May 1st.—Parliament met yesterday, the last (Irish) election having ended only a few days before. Denison's election as Speaker went off very quietly. The prevailing opinion now seems to be that this will prove a good Parliament, on the whole safe and moderate, and an improvement on the last. All the news we get from China, or in reference to Chinese affairs, only proves the more strongly how foolish and mischievous the conduct of Bowring was, and what a sound and correct judgement the vote of the House of Commons expressed upon it. It is impossible to conjecture what the result of the war now began will be, but is quite certain that we shall have to wade to our ends through all sorts of horrors and atrocities, which it does not become us to inflict, though the Chinese are a savage, stupid, and uninteresting people, who in some degree deserve the sufferings that will be inflicted on them, though perhaps not at our hands.
George Anson[1] writes to me from India that there is a strange feeling of discontent pervading the Indian Army from religious causes, and a suspicion that we are going to employ our irresistible power in forcing Christianity upon them. It is not true, but the natives will never be quite convinced that it is not, as long as Exeter Hall and the missionaries are permitted to have carte blanche and work their will as they please in those regions.
[1] [General Anson was at this time Commander-in-Chief in India. He died there shortly after the outbreak of the great military revolt, of which the letter mentioned in the text was the first premonitory indication.]
DEATH OF LADY ASHBURTON.
May 10th.—I passed the last week at Wynnstay for Chester races; a very fine place. The events that have occurred in the course of the last ten days are the opening of the Manchester Exhibition, very successfully; the first proceedings of the new Parliament, which promise a quiet session and a peaceful reign to Palmerston, who has put the House in good humour by promising a Reform Bill next year; the death of the Duchess of Gloster, and, what interests the world still more, the death of Lady Ashburton.[1] Milnes has written a short, but very fair and appropriate notice of her for the 'Times' newspaper, which of course was intended as a eulogy, and not as a character, with the bad as well as the good that could be said of her. Lady Ashburton was perhaps, on the whole, the most conspicuous woman in the society of the present day. She was undoubtedly very intelligent, with much quickness and vivacity in conversation, and by dint of a good deal of desultory reading and social intercourse with men more or less distinguished, she had improved her mind, and made herself a very agreeable woman, and had acquired no small reputation for ability and wit. It is never difficult for a woman in a great position and with some talent for conversation to attract a large society around her, and to have a number of admirers and devoted habitu�s. Lady Ashburton laid herself out for this, and while she exercised hospitality on a great scale, she was more of a pr�cieuse than any woman I have known. She was, or affected to be, extremely intimate with many men whose literary celebrity or talents constituted their only attraction, and while they were gratified by the attentions of the great lady, her vanity was flattered by the homage of such men, of whom Carlyle was the principal. It is only justice to her to say that she treated her literary friends with constant kindness and the most unselfish attentions. They, their wives and children (when they had any), were received at her house in the country, and entertained there for weeks without any airs of patronage, and with a spirit of genuine benevolence as well as hospitality. She was in her youth tall and commanding in person, but without any pretension to good looks; still she was not altogether destitute of sentiment and coquetry, or incapable of both feeling and inspiring a certain amount of passion. The only man with whom she was ever what could be called in love was Clarendon, and that feeling was never entirely extinct, and the recollection of it kept up a sort of undefined relation between them to the end of her life. Two men were certainly in love with her, both distinguished in different ways. One was John Mill, who was sentimentally attached to her, and for a long time was devoted to her society. She was pleased and flattered by his devotion, but as she did not in the slightest degree return his passion, though she admired his abilities, he at last came to resent her indifference, and ended by estranging himself from her entirely, and proved the strength of his feeling by his obstinate refusal to continue even his acquaintance with her. Her other admirer was Charles Buller, with whom she was extremely intimate, but without ever reciprocating his love. Curiously enough, they were very like each other in person, as well as in their mental accomplishments. They had both the same spirits and cleverness in conversation, and the same quickness and drollery in repartee. I remember Allen well describing them, when he said that their talk was like that in the polite conversation between Never Out and Miss Notable. Her faults appeared to be caprice and a disposition to quarrels and tracasseries about nothing, which, however common amongst ordinary women, were unworthy of her superior understanding. But during her last illness all that was bad and hard in her nature seemed to be improved and softened, and she became full of charity, good-will, and the milk of human kindness. Her brother and her sister-in-law, who, forgetting former estrangements, hastened to her sickbed, were received by her with overflowing tenderness, and all selfish and unamiable feelings seemed to be entirely subdued within her. Had she recovered she would probably have lived a better and a happier woman, and as it is she has died in charity with all the world, and has left behind her corresponding sentiments of affection and regret for her memory. I was once very intimate with her, but for a long time past our intimacy had dwindled into ordinary acquaintance.
[1] [Harriet Mary, eldest daughter of the sixth Earl of Sandwich, was married in 1828 to William Bingham Baring, afterwards second Baron Ashburton. One son, the only issue of this marriage, died in infancy. Lady Ashburton was distinguished for her wit, her social qualities, and her hospitality, which made Bath House and the Grange the centres of a brilliant literary society, well known by the records of it in the Life of Mr. Carlyle and the Autobiography of Sir Henry Taylor.]
June 3rd.—There is really nothing to write about, but it is evident that the session is going to pass away in the most quiet and uneventful manner. Never had Minister such a peaceful and undisturbed reign as Palmerston's. There is something almost alarming in his prodigious felicity and success. Everything prospers with him. In the House of Commons there is scarcely a semblance of opposition to anything he proposes; a speech or two here and there from Roebuck, or some stray Radical, against some part of the Princess Royal's dowry, but hardly any attempt at divisions; and when there have been any, the minorities have been so ridiculously small as to show the hopelessness of opposition. The only men who might be formidable or troublesome seem to have adopted the prudent course of not kicking against the pricks. John Russell evinces no hostility, and accepts Hayter's letters. Gladstone hardly ever goes near the House of Commons, and never opens his lips. There seems to be a disposition in both Houses to work and bring legislative reforms to a conclusion. The House of Lords has been very busy with the Divorce Bill, and there has been a good deal of vigorous debating, particularly among Lyndhurst, the Bishops of Oxford and London, and Campbell and Wensleydale, who hate each other, and have interchanged blows.
THE HANDEL CONCERTS.
June 20th.—All this past week the world has been occupied with the Handel Concerts at the Crystal Palace, which went off with the greatest success and �clat. I went to the first ('Messiah'), and the last ('Israel in Egypt'); they were amazingly grand, and the beauty of the locale, with the vast crowds assembled in it, made an imposing spectacle. The arrangements were perfect, and nothing could be easier than the access and egress, or more comfortable than the accommodation. But the wonderful assembly of 2,000 vocal and 500 instrumental performers did not produce musical effect so agreeable and so perfect as the smaller number in the smaller space of Exeter Hall. The volume of sound was dispersed and lost in the prodigious space, and fine as it undoubtedly was, I much prefer the concerts of the Harmonic Society.
Fould[1] came over from Paris the other day for the purpose of going to see the Manchester Exhibition. He was received with great distinction. The Queen invited him to Windsor for Ascot, and Granville gave him a breakfast here to meet the financial notabilities whom he wanted to talk to. We had the Chancellor of the Exchequer and an ex-Chancellor (C. Wood), the Governor of the Bank, and the ex-Governor of the Bank, cum multis aliis. He said that their financial affairs in France were in a very healthy state, which is contrary to the general impression here.