One of the most curious projects broached by Lord Palmerston’s satellites was that of raising a subscription among “the gentry of England” to furnish Garibaldi with funds for attacking Austria in Venice, and France in Rome. This scheme, says Lord Shaftesbury, who euphuistically describes it as one for “furthering his [Garibaldi’s] Italian purposes,” was quashed by
GARIBALDI’S RECEPTION IN TRAFALGAR SQUARE, LONDON.
the patriot himself, happily in time to save his credit as well as the credit of “the gentry of England.” After “many sittings of committees,” writes Lord Shaftesbury, who was one of the most active of Lord Palmerston’s agents in this business,[197] “myriads of letters and private requests, we had in two months obtained payments and promises for a sum considerably under three thousand pounds.” Whether Lord Shaftesbury was, like Garibaldi, a tool in Palmerston’s hands it is impossible to say. But it is a singular fact that we find him writing to the Duc de Persigny on the 8th of April assuring him “that there is not in it [Garibaldi’s visit] a notion of politics.” On the other hand, he himself discloses, in a posthumous Memorandum unearthed by the industry of his biographer, the whole story of his abortive attempt to raise subsidies for Garibaldi’s revolutionary designs. Nay, when the Tory chiefs went to Stafford House to dine with the hero, Lady Shaftesbury, who was Lady Palmerston’s daughter, appears on the scene laughing at them for having fallen into a trap.[198]
KIEL.
But after the lion had roared loud enough to wake the echoes of the Tuileries, Lord Clarendon was sent to Paris on a private diplomatic mission. His object was to induce the Emperor Napoleon to support Lord Palmerston’s proposal for a Conference of the Powers on the Sleswig-Holstein Question, a scheme which France as yet did not sanction. It must be allowed that if the German Powers scoffed at the attempt to frighten them by a Cockney demonstration in favour of Garibaldi, Lord Palmerston and his envoy seem to have made it serve their turn in Paris. Napoleon III. agreed at last to support the Palmerston-Russell scheme of a Conference, provided Palmerston would send Garibaldi out of England as quickly as possible. This was an embarrassing condition to fulfil, as the guerilla chief was becoming far too popular to be treated in such an unceremonious fashion. He had entered into an engagement to proceed to Manchester, and from thence on a provincial tour of agitation, which greatly disquieted Napoleon III., and which must therefore be stopped. The end of the farce may be told in Lord Malmesbury’s words. In his Diary on the 20th of April he writes:—“Garibaldi leaves England on Friday.... Certainly there must be some intrigue, as Mr. Ferguson, the surgeon, writes a letter to the Duke of Sutherland—which is published—saying it would be dangerous for Garibaldi’s health if he exposed himself to the fatigue of an expedition to Manchester, &c. &c. On the other hand, Dr. Basile, Garibaldi’s own doctor, says he is perfectly well, and able to undergo all the fatigue of a journey to the manufacturing towns.”[199] This communication from Dr. Basile was published, because Garibaldi was naturally angry at having been overreached by Palmerston and the Whig aristocracy, who sacrificed him whenever he was of no more use to them as a piece on the political chessboard. What made matters worse was that Garibaldi felt certain that, if he had been allowed but one week for agitation in the provinces, he would have stirred up so much popular feeling that he could have defied Lord Palmerston to order him home.
As usual in cases where Lord Palmerston was forced to do something that displeased the populace, it was promptly insinuated far and wide that he was again the victim of the Court. Garibaldi, it was hinted, had been expelled in deference to the Queen’s pro-Austrian sympathies. It is but right to vindicate her Majesty from the absurd suggestions that were then current, and for that reason it has been deemed expedient to tell the true story of Garibaldi’s visit to London in 1864. Let it be admitted, however, that at least one member of the Whig aristocracy refused to turn against the hero when the mot d’ordre went forth from Cambridge House that he must be dropped. This was the Dowager Duchess of Sutherland, who carried the discarded lion away to Cliefden, and tended him faithfully till he left Plymouth on the 25th of April. It was her enthusiasm that inspired one of the diners-out of the day with an anecdote which rendered the wonderful party at Stafford House on the 13th of April almost as memorable as Garibaldi’s presence there. “She” (the Dowager Duchess), said one of the company, “is noble, richly jointured, romantic, and a widow—why, then, does she not marry her hero?” “Ah,” was the reply, “but you forget he has a wife living.” “That,” said another guest—alleged to have been Lord Palmerston—“is of no consequence; I have Gladstone here, and can easily get him to explain her away.” Yet, though the duchess and the mob alike forgot to mourn for their hero after his expulsion had ceased to be a nine days’ wonder, it is pleasing to know that their fidelity to his cause was unwavering, and that their admiration of the man himself was absolutely untarnished by sordid and selfish calculations.