March 18th, 1840
The first symptom of a failure in the Duke of Wellington’s memory came under my notice the day before yesterday. I had been employed by Gurwood to negotiate with Dr. Lushington about some papers written by the Duke when in Spain, which had fallen into the Doctor’s hands, and I spoke twice to the Duke on the subject, the last time on Friday last, when I walked home with him from the House of Lords. It was settled that the Doctor should write to the Duke about them, who was to write an answer, after which they were to be given up. But when the Doctor’s letter arrived, the Duke had forgotten the whole thing, and could not remember what Lushington it was, and actually wrote a reply (which was not sent, because my brother set him right) to Stephen Lushington, the ex-Secretary to the Treasury. This is so remarkable in a man so accurate, and whose memory is generally so retentive, that I can’t help noticing it, as the first clear and undoubted proof of his failure in a particular faculty.
I dined yesterday at Devonshire House, a dinner of forty people to feast the Royalties of Sussex and Capua with their quasi-Consorts, for I know not whether the Princess of Capua is according to Neapolitan law a real Princess any more than our Cecilia is a real Duchess,[1] which she certainly DINNER AT DEVONSHIRE HOUSE. is not, nor takes the title, though every now and then somebody gives it her. However, there they were yesterday in full possession of all the dignities of their husbands. The Duke made a mystery of the order in which he meant them to go out to dinner, and would let nobody know how it was all to be till the moment came. He then made the Duke of Sussex go out first with the Princess of Capua, next the Prince with Lady Cecilia, and he himself followed with the Duchess of Somerset, and so on. After dinner the Duke of Sussex discoursed to me about the oath and other matters. He is dissatisfied on account of the banners of the Knights of the Garter having been moved in St. George’s Chapel, to make room for Prince Albert’s, I suppose; but I could not quite make out what it was he complained of, only he said when such a disposition had been shown in all quarters to meet Her Majesty’s wishes, and render to the Prince all honour, they ought not to push matters farther than they can properly do, &c. ... something to this effect. He is not altogether pleased with the Court; that is evident.
[1] [The Duke of Sussex was married to Lady Cecilia Underwood, though not according to the provisions of the Royal Marriage Act. But the marriage was recognised, and his lady was shortly afterwards created by the Queen Duchess of Inverness.]
March 26th, 1840
Ministers were defeated by sixteen on Stanley’s motion about Irish Registration.[2] O’Connell made a most blackguard speech, alluding with wretched ribaldry to the deathbed of Stanley’s mother-in-law, from which he had come to urge his motion, out of deference to those whom he had brought up for it. One of the worst of those disgraceful and stupid brutalities, which will obliterate (if possible) the fame of the great things O’Connell has done in the course of his career. What will Government do upon this? It is impossible for anything to be more embarrassing. It is humiliating to go on, after another great defeat, and it is a bad question for them to dissolve upon. Weak in itself, and with all the moral deformity of its O’Connellism, it will produce no sympathy in this country, and not even a cry to stand upon at a general election.
[2] [Lord Stanley’s Irish Registration Bill, providing for an annual revision of the lists by revising barristers, was carried against the Government by 250 to 234 votes. The Bill made considerable progress, and was warmly supported by the Opposition, but eventually Lord Stanley saw reason to abandon it. See infra, August 13, 1840.]
March 29th, 1840
They did not care about this division, but made very light of it. However, it adds an item to the account against them, and is (say what they will) a bad thing. It is bad too, to establish as a principle that no defeats, nor any number of them, signify, as long as they are not upon vital questions; it produces not only a laxity of opinion and feeling upon public matters, but an indifference and insouciance on the part of their supporters, which may some day prove very mischievous; for if they once are permitted to assume that defeats do not signify, they will not be at the trouble of attending when inconvenient, nor will they encounter unpopularity for the sake of Government, and they will very soon begin to judge for themselves, or to mistake what are and what are not vital questions. Upon this occasion, Lord Charles Russell went away the morning of the division without a pair.
Yesterday, at dinner at Normanby’s, I met Lord Duncannon,[3] who showed me the correspondence between him and the King of Hanover about the apartments at St. James’s. The case is this: When the Queen was going to be married, the Duchess of Kent told Duncannon that she must have a house,[4] and that she could not afford to pay for one (the greater part of her income being appropriated to the payment of her debts). Duncannon told her that there were no royal apartments unoccupied, except the King of Hanover’s at St. James’s; and it was settled that he should be apprised that the Queen had occasion for them, and be requested to give them up. Duncannon accordingly wrote a note to Sir F. Watson, who manages the King’s affairs here, and told him that he had such a communication to make to his Majesty, which he was desirous of bringing before him in the most respectful manner, and that the arrangement THE KING OF HANOVER’S APARTMENTS. should be made in whatever way would be most convenient to him. Watson informed him that he had forwarded his note to the King, and shortly after Duncannon received an answer from the King himself, which was neither more nor less than a flat refusal to give up the apartments. Another communication then took place between Duncannon and Watson, when the latter said that it would be very inconvenient to the King to remove his things from the apartments without coming over in person, as the library particularly was full of papers of importance. Duncannon then proposed that the library and the adjoining room, in which it was said that his papers were deposited, should not be touched, but remain in his possession; that they should be walled off and separated from the rest of the suite, which might be given up to the Duchess for her occupation. This proposal was sent to the King, who refused to agree to it, or to give up the apartments at all. Accordingly the Queen was obliged to hire a house for her mother at a rent of 2,000ℓ. a year. I told Duncannon that they were all very much to blame for submitting to the domineering insolence of the King, and that when they thought it right to require the apartments, they ought to have gone through with it, and have taken no denial. It was a gross insult to the Queen to refuse to give up to her an apartment in her own palace, which she desired to dispose of; and they were very wrong in permitting such an affront to be offered to her. So Duncannon was himself of opinion; but Melbourne, who is all for quietness, would not allow matters to proceed to extremities, and preferred knocking under—a mode of proceeding which is always as contemptible as it is useless. The first thing is to be in the right, to do nothing unbecoming or unjust, but with right and propriety clearly on your side, to be as firm as a rock, and, above all things, never to succumb to insolence and presumption.