Aug. 25.—[At Balmoral]. Walked thirteen miles, quite fresh. 26.—Walked 8-½ miles in 2 h. 10 m. Sept. 1.—Off at 9.15 [from Invercauld] to Castleton and Derry Lodge, driving. From the Lodge at 11.15, thirty-three miles to Kingussie on foot. Half an hour for luncheon, 1/4 hour waiting for the ponies (the road so rough on the hill); touched a carriageable road at 5, the top at 3. Very grand hill views, floods of rain on Speyside. Good hotel at Kingussie, but sorely disturbed by rats.
“Think,” he wrote to his daughter Mary from Naworth, “of my walking a good three and thirty miles last Monday, some of it the roughest ground I ever passed.” He was always wont to enjoy proofs of physical vigour, never forgetting how indispensable it is in the equipment of the politician for the athletics of public life. On his return home, he resumed the equable course of life associated with that happy place, though political consultations intruded:—
Sept. 6.—Settled down again at Hawarden, where a happy [pg 474] family party gathered to-day. 13.—Finished the long and sad but profoundly interesting task of my letter to Miss Hope-Scott [on her father]. Also sent her father's letters (105) to her.... We finished cutting down a great beech. Our politicians arrived. Conversations with Bright, with Wolverton, with Granville, and with all three till long past twelve, when I prayed to leave off for the sake of the brain. 14.—Church morning and evening.... A stiff task for a half exhausted brain. But I cannot desist from a sacred task. Conversation with Lord Granville, Lord Wolverton, Mr. Bright. 15.—Church, 8-½ a.m. Spent the forenoon in conclave till two, after a preliminary conversation with Bright. Spent the evening also in conclave, we have covered a good deal of ground.... Cut down the half-cut alder. 16.—Final conversation with Granville, with Wolverton, and with Bright, who went last. 18.—Wood-cutting with Herbert, then went up to Stephen's school feast, an animated and pretty scene. 21.—Read Manning's letter to Archbishop of Armagh. There is in it to me a sad air of unreality; it is on stilts all through. 27.—Conversation with Mr. Palgrave chiefly on Symonds and the Greek mythology.... Cut a tree with Herbert. 28.—Conversation with Mr. Palgrave. He is tremendous, but in all other respects good and full of mental energy and activity, only the vent is rather large. 29.—Conversation with Mr. Palgrave, pretty stiff. Wood-cutting with Herbert. Wrote a rough mem. and computation for the budget of next year. I want eight millions to handle! Oct. 2.—Off at 8, London at 3.
The memorial letter on the departed friend of days long past, if less rich than the companion piece upon Lord Aberdeen, is still a graceful example of tender reminiscence and regret poured out in periods of grave melody.[299] It is an example, too, how completely in the press of turbid affairs, he could fling off the load and at once awake afresh the thoughts and associations that in truth made up his inmost life.
The Bath Election
Next came the autumn cabinets, with all their embarrassments, so numerous that one minister tossed a scrap across the table to another, “We ought to have impeached Dizzy [pg 475] for not taking office last spring.” Disraeli had at least done them one service. An election took place at Bath in October. The conservative leader wrote a violent letter in support of the conservative candidate. “For nearly five years,” said Mr. Disraeli, “the present ministers have harassed every trade, worried every profession and assailed or menaced every class, institution, and species of property in the country. Occasionally they have varied this state of civil warfare by perpetrating some job which outraged public opinion, or by stumbling into mistakes which have been always discreditable and sometimes ruinous. All this they call a policy and seem quite proud of it; but the country has I think made up its mind to close this career of plundering and blundering.”[300] Mr. Gladstone described this curious outburst as “Mr. Disraeli's incomparable stroke on our behalf,” and in fact its effect on public opinion was to send the liberal candidate to the head of the poll. But the victory at Bath stood solitary in the midst of reverses.
As for the general legislative business of the coming session, Mr. Gladstone thought it impossible to take up the large subject of the extension of the county franchise, but they might encourage Mr. Trevelyan to come forward with it on an early day, and give him all the help they could. Still the board was bare, the meal too frugal. They were afraid of proposing a change in the laws affecting the inheritance of land, or reform of London government, or a burials bill, or a county government bill. The home secretary was directed to draw up a bill for a group of difficult questions as to employers and employed. No more sentences were to be provided for Mr. Disraeli's next electioneering letter.
December was mainly spent at Hawarden. A pleasant event was his eldest daughter's marriage, of which he wrote to the Duke of Argyll:—
The kindness of all from the Queen down, to the cottagers and poor folks about us, has been singular and most touching. [pg 476] Our weather for the last fortnight has been delightful, and we earnestly hope it may hold over to-morrow. I have not yet read Renan's apôtres. My opinion of him is completely dual. His life of Our Lord I thought a piece of trumpery; his work Sur les langues sémitiques most able and satisfactory in its manner and discussion.
The notes in the diary bring us up to the decision that was to end the great ministry:—