Lord Melbourne was sent for in July, and took his place at the head of a Cabinet which remained practically unaltered. He had been Home Secretary under Grey, and Duncannon was now called to fill that post. The first Melbourne Administration was short-lived, for when it had existed four months Earl Spencer died, and Althorp, on his succession to the peerage, was compelled to relinquish his leadership of the House of Commons. William IV. cared little for Melbourne, and less for Russell, and, as he wished to pick a quarrel with the Whigs, since their policy excited his alarm, he used Althorp for a pretext. Lord Grey had professed to regard Althorp as indispensable to the Ministry, and the King imagined that Melbourne would adopt the same view. Although reluctant to part with Althorp, who eagerly seized the occasion of his accession to an earldom to retire from official life, Melbourne refused to believe that the heavens would fall because of that fact.

There was no pressing conflict of opinion between the King and his advisers, but William IV. nevertheless availed himself of the accident of Althorp's elevation to the peerage to dismiss the Ministry. The reversion of the leadership in the Commons fell naturally to Lord John, and Melbourne was quick to recognise the fact. 'Thus invited,' says Lord John Russell, 'I considered it my duty to accept the task, though I told Lord Melbourne that I could not expect to have the same influence with the House of Commons which Lord Althorp had possessed. In conversation with Mr. Abercromby I said, more in joke than in earnest, that if I were offered the command of the Channel Fleet, and thought it my duty to accept, I should not refuse it.' It was unlike Sydney Smith to treat the remark about taking command of the Channel Fleet seriously, when 'he elaborated a charge' against Lord John on the Deans and Chapters question; but even the witty Canon could lose his temper sometimes.

[Sidenote: WILLIAM IV. DEFENDER OF THE FAITH]

The King, however, had strong opinions on the subject of Lord John's qualifications, and he expressed in emphatic terms his disapproval. The nation trusted Lord John, and had come to definite and flattering conclusions about him as a statesman, but at Windsor a different opinion prevailed. The King, in fact, made no secret to Lord Melbourne, in the famous interview at Brighton, of his conviction that Lord John Russell had neither the ability nor the influence to qualify him for the task; and he added that he would 'make a wretched figure' when opposed in the Commons by men like Peel and Stanley. His Majesty further volunteered the remark that he did not 'understand that young gentleman,' and could not agree to the arrangement proposed. William, moreover, took occasion to pose as a veritable, as well as titular, Defender of the Faith, for, on the authority of Baron Stockmar, the King 'considered Lord John Russell to have pledged himself to certain encroachments on the Church, which his Majesty had made up his mind and expressed his determination to resist.' As Russell was clearly quite out of the reckoning, Melbourne suggested two other names. But the King had made up his mind on more subjects than one, and next morning, Lord Melbourne found himself in possession of a written paper, which informed him his Majesty had no further occasion either for his services or for those of his colleagues.

William IV. acted within his constitutional rights, but such an exercise of the royal prerogative was, to say the least, worthy of George III. in his most uninspired mood. Althorp regarded the King's action as the 'greatest piece of folly ever committed,' and Lord John, in reply to the friendly note which contained this emphatic verdict, summoned his philosophy to his aid in the following characteristic rejoinder: 'I suppose everything is for the best in this world; otherwise the only good which I should see in this event would be that it saves me from being sadly pommelled by Peel and Stanley, to say nothing of O'Connell.' Wellington, who was hastily summoned by the King, suggested that Sir Robert Peel should be entrusted with the formation of a new Government.

Sir Robert Peel was accordingly sent for in hot haste from Rome to form a new Ministry. On his arrival in London in December 1834, he at once set about the formation of a Cabinet. This is Jekyll's comment: 'Our crisis has been entertaining, and Peel is expected to-day. I wish he could have remained long enough at Rome to have learnt mosaic, of which parti-coloured materials our Cabinets have been constructed for twenty years, and for want of cement have fallen to pieces. The Whigs squall out, "Let us depart, for the Reformers grow too impatient." The Tories squall out, "Let us come in, and we will be very good boys, and become Reformers ourselves." However, the country is safe by the Reform Bill, for no Minister can remain in office now by corrupt Parliaments; he must act with approbation of the country or lose his Cabinet in a couple of months.' At the General Election which followed, Peel issued his celebrated address to the electors of Tamworth, in which he declared himself favourable to the reform of 'proved abuses,' and to the carrying out of such measures 'gradually, dispassionately, and deliberately,' in order that it might be lasting. Lord John was returned again for South Devon; but on the reassembling of Parliament the Liberal majority had dwindled from 314 to 107. It was during his election tour that he delivered an address at Totnes, which Greville described as not merely 'a very masterly performance,' but 'one of the cleverest and most appropriate speeches' he had ever read, and for which his friends warmly complimented him. It was a powerful and humorous examination of the Tories' professed anxiety for Reform, and of the prospects of any Reform measures being carried out by their instrumentality.

[Sidenote: LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION]

Lord John now became leader of the Opposition, though the Duke of Bedford dreaded the strain, and expostulated with his son on his acceptance of so irksome and laborious a task. 'You will have to conduct and keep in order a noisy and turbulent pack of hounds which, I think, you will find it quite impossible to restrain.' The Duke of Bedford's fears were not groundless, and Lord John afterwards confessed that, in the whole period during which he had led the Liberal party in the House of Commons, he never had so difficult a task. The forces under his command consisted of a few stalwart Radicals, a number of Whigs of the traditional and somewhat stationary type, and some sixty Irish members. Nevertheless, he promptly assumed an aggressive attitude, and his first victory as leader of the Opposition was won on the question of the choice of a new Speaker, when Mr. Abercromby was placed in the chair in preference to the Ministerial candidate. As the session went on, Lord John's resources in attack grew more and more marked, but he was foiled by the lack of cohesion amongst his followers. It became evident that, unless all sections of the Opposition were united as one man, the Government of Sir Robert Peel could not be overthrown. Alliance with the Radicals and the Irish party, although hateful to the old-fashioned Whigs, was in fact imperative. Lord John summoned a meeting of the Opposition at Lord Lichfield's house; the support of the Radicals and Irish was secured, and then the leader marshalled his forces for what he hoped would prove a decisive victory. His expectations were not disappointed, for early in April he brought forward a motion for the appropriation of the surplus revenues of the Irish Church to general moral and religious purposes, and won with a majority of twenty-seven votes (285 to 258). Sir Robert Peel forthwith resigned, and the Whigs were avenged for their cavalier dismissal by the King.

On the day after the Prime Minister's resignation, Lord John Russell was married—April 11, 1835, at St. George's, Hanover Square—to Adelaide, Lady Ribblesdale, the widow of the second bearer of that title. The respite from political strife was of short duration, for at the end of forty-eight hours he was summoned from Woburn to take the seals of the Home Office in the second Melbourne Administration. The members of the new Cabinet presented themselves to their constituents for re-election, and Lord John suffered defeat in Devonshire. A seat was, however, found for him at Stroud, and in May he was back again in the House of Commons. The first measure of importance introduced by him, on June 5, was the Municipal Reform Act—a measure which embodied the results of the Commission on the subject appointed by Lord Grey. The bill swept away a host of antiquated and absurd privileges of corporate cities and towns, abolished the authority of cliques of freemen, rectified a variety of abuses, and entrusted municipal government to the hands of all taxpayers. Lord John piloted the measure through the Commons, and fought almost single-handed the representatives of vested rights. After a long contest with the Opposition and the Lords, he had the satisfaction of passing the bill, in a somewhat modified form, through its final stages in September, though the Peers, as usual, opposed it as long as they dared, and only yielded at last when Peel in the one House and Wellington in the other recommended concession.

[Sidenote: A POPULAR OVATION]

The Irish Tithes Bill was subsequently introduced, and, though it now included the clauses for the appropriation of certain revenues, it passed the Commons by a majority of thirty-seven. The Lords, however, struck out the appropriation clauses, and the Government in consequence abandoned the measure. The Irish Municipal Bill shared a similar fate, and Lord John's desire to see justice done in Ireland was brought for the moment to naught. The labours of the session had been peculiarly arduous, and in the autumn his health suffered from the prolonged strain. His ability as a leader of the House of Commons, in spite of the dismal predictions of William IV. and the admonitions of paternal solicitude, was now recognised by men of all shades of opinion, though, of course, he had to confront the criticism alike of candid friends and equally outspoken foes. He recruited his energies in the West of England, and, though he had been so recently defeated in Devonshire, wherever he went the people, by way of amends, gave him an ovation. Votes of thanks were accorded to him for his championship of civil and religious liberty, and in November he was entertained at a banquet at Bristol, and presented with a handsome testimonial, raised by the sixpences of ardent Reformers.

Parliament, in the Speech from the Throne, when the session of 1836 began, was called upon to take into early consideration various measures of Reform. The programme of the Ministry, like that of many subsequent administrations, was not lacking in ambition. It was proposed to deal with the antiquated and vexatious manner in which from time immemorial the tithes of the English Church had been collected. The question of Irish tithes was also once more to be brought forward for solution; the municipal corporations of Ireland and the relief of its poor were to be dealt with in the light of recent legislation for England in the same direction. Improvements in the practical working of the administration of justice, 'more especially in the Court of Chancery,' were foreshadowed, and it was announced that the early attention of Parliament would also be called to certain 'grievances which affect those who dissent from the doctrines or discipline of the Established Church.' Such a list of measures bore on its very face the unmistakeable stamp of Lord John Russell's zeal for political redress and religious toleration. Early in the session he brought forward two measures for the relief of Nonconformists. One of them legalised marriages in the presence of a registrar in Nonconformist places of worship, and the other provided for a general civil registration of births, marriages, and deaths. His original proposal was that marriage in church as well as chapel should only take place after due notice had been given to the registrar. The bishops refused to entertain such an idea, and the House of Lords gave effect to their objections, with the result that the registrar was bowed out of church, though not out of chapel, where indeed he remains to this day. The Tithe Commutation Act and three other measures—one for equalising the incomes of prelates, rearranging ancient dioceses and creating new sees; another for the better application of the revenues of the Church to its general purposes; and a third to diminish pluralities—bore witness to his ardour for ecclesiastical reform. The first became law in 1836, and the other two respectively in 1838 and 1839. He lent his aid also to the movement for the foundation on a broad and liberal basis of a new university in London with power to confer degrees—a concession to Nonconformist scholarship and liberal culture generally, which was the more appreciated since Oxford and Cambridge still jealously excluded by their religious tests the youth of the Free Churches.

The Tithe Commutation Act was passed in June; it provided for the exchange of tithes into a rent-charge upon land payable in money, but according to a sliding scale which varied with the average price of corn during the seven preceding years. In the opinion of Lord Farnborough, to no measure since the Reformation has the Church owed so much peace and security. The Irish Municipal Bill was carried in the course of the session through the Commons, but the Lords rendered the measure impossible; and though the Irish Poor Law Bill was carried, a different fate awaited Irish Tithes. This measure was introduced for the fifth time, but in consequence of the King's death, on June 20, and the dissolution of Parliament which followed, it had to be abandoned. Between 1835 and 1837 Lord John, as Home Secretary, brought about many changes for the better in the regulation of prisons, and especially in the treatment of juvenile offenders. By his directions prisoners in Newgate, from metropolitan counties, were transferred to the gaol of each county. Following in the steps of Sir Samuel Romilly, he also reduced the number of capital crimes, and, later on, brought about various prison reforms, notably the establishment of a reformatory for juvenile offenders.

[Sidenote: THE QUEEN'S ACCESSION]

The rejoicings over Queen Victoria's accession in the summer of 1837 were quickly followed by a General Election. The result of this appeal to the country was that the Liberal majority in the House of Commons was reduced to less than forty. Lord John was again returned for Stroud, and on that occasion he delivered a speech in which he cleverly contrasted the legislative achievements of the Tories with those of the Whigs. He made a chivalrous allusion to the 'illustrious Princess who has ascended the Throne with purest intentions and the justest desires.' One passage from his speech merits quotation: 'We have had glorious female reigns. Those of Elizabeth and Anne led us to great victories. Let us now hope that we are going to have a female reign illustrious in its deeds of peace—an Elizabeth without her tyranny, an Anne without her weakness.... I trust that we may succeed in making the reign of Victoria celebrated among the nations of the earth and to all posterity, and that England may not forget her precedence of teaching the nations how to live.'

[Sidenote: LORD MELBOURNE AND THE COURT]

Lord Melbourne had never been a favourite with William, but from the first he stood high in the regard of the young Queen. Her Majesty was but eighteen when she ascended the throne upon which her reign has shed so great a lustre; she had been brought up in comparative seclusion, and her knowledge of public affairs was, of necessity, small. Lord Melbourne at that time was approaching sixty, and the respect which her Majesty gave to his years was heightened by the quick recognition of the fact that the Prime Minister was one of the most experienced statesmen which the country at that moment possessed. He was also a man of ready wit, and endowed with the charm of fine manners, and under his easy nonchalance there lurked more earnest and patriotic conviction than he ever cared to admit. 'I am sorry to hurt any man's feelings,' said Sydney Smith, 'and to brush aside the magnificent fabric of levity and gaiety he has reared; but I accuse our Minister of honesty and diligence.' Ridiculous rumours filled the air during the earliest years of her Majesty's reign concerning the supposed undue influence which Lord Melbourne exerted at Court. The more advanced Radicals complained that he sought to render himself indispensable to the sovereign, and that his plan was to surround her with his friends, relations, and creatures, and so to obtain a prolonged tenure of power. The Tories also grumbled, and made no secret of the same ungenerous suspicions. They knew neither her Majesty nor Lord Melbourne who thus spoke. At the same time, it must be admitted that Lord Melbourne was becoming more and more out of touch with popular aspirations, and the political and social questions which were rapidly coming to the front were treated by him in a somewhat cavalier manner.

Russell had his own misgivings, and was by no means inclined to lay too much stress on the opinions of philosophical Radicals of the type of Grote. At the same time, he urged upon Melbourne the desirability of meeting the Radicals as far as possible, and he laid stress on the fact that they, at least, were not seeking for grounds of difference with the Premier. 'There are two things which I think would be more acceptable than any others to this body—the one to make the ballot an open question, the other to remove Tories from the political command of the army.' Lord Melbourne, however, believed that the ballot would create many evils and cure none. Lord John yielded to his chief, but in doing so brought upon himself a good deal of angry criticism, which was intensified by an unadvised declaration in the House of Commons. In his speech on the Address he referred to the question of Reform, and declared that it was quite impossible for him to take part in further measures of Reform. The people of England might revise the Act of 1832, or agitate for a new one; but as for himself, he refused to be associated with any such movement. A storm of expostulation and angry protest broke out; but the advanced Reformers failed to move Lord John from the position which he had taken. So they concentrated their hostility in a harmless nickname, and Lord John for some time forward was called in Radical circles and certain journalistic publications, 'Finality Jack.' This honest but superfluous and embarrassing deliverance brought him taunts and reproaches, as well as a temporary loss of popularity. It was always characteristic of Lord John to speak his mind, and he sometimes did it not wisely but too well. Grote wrote in February 1838: 'The degeneracy of the Liberal party, and their passive acquiescence in everything, good or bad, which emanates from the present Ministry, puts the accomplishment of any political good out of the question; and it is not worth while to undergo the fatigue of a nightly attendance in Parliament for the simple purpose of sustaining Whig Conservatism against Tory Conservatism. I now look back wistfully to my unfinished Greek history.' Yet Lord Brougham, in the year of the Queen's accession, declared that Russell was the 'stoutest Reformer of them all.'

[Sidenote: LORD DURHAM AND CANADA]

The rebellion in Canada was the first great incident in the new reign, and the Melbourne Cabinet met the crisis by proposals—which were moved by Lord John in the Commons, and adopted—for suspending the Canadian Constitution for the space of four years. The Earl of Durham, at the beginning of 1838, was appointed Governor-General with extraordinary powers, and he reluctantly accepted the difficult post, trusting, as he himself said, to the confidence and support of the Government, and to the forbearance of those who differed from his political views. No one doubts that Durham acted to the best of his judgment, though everyone admits that he exceeded at least the letter of his authority; and no one can challenge, in the light of the subsequent history of Canada, the greatness and far-reaching nature of his services, both to the Crown and to the Dominion. Relying on the forbearance and support, in the faith of which he had accepted his difficult commission, the Governor-General took a high hand with the rebels; but his ordinances were disallowed, and he was practically discredited and openly deserted by the Government. When he was on the point of returning home, a broken-hearted man, in failing health, it was Lord John Russell who at length stood up in Durham's defence. Speaking on the Durham Indemnity Bill, Lord John said: 'I ask you to pass this Bill of Indemnity, telling you that I shall be prepared when the time comes, not indeed to say that the terms or words of the ordinances passed by the Earl of Durham are altogether to be justified, but that, looking at his conduct as a whole, I shall be ready to take part with him. I shall be ready to bear my share of any responsibility which is to be incurred in these difficult circumstances.' The generous nature of this declaration was everywhere recognised, and by none more heartily than Lord Durham. 'I do not conceal from you that my feelings have been deeply wounded by the conduct of the Ministry. From you, however, and you alone of them all, have I received any cordial support personally; and I feel, as I have told you in a former letter, very grateful to you.'

Meanwhile Lord John Russell had been called upon to oppose Mr. Grote's motion in favour of the ballot. Although the motion was lost by 315 to 198 votes, the result was peculiarly galling to Lord John, for amongst the majority were those members who were usually opposed to the Government, whilst the minority was made up of Lord Melbourne's followers. But the crisis threatening the Ministry passed away when a motion of want of confidence in Lord Glenelg, the head of the Colonial Office, was defeated by twenty-nine votes. The Irish legislation of the Government as represented by the Tithe Bill did not prosper, and it became evident that, in order to pass the measure, the Appropriation Clause must be abandoned. Although Lord John Russell emphatically declared in 1835 that no Tithe Bill could be effective which did not include an Appropriation Clause, he gave way to the claims of political expediency, and further alienated the Radicals by allowing a measure which had been robbed of its potency to pass through Parliament. Lord Melbourne's Government accomplished during the session something in the direction of Irish Reform by the passage of the Poor Law, but it failed to carry the Municipal Bill, which in many respects was the most important of the three.

The autumn, which witnessed on both sides of the Atlantic the excitement over Lord Durham's mission to Canada, was darkened in the home of Lord John by the death at Brighton, on November 1, of his wife. His first impulse was to place the resignation of his office and of leadership in the Commons in the hands of his chief. Urgent appeals from all quarters were made to him to remain at his post, and, though his own health was precarious, cheered by the sympathy of his colleagues and of the country, he resumed his work after a few weeks of quiet at Cassiobury.

FOOTNOTES:

[9] Russell's Life of Fox, vol. i. p. 242.



CHAPTER VI

THE TWO FRONT BENCHES

1840-1845

Lord John's position in the Cabinet and in the Commons—His services to Education—Joseph Lancaster—Lord John's Colonial Policy—Mr. Gladstone's opinion—Lord Stanmore's recollections—The mistakes of the Melbourne Cabinet—The Duke of Wellington's opinion of Lord John—The agitation against the Corn Laws—Lord John's view of Sir Robert Peel—The Edinburgh Letter—Peel's dilemma—Lord John's comment on the situation.

THE truth was, Lord John could not be spared, and his strong sense of duty triumphed over his personal grief. One shrewd contemporary observer of men and movements declared that Melbourne and Russell were the only two men in the Cabinet for whom the country cared a straw. The opinion of the man in the street was summed up in Sydney Smith's assertion that the Melbourne Government could not possibly exist without Lord John, for the simple reason that five minutes after his departure it would be dissolved into 'sparks of liberality and splinters of reform.' In 1839 the Irish policy of the Government was challenged, and, on the motion of Lord Roden, a vote of censure was carried in the House of Lords. When the matter came before the Commons, Lord John delivered a speech so adroit and so skilful that friends and foes alike were satisfied, and even pronounced Radicals forgot to grumble.

Lord John's speech averted a Ministerial crisis, and on a division the Government won by twenty-two votes. A month later the affairs of Jamaica came up for discussion, for the Government found itself forced, by the action of the House of Assembly in refusing to adopt the Prisons Act which had been passed by the Imperial Legislature, to ask Parliament to suspend the Constitution of the colony for a period of five years; and on a division they gained their point by a majority of only five votes. The Jamaica Bill was an autocratic measure, which served still further to discredit Lord Melbourne with the party of progress. Chagrined at the narrow majority, the Cabinet submitted its resignation to her Majesty, who assured Lord John that she had 'never felt more pain' than when she learnt the decision of her Ministers. The Queen sent first for Wellington, and afterwards, at his suggestion, for Peel, who undertook to form an Administration; but when her Majesty insisted on retaining the services of the Whig Ladies-in-Waiting, Sir Robert declined to act, and the former Cabinet was recalled to office, though hardly with flying colours.

Education, to hark back for a moment, was the next great question with which Lord John dealt, for, in the summer of 1839, he brought in a bill to increase the grant to elementary schools from 20,000l. a year to 30,000l.—first made in 1833—and to place it under the control of the Privy Council, as well as to subject the aided schools to inspection. 'I explained,' was his own statement, 'in the simplest terms, without any exaggeration, the want of education in the country, the deficiencies of religious instruction, and the injustice of subjecting to the penalties of the criminal law persons who had never been taught their duty to God and man.' His proposals, particularly with regard to the establishment of a Normal school, were met with a storm of opposition. This part of the scheme was therefore abandoned; 'but the throwing out of one of our children to the wolf,' remarks Lord John, 'did little to appease his fury!' At length the measure, in its modified shape, was carried in the Commons; but the House of Lords, led on this occasion by the Archbishop of Canterbury, by a majority of more than a hundred, condemned the scheme entirely. Dr. Blomfield, Bishop of London, at this juncture came forward as peacemaker, and, at a private meeting at Lansdowne House, consisting of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishops of London and Salisbury, Lord Lansdowne, and Lord John Russell, the dispute was amicably adjusted, on the basis of the reports of the Inspectors of Schools being sent to the Bishops as well as to the Committee of Privy Council, and co-operation between the Bishops and the Committee in the work of education.

[Sidenote: JOSEPH LANCASTER]

The Duke of Bedford was one of the first men of position in the country to come to the aid of Joseph Lancaster—a young Quaker philanthropist, who, in spite of poverty and obscurity, did more for the cause of popular education in England in the early years of the century than all the privileged people in the country.[10] Here a floating straw of reminiscence may be cited, since it throws momentary light on the mischievous instincts of a quick-witted boy. Lord John, looking back towards the close of his life, said: 'One of my earliest recollections as a boy at Woburn Abbey is that of putting on Joseph Lancaster's broad hat and mimicking his mode of salutation.'

Other changes were imminent. Lord Normanby had proved himself to be a popular Viceroy of Ireland; indeed, O'Connell asserted that he was one of the best Englishmen that had ever been sent across St. George's Channel in an official capacity. He was now Colonial Secretary; and, in spite of his virtues, he was scarcely the man for such a position—at all events, at a crisis in which affairs required firm handling. He managed matters so badly that the Under-Secretary (Mr. Labouchere, afterwards Lord Taunton) was in open revolt. The cards were accordingly shuffled in May 1839, and, amongst other and less significant changes, Normanby and Russell changed places. Lord John quickly made his presence felt at the Colonial Office. He was a patient listener to the permanent officials; indeed, he declared that he meant to give six months to making himself master of the new duties of his position. Like all men of the highest capacity, Lord John was never unwilling to learn. He held that the Imperial Government was bound not merely by honour, but by enlightened self-interest, to protect the rights and to advance the welfare of the Colonies. His words are significant, and it seems well to quote them, since they gather up the policy which he consistently followed: 'If Great Britain gives up her supremacy from a niggardly spirit of parsimony, or from a craven fear of helplessness, other Powers will soon look upon the Empire, not with the regard due to an equal, as she once was, but with jealousy of the height she once held, without the fear she once inspired. To build up an empire extending over every sea, swaying many diverse races, and combining many forms of religion, requires courage and capacity; to allow such an empire to fall to pieces is a task which may be performed by the poor in intellect, and the pusillanimous in conduct.'

[Sidenote: COLONIAL POLICY]

When Lord John was once asked at the Colonial Office by an official of the French Government how much of Australia was claimed as the dominion of Great Britain, he promptly answered, 'The whole.' The visitor, quite taken aback, found it expedient to take his departure. Lord John vigorously assailed the view that colonies which had their own parliaments, framed on the British model, were virtually independent, and, therefore, had no right to expect more than moral help from the Mother Country. During his tenure of office New Zealand became part of the British dominions. By the treaty of Waitangi, the Queen assumed the sovereignty, and the new colony was assured of the protection of England. Lord John assured the British Provinces of North America that, so long as they wished to remain subjects of the Queen, they might confidently rely on the protection of England in all emergencies.

Mr. Gladstone has in recent years done justice to the remarkable prescience, and scarcely less remarkable administrative skill, which Lord John brought to bear at a critical juncture in the conduct of the Colonial policy of the Melbourne Government. He lays stress on the 'unfaltering courage' which Russell displayed in meeting, as far as was then possible, the legitimate demand for responsible self-government. It is not, therefore, surprising that, to borrow Mr. Gladstone's words, 'Lord John Russell substituted harmony for antagonism in the daily conduct of affairs for those Colonies, each of which, in an infancy of irrepressible vigour, was bursting its swaddling clothes. Is it inexcusable to say that by this decision, which was far ahead of the current opinion of the day, he saved the Empire, possibly from disruption, certainly from much embarrassment and much discredit.'[11] Lord John was a man of vision. He saw, beyond most of his contemporaries, the coming magnitude of the Empire, and he did his best to shape on broad lines and to far-reaching issues the policy of England towards her children beyond the seas. Lord John recognised in no churlish or half-hearted spirit the claims of the Colonies, nor did he stand dismayed by the vision of Empire. 'There was a time when we might have stood alone,' are his words. 'That time has passed. We conquered and peopled Canada, we took possession of the whole of Australia, Van Dieman's Land, and New Zealand. We have annexed India to the Crown. There is no going back. For my part, I delight in observing the imitation of our free institutions, and even our habits and manners, in colonies at a distance from the Palace of Westminster.' He trusted the Colonies, and refused to believe that all the wisdom which was profitable to direct their affairs was centred in Downing Street. His attitude was sympathetic and generous, and at the same time it was candid and firm.

Lord Stanmore's recollections of his father's colleague go back to this period, and will be read with interest: 'As a boy of ten or twelve I often saw Lord John. His half-sister, Lady Louisa Russell, was the wife of my half-brother, Lord Abercorn, and Lord John was a frequent guest at Lord Abercorn's villa at Stanmore, where my father habitually passed his Saturdays and Sundays during the session, and where I almost wholly lived. My first conscious remembrance of Lord John dates from the summer of 1839, and in that and the following years I often saw him at the Priory. Towards the close of 1839 Lord John lost his first wife, and the picture of his little figure, in deep mourning, walking by the side of my father on the gravel walks about the house in the spring and summer of 1840 is one vividly impressed on my recollection. His manner to children was not unpleasant, and I well remember his pausing, an amused listener to a childish and vehement political discussion between his step-daughter, Miss Lister, and myself—a discussion which he from time to time stirred up to increased animation by playfully mischievous suggestions.'

[Sidenote: A HOSTILE RESOLUTION]

Early in the session of 1840, the Ministry was met by a vote of want of confidence, and in the course of the discussion Sir James Graham accused Lord John of encouraging sedition by appointing as magistrate one of the leaders of the Chartist agitation at Newport. Lord John, it turned out, had appointed Mr. Frost, the leader in question, on the advice of the Lord-Lieutenant, and he was able to prove that his own speech at Liverpool had been erroneously reported. The hostile resolution was accordingly repelled, and the division resulted in favour of the Government. For six years Turkey and Egypt had been openly hostile to each other, and in 1839 the war had been pushed to such extremities that Great Britain, Austria, Russia, and Prussia entered into a compact to bring about—by compulsion if necessary—a cessation of hostilities. Lord Holland and Lord Clarendon objected to England's share in the Treaty of July 1840, but Lord Palmerston compelled the Cabinet to acquiesce by a threat of resignation, and Lord John, at this crisis, showed that he was strongly in favour of his colleague's policy. The matter, however, was by no means settled, for once more a grave division of opinion in the party arose as to the wisdom of practically throwing away our alliance with France. Althorp—now Lord Spencer—reminded his former colleagues that that nation was most fitted to be our ally of any in Europe, on the threefold ground of situation, institutions, and civilisation.

Lord John drew up a memorandum and submitted it to his colleagues, in which he recognised the rights of France, and proposed to summon her, under given conditions, to take measures with the other Powers to preserve the peace of Europe. The personal ascendency of Lord Palmerston on questions of foreign policy was, however, already so marked that Lord Melbourne—now his brother-in-law, was reluctant to insist on moderation. Lord John, however, stood firm, and the breaking up of the Government seemed inevitable. During the crisis which followed, Lord Palmerston, striking, as was his wont, from his own bat, rejected, under circumstances which Mr. Walpole has explained in detail in his Life of Lord John Russell, a proposal for a conference of the allied Powers. Lord John had already entered his protest against any one member of the Cabinet being allowed to conduct affairs as he pleased, without consultation or control, and he now informed Lord Melbourne in a letter dated November 1, 1840—which Mr. Walpole prints—that Palmerston's reply to Austria compelled him to once more consider his position, as he could not defend in the House of Commons measures which he thought wrong. Lord Melbourne promptly recognised that Russell was the only possible leader in the Commons, and he induced Lord Palmerston to admit his mistake over the despatch to Metternich, and in this way the misunderstanding was brought to an end. Meanwhile, the fortunes of the war in the East turned against Ibrahim Pasha, and Palmerston's policy, though not his manner of carrying it out, was justified.

[Sidenote: DIVIDED COUNSELS]

The closing years of the Melbourne Administration were marked not only by divided counsels, but by actual blunders of policy, and in this connection it is perhaps enough to cite the Opium war against China and the foolhardy invasion of Afghanistan. At home the question of Free Trade was coming rapidly to the front, and the Anti-corn Law League, which was founded in Manchester in 1838, was already beginning to prove itself a power in the land. As far back as 1826, Hume had taken up his parable in Parliament against the Corn Laws as a blight on the trade of the country; and two years after the Reform Bill was passed he had returned to the attack, only to find, however, that the nation was still wedded to Protection. Afterwards, year after year, Mr. Villiers drew attention to the subject, and moved for an inquiry into the working of the Corn Laws. He declared that the existing system was opposed by the industry, the intelligence, and the commerce of the nation, and at length, in a half-hearted fashion, the Government found itself compelled, if it was to exist at all, to make some attempt to deal with the problem. Lord Melbourne, and some at least of his colleagues, were but little interested in the question, and they failed to gauge the feeling of the country.

In the spring of 1841 action of some kind grew inevitable, and the Cabinet determined to propose a fixed duty of eight shillings per quarter on wheat, and to reduce the duty on sugar. Lord John opened the debate on the latter proposal in a speech which moved even Greville to enthusiasm; but neither his arguments nor his eloquence produced the desired impression on the House, for the Government was defeated by thirty-six votes. Everyone expected the Ministry at once to face the question of dissolution or resignation; but Melbourne was determined to cling to office as long as possible, in spite of the growing difficulties and even humiliations of his position. On June 4, the day on which Lord John was to bring forward his proposal for a fixed duty on wheat, Sir Robert Peel carried a vote of want of confidence by a majority of one, and, as an appeal to the country was at length inevitable, Parliament was dissolved a few days later. The Melbourne Ministry had outstayed its welcome. The manner in which it had left Lord Durham in the lurch over his ill-advised ordinances had aroused widespread indignation, for the multitude at least could not forget the greatness of his services to the cause of Reform. If the dissolution had come two or three years earlier, the Government might have gone to the country without fear; but in 1841, both at home and abroad, their blunders and their vacillation had alienated confidence, and it was not difficult to forecast the result. The General Election brought Lord John a personal triumph. He was presented with a requisition signed by several thousand persons, asking him to contest the City of London, and after an exciting struggle he was returned, though with only a narrow majority; and during the political vicissitudes of the next eighteen years London was faithful to him.

Lord John Russell was essentially a home-loving man, and the gloom which bereavement had cast over his life in the autumn of 1839 was at best only partially dispelled by the close and sympathetic relations with his family. It was, therefore, with satisfaction that all his friends, both on his own account and that of his motherless young children, heard of his approaching second marriage. Immediately after the election for the City, Lord John was married to Lady Fanny Elliot, second daughter of the Earl of Minto, a union which brought him lasting happiness.

[Sidenote: 'A HOST IN HIMSELF']

Parliament met in the middle of August, and the Government were defeated on the Address by a majority of ninety-one, and on August 28 Lord John found himself once more out of harness. In his speech in the House of Commons announcing the resignation of the Government, he said that the Whigs under Lord Grey had begun with the Reform Act, and that they were closing their tenure of power by proposals for the relief of commerce. The truth was, the Melbourne Administration had not risen to its opportunities. Its fixed duty on corn was a paltry compromise. The leaders of the party needed to be educated up to the level of the national demands. Opposition was to bring about unexpected political combinations and new political opportunities, and the years of conflict which were dawning were also to bring more clearly into view Lord John Russell's claims to the Liberal leadership. When the Melbourne Administration was manifestly losing the confidence of the nation, Rogers the poet was walking one day with the Duke of Wellington in Hyde Park, and the talk turned on the political situation. Rogers remarked, 'What a powerful band Lord John Russell will have to contend with! There's Peel, Lord Stanley, Sir James Graham——;' and the Duke interrupted him at this point with the laconic reply, 'Lord John Russell is a host in himself.'

Protection had triumphed at the General Election, and Sir Robert Peel came to power as champion of the Corn Laws. The Whigs had fallen between two stools, for the country was not in a humour to tolerate vacillation. The Melbourne Cabinet had, in truth, in the years which had witnessed its decline and fall, spoken with the voice of Jacob, but stretched forth the hands of Esau. The Radicals shook their heads, scouted the Ministry's deplorable efforts at finance, and felt, to say the least, lukewarm about their spirited foreign policy. 'I don't thank a man for supporting me when he thinks me right,' was the cynical confession of a statesman of an earlier generation; 'my gratitude is with the man who supports me when he thinks me wrong.' Melbourne was doubtless of the same mind; but the man in the crowd, of Liberal proclivities, was, for the most part, rather disgusted with the turn which affairs had taken, and the polling booths made it plain that he thought the Prime Minister wrong, and, that being the case, he was not obliging enough to return him to power. The big drum had been successfully beaten, moreover, at the General Election by the defenders of all sorts and sizes of vested interests, sinecures, monopolies, and the like, and Sir Robert Peel—though not without personal misgivings—accordingly succeeded Melbourne as First Lord, whilst Stanley, now the hope of stern unbending Tories, took Russell's place as Secretary for the Colonies.

The annals of the Peel Administration of course lie outside the province of this monograph; they have already been told with insight and vigour in a companion volume, and the temptation to wander at a tangent into the history of the Queen's reign—especially with Lord John out of office—must be resisted in deference to the exigencies of space. In the Peel Cabinet the men who had revolted under Melbourne, with the exception of the Duke of Richmond, were rewarded with place and power. Lord Ripon, who was spoken of at the time with scarcely disguised contempt as a man of tried inefficiency, became President of the Board of Trade. Sir James Graham, a statesman who was becoming somewhat impervious to new ideas, and who as a Minister displayed little tact in regard to either movements or men, was appointed Home Secretary. Stanley, who had proved himself to be a strong man in the wrong camp, and therefore the evil genius of his party, now carried his unquestionable skill, and his brilliant powers of debate, as well as his imperious temper and contracted views, to the service of the Tories. One other man held a prominent place in Peel's Cabinet, and proved a tower of strength in it—Lord Aberdeen, who was Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and who did much to maintain the peace of Europe when the Tahiti incident and the Spanish marriages threatened embroilment. Lord Aberdeen, from 1841 to 1846, guided the foreign policy of England with ability and discretion, and, as a matter of fact, steered the nation through diplomatic quarrels which, if Lord Palmerston had been at the Foreign Office, would probably have ended in war. This circumstance heightens the irony of his subsequent career.

[Sidenote: THE POLITICAL OUTLOOK]

The outlook, political and social, when Peel took office and Russell confronted him as leader of the Opposition, was gloomy and full of hazard. The times, in Peel's judgment, were 'out of joint,' and this threw party Government out of joint and raised issues which confused ordinary minds. The old political catchwords 'Peace, retrenchment, and reform,' no longer awoke enthusiasm. Civil and religious liberty were all very well in their way, but they naturally failed to satisfy men and women who were ground down by economic oppression, and were famished through lack of bread. The social condition of England was deplorable, for, though the Reform Bill had brought in its wake measures of relief for the middle classes, it had left the artisans and the peasants almost where it found them. In spite of the new Poor Law and other enactments, the people were burdened with the curse of bitter and hopeless poverty, and the misery and squalor in which they were permitted to live threw a menacing shadow over the fair promise of the opening years of the young Queen's reign. The historians of the period are responsible for the statement that in Manchester, for example, one-tenth of the population lived in cellars; even in the rural districts, the overcrowding, with all its attending horrors in the direction of disease and vice, was scarcely less terrible, for in one parish in Dorset thirty-six persons dwelt, on an average, in each house. The wonder is, not that the Anti-Corn Law League under such circumstances grew strong and the demand for the People's Charter rang through the land, but that the masses in town and country alike bore the harsh servitude of their lot with the patience that was common, and with the heroism that was not rare.

[Sidenote: PEEL'S OPEN MIND]

Lord John Russell never refused to admit the ability of Peel's Administration. He described it as powerful, popular, and successful. He recognised the honesty of his great rival, his openness of mind, the courage which he displayed in turning a deaf ear to the croakers in his own Cabinet, and the genuine concern which he manifested for the unredressed grievances of the people. In his 'Recollections' he lays stress on the fact that Sir Robert Peel did not hesitate, when he thought such a step essential to the public welfare, to risk the fate of his Ministry on behalf of an unpopular measure. Ireland was a stone of stumbling in his path, and long after he had parted with his old ideas of Protestant ascendency he found himself confronted with the suspicion of the Roman Catholics, who, in Lord John's words, 'obstinately refused favours at Peel's hands, which they would have been willing to accept from a Liberal Administration.' The allusion is, of course, to the Maynooth Grant—a measure of practical relief to the Irish Catholics, which would, without doubt, have thrown Sir Robert Peel out of office if he had been left to the tender mercies of his own supporters. Disraeli was fond of asserting that Peel lacked imagination, and there was a measure of truth in the charge. He was a great patriotic statesman, haunted by no foolish bugbear of consistency, but willing to learn by experience, and courageous enough to follow what he believed to be right, with unpolitical but patriotic scorn of consequence. Men with stereotyped ideas, who persisted in interpreting concession, however just, as weakness, and reform, however urgent, as revolution, were unable to follow such a leader.

Peel might lack imagination, but he never lacked courage, and the generosity of vision which imposed on courage great and difficult tasks of statesmanship. He could educate himself—for he kept an open mind—and was swift to seize and to interpret great issues in the affairs of the nation; but it was altogether a different matter for him to educate his party. In the spring of 1845, Sir Robert Peel determined to meet the situation in Ireland by bold proposals for the education of the Catholic priesthood. Almost to the close of the eighteenth century the Catholics were compelled by the existing laws to train young men intended for the work of the priesthood in Ireland in French colleges, since no seminary of the kind was permitted in Ireland. The French Revolution overthrew this arrangement, and in 1795, by an Act of the Irish Parliament, Maynooth College was founded, and was supported by annual grants, which were continued, though not without much opposition, by the Imperial Parliament after the Union. On April 3, Sir Robert Peel brought forward his measure for dealing in a generous manner with the needs and claims of this great institution. He proposed that the annual grant should be raised from 9,000l. to upwards of 26,000l., that a charter of incorporation should be given, and that the trustees should be allowed to hold land to the value of 3,000l. a year. He also proposed that the new endowment should be a charge upon the Consolidated Fund, so that angry discussions of the kind in which bigotry and prejudice delight might be avoided. Moreover, in order to restore and enlarge the college buildings, Sir Robert finally proposed an immediate and separate grant of 30,000l. Few statesmen were more sensitive than Peel, but, convinced of the justice of such a concession, he spoke that day amid the angry opposition of the majority of his usual supporters and the approving cheers of his ordinary opponents.

Peel was not the man to falter, although his party was in revolt. He had gauged the forces which were arrayed in Ireland against the authority of Parliament; he stated in his final words on the subject that there was in that country a formidable confederacy, which was prepared to go any lengths against a hard interpretation of the supremacy of England. 'I do not believe that you can break it up by force; I believe you can do much by acting in a spirit of kindness, forbearance, and generosity.' At once a great storm of opposition arose in Parliament, on the platform, and in the Press. The Carlton Club found itself brought into sudden and unexpected agreement with many a little Bethel up and down the country, for the champions of 'No Surrender' in Pall Mall were of one mind with those of 'No Popery' in Exeter Hall. Society for the moment, according to Harriet Martineau, seemed to be going mad, and she saw enough to convince her that it was not the extent of the grant that was deprecated so much as an advance in that direction at all. Public indignation ran so high that in some instances members of Parliament were called upon to resign their seats, whilst Dublin—so far at least as its sentiments were represented by the Protestant Operative Association—was for nothing less than the impeachment of the unhappy Prime Minister. Sectarian animosity, whipped into fury by rhetorical appeals to its prejudices, encouraged the paper trade by interminable petitions to Parliament; and three nights were spent in debate in the Lords and six in the Commons over the second reading of the bill.

[Sidenote: HOW PEEL TRIUMPHED]

Lord John Russell was assailed with threatening letters as soon as it was known that he intended to help Peel to outweather the storm of obloquy which he was called to encounter. Sir Robert's proposals were welcomed by him as a new and worthy departure from the old repressive policy. It was because he thought that such a measure would go far to conciliate the Catholics of Ireland, as well as to prove to them that any question which touched their interests and welfare was not a matter of unconcern to the statesmen and people of England, that he gave—with a loyalty only too rare in public life—his powerful support to a Minister who would otherwise have been driven to bay by his own followers. It was, in fact, owing to Lord John's action that Peel triumphed over the majority of his own party, and his speech in support of the Ministry, though not remarkable for eloquence, was admirable alike in temper and in tact, and was hailed at the moment as a presage of victory. 'Peel lives, moves, and has his being through Lord John Russell,' was Lord Shaftesbury's comment at the moment. Looking back at the crisis from the leisure of retirement, Lord John Russell declared that the Maynooth Act was a work of wisdom and liberality, and one which ought always to be remembered to the honour of the statesman who proposed and carried it. The controversy over the Maynooth Grant revealed how great was the gulf between Peel and the majority of the Tories, and Greville, as usual, in his own incisive way hit off the situation. 'The truth is that the Government is Peel, that Peel is a Reformer and more of a Whig than a Tory, and that the mass of his followers are prejudiced, ignorant, obstinate, and selfish.' Peel declared that he looked with indifference on a storm which he thought partly fanatical and partly religious in its origin, and he added that he was careless as to the consequences which might follow the passing of the Maynooth Bill, so far at least as they concerned his own position.

Meanwhile another and far greater question was coming forward with unsuspected rapidity for solution. The summer of 1845 was cold and wet, and its dark skies and drenching showers were followed by a miserable harvest. With the approach of autumn the fields were flooded and the farmers in consequence in despair. Although England and Scotland suffered greatly, the disaster fell with still greater force on Ireland. As the anxious weeks wore on, alarm deepened into actual distress, for there arose a mighty famine in the land. The potato crop proved a disastrous failure, and with the approach of winter starvation joined its eloquence to that of Cobden and Bright in their demand for the repeal of the Corn Laws. In speaking afterwards of that terrible crisis, and of the services which Cobden and himself were enabled to render to the nation, John Bright used these memorable words: 'Do not suppose that I wish you to imagine that he and I were the only persons engaged in this great question. We were not even the first, though afterwards, perhaps, we became before the public the foremost, but there were others before us, and we were joined, not by scores, but by hundreds, and afterwards by thousands, and afterwards by countless multitudes, and afterwards famine itself, against which we had warred, joined us, and a great Minister was converted, and minorities became majorities, and finally the barrier was entirely thrown down.'

[Sidenote: COBDEN'S PREDICTION]

Quite early in the history of the Anti-Corn-Law League, Cobden had predicted, in spite of the apathy and opposition which the derided Manchester school of politics then encountered, at a time when Peel and Russell alike turned a deaf ear to its appeals, that the repeal of the Corn Laws would be eventually carried in Parliament by a 'statesman of established reputation.' Argument and agitation prepared the way for this great measure of practical relief, but the multitude were not far from the mark when they asserted that it was the rain that destroyed the Corn Laws.[12] The imperative necessity of bringing food from abroad if the people were not to perish for lack of bread brought both Sir Robert Peel and Lord John Russell almost at the same moment to the conclusion that this great economic problem must at once be faced. Peel declared in 1847 that towards the end of 1845 he had reached the conclusion that the repeal of the Corn Laws was indispensable to the public welfare. If that was so, he seems to have kept his opinion to himself, for as late as November 29, in the memorandum which he sent to his colleagues, there is no hint of abolition. On the contrary, Sir Robert, who was always fond of setting forth three alternatives of action, wrote as follows: 'Time presses, and on some definite course we must decide. Shall we undertake without suspension to modify the existing Corn Law? Shall we resolve to maintain the existing Corn Law? Shall we advise the suspension of that law for a limited period? My opinion is for the last course, admitting as I do that it involves the necessity for the immediate consideration of the alterations to be made in the existing Corn Law; such alterations to take effect after the period of suspension. I should rather say it involves the question of the principle and degree of protection to agriculture.'[13] As to the justice of the demand for Free Trade, Peel, there can be no doubt, was already convinced; but his party was regarded as the stronghold of Protection, and he knew enough of the men who sat behind him to be fully alive to the fact that they still clung tenaciously to the fallacies which Adam Smith had exploded. 'We had ill luck,' were Lord Aberdeen's words to the Queen; 'if it had not been for the famine in Ireland, which rendered immediate measures necessary, Sir Robert would have prepared the party gradually for the change.'[14]

[Sidenote: THE 'EDINBURGH LETTER']

Cobden, it is only fair to state, made no secret of his conviction that the question of the repeal of the Corn Laws was safer in the hands of Sir Robert than of Lord John. Peel might be less versed in constitutional questions, but he was more in touch with the manufacturing classes, and more familiar with economic conditions. Sir Robert, however, was sore let and hindered by the weaklings of his own Cabinet, and the rats did not disguise their intention of quitting the ship. Lord John Russell, who was spending the autumn in Scotland, was the first 'responsible statesman' to take decisive action, for whilst Peel, hampered by the vacillation and opposition of his colleagues, still hesitated, Russell took the world into his confidence in his historic 'Edinburgh Letter,' dated November 22, 1845, to his constituents in London. It was a bold and uncompromising declaration of policy, for the logic of events had at length convinced Lord John that any further delay was dangerous. He complained that Her Majesty's Ministers had not only met, but separated, without affording the nation any promise of immediate relief. He pointed out that the existing duties on corn were so contrived that, the worse the quality of the wheat, the higher was the duty. 'When good wheat rises to seventy shillings a quarter, the average price of all wheat is fifty-seven or fifty-eight shillings, and the duty fourteen or fifteen shillings a quarter. Thus the corn barometer points to fair, while the ship is bending under a storm.' He reviewed the course of recent legislation on the subject, and declared that he had for years endeavoured to obtain a compromise. He showed that Peel had opposed in 1839, 1840, and 1841, even qualified concession, and he added the stinging allusion to that statesman's attitude on other great questions of still earlier date. 'He met the proposition for diminished Protection in the same way in which he had met the offer of securities for Protestant interests in 1817 and 1825—in the same way in which he met the proposal to allow Manchester, Leeds, and Birmingham to send members to Parliament in 1830.' Finally, Lord John announced his conviction that it was no longer worth while to contend for a fixed duty, and his vigorous attack on the Ministry ended with a call to arms. 'Let us unite to put an end to a system which has been proved to be the blight of commerce, the bane of agriculture, the source of bitter divisions among classes, the cause of penury, fever, mortality, and crime among the people. The Government appear to be waiting for some excuse to give up the present Corn Law. Let the people, by petition, by address, by remonstrance, afford them the excuse they seek.'

[Sidenote: THE 'POISONED CHALICE']

Sir Robert, when this manifesto appeared, had almost conquered the reluctance of his own Cabinet to definite action; but his position grew now untenable in consequence of the panic of Stanley and the Duke of Buccleuch. Lord John's speech was quickly followed by a Ministerial crisis, and Peel, beset by fightings without and fears within his Cabinet, had no alternative but resignation. He accordingly relinquished office on December 5, and three days later Lord John, much to his own surprise, was summoned to Windsor and entrusted with the task of forming a new Ministry. He was met by difficulties which, in spite of negotiations, proved insurmountable, for Howick, who had succeeded in the previous summer to his distinguished father's earldom, refused to serve with Palmerston. Lord Grey raised another point which might reasonably have been conceded, for he urged that Cobden, as the leader of the Anti-Corn-Law League, ought to have the offer of a seat in the Cabinet. Lord John was unable to bring about an amicable understanding, and therefore, as the year was closing, he was compelled to inform her Majesty of the fact, and to hand back what Disraeli theatrically described as the 'poisoned chalice' to Sir Robert. 'It is all at an end,' wrote Lord John to his wife. 'Power may come, some day or other, in a less odious shape.'

FOOTNOTES:

[10] Justice has never yet been done to the founder of the Lancasterian system of education. Joseph Lancaster was a remarkable man who aroused the conscience of the nation, and even the dull intelligence of George III., to the imperative need of popular education.

[11] 'The Melbourne Government: its Acts and Persons,' by the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P. The Nineteenth Century, January 1890, p. 50.

[12] 'The Corn Law of 1815 was a copy of the Corn Law of 1670—so little had economic science grown in England during all those years. The Corn Law of 1670 imposed a duty on the importation of foreign grain which amounted almost literally to a prohibition.'—Sir Robert Peel, by Justin McCarthy, M.P., chapter xii. p. 136.

[13] The Croker Papers, edited by Louis Jennings, vol. iii. p. 35.

[14] Life of the Prince Consort, by Sir Theodore Martin, vol. i. p. 317.



CHAPTER VII

FACTION AND FAMINE

1846-1847

Peel and Free Trade—Disraeli and Lord George Bentinck lead the attack—Russell to the rescue—Fall of Peel—Lord John summoned to power—Lord John's position in the Commons and in the country—The Condition of Ireland question—Famine and its deadly work—The Russell Government and measures of relief—Crime and coercion—The Whigs and Education—Factory Bill—The case of Dr. Hampden.

LORD STANLEY'S place in the 'organised hypocrisy,' as the Protectionists termed the last Ministry of Sir Robert Peel, was taken by Mr. Gladstone. Sir Robert Peel resumed office in the closing days of December, and all the members of his old Cabinet, on the principle of bowing to the inevitable, returned with him, except the Duke of Buccleuch and Lord Stanley, who resolutely declined to have part or lot in the new departure which the Premier now felt called upon to make. The Duke of Wellington, though hostile to Free Trade, determined to stand by Peel; but he did not disguise the fact that his only reason for remaining in office was for the sake of the Queen. He declared that he acted as the 'retained servant of the monarchy,' for he did not wish her Majesty to be placed under the necessity of taking members of the Anti-Corn-Law League, or, as he put it, 'Cobden & Co.,' for her responsible advisers.

[Sidenote: THE QUEEN'S SPEECH]

The opening days of 1846 were full of political excitement, and were filled with all kinds of rumours. Wellington, on January 6, wrote: 'I don't despair of the Corn Laws,' and confessed that he did not know what were the intentions of Sir Robert Peel concerning them.[15] Peel kept his own counsel, though the conviction grew that he had persuaded himself that in boldness lay the chance as well as the duty of the hour. Peel, like Russell, was converted to Free Trade by the logic of events, and he determined at all hazards to avow the new faith that was in him. Parliament was opened by the Queen in person on January 22, and the Speech from the Throne laid stress on the privation and suffering in Ireland, and shadowed forth the repeal of prohibitive and the relaxation of protective duties. The debate on the Address was rendered memorable by Peel's explanations of the circumstances under which the recent crisis had arisen. He made a long speech, and the tone of it, according to Lord Malmesbury, was half threatening and half apologetic. It was a manly, straightforward statement of the case, and Sir Robert made it plain that he had accepted the views of the Manchester school on the Corn Laws, and was prepared to act without further hesitation on his convictions. One significant admission was added. He stated before he sat down that it was 'no easy task to insure the harmonious and united action of an ancient monarchy, a proud aristocracy, and a reformed House of Commons.'

New interests were, in fact, beginning to find a voice in Parliament, and that meant the beginning of the principle of readjustment which is yet in progress. A few days later the Prime Minister explained his financial plans for the year, and in the course of them he proposed the gradual repeal of the Corn Laws. Free trade in corn was, in fact, to take final effect after an interval of three years. Meanwhile the sliding scale was to be abandoned in favour of a fixed duty of ten shillings the quarter on corn, and other concessions for the relief not only of agriculture but of manufactures and commerce were announced. The principle of Free Trade was, in fact, applied not in one but in many directions, and from that hour its legislative triumph was assured. In the course of the protracted debate which followed, Disraeli, with all the virulence of a disappointed place-hunter, attacked Sir Robert Peel with bitter personalities and barbed sarcasm. On this occasion, throwing decency and good taste to the winds, and, to borrow a phrase of his own, 'intoxicated with the exuberance of his own verbosity,' and with no lack of tawdry rhetoric and melodramatic emphasis, he did his best to cover with ridicule and to reduce to confusion one of the most chivalrous and lofty-minded statesmen of the Queen's reign.

[Sidenote: OUTCAST PROTECTIONISTS]

Disraeli's audacity in attack did much to revive the drooping courage of the Protectionist party, the leadership of which fell for the moment into the hands of Lord George Bentinck, a nobleman more renowned at Newmarket than at Westminster. Once saddled with authority, Lord George developed some capacity for politics; but his claims as a statesman were never serious, though Disraeli, in the political biography which he published shortly after his friend's sudden death, gives him credit for qualities of mind of which the nation at large saw little evidence. After long and tedious discussion, extending over some twenty nights, the Free Trade Bill was carried through the Commons by a majority of ninety-eight votes, and in the Lords it passed the second reading by forty-seven votes. Croker—true to the dismal suggestion of his name—promptly took up his parable against Sir Robert. He declared that the repeal of the Corn Laws meant a schism in the great landed interest and broad acres, in his view, were the only solid foundation on which the government of the nation could possibly be based. He asked, how was it possible to resist the attack on the Irish Church and the Irish Union after the surrender of the Corn Laws? He wanted to know how primogeniture, the Bishops, the House of Lords, and the Crown itself were to be maintained, now that the leader of the Conservative party had truckled to the League. Sir Robert Peel, he added, had imperilled these institutions of the country more than Cobbett or O'Connell; he had broken up the old interests, divided the great families, and thrown personal hostility into the social life of half the counties of England—and all to propitiate Richard Cobden. Such was the bitter cry of the outcast Protectionist, and similar vapourings arose in cliques and clubs all over the land. The abolition of the Corn Laws was the last measure of Sir Robert Peel's political life, and he owed the victory, which was won amid the murmurs and threats of his own followers, to the support which his political antagonists gave him, under the leadership of Lord John Russell, who recognised both the wisdom and the expediency of Sir Robert's course.

Meanwhile the dark winter of discontent which privation had unhappily brought about in Ireland had been marked by many crimes of violence, and at length the Government deemed it imperative to ask Parliament to grant them additional powers for the suppression of outrage. The measure met with the opposition alike of Lord John Russell and Daniel O'Connell. The Government moved the second reading of the Irish Coercion Bill, and the Protectionists, who knew very well not only the views of Daniel O'Connell, but of Smith O'Brien, saw their opportunity and promptly took it. Lord George Bentinck had supported the Coercion Bill on its introduction in the spring, and had done so in the most unmistakable terms. He was not the man, however, to forego the mean luxury of revenge, and neither he nor Disraeli could forgive what they regarded as Sir Robert's great betrayal of the landed interest. He now had the audacity to assert that Peel had lost the confidence of every honest man both within and without the House of Commons, and in spite of his assurances of support he ranged himself for the moment with Russell and O'Connell to crush the Administration. The division took place on June 25, and in a House of 571 members the Ministry was defeated by a majority of 73. The defeat of the Government was so crushing that Whigs and Protectionists alike, on the announcement of the figures, were too much taken aback to cheer. 'Anything,' said Sir Robert, 'is preferable to maintaining ourselves in office without a full measure of the confidence of this House.'

[Sidenote: THE RUSSELL CABINET]

Lord John had triumphed with the help of the Irish, whom Peel had alienated; but the great Minister's downfall had in part been accomplished by the treachery of those who abandoned him with clamour and evil-speaking in the hour of need. Defeat was followed within a week by resignation, and on July 4 Peel, writing from the leisured seclusion of Drayton Manor, 'in the loveliest weather,' was magnanimous enough to say, 'I have every disposition to forgive my enemies for having conferred on me the blessing of the loss of power.' Lord John was summoned to Windsor, and kissed hands on July 6. He became Prime Minister when the condition of affairs was gloomy and menacing, and the following passage from his wife's journal, written on July 14, conjures up in two or three words a vivid picture of the difficulties of the hour: 'John has much to distress him in the state of the country. God grant him success in his labours to amend it! Famine, fever, trade failing, and discontent growing are evils which it requires all his resolution, sense of duty, and love for the public to face.' Lord Palmerston was, of course, inevitable as Foreign Secretary in the new Administration; Sir Charles Wood became Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Sir George Grey, Home Secretary. Earl Grey's scruples were at length satisfied, and he became Secretary to the Colonies; whilst Lord Clarendon took office as President of the Board of Trade, and Lord Lansdowne became President of the Council. Among the lesser lights of the Ministry were Sir J. C. Hobhouse, Mr. Milner Gibson, Mr. Fox Maule, Lord Morpeth, and Mr. (afterwards Lord) Macaulay. Sir James Graham was offered the Governor-Generalship of India, but he had aspirations at Westminster, which, however, were never fulfilled, and declined the offer. The Tory party was demoralised and split up into cliques by suspicion and indignation. Stanley was in the House of Lords by this time, Peel was in disgrace, and Lord George Bentinck was already beginning to cut a somewhat ridiculous figure, whilst nobody as yet was quite prepared to take Disraeli seriously. 'We are left masters of the field,' wrote Palmerston, with a touch of characteristic humour, 'not only on account of our own merits, which, though we say it ourselves, are great, but by virtue of the absence of any efficient competitors.'

The new Ministry began well. Lord John's address to his constituents in the City made an excellent impression, and was worthy of the man and the occasion. 'You may be assured that I shall not desert in office the principles to which I adhered when they were less favourably received. I cannot indeed claim the merit either of having carried measures of Free Trade as a Minister, or of having so prepared the public mind by any exertions of mine as to convert what would have been an impracticable attempt into a certain victory. To others belong those distinctions. But I have endeavoured to do my part in this great work according to my means and convictions, first by proposing a temperate relaxation of the Corn Laws, and afterwards, when that measure has been repeatedly rejected, by declaring in favour of total repeal, and using every influence I could exert to prevent a renewal of the struggle for an object not worth the cost of conflict. The Government of this country ought to behold with an impartial eye the various portions of the community engaged in agriculture, in manufactures, and in commerce. The feeling that any of them is treated with injustice provokes ill-will, disturbs legislation, and diverts attention from many useful and necessary reforms. Great social improvements are required: public education is manifestly imperfect; the treatment of criminals is a problem yet undecided; the sanitary condition of our towns and villages has been grossly neglected. Our recent discussions have laid bare the misery, the discontent, and outrages of Ireland; they are too clearly authenticated to be denied, too extensive to be treated by any but the most comprehensive means.'

[Sidenote: EVER A FIGHTER]

Lord John had been thirty-three years in the House of Commons when he became for the first time Prime Minister. The distinction of rank and of an historic name gave him in 1813, when government by great families was still more than a phrase, a splendid start. The love of liberty which he inherited as a tradition grew strong within him, partly through his residence in Edinburgh under Dugald Stewart, partly through the generous and stimulating associations of Holland House, but still more, perhaps, because of the tyranny of which he was an eye-witness during his travels as a youth in Italy and Spain at a period when Europe lay under the heel of Napoleon. Lord John was ever a fighter, and the political conflicts of his early manhood against the triple alliance of injustice, bigotry, and selfish apathy in the presence of palpable social abuses lent ardour to his convictions, tenacity to his aims, and boldness to his attitude in public life. Although an old Parliamentary hand, he was in actual years only fifty-four when he came to supreme office in the service of the State, but he had already succeeded in placing great measures on the Statute Book, and he had also won recognition on both sides of the House as a leader of fearless courage, open mind, and great fertility of resource alike in attack and in defence. Peel, his most formidable rival on the floor of the Commons, hinted that Lord John Russell was small in small things, but, he added significantly that, when the issues grew great, he was great also. Everyone who looks at Lord John's career in its length and breadth must admit the justice of such a criticism. On one occasion he himself said, in speaking of the first Lord Halifax, that the favourite of Charles II. had 'too keen a perception of errors and faults to act well with others,' and the remark might have been applied to himself. There were times when Lord John, by acting hastily on the impulse of the moment, landed his colleagues in serious and unlooked for difficulties, and sometimes it happened that in his anxiety to clear his own soul by taking an independent course, he compromised to a serious extent the position of others.

Lord Melbourne's cynical remark, to the effect that nobody did anything very foolish except from some strong principle, carries with it a tribute to motive as well as a censure on action, and it is certain that the promptings to which Lord John yielded in the questionable phases of his public career were not due to the adroit and calculating temper of self-interest. His weaknesses were indeed, after all, trivial in comparison to his strength. He rose to the great occasion and was inspired by it. All that was formal and hesitating in manner and speech disappeared, and under the combined influence of the sense of responsibility and the excitement of the hour 'languid Johnny,' to borrow Bulwer Lytton's phrase, 'soared to glorious John.' Palmerston, like Melbourne, was all things to all men. His easy nonchalance, sunny temper, and perfect familiarity with the ways of the world and the weaknesses of average humanity, gave him an advantage which Lord John, with his nervous temperament, indifferent health, fastidious tastes, shy and rather distant bearing, and uncompromising convictions, never possessed. Russell's ethical fervour and practical energetic bent of mind divided him sharply from politicians who lived from hand to mouth, and were never consumed by a zeal for reform in one direction or another; and these qualities sometimes threw him into a position of singular isolation. The wiles and artifices by which less proud and less conscientious men win power, and the opportune compliments and unwatched concessions by which too often they retain it, lay amongst the things to which he refused to stoop.

[Sidenote: HIS PRACTICAL SAGACITY]

Men might think Lord John taciturn, angular, abrupt, tenacious, and dogmatic, but it was impossible not to recognise his honesty, public spirit, pluck in the presence of difficulty, and high interpretation of the claims of public duty which marked his strenuous and indomitable career. His qualifications for the post of Prime Minister were not open to challenge. He was deeply versed in constitutional problems, and had received a long and varied training in the handling of great affairs. He possessed to an enviable degree the art of lucid exposition, and could render intricate proposals luminous to the public mind. He was a shrewd Parliamentary tactician, as well as a statesman who had worthily gained the confidence of the nation. He was ready in debate, swift to see and to seize the opportunity of the hour. He was full of practical sagacity, and his personal character lent weight to his position in the country. In the more militant stages of his career, and especially when he was fighting the battles of Parliamentary reform and religious liberty, he felt the full brunt of that 'sullen resistance to innovation,' as well as that 'unalterable perseverance in the wisdom of prejudice,' which Burke declared was characteristic of the English race. The natural conservatism of growing years, it must be frankly admitted, led eventually in Lord John's case, as in that of the majority of mankind, to the slackening of interest in the new problems of a younger generation, but to the extreme verge of life he remained far too great a statesman and much too generous a man ever to lapse into the position of a mere laudator temporis acti. Lord John did not allow the few remaining weeks of a protracted and exhaustive session to elapse without a vigorous attempt to push the principle of Free Trade to its logical issues. He passed a measure which rendered the repeal of the Corn Laws total and immediate, and he carried, with the support of Peel and in spite of the opposition of Bentinck and Disraeli, the abolition of protection to sugar grown in the British Colonies.

Ireland quickly proved itself to be a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence to the new Administration. Lord John's appointment of Lord Bessborough—his old colleague, Duncannon, in the Committee on Reform in 1830—as viceroy was popular, for he was a resident Irish landlord, and a man who was genuinely concerned for the welfare of the people. O'Connell trusted Lord Bessborough, and that, in the disturbed condition of the country, counted for much. The task of the new viceroy was hard, even with such support, and though Bessborough laboured manfully and with admirable tact to better the social condition of the people and to exorcise the spirit of discord, the forces arrayed against him proved resistless when famine came to their aid. As the summer slipped past, crime and outrage increased, and the prospect for the approaching winter grew not merely gloomy but menacing. Peel had been turned out of office because of his Irish Arms Bill, and Bessborough was no sooner installed in Dublin than he made urgent representations to the Cabinet in Downing Street as to the necessity of adopting similar repressive measures, in view of the prevailing lawlessness and the contempt for life and property which in the disaffected districts were only too common. In August the crisis was already so acute that the Government, yielding to the fears of its Irish advisers, stultified itself by proposing the renewal of the Arms Bill until the following spring. The step was ill advised, and provoked much hostile criticism. Lord John did not relish the measure, but Lord Bessborough declared that Ireland could not be governed for the moment without it, and as he also talked of throwing up his appointment, and was supported in this view of the situation by Mr. Labouchere (afterwards Lord Taunton), who at that time was Chief Secretary, the Prime Minister gave way and introduced in the House of Commons proposals which were out of keeping with his own antecedents, and which he personally disliked. In speaking of Sir Robert Peel's Coercion Bill in his published 'Recollections,' Lord John makes no secret of his own attitude towards the measure. 'I objected to the Bill on Irish grounds. I then thought, and I still think, that it is wrong to arrest men and put them in prison on the ground that they may be murderers and housebreakers. They may be, on the other hand, honest labourers going home from their work.' On the contrary, he thought that every means ought to be promptly taken for discovering the perpetrators of crime and bringing them to justice, and he also believed in giving the authorities on the spot ample means of dealing with the reign of terror which agrarian outrages had established.

[Sidenote: THE IRONY OF THE SITUATION]

If O'Connell had been at Lord John's side at that juncture, England might have sent a practical message of good-will to Ireland instead of falling back on the old policy of coercion. O'Connell had learnt to trust Russell—as far, at least, as it was possible for a leader of the Irish people to trust a Whig statesman—and Russell, on the other hand, was beginning to understand not merely O'Connell, but the forces which lay behind him, and which rendered him, quite apart from his own eloquence and gifts, powerful. Unfortunately, the Liberator was by this time broken in health, and the Young Ireland party were already in revolt against his authority, a circumstance which, in itself, filled the Premier with misgivings, and led him to give way, however reluctantly, to the demand of the viceroy for repressive measures. Lord John was, in fact, only too well aware that force was no remedy. He wished, as much as O'Connell, to root up the causes which produced crime. Young Ireland, however, seemed determined to kick over the traces at the very time when the Liberator was inducing the Whigs to look at the question in a practical manner. Lord John knew, to borrow his own expression, that the 'armoury of penal legislation was full of the weapons of past battles, and yet the victory of order and peace had not been gained.' The Liberal party set its face against coercion in any shape or form, and the Government withdrew a proposal which they ought never to have introduced. This course had scarcely been taken when a new and terrible complication of the social problem in Ireland arose.

[Sidenote: THE IRISH FAMINE]

Famine suddenly made its presence felt, and did so in a manner which threw the privation and scarcity of the previous winter altogether into the shade. The potato crop was a disastrous failure, and, as the summer waned, the distress of an impoverished and thriftless race grew acute. The calamity was as crushing as it was rapid. 'On July 27,' are Father Mathew's words, 'I passed from Cork to Dublin, and this doomed plant bloomed in all the luxuriance of an abundant harvest. Returning on August 3 I beheld with sorrow one wide waste of putrefying vegetation.' A million and a half of acres were at the moment under cultivation, and the blight only spared a quarter of them, whilst, to make matters worse, the oat crop, by an unhappy coincidence, proved to a startling extent insufficient. The financial loss in that disastrous harvest, in the reckoning of experts, amounted to between fifteen and sixteen millions sterling. Fever and dysentery made fatal inroads on the dwindling strength of the gaunt and famished peasantry, and in one district alone, out of a population of 62,000 inhabitants, no less than 5,000 persons died, directly or indirectly, of starvation in the course of three months. 'All our thoughts,' wrote O'Connell, 'are engrossed with two topics—endeavouring to keep the people from outbreaks, and endeavouring to get food for them.' In many instances the landlords seemed robbed of the characteristics of ordinary humanity, for the ruthless process of eviction was carried on with a high hand, and old men and children were left unsheltered as well as unfed.

Property had neglected its duties, but, as usual, did not neglect its rights, and in that terrible crisis it overrode the rights of humanity. Many of the landowners, however, manfully did their best to stay the plague, but anything which they could accomplish seemed a mockery amid the widespread distress. Readers of Sir Gavan Duffy's 'Four Years of Irish History' will recall his vivid description of the manner in which some of the landowners, however, saw their cruel opportunity, and accordingly 'closed on the people with ejectments, turned them on the road, and plucked down their roof-trees,' and also that still more painful passage which describes how women with dead children in their arms were seen begging for a coffin to bury them. Relief committees were, of course, started; the Friends, in particular, busied themselves in practical efforts to cope with the distress, and Mr. W. E. Forster, who went to Ireland to distribute relief, declared that his wonder was, as he passed from village to village, not that the people died, but that so many contrived to live.

The Russell Government met the crisis with courage, though scarcely with adequate understanding. Ireland remembered with bitterness their Arms Bill and their repressive measures. Public feeling ran high over some of their proposals, for the people resented Lord John's modification of Sir Robert Peel's plan by which the cost of public works was to be defrayed by the State and district in which employment was given. Lord John determined that the cost should be met in the first instance by Government loans, which were to be repaid with an almost nominal interest by the people of the district. This was interpreted to mean that Ireland was to bear her own burdens, and in her impoverished state was to be saddled with the financial responsibilities inseparable from so pitiable a collapse of prosperity. Bread riots and agrarian disturbances grew common, and the Government met them with rather more than becoming sternness, instead of dealing promptly with the land-tenure system which lay at the root of so much of the misery. At the beginning of the session of 1847 it was stated that 10,000,000l. would be required to meet the exigencies of the situation. Lord George Bentinck proposed a grant of 16,000,000l. for the construction of Irish railways, but Lord John made the question one of personal confidence in himself, and threatened resignation if it passed. His chief objection to the proposal was based on the fact that seventy-five per cent. of the money spent in railway construction would not reach the labouring classes. Lord George Bentinck's motion was rejected by a sweeping majority, though at a subsequent stage in the session the Government consented to advance a substantial sum to three Irish railways—a concession which exposed them to the usual taunts of inconsistency.

[Sidenote: MEASURES OF RELIEF]

Measures were also introduced for promoting emigration to the colonies, and for the suspension of certain clauses of the Navigation Laws which hindered the importation of foreign corn. At one time during the distress there were no less than six hundred thousand men employed on public works in Ireland, and the Government found it no easy task to organise this vast army of labour, or to prevent abuses. Lord Bessborough urged that the people should be employed in the improvement of private estates, but Lord John met this proposal with disapproval, though he at length agreed that the drainage of private land should come within the scope of public works. It was further determined to lend money in aid of the improvement of private property, the operation of the Irish Poor Law was also extended, and in other directions energetic measures were taken for the relief of the prevailing destitution. Lord John was a keen observer both of men and of movements, and the characteristics of the peasantry, and more particularly the personal helplessness of the people, and the lack of concerted action among them, impressed him. 'There are some things,' he declared, 'which the Crown cannot grant and which Parliament cannot enact—the spirit of self-reliance and the spirit of co-operation. I must say plainly that I should indeed despair of this task were it not that I think I see symptoms in the Irish people both of greater reliance on their own energies and exertions, and of greater intelligence to co-operate with each other. Happy will it be, indeed, if the Irish take for their maxim, "Help yourselves and Heaven will help you," and then I think they will find there is some use in adversity.'