June 3rd, 1833

The Government are in high spirits. The Saints have given in their adhesion to Stanley’s plan, and they expect to carry the West India question. The Bank measure has satisfied the directors, and most people, except Peel. The Duke of Wellington told me he was very well satisfied, but that they had intended to make better terms with the Bank, and he thought they should have done so. Melbourne says, ‘Now that we are as much hated as they were, we shall stay in for ever.’

As I came into town (having come by the steamboat from Margate very luxuriously) on Saturday I found a final meeting at the Council Office to dispose of the lunacy case. It was so late when Horne finished his reply that I thought there was no chance of any discussion, and I did not go in; but I met the Master of the Rolls afterwards, who told me they had delivered their opinions, Lord Eldon cautiously, he himself ‘broadly,’ which I will be bound he did (for he hates Brougham), and that, though no judgment had been yet given, the Chancellor’s decree would be reversed; so that after all Brougham’s wincing and wriggling to this he has been forced to submit at last.

London, June 11th, 1833

At a place called Buckhurst all last week for the Ascot races; a party at Lichfield’s, racing all the morning, then eating and drinking, and play at night. I may say, with more truth than anybody, ‘Video meliora proboque, deteriora sequor.’ The weather was charming, the course crowded, the King received decently. His household is now so ill managed that his grooms were drunk every day, and one man (who was sober) was killed going home from the races. Goodwin told me nobody exercised any authority, and the consequence was that the household all ran riot.

The first day of the races arrived the news that the Duke of Wellington, after making a strong muster, had beaten the Government in the House of Lords on the question of Portuguese neutrality and Don Miguel, that Lord Grey had announced that he considered it a vote of censure, and threw out a sort of threat of resigning. He and Brougham (after a Cabinet) went down to the King. The King was very much annoyed at this fresh dilemma into which the Tories had brought him, and consented to whatever Lord Grey required. In the meantime the House of Commons flew to arms, and Colonel Dawes gave notice of a motion of confidence in Ministers upon their foreign policy. This was carried by an immense majority after a weak debate, in which some very cowardly menaces were thrown out against the Bishops, and this settled the question. Ministers did not resign, no Peers were made, and everything goes on as before. It has been, however, a disastrous business. How the Duke of Wellington could take this course after the conversation I had with him in this room, when he told me he would support the Government because he wished it to be strong, I can’t conceive. At all events he seems resolved that his Parliamentary victories should be as injurious as his military ones were glorious to his country. Some of his friends say that he was provoked by Lord Grey’s supercilious answer to him the other day, when he said he knew nothing of what was going on but from what he read in the newspapers, others that he ‘feels so very strongly’ about Portugal, TORY BLUNDERS. others that he cannot manage the Tories, and that they were determined to fight; in short, that he has not the same authority as leader of a party that he had as general of an army, for nobody would have forced him to fight the battle of Salamanca or Vittoria if he had not fancied it himself. The effect, however, has been this: the House of Lords has had a rap on the knuckles from the King, their legislative functions are practically in abeyance, and his Majesty is more tied than ever to his Ministers. The House of Lords is paralysed; it exists upon sufferance, and cannot venture to throw out or materially alter any Bill (such as the India, Bank, Negro, Church Reform, &c.) which may come up to it without the certainty of being instantly swamped, and the measures, however obnoxious, crammed down its throat. This Government has lost ground in public opinion, they were daily falling lower, and these predestinated idiots come and bolster them up just when they most want it. Tavistock acknowledged to me that they were unpopular, and that this freak had been of vast service to them; consequently they are all elated to the greatest degree. The Tories are sulky and crestfallen; moderate men are vexed, disappointed, grieved; and the Radicals stand grinning by, chuckling at the sight of the Conservatives (at least those who so call themselves, and those who must be so really) cutting each others’ throats.

On Saturday, the day after I came back, I found a final meeting at the Council Office on the lunacy case, the appeal of Grosvenor against Drax. There were Lord Lansdowne, the Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, Master of the Rolls, Lord Manners, Lord Eldon, and Lord Lyndhurst. The rule is that the President of the Council collects the opinions and votes, beginning with the junior Privy Councillor. This was the Chancellor,[9] who made a sort of apology for his judgment, stating that he had made the order just after two or three very flagrant cases of a similar description had been brought under his notice, and then he went into this case, and endeavoured to show that there was fraud (and intentional fraud) on the part of the Grosvenors, and he maintained, without insisting on, and very mildly, his own former view of the case. Leach then made a speech strongly against the judgment, and Lord Eldon made a longish speech, very clear, and very decided against it, interlarded with professions of his ‘sincere’ respect for the person who delivered the judgment. The Chancellor did not reply to Lord Eldon, but put some questions—some hypothetical, and some upon parts of the case itself—which, together with some remarks, brought on a discussion between him and Leach, in which the latter ended by lashing himself into a rage. ‘My Lord,’ said he to the Chancellor, ‘we talk too much, and we don’t stick to the point.’ Brougham put on one of his scornful smiles, and in reply to something (I forget what) that the Vice-Chancellor said he dropped in his sarcastic tone that he would do so and so ‘if his Honour would permit.’ For a moment I thought there would be a breeze, but it ended without any vote, in the adoption of a form of reversal suggested by Lord Eldon, which left it to the option of the respondent to institute other proceedings if he should think fit. Afterwards all was harmony. Eldon seemed tolerably fresh, feeble, but clear and collected. He was in spirits about the dinner which had just been given him by the Templars, at which he was received with extraordinary honours. He said he hoped never to be called to the Council Board again, and this was probably the last occasion on which he will have to appear in a judicial capacity. It is remarkable that his last act should be to reverse a judgment of Brougham’s, Brougham being Chancellor and himself nothing. I could not help looking with something like emotion at this extraordinary old man, and reflecting upon his long and laborious career, which is terminating gently and by almost insensible gradations, in a manner more congenial to a philosophic mind than to an ambitious spirit. LORD ELDON’S GREAT CAREER. As a statesman and a politician he has survived and witnessed the ruin of his party and the subversion of those particular institutions to which he tenaciously clung, and which his prejudices or his wisdom made him think indispensable to the existence of the Constitution. As an individual his destiny has been happier, for he has preserved the strength of his body and the vigour of his mind far beyond the ordinary period allotted to man, he is adorned with honours and blessed with wealth sufficient for the aspirations of pride and avarice, and while the lapse of time has silenced the voice of envy, and retirement from office has mitigated the rancour of political hostility, his great and acknowledged authority as a luminary of the law shines forth with purer lustre. He enjoys, perhaps, the most perfect reward of his long life of labour and study—a foretaste of posthumous honour and fame. He has lived to see his name venerated and his decisions received with profound respect, and he is departing in peace, with the proud assurance that he has left to his country a mighty legacy of law and secured to himself an imperishable fame.

[9] [This must be a mistake. The Chancellor takes rank in the Privy Council after the Lord President and before everyone else. Lord Brougham was junior Privy Councillor in mere seniority, but his office gave him rank over the others present. His opinion was probably taken first out of compliment to him, as he had made the order under review.]

June 15th, 1833

The day before yesterday I had occasion to see the Duke of Wellington about the business in which we are joint trustees, and when we had done I said, ‘Well, that business in the House of Lords turned out ill the other day.’ ‘No; do you think so?’ he said, and then he went into the matter. He said that he was compelled to make the motion by the answer Lord Grey gave to his question a few nights before; that his party in the House of Lords would not be satisfied without dividing—they had been impatient to attack the Government, and were not to be restrained; that on the question itself they were right; that so far from his doing harm to the Government, if they availed themselves wisely of the defeat they might turn it to account in the House of Commons, and so far it was of use to them, as it afforded a convincing proof to their supporters that the House of Lords might be depended upon for good purposes, and they might demand of their supporters in the other House that they should enable them to carry good measures, and they keep the House of Commons in harmony with the House of Lords. He said the Government would make no Peers, and that they could not; that the Tories were by no means frightened or disheartened, and meant to take the first opportunity of showing fight again; in short, he seemed not dissatisfied with what had already occurred, and resolved to pursue the same course. He said the Tories were indignant at the idea of being compelled to keep quiet, and that if they were to be swamped the sooner it was done the better, and that they would not give up their right to deal with any question they thought fit from any motive of expediency whatever.