October 4th.—There has been a continual discussion of the Boundary Treaty, kept up by Palmerston's articles in the 'Morning Chronicle,' which have been well replied to in the 'Times,' 'Standard,' and still more the 'Spectator' and 'Examiner.' Palmerston has certainly not acted wisely as one of the leaders of his party. He ought to have felt the public pulse, and ascertained how his own friends would be likely to view the question, before he plunged into such violent opposition to it. It is now evident that he will not carry the public nor even his own party with him. John Russell is satisfied; he thought at first that we had conceded too much, but on further examination he changed his opinion, and he now thinks the settlement on the whole a good one, and this will in all probability be the general opinion. Everybody was alive to the inconvenience of having this question left open, and there was a universal desire to settle our various differences with America upon such terms as would conduce to the restoration of good humour and good will.
October 5th.—There was a very clever letter in the 'Morning Chronicle' yesterday from some Whig, attacking the paper for the line it has taken, which produced a furious defence and retort. This morning I have got a letter from the Duke of Bedford informing me that his brother John has gone back to his original opinion about the Treaty. First, he thought we had made too great concessions, then that we had not, and now he thinks again that we have. It is probable that Palmerston has been at him, and he thinks it better to sacrifice his own opinion than to have a difference with his colleague.
I have been at Woburn for a couple of days. The Duke told me there that all the people he had conversed or communicated with agreed in rejoicing that the question was settled, and were not disposed to cavil at the terms. The Duke is well and wisely administering his estate and improving his magnificent place in every way. I never saw such an abode of luxury and enjoyment, one so full of resources for all tastes. The management of his estate is like the administration of a little kingdom. He has 450 people in his employment on the Bedfordshire property alone, not counting domestic servants. His pensions amount to 2,000l. a year. There is order, economy, grandeur, comfort, and general content.
The Baroness Lehzen has left Windsor Castle, and is gone abroad for her health (as she says), to stay five or six months, but it is supposed never to return. This lady, who is much beloved by the women and much esteemed and liked by all who frequent the Court, who is very intelligent, and has been a faithful and devoted servant to the Queen from her birth, has for some time been supposed to be obnoxious to the Prince, and as he is now all-powerful her retirement was not unexpected. I do not know the reason of it, nor how it has been brought about; Melbourne told me long ago that the Prince would acquire unbounded influence.
I met yesterday Lord Ponsonby and sat next to him at dinner at Palmerston's, for although I have always been so opposed to Palmerston, and he knows it, and no doubt dislikes me, I live with them as much as if we were the greatest friends. Lord Ponsonby is a most remarkable-looking man for his age, which is seventy-two or seventy-three. He exhibits no signs of old age, and is extremely agreeable. His account of Turkey was very different from my ideas about the state of the country, but I fancy all he says is sujet à caution. He describes the Sultan to be intelligent, liberal, and independent, that is, really master, and not in the hands of any party; the Turkish public men as very able, the country improving in its internal condition, especially its agriculture, and its revenue flourishing—five millions a year regularly collected, not a farthing of debt, and the whole military and civil service of the State punctually paid.
THE FAMILY AT THE GROVE.
October 12th.—The controversy about the American Treaty is vigorously maintained. The letter in the 'Morning Chronicle' was written by John Mill, and now Charles Buller has taken the field (in the 'Globe'). John Russell says 'it is advantageous and honourable to America, but not disadvantageous to us.' But he thinks it has been clumsily managed and that we might have got better terms; that Aberdeen and Everett might have settled it here more favourably for us. This is mere conjecture and worth nothing. The truth is, he does not disapprove, but finds Palmerston has taken such a violent part that he must, out of deference to his colleague, find as much fault as he possibly can. The account of the revenue came out yesterday, and a very sorry account it is.
October 18th.—On Wednesday last I went to the Grove; on Friday to Gorhambury[45] to meet the Bishop of London, who came there in the course of his visitation; yesterday back to London. It is always refreshing, in the midst of the cold hearts and indifferent tempers one sees in the world, to behold such a spectacle of intimate union and warm affection as the Grove presents. A mother, with a tribe of sons and daughters, and their respective husbands and wives, all knit together in the closest union and community of affections, feelings and interests—all, too, very intelligent people, lively, cheerful, and striving to contribute to each other's social enjoyment as well as to their material interests. I have always thought Clarendon the least selfish, most generous, and amiable man with whom I am acquainted.
Edward Villiers, who is just come from Germany, told me nothing could exceed the disgust excited all over that country by the publication of Lord Hertford's trial,[46] and that there was a universal impression there that the state of society in England and the character of its aristocracy were to the last degree profligate and unprincipled. We are mighty proud of our fine qualities, and plume ourselves on our morality; but it must be owned that a German public, which can know nothing of English society but from the specimens it sees of Englishmen, or what it reads in the press of English doings, may well entertain a less exalted idea of our perfections, and we need not wonder at the impressions which we think so unfair, and which are not in fact correct.
The Bishop of London was, and is still, going about his diocese, delivering a very elaborate Charge, which has excited a good deal of notice, and parts of which have been well enough quizzed in the 'Morning Chronicle.' To the surprise of many people, his Charge, like those of the Bishops of Exeter and Oxford, contained some crumbs of compliment to the Puseyites, and an endeavour to prescribe some formal observances half-way in advance towards their opinions. There is an evident desire on the part of these dignitaries to conciliate the Tractarians, probably because they are aware of, and alarmed at, their remarkable superiority in everything which relates to ecclesiastical learning. It is curious, too, to see the 'Times,' which certainly exercises no small or limited influence, become decidedly Puseyite. Its Catholic tendencies are intermingled with its Poor Law crotchets, and both are of a highly democratic character. The present object of attack is the pew system, which certainly appears obnoxious to censure. I asked the Bishop of London what the law was with regard to pews, and he owned that the whole thing was an anomaly, in some respects doubtful, but in many regulated by ancient usage, or by local Acts of Parliament. The Bishop is an agreeable man in society, good-humoured, lively, a little brusque in his manner. He sang a duet with Lady Jane Grimston on Friday evening, when there was no company. Though he is intemperate and imperious, he has always been distinguished for great liberality and a munificent disposition, and from an anecdote I heard of him at the Grove, he must be of a generous mind, and capable of forgiving an enemy, and casting aside feelings of resentment and wounded pride. William Capel, brother of the late Lord Essex, a disreputable, good-for-nothing parson, and Rector of Watford, neglected his clerical duties, and incurred the displeasure of the Bishop, who insisted on Capel's appointing a curate, which he refused to do, on which the Bishop, who became very angry, appointed one himself, and sent him down there. Capel resisted stoutly, and on one occasion the rector and the curate had a race for the reading-desk in church. He refused to receive the curate or to pay him, and forbad him at his peril to execute any clerical function. The end of it was a trial at the Hertford Assizes, when the parson beat the Bishop, who in his angry haste had failed to comply with all the forms which the law requires. The trial cost the Bishop near a thousand pounds, and Capel was triumphant. I don't know what happened in the interim, but a few years afterwards they had become such good friends that the Bishop came down to preach a charity sermon at Watford, when he was the guest of William Capel, dining and sleeping at his house. Upon that occasion such was his want of common decency, that, having the Bishop for his guest, and under circumstances which demanded more than ordinary respect and attention, he came down to breakfast in an old grey dressing-gown and red slippers, much to the surprise and something to the discomposure of his Diocesan. Nobody would believe Capel when he told them that the Bishop was going to be his guest. 'The Bishop of London!' said Clarendon to him, when he told him, 'how on earth did you contrive to get the Bishop of London to come to your house?' 'How,' said the other, 'why I gave him a good licking and that made him civil. We are very good friends now.' The only pity is, that having the quality of generosity and forgiveness of wrongs—for successful resistance is the same as a wrong—those virtues did not find a more estimable subject for their exercise.