In 1858 the Queen made another attempt to bring the great novelist to Court. “I was put into a state of much perplexity on Sunday” (30th March, 1858), writes Dickens. “I don’t know who had spoken to my informant, but it seems that the Queen is bent upon hearing the ‘Carol’ read, and has expressed her desire to bring it about without offence, and hesitating about the manner of it, in consequence of my having begged to be excused from going to her when she sent for me after the Frozen Deep. I parried the thing as well as I could, but being asked to be prepared with a considerate and obliging answer, as it was known the request would be preferred, I said, ‘Well, I supposed Colonel Phipps would speak to me about it, and, if it were he who did so, I should assure him of my desire to meet any wish of her Majesty, and should express my hope that she would indulge me by making one of some audience or other, for I thought an audience necessary to the effect.’ Thus it stands, but it bothers me.” This difficulty could not be got over, though the Queen, by buying a copy of the “Carol,” embellished with the author’s autograph, at the sale of Thackeray’s library, testified to her interest in the two great humourists of the Victorian age.[341] Indeed, it was not till 1870, shortly before Dickens’s death, that the novelist met the Queen. He had brought from his American tour a great many large photographs of the battle-fields of the Civil War. Having taken a deep interest in that struggle, and having followed its details closely, her Majesty, who heard of the photographs through Mr. Arthur Helps (Clerk of the Privy Council), expressed a desire to see them. Dickens, on hearing of this from Mr. Helps, at once sent the photographs to Buckingham Palace, and then received a message from the Queen inviting him to see her, that she might thank him in person. “The Queen’s kindness,” says Mr. Forster, “left a strong impression on Dickens. Upon her Majesty expressing regret not to have heard his readings, Dickens intimated that they had become now a thing of the past, while he acknowledged gratefully her Majesty’s compliment in regard to them. She spoke to him of the impression made upon her by his acting in the Frozen Deep, and, on his stating, in reply to her inquiry, that the little play had not been very successful on the public stage, said this did not surprise her, since it no longer had the advantage of his performance in it. Then arose some mention of some alleged discourtesy shown to Prince Arthur in New York, and he begged her Majesty not to confound the true Americans of that city with the Fenian portion of its Irish population, on which she made the quiet comment that she was sure the people about the Prince had made too much of the story. He related to her the story of President Lincoln’s dream the night before his murder. She asked him to give her his writings, and could she have them that afternoon? but he begged to be allowed to send a bound copy. Her Majesty then took from a table her own book on the Highlands, with an autograph inscription to ‘Charles Dickens,’ and saying that the ‘humblest of writers’ would be ashamed to offer it to ‘one of the greatest,’ but that Mr. Helps, being asked to give it, had remarked that it would be valued most from herself, closed the interview by placing it in his hands.” Though Dickens refused a baronetcy, which the Queen would have gladly conferred on him, he was persuaded to go to Court. In March, 1870, he writes to a friend:—“As my Sovereign desires that I should attend the next levee, don’t faint with amazement if you see my name in that unwonted connection. I have scrupulously kept myself free for the 2nd of April, in case you should be accessible.” His name is among those who attended the levee, and his daughter’s name appears among those who were at the Drawing Room that followed. “I never saw Mr. Dickens more agreeable,” says Lady Houghton in a letter to Mr. Forster, “than at a dinner at our house about a fortnight before his death, when he met the King of the Belgians and the Prince of Wales, at the special desire of the latter.”[342]
The chief social function of the season of 1870 was the Garden Party at Windsor, which took place on the 25th of June. Great preparations were made for the event. A series of tastefully arranged tents had been erected on the lawn under the East Terrace, and in the grounds of the Home Park towards Frogmore, and the State Apartments of the Castle were also thrown open for the reception of guests, who were conveyed from the station by forty carriages. They began to arrive about four o’clock, and the Prince and Princess of Wales and other members of the Royal Family came on the scene later on. The street and road to the Castle were kept by a large body of the Metropolitan Police; a guard of honour of the Scots Fusilier Guards was posted in the quadrangle of the Castle, and the Yeomen of the Royal Body Guard were on duty inside. The Queen, who looked well and cheerful, received her visitors in a tent near the wall of the East Terrace, and was surrounded by members of her family, and attended by the Lord Chamberlain, the Duchess of Sutherland, and the Marchioness of Ely. The London Glee and Madrigal Union and her Majesty’s private band supplied the music that delighted the gay and brilliant crowd of promenaders, who did not break up and return to town till about seven o’clock in the evening. It had been expected that the Queen would be able to attend and open the Thames Embankment early in July, and her appearance at the Garden Party at Windsor strengthened popular anticipations. Unfortunately, when the time came round, her Majesty felt herself unable to endure the strain of the public ceremony, and the consequence was that, when it was performed on her behalf by the Prince of Wales (13th July), at least a thousand seats were vacant for which tickets had been issued.
Ere the year ended the rebellion in the Red River Settlement, or the “Revolt of the Winnipegers,” as the Americans called them, was quelled. The history of the rising was as follows:—The Hudson’s Bay Company had enjoyed powers of proprietorship and exclusive trade in the vast region extending from the American frontier to the Frozen Ocean. Early in the century Lord Selkirk had established in the extreme south of this region, and close to the American line, a colony of mixed blood, descended from French, Canadian, English, and Scottish parents, servants of the Company. They squatted on a strip of fertile land on the Red River, which flows from Minnesota into Lake Winnipeg. These people increased to the number of 10,000, and they inhabited, perhaps, the most secluded spot ever reached by European colonists, in the centre of the North American Continent. They had been ruled by the Company under a “Governor of Assiniboia,” and a Recorder. In 1869 the Company agreed to sell all their territorial and sovereign rights in Rupert’s Land to Canada for £300,000. This cession included the Red River Settlement. The “Winnipegers” however, objected to be transferred to what they called a “foreign power,” and they split into two parties—the Canadians, almost all half-breeds, speaking French and professing the Catholic religion, and who rose in rebellion, and a minority of English and Scots who remained loyal. The rebels refused to admit into the district Mr. Macdougal, who was sent by Canada as Governor. A leading agitator, Louis Riel, was proclaimed (in February) “President of the Republic of the North-West,” and the insurgents appealed to the United States for protection. A contingent under command of Colonel Wolseley was despatched to suppress the insurrection. The expedition reached Fort Garry, the headquarters of Riel and his rebel followers, on the 23rd of August. They were welcomed by the loyal party, and found that Riel himself had disappeared, with a considerable amount of plunder, into the neighbouring American territory. The British force was admirably handled, and did not lose a single man, despite the enormous difficulties of its march over a rough and broken country. For from its point of disembarkation in Lake Superior, it had to travel through 600 miles of an unknown wilderness of water, rocks, and forests, where no supplies were obtainable. The whole expense was under £100,000, of which one quarter only was to be paid by England. Order was re-established on the Red River at the end of 1870, and, as the “province of Manitoba,” it was added to Canada.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] In 1847 the rate of discount had risen to 8 per cent., and the bullion in the Bank had fallen to £8,313,000. On the 9th of November, 1857, the rate of discount rose to 10 per cent., and yet gold still flowed out till it sank to £7,171,000. The Bank was authorised to increase its issue by £21,000,000.
[2] Campbell’s army consisted of 25,000 men, 16,000 being European troops, the largest number ever brought together in India up to that time.
[3] Sir H. Rose’s losses were 38 killed, and 215 wounded. The starving women and children were, however, spared, and, indeed, fed by the English soldiers, out of their own rations. The massacre of the garrison was an act of vengeance for the treacherous butchery of the English in Jhansi, who, on the 4th of June, 1857, had surrendered, on the assurance that their lives would be spared by the implacable Ranee. She, however, ordered them to be killed, as at Cawnpore.
[4] The Nankin Treaty of 1842 was confirmed. Ambassadors and diplomatic agents were by the new Treaty to be appointed at St. James’s and Pekin, and the British Minister was to be received at Pekin without being called on to perform any humiliating ceremony. Disrespect to the British Minister was to be a punishable offence, and Consuls in open ports were to be respected. Chinese Christians were to be protected, and not persecuted by the Government, and British subjects were to have a right of travelling in China under passports. Newchwang, Tang-chow, Taiwan, Chan-chow, and Kiung-chow were to be, with the ports, opened by the Treaty of Nankin free to British subjects. British subjects were permitted to employ Chinamen in any lawful capacity, and British ships were to trade on the Yang-Tsze river. All questions of right between British subjects were to be decided by British authorities, but Chinese criminals were to be punished by the Chinese tribunals. Other clauses stipulated for a war indemnity to England, for full privileges of protection to British subjects, and for tariff and customs dues on goods carried by British ships. After the Treaty was concluded, the Chinese Emperor evaded his obligation to ratify it, till compelled to do so by force in 1860.
[5] Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. II., pp. 125, 126.
[6] Greville Memoirs, Third Part, Vol. II., pp. 133, 134.