December 2nd, 1834
Dined with Lord Lyndhurst yesterday; the dinner for Mr. Barnes. He had collected a miscellaneous party, droll enough—Mrs. Fox, Baron Bolland, Follett, Hardinge, &c. The Duke and Lord Chandos were to have been there. Barnes told Hardinge there was a great cry getting up in the country against the Duke. After dinner I had a long conversation with Hardinge, on the whole satisfactory. He said that he had been instrumental in bringing the Duke and Peel together again, after a considerable coldness and estrangement had existed between them; that after the failure in May 1832, when Peel refused to have anything to do with the concern, he had called upon him and insisted upon taking him to Apsley House and spontaneously consulting with the Duke how he should withdraw from the business; that with great difficulty he had persuaded him, and together they went, from which time the Duke and he have again become friends. He is convinced that Peel will at once make a fair and cordial overture to Stanley, and thinks it of the greatest importance that Stanley’s disposition and probable demands should be ascertained before Peel arrives. I told him what I had before told the Duke, and what I had reason to believe were Stanley’s sentiments. He asked whether Stanley would insist upon Richmond and Ripon coming in with him; he said that for the former he (Hardinge) was sure Peel would never admit him without the Duke’s full and especial consent, which, however, he has no doubt the Duke would give without hesitation, and overlook any personal cause of offence, to facilitate a desirable arrangement; that there was some dispute among his friends whether it would be better that Stanley should join now or only support (if he would) at first and join afterwards. I said, ‘Unquestionably it is better he should join at once,’ to which Hardinge assented, though he added that many thought otherwise, that if Stanley made difficulties and declined the junction, he was persuaded Peel would keep nothing open, and would not make provisional arrangements to admit him and his party when they should think it more safe and convenient to unite their future to his. What they would like evidently is to take Stanley and Graham and wash their hands of Ripon and Richmond, but I think they will be forced to admit them all, for Lyndhurst owned to me that he did not think they could stand without Stanley; and the King is so anxious for it that if Stanley insists on terms which are not very unreasonable (under the circumstances) they will not be refused. Hardinge said that four seats in the Cabinet would be a large share, but that the best men among them were prepared to make every sacrifice of their own just expectations or claims to render any arrangement feasible that circumstances might require, that ‘all was right with the Speaker,’ and as for the High Tories, the sooner they cut the connection with them the better, but that they (the High Tories) were now at their feet.
He then went into the details of the King’s case with his late Ministers—much to the same effect as I had before heard from the Duke and Lyndhurst, but perhaps rather more clearly. He said that Melbourne had stated to the King that questions must soon be brought under the consideration of the Cabinet relating to the Irish Church on which a considerable difference of opinion prevailed, and that if the opinion of the majority of the Cabinet should be acquiesced in by his Majesty, the secession of two or more members of it would in all probability follow; that if the desire of his Majesty to compromise these differences of opinion and prevent any separation should have the effect of preventing such discussions in the Cabinet as should lead to any disunion for the time, it was only fair and right to own to him that it would be in the power of any member of the House of Commons who should become acquainted with the difference of opinion which prevailed to bring the question to an issue; and if such a thing should occur, the resignations, he apprehended, would only be retarded. The King, under these circumstances, asked how he proposed to fill up the vacancies that would thus occur, whether from any but what is called SIR H. HARDINGE ON THE LATE CRISIS. the extreme party, and whether he (Melbourne), with a knowledge of the King’s sentiments, could advise him to have recourse to Lord Durham and others of the same opinions. Melbourne acknowledged that he could look nowhere else, and that he certainly could not give the King such advice, upon which he said that as the breach sooner or latter appeared inevitable, he thought it better that the dissolution of the Government should take place at once, and he preferred making the change during the recess, when he should have time to form other arrangements, rather than have it forced upon him during all the excitement of the session of Parliament. This, I think, was the pith of the thing, and in my opinion it forms a good case. Hardinge said that if the King had been a clever man he would have postponed his decision and spun out the correspondence, in the course of which he would have acquired pretexts sufficient. This, however, explains what the other side means by insisting that there was no difference of opinion in the Cabinet; there was none actual, but it was on the prospective disunion so clearly announced to the King, and impending at such an indefinite and probably inconvenient time, that he took his resolution. Melbourne appears to have been bullied into a sort of exculpatory letter on account of his speech at Derby, saying that he spoke of having no personal cause of complaint because the King was very civil to him.
December 5th, 1834
The dinner that Lyndhurst gave to Barnes has made a great uproar, as I thought it would. I never could understand the Chancellor’s making such a display of this connexion, but whatever he may be as a lawyer, and how great soever in his wig, I suspect that he is deficient in knowledge of the world and those nice calculations of public taste and opinion which are only to be acquired by intuitive sagacity exercised in the daily communion of social life.
Melbourne has had to make another speech, which smells of the recent reproaches of his colleagues; without exactly recanting what he had said, he has amplified, modified, and explained, so as to chime in to a certain degree with their assertions.
Brougham has been made to recall his letter offering to be Chief Baron. It matters not what he does for the present; his star is totally eclipsed, but not, I think, for ever quenched; his vast abilities must find scope and produce effect. It is true he can never thoroughly inspire confidence, but if adversity teaches him wisdom, and cools the effervescence of his temper and imagination, nothing can prevent his political resurrection, thought not in ‘all his original brightness.’
December 6th, 1834
The Chancellor called on me yesterday about getting young Disraeli into Parliament (through the means of George Bentinck)[5] for Lynn. I had told him George wanted a good man to assist in turning out William Lennox, and he suggested the above-named gentleman, whom he called a friend of Chandos. His political principles must, however, be in abeyance, for he said that Durham was doing all he could to get him by the offer of a seat, and so forth; if, therefore, he is undecided and wavering between Chandos and Durham, he must be a mighty impartial personage. I don’t think such a man will do, though just such as Lyndhurst would be connected with.
[5] [Lord George Bentinck was member for Lynn Regis. It is curious that this, the first mention of Mr. Disraeli in political life, should have originated with the man who afterwards became his most powerful coadjutor and ally.]