[82] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. I., p. 379.
[83] This person wielded an influence that few people suspected at the time. For example, in September, 1852, Lord Malmesbury, then Foreign Secretary, set a gang of police spies to watch the outraged victims of the coup d’état in London. Having put together all the information he could get, he illustrated the spirited foreign policy of the day by sending his private secretary and relative, Mr. George Harris, to convey this information secretly to Charles Louis Bonaparte. But that potentate did not deign to give Mr. Harris an interview. For three days he was kept dancing attendance, and at last by a private letter of introduction to an aide-de-camp of the President’s, he got access to Canrobert, Tascher, and Roquet, who loftily told him that in a week’s time perhaps he might have an audience. “Then,” writes Mr. Harris to Lord Malmesbury, “I returned to Paris, and called on Mrs. Howard, toadied and flattered her, stating that I was in a great hurry to get back to London, and only wanted to see his Highness the President for two minutes. She sent off an orderly at once, and before night, I received an invitation from Louis Napoleon to accompany him out shooting to say my say, at 5.30, and dine afterwards.”—Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. I., p. 346. That the Foreign Minister of England should act the part of a Bonapartist spy, is curious. That his relative and private secretary should have accepted the mission of a subordinate mouchard, and, in carrying it out, should have “toadied and flattered” a Parisian cocotte to get an audience from the Prince-President, gives one a quaint glimpse of diplomatic manners and customs in 1852.
[84] Memoirs of an Ex-Minister, Vol. I., p. 379.
[85] The Imperial marriage took place—the civil ceremony on the 29th, and the religious ceremony on the 30th of January, 1853.
[86] Compare with such comments a passage in a letter written by Mr. Nassau Senior, to M. de Tocqueville. “Mrs. Grote tells me that you rather complain that the English papers approve the marriage, a marriage which you all disapprove. The fact is that we like the marriage because you dislike it. We are, above all things, desirous that the present tyranny should end as quickly as possible. It can end only by the general alienation of the French people from the tyrant; and every fault that he commits delights us, because it is a step towards his fall.”—Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville, Vol. II., p. 34. Cf. also Palmerston’s opinion from another point of view. Ashley’s Life of Lord Palmerston, Vol. II., p. 7.
[87] Mr. Disraeli reckoned the revenue of 1852 at £51,625,000. It actually reached £53,089,000. He set down the expenditure at £51,164,000, whereas it came only to £50,782,000.
[88] Dowell’s History of Taxation, Vol. II., p. 322; Smith’s Wealth of Nations, Vol. III., p. 337.
[89] These bore interest at £1 10s. per cent., but were in future to bear interest at £2 15s. up to 1864, and £2 10s. up to 1891.
[90] Walpole’s History of England, Vol. V., p. 68.
[91] Students of financial history may be referred to Hansard, Vol. CXXL, p. 11, for Mr. Disraeli’s first Budget, and to Hansard, Vol. CXXV., pp. 818, 1355, 1399, and 1423, for Mr. Gladstone’s. Cf, also Report of the Commissioners of Inland Revenue, 1870.