The most serious of the many embarrassments inherited from the Administration of Grey was the trouble with China, that had arisen out of Troubles in China the East India Company's opium trade in the Far East. When the charter of the East India Company was renewed in 1834, it was shorn of its monopoly of this trade. The consequent extension of the trade in opium, so strenuously opposed by the Chinese Government, incensed Emperor Taouk-Wang. Lord Napier, the new British Commissioner, reached the Canton River in July. His instructions from Lord Palmerston were to foster the English opium trade not only at Canton, but to demand an extension of the trade to other parts of the Chinese empire. The Chinese mandarins, under instructions from the Opium trade resented Viceroy of Canton, refused to have anything to do with Napier. He was lampooned in Chinese prints as "the foreign eye." The Viceroy issued an edict forbidding the British Commissioner to proceed up the river. At the same time all trade with English merchants was suspended. In defiance of the Chinese orders Lord Napier left Macao, and sailing up the river made his way to the English factory at Canton. There he found himself isolated. An Imperial proclamation declared that the national dignity was at stake, and ordered all Chinese subjects to keep away from the Englishmen. The Lord Napier's defiance Canton factory was deserted by all of its coolies and domestic servants. Lord Napier, ailing in health as he was, found his position untenable. He sent a final defiance to the Viceroy of Canton: "The merchants of Great Britain wish to trade with all China on principles of mutual benefit. They will never relax in their exertions until they gain this. The Viceroy will find it as easy to stop the current of the Canton River, as to carry into effect his insane determination." After this the Viceroy sent his troops British ships fired on into the foreign settlements, and ordered the Bogue forts to fire on any English ship that attempted to pass. On September 5, two British ships in the river were fired upon by the Chinese. The English merchants petitioned Lord Napier to retire to Macao. This he did with a futile protest against China's acts "of unprecedented tyranny and injustice." Lord Napier died, leaving to others the settlement of the difficulties which his presence had intensified.
The death of Earl Spencer, which raised Lord Althorp, his son, to the Upper Lord Melbourne dismissed House, gave the King a chance to get rid of his new advisers. When Lord Melbourne, on November 14, submitted to the King the changes he proposed to make in the Ministry in consequence of the vacancies in the Exchequer, William IV. expressed his disapproval and called in the Duke of Wellington in his stead. The Duke advised that the task of forming a new Cabinet be intrusted to Sir Robert Peel, then in Rome. Sir Peel dissolves Parliament Robert arrived in London on December 9, and at once accepted the task imposed on him. The opposition against his new-formed Ministry was so strong that it was decided to appeal to the country. On December 30, Parliament was dissolved.
In North America, the contest between the Northern and Southern States in regard to slavery steadily gathered force. President Jackson, in his annual message, called attention to "the fearful excitement produced in the South American slavery agitation by attempts to circulate through the mails inflammatory appeals addressed to the slaves." The Federal postmasters of the South and in several cities of the North were encouraged in the practice of rifling the mails of possibly offensive matter. John Quincy Adams was threatened with public censure at the bar of the House for proposing to print a petition for "Atherton Gag" freedmen. All attempts to get such petitions before Congress were defeated by a standing rule known as the Atherton Gag. During this year the national debt was almost liquidated by Jackson's payment of $4,760,082. A measure was passed through Congress establishing the value of gold and silver. Gold flowed into the Treasury through all channels of commerce. The mint was kept busy, and specie payments, which had been suspended for thirty years, were resumed. Gold and silver became the recognized currency of the land. The President's measures against the National Bank were less successful. On March 28, the Senate debated Clay's resolution censuring the President for his removal of the government deposits. A joint resolution by both HousesAmerican events of Congress was passed, in the Senate, June 3, by a vote of 29 to 10. Other events of the year of interest to Americans were the popular riots that threw New York into a turmoil on the occasion of the first mayoralty election in that city, the election of Abraham Lincoln to the Legislature of Illinois, the establishment of the Indian Territory; and the first appearance of Bancroft's "History of the United States."
Of world-wide interest was the emancipation of all black slaves in the British West Indies, South Africa, and other colonies; the establishment of the German tariff union, including all German States except Austria; the transfer of the capital of Greece from Nauplia to the site of Athens; the Friction matches foundation of the free university of Brussels, and the death of the great German theologian Schleiermacher. An innovation that was destined to add to the convenience and comfort of domestic life throughout the world was the introduction of lucifer matches during this year.
1835
ON February 19, Parliament reassembled. It was found that a working majority of Tories had been returned, but the first vote on the King's Irish balance of power speech revealed a junction of the Whigs with O'Connell's Irish party, which foreboded disaster to the government. For the first time in Parliamentary history the Irish members held the balance of power. In vain did Sir Robert Peel attempt to stave off his downfall by the introduction of welcome measures of reform. Once more it was on a question affecting Ireland that the government was defeated. This was Peel's high commutation bill. Lord Russell in reply moved that the surplus revenues of the Irish Church be used for non-ecclesiastical purposes. In the debate that followed, Gladstone spoke strongly against the measure. For this early speech, Gladstone's anti-Irish speech embodying as it did views so radically different from those of his later life, he was constantly reproached during his career. It ended with the words, "I hope I shall never live to see the day when such a system shall be adopted in this country; for the consequences of it to public men will be lamentable beyond all description." O'Connell said in reply: "I shall content myself with laying down O'Connell's reply the broad principle that the emoluments of a church ought not to be raised from a people who do not belong to it.... All that the Catholics of Ireland require is justice—equal and even-handed justice."
When the matter came to a vote the government was defeated by a majority of Fall of Peel's Ministry thirty-three. On April 8, the resignation of the Ministry was announced to Parliament. The King sent for Earl Grey, and, on his refusal to form a Ministry, was driven to the humiliating expedient of recalling Lord Melbourne. On April 18, a new Cabinet was formed, composed largely of the men who had been so summarily dismissed by the King a few months before. Melbourne's second Administration Lord Melbourne's second Administration was marked by the elevation of the settlements of South Australia to a Crown colony. The city of Melbourne, which was founded that year, was named in his honor.
An extraordinary career was ended, on June 18, by the death of William Cobbett, from overwork in Parliament. With but little school education, Death of William Cobbett this remarkable man succeeded in becoming not only one of the foremost prose writers of English, but the leader of a great popular party.
During the early part of Lord Melbourne's Administration, the discontent and irritation prevailing in Ireland were heightened by the agitation against the Orange lodges. The original purpose of these lodges had been to defend, against the Stuarts and their supporters, the Protestant ascendancy which had begun with the reign of William of Orange. The lodges had grown The Orange Lodges in strength until, in 1835, it was estimated that they numbered 140,000 members in Ireland, and as many as 40,000 in London alone. The Grand Master of all the Orange Lodges was no less a personage than the Duke of Cumberland, the King's brother. It was believed in Ireland that a conspiracy existed on the part of the Orangemen to set aside the Princess Victoria, the next heir to the throne, in favor of the Duke of Cumberland. The subject was brought to the notice of Parliament by Hume and O'Connell, who drew special attention to the illegal introduction of Orangemen into Duke of Cumberland implicated the British army, under warrants signed by the Duke of Cumberland. The scandal grew to such an extent that the Duke of Cumberland hastened to dissolve the order before a resolution condemning his conduct could pass through the Commons.