September 5th.—On Saturday to the Grange, where Charles Buller showed me a paper he has drawn up with suggestions of measures for Ireland, which are very sound and good on the whole, though I do not know that I should agree as to all the details. He proposes strong government, abolition of jury unanimity in criminal cases, emigration on a large scale—particularly to the Cape of Good Hope, and the constitution of a Board of employment and cultivation, who are to borrow money and invest it just as an individual capitalist might do. He adds to this, payment of the Catholic clergy by funds to be raised in Ireland, not asking imperial aid nor touching the Protestant Church; he only allots to this purpose 350,000l., not enough. He very justly says, however, that unless Government do something bold, new, comprehensive, and on a great scale, they will incur disgrace and ultimately ruin.

We had a Council yesterday for the parting Speech, and to-day this long session, the longest and most tedious ever known, closes. On Wednesday last, Disraeli with a great flourish of trumpets and note of preparation delivered an oration à la Lyndhurst, of three hours long, to which John Russell made a pretty good reply. Dizzy's speech was very sparkling and clever, but it was, after all, nothing but a theatrical display, without object or meaning but to show off his own powers. It was prefaced by a sort of advertisement that the great actor would take his benefit that morning on the stage of St. Stephen's; an audience was collected, and he sent word to Delane that he was going to speak in order that he might have one of his best reporters there. He quizzed Charles Wood unmercifully, and showed up a good many of the blunders and really stupid things which the Government did in the course of the session.

September 22nd.—No sooner was Parliament up than every creature took flight, and London became more empty and deserted than ever I saw it.

DEATH OF LORD GEORGE BENTINCK.

September 28th.—I was about to record my own proceedings and such other scraps as occurred to me, when my mind was diverted from all other topics by the intelligence of the death of George Bentinck.[69] This event was so strange and sudden, that it could not fail to make a very great sensation in the world, and so it did. It would be false and hypocritical were I to pretend that it affected me personally with any feeling of affliction, but I can say with truth that I was much shocked, and that I was sincerely sorry for it. I was sorry for the heavy blow thus inflicted on his father and his family, and it was impossible not to regard with compassion and something of regret the sudden termination of a career which promised to be one of no small prosperity and success. He was in truth a very remarkable man, of very singular character and disposition, and his history is one very much out of the common way. I am in one respect better, and in another worse, fitted to describe him than any other person, for nobody knew him so intimately and so well as I once did, nobody is so well acquainted with his most private thoughts and feelings as well as with his most secret practices; but, on the other hand, I should never be deemed an impartial biographer of a man from whom I had been so long and completely estranged, and between whom and myself there existed such strong feelings of alienation and dislike. Nevertheless, I will try to describe him as I think he really was, nothing extenuating, and nothing setting down in malice. The world will and must form a very incorrect estimate of his character; more of what was good than of what was bad in it was known to the public; he had the credit of virtues which he did not possess, or which were so mixed with vices that if all had been known he would have been most severely reproached in reference to the matters in which he has been the most loudly and generally bepraised; but his was one of those composite characters, in which opposite qualities, motives, and feelings were so strangely intermingled that nothing but a nice analysis, a very close and impartial inspection of it, can do him justice. His memory has been kindly and generously dealt with; he was on the whole high in favour with the world; he had been recently rising in public estimation; and his sudden and untimely end has stifled all feelings but those of sympathy and regret, and silenced all voices but those of eulogy and lamentation. He has long been held up as the type and model of all that is most honourable and high-minded; 'iracundus, inexorabilis, acer,' indeed, but the lofty and incorruptible scorner of everything mean and dishonourable, and the stern exposer and scourger of every species of delinquency and fraud, public or private. Oh for the inconsistency of human nature, the strange compound and medley of human motives and impulses, when the same man who crusaded against the tricks and villanies of others did not scruple to do things quite as bad as the worst of the misdeeds which he so vigorously and unrelentingly attacked! But it is only possible to make his character intelligible by a reference to certain passages of his life, especially to his transactions and connexions with myself.

He was brought up at home under a private tutor, was not studious in early life, and very soon entered the army. I do not remember whether he went to a public school. He soon distinguished himself in the army by his great spirit and courage, and by that arrogance which was his peculiar characteristic, and which never deserted him in any situation or circumstance in which he was placed. I well remember his getting into a quarrel which would have led to a duel, if his father had not got me to go to the Duke of York, by whose interposition the hostile collision was prevented.[70] I have, however, forgotten both the name of his antagonist and the merits of the case. He very soon quitted the army, and when Mr. Canning became Prime Minister he made George his private secretary. It has been said that Canning predicted great things of him if he would apply himself seriously to politics, but I do not know whether this is true. It is certain that after Canning's death, although by no means indifferent to public affairs, he took no active or prominent part in them, and the first development of his great natural energy took place in a very different field. He fell desperately in love, and he addicted himself with extraordinary vivacity to the turf. At this time and for a great many years we were most intimate friends, and I was the depositary of his most secret thoughts and feelings. This passion, the only one he ever felt for any woman, betrayed him into great imprudence of manner and behaviour, so much so, that I ventured to put him on his guard. I cannot now say when this occurred, it is so long ago, but I well recollect that as I was leaving——after the races I took him aside, told him it was not possible to be blind to his sentiments, that he was exposing himself and her likewise; that I did not mean to thrust myself into his confidence in so delicate a matter, but besought him to remember that all eyes were on him, all tongues ready to talk, and that it behoved him to be more guarded and reserved for her sake as well as his own. He made no reply, and I departed, I think I repeated the same thing to him in a letter; but whether I did or no, I received from him a very long one in which he confessed his sentiments without disguise, went at great length into his own case, declared his inability to sacrifice feelings which made the whole interest of his existence, but affirmed with the utmost solemnity that he had no reason to believe his feelings were reciprocated by her, and that not only did he not aspire to success, but that if it were in his power to obtain it (which he knew it was not), he would not purchase his own gratification at the expense of her honour and happiness; in short, his letter amounted to this—

'Let me but visit her, I'll ask no more; Guiltless I'll gaze, and innocent adore.'

I allude to this to show the terms of intimacy on which he and I were, and likewise to do justice to the purity and unselfishness of his devotion, for I am certain that all he said to me was true. He was, however, not of a very warm temperament, and this may perhaps materially diminish the virtue and the value of his high-flown and self-immolating sentiments; but let them pass for what they are worth.

CHARACTER OF LORD GEORGE BENTINCK.

The first time I ever knew him much occupied with politics was during the great Reform battles in 1831 and 1832, when he was member for Lynn. He took much the same views that I did, and was very anxious to modify the Reform Bill and render it a less Radical measure. The people of Lynn wanted a member and commissioned him to find one, and he exerted himself greatly for that purpose. By his desire I applied to Kindersley, then a man of some eminence at the Chancery bar, but he declined. I remember that he and his father did not coincide in their opinions. The Duke was frightened out of his wits, dreaded the loss of his vast property, and thought that the only safe policy was unconditional submission to the roar for Reform. Hating the measure in his heart, he was against any endeavour to arrest its progress; and he was not at all pleased with George for the part which he took. The latter, however, to do him justice, was never afraid of anybody or anything; and he sturdily but deferentially adhered to his own opinion in opposition to the Duke's. Meanwhile, he constantly attended Newmarket, and it was not long before he began to have horses of his own, running them, however, in my name. The first good racehorse he possessed was 'Preserve,' which I bought for him in 1833, and she, alas! was the cause of our first quarrel, that which was made up in appearance, but in reality never. Of course in this quarrel (which took place in August 1835) we both thought ourselves in the right. Till then not an unkind word had ever passed between us, nor had a single cloud darkened our habitual intercourse; but on this occasion I opposed and thwarted him, and his resentment broke out against me with a vehemence and ferocity that perfectly astounded me, and displayed in perfection the domineering insolence of his character. I knew he was out of humour, but had no idea that he meant to quarrel with me, and thought his serenity would speedily return. I wrote to him as usual, and to my astonishment received one of his most elaborate epistles, couched in terms so savage and so virulently abusive, imputing to me conduct the most selfish and dishonourable, that I knew not on reading it whether I stood on my head or my heels. I was conscious that his charges and insinuations were utterly groundless, but what was I to do? I could not tamely endure such gross and unwarrantable insults, and I could not challenge my uncle's son. In this dilemma I consulted a friend, and placed the letter in his hands; he went to him, and (not I believe without great difficulty) he persuaded him to ask to withdraw it. It was agreed that the letter should be destroyed, and that there should be no ostensible quarrel between us; but it was evident that our turf connexion could no longer subsist, and accordingly it was instantly dissolved, and other arrangements were made for his stud.