The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Volume 1

by Stephen Lucius Gwynn

II.

The business of the autumn Session was limited, by agreement, to determining the new "Rules of Procedure."

'On Friday, October 20th, there was a Cabinet which decided to stick to our first resolution on procedure—that is on the closure—without change; or, in other words, to closure by a bare majority.'

When the matter came to a vote in the House, the Government were saved from defeat by the support of Mr. Parnell and his adherents, who were determined not to have closure by a two-thirds majority, which could in practice be used only against a small group.

'On Monday, October 23rd, the Cabinet considered the principle of delegation of duties from Parliament itself to Grand Committees, to be proposed in the procedure resolutions.'

This was the beginning of what is now the ordinary procedure in all Bills, except those of the first importance. It was introduced expressly as an experiment on six months' trial; and it appears that it was not adopted without much opposition in the Cabinet, for the Memoir records:

'On November 21st Hartington and Harcourt tried hard to induce Mr. Gladstone to drop his idea of Grand Committees, and I noted in my diary: "If they are dropped now they are dead for ever—that is, for a year at least. 'Ever' in politics means one year."'

On November 13th Lord Randolph Churchill, in a discourse upon the right to make motions for adjournment, contrived, by way of happy illustration, to refer to the "Kilmainham Treaty." The phrase in itself was a red rag to Mr. Gladstone, but Lord Randolph added to the provocation by describing it as "a most disgraceful transaction, so obnoxious that its precise terms had never been made known." Mr. Gladstone charged fiercely at the lure, denied that there had been any "treaty," and challenged the Opposition to move for a Committee of Inquiry.

On November 14th, between two meetings at Lord Granville's house, at which
'Kimberley, Northbrook, Carlingford, and Childers were present with
myself, there was a discussion at lunch as to Mr. Gladstone's promise of a
Committee on the Kilmainham Treaty, at which all his colleagues of the
Cabinet were furious.'

On November 16th:

'a Cabinet was suddenly called for this afternoon to consider Mr. Gladstone's extraordinary blunder in granting a Committee on the Treaty of Kilmainham. The whole of his colleagues had been against him when he had previously wished to do it, and now he had done it without asking one of them. Grosvenor, the Whip, thought it would upset the Government. Mr. Gladstone expressed his regret to his colleagues that he had been carried away by his temper. Harcourt said that no two of the witnesses would give the same account of the transaction, and that while Mr. Gladstone might force Chamberlain, as his subordinate, to make a clean breast of it, it was hard on Parnell.

'There was later in the day a private conversation between Chamberlain and Harcourt and Grosvenor as to the Kilmainham Committee, Chamberlain declaring that if called before a Committee he must read all the letters, and Harcourt saying that if they were read he should resign.'

When the Session opened on October 27th, the Memoir indicates that the
Prime Minister's retirement was expected.

On November 4th there was a dinner at 76, Sloane Street, at which Mr. Gladstone, Lord Granville, the Dean of Westminster, Mr. Balfour, and others, came to meet the Duc de Broglie. In the course of the evening,

'Mr. Gladstone told me that he had finally decided not to meet Parliament again in February. The gossip was that Hartington was to be Prime Minister, that Fawcett would resign if not put into the Cabinet, and Chamberlain and I had agreed to insist on county franchise '(which meant a very large extension of the suffrage),' and to withdraw our opposition to Goschen, it being understood that he gave way on county franchise. It was far from certain that Mr. Gladstone meant Hartington to be leader on his retirement. The Duchess of Manchester had told me just before my dinner on Saturday, November 4th, that Mr. Gladstone had written to Lord Granville to tell him he should not meet Parliament again, saying that he wrote to him as he had been leader when the party had been in Opposition. The letter had been shown to Hartington, who was much irritated at the phrase. The letter was also sent on to the Queen, and the Duchess thought that the Queen had said in reply that if Mr. Gladstone resigned she should send not for Lord Granville, but for Hartington.

'On Monday, November 6th, I heard more about the proposed resignation of Mr. Gladstone. He had declared that he would not take a peerage, but had promised not to attend the House of Commons, and I thought that Hartington would make his going to the Lords, or at least leaving the Commons, a condition. I pressed for the inclusion of Courtney in the Cabinet in the event of any change.'

Although one of Mr. Gladstone's junior colleagues from 1880 onwards, Sir Charles Dilke had been frequently in disagreement with him, and in 1882 had refused to accept the Irish Secretaryship. Yet it was to Sir Charles that Mr. Gladstone in 1882 was beginning to look as his ultimate successor in the lead of the House of Commons. A passage in Lord Acton's correspondence shows how Mr. Gladstone's mind was working at this time. A breakfast-table discussion between Miss Gladstone and her father is noted by her, at which, on the assumption of Mr. Gladstone's retirement and the removal of Lord Hartington to the House of Lords, the names of possible successors to the leadership of the House of Commons were discussed. The Chief's estimate of Dilke was thus given:

"The future leader of H. of C. was a great puzzle and difficulty. Sir
Charles Dilke would probably be the man best fitted for it; he had
shown much capacity for learning and unlearning, but he would require
Cabinet training first." [Footnote: Letters of Lord Acton, p. 90.]

It followed, then, that if Mr. Gladstone seriously contemplated resignation, he was bound to insure that Sir Charles got without more delay the "Cabinet training." It was absurd that the Minister in whom Mr. Gladstone saw the likeliest future leader of the House of Commons should be kept technically, and to some extent really, outside the inner circle of confidence and responsibility.

By the middle of November the hint of Mr. Gladstone's retirement had leaked out, and conjecture was busy with reconstruction of the Cabinet. Apart from the question of the Prime Minister's position, speculation was kept active by the fact that since Mr. Bright's retirement in June no appointment had been made to the Chancellorship of the Duchy of Lancaster, that office having no very urgent or definite duties. There was also the widespread feeling that Sir Charles Dilke's admission to the Cabinet was overdue, and men guessed rightly at the cause of the delay. Meanwhile the leaders of the party were considering how far these causes still operated. On November 16th Sir Charles was approached by the Chief Whip.

'Lord R. Grosvenor, after the Cabinet, came to me, and asked me if I thought that the Queen was now willing to have me in the Cabinet. I said that so far as I knew the trouble was at an end. He replied that he had had two accounts of it. Harcourt told him that both the Prince of Wales and Prince Leopold had said that she had made up her mind to take me; but Hartington said that she had told him a different story. I said I did not know which was right; but that she could take me or leave me, for not another word would I say.

'Sunday, November 19th, I spent at Cuffnells, Lyndhurst—the home of
"Alice in Wonderland," Mrs. Hargreaves, Dean Liddel's daughter—with
the Harcourts, and Harcourt told me that he believed in Mr.
Gladstone's retirement.'

In the last days of November Sir Charles was at Sandringham with Mr.
Chamberlain.

'Chamberlain told me that Lord Hartington and Lord Granville were going to insist with Mr. Gladstone that he should stay as nominal Prime Minister, Hartington taking the Exchequer and dividing the lead of the House with him, and Rosebery and I being put into the Cabinet.

'On December 1st there was a Cabinet, before which Lord Granville told me that I was to be put into the Cabinet at once if the Queen consented. When they met at two o'clock the Cabinet were told of this and strict secrecy sworn, but two of them immediately came and told me that it was settled I was to be Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.'

The Chancellorship of the Duchy presented itself to Sir Charles Dilke as a kind of roving commission to help other Ministers with the detail of measures. But the Queen took the view that this place was a "peculiarly personal one," and should be held by someone whom she considered a "moderate" politician, and who need not be in the Cabinet. On December 4th

'the Queen, who had been informed that she was still a free agent with regard to me, had hesitated with regard to the Duchy of Lancaster, which had, of course, been conditionally accepted by me on the understanding that I was to be man-of-all-work in the Cabinet. It was understood on this day that Childers was to be Chancellor of the Exchequer if his health allowed it, and a delay was granted for his decision or that of his doctors; and it was understood that Lord Derby was to come in in Childers' place. Evelyn Ashley was suggested for my place; and Edmond Fitzmaurice, Henry Brand, or Brett for Ashley's' (that of Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade).

On December 7th it was settled that

'Hartington was to go to the War Office if the doctors pronounced
Childers well enough to take the Exchequer, and this would leave the
Under-Secretaryships for the Colonies and India, as well as for
Foreign Affairs, open between Fitzmaurice, Ashley, Brand, and Brett.

'Harcourt wrote on the 7th about Mr. Gladstone: "The resignation
project is for the present adjourned sine die."

'On Saturday, December 9th, Childers came to me from Mr. Gladstone to ask if I objected (as we had settled that it would be improper for me to invite a contest in Chelsea on the old register in the last month of the year) to letting my appointment be known before it was made, and I consented, although this would have had the effect, in the event of opposition, of giving me a twenty days' fight instead of one of only seventeen.'

Mr. Gladstone now put forward a different proposal:

'On Monday, the 11th, I saw the Prince of Wales with regard to my appointment. On the same day Mr. Gladstone had some trouble with the Queen about the Primacy, as he told me on December 12th…. On the 12th I wrote to Chamberlain that Austin Lee had told me that the Queen had some days earlier told our friend Prince Leopold that she was willing that I should be in the Cabinet, but not in the Duchy, and it was this that she had said to Mr. Gladstone on the 11th about which he sent for me on the 12th. He said that he thought it would be possible to get over this objection in time, but that there was another possibility about which he asked me to write to Chamberlain, but not as from him. I wrote: "Would you take the Duchy and let me go to the Board of Trade, you keeping your Bills? This would be unpleasant to you personally, I feel sure, unless for my sake, though the Duchy is of superior rank. It would, of course, be a temporary stopgap, as there must be other changes soon. It is not necessary that you should do it, else I know that you would do it for me. So that please feel you are really free. I told Mr. Gladstone that I could only put it to you in such a way as to leave you free. You had better perhaps write your answer so that I can show it him, though I suppose he will suppose himself not to have seen it!"'

On December 13th the Prince of Wales sent for Sir Charles to advise his pressing this course on Mr. Chamberlain. But on that same day Mr. Chamberlain replied from Highbury:

"MY DEAR DILKE,

"Your letter has spoilt my breakfast. The change will be loathsome to me for more than one reason, and will give rise to all sorts of disagreeable commentaries. But if it is the only way out of the difficulty, I will do what I am sure you would have done in my place— accept the transfer. I enclose a note to this effect which you can show to Mr. G. Consider, however, if there is any alternative. I regard your immediate admission to the Cabinet as imperative, and therefore if this can only be secured by my taking the Duchy, cadit quaestio, and I shall never say another word on the subject. Two other courses are possible, though I fear unlikely to be accepted: (1) Mr. Gladstone might tell the Queen that I share the opinions you have expressed with regard to the dowries, and intend to make common cause with you—that if your appointment is refused I shall leave the Government, and that the effect will be to alienate the Radical Party from the Ministry and the Crown, and to give prominence to a question which it would be more prudent to allow to slumber. I think the Queen would give way. If not we should both go out. We should stand very well with our party, and in a year or two we could make our own terms. Personally I would rather go out than take the Duchy…. (2) Has the matter been mentioned to Dodson? He might like an office with less work, [Footnote: Mr. Dodson was President of the Local Government Board.] and he might be influenced by the nominally superior rank…. Now you have my whole mind. I would gladly avoid the sacrifice, but if your inclusion in the Cabinet depends upon it, I will make it freely and with pleasure for your sake."

'The result was that Dodson "put himself in Mr. Gladstone's hands." There was, however, an interval of ten days, during which things went backwards and forwards much.'

The probability of the Queen's refusal to accept Mr. Chamberlain for the Duchy made his threat of resignation more serious, and a letter came to Sir Charles from Mr. Francis Knollys deprecating this vehemently on behalf of the Prince of Wales. Its last sentence is worth quoting, as it endorsed what was known to be Dilke's own special wish:

"What he would like to see would be Lord Northbrook at the India
Office and you at the Admiralty."

'On December 14th I saw Mr. Gladstone, but a new opening had arisen, for Fawcett was very ill, and supposed to be dying, and Mr. Gladstone determined to wait for a few days to see whether he got better….

'On December 16th Mr. Gladstone pledged himself to me in writing with regard to putting me immediately into the Cabinet in some place, and on December 17th the Queen agreed that a paragraph to that effect should be sent to the newspapers. On the 18th, however, she declined to entertain the question of taking Chamberlain for the Duchy. On December 20th Mr. Gladstone wrote that he was "between the devil and the deep sea." I do not know which of the two meant the Queen, and whether the other was myself or Chamberlain. On December 21st Chamberlain came up to town to see me. On the 22nd the Dodson plan went forward in letters from Mr. Gladstone to Sir Henry Ponsonby, the Queen's Secretary, and from Lord Hartington, to the Queen. On the 22nd at night Dodson accepted it, and on the 23rd I was formally so informed, and virtually accepted the Presidency of the Local Government Board, which I nominally accepted on December 26th.'

Before Sir Charles vacated the seat by his letter of acceptance, the Tories in Chelsea had met and decided not to oppose him. Among the letters of congratulation none gratified the new Minister more than one from Lord Barrington, Lord Beaconsfield's former private secretary, who wrote, even before the appointment was officially confirmed:

"I like watching your political career as, besides personal feeling, it makes me think of what my dear old chief used to say about you— that you were the rising man on the other side."

On December 27th Lord Granville sent from Walmer Castle a letter of characteristic courtesy and charm.[Footnote: The letter given in Chapter XX., p. 311.] It crossed an expression of gratitude already despatched by his junior:

"MY DEAR LORD GRANVILLE,

"Having received Mr. Gladstone's letter with the Queen's approval, I write to thank you for all your many kindnesses to me while I have been under your orders. I shall continue to attend the office until the Council, but I cannot let the day close without trying to express in one word all that I owe to you as regards the last thirty-two months.

"Sincerely yours,

"CHARLES W. DILKE."

But it was much later, when the Government had fallen, that this "one word" came to be developed.

"76, SLOANE STREET, S.W. "Tuesday, July 14th, 1885.

"MY DEAR LORD GRANVILLE,

"I am glad you feel as you do about me. Malicious people and foolish people have both so long said that I wanted to be S. of S. for For. Affs. myself that I never expect to be believed when I say the simple truth—that in my opinion it ought to be in the Lords as long as there are Lords, and that my only wish was to be of any help I could. I can only think of the Errington-Walsh business when I think over points on which we have differed, and I cannot help scoring that down to Forster and the silly Irish Government, and not to you, though you are so loyal a colleague that when you have accepted you always actively support.

"I do not suppose I shall ever, if again in office, have such pleasant official days as those I spent in the F.O. under you, but the next best thing would be at the Admiralty—the office to which all my life has always inclined me—to obey your orders from the F.O.

"I am sure you will believe this even if no one else will, and believe me also ever

"Yours very affectionately and sincerely,

"CHARLES W. DILKE."

'Trevelyan, in sending his congratulations from the Chief Secretary's Office at Dublin, asked me for the earliest possible draft of heads of my Local Government Bill for England: "in case it is settled that we are to bring one in—a move which I have come to think is necessary. They need not run on all fours, but there are points on which it would not do to adopt a different policy."'

To the Secretary of State's congratulations, Sir Julian Pauncefote, permanent head of the Foreign Office staff, added his tribute:

"How we all deplore your departure, none so much as myself. You will leave behind you a lasting memory of your kindness and geniality, and of your great talents."

Other friends, among them Mr. Knollys, assumed as a matter of course that the promotion would bring a change from congenial to uncongenial work. They were right. "I shall be in the Local Government Board by Wednesday, as I shan't, after Chamberlain's kindness, put him in a place which he will like less than the Board of Trade. Shan't I hate it after this place!" Sir Charles Dilke wrote. "But," he added, "it will 'knock the nonsense out of me.'" That was the view put to him, for instance, by Lord Barrington. "In the end it is well that a Minister should go through the comparative drudgery of other offices. It gets him 'out of a groove.'"

Mr. Gladstone, on making what Sir Charles Dilke calls 'the formal announcement' on December 23rd, wrote:

"Notwithstanding the rubs of the past, I am sanguine as to your future relations with the Queen. There are undoubtedly many difficulties in that quarter, but they are in the main confined to three or four departments. Your office will not touch them, while you will have in common with all your colleagues the benefit of two great modifying circumstances which never fail—the first her high good manners, and the second her love of truth….

"I have entered on these explanations, because it is my fervent desire, on every ground, to reduce difficulties in such high and delicate matters to their minimum; and because, with the long years which I hope you have before you, I also earnestly desire that your start should be favourable in your relations with the Sovereign."

This was written only a few weeks after the Prime Minister had spoken to his intimates of Dilke as some day his probable successor in the leadership of the House of Commons. Mr. Gladstone did not omit to urge that the new Minister should do his best to conciliate good-will. The Queen, he said, "looked with some interest or even keenness to the words of explanation as to the distant past," which Sir Charles himself had— "not in any way as a matter of bargain, but as a free tender"—proposed to use.

They were guarded. In an address delivered at Kensington before his re- election, he dwelt almost exclusively on questions of Local Government, and coming to the Government of London, he said:

"There were very many subjects upon which one might modify one's opinions as one grew older; there were opinions of political infancy which, as one grew older, one might regard as unwise, or might prefer not to have uttered; but upon the Government of London—the opinions he expressed in 1867 were his personal opinions at the present time."

This and the closing admission that when he first came before the electors of Chelsea, he "was only between three-and four-and-twenty years of age, and was perhaps at that time rather scatter-brained," are all the allusions to the remote past which the speech contains; but there is every reason to believe that it was taken as satisfactory. Mr. Gladstone wrote that the comments of the Conservative press, which were pretty certain to be read at Osborne, would be useful. Finally, "to integrate their correspondence," he added this reference to Sir Charles's known wish for the Admiralty:

"I passed over the suggestion about clearing the Admiralty (a) from reluctance to start Northbrook's removal to any less efficient place; (b) on account of Parliamentary displacements; not at all because it was too big a place to vacate and offer."

'All the same,' the Memoir adds, 'I liked the L.G.B.'

The change of office did not mean any severance from foreign policy, which Sir Charles could now approach in his proper sphere, with the authority of a Cabinet Minister. He was succeeded by Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice, who had returned from his mission to Constantinople. Dilke wrote on December 23rd to Lord Granville: "I should suggest that no time be lost in getting Fitzmaurice here. He likes work, and will go at these matters like a lion."

'On the last day of the old year Lord Granville, writing from Walmer to thank me for what I had said about him to my constituents, added: "I have given the sack to —— at the end of the five years' limit which now expires. He would like to keep the appointment on leave for six months, and might be very useful in advising the office. But would there be any House of Commons objection to this prolongation?" This was a specimen of the way in which, after I had left the Foreign Office, all Foreign Office questions were still thrown on to me; and as a matter of fact I did almost as much Foreign Office work during the year 1883 as I had done from 1880 to 1882. Fitzmaurice, however, was able, and worked very hard, and he gradually acquired an enormous mastery of the detail of the questions.' [Footnote: Sir Charles notes how glad he was to induce Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice to continue Mr. Austin Lee in the post of official private secretary.]

His unopposed return for Chelsea did not take place till January 8th, 1883. Before this he had been formally admitted to the Privy Council.

'I had left the Foreign Office on December 27th, having been there exactly two years and eight months, and on Thursday, the 28th, I went down to a Council at Osborne to be sworn; and on the 29th addressed the principal meeting held in my constituency with regard to my re- election, and advocated a policy of decentralization in Local Government affairs. I was rather amused at Osborne by the punctiliousness with which, after I had kissed hands on being sworn a member of the Council, the Queen pointed out to the Clerk of the Council that it was necessary for me again to immediately go through precisely the same ceremony on appointment as President of the Local Government Board—a curious point of strict etiquette. I could not but think that the portion of the Privy Councillor's oath which concerns keeping secret matters treated of secretly in Council is more honoured in the breach than in the observance; but when Mr. Gladstone chose, which was not always, he used to maintain the view that the clause is governed by the first part of the oath, so as to make it secret only in respect of the interests of the country and the position of other members of Council. There is nothing in the oath about any limit of time, but it has always been held in practice that a time comes when all political importance has departed from the proceedings of the Council, and when the obligation of secrecy may be held to lapse. There is nothing, however, more delicate than the question of where the line is drawn. Chamberlain was directed by the Cabinet, for example, at the time of the Kilmainham Treaty, to carry on negotiations with Parnell which were absolutely impossible except by a partial revelation of matters discussed secretly in Council; but as the Prime Minister was a party to this, I suppose that the Queen's consent to the removal of the obligation would be in such a case assumed, though it was not in this case real. Another difficulty about the oath is that it in no way provides for the position towards their chiefs of members of the Government not members of the Privy Council.

'It is difficult, therefore, to say that the oath in practice imposes any obligation other than that which any man of honour would feel laid upon him by the ordinary observances of gentlemen.'

Sir Charles was only thirty-nine when he entered the Cabinet, yet the general feeling was that his admission was overdue rather than early, and no one had shown more anxiety for it than the future King.

'During the whole month while my position in the Cabinet was under hot discussion, I saw a great deal of the Prince of Wales, who wished to know from day to day how matters stood, and I was able to form a more accurate opinion both of himself and of the Princess, and of all about them, than I had formed before. The Prince is, of course, in fact, a strong Conservative, and a still stronger Jingo, really agreeing in the Queen's politics, and wanting to take everything everywhere in the world and to keep everything if possible, but a good deal under the influence of the last person who talks to him, so that he would sometimes reflect the Queen and sometimes reflect me or Chamberlain, or some other Liberal who had been shaking his head at him. He has more sense and more usage of the modern world than his mother, whose long retirement has cut her off from that world, but less real brain power. He is very sharp in a way, the Queen not sharp at all; but she carries heavy metal, for her obstinacy constitutes power of a kind. The strongest man in Marlborough House is Holzmann, the Princess's Secretary and the Prince's Librarian. He is a man of character and solidity, but then he is a Continental Liberal, and looks at all English questions as a foreigner! The Princess never talks politics…. It is worth talking seriously to the Prince. One seems to make no impression at the time … but he does listen all the same, and afterwards, when he is talking to somebody else, brings out everything that you have said.'

Some letters of this date show how strongly the personal friendship of Sir Charles Dilke and Mr. Chamberlain had developed during their political alliance.

In September, 1881, Mr. Chamberlain writes that he has been "reading over again a book called Greater Britain, written, I believe, by a young fellow of twenty-five, and a very bright, clever, and instructive book it is." He petitions for a copy "properly inscribed to your devoted friend and admirer, J. C." Sir Charles, in acknowledging this, protested against the word "instructive," and his friend apologized. "But it is instructive for all that. When you next come to Birmingham you shall inscribe my copy…. Let me add that in all my political life the pleasantest and the most satisfactory incident is your friendship."

These expressions were further emphasized by another letter of this date. Sir Charles, hurrying into Mr. Chamberlain's room in the House of Commons, had found him busy and preoccupied, and so followed up his visit with a letter. Mr. Chamberlain replied:

"December 6th.

"I am not sorry to have the opportunity of saying how much I appreciate and how cordially I reciprocate all your kind words.

"The fact is that you are by nature such a reserved fellow that all demonstration of affection is difficult, but you may believe me when I say that I feel it—none the less. I suppose I am reserved myself. The great trouble we have both been through has had a hardening effect in my case, and since then I have never worn my heart on my sleeve.

"But if I were in trouble I should come to you at once—and that is the best proof of friendship and confidence that I know of."

About that same time Lord Granville was writing to Sir Charles on foreign affairs, and diverged into general politics, remarking on the Free Trade speeches then being delivered. "With what ability Chamberlain has been speaking! I doubt whether going on the stump suits the Tory party." To this Sir Charles replied with an enthusiasm rare in his utterances:

"Chamberlain's speech was admirable, I thought. I, as you know, delight in his triumphs more than he does himself. It is absurd that this should be so between politicians, but so it is. Our friendship only grows closer and my admiration for him stronger day by day."