Another characteristic incident is recorded by Mr. Richard Redgrave: ‘Mr. Lowe said that a few days before, dining with Mr. Gladstone, a lady being seated between them, Mr. Gladstone across said to Mr. Lowe: “I cannot think why they called Cobden the Inspired Bagman.” “Neither can I,” said Mr. Lowe; “for he was neither inspired nor a bagman. In fact, it reminds me of a story told of Madame Maintenon when someone offered to obtain an order for her to gain admission into the Maison des filles repenties. ‘Nay,’ said Madame, ‘I am neither a fille nor am I a repentie.’” At that the lady between the two politicians burst into a laugh, but Mr. Gladstone pulled rather a long face,’ as he did, I am told by a late Minister, at a dinner where Lord Westbury uttered some rather coarse jokes.
The late Mr. R. H. Hutton, of the Spectator, in an article in the Contemporary Review, smartly hit off one of Mr. Gladstone’s characteristics: ‘There is a story that one of his most ardent followers said of him that he did not at all object to Mr. Gladstone’s always having one ace up his sleeve, but he did object to his always saying that Providence placed it there.’ In 1832 a Dean of Peterborough said of Mr. Gladstone: ‘His conscience is too tender ever to run straight.’ In 1866 Dr. Lake, of Durham, remarked of Mr. Gladstone that ‘his intellect could persuade his conscience of anything.’
‘In the course of life,’ Mr. Gladstone wrote to Sir Henry Taylor, ‘I have found it just as difficult to get out of office as to get in, and I have done more doubtful things to get out than to get in. Furthermore, for more than nine or ten months of the year I am always willing to go, but in the two or three which precede the Budget I begin to feel an itch to have the handling of it. Last summer I should have been delighted [to resign]; now I am indifferent. In February, if I live so long, I shall, I have no doubt, be loath, but in April quite ready again. Such are my signs of the Zodiac.’
In the series of sketches of ‘Bookworms of Yesterday and To-day,’ place in the Bookworm is given to Mr. Gladstone, who has been a book-collector for over three-quarters of a century. ‘He kindly informs me,’ writes Mr. W. Roberts, ‘that he has two books which he acquired in 1815, one of which was a present from Miss H. More. At the present time he estimates his library to contain from 22,000 to 25,000 books, arranged by himself into divisions and sections in a very minute manner. The library is so exceedingly miscellaneous that Mr. Gladstone himself does not venture to state which section preponderates, although he thinks that “theology may be one-fourth.” There are about twenty editions of Homer, and from thirty to forty translations, whole or part. He has never sympathized to any considerable extent with the craze for modern first editions, but “I like a tall copy” is Mr. Gladstone’s reply, made with all the genuine spirit of the true connoisseur, to an inquiry on the subject. And so far as regards a preference for ancient authors, in old but good editions, to modernized reprints, the verdict is emphatically in favour of the former.’
Lord Shaftesbury seems to have been struck with Mr. Gladstone’s inconsistency. In his diary, in 1873, he writes: ‘Last year Gladstone, speaking on Female Suffrage, said “the Bill will destroy the very foundation of social life.” This year he says: “We had better defer it till we get the ballot; then it will be quite safe.”’ In 1864 his lordship had written: ‘Mr. Gladstone will succumb to every pressure except the pressure of a constitutional and Conservative party.’
Mr. W. Lucy thus illustrates Mr. Gladstone’s restlessness: ‘Except at the very best, Mr. Gladstone’s Parliamentary manner lacked repose. He was always brimming over with energy, which had much better have been reserved for worthier objects than those that sometimes succeeded in evoking its lavish expenditure. I once followed Mr. Gladstone through the hours of an eventful sitting. . . . The foe opposite was increasing in the persistence of his attack, and nominal friends on the benches were growing weary in their allegiance. The Premier came in from behind the chair with hurried pace; he had been detained in Downing Street up to the last moment. As usual, when contemplating making a great speech, he had a flower in his button-hole, and was dressed with unusual care. Striding swiftly past his colleagues on the Treasury Bench, he dropped into the seat kept vacant for him, and, hastily taking up a copy of the orders, ascertained what particular question in the long list had been reached. Then turning with a sudden bound of his whole body, he entered into animated conversation with a colleague, his pale face working with excitement, his eyes glistening, and his right hand vehemently beating the open palm of his left hand, as if he were literally pulverizing an adversary. Tossing himself back with equally rapid gesture, he lay passive for the space of eighty seconds. Then with another swift movement of the body he turned to the colleague on the left, dashed his hand into his side-pocket, as if he had suddenly become conscious of a live coal secreted there, pulled out a letter, opened it with a violent flick of extended forefingers, and earnestly discoursed thereon.’
In acknowledging a copy of a recently published work on ‘Clergymen’s Sore Throat,’ Mr. Gladstone has addressed a letter to the author, Dr. E. B. Shuldham, on the subject of the management of the voice in public speaking. ‘No part of the work,’ writes Mr. Gladstone, ‘surprised me more than your account of the various expedients resorted to by eminent singers. There, if anywhere, we might have anticipated something like a fixed tradition. But it seems we have learned nothing from experience, and I myself can testify that even in this matter fashion prevails. Within my recollection an orange, or more than one, was alone, as a rule, resorted to by members of Parliament requiring aid. Now it is never used. When I have had very lengthy statements to make I have used what is called egg-flip—a glass of sherry beaten up with an egg. I think it excellent, but I have much more faith in the egg than in the alcohol. I never think of employing it unless on the rare occasions when I have expected to go much beyond an hour. One strong reason for using something of the kind is the great exhaustion often consequent on protracted expectation and attention before speaking.’
One of the best of the many stories connected with Mr. Gladstone’s many residences in the South of France tells how one Sunday he and his wife were seated in the church at Cannes near the pulpit. The Grand Old Man, turning to his wife, said, in an irritable tone: ‘I can’t hear.’ ‘Never mind, my dear,’ said the lady. ‘Go to sleep; it will do you much more good.’
In a chapter of his autobiography Mr. Gladstone wrote: ‘In theory, and at least for others, I am a purist with respect to what touches the consistency of statesmen. Change of opinion in those to whom the public look more or less to assert its own is an evil to the country at large, though a much smaller one than their persistency in a course which they know to be wrong. It is not always to be blamed, but it is to be watched with vigilance—always to be challenged and put upon trial.’
In 1881 Mr. Gladstone told the electors of Leeds he had been a Liberal since 1846. The fact is, as Mr. Jennings has shown, that he held office under a Conservative Premier, that he was returned for Oxford as a Conservative, and that in 1858 he canvassed the county of Flint for Sir Stephen Glynne, who was a strong supporter of Lord Derby’s Government.