Ministerial Embarrassments
While still grieving over this painful loss, Mr. Gladstone suddenly found himself in a cauldron of ministerial embarrassments. An inquiry into certain irregularities at the general post office led to the discovery that the sum of eight hundred thousand pounds had been detained on its way to the exchequer, and applied to the service of the telegraphs. The persons concerned in the gross and inexcused irregularities were Mr. Monsell, Mr. Ayrton, and the chancellor of the exchequer. “There probably have been times,” Mr. Gladstone wrote to the Queen (Aug. 7), “when the three gentlemen who in their several positions have been chiefly to blame would have been summarily dismissed from your Majesty's service. But on none of them could any ill-intent be charged; two of them had, among whatever errors of judgment, [pg 461] done much and marked good service to the state.” Under the circumstances he could not resort to so severe a course without injustice and harshness. “The recent exposures,” Mr. Gladstone wrote to Lord Russell, “have been gall and wormwood to me from day to day.” “Ever since the failure of the Irish University bill,” he said, “the government has been in a condition in which, to say the least, it has had no strength to spare, and has stood in need of all the strength it could derive from internal harmony and vigorous administration.” The post office scandal exposed to the broad light of day that neither harmony nor vigour existed or could be counted on. It was evident that neither the postmaster nor the chancellor of the exchequer could remain where they were. In submitting new arrangements to the Queen, Mr. Gladstone said that he would gladly have spared her the irksome duty of considering them, had it been “in his power either on the one side to leave unnoticed the scandals that have occurred, or on the other to have tendered a general resignation, or to have advised a dissolution of parliament.” The hot weather and the lateness of the session made the House of Commons disinclined for serious conflict; still at the end of July various proceedings upon the scandals took place, which. Mr. Gladstone described to the Queen as of “a truly mortifying character.” Mr. Ayrton advanced doctrines of ministerial responsibility that could not for a moment be maintained, and Mr. Gladstone felt himself bound on the instant to disavow them.[292]
Sir Robert Phillimore gives a glimpse of him in these evil days:—
July 24.—Gladstone dined here hastily; very unwell, and much worn. He talked about little else than Bishop Wilberforce's funeral and the ecclesiastical appeals in the Judicature bill. 29th.—Saw Gladstone, better but pale. Said the government deserved a vote of censure on Monsell and Lowe's account. Monsell ought to resign; but Lowe, he said, ought for past [pg 462] services to be defended. 30th..—Dined at Gladstone's. Radical M.P.'s ... agreed that government was tottering, and that Gladstone did everything. Gladstone walks with a stick. Aug. 7.—An interview with Gladstone. He was communicative. A great reform of his government has become necessary. The treasury to be swept out. He looked much better.
Nothing at any time was so painful, almost intolerably painful, to Mr. Gladstone as personal questions, and cabinet reconstruction is made up of personal questions of the most trying and invidious kind. “I have had a fearful week,” he wrote to the Duke of Argyll (Aug. 8), “but have come through. A few behave oddly, most perfectly well, some incomparably well; of these last I must name honoris causâ, Bright, Bruce, and F. Cavendish.” To Mr. Bright he had written when the crisis first grew acute:—
Aug. 2.—You have seen the reports, without doubt, of what has been going on. You can hardly conceive the reality. I apprehend that the House of Commons by its abstinence and forbearance, must be understood to have given us breathing time and space to consider what can be done to renovate the government in something like harmony and something like dignity. This will depend greatly upon men and partly upon measures. Changes in men there must be, and some without delay. A lingering and discreditable death, after the life we have lived, is not an ending to which we ought to submit without effort; and as an essential part of the best effort that can be made, I am most desirous to communicate with you here. I rely on your kindness to come up. Here only can I show you the state of affairs, which is most dangerous, and yet not unhopeful.
From the diary:—
Aug. 1.—Saw Lord F. Cavendish, also Lord Granville, Lord Wolverton, Mr. Cardwell, repeatedly on the crisis. 2.—An anxious day. The first step was taken, Cardwell broke to Lowe the necessity of his changing his office. Also I spoke to Forster and Fortescue. 4.—A very anxious day of constant conversation and reflection, ending with an evening conclave. 5.—My day began with Dr. Clark. Rose at eleven.... Wrote.... Most of [pg 463] these carried much powder and shot. Some were Jack Ketch and Calcraft [the public executioner] letters. 6.—Incessant interviews.... Much anxiety respecting the Queen's delay in replying. Saw Lord Wolverton late with her reply. 9.—To Osborne. A long and satisfactory audience of H.M. Attended the council, and received a third time the seals of my old office.
This resumption of the seals of the exchequer, which could no longer be left with Mr. Lowe, was forced upon Mr. Gladstone by his colleagues. From a fragmentary note, he seems to have thought of Mr. Goschen for the vacant post, “but deferring to the wishes of others,” he says, “I reluctantly consented to become chancellor of the exchequer.” The latest instance of a combination of this office with that of first lord of the treasury were Canning in 1827, and Peel in 1884-5.[293]
The correspondence on this mass of distractions is formidable, but, luckily for us it is now mere burnt-out cinder. The two protagonists of discord had been Mr. Lowe and Mr. Ayrton, and we may as well leave them with a few sentences of Mr. Gladstone upon the one, and to the other:—