The town continues quite quiet; the country nearly so. The press strain every nerve to produce excitement, and the ‘Times’ has begun an assault on the bishops, whom it has marked out for vengeance and defamation for having voted against the Bill. Althorp and Lord John Russell have written grateful letters to Attwood as Chairman of the Birmingham Union, thus indirectly acknowledging that puissant body. There was a desperate strife in the House of Lords between Phillpotts and Lord Grey, in which the former got a most tremendous dressing. Times must be mightily changed when my sympathies go with this bishop, and even now, though full of disgust with the other faction, I have a pleasure in seeing him trounced. The shade of Canning may rejoice at the sight of Grey smiting Phillpotts. Even on such a question Phillpotts was essentially in the right; but he lost his temper, floundered, and got punished. It was most indecent and disgusting to hear Brougham from the Woolsack, in a strain of the bitterest irony and sarcasm, but so broad as to be without the semblance of disguise, attack the bench of bishops. I am of opinion that it would have been far better never to have let them back into the House of Lords, but now that they are there I would not thrust them out, especially at this moment. Lord Grey in this debate gave no handle certainly, for he interposed in their favour, and rebuked Lord Suffield, who attacked them first, and told him he was out of order, and then Phillpotts very foolishly attacked him.
October 15th, 1831
A furious attack in the House of Commons upon Althorp’s and John Russell’s letters to Attwood by Hardinge and Vyvyan. Peel not there, having hopped off to Staffordshire, to the great disgust of his party, whom he never scruples to leave in the lurch. They made wretched excuses for these letters, and could only have recourse to the pretence of indignation at being thought capable of fomenting disorders, which is all very well; but they do foment discord and discontent by every means in their power. With a yelling majority in the House, and a desperate press out of it, they go on in their reckless course without fear or shame. Lord Harrowby made a speech in the House of Lords, and declared his conviction that the time was come for effecting a Reform, and that he would support one to a certain extent, which he specified. In the House he was coolly received, and the ‘Times’ hardly deigned to notice what he said. Parliament is to be up on Thursday next, and will probably not meet till January, when of course the first thing done will be to bring in the Bill again. What, then, is gained? For as Ministers take every opportunity of declaring that they will accept nothing less efficient (as they call it) than the present Bill, no compromise can be looked for. Lord Harrowby is the only man who has said what he will do, and probably he goes further than the bulk of his party would approve of; and yet he is far behind the Ministerial plan. So that there seems little prospect of getting off for less than the old Bill, for the Opposition will hardly venture to stop the next in limine as they did this. I do not see why they should hope to amend the next Bill in Committee any more than the last, and the division which they dreaded the other day is not less likely, and would not DANGERS OF REFORM. be less fatal upon another occasion. If, then, it is to pass at last, it comes back to what I thought before, that it might as well have passed at first as at last, and the excitement consequent on its rejection have been spared, as well as the odium which has accrued to the Peers, which will not be forgotten or laid aside.
The Dorsetshire election promises to end in favour of Ashley, and there will be a contest for Cambridgeshire, which may also end in favour of the anti-Reform candidate. These victories I really believe to be unfortunate, for they are taken (I am arguing as if they were won, though, with regard to the first, it is the same thing by contrast with the last election) by the Tories and anti-Reform champions as undoubted proofs of the reaction of public opinion, and they are thereby encouraged to persevere in opposition under the false notion that this supposed reaction will every day gain ground. I wish it were so with all my soul, but believe it is no such thing, and that although there may be fewer friends to the Bill than there were, particularly among the agriculturists, Reform is not a whit less popular with the mass of the people in the manufacturing districts, throughout the unions, and generally amongst all classes and in all parts of the country. When I see men, and those in very great numbers, of the highest birth, of immense fortunes, of undoubted integrity and acknowledged talents, zealously and conscientiously supporting this measure, I own I am lost in astonishment, and even doubt; for I can’t help asking myself whether it is possible that such men would be the advocates of measures fraught with all the peril we ascribe to these, whether we are not in reality mistaken, and labouring under groundless alarm generated by habitual prejudices and erroneous calculations. But often as this doubt comes across my mind, it is always dispelled by a reference to and comparison of the arguments on both sides, and by the lessons which all that I have ever read and all the conclusions I have been able to draw from the study of history have impressed on my mind. I believe these measures full of danger, but that the manner in which they have been introduced, discussed, defended, and supported is more dangerous still. The total unsettlement of men’s minds, the bringing into contempt all the institutions which have been hitherto venerated, the aggrandisement of the power of the people, the embodying and recognition of popular authority, the use and abuse of the King’s name, the truckling to the press, are things so subversive of government, so prejudicial to order and tranquillity, so encouraging to sedition and disaffection, that I do not see the possibility of the country settling down into that calm and undisturbed state in which it was before this question was mooted, and without which there can be no happiness or security to the community. A thousand mushroom orators and politicians have sprung up all over the country, each big with his own ephemeral importance, and every one of whom fancies himself fit to govern the nation. Amongst them are some men of active and powerful minds, and nothing is less probable than that these spirits of mischief and misrule will be content to subside into their original nothingness, and retire after the victory has been gained into the obscurity from which they emerged.
Newmarket, October 23rd, 1831
Nothing but racing all this week; Parliament has been prorogued and all is quiet. The world seems tired, and requires rest. How soon it will all begin again God knows, but it will not be suffered to sleep long.
London, November 11th, 1831
Nothing written for a long time; I went after the second October meeting to Euston, and from thence to Horsham, returned to Newmarket, was going to Felbrigg, but came to town on Tuesday last (the 8th) on account of the cholera, which has broken out at Sunderland. The country was beginning to slumber after the fatigues of Reform, when it was rattled up by the business of Bristol,[3] which for brutal ferocity and wanton, unprovoked violence may vie with some of the worst scenes of the RIOTS AT BRISTOL. French Revolution, and may act as a damper to our national pride. The spirit which produced these atrocities was generated by Reform, but no pretext was afforded for their actual commission; it was a premature outbreaking of the thirst for plunder, and longing after havoc and destruction, which is the essence of Reform in the mind of the mob. The details are ample, and to be met with everywhere; nothing could exceed the ferocity of the populace, the imbecility of the magistracy, or the good conduct of the troops. More punishment was inflicted by them than has been generally known, and some hundreds were killed or severely wounded by the sabre. One body of dragoons pursued a rabble of colliers into the country, and covered the fields and roads with the bodies of wounded wretches, making a severe example of them. In London there would probably have been a great uproar and riot, but fortunately Melbourne, who was frightened to death at the Bristol affair, gave Lord Hill and Fitzroy Somerset carte blanche, and they made such a provision of military force in addition to the civil power that the malcontents were paralysed. The Bristol business has done some good, inasmuch as it has opened people’s eyes (at least so it is said), but if we are to go on as we do with a mob-ridden Government and a foolish King, who renders himself subservient to all the wickedness and folly of his Ministers, where is the advantage of having people’s eyes open, when seeing they will not perceive, and hearing they will not understand? Nothing was wanting to complete our situation but the addition of physical evil to our moral plague, and that is come in the shape of the cholera, which broke out at Sunderland a few days ago. To meet the exigency Government has formed another Board of Health, but without dissolving the first, though the second is intended to swallow up the first and leave it a mere nullity. Lord Lansdowne, who is President of the Council, an office which for once promises not to be a sinecure, has taken the opportunity to go to Bowood, and having come up (sent for express) on account of the cholera the day it was officially declared really to be that disease, he has trotted back to his house in the country.
[3] [Riots broke out with great violence at Bristol on the 29th of October, the pretext being the entry of Sir Charles Wetherell into that city (of which he was Recorder), who was notorious for his violent opposition to the Reform Bill. Much property was destroyed, and many lives lost.]