June 1st, 1839
Laid up with the gout and confined to my room for ten days, very ill and utterly disinclined to write. Nothing new of consequence, but little things keep oozing out, throwing light on the recent transaction, and all tending to the same conclusion. In the meantime Parliament met, but nothing has been done. Lord John Russell began by deferring the Education question, which he will be obliged to abandon, for the Church has risen up and put forth all its strength against it, and having been joined by the Wesleyans, will, without difficulty, defeat it. The Bishop of London made a most eloquent philippic against it at Exeter Hall the other day. Government have brought in another Jamaica Bill, not very different from Peel’s proposed measure, and which they will probably contrive to pass.
The Radicals have been again bestirring themselves, and trying to turn the present occasion to account and extract some concessions from the Government. Warburton has been in communication with Lord John Russell, and they LORD BROUGHAM ATTACKS MINISTERS. expect some declarations from him and Melbourne of their future intentions, and some indications of a disposition to give way on some of the favourite Radical measures. Melbourne’s intention was to be elicited by certain questions of which Lord Winchilsea gave notice, and which he actually put last night, as to the principles on which the Government was to be conducted. Melbourne replied in a very guarded and somewhat didactic style, but, so far from evincing any disposition to make Radical concessions, he intimated with sufficient clearness that he was resolved to make none whatever, and that he would not sacrifice his conscientious convictions for any political or party purpose.
After this, up got Brougham, and that boiling torrent of rage, disdain, and hatred, which had been dammed up upon a former occasion when he was so unaccountably muzzled, broke forth with resistless and overwhelming force. He spoke for three hours, and delivered such an oration as no other man in existence is capable of: devilish in spirit and design, but of superhuman eloquence and masterly in execution. He assailed the Ministers with a storm of invective and ridicule; and, while he enveloped his periods in a studied phraseology of pretended loyalty and devotion, he attacked the Queen herself with unsparing severity. He went at length and in minute detail into the whole history of the recent transaction, drew it in its true colours, and exposed its origin, progress, and motives, and thus he laid bare all the arts and falsehoods by which attempts had been made to delude and agitate the country. If it were possible to treat this as a party question, his speech would be a powerful party auxiliary, most valuable to the Tories as a vindication of them, for it was the peculiar merit of this speech that it abounded in truths and in great constitutional principles of undoubted authority and unerring application. The Duke of Wellington rose after Brougham: in a short speech, replete with moderation and dignity, he abstained from entering upon the past, but fastened upon Melbourne’s declaration, and gave him to understand that as long as he adhered to such principles as he had then declared he would be governed by, he might appeal to Parliament confidently for support.
These three speeches have all in their different ways produced a great effect: Melbourne’s will not satisfy the Radicals, though they catch (as dying men at straws) at a vague expression about ‘progressive reforms,’ and try (or pretend) to think that this promises something, though they know not what. Brougham’s speech was received by the Tory Lords with enthusiastic applause, vociferous cheering throughout, and two or three rounds at the conclusion. But the Duke’s assurance of support to Melbourne exasperated his own people to the greatest degree, produced a sulky article in the ‘Times,’ and the usual complaints at White’s and the Carlton of the Duke’s being in his dotage, and so forth. Even some of his real admirers thought he ‘had overdone it,’ and whilst at Brooks’s they did not quite know what to make of it, at the Carlton they were in the same doubt how to interpret Melbourne’s cautious ambiguities. Both, however, were clear enough: Melbourne meant to say he would ‘go no further,’ and the Duke meant to pat him on the back, and promise him that while he adhered to that resolution he should have no vexatious opposition to fear; but his meaning was made still more clear, for he told my brother this afternoon that ‘it was of the greatest importance to nail Melbourne to his declaration, and that they must do what they could to help the Queen out of the difficulty in which she was placed.’ He looks to the Crown of England; he wants to uphold it and not to punish her; and he does not care to achieve a Tory triumph at the expense of the highest Tory principle; he thinks the Monarchy is in danger, and he sees that the danger may be more surely averted by still enduring the existence of the present Government, depriving them of all power to do evil, and converting them into instruments of good, than by accelerating their fall under circumstances calculated to engender violent animosities, irreconcileable enmities, wide separation of parties, and the adoption of extreme measures and dangerous principles by many who have no natural bias that way. I entirely concur MACAULAY ELECTED FOR EDINBURGH. with him, and if it were possible to restore matters to something like the state they were in before the Bedchamber crisis, nothing would be so desirable; nothing so desirable as that the Whigs and the Radicals should be furnished with fresh occasion to fall out, and the dissolution of the Government be the final consequence of their dissensions. Also it is expedient that time should be given for the angry waters to become smooth and calm once more, albeit the smoothness is only on their surface.
Yesterday the Grand Duke Alexander[3] went away after a stay of some three weeks, which has been distinguished by a lavish profusion—perhaps a munificence—perfectly unexampled; he is by no means remarkable in appearance one way or the other, and does not appear to have made any great impression except by the splendour and extent of his presents and benefactions: he has scattered diamond boxes and rings in all directions, subscribed largely to all the charities, to the Wellington and Nelson memorials, and most liberally (and curiously) to the Jockey Club, to which he has sent a sum of 300ℓ., with a promise of its annual repetition.
[3] [Afterwards the Emperor Alexander II. of Russia. He ascended the throne in 1855 and perished by assassination in the streets of St. Petersburgh on the 13th March, 1881.]
Macaulay is gone to Edinburgh to be elected in the room of Abercromby, so he is again about to descend into the arena of politics. He made a very eloquent and, to my surprise, a very Radical speech, declaring himself for Ballot and short Parliaments. I was the more astonished at this, because I knew he had held very moderate language, and I remembered his telling me that he considered the Radical party to be reduced to ‘Grote and his wife,’ after which I did not expect to see him declare himself the advocate of Grote’s favourite measure and the darling object of the Radicals.
June 7th, 1839
Macaulay’s was a very able speech and a good apology for the Whig Government, and as he has always been for Ballot, he is not inconsistent. On Sir H. Fleetwood’s motion the other night (for giving votes for counties to ten-pound householders), John Russell spoke out, though in a reforming tone, and threw the Radicals into a paroxysm of chagrin and disappointment. The Tories had heard he was going to give way, and Peel, who is naturally suspicious and distrustful, believed it; but when he found he would not give way, nor held out any hopes for the future, Peel nailed him to that point and spoke with great force and effect. This debate was considered very damaging to Whigs and Radicals, and likely to lead to a dissolution—first, of Parliament, and then of Government. But the Radicals are now adopting a whining, fawning tone, have dropt that of bluster and menace, and, having before rudely insisted on a mighty slice of the loaf, are now content to put their tails between their legs and swallow such crumbs as they can get. Peel has written and published a very stout letter, in reply to a Shrewsbury declaration presented to him, in which he defends his recent conduct, and declares he will never take office on any other terms.