March 24th, 1835
A meeting at Lichfield’s yesterday, when they resolved to reserve themselves for the great battle on Monday next, in full persuasion that Peel will resign after the division. Whether he means it or not, I have no idea, but it is surprising to me that they do not think it better to attack him on his Tithe Bill than on the Appropriation clause; for I think he must go out if beaten on the former, but need not if beaten on the latter. They are, however, bent upon his expulsion; and Lichfield (who is more or less in their secrets) told me they feel no difficulty as to making another Government under Melbourne’s auspices. There was a great dinner of the Opposition at the Duke of Sussex’s on Sunday, to which Brougham was not invited. It will not be the least of their difficulties how to deal with him. Sugden, after all, stays in Ireland. The Bar were up in arms at his menaced return among them, which would have had the effect of half ruining some of those who took silk gowns upon his retirement. His absurdity will, therefore, have had no other effect than that of revealing his wife’s misfortune to the whole world in a very noisy way. Lord Canterbury gives up Canada on account of his wife’s health, and probably not liking to face the disagreeable things that would have been said about himself and her. Lord Aberdeen has offered it to Stratford Canning, who, though clever enough, is so difficile à vivre, that nobody can be less calculated for conciliatory objects; so that for a situation which required an agent of strong understanding and good temper, they successively selected a foolish man of good temper, and a clever man of bad.
March 26th, 1835
On Tuesday night Government was beaten on a division about the Chatham election; a thing of no consequence in itself, but the whole affair was mismanaged. John Russell had said he should not divide, but his people were not to be restrained. Peel would have given way, but his whippers-in told him he was strong enough in the House to carry it, which only shows how stupid they are. It is now universally believed that he will resign next week, after the division on John Russell’s motion, upon which he is sure to be beaten by twenty or thirty votes. I am inclined to believe that he has made known his intentions to Stanley, for the latter entertains no doubt on the subject. The Greyites are all alive, and patting Lord Grey on the back all day long to incline him to obey the summons they confidently expect him to receive from the King. It is very obvious that Peel cannot go on; and I doubt much if he could even were he to obtain a majority on Monday. His physical strength would not suffice for the harassing warfare that is waged against him, the whole brunt of which he bears alone. This, however, is his own fault, for he will not let anybody else take a part, whether from distrust of his colleagues, or his own rage APPROACHING DEFEAT OF GOVERNMENT. for being all in all. Then, from the relative constitution of the two parties, he must be in continual danger of defeats upon minor and collateral questions, or suddenly started points. His party is in great part composed of the rich and fashionable, who are constantly drawn away by one attraction or another, and whose habitual haunts are the clubs and houses at the west end of the town; and it is next to impossible to collect his scattered forces at a moment’s notice. The Opposition contains a dense body of fellows who have no vocation out of the walls of the House of Commons; who put up in the vicinity; either do not dine at all, or get their meals at some adjoining chop-house, throng the benches early, and never think of moving till everything is over; constituting a steady, never-failing foundation, the slightest addition to which will generally secure a majority in the present state of the House. In old times the placemen and immediate hangers-on of Government, who make it their business to attend in order to carry the public business through, afforded a regular certain majority for the Ministers of the day; but now this household phalanx is outnumbered by these blackguards, the chief of whom are O’Connell’s Tail and the lower Radicals. All this immensely increases Peel’s embarrassment; and the tactics of his opponents have been extremely able, considered with a view to obstruct the march of Government. While the leaders have abstained from any violent measure, and have always resolved at their consultations not to stop the supplies or impede the public service, their active partisans have taken good care to produce all the same effects, by raising debate after debate upon every description of personal question, and every miscellaneous matter they could drag in, so as to prevent any progress being made in the public business; and in this they have completely succeeded, for never was there more noise and violence, and less business done, than in this session.
In anticipation of Peel’s resignation there are three parties all animated with different hopes and desires—the Grey party, the Melbourne, the Stanley. The first want Lord Grey back with all the moderate Whigs, throwing over the Radicals; and leaving out the ‘Dilly’ (as Stanley’s party is derisively called); in fact, Lord Grey would only come back to carry the Irish question, which Stanley will be no party to. The second want Melbourne and all his kit back again, to go on with all the strength that the united force of Whigs and Radicals amounts to. The third, expecting that Lord Grey will decline to return without Stanley, desire that the Radical Whigs should attempt it, with (as they think) the certainty of failing, and then, that the urgency of the case may bring about a coalition between Lord Grey, Peel, and Stanley. Such a coalition would be very desirable in many respects, but I much doubt Peel’s ever consenting to take office under Lord Grey (though with an equality of authority and influence in the Government), and to lead a party from which all his old friends, and those who look up to him with unbounded devotion, must necessarily be excluded, and to give up all pretensions to ascendency and domination in the Cabinet.
March 28th, 1835
It appears now very doubtful whether Peel will resign after a defeat on Monday; and I am disposed to believe that it is not his intention; indeed, I never could understand why he should. He has over and over again declared that whenever the Opposition would bring forward a direct motion against him, he should be prepared to resign, but not till then. Still, I do not see how he can go on, and am much inclined to think he ought not. Weak as he is, at the mercy of this furious and reckless Opposition, Government suffers in his hands; the Crown and all Executive authority suffer. Every Government, to be useful and respectable, should have the power of carrying its measures in its own way through Parliament; but Peel cannot do this, and instead of quashing any mischievous or untimely motion, he is compelled to submit to one defeat after another upon matters which would never have been stirred (or certainly not successfully) with the late Government, or with any which possessed the confidence of the House of Commons. It was expected that Hume would persist in his motion for referring the Army estimates to a committee, and that the Whigs would support FRESH REVERSES. him; but when it came to the point, at the suggestion of John Russell and Stanley, he very sulkily withdrew it; but the night before, Government was beaten on two divisions, one about the Leicester election, upon which all the lawyers in the House were unanimous. But these opinions had no effect upon the Radical majority, and they voted an address to the Crown to confer a charter upon the London University, Lord John Russell supporting it, although this question had been argued before the Privy Council, which had still to report upon it; and I believe that the general opinion of the Lords was against conferring the charter in the present circumstances of the university. Certainly, there was no discussion in Council after the arguments were closed, but I gathered that the impression was unfavourable to the grant of the charter. The House of Commons knows nothing of the argument, and rejected Goulburn’s amendment to have the proceedings before the Privy Council laid upon the table, voting the address merely because Government opposed it.
March 29th, 1835
A meeting yesterday of Tories at Bridgewater House for the purpose of securing a better attendance. Twenty-nine Moderates met at the ‘King’s Head,’ passengers in the ‘Dilly;’[4] but of these, nine mean to vote with John Russell, and one stays away; also, two or three others vote against Stanley: queer partisans and soi-disant followers, who oppose him on his own vital question. Peel concerted with Stanley in the House on Friday, that the resolution should be met with a negative. Wharncliffe was here to-day, loud in his praises of the Duke of Wellington, and delighted with the Cabinet of which he is a member, jam morituri as they are.[5] He owned that they could not probably go on, but that they would not give in till they could show their friends that they had done all that men could or ought to do; so that they are resigned to their fate, and only studying in what attitude they shall meet it.
[4] [The ‘Derby Dilly’ was the nickname given to Lord Stanley’s section of a party, from a joke of O’Connell’s, who had applied to it the well-known lines,