Now, in 1828, Lord Palmerston was out of office for the first time since he had become a Lord of the Admiralty in 1807. There had been twenty-one years of it, during which he had been thoroughly used to official life, official habits, and official language. It must have seemed to him that a man such as he was born to be in office. “It is so many years since I have been entirely my own master,” he writes, “that I feel it quite comical to have no tie, and to be able to dispose of my day as I like.” Then he goes on to tell how, since he had left the Duke of Wellington’s Government, the Duke of Clarence had been specially civil to him, and the Duke of Cumberland specially uncivil; the two Royal brothers thus showing the politics by which they were instigated. We also know that the Duke of Clarence, afterwards William IV., sided with the Whigs, and that the Duke of Cumberland was the most violent of Tories. Lord Palmerston had hitherto been a Tory, but each of the Royal Dukes saw in what course he was about to run. “His next appearance in office,” says Mr. Ashley, “was in connexion with the Whigs, and the whole of his subsequent career was spent in sympathy and harmony with their views.”
It may be doubted whether this correctly describes the condition of Lord Palmerston’s feelings. He was certainly loyal to the Whigs till his great fight came with Lord John Russell in 1851, when Lord John quarrelled with him, and not he with Lord John. And a thorough loyalty to a party of nearly a quarter of a century’s duration may serve to make a man a Whig or Tory, as far as the name goes. Lord Palmerston had, almost by accident, fallen among the Whigs, having submitted himself to the genius of Mr. Canning, who, though influenced by liberal ideas, was no Whig; and then, on Canning’s death, had leagued himself with Huskisson, upon whose shoulders as much of Canning’s mantle had fallen as they were able to carry. Then Palmerston had left the Duke’s Government because Huskisson left it, and had drifted away in a boat in which Charles Grant and William Lamb were with him. Thus he had joined himself with politicians who became Whig leaders and entertained Whig principles. But in doing so he was made over to the Foreign Office, where it was necessary that his politics should be foreign politics; and during those years of his life in which a man is most strongly imbued with political opinions,—from forty, let us say, till sixty, though in Lord Palmerston’s case the twenty years came somewhat later,—his feelings and his opinions were British and conservative rather than liberal and expansive. He did not feel himself called upon to dispute the measures of his colleagues, but, in accordance with the system and theory by which he governed his own conduct, he confined himself to his own duties, and cared as little, we should say, for the Whiggery of Lord John Russell as for the Toryism of the Duke of Wellington and Lord Lyndhurst.
But, whether Whig or Tory, he was constant in doing good in that direction in which good done to himself must be good also to others. In the Quarterly Review for July, 1828, we are told what he did on his Irish estate in the way of draining;—“In the summer of 1826, a trial of what might be effected in reclaiming bog was made upon Lord Palmerston’s estate. Fifty acres of bog, which contained nothing beneficial in the way of manure, were drained, and brought into a state fit for producing a crop, at an expense not exceeding £7 per acre; and in four months after the spade was put into it, says Mr. Nimmo, we had very fine potatoes, and turnips, and rape, and so on, growing there as good as on any land in the world.” “We think the public in general, and the landed proprietors of Ireland in particular, are deeply indebted to Lord Palmerston for the experiment which he has made,” says the reviewer. In these present days (1882) we can hardly venture to express a hope of the advantage which may accrue from such work to an Irish landlord; but such good when done is done for every one, whether to an owner of the soil or to another, and to Lord Palmerston the idea was rather that of multiplying the produce of the earth, than of an immediate increase to his own income.
We find from the autobiography how intent he was on the abolition of slavery in all parts of the earth, to which his own influence could be made to extend. The sale of Greek slaves by the Turks had been abominable. Men, women, and children had been abducted and sold. It was probably by the horrors which had been so occasioned, and which had been brought under his notice as Secretary at War, that this strong feeling was created; but it remained with him through his life; and, as Wilberforce and Buxton had been strong in speech to cause great things to be done, so was he constant in action to cause the perpetual doing of smaller things which in their aggregate became great. This, and the work of the Catholic emancipation,—which had begun in earnest with the Clare election,—occupied his mind during the time that he was out of office. But he went to Paris also during the same period, and wrote long letters home which, interesting as they are, would be too long for our present occasion.
In the autumn of 1830 we hear from himself what efforts were made to strengthen the Duke’s Government,—efforts which ultimately led to the formation of Lord Grey’s Ministry. The Duke of Wellington’s Government had been necessarily weak since the withdrawal from it of Mr. Canning’s followers. Ministers had consented to the emancipation of the Catholics in 1829, and Mr. O’Connell had taken his seat for County Clare. Liberal ideas and Liberal measures were creeping on, and the Duke of Wellington felt that if he were desirous of keeping the Whigs out of office, and himself in, he could only do so by some re-admission of Mr. Canning’s party. He accordingly sent an offer to Lord Palmerston. Would Lord Palmerston join him?
But that other, and greater, question of Reform of Parliament was now coming to the front. That the Duke of Wellington and Sir Robert Peel should not have already seen how impossible it was to stop the avalanche with such mill-dam as they were able to oppose to it is now surprising to us all. But we, looking back upon the avalanche, and what it did, can judge of its power much more accurately than could they who only heard its murmurings as it came. Wilson Croker, who was not the first messenger from the Duke, but who appeared afterwards on the scene, put to Lord Palmerston the one vital question;—“Are you resolved, or are you not, to vote for Parliamentary Reform?” “I am,” said Lord Palmerston. “Then,” said Croker, “there is no use in talking to you any more on this subject.”
The Duke, finding it was so, resigned. There is nothing, I think, in Lord Palmerston’s after-life to show that he himself loved the idea of Parliamentary Reform. But he had joined himself with Grant and Lamb, who had now become Lord Melbourne, and who, in truth, were now absolutely Whigs; and he had that power of foresight which enabled him to see which way the wind blew. He heard the rumblings of the avalanche, and determined not to be in its way when it should fall. Then Lord Grey’s Government was formed, and Lord Palmerston became Foreign Secretary in November, 1830.
CHAPTER IV.
PALMERSTON FOREIGN SECRETARY, NOVEMBER, 1830, TO NOVEMBER, 1834.
WE here begin the record of that portion of Lord Palmerston’s life which is of truth important to the English reader. In years, his life was more than half over. He was already forty-five, and had been in office for more than twenty years; but had he then died, he would have passed away as one of those unimportant statesmen whom, though they may do good work for their country, it is not worth their country’s while to remember. But though he was forty-five, Lord Palmerston’s period of importance was yet to begin, and to be continued during thirty-five additional years of uninterrupted labour.
Lord Dalling, in the short preface which he has prefixed to his unfinished life of Lord Palmerston, speaks as follows of the condition of England at this time in reference to the political state of Europe. “That period begins with a certain struggle against the resistance of the northern Cabinets to any change in the affairs of Europe; and a struggle at the same time against that reactionary spirit sprung from the Revolution of 1830 in France, which wished to change everything.” The writer means to imply that England was anxious to stand between the despotism of Russia, Prussia, and Austria, and the democratic tendencies of France. In this he describes accurately the position which Lord Palmerston took as the exponent of English foreign politics, and which from the first to the last he maintained with a consistency which it has been given to few men to achieve, whose concern in the matter has lasted so long, and whose influence has been so great. Throughout his career it was his object to repress the personal power of the occupants of thrones; but at the same time so to repress that power as to give no inch of standing ground to demagogues. If that be true, it must be acknowledged that whether his attempts were good or evil, they were made in strict accordance with established English principles. And it will probably be admitted by most who may read these pages, that the efforts were good. That they were pre-eminently successful, it will be my duty to endeavour to show. That in making these efforts Lord Palmerston fell into various errors of manner, that he was frequently led away by human frailty, and often puffed up by pride and a spirit of personal success, is no doubt true. And it is true also that he seldom rose to any specially exalted view of human nature. He saw all things from a common-sense point of view, with what we may call mundane eyes. But we are not sure that such a point of view and such eyes are not the most useful for a British statesman. And of Lord Palmerston, it may be said that his followers would always know what political teaching they were expected to follow. He was not gifted with that fine insight into matters which enables a man to discern to-day something better than what he saw yesterday. Such still advancing improvement in sight is within the capacity only of the highest genius. But as an English politician can work only by the means of others, and needs many followers, the followers should see as quickly as he does, and if they be left in the dark they will not follow long. Lord Palmerston left none in the dark, and was therefore successful to the last by means of the true following of an attached party who always knew their man, and were sure that they never would be led whither they did not wish to go.