March 7th.—The news from India of Gough's disastrous and stupid battle[90] filled everybody with indignation and dismay, and a universal cry arose for Sir Charles Napier. On Saturday evening I met Lord John Russell at Lord Granville's, and told him so, entreating him to send him out. He answered, in his cold, easy way, that 'it was too late now,' that the campaign could not last beyond the end of this month or middle of the next, and that he therefore could not get out in time; that they had appointed Sir William Gomm, and that the Duke of Wellington gave him a high character, and he thought all would do well; in short, he seemed not inclined to do anything.
On Sunday I called on Arbuthnot at Apsley House, where I found the Duke. I talked to him of the battle; he shook his head, and lifted up his hands. I said they ought to send out Napier; he said he had long ago wanted to do so, that now he could not get out till the campaign was over; that he hoped it would all end well, though it had been a bad affair, and ill-managed. I asked him would Napier go if they would appoint him. He said, 'Oh yes; he would go, he would go,' he repeated. He then went away. When he was gone, Arbuthnot said to me, 'Though the Duke puts a good face upon it, and endeavours to make the best of it, I can tell you (though he will not say so to you or to anybody) that he is extremely alarmed, and thinks the state of things most serious.' He then said that the Duke would like exceedingly to send out Napier, but that he would express no opinion, and give no advice; that he always said he was not a Cabinet Minister, and it was not for him to tender advice, but he would give it if it was asked. I said I had spoken to John Russell the evening before, when Arbuthnot said, if I could do anything with the Government to induce them to send Napier out, it would be doing a great service, and he knew that the Duke would afford every assistance in his power for that purpose. I said I would try. I determined to go and speak to Hobhouse.[91] In my way to Brooks', where I went to look for him, I met Lord Lansdowne, when I urged him to send out Napier. He said he would not go. I told him I knew he would, and then repeated what had passed at Apsley House. He said John Russell had seen the Duke the day before, who had said nothing about it. I told him the Duke would not say anything unless he was asked, but then he would, and would give his opinion. I then went to Hobhouse, found him, and urged him, as strongly as I could, to send Napier out, telling him how clamorous everybody was for it, and what the Duke and Arbuthnot had said to me. He acknowledged that it was the only thing to do, but that he did not know how the Directors were to be brought to consent to it, and that his having the seat in Council or not made the difference between 8,000l. or 18,000l. a year to him, to say nothing of the insult which Napier considered would be put upon him by excluding him from the Council. Hobhouse then said, 'You do not know the difficulties I have had with these men. I have brought the Government, the Duke of Wellington, and the Queen all to bear upon them, and all in vain. It was only the other day, after the affair in which Cureton was killed, that I made another attempt. I sent to Sir James Lushington, and asked him if it was not then possible to send Napier out to India. The next day he sent me word that it was impossible, for if it was proposed not one man would vote for it.'
SIR CHARLES NAPIER SENT TO INDIA.
I replied, since all the powers had failed, that I would bring one more to bear upon them, viz. the House of Commons, and advised him to go down and announce the appointment of Napier as Commander-in-Chief; and if the Directors refused the seat in Council, to cast all the responsibility on them, and ask Parliament for the additional salary. He approved of the plan, if it should become necessary. I ended by urging him to probe the Duke of Wellington, who would tell him his real opinion (he was to see him the next morning), and then to take a decisive step, and send Napier out. I told him his Government wanted credit, and that while in the event of any fresh disasters they would incur an enormous responsibility, and be called to a severe account for not having sent the best man they could find, by doing so now, they would acquire reputation, vigour, and resolution. The next morning early he went to Lord John Russell, and they agreed to appoint Napier. Hobhouse went to the Duke, and it was settled at once, greatly to the Duke's satisfaction. Napier, however, took twelve hours to consider of it, and the Duke told me he did not at all like it. The Directors behaved well, and, whether agreeable to them or not, they acquiesced with a good grace. Ellenborough advised Napier to demand powers greater than had ever been given to any commander-in-chief, but Napier consulted Hardinge, who advised him to do no such thing. He said there was no necessity for them, and that he had much better go out as all his predecessors had done. This was sound advice, and Napier took it. It would have been most unwise in a man appointed under such circumstances to make extraordinary demands upon the authority which only with the greatest reluctance could be induced to give him any powers at all. Hardinge told me this in the House of Lords last night.
The satisfaction at Napier's appointment is great and universal, but I really believe it is in a considerable degree attributable to the accident of my seeing the Duke on Sunday, and bringing him and the Government to an understanding on the subject. If I had not seen Hobhouse on Sunday afternoon, I doubt if any change would have been made, and am inclined to think Gomm's appointment would have been carried out.
Last night in the House of Lords Palmerston got the hardest hit he has ever yet had, though his skin is so impenetrably thick that he will hardly feel it. Some nights ago Bankes had asked a question about the Sicilian arms, which Palmerston answered in his usual offhand way, and as usual the matter fell flat, nobody appearing to think or care anything about it. Palmerston made a sort of explanation, such as it was, without a word in it of regret or excuse, as if it had been all quite natural and right. But the matter did not go off so easily in the Lords. Stanley stated the case he had heard, and asked if it was true. Lord Lansdowne at once owned it was true; he called it 'an inadvertence'! But he said that as soon as it was known to the Cabinet, they were deliberately of opinion that the permission ought to have been withheld, and that instructions had been sent to Temple in case any complaint was made, to apologise, explain, and promise nothing of the sort should ever recur. A more mortifying declaration for Palmerston (if anything can mortify him) could not well be, and it was besides an exposure not to be mistaken. If this affair had stood alone, it might have passed for an inadvertence, but conjoined with all the other circumstances of the case, and the general tenor of Palmerston's Italian policy, nothing can well be worse. Palmerston is safe enough as far as his office is concerned, and the Government will not be shaken, but it is damaging beyond all doubt, and when the question comes to be regularly discussed, Stanley, though now too late, will give him a tremendous dressing.
AFFAIR OF THE SICILIAN ARMS.
March 16th.—I have been entirely occupied with the labour and trouble of migration from Grosvenor Place to Bruton Street, where I took up my abode yesterday evening, and the consequence is that I have not found time to write a line about passing events.[92]
A day or two after Lord Lansdowne's explanation in the House of Lords about the Sicilian arms Bankes made another interpellation in the House of Commons, the object of which was to ask the same question that Stanley had done. But unlike his chief he made a long, rambling, stupid speech, which gave Palmerston one of those opportunities of which he never fails to avail himself with so much dexterity, and accordingly he delivered a slashing, impudent speech, full of sarcasm, jokes, and clap-traps, the whole eminently successful. He quizzed Bankes unmercifully, he expressed ultra-Liberal sentiments to please the Radicals, and he gathered shouts of laughter and applause as he dashed and rattled along. He scarcely deigned to notice the question, merely saying a few words at the end of his speech in replying to it. All this did perfectly well for the House of Commons, and he got the honours of the day. Stanley was furious, and all the Anti-Palmerstonians provoked to death, while he and his friends chuckled and laughed in their sleeves. John Russell also came to his rescue, and made an apology for him, which in his mouth was very discreditable, for it was in fact inconsistent with what Lord Lansdowne had said in the House of Lords.