No other speaker spoke so boldly as Lord Cochrane; but his eloquent words were substantially endorsed by many; by Sir Samuel Romilly and Mr. Brougham in especial; and on a division, though 265 voted against Sir Francis Burdett's motion, it was supported by a minority—unusually large for the time—of 77.
Slowly but surely the better principles of government for which Lord Cochrane fought so persistently were gaining ground, destined ultimately to produce the changes in national temper which made plain the duty and expediency of adopting the changes in political systems in which the years 1832 and 1867 are epochs. In after years, Lord Cochrane himself clearly saw that he had been rash in his advocacy of the sweeping reforms which the excited people deemed necessary for their welfare in the years of trouble and misgovernment consequent on the tedious war-time ending with the battle of Waterloo. But he never had cause to regret the honest zeal and the generous sympathy with which he strove, though in violent ways, to lessen the weight of the popular distresses.
Distresses were not wanting to himself during this period. The weight of his former troubles still hung heavily upon him. He could not forget the terrible disgrace—none the less terrible because it was unmerited—that had befallen him. And in pecuniary ways he was a grievous sufferer by them. In losing his naval employment he lost the income on which he had counted. His resources were thus seriously crippled; and the scientific pursuits, in which he still persevered, failed to bring to him the profit that he anticipated.
In one characteristic way—only one among many—the Government persecution still clung to him. In the distribution of prize-money for the achievement at Basque Roads all the officers and crews of Lord Grambier's fleet had been considered entitled to share. To this arrangement Lord Cochrane objected. He urged that as the whole triumph was due to the Impérieuse and the few ships actually engaged with her, the reward ought to be limited to them. "I am preparing to proceed in the Court of Admiralty on the question of head-money for Basque Roads," he wrote on the 5th of November, 1816; "my affidavit has reluctantly been admitted, though strenuously opposed, on the ground that I was not to be believed on my oath!"
Lord Cochrane's council in this case was Dr. Lushington, afterwards the eminent judge of the Admiralty Court. Dr. Lushington showed plainly that the greater part of the fleet, having taken no share in the action, had no right to head-money, and that therefore all ought to be divided among those who actually shared with Lord Cochrane the danger and the success of the enterprise. But Sir William Scott (afterwards Lord Stowell), the judge at that time, was not disposed to sanction this view. Therefore he thwarted it by delays. The case having been postponed from November, 1816, was brought up again in the first term of 1817. "The judge has again delayed his decision," wrote Lord Cochrane on the 28th of February, the day of the announcement, "and I believe has done so until next session. He gave a curious reason for this, namely, that I took part at the Westminster meeting against the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act!"
At the next session it was again postponed, all the time available for its consideration being taken up with a frivolous discussion as to Lord Cochrane's right to give evidence. "They have gone the length," wrote his secretary, Mr. Jackson, on the 3rd of May, "of denying Lord Cochrane's credibility in a court of justice. They had no other way of answering his affidavit, which would have gained his cause in the Court of Admiralty, as it proved that the French ships in Basque Roads were destroyed by his own exertions in fighting without orders from the Admiral. The denial-of Lord Cochrane's competency to give evidence has excited a great deal of interest, and the Court of Admiralty was quite crowded on Tuesday, when the question came on to be discussed. I thought that our counsel had much the best of the argument, and I believe the judge, Sir William Scott, thought so too, as he put off his sentence to a future day." On the future day the judge admitted as much. "We have gained a bit of a victory in the Admiralty Court," said the same writer in a letter dated the 9th of June, "the judge having been compelled to pronounce in favour of his lordship's right to be believed on his oath." The time taken by him to arrive at this decision, however, was so long that the case had to be adjourned to November term, and thereby Lord Cochrane's enemies so far attained their object, that it was impossible for him, in November term, to renew the suit.
In the interval he had gone to France, preparatory to a much longer and more momentous journey to South America, in anticipation of which he was winding up his affairs and realizing his property during and after the summer of 1817.
In this settlement of accounts there was at any rate one amusing incident. It will be remembered that, on the occasion of his being elected Member of Parliament for Honiton in 1806, Lord Cochrane had refused to follow the almost universal fashion of bribery, but, after the election was over, had thoughtlessly yielded to the proposal of his agent that he should entertain his constituents at a public supper.[A] This entertainment, either through spite or through wanton extravagance, was turned by those to whom the management of it was assigned into a great occasion of feasting for all the inhabitants of the town; and for defrayment of the expenses thus incurred a claim for more than 1200£ was afterwards made upon Lord Cochrane. Through eleven years he bluntly refused to pay the preposterous demand; but his creditors had the law upon their side, and in the spring of 1817 an order was granted for putting an execution into his house at Holly Hill.
[Footnote A: 'The Autobiography of a Seaman,' vol. i. pp. 203, 204.]
Lord Cochrane, however, having resisted the demand thus far, determined to resist to the end. For more than six weeks he prevented the agents of the law from entering the house. "I still hold out," he said in a letter to his secretary, "though the castle has several times been threatened in great force. The trumpeter is now blowing for a parley, but no one appears on the ramparts. Explosion-bags are set in the lower embrasures, and all the garrison is under arms." In the explosion-bags there was nothing more dangerous than powdered charcoal; but, supposing they contained gunpowder or some other combustible, the sheriff of Hampshire and twenty-five officers were held at bay by them, until at length one official, more daring than the rest, jumped in at an open window, to find Lord Cochrane sitting at breakfast and to be complimented by him upon the wonderful bravery which he had shown in coming up to a building defended by charcoal dust.