fear, as mischievous as it is unsound.' A sermon of Keble's at St. Mary's prompts the uneasy question, 'Are all Mr. Keble's opinions those of scripture and the church? Of his life and heart and practice, none could doubt, all would admire.' A good sermon is mentioned from Blanco White, that strange and forlorn figure of whom in later life Mr. Gladstone wrote an interesting account, not conclusive in argument, but assuredly not wanting in either delicacy or generosity.[42] 'Dr. Pusey was very kind to me when I was an undergraduate at Oxford,' he says, but what their relations were I know not. 'I knew and respected both Bishop Lloyd and Dr. Pusey,' he says, 'but neither of them attempted to exercise the smallest influence over my religious opinions.' With Newman he seems to have been brought into contact hardly at all.[43] Newman and one of the Wilberforces came to dine at Cuddesdon one day, and, on a later occasion, he and another fellow of Oriel were at a dinner with Mr. Gladstone at the table of his friend Philip Pusey. Two or three of his sermons are mentioned. One of them (March 7, 1831) contained 'much singular, not to say objectionable matter, if one may so speak of so good a man.' Of another,--'heard Newman preach a good sermon on those who made excuse' (Sept. 25, 1831). Of the generality of university sermons, he accepted the observation of his friend Anstice,--'Depend upon it, such sermons as those can never convert a single person.' On some Sundays he hears two of these discourses in the morning and afternoon, and a third sermon in the evening, for though he became the most copious of all speakers, Mr. Gladstone was ever the most generous of listeners. It was at St. Ebb's that he found really congenial ministrations--an ecclesiastical centre described by him fifty years later--under Mr. Bulteel, a man of some note in his day; here the flame was at white heat, and a score or two of young men felt its attractions.[44] He always remembered among the wonderful sights of his life, St. Mary's 'crammed in all parts by all orders, when Mr. Bulteel, an outlying calvinist, preached his accusatory sermon (some of it too true) against the university.' In the summer of 1830, Mr. Gladstone notes, 'Poor Bulteel has lost his church for preaching in the open air. Pity that he should have acted so, and pity that it should be found necessary to make such an example of a man of God.' The preacher was impenitent, for from a window Mr. Gladstone again heard him conduct a service for a large congregation who listened attentively to a sermon that was interesting, but evinced some soreness of spirit. A 'most painful' discourse from a Mr. Crowther so moves Mr. Gladstone that he sits down to write to the preacher, 'earnestly expostulating with him on the character and the doctrines of the sermon,' and after re-writing his letter, he delivers it with his own hand at the door of the displeasing divine. The effect was not other than salutary, for a little later he was 'happy to hear two sermons of good principles from Mr. Crowther.' To his father, October 27, 1830:--'Dr. Chalmers has been passing through Oxford, and I went to hear him preach on Sunday evening, though it was at the baptist chapel.... I need hardly say that his sermon was admirable, and quite as remarkable for the judicious and sober manner in which he enforced his views, as for their lofty principles and piety. He preached, I think, for an hour and forty minutes.' The admiration thus first aroused only grew with fuller knowledge in the coming years. ESSAY CLUB An Essay Club, called from its founder's initials the WEG, was formed at a meeting in Gaskell's rooms in October, 1829. Only two members out of the first twelve did not belong to Christ Church, Rogers of Oriel and Moncreiff of New.[45] The Essay Club's transactions, though not very serious, deserve a glance. Mr. Gladstone reads an essay (Feb. 20, 1830) on the comparative rank of poetry and philosophy, concluding with a motion that the rank of philosophy is higher than that of poetry: it was beaten by seven to five. Without a division, they determined that English poetry is of a higher order than Greek. The truth of the principles of phrenology was affirmed with the tremendous emphasis of eleven to one. Though trifling in degree, the influence of the modern drama was pronounced in quality pernicious. Gladstone gave his casting vote against the capacious proposition, of which philosophers had made so much in France, Switzerland, and other places on the eve of the French revolution, that education and other outward circumstances have more than nature to do with man's disposition. By four to three, Mr. Tennyson's poems were affirmed to show considerable genius, Gladstone happily in the too slender majority. The motion that 'political liberty is not to be considered as the end of government' was a great affair. Maurice, who had been admitted to the club on coming to Oxford from Cambridge, moved an amendment 'that every man has a right to perform certain personal duties with which no system of government has a right to interfere.' Gladstone 'objected to an observation that had fallen from the mover, "A man finds himself in the world," as if he did not come into the world under a debt to his parents, under obligations to society.' The tame motion of Lord Abercorn, that Elizabeth's conduct to Mary Queen of Scots was unjustifiable and impolitic, was stiffened into 'not only unjustifiable and impolitic, but a base and treacherous murder,' and in that severe form was carried without a division. Plenty of nonsense was talked we may be sure, and so there was, no doubt, in the Olive Grove of Academe or amid those surnamed Peripatetics and the Sect Epicurean. Yet nonsense notwithstanding, the Essay Club had members who proved in time to have superior minds if ever men had, and their disputations in one another's rooms helped to sharpen their mental apparatus, to start trains of ideas however immature, and to shake the cherished dogmatisms brought from beloved homes, even if dogmatism as stringent took their place. This is how the world moves, and Oxford was just beginning to rub its eyes, awaking to the speculations of a new time. When he looked back in after times, Mr. Gladstone traced one great defect in the education of Oxford. 'Perhaps it was my own fault, but I must admit that I did not learn when I was at Oxford that which I have learned since--namely, to set a due value on the imperishable and inestimable principle of British liberty. The temper which too much prevailed in academical circles was that liberty was regarded with jealousy and fear, something which could not wholly be dispensed with, but which was to be continually watched for fear of excesses.'[46] III TRIES FOR THE IRELAND SCHOLARSHIP In March 1830 Gladstone made the first of two attempts to win the scholarship newly founded by Dean Ireland, and from the beginning one of the most coveted of university prizes. In 1830 (March 16) he wrote:--'There is it appears smaller chance than ever of its falling out of the hands of the Shrewsbury people. There is a very formidable one indeed, by name Scott, come up from Christ Church. If it is to go among them I hope he may get it.' This was Robert Scott, afterwards master of Balliol, and then dean of Rochester, and the coadjutor with Dean Liddell in the famous Greek Lexicon brought out in 1843. A year later he tried again, but little better success came either to himself or to Scott. He tells his father the story (March 16th, 1831) and collegians who have fought such battles may care to hear it:-- I must first tell you that I am _not_ the successful candidate, and after this I shall have nothing to communicate but what will, I think, give you pleasure. The scholarship has been won by (I believe) a native of Liverpool.[47] His name is Brancker, and he is now actually at Shrewsbury, but had matriculated here though he had not come up to reside. This result has excited immense surprise. For my own part, I went into the examination _solely_ depending for any hope of pre-eminence above the Shrewsbury men on three points, Greek history, one particular kind of Greek verses, and Greek philosophy.... It so fell out, however, that not one of these three points was brought to bear on the examination, though, indeed, it is but a lame one without them. Accordingly from the turn it seemed to take as it proceeded, my own expectations regularly declined, and I thought I might consider myself very well off if I came in pretty high. As it is, I am even with the great competitor, Scott, whom everybody almost thought the favourite candidate, and above the others. Allies, an Eton man, Scott and I are placed together; and Short, one of the examiners, told us this morning that it was an extremely near thing, and he had great difficulty in making up his mind, which he never had felt in any former examination in which he had been engaged; and indeed he laid the preference given to Brancker chiefly on his having written short and concise answers, while ours were longwinded. And in consideration of its having been so closely contested, the vice-chancellor is to present each of us with a set of books.... Something however may fairly enough be attributed to the fact that at Eton we were not educated for such objects as these.... The result will affect the scholarship itself more than any individual character; for previous events have created, and this has contributed amazingly to strengthen, a prevalent impression that the Shrewsbury system is radically a false one, and that its object is not to educate the mind but merely to cram and stuff it for these purposes. However, we who are beaten are not fair judges.... I only trust that you will not be more annoyed than I am by this event. Brancker was said to have won because he answered all the questions not only shortly, but most of them right, and Mr. Gladstone's essay was marked 'desultory beyond belief.' Below Allies came Sidney Herbert, then at Oriel, and Grove, afterwards a judge and an important name in the history of scientific speculation. He was equally unsuccessful in another field of competition. He sent in a poem on Richard Coeur de Lion for the Newdigate prize in 1829. In 1893 somebody asked his leave to reprint it, and at Mr. Gladstone's request sent him a copy:-- On perusing it I was very much struck by the contrast it exhibited between the faculty of versification which (I thought) was good, and the faculty of poetry, which was very defective. This faculty of verse had been trained I suppose by verse-making at Eton, and was based upon the possession of a good or tolerable ear with which nature had endowed me. I think that a poetical faculty did develop itself in me a little later, that is to say between twenty and thirty, due perhaps to having read Dante with a real devotion and absorption. It was, however, in my view, true but weak, and has never got beyond that stage. It was evidently absent from the verses, I will not say the poem, on Coeur de Lion; and without hesitation I declined to allow any reprint.[48] DEBATES AT THE UNION He was active in the debates at the Union, where he made his first start in the speaking line (Feb. 1830) in a strong oration much admired by his friends, in favour,--of all the questionable things in the world,--of the Treason and Sedition Acts of 1795. He writes home that he did not find the ordeal so formidable as it used to be before the smaller audiences at Eton, for at Oxford they sometimes mustered as many as a hundred or a hundred and fifty. He spoke for a strongly-worded motion on a happier theme, in favour of the policy and memory of Canning. In the summer of 1831, he mentions a debate in which a motion was proposed in favour of speedy emancipation of the West Indian slaves. 'I moved an amendment that education of a religious kind was the fit object of legislation, which was carried by thirty-three to twelve.' Of the most notable of all his successes at the Union we shall soon hear. DAILY LIFE His little diary, written for no eye but his own, and in the use of which I must beware of the sin of violating the sanctuary, contains in the most concise of daily records all his various activities, and, at least after the summer at Cuddesdon, it presents an attractive picture of duty, industry, and attention, 'constant as the motion of the day.' The entries are much alike, and a few of them will suffice to bring his life and him before us. The days for 1830 may almost be taken at random. _May 10, 1830._--Prospectively, I have the following work to do in the course of this term. (I mention it now, that this may at least make me blush if I fail.) Butler's _Analogy_, analysis and synopsis. Herodotus, questions. St. Matthew and St. John. Mathematical lecture. _Aeneid._ Juvenal and Persius. _Ethics_, five books. Prideaux (a part of, for Herodotus). Themistocles Greciae valedicturus [I suppose a verse composition]. Something in divinity. Mathematical lecture. Breakfast with Gaskell, who had the Merton men. Papers. _Edinburgh Review_ on Southey's _Colloquies_ [Macaulay's]. _Ethics._ A wretched day. God forgive idleness. Note to Bible. _May 13._--Wrote to my mother. At debate (Union). Elected secretary. Papers. _British Critic_ on _History of the Jews_ [by Newman on Milman]. Herodotus, _Ethics_. Butler and analysis. Papers, Virgil, Herodotus. Juvenal. Mathematics and lecture. Walk with Anstice. Ethics, finished book 4. _May 25._--Finished Porteus's _Evidences_. Got up a few hard passages. Analysis of Porteus. Sundry matters in divinity. Themistocles. Sat with Biscoe talking. Walk with Canning and Gaskell. Wine and tea. Wrote to Mr. G. [his father]. Papers. _June 13. Sunday._--Chapel morning and evening. Thomas à Kempis. Erskine's _Evidence_. Tea with Mayow and Cole. Walked with Maurice to hear Mr. Porter, a wild but splendid preacher. _June 14._--Gave a large wine party. Divinity lecture. Mathematics. Wrote three long letters. Herodotus, began book 4. Prideaux. Newspapers, etc. Thomas à Kempis. _June 15._--Another wine party. _Ethics_, Herodotus. A little Juvenal. Papers. Hallam's poetry. Lecture on Herodotus. Phillimore got the verse prize. _June 16._--Divinity lecture. Herodotus. Papers. Out at wine. A little Plato. _June 17._--_Ethics_ and lecture. Herodotus. T. à Kempis. Wine with Gaskell. _June 18._--Breakfast with Gaskell. T. à Kempis. Divinity lecture. Herodotus. Wrote on Philosophy _versus_ Poetry. A little Persius. Wine with Buller and Tupper. _June 25._--_Ethics_. Collections 9-3. Among other things wrote a long paper on religions of Egypt, Persia, Babylon; and on the Satirists. Finished packing books and clothes. Left Oxford between 5-6, and walked fifteen miles towards Leamington. Then obliged to put in, being caught by a thunderstorm. Comfortably off in a country inn at Steeple Aston. Read and spouted some _Prometheus Vinctus_ there. _June 26._--Started before 7. Walked eight miles to Banbury. Breakfast there, and walked on twenty-two to Leamington. Arrived at three and changed. Gaskell came in the evening. _Life of Massinger_. _July 6._ _Cuddesdon_.--Up soon after 6. Began my Harmony of Greek Testament. Differential calculus, etc. Mathematics good while, but in a rambling way. Began _Odyssey_. Papers. Walk with Anstice and Hamilton. Turned a little bit of Livy into Greek. Conversation on ethics and metaphysics at night. _July 8._--Greek Testament. Bible with Anstice. Mathematics, long but did little. Translated some _Phædo_. Butler. Construed some Thucydides at night. Making hay, etc., with S., H., and A. Great fun. Shelley. _July 10._--Greek Testament. Lightfoot. Butler, and writing a marginal analysis. Old Testament with Anstice and a discussion on early history. Mathematics. Cricket with H. and A. A conversation of two hours at night with A. on religion till past 12. Thucydides, etc. I cannot get anything done, though I seem to be employed a good while. Short's sermon. _July 11._--Church and Sunday-school teaching, morning and evening. The children miserably deluded. Barrow. Short. Walked with S. _September 4._--Same as yesterday. _Paradise Lost._ Dined with the bishop. Cards at night. I like them not, for they excite and keep me awake. Construing Sophocles. _September 18._--Went down early to Wheatley for letters. It is indeed true [the death of Huskisson], and he, poor man, was in his last agonies when I was playing cards on Wednesday night. When shall we learn wisdom? Not that I see folly in the fact of playing cards, but it is too often accompanied by a dissipated spirit. He did not escape the usual sensations of the desultory when fate forces them to wear the collar. 'In fact, at times I find it very irksome, and my having the inclination to view it in that light is to me the surest demonstration that my mind was in great want of some discipline, and some regular exertion, for hitherto I have read by fits and starts and just as it pleased me. I hope that this vacation [summer of 1830] will confer on me one benefit more important than any having reference merely to my class--I mean the habit of steady application and strict economy of time.' CORRESPONDENCE WITH HALLAM Among the recorded fragmentary items of 1830, by the way, he read Mill's celebrated essay on Coleridge, which, when it was republished a generation later along with the companion essay on Bentham, made so strong an impression on the Oxford of my day. He kept up a correspondence with Hallam, now at Cambridge, and an extract from one of Hallam's letters may show something of the writer, as of the friend for whose sympathising mind it was intended:-- Academical honours would be less than nothing to me were it not for my father's wishes, and even these are moderate on the subject. If it please God that I make the name I bear honoured in a second generation, it will be by inward power which is its own reward; if it please Him not, I hope to go down to the grave unrepining, for I have lived and loved and been loved; and what will be the momentary pangs of an atomic existence when the scheme of that providential love which pervades, sustains, quickens this boundless universe shall at the last day be unfolded and adored? The great truth which, when we are rightly impressed with it, will liberate mankind is that no man has a right to isolate himself, because every man is a particle of a marvellous whole; that when he suffers, since it is for the good of that whole, he, the particle, has no right to complain; and in the long run, that which is the good of all will abundantly manifest itself to be the good of each. Other belief consists not with theism. This is its centre. Let me quote to their purpose the words of my favourite poet; it will do us good to hear his voice, though but for a moment:-- 'One adequate support For the calamities of mortal life Exists--one only: an assured belief That the procession of our fate, howe'er Sad or disturbed, is ordered by a Being Of infinite benevolence and power, Whose everlasting purposes embrace All accidents, converting them to good.'[49] Hallam's father, in that memoir so just and tender which, he prefixes to his son's literary remains, remarks that all his son's talk about this old desperate riddle of the origin and significance of evil, like the talk of Leibnitz about it, resolved itself into an unproved assumption of the necessity of evil. In truth there is little sign that either Arthur Hallam or Gladstone had in him the making of the patient and methodical thinker in the high abstract sphere. They were both of them cast in another mould. But the efficacy of human relationships springs from a thousand subtler and more mysterious sources than either patience or method in our thinking. Such marked efficacy was there in the friendship of these two, both of them living under pure skies, but one of the pair endowed besides with 'the thews that throw the world.' Whether in Gladstone's diary or in his letters, in the midst of Herodotus and Butler and Aristotle and the rest of the time-worn sages, we are curiously conscious of the presence of a spirit of action, affairs, excitement. It is not the born scholar eager in search of knowledge for its own sake; there is little of Milton's 'quiet air of delightful studies;' and none of Pascal's 'labouring for truth with many a heavy sigh.' The end of it all is, as Aristotle said it should be, not knowing but doing:--honourable desire of success, satisfaction of the hopes of friends, a general literary appetite, conscious preparation for private and public duty in the world, a steady progression out of the shallows into the depths, a gaze beyond garden and cloister, _in agmen, in pulverem, in clamorem_, to the dust and burning sun and shouting of the days of conflict. IV In September 1829, as we have seen, Huskisson had disappeared. Thomas Gladstone was in the train drawn by the _Dart_ that ran over the statesman and killed him. Poor Huskisson, he writes to William Gladstone, the great promoter of the railroad, has fallen a victim to its opening!... As soon as I heard that Huskisson had been run over, I ran and found him on the ground close to the duke's [Wellington] car, his legs apparently both broken (though only one was), the ground covered with blood, his eyes open, but death written in his face. When they raised him a little he said, 'Leave me, let me die.' 'God forgive me, I am a dead man.' 'I can never stand this.'... On Tuesday he made a speech in the Exchange reading room, when he said he hoped long to represent them. He said, too, that day, that we were sure of a fine day, for the duke would have his old luck. Talked jokingly, too, of insuring his life for the ride. And he notes, as others did, the extraordinary circumstance that of half a million of people on the line of road the victim should be the duke's great opponent, thus carried off suddenly before his eyes. There was some question of Mr. John Gladstone taking Huskisson's place as one of the members for Liverpool, but he did not covet it. He foresaw too many local jealousies, his deafness would be sadly against him, he was nearly sixty-five, and he felt himself too old to face the turmoil. He looked upon the Wellington government as the only government possible, though as a friend of Canning he freely recognised its defects, the self-will of the duke, and the parcel of mediocrities and drones with whom, excepting Peel, he had filled his cabinet. His view of the state of parties in the autumn of 1830 is clear and succinct enough to deserve reproduction. 'Huskisson's death,' he writes to his son at Christ Church (October 29, 1830), 'was a great gain to the duke, for he was the most formidable thorn to prick him in the parliament. Of those who acted with Huskisson, none have knowledge or experience sufficient to enable them to do so. As for the whigs, they can all talk and make speeches, but they are not men of business. The ultra-tories are too contemptible and wanting in talent to be thought of. The radicals cannot be trusted, for they would soon pull down the venerable fabric of our constitution. The liberals or independents must at least generally side with the duke; they are likely to meet each other half way.' THE REFORM BILL In less than a week after this acute survey the duke made his stalwart declaration in the House of Lords against all parliamentary reform. 'I have not said too much, have I?' he asked of Lord Aberdeen on sitting down. 'You'll hear of it,' was Aberdeen's reply. 'You've announced the fall of your government, that's all,' said another. In a fortnight (November 18) the duke was out, Lord Grey was in, and the country was gradually plunged into a determined struggle for the amendment of its constitution. Mr. Gladstone, as a resolute Canningite, was as fiercely hostile to the second and mightier innovation as he had been eager for the relief of the catholics, and it was in connection with the Reform bill that he first made a public mark. The reader will recall the stages of that event; how the bill was read a second time in the Commons by a majority of one on March 22nd, 1831; how, after a defeat by a majority of eight on a motion of going into committee, Lord Grey dissolved; how the country, shaken to its depths, gave the reformers such undreamed of strength, that on July 8th the second reading of the bill was carried by a hundred and thirty-six; how on October 8th the Lords rejected it by forty-one, and what violent commotions that deed provoked; how a third bill was brought in (December 12th, 1831) and passed through the Commons (March 23rd, 1832); how the Lords were still refractory; what a lacerating ministerial crisis ensued; and how at last, in June, the bill, which was to work the miracle of a millennium, actually became the law of the land. Not even the pressure of preparation for the coming ordeal of the examination schools could restrain the activity and zeal of our Oxonian. Canning had denounced parliamentary reform at Liverpool in 1820; and afterwards had declared in the House of Commons that if anybody asked him what he meant to do on the subject, he would oppose reform to the end of his life, under whatever shape it might appear. Canning's disciple at Christ Church was as vehement as the master.[50] To a friend he wrote in 1865:-- I think that Oxford teaching had in our day an anti-popular tendency. I must add that it was not owing to the books, but rather to the way in which they were handled: and further, that it tended still more strongly in my opinion to make the love of truth paramount over all other motives in the mind, and thus that it supplied an antidote for whatever it had of bane. The Reform bill frightened me in 1831, and drove me off my natural and previous bias. Burke and Canning misled many on that subject, and they misled me. While staying at Leamington, whither his family constantly went in order to be under the medical care of the famous Jephson, Mr. Gladstone went to a reform meeting at Warwick, of which he wrote a contemptuous account in a letter to the _Standard_ (April 7). The gentry present were few, the nobility none, the clergy one only, while 'the mob beneath the grand stand was Athenian in its levity, in its recklessness, in its gaping expectancy, in its self-love and self-conceit--in everything but its acuteness.' 'If, sir, the nobility, the gentry, the clergy are to be alarmed, overawed, or smothered by the expression of popular opinion such as this, and if no great statesman be raised up in our hour of need to undeceive this unhappy multitude, now eagerly rushing or heedlessly sauntering along the pathway of revolution, as an ox goeth to the slaughter or a fool to the correction of the stocks, what is it but a symptom as infallible as it is appalling, that the day of our greatness and stability is no more, and that the chill and damp of death are already creeping over England's glory.' These dolorous spectres haunted him incessantly, as they haunted so many who had not the sovereign excuse of youth, and his rhetoric was perfectly sincere. He felt bound to say that, as far as he could form an opinion, the ministry most richly deserved impeachment. Its great innovations and its small alike moved his indignation. When Brougham committed the enormity of hearing causes on Good Friday, Gladstone repeats with deep complacency a saying of Wetherell, that Brougham was the first judge who had done such a thing since Pontius Pilate. OXFORD ELECTIONEERING The undergraduates took their part in the humours of the great election, and Oxford turned out her chivalry gallantly to bring in the anti-reform candidate for the county to the nomination. 'I mounted the mare to join the anti-reform procession,' writes the impassioned student to his father, 'and we looked as well as we could do, considering that we were all covered with mud from head to foot. There was mob enough on both sides, but I must do them justice to say they were for the most part exceedingly good-humoured, and after we had dismounted, we went among them and elbowed one another and bawled and bellowed with the most perfect good temper. At the nomination in the town hall there was so much row raised that not one of the candidates could be heard.' The effect of these exercitations was a hoarseness and cold, which did not, however, prevent the sufferer from taking his part in a mighty bonfire in Peckwater. On another day:-- I went with Denison and another man named Jeffreys between eleven and twelve. We began to talk to some men among Weyland's friends; they crowded round, and began to holloa at us, and were making a sort of ring round us preparatory to a desperate hustle, when lo! up rushed a body of Norreys' men from St. Thomas's, broke their ranks, raised a shout, and rescued us in great style. I shall ever be grateful to the men of St. Thomas's. When we were talking, Jeffreys said something which made one man holloa, 'Oh, his father's a parson.' This happened to be true, and flabbergasted me, but he happily turned it by reminding them, that they were going to vote for Mr. Harcourt, son of the greatest parson in England but one (Archbishop of York). Afterwards they left me, and I pursued my work alone, conversed with a great number, shook hands with a fair proportion, made some laugh, and once very nearly got hustled when alone, but happily escaped. You would be beyond measure astonished how unanimous and how _strong_ is the feeling among the freeholders (who may be taken as a fair specimen of the generality of all counties) _against_ the catholic question. Reformers and anti-reformers were alike sensitive on that point and perfectly agreed. One man said to me, 'What, vote for Lord Norreys? Why, he voted against the country _both_ times, _for_ the Catholic bill and then against the Reform.' What would this atrocious ministry have said had the appeal to the voice of the people, which they now quote as their authority, been made in 1829? I held forth to a working man, possibly a forty-shilling freeholder, [he adds in a fragment of later years,] on the established text, reform was revolution. To corroborate my doctrine I said, 'Why, look at the revolutions in foreign countries,' meaning of course France and Belgium. The man looked hard at me and said these very words, 'Damn all foreign countries, what has old England to do with foreign countries?' This is not the only time that I have received an important lesson from a humble source. SPEECH AT THE UNION A more important scene which his own future eminence made in a sense historic, was a debate at the Union upon Reform in the same month, where his contribution (May 17th) struck all his hearers with amazement, so brilliant, so powerful, so incomparably splendid did it seem to their young eyes. His description of it to his brother (May 20th, 1831) is modest enough:-- I should really have been glad if your health had been such as to have permitted your visiting Oxford last week, so that you might have heard our debate, for certainly there had never been anything like it known here before and will scarcely be again. The discussion on the question that the ministers were incompetent to carry on the government of the country was of a miscellaneous character, and I moved what they called a 'rider' to the effect that the Reform bill threatened to change the form of the British government, and ultimately to break up the whole frame of society. The debate altogether lasted three nights, and it closed then, partly because the _votes_ had got tired of dancing attendance, partly because the speakers of the revolutionary side were exhausted. There were eight or nine more on ours ready, and indeed anxious. As it was, there were I think fifteen speeches on our side and thirteen on theirs, or something of that kind. Every man spoke above his average, and many very far beyond it. They were generally short enough. Moncreiff, a long-winded Scotsman, spouted nearly an hour, and I was guilty of three-quarters. I remember at Eton (where we used, when I first went into the society, to speak from three to ten minutes) I thought it must be one of the finest things in the world to speak for three-quarters of an hour, and there was a legend circulated about an old member of the society's having done so, which used to make us all gape and stare. However, I fear it does not necessarily imply much more than length. Doyle spoke remarkably well, and made a violent attack on Mr. Canning's friends, which Gaskell did his best to answer, but very ineffectually from the nature of the case. We got a conversion speech from a Christ Church gentleman-commoner, named Alston, which produced an excellent effect, and the division was favourable beyond anything we had hoped--ninety-four to thirty-eight. We should have had larger numbers still had we divided on the first night. Great diligence was used by both parties in bringing men down, but the tactics on the whole were better on our side, and we had fewer truants in proportion to our numbers. England expects every man to do his duty; and ours, humble as it is, has been done in reference to this question. On Friday I wrote a letter to the _Standard_ giving an account of the division, which you will see in Saturday's paper, if you think it worth while to refer to it. The way in which the present generation of undergraduates is divided on the question is quite remarkable. The occasion was to prove a memorable one in his career, and a few more lines about it from his diary will not be considered superfluous:-- _May 16th._--Sleepy. Mathematics, few and shuffling, and lecture. Read Canning's reform speeches at Liverpool and made extracts. Rode out. Debate, which was adjourned. I am to try my hand to-morrow. My thoughts were but ill-arranged, but I fear they will be no better then. Wine with Anstice. Singing. Tea with Lincoln. _May 17th._--Ethics. Little mathematics. A good deal exhausted in forenoon from heat last night. Dined with White and had wine with him, also with young Acland. Cogitations on reform, etc. Difficult to _select_ matter for a speech, not to gather it. _Spoke at the adjourned debate for three-quarters of an hour_; immediately after Gaskell, who was preceded by Lincoln. Row afterwards and adjournment. Tea with Wordsworth. When Gladstone sat down, one of his contemporaries has written, 'we all of us felt that an epoch in our lives had occurred. His father was so well pleased with the glories of the speech and with its effect, that he wished to have it published. Besides his speech, besides the composition of sturdy placards against the monstrous bill, and besides the preparation of an elaborate petition[51] and the gathering of 770 signatures to it, the ardent anti-reformer, though the distance from the days of doom in the examination schools was rapidly shrinking, actually sat down to write a long pamphlet (July 1831) and sent it to Hatchard, the publisher. Hatchard doubted the success of an anonymous pamphlet, and replied in the too familiar formula that has frozen so many thousand glowing hearts, that he would publish it if the author would take the money risk. The most interesting thing about it is the criticism of the writer's shrewd and wise father upon his son's performance (too long for reproduction here). He went with his son in the main, he says, 'but I cannot go all your lengths,' and the language of his judgment sheds a curious light upon the vehement temperament of Mr. Gladstone at this time as it struck an affectionate yet firm and sober monitor. * * * * * HEARS HIS FIRST DEBATE In the autumn of 1831 Mr. Gladstone took some trouble to be present on one of the cardinal occasions in this fluctuating history:-- _October 3rd to 8th._--Journey to London. From Henley in Blackstone's chaise. Present at five nights' debate of infinite interest in the House of Lords. The first, I went forwards and underwent a somewhat high pressure. At the four others sat on a round transverse rail, very fortunate in being so well placed. Had a full view of the peeresses. There nine or ten hours every evening. Read Peel's speech and sundry papers relating to King's College, which I went to see; also London Bridge. Read introduction to Butler. Wrote to Saunders. Much occupied in order-hunting during the morning. Lord Brougham's as a speech most wonderful, delivered with a power and effect which cannot be appreciated by any hearsay mode of information, and with fertile exuberance in sarcasm. In point of argument it had, I think, little that was new. Lord Grey's most beautiful, Lord Goderich's and Lord Lansdowne's extremely good, and in these was comprehended nearly all the oratorical merit of the debate. The reasoning or the attempt to reason, independently of the success in such attempt, certainly seemed to me to be with the opposition. Their best speeches, I thought, were those of Lords Harrowby, Carnarvon, Mansfield, Wynford; next Lords Lyndhurst, Wharncliffe, and the Duke of Wellington. Lord Grey's reply I did not hear, having been compelled by exhaustion to leave the House. Remained with Ryder and Pickering in the coffee-room or walking about until the division, and joined Wellesley and [illegible] as we walked home. Went to bed for an hour, breakfasted, and came off by the Alert. Arrived safely, thank God, in Oxford. Wrote to my brother and to Gaskell. Tea with Phillimore and spent the remainder of the evening with Canning. The consequences of the vote may be awful. God avert this. But it was an honourable and manly decision, and so may God avert them. This was the memorable occasion when the Lords threw out the Reform bill by 199 to 158, the division not taking place until six o'clock in the morning. The consequences, as the country instantly made manifest, were 'awful' enough to secure the reversal of the decision. It seems, so far as I can make out, to have been the first debate that one of the most consummate debaters that ever lived had the fortune of listening to. V READING FOR THE SCHOOLS Meanwhile intense interest in parliament and the newspapers had not impaired his studies. Disgusted as he was at the political outlook, in the beginning of July he had fallen fairly to work more or less close for ten or twelve hours a day. It 'proved as of old a cure for ill-humour, though in itself not of the most delectable kind. It is odd enough, though true, that reading hard close-grained stuff produces a much more decided and better effect in this way, than books written professedly for the purpose of entertainment.' Then his eyes became painful, affected the head, and in August almost brought him to a full stop. After absolute remission of work for a few days, he slowly spread full sail again, and took good care no more to stint either exercise or sleep, thinking himself, strange as it now sounds, rather below than above par for such exertions. He declared that the bodily fatigue, the mental fatigue, and the anxiety as to the result, made reading for a class a thing not to be undergone more than once in a lifetime. Time had mightier fatigues in store for him than even this. The heavy work among the ideas of men of bygone days did not deaden intellectual projects of his own. A few days before he went to see the Lords throw out the Reform bill, he made a curious entry:-- _October 3rd, 1831._--Yesterday an idea, a chimera, entered my head, of gathering during the progress of my life, notes and materials for a work embracing three divisions, Morals, Politics, Education, and I commit this notice to paper now, that many years hence, if it please God, I may find it either a pleasant or at least an instructive reminiscence, a pleasant and instructing one, I trust, if I may ever be permitted to execute this design; instructive if it shall point while in embryo, and serve to teach me the folly of presumptuous schemes conceived during the buoyancy of youth, and only relinquished on a discovery of incompetency in later years. Meanwhile I am only contemplating the gradual accumulation of materials. The reading went on at a steady pace, not without social intermissions:-- _Oct. 11th and 12th._--Rode. Papers. Virgil. Thucydides, both days. Also some optics. Wrote a long letter home. Read a chapter of Butler each day. Hume. Breakfasted also with Canning to meet Lady C[anning]. She received us, I thought, with great kindness, and spoke a great deal about Lord Grey's conduct with reference to her husband's memory, with great animation and excitement; her hand in a strong tremor. It was impossible not to enter into her feelings. Then comes the struggle for the palm:-- _Monday, November 7th to Saturday 12th._--In the schools or preparing. Read most of Niebuhr. Finished going over the _Agamemnon_. Got up Aristophanic and other hard words. Went over my books of extracts, etc. Read some of Whately's rhetoric. Got up a little Polybius, and the history out of Livy, decade one. In the schools Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday; each day about six and a half hours at work or under. First Stratford's speech into Latin with logical and rhetorical questions--the latter somewhat abstract. Dined at Gaskell's and met Pearson, a clever and agreeable man. On Thursday a piece of Johnson's preface in morning, in evening critical questions which I did very badly, but I afterwards heard, better than _the rest_, which I could not and cannot understand. On Friday we had in the morning historical questions. Wrote a vast quantity of matter, ill enough digested. In the evening, Greek to translate and illustrate. Heard cheering accounts indirectly of myself, for which I ought to be very thankful.... Dined with Pearson at the Mitre. Very kind in him to ask me. Made Saturday in great measure an idle day. Had a good ride with Gaskell. Spent part of the evening with him. Read about six hours. _Sunday, November 13th._--Chapel thrice. Breakfast and much conversation with Cameron. Read Bible. Some divinity of a character approaching to cram. Looked over my shorter abstract of Butler. Tea with Harrison. Walk with Gaskell. Wine with Hamilton, more of a party than I quite liked or expected. Altogether my mind was in an unsatisfactory state, though I heard a most admirable sermon from Tyler on Bethesda, which could not have been more opportune if written on purpose for those who are going into the schools. But I am cold, timid, and worldly, and not in a healthy state of mind for the great trial of to-morrow, to which I know I am utterly and miserably unequal, but which I also know will be sealed for good.... Here is his picture of his _viva voce_ examination:-- _November 14th._--Spent the morning chiefly in looking over my Polybius; short abstract of ethics, and definitions. Also some hard words. Went into the schools at ten, and from this time was little troubled with fear. Examined by Stocker in divinity. I did not answer as I could have wished. Hampden [the famous heresiarch] in science, a beautiful examination, and with every circumstance in my favour. He said to me, 'Thank you, you have construed extremely well, and appear to be thoroughly acquainted with your books,' or something to that effect. Then followed a very clever examination in history from Garbett, and an agreeable and short one in my poets from Cremer, who spoke very kindly to me at the close. I was only put on in eight books besides the Testament, namely Rhetoric, Ethics, _Phædo_, Herodotus, Thucydides, _Odyssey_, Aristophanes (_Vespae_), and Persius. Everything was in my favour; the examiners kind beyond everything; a good many persons there, and all friendly. At the end of the science, of course, my spirits were much raised, and I could not help at that moment [giving thanks] to Him without whom not even such moderate performances would have been in my power. Afterwards rode to Cuddesdon with the Denisons, and wrote home with exquisite pleasure. HIS DOUBLE FIRST CLASS I have read a story by some contemporary how all attempts to puzzle him by questions on the minutest details of Herodotus only brought out his knowledge more fully; how the excitement reached its climax when the examiner, after testing his mastery of some point of theology, said: 'We will now leave that part of the subject,' and the candidate, carried away by his interest in the subject, answered: 'No, sir; if you please, we will not leave it yet,' and began to pour forth a fresh stream. Ten days later, after a morning much disturbed and excited he rode in the afternoon, and by half-past four the list was out, with Gladstone and Denison both of them in the first class; Phillimore and Maurice in the second; Herbert in the fourth. Then mathematics were to come. The interval between the two schools he passed at Cuddesdon, working some ten hours a day at his hardest, riding every day with Denison, and all of them in high spirits. But optics, algebra, geometry, calculus, trigonometry, and the rest, filled him with misgivings for the future. 'Every day I read, I am more and more thoroughly convinced of my incapacity for the subject.' 'My work continued and my reluctance to exertion increased with it.' For the Sunday before the examination, this is the entry, and a characteristic and remarkable one it is:--'Teaching in the school morning and evening. Saunders preached well on "Ye cannot serve God and Mammon." Read Bible and four of Horsley's sermons. Paid visits to old people.' On December 10th the mathematical ordeal began, and lasted four days. The doctor gave him draughts to quiet his excitement. Better than draughts, he read Wordsworth every day. On Sunday (December 11th) he went, as usual, twice to chapel, and heard Newman preach 'a most able discourse of a very philosophical character, more apt for reading than for hearing--at least I, in the jaded state of my mind, was unable to do it any justice.' On December 14th, the list was out, and his name was again in the first class, again along with Denison. As everybody knows, Peel had won a double-first twenty-three years before, and in mathematics Peel had the first class to himself. Mr. Gladstone in each of the two schools was one of five. Anstice, whose counsels and example he counted for so much at one epoch in his collegiate life, in 1830 carried off the same double crown, and was, like Peel, alone in the mathematical first class. It was an hour of thrilling happiness, between the past and the future, for the future was, I hope, not excluded; and feeling was well kept in check by the bustle of preparation for speedy departure. Saw the Dean, Biscoe, Saunders (whom I thanked for his extreme kindness), and such of my friends as were in Oxford; all most warm. The mutual hand-shaking between Denison, Jeffreys, and myself, was very hearty. Wine with Bruce.... Packed up my things.... Wrote at more or less length to Mrs. G. [his mother], Gaskell, Phillimore, Mr. Denison, my old tutor Knapp.... Left Oxford on the Champion. _December 15th._--After finding the first practicable coach to Cambridge was just able to manage breakfast in Bedford Square. Left Holborn at ten, in Cambridge before five. Here he was received by Wordsworth, the master of Trinity, and father of his Oxford tutor. He had a visit full of the peculiar excitement and felicity that those who are capable of it know nowhere else than at Oxford and Cambridge. He heard Hallam recite his declamation; was introduced to the mighty Whewell, to Spedding, the great Baconian, to Smyth, the professor of history, to Blakesley; renewed his acquaintance with the elder Hallam; listened to glorious anthems at Trinity and King's; tried to hear a sermon from Simeon, the head of the English evangelicals; met Stanhope, an old Eton man, and the two sons of Lord Grey; and 'copied a letter of Mr. Pitt's.' From Cambridge he made his way home, having thus triumphantly achieved the first stage of his long life journey. Amid the manifold mutations of his career, to Oxford his affection was passionate as it was constant. 'There is not a man that has passed through that great and famous university that can say with more truth than I can say, I love her from the bottom of my heart.'[52] VI THOUGHTS ON FUTURE PROFESSION Another episode must have a place before I close this chapter. At the end of 1828, the youthful Gladstone had composed a long letter, of which the manuscript survives, to a Liverpool newspaper, earnestly contesting its appalling proposition that 'man has no more control over his belief, than he has over his stature or his colour,' and beseeching the editor to try Leslie's _Short Method with the Deists_, if he be unfortunate enough to doubt the authority of the Bible. At Oxford his fervour carried him beyond the fluent tract to a personal decision. On August 4th, 1830, the entry is this:--'Began Thucydides. Also working up Herodotus. [Greek: exêrtumenos]. Construing Thucydides at night. Uncomfortable again and much distracted with doubts as to my future line of conduct. God direct me. I am utterly blind. Wrote a very long letter to my dear father on the subject of my future profession, wishing if possible to bring the question to an immediate and final settlement.' The letter is exorbitant in length, it is vague, it is obscure; but the appeal contained in it is as earnest as any appeal from son to parent on such a subject ever was, and it is of special interest as the first definite indication alike of the extraordinary intensity of his religious disposition, and of that double-mindedness, that division of sensibility between the demands of spiritual and of secular life, which remained throughout one of the marking traits of his career. He declares his conviction that his duty, alike to man as a social being, and as a rational and reasonable being to God, summons him with a voice too imperative to be resisted, to forsake the ordinary callings of the world and to take Upon himself the clerical office. The special need of devotion to that office, he argues, must be plain to any one who 'casts his eye over the moral wilderness of the world, who contemplates the pursuits, desires, designs, and principles of the beings that move so busily in it to and fro, without an object beyond the finding food for it, mental or bodily, for the present moment.' This letter the reader will find in full elsewhere.[53] The missionary impulse, the yearning for some apostolic destination, the glow of self-devotion to a supreme external will, is a well-known element in the youth of ardent natures of either sex. In a thousand forms, sometimes for good, sometimes for evil, such a mood has played its part in history. In this case, as in many another, the impulse in its first shape did not endure, but in essence it never faded. His father replied as a wise man was sure to do, almost with sympathy, with entire patience, and with thorough common sense. The son dutifully accepts the admonition that it is too early to decide so grave an issue, and that the immediate matter is the approaching performance in the examination schools. 'I highly approve,' his father had written (Nov. 8th, 1830), 'your proposal to leave undetermined the profession you are to follow, until you return from the continent and complete your education in all respects. You will then have seen more of the world and have greater confidence in the choice you may make; for it will then rest wholly with yourself, having our advice whenever you may wish for it.' The critical issue was now finally settled. At almost equal length, and in parts of this second letter no less vague and obscure than the first, but with more concentrated power, Mr. Gladstone tells his father (Jan. 17th, 1832) how the excitement has subsided, but still he sees at hand a great crisis in the history of mankind. New principles, he says, prevail in morals, politics, education. Enlightened self-interest is made the substitute for the old bonds of unreasoned attachment, and under the plausible maxim that knowledge is power, one kind of ignorance is made to take the place of another kind. Christianity teaches that the head is to be exalted through the heart, but Benthamism maintains that the heart is to be amended through the head. The conflict proceeding in parliament foreshadows a contest for the existence of the church establishment, to be assailed through its property. The whole foundation of society may go. Under circumstances so formidable, he dares not look for the comparative calm and ease of a professional life. He must hold himself free of attachment to any single post and function of a technical nature. And so--to make the long story short--'My own desires for future life are exactly coincident with yours, in so far as I am acquainted with them; believing them to be a _profession_ of the law, with a view substantially to studying the constitutional branch of it, and a subsequent experiment, as time and circumstances might offer, on what is termed public life.' 'It tortures me,' he had written to his brother John (August 29th, 1830), 'to think of an inclination opposed to that of my beloved father,' and this was evidently one of the preponderant motives in his final decision. In the same letter, while the fire of apostolic devotion was still fervid within him, he had penned a couple of sentences that contain words of deeper meaning than he could surely know:--'I am willing to persuade myself that in spite of other longings which I often feel, my heart is prepared to yield other hopes and other desires for this--of being permitted to be the humblest of those who may be commissioned to set before the eyes of man, still great even, in his ruins, the magnificence and the glory of Christian truth. Especially as I feel that my temperament is so excitable, that I should fear giving up my mind to other subjects which have ever proved sufficiently alluring to me, and which I fear would make my life a fever of unsatisfied longings and expectations.' So men unconsciously often hint an oracle of their lives. Perhaps these forebodings of a high-wrought hour may in other hues have at many moments come back to Mr. Gladstone's mind, even in the full sunshine of a triumphant career of duty, virtue, power, and renown. MEDITATIONS The entry in his diary, suggested by the return of his birthday (Dec. 29, 1831), closes with the words, 'This has been my debating society year, now, I fancy, done with. Politics are fascinating to me; perhaps too fascinating.' Higher thoughts than this press in upon him:-- Industry of a kind and for a time there has been, but the industry of necessity, not of principle. I would fain believe that my sentiments in religion have been somewhat enlarged and untrammelled, but if this be true, my responsibility is indeed augmented, but wherein have my deeds of duty been proportionally modified?... One conclusion theoretically has been much on my mind--it is the increased importance and necessity and benefit of prayer--of the life of obedience and self-sacrifice. May God use me as a vessel for his own purposes, of whatever character and results in relation to myself.... May the God who loves us all, still vouchsafe me a testimony of His abiding presence in the protracted, though well nigh dormant life of a desire which at times has risen high in my soul, a fervent and a buoyant hope that I might work an energetic work in this world, and by that work (whereof the worker is only God) I might grow into the image of the Redeemer.... It matters not whether the sphere of duty be large or small, but may it be duly filled. May those faint and languishing embers be kindled by the truth of the everlasting spirit into a living and a life-giving flame. Every reader will remember how, just two hundred years before, the sublimest of English poets had on his twenty-third birthday closed the same self-reproach for sluggishness of inward life, with the same aspiration:-- Yet be it less or more, or soon or slow, It shall be still in strictest measure even To that same lot however mean or high, Towards which time leads me and the will of heaven. All is, if I have grace to use it so, As ever in my great taskmaster's eye. Two generations after he had quitted the university, Mr. Gladstone summed up her influence upon him:-- Oxford had rather tended to hide from me the great fact that liberty is a great and precious gift of God, and that human excellence cannot grow up in a nation without it. And yet I do not hesitate to say that Oxford had even at this time laid the foundations of my liberalism. School pursuits had revealed little; but in the region of philosophy she had initiated if not inured me to the pursuit of truth as an end of study. The splendid integrity of Aristotle, and still more of Butler, conferred upon me an inestimable service. Elsewhere I have not scrupled to speak with severity of myself, but I declare that while in the arms of Oxford, I was possessed through and through with a single-minded and passionate love of truth, with a virgin love of truth, so that, although I might be swathed in clouds of prejudice there was something of an eye within, that might gradually pierce them. FOOTNOTES: [34] Charles Wordsworth's _Annals_. [35] After Peel had begun his career, Jackson gave him a piece of advice that would have pleased Mr. Gladstone:--'Let no day pass without your having Homer in your hand. Elevate your own mind by continual meditation on the vastness of his comprehension and the unerring accuracy of all his conceptions. If you will but read him four or five times over every year, in a half a dozen years you will know him by heart, and he well deserves it.'--Parker's _Life of Sir R. Peel_, i. p. 28. [36] On the four periods of Aristotelian study at Oxford in the first half of the century see Pattison's Essays, i. P. 463. [37] _Ibid_, i. p. 465. [38] Reprinted from the _Edingburgh Review_ in _Discussions on Philosophy and Literature_, pp. 401-559. (1852.) [39] Tupper (_My Life_, etc., p. 53, 1886) mentions that he beat Mr. Gladstone for the Burton theological essay, 'The Reconciliation of Matthew and John'; but Gladstone was so good a second that Dr. Burton begged that one-fifth of the prize money, might be given to him as solatium. [40] Anstice was afterwards professor of Classics at King's College, and was cut off prematurely at the age of thirty. See below, p. 134. [41] _Gleanings_, vii. p. 141. [42] _Ibid._ ii, p. 1. [43] Purcell (_Manning_, i. p. 46) makes Mr. Gladstone say, 'I was intimate with Newman, but then we had many friends in common.' This must be erroneously reported. [44] _Gleanings_, vii. p. 211. [45] Sir Thomas Acland gives the names of the first twelve members as follows: Gladstone, Gaskell, Doyle, Moncreiff, Seymer, Rogers, two Aclands, Leader, Anstice, Harrison, Cole. Mr. Gladstone in a letter to Acland (1889) mentions these twelve names, and adds 'from the old book of record,' Bruce, J., Bruce, F., Egerton, Liddell, Lincoln, Lushington, Maurice, Oxenham, Vaughan, Thornton, C. Marriott. [46] At Palmerston Club, Oxford, Jan. 30, 1878. [47] His father was a Liverpool merchant, and had been mayor. [48] By the kindness of the present dean of Christ Church I am able to give the reader a couple of specimens of Mr. Gladstone's Latin verse. The two pieces were written for 'Lent verses':-- (1829) Gladstone. _An aliquid sit immutabile? Affirmatur._ Vivimus incertum? Fortunæ lusus habemur? Singula præteriens det rapiatve dies? En nemus exaninum, qua se modo germina, verno Tempore, purpureis explicuere comis. Respice pacatum Neptuni numine pontum: Territa mox tumido verberat astra salo. Sed brevior brevibus, quas unda supervenit, undis Sed gelidâ, quam mox dissipat aura, nive: Sed foliis sylvarum, et amici veris odore, Quisquis honos placeat, quisquis alatur amor. Jamne joci lususque sonant? viget alma Juventus? Funereæ forsan eras cecinere tubæ. Nec pietas, nec casta Fides, nec libera Virtus, Nigrantes vetuit mortis inire domos. Certa tamen lex ipsa manet, labentibus annis, Quæ jubet assiduas quæque subire vices. (1830) Gladstone. _An malum a seipso possit sanari? Affirmatur._ Cernis ut argutas effuderit Anna querelas? Lumen ut insolitâ triste tumescat aquâ? Quicquid in ardenti flammarum corde rotatur, Et fronte et rubris pingitur omne genis. Dum ruit hùc illùc, speculum simulacra ruentis, Ora Mimalloneo plena furore, refert. Pectora vesano cùm turgida conspicit æstu, Quæ fuit (haud qualis debeat esse) videt. Ac veluti ventis intra sua claustra coactis, Quum piget �olium fræna dedisse ducem; Concita non aliter subsidit pectoris unda, Et propriâ rursum sede potitur Amor, Jurâsses torvam perculso astare Medusam Jurares Paphiæ lumen adesse deæ. [49] _Excursion_, Book iv. p. 1. [50] It is curious, we may note in passing, that Thomas Gladstone, his eldest brother, was then member for Queenborough, and he, after voting in the majority of one, a few weeks later changed his mind and supported the amendment that destroyed the first bill. At the election he lost his seat. [51] It is given in Robbins, _Early Life_, pp. 104-5. [52] Oxford, Feb. 5, 1890. [53] See Appendix. Book II _1882-1846_ CHAPTER I ENTERS PARLIAMENT (_1832-1834_) I may speak of the House of Commons as a school of discipline for those who enter it. In my opinion it is a school of extraordinary power and efficacy. It is a great and noble school for the creation of all the qualities of force, suppleness, and versatility of intellect. And it is also a great moral school. It is a school of temper. It is also a school of patience. It is a school of honour, and it is a school of justice.--GLADSTONE (1878). FOREIGN TRAVEL Leaving home in the latter part of January (1832), with a Wordsworth for a pocket companion, Mr. Gladstone made his way to Oxford, where he laboured through his packing, settled accounts, 'heard a very able sermon indeed from Newman at St. Mary's,' took his bachelor's degree (Jan. 26), and after a day or two with relatives and friends in London, left England along with his brother John at the beginning of February. He did not return until the end of July. He visited Brussels, Paris, Florence, Naples, Rome, Venice, and Milan. Of this long journey he kept a full record, and it contains one entry of no small moment in his mental history. A conception now began to possess him, that according to one religious school kindled a saving illumination, and according to another threw something of a shade upon his future path. In either view it marked a change of spiritual course, a transformation not of religion as the centre of his being, for that it always was, but of the frame and mould within which religion was to expand. In entering St. Peter's at Rome (March 31, 1832) he experienced his 'first conception of unity in the Church,' and first longed for its visible attainment. Here he felt 'the pain and shame of the schism which separates us from Rome--whose guilt surely rests not upon the venerable fathers of the English Reformed Church but upon Rome itself, yet whose melancholy effects the mind is doomed to feel when you enter this magnificent temple and behold in its walls the images of Christian saints and the words of everlasting truth; yet such is the mass of intervening encumbrances that you scarcely own, and can yet more scantily realise, any bond of sympathy or union.' This was no fleeting impression of a traveller. It had been preceded by a disenchantment, for he had made his way from Turin to Pinerol, and seen one of the Vaudois valleys. He had framed a lofty conception of the people as ideal Christians, and he underwent a chill of disappointment on finding them apparently much like other men. Even the pastor, though a quiet, inoffensive man, gave no sign of energy or of what would have been called in England vital religion. With this chill at his heart he came upon the atmosphere of gorgeous Rome. It was, however, in the words of Clough's fine line from _Easter Day_, 'through the great sinful streets of Naples as he passed,' that a great mutation overtook him. One Sunday (May 13) something, I know not what, set me on examining the occasional offices of the church in the prayer book. They made a strong impression upon me on that very day, and the impression has never been effaced. I had previously taken a great deal of teaching direct from the Bible, as best I could, but now the figure of the Church arose before me as a teacher too, and I gradually found in how incomplete and fragmentary a manner I had drawn divine truth from the sacred volume, as indeed I had also missed in the thirty-nine articles some things which ought to have taught me better. Such, for I believe that I have given the fact as it occurred, in its silence and its solitude, was my first introduction to the august conception of the Church of Christ. It presented to me Christianity under an aspect in which I had not yet known it: its ministry of symbols, its channels of grace, its unending line of teachers joining from the Head: a sublime construction, based throughout upon historic fact, uplifting the idea of the community in which we live, and of the access which it enjoys through the new and living way to the presence of the Most High. From this time I began to feel my way by decrees into or towards a true notion of the Church. It became a definite and organised idea when, at the suggestion of James Hope, I read the just published and remarkable work of Palmer. But the charm of freshness lay upon that first disclosure of 1832. This mighty question:--what is the nature of a church and what the duties, titles, and symbols of faithful membership, which in divers forms had shaken the world for so many ages and now first dawned upon his ardent mind, was the germ of a deep and lasting pre-occupation of which we shall speedily and without cessation find abundant traces. II OFFER OF A SEAT A few weeks later, the great rival interest in Mr. Gladstone's life, if rival we may call it, was forced into startling prominence before him. At Milan he received a letter from Lord Lincoln, saying that he was commissioned by his father, the Duke of Newcastle, to inform him that his influence in the borough of Newark was at Mr. Gladstone's disposal if he should be ready to enter parliamentary life. This was the fruit of his famous anti-reform speech at the Oxford Union. No wonder that such an offer made him giddy. 'This stunning and overpowering proposal,' he says to his father (July 8), 'naturally left me the whole of the evening on which I received it, in a flutter of confusion. Since that evening there has been time to reflect, and to see that it is not of so intoxicating a character as it seemed at first. First, because the Duke of Newcastle's offer must have been made at the instance of a single person (Lincoln), that person young and sanguine, and I may say in such a matter partial.... This much at least became clear to me by the time I had recovered my breath: that decidedly more than mere permission from my dear father would be necessary to authorise my entering on the consideration of particulars at all.' And then he falls into a vein of devout reflection, almost as if this sudden destination of his life were some irrevocable priesthood or vow of monastic profession, and not the mere stringent secularity of labour in a parliament. It would be thin and narrow to count all this an overstrain. To a nature like his, of such eager strength of equipment; conscious of life as a battle and not a parade; apt for all external action yet with a burning glow of light and fire in the internal spirit; resolute from the first in small things and in great against aimless drift and eddy,--to such an one the moment of fixing alike the goal and the track may well have been grave. Then points of doubt arose. 'It is, I daresay, in your recollection,'--this to his father,--'that at the time when Mr. Canning came to power, the Duke of Newcastle, in the House of Lords, declared him the most profligate minister the country had ever had. Now it struck me to inquire of myself, does the duke know the feelings I happen to entertain towards Mr. Canning? Does he know, or can he have had in his mind, my father's connection with Mr. Canning?' The duke had in fact been one of the busiest and bitterest of Canning's enemies, and had afterwards in the same spirit striven with might and main to keep Huskisson out of the Wellington cabinet. Another awkwardness appeared. The duke had offered a handsome contribution towards expenses. Would not this tend to abridge the member's independence? What was the footing on which patron and member were to stand? Mr. Gladstone was informed by his brother that the duke had neither heretofore asked for pledges, nor now demanded them. After a very brief correspondence with his shrewd and generous father, the plunge was taken, and on his return to England, after a fortnight spent 'in an amphibious state between that of a candidate and [Greek: idiôtês] or private person,' he issued his address to the electors of Newark (August 4, 1832). He did not go actually on to the ground until the end of September. The intervening weeks he spent with his family at Torquay, where he varied electioneering correspondence and yachting with plenty of sufficiently serious reading from Blackstone and Plato and the _Excursion_ down to _Corinne_. One Sunday morning (September 23), his father burst into his bedroom, with the news that his presence was urgently needed at Newark. 'I rose, dressed, and breakfasted speedily, with infinite disgust. I left Torquay at 8¾ and devoted my Sunday to the journey. Was I right?... My father drove me to Newton; chaise to Exeter. There near an hour; went to the cathedral and heard a part of the prayers. Mail to London. Conversation with a tory countryman who got in for a few miles, on Sunday travelling, which we agreed in disapproving. Gave him some tracts. Excellent mail. Dined at Yeovil; read a little of the _Christian Year_ [published 1827]. At 6½ A.M. arrived at Piccadilly, 18½ hours from Exeter. Went to Fetter Lane, washed and breakfasted, and came off at 8 o'clock by a High Flyer for Newark. The sun hovered red and cold through the heavy fog of London sky, but in the country the day was fine. Tea at Stamford; arrived at Newark at midnight.' Such in forty hours was the first of Mr. Gladstone's countless political pilgrimages. His two election addresses are a curious starting-point for so memorable a journey. Thrown into the form of a modern programme, the points are these:--union of church and state, the defence in particular of our Irish establishments; correction of the poor laws; allotment of cottage grounds; adequate remuneration of labour; a system of Christian instruction for the West Indian slaves, but no emancipation until that instruction had fitted them for it; a dignified and impartial foreign policy. The duke was much startled by the passage about labour receiving adequate remuneration, 'which unhappily among several classes of our fellow countrymen is not now the case.' He did not, however, interfere. The whig newspaper said roundly of the first of Mr. Gladstone's two addresses, that a more jumbled collection of words had seldom been sent from the press. The tory paper, on the contrary, congratulated the constituency on a candidate of considerable commercial experience and talent. The anti-slavery men fought him stoutly. They put his name into their black schedule with nine-and-twenty other candidates, they harried him with posers from a pamphlet of his father's, and they met his doctrine that if slavery were sinful the Bible would not have commended the regulation of it, by bluntly asking him on the hustings whether he knew a text in Exodus declaring that 'he that stealeth a man and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death.' His father's pamphlets undoubtedly exposed a good deal of surface. We cannot be surprised that any adherent of these standard sophistries should be placed on the black list of the zealous soldiers of humanity. The candidate held to the ground he had taken at Oxford and in his election address, and apparently made converts. He had an interview with forty voters of abolitionist complexion at his hotel, and according to the friendly narrative of his brother, who was present, 'he shone not only in his powers of conversation, but by the tact, quickness, and talent with which he made his replies, to the thorough and complete satisfaction of baptists, wesleyan methodists, and I may say even, of almost every religious sect! Not one refused their vote: they came forward, and enrolled their names, though before, I believe, they never supported any one on the duke's interest!' ISSUES ADDRESS AT NEWARK The humours of an election of the ancient sort are a very old story, and Newark had its full share of them. The register contained rather under sixteen hundred voters on a scot and lot qualification, to elect a couple of members. The principal influence over about one quarter of them was exercised by the Duke of Newcastle, who three years before had punished the whigs of the borough for the outrage of voting against his nominee, by serving, in concert with another proprietor, forty of them with notice to quit. Then the trodden worm turned. The notices were framed, affixed to poles, and carried with bands of music through the streets. Even the audacity of a petition to parliament was projected. The duke, whose chief fault was not to know that time had brought him into a novel age, defended himself with the haughty truism, then just ceasing to be true, that he had a right to do as he liked with his own. This clear-cut enunciation of a vanishing principle became a sort of landmark, and gave to his name an unpleasing immortality in our political history. In the high tide of agitation for reform the whigs gave the duke a beating, and brought their man to the top of the poll, a tory being his colleague. Handley, the tory, on our present occasion seemed safe, and the fight lay between Mr. Gladstone and Sergeant Wilde, the sitting whig, a lawyer of merit and eminence, who eighteen years later went to the woolsack as Lord Truro. Reform at Newark was already on the ebb. Mr. Gladstone, though mocked as a mere schoolboy, and fiercely assailed as a slavery man, exhibited from the first hour of the fight tremendous gifts of speech and skill of fence. His Red club worked valiantly; the sergeant did not play his cards skilfully; and pretty early in the long struggle it was felt that the duke would this time come into his own again. The young student soon showed that his double first class, his love of books, his religious preoccupations, had not unfitted him by a single jot for one of the most arduous of all forms of the battle of life. He proved a diligent and prepossessing canvasser, an untiring combatant, and of course the readiest and most fluent of speakers. Wilde after hearing him said sententiously to one of his own supporters, 'There is a great future before this young man.' The rather rotten borough became suffused with the radiant atmosphere of Olympus. The ladies presented their hero with a banner of red silk, and an address expressive of their conviction that the good old Red cause was the salvation of their ancient borough. The young candidate in reply speedily put it in far more glowing colours. It was no trivial banner of a party club, it was the red flag of England that he saw before him, the symbol of national moderation and national power, under which, when every throne on the continent had crumbled into dust beneath the tyrannous strength of France, mankind had found sure refuge and triumphant hope, and the blast that tore every other ensign to tatters served only to unfold their own and display its beauty and its glory. Amid these oratorical splendours the old hands of the club silently supplemented eloquence and argument by darker agencies, of which happily the candidate knew little until after. There was a red band and each musician received fifteen shillings a day, there happening accidentally to be among them no fewer than ten patriotic red plumpers. Large tea-parties attracted red ladies. The inns great and small were thrown joyously open on one side or other, and when the time came, our national heroes from Robin Hood to Lord Nelson and the Duke of Wellington, as well as half the animal kingdom, the swan and salmon, horses, bulls, boars, lions, and eagles, of all the colours of the rainbow and in every kind of strange partnership, sent in bills for meat and liquor supplied to free and independent electors to the tune of a couple of thousand pounds. Apart from these black arts, and apart from the duke's interest, there was a good force of the staunch and honest type, the life-blood of electioneering and the salvation of party government, who cried stoutly, 'I was born Red, I live Red, and I will die Red.' 'We started on the canvass,' says one who was with Mr. Gladstone, 'at eight in the morning and worked at it for about nine hours, with a great crowd, band and flags, and innumerable glasses of beer and wine all jumbled together; then a dinner of 30 or 40, with speeches and songs until say ten o'clock; then he always played a rubber of whist, and about twelve or one I got to bed and not to sleep.' HUMOURS OF AN OLD ELECTION At length the end came. At the nomination the show of hands was against the reds, but when the poll was taken and closed on the second day, Gladstone appeared at the head of it with 887 votes, against 798 for his colleague Handley, and 726 for the fallen Wilde. 'Yesterday' (Dec. 13, 1832), he tells his father, 'we went to the town hall at 9 A.M., when the mayor cast up the numbers and declared the poll. While he was doing this the popular wrath vented itself for the most part upon Handley.... The sergeant obtained me a hearing, and I spoke for perhaps an hour or more, but it was flat work, as they were no more than patient, and agreed with but little that I said. The sergeant then spoke for an hour and a half.... He went into matters connected with his own adieu to Newark, besought the people most energetically to bear with their disappointment like men, and expressed his farewell with great depth of feeling. Affected to tears himself, he affected others also. In the evening near fifty dined here [Clinton Arms] and the utmost enthusiasm was manifested.' The new member began his first speech as a member of parliament as follows:-- Gentlemen: In looking forward to the field which is now opened before me, I cannot but conceive that I shall often be reproached with being not your representative but the representative of the Duke of Newcastle. Now I should rather incline to exaggerate than to extenuate such connection as does exist between me and that nobleman: and for my part should have no reluctance to see every sentiment which ever passed between us, whether by letter or by word of mouth, exposed to the view of the world. I met the Duke of Newcastle upon the broad ground of public principle, and upon that ground alone. I own no other bond of union with him than this, that he in his exalted sphere, and I in my humble one, entertained the same persuasion, that the institutions of this country are to be defended against those who threaten their destruction, at all hazards, and to all extremities. Why do you return me to parliament? Not because I am the Duke of Newcastle's man, simply: but because, coinciding with the duke in political sentiment, you likewise admit that one possessing so large a property here, and faithfully discharging the duties which the possession of that property entails, ought in the natural course of things to exercise a certain influence. You return me to parliament, not merely because I am the Duke of Newcastle's man: but because both the man whom the duke has sent, and the duke himself, are _your men_. RETURNED FOR NEWARK The election was of course pointed to by rejoicing conservatives as a proof the more of that reaction which the ministerial and radical press was audacious enough to laugh at. This borough, says the local journalist, was led away by the bubble reform, to support those who by specious and showy qualification had dazzled their eyes; delusion had vanished, shadows satisfied no longer, Newark was restored to its high place in the esteem of the friends of order and good government. Of course the intimates of the days of his youth were delighted. We want such a man as Gladstone, wrote Hallam to Gaskell (October 1, 1832); 'in some things he is likely to be obstinate and prejudiced; but he has a fine fund of high chivalrous tory sentiment, and a tongue, moreover, to let it loose with. I think he may do a great deal.' In the course of his three months of sojourn at Newark Mr. Gladstone paid his first visit to the great man at Clumber. The duke received me, he tells his father, with the greatest kindness, and conversed with such ease and familiarity of manner as speedily to dispel a certain degree of awe which I had previously entertained, and to throw me perhaps more off my guard than I ought to have been in company with a man of his age and rank.... The utmost regularity and subordination appears to prevail in the family, and no doubt it is in many respects a good specimen of the old English style. He is apparently a most affectionate father, but still the sons and daughters are under a certain degree of restraint in his presence.... A man, be his station of life what it may, more entirely divested of personal pride and arrogance, more single-minded and disinterested in his views, or more courageous and resolute in determination to adhere to them as the dictates of his own conscience, I cannot conceive. From this frigid interior Mr. Gladstone made his way to the genial company of Milnes Gaskell at Thornes and had a delightful week. Thence he proceeded to spend some days with his sick mother at Leamington. 'We have been singularly dealt with as a family,' he observes, 'once snatched from a position where we were what is called entering society, and sent to comparative seclusion as regards family establishment--and now again prevented from assuming the situation that seems the natural termination of a career like my father's. Here is a noble trial--for me personally to exercise a kindly and unselfish feeling, if amid the excitements and allurements now near me, I am enabled duly to realise the bond of consanguinity and suffer with those whom Providence has ordained to suffer.' And this assuredly was no mere entry in a journal. In betrothals, marriages, deaths, on all the great occasions of life in his circle, his letters under old-fashioned formalities of phrase yet beat with a marked and living pulse of genuine interest, solicitude, sympathy, unselfishness, and union. III As always, he sought refreshment from turmoil that was only moderately congenial to him, in reading and writing. Among much else he learns Shelley by heart, but his devotion to Wordsworth is unshaken. 'One remarkable similarity prevails between Wordsworth and Shelley; the quality of combining and connecting everywhere external nature with internal and unseen mind. But how different are they in applications. It frets and irritates the one, it is the key to the peacefulness of the other.' Two books of _Paradise Regained_, he finds 'very objectionable on religious grounds,'--the books presumably where Milton has been convicted of Arian heresy. He still has energy enough left for more mundane things, to write a succession of articles for the _Liverpool Standard_, and he finds time to record his joy (December 7) 'over five Eton first classes' at Oxford. Then, by and by, the election accounts come in. The arrangement had been made that the expenses were not to exceed a thousand pounds, of which the duke was to contribute one half, and John Gladstone the other half. It now appeared that twice as much would not suffice. The new member flung himself with all his soul into a struggle with his committee against the practice of opening public houses and the exorbitant demands that came of it. Open houses, he protested, meant profligate expenditure and organised drunkenness; they were not a pecuniary question, but a question of right and wrong. In the afternoon of the second day of polling, his agent had said to him, speaking about special constables, that he scarcely knew how they could be got if wanted, for he thought nearly every man in the town was drunk. It was in vain that the committee assured him of the discouraging truth that a certain proportion of the voters could not be got to the poll without a breakfast; and an observer from another planet might perhaps have asked himself whether all this was so remarkable an improvement on the duke doing what he liked with his own. Mr. Gladstone still stood to it that a system of entertainment that ended in producing a state of general intoxication, was the most demoralising and vicious of all forms of outlay, and the Newark worthies were bewildered and confounded by the gigantic dialectical and rhetorical resources of their incensed representative. The fierce battle lasted, with moments of mitigation, over many of the thirteen years of the connection. Of all the measures that Mr. Gladstone was destined in days to come to place upon the statute book, none was more salutary than the law that purified corrupt practices at elections.[54] HIS BIRTHDAY On his birthday at the close of this eventful year, here is his entry in his diary:--'On this day I have completed my twenty-third year.... The exertions of the year have been smaller than those of the last, but in some respects the diminution has been unavoidable. In future I hope circumstances will bind me down to work with a rigour which my natural sluggishness will find it impossible to elude. I wish that I could hope my frame of mind had been in any degree removed from earth and brought nearer to heaven, that the habit of my mind had been imbued with something of that spirit which is not of this world. I have now familiarised myself with maxims sanctioning and encouraging a degree of intercourse with society, perhaps attended with much risk.... Nor do I now think myself warranted in withdrawing from the practices of my fellow men except when they really _involve_ an encouragement of sin, in which case I do certainly rank races and theatres....' 'Periods like these,' he writes to his friend Gaskell (January 3, 1833), 'grievous generally in many of their results, are by no means unfavourable to the due growth and progress of individual character. I remember a very wise saying of Archidamus in Thucydides, that the being educated [Greek: en tois anankaiotatois] brings strength and efficacy to the character.'[55] In one of his letters to his father at this exciting epoch Mr. Gladstone says, that before the sudden opening now made for him, what he had marked out for himself was 'a good many years of silent reading and inquiry.' That blessed dream was over; his own temperament and outer circumstances, both of them made its realisation impossible; but in a sense he clung to it all his days. He entered at Lincoln's Inn (January 25), and he dined pretty frequently in hall down to 1839, meeting many old Eton and Oxford acquaintances, more genuine law students than himself. He kept thirteen terms but was never called to the bar. If he had intended to undergo a legal training, the design was ended by Newark. After residing for a short time in lodgings in Jermyn Street, he took quarters at the Albany (March 1833), which remained his London home for six years. 'I am getting on rapidly with my furnishing,' he tells his father, 'and I shall be able, I feel confident, to do it all, including plate, within the liberal limits which you allow. I cannot warmly enough thank you for the terms and footing on which you propose to place me in the chambers, but I really fear that after this year my allowance in all will be greater not only than I have any title to, but than I ought to accept without blushing.' He became a member of the Oxford and Cambridge Club the previous month,[56] and now was 'elected _without_ my will (but not more than without it) a member of the Carlton Club.' He would not go to dinner parties on Sundays, not even with Sir Robert Peel. He was closely attentive to the minor duties of social life, if duties they be; he was a strict observer of the etiquette of calls, and on some afternoons he notes that he made a dozen or fourteen of them. He frequented musical parties, where his fine voice, now reasonably well trained, made him a welcome guest, and he goes to public concerts where he finds Pasta and Schröder splendid. His irrepressible desire to expand himself in writing or in speech found a vent in constant articles in the _Liverpool Standard_, neither better nor worse than the ordinary juvenilia of a keen young college politician. He was confident that, whether estimated by their numbers, their wealth, or their respectability, the conservatives indubitably held in their hands the means and elements of permanent power. He discharges a fusillade from Roman history against the bare idea of vote by ballot, quotes Cicero as its determined enemy, and ascribes to secret suffrage the fall of the republic. He quotes with much zest a sentence from an ultra-radical journal that the life of the West Indian negro is happiness itself compared with that of the poor inmate of our spinning-mills. He scores a good point for the patron of Newark, by an eloquent article on the one man who had laboured to retrieve the miserable condition of the factory children, and ends with a taunting reminder to the reformers that this one man, Sadler,[57] was the nominee of a borough-monger, and that borough-monger the Duke of Newcastle. LONDON LIFE It need not be said that his church-going never flagged. In 1840 his friend, the elder Acland, interested himself in forming a small brotherhood, with rules for systematic exercises of devotion and works of mercy. Mr. Gladstone was one of the number. The names were not published, nor did any one but the treasurer know the amounts given. The pledge to personal and active benevolence seems not to have been strongly operative, for at the end of 1845 (Dec. 7) Mr. Gladstone writes to Hope in reference to Acland's scheme:--'The desire we then both felt passed off, as far as I am concerned, into a plan of asking only a donation and subscription. Now it is very difficult to satisfy the demands of duty to the poor by money alone. On the other hand, it is extremely hard for me--and I suppose possibly for you--to give them much in the shape of time and thought, for both with me are already tasked up to and beyond their powers.... I much wish we could execute some plan which without demanding much time would entail the discharge of some humble and humbling office.... If you thought with me--and I do not see why you should not, except to assume the reverse is paying myself a compliment--let us go to work, as in the young days of the college plan but with a more direct and less ambitious purpose.' Of this we may see something later. At a great service at St. Paul's, he notes the glory alike of sight and sound as 'possessing that remarkable criterion of the sublime, a grand result from a combination of simple elements.' Edward Irving did not attract; 'a scene pregnant with melancholy instruction.' He was immensely struck by Melvill, whom some of us have heard pronounced by the generation before us to be the most puissant of all the men in his calling. 'His sentiments,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'are manly in tone; he deals powerfully with all his subjects; his language is flowing and unbounded; his imagery varied and intensely strong. Vigorous and lofty as are his conceptions, he is not, I think, less remarkable for soundness and healthiness of mind.' Such a passage shows among other things how the diarist was already teaching himself to analyse the art of oratory. I may note one rather curious habit, no doubt practised with a view to training in the art of speech. Besides listening to as many sermons as possible, he was also for a long time fond of reading them aloud, especially Dr. Arnold's, in rather a peculiar way. 'My plan is,' he says, 'to strengthen or qualify or omit expressions as I go along.' IV HOUSE OF COMMONS In an autobiographical note, written in the late days of his life, when he had become the only commoner left who had sat in the old burned House of Commons, he says:-- I took my seat at the opening of 1833, provided unquestionably with, a large stock of schoolboy bashfulness. The first time that business required me to go to the arm of the chair to say something to the Speaker, Manners Sutton--the first of seven whose subject I have been--who was something of a Keate, I remember the revival in me bodily of the frame of mind in which a schoolboy stands before his master. But apart from an incidental recollection of this kind, I found it most difficult to believe with, any reality of belief, that such a poor and insignificant creature as I, could really belong to, really form a _part_ of, an assembly which, notwithstanding the prosaic character of its entire visible equipment, I felt to be so august. What I may term its corporeal conveniences were, I may observe in passing, marvellously small. I do not think that in any part of the building it afforded the means of so much as washing the hands. The residences of members were at that time less distant: but they were principally reached on foot. When a large House broke up after a considerable division, a copious dark stream found its way up Parliament Street, Whitehall, and Charing Cross. I remember that there occurred some case in which a constituent (probably a maltster) at Newark sent me a communication which made oral communication with the treasury, or with the chancellor of the exchequer (then Lord Althorp), convenient. As to the means of bringing this about, I was puzzled and abashed. Some experienced friend on the opposition bench, probably Mr. Goulburn, said to me, There is Lord Althorp sitting alone on the treasury bench, go to him and tell him your business. With such encouragement I did it. Lord Althorp received me in the kindest manner possible, alike to my pleasure and my surprise. The exact composition of the first reformed House of Commons was usually analysed as tories 144; reformers 395; English and Scotch radicals 76; Irish repealers 43. Mr. Gladstone was for counting the decided conservatives as 160 and reckoning as a separate group a small party who had once been tories and now ranked between conservative opposition and whig ministers. The Irish representatives he divided between 28 tories, and a body of 50 who were made up of ministerialists, conditional repealers, and tithe extinguishers. He heard Joseph Hume, the most effective of the leading radicals, get the first word in the reformed parliament, speaking for an hour and perhaps justifying O'Connell's witty saying that Hume would have been an excellent speaker, if only he would finish a sentence before beginning the next but one after it. No more diligent member of parliament than Mr. Gladstone ever sat upon the green benches. He read his blue-books, did his duty by election committees, and on the first occasion when, in consequence of staying a little too long at a dinner at the Duke of Hamilton's, he missed a division, his self-reproach was almost as sharp as if he had fallen into mortal sin. This is often enough the way with virtuous young members, but Mr. Gladstone's zealous ideal of parliamentary duty lasted, and both at first and always he was a singular union of deep meditative seriousness with untiring animation, assiduity, and practical energy and force working over a wide field definitely mapped. MAIDEN SPEECH In the assembly where he was one day to rank among the most powerful orators ever inscribed upon its golden roll, he first opened his lips in a few words on a Newark petition (April 30) and shortly after (May 21) he spoke two or three minutes on an Edinburgh petition. A little later the question of slavery, where he knew every inch of the ground, brought him to a serious ordeal. In May, Stanley as colonial secretary introduced the proposals of the government for the gradual abolition of colonial slavery. Abolition was to be preceded by an intermediate stage, designated as apprenticeship, to last for twelve years; and the planters were to be helped through the difficulties of the transition by a loan of fifteen millions. In the course of the proceedings, the intermediate period was shortened from twelve years to seven, and the loan of fifteen millions was transformed into a free gift of twenty. To this scheme John Gladstone, whose indomitable energy made him the leading spirit of the West Indian interest, was consistently opposed, and he naturally became the mark of abolitionist attack. The occasion of Mr. Gladstone's first speech was an attack by Lord Howick on the manager of John Gladstone's Demerara estates, whom he denounced as 'the murderer of slaves,'--an attack made without notice to the two sons of the incriminated proprietor sitting in front of him. He declared that the slaves on the Vreedenhoop sugar plantations were systematically worked to death in order to increase the crop. Mr. Gladstone tried in vain to catch the eye of the Chairman on May 30, and the next day he wished to speak but saw no good opportunity. 'The emotions through which one passes, at least through which I pass, in anticipating such an effort as this, are painful and humiliating. The utter prostration and depression of spirit; the deep sincerity, the burdensome and overpowering reality of the feeling of mere feebleness and incapacity, felt in the inmost heart, yet not to find relief by expression, because the expression of such things goes for affectation,--these things I am unequal to describe, yet I have experienced them now.' On June 3, the chance came. Here is his story of the day: 'Began _le miei Prigioni_. West India meeting of members at one at Lord Sandon's. Resolutions discussed and agreed upon; ... dined early. Re-arranged my notes for the debate. Rode. House 5 to 1. Spoke my first time, for 50 minutes. My leading desire was to benefit the cause of those who are now so sorely beset. The House heard me very kindly, and my friends were satisfied. Tea afterwards at the Carlton.' The speech was an uncommon success. Stanley, the minister mainly concerned, congratulated him with more than those conventional compliments which the good nature of the House of Commons expects to be paid to any decent beginner. 'I never listened to any speech with greater pleasure,' said Stanley, himself the prince of debaters and then in the most brilliant part of his career; 'the member for Newark argued his case with a temper, an ability, and a fairness which may well be cited as a good model to many older members of this House.' His own leader, though he spoke later, said nothing in his speech about the new recruit, but two days after Mr. Gladstone mentioned that Sir R. Peel came up to him and praised Monday night's affair. King William wrote to Althorp: 'he rejoices that a young member has come forward in so promising a manner, as Viscount Althorp states Mr. W. E. Gladstone to have done.'[58] Apart from its special vindication in close detail of the state of things at Vreedenhoop as being no worse than others, the points of the speech on this great issue of the time were familiar ones. He confessed with shame and pain that cases of cruelty had existed, and would always exist, under the system of slavery, and that this was 'a substantial reason why the British legislature and public should set themselves in good earnest to provide for its extinction.' He admitted, too, that we had not fulfilled our Christian obligations by communicating the inestimable benefits of our religion to the slaves in our colonies, and that the belief among the early English planters, that if you made a man a Christian you could not keep him a slave, had led them to the monstrous conclusion that they ought not to impart Christianity to their slaves. Its extinction was a consummation devoutly to be desired, and in good earnest to be forwarded, but immediate and unconditioned emancipation, without a previous advance in character, must place the negro in a state where he would be his own worst enemy, and so must crown all the wrongs already done to him by cutting off the last hope of rising to a higher level in social existence. At some later period of his life Mr. Gladstone read a corrected report of his first speech, and found its tone much less than satisfactory. 'But of course,' he adds, 'allowance must be made for the enormous and most blessed change of opinion since that day on the subject of negro slavery. I must say, however, that even before this time I had come to entertain little or no confidence in the proceedings of the resident agents in the West Indies.' 'I can now see plainly enough,' he said sixty years later, 'the sad defects, the real illiberalism of my opinions on that subject. Yet they were not illiberal as compared with the ideas of the times, and as declared in parliament in 1833 they obtained the commendation of the liberal leaders.' COMMON OPINIONS ON SLAVERY It is fair to remember that Pitt, Fox, Grenville, and Grey, while eager to bring the slave trade to an instant end, habitually disclaimed as a calumny any intention of emancipating the blacks on the sugar islands. In 1807, when the foul blot of the trade was abolished, even Wilberforce himself discouraged attempts to abolish slavery, though the noble philanthropist soon advanced to the full length of his own principles. Peel in 1833 would have nothing to do with either immediate emancipation or gradual. Disraeli has put his view on deliberate record that 'the movement of the middle class for the abolition of slavery was virtuous, but it was not wise. It was an ignorant movement. The history of the abolition of slavery by the English, and its consequences, would be a narrative of ignorance, injustice, blundering, waste, and havoc, not easily paralleled in the history of mankind.'[59] A week later Lord Howick proposed to move for papers relating to Vreedenhoop. Lord Althorp did not refuse to grant them, but recommended him to drop his motion, as Mr. Gladstone insisted on the equal necessity of a similar return for all neighbouring plantations. Howick withdrew his motion, though he afterwards asserted that ministers had declined the return, which was not true. When Buxton moved to reduce the term of apprenticeship, Mr. Gladstone voted against him. On the following day Stanley, without previous intimation, announced the change from twelve years to seven. 'I spoke a few sentences,' Mr. Gladstone enters in his diary, 'in much confusion: for I could not easily recover from the sensation caused by the sudden overthrow of an entire and undoubting alliance.' The question of electoral scandals at Liverpool, which naturally excited lively interest in a family with local ties so strong, came up in various forms during the session, and on one of these occasions (July 4) Mr. Gladstone spoke upon it, 'for twenty minutes or more, anything but satisfactorily to myself.' Nor can the speech now be called satisfactory by any one else, except for the enunciation of the sound maxim that the giver of a bribe deserves punishment quite as richly as the receiver. Four days later he spoke for something less than half an hour on the third reading of the Irish Church Reform bill. 'I was heard,' he tells his father, 'with kindness and indulgence, but it is, after all, uphill work to address an assembly so much estranged in feeling from one's self.' Peel's speech was described as temporising, and the deliverance of his young lieutenant was temporising too, though firm on the necessary principle, as he called it, of which the world was before long to hear so much from him, that the nation should be taxed for the support of a national church. Besides his speeches he gave a full number of party votes, some of them interesting enough in view of the vast career before him. I think the first of them all was in the majority of 428 against 40 upon O'Connell's amendment for repeal,--an occasion that came vividly to his memory on the eve of his momentous change of policy in 1886. He voted for the worst clauses of the Irish Coercion bill, including the court-martial clause. He fought steadily against the admission of Jews to parliament. He fought against the admission of dissenters without a test to the universities, which he described as seminaries for the established church. He supported the existing corn law. He said 'No' to the property tax and 'Aye' for retaining the house and window taxes. He resisted a motion of Hume's for the abolition of military and naval sinecures (February 14), and another motion of the same excellent man's for the abolition of all flogging in the army save for mutiny and drunkenness. He voted against the publication of the division lists. He voted with ministers both against shorter parliaments and (April 25) against the ballot, a cardinal reform carried by his own government forty years later. On the other hand he voted (July 5) with Lord Ashley against postponing his beneficent policy of factory legislation; but he did not vote either way a fortnight later when Althorp sensibly reduced the limit of ten hours' work in factories from the impracticable age of eighteen proposed by Ashley, to the age of thirteen. He supported a bill against work on Sundays. V PURCHASE OF FASQUE A page or two from his diary will carry us succinctly enough over the rest of the first and second years of his parliamentary life. _July 21, 1833, Sunday._-- ... Wrote some lines and prose also. Finished Strype. Read Abbott and Sumner aloud. Thought for some hours on my own future destiny, and took a solitary walk to and about Kensington Gardens. _July 23._--Read _L'Allemagne_, _Rape of the Lock_, and finished factory report. _July 25_.--Went to breakfast with old Mr. Wilberforce, introduced by his son. He is cheerful and serene, a beautiful picture of old age in sight of immortality. Heard him pray with his family. Blessing and honour are upon his head. _July 30._--_L'Allemagne_. Bulwer's England. Parnell. Looked at my Plato. Rode. House. _July 31._--Hallam breakfasted with me.... Committee on West India bill finished.... German lesson. _August 2._--Worked German several hours. Head half of the _Bride of Lammermoor_. _L'Allemagne_. Rode. House. _August_ 3.--German lesson and worked alone.... Attended Mr. Wilberforce's funeral; it brought solemn thoughts, particularly about the slaves. This a burdensome question. [German kept up steadily for many days.] _August 9._--House ... voted in 48 to 87 against legal tender clause.... Read Tasso. _August 11_.--St. James's morning and afternoon. Read Bible. Abbott (finished) and a sermon of Blomfield's aloud. Wrote a paraphrase of part of chapter 8 of Romans. _August 15._--Committee 1-3¼. Rode. Plato. Finished Tasso, canto 1. Anti-slavery observations on bill. German vocabulary and exercise. _August 16._--2¾-3½ Committee finished. German lesson. Finished Plato, _Republic_, bk. v. Preparing to pack. _August_ 17.--Started for Aberdeen on board _Queen of Scotland_ at 12. _August 18th._--Rose to breakfast, but uneasily. Attempted reading, and read most of Baxter's narrative. Not too unwell to reflect. _August 19th._--Remained in bed. Read Goethe and translated a few lines. Also _Beauties of Shakespeare_. In the evening it blew: very ill though in bed. Could not help admiring the crests of the waves even as I stood at cabin window. _August 20._--Arrived 8½ A.M.--56½ hours. His father met him, and in the evening he and his brother found themselves at the new paternal seat. In 1829 John Gladstone, after much negotiation, had bought the estate of Fasque in Kincardineshire for, £80,000, to which and to other Scotch affairs he devoted his special and personal attention pretty exclusively. The home at Seaforth was broken up, though relatives remained there or in the neighbourhood. For some time he had a house in Edinburgh for private residence--the centre house in Atholl Crescent. They used for three or four years to come in from Kincardineshire, and spend the winter months in Edinburgh. Fasque was his home for the rest of his days. This was W. E. Gladstone's first visit, followed by at least one long annual spell for the remaining eighteen years of his father's life. On the morning of his arrival, he notes, 'I rode to the mill of Kincairn to see Mackay who was shot last night. He was suffering much and seemed near death. Read the Holy Scriptures to him (Psalms 51, 69, 71, Isaiah 55, Joh. 14, Col. 3). Left my prayer book.' The visit was repeated daily until the poor man's death a week later. Apart from such calls of duty, books are his main interest. He is greatly delighted with Hamilton's _Men and Manners in America_. Alfieri's _Antigone_ he dislikes as having the faults of both ancient and modern drama. He grinds away through Gifford's _Pitt_, and reads Hallam's _Middle Ages_. 'My method has usually been, 1, to read over regularly; 2, to glance again over all I have read, and analyse.' He was just as little of the lounger in his lighter reading. Schiller's plays he went through with attention, finding it 'a good plan to read along with history, historical plays of the same events for material illustration, as well as aid to the memory.' He read Scott's chapters on Mary Stuart in his history of Scotland, 'to enable me better to appreciate the admirable judgment of Schiller (in _Maria Stuart_) both where he has adhered to history and where he has gone beyond it.' He finds fault with the _Temistocle_ of Metastasio, as 'too humane.' 'History should not be violated without a reason. It may be set aside to fill up poetical verisimilitude. If history assigns a cause inadequate to its effect, or an effect inadequate to its cause, poetry may supply the deficiency for the sake of an impressive whole. But it is too much to overset a narrative and call it a historical play.' Then came a tragic stroke in real life. DAYS IN SCOTLAND _October 6, 1833._--Post hour to-day brought me a melancholy announcement--the death of Arthur Hallam. This intelligence was deeply oppressive even to my selfish disposition. I mourn in him, for myself, my earliest near friend; for my fellow creatures, one who would have adorned his age and country, a mind full of beauty and of power, attaining almost to that ideal standard of which it is presumption to expect an example. When shall I see his like? Yet this dispensation is not all pain, for there is a hope and not (in my mind) a bare or rash hope that his soul rests with God in Jesus Christ.... I walked upon the hills to muse upon this very mournful event, which cuts me to the heart. Alas for his family and his intended bride. _October 7th._--My usual occupations, but not without many thoughts upon my departed friend. Bible. Alfieri, _Wallenstein_, Plato, Gifford's _Pitt_, _Biographia Literaria_. Rode with my father and Helen. All objects lay deep in the softness and solemnity of autumnal decay. Alas, my poor friend was cut off in the spring of his bright existence. _December 13, Edinburgh._--Breakfast with Dr. Chalmers. His modesty is so extreme that it is oppressive to those who are in his company, especially his juniors, since it is impossible for them to keep their behaviour in due proportion to his. He was on his own subject, the Poor Laws, very eloquent, earnest, and impressive. Perhaps he may have been hasty in applying maxims drawn from Scotland to a more advanced stage of society in England. _December 17._--Robertson's _Charles V._, Plato, began book 10. Chalmers. Singing-lesson and practice. Whist. Walked on the Glasgow road, first milestone to fourth and back in 70 minutes--the returning three miles in about 33¾. Ground in some places rather muddy and slippery. _December 26._--A feeble day. Three successive callers and conversation with my father occupied the morning. Read a good allowance of Robertson, an historian _who leads his reader on_, I think, more pleasantly than any I know. The style most attractive, but the mind of the writer does not set forth the loftiest principles. _December 29th, Sunday._--Twenty-four years have I lived.... Where is the _continuous_ work which ought to fill up the life of a Christian without intermission?... I have been growing, that is certain; in good or evil? Much fluctuation; often a supposed progress, terminating in finding myself at, or short of, the point which I deemed I had left behind me. Business and political excitement a tremendous trial, not so much alleviating as forcibly dragging down the soul from that temper which is fit to inhale the air of heaven. _Jan. 8, 1834, Edinburgh._--Breakfast with Dr. Chalmers. Attended his lecture 2-3.... More than ever struck with the superabundance of Dr. C.'s gorgeous language, which leads him into repetitions, until the stores of our tongue be exhausted on each particular point. Yet the variety and magnificence of his expositions must fix them very strongly in the minds of his hearers. In ordinary works great attention would be excited by the very infrequent occurrence of the very brilliant expressions and illustrations with which he cloys the palate. His gems lie like paving stones. He does indeed seem to be an _admirable_ man. Of Edinburgh his knowledge soon became intimate. His father and mother took him to that city, as we have seen, in 1814. He spent a spring there in 1828 just before going to Oxford, and he recollected to the end of his life a sermon of Dr. Andrew Thomson's on the Repentance of Judas, 'a great and striking subject.' Some circumstance or another brought him into relations with Chalmers, that ripened into friendship. 'We used to have walks together,' Mr. Gladstone remembered, 'chiefly out of the town by the Dean Bridge and along the Queensferry road. On one of our walks together, Chalmers took me down to see one of his districts by the water of Leith, and I remember we went into one or more of the cottages. He went in with smiling countenance, greeting and being greeted by the people, and sat down. But he had nothing to say. He was exactly like the Duke of Wellington, who said of himself that he had no small talk. His whole mind was always full of some great subject and he could not deviate from it. He sat smiling among the people, but he had no small talk for them and they had no large talk. So after some time we came away, he pleased to have been with the people, and they proud to have had the Doctor with them.[60] For Chalmers he never lost a warm appreciation, often expressed in admirable words--'one of nature's nobles; his warrior grandeur, his rich and glowing eloquence, his absorbed and absorbing earnestness, above all his singular simplicity and detachment from the world.' Among other memories, 'There was a quaint old shop at the Bowhead which used to interest me very much. It was kept by a bookseller, Mr. Thomas Nelson. I remember being amused by a reply he made to me one day when I went in and asked for Booth's _Reign of Grace_. He half turned his head towards me, and remarked with a peculiar twinkle in his eye, "Ay, man, but ye're a young chiel to be askin' after a book like that."' RELATIONS WITH CHALMERS On his way south in January 1834, Mr. Gladstone stays with relatives at Seaforth, 'where even the wind howling upon the window at night was dear and familiar;' and a few days later finds himself once more within the ever congenial walls of Oxford. _January 19, Sunday._--Read the first lesson in morning chapel. A most masterly sermon of Pusey's preached by Clarke. Lancaster in the afternoon on the Sacrament. Good walk. Wrote [family letters]. Read Whyte. Three of Girdlestone's Sermons. Pickering on adult baptism (some clever and singularly insufficient reasoning). Episcopal pastoral letter for 1832. Doane's Ordination sermon, 1833, admirable,--Wrote some thoughts. _Jan. 20._--Sismondi's _Italian Republics_. Dined at Merton, and spent all the evening there in interesting conversation. I was Hamilton's guest [afterwards Bishop of Salisbury]. It was delightful, it wrings joy even from the most unfeeling heart, to see religion on the increase as it is here. _Jan. 23rd._--Much of to-day, it fell out, spent in conversation of an interesting kind, with Brandreth and Pearson on eternal punishment; with Williams on baptism; with Churton on faith and religion in the university; with Harrison on prophecy and the papacy.... _Jan. 24._--Began _Essay on Saving Faith_, and wrote thereon. _Jan. 29th._--Dined at Oriel. Conversation with Newman chiefly on church matters.... I excuse some idleness to myself by the fear of doing some real injury to my eyes. [After a flight of three or four days to London, he again returns for a Sunday in Oxford.] _Feb. 9._--Two university sermons and St. Peter's. Round the meadows with Williams. Dined with him, common room. Tea and a pleasant conversation with Harrison. Began _Chrysostom de Sacerdotio_, and Cecil's _Friendly Visit_. [Then he goes back to town for the rest of the session.] _Feb. 12, London._--Finished _Friendly Visit_, beautiful little book. Finished Tennyson's poems. Wrote a paper on [Greek: êthikê pistis] in poetry. Recollections of Robert Hall. _13th._--With Doyle, long and solemn conversation on the doctrine of the Trinity.... Began Wardlaw's _Christian Ethics._ _26th, London._--A busy day, yet of little palpable profit.... Read two important Demerara papers.... Rode. At the levee. House 5½ - 11. Wished to speak, but deterred by the extremely ill disposition to hear. Much sickened by their unfairness in the judicial character, more still at my own wretched feebleness and fears. _April 1._--Dined at Sir R. Peel's. Herries, Sir G. Murray, Chantrey, etc. Sir R. Peel very kind in his manner to us. _May 29._--Mignet's _Introduction_ [to 'the History of the Spanish succession,' one of the masterpieces of historical literature]. _June 4._--Bruce to breakfast. Paper. Mignet and analysis. Burke. Harvey committee.[61] Ancient music concert. Dined at Lincoln's Inn. House 11¼-12¾. Rode. _June 6._--_Paradise Lost._ Began Leibnitz's _Tentamina Theodiceæ_. _June 11._--Read Pitt's speeches on the Union in January, 1799, and Grattan on Catholic petition in 1805. _15th._--Read some passages in the latter part of _Corinne_, which always work strongly on me. _18th._--Coming home to dine, found _Remains of A. H. H._ Yesterday a bridal at a friend's, to-day a sad memorial of death. 'Tis a sad subject, a very sad one to me. I have not seen his like. The memory of him reposes gently in my inmost heart, a fountain of tears which soften and fertilise it in the midst of pursuits whose tendency is to dry up the sources of emotion by the fever of excitement. I read his memoir. His father had done me much and undeserved kindness there. _20th._--Most of my time went in thinking confusedly over the university question. Very anxious to speak, tortured with nervous anticipations; could not get an opportunity. Certainly my inward experience on these occasions ought to make me humble. Herbert's maiden speech very successful. I ought to be thankful for my _miss_; perhaps also because my mind was so much oppressed that I could not, I fear, have unfolded my inward convictions. What a world it is, and how does it require the Divine power and aid to clothe in words the profound and mysterious thoughts on those subjects most connected with the human soul--thoughts which the mind does not command as a mistress, but entertains reverentially as honoured guests ... content with only a partial comprehension, hoping to render it a progressive one, but how difficult to define in words a conception, many of whose parts are still in a nascent state with no fixed outline or palpable substance. _July 2._-- ... Guizot. Cousin. Bossuet (_Hist. Univ._). Rode. Committee and House. Curious detail from O'Connell of his interview with Littleton. _10th._--7¼ A.M.-7½ in an open chaise to Coggeshall and back with O'Connell and Sir G. Sinclair, to examine Skingley [a proceeding arising from the Harvey committee], which was done with little success. THE UNIVERSITY QUESTION The conversation of the great Liberator was never wholly forgotten, and it was probably his earliest chance of a glimpse of the Irish point of view at first hand. _July 11._--No news till the afternoon and then heard on very good authority that the Grey government is definitely broken up, and that attempts at reconstruction have failed. Cousin, Sismondi, Education evidence. Letters. House. _21st._--To-day not for the first time felt a great want of courage to express feelings strongly awakened on hearing a speech of O'Connell. To have so strong an impulse and not obey it seems unnatural; it seems like an inflicted dumbness. _28th._--Spoke 30 to 35 minutes on University bill, with more ease than I had hoped, having been more mindful or less unmindful of Divine aid. Divided in 75 v. 164. [To his father next day.] You will see by your _Post_ that I held forth last night on the Universities bill. The House I am glad to say heard me with the utmost kindness, for they had been listening previously to an Indian discussion in which very few people took any interest, though indeed it was both curious and interesting. But the change of subject was no doubt felt as a relief, and their disposition to listen set me infinitely more at my ease than I should otherwise have been. _29th._--Pleasant house dinner at Carlton. Lincoln got up the party. Sir R. Peel was in good spirits and very agreeable. It was on this occasion that he wrote to his mother,--'Sir Robert Peel caused me much gratification by the way in which he spoke to me of my speech, and particularly the great warmth of his manner. He told me he cheered me loudly, and I said in return that I had heard his voice under me while speaking, and was much encouraged thereby.' He ends the note already cited (Sept. 6, 1897) on the old House of Commons, which was burned down this year, with what he calls a curious incident concerning Sir Robert Peel, and with a sentence or two upon the government of Lord Grey:-- Cobbett made a motion alike wordy and absurd, praying the king to remove him [Peel] from the privy council as the author of the act for the re-establishment of the gold standard in 1819. The entire House was against him, except his colleague Fielden of Oldham, who made a second teller.[62] After the division I think Lord Althorp at once rose and moved the expunction of the proceedings from the votes or journals; a severe rebuke to the mover. Sir Robert in his speech said, 'I am at a loss, sir, to conceive what can be the cause of the strong hostility to me which the honourable gentleman exhibits. _I_ never conferred on him an obligation.' This stroke was not original. But what struck me at the time as singular was this, that notwithstanding the state of feeling which I have described, Sir R. Peel was greatly excited in dealing with one who at the time was little more than a contemptible antagonist. At that period shirt collars were made with 'gills' which came up upon the cheek; and Peel's gills were so soaked with perspiration that they actually lay down upon his neck-cloth. In one of these years, I think 1833, a motion was made by some political economist for the abolition of the corn laws. I (an absolute and literal ignoramus) was much struck and staggered with it. But Sir James Graham--who knew more of economic and trade matters, I think, than the rest of the cabinet of 1841 all put together--made a reply in the sense of protection, whether high or low I cannot now say. But I remember perfectly well that this speech of his built me up again for the moment and enabled me (I believe) to vote with the government. A YEAR OF SPLENDID LEGISLATION The year 1833 was, as measured by quantity and in part by quality, a splendid year of legislation. In 1834 the Government and Lord Althorp far beyond all others did themselves high honour by the new Poor Law Act, which rescued the English peasantry from the total loss of their independence. Of the 658 members of Parliament about 480 must have been their general supporters. Much gratitude ought to have been felt for this great administration. But from a variety of causes, at the close of the session 1834 the House of Commons had fallen into a state of cold indifference about it. He was himself destined one day to feel how soon parliamentary reaction may follow a sweeping popular triumph. FOOTNOTES: [54] Sir Henry James's Act (1883). [55] Thuc. i. 84, § 7.--'We should remember that man differs little from man, except that he turns out best who is trained in the sharpest school.' [56] Proposed by Sir R. Inglis and seconded by George Denison, afterwards the militant Archdeacon of Taunton. He was on the committee from 1834 to 1838, and he withdrew from the Club at the end of 1842. [57] Sadler is now not much more than a name, except to students of the history of social reform in England, known to some by a couple of articles of Macaulay's, written in that great man's least worthy and least agreeable style, and by the fact that Macaulay beat him at Leeds in 1832. But he deserves our honourable recollection on the ground mentioned by Mr. Gladstone, as a man of indefatigable and effective zeal in one of the best of causes. [58] _Memoir of Althorp_, p. 471. [59] _Lord George Bentinck_, chapter xviii. p. 324. [60] Report of an interview with Mr. Gladstone in 1890, in _Scottish Liberal_, May 2, 9, etc., 1890. [61] Daniel Whittle Harvey was an eloquent member of parliament whom the benchers of his inn refused to call to the bar, on the ground of certain charges against his probity. The House appointed a committee of which Mr. Gladstone was a member to inquire into these charges. O'Connell was chairman, and they acquitted Harvey, without however affecting the decision of the benchers. Mr. Gladstone was the only member of the committee who did not concur in its final judgment. See his article on Daniel O'Connell in the _Nineteenth Century_, Jan. 1889. [62] See Cobbett's _Life_ by Edward Smith, ii. p. 287. Attwood of Birmingham seems to have voted for the motion. CHAPTER II THE NEW CONSERVATISM AND OFFICE (_1834-1845_) I consider the Reform bill a final and irrevocable settlement of a great constitutional question.... If by adopting the spirit of the Reform bill it be meant that we are to live in a perpetual vortex of agitation; that public men can only support themselves in public estimation by adopting every popular impression of the day, by promising the instant redress of anything that anybody may call an abuse ... I will not undertake to adopt it. But if the spirit of the Reform bill implies merely a careful review of institutions civil and ecclesiastical, undertaken in a friendly temper, the correction of proved abuses and the redress of real grievances, then, etc. etc.--PEEL (_Tamworth Address_). MISCELLANEOUS READING The autumn of 1834 was spent at Fasque. An observant eye followed political affairs, but hardly a word is said about them in the diary. A stiff battle was kept up against electioneering iniquities at Newark. Riding, boating, shooting were Mr. Gladstone's pastimes in the day; billiards, singing, backgammon, and a rubber in the evening. Sport was not without compunction which might well, in an age that counts itself humane, be expected to come oftener. 'Had to kill a wounded partridge,' he records, 'and felt after it as if I had shot the albatross. It might be said: This should be more or less.' And that was true. He was always a great walker. He walked from Montrose, some thirteen or fourteen miles off, in two hours and three quarters, and another time he does six miles in seventy minutes. Nor does he ever walk with an unobserving mind. At Lochnagar: 'Saw Highland women from Strathspey coming down for harvest with heavy loads, some with babies, over these wild rough paths through wind and storm. Ah, with what labour does a large portion of mankind subsist, while we fare sumptuously every day!' This was the ready susceptibility to humane impression in the common circumstance of life, the eye stirring the emotions of the feeling heart, that nourished in him the soul of true oratory, to say nothing of feeding the roots of statesmanship. His bookmindedness is unabated. He began with a resolution to work at least two hours every morning before breakfast, and the resolution seems to have been manfully kept, without prejudice to systematic reading for a good many hours of the day besides. For the first time, rather strange to say, he read St. Augustine's _Confessions_, and with the delight that might have been expected. He finds in that famous composition 'a good deal of prolix and fanciful, though acute speculation, but the practical parts of the book have a wonderful force, and inimitable sweetness and simplicity.' In other departments of religion, he read Archbishop Leighton's life and Hannah More's, Arnold's Sermons and Milner's _Church History_ and Whewells _Bridgewater Treatise_. Once more he analyses the _Novum Organum_ and the _Advancement of Learning_, and he reads or re-reads Locke's _Essay_. He studies political science in the two great manuals of the old world and the new, in the _Politics_ of Aristotle and the _Prince_ of Machiavelli. He goes through three or four plays of Schiller; also Manzoni, and Petrarch, and Dante at the patient rate of a couple of cantos a day; then Boccaccio, from whom, after a half-dozen of the days, he willingly parts company, only interested in him as showing a strange state of manners and how religion can be dissociated from conduct. In modern politics he reads the memoirs of Chatham, and Brougham on Colonial Policy, of which he says that 'eccentricity, paradox, fast and loose reasoning and (much more) sentiment, appear to have entered most deeply into the essence of this remarkable man when he wrote his Colonial Policy, as now; with the rarest power of _expressing_ his thoughts, has he any fixed law to guide them?' On Roscoe's _Leo X._ he remarks how interesting and highly agreeable it is in style, and while disclaiming any right to judge its fidelity and research, makes the odd observation that it has in some degree subdued the leaven of its author's unitarianism. He writes occasional verses, including the completion of 'some stanzas of December 1832 on "The Human Heart," but I am not impudent enough to call them by that name.' In the midst of days well filled by warm home feeling, reasonable pleasure, and vigorous animation of intellect came the summons to action. On November 18, a guest arrived with the astonishing news that ministers were out. The king had dismissed the Melbourne government, partly because he did not believe that Lord John Russell could take the place of Althorp as leader of the Commons, partly because like many cleverer judges he was sick of them, and partly because, as is perhaps the case with more cabinets than the world supposes, the ministers were sick of one another, and King William knew it. Mr. Gladstone in 1875[63] described the dismissal of the whigs in 1834 as the indiscreet proceeding of an honest and well-meaning man, which gave the conservatives a momentary tenure of office without power, but provoked a strong reaction in favour of the liberals, and greatly prolonged the predominance which they were on the point of losing through the play of natural causes.[64] Sir Robert Peel was summoned in hot haste from Rome, and after a journey of twelve days over alpine snows, eight nights out of the twelve in a carriage, on December 9 he reached London, saw the king and kissed hands as first lord of the treasury. Less than two years before, he had said, 'I feel that between me and office there is a wider gulf than there is perhaps between it and any other man in the House.' PROPOSAL OF OFFICE Mr. Gladstone meanwhile at Fasque worked off some of his natural excitement which he notes as invading even Sundays, by the composition of a political tract. The tract has disappeared down the gulf of time. December 11 was his father's seventieth birthday, 'his strength and energy wonderful and giving promise of many more.' Within the week the fated message from the new prime minister arrived; the case is apt to quicken the pulse of even the most serene of politicians, and we may be sure that Mr. Gladstone with the keen vigour of five-and-twenty tingling in his veins was something more or less than serene. _Dec. 17._--Locke, and Russell's _Modern Europe_ in the morning. Went to meet the post, found a letter from Peel desiring to see me, dated 13th. All haste; ready by 4--no place! Reluctantly deferred till the morning. Wrote to Lincoln, Sir R. Peel, etc.... A game of whist. This is a serious call. I got my father's advice to take anything with work and responsibility. _18th._--Off at 7.40 by mail. I find it a privation to be unable to read in a coach. The mind is distracted through the senses, and rambles. Nowhere is it to me so incapable of continuous thought.... Newcastle at 9¼ P.M. _19th._--Same again. At York at 6¼ A.M. to 7. Ran to peep at the minster and bore away a faint twilight image of its grandeur. _20th._--Arrived safe, thank God, and well at the Bull and Mouth 5¾ A.M. Albany soon. To bed for 2¼ hours. Went to Peel about eleven. He writes to his father the same day-- My interview with him was not more than six or eight minutes, but he was _extremely_ kind. He told me his letter to me was among his first; that he was prompted only by his own feelings towards me and some more of that kind; that I might have a seat either at the admiralty or treasury boards, but the latter was that which he intended for me; that I should then be in immediate and confidential communication with himself; and should thereby have more insight into the general concerns of government; that there was a person very anxious for the seat at the treasury, who would go to the admiralty if I did not; but that he meant to go upon the principle of putting every one to the post for which he thought them most fit, so far as he could, and therefore preferred the arrangement he had named. As he distinctly preferred the treasury for me, and assigned such reasons for the preference, it appeared to me that the question was quite settled, and I immediately closed with his offer. I expressed my gratitude for the opinions of me which he had expressed; and said I thought it my duty to mention that the question of my re-election at Newark upon a single vacancy had never been put to my friends, and I asked whether I should consider any part of what he had said as contingent upon the answer I might receive from them. He said no, that he would willingly take that risk. At first, he thought I had suspicions about the Duke of Newcastle, and assured me that he would be much pleased, of which I said I felt quite persuaded. This inquiry, however, served the double purpose of discharging my own duty, and drawing out something about the dissolution. He said to me, 'You will address your constituents upon vacating your seat, and acquaint them of your intention to solicit a renewal of their confidence whenever they are called upon to exercise their franchise, _which I tell you confidentially_,' he added, 'will be very soon.' I would have given a hundred pounds to be then and there in a position to express my hopes and fears! But it is, then, you see _certain_ that we are to have it, and that they will not meet the present parliament. Most bitterly do I lament it. Mr. Gladstone at a later date (July 25, 1835) recorded that he had reason to believe from a conversation with a tory friend who was in many party secrets, that the Duke of Wellington set their candidates in motion all over the country before Sir Robert's return. Active measures, and of course expense, had so generally begun, so much impatience for the dissolution had been excited, and the anticipations had been permitted for so long a time to continue and to spread, as to preclude the possibility of delay.[65] SECOND ELECTION AT NEWARK The appointment of the young member for Newark was noted at the time as an innovation upon a semi-sacred social usage. Sir Robert Inglis said to him, 'You are about the youngest lord who was ever placed at the treasury on his own account, and not because he was his father's son.' The prime minister, no doubt, rejoiced in finding for the public service a young man of this high promise, sprung out of the same class, and bred in the same academic traditions as his own.[66] The youthful minister's path was happily smoothed at Newark. This time blues and reds called a grand truce, divided the honours, and returned Mr. Gladstone and Sergeant Wilde without a contest. The question that excited most interest in the canvass was the new poor law. Mr. Gladstone gave the fallen ministers full credit for their measure. Most of their bills, he said, were projected from a mere craving for popularity, but in the case of the poor law they acted in defiance of the public press and many of their own friends. On the other hand, he defended the new government as the government of a truly reforming party, pointing to the commercial changes made by Lord Liverpool's administration, to the corporation and test Acts, and to catholic emancipation. Who could deny that these were changes of magnitude settled in peaceful times by a parliament unreformed? Who could deny that Sir Robert Peel had long been a practical reformer of the law, and that the Duke of Wellington had carried out great retrenchments? Let them then rally round throne and altar, and resist the wild measures of the destructives. The red hero was drawn through the town by six greys, with postilions in silk jackets, amid the music of bands, the clash of bells, and the cheers of the crowd. When the red procession met the blue, mutual congratulations took the place of the old insult and defiance, and at five o'clock each party sat down to its own feast. The reds drank toasts of a spirited, loyal, and constitutional character, many admirable speeches were made which the chronicler regrets that his limits will not allow him to report,--regrets unshared by us,--and soon after eleven Mr. Gladstone escaped. After a day at Clumber, he was speedily on his way to London. 'Off at 10½ P.M. Missed the High Flyer at Tuxford, broke down in my chaise on the way to Newark; no injury, thanks to God. Remained 2½ hours alone; overtaken by the Wellington at 3½ A.M. Arrived in London (Jan. 8) before 8 P.M. Good travelling.' On reckoning up his movements he finds that, though not at all fond of travelling for the sake of going from place to place, he has had in 1834 quite 2400 miles of it. Before the dissolution, Sir H. Hardinge had told him that the conservatives would not be over 340 nor under 300, but by the middle of the month things looked less prosperous. The reaction against the whigs had not yet reached full flood, the royal dismissal of the administration was unpopular, moderate people more especially in Scotland could not stand a government where the Duke of Wellington, the symbol of a benighted and stubborn toryism, was seen over Peel's shoulder. 'At present,' Mr. Gladstone writes, 'the case is, even in my view, hopeful; in that of most here it is more. And certainly, to have this very privilege of entertaining a deliberate and reasonable hope, to think that notwithstanding the ten pound clause, a moderate parliament may be returned; in fine, to believe that we have now _some_ prospect of surviving the Reform bill without a bloody revolution, is to me as surprising as delightful; it seems to me the greatest and most providential mercy with which a nation was ever visited.... To-day I am going to dine with the lord chancellor [Lyndhurst], having received a card to that effect last night.' It was at this dinner that Mr. Gladstone had his first opportunity of making a remarkable acquaintance. In his diary he mentions as present three of the judges, the flower of the bench, as he supposes, but he says not a word of the man of the strangest destiny there, the author of _Vivian Grey_. Disraeli himself, in a letter to his sister, names 'young Gladstone,' and others, but condemns the feast as rather dull, and declares that a swan very white and tender, and stuffed with truffles, was the best company at the table. What Mr. Gladstone carried away in his memory was a sage lesson of Lyndhurst's, by which the two men of genius at his table were in time to show themselves extremely competent to profit,--'Never defend yourself before a popular assemblage, except with and by retorting the attack; the hearers, in the pleasure which the assault gives them, will forget the previous charge.' As Disraeli himself put it afterwards, _Never complain and never explain._ II CHANGE OF OFFICE One afternoon, a few days later, while he was grappling at the treasury with a file of papers on the mysteries of superannuation, Mr. Gladstone was again summoned by the prime minister, and again (Jan. 26) he writes to his father:-- I have had an important interview with Sir R. Peel, the result of which is that I am to be under-secretary for the colonies. I will give you a hurried and imperfect sketch of the conversation. He began by saying he was about to make a great sacrifice both of his own feelings and convenience, but that what he had to say he hoped would be gratifying to me, as a mark of his confidence and regard. 'I am going to propose to you, Gladstone, that you should be, for you know Wortley has lost his election, under-secretary of state for the colonies, and I give you my word that I do not know six offices which are at this moment of greater importance than that to which is attached the representation of the colonial department in the House of Commons, at a period when so many questions of importance are in agitation.' I expressed as well as I could, and indeed it was but ill, my unfeigned and deep sense of his kindness, my hesitation to form any opinion of my own competency for the office, and at the same time my general desire not to shrink from any responsibility which he might think proper to lay upon me. He said that was the right and manly view to take.... He adverted to my connection with the West Indies as likely to give satisfaction to persons dependent on those colonies, and thought that others would not be displeased. In short, I cannot go through it all, but I can only say that if I had always heard of him that he was the warmest and freest person of all living in the expression of his feelings, such description would have been fully borne out by his demeanour to me. When I came away he took my hand and said, '_Well, God bless you, wherever you are._' From Sir Robert the new under-secretary made his way, in fear and trembling, to his new chief, Lord Aberdeen. Distinction of itself naturally and properly rather alarms the young. I had heard of his high character; but I had also heard of him as a man of cold manners, and close and even haughty reserve. It was dark when I entered his room, so that I saw his figure rather than his countenance. I do not recollect the matter of the conversation, but I well remember that, before I had been three minutes with him, all my apprehensions had melted away like snow in the sun. I came away from that interview conscious indeed of his dignity, but of a dignity so tempered by a peculiar purity and gentleness, and so associated with impressions of his kindness and even friendship, that I believe I thought more about the wonder of his being at that time so misunderstood by the outer world, than about the new duties and responsibilities of my office.[67] Time only deepened these impressions. It is not hard for a great party chief to win the affection and regard of his junior colleague, and where good fortune has brought together a congenial pair, no friendship outside the home can be more valuable, more delightful, alike to veteran and to tiro. Of all the host of famous or considerable men with whom he was to come into official and other relations, none ever, as we shall see, held the peculiar place in Mr. Gladstone's esteem and reverence of the two statesmen under whose auspices he now first entered the enchanted circle of public office. The promotion was a remarkable stride. He was only five-and-twenty, his parliamentary existence had barely covered two years, and he was wholly without powerful family connection. 'You are aware,' Peel wrote to John Gladstone, 'of the sacrifice I have made of personal feeling to public duty, in placing your son in one of the most important offices--that of representative of the colonial department in the House of Commons, and thus relinquishing his valuable aid in my own immediate department. Wherever he may be placed, he is sure to distinguish himself.'[68] III POSITION OF GOVERNMENT Mr. Gladstone's first spell of office was little more than momentary. The liberal majority, as has so often happened, was composite, but Peel can hardly have supposed that the sections of which it was made up would fail to coalesce, and coalesce pretty soon, for the irresistible object of ejecting ministers who were liked by none of them, and through whose repulse they could strike an avenging blow against the king. Ardent subalterns like Mr. Gladstone took more vehement views. The majority at once beat the government (supported by the group of Stanleyites, fifty-three strong) in the contest for the Speaker's chair. Other repulses followed. 'The division,' writes Mr. Gladstone to his father, with the honourable warmth of the young party man, 'I need not say was a disappointment to me; but it must have been much more so to those who have ever thought well of the parliament. Our party mustered splendidly. Some few, but very, very few, of the others appear to have kept away through a sense of decency; they had not virtue enough to vote for the man whom they knew to be incomparably the best, and against whom they had no charge to bring. No more shameful act I think has been done by a British House of Commons.' Not many days after fervently deprecating a general resignation, an ill-omened purpose of this very course actually flitted across the mind of the young under-secretary himself. A scheme was on the anvil for the education of the blacks in the West Indies, and a sudden apprehension startled Mr. Gladstone, that his chief might devote public funds to all varieties of denominational religious teaching. Any plan of that kind would be utterly opposed to what with him, as we shall soon discover, was then a fundamental principle of national polity. Happily the fatal leap was not needed, but if either small men like the government whips, or great men like Peel and Aberdeen, could have known what was passing, they would have shaken grave heads over this spirit of unseasonable scruple at the very start of the race in a brilliant man with all his life before him. _Feb. 4 or 5._--Charles Canning told me Peel had offered him the vacant lordship of the treasury, through his mother. They were, he said, very much gratified with the manner in which it had been done, though the offer was declined, upon the ground stated in the reply, that though he did not anticipate any discrepancy in political sentiments to separate him from the present government, yet he should prefer in some sense deserving an official station by parliamentary conduct.... Peel's letter was written at some length, very friendly, without any statesmanlike reserve or sensitive attention to nicety of style. In the last paragraph it spoke with amiable embarrassment of Mr. Canning; stating that his 'respect, regard, and admiration' (I think even), apparently interrupted by circumstances, continued fresh and vivid, and that those very circumstances made him more desirous of thus publicly testifying his real sentiments. _March 30._--Wished to speak on Irish church. No opportunity. Wrote on it. A noble-minded speech from Sir J. Graham. _March 31._--Spoke on the Irish church--under forty minutes. I cannot help here recording that this matter of speaking is really my strongest religious exercise. On all occasions, and to-day especially, was forced upon me the humiliating sense of my inability to exercise my reason in the face of the H. of C., and of the necessity of my utterly failing, unless God gave me the strength and language. It was after all a poor performance, but would have been poorer had He never been in my thoughts as a present and powerful aid. But this is what I am as yet totally incompetent to effect--to realise, in speaking, anything, however small, which at all satisfies my mind. Debating seems to me less difficult, though unattained. But to hold in serene contemplative action the mental faculties in the turbid excitement of debate, so as to see truth clearly and set it forth such as it is, this I cannot attain to. As regards my speech in the Irish church debate, he tells his father (April 2), it was received by the House, and has been estimated, in a manner extremely gratifying to me. As regards satisfaction to myself in the manner of its execution, I cannot say so much. Backed by a numerous and warm-hearted party, and strong in the consciousness of a good cause, I did not find it difficult to grapple with the more popular parts of the question; but I fell miserably short of my desires in touching upon the principles which the discussion involved, and I am sure that it must be long before I am enabled in any reasonable sense to be a speaker according even to the conception which I have formed in my own mind. A few days later, he received the congratulations of a royal personage:-- In the evening, dining at Lord Salisbury's, I was introduced to the Duke of Cumberland, who was pleased to express himself favourably of my speech. He is fond of conversation, and the common reputation which he bears of including in his conversation many oaths, appears to be but too true. Yet he said he had made a point of sending his son to George the Fourth's funeral, thinking it an excellent advantage for a boy to receive the impression which such a scene was calculated to convey. The duke made many acute remarks, and was, I should say, most remarkably unaffected and kind. These are fine social qualities for a prince, though, of course, not the most important--'My dear Sir,' and thumps on the shoulder after a ten minutes' acquaintance. He spoke broadly and freely--much on the disappearance of the bishops' wigs, which he said had done more harm to the church than anything else! MINISTERS DEFEATED On the same night the catastrophe happened. After a protracted and complex struggle Lord John Russell's proposal for the appropriation of the surplus revenues of the Irish church was carried against ministers. The following day Peel announced his resignation. Though his official work had been unimportant, Mr. Gladstone had left an excellent impression behind him among the permanent men. When he first appeared in the office, Henry Taylor said, 'I rather like Gladstone, but he is said to have more of the devil in him than appears.' A few weeks were enough to show him that 'Gladstone was far the most considerable of the rising generation, having besides his abilities an excellent disposition and great strength of character.' James Stephen thought well of him, but doubted if he had pugnacity enough for public life. A few days later Mr. Gladstone dined with an official party at the fallen minister's:-- Sir R. Peel made a very nice speech on Lincoln's proposing and our drinking his health. The following is a slight and bad sketch:--'I really can hardly call you gentlemen alone. I would rather address you as my warm and attached friends in whom I have the fullest confidence, and with whom it has afforded me the greatest satisfaction to be associated during the struggle which has just been brought to a close. In undertaking the government, from the first I have never expected to succeed; still it was my conviction that good might be done, and I trust that good has been effected. I believe we have shown that even if a conservative government be not strong enough to carry on the public affairs of this country, at least we are so strong that we ought to be able to prevent any other government from doing any serious mischief to its institutions. We meet now as we met at the beginning of the session, then perhaps in somewhat finer dresses, but not, I am sure, with kindlier feelings towards each other.' The rest of the session Mr. Gladstone passed in his usual pursuits, reading all sorts of books, from the correspondence of Leibnitz with Bossuet, and Alexander Knox's _Remains_, down to Rousseau's _Confessions_. As to the last of these he scarcely knew whether to read on or to throw it aside, and, in fact, he seems only to have persevered with that strange romance of a wandering soul for a day or two. Besides promiscuous reading, he performed some scribbling, including a sonnet, recorded in his diary with notes of wondering exclamation. His family were in London for most of May, his mother in bad health; no other engagement ever interrupted his sedulous attendance on her every day, reading the Bible to her, and telling the news about levees and drawing-rooms, a great dinner at Sir Robert Peel's, and all the rest of his business and recreations. In the House he did little between the fall of the ministry and the close of the session. He once wished to speak, but was shut out by the length of other speeches. 'So,' he moralises, 'I had two useful lessons instead of one. For the sense of helplessness which always possesses me in prospect of a speech is one very useful lesson; and being disappointed after having attained some due state of excitement and anticipation is another.' SPEECH AT NEWARK In June at a feast at Newark, which, terrible to relate, lasted from four o'clock to eleven, Mr. Gladstone gave them nearly an hour, not to mention divers minor speeches. His father 'expressed himself with beautiful and affectionate truth of feeling, and the party sympathised.' His own speech deserves to be noted as indicating the political geography for three or four years to come. The standing dish of the tory opposition of the period was highly-spiced reproach of the ministers for living on the support of O'Connell, and Newark was regaled with an ample meal. Mr. Gladstone would not enter into a detail of the exploits, character, political opinions of that Irish gentleman; he would rather say what he thought of him in his presence than in his absence, because he could unfortunately say nothing of him but what was bad. 'This is not the first period in English history,' Mr. Gladstone noted down at that time, 'in which a government has leaned on the Roman catholic interest in Ireland for support. Under the administration of Strafford and at the time of the Scotch revolt, Charles I. was enthusiastically supported by the recusants of the sister isle, and what was the effect? The religious sympathies of the people were touched then and they were so now with the same consequence, in the gradual decline of the party to whom the suspicion attaches in popular fervour and estimation.' Half a century later he may have recalled this early fruit of historic observation. Meanwhile, in his Newark speech, he denounced the government for seeking to undo the mischief of the Irish alliance by systematic agitation. But it was upon the church question, far deeper and more vital than municipal corporations, that the fate of the government should be decided. Then followed a vindication of the church in Ireland. 'The protestant faith is held good for us, and _what is good for us is also good for the population of Ireland_.' That most disastrous of all our false commonplaces was received at Newark, as it has been received so many hundreds of times ever since all over England, with loud and long-continued cheering, to be invariably followed in after act and event with loud and long-continued groaning.[69] Four years later Mr. Gladstone heard words from Lord John Russell on this point, that began to change his mind. 'Often do I think,' he wrote to Lord Russell in 1870, 'of a saying of yours more than thirty years back which struck me ineffaceably at the time. You said: "The true key to our Irish debates was this: that it was not properly borne in mind that as England is inhabited by Englishmen, and Scotland by Scotchmen, so Ireland is inhabited by Irishmen."'[70] FOOTNOTES: [63] _Gleanings_, i. p. 38. [64] In another place he describes it as an action done 'with no sort of reason' (_Ib._ p. 78). But the Melbourne papers, published in 1890, pp. 219-221 and 225, indicate that Melbourne had spontaneously given the king good reasons for cashiering him and his colleagues. [65] Lord Palmerston doubted (Nov. 25, 1834) whether Peel would dissolve. 'I think his own bias will rather be to abide by the decision of this House of Commons, and try to propitiate it by great professions of reform. The effect of a dissolution must be injurious to the principles that he professes.... But he may be overborne by the violent people of his own party whom he will not be able to control.' Ashley's _Life of Palmerston_ (1879), i. p. 313. [66] Greville, on the other hand, grumbled at Peel, for taking high birth and connections as substitutes for other qualities, because he made Sidney Herbert secretary at the board of control, instead of making him a lord of the treasury, and sending 'Gladstone, who is a very clever man,' to the other and more responsible post. [67] Lord Stanmore's _Earl of Aberdeen_ (1893), p. iii. [68] Parker's _Peel_, ii. p. 267. [69] O'Connell paid Newark a short visit in 1836--spoke against Mr. Gladstone for an hour in the open air, and then left the town, both he and it much as they had been before his arrival. [70] Walpole, _Life of Lord John Russell_, ii. p. 455. CHAPTER III PROGRESS IN PUBLIC LIFE (_1835-1838_) Les hommes en tout ne s'éclairent que par le tâtonnement de l'expérience. Les plus grands génies sont eux-mêmes entraînés par leur siècle.--TURGOT. Men are only enlightened by feeling their way through experience. The greatest geniuses are themselves drawn along by their age. In September (1835), after long suffering, his mother died amid tender care and mournful regrets. Her youngest son was a devoted nurse; her loss struck him keenly, but with a sense full of the consolations of his faith. To Gaskell he writes: 'How deeply and thoroughly her character was imbued with love; with what strong and searching processes of bodily affliction she was assimilated in mind and heart to her Redeemer; how above all other things she sighed for the advancement of His kingdom on earth; how few mortals suffered more pain, or more faithfully recognised it as one of the instruments by which God is pleased to forward that restoring process for which we are placed on earth.' Then the world resumed its course for him, and things fell into their wonted ways of indefatigable study. His scheme for week-days included Blackstone, Mackintosh, Aristotle's _Politics_--'a book of immense value for all governors and public men'--Dante's _Purgatorio_, Spanish grammar, Tocqueville, Fox's _James II._, by which he was disappointed, not seeing such an acuteness in extracting and exhibiting the principles that govern from beneath the actions of men and parties, nor such a grasp of generalisation, nor such a faculty of separating minute from material particulars, nor such an abstraction from a debater's modes of thought and forms of expression, as he should have hoped. To these he added as he went along the _Génie du Christianisme_, Bolingbroke, Bacon's _Essays_, _Don Quixote_, the _Annals_ of Tacitus, Le Bas' _Life of Laud_ ('somewhat too Laudish, though right _au fond_'; unlike Lawson's _Laud_, 'a most intemperate book, the foam swallows up all the facts'), _Childe Harold_, _Jerusalem Delivered_ ('beautiful in its kind, but how can its author be placed in the same category of genius as Dante?'), Pollok's _Course of Time_ ('much talent, little culture, insufficient power to digest and construct his subject or his versification; his politics radical, his religious sentiments generally sound, though perhaps hard'). In the evenings he read aloud to his father the _Faery Queen_ and Shakespeare. On Sundays he read Chillingworth and Jewel, and, above all, he dug and delved in St. Augustine. He drew a sketch of a project touching Peculiarities in Religion. For several days he was writing something on politics. Then an outline or an essay on our colonial system. For he was no reader of the lounging, sauntering, passively receptive species; he went forward in a sedulous process of import and export, a mind actively at work on all the topics that passed before it. At the beginning of the year 1836 he was invited to pay a visit to Drayton, where he found only Lord Harrowby--a link with the great men of an earlier generation, for he had acted as Pitt's second in the duel with Tierney, and had been foreign secretary in Pitt's administration of 1804; might have been prime minister in 1827 if he had liked; and he headed the Waverers who secured the passing of the Reform bill by the Lords. Other guests followed, the host rather contracting in freedom of conversation as the party expanded.[71] VISIT TO DRAYTON I cannot record anything continuous, Mr. Gladstone writes in his memorandum of the visit, but commit to paper several opinions and expressions of Sir R. Peel, which bore upon interesting and practical questions. That Fox was not a man of settled, reasoned, political principle. Lord Harrowby added that he was thrown into opposition and whiggism by the insult of Lord North. That his own doctrines, both as originally declared, and as resumed when finally in office, were of a highly toned spirit of government. That Brougham was the most _powerful_ man he had ever known in the H. of C.; that no one had ever fallen so fast and so far. That the political difficulties of England might be susceptible of cure, and were not appalling; but that the state of Ireland was to all appearance hopeless. That there the great difficulty lay in procuring the ordinary administration of justice; that the very institution of juries supposed a common interest of the juror and the state, a condition not fulfilled in the present instance; that it was quite unfit for the present state of society in Ireland. Lord Harrowby thought that a strong conservative government might still quell agitation. And Sir B. Peel said Stanley had told him that the whig government were on the point of succeeding in putting a stop to the resistance to payment of tithe, when Lord Althorp, alarmed at the expense already incurred, wrote to stop its collection by the military. We should probably live to see the independence of Poland established. The Duke of Wellington and others arrived later in the day. It was pleasing to see the deference with which he was received as he entered the library; at the sound of his name everybody rose; he is addressed by all with a respectful manner. He met Peel most cordially, and seized both Lady Peel's hands. I now recollect that it was with _glee_ Sir R. Peel said to me on Monday, 'I am glad to say you will meet the duke here,' which had reference, I doubt not, partly to the anticipated pleasure of seeing him, partly to the dissipation of unworthy suspicions. He reported that government are still labouring at a church measure without appropriation. _Jan. 20._--The Duke of Wellington appears to speak little; and never for speaking's sake, but only to convey an idea, commonly worth conveying. He receives remarks made to him very frequently with no more than 'Ha,' a convenient, suspensive expression, which acknowledges the arrival of the observation and no more. Of the two days which he spent here he hunted on Thursday, shot on Friday, and to-day travelled to Strathfieldsay, more, I believe, than 100 miles, to entertain a party of friends to dinner. With this bodily exertion he mixes at 66 or 67 a constant attention to business. Sir R. Peel mentioned to me to-night a very remarkable example of his [the duke's] perhaps excessive precision. Whenever he signs a draft on Coutts's, he addresses to them at the same time a note apprising them that he has done so. This perfect facility of transition from one class of occupation to their opposites, and their habitual intermixture without any apparent encroachments on either side, is, I think, a very remarkable evidence of self-command, and a mental power of singular utility. Sir Robert is also, I conceive, a thrifty dealer with his time, but in a man of his age [Peel now 48] this is less beyond expectation. He said good-bye on the last night with regret. In the midst of the great company he found time to read Bossuet on Variations, remarking rather oddly, 'some of Bossuet's theology seems to me very good.' MIXED AVOCATIONS On Jan. 30th is the entry of his journey from Liverpool, '1 to 4 to Hawarden Castle.' [I suppose his first visit to his future home.] Got to Chester (Feb. 1) five minutes after the mail had started. Got on by Albion. Outside all night; frost; rain; arrived at Albany 11¾. _Feb. 4th._--Session opens. Voted in 243-284. A good opportunity for speaking, but in my weakness did not use it. _Feb. 8th._--Stanley made a noble speech. Voted in 243 to 307 for abolition of Irish corporations. Pendulums and Nothingarians all against us. _Sunday._--Wrote on Hypocrisy. On Worship. Attempted to explain this to the servants at night. Newman's Sermons and J. Taylor. Trench's Poems. _March 2nd._--Read to my deep sorrow of Anstice's death on Monday. His friends, his young widow, the world can spare him ill; so says at least the flesh. Stapleton. _Paradiso_, VII. VIII. Calls. Rode. Wrote. Dined at Lord Ashbuxton's. House. Statistical Society's _Proceedings._ Verses on Anstice's death. _March 22nd._--House 5¼-9¾. Spoke 50 minutes [on negro apprenticeship; see p. 145]; kindly heard, and I should thank God for being made able to speak even thus indifferently.[72] _March 23rd_.... Late, having been awake last night till between 4 and 5, as usual after speaking. How useful to make us feel the habitual unremembered blessing of sound sleep.... _April 7th._--_Gerus. Lib._ c. xi.... Dr. Pusey here from 12 to 3 about church building. Rode. At night 11 to 2 perusing Henry Taylor's proofs of _The Statesman_, and writing notes on it, presumptuous enough.... _Gerus._ xii. Re-perused Taylor's sheets. A batch of calls. Wrote letters. Bossuet. Dined at Henry Taylor's, a keen intellectual exercise, and thus a place of danger, especially as it is exercise seen.... _9th._--Spedding at breakfast. _Gerus._ xiii. Finished Locke on Understanding. It appears to me on the whole a much overrated, though, in some respects, a very useful book.... _May 16th._--Mr. Wordsworth, H. Taylor, and Doyle to breakfast. Sat till 12¾. Conversation on Shelley, Trench, Tennyson; travelling, copyright, etc. _30th._--Milnes, Blakesley, Taylor, Cole, to breakfast. Church meeting at Archbishop of Armagh's. Ancient music rehearsal. House 6-8¼ and 9¼-12. _June 1st._--Read Wordsworth.... House 5-12. Spoke about 45 minutes [on Tithes and Church (Ireland) bill]. I had this pleasure in my speech, that I never rose more intent upon telling what I believe to be royal truth; though I did it very ill, and further than ever below the idea which I would nevertheless hold before my mind. _3rd._--West Indies Committee 1-4. Finished writing out my speech and sent it. Read Wordsworth.... Saw Sir R. Peel. Dined at Sergeant Talfourd's to meet Wordsworth.... _5th._--St. James's, Communion. Dined at Lincoln's Inn. St. Sepulchre's. Wrote. Jer. Taylor, Newman. Began Nicole's _Préjugés_. Arnold aloud. _8th._--Wordsworth, since he has been in town, has breakfasted twice and dined once with me. Intercourse with him is, upon the whole, extremely pleasing. I was sorry to hear Sydney Smith say that he did not see very much in him, nor greatly admire his poems. He even adverted to the London Sonnet as ridiculous. Sheil thought this of the line: 'Dear God! the very houses seem asleep.' I ventured to call his attention to that which followed as carrying out the idea: 'And all that mighty heart is lying still.' Of which I may say _omne tulit punctum_. Wordsworth came in to breakfast the other day before his time. I asked him to excuse me while I had my servant to prayers; but he expressed a _hearty_ wish to be present, which was delightful. He has laboured long; if for himself, yet more for men, and over all I trust for God. Will he ever be the bearer of evil thoughts to any mind? Glory is gathering round his later years on earth, and his later works especially indicate the spiritual ripening of his noble soul. I heard but few of his opinions; but these are some He was charmed with Trench's poems; liked Alford; thought Shelley had the greatest native powers in poetry of all the men of this age. In reading _Die Braut von Korinth_ translated, was more horrified than enchained, or rather altogether the first. Wondered how any one could translate it or the Faust, but spoke as knowing the original. Thought little of Murillo as to the mind of painting; said he could not have painted Paul Veronese's 'Marriage of Cana.' Considered that old age in great measure disqualified him by its rigid fixity of habits from judging of the works of young poets--I must say that he was here even over liberal in self-depreciation. He defended the make of the steamboat as more poetical than otherwise to the eye (see Sonnets).[73] Thought Coleridge admired Ossian only in youth, and himself admired the spirit which Macpherson _professes_ to embody. Sergeant Talfourd dined here to meet Wordsworth yesterday. Wordsworth is vehement against Byron. Saw in Shelley the lowest form of irreligion, but a later progress towards better things. Named the discrepancy between his creed and his imagination as the marring idea of his works, in which description I could not concur. Spoke of the _entire_ revolution in his own poetical taste. We were agreed that a man's personal character ought to be the basis of his politics. He quoted his sonnet on the contested election [what sonnet is this?], from which I ventured to differ as regards its assuming nutriment for the heart to be inherent in politics. He described to me his views; that the Reform Act had, as it were, brought out too prominently a particular muscle of the national frame: the strength of the towns; that the cure was to be found in a large further enfranchisement, I fancy, of the country chiefly; that you would thus extend the base of your pyramid and so give it strength. He wished the old institutions of the country preserved, and thought this the way to preserve them. He thought the political franchise upon the whole a good to the mass--regard being had to the state of human nature; against me. _11th._--Read Browning's _Paracelsus_. Went to Richmond to dine with the Gaskells. A two hours' walk home at night. _16th._--Wrote two sonnets. Finished and wrote out _Brant von Korinth_. Shall I ever dare to make out a counterpart? _21st._--Breakfast at Mr. Hallam's to meet Mr. Wordsworth and Mr. Rogers. Wordsworth spoke much and justly about copyright. Conversation with Talfourd in the evening, partly about that subject. Began something on egotism. _24th._--Breakfast with Mr. Rogers, Mr. Wordsworth only there. Very agreeable. Rogers produced an American poem, the death of Bozzaris, which Wordsworth proposed that I should read to them: of course I declined, so even did Rogers. But Wordsworth read it through in good taste, and doing it justice. _Fasque_ in time for Aug. 12; out on the hill, but unlucky with a sprained ankle, and obliged to give up early. _Aug. 15th._--Wrote (long) to Dr. Chalmers. Orator. _Sept. 20th._--Milner, finished Vol. ii. Cic. _Acad._ Wraxall. Began Goethe's _Iphigenie_. Wrote. _Oct. 7th._--Milner. Wraxall. A dinner-party. Wrote out a sketch for an essay on Justification. Singing, whist, shooting. Copied a paper for my father. _12th._--A day on the hill for roe. 14 guns. [To Liverpool for public dinner at the Amphitheatre.] _18th._--Most kindly heard. Canning's début everything that could be desired. I thought I spoke 35 minutes, but afterwards found it was 55. Read _Marco Visconti_. _21st._--Operative dinner at Amphitheatre. Spoke perhaps 16 or 18 minutes. _28th._--_Haddo_ [Lord Aberdeen's]. Finished _Marco Visconti_, a long bout, but I could not let it go. Buckland's opening chapters. _On the whole_ satisfactory. _30th._--Lord Aberdeen read prayers in the evening with simple and earnest pathos. _Nov. 10th._--_Wilhehm Meister_, Book i., and there I mean to leave it, unless I hear a better report of the succeeding one than I could make of the first. Next day, recommenced with great anticipations of delight the _Divina Commedia_. _13th._--Finished Nicole _De l'Unité_. August. _De Civ._ [Every day at this time.] _19th._--Began Cicero's _Tusculan Questions_.... _25th._--Aug. _Civ. Dei._ I am now in Book xiv. Cic. _Tusc._ finished. Book ii. _Purgatorio_, iii.-v. A dose of whist. Still snow and rain. _26th._--Aug. Cicero. Billiards. _Purgatorio_, vi.-viii. Began Dryden's _Fables._ My eyes are not in their best plight, and I am obliged to consider type a little. _Jan. 3rd_, 1837.--Breakfasted with Dr. Chalmers. How kind my father is in small matters as well as great--thoughtfully sending carriage. _13th, Glasgow._--The pavilion astonishing, and the whole effect very grand. Near 3500. Sir E. Peel spoke 1 h. 55 m. Explicit and bold; it was a very great effort. I kept within 15 min.--quite long enough. _14th._--7½-5½ mail to Carlisle. On all night, _15th._ Wetherby at 7½. Leeds 10½. Church there. Walked over to Wakefield. Church there. Evening at Thornes. [Milnes Gaskell's.] _17th._--To Newark. Very good meeting. Spoke ¾ hour. In this speech, after the regulation denunciation of the reckless wickedness of O'Connell, he set about demonstrating the change that had taken place in the character of public feeling during the last few years. He pointed out that at the dissolution of 1831 the conservative members of the House of Commons amounted perhaps to 50. In 1835 they saw this small dispirited band grow into a resolute and formidable phalanx of 300. The cry was: 'Resolute attachment to the institutions of the country.' One passage in the speech is of interest in the history of his attitude on toleration. Sir William Moles worth had been invited to come forward as candidate for the representation of Leeds. A report spread that Sir William was not a believer in the Christian articles of faith. Somebody wrote to Molesworth, to know if this was true. He answered, that the question whether he was a believer in the Christian religion was one that no man of liberal principles ought to propose to another, or could propose without being guilty of a dereliction of duty. On this incident, Mr. Gladstone said that he would ask, 'Is it not a time for serious reflection among moderate and candid men of all parties, when such a question was actually thought impertinent interference? Surely they would say with him, that men who have no belief in the divine revelation are not the men to govern this nation, be they whigs or radicals.' Long, extraordinary, and not inglorious, was the ascent from such a position as this, to the principles so nobly vindicated in the speech on the Affirmation bill in 1883. PARTY COUNCILS At the end of January he is back in London, arranging books and papers and making a little daylight in his chaos. 'What useful advice might a man who has been _buon pezzo_ in parliament give to one going into it, on this mechanical portion of his business.' The entries for 1837 are none of them especially interesting. Every day in the midst of full parliamentary work, social engagements, and public duties outside of the House of Commons, he was elaborating the treatise on the relations of church and state, of which we shall see more in our following chapter. At the beginning of the session he went to a dinner at Peel's, at which Lord Stanley and some of his friends were present--a circumstance noted as a sign of the impending fusion between the whig seceders of 1834 and the conservative party. Sir Robert seems to have gone on extending his confidence in him. I visited Sir Robert Peel (March 4th) about the Canada question, and again by appointment on the 6th, with Lord Aberdeen. On the former day he said, 'Is there anyone else to invite?' I suggested Lord Stanley. He said, perhaps he might be inclined to take a separate view. But in the interval he had apparently thought otherwise. For on Monday he read to Lord Aberdeen and myself a letter from Stanley written with the utmost frankness and in a tone of political intimacy, saying that an engagement as chairman of a committee at the House would prevent his meeting us. The business of the day was discussed in conversation, and it was agreed to be quite impossible to support the resolution on the legislative council in its existing terms, without at least a protest. Peel made the following remark: 'You have got another Ireland growing up in every colony you possess.' A week later he was shocked by the death of Lady Canning. 'Breakfast with Gaskell' (March 23rd), 'and thence to Lady Canning's funeral in Westminster Abbey. We were but eleven in attendance. Her coffin was laid on that of her illustrious husband. Canning showed a deep but manly sorrow. May we live as by the side of a grave and looking in.' In the same month he spoke on Canada (March 8th) 'with insufficient possession of the subject,' and a week later on church rates, for an hour or more, 'with more success than the matter or manner deserved.' He finished his translation of the _Bride of Corinth_, and the episode of Ugolino from Dante, and read Eckermann's _Conversations with Goethe_, to which he gives the too commonplace praise of being very interesting. He learned Manzoni's noble ode on the death of Napoleon, of which he by-and-by made a noble translation; this by way of sparing his eyes, and Italian poetry not taking him nearly half the time of any other to commit to memory. He found a 'beautiful and powerful production' in Channing's letter to Clay, and he made the acquaintance of Southey, 'in appearance benignant, melancholy, and intellectual.' II THE GENERAL ELECTION OF 1837 In June King William IV. died, 'leaving a perilous legacy to his successor.' A month later (July 14) Mr. Gladstone went up with the Oxford address, and this was, I suppose, the first occasion on which he was called to present himself before the Queen, with whose long reign his own future career and fame were destined to be so closely and so conspicuously associated. According to the old law prescribing a dissolution of parliament within six months of the demise of the crown, Mr. Gladstone was soon in the thick of a general election. By July 17th he was at Newark, canvassing, speaking, hand-shaking, and in lucid intervals reading Filicaja. He found a very strong, angry, and general sentiment, not against the principle of the poor law as regards the able-bodied, but against the regulations for separating man and wife, and sending the old compulsorily to the workhouse, with others of a like nature. With the disapprobation on these heads he in great part concurred. There was to be no contest, but arrangements of this kind still leave room for some anxiety, and in Mr. Gladstone's case a singular thing happened. Two days after his arrival at Newark he was followed by a body of gentlemen from Manchester, with an earnest invitation that he would be a candidate for that great town. He declined the invitation, absolutely as he supposed, but the Manchester tories nominated him notwithstanding. They assured the electors that he was the most promising young statesman of the day. The whigs on the other hand vowed that he was an insulter of dissent, a bigot of such dark hue as to wish to subject even the poor negroes of his father's estates to the slavery of a dominant church, a man who owed whatever wealth and consequence his family possessed to the crime of holding his fellow-creatures in bondage, a man who, though honest and consistent, was a member of that small ultra-tory minority which followed the Duke of Cumberland. When the votes were counted, Mr. Gladstone was at the bottom of the poll, with a majority of many hundreds against him.[74] Meantime he was already member for Newark. His own election was no sooner over than he caught the last vacant place on the mail to Carlisle, whence he hastened to the aid of his father's patriotic labours as candidate for Dundee. Here he worked hard at canvassing and meetings, often pelted with mud and stones, but encouraged by friends more buoyant than the event justified. _Aug. 1st._--My father beaten after all, our promised votes in many cases going back or going against us.... Two hundred promises broken. Poll closed at Parnell, 666; Gladstone, 381. It is not in human approbation that the reward of right action is to be sought. Left at 4½ amid the hisses of the crowd. Perth at 7¼. Left at one in the morning for Glasgow. _2nd._--Glasgow 8½. Steamer at 11. Breeze; miserably sick; deck all night. _3rd._--Arrived at 11½; (Liverpool), very sore. _4th._--Out at 8½ to vote for S. Lancashire. Acted as representative in the booth half the day. Results of election excellent. _5th._--Again at the booths. A great victory here. _6th._--Wrote to Manning on the death of his wife. _9th._--_Manchester._ Public dinner at 6; lasted till near 12. Music excellent. Spoke 1½ hours, I am told, _proh pudor!_[75] Back at Fasque, only a day too late for the Twelfth, he found the sport bad and he shot badly, but he enjoyed the healthful walks on the hill. His employments were curiously mixed. '_Sept. 8th._--In the bog for snipe with Sir J. Mackenzie. Read _Timæus_. Began Byron's Life. My eyes refused progress. Verses. _15th._--Snipe-shooting with F. in the bog. Began _Critias_. _22nd._--_Haddo._ Otter-hunting, _senz esito_. Finished Plato's _Laws_. Hunting too in the library.' The mental dispersion of country-house visiting never affects either multifarious reading or multifarious writing. Spanish grammar, _Don Quixote_ in the original, Crabbe, _Don Juan_, alternate with Augustine _de peccatorum remissione_ or _de utilitate Credendi_ ('beautiful and useful'). He works at an essay of his own upon Justification, at adversaria on Aristotle's _Ethics_, at another essay upon Rationalism, and to save his eyes, spins verse enough to fill a decent volume of a hundred and fifty pages. He makes a circuit of calls upon the tenants, taking a farming lecture from one, praying by the sick-bed of another. BUSINESS WITH WELLINGTON In November he was again in London to be sworn of the new parliament, and at the end of the month he had for the first time an interview on business with the Duke of Wellington--of interest as the collocation of two famous names. 'The immediate subject was the Cape of Good Hope. His reception of me was plain but kind. He came to the door of his room. "Will you come in? How do you do? I am glad to see you." We spoke a little of the Cape. He said with regard to the war--and with sufficient modesty--that he was pretty well aware of the operations that had taken place in it, having been at the Cape, and being in some degree able to judge of those matters. He said, "I suppose it is there as everywhere else, as we had it last night about Ireland and the House of Lords. They won't use the law, as it is in Canada, as it is in the West Indies. They excite insurrection everywhere (I, however, put in an apology for them in the West Indies), they _want to play the part of opposition_; they are not a government, for they don't maintain the law." He appointed me to return to him to-morrow.' The result of the general election was a slight improvement in the position of the conservatives, but they still mustered no more than 315 against 342 supporters of the ministry, including the radical and Irish groups. If Melbourne and Russell found their team delicate to drive, Peel's difficulties were hardly less. Few people, he wrote at this moment, can judge of the difficulty there has frequently been in maintaining harmony between the various branches of the conservative party. The great majority in the Lords and the minority in the Commons consisted of very different elements; they included men like Stanley and Graham, who had been authors and advocates of parliamentary reform, and men who had denounced reform as treason to the constitution and ruin to the country. Even the animosities of 1829 and catholic emancipation were only half quenched within the tory ranks.[76] It was at a meeting held at Peel's on December 6, 1837, that Lord Stanley for the first time appeared among the conservative members. The distractions produced in Canada by mismanagement and misapprehension in Downing Street had already given trouble during the very short time when Mr. Gladstone was under-secretary at the colonial office; but they now broke into the flame of open revolt. The perversity of a foolish king and weakness and disunion among his whig ministers had brought about a catastrophe. At the beginning of the session (1838) the government introduced a bill suspending the constitution and conferring various absolute powers on Lord Durham as governor general and high commissioner. It was in connection with this proposal that Mr. Gladstone seems to have been first taken into the confidential consultations of the leaders of his party. CANADIAN SPEECH The sage marshalling and manoeuvring of the parliamentary squads was embarrassed by a move from Sir William Molesworth, of whom we have just been hearing, the editor of Hobbes, and one of the group nicknamed philosophic radicals with whom Mr. Gladstone at this stage seldom or never agreed. 'The new school of morals,' he called them, 'which taught that success was the only criterion of merit,'--a delineation for which he would have been severely handled by Bentham or James Mill. Molesworth gave notice of a vote of censure on Lord Glenelg, the colonial minister; that is, he selected a single member of the cabinet for condemnation, on the ground of acts for which all the other ministers were collectively just as responsible. For this discrimination the only precedent seems to be Fox's motion against Lord Sandwich in 1779. Mr. Gladstone's memorandum[77] completes or modifies the account of the dilemma of the conservative leader, already known from Sir Robert Peel's papers,[78] and the reader will find it elsewhere. It was the right of a conservative opposition to challenge a whig ministry; yet to fight under radical colours was odious and intolerable. On the other hand he could not vote for Molesworth, because he thought him unjust; but he could not vote against him, because that would imply confidence in the Canadian policy of ministers. A certain conservative contingent would not acquiesce in support of ministers against Molesworth, or in tame resort to the previous question. Again, Peel felt or feigned an apprehension that if by aggressive action they beat the government, a conservative ministry must come in, and he did not think that such a ministry could last. Even at this risk, it became clear that the only way of avoiding the difficulty was an amendment to Molesworth's motion from the official opposition. Mr. Gladstone spoke (Mar. 7), and was described as making his points with admirable precision and force, though 'with something of a provincial manner, like the rust to a piece of powerful steel machinery that has not worked into polish.' The debate, on which such mighty issues were thought to hang, lasted a couple of nights with not more than moderate spirit. At the close the amendment was thrown out by a majority of twenty-nine for ministers. The general result was to moderate the impatience of the Carlton Club men, who wished to see their party in, on the one hand; and of the radical men, who did not object to having the whigs out, on the other. It showed that neither administration nor opposition was in a station of supreme command. III At the end of March Mr. Gladstone produced the strongest impression that he had yet made in parliament, and he now definitely took his place in the front rank. It was on the old embarrassment of slavery. Reports from the colonies showed that in some at least, and more particularly in Jamaica, the apprenticeship system had led to harsher treatment of the negroes than under slavery. As it has been well put, the bad planters regarded their slave-apprentices as a bad farmer regards a farm near the end of an expiring term. In 1836 Buxton moved for a select committee to inquire into the working of the system. Mr. Gladstone defended it, and he warned parliament against 'incautious and precipitate anticipations of entire success' (March 22). Six days later he was appointed a member of the apprenticeship committee which at once began to investigate the complaints from Jamaica. Mr. Gladstone acted as the representative of the planters on the committee, and he paid very close attention to the proceedings during two sessions. In the spring of 1838 a motion was made to accelerate by two years the end of the apprenticeship system on the slave plantations of the West Indies. Brougham had been raising a tempest of humane sentiment by more than one of his most magnificent speeches. The leading men on both sides in parliament were openly and strongly against a disturbance of the settlement, but the feeling in the constituencies was hot, and in liberal and tory camp alike members in fear and trembling tried to make up their minds. Sir George Grey made an effective case for the law as it stood, and Peel spoke on the same side; but it was agreed that Mr. Gladstone, by his union of fervour, elevation, and a complete mastery of the facts of the case, went deeper than either. Even unwilling witnesses 'felt bound to admit the great ability he displayed.' His address was completely that of an advocate, and he did not even affect to look on both sides of the question, expressing his joy that the day had at length arrived when he could meet the charges against the planters and enter upon their defence. _March 30th._--Spoke from 11 to 1. Received with the greatest and most affecting kindness from, all parties, both during and after. Through the debate I felt the most painful depression. Except Mr. Plumptre and Lord John Russell, all who spoke damaged the question to the utmost possible degree. Prayer earnest for the moment was wrung from me in my necessity; I hope it was not a blasphemous prayer, for support in pleading the cause of justice.... I am half insensible even in the moment of delight to such pleasures as this kind of occasion affords. But this is a dangerous state; indifference to the world is not love of God.... SPEECH ON SLAVERY In writing to him upon this speech, Mr. Stephen, his former ally at the colonial office, addressed an admonition, which is worth, recalling both for its own sake and because it hits by anticipation what was to be one of the most admirable traits in the mighty parliamentarian to whom it was written. 'It seems to me,' says Stephen, 'that this part of your speech establishes nothing more than the fact that your opponents are capricious in the distribution of their sympathy, which is, after all, a reproach and nothing more. Now, reproach is not only not your strength, but it is the very thing in the disuse of which your strength consists; and indulging as I do the hope that you will one day occupy one of the foremost stations in the House of Commons, if not the first of all, I cannot help wishing that you may also be the founder of a more magnanimous system of parliamentary tactics than has ever yet been established, in which recrimination will be condemned as unbefitting wise men and good Christians.' In an assembly for candid deliberation modified by party spirit, this is, I fear, almost as much a counsel of perfection as it would have been in a school of Roman gladiators, but at any rate it points the better way. The speech itself has a close, direct, sinewy quality, a complete freedom from anything vague or involved; and shows for the first time a perfect mastery of the art of handling detail upon detail without an instant of tediousness, and holding the attention of listeners sustained and unbroken. It was a remonstrance against false allegations of the misbehaviour of the planters since the emancipating act, but there is not a trace of backsliding upon the great issue. 'We joined in passing the measure; we declared a belief that slavery was an evil and demoralising state, and _a desire to be relieved from it_; we accepted a price in composition for the loss which was expected to accrue.' Neither now or at any time did Mr. Gladstone set too low a value on that great dead-lift effort, not too familiar in history, to heave off a burden from the conscience of the nation, and set back the bounds of cruel wrong upon the earth. On the day after this performance, the entry in his diary is--'In the morning my father was greatly overcome, and I could hardly speak to him. Now is the time to turn this attack into measures of benefit for the negroes.' More than once in the course of the spring he showed how much in earnest he was about the negroes, by strenuously pressing his father to allow him to go to the West Indies and view the state of things there for himself. Perhaps by prudent instinct his father disapproved, and at last spoke decidedly against any project of the kind. The question of the education of the people was rising into political prominence, and its close relations with the claims of the church sufficed to engage the active interest of so zealous a son of the church as Mr. Gladstone. From a very early stage we find him moving for returns, serving on education committees in parliament, corresponding energetically with Manning, Acland, and others of like mind in and out of parliament. Primary education is one of the few subjects on which the fossils of extinct opinion neither interest nor instruct. It is enough to mark that Mr. Gladstone's position in the forties was that of the ultra-churchman of the time, and such as no church-ultra now dreams of fighting for. We find him 'objecting to any infringement whatever of the principle on which the established church was founded--that of confining the pecuniary support of the state to one particular religious denomination.'[79] To Dr. Hook (March 12, 1838), he speaks of 'a safe and precious interval, perhaps the last to those who are desirous of placing the education of the people under the efficient control of the clergy.' The aims of himself and his allies were to plant training schools in every diocese; to connect these with the cathedrals through the chapters; to license the teachers by the bishops after examination. Writing to Manning (Feb. 22, 1839), he compares control by government to the 'little lion cub in the _Agamemnon_,' which after being in its primeval season the delight of the young and amusement of the old, gradually revealed its parent stock, and grew to be a creature of huge mischief in the household.[80] He describes a divergence of view among them on the question whether the clergyman should have his choice as to 'admitting the children of dissenters without at once teaching them the catechism.' How Mr. Gladstone went he does not say, nor does it matter. He was not yet thirty. He accepted his political toryism on authority and in good faith, and the same was true of his views on church policy. He could not foresee that it was to be in his own day of power that the cub should come out full-grown lion. IN SOCIETY His work did not prevent him from mixing pretty freely with men in society, though he seems to have thought that little of what passed was worth transcribing, nor in truth had Mr. Gladstone ever much or any of the rare talent of the born diarist. Here are one or two miscellanea which must be made to serve:-- _April 25/38._--A long sitting and conversation with Mr. Rogers after the Milnes' marriage breakfast. He spoke unfavourably of Bulwer; well of Milnes' verses; said his father wished them not to be published, because such authorship and its repute would clash with the parliamentary career of his son. Mr. Rogers thought a great author would undoubtedly stand better in parliament from being such; but that otherwise the additament of authorship, unless on germane subjects, would be a hindrance. He quoted Swift on women.... He has a good and tender opinion of them; but went nearly the length of Maurice (when mentioned to him) that they had not that specific faculty of understanding which lies beneath the reason. Peel was odd, in the contrast of a familiar first address, with slackness of manner afterwards. The Duke of Wellington took the greatest interest in the poor around him at Strathfieldsay, had all of eloquence except the words. Mr. Rogers quoted a saying about Brougham that he was not so much a master of the language as mastered by it. I doubt very much the truth of this. Brougham's management of his sentences, as I remember the late Lady Canning observing to me, is surely most wonderful. He never loses the thread, and yet he habitually twists it into a thousand varieties of intricate form. He said, when Stanley came out in public life, and at the age of thirty, he was by far the cleverest young man of the day; and at sixty he would be the same, still by far the cleverest young man of the day. PROGRESS IN PUBLIC LIFE _June 13th._--Sir R. Peel dined at Mr. Dugdale's. After dinner he spoke of Wilberforce; believed him to be an excellent man independently of the book, or would not have been favourably impressed by the records of his being in society, and then going home and describing as lost in sin those with whom he had been enjoying himself. Upon the other hand, however, he would have exposed himself to the opposite reproach had he been more secluded, morosely withdrawing himself from the range of human sympathies. He remembered him as an admirable speaker; agreed that the results of his life were very great (and the man must be in part measured by them). He disapproved of taking people to task by articles in the papers, for votes against their party. _July 18th._--I complimented the Speaker yesterday on the time he had saved by putting an end to discussions upon the presentation of petitions. He replied that there was a more important advantage; that those discussions very greatly increased the influence of popular feeling on the deliberations of the House; and that by stopping them he thought a wall was erected against such influence--not as strong as might be wished. Probably some day it might be broken down, but he had done his best to raise it. His maxim was to shut out as far as might be all extrinsic pressure, and then to do freely what was right within doors. This high and sound way of regarding parliament underwent formidable changes before the close of Mr. Gladstone's career, and perhaps his career had indirectly something to do with them. But not, I think, with intention. In 1838 he cited with approval an exclamation of Roebuck's in the House of Commons, 'We, sir, are or ought to be the _élite_ of the people of England for mind: we are at the head of the mind of the people of England.' EXPECTATIONS OF FRIENDS Mr. Gladstone's position in parliament and the public judgment, as the session went on, is sufficiently manifest from a letter addressed to him at this time by Samuel Wilberforce, four years his junior, henceforth one of his nearest friends, and always an acute observer of social and political forces. 'It would be an affectation in you, which you are above,' writes the future bishop (April 20, 1838), 'not to know that few young men have the weight you have in the H. of C. and are gaining rapidly throughout the country.... I want to urge you to look calmly before you, ... and act now with a view to _then_. There is no height to which you may not fairly rise in this country. If it pleases God to spare us violent convulsions and the loss of our liberties, you may at a future day wield the whole government of this land; and if this should be so, of what extreme moment will your _past steps_ then be to the real usefulness of your high station.' FOOTNOTES: [71] Parker's _Peel_, ii. p. 321. [72] The _Standard_ marks it 'as a brilliant and triumphant argument--one of the few gems that have illuminated the reformed House of Commons.' [73] 'Motions and Means on Land and Sea at War,' v. 248. Steamboats, Viaducts, and Railways. [74] Thomson, 4127; Philips, 3759; Gladstone, 2324. [75] In this speech he dealt with an attack made upon him by his opponent, Poulett Thomson, afterwards Lord Sydenham, on the question of negro slavery:-- 'I have had some obloquy cast upon me by Mr. Thomson, in reference to the part which I took in the question of negro slavery. Now, if there was ever a question upon which I would desire to submit all that I have ever said to a candid inquirer, it is that of negro slavery. He should try me in opposition to Lord Stanley, and did Lord Stanley complain? It is well known that he stated that the only two speeches which were decidedly hostile to that measure were delivered by two gentlemen who hold office under her majesty's present government, whilst, on the contrary, his lordship was pleased to express candidly his high approbation of my sentiments, and my individual exertions for the settlement of that matter. Does Mr. Thomson mean to say that the great conservative body in parliament has offered opposition to that measure? Who, I would ask, conducted the correspondence of the government office with reference to that important question? Will any man who knows the character of Lord Bathurst--will any man who knows the character of Mr. Stephen, the under-secretary for the colonies--the chosen assistant of the noble lord in that ministry of which he was no unimportant member--will any man say that Mr. Stephen, who was all along the advocate of the slaves, with his liberal and enlightened views, exercised an influence less than under Lord Stanley? Does Mr. Thomson presume to state that Lord Aberdeen was guilty of neglect to the slaves? When I add that the question underwent a considerable discussion last year, in the House of Commons, when all parties and all interests were fairly represented, and the best disposition was evinced to assist the proper working of the measure, and to alter some parts that were considered injurious to the slaves, and which had come under the immediate cognisance of the conservative party, is it fair, is it just, that a minister of the crown should take advantage, for electioneering purposes, of the fact that my connections have an interest in the West Indies, to throw discredit upon me and the cause which I advocate?' [76] Parker's _Peel_, ii. pp. 336-8. [77] See Appendix. [78] Parker, ii. pp. 352-367. [79] _Hansard_, June 20, 1839. [80] _Agam._ 696-716. Even so belike might one A lion suckling nurse, Like a foster-son, To his home a future curse. In life's beginnings mild Dear to sire and kind to child.... But in time he showed The habit of his blood.... --Gladstone in _Translations_, p. 83. CHAPTER IV THE CHURCH (_1838_) A period and a movement certainly among the most remarkable in the Christendom of the last three and a half centuries; probably more remarkable than the movement associated with the name of Port Royal, for that has passed away and left hardly a trace behind; but this has left ineffaceable marks upon the English church and nation.--GLADSTONE (1891). It was the affinity of great natures for great issues that made Mr. Gladstone from his earliest manhood onwards take and hold fast the affairs of the churches for the objects of his most absorbing interest. He was one and the same man, his genius was one. His persistent incursions all through his long life into the multifarious doings, not only of his own anglican communion, but of the Latin church of the west, as well as of the motley Christendom of the east, puzzled and vexed political whippers-in, wire-pullers, newspaper editors, leaders, colleagues; they were the despair of party caucuses; and they made the neutral man of the world smile, as eccentricities of genius and rather singularly chosen recreations. All this was, in truth, of the very essence of his character, the manifestation of its profound unity. The quarrel upon church comprehension that had perplexed Elizabeth and Burleigh, had distracted the councils of Charles I. and of Cromwell, had bewildered William of Orange and Tillotson and Burnet, was once more aglow with its old heat. The still mightier dispute, how wide or how narrow is the common ground between the church of England and the church of Rome, broke into fierce flame. THE RELIGIOUS QUESTION Then by and by these familiar contests of ancient tradition, thus quickened in the eternal ebb and flow of human things into fresh vitality, were followed by a revival, with new artillery and larger strategy, of a standing war that is roughly described as the conflict between reason and faith, between science and revelation. The controversy of Laudian divines with puritans, of Hoadly with non-jurors, of Hanoverian divines with deists and free-thinkers, all may seem now to us narrow and dry when compared with such a drama, of so many interesting characters, strange evolutions, and multiple and startling climax, as gradually unfolded itself to Mr. Gladstone's ardent and impassioned gaze. His is not one of the cases, like Pascal, or Baxter, or Rutherford, or a hundred others, where a man's theological history is to the world, however it may seem to himself, the most important aspect of his career or character. This is not the place for an exploration of Mr. Gladstone's strictly theological history, nor is mine the hand by which such exploration could be attempted. In the sphere of dogmatic faith, apart from ecclesiastical politics and all the war of principles connected with such politics, Mr. Gladstone, by the time when he was thirty, had become a man of settled questions. Nor was he for his own part, with a remarkable exception in respect of one particular doctrine towards the end of his life, ever ready to re-open them. What is extraordinary in the career of this far-shining and dominant character of his age, is not a development of specific opinions on dogma, or discipline, or ordinance, on article or sacrament, but the fact that with a steadfast tread he marched along the high anglican road to the summits of that liberalism which it was the original object of the new anglicans to resist and overthrow. The years from 1831 to 1840 Mr. Gladstone marked as an era of a marvellous uprising of religious energy throughout the land; it saved the church, he says. Not only in Oxford but in England he declares that party spirit within the church had fallen to a low ebb. Coming hurricanes were not foreseen. In Lord Liverpool's government patronage was considered to have been respectably dispensed, and church reform was never heard of.[81] This dreamless composure was rudely broken. The repeal of the test and corporation Acts in 1828 first roused the church; and her sons rubbed their eyes when they beheld parliament bringing frankly to an end the odious monopoly of office under the crown, all corporate office, all magistracy, in men willing to take the communion at the altar of the privileged establishment. The next year a deadlier blow fell after a more embittered fight--the admission of Roman catholics to parliament and place. The Reform bill of 1832 followed. Even when half spent, the forces that had been gathering for many years in the direction of parliamentary reform, and had at last achieved more than one immense result, rolled heavily forward against the church. The opening of parliament and of close corporations was taken to involve an opening to correspond in the grandest and closest of all corporations. The resounding victory of the constitutional bill of 1832 was followed by a drastic handling of the church in Ireland, and by a proposal to divert a surplus of its property to purposes not ecclesiastical. A long and peculiarly unedifying crisis ensued. Stanley and Graham, two of the most eminent members of the reforming whig cabinet, on this proposal at once resigned. The Grey ministry was thus split in 1834, and the Peel ministry ejected in 1835, on the ground of the absolute inviolability of the property of the Irish church. The tide of reaction set slowly in. The shock in political party was in no long time followed by shock after shock in the church. As has happened on more than one occasion in our history, alarm for the church kindled the conservative temper in the nation. Or to put it in another way, that spontaneous attachment to the old order of things, with all its symbols, institutes, and deep associations, which the radical reformers had both affronted and ignored, made the church its rallying-point. The three years of tortuous proceedings on the famous Appropriation clause--proceedings that political philosophers declared to have disgraced this country in the face of Europe, and that were certainly an ignominy and a scandal in a party called reforming--were among the things that helped most to prepare the way for the fall of the whigs and the conservative triumph of 1841. Within ten years from the death of Canning the church transfixed the attention of the politician. The Duke of Wellington was hardly a wizard in political foresight, but he had often a good soldier's eye for things that stood straight up in front of him. 'The real question,' said the duke in 1838, 'that now divides the country and which truly divides the House of Commons, is church or no church. People talk of the war in Spain, and the Canada question. But all that is of little moment. The real question is church or no church.' CHANGED POSITION OF THE CHURCH The position of the tory party as seen by its powerful recruit was, when he entered public life, a state of hopeless defeat and discomfiture. 'But in my imagination,' wrote Mr. Gladstone, 'I cast over that party a prophetic mantle and assigned to it a mission distinctly religious as the champion in the state field of that divine truth which it was the office of the Christian ministry to uphold in the church. Neither then did I, nor now can I, see on what ground this inviolability could for a moment be maintained, except the belief that the state had such a mission.' He soon discovered how hard it is to adjust to the many angles of an English political party the seamless mantle of ecclesiastical predominance. The changes in the political constitution in 1828, in 1829, and in 1832, carried with them a deliberate recognition that the church was not the nation; that it was not identical with the parliament who spoke for the nation; that it had no longer a title to compose the governing order; and--a more startling disclosure still to the minds of churchmen--that laws affecting the church would henceforth be made by men of all churches and creeds, or even men of none. This hateful circumstance it was that inevitably began in multitudes of devout and earnest minds to produce a revolution in their conception of a church, and a resurrection in curiously altered forms of that old ideal of Milton's austere and lofty school--the ideal of a purely spiritual association that should leave each man's soul and conscience free from 'secular chains' and 'hireling wolves.' CHANGED SOCIAL CONDITIONS Strange social conditions were emerging on every side. The factory system established itself on a startling scale. Huge aggregates of population collected with little regard to antique divisions of diocese and parish. Colonies over the sea extended in boundaries and numbers, and churchmen were zealous that these infant societies should be blessed by the same services, rites, ecclesiastical ordering and exhortation, as were believed to elevate and sanctify the parent community at home. The education of the people grew to be a formidable problem, the field of angry battles and campaigns that never end. Trade, markets, wages, hours, and all the gaunt and haggard economics of the labour question, added to the statesman's load. Pauperism was appalling. In a word, the need for social regeneration both material and moral was in the spirit of the time. Here were the hopes, vague, blind, unmeasured, formless, that had inspired the wild clamour for the bill, the whole bill, and nothing but the bill. The whig patricians carried away the prizes of great office, though the work had been done by men of a very different stamp. It was the utilitarian radicals who laid the foundations of social improvement in a reasoned creed. With admirable ability, perseverance, unselfishness, and public spirit, Bentham and his disciples had regenerated political opinion, and fought the battle against debt, pauperism, class-privilege, class-monopoly, abusive patronage, a monstrous criminal law, and all the host of sinister interests.[82] As in every reforming age, men approached the work from two sides. Evangelical religion divides with rationalism the glory of more than one humanitarian struggle. Brougham, a more potent force than we now realise, plunged with the energy of a Titan into a thousand projects, all taking for granted that ignorance is the disease and useful knowledge the universal healer, all of them secular, all dealing with man from the outside, none touching imagination or the heart. March-of-mind became to many almost as wearisome a cry as wisdom-of-our-ancestors had been. According to some eager innovators, dogma and ceremony were to go, the fabrics to be turned into mechanics' institutes, the clergy to lecture on botany and statistics. The reaction against this dusty dominion of secularity kindled new life in rival schools. They insisted that if society is to be improved and civilisation saved, it can only be through improvement in the character of man, and character is moulded and inspired by more things than are dreamed of by societies for useful knowledge. The building up of the inward man in all his parts, faculties, and aspirations, was seen to be, what in every age it is, the problem of problems. This thought turned the eyes of many--of Mr. Gladstone first among them--to the church, and stirred an endeavour to make out of the church what Coleridge describes as the sustaining, correcting, befriending opposite of the world, the compensating counterforce to the inherent and inevitable defects of the state as a state. Such was the new movement of the time between 1835 and 1845. 'It is surprising,' said Proudhon, the trenchant genius of French socialism in 1840 and onwards, 'how at the bottom of our politics we always found theology.' It is true at any rate that the association of political and social change with theological revolution was the most remarkable of all the influences in the first twenty years of Mr. Gladstone's public life. Then rose once more into active prominence the supreme debate, often cutting deep into the labours of the modern statesman, always near to the heart of the speculations of the theologian, in many fields urgent in its interest alike to ecclesiastic, historian, and philosopher, the inquiry: what is a church? This opened the sluices and let out the floods. What is the church of England? To ask that question was to ask a hundred others. Creeds, dogmas, ordinances, hierarchy, parliamentary institution, judicial tribunals, historical tradition, the prayer-book, the Bible--all these enormous topics sacred and profane, with all their countless ramifications, were rapidly swept into a tornado of such controversy as had not been seen in England since the Revolution. Was the church a purely human creation, changing with time and circumstance, like all the other creations of the heart and brain and will of man? Were its bishops mere officers, like high ministers of mundane state, or were they, in actual historic truth as in supposed theological necessity, the direct lineal successors of the first apostles, endowed from the beginning with the mystical prerogatives on which the efficacy of all sacramental rites depended? What were its relations to the councils of the first four centuries, what to the councils of the fifteenth century and the sixteenth, what to the Fathers? The Scottish presbyterians held the conception of a church as strongly as anybody;[83] but England, broadly speaking, had never been persuaded that there could be a church without bishops. In the answers to this group of hard questions, terrible divisions that had been long muffled and huddled away burst into view. The stupendous quarrel of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries again broke out. To the erastian lawyer the church was an institution erected on principles of political expediency by act of parliament. To the school of Whately and Arnold it was a corporation of divine origin, devised to strengthen men in their struggle for goodness and holiness by the association and mutual help of fellow-believers. To the evangelical it was hardly more than a collection of congregations commended in the Bible for the diffusion of the knowledge and right interpretation of the Scriptures, the commemoration of gospel events, and the linking of gospel truths to a well-ordered life. To the high anglican as to the Roman catholic, the church was something very different from this; not a fabric reared by man, nor in truth any mechanical fabric at all, but a mystically appointed channel of salvation, an indispensable element in the relation between the soul of man and its creator. To be a member of it was not to join an external association, but to become an inward partaker in ineffable and mysterious graces to which no other access lay open. Such was the Church Catholic and Apostolic as set up from the beginning, and of this immense mystery, of this saving agency, of this incommensurable spiritual force, the established church of England was the local presence and the organ. HARD QUESTIONS REVIVED The noble restlessness of the profounder and more penetrating minds was not satisfied, any more than Bossuet had been, to think of the church as only an element in a scheme of individual salvation. They sought in it the comprehensive solution of all the riddles of life and time. Newman drew in powerful outline the sublime and sombre anarchy of human history. This is the enigma, this the solution in faith and spirit, in which Mr. Gladstone lived and moved. In him it gave to the energies of life their meaning, and to duty its foundation. While poetic voices and the oracles of sages--Goethe, Scott, Wordsworth, Shelley, Byron, Coleridge--were drawing men one way or another, or else were leaving the void turbid and formless, he, in the midst of doubts, distractions, and fears, saw a steadfast light where the Oxford men saw it; in that concrete representation of the unseen Power that, as he believed, had made and guides and rules the world, in that Church Catholic and Apostolic which alone would have the force and the stoutness necessary to serve for a breakwater against the deluge. Yet to understand Mr. Gladstone's case, we have ever to remember that what is called the catholic revival was not in England that which the catholic counter-revolution had been on the continent of Europe, primarily a political movement. Its workings were inward, in the sphere of the mind, in thought and faith, in idealised associations of historic grandeur.[84] II HIS RELIGIOUS GROWTH The reader has already been told how at Rome and in Naples in 1832, Mr. Gladstone was suddenly arrested by the new idea of a church, interweaving with the whole of human life a pervading and equalised spirit of religion. Long years after, in an unfinished fragment, he began to trace the golden thread of his religious growth:-- My environment in my childhood was strictly evangelical. My dear and noble mother was a woman of warm piety but broken health, and I was not directly instructed by her. But I was brought up to believe that Doyly and Mant's Bible (then a standard book of the colour ruling in the church) was heretical, and that every unitarian (I suppose also every heathen) must, as matter of course, be lost forever. This deplorable servitude of mind oppressed me in a greater or less degree for a number of years. As late as in the year (I think) 1836, one of my brothers married a beautiful and in every way charming person, who had been brought up in a family of the unitarian profession, yet under a mother very sincerely religious. I went through much mental difficulty and distress at the time, as there had been no express renunciation [by her] of the ancestral creed, and I absurdly busied myself with devising this or that religious test as what if accepted might suffice.[85] So, as will be seen, the first access of churchlike ideas to my mind by no means sufficed to expel my inherited and bigoted misconception, though in the event they did it as I hope effectively. But I long retained in my recollection an observation made to me in (I think) the year 1829, by Mrs. Benjamin Gaskell of Thornes, near Wakefield, a seed which was destined long to remain in my mind without germinating. I fell into religious conversation with this excellent woman, the mother of my Eton friend Milnes Gaskell, himself the husband of an unitarian. She said to me, Surely we cannot entertain a doubt as to the future condition of any person truly united to Christ by faith and love, whatever may be the faults of his opinions. Here she supplied me with the key to the whole question. At this hour I feel grateful to her accordingly, for the scope of her remark is very wide; and it is now my rule to remember her in prayer before the altar. There was nothing at Eton to subvert this frame of mind; for nothing was taught us either for it or against it. But in the spring and summer of 1828, I set to work on Hooker's _Ecclesiastical Polity_, and read it straight through. Intercourse with my elder sister Anne had increased my mental interest in religion, and she, though generally of evangelical sentiments, had an opinion that the standard divines of the English church were of great value. Hooker's exposition of the case of the church of England came to me as a mere abstraction; but I think that I found the doctrine of Baptismal Regeneration, theretofore abhorred, impossible to reject, and the way was thus opened for further changes. In like manner at Oxford, I do not doubt that in 1830 and 1831 the study of Bishop Butler laid the ground for new modes of thought in religion, but his teaching in the sermons on our moral nature was not integrated, so to speak, until several years later by larger perusal of the works of Saint Augustine. I may, however, say that I was not of a mind ill disposed to submit to authority. The Oxford Movement, properly so called, began in the year 1833, but it had no direct effect upon me. I did not see the Tracts, and to this hour I have read but few of them. Indeed, my first impressions and emotions in connection with it were those of indignation at what I thought the rash intemperate censures pronounced by Mr. Hurrell Froude upon the reformers. My chief tie with Oxford was the close friendship I had formed in 1830 with Walter Hamilton.[86] His character, always loving and loved, had, not very greatly later, become deeply devout. But I do not think he at this time sympathised with Newman and his friends; and he had the good sense, in conjunction with Mr. Denison, afterwards bishop, to oppose the censure upon Dr. Hampden, to which I foolishly and ignorantly gave in, without, however, being an active or important participator. But the blow struck by the prayer-book in 1832 set my mind in motion, and that motion was never arrested. I found food for the new ideas and tendencies in various quarters, not least in the religious writings of Alexander Knox, all of which I perused. Moreover, I had an inclination to ecclesiastical conformity, and obedience as such, which led me to concur with some zeal in the plans of Bishop Blomfield. In the course of two or three years, Manning turned from a strongly evangelical attitude to one as strongly anglican, and about the same time converted his acquaintance with me into a close friendship. In the same manner James Hope, whom I had known but slightly at Eton or Oxford, made a carefully considered change of the same kind; which also became the occasion of a fast friendship. Both these intimacies led me forward; Hope especially had influence over me, more than I think any other person at any period of my life.[87] When I was preparing in 1837-8 _The State in its Relations with the Church_, he took a warm interest in the work, which, during my absence on the continent, he corrected for the press. His attitude towards the work, however, included a desire that its propositions should be carried further. The temper of the times among young educated men was working in the same direction. I had no low churchmen among my near friends, except Walter Farquhar. Anstice, a great loss, died very early in his beautiful married life. While I was busy about my book, Hope made known to me Palmer's work on the Church, which had just appeared. I read it with care and great interest. It took hold upon me; and gave me at once the clear, definite, and strong conception of the church which, through all the storm and strain of a most critical period, has proved for me entirely adequate to every emergency, and saved me from all vacillation. I did not, however, love the extreme rigour of the book in its treatment of non-episcopal communions. It was not very long after this, I think in 1842, that I reduced into form my convictions of the large and important range of subjects which recent controversy had brought into prominence. I conceive that in the main Palmer completed for me the work which inspection of the prayer-book had begun. Before referring further to my 'redaction' of opinions, I desire to say that at this moment I am as closely an adherent to the doctrines of grace generally, and to the general sense of Saint Augustine, as at the date from which this narrative set out. I hope that my mind has dropped nothing affirmative. But I hope also that there has been dropped from it all the damnatory part of the opinions taught by the evangelical school; not only as regards the Roman catholic religion, but also as to heretics and heathens; nonconformists and presbyterians I think that I always let off pretty easily.... III INFLUENCE OF FRIENDS AND BOOKS The Tractarian movement is by this time one of the most familiar chapters in our history, and it has had singular good fortune in being told by three masters of the most winning, graphic, and melodious English prose of the century to which the tale belongs.[88] Whether we call it by the ill name of Oxford counter-reformation or the friendlier name of catholic revival, it remains a striking landmark in the varied motions of English religious thought and feeling for the three-quarters of a century since the still unfinished journey first began. In its early stages, the movement was exclusively theological. Philanthropic reform still remained with the evangelical school that so powerfully helped to sweep away the slave trade, cleansed the prisons, and aided in humanising the criminal law. It was they who 'helped to form a conscience, if not a heart, in the callous bosom of English politics,' while the very foremost of the Oxford divines was scouting the fine talk about black men, because they 'concentrated in themselves all the whiggery, dissent, cant, and abomination that had been ranged on their side.'[89] Nor can we forget that Shaftesbury, the leader in that beneficent crusade of human mercy and national wisdom which ended in the deliverance of women and children in mines and factories, was also a leader of the evangelical party. The Tractarian movement, as all know, opened, among other sources, in antagonism to utilitarian liberalism. Yet J. S. Mill, the oracle of rationalistic liberalism in Oxford and other places in the following generation, had always much to say for the Tractarians. He used to tell us that the Oxford theologians had done for England something like what Guizot, Villemain, Michelet, Cousin had done a little earlier for France; they had opened, broadened, deepened the issues and meanings of European history; they had reminded us that history is European; that it is quite unintelligible if treated as merely local. He would say, moreover, that thought should recognise thought and mind always welcome mind; and the Oxford men had at least brought argument, learning, and even philosophy of a sort, to break up the narrow and frigid conventions of reigning system in church and college, in pulpits and professorial chairs. They had made the church ashamed of the evil of her ways, they had determined that spirit of improvement from within 'which, if this sect-ridden country is ever really to be taught, must proceed _pari passu_ with assault from without.'[90] One of the ablest of the Oxford writers talking of the non-jurors, remarks how very few of the movements that are attended with a certain romance, and thus bias us for a time in their favour, will stand full examination; they so often reveal some gross offence against common sense.[91] Want of common sense is not the particular impression left by the Tractarians, after we have put aside the plausible dialectic and winning periods of the leader, and proceed to look at the effect, not on their general honesty but on their intellectual integrity, of their most peculiar situation and the methods which they believed that situation to impose. Nobody will be so presumptuous or uncharitable as to deny that among the divines of the Oxford movement were men as pure in soul, as fervid lovers of truth, as this world ever possessed. On the other hand it would be nothing short of a miracle in human nature, if all that dreadful tangle of economies and reserves, so largely practised and for a long time so insidiously defended, did not familiarise a vein of subtlety, a tendency to play fast and loose with words, a perilous disposition to regard the non-natural sense of language as if it were just as good as the natural, a willingness to be satisfied with a bare and rigid logical consistency of expression, without respect to the interpretation that was sure to be put upon that expression by the hearer and the reader. The strain of their position in all these respects made Newman and his allies no exemplary school. Their example has been, perhaps rightly, held to account for something that was often under the evil name of sophistry suspected and disliked in Mr. Gladstone himself, in his speeches, his writings, and even in his public acts. MISCHIEVOUS EFFECTS OF OXFORD ENTANGLEMENTS It is true that to the impartial eye Newman is no worse than teachers in antagonistic sects; he is, for instance, no subtler than Maurice. The theologian who strove so hard in the name of anglican unity to develop all the catholic elements and hide out of sight all the calvinistic, was not driven to any hardier exploits of verbal legerdemain, than the theologian who strove against all reason and clear thinking to devise common formulæ that should embrace both catholic and calvinistic explanations together, or indeed anything else that anybody might choose to bring to the transfusing alchemy of his rather smoky crucible. Nor was the third, and at that moment the strongest, of the church parties at Oxford and in the country, well able to fling stones at the other two. What better right, it was asked, had low churchmen to shut their eyes to the language of rubrics, creeds, and offices, than the high churchmen had to twist the language of the articles? The confusion was grave and it was unfathomable. Newman fought a skilful and persistent fight against liberalism, as being nothing else than the egregious doctrine that there is no positive truth in religion, and that one creed is as good as another. Dr. Arnold, on the other hand, denounced Newmanism as idolatry; declared that if you let in the little finger of tradition, you would soon have in the whole monster, horns and tail and all; and even complained of the English divines in general, with the noble exceptions of Butler and Hooker, that he found in them a want of believing or disbelieving anything because it was true or false, as if that were a question that never occurred to them.[92] The plain man, who was but a poor master either of theology or of the history of the church of England, but who loved the prayer-book and hated confession, convents, priest-craft, and mariolatry, was wrought to madness by a clergyman who should describe himself, as did R. H. Froude, as a catholic without the popery, and a church of England man without the protestantism. The plain man knew that he was not himself clever enough to form any distinct idea of what such talk meant. But then his helplessness only deepened his conviction that the more distinct his idea might become, the more intense would his aversion be, both to the thing meant and to the surpliced conjurer who, as he bitterly supposed, was by sophistic tricks trying hard to take him in. Other portents were at the same time beginning to disturb the world. The finds and the theories of geologists made men uncomfortable, and brought down sharp anathemas. Wider speculations on cosmic and creative law came soon after, and found their way into popular reading.[93] In prose literature, in subtler forms than the verse of Shelley, new dissolving elements appeared that were destined to go far. Schleiermacher, between 1820 and 1830, opened the sluices of the theological deep, whether to deluge or to irrigate. In 1830 an alarming note was sounded in the publication by a learned clergyman of a history of the Jews. We have seen (p. 56) how Mr. Gladstone was horrified by it. Milman's book was the beginning of a new rationalism within the fold. A line of thought was opened that seemed to make the history of religious ideas more interesting than their truth. The special claims of an accepted creed were shaken by disclosing an unmistakeable family likeness to creeds abhorred. A belief was deemed to be accounted for and its sanctity dissolved, by referring it historically to human origins, and showing it to be only one branch of a genealogical trunk. Historic explanation became a graver peril than direct attack. IV NEW IDEAS AND TENDENCIES The first skirmish in a dire conflict that is not even now over or near its end happened in 1836. Lord Melbourne recommended for the chair of divinity at Oxford Dr. Hampden, a divine whose clumsy handling of nice themes had brought him, much against his intention, under suspicion of unsound doctrine, and who was destined eleven years later to find himself the centre of a still louder uproar. Evangelicals and Tractarians flew to arms, and the two hosts who were soon to draw their swords upon one another, now for the first time, if not the last, swarmed forth together side by side against the heretic. What was rather an affront than a penalty was inflicted upon Hampden by a majority of some five to one of the masters of arts of the university, and in accord with that majority, as he has just told us, though he did not actually vote, was Mr. Gladstone. Twenty years after, when he had risen to be a shining light in the world's firmament, he wrote to Hampden to express regret for the injustice of which in this instance 'the forward precipitancy of youth' had made him guilty.[94] The case of Hampden gave a sharp actuality to the question of the relations of church and crown. The particular quarrel was of secondary importance, but it brought home to the high churchmen what might be expected in weightier matters than the affair of Dr. Hampden from whig ministers, and confirmed the horrible apprehension that whig ministers might possibly have to fill all the regius chairs and all the sees for a whole generation to come. Not less important than the theology of the Oxford divines in its influence on Mr. Gladstone's line of thought upon things ecclesiastical was the speculation of Coleridge on the teaching and polity of a national church. His fertile book on _Church and State_ was given to the world in 1830, four years before his death, and this and the ideas proceeding from it were the mainspring, if not of the theology of the movement, at least of Mr. Gladstone's first marked contribution to the stirring controversies of the time. He has described the profound effect upon his mind of another book, the _Treatise on the Church of Christ_, by William Palmer of Worcester College (1838), and to the end of his life it held its place in his mind among the most masterly performances of the day in the twin hemispheres of theology and church polity.[95] Newman applauded the book for its magnificence of design, and undoubtedly it covers much ground, including a stiff rejection of Locke's theory of toleration, and the assertion of the strong doctrine that the Christian prince has a right by temporal penalties to protect the church from the gathering together of the froward and the insurrection of wicked doers. It has at least the merit, so far from universal in the polemics of that day, of clear language, definite propositions, and formal arguments capable of being met by a downright yes or no.[96] The question, however, that has often slumbered yet never dies, of the right relations between the Christian prince or state and the Christian church, was rapidly passing away from logicians of the cloister. Note to page 167. '_Hawarden, Chester, November 9, 1856._--MY LORD BISHOP,--Your lordship will probably be surprised at receiving a letter from me, as a stranger. The simple purpose of it is to discharge a debt of the smallest possible importance to you, yet due I think from me, by expressing the regret with which I now look back on my concurrence in a vote of the University of Oxford in the year 1836, condemnatory of some of your lordship's publications. I did not take actual part in the vote; but upon reference to a journal kept at the time, I find that my absence was owing to an accident. 'For a good many years past I have found myself ill able to master books of an abstract character, and I am far from pretending to be competent at this time to form a judgment on the merits of any propositions then at issue. I have learned, indeed, that many things which, in the forward precipitancy of my youth, I should have condemned, are either in reality sound, or lie within the just limits of such discussion as especially befits an University. But that which (after a delay, due, I think, to the cares and pressing occupations of political life) brought back to my mind the injustice of which I had unconsciously been guilty in 1836, was my being called upon, as a member of the Council of King's College in London, to concur in a measure similar in principle with respect to Mr. Maurice; that is to say, in a condemnation couched in general terms which did not really declare the point of imputed guilt, and against which perfect innocence could have no defence. I resisted to the best of my power, though ineffectually, the grievous wrong done to Mr. Maurice, and urged that the charges should be made distinct, that all the best means of investigation should be brought to bear on them, ample opportunity given for defence, and a reference then made, if needful, to the Bishop in his proper capacity. But the majority of laymen in the Council were inexorable. It was only, as I have said, after mature reflection that I came to perceive the bearing of the case on that of 1836, and to find that by my resistance I had condemned myself. I then lamented very sincerely that I had not on that occasion, now so remote, felt and acted in a different manner. 'I beg your lordship to accept this expression of my cordial regret, and to allow me to subscribe myself, very respectfully, your obedient and humble servant, W. E. GLADSTONE.'[97] FOOTNOTES: [81] Newman, _Essays_. ii. p. 428. [82] See Sir Leslie Stephen's _English Utilitarians_, ii. p. 42. [83] 'Nowhere that I know of,' the Duke of Argyll once wrote in friendly remonstrance with Mr. Gladstone, 'is the doctrine of a separate society being of divine foundation, so dogmatically expressed as in the Scotch Confession; the 39 articles are less definite on the subject.' [84] On this, see Fairbairn's _Catholicism, Roman and Anglican_, pp. 114-5. [85] A little sheaf of curious letters on this family episode survives. [86] Afterwards Bishop of Salisbury. [87] Marrying Walter Scott's granddaughter (1847) he was named Hope-Scott after 1853. [88] The _Apologia_ of its leader; Froude, _Short Studies_, vol. iv.; and Dean Church's _Oxford Movement_, 1833-45, a truly fascinating book--called by Mr. Gladstone a great and noble book. 'It has all the delicacy,' he says, 'the insight into the human mind, heart, and character, which were Newman's great endowment; but there is a pervading sense of soundness about it which Newman, great as he was, never inspired.' [89] See Dr. Fairbairn's _Catholicism, Roman and Anglican_, p. 292. Pusey speaks of our 'paying twenty millions for a theory about slavery' (Liddon, _Life of Pusey_, iii. p. 172). [90] _Dissertations_, i. p. 444. [91] J. B. Mozley's _Letters_, p. 234. [92] Stanley's _Life of Arnold_, ii. p. 56 _n_. [93] The _Vestiges of Creation_ appeared in 1844. [94] The letter will be found at the end of the chapter. [95] See his article in the _Nineteenth Century_ for August, 1894, where he calls Palmer's book the most powerful and least assailable defence of the position of the anglican church from the sixteenth century downwards. [96] See Church, _Oxford Movement_, pp. 214-6. [97] This letter is printed in the _Life of Hampden_ (1876), p. 199. CHAPTER V HIS FIRST BOOK (_1838-1839_) The union [with the State] is to the Church of secondary though great importance. _Her_ foundations are on the holy hills. Her charter is legibly divine. She, if she should be excluded from the precinct of government, may still fulfil all her functions, and carry them out to perfection. Her condition would be anything rather than pitiable, should she once more occupy the position which she held before the reign of Constantine. But the State, in rejecting her, would actively violate its most solemn duty, and would, if the theory of the connection be sound, entail upon itself a curse.--GLADSTONE (1838). According to Mr. Gladstone, a furore for church establishment came down upon the conservative squadrons between 1835 and 1838. He describes it as due especially to the activity of the presbyterian established church of Scotland before the disruption, and especially to the 'zealous and truly noble propagandism of Dr. Chalmers, a man with the energy of a giant and the simplicity of a child.' In 1837, Mr. Gladstone says in one of the many fragments written when in his later years he mused over the past, 'we had a movement for fresh parliamentary grants to build churches in Scotland. The leaders did not seem much to like it, but had to follow. I remember dining at Sir R. Peel's with the Scotch deputation. It included Collins, a church bookseller of note, who told me that no sermon ought ever to fall short of an hour, for in less time than that it was not possible to explain any text of the Holy Scripture.' In the spring of 1838, the mighty Chalmers was persuaded to cross the border and deliver in London half a dozen discourses to vindicate the cause of ecclesiastical establishments. The rooms in Hanover Square were crowded to suffocation by intense audiences mainly composed of the governing class. Princes of the blood were there, high prelates of the church, great nobles, leading statesmen, and a throng of members of the House of Commons, from both sides of it. The orator was seated, but now and again in the kindling excitement of his thought, he rose unconsciously to his feet, and by ringing phrase or ardent gesture roused a whirlwind of enthusiasm such that vehement bystanders assure us it could not be exceeded in the history of human eloquence.[98] In Chalmers' fulminating energy, the mechanical polemics of an appropriation clause in a parliamentary bill assume a passionate and living air. He had warned his northern flock, 'should the disaster ever befall us, of vulgar and upstart politicians becoming lords of the ascendant, and an infidel or demi-infidel government wielding the destinies of this mighty empire, and should they be willing at the shrines of their own wretched partizanship to make sacrifice of those great and hallowed institutions which were consecrated by our ancestors to the maintenance of religious truth and religious liberty,--should in particular the monstrous proposition ever be entertained to abridge the legal funds for the support of protestantism,--let us hope that there is still enough, not of fiery zeal, but of calm, resolute, enlightened principle in the land to resent the outrage--enough of energy and reaction in the revolted sense of this great country to meet and overbear it.' CHALMERS IN LONDON The impression made by all this on Mr. Gladstone he has himself described in an autobiographic note of 1897:-- The primary idea of my early politics was the church. With this was connected the idea of the establishment, as being everything except essential. When therefore Dr. Chalmers came to London to lecture on the principle of church establishments, I attended as a loyal hearer. I had a profound respect for the lecturer, with whom I had had the honour of a good deal of acquaintance during winter residences in Edinburgh, and some correspondence by letter. I was in my earlier twenties, and he near his sixties [he was 58], with a high and merited fame for eloquence and character. He subscribed his letters to me 'respectfully' (or 'most respectfully') yours, and puzzled me extremely in the effort to find out what suitable mode of subscription to use in return. Unfortunately the basis of his lectures was totally unsound. Parliament as being Christian was bound to know and establish the truth. But not being made of theologians, it could not follow the truth into its minuter shadings, and must proceed upon broad lines. Fortunately these lines were ready to hand. There was a religious system which, taken in the rough, was truth. This was known as protestantism: and to its varieties it was not the business of the legislature to have regard. On the other side lay a system which, taken again in the rough, was not truth but error. This system was known as popery. Parliament therefore was bound to establish and endow some kind of protestantism, and not to establish or endow popery. In a letter to Manning (May 14, 1838) he puts the case more bluntly:-- Such a jumble of church, un-church, and anti-church principles as that excellent and eloquent man Dr. Chalmers has given us in his recent lectures, no human being ever heard, and it can only be compared to the state of things-- Ante mare et terras et quod tegit omnia coelum.[99] He thinks that the State has not cognisance of spirituals, except upon a broad simple principle like that which separates popery from protestantism, namely that protestantism receives the word of God only, popery the word of God and the word of man alike--it is easy, he says, such being the alternatives, to judge which is preferable. He flogged the apostolic succession grievously, seven bishops sitting below him: London, Winchester, Chester, Oxford, Llandaff, Gloucester, Exeter, and the Duke of Cambridge incessantly bobbing assent; but for fear we should be annoyed he then turned round on the cathedrals plan and flogged it with at least equal vigour. He has a mind keenly susceptible of what is beautiful, great, and good; tenacious of an idea when once grasped, and with a singular power of concentrating the whole man upon it. But unfortunately I do not believe he has ever looked in the face the real doctrine of the visible church and the apostolic succession, or has any idea what is the matter at issue. Mr. Gladstone says he could not stand the undisputed currency in conservative circles of a theory like this, and felt that the occasion ought to be seized for further entrenching the existing institution, strong as it seemed in fact, by more systematic defences in principle and theory. He sat down to the literary task with uncommon vigour and persistency. His object was not merely to show that the state has a conscience, for not even the newest of new Machiavellians denies that a state is bound by some moral obligations, though in history and fact it is true that Earth is sick, And Heaven is weary, of the hollow words Which States and Kingdoms utter when they talk Of truth and justice.[100] But the obligation of conscience upon a state was not Mr. Gladstone's only point. His propositions were, that the state is cognisant of the difference between religious truth and religious error: that the propagation of this truth and the discouragement of this error are among the ends for which government exists; that the English state did recognise as a fundamental duty to give an active and exclusive support to a certain religion; and finally that the condition of things resulting from the discharge of this duty was well worth preserving against encroachment, from whatever quarter encroachment might threaten. COMPOSITION OF HIS WORK On July 23rd, the draft of his book was at last finished, and he dispatched it to James Hope for free criticism, suggestions, and revision. The 'physical state of the MS.,' as Mr. Gladstone calls it, seems to have been rather indefensible, and his excuse for writing 'irregularly and confusedly, considering the pressure of other engagements'--an excuse somewhat too common with him--was not quite so valid as he seems to have thought it. 'The defects,' writes Hope, 'are such as must almost necessarily occur when a great subject is handled piecemeal and at intervals; and I should recommend, with a view to remedying them, that you procure the whole to be copied out in a good legible hand with blank pages, and that you read it through in this shape once connectedly, with a view to the whole argument, and again with a view to examining the structure of each part.'[101] Hope took as much trouble with the argument and structure of the book as if he were himself its author. For many weeks the fervid toil went on. The strain on his eyesight that had embarrassed Mr. Gladstone for several months now made abstinence from incessant reading and writing necessary, and he was ordered to travel. He first settled with his sister at Ems (August 15th), whither the proofs of his book with Hope's annotations followed, nor did he finally get rid of the burden until the middle of September. The tedium of life in hotels was almost worse than the tedium of revising proofs, and at Milan and Florence he was strongly tempted to return home, as the benefit was problematical; it was even doubtful whether pictures were any less trying to his eyes than books. He made the acquaintance of one celebrated writer of the time. 'I went to see Manzoni,' he says, 'in his house some six or eight miles from Milan in 1838. He was a most interesting man, but was regarded, as I found, among the more fashionable priests in Milan as a _bacchettone_ [hypocrite]. In his own way he was, I think, a liberal and a nationalist, nor was the alliance of such politics with strong religious convictions uncommon among the more eminent Italians of those days.' October found him in Sicily,[102] where he travelled with Sir Stephen Glynne and his two sisters, and here we shall soon see that with one of these sisters a momentous thing came to pass. It was at Catania that he first heard of the publication of his book. A month or more was passed in Rome in company with Manning, and together they visited Wiseman, Manning's conversion still thirteen years off. Macaulay too, now eight-and-thirty, was at Rome that winter. 'On Christmas Eve,' he says, 'I found Gladstone in the throng, and I accosted him, as we had met, though we had never been introduced to each other. We talked and walked together in St. Peter's during the best part of an afternoon. He is both a clever and an amiable man....' At Rome, as the state of his eyesight forbade too close resort to picture galleries and museums, he listened to countless sermons, all carefully recorded in his diary. Dr. Wiseman gave him a lesson in the missal. On his birthday he went with Manning to hear mass with the pope's choir, and they were placed on the bench behind the cardinals. At St. Peter's he recalled that there his first conception of the unity of the church had come into his mind, and the desire for its attainment--'an object in every human sense hopeless, but not therefore the less to be desired, for the horizon of human hope is not that of divine power and wisdom. That idea has been upon the whole, I believe, the ruling one of my life during the period that has since elapsed.' On January 19, he bade 'a reluctant adieu to the mysterious city, whither he should repair who wishes to renew for a time the dream of life.' A few years later Mr. Gladstone noted some differences between English and Italian preaching that are of interest:-- The fundamental distinction between English and Italian preaching is, I think, this: the mind of the English preacher, or reader of sermons, however impressive, is fixed mainly upon his composition, that of the Italian on his hearers. The Italian is a man applying himself by his rational and persuasive organs to men, in order to move them; the former is a man applying himself, with his best ability in many cases, to a fixed form of matter, in order to _make it_ move those whom he addresses. The action in the one case is warm, living, direct, immediate, from heart to heart; in the other it is transfused through a medium comparatively torpid. The first is surely far superior to the second in truth and reality. The preacher bears an awful message. Such messengers, if sent with authority, are too much identified with, and possessed by, that which they carry, to view it objectively during its delivery, it absorbs their very being and all its energies, they _are_ their message, and they see nothing extrinsic to themselves except those to whose hearts they desire to bring it. In truth, what we want is the following of nature, and her genial development. (March 20, Palm Sunday, '42.) II GOES ABROAD. BOOK PUBLISHED It was the end of January (1839) before Mr. Gladstone arrived in London, and by that time his work had been out for six or seven weeks.[103] On his return we may be sure that his book and its fortunes were the young author's most lively interest. Church authorities and the clergy generally, so far as he could learn, approved, many of them very warmly. The Bishop of London wrote this, and the Archbishop of Canterbury said it. It is easy to understand with what interest and delight the average churchman would welcome so serious a contribution to the good cause, so bold an effort by so skilled a hand, by lessons from history, by general principles of national probity and a national religion, and by well-digested materials gathered, as Hooker gathered his, 'from the characteristic circumstances of the time,' to support the case for ecclesiastical privilege. Anglicans of the better sort had their intellectual self-respect restored in Mr. Gladstone's book, by finding that they need no longer subsist on the dregs of Eldonian prejudice, but could sustain themselves in intellectual dignity and affluence by large thoughts and sonorous phrases upon the nature of human society as a grand whole.[104] Even unconvinced whigs who quarrelled with the arguments, admitted that the tories had found in the young member for Newark a well-read scholar, with extraordinary amplitude of mind, a man who knew what reasoning meant, and a man who knew how to write. The first chapter dealing with establishment drew forth premature praise from many who condemned the succeeding chapters setting out high notions as to the church. From both universities he had favourable accounts. 'From Scotland they are mixed; those which are most definite tend to show there is considerable soreness, at which, God knows, I am not surprised; but I have not sought nor desired it.' The Germans on the whole approved. Bunsen was exuberant; there was nobody, he said, with whom he so loved [Greek: symphilosophein kai symphilologein]; people have too much to do about themselves to have time to seek truth on its own account; the greater, therefore, the merit of the writer who forces his age to decide, whether they will serve God or Baal. Gladstone is the first man in England as to intellectual power, he cried, and he has heard higher tones than any one else in this land. The Crown Prince of Prussia sent him civil messages, and meant to have the book translated. Rogers, the poet, wrote that his mother was descended from stout nonconformists, that his father was perverted to his mother's heresies, and that therefore he himself could not be zealous in the cause; but, however that might be, of this Mr. Gladstone might be very sure, that he would love and admire the author of the book as much as ever. The Duke of Newcastle expected much satisfaction; meanwhile declared it to be a national duty to provide churches and pastors; parliament should vote even millions and millions; then dissent would uncommonly soon disappear, and a blessing would fall upon the land. Dr. Arnold told his friends how much he admired the spirit of the book throughout, how he liked the substance of half of it, how erroneous he thought the other half. Wordsworth pronounced it worthy of all attention, doubted whether the author had not gone too far about apostolical descent; but then, like the sage that he was, the poet admitted that he must know a great deal more ecclesiastical history, be better read in the Fathers, and read the book itself over again, before he could feel any right to criticise.[105] ITS RECEPTION His political leaders had as yet not spoken a word. On February 9th, Mr. Gladstone dined at Sir Robert Peel's. 'Not a word from him, Stanley, or Graham yet, even to acknowledge my poor book; but no change in manner, certainly none in Peel or Graham.' Monckton Milnes had been to Drayton, and told how the great man there had asked impatiently why anybody with so fine a career before him should go out of his way to write books. 'Sir Robert Peel,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'who was a religious man, was wholly anti-church and unclerical, and largely undogmatic. I feel that Sir R. Peel must have been quite perplexed in his treatment of me after the publication of the book, partly through his own fault, for by habit and education he was quite incapable of comprehending the movement in the church, the strength it would reach, and the exigencies it would entail. Lord Derby, I think, early began to escape from the erastian yoke which weighed upon Peel. Lord Aberdeen was, I should say, altogether enlightened in regard to it and had cast it off: so that he obtained from some the sobriquet (during his ministry) of "the presbyterian Puseyite."' Even Mr. Gladstone's best friends trembled for the effect of his ecclesiastical zeal upon his powers of political usefulness, and to the same effect was the general talk of the town. The common suspicion that the writer was doing the work of the hated Puseyites grew darker and spread further. Then in April came Macaulay's article in the _Edinburgh_, setting out with his own incomparable directness, pungency, and effect, all the arguments on the side of that popular antagonism which was rooted far less in specific reasoning than in a general anti-sacerdotal instinct that lies deep in the hearts of Englishmen. John Sterling called the famous article the assault of an equipped and practised sophist against a crude young platonist, who happens by accident to have been taught the hard and broken dialect of Aristotle rather than the deep, continuous, and musical flow of his true and ultimate master. Author and critic exchanged magnanimous letters worthy of two great and honourable men.[106] Not the least wonderful thing about Macaulay's review is that he should not have seen how many of his own most trenchant considerations told no more strongly against Mr. Gladstone's theory, than they told against that whig theory of establishment which at the end of his article he himself tried to set up in its place. Praise indeed came, and praise that no good man could have treated with indifference, from men like Keble, and it came from other quarters whence it was perhaps not quite so welcome, and not much more dangerous. He heard (March 19) that the Duke of Sussex, at Lord Durham's, had been strongly condemning the book; and by an odd contrast just after, as he was standing in conversation with George Sinclair, O'Connell with evident purpose came up and began to thank him for a most valuable work; for the doctrine of the authority of the church and infallibility in essentials--a great approximation to the church of Rome--an excellent sign in one who if he lived, etc. etc. It did not go far enough for the Roman catholic Archbishop of Tuan; but Dr. Murray, the Archbishop of Dublin, was delighted with it; he termed it an honest book, while as to the charges against romanism Mr. Gladstone was misinformed. 'I merely said I was very glad to approximate to any one on the ground of _truth_; _i.e._ rejoiced when truth immediately wrought out, in whatever degree, its own legitimate result of unity. O'Connell said he claimed half of me.... Count Montalembert came to me to-day (March 23rd), and sat long, for the purpose of ingenuously and kindly impugning certain statements in my book, viz. (1) That the peculiar tendency of the policy of romanism before the reformation went to limit in the mass of men intellectual exercise upon religion. (2) That the doctrine of purgatory adjourned until after death, more or less, the idea and practice of the practical work of religion. (3) That the Roman catholic church restricts the reading of the scriptures by the Christian people. He spoke of the evils; I contended we had a balance of good, and that the idea of duty in individuals was more developed here than in pure Roman catholic countries.' THE BOOK TOO LATE All was of no avail. 'Scarcely had my work issued from the press,' wrote Mr. Gladstone thirty years later, 'when I became aware that there was no party, no section of a party, no individual person probably, in the House of Commons, who was prepared to act upon it. I found myself the last man on a sinking ship.' Exclusive support to the established religion of the country had been the rule; 'but when I bade it live, it was just about to die. It was really a quickened, not a deadened conscience, in the country, that insisted on enlarging the circle of state support.'[107] The result was not wholly unexpected, for in the summer of 1838 while actually writing the book, he records that he 'told Pusey for himself alone, I thought my own church and state principles within one stage of being hopeless as regards success in this generation.' Another set of fragmentary notes, composed in 1894, and headed 'Some of my Errors,' contains a further passage that points in a significant direction:-- Oxford had not taught me, nor had any other place or person, the value of liberty as an essential condition of excellence in human things. True, Oxford had supplied me with the means of applying a remedy to this mischief, for she had undoubtedly infused into my mind the love of truth as a dominant and supreme motive of conduct. But this it took long to develop into its proper place and function. It may, perhaps, be thought that among these errors I ought to record the publication in 1838 of my first work, _The State in its Relation with the Church_. Undoubtedly that work was written in total disregard or rather ignorance of the conditions under which alone political action was possible in matters of religion. It involved me personally in a good deal of embarrassment.... In the sanguine fervour of youth, having now learned something about the nature of the church and its office, and noting the many symptoms of revival and reform within her borders, I dreamed that she was capable of recovering lost ground, and of bringing back the nation to unity in her communion. A notable projection from the ivory gate, 'Sed falsa ad coelum mittunt insomnia manes.'[108] From these points of view the effort seems contemptible. But I think that there is more to be said. The land was overspread with a thick curtain of prejudice. The foundations of the historic church of England, except in the minds of a few divines, were obscured. The evangelical movement, with all its virtues and merits, had the vice of individualising religion in degree perhaps unexampled, and of rendering the language of holy scripture about Mount Sion and the kingdom of heaven little better than a jargon.... To meet the demands of the coming time, it was a matter of vital necessity to cut a way through all this darkness to a clearer and more solid position. Immense progress has been made in that direction during my lifetime, and I am inclined to hope that my book imparted a certain amount of stimulus to the public mind, and made some small contribution to the needful process in its earliest stage. In the early pages of this very book, Mr. Gladstone says, that the union of church and state is to the church of secondary though great importance; _her_ foundations are on the holy hills and her condition would be no pitiable one, should she once more occupy the position that she held before the reign of Constantine.[109] Faint echo of the unforgotten lines in which Dante cries out to Constantine what woes his fatal dower to the papacy had brought down on religion and mankind.[110] In these sentences lay a germ that events were speedily to draw towards maturity, a foreshadowing of the supreme principle that neither Oxford nor any other place had yet taught him, 'the value of liberty as an essential condition of excellence in human things.' WRITES _CHURCH PRINCIPLES_ This revelation only turned his zeal for religion as the paramount issue of the time and of all times into another channel. Feeling the overwhelming strength of the tide that was running against his view of what he counted vital aspects of the church as a national institution, he next flew to the new task of working out the doctrinal mysteries that this institution embodied, and with Mr. Gladstone to work out a thing in his own mind always meant to expound and to enforce for the minds of others. His pen was to him at once as sword and as buckler; and while the book on _Church and State_, though exciting lively interest, was evidently destined to make no converts in theory and to be pretty promptly cast aside in practice, he soon set about a second work on _Church Principles_. It is true that with the tenacious instinct of a born controversialist, he still gave a good deal of time to constructing buttresses for the weaker places that had been discovered by enemies or by himself in the earlier edifice, and in 1841 he published a revised version of _Church and State_.[111] But ecclesiastical discussion was by then taking a new shape, and the fourth edition fell flat. Of _Church Principles_, we may say that it was stillborn. Lockhart said of it, that though a hazy writer, Gladstone showed himself a considerable divine, and it was a pity that he had entered parliament instead of taking orders. The divinity, however, did not attract. The public are never very willing to listen to a political layman discussing the arcana of theology, and least of all were they inclined to listen to him about the new-found arcana of anglo-catholic theology. As Macaulay said, this time it was a theological treatise, not an essay upon important questions of government; and the intrepid reviewer rightly sought a more fitting subject for his magician's gifts in the dramatists of the Restoration. Newman said of it, 'Gladstone's book is not open to the objections I feared; it is doctrinaire, and (I think) somewhat self-confident; but it will do good.' III A few sentences more will set before us the earliest of his transitions, and its gradual dates. He is writing about the first election at Newark:-- It was a curious piece of experience to a youth in his twenty-third year, young of his age, who had seen little or nothing of the world, who resigned himself to politics, but whose desire had been for the ministry of God. The remains of this desire operated unfortunately. They made me tend to glorify in an extravagant manner and degree not only the religious character of the state, which in reality stood low, but also the religious mission of the conservative party. There was in my eyes a certain element of Antichrist in the Reform Act, and that act was cordially hated, though the leaders soon perceived that there would be no step backward. It was only under the second government of Sir Robert Peel that I learned how impotent and barren was the conservative office for the church, though that government was formed of men able, upright, and extremely well-disposed. It was well for me that the unfolding destiny carried me off in a considerable degree from political ecclesiasticism of which I should at that time have made a sad mess. Providence directed that my mind should find its food in other pastures than those in which my youthfulness would have loved to seek it. I went beyond the general views of the tory party in state churchism, ... it was my opinion that as to religions other than those of the state, the state should tolerate only and not pay. So I was against salaries for prison chaplains not of the church, and I applied a logic plaster to all difficulties.... So that Macaulay ... was justified in treating me as belonging to the ultra section of the tories, had he limited himself to ecclesiastical questions. In 1840, when he received Manning's imprimatur for _Church Principles_, he notes how hard the time and circumstances were in which he had to steer his little bark. 'But the polestar is clear. Reflection shows me that a political position is mainly valuable as instrumental for the good of the church, and under this rule every question becomes one of detail only.' By 1842 reflection had taken him a step further:-- I now approach the _mezzo del cammin_; my years glide away. It is time to look forward to the close, and I do look forward. My life ... has two prospective objects, for which I hope the performance of my present public duties may, if not qualify, yet extrinsically enable me. One, the adjustment of certain relations of the church to the state. Not that I think the action of the latter can be harmonised to the laws of the former. We have passed the point at which that was possible.... But it would be much if the state would honestly aim at enabling the church to develop her own intrinsic means. To this I look. The second is, unfolding the catholic system within her in some establishment or machinery looking both towards the higher life, and towards the external warfare against ignorance and depravity. INTERNAL CONFLICT In the autumn of 1843, Mr. Gladstone explains to his father the relative positions of secular and church affairs in his mind, and this is only a few months after what to most men is the absorbing moment of accession to cabinet and its responsibilities. 'I contemplate secular affairs,' he says, 'chiefly as a means of being useful in church affairs, though I likewise think it right and prudent not to meddle in church matters for any small reason. I am not making known anything new to you.... These were the sentiments with which I entered public life, and although I do not at all repent of [having entered it, and] am not disappointed in the character of the employments it affords, certainly the experience of them in no way and at no time has weakened my original impressions.' At the end of 1843 he reached what looked like a final stage:-- Of public life, I certainly must say, every year shows me more and more that the idea of Christian politics cannot be realised in the state according to its present conditions of existence. For purposes sufficient, I believe, but partial and finite, I am more than content to be where I am. But the perfect freedom of the new covenant can only, it seems to me, be breathed in other air; and the day may come when God may grant to me the application of this conviction to myself. FOOTNOTES: [98] Hanna's _Life of Chalmers_, iv. pp. 37-46. [99] Ovid, _Met._ i. 5.--Chaos, before sea and land and all-covering skies. [100] _Excursion_, v. [101] _Memoirs of J. R. Hope-Scott_, i. p. 150, where an adequate portion of the correspondence is to be found. [102] He wrote an extremely graphic account of their ascent of Mount Etna, which has since found a place in Murray's handbook for Sicily. [103] Of the first edition some 1500 or 1750 copies were sold. [104] _Memoirs of J. R. Hope-Scott_, i. p. 172. [105] Carlyle wrote to Emerson (Feb. 8, 1839): One of the strangest things about these New England Orations (Emerson's) is a fact I have heard, but not yet seen, that a certain W. Gladstone, an Oxford crack scholar, tory M.P., and devout churchman of great talent and hope, has contrived to insert a piece of you (_first_ Oration it must be) in a work of his own on _Church and State_, which, makes some figure at present! I know him for a solid, serious, silent-minded man; but how with his Coleridge shovel-hattism he has contrived to relate himself to _you_, there is the mystery. True men of all creeds, it _would_ seem, are brothers.--_Correspondence of Carlyle and Emerson_, i. p. 217. There is more than one reference to Emerson in Mr. Gladstone's book, _e.g._ i. pp. 25, 130. [106] The letters are given in full in _Gleanings_, vii. p. 106. See also Trevelyan's _Macaulay_, chap. viii. [107] Chapter of Autobiography, 1868.--_Gleanings_, vii. p. 115. [108] _Aeneid_, vi. 896. But through the ivory gate the shades send to the upper air apparitions that do but cheat us. [109] Chapter i. p. 5. [110] _Inferno_, xix. 115-7. [111] It was translated into German and published, with a preface by Tholuck, in 1843. CHAPTER VI CHARACTERISTICS (_1840_) Be inspired with the belief that life is a great and noble calling; not a mean and grovelling thing that we are to shuffle through as we can, but an elevated and lofty destiny.--GLADSTONE.[112] It is the business of biography to depict a physiognomy and not to analyse a type. In our case there is all the more reason to think of this, because type hardly applies to a figure like Gladstone's, without any near or distant parallel, and composed of so many curious dualisms and unforeseen affinities. Truly was it said of Fénelon, that half of him would be a great man, and would stand out more clearly as a great man than does the whole, because it would be simpler. So of Mr. Gladstone. We are dazzled by the endless versatility of his mind and interests as man of action, scholar, and controversial athlete; as legislator, administrator, leader of the people; as the strongest of his time in the main branches of executive force, strongest in persuasive force; supreme in the exacting details of national finance; master of the parliamentary arts; yet always living in the noble visions of the moral and spiritual idealist. This opulence, vivacity, profusion, and the promise of it all in these days of early prime, made an awakening impression even on his foremost contemporaries. The impression might have been easier to reproduce, if he had been less infinitely mobile. 'I cannot explain my own foundation,' Fénelon said; 'it escapes me; it seems to change every hour.' How are we to seek an answer to the same question in the history of Mr. Gladstone? II INTERNAL CONFLICT His physical vitality--his faculties of free energy, endurance, elasticity--was a superb endowment to begin with. We may often ask for ourselves and others: How many of a man's days does he really live? However men may judge the fruit it bore, Mr. Gladstone lived in vigorous activity every day through all his years. Time showed that he was born with a frame of steel. Though, unlike some men of heroic strength--Napoleon for example--he often knew fatigue and weariness, yet his organs never failed to answer the call of an intense and persistent Will. As we have already seen, in early manhood his eyes gave him much trouble, and he both learned by heart and composed a good deal of verse by way of sparing them. He was a great walker, and at this time he was a sportsman, as his diary has shown. 'My object in shooting, ill as I do it, is the invigorating and cheering exercise, which does so much for health (1842).' One day this year (Sept. 13, '42) while out shooting, the second barrel of a gun went off while he was reloading, shattering the forefinger of his left hand. The remains of the finger the surgeons removed. 'I have hardly ever in my life,' he says, 'had to endure serious bodily pain, and this was short.' In 1845, he notes, 'a hard day. What a mercy that my strength, in appearance not remarkable, so little fails me.' In the autumn of 1853 he was able to record, 'Eight or nine days of bed illness, the longest since I had the scarlet fever at nine or ten years old.' It was the same all through. His bodily strength was in fact to prove extraordinary, and was no secondary element in the long and strenuous course now opening before him. Not second to vigour of physical organisation--perhaps, if we only knew all the secrets of mind and matter, even connected with this vigour--was strength and steadfastness of Will. Character, as has been often repeated, is completely fashioned will, and this superlative requirement, so indispensable for every man of action in whatever walk and on whatever scale, was eminently Mr. Gladstone's. From force of will, with all its roots in habit, example, conviction, purpose, sprang his leading and most effective qualities. He was never very ready to talk about himself, but when asked what he regarded as his master secret, he always said, '_Concentration_.' Slackness of mind, vacuity of mind, the wheels of the mind revolving without biting the rails of the subject, were insupportable. Such habits were of the family of faintheartedness, which he abhorred. Steady practice of instant, fixed, effectual attention, was the key alike to his rapidity of apprehension and to his powerful memory. In the orator's temperament exertion is often followed by a reaction that looks like indolence. This was never so with him. By instinct, by nature, by constitution, he was a man of action in all the highest senses of a phrase too narrowly applied and too narrowly construed. The currents of daimonic energy seemed never to stop, the vivid susceptibility to impressions never to grow dull. He was an idealist, yet always applying ideals to their purposes in act. Toil was his native element; and though he found himself possessed of many inborn gifts, he was never visited by the dream so fatal to many a well-laden argosy, that genius alone does all. There was nobody like him when it came to difficult business, for bending his whole strength to it, like a mighty archer stringing a stiff bow. FORCE OF WILL AND POWER OR TOIL Sir James Graham said of him in these years that Gladstone could do in four hours what it took any other man sixteen to do, and he worked sixteen hours a day. When I came to know him long years after, he told me that he thought when in office in the times that our story is now approaching, fourteen hours were a common tale. Nor was it mere mechanic industry; it was hard labour, exact, strenuous, engrossing rigorous. No Hohenzollern soldier held with sterner regularity to the duties of his post. Needless to add that he had a fierce regard for the sanctity of time, although in the calling of the politician it is harder than in any other to be quite sure when time is well spent, and when wasted. His supreme economy here, like many other virtues, carried its own defect, and coupled with his constitutional eagerness and his quick susceptibility, it led at all periods of his life to some hurry. The tumult of business, he says one year in his diary, 'follows and whirls me day and night.' He speaks once in 1844 of 'a day restless as the sea.' There were many such. That does not mean, and has nothing to do with, 'proud precipitance of soul,' nor haste in forming pregnant resolves. Here he was deliberate enough, and in the ordinary conduct of life even minor things were objects of scrutiny and calculation, far beyond the habit of most men. For he was lowlander as well as highlander. But a vast percentage of his letters from boyhood onwards contain apologies for haste. More than once when his course was nearly run, he spoke of his life having been passed in 'unintermittent hurry,' just as Mill said, he had never been in a hurry in his life until he entered parliament, and then he had never been out of a hurry. It was no contradiction that deep and constant in him, along with this vehement turn for action, was a craving for tranquil collection of himself that seemed almost monastic. To Mrs. Gladstone he wrote a couple of years after their marriage (Dec. 13, 1841):-- You interpret so indulgently what I mean about the necessity of quiescence at home during the parliamentary session, that I need not say much; and yet I think my doctrine must _seem_ so strange that I wish again and again to state how entirely it is different from anything like disparagement, of George for example. It is always relief and always delight to see and to be with you; and you would, I am sure, be glad to know, how near Mary [Lady Lyttelton] comes as compared with others to you, as respects what I can hardly describe in few words, my mental rest, when she is present. But there is no _man_ however near to me, with whom I am fit to be habitually, when hard worked. I have told you how reluctant I have always found myself to detail to my father on coming home, when I lived with him, what had been going on in the House of Commons. Setting a tired mind to work is like making a man run up and down stairs when his limbs are weary. If he sometimes recalls a fiery hero of the _Iliad_, at other times he is the grave and studious benedictine, but whether in quietude or movement, always a man with a purpose and never the loiterer or lounger, never apathetic, never a sufferer from that worst malady of the human soul--from cheerlessness and cold. We need not take him through a phrenological table of elements, powers, faculties, leanings, and propensities. Very early, as we shall soon see, Mr. Gladstone gave marked evidence of that sovereign quality of Courage which became one of the most signal of all his traits. He used to say that he had known three men in his time possessing in a supreme degree the virtue of parliamentary courage--Peel, Lord John Russell, and Disraeli. To some other contemporaries for whom courage might be claimed, he stoutly denied it. Nobody ever dreamed of denying it to him, whether parliamentary courage or any other, in either its active or its passive shape, either in daring or in fortitude. He had even the courage to be prudent, just as he knew when it was prudent to be bold. He applied in public things the Spenserian line, '_Be bold, be bold, and everywhere be bold_,' but neither did he forget the iron door with its admonition, '_Be not too bold_.' The great Condé, when complimented on his courage, always said that he took good care never to call upon it unless the occasion were absolutely necessary. No more did Mr. Gladstone go out of his way to summon courage for its own sake, but only when spurred by duty; then he knew no faltering. Capable of much circumspection, yet soon he became known for a man of lion heart. MEASURE OF HIS GIFTS Nature had bestowed on him many towering gifts. Whether Humour was among them, his friends were wont to dispute. That he had a gaiety and sympathetic alacrity of mind that was near of kin to humour, nobody who knew him would deny. Of playfulness his speeches give a thousand proofs; of drollery and fun he had a ready sense, though it was not always easy to be quite sure beforehand what sort of jest would hit or miss. For irony, save in its lighter forms as weapon in debate, he had no marked taste or turn. But he delighted in good comedy, and he reproached me severely for caring less than one ought to do for the _Merry Wives of Windsor_. Had he Imagination? In its high literary and poetic form he rose to few conspicuous flights--such, for example, as Burke's descent of Hyder Ali upon the Carnatic--in vast and fantastic conceptions such as arose from time to time in the brain of Napoleon, he had no part or lot. But in force of moral and political imagination, in bold, excursive range, in the faculty of illuminating practical and objective calculations with lofty ideals of the strength of states, the happiness of peoples, the whole structure of good government, he has had no superior among the rulers of England. His very ardour of temperament gave him imagination; he felt as if everybody who listened to him in a great audience was equally fired with his own energy of sympathy, indignation, conviction, and was transported by the same emotion that thrilled through himself. All this, however, did not fully manifest itself at this time, nor for some years to come. Strength of will found scope for exercise where some would not discover the need for it. In native capacity for righteous Anger he abounded. The flame soon kindled, and it was no fire of straw; but it did not master him. Mrs. Gladstone once said to me (1891), that whoever writes his life must remember that he had two sides--one impetuous, impatient, irrestrainable, the other all self-control, able to dismiss all but the great central aim, able to put aside what is weakening or disturbing; that he achieved this self-mastery, and had succeeded in the struggle ever since he was three or four and twenty, first by the natural power of his character, and second by incessant wrestling in prayer--prayer that had been abundantly answered. Problems of compromise are of the essence of the parliamentary and cabinet system, and for some years at any rate he was more than a little restive when they confronted him. Though in the time to come he had abundant difference with colleagues, he had all the virtues needed for political co-operation, as Cobden, Bright, and Mill had them, nor did he ever mistake for courage or independence the unhappy preference for having a party or an opinion exclusively to one's self. 'What is wanted above all things,' he said, 'in the business of joint counsel, is the faculty of making many one, of throwing the mind into the common stock.'[113] This was a favourite phrase with him for that power of working with other people, without which a man would do well to stand aside from public affairs. He used to say that of all the men he had ever known, Sir George Grey had most of this capacity for throwing his mind into joint stock. The demands of joint stock he never took to mean the quenching of the duty in a man to have a mind of his own. He was always amused by the recollection of somebody at Oxford--'a regius professor of divinity, I am sorry to say'--who was accustomed to define taste as 'a faculty of coinciding with the opinion of the majority.' Hard as he strove for a broad basis in general theory and high abstract principle, yet always aiming at practical ends he kept in sight the opportune. Nobody knew better the truth, so disastrously neglected by politicians who otherwise would be the very salt of the earth, that not all questions are for all times. 'For my part,' Mr. Gladstone said, 'I have not been so happy, at any time of my life, as to be able sufficiently to adjust the proper conditions of handling any difficult question, until the question itself was at the door.'[114] He could not readily apply himself to topics outside of those with which he chanced at the moment to be engrossed:--'Can you not wait? Is it necessary to consider now?' That was part of his concentration. Nor did he fly at a piece of business, deal with it, then let it fall from his grasp. It became part of him. If circumstances brought it again into his vicinity, they found him instantly ready, with a prompt continuity that is no small element of power in public business. How little elastic and self-confident at heart he was in some of his moods in early manhood, we discern in the curious language of a letter to his brother-in-law Lyttelton in 1840:-- It is my nature to lean not so much on the applause as upon the assent of others to a degree which perhaps I do not show, from that sense of weakness and utter inadequacy to my work which never ceases to attend me while I am engaged upon these subjects.... I wish you knew the state of total impotence to which I should be reduced if there were no echo to the accents of my own voice. I go through my labour, such as it is, not by a genuine elasticity of spirit, but by a plodding movement only just able to contend with inert force, and in the midst of a life which indeed has little claim to be called active, yet is broken this way and that into a thousand small details, certainly unfavourable to calm and continuity of thought. Here we have a glimpse of a singular vein peculiarly rare in ardent genius at thirty, but disclosing its traces in Mr. Gladstone even in his ripest years. AS ORATOR Was this the instinct of the orator? For it was in the noble arts of oratory that nature had been most lavish, and in them he rose to be consummate. The sympathy and assent of which he speaks are a part of oratorical inspiration, and even if such sympathy be but superficial, the highest efforts of oratorical genius take it for granted. 'The work of the orator,' he once wrote, 'from its very inception is inextricably mixed up with practice. It is cast in the mould offered to him by the mind of his hearers. It is an influence principally received from his audience (so to speak) in vapour, which he pours back upon them in a flood. The sympathy and concurrence of his time, is, with his own mind, joint parent of the work. He cannot follow nor frame ideals: his choice is, to be what his age will have him, what it requires in order to be moved by him; or else not to be at all.'[115] Among Mr. Gladstone's physical advantages for bearing the orator's sceptre were a voice of singular fulness, depth, and variety of tone; a falcon's eye with strange imperious flash; features mobile, expressive, and with lively play; a great actor's command of gesture, bold, sweeping, natural, unforced, without exaggeration or a trace of melodrama. His pose was easy, alert, erect. To these endowments of external mien was joined the gift and the glory of words. They were not sought, they came. Whether the task were reasoning or exposition or expostulation, the copious springs never failed. Nature had thus done much for him, but he superadded ungrudging labour. Later in life he proffered to a correspondent a set of suggestions on the art of speaking:-- 1. Study plainness of language, always preferring the simpler word. 2. Shortness of sentences. 3. Distinctness of articulation. 4. Test and question your own arguments beforehand, not waiting for critic or opponent. 5. Seek a thorough digestion of, and familiarity with, your subject, and rely mainly on these to prompt the proper words. 6. Remember that if you are to sway an audience you must besides thinking out your matter, watch them all along.--(March 20, 1875.) The first and second of these rules hardly fit his own style. Yet he had seriously studied from early days the devices of a speaker's training. I find copied into a little note-book many of the precepts and maxims of Quintilian on the making of an orator. So too from Cicero's _De Oratore_, including the words put into the mouth of Catulus, that nobody can attain the glory of eloquence without the height of zeal and toil and knowledge.[116] Zeal and toil and knowledge, working with an inborn faculty of powerful expression--here was the double clue. He never forgot the Ciceronian truth that the orator is not made by the tongue alone, as if it were a sword sharpened on a whetstone or hammered on an anvil; but by having a mind well filled with a free supply of high and various matter.[117] His eloquence was 'inextricably mixed up with practice.' An old whig listening to one of his budget speeches, said with a touch of bitterness, 'Ah, Oxford on the surface, but Liverpool below.' No bad combination. He once had a lesson from Sir Robert Peel. Mr. Gladstone, being about to reply in debate, turned to his chief and said: 'Shall I be short and concise?' 'No,' was the answer, 'be long and diffuse. It is all important in the House of Commons to state your case in many different ways, so as to produce an effect on men of many ways of thinking.' In discussing Macaulay, Sir Francis Baring, an able and unbiassed judge, advised a junior (1860) about patterns for the parliamentary aspirant:--'Gladstone is to my mind a much better model for speaking; I mean he is happier in joining great eloquence and selection of words and rhetoric, if you will, with a style not a bit above debate. It does not smell of the oil. Of course there has been plenty of labour, and that not of to-day but during a whole life.' Nothing could be truer. Certainly for more than the first forty years of his parliamentary existence, he cultivated a style not above debate, though it was debate of incomparable force and brilliance. When simpletons say, as if this were to dispose of every higher claim for him, that he worked all his wonders by his gifts as orator, do they ever think what power over such an assembly as the House of Commons signifies? Here--and it was not until he had been for thirty years and more in parliament that he betook himself largely to the efforts of the platform--here he was addressing men of the world, some of them the flower of English education and intellectual accomplishment; experts in all the high practical lines of life, bankers, merchants, lawyers, captains of industry in every walk; men trained in the wide experience and high responsibilities of public office; lynx-eyed rivals and opponents. Is this the scene, or were these the men, for the triumphs of the barren rhetorician and the sophist, whose words have no true relation to the facts? Where could general mental strength be better tested? As a matter of history most of those who have held the place of leading minister in the House of Commons have hardly been orators at all, any more than Washington and Jefferson were orators. Mr. Gladstone conquered the house, because he was saturated with a subject and its arguments; because he could state and enforce his case; because he plainly believed every word he said, and earnestly wished to press the same belief into the minds of his hearers; finally because he was from the first an eager and a powerful athlete. The man who listening to his adversary asks of his contention, 'Is this true?' is a lost debater; just as a soldier would be lost who on the day of battle should bethink him that the enemy's cause might after all perhaps be just. The debater does not ask, 'Is this true?' He asks, 'What is the answer to this? How can I most surely floor him?' Lord Coleridge inquired of Mr. Gladstone whether he ever felt nervous in public speaking: 'In opening a subject often,' Mr. Gladstone answered, 'in reply never.' Yet with this inborn readiness for combat, nobody was less addicted to aggression or provocation. It was with him a salutary maxim that, if you have unpalatable opinions to declare, you should not make them more unpalatable by the way of expressing them. In his earlier years he did not often speak with passion. 'This morning,' a famous divine once said, 'I preached a sermon all flames.' Mr. Gladstone sometimes made speeches of that cast, but not frequently, I think, until the seventies. Meanwhile he impressed the House by his nobility, his sincerity, his simplicity; for there is plenty of evidence besides Mr. Gladstone's case, that simplicity of character is no hindrance to subtlety of intellect. Contemporaries in these opening years describe his parliamentary manners as much in his favour. His countenance, they say, is mild and pleasant, and has a high intellectual expression. His eyes are clear and quick. His eyebrows are dark and rather prominent. There is not a dandy in the House but envies his fine head of jet-black hair. Mr. Gladstone's gesture is varied, but not violent. When he rises, he generally puts both his hands behind his back, and having there suffered them to embrace each other for a short time, he unclasps them, and allows them to drop on either side. They are not permitted to remain long in that locality before you see them again closed together, and hanging down before him.[118] Other critics say that his air and voice are too abstract, and 'you catch the sound as though he were communing with himself. It is as though you saw a bright picture through a filmy veil. His countenance, without being strictly handsome, is highly intellectual. His pale complexion, slightly tinged with olive, and dark hair, cut rather close to his head, with an eye of remarkable depth, still more impress you with the abstracted character of his disposition. The expression of his face would be sombre were it not for the striking eye, which has a remarkable fascination. His triumphs as a debater are achieved not by the aid of the passions, as with Sir James Graham, or with Mr. Sheil; not of prejudice and fallacy, as with Robert Peel; not with imagination and high seductive colouring, as with Mr. Macaulay: but--of pure reason. He prevails by that subdued earnestness which results from deep religious feelings, and is not fitted for the more usual and more stormy functions of a public speaker.'[119] III ACTION HIS FIELD We are not to think of him as prophet, seer, poet, founder of a system, or great born man of letters like Gibbon, Macaulay, Carlyle. Of these characters he was none, though he had warmth and height of genius to comprehend the value of them all, and--what was more curious--his oratory and his acts touched them and their work in such a way that men were always tempted to apply to him standards that belonged to them. His calling was a different one, and he was wont to appraise it lower. His field lay 'in working the institutions of his country.' Whether he would have played a part as splendid in the position of a high ruling ecclesiastic, if the times had allowed such a personage, we cannot tell; perhaps he had not 'imperious immobility' enough. Nor whether he would have made a judge of the loftier order; perhaps his mind was too addicted to subtle distinctions, and not likely to give a solid adherence to broad principles of law. A superb advocate? An evangelist, as irresistible as Wesley or as Whitefield? What matters it? All agree that more magnificent power of mind was never placed at the service of the British Senate. His letters to his father from 1832 onwards show all the interest of a keen young member in his calling, though they contain few anecdotes, or tales, or vivid social traits. 'Of political gossip,' he admits to his father (1843), 'you always find me barren enough.' What comes out in all his letters to his kinsfolk is his unbounded willingness to take trouble in order to spare others. Even in prolonged and intricate money transactions, of which we shall see something latertransactions of all others the most apt to produce irritation--not an accent of impatience or dispute escapes him, though the guarded firmness of his language marks the steadfast self-control. We may say of Mr. Gladstone that nobody ever had less to repent of from that worst waste in human life that comes of unkindness. Kingsley noticed, with some wonder, how he never allowed the magnitude and multiplicity of his labours to excuse him from any of the minor charities and courtesies of life. Active hatred of cruelty, injustice, and oppression is perhaps the main difference between a good man and a bad one; and here Mr. Gladstone was sublime. Yet though anger burned fiercely in him over wrong, nobody was more chary of passing moral censures. What he said of himself in 1842, when he was three and thirty, held good to the end:-- Nothing grows upon me so much with lengthening life as the sense of the difficulties, or rather the impossibilities, with which we are beset whenever we attempt to take to ourselves the functions of the Eternal Judge (except in reference to ourselves where judgment is committed to us), and to form any accurate idea of relative merit and demerit, good and evil, in actions. The shades of the rainbow are not so nice, and the sands of the sea-shore are not such a multitude, as are all the subtle, shifting, blending forms of thought and of circumstances that go to determine the character of us and of our acts. But there is One that seeth plainly and judgeth righteously. HIS SILENCES This was only one side of Mr. Gladstone's many silences. To talk of the silences of the most copious and incessant speaker and writer of his time may seem a paradox. Yet in this fluent orator, this untiring penman, this eager and most sociable talker at the dinner-table or on friendly walks, was a singular faculty of self-containment and reserve. Quick to notice, as he was, and acutely observant of much that might have been expected to escape him, he still kept as much locked up within as he so liberally gave out. Bulwer Lytton was at one time, as is well known, addicted to the study of mediæval magic, occult power, and the conjunctions of the heavenly bodies; and among other figures he one day amused himself by casting the horoscope of Mr. Gladstone (1860). To him the astrologer's son sent it. Like most of such things, the horoscope has one or two ingenious hits and a dozen nonsensical misses. But one curious sentence declares Mr. Gladstone to be '_at heart a solitary man_.' Here I have often thought that the stars knew what they were about. Whether Mr. Gladstone ever became what is called a good judge of men it would be hard to say. Such characters are not common even among parliamentary leaders. They do not always care to take the trouble. The name is too commonly reserved for those who think dubiously or downright ill of their fellow-creatures. Those who are accustomed to make most of knowing men, do their best to convince us that men are hardly worth knowing. This was not Mr. Gladstone's way. Like Lord Aberdeen, he had a marked habit of believing people; it was part of his simplicity. His life was a curious union of ceaseless contention and inviolable charity--a true charity, having nothing in common with a lazy spirit of unconcern. He knew men well enough, at least, to have found out that none gains such ascendency over them as he who appeals to what is the nobler part in human nature. Nestors of the whigs used to wonder how so much imagination, invention, courage, knowledge, diligence--all the qualities that seem to make an orator and a statesman--could be neutralised by the want of a sound overruling judgment. They said that Gladstone's faculties were like an army without a general, or a jury without guidance from the bench.[120] Yet when the time came, this army without a general won the crowning victories of the epoch, and for twenty years the chief findings of this jury without a judge proved to be the verdicts of the nation. It is not easy for those less extraordinarily constituted, to realise the vigour of soul that maintained an inner life in all its absorbing exaltation day after day, year after year, decade after decade, amid the ever-swelling rush of urgent secular affairs. Immersed in active responsibility for momentous secular things, he never lost the breath of what was to him a diviner aether. Habitually he strove for the lofty uplands where political and moral ideas meet. Even in those days he struck all who came into contact with him by a goodness and elevation that matched the activity and power of his mind. His political career might seem doubtful, but there was no doubt about the man. One of the most interesting of his notes about his own growth is this:-- There was a singular slowness in the development of my mind, so far as regarded its opening into the ordinary aptitudes of the man of the world. For years and years well into advanced middle life, I seem to have considered actions simply as they were in themselves, and did not take into account the way in which they would be taken and understood by others. I did not perceive that their natural or probable effect upon minds other than my own formed part of the considerations determining the propriety of each act in itself, and not unfrequently, at any rate in public life, supplied the decisive criterion to determine what ought and what ought not to be done. In truth the dominant tendencies of my mind were those of a recluse, and I might, in most respects with ease, have accommodated myself to the education of the cloister. All the mental apparatus requisite to constitute the 'public man' had to be purchased by a slow experience and inserted piecemeal into the composition of my character. Lord Malmesbury describes himself in 1844 as curious to see Mr. Gladstone, 'for he is a man much spoken of as one who will come to the front.' He was greatly disappointed at his personal appearance, 'which is that of a Roman catholic ecclesiastic, but he is very agreeable.'[121] Few men can have been more perplexed, and few perhaps more perplexing, as the social drama of the capital was in time unfolded to his gaze. There he beheld the glitter of rank and station, and palaces, and men and women bearing famous names; worlds within worlds, high diplomatic figures, the partisan leaders, the constant stream of agitated rumours about weighty affairs in England and Europe; the keen play of ambition, passions, interests, under easy manners and fugitive pleasantry; gross and sordid aims, as King Hudson was soon to find out, masked by exterior refinement; so much kindness with a free spice of criticism and touches of ill-nature; so much of the governing force of England still gathered into a few great houses, exclusive and full of pride, and yet, after the astounding discovery that in spite of the deluge of the Reform bill they were still alive as the directing class, always so open to political genius if likely to climb, and help them to climb, into political power. These were the last high days of the undisputed sway of territorial aristocracy in England. The artificial scene was gay and captivating; but much in it was well fitted to make serious people wonder. Queen Victoria was assuredly not of the harsh fibre of the misanthropist in Molière's fine comedy; yet she once said a strange and deep thing to an archbishop. 'As I get older,' she said, 'I cannot understand the world. I cannot comprehend its littlenesses. When I look at the frivolities and littlenesses, _it seems to me as if they were all a little mad_.'[122] THE SOCIAL DRAMA This was the stage on which Mr. Gladstone, with 'the dominant tendencies of a recluse' and a mind that might easily have been 'accommodated to the cloister,' came to play his part,--in which he was 'by a slow experience' to insert piecemeal the mental apparatus proper to the character of the public man. Yet it was not among the booths and merchandise and hubbub of Vanity Fair, it was among strata in the community but little recognised as yet, that he was to find the field and the sources of his highest power. His view of the secular world was never fastidious or unmanly. Looking back upon his long experience of it he wrote (1894):-- That political life considered as a profession has great dangers for the inner and true life of the human being, is too obvious. It has, however, some redeeming qualities. In the first place, I have never known, and can hardly conceive, a finer school of temper than the House of Commons. A lapse in this respect is on the instant an offence, a jar, a wound, to every member of the assembly; and it brings its own punishment on the instant, like the sins of the Jews under the old dispensation. Again, I think the imperious nature of the subjects, their weight and force, demanding the entire strength of a man and all his faculties, leave him no residue, at least for the time, to apply to self-regard; no more than there is for a swimmer swimming for his life. He must, too, in retrospect feel himself to be so very small in comparison with the themes and the interests of which he has to treat. It is a further advantage if his occupation be not mere debate, but debate ending in work. For in this way, whether the work be legislative or administrative, it is continually tested by results, and he is enabled to strip away his extravagant anticipations, his fallacious conceptions, to perceive his mistakes, and to reduce his estimates to the reality. No politician has any excuse for being vain. Like the stoic emperor, Mr. Gladstone had in his heart the feeling that the man is a runaway who deserts the exercise of civil reason. IV RELIGION THE MAINSPRING All his activities were in his own mind one. This, we can hardly repeat too often, is the fundamental fact of Mr. Gladstone's history. Political life was only part of his religious life. It was religion that prompted his literary life. It was religious motive that, through a thousand avenues and channels stirred him and guided him in his whole conception of active social duty, including one pitiful field of which I may say something later. The liberalism of the continent at this epoch was in its essence either hostile to Christianity or else it was indifferent; and when men like Lamennais tried to play at the same time the double part of tribune of the people and catholic theocrat, they failed. The old world of pope and priest and socialist and red cap of liberty fought on as before. In England, too, the most that can be said of the leading breed of the political reformers of that half century, with one or two most notable exceptions, is that they were theists, and not all of them were even so much as theists.[123] If liberalism had continued to run in the grooves cut by Bentham, James Mill, Grote, and the rest, Mr. Gladstone would never have grown to be a liberal. He was not only a fervid practising Christian; he was a Christian steeped in the fourth century, steeped in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Every man of us has all the centuries in him, though their operations be latent, dim, and very various; in his case the roots were as unmistakeable as the leafage, the blossom, and the fruits. A little later than the date with which we are now dealing (May 9, 1854)--and here the date matters little, for the case was always the same--he noted what in hours of strain and crisis the Bible was to him:-- On most occasions of very sharp pressure or trial, some word of scripture has come home to me as if borne on angels' wings. Many could I recollect. The Psalms are the great storehouse. Perhaps I should put some down now, for the continuance of memory is not to be trusted. 1. In the winter of 1837, Psalm 128. This came in a most singular manner, but it would be a long story to tell. 2. In the Oxford contest of 1847 (which was very harrowing) the verse--'O Lord God, Thou strength of my health, Thou hast covered my head in the day of battle.' 3. In the Gorham contest, after the judgment: 'And though all this be come upon us, yet do we not forget Thee; nor behave ourselves frowardly in Thy covenant. Our heart is not turned back; neither our steps gone out of Thy way. No not when Thou hast smitten us into the place of dragons: and covered us with the shadow of death.' 4. On Monday, April 17, 1853 [his first budget speech], it was: 'O turn Thee then unto me, and have mercy upon me: give Thy strength unto Thy servant, and help the son of Thine handmaid.' Last Sunday [Crimean war budget] it was not from the Psalms for the day: 'Thou shalt prepare a table before me against them that trouble me; Thou hast anointed my head with oil and my cup shall be full.' In that stage at least he had shaken off none of the grip of tradition, in which his book and college training had placed him. His mind still had greater faith in things because Aristotle or Augustine said them, than because they are true.[124] If the end of education be to teach independence of mind, the Socratic temper, the love of pushing into unexplored areas--intellectual curiosity in a word--Oxford had done none of all this for him. In every field of thought and life he started from the principle of authority; it fitted in with his reverential instincts, his temperament, above all, his education. PLACE OF DANTE IN HIS MIND The lifelong enthusiasm for Dante should on no account in this place be left out. In Mr. Gladstone it was something very different from casual dilettantism or the accident of a scholar's taste. He was always alive to the grandeur of Goethe's words, _Im Ganzen, Guten, Wahren, resolut zu leben_, 'In wholeness, goodness, truth, strenuously to live.' But it was in Dante--active politician and thinker as well as poet--that he found this unity of thought and coherence of life, not only illuminated by a sublime imagination, but directly associated with theology, philosophy, politics, history, sentiment, duty. Here are all the elements and interests that lie about the roots of the life of a man, and of the general civilisation of the world. This ever memorable picture of the mind and heart of Europe in the great centuries of the catholic age,--making heaven the home of the human soul, presenting the natural purposes of mankind in their universality of good and evil, exalted and mean, piteous and hateful, tragedy and farce, all commingled as a living whole,--was exactly fitted to the quality of a genius so rich and powerful as Mr. Gladstone's in the range of its spiritual intuitions and in its masculine grasp of all the complex truths of mortal nature. So true and real a book is it, he once said,--such a record of practical humanity and of the discipline of the soul amidst its wonderful poetical intensity and imaginative power. In him this meant no spurious revivalism, no flimsy and fantastic affectation. It was the real and energetic discovery in the vivid conception and commanding structure of Dante, of a light, a refuge, and an inspiration in the labours of the actual world. 'You have been good enough,' he once wrote to an Italian correspondent (1883), 'to call that supreme poet "a solemn master" for me. These are not empty words. The reading of Dante is not merely a pleasure, a _tour de force_, or a lesson; it is a vigorous discipline for the heart, the intellect, the whole man. In the school of Dante I have learned a great part of that mental provision (however insignificant it may be) which has served me to make the journey of human life up to the term of nearly seventy-three years.' He once asked of an accomplished woman possessing a scholar's breadth of reading, what poetry she most lived with. She named Dante for one. 'But what of Dante?' 'The Paradiso,' she replied. 'Ah, that is right,' he exclaimed, 'that's my test.' In the Paradiso it was, that he saw in beams of crystal radiance the ideal of the unity of the religious mind, the love and admiration for the high unseen things of which the Christian church was to him the sovereign embodiment. The mediæval spirit, it is true, wears something of a ghostly air in the light of our new day. This attempt, which has been made many a time before, 'to unify two ages,' did not carry men far in the second half of the nineteenth century. Nevertheless it were an idle dream to think that the dead hand of Dante's century, and all that it represented, is no longer to be taken into account by those who would be governors of men. Meanwhile, let us observe once more that the statesman who had drunk most deeply from the mediæval fountains was yet one of the supreme leaders of his own generation in a notable stage of the long transition from mediæval to modern. 'At Oxford,' he records, 'I read Rousseau's _Social Contract_ which had no influence upon me, and the writings of Burke which had a great deal.' Yet the day came when he too was drawn by the movement of things into the flaming circle of thought, feeling, phrase, that in romance and politics and all the ways of life Europe for a century associated with the name of Rousseau. There was what men call Rousseau in a statesman who could talk of men's common 'flesh and blood' in connection with a franchise bill. Indeed one of the strangest things in Mr. Gladstone's growth and career is this unconscious raising of a partially Rousseauite structure on the foundations laid by Burke, to whom Rousseau was of all writers on the nature of man and the ordering of states the most odious and contemptible. We call it strange, though such amalgams of contrary ways of thinking and feeling are more common than careless observers may suppose. Mr. Gladstone was never an 'equalitarian,' but the passion for simplicity he had--simplicity in life, manners, feeling, conduct, the relations of men to men; dislike of luxury and profusion and all the fabric of artificial and factitious needs. It may well be that he went no further for all this than the Sermon on the Mount, where so many secret elements of social volcano slumber. However we may choose to trace the sources and relations of Mr. Gladstone's general ideas upon the political problems of his time, what he said of himself in the evening of his day was at least true of its dawn and noon. 'I am for old customs and traditions,' he wrote, 'against needless change. I am for the individual as against the state. I am for the family and the stable family as against the state.' He must have been in eager sympathy with Wordsworth's line taken from old Spenser in these very days, 'Perilous is sweeping change, all chance unsound.'[125] Finally and above all, he stood firm in 'the old Christian faith.' Life was to him in all its aspects an application of Christian teaching and example. If we like to put it so, he was steadfast for making politics more human, and no branch of civilised life needs humanising more. Here we touch the question of questions. At nearly every page of Mr. Gladstone's active career the vital problem stares us in the face, of the correspondence between the rule of private morals and of public. Is the rule one and the same for individual and for state? From these early years onwards, Mr. Gladstone's whole language and the moods that it reproduces,--his vivid denunciations, his sanguine expectations, his rolling epithets, his aspects and appeals and points of view,--all take for granted that right and wrong depend on the same set of maxims in public life and private. The puzzle will often greet us, and here it is enough to glance at it. In every statesman's case it arises; in Mr. Gladstone's it is cardinal and fundamental. V MAXIMS OF ORDERED LIFE To say that he had drawn prizes in what is called the lottery of life would not be untrue; but just as true is it that one of those very prizes was the determined conviction that life is no lottery at all, but a serious business worth taking infinite pains upon. To one of his sons at Oxford he wrote a little paper of suggestions that are the actual description of his own lifelong habit and unbroken practice. _Strathconan, Oct. 7, 1872._--1. To keep a short journal of principal employments in each day: most valuable as an account-book of the all-precious gift of Time. 2. To keep also an account-book of receipt and expenditure; and the least troublesome way of keeping it is to keep it with care. This done in early life, and carefully done, creates the habit of performing the great duty of keeping our expenditure (and therefore our desires) within our means. 3. Read attentively (and it is pleasant reading) Taylor's essay on Money,[126] which if I have not done it already, I will give you. It is most healthy and most useful reading. 4. Establish a minimum number of hours in the day for study, say seven at present, and do not without reasonable cause let it be less; noting down against yourself the days of exception. There should also be a minimum number for the vacations, which at Oxford are extremely long. 5. There arises an important question about Sundays. Though we should to the best of our power avoid secular work on Sundays, it does not follow that the mind should remain idle. There is an immense field of knowledge connected with religion, and much of it is of a kind that will be of use in the schools and in relation to your general studies. In these days of shallow scepticism, so widely spread, it is more than ever to be desired that we should be able to give a reason for the hope that is in us. 6. As to duties directly religious, such as daily prayer in the morning and evening, and daily reading of some portion of the Holy Scripture, or as to the holy ordinances of the gospel, there is little need, I am confident, to advise you; one thing, however, I would say, that it is not difficult, and it is most beneficial, to cultivate the habit of inwardly turning the thoughts to God, though but for a moment in the course or during the intervals of our business; which continually presents occasions requiring His aid and guidance. 7. Turning again to ordinary duty, I know no precept more wide or more valuable than this: cultivate self-help; do not seek nor like to be dependent upon others for what you can yourself supply; and keep down as much as you can the standard of your wants, for in this lies a great secret of manliness, _true_ wealth, and happiness; as, on the other hand, the multiplication of our wants makes us effeminate and slavish, as well as selfish. 8. In regard to money as well as to time, there is a great advantage in its methodical use. Especially is it wise to dedicate a certain portion of our means to purposes of charity and religion, and this is more easily begun in youth than in after life. The greatest advantage of making a little fund of this kind is that when we are asked to give, the competition is not between _self_ on the one hand and charity on the other, but between the different purposes of religion and charity with one another, among which we ought to make the most careful choice. It is desirable that the fund thus devoted should not be less than one-tenth of our means; and it tends to bring a blessing on the rest. 9. Besides giving this, we should save something, so as to be before the world, _i.e._ to have some preparation to meet the accidents and unforeseen calls of life as well as its general future. Fathers are generally wont to put their better mind into counsels to their sons. In this instance the counsellor was the living pattern of his own maxims. His account-books show in full detail that he never at any time in his life devoted less than a tenth of his annual incomings to charitable and religious objects. The peculiarity of all this half-mechanic ordering of a wise and virtuous individual life, was that it went with a genius and power that 'moulded a mighty State's decrees,' and sought the widest 'process of the suns.' VI MENTAL GROWTH Once more, his whole temper and spirit turned to practice. His thrift of time, his just and regulated thrift in money, his hatred of waste, were only matched by his eager and minute attention in affairs of public business. He knew how to be content with small savings of hours and of material resources. He was not downcast if progress were slow. In watching public opinion, in feeling the pulse of a cabinet, in softening the heart of a colleague, even when skies were gloomiest, he was almost provokingly anxious to detect signs of encouragement that to others were imperceptible. He was of the mind of the Roman emperor, 'Hope not for the republic of Plato; but be content with ever so small an advance, and look on even that as a gain worth having.'[127] A commonplace, but not one of the commonplaces that are always laid to heart. If faith was one clue, then next to faith was growth. The fundamentals of Christian dogma, so far as I know and am entitled to speak, are the only region in which Mr. Gladstone's opinions have no history. Everywhere else we look upon incessant movement; in views about church and state, tests, national schools; in questions of economic and fiscal policy; in relations with party; in the questions of popular government--in every one of these wide spheres of public interest he passes from crisis to crisis. The dealings of church and state made the first of these marked stages in the history of his opinions and his life, but it was only the beginning. I was born with smaller natural endowments than you, he wrote to his old friend Sir Francis Doyle (1880), and I had also a narrower early training. But my life has certainly been remarkable for the mass of continuous and searching experience it has brought me ever since I began to pass out of boyhood. I have been feeling my way; owing little to living teachers, but enormously to four dead ones[128] (over and above the four gospels). It has been experience which has altered my politics. My toryism was accepted by me on authority and in good faith; I did my best to fight for it. But if you choose to examine my parliamentary life you will find that on every subject as I came to deal with it practically, I had to deal with it as a liberal elected in '32. I began with slavery in 1833, and was commended by the liberal minister, Mr. Stanley. I took to colonial subjects principally, and in 1837 was commended for treating them liberally by Lord Russell. Then Sir R. Peel carried me into trade, and before I had been six months in office, I wanted to resign because I thought his corn law reform insufficient. In ecclesiastical policy I had been a speculator; but if you choose to refer to a speech of Sheil's in 1844 on the Dissenters' Chapels bill,[129] you will find him describing me as predestined to be a champion of religious equality. All this seems to show that I have changed under the teaching of experience. And much later he wrote of himself:-- The stock in trade of ideas with which I set out on the career of parliamentary life was a small one. I do not think the general tendencies of my mind were even in the time of my youth illiberal. It was a great accident that threw me into the anti-liberal attitude, but having taken it up I held to it with energy. It was the accident of the Reform bill of 1831. For teachers or idols or both in politics I had had Mr. Burke and Mr. Canning. I followed them in their dread of reform, and probably caricatured them as a raw and unskilled student caricatures his master. This one idea on which they were anti-liberal became the master-key of the situation, and absorbed into itself for the time the whole of politics. This, however, was not my only disadvantage. I had been educated in an extremely narrow churchmanship, that of the evangelical party. This narrow churchmanship too readily embraced the idea that the extension of representative principles, which was then the essential work of liberalism, was associated with irreligion; an idea quite foreign to my older sentiment on behalf of Roman catholic emancipation. (_Autobiographic note, July 22, 1894_.) VII LIMITATIONS OF INTEREST Notwithstanding his humility, his willingness within a certain range to learn, his profound reverence for what he took for truth, he was no more ready than many far inferior men to discern a certain important rule of intellectual life that was expressed in a quaint figure by one of our old English sages. 'He is a wonderful man,' said the sage, 'that can thread a needle when he is at cudgels in a crowd; and yet this is as easy as to find Truth in the hurry of disputation.'[130] The strenuous member of parliament, the fervid minister fighting the clauses of his bill, the disputant in cabinet, when he passed from man of action to the topics of balanced thought, nice scrutiny, long meditation, did not always succeed in getting his thread into the needle's eye. As to the problems of the metaphysician, Mr. Gladstone showed little curiosity. Nor for abstract discussion in its highest shape--for investigation of ultimate propositions--had he any of that power of subtle and ingenious reasoning which was often so extraordinary when he came to deal with the concrete, the historic, and the demonstrable. A still more singular limitation on the extent of his intellectual curiosity was hardly noticed at this early epoch. The scientific movement, which along with the growth of democracy and the growth of industrialism formed the three propelling forces of a new age,--was not yet developed in all its range. The astonishing discoveries in the realm of natural science, and the philosophic speculations that were built upon them, though quite close at hand, were still to come. Darwin's _Origin of Species_, for example, was not given to the world until 1859. Mr. Gladstone watched these things vaguely and with misgiving; instinct must have told him that the advance of natural explanation, whether legitimately or not, would be in some degree at the expense of the supernatural. But from any full or serious examination of the details of the scientific movement he stood aside, safe and steadfast within the citadel of Tradition. He was once asked to subscribe to a memorial of Tyndale, the translator of the Bible,[131] and he put his refusal upon grounds that show one source at least of his scruple about words. He replies that he has been driven to a determination to renounce all subscriptions for the commemoration of ancient worthies, as he finds that he cannot signify gratitude for services rendered, without being understood to sanction all that they have said or done, and thus becoming involved in controversy or imputation about them. 'I am often amazed,' he goes on, 'at the construction put upon my acts and words; but experience has shown me that they are commonly put under the microscope, and then found to contain all manner of horrors, like the animalcules in Thames water.' This microscope was far too valuable an instrument in the contentions of party, ever to be put aside; and the animalcules, duly magnified to the frightful size required, were turned into first-rate electioneering agents. Even without party microscopes, those who feel most warmly for Mr. Gladstone's manifold services to his country, may often wish that he had inscribed in letters of gold over the door of the Temple of Peace, a certain sentence from the wise oracles of his favourite Butler. 'For the conclusion of this,' said the bishop, 'let me just take notice of the danger of over-great refinements; of going beside or beyond the plain, obvious first appearances of things, upon the subject of morals and religion.'[132] Nor would he have said less of politics. It is idle to ignore in Mr. Gladstone's style an over-refining in words, an excess of qualifying propositions, a disproportionate impressiveness in verbal shadings without real difference. Nothing irritated opponents more. They insisted on taking literary sin for moral obliquity, and because men could not understand, they assumed that he wished to mislead. Yet if we remember how carelessness in words, how the slovenly combination under the same name of things entirely different, how the taking for granted as matter of positive proof what is at the most only possible or barely probable--when we think of all the mischief and folly that has been wrought in the world by loose habits of mind that are almost as much the master vice of the head as selfishness is the master vice of the heart, men may forgive Mr. Gladstone for what passed as sophistry and subtlety, but was in truth scruple of conscience in that region where lack of scruple half spoils the world. VERBAL REFINING This peculiar trait was connected with another that sometimes amused friends, but always exasperated foes. Among the papers is a letter from an illustrious man to Mr. Gladstone--wickedly no better dated by the writer than 'Saturday,' and no better docketed by the receiver than 'T. B. Macaulay, March 1,'--showing that Mr. Gladstone was just as energetic, say in some year between 1835 and 1850, in defending the entire consistency between a certain speech of the dubious date and a speech in 1833, as he ever afterwards showed himself in the same too familiar process. In later times he described himself as a sort of purist in what touches the consistency of statesmen. 'Change of opinion,' he said, 'in those to whose judgment the public looks more or less to assist its own, is an evil to the country, although a much smaller evil than their persistence in a course which they know to be wrong. It is not always to be blamed. But it is always to be watched with vigilance; always to be challenged and put upon its trial.'[133] To this challenge in his own case--and no man of his day was half so often put upon his trial for inconsistency--he was always most easily provoked to make a vehement reply. In that process Mr. Gladstone's natural habit of resort to qualifying words, and his skill in showing that a new attitude could be reconciled by strict reasoning with the logical contents of old dicta, gave him wonderful advantage. His adversary, as he strode confidently along the smooth grass, suddenly found himself treading on a serpent; he had overlooked a condition, a proviso, a word of hypothesis or contingency, that sprang from its ambush and brought his triumph to naught on the spot. If Mr. Gladstone had only taken as much trouble that his hearers should understand exactly what it was that he meant, as he took trouble afterwards to show that his meaning had been grossly misunderstood, all might have been well. As it was, he seemed to be completely satisfied if he could only show that two propositions, thought by plain men to be directly contradictory, were all the time capable on close construction of being presented in perfect harmony. As if I had a right to look only to what my words literally mean or may in good logic be made to mean, and had no concern at all with what the people meant who used the same words, or with what I might have known that my hearers were all the time supposing me to mean. Hope-Scott once wrote to him (November 24, 1841): 'We live in a time in which accurate distinctions, especially in theology, are absolutely unconsidered. The "common sense" or general tenor of questions is what alone the majority of men are guided by. And I verily believe that semi-arian confessions or any others turning upon nicety of thought and expression, would be for the most part considered as fitter subjects for scholastic dreamers than for earnest Christians.' In politics at any rate, Bishop Butler was wiser. The explanation of what was assailed as inconsistency is perhaps a double one. In the first place he started on his journey with an intellectual chart of ideas and principles not adequate or well fitted for the voyage traced for him by the spirit of his age. If he held to the inadequate ideas with which Oxford and Canning and his father and even Peel had furnished him, he would have been left helpless and useless in the days stretching before him. The second point is that the orator of Mr. Gladstone's commanding school exists by virtue of large and intense expression; then if circumstances make him as vehement for one opinion to-day as he was vehement for what the world regards as a conflicting opinion yesterday, his intellectual self-respect naturally prompts him to insist that the opinions do not really clash, but are in fact identical. You may call this a weakness if you choose, and it certainly involved Mr. Gladstone in much unfruitful and not very edifying exertion; but it is at any rate better than the front of brass that takes any change of opinion for matter-of-course expedient, as to which the least said will be soonest mended. And it is better still than the disastrous self-consciousness that makes a man persist in a foolish thing to-day, because he chanced to say or do a foolish thing yesterday. VIII MINOR MORALS In this period of his life, with the battle of the world still to come, Mr. Gladstone to whose grave temperament everything, little or great, was matter of deliberate reflection, of duty and scruple, took early note of minor morals as well as major. Characteristically he found some fault with a sermon of Dr. Wordsworth's upon Saint Barnabas, for hardly pushing the argument for the connection of good manners with Christianity to the full extent of which it is fairly capable. The whole system of legitimate courtesy, politeness, and refinement is surely nothing less than one of the genuine though minor and often unacknowledged results of the gospel scheme. All the great moral qualities or graces, which in their large sphere determine the formation and habits of the Christian soul as before God, do also on a smaller scale apply to the very same principles in the common intercourse of life, and pervade its innumerable and separately inappreciable particulars; and the result of this application is that good breeding which distinguishes Christian civilisation. (March 31, 1844.) It is not for us to discuss whether the breeding of Plato or Cicero or the Arabs of Cordova was better or worse than the breeding of the eastern bishops at Nicæa or Ephesus. Good manners, we may be sure, hardly have a single master-key, unless it be simplicity, or freedom from the curse of affectation. What is certain is that nobody of his time was a finer example of high good manners and genuine courtesy than Mr. Gladstone himself. He has left a little sheaf of random jottings which, without being subtle or recondite, show how he looked on this side of human things. Here is an example or two:-- There are a class of passages in Mr. Wilberforce's _Journals_, _e.g._, some of those recording his successful speeches, which might in many men be set down to vanity, but in him are more fairly I should think ascribable to a singlemindedness which did not inflate. Surely with _most_ men it is the safest rule, to make scanty records of success achieved, and yet more rarely to notice praise, which should pass us like the breeze, enjoyed but not arrested. There must indeed be some sign, a stone as it were set up, to remind us that such and such were occasions for thankfulness; but should not the memorials be restricted wholly and expressly for this purpose? For the fumes of praise are rapidly and fearfully intoxicating; it comes like a spark to the tow if once we give it, as it were, admission within us. (1838.) There are those to whom vanity brings more of pain than of pleasure; there are also those whom it oftener keeps in the background, than thrusts forward. The same man who to-day volunteers for that which he is not called upon to do, may to-morrow flinch from his obvious duty from one and the same cause,--vanity, or regard to the appearance he is to make, for its own sake, and perhaps that vanity which shrinks is a more subtle and far-sighted, a more ethereal, a more profound vanity than that which presumes. (1842.) A question of immense importance meets us in ethical inquiries, as follows: is there a sense in which it is needful, right, and praiseworthy, that man should be much habituated to look back upon himself and keep his eye upon himself; a self-regard, and even a self-respect, which are compatible with the self-renunciation and self-distrust which belong to Christianity? In the observance of a single distinction we shall find, perhaps, a secure and sufficient answer. We are to respect our responsibilities, not ourselves. We are to respect the duties of which we are capable, but not our capabilities simply considered. There is to be no complacent self-contemplation, beruminating upon self. When self is viewed, it must always be in the most intimate connection with its purposes. How well were it if persons would be more careful, or rather, more conscientious, in paying compliments. How often do we delude another, in subject matter small or great, into the belief that he has done well what we know he has done ill, either by silence, or by so giving him praise on a particular point as to _imply_ approbation of the whole. Now it is undoubtedly difficult to observe politeness in all cases compatibly with truth; and politeness though a minor duty is a duty still. (1838.) If truth permits you to praise, but binds you to praise with a qualification, observe how much more acceptably you will speak, if you put the qualification first, than if you postpone it. For example: 'this is a good likeness; but it is a hard painting,' is surely much less pleasing, than 'this is a hard painting; but it is a good likeness.' The qualification is generally taken to be more genuinely the sentiment of the speaker's mind, than the main proposition; and it carries ostensible honesty and manliness to propose first what is the less acceptable. (1835-6.) IX SPIRIT OF SUBMISSION To go back to Fénelon's question about his own foundation. 'The great work of religion,' as Mr. Gladstone conceived it, was set out in some sentences of a letter written by him to Mrs. Gladstone in 1844, five years after they were married. In these sentences we see that under all the agitated surface of a life of turmoil and contention, there flowed a deep composing stream of faith, obedience, and resignation, that gave him, in face of a thousand buffets, the free mastery of all his resources of heart and brain:-- _To Mrs. Gladstone._ 13 _C.H. Terrace, Sunday evening, Jan. 21, 1844._--Although I have carelessly left at the board of trade with your other letters that on which I wished to have said something, yet I am going to end this day of peace by a few words to show that what you said did not lightly pass away from my mind. There is a beautiful little sentence in the works of Charles Lamb concerning one who had been afflicted: 'he gave his heart to the Purifier, and his will to the Sovereign Will of the Universe.'[134] But there is a speech in the third canto of the _Paradiso_ of Dante, spoken by a certain Piccarda, which is a rare gem. I will only quote this one line: _In la sua volontade è nostra pace._[135] The words are few and simple, and yet they appear to me to have an inexpressible majesty of truth about them, to be almost as if they were spoken from the very mouth of God. It so happened that (unless my memory much deceives me) I first read that speech on a morning early in the year 1836, which was one of trial. I was profoundly impressed and powerfully sustained, almost absorbed, by these words. They cannot be too deeply graven upon the heart. In short, what we all want is that they should not come to us as an admonition from without, but as an instinct from within. They should not be adopted by effort or upon a process of proof, but they should be simply the translation into speech of the habitual tone to which all tempers, affections, emotions, are set. In the Christian mood, which ought never to be intermitted, the sense of this conviction should recur spontaneously; it should be the foundation of all mental thoughts and acts, and the measure to which the whole experience of life, inward and outward, is referred. The final state which we are to contemplate with hope, and to seek by discipline, is that in which our will shall be _one_ with the will of God; not merely shall submit to it, not merely shall follow after it, but shall live and move with it, even as the pulse of the blood in the extremities acts with the central movement of the heart. And this is to be obtained through a double process; the first, that of checking, repressing, quelling the inclination of the will to act with reference to self as a centre; this is to mortify it. The second, to cherish, exercise, and expand its new and heavenly power of acting according to the will of God, first, perhaps, by painful effort in great feebleness and with many inconsistencies, but with continually augmenting regularity and force, until obedience become a necessity of second nature.... Resignation is too often conceived to be merely a submission not unattended with complaint to what we have no power to avoid. But it is less than the whole of a work of a Christian. Your full triumph as far as that particular occasion of duty is concerned will be to find that you not merely repress inward tendencies to murmur--but that you would not if you could alter what in any matter God has plainly willed.... Here is the great work of religion; here is the path through which sanctity is attained, the highest sanctity; and yet it is a path evidently to be traced in the course of our daily duties.... When we are thwarted in the exercise of some innocent, laudable, and almost sacred affection, as in the case, though its scale be small, out of which all of this has grown, Satan has us at an advantage, because when the obstacle occurs, we have a sentiment that the feeling baffled is a right one, and in indulging a rebellious temper we flatter ourselves that we are merely as it were indulgent on behalf, not of ourselves, but of a duty which we have been interrupted in performing. But our duties can take care of themselves when God calls us away from any of them.... To be able to relinquish a duty upon command shows a higher grace than to be able to give up a mere pleasure for a duty.... RESPONSIBILITY FOR GIFTS The resignation thus described with all this power and deep feeling is, of course, in one form of thoughts and words, of symbol and synthesis, or another, the foundation of all the great systems of life. A summary of Mr. Gladstone's interpretation of it is perhaps found in a few words used by him of Blanco White, a heterodox writer whose strange spiritual fortunes painfully interested and perplexed him. 'He cherished,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'with whatever associations, the love of God, and maintained resignation to His will, even when it appears almost impossible to see how he could have had a dogmatic belief in the existence of a divine will at all. There was, in short [in Blanco White], a disposition _to resist the tyranny of self; to recognise the rule of duty; to maintain the supremacy of the higher over the lower parts of our nature_.'[136] This very disposition might with truth no less assured have been assigned to the writer himself. These three bright crystal laws of life were to him like pointer stars guiding a traveller's eye to the celestial pole by which he steers. When all has been said of a man's gifts, the critical question still stands over, how he regards his responsibility for using them. Once in a conversation with Mr. Gladstone, some fifty years from the epoch of this present chapter, we fell upon the topic of ambition. 'Well,' he said, 'I do not think that I can tax myself in my own life with ever having been much moved by ambition.' The remark so astonished me that, as he afterwards playfully reported to a friend, I almost jumped up from my chair. We soon shall reach a stage in his career when both remark and surprise may explain themselves. We shall see that if ambition means love of power or fame for the sake of glitter, decoration, external renown, or even dominion and authority on their own account--and all these are common passions enough in strong natures as well as weak--then his view of himself was just. I think he had none of it. Ambition in a better sense, the motion of a resolute and potent genius to use strength for the purposes of strength, to clear the path, dash obstacles aside, force good causes forward--such a quality as that is the very law of the being of a personality so vigorous, intrepid, confident, and capable as his. FOOTNOTES: [112] Hawarden Grammar School, Sept. 19, 1877. [113] Mr. Gladstone on Lord Houghton's _Life_; _Speaker_, Nov. 29, 1890. [114] _Gleanings_, vii. p. 133. [115] _Homeric Studies_, vol. iii. [116] Book ii. § 89, 363. [117] Non enim solum acuenda nobis neque procudenda lingua est, sed onerandum complendumque pectus maximarum rerum et plurimarum suavitate, copia, varietate. Cicero, _De Orat._, iii. § 30. [118] _The British Senate_, by James Grant, vol. ii. pp. 88-92. [119] _Anatomy of Parliament_, November 1840. 'Contemporary Orators,' in _Fraser's Magazine_. [120] Lord Lansdowne to Senior (1855), in Mrs. Simpson's _Many Memories_, p. 226. [121] Malmesbury, _Memoirs of an Ex-Minister_, i. p. 155. [122] _Life of Archbishop Benson_, ii. p. 11. [123] The noble anti-slavery movement must be excepted, for it was very directly connected with evangelicalism. [124] Paruta, i. p. 64. [125] 'Blest statesman he, whose mind's unselfish will' (1838).--Knight's _Wordsworth_, viii. p. 101. [126] The first chapter in Sir Henry Taylor's _Notes from Life_ (1847). [127] Marcus Aurelius, ix. p. 29. [128] Aristotle, Augustine, Dante, Butler. 'My four "doctors,"' he tells Manning, 'are doctors to the speculative man; would they were such to the practical too!' [129] See below, p. 323. [130] Glanville's _Vanity of Dogmatising_. [131] See Shaftesbury's _Life_, iii. p. 495. He refused to be on a committee for a memorial to Thirlwall. (1875.) [132] First Sermon, _Upon Compassion_. [133] _Gleanings_, vii. p. 100, 1868. [134] _Rosamund Gray_, chap. xi. [135] Mr. Gladstone's rendering of the speech of Piccarda (_Paradiso_, iii. 70) is in the volume of collected translations (p. 165), under the date of 1835: 'In His Will is our peace. To this all things By Him created, or by Nature made, As to a central Sea, self-motion brings.' [136] _Gleanings_, ii. p. 20, 1845. CHAPTER VII CLOSE OF APPRENTICESHIP (_1839-1841_) What are great gifts but the correlative of great work? We are not born for ourselves, but for our kind, for our neighbours, for our country: it is but selfishness, indolence, a perverse fastidiousness, an unmanliness, and no virtue or praise, to bury our talent in a napkin.--CARDINAL NEWMAN. Along with his domestic and parliamentary concerns, we are to recognise the ferment that was proceeding in Mr. Gladstone's mind upon new veins of theology; but it was an interior working of feeling and reflection, and went forward without much visible relation to the outer acts and facts of his life during this period. As to those, one entry in the diary (Feb. 1st, 1839) tells a sufficient tale for the next two years. 'I find I have, besides family and parliamentary concerns and those of study, _ten_ committees on hand: Milbank, Society for Propagation of the Gospel, Church Building Metropolis, Church Commercial School, National Schools inquiry and correspondence, Upper Canada, Clergy, Additional Curates' Fund, Carlton Library, Oxford and Cambridge Club. These things distract and dissipate my mind.' Well they might; for in any man with less than Mr. Gladstone's amazing faculty of rapid and powerful concentration, such dispersion must have been disastrous both to effectiveness and to mental progress. As it is, I find little in the way of central facts to remark in either mental history or public action. He strayed away occasionally from the Fathers and their pastures and dipped into the new literature of the hour, associated with names of dawning popularity. Carlyle he found hard to lay down. Some of Emerson, too, he became acquainted with, as we have already seen; but his mind was far too closely filled with transcendentalisms of his own to offer much hospitality to the serene and beautiful transcendentalism of Emerson. He read _Oliver Twist_ and _Nicholas Nickleby_, and on the latter he makes a characteristic comment--'the tone is very human; it is most happy in touches of natural pathos. No church in the book, and the motives are not those of religion.' So with Hallam's _History of Literature_, 'Finished (Oct. 10, 1839) his theological chapter, in which I am sorry to find amidst such merits, what is even far more grievous than his anti-church sarcasms, such notions on original sin as in iv. p. 161.' He found Chillingworth's _Religion of Protestants_ 'a work of the most mixed merits,' an ambiguous phrase which I take to mean not that its merits were various, but that they were much mixed with those demerits for which the puritan Cheynell baited the unlucky latitudinarian to death. About this time also he first began Father Paul's famous history of the Council of Trent, a work that always stood as high in his esteem as in Macaulay's, who liked Sarpi the best of all modern historians. To the great veteran poet of the time Mr. Gladstone's fidelity was unchanging, even down to compositions that the ordinary Wordsworthian gives up:-- Read aloud Wordsworth's _Cumberland Beggar_ and _Peter Bell_. The former is generally acknowledged to be a noble poem. The same justice is not done to the latter; I was more than ever struck with the vivid power of the descriptions, the strong touches of feeling, the skill and order with which the plot upon Peter's conscience is arranged, and the depth of interest which is made to attach to the humblest of quadrupeds. It must have cost great labour, and is an extraordinary poem, both as a whole and in detail. Let not the scorner forget that Matthew Arnold, that admirable critic and fine poet, confesses to reading _Peter Bell_ with pleasure and edification. In the political field he moved steadily on. Sir R. Peel spoke to him (April 19, 1839) in the House about the debate and wished him to speak after Sheil, if Graham, who was to speak about 8 or 9, could bring him up. Peel showed him several points with regard to the committee which he thought might be urged. 'This is very kind in him as a mark of confidence; and assures me that if, as I suspect, he considers my book as likely to bring me into some embarrassment individually, yet he is willing to let me still act under him, and fight my own battles in that matter as best with God's help I may, which is thoroughly fair. It imposes, however, a great responsibility. I was not presumptuous enough to dream of following Sheil; not that his speech is formidable, but the impression it leaves on the House is. I meant to provoke him. A mean man may fire at a tiger, but it requires a strong and bold one to stand his charge; and the longer I live, the more I feel my own (intrinsically) utter _powerlessness_ in the House of Commons. But my principle is this--not to shrink from any such responsibility when laid upon me by a competent person. Sheil, however, did not speak, so I am reserved and may fulfil my own idea, please God, to-night.' THE JAMAICA CASE We come now to one of the memorable episodes in this vexed decade of our political history. The sullen demon of slavery died hard. The negro still wore about his neck galling links of the broken chain. The transitory stage of apprenticeship was in some respects even harsher than the bondage from which it was to bring deliverance, and the old iniquity only worked in new ways. The pity and energy of the humane at home drove a perplexed and sluggish government to pass an act for dealing with the abominations of the prisons to which the unhappy blacks were committed in Jamaica. The assembly of that island, a planter oligarchy, resented the new law from the mother country as an invasion of their constitutional rights, and stubbornly refused in their exasperation, even after a local dissolution, to perform duties that were indispensable for working the machinery of administration. The cabinet in consequence asked parliament (April 9th) to suspend the constitution of Jamaica for a term of five years. The tory opposition, led by Peel with all his force, aided by the aversion of a section of the liberals to a measure in which they detected a flavour of dictatorship, ran the ministers (May 6th) within five votes of defeat on a cardinal stage. 'I was amused,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'with observing yesterday the differences of countenance and manner in the ministers whom I met on my ride. Ellice (their friend) would not look at me at all. Charles Wood looked but askance and with the hat over the brow. Grey shouted, "Wish you joy!" Lord Howick gave a remarkably civil and smiling nod; and Morpeth a hand salute with all his might, as we crossed in riding. On Monday night after the division, Peel said just as it was known and about to be announced, "Jamaica was a good horse to start."' Of his own share in the performance, Mr. Gladstone only says that he spoke a dry speech to a somewhat reluctant House. 'I cannot work up my matter at all in such a plight. However, considering what it was, they behaved very well. A loud cheer on the announcement of the numbers from our people, in which I did not join.' To have won the race by so narrow a majority as five seemed to the whigs, wearied of their own impotence and just discredit, a good plea for getting out of office. Peel proceeded to begin the formation of a government, but the operation broke down upon an affair of the bedchamber. He supposed the Queen to object to the removal of any of the ladies of her household, and the Queen supposed him to insist on the removal of them all. The situation was unedifying and nonsensical, but the Queen was not yet twenty, and Lord Melbourne had for once failed to teach a prudent lesson. A few days saw Melbourne back in office, and in office he remained for two years longer.[137] II MARRIAGE In June 1839 the understanding arrived at with Miss Catherine Glynne during the previous winter in Sicily, ripened into a definite engagement, and on the 25th of the following July their marriage took place amid much rejoicing and festivity at Hawarden. At the same time and place, Mary Glynne, the younger sister, was married to Lord Lyttelton. Sir Stephen Glynne, their brother, was the ninth, and as was to happen, the last baronet. Their mother, born Mary Neville, was the daughter of the second Lord Braybrooke and Mary Grenville his wife, sister of the first Marquis of Buckingham. Hence Lady Glynne was one of a historic clan, granddaughter of George Grenville, the minister of American taxation, and niece of William, Lord Grenville, head of the cabinet of All the Talents in 1806. She was first cousin therefore of the younger Pitt, and the Glynnes could boast of a family connection with three prime ministers, or if we choose to add Lord Chatham who married Hester Grenville, with four.[138] 'I told her,' Mr. Gladstone recorded on this occasion of their engagement (June 8th), 'what was my original destination and desire in life; in what sense and manner I remained in connection with politics.... I have given her (led by her questions) these passages for canons of our living:-- 'Le fronde, onde s'infronda tutto l'orto Dell' Ortolano eterno, am' io cotanto, Quanto da lui a lor di bene è porto.'[139] And Dante again-- 'In la sua volontade è nostra pace: Ella è quel mare, al qual tutto si muove.'[140] In few human unions have the good hopes and fond wishes of a bridal day been better fulfilled or brought deeper and more lasting content. Sixty long years after, Mr. Gladstone said, 'It would not be possible to unfold in words the value of the gifts which the bounty of Providence has conferred upon me through her.' And the blessing remained radiant and unclouded to the distant end. At the close of August, after posting across Scotland from Greenock by a route better known now than then to every tourist, the young couple made their way to Fasque, where the new bride found an auspicious approach and the kindest of welcomes. Her 'entrance into her adoptive family was much more formidable than it would be to those who had been less loved, or less influential, or less needed and leant upon, in the home where she was so long a queen.' At Fasque all went as usual. Soon after his arrival, his father communicated that he meant actually to transfer to his sons his Demerara properties--Robertson to have the management. 'This increased wealth, so much beyond my needs, with its attendant responsibility is very burdensome, however on his part the act be beautiful.' III The parliamentary session of 1840 was unimportant and dreary. The government was tottering, the conservative leaders were in no hurry to pluck the pear before it was ripe, and the only men with any animating principle of active public policy in them were Cobden and the League against the Corn Law. The attention of the House of Commons was mainly centred in the case of Stockdale and the publication of debates. But Mr. Gladstone's most earnest thoughts were still far away from what he found to be the dry sawdust of the daily politics, as the following lines may show:-- _March 16th, 1849._--Manning dined with us. He kindly undertook to revise my manuscript on 'Church Principles.' _March 18th._--Yesterday I had a long conversation with James Hope. He came to tell me, with great generosity, that he would always respond to any call, according to the best of his power, which I might make on him for the behalf of the common cause--he had given up all views of advancement in his profession--he had about £400 a year, and this, which includes his fellowship, was quite sufficient for his wants; his time would be devoted to church objects; in the intermediate region he considered himself as having the first tonsure. Hope urged strongly the principle, 'Let every man abide in the calling ----' I thought even over strongly. My belief is that he foregoes the ministry from deeming himself unworthy.... The object of my letter to Hope was in part to record on paper my abhorrence of party in the church, whether Oxford party or any other. _March 18th._--To-day a meeting at Peel's on the China question; considered in the view of censure upon the conduct of the administration, and a motion will accordingly be made objecting to the attempts to force the Chinese to modify their old relations with us, and to the leaving the superintendent without military force. It was decided not to move simultaneously in the Lords--particularly because the radicals would, if there were a double motion, act not on the merits but for the ministry. Otherwise, it seemed to be thought we should carry a motion. The Duke of Wellington said, 'God! if it is carried, they will go,' that they were as near as possible to resignation on the last defeat, and would not stand it again. Peel said, he understood four ministers were then strongly for resigning. The duke also said, our footing in China could not be re-established, unless under some considerable naval and military demonstration, now that matters had gone so far. He appeared pale and shaken, but spoke loud and a good deal, much to the point and with considerable gesticulation. The mind's life I never saw more vigorous. THE CHINA QUESTION The Chinese question was of the simplest. British subjects insisted on smuggling opium into China in the teeth of Chinese law. The British agent on the spot began war against China for protecting herself against these malpractices. There was no pretence that China was in the wrong, for in fact the British government had sent out orders that the opium-smugglers should not be shielded; but the orders arrived too late, and war having begun, Great Britain felt bound to see it through, with the result that China was compelled to open four ports, to cede Hong Kong, and to pay an indemnity of six hundred thousand pounds. So true is it that statesmen have no concern with pater nosters, the Sermon on the Mount, or the _vade mecum_ of the moralist. We shall soon see that this transaction began to make Mr. Gladstone uneasy, as was indeed to be expected in anybody who held that a state should have a conscience.[141] On April 8, 1840, his journal says: 'Read on China. House.... Spoke heavily; strongly against the trade and the war, having previously asked whether my speaking out on them would do harm, and having been authorised.' An unguarded expression brought him into a debating scrape, but his speech abounded in the pure milk of what was to be the Gladstonian word:-- I do not know how it can be urged as a crime against the Chinese that they refused provisions to those who refused obedience to their laws whilst residing within their territory. I am not competent to judge how long this war may last, nor how protracted may be its operations, but this I can say, that a war more unjust in its origin, a war more calculated in its progress to cover this country with disgrace, I do not know and I have not read of. Mr. Macaulay spoke last night in eloquent terms of the British flag waving in glory at Canton, and of the animating effect produced upon the minds of our sailors by the knowledge that in no country under heaven was it permitted to be insulted. But how comes it to pass that the sight of that flag always raises the spirits of Englishmen? It is because it has always been associated with the cause of justice, with opposition to oppression, with respect for national rights, with honourable commercial enterprise, but now under the auspices of the noble lord [Palmerston] that flag is hoisted to protect an infamous contraband traffic, and if it were never to be hoisted except as it is now hoisted on the coast of China, we should recoil from its sight with horror, and should never again feel our hearts thrill, as they now thrill, with emotion when it floats magnificently and in pride upon the breeze.... Although the Chinese were undoubtedly guilty of much absurd phraseology, of no little ostentatious pride, and of some excess, justice in my opinion is with them, and whilst they the pagans and semi-civilised barbarians have it, we the enlightened and civilised Christians are pursuing objects at variance both with justice and with religion.[142] _May 14th._--Consulted [various persons] on opium. All but Sir R. Inglis were on grounds of prudence against its [a motion against the compensation demanded from China] being brought forward. To this majority of friendly and competent persons I have given way, I hope not wrongfully; but I am in dread of the judgment of God upon England for our national iniquity towards China. It has been to me matter of most painful and anxious consideration. I yielded specifically to this; the majority of the persons most trustworthy feel that to make the motion would, our leaders being in such a position and disposition with respect to it, injure the cause. _June 1st._--Meeting of the Society for Suppression of the Slave Trade. [This was the occasion of a speech from Prince Albert, who presided.] Exeter Hall crammed is really a grand spectacle. Samuel Wilberforce a beautiful speaker; in some points resembles Macaulay. Peel excellent. _June 12th._--This evening I voted for the Irish education grant; on the ground that in its principle, according to Lord Stanley's letter, it is identical practically with the English grant of '33-8, and I might have added with the Kildare Place grant. To exclude doctrine from exposition is in my judgment as truly a mutilation of scripture, as to omit bodily portions of the sacred volume. SOCIAL DIVERSION His first child and eldest son was born (June 3), and Manning and Hope became his godfathers; these two were Mr. Gladstone's most intimate friends at this period. Social diversions were never wanting. One June afternoon he went down to Greenwich, 'Grillion's fish dinner to the Speaker. Great merriment; and an excellent speech from Stanley, "good sense and good nonsense." A modest one from Morpeth. But though we dined at six, these expeditions do not suit me. I am ashamed of paying £2, 10s. for a dinner. But on this occasion the object was to do honour to a dignified and impartial Speaker.' He had been not at all grateful, by the way, for the high honour of admission to Grillion's dining club this year,--'a thing quite alien to my temperament, which requires more soothing and domestic appliances after the feverish and consuming excitements of party life; but the rules of society oblige me to submit.' As it happened, so narrow is man's foreknowledge, Grillion's down to the very end of his life, nearly sixty years ahead, had no more faithful or congenial member. _July 1st._--Last evening at Lambeth Palace I had a good deal of conversation with Colonel Gurwood about the Duke of Wellington and about Canada. He told me an anecdote of Lord Seaton which throws light upon his peculiar reserve, and shows it to be a modesty of character, combined no doubt with military habits and notions. When Captain Colborne, and senior officer of his rank in the 21st foot, he [Lord Seaton] was military secretary to General Fox during the war. A majority in his regiment fell vacant, Gen. Fox desired him to ascertain who was the senior captain on the _command_. 'Captain So-and-so of the 80th [I think].' 'Write to Colonel Gordon and recommend him to his royal highness for the vacant majority.' He did it. The answer came to this effect: 'The recommendation will not be refused, but we are surprised to see that it comes in the handwriting of Captain Colborne, the very man who, according to the rules of the service, ought to have this majority.' General Fox had forgotten it, and Captain Colborne had not reminded him! The error was corrected. He (Gurwood) said he had never known the Duke of Wellington speak on the subject of religion but once, when he quoted the story of Oliver Cromwell on his death-bed, and said: 'That state of grace, in my opinion, is a state or habit of doing right, of persevering in duty, and to fall from it is to cease from acting right.' He always attends the service at 8 A.M. in the Chapel Royal, and says it is a duty which ought to be done, and the earlier in the day it is discharged the better. _July 24th._ Heard [James] Hope in the House of Lords against the Chapters bill; and he spoke with such eloquence, learning, lofty sentiment, clear and piercing diction, continuity of argument, just order, sagacious tact, and comprehensive method, as one would say would have required the longest experience as well as the greatest natural gifts. Yet he never acted before, save as counsel for the Edinburgh and Glasgow railway. If hearts are to be moved, it must be by this speech.[143] _July 27th_.--Again went over and got up the subject of opium compensation as it respects the Chinese. I spoke thereon 1½ hours for the liberation of my conscience, and to afford the friends of peace opposite an opportunity, of which they would not avail themselves. In August he tells Mrs. Gladstone how he has been to dine with 'such an odd party at the Guizots'; Austin, radical lawyer; John Mill, radical reviewer; M. Gaskell, Monckton Milnes, Thirlwall, new Bishop of St. David's, George Lewis, poor law commissioner. Not very ill mixed, however. The host is extremely nice.' An odd party indeed; it comprised four at least of the strongest heads in England, and two of the most illustrious names of all the century in Europe. EXAMINER AT ETON In March (1840) Mr. Gladstone and Lord Lyttelton went to Eton together to fulfil the ambitious functions of examiner for the Newcastle scholarship. In thanking Mr. Gladstone for his services, Hawtrey speaks of the advantage of public men of his stamp undertaking such duties in the good cause of the established system of education, 'as against the nonsense of utilitarians and radicals.' The questions ran in the familiar mould in divinity, niceties of ancient grammar, obscurities of classical construction, caprices of vocabulary, and all the other points of the old learning. The general merit Mr. Gladstone found 'beyond anything possible or conceivable' when he was a boy at Eton a dozen years before:-- We sit with the boys (39 in number) and make about ten hours a day in looking over papers with great minuteness.... Although it is in quantity hard work, it is lightened by a warm interest, and the refreshment of early love upon a return to this sweet place. It is work apart from human passion, and is felt as a moral relaxation, though it is not one in any other sense.... This is a curious experience to me, of jaded body and mind refreshed. I propose for Latin theme a little sentence of Burke's which runs to this effect, 'Flattery corrupts both the receiver and the giver; and adulation is not of more service to the people than to kings.' _April 2nd._--The statistics become excessively interesting. Henry Hallam gained, and now stands second [the brother of his dead friend]. _April 3rd._--In, 6 hours; out, from 4 to 5 hours more upon the papers. Vinegar, thank God, carries my eyes through so much MS., and the occupation is deeply interesting, especially on Hallam's account. Our labours were at one time anxious and critical, the two leaders being 1388 and 1390 respectively. At night, however, all was decided. _April 4th._ 12.2.--_Viva voce_ for fourteen select. At 2½ Seymour was announced scholar to the boys, and chaired forthwith. Hallam, medallist. It was quite overpowering. Henry Hallam was the second son of the historian, the junior of Arthur by some fourteen or fifteen years. Mr. Gladstone more than a generation later described a touching supplement to his Eton story. 'In 1850 Henry Hallam had attained an age exceeding only by some four years the limit of his brother's life. During that autumn I was travelling post between Turin and Genoa, upon my road to Naples. A family coach met us on the road, and the glance of a moment at the inside showed me the familiar face of Mr. Hallam. I immediately stopped my carriage, descended, and ran after his. On overtaking it, I found the dark clouds accumulated on his brow, and learned with indescribable pain that he was on his way home from Florence, where he had just lost his second and only remaining son, from an attack corresponding in its suddenness and its devastating rapidity with that which had struck down his eldest born son seventeen years before.' At Fasque, where his autumn sojourn began in September, he threw himself with special ardour into his design for a college for Scotch episcopalians, especially for the training of clergy. He wrote to Manning (Aug. 31, 1840):-- Hope and I have been talking and writing upon a scheme for raising money to found in Scotland a college akin in structure to the Romish seminaries in England; that is to say, partly for training the clergy, partly for affording an education to the children of the gentry and others who now go chiefly to presbyterian schools or are tended at home by presbyterian tutors. I think £25,000 would do it, and that it might be got. I must have my father's sanction before committing myself to it. Hope's intended absence for the winter is a great blow. Were he to be at home I do not doubt that great progress might be made. In the kirk toil and trouble, double, double, the fires burn and cauldrons bubble: and though I am not sanguine as to very speedy or extensive resumption by the church of her spiritual rights, she may have a great part to play. At present she is very weakly manned, and this is the way I think to strengthen the crew. GLENALMOND The scheme expanded as time went on. His father threw himself into it with characteristic energy and generosity, contributing many thousand pounds, for the sum required greatly exceeded the modest figure above mentioned. Mr. Gladstone conducted a laborious and sometimes vexatious correspondence in the midst of more important public cares. Plans were mature, and adequate funds were forthcoming, and in the autumn of 1842 Hope and the two Gladstones made what they found an agreeable tour, examining the various localities for a site, and finally deciding on a spot 'on a mountain-stream, ten miles from Perth, at the very gate of the highlands.' It was 1846 before the college at Glenalmond was opened for its destined purposes.[144] We all know examples of men holding opinions with trenchancy, decision, and even a kind of fervour, and yet with no strong desire to spread them. Mr. Gladstone was at all times of very different temper; consumed with missionary energy and the fire of ardent propagandism. LETTER FROM COBDEN He laboured hard at the fourth edition of his book, sometimes getting eleven hours of work, 'a good day as times go,'--Montesquieu, Burke, Bacon, Clarendon, and others of the masters of civil and historic wisdom being laid under ample contribution. By Christmas he was at Hawarden. In January he made a speech at a meeting held in Liverpool for the foundation of a church union, and a few days later he hurried off to Walsall to help his brother John, then the tory candidate, and a curious incident happened:-- I either provided myself, or I was furnished from headquarters, with a packet of pamphlets in favour of the corn laws. These I read, and I extracted from them the chief material of my speeches. I dare say it was sad stuff, furbished up at a moment's notice. We carried the election. Cobden sent me a challenge to attend a public discussion of the subject. Whether this was quite fair, I am not certain, for I was young, made no pretension to be an expert, and had never opened my lips in parliament on the subject. But it afforded me an excellent opportunity to decline with modesty and with courtesy as well as reason. I am sorry to say that, to the best of my recollection, I did far otherwise, and the pith of my answer was made to be that I regarded the Anti-Corn Law League as no better than a big borough-mongering association. Such was my first capital offence in the matter of protection; redeemed from public condemnation only by obscurity. The letters are preserved, but a sentence or two from Mr. Gladstone's to Cobden are enough. 'The phrases which you quote from a report in the _Times_ have reference, not to the corn law, but to the Anti-Corn Law League and its operations in Walsall. Complaining apparently of these, you desire me to meet you in discussion, not upon the League but upon the corn law. I cannot conceive two subjects more distinct. I admit the question of the repeal of the corn laws to be a subject fairly open to discussion, although I have a strong opinion against it. But as to the Anti-Corn Law League, I do not admit that any equitable doubt can be entertained as to the character of its present proceedings; and, excepting a casual familiarity of phrase, I adhere rigidly to the substance of the sentiments which I have expressed. I know not who may be answerable for these measures, nor was your name known to me, or in my recollection at the time when I spoke.' Time soon changed all this, and showed who was teacher and who the learner. By and by the session of 1841 opened, the whigs moving steadily towards their fall, and Mr. Gladstone almost overwhelmed with floods of domestic business. He settled in the pleasant region which is to the metropolis what Delphi was to the habitable earth, and where, if we include in it Downing Street, he passed all the most important years of his life in London.[145] Though he speaks of being overwhelmed by domestic business, and he was undoubtedly hard beset by all the demands of early housekeeping, yet he very speedily recovered his balance. He resisted now and always as jealously as he could those promiscuous claims on time and attention by which men of less strenuous purpose suffer the effectiveness of their lives to be mutilated. 'I well know,' he writes to his young wife who was expecting him to join her at Hagley, 'you would not have me come on any conditions with which one's sense of duty could not be quieted, and would (I hope) send me back by the next train. These delays are to you a practical exemplification of the difficulty of reconciling domestic and political engagements. The case is one that scarcely admits of compromise; the least that is required in order to the fulfilment of one's duty is constant bodily presence in London until the fag-end of the session is fairly reached.' Here are a few examples of the passing days:-- _March 12th_, 1841.--_Tracts for the Times_, No. 90; ominous. _March 13th._--Went to see Reform Club. Sat to Bradley 2½-4. London Library committee. Carlton Library committee. Corrected two proof-sheets. Conversed an hour and a half with Mr. Richmond, who came to tea, chiefly on my plan for a picture-life of Christ. Chess with C. [his wife]. _March 14th_ (_Sunday_).--Communion (St. James's), St. Margaret's afternoon. Wrote on Ephes. v. 1, and read it aloud to servants. _March 20th._--City to see Freshfield. Afternoon service in Saint Paul's. What an image, what a crowd of images! Amidst the unceasing din, and the tumult of men hurrying this way and that for gold, or pleasure, or some self-desire, the vast fabric thrusts itself up to heaven and firmly plants itself on soil begrudged to an occupant that yields no lucre. But the city cannot thrust forth its cathedral; and from thence arises the harmonious measured voice of intercession from day to day. The church praying and deprecating continually for the living mass that are dead while they live, from out of the very centre of that mass; silent and lonesome is her shrine, amidst the noise, the thunder of multitudes. Silent, lonesome, motionless, yet full of life; for were we not more dead than the stones, which built into that sublime structure witness continually to what is great and everlasting,--did priest or chorister, or the casual worshipper but apprehend the grandeur of his function in that spot,--the very heart must burst with the tide of emotions gathering within it. Oh for speed, speed to the wings of that day when this glorious unfulfilled outline of a church shall be charged as a hive with the operations of the Spirit of God and of His war against the world; when the intervals of space and time within its walls, now untenanted by any functions of that holy work, shall be thickly occupied; and when the glorious sights and sounds which shall arrest the passenger in his haste that he may sanctify his purposes by worship, shall be symbols still failing to express the fulness of the power of God developed among His people. _March 21._--Wrote on 1 Thess. v. 17, and read it to servants. Read _The Young Communicants_; Bishop Hall's _Life_. It seems as if at this time the number and close succession of occupations without any great present reward of love or joy, and chiefly belonging to an earthly and narrow range, were my special trial and discipline. Other I seem hardly to have any of daily pressure. Health in myself and those nearest me; (comparative) wealth and success; no strokes from God; no opportunity of pardoning others, for none offend me. _April 3._--Two or three nights ago Mrs. Wilbraham told Catherine that Stanley was extremely surprised to find, after his speech on the Tarmworth and Rugby railway bill, that Peel had been very much annoyed with the expression he had used: 'that his right hon. friend had in pleading for the bill made use of all that art and ingenuity with which he so well knew how to dress up a statement for that House,' and that he showed his annoyance very much by his manner to him, S., afterwards. He, upon reflecting that this was the probable cause, wrote a note to Peel to set matters to rights, in which he succeeded; but he thought Peel very thin-skinned. Wm. Cowper told me the other day at Milnes's that Lord John Russell is remarkable among his colleagues for his anxiety during the recess for the renewal of the session of parliament; that he always argues for fixing an early day of meeting, and finds pleas for it, and finds the time long until it recommences. A visit to Nuneham (April 12) and thence to Oxford brought him into the centre of the tractarians. He saw much of Hamilton, went to afternoon service at Littlemore, breakfasted in company with Newman at Merton, had a long conversation with Pusey on Tract 90, and gathered that Newman thought differently of the Council of Trent from what he had thought a year or two back, and that he differed from Pusey in thinking the English reformation uncatholic. Mr. Gladstone replied that No. 90 had the appearance to his mind of being written by a man, if in, not of, the church of England; and would be interpreted as exhibiting the Tridentine system for the ideal, the anglican for a mutilated and _just_ tolerable actual. Then in the same month he 'finished Palmer on the Articles, deep, earnest, and generally trustworthy. Worked upon a notion of private eucharistical devotions, to be chiefly compiled; and attended a meeting about colonial bishoprics,' where he spoke but indifferently. IV NEW FISCAL POLICY In 1841 the whigs in the expiring hours of their reign launched parliament and parties upon what was to be the grand marking controversy of the era. To remedy the disorder into which expenditure, mainly due to highhanded foreign policy, had brought the national finance, they proposed to reconstruct the fiscal system by reducing the duties on foreign sugar and timber, and substituting for Wellington's corn law a fixed eight shilling duty on imported wheat. The wiser heads, like Lord Spencer, were aware that as an electioneering expedient the new policy would bring them little luck, but their position in any case was desperate. The handling of their proposals was curiously maladroit; and even if it had been otherwise, ministerial repute alike for competency and for sincerity was so damaged both, in the House of Commons and the country, that their doom was certain. The reduction of the duty on slave-grown sugar from foreign countries was as obnoxious to the abolitionist as it was disadvantageous to the West Indian proprietors, and both of these powerful sections were joined by the corn-grower, well aware that his turn would come next. Many meetings took place at Sir Robert Peel's upon the sugar resolutions, and Mr. Gladstone worked up the papers and figures so as to be ready to speak if necessary. At one of these meetings, by the way, he thought it worth while to write down that Peel had the tradesmen's household books upon his desk--a circumstance that he mentioned also to the present writer, when by chance we found ourselves together in the same room fifty years later. On May 10th, his speech on the sugar duties came off in due course. In this speech he took the sound point that the new arrangement must act as an encouragement to the slave trade, 'that monster which, while war, pestilence, and famine were slaying their thousands, slew from year to year with unceasing operation its tens of thousands.' As he went on, he fell upon Macaulay for being member of a cabinet that was thus deserting a cause in which Macaulay's father had been the unseen ally of Wilberforce, and the pillar of his strength,--'a man of profound benevolence, of acute understanding, of indefatigable industry, and of that self-denying temper which is content to work in secret, and to seek for its reward beyond the grave.' Macaulay was the last man to suffer rebuke in silence, and he made a sharp reply on the following day, followed by a magnanimous peace-making behind the Speaker's chair. DEFEAT OF WHIG MINISTRY Meanwhile the air was thick and loud with rumours. Lord Eliot told Mr. Gladstone in the middle of the debate that there had been a stormy cabinet that morning, and that ministers had at last made up their minds to follow Lord Spencer's advice, to resign and not to dissolve. When the division on the sugar duties was taken, ministers were beaten (May 19) by a majority of 36, after fine performances from Sir Robert, and a good one from Palmerston on the other side. The cabinet, with, a tenacity incredible in our own day, were still for holding on until their whole scheme, with the popular element of cheap bread in it, was fully before the country. Peel immediately countered them by a vote of want of confidence, and this was carried (June 4) by a majority of one:-- On Saturday morning the division in the House of Commons presented a scene of the most extraordinary excitement. While we were in our lobby we were told that we were 312 and the government either 311 or 312. It was also known that they had brought down Lord ---- who was reported to be in a state of total idiocy. After returning to the House I went to sit near the bar, where the other party were coming in. We had all been counted, 312, and the tellers at the government end had counted to 308; there remained behind this unfortunate man, reclining in a chair, evidently in total unconsciousness of what was proceeding. Loud cries had been raised from our own side, when it was seen that he was being brought up, to clear the bar that the whole House might witness the scene, and every one stood up in intense curiosity. There were now only this figure, less human even than an automaton, and two persons, R. Stuart and E. Ellice, pushing the chair in which he lay. A loud cry of 'Shame, Shame,' burst from our side; those opposite were silent. Those three were counted without passing the tellers, and the moment after we saw that our tellers were on the right in walking to the table, indicating that we had won. Fremantle gave out the numbers, and then the intense excitement raised by the sight we had witnessed found vent in our enthusiastic (quite irregular) hurrah with great waving of hats. Upon looking back I am sorry to think how much I partook in the excitement that prevailed; but how could it be otherwise in so extraordinary a case? I thought Lord John's a great speech--it was delivered too under the pressure of great indisposition. He has risen with adversity. He seemed rather below par as a leader in 1835 when he had a clear majority, and the ball nearly at his foot; in each successive year the strength of his government has sunk and his own has risen. Then came the dissolution, and an election memorable in the history of party. Thinking quite as much of the Scotch college, the colonial bishoprics, and Tract Ninety, as of sugar duties or the corn law, Mr. Gladstone hastened to Newark. He was delighted with the new colleague who had been provided for him. 'As a candidate,' he writes to his wife, 'Lord John Manners is excellent; his speaking is popular and effective, and he is a good canvasser, by virtue not I think of effort, but of a general kindliness and warmth of disposition which naturally shows itself to every one. Nothing can be more satisfactory than to have such a partner.' In his address Mr. Gladstone only touched on the poor law and the corn law. On the first he would desire liberal treatment for aged, sick, and widowed poor, and reasonable discretion to the local administrators of the law. As to the second, the protection of native agriculture is an object of the first economical and national importance, and should be secured by a graduated scale of duties on foreign grain. 'Manners and I,' he says, 'were returned as protectionists. My speeches were of absolute dulness, but I have no doubt they were sound in the sense of my leaders Peel and Graham and others of the party.' The election offered no new incidents. One old lady reproached him for not being content with keeping bread and sugar from the people, but likewise by a new faith, the mysterious monster of Puseyism, stealing away from them the bread of life. He found the wesleyans shaky, partly because they disliked his book and were afraid of the Oxford Tracts, and partly from his refusal to subscribe to their school. Otherwise, flags, bands, suppers, processions, all went on in high ceremonial order as before. Day after day passed with nothing worse than the threat of a blue candidate, but one Sunday morning (June 26) as people came out of church, they found an address on the walls and a dark rumour got afloat that the new man had brought heavy bags of money. For this rumour there was no foundation, but it inspired annoying fears in the good and cheerful hopes in the bad. The time was in any case too short, and at four o'clock on June 29 the poll was found to be, Gladstone 633, Manners 630, Hobhouse 391. His own election safely over, Mr. Gladstone turned to take part in a fierce contest in which Sir Stephen Glynne was candidate for the representation of Flintshire, but 'bribery, faggotry, abduction, personation, riot, factious delays, landlord's intimidations, partiality of authorities,' carried the day, and to the bitter dismay of Hawarden, Sir Stephen was narrowly beaten. One ancient dame, overwhelmed by the defeat of the family that for eighty years she had idolised, cried aloud to Mrs. Gladstone, 'I am a great woman for thinking of the Lord, but O, my dear lady, this has put it all out of my head.' The election involved him in what would now be thought a whimsical correspondence with one of the Grosvenor family, who complained of Mr. Gladstone for violating the sacred canons of electioneering etiquette by canvassing Lord Westminster's tenants. 'I did think,' says the wounded patrician, 'that interference between a landlord with whose opinions you were acquainted and his tenants was not justifiable according to those laws of delicacy and propriety which I considered binding in such cases.' ELECTION OF 1841 At last he was able to snatch a holiday with his wife and child by the seaside at Hoylake, which rather oddly struck him as being like Pæstum without the temples. He read away at Gibbon and Dante until he went to Hawarden, partly to consider the state of its financial affairs; as to these something is to be said later. 'Walked alone in the Hawarden grounds,' he says one day during his stay; 'ruminated on the last-named subject [accounts], also on anticipated changes [in government]. I can digest the crippled religious action of the state; but I cannot be a party to exacting by blood opium compensation from the Chinese.' Then to London (Aug. 18). He attended the select party meetings at Sir Robert Peel's and Lord Aberdeen's. Dining at Grillion's he heard Stanley, speaking of the new parliament, express a high opinion of Roebuck as an able man and clear speaker, likely to make a figure; and also of Cobden as a resolute perspicacious man, familiar with all the turns of his subject; and when the new House assembled, he had made up his mind for himself that '_Cobden will be a worrying man on corn_.' This was Cobden's first entry into the House. At last the whigs were put out of office by a majority of 91, and Peel undertook to form a government. _Aug. 31/41._--In consequence of a note received this morning from Sir Robert Peel I went to him at half-past eleven. The following is the substance of a quarter of an hour's conversation. He said: 'In this great struggle, in which we have been and are to be engaged, the chief importance will attach to questions of finance. It would not be in my power to undertake the business of chancellor of the exchequer in detail; I therefore have asked Goulburn to fill that office, and I shall be simply first lord. I think we shall be very strong in the House of Commons if as a part of this arrangement you will accept the post of vice-president of the board of trade, and conduct the business of that department in the House of Commons, with Lord Ripon as president. I consider it an office of the highest importance, and you will have my unbounded confidence in it.'[146] I said, 'of the importance and responsibility of that office at the present time I am well aware; but it is right that I should say as strongly as I can, that I really am not fit for it. I have no general knowledge of trade whatever; with a few questions I am acquainted, but they are such as have come across me incidentally.' He said, 'The satisfactory conduct of an office of that kind must after all depend more upon the intrinsic qualities of the man, than upon the precise amount of his previous knowledge. I also think you will find Lord Ripon a perfect master of these subjects, and depend upon it with these appointments at the board of trade we shall carry the whole commercial interests of the country with us.' VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE He resumed, 'If there be any other arrangement that you would prefer, my value and "affectionate regard" for you would make me most desirous to effect it so far as the claims of others would permit. To be perfectly frank and unreserved, I should tell you, that there are many reasons which would have made me wish to send you to Ireland; but upon the whole I think that had better not be done. Some considerations connected with the presbyterians of Ireland make me prefer on the whole that we should adopt a different plan.[147] Then, if I had had the exchequer, I should have asked you to be financial secretary to the treasury; but under the circumstances I have mentioned, that would be an office of secondary importance and I am sure you will not estimate that I now propose to you by the mere name which it bears.' He also made an allusion to the admiralty of which I do not retain the exact form. But I rather interposed and said, 'My objection on the score of fitness would certainly apply with even increased force to anything connected with the military and naval services of the country, for of them I know nothing. Nor have I any other object in view; there is no office to which I could designate myself. I think it my duty to act upon your judgment as to my qualifications. If it be your deliberate wish to make me vice-president of the board of trade, I will not decline it; I will endeavour to put myself into harness, and to prepare myself for the place in the best manner I can; but it really is an apprenticeship.' He said, 'I hope you will be content to act upon the sense which others entertain of your suitableness for this office in particular, and I think it will be a good arrangement both with a view to the present conduct of business and to the brilliant destinies which I trust are in store for you.' I answered, that I was deeply grateful for his many acts of confidence and kindness; and that I would at once assent to the plan he had proposed, only begging him to observe that I had mentioned my unfitness under a very strong sense of duty and of the facts, and not by any means as a mere matter of ceremony. I then added that I thought I should but ill respond to his confidence if I did not mention to him a subject connected with his policy which might raise a difficulty in my mind. 'I cannot,' I said, 'reconcile it to my sense of right to exact from China, as a term of peace, compensation for the opium surrendered to her.'... He agreed that it was best to mention it; observed that in consequence of the shape in which the Chinese affair came into the hands of the new government, they would not be wholly unfettered; seemed to hint that under any other circumstances the vice-president of board of trade need not so much mind what was done in the other departments, but remarked that at present every question of foreign relations and many more would be very apt to mix themselves with the department of trade. He thought I had better leave the question suspended. I hesitated a moment before coming away and said it was only from my anxiety to review what I had said, and to be sure that I had made a clean breast on the subject of my unfitness for the department of trade. Nothing could be more friendly and warm than his whole language and demeanour. It has always been my hope, that I might be able to avoid this class of public employment. On this account I have not endeavoured to train myself for them. The place is very distasteful to me, and what is of more importance, I fear I may hereafter demonstrate the unfitness I have to-day only stated. However, it comes to me, I think, as a matter of plain duty; it may be all the better for not being according to my own bent and leaning; I must forthwith go to work, as a reluctant schoolboy meaning well. _Sept. 3._--This day I went to Claremont to be sworn in. When the council was constructed, the Duke of Buckingham and Lord Liverpool were first called in to take their oaths and seats; then the remaining four followed, Lincoln, Eliot, Ernest Bruce, and I. The Queen sat at the head of the table, composed but dejected--one could not but feel for her, all through the ceremonial. We knelt down to take the oaths of allegiance and supremacy and stood up to take (I think) the councillor's oath, then kissed the Queen's hand, then went round the table shaking hands with each member, beginning from Prince Albert who sat on the Queen's right, and ending with Lord Wharncliffe on her left. We then sat at the lower end of the table, excepting Lord E. Bruce, who went to his place behind the Queen as vice-chamberlain. Then the chancellor first and next the Duke of Buckingham were sworn to their respective offices. C. Greville forgot the duke's privy seal and sent him off without it; the Queen corrected him and gave it.... Then were read and approved several orders in council; among which was one assigning a district to a church and another appointing Lord Ripon and me to act in matters of trade. These were read aloud by the Queen in a very clear though subdued voice; and she repeated 'Approved' after each. Upon that relating to Lord R. and myself we were called up and kissed hands again. Then the Queen rose, as did all the members of the council, and retired bowing. We had luncheon in the same room half an hour later and went off. The Duke of Wellington went in an open carriage with a pair; all our other grand people with four. Peel looked shy all through. I visited Claremont once before, 27 years ago I think, as a child, to see the place, soon after the Princess Charlotte's death. It corresponded pretty much with my impressions. SWORN OF THE PRIVY COUNCIL He secured his re-election at Newark on September 14 without opposition, and without trouble, beyond the pressure of a notion rooted in the genial mind of his constituency that as master of the mint he would have an unlimited command of public coin for all purposes whether general or particular. His reflections upon his ministerial position are of much biographic interest. He had evidently expected inclusion in the cabinet:-- _Sept. 16._--Upon quietly reviewing past times, and the degree of confidence which Sir Robert Peel had for years, habitually I may say, reposed in me, and especially considering its climax, in my being summoned to the meetings immediately preceding the debate on the address in August, I am inclined to think, after allowing for the delusions of self love, that there is not a perfect correspondence between the tenor of the past on the one hand, and my present appointment and the relations in which it places me to the administration on the other. He may have made up his mind at those meetings that I was not qualified for the consultations of a government, nor would there be anything strange in this, except the supposition that he had not seen it before. Having however taken the alarm (so to speak) upon the invitation at that time, and been impressed with the idea that it savoured of cabinet office, I considered and consulted on the Chinese question, which I regarded as a serious impediment to office of that description, and I had provisionally contemplated saying to Peel in case he should offer me Ireland with the cabinet, to reply that I would gladly serve his government in the secretaryship, but that I feared his Chinese measures would hardly admit of my acting in the cabinet. I am very sorry now to think that I may have been guilty of an altogether absurd presumption, in dreaming of the cabinet. But it was wholly suggested by that invitation. And I still think that there must have been some consultation and decision relating to me in the interval between the meetings and the formation of the new ministry, which produced some alteration.... In confirmation of the notion I have recorded above, I am distinct in the recollection that there was a shyness in Peel's manner and a downward eye, when he opened the conversation and made the offer, not usual with him in speaking to me. In after years, he thus described his position when he went to the board of trade:-- I was totally ignorant both of political economy and of the commerce of the country. I might have said, as I believe was said by a former holder of the vice-presidency, that my mind was in regard to all those matters a 'sheet of white paper,' except that it was doubtless coloured by a traditional prejudice of protection, which had then quite recently become a distinctive mark of conservatism. In a spirit of ignorant mortification I said to myself at the moment: the science of politics deals with the government of men, but I am set to govern packages. In my journal for Aug. 2 I find this recorded: 'Since the address meetings' (which were quasi-cabinets) 'the idea of the Irish secretaryship had nestled imperceptibly in my mind.'[148] The vice-presidency was the post, by the way, impudently proposed four years later by the whigs to Gobden, after he had taught both whigs and tories their business. Mr. Gladstone, at least, was quick to learn the share of 'packages' in the government of men. REFLECTIONS ON HIS OFFICE _Sept. 30._--Closing the month, and a period of two years comprehended within this book, I add a few words. My position is changed by office. In opposition I was frequently called, or sometimes at least, to the confidential councils of the party on a variety of subjects. In office, I shall of course have to do with the department of trade and with little or nothing beyond. There is some point in the query of the _Westminster Review: Whether my appointments are a covet satire?_ But they bring great advantages; much less responsibility, much less anxiety. I could not have made myself answerable for what I expect the cabinet will do in China. It must be admitted that it presents an odd appearance, when a person whose mind and efforts have chiefly ranged within the circle of subjects connected with the church, is put into office of the most different description. It looks as if the first object were to neutralise his mischievous tendencies. But I am in doubt whether to entertain this supposition would be really a compliment to the discernment of my superiors, or a breach of charity; therefore it is best not entertained. Paragraphs appeared in newspapers imputing to Mr. Gladstone a strong reprobation of the prime minister's opinions upon church affairs, and he thought it worth while to write to Sir Robert a strong (and most excessively lengthy) disclaimer of being, among other things, an object of hope to unbending tories as against their moderate and cautious leader.[149] 'Should party spirit,' he went on, 'run very high against your commercial measures, I have no doubt that the venom of my religious opinions will be plentifully alleged to have infused itself into your policy even in that direction, ... and more than ever will be heard of your culpability in taking into office a person of my bigoted and extreme sentiments.' Peel replied (October 19, 1841) with kindness and good sense. He had not taken the trouble to read the paragraph; he had read the works from which a mischievous industry had tried to collect means of defaming their author; he found nothing in them in the most distant manner to affect political co-operation; and he signed his name to the letter, 'with an esteem and regard, which are proof against evil-minded attempts to sow jealousy and discord.'[150] FOOTNOTES: [137] For Mr. Gladstone's later view of this transaction, see _Gleanings_, i. p. 39. He composed a letter on the subject, which, he says, 'will probably never see the light.' [138] Mr. Gladstone compiled this list of the statesmen in the maternal ancestry of his children:-- Right Hon. George Grenville, Great, great grandfather. Sir W. Wyndham, Great, great, great grandfather. Lord Chatham, Great, great granduncle-in-law. Mr. Pitt, First cousin thrice removed. Lord Grenville, Great granduncle. Mr. Grenville, Great granduncle. [139] _Paradiso_, xxvi. 64-6-- 'Love for each plant that in the garden grows, Of the Eternal Gardener, I prove, Proportioned to the goodness he bestows.'--WRIGHT. [140] _Ibid._ iii. 85. See above, p. 215. [141] See Lord Palmerston's speech, Aug. 10, 1842. [142] _Hansard_, 3 S. vol. 53, p. 819. [143] 'It was the common talk of Oxford how the most distinguished lawyer of the day, a literary man and a critic, on hearing the speech in question, pronounced his prompt verdict on him in the words, "That young man's fortune is made."'--Newman's Funeral Sermon on J. R. Hope-Scott in _Sermons preached on Various Occasions_, p. 269. [144] The reader who cares for further particulars may consult the _Memoirs of J. R. Hope-Scott_, i. pp. 248, 281-8; and ii. p. 291. [145] His first house was 13 Carlton House Terrace, then his father gave him 6 Carlton Gardens. In 1856 he purchased 11 Carlton House Terrace, which was his London home until 1875. From 1876 to 1880 he occupied 73 Harley Street. [146] 'At that period the board of trade was the department which administered to a great extent the functions that have since passed principally into the hands of the treasury, connected with the fiscal laws of the country.'--_Mr. Gladstone at Leeds_, Oct. 8, 1881. In 1880, writing to Mr. Chamberlain, then president, he says: 'If you were to look back to the records of your department thirty-five and forty years ago, you would find how much of the public trade business was transacted in it. Revenue was then largely involved: and hence, I imagine, it came about that this business was taken over in a great degree by the treasury. I myself have drawn up new tariffs in both, at the B. of T. in 1842 and 1844-5, and at the treasury in 1853 and 1860. Why and how the old B. of T. functions also passed in part to the F.O. I do not so well know.' [147] I suppose this points to incompatibility in the fevers of the hour between protestant Ulster and a Puseyite chief secretary. [148] Autobiographic note. [149] It would appear from the manuscript at the British Museum, that Macaulay's sentence about Mr. Gladstone as the rising hope of the stern and unbending tories, which later events made long so famous and so tiresome, was a happy afterthought, written in along the margin. [150] Parker's _Peel_, ii. pp. 514-17. CHAPTER VIII PEEL'S GOVERNMENT (_1842-1844_) In many of the most important rules of public policy Sir R. Peel's government surpassed generally the governments which have succeeded it, whether liberal or conservative. Among them I would mention purity in patronage, financial strictness, loyal adherence to the principle of public economy, jealous regard to the rights of parliament, a single eye to the public interest, strong aversion to extension of territorial responsibilities and a frank admission of the rights of foreign countries as equal to those of their own.--MR. GLADSTONE (1880).[151] Of the four or five most memorable administrations of the century, the great conservative government of Sir Robert Peel was undoubtedly one. It laid the groundwork of our solid commercial policy, it established our railway system, it settled the currency, and, by no means least, it gave us a good national character in Europe as lovers of moderation, equity, and peace. Little as most members of the new cabinet saw it, their advent definitely marked the rising dawn of an economic era. If you had to constitute new societies, Peel said to Croker, then you might on moral and social grounds prefer cornfields to cotton factories, and you might like an agricultural population better than a manufacturing; as it was, the national lot was cast, and statesmen were powerless to turn back the tide. The food of the people, their clothing, the raw material for their industry, their education, the conditions under which women and children were suffered to toil, markets for the products of loom and forge and furnace and mechanic's shop,--these were slowly making their way into the central field of political vision, and taking the place of fantastic follies about foreign dynasties and the balance of power as the true business of the British statesman. On the eve of entering parliament (September 17, 1832), Mr. Gladstone recounts some articles of his creed at the time to his friend Gaskell, and to modern eyes a curious list it is. The first place is given to his views on the relative merits of Pedro, Miguel, Donna Maria, in respect of the throne of Portugal. The second goes to Poland. The third to the affairs of Lombardy. Free trade comes last. This was still the lingering fashion of the moment, and it died hard. The new ministry contained an unusual number of men of mark and capacity, and they were destined to form a striking group. At their head was a statesman whose fame grows more impressive with time, not the author or inspirer of large creative ideas, but with what is at any rate next best--a mind open and accessible to those ideas, and endowed with such gifts of skill, vigilance, caution, and courage as were needed for the government of a community rapidly passing into a new stage of its social growth. One day in February 1842, he sent for Mr. Gladstone on some occasion of business. Peel happened not to be well, and in the course of the conversation his doctor called. Sir James Graham who had come in, said to his junior in Peel's absence with the physician, 'The pressure upon him is immense. We never had a minister who was so truly a first minister as he is. He makes himself felt in every department, and is really cognisant of the affairs of each. Lord Grey could not master such an amount of business. Canning could not do it. Now he is an actual minister, and is indeed _capax imperii_.' Next to Peel as parliamentary leaders stood Graham himself and Stanley. They had both of them sat in the cabinet of Lord Grey, and now found themselves the colleagues of the bitterest foes of Grey's administration. As we have seen, Mr. Gladstone pronounces Graham to have known more about economic subjects than all the rest of the government put together. Such things had hitherto been left to men below the first rank in the hierarchy of public office, like Huskisson. Pedro and Miguel held the field. END OF HIS PROTECTIONIST STAGE Mr. Gladstone's own position is described in an autobiographic fragment of his last years:-- When I entered parliament in 1832, the great controversy between protection or artificial restraint and free trade, of which Cobden was the leading figure, did not enter into the popular controversies of the day, and was still in the hands of the philosophers. My father was an active and effective local politician, and the protectionism which I inherited from him and from all my youthful associations was qualified by a thorough acceptance of the important preliminary measures of Mr. Huskisson, of whom he was the first among the local supporters. Moreover, for the first six years or so of my parliamentary life free trade was in no way a party question, and it only became strictly such in 1841 at, and somewhat before, the general election, when the whig government, _in extremis_, proposed a fixed duty upon corn. My mind was in regard to it a sheet of white paper, but I accepted the established conditions in _the lump_, and could hardly do otherwise. In 1833 only, the question was debated in the House of Commons, and the speech of the mover against the corn laws made me uncomfortable. But the reply of Sir James Graham restored my peace of mind. I followed the others with a languid interest. Yet I remember being struck with the essential unsoundness of the argument of Mr. Villiers. It was this. Under the present corn law our trade, on which we depend, is doomed, for our manufacturers cannot possibly contend with the manufacturers of the continent if they have to pay wages regulated by the protection price of food, while their rivals pay according to the natural or free trade price. The answer was obvious. 'Thank you. We quite understand you. Your object is to get down the wages of your workpeople.' It was Cobden who really set the argument on its legs; and it is futile to compare any other man with him as the father of our system of free trade. I had in 1840 to dabble in this question, and on the wrong side of it[152].... The matter passed from my mind, full of churches and church matters, in which I was now gradually acquiring knowledge. In 1841 the necessities of the whig government led to a further development of the great controversy; but I interfered only in the colonial part of it in connection with the colonies and the slave trade to Porto Rico and Brazil. We West Indians were now great philanthropists! When Sir Robert Peel assumed the government he had become deeply committed to protection, which in the last two or three years had become the subject of a commanding controversy. I suppose that at Newark I followed suit, but I have no records. On the change of government Peel, with much judgment, offered me the vice-presidentship of the board of trade. On sound principles of party discipline, I took the office at once; and having taken it I set to work with all my might as a worker. In a very short time I came to form a low estimate of the knowledge and information of Lord Ripon; and of the cabinet Sir James Graham, I think, knew most. And now the stones of which my protectionism was built up began to get uncomfortably loose. When we came to the question of the tariff, we were all nearly on a par in ignorance, and we had a very bad adviser in Macgregor, secretary to the board of trade. But I had the advantage of being able to apply myself with an undivided attention. My assumption of office at the board of trade was followed by hard, steady, and honest work; and every day so spent beat like a battering ram on the unsure fabric of my official protectionism. By the end of the year I was far gone in the opposite sense. I had to speak much on these questions in the session of 1842, but it was always done with great moderation. II PEEL'S SLOW CONVERSION The case on the accession of the new ministers was difficult. Peel himself has drawn the picture. By incompetent finance, by reckless colonial expenditure, by solving political difficulties through gifts or promises of cash from the British treasury, by war and foreign relations hovering on the verge of war and necessitating extended preparations, the whigs had brought the national resources into an embarrassment that was extreme. The accumulated deficits of five years had become a heavy incubus, and the deficit of 1842-3 was likely to be not less than two and a half millions more. Commerce and manufactures were languishing. Distress was terrible. Poor-rates were mounting, and grants-in-aid would extend impoverishment from the factory districts to the rural. 'Judge then,' said Peel, 'whether we can with safety retrograde in manufactures.'[153] So grave a crisis could only be met by daring remedies. With the highest courage, moral courage no less than political, Peel resolved to ask parliament to let him raise four or five millions a year by income-tax, in order to lower the duties on the great articles of consumption, and by reforming the tariff both to relieve trade, and to stimulate and replenish the reciprocal flow of export and import. That he at this time, or perhaps in truth at any time, had acquired complete mastery of those deeper principles and wider aspects of free trade of which Adam Smith had been the great exponent--principles afterwards enforced by the genius of Cobden with such admirable still, persistency, and patriotic spirit--there was nothing to show. Such a scheme had no originality in it. Huskisson, and men of less conspicuous name, had ten years earlier urged the necessity of a new general system of taxation, based upon remission of duty on raw materials and on articles of consumption, and upon the imposition of an income-tax. The famous report of the committee on import duties of 1840, often rightly called the charter of free trade, and of which Peel, not much to his credit, had at this moment not read a word,[154] laid the foundations of the great policy of tariff reform with which the names of Peel and Gladstone are associated in history. The policy advocated in 1830 in the admirable treatise of Sir Henry Parnell is exactly the policy of Peel in 1842, as he acknowledged. After all it is an idle quarrel between the closet strategist and the victorious commander; between the man who first discerns some great truth of government, and the man who gets the thing, or even a part of the thing, actually done. PEEL'S GOVERNMENT Mr. Gladstone has left on record some particulars of his own share as subordinate minister not in the cabinet, in this first invasion upon the old tory corn law of 1827. Peel from the beginning appreciated the powers of his keen and zealous lieutenant, and even in the autumn of 1841 he had taken him into confidential counsel.[155] Besides a letter of observations on the general scheme of commercial freedom, Mr. Gladstone prepared for the prime minister a special paper on the corn laws. The ordinary business of the department soon fell into my hands to transact with the secretaries, one of them Macgregor, a loose-minded free trader, and the other Lefevre, a clear and scientific one. In that autumn I became possessed with the desire to relax the corn law, which formed, I believe, the chief subject of my meditations. Hence followed an important consequence. Very slow in acquiring relative and secondary knowledge and honestly absorbed in my work, I simply thought on and on as to what was right and fair under the circumstances. In January 1842, as the session approached, they came to close quarters. The details of all the mysteries of protectionist iniquity we may well spare ourselves. Peel, feeling the pulse of his agricultural folk, thought it would never do to give them less than a ten-shilling duty, when the price of wheat was at sixty-two shillings the quarter; while Mr. Gladstone thought a twelve-shilling duty at a price of sixty far too low a relief to the consumer. His eyes were beginning to be opened. _Feb. 2._--I placed in Sir R. Peel's hands a long paper on the corn law in the month of November, which, on wishing to refer to it, he could not find; and he requested me to write out afresh my argument upon the value of a rest or dead level, and the part of the scale of price at which it should arrive; this I did. On Monday I wrote another paper arguing for a rest between 60/ and 70/ or thereabouts; and yesterday a third intended to show that the present law has been in practice _fully_ equivalent to a prohibition up to 70/. Lord Ripon then told me the cabinet had adopted Peel's scale as it originally stood--and seemed to doubt whether _any_ alteration could be made. On his announcing the adoption, I said in a marked manner, '_I am very sorry for it_'--believing that it would be virtual prohibition up to 65/ or 66/ and often beyond, to the minimum; and not being able, in spite of all the good which the government is about to do with respect to commerce, to make up my mind to support such a protection. I see, from conversations with them to-day, that Lord Ripon, Peel, and Graham, are all aware the protection is greater than is necessary. MR. GLADSTONE'S RAPID ADVANCE This mood soon carried the vice-president terribly far. On Feb. 5 he met most of the members of the cabinet at Peel's house. He argued his point that the scale would operate as virtual protection up to seventy shillings, and in a private interview with Peel afterwards hinted at retirement. Peel declared himself so taken by surprise that he hardly knew what to say; 'he was thunderstruck;' and he told his young colleague that 'the retirement of a person holding his office, on this question, immediately before his introducing it, would endanger the existence of the administration, and that he much doubted whether in such a case he could bring it on.' I fear Peel was much annoyed and displeased, for he would not give me a word of help or of favourable supposition as to my own motives and belief. He used nothing like an angry or unkind word, but the negative character of the conversation had a chilling effect on my mind. I came home sick at heart in the evening and told all to Catherine, my lips being to every one else, as I said to Sir R. Peel, absolutely sealed. 'He might have gained me more easily, I think,' Mr. Gladstone wrote years afterwards, 'by a more open and supple method of expostulation. But he was not skilful, I think, in the management of personal or sectional dilemmas, as he showed later on with respect to two important questions, the Factory acts and the crisis on the sugar duties in 1844.' This sharp and unnecessary corner safely turned, Mr. Gladstone learned the lesson how to admire a great master overcoming a legislator's difficulties. I have been much struck (he wrote, Feb. 26) throughout the private discussions connected with, the new project of a corn law, by the tenacity with which Sir Robert Peel, firstly by adhering in every point to the old arrangements where it seemed at all possible, and since the announcement of the plan to parliament, by steadily resisting changes in any part of the resolutions, has narrowed the ground and reduced in number the points of attack, and thus made his measure practicable in the face of popular excitement and a strong opposition. Until we were actually in the midst of the struggle, I did not appreciate the extraordinary sagacity of his parliamentary instinct in this particular. He said yesterday to Lord Ripon and to me, 'Among ourselves, in this room, I have no hesitation in saying, that if I had not had to look to other than abstract considerations, I would have proposed a lower protection. But it would have done no good to push the matter so far as to drive Knatchbull out of the cabinet after the Duke of Buckingham, nor could I hope to pass a measure with greater reductions through the House of Lords.' When Lord John Russell proposed an amendment substituting an eight-shilling duty for a sliding scale, Peel asked Mr. Gladstone to reply to him. 'This I did (Feb. 14, 1842),' he says, 'and with my whole heart, for I did not yet fully understand the vicious operation of the sliding scale on the corn trade, and it is hard to see how an eight-shilling duty could even then have been maintained.' III THE NEW POLICY The three centres of operations were the corn bill, then the bill imposing the income-tax, and finally the reform of the duties upon seven hundred and fifty out of the twelve hundred articles that swelled the tariff. The corn bill was the most delicate, the tariff the most laborious, the income-tax the boldest, the most fraught alike with peril for the hour and with consequences of pith and moment for the future. It is hardly possible for us to realise the general horror in which this hated impost was then enveloped. The fact of Brougham procuring the destruction of all the public books and papers in which its odious accounts were recorded, only illustrates the intensity of the common sentiment against the dire hydra evoked by Mr. Pitt for the destruction of the regicide power of France, and sent back again to its gruesome limbo after the ruin of Napoleon. From 1842 until 1874 the question of the income-tax was the vexing enigma of public finance. It was upon Mr. Gladstone that the burden of the immense achievement of the new tariff fell, and the toil was huge. He used afterwards to say that he had been concerned in four revisions of the tariff, in 1842, 1845, 1853, and 1860, and that the first of them cost six times as much trouble as the other three put together. He spoke one hundred and twenty-nine times during the session. He had only once sat on a committee of trade, and had only once spoken on a purely trade question during the nine years of his parliamentary life. All his habits of thought and action had been cast in a different mould. It is ordinarily assumed that he was a born financier, endowed besides with a gift of idealism and the fine training of a scholar. As matter of fact, it was the other way; he was a man of high practical and moral imagination, with an understanding made accurate by strength of grasp and incomparable power of rapid and concentrated apprehension, yoked to finance only by force of circumstance--a man who would have made a shining and effective figure in whatever path of great public affairs, whether ecclesiastical or secular, duty might have called for his exertions. It is curious that the first measure of commercial policy in this session should have been a measure of protection in the shape of a bill introduced by the board of trade, imposing a duty on corn, wheat, and flour brought from the United States into Canada.[156] But this was only a detail, though a singular one, in a policy that was in fact a continuance of the relaxation of the commercial system of the colonies which had been begun in 1822 and 1825 by Robinson and Huskisson. In his present employment Mr. Gladstone was called upon to handle a mass of questions that were both of extreme complexity in themselves, and also involved collision with trade interests always easily alarmed, irritated, and even exasperated. With merchants and manufacturers, importers and exporters, brokers and bankers, with all the serried hosts of British trade, with the laws and circumstances of international commerce, he was every day brought into close, detailed, and responsible contact:--Whether the duty on straw bonnets should go by weight or by number; what was the difference between boot-fronts at six shillings per dozen pairs and a 15 per cent. duty _ad valorem_; how to distinguish the regulus of tin from mere ore, and how to fix the duty on copper ore so as not to injure the smelter; how to find an adjustment between the liquorice manufacturers of London and the liquorice growers of Pontefract; what was the special case for muscatels as distinct from other raisins; whether 110 pounds of ship biscuits would be a fair deposit for taking out of bond 100 pounds of wheat if not kiln-dried, or 96 pounds if kiln-dried; whether there ought to be uniformity between hides and skins. He applies to Cornewall Lewis, then a poor-law commissioner, not on the astronomy of the ancients or the truth of early Roman history, but to find out for a certain series of years past the contract price of meat in workhouses. He listens to the grievances of the lath-renders; of the coopers who complain that casks will come in too cheap; of the coal-whippers, and the frame-work knitters; and he examines the hard predicament of the sawyers, who hold government answerable both for the fatal competition of machinery and the displacement of wood by iron. 'These deputations,' he says, 'were invaluable to me, for by constant close questioning I learned the nature of their trades, and armed with this admission to their interior, made careful notes and became able to defend in debate the propositions of the tariff and to show that the respective businesses would be carried on and not ruined as they said. I have ever since said that deputations are most admirable aids for the transaction of public business, provided the receiver of them is allowed to fix the occasion and the stage at which they appear.' PEEL TO JOHN GLADSTONE Among the deputations of this period Mr. Gladstone always recalled one from Lancashire, as the occasion on which he first saw Mr. Bright:-- The deputation was received not by me but by Lord Ripon, in the large room at the board of trade, I being present. A long line of fifteen or twenty gentlemen occupied benches running down and at the end of the room, and presented a formidable appearance. All that I remember, however, is the figure of a person in black or dark Quaker costume, seemingly the youngest of the band. Eagerly he sat a little forward on the bench and intervened in the discussion. I was greatly struck with him. He seemed to me rather fierce, but very strong and very earnest. I need hardly say this was John Bright. A year or two after he made his appearance in parliament.[157] The best testimony to Mr. Gladstone's share in this arduous task is supplied in a letter written by the prime minister himself to John Gladstone, and that he should have taken the trouble to write it shows, moreover, that though Peel may have been a 'bad horse to go up to in the stable,' his reserve easily melted away in recognition of difficult duty well done:-- _Sir Robert Peel to John Gladstone._ _Whitehall, June 16, 1842._--You probably have heard that we have concluded the discussions (the preliminary discussions at least) on the subject of the tariff. I cannot resist the temptation, if it be only for the satisfaction of my own feelings, of congratulating you most warmly and sincerely, on the distinction which your son has acquired, by the manner in which he has conducted himself throughout those discussions and all others since his appointment to office. At no time in the annals of parliament has there been exhibited a more admirable combination of ability, extensive knowledge, temper, and discretion. Your paternal feelings must be gratified in the highest degree by the success which has naturally and justly followed the intellectual exertions of your son, and you must be supremely happy as a father in the reflection that the capacity to make such exertions is combined in his case with such purity of heart and integrity of conduct. More than fifty years later in offering to a severe opponent magnanimous congratulations in debate on his son's successful maiden speech, Mr. Gladstone said he knew how refreshing to a father's heart such good promise must ever be. And in his own instance Peel's generous and considerate letter naturally drew from John Gladstone a worthy and feeling response:-- _John Gladstone to Sir R. Peel._ _June 17._--The receipt last evening of your kind letter of yesterday filled my eyes with tears of gratitude to Almighty God, for having given me a son whose conduct in the discharge of his public duties has received the full approbation of one, who of all men, is so well qualified to form a correct judgment of his merits. Permit me to offer you my most sincere thanks for this truly acceptable testimonial, which I shall carefully preserve. William is the youngest of my four sons; in the conduct of all of them, I have the greatest cause for thankfulness, for neither have ever caused me a pang. He excels his brothers in talent, but not so in soundness of principles, habits of usefulness, or integrity of purpose. My eldest, as you are aware, has again, and in a most satisfactory manner, got into parliament. To have the third also again there, whilst the services of naval men, circumstanced as he is, who seek unsuccessfully for employment, are not required, we are desirous to effect, and wait for a favourable opportunity to accomplish. Whenever we may succeed, I shall consider my cup to be filled, for the second is honourably and usefully engaged as a merchant in Liverpool, occupying the situation I held there for so many years. It was while they were in office that Peel wrote from Windsor to beg Mr. Gladstone to sit for his portrait to Lucas, the same artist who had already painted Graham for him. 'I shall be very glad of this addition to the gallery of the eminent men of my own time.' ENTRY INTO THE CABINET It was evident that Mr. Gladstone's admission to the cabinet could not be long deferred, and in the spring of the following year, the head of the government made him the coveted communication:-- _Whitehall, May 13, 1843._ MY DEAR GLADSTONE,--I have proposed to the Queen that Lord Ripon should succeed my lamented friend and colleague, Lord Fitzgerald, as president of the board of control. I, at the same time, requested her Majesty's permission (and it was most readily conceded) to propose to you the office of president of the board of trade, with a seat in the cabinet. If it were not for the occasion of the vacancy I should have had unmixed satisfaction in thus availing myself of the earliest opportunity that has occurred since the formation of the government, of giving a wider scope to your ability to render public service, and of strengthening that government by inviting your aid as a minister of the crown. For myself personally, and I can answer also for every other member of the government, the prospect of your accession to the cabinet is very gratifying to our feelings.--Believe me, my dear Gladstone, with sincere esteem and regard, most truly yours, ROBERT PEEL. At two to-day (May 13), Mr. Gladstone records, I went to Sir R. Peel's on the subject of his letter. I began by thanking him for the indulgent manner in which he had excused my errors, and more than appreciated any services I might have rendered, and for the offer he had made and the manner of it. I said that I went to the board of trade without knowledge or relish, but had been very happy there; found quite enough to occupy my mind, enough responsibility for my own strength, and had no desire to move onwards, but should be perfectly satisfied with any arrangement which he might make as to Lord Ripon's successor. He spoke most warmly of service received, said he could not be governed by any personal considerations, and this which he proposed was obviously the right arrangement. I then stated the substance of what I had put in my memorandum, first on the opium question, to which his answer was, that the immediate power and responsibility lay with the East India Company; he did not express agreement with my view of the cultivation of the drug, but said it was a minor subject as compared with other imperial interests constantly brought under discussion; intimated that the Duke of Wellington had surrendered his opinion (I think) upon the boundary question; and he referred to the change in his own views, and said that in future he questioned whether he could undertake the defence of the corn laws on principle. His words were addressed to a sympathising hearer. My speeches in the House had already excited dissatisfaction if not dismay. Then came something about the preservation of the two bishoprics in North Wales.[158] To Mr. Gladstone's surprise, Peel reckoned this a more serious matter, as it involved a practical course. After much had been said on the topic, Mr. Gladstone asked for a day or two to consider the question. 'I have to consider with God's help by Monday whether to enter the cabinet or to retire altogether: at least such is probably the second alternative.' He wished to consult Hope and Manning, and they, upon discussion, urged that the point was too narrow on which to join issue with the government. This brought him round. 'I well remember,' he says of this early case of compromise, 'that I pleaded against them that I should be viewed as a traitor, and they observed to me in reply that I must be prepared for that if necessary, that (and indeed I now feel) in these times the very wisest and most effective servants of any cause must necessarily fall so far short of the popular sentiment of its friends, as to be liable constantly to incur mistrust and even abuse. But patience and the power of character overcome all these difficulties. I am certain that Hope and Manning in 1843 were not my tempters but rather my good angels.'[159] Peel had been in parliament as long, and almost as long in office, as Mr. Gladstone had lived, but experience of public life enlarges the man of high mind, and Peel, while perhaps he wondered at his junior's bad sense of proportion, was the last man to laugh at force of sincerity and conscience. Men of the other sort, as he knew, were always to be had for the asking. 'He spoke again of the satisfaction of his colleagues, and even said he did not recollect former instances of a single vacancy in a cabinet, on which there was an entire concurrence. I repeated what I had said of his and their most indulgent judgment and took occasion distinctly to apologise for my blunder, and the consequent embarrassment which I caused to him in Feb. 1842, on the corn scale.'[160] PARLIAMENTARY SUCCESS His parliamentary success had been extraordinary. From the first his gifts of reasoning and eloquence had pleased the House; his union of sincerity and force had attracted it as sincerity and force never fail to do; and his industry and acuteness, his steady growth in political stature, substance, and acquisition, had gained for him the confidence of the austerest of leaders. He had reached a seat in the cabinet before he was thirty-four, and after little more than ten years of parliamentary life. Canning was thirty-seven before he won the same eminence, and he had been thirteen years in the House; while Peel had the cabinet within reach when he was four-and-thirty, and had been in the House almost thirteen years, of which six had been passed in the arduous post of Irish secretary. Mr. Gladstone had shown that he had in him the qualities that make a minister and a speaker of the first class, though he had shown also the perilous quality of a spirit of minute scruple. He had not yet displayed those formidable powers of contention and attack, that were before long to resemble some tremendous projectile, describing a path the law of whose curves and deviations, as they watched its journey through the air in wonder and anxiety for the shattering impact, men found it impossible to calculate. Mr. Gladstone's brief notes of his first and second cabinets are worth transcribing: the judicious reader will have little difficulty in guessing the topic for deliberation; it figured in the latest of his cabinets as in the earliest, as well as in most of those that intervened. '_May 15._--My first cabinet. On Irish repeal meetings. No fear of breach of the peace, grounded on reasons. Therefore no case for interference. (The duke, however, was for issuing a proclamation.) _May 20._--Second [cabinet] Repeal. Constabulary tainted.' It would be safe to say of any half dozen consecutive meetings of the Queen's servants, taken at random during the reign, that Ireland would be certain to crop up. Still, protection was the burning question. From one cause or another, said Mr. Gladstone looking back to these times, 'my reputation among the conservatives on the question of protection oozed away with rapidity. It died with the year 1842, and early in 1843 a duke, I think the Duke of Richmond, speaking in the House of Lords, described some renegade proceeding as a proceeding conducted under the banner of the vice-president of the board of trade.' He was not always as careful as Peel, and sometimes came near to a scrape. In my speech, on Lord Howick's motion (Mar. 10, 1843) I was supposed to play with the question, and prepare the way for a departure from the corn law of last year, and I am sensible that I so far lost my head, as not to put well together the various, and, if taken separately, conflicting considerations which affect the question.... It so happens that I spoke under the influence of a new and most sincere conviction, having reference to the recent circumstances of commercial legislation abroad, to the effect that it would not be wise to displace British labour for the sake of cheap corn, without the counteracting and sustaining provisions which exchange, not distorted by tariffs all but prohibitory, would supply.... This, it is clear, is a slippery position for a man who does not think firmly in the midst of ambiguous and adverse cheering, and I did my work most imperfectly, but I do think honestly. Sir R. Peel's manner, by negative signs, showed that he thought either my ground insecure or my expressions dangerous. AN ARTIFICIAL SITUATION The situation was essentially artificial. There was little secret of the surrender of protection as a principle. In introducing the proposals for the reform of the customs tariff, Peel made the gentlemen around him shiver by openly declaring that on the general principle of free trade there was no difference of opinion; that all agreed in the rule that we should buy in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest; that even if the foreigner were foolish enough not to follow suit, it was still for the interest of this country to buy as cheap as we could, whether other countries will buy from us or no.[161] Even important cabinet colleagues found this too strong doctrine for them. 'On Tuesday night,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'Peel opened the tariff anew, and laid down, in a manner which drew great cheering from the opposition, the doctrine of purchasing in the cheapest market. Stanley said to me afterwards, "Peel laid that down a great deal too broadly." Last night he (Lord S.) sat down angry with himself, and turned to me and said, "It does not signify, I _cannot_ speak on these subjects; I quite lost my head." I merely answered that no one but himself would have discovered it.' Yet it was able men, apt to lose their heads in economics, whom Peel had to carry along with him. 'On another night,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'I thought Sir R. Peel appeared in an attitude of conspicuous intellectual greatness, and on comparing notes next day with Sir J. Graham at the palace, I found he was similarly impressed. Sheil delivered a very effective rhetorical speech. Lord Stanley had taken a few notes and was to follow him. Sheil was winding up just as the clock touched twelve. Lord Stanley said to Peel, "It is twelve, shall I follow him? I think not." Peel said, "I do not think it will do to let this go unanswered." He had been quite without the idea of speaking that night. Sheil sat down, and peals of cheering followed. Stanley seemed to hesitate a good deal, and at last said, as it were to himself, "No, I won't, it's too late." In the meantime the adjournment had been moved; but when Peel saw there was no one in the breach, he rose. The cheers were still, a little spitefully, prolonged from the other side. He had an immense subject, a disturbed House, a successful speech, an entire absence of notice to contend against; but he began with power, gathered power as he went on, handled every point in his usual mode of balanced thought and language, and was evidently conscious at the close, of what no one could deny, that he had made a deep impression on the House.' IV Mr. Gladstone kept pretty closely in step with his leader. From Sir Robert he slowly learned lessons of circumspection that may not seem congenial to his temperament, though for that matter we should remember all through that his temperament was double. He was of opinion, as he told the House of Commons, that a sliding-scale, a fixed duty, and free trade were all three open to serious objection. He regarded the defects of the existing law as greatly exaggerated, and he refused to admit that the defects of the law, whatever they might be, were fatal to every law with a sliding-scale. He wished to relieve the consumer, to steady the trade, to augment foreign commerce, and the demand for labour connected with commerce. On the other hand he desired to keep clear of the countervailing evils of disturbing either vast capitals invested in land, or the immense masses of labour employed in agriculture.[162] He noted with some complacency, that during the great controversy of 1846 and following years, he never saw any parliamentary speech of his own quoted in proof of the inconsistency of the Peelites. Here are a couple of entries from Lord Broughton's diary for 1844:--'_June 17._ Brougham said "Gladstone was a d----d fellow, a prig, and did much mischief to the government," alluding to his speech about keeping sugar duties. _June 27._ Gladstone made a decided agricultural protection speech, and was lauded therefor by Miles--so the rebels were returning to their allegiance.' Gladstone's arguments, somebody said, were in favour of free trade, and his parentheses were in favour of protection. Well might the whole position be called as slippery a one as ever occurred in British politics. It was by the principles of free trade that Peel and his lieutenant justified tariff-reform; and they indirectly sapped protection in general by dwelling on the mischiefs of minor forms of protection in particular. They assured the country gentlemen that the sacred principle of a scale was as tenderly cherished in the new plan as in the old; on the other hand they could assure the leaguers and the doubters that the structure of the two scales was widely different. We cannot wonder that honest tories who stuck to the old doctrine, not always rejected even by Huskisson, that a country ought not to be dependent on foreign supply, were mystified and amazed as they listened to the two rival parties disputing to which of them belonged the credit of originating a policy that each of them had so short a time before so scornfully denounced. The only difference was the difference between yesterday and the day before yesterday. The whigs, with their fixed duty, were just as open as the conservatives with their sliding-scale to the taunts of the Manchester school, when they decorated economics by high _a priori_ declaration that the free importation of corn was not a subject for the deliberations of the senate, but a natural and inalienable law of the Creator. Rapid was the conversion. Even Lord Palmerston, of all people in the world, denounced the arrogance and presumptuous folly of dealers in restrictive duties 'setting up their miserable legislation instead of the great standing laws of nature.' Mr. Disraeli, still warmly on the side of the minister, flashed upon his uneasy friends around him a reminder of the true pedigree of the dogmas of free trade. Was it not Mr. Pitt who first promulgated them in 1787, who saw that the loss of the market of the American colonies made it necessary by lowering duties to look round for new markets on the continent of Europe? And was it not Fox, Burke, Sheridan, and the minor whig luminaries, who opposed him, while not a single member of his own government in the House of Lords was willing or able to defend him? But even reminiscences of Mr. Pitt, and oracular descriptions of Lord Shelburne as the most remarkable man of his age, brought little comfort to men sincerely convinced with fear and trembling that free corn would destroy rent, close their mansions and their parks, break up their lives, and beggar the country. They remembered also one or two chapters of history nearer to their own time. They knew that Lord John had a right to revive the unforgotten contrast between Peel's rejection of so-called protestant securities in 1817 and 1825, and the total surrender of emancipation in 1829. Natural forebodings darkened their souls that protectionism would soon share the fate of protestantism, and that capitulation to Cobden was doomed to follow the old scandal of capitulation to O'Connell. They felt that there was something much more dreadful than the mere sting of a parliamentary recrimination, in the contrast between the corn bill of 1842 and Peel's panegyrics in '39, '40, and '41 on the very system which that bill now shattered. On the other side some could not forget that in 1840 the whig prime minister, the head of a party still even at the eleventh hour unregenerated by Manchester, predicted a violent struggle as the result of the Manchester policy, stirring society to its foundations, kindling bitter animosities not easy to quench, and creating convulsions as fierce as those of the Reform bill. A situation so precarious and so unedifying was sure to lead to strange results in the relations of parties and leaders. In July 1843 the Speaker told Hobhouse that Peel had lost all following and authority; all but votes. Hobhouse meeting a tory friend told him that Sir Robert had got nothing but his majority. 'He won't have that long,' the tory replied. 'Who will make sacrifices for such a fellow? They call me a _frondeur_, but there are many such. Peel thinks he can govern by Fremantle and a little clique, but it will not do. The first election that comes, out he must go.' Melbourne, only half in jest, was reported to talk of begging Peel to give him timely notice, lest the Queen might take him by surprise. On one occasion Hobhouse wished a secondary minister to tell Sir Robert how much he admired a certain speech. 'I!' exclaimed the minister; 'he would kick me away if I dared to speak to him.' 'A man,' Hobhouse observes, 'who will not take a civil truth from a subaltern is but a sulky fellow after all; there is no true dignity or pride in such reserve.' Oddly enough, Lord John was complaining just as loudly about the same time of his own want of hold upon his party. The tariff operations of 1842 worked no swift social miracle. General stagnation still prevailed. Capital was a drug in the market, but food was comparatively cheap.[163] Stocks were light, and there was very little false credit. In spite of all these favouring conditions, Mr. Gladstone (March 20, 1843) had to report to his chief that 'the deadness of foreign demand keeps our commerce in a state of prolonged paralysis.' Cobden had not even yet convinced them that the true way to quicken foreign demand was to open the ports to that foreign supply, with which they paid us for what they bought from us. Mr. Gladstone saw no further than the desire of making specific arrangement with other countries for reciprocal reductions of import duties. In one of his autobiographic notes (1897) Mr. Gladstone describes the short and sharp parliamentary crisis in 1844 brought about by the question of the sugar duties, but this may perhaps be relegated to an appendix.[164] V From 1841 to 1844 Mr. Gladstone's department was engaged in other matters lying beyond the main stream of effort. 'We were anxiously and eagerly endeavouring to make tariff treaties with many foreign countries. Austria, I think, may have been included, but I recollect especially France, Prussia, Portugal, and I believe Spain. And the state of our tariff, even after the law of 1842, was then such as to supply us with plenty of material for liberal offers. Notwithstanding this, we failed in every case. I doubt whether we advanced the cause of free trade by a single inch.' The question of the prohibition against the export of machinery came before him. The custom-house authorities pronounced it ineffective, and recommended its removal. A parliamentary committee in 1841 had reported in favour of entire freedom. The machine makers, of course, were active, and the general manufacturers of the country, excepting the Nottingham lace makers and the flax-spinners of the north of Ireland, had become neutral. Only a very limited portion of the trade was any longer subject to restriction, and Mr. Gladstone, after due consultation with superior ministers, proposed a bill for removing the prohibition altogether.[165] He also brought in a bill (April 1844) for the regulation of companies. It was when he was president of the board of trade that the first Telegraph Act was passed. 'I was well aware,' he wrote, 'of the advantage of taking them into the hands of the government, but I was engaged in a plan which contemplated the ultimate acquisition of the railways by the public, and which was much opposed by the railway companies, so that to have attempted taking the telegraphs would have been hopeless. The bill was passed, but the executive machinery two years afterwards broke down.' RAILWAYS Questions that do not fall within the contentions of party usually cut a meagre figure on the page of the historian, and the railway policy of this decade is one of those questions. It was settled without much careful deliberation or foresight, and may be said in the main to have shaped itself. At the time when Mr. Gladstone presided over the department of trade, an immense extension of the railway system was seen to be certain, and we may now smile at what then seemed the striking novelty of such a prospect. Mr. Gladstone proposed a select committee on the subject, guided its deliberations, drew its reports, and framed the bill that was founded upon them. He dwelt upon the favour now beginning to be shown to the new roads by the owners of land through which they were to pass, so different from the stubborn resistance that had for long been offered; upon the cheapened cost of construction; upon the growing disposition to employ redundant capital in making railways, instead of running the risks that had made foreign investment so disastrous. It was not long, indeed, before this very disposition led to a mania that was even more widely disastrous than any foreign investment had been since the days of the South Sea bubble. Meanwhile, Mr. Gladstone's Railway Act of 1844, besides a number of working regulations for the day, laid down two principles of the widest range: reserving to the state the full right of intervention in the concerns of the railway companies, and giving to the state the option to purchase a line at the end of a certain term at twenty-five years' purchase of the divisible profits.[166] It was during these years of labour under Peel that he first acquired principles of administrative and parliamentary practice that afterwards stood him in good stead: on no account to try to deal with a question before it is ripe; never to go the length of submitting a difference between two departments to the prime minister before the case is exhausted and complete; never to press a proposal forward beyond the particular stage at which it has arrived. Pure commonplaces if we will, but they are not all of them easy to learn. We cannot forget that Peel and Mr. Gladstone were in the strict line of political succession. They were alike in social origin and academic antecedents. They started from the same point of view as to the great organs of national life, the monarchy, the territorial peerage and the commons, the church, the universities. They showed the same clear knowledge that it was not by its decorative parts, or what Burke styled 'solemn plausibilities,' that the community derived its strength; but that it rested for its real foundations on its manufactures, its commerce, and its credit. Even in the lesser things, in reading Sir Robert Peel's letters, those who in later years served under Mr. Gladstone can recognise the school to which he went for the methods, the habits of mind, the practices of business, and even the phrases which he employed when his own time came to assume the direction of public affairs, the surmounting of administrative difficulties, the piloting of complex measures, and the handling of troublesome persons. FOOTNOTES: [151] Undated fragment of letter to the Queen. See Appendix. [152] See above, p. 232. [153] Parker, ii. pp. 499, 529, 533. [154] _Ibid._, p. 509. Before the end of the session (Aug. 10, 1842) he had learned enough to do more justice to Hume and the committee. [155] The editor of Sir Robert Peel's papers was allowed to print three or four of Mr. Gladstone's letters to his chief at this interesting date. The reader will find the correspondence in Parker, ii. pp. 497-517, 519, 520. [156] In 1843 a bill was passed lowering the duty on Canadian corn imported into England, and Mr. Gladstone says in a memo, of 1851: 'In 1843 I pleaded strongly for the admission of all the colonies to the privilege then granted to Canada.' [157] Bright was elected for Durham in July 1843. [158] The question of the Welsh bishoprics was one of a certain magnitude in its day. The union of Bangor and St. Asaph had been provided for by parliament in 1836, with a view to form a new see at Manchester. The measure was passed with the general assent of the episcopal bench and the church at large. But sentiment soon changed, and a hostile cry was raised before the death of the Bishop of St. Asaph, when its provisions would come into force. On his death in 1846 the whig ministry gave way and the sees remained separate. [159] Mr. Gladstone to Lord Lyttelton, Dec. 30, 1845. [160] See above, p. 253. [161] _Hansard_, May 10, 1842. [162] _Hansard_, February 14, 1842. [163] The average price of wheat per quarter in 1841 was 64 shillings, in 1842, 57 shillings, and in 1843, 50 shillings, a lower average than for any year until 1849. [164] See Appendix. [165] See Speech, Aug. 10, 1843. [166] Wordsworth wrote (Oct. 15,1844) to implore him to direct special attention to the desecrating project of a railway from Kendal to the head of Windermere, and enclosed a sonnet. The sixth line, by the way, is a variant from the version in the books: 'And must he too his old delights disown.'--Knight's _Wordsworth_ (1896 edition), viii. 166. CHAPTER IX MAYNOOTH (_1844-1845_) When I consider how munificently the colleges of Cambridge and Oxford are endowed, and with what pomp religion and learning are there surrounded; ... when I remember what was the faith of Edward III. and of Henry VI., of Margaret of Anjou and Margaret of Richmond, of William of Wykeham and William of Waynefleet, of Archbishop Chichele and Cardinal Wolsey; when I remember what we have taken from the Roman catholics, King's College, New College, Christ Church, my own Trinity; and when I look at the miserable Dotheboys' Hall which we have given them in exchange, I feel, I must own, less proud than I could wish of being a protestant and a Cambridge man.--MACAULAY. IRISH POLICY OF CONCILIATION In pursuit of the policy of conciliation with which he was now endeavouring to counter O'Connell, Peel opened to his colleagues in 1844 a plan for dealing with the sum annually voted by parliament to the seminary for the training of catholic clergy at Maynooth. The original grant was made by the Irish parliament, protestant as it was; and was accepted even by anti-catholic leaders after 1800 as virtually a portion of the legislative union with Ireland. Peel's proposal, by making an annual grant permanent, by tripling the amount, by incorporating the trustees, established a new and closer connection between the state and the college. It was one of the boldest things he ever did. What Lord Aberdeen wrote to Madame de Lieven in 1852 was hardly a whit less true in 1845: 'There is more intense bigotry in England at this moment than in any other country in Europe.' Peel said to Mr. Gladstone at the beginning of 1845--'I wish to speak without any reserve, and I ought to tell you, I think it will very probably be fatal to the government.' 'He explained that he did not know whether the feeling among Goulburn's constituents [the university of Cambridge] might not be too strong for him; that in Scotland, as he expected, there would be a great opposition; and he seemed to think that from the church also there might be great resistance, and he said the proceedings in the diocese of Exeter showed a very sensitive state of the public mind.' During the whole of 1844 the project simmered. At a very early moment Mr. Gladstone grew uneasy. He did not condemn the policy in itself, but whatever else might be said, it was in direct antagonism to the principle elaborately expounded by him only six years before, as the sacred rule and obligation between a Christian state and Christian churches. He had marked any departure from that rule as a sign of social declension, as a descent from a higher state of society to a lower, as a note in the ebb and flow of national life. Was it not inevitable, then, that his official participation in the extension of the public endowment of Maynooth would henceforth give to every one the right to say of him, 'That man cannot be trusted'? He was not indeed committed, by anything that he had written, to the extravagant position that the peace of society should be hazarded because it could no longer restore its ancient theories of religion; but was he not right in holding it indispensable that any vote or further declaration from him on these matters should be given under circumstances free from all just suspicions of his disinterestedness and honesty?[167] In view of these approaching difficulties upon Maynooth, on July 12 he made a truly singular tender to the head of the government. He knew Peel to be disposed to entertain the question of a renewal of the public relations with the papal court at Rome, first to be opened by indirect communications through the British envoy at Florence or Naples. 'What I have to say,' Mr. Gladstone now wrote to the prime minister, 'is that if you and Lord Aberdeen should think fit to appoint me to Florence or Naples, and to employ me in any such communications as those to which I have referred, I am at your disposal.' Of this startling offer to transform himself from president of the board of trade into Vatican envoy, Mr. Gladstone left his own later judgment upon record; here it is, and no more needs to be said upon it:-- About the time of my resignation on account of the contemplated increase of the grant to the College of Maynooth, I became possessed with the idea that there was about to be a renewal in some shape of our diplomatic [relations] with the see of Rome, and I believe that I committed the gross error of tendering myself to Sir Robert Peel to fill the post of envoy. I have difficulty at this date (1894) in conceiving by what obliquity of view I could have come to imagine that this was a rational or in any way excusable proposal: and this, although I vaguely think my friend James Hope had some hand in it, seems to show me now that there existed in my mind a strong element of fanaticism. I believe that I left it to Sir R. Peel to make me any answer or none as he might think fit; and he with great propriety chose the latter alternative. INTENTION TO RESIGN In the autumn of 1844, the prime minister understood that if he proceeded with the Maynooth increase, he would lose Mr. Gladstone. The loss, Peel said to Graham, was serious, and on every account to be regretted, but no hope of averting it would justify the abandonment of a most important part of their Irish policy. Meanwhile, in the midst of heavy labours on the tariff in preparation for the budget of 1845, Mr. Gladstone was sharply perturbed, as some of his letters to Mrs. Gladstone show:-- _Whitehall, Nov. 22, '44._--It is much beyond my expectation that Newman should have taken my letter so kindly; it seemed to me so like the operation of a clumsy, bungling surgeon upon a sensitive part. I cannot well comment upon his meaning, for as you may easily judge, what with cabinet, board, and Oak Farm, I have enough in my head to-day--and the subject is a fine and subtle one. But I may perhaps be able to think upon it to-night, in the meantime I think yours is a very just conjectural sketch. We have not got in cabinet to-day to the really pinching part of the discussion, the Roman catholic religious education. That comes on Monday. My mind does not waver; pray for me, that I may do right. I have an appointment with Peel to-morrow, and I rather think he means to say something to me on the question. _Nov. 23._--You will see that whatever turns up, I am sure to be in the wrong. An invitation to Windsor for us came this morning, and I am _sorry to say_ one including Sunday--Nov. 30 to Dec. 2. I have had a long battle with Peel on the matters of my office; not another syllable. So far as it goes this tends to make me think he does not calculate on any change in me; yet on the whole I lean the other way. Manning comes up on Monday. _Nov. 25._--Events travel fast and not slow. My opinion is that I shall be out on Friday evening. We have discussed Maynooth to-day. An intermediate letter which Sir James Graham has to write to Ireland for information causes thus much of delay. I have told them that if I go, I shall go on the ground of what is required by my personal character, and not because my mind is _made up_ that the course which they propose can be avoided, far less because I consider myself bound to resist it. I had the process of this declaration to repeat. I think they were prepared for it, but they would not assume that it was to be, and rather proceeded as if I had never said a word before upon the subject. It was painful, but not so painful as the last time, and by an effort I had altogether prevented my mind from brooding upon it beforehand. At this moment (6¼) I am sure they are talking about it over the way. I am going to dine with Sir R. Peel. Under these circumstances the Windsor visit will be strange enough! In the meantime my father writes to me most urgently, desiring me to come to Liverpool. I _hope_ for some further light from him on Wednesday morning.... _Nov. 26._--I have no more light to throw upon the matters which I mentioned yesterday. The dinner at Peel's went off as well as could be expected; I did not sit near him. Lord Aberdeen was with me to-day, and said very kindly it _must_ be prevented. But I think it cannot, and friendly efforts to prolong the day only aggravate the pain. Manning was with me all this morning; he is well, and is to come back to-morrow. _Jan. 9, '45._--Another postponement; but our explanations were as satisfactory as could possibly be made under such circumstances. The tone and manner as kind as at any time--nothing like murmur. At the same time Peel said he thought it right to intimate a belief that the government might very probably be shipwrecked upon the Maynooth question, partly in connection with my retirement, but also as he intimated from the uncertainty whether there might not be a very strong popular feeling against it. _He_ takes upon himself all responsibility for any inconvenience to which the government may possibly be put from the delay and a consequent abrupt retirement, and says I have given him the fullest and fairest notice.... I saw Manning for two hours this morning, and let the cat out of the bag to him in part. Have a note from Lockhart saying the Bishop of London had sent his chaplain to Murray to express high approval of the article on Ward--and enclosing the vulgar addition of £63. AT WINDSOR CASTLE _Windsor Castle, Jan. 10._--First, owing to the Spanish ambassador's not appearing, Lady Lyttelton was suddenly invited, and fell to my lot to hand in and sit by, which was very pleasant. I am, as you know, a shockingly bad witness to looks, but she appeared to me, I confess, a little worn and aged. She ought to have at least two months' holiday every year. After dinner the Queen inquired as usual about you, and rather particularly with much interest about Lady Glynne. I told her plainly all I could. This rather helped the Queen through the conversation, as it kept me talking, and she was evidently hard pressed at the gaps. Then we went to cards, and played commerce; fortunately I was never the worst hand, and so was not called upon to pay, for I had locked up my purse before going to dinner; but I found I had won 2s. 2d. at the end, 8d. of which was paid me by the Prince. I mean to keep the 2d. piece (the 6d. I cannot identify) accordingly, unless I lose it again to-night. I had rather a nice conversation with him about the international copyright convention with Prussia.... _Whitehall, Jan. 11._--I came back from Windsor this morning, very kindly used. The Queen mentioned particularly that you were not asked on account of presumed inconvenience, and sent me a private print of the Prince of Wales, and on my thanking for it through Lady Lyttelton, another of the Princess. Also she brought the little people through the corridor yesterday after luncheon, where they behaved very well, and she made them come and shake hands with me. The Prince of Wales has a very good countenance; the baby I should call a very fine child indeed. The Queen said, After your own you must think them dwarfs; but I answered that I did not think the Princess Royal short as compared with Willy. We had more cards last evening; Lady ---- made more blunders and was laughed at as usual.... _Jan. 13._--I think there will certainly be at least one cabinet more in the end of the week. My position is what would commonly be called uncomfortable. I do not know how long the Maynooth matter may be held over. I may remain a couple of months, or only a week--may go at any time at twenty-four hours' notice. I think on the whole it is an even chance whether I go before or after the meeting of parliament, so that I am unfeignedly put to obey the precept of our Lord, 'Take no thought for the morrow; the morrow will take thought for the things of itself.' I am sorry that a part of the inconvenience falls on your innocent head. I need not tell you the irksomeness of business is much increased, and one's purposes unmanned by this indefiniteness. Still, having very important matters in preparation, I must not give any signs of inattention or indifference. _Cabinet Room, Jan. 14._--I have no news to give you about myself, but continue to be quite in the dark. There is a certain Maynooth bill in preparation, and when that appears for decision my time will probably have come, but I am quite ignorant when it will be forthcoming. I am to be with Peel to-morrow morning, but I think on board of trade business only. Graham has just told us that the draft of the Maynooth bill will be ready on Saturday; but it cannot, I think, be _considered_ before the middle of next week at the earliest. _Jan. 15._--The nerves are a little unruly on a day like this between (official) life and death; so much of feeling mixes with the more abstract question, which would be easily disposed of if it stood alone. (_Diary._) It was February 3 before Mr. Gladstone wrote his last note from his desk at the board of trade, thanking the prime minister for a thousand acts of kindness which he trusted himself not readily to forget. The feeling of the occasion he described to Manning:-- Do you know that daily intercourse and co-operation with men upon matters of great anxiety and moment interweaves much of one's being with theirs, and parting with them, leaving them under the pressure of their work and setting myself free, feels, I think, much like dying: more like it than if I were turning my back altogether upon public life. I have received great kindness, and so far as personal sentiments are concerned, I believe they are as well among us as they can be. One other incident he describes to his wife:-- Peel thought I should ask an audience of the Queen on my retirement, and accordingly at the palace to-day (Feb. 3) he intimated, and then the lord-in-waiting, as is the usage, formally requested it. I saw the Queen in her private sitting-room. As she did not commence speaking immediately after the first bow, I thought it my part to do so; and I said, 'I have had the boldness to request an audience, madam, that I might say with how much pain it is that I find myself separated from your Majesty's service, and how gratefully I feel your Majesty's many acts of kindness.' She replied that she regretted it very much, and that it was a great loss. I resumed that I had the greatest comfort I could enjoy under the circumstances in the knowledge that my feelings towards her Majesty's person and service, and also towards Sir R. Peel and my late colleagues, were altogether unchanged by my retirement. After a few words more she spoke of the state of the country and the reduced condition of Chartism, of which I said I believed the main feeder was want of employment. At the pauses I watched her eye for the first sign to retire. But she asked me about you before we concluded. Then one bow at the spot and another at the door, which was very near, and so it was all over. _Feb. 4._--Ruminated on the dangers of my explanation right and left, and it made me unusually nervous. H. of C. 4½-9. I was kindly spoken of and heard, and I hope attained practically purposes I had in view, but I think the House felt that the last part by taking away the sting reduced the matter to flatness. RESIGNATION OF OFFICE According to what is perhaps a questionable usage, Lord John Russell invited the retiring minister to explain his secession from office to the House. In the suspicion, distraction, tension that marked that ominous hour in the history of English party, people insisted that the resignation of the head of the department of trade must be due to divergence of judgment upon protection. The prime minister, while expressing in terms of real feeling his admiration for Mr. Gladstone's character and ability, and his high regard for his colleague's private qualities, thought well to restate that the resignation came from no question of commercial policy. 'For three years,' he went on, 'I have been closely connected with Mr. Gladstone in the introduction of measures relating to the financial policy of the country, and I feel it my duty openly to avow that it seems almost impossible that two public men, acting together so long, should have had so little divergence in their opinions upon such questions.' If anybody found fault with Mr. Gladstone for not resigning earlier, the prime minister was himself responsible: 'I was unwilling to lose until the latest moment the advantages I derived from one whom I consider capable of the highest and most eminent services.'[168] The point of Mr. Gladstone's reply was in fact an extremely simple and a highly honourable one. While carefully abstaining from laying down any theory of political affairs as under all circumstances inflexible and immutable, yet he thought that one who had borne such solemn testimony as he had borne in his book, to a particular view of a great question, ought not to make himself responsible for a material departure from it, without at least placing himself openly in a position to form a judgment that should be beyond all mistake at once independent and unsuspected. That position in respect of the Maynooth policy he could not hold, so long as he was a member of the cabinet proposing it, and therefore he had resigned, though it was understood that he would not resist the Maynooth increase itself. All this, I fancy, might easily have been made plain even to those who thought his action a display of overstrained moral delicacy. As it was, his anxiety to explore every nook and cranny of his case, and to defend or discover in it every point that human ingenuity could devise for attack, led him to speak for more than an hour; at the end of which even friendly and sympathetic listeners were left wholly at a loss for a clue to the labyrinth. 'What a marvellous talent is this,' Cobden exclaimed to a friend sitting near him; 'here have I been sitting listening with pleasure for an hour to his explanation, and yet I know no more why he left the government than before he began.' 'I could not but know,' Mr. Gladstone wrote on this incident long years after, 'that I should inevitably be regarded as fastidious and fanciful, fitter for a dreamer or possibly a schoolman, than for the active purposes of public life in a busy and moving age.'[169] VIEWS OF HIS RESIGNATION Sir Robert Inglis begged him to lead the opposition to the bill. In the course of the conversation Inglis went back to the fatal character and consequences of the Act of 1829; and wished that his advice had then been taken, which was that the Duke of Cumberland should be sent as lord lieutenant to Ireland with thirty thousand men. 'As that good and very kind man spoke the words,' Mr. Gladstone says, 'my blood ran cold, and he too had helped me onwards in the path before me.' William Palmer wrote that the grant to Maynooth was the sin of 1829 over again, and would bring with it the same destruction of the conservative party. Lord Winchilsea, one of his patrons at Newark, protested against anything that savoured of the national endowment of Romanism. Mr. Disraeli was reported as saying that with his resignation on Maynooth Mr. Gladstone's career was over. The rough verdict pronounced his act a piece of political prudery. One journalistic wag observed, 'A lady's footman jumped off the Great Western train, going forty miles an hour, merely to pick up his hat. Pretty much like this act, so disproportional to the occasion, is Mr. Gladstone's leap out of the ministry to follow his book.' When the time came he voted for the second reading of the Maynooth bill (April 11) with remarkable emphasis. 'I am prepared, in opposition to what I believe to be the prevailing opinion of the people of England and of Scotland, in opposition to the judgment of my own constituents, from whom I greatly regret to differ, and in opposition to my own deeply cherished predilections, to give a deliberate and even anxious support to the measure.' The 'dreamer and the schoolman' meanwhile had left behind him a towering monument of hard and strenuous labour in the shape of that second and greater reform of the tariff, in which, besides the removal of the export duty on coal and less serious commodities, no fewer than four hundred and thirty articles were swept altogether away from the list of the customs officer. Glass was freed from an excise amounting to twice or thrice the value of the article, and the whole figure of remission was nearly three times as large as the corresponding figure in the bold operations of 1842. Whether the budget of 1842 or that of 1845 marked the more extensive advance, we need not discuss; it is enough that Mr. Gladstone himself set down the construction of these two tariffs among the principal achievements in the history of his legislative works. His unofficial relations with the colleagues whom he had left were perfectly unchanged. 'You will be glad to know,' he writes to his father, 'that the best feeling, as I believe, subsists between us. Although our powers of entertaining guests are not of the first order, yet with a view partly to these occurrences we asked Sir R. and Lady Peel to dinner to-day, and also Lord and Lady Stanley and Lord Aberdeen. All accepted, but unfortunately an invitation to Windsor has carried off Sir R. and Lady Peel. A small matter, but I mention it as a symbol of what is material.' Before many days were over, he was working day and night on a projected statement, involving much sifting and preparation, upon the recent commercial legislation. Lord John Russell had expressed a desire for a competent commentary on the results of the fiscal changes of 1842, and the pamphlet in which Mr. Gladstone showed what those results had been was the reply. Three editions of it were published within the year.[170] This was not the only service that Mr. Gladstone had an opportunity of rendering in the course of the session to the government that he had quitted. 'Peel,' he says, 'had a plan for the admission of free labour sugar on terms of favour. Lord Palmerston made a motion to show that this involved a breach of our old treaties with Spain. I examined the case laboriously, and, though I think his facts could not be denied, I undertook (myself out of office) to answer him on behalf of the government. This I did, and Peel, who was the most conscientious man I ever knew in spareness of eulogium, said to me when I sat down, "That was a wonderful speech, Gladstone."' The speech took four hours, and was, I think, the last that he made in parliament for two years and a half, for reasons that we shall presently discover. THOUGHTS OF VISITING IRELAND In the autumn of 1845, Mr. Gladstone made a proposal to Hope-Scott. 'As Ireland,' he said, 'is likely to find this country and parliament so much employment for years to come, I feel rather oppressively an obligation to try and see it with my own eyes instead of using those of other people, according to the limited measure of my means.' He suggested that they should devote some time 'to a working tour in Ireland, eschewing all grandeur and taking little account of scenery, compared with the purpose of looking at close quarters at the institutions for religion and education of the country and at the character of the people.' Philip Pusey was inclined to join them. 'It will not alarm you,' says Pusey, 'if I state my belief that in these agrarian outrages the Irish peasants have been engaged in a justifiable civil war, because the peasant ejected from his land could no longer by any efforts of his own preserve his family from the risk of starvation. This view is that of a very calm utilitarian, George Lewis.'[171] They were to start from Cork and the south and work their way round by the west, carrying with them Lewis's book, blue books, and a volume or two of Plato, �schylus, and the rest. The expedition was put off by Pusey's discovery that the _Times_ was despatching a correspondent to carry on agrarian investigations. Mr. Gladstone urged that the Irish land question was large enough for two, and so indeed it swiftly proved, for Ireland was now on the edge of the black abysses of the famine. FOOTNOTES: [167] The letters from Mr. Gladstone to Peel on this topic are given by Mr. Parker, _Peel_, iii. pp. 160, 163, 166. [168] In the course of May, 1845, Peel made some remarks on resignations, of which Mr. Gladstone thought the report worth preserving:--'I admit that there may be many occasions when it would be the duty of a public man to retire from office, rather than propose measures which are contrary to the principles he has heretofore supported. I think that the propriety of his taking that course will mainly depend upon the effect which his retirement will have upon the success of that public measure, which he believes to be necessary for the good of his country. I think it was perfectly honourable, perfectly just, in my right honourable friend the late president of the board of trade to relinquish office. The hon. gentleman thinks I ought to have pursued the same course in 1829. That was precisely the course I wished to pursue--it was precisely the course which I intended to pursue. Until within a month of the period when I consented to bring forward the measure for the relief of the Roman catholics, I did contemplate retiring from office--not because I shrank from the responsibility of proposing that measure--not from the fear of being charged with inconsistency--not because I was not prepared to make the painful sacrifice of private friendships and political connections, but because I believed that my retirement from office would promote the success of the measure. I thought that I should more efficiently assist my noble friend in carrying that measure if I retired from office, and gave the measure my cordial support in a private capacity. I changed my opinion when it was demonstrated to me that there was a necessity for sacrificing my own feelings by retaining office--when it was shown to me that, however humble my abilities, yet, considering the station which I occupied, my retiring from office would render the carrying of that measure totally impossible--when it was proved to me that there were objections in the highest quarters which would not be overcome unless I was prepared to sacrifice much that was dear to me--when it was intimated to my noble friend that there was an intention on the part of the highest authorities in the church of England to offer a decided opposition to the measure, and when my noble friend intimated to me that he thought, if I persevered in my intention to retire, success was out of the question. It was then I did not hesitate to say that I would not expose others to obloquy or suspicions from which I myself shrunk.' [169] _Gleanings_, vii. p. 118. [170] 'Remarks upon recent Commercial Legislation suggested by the expository statement of the Revenue from Customs, and other Papers lately submitted to Parliament, by the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P. for Newark.' London, Murray, 1845. Mr. Gladstone had written on the same subject in the _Foreign and Colonial Quarterly Review_, January 1843. [171] See his memorable work on Irish Disturbances, published in 1836. CHAPTER X TRIUMPH OF POLICY AND FALL OF THE MINISTER (_1846_) Change of opinion, in those to whose judgment the public looks more or less to assist its own, is an evil to the country, although a much smaller evil than their persistence in a course which they know to be wrong. It is not always to be blamed. But it is always to be watched with vigilance; always to be challenged and put upon its trial.--GLADSTONE. Not lingering for the moment on Mr. Gladstone's varied pre-occupations during 1845, and not telling over again the well-known story of the circumstances that led to the repeal of the corn law, I pass rapidly to Mr. Gladstone's part--it was a secondary part--in the closing act of the exciting political drama on which the curtain had risen in 1841. The end of the session of 1845 had left the government in appearance even stronger than it was in the beginning of 1842. Two of the most sagacious actors knew better what this was worth. Disraeli was aware how the ties had been loosened between the minister and his supporters, and Cobden was aware that, in words used at the time, 'three weeks of rain when the wheat was ripening would rain away the corn law.'[172] AN EXCITING DECEMBER Everybody knows how the rain came, and alarming signs of a dreadful famine in Ireland came; how Peel advised his cabinet to open the ports for a limited period, but without promising them that if the corn duties were ever taken off, they could ever be put on again; how Lord John seized the moment, wrote an Edinburgh letter, and declared for total and immediate repeal; how the minister once more called his cabinet together, invited them to support him in settling the question, and as they would not all assent, resigned; how Lord John tried to form a government and failed; and how Sir Robert again became first minister of the crown, but not bringing all his colleagues back with him. 'I think,' said Mr. Gladstone in later days, 'he expected to carry the repeal of the corn law without breaking up his party, but meant at all hazard to carry it.' Peel's conduct in 1846, Lord Aberdeen said to a friend ten years later, was very noble. With the exception of Graham and myself, his whole cabinet was against him. Lyndhurst, Goulburn, and Stanley were almost violent in their resistance. Still more opposed to him, if it were possible, was the Duke of Wellington. To break up the cabinet was an act of great courage. To resume office when Lord John had failed in constructing one, was still more courageous. He said to the Queen: 'I am ready to kiss hands as your minister to-night. I believe I can collect a ministry which will last long enough to carry free trade, and I am ready to make the attempt.' When he said this there were only two men on whom he could rely. One of the first to join him was Wellington. 'The Queen's government,' he said, 'must be carried on. We have done all that we could for the landed interest. Now we must do all that we can for the Queen.'[173] On one of the days of this startling December, Mr. Gladstone writes to his father: 'If Peel determines to form a government, and if he sends for me (a compound uncertainty), I cannot judge what to do until I know much more than at present of the Irish case. It is there if anywhere that he must find his justification; there if anywhere that one returned to parliament as I am, can honestly find reason for departing at this time from the present corn law.' Two other letters of Mr. Gladstone's show us more fully why he followed Peel instead of joining the dissentients, of whom the most important was Lord Stanley. The first of these was written to his father four and a half years later:-- _6 Carlton Gardens, June 30, 1849._--As respects my 'having made Peel a free trader,' I have never seen that idea expressed anywhere, and I think it is one that does great injustice to the character and power of his mind. In every case, however, the head of a government may be influenced more or less in the affairs of each department of state by the person in charge of that department. If, then, there was any influence at all upon Peel's mind proceeding from me between 1841 and 1845, I have no doubt it may have tended on the whole towards free trade.... But all this ceased with the measures of 1845, when I left office. It was during the alarm of a potato famine in the autumn of that year that the movement in the government about the corn laws began. I was then on the continent, looking after Helen [his sister], and not dreaming of office or public affairs.... I myself had invariably, during Peel's government, spoken of protection not as a thing good in principle, but to be dealt with as tenderly and cautiously as might be according to circumstances, always moving in the direction of free trade. It _then_ appeared to me that the case was materially altered by events; it was no longer open to me to pursue that cautious course. A great struggle was imminent, in which it was plain that two parties only could really find place, on the one side for repeal, on the other side for _permanent_ maintenance of a corn law and a protective system generally and on principle. It would have been more inconsistent in me, even if consistency had been the rule, to join the latter party than the former. But independently of that, I thought, and still think, that the circumstances of the case justified and required the change. So far as relates to the final change in the corn law, you will see that no influence proceeded from me, but rather that events over which I had no control, and steps taken by Sir R. Peel while I was out of the government, had an influence upon me in inducing me to take office. I noticed some days ago that you had made an observation on this subject, but I did not recollect that it was a question. Had I adverted to this I should have answered it at once. If I had any motive for avoiding the subject, it was, I think, this--that it is not easy to discuss such a question as that of an influence of mine over a mind so immeasurably superior, without something of egotism and vanity. SECRETARY OF STATE So much for the general situation. The second letter is to Mrs. Gladstone, and contributes some personal details:-- _13 Carlton House Terrace, Dec. 22, 6 P.M., 1845._--It is offensive to begin about myself, but I must. Within the last two hours I have accepted the office of secretary for the colonies, succeeding Lord Stanley, who resigns. The last twenty-four have been very anxious hours. Yesterday afternoon (two hours after Holy Communion) Lincoln came to make an appointment on Peel's part. I went to meet him in Lincoln's house at five o'clock. He detailed to me the circumstances connected with the late political changes, asked me for no reply, and gave me quantities of papers to read, including letters of his own, the Queen's, and Lord J. Russell's, during the crisis. This morning I had a conversation with Bonham [the party whipper-in] upon the general merits, but without telling him precisely what the proposal made to me was. Upon the whole my mind, though I felt the weight of the question, was clear. I had to decide what was best to be done _now_. I arrived speedily at the conviction that _now_, at any rate, it is best that the question should be finally settled; that Peel ought and is bound now to try it; that I ought to support it in parliament; that if, in deciding the mode, he endeavours to include the most favourable terms for the agricultural body that it is in his power to obtain, I ought not only to support it, by which I mean vote for it in parliament, but likewise not to refuse to be a party to the proposal. I found from him that he entirely recognised this view, and did feel himself bound to make the best terms that he believed attainable, while, on the other hand, I am convinced that we are now in a position that requires provision to be made for the final abolition of the corn law. Such being the state of matters, with a clear conscience, but with a heavy heart, I accepted office. He was exceedingly warm and kind. But it _was_ with a heavy heart.... I have seen Lord Stanley. 'I am extremely glad to hear you have taken office,' said he. We go to Windsor to-morrow to a council--he to resign the seals, and I to receive them. In the diary he enters:-- Saw Sir R. Peel at 3, and accepted office--in opposition, as I have the consolation of feeling, to my leanings and desires, and with the most precarious prospects. Peel was most kind, nay fatherly. We _held_ hands instinctively, and I could not but reciprocate with emphasis his 'God bless you.' I well remember, Mr. Gladstone wrote in a memorandum of Oct. 4, 1851, Peel's using language to me in the Duke of Newcastle's house on Sunday, Dec. 21, 1845, which, as I conceive, distinctly intimated his belief that he would be able to carry his measure, and at the same time hold his party together. He spoke with a kind of glee and complacency in his tone when he said, making up his meaning by signs, 'I have not lived near forty years in public life to find myself wholly without the power of foreseeing the course of events in the House of Commons'--in reference to the very point of the success of his government. One thing is worth noting as we pass. The exact proceedings of the memorable cabinets of November and the opening days of December are still obscure. It has generally been held that Disraeli planted a rather awkward stroke when he taunted Peel with his inconsistency in declaring that he was not the proper minister to propose repeal, and yet in trying to persuade his colleagues to make the attempt before giving the whigs a chance. The following note of Mr. Gladstone's (written in 1851 after reading Sir R. Peel's original memoir on the Corn Act of 1846) throws some light on the question:-- When Sir R. Peel invited me to take office in December 1845 he did not make me aware of the offer he had made to the cabinet in his memorandum, I think of Dec. 2, to propose a new corn law with a lowered sliding duty, which should diminish annually by a shilling until in some eight or ten years the trade would be free. No doubt he felt that after Lord John Russell had made his attempt to form a government, and after, by Lord Stanley's resignation, he had lost the advantages of unanimity, he could not be justified in a proposal involving so considerable an element of protection. It has become matter of history. But as matter of history it is important to show how honestly and perseveringly he strove to hold the balance fairly between contending claims, and how far he was from being the mere puppet of abstract theories. That is to say, what he proposed to his cabinet early in December was not the total and immediate repeal to which he was led by events before the end of the month. II OUT OF PARLIAMENT The acceptance of office vacated the seat at Newark, and Mr. Gladstone declined to offer himself again as a candidate. He had been member for Newark for thirteen years, and had been five times elected. So ended his connection with the first of the five constituencies that in his course he represented. 'I part from my constituents,' he tells his father, 'with deep regret. Though I took office under circumstances which might reasonably arouse the jealousy of my friends, an agricultural constituency, the _great_ majority of my committee were prepared to support me, and took action and strong measures in my favour.' 'My deep obligation,' he says, 'to the Duke of Newcastle for the great benefit he conferred upon me, not only by his unbroken support, but, far above all, by his original introduction of me to the constituency, made it my duty at once to decline some overtures made to me for the support of my re-election, so it only remained to seek a seat elsewhere.' Some faint hopes were entertained by Mr. Gladstone's friends that the duke might allow him to sit for the rest of the parliament, but the duke was not the man to make concessions to a betrayer of the territorial interest. Mr. Gladstone, too, we must not forget, was still and for many years to come, a tory. When it was suggested that he might stand for North Notts, he wrote to Lord Lincoln:--'It is not for one of my political opinions without an extreme necessity to stand upon the basis of democratic or popular feeling against the local proprietary: for you who are placed in the soil the case is very different.' Soon after the session of 1846 began, it became known that the protectionist petition against the Peelite or liberal sitting member for Wigan was likely to succeed in unseating him. 'Proposals were made to me to succeed him, which were held to be eligible. I even wrote my address; on a certain day, I was going down by the mail train. But it was an object for our opponents to keep a secretary of state out of parliament during the corn law crisis, and their petition was suddenly withdrawn. The consequence was that I remained until the resignation of the government in July a minister of the crown without a seat in parliament. This was a state of things not agreeable to the spirit of parliamentary government; and some objection was taken, but rather slightly, in the House of Commons. Sir R. Peel stood fire.' There can be little doubt that in our own day a cabinet minister without a seat in either House of parliament would be regarded, in Mr. Gladstone's words, as a public inconvenience and a political anomaly, too _dark_ to be tolerated; and he naturally felt it his absolute duty to peep in at every chink and cranny where a seat in parliament could be had. A Peelite, however, had not a good chance at a by-election, and Mr. Gladstone remained out of the House until the general election in the year following.[174] Lord Lincoln, also a member of the cabinet, vacated his seat, but, unlike his friend, found a seat in the course of the session. Mr. Gladstone's brother-in-law, Lyttelton, was invited to represent the colonial office in the Lords, but had qualms of conscience about the eternal question of the two Welsh bishoprics. 'How could the government of this wonderful empire,' Peel wrote to Mr. Gladstone, 'be ever constructed, if a difference on such a point were to be an obstruction to union? Might not any one now say with perfect honour and, what is of more importance (if they are not identical), perfect satisfaction to his own conscience, "I will not so far set up my own judgment on one isolated measure against that of a whole administration, to such an extent as to preclude me from co-operation with them at a critical period." This, of course, assumes general accordance of sentiment on the great outlines of public policy.' Wise words and sound, that might prevent some of the worst mistakes of some of the best men. III THE SESSION OF 1846 This memorable session of 1846 was not a session of argument, but of lobby computations. The case had been argued to the dregs, the conclusion was fixed, and all interest was centred in the play of forces, the working of high motives and low, the balance of parties, the secret ambitions and antagonism of persons. Mr. Gladstone therefore was not in the shaping of the parliamentary result seriously missed, as he had been missed in 1845. 'It soon became evident,' says a leading whig in his journal of the time, 'that Peel had very much over-rated his strength. Even the expectation of December that he could have carried with him enough of his own followers to enable Lord John, if that statesman had contrived to form a government, to pass the repeal of the corn law, was perceived to have been groundless, when the formidable number of the protectionist dissentients appeared. So many even of those who remained with Peel avowed that they disapproved of the measure, and only voted in its favour for the purpose of supporting Peel's government.'[175] The tyranny of the accomplished fact obscures one's sense of the danger that Peel's high courage averted. It is not certain that Lord John as head of a government could have carried the whole body of whigs for total and immediate repeal, Lord Lansdowne and Palmerston openly stating their preference for a fixed duty, and not a few of the smaller men cursing the precipitancy of the Edinburgh letter. It is certain, as is intimated above, that Peel could not have carried over to him the whole of the 112 men who voted for repeal solely because it was his measure. In the course of this session Sir John Hobhouse met Mr. Disraeli at an evening party, and expressed a fear lest Peel having broken up one party would also be the means of breaking up the other. 'That, you may depend upon it, he will,' replied Disraeli, 'or any other party that he has anything to do with.' It was not long after this, when all was over, that the Duke of Wellington told Lord John that he thought Peel was tired of party and was determined to destroy it. After the repeal of the corn law was safe, the minister was beaten on the Irish coercion bill by what Wellington called a 'blackguard combination' between the whigs and the protectionists. He resigned, and Lord John Russell at the head of the whigs came in. 'Until three or four days before the division on the coercion bill,' Mr. Gladstone says in a memorandum written at the time, 'I had not the smallest idea, beyond mere conjecture, of the views and intentions of Sir R. Peel with respect to himself or to his government. Only we had been governed in all questions, so far as I knew, by the determination to carry the corn bill and to let no collateral circumstance interfere with that main purpose.... He sent round a memorandum some days before the division arguing for resignation against dissolution. There was also a correspondence between the Duke of Wellington and him. The duke argued for holding our ground and dissolving. But when we met in cabinet on Friday the 26th of June, not an opposing voice was raised. It was the shortest cabinet I ever knew. Peel himself uttered two or three introductory sentences. He then said that he was convinced that the formation of a conservative party was impossible while he continued in office. That he had made up his mind to resign. That he strongly advised the resignation of the entire government. Some declared their assent. None objected; and when he asked whether it was unanimous, there was no voice in the negative.' 'This was simply,' as Mr. Gladstone added in later notes, 'because he had very distinctly and positively stated his own resolution to resign. It amounted therefore to this,--no one proposed to go on without him.' One other note of Mr. Gladstone's on this grave decision is worth quoting:-- I must put into words the opinion which I silently formed in my room at the colonial office in June 1846, when I got the circulation box with Peel's own memorandum not only arguing in favour of resignation but intimating his own intention to resign, and with the Duke of Wellington's in the opposite sense. The duke, in my opinion, was right and Peel wrong, but he had borne the brunt of battle already beyond the measure of human strength, and who can wonder that his heart and soul as well as his physical organisation needed rest?[176] DEFEAT OF THE GOVERNMENT In announcing his retirement to the House (June 29), Peel passed a magnanimous and magnificent eulogium on Cobden.[177] Strange to say, the panegyric gave much offence, and among others to Mr. Gladstone. The next day he entered in his diary:-- Much comment is made upon Peel's declaration about Cobden last night. My objection to it is that it did not do full justice. For if his power of discussion has been great and his end good, his tone has been most harsh and his imputation of bad and vile motives to honourable men incessant. I do not think the thing was done in a manner altogether worthy of Peel's mind. But he, like some smaller men, is, I think, very sensible of the sweetness of the cheers of opponents. He describes himself at the time as 'grieved and hurt' at these closing sentences; and even a year later, in answer to some inquiry from his father, who still remained protectionist, he wrote: 'July 1, '47.--I do not know anything about Peel's having repented of his speech about Cobden; but I hope that he has seen the great objection to which it is, as I think, fairly open.' Some of his own men who voted for Peel declared that after this speech they bitterly repented. PEEL'S TRIBUTE TO COBDEN The suspected personal significance of the Cobden panegyric is described in a memorandum written by Mr. Gladstone a few days later (July 12):-- A day or two afterwards I met Lord Stanley crossing the park, and we had some conversation, first on colonial matters. Then he said, 'Well, I think our friend Peel went rather far last night about Cobden, did he not?' I stated to him my very deep regret on reading that passage (as well as what followed about the monopolists), and that, not for its impolicy but for its injustice. All that he said was true, but he did not say the whole truth; and the effect of the whole, as a whole, was therefore untrue. Mr. Cobden has throughout argued the corn question on the principle of holding up the landlords of England to the people, as plunderers and as knaves for maintaining the corn law to save their rents, and as fools because it was not necessary for that purpose. This was passed by, while he was praised for sincerity, eloquence, indefatigable zeal. On Thursday the 2nd I saw Lord Aberdeen. He agreed in the general regret at the tone of that part of the speech. He said he feared it was designed with a view to its effects, for the purpose of making it impossible that Peel should ever again be placed in connection with the conservative party as a party. He said that Peel had absolutely made up his mind never again to lead it, never again to enter office; that he had indeed made up his mind, at one time, to quit parliament, but that probably on the Queen's account, and in deference to her wishes, he had abandoned this part of his intentions. But that he was fixed in the idea to maintain his independent and separate position, taking part in public questions as his views of public interests might from time to time seem to require. I represented that this for _him_, and in the House of Commons, was an intention absolutely impossible to fulfil; that with his greatness he could not remain there overshadowing and eclipsing all governments, and yet have to do with no governments; that acts cannot for such a man be isolated, they must be in series, and his view of public affairs must coincide with one body of men rather than another, and that the attraction must place him in relations with them. Lord Aberdeen said that Earl Spencer in his later days was Sir R. Peel's ideal,--rare appearances for serious purposes, and without compromise generally to the independence of his personal habits. I put it that this was possible in the House of Lords, but only there.... On Saturday I saw him again as he came from the palace. He represented that the Queen was sorely grieved at this change; which indeed I had already heard from Catherine through Lady Lyttelton, but this showed that it continued. And again on Monday we heard through Lady Lyttelton that the Queen said it was a comfort to think that the work of that day would soon be over. It appears too that she spoke of the kindness she had received from her late ministers; and that the Prince's sentiments are quite as decided. On Monday we delivered up the seals at our several audiences. Her Majesty said simply but very kindly to me, 'I am very sorry to receive them from you.' I thanked her for my father's baronetcy, and apologised for his not coming to court. She had her glove half off, which made me think I was to kiss hands; but she simply bowed and retired. Her eyes told tales, but she smiled and put on a cheerful countenance. It was in fact the 1st of September 1841 over again as to feelings; but this time with more mature judgment and longer experience. Lord Aberdeen and Sir J. Graham kissed hands, but this was by favour. The same night I saw Sidney Herbert at Lady Pembroke's. He gave me in great part the same view of Sir R. Peel's speech, himself holding the same opinion with Lord Aberdeen. But he thought that Peel's natural temper, which he said is very violent though usually under thorough discipline, broke out and coloured that part of the speech, but that the end in view was to cut off all possibility of reunion. He referred to a late conversation with Peel, in which Peel had intimated his intention of remaining in parliament and acting for himself without party, to which Herbert replied that he knew of no minister who had done so except lord Bute, a bad precedent. Peel rejoined 'Lord Grenville,' showing that his mind had been at work upon the subject. He had heard him not long ago discussing his position with Lord Aberdeen and Sir James Graham, when he said, putting his hand up to the side of his head, 'Ah! you do not know what I suffer here.' Yesterday Lord Lyndhurst called on me.... He proceeded to ask me what I thought with respect to our political course. He said he conceived that the quarrel was a bygone quarrel, that the animosities attending it ought now to be forgotten, and the old relations of amity and confidence among the members of the conservative body resumed. I told him, in the first place, that I felt some difficulty in answering him in my state of total ignorance, so far as direct communication is concerned, of Sir R. Peel's knowledge and intentions; that on Tuesday I had seen him on colonial matters, and had talked on the probable intentions of the new government as to the sugar duties, but that I did not like to ask what he did not seem to wish to tell, and that I did not obtain the smallest inkling of light as to his intentions in respect to that very matter now immediately pending. He observed it was a pity Sir R. Peel was so uncommunicative; but that after having been so long connected with him, he would certainly be very unwilling to do anything disagreeable to him; still, if I and others thought fit, he was ready to do what he could towards putting the party together again. I then replied that I thought, so far as extinguishing the animosities which had been raised in connection with the corn law was concerned, I could not doubt its propriety, that I thought we were bound to give a fair trial to the government, and not to assume beforehand an air of opposition, and that if so much of confidence is due to them, much more is it due towards friends from whom we have differed on the single question of free trade, that our confidence should be reposed in them. That I thought, however, that in any case, before acting together as a party, we ought to consider well the outline of our further course, particularly with reference to Irish questions and the church there, as I was of opinion that it was very doubtful whether we had now a justification for opposing any change with respect to it, meaning as to the property. He said with his accustomed facility, 'Ah yes, it will require to be considered what course we shall take.'[178] CONVERSATIONS WITH COLLEAGUES I met Lord Aberdeen the same afternoon in Bond Street, and told him the substance of this conversation. He said, 'It is stated that Lord G. Bentinck is to resign, and that they are to have you.' That, I replied, was quite new to me. The (late) chancellor had simply said, when I pointed out that the difficulties lay in the House of Commons, that it was true, and that my being there would make the way more open. I confess I am very doubtful of that, and much disposed to believe that I am regretted, as things and persons _absent_ often are, in comparison with the present. At dinner I sat between Graham and Jocelyn. The latter observed particularly on the absence from Sir R. Peel's speech of any acknowledgment towards his supporters and his colleagues. These last, however, are named. Jocelyn said the new government were much divided.... Jocelyn believes that Lord Palmerston will not be very long in union with this cabinet. With Sir J. Graham I had much interesting conversation. I told him, I thought it but fair to mention to him the regret and blame which I found to have been elicited from all persons whom I saw and conversed with, by the passage relating to Cobden. He said he believed it was the same on all hands; and that the new government in particular were most indignant at it. He feared that it was deliberately preconceived and for the purpose; and went on to repeat what Lord Aberdeen had told me, that Sir R. Peel had been within an ace of quitting parliament, and was determined to abjure party and stand aloof for ever, and never resume office. I replied as before, that in the House of Commons it was impossible. He went on to sketch the same kind of future for himself. He was weary of labour at thirteen or fourteen hours a day, and of the intolerable abuse to which he was obliged to submit; but his habits were formed in the House of Commons and for it, and he was desirous to continue there as an independent gentleman, taking part from time to time in public business as he might find occasion, and giving his leisure to his family and to books. I said, 'Are you not building houses of cards? Do you conceive that men who have played a great part, who have swayed the great moving forces of the state, who have led the House of Commons and given the tone to public policy, can at their will remain there, but renounce the consequences of their remaining, and refuse to fulfil what must fall to them in some contingency of public affairs? The country will demand that they who are the ablest shall not stand by inactive.' He said Sir Robert Peel had all but given up his seat. I answered that would at any rate have made his resolution a practicable one. He said, 'You can have no conception of what the virulence is against Peel and me.' I said, No; that from having been out of parliament during these debates my sense of these things was less lively and my position in some respects different. He replied, 'Your position is quite different. You are free to take any course you please with perfect honour.' I told him of Lord Lyndhurst's visit and the purport of his conversation, of the meaning of the junction on the opposition bench in the Lords, and of what we had said of the difficulties in the Commons. He said, 'My resentment is not against the new government, but against the seventy-three conservative members of parliament who displaced the late government by a factious vote; nearly all of them believed the bill to be necessary for Ireland; and they knew that our removal was not desired by the crown, not desired by the country. I find no fault with the new ministers, they are fairly in possession of power--but with those gentlemen I can never unite.' Later, however, in the evening he relented somewhat, and said he must admit that what they did was done under great provocation; that it was no wonder they regarded themselves as betrayed; and that unfortunately it had been the fate of Sir R. Peel to perform a similar operation twice.... Graham dwelt with fondness and with pain on Lord Stanley; said he had very great qualities--that his speech on the corn law, consisting as it did simply of old fallacies though in new dress, was a magnificent speech, one of his greatest and happiest efforts--that all his conduct in the public eye had been perfectly free from exception; that he feared, however, he had been much in Lord Geo. Bentinck's counsels, and had concurred in much more than he had himself done, and had aided in marking out the course taken in the House of Commons. He had called on Lord Stanley several times but had never been able to see him, he trusted through accident, but seemed to doubt. On the Cobden eulogy, though he did not defend it outright by any means, he said, 'Do you think if Cobden had not existed the repeal of the corn law would have been carried at this moment?' I said very probably not, that he had added greatly to the force of the movement and accelerated its issue, that I admitted the truth of every word that Peel had uttered, but complained of its omissions, of its spirit towards his own friends, of its false moral effect, as well as and much more than of its mere impolicy.[179] IV FAREWELL INTERVIEW WITH PEEL Still more interesting is an interview with the fallen minister himself, written ten days after it took place:-- _July 24._--On Monday the 13th I visited Sir R. Peel, and found him in his dressing-room laid up with a cut in one of his feet. My immediate purpose was to let him know the accounts from New Zealand which Lord Grey had communicated to me.... However _I_ led on from subject to subject, for I thought it my duty not to quit town, at the end possibly of my political connection with Sir R. Peel, that is if he determined to individualise himself, without giving the opportunity at least for free communication. Though he opened nothing, yet he followed unreluctantly. I said the government appeared to show signs of internal discord or weakness. He said, Yes; related that Lord John did not mean to include Lord Grey, that he sent Sir G. Grey and C. Wood to propitiate him, that Lord Grey was not only not hostile but volunteered his services. At last I broke the ice and said, 'You have seen Lord Lyndhurst.' He said, 'Yes.' I mentioned the substance of my interview with Lord Lyndhurst, and also what I had heard from Goulburn of his. He said, 'I am _hors de combat_.' I said to him, 'Is that possible? Whatever your present intentions may be, can it be done?' He said he had been twice prime minister, and nothing should induce him again to take part in the formation of a government; the labour and anxiety were too great and he repeated more than once emphatically with regard to the work of his post, 'No one in the least degree knows what it is. I have told the Queen that I part from her with the deepest sentiments of gratitude and attachment; but that there is one thing she must not ask of me, and that is to place myself again in the same position.' Then he spoke of the immense accumulation. 'There is the whole correspondence with the Queen, several times a day, and all requiring to be in my own hand, and to be carefully done; the whole correspondence with peers and members of parliament, in my own hand, as well as other persons of consequence; the sitting seven or eight hours a day to listen in the House of Commons. Then I must, of course, have my mind in the principal subjects connected with the various departments, such as the Oregon question for example, and all the reading connected with them. I can hardly tell you, for instance, what trouble the New Zealand question gave me. Then there is the difficulty that you have in conducting such questions on account of your colleague whom they concern.' It was evident from this, as it had been from other signs, that he did not think Stanley had been happy in his management of the New Zealand question. I said, however, 'I can quite assent to the proposition that no one understands the labour of your post; that, I think, is all I ever felt I could know about it, that there is nothing else like it. But then you have been prime minister in a sense in which no other man has been it since Mr. Pitt's time.' He said, 'But Mr. Pitt got up every day at eleven o'clock, and drank two bottles of port wine every night.' 'And died of old age at forty-six,' I replied. 'This all strengthens the case. I grant your full and perfect claim to retirement in point of justice and reason; if such a claim can be made good by amount of service, I do not see how yours could be improved. You have had extraordinary physical strength to sustain you; and you have performed an extraordinary task. Your government has not been carried on by a cabinet, but by the heads of departments each in communication with you.' He assented, and added it had been what every government ought to be, a government of confidence in one another. 'I have felt the utmost confidence as to matters of which I had no knowledge, and so have the rest. Lord Aberdeen in particular said that nothing would induce him to hold office on any other principle, or to be otherwise than perfectly free as to previous consultations.' And he spoke of the defects of the Melbourne government as a mere government of departments without a centre of unity, and of the possibility that the new ministers might experience difficulty in the same respect. I then went on to say, 'Mr. Perceval, Lord Liverpool, Lord Melbourne were not prime ministers in this sense; what Mr. Canning might have been, the time was too short to show. I fully grant that your labours have been incredible, but, allow me to say, that is not the question. The question is not whether you are entitled to retire, but whether after all you have done, and in the position you occupy before the country, you can remain in the House of Commons as an isolated person, and hold yourself aloof from the great movements of political forces which sway to and fro there?' He said, 'I think events will answer that question better than any reasoning beforehand.' I replied, 'That is just what I should rely upon, and should therefore urge how impossible it is for you to lay down with certainty a foregone conclusion such as that which you have announced to-day, and which events are not to influence, merely that you will remain in parliament and yet separate yourself from the parliamentary system by which our government is carried on.' Then he said, (If it is necessary I will) 'go out of parliament'--the first part of the sentence was indistinctly muttered, but the purport such as I have described. To which I merely replied that I hoped not, and that the country would have something to say upon that too.... No man can doubt that he is the strong man of this parliament--of this political generation. Then it is asked, Is he honest? But this is a question which I think cannot justly be raised nor treated as admissible in the smallest degree by those who have known and worked with him.... He spoke of the immense multiplication of details in public business and the enormous task imposed upon available time and strength by the work of attendance in the House of Commons. He agreed that it was extremely adverse to the growth of greatness among our public men; and he said the mass of public business increased so fast that he could not tell what it was to end in, and did not venture to speculate even for a few years upon the mode of administering public affairs. He thought the consequence was already manifest in its being not well done. It sometimes occurred to him whether it would after all be a good arrangement to have the prime minister in the House of Lords, which would get rid of the very encroaching duty of attendance on and correspondence with the Queen. I asked if in that case it would not be quite necessary that the leader in the Commons should frequently take upon himself to make decisions which ought properly to be made by the head of the government? He said, Certainly, and that that would constitute a great difficulty. That although Lord Melbourne might be very well adapted to take his part in such a plan, there were, he believed, difficulties in it under him when Lord J. Russell led the House of Commons. That when he led the House in 1828 under the Duke of Wellington as premier, he had a very great advantage in the disposition of the duke to follow the judgments of others in whom he had confidence with respect to all civil matters. He said it was impossible during the session even to work the public business through the medium of the cabinet, such is the pressure upon time.... He told me he had suffered dreadfully in his head on the left side--that twenty-two or twenty-three years ago he injured the ear by the use of a detonating tube in shooting. Since then he had always had a noise on that side, and when he had the work of office upon him, this and the pain became scarcely bearable at times, as I understood him. Brodie told him that 'as some overwork one part and some another, he had overworked his brain,' but he said that with this exception his health was good. It was pleasant to me to find and feel by actual contact as it were (though I had no suspicion of the contrary) his manner as friendly and as much unhurt as at any former period. V Before leaving office Peel wrote to Mr. Gladstone (June 20) requesting him to ask his father whether it would be acceptable to him to be proposed to the Queen for a baronetcy. 'I should name him to the Queen,' he said, 'as the honoured representative of a great class of the community which has raised itself by its integrity and industry to high social eminence. I should gratify also my own feeling by a mark of personal respect for a name truly worthy of such illustration as hereditary honour can confer.' John Gladstone replied in becoming words, but honestly mentioned that he had published his strong opinion of the injurious consequences that he dreaded from 'the stupendous experiment about to be made' in commercial policy. Peel told him that this made no difference.[180] LORD GEORGE BENTINCK At the close of the session a trivial incident occurred that caused Mr. Gladstone a disproportionate amount of vexation for several months. Hume stated in the House that the colonial secretary had countersigned what was a lie, in a royal patent appointing a certain Indian judge. The 'lie' consisted in reciting that a judge then holding the post had resigned, whereas he had not resigned, and the correct phrase was that the Queen had permitted him to retire. Lord George Bentinck, whose rage was then at its fiercest, pricked up his ears, and a day or two later declared that Mr. Secretary Gladstone had 'deliberately affirmed, not through any oversight or inadvertence or thoughtlessness, but designedly and of his own malice prepense, that which in his heart he knew not to be true.' Things of this sort may either be passed over in disdain, or taken with logician's severity. Mr. Gladstone might well have contented himself with the defence that his signature had been purely formal, and that every secretary of state is called upon to put his name to recitals of minute technical fact which he must take on trust from his officials. As it was, he chose to take Bentinck's reckless aspersion at its highest, and the combat lasted for weeks and months. Bentinck got up the case with his usual industrious tenacity; he insisted that the Queen's name stood at that moment in the degrading position of being prefixed to a proclamation that all her subjects knew to recite and to be founded upon falsehood; he declared that the whole business was a job perpetrated by the outgoing ministers, to fill up a post that was not vacant; he imputed no corrupt motive to Mr. Gladstone; he admitted that Mr. Gladstone was free from the betrayal and treachery practised by his political friends; but he could not acquit him of having been in this particular affair the tool and the catspaw of two old foxes greedier and craftier than himself. To all this unmannerly stuff the recipient of it only replied by holding its author the more tight to the point of the original offence; the blood of his highland ancestors was up, and the poet's contest between eagle and serpent was not more dire. The affair was submitted to Lord Stanley. He reluctantly consented (Oct. 29) to decide the single question whether Bentinck was justified 'on the information before him in using the language quoted.' There was a dispute what information Bentinck had before him, and upon this point, where Bentinck's course might in his own polite vocabulary be marked as pure shuffling, Lord Stanley returned the papers (Feb. 8, 1847) and expressed his deep regret that he could bring about no more satisfactory result. Even so late as the spring of 1847 Mr. Gladstone was only dissuaded by the urgent advice of Lord Lincoln and others from pursuing the fray. It was, so far as I know, the only personal quarrel into which he ever allowed himself to be drawn. FOOTNOTES: [172] Perhaps I may refer to my _Life of Cobden_, which had the great advantage of being read before publication by Mr. Bright. Chapters xiv. and xv. [173] Lord Aberdeen to Senior, Sept. 1856. Mrs. Simpson's _Many Memories_, p. 233. [174] Sibthorp asked Peel in the H. of C. when Gladstone and Lincoln would appear. Peel replied that if S. would take the Chiltern Hundreds, G. should stand against him. S. retorted that the Chiltern Hundreds is a place under government, and he would never take place from Peel; but if P. would dissolve he would welcome Gladstone to Lincoln--or P. himself; and added privately that he would give P. or G. best bottle of wine in his cellar if he would come to Lincoln and fight him fairly.--_Lord Broughton's Diaries_. [175] _Halifax Papers._ [176] Cobden also wrote to Peel strongly urging him to hold on, and Peel replied with an effective defence of his own view. _Life of Cobden_, i. chap. 18. [177] 'There is a name that ought to be associated with the success of these measures; it is not the name of Lord John Russell, neither is it my name. Sir, the name which ought to be, and will be, associated with these measures is the name of a man who, acting from pure and disinterested motives, has advocated their cause with untiring energy, and by appeals to reason expressed by an eloquence the more to be admired because it was unaffected and unadorned--the name which ought to be associated with the success of these measures is the name of Richard Cobden. Without scruple, Sir, I attribute the success of these measures to him.' [178] See _Life of Lord Lyndhurst_, by Lord Campbell, p. 163. [179] Six years later (Nov. 26, 1852), Mr. Gladstone in the House of Commons said of Cobden, with words of characteristic qualification:--'Agree you may in his general politics, or you may not; complain you may, if you think you have cause, of the mode and force with which in the freedom of debate he commonly states his opinions in this House. But it is impossible for us to deny that those benefits of which we are now acknowledging the existence are, in no small part at any rate, due to the labours in which he has borne so prominent a share.' [180] Parker, iii. pp. 434-5. CHAPTER XI THE TRACTARIAN CATASTROPHE (_1841-1846_) The movement of 1833 started out o£ the anti-Roman feelings of the Emancipation time. It was anti-Roman as much as it was anti-sectarian and anti-erastian. It was to avert the danger of people becoming Romanists from ignorance of church principles. This was all changed in one important section of the party. The fundamental conceptions were reversed. It was not the Roman church but the English church that was put on its trial.... From this point of view the object of the movement was no longer to elevate and improve an independent English church, but to approximate it as far as possible to what was assumed to be undeniable--the perfect catholicity of Rome.--DEAN CHURCH. The fall of Peel and the break-up of his party in the state coincided pretty nearly with a hardly less memorable rupture in that rising party in the church, with which Mr. Gladstone had more or less associated himself almost from its beginning. Two main centres of authority and leading in the land were thus at the same moment dislodged and dispersed. A long struggle in secular concerns had come to a decisive issue; and the longer struggle in religious concerns had reached a critical and menacing stage. The reader will not wonder that two events so far-reaching as the secession of Newman and the fall of Sir Robert, coupled as these public events were with certain importunities of domestic circumstance of which I shall have more to say by and by, brought Mr. Gladstone to an epoch in his life of extreme perturbation. Roughly it may be said to extend from 1845 to 1852. At the time of his resignation in the beginning of 1845, he wrote to Lord John Manners, then his colleague at Newark, a curious account of his views on party life. Lord John was then acting with the Young England group inspired by Disraeli, who has left a picture of them in _Sybil_, the most far-seeing of all his novels. _To Lord John Manners._ _Jan. 30, 1845._--You, I have no doubt, are disappointed as to the working of a conservative government. And so should I be if I were to estimate its results by a comparison with the anticipations which, from a distance and in the abstract, I had once entertained of political life. But now my expectations not only from this but from any government are very small. If they do a little good, if they prevent others from doing a good deal of evil, if they maintain an unblemished character, it is my fixed conviction that under the circumstances of the times I can as an independent member of parliament, for I am now virtually such, ask no more. And I do entertain the strongest impression that if, with your honourable and upright mind, you had been called upon for years to consult as one responsible for the movements of great parliamentary bodies, if you thus had been accustomed to look into public questions at close quarters, your expectations from an administration, and your dispositions towards it, would be materially changed.... The principles and moral powers of government as such are sinking day by day, and it is not by laws and parliaments that they can be renovated.... I must venture even one step further, and say that such schemes of regeneration as those which were propounded (not, I am bound to add, by you) at Manchester,[181] appear to me to be most mournful delusions; and their re-issue, for their real parentage is elsewhere, from the bosom of the party to which we belong, an omen of the worst kind if they were likely to obtain currency under the new sanction they have received. It is most easy to complain as you do of _laissez-faire_ and _laissez-aller_; nor do I in word or in heart presume to blame you; but I should sorely blame myself if with my experience and convictions of _the growing impotence of government for its highest functions_, I were either to recommend attempts beyond its powers, which would react unfavourably upon its remaining capabilities, or to be a party to proposed substitutes for its true moral and paternal work which appear to me mere counterfeits. RELIGION AT OXFORD On this letter we may note in passing, first, that the tariff legislation did in the foundations what the Young England party wished to do in a superficial and flimsy fashion; and second, it was the tariff legislation that drove back a rising tide of socialism, both directly by vastly improving the condition of labour, and indirectly by force of the doctrine of free exchange which was thus corroborated by circumstances. Of this we shall see more by and by. Throughout the years of Sir Robert Peel's government, Mr. Gladstone had been keenly intent upon the progress of religious affairs at Oxford. 'From 1841 till the beginning of 1845,' he says in a fragmentary note, 'I continued a hardworking official man, but with a decided predominance of religious over secular interests. Although I had little of direct connection with Oxford and its teachers, I was regarded in common fame as tarred with their brush; and I was not so blind as to be unaware that for the clergy this meant not yet indeed prosecution, but proscription and exclusion from advancement by either party in the state, and for laymen a vague and indeterminate prejudice with serious doubts how far persons infected in this particular manner could have any real capacity for affairs. Sir Robert Peel must, I think, have exercised much self-denial when he put me in his cabinet in 1843.' The movement that began in 1833 had by the opening of the next decade revealed startling tendencies, and its first stage was now slowly but unmistakeably passing into the second. Mr. Gladstone has told us[182] how he stood at this hour of crisis; how strongly he believed that the church of England would hold her ground, and even revive the allegiance not only of the masses, but of those large and powerful nonconforming bodies who were supposed to exist only as a consequence of the neglect of its duties by the national church. He has told us also how little he foresaw the second phase of the Oxford movement--the break-up of a distinguished and imposing generation of clergy; 'the spectacle of some of the most gifted sons reared by Oxford for the service of the church of England, hurling at her head the hottest bolts of the Vatican; and along with this strange deflexion on one side, a not less convulsive rationalist movement on the other,--all ending in contention and estrangement, and in suspicions worse than either, because less accessible and more intractable.' II The landmarks of the Tractarian story are familiar, and I do not ask the reader in any detail to retrace them. The publication of Froude's _Remains_ was the first flagrant beacon lighting the path of divergence from the lines of historical high churchmen in an essentially anti-protestant direction. Mr. Gladstone read the first instalment of this book (1838) 'with repeated regrets.' Then came the blaze kindled by Tract Ninety (1841). This, in the language of its author and his friends, was the famous attempt to clear the Articles from the glosses encrusting them like barnacles, and to bring out the old catholic truth that man had done his worst to disfigure and to mutilate, and yet in spite of all man's endeavour it was in the Articles still. Mr. Gladstone, as we have seen, regarded Tract Ninety with uneasy doubts as to its drift, its intentions, the way in which the church and the world would take it. 'This No. Ninety of _Tracts for the Times_ which I read by desire of Sir R. Inglis,' he writes to Lord Lyttelton, 'is like a repetition of the publication of Froude's _Remains_, and Newman has again burned his fingers. The most serious feature in the tract to my mind is that, doubtless with very honest intentions and with his mind turned for the moment so entirely towards those inclined to defection, and therefore occupying _their_ point of view exclusively, he has in writing it placed himself quite outside the church of England in point of spirit and sympathy. As far as regards the proposition for which he intended mainly to argue, I believe not only that he is right, but that it is an a b c truth, almost a truism of the reign of Elizabeth, namely that the authoritative documents of the church of England were not meant to bind _all_ men to every opinion of their authors, and particularly that they intended to deal as gently with prepossessions thought to look towards Rome, as the necessity of securing a certain amount of reformation would allow. Certainly also the terms in which Newman characterises the present state of the church of England in his introduction are calculated to give both pain and alarm; and the whole aspect of the tract is like the assumption of a new position.' TRACTARIAN LANDMARKS Next followed the truly singular struggle for the university chair of poetry at the end of the same year, between a no-popery candidate and a Puseyite. Seldom surely has the service of the muses been pressed into so alien a debate. Mr. Gladstone was cut to the heart at the prospect of a sentence in the shape of a vote for this professorship, passed by the university of Oxford 'upon all that congeries of opinions which the rude popular notion associates with the _Tracts for the Times_.' Such a sentence would be a disavowal by the university of catholic principles in the gross; the association between catholic principles and the church of England would be miserably weakened; and those who at all sympathised with the Tracts would be placed in the position of aliens, corporally within the pale, but in spirit estranged or outcast. If the church should be thus broken up, there would be no space for catholicity between the rival pretensions of an ultra-protestantised or decatholicised English church, and the communion of Rome. 'Miserable choice!' These and other arguments are strongly pressed (December 3, 1841) in favour of an amicable compromise, in a letter addressed to his close friend Frederic Rogers. In the same letter Mr. Gladstone says that he cannot profess to understand or to have studied the Tracts on Reserve.[183] He 'partakes perhaps in the popular prejudice against them.' Anybody can now see in the coolness of distant time that it was these writings on Reserve that roused not merely prejudice but fury in the public mind--a fury that without either justice or logic extended from hatred of Romanisers to members of the church of Rome itself. It affected for the worse the feeling between England and Ireland, for in those days to be ultra-protestant was to be anti-Irish; and it greatly aggravated, first the storm about the Maynooth grant in 1845, and then the far wilder storm about the papal aggression six years later. THE JERUSALEM BISHOPRIC Further fuel for excitement was supplied the same year (1841) in a fantastic project by which a bishop, appointed alternately by Great Britain and Prussia and with his headquarters at Jerusalem, was to take charge through a somewhat miscellaneous region, of any German protestants or members of the church of England or anybody else who might be disposed to accept his authority. The scheme stirred much enthusiasm in the religious world, but it deepened alarm among the more logical of the high churchmen. Ashley and the evangelicals were keen for it as the blessed beginning of a restoration of Israel, and the king of Prussia hoped to gain over the Lutherans and others of his subjects by this side-door into true episcopacy. Politics were not absent, and some hoped that England might find in the new protestant church such an instrument in those uncomfortable regions, as Russia possessed in the Greek church and France in the Latin. Dr. Arnold was delighted at the thought that the new church at Jerusalem would comprehend persons using different liturgies and subscribing different articles,--his favourite pattern for the church of England. Pusey at first rather liked the idea of a bishop to represent the ancient British church in the city of the Holy Sepulchre; but Newman and Hope, with a keener instinct for their position, distrusted the whole design in root and branch as a betrayal of the church, and Pusey soon came to their mind. With caustic scorn Newman asked how the anglican church, without ceasing to be a church, could become an associate and protector of nestorians, jacobites, monophysites, and all the heretics one could hear of, and even form a sort of league with the mussulman against the Greek orthodox and the Latin catholics. Mr. Gladstone could not be drawn to go these lengths. Nobody could be more of a logician than Mr. Gladstone when he liked, no logician could wield a more trenchant blade; but nobody ever knew better in complex circumstance the perils of the logical short cut. Hence, according to his general manner in all dubious cases, he moved slowly, and laboured to remove practical grounds for objection. Ashley describes him (October 16) at a dinner at Bunsen's rejoicing in the bishopric, and proposing the health of the new prelate, and this gave Ashley pleasure, for 'Gladstone is a good man and a clever man and an industrious man.'[184] While resolute against any plan for what Hope called gathering up the scraps of Christendom and making a new church out of them, and resolute against what he himself called the inauguration of an experimental or fancy church, Mr. Gladstone declared himself ready 'to brave misconstruction for the sake of union with any Christian men, provided the terms of union were not contrary to sound principles.' With a strenuous patience that was thoroughly characteristic, he set to work to bring the details of the scheme into an order conformable to his own views, and he even became a trustee of the endowment fund. Two bishops in succession filled the see, but in the fulness of time most men agreed with Newman, who 'never heard of any either good or harm that bishopric had ever done,' except what it had done for him. To him it gave a final shake, and brought him on to the beginning of the end.[185] In the summer of 1842 Mr. Gladstone received confidences that amazed him. Here is a passage from his diary:-- _July 31, 1842._--Walk with R. Williams to converse on the subject of our recent letters. I made it my object to learn from him the general view of the ulterior section of the Oxford writers and their friends. It is startling. They look not merely to the renewal and development of the catholic idea within the pale of the church of England, but seem to consider the main condition of that development and of all health (some tending even to say of all life) to be reunion with the church, of Rome as the see of Peter. They recognise, however, authority in the church of England, and abide in her without love specifically fixed upon her, to seek the fulfilment of this work of reunion. It is, for example, he said, the sole object of Oakeley's life. They do not look to any defined order of proceedings in the way of means. They consider that the end is to be reached through catholicising the mind of the members of the church of England, but do not seem to feel that this can be done to any great degree in working out and giving free scope to her own rubrical system. They have no strong feeling of revulsion from actual evils in the church of Rome, first, because they do not wish to judge; secondly, especially not to judge the saints; thirdly, they consider that infallibility is somewhere and nowhere but there. They could not remain in the church of England if they thought that she dogmatically condemned anything that the church of Rome has defined _de fide_, but they do and will remain on the basis of the argument of Tract 90; upon which, after mental conflict, they have settled steadily down. They regret what Newman has said strongly against the actual system of the church of Rome, and they could not have affirmed, though neither do they positively deny it. Wherever Roman doctrine _de fide_ is oppugned they must protest; but short of this they render absolute obedience to their ecclesiastical superiors in the church of England. They expect to work on in practical harmony with those who look mainly to the restoration of catholic ideas on the foundation laid by the church of England as reformed, and who take a different view as to reunion with Rome in particular, though of course desiring the reunion of the whole body of Christ. All this is matter for very serious consideration. In the meantime I was anxious to put it down while fresh. POSITION OF NEWMAN Now was the time at which Mr. Gladstone's relations with Manning and Hope began to approach their closest. Newman, the great enchanter, in obedience to his bishop had dropped the issue of the Tracts; had withdrawn from all public discussion of ecclesiastical politics; had given up his work in Oxford; and had retired with a neophyte or two to Littlemore, a hamlet on the outskirts of the ever venerable city, there to pursue his theological studies, to prepare translations of Athanasius, to attend to his little parish, and generally to go about his own business so far as he might be permitted by the restlessness alike of unprovoked opponents and unsought disciples. This was the autumn of 1843. In October Manning sent to Mr. Gladstone two letters that he had received from Newman, indicating only too plainly, as they were both convinced, that the foundations of their leader's anglicanism had been totally undermined by the sweeping repudiation alike by episcopal and university authority of the doctrines of Tract Ninety. Dr. Pusey, on the other hand, admitted that the expressions in Newman's letter were portentous, but did not believe that they necessarily meant secession. In a man of the world this would not have been regarded as candid. For Newman says, 'I formally told Pusey that I expected to leave the church of England in the autumn of 1843, and begged him to tell others, that no one might be taken by surprise or might trust me in the interval.'[186] But Newman has told us that he had from the first great difficulty in making Dr. Pusey understand the differences between them. The letters stand in the _Apologia_ (chapter iv. § 2) to tell their own tale. To Mr. Gladstone their shock was extreme, not only by reason of the catastrophe to which they pointed, but from the ill-omened shadow that they threw upon the writer's probity of mind if not of heart. 'I stagger to and fro like a drunken man,' he wrote to Manning, 'I am at my wit's end.' He found some of Newman's language, 'forgive me if I say it, more like the expressions of some Faust gambling for his soul, than the records of the inner life of a great Christian teacher.' In his diary, he puts it thus:-- _Oct. 28, 1843._--S. Simon and S. Jude. St. James's 11 A.M. with a heavy heart. Another letter had come from Manning, enclosing a second from Newman, which announced that since the summer of 1839 he had had the conviction that the church of Rome is the catholic church, and ours not a branch of the catholic church because not in communion with Rome; that he had resigned St. Mary's because he felt he could not with a safe conscience longer teach in her; that by the article in the _British Critic_ on the catholicity of the English church he had quieted his mind for two years; that in his letter to the Bishop of Oxford, written most reluctantly, he, as the best course under the circumstances, committed himself again; that his alarms revived with that wretched affair of the Jerusalem bishopric, and had increased ever since; that Manning's interference had only made him the more realise his views; that Manning might make what use he pleased of his letters; he was relieved of a heavy heart; yet he trusted that God would beep him from hasty steps and resolves with a doubting conscience! How are the mighty fallen and the weapons of war perished! With the characteristic spirit with which, in politics and in every other field, he always insisted on espying patches of blue sky where others saw unbroken cloud, he was amazed that Newman did not, in spite of all the pranks of the Oxford heads, perceive the English church to be growing in her members more catholic from year to year, and how much more plain and undeniable was the sway of catholic principles within its bounds, since the time when he entertained no shadow of doubt about it. But while repeating his opinion that in many of the Tracts the language about the Roman church had often been far too censorious, Mr. Gladstone does not, nor did he ever, shrink from designating conversion to that church by the unflinching names of lapse and fall.[187] As he was soon to put it, 'The temptation towards the church of Rome of which some are conscious, has never been before my mind in any other sense than as other plain and flagrant sins have been before it.'[188] Two days later he wrote to Manning again:-- _Oct. 30, 1843._-- ... I have still to say that my impressions, though without more opportunity of testing them I cannot regard them as final, are still and strongly to the effect that upon the promulgation of those two letters to the world. Newman stands in the general view a _disgraced man_--and all men, all principles, with which he has had to do, disgraced in proportion to the proximity of their connection. And further I am persuaded that were he not spellbound and entranced, he could not fail to see the gross moral incoherence of the parts of his two statements; and that were I upon the terms which would warrant it, I should feel it my duty, at a time when as now, _summa res agitur_, to tell him so, after having, however, tried my own views by reference to some other mind, for instance to your own. But surely it will be said that his 'committing himself again' was simply a deliberate protestation of what he knew to be untrue. I have no doubt of his having proceeded honestly; no doubt that he can show it; but I say that those two letters are quite enough to condemn a man in whom one has no [Greek: pistis êthikê]: much more then one whom a great majority of the community regard with prejudice and deep suspicion.... With regard to your own feelings believe me that I enter into them; and indeed our communications have now for many years been too warm, free, and confiding to make it necessary for me, as I trust, to say what a resource and privilege it is to me to take counsel with you upon those absorbing subjects and upon the fortunes of the church; to which I desire to feel with you that life, strength, and all means and faculties, ought freely to be devoted, and indeed from such devotion alone can they derive anything of true value.[189] WARD'S _IDEAL_ The next blow was struck in the summer of 1844 by Ward's _Ideal of a Christian Church_, which had the remarkable effect of harassing and afflicting all the three high camps--the historical anglicans, the Puseyites and moderate tractarians, and finally the Newmanites and moderate Romanisers.[190] The writer was one of the most powerful dialecticians of the day, defiant, aggressive, implacable in his logic, unflinching in any stand that he chose to take; the master-representative of tactics and a temper like those to which Laud and Strafford gave the pungent name of Thorough. It was not its theology, still less its history, that made his book the signal for the explosion; it was his audacious proclamation that the whole cycle of Roman doctrine was gradually possessing numbers of English churchmen, and that he himself, a clergyman in orders and holding his fellowship on the tenure of church subscription, had in so subscribing to the Articles renounced no single Roman doctrine. This, and not the six hundred pages of argumentation, was the ringing challenge that provoked a plain issue, precipitated a decisive struggle, and brought the first stage of tractarianism to a close. ARTICLE ON WARD It was impossible that Mr. Gladstone even in the thick of his tariffs, his committees and deputations, his cabinet duties, and all the other absorbing occupations of an important minister in strong harness, should let a publication, in his view so injurious, pass in silence.[191] With indignation he flew to his intrepid pen, and dealt as trenchantly with Ward as Ward himself had dealt trenchantly with the reformers and all others whom he found planted in his dialectic way. Mr. Gladstone held the book up to stringent reproof for its capricious injustice; for the triviality of its investigations of fact; for the savageness of its censures; for the wild and wanton opinions broached in its pages; for the infatuation of mind manifested in some of its arguments; and for the lamentable circumstance that it exhibited a far greater debt in mental culture to Mr. John Stuart Mill than to the whole range of Christian divines. In a sentence, Ward 'had launched on the great deep of human controversy as frail a bark as ever carried sail,' and his reviewer undoubtedly let loose upon it as shrewd a blast as ever blew from the �olian wallet. The article was meant for the _Quarterly Review_, and it is easy to imagine the dire perplexities of Lockhart's editorial mind in times so fervid and so distracted. The practical issue after all was not the merits or the demerits of Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, nor the real meaning of Hooker, Jewel, Bull, but simply what was to be done to Ward. Lockhart wrote to Murray that he had very seriously studied the article and studied Ward's book, and not only these, but also the Articles and the canons of the church, and he could not approve of the _Review_ committing itself to a judgment on the line proper to be taken by the authorities of church and university, and the expression of such a judgment he suspected to be Mr. Gladstone's main object in writing. Mr. Gladstone, describing himself most truly as 'one of those soldiers who do not know when they are beat,' saw his editor; declared that what he sought was three things, first, that the process of mobbing out by invective and private interpretations is bad and should be stopped; second, that the church of England does not make assent to the proceedings of the Reformation a term of communion; and third, that before even judicial proceedings in one direction, due consideration should be had of what judicial proceedings in another direction consistency might entail, if that game were once begun. As Ward himself had virtually put it, 'Show me how any of the recognised parties in the church can subscribe in a natural sense, before you condemn me for subscribing in a non-natural.'[192] The end was a concordat between editor and contributor, followed by an immense amount of irksome revision, mutilation, and re-revision, reducing the argument in some places 'almost to tatters'; but the writer was in the long run satisfied that things were left standing in it which it was well to plant in a periodical like the _Quarterly Review_. We have a glimpse of the passionate agitation into which this great controversy, partly theologic, partly moral, threw Mr. Gladstone:-- _Feb. 6._--Breakfast at Mr. Macaulay's. Conversation chiefly on Aristotle's politics and on the Oxford proceedings. I grew hot, for which _ignoscat Deus_. _Feb. 13._--Oxford 1-5. We were in the theatre. Ward was like himself, honest to a fault, as little like an advocate in his line of argument as well could he, and strained his theology even a point further than before. The forms are venerable, the sight imposing; the act is fearful [the degradation of Ward], if it did not leave strong hope of its revisal by law. To Dr. Pusey he writes (Feb. 7):-- Indignation at this proposal to treat Mr. Newman worse than a dog really makes me mistrust my judgment, as I suppose one should always do when any proposal seeming to present an aspect of incredible wickedness is advanced. _Feb. 17._--I concur with my whole heart and soul in the desire for repose; and I fully believe that the gift of an interval of reflection is that which would be of all gifts the most precious to us all, which would restore the faculty of deliberation now almost lost in storms, and would afford the best hope both of the development of the soundest elements that are in motion amongst us, and of the mitigation or absorption of those which are more dangerous. In the proceedings at Oxford against Ward (February 13, 1845), Mr. Gladstone voted in the minority both against the condemnation of the book, and against the proposal to strip its writer of his university degree. He held that the censure combined condemnation of opinions with a declaration of personal dishonesty, and the latter question he held to be one 'not fit for the adjudication of a human tribunal.' All this has a marked place in Mr. Gladstone's mental progress. Though primarily and ostensibly the concern of the established church, yet the series of proceedings that had begun with the attack on Hampden in 1836, and then were followed down to our own day by academical, ecclesiastical and legal censures and penalties, or attempts at censure and penalty, on Newman, Pusey, Maurice, Gorham, _Essays and Reviews_, Colenso, and ended, if they have yet ended, in a host of judgments affecting minor personages almost as good as nameless--all constitute a chapter of extraordinary importance in the general history of English toleration, extending in its consequences far beyond the pale of the communion immediately concerned. It was a long and painful journey, often unedifying, not seldom squalid, with crooked turns not a few, and before it was over, casting men into strange companionship upon bleak and hazardous shores. Mr. Gladstone, though he probably was not one of those who are as if born by nature tolerant, was soon drawn by circumstance to look with favour upon that particular sort of toleration which arose out of the need for comprehension. When the six doctors condemned Pusey (June 1843) for preaching heresy and punished him by suspension, Mr. Gladstone was one of those who signed a vigorous protest against a verdict and a sentence passed upon an offender without hearing him and without stating reasons. This was at least the good beginning of an education in liberal rudiments. III NEWMAN'S SECESSION In October 1845 the earthquake came. Newman was received into the Roman communion. Of this step Mr. Gladstone said that it has never yet been estimated at anything like the full amount of its calamitous importance. The leader who had wielded a magician's power in Oxford was followed by a host of other converts. More than once I have heard Mr. Gladstone tell the story how about this time he sought from Manning an answer to the question that sorely perplexed him: what was the common bond of union that led men of intellect so different, of character so opposite, of such various circumstance, to come to the same conclusion. Manning's answer was slow and deliberate: '_Their common bond is their want of truth._' 'I was surprised beyond measure,' Mr. Gladstone would proceed, 'and startled at his judgment.'[193] Most ordinary churchmen remained where they were. An erastian statesman of our own time, when alarmists ran to him with the news that a couple of noblemen and their wives had just gone over to Rome, replied with calm, 'Show me a couple of grocers and their wives who have gone over, then you will frighten me.' The great body of church people stood firm, and so did Pusey, Keble, Gladstone, and so too, for half a dozen years to come, did his two closest friends, Manning and Hope. The dominant note in Mr. Gladstone's mind was clear and it was constant. As he put it to Manning (August 1,1845),--'That one should entertain love for the church of Rome in respect of her virtues and her glories, is of course right and obligatory; but one is equally bound under the circumstances of the English church in direct antagonism with Rome to keep clearly in view their very fearful opposites.' Tidings of the great secession happened to find Mr. Gladstone in a rather singular atmosphere. In the course of 1842, to the keen distress of her relatives, his sister had joined the Roman church, and her somewhat peculiar nature led to difficulties that taxed patience and resource to the uttermost. She had feelings of warm attachment to her brother, and spoke strongly in that sense to Dr. Wiseman; and it was for the purpose of carrying out some plans of his father's for her advantage, that in the autumn of 1845 (September 24-November 18), Mr. Gladstone passed nearly a couple of months in Germany. The duty was heavy and dismal, but the journey brought him into a society that could not be without effect upon his impressionable mind. At Munich he laid the foundation of one of the most interesting and cherished friendships of his life. Hope-Scott had already made the acquaintance of Dr. Döllinger, and he now begged Mr. Gladstone on no account to fail to present himself to him, as well as to other learned and political men, 'good catholics and good men with no ordinary talent and information.' 'Nothing,' Mr. Gladstone once wrote in after years, 'ever so much made me anglican _versus_ Roman as reading in Döllinger over forty years ago the history of the fourth century and Athanasius _contra mundum_.' Here is his story to his wife:-- _Munich, Sept. 30, 1845._--Yesterday evening after dinner with two travelling companions, an Italian _negoziante_ and a German, I must needs go and have a shilling's worth of the Augsburg Opera, where we heard Mozart (_Don Juan_) _well_ played and very respectably sung. To-day I have spent my evening differently, in tea and infinite conversation with Dr. Döllinger, who is one of the first among the Roman catholic theologians of Germany, a remarkable and a very pleasing man. His manners have great simplicity and I am astonished at the way in which a busy student such as he is can receive an intruder. His appearance is, singular to say, just compounded of those of two men who are among the most striking in appearance of our clergy, Newman and Dr. Mill. He surprises me by the extent of his information and the way in which he knows the details of what takes place in England. Most of our conversation related to it. He seemed to me one of the most liberal and catholic in mind of all the persons of his communion whom I have known. To-morrow I am to have tea with him again, and there is to be a third, Dr. Görres, who is a man of eminence among them. Do not think he has designs upon me. Indeed he disarms my suspicions in that respect by what appears to me a great sincerity.... DR. D�LLINGER _Oct. 2._--On Tuesday after post I began to look about me; and though I have not seen all the sights of Munich I have certainly seen a great deal that is interesting in the way of art, and having spent a good deal of time in Dr. Döllinger's company, last night till one o'clock, I have lost my heart to him. What I like perhaps most, or what crowns other causes of liking towards him, is that he, like Rio, seems to take hearty interest in the progress of religion in the church of England, apart from the (so to speak) party question between us, and to have a mind to appreciate good wherever he can find it. For instance, when in speaking of Wesley I said that his own views and intuitions were not heretical, and that if the ruling power in our church had had energy and a right mind to turn him to account, or if he had been in the church of Rome I was about to add, he would then have been a great saint, or something to that effect. But I hesitated, thinking it perhaps too strong, and even presumptuous, but he took me up and used the very words, declaring that to be his opinion. Again, speaking of Archbishop Leighton he expressed great admiration of his piety, and said it was so striking that he could not have been a real Calvinist. He is a great admirer of England and English character, and he does not at all _slur_ over the mischief with which religion has to contend in Germany. Lastly, I may be wrong, but I am persuaded he in his mind abhors a great deal that is too frequently taught in the church of Rome. Last night he spoke with such a sentiment of the doctrine that was taught on the subject of indulgences which moved Luther to resist them; and he said he believed it was true that the preachers represented to the people that by money payments they could procure the release souls from purgatory. I told him that was exactly the doctrine I had heard preached in Messina, and he said a priest preaching so in Germany would be suspended by his bishop. Last night he invited several of his friends whom I wanted to meet, to an entertainment which consisted first of weak tea, immediately followed by meat supper with beer and wine and sweets. For two hours was I there in the midst of five German professors, or four, and the editor of a paper, who held very interesting discussions; I could only follow them in part, and enter into them still less, as none of them (except Dr. D.) seemed to speak any tongue but their own with any freedom, but you would have been amused to see and hear them, and me in the midst. I never saw men who spoke together in a way to make one another inaudible as they did, always excepting Dr. Döllinger, who sat like Rogers, being as he is a much more refined man than the rest. But of the others I assure you always two, sometimes three, and once all four, were speaking at once, very loud, each not trying to force the attention of the others, but to be following the current of his own thoughts. One of them was Dr. Görres,[194] who in the time of Napoleon edited a journal that had a great effect in rousing Germany to arms. Unfortunately he spoke more _thickly_ than any of them.[195] At Baden-Baden (October 16) he made the acquaintance of Mrs. Craven, the wife of the secretary of the Stuttgart mission, and authoress of the _Récit d'une Soeur_. Some of the personages of that alluring book were of the company. 'I have drunk tea several times at her house, and have had two or three long conversations with them on matters of religion. They are excessively acute and also full of Christian sentiment. But they are much more difficult to make real way with than a professor of theology, because they are determined (what is vulgarly called) to go the whole hog, just as in England usually when you find a woman anti-popish in spirit, she will push the argument against them to all extremes.' FURTHER ADVANCE It was at the same time that he read Bunsen's book on the church. 'It is dismal,' he wrote home to Mrs. Gladstone, 'and I must write to him to say so as kindly as I can.' Bunsen would seem all the more dismal from the contrast with the spiritual graces of these catholic ladies, and the ripe thinking and massive learning of one who was still the great catholic doctor. At no time in Mr. Gladstone's letters to Manning or to Hope is there a single faltering accent in respect of Rome. The question is not for an instant, or in any of his moods, open. He never doubts nor wavers. None the less, these impressions of his German journey would rather confirm than weaken his theological faith within the boundaries of anglican form and institution. 'With my whole soul I am convinced,' he says to Manning (June 23, 1850), 'that if the Roman system is incapable of being powerfully modified in spirit, it never can be the instrument of the work of God among us; the faults and the virtues of England are alike against it.' THE LADY HEWLEY CASE I need spend no time in pointing out how inevitably these new currents drew Mr. Gladstone away from the old moorings of his first book. Even in 1844 he had parted company with the high ecclesiastical principles of good tories like Sir Robert Inglis. Peel, to his great honour, in that year brought in what Macaulay truly called 'an honest, an excellent bill, introduced from none but the best and purest motives.' It arose from a judicial decision in what was known as the Lady Hewley case, and its object was nothing more revolutionary or latitudinarian than to apply to Unitarian chapels the same principle of prescription that protected gentlemen in the peaceful enjoyment of their estates and their manor-houses. The equity of the thing was obvious. In 1779 parliament had relieved protestant dissenting ministers from the necessity of declaring their belief in certain church articles, including especially those affecting the doctrine of the Trinity. In 1813 parliament had repealed the act of William III. that made it blasphemy to deny that doctrine. This legislation, rendered Unitarian foundations legal, and the bill extended to unitarian congregations the same prescriptions as covered the titles of other voluntary bodies to their places of worship, their school-houses, and their burial-grounds. But what was thus a question of property was treated as if it were a question of divinity; 'bigotry sought aid from chicane,' and a tremendous clamour was raised by anglicans, wesleyans, presbyterians, not because they had an inch of _locus standi_ in the business, but because unitarianism was scandalous heresy and sin. Follett made a masterly lawyer's speech, Sheil the speech of a glittering orator, guarding unitarians by the arguments that had (or perhaps I should say had not) guarded Irish catholics, Peel and Gladstone made political speeches lofty and sound, and Macaulay the speech of an eloquent scholar and a reasoner, manfully enforcing principles both of law and justice with a luxuriance of illustration all his own, from jurists of imperial Rome, sages of old Greece, Hindoos, Peruvians, Mexicans, and tribunals beyond the Mississippi.[196] We do not often enjoy such parliamentary nights in our time. Mr. Gladstone supported the proposal on the broadest grounds of unrestricted private judgment:-- I went into the subject laboriously, he says, and satisfied myself that this was not to be viewed as a mere quieting of titles based on lapse of time, but that the unitarians were the true lawful holders, because though they did not agree with the puritan opinions they adhered firmly to the puritan principle, which was that scripture was the rule without any binding interpretation, and that each man, or body, or generation must interpret for himself. This measure in some ways heightened my churchmanship, but depressed my church-and-statesmanship. Far from feeling that there was any contrariety between his principles of religious belief and those on which legislation in their case ought to proceed, he said that the only use he could make of these principles was to apply them to the decisive performance of a great and important act, founded on the everlasting principles of truth and justice. Sheil, who followed Mr. Gladstone, made a decidedly striking observation. He declared how delighted he was to hear from such high authority that the bill was perfectly reconcilable with the strictest and the sternest principles of state conscience. 'I cannot doubt,' he continued, 'that the right hon. gentleman, the champion of free trade, will ere long become the advocate of the most unrestricted liberty of thought.' Time was to justify Sheil's acute prediction. Unquestionably the line of argument that suggested it was a great advance from the arguments of 1838, of which Macaulay had said that they would warrant the roasting of dissenters at slow fires. IV In this vast field of human interest what engaged and inflamed him was not in the main place that solicitude for personal salvation and sanctification, which under sharp stress of argument, of pious sensibility, of spiritual panic, now sent so many flocking into the Roman fold. It was at bottom more like the passion of the great popes and ecclesiastical master-builders, for strengthening and extending the institutions by which faith is spread, its lamps trimmed afresh, its purity secured. What wrung him with affliction was the laying waste of the heritage of the Lord. 'The promise,' he cried, 'indeed stands sure to the church and the elect. In the farthest distance there is peace, truth, glory; but what a leap to it, over what a gulf.' For himself, the old dilemma of his early years still tormented him. 'I wish,' he writes to Manning (March 8, 1846) good humouredly, 'I could get a synodical decision in favour of my retirement from public life. For, I profess to remain there (to myself) for the service of the church, and my views of the mode of serving her are getting so fearfully wide of those generally current, that even if they be sound, they may become wholly unavailable.' The question whether the service of the church can be most effectually performed in parliament was incessantly present to his mind. Manning pressed him in one direction, the inward voice drew him in the other. 'I could write down in a few lines,' he says to Manning, 'the measures, after the adoption of which I should be prepared to say to a young man entering life, If you wish to serve the church do it in the sanctuary, and not in parliament (unless he were otherwise determined by his station, and not always then; it must depend upon his inward vocation), and should not think it at all absurd to say the same thing to some who have already placed themselves in this latter sphere. For when the end is attained of letting "the church help herself," and when it is recognised that active help can no longer be given, the function of serving the church in the state, such as it was according to the old idea, dies of itself, and what remains of duty is of a character essentially different.' Then a pregnant passage:--'It is the essential change now in progress from the catholic to the infidel idea of the state which is the determining element in my estimate of this matter, and which has, I think, no place in yours. For I hold and believe that when that transition has once been effected, the state never can come back to the catholic idea by means of any agency from within itself: that, if at all, it must be by a sort of re-conversion from without. I am not of those (excellent as I think them) who say, Remain and bear witness for the truth. There is a place where witness is ever to be borne for truth, that is to say for full and absolute truth, but it is not there.'[197] He reproaches himself with being 'actively engaged in carrying on a process of, lowering the religious tone of the state, letting it down, demoralising it, and assisting in its transition into one which is mechanical.' The objects that warrant public life in one in whose case executive government must be an element, must be very special. True that in all probability the church will hold her nationality in substance beyond our day. 'I think she will hold it as long as the monarchy subsists.' So long the church will need parliamentary defence, but in what form? The dissenters had no members for universities, and yet their real representation was far better organised in proportion to its weight than the church, though formally not organised at all. 'Strength with the people will for our day at least be the only effectual defence of the church in the House of Commons, as the want of it is now our weakness there. It is not everything that calls itself a defence that is really such.'[198] HOPES FOR THE CHURCH Manning expressed a strong fear, amounting almost to a belief, that the church of England must split asunder. 'Nothing can be firmer in my mind,' Mr. Gladstone replied (Aug. 31, 1846), 'than the opposite idea. She will live through her struggles, she has a great providential destiny before her. Recollect that for a century and a half, a much longer period than any for which puritan and catholic principles have been in conflict within the church of England, Jansenist and anti-Jansenist dwelt within the church of Rome with the unity of wolf and lamb. Their differences were not absorbed by the force of the church; they were in full vigour when the Revolution burst upon both. Then the breach between nation and church became so wide as to make the rivalries of the two church sections insignificant, and so to cause their fusion.' Later, he thinks that he finds a truer analogy between 'the superstition and idolatry that gnaws and corrodes' the life of the Roman church, and the puritanism that with at least as much countenance from authority abides in the English church. There are two systems, he says, in the English church vitally opposed to one another, and if they were equally developed they could not subsist together in the same sphere. If puritanical doctrines were the base of episcopal and collegiate teaching, then the church must either split or become heretical. As it is, the basis is on the whole anti-puritanic, and what we should call catholic. The conflict may go on as now, and with a progressive advance of the good principle against the bad one. 'That has been on the whole the course of things during our lifetime, and to judge from present signs it is the will of God that it should so continue.' (Dec. 7, 1846.) The following to Mr. Phillimore sums up the case as he then believed it to stand (June 24, 1847):-- ... The church is now in a condition in which her children may and must desire that she should keep her national position and her civil and proprietary rights, and that she should by degrees obtain the means of extending and of strengthening herself, not only by covering a greater space, but by a more vigorous organisation. Her attaining to this state of higher health depends in no small degree upon progressive adaptations of her state and her laws to her ever enlarging exigencies; these depend upon the humour of the state, and the state cannot and will not be in good humour with her, if she insists upon its being in bad humour with all other communions. It seems to me, therefore, that while in substance we should all strive to sustain her in her national position, we shall do well on her behalf to follow these rules: to part earlier, and more freely and cordially, than heretofore with such of her privileges, here and there, as may be more obnoxious than really valuable, and some such she has; and further, not to presume too much to give directions to the state as to its policy with respect to other religious bodies.... This is not political expediency as opposed to religious principle. Nothing did so much damage to religion as the obstinate adherence to a negative, repressive, and coercive course. For a century and more from the Revolution it brought us nothing but outwardly animosities and inwardly lethargy. The revival of a livelier sense of duty and of God is now beginning to tell in the altered policy of the church.... As her sense of her spiritual work rises, she is becoming less eager to assert her exclusive claim, leaving that to the state as a matter for itself to decide; and she also begins to forego more readily, but cautiously, her external prerogatives. FOOTNOTES: [181] Some proceedings, I think, of Mr. Disraeli and his Young England friends. [182] Chapter of Autobiography: _Gleanings_, vii. pp. 142-3. [183] On Reserve in Communicating Religious Knowledge--Tracts 80 and 87. (1837-40). With the ominous and in every sense un-English superscription, _Ad Clerum_. Isaac Williams was the author. [184] _Life of Shaftesbury_, i. p. 377. There is a letter from Bunsen (p. 373), in which he exclaims how wonderful it is 'that the great-grandson of Anthony Earl of Shaftesbury, the friend of Voltaire, should write thus to the great-grandson of Frederick the Great, the admirer of both.' But not more wonderful than Bunsen forgetting that Frederick had no children. [185] See _Memoirs of J. R. Hope-Scott_, i. chapters 15-17. _Apologia_, chapter 3, _ad fin._ [186] _Story of Dr. Pusey's Life_, p. 227. [187] This letter of October 28 is in Purcell, _Manning_, i. p. 242. [188] Mr. Gladstone to Dr. Hook, Jan. 30. '47. [189] It was on the fifth of November, a week after this correspondence, that Manning preached the Guy Fawkes sermon which caused Newman to send J. A. Froude to the door to tell Manning that he was 'not at home.'--Purcell, i. pp. 245-9. [190] For a full account of this book and its consequences the reader will always consult chapters xi., xii., and xiii., of Mr. Wilfrid Ward's admirably written work, _William George Ward and the Oxford Movement_. [191] It was in the midst of these laborious employments that Mr. Gladstone published a prayer-book, compiled for family use, from the anglican liturgy. An edition of two thousand copies went off at once, and was followed by many editions more. [192] _William George Ward_, p. 332. [193] The story is told in Purcell, _Manning_, i. p. 318. [194] Joseph Görres, one of the most famous of European publicists and gazetteers between the two revolutionary epochs of 1789 and 1848. His journal was the _Rhine Mercury_, where the doctrine of a free and united Germany was preached (1814-16) with a force that made Napoleon call the newspaper a fifth great power. In times Görres became a vehement ultramontane. [195] See Friedrich's _Life of Döllinger_, ii. pp. 222-226, for a letter from Döllinger to Mr. Gladstone after his visit, dated Nov. 15, 1845. [196] _Hansard_, June 6, 1844. [197] To Manning, April 5, 1846. [198] To Manning, April 19, 1846. Book III _1847-1852_ CHAPTER I MEMBER FOR OXFORD (_1847_) There is not a feature or a point in the national character which has made England great among the nations of the world, that is not strongly developed and plainly traceable in our universities. For eight hundred or a thousand years they have been intimately associated with everything that has concerned the highest interests of the country.--GLADSTONE. In 1847 the fortunes of a general election brought Mr. Gladstone into relations that for many years to come deeply affected his political course. As a planet's orbit has puzzled astronomers until they discover the secret of its irregularities in the attraction of an unseen and unsuspected neighbour in the firmament, so some devious motions of this great luminary of ours were perturbations due in fact to the influence of his new constituency. As we have seen, Mr. Gladstone quitted Newark when he entered the cabinet to repeal the corn law. At the end of 1846, writing to Lord Lyttelton from Fasque, he tells him: 'I wish to be in parliament but coldly; feeling at the same time that I ought to wish it warmly on many grounds. But my father is so very keen in his protective opinions, and I am so very decidedly of the other way of thinking, that I look forward with some reluctance and regret to what must, when it happens, place me in marked and public contrast with him.' The thing soon happened. I remained, he says, without a seat until the dissolution in June 1847. But several months before this occurred it had become known that Mr. Estcourt would vacate his seat for Oxford, and I became a candidate. It was a serious campaign. The constituency, much to its honour, did not stoop to fight the battle on the ground of protection. But it was fought, and that fiercely, on religious grounds. There was an incessant discussion, and I may say dissection, of my character and position in reference to the Oxford movement. This cut very deep, for it was a discussion which each member of the constituency was entitled to carry on for himself. The upshot was favourable. The liberals supported me gallantly, so did many zealous churchmen, apart from politics, and a good number of moderate men, so that I was returned by a fair majority. I held the seat for eighteen years, but with five contests and a final defeat. The other sitting member after the retirement of Mr. Estcourt was Sir Robert Harry Inglis, who had beaten Peel by a very narrow majority in the memorable contest for the university seat on the final crisis of the catholic question in 1829. He was blessed with a genial character and an open and happy demeanour; and the fact that he was equipped with a full store of sincere and inexorable prejudices made it easy for him to be the most upright, honourable, kindly, and consistent of political men. Repeal of the Test acts, relief of the catholics, the Reform bill, relief of the Jews, reform of the Irish church, the grant to Maynooth, the repeal of the corn laws--one after another he had stoutly resisted the whole catalogue of revolutionising change. So manful a record made his seat safe. In the struggle for the second seat, Mr. Gladstone's friends encountered first Mr. Cardwell, a colleague of his as secretary of the treasury in the late government. Cardwell was deep in the confidence and regard of Sir Robert Peel, and he earned in after years the reputation of an honest and most capable administrator; but in these earlier days the ill-natured called him Peel-and-water, others labelled him latitudinarian and indifferent, and though he had the support of Peel, promised before Mr. Gladstone's name as candidate was announced, he thought it wise at a pretty early hour to withdraw from a triangular fight. The old high-and-dry party and the evangelical party combined to bring out Mr. Round. If he had achieved no sort of distinction, Mr. Round had at least given no offence: above all, he had kept clear of all those tractarian innovations which had been finally stamped with the censure of the university two years before. OXFORD SUPPORTERS Charles Wordsworth, his old tutor and now warden of Glenalmond, found it hard to give Mr. Gladstone his support, because he himself held to the high principle of state conscience, while the candidate seemed more than ever bent on the rival doctrine of social justice. Mr. Hallam joined his committee, and what that learned veteran's adhesion was in influence among older men, that of Arthur Clough was among the younger. Northcote described Clough to Mr. Gladstone as a very favourable specimen of a class, growing in numbers and importance among the younger Oxford men, a friend of Carlyle's, Frank Newman's, and others of that stamp; well read in German literature and an admirer of German intellect, but also a still deeper admirer of Dante; just now busily taking all his opinions to pieces and not beginning to put them together again; but so earnest and good that he might be trusted to work them into something better than his friends inclined to fear. Ruskin, again, who had the year before published the memorable second volume of his _Modern Painters_ (he was still well under thirty), was on the right side, and the Oxford chairman is sure that Mr. Gladstone will appreciate at its full value the support of such high personal merit and extraordinary natural genius. Scott, the learned Grecian who had been beaten along with Mr. Gladstone in the contest for the Ireland scholarship seventeen years before, wrote to him:--'Ever since the time when you and I received Strypes at the hand of the vice-chancellor, and so you became my [Greek: homomastigias labôn agônos tas isas plêgas emoi,'][1] I have looked forward to your being the representative of the university.' Richard Greswell of Worcester was the faithful chairman of his Oxford committee now and to the end, eighteen years off. He had reached the dignity of a bachelor of divinity, but nearly all the rest were no more than junior masters. Routh, the old president of Magdalen, declined to vote for him on the well-established ground that Christ Church had no business to hold both seats. Mr. Gladstone at once met this by the dexterous proposition that though Christ Church was not entitled to elect him against the wish of the other colleges, yet the other colleges were entitled to elect him if they liked, by giving him a majority not made up of Christ Church votes. His eldest brother had written to tell him in terms of affectionate regret, that he could take no part in the election; mere political differences would be secondary, but in the case of a university, religion came first, and there it was impossible to separate a candidate from his religious opinions. When the time came, however, partly under strong pressure from Sir John, Thomas Gladstone took a more lenient view and gave his brother a vote. The Round men pointed triumphantly to their hero's votes on Maynooth and on the Dissenters' Chapels bill, and insisted on the urgency of upholding the principles of the united church of England and Ireland in their full integrity. The backers of Mr. Gladstone retorted by recalling their champion's career; how in 1834 he first made himself known by his resistance to the admission of dissenters to the universities; how in 1841 he threw himself into the first general move for the increase of the colonial episcopate, which had resulted in the erection of eleven new sees in six years; how zealously with energy and money he had laboured for a college training for the episcopalian clergy in Scotland; how instrumental he was in 1846, during the few months for which he held the seals of secretary of state, in erecting four colonial bishoprics; how the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, through the mouth of the Archbishop of Canterbury himself, had thanked him for his services; how long he had been an active supporter of the great societies for the spread of church principles, the propagation of church doctrines, and the erection of church fabrics. As for the Dissenters' Chapels bill, it was an act of simple justice and involved no principles at issue between the church and dissent, and Mr. Gladstone's masterly exposition of the tendency of dissent to drop one by one all the vital truths of Christianity was proclaimed to be a real service to the church. The reader will thus see the lie of the land, what it meant to be member for a university, and why Mr. Gladstone thought the seat the highest of electoral prizes. THE CONTEST A circular was issued impugning his position on protestant grounds. 'I humbly trust,' wrote Mr. Gladstone in reply (July 26), 'that its writers are not justified in exhibiting me to the world as a person otherwise than heartily devoted to the doctrine and constitution of our reformed church. But I will never consent to adopt as the test of such doctrine, a disposition to identify the great and noble cause of the church of England with the restraint of the civil rights of those who differ from her.' Much was made of Mr. Gladstone's refusal to vote for the degradation of Ward. People wrote to the newspapers that it was an admitted and notorious fact that a sister of Mr. Gladstone's under his own influence had gone over to the church of Rome.[200] The fable was retracted, but at once revived in the still grosser untruth, that he habitually employed 'a Jesuitical system of argument' to show that nobody need leave the church of England, 'because all might be had there that was to be enjoyed in the church of Rome.' Maurice published a letter to a London clergyman vigorously remonstrating against the bigoted spirit that this election was warming into life, and fervently protesting against making a belief in the Nicene creed into the same thing as an opinion about a certain way of treating the property of unitarians. 'One artifice of this kind,' said Maurice, 'has been practised in this election which it makes me blush to speak of. Mr. Ward called the reformation a vile and accursed thing; Mr. Gladstone voted against a certain measure for the condemnation of Mr. Ward; therefore he spoke of the reformation as a vile and accursed thing. I should not have believed it possible that such a conclusion had been drawn from such premisses even by our religious press.' The worthy Mr. Round, on the other hand, was almost impregnable. A diligent scrutiny at last dragged the dark fact to the light of day, that he had actually sat on Peel's election committee at the time of catholic emancipation in 1829, and had voted for him against Inglis. So it appears, said the mocking Gladstonians, that the protestant Mr. Round 'was willing to lend a helping hand to the first of a series of measures which are considered by his supporters as fraught with danger to the country's very best interests.' A still more sinister rumour was next bruited abroad: that Mr. Round attended a dissenting place of worship, and he was constrained to admit that, once in 1845 and thrice in 1846, he had been guilty of this blacksliding. The lost ground, however, was handsomely recovered by a public declaration that the very rare occasions on which he had been present at other modes of Christian worship had only confirmed his affection and reverential attachment to the services and formularies of his own church. VICTORY AT THE POLL The nomination was duly made in the Sheldonian theatre (July 29), the scene of so many agitations in these fiery days. Inglis was proposed by a canon of Christ Church, Round by the master of Balliol, and Gladstone by Dr. Richards, the rector of Exeter. The prime claim advanced for him by his proposer, was his zeal for the English church in word and deed, above all his energy in securing that wherever the English church went, thither bishoprics should go too. Besides all this, his master work, he had found time to spare not only for public business of the commonwealth, but for the study of theology, philosophy, and the arts.[201] Then the voting began. The Gladstonians went into the battle with 1100 promises. Northcote,[202] passing vigilant days in the convocation house, sent daily reports to Mr. Gladstone at Fasque. Peel went up to vote for him (splitting for Inglis); Ashley went up to vote against him. At the close of the second day things looked well, but there was no ground for over-confidence. Inglis was six hundred ahead of Gladstone, and Gladstone only a hundred and twenty ahead of Round. The next day Round fell a little more behind, and when the end came (August 3) the figures stood:--Inglis 1700, Gladstone 997, Round 824, giving Gladstone a majority of 173 over his competitor. Numbers were not the only important point. When the poll came to be analysed by eager statisticians, the decision of the electors was found to have a weight not measured by an extra hundred and seventy votes. For example, Mr. Gladstone had among his supporters twenty-five double-firsts against seven for Round, and of single first-classes he had one hundred and fifty-seven against Round's sixty-six. Of Ireland and Hertford scholars Mr. Gladstone had nine to two and three to one respectively; and of chancellor's prizemen who voted he had forty-five against twelve. Of fellows of colleges he had two hundred and eighteen against one hundred and twenty-eight, and his majority in this class was highest where the elections to fellowships were open. The heads of the colleges told a different tale. Of these, sixteen voted for Round and only four for Gladstone. This discrepancy it was that gave its significance to the victory. Sitting in the convocation house watching the last casual voters drop in at the rate of two or three an hour through the summer afternoon, the ever faithful Northcote wrote to Mr. Gladstone at Fasque:-- Since I have been here, the contest has seemed even more interesting than it did in London. The effect of the contest itself has apparently been good. It has brought together the younger men without distinction of party, and has supplied the elements of a very noble party which will now look to you as a leader. I think men of all kinds are prepared to trust you, and though each feels that you will probably differ from his set in some particulars, each seems disposed to waive objections for the sake of the general good he expects.... The victory is not looked upon as 'Puseyite'; it is a victory of the masters over the Hebdomadal board, and as such a very important one. The Heads felt it their last chance, and are said to have expressed themselves accordingly. The provost of Queen's, who is among the dissatisfied supporters of Round, said the other day, 'He would rather be represented by an old woman than by a young man.' It is not as a Maynoothian that you are dreaded here, though they use the cry against you and though that is the country feeling, but as a possible reformer and a man who thinks. On the other hand, the young men exult, partly in the hope that you will do something for the university yourself, partly in the consciousness that they have shown the strength of the magisterial party by carrying you against the opposition of the Heads, and have proved their title to be considered an important element of the university. They do not seem yet to be sufficiently united to effect great things, but there is a large amount of ability and earnestness which only wants direction, and this contest has tended to unite them. 'Puseyism' seems rather to be a name of the past, though there are still Puseyites of importance. Marriott, Mozley, and Church appear to be regarded as leaders; but Church who is now abroad, is looked upon as something more, and I am told may be considered on the whole the fairest exponent of the feelings of the place. Stanley, Jowett, Temple, and others are great names in what is nicknamed the Germanising party. Lake, and perhaps I should say Temple, hold an intermediate position between the two parties.... Whatever may have been the evils attendant on the Puseyite movement, and I believe they were neither few nor small, it has been productive of great results; and it is not a little satisfactory to see how its distinctive features are dying away and the spirit surviving, instead of the spirit departing and leaving a great sham behind it. PECULIARITY OF ELECTION Of the many strange positions to which in his long and ardent life Mr. Gladstone was brought, none is more startling than to find him, as in this curious moment at Oxford, the common rallying-point of two violently antagonistic sections of opinion. Dr. Pusey supported him; Stanley and Jowett supported him. The old school who looked on Oxford as the ancient and peculiar inheritance of the church were zealous for him; the new school who deemed the university an organ not of the church but of the nation, eagerly took him for their champion. A great ecclesiastical movement, reviving authority and tradition, had ended in complete academic repulse in 1845. It was now to be followed by an anti-ecclesiastical movement, critical, sceptical, liberal, scornful of authority, doubtful of tradition. Yet both the receding force and the rising force united to swell the stream that bore Mr. Gladstone to triumph at the poll. The fusion did not last. The two bands speedily drew off into their rival camps, to arm themselves in the new conflict for mastery between obscurantism and illumination. The victor was left with his laurels in what too soon proved to be, after all, a vexed and precarious situation, that he could neither hold with freedom nor quit with honour. Meanwhile he thoroughly enjoyed his much coveted distinction:-- _To Mrs. Gladstone._ _Exeter Coll., Nov. 2, 1847._--This morning in company with Sir R. Inglis, and under the protection or chaperonage of the dean, I have made the formal circuit of visits to all the heads of houses and all the common-rooms. It has gone off very well. There was but one reception by a head (Corpus) that was not decidedly _kind_, and that was only a little cold. Marsham (Merton), who is a frank, warm man, keenly opposed, said very fairly, to Inglis, 'I congratulate you warmly'; and then to me, 'And I would be very glad to do the same to you, Mr. Gladstone, if I could think you would do the same as Sir R. Inglis.' I like a man for this. They say the dean should have asked me to dine to-day, but I think he may be, and perhaps wisely, afraid of recognising me in any very marked way, for fear of endangering the old Christ Church right to one seat which it is his peculiar duty to guard. We dined yesterday in the hall at Christ Church, it being a grand day there. Rather unfortunately the undergraduates chose to make a row in honour of me during dinner, which the two censors had to run all down the hall to stop. This had better not be talked about. Thursday the warden of All Souls' has asked me and I _think_ I must accept; had it not been a head (and it is one of the little party of four who voted for me) I should not have doubted, but at once have declined. FOOTNOTES: [199] _Frogs_, 756; the second line is Scott's own. An Aristophanic friend translates:-- 'Good brother-rogue, we've shared the selfsame beating: At least, we carried off one Strype apiece.' Strype was the book given to Scott and Gladstone as being good seconds to the winner of the Ireland. See above p. 61. [200] _Standard_, May 29, 1847. [201] The proposer's Latin is succinct, and may be worth giving for its academic flavour:--'Jam inde a pueritia literarum studio imbutus, et in celeberrimo Etonensi gymnasio informatus, ad nostram accessit academiam, ubi morum honestate, pietate, et pudore nemini æqualium secundus, indole et ingenio facile omnibus antecellebat. Summis deinde nostræ academiæ honoribus cumulatus ad res civiles cum magnâ omnium expectatione se contulit; expectatione tamen major omni evasit. In senatûs enim domum inferiorem cooptatus, eam ad negotia tractanda habilitatem, et ingenii perspicacitatem exhibebat, ut reipublicæ administrationis particeps et adjutor adhuc adolescens fieret. Quantum erga ecclesiam Anglicanam ejus studium non verba, sed facta, testentur. Is enim erat qui inter primos et perpaucos summo labore et eloquentiâ contendebat, ut ubicunque orbis terrarum ecclesia Anglicana pervenisset, episcopatus quoque eveheretur. Et quamdiu e secretis Reginæ fuit, ecclesia Anglicana apud colonos nostros plurimis locis labefactam suâ ope stabilivit, et patrocinium ejus suscepit. Neque vero publicis negotiis adeo se dedit quin theologiæ, philosophiæ, artium studio vacaret. Quæ cum ita sint, si delegatum, Academici, cooptare velimus, qui cum omni laude idem nostris rebus decus et tutamen sit, et qui summa eloquentiæ et argumenti vi, jura et libertates nostras tueri queat, hunc hodie suffragiis nostris comprobemus.' [202] Stafford Northcote had been private secretary to Mr. Gladstone at the board of trade. On the appointment of his first private secretary, Mr. Rawson, to a post in Canada in 1842, Mr. Gladstone applied to Coleridge of Eton to recommend a successor. He suggested three names, Farrer, afterwards Lord Farrer, Northcote, and Pocock. Northcote, who looked to a political career, was chosen. 'Mr. Gladstone,' he wrote to a friend, June 30, 1842, 'is the man of all others among the statesmen of the present day to whom I should desire to attach myself.... He is one whom I respect beyond measure; he stands almost alone as representative of principles with which I cordially agree; and as a man of business, and one who humanly speaking is sure to rise, he is preeminent.'--Lang's _Life of Lord Iddesleigh_, i. pp. 63-67. CHAPTER II THE HAWARDEN ESTATE (_1847_) It is no Baseness for the Greatest to descend and looke into their owne Estate. Some forbeare it, not upon Negligence alone, But doubting to bring themselves into Melancholy in respect they shall finde it Broken. But wounds cannot be cured without Searching. Hee that cleareth by Degrees induceth a habit of Frugalitie, and gaineth as well upon his Minde, as upon his Estate.--BACON. I must here pause for material affairs of money and business, with which, as a rule, in the case of its heroes the public is considered to have little concern. They can no more be altogether omitted here than the bills, acceptances, renewals, notes of hand, and all the other financial apparatus of his printers and publishers can be left out of the story of Sir Walter Scott. Not many pages will be needed, though this brevity will give the reader little idea of the pre-occupations with which they beset a not inconsiderable proportion of Mr. Gladstone's days. A few sentences in a biography many a time mean long chapters in a life, and what looked like an incident turns out to be an epoch. Sir Stephen Glynne possessed a small property in Staffordshire of something less than a hundred acres of land, named the Oak Farm, near Stourbridge, and under these acres were valuable seams of coal and ironstone. For this he refused an offer of five-and-thirty thousand pounds in 1835, and under the advice of an energetic and sanguine agent proceeded to its rapid development. On the double marriage in 1839, Sir Stephen associated his two brothers-in-law with himself to the modest extent of one-tenth share each in an enterprise that seemed of high prospective value. Their interests were acquired through their wives, and it is to be presumed that they had no opportunity of making a personal examination of the concern. The adventurous agent, now manager-in-chief of the business, rapidly extended operations, setting up furnaces, forges, rolling-mills, and all the machinery for producing tools and hardware for which he foresaw a roaring foreign market. The agent's confidence and enthusiasm mastered his principal, and large capital was raised solely on the security of the Hawarden fortune and credit. Whether Oak Farm was irrationally inflated or not, we cannot say, though the impression is that it had the material of a sound property if carefully worked; but it was evidently pushed in excess of its realisable capital. The whole basis of its credit was the Hawarden estate, and a forced stoppage of Oak Farm would be the death-blow to Hawarden. As early as 1844 clouds rose on the horizon. The position of Sir Stephen Glynne had become seriously compromised, while under the system of unlimited partnership the liability of his two brothers-in-law extended in proportion. In 1845 the three brothers-in-law by agreement retired, each retaining an equitable mortgage on the concern. Two years later, one of our historic panics shook the money-market, and in its course brought down Oak Farm.[203] A great accountant reported, a meeting was held at Freshfield's, the company was found hopelessly insolvent, and it was determined to wind up. The court directed a sale. In April 1849, at Birmingham, Mr. Gladstone purchased the concern on behalf of himself and his two brothers-in-law, subject to certain existing interests; and in May Sir Stephen Glynne resumed legal possession of the wreck of Oak Farm. The burden on Hawarden was over £250,000, leaving its owner with no margin to live upon. Into this far-spreading entanglement Mr. Gladstone for several years threw himself with the whole weight of his untiring tenacity and force. He plunged into masses of accounts, mastered the coil of interests and parties, studied legal intricacies, did daily battle with human unreason, and year after year carried on a voluminous correspondence. OAK FARM There are a hundred and forty of his letters to Mr. Freshfield on Oak Farm alone. Let us note in passing what is, I think, a not unimportant biographic fact. These circumstances brought him into close and responsible contact with a side of the material interests of the country that was new to him. At home he had been bred in the atmosphere of commerce. At the board of trade, in the reform of the tariff, in connection with the Bank act and in the growth of the railway system, he had been well trained in high economics. Now he came to serve an arduous apprenticeship in the motions and machinery of industrial life. The labour was immense, prolonged, uncongenial; but it completed his knowledge of the customs, rules, maxims, and currents of trade and it bore good fruit in future days at the exchequer. He manfully and deliberately took up the burden as if the errors had been his own, and as if the financial sacrifice that he was called to make both now and later were matter of direct and inexorable obligation. These, indeed, are the things in life that test whether a man be made of gold or clay. 'The weight,' he writes to his father (June 16, 1849), 'of the private demands upon my mind has been such, since the Oak Farm broke down, as frequently to disqualify me for my duties in the House of Commons.' The load even tempted him, along with the working of other considerations, to think of total withdrawal from parliament and public life. Yet without a trace of the frozen stoicism or cynical apathy that sometimes passes muster for true resignation, he kept himself nobly free from vexation, murmur, repining, and complaint. Here is a moving passage from a letter of the time to Mrs. Gladstone:-- _Fasque, Jan. 20, 1849._--Do not suppose for a moment that if I could by waving my hand strike out for ever from my cares and occupations those which relate to the Oak Farm and Stephen's affairs, I would do so; I have never felt that, have never asked it; and if my language seems to look that way, it is the mere impatience of weakness comforting itself by finding a vent. It has evidently come to me by the ordinance of God; and I am rather frightened to think how light my lot would be, were it removed, so light that something else would surely come in its place. I do not confound it with visitations and afflictions; it is merely a drain on strength and a peculiar one, because it asks for a kind of strength and skill and habits which I have not, but it falls altogether short of the category of high trials. Least of all suppose that the subject can ever associate itself painfully with the idea of you. No persons who have been in contact with it can be so absolutely blameless as you and Mary, nor can _our_ relation together be rendered in the very smallest degree less or more a blessing by the addition or the subtraction of worldly wealth. I have abundant comfort _now_ in the thought that at any rate I am the means of keeping a load off the minds of others; and I shall have much more hereafter when Stephen is brought through, and once more firmly planted in the place of his fathers, provided I can conscientiously feel that the restoration of his affairs has at any rate not been impeded by indolence, obstinacy, or blunders on my part. Nor can anything be more generous than the confidence placed in me by all concerned. Indeed, I can only regret that it is too free and absolute. LETTER TO HIS SON I may as well now tell the story to the end, though in anticipation of remote dates, for in truth it held a marked place in Mr. Gladstone's whole life, and made a standing background amid the vast throng of varying interests and transient commotions of his great career. Here is his own narrative as told in a letter written to his eldest son for a definite purpose in 1885:-- _To W. H. Gladstone._ _Hawarden, Oct. 3, 1885._--Down to the latter part of that year (1847), your uncle Stephen was regarded by all as a wealthy country gentleman with say £10,000 a year or more (subject, however, to his mother's jointure) to spend, and great prospects from iron in a Midland estate. In the bank crisis of that year the whole truth was revealed; and it came out that his agent at the Oak Farm (and formerly also at Hawarden) had involved him to the extent of £250,000; to say nothing of minor blows to your uncle Lyttelton and myself. At a conversation in the library of 13 Carlton House Terrace, it was considered whether Hawarden should be sold. Every obvious argument was in favour of it, for example the comparison between the income and the liabilities I have named. How was Lady Glynne's jointure (£2500) to be paid? How was Sir Stephen to be supported? There was _no_ income, even less than none. Oak Farm, the iron property, was under lease to an insolvent company, and could not be relied on. Your grandfather, who had in some degree surveyed the state of affairs, thought the case was hopeless. But the family were unanimously set upon making any and every effort and sacrifice to avoid the necessity of sale. Mr. Barker, their lawyer, and Mr. Burnett, the land agent, entirely sympathised; and it was resolved to persevere. But the first effect was that Sir Stephen had to close the house (which it was hoped, but hoped in vain, to let); to give up carriages, horses, and I think for several years his personal servant; and to take an allowance of £700 a year out of which, I believe, he continued to pay the heavy subvention of the family to the schools of the parish, which was certainly counted by hundreds. Had the estate been sold, it was estimated that he would have come out a wealthy bachelor, possessed of from a hundred to a hundred and twenty thousands pounds free from all encumbrance but the jointure. In order to give effect to the nearly hopeless resolution thus taken at the meeting in London, it was determined to clip the estate by selling £200,000 worth of land. Of this, nearly one-half was to be taken by your uncle Lyttelton and myself, in the proportion of about two parts for me and one for him. Neither of us had the power to buy this, but my father enabled me, and Lord Spencer took over his portion. The rest of the sales were effected, a number of fortunate secondary incidents occurred, and the great business of recovering and realising from the Oak Farm was laboriously set about. Considerable relief was obtained by these and other measures. By 1852, there was a partial but perceptible improvement in the position. The house was reopened in a very quiet way by arrangement, and the allowance for Sir Stephen's expenditure was rather more than doubled. But there was nothing like ease for him until the purchase of the reversion was effected by me in 1865. I paid £57,000 for the bulk of the property, subject to debts not exceeding £150,000, and after the lives of the two brothers, the table value of which was, I think, twenty-two and a-half years. From this time your uncle had an income to spend of, I think, £2200, or not more than half what he probably would have had since 1847 had the estate been sold, which it would only have been through the grievous fault of others. The full process of recovery was still incomplete, but the means of carrying it forward were now comparatively simple. Since the reversion came in, I have, as you know, forwarded that process; but it has been retarded by agricultural depression and by the disastrous condition through so many years of coal-mining; so that there still remains a considerable work to be done before the end can be attained, which I hope will never be lost sight of, namely, that of extinguishing the debt upon the property, though for family purposes the estate may still remain subject to charges in the way of annuity. The full history of the Hawarden estate from 1847 would run to a volume. For some years after 1847, it and the Oak Farm supplied my principal employment[204]; but I was amply repaid by the value of it a little later on as a home, and by the unbroken domestic happiness there enjoyed. What I think you will see, as clearly resulting from this narrative, is the high obligation not only to keep the estate in the family, and as I trust in its natural course of descent, but to raise it to the best condition by thrift and care, and to promote by all reasonable means the aim of diminishing and finally extinguishing its debt. This I found partly on a high estimate of the general duty to promote the permanence of families having estates in land, but very specially on the sacrifices made, through his remaining twenty-seven years of life, by your uncle Stephen, without a murmur, and with the concurrence of us all.... Before closing I will repair one omission. When I concurred in the decision to struggle for the retention of Hawarden, I had not the least idea that my children would have an interest in the succession. In 1847 your uncle Stephen was only forty; your uncle Henry, at thirty-seven, was married, and had a child almost every year. It was not until 1865 that I had any title to look forward to your becoming at a future time the proprietor.--Ever your affectionate father. FINAL SETTLEMENT The upshot is this, that Mr. Gladstone, with his father's consent and support, threw the bulk of his own fortune into the assets of Hawarden. By this, and the wise realisation of everything convertible to advantage, including, in 1865, the reversion after the lives of Sir Stephen Glynne and his brother, he succeeded in making what was left of Hawarden solvent. His own expenditure from first to last upon the Hawarden estate as now existing, he noted at £267,000. 'It has been for thirty-five years,' he wrote to W. H. Gladstone in 1882, '_i.e._, since the breakdown in 1847, a great object of my life, in conjunction with your mother and your uncle Stephen, to keep the Hawarden estate together (or replace what was alienated), to keep it in the family, and to relieve it from debt with which it was ruinously loaded.' In 1867 a settlement was made, to which Sir Stephen Glynne and his brother, and Mr. Gladstone and his wife, were the parties, by which the estate was conveyed in trust for one or more of the Gladstone children as Mr. Gladstone might appoint.[205] This was subject to a power of determining the settlement by either of the Glynne brothers, on repaying with interest the sum paid for the reversion. As the transaction touched matters in which he might be supposed liable to bias, Mr. Gladstone required that its terms should be referred to two men of perfect competence and probity--Lord Devon and Sir Robert Phillimore--for their judgment and approval. Phillimore visited Hawarden (August 19-26, 1865) to meet Lord Devon, and to confer with him upon Sir Stephen Glynne's affairs. Here are a couple of entries from his diary:-- _Aug. 26._--The whole morning was occupied with the investigation of S. G.'s affairs by Lord Devon and myself. We examined at some length the solicitor and the agent. Lord D. and I perfectly agreed in the opinion expressed in a memorandum signed by us both. Gladstone, as might have been expected, has behaved very well. _Sept. 19_ [_London_].--Correspondence between Lyttelton and Gladstone, contained in Lord Devon's letter. Same subject as that which Lord D. and I came to consult upon at Hawarden. _Sept. 24._--I wrote to Stephen Glynne to the effect that Henry entirely approved of the scheme agreed upon by Lord D. and myself, after a new consideration of all the circumstances, and after reading the Lyttelton-Gladstone correspondence. I showed Henry Glynne the letter, of which he entirely approved. In 1874 the death of Sir Stephen Glynne, following that of his brother two years before, made Mr. Gladstone owner in possession of the Hawarden estate, under the transaction of 1865. With as little delay as possible (April 1875) he took the necessary steps to make his eldest son the owner in fee, and seven years after that (October 1882) he further transferred to the same son his own lands in the county, acquired by purchase, as we have seen, after the crash in 1847. By agreement, the possession and control of the castle and its contents remained with Mrs. Gladstone for life, as if she were taking a life-interest in it under settlement or will. FURTHER LETTERS TO HIS SON Although, therefore, for a few months the legal owner of the whole Hawarden estate, Mr. Gladstone divested himself of that quality as soon as he could, and at no time did he assume to be its master. The letters written by him on these matters to his son are both too interesting as the expression of his views on high articles of social policy, and too characteristic of his ideas of personal duty, for me to omit them here, though much out of their strict chronological place. The first is written after the death of Sir Stephen, and the falling in of the reversion:-- _To W. H. Gladstone._ 11 _Carlton House Terrace, April 5, 1875._--There are several matters which I have to mention to you, and for which the present moment is suitable; while they embrace the future in several of its aspects. 1. I have given instructions to Messrs. Barker and Hignett to convert your life interest under the Hawarden settlement into a fee simple. Reflection and experience have brought me to favour this latter method of holding landed property as on the whole the best, though the arguments may not be all on one side. In the present case, they are to my mind entirely conclusive. First, because I am able thoroughly to repose in you an entire confidence as to your use of the estate during your lifetime, and your capacity to provide wisely for its future destination. Secondly, because you have, delivered over to you with the estate, the duty and office of progressively emancipating it from the once ruinous debt; and it is almost necessary towards the satisfactory prosecution of this purpose, which it may still take very many years to complete, that you should be entire master of the property, and should feel the full benefit of the steady care and attention which it ought to receive from you. 2. I hope that with it you will inherit the several conterminous properties belonging to me, and that you will receive these in such a condition as to enjoy a large proportion of the income they yield. Taking the two estates together, they form the most considerable estate in the county, and give what may be termed the first social position there. The importance of this position is enhanced by the large population which inhabits them. You will, I hope, familiarise your mind with this truth, that you can no more become the proprietor of such a body of property, or of the portion of it now accruing, than your brother Stephen could become rector of the parish, without recognising the serious moral and social responsibilities which belong to it. They are full of interest and rich in pleasure, but they demand (in the absence of special cause) residence on the spot, and a good share of time, and especially a free and ungrudging discharge of them. Nowhere in the world is the position of the landed proprietor so high as in this country, and this in great part for the reason that nowhere else is the possession of landed property so closely associated with definite duty. 3. In truth, with this and your seat in parliament, which I hope (whether Whitby supply it, or whether you migrate) will continue, you will, I trust, have a well-charged, though not an over-charged, life, and will, like professional and other thoroughly employed men, have to regard the bulk of your time as forestalled on behalf of duty, while a liberal residue may be available for your special pursuits and tastes, and for recreations. This is really the sound basis of life, which never can be honourable or satisfactory without adequate guarantees against frittering away, even in part, the precious gift of time. While touching on the subject I would remind you of an old recommendation of mine, that you should choose some parliamentary branch or subject, to which to give special attention. The House of Commons has always heard your voice with pleasure, and ought not to be allowed to forget it. I say this the more freely, because I think it is, in your case, the virtue of a real modesty, which rather too much indisposes you to put yourself forward. Yet another word. As years gather upon me, I naturally look forward to what is to be after I am gone; and although I should indeed be sorry to do or say anything having a tendency to force the action of your mind beyond its natural course, it will indeed be a great pleasure to me to see you well settled in life by marriage. Well settled, I feel confident, you will be, if settled at all. In your position at Hawarden, there would then be at once increased ease and increased attraction in the performance of your duties; nor can I overlook the fact that the life of the unmarried man, in this age particularly, is under peculiar and insidious temptations to selfishness, unless his celibacy arise from a very strong and definite course of self-devotion to the service of God and his fellow creatures. The great and sad change of Hawarden [by the death of Sir Stephen] which has forced upon us the consideration of so many subjects, gave at the same time an opening for others, and it seemed to me to be best to put together the few remarks I had to make. I hope the announcement with which I began will show that I write in the spirit of confidence as well as of affection. It is on this footing that we have ever stood, and I trust ever shall stand. You have acted towards me at all times up to the standard of all I could desire. May you have the help of the Almighty to embrace as justly, and fulfil as cheerfully, the whole conception of your duties in the position to which it has pleased Him to call you, and which perhaps has come upon you with somewhat the effect of a surprise; that may, however, have the healthy influence of a stimulus to action, and a help towards excellence. Believe me ever, my dear son, your affectionate father. DUTIES OF A LANDOWNER In the second letter Mr. Gladstone informed W. H. Gladstone that he had at Chester that morning (Oct. 23, 1882), along with Mrs. Gladstone, executed the deeds that made his son the proprietor of Mr. Gladstone's lands in Flintshire, subject to the payment of annuities specified in the instrument of transfer; and he proceeds:-- I earnestly entreat that you will never, under any circumstances, mortgage any of your land. I consider that our law has offered to proprietors of land, under a narrow and mistaken notion of promoting their interests, dangerous facilities and inducements to this practice; and that its mischievous consequences have been so terribly felt (the word is strong, but hardly too strong) in the case of Hawarden, that they ought to operate powerfully as a warning for the future. You are not the son of very wealthy parents; but the income of the estates (the Hawarden estates and mine jointly), with your prudence and diligence, will enable you to go steadily forward in the work I have had in hand, and after a time will in the course of nature give considerable means for the purpose. I have much confidence in your prudence and intelligence; I have not the smallest fear that the rather unusual step I have taken will in any way weaken the happy union and harmony of our family; and I am sure you will always bear in mind the duties which attach to you as the head of those among whom you receive a preference, and as the landlord of a numerous tenantry, prepared to give you their confidence and affection. A third letter on the same topics followed three years after, and contains a narrative of the Hawarden transactions already given in an earlier page of this chapter. _To W. H. Gladstone._ _Oct. 3, 1885._--When you first made known to me that you thought of retiring from the general election of this year, I received the intimation with mixed feelings. The question of money no doubt deserves, under existing circumstances, to be kept in view; still I must think twice before regarding this as the conclusive question. I conceive the balance has to be struck mainly between these two things; on the one hand, the duty of persons connected with the proprietorship of considerable estates in land, to assume freely the burden and responsibility of serving in parliament. On the other hand, the peculiar position of this combined estate, which in the first place is of a nature to demand from the proprietor an unusual degree of care and supervision, and which in the second place has been hit severely by recent depressions in corn and coal, which may be termed its two pillars. On the first point it may fairly be taken into view that in serving for twenty years you have stood four contested elections, a number I think decidedly beyond the average.... I will assume, for the present, that the election has passed without bringing you back to parliament. I should then consider that you had thus relieved yourself, at any rate for a period, from a serious call upon your time and mind, mainly with a view to the estate; and on this account, and because I have constituted you its legal master, I write this letter in order to place clearly before you some of the circumstances which invest your relation to it with a rather peculiar character. I premise a few words of a general nature. An enemy to entails, principally though not exclusively on social and domestic grounds, I nevertheless regard it as a very high duty to labour for the conservation of estates, and the permanence of the families in possession of them, as a principal source of our social strength, and as a large part of true conservatism, from the time when Aeschylus wrote [Greek: archaioploutôn despotôn pollê charis].[206] But if their possession is to be prolonged by conduct, not by factitious arrangements, we must recognise this consequence, that conduct becomes subject to fresh demands and liabilities. In condemning laws which tie up the _corpus_, I say nothing against powers of charge, either by marriage settlement or otherwise, for wife and children, although questions of degree and circumstance may always have to be considered. But to mortgages I am greatly opposed. Whether they ought or ought not to be restrained by law, I do not now inquire. But I am confident that few and rare causes only will warrant them, and that as a general rule they are mischievous, and in many cases, as to their consequences, anti-social and immoral. Wherever they exist they ought to be looked upon as evils, which are to be warred upon and got rid of. One of our financial follies has been to give them encouragement by an excessively low tax; and one of the better effects of the income-tax is that it is a fine upon mortgaging. FOOTNOTES: [203] For an account of the creditors' meeting held at Birmingham on Dec. 2, 1847, see the _Times_ of Dec. 3, 1847. [204] To Lord Lyttelton, July 29, 1874: 'I could not devote my entire life to it; and after 1852 my attention was only occasional.' [205] This settlement followed the lines of a will made by Sir Stephen in 1855, devising the estate to his brother for life, with the remainder to his brother's sons in tail male; and next to W. H. Gladstone and his sons in tail male, and then to W. E. Gladstone's other sons; and in default of male issue of W. E. Gladstone, then to the eldest and other sons of Lord Lyttelton, and so forth in the ordinary form of an entailed estate. [206] _Agam._ 1043, 'A great blessing are masters with, ancient riches.' CHAPTER III PARTY EVOLUTION--NEW COLONIAL POLICY (_1846-1850_) I shall ever thankfully rejoice to have lived in a period when so blessed a change in our colonial policy was brought about; a change which is full of promise and profit to a country having such claims on mankind as England, but also a change of system, in which we have done no more than make a transition from misfortune and from evil, back to the rules of justice, of reason, of nature, and of common sense.--GLADSTONE (1856). The fall of Peel and the break up of the conservative party in 1846 led to a long train of public inconveniences. When Lord John Russell was forming his government, he saw Peel, and proposed to include any of his party. Peel thought such a junction under existing circumstances unadvisable, but said he should have no ground of complaint if Lord John made offers to any of his friends; and he should not attempt to influence them either way.[207] The action ended in a proposal of office to Dalhousie, Lincoln, and Sidney Herbert. Nothing came of it, and the whigs were left to go on as they best could upon the narrow base of their own party. The protectionists gave them to understand that before Bentinck and his friends made up their minds to turn Peel out, they had decided that it would not be fair to put the whigs in merely to punish the betrayer, and then to turn round upon them. On the contrary, fair and candid support was what they intended. The conservative government had carried liberal measures; the liberal government subsisted on conservative declarations. Such was this singular situation. PEELITES AND PROTECTIONISTS The Peelites, according to a memorandum of Mr. Gladstone's, from a number approaching 120 in the corn law crisis of 1846, were reduced at once by the election of 1847 to less than half. This number, added to the liberal force, gave free trade a very large majority: added to the protectionists it just turned the balance in their favour. So long as Sir Robert Peel lived (down to June 1850) the entire body never voted with the protectionists. From the first a distinction arose among Peel's adherents that widened, as time went on, and led to a long series of doubts, perturbations, manoeuvres. These perplexities lasted down to 1859, and they constitute a vital chapter in Mr. Gladstone's political story. The distinction was in the nature of political things. Many of those who had stood by Peel's side in the day of battle, and who still stood by him in the curious morrow that combined victorious policy with personal defeat, were in more or less latent sympathy with the severed protectionists in everything except protection.[208] Differing from these, says Mr. Gladstone, others of the Peelites 'whose opinions were more akin to those of the liberals, cherished, nevertheless, personal sympathies and lingering wishes which made them tardy, perhaps unduly tardy, in drawing towards that party. I think that this description applied in some degree to Mr. Sidney Herbert, and in the same or a greater degree to myself.'[209] Shortly described, the Peelites were all free trade conservatives, drawn by under-currents, according to temperament, circumstances, and all the other things that turn the balance of men's opinions, to antipodean poles of the political compass. 'We have no party,' Mr. Gladstone tells his father in June 1849, 'no organisation, no whipper-in; and under these circumstances we cannot exercise any considerable degree of permanent influence as a body.' The leading sentiment that guided the proceedings of the whole body of Peelites alike was a desire to give to protection its final quietus. While the younger members of the Peel cabinet held that this could only be done in one way, namely, by forcing the protectionists into office where they must put their professions to the proof, Peel himself, and Graham with him, took a directly opposite view, and adopted as the leading principle of their action the vital necessity of keeping the protectionists out. This broad difference led to no diminution of personal intercourse or political attachment. Certainly this was not due, says Mr. Gladstone, to any desire (at least in Sir R. Peel's mind) for, or contemplation of, coalition with the liberal party. It sprang entirely from a belief on his part that the chiefs of the protectionists would on their accession to power endeavour to establish a policy in accordance with the designation of their party, and would in so doing probably convulse the country. As long as Lord George Bentinck lived, with his iron will and strong convictions, this was a contingency that could not be overlooked. But he died in 1848, and with his death it became a visionary dream. Yet I remember well Sir Robert Peel saying to me, when I was endeavouring to stir him up on some great fault (as I thought it), in the colonial policy of the ministers, 'I foresee a tremendous struggle in this country for the restoration of protection.' He would sometimes even threaten us with the possibility of being 'sent for' if a crisis should occur, which was a thing far enough from our limited conceptions. We were flatly at issue with him on this opinion. We even considered that as long as the protectionists had no responsibilities but those of opposition, and as there were two hundred and fifty seats in parliament to be won by chanting the woes of the land and promising redress, there would be protectionists in plenty to fill the left hand benches on those terms. RELATIONS WITH PEEL The question what it was that finally converted the country to free trade is not easy to answer. Not the arguments of Cobden, for in the summer of 1845 even his buoyant spirit perceived that some precipitating event, and not reasoning, would decide. His appeals had become, as Disraeli wrote, both to nation and parliament a wearisome iteration, and he knew it. Those arguments, it is true, had laid the foundations of the case in all their solidity and breadth. But until the emergency in Ireland presented itself, and until prosperity had justified the experiment, Peel was hardly wrong in reckoning on the possibility of a protectionist reaction. Even the new prosperity and contentment of the country were capable of being explained by the extraordinary employment found in the creation of railways. As Mr. Gladstone said to a correspondent in the autumn of 1846, 'The liberal proceedings of conservative governments, and the conservative proceedings of the new liberal administration, unite in pointing to the propriety of an abstinence from high-pitched opinions.' This was a euphemism. What it really meant was that outside of protection no high-pitched opinions on any other subject were available. The tenets of party throughout this embarrassed period from 1846 to 1852 were shifting, equivocal, and fluid. Nor even in the period that followed did they very rapidly consolidate. Mr. Gladstone writes to his father (June 30, 1849):-- I will only add a few words about your desire that I should withdraw my confidence from Peel. My feelings of admiration, attachment, and gratitude to him I do not expect to lose; and I agree with Graham that he has done more and _suffered_ more than any other living statesman for the good of the people. But still I must confess with sorrow that the present course of events tends to separate and disorganise the small troop of the late government and their adherents. On the West Indian question last year I, with others, spoke and voted against Peel. On the Navigation law this year I was saved from it only by the shipowners and their friends, who would not adopt a plan upon the basis I proposed. Upon Canada--a vital question--I again spoke and voted against him.[210] And upon other colonial questions, yet most important to the government, I fear even this year the same thing may happen again. However painful, then, it may be to me to differ from him, it is plain that my conduct is not placed in his hands to govern. We find an illustration of the distractions of this long day of party metamorphosis, as well as an example of what was regarded as Mr. Gladstone's over-ingenuity, in one among other passing divergences between him and his chief. Mr. Disraeli brought forward a motion (Feb. 19, 1850) of a very familiar kind, on the distress of the agricultural classes and the insecurity of relief of rural burdens. Bright bluntly denied that there was a case in which the fee of land had been depreciated or rent been permanently lowered. Graham said the mover's policy was simply a transfer of the entire poor rate to the consolidated fund, violating the principles of local control and inviting prodigal expenditure. Fortune then, in Mr. Disraeli's own language, sent him an unexpected champion, by whom, according to him, Graham was fairly unhorsed. The reader will hardly think so, for though the unexpected champion was Mr. Gladstone, he found no better reason for supporting the motion, than that its adoption would weaken the case for restoring protection. As if the landlords and farmers were likely to be satisfied with a small admission of a great claim, while all the rest of their claim was to be as bitterly contested as ever; with the transfer of a shabby couple of millions from their own shoulders to the consolidated fund, when they were clamouring that fourteen millions would hardly be enough. Peel rose later, promptly took this plain point against his ingenious lieutenant, and then proceeded to one more of his elaborate defences, both of free trade and of his own motives and character. For the last time, as it was to happen, Peel declared that for Mr. Gladstone he had 'the greatest respect and admiration.' 'I was associated with him in the preparation and conduct of those measures, to the desire of maintaining which he partly attributes the conclusion at which he has arrived. I derived from him the most zealous, the most effective assistance, and it is no small consolation to me to hear from him, although in this particular motion we arrive at different conclusions, that his confidence in the justice of those principles for which we in common contended remains entirely unshaken.'[211] ON HIS POSITION On this particular battle, as well as on more general matter, a letter from Mr. Gladstone to his wife (Feb. 22,1850) sheds some light:--: _To Mrs. Gladstone._ Indeed you do rise to very daring flights to-day, and suggest many things that flow from your own deep affection which, perhaps, disguises from you some things that are nevertheless real. I cannot form to myself any other conception of my duty in parliament except the simple one of acting independently, without faction, and without subserviency, on all questions as they arise. To the formation of a party, or even of the nucleus of a party, there are in my circumstances many obstacles. I have been talking over these matters with Manning this morning, and I found him to be of the opinion which is deliberately mine, namely, that it is better that I should not be the head or leader even of my own contemporaries; that there are others of them whose position is less embarrassed, and more favourable and powerful, particularly from birth or wealth or both. Three or four years ago, before I had much considered the matter, and while we still felt as if Peel were our actual chief in politics, I did not think so, but perhaps thought or assumed that as, up to the then present time, I had discharged some prominent duties in office and in parliament, the first place might naturally fall to me when the other men were no longer in the van. But since we have become more disorganised, and I have had little sense of union except with the men of my own standing, and I have _felt_ more of the actual state of things, and how this or that would work in the House of Commons, I have come to be satisfied in my own mind that, if there were a question whether there should be a leader and who it should be, it would be much better that either Lincoln or Herbert should assume that post, whatever share of the mere work might fall on me. I have viewed the matter very drily, and so perhaps you will think I have written on it. To turn then to what is more amusing, the battle of last night. After much consideration and conference with Herbert (who has had an attack of bilious fever and could not come down, though much better, and soon, I hope, to be out again, but who agreed with me), I determined that I ought to vote last night with Disraeli; and made up my mind accordingly, which involved saying why, at some period of the night. I was anxious to do it early, as I knew Graham would speak on the other side, and did not wish any conflict even of reasoning with him. But he found I was going to speak, and I suppose may have had some similar wish. At any rate, he had the opportunity of following Stafford who began the debate, as he was to take the other side. Then there was an amusing scene between him and Peel. Both rose and stood in competition for the Speaker's eye. The Speaker had seen Graham first, and he got it. But when he was speaking I felt I had no choice but to follow him. He made so very able a speech that this was no pleasant prospect; but I acquired the courage that proceeds from fear, according to a line from Ariosto: _Chi per virtù, chi per paura vale_ [one from valour, another from fear, is strong], and made my plunge when he sat down. But the Speaker was not dreaming of me, and called a certain Mr. Scott who had risen at the same time. Upon this I sat down again, and there was a great uproar because the House always anticipating more or less interest when men speak on opposite sides and in succession, who are usually together, called for me. So I was up again, and the Speaker deserted Scott and called me, and I had to make the best I could after Graham. That is the end of the story, for there is nothing else worth saying. It was at the dinner hour from 7 to 7¾, and then I went home for a little quiet. Peel again replied upon me, but I did not hear that part of him; and Disraeli showed the marvellous talent that he has, for summing up with brilliancy, buoyancy, and comprehensiveness at the close of a debate. You have heard me speak of that talent before when I have been wholly against him; but never, last night or at any other time, would I go to him for conviction, but for the delight of the ear and the fancy. What a long story! PARTIAL WITHDRAWAL During the parliament that sat from 1847 to 1852, Mr. Gladstone's political life was in partial abeyance. The whole burden of conducting the affairs of the Hawarden estate fell upon him. For five years, he said, 'it constituted my daily and continuing care, while parliamentary action was only occasional. It supplied in fact my education for the office of finance minister.' The demands of church matters were anxious and at times absorbing. He warmly favoured and spoke copiously for the repeal of the navigation laws. He desired, however, to accept a recent overture from America which offered everything, even their vast coasting trade, upon a footing of absolute reciprocity. 'I gave notice,' he says, 'of a motion to that effect. But the government declined to accept it. I accordingly withdrew it. At this the tories were much put about. I, who had thought of things only and not taken persons into view, was surprised at their surprise. It did not occur to me that by my public notification I had given to the opposition generally something _like_ a vested interest in my proposal. I certainly should have done better never to have given my notice. This is one of the cases illustrating the extreme slowness of my political education.' The sentence about thinking of things only and leaving persons out, indicates a turn of mind that partly for great good, partly for some evil, never wholly disappeared. Yet partially withdrawn as he was from active life in the House of Commons, Mr. Gladstone was far too acute an observer to have any leanings to the delusive self-indulgence of temporary retirements. To his intimate friend, Sir Walter James, who seems to have nursed some such intention, he wrote at this very time (Feb. 13, 1847):-- The way to make parliament profitable is to deal with it as a calling, and if it be a calling it can rarely be advantageous to suspend the pursuit of it for years together with an uncertainty, too, as to its resumption. You have not settled in the country, nor got your other vocation open and your line clear before you. The purchase of an estate is a very serious matter, which you may not be able to accomplish to your satisfaction except after the lapse of years. It would be more satisfactory to drop parliament with another path open to you already, than in order to seek about for one.... I think with you that the change in the position of the conservative party makes public life still more painful where it was painful before, and less enjoyable, where it was enjoyable; but I do not think it remains less a duty to work through the tornado and to influence for good according to our means the new forms into which, political combination may be cast. In 1848 Northcote speaks of Mr. Gladstone as the 'patron saint' of the coal-whippers, who, as a manifestation of their gratitude for the Act which he had induced parliament to pass for them, offered their services to put down the chartist mob. Both Mr. Gladstone and his brother John served as special constables during the troubled days of April. In his diary he records on April 10, 'On duty from 2 to 3¾ P.M.' II VIEWS OF COLONIAL GOVERNMENT When Mr. Gladstone became colonial secretary at the end of 1845, he was described as a strong accession to the progressive or theorising section of the cabinet--the men, that is to say, who applied to the routine of government, as they found it, critical principles and improved ideals. If the church had been the first of Mr. Gladstone's commanding interests and free trade the second, the turn of the colonies came next. He had not held the seals of the colonial department for more than a few months, but to any business, whatever it might be, that happened to kindle his imagination or work on his reflection, he never failed to bend his whole strength. He had sat upon a committee in 1835-6 on native affairs at the Cape, and there he had come into full view of the costly and sanguinary nature of that important side of the colonial question. Molesworth mentions the 'prominent and valuable' part taken by him in the committee on Waste Lands (1836). He served on committees upon military expenditure in the colonies, and upon colonial accounts. He was a member of the important committee of 1840 on the colonisation of New Zealand, and voted in the minority for the draft report of the chairman, containing among other things the principle of the reservation of all unoccupied lands to the crown.[212] Between 1837 and 1841 he spoke frequently on colonial affairs. When he was secretary of state in 1846, questions arose upon the legal status of colonial clergy, full of knotty points as to which he wrote minutes; questions upon education in penal settlements, and so forth, in which he interested himself, not seldom differing from Stephen, the chief of the staff in the office. He composed an argumentative despatch on the commercial relations between Canada and the mother country, endeavouring to wean the Canadian assembly from its economic delusions. It was in effect little better than if written in water. He made the mistake of sending out despatches in favour of resuming on a limited scale the transportation of convicts to Australia, a practice effectually condemned by the terrible committee eight years before. Opinion in Australia was divided, Robert Lowe leading the opposition,[213] and the experiment was vetoed by Mr. Gladstone's successor at the colonial office. He exposed himself to criticism and abuse by recalling a colonial governor for inefficiency in his post; imprudently in the simplicity of his heart he added to the recall a private letter stating rumours against the governor's personal character. These he had taken on trust from the bishop of the diocese and others. The bishop left him in the lurch; the recall was one affair, the personal rumours were another; nimble partizanship confused the two, to the disadvantage of the secretary of state; the usual clatter that attends any important personage in a trivial scrape ensued; Mr. Gladstone's explanations, simple and veracious as the sunlight in their substance, were over-skilful in form, and half a dozen blunt, sound sentences would have stood him in far better stead. 'There was on my part in this matter,' he says in a fugitive scrap upon it, 'a singular absence of worldly wisdom.'[214] To colonial policy at this stage I discern no particular contribution, and the matters that I have named are now well covered with the moss of kindly time. Almost from the first he was convinced that some leading maxims of Downing Street were erroneous. He had, from his earliest parliamentary days, regarded our colonial connection as one of duty rather than as one of advantage. When he had only been four years in the House he took a firm stand against pretensions in Canada to set their assembly on an equal footing with the imperial parliament at home.[215] On the other hand, while he should always be glad to see parliament inclined to make large sacrifices for the purpose of maintaining the colonies, he conceived that nothing could be more ridiculous, or more mistaken, than to suppose that Great Britain had anything to gain by maintaining that union in opposition to the deliberate and permanent conviction of the people of the colonies themselves.[216] He did not at all undervalue what he called the mere political connection, but he urged that the root of such a connection lay in the natural affection of the colonies for the land from which they sprang, and their spontaneous desire to reproduce its laws and the spirit of its institutions. From first to last he always declared the really valuable tie with a colony to be the moral and the social tie.[217] The master key with him was local freedom, and he was never weary of protest against the fallacy of what was called 'preparing' these new communities for freedom: teaching a colony, like an infant, by slow degrees to walk, first putting it into long clothes, then into short clothes. A governing class was reared up for the purposes which the colony ought to fulfil itself; and, as the climax of the evil, a great military expenditure was maintained, which became a premium on war. Our modern colonists, he said, after quitting the mother country, instead of keeping their hereditary liberties, go out to Australia or New Zealand to be deprived of these liberties, and then perhaps, after fifteen or twenty or thirty years' waiting, have a portion given back to them, with magnificent language about the liberality of parliament in conceding free institutions. During the whole of that interval they are condemned to hear all the miserable jargon about fitting them for the privileges thus conferred; while, in point of fact, every year and every month during which they are retained under the administration of a despotic government, renders them less fit for free institutions. 'No consideration of money ought to induce parliament to sever the connection between any one of the colonies and the mother country,' though it was certain that the cost of the existing system was both large and unnecessary. But the real mischief was not here, he said. Our error lay in the attempt to hold the colonies by the mere exercise of power.[218] Even for the church in the colonies he rejected the boon of civil preference as being undoubtedly a fatal gift,--'nothing but a source of weakness to the church herself and of discord and difficulty to the colonial communities, in the soil of which I am anxious to see the church of England take a strong and healthy root.'[219] He acknowledged how much he had learned from Molesworth's speeches,[220] and neither of them sympathised with the opinion expressed by Mr. Disraeli in those days, 'These wretched colonies will all be independent too in a few years, and are a millstone round our necks.'[221] Nor did Mr. Gladstone share any such sentiments as those of Molesworth who, in the Canadian revolt of the winter of 1837, actually invoked disaster upon the British arms.[222] THE TWO SCHOOLS In their views of colonial policy Mr. Gladstone was in substantial accord with radicals of the school of Cobden, Hume, and Molesworth. He does not seem to have joined a reforming association founded by these eminent men among others in 1850, but its principles coincided with his own:--local independence, an end of rule from Downing Street, the relief of the mother country from the whole expense of the local government of the colonies, save for defence from aggression by a foreign power. Parliament was, as a rule, so little moved by colonial concerns that, according to Mr. Gladstone, in nine cases out of ten it was impossible for the minister to secure parliamentary attention, and in the tenth case it was only obtained by the casual operations of party spirit. Lord Glenelg's case showed that colonial secretaries were punished when they got into bad messes, and his passion for messes was punished, in the language of the journals of the day, by the life of a toad under a harrow until he was worried out of office. There was, however, no force in public opinion to prevent the minister from going wrong if he liked; still less to prevent him from going right if he liked. Popular feeling was coloured by no wish to give up the colonies, but people doubted whether the sum of three millions sterling a year for colonial defence and half a million more for civil charges, was not excessive, and they thought the return by no means commensurate with the outlay.[223] In discussions on bills effecting the enlargement of Australian constitutions, Mr. Gladstone's views came out in clear contrast with the old school. 'Spoke 1½ hours on the Australian Colonies bill,' he records (May 13,1850), 'to an indifferent, inattentive House. But it is necessary to speak these truths of colonial policy even to unwilling ears.' In the proceedings on the constitution for New Zealand, he delivered a speech justly described as a pattern of close argument and classic oratory.[224] Lord John Russell, adverting to the concession of an elective chamber and responsible government, said that one by one in this manner, all the shields of our authority were thrown away, and the monarchy was left exposed in the colonies to the assaults of democracy. 'Now I confess,' said Mr. Gladstone, in a counter minute, 'that the nominated council and the independent executive were, not shields of authority, but sources of weakness, disorder, disunion, and disloyalty.'[225] HIS WHOLE VIEW His whole view he set out at Chester[226] a little later than the time at which we now stand:-- ... Experience has proved that if you want to strengthen the connection between the colonies and this country--if you want to see British law held in respect and British institutions adopted and beloved in the colonies, never associate with them the hated name of force and coercion exercised by us, at a distance, over their rising fortunes. Govern them upon a principle of freedom. Defend them against aggression from without. Regulate their foreign relations. These things belong to the colonial connection. But of the duration of that connection let them be the judges, and I predict that if you leave them the freedom of judgment it is hard to say when the day will come when they will wish to separate from the great name of England. Depend upon it, they covet a share in that great name. You will find in that feeling of theirs the greatest security for the connection. Make the name of England yet more and more an object of desire to the colonies. Their natural disposition is to love and revere the name of England, and this reverence is by far the best security you can have for their continuing, not only to be subjects of the crown, not only to render it allegiance, but to render it that allegiance which is the most precious of all--the allegiance which proceeds from the depths of the heart of man. You have seen various colonies, some of them lying at the antipodes, offering to you their contributions to assist in supporting the wives and families of your soldiers, the heroes that have fallen in the war. This, I venture to say, may be said, without exaggeration, to be among the first fruits of that system upon which, within the last twelve or fifteen years, you have founded a rational mode of administering the affairs of your colonies without gratuitous interference. As I turn over these old minutes, memoranda, despatches, speeches, one feels a curious irony in the charge engendered by party heat or malice, studiously and scandalously careless of facts, that Mr. Gladstone's policy aimed at getting rid of the colonies. As if any other policy than that which he so ardently enforced could possibly have saved them. III A PAINFUL INCIDENT In 1849 Mr. Gladstone was concerned in a painful incident that befel one of his nearest friends. Nobody of humane feeling would now willingly choose either to speak or hear of it, but it finds a place in books even to this day; it has been often misrepresented; and it is so characteristic of Mr. Gladstone, and so entirely to his honour, that it cannot be wholly passed over. Fortunately a few sentences will suffice. His friend's wife had been for some time travelling abroad, and rumours by and by reached England of movements that might be no more than indiscreet, but might be worse. In consequence of these rumours, and after anxious consultations between the husband and three or four important members of his circle, it was thought best that some one should seek access to the lady, and try to induce her to place herself in a position of security. The further conclusion reached was that Mr. Gladstone and Manning were the two persons best qualified by character and friendship for this critical mission. Manning was unable to go, but Mr. Gladstone at the earnest solicitation of his friend, and also of his own wife who had long been much attached to the person missing, set off alone for a purpose, as he conscientiously believed, alike friendly to both parties and in the interests of both. I have called the proceeding characteristic, for it was in fact exactly like him to be ready at the call of friendship, and in the hope of preventing a terrible disaster, cheerfully to undertake a duty detestable to anybody and especially detestable to him; and again, it was like him to regard the affair with an optimistic simplicity that made him hopeful of success, where to ninety-nine men of a hundred the thought of success would have seemed absurd. To no one was it a greater shock than to him when, after a journey across half Europe, he suddenly found himself the discoverer of what it was inevitable that he should report to his friend at home. In the course of the subsequent proceedings on the bill for a divorce brought into the House of Lords, he was called as a witness to show that in this case the person claiming the bill had omitted no means that duty or affection could suggest for averting the calamity with which his hearth was threatened. It was quite untrue, as he had occasion to tell the House of Commons in 1857, that he had anything whatever to do with the collection of evidence, or that the evidence given by him was the evidence, or any part of it, on which the divorce was founded. The only thing to be added is the judgment of Sir Robert Peel upon a transaction, with all the details of which he was particularly well acquainted:-- _Aug. 26, 1849._ MY DEAR GLADSTONE,--I am deeply concerned to hear the result of that mission which, with unparalleled kindness and generosity, you undertook in the hope of mitigating the affliction of a friend, and conducing possibly to the salvation of a wife and mother. Your errand has not been a fruitless one, for it affords the conclusive proof that everything that the forbearance and tender consideration of a husband and the devotion of a friend could suggest as the means of averting the necessity for appealing to the Law for such protection as it can afford, had been essayed and essayed with the utmost delicacy. This proof is valuable so far as the world and the world's opinion is concerned--much more valuable as it respects the heart and conscience of those who have been the active agents in a work of charity. I can offer you nothing in return for that which you undertook with the promptitude of affectionate friendship, under circumstances which few would not have considered a valid excuse if not a superior obligation, but the expression of my sincere admiration for truly virtuous and generous conduct.--Ever, my dear Gladstone, most faithfully yours, ROBERT PEEL. FOOTNOTES: [207] _The Halifax Papers._ [208] Among them were such men as Wilson Patten, General Peel, Mr. Corry, Lord Stanhope, Lord Hardinge, most of whom in days to come took their places in conservative administrations. [209] Memo, of 1876. [210] A bill to indemnify the inhabitants of Lower Canada, many of whom had taken part in the rebellion of 1837-8, for the destruction and injury of their property. Mr. Gladstone strongly opposed any compensation being given to Canadian, rebels.--_Hansard_, June 14, 1849. [211] _Hansard_, Feb. 21, 1850, p. 1233. [212] Garnett's _Edward Gibbon Wakefield_, p. 248. See also p. 232. [213] See _The Gladstone Colony_ by J. F. Hogan, M.P., with prefatory note by Mr. Gladstone, April 20, 1897, and the chapter in Lord Sherbrooke's _Life_, 'Mr. Gladstone's Penal Colony.' [214] Stafford Northcote published an effective vindication in a 'Letter to a Friend,' 1847. [215] Speech on affairs of Lower Canada, Mar. 8, 1837. [216] On Government of Canada bill, May 29, 1840. [217] See his evidence before a Select Committee on Colonial Military Expenditure, June 6, 1861. [218] See speech on Australian Colonies bill, June 26, 1849, Colonial Administration, April 16, 1849, on the Australian Colonies, Feb. 8, 1850, March 22, 1850, and May 13, 1850. On the Kaffir War, April 5, 1852. On the New Zealand Government bill, May 21, 1852. Also speech on Scientific Colonisation before the St. Martin in the Fields Association for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, March 27, 1849. [219] On the Colonial Bishops bill, April 28, 1852. [220] Wakefield was their common teacher. In a letter as secretary of state to Sir George Grey, then governor of New Zealand (March 27), 1846, he states how the signal ability of Wakefield and his devotion to every subject connected with the foundation of colonies has influenced him. [221] To Lord Malmesbury, Aug. 13, 1852. _Memoirs of an Ex-Minister_, by the Earl of Malmesbury, i. p. 344. [222] 'Should a war take place, I must declare that I should more deplore success on the part of this country than defeat; and though as an English citizen I could not but lament the disasters of my countrymen, still it would be to me a less poignant matter of regret than a success which would offer to the world the disastrous and disgraceful spectacle of a free and mighty nation succeeding by force of arms in putting down and tyrannising over a free though feebler community struggling in defence of its just rights.... That our dominion in America should now be brought to a conclusion, I for one most sincerely desire, but I desire it should terminate in peace and friendship. Great would be the advantages of an amicable separation of the two countries, and great would be the honour this country would reap in consenting to such a step.' Mr. Gladstone spoke the same evening in an opposite sense.--_Hans._ 39, p. 1466, Dec. 22, 1837. Walpole, _Hist. Eng._, iii. p. 425. [223] See, for instance, _Spectator_, Jan. 17, 1845; _Times_, June 8, 1849. In 1861 it was estimated that colonial military expenditure was between three and four millions a year, about nine-tenths of which was borne by British taxpayers, and one-tenth by colonial contribution. [224] _Edward Gibbon Wakefield_, p. 331. The reader will find an extract in the Appendix. 'The New Zealand Government bill of 1852, with all its errors and complications, was a grand step in the recovery of our old colonial policy; but perhaps its chief contribution to the re-establishment of constitutional views was Mr. Gladstone's speech on its second reading.'--Right Hon. C. B. Adderley, _Review of Earl Grey's Colonial Policy of Lord John Russell's Administration_, p. 135. [225] See Mr. Gladstone's speech on introducing the Government of Ireland bill, April 8, 1886. [226] Nov. 12, 1855. See also two speeches of extraordinary fervour and exaltation, one at Mold (Sept. 29, 1856), and the other at Liverpool the same evening, both in support of the claims of societies for foreign missions. CHAPTER IV DEATH OF SIR ROBERT PEEL (_1850_) Famous men--whose merit it is to have joined their name to events that were brought onwards by the course of things.--PAUL-LOUIS COURIER. LORD PALMERSTON It was now that Lord Palmerston strode to a front place--one of the two conspicuous statesmen with whom, at successive epochs in his career, Mr. Gladstone found himself in different degrees of energetic antagonism. This was all the stiffer and more deeply rooted, for being in both cases as much a moral antagonism as it was political. After a long spell of peace, earnestness, and political economy, the nation was for a time in a mood for change, and Palmerston convinced it that he was the man for its mood. He had his full share of shrewd common sense, yet was capable of infinite recklessness. He was good-tempered and a man of bluff cheerful humour. But to lose the game was intolerable, and it was noticed that with him the next best thing to success was quick retaliation on a victorious adversary--a trait of which he was before long to give the world an example that amused it. Yet he had no capacity for deep and long resentments. Like so many of his class, he united passion for public business to sympathy with social gaiety and pleasure. Diplomatists found him firm, prompt, clean-cut, but apt to be narrow, teasing, obstinate, a prisoner to his own arguments, and wanting in the statesman's first quality of seeing the whole and not merely the half. Metternich described him as an audacious and passionate marksman, ready to make arrows out of any wood. He was a sanguine man who always believed what he desired; a confident man who was sure that he must be right in whatever he chose to fear. On the economic or the moral side of national life, in the things that make a nation rich and the things that make it scrupulous and just, he had only limited perception and moderate faith. Where Peel was strong and penetrating, Palmerston was weak and purblind. He regarded Bright and Cobden as displeasing mixtures of the bagman and the preacher. In 1840 he had brought us within an ace of war with France. Disputes about an American frontier were bringing us at the same period within an ace of war with the United States. When Peel and Aberdeen got this quarrel into more promising shape, Palmerston characteristically taunted them with capitulation. Lord Grey refused help in manufacturing a whig government in December 1845, because he was convinced that at that moment Palmerston at the foreign office meant an American war. When he was dismissed by Lord John Russell in 1852 a foreign ruler on an insecure throne observed to an Englishman, 'This is a blow to me, for so long as Lord Palmerston remained at the foreign office, it was certain that you could not procure a single ally in Europe.' Yet all this policy of high spirits and careless dictatorial temper had its fine side. With none of the grandeur of the highest heroes of his school--of Chatham, Carteret, Pitt--without a spark of their heroic fire or their brilliant and steadfast glow, Palmerston represented, not always in their best form, some of the most generous instincts of his countrymen. A follower of Canning, he was the enemy of tyrants and foreign misrule. He had a healthy hatred of the absolutism and reaction that were supreme at Vienna in 1815; and if he meddled in many affairs that were no affairs of ours, at least he intervened for freedom. The action that made him hated at Vienna and Petersburg won the confidence of his countrymen. They saw him in Belgium and Holland, Spain, Italy, Greece, Portugal, the fearless champion of constitutions and nationality. Of Aberdeen, who had been Peel's foreign minister, it was said that at home he was a liberal without being an enthusiast; abroad he was a zealot, in the sense most opposed to Palmerston. So, of Palmerston it could be said that he was conservative at home and revolutionist abroad. If such a word can ever be applied to such a thing, his patriotism was sometimes not without a tinge of vulgarity, but it was always genuine and sincere. This masterful and expert personage was the ruling member of the weak whig government now in office, and he made sensible men tremble. Still, said Graham to Peel, 'it is a choice of dangers and evils, and I am disposed to think that Palmerston and his foreign policy are less to be dreaded than Stanley and a new corn law.'[227] In a debate of extraordinary force and range in the summer of 1850, the two schools of foreign policy found themselves face to face. Palmerston defended his various proceedings with remarkable amplitude, power, moderation, and sincerity. He had arrayed against him, besides Mr. Gladstone, the greatest men in the House--Peel, Disraeli, Cobden, Graham, Bright--but in his last sentence the undaunted minister struck a note that made triumph in the division lobbies sure. For five hours a crowded house hung upon his lips, and he then wound up with a fearless challenge of a verdict on the question, 'Whether, as the Roman in days of old held himself free from indignity when he could say _Civis Romanus sum_, so also a British subject, in whatever land he may be, shall feel confident that the watchful eye and the strong arm of England will protect him against injustice and wrong?' DON PACIFICO The Roman citizen was in this instance a Mediterranean Jew who chanced to be a British subject. His house at Athens had for some reason or other been sacked by the mob; he presented a demand for compensation absurdly fraudulent on the face of it. The Greek government refused to pay. England despatched the fleet to collect this and some other petty accounts outstanding. Russia and France proposed their good offices; the mediation of France was accepted; then a number of Greek vessels were peremptorily seized, and France in umbrage recalled her ambassador from London. Well might Peel, in the last speech ever delivered by him in the House of Commons, describe such a course of action as consistent neither with the dignity nor the honour of England. The debate travelled far beyond Don Pacifico, and it stands to this day as a grand classic exposition in parliament of the contending views as to the temper and the principles on which nations in our modern era should conduct their dealings with one another. It was in the Greek debate of 1850, which involved the censure or acquittal of Lord Palmerston, that I first meddled in speech with foreign affairs, to which I had heretofore paid the slightest possible attention. Lord Palmerston's speech was a marvel for physical strength, for memory, and for lucid and precise exposition of his policy as a whole. A very curious incident on this occasion evinced the extreme reluctance of Sir R. Peel to appear in any ostensible relation with Disraeli. Voting with him was disagreeable enough, but this with his strong aversion to the Palmerstonian policy Peel could not avoid; besides which, it was known that Lord Palmerston would carry the division. Disraeli, not yet fully recognised as leader of the protectionists, was working hard for that position, and assumed the manners of it, with Beresford, a kind of whipper-in, for his right-hand man. After the Palmerston speech he asked me on the next night whether I would undertake to answer it. I said that I was incompetent to do it, from want of knowledge and otherwise. He answered that in that case he must do it. As the debate was not to close that evening, this left another night free for Peel when he might speak and _not_ be in Disraeli's _neighbourhood_. I told Peel what Disraeli had arranged. He was very well satisfied. But, shortly afterwards, I received from Disraeli a message through Beresford, that he had changed his mind, and would not speak until the next and closing night, when Peel would have to speak also. I had to make known to Peel this alteration. He received the tidings with extreme annoyance: thinking, I suppose, that if the two spoke on the same side and in the late hours just before the division it would convey the idea of some concert or co-operation between them, which it was evident that he was most anxious to avoid. But he could not help himself. Disraeli's speech was a very poor one, almost like a 'cross,' and Peel's was prudent but otherwise not one of his best.[228] Mr. Gladstone had not in 1850 at all acquired such full parliamentary ascendency as belonged to the hardy veteran confronting him; still less had he such authority as the dethroned leader who sat by his side. Yet the House felt that, in the image of an ancient critic, here was no cistern of carefully collected rain-water, but the bounteous flow of a living spring. It felt all the noble elevation of an orator who transported them apart from the chicane of diplomatic chanceries, above the narrow expediencies of the particular case, though of these too he proved himself a thoroughly well-armed master, into a full view of the state system of Europe and of the principles and relations on which the fabric is founded. Now for the first time he made the appeal, so often repeated by him, to the common sentiment of the civilised world, to the general and fixed convictions of mankind, to the principles of brotherhood among nations, to their sacred independence, to the equality in their rights of the weak with the strong. Such was his language. 'When we are asking for the maintenance of the rights that belong to our fellow-subjects resident in Greece,' he said, '_let us do as we would be done by_; let us pay all respect to a feeble state and to the infancy of free institutions, which we should desire and should exact from others towards their authority and strength.' Mr. Gladstone had not read history for nothing, he was not a Christian for nothing. He knew the evils that followed in Europe the breakdown of the great spiritual power--once, though with so many defects, a controlling force over violence, anarchy, and brute wrong. He knew the necessity for some substitute, even a substitute so imperfect as the law of nations. 'You may call the rule of nations vague and untrustworthy,' he exclaimed; 'I find in it, on the contrary, a great and noble monument of human wisdom, founded on the combined dictates of sound experience, a precious inheritance bequeathed to us by the generations that have gone before us, and a firm foundation on which we must take care to build whatever it may be our part to add to their acquisitions, if indeed we wish to promote the peace and welfare of the world.' EXALTS THE LAW OF NATIONS The government triumphed by a handsome majority, and Mr. Gladstone, as was his wont, consoled himself for present disappointment by hopes for a better future. 'The majority of the House of Commons, I am convinced,' he wrote to Guizot, then in permanent exile from power, 'was with us in heart and in conviction; but fear of inconveniences attending the removal of a ministry which there is no regularly organised opposition ready to succeed, carried the day beyond all authoritative doubt, against the merits of the particular question. It remains to hope that the demonstration which has been made may not be without its effect upon the tone of Lord Palmerston's future proceedings.' The conflict thus opened between Mr. Gladstone and Lord Palmerston in 1850 went on in many changing phases, with some curious vicissitudes and inversions. They were sometimes frank foes, occasionally partners in opposition, and for a long while colleagues in office. Never at any time were they in thought or feeling congenial.[229] On the afternoon of the day following this debate, Peel was thrown from his horse and received injuries from which he died three days later (July 2), in the sixty-third year of his age, and after forty-one years of parliamentary life. When the House met the next day, Hume, as one of its oldest members, at once moved the adjournment, and it fell to Mr. Gladstone to second him. He was content with a few words of sorrow and with the quotation of Scott's moving lines to the memory of Pitt:-- 'Now is the stately column broke, The beacon-light is quench'd in smoke, The trumpet's silver sound is still, The warder silent on the hill!' These beautiful words were addressed, said Mr. Gladstone, 'to a man great indeed, but not greater than Sir Robert Peel.' 'Great as he was to the last,' wrote Mr. Gladstone in one of his notes in 1851, 'I must consider the closing years of his life as beneath those that had preceded them. His enormous energies were in truth so lavishly spent upon the gigantic work of government, which he conducted after a fashion quite different,--I mean as to the work done in the workshop of his own brain,--from preceding and succeeding prime ministers, that their root was enfeebled, though in its feebleness it had more strength probably remaining than fell to the lot of any other public man.' Peel may at least divide with Walpole the laurels of our greatest peace minister to that date--the man who presided over beneficent and necessary changes in national polity, that in hands less strong and less skilful might easily have opened the sluices of civil confusion. And when we think of Walpole's closing days, and of the melancholy end of most other ruling spirits in our political history--of the mortifications and disappointments in which, from Chatham and Pitt down to Canning and O'Connell, they have quitted the glorious field--Peel must seem happy in the manner and moment of his death. Daring and prosperous legislative exploits had marked his path. His authority in parliament never stood higher, his honour in the country never stood so high. His last words had been a commanding appeal for temperance in national action and language, a solemn plea for peace as the true aim to set before a powerful people. To his father Mr. Gladstone wrote:-- _July 2, 1850._--I thought Sir R. Peel looked extremely feeble during the debate last week. I mean as compared with what he usually is. I observed that he slept during much of Lord Palmerston's speech, that he spoke with little physical energy, and next day, Saturday, in the forenoon I thought he looked very ill at a meeting which, in common with him, I had to attend. This is all that I know and that is worth telling on a subject which is one of deep interest to all classes, from the Queen downwards. I was at the palace last night and she spoke to me with great earnestness about it. As to the division I shall say little; it is an unsatisfactory subject. The majority of the government was made up out of our ranks, partly by people staying away and partly by some twenty who actually voted with the government. By far the greater portion, I am sorry to say, of both sets of persons were what are called Peelites, and not protectionists. The fact is, that if all calling themselves liberal be put on one side, and all calling themselves conservatives on the other, the House of Commons is as nearly as possible _equally_ divided. QUESTIONS OF LEADERSHIP I have already described how Mr. Gladstone thought it a great mistake in Peel to resist any step that might put upon the protectionists the responsibilities of office. In a note composed a quarter of a century later (1876), he says: 'This I think was not only a safe experiment (after 1848) but a vital necessity. I do not, therefore, think, and I did not think, that the death of Sir R. Peel at the time when it occurred was a great calamity so far as the chief question of our internal politics was concerned. In other respects it was indeed great; in some of them it may almost be called immeasurable. The moral atmosphere of the House of Commons has never since his death been quite the same, and is now widely different. He had a kind of authority there that was possessed by no one else. Lord John might in some respects compete with, in some even excel, him; but to him, as leader of the liberals, the loss of such an opponent was immense. It is sad to think what, with his high mental force and noble moral sense, he might have done for us in after years. Even the afterthought of knowledge of such a man and of intercourse with him, is a high privilege and a precious possession.' An interesting word or two upon his own position at this season occur in a letter to his father (July 9, 1850):-- The letter in which you expressed a desire to be informed by me, so far as I might be able to speak, whether there was anything in the rumours circulated with regard to my becoming the leader in parliament of the conservative party, did not come to my hands until yesterday. The fact is, that there is nothing whatever in those rumours beyond mere speculation on things supposed probable or possible, and they must pass for what they are worth in that character only. People feel, I suppose, that Sir Robert Peel's life and continuance in parliament were of themselves powerful obstacles to the general reorganisation of the conservative party, and as there is great annoyance and dissatisfaction with the present state of things, and a widely spread feeling that it is not conducive to the public interests, there arises in men's minds an expectation that the party will be in some manner reconstituted. I share in the feeling that it is desirable; but I see very great difficulties in the way, and do not at present see how they are to be effectually overcome. The House of Commons is almost equally divided, indeed, between those professing liberal and those professing conservative politics; but the late division [Don Pacifico] showed how ill the latter could hang together, even when all those who had any prominent station among them in any sense were united.... Cornewall Lewis wrote,'Upon Gladstone the death of Peel will have the effect of removing a weight from a spring--he will come forward more and take more part in discussion. The general opinion is that Gladstone will renounce his free trade opinions, and become leader of the protectionists. I expect neither the one event nor the other.'[230] More interesting still is something told by the Duke of Buccleuch. 'Very shortly,' said the duke in 1851, 'before Sir Robert Peel's death, he expressed to me his belief that Sidney Herbert or Gladstone would one day be premier; but Peel said with sarcasm, If the hour comes, Disraeli must be made governor-general of India. He will be a second Ellenborough.'[231] FOOTNOTES: [227] Parker, iii. p. 536. [228] Fragment of 1897. [229] Mr. Gladstone's Don Pacifico speech is still not quite out of date.--June 27, _Hansard_, 1850. [230] _Letters_, p. 226. [231] Dean Boyle's _Recollections_, p. 32. CHAPTER V GORHAM CASE--SECESSION OF FRIENDS (_1847-1851_) It is not by the State that man can be regenerated, and the terrible woes of this darkened world effectually dealt with.--GLADSTONE (1894). The test case of toleration at the moment of the Oxford election of 1847 was the admission of the Jews to sit in parliament, and in the last month of 1847 Mr. Gladstone astonished his father, as well as a great host of his political supporters, by voting with the government in favour of the removal of Jewish disabilities. No ordinary degree of moral courage was needed for such a step by the member for such a constituency. 'It is a painful decision to come to,' he writes in his diary (Dec. 16), 'but the only substantive doubt it raises is about remaining in parliament, and it is truly and only the church which holds me there, though she may seem to some to draw me from it.' Pusey wrote to him in rather violent indignation, for Mr. Gladstone was the only man of that school who learned, or was able to learn, what the modern state is or is going to be. This was the third phase, so Gladstone argued, of an irresistible movement. The tory party had fought first for an anglican parliament, second they fought for a protestant parliament, and now they were fighting for a Christian parliament. Parliament had ceased to be anglican and it had ceased to be protestant, and the considerations that supported these two earlier operations thenceforth condemned the exclusion from full civil rights of those who were not Christians. To his father he explained (December 17, 1847): 'After much consideration, prolonged indeed I may say for the last two years and a half, I made up my mind to support Lord John Russell's bill for the admission of the Jews. I spoke to this effect last night. It is with reluctance that I give the vote, but I am convinced that after the civil privileges we have given them already (including the magistracy and the franchise), and after the admission we have already conceded to unitarians who refuse the whole of the most vital doctrines of the Gospel, we cannot compatibly with entire justice and fairness refuse to admit them.' His father, who was sometimes exacting, complained of concealment. Mr. Gladstone replied that he regarded the question as one of difficulty, and he therefore took as much time as he possibly could for reflection upon it, though he never intended to run it as close as it actually came. 'I know,' he says, in a notable sentence, 'it seems strange to you that I should find it necessary to hold my judgment in suspense on a question which seemed to many so plain; _but suspense is of constant occurrence in public life upon very many kinds of questions, and without it errors and inconsistencies would be much more frequent than even they are now_.' This did not satisfy his father. 'I shall certainly read your speech to find some fair apology for your vote: good and satisfactory reason I do not expect. I cannot doubt you thought you withheld your opinions from me under the undecided state you were in, without any intention whatever to annoy me. There is, however, a natural closeness in your disposition, with a reserve towards those who may think they may have some claim to your confidence, probably increased by official habits, which it may perhaps in some cases be worth your inquiring into.' The sentence above about suspense is a key to many misunderstandings of Mr. Gladstone's character. His stouthearted friend Thomas Acland had warned him, for the sake of his personal influence, to be sure to deal with the Jew question on broad grounds, without refining, and without dragging out some recondite view not seen by common men, 'in short, to be _as little as possible like Maurice, and more like the Duke of Wellington_.' 'My speech,' Mr. Gladstone answered, 'was most unsatisfactory in many ways, but I do not believe that it mystified or puzzled anybody.' JEWISH DISABILITIES The following year he received the honour of a D.C.L. degree at Oxford. Mrs. Gladstone was there, he tells his father, and 'was well satisfied with my reception, though it is not to be denied that my vote upon the Jew bill is upon the whole unpalatable there, and they had been provoked by a paragraph in the _Globe_ newspaper stating that I was to have the degree, and that this made it quite clear that the minority was not unfavourable to the Jew bill.' _July 5._--I went off after breakfast to Oxford. Joined the V.-C. and doctors in the hall at Wadham, and went in procession to the Divinity schools provided with a white neckcloth by Sir R. Inglis, who seized me at the station in horror and alarm when he saw me with a black one. In due time we were summoned to the theatre where my degree had been granted with some _non placets_ but with no scrutiny. The scene remarkable to the eye and mind, so pictorial and so national. There was great tumult about me, the hisses being obstinate, and the _fautores_ also very generous. 'Gladstone and the Jew bill' came sometimes from the gallery, sometimes more favouring sounds. II After the whig government was formed in 1846, Mr. Gladstone expressed himself as having little fear that they could do much harm, 'barring church patronage.' He was soon justified in his own eyes in this limitation of his confidence, for the next year Dr. Hampden was made a bishop.[232] This was a rude blow both to the university which had eleven years before pronounced him heretical, and to the bishops who now bitterly and fervidly remonstrated. Grave points of law were raised, but Mr. Gladstone, though warmly reprobating the prime minister's recommendation of a divine so sure to raise the hurricane, took no leading part in the strife that followed. 'Never in my opinion,' he said to his father (Feb. 2, 1848), 'was a firebrand more wantonly and gratuitously cast.' It was an indication the more of a determination to substitute a sort of general religion for the doctrines of the church. The next really marking incident after the secession of Newman was a decision of a court of law, known as the Gorham judgment. This and the preferment of Hampden to his bishopric produced the second great tide of secession. 'Were we together,' Mr. Gladstone writes to Manning at the end of 1849 (December 30), 'I should wish to converse with you from sunrise to sunset on the Gorham case. It is a stupendous issue. Perhaps they will evade it. On abstract grounds this would be still more distasteful than a decision of the state against a catholic doctrine. But what I feel is that as a body we are not ready yet for the last alternatives. More years must elapse from the secession of Newman and the group of secessions which, following or preceding, belonged to it. A more composed and settled state of the public mind in regard to our relations with the church of Rome must supervene. There must be more years of faithful _work_ for the church to point to in argument, and to grow into her habits. And besides all these very needful conditions of preparation for a crisis, I want to see the question more fully answered, What will the state of its own free and good will do, or allow to be done, for the church while yet in alliance with it?' The Gorham case was this: a bishop refused to institute a clergyman to a vicarage in the west of England, on the ground of unsound doctrine upon regeneration by baptism. The clergyman sought a remedy in the ecclesiastical court of Arches. The judge decided against him. The case then came on appeal before the judicial committee of the privy council, and here a majority with the two archbishops as assessors reversed the decision of the court below. The bishop, one of the most combative of the human race, flew to Westminster Hall, tried move upon move in queen's bench, exchequer, common pleas; declared that his archbishop had abused his high commission; and even actually renounced communion with him. But the sons of Zeruiah were too hard. The religious world in both of its two standing camps was convulsed, for if Gorham had lost the day it would or might have meant the expulsion from the establishment of calvinists and evangelicals bag and baggage. 'I am old enough,' said the provost of Oriel, 'to remember three baptismal controversies, and this is the first in which one party has tried to eject the other from the church.' On the other hand the sacramental wing found it intolerable that fundamental doctrines of the church should be settled under the veil of royal supremacy, by a court possessed of no distinctly church character. THE JUDGMENT The judgment was declared on March 8 (1850), and Manning is made to tell a vivid story about going to Mr. Gladstone's house, finding him ill with influenza, sitting down by his bedside and telling him what the court had done; whereon Mr. Gladstone started up, threw out his arms and exclaimed that the church of England was gone unless it relieved itself by some authoritative act. A witty judge once observed in regard to the practice of keeping diaries, that it was wise to keep diary enough at any rate to prove an _alibi_. According to Mr. Gladstone's diary he was not laid up until several days later, when he did see various people, Manning included, in his bedroom. On the black day of the judgment, having dined at the palace the night before, and having friends to dine with him on this night, he records a busy day, including a morning spent after letter-writing, in discussion with Manning, Hope, and others on the Gorham case and its probable consequences. This slip of memory in the cardinal is trivial and not worth mentioning, but perhaps it tends to impair another vivid scene described on the same authority; how thirteen of them met at Mr. Gladstone's house, agreed to a declaration against the judgment, and proceeded to sign; how Mr. Gladstone, standing with his back to the fire, began to demur; and when pressed by Manning to sign, asked him in a low voice whether he thought that as a privy councillor he ought to sign such a protest; and finally how Manning, knowing the pertinacity of his character, turned and said: We will not press him further.[233] This graphic relation looks as if Mr. Gladstone were leaving his friends in the lurch. None of them ever said so, none of them made any signs of thinking so. There is no evidence that Mr. Gladstone ever agreed to the resolution at all, and there is even evidence that points presumptively the other way: that he was taking a line of his own, and arguing tenaciously against all the rest for delay.[234] Mr. Gladstone was often enough in a hurry himself, but there never was a man in this world more resolute against being hurried by other people.[235] EXCITING EFFECT OF THE JUDGMENT We need not, however, argue probabilities. Mr. Gladstone no sooner saw the story than he pronounced it fiction. In a letter to the writer of the book on Cardinal Manning (Jan. 14, 1896) he says:-- I read with surprise Manning's statement (made first after 35 years) that I would not sign the declaration of 1850 because I 'was a privy councillor.' I should not have been more surprised had he written that I told him I could not sign because my name began with G. I had done stronger things than that when I was not only privy councillor but official servant of the crown, nay, I believe cabinet minister. The declaration was liable to _many_ interior objections. Seven out of the thirteen who signed did so without (I believe) any kind of sequel. I wish you to know that I entirely disavow and disclaim Manning's statement as it _stands_. And here I have to ask you to insert two lines in your second or next edition; with the simple statement that I prepared and published with promptitude an elaborate argument to show that the judicial committee was historically unconstitutional, as an organ for the decision of ecclesiastical questions. This declaration was entitled, I think, 'A Letter to the Bishop of London on the Ecclesiastical Supremacy.' If I recollect right, while it dealt little with theology, it was a more pregnant production than the declaration, and it went much nearer the mark. It has been repeatedly published, and is still on sale at Murray's. I am glad to see that Sidney Herbert (a _gentleman_ if ever there was one) also declined to sign. It seems to me _now_, that there is something almost ludicrous in the propounding of such a congeries of statements by such persons as we were; not the more, but certainly not the less, because of being privy councillors. It was a terrible time; aggravated for me by heavy cares and responsibilities of a nature quite extraneous: and far beyond all others by the illness and death of a much-loved child, with great anxieties about another. My recollections of the conversations before the declaration are little but a mass of confusion and bewilderment. I stand only upon what I _did_. No one of us, I think, understood the actual position, not even our lawyers, until Baron Alderson printed an excellent statement on the points raised.[236] III For long the new situation filled his mind. 'The case of the church of England at this moment,' he wrote to Lord Lyttelton, 'is a very dismal one, and almost leaves men to choose between a broken heart and no heart at all. But at present it is all dark or only twilight which rests upon our future.' He busily set down thoughts upon the supremacy. He studied Cawdry's case, and he mastered Lord Coke's view of the law. He feels better pleased with the Reformation in regard to the supremacy; but also much more sensible of the drifting of the church since, away from the range of her constitutional securities; and more than ever convinced how thoroughly false is the present position. As to himself and his own work in life, in reply I suppose to something urged by Manning, he says (April 29, 1850), 'I have two characters to fulfil--that of a lay member of the church, and that of a member of a sort of wreck of a political party. I must not break my understood compact with the last, and forswear my profession, unless and until the necessity has arisen. That necessity will plainly have arisen for me when it shall have become evident that justice cannot, _i.e._, will not, be done by the state to the church.' With boundless exaltation of spirit he expatiated on the arduous and noble task which it was now laid upon the children of the church of England amid trouble, suspense, and it might be even agony to perform. 'Fully believing that the death of the church of England is among the alternative issues of the Gorham case,' he wrote to a clerical friend (April 9), 'I yet also believe that all Christendom and all its history have rarely afforded a nobler opportunity of doing battle for the faith in the church than that now offered to English churchmen. That opportunity is a prize far beyond any with which the days of her prosperity, in any period, can have been adorned.' He does not think (June 1, 1850), that a loftier work was ever committed to men. Such vast interests were at stake, such unbounded prospects open before them. What they wanted was the divine art to draw from present terrible calamities and appalling future prospects the conquering secret to rise through the struggle into something better than historical anglicanism, which essentially depended on conditions that have passed away. 'In my own case,' he says to Manning a little later, 'there is work ready to my hand and much more than enough for its weakness, a great mercy and comfort. But I think I know what my course would be, were there not. It would be to set to work upon the holy task or clearing, opening, and establishing positive truth in the church of England, which is an office doubly blessed, inasmuch as it is both the business of truth, and the laying of firm foundations for future union in Christendom.' If this vision of a dream had ever come to pass, perhaps Europe might have seen the mightiest Christian doctor since Bossuet; and just as Bossuet's struggle was called the grandest spectacle of the seventeenth century, so to many eyes this might have appeared the greatest of the nineteenth. Mr. Gladstone did not see, in truth he never saw, any more than Bossuet saw in his age, that the Time-Spirit was shifting the foundations of the controversy. However that may be, the interesting thing for us in the history of his life is the characteristic blaze of battle that this case now kindled in his breast. VIEW OF THE CRISIS IN THE CHURCH On the eve of his return from Germany in the autumn of 1845, one of his letters to Mrs. Gladstone reveals the pressing intensity of his conviction, deepened by his intercourse with the grave and pious circles at Munich and at Stuttgart, of the supreme interest of spiritual things:-- In my wanderings my thoughts too have had time to travel; and I have had much conversation upon church matters first at Munich and since coming here with Mrs. Craven and some connections of hers staying with her, who are Roman catholics of a high school. All that I can see and learn induces me more and more to feel what a crisis for religion at large is this period of the world's history--how the power of religion and its permanence are bound up with the church--how inestimably precious would be the church's unity, inestimably precious on the one hand, and on the other to human eyes immeasurably remote--lastly how loud, how solemn is the call upon all those who hear and who _can_ obey it, to labour more and more in the spirit of these principles, to give themselves, if it may be, clearly and wholly to that work. It is dangerous to put indefinite thoughts, instincts, longings, into language which is necessarily determinate. I cannot trace the line of my own future life, but I hope and pray it may not always be where it is.... Ireland, Ireland! that cloud in the west, that coming storm, the minister of God's retribution upon cruel and inveterate and but half-atoned injustice! Ireland forces upon us those great social and great religious questions--God grant that we may have courage to look them in the face, and to work through them. Were they over, were the path of the church clear before her, as a body able to take her trial before God and the world upon the performance of her work as His organ for the recovery of our country--how joyfully would I retire from the barren, exhausting strife of merely political contention. I do not think that you would be very sorrowful? As to ambition in its ordinary sense, we are spared the chief part of its temptations. If it has a valuable reward upon earth over and above a good name, it is when a man is enabled to bequeath to his children a high place in the social system of his country. That cannot be our case. The days are gone by when such a thing might have been possible. To leave to Willy a title with its burdens and restraints and disqualifications, but without the material substratum of wealth, and the duties and means of good, as well as the general power attending it, would not I think be acting for him in a wise and loving spirit--assuming, which may be a vain assumption, that the alternative could ever be before us. The fact that in Scotland, a country in which Mr. Gladstone passed so much time and had such lively interests, the members of his own episcopal church were dissenters, was well fitted to hasten the progress of his mind in the liberal direction. Certain it is that in a strongly-written letter to a Scotch bishop at the end of 1851, Mr. Gladstone boldly enlarged upon the doctrine of religious freedom, with a directness that kindled both alarm and indignation among some of his warmest friends.[237] Away, he cried, with the servile doctrine that religion cannot live but by the aid of parliaments. When the state has ceased to bear a definite and full religious character, it is our interest and our duty alike to maintain a full religious freedom. It is this plenary religious freedom that brings out in full vigour the internal energies of each communion. Of all civil calamities the greatest is the mutilation, under the seal of civil authority, of the Christian religion itself. One fine passage in this letter denotes an advance in his political temper, as remarkable as the power of the language in which it finds expression:-- It is a great and noble secret, that of constitutional freedom, which has given to us the largest liberties, with the steadiest throne and the most vigorous executive in Christendom. I confess to my strong faith in the virtue of this principle. I have lived now for many years in the midst of the hottest and noisiest of its workshops, and have seen that amidst the clatter and the din a ceaseless labour is going on; stubborn matter is reduced to obedience, and the brute powers of society like the fire, air, water, and mineral of nature are, with clamour indeed but also with might, educated and shaped into the most refined and regular forms of usefulness for man. I am deeply convinced that among us all systems, whether religious or political, which rest on a principle of absolutism, must of necessity be, not indeed tyrannical, but feeble and ineffective systems; and that methodically to enlist the members of a community, with due regard to their several capacities, in the performance of its public duties, is the way to make that community powerful and healthful, to give a firm seat to its rulers, and to engender a warm and intelligent devotion in those beneath their sway.[238] FOUNDATIONS OF LIBERALISM These were the golden trumpet-notes of a new time. When they readied the ears of old Dr. Routh, as he sat in wig and cassock among his books and manuscripts at Magdalen, revolving nearly a hundred years of mortal life, he exclaimed that he had heard enough to be quite sure that no man holding such opinions as these could ever be a proper member for the university of Oxford. A few months later, it was seen how the learned man found several hundreds of unlearned to agree with him. IV This chapter naturally closes with what was to Mr. Gladstone one of the dire catastrophies of his life. With growing dismay he had seen Manning drawing steadily towards the edge of the cataract. When he took the ominous step of quitting his charge at Lavington, Mr. Gladstone wrote to him from Naples (January 26, 1851): 'Without description from you, I can too well comprehend what you have suffered.... Such griefs ought to be sacred to all men, they must be sacred to me, even did they not touch me sharply with a reflected sorrow. You can do nothing that does not reach me, considering how long you have been a large part both of my actual life and of my hopes and reckonings. Should you do the act which I pray God with my whole soul you may not do, it will not break, however it may impair or strain, the bonds between us.' 'If you go over,' he says, in another letter of the same month, 'I should earnestly pray that you might not be as others who have gone before you, but might carry with you a larger heart and mind, able to raise and keep you above that slavery to a system, that exaggeration of its forms, that disposition to rivet every shackle tighter and to stretch every breach wider, which makes me mournfully feel that the men who have gone from the church of England after being reared in her and by her, are far more keen, and I must add, far more cruel adversaries to her, than were the mass of those whom they joined.' In the case of Hope there had been for some considerable time a lingering sense of change. 'My affection for him, during these later years before his change, was I may almost say intense: there was hardly anything I think which he could have asked me to do, and which I would not have done. But as I saw more and more through the dim light what was to happen, it became more and more like the affection felt for one departed.' Hope, he says, was not one of those shallow souls who think that such a relation can continue after its daily bread has been taken away. At the end of March he enters in his diary: 'Wrote a paper on Manning's question and gave it him. He smote me to the ground by announcing with suppressed emotion that he is now upon the _brink_, and Hope too. Such terrible blows not only overset and oppress but, I fear, demoralise me.' On the same day in April 1851, Manning and Hope were received together into the Roman church. Political separations, though these too have their pangs, must have seemed to Mr. Gladstone trivial indeed, after the tragic severance of such a fellowship as this had been. MANNING AND HOPE GO OVER 'They were my two props,' he wrote in his diary the next day. 'Their going may be to me a sign that my work is gone with them.... One blessing I have: total freedom from doubts. These dismal events have smitten, but not shaken.' The day after that, he made a codicil to his will striking out Hope as executor, and substituting Northcote. Friendship did not die, but only lived 'as it lives between those who inhabit separate worlds.' Communication was not severed; social intercourse was not avoided; and both on occasions in life, the passing by of which, as Hope-Scott said, would be a loss to friendship, and on smaller opportunities, they corresponded in terms of the old affection. _Quis desiderio_ is Mr. Gladstone's docket on one of Hope's letters, and in another (1858) Hope communicates in words of tender feeling the loss of his wife, and the consolatory teachings of the faith that she, like himself, had embraced; and he recalls to Mr. Gladstone that the root of their friendship which struck the deepest was fed by a common interest in religion.[239] In Manning's case the wound cut deeper, and for many years the estrangement was complete.[240] To Wilberforce, the archdeacon, Mr. Gladstone wrote (April 11, 1851):-- I do indeed feel the loss of Manning, if and as far as I am capable of feeling anything. It comes to me cumulated, and doubled, with that of James Hope. Nothing like it can ever happen to me again. Arrived now at middle life, I never _can_ form I suppose with any other two men the habits of communication, counsel, and dependence, in which I have now for from fifteen to eighteen years lived with them both.... My intellect does deliberately reject the grounds on which Manning has proceeded. Indeed they are such as go far to destroy my confidence, which was once and far too long at the highest point, in the healthiness and soundness of his. To show that at any rate this is not from the mere change he has made, I may add, that my conversations with Hope have not left any corresponding impression upon my mind with regard to him. A wider breach was this same year made in his inmost circle. In April of the year before a little daughter, between four and five years old, had died, and was buried at Fasque. The illness was long and painful, and Mr. Gladstone bore his part in the nursing and watching. He was tenderly fond of his little children, and the sorrow had a peculiar bitterness. It was the first time that death entered his married home. When he returned to Fasque in the autumn he found that his father had taken 'a decided step, nay a stride, in old age'; not having lost any of his interest in politics, but grown quite mild. The old man was nearing his eighty-seventh year. 'The very wreck of his powerful and simple nature is full of grandeur.... Mischief is at work upon his brain--that indefatigable brain which has had to stand all the wear and pressure of his long life.' In the spring of 1851 he finds him 'very like a spent cannon-ball, with a great and sometimes almost frightful energy remaining in him: though weak in comparison with what he was, he hits a very hard knock to those who come across him.' When December came, the veteran was taken seriously ill, and the hope disappeared of seeing him even reach his eighty-seventh birthday (Dec. 11). On the 7th he died. As Mr. Gladstone wrote to Phillimore, 'though with little left either of sight or hearing, and only able to walk from one room to another or to his brougham for a short drive, though his memory was gone, his hold upon language even for common purposes imperfect, the reasoning power much decayed, and even his perception of personality rather indistinct, yet so much remained about him as one of the most manful, energetic, affectionate, and simple-hearted among human beings, that he still filled a great space to the eye, mind, and heart, and a great space is accordingly left void by his withdrawal.' 'The death of my father,' Mr. Gladstone wrote to his brother John, 'is the loss of a great object of love, and it is the shattering of a great bond of union. Among few families of five persons will be found differences of character and opinion to the same aggregate amount as among us. We cannot shut our eyes to this fact; by opening them, I think we may the better strive to prevent such differences from begetting estrangement.' FOOTNOTES: [232] See above, p. 167. [233] Purcell, _Manning_, i. pp. 528-33. [234] See J. B. Hope's letter (undated) in Purcell, i. p. 530. [235] On March 13, Hope writes to Mr. Gladstone from 14 Curzon Street:--'Keble and Pusey have been with me to-day, and the latter has suggested some alterations in the resolutions; I have taken upon me to propose a meeting at your house at ¼ before 10 to-morrow morning. If you cannot _or do not wish_ to be present, I do not doubt you will at any rate allow me the use of your rooms.' The meeting seems to have taken place, for the entry on March 14 in Mr. Gladstone's diary is this:--'Hope, Badeley, Talbot, Cavendish, Denison, Dr. Pusey, Keble, Bennett, here from 9¾ to 12 on the draft of the resolutions. Badeley again in the evening. On the whole I resolved to try some immediate effort.' This would appear to be the last meeting, and Manning is not named as present. On the 18th:--'Drs. Mill, Pusey, etc., met here in the evening, I was not with them.' On the same day Mr. Gladstone had written to the Rev. W. Maskell, 'As respects myself, I do not intend to pursue the consideration of them with those who meet to-night, first, because the pressure of other business has become very heavy upon me, and secondly and mainly, because I do not consider that the time for any enunciation of a character pointing to ultimate issues will have arrived until the Gorham judgment shall have taken effect.' No later meeting is ever mentioned. [236] Purcell professed to rectify the matter in the fourth edition, i. p. 536, but the reader is nowhere told that Mr. Gladstone disavowed the original story. [237] _Letter to the Right Rev. William Skinner, Bishop of Aberdeen and Primus, on the functions of laymen in the Church_, reprinted in _Gleanings_, vi. Also _Letter_ to Mr. Gladstone on this letter by Charles Wordsworth, the Warden of Glenalmond. Oxford. J. H. Parker, 1852. [238] _Gleanings_, vi. p. 17. [239] In 1868 Mr. Gladstone urged him to produce an abridged version of Lockhart's _Life of Scott_. Then Hope found that his father-in-law's own abridgment was unknown; and (1871) asks Mr. Gladstone's leave to dedicate a reprint of it to him as 'one among those who think that Scott still deserves to be remembered, not as an author only, but as a noble and vigorous man.' [240] From 1853 to 1861 they did not correspond nor did they even meet. CHAPTER VI NAPLES (_1850-1851_) It would be amusing, if the misfortunes of mankind ever could be so, to hear the pretensions of the government here [Naples] to mildness and clemency, because it does not put men to death, and confines itself to leaving six or seven thousand state prisoners to perish in dungeons. I am ready to believe that the king of Naples is naturally mild and kindly, but he is afraid, and the worst of all tyrannies is the tyranny of cowards.--TOCQUEVILLE [1850]. In the autumn of 1850, with the object of benefiting the eyesight of one of their daughters, the Gladstones made a journey to southern Italy, and an eventful journey it proved. For Italy it was, that now first drew Mr. Gladstone by the native ardour of his humanity, unconsciously and involuntarily, into that great European stream of liberalism which was destined to carry him so far. Two deep principles, sentiments, aspirations, forces, call them what we will, awoke the huge uprisings that shook Europe in 1848--the principle of Liberty, the sentiment of Nationality. Mr. Gladstone, slowly and almost blindly heaving off his shoulders the weight of old conservative tradition, did not at first go beyond liberty, with all that ordered liberty conveys. Nationality penetrated later, and then indeed it penetrated to the heart's core. He went to Naples with no purposes of political propagandism, and his prepossessions were at that time pretty strongly in favour of established governments, either at Naples or anywhere else. The case had doubtless been opened to him by Panizzi--a man as Mr. Gladstone described him, 'of warm, large, and free nature, an accomplished man of letters, and a victim of political persecution, who came to this country a nearly starving refugee.' But Panizzi had certainly made no great revolutionist of him. His opinions, as he told Lord Aberdeen, were the involuntary and unexpected result of his sojourn. He had nothing to do with the subterranean forces at work in the kingdom of the Two Sicilies, in the States of the Church, and in truth all over the Peninsula. The protracted struggle that had begun after the establishment of Austrian domination in the Peninsula in 1815, and was at last to end in the construction of an Italian kingdom--the most wonderful political transformation of the century--seemed after the fatal crisis of Novara (1849) further than ever from a close. Now was the morrow of the vast failures and disenchantments of 1848. Jesuits and absolutists were once more masters, and reaction again alternated with conspiracy, risings, desperate carbonari plots. Mazzini, four years older than Mr. Gladstone, and Cavour, a year his junior, were directing in widely different ways, the one the revolutionary movement of Young Italy, the other the constitutional movement of the Italian Resurrection. The scene presented brutal repression on the one hand; on the other a chaos of republicans and monarchists, unitarians and federalists, frenzied idealists and sedate economists, wild ultras and men of the sober middle course. In the midst was the pope, the august shadow, not long before the centre, now once again the foe, of his countrymen's aspirations after freedom and a purer glimpse of the lights of the sun. The evolution of this extraordinary historic drama, to which passion, genius, hope, contrivance, stratagem, and force contributed alike the highest and the lowest elements in human nature and the growth of states, was to be one of the most sincere of Mr. Gladstone's interests for the rest of his life. SPECTACLE OF MISRULE As we shall see, he was at first and he long remained untouched by the idea of Italian unity and Italy a nation. He met some thirty or more Italian gentlemen in society at Naples, of whom seven or eight only were in any sense liberals, and not one of them a republican. It was now that he made the acquaintance of Lacaita, afterwards so valued a friend of his, and so well known in many circles in England for his geniality, cultivation, and enlightenment. He was the legal adviser to the British embassy; he met Mr. Gladstone constantly; they talked politics and literature day and night, 'under the acacias and palms, between the fountains and statues of the Villa Reale, looking now to the sea, now to the world of fashion in the Corso.' Here Lacaita first opened the traveller's eyes to the condition of things, though he was able to say with literal truth that not a single statement of fact was made upon Lacaita's credit. Mr. Gladstone saw Bourbon absolutism no longer in the decorous hues of conventional diplomacy, but as the black and execrable thing it really was,--'the negation of God erected into a system of government.' Sitting in court for long hours during the trial of Poerio, he listened with as much patience as he could command to the principal crown witness, giving such evidence that the tenth part of what he heard should not only have ended the case, but secured condign punishment for perjury--evidence that a prostitute court found good enough to justify the infliction on Poerio, not long before a minister of the crown, of the dreadful penalty of four-and-twenty years in irons. Mr. Gladstone accurately informed himself of the condition of those who for unproved political offences were in thousands undergoing degrading and murderous penalties. He contrived to visit some of the Neapolitan prisons, another name for the extreme of filth and horror; he saw political prisoners (and political prisoners included a large percentage of the liberal opposition) chained two and two in double irons to common felons; he conversed with Poerio himself in the bagno of Nisida chained in this way; he watched sick prisoners, men almost with death in their faces, toiling upstairs to see the doctors, because the lower regions were too foul and loathsome to allow it to be expected that professional men would enter. Even these inhuman and revolting scenes stirred him less, as it was right they should, than the corruptions of the tribunals, the vindictive treatment for long periods of time of uncondemned and untried men, and all the other proceedings of the government, 'desolating entire classes upon which the life and growth of the nation depend, undermining the foundation of all civil rule.' It was this violation of all law, and of the constitution to which King Ferdinand had solemnly sworn fidelity only a year or two before, that outraged him more than even rigorous sentences and barbarous prison practice. 'Even on the severity of these sentences,' he wrote, 'I would not endeavour to fix attention so much as to draw it off from the great fact of illegality, which seems to me to be the foundation of the Neapolitan system; illegality, the fountain-head of cruelty and baseness and every other vice; illegality which gives a bad conscience, creates fears; those fears lead to tyranny, that tyranny begets resentment, that resentment creates true causes of fear where they were not before; and thus fear is quickened and enhanced, the original vice multiplies itself with fearful speed, and the old crime engenders a necessity for new.'[241] Poerio apprehended that his own case had been made worse by the intervention of Mr. Temple, the British minister and brother of Lord Palmerston; not in the least as blaming him or considering it officious. He adopted the motto, 'to suffer is to do,' '_il patire è anche operare_.' For himself he was not only willing--he rejoiced--to play the martyr's part. I was particularly desirous, wrote Mr. Gladstone in a private memorandum, to have Poerio's opinion on the expediency of making some effort in England to draw general attention to these horrors, and dissociate the conservative party from all suppositions of winking at them; because I had had from a sensible man one strong opinion against such a course. I said to him that in my view only two models could be thought of,--the first, amicable remonstrance through the cabinets, the second public notoriety and shame. That had Lord Aberdeen been in power the first might have been practicable, but that with Lord Palmerston it would not, because of his position relatively to the other cabinets (Yes, he said, Lord Palmerston was _isolato_), not because he would be wanting in the will. Matters standing thus, I saw no way open but that of exposure; and might that possibly exasperate the Neapolitan government, and increase their severity? His reply was, 'As to us, never mind; we can hardly be worse than we are. But think of our country, for which we are most willing to be sacrificed. Exposure will do it good. The present government of Naples rely on the English conservative party. Consequently we were all in horror when Lord Stanley last year carried his motion in the House of Lords. Let there be a voice from that party showing that whatever government be in power in England, no support will be given to such proceedings as these. It will do much to break them down. It will also strengthen the hands of a better and less obdurate class about the court. Even there all are not alike. I know it from observation. These ministers are the extremest of extremes. There are others who would willingly see more moderate means adopted.' On such grounds as these (I do not quote words) he strongly recommended me to _act_. II RETURN TO LONDON Mr. Gladstone reached London on February 26. Phillimore met him at the station with Lord Stanley's letter, of which we shall hear in the next chapter, pressing him to enter the government. 'I was never more struck,' says Phillimore, 'by the earnestness and simplicity of his character. He could speak of nothing so readily as the horrors of the Neapolitan government, of which I verily believe he thought nearly as much as the prospect of his own accession to one of the highest offices of state.' He probably thought not only nearly as much, but infinitely more of those 'scenes fitter for hell than earth,' now many hundred miles away, but still vividly burning in the haunted chambers of his wrath and pity. After rapidly despatching the proposal to join the new cabinet, after making the best he could of the poignant anxieties that were stirred in him by the unmistakeable signs of the approaching secession of Hope and Manning, he sought Lord Aberdeen (March 4), and 'found him as always, satisfactory; kind, just, moderate, humane' (to Mrs. Gladstone, March 4). He had come to London with the intention of obtaining, if possible, Aberdeen's intervention, in preference to any other mode of proceeding,[242] and they agreed that private representation and remonstrance should be tried in the first instance, as less likely than public action by Mr. Gladstone in parliament, to rouse international jealousy abroad, or to turn the odious tragedy into the narrow channels of party at home. Mr. Gladstone, at Lord Aberdeen's desire, was to submit a statement of the case for his consideration and judgment. POSITION OF LORD ABERDEEN This statement, the first memorable Letter to Lord Aberdeen, was ready at the beginning of April. The old minister gave it 'mature consideration' for the best part of a month. His antecedents made him cautious. Mr. Gladstone, ten years later, admitted that Lord Aberdeen's views of Italy did not harmonise with what was his general mode of estimating human action and the world's affairs, and there was a reason for this in his past career. In very early youth he had been called upon to deal with the gigantic questions that laid their mighty weight upon European statesmen at the fall of Napoleon; the natural effect of this close contact with the vast and formidable problems of 1814-5 was to make him regard the state-system then founded as a structure on which only reckless or criminal unwisdom would dare to lay a finger. The fierce storms of 1848 were not calculated to loosen this fixed idea, or to dispose him to any new views of either the relations of Austria to Italy, or of the uncounted mischiefs to the Peninsula of which those relations were the nourishing and maintaining cause. In a debate in the Lords two years before (July 20, 1849), Lord Aberdeen had sharply criticised the British government of the day for doing the very thing officially, which Mr. Gladstone was now bringing moral compulsion on him to attempt unofficially. Lord Palmerston had called attention at Vienna to the crying evils of the government of Naples, and had boldly said that it was little wonder if men groaning for long years under such grievances and seeing no hope of redress, should take up any scheme, however wild, that held out any chance of relief. This and other proceedings indicating unfriendliness to the King of Naples and a veiled sympathy with rebellion shocked Aberdeen as much as Lamartine's trenchant saying that the treaties of Vienna were effete. In attacking Palmerston's foreign policy again in 1850, he protested that we had deeply injured Austria and had represented her operations in Italy in a completely false light. In his speech in the Pacifico debate, he had referred to the Neapolitan government without approval but in guarded phrases, and had urged as against Lord Palmerston that the less they admired Neapolitan institutions and usages, the more careful ought they to be not to impair the application of the sacred principles that govern and harmonise the intercourse between states, from which you never can depart without producing mischiefs a thousand fold greater than any promised advantage. Aberdeen was too upright and deeply humane a man to resist the dreadful evidence that was now forced upon him. Still that evidence plainly shook down his own case of a few months earlier, and this cannot have been pleasing. He felt the truth and the enormity of the indictment laid before him; he saw the prejudice that would inevitably be done to conservatism both at home and on the European continent, by the publication of such an indictment from the lips of such a pleader; and he perceived from Mr. Gladstone's demeanour that the decorous plausibilities of diplomacy would no more hold him back from resolute exposure, than they would put out the fires of Vesuvius or Etna. On May 2 Lord Aberdeen wrote to Schwarzenberg at Vienna, saying that for forty years he had been connected with the Austrian government, and taken a warm interest in the fortunes of the empire; that Mr. Gladstone, one of the most distinguished members of the cabinet of Peel, had been so shocked by what he saw at Naples, that he was resolved to make some public appeal; that to avoid the pain and scandal of a conservative statesman taking such a course, would not his highness use his powerful influence to get done at Naples all that could reasonably be desired? The Austrian minister replied several weeks after (June 30). If he had been invited, he said, officially to interfere he would have declined; as it was, he would bring Mr. Gladstone's statements to the notice of his Sicilian majesty. Meanwhile, at great length, he reminded Lord Aberdeen that a political offender may be the worst of all offenders, and argued that the rigour exercised by England herself in the Ionian Islands, in Ceylon, in respect of Irishmen, and in the recent case of Ernest Jones, showed how careful she should be in taking up abroad the cause of bad men posing as martyrs in the holy cause of liberty. During all these weeks, while Aberdeen was maturely considering, and while Prince Schwarzenberg was making his secretaries hunt up recriminatory cases against England, Mr. Gladstone was growing impatient. Lord Aberdeen begged him to give the Austrian minister a little more time. It was nearly four months since Mr. Gladstone landed at Dover, and every day he thought of Poerio, Settembrini, and the rest, wearing their double chains, subsisting on their foul soup, degraded by forced companionship with criminals, cut off from the light of heaven, and festering in their dungeons. The facts that escaped from him in private conversation seemed to him--so he tells Lacaita--to spread like wildfire from man to man, exciting the liveliest interest, and extending to the highest persons in the land. He waited a fortnight more, then at the beginning of July he launched his thunderbolt, publishing his Letter to Lord Aberdeen, followed by a second explanation and enlargement a fortnight later.[243] He did not obtain formal leave from Lord Aberdeen for the publication, but from their conversation took it for granted. NEAPOLITAN LETTERS PUBLISHED The sensation was profound, and not in England only. The Letters were translated into various tongues and had a large circulation. The Society of the Friends of Italy in London, the disciples of Mazzini (and a high-hearted band they were), besought him to become a member. Exiles wrote him letters of gratitude and hope, with all the moving accent of revolutionary illusion. Italian women composed fervid odes in fire and tears to the '_generoso britanno_,' the '_magnanimo cor_,' the '_difensore d'un popolo gemente_.' The press in this country took the matter up with the warmth that might have been expected. The character and the politics of the accuser added invincible force to his accusations, and for the first time in his life Mr. Gladstone found himself vehemently applauded in liberal prints. Even the contemporary excitement of English public feeling against the Roman catholic church fed the flame. It was pointed out that the King of Naples was the bosom friend of the pope, and that the infernal system described by Mr. Gladstone was that which the Roman clergy regarded as normal and complete.[244] Mr. Gladstone had denounced as one of the most detestable books he ever read a certain catechism used in the Neapolitan schools. Why then, cried the _Times_, does he omit all comment on the church which is the main and direct agent in this atrocious instruction? The clergy had either basely accepted from the government doctrines that they were bound to abhor, or else these doctrines were their own. And so things glided easily round to Dr. Cullen and the Irish education question. This line was none the less natural from the fact that the editor of the _Univers_, the chief catholic organ in France, made himself the foremost champion of the Neapolitan policy. The Letters delighted the Paris Reds. They regarded their own epithets as insipid by comparison with the ferocious adjectives of the English conservative. On the other hand, an English gentleman was blackballed at one of the fashionable clubs in Paris for no better reason than that he bore the name of Gladstone. For European conservatives read the letters with disgust and apprehension. People like Madame de Lieven pronounced Mr. Gladstone the dupe of men less honest than himself, and declared that he had injured the good cause and discredited his own fame, besides doing Lord Aberdeen the wrong of setting his name at the head of a detestable libel. The illustrious Guizot wrote Mr. Gladstone a long letter expressing, with much courtesy and kindness, his regret at the publication. Nothing is left in Italy, said Guizot, between the terrors of governments attacked in their very existence and the fury of the beaten revolutionists with hopes more alert than ever for destruction and chaos. The King of Naples on one side, Mazzini on the other; such, said Guizot, is Italy. Between the King of Naples and Mazzini, he for one did not hesitate. This was Mr. Gladstone's first contact with the European party of order in the middle of the century. Guizot was a great man, but '48 had perverted his generalising intellect, and everywhere his jaundiced vision perceived in progress a struggle for life and death with 'the revolutionary spirit, blind, chimerical, insatiate, impracticable.' He avowed his own failure when he was at the head of the French government, to induce the rulers of Italy to make reforms; and now the answer of Schwarzenberg to Lord Aberdeen, as well as the official communications from Naples, showed that like Guizot's French policy the Austrian remedy was moonshine. Perhaps discomposed by the reproaches of reactionary friends abroad, Lord Aberdeen thought he had some reason to complain of the publication. It is not easy to see why. Mr. Gladstone from the first insisted that if private remonstrance did not work 'without elusion or delay,' he would make a public appeal. In transmitting the first letter, he described in very specific terms his idea that a short time would suffice to show whether the private method could be relied upon.[245] The attitude of the minister at Vienna, of Fortunato at Naples, and of Castelcicala in London, discovered even to Aberdeen himself how little reasonable hope there was of anything being done; elusion and delay was all that he could expect. He was forced to give entire credit to Mr. Gladstone's horrible story, and was as far as possible from thinking it a detestable libel. He never denied the foundation of the case, or the actual state of the abominable facts. Schwarzenberg never consented to comply with his wishes even when writing before the publication. How then could Aberdeen expect that Mr. Gladstone should abandon the set and avowed purpose with which he had come flaming and resolved to England? SENSATION IN EUROPE It was exactly because the party with which Mr. Gladstone was allied had made itself the supporter of established governments throughout Europe, that in his eyes that party became specially responsible for not passing by in silence any course of conduct, even in a foreign country, flagrantly at variance with right.[246] And what was there, when at last they arrived, in Prince Schwarzenberg's idle dissertations and recriminations, winding up with a still more idle sentence about bringing the charges under the notice of the Neapolitan government, that should induce Mr. Gladstone to abandon his purpose? He had something else to think of than the scandal to the reactionaries of Europe. 'I wish it were in your power,' he writes to Lacaita in May, 'to assure any of those directly interested, in my name, that I am not unfaithful to them, and will use every means in my power; feeble they are, and I lament it; but God is strong and is just and good; and the issue is in His hands.' That is what he was thinking of. When he talked of 'the sacred purposes of humanity' it was not artificial claptrap in a protocol.[247] 'When I consider,' Mr. Gladstone wrote to Lord Aberdeen, 'that Prince Schwarzenberg really knew the state of things at Naples well enough independently of me, and then ask myself why did he wait seven weeks before acknowledging a letter relating to the intense sufferings of human beings which were going on day by day and hour by hour, while his people were concocting all that trash about Frost and Ernest Jones and O'Brien, I cannot say that I think the spirit of the letter was creditable to him, or very promising as regards these people.' The Neapolitan government entered the field with a formal reply point by point, and Mr. Gladstone met them with a point by point rejoinder. The matter did not rest there. Soon after his arrival at home, he had had some conversation with John Russell, Palmerston, and other members of the government. They were much interested and not at all incredulous. Lord Palmerston's brother kept him too well informed about the state of things there for him to be sceptical. 'Gladstone and Molesworth,' wrote Palmerston, 'say that they were wrong last year in their attacks on my foreign policy, but they did not know the truth.'[248] Lord Palmerston directed copies of Mr. Gladstone's Letters to be sent to the British representatives in all the courts of Europe, with instructions to give a copy to each government. The Neapolitan envoy in London in his turn requested him also to send fifteen copies of the pamphlet that had been got up on the other side. Palmerston promptly, and in his most characteristic style, vindicated Mr. Gladstone against the charges of overstatement and hostile intention; warned the Neapolitan government of the violent revolution that long-continued and widespread injustice would assuredly bring upon them; hoped that they might have set to work to correct the manifold and grave abuses to which their attention had been drawn; and flatly refused to have anything to do with an official pamphlet 'consisting of a flimsy tissue of bare assertions and reckless denials, mixed up with coarse ribaldry and commonplace abuse.' This was the kind of thing that gave to Lord Palmerston the best of his power over the people of England. ENERGETIC SYMPATHY OF PALMERSTON In the House of Commons he spoke with no less warmth. Though he had not felt it his duty, he said, to make representations at Naples on a matter relating to internal affairs, he thought Mr. Gladstone had done himself great honour. Instead of seeking amusements, diving into volcanoes and exploring excavated cities, he had visited prisons, descended into dungeons, examined cases of the victims of illegality and injustice, and had then sought to rouse the public opinion of Europe. It was because he concurred in this opinion that he had circulated the pamphlet, in the hope that the European courts might use their influence.[249] As Lord Aberdeen told Madame de Lieven, Mr. Gladstone's pamphlet by the extraordinary sensation it had created among men of all parties had given a great practical triumph to Palmerston and the foreign office. The immediate effect of Mr. Gladstone's appeal was an aggravation of prison rigour. Panizzi was convinced that the king did not know of all the iniquities exposed by Mr. Gladstone. At the close of 1851 he obtained an interview with Ferdinand, and for twenty minutes spoke of Poerio, Settembrini and the condition of the prisons. The king suddenly cut short the interview, saying, _Addio, terribile Panizzi_.[250] Faint streaks of light from the outside world pierced the gloom of the dungeons. As time went on, a lady contrived to smuggle in a few pages of Mr. Gladstone's first Letter; and in 1854 the martyrs heard vaguely of the action of Cavour. But it was not until 1859 that the tyrant, fearing the cry of horror that would go up in Europe if Poerio should die in chains, or worse than death, should go mad, commuted prison to perpetual exile,[251] and sixty-six of them were embarked for America. At Lisbon they were transferred to an American ship; the captain, either intimidated or bribed, put in at Queenstown. 'In setting foot on this free soil,' Poerio wrote to Mr. Gladstone from the Irish haven (March 12, 1859), 'the first need of my heart was to seek news of you.' Communications were speedily opened. The Italians made their way to Bristol, where they were received with sympathy and applause by the population. The deliverance of their country was close at hand. Not now, nor for many years to come, did Mr. Gladstone grasp the idea of Italian unity. It was impossible for him to ignore, but he did undoubtedly set aside, the fact that every shade and section of Italian liberalism from Farini on the right, to Mazzini on the furthest left, insisted on treating Italy as a political integer, and placed the independence of Italy and the expulsion of Austria from Italian soil as the first and fundamental article in the creed of reform. Like most of the English friends of the Italian cause at this time, except the small but earnest group who rallied round the powerful moral genius of Mazzini, he thought only of local freedom and local reforms. 'The purely abstract idea of Italian nationality,' said Mr. Gladstone at this time, 'makes little impression and finds limited sympathy among ourselves.' 'I am certain,' he wrote to Panizzi (June 21, 1851), 'that the Italian habit of preaching unity and nationality in preference to showing grievances produces a revulsion here; for if there are two things on earth that John Bull hates, they are an abstract proposition and the pope.' 'You need not be afraid, I think,' he told Lord Aberdeen (December 1, 1851), 'of Mazzinism from me, still less of Kossuth-ism, which means the other _plus_ imposture, Lord Palmerston, and his nationalities.' But then in 1854 Manin came to England, and failed to persuade even Lord Palmerston that the unity of Italy was the only clue to her freedom.[252] The Russian war made it inconvenient to quarrel with Austria about Italy. With Mr. Gladstone he made more way. 'Seven to breakfast to meet Manin,' says the diary; 'he too is wild.' Not too wild, however, to work conversion on his host. 'It was my privilege,' Mr. Gladstone afterwards wrote, 'to welcome Manin in London in 1854, when I had long been anxious for reform in Italy, and it was from him that, in common with some other Englishmen, I had my first lessons upon Italian unity as the indispensable basis of all effectual reform under the peculiar circumstances of that country.'[253] Yet the page of Dante holds the lesson. III THE TEMPORAL POWER On one important element in the complex Italian case at this time, Mr. Gladstone gained a clear view. Some things I have learned in Italy, he wrote to Manning (_January 26, 1851_), that I did not know before, one in particular. The temporal power of the pope, that great, wonderful, and ancient erection, is _gone_. The problem has been worked out--the ground is mined--the train is laid--a foreign force, in its nature transitory, alone stays the hand of those who would complete the process by applying the match. This seems, rather than is, a digression. When that event comes, it will bring about a great shifting of parts--much super-and much subter-position. God grant it may be for good. I desire it, because I see plainly that justice requires it. Not out of malice to the popedom; for I cannot at this moment dare to answer with a confident affirmative, the question, a very solemn one--Ten, twenty, fifty years hence, will there be any other body in western Christendom witnessing for fixed dogmatic truth? With all my heart I wish it well (though perhaps not wholly what the consistory might think agreed with the meaning of the term)--it would be to me a joyous day in which I should see it really doing well. Various ideas of this kind set him to work on the large and curious enterprise, long since forgotten, of translating Farini's volumes on the Roman State from 1815 down to 1850. According to the entries in his diary he began and finished the translation of a large portion of the book at Naples in 1850--dictating and writing almost daily. Three of the four volumes of this English translation were done with extraordinary speed by Mr. Gladstone's own hand, and the fourth was done under his direction.[254] His object was, without any reference to Italian unity, to give an illustration of the actual working of the temporal power in its latest history. It is easy to understand how the theme fitted in with the widest topics of his life; the nature of theocratic government; the possibility (to borrow Cavour's famous phrase) of a free church in a free state; and above all,--as he says to Manning now, and said to all the world twenty years later in the day of the Vatican decrees,--the mischiefs done to the cause of what he took for saving truth by evil-doing in the heart and centre of the most powerful of all the churches. His translation of Farini, followed by his article on the same subject in the _Edinburgh_ in 1852, was his first blast against 'the covetous, domineering, implacable policy represented in the term Ultramontanism; the winding up higher and higher, tighter and tighter, of the hierarchical spirit, in total disregard of those elements by which it ought to be checked and balanced; and an unceasing, covert, smouldering war against human freedom, even in its most modest and retiring forms of private life and of the individual conscience.' With an energy not unworthy of Burke at his fiercest, he denounces the fallen and impotent regality of the popes as temporal sovereigns. 'A monarchy sustained by foreign armies, smitten with the curse of social barrenness, unable to strike root downward or bear fruit upward, the sun, the air, the rain soliciting in vain its sapless and rotten boughs--such a monarchy, even were it not a monarchy of priests, and tenfold more because it is one, stands out a foul blot upon the face of creation, an offence to Christendom and to mankind.'[255] As we shall soon see, he was just as wrathful, just as impassioned and as eloquent, when, in a memorable case in his own country, the temporal power bethought itself of a bill for meddling with the rights of a Roman voluntary church. FOOTNOTES: [241] For the two _Letters to Lord Aberdeen_, see _Gleanings_, iv. [242] There was a slight discrepancy between the two on this point, Mr. Gladstone describing the position as above, Aberdeen believing that it was by his persuasion that Mr. Gladstone dropped his intention of instant publicity. Probably the latter used such urgent language about an appeal to the public opinion of England and Europe, that Lord Aberdeen supposed it to be an immediate and not an ulterior resort. Aberdeen to Castelcicala, September 15, 1851, and Mr. Gladstone to Aberdeen, October 3. [243] The mere announcement caused such a demand that a second edition was required almost before the first was published. [244] _Wesleyan Methodist Magazine_, October 1851. _Protestant Magazine_, September 1851. [245] Gladstone to Lord Aberdeen, September 16, 1851. [246] Mr. Gladstone in an undated draft letter to Castelcicala. [247] The one point on which Lord Aberdeen had a right to complain was that Mr. Gladstone did not take his advice. As the point revives in Lord Stanmore's excellent life of his father, it may be worth while to reproduce two further passages from Mr. Gladstone's letter to Lord Aberdeen of July 7, 1851. Before publishing the second of the two Letters, he wrote to Lord Aberdeen: 'I ought perhaps to have asked your formal permission for the act of publication; but _I thought that I distinctly inferred it from a recent conversation with you as to the mode of proceeding_'--(Mr. Gladstone to Lord Aberdeen, July 7, 1851). Then he proceeds as to the new supplementary publication: 'If it be disagreeable to you in any manner to be the recipient of such sad communications, or if you think it better for any other reason, I would put the further matter into another form.' In answer to this, Lord Aberdeen seems not to have done any more to refuse leave to associate his name with the second Letter, than he had done to withdraw the assumed leave for the association of his name with the first. [248] Ashley, _Palmerston_, ii. p. 179. [249] August 7, 1851. _Hansard_, cxv. p. 1949. [250] Fagan's _Life of Panizzi_, ii. pp. 102-3. [251] On the share of Mr. Gladstone's Letters in leading indirectly to this decision, see the address of Baldacchini, _Della Vita e de' Tempi di Carlo Poerio_ (1867), p. 58. [252] _Gleanings_, iv. pp. 188, 195. Trans. of Farini, pref. p. ix. [253] To Dr. Errera, author of _A Life of Manin_, Sept. 28, 1872. For Manin's account, see his _Life_, by Henri Martin, p. 377. [254] The first two volumes were published by Mr. Murray in 1852, and the last two in 1854. '_June 17, 1851._--Got my first copies of Farini. Sent No. 1 to the Prince; and wrote with sad feelings in those for Hope and Manning.'--_Diary._ [255] _Gleanings_, iv. pp. 160, 176. CHAPTER VII RELIGIOUS TORNADO--PEELITE DIFFICULTIES (_1851-1852_) I am always disposed to view with regret the rupture of party ties--my disposition is rather to maintain them. I confess I look, if not with suspicion, at least with disapprobation on any one who is disposed to treat party connections as matters of small importance. My opinion is that party ties closely appertain to those principles of confidence which we entertain for the House of Commons.--GLADSTONE (1852). As we have seen, on the morning of his arrival from his Italian journey (February 26, 1851) Mr. Gladstone found that he was urgently required to meet Lord Stanley. Mortified by more than one repulse at the opening of the session, the whigs had resigned. The Queen sent for the protectionist leader. Stanley said that he was not then prepared to form a government, but that if other combinations failed, he would make the attempt. Lord John Russell was once more summoned to the palace, this time along with Aberdeen and Graham--the first move in a critical march towards the fated coalition between whigs and Peelites. The negotiation broke off on the No Popery bill; Lord John was committed to it, the other two strongly disapproved. The Queen next wished Aberdeen to undertake the task. Apparently not without some lingering doubts, he declined on the good ground that the House of Commons would not stand his attitude on papal aggression.[256] Then according to promise Lord Stanley tried his hand. Proceedings were suspended for some days until Mr. Gladstone should be on the ground. He no sooner reached Carlton Gardens, than Lord Lincoln arrived, eager to dissuade him from accepting office. Before the discussion had gone far, the tory whip hurried in from Stanley, begging for an immediate visit. I promised, says Mr. Gladstone, to go directly after seeing Lord Aberdeen. But he came back with a fresh message to go at once, and _hear_ what Stanley had to say. I did not like to stickle, and went. He told me his object was that I should take office with him--_any_ office, subject to the reservation that the foreign department was offered to Canning, but if he declined it was open to me, along with others of which he named the colonial office and the board of trade. Nothing was said of the leadership of the House of Commons, but his anxiety was evident to have any occupant but one for the foreign office. I told him, I should ask no questions and make no remark on these points, as none of them would constitute a difficulty with me, provided no preliminary obstacle were found to intervene. Stanley then said that he proposed to maintain the system of free trade generally, but to put a duty of five or six shillings on corn. I heard him pretty much in silence, but with an intense sense of relief; feeling that if he had put protection in abeyance, I might have had a most difficult question to decide, whereas now I had no question at all. I thought, however, it might be well that I should still see Lord Aberdeen before giving him an answer; and told him I would do so. I asked him also what was his intention with respect to papal aggression. He said that this measure was hasty and intemperate as well as ineffective; and that he thought something much better might result from a comprehensive and deliberate inquiry. I told him I was utterly against all penal legislation and against the ministerial bill, but that I did not on principle object to inquiry; that, on general as well as on personal grounds, I wished well to his undertakings; and that I would see Lord Aberdeen, but that what he had told me about corn constituted, I must not conceal from him, 'an enormous difficulty.' I used this expression for the purpose of preparing him to receive the answer it was plain I must give; he told me his persevering would probably depend on me. DECLINES OFFICE Mr. Gladstone next hastened to Lord Aberdeen, and learned what had been going on during his absence abroad. He learned also the clear opinions held by Aberdeen and Graham against No Popery legislation, and noticed it as remarkable that so many minds should arrive independently at the same conclusion on a new question, and in opposition to the overwhelming majority. 'I then,' he continues, 'went on to the levee, saw Lord Normanby and others, and began to bruit abroad the fame of the Neapolitan government. Immediately after leaving the levee (where I also saw Canning, told him what I meant to do, and gathered that he would do the like), I changed my clothes and went to give Lord Stanley my answer, at which he did not show the least surprise. He said he would still persevere, though with little hope. I think I told him it seemed to me he ought to do so. I was not five minutes with him this second time.'[257] The protectionists having failed, and the Peelites standing aside, the whigs came back, most of them well aware that they could not go on for long. The events of the late crisis had given Mr. Gladstone the hope that Graham would effectively place himself at the head of the Peelites, and that they would now at length begin to take an independent course of their own. 'But it soon appeared that, unconsciously I think more than consciously, he is set upon the object of avoiding the responsibility either of taking the government with the Peel squadron, or of letting in Stanley and his friends.' Here was the weak point in a strong and capable character. When Graham died ten years after this (1861), Mr. Gladstone wrote to a friend, 'On administrative questions, for the last twenty years and more, I had more spontaneous recourse to him for advice, than to all other colleagues together.' In some of the foundations of character no two men could be more unlike. One of his closest allies talks to Graham of 'your sombre temperament.' 'My forebodings are always gloomy,' says Graham himself; 'I shudder on the brink of the torrent.' All accounts agree that he was a good counsellor in cabinet, a first-rate manager of business, a good if rather pompous speaker, admirably loyal and single-minded, but half-ruined by intense timidity. I have heard nobody use warmer language of commendation about him than Mr. Bright. But nature had not made him for a post of chief command. It by and by appeared that the Duke of Newcastle, known to us hitherto as Lord Lincoln, coveted the post of leader, but Mr. Gladstone thought that on every ground Lord Aberdeen was the person entitled to hold it. 'I made,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'my views distinctly known to the duke. He took no offence. I do not know what communications he may have held with others. But the upshot was that Lord Aberdeen became our leader. And this result was obtained without any shock or conflict.'[258] II BILL AGAINST ECCLESIASTICAL TITLES In the autumn of 1850 the people of this country were frightened out of their senses by a document from the Vatican, dividing England into dioceses bearing territorial titles and appointing Cardinal Wiseman to be Archbishop of Westminster. The uproar was tremendous. Lord John Russell cast fuel upon the flame in a perverse letter to the Bishop of Durham (Nov. 4, 1850). In this unhappy document he accepted the description of the aggression of the pope upon our protestantism as insolent and insidious, declared his indignation to be greater even than his alarm, and even his alarm at the aggressions of a foreign sovereign to be less than at the conduct of unworthy sons of the church of England within her own gates. He wound up by declaring that the great mass of the nation looked with contempt upon the mummeries of superstition. Justified indeed was Bright's stern rebuke to a prime minister of the Queen who thus allowed himself to offend and to indict eight millions of his countrymen, recklessly to create fresh discords between the Irish and English nations, and to perpetuate animosities that the last five-and-twenty years had done so much to assuage. Having thus precipitately committed himself, the minister was forced to legislate. 'I suspect,' wrote Mr. Gladstone to his great friend, Sir Walter James, 'John Russell has more rocks and breakers ahead than he reckoned upon when he dipped his pen in gall to smite first the pope, but most those who not being papists are such traitors and fools as really to mean something when they say, "I believe in one Holy Catholic Church."' There was some division of opinion in the cabinet,[259] but a bill was settled, and the temper of the times may be gauged by the fact that leave to introduce it was given by the overwhelming majority of 395 votes to 63. In his own language, Mr. Gladstone lamented and disapproved of the pope's proceeding extremely, and had taken care to say so in parliament two and a half years before, when 'Lord John Russell, if he had chosen, could have stopped it; but the government and the press were alike silent at that period.'[260] His attitude is succinctly described in a letter to Greswell, his Oxford chairman, in 1852: 'Do not let it be asserted without contradiction that I ever felt or counselled indifference in regard to the division of England into Romish dioceses. So far is this from being the truth that shortly after I was elected, _when the government were encouraging the pope to proceed_, and when there was yet time to stop the measure (which I deplore sincerely) by amicable means, I took the opportunity in the House (as did Sir R. Inglis, I _think_ a little later), of trying to draw attention to it. But it was nobody's game then, and the subject fell to the ground. Amicable prevention I desired; spiritual and ecclesiastical resistance I heartily approved; but while I say this, I cannot recede from one inch of the ground I took in opposing the bill, and I would far rather quit parliament for ever than not have voted against so pernicious a measure.' Other matters, as we have seen, brought on a ministerial crisis, the bill was stopped, and after the crisis was over the measure came to life again with changes making it still more futile for its ends. The Peelites while, like Mr. Bright, 'despising and loathing' the language of the Vatican and the Flaminian Gate, had all of them without concert taken this outburst of prejudice and passion at its right value, and all resolved to resist legislation. How, they asked, could you tolerate the Roman catholic religion, if you would not tolerate its tenet of the ecclesiastical supremacy of the pope; and what sort of toleration of such a tenet would that be, which forbade the pope to name ecclesiastics to exercise the spiritual authority exercised in any other voluntary episcopal church, Scottish, colonial, or another? Why was it more of a usurpation for the pope to make a new Archbishop of Westminster, than to administer London by the old form of vicars apostolic? Was not the action of the pope, after all, a secondary consideration, and the frenzy really and in essence an explosion of popular wrath against the Puseyites? What was to be thought of a prime minister who, at such risk to the public peace, tried to turn the ferment to account for the sake of strengthening his tottering government? To all this there was no rational reply; and even the editor of a powerful newspaper that every morning blew up the coals, admitted to Greville that 'he thought the whole thing humbug and a pack of nonsense!'[261] GREAT SPEECH AGAINST THE BILL The debate on the second reading was marked by a little brutality and much sanctimony. Mr. Gladstone (March 25, 1851) spoke to a House practically almost solid against him. Yet his superb resources as an orator, his transparent depth of conviction, the unmistakeable proofs that his whole heart was in the matter, mastered his audience and made the best of them in their hearts ashamed. He talked of Boniface VIII. and Honorius IX.; he pursued a long and close historical demonstration of the earnest desire of the lay catholics of this country for diocesan bishops as against vicars apostolic; he moved among bulls and rescripts, briefs and pastorals and canon law, with as much ease as if he had been arguing about taxes and tariffs. Through it all the House watched and listened in enchantment, as to a magnificent tragedian playing a noble part in a foreign tongue. They did not apprehend every point, nor were they converted, but they felt a man with the orator's quality of taking fire and kindling fire at a moral idea. They felt his command of the whole stock of fact and of principle belonging to his topics, as with the air and the power of a heroic master he cleared the way before him towards his purpose. Along with complete grasp of details, went grasp of some of the most important truths in the policy of a modern state. He clearly perceived the very relevant fact, so often overlooked by advocates of the free church in a free state, that 'there is no religious body in the world where religious offices do not in a certain degree conjoin with temporal incidents.' But this did not affect the power of his stroke, as he insisted on respect for the frontier--no scientific frontier--between temporal and spiritual. 'You speak of the progress of the Roman catholic religion, and you pretend to meet that progress by a measure false in principle as it is ludicrous in extent. You must meet the progress of that spiritual system by the progress of another; you can never do it by penal enactments. Here, once for all, I enter my most solemn, earnest, and deliberate protest against all attempts to meet the spiritual dangers of our church by temporal legislation of a penal character.' The whole speech is in all its elements and aspects one of the great orator's three or four most conspicuous masterpieces, and the reader would not forgive me if I failed to transcribe its resplendent close. He went back to a passage of Lord John Russell's on the Maynooth bill of 1845. 'I never heard,' said Mr. Gladstone, 'a more impressive passage delivered by any statesman at any time in this House.' The noble lord referred to some beautiful and touching lines of Virgil, which the house will not regret to hear:-- 'Scilicet et tempus veniet, cum finibus illis Agricola, incurvo terram molitus aratro, Exesa inveniet scabra rubigine pila; Aut gravibus rastris galeas pulsabit inanes, Grandiaque effossis mirabitur ossa sepulcris.'[262] And he said, upon those scenes where battles have been fought, the hand of nature effaces the traces of the wrath of man, and the cultivator of the soil in following times finds the rusted arms, and looks upon them with calm and joy, as the memorials of forgotten strife, and as quickening his sense of the blessings of his peaceful occupation. The noble lord went on to say, in reference to the powerful opposition then offered to the bill for the endowment of Maynooth, that it seems as if upon the questions of religious freedom, our strife is never to cease, and our arms are never to rust. Would any man, who heard the noble lord deliver these impressive sentiments, have believed not only that the strife with respect to religious liberty was to be revived with a greater degree of acerbity, in the year 1851, but that the noble lord himself was to be a main agent in its revival--that his was to be the head that was to wear the helmet, and his the hand that was to grasp the spear? My conviction is, that this great subject of religious freedom is not to be dealt with, as one of the ordinary matters in which you may, with safety or with honour, do to-day and undo to-morrow. This great people, whom we have the honour to represent, moves slowly in politics and legislation; but, although it moves slowly, it moves steadily. The principle of religious freedom, its adaptation to our modern state, and its compatibility with ancient institutions, was a principle which you did not adopt in haste. It was a principle well tried in struggle and conflict. It was a principle which gained the assent of one public man after another. It was a principle which ultimately triumphed, after you had spent upon it half a century of agonising struggle. And now what are you going to do? You have arrived at the division of the century. Are you going to repeat Penelope's process, but without the purpose of Penelope? Are you going to spend the decay and the dusk of the nineteenth century in undoing the great work which with so much pain and difficulty your greatest men have been achieving during its daybreak and its youth? Surely not. Oh, recollect the functions you have to perform in the face of the world. Recollect that Europe and the whole of the civilised world look to England at this moment not less, no, but even more than ever they looked to her before, as the mistress and guide of nations, in regard to the great work of civil legislation. And what is it they chiefly admire in England? It is not the rapidity with which you form constitutions and broach abstract theories. On the contrary; they know that nothing is so distasteful to you as abstract theories, and that you are proverbial for resisting what is new until you are well assured by gradual effort, by progressive trials, and beneficial tendency. But they know that when you make a step forward you keep it. They know that there is reality and honesty, strength and substance, about your proceedings. They know that you are not a monarchy to-day, a republic to-morrow, and a military despotism the day after. They know that you have been happily preserved from irrational vicissitudes that have marked the career of the greatest and noblest among the neighbouring nations. Your fathers and yourselves have earned this brilliant character for England. Do not forfeit it. Do not allow it to be tarnished or impaired. Show, I beseech you--have the courage to show the pope of Rome, and his cardinals, and his church, that England too, as well as Rome, has her _semper eadem_; and that when she has once adopted some great principle of legislation, which is destined to influence the national character, to draw the dividing lines of her policy for ages to come, and to affect the whole nature of her influence and her standing among the nations of the world--show that when she has done this slowly, and done it deliberately, she has done it once for all; and that she will then no more retrace her steps than the river that bathes this giant city can flow back upon its source. The character of England is in our hands. Let us feel the responsibility that belongs to us, and let us rely on it; if to-day we make this step backwards, it is one which hereafter we shall have to retrace with pain. We cannot change the profound and resistless tendencies of the age towards religious liberty. It is our business to guide and to control their application; do this you may, but to endeavour to turn them backwards is the sport of children, done by the hands of men, and every effort you may make in that direction will recoil upon you in disaster and disgrace. The noble lord appealed to gentlemen who sit behind me, in the names of Hampden and Pym. I have great reverence for these in one portion at least of their political career, because they were men energetically engaged in resisting oppression. But I would rather have heard Hampden and Pym quoted on any other subject than one which relates to the mode of legislation or the policy to be adopted with our Roman catholic fellow-citizens, because, if there was one blot on their escutcheon, if there was one painful--I would almost say odious--feature in the character of the party among whom they were the most distinguished chiefs, it was the bitter and ferocious intolerance which in them became the more powerful because it was directed against the Roman catholics alone. I would appeal in other names to gentlemen who sit on this side of the House. If Hampden and Pym were friends of freedom, so were Clarendon and Newcastle, so were the gentlemen who sustained the principles of loyalty.... They were not always seeking to tighten the chains and deepen the brand. Their disposition was to relax the severity of the law, and attract the affections of their Roman catholic fellow-subjects to the constitution by treating them as brethren.... We are a minority insignificant in point of numbers. We are more insignificant still, because we are but knots and groups of two or three, we have no power of cohesion, no ordinary bond of union. What is it that binds us together against you, but the conviction that we have on our side the principle of justice--the conviction that we shall soon have on our side the strength of public opinion (_oh, oh!_). I am sure I have not wished to say a syllable that would wound the feelings of any man, and if in the warmth of argument such expressions should have escaped me, I wish them unsaid. But above all we are sustained by the sense of justice which we feel belongs to the cause we are defending; and we are, I trust, well determined to follow that bright star of justice, beaming from the heavens, whithersoever it may lead. All this was of no avail, just as the same arguments and temper on two other occasions of the same eternal theme in his life,[263] were to be of no avail. Disraeli spoke strongly against the line taken by the Peelites. The second reading was carried by 438 against 95, one-third even of this minority being Irish catholics, and the rest mainly Peelites, 'a limited but accomplished school,' as Disraeli styled them. Hume asked Mr. Gladstone for his speech for publication to circulate among the dissenters who, he said, know nothing about religious liberty. It was something, however, to find Mr. Gladstone, the greatest living churchman, and Bright, the greatest living nonconformist, voting in the same lobby. The fight was stiff, and was kept up until the end of the summer. The weapon that had been forged in this blazing furnace by these clumsy armourers proved blunt and worthless; the law was from the first a dead letter, and it was struck out of the statute book in 1871 in Mr. Gladstone's own administration.[264] III FALL OF THE RUSSELL GOVERNMENT In the autumn (1851) a committee of the whig cabinet, now reinforced by the admission for the first time of Lord Granville, was named to prepare a reform bill. Palmerston, no friend to reform, fell into restive courses that finally upset the coach. The cabinet, early in November, settled that he should not receive Kossuth, and he complied; but he received a public deputation and an address complimenting him for his exertions on Kossuth's behalf. The court at this proceeding took lively offence, and the Queen requested the prime minister to ascertain the opinion of the cabinet upon it. Such an appeal by the sovereign from the minister to the cabinet was felt by them to be unconstitutional, and though they did not conceal from Palmerston their general dissatisfaction, they declined to adopt any resolution. Before the year ended Palmerston persisted in taking an unauthorised line of his own upon Napoleon's _coup d'état_ (this time for once not on the side of freedom against despotism), and Lord John closed a correspondence between them by telling him that he could not advise the Queen to leave the seals of the foreign department any longer in his hands. This dismissal of Palmerston introduced a new element of disruption and confusion, for the fallen minister had plenty of friends. Lord Lansdowne was very uneasy about reform, and talked ominously about preferring to be a supporter rather than a member of the government; and whig dissensions, though less acute in type, threatened a perplexity as sharp in the way of a stable administration, as the discords among conservatives. Lord John (Jan. 14, 1852) next asked his cabinet whether an offer should be made to Graham. A long discussion followed; whether Graham alone would do them any good; whether the Peelites, considering themselves as a party, might join, but would not consent to be absorbed; whether an offer to them was to be a persistent attempt in good faith or only a device to mend the parliamentary case, if the offer were made and refused. Two or three of the whig ministers, true to the church traditions of the caste, made great difficulties about the Puseyite notions of Newcastle and Mr. Gladstone. 'Gladstone,' writes one of them, 'is a Jesuit, and more Peelite than I believe was Peel himself.' In the end Lord John Russell and his men met parliament without any new support. Their tottering life was short, and it was an amendment moved by Palmerston (Feb. 20) on a clause in a militia bill, that slit the thread. The hostile majority was only eleven, but other perils lay pretty thick in front. The ministers resigned, and Lord Stanley, who had now become Earl of Derby, had no choice but to give his followers their chance. The experiment that seemed so impossible when Bentinck first tried it, of forming a new third party in the state, seemed up to this point to have prospered, and the protectionists had a definite existence. The ministers were nearly all new to public office, and seventeen of them were for the first time sworn of the privy council in a single day. One jest was that the cabinet consisted of three men and a half--Derby, Disraeli, St. Leonards, and a worthy fractional personage at the admiralty. Sending to his wife at Hawarden a provisional list (Feb. 23), Mr. Gladstone doubts the way in which the offices were distributed:--'It is not good, as compared I mean with what it should have been. Disraeli could not have been worse placed than at the exchequer. Henley could not have been worse than at the board of trade. T. Baring, who would have been their best chancellor of the exchequer, seems to have declined. Herries would have been much better than Disraeli for that particular place. I suppose Lord Malmesbury is temporary foreign secretary, to hold the place for S. Canning. What does not appear on the face of the case is, who is to lead the House of Commons, and about that everybody seems to be in the dark....' IV FIRST DERBY ADMINISTRATION The first Derby administration, thus formed and covering the year 1852, marks a highly interesting stage in Mr. Gladstone's career. 'The key to my position,' as he afterwards said, 'was that my opinions went one way, my lingering sympathies the other.' His opinions looked towards liberalism, his sympathies drew him to his first party. It was the Peelites who had now been thrown into the case of a dubious third party. At the end of February Mr. Gladstone sought Lord Aberdeen, looking 'to his weight, his prudence, and his kindliness of disposition as the main anchor of their section. His tone has usually been, during the last few years, that of anxiety to reunite the fragments and reconstruct the conservative party, but yesterday, particularly at the commencement of our conversation, he seemed to lean the other way; spoke kindly of Lord Derby and wished that _he_ could be extricated from the company with which he is associated; said that though called a despot all his life, he himself had always been, and was now, friendly to a liberal policy. He did not, however, like the reform question in Lord John's hands; but he considered, I thought (and if so he differed from me), that on church questions we all might co-operate with him securely.' Mr. Gladstone, on the contrary, insisted that their duty plainly was to hold themselves clear and free from whig and Derbyite alike, so as to be prepared to take whatever of three courses might, after the defeat of protectionist proposals, seem most honourable--whether conservative reconstruction, or liberal conjunction, or Peelism single-handed. The last he described as their least natural position; for, he urged, they might be 'liberal in the sense of Peel, working out a liberal policy through the medium of the conservative party.' To that procrastinating view Mr. Gladstone stood tenaciously, and his course now is one of the multitudinous illustrations of his constant abhorrence of premature committal, and the taking of a second step before the first. After Aberdeen he approached Graham, who proceeded to use language that seemed to point to his virtual return to his old friends of the liberal party, for the reader will not forget the striking circumstance that the new head of a conservative government, and the most trusted of the cabinet colleagues of Peel, had both of them begun official life in the reform ministry of Lord Grey. Graham said he had a very high opinion of Lord Derby's talents and character, and that Lord J. Russell had committed many errors, but that looking at the two as they stood, he thought that the opinions of Lord Derby as a whole were more dangerous to the country than those of Lord John. Mr. Gladstone said it did not appear to him that the question lay between these two; but Graham's reception of this remark implied a contrary opinion. Lincoln, now Duke of Newcastle, he found obdurate in another direction, speaking with great asperity against Lord Derby and his party; he would make no vows as to junction, not even that he would not join Disraeli; but he thought this government must be opposed and overthrown; then those who led the charge against it would reap the reward; if the Peelites did not place themselves in a prominent position, others would. They had a further conversation. The duke told him that Beresford, the whip, had sent out orders to tory newspapers to run them down; that the same worthy had said 'The Peelites, let them go to hell.' Mr. Gladstone replied that Beresford's language was not a good test of the feelings of his party, and that his violence and that of other people was stimulated by what they imagined or heard of the Peelites. Newcastle persisted in his disbelief in the government. 'During this conversation, held on a sofa at the Carlton, we were rather warm; and I said to him, "It appears to me that you do not believe this party to be composed even of men of honour or of gentlemen."... He clung to the idea that we were hereafter to form a party of our own, containing all the good elements of both parties. To which I replied, the country cannot be governed by a third or middle party unless it be for a time only, and on the whole I thought a liberal policy would be worked out with greater security to the country through the medium of the conservative party, and I thought a position like Peel's on the liberal side of that party preferable, comparing all advantages and disadvantages, to the conservative side of the liberal party. And when he spoke of the tories as the obstructive body I said not all of them--for instance Mr. Pitt, Mr. Canning, Mr. Huskisson, and in some degree Lord Londonderry and Lord Liverpool.' FOUR SHADES OF PEELITES The upshot of all these discussions was the discovery that there were at least four distinct shades among the Peelites. 'Newcastle stands nearly alone, if not quite, in the rather high-flown idea that we are to create and lead a great, virtuous, powerful intelligent party, neither the actual conservative nor the actual liberal party but a new one. Apart from these witcheries, Graham was ready to take his place in the liberal ranks; Cardwell, Fitzroy and Oswald would I think have gone with him, as F. Peel and Sir C. Douglas went before him. But this section has been arrested, not thoroughly amalgamated, owing to Graham. Thirdly, there are the great bulk of the Peelites from Goulburn downwards, more or less undisguisedly anticipating junction with Lord Derby, and avowing that free trade is their only point of difference. Lastly myself, and I think I am with Lord Aberdeen and S. Herbert, who have nearly the same desire, but feel that the matter is too crude, too difficult and important for anticipating any conclusion, and that our clear line of duty is independence, until the question of protection shall be settled.' (March 28, 1852.) The personal composition of this section deserves a sentence. In 1835, during Peel's short government, the whig phalanx opposed to it in the House of Commons consisted of John Russell and seven others.[265] Of these eight all were alive in 1851, seven of them in the then existing cabinet; six of the eight still in the Commons. On the other hand, Peel's cabinet began its career thus manned in the Commons--Peel, Stanley, Graham, Hardinge, Knatchbull, Goulburn. Of these only the last remained in his old position. Peel and Knatchbull were dead; Stanley in the Lords and separated; Graham isolated; Hardinge in the Lords and by way of having retired. Nor was the band very large even as recruited. Of ex-cabinet ministers there were but three commoners; Goulburn, Herbert, Gladstone. And of others who had held important offices there were only available, Clerk, Cardwell, Sir J. Young, H. Corry. The Lords contributed Aberdeen, Newcastle, Canning,[266] St. Germains and the Duke of Argyll. Such, as counted off by Mr. Gladstone, was the Peelite staff. Graham in April made his own position definitely liberal, or 'whig and something more,' in so pronounced a way as to cut him off from the Gladstonian subdivision or main body of the Peelites. Mr. Gladstone read the speech in which this departure was taken, 'with discomfort and surprise.' He instantly went to read to Lord Aberdeen some of the more pungent passages; one or two consultations were held with Newcastle and Goulburn; and all agreed that Graham's words were decisive. 'I mentioned that some of them were coming to 5 Carlton Gardens in the course of the afternoon (April 20); and my first wish was that now Lord Aberdeen himself would go and tell them how we stood upon Graham's speech. To this they were all opposed; and they seemed to feel that as we had had no meeting yet, it would seem ungracious and unkind to an old friend to hold one by way of ovation over his departure. It was therefore agreed that I should acquaint Young it was their wish that he should tell any one who might come, that we, who were there present, looked upon our political connection with Graham as dissolved by the Carlisle speech.'[267] ATTITUDE OF GRAHAM The temporary parting from Graham was conducted with a degree of good feeling that is a pattern for such occasions in politics. In writing to Mr. Gladstone (Mar. 29, 1852), and speaking of his colleagues in Peel's government, Graham says, 'I have always felt that my age and position were different from theirs: that the habits and connections of my early political life, though broken, gave to me a bias, which to them was not congenial; and since the death of our great master and friend, I have always feared that the time might arrive when we must separate. You intimate the decision that party connection must no longer subsist between us. I submit to your decision with regret; but at parting I hope that you will retain towards me some feelings of esteem and regard, such as I can never cease to entertain towards you; and though political friendships are often short-lived, having known each other well, we shall continue, I trust, to maintain kindly relations. It is a pleasure to me to remember that we have no cause of complaint against each other.' 'I have to thank you,' Mr. Gladstone replies, 'for the unvarying kindness of many years, to acknowledge all the advantages I have derived from communication with you, to accept and re-echo cordially your expressions of good will, and to convey the fervent hope that no act or word of mine may ever tend to impair these sentiments in my own mind or yours.' When the others had withdrawn, Aberdeen told Mr. Gladstone that Lord John had been to call upon him the day before for the first time, and he believed that the visit had special reference to Mr. Gladstone himself. 'The tenor of his conversation,' Mr. Gladstone reports, 'was that my opinions were quite as liberal as his; that in regard to the colonies I went beyond him; that my Naples pamphlets could have been called revolutionary if he had written them; and in regard to church matters he saw no reason why there should not be joint action, for he was cordially disposed to maintain the church of England, and so, he believed, was I.' Lord John, however, we may be sure was the last man not to know how many another element, besides agreement in opinion, decides relations of party. Personal sympathies and antipathies, hosts of indirect affinities having apparently little to do with the main trunk of the school or the faction, hosts of motives only half disclosed, or not disclosed at all even to him in whom they are at work--all these intrude in the composition and management of parties whether religious or political. Grave discussions turned on new nicknames. The tories had greatly gained by calling themselves conservatives after 1832. The name of whig had some associations that were only less unpopular in the country than the name of tory. It was pointed out that many people would on no account join the whigs, who yet would join a government of which Russells, Greys, Howards, Cavendishes, Villierses, were members. On the other hand Graham declared that Paley's maxim about religion was just as true in politics--that men often change their creed, but not so often the name of their sect. And as to the suggestion, constantly made at all times in our politics for the benefit of waverers, of the name of liberal-conservative, Lord John caustically observed that whig has the convenience of expressing in one syllable what liberal-conservative expresses in seven, and whiggism in two syllables what conservative progress expresses in six. MR. GLADSTONE AND HIS GROUP Connected with all this arose a geographical question--in what quarter of the House were the Peelites to sit? Hitherto the two wings of the broken tory party, protectionist and Peelite, had sat together on the opposition benches. The change of administration in 1852 sent the protectionists over to the Speaker's right, and brought the whigs to the natural place of opposition on his left. The Peelite leaders therefore had no other choice than to take their seats below the gangway, but on which side? Such a question is always graver than to the heedless outsider it may seem, and the Peelite discussions upon it were both copious and vehement.[268] Graham at once resolved on sharing the front opposition bench with the whigs: he repeated that his own case was different from the others, because he had once been a whig himself. Herbert, who acted pretty strictly with Mr. Gladstone all this year, argued that they only held aloof from the new ministers on one question, and therefore that they ought not to sit opposite to them as adversaries, but should sit below the gangway on the ministerial side. Newcastle intimated dissent from both, looking to the formation of his virtuous and enlightened third party, but where they should sit in the meantime he did not seem to know. Mr. Gladstone expressed from the first a decided opinion in favour of going below the gangway on the opposition side. What they ought to desire was the promotion of a government conservative in its personal composition and traditions, as soon as the crisis of protection should be over. Taking a seat, he said, is an external sign and pledge that ought to follow upon full conviction of the thing it was understood to betoken; and to sit on the front opposition bench would indicate division from the conservative government as a party, while in fact they were not divided from them as a party, but only on a single question. In the end, Graham sat above the opposition gangway next to Lord John Russell and Cardwell. The Peelite body as a whole determined on giving the new government what is called a fair trial. 'Mr. Sidney Herbert and I,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'took pains to bring them together, in the recognised modes. They sat on the opposition side, but below the gangway, full, or about forty strong; and Sir James Graham, I recollect, once complimented me on the excellent appearance they had presented to him as he passed them in walking up the House.' Considerable uneasiness was felt among some of them at finding themselves neighbours on the benches to Cobden and Bright and Hume and their friends on the one hand, and 'the Irish Brass Band' on the other. It depended entirely on the Peelites whether the new government should be permitted to conduct the business of the session (subject to conditions or otherwise), or whether they should be open to an instant attack as the enemies of free trade. The effect of such attack must have been defeat, followed by dissolution forthwith, and by the ejection of the Derby government in June (as happened in 1859) instead of in December. The tactics of giving the ministers a fair trial prevailed and were faithfully adhered to, Graham and Cardwell taking their own course. As the result of this and other conditions, for ten months ministers, greatly outnumbered, were maintained in power by the deliberate and united action of about forty Peelites. Lord Derby had opened his administration with a pledge, as the Peelites understood, to confine himself during the session to business already open and advanced, or of an urgent character. When Mr. Disraeli gave notice of a bill to dispose of four seats which were vacant, this was regarded by them as a manner of opening new and important issues, and not within the definition that had been the condition of their provisional support.[269] 'Lord John Russell came and said to me,' says Mr. Gladstone, '"What will you do?" I admitted we were bound to act; and, joining the liberals, we threw over the proposal by a large majority. This was the only occasion of conflict that arose; and it was provoked, as we thought, by the government itself.' FOOTNOTES: [256] 'He had told the Queen that he thought all the offices might be filled in a respectable manner from among the members of the Peel administration. On a subsequent day both Herbert and Cardwell made out from his conversation what I did not clearly catch, namely that Lord Aberdeen himself would have acted on the Queen's wish, and that Graham had either suggested the difficulty altogether, or at any rate got it put forward into its position.' Gladstone Memo., April 22, 1851. [257] Memorandum, dated Fasque, April 22, 1851. [258] Memorandum, Sept. 9, 1897. [259] _Grey Papers._ [260] To Phillimore, Nov. 26, 1850. [261] Greville, Part II, vol. iii. p. 369. [262] _Georgics_, i. 493-7. 'Aye, and time will come when the husbandman with bent ploughshare upturning the clods, shall find all corroded by rusty scurf the Roman pikeheads; shall strike with heavy rake on empty helms, and gaze in wonder on giant bones cast from their broken graves.' [263] Affirmation bill (1883) and Religious Disabilities Removal bill (1891). [264] One of the most illustrious of the European liberals of the century wrote to Senior:-- Ce que vous me dites que le bill contre les titres ecclésiastiques ne mènera à rien, me paraît vraisemblable, grâce aux moeurs du pays. Mais pourquoi faire des lois pires que les moeurs? C'est le contraire qui devait être. Je vous avoue que j'ai été de coeur et d'esprit avec ceux qui comme Lord Aberdeen et M. Gladstone, se sont opposés au nom de la liberté et du principe même de la réforme, à ces atteintes à la fois vaines et dangereuses que le bill a portées au moins en théorie à l'indépendance de conscience. Où se réfugiera la liberté religieuse, si on la chasse de l'Angleterre?--Tocqueville, _Corr._ iii. p. 274. [265] Namely Palmerston, Spring-Rice, F. Baring, Charles Wood, Hobhouse, Labouchere, Lord Howick. [266] This, of course, was Charles John Earl Canning, third son of Canning the prime minister, Mr. Gladstone's contemporary at Eton and Christ Church, and known to history as governor-general of India in the Mutiny. Stratford Canning, afterwards Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, was cousin of George Canning. [267] Graham spoke of himself as a tried reformer and as a member of the liberal party, and as glad to find himself the ally of so faithful a liberal and reformer as his fellow-candidate. He would not exactly pledge himself to support the ballot, but he admitted it was a hard question, and said he was not so blind that practical experience might not convince him that he was wrong. (Mar. 26, 1852.) [268] The same question greatly exercised Mr. Gladstone's mind in 1886, for the same reason, that he again hoped for the reunion of a divided party. [269] This was a bill to assign the four disfranchised seats for Sudbury and St. Albans to the West Riding of Yorkshire and the southern division of Lancashire. Mr. Gladstone carried the order of the day by a majority of 86 against the government. CHAPTER VIII END OF PROTECTION (_1852_) It is not too much to ask that now at least, after so much waste of public time, after ministries overturned and parties disorganised, the question of free trade should be placed high and dry on the shore whither the tide of political party strife could no longer reach it.--GLADSTONE. The parliament was now dissolved (July 1) to decide a great question. The repeal of the corn law, the ultimate equalisation of the sugar duties, the repeal of the navigation laws, had been the three great free trade measures of the last half-dozen years, and the issue before the electors in 1852 was whether this policy was sound or unsound. Lord Derby might have faced it boldly by announcing a moderate protection for corn and for colonial sugar. Or he might have openly told the country that he had changed his mind, as Peel had changed his mind about the catholic question and about free trade, and as Mr. Disraeli was to change his mind upon franchise in 1867, and Mr. Gladstone upon the Irish church in 1868. Instead of this, all was equivocation. The Derbyite, as was well said, was protectionist in a county, neutral in a small town, free trader in a large one. He was for Maynooth in Ireland, and against it in Scotland. Mr. Disraeli did his best to mystify the agricultural elector by phrases about set-offs and compensations and relief of burdens, 'seeming to loom in the future.' He rang the changes on mysterious new principles of taxation, but what they were to be, he did not disclose. The great change since 1846 was that the working-class had become strenuous free traders. They had in earlier times never been really convinced when Cobden and Bright assured them that no fall in wages would follow the promised fall in the price of food. It was the experience of six years that convinced them. England alone had gone unhurt and unsinged through the fiery furnace of 1848, and nobody doubted that the stability of her institutions and the unity of her people were due to the repeal of bad laws, believed to raise the price of bread to the toilers in order to raise rents for territorial idlers. AGAIN ELECTED FOR OXFORD Long before the dissolution, it was certain that Mr. Gladstone would have to fight for his seat. His letter to the Scotch bishop (see above, p. 384), his vote for the Jews, his tenacity and vehemence in resisting the bill against the pope,--the two last exhibitions in open defiance of solemn resolutions of the university convocation itself,--had alienated some friends and inflamed all his enemies. Half a score of the Heads induced Dr. Marsham, the warden of Merton, to come out. In private qualities the warden was one of the most excellent of men, and the accident of his opposition to Mr. Gladstone is no reason why we should recall transient electioneering railleries against a forgotten worthy. The political addresses of his friends depict him. They applaud his sound and manly consistency of principle and his sober attachment to the reformed church of England, and they dwell with zest on the goodness of his heart. The issue, as they put it, was simple: 'At a time when the stability of the protestant succession, the authority of a protestant Queen, and even the Christianity of the national character, have been rudely assailed by Rome on one side, and on the other by democratic associations directed against the union of the Christian church with the British constitution--at such a time, it becomes a protestant university, from which emanates a continuous stream of instruction on all ecclesiastical and Christian questions over the whole empire, to manifest the importance which it attaches to protestant truth, by the selection of a _Protestant Representative_.' The teaching residents were, as always, decisively for Gladstone, and nearly all the fellows of Merton voted against their own warden. In one respect this was remarkable, for Mr. Gladstone had in 1850 (July 18) resisted the proposal for that commission of inquiry into the universities which the Oxford liberals had much at heart, and it would not have been surprising if they had held aloof from a candidate who had told the House of Commons that 'after all, science was but a small part of the business of education,'--a proposition that in one sense may be true, but applied to unreformed Oxford was the reverse of true. The non-residents were diligently and rather unscrupulously worked upon, and they made a formidable set of discordant elements. The evangelicals disliked Mr. Gladstone. The plain high-and-dry men distrusted him as what they called a sophist. Even some of the anglo-catholic men began to regard as a bad friend 'to the holy apostolic church of these realms, the author of the new theory of religious liberty' in the Scotch letter. They reproachfully insisted that had he headed a party in the House of Commons defending the church, not upon latitudinarian theories of religious liberty, not upon vague hints of a disaffected movement of the non-juring sort, still less upon romanising principles, but on the principles of the constitution, royal supremacy included, then the church would have escaped the worst that had befallen her since 1846. The minister would never have dared to force Hampden into the seat of a bishop. The privy council would never have reversed the court of arches in the Gorham case. The claim of the clergy to meet in convocation would never have been refused. The committee of council would have treated education very differently.[270] All came right in the end, however, and Mr. Gladstone was re-elected (July 14), receiving 260 votes fewer than Sir Robert Inglis, but 350 more than the warden of Merton.[271] We have to remember that he was not returned as a liberal. II The leaders of the sections out of office, when the general election was over, at once fetched forth line and plummet to take their soundings. 'The next few months,' Mr. Gladstone wrote to Lord Aberdeen (Aug. 20), 'are, I apprehend, the crisis of _our_ fate, and will show whether we are equal or unequal to playing out with prudence, honour, and resolution _the drama or trilogy that has been on the stage since 1841_.' He still regarded the situation as something like a reproduction of the position of the previous March. The precise number of the ministerialists could not be ascertained until tested by a motion in the House. They had gained rather more than was expected, and some put them as high as 320, others as low as 290. What was undoubted was that Lord Derby was left in a minority, and that the support of the Peelites might any hour turn it into a majority. Notwithstanding a loss or two in the recent elections, that party still numbered not far short of 40, and Mr. Gladstone was naturally desirous of retaining it in connection with himself. Most of the group were disposed rather to support a conservative government than not, unless such a government were to do, or propose, something open to strong and definite objection. At the same time what he described as the difficulty of keeping Peelism for ever so short a space upon its legs, was as obvious to him as to everybody else. 'It will be an impossible parliament,' Graham said to Mr. Gladstone (July 15), 'parties will be found too nicely balanced to render a new line of policy practicable without a fresh appeal to the electors.' Before a fresh appeal to the electors took place, the impossible parliament had tumbled into a great war. THE NEW PARLIAMENT When the newly chosen members met in November, Mr. Disraeli told the House of Commons that 'there was no question in the minds of ministers with respect to the result of that election: there was no doubt that there was not only not a preponderating majority in favour of a change in the laws [free trade] passed in the last few years, or even of modifying them in any degree; but that on the contrary there was a decisive opinion on the part of the country that that settlement should not be disturbed.' Mr. Gladstone wrote to Lord Aberdeen (July 30) that he thought the government absolutely chained to Mr. Disraeli's next budget, and 'I, for one, am not prepared to accept him as a financial organ, or to be responsible for what he may propose in his present capacity.' Each successive speech made by Mr. Disraeli at Aylesbury he found 'more quackish in its flavour than its predecessor.' Yet action on his own part was unavoidably hampered by Oxford. 'Were I either of opinion,' he told Lord Aberdeen (Aug. 5), 'that Lord John Russell ought to succeed Lord Derby, or prepared without any further development of the plans of the government to take my stand as one of the party opposed to them, the first step which, as a man of honour, I ought to adopt, should be to resign my seat.' 'I do not mean hereby,' he adds in words that were soon to derive forcible significance from the march of events, 'that I am unconditionally committed against any alliance or fusion, but that any such alliance or fusion, to be lawful for me, must grow out of some failure of the government in carrying on public affairs, or a disapproval of its measures when they shall have been proposed.' He still, in spite of all the misdeeds of ministers during the elections, could not think so ill of them as did Lord Aberdeen. 'Protection and religious liberty,' he wrote to Lord Aberdeen (Aug. 5),'are the subjects on which my main complaints would turn; shuffling as to the former, trading on bigotry as to the latter. The shifting and shuffling that I complain of have been due partly to a miserably false position and the giddy prominence of inferior men; partly to the (surely not unexpected) unscrupulousness and second motives of Mr. Disraeli, at once the necessity of Lord Derby and his curse. I do not mean that this justifies what has been said and done; I only think it brings the case within the common limits of political misconduct. As for religious bigotry,' he continues, 'I condemn the proceedings of the present government; yet much less strongly than the unheard-of course pursued by Lord John Russell in 1850-1, the person to whom I am now invited to transfer my confidence.' Even on the superficial conversion of the Derbyites to free trade, Mr. Gladstone found a _tu quoque_ against the whigs. 'It is, when strictly judged, an act of public immorality to form and lead an opposition on a certain plea, to succeed, and then in office to abandon it.... But in this view, the conduct of the present administration is the counterpart and copy of that of the whigs themselves in 1835, who ran Sir Robert Peel to ground upon the appropriation clause, worked it just while it suited them, and then cast it to the winds; to say nothing of their conduct on the Irish Assassination bill of 1846.' This letter was forwarded by Aberdeen to Lord John Russell. Lord John had the peculiar temperament that is hard to agitate, but easy to nettle. So polemical a reading of former whig pranks nettled him considerably. Why, he asked, should he not say just as reasonably that Mr. Gladstone held up the whigs to odium in 1841 for stripping the farmer of adequate protection; worked the corn law of 1842 as long as it suited him; and then turned round and cast the corn law to the winds? If he gave credit to Mr. Gladstone for being sincere in 1841, 1842, and 1846, why should not Mr. Gladstone give the same credit to him? As to the principle of appropriation, he and Althorp had opposed four of their colleagues in the Grey cabinet; how could he concede to Peel what he had refused to them? As for the Irish bill on which he had turned Peel out, it was one of the worst of all coercion bills; Peel with 117 followers evidently could not carry on the government; and what sense could there have been in voting for a bad bill, in order to retain in office an impossible ministry? This smart apologia of Lord John's was hardly even plausible, much less did it cover the ground. The charge against the whigs is not that they took up appropriation, but that having taken it up they dropped it for the sake of office. Nor was it a charge that they resisted an Irish coercion bill, but that having supported it on the first reading ('worst of all coercion bills' as it was, even in the eyes of men who had passed the reckless act of 1833), they voted against it when they found that both Bentinck and the Manchester men were going to do the same, thus enabling them to turn Peel out. CONFUSIONS OF PARTY Sharp sallies into the past, however, did not ease the present. It was an extraordinary situation only to be described in negatives. A majority could not be found to beat the government upon a vote of want of confidence. Nobody knew who could take their places. Lord John Russell as head of a government was impossible, for his maladroit handling of papal aggression had alienated the Irish; his dealings with Palmerston had offended one powerful section of the English whigs; the Scottish whigs hated him as too much managed by the lights of the free church; and the radicals proscribed him as the chief of a patrician clique. Yet though he was impossible, he sometimes used language to the effect that for him to take any place save the first would be a personal degradation that would lower him to the level of Sidmouth or Goderich. Lord Palmerston represented the moderate centre of the liberal party. Even now he enjoyed a growing personal favour out of doors, not at all impaired by the bad terms on which he was known to be with the court, for the court was not at that date so popular an institution as it became by and by. Among other schemes of ingenious persons at this confused and broken time was a combination under Palmerston or Lansdowne of aristocratic whigs, a great contingent of Derbyites, and the Peelites; and before the elections it was true that Lord Derby had made overtures to these two eminent men. A Lansdowne combination lingered long in the mind of Lord Palmerston himself, who wished for the restoration of a whig government, but resented the idea of serving under its late head. Some dreamed that Palmerston and Disraeli might form a government on the basis of resistance to parliamentary reform. Strange rumours were even afloat that Mr. Gladstone's communications with Palmerston before he left London at the election had been intimate and frequent. 'I cannot make Gladstone out,' said Lord Malmesbury, 'he seems to me a dark horse.' In the closing days of the autumn (September 12) Graham interpreted some obscure language of Mr. Gladstone's as meaning that if protection were renounced, as it might be, if Palmerston joined Derby and the government were reconstructed, and if Disraeli ceased to be leader, then his own relations with the government would be changed. Gladstone was so uneasy in his present position, so nice in the equipoise of his opinions that he wished to be, as he said, 'on the liberal side of the conservative party, rather than on the conservative side of the liberal party.' A little earlier than this, Lord Aberdeen and Graham agreed in thinking (August) that 'Disraeli's leadership was the great cause of Gladstone's reluctance to have anything to do with the government; ... that even if this should be removed, it would not be very easy for him to enter into partnership with them.' Mr. Gladstone himself now and always denied that the lead in the Commons or other personal question had anything to do with the balance of his opinions at the present and later moments. Those who know most of public life are best aware how great is the need in the case of public men for charitable construction of their motives and intent. Yet it would surely have been straining charity to the point of dishonour if, within two years of Peel's death, any of those who had been attached to him as master and as friend, either Mr. Gladstone or anybody else, could have looked without reprobation and aversion on the idea of cabinet intimacy with the bitterest and least sincere of all Peel's assailants. III OPENING SKIRMISHES Mr. Gladstone repaired to London some weeks before the new session, and though he was not in a position to open direct relations with the government, he expressed to Lord Hardinge, with a view to its communication to Lord Derby, his strong opinion that the House of Commons would, and should, require from ministers a frank and explicit adoption of free trade through the address, and secondly, the immediate production of their financial measures. Lord Derby told Hardinge at Windsor that he thought that neither expectation was far wrong. When the Peelites met at Lord Aberdeen's to discuss tactics, they were secretly dissatisfied with the paragraphs about free trade. Mr. Disraeli had laid down at the election the sonorous maxim, that no statesman can disregard with impunity the genius of the epoch in which he lives. And he now after the election averred that the genius of the age was in favour of free exchange. Still it was pleasanter to swallow the dose with as little public observation as possible. 'What would have been said,' cried Lord Derby in fervid remonstrance, 'if shortly after catholic emancipation and the reform bill had been admitted as settlements, their friends had come down and insisted not only that the Houses of parliament should consent to act on the new policy they had adopted, but should expressly recant their opinion in favour of the policy that had formerly prevailed? What would the friends of Sir R. Peel have said in 1835 if, when he assumed the government and when the new parliament assembled, he had been called upon to declare that the reform bill was wise, just, and necessary?' The original free traders were not disposed to connive at Derbyite operations any more than were the whigs. Notice was at once given by Mr. Villiers of a motion virtually assailing the ministers, by asserting the doctrine of free trade in terms they could not adopt. 'Now,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'we came to a case in which the liberals did that which had been done by the government in the case of the Four Seats bill; that is to say, they raised an issue which placed us against them. Lord Palmerston moved the amendment which defeated the attack, but he did this at the express request of S. Herbert and mine, and we carried the amendment to him at his house. He did not recommend any particular plan of action, and he willingly acquiesced in and adopted ours.' He said he would convey it to Disraeli, 'with whom,' he said, 'I have had communications from time to time.' In the debate (Nov. 26) upon the two rival amendments--that of Mr. Villiers, which the ministers could not accept, and that of Palmerston, which they could--Sidney Herbert paid off some old scores in a speech full of fire and jubilation; Mr. Gladstone, on the other hand, was elaborately pacific. He earnestly deprecated the language of severity and exasperation, or anything that would tend to embitter party warfare. His illustrious leader Peel, he said, did indeed look for his revenge; but for what revenge did he look? Assuredly not for stinging speeches, assuredly not for motions made in favour of his policy, if they carried pain and degradation to the minds of honourable men. Were they not celebrating the obsequies of an obnoxious policy? Let them cherish no desire to trample on those who had fought manfully and been defeated fairly. Rather let them rejoice in the great public good that had been achieved; let them take courage from the attainment of that good, for the performance of their public duty in future. All this was inspired by the strong hope of conservative reunion. 'Nervous excitement kept me very wakeful after speaking,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'the first time for many years.' (_Diary._) Villiers's motion was rejected by 336 to 256, the Peelites and Graham voting with ministers in the majority. The Peelite amendment in moderated terms, for which Palmerston stood sponsor, was then carried against the radicals by 468 to 53. For the moment the government was saved. This evening, Mr. Gladstone writes on the next day, Nov. 27, I went to Lady Derby's evening party, where Lord Derby took me a little aside and said he must take the opportunity of thanking me for the tone of my speech last night, which he thought tended to place the discussion on its right footing. It was evident from his manner, and Lady Derby's too, that they were highly pleased with the issue of it. I simply made my acknowledgments in terms of the common kind, upon which he went on to ask me what in my view was to happen next? The great object, he said, was to get rid of all personal questions, and to consider how all those men who were united in their general views of government might combine together to carry on with effect. For himself he felt both uncertain and indifferent; he might be able to carry on the government or he might not; but the question lay beyond that, by what combination or arrangement of a satisfactory nature, in the event of his displacement, the administration of public affairs could be conducted. To this I replied, that it seemed to me that _our_ situation (meaning that of Herbert, Goulburn, and others, with myself) in relation to his government remained much as it was in March and April last.... We have to expect your budget, and the production of that is the next step. He replied that he much desired to see whether there was a possibility of any _rapprochement_, and seemed to glance at personal considerations as likely perhaps to stand in the way [Disraeli, presumably]. I said in reply, that no doubt there were many difficulties of a personal nature to be faced in conceiving of any ministerial combination when we looked at the present House of Commons: many men of power and eminence, but great difficulties arising from various causes, present and past relations, incompatibilities, peculiar defects of character, or failure in bringing them into harmony. I said that, as to relations of parties, circumstances were often stronger than the human will; that we must wait for their guiding, and follow it.... He said, rather decidedly, that he assented to the truth of this doctrine. He added, 'I think Sidney said more last night than he intended, did he not?' I answered, 'You mean as to one particular expression or sentence?' He rejoined, 'Yes.'[272] I said, 'I have had no conversation with him on it, but I think it very probable that he grew warm and went beyond his intention at that point; at the same time, I think I ought to observe to you that I am confident that expression was occasioned by one particular preceding speech in the debate.' He gave a significant assent, and seemed to express no surprise. IV MR. DISRAELI'S PROPOSALS The respite for ministers was short. The long day of shadowy promises and delusive dreams was over; and the oracular expounder of mysteries was at last gripped by the hard realities of the taxes. Whigs and Peelites, men who had been at the exchequer and men who hoped to be, were all ready at last to stalk down their crafty quarry. Without delay Disraeli presented his budget (Dec. 3). As a private member in opposition he had brought forward many financial proposals, but it now turned out that none of them was fit for real use. With a serene audacity that accounts for some of Mr. Gladstone's repulsion, he told the House that he had greater subjects to consider 'than the triumph of obsolete opinions.' His proposals dazzled for a day, and then were seen to be a scheme of illusory compensations and dislocated expedients. He took off half of the malt-tax and half of the hop duty, and in stages reduced the tea duty from two shillings and twopence to one shilling. More important, he broke up the old frame of the income-tax by a variation of its rates, and as for the house-tax, he doubled its rate and extended its area. In one of his fragmentary notes, Mr. Gladstone says:-- Having run away from protection, as it was plain from the first they would do, they had little to offer the land, but that little their minority was ready to accept. It was a measure essentially bad to repeal half the malt duty. But the flagrantly vicious element in Disraeli's budget was his proposal to reduce the income-tax on schedule D. to fivepence in the pound, leaving the other schedules at sevenpence. This was no compensation to the land; but, inasmuch as to exempt one is to tax another, it was a distinct addition to the burdens borne by the holders of visible property. It was on Disraeli's part a most daring bid for the support of the liberal majority, for we all knew quite well that the current opinion of the whigs and liberals was in favour of this scheme; which, on the other hand, was disapproved by sound financiers. The authority of Pitt and Peel, and then my own study of the subject, made me believe that it was impracticable, and probably meant the disruption of the tax, with confusion in finance, as an immediate sequitur. What angered me was that Disraeli had never examined the question. And I afterwards found that he had not even made known his intentions to the board of inland revenue. The gravity of the question thus raised made me feel that the day was come to eject the government. ATTACK ON THE BUDGET It was upon the increase of the house-tax that the great battle was finally staked. Mr. Gladstone's letters to his wife at Hawarden bring the rapid and excited scenes vividly before us. _6 Carlton Gardens, Dec. 3, 1852._--I write from H. of C. at 4½ just expecting the budget. All seem to look for startling and dangerous proposals. You will read them in the papers of to-morrow, be they what they may. If there is anything outrageous, we may protest at once; but I do not expect any extended debate to-night.... The rush for places in the H. of C. is immense. _Monday, Dec. 6._--On Saturday, in the early part of the day, I had a return, perhaps caused by the damp relaxing weather, of the neuralgic pain in my face, and in the afternoon a long sitting at Lord Aberdeen's about the budget, during which strange to say my pain disappeared, but which kept me past the ordinary post hour. These were the causes of your having no letter. The said budget will give rise to serious difficulties. It is plain enough that when its author announced something looming in the distance, he did not mean this plan but something more extensive. Even his reduced scheme, however, includes fundamental faults of principle which it is impossible to overlook or compound with. The first day of serious debate on it will be Friday next, and a vote will be taken either then or on Monday. _Dec. 8._--Be sure to read Lord Derby's speech on Monday. His reference to the cause of his quarrel with Lord George Bentinck was most striking, and is interpreted as a rap at Disraeli.[273] I have had a long sit with Lord Aberdeen to-day talking over possibilities. The government, I believe, talk confidently about the decision on the house-tax, but I should doubt whether they are right. Meantime I am convinced that Disraeli's is the least conservative budget I have ever known. _Dec. 14._--I need hardly say the vision of going down to-morrow has been dissolved. It has been arranged that I am not to speak until the close of the debate; and it is considered almost certain to go on till Monday. Ministers have become much less confident, but I understand that some, I know not how many, of Lord John's men are not to be relied on. Whether they win or not (I expect the latter, but my opinion is _naught_) they cannot carry this house-tax nor their budget. But the mischief of the proposals they have launched will not die with them. _Dec. 15._--I write in great haste. Though it is Wednesday, I have been down at the House almost all day to unravel a device of Disraeli's about the manner in which the question is to be put, by which he means to catch votes; and _I think_ after full consultation with Mahon and Wilson Patten, that this will be accomplished. The debate may close to-morrow night. I am sorry to say I have a long speech fermenting in me, and I feel as a loaf might in the oven. The government, it is thought, are likely to be beaten. _Dec. 16._--I have been engaged in the House till close on post time. Disraeli trying to wriggle out of the question, and get it put upon words without meaning, to enable more to vote as they please, _i.e._ his men or those favourably inclined to him. But he is beaten in this point, and we have now the right question before us. It is not now quite certain whether we shall divide to-night; I hope we may, for it is weary work sitting with a speech fermenting inside one.[274] _Dec. 18._--I have never gone through so exciting a passage of parliamentary life. The intense efforts which we made to obtain, and the government to escape, a definite issue, were like a fox chase, and prepared us all for excitement. I came home at seven, dined, read for a quarter of an hour, and actually contrived (only think) to sleep in the fur cloak for another quarter of an hour; got back to the House at nine. Disraeli rose at 10.20 [Dec. 16], and from that moment, of course, I was on tenterhooks, except when his superlative acting and brilliant oratory from time to time absorbed me and made me quite _forget_ that I had to follow him. He spoke until one. His speech as a whole was grand; I think the most powerful I ever heard from him. At the same time it was disgraced by shameless personalities and otherwise; I had therefore to begin by attacking him for these. There was a question whether it would not be too late, but when I heard his personalities I felt there was no choice but to go on. My great object was to show the conservative party how their leader was hoodwinking and bewildering them, and this I have the happiness of believing that in some degree I effected; for while among some there was great heat and a disposition to interrupt me when they could, I could _see_ in the faces and demeanour of others quite other feelings expressed. But it was a most difficult operation, and altogether it might have been better effected. The House has not I think been so much excited for years. The power of his speech, and the importance of the issue, combined with the lateness of the hour, which always operates, were the causes. My brain was strung very high, and has not yet quite got back to calm, but I slept well last night. On Thursday night [_i.e._ Friday morning] after two hours of sleep, I awoke, and remembered a gross omission I had made, which worked upon me so that I could not rest any more. And still, of course, the time is an anxious one, and I wake with the consciousness of it, but I am very well and really not unquiet. When I came home from the House, I thought it would be good for me to be mortified. Next morning I opened the _Times_, which I thought _you_ would buy, and _was_ mortified when I saw it did not contain my speech but a mangled abbreviation. Such is human nature, at least mine. But in the _Times_ of to-day you will see a very curious article descriptive of the last scene of the debate. It has evidently been written by a man who must have seen what occurred, or been informed by those who did see. He by no means says too much in praise of Disraeli's speech. I am told he is much stung by what I said. I am very sorry it fell to me to say it; God knows I have no wish to give him pain; and really with my deep sense of his gifts I would only pray they might be well used. THE TWO ANTAGONISTS The writer in the _Times_ to whom the victorious orator here refers describes how, 'like two of Sir Walter Scott's champions, these redoubtable antagonists gathered up all their force for the final struggle, and encountered each other in mid-career; how, rather equal than like, each side viewed the struggle of their chosen athletes, as if to prognosticate from the war of words the fortunes of two parties so nicely balanced and marshalled in apparently equal array. Mr. Disraeli's speech,' he says, 'was in every respect worthy of his oratorical reputation. The retorts were pointed and bitter, the hits telling, the sarcasm keen, the argument in many places cogent, in all ingenious, and in some convincing. The merits were counterbalanced by no less glaring defects of tone, temper, and feeling. In some passages invective was pushed to the limit of virulence, and in others, meant no doubt to relieve them by contrast, the coarser stimulants to laughter were very freely applied. Occasionally whole sentences were delivered with an artificial voice and a tone of studied and sardonic bitterness, peculiarly painful to the audience, and tending greatly to diminish the effect of this great intellectual and physical effort. The speech of Mr. Gladstone was in marked contrast. It was characterised throughout by the most earnest sincerity. It was pitched in a high tone of moral feeling--now rising to indignation, now sinking to remonstrance--which was sustained throughout without flagging and without effort. The language was less ambitious, less studied, but more natural and flowing than that of Mr. Disraeli; and though commencing in a tone of stern rebuke, it ended in words of almost pathetic expostulation.... That power of persuasion which seems entirely denied to his antagonist, Mr. Gladstone possesses to great perfection, and to judge by the countenances of his hearers, those powers were very successfully exerted. He had, besides, the immense advantage resulting from the tone of moral superiority which he assumed and successfully maintained, and which conciliated to him the goodwill of his audience in a degree never attained by the most brilliant sallies of his adversary, and when he concluded the House might well feel proud of him and of themselves.' A violent thunderstorm raged during the debate, but the excited senators neither noticed the flashes of lightning nor heard a tremendous shock of thunder. A little before four o'clock in the morning (Dec. 17), the division was taken, and ministers were beaten by nineteen (305 to 286). 'There was an immense crowd,' says Macaulay, 'a deafening cheer when Hayter took the right hand of the row of tellers, and a still louder cheer when the numbers were read.'[275] DEFEAT OF GOVERNMENT A small incident occurred a few nights later to show that it was indeed high time to abate the passions of these six years and more. A politician of secondary rank had been accused of bribery at Derby, and a band of tory friends thought the moment opportune to give him a banquet at the Carlton. Mr. Gladstone in another room was harmlessly reading the paper. Presently in came the revellers, began to use insulting language, and finally vowed that he ought to be pitched headlong out of the window into the Reform. Mr. Gladstone made some courteous reply, but as the reporter truly says, courtesy to gentry in this humour was the casting of pearls before swine. Eventually they ordered candles in another room, and left him to himself.[276] 'You will perhaps,' he wrote to his wife, 'see an account of a row at the Carlton in which I have taken no harm.' The affair indeed was trivial, but it illustrates a well-known and striking reflection of Cornewall Lewis upon the assault perpetrated on Sumner in the Senate at Washington by Brooks. 'That outrage,' he said, 'is no proof of brutal manners or low morality in Americans; it is the first blow in a civil war.... If Peel had proposed a law not only reducing rents, but annihilating them, instead of being attacked by a man of words like Disraeli, he would have been attacked with physical arguments by some man of blows.'[277] In point of numbers the stroke given to protection was not tremendous, but as the history of half a century has shown, it was adequate and sufficient, and Lord Derby at once resigned. He did not take his defeat well. 'Strange to say,' Mr. Gladstone wrote to his wife, 'Lord Derby has been making a most petulant and intemperate speech in the House of Lords on his resignation; such that Newcastle was obliged to rise after him and contradict the charge of combination; while nothing could be better in temper, feeling, and judgment than Disraeli's farewell.' Derby angrily divided the combination that had overthrown him into, first, various gradations of liberalism from 'high aristocratic and exclusive whigs down to the extremest radical theorists'; second, Irish ultramontanes; and lastly, a party of some thirty or thirty-five gentlemen 'of great personal worth, of great eminence and respectability, possessing considerable official experience and a large amount of talent--who once professed, and I believe do still profess, conservative opinions.' Mr. Disraeli, on the contrary, with infinite polish and grace asked pardon for the flying words of debate, and drew easy forgiveness from the member whom a few hours before he had mocked as 'a weird sibyl'; the other member whom he would not say he greatly respected, but whom he greatly regarded; and the third member whom he bade learn that petulance is not sarcasm, and insolence is not invective. Lord John Russell congratulated him on the ability and the gallantry with which he had conducted the struggle, and so the curtain fell. The result, as the great newspaper put it with journalistic freedom, was 'not merely the victory of a battle, but of a war; not a reverse, but a conquest. The vanquished have no principles which they dare to assert, no leaders whom they can venture to trust.' FOOTNOTES: [270] Charles Wordsworth, _Letter to Mr. Gladstone_, 1852, p. 50. [271] Inglis, 1368; Gladstone, 1108; Marsham, 758. [272] I suppose this refers to a passage about Mr. Disraeli:--'For my part I acquit the chancellor of the exchequer, so far as his own convictions are concerned, of the charge of having ever been a protectionist. I never for one moment thought he believed in the least degree in protection. I do not accuse him of having forgotten what he said or what he believed in those years. I only accuse him of having forgotten now what he then wished it to appear that he believed.' The same speech contains a whimsical reason why the Jews make no converts, which the taste of our more democratic House would certainly not tolerate. [273] 'The only serious misunderstanding I ever had with my noble and lamented friend Lord George Bentinck, which I am happy to say was thoroughly removed before his untimely death--was upon a full and frank expression of my opinion that nothing could be more unfitting nor more impolitic than to load with terms of vituperation those from whom we are compelled conscientiously to differ' (_Dec. 6_). [274] 'We had a preliminary debate to have the whole resolution put, instead of the preamble only, which was ultimately agreed to, and placed the question more fairly before the public, Disraeli making the extraordinary declaration that though the proposal was for doubling the house-tax, nobody was bound by that vote to do so. It was an attempt at a shuffle in order to catch votes from his own people, and to a certain extent it succeeded.'--_Halifax Papers_, 1852. [275] Trevelyan, ii. p. 331. [276] _Times_, Dec. 23, 1852. [277] _Letters_, p. 315. Book IV _1853-1859_ CHAPTER I THE COALITION (_1853_) The materials necessary for a sound judgment of facts are not found in the success or failure of undertakings; exact knowledge of the situation that has provoked them forms no inconsiderable element of history.--METTERNICH. England was unconsciously on the eve of a violent break in the peace that had been her fortunate lot for nearly forty years. To the situation that preceded this signal event, a judicious reader may well give his attention. Some of the particulars may seem trivial. In countries governed by party, what those out of the actualities of the fray reckon trivial often count for much, and in the life of a man destined to be a conspicuous party leader, to pass them by would be to leave out real influences. The first experiment in providing the country with a tory government had failed. That alliance between whig and Peelite which Lord John the year before had been unable to effect, had become imperative, and at least a second experiment was to be tried. The initial question was who should be head of the new government. In August, Lord Aberdeen had written to Mr. Gladstone in anticipation of the Derbyite defeat: 'If high character and ability only were required, _you_ would be the person; but I am aware that for the present at least this would not be practicable. Whether it would be possible for Newcastle or me to undertake the concern is more than I can say.' Other good reasons apart, it is easy to see that Mr. Gladstone's attitude in things ecclesiastical put him out of court, and though he had made a conspicuous mark not only, as Lord Aberdeen said, by character and ability but by liberality of view especially in the region of colonial reform, still he had as yet had no good opportunity for showing an independent capacity for handling great affairs. Not any less impossible was Lord John. Shortly before the occasion arose, a whig intimate told him plainly that reconstruction on the basis of his old government was out of the question. 'Lord John's answer was a frank acceptance of that opinion; and he was understood to say that the composition of the next government must be mainly from the ranks of the Peelites; he evidently looked forward to being a member of it, but not the head. When various persons were named as possible heads, Lord Aberdeen was distinctly approved, Graham was distinctly rejected, Newcastle was mentioned without any distinct opinion expressed. We [Aberdeen and Gladstone] were both alike at a loss to know whether Lord John had changed his mind, or had all along since his resignation been acting with this view. All his proceedings certainly seem to require an opposite construction, and to contemplate his own leadership.'[278] Lord Palmerston was determined not to serve again under a minister who had with his own hand turned him out of office, and of whose unfitness for the first post he was at the moment profoundly convinced. He told a Peelite friend that Lord John's love of popularity would always lead him into scrapes, and that his way of suddenly announcing new policies (Durham letter and Edinburgh letter) without consulting colleagues, could not be acquiesced in. Besides the hostility of Palmerston and his friends, any government with the writer of the Durham letter at its head must have the hostility of the Irishmen to encounter. The liberal attitude of the Peelites on the still smouldering question of papal aggression gave Aberdeen a hold on the Irish such as nobody else could have. A HARASSED WEEK Another man of great eminence in the whig party might have taken the helm, but Lord Lansdowne was seventy-two, and was supposed to have formally retired from office for ever. The leader of the Peelites visited the patrician whig at Lansdowne House, and each begged the other to undertake the uncoveted post. Lord Aberdeen gave a slow assent. Previously understanding from Lord John that he would join, Aberdeen accepted the Queen's commission to form a government. He had a harassed week. At first the sun shone. 'Lord John consents,' wrote Mr. Gladstone to his wife at Hawarden, 'and has behaved very well. Palmerston refuses, which is a serious blow. To-morrow I think we shall get to detailed arrangements, about which I do not expect extraordinary difficulty. But I suppose Palmerston is looking to become the leader of a Derby opposition; and without him, or rather with him between us and the conservatives, I cannot but say the game will be a very difficult one to play. It is uncertain whether I shall be chancellor of the exchequer or secretary for the colonies; one of the two I think certainly; and the exchequer will certainly come to Graham or me.' Within a few hours angry squalls all but capsized the boat. Lord John at first had sought consolation in an orthodox historical parallel--the case of Mr. Fox, though at the head of the largest party, leading the Commons under Lord Grenville as head of the government. Why should he, then, refuse a position that Fox had accepted? But friends, often in his case the most mischievous of advisers, reminded him what sort of place he would hold in a cabinet in which the chief posts were filled by men not of his own party. Lord John himself thought, from memories of Bishop Hampden and other ecclesiastical proceedings, that Mr. Gladstone would be his sharpest opponent. Then as the days passed, he found deposition from first place to second more bitter than he had expected. Historic and literary consolation can seldom be a sure sedative against the stings of political ambition. He changed his mind every twelve hours, and made infinite difficulties. When these were with much travail appeased, difficulties were made on behalf of others. The sacred caste and their adherents were up in arms, and a bitter cry arose that all the good things were going to the Peelites, only the leavings to the whigs. Lord John doubtless remembered what Fox had said when the ministry of All the Talents was made,--'We are three in a bed.' Disraeli now remarked sardonically, 'The cake is too small.' To realise the scramble, the reader may think of the venerable carp that date from Henry iv. and Sully, struggling for bread in the fish-ponds of the palace of Fontainebleau. The whigs of this time were men of intellectual refinement; they had a genuine regard for good government, and a decent faith in reform; but when we chide the selfishness of machine politicians hunting office in modern democracy, let us console ourselves by recalling the rapacity of our oligarchies. 'It is melancholy,' muses Sir James Graham this Christmas in his journal, 'to see how little fitness for office is regarded on all sides, and how much the public employments are treated as booty to be divided among successful combatants.' From that point of view, the whig case was strong. 'Of 330 members of the House of Commons,' wrote Lord John to Aberdeen, '270 are whig and radical, thirty are Irish brigade, thirty are Peelites. To this party of thirty you propose to give seven seats in cabinet, to the whigs and radicals five, to Lord Palmerston one.' In the end there were six whigs, as many Peelites, and one radical. The case of four important offices out of the cabinet was just as heartrending: three were to go to the thirty Peelites, and one to the two hundred and seventy just persons. 'I am afraid,' cried Lord John, 'that the liberal party will never stand this, and that the storm will overwhelm me.' Whig pride was deeply revolted at subjection to a prime minister whom in their drawing-rooms they mocked as an old tory. In the Aberdeen cabinet, says Mr. Gladstone, 'it may be thought that the whigs, whose party was to supply five-sixths or seven-eighths of our supporters, had less than their due share of power. It should, however, be borne in mind that they had at this juncture in some degree the character of an used up, and so far a discredited, party. Without doubt they were sufferers from their ill-conceived and mischievous Ecclesiastical Titles Act. Whereas we, the Peelites had been for six and a half years out of office, and had upon us the gloss of freshness.' CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER Lord Palmerston refused to join the coalition, on the honourable ground that for many years he and Aberdeen had stood at the antipodes to one another in the momentous department of foreign affairs. In fact he looked in another direction. If the Aberdeen-Russell coalition broke down, either before they began the journey or very soon after, Lord Derby might come back with a reconstructed team, with Palmerston leading in the Commons a centre party that should include the Peelites. He was believed to have something of this kind in view when he consented to move the amendment brought to him by Gladstone and Herbert in November, and he was bitterly disappointed at the new alliance of that eminent pair with Lord John. With the tories he was on excellent terms. Pall Mall was alive with tales of the anger and disgust of the Derbyites against Mr. Disraeli, who had caused them first to throw over their principles and then to lose their places. The county constituencies and many conservative boroughs were truly reported to be sick of the man who had promised marvels as 'looming in the future,' and then like a bad jockey had brought the horse upon its knees. Speculative minds cannot but be tempted to muse upon the difference that the supersession by Lord Palmerston of this extraordinary genius at that moment might have made, both to the career of Disraeli himself, and to the nation of which he one day became for a space the supreme ruler. Cobden and Bright let it be understood that they were not candidates for office. 'Our day has not come yet,' Bright said to Graham, and the representative of the radicals in the cabinet was Sir William Molesworth. In their newspaper the radicals wrote rather stiffly and jealously. In the end Lord Palmerston changed his mind and joined. It was three days before the post of the exchequer was filled. Mr. Gladstone in his daily letter to Hawarden writes: 'At headquarters I understand they say, "Mr. G. destroyed the budget, so he ought to make a new one." However we are trying to press Graham into that service.' The next day it was settled. From Osborne a letter had come to Lord Aberdeen: 'The Queen hopes it may be possible to give the chancellorship of the exchequer to Mr. Gladstone, and to secure the continuance of Lord St. Leonards as chancellor.'[279] Notwithstanding the royal wish, 'we pressed it,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'on Graham, but he refused point blank.' Graham, as we know, was the best economist in the administration of Peel, and Mr. Gladstone's frequent references to him in later times on points of pure finance show the value set upon his capacity in this department. His constitutional dislike of high responsibility perhaps intervened. Mr. Gladstone himself would cheerfully have returned to the colonial office, but the whigs suspected the excesses of his colonial liberalism, and felt sure that he would sow the tares of anglicanism in these virgin fields. So before Christmas day came, Mr. Gladstone accepted what was soon in influence the second post in the government,[280] and became chancellor of the exchequer. Say what they would, the parliamentary majority was unstable as water. His own analysis of the House of Commons gave 270 British liberals, not very compact, and the radical wing of them certain to make occasions of combination against the government, especially in finance. The only other party avowing themselves general supporters of the government were the forty Peelites--for at that figure he estimated them. The ministry, therefore, were in a minority, and a portion even of that minority not always to be depended on. The remainder of the House he divided into forty Irish brigaders, bent on mischief; from fifty to eighty conservatives, not likely to join in any factious vote, and not ill-disposed to the government, but not to be counted on either for attendance or confidence; finally, the Derby opposition, from 200 to 250, ready to follow Mr. Disraeli into any combination for turning out the government. 'It thus appears, if we strike out the fifty conservatives faintly favourable, that we have a government with 310 supporters, liable on occasions, which frequently arise, to heavy deductions; with an opposition of 290 (Derbyites and brigaders), most of them ready to go all lengths. Such a government cannot be said to possess the confidence of the House of Commons in the full constitutional sense.' EARLY POSITION OF THE MINISTRY The general course seemed smooth. Palmerston had gone to the harmless department of home affairs. The international airs were still. But a cabinet finally composed of six Peelites, six whigs, and a radical, was evidently open to countless internal hazards. 'We shall all look strangely at each other,' one of them said, 'when we first meet in cabinet.' Graham describes them as a powerful team that would need good driving. 'There are some odd tempers and queer ways among them; but on the whole they are gentlemen, and they have a perfect gentleman at their head, who is honest and direct, and who will not brook insincerity in others.' The head of the new government described it to a friend as 'a great experiment, hitherto unattempted, and of which the success must be considered doubtful, but in the meantime the public had regarded it with singular favour.' To the King of the Belgians, Aberdeen wrote: 'England will occupy her true position in Europe as the constant advocate of moderation and peace'; and to Guizot, that 'the position which we desired so see England occupy among the nations of Europe, was to act the part of a moderator, and by reconciling differences and removing misunderstandings to preserve harmony and peace.' I have seen no more concise analysis of the early position of the coalition government than that by one of the ablest and most experienced members of the whig party, not himself a candidate for office:-- 'It is strong,' Sir Francis Baring wrote to his son, 'in personal talent; none that I can remember stronger, though the head of the government is untried. It is strong in one point of view: as to public feeling. The country, I believe, wanted a moderate liberal government, and a fusion of liberal conservatives and moderate liberals. It is weak in the feelings of the component parts: Palmerston is degraded, Gladstone will struggle for power, Lord John cannot be comfortable. It is weak in the discordant antecedents of the cabinet; they must all make some sacrifices and work uncomfortably. It is weak in the support. I do not mean the numbers, but the class of supporters. The Peelites are forty; they will have the liberals on the one side and the conservatives on the other. The whigs of the cabinet will be anxious to satisfy the former; the Peelites (Gladstone especially) the other. They are weak in their church views. The protestants look on those who voted against the Aggression bill with distrust; the evangelicals on Gladstone and S. Herbert with dislike. I don't pretend to be a prophet, but it is always well to put down what you expect and to compare these expectations with results. My conjecture is that Gladstone will, before long, leave the government or that he will break it up.'[281] Long afterwards Mr. Gladstone himself said this of the coalition:-- I must say of this cabinet of Lord Aberdeen's that in its deliberations it never exhibited the marks of its dual origin. Sir W. Molesworth, its radical member, seemed to be practically rather nearer in colour to the Peelites than to the whigs. There were some few idiosyncrasies without doubt. Lord Palmerston, who was home secretary, had in him some tendencies which might have been troublesome, but for a long time were not so. It is, for instance, a complete error to suppose that he asked the cabinet to treat the occupation of the Principalities as a _casus belli_. Lord Russell shook the position of Lord Aberdeen by action most capricious and unhappy. But with the general course of affairs this had no connection; and even in the complex and tortuous movements of the Eastern negotiations, the cabinet never fell into two camps. That question and the war were fatal to it. In itself I hardly ever saw a cabinet with greater promise of endurance. II OPPOSITION AT OXFORD Acceptance of office vacated the Oxford seat, and the day after Christmas a thunderbolt fell upon the new chancellor of the exchequer from his friend, the militant archdeacon of Taunton. 'I wish to use few words,' Denison wrote, 'where every word I write is so bitterly distressing to me, and must be little less so, I cannot doubt, to yourself and to many others whom I respect and love. I have to state to you, as one of your constituents, that from this time I can place no confidence in you as representative of the university of Oxford, or as a public man.' Mr. Gladstone's protestations that church patronage would be as safe in Lord Aberdeen's hands as in Lord Derby's; that his own past history dispensed with the necessity of producing other assurances of his own fidelity; that his assumption of office could not shake it--all these were vain in face of the staring and flagrant fact that he would henceforth be the intimate and partner in council of Lord John Russell, the latitudinarian, the erastian, the appropriationist, the despoiler; and worse still, of Molesworth, sometimes denounced as a Socinian, sometimes as editor of the atheist Hobbes, but in either case no fit person to dispense the church patronage of the duchy of Lancaster. Only a degree less shocking was the thought of the power of filling bishoprics and deaneries by a prime minister himself a presbyterian. No guarantee that the member for Oxford might have taken against aggression upon the church, or for the concession of her just claims, was worth a feather when weighed against the mere act of a coalition so deadly as this. It was an awkward fact for Mr. Gladstone's canvassers that Lord Derby had stated that his defeat was the result of a concert or combination between the Peelites and other political parties. Mr. Gladstone himself saw no reason why this should cause much soreness among his Oxford supporters. 'No doubt,' he said, 'they will remember that I avowed before and during the last election a wish to find the policy and measures of the government such as would justify me in giving them my support. That wish I sincerely entertained. But the main question was whether the concert or combination alleged to have taken place for the purpose of ejecting Lord Derby's government from office was fact or fiction. I have not the slightest hesitation in stating to you that it is a fiction. Evidence for the only presumption in its favour was this--that we voted against the budget of Mr. Disraeli in strict conformity with every principle of finance we had professed through our political lives and with the policy of former finance ministers from the time of Mr. Pitt, against the "new principles" and "new policies" which Mr. Disraeli declared at Aylesbury his intention to submit to the House of Commons--a pledge which I admit that he completely redeemed.'[282] All this was true enough, but what people saw was that the first fruits of the victory were a coalition with the whigs, who by voting with Villiers had from the first shown their predetermination against ministers. As Northcote humorously said, Mary Stuart could never get over the presumption which her marriage with Bothwell immediately raised as to the nature of her previous connection with him. It is hard to deny that, as the world goes, the Oxford tories clerical and lay might think they had a case. Lord Derby was the tory minister, and Mr. Gladstone had been a chief instrument in turning him out. That was the one salient fact, and the political flock is often apt to see a thing with a more single eye than their shepherds. A candidate was found in Mr. Perceval, son of the tory prime minister who had met a tragic death forty years before. The country clergy were plied with instigations and solicitations, public and private. No absurdity was too monstrous to set afloat. Mr. Gladstone had seceded to the episcopal church of Scotland. He had long ceased to be a communicant. He was on close and intimate terms with Cardinal Wiseman. He had incited the pope to persecute protestants at Florence. In this vein a flight of angry articles and circulars descended on every parsonage where there was an Oxford master of arts with his name still on the university books. At the beginning the enemy by a rush were in a majority, but they were speedily beaten out of it. At the end of six days, in spite of frenzied efforts, no more than 1330 votes out of a constituency of 3600 had been recorded. Still the indomitable men insisted on the legal right of keeping the poll open for fifteen days, and learned persons even gloomily hinted that the time might be extended to forty days. In the end (Jan. 20) Mr. Gladstone had 1022 votes against Perceval's 898, or a narrow majority of 124. The tory press justly consoled themselves by calculating that such a majority was only six per cent. of the votes polled, but they were very angry with the failure of the protestant electors in doing their patriotic duty against 'the pro-romanist candidate.' The organ of the Peelites, on the other hand, was delighted at the first verdict thus gained from the most influential constituency in Great Britain, in favour of the new experiment of conservative-liberalism and wise and rational progress. Graham said, and truly, that 'though Gladstone's defeat at that precise juncture would have been a misfortune, yet for his own sake hereafter, emancipation from the thraldom of that constituency would be a blessing. It is a millstone under which even Peel would have sunk.' Was Mr. Gladstone right in his early notion of himself as a slow moving mind? Would it be true to say that, compared with Pitt, for instance, he ripened slowly? Or can we accurately describe him as having in any department of life, thought, knowledge, feeling, been precocious? Perhaps not. To speak of slowness in a man of such magical rapidity of intellectual apprehension would be indeed a paradox, but we have seen already how when he is walking in the middle path of his years, there is a sense in which he was slow in character and motion. Slowness explains some qualities in his literary and oratorical form, which was often, and especially up to our present period, vague, ambiguous, and obscure. The careless and the uncharitable set all down to sophistry. Better observers perceived that his seeming mystifications were in fact the result of a really embarrassed judgment. They pointed out that where the way was clear, as in free trade, colonial government, dissenters' chapels, Jewish disabilities, catholic bishoprics, nobody could run more straight, at higher speed, or with more powerful stride. They began to say that in spite of Russells, Palmerstons, Grahams, Mr. Gladstone, after all, was the least unlikely of them 'to turn out a thoroughgoing man of the people.' These anticipations of democracy there is no sign that Mr. Gladstone himself, in the smallest degree, shared. The newspapers, meanwhile, were all but unanimous in declaring that 'if experience, talent, industry, and virtue, are the attributes required for the government of this empire,' then the coalition government would be one of the best that England had ever seen. III Mr. Gladstone's dislike and distrust of the intrusion not only of the rude secular arm, but of anything temporal into the sphere of spiritual things, had been marked enough in the old days of battle at Oxford between the tractarians and the heads, though it was less manifest in the Gorham case. In 1853 he found occasion for an honourable exhibition of the same strong feeling. Maurice had got into trouble with the authorities at King's College by essays in which he was taken to hold that the eternity of the future torment of the wicked is a superstition not warranted by the Thirty-nine Articles. A movement followed in the council of the college to oust Maurice from his professorial chair. Mr. Gladstone took great pains to avert the stroke, and here is the story as he told it to his brother-in-law, Lord Lyttelton:-- _To Lord Lyttelton._ _Oct. 29, 1853._--I remained in town last Thursday in order to attend the council of K.C., and as far as I could, to see fair play. I was afraid of a very precipitous proceeding, and I regret to say my fears have been verified. The motion carried was the Bishop of London's, but I am bound to say he was quite willing to have waived it for another course, and the proceeding is due to a body of laymen chiefly lords. The motion carried is to the effect that the statements on certain points contained in Maurice's last essay are of a dangerous character, and that his connection with the theology of the school ought not to continue. I moved as an amendment that the bishop be requested to appoint competent theologians who should personally examine how far the statements of Mr. Maurice were conformable to or at variance with the three creeds and the formularies of the church of England, and should make a report upon them, and that the bishop should be requested to communicate with the council. For myself I find in different parts of what Maurice has written things that I cannot, and I am quite certain the council had not been able to, reconcile. This consideration alone seemed to me to show that they were not in a condition to proceed with a definite judgment. I do not feel sufficiently certain what his view as a whole may be, even if I were otherwise competent to judge whether it is within or beyond the latitude allowed by the church in this matter. And independently of all this I thought that even decency demanded of the council, acting perforce in a judicial capacity, that they should let the accused person know in the most distinct terms for _what_ he was dismissed, and should show that they had dismissed him, if at all, only after using greater pains to ascertain that his opinions were in real contrariety to some article of the faith. I also cherished the hope, founded on certain parts of what he has said, that his friends might be able in the meantime to arrange some _formula concordiæ_ which might avert the scandal and mischief of the dismissal. Sir J. Patteson, Sir B. Brodie, and Mr. Green supported the amendment, but the majority went the other way, and much was I grieved at it. I am not inclined to abate the dogmatic profession of the church--on the contrary, nothing would induce me to surrender the smallest fraction of it; but while jealous of its infraction in any particular, I am not less jealous of the obtrusion of any private or local opinion into the region of dogma; and above all I hold that there should be as much rigour in a trial of this kind, irrespective of the high character and distinguished powers of the person charged in this particular case, as if he were indicted for murder.[283] DEFENCE OF MAURICE Long afterwards, when the alleged heretic was dead, Mr. Gladstone wrote of him to Mr. Macmillan (April 11, 1884): 'Maurice is indeed a spiritual splendour, to borrow the phrase of Dante about St. Dominic. His intellectual constitution had long been, and still is, to me a good deal of an enigma. When I remember what is said and thought of him, and by whom, I feel that this must be greatly my own fault.' Some years after the affair at King's College, Maurice was appointed to Vere Street, and the attack upon him was renewed. Mr. Gladstone was one of those who signed an address of recognition and congratulation. FOOTNOTES: [278] Memo, by Mr. Gladstone of a conversation with Aberdeen. [279] The practical impossibility of retaining this learned man, the Derbyite chancellor, upon the coalition woolsack, is an illustration of the tenacity of the modern party system. [280] It was not until the rise of Mr. Gladstone that a chancellor of the exchequer, not being prime minister, stood at this high level. [281] From the Baring papers, for which I am indebted to the kindness of Lord Northbrook. [282] _Times_, December 23, 1852. [283] See _Life of Maurice_, ii. p. 195; _Life of Wilberforce_, ii. pp. 208-218. See also Mr. Gladstone's letter to Bishop Hampden, 1856, above p. 168. CHAPTER II THE TRIUMPH OF 1853 (_1853_) We have not sought to evade the difficulties of our position.... We have not attempted to counteract them by narrow or flimsy expedients.... We have proposed plans which will go some way towards closing up many vexed financial questions.... While we have sought to do justice to intelligence and skill as compared with property--while we have sought to do justice to the great labouring community by further extending their relief from indirect taxation, we have not been guided by any desire to set one class against another.--GLADSTONE (1853). Mr. Gladstone began this year, so important both to himself and to the country, with what he described as a short but active and pleasant visit to Oxford. He stayed at Christ Church with Dr. Jacobson, of whom it was observed that he always looked as if on the point of saying something extremely piercing and shrewd, only it never came. He paid many calls, dined at Oriel, had a luncheon and made a speech in the hall at Balliol; passed busy days and brisk evenings, and filled up whatever spare moments he could find or manufacture, with treasury papers, books on taxation, consolidated annuities, and public accounts, alternating with dips into Lamennais--the bold and passionate French mystic, fallen angel of his church, most moving of all the spiritual tragedies of that day of heroic idealists. On February 3 he moved into the house of the chancellor of the exchequer in that best known of all streets which is not a street, where he was destined to pass some two and twenty of the forty-one years of the public life that lay before him. He had a correspondence with Mr. Disraeli, his predecessor, on the valuation of the furniture in the official house. There was question, also, of the robe that passes down under some law of exchange from one chancellor to another on an apparently unsettled footing. The tone on this high concern was not wholly amicable. Mr. Gladstone notes especially in his diary that he wrote a draft of one of his letters on a Sunday, as being, I suppose, the day most favourable to self-control; while Mr. Disraeli at last suggests that Mr. Gladstone should really consult Sir Charles Wood, 'who is at least a man of the world.' Such are the angers of celestial minds. At an early cabinet (Feb. 5) he began the battle that lasted in various shapes all the rest of his life. It was on a question of reducing the force in the Pacific. 'Lord Aberdeen, Granville, Molesworth, and I were for it. We failed.' What was the case for this particular retrenchment I do not know, nor does it matter. Fiercer engagements, and many of them, were to follow. Meanwhile he bent all the energies of his mind to the other front of financial questions--to raising money rather than expending it, and with unwearied industry applied himself to solve the problem of redistributing the burdens and improving the machinery of taxation. For many years circumstances had given to finance a lively and commanding place in popular interest. The protracted discussion on the corn law, conducted not only in senate and cabinet, but in country market-places and thronged exchanges, in the farmer's ordinary and at huge gatherings in all the large towns in the kingdom, had agitated every class in the community. The battle between free trade and protection, ending in a revolution of our commercial system, had awakened men to the enormous truth, as to which they are always so soon ready to relapse into slumber, that budgets are not merely affairs of arithmetic, but in a thousand ways go to the root of the prosperity of individuals, the relations of classes, and the strength of kingdoms. The finance of the whigs in the years after the Reform bill had not only bewildered parliament, but had filled merchants, bankers, shipowners, manufacturers, shopkeepers, and the whole array of general taxpayers with perplexity and dismay. Peel recovered a financial equilibrium and restored public confidence, but Peel was gone. The whigs who followed him after 1846 had once more laboured under an unlucky star in this vital sphere of national affairs. They performed the unexampled feat of bringing forward four budgets in a single year, the first of them introduced by Lord John Russell himself as prime minister. By 1851 floundering had reached a climax. Finance had thus discredited one historical party; it had broken up the other. It was finance that overthrew weak governments and hindered the possibility of a strong one. FISCAL CONFUSION Mr. Disraeli, the most unsparing of all the assailants of Peel, tried his own hand in 1852. To have the genius and the patience of a great partisan chief is one gift, and this he had; to grasp the complex material interests of a vast diversified society like the United Kingdom demands powers of a different order. The defeat of Mr. Disraeli's budget at the end of 1852 seemed to complete the circle of fiscal confusion. Every source of public income was the object of assault. Every indirect tax was to be reduced or swept away, and yet no two men appeared to agree upon the principles of the direct taxes that were to take their place. The window duty, the paper duty, the tax on advertisements, the malt-tax, the stamp on marine insurances, were all to vanish, but even the most zealous reformers were powerless to fill the void. The order-book of the House of Commons was loaded with motions about the income-tax, and an important committee sat in 1851 to consider all the questions connected with the possibility of its readjustment and amendment. They could not even frame a report. The belief that it was essentially unjust to impose the tax at one and the same rate upon permanent and temporary incomes, prevailed in the great mass, especially of the liberal party. Discussions arose all through this period, descending not only to the elementary principles of taxation, but, as Mr. Gladstone said, almost to the first principles of civilised society itself. Party distraction, ministerial embarrassment, adjournment after adjournment of a decision upon fundamental maxims of national taxation--such was the bewildered scene. At last a statesman appeared, a financier almost by accident (for, as we have seen, it was by no special choice of his own that Mr. Gladstone went to the exchequer), but a financier endowed with a practical imagination of the highest class, with a combination of the spirit of vigorous analysis and the spirit of vigorous system, with the habit of unflagging toil, and above all, with the gift of indomitable courage. If anybody suggested the reappointment of Hume's committee, the idea was wisely dismissed. It was evidently, as Graham said, the duty of the executive government to lead the way and to guide public opinion in a matter of this crucial importance. It seemed impossible and unworthy to avoid a frank declaration about the income-tax. He was strongly of opinion (March 15) that a larger measure would be carried with greater certainty and ease than simple renewal; and that a combination of income-tax, gradually diminishing to a fixed term of extinction, with reduction of the interest of debt, and a review of the probate and legacy duties, afforded the best ground for a financial arrangement both successful and creditable. It was strong ideas of this kind that encouraged Mr. Gladstone to build on a broad foundation. The nature of his proceedings he set out in one of the most interesting of his political memoranda:-- The liberals were, to all appearance, pledged to the reconstruction of the tax by their opinions, and the tories by their party following. The small fraction of Peelites could probably be relied upon the other way, and some few individuals with financial knowledge and experience. The mission of the new government was described by Lord Aberdeen in the House of Lords as a financial mission, and the stress of it thus lay upon a person, very ill-prepared. My opinions were with Peel; but under such circumstances it was my duty to make a close and searching investigation into the whole nature of the tax, and make up my mind whether there was any means of accepting or compounding with the existing state of opinion. I went to work, and laboured very hard. When I had entered gravely upon my financial studies, I one day had occasion--I know not what--to go into the city and to call upon Mr. Samuel Gurney, to whom experience and character had given a high position there. He asked me with interest about my preparations for my budget; and he said, 'One thing I will venture to urge, whatever your plan is,--let it be simple.' I was a man much disposed to defer to authority, and I attached weight to this advice. But as I went further and further into my subject, I became more and more convinced that, as an honest steward, I had no option but to propose the renewal of the tax in its uniform shape. I constructed much elaborate argument in support of my proposition, which I knew it would be difficult to answer. But I also knew that no amount of unassisted argument would suffice to overcome the obstacles in my way, and that this could only be done by large compensations in my accompanying propositions. So I was led legitimately on, and on, until I had framed the most complicated scheme ever submitted to parliament. THE FABRIC PLANNED Truly has it been said that there is something repulsive to human nature in the simple reproduction of defunct budgets. Certainly if anything can be more odious than a living tax, it is a dead one. It is as much as is consonant to biography to give an outline of the plan that was gradually wrought out in Mr. Gladstone's mind during the first three laborious months of 1853, and to mark the extraordinarily far-reaching and comprehensive character of the earliest of his thirteen budgets. Its initial boldness lay in the adoption of the unusual course of estimating the national income roughly for a long period of seven years, and assuming that expenditure would remain tolerably steady for the whole of that period. Just as no provident man in private life settles his establishment on the basis of one year or two years only, so Mr. Gladstone abandoned hand-to-mouth, and took long views. 'I ought, no doubt,' he said afterwards, 'to have pointed out explicitly that a great disturbance and increase of our expenditure would baffle my reckonings.' Meanwhile, the fabric was planned on strong foundations and admirable lines. The simplification of the tariff of duties of customs, begun by Peel eleven years before, was carried forward almost to completion. Nearly one hundred and forty duties were extinguished, and nearly one hundred and fifty were lowered. The tea duty was to be reduced in stages extending over three years from over two shillings to one shilling. In the department of excise, the high and injurious duty on soap, which brought into the exchequer over eleven hundred thousand pounds annually, was swept entirely away. In the same department, by raising the duties on spirits manufactured in Ireland nearer to the level of England and Scotland, a step was taken towards identity of taxation in the three kingdoms--by no means an unequivocal good. Miscellaneous provisions and minor aspects of the scheme need not detain us; but a great reform of rate and scale in the system of the assessed taxes, the reduction of the duty on the beneficent practice of life insurance from half-a-crown to sixpence on the hundred pounds, and the substitution of a uniform receipt stamp, were no contemptible contributions to the comfort and well-being of the community. Advertisements in newspapers became free of duty.[284] KEYSTONE OF THE BUDGET The keystone of the budget in Mr. Gladstone's conception was the position to be assigned in it to the income-tax. This he determined to renew for a period of seven years,--for two years at sevenpence in the pound, for two years more at sixpence, and for the last three at fivepence. By that time he hoped that parliament would be able to dispense with it. Meanwhile it was to be extended to Ireland, in compensation for the remission of a debt owed by Ireland to the British treasury of between four and five millions. It was to be extended, also, at a reduced rate of fivepence, to incomes between a hundred and fifty and a hundred pounds--the former having hitherto been the line of total exemption. From the retention of the income-tax as a portion of the permanent and ordinary finance of the country the chancellor of the exchequer was wholly and strongly averse, and so he remained for more than twenty years to come. In order, however, to meet a common and a just objection, that under this impost intelligence, enterprise, and skill paid too much and property paid too little, he resolved upon a bold step. He proposed that the legacy duty, hitherto confined to personal property passing on death, either by will or by inheritance and not by settlement, should henceforth be extended to real property, and to both descriptions of property passing by settlement, whether real or personal. In a word, the legacy duty was to extend to all successions whatever. This was the proposal that in many senses cut deepest. It was the first rudimentary breach in the ramparts of the territorial system, unless, indeed, we count as first the abolition of the corn law.[285] Mr. Gladstone eagerly disclaimed any intention of accelerating by the pressure of fiscal enactment changes in the tenure of landed property, and the letters which the reader has already seen (pp. 345-9) show the high social value that he invariably set upon the maintenance of the old landed order. The succession duty, as we shall find, for the time disappointed his expectations, for he counted on two millions, and in fact it yielded little more than half of one. But it secured for its author the lasting resentment of a powerful class. Such was the scheme that Mr. Gladstone now worked out in many weeks of toil that would have been slavish, were it not that toil is never slavish when illuminated by a strenuous purpose. When by and by the result had made him the hero of a glorious hour, he wrote to Lord Aberdeen (April 19): 'I had the deepest anxiety with regard to you, as our chief, lest by faults of my own I should aggravate the cares and difficulties into which I had at least helped to bring you; and the novelty of our political relations with many of our colleagues, together with the fact that I had been myself slow, and even reluctant, to the formation of a new connection, filled me with an almost feverish desire to do no injustice to that connection now that it was formed; and to redeem the pledge you generously gave on my behalf, that there would be no want of cordiality and zeal in the discharge of any duties which it might fall to me to perform on behalf of such a government as was then in your contemplation.' Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen hours a day he toiled at his desk. Treasury officials and trade experts, soap deputations and post-horse deputations, representatives of tobacco and representatives of the West India interest, flocked to Downing Street day by day all through March. If he went into the city to dine with the Lord Mayor, the lamentable hole thus made in his evening was repaired by working till four in the morning upon customs reform, Australian mints, budget plans of all kinds. It is characteristic that even this mountain load of concentrated and exacting labour did not prevent him from giving a Latin lesson every day to his second boy. II 'Some days before the day appointed for my statement,' says Mr. Gladstone, 'I recited the leading particulars to my able and intelligent friend Cardwell, not in the cabinet but then holding office as president of the board of trade. He was so bewildered and astounded at the bigness of the scheme, that I began to ask myself, Have I a right to ask my colleagues to follow me amidst all these rocks and shoals? In consequence I performed a drastic operation upon the plan, and next day I carried to Lord Aberdeen a reduced and mutilated scheme which might be deemed by some politicians to be weaker but safer. I put to Lord Aberdeen the question I had put to myself, and stated my readiness, if he should think it called for, to make this sacrifice to the probable inclinations of my colleagues. But he boldly and wisely said, "I take it upon myself to ask you to bring your original and whole plan before the cabinet." I thought this an ample warrant.' THE BUDGET IN CABINET At last, after Mr. Gladstone had spent an hour at the palace in explaining his scheme to the Prince Consort, the budget was opened to the cabinet (April 9) in a speech of three hours--an achievement, I should suppose, unparalleled in that line, for a cabinet consists of men each with pretty absorbing pre-occupations of his own. The exposition was 'as ingenious,' Lord Aberdeen told Prince Albert, 'as clear, and for the most part as convincing, as anything I have ever heard.' 'Gladstone,' said Lord Aberdeen later (1856) 'does not weigh well against one another different arguments, each of which has a real foundation. But he is unrivalled in his power of proving that a specious argument has no real foundation. On the Succession bill the whole cabinet was against him. He delivered to us much the same speech as he made in the House of Commons. At its close we were all convinced.'[286] Differences that might easily become serious speedily arose upon details in the minds of two or three of them, and for some days the prime minister regarded the undertaking as not only difficult but perilous. Sir Charles Wood, in cabinet (April 11), strongly disapproved of the extension of income-tax to Ireland, and to the lowering of the exemption line. On Ireland the plan would lay more than half a million of new taxation, whereas much of the relief, such as soap and assessed taxes, would not touch her.[287] Palmerston thought it a great plan, perfectly just, and admirably put together, only it opened too many points of attack, and it could never be carried: Disraeli was on the watch, the Irish would join him, so would the radicals, while the succession duty, to which Palmerston individually had great objection, would estrange many conservatives. Lord John Russell perceived difficulties, but he did not see an alternative. Graham then fell in, disliked the twofold extension of the income-tax, and thought they should only take away half the soap-tax. Lord Lansdowne (a great Irish landlord) agreed with him. Mr. Gladstone told them that he was willing to propose whatever the cabinet might decide on, except one thing, namely, the breaking up of the basis of the income-tax: that he could not be a party to; he should regard it as a high political offence. With this reservation he should follow their judgment, but he strongly adhered to his whole plan. Lord Aberdeen said, 'You must take care your proposals are not unpopular ones.' Mr. Gladstone replied that it was after applying the test of popularity, that he was convinced the budget would be damaged beforehand by some of the small changes that had been suggested. At the end of a long and interesting discussion, there stood for the whole budget Lord John, Newcastle, Clarendon, Molesworth, Gladstone, with Argyll and Aberdeen more or less favourable; for dropping the two extensions of income-tax and keeping half the soap duty, Lansdowne, Graham, Wood; more or less leaning towards them, Palmerston and Granville. They agreed to meet again the next day (April 12), when they got into the open sea. Wood stuck to his text. Lansdowne suggested that an increased spirit duty and an income-tax for Ireland together would be something like a breach of faith. Palmerston thought they would be beaten, but he would accept the budget provided they were not to be bound to dissolve or resign upon such a point as to the two extensions of the income-tax. Lord John said that if they were beaten on differentiating the tax, they would have to dissolve. Palmerston expressed his individual opinion in favour of a distinction for precarious incomes, and would act in that sense if he were out of the government; as it was, he assented. Argyll created a diversion by suggesting the abandonment of the Irish spirit duty. Mr. Gladstone admitted that he thought the spirit duty the weakest point of the plan, though warrantable and tenable on the whole. At last, after further patient and searching discussion, the cabinet finding that the suggested amendments cut against one another, were for adopting the entire budget, the dissentients being Lansdowne, Graham, Wood, and Herbert. Graham was full of ill auguries, but said he would assent and assist. Wood looked grave, and murmured that he must take time. CABINET MISGIVINGS In the course of these preliminaries Lord John Russell had gone to Graham, very uneasy about the income-tax. Graham, though habitually desponding, bade him be of good cheer. Their opponents, he said, were in numbers strong; but the budget would be excellent to dissolve upon, and Lord John admitted that they would gain forty seats. They agreed, however, in Graham's language, that it would never do to play their trump card until the state of the game actually required it. Lord John confessed that he was no judge of figures,--somewhat of a weakness in a critic of a budget,--and Graham comforted him by the reply that he was at any rate the best judge living of House of Commons tactics. The position of the government in the House of Commons was notoriously weak. The majority that had brought them into existence was excessively narrow. It had been well known from the first that if any of the accidents of a session should happen to draw the tories, the Irish, and the radicals into one lobby, ministers would find themselves in a minority. Small defeats occurred. The budget was only four days off. Mr. Gladstone enters in his diary: 'Spoke against Gibson; beaten by 200-169. Our third time this week. Very stiff work this. Ellice said dissolution would be the end of it; we agreed in the House to a cabinet to-morrow. Herbert and Cardwell, to whom I spoke, inclined to dissolve.' Next day (April 15), the cabinet met in a flutter, for the same tactics might well be repeated, whenever Mr. Disraeli should think the chances good. Lord John adverted to the hostility of the radicals as exhibited in the tone of the debate, and hinted the opinion that they must take in a reef or two. Mr. Gladstone doubted whether the budget could live in that House, whatever form it might assume; but even with such perils he should look upon the whole budget as less unsafe than a partial contraction. Graham took the same view of the disposition of parliament: keen opposition; lukewarm support; the necessity of a greater party sympathy and connection to enable them to surmount the difficulties of a most unusual and hazardous operation. But he did not appear to lean to dissolution, and the older members of the cabinet generally declared themselves against it. 'In the end we went back to the position that we must have a budget on Monday, but Clarendon, Herbert, and Palmerston joined the chorus of those who said the measure was too sharp upon Ireland. The idea was then started whether we should go the length of the entire remission of the consolidated annuities[288] and impose the income-tax at sevenpence, with the augmented spirit duty. This view found favour generally; and I felt that some excess in the mere sacrifice of money was no great matter compared with the advantage of so great an approximation to equal taxation.' Then, 'speaking with great deference,' Gladstone repeated his belief once more that the entire budget was safer than a contracted one, both for the House and the country, and his conviction that if they proposed it, the name and fame of the government at any rate would stand well. 'Wood seemed still to hang back, but the rest of the cabinet now appeared well satisfied, and we parted, each resolved and certainly more likely to stand or fall by the budget as a whole than we seemed to be on Wednesday.' III The decisive cabinet was on Saturday, April 16. It was finally settled that the budget should be proposed as it stood, with its essential features unaltered. On Sunday, the chancellor of the exchequer went as usual twice to church, and read the _Paradiso_; 'but I was obliged,' he says, with an accent of contrition, 'to give several hours to my figures.' Monday brought the critical moment. 'April 18. Wrote minutes. Read Shakespeare at night. This day was devoted to working up my papers and figures for the evening. Then drove and walked with C. [Mrs. Gladstone]. Went at 4½ to the House. Spoke 4¾ hours in detailing the financial measures, and my strength stood out well, thank God. Many kind congratulations afterwards. Herberts and Wortleys came home with us and had soup and negus.' LAID BEFORE PARLIAMENT The proceeding that figures here so simply was, in fact, one of the great parliamentary performances of the century. Lord Aberdeen wrote to Prince Albert that 'the display of power was wonderful; it was agreed in all quarters that there had been nothing like the speech for many years, and that under the impression of his commanding eloquence the reception of the budget had been most favourable.' Lord John told the Queen the speech was one of the ablest ever made in the House of Commons. 'Mr. Pitt, in the days of his glory, might have been more imposing, but he could not have been more persuasive.' Lord Aberdeen heard from Windsor the next day: 'The Queen must write a line to Lord Aberdeen to say how delighted she is at the great success of Mr. Gladstone's speech last night.... We have every reason to be sanguine now, which is a great relief to the Queen.' Prince Albert used the same language to Mr. Gladstone: 'I cannot resist writing you a line in order to congratulate you on the success of your speech of yesterday. I have just completed a close and careful perusal of it and should certainly have cheered had I a seat in the House. I hear from all sides that the budget has been well received. Trusting that your Christian humility will not allow you to be dangerously elated, I cannot help sending for your perusal the report which Lord John Russell sent to the Queen, feeling sure that it will give you pleasure, such approbation being the best reward a public man can have.' On the cardinal question of the fortunes of the ministry its effect was decisive. The prime minister wrote to Mr. Gladstone himself (April 19): 'While everybody is congratulating _me_ on the wonderful impression produced in the House of Commons last night, it seems only reasonable that I should have a word of congratulation for _you_. You will believe how much more sincerely I rejoice on your account than on my own, although most assuredly, if the existence of my government shall be prolonged, it will be your work.' To Madame de Lieven Aberdeen said that Gladstone had given a strength and lustre to the administration which it could not have derived from anything else. No testimony was more agreeable to Mr. Gladstone than a letter from Lady Peel. 'I know the recollections,' he replied, 'with which you must have written, and therefore I will not scruple to say that as I was inspired by the thought of treading, however unequally, in the steps of my great teacher and master in public affairs, so it was one of my keenest anxieties not to do dishonour to his memory, or injustice to the patriotic policy with which his name is forever associated.'[289] POWER OF THE PERFORMANCE Greville makes a true point when he says that the budget speech 'has raised Gladstone to a great political elevation, and what is of far greater consequence than the measure itself, has given the country assurance of a _man_ equal to great political necessities and fit to lead parties and direct governments.'[290] Mr. Gladstone had made many speeches that were in a high degree interesting, ingenious, attractive, forcible. He now showed that besides and apart from all this, he was the possessor of qualities without which no amount of rhetorician's glitter commands the House of Commons for a single hour after the fireworks have ceased to blaze. He showed that he had precise perception, positive and constructive purpose, and a powerful will. In 1851, he had on two occasions exhibited the highest competency as a critic of the budget of Sir Charles Wood. On the memorable night in the previous December, when he had torn Mr. Disraeli's budget to pieces, he had proved how terrifying he could be in exposure and assault. He now triumphantly met the test that he had triumphantly applied to his predecessor, and presented a command of even more imposing resources in the task of responsible construction than he had displayed in irresponsible criticism. The speech was saturated with fact; the horizons were large; and the opening of each in the long series of topics, from Mr. Pitt and the great war, down to the unsuspected connection between the repeal of the soap-tax and the extinction of the slave trade in Africa, was exalted and spacious. The arguments throughout were close, persuasive, exhaustive; the moral appeal was in the only tone worthy of a great minister addressing a governing assembly--a masculine invocation of their intellectual and political courage. This is the intrepid way in which a strong parliament and a strong nation like to see public difficulties handled, and they now welcomed the appearance of a new minister, who rejected what he called narrow and flimsy expedients, of which so much had been seen in the last half dozen years; who was not afraid to make a stand against heedless men with hearts apparently set on drying up one source of revenue after another; who did not shrink from sconcing the powerful landed phalanx like other people; and who at the same time boldly used and manfully defended the most unpopular of all the public imposts. In politics the spectacle of sheer courage is often quite as good in its influence and effect as the best of logic. It was so here. While proposing that the income-tax should come to an end in seven years, he yet produced the most comprehensive analysis and the boldest vindication of the structure of the tax as it stood. His manner was plain, often almost conversational, but his elaborate examination of the principles of an income-tax remains to this day a master example of accurate reasoning thrown into delightful form. He admitted all the objections to it: the inquisition that it entailed, the frauds to which it led, the sense in the public mind of its injustice in laying the same rate upon the holder of idle and secured public funds, upon the industrious trader, upon the precarious earnings of the professional man. It was these disadvantages that made him plan the extinction of the tax at the end of a definite period, when the salutary remissions of other burdens now proposed would have had time to bring forth their fruits. As was said by a later chancellor of the exchequer, this speech not only won 'universal applause from his audience at the time, but changed the convictions of a large part of the nation, and turned, at least for several years, a current of popular opinion which had seemed too powerful for any minister to resist.'[291] The succession duty brought Mr. Gladstone into the first conflict of his life with the House of Lords. That land should be made to pay like other forms of property Was a proposition denounced as essentially impracticable, oppressive, unjust, cowardly, and absurd. It was called _ex post facto_ legislation. It was one of the most obnoxious, detestable, and odious measures ever proposed. Its author was a vulture soaring over society, waiting for the rich harvest that death would pour into his treasury. Lord Derby invoked him as a phoenix chancellor, in whom Mr. Pitt rose from his ashes with double lustre, for Mr. Gladstone had ventured where Pitt had failed. He admitted that nothing short of the chancellor's extraordinary skill and dexterity could have carried proposals so evil through the House of Commons.[292] Meanwhile the public counted up their gains: a remission on tea, good for twenty shillings a year in an ordinary household; a fall in the washing bill; a boon of a couple of pounds for the man who insured his life for five hundred; an easy saving of ten pounds a year in the assessed taxes, and so forth,--the whole performance ending with 'a dissolving view of the decline and fall' of the hated income-tax. SUCCESSION DUTY AND REDEMPTION The financial proceedings of this year included a proposal for the redemption of South Sea stock and an attempted operation on the national debt, by the creation of new stocks bearing a lower rate of interest, two options of conversion being given to the holders of old stock. The idea of the creation of a two-and-half-per-cent. stock, said Mr. Gladstone in later years, though in those days novel, was very favourably received.[293] I produced my plan. Disraeli offered it a malignant opposition. He made a demand for time; the one demand that ought not to have been made. In proposals of this kind, it is allowed to be altogether improper. In 1844 Mr. Goulburn was permitted, I think, to carry through with great expedition his plan for a large reduction of interest. When Mr. Goschen produced his still larger and much more important measure, we, the opposition, did our best to expedite the decision. There are no complications requiring time on such an occasion. It is a matter of aye or no. But when time is allowed the chapter of accidents allows an opponent to hope that a situation known to be unusually happy will deteriorate. Of this contingency Disraeli took his chance. Time as it happened was in his favour. It was no question of the substance of the plan, but a moderate change in the political barometer, which reduced to two or three millions a subscription which at the right moment would probably have been twenty or thirty.[294] In a letter to W. R. Farquhar (March 8, 1861) he makes further remarks, which are introspective and autobiographic:-- Looking back now upon those of my proceedings in 1853 which related to interest upon exchequer bills and to the reduction of interest on the public debt, I think that there was nothing in the proposals themselves which might not have taken full and quick effect, if they had been made at a time which I may best describe as the time that precedes high-water with respect to abundance of money and security of the market. As respects exchequer bills, I am decidedly of opinion that the rates of premium current for some years before '53 were wholly incompatible with a sound state of things: and the fluctuations then were even greater than since. Still I think that I committed an error from want of sufficient quickness in discerning the signs of the times, for we were upon the very eve of an altered state of things, and any alteration of a kind at all serious was enough to make the period unfit for those grave operations. It is far from being the first or only time when I have had reason to lament my own deficiency in the faculty of rapid and comprehensive observation. I failed to see that high-water was just past; and that although the tide had not perceptibly fallen, yet it was going to fall. The truth likewise is this (to go a step further in my confessions) that almost all my experience in money affairs had been of a most difficult and trying kind, under circumstances which admitted of no choice but obliged me to sail always very near the wind, and this induced a habit of more daring navigation than I could now altogether approve. Nor will I excuse myself by saying that others were deceived like me, for none of them were in a condition to have precisely my responsibility. Another note contributes a further point of explanation: 'I have always imagined that this fault was due to my experience in the affairs of the Hawarden and Oak Farm estates, where it was an incessant course of sailing near the wind, and there was really no other hope.' INCOME-TAX Seven years later Mr. Gladstone, once more chancellor of the exchequer, again produced a budget. Semi-ironic cheers met his semi-ironic expression of an expectation that he would be asked the question: what had become of the calculations of 1853? The succession duty proved a woeful disappointment, and instead of producing two million pounds, produced only six hundred thousand. A similar but greater disappointment, we must recollect, owing mainly to a singular miscalculation as to the income-tax, had marked Peel's memorable budget of 1842, which landed him in a deficiency of nearly two and a quarter millions, instead of a surplus of half a million.[295] Of the disappointment in his own case, Mr. Gladstone when the time came propounded an explanation, only moderately conclusive. I need not discuss it, for as everybody knows, the effective reason why the income-tax could not be removed was the heavy charge created by the Crimean war. What is more to the point in estimating the finance of 1853, is its effect in enabling us to meet the strain of the war. It was this finance that, continuing the work begun by Peel, made the country in 1859 richer by more than sixteen per cent, than it had been in 1853. It was this finance, that by clinching the open questions that enveloped the income-tax, and setting it upon a defensible foundation while it lasted, bore us through the struggle. Unluckily, in demonstrating the perils of meddling with the structure of the tax, in showing its power and simplicity, the chancellor was at the same time providing the easiest means, if not also the most direct incentive, to that policy of expenditure--it rose from fifty to seventy millions between 1853 and 1859--which was one of the most fatal obstacles to the foremost aims of his political life. It was twenty years from now, as my readers will see, before the effort, now foreshadowed, to exclude the income-tax from the ordinary sources of national revenue, reached its dramatic close. FOOTNOTES: [284] A curious parliamentary incident occurred. The original proposal was to reduce the duty from eighteen-pence to sixpence. A motion to repeal it altogether was rejected by ten. Then a motion was made to substitute zero for sixpence in the clause. The Speaker ruled that this reversal of the previous vote was not out of order, and it was carried by nine. [285] Some may place first the Act of 1833 making real estate liable for simple contract debts. [286] Mrs. Simpson's _Many Memories_, p. 237. [287] For paper on Irish income-tax, see Appendix. [288] Loans made to Ireland for various purposes. [289] Cavour, as Costi's letters show, took an eager interest in Mr. Gladstone's budget speech. [290] Greville, Third Series, i. p. 59. [291] Northcote, _Twenty Years of Financial Policy_, p. 185. [292] Mr. Gladstone received valuable aid from Bethell, the solicitor-general. On leaving, office in 1855 he wrote to Bethell: 'After having had to try your patience more than once in circumstances of real difficulty, I have found your kindness inexhaustible, and your aid invaluable, so that I really can ill tell on which of the two I look back with the greater pleasure. The memory of the Succession Duty bill is to me something like what Inkermann may be to a private of the Guards: you were the sergeant from whom I got my drill and whose hand and voice carried me through.' [293] The city articles of the time justify this statement. [294] Gladstone Memo., 1897. See also Appendix. [295] It may be said, however, that Peel was right about the yield of the income-tax, and only overlooked the fact that it would not all be collected, within the year. CHAPTER III THE CRIMEAN WAR (_1853-1854_) He [Burke] maintained that the attempt to bring the Turkish empire into the consideration of the balance of power in Europe was extremely new, and contrary to all former political systems. He pointed out in strong terms the danger and impolity of our espousing the Ottoman cause.--BURKE (1791). After the session Mr. Gladstone had gone on a visit to Dunrobin, and there he was laid up with illness for many days. It was the end of September before he was able to travel south. At Dingwall they presented him (Sept. 27) with the freedom of that ancient burgh. He spoke of himself as having completed the twenty-first year of his political life, and as being almost the youngest of those veteran statesmen who occupied the chief places in the counsels of the Queen. At Inverness the same evening, he told them that in commercial legislation he had reaped where others had sown; that he had enjoyed the privilege of taking a humble but laborious part in realising those principles of free trade which, in the near future, would bring, in the train of increased intercourse and augmented wealth, that closer social and moral union of the nations of the earth which men all so fervently desire, and which must in the fulness of time lessen the frequency of strife and war. Yet even while the hopeful words were falling from the speaker's lips, he might have heard, not in far distance but close at hand, the trumpets and drums, the heavy rumbling of the cannon, and all the clangour of a world in arms. II OTTOMANS AND THE WEST One of the central and perennial interests of Mr. Gladstone's life was that shifting, intractable, and interwoven tangle of conflicting interests, rival peoples, and antagonistic faiths, that is veiled under the easy name of the Eastern question. The root of the Eastern question, as everybody almost too well knows, is the presence of the Ottoman Turks in Europe, their possession of Constantinople,--that incomparable centre of imperial power standing in Europe but facing Asia,--and their sovereignty as Mahometan masters over Christian races. In one of the few picturesque passages of his eloquence Mr. Gladstone once described the position of these races. 'They were like a shelving beach that restrained the ocean. That beach, it is true, is beaten by the waves; it is laid desolate; it produces nothing; it becomes perhaps nothing save a mass of shingle, of rock, of almost useless sea-weed. But it is a fence behind which the cultivated earth can spread, and escape the incoming tide, and such was the resistance of Bulgarians, of Servians, and of Greeks. It was that resistance which left Europe to claim the enjoyment of her own religion and to develop her institutions and her laws.' This secular strife between Ottoman and Christian gradually became a struggle among Christian powers of northern and western Europe, to turn tormenting questions in the east to the advantage of rival ambitions of their own. At a certain epoch in the eighteenth century Russia first seized her place among the Powers. By the end of the century she had pushed her force into the west by the dismemberment of Poland; she had made her way to the southern shores of the Black Sea; and while still the most barbaric of all the states, she had made good a vague claim to exercise the guardianship of civilisation on behalf of the Christian races and the Orthodox church. This claim it was that led at varying intervals of time, and with many diversities of place, plea, and colour, to crisis after crisis springing up within the Turkish empire, but henceforth all of them apt to spread with dangerous contagion to governments beyond Ottoman limits. England, unlike France, had no systematic tradition upon this complicated struggle. When war began between Russia and the Porte in 1771, we supported Russia and helped her to obtain an establishment in the Black Sea. Towards the end of 1782 when Catherine by a sort of royal syllogism, as Fox called it, took the Crimea into her own hands, the whig cabinet of the hour did not think it necessary to lend Turkey their support, though France and Spain proposed a combination to resist. Then came Pitt. The statesman whose qualities of greatness so profoundly impressed his contemporaries has usually been praised as a minister devoted to peace, and only driven by the French Revolution into the long war. His preparations in 1791 for a war with Russia on behalf of the Turk are a serious deduction from this estimate. Happily the alarms of the Baltic trade, and the vigorous reasoning of Fox, produced such an effect upon opinion, that Pitt was driven, on peril of the overthrow of his government, to find the best expedient he could to bring the business to an end without extremities. In 1853 the country was less fortunate than it had been in 1791. A Russian diplomatist made a homely comparison of the Eastern question to the gout; now its attack is in the foot, now in the hand; but all is safe if only it does not fly to a vital part. In 1852 the Eastern question showed signs of flying to the heart, and a catastrophe was sure. A dispute between Greek and Latin religious as to the custody of the holy places at Jerusalem, followed by the diplomatic rivalries of their respective patrons, Russia and France, produced a crisis that was at first of no extraordinary pattern. The quarrel between two packs of monks about a key and a silver star was a trivial symbol of the vast rivalry of centuries between powerful churches, between great states, between heterogeneous races. The dispute about the holy places was adjusted, but was immediately followed by a claim from the Czar for recognition by treaty of his rights as protector of the Sultan's Christian subjects. This claim the Sultan, with encouragement from the British ambassador, rejected, and the Czar marched troops into the Danubian provinces, to hold them in pledge until the required concession should be made to his high protective claims. This issue was no good cause for a general conflagration. Unfortunately many combustibles happened to lie about the world at that time, and craft, misunderstanding, dupery, autocratic pride, democratic hurry, combined to spread the blaze. DIPLOMATIC RIVALRIES The story is still fresh. With the detailed history of the diplomacy that preceded the outbreak of war between England, France, and Turkey on the one part and Russia on the other, we have here happily only the smallest concern. The large question, as it presented itself to Mr. Gladstone's mind in later years, and as it presents itself now to the historic student, had hardly then emerged to the view of the statesmen of the western Powers. Would the success of Russian designs at that day mean anything better than the transfer of the miserable Christian races to the yoke of a new master?[296] Or was the repulse of these designs necessary to secure to the Christian races--who, by the by, were not particularly good friends to one another--the power of governing themselves without any master, either Russian or Turk? To this question, so decisive as it is in judging the policy of the Crimean war, it is not quite easy even now for the historian--who has many other things to think of than has the contemporary politician--to give a confident answer. Nicholas was not without advisers who warned him that the break-up of Turkey by force of Russian arms might be to the deliverer a loss and not a gain. Brunnow, then Russian ambassador at St. James's, said to his sovereign: 'The war in its results would cause to spring out of the ruins of Turkey all kinds of new states, as ungrateful to us as Greece has been, as troublesome as the Danubian Principalities have been, and an order of things where our influence will be more sharply combated, resisted, restrained, by the rivalries of France, England, Austria, than it has ever been under the Ottoman. War cannot turn to our direct advantage. We shall shed our blood and spend our treasure in order that King Otho may gain Thessaly; that the English may take more islands at their own convenience; that the French too may get their share; and that the Ottoman empire may be transformed into independent states, which for us will only become either burdensome clients or hostile neighbours.' If this forecast was right, then to resist Russia was at once to prevent her from embarrassing and weakening herself, and to lock up the Christians in their cruel prison-house for a quarter of a century longer. If sagacious calculation in such a vein as this were the mainspring of the world, history would be stripped of many a crimson page. But far-sighted calculation can no longer be ascribed to the actors in this tragedy of errors--to Nicholas or Napoleon, to Aberdeen or Palmerston, or to any other of them excepting Cavour and the Turk. In England both people and ministers have been wont to change their minds upon the Eastern question. In the war between Russia and Turkey in 1828, during the last stage of the struggle for Greek independence, Russia as Greek champion against the Turk had the English populace on her side; Palmerston was warmly with her, regarding even her advance to Constantinople with indifference; and Aberdeen was reproached as a Turkish sympathiser. Now we shall see the parts inverted,--England and Palmerston ardent Turks, and Aberdeen falling into disgrace (unjustly enough) as Russian. Before we have done with Mr. Gladstone, the popular wheel will be found to make another and yet another revolution. III THE BRITISH CABINET When Kinglake's first two volumes of his history of the Crimean war appeared (1863), Mr. Gladstone wrote to a friend (May 14): 'Kinglake is fit to be a brilliant popular author, but quite unfit to be a historian. His book is too bad to live, and too good to die. As to the matter most directly within my cognisance, he is not only not too true, but so entirely void of resemblance to the truth, that one asks what was really the original of his picture.'[297] A little earlier he had written to Sir John Acton: 'I was not the important person in the negotiation before the war that Mr. Kinglake seems to suppose; and with him every supposition becomes an axiom and a dogma.' All the papers from various sources to which I have had access show that Mr. Gladstone, as he has just said, had no special share in the various resolutions taken in the decisive period that ended with the abandonment of the Vienna note in the early autumn of 1853. He has himself told us that through the whole of this critical stage Lord Clarendon, then in charge of foreign affairs, was the centre of a distinct set of communications, first, with the prime minister, next, with Lord John Russell as leader in the Commons, and third, with Lord Palmerston, whose long and active career at the foreign office had given him special weight in that department. The cabinet as a body was a machine incapable of being worked by anything like daily and sometimes hourly consultations of this kind, 'the upshot of which would only become known on the more important occasions to the ministers at large, especially to those among them charged with the most laborious departments.'[298] This was not at all said by way of exculpating Mr. Gladstone from his full share of responsibility for the war, for of that he never at any time showed the least wish or intention to clear himself, but rather the contrary. As matter of fact, it was the four statesmen just named who were in effective control of proceedings until the breakdown of the Vienna note, and the despatch of the British and French squadrons through the Dardanelles in October, opened the second stage of the diplomatic campaign, and led directly if not rapidly to its fatal climax. We have little more than a few glimpses of Mr. Gladstone's participation in the counsels of the eventful months that preceded the outbreak of the war. To Mrs. Gladstone he writes (October 4): 'I can hardly at this moment write about anything else than the Turkish declaration of war. This is a most serious event, and at once raises the question, Are we to go into it? The cabinet meets on Friday, and you must not be surprised at anything that may happen. The weather may be smooth; it also may be _very rough_.' First the smooth weather came. 'October 7. We have had our cabinet, three hours and a half; all there but Graham and Molesworth,[299] who would both have been strongly for peace. We shall have another to-morrow, to look over our results in writing. Some startling things were said and proposed, but I think that as far as government is concerned, all will probably keep straight at this juncture, and as to war I hope we shall not be involved in it, even if it goes on between Russia and Turkey, which is not quite certain.' Aberdeen himself thought the aspect of this cabinet of the 7th on the whole very good, Gladstone arguing strongly against a proposal of Palmerston's that England should enter into an engagement with Turkey to furnish her with naval assistance. Most of the cabinet were for peace. Lord John was warlike, but subdued in tone. Palmerston urged his views 'perseveringly but not disagreeably.' The final instruction was a compromise, bringing the fleet to Constantinople, but limiting its employment to operations of a strictly defensive character. This was one of those peculiar compromises that in their sequel contain surrender. The step soon showed how critical it was. Well indeed might Lord Aberdeen tell the Queen that it would obviously every day become more and more difficult to draw the line between defensive and offensive, between an auxiliary and a principal. So much simpler is a distinction in words than in things. Still, he was able to assure her that, though grounds of difference existed, the discussions of the cabinet of the 8th were carried on amicably and in good humour. With straightforward common sense the Queen pressed the prime minister for his own deliberate counsel on the spirit and ultimate tendency of the policy that he would recommend her to approve. In fact, Lord Aberdeen had no deliberate counsel to proffer. Speedily the weather roughened. SPEECH AT MANCHESTER Four days later (October 12) the minister repeated that, while elements of wide difference existed, still the appearance of that day was more favourable and tended to mutual agreement. At this cabinet Mr. Gladstone was not present, having gone on an expedition to Manchester, the first of the many triumphal visits of his life to the great industrial centres of the nation. 'Nothing,' he wrote to Lord Aberdeen, 'could have gone off better. Yesterday (October 11), I had to make a visit to the Exchange, which was crammed and most cordial. This morning we had first the "inauguration" of the Peel statue, in the presence of an enormous audience--misnamed so, inasmuch as but a portion of them could hear; and then a meeting in the Town Hall, where there were addresses and speeches made, to which I had to reply. I found the feeling of the assemblage so friendly that I said more on the war question than I had intended, but I sincerely hope I did not transgress the limits you would think it wise for me to observe. The existence of a peace and a war party was evident, from alternate manifestations, but I think the former feeling was decidedly the stronger, and at any rate I should say without the smallest doubt that the feeling of the whole meeting as a mass was unequivocally favourable to the course that the government have pursued.' 'Your Manchester speech,' Lord Aberdeen wrote to him in reply, 'has produced a great and, I hope, a very beneficial effect upon the public mind, and it has much promoted the cause of peace.' This result was extremely doubtful. The language of the Manchester speech is cloudy, but what it comes to is this. It recognises the duty of maintaining the integrity and independence of the Ottoman empire. Independence, however, in this case, says Mr. Gladstone, designates a sovereignty full of anomaly, of misery, of difficulty, and it has been subject every few years since we were born to European discussion and interference; we cannot forget the political solecism of Mahometans exercising despotic rule over twelve millions of our fellow Christians; into the questions growing out of this political solecism we are not now entering; what we see to-day is something different; it is the necessity for regulating the distribution of power in Europe; the absorption of power by one of the great potentates of Europe, which would follow the fall of the Ottoman rule, would be dangerous to the peace of the world, and it is the duty of England, at whatever cost, to set itself against such a result. This was Mr. Gladstone's first public entry upon one of the most passionate of all the objects of his concern for forty years to come. He hears the desolate cry, then but faint, for the succour of the oppressed Christians. He looks to European interference to terminate the hateful solecism. He resists the interference single-handed of the northern invader. It was intolerable that Russia should be allowed to work her will upon Turkey as an outlawed state.[300] In other words, the partition of Turkey was not to follow the partition of Poland. What we shortly call the Crimean war was to Mr. Gladstone the vindication of the public law of Europe against a wanton disturber. This was a characteristic example of his insistent search for a broad sentiment and a comprehensive moral principle. The principle in its present application had not really much life in it; the formula was narrow, as other invasions of public law within the next dozen years were to show. But the clear-cut issues of history only disclose themselves in the long result of Time. It was the diplomatic labyrinth of the passing hour through which the statesmen of the coalition had to thread their way. The disastrous end was what Mr. Disraeli christened the coalition war. 'The first year of the coalition government,' Lord Aberdeen wrote to Mr. Gladstone, 'was eminently prosperous, and this was chiefly owing to your own personal exertions, and to the boldness, ability, and success of your financial measures. Our second year, if not specially brilliant, might still have proved greatly advantageous to the country, had we possessed the courage to resist popular clamour and to avoid war; but this calamity aggravated all other causes of disunion and led to our dissolution.'[301] IV ENGLAND SLOWLY DRAWN IN On November 4, Clarendon wrote to Lord Aberdeen that they were now in an anomalous and painful position, and he had arrived at the conviction that it might have been avoided by firm language and a more decided course five months ago. 'Russia would then, as she is now, have been ready to come to terms, and we should have exercised a control over the Turks that is now not to be obtained.' Nobody, I suppose, doubts to-day that if firmer language had been used in June to Sultan and Czar alike, the catastrophe of war would probably have been avoided, as Lord Clarendon here remorsefully reflects. However that may have been, this pregnant and ominous avowal disclosed the truth that the British cabinet were no longer their own masters; that they had in a great degree, even at this early time, lost all that freedom of action which they constantly proclaimed it the rule of their policy to maintain, and which for a few months longer some of them at least strove very hard but all in vain to recover. The Turks were driving at war whilst we were labouring for peace, and both by diplomatic action and by sending the fleet to protect Turkish territory against Russian attack, we had become auxiliaries and turned the weaker of the two contending powers into the stronger. A few months afterwards Mr. Gladstone found a classic parallel for the Turkish alliance. 'When Aeneas escaped from the flames of Troy he had an ally. That ally was his father Anchises, and the part which Aeneas performed in the alliance was to carry his ally upon his back.' But the discovery came too late, nor was the Turk the only ally. Against the remonstrances of our ambassador the Sultan declared war upon Russia, and proceeded to acts of war, well knowing that England and France in what they believed to be interests of their own would see him through it. If the Sultan and his ulemas and his pashas were one intractable factor, the French Emperor was another. 'We have just as much to apprehend,' Graham wrote (Oct. 27), 'from the active intervention of our ally as from the open hostility of our enemy.' Behind the decorous curtain of European concert Napoleon III. was busily weaving scheme after scheme of his own to fix his unsteady diadem upon his brow, to plant his dynasty among the great thrones of western Europe, and to pay off some old scores of personal indignity put upon him by the Czar. The Czar fell into all the mistakes that a man could. Emperor by divine right, he had done his best to sting the self-esteem of the revolutionary emperor in Paris. By his language to the British ambassador about dividing the inheritance of the sick man, he had quickened the suspicions of the English cabinet. It is true the sick man will die, said Lord John Russell, but it may not be for twenty, fifty, or a hundred years to come; when William III. and Louis XIV. signed their treaty for the partition of the Spanish monarchy, they first made sure that the death of the king was close at hand. Then the choice as agent at Constantinople of the arrogant and unskilful Menschikoff proved a dire misfortune. Finally, the Czar was fatally misled by his own ambassador in London. Brunnow reported that all the English liberals and economists were convinced that the notion of Turkish reform was absurd; that Aberdeen had told him in accents of contempt and anger, 'I hate the Turks'; and that English views generally as to Russian aggression and Turkish interests had been sensibly modified. All this was not untrue, but it was not true enough to bear the inference that was drawn from it at St. Petersburg. The deception was disastrous, and Brunnow was never forgiven for it.[302] LORD STRATFORD DE REDCLIFFE Another obstacle to a pacific solution, perhaps most formidable of them all, was Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, the British ambassador at Constantinople. Animated by a vehement antipathy to Russia, possessing almost sovereign ascendency at the Porte, believing that the Turk might never meet a happier chance of having the battle out with his adversary once for all, and justly confident that a policy of war would find hearty backers in the London cabinet--in him the government had an agent who while seeming to follow instructions in the narrow letter baffled them in their spirit. In the autumn of 1853 Lord Aberdeen wrote to Graham, 'I fear I must renounce the sanguine view I have hitherto taken of the Eastern question; for nothing can be more alarming than the present prospect. I thought that we should have been able to conquer Stratford, but I begin to fear that the reverse will be the case, and that he will succeed in defeating us. Although at our wit's end, Clarendon and I are still labouring in the cause of peace; but really to contend at once with the pride of the Emperor, the fanaticism of the Turks, and the dishonesty of Stratford is almost a hopeless attempt.'[303] This description, when he saw it nearly forty years later, seems to have struck Mr. Gladstone as harsh. Though he agreed that the passage could hardly be omitted, he confessed his surprise that Lord Aberdeen should have applied the word dishonesty to Lord Stratford. He suggested the addition of a note that should recognise the general character of Lord Stratford, and should point out that prejudice and passion, by their blinding powers, often produce in the mind effects like those proper to dishonesty.[304] Perhaps we may find this a hard saying. Doubtless when he comes to praise and blame, the political historian must make due allowance for his actors; and charity is the grandest of illuminants. Still hard truth stands first, and amiable analysis of the psychology of a diplomatic agent who lets loose a flood of mischief on mankind is by no means what interests us most about him. Why not call things by their right names?[305] In his private letters (November) Stratford boldly exhibited his desire for war, and declared that 'the war, to be successful, must be a very comprehensive war on the part of England and France.' Well might the Queen say to the prime minister that it had become a serious question whether they were justified in allowing Lord Stratford any longer to remain in a situation that enabled him to frustrate all the efforts of his government for peace. Yet here, as many another time in these devious manoeuvres, that fearful dilemma interposed--inseparable in its many forms from all collective action whether in cabinet or party; so fit to test to the very uttermost all the moral fortitude, all the wisdom of a minister, his sense of proportion, his strength of will, his prudent pliancy of judgment, his power of balance, his sure perception of the ruling fact. The dilemma here is patent. To recall Lord Stratford would be to lose Lord Palmerston and Lord John; to lose them would be to break up the government; to break up the government would be to sunder the slender thread on which the chances of peace were hanging.[306] The thought, in short, of the high-minded Aberdeen striving against hope to play a steadfast and pacific part in a scene so sinister, among actors of such equivocal or crooked purpose, recalls nothing so much as the memorable picture long ago of Maria Theresa beset and baffled by her Kaunitzes and Thuguts, Catherines, Josephs, great Fredericks, Grand Turks, and wringing her hands over the consummation of an iniquitous policy to which the perversity of man and circumstance had driven her. As the proceedings in the cabinet dragged on through the winter, new projects were mooted. The ground was shifted to what Lord Stratford had called a comprehensive war upon Russia. Some of the cabinet began to aim at a transformation of the policy. It was suggested that the moment should be seized to obtain not merely the observance by Russia of her treaty obligations to Turkey, but a revision and modification of the treaties in Turkish interests. This is the well-known way in which, ever since the world called civilised began, the area of conflict is widened. If one plea is eluded or is satisfied, another is found; and so the peacemakers are at each step checkmated by the warmakers. The Powers of central Europe were immovable, with motives, interests, designs, each of their own. Austria had reasons of irresistible force for keeping peace with Russia. A single victory of Russia in Austrian Poland would enable her to march direct upon Vienna. Austria had no secure alliance with Prussia; on the contrary, her German rival opposed her on this question, and was incessantly canvassing the smaller states against her in respect to it. The French Emperor was said to be revolving a plan for bribing Austria out of Northern Italy by the gift of Moldavia and Wallachia. All was intricate and tortuous. The view in Downing Street soon expanded to this, that it would be a shame to England and to France unless the Czar were made not only to abandon his demands, and to evacuate the Principalities, but also to renounce some of the stipulations in former treaties on which his present arrogant pretensions had been formed. In the future, the guarantees for the Christian races should be sought in a treaty not between Sultan and Czar, but between the Sultan and the five Powers. BRITISH OPINION Men in the cabinet and men out of it, some with ardour, others with acquiescence, approved of war for different reasons, interchangeable in controversial value and cumulative in effect. Some believed, and more pretended to believe, that Turkey abounded in the elements and energies of self-reform, and insisted that she should have the chance. Others were moved by vague general sympathy with a weak power assailed by a strong one, and that one, moreover, the same tyrannous strength that held an iron heel on the neck of prostrate Poland; that only a few years before had despatched her legions to help Austria against the rising for freedom and national right in Hungary; that urged intolerable demands upon the Sultan for the surrender of the Hungarian refugees. Others again counted the power of Russia already exorbitant, and saw in its extension peril to Europe, and mischief to the interests of England. Russia on the Danube, they said, means Russia on the Indus. Russia at Constantinople would mean a complete revolution in the balance of power in the Mediterranean, and to an alarmed vision, a Russia that had only crossed the Pruth was as menacing as if her Cossacks were already encamped in permanence upon the shores of the Bosphorus. Along with the anxieties of the Eastern question, ministers were divided upon the subject of parliamentary reform. Some, including the prime minister, went with Lord John Russell in desiring to push a Reform bill. Others, especially Palmerston, were strongly adverse. Mr. Gladstone mainly followed the head of the government, but he was still a conservative, and still member for a tory constituency, and he followed his leader rather mechanically and without enthusiasm. Lord Palmerston was suspected by some of his colleagues of raising the war-cry in hopes of drowning the demand for reform. In the middle of December (1853) he resigned upon reform,[307] but nine days later he withdrew his resignation and returned. In the interval news of the Russian attack on the Turkish fleet at Sinope (November 30) had arrived--an attack justified by precedent and the rule of war. But public feeling in England had risen to fever; the French Emperor in exacting and peremptory language had declared that if England did not take joint action with him in the Black Sea, he would either act alone or else bring his fleet home. The British cabinet yielded, and came to the cardinal decision (Dec. 22) to enter the Black Sea. 'I was rather stunned,' Gladstone wrote to Sidney Herbert next day, 'by yesterday's cabinet. I have scarcely got my breath again. I told Lord Aberdeen that I had had wishes that Palmerston were back again on account of the Eastern question.' Here is a glimpse of this time:-- _Nov. 23, '53._--Cabinet. Reform discussed largely, amicably, and satisfactorily on the whole. _Dec. 16._--Hawarden. Off at 9 A.M. Astounded by a note from A. Gordon. [Palmerston had resigned the day before.] After dinner went to the admiralty, 10½-1½, where Lord Aberdeen, Newcastle, Graham, and I went over the late events and went over the course for to-morrow's cabinet. _Dec. 21._--Called on Lord Palmerston, and sat an hour. 22.--Cabinet, 2-7½, on Eastern Question. Palmerston and reform. A day of no small matter for reflection. _Jan. 4, 1854._--To Windsor. I was the only guest, and thus was promoted to sit by the Queen at dinner. She was most gracious, and above all so thoroughly natural. THE DECISION OF DECEMBER 22 On the decision of Dec. 22, Sir Charles Wood says:-- We had then a long discussion on the question of occupying the Black Sea, as proposed by France, and it seemed to me to be such a tissue of confusions that I advocated the simple course of doing so. Gladstone could not be persuaded to agree to this, in spite of a strong argument of Newcastle's. Gladstone's objection being to our being hampered by any engagement. His scheme was that our occupying the Black Sea was to be made dependent, in the first place, on the Turks having acceded to the Vienna proposals, or at any rate to their agreeing to be bound by any basis of peace on which the English and French governments agreed. Newcastle and I said we thought this would bind us much more to the Turks than if we occupied the Black Sea as part of our own measures, adopted for our own purposes, and without any engagement to the Turks, under which we should be if they accepted our conditions. Gladstone said he could be no party to unconditional occupation; so it ended in our telling France that we would occupy the Black Sea, that is, prevent the passage of any ships or munitions of war by the Russians, but that we trusted she would join us in enforcing the above condition on the Turks. If they agreed, then we were to occupy the Black Sea; if they did not, we were to reconsider the question, and then determine what to do. Clarendon saw Walewski, who was quite satisfied. By the middle of February war was certain. Mr. Gladstone wrote an account of a conversation that he had at this time with Lord Aberdeen:-- _Feb. 22._--Lord Aberdeen sent for me to-day and informed me that Lord Palmerston had been with him to say that he had made up his mind to vote for putting off (without entering into the question of its merits) the consideration of the Reform bill for the present year. [Conversation on Reform.][308] He then asked me whether I did not think that he might himself withdraw from office when we came to the declaration of war. All along he had been acting against his feelings, but still defensively. He did not think that he could regard the offensive in the same light, and was disposed to retire. I said that a defensive war might involve offensive operations, and that a declaration of war placed the case on no new ground of principle. It did not make the quarrel, but merely announced it, notifying to the world (of itself justifiable) a certain state of facts which would have arrived. He said all wars were called or pretended to be defensive. I said that if the war was untruly so called, then our position was false; but that the war did not become less defensive from our declaring it, or from our entering upon offensive operations. To retire therefore upon such a declaration, would be to retire upon no ground warrantable and conceivable by reason. It would not be standing on a principle, whereas any man would require a distinct principle to justify him in giving up at this moment the service of the crown. He asked: How could he bring himself to fight for the Turks? I said we were not fighting for the Turks, but we were warning Russia off the forbidden ground. That if, indeed, we undertook to put down the Christians under Turkish rule by force, then we should be fighting for the Turks; but to this I for one could be no party. He said if I saw a way for him to get out, he hoped I would mention it to him. I replied that my own views of war so much agreed with his, and I felt such a horror of bloodshed, that I had thought the matter over incessantly for myself. We stand, I said, upon the ground that the Emperor has invaded countries not his own, inflicted wrong on Turkey, and what I feel much more, most cruel wrong on the wretched inhabitants of the Principalities; that war had ensued and was raging with all its horrors; that we had procured for the Emperor an offer of honourable terms of peace which he had refused; that we were not going to extend the conflagration (but I had to correct myself as to the Baltic), but to apply more power for its extinction, and this I hoped in conjunction with all the great Powers of Europe. That I, for one, could not shoulder the musket against the Christian subjects of the Sultan, and must there take my stand. (Not even, I had already told him, if he agreed to such a course, could I bind myself to follow him in it.) He said Granville and Wood had spoken to him in the same sense. I added that S. Herbert and Graham probably would adhere; perhaps Argyll and Molesworth, and even others might be added. LORD ABERDEEN'S MISGIVINGS Ellice had been with him and told him that J. Russell and Palmerston were preparing to contend for his place. Ellice himself, deprecating Lord Aberdeen's retirement, anticipated that if it took place Lord Palmerston would get the best of it, and drive Lord John out of the field by means of his war popularity, though Lord John had made the speech of Friday to put himself up in this point of view with the country. In consequence of what I had said to him about Newcastle, he [Aberdeen] had watched him, and had told the Queen to look to him as her minister at some period or other; which, though afraid of him (as well as of me) about Church matters, she was prepared to do. I said I had not changed my opinion of Newcastle as he had done of Lord John Russell, but I had been disappointed and pained at the recent course of his opinions about the matter of the war. At my house last Wednesday he [Newcastle] declared openly for putting down by force the Christians of European Turkey. Yes, Lord Aberdeen replied; but he thought him the description of man who would discharge well the duties of that office. In this I agree.[309] A few days later (March 3) Lord John Russell, by way of appeasing Aberdeen's incessant self-reproach, told him that the only course that could have prevented war would have been to counsel the Turks to acquiesce, and not to allow the British fleet to quit Malta. 'But that was a course,' Lord John continued, 'to which Lansdowne, Palmerston, Clarendon, Newcastle, and I would not have consented; so that you would only have broken up your government if you had insisted upon it.' Then the speaker added his belief that the Czar, even after the Turk's acquiescence and submission, if we could have secured so much, would have given the Sultan six months' respite, and no more. None of these arguments ever eased the mind of Lord Aberdeen. Even in his last interview with the departing ambassador of the Czar, he told him how bitterly he regretted, first, the original despatch of the fleet from Malta to Besika Bay (July 1853); and second that he had not sent Lord Granville to St. Petersburg immediately on the failure of Menschikoff at Constantinople (May 1853), in order to carry on personal negotiations with the Emperor.[310] An ultimatum demanding the evacuation of the Principalities was despatched to St. Petersburg by England and France, the Czar kept a haughty silence, and at the end of March war was declared. In the event the Principalities were evacuated a couple of months later, but the state of war continued. On September 14, English, French, and Turkish troops disembarked on the shores of the Crimea, and on the 20th of the month was fought the battle of the Alma. 'I cannot help repeating to you,' Mr. Gladstone wrote to Lord Palmerston (Oct. 4, 1854), 'which I hope you will forgive, the thanks I offered at an earlier period, for the manner in which you urged--when we were amidst many temptations to far more embarrassing and less effective proceedings--the duty of concentrating our strokes upon the heart and centre of the war at Sebastopol.'[311] In the same month Bright wrote the solid, wise, and noble letter that brought him so much obloquy then, and stands as one of the memorials of his fame now.[312] Mr. Gladstone wrote to his brother Robertson upon it:-- _Nov. 7, 1854._--I thought Bright's letter both an able and a manly one, and though I cannot go his lengths, I respect and sympathise with the spirit in which it originated. I think he should draw a distinction between petty meddlings of our own, or interferences for selfish purposes, and an operation like this which really is in support of the public law of Europe. I agree with him in some of the retrospective part of his letter. Then came the dark days of the Crimean winter. DID THE CABINET DRIFT? In his very deliberate vindication of the policy of the Crimean war composed in 1887, Mr. Gladstone warmly denies either that the ship of state drifted instead of being steered, or that the cabinet was in continual conflict with itself at successive stages of the negotiation.[313] He had witnessed, he declares, much more of sharp or warm argument in every other of the seven cabinets to which he belonged.[314] In 1881 he said to the present writer: 'As a member of the Aberdeen cabinet I never can admit that divided opinions in that cabinet led to hesitating action, or brought on the war. I do not mean that all were always and on all points of the same mind. But I have known much sharper divisions in a cabinet that has worked a great question honourably and energetically, and I should confidently say, whether the negotiations were well or ill conducted, that considering their great difficulty they were worked with little and not much conflict. It must be borne in mind that Lord Aberdeen subsequently developed opinions that were widely severed from those that had guided us, but these never appeared in the cabinet or at the time.' Still he admits that this practical harmony could much less truly be affirmed of the four ministers especially concerned with foreign affairs;[315] that is to say, of the only ministers whose discussions mattered. It is certainly impossible to contend that Aberdeen was not in pretty continual conflict, strong and marked though not heated, with these three main coadjutors. Whether it be true to say that the cabinet drifted, depends on the precise meaning of a word. It is undoubtedly true that it steered a course bringing the ship into waters that the captain most eagerly wished to avoid, and each tack carried it farther away from the expected haven. Winds and waves were too many for them. We may perhaps agree with Mr. Gladstone that as it was feeling rather than argument that raised the Crimean war into popularity, so it is feeling and not argument that has plunged it into the 'abyss of odium.' When we come to a period twenty years after this war was over, we shall see that Mr. Gladstone found out how little had time changed the public temper, how little had events taught their lesson. FOOTNOTES: [296] In 1772 Burke had said that he did not wish well to Turkey, for any people but the Turks, situated as they are, would have been cultivated in three hundred years; yet they grow more gross in the very native soil of civility and refinement. But he did not expect to live to see the Turkish barbarian civilised by the Russian.--_Corr._ i. p. 402. [297] To Mrs. Gladstone, Jan. 3, 1863: 'In the evenings I have leisure. Much of it I have been spending in reading Kinglake's book, which touches very nearly, and not agreeably or justly, the character of Lord Aberdeen and his government. I am afraid Newcastle blabbed on what took place, and that his blabbing was much coloured with egotism. Clarendon, I hear, is very angry with the book, and Lewis too, but Lewis is not a party concerned.' [298] _Eng. Hist. Rev._ No. vi. p. 289. [299] 'Molesworth in the cabinet,' said Lord Aberdeen later, 'was a failure. Until the war he was a mere cipher. When the war had broken out and was popular he became outrageously warlike.'--Mrs. Simpson's _Many Memories_, p. 264; see also Cobden's _Speeches_, ii. p. 28. [300] _Eng. Hist. Rev. No._ vi. p. 290. [301] March 17, 1856. [302] See Martens' _Recueil des Traités_, etc., published by the Russian foreign office, 1898, vol. xii., containing many graphic particulars of these events. [303] Stanmore, _Earl of Aberdeen_, pp. 270-1. [304] To Sir A. Gordon, Aug. 31, 1892. [305] See Stanmore, p. 253. [306] This is clearly worked out by Lord Stanmore, p. 254, etc. [307] Ashley's _Life of Palmerston_, ii. p. 270. [308] See Appendix. [309] Lord Blachford in his _Letters_ says of Newcastle (p. 225): 'An honest and honourable man, a thorough gentleman in all his feelings and ways, and considerate of all about him. He respected other people's position, but was sensible of his own; and his familiarity, friendly enough, was not such as invited response. It was said of him that he did not remember his rank unless you forgot it. In political administration he was painstaking, clear-headed, and just. But his abilities were moderate, and he did not see how far they were from being sufficient for the management of great affairs, which, however, he was always ambitious of handling.' See also Selborne's _Memorials_, ii. pp. 257-8. [310] Martens. [311] The equivocal honour of originality seems to belong to the French, but they had allowed the plan to slumber.--De La Gorce, _Hist. du second Empire_, i. pp. 231-3. [312] It is given in _Speeches_, i. p. 529. Oct. 29, 1854. [313] _Eng. Hist. Rev._ April 1887. This article was submitted to the Duke of Argyll and Lord Granville for correction before publication. [314] The cabinet of 1892 was his eighth. [315] Aberdeen, Russell, Palmerston, Clarendon. CHAPTER IV OXFORD REFORM--OPEN CIVIL SERVICE (_1854_) To rear up minds with aspirations and faculties above the herd, capable of leading on their countrymen to greater achievements in virtue, intelligence, and social well-being; to do this, and likewise so to educate the leisured classes of the community generally, that they may participate as far as possible in the qualities of these superior spirits, and be prepared to appreciate them, and follow in their steps--these are purposes requiring institutions of education placed above dependence on the immediate pleasure of that very multitude whom they are designed to elevate. These are the ends for which endowed universities are desirable; they are those which all endowed universities profess to aim at; and great is their disgrace, if, having undertaken this task, and claiming credit for fulfilling it, they leave it unfulfilled.--J. S. MILL. The last waves of the tide of reform that had been flowing for a score of years, now at length reached the two ancient universities. The Tractarian revival with all its intense pre-occupations had given the antique Oxford a respite, but the hour struck, and the final effort of the expiring whigs in their closing days of power was the summons to Oxford and Cambridge to set their houses in order. Oxford had been turned into the battle-field on which contending parties in the church had at her expense fought for mastery. The result was curious. The nature of the theological struggle, by quickening mind within the university, had roused new forces; the antagonism between anglo-catholic and puritan helped, as it had done two centuries before, to breed the latitudinarian; a rising school in the sphere of thought and criticism rapidly made themselves an active party in the sphere of affairs; and Mr. Gladstone found himself forced to do the work of the very liberalism which his own theological leaders and allies had first organised themselves to beat down and extinguish. FIRST OXFORD COMMISSION In 1850 Lord John Russell, worked upon by a persevering minority in Oxford, startled the House of Commons, delighted the liberals, and angered and dismayed the authorities of the powerful corporations thus impugned, by the announcement of a commission under the crown to inquire into their discipline, state, and revenues, and to report whether any action by crown and parliament could further promote the interests of religion and sound learning in these venerable shrines. This was the first step in a long journey towards the nationalisation of the universities, and the disestablishment of the church of England in what seemed the best fortified of all her strongholds. After elaborate correspondence with both liberal and tory sections in Oxford, Mr. Gladstone rose in his place and denounced the proposed commission as probably against the law, and certainly odious in the eye of the constitution. He undertook to tear in tatters the various modern precedents advanced by the government for their purpose; scouted the alleged visitorial power of the crown; insisted that it would blight future munificence; argued that defective instruction with freedom and self-government would, in the choice of evils, be better than the most perfect mechanism secured by parliamentary interference; admitted that what the universities had done for learning was perhaps less than it might have been, but they had done as much as answered the circumstances and exigencies of the country. When we looked at the lawyers, the divines, the statesmen of England, even if some might judge them inferior in mere scholastic and technical acquirements, why need we be ashamed of the cradles in which they were mainly nurtured? He closed with a triumphant and moving reference to Peel (dead a fortnight before), the most distinguished son of Oxford in the present century, and beyond all other men the high representative and the true type of the genius of the British House of Commons.[316] In truth no worse case was ever more strongly argued, and fortunately the speech is to be recorded as the last manifesto, on a high theme and on a broad scale, of that toryism from which this wonderful pilgrim had started on his shining progress. It is just to add that the party in Oxford who resisted the commission was also the party most opposed to Mr. Gladstone, and further that the view of the crown having no right to issue such a commission _in invitos_ was shared with him by Sir Robert Peel.[317] Of this debate, Arthur Stanley (a strong supporter of the measure), tells us: 'The ministerial speeches were very feeble.... Gladstone's was very powerful; he said, in the most effective manner, anything which could be said against the commission. His allusion to Peel was very touching, and the House responded to it by profound and sympathetic silence.... Heywood's closing speech was happily drowned in the roar of "Divide," so that nothing could be heard save the name of "Cardinal Wolsey" thrice repeated.'[318] The final division was taken on the question of the adjournment, when the government had a majority of 22. (July 18, 1850.) II REPORT OF THE COMMISSION In Oxford the party of 'organised torpor' did not yield without a struggle. They were clamorous on the sanctity of property; contemptuous of the doctrine of the rights of parliament over national domains; and protestant collegians subsisting on ancient Roman catholic endowments edified the world on the iniquity of setting aside the pious founder. They submitted an elaborate case to the most eminent counsel of the day, and counsel advised that the commission was not constitutional, not legal, and not such as the members of the university were bound to obey. The question of duty apart from legal obligation the lawyers did not answer, but they suggested that a petition might be addressed to the crown, praying that the instrument might be cancelled. The petition was duly prepared, and duly made no difference. Many of the academic authorities were recalcitrant, but this made no difference either, nor did the Bishop of Exeter's hot declaration that the proceeding had 'no parallel since the fatal attempt of King James II. to subject the colleges to his unhallowed control.' The commissioners, of whom Tait and Jeune seem to have been the leading spirits, with Stanley and Mr. Goldwin Smith for secretaries, conducted their operations with tact, good sense, and zeal. At the end of two years (April 1852) the inquiry was completed and the report made public--one of the high landmarks in the history of our modern English life and growth. 'When you consider,' Stanley said to Jowett, 'the den of lions through which the raw material had to be dragged, much will be excused. In fact the great work was to finish it at all. There is a harsh, unfriendly tone about the whole which ought, under better circumstances, to have been avoided, but which may, perhaps, have the advantage of propitiating the radicals.'[319] Mr. Gladstone thought it one of the ablest productions submitted in his recollection to parliament, but the proposals of change too manifold and complicated. The evidence he found more moderate and less sweeping in tone than the report, but it only deepened his conviction of the necessity of important and, above all, early changes. He did not cease urging his friends at Oxford to make use of this golden opportunity for reforming the university from within, and warning them that delay would be dearly purchased.[320] 'Gladstone's connection with Oxford,' said Sir George Lewis, 'is now exercising a singular influence upon the politics of the university. Most of his high church supporters stick to him, and (insomuch as it is difficult to struggle against the current) he is liberalising them, instead of their torifying him. He is giving them a push forwards instead of their giving him a pull backwards.'[321] The originators of the commission were no longer in office, but things had gone too far for their successors to burke what had been done.[322] The Derby government put into the Queen's speech, in November (1852), a paragraph informing parliament that the universities had been invited to examine the recommendations of the report. After a year's time had been given them to consider, it became the duty of the Aberdeen government to frame a bill. The charge fell upon Mr. Gladstone as member for Oxford, and in the late autumn of 1853 he set to work. In none of the enterprises of his life was he more industrious or energetic. Before the middle of December he forwarded to Lord John Russell what he called a rude draft, but the rude draft contained the kernel of the plan that was ultimately carried, with a suggestion even of the names of the commissioners to whom operations were to be confided. 'It is marvellous to me,' wrote Dr. Jeune to him (Dec. 21, 1853), 'how you can give attention so minute to university affairs at such a crisis. Do great things become to great men from the force of habit, what their ordinary cares are to ordinary persons?' As he began, so he advanced, listening to everybody, arguing with everybody, flexible, persistent, clear, practical, fervid, unconquerable. 'I fear,' Lord John Russell wrote to him (March 27), 'my mind is exclusively occupied with the war and the Reform bill, and yours with university reform.' Perhaps, unluckily for the country, this was true. 'My whole heart is in the Oxford bill,' Mr. Gladstone writes (March 29); 'it is my consolation under the pain with which I view the character my office [the exchequer] is assuming under the circumstances of war.' 'Gladstone has been surprising everybody here,' writes a conspicuous high churchman from Oxford, 'by the ubiquity of his correspondence. Three-fourths of the colleges have been in communication with him, on various parts of the bill more or less affecting themselves. He answers everybody by return of post, fully and at length, quite entering into their case, and showing the greatest acquaintance with it.'[323] 'As one of your burgesses,' he told them, 'I stand upon the line that divides Oxford from the outer world, and as a sentinel I cry out to tell what I see from that position.' What he saw was that if this bill were thrown out, no other half so favourable would ever again be brought in. THE BILL FRAMED The scheme accepted by the cabinet was in essentials Mr. Gladstone's own. Jowett at the earliest stage sent him a comprehensive plan, and soon after, saw Lord John (Jan. 6). 'I must own,' writes the latter to Gladstone, 'I was much struck by the clearness and completeness of his views.' The difference between Jowett's plan and Mr. Gladstone's was on the highly important point of machinery. Jowett, who all his life had a weakness for getting and keeping authority into his own hands, or the hands of those whom he could influence, contended that after parliament had settled principles, Oxford itself could be trusted to settle details far better than a little body of great personages from outside, unacquainted with special wants and special interests. Mr. Gladstone, on the other hand, invented the idea of an executive commission with statutory powers. The two plans were printed and circulated, and the balance of opinion in the cabinet went decisively for Mr. Gladstone's scheme. The discussion between him and Jowett, ranging over the whole field of the bill, was maintained until its actual production, in many interviews and much correspondence. In drawing the clauses Mr. Gladstone received the help of Bethell, the solicitor-general, at whose suggestion Phillimore and Thring were called in for further aid in what was undoubtedly a task of exceptional difficulty. The process brought into clearer light the truth discerned by Mr. Gladstone from the first, that the enormous number of diverse institutions that had grown up in Oxford made resort to what he called sub-legislation inevitable; that is to say, they were too complex for parliament, and could only be dealt with by delegation to executive act. It is untrue to say that Oxford as a place of education had no influence on the mind of the country; it had immense influence, but that influence was exactly what it ought not to have been. Instead of stimulating it checked, instead of expanding it stereotyped. Even for the church it had failed to bring unity, for it was from Oxford that the opinions had sprung that seemed to be rending the church in twain. The regeneration introduced by this momentous measure has been overlaid by the strata of subsequent reforms. Enough to say that the objects obtained were the deposition of the fossils and drones, and a renovated constitution on the representative principle for the governing body; the wakening of a huge mass of sleeping endowments; the bestowal of college emoluments only on excellence tested by competition, and associated with active duties; the reorganisation or re-creation of professorial teaching; the removal of local preferences and restrictions. Beyond these aspects of reform, Mr. Gladstone was eager for the proposed right to establish private halls, as a change calculated to extend the numbers and strength of the university, and as settling the much disputed question, whether the scale of living could not be reduced, and university education brought within reach of classes of moderate means. These hopes proved to be exaggerated, but they illustrate his constant and lifelong interest in the widest possible diffusion of all good things in the world from university training down to a Cook's tour. Mr. Gladstone seems to have pressed his draftsmen hard, as he sometimes did. Bethell returning to him 'the _disjecta membra_ of this unfortunate bill,' tells him that he is too deeply attached to him to care for a few marks of impatience, and adds, 'write a few kind words to Phillimore, for he really loves you and feels this matter deeply.' Oxford, scene of so many agitations for a score of years past, was once more seized with consternation, stupefaction, enthusiasm. A few private copies of the draft were sent down from London for criticism. On the vice-chancellor it left 'an impression of sorrow and sad anticipations'; it opened deplorable prospects for the university, for the church, for religion, for righteousness. The dean of Christ Church thought it not merely inexpedient, but unjust and tyrannical. Jowett, on the other hand, was convinced that it must satisfy all reasonable reformers, and added emphatically in writing to Mr. Gladstone, 'It is to yourself and Lord John that the university will be indebted for the greatest boon that it has ever received.' After the introduction of the bill by Lord John Russell, the obscurantists made a final effort to call down one of their old pelting hailstorms. A petition against the bill was submitted to convocation; happily it passed by a majority of no more than two. SECOND READING At length the blessed day of the second reading came. The ever zealous Arthur Stanley was present. 'A superb speech from Gladstone,' he records, 'in which, for the first time, all the arguments from our report were worked up in the most effective manner. He vainly endeavoured to reconcile his present with his former position. But, with this exception, I listened to his speech with the greatest delight.... To behold one's old enemies slaughtered before one's face with the most irresistible weapons was quite intoxicating. One great charm of his speaking is its exceeding good-humour. There is great vehemence but no bitterness.'[324] An excellent criticism of many, perhaps most, of his speeches. 'It must ever be borne in mind,' Mr. Gladstone wrote to Lord John at the outset, 'with respect to our old universities that history, law, and usage with them form such a manifold, diversified, and complex mass, that it is not one subject but a world of subjects that we have to deal with in approaching them.' And he pointed out that if any clever lawyer such as Butt or Cairns were employed to oppose the bill systematically, debate would run to such lengths as to make it hopeless. This was a point of view that Mr. Gladstone's more exacting and abstract critics now, and many another time, forgot: they forgot that, whatever else you may say of a bill, after all it is a thing that is to be carried through parliament. Everybody had views of his own. A characteristic illustration of Mr. Gladstone's temper in the arduous work of practical legislation to which so much of the energies of his life was devoted, is worth giving here from a letter of this date to Burgon of Oriel. Nobody answers better to the rare combination, in Bacon's words, of a 'glorious nature that doth put life into business, with a solid and sober nature that hath as much of the ballast as of the sail':-- Sometimes it may be necessary in dealing with a very ancient institution to make terms, as it were, between such an institution and the actual spirit of the age. This may be in certain circumstances a necessary, but it can never be a satisfactory, process. It is driving a bargain, and somewhat of a wretched bargain. But I really do not find or feel that this is the case now before us. In that case, my view, right or wrong, is this: that Oxford is far behind her duties or capabilities, not because her working men work so little, but because so large a proportion of her children do not work at all, so large a proportion of her resources remains practically dormant, and her present constitution is so ill-adapted to developing her real but latent powers. What I therefore anticipate is not the weakening of her distinctive principles, not the diminution of her labour, already great, that she discharges for the church and for the land, but a great expansion, a great invigoration, a great increase of her numbers, a still greater increase of her moral force, and of her hold upon the heart and mind of the country. ADMISSION OF DISSENTERS Pusey seems to have talked of the university as ruined and overthrown by a parricidal hand; Oxford would be lost to the church; she would have to take refuge in colleges away from the university. Oxford had now received its death-blow from Mr. Gladstone and the government to which he belonged, and he could no longer support at election times the worker of such evil, and must return to that inactivity in things political, from which only love and confidence for Mr. Gladstone had roused him. 'Personally,' the good man adds, 'I must always love you.' To Pusey, and to all who poured reproach upon him from this side, Mr. Gladstone replied with inexhaustible patience. He never denied that parliamentary intervention was an evil, but he submitted to it in order to avert greater evil. 'If the church of England has not strength enough to keep upright, this will soon appear in the troubles of emancipated Oxford: if she has, it will come out to the joy of us all in the immensely augmented energy and power of the university for good. If Germanism and Arnoldism are now to carry the day at Oxford (I mean supposing the bill is carried into law), they will carry it fairly; let them win and wear her (God forbid, however); but if she has a heart true to the faith her hand will be stronger ten times over than it has been heretofore, in doing battle.... Nor am I saddened by the pamphlet of a certain Mr. ---- which I have been reading to-day. It has more violence than venom, and also much more violence than strength. I often feel how hard it is on divines to be accused of treachery and baseness, because they do not, like _us_, get it every day and so become case-hardened against it.' In parliament the craft laboured heavily in cross-seas. 'I have never known,' says its pilot, 'a measure so foolishly discussed in committee.' Nor was oil cast upon the waters by its friends. By the end of May Mr. Gladstone and Lord John saw that they must take in canvas. At this point a new storm broke. It was impossible that a measure on such a subject could fail to awaken the ever ready quarrel between the two camps into which the English establishment, for so many generations, has so unhappily divided the life of the nation. From the first, the protestant dissenters had been extremely sore at the absence from the bill of any provision for their admission to the remodelled university. Bright, the most illustrious of them, told the House of Commons that he did not care whether so pusillanimous and tinkering an affair as this was passed or not. Dissenters, he said with scorn, are expected always to manifest too much of those inestimable qualities which are spoken of in the Epistle to the Corinthians: 'To hope all things, to believe all things, and to endure all things.' More discredit than he deserved fell upon Mr. Gladstone for this obnoxious defect. In announcing the commission of inquiry four years before, Lord John as prime minister had expressly said that the improvement of the universities should be treated as a subject by itself, and that the admission of dissenters ought to be reserved for future and separate consideration. Writing to Mr. Gladstone (Jan. 1854) he said, 'I do not want to stir the question in this bill,' but he would support a proposal in a separate bill by which the halls might be the means of admitting dissenters. Mr. Gladstone himself professed to take no strong line either way; but in a parliamentary case of this kind to take no line is not materially different from a line in effect unfriendly. Arthur Stanley pressed him as hard as he could. 'Justice to the university,' said Mr. Gladstone in reply, 'demands that it should be allowed to consider the question for itself.... Indeed, while I believe that the admission of dissenters without the breaking up of the religious teaching and the government of the university would be a great good, I am also of opinion that to give effect to that measure by forcible intervention of parliament would be a great evil. Whether it is an evil that must some day or other be encountered, the time has not yet, I think, arrived for determining.' The letter concludes with a remark of curious bearing upon the temper of that age. 'The very words,' he says to Stanley, 'which you have let fall upon your paper--"Roman catholics"--used in this connection, were enough to burn it through and through, considering we have _a parliament which, were the measure of 1829 not law at this moment, would I think probably refuse to make it law_.' There is no reason to think this an erroneous view. Perhaps it would not be extravagant even to-day. What Mr. Gladstone called 'the evil of parliamentary interference' did not tarry, and on the report stage of the bill, a clause removing the theological test at matriculation was carried (June 22) against the government by ninety-one. The size of the majority and the diversified material of which it was composed left the government no option but to yield. 'Parliament having now unhappily determined to legislate upon the subject,' Mr. Gladstone writes to the provost of Oriel, 'it seems to me, I may add it seems to my colleagues, best for the interests of the university that we should now make some endeavour to settle the whole question and so preclude, if we can, any pretext for renewed agitation.' 'The basis of that settlement,' he went on in a formula which he tenaciously reiterated to all his correspondents, and which is a landmark in the long history of his dealing with the question, 'should be that the whole teaching and governing function in the university and in the colleges, halls, and private halls, should be retained, as now, in the church of England, but that everything outside the governing and teaching functions, whether in the way of degrees, honours, or emoluments, should be left open.' The new clause he described as 'one of those incomplete arrangements that seem to suit the practical habits of this country, and which by taking the edge off a matter of complaint, are often found virtually to dispose of it for a length of time.' In the end the church of England test was removed, not only on admission to the university, but from the bachelor's degree. Tests in other forms remained, as we shall in good time perceive. 'We have proceeded,' Mr. Gladstone wrote, 'in the full belief that the means of applying a church test to fellowships in colleges are clear and ample.' So they were, and so remained, until seventeen years later in the life of an administration of his own the obnoxious fetter was struck off. MR. DISRAELI ON THE BILL The debates did not close without at least one characteristic masterpiece from Mr. Disraeli. He had not taken a division on the second reading, but he executed with entire gravity all the regulation manoeuvres of opposition, and his appearance on the page of Hansard relieves a dull discussion. If government, he asked, could defer a reform of the constitution (referring to the withdrawal of Lord John's bill) why should they hurry to reform the universities? The talk about the erudite professors of Germany as so superior to Oxford was nonsense. The great men of Germany became professors only because they could not become members of parliament. 'We, on the contrary, are a nation of action, and you may depend upon it, that though you may give an Oxford professor two thousand a year instead of two hundred, still ambition in England will look to public life and to the House of Commons, and not to professors' chairs.' The moment the revolution of 1848 gave the German professors a chance, see how they rushed into political conventions and grasped administrative offices. Again, the principle of the bill was the laying of an unhallowed hand upon the ark of the universities, and wore in effect the hideous aspect of the never-to-be-forgotten appropriation clause. If he were asked whether he would rather have Oxford free with all its imperfections, or an Oxford without imperfections but under the control of the government, he would reply, 'Give me Oxford free and independent, with all its anomalies and imperfections.' An excellently worded but amusingly irrelevant passage about Voltaire and Rousseau, and the land that was enlightened by the one and inflamed by the other, brought the curious performance to a solemn close. High fantastic trifling of this sort, though it may divert a later generation to whose legislative bills it can do no harm, helps to explain the deep disfavour with which Disraeli was regarded by his severe and strenuous opponent. 'The admiration of posterity,' Dr. Jeune wrote to Mr. Gladstone, 'would be greatly increased if men hereafter could know what wisdom, what firmness, what temper, what labour your success has required.' More than this, it was notorious that Mr. Gladstone was bravely risking his seat. This side of the matter Jeune made plain to him. 'Had I foreseen in 1847,' replied Mr. Gladstone (_Broadstairs_, Aug. 26, 1854), 'that church controversies which I then hoped were on the decline, were really about to assume a fiercer glare and a wider range than they had done before, I should not have been presumptuous enough to face the contingencies of such a seat at such a time.' As things stood he was bound to hold on. With dauntless confidence that never failed him, he was convinced that no long time would suffice to scatter the bugbears, and the bill would be nothing but a source of strength to any one standing in reputed connection with it. To Dr. Jeune when the battle was over he expresses 'his warm sense of the great encouragement and solid advantage which at every stage he had derived from his singularly ready and able help.' To Jowett and Goldwin Smith he acknowledged a hardly lower degree of obligation. The last twenty years, wrote a shrewd and expert sage in 1866, 'have seen more improvement in the temper and teaching of Oxford than the three centuries since the Reformation. This has undoubtedly been vastly promoted by the Reform bill of 1854, or at least by one enactment in it, the abolition of close fellowships, which has done more for us than all the other enactments of the measure put together.'[325] 'The indirect effects,' says the same writer in words of pregnant praise, 'in stimulating the spirit of improvement among us, have been no less important than the specific reforms enacted by it.'[326] III ANOTHER FAR-REACHING CHANGE Another of the most far-reaching changes of this era of reform affected the civil service. J. S. Mill, then himself an official at the India House, did not hesitate 'to hail the plan of throwing open the civil service to competition as one of the greatest improvements in public affairs ever proposed by a government.' On the system then reigning, civil employment under the crown was in all the offices the result of patronage, though in some, and those not the more important of them, nominees were partially tested by qualifying examination and periods of probation. The eminent men who held what were called the staff appointments in the service--the Merivales, Taylors, Farrers--were introduced from without, with the obvious implication that either the civil service trained up within its own ranks a poor breed, or else that the meritorious men were discouraged and kept back by the sight of prizes falling to outsiders. Mr. Gladstone was not slow to point out that the existing system if it brought eminent men in, had driven men like Manning and Spedding out. What patronage meant is forcibly described in a private memorandum of a leading reformer, preserved by Mr. Gladstone among his papers on this subject. 'The existing corps of civil servants,' says the writer, 'do not like the new plan, because the introduction of well-educated, active men, will force them to bestir themselves, and because they cannot hope to get their own ill-educated sons appointed under the new system. _The old established political families habitually batten on the public patronage_--their sons legitimate and illegitimate, their relatives and dependents of every degree, are provided for by the score. Besides the adventuring disreputable class of members of parliament, who make God knows what use of the patronage, a large number of borough members are mainly dependent upon it for their seats. What, for instance, are the members to do who have been sent down by the patronage secretary to contest boroughs in the interest of the government, and who are pledged twenty deep to their constituents?' The foreign office had undergone, some years before, a thorough reconstruction by Lord Palmerston, who, though very cool to constitutional reform, was assiduous and exacting in the forms of public business, not least so in the vital matter of a strong, plain, bold handwriting. Revision had been attempted in various departments before Mr. Gladstone went to the exchequer, and a spirit of improvement was in the air. Lowe, beginning his official career as one of the secretaries of the board of control, had procured the insertion in the India bill of 1853 of a provision throwing open the great service of India to competition for all British-born subjects, and he was a vigorous advocate of a general extension of the principle.[327] It was the conditions common to all the public establishments that called for revision, and the foundations for reform were laid in a report by Northcote and Sir Charles Trevelyan (November 1853), prepared for Mr. Gladstone at his request, recommending two propositions, so familiarised to us to-day as to seem like primordial elements of the British constitution. One was, that access to the public service should be through the door of a competitive examination; the other, that for conducting these examinations a central board should be constituted. The effect of such a change has been enormous not only on the efficiency of the service, but on the education of the country, and by a thousand indirect influences, raising and strengthening the social feeling for the immortal maxim that the career should be open to the talents. The lazy doctrine that men are much of a muchness gave way to a higher respect for merit and to more effectual standards of competency. OLD SYSTEM AND NEW The reform was not achieved without a battle. The whole case was argued by Mr. Gladstone in a letter to Lord John Russell of incomparable trenchancy and force, one of the best specimens of the writer at his best, and only not worth reproducing here, because the case has long been finished.[328] Lord John (Jan. 20) wrote to him curtly in reply, 'I hope no change will be made, and I certainly must protest against it.' In reply to even a second assault, he remained quite unconvinced. At present, he said, the Queen appointed the ministers, and the ministers the subordinates; in future the board of examiners would be in the place of the Queen. Our institutions would be as nearly republican as possible, and the new spirit of the public offices would not be loyalty but republicanism! As one of Lord John's kindred spirits declared, 'The more the civil service is recruited from the lower classes, the less will it be sought after by the higher, until at last the aristocracy will be altogether dissociated from the permanent civil service of the country.' How could the country go on with a democratic civil service by the side of an aristocratic legislature?[329] This was just the spirit that Mr. Gladstone loathed. To Graham he wrote (Jan. 3, 1854), 'I do not want any pledges as to details; what I seek is your countenance and favour in an endeavour to introduce to the cabinet a proposal that we should give our sanction to the principle that in every case where a satisfactory test of a defined and palpable nature can be furnished, the public service shall be laid open to personal merit.... This is _my_ contribution to parliamentary reform.' On January 26 (1854) the cabinet was chiefly occupied by Mr. Gladstone's proposition, and after a long discussion his plan was adopted. When reformers more ardent than accurate insisted in later years that it was the aristocracy who kept patronage, Mr. Gladstone reminded the House, 'No cabinet could have been more aristocratically composed than that over which Lord Aberdeen presided. I myself was the only one of fifteen noblemen and gentlemen who composed it, who could not fairly be said to belong to that class.' Yet it was this cabinet that conceived and matured a plan for the surrender of all its patronage. There for the moment, in spite of all his vigour and resolution, the reform was arrested. Time did not change him. In November he wrote to Trevelyan: 'My own opinions are more and more in favour of the plan of competition. I do not mean that they can be more in its favour as a principle, than they were when I invited you and Northcote to write the report which has lit up the flame; but more and more do the incidental evils seem curable and the difficulties removable.' As the Crimean war went on, the usual cry for administrative reform was raised, and Mr. Gladstone never made a more terse, pithy, and incontrovertible speech than his defence for an open civil service in the summer of 1855.[330] For this branch of reform, too, the inspiration had proceeded from Oxford. Two of the foremost champions of the change had been Temple--afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury--and Jowett. The latter was described by Mr. Gladstone to Graham as being 'as handy a workman as you shall readily find,' and in the beginning of 1855 he proposed to these two reformers that they should take the salaried office of examiners under the civil service scheme. Much of his confident expectation of good, he told them, was built upon their co-operation. In all his proceedings on this subject, Mr. Gladstone showed in strong light in how unique a degree he combined a profound democratic instinct with the spirit of good government; the instinct of popular equality along with the scientific spirit of the enlightened bureaucrat. FOOTNOTES: [316] July 18, 1850. [317] Letter to Bishop Davidson, June 11, 1891. [318] _Life_, i. p. 420. [319] _Life of Stanley_, i. p. 432. [320] Letters to Graham, July 30, 1852, and Dr. Haddan, Aug. 14 and Sept. 29, 1852. [321] _Letters_, March 26, 1853, p. 261. [322] Interesting particulars of this memorable commission are to be found in the _Life of Archbishop Tait_, i. pp. 156-170. [323] Mozley, _Letters_, p. 220. Mr. Gladstone preserved 560 letters and documents relating to the preparation and passing of the Oxford University bill. Among them are 350 copies of his own letters written between Dec. 1853 and Dec. 1854, and 170 letters received by him during the same period. [324] _Life_, i. p. 434. [325] _Academical Organisation._ By Mark Pattison, p. 24. [326] The following speeches made by Mr. Gladstone on the Oxford bill were deemed by him of sufficient importance to be included in the projected edition of his collected speeches: On the introduction of the bill, March 19 (1854); on the second reading, April 7; during the committee stage, April 27, June 1, 22, 23, and July 27. [327] _Life of Lord Sherbrooke_, pp. 421-2. [328] For an extract see Appendix. [329] Romilly, quoted by Layard, June 15th, 1855. [330] He made three speeches on the subject at this period; June 15th and July 10th, 1855, and April 24th, 1856. The first was on Layard's motion for reform, which was rejected by 359 to 46. CHAPTER V WAR FINANCE--TAX OR LOAN (_1854_) The expenses of a war are the moral check which it has pleased the Almighty to impose upon the ambition and lust of conquest, that are inherent in so many nations. There is pomp and circumstance, there is glory and excitement about war, which, notwithstanding the miseries it entails, invests it with charms in the eyes of the community, and tends to blind men to those evils to a fearful and dangerous degree. The necessity of meeting from year to year the expenditure which it entails is a salutary and wholesome check, making them feel what they are about, and making them measure the cost of the benefit upon which they may calculate.--GLADSTONE. The finance of 1854 offered nothing more original or ingenious than bluntly doubling the income tax (from seven pence to fourteen pence), and raising the duties on spirits, sugar, and malt. The draught was administered in two doses, first in a provisional budget for half a year (March 6), next in a completed scheme two months later. During the interval the chancellor of the exchequer was exposed to much criticism alike from city experts and plain men. The plans of 1853 had, in the main, proved a remarkable success, but they were not without weak points. Reductions in the duties of customs, excise, and stamps had all been followed by increase in their proceeds. But the succession duty brought in no more than a fraction of the estimated sum--the only time, Mr. Gladstone observes, in which he knew the excellent department concerned to have fallen into such an error. The proposal for conversion proved, under circumstances already described, to have no attraction for the fundholder. The operation on the South Sea stock was worse than a failure, for it made the exchequer, in order to pay off eight millions at par, raise a larger sum at three and a half per cent., and at three per cent. in a stock standing at 87.[331] All this brought loudish complaints from the money market. The men at the clubs talked of the discredit into which Gladstone had fallen as a financier, and even persons not unfriendly to him spoke of him as rash, obstinate, and injudicious. He was declared to have destroyed his prestige and overthrown his authority.[332] POWERFUL SELF-DEFENCE This roused all the slumbering warrior in him, and when the time came (May 8), in a speech three and a half hours long, he threw his detractors into a depth of confusion that might have satisfied the Psalmist himself. Peremptorily he brushed aside the apology of his assailants for not challenging him by a direct vote of want of confidence, that such a vote would be awkward in a time of war. On the contrary, he said, a case so momentous as the case of war is the very reason why you should show boldly whether you have confidence in our management of your finances or not; if you disapprove, the sooner I know it the better. Then he dashed into a close and elaborate defence in detail, under all the heads of attack,--his manner of dealing with the unfunded debt, his abortive scheme of conversion, his mode of charging deficiency bills. This astonishing mass of dry and difficult matter was impressed in full significance upon the House, not only by the orator's own buoyant and energetic interest in the performance, but by the sense which he awoke in his hearers, that to exercise their attention and judgment upon the case before them was a binding debt imperatively due to themselves and to the country, by men owning the high responsibility of their station. This was the way in which he at all times strove to stir the self-respect of the House of Commons. Not sparing his critics a point or an argument, he drove his case clean home with a vigour that made it seem as if the study of Augustine and Dante and the Fathers were after all the best training for an intimate and triumphant mastery of the proper amount of gold to be kept at the bank, the right interest on an exchequer bond and an exchequer bill, and all the arcana of the public accounts.[333] Even where their case had something in it, he showed that they had taken the wrong points. Nor did he leave out the spice of the sarcasm that the House loves. A peer had reproached him for the amount of his deficiency bills. This peer had once himself for four years been chancellor of the exchequer. 'My deficiency bills,' cried Mr. Gladstone, 'reached three millions and a half. How much were the bills of the chancellor whom this figure shocks? In his first year they were four millions and a half, in the second almost the same, in the third more than five and a quarter, in the fourth nearly five millions and a half.' Disraeli and others pretended that they had foreseen the failure of the conversion. Mr. Gladstone proved that, as matter of recorded fact, they had done nothing of the sort. 'This is the way in which mythical history arises. An event happens without attracting much notice; subsequently it excites interest; then people look back upon the time now passed, and see things not as they are or were, but through the haze of distance--they see them as they wish them to have been, and what they wish them to have been, they believe that they were.' For this budget no genius, only courage, was needed; but Mr. Gladstone advanced in connection with it a doctrine that raised great questions, moral, political, and economic, and again illustrated that characteristic of his mind which always made some broad general principle a necessity of action. All through 1854, and in a sense very often since, parliament was agitated by Mr. Gladstone's bold proposition that the cost of war should be met by taxation at the time, and not by loans to be paid back by another generation. He did not advance his abstract doctrine without qualification. This, in truth, Mr. Gladstone hardly ever did, and it was one of the reasons why he acquired a bad name for sophistry and worse. Men fastened on the general principle, set out in all its breadth and with much emphasis; they overlooked the lurking qualification; and then were furiously provoked at having been taken in. 'I do not know,' he wrote some years later to Northcote, 'where you find that I laid down any general maxim that all war supplies were to be raised by taxes.... I said in my speech of May 8, revised for Hansard, it was the duty and policy of the country to make _in the first instance_ a great effort from its own resources.' The discussions of the time, however, seem to have turned on the unqualified construction. While professing his veneration and respect for the memory of Pitt, he opened in all its breadth the question raised by Pitt's policy of loan, loan, loan. The economic answer is open to more dispute than he then appeared to suppose, but it was the political and moral reasons for meeting the demands of war by tax and not by loan that coloured his economic view. The passage in which he set forth the grounds for his opinion has become a classic place in parliamentary discussion, but it is only too likely for a long time to come to bear reproducing, and I have taken it as a motto for this chapter. His condemnation of loans, absolutely if not relatively, was emphatic. 'The system of raising funds necessary for wars by loan practises wholesale, systematic, and continual deception upon the people. The people do not really know what they are doing. The consequences are adjourned into a far future.' I may as well here complete or correct this language by a further quotation from the letter to Northcote to which I have already referred. He is writing in 1862 on Northcote's book on _Twenty Years of Finance_. 'I cannot refrain,' he says, 'from paying you a sincere compliment, first on the skill with which you have composed an eminently readable work on a dry subject; and secondly, on the tact founded in good feeling and the love of truth with which you have handled your materials throughout.' He then remarks on various points in the book, and among the rest on this:-- LETTERS TO NORTHCOTE Allow me also to say that I think in your comparison of the effect of taxes and loans you have looked (p. 262) too much to the effect on labour at the moment. Capital and labour are in permanent competition for the division of the fruits of production. When in years of war say twenty millions annually are provided by loan say for three, five, or ten years, then two consequences follow. 1. An immense factitious stimulus is given to labour at the time--and thus much more labour is brought into the market. 2. When that stimulus is withdrawn an augmented quantity of labour is left to compete in the market with a greatly diminished quantity of capital. Here is the story of the _misery_ of great masses of the English people after 1815, or at the least a material part of that story. I hold by the doctrine that war loans are in many ways a great evil: but I admit their necessity, and in fact the budget of 1855 was handed over by me to Sir George Lewis, and underwent in his hands little alteration unless such as, with the growing demands of the war, I should myself have had to make in it, _i.e._ some, not very considerable, enlargement. Writing a second letter to Northcote a few days later (August 11, 1862), he goes a little deeper into the subject:-- The general question of loans _v._ taxes for war purposes is one of the utmost interest, but one that I have never seen worked out in print. But assuming as _data_ the established principles of our financial system, and by no means denying the necessity of loans, I have not the least doubt that it is for the interest of labour, as opposed to capital, that as large a share as possible of war expenditure should be defrayed from taxes. When war breaks out the wages of labour on the whole have a tendency to rise, and the labour of the country is well able to bear some augmentation of taxes. The sums added to the public expenditure are likely at the outset, and for some time, to be larger than the sums withdrawn from commerce. When war ends, on the contrary, a great mass of persons are dismissed from public employment, and, flooding the labour market, reduce the rate of wages. But again, when war comes, it is quite certain that a large share of the war taxes will be laid upon property: and that, in war, property will bear a larger share of our total taxation than in peace. From this it seems to follow at once that, up to the point at which endurance is practicable, payment by war-taxes rather than by taxes in peace is for the interest of the people at large. I am not one of those who think that our system of taxation, taken as a whole, is an over-liberal one towards them. These observations are mere contributions to a discussion, and by no means pretend to dispose of the question. II DISPUTE WITH THE BANK In the autumn he had a sharp tussle with the Bank of England, and displayed a toughness, stiffness, and sustained anger that greatly astonished Threadneedle Street. In the spring he had introduced a change in the mode of issuing deficiency bills, limiting the quarterly amount to such a sum as would cover the maximum of dividends payable, as known by long experience to be called for. The Bank held this to be illegal; claimed the whole amount required, along with balances actually in hand, to cover the entire amount payable; and asked him to take the opinion of the law officers. The lawyers backed the chancellor of the exchequer. Then the Bank took an opinion of their own; their counsel (Kelly and Palmer) advised that the attorney and solicitor were wrong; and recommended the Bank to bring their grievance before the prime minister. Mr. Gladstone was righteously incensed at this refusal to abide by an opinion invited by the Bank itself, and by which if it had been adverse he would himself have been bound. 'And then,' said Bethell, urging Mr. Gladstone to stand to his guns, 'its counsel call the Bank a trustee for the public! Proh pudor! What stuff lawyers will talk. But 'tis their vocation.' Mr. Gladstone's letters were often prolix, but nobody could be more terse and direct when occasion moved him, and the proceedings of the lawyers with their high Bank views and the equivocal faith of the directors in bringing fresh lawyers into the case at all provoked more than one stern and brief epistle. The governor, who was his private friend, winced. 'I do not study diplomacy in letters of this kind,' Mr. Gladstone replied, 'and there is no sort of doubt that I am very angry about the matter of the opinion; but affected and sarcastic politeness is an instrument which in writing to you I should think it the worst taste and the worst feeling to employ. I admire the old fashion according to which in English pugilism (which, however, I do not admire) the combatants shook hands before they fought; only I think much time ought not to be spent upon such salutations when there is other work to do.' In a letter to his wife seven years later, Mr. Gladstone says of this dispute, 'Mr. Arbuthnot told me to-day an observation of Sir George Lewis's when at the exchequer here. Speaking of my controversy with the Bank in 1854, he said, "It is a pity Gladstone puts so much heat, so much irritability into business. Now I am as cool as a fish."' The worst of being as cool as a fish is that you never get great things done, you effect no improvements, and you carry no reforms, against the lethargy or selfishness of men and the tyranny of old custom.[334] Now also his attention was engaged by the controversies on currency that thrive so lustily in the atmosphere of the Bank Charter Act, and, after much discussion with authorities both in Lombard Street and at the treasury, without committal he sketched out at least one shadow of a project of his own. He knew, however, that any great measure must be undertaken by a finance minister with a clear position and strong hands, and he told Graham that even if he saw his way distinctly to a plan, he did not feel individually strong enough for the attempt. Nor was there time. To reconstitute the Savings Bank finance, to place the chancery and some other accounts on a right basis, and to readjust the banking relations properly so-called between the Bank and the state, would be even more than a fair share of financial work for the session. Before the year was over he passed a bill, for which he had laid before the cabinet elaborate argumentative supports, removing a number of objections to the then existing system of dealing with the funds drawn from Savings Banks.[335] The year closed with an incident that created a considerable stir, and might by misadventure have become memorable. What has been truly called a warm and prolonged dispute[336] arose out of Mr. Gladstone's removal of a certain official from his post in the department of woods and forests. As Lord Aberdeen told the Queen that he could not easily make the case intelligible, it is not likely that I should succeed any better, and we may as well leave the thick dust undisturbed. Enough to say that Lord John Russell thought the dismissal harsh; that Mr. Gladstone stood his ground against either the reversal of what he had done, or any proceedings in parliament that might look like contrition, but was willing to submit the points to the decision of colleagues; that Lord John would submit no point to colleagues 'affecting his personal honour'--to such degrees of heat can the quicksilver mount even in a cabinet thermometer. If such quarrels of the great are painful, there is some compensation in the firmness, patience, and benignity with which a man like Lord Aberdeen strove to appease them. Some of his colleagues actually thought that Lord John would make this paltry affair a plea for resigning, while others suspected that he might find a better excuse in the revival of convocation. As it happened, a graver occasion offered itself. FOOTNOTES: [331] Northcote, _Financial Policy_, p. 242; Buxton, _Mr. Gladstone: A Study_, pp. 154-5. [332] Greville, Part III. i. pp. 150, 151, 157. [333] Not many years before (1838), Talleyrand had surprised the French institute by a paper in which he passed a eulogy on strong theological studies; their influence on vigour as well as on finesse of mind; on the skilful ecclesiastical diplomatists that those studies had formed. [334] See Appendix. [335] 17 and 18 Vict., c. 50. [336] Walpole's _Russell_, ii. p. 243 _n_. CHAPTER VI CRISIS OF 1855 AND BREAK-UP OF THE PEELITES (_1855_) Party has no doubt its evils; but all the evils of party put together would be scarcely a grain in the balance, when compared with the dissolution of honourable friendships, the pursuit of selfish ends, the want of concert in council, the absence of a settled policy in foreign affairs, the corruption of certain statesmen, the caprices of an intriguing court, which the extinction of party connection has brought and would bring again upon this country.--EARL RUSSELL.[337] The administrative miscarriages of the war in the Crimea during the winter of 1854-5 destroyed the coalition government.[338] When parliament assembled on January 23, 1855, Mr. Roebuck on the first night of the session gave notice of a motion for a committee of inquiry. Lord John Russell attended to the formal business, and when the House was up went home accompanied by Sir Charles Wood. Nothing of consequence passed between the two colleagues, and no word was said to Wood in the direction of withdrawal. The same evening as the prime minister was sitting in his drawing-room, a red box was brought in to him by his son, containing Lord John Russell's resignation. He was as much amazed as Lord Newcastle, smoking his evening pipe of tobacco in his coach, was amazed by the news that the battle of Marston Moor had begun. Nothing has come to light since to set aside the severe judgment pronounced upon this proceeding by the Universal opinion of contemporaries, including Lord John's own closest political allies. That a minister should run away from a hostile motion upon affairs for which responsibility was collective, and this without a word of consultation with a single colleague, is a transaction happily without a precedent in the history of modern English cabinets.[339] It opened an intricate and unexpected chapter of affairs. The ministerial crisis of 1855 was unusually prolonged; it was interesting as a drama of character and motive; it marked a decisive stage in the evolution of party, and it was one of the turning points in the career of the subject of this biography. Fortunately for us, Mr. Gladstone has told in his own way the whole story of what he calls this 'sharp and difficult passage in public affairs,' and he might have added that it was a sharp passage in his own life. His narrative, with the omission of some details now dead and indifferent, and of a certain number of repetitions, is the basis of this chapter. I LORD JOHN'S RESIGNATION On the day following Lord John's letter the cabinet met, and the prime minister told them that at first he thought it meant the break-up of the government, but on further consideration he thought they should hold on, if it could be done with honour and utility. Newcastle suggested his own resignation, and the substitution of Lord Palmerston in his place. Palmerston agreed that the country, rightly or wrongly, wished to see him at the war office, but he was ready to do whatever his colleagues thought best. The whigs thought resignation necessary. Mr. Gladstone thought otherwise, and scouted the suggestion that as Newcastle was willing to resign, Lord John might come back. Lord John himself actually sent a sort of message to know whether he should attend the cabinet. In the end Lord Aberdeen carried all their resignations to the Queen. These she declined to accept, and she 'urged with the greatest eagerness that the decision should be reconsidered.' It is hard at this distance of time to understand how any cabinet under national circumstances of such gravity could have thought of the ignominy of taking to flight from a motion of censure, whatever a single colleague like Lord John Russell might deem honourable. On pressure from the Queen, the whigs in the government, Lord John notwithstanding, agreed to stand fire. Mr. Gladstone proceeds:-- Lord John's explanation, which was very untrue in its general effect, though I believe kindly conceived in feeling as well as tempered with some grains of policy and a contemplation of another possible premiership, carried the House with him, as Herbert observed while he was speaking. Palmerston's reply to him was wretched. It produced in the House (that is, in so much of the House as would otherwise have been favourable), a flatness and deadness of spirit towards the government which was indescribable; and Charles Wood with a marked expression of face said while it was going on, 'And this is to be our leader!' I was myself so painfully full of the scene, that when Palmerston himself sat down I was on the very point of saying to him unconsciously, 'Can anything more be said?' But no one would rise in the adverse sense, and therefore there was no opening for a minister. Palmerston [now become leader in the Commons] had written to ask me to follow Lord John on account of his being _a party_. But it was justly thought in the cabinet that there were good reasons against my taking this part upon me, and so the arrangement was changed. Roebuck brought forward his motion. Mr. Gladstone resisted it on behalf of the government with immense argumentative force, and he put the point against Lord John which explains the word 'untrue' in the passage just quoted, namely, that though he desired in November the substitution of Palmerston for Newcastle as war minister, he had given it up in December, and yet this vital fact was omitted.[340] It was not for the government, he said, either to attempt to make terms with the House by reconstruction of a cabinet, or to shrink from any judgment of the House upon their acts. If they had so shrunk, he exclaimed, this is the sort of epitaph that he would expect to have written over their remains: 'Here lie the dishonoured ashes of a ministry that found England in peace and left in it war, that was content to enjoy the emoluments of office and to wield the sceptre of power, so long as no man had the courage to question their existence: they saw the storm gathering over the country; they heard the agonising accounts that were almost daily received of the sick and wounded in the East. These things did not move them, but so soon as a member of opposition raised his hand to point the thunderbolt, they became conscience-stricken into a sense of guilt, and hoping to escape punishment, they ran away from duty.' Such would be their epitaph. Of the proposed inquiry itself,--an inquiry into the conduct of generals and troops actually in the field, and fighting by the side of, and in concert with, foreign allies, he observed--'Your inquiry will never take place as a real inquiry; or, if it did, it would lead to nothing but confusion and disturbance, increased disasters, shame at home and weakness abroad; it would convey no consolation to those whom you seek to aid, but it would carry malignant joy to the hearts of the enemies of England; and, for my part, I shall ever rejoice, if this motion is carried to-night, that my own last words as a member of the cabinet of the Earl of Aberdeen have been words of solemn and earnest protest against a proceeding which has no foundation either in the constitution or in the practice of preceding parliaments; which is useless and mischievous for the purpose which it appears to contemplate; and which, in my judgment, is full of danger to the power, dignity, and usefulness of the Commons of England.' A journalistic observer, while deploring the speaker's adherence to 'the dark dogmatisms of medieval religionists,' admits that he had never heard so fine a speech. The language, he says, was devoid of redundance. The attitude was calm. Mr. Gladstone seemed to feel that he rested upon the magnitude of the argument, and had no need of the assistance of bodily vehemence of manner. His voice was clear, distinct, and flexible, without monotony. It was minute dissection without bitterness or ill-humoured innuendo. He sat down amid immense applause from hearers admiring but unconvinced. Mr. Gladstone himself records of this speech: 'Hard and heavy work, especially as to the cases of three persons: Lord John Russell, Duke of Newcastle, and Lord Raglan.' Ministers were beaten (January 29) by 325 to 148, and they resigned. _Jan. 30, 1855._--Cabinet 1-2. We exchanged friendly adieus. Dined with the Herberts. This was a day of personal light-heartedness, but the problem for the nation is no small one. END OF THE COALITION The Queen sent for Lord Derby, and he made an attempt to form a government. Without aid from the conservative wing of the fallen ministry there was no hope, and his first step (Jan. 31) was to call on Lord Palmerston, with an earnest request for his support, and with a hope that he would persuade Mr. Gladstone and Sidney Herbert to rejoin their old political connection; with the intimation moreover that Mr. Disraeli, with a self-abnegation that did him the highest credit, was willing to waive in Lord Palmerston's favour his own claim to the leadership of the House of Commons. Palmerston was to be president of the council, and Ellenborough minister of war. In this conversation Lord Palmerston made no objection on any political grounds, or on account of any contemplated measures; he found no fault with the position intended for himself, or for others with whom he would be associated. Lord Derby supposed that all would depend on the concurrence of Mr. Gladstone and Herbert. He left Cambridge House at half-past two in the afternoon, and at half-past nine in the evening he received a note from Lord Palmerston declining. Three hours later he heard from Mr. Gladstone, who declined also. The proceedings of this eventful day, between two in the afternoon and midnight, whatever may have been the play of motive and calculation in the innermost minds of all or any of the actors, were practically to go a long way, though by no means the whole way, as we shall see, towards making Mr. Gladstone's severance from the conservative party definitive. _Jan. 31._--Lord Palmerston came to see me between three and four, with a proposal from Lord Derby that he and I, with S. Herbert should take office under him; Palmerston to be president of the council and lead the House of Commons. Not finding me when he called before, he had gone to S. Herbert, who seemed to be disinclined. I inquired (1) whether Derby mentioned Graham? (2) Whether he had told Lord Palmerston if his persevering with the commission he had received would depend on the answer to this proposal. (3) How he was himself inclined. He answered the two first questions in the negative, and said as to the third, though not keenly, that he felt disinclined, but that if he refused it would be attributed to his contemplating another result, which other result he considered would be agreeable to the country. I then argued strongly with him that though he might form a government, and though if he formed it, he would certainly start it amidst immense clapping of hands, yet he could not have any reasonable prospect of stable parliamentary support; on the one hand would stand Derby with his phalanx, on the other Lord J. Russell, of necessity a centre and nucleus of discontent, and between these two there would and could be no room for a parliamentary majority such as would uphold his government. He argued only rather faintly the other way, and seemed rather to come to my way of thinking. I said that even if the proposition were entertained, there would be much to consider; that I thought it clear, whatever else was doubtful, that we could not join without him, for in his absence the wound would not heal kindly again, that I could not act without Lord Aberdeen's approval, nor should I willingly separate myself from Graham; that if we joined, we must join in force. But I was disposed to wish that if all details could be arranged, we should join in that manner rather than that Derby should give up the commission, though I thought the best thing of all would be Derby forming a ministry of his own men, provided only he could get a good or fair foreign secretary instead of Clarendon, who in any case would be an immense loss.... I went off to speak to Lord Aberdeen, and Palmerston went to speak to Clarendon, with respect to whom he had told Derby that he could hardly enter any government which had not Clarendon at the foreign office. When we reassembled, I asked Lord Palmerston whether he had made up his mind for himself independently of us, inasmuch as I thought that if he had, that was enough to close the whole question? He answered, Yes; that he should tell Derby he did not think he could render him useful service in his administration. He then left. It was perhaps 6.30. Herbert and I sat down to write, but thought it well to send off nothing till after dinner, and we went to Grillion's where we had a small but merry party. Herbert even beyond himself amusing. At night we went to Lord Aberdeen's and Graham's, and so my letter came through some slight emendations to the form in which it went.[341] I had doubts in my mind whether Derby had even intended to propose to Herbert and me _except_ in conjunction with Palmerston, though I had no doubt that without Palmerston it would not do; and I framed my letter so as not to assume that I had an independent proposal, but to make my refusal a part of his. _Feb. 2._--I yesterday also called on Lord Palmerston and read him my letter to Lord Derby. He said: 'Nothing can be better.' LORD DERBY'S PROPOSALS Lord Derby knew that, though he had the country gentlemen behind him, his own political friends, with the notable and only half-welcome exception of Mr. Disraeli, were too far below mediocrity in either capacity or experience to face so angry and dangerous a crisis. Accordingly he gave up the task. Many years after, Mr. Gladstone recorded his opinion that here Lord Derby missed his one real chance of playing a high historic part. 'To a Derby government,' he said, 'now that the party had been _drubbed_ out of protection, I did not in principle object; for old ties were with me more operatively strong than new opinions, and I think that Lord Derby's error in not forming an administration was palpable and even gross. Such, it has appeared, was the opinion of Disraeli.[342] Lord Derby had many fine qualities; but strong parliamentary courage was not among them. When Lord Palmerston (probably with a sagacious discernment of the immediate future) declined, he made no separate offer to the Peelites. Had Lord Derby gone on, he would have been supported by the country, then absorbed in the consideration of the war. None of the three occasions when he took office offered him so fine an opportunity as this; but he missed it.' On the previous day, Mr. Gladstone records: 'Saw Mr. Disraeli in the House of Lords and put out my hand, which was very kindly accepted.' To nobody was the hour fraught with more bitter mortification than to Mr. Disraeli, who beheld a golden chance of bringing a consolidated party into the possession of real power flung away. II ERROR OF REFUSING LORD LANSDOWNE Next, at the Queen's request, soundings in the whig and Peelite waters were undertaken by Lord Lansdowne, and he sent for Mr. Gladstone, with a result that to the latter was ever after matter of regret. _Feb. 2._--In consequence of a communication from Lord Lansdowne, I went to him in the forenoon and found him just returned from Windsor. He trusted I should not mind speaking freely to him, and I engaged to do it, only premising that in so crude and dark a state of facts, it was impossible to go beyond first impressions. We then conversed on various combinations, as (1) Lord J. Russell, premier, (2) Lord Palmerston, (3) Lord Clarendon, (4) Lord Lansdowne himself. Of the first I doubted whether, in the present state of feeling, he could get a ministry on its legs. In answer to a question from him, I added that I thought, viewing my relations to Lord Aberdeen and to Newcastle, and _his_ to them also, the public feeling would be offended, and it would not be for the public interest, if I were to form part of his government (_i.e._ Russell's). Of the second I said that it appeared to me Lord Palmerston could not obtain a party majority. Aloof from him would stand on the one hand Derby and his party, on the other Lord J. Russell, who I took it for granted would never serve under him. Whatever the impression made by Russell's recent conduct, yet his high personal character and station, forty years career, one-half of it in the leadership of his party, and the close connection of his name with all the great legislative changes of the period, must ever render him a power in the state, and render it impossible for a government depending on the liberal party to live independently of him. I also hinted at injurious effects which the substitution of Palmerston for Lord Aberdeen would produce on foreign Powers at this critical moment, but dwelt chiefly on the impossibility of his having a majority. In this Lord Lansdowne seemed to agree. Lastly, I said that if Lord Lansdowne himself could venture to risk his health and strength by taking the government, this would be the best arrangement. My opinion was that at this crisis Derby, if he could have formed an administration, would have had advantages with regard to the absorbing questions of the war and of a peace to follow it, such as no other combination could possess. Failing this, I wished for a homogeneous whig government. The best form of it would be under him. He said he might dare it provisionally, if he could see his way to a permanent arrangement at the end of a short term; but he could see nothing of the sort at present. _An autobiographic note of 1897 gives a further detail of moment_:--He asked whether I would continue to hold my office as chancellor of the exchequer in the event of his persevering. He said that if I gave an affirmative reply he would persevere with the commission, and I think intimated that except on this condition he would not. I said that the working of the coalition since its formation in December 1852 had been to me entirely satisfactory, but that I was not prepared to co-operate in its continuation under any other head than Lord Aberdeen. I think that though perfectly satisfied to be in a Peelite government which had whigs or radicals in it, I was not ready to be in a whig government which had Peelites in it. It took a long time, with my slow-moving and tenacious character, for the Ethiopian to change his skin. In the paper that I have already mentioned, as recording what, when all was near an end, he took to be some of the errors of his life, Mr. Gladstone names as one of those errors this refusal in 1855 to join Lord Lansdowne. 'I can hardly suppose,' he says, more than forty years after that time, 'that the eventual failure of the Queen's overture to Lord Lansdowne was due to my refusal; but that refusal undoubtedly constituted one of his difficulties and helped to bring about the result. I have always looked back upon it with pain as a serious and even gross error of judgment. It was, I think, injurious to the public, if it contributed to the substitution as prime minister of Lord Palmerston for Lord Lansdowne,--a personage of greater dignity, and I think a higher level of political principle. There was no defect in Lord Lansdowne sufficient to warrant my refusal. He would not have been a strong or very active prime minister; but the question of the day was the conduct of the war, and I had no right to take exception to him as a head in connection with this subject. His attitude in domestic policy was the same as Palmerston's, but I think he had a more unprejudiced and liberal mind, though less of motive force in certain directions.' III FRUITLESS NEGOTIATIONS The next day Mr. Gladstone called on Lord Aberdeen, who for the first time let drop a sort of opinion as to their duties in the crisis on one point; hithertofore he had restrained himself. He said, 'Certainly the most natural thing under the circumstances, if it could have been brought about in a satisfactory form, would have been that you should have joined Derby.' On returning home, Mr. Gladstone received an important visitor and a fruitless visit. At half-past two to-day Lord John Russell was announced; and sat till three--his hat shaking in his hand. A communication had reached him late last night from the Queen, charging him with the formation of a government, and he had thought it his duty to make the endeavour. I repeated to him what I had urged on Lord Lansdowne, that a coalition with advantages has also weaknesses of its own, that the late coalition was I thought fully justified by the circumstances under which it took place, but at this juncture it had broken down. This being so, I thought what is called a homogeneous government would be best for the public, and most likely to command approval; that Derby if he could get a good foreign minister would have had immense advantages with respect to the great questions of war and peace. Lord John agreed as to Derby; thought that every one must have supported him, and that he ought to have persevered. I held to my point, adding that I did not think Lord Aberdeen and Lord Palmerston represented opposite principles, but rather different forms of the same principles connected with different habits and temperaments. He said that Lord Palmerston had agreed to lead the House of Commons for him, he going as first minister to the Lords; but he did not mention any other alteration. Upon the whole his tone was low and doubtful. He asked whether my answer was to be considered as given, or whether I would take time. But I said as there was no probability that my ideas would be modified by reflection, it would not be fair to him to ask any delay. With the single exception of Lord Palmerston, none of his colleagues would have anything to do with Lord John, some even declining to go to see him. Wood came to Mr. Gladstone, evidently in the sense of the Palmerston premiership. He declared that Aberdeen was impossible, to which, says Mr. Gladstone, 'I greatly demurred.' IV Thus the two regular party leaders had failed; Lord Aberdeen, the coalition leader, was almost universally known to be out of the question; the public was loudly clamouring for Lord Palmerston. A Palmerston ministry was now seen to be inevitable. Were the Peelites, then, having refused Lord Derby, having refused Lord John, having told Lord Lansdowne that he had better form a system of homogeneous whigs, now finally to refuse Lord Palmerston, on no better ground than that they could not have Lord Aberdeen, whom nobody save themselves would consent on any terms to have? To propound such a question was to answer it. Lord Aberdeen himself, with admirable freedom from egotism, pressed the point that in addition to the argument of public necessity, they owed much to their late whig colleagues, 'who behaved so nobly and so generously towards us after Lord John's resignation.' 'I have heard club talk and society talk,' wrote an adherent to Mr. Gladstone late one night (February 4), 'and I am sure that in the main any government containing good names in the cabinet, provided Lord John is not in it, will obtain general support. Lord Clarendon is universally, or nearly so, looked on as essential. Next to him, I think you are considered of vital importance in your present office. After all, rightly or wrongly, Lord Palmerston is master of the situation in the country; he is looked upon as the man. If the country sees you and Sidney Herbert holding aloof from him, it will be said the Peelites are selfish intriguers.' The same evening, another correspondent said to Mr. Gladstone: 'Two or three people have come in since eleven o'clock with the news of Brooks's and the Reform. Exultation prevails there, and the certainty of Palmerston's success to-morrow. There is a sort of rumour prevalent that Lord Palmerston may seek Lord J. Russell's aid.... This would, of course, negative all idea of your joining in the concern. Otherwise a refusal would be set down as sheer impracticability, or else the selfish ambition of a clique which could not stand alone, and should no longer attempt to do so. If the refusal to join Palmerston is to be a going over to the other side, and a definite junction within a brief space, that is clear and intelligible. But a refusal to join Lord Palmerston and yet holding out to him a promise of support, is a half-measure which no one will understand, and which, I own, I cannot see the grounds to defend.' PALMERSTON FORMS A MINISTRY We shall now find how after long and strenuous dubitation, the Peelite leaders refused to join on the fifth of February, and then on the sixth they joined. Unpromising from the very first cabinet, the junction was destined to a swift and sudden end. Here is the story told by one of the two leading actors. _Sunday, Feb. 4._--Herbert came to me soon after I left him, and told me Palmerston had at last got the commission. He considered that this disposed of Lord Lansdowne; and seemed himself to be disposed to join. He said _we_ must take care what we were about, and that we should be looked upon by the country as too nice if we declined to join Palmerston; who he believed (and in this I inclined to agree), would probably form a government. He argued that Lord Aberdeen was out of the question; that the vote of Monday night was against him; that the country would not stand him. No new coalition ought to be formed, I said, without a prospect of stability; and joining Lord Palmerston's cabinet would be a new coalition. He said he rather applied that phrase to a junction with Derby. I quite agreed we could not join Derby except under conditions which might not be realised; but if we _did_ it, it would be a reunion, not a coalition. In coalition the separate existence is retained. I referred to the great instances of change of party in our time; Palmerston himself, and Stanley with Graham. But these took place when parties were divided by great questions of principle; there were none such now, and no one could say that the two sides of the House were divided by anything more than this, that one was rather more stationary, the other more movable. He said, 'True, the differences are on the back benches.' I said I had now for two years been holding my mind in suspense upon the question I used to debate with Newcastle, who used to argue that we should grow into the natural leaders of the liberal party. I said, it is now plain this will not be; we get on very well with the independent liberals, but the whigs stand as an opaque body between us and them, and moreover, there they will stand and ought to stand. Lord Palmerston came a little after two, and remained perhaps an hour. Lord Lansdowne had promised to join him if he formed an administration on a basis sufficiently broad. He wished me to retain my office; and dwelt on the satisfactory nature of my relations with the liberal party. He argued that Lord Aberdeen was excluded by the vote on Monday night; and that there was now no other government in view. My argument was adverse, though without going to a positive conclusion. I referred to my conversation of Wednesday, Jan. 31, in favour of a homogeneous government at this juncture. At half-past eleven I went to Lord Aberdeen's and stayed about an hour. His being in the Palmerston cabinet which had been proposed, was, he said, out of the question; but his _velleities_ seemed to lean rather to _our_ joining, which surprised me. He was afraid of the position we should occupy in the public eye if we declined.... _Feb. 5._--The most irksome and painful of the days; beginning with many hours of anxious consultation to the best of our power, and ending amidst a storm of disapproval almost unanimous, not only from the generality, but from our own immediate political friends. At 10.30 I went to Sir James Graham, who is still in bed, and told him the point to which by hard struggles I had come. The case with me was briefly this. I was ready to make the sacrifice of personal feeling; ready to see him (Lord Aberdeen) expelled from the premiership by a censure equally applicable to myself, and yet to remain in my office; ready to overlook not merely the inferior fitness, but the real and manifest unfitness, of Palmerston for that office; ready to enter upon a new venture with him, although in my opinion without any reasonable prospect of parliamentary support, such as is absolutely necessary for the credit and stability of a government--upon the one sole and all-embracing ground that the prosecution of the war with vigour, and the prosecution of it to and for peace, was now the question of the day to which every other must give way. But then it was absolutely necessary that if we joined a cabinet after our overlooking all this and more, it should be a cabinet in which confidence should be placed with reference to war and peace. Was the Aberdeen cabinet without Lord Aberdeen one in which I could place confidence? I answer, No. He was vital to it; his love of peace was necessary to its right and steady pursuit of that great end; if, then, _he_ could belong to a Palmerston cabinet, I might; but without him I could not. In all this, Sir J. Graham concurred. Herbert came full of doubts and fears, but on the whole adopted the same conclusion. Lord Aberdeen sent to say he would not come, but I wrote to beg him, and he appeared. On hearing how we stood, he said his remaining in the cabinet was quite out of the question; and that he had told Palmerston so yesterday when he glanced at it. But he thought we should incur great blame if we did not; which, indeed, was plainly beyond all dispute. THE PEELITES JOIN At length, when I had written and read aloud the rough draft of an answer, Lord Aberdeen said he must strongly advise our joining. I said to him, 'Lord Aberdeen, when we have joined the Palmerston cabinet, you standing aloof from it, will you rise in your place in the House of Lords and say that you give that cabinet your confidence with regard to the question of war and peace?' He replied, 'I will express my hope that it will do right, but not my confidence, which is a different thing.' 'Certainly,' I answered, 'and that which you have now said is my justification. The unswerving honesty of your mind has saved us. Ninety-nine men out of a hundred in your position at the moment would have said, "Oh yes, I shall express my confidence." But you would not deviate an inch to the right or to the left.' Herbert and I went to my house and despatched our answers. Now began the storm. Granville met us driving to Newcastle. Sorry beyond expression; he almost looked displeased, which for him is much. _Newcastle_: I incline to think you are wrong. _Canning_: My impression is you are wrong. Various letters streaming in, all portending condemnation and disaster. Herbert became more and more uneasy. _Feb. 6._--The last day I hope of these tangled records; in which we have seen, to say nothing of the lesser sacrifice, one more noble victim struck down, and we are set to feast over the remains. The thing is bad and the mode worse. Arthur Gordon came early in the day with a most urgent letter from Lord Aberdeen addressed virtually to us, and urging us to join. He had seen both Palmerston and Clarendon, and derived much satisfaction from what they said. We met at the admiralty at twelve, where Graham lay much knocked up with the fatigue and anxiety of yesterday. I read to him and Lord Aberdeen Palmerston's letter of to-day to me. Herbert came in and made arguments in his sense. I told him I was at the point of yesterday, and was immovable by considerations of the class he urged. _The only security worth having lies in men_; the man is Lord Aberdeen; moral union and association with him must continue, and must be publicly known to continue. I therefore repeated my question to Lord Aberdeen, whether he would in his place as a peer declare, if we joined the cabinet, that it had his confidence with reference to war and peace? He said, much moved, that he felt the weight of the responsibility, but that after the explanation and assurances he had received, he would. He was even more moved when Graham said that though the leaning of his judgment was adverse, he would place himself absolutely in the hands of Lord Aberdeen. To Herbert, of course, it was a simple release from a difficulty. Palmerston had told Cardwell, 'Gladstone feels a difficulty first infused into him by Graham; Argyll and Herbert have made up their minds to do what Gladstone does.' Newcastle joined us, and was in Herbert's sense. I repeated again that Lord Aberdeen's declaration of confidence enabled me to see my way to joining.... I went to Lord Aberdeen in his official room after his return from Palmerston. It was only when I left that room to-day that I began to realise the pang of parting. There he stood, struck down from his eminence by a vote that did not dare to avow its own purpose, and for his wisdom and virtue; there he stood endeavouring to cure the ill consequences to the public of the wrong inflicted upon himself, and as to the point immediately within reach successful in the endeavour. I ventured, however, to tell him that I hoped our conduct and reliance on him would tend to his eminence and honour, and said, 'You are not to be of the cabinet, but you are to be its tutelary deity.' I had a message from Palmerston that he would answer me, but at night I went up to him. V THE COMMITTEE REVIVED The rush of events was now somewhat slackened. Lord John called on Graham, and complained of the Peelites for having selfishly sought too many offices, alluding to what Canning had done, and imputing the same to Cardwell. He also thought they had made a great mistake in joining Palmerston. He seemed sore about Mr. Gladstone, and told Graham that Christopher, a stout tory, had said that if Gladstone joined Derby, a hundred of the party would withdraw their allegiance. At the party meeting on Feb. 21, Lord Derby was received with loud cries of 'No Puseyites; No papists,' and was much reprehended for asking Gladstone and Graham to join. 'I ought to have mentioned before,' Mr. Gladstone writes here, 'that, during our conferences at the admiralty, Lord Aberdeen expressed great compunction for having allowed the country to be dragged without adequate cause into the war. So long as he lived, he said with his own depth and force, it would be a weight upon his conscience. He had held similar language to me lately at Argyll House; but when I asked him at what point _after_ the fleet went to Besika Bay it would have been possible to stop short, he alluded to the _sommation_, which we were encouraged however, as he added, by Austria to send; and thought _this_ was the false step. Yet he did not seem quite firm in the opinion.' Then came the first cabinet (Feb. 10). It did not relieve the gloom of Mr. Gladstone's impressions. He found it more 'acephalous' than ever; 'less order; less unity of purpose.' The question of the Roebuck committee was raised, on which he said he thought the House would give it up, if government would promise an investigation under the authority of the crown. The fatal subject came up again three days later. Palmerston said it was plain from the feeling in the House the night before, that they were set upon it; if they could secure a fair committee, he was disposed to let the inquiry go forward. On this rock the ship struck. One minister said they could not resign in consequence of the appointment of the committee, because it stood affirmed by a large majority when they took office in the reconstructed cabinet. Mr. Gladstone says he 'argued with vehemence upon the breach of duty which it would involve on our part towards those holding responsible commands in the Crimea, if we without ourselves condemning them were to allow them to be brought before another tribunal like a select committee.' Dining the same evening at the palace, Mr. Gladstone had a conversation on the subject both with the Queen and Prince Albert. 'The latter compared this appointment of a committee to the proceedings of the Convention of France; but still seemed to wish that the government should submit rather than retire. The Queen spoke openly in that sense, and trusted that she should not be given over into the hands of those "who are the least fit to govern." Without any positive and final declaration, I intimated to each that I did not think I could bring my mind to acquiesce in the proposition for an inquiry by a select committee into the state of the army in the Crimea.' Time did not remove difficulties. Mr. Gladstone and Graham fought with extreme tenacity, and the first of them with an ingenuity for which the situation gave boundless scope. To the argument that they accepted office on reconstruction with the decision of the House for a committee staring them in the face, he replied: 'Before we were _out_, we were _in_. Why did we go out? Because of that very decision by the House of Commons. Our language was: The appointment of such a committee is incompatible with the functions of the executive, therefore it is a censure on the executive; therefore we resign! But it is not a whit _more_ compatible with the functions of the executive now than it was then; therefore it is not one whit less a censure; and the question arises, (1) whether any government ought to allow its (now) principal duty to be delegated to a committee or other body, especially to one not under the control of the crown? (2) whether _that_ government ought to allow it, the members of which (except one) have already resigned rather than allow it? In what way can the first resignation be justified on grounds which do not require a second?' He dwelt mainly on these two points--That the proposed transfer of the functions of the executive to a select committee of the House of Commons, with respect to an army in the face of the enemy and operating by the side of our French allies, and the recognition of this transfer by the executive government, was an evil greater than any that could arise from a total or partial resignation. Second, that it was clear that they did not, as things stood, possess the confidence of a majority of the House. 'I said that the committee was itself a censure on the government. They had a right to believe that parliament would not inflict this committee on a government which had its confidence. I also,' he says, 'recited my having ascertained from Palmerston (upon this recital we were agreed) on the 6th, before our decision was declared, his intention to oppose the committee....' PEELITES RESIGN Graham did not feel disposed to govern without the confidence of the House of Commons, or to be responsible for the granting of a committee which the cabinet had unanimously felt to be unprecedented, unconstitutional, and dangerous. Lord Palmerston met all this by a strong practical clincher. He said that the House of Commons was becoming unruly from the doubts that had gone abroad as to the intentions of the government with respect to the committee; that the House was determined to have it; that if they opposed it they should be beaten by an overwhelming majority; to dissolve upon it would be ruinous; to resign a fortnight after taking office would make them the laughingstock of the country. Mr. Gladstone, Herbert, and Graham then resigned. Of the Peelite group the Duke of Argyll and Canning remained. _Feb. 22._--After considering various _sites_, we determined to ask the Manchester school to yield us, at any rate for to-morrow, the old place devoted to ex-ministers.[343] Sir J. Graham expressed his wish to begin the affair, on the proposal of the first name [of the committee]. Cardwell came at 4 to inform me that he had declined to be my successor; and showed me his letter, which gave as his reason disinclination to step into the cabinet over the bodies of his friends. It seems that Palmerston and Lord Lansdowne, who assists him, sent Canning to Lord Aberdeen to invoke his aid with Cardwell and prevail on him to retract. But Lord Aberdeen, though he told Canning that he disapproved (at variance here with what Graham and I considered to be his tone on Monday, but agreeing with a note he wrote in obscure terms the next morning), said he could not make such a request to Cardwell, or again play the peculiar part he had acted a fortnight ago. The cabinet on receiving Cardwell's refusal were at a deadlock. Application was to be made, or had been made, to Sir Francis Baring, but it seems that he is reluctant; he is, however, the best card they have to play. _Feb. 28._--On Sunday, Sir George Lewis called on me, and said my office had been offered him. This was after being refused by Cardwell and Baring. He asked my advice as to accepting it. This I told him I could not give. He asked if I would assist him with information in case of his accepting. I answered that he might command me precisely as if instead of resigning I had only removed to another department. I then went over some of the matters needful to be made known. On Tuesday he came again, acquainted me with his acceptance, and told me he had been mainly influenced by my promise.[344] This day at a quarter to three I attended at the palace to resign the seals, and had an audience of about twenty minutes. The Queen, in taking them over, was pleased to say that she received them with great pain. I answered that the decision which had required me to surrender them had been the most painful effort of my public life. The Queen said she was afraid on Saturday night [Feb. 17, when he had dined at the palace] from the language I then used that this was about to happen. I answered that we had then already had a discussion in the cabinet which pointed to this result, and that I spoke as I did, because I thought that to have no reserve whatever with H. M. was the first duty of all those who had the honour and happiness of being her servants. I trusted H. M. would believe that we had all been governed by no other desire than to do what was best for the interests of the crown and the country. H. M. expressed her confidence of this, and at no time throughout the conversation did she in any manner indicate an opinion that our decision had been wrong. She spoke of the difficulty of making arrangements for carrying on the government in the present state of things, and I frankly gave my opinion to H. M. that she would have little peace or comfort in these matters, until parliament should have returned to its old organisation in two political parties; that at present we were in a false position, and that both sides of the House were demoralised--the ministerial side overcharged with an excess of official men, and the way stopped up against expectants, which led to subdivision, jealousy, and intrigue; the opposition so weak in persons having experience of affairs as to be scarcely within the chances of office, and consequently made reckless by acting without keeping it in view; yet at the same time, the party continued and must continue to exist, for it embodied one of the great fundamental elements of English society. The experiment of coalition had been tried with remarkable advantage under a man of the remarkable wisdom and powers of conciliation possessed by Lord Aberdeen, one in entire possession too of H. M.'s confidence. They intimated that there were peculiar disadvantages, too, evidently meaning Lord J. Russell. I named him in my answer, and said I thought that even if he had been steady, yet the divisions of the ministerial party would a little later have brought about our overthrow.[345] H. M. seeming to agree in my main position, as did the Prince, asked me: But when will parliament return to that state? I replied I grieved to say that I perceived neither the time when, nor the manner how, that result is to come about; but until it is reached, I fear that Y. M. will pass through a period of instability and weakness as respects the executive. She observed that the prospect is not agreeable. I said, True, madam, but it is a great consolation that all these troubles are upon the surface, and that the throne has for a long time been gaining and not losing stability from year to year. I could see but one danger to the throne, and that was from encroachments by the House of Commons. No other body in the country was strong enough to encroach. This was the consideration which had led my resigning colleagues with myself to abandon office that we might make our stand against what we thought a formidable invasion.... I thought the effect of the resistance was traceable in the good conduct of the House of Commons last night, when another attempt at encroachment was proposed and firmly repelled.... I expressed my comfort at finding that our motives were so graciously appreciated by H. M. and withdrew. PUBLIC OUTCRY Loud was the public outcry. All the censure that had been foretold in case they should refuse to join, fell with double force upon them for first joining and then seceding. Lord Clarendon pronounced their conduct to be actually worse and more unpatriotic than Lord John's. The delight at Brooks's Club was uproarious, for to the whigs the Peelites had always been odious, and they had been extremely sorry when Palmerston asked them to join his government.[346] For a time Mr. Gladstone was only a degree less unpopular in the country than Cobden and Bright themselves. The newspapers declared that Gladstone's epitaph over the Aberdeen administration might be applied with peculiar force to his own fate. The short truth seems to be that Graham, Gladstone, and Palmerston were none of them emphatic or explicit enough beforehand on the refusal of the committee when the government was formed, though the intention to refuse was no doubt both stated and understood. Graham admitted afterwards that this omission was a mistake. The world would be astonished if it knew how often in the pressure of great affairs men's sight proves short. After the language used by Mr. Gladstone about the inquiry, we cannot wonder that he should have been slow to acquiesce. The result in time entirely justified his description of the Sebastopol committee.[347] But right as was his judgment on the merits, yet the case was hardly urgent enough to make withdrawal politic or wise. Idle gossip long prevailed, that Graham could not forgive Palmerston for not having (as he thought) helped to defend him in the matter of opening Mazzini's letters; that from the first he was bent on overthrowing the new minister; that he worked on Gladstone; and that the alleged reason why they left was not the real one. All the evidence is the other way; that Graham could not resist the obvious want of the confidence of parliament, and that Gladstone could not bear a futile and perilous inquiry. That they both regretted that they had yielded to over-persuasion in joining, against their own feelings and judgment, is certain. Graham even wrote to Mr. Gladstone in the following summer that his assent to joining Palmerston was perhaps the greatest mistake of his public life. In Mr. Gladstone's case, the transaction gave a rude and protracted shock to his public influence. LORD PALMERSTON'S REIGN Lord Palmerston meanwhile sat tight in his saddle. When the crisis first began, Roebuck in energetic language had urged him to sweep the Peelites from his path, and at any rate he now very steadily went on without them. Everybody took for granted that his administration would be temporary. Mr. Gladstone himself gave it a twelvemonth at most. As it happened, Lord Palmerston was in fact, with one brief interruption, installed for a decade. He was seventy-one; he had been nearly forty years in office; he had worked at the admiralty, war department, foreign office, home office; he had served under ten prime ministers--Portland, Perceval, Liverpool, Canning, Goderich, Wellington, Grey, Melbourne, Russell, Aberdeen. He was not more than loosely attached to the whigs, and he had none of the strength of that aristocratic tradition and its organ, the Bedford sect. The landed interest was not with him. The Manchester men detested him. The church in all its denominations was on terms of cool and reciprocated indifference with one who was above all else the man of this world. The press he knew how to manage. In every art of parliamentary sleight of hand he was an expert, and he suited the temper of the times, while old maxims of government and policy were tardily expiring, and the forces of a new era were in their season gathering to a head. FOOTNOTES: [337] On Bute's plan of superseding party by prerogative, in the introduction to vol. iii. of the Bedford _Correspondence_. [338] See Appendix. [339] See Chap. x. of Lord Stanmore's _Earl of Aberdeen_. [340] 'This _suppressio veri_ is shocking, and one of the very worst things he ever did.'--_Greville_, iii. i. p. 232. [341] At Lord Aberdeen's the question seems to have been discussed on the assumption that the offer to Mr. Gladstone and Herbert was meant to be independent of Palmerston's acceptance or refusal, and the impression there was that Mr. Gladstone had been not wholly disinclined to consider the offer. [342] Malmesbury's _Memoirs of an Ex-Minister_, i. pp. 8, 37. [343] On Feb. 23, he writes to Mr. Hayter, the government whip: 'We have arranged to sit in the orthodox ex-ministers' place to-night, _i.e._ second bench immediately below the gangway. This avoids constructions and comparisons which we could hardly otherwise have escaped; and Bright and his friends agreed to give it us. Might I trust to your kindness to have some cards put in the place for us before prayers?' [344] While Lewis went to the exchequer, Sir Charles Wood succeeded Graham at the admiralty, Lord John, then on his way to Vienna, agreed to come hack to the cabinet and took the colonial office, which Sir George Grey had left for the home office, where he succeeded Palmerston. [345] This seems to contradict the proposition in the article on Greville in the _Eng. Hist. Rev._ of 1887. [346] _Greville_, III. i. p. 246. [347] Mr. Gladstone projected and partly executed some public letters on all this, to be addressed, like the Neapolitan letters, to Lord Aberdeen. CHAPTER VII POLITICAL ISOLATION (_1855-1856_) [Greek: êkista gar polemos epì rêtois chôrei]--THUC. i. 122. War is the last thing in all the world to go according to programme. Statesmen are invincibly slow to learn the lesson put by Thucydides long centuries ago into the mouth of the Athenian envoys at Sparta, and often repeated in the same immortal pages, that war defies all calculations, and if it be protracted comes to be little more than mere matter of chance, over which the combatants have no control. A thousand times since has history proved this to be true. Policy is mastered by events; unforeseen sequels develop novel pretexts, or grow into startling and hateful necessities; the minister finds that he is fastened to an inexorable chain. NEW VIEWS OF THE WAR Mr. Gladstone now had this fatal law of mundane things brought home to him. As time went on, he by rapid intuition gained a truer insight into the leading facts. He realised that Mahometan institutions in the Ottoman empire were decrepit; that the youthful and vigorous elements in European Turkey were crushed under antiquated and worn-out forms and forces unfit for rule. He awoke to the disquieting reflection how the occupation of the Principalities had been discussed, day after day and month after month, entirely as a question of the payment of forty thousand pounds a year to Turkey, or as a violation of her rights as suzerain, but never in reference to the well-being, happiness, freedom, or peace of the inhabitants. He still held that the war in its origin was just, for it had been absolutely necessary, he said, to cut the meshes of the net in which Russia had entangled Turkey. He persisted in condemning the whole tone and policy of Russia in 1854. By the end of 1854, in Mr. Gladstone's eyes, this aggressive spirit had been extinguished, the Czar promising an almost unreserved acceptance of the very points that he had in the previous August angrily rejected. The essential objects of the war were the abolition of Russian rights in the Principalities, and the destruction of Russian claims upon Greek Christians under Ottoman sway. These objects, Mr. Gladstone insisted, were attained in January 1855, when Russia agreed to three out of the Four Points--so the bases of agreement were named--and only demurred upon the plan for carrying out a portion of the fourth. The special object was to cancel the preponderance of Russia in the Black Sea. No fewer than seven different plans were simultaneously or in turn propounded. They were every one of them admitted to be dubious, inefficient, and imperfect. I will spare the reader the mysteries of limitation, of counterpoise, of counterpoise and limitation mixed. Russia preferred counterpoise, the allies were for limitation. Was this preference between two degrees of the imperfect, the deficient, and the ineffective a good ground for prolonging a war that was costing the allies a hundred million pounds a year, and involved to all the parties concerned the loss of a thousand lives a day? Yet, for saying No to this question, Mr. Gladstone was called a traitor, even by men who in 1853 had been willing to content themselves with the Vienna note, and in 1854 had been anxious to make peace on the basis of the Four Points. In face of pleas so wretched for a prolongation of a war to which he had assented on other grounds, was he bound to silence? 'Would it not, on the contrary,' he exclaimed, 'have been the most contemptible effeminacy of character, if a man in my position, who feels that he has been instrumental in bringing his country into this struggle, were to hesitate a single moment when he was firmly convinced in his own mind that the time had arrived when we might with honour escape from it?' The prospect of reducing Russia to some abstract level of strength, so as to uphold an arbitrary standard of the balance of power--this he regarded as mischief and chimera. Rightly he dreaded the peril of alliances shifting from day to day, like quicksands and sea-shoals--Austria moved by a hundred strong and varying currents, France drawing by unforeseen affinities towards Russia. Every war with alliances, he once said, should be short, sharp, decisive.[348] As was to be expected, the colleagues from whom he had parted insisted that every one of his arguments told just as logically against the war in all its stages, against the first as legitimately as the last. In fact, we can never say a plain sure aye or no to questions of peace and war, after the sword has once left the scabbard. They are all matter of judgment on the balance of policy between one course and another; and a very slight thing may incline the balance either way, even though mighty affairs should hang on the turn of the scale. Meanwhile, as the months went on, Sebastopol still stood untaken, excitement grew, people forgot the starting point. They ceased to argue, and sheer blatancy, at all times a power, in war-time is supreme. Mr. Gladstone's trenchant dialectic had no more chance than Bright's glowing appeals. Shrewd and not unfriendly onlookers thought that Graham and Gladstone were grievously mistaken in making common cause with the peace party, immediately after quitting a war government, and quitting it, besides, not on the issues of the war. Herbert was vehement in his remonstrances. The whole advantage of co-operation with the Manchester men, he cried, would be derived by them, and all the disrepute reaped by us. 'For the purposes of peace, they were the very men we ought to avoid. As advocates for ending the war, they were out of court, for they were against beginning it.'[349] If Gladstone and Graham had gone slower, their friends said, they might have preached moderation to ministers and given reasonable advice to people out of doors. As it was, they threw the game into the hands of Lord Palmerston. They were stamped as doctrinaires, and what was worse, doctrinaires suspected of a spice of personal animus against old friends. Herbert insisted that the Manchester school 'forgot that the people have flesh and blood, and propounded theories to men swayed by national feeling.' As a matter of fact, this was wholly untrue. Cobden and Bright, as everybody nowadays admits, had a far truer perception of the underlying realities of the Eastern question in 1854, than either the Aberdeen or the Palmerston cabinet, or both of them put together. What was undeniable was that the public, with its habits of rough and ready judgment, did not understand, and could not be expected to understand, the new union of the Peelites with a peace party, in direct opposition to whose strongest views and gravest warnings they had originally begun the war. 'In Gladstone,' Cornewall Lewis said, 'people ascribe to faction, or ambition, or vanity, conduct which I believe to be the result of a conscientious, scrupulous, ingenuous, undecided mind, always looking on each side of a question and magnifying the objections which belong to almost every course of action.'[350] ADVOCATES OF PEACE A foreign envoy then resident in England was struck by the general ignorance of facts even among leading politicians. Of the friends of peace, he says, only Lord Grey and Gladstone seemed to have mastered the Vienna protocols: the rest were quite astonished when the extent of the Russian concessions was pointed out to them. The envoy dined with Mr. Gladstone at the table of the Queen, and they talked of Milner Gibson's motion censuring ministers for losing the opportunity of the Vienna conferences to make a sound and satisfactory peace. Mr. Gladstone said to him that he should undertake the grave responsibility of supporting this motion, 'because in his opinion the concessions promised by Russia contain sufficient guarantees. Those very concessions will tear to pieces all the ancient treaties which gave an excuse to Russia for interfering in the internal affairs of Turkey.'[351] At all times stimulated rather than checked by a difficult situation, Mr. Gladstone argued the case for peace to the House during the session of 1855 in two speeches of extraordinary power of every kind. His position was perfectly tenable, and he defended it with unsurpassed force. For the hour unfortunately his influence was gone. Great newspapers thought themselves safe in describing one of these performances as something between the rant of the fanatic and the trick of the stage actor; a mixture of pious grimace and vindictive howl, of savage curses and dolorous forebodings; the most unpatriotic speech ever heard within the walls of parliament. In sober fact, it was one of the three or four most masterly deliverances evoked by the Crimean war. At the very same time Lord John Russell was still sitting in the cabinet, though he had held the opinion that at the beginning of May the Austrian proposal ought to have ended the war and led to an honourable peace. The scandal of a minister remaining in a government that persisted in a war condemned by him as unnecessary was intolerable, and Lord John resigned (July 16). The hopes of the speedy fall of Sebastopol brightened in the summer of 1855, but this brought new alarms to Lord Palmerston. 'Our danger,' he said in remarkable words, 'will then begin--a danger of peace and not a danger of war.' To drive the Russians out of the Crimea was to be no more than a preliminary. England would go on by herself, if conditions deemed by her essential were not secured. 'The British nation is unanimous, for I cannot reckon Cobden, Bright, and Co. for anything.'[352] His account of the public mind was indubitably true. Well might Aberdeen recall to his friends that, with a single exception, every treaty concluded at the termination of our great wars had been stigmatised as humiliating and degrading, ignominious, hollow and unsafe. He cited the peace of Utrecht in 1713, the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748, the peace of Paris in 1763, the peace of Versailles in 1783, and the peace of Amiens in 1801. The single exception was the peace of Paris in 1814. It would have been difficult in this case, he said, for patriotism or faction to discover humiliation 'in a treaty dictated at the head of a victorious army in the capital of the enemy.' AT PENMAENMAWR While the storm was raging, Mr. Gladstone made his way with his family to Penmaenmawr, whence he writes to Lord Aberdeen (Aug. 9): 'It was a charitable act on your part to write to me. It is hardly possible to believe one is not the greatest scoundrel on earth, when one is assured of it from all sides on such excellent authority.... I am busy reading Homer about the Sebastopol of old time, and all manner of other fine fellows.' In another letter of the same time, written to Sir Walter James, one of the most closely attached of all his friends, he strikes a deeper note:-- _Sept. 17._--If I say I care little for such an attack you will perhaps think I make little of sympathy like yours and Lord Hardinge's, but such, I beg you and him to believe, is not the case. Public life is full of snares and dangers, and I think it a fearful thing for a Christian to look forward to closing his life in the midst of its (to me at least) essentially fevered activity. It has, however, some excellent characteristics in regard to mental and even spiritual discipline, and among these in particular it absolutely requires the habits of resisting temper and of suppressing pain. I never allow myself, in regard to my public life, to realise, _i.e._ to dwell upon, the fact that a thing is _painful_. Indeed life has no time for such broodings: neither in session nor recess is the year, the day, or the hour long enough for what it brings with it. Nor was there ever a case in which it was so little difficult to pass over and make little of a personal matter: for if indeed it be true, as I fear it is, that we have been committing grave errors, that those errors have cost many thousands of lives and millions of money, and that no glare of success can effectually hide the gloom of thickening complications, the man who can be capable of weighing his own fate and prospects in the midst of such contingencies has need to take a lesson from the private soldier who gives his life to his country at a shilling a day. 'We are on our way back,' he writes at the end of September, 'after a month of sea-bathing and touring among the Welsh mountains. Most of my time is taken up with Homer and Homeric literature, in which I am immersed with great delight up to my ears; perhaps I should say out of my depth.' Mr. Gladstone was one of the men whom the agitations of politics can never submerge. Political interests were what they ought to be, a very serious part of life; but they took their place with other things, and were never suffered, as in narrower natures sometimes happens, to blot out 'stars and orbs of sun and moon' from the spacious firmament above us. He now found a shelter from the intensity of the times in the systematic production of his book on Homer, a striking piece of literature that became the most definite of his pursuits for two years or more. His children observed that he never lounged or strolled upon the shore, but when the morning's labour was over--and nothing was ever allowed to break or mutilate the daily spell of serious work--he would stride forth staff in hand, and vigorously breast the steepest bluffs and hills that he could find. This was only emblematic of a temperament to which the putting forth of power was both necessity and delight. The only rest he ever knew was change of effort. While he was on the Welsh coast Sebastopol fell, after a siege of three hundred and fifty days. Negotiations for peace were opened tolerably soon afterwards, ending, after many checks and diplomatic difficulties, in the Treaty of Paris (March 30, 1856), as to which I need only remind the reader, with a view to a future incident in Mr. Gladstone's history, that the Black Sea was neutralised, and all warships of every nation excluded from its waters. Three hundred thousand men had perished. Countless treasure had been flung into the abyss. The nation that had won its last victory at Waterloo did not now enhance the glory of its arms, nor the power of its diplomacy, nor the strength of any of its material interests. It was our French ally who profited. The integrity of Turkey was so ill confirmed that even at the Congress of Paris the question of the Danubian Principalities was raised in a form that in a couple of years reduced Turkish rule over six millions of her subjects to the shadow of smoke. Of the confidently promised reform of Mahometan dominion there was never a beginning nor a sign. The vindication of the standing European order proved so ineffectual that the Crimean war was only the sanguinary prelude to a vast subversion of the whole system of European states. II WORK ON HOMER Other interests now came foremost in Mr. Gladstone's mind. The old ground so constantly travelled over since the death of Peel was for three years to come traversed again with fatiguing iteration. In the spring of 1856 Lord Derby repeated the overtures that he had made in specific form in 1851 and in 1855. The government was weak, as Mr. Gladstone had predicted that it would be. Lord Derby told Sir William Heathcote, through whom he and Mr. Gladstone communicated, that as almost any day it might be overturned, and he might be sent for by the Queen, he was bound to see what strength he might rely upon, and he was anxious to know what were Mr. Gladstone's views on the possibility of co-operation. What was the nature of his relations with other members of the Peel government who had also been in the cabinet of Lord Aberdeen? Did they systematically communicate? Were they a party? Did they intend to hold and to act together? These questions were soon answered:-- On the first point, Mr. Gladstone said, you cannot better describe my views for present purposes than by saying that they are much like Lord Derby's own as I understand them--there was nothing in them to prevent a further consideration of the subject, if public affairs should assume such a shape as to recommend it. On the second, I said Graham, Herbert, Cardwell, and I communicated together habitually and confidentially; that we did not seek to act, but rather eschewed acting, as a party; that our habits of communication were founded upon long political association, general agreement, and personal friendship; that they were not, however, a covenant for the future, but a natural growth and result of the past. Then he proceeds to tell with a new and rather startling conclusion the old story of the Peelite responsibility for the broken and disorganised state of the House of Commons:-- We, the friends of Lord Aberdeen, were a main cause of disunion and weakness in the executive government, and must be so, from whichever side the government were formed, so long as we were not absolutely incorporated into one or the other of the two great parties. For though we had few positively and regularly following us, yet we had indirect relations with others on both sides of the House, which tended to relax, and so far disable, party connections, and our existence as a section encouraged the formation of other sections all working with similar effects. I carried my feeling individually so far upon the subject as even to be ready, if I had to act alone, to surrender my seat in parliament, rather than continue a cause of disturbance to any government to which I might generally wish well.[353] RELATIONS WITH LORD DERBY This exchange of views with Lord Derby he fully reported to Graham, Herbert, and Cardwell, whom Lord Aberdeen, at his request, had summoned for the purpose. Herbert doubted the expediency of such communications, and Graham went straight to what was a real point. 'He observed that the question was of the most vital consequence, Who should lead the House of Commons? This he thought must come to me, and could not be with Disraeli. I had said and repeated, that I thought we could not bargain Disraeli out of the saddle; that it must rest with him (so far as we were concerned) to hold the lead if he pleased; that besides my looking to it with doubt and dread, I felt he had this right; and that I took it as one of the _data_ in the case before us upon which we might have to consider the question of political junction, and which might be seriously affected by it.' Of these approaches in the spring of 1856 nothing came. The struggle in Mr. Gladstone's mind went on with growing urgency. He always protested that he never at any time contemplated an isolated return to the conservative ranks, but 'reunion of a body with a body.' Besides his sense of the vital importance of the reconstruction of the party system, he had two other high related aims. The commanding position that had first been held in the objects of his activity by the church, then, for a considerable space, by the colonies, was now filled by finance. As he put it in a letter to his sympathetic brother Robertson: He saw two cardinal subjects for the present moment in public affairs, a rational and pacific foreign policy, and second, the due reduction in our establishments, economy in administration, and finance to correspond. In 1853 he had, as he believed, given financial pledges to the country. These pledges were by the present ministers in danger of being forgotten. They were incompatible with Palmerston's spirit of foreign policy. His duty, then, was to oppose that policy, and to labour as hard as he could for the redemption of his pledges. Yet isolated as he was, he had little power over either one of these aims or the other. The liberal party was determined to support the reigning foreign policy, and this made financial improvement desperate. Of Lord Derby's friends he was not hopeful, but they were not committed to so dangerous a leader.[354] As he put it to Elwin, the editor of the _Quarterly_: There is a policy going a begging; the general policy that Sir Robert Peel in 1841 took office to support--the policy of peace abroad, of economy, of financial equilibrium, of steady resistance to abuses, and promotion of practical improvements at home, with a disinclination to questions of reform, gratuitously raised.[355] His whole mind beset, possessed, and on fire with ideals of this kind, and with sanguine visions of the road by which they might be realised--it was not in the temperament of this born warrior to count the lions in his path. He was only too much in the right, as his tribulations of a later date so amply proved, in his perception that neither Palmerston nor Palmerstonian liberals would take up the broken clue of Peel. The importunate presence of Mr. Disraeli was not any sharper obstacle to a definite junction with conservatives, than was the personality of Lord Palmerston to a junction with liberals. As he had said to Graham in November 1856, 'the pain and strain of public duty is multiplied tenfold by the want of a clear and firm ground from which visibly to act.' In rougher phrase, a man must have a platform and work with a party. This indeed is for sensible men one of the rudiments of practical politics. Of a certain kind of cant about public life and office Mr. Gladstone was always accustomed to make short work. The repudiation of desire for official power, he at this time and always roundly denounced as 'sentimental and maudlin.' One of the not too many things that he admired in Lord Palmerston was 'the manly frankness of his habitual declarations that office is the natural and proper sphere of a public man's ambition, as that in which he can most freely use his powers for the common advantage of his country.' 'The desire for office,' said Mr. Gladstone, 'is the desire of ardent minds for a larger space and scope within which to serve the country, and for access to the command of that powerful machinery for information and practice, which the public departments supply. He must be a very bad minister indeed, who does not do ten times the good to the country that he would do when out of office, because he has helps and opportunities which multiply twenty fold, as by a system of wheels and pulleys, his power for doing it.' It is true, as the smallest of men may see--and the smaller the man, the more will he make of it--that this sterling good sense may set many a snare for the politician; but then even the consecrated affectations of our public life have their snares too. The world was not in the secret of the communications with Lord Derby, but the intrinsic probabilities of a case often give to the public a trick of divination. In the middle of December (1856) articles actually appeared in the prints of the day announcing that Mr. Gladstone would at the opening of the next session figure at the head of the opposition. The tories, they said, wanted a leader, Mr. Gladstone wanted a party. They were credulous, he was ingenious. The minority in a party must yield to a majority, and he stood almost by himself. He would be a returned prodigal in the conservative household, for unlike Sir James Graham, he had never merged himself in the ordinary ruck of liberalism. A tory peer writes to assure him that there never was such a chance for the reunion of the party. Even the nobleman who had moved Mr. Gladstone's expulsion from the Carlton said that he supposed reunion must pretty soon come off. A few, perhaps under a score, made a great noise, but if Lord Derby would only form a government, the noisy ones would be as glad as the rest. True--and here the writer came nearer to the central difficulty--'Disraeli ought _at first_ to lead the Commons,' because he had been leader before; second, he had the greater number of followers; third, because on public grounds he must desire to see Mr. Gladstone at the exchequer; and to transfer to him both the great subject of finance and the great prize of leadership would be impossible. So easy do flat impossibilities ever seem to sanguine simpletons in Pall Mall. Another correspondent has been staying at a grand country-house, full of tory company, and the state of parties was much discussed--'There was one unanimous opinion,' he tells Mr. Gladstone, 'that nothing could save the conservative party except electing you for their leader.' The same talk was reported from the clubs. 'The difficulty was Disraeli, not so much for any damage that his hostility could do the party, as because Lord Derby had contracted relations with him which it would perhaps be impossible for him to disown.' Meanwhile the sagacious man in the tents of the tories, whose course was so neatly chalked out for him by sulky followers not relishing his lead, was, we may be sure, entirely wide-awake, watching currents, gales, and puffs of wind without haste, without rest. Disraeli made a bold stroke for party consolidation by inviting to his official dinner at the opening of the session of 1857, General Peel, the favourite brother of the great minister and his best accredited representative. Peel consulted Mr. Gladstone on the reply to Disraeli's invitation, and found him strongly adverse. The public, said Mr. Gladstone, views with much jealousy every change of political position not founded on previous parliamentary co-operation for some national object. Mr. Gladstone might have put it on the narrower ground that attendance at the dinner would be an explicit condonation of Disraeli's misdeeds ten years before, and a direct acceptance of his leadership henceforth. Elwin believed that he had the direct sanction of Lord Derby for a message from him to Mr. Gladstone suggesting communication. After much ruminating and consulting, Mr. Gladstone wrote (Dec. 13, 1856) in sufficiently circuitous language to Elwin, that though he should not be justified in communicating with Lord Derby, considered simply as a political leader with whom he was not in relations of party, yet, he proceeds, 'remembering that I was once his colleague, and placing entire reliance on his honour, I am ready to speak to him in confidence and without reserve on the subject of public affairs, should it be his desire.' His three friends, Graham, Aberdeen, and Herbert, still viewed the proceeding with entire disfavour, and no counsels were ever dictated by sincerer affection and solicitude. Your financial scheme, says Graham, is conceived in the very spirit of Peel; it would be most conducive to national welfare; you alone and in high office can carry it; but it must be grafted on a pacific policy and on a moderate scale of public expenditure; it is not under Palmerston that such blessings are to be anticipated; but then are they more probable under Derby and Disraeli? Lord Aberdeen took another line, insisting that to make any sort of approach to Lord Derby, after joining Palmerston only the previous year, would be unjustifiable; the bare apprehension of a vicious policy would be no intelligible ground for changing sides; more tangible reasons would be needed, and they were only too likely soon to arrive from Palmerston's foreign policy. Then a reasonable chance might come. Herbert, in his turn, told Mr. Gladstone that though he might infuse vigour and respectability into a party that stood much in need of both, yet he would always be in a false position. 'Your opinions are essentially progressive, and when the measures of any government mast be liberal and progressive, the country will prefer the men whose antecedents and mottoes are liberal, while the conservatives will always prefer a leader whose prejudices are with themselves.' As Graham put it to him: 'If you were to join the tory party to-morrow, you would have neither their confidence nor their real good will, and they would openly break with you in less than a year.' It all reminds one of the chorus in Greek plays, sagely expostulating with a hero bent on some dread deed of fate. III MEDITATIONS In the autumn of 1856 ecclesiastical questions held a strong place in Mr. Gladstone's interests. The condemnation of Archdeacon Denison for heresy roused him to lively indignation. He had long interviews with the archdeacon, drafted answers for him, and flung his whole soul into the case, though he was made angry by Denison's oscillations and general tone. 'Gladstone tells me,' said Aberdeen, 'that he cannot sleep for it, and writes to me volumes upon volumes. He thinks that Denison ought to have been allowed to show that his doctrine, whether in accordance or not with the articles, is in accordance with scripture. And he thinks the decision ought to have been in his case as it was in Gorham's, that the articles are comprehensive, that they admit Denison's view of the Eucharist as well as that of his opponents.'[356] His closing entry for the year (1856) depicts an inner mood:-- It appears to me that there are few persons who are so much as I am enclosed in the invisible net of pendent steel. I have never known what tedium was, have always found time full of calls and duties, life charged with every kind of interest. But now when I look calmly around me, I see that these interests are for ever growing and grown too many and powerful, and that were it to please God to call me I might answer with reluctance.... See how I stand. Into politics I am drawn deeper every year; in the growing anxieties and struggles of the church I have no less [interest] than I have heretofore; literature has of late acquired a new and powerful hold upon me; the fortunes of my wife's family, which have had, with all their dry detail, all the most exciting and arduous interest of romance for me now during nine years and more; seven children growing up around us, and each day the object of deeper thoughts and feelings, and of higher hopes to Catherine and me,--what a network is here woven out of all that the heart and all that the mind of man can supply.... FOOTNOTES: [348] See Appendix. [349] Herbert to Gladstone, May 27, 1855. [350] _Many Memories_, p. 229. [351] Vitzthum, _St. Petersburg and London_, i. p. 170. A full account of these parliamentary events from May to July, 1855, is to be found in Martin's _Prince Consort_, iii. pp. 281-307. [352] Ashley, ii. pp. 320, 325. [353] Memo. April 17, 1856. [354] To Robertson Gladstone, Dec. 16, 1856. [355] To Mr. Elwin, Dec. 2, 1856. [356] Simpson's _Many Memories_, p. 238. CHAPTER VIII GENERAL ELECTION--NEW MARRIAGE LAW (_1857_) No wave on the great ocean of Time, when once it has floated past us, can be recalled. All we can do is to watch the new form and motion of the next, and launch upon it to try in the manner our best judgment may suggest our strength and skill.--GLADSTONE. In spite of wise counsels of circumspection, Mr. Gladstone clung to the chances that might come from personal communication between himself and Lord Derby. Under pressure from his friends, he agreed with Lord Derby to put off an interview until after the debate on the address. Then, after parliament met, they took the plunge. We are now at the beginning of February. This afternoon at three I called on Lord Derby and remained with him above three hours, in prosecution of the correspondence which had passed between us. I told him that I deliberately disapproved of the government of Lord Palmerston, and was prepared and desirous to aid in any proper measures which might lead to its displacement. That so strong were my objections that I was content to act thus without inquiring who was to follow, for I was convinced that any one who might follow would govern with less prejudice to the public interests. That in the existing state of public affairs I did not pretend to see far, but thus far I saw clearly. I also told him that I felt the isolated position in which I stood, and indeed in which we who are called Peelites all stand, to be a great evil as tending to prolong and aggravate that parliamentary disorganisation which so much clogs and weakens the working of our government; and I denounced myself as a public nuisance, adding that it would be an advantage if my doctor sent me abroad for the session. PEELITES AND TORIES He concurred in the general sentiments which I had expressed, but said it was material for him, as he had friends with and for whom to act, and as I had alluded to the possibility, in the event of a change, of his being invited by the Queen to form a government, to consider beforehand on what strength he could rely. He said he believed his friends were stronger than any other single section, but that they were a minority in both Houses. Weak in 1852, he was weaker now, for it was natural that four years of exclusion from office should thin the ranks of a party, and such had been his case. He described the state of feeling among his friends, and adverted to the offer he had made in 1851 and in 1855. The fact of an overture made and not accepted had led to much bitterness or anger towards us among a portion of his adherents. He considered that in 1855 Lord Palmerston had behaved far from well either to Herbert and me, or to him.[357] Other interviews followed; resolutions were discussed, amendments, forms of words. They met at discreet dinners. 'Nobody,' Lord Derby tells him, 'except Disraeli knows the length to which our communications have gone.' Nobody, that is to say, excepting also Mr. Gladstone's three personal allies; them he kept accurately informed of all that passed at every stage. On February 13 the government presented their budget. In introducing his plan, Cornewall Lewis rashly quoted, and adopted as his own, the terrible heresy of Arthur Young, that to multiply the number of taxes is a step towards equality of burden, and that a good system of taxation is one that bears lightly on an infinite number of points. The reader will believe how speedily an impious opinion of this sort kindled volcanic flame in Mr. Gladstone's breast. He thought moreover that he espied in the ministerial plan a prospective deficiency a year ahead. To maintain a steady surplus of income over expenditure, he reflected; to lower indirect taxes when excessive in amount, for the relief of the people, and bearing in mind the reproductive power inherent in such operations; to simplify our fiscal system by concentrating its pressure on a few well chosen articles of extended consumption; and to conciliate support to the income-tax by marking its temporary character, and by associating it with beneficial changes in the tariff: these aims have been for fifteen years the labour of our life. By this budget he found them in principle utterly reversed. He told his friends that the shade of Peel would appear to him if he did not oppose such plans with his whole strength. When the time came (Feb. 3), 'the government was fired into from all quarters. Disraeli in front; Gladstone on flank; John Russell in rear. Disraeli and Gladstone rose at same time. Speaker called the former. Both spoke very well. It was a night of triumph for Gladstone.'[358] There is another note of the proceedings on Lewis's budget:-- _Saturday, Feb. 14._--I was engaged to meet Graham, Herbert, and Cardwell at Lord Aberdeen's, and I knew from Lord Derby that he was to see his friends at noon. So I went to him on my way, first to point out the _deficit_ of between five and six millions for 1858-9 which is created by this budget, with the augmentations of it in subsequent years; and secondly, to say that in my opinion it was hopeless to attack the scheme in detail, and that it must be resisted on the ground of deficit as a whole, to give a hope of success. I said that if among the opposition there still lingered a desire to revive and extend indirect taxation, I must allow that the government had bid high for support from those who entertained it; that it was the worst proposition I had ever heard from a minister of finance. At Lord Aberdeen's we examined the figures of the case, and drafted two resolutions which expressed our opinions. The more serious point, however, was that they all wished me to insist upon taking the motion into my own hands; and announcing this to Lord J. Russell as well as to Lord Derby. As to the second I had no difficulty, could I have acceded to the first. But I did not doubt that Disraeli would still keep hold of so much of his notice of Feb. 3 as had not been set aside by the budget. I said that from motives which I could neither describe nor conquer I was quite unable to undertake to enter into any squabble or competition with him for the possession of a post of prominence. We had much conversation on political prospects: Graham wishing to see me lead the Commons under Lord John as prime minister in the Lords; admitting that the same thing would do under Lord Derby, but for Disraeli, who could not be thrown away like a sucked orange; and I vehemently deploring our position, which I said, and they admitted, was generally condemned by the country. I again went to Derby, as he had requested, at five; and he told me that he had had with him Malmesbury, Hardwicke, Disraeli, Pakington, Walpole, Lytton. They had all agreed that the best motion would be a resolution (from Disraeli) on Monday, before the Speaker left the chair, which would virtually rest the question on deficit. I made two verbal suggestions on the resolution to improve its form. CO-OPERATION WITH MR. DISRAELI Late in the evening Lord Derby writes, enclosing a note received at dinner from Disraeli, 'I hope I may take it for granted that there is now a complete understanding between us as to the move on Monday night.' 'My dear lord,' runs the note, 'I like the resolution as amended. It is improved. Yours ever, D.' When Monday came, the move was duly made, and Gladstone and Disraeli again fought side by side as twin champions of the cause of reduced expenditure. Time had incensed Mr. Gladstone still further, and he conducted a terrific fusillade. He recounted how between 1842 and 1853 two and twenty millions of taxation had been taken off without costing a farthing. 'A man may be glad and thankful to have been an Englishman and a member of the British parliament during these years, bearing his part in so blessed a work. But if it be a blessed work, what are we to say of him who begins the undoing of it?' The proposal of the government showed a gross, a glaring, an increasing deficiency, a deficiency unparalleled in the financial history of a quarter of a century. It was deluding the people and trifling with national interests. It is certain that no financier before or since ever, in Cromwellian phrase, made such a conscience of the matter, or ever found the task more thankless.[359] Great as was the effect of the close and searching argument that accompanied all this invective, even Mr. Gladstone's friends thought it too impassioned and too severe upon Lewis, in whose favour there was consequently a reaction. The cool minister contented himself with quoting Horace's lines upon the artist skilled in reproducing in his bronze fierce nails or flowing hair, yet who fails because he lacks the art to seize the whole.[360] At the end of February (1857), at a party meeting of 160 members, Lord Derby told his men that the course taken by Mr. Disraeli upon the budget had been concerted with him and had his entire approval; spoke with admiration of Mr. Gladstone; justified political union when produced by men finding themselves drawn to the same lobby by identity of sentiment; and advised them not to decline such accession of strength as would place their party in a position to undertake the government of the country. The newspapers cried out that the long-expected coalition had at length really taken place. In their hearts the conservative managers were not sure that Mr. Gladstone's adhesion would not cost them too dearly. 'He would only benefit us by his talents' (says Lord Malmesbury) 'for we should lose many of our supporters. The Duke of Beaufort, one of our staunchest adherents, told me at Longleat that if we coalesced with the Peelites he would leave the party, and I remember in 1855, when Lord Derby attempted to form a government, and offered places to Gladstone and Herbert, that no less than eighty members of the House of Commons threatened to leave him.'[361] All these schemes and calculations were destined to be rudely interrupted. II SPEECH ON THE CHINA WAR While he was acting with Lord Derby on the one hand, Mr. Gladstone sought counsel from Cobden on the other, having great confidence in his 'firmness and integrity of purpose,' and hoping for support from him in face of a faint-hearted disposition to regard Lord Palmerston as a magician against whom it was vain to struggle. Events were speedily to show that Lord Palmerston had more magic at his disposal than his valiant foe believed. The agent of the British government in the China seas--himself, by the way, a philosophic radical--had forced a war upon the Chinese. The cabinet supported him. On the motion of Cobden, the House censured the proceeding. Mr. Gladstone, whose hatred of high-handed iniquities in China had been stirred in early days,[362] as the reader may recall, made the most powerful speech in a remarkable debate. 'Gladstone rose at half-past nine,' Phillimore says (Mar. 3), 'and delivered for nearly two hours an oration which enthralled the House, and which for argument, dignity, eloquence, and effect is unsurpassed by any of his former achievements. It won several votes. Nobody denies that his speech was the finest delivered in the memory of man in the House of Commons.' Apart from a rigorous examination of circumstance and fact in the special case, as in the famous precedent of Don Pacifico seven years before, he raised the dispute to higher planes and in most striking language. He examined it both by municipal and international law, and on 'the higher ground of natural justice'--'that justice which binds man to man; which is older than Christianity, because it was in the world before Christianity; which is broader than Christianity, because it extends to the world beyond Christianity; and which underlies Christianity, for Christianity itself appeals to it.... War taken at the best is a frightful scourge upon the human race; but because it is so, the wisdom of ages has surrounded it with strict laws and usages, and has required formalities to be observed which shall act as a curb upon the wild passions of man.... You have dispensed with all these precautions. You have turned a consul into a diplomatist, and that metamorphosed consul is forsooth to be at liberty to direct the whole might of England against the lives of a defenceless people.' Disraeli in turn denounced proceedings which began in outrage and ended in ruin, mocked at 'No reform, new taxes, Canton blazing, Persia invaded,' as the programme of the party of progress and civilisation, and reprobated a prime minister who had professed almost every principle, and connected himself with almost every party. Palmerston replied by a stout piece of close argument, spiced by taunts about coalitions, combinations, and eloquent flourishes. But this time in parliament his slender majority failed him. _March 3, '57._--Spoke on Cobden's resolutions, and voted in 263-247--a division doing more honour to the House of Commons than any I ever remember. Home with C. and read Lord Ellesmere's _Faust_, being excited, which is rare with me. (_Diary._) LORD PALMERSTON'S TRIUMPH The repulse was transient. The minister appealed to the constituencies, and won a striking triumph. Nearly all the Manchester politicians, with Bright and Cobden at their head, were ruthlessly dismissed, and the election was a glorious ratification not only of the little war among the Chinese junks, but of the great war against the Czar of Russia, and of much besides. This, said Mr. Gladstone, was not an election like that of 1784, when Pitt appealed on the question whether the crown should be the slave of an oligarchic faction; nor like that of 1831, when Grey sought a judgment on reform; nor like that of 1852, when the issue was the expiring controversy of protection. The country was to decide not upon the Canton river, but whether it would or would not have Lord Palmerston for prime minister. 'The insolent barbarian wielding authority at Canton who had violated the British flag' was indeed made to play his part. But the mainspring of the electoral victory was to be sought in the profound public weariness of the party dispersions of the last eleven years; in the determination that the country should be governed by men of intelligible opinions and definite views; in the resolution that the intermediate tints should disappear; in the conviction that Palmerston was the helmsman for the hour. The result was justly compared to the plebiscite taken in France four or five years earlier, whether they would have Louis Napoleon for emperor or not. It was computed that no fewer than one-sixth, or at best one-seventh, of the most conspicuous men in the former House of Commons were thrust out. The Derbyites were sure that the report of the coalition with the Peelites had done them irreparable harm, though their electioneering was independent. At Oxford Mr. Gladstone was returned without opposition. On the other hand, his gallant attempt to save the seat of his brother-in-law in Flintshire failed, his many speeches met much rough interruption, and to his extreme mortification Sir Stephen Glynne was thrown out. The moral of the general election was undoubtedly a heavy shock to Mr. Gladstone, and he was fully conscious of the new awkwardness of his public position. Painful change seemed imminent even in his intimate relations with cherished friends. Sidney Herbert had written to him that as for Gladstone, Graham, and himself, they were not only broken up as a party, but the country intended to break them up and would resent any attempt at resuscitation; they ought on no account to reappear as a triumvirate on their old bench. Mr. Gladstone's reply discloses in some of its phrases a peculiar warmth of sensibility, of which he was not often wont to make much display:-- _To Sidney Herbert._ _March 22, 1857._--I did not reply to your letter when it arrived, because it touches principally upon subjects with respect to which I feel that my mind has been wrought into a state of sensitiveness which is excessive and morbid. For the last eleven years, with the exception of only two among them, the pains of political strife have not for us found their usual and proper compensation in the genial and extended sympathies of a great body of comrades, while suspicion, mistrust, and criticism have flanked us on both sides and in unusual measure. Our one comfort has been a concurrence of opinion which has been upon the whole remarkably close, and which has been cemented by the closer bonds of feeling and of friendship. The loss of this one comfort I have no strength to face. Contrary to your supposition, I have nothing with which to replace it; but the attachments, which began with political infancy, and which have lived through so many storms and so many subtler vicissitudes will never be replaced. You will never be able to get away from me as long as I can cling to you, and if at length, urged by your conscience and deliberate judgment, you effect the operation, the result will not be to throw me into the staff of Lord Derby. I shall seek my duty, as well as consult my inclination, first, by absconding from what may be termed general politics, and secondly, by appearing, wherever I must appear, only in the ranks. I can neither give even the most qualified adhesion to the ministry of Lord Palmerston, nor follow the liberal party in the abandonment of the very principles and pledges which were original and principal bonds of union with it. So, on the other hand, I never have had any hope of conservative reconstruction except (and that slender and remote) such as presupposed the co-operation--I am now speaking for the House of Commons only--of yourself and Graham in particular. By adopting Reform as a watchword of present political action he has certainly inserted a certain amount of gap between himself and me, which may come to be practically material or may not. If you make a gap upon this opportunity, I believe it will be a novelty in political history: it will be the first case on record of separation between two men, all of whose views upon every public question, political, administrative, or financial, are I believe in as exact accordance as under the laws of the human mind is possible.... His leaning towards the conservative party seemed to become more decided rather than less. Lord Aberdeen had written to him as if the amalgamation of Peel's friends with the liberal party had practically taken place. 'If that be true,' Mr. Gladstone replies (April 4, 1857), 'then I have been deceiving both the world and my constituents, and the deception has reached its climax within the last fortnight, during which I have been chosen without opposition to represent Oxford under a belief directly contrary in the minds of the majority of my constituents.' He saw nothing but evil in Lord Palmerston's supremacy. That was his unending refrain. He tells one of his constituents, the state of things 'is likely to end in much political confusion if it is not stopped by the failure of Lord Palmerston's physical force, the only way of stopping it which I could view with regret, for I admire the pluck with which he fights against the infirmities of age, though in political and moral courage I have never seen a minister so deficient.' Cobden asked him in the course of the first session of the new parliament, to take up some position adverse to the ministers. 'I should not knowingly,' Mr. Gladstone replies (June 16, 1857), 'allow any disgust with the state of public affairs to restrain me from the discharge of a public duty; but I arrived some time ago at the conclusion, which has guided my conduct since the dissolution, that the House of Commons would sooner and more healthily return to a sense of its own dignity and of its proper functions, if let alone by a person who had so thoroughly worried both it and the country as myself.' III DIVORCE BILL This stern resolve to hold aloof did not last. Towards the end of the session a subject was brought before parliament that stirred him to the very depths of heart and conscience. It marked one more stage of the history of English laws in that immense process of the secularisation of the state, against which, in his book of 1888, Mr. Gladstone had drawn up, with so much weight of reading and thought, a case so wholly unavailing. The legal doctrine of marriage had been established against the theological doctrine by Lord Hardwicke's famous act of 1753, for that measure made the observance of certain requirements then set up by law essential to a good marriage. A further fundamental change had begun with the legislation of civil marriage in 1836. The conception of marriage underlying such a change obviously removed it from sacrament, or anything like a sacrament, to the bleak and frigid zone of civil contract; it was antagonistic, therefore, to the whole ecclesiastical theory of divorce.[363] A royal commission issued a report in 1853, setting forth the case against the existing system of dissolving marriage, and recommending radical changes. In the following year the cabinet of which Mr. Gladstone was a member framed and introduced a bill substantially conforming to these recommendations. For one reason or another it did not become law, nor did a bill of similar scope in 1856. In the interval of leisure that followed, Mr. Gladstone was pressed, perhaps by Bishop Wilberforce, thoroughly to consider the matter. With his prepossessions, there could be little doubt that he would incline to that view of marriage, and the terms and legal effects of loosening the marriage tie, that the Council of Trent had succeeded in making the general marriage law of catholic Europe. The subject was one peculiarly calculated to interest and excite him. Religion and the church were involved. It raised at our own hearths the eternal question of rendering to Cæsar what is Cæsar's, and to the church what belongs to the church. It was wrapped up with topics of history and of learning. It could not be discussed without that admixture of legality and ethics which delights a casuistic intellect. Above all, it went to the root both of that deepest of human relations, and of that particular branch of morals, in which Mr. Gladstone always felt the vividest concern. So, in short, being once called upon for a practical purpose to consider divorce and the many connected questions of re-marriage, he was inevitably roused to a fervour on one side, not any less heated and intense than the fervour of the mighty Milton on the other side two centuries before. He began operations by an elaborate article in the _Quarterly Review_.[364] Here he flings himself upon the well-worn texts in the Bible familiar to the readers of _Tetrachordon_,--if, indeed, _Tetrachordon_ have any readers,--with a dialectical acuteness and force that only make one wonder the more how a mind so powerful as Mr. Gladstone's could dream that, at that age of the world, men would suffer one of the most far-reaching of all our social problems, whatever be the right or wrong social solution, to be in the slightest degree affected by a Greek word or two of utterly disputable and unfixed significance. INTEREST IN LAW OF DIVORCE I may note in passing that in another department of supposed Levitical prohibition--the case of the wife's sister--he had in 1849 strongly argued against relaxation, mainly on the ground that it would involve an alteration of the law and doctrines of the church of England, and therefore of the law of Christianity.[365] Experience and time revolutionised his point of view, and in 1869, in supporting a bill legalising these marriages, he took the secular and utilitarian line, and said that twelve or fourteen years earlier (about the time on which we are now engaged) he formed the opinion that it was the mass of the community to which we must look in dealing with such a question, and that the fairest course would be to legalise the marriage contracts in question, and legitimise their issue, leaving to each religious community the question of attaching to such marriages a religious character.[366] The Divorce bill of 1857 was introduced in the Lords, and passed by them without effective resistance. It was supported by the Archbishop of Canterbury and nine other prelates. Authorities no less exalted than Bishop Wilberforce were violently hostile, even at one stage carrying amendments (ultimately rejected), not only for prohibiting the inter-marriage of the guilty parties, but actually imposing a fine or imprisonment on either of them. This, I fancy, is the high-water mark of the ecclesiastical theory in the century.[367] Lord Mahon in a letter to Mr. Gladstone at this date pictures Macaulay's New Zealander being taken to the House of Lords and hearing learned lords and reverend prelates lay down the canon that marriage is indissoluble by the law of England and by the law of the church. But who, he might have asked, are those two gentlemen listening so intently? Oh, these are two gentlemen whose marriages were dissolved last year. And that other man? Oh, he was divorced last week. And those three ladies? Oh, their marriages may in all probability be dissolved in another year or two. Still this view of the absurdity of existing practice did not make a convert. As soon as the bill came down to the House of Commons Mr. Gladstone hastened up to London in the dog-days. 'A companion in the railway carriage,' he wrote to Mrs. Gladstone, 'more genial than congenial, offered me his _Times_, and then brandy! This was followed by a proposal to smoke, so that he had disabled me from objecting on personal grounds.' Tobacco, brandy at odd hours, and the newspaper made a triple abomination in a single dose, for none of the three was ever a favourite article of his consumption. In London he found the counsels of his friends by no means encouraging for the great fight on which he was intent. They deprecated anything that would bring him into direct collision with Lord Palmerston. They urged that violent opposition now would be contrasted with his past silence, and with his own cabinet responsibility for the very same proposal. Nothing would be intelligible to the public, Lord Aberdeen said, beyond a 'carefully moderated course.' But a carefully moderated course was the very last thing possible to Mr. Gladstone when the flame was once kindled, and he fought the bill with a holy wrath as vehement as the more worldly fury with which Henry Fox, from very different motives, had fought the marriage bill of 1753. The thought that stirred him was indicated in a phrase or two to his wife at Hawarden: '_July 31._--Parliamentary affairs are very black; the poor church gets deeper and deeper into the mire. I am to speak to-night; it will do no good; and the fear grows upon me from year to year that when I finally leave parliament, I shall not leave the great question of state and church better, but perhaps even worse, than I found it.' VEHEMENT OPPOSITION The discussion of the bill in the Commons occupied no fewer than eighteen sittings, more than one of them, according to the standard of those primitive times, inordinately long. In the hundred encounters between Mr. Gladstone and Bethell, polished phrase barely hid unchristian desire to retaliate and provoke. Bethell boldly taunted Mr. Gladstone with insincerity. Mr. Gladstone, with a vivacity very like downright anger, reproached Bethell with being a mere hewer of wood and drawer of water to the cabinet who forced the bill into his charge; with being disorderly and abusing the privileges of speech by accusations of insincerity, 'which have not only proceeded from his mouth but gleamed from those eloquent eyes of his, which have been continuously turned on me for the last ten minutes, instead of being addressed to the chair.' On every division those who affirmed the principle of the bill were at least two to one. 'All we can do,' Mr. Gladstone wrote to his wife, 'is to put shoulder to shoulder, and this, please God, we will do. Graham is with us, much to my delight, and much too, let me add, to my surprise. I am as thankful to be in parliament for this (almost) as I was for the China vote.... Yesterday ten and a-half hours, rather angry; to-day with pacification, but still tough and prolonged.' An unfriendly but not wholly unveracious chronicler says of this ten hours' sitting (August 14) on a single clause: 'Including questions, explanations, and interlocutory suggestions, Mr. Gladstone made nine-and-twenty speeches, some of them of considerable length. Sometimes he was argumentative, frequently ingenious and critical, often personal, and not less often indignant at the alleged personality of others.' He made no pretence of thinking the principle of divorce _a vinculo_ anything but an immense evil, but he still held himself free, if that view were repudiated, to consider the legislative question of dissolubility and its conditions. He resorted abundantly to what Palmerston called 'the old standard set-up form of objecting to any improvement, to say that it does not carry out all the improvements of which the matter in hand is susceptible.' One of the complaints of which he made most was the inequality in the bill between the respective rights of husband and wife. 'It is the special and peculiar doctrines of the Gospel,' he said, 'respecting the personal relation of every Christian, whether man or woman, to the person of Christ, that form the firm, the broad, the indestructible basis of the equality of the sexes under the Christian law.' Again, 'in the vast majority of instances where the woman falls into sin, she does so from motives less impure and ignoble than those of the man.' He attacks with just vigour the limitation of legal cruelty in this case to the cruelty of mere force importing danger to life, limb, or health, though he was shocked in after years, as well he might be, at the grotesque excess to which the doctrine of 'mental cruelty' has been carried in some States of the American Union. In this branch of the great controversy, at any rate, he speaks in a nobler and humaner temper than Milton, who writes with a tyrannical Jewish belief in the inferiority of women to men, and wives to husbands, that was in Mr. Gladstone's middle life slowly beginning to melt away in English public opinion. His second complaint, and in his eyes much the more urgent of the two, was the right conferred by the government bill upon divorced persons to claim marriage by a clergyman in a church, and still more bitterly did he resent the obligation imposed by the bill upon clergymen to perform such marriages. Here the fight was not wholly unsuccessful, and modifications were secured as the fruit of his efforts, narrowing and abating, though not removing, his grounds of objection.[368] IV DEATH OF LADY LYTTELTON Before the battle was over, he was torn away from the scene by a painful bereavement. Mrs. Gladstone was at Hagley nursing her beloved sister, Lady Lyttelton. He wrote to his wife in the fiercest hours of the fight (11 Carlton House Terrace, Aug. 15): 'I read too plainly in your letter of yesterday that your heart is heavy, and mine too is heavy along with yours. I have been in many minds about my duty to-day; and I am all but ready to break the bands even of the high obligations that have kept me here with reference to the marriage bill. You have only to speak the word by telegraph or otherwise, showing that I can help to give any of the support you need, and I come to you. As matters stand I am wanted in the House to-day, and am wanted for the Divorce bill again on Monday.' Before Monday came, Lady Lyttelton was no more. Four days after her death, Mr. Gladstone wrote to Mr. Arthur Gordon from Hagley:-- The loss suffered here is a dreadful one, but it is borne in the way which robs death and all evil of its sting. My deceased sister-in-law was so united with my wife; they so drew from their very earliest years, and not less since marriage than before it, their breath so to speak in common, that the relation I bore to her conveys little even of what I have lost; but that again is little compared to my wife's bereavement; and far above all to that of Lyttelton, who now stands lonely among his twelve children. But the retrospect from first to last is singularly bright and pure. She seemed to be one of those rare spirits who do not need affliction to draw them to their Lord, and from first to last there was scarce a shade of it in her life. When she was told she was to die, her pulse did not change; the last communion appeared wholly to sever her from the world, but she smiled upon her husband within a minute of the time when the spirit fled. FOOTNOTES: [357] See above pp. 525-8. [358] Phillimore's Diary. [359] The reader will find a candid statement of the controversy in Northcote, _Financial Policy_, pp. 306-329. [360] _Ars Poetica_, 32-5. [361] Malmesbury, _Memoirs_, ii. pp. 56-7. See above, p. 536. [362] See above, p. 225. [363] It is a striking indication of the tenacity of custom against logic that in France, though civil marriage was made not merely permissive, as with us, but compulsory in 1792, divorce was banished from French law from 1816 down to 1884. [364] July 1857. Reprinted in _Gleanings_, vi. p. 47. [365] House of Commons, June 20, 1849. [366] _Ibid._, July 20, 1869. See also _Gleanings_, vi. p. 50. [367] It may be said that the exaction of damages comes to the same thing. [368] In republishing in 1878 his article from the _Quarterly_ (_Gleanings_, vi. p. 106), he says his arguments have been too sadly illustrated by the mischievous effects of the measure. The judicial statistics, however, hardly support this view, that petitions for divorce were constantly increasing, and at an accelerating rate of progression. In England the proportion of divorce petitions to marriages and the proportion of divorce decrees to population are both of them lower than they were a few years ago. Mr. Gladstone used to desire the prohibition of publicity in these proceedings, until he learned the strong view of the president of the Court that the hideous glare of this publicity acts probably as no inconsiderable deterrent. CHAPTER IX THE SECOND DERBY GOVERNMENT (_1858_) Extravagance and exaggeration of ideas are not the essential characteristic of either political party in this country. Both of them are composed in the main of men with English hearts and English feelings. Each of them comprises within itself far greater diversities of political principles and tendencies, than can be noted as dividing the more moderate portion of the one from the more moderate portion of the other.... But while the great English parties differ no more in their general outlines than by a somewhat varied distribution of the same elements in each, they are liable to be favourably or unfavourably affected and their essential characteristics unduly exaggerated, by circumstances of the order that would be termed accidental.--GLADSTONE. The turn of the political wheel is constantly producing strange results, but none has ever been more strikingly dramatic than when, on February 20, Bright and Milner Gibson, who had been ignominiously thrown out at Manchester the year before, had the satisfaction of walking to the table of the House of Commons as victorious tellers in the division on the Conspiracy to Murder bill that overthrew Lord Palmerston. A plot to slay the French Emperor had been organised by a band of Italian refugees in London. The bombs were manufactured in England. Orsini's design miscarried, but feeling in France was greatly excited, and the French government formally drew attention at St. James's to the fact that bodies of assassins abused our right of asylum. They hinted further that the amity of the crown called for stronger law. Palmerston very sensibly did not answer the French despatch, but introduced a bill with new powers against conspiracy. He in an instant became the most unpopular man in the country, and the idol of the year before was now hooted in the Park. LORD PALMERSTON DEFEATED Mr. Gladstone was at first doubtful, but soon made up his mind. To Mrs. Gladstone he writes (Feb. 17):-- As respects the Conspiracy bill, you may depend upon our having plenty of fight; the result is doubtful; but if the bill gets into the House of Lords it will pass. Lord Aberdeen is strong against it. From him I went to-day to Lord Lyndhurst, and I found Lord Brougham with him. A most interesting conversation followed with these two wonderful old men at 80 and 86 (coming next birthday) respectively, both in the fullest possession of their faculties, Brougham vehement, impulsive, full of gesticulation, and not a little rambling, the other calm and clear as a deep pool upon rock. Lord Lyndhurst is decidedly against the bill, Brougham somewhat inclines to it; being, as Lord Lyndhurst says, half a Frenchman. [Lord Lyndhurst expounded the matter in a most luminous way from his point of view. Brougham went into raptures and used these words: 'I tell you what, Lyndhurst, I wish I could make an exchange with you. I would give you some of my walking power, and you should give me some of your brains.' I have often told the story with this brief commentary, that the compliment was the highest I have ever known to be paid by one human being to another.][369] The debate showed a curious inversion of the parts usually played by eminent men. Palmerston vainly explained that he was doing no more than international comity required, and doing no worse than placing the foreign refugee on the same footing in respect of certain offences as the British subject. Mr. Gladstone (Feb. 19), on the other hand, 'as one who has perhaps too often made it his business to call attention to the failings of his countrymen,' contended that if national honour was not henceforth to be a shadow and a name, it was the paramount, absolute, and imperative duty of Her Majesty's ministers to protest against the imputation upon us of favour for assassination, 'a plant which is congenial neither to our soil nor to the climate in which we live.'[370] One of the truest things said in the debate was Disraeli's incidental observation that 'the House should remember that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, when there is a quarrel between two states, it is generally occasioned by some blunder of a ministry.' Mr. Disraeli perhaps consoled himself by the pithy saying of Baron Brunnow, that if no one made any blunders, there would be no politics. The blood of the _civis Romanus_, however, was up, and Palmerston, defeated by a majority of nineteen, at once resigned. CORRESPONDENCE WITH LORD DERBY Lord Derby, whose heart had failed him three years earlier, now formed his second administration, and made one more attempt to bring Mr. Gladstone over to the conservative ranks. Lord Lansdowne had told the Queen that no other government was possible, and an hour after he had kissed hands the new prime minister applied to Mr. Gladstone. The decisions taken by him in answer to this and another application three months later, mark one more of the curious turning points in his career and in the fate of his party. _Feb. 20, 1858._--Dined at Herbert's with Graham. We sat till 12½, but did not talk quite through the crisis. Palmerston has resigned. He is down. I must now cease to denounce him. 21.--St. James's morning, and holy communion. Westminster Abbey in evening, when I sat by Sir George Grey. From St. James's I went to Lord Aberdeen's. There Derby's letter reached me. We sent for Herbert and I wrote an answer. Graham arrived and heard it; with slight modifications it went. The case though grave was not doubtful. Made two copies and went off before 6 with S. Herbert. We separated for the evening with the fervent wish that in public life we might never part. Two or three letters exhibit the situation:-- _Lord Derby to Mr. Gladstone._ _St. James's Square, Feb. 21, 1858._--In consequence of the adverse vote of the other night, in which you took so prominent and distinguished a part, the government, as you know, has resigned; and I have been entrusted by the Queen with the difficult task, which I have felt it my duty not to decline, of forming an administration. In doing so, I am very desirous, if possible, of obtaining the co-operation of men of eminence, who are not at this moment fettered by other ties, and whose principles are not incompatible with my own. Believing that you stand in this position, it would afford me very great satisfaction if I could obtain your valuable aid in forming my proposed cabinet; and if I should be so fortunate as to do so, I am sure there would be on all hands a sincere desire to consult your wishes, as far as possible, as to the distribution of offices. I would willingly include Sidney Herbert in this offer; but I fear he is too intimately associated with John Russell to make it possible for him to accept. _Mr. Gladstone to Lord Derby._ 10 _Great George Street, Feb. 21, 1851._--I am very sensible of the importance of the vote taken on Friday; and I should deeply lament to see the House of Commons trampled on in consequence of that vote. The honour of the House is materially involved in giving it full effect. It would therefore be my first wish to aid, if possible, in such a task; and remembering the years when we were colleagues, I may be permitted to say that there is nothing in the fact of your being the head of a ministry, which would avail to deter me from forming part of it. Among the first questions I have had to put to myself, in consequence of the offer which you have conveyed in such friendly and flattering terms, has been the question whether it would be in my power by accepting it, either alone or in concert with others, to render you material service. After the long years during which we have been separated, there would be various matters of public interest requiring to be noticed between us; but the question I have mentioned is a needful preliminary. Upon the best consideration which the moment allows, I think it plain that alone, as I must be, I could not render you service worth your having. The dissolution of last year excluded from parliament men with whom I had sympathies; and it in some degree affected the position of those political friends with whom I have now for many years been united through evil and (much more rarely) through good report. Those who lament the rupture of old traditions may well desire the reconstitution of a party; but the reconstitution of a party can only be effected, if at all, by the return of the old influences to their places, and not by the junction of an isolated person. The difficulty is even enhanced in my case by the fact that in your party, reduced as it is at the present moment in numbers, there is a small but active and not unimportant section who avowedly regard me as the representative of the most dangerous ideas. I should thus, unfortunately, be to you a source of weakness in the heart of your own adherents, while I should bring you no party or group of friends to make up for their defection or discontent. For the reasons which I have thus stated or glanced at, my reply to your letter must be in the negative. I must, however, add that a government formed by you at this time will, in my opinion, have strong claims upon me, and upon any one situated as I am, for favourable presumptions, and in the absence of conscientious difference on important questions, for support. I have had an opportunity of seeing Lord Aberdeen and Sidney Herbert; and they fully concur in the sentiments I have just expressed. LETTER FROM MR. BRIGHT Mr. Gladstone had no close personal or political ties with the Manchester men at this moment, but we may well believe that a sagacious letter from Mr. Bright made its mark upon his meditations:-- _Mr. Bright to Mr. Gladstone._ _Reform Club, Feb. 21, '58._--Coming down Park Lane just now, I met a leading lawyer of Lord Derby's party, who will doubtless be in office with him if he succeeds in forming a government. He told me that Lord Derby and his friends were expecting to be able to induce you to join them. Will you forgive me if I write to you on this matter? I say nothing but in the most friendly spirit, and I have some confidence that you will not misinterpret what I am doing. Lord Derby has only about one-third of the House of Commons with him--and it is impossible by any management, or by any dissolution, to convert this minority into a majority. His minority in the House is greater and more powerful than it is in the country--and any appeal to the country, now or hereafter, must, I think, leave him in no better position than that in which he now finds himself. The whole liberal party in the country dislike him, and they dislike his former leader in the Commons; and notoriously his own party in the country, and in the House, have not much confidence in him. There is no party in the country to rally round him, as Peel was supported in 1841. A Derby government can only exist upon forbearance, and will only last till it is convenient for us and the whigs to overthrow it. Lord Palmerston may give it his support for a time, but he can give it little more than his own vote and speeches, for the liberal constituencies will not forgive their members if they support it. If you join Lord Derby, you link your fortunes with a constant minority, and with a party in the country which is every day lessening in numbers and in power. If you remain on our side of the House, you are with the majority, and no government can be formed without you. You have many friends there, and some who would grieve much to see you leave them--and I know nothing that can prevent your being prime minister before you approach the age of every other member of the House who has or can have any claim to that high office. If you agree rather with the men opposite than with those among whom you have been sitting of late, I have nothing to say. I am sure you will follow where 'the right' leads, if you only discover it, and I am not hoping or wishing to keep you from the right. I think I am not mistaken in the opinion I have formed of the direction in which your views have for some years been tending. You know well enough the direction in which the opinions of the country are tending. The minority which invites you to join it, if honest, must go or wish to go, in an opposite direction, and it cannot therefore govern the country. Will you unite yourself with what must be, from the beginning, an inevitable failure? Don't be offended, if, by writing this, I seem to believe you will join Lord Derby. I don't believe it--but I can imagine your seeing the matter from a point of view very different to mine--and I feel a strong wish just to say to you what is passing in my mind. You will not be the less able to decide on your proper course. If I thought this letter would annoy you, I would not send it. I think you will take it in the spirit in which it is written. No one knows that I am writing it, and I write it from no idea of personal advantage to myself, but with a view to yours, and to the interests of the country. I may be mistaken, but think I am not. Don't think it necessary to reply to this. I only ask you to read it, and to forgive me the intrusion upon you--and further to believe that I am yours, with much respect. _Mr. Gladstone to Mr. Bright._ _10 Great George Street, Feb. 22, '58._--Your letter can only bear one construction, that of an act of peculiar kindness which ought not to be readily forgotten. For any one in whom I might be interested I should earnestly desire, upon his entering public life, that, if possible, he might with a good conscience end in the party where he began, or else that he might have broad and definite grounds for quitting it. When neither of these advantages appears to be certainly within command, there remains a strong and paramount consolation in seeking, as we best can, the truth and the public interests; and I think it a marked instance of liberality, that you should give me credit for keeping this object in my view. My seeking, however, has not on the present occasion been very difficult. The opinions, such as they are, that I hold on many questions of government and administration are strongly held; and although I set a value, and a high value, upon the power which office gives, I earnestly hope never to be tempted by its exterior allurements, unless they are accompanied with the reasonable prospect of giving effect to some at least of those opinions and with some adequate opening for public good. On the present occasion I have not seen such a prospect; and before I received your letter yesterday afternoon I had made my choice. This ended the first scene of the short fifth act. The new government was wholly conservative. II UNEASINESS OF FRIENDS Throughout the whole of this period, Mr. Gladstone's political friends were uneasy about him. 'He writes and says and does too much,' Graham had told Lord Aberdeen (Dec. 1856), and a year and a half later the same correspondent notices a restless anxiety for a change of position, though at Gladstone's age and with his abilities he could not wonder at it. Mr. Gladstone was now approaching fifty; Graham was nearer seventy than sixty; and Aberdeen drawing on to seventy-five. One of the most eminent of his friends confessed that he was 'amazed at a man of Gladstone's high moral sense of feeling being able to _bear_ with Dizzy. I can only account for it on the supposition, which I suppose to be the true one, that personal dislike and distrust of Palmerston is the one absorbing feeling with him.... I see no good ground for the violent personal prejudice which is the sole ruling motive of Gladstone's and Graham's course--especially when the alternative is such a man as Dizzy.' Then comes some angry language about that enigmatic personage which at this cooling distance of time need not here be transcribed. At the end of 1856 Lord Aberdeen told Mr. Gladstone that his position in the House was 'very peculiar.' 'With an admitted superiority of character and intellectual power above any other member, I fear that you do not really possess the sympathy of the House at large, while you have incurred the strong dislike of a considerable portion of Lord Derby's followers.' Things grew worse rather than better. Even friendly journalists in the spring of 1858 wrote of him as 'the most signal example that the present time affords of the man of speculation misplaced and lost in the labyrinth of practical politics.' They call him the chief orator and the weakest man in the House of Commons. He has exhibited at every stage traces of an unhappy incoherence which is making him a mere bedouin of parliament, a noble being full of spirit and power, but not to be tamed into the ordinary ways of civil life. His sympathies hover in hopeless inconsistency between love for righteous national action, good government, freedom, social and commercial reform, and a hankering after a strong, unassailable executive in the old obstructive tory sense. He protests against unfair dealing with the popular voice in the Principalities on the Danube, but when the popular voice on the Thames demands higher honours for General Havelock he resists it with the doctrine that the executive should be wholly free to distribute honours as it pleases. He is loudly indignant against the supersession of parliament by diplomacy, but when a motion is made directly pointing to the rightful influence of the House over foreign affairs, he neither speaks nor votes. Is it not clear beyond dispute that his cannot be the will to direct, nor the wisdom to guide the party of progress out of which the materials for the government of this country will have to be chosen?[371] In organs supposed to be inspired by Disraeli, Mr. Gladstone's fate is pronounced in different terms, but with equal decision. In phrases that must surely have fallen from the very lips of the oracle itself, the public was told that 'cerebral natures, men of mere intellect without moral passion, are quite unsuited for governing mankind.' The days of the mere dialectician are over, and the rulers of Christendom are no longer selected from the serfs of Aristotle. Without the emotions that soar and thrill and enkindle, no man can attain 'a grand moral vision.' When Mr. Gladstone aims at philosophy, he only reaches casuistry. He reasons like one of the sons of Ignatius Loyola. What their Society is to the Jesuit, his own individualism is to Mr. Gladstone. He supports his own interests as much from intellectual zeal as from self-love. A shrewd observer is quoted: 'looking on Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Sidney Herbert sitting side by side, the former with his rather saturnine face and straight black hair, and the latter eminently handsome, with his bright, cold smile and subtlety of aspect, I have often thought that I was beholding the Jesuit of the closet really devout, and the Jesuit of the world, ambitious, artful, and always on the watch for making his rapier thrusts.' Mr. Gladstone, in a word, is extremely eminent, but strangely eccentric, 'a Simeon Stylites among the statesmen of his time.'[372] RENEWED PROPOSAL OF OFFICE In May an important vacancy occurred in the ministerial ranks by Lord Ellenborough's resignation of the presidency of the board of control. This became the occasion of a renewed proposal to Mr. Gladstone. He tells the story in a memorandum prepared (May 22) for submission to Aberdeen and Graham, whom Lord Derby urged him to consult. _Memorandum by Mr. Gladstone submitted to Lord Aberdeen and Sir James Graham. May 22, '58._ _Secret._--Last week after Mr. Cardwell's notice but before the debate began, Mr. Walpole, after previously sounding Sir William Heathcote to a similar effect, called me aside in the lobby of the House of Commons and inquired whether I could be induced to take office. I replied that I thought that question put by him of his own motion--as he had described it--was one that I could hardly answer. It seemed plain, I said, that the actual situation was one so entirely belonging to the government as it stood, that they must plainly work through it unchanged; that the head of the government was the only person who could make a proposal or put a question about taking office in it; I added, however, that my general views were the same as in February. This morning I had a note from Walpole asking for an appointment; and he called on me at four o'clock accordingly. He stated that he came by authority of Lord Derby to offer me the board of control or, if I preferred it, the colonial office. That he had told Lord Derby I should, he thought, be likely to raise difficulties on two points: first, the separation from those who have been my friends in public life; secondly, the leadership of the House of Commons. I here interrupted him to say it must be in his option to speak or to be silent on the latter of these subjects; it was one which had never been entertained or opened by me in connection with this subject, since the former of the two points had offered an absolute preliminary bar to the acceptance of office. He, however, explained himself as follows, that Mr. Disraeli had stated his willingness to surrender the leadership to Sir James Graham, if he were disposed to join the government; but that the expressions he had used in his speech of Thursday[373] (apparently those with respect to parties in the House and to office), seemed to put it beyond the right of the government to make any proposal to him. He at the same time spoke in the highest terms not only of the speech, but of the position in which he thought it placed Sir James Graham; and he left me to infer that there would have been, but for the cause named, a desire to obtain his co-operation as leader of the House of Commons. With respect to the proposal as one the acceptance of which would separate me from my friends, he hoped it was not so. It was one made to me alone, the immediate vacancy being a single one; but the spirit in which it was made was a desire that it should be taken to signify the wish of the government progressively to extend its basis, as far as it could be effected compatibly with consistency in its opinions. He added that judging from the past he hoped he might assume that there was no active opposition to the government on the part of my friends, naming Lord Aberdeen, Sir James Graham, and the Duke of Newcastle. I told him with respect to the leadership that I thought it handsome on the part of Mr. Disraeli to offer to waive it on behalf of Sir James Graham; that it was a subject which did not enter into my decision for the reason I had stated; and I hinted also that it was one on which I could never negotiate or make stipulations. It was true, I said, I had no broad differences of principle from the party opposite; on the whole perhaps I differed more from Lord Palmerston than from almost any one, and this was more on account of his temper and views of public conduct, than of any political opinions. Nay more, it would be hard to show broad differences of public principle between the government and the bench opposite. RENEWED PROPOSAL OF OFFICE I said, however, that in my view the proposal which he had made to me could not be entertained. I felt the personal misfortune and public inconvenience of being thrown out of party connection; but a man at the bottom of the well must not try to get out, however disagreeable his position, until a rope or a ladder is put down to him. In this case my clear opinion was that by joining the government I should shock the public sentiment and should make no essential, no important, change in their position. I expressed much regret that accidental causes had kept back from my view at the critical moment the real extent of Lord Derby's proposals in February; that I answered him then as an individual with respect to myself individually.... I could not separate from those with whom I had been acting all my life long, in concert with whom all the habits of my mind and my views of public affairs had been formed, to go into what might justly be called a cabinet of strangers, since it contained no man to whom I had ever been a colleague, with the single exception of Lord Derby, and that twelve or fourteen years ago. While I did not conceive that public feeling would or ought to approve this separation, on the other hand I felt that my individual junction would and could draw no material accession of strength to the cabinet. He made the marked admission that if my acceptance must be without the _approval_ of friends, that must undoubtedly be an element of great weight in the case. This showed clearly that Lord Derby was looking to me in the first place, and then to others beyond me. He did not, however, found upon this any request, and he took my answer as an absolute refusal. His tone was, I need not say, very cordial; and I think I have stated all that was material in the conversation, except that he signified they were under the belief that Herbert entertained strong personal feelings towards Disraeli. Returning home, however, at seven this evening I found a note from Walpole expressing Lord Derby's wish in the following words: 'That before you finally decide on refusing to accept the offer he has made either of the colonies or of the India board he wishes you would consult Sir James Graham and Lord Aberdeen.' In order to meet this wish, I have put down the foregoing statement. Lord Aberdeen agreed with Mr. Gladstone that on the whole the balance inclined to _no_. Graham, in an admirable letter, truly worthy of a wise, affectionate, and faithful friend, said, 'My judgment is, on this occasion, balanced like your own.' He ran through the catalogue of Mr. Gladstone's most intimate political friends; the result was that he stood alone. Fixed party ties and active official duties would conduce to his present happiness and his future fame. He might form an intimate alliance with Lord Derby with perfect honour. His natural affinities were strong, and his 'honest liberal tendencies' would soon leaven the whole lump and bring it into conformity with the shape and body of the times. As for the leadership in the Commons, Graham had once thought that for Gladstone to sit on the treasury bench with Disraeli for his leader would be humiliation and dishonour. Later events had qualified this opinion. Of course, the abdication of Disraeli could not be made a condition precedent, but the concession would somehow be made, and in the Commons pre-eminence would be Gladstone's, be the conditions what they might. In fine, time was wearing fast away, Gladstone had reached the utmost vigour of his powers, and present opportunities were not to be neglected in vain expectation of better. III LETTER FROM MR. DISRAELI Before this letter of Graham's arrived, an unexpected thing happened, and Mr. Disraeli himself advanced to the front of the stage. His communication, which opens and closes without the usual epistolary forms, just as it is reproduced here, marks a curious episode, and sheds a strange light on that perplexing figure:-- _Mr. Disraeli to Mr. Gladstone._ _Confidential._ I think it of such paramount importance to the public interests, that you should assume at this time a commanding position in the administration of affairs, that I feel it a solemn duty to lay before you some facts, that you may not decide under a misapprehension. Our mutual relations have formed the great difficulty in accomplishing a result, which I have always anxiously desired. Listen, without prejudice, to this brief narrative. In 1850, when the balanced state of parties in the House of Commons indicated the future, I endeavoured, through the medium of the late Lord Londonderry, and for some time not without hope, to induce Sir James Graham to accept the post of leader of the conservative party, which I thought would remove all difficulties. When he finally declined this office, I endeavoured to throw the game into your hands, and your conduct then, however unintentional, assisted me in my views. The precipitate ministry of 1852 baffled all this. Could we have postponed it another year, all might have been right. Nevertheless, notwithstanding my having been forced publicly into the chief place in the Commons, and all that occurred in consequence, I was still constant to my purpose, and in 1855 suggested that the leadership of the House should be offered to Lord Palmerston, entirely with the view of consulting your feelings and facilitating your position. Some short time back, when the power of dissolution was certain, and the consequences of it such as, in my opinion, would be highly favourable to the conservative party, I again confidentially sought Sir James Graham, and implored him to avail himself of the favourable conjuncture, accept the post of leader in the H. of C, and allow both of us to serve under him. He was more than kind to me, and fully entered into the state of affairs, but he told me his course was run, and that he had not strength or spirit for such an enterprise. Thus you see, for more than eight years, instead of thrusting myself into the foremost place, I have been, at all times, actively prepared to make every sacrifice of self for the public good, which I have ever thought identical with your accepting office in a conservative government. Don't you think the time has come when you might deign to be magnanimous? Mr. Canning was superior to Lord Castlereagh in capacity, in acquirements, in eloquence, but he joined Lord C. when Lord C. was Lord Liverpool's lieutenant, when the state of the tory party rendered it necessary. That was an enduring, and, on the whole, not an unsatisfactory connection, and it certainly terminated very gloriously for Mr. Canning. I may be removed from the scene, or I may wish to be removed from the scene. Every man performs his office, and there is a Power, greater than ourselves, that disposes of all this. The conjuncture is very critical, and if prudently yet boldly managed, may rally this country. To be inactive now is, on your part, a great responsibility. If you join Lord Derby's cabinet, you will meet there some warm personal friends; all its members are your admirers. You may place me in neither category, but in that, I assure you, you have ever been sadly mistaken. The vacant post is, at this season, the most commanding in the commonwealth; if it were not, whatever office you filled, your shining qualities would always render you supreme; and if party necessities retain me formally in the chief post, the sincere and delicate respect which I should always offer you, and the unbounded confidence, which on my part, if you choose you could command, would prevent your feeling my position as anything but a form. Think of all this in a kindly spirit. These are hurried lines, but they are heartfelt. I was in the country yesterday, and must return there to-day for a county dinner. My direction is Langley Park, Slough. But on Wednesday evening I shall be in town.--B. DISRAELI. _Grosvenor Gate_, _May_ 25, 1858. None of us, I believe, were ever able to persuade Mr. Gladstone to do justice to Disraeli's novels,--the spirit of whim in them, the ironic solemnity, the historical paradoxes, the fantastic glitter of dubious gems, the grace of high comedy, all in union with a social vision that often pierced deep below the surface. In the comparative stiffness of Mr. Gladstone's reply on this occasion, I seem to hear the same accents of guarded reprobation:-- _Mr. Gladstone to Mr. Disraeli._ 11 _Carlton House Terrace_, _May_ 25, '58.--MY DEAR SIR,--The letter you have been so kind as to address to me will enable me, I trust, to remove from your mind some impressions with which you will not be sorry to part. You have given me a narrative of your conduct since 1850 with reference to your position as leader of your party. But I have never thought your retention of that office matter of reproach to you, and on Saturday last I acknowledged to Mr. Walpole the handsomeness of your conduct in offering to resign it to Sir James Graham. You consider that the relations between yourself and me have proved the main difficulty in the way of certain political arrangements. Will you allow me to assure you that I have never in my life taken a decision which turned upon those relations. You assure me that I have ever been mistaken in failing to place you among my friends or admirers. Again I pray you to let me say that I have never known you penurious in admiration towards any one who had the slightest claim to it, and that at no period of my life, not even during the limited one when we were in sharp political conflict, have I either felt any enmity towards you, or believed that you felt any towards me. At the present moment I am awaiting counsel which at Lord Derby's wish I have sought. But the difficulties which he wishes me to find means of overcoming, are broader than you may have supposed. Were I at this time to join any government I could not do it in virtue of party connections. I must consider then what are the conditions which make harmonious and effective co-operation in cabinet possible--how largely old habits enter into them--what connections can be formed with public approval--and what change would be requisite in the constitution of the present government, in order to make any change worth a trial. I state these points fearlessly and without reserve, for you have yourself well reminded me that there is a Power beyond us that disposes of what we are and do, and I find the limits of choice in public life to be very narrow.--I remain, etc. THE SECOND DERBY GOVERNMENT The next day Mr. Gladstone received Graham's letter already described. The interpretation that he put upon it was that although Graham appeared to lean in favour of acceptance, 'yet the counsel was indecisive.' On ordinary construction, though the counsellor said that this was a case in which only the man himself could decide, yet he also said that acceptance would be for the public good. 'Your affirmative advice, had it even been more positive, was not approval, nor was Lord Aberdeen's. On the contrary it would have been like the orders to Balaam, that he should go with the messengers of Balak, when notwithstanding the command, the act was recorded against him.' We may be quite sure that when a man draws all these distinctions, between affirmative advice, positive advice, approval, he is going to act without any advice at all, as Mr. Gladstone was in so grave a case bound to do. He declined to join. _Mr. Gladstone to Lord Derby._ _Private._ _11 C.H. Terrace, May 26, '58._--I have this morning received Sir James Graham's reply, and I have seen Lord Aberdeen before and since. Their counsel has been given in no narrow or unfriendly spirit. It is, however, indecisive, and leaves upon me the responsibility which they would have been glad if it had been in their power to remove. I must therefore adhere to the reply which I gave to Mr. Walpole on Saturday; for I have not seen, and I do not see, a prospect of public advantage or of material accession to your strength, from my entering your government single-handed. Had it been in your power to raise fully the question whether those who were formerly your colleagues, could again be brought into political relation with you, I should individually have thought it to be for the public good that, under the present circumstances of the country, such a scheme should be considered deliberately and in a favourable spirit. But I neither know that this is in your power, nor can I feel very sanguine hopes that the obstacles in the way of this proposal on the part of those whom it would embrace, could be surmounted. Lord Aberdeen is the person who could best give a dispassionate and weighty opinion on that subject. For me the question, confined as it is to myself, is a narrow one, and I am bound to say that I arrive without doubt at the result. REFUSAL 'I hope and trust,' said Graham, when he knew what Mr. Gladstone had done, 'that you have decided rightly; my judgment inclined the other way. I should be sorry if your letter to Lord Derby led him to make any more extended proposal. It could not possibly succeed, as matters now stand; and the abortive attempt would be injurious to him. The reconstruction of the fossil remains of the old Peel party is a hopeless task. No human power can now reanimate it with the breath of life; it is decomposed into atoms and will be remembered only as a happy accident, while it lasted.'[374] IV SUEZ CANAL In one remarkable debate of this summer the solitary statesman descended from his pillar. Now was the time of the memorable scheme for the construction of the Suez Canal, that first emanated from the French group of Saint Simonian visionaries in the earlier half of the century. Their dream had taken shape in the fertile and persevering genius of Lesseps, and was at this time the battle-ground of engineers, statesmen, and diplomatists in every country in Europe. For fifteen years the British government had used all their influence at Constantinople to prevent the Sultan from sanctioning the project. In June a motion of protest was made in the House of Commons. Lord Palmerston persisted that the scheme was the greatest bubble that ever was imposed upon the credulity and simplicity of the people of this country; the public meetings on its behalf were got up by a pack of foreign projectors; traffic by the railway would always beat traffic by steamer through the canal; it would be a step towards the dismemberment of the Turkish empire; it would tend to dismember our own empire by opening a passage between the Mediterranean and the Indian ocean, which would be at the command of other nations and not at ours. Away, then, with such a sacrifice of the interest of Great Britain to philanthropic schemes and philosophic reveries! So much for the sound practical man. Mr. Gladstone followed. Don't let us, he said, have governments and ex-governments coming down to instruct us here on bubble schemes. As a commercial project, let the Suez Canal stand or fall upon commercial grounds. With close reasoning, he argued against the proposition that the canal would tend to sever Turkey from Egypt. As to possible danger to our own interests, was it not a canal that would fall within the control of the strongest maritime power in Europe? And what could that power be but ourselves? Finally, what could be more unwise than to present ourselves to the world as the opponents of a scheme on the face of it beneficial to mankind, on no better ground than remote and contingent danger to interests of our own, with the alleged interest of Turkey merely thrust hypocritically in for the purpose of justifying a policy purely narrow-minded and wholly selfish? The majority against the motion was large, as it was in the case of the seven cardinals against Galileo. Still the canal was made, with some very considerable consequences that were not foreseen either by those who favoured it or those who mocked it as a bubble. M. de Lesseps wrote to Mr. Gladstone from Constantinople that the clearness of his speech had enabled him to use it with good effect in his negotiations with the Porte. 'Your eloquent words, the authority of your name, and the consideration that attaches to your character, have already contributed much and will contribute more still to hinder the darkening and complication of a question of itself perfectly clear and simple, and to avoid the troubling of the relations between two countries of which it is the natural mission to hold aloft _together_ the flag of modern civilisation.' Mr. Gladstone took an active interest in the various measures--some of them extremely singular--proposed by Mr. Disraeli for the transfer of the government of India from the Company to the crown. Writing early in the year to Sir James Graham he argued that their object should be steadily and vigorously to resist all attempts at creating a monster military and civil patronage, and to insist upon a real check on the Indian minister. He had much conversation with Mr. Bright--not then an intimate acquaintance--on the difficulty of the problem to govern a people by a people. The two agreed strongly as to one prominent possibility of mischief: they both distrusted the discretion confided to the Indian minister in the use of the Indian army. Mr. Gladstone set a mark upon the bill by carrying a clause to provide that the Indian army should not be employed beyond the frontiers of India without the permission of parliament. This clause he privately hoped would 'afford a standing-ground from which a control might be exercised on future Palmerstons.' FOOTNOTES: [369] The portion within brackets is from a letter of Mr. Gladstone's to Lady Lyndhurst, Aug. 31, 1883, and he continues: 'I have often compared Lord Lyndhurst in my own mind with the five other lord chancellors who since his time have been my colleagues in cabinet: much to the disadvantage in certain respects of some of them. Once I remember in the Peel cabinet the conversation happened to touch some man (there are such) who was too fond of making difficulties. Peel said to your husband, "That is not your way, Lyndhurst." Of all the intellects I have ever known, his, I think, worked with the least friction.' [370] 'Happily for the reputation of the House, but unhappily for the ministry, the debate assumed once more, with Gladstone's eloquence, a statesmanlike character. The foremost speaker of the House showed himself worthy of his reputation ... much as there was to lament in the too radical tone of his often finespun argumentation. His thundering periods were received with thundering echoes of applause.'--Vitzthum, _St. Petersburg and London_, i. p. 273. [371] See _Spectator_, May 8, 1858. [372] _Press_, April 7, 1858. [373] I wish to state that it is by the courtesy of hon. gentlemen that I occupy a seat on this (the ministerial) side of the House, although I am no adherent of Her Majesty's government. By no engagement, express or implied, am I their supporter. On the contrary, my sympathies and opinions are with the liberal party sitting on the opposite side of the House, and from recent kind communications I have resumed those habits of friendly intercourse and confidential communication with my noble friend (Lord John Russell) which formerly existed between us.--_May_ 20, 1858. [374] 'I wish,' said Mr. Disraeli to Bishop Wilberforce in 1862, 'you could have induced Gladstone to join Lord Derby's government when Lord Ellenborough resigned in 1858. It was not my fault that he did not: I almost went on my knees to him.'--_Life_, iii. p. 70. Vitzthum reports a conversation with Mr. Disraeli in January 1858, of a different tenor: 'We are at all times ready,' he said, 'to take back this deserter, but only if he surrenders unconditionally.'--Vitzthum, i. p. 269. CHAPTER X THE IONIAN ISLANDS (_1858-1859_) The world is now taking an immense interest in Greek affairs, and does not seem to know why. But there are very good reasons for it. Greece is a centre of life, and the only possible centre for the Archipelago, and its immediate neighbourhood. But it is vain to think of it as a centre from which light and warmth can proceed, until it has attained to a tolerable organisation, political and economical. I believe in the capacity of the people to receive the boon.--GLADSTONE (1862). PROPOSAL FROM BULWER At the beginning of October, while on a visit to Lord Aberdeen at Haddo, Mr. Gladstone was amazed by a letter from the secretary of state for the colonies--one of the two famous writers of romance then in Lord Derby's cabinet--which opened to him the question of undertaking a special mission to the Ionian islands. This, said Bulwer Lytton, would be to render to the crown a service that no other could do so well, and that might not inharmoniously blend with his general fame as scholar and statesman. 'To reconcile a race that speaks the Greek language to the science of practical liberty seemed to me a task that might be a noble episode in your career.' The origin of an invitation so singular is explained by Phillimore:-- _November_ 2nd, 1858.--Lord Carnarvon (then under-secretary at the colonial office) sent an earnest letter to me to come to the C.O. and advise with Rogers and himself as to drawing the commission. I met Bulwer Lytton there, overflowing with civility. The offer to Gladstone had arisen as I expected from Lord C., and he had told B. L. the conversation which he (C.) and I had together in the summer, in which I told Lord C. that I thought Gladstone would accept a mission extraordinary to Naples.... I risked without authority from G. this communication. Lord C. bore it in mind, and from this suggestion of mine sprang in fact this offer. So Lord C. said to me. Lord Malmesbury very sensibly observed that to send Mr. Gladstone to Naples was out of the question, in view of his famous letters to Lord Aberdeen. To the new proposal Mr. Gladstone replied that his first impulse on any call from a minister of the crown to see him on public business, would be to place himself at the minister's disposal. The interview did not occur for a week or two. Papers were sent from the colonial office to Hawarden, long letters followed from the secretary of state, and Mr. Gladstone took time to consider. The constitution of the Ionian islands had long been working uneasily, and what the colonial secretary invited him to undertake was an inquiry on the spot into our relations there, and into long-standing embarrassments that seemed to be rapidly coming to a head. Sir John Young, then lord high commissioner of the Ionian islands, had been with him at Eton and at Oxford, besides being a Peelite colleague in parliament, and Mr. Gladstone was not inclined to be the instrument of indicating disparagement of his friend. Then, moreover, he was in favour of 'a very liberal policy' in regard to the Ionian islands, and possibly the cabinet did not agree to a very liberal policy. As for personal interest and convenience, he was not disposed to raise any difficulty in such a case. The Peelite colleagues whose advice he sought were all, with the single exception of the Duke of Newcastle, more or less unconditionally adverse. Lord Aberdeen (October 8) admitted that Mr. Gladstone's name, acquirements, and conciliatory character might operate powerfully on the Ionians; still many of them were false and artful, and the best of them little better than children. 'It is clear,' he said, 'that Bulwer has sought to allure you with vague declarations and the attractions of Homeric propensities.... I doubt if Homer will be a _cheval de bataille_ sufficiently strong to carry you safely through the intricacies of this enterprise.' The sagacious Graham also warned him that little credit would be gained by success, while failure would be attended by serious inconveniences: in any case to quell 'a storm in a teapot' was no occupation worthy of his powers and position. Sidney Herbert was strong that governments were getting more and more into the bad habit of delegating their own business to other people; he doubted success, and expressed his hearty wish that we could be quit of the protectorate altogether, and could hand the islands bodily over to Greece, to which by blood, language, religion, and geography they belonged. I have said that these adverse views were almost unqualified, and such qualification as existed was rather remarkable. 'The only part of the affair I should regard with real pleasure,' wrote Lord Aberdeen, 'would be the means it might afford you of drawing closer to the government, and of naturally establishing yourself in a more suitable position; for in spite of Homer and Ulysses, your Ionian work will by no means be _tanti_ in itself.' Graham took the same point: 'An approximation to the government may be fairly sought or admitted by you. But this should take place on higher grounds.' Thus, though he was now in fact unconsciously on the eve of his formal entry into a liberal cabinet, expectations still survived that he might re-join his old party. As might have been expected, the wanderings of Ulysses and the geography of Homer prevailed in Mr. Gladstone's mind over the counsels of parliamentary Nestors. Besides the ancient heroes, there was the fascination of the orthodox church, so peculiar and so irresistible for the anglican school to which Mr. Gladstone belonged. Nor must we leave out of account the passion for public business so often allied with the student's temperament; the desire of the politician out of work for something definite to do; Mr. Gladstone's keen relish at all times for any foreign travel that came in his way; finally, and perhaps strongest of all, the fact that his wife's health had been much shaken by the death of her sister, Lady Lyttelton, and the doctors were advising change of scene, novel interests, and a southern climate. His decision was very early a foregone conclusion. So his doubting friends could only wish him good fortune. Graham said, 'If your hand be destined to lay the foundation of a Greek empire on the ruins of the Ottoman, no hand can be more worthy, no work more glorious. _Recidiva manu posuissem Pergama_ was a noble aspiration;[375] with you it may be realised.' MISSION ACCEPTED He hastened to enlist the services as secretary to his commission of Mr. Lacaita, whose friendship he had first made seven years before, as we have seen, amid the sinister tribunals and squalid dungeons of Naples. For dealings with the Greco-Italian population of the islands he seemed the very man. 'As regards Greek,' Mr. Gladstone wrote to him, 'you are one of the few persons to whom one gives credit for knowing everything, and I assumed on this ground that you had a knowledge of ancient Greek, such as would enable you easily to acquire the _kind_ of acquaintance with the modern form, such as is, I presume, desirable. That is my own predicament; with the additional disadvantage of our barbarous English pronunciation.' Accompanied by Mrs. Gladstone and their eldest daughter, and with Mr. Arthur Gordon, the son of Lord Aberdeen, and now, after long service to the state, known as Lord Stanmore, for private secretary, Mr. Gladstone left England on November 8, 1858, and he returned to it on the 8th of March 1859. II THE IONIAN CASE The Ionian case was this. By a treaty made at Paris in November 1815, between Great Britain, Russia, Austria, and Prussia, the seven islands--scattered along the coast from Epiros to the extreme south of the Morea--were constituted into a single free and independent state under the name of the United States of the Ionian Islands, and this state was placed under the immediate and exclusive protection of Great Britain. The Powers only thought of keeping the islands out of more dubious hands, and cared little or not at all about conferring any advantage upon either us or the Ionians. The States were to regulate their own internal organisation, and Great Britain was 'to employ a particular solicitude with regard to the legislation and general administration of those states,' and was to appoint a lord high commissioner to reside there with all necessary powers and authorities. The Duke of Wellington foretold that it would prove 'a tough and unprofitable job,' and so in truth it did. A constitutional charter in 1817 formed a system of government that soon became despotic enough to satisfy Metternich himself. The scheme has been justly described as a singularly clever piece of work, appearing to give much while in fact giving nothing at all. It contained a decorous collection of chapters, sections, and articles imposing enough in their outer aspect, but in actual operation the whole of them reducible to a single clause enabling the high commissioner to do whatever he pleased. This rough but not ill-natured despotism lasted for little more than thirty years, and then in 1849, under the influence of the great upheaval of 1848, it was changed into a system of more popular and democratic build. The old Venetians, when for a couple of centuries they were masters in this region, laid it down that the islanders must be kept with their teeth drawn and their claws clipped. Bread and the stick, said Father Paul, that is what they want. This view prevailed at the colonial office, and maxims of Father Paul Sarpi's sort, incongruously combined with a paper constitution, worked as ill as possible. Mr. Gladstone always applied to the new system of 1849 Charles Buller's figure, of first lighting the fire and then stopping up the chimney. The stick may be wholesome, and local self-government may be wholesome, but in combination or rapid alternation they are apt to work nothing but mischief either in Ionian or any other islands. Sir Charles Napier--the Napier of Scinde--who had been Resident in Cephalonia thirty years before, in Byron's closing days, describes the richer classes as lively and agreeable; the women as having both beauty and wit, but of little education; the poor as hardy, industrious, and intelligent--all full of pleasant humour and vivacity, with a striking resemblance, says Napier, to his countrymen, the Irish. The upper class was mainly Italian in origin, and willingly threw all the responsibility for affairs on the British government. The official class, more numerous in proportion to population than in any country in Europe, scrambled for the petty salaries of paltry posts allotted by popular election. Since 1849 they had increased by twenty-five per cent., and were now one in a hundred of the inhabitants. The clergy in a passive way took part with the demagogues. Men of ability and sense were not wanting, but being unorganised, discouraged, and saturated with distrust, they made no effort to stem the jobbery, corruption, waste, going on around them. Roads, piers, aqueducts, and other monuments of the British protectorate reared before 1849, were falling to pieces. Taxes were indifferently collected. Transgressors of local law went unpunished. In ten years the deficit in the revenue had amounted to nearly £100,000, or two-thirds of a year's income. The cultivators of the soil figured in official reports as naturally well affected, and only wishing to grow their currants and their olives in peace and quietness. But they were extremely poor, and they were ignorant and superstitious, and being all these things it was inevitable that they should nurse discontent with their government. Whoever wanted their votes knew that the way to get them was to denounce the Englishman as [Greek: heterodoxos kai xenos], heretic, alien, and tyrant. There was a senate of six members, chosen by the high commissioner from the assembly. The forty-two members of the assembly met below galleries that held a thousand persons, and nothing made their seats and salaries so safe as round declamations from the floor to the audience above, on the greatness of the Hellenic race and the need for union with the Greek kingdom. The municipal officer in charge of education used to set as a copy for the children, a prayer that panhellenic concord might drive the Turks out of Greece and the English out of the seven islands. Cephalonia exceeded the rest of the group both in population and in vehemence of character, while Zante came first of all in the industry and liveliness of its people.[376] These two islands were the main scene and source of difficulty. In Cephalonia nine years before the date with which we are now dealing, an agrarian rising had occurred more like a bad whiteboy outrage than a national rebellion, and it was suppressed with cruel rigour by the high commissioner of the day. Twenty-two people had been hanged, three hundred or more had been flogged, most of them without any species of judicial investigation. The fire-raisings and destruction of houses and vineyards were of a fierce brutality to match. These Ionian atrocities were the proceedings with which Prince Schwarzenberg had taunted Lord Aberdeen by way of rejoinder to Mr. Gladstone's letters on barbarous misgovernment in Naples, and the feelings that they had roused were still smouldering. Half a dozen newspapers existed, all of them vehemently and irreconcilably unionist, though all controlled by members of the legislative assembly who had taken an oath at the beginning of each parliament to respect and maintain the constitutional rights of the protecting sovereign. The liberty of unlicensed printing, however, had been subject to a pretty stringent check. By virtue of what was styled a power of high police, the lord high commissioner was able at his own will and pleasure to tear away from home, occupation, and livelihood anybody that he chose, and the high police found its commonest objects in the editors of newspapers. An obnoxious leading article was not infrequently followed by deportation to some small and barren rock, inhabited by a handful of fishermen. Not Cherubim and Seraphim, said Mr. Gladstone, could work such a system. A British corporal with all the patronage in his hands, said another observer, would get on better than the greatest and wisest statesman since Pericles, if he had not the patronage. It was little wonder that a distracted lord high commissioner, to adopt the similes of the florid secretary of state, should one day send home a picture like Salvator's Massacre of the Innocents, or Michel Angelo's Last Judgment, and the next day recall the swains of Albano at repose in the landscapes of Claude; should one day advise his chiefs to wash their hands of the Ionians, and on the morrow should hint that perhaps the best thing would be by a bold _coup d'état_ to sweep away the constitution.[377] III THE STOLEN DESPATCH Immediately after Mr. Gladstone had started, what the secretary of state described as the most serious misfortune conceivable happened. A despatch was stolen from the pigeon-holes of the colonial office, and a morning paper printed it. It had been written home some eighteen months before by Sir John Young, and in it he advised his government, with the assent of the contracting powers, to hand over either the whole of the seven islands to Greece, or else at least the five southern islands, while transforming Corfu and its little satellite of Paxo into a British colony. It was true that a few days later he had written a private letter, wholly withdrawing this advice and substituting for it the exact opposite, the suppression namely of such freedom as the islanders possessed. This second fact the public did not know, nor would the knowledge of it have made any difference. The published despatch stood on record, and say what they would, the startling impression could not be effaced. Well might Lytton call it an inconceivable misfortune. It made Austria uneasy, it perturbed France, and it irritated Russia, all of them seeing in Mr. Gladstone's mission a first step towards the policy recommended in the despatch. In the breasts of the islanders it kindled intense excitement, and diversified a chronic disorder by a sharp access of fever. It made Young's position desperate, though he was slow to see it, and practically it brought the business of the high commissioner extraordinary to nought before it had even begun. He learned the disaster, for disaster it was, at Vienna, and appears to have faced it with the same rigorous firmness and self-command that some of us have beheld at untoward moments long after. The ambassador told him that he ought to see the Austrian minister. With Count Buol he had a long interview accordingly, and assured him that his mission had no concern with any question of Ionian annexation whether partial or total. Count Buol on his part disclaimed all aggressive tendencies in respect of Turkey, and stated emphatically that the views and conduct of Austria in her Eastern policy were in the strictest sense conservative. Embarking at Trieste on the warship _Terrible_, Nov. 21, and after a delightful voyage down the Adriatic, five days after leaving Vienna (Nov. 24th) Mr. Gladstone found himself at Corfu--the famous island of which he had read such memorable things in Thucydides and Xenophon, the harbour where the Athenians had fitted out the expedition to Syracuse, so disastrous to Greek democracy; where the young Octavian had rallied his fleet before the battle of Actium, so critical for the foundation of the empire of the Cæsars; and whence Don John had sallied forth for the victory of Lepanto, so fatal to the conquering might of the Ottoman Turks. It was from Corfu that the brothers Bandiera had started on their tragic enterprise for the deliverance of Italy fourteen years before. Mr. Gladstone landed under a salute of seventeen guns, and was received with all ceremony and honour by the lord high commissioner and his officers. ARRIVAL AT CORFU He was not long in discovering what mischief the stolen despatch had done, and may well have suspected from the first in his inner mind that his efforts to undo it would bear little fruit. The morning after his arrival the ten members for Corfu came to him in a body with a petition to the Queen denouncing the plan of making their island a British colony, and praying for union with Greece. The municipality followed suit in the evening. The whole sequel was in keeping. Mr. Gladstone with Young's approval made a speech to the senate, in which he threw over the despatch, severed his mission wholly from any purpose or object in the way of annexation, and dwelt much upon a circular addressed by the foreign office in London to all its ministers abroad disclaiming any designs of that kind. He held levees, he called upon the archbishop, he received senators and representatives, and everywhere he held the same emphatic language. He soon saw enough to convince him of the harm done to British credit and influence by the severities in Cephalonia; by the small regard and frequent contempt shown by many Englishmen for the religion of the people for whose government they were responsible; by the diatribes in the London press against the Ionians as brigands, pirates, and barbarians; and by the absence in high commissioners and others 'of tact, good sense, and good feeling in the sense in which it is least common in England, the sense namely in which it includes a disposition to enter into and up to a certain point sympathise with, those who differ with us in race, language, and creed.' Perhaps his penetrating eye early discovered to him that forty years of bad rule had so embittered feeling, that even without the stolen despatch, he had little chance. He made a cruise round the islands. His visit shook him a good deal with respect to two of the points--Corfu and Ithaca--on which it has been customary to dwell as proving Homer's precise local knowledge. The rain poured in torrents for most of the time, but it cleared up for a space to reveal the loveliness of Ithaca. In the island of Ulysses and Penelope he danced at a ball given in his honour. In Cephalonia he was received by a tumultuous mob of a thousand persons, whom neither the drenching rains nor the unexpected manner of his approach across the hills could baffle. They greeted him with incessant cries for union with Greece, thrust disaffected papers into his carriage, and here and there indulged in cries of [Greek: katô ê prostasia], down with the protectorate, down with the tyranny of fifty years. This exceptional disrespect he ascribed to what he leniently called the history of Cephalonia, meaning the savage dose of martial law nine years before. He justly took it for a marked symbol of the state of excitement at which under various influences the popular mind had arrived. Age and infirmity prevented the archbishop from coming to offer his respects, so after his levee Mr. Gladstone with his suite repaired to the archbishop. 'We found him,' says Mr. Gordon, 'seated on a sofa dressed in his most gorgeous robes of gold and purple, over which flowed down a long white beard.... Behind him stood a little court of black-robed, black-bearded, black-capped, dark-faced priests. He is eighty-six years old, and his manners and appearance were dignified in the extreme. Speaking slowly and distinctly he began to tell Gladstone that the sole wish of Cephalonia was to be united to Greece, and there was something very exciting and affecting in the tremulous tones of the old man saying over and over again, "_questa infelice isola, questa isola infelice_," as the tears streamed down his cheeks and long silvery beard. It was like a scene in a play.' At Zante (Dec. 15), the surface was smoother. A concourse of several thousands awaited him; Greek flags were flying on all sides in the strong morning sea-breeze; the town bands played Greek national tunes; the bells were all ringing; the harbour was covered with boats full of gaily dressed people; and the air resounded with loud shouts [Greek: zêtô ho philellên Gladstôn, zêtô hê henôsis meta tês Hellados], Long live Gladstone the Philhellene, hurrah for union with Greece. Every room and passage in the residency, Mr. Gordon writes to Lord Aberdeen, was already thronged.... Upstairs the excitement was great, and as soon as Gladstone had taken his place, in swept Gerasimus the bishop (followed by scores of swarthy priests in their picturesque black robes) and tendered to him the petition for union. But before he could deliver it, Gladstone stopped him and addressed to him and to the assembly a speech in excellent Italian. Never did I hear his beautiful voice ring out more clear or more thrillingly than when he said, '_Ecco l' inganno_.'... It was a scene not to be forgotten. The priests, with eye and hand and gesture, expressed in lively pantomime to each other the effect produced by each sentence, in what we should think a most exaggerated way, like a chorus on the stage, but the effect was most picturesque. VISITS ATHENS He attended a banquet one night, went to the theatre the next, where he was greeted with lusty zetos, and at midnight embarked on the _Terrible_ on his way to Athens. His stay in the immortal city only lasted for three or four days, and I find no record of his impressions. They were probably those of most travellers educated enough to feel the spell of the Violet Crown. Illusions as to the eternal summer with which poets have blessed the Isles of Greece vanished as they found deep snow in the streets, icicles on the Acropolis, and snow-balling in the Parthenon. He had a reception only a shade less cordial than if he were Demosthenes come back. He dined with King Otho, and went to a _Te Deum_ in honour of the Queen's birthday. Finlay, the learned man who had more of the true spirit of history than most historians then alive, took him to a meeting of the legislature; he beheld some of the survivors of the war of independence, and made friends with one valiant lover of freedom, the veteran General Church. Though, thanks to the generosity of an Englishman, they had a university of their own at Corfu, the Ionians preferred to send their sons to Athens, and the Athenian students immediately presented a memorial to Mr. Gladstone with the usual prayer for union with the Hellenic kingdom. On the special object of his visit, he came away from Athens with the impression that opinion in Greece was much divided on the question of immediate union with the Ionian islands. In truth his position had been a false one. Everybody was profoundly deferential, but nobody was quite sure whether he had come to pave the way for union, or to invite the Athenian government to check it, and when Rangabé, the foreign minister, found him without credentials or instructions, and staved off all discussion, Mr. Gladstone must have felt that though he had seen one of the two or three most wondrous historic sites on the globe, that was all. IN ALBANIA Of a jaunt to wilder scenes a letter of Mr. Arthur Gordon's gives a pleasant glimpse:-- You will like an account of an expedition the whole party made yesterday to Albania to pay a visit to an old lady, a great proprietress, who lives in a large ruinous castle at a place called Filates. She is about the greatest personage in these regions, and it was thought that the lord high commissioner should pay her a visit if he wished to see Albania.... It was a lovely morning, and breakfast was laid on the balcony of the private apartments looking over the garden and commanding the loveliest of views across the strait. Gladstone was in the highest spirits, full of talk and _romping boyishly_. After breakfast the L.H.C.'s barge and the cutters of the _Terrible_ conveyed us on board the pretty little gunboat. We reached Sayada in about two hours, and were received on landing by the governor of the province, who had ridden down from Filates to meet us. We went to the house of the English vice-consul, whilst the long train of horses was preparing to start, but after a few minutes' stay there Gladstone became irrepressibly restless, and insisted on setting off to walk--I of course walked too. The old steward also went with us, and a guard of eight white-kilted palikari on foot. The rest of the party rode, and from a slight hill which we soon reached, it was very pretty to look back at the long procession starting from Sayada and proceeding along the narrow causeway running parallel to our path, the figures silhouetted against the sea. Filates is about 12 miles from Sayada, perhaps more, the path is rugged and mountainous, and commands some fine views. Our palikari guards fired off their long Afghan-looking guns in every direction, greatly to Gladstone's annoyance, but there was no stopping them. Scouts on the hills gave warning of our approach, and at the entrance to Filates we were met by the whole population. First the Valideh's retainers, then the elders, then the moolahs in their great green turbans, the Christian community, and finally, on the top of the hill, the Valideh's little grandson, gorgeously dressed, and attended by his tutor and a number of black slaves. The little boy salaamed to Gladstone with much grace and self-possession, and then conducted us to the castle, in front of which all the townsfolk who were not engaged in receiving us were congregated in picturesque groups on the smooth grassy lawns and under the great plane trees. The castle is a large ruinous enclosure of walls and towers, with buildings of all sorts and ages within. The Valideh herself, attired in green silk and a fur pelisse, her train held by two negro female slaves, received us at the head of the stairs and ushered us into a large room with a divan round three sides of it. Sweetmeats and water and pipes and coffee were brought as usual, some of the cups and their filigree stands very handsome. We went out to see the town, preceded by a tall black slave in a gorgeous blue velvet jacket, with a great silver stick in his hand. Under his guidance we visited the khans, the bazaar, and the mosque; not only were we allowed to enter the mosque with our shoes on, but on Gladstone expressing a wish to hear the call to prayer, the muezzin was sent up to the top of the minaret to call the azan two hours before the proper time. The sight of the green-turbaned imam crying the azan for a Frank was most singular, and the endless variety of costume displayed by the crowds who thronged the verandahs which surround the mosque was most picturesque. The gateway of the castle too was a picturesque scene. Retainers and guards, slaves and soldiers, and even women, were lounging about, and a beautiful tame little pet roedeer played with the pretty children in bright coloured dresses, clustering under the cavernous archway. We had dinner in another large room. I counted thirty-two dishes, or I may say courses, for each dish at a Turkish dinner is brought in separately, and it is rude not to eat of all! The most picturesque part of the dinner, and most unusual, was the way the room was lighted. Eight tall, grand Albanians stood like statues behind us, each holding a candle. It reminded me of the torch-bearers who won the laird his bet in the _Legend of Montrose_. After dinner there was a long and somewhat tedious interval of smoking and story-telling in the dark, and we called upon Lacaita to recite Italian poetry, which he did with much effect, pouring out sonnet after sonnet of Petrarch, including that which my father thinks the most beautiful in the Italian language, that which has in it the 'Campeggiar del angelico riso.' This showed me how easy it was to fall into the habits of a country. Gladstone is as unoriental as any man well can be, yet his calling on Lacaita to recite was really just the same thing that every Pasha does after dinner, when he orders his tale-teller to repeat a story. The ladies meanwhile were packed off to the harem for the night, Lady Bowen acting as their interpreter. My L.H.C., his two secretaries, his three aide-de-camps, Captains Blomfield and Clanricarde, and the vice-consul, all slept in the same room, and that not a large one, and we were packed tight on the floor, under quilts of Brusa silk and gold, tucked up round us by gorgeous Albanians. Gladstone amused himself with speculating whether or no we were in contravention of the provisions of Lord Shaftesbury's lodging-house act! After a month of cloudless sunshine it took it into its head to rain this night of all nights in the year, and rain as it only does in these regions. Gladstone and I walked down again despite of wind, rain, and mud, and our palikari guard--to keep up their spirits, I suppose--chanted wild choruses all the way. We nearly got stuck altogether in the muddy flat near Sayada, and got on board the _Osprey_ wet through, my hands so chilled I could hardly steer the boat. Of course we had far outwalked the riding party, so we had to wait. What a breakfast we ate! that is those of us who could eat, for the passage was rough and Gladstone and the ladies flat on their backs and very sorry for themselves. Mr. Gladstone's comment in his diary is brief: 'The whole impression is saddening; it is all indolence, decay, stagnation; the image of God seems as if it were nowhere. But there is much of wild and picturesque.' The English in the island, both civil and military, adopted the tone of unfriendly journals in London, and the garrison went so far as not even to invite Mr. Gladstone to mess, a compliment never omitted before. The Ionians, on the other hand, like people in most other badly governed countries did not show in the noblest colours. There were petitions, letters, memorials, as to which Mr. Gladstone mildly notes that he has to 'lament a spirit of exaggeration and obvious errors of fact.' There was a stream of demands from hosts of Spiridiones, Christodulos, Euphrosunes, for government employ, and the memorial survives, attested by bishop and clergy, of a man with a daughter to marry, who being too poor to find a dowry 'had decided on reverting to your Excellency's well-known philhellenism, and with tears in his eyes besought that your Excellency,' et cetera. CORRESPONDENCE WITH BULWER One incident was much disliked at home, as having the fearsome flavour of the Puseyite. It had been customary at levees for the lord high commissioner to bow to everybody, but also to shake hands with the bishops and sundry other high persons. Mr. Gladstone stooped and actually kissed the bishop's hand. Sir Edward Lytton inquired if the story were true, as a question might be asked in parliament. It is true, said Mr. Gladstone (February 7), but 'I hope Sir E. L. will not in his consideration for me entangle himself in such a matter, but as he knows nothing now, will continue to know nothing, and will say that the subject did not enter into his instructions, and that he presumes I shall be at home in two or three more weeks to answer for all my misdeeds.'[378] The secretary of state and his potent emissary--the radical who had turned tory and the tory who was on the verge of formally turning liberal--got on excellently together. Though he was not exact in business, the minister's despatches and letters show shrewdness, good sense, and right feeling, with a copious garnish of flummery. Demagogy, he says to Mr. Gladstone, will continue to be a trade and the most fascinating of all trades, because animated by personal vanity, and its venality disguised even to the demagogue himself by the love of country, by which it may be really accompanied. The Ionian constitution should certainly be mended, for 'my convictions tell me that there is nothing so impracticable as the Unreal.' He comforts his commissioner by the reminder that a population after all has one great human heart, and a great human heart is that which chiefly exalts the Man of Genius over the mere Man of Talent, so that when a Man of Genius with practical experience of the principles of sound government comes face to face with a people whose interest it is to be governed well, the chances are that they will understand each other. IV Mr. Gladstone applied himself with the utmost gravity to the affairs of a pygmy state with a total population under 250,000. His imagination did its work. While you seem, he said most truly, to be dealing only with a few specks scarcely visible on the map of Europe, you are engaged in solving a problem as delicate and difficult as if it arose on a far more conspicuous stage. The people he found to be eminently gifted by nature with that subtlety which is apt to degenerate into sophistry, and prone to be both rather light-minded and extremely suspicious. The permanent officials in Downing Street, with less polite analysis, had been accustomed to regard the islanders more bluntly as a 'pack of scamps.' This was what had done the mischief. The material condition of the cultivators was in some respects not bad, but Mr. Gladstone laid down a profound and solid principle when he said that 'no method of dealing with a civilised community can be satisfactory which does not make provision for its political action as well as its social state.'[379] The idea of political reform had for a time made head against the idea of union with the Greek kingdom, but for some years past the whole stream of popular tendency and feeling set strongly towards union, and disdained contentment with anything else. Mankind turn naturally to the solutions that seem the simplest. Mr. Gladstone condemned the existing system as bad for us and bad for them. Circumstances made it impossible for him to suggest amendment by throwing the burden bodily off our shoulders, and at that time he undoubtedly regarded union with Greece as in itself undesirable for the Ionians. Circumstances and his own love of freedom made it equally impossible to recommend the violent suppression of the constitution. The only course left open was to turn the mockery of free government into a reality, and this operation he proposed to carry out with a bold hand. The details of this enlargement of popular rights and privileges, and the accompanying financial purgation, do not now concern us. Whether the case either demanded or permitted originality in the way of construction I need not discuss. The manufacture of a constitution is always the easiest thing in the world. The question is whether the people concerned will work it, and in spite of that buoyant optimism which never in any circumstances deserted him in respect of whatever business he might have in hand, Mr. Gladstone must have doubted whether his islanders would ever pretend to accept what they did not seek, as a substitute for what they did seek but were not allowed to have. Before anybody knew the scope of his plan, the six newspapers flew to arms with a vivacity that, whether it was Italian or was Greek, was in either case a fatal sign of the public temper. What, they cried, did the treaty of 1815 mean by describing the Ionian state as free and independent? What was a protectorate, and what the rights of the protector? Was there no difference between a protector and a sovereign? What could be more arrogant and absurd than that the protector, who was not sovereign, should talk about 'conceding' reforms to a free and independent state? All these questions were in themselves not very easy to answer, but what was a more serious obstacle than the argumentative puzzles of partisans was a want of moral and political courage; was the sycophancy of one class, and the greediness of others.[380] CONSTITUTIONAL REFORM Closely connected with the recommendations of constitutional reform was the question by whom the necessary communications with the assembly were to be conducted. Sir John Young was obviously impossible, though he was not at once brought to face the fact. Mr. Gladstone upon this made to the colonial secretary (December 27) an offer that if he had already determined on Young's recall, and if he thought reform would stand a better chance if introduced by Mr. Gladstone himself, he was willing to serve as lord high commissioner for the very limited time that might be necessary. We may be sure that the government lost not an hour in making up their minds on a plan that went still further both in the way of bringing Mr. Gladstone into still closer connection with them, and towards relieving themselves of a responsibility which they never from the first had any business to devolve upon Mr. Gladstone or anybody else. The answer came by telegraph (January 11), 'The Queen accepts. Your commission is being made out.' All other embarrassments were now infinitely aggravated by the sudden discovery from the lawyers that acceptance of the new office not only vacated the seat in parliament, but also rendered Mr. Gladstone incapable of election until he had ceased to hold the office. 'This, I must confess,' he told Sir Edward, 'is a great blow. The difficulty and the detriment are serious' (January 17). If some enemy on the meeting of the House in February should choose to move the writ for the vacant seat at Oxford, the election would necessarily take place at a date too early for the completion of the business at Corfu, and Mr. Gladstone still at work as high commissioner would still therefore be ineligible. Nobody was ever by constitution more averse than Mr. Gladstone to turning backward, and in this case he felt himself especially bound to go forward not only by the logic of the Ionian situation at the moment, but for the reason which was also characteristic of him, that the Queen in approving his appointment (January 7) had described his conduct as both patriotic and most opportune, and therefore he thought there would be unspeakable shabbiness in turning round upon her by a hurried withdrawal. The Oxford entanglement thus became almost desperate. Resolved not to disturb the settled order of proceeding with his assembly, Mr. Gladstone with a thoroughly characteristic union of ingenuity and tenacity tried various ways of extrication. To complete the mortifications of the position, the telegraph broke down. QUESTION OF THE OXFORD SEAT The scrape was nearly as harassing to his friends at home as to himself. Politicians above all men can never safely count on the charity that thinketh no evil. Lord John Russell told Lord Aberdeen that it was clear that Gladstone was staying away to avoid a discussion on the coming Reform bill. There was a violent attack upon him in the _Times_ (January 13) as having supplanted Young. The writers of leading articles looked up Greek history from the days of the visit of Ulysses to Alcinous downwards, and they mocked his respect for the countrymen of Miltiades, and his reverence for the church of Chrysostom and Athanasius. The satirists of the cleverest journal of the day admitted his greatness, the brilliance and originality of his finance, the incomparable splendour of his eloquence, and a courage equal to any undertaking, that quailed before no opposition and suffered no abatement in defeat, and they only marvelled the more that a statesman of the first rank should accept at the hands of an insidious rival a fifth-rate mission--insidious rival not named but easy to identify. The fact that Mr. Gladstone had hired a house at Corfu was the foundation of a transcendent story that Mr. Disraeli wished to make him the king of the Ionian islands. 'I hardly think it needful to assure you,' Mr. Gladstone told Lytton, 'that I have never attached the smallest weight to any of the insinuations which it seems people have thought worth while to launch at some member or members of your government with respect to my mission.' Though Mr. Gladstone was never by any means unconscious of the hum and buzz of paltriness and malice that often surrounds conspicuous public men, nobody was ever more regally indifferent. Graham predicted that though Gladstone would always be the first man in the House of Commons, he would not again be what he was before the Ionian business. They all thought that he would be attacked on his return. '_Ah_,' said Aberdeen, '_but he is terrible in the rebound_.' After much perplexity and running to and fro in London, it was arranged between the secretary of state and Mr. Gladstone's friends, including Phillimore principally, and then Northcote and M. Bernard, that a course of proceeding should be followed, which Mr. Gladstone when he knew it thought unfortunate. A new commission naming a successor was issued, and Mr. Gladstone then became _ipso facto_ liberated. Sir Henry Storks was the officer chosen, and as soon as his commission was formally received by him, he was to execute a warrant under which he deputed all powers to Mr. Gladstone until his arrival. Whether Mr. Gladstone was lord high commissioner when he came to propose his reform is a moot point. So intricate was the puzzle that the under-secretary addressed a letter to Mr. Gladstone by his name and not by the style of his official dignity, because he could not be at all sure what that official dignity really was. What is certain is that Mr. Gladstone, though it was never his way to quarrel with other people's action taken in good faith on his behalf, did not perceive the necessity for proceeding so rapidly to the appointment of his successor, and thought it decidedly injurious to such chances as his reforms might have possessed.[381] The assembly that had been convoked by Sir John Young for an extraordinary session (January 25), at once showed that its labours would bear no fruit. Mr. Gladstone as lord high commissioner opened the session with a message that they had met to consider proposals for reform which he desired to lay before them as soon as possible. The game began with the passing of a resolution that it was the single and unanimous _will_ ([Greek: thelêsis]) of the Ionian people that the seven islands should be united to Greece. Mr. Gladstone fought like a lion for scholar's authority to treat the word as only meaning wish or disposition, and he took for touchstone the question whether men could speak of the [Greek: thelêsis] of the Almighty; the word in the Lord's Prayer was found to be [Greek: thelêma]. As Finlay truly says, it would have been much more to the point to accept the word as it was meant by those who used it. As to that no mistake was possible. Some say that he ought plainly to have told them they had violated the constitution, to have dissolved them, and above all to have stopped their pay. Instead of this he informed them that they must put their wishes into the shape of a petition to the Queen. The idea was seized with alacrity (January 29). Oligarchs and demagogues were equally pleased to fall in with it, the former because they hoped it would throw their rivals into deeper discredit with their common master, the latter because they knew it would endear them to their constituents. OPENING OF THE IONIAN SESSION The Corfiotes received the declaration of the assembly and the address to the Queen with enthusiasm. Great crowds followed the members to their homes with joyous acclamations, all the bells of the town were set ringing, there was a grand illumination for two nights, and the archbishop ordered a _Te Deum_. Neither te-deums nor prayers melted the heart of the British cabinet, aware of the truth impressed at the time on Mr. Gladstone by Lytton, that neither the English public nor the English parliament likes any policy that '_gives anything up_.' The Queen was advised to reply that she could neither consent to abandon the obligations she had undertaken, nor could permit any application from the islands to other Powers in furtherance of any similar design. Then at last came the grand plan for constitutional reconstruction. Mr. Gladstone after first stating the reply of the Queen, read an eloquent address to the assembly (February 4) in Italian, adjuring them to reject all attempts to evade by any indirect devices the duty of pronouncing a clear and intelligible judgment on the propositions now laid before them. His appeal was useless, and it was received exactly as plans for assimilating Irish administration to English used to be. The nationalists knew that reform would be a difficulty the more in the way of separation, the retrogrades knew it would be a spoke in the wheel of their own jobbery. Mr. Gladstone professed extreme and truly characteristic astonishment in respect of the address to the Queen, that they should regard the permission to ask as identical with the promise to grant, and the right to petition as equivalent to the right to demand. If the affair had been less practically vexatious, we can imagine the Socratic satisfaction with which Mr. Gladstone would have revelled in pressing all these and many other distinctions on those who boasted of being Socrates' fellow-countrymen. From day to day anxiously did Mr. Gladstone watch what he called the dodges of the assembly. Abundant reason as there was to complain of the conduct of the Ionians in all these proceedings, it is well to record the existence of a number of sincere patriots and enlightened men like the two brothers Themistocles, Napoleon Zambelli, and Sir Peter Braila, afterwards Greek minister in London. This small band of royal adherents gave Mr. Gladstone all the help they could in preparing his scheme of reform, and after the scheme was launched, they strained every nerve to induce the assembly to assent to it in spite of the pressure from the people. Their efforts were necessarily unavailing. The great majority, composed as usual of the friends of England who trembled for their own jobs, joining hands with the demagogues, was hostile to the changes proposed, and only flinched from a peremptory vote from doubt as to its reception among the people. Promptitude and force were not to be expected in either way from men in such a frame of mind. 'On a preliminary debate,' Mr. Gladstone wrote mournfully to Phillimore, 'without any motion whatever, one man has spoken for nearly the whole of two days.' Strong language about the proposals as cheating and fraudulent was freely used, but nothing that in Mr. Gladstone's view justified one of those high-handed prorogations after the manner of the Stuarts, that had been the usual expedient in quarrels between the high commissioner and a recalcitrant assembly. These doings had brought English rule over the islands to a level in the opinion of Southern Europe with Austrian rule at Venice and the reign of the cardinals in the pontifical states. PROCEEDINGS IN ASSEMBLY Sir Henry Storks arrived on the 16th of February, and the same day the assembly which before had been working for delay, in a great hurry gave a vote against the proposals, which, though in form preliminary, was in substance decisive; there were only seven dissentients. Mr. Gladstone sums up the case in a private letter to Sidney Herbert. _Corfu, 17th Feb. 1859._--This decision is not convenient for me personally, nor for the government at home; but as a whole I cannot regret it so far as England is concerned. I think the proposals give here almost for the first time a perfectly honourable and tenable position in the face of the islands. The first set of manoeuvres was directed to preventing them from being made; and that made me really uneasy. The only point of real importance was to get them out.... Do not hamper yourself in this affair with me. Let me sink or swim. I have been labouring for truth and justice, and am sufficiently happy in the consciousness of it, to be little distressed either with the prospect of blame, or with the more serious question whether I acted rightly or wrongly in putting myself in the place of L.H.C. to propose these reforms,--a step which has of course been much damaged by the early nomination of Sir H. Storks, done out of mere consideration for me in another point of view. Lytton's conduct throughout has been such that I could have expected no more from the oldest and most confiding friend. To Lytton himself he writes (Feb. 7, 1859):-- I sincerely wish that I could have repaid your generous confidence and admirable support with recommendations suited to the immediate convenience of your government. But in sending me, you grappled with a difficulty which you might have postponed, and I could not but do the same. Whether it was right that I should come, I do not feel very certain. Yet (stolen despatch and all) I do not regret it. For my feelings are those you have so admirably described; and I really do not know for what it is that political life is worth the living, if it be not for an opportunity of endeavouring to redeem in the face of the world the character of our country wherever, it matters not on how small a scale, that character has been compromised. Language like this, as sincere as it was lofty, supplies the true test by which to judge Mr. Gladstone's conduct both in the Ionian transaction and many another. From the point of personal and selfish interest any simpleton might see that he made a mistake, but measured by his own standard of public virtue, how is he to be blamed, how is he not to be applauded, for undertaking a mission that, but for an unforeseen accident, might have redounded to the honour and the credit of the British power? V On February 19 he quitted the scene of so many anxieties and such strenuous effort as we have seen. The _Terrible_ fell into a strong north-easter in the Adriatic, and took thirty-six hours to Pola. There they sought shelter and got across with a smooth sea to Venice on the 23rd. He saw the Austrian archduke whom he found kind, intelligent, earnest, pleasing. At Turin a few days later (March 23), he had an interview with Cavour, for whom at that moment the crowning scenes of his great career were just opening. 'At Vicenza,' the diary records (Feb. 28), 'we had cavalry and artillery at the station about to march; more cavalry on the road with a van and pickets, some with drawn swords; at Verona regiments in review; at Milan pickets in the streets; as I write I hear the tread of horse patrolling the streets. Dark omens!' The war with Austria was close at hand. I may as well in a few sentences finally close the Ionian chapter, though the consummation was not immediate. Mr. Gladstone, while he was for the moment bitten by the notion of ceding the southern islands to Greece, was no more touched by the nationalist aspirations of the Ionians than he had been by nationalism and unification in Italy in 1851. Just as in Italy he clung to constitutional reforms in the particular provinces and states as the key to regeneration, so here he leaned upon the moderates who, while professing strong nationalist feeling, did not believe that the time for its realisation had arrived. A debate was raised in the House of Commons in the spring of 1861, by an Irish member. The Irish catholics twitted Mr. Gladstone with flying the flag of nationality in Italy, and trampling on it in the Ionian islands. He in reply twitted them with crying up nationality for the Greeks, and running it down when it told against the pope. In the Italian case Lord John Russell had (1860) set up the broad doctrine that a people are the only true judges who should be their rulers--a proposition that was at once seized and much used by the Dandolos, Lombardos, Cavalieratos and the rest at Corfu. Scarcely anybody pretended that England had any separate or selfish interest of her own. 'It is in my view,' said Mr. Gladstone, 'entirely a matter of that kind of interest only, which, is in one sense the highest interest of all--namely the interest which is inherent in her character and duty, and her exact and regular fulfilment of obligations which she has contracted with Europe.'[382] LATER FORTUNES OF THE ISLANDS But he held the opinion that it would be nothing less than a crime against the safety of Europe, as connected with the state and course of the Eastern question, if England were at this moment to surrender the protectorate; for if you should surrender the protectorate, what were you to say to Candia, Thessaly, Albania, and other communities of Greek stock still under Turkish rule? Then there was a military question. Large sums of British money had been flung away on fortifications,[383] and people talked of Corfu as they talked in later years about Cyprus, as a needed supplement to the strength of Gibraltar and Malta, and indispensable to our Mediterranean power. People listened agape to demonstrations that the Ionian islands were midway between England and the Persian Gulf; that they were two-thirds of the way to the Red Sea; that they blocked up the mouth of the Adriatic; Constantinople, Smyrna, Alexandria, Naples, formed a belt of great towns around them; they were central to Asia, Europe, and Africa. And so forth in the alarmist's well-worn currency. Lord Palmerston in 1850 had declared in his highest style that Corfu was a very important position for Mediterranean interests in the event of a war, and it would be great folly to give it up. A year later he repeated that though he should not object to the annexation of the southern islands to Greece, Corfu was too important a military and naval post ever to be abandoned by us.[384] As Lord Palmerston changed, so did Mr. Gladstone change. 'Without a good head for Greece, I should not like to see the Ionian protectorate surrendered; with it, I should be well pleased for one to be responsible for giving it up.' Among many other wonderful suggestions was one that he should himself become that 'good head.' 'The first mention,' he wrote to a correspondent in parliament (Jan. 21, 1863), 'of my candidature in Greece some time ago made me laugh very heartily, for though I do love the country and never laughed at anything else in connection with it before, yet the seeing my own name, which in my person was never meant to carry a title of any kind, placed in juxtaposition with that particular idea, made me give way.' Meanwhile it is safe to conjecture, for the period with which in this chapter we are immediately concerned, that in conceiving and drawing up his Ionian scheme, close contact with liberal doctrines as to free institutions and popular government must have quickened Mr. Gladstone's progress in liberal doctrines in our own affairs at home. In 1863[385] Lord Palmerston himself, in spite of that national aversion to anything like giving up, of which he was himself the most formidable representative, cheerfully handed the Ionians over to their kinsfolk, if kinsfolk they truly were, upon the mainland.[386] FOOTNOTES: [375] Virg. _Aen._ iv. 344. [376] See Sir C. Napier's _The Colonies: treating of their value generally and of the Ionian Islands in particular._ [377] _Parliamentary Papers, relative to the mission of the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone to the Ionian Islands in 1858._ Presented in 1861. Finlay's _History of Greece_, vii. p. 305, etc. _Letters by Lord Charles Fitzroy, etc., showing the anomalous political and financial Position of the Ionian Islands._ (Ridgway, 1850.) _Le Gouvernement des Iles Ioniennes._ Lettre à Lord John Russell, par Francois Lenormant. (Paris, Amyot, 1861.) _The Ionian Islands in relation to Greece._ By John Dunn Gardner, Esqr., 1859. _Four years in the Ionian Islands._ By Whittingham. Pamphlet by S. G. Potter, D.D. See also _Gleanings_, iv. p. 287. [378] This and his alleged attendance at mass, and compliance with sundry other rites, were often heard of in later times, and even so late as 1879 Mr. Gladstone was subjected to some rude baiting from doctors of divinity and others. [379] Finlay, _History of Greece_, vii. p. 306, blames both Bulwer and Mr. Gladstone because they 'directed their attention to the means of applying sound theories of government to a state of things where a change in the social relations of the inhabitants and modifications in the tenure and rights of property were the real evils that required remedy, and over these the British government could exercise very little influence if opposed by the Ionian representatives.' But is not this to say that the real remedy was unattainable without political reform? [380] May 7, 1861. _Hans._ 3rd Ser. 162, p. 1687. The salaries of the deputies struck him as especially excessive, and on the same occasion he let fall the _obiter dictum_; 'For my part I trust that of all the changes that may in the course of generations be made in the constitution of this country, the very last and latest will be the payment of members of this House.' [381] On Feb. 7, the secretary of the treasury moved the writ, and the next day the vice-chancellor notified that there would be an election, Mr. Gladstone having 'vacated his seat by accepting the office of lord high commissioner of the Ionian Islands, which he no longer holds.' He was re-elected (Feb. 12) without opposition. [382] Mr. Gladstone, May 7, 1861.--_Hans._ Third Ser. 162. p. 1687. [383] Napier in his _Memoir on the Roads of Cephalonia_ (p. 45) tells how Maitland had a notion of building a fort on that island, and on his boat one day asked the commanding engineer how much it would cost. The engineer talked about £100,000. 'Upon this Sir Thomas turned round in the boat, with a long and loud whistle. After this whistle I thought it best to let at least a year pass without again mentioning the subject.' [384] Ashley, ii. pp. 184, 186. [385] _Dec. 8, 1862._--Cabinet. Resolution to surrender the Ionian protectorate. Only Lord W[estbury] opposing. [386] Mr. Gladstone sent home and revised afterwards three elaborate reports on the mischiefs of Ionian government and the constitutional remedies proper for them. They were printed for the use of the cabinet, though whether these fifty large pages, amounting to about a quarter of this volume, received much attention from that body, may without _scandalum magnatum_ be doubted, nor do the reports appear to have been laid before parliament. The Italian war was then creating an agitation in Europe upon nationality, as to which the people of the Ionian islands were sensitively alive, and the reports would have supplied a good deal of fuel. There was a separate fourth report upon the suppression of disorder in Cephalonia in 1848, which everybody afterwards agreed that it was not expedient to publish. It still exists in the archives of the colonial office. CHAPTER XI JUNCTION WITH THE LIBERALS (_1859_) Conviction, in spite of early associations and long-cherished preposessions--strong conviction, and an overpowering sense of the public interests operating for many, many years before full effect was given to it, placed me in the ranks of the liberal party.--GLADSTONE (Ormskirk, 1867). When Mr. Gladstone returned to England in March 1859, he found the conservatives with much ineffectual industry, some misplaced ingenuity, and many misgivings and divisions, trying their hands at parliamentary reform. Their infringement of what passed for a liberal patent was not turning out well. Convulsions in the cabinet, murmurs in the lobbies, resistance from the opposite benches, all showed that a ministry existing on sufferance would not at that stage be allowed to settle the question. In this contest Mr. Gladstone did not actively join. Speaking from the ministerial side of the House, he made a fervid defence of nomination boroughs as the nurseries of statesmen, but he voted with ministers against a whig amendment. His desire, he said, was to settle the question as soon as possible, always, however, on the foundation of trust in the people, that 'sound and satisfactory basis on which for several years past legislation had been proceeding.' The hostile amendment was carried against ministers by statesmen irreconcilably at variance with one another, alike in principle and object. The majority of thirty-nine was very large for those days, and it was decisive. Though the parliament was little more than a couple of years old, yet in face of the desperate confusion among leaders, parties, and groups, and upon the plea that reform had not been formally submitted as an issue to the country, Lord Derby felt justified in dissolving. Mr. Gladstone held the Oxford seat without opposition. The constituencies displayed an extension of the same essentially conservative feeling that had given Lord Palmerston the victory two years before. Once more the real question lay not so much between measures as men; not so much between democratic change and conservative moderation, as between Palmerston and Russell on the one hand, and Derby and Disraeli on the other. The government at the election improved their position by some thirty votes. This was not enough to outnumber the phalanx of their various opponents combined, but was it possible that the phalanx should combine? Mr. Gladstone, who spoke of the dissolution as being a most improper as well as a most important measure, alike in domestic and in foreign bearings, told Acland that he would not be surprised if the government were to attempt some reconstruction on a broad basis before the new parliament met. This course was not adopted. CRITICAL MOMENTS The chances of turning out the government were matters of infinite computation among the leaders. The liberal whip after the election gave his own party a majority of fifteen, but the treasury whip, on the other hand, was equally confident of a majority of ten. Still all was admittedly uncertain. The prime perplexity was whether if a new administration could be formed, Lord Palmerston or Lord John should be at its head. Everybody agreed that it would be both impossible and wrong to depose the tories until it was certain that the liberals were united enough to mount into their seat, and no government could last unless it comprehended both the old prime ministers. Could not one of them carry the prize of the premiership into the Lords, and leave to the other the consolation stake of leadership in the Commons? Lord Palmerston, who took the crisis with a veteran's good-humoured coolness, told his intimates that he at any rate would not go up to the Lords, for he could not trust John Russell in the other House. With a view, however, to ministerial efficiency, he was anxious to keep Russell in the Commons, as with him and Gladstone they would make a strong treasury bench. But was it certain that Gladstone would join? On this there was endless gossip. One story ran that Mrs. Gladstone had told somebody that her husband wished bygones to be bygones, was all for a strong government, and was ready to join in forming one. Then the personage to whom this was said upset the inference by declaring there was nothing in the conversation incompatible with a Derby junction. Sir Charles Wood says in his journal:-- _May 22._--Saw Mrs. Gladstone, who did not seem to contemplate a junction with Palmerston but rather that he should join Derby. I stated the impossibility of that, and that the strongest government possible under present circumstances would be by such a union as took place under Aberdeen. To effect this, all people must pull the same and not different ways as of late years. I said that I blamed her husband for quitting, and ever since he quitted, Palmerston's government in 1855, as well as Lord John; that in the quarrel between Lord John and Gladstone the former had behaved ill, and the latter well. _May 27._--Gladstone dined here.... He would vote a condemnation of the dissolution, and is afraid of the foreign affairs at so critical a moment being left in the hands of Malmesbury; says that we, the opposition, are not only justified but called upon by the challenge in the Queen's speech on the dissolution, to test the strength of parties; but that he is himself in a different position, that he would vote a condemnation of the dissolution, but hesitates as to no confidence. Sir Robert Phillimore[387] gives us other glimpses during this month:-- _May 18._--Long interview with Gladstone. He entered most fully and without any reserve into his views on the state of political parties and on the duties of a statesman at this juncture. Thought the only chance of a strong government was an engrafting of Palmerston upon Lord Derby, dethroning Disraeli from the leadership of the House of Commons, arranging for a moderate Reform bill, placing the foreign office in other hands, but not in Disraeli's. He dwelt much upon this. Foreign politics seemed to have the chief place in his mind. _May 31._--Gladstone has seen Palmerston, and said he will not vote against Lord Derby in support of Lord John's supposed motion. The government Gladstone thinks desirable is a fusion of Palmerston and his followers with Lord Derby, which implies, of course, weeding out half at least of the present cabinet. Gladstone will have to vote with government and speak against the cabinet, and violently he will be abused. _June 1._--Dined with Gladstone. He is much harassed and distressed at his position relative to the government and opposition. Spoke strongly against Lord Malmesbury. Said if the proposal is to censure the dissolution, he must agree with it, but he will vote against a want of confidence. One important personage was quite confident that Gladstone would vote the government out. Another thought that he would be sure to join a liberal administration. Palmerston believed this too, even though he might not vote for a motion of want of confidence. Clarendon expected Gladstone to join, though he would rather see him at the foreign office than at the exchequer. At a dinner party at Lord Carlisle's where Palmerston, Lord John, Granville, Clarendon, Lewis, Argyll, and Delane were present, Sir Charles Wood in a conversation with Mrs. Gladstone found her much less inclined to keep the Derby government in. In the last week of May a party feast was planned by Lord Palmerston and the whip, but Lord John Russell declined to join the dinner. It was decided to call a meeting of the party. A confidential visitor was talking of it at Cambridge House, when the brougham came to the door to take Palmerston down to Pembroke Lodge. He was going, he said, to ask Lord John what they should say if they were asked at the meeting whether they had come to an agreement. The interview was not unsatisfactory. Four days later (June 6) a well-attended meeting of the party was held at Willis's Rooms. The two protagonists declared themselves ready to aid in forming a government on a broad basis, and it was understood that either would serve under the other. It would be for the sovereign to decide. Mr. Bright spoke in what the whigs pronounced to be a highly reasonable vein, and they all broke up in great spirits. The whip pored over his lists, and made out that they could not beat the government by less than seven. This was but a slender margin for a vote of no confidence, but it was felt that mere numbers, though a majority might be an indispensable incident, were in this case not the only test of the conditions required for a solid government. Lord Hartington, the representative of the great house of Cavendish, was put up to move a vote of no confidence.[388] FALL OF THE DERBY GOVERNMENT After three days' debate, ministers were defeated (June 11) by the narrow figure of thirteen in a House of six hundred and thirty-seven. Mr. Gladstone did not speak, but he answered the riddle that had for long so much harassed the wirepullers, by going into the lobby with Disraeli and his flock. The general sense of the majority was probably best expressed by Mr. Bright. Since the fall of the government of Sir Robert Peel, he said, there had been no good handling of the liberal party in the House: the cabinet had been exclusive, the policy had been sometimes wholly wrong, and generally feeble and paltering: if in the new government there should be found men adequately representing these reconciled sections, acting with some measure of boldness and power, grappling with the abuses that were admitted to exist, and relying upon the moral sense and honest feeling of the House, and the general sympathy of the people of England for improvement in our legislation, he was bold to hope that the new government would have a longer tenure of office than any government that had existed for many years past. The Queen, in the embarrassment of a choice between the two whig veterans, induced Lord Granville, whose cabinet life as yet was only some five years, to try to form a government. This step Palmerston explained by her German sympathies, which made her adverse alike to Lord John and himself. Lord Granville first applied to Palmerston, who said that the Queen ought to have sent for himself first; still he agreed to serve. Lord John would only serve under Granville on condition of being leader in the House of Commons; if he joined--so he argued--and if Palmerston were leader in the Commons, this would make himself third instead of second: on that point his answer was final. So Lord Granville threw up a commission that never had life in it; the Queen handed the task over to Palmerston, and in a few days the new administration was installed. (June 17, 1859.) II Mr. Gladstone went back to the office that he had quitted four years and a half before, and undertook the department of finance. The appointment did not pass without considerable remark. 'The real scandal,' he wrote to his Oxford chairman, 'is among the extreme men on the liberal side; they naturally say, "This man has done all he could on behalf of Lord Derby; why is he here to keep out one of us?"' Even some among Mr. Gladstone's private friends wondered how he could bring himself to join a minister of whom he had for three or four years used such unsparing language as had been common on his lips about Lord Palmerston. The plain man was puzzled by a vote in favour of keeping a tory government in, followed by a junction with the men who had thrown that government out. Cobden, as we know, declined to join.[389] 'I am exceedingly sorry,' wrote Mr. Gladstone to his brother Robertson (July 2), 'to find that Cobden does not take office. It was in his person that there seemed to be the best chance of a favourable trial of the experiment of connecting his friends with the practical administration of the government of this country. I am very glad we have Gibson; but Cobden would, especially as an addition to the former, have made a great difference in point of weight.'[390] AGAIN AT THE EXCHEQUER Mr. Gladstone, with no special anxiety to defend himself, was clear about his own course. 'Never,' he says, 'had I an easier question to determine than when I was asked to join the government. I can hardly now think how I could have looked any one in the face, had I refused my aid (such as it is) at such a time and under such circumstances.' 'At a moment,' he wrote to the warden of All Souls, 'when war is raging in Europe, when the English government is the only instrument through which there is any hope, humanly speaking, of any safe and early settlement, and when all parties agree that the government of the Queen ought to be strengthened, I have joined the only administration that could be formed, in concert with all the friends (setting aside those whom age excludes) with whom I joined and acted in the government of Lord Aberdeen.' To the provost of Oriel he addressed a rather elaborate explanation,[391] but it only expands what he says more briefly in a letter (June 16) to Sir William Heathcote, an excellent and honourable man, his colleague in the representation of Oxford:-- I am so little sensible of having had any very doubtful point to consider, that I feel confident that, given the antecedents of the problem as they clearly stood before me, you would have decided in the way that I have done. For thirteen years, the middle space of life, I have been cast out of party connection, severed from my old party, and loath irrecoverably to join a new one. So long have I adhered to the vague hope of a reconstruction, that I have been left alone by every political friend in association with whom I had grown up. My votes too, and such support as I could give, have practically been given to Lord Derby's government, in such a manner as undoubtedly to divest me of all claims whatever on the liberal party and the incoming government. Under these circumstances I am asked to take office. The two leading points which must determine immediate action are those of reform and foreign policy. On the first I think that Lord Derby had by dissolution lost all chance of settling it; and, as I desire to see it settled, it seems my duty to assist those who perhaps may settle it. Upon the second I am in real and close harmony of sentiment with the new premier, and the new foreign secretary. How could I, under these circumstances, say, I will have nothing to do with you, and be the one remaining Ishmael in the House of Commons? Writing to Sir John Acton in 1864, Mr. Gladstone said:-- When I took my present office in 1859, I had several negative and several positive reasons for accepting it. Of the first, there were these. There had been differences and collisions, but there were no resentments. I felt myself to be mischievous in an isolated position, outside the regular party organisation of parliament. And I was aware of no differences of opinion or tendency likely to disturb the new government. Then on the positive side. I felt sure that in finance there was still much useful work to be done. I was desirous to co-operate in settling the question of the franchise, and failed to anticipate the disaster that it was to undergo. My friends were enlisted, or I knew would enlist: Sir James Graham indeed declining office, but taking his position in the party. And the overwhelming interest and weight of the Italian question, and of our foreign policy in connection with it, joined to my entire mistrust of the former government in relation to it, led me to decide without one moment's hesitation.... CONTEST AT OXFORD On the day on which Mr. Gladstone kissed hands (June 18) disturbing news came from Oxford. Not only was his re-election to be opposed, but the enemy had secured the most formidable candidate that he had yet encountered, in the person of Lord Chandos, the eldest son of the Duke of Buckingham. His old chairman became chairman for his new antagonist, and Stafford Northcote, who with Phillimore and Bernard had hitherto fought every election on his behalf, now refused to serve on his committee, while even Sir John Coleridge was alarmed at some reported wavering on the question of a deceased wife's sister. 'Gladstone, angry, harassed, sore,' Phillimore records, 'as well he might be.' The provost of Oriel explains to him that men asked whether his very last vote had not been a vote of confidence in a Derby government, and of want of confidence in a Palmerston government, yet he had joined the government in which he declared by anticipation that he had no confidence. After all, the root of the anger against him was simply that the tories were out and the liberals in, with himself as their strongest confederate. A question was raised whether he ought not to go down and address convocation in person. The dean of Christ Church, however, thought it very doubtful whether he would get a hearing. 'Those,' he told Mr. Gladstone, 'who remember Sir Robert Peel's election testify that there never was a more unreasonable and ferocious mob than convocation was at that time. If you were heard, it is doubtful whether you would gain any votes at that last moment, while it is believed you would lose some. You would be questioned as to the ecclesiastical policy of the cabinet. Either you would not be able to answer fully, or you would answer in such terms as to alienate one or other of the two numerous classes who will now give you many votes.' The usual waterspout began to pour. The newspapers asserted that Mr. Gladstone meant to cut down naval estimates, and this moved the country clergy to angry apprehension that he was for peace at any price. The candidate was obliged to spend thankless hours on letters to reassure them. 'The two assertions of fact respecting me are wholly unfounded. I mean these two:--1. That as chancellor of the exchequer I "starved" the Crimean war: that is to say limited the expenditure upon it. There is not a shadow of truth in this statement. 2. That as soon as the war was over I caused the government to reduce their estimates, diminish the army, disband two fleets, and break faith with our seamen. When the war was over, that is in the year 1856, I did not take objection at all to the establishment or expenditure of the year. In the next year, 1857, I considered that they ought to have been further reduced: but neither a man nor a shilling was taken from them in consequence of my endeavours.' Other correspondents were uneasy about his soundness on rifle corps and rifle clubs. 'How,' he replied, 'can any uncertainty exist as to the intentions in regard to defence in a government with Lord Palmerston at its head?' He was warned that Cobden, Bright, and Gibson were odious in Oxford, and he was suspected of being their accomplice. The clamour against Puseyism had died down, and the hostility of the evangelicals was no longer keen; otherwise it was the old story. Goldwin Smith tells him, 'Win or lose, you will have the vote of every one of heart and brain in the university and really connected with it. Young Oxford is all with you. Every year more men obtain the reward of their industry through your legislation. But old Oxford takes a long time in dying.' In the end (July 1), he won the battle by a majority of 191--Gladstone, 1050, Chandos, 859. 'My conscience is light and clear,' he wrote to Heathcote in the course of the contest. 'The interests that have weighed with me are in some degree peculiar, and I daresay it is a fault in me, especially as member for Oxford, that I cannot merge the man in the representative. While they have had much reason to complain, I have not had an over-good bargain. In the estimate of mere pleasure and pain, the representation of the university is not worth my having; for though the account is long on both sides, the latter is the heavier, and sharper. In the true estimates of good and evil, I can look back upon the last twelve years with some satisfaction, first, because I feel that as far as I am capable of labouring for anything, I have laboured for Oxford; and secondly, because in this respect at least I have been happy, that the times afforded me in various ways a field. And even as to the contemptible summing up between suffering and enjoyment, my belief is that the latter will endure, while the former will pass away.' The balance struck in this last sentence is a characteristic fragment of Mr. Gladstone's philosophy of public life. It lightened and dispelled the inevitable hours of disappointment and chagrin that, in natures of less lofty fortitude than his, are apt to slacken the nerve and rust the sword. III PARTY SEVERANCE, NOT CHANGED PRINCIPLES It seems a mistake to treat the acceptance of office under Lord Palmerston as a chief landmark in Mr. Gladstone's protracted journey from tory to liberal. The dilemma between joining Derby and joining Palmerston was no vital choice between two political creeds. The new prime minister and his chancellor of the exchequer had both of them started with Canning for their common master; but there was a generation between them, and Mr. Gladstone had travelled along a road of his own, perhaps not even now perceiving its goal. As we have seen, he told Mr. Walpole in May 1858 (p. 584), that there were 'no broad and palpable differences of opinion on public questions of principle,' that separated himself from the Derbyite tories.[392] Palmerston on the other hand was so much of a Derbyite tory, that his government, which Mr. Gladstone was now entering, owed its long spell of office and power to the countenance of Derby and his men. Mr. Bright had contemplated (p. 579) the possibility of a reverse process--a Derbyite government favoured by Palmerston's men. In either case, the political identity of the two leaders was recognised. To join the new administration, then, marked a party severance but no changed principles. I am far from denying the enormous significance of the party wrench, but it was not a conversion. Mr. Gladstone was at this time in his politics a liberal reformer of Turgot's type, a born lover of good government, of just practical laws, of wise improvement, of public business well handled, of a state that should emancipate and serve the individual. The necessity of summoning new driving force, and amending the machinery of the constitution, had not yet disclosed itself to him. This was soon discovered by events. Meanwhile he may well have thought that he saw as good a chance of great work with Palmerston as with Disraeli; or far better, for the election had shown that Bright was not wrong when he warned him that a Derby government could only exist upon forbearance. Bright's own words already referred to (p. 625) sufficiently describe Mr. Gladstone's point of view; the need for a ministry with men in it 'acting with some measure of boldness and power, grappling with abuses, and relying upon the moral sense and honest feeling of the House, and the general sympathy of the people of England for improvement.' With such purposes an alliance with liberals of Lord Palmerston's temper implied no wonderful dislodgment. The really great dislodgment in his life had occurred long before. It was the fates that befell his book, it was the Maynooth grant, and the Gorham case, that swept away the foundations on which he had first built. In writing to Manning in 1845 (April 25) after his retirement on the question of Maynooth, Mr. Gladstone says to him, 'Newman sent me a letter giving his own explanation of my position. It was admirably done.' Newman in his letter told him that various persons had asked how he understood Mr. Gladstone's present position, so he put down what he conceived it to be, and he expresses the great interest that he feels in the tone of thought then engaging the statesman's mind:-- LETTER FROM NEWMAN I say then [writes Newman, addressing an imaginary interlocutor]: 'Mr. Gladstone has said the state _ought_ to have a conscience, but it has not a conscience. Can _he_ give it a conscience? Is he to impose his own conscience on the state? He would be very glad to do so, if it thereby would become the state's conscience. But that is absurd. He must deal with facts. It has a thousand consciences, as being in its legislative and executive capacities the aggregate of a hundred minds; that is, it has no conscience. 'You will say, "Well the obvious thing would be, if the state has not a conscience, that he shall cease to be answerable for it." So he has--he has retired from the ministry. While he thought he could believe it had a conscience--till he was forced to give up, what it was his duty to cherish as long as ever he could, the notion that the British empire was a subject and servant of the kingdom of Christ--he served the state. Now that he finds this to be a mere dream, much as it ought to be otherwise, and as it once was otherwise, he has said, I cannot serve such a mistress. 'But really,' I continue, 'do you in your heart mean to say that he should absolutely and for ever give up the state and country? I hope not. I do not think he has so committed himself. That the conclusion he has come to is a very grave one, and not consistent with his going on blindly in the din and hurry of business, without having principles to guide him, I admit; and this, I conceive, is his reason for at once retiring from the ministry, that he may contemplate the state of things calmly and from without. But I really cannot pronounce, nor can you, nor can he perhaps at once, what is a Christian's duty under these new circumstances, whether to remain in retirement from public affairs or not. Retirement, however, could not be done by halves. If he is absolutely to give up all management of public affairs, he must retire not only from the ministry but from parliament. 'I see another reason for his retiring from the ministry. The public thought they had in his book a pledge that the government would not take such a step with regard to Maynooth as is now before the country. Had he continued in the ministry he would to a certain extent have been misleading the country. 'You say, "He made some show of seeing his way in future, for he gave advice; he said it would be well for all parties to yield something. To see his way and to give advice is as if he had found some principle to go on." I do not so understand him. I thought he distinctly stated he had not yet found a principle. But he gave that advice which facts, or what he called circumstances, made necessary, and which if followed out, will, it is to be hoped, lead to some basis of principle which we do not see at present.' Compared to the supreme case of conscience indicated here, and it haunted Mr. Gladstone for nearly all his life, the perplexities of party could be but secondary. Those perplexities were never sharper than in the four years from 1854 to 1859; and with his living sense of responsibility for the right use of transcendent powers of national service, it was practically inevitable that he should at last quit the barren position of 'the one remaining Ishmael in the House of Commons.' IV Later in this year Mr. Gladstone was chosen to be the first lord rector of the university of Edinburgh under powers conferred by a recent law. His unsuccessful rival was Lord Neaves, excellent as lawyer, humorist, and scholar. In April the following year, in the midst of the most trying session of his life, he went down from the battle-ground at Westminster, and delivered his rectorial address[393]--not particularly pregnant, original, or pithy, but marked by incomparable buoyancy; enforcing a conception of the proper functions of a university that can never be enforced too strongly or too often; and impressing in melodious period and glowing image those ever needed commonplaces about thrift of time and thirst for fame and the glory of knowledge, that kindle sacred fire in young hearts. It was his own career, intellectual as well as political, that gave to his discourse momentum. It was his own example that to youthful hearers gave new depth to a trite lesson, when he exclaimed: 'Believe me when I tell you that the thrift of time will repay you in after life with an usury of profit beyond your most sanguine dreams, and that the waste of it will make you dwindle, alike in intellectual and in moral stature, beneath your darkest reckonings.' So too, we who have it all before us know that it was a maxim of his own inner life, when he told them: 'The thirst for an enduring fame is near akin to the love of true excellence; but the fame of the moment is a dangerous possession and a bastard motive; and he who does his acts in order that the echo of them may come back as a soft music in his ears, plays false to his noble destiny as a Christian man, places himself in continual danger of dallying with wrong, and taints even his virtuous actions at their source.' FOOTNOTES: [387] Not, however, Sir Robert until 1862, when he was knighted on becoming Queen's advocate. He was created baronet in 1881. [388] Lord Hartington's motion was--'That it is essential for the satisfactory result of our deliberations, and for facilitating the discharge of your Majesty's high functions, that your Majesty's government should possess the confidence of this House and of the country; and we deem it our duty respectfully to submit to your Majesty that such confidence is not reposed in the present advisers of your Majesty.' [389] _Life of Cobden_, ii. pp. 229-233. [390] There is a strange story in the _Halifax Papers_ of Bright at this time visiting Lord Aberdeen, and displaying much ill humour. 'He cannot reconcile himself to not being considered capable of taking office. Lord John broached a scheme for sending him as governor-general to Canada. I rather doubted the expediency of this, but Mr. Gladstone seemed to think it not a bad scheme' (June 15, 1859). Many curious things sprang up in men's minds at that moment. [391] Reproduced in Mr. Russell's book on Mr. Gladstone, pp. 144-5. [392] It is worth noticing that he sat on the ministerial side of the House without breach of continuity from 1853 to 1866. During the first Derby government, as we have already seen (p. 423), he sat below the gangway on the opposition side; during the Palmerston administration of 1855 he sat below the gangway on the government side; and he remained there after the second Derby accession to office in 1858. [393] The Address is in _Gleanings_, vii. APPENDIX CHOICE OF PROFESSION _Page 82_ _Mr. Gladstone to his Father_ _Cuddesdon, Aug. 4, 1830._--MY BELOVED FATHER,--I have a good while refrained from addressing you on a subject of importance and much affecting my own future destiny, from a supposition that your time and thoughts have been much occupied for several months past by other matters of great interest in succession. Now, however, believing you to be more at leisure, I venture to bring it before you. It is, as you will have anticipated, the decision of the profession to which I am to look forward for life. Above eighteen months have now passed since you spoke to me of it at Seaforth, and most kindly desired me, if unable then to make up my mind to go into the law, to take some time to consider calmly of the whole question. It would have been undutiful to trouble you with a recurrence of it, until such a period had been suffered to elapse, as would suffice to afford, by the effects it should itself produce, some fair criterion and presumption of the inclination which my mind was likely to adopt in reference to the _final_ decision. At the same time it would also have been undutiful, and most repugnant to my feelings, to permit the prolongation of that intervening period to such an extent, as to give the shadow of a reason to suppose that anything approaching to reserve had been the cause of my silence. The present time seems to lie between these two extremes, and therefore to render it incumbent on me to apprise you of the state of my own views. I trust it is hardly necessary to specify my knowledge that when I speak of 'the state of my own views' on this question, I do so not of right but by sufferance, by invitation from you, by that more than parental kindness and indulgence with which I have ever met at my parents' hands, which it would be as absurd to make a matter of _formal_ acknowledgment as it would be impossible to repay, and for which I can only say, and I say it from the bottom of my heart, may God reward them with his best and choicest gifts, eternal, unfading in the heavens. If then I am to advert to the disposition of my own mind as regards this matter, I cannot avoid perceiving that it has inclined to the ministerial office, for what has now become a considerable period, with a bias at first uncertain and intermittent, but which has regularly and rapidly increased in force and permanence. It has not been owing as far as I can myself discern, to the operation of any external cause whatever; nor of internal ones to any others than those which work their effects in the most gradual and imperceptible manner. Day after day it has grown upon and into my habit of feeling and desire. It has been gradually strengthened by those small accessions of power, each of which singly it would be utterly impossible to trace, but which collectively have not only produced a desire of a certain description, but have led me by reasonings often weighed and sifted and re-sifted to the best of my ability, to the deliberate conclusion which I have stated above. I do not indeed mean to say that there has been _no_ time within this period at which I have felt a longing for other pursuits; but such feelings have been unstable and temporary; that which I now speak of is the permanent and habitual inclination of my mind. And such too, I think, it is likely to continue; as far at least as I can venture to think I see anything belonging to the future, or can anticipate the continuance of any one desire, feeling, or principle, in a mind so wayward and uncertain as my own--so far do I believe that this sentiment will remain. It gives me pain, great pain, to communicate anything which I have even the remotest apprehension can give the slightest annoyance to you. I trust this will not do so; although I fear it may. But though fearing it may, I feel it is my duty to do it: because I have only these three alternatives before me. First, to delay communication to some subsequent opportunity: but as I have no fair prospect of being able _then_ to convey a different statement, this plan would be attended with no advantage whatever, as far as I can see. Secondly, to dissemble my feelings: an alternative on which if I said another word I should be behaving undutifully and wickedly towards you. Thirdly, to follow the course I have now chosen, I trust with no feelings but those of the most profound affection, and of unfeigned grief that as far as my own view is concerned, I am unable to make it coincide with yours. I say, _as far_ as my own view goes, because I do not now see that my own view can or ought to stand for a moment in the way of your desires. In the hands of my parents, therefore, I am left. But lest you should be led to suppose that I have never reasoned with myself on this matter, but yielded to blind impulses or transitory whims, I will state, not indeed at length, but with as much simplicity and clearness as I am able, some of the motives which seem to me to urge me with an irresistible accumulation of moral force, to this conclusion, and this alone. In the first place, I would say that my own state and character is _not_ one of them; nor, I believe, could any views of that character be compatible with their existence and reception, but that in which it now appears to me: namely, as one on which I can look with no degree of satisfaction whatever, and for the purification of which I can only direct my eyes and offer up my prayers to the throne of God. First, then, with reference to the _dignity_ of this office, I know none to compare with it; none which can compete with the grandeur of its end or of its means--the end, the glory of God, and the means, the restoration of man to that image of his Maker which is now throughout the world so lamentably defaced. True indeed it is, that there are other fields for the use and improvement of all which God lends to us, which are wide, dignified, beneficial, desirable: desirable in the first and highest degree, _if we had not this_. But as long as this field continues, and as long as it continues unfilled, I do not see how I am to persuade myself that any powers, be they the meanest or the greatest, can be _so_ profitably or _so_ nobly employed as in the performance of this sublime duty. And that this field is _not_ yet filled, how can any one doubt who casts his eyes abroad over the moral wilderness of this world, who contemplates the pursuits, desires, designs, and principles of the beings that move so busily in it to and fro, without an object beyond the finding food, be it mental or bodily, for the _present_ moment or the _present_ life--it matters little which--or beyond ministering to the desires, under whatever modification they may appear, of self-will and self-love? When I look to the standard of habit and principle adopted in the world at large, and then divert my eyes for a moment from that spectacle to the standard fixed and the picture delineated in the book of revelation, then, my beloved father, the conviction flashes on my soul with a moral force I cannot resist, and would not if I could, that the vineyard still wants labourers, that 'the kingdoms of this world are not yet become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ,' and that _till_ they are become such, till the frail race of Adam is restored to the knowledge and the likeness of his Maker, till universally and throughout the wide world the will of God is become our delight, and its accomplishment our first and last desire, there can be no claim so solemn and imperative as that which even now seems to call to us with the voice of God from heaven, and to say 'I have given Mine own Son for this rebellious and apostate world, the sacrifice is offered and accepted, but you, you who are basking in the sunbeams of Christianity, you who are blessed beyond measure, and, oh, how beyond desert in parents, in friends, in every circumstance and adjunct that can sweeten your pilgrimage, why will you not bear to fellow-creatures sitting in darkness and the shadow of death the tidings of this universal and incomprehensible love?' In this, I believe, is included the main reason which influences me; a reason as full of joy as of glory: that transcendent reason, in comparison with which every other object seems to dwindle into utter and absolute insignificance. But I would not conceal from you--why should I?--that which I cannot conceal from myself: that the darker side of this great picture sometimes meets me, and it is vain that, shuddering, I attempt to turn away from it. My mind involuntarily reverts to the sad and solemn conviction that a fearfully great portion of the world round me is dying in sin. This conviction is the result of that same comparison I have mentioned before, between the principles and practices it embraces, and those which the Almighty authoritatively enjoins: and _entertaining it_ as I do, how, my beloved parent, can I bear to think of my own seeking to wanton in the pleasures of life (I mean even its innocent pleasures), or to give up my heart to its business, while my fellow-creatures, to whom I am bound by every tie of human sympathies, of a common sinfulness and a common redemption, day after day are sinking into death? I mean, not the death of the body, which is but a gate either to happiness or to misery, but that of the soul, the true and the only true death. Can I, with this persuasion engrossing me, be justified in inactivity? or in any measure short of the most direct and most effective means of meeting, if in _any degree_ it be possible, these horrible calamities? Nor is impotency and incompetency any argument on the other side: if I saw a man drowning I should hold out my hand to help him, although I were uncertain whether my strength would prove sufficient to extricate him or not; how much more strongly, then, is this duty incumbent when there are thousands on thousands perishing in sin and ignorance on every side, and where the stake is not the addition or subtraction of a few short years from a life, which can but be a span, longer or shorter, but the doom, the irrevocable doom of spirits made for God, and once like God, but now alienated and apostate? And the remedy which God has provided for this portentous evil is not like the ponderous and elaborate contrivances of men; its spear is not, like Goliath's, the weaver's beam, but all its weapons are a few pure and simple elements of truth, ill calculated, like the arms of David, in the estimation of the world to attain their object, but yet capable of being wielded by a stripling's hand, and yet more, 'mighty, through God, to the pulling down of strongholds.' What I have said is from the bottom of my heart, and put forward without the smallest reservation of any kind: and I have said it thus, because in duty bound to do it; and having, too, the comfort of the fullest persuasion that even if your judgment should disallow it, your affection would pardon it. It is possible, indeed, that the (as it seems to me) awful consideration which I have last put forward may have been misstated or misapprehended. Would God it may be so! happy should I be to find either by reason or revelation that the principles of this world were other than I have estimated them to be, and consequently that their fate would be other likewise. I may be under darkness and delusion, having consulted with none in this matter; but till it is shown that I am so, I am bound by all the most solemn ties, ties not created in this world nor to be dissolved with it, but eternal and changeless as our spirits and He who made them, to regulate my actions with reference to these all-important truths--the apostasy of man on the one hand, the love of God on the other. Of my duties _to men_ as a social being, can any be so important as to tell them of the danger under which I believe them to lie, of the precipice to which I fear many are approaching, while thousands have already fallen headlong, and others again, even while I write, are continuing to fall in a succession of appalling rapidity? Of my duties _to God_ as a rational and responsible being, especially as a being for whom in common with all men the precious blood of Christ has been given, can any more imperatively and more persuasively demand all the little I can give than this, the proclaiming that one instance of God's unfathomable love which alone so transcends as almost to swallow up all others? while those others thus transcended and eclipsed are such as would be of themselves by far the highest and holiest obligations man could know, did we not know this. Thus I have endeavoured to state these truths, if truths they are, at least these convictions, to you, dwelling upon them at a length which may perhaps be tedious and appear affected, simply as I trust, in order to represent them to your mind as much to the life as possible, I mean as nearly as possible in the light in which they have again and again appeared, and do habitually appear, to my own, so as to give you the best means in my power of estimating the strength or detecting the weakness of those grounds on which the conclusions above stated rest. (I have not mentioned the benefit I might hope myself to derive from this course of living compared with others; and yet this consideration, though here undoubtedly a secondary one, is, I believe, more weighty than any of those which can be advanced in favour of an opposite determination.) For some time I doubted whether to state reasons at all: fearing that it might appear presumptuous; but I resolved to do it as choosing rather to incur that risk, than the hazarding an appearance of reserve and desire to conceal my real sentiments from one who has a right to see into the bottom of my heart. Yet one trespass more I must make on your patience. It may perhaps seem that the inducements I have stated are of an unusual character, unsubstantial, romantic, theoretical, and not practical. Unusual, indeed, they are: because (though it is not without diffidence that I bring this sweeping charge--indeed, I should not dare to bring it were it not brought elsewhere) it is a rare thing in this world even where right actions are performed to ground them upon right motives. At least, I am convinced that there are fundamental errors on this subject very prevalent--that they are in general fixed far too low, and that the height of our standard of practice must ever be adapted more or less to that of principle. God only knows whether this be right. But hence it has been that I have endeavoured, I trust not improperly, to put these motives forward in the simplicity of that form wherein they seem to me to come down from the throne of God to the hearts of men; and to consider my prospects and obligations, not under all the limitations which a highly artificial state of society might seem to impose upon them, but direct and undiluted; not, in short, as one who has certain pursuits to follow, certain objects of his own to gain, and relations to fulfil, and arrangements to execute--but as a being destined shortly to stand before the judgment seat of God, and there give the decisive account of his actions at the tribunal whose awards admit of no evasion and of no appeal. That I _have_ viewed them in this light I dare not assert; but I have wished and striven to view them so, and to weigh them, and to answer these questions in the same manner as I must answer them on that day when the trumpet of the archangel shall arouse the living and the dead, and when it will be demanded of me in common with all others, how I have kept and how employed that which was committed to my charge. I dare not pretend that I could act even up to the standard here fixed, but I can eye it though distant, with longing hope, and look upwards for the power which I know is all-sufficient, and therefore sufficient to enable even such an one as myself to reach it. Viewing, then, these considerations in such a light as this, I can come to no other conclusion, at least unaided, than that the work of spreading religion has a claim infinitely transcending all others in dignity, in solemnity, and in usefulness: destined to continue in force until the happy moment come when every human being has been made fully and effectually acquainted with his condition and its remedies--when too, as it seems to me, it will be soon enough--of course, I lay down this rule for myself, provided as I am to the extent of my wants and very far beyond them--to devise other occupations: _now_ it behoves me to discharge the overwhelming obligation which summons me to this. I have scarcely mentioned my beloved mother in the whole of this letter; for though little has ever passed between us on this subject through the medium of language, and nothing whatever, I believe, since I last spoke with you upon it, yet I have long been well aware of the tendency of her desires, long indeed before my own in any degree coincided with them. I await with deference and interest the communication of your desires upon this subject: earnestly desiring that if I have said anything through pride or self-love, it may be forgiven me at your hands, and by God through his Son; and that if my statements be false, or exaggerated, or romantic, or impracticable, I may, by His mercy and through your instrumentality or that of others, be brought back to my right mind, and taught to hold the truth of God in all its sobriety as well as in all its force.--And believe me ever, my beloved and honoured father, your affectionate and dutiful son, WM. E. GLADSTONE. _John Gladstone to his Son_ _Leamington, 10 Aug. 1830_. MY BELOVED WILLIAM,--I have read and given my best consideration to your letter, dated the 4th, which I only received yesterday. I did hope that you would have delayed making up your mind on a subject so important as your future pursuits in life must be to yourself and to us all, until you had completed those studies connected with the attainment of the honours or distinctions of which you were so justly ambitious, and on which your mind seemed so bent when we last communicated respecting them. You know my opinion to be, that the field for actual usefulness to our fellow-creatures, where a disposition to exercise it actively exists, is more circumscribed and limited in the occupations and duties of a clergyman, whose sphere of action, unless pluralities are admitted (as I am sure they would not be advocated by you) is necessarily in a great degree confined to his parish, than in those professions or pursuits which lead to a more general knowledge, as well as a more general intercourse with mankind, such as the law, taking it as a basis, and introduction to public life, to which I had looked forward for you, considering you, as I do, peculiarly well qualified to be made thus eminently useful to others, with credit and satisfaction to yourself. There is no doubt but as a clergyman, faithfully and conscientiously discharging the duties of that office to those whose spiritual interests are entrusted to your care, should you eventually be placed in that situation, that you may have both comfort and satisfaction, with few worldly responsibilities, but you will allow me to doubt whether the picture your perhaps too sanguine mind has drawn in your letter before me, would ever be practically realised. Be this as it may, whenever your mind shall be finally made up on this most important subject, I shall trust to its being eventually for your good, whatever that determination may be. In the meantime I am certainly desirous that those studies with which you have been occupied in reading for your degree may be followed up, whether the shorter or longer period may be necessary to prepare you for the results. You are young and have ample time before you. Let nothing be done rashly; be consistent with yourself, and avail yourself of all the advantages placed within your reach. If, when that ordeal is passed, you should continue to think as you now do, I shall not oppose your _then_ preparing yourself for the church, but I do hope that your final determination will not until then be taken, and that whatever events may occur in the interval, you will give them such weight and consideration as they may appear to merit.... Your mother is much as usual.--With our united and affectionate love, I ever am your affectionate father, JOHN GLADSTONE. CANADA, 1838 _Page 144_ _Jan. 20/38._--To-day there was a meeting on Canada at Sir R. Peel's. There were present Duke of Wellington, Lords Aberdeen, Ripon, Ellenborough, Stanley, Hardinge, and others.... Peel said he did not object to throwing out the government provided it were done by us on our own principles; but that to throw them out on radical principles would be most unwise. He agreed that less might have been done, but was not willing to take the responsibility of refusing what the government asked. He thought that this rebellion had given a most convenient opportunity for settling the question of the Canadian constitution, which had long been a thorny one and inaccessible; that if we postponed the settlement by giving the assembly another trial, the revolt would be forgotten, and in colder blood the necessary powers might be refused. He thought that when once you went into a measure of a despotic character, it was well to err, if at all, on the side of sufficiency; Lord Ripon strongly concurred. The duke sat with his hand to his ear, turning from one towards another round the circle as they took up the conversation in succession, and said nothing till directly and pressingly called upon by Peel, a simple but striking example of the self-forgetfulness of a great man. _Jan. 26/38._--I was myself present at about eight hours [_i.e._ on three occasions] of discussion in Peel's house upon the Canadian question and bill, and there was one meeting held to which I was not summoned. The conservative amendments were all adopted in the thoroughly straightforward view of looking simply at the bill and not at the government and the position of parties. Peel used these emphatic words: 'Depend upon it, our course is the direct one; don't do anything that is wrong for the sake of putting them out; don't avoid anything that is right for the sake of keeping them in.' Every one of these points has now been carried without limitation or exception. For the opposition party this is, in familiar language, a feather in its cap. The whole has been carefully, thoroughly, and effectually done. Nothing since I have been in parliament--not even the defeat of the Church Rate measure last year--has been of a kind to tell so strikingly as regards appearances upon the comparative credit of the two parties. SIR ROBERT PEEL'S GOVERNMENT _Page 247_ _In the great mountain of Mr. Gladstone's papers I have come across an unfinished and undated draft of a letter written by him for the Queen in 1880 on Sir Robert Peel's government_:-- Mr. Gladstone with his humble duty reverts to the letter which your Majesty addressed to him a few days back, and in which your Majesty condescended to recollect and to remind him of the day now nearly forty years ago, a day he fears not altogether one of pleasure to your Majesty, when together with others he had the honour to be sworn of your Majesty's privy council. Your Majesty is pleased to pronounce upon the government then installed into office a high eulogy: a eulogy which Mr. Gladstone would presume, as far as he may, to echo. He values it, and values the recollection of the men who principally composed it, because it was, in the first place, a most honourable and high-minded government; because its legislative acts tended greatly, and almost uniformly, to increase the wellbeing of the country, and to strengthen the attachment of the people to the throne and the laws; while it studied in all things to maintain the reverse of an ambitious or disturbing policy. It was Mr. Gladstone's good fortune to live on terms of intimacy, and even affection, with the greater portion of its principal and more active members until the close of their valued lives; and although he is far from thinking that they, and he himself with them, committed no serious errors, yet it is his conviction that in many of the most important rules of public policy that government surpassed generally the governments which have succeeded it, whether liberal or conservative. Among them he would mention purity in patronage, financial strictness, loyal adherence to the principle of public economy, jealous regard to the rights of parliament, a single eye to the public interest, strong aversion to extension of territorial responsibilities, and a frank admission of the rights of foreign countries as equal to those of their own. With these recollections of the political character of Sir R. Peel and his government Mr. Gladstone has in no way altered his feelings of regard and respect for them. In all the points he has mentioned he would desire to tread in their steps, and in many of them, or at least in some, he has no hope of soon seeing them equalled. The observance of such principles is in his conviction the best means of disarming radicalism of whatever is dangerous in its composition, and he would feel more completely at ease as to the future prospects of this country could he feel more sure of their being faithfully observed. Mr. Gladstone is, and has been, but a learner through his life, and he can claim no special gift of insight into the future: the history of his life may not be flattering to his self-love, but he has great consolation in believing that the great legislative acts of the last half-century, in most of which he has had some share ... _And here the fragment closes_. CRISIS ON THE SUGAR DUTIES, 1844 _Page 267_ In 1841 the whig government raised the question of the sugar duties, and proposed to substitute a protective duty of 12/ per cwt. for the actual or virtual prohibition of foreign sugars which had up to that time subsisted. They were strongly opposed, and decisively beaten. The argument used against them was, I think, twofold. There was the protection plea on behalf of the West Indians whose estates were now worked only by free labour--and there was the great and popular contention that the measure not only admitted sugar the product of slave labour, which we would not allow our own colonies to employ, but that our new supplies would be derived from Brazil, and above all from Cuba and Puerto Rico, where the slave trade was rampant, and was prosecuted on an enormous scale. The government of Sir R. Peel largely modified our system. Its general professions were the abolition of prohibition, and the reduction of protective duties to a moderate rate. In 1844 it was determined to deal with the sugar duties, and to admit sugar at, I think, a rate of 10/ per cwt. beyond the rate for British-grown. But we had to bear in mind the arguments of 1841, and it was determined that the sugars so to be admitted were to be the product of free labour only. There was some uncertainty from whence they were to come. Java produced sugar largely, under a system involving certain restraints, but as we contended essentially free. The whole argument, however, was difficult and perplexed, and a parliamentary combination was formed against the government. The opposition, with perfect consistency, mustered in full force. The West Indian interest, which, though much reduced in wealth, still subsisted as a parliamentary entity, was keenly arrayed on the same side. There were some votes attracted by dislike, perhaps, to the argument on our side, which appeared to be complex and over-refined. A meeting of the party was held in order to confront the crisis. Sir Robert Peel stated his case in a speech which was thought to be haughty and unconciliatory. I do not recollect whether there was hostile discussion, or whether silence and the sulks prevailed. But I remember that when the meeting of the party broke up, Sir Robert Peel said on quitting the room that it was the worst meeting he had ever attended. It left disagreeable anticipations as to the division which was in immediate prospect.... The opposition in general had done what they could to strengthen their momentary association with the West Indian conservatives. Their hopes of a majority depended entirely upon conservative votes. Of course, therefore, it was vital to confine the attack to the merits of the question immediately before the House, as an attack upon the policy of the government generally could only strengthen it by awakening the susceptibilities of party and so reclaiming the stray voters to the administration. Lord Howick, entering into the debate as the hours of enhanced interest began, made a speech which attacked the conservative policy at large, and gave the opening for an effective reply. Lord Stanley perceived his opportunity and turned it to account with great force and adroitness. In a strictly retaliatory speech, he wound up conservative sentiment on behalf of ministers, and restored the tone of the House. The clouds of the earlier evening hours dispersed, and the government was victorious. Two speeches, one negatively and the other positively, reversed the prevailing current, and saved the administration. I have never known a parallel case. The whole honour of the fray, in the ministerial sense, redounded to Lord Stanley. I doubt whether in the twenty-six years of his after life he ever struck such a stroke as this. COLONIAL POLICY _Page 362_ You have reversed, within the last seventy years, every one of these salutary principles. Your policy has been this; you have retained at home the management of and property in colonial lands. You have magnificent sums figuring in your estimates for the ordinary expenses of their governments, instead of allowing them to bear their own expenses. Instead of suffering them to judge what are the measures best adapted to secure their peaceful relations with the aboriginal tribes, and endeavouring to secure their good conduct--instead of telling them that they must not look for help from you unless they maintain the principles of justice, you tell them, 'You must not meddle with the relations between yourselves and the natives; that is a matter for parliament'; a minister sitting in Downing Street must determine how the local relations between the inhabitants of the colony and the aboriginal tribes are to be settled, in every point down to the minutest detail. Nay, even their strictly internal police your soldiery is often called upon to maintain. Then, again, the idea of their electing their own officers is, of course, revolutionary in the extreme--if not invading the royal supremacy, it is something almost as bad, dismembering the empire; and as to making their own laws upon their local affairs without interference or control from us, that is really an innovation so opposed to all ideas of imperial policy, that I think my honourable friend the member for Southwark (Sir William Molesworth) has been the first man in the House bold enough to propose it. Thus, in fact, the principles on which our colonial administration was once conducted have been precisely reversed. Our colonies have come to be looked upon as being, not municipalities endowed with internal freedom, but petty states. If you had only kept to the fundamental idea of your forefathers, that these were municipal bodies founded within the shadow and cincture of your imperial powers--that it was your business to impose on them such positive restraints as you thought necessary, and having done so, to leave them free in everything else--all those principles, instead of being reversed, would have survived in full vigour--you would have saved millions, I was going to say countless millions, to your exchequer; but you would have done something far more important by planting societies more worthy by far of the source from which they spring; for no man can read the history of the great American Revolution without seeing that a hundred years ago your colonies, such as they then were, with the institutions they then possessed, and the political relations in which they then stood to the mother-country, bred and reared men of mental stature and power such as far surpassed anything that colonial life is now commonly considered to be capable of producing.--_Speech on second reading of the New Zealand Constitution bill, May_ 21, 1852. FINANCIAL ARRANGEMENTS OF 1853 AS AFFECTING IRELAND _Page 465_ _When the report of the Irish Financial Relations Commission of 1894 was named to him, Mr. Gladstone made the following observations:--_ The changes adopted in that year were explained in my budget speech, and will be found in my volume of _Financial Statements_, pp. 53, 60, and 69. They affected the Spirit Duties and the Income-Tax. 1. _The Spirit Duties._--We laid 8d. per gallon upon Irish spirits, imposed at the same time 1s. per gallon in Scotland, and laid it down that the equalisation of the duty in the three countries would require a reduction of the duty of 8s. chargeable in England. Sir Robert Peel had imposed 1s. per gallon on Irish spirits in 1842, but was defeated by the smuggler, and repealed the duty in consequence of the failure. In 1842 the duty was levied by a separate revenue police. I abolished this separate police, and handed the duty to the constabulary force, which raised it, and without difficulty. 2. _The Income-Tax_ was also in that year extended to Ireland. I pointed out that Sir Robert Peel, in imposing the burden on Great Britain, proposed to give a compensation for it by progressive reductions of duty on consumable commodities, and that Ireland had for twelve years enjoyed her full share of the compensation without undergoing any part of the burden; but I also laid it down as a fundamental principle that the peace income-tax was to be temporary, and I computed that it might cease in 1860. This computation was defeated, first by the Crimean war, second by a change of ideas as to expenditure and establishments which I did everything in my power to check, but which began to creep in with, and after, that war. We were enabled to hold it in check during the government of 1859-66. It has since that time, and especially in these last years, broken all bounds. But although the computation of 1853 was defeated, the principle that the income-tax should be temporary was never forgotten, at least by me, and in the year 1874 I redeemed my pledge by proposing, as mentioned, to repeal it--a course which would have saved the country a sum which it is difficult to reckon, but very large. This fact which was in the public mind in 1853 when the income-tax was temporary, is the key to the whole position. From this point of view we must combine it with the remission of the consolidated annuities. I have not now the means of making the calculation exactly, but it will be found that a descending income-tax on Ireland for seven years at 7d., then 6d., then 5d., is largely, though not completely, balanced by that remission. It will thus be seen that the finance of 1853 is not responsible either for a permanent peace income-tax upon Ireland, or for the present equalisation of the spirit duties. At the same time, I do not mean to condemn those measures. I condemn utterly the extravagance of the civil expenditure in Ireland, which, if Ireland has been unjustly taxed, cannot for a moment be pleaded as a compensation. I reserve my judgment whether political equality can be made compatible with privilege in point of taxation. I admit, for my own part, that in 1853 I never went back to the union whence the difficulty springs, but only to the union of the exchequers in or about 1817. It is impossible to resist the authority which has now affirmed that we owe a pecuniary, as well as a political debt to Ireland. FINANCIAL PROPOSAL OF 1853 _Page 473_ _Mr. Gladstone to Sir Stafford Northcote_ _Aug._ 6, 1862.--I have three main observations to make upon the conversion scheme, two of which are confessions, and one a maxim for an opposition to remember. 1. In the then doubtful state of foreign politics, had I been capable of fully appreciating it at the time, I ought not to have made the proposal. 2. Such a proposal when made by a government ought either to be resisted outright, or allowed to pass, I do not say without protest, but without delay. For _that_ can do nothing but mischief to a proposal depending on public impression. The same course should be taken as is taken in the case of loans. 3. I am sorry to say I made a more serious error, as regards the South Sea Stocks, than the original proposal. In the summer, I think, of 1853, and a good while before harvest the company proposed to me to take Mr. Goulburn's 3 per cents. to an equal amount in lieu of their own. They were at the time more valuable and I refused; but it would have been wise to accept, not because the event proved it so, but because the state of things at the time was so far doubtful as to have made this kind of insurance prudent. _For the benefit of the expert, I give Mr. Gladstone's further observations on this highly technical matter:--_ I have other remarks to offer. I write, however, from memory. Three millions of the £8,000,000 were paid in exchequer bills. The difference between £100 and the price of consols at the time may, in argument at least, fairly be considered as public loss. You say it was 90 or 91. We could not, however, if the operation had not taken place, have applied our surplus revenue with advantage to the reduction of debt. The balances would have been richer by £5,000,000, but we had to raise seven millions for the services of the year 1854-5. Now, as I am making myself liable for the loss of half a million of money in repaying the South Sea Company, and thereby starving the balances, I am entitled to say on the other hand that the real loss is to be measured by the amount of necessity created for replenishing them, and the charge entailed in effecting it. This I think was done by the exchequer bonds: and beyond all doubt a large saving was effected to the public by raising money upon those bonds, instead of borrowing in consols at 84 or thereabouts, which I think would have been the price for which we should in that year have borrowed--say, at 84. The redemption price, _i.e._ the price at which on the average consols have been in recent times redeemed, can hardly I think be less than 95, and may be higher. There was in 1854 a strong combination in the City to compel a 'loan' by bearing the funds; and when it was defeated by the vote of the House of Commons, a rapid reaction took place, several millions, as I understand, were lost by the 'bear,' and the attempt was not renewed in 1855, when the loan was, I believe, made on fair terms, relatively to the state of the market. THE REFORM BILL OF 1854 _Page 491_ In cabinet on Wednesday Lord John Russell opened the question of the Reform bill, stated the prospect of defeat on Sir E. Dering's motion, and expressed his willingness to postpone the measure until the 27th April. Lord Palmerston recommended postponement altogether. Lord Aberdeen and Graham were averse to any postponement, the latter even declaring his opinion that we ought at the time when the Queen's Speech was framed to have assumed the present state of circumstances as inevitable, and that, therefore, we had no apology or ground for change; further, that we ought if necessary to dissolve upon defeat in order to carry the measure. No one else went this length. All the three I have named were, from their different points of view, disposed to concur in the expedient of postponement, which none of them preferred on its merits. Of the rest of the cabinet, Molesworth and I expressed decidedly our preference for the more decided course of at once giving up the bill for the year, as did the chancellor, and this for the ultimate interest of the plan itself. Lord Lansdowne, Wood, Clarendon, Herbert were all, with more or less decision of phrase, in the same sense. Newcastle, Granville, and Argyll were, I believe, of the same mind. But all were willing to accept the postponement until April 27, rather than the very serious alternative. Molesworth and I both expressed our apprehension that this course would in the end subject the government to far more of censure and of suspicion than if we dealt with the difficulty at once. Next day Lord John came to see me, and told me he had the idea that in April it might probably be found advisable to divide the part of the bill which enfranchises new classes from that which disfranchises places and redistributes seats; with a view of passing the first and letting the latter take its chance; as the popular feeling would tell for the first while the selfish interests were provoked by the last. He thought that withdrawal of the bill was equivalent to defeat, and that either must lead to a summary winding up of the session. I said the division of the bill was a new idea and a new light to me; but observed that it would by no means help Graham, who felt himself chiefly tied to the disfranchising part; and submitted to him that his view of a withdrawal of the bill, given such circumstances as would alone induce the cabinet to think of it, was more unfavourable than the case warranted--_March_ 3, 1854. CIVIL SERVICE REFORM _Page 511_ _Extracts from a letter to Lord John Russell, Jan. 20, 1854_ ... I do not hesitate to say that one of the great recommendations of the change in my eyes would be its tendency to strengthen and multiply the ties between the higher classes and the possession of administrative power. As a member for Oxford, I look forward eagerly to its operation. There, happily, we are not without some lights of experience to throw upon this part of the subject. The objection which I always hear there from persons who wish to retain restrictions upon elections is this: 'If you leave them to examination, Eton, Harrow, Rugby, and the other public schools will carry _everything_.' I have a strong impression that the aristocracy of this country are even superior in natural gifts, on the average, to the mass: but it is plain that with their acquired advantages, their _insensible education_, irrespective of book-learning, they have an immense superiority. This applies in its degree to all those who may be called gentlemen by birth and training; and it must be remembered that an essential part of any such plan as is now under discussion is the separation of _work_, wherever it can be made, into mechanical and intellectual, a separation which will open to the highly educated class a career, and give them a command over all the higher parts of the civil service, which up to this time they have never enjoyed.... I must admit that the aggregate means now possessed by government for carrying on business in the House of Commons are not in excess of the real need, and will not bear serious diminution. I remember being alarmed as a young man when Lord Althorp said, or was said to have said, that this country could no longer be governed by patronage. But while sitting thirteen years for a borough with a humble constituency, and spending near ten of them in opposition, I was struck by finding that the loss or gain of access to government patronage was not traceable in its effect upon the local political influences. I concluded from this that it was not the intrinsic value of patronage (which is really none, inasmuch as it does not, or ought not, to multiply the aggregate number of places to be given, but only acts on the mode of giving them) that was regarded, but simply that each party liked and claimed to be upon a footing of equality with their neighbours. Just in the same way, it was considered necessary that bandsmen, flagmen, and the rest, should be paid four times the value of their services, without any intention of bribery, but because it was the custom, and was done on the other side--in places where this was thought essential, it has now utterly vanished away, and yet the people vote and work for their cause as zealously as they did before. May not this after all be found to be the case in the House of Commons as well as in many constituencies?... It might increase the uncertainties of the government in the House of Commons on particular nights; but is not the hold even now uncertain as compared with what it was thirty or forty years ago; and is it really weaker for general and for good purposes, on account of that uncertainty, than it then was? I have heard you explain with great force to the House this change in the position of governments since the Reform bill, as a legitimate accompaniment of changes in our political state, by virtue of which we appeal _more_ to reason, less to habit, direct interest, or force. May not this be another legitimate and measured step in the same direction? May we not get, I will not say more ease and certainty for the leader of the House, but more real and more honourable strength with the better and, in the long run, the ruling part of the community, by a signal proof of cordial desire that the processes by which government is carried on should not in elections only, but elsewhere too be honourable and pure? I speak with diffidence; but remembering that at the revolution we passed over from prerogative to patronage, and that since the revolution we have also passed from bribery to influence, I cannot think the process is to end here; and after all we have seen of the good sense and good feeling of the community, though it may be too sanguine, I cherish the hope that the day is now near at hand, or actually come, when in pursuit not of visionary notions, but of a great practical and economical improvement, we may safely give yet one more new and striking sign of rational confidence in the intelligence and character of the people. MR. GLADSTONE AND THE BANK _Page 519_ From the time I took office as chancellor of the exchequer I began to learn that the state held in the face of the Bank and the City an essentially false position as to finance. When those relations began, the state was justly in ill odour as a fraudulent bankrupt who was ready on occasion to add force to fraud. After the revolution it adopted better methods though often for unwise purposes, and in order to induce monied men to be lenders it came forward under the countenance of the Bank as its sponsor. Hence a position of subserviency which, as the idea of public faith grew up and gradually attained to solidity, it became the interest of the Bank and the City to prolong. This was done by amicable and accommodating measures towards the government, whose position was thus cushioned and made easy in order that it might be willing to give it a continued acquiescence. The hinge of the whole situation was this: the government itself was not to be a substantive power in matters of finance, but was to leave the money power supreme and unquestioned. In the conditions of that situation I was reluctant to acquiesce, and I began to fight against it by financial self-assertion from the first, though it was only by the establishment of the Post Office Savings Banks and their great progressive development that the finance minister has been provided with an instrument sufficiently powerful to make him independent of the Bank and the City power when he has occasion for sums in seven figures. I was tenaciously opposed by the governor and deputy-governor of the Bank, who had seats in parliament, and I had the City for an antagonist on almost every occasion.--_Undated fragment_. THE DUKE OF NEWCASTLE AND SIDNEY HERBERT _Page 521_ With reference to the Crimean war, I may give a curious example of the power of self-deception in the most upright men. The offices of colonial secretary and war minister were, in conformity with usage, united in the hands of the Duke of Newcastle. On the outbreak of war it became necessary to separate them. It evidently lay with the holder to choose which he would keep. The duke elected for the war department, and publicly declared that he did this in compliance with the unanimous desire of his colleagues. And no one contradicted him. We could only 'grin and bear it.' I cannot pretend to know the sentiments of each and every minister on the matter. But I myself, and every one with whom I happened to communicate, were very strongly of an opposite opinion. The duke was _well_ qualified for the colonial seals, for he was a statesman; _ill_ for the war office, as he was no administrator. I believe we all desired that Lord Palmerston should have been war minister. It might have made a difference as to the tolerance of the feeble and incapable administration of our army before Sebastopol. Indeed, I remember hearing Lord Palmerston suggest in cabinet the recall of Sir Richard Airy. In that crisis one man suffered most unjustly. I mean Sidney Herbert. To some extent, perhaps, his extraordinary and most just popularity led people to refrain from pouring on him those vials of wrath to which his office exposed him in the eyes especially of the uninformed. The duties of his department were really financial. I suppose it to be doubtful whether it was not the duty of the secretary of state's department to deal with the question of supply for the army, leaving to him only the management of the purchasing part. But I conceive it could be subject to no doubt at all that it was the duty of the administrative department of the army on the spot to anticipate and make known their wants for the coming winter. This, if my memory serves me, they wholly failed to do: and, the Duke of Newcastle's staff being in truth very little competent, Herbert strained himself morning, noon, and night to invent wants for the army, and according to his best judgment or conjecture to supply them. So was laden the great steamer which went to the bottom in the harbour of Balaclava. And so came Herbert to be abused for his good deeds.--_Autobiographic Note_, Sept. 17, 1897. THE CRIMEAN WAR _Page 546_ _Mr. Gladstone to Duke of Argyll_ _Oct._ 18, '55.--You have conferred a great obligation on me by putting me into the witness-box, and asking me why I thought last year that we were under an obligation to Lord Palmerston for 'concentrating the attention of the cabinet on the expedition to the Crimea.' Such was _then_ my feeling, entertained so strongly that I even wrote to him for the purpose of giving to it the most direct expression. And such is my feeling _still_. I think the fall of Sebastopol, viewed in itself and apart from the mode in which it has been brought about, a great benefit to Europe.... This benefit I should have contemplated with high and, so to speak, unmixed satisfaction, were I well assured as to the means by which we had achieved it. But, of course, there is a great difference between a war which I felt, however grievous it was, yet to be just and needful, and a war carried on without any adequate justification; so far as I can to this hour tell, without even any well-defined practical object.... Your letter (if I must now pass from the defensive) seems to me to involve assumptions as to our right to rectify the distribution of political power by bloodshed, which carry it far beyond just bounds. In the hour of success doctrines and policy are applauded, or pass unquestioned even under misgiving, which are very differently handled at a period of disaster, or when a nation comes to feel the embarrassments it has accumulated. The government are certainly giving effect to the public opinion of the day. If that be a justification, they have it: as all governments of England have had, in all wars, at eighteen months from their commencement. Apart from the commanding consideration of our duty as men and Christians, I am not less an objector to the post-April-policy, on the ground of its certain or probable consequences--in respect first and foremost to Turkey; in respect to the proper place and power of France; in respect to the interest which Europe has in keeping her (and us all) within such place and power; in respect to the permanence of our friendly relations with her; and lastly, in respect to the effects of continued war upon the condition of our own people, and the stability of our institutions. But each of these requires an octavo volume. I must add another head: I view with alarm the future use against England of the arguments and accusations we use against Russia. _Dec._ 1.--What I find press hardest among the reproaches upon me is this:--'You went to war for limited objects; why did you not take into account the high probability that those objects would be lost sight of in the excitement which war engenders, and that this war, if once begun, would receive an extension far beyond your views and wishes?' _Dec. 3._--I _do_ mean that the reproach I named is the one most nearly just. What the weight due to it is, I forbear finally to judge until I see the conclusion of this tremendous drama. But I quite see enough to be aware that the particular hazard in question ought to have been more sensibly and clearly before me. It _may_ be good logic and good sense, I think, to say:--'I will forego ends that are just, for fear of being driven upon the pursuit of others that are not so.' Whether it is so in a particular case depends very much upon the probable amount of the driving power, and of the resisting force which may be at our command. CHRONOLOGY[394] 1832. Dec. 13. Elected member for Newark,--Gladstone, 887; Handley, 798; Wilde, 726. 1833. Jan. 25. Admitted a law student at Lincoln's Inn. March 6. Elected member of Carlton Club. April 30. Speaks on a Newark petition. May 17. Appointed on Colchester election committee. " 21. Presents an Edinburgh petition against immediate abolition of slavery. June 3. On Slavery Abolition bill. July 4. On Liverpool election petition. " 8. Opposes Church Reform (Ireland) bill. " 25 and 29. On negro apprenticeship system. Aug. 5. Serves on select committee on stationary office. " 8. Moves for return on Irish education. 1834. Mar. 12 and 19. On bill disenfranchising Liverpool freemen. June 4. Serves on select committee on education in England. July 28. Opposes Universities Admission bill. Dec. 26. Junior lord of the treasury in Sir R. Peel's ministry. 1835. Jan. 5. Returned unopposed for Newark. " 27. Under-secretary for war and the colonies. March 4. Moves for, and serves on, a committee on military expenditure in the colonies. " 19. Brings in Colonial Passengers' bill for improving condition of emigrants. " 31. In defence of Irish church. June 11. Entertained at Newark. " 22, July 20. Criticises Municipal Corporation bill. Aug. 21. Defends House of Lords. Sept. 23. Death of his mother. 1836. Feb. 8. A member of Aborigines committee. March 22. On negro apprenticeship in Jamaica. " 28. A member of negro apprenticeship committee. June 1. On Tithes and Church (Ireland) bill. " 8. A member of select committee on disposal of land in the colonies. Oct. 18. Speaks at dinner of Liverpool Tradesmen's Conservative Association. " 21. Speaks at dinner of Liverpool Operatives' Conservative Association. 1837. Jan. 13. Speaks at Peel banquet at Glasgow. " 17. Speaks at Newark. Feb. 10. Moves for return showing religious instruction in the colonies. March 7. A member of committee on Irish education. " 8. On affairs of Lower Canada. " 15. In support of church rates. April 28. A member of colonial accounts committee. " 21. At Newark on Poor Law. " 24. Returned unopposed for Newark. " 27. Defeated for Manchester,--Thomson, 4127; Philips, 3759; Gladstone, 2324. Aug. 9. Speaks at dinner at Manchester. Dec. 12. Member of committee on education of poor children. " 22. On Canadian discontent. 1838. Jan. 23. On Canadian affairs. March 7. Criticises action of government in Canada. " 30. In defence of West Indian sugar planters. June 20. On private bill to facilitate colonisation of New Zealand. July 10. Moves for a commission on grievances of Cape colonists. " 11 and 23. Opposes the appointment of dissenting chaplains in prisons. " 27. A member of committee on Scotch education. " 30. Opposes grant to Maynooth College. Aug. Visits the continent. Oct. in Sicily; Dec. in Rome. Dec. _The Church in its Relations with the State_, published. 1839. Jan. 31. Returns to England. Apr. 15. Withdraws from Lincoln's Inn. May 6. Opposes Suspension of the Jamaica constitution. June 10. Opposes bill for temporary government of Jamaica. " 20. Criticises the proposal for a board of education. July 25. Married to Miss Catherine Glynne at Hawarden. 1840. Mar. 30-April 4. Examiner at Eton for Newcastle scholarship. April 8. Denounces traffic in opium and Chinese war. " 8. A member of committee on opium question. May 29. In support of Government of Canada bill. June 3. Eldest son, William Henry, born. " 15. On Canadian Clergy Reserves bill. " 25. On sugar duties. " 29, July 20. Opposes Ecclesiastical Revenues bill. July 9. A member of select committee on colonisation of New Zealand. " 27. Denounces traffic in opium. Sept. 18. Speaks at Liverpool on religious education. Nov. _Church Principles considered in their Results_, published. 1841. Jan. 20. On the corn laws at Walsall. March 31. Proposes rejection of bill admitting Jews to corporate office. April Revised edition of _The Church in its Relations with the State_, published. May 10. Opposes reduction of duty on foreign sugar. July 29. Re-elected for Newark,--Mr. Gladstone, 633; Lord John Manners, 630; Mr. Hobhouse, 394. Sept. 3. Appointed vice-president of the board of trade. " 14. Returned unopposed for Newark. 1842. Feb. 8. Proposes colonial trade resolutions, and brings in bill for better regulation of railways. " 14. Replies to Lord J. Russell's condemnation of government's proposals for amending corn law. " 25. Opposes Mr. Christopher's sliding scale amendment. March 9. On second reading of corn law importation bill. April 15. On Colonial Customs Duties bill. May 13. On preferential duties for colonial goods. " 23. On importation of live cattle. June 3. On sugar duties. " 14. On export duty on coal. Sept. 18. Loses finger of left hand in gun accident. 1843. Jan. Anonymous article, 'The Course of Commercial Policy at Home and Abroad,' in _Foreign and Colonial Quarterly Review_. " 6. Inaugural address at opening of Collegiate Institute, Liverpool. Feb. 13. Replies to Viscount Howick on the corn law. April 25. Opposes Mr. Ricardo's motion for immediate free trade. May 9. Opposes Mr. Villiers's motion for the immediate abolition of corn laws. " 15. Attends first cabinet as president of the board of trade. " 19. Supports bill reducing duty on Canadian corn. June 13. Opposes Lord J. Russell's motion for fixed duty on imported corn. Aug. 10. Moves second reading of bill legalising exportation of machinery. Oct. 'Present Aspects of the Church' in _Foreign and Colonial Review_. 1844. Feb. 5. Moves for select committeen on railways. March 4. On recommendations of committee on railways. " 7. On slave trade and commercial relations with Brazil. " 12. Replies to Mr. Cobden's speech on his motion for committee on protective duties. " 19. On reciprocity in commercial treaties. " 26. Opposes motion to extend low duty on Canadian corn to colonial wheat. April 'On Lord John Russell's Translation of the Francesca da Rimini,' in the _English Review_. " 2. Outlines provisions of Joint Stock Companies Regulation bill. " 4. Second son, Stephen Edward, born. May 18. Presides at Eton anniversary dinner. June 3. On sugar duties bill. " 6. In support of Dissenters' Chapels bill. " 25. Opposes Mr. Villiers's motion for abolition of corn laws. July. Review of 'Ellen Middleton,' in _English Review._ " 8. On second reading of Railways bill. Aug. 5. Introduces three bills for regulating private bill procedure. Oct. 'The Theses of Erastus and the Scottish Church Establishment' in the _New Quarterly Review_. Dec. On Mr. Ward's 'Ideal Church,' in _Quarterly Review_. 1845. Jan. 28. Retires from cabinet. Feb. 4. Personal explanation. " 24. In favour of discriminating duties on sugar. " 26. Defends distinction between free-labour and slave-labour sugar. March. _Remarks upon recent Commercial Legislation_, published. April 11. On second reading of Maynooth College bill. June. Review of 'Life of Mr. Blanco White,' in _Quarterly_. " 2. Supports Academical Institutions (Ireland) bill. July 15. On Spanish treaties and slave-labour sugar. Sept. 25-Nov. 18. Visits Germany. Dec. 'Scotch Ecclesiastical Affairs,' in the _Quarterly_. " 23. Colonial secretary. Publishes, _A Manual of Prayers from the Liturgy, Arranged for Family Use_. 1846. Jan. 5. Retires from the representation of Newark. 1847. June 'From Oxford to Rome' in the _Quarterly_. " 7. Captain Gladstone defends his brother's action in recalling Sir Eardley Wilmot. Aug. 3. Elected for Oxford University,--Sir R. Inglis, 1700; W. E. Gladstone, 997; Mr. Round, 824. Sept. On Lachmann's 'Ilias' in the _Quarterly_. Dec. 8. Supports Roman Catholic Relief bill. " 13. On government of New Zealand. " 16. In favour of admission of Jews to parliament. 1848. Feb. 9 and 14. On New Zealand Government bill. " 16. On Roman Catholic Relief bill. March 10. On recent commercial changes. April 3. On repeal of Navigation laws, criticising government's proposal. " 4. On episcopal revenues. " 10. Serves as special constable. " 22. Moves address to the Queen at vestry of St. Martin's-in-the-Fields. May 16. In favour of increasing usefulness of cathedrals. " 23. Replies to Lord G. Bentinck on free trade. June 2. In favour of freedom of navigation. " 22. Opposes reduction of sugar duties. Aug. 17. In favour of legalising diplomatic relations with the Vatican. " 18. On Vancouver's Island, and free colonisation. Dec. On the Duke of Argyll's _Presbytery Examined_ in the _Quarterly_. 1849. Feb. 19. On revision of parliamentary oaths. " 22, May 2. In favour of Clergy Relief bill. March 8. On transportation of convicts. " 12. On Navigation laws. " 13. On church rates. " 27. In favour of scientific colonisation at St. Martin's-in-the-Fields. April 16. On colonial administration. May 10. Defends right of parliament to interfere in colonial affairs. " 24. In favour of better government of colonies. June 4. On Australian Colonies bill. " 14. Protests against compensating Canadian rebels. " 20. Opposes bill legalising marriage with deceased wife's sister. " 26. Explains views on colonial questions and policy. July 5. Moves for inquiry into powers of Hudson Bay Company. " 13-Aug. 9. Visits Italy: Rome, Naples, Como. Dec. 'The Clergy Relief Bill' in _Quarterly_. 1850. Feb. 8. In favour of double chamber constitutions for colonies. " 21. On causes of agricultural distress, in support of Mr. Disraeli's motion. March. 'Giacomo Leopardi' in the _Quarterly_. " 19. On suppression of slave trade. " 22. On principles of colonial policy. April 9. Death of his daughter, Catherine Jessy. May 6. In favour of colonial self-government, and ecclesiastical constitution for church in Australia. " 13. Moves that Australian Government bill be submitted to colonists. " 31. In favour of differential sugar duties. June 4. Letter to Bishop of London: _Remarks on the Royal Supremacy._ " 27. Attacks Lord Palmerston's foreign policy in Don Pacifico debate. July 3. On death of Sir R. Peel. " 8. Criticises Ecclesiastical Commission bill. " 15. Explains plan for creation of new bishoprics. " 18. Opposes commission of inquiry into English and Irish universities. Aug. 1. 'Last earnest protest' against Australian Colonies Government bill. Oct. 26. Leaves England for Naples. 1851. Feb. 26. Returns to England from Naples. Declines Lord Stanley's invitation to join his government. March 25. Opposes Ecclesiastical Titles Assumption bill. April 11. On financial plans to relieve agricultural distress. " 15. Opposes appointment of committee on relations with Kaffir tribes. May 29. On grievances of inhabitants of Ceylon. June 30. Opposes Inhabited House Duty bill. July 4. Protests against Ecclesiastical Titles bill. " 10. On Rajah Brooke's methods of suppressing piracy. " 19. On discipline in colonial church. " Publishes two letters to Lord Aberdeen on Neapolitan misgovernment. Dec. 7. Death of Sir John Gladstone at Fasque. " Letter to Dr. Skinner, Bishop of Aberdeen, _On the functions of laymen in the Church_. Translation of Farini's _The Roman State_, 1815 to 1850, vols. i. and ii. published. 1852. Jan. 29. Publishes _An Examination of the Official Reply of the Neapolitan Government_. Feb. 20. Brings in Colonial Bishops bill. March 15. On free trade. April On Farini's 'Stato Romano,' in _Edinburgh Review_. " 2. Third son, Henry Neville, born. " 5. Protests against policy of Kaffir war. " 28. Moves second reading of Colonial Bishops bill. " 30. On Mr. Disraeli's budget statement. May 10. Proposes rejection of bill to assign disenfranchised seats of St. Albans and Sudbury. " 11. In favour of select committee on education at Maynooth College. " 12. On paper duty. " 21. On New Zealand Government bill. June 8 and 10. Defends action of Bishop of Bath and Wells in the case of Frome vicarage. " 23. Brings in bill to amend colonial church laws. July 14. Re-elected for Oxford University,--Sir. R. Inglis, 1368; W. E. Gladstone, 1108; Dr. Marsham, 758. Nov. 11, 25. In defence of principles of free trade. " 26. Defends Sir R. Peel's free trade policy. Dec. 'Count Montalembert on Catholic Interests in the Nineteenth Century' in the _Quarterly_. " 6. Attacks government's income-tax proposals. " 16. Replies to Mr. Disraeli's speech in defence of his budget proposals. " 23. Appointed chancellor of the exchequer. 1853. Jan. 20. Re-elected for Oxford University,--W. E. Gladstone, 1022; Mr. Perceval, 898. March 3. Speech on Mr. Hume's motion for repeal of all protective import duties. " 4 and 18. On Clergy reserves (Canada) bill. " 28. At Mansion House banquet, on public opinion and public finance. April 4. On government's proposal to improve education in England and Wales. " 8. Explains nature of proposals for conversion of portion of national debt. " 8. On Irish taxation. " 14. Opposes motion for repeal of advertisement duty, newspaper stamp tax, and paper duty on financial grounds. " 18. Introduces his first budget. " 22. Defends South Sea commutation bill. May 9. Opposes amendment, in the interest of property, to income-tax. " 12. Explains changes proposed in succession duties. " 23. On taxation of Ireland. June 13. Moves second reading of Savings Bank bill; and July 21. July 1. Proposes reduction of advertisement duty to sixpence. " 29. On South Sea Annuities. Aug. 3. On Colonial Church Regulation bill. Sept. 27. At Dingwall and Inverness, on results of free trade and evils of war. Oct. 12. Tribute to memory of Sir R. Peel at unveiling of statue at Manchester. At town hall on Russo-Turkish question. 1854. Jan. 7. Fourth son, Herbert John, born. March 6. Introduces budget. " 17. In support of Oxford University bill. " 21. Replies to Mr. Disraeli's attack on his financial schemes. " 25. At Mansion House banquet on war and finance. April 7. On second reading of Oxford University bill. " 11. Statement on public expenditure and income. May 8. Introduces war budget. " 22. Defends resolution empowering government to issue two millions of exchequer bonds against criticism of Mr. Disraeli. " 25. On second reading of bill for revision of parliamentary oaths. " 29. On withdrawal of Bribery Prevention bills. June 2. Explains provisions of Revenue and Consolidated Fund Charges bill. " 21. On proposal to abolish church rates. " 29. Brings in bill for repeal of usury laws. Dec. 13. On the Crimean war. " 2. Moves resolution for regulation of interest on Savings Bank deposits. 1855. Jan. 29. Opposes Mr. Roebuck's motion. Feb. 5. Explains reasons for government's resignation. " 22. Withdraws from cabinet. " 23. Explains reasons. March 19. Explains methods adopted to meet war expenditure. " 19. In favour of free press. " 26. Defends government of Sardinia in debate on military convention. April 20. Criticises budget of Sir G. C. Lewis. " 26. On principles of taxation. " 30. Criticises government Loan bill. May 9. Opposes bill for amendment of marriage law. " 21. Moves adjournment of debate to discuss Vienna conferences. " 24. On prosecution of the war. June. 'Sardinia and Rome,' in _Quarterly_. " 15. On civil service reform. " 15. Statement as to Aberdeen government, and terms of peace. July 10. In favour of open admission to civil service. " 20, 23, and 27. Protests against the system of subsidies, on the guarantee of Turkish loan. Aug. 3. On Vienna negotiations. Oct. 12. Lecture on Colonial Policy at Hawarden. Nov. 12. Lecture on Colonies at Chester. 1856. Feb. 29. On report of Crimean commissioners. April 11. Condemns government proposals for national education. " 24. On civil service reform. May 6. On treaty of peace. " 19. Criticises budget. July 1. On differences with the United States government on recruiting for the British army. " 11. Criticises County Courts Amendment bill. " 23. Strongly opposes the Bishops of London and Durham Retirement bill. Aug. 'The War and the Peace' in _Gentleman's Magazine_. Sept. 'The Declining Efficiency of Parliament' in the _Quarterly_. " 29. At town hall, Mold, in support of Foreign Missionary Society; in the evening at Collegiate Institution, Liverpool, for Society for Propagation of the Gospel. 1857. Jan. 'Homer and His Successors in Epic Poetry,' and 'Prospects Political and Financial' in _Quarterly_. " 31. At Stepney, on duty of rich to poor. Feb. 3. Criticises government's foreign policy and financial measures. " 5. In support of motion to appoint committee on the Hudson Bay Company. Nominated member of the committee. " 20. Condemns budget of Sir G. C. Lewis. March 3. Supports Mr. Cobden's resolution on China. " 6. Proposes reduction of tea duty, and condemns Sir G. C. Lewis's financial proposals. " 10. Moves resolution in favour of revising and reducing expenditure. " 27. Returned unopposed for Oxford University. April. 'The New Parliament and its Work' in _Quarterly_. June 2. Speaks at Oxford at inauguration of Diocesan Spiritual Help Society. July. 'The Bill for Divorce,' and 'Homeric Characters In and Out of Homer' in _Quarterly_. " 9. At Glenalmond College on Christian and classical education. " 16. On the Persian war. " 17. Denounces war with China. " 21. On Lord J. Russell's Oaths Validity Act Amendment bill. " 22, Aug. 4. Criticises and moves amendments to Burials Act Amendment bill. " 24. Explains strong objections to Divorce and Matrimonial Causes bill. " 29. Opposes Superannuation Act Amendment bill. " 31. Opposes second reading of the Divorce bill. Aug. 7. Protests against unequal treatment of men and women in Divorce bill. " 12. Supports continuance of tea and sugar duties. " 14. On Balkan Principalities. " 14. Personal explanation regarding his connection with Lord Lincoln's divorce. Oct. 12. At Chester, on duty of England to India. " 22. At Liverpool, urging closer connection between the great manufacturing towns and the universities. Dec. 4 and 7. Criticises the Bank Issues Indemnity bill. " 9. Protests against proposal to increase pension of Sir Henry Havelock. " 11. On appointment of select committee on Bank Act. 1858. Feb. 19. Opposes Conspiracy to Murder bill. March. _Studies in Homer and the Homeric Age_ published. April. 'The Fall of the Late Ministry' in _Quarterly_. " 19. On Mr. Disraeli's budget statement. " 21, June 8. Criticises Church Rates Abolition bill. " 26 and 30. On proposals for government of India. May 3. On financial condition of the country. " 3, June 7, 14, 17, and July 1. On government of India. " 4. Moves address on Danubian Principalities. " 21. Defends Lord Canning in debate on the Oude Proclamation. June 1. On the Suez Canal, condemning English interference with the project. " 28. Supports Funded Debt bill. July 1 and 5. Proposes additional clause to Universities (Scotland) bill facilitating the creation of a national university. " 6. Moves that the army of India be not employed beyond the frontiers of India without permission of parliament. " 19. On Government of British Columbia bill. " 20. On Hudson Bay Company. Oct. 'The Past and Present Administrations' in _Quarterly_. " 17. Address at Liverpool on university extension. Nov. 8. Leaves England for Corfu, on appointment as lord high commissioner extraordinary of the Ionian Islands. Dec. 3. Addresses Ionian Assembly. 1859. Feb. 5. Presents new constitution to Ionian Chamber of Deputies. " 12. Returned unopposed for Oxford University. March 8. Returns to London. " 29. On Representation of the People bill. April. 'The War in Italy' in the _Quarterly_. " 18. On the state of Italy. " 29. Returned unopposed for Oxford University. June 17. Letter to the provost of Oriel. " 20. Appointed chancellor of the exchequer. " 22. Presides at annual dinner of Royal Literary Fund. July 1. Re-elected for Oxford University,--Mr. Gladstone, 1050; Marquis of Chandos, 859. " 12. Supports bill enabling Roman catholics to hold office of chancellor of Ireland. " 18. Introduces budget. " 21. Replies to Mr. Disraeli's criticisms. Aug. 8. In defence of government's Italian policy. Oct. On 'Tennyson's Poems' in _Quarterly_. Nov. 1. At Cambridge, in support of Oxford and Cambridge mission to Central Africa. " 12. Elected Lord Rector of University of Edinburgh,--Mr. Gladstone, 643; Lord Neaves, 527. Dec. 'Nelda, a Romance,' translated from Grossi, in _Fraser's Magazine_. FOOTNOTES: [394] All speeches unless otherwise stated were made in the House of Commons.