LORD CLARENDON AND LORD GRANVILLE
The generation of the Villiers family to which Lord Clarendon belonged
were people singularly gifted with charm and ability. I did not know the
Bishop, nor did I know Mr. Edward Villiers, but Lady Theresa Lewis was a
most attractive personality. She must have been very pretty in her youth,
and when I knew her as the mother of grown-up children she was a most
fascinating hostess, clever, agreeable, accomplished, doing the honours
of Kent House with all the grace of a finished _grande dame_.
Mr. Charles Villiers was first returned for Wolverhampton in January,
1835. He retained the seat for sixty-four years and died in January,
1898, aged ninety-six. The last time that he voted in the House of
Commons was in 1894 against Gladstone’s Home Rule Bill. I had the honour
of giving him my arm to walk through the lobbies. He was bent, infirm,
and very tottery, but his mind was as full of fire as ever, and his wit
nimble and good to listen to. That was the last time that I saw him and
had speech of him.
Charles Villiers was universally admitted to be the best of good company;
he was a wonderful talker and he was ever ready in repartee, his ripostes
being the perfection of fencing; but his sallies were sometimes, like
those of Bernal Osborne, a little apt to be biting. He had not the
sparkling, happy nature of his great brother, Lord Clarendon, whose
ringing laugh would put a whole roomful of guests in a good humour. I do
not think that I ever came across a man who, in spite of the gout, seemed
so instinct with the joy of life as Lord Clarendon. In his youth he was
accused of being rather boisterous, and Lord Granville once told me that
his mother, old Lady Granville, the witty Ambassadress at Paris, said of
him rather slily: “Yes, George Villiers, with a slight headache, is the
most agreeable young man in London.”
His gaiety was infectious, and few more lovable men have ever enriched
the happiness of those to whom he extended that generous sympathy—the
secret of the affection in which he was held by all with whom he came in
contact, from Queen to Peer and Peasant. The gracious manner, the happy
turn of an epigrammatic sentence, the droll humour, the gift of being a
listener as well as a talker—who shall say that these are not valuable
assets even in a statesman’s wallet?
I first made his acquaintance about the year 1858 and used constantly
to be invited to the Grove, which surely was the merriest and brightest
country house in all England. And there were two or three other homes
hard by, also filled with young people ready for fun of all sorts—the
Rokebys, Eburys and the Mill, where Mrs. Edward Villiers lived—all
furnishing their quota of dancing dogs and pretty girls, so that
there was a perfect succession of balls, theatricals and music; but
I doubt whether any of us young people took more delight in all the
entertainments than the great statesman and diplomatist whose gaiety was
so infectious. He was strikingly handsome and had that air of distinction
which means so much more than mere beauty; when the two are combined
their possessor ranks with the demigods.
As a host he had the rare gift of drawing out every one of his friends to
the best advantage, so that after a dinner-party of sixteen or eighteen
people in Grosvenor Crescent every guest was sent home on the best of
possible terms with himself, feeling that he, too, had played his little
part not altogether in vain.
To younger men his kindness knew no bounds. When I came back from Russia
in 1864 he was not Secretary of State, but he sent for me and told me
that he had had a very flattering letter about me from my chief, Lord
Napier, which made him wish to have a quiet talk about Russian policy and
the great men in St. Petersburg, where he had himself been in his youth
as attaché. Lord Napier, it seemed, had told him that I had had rather
special opportunities of becoming acquainted with some of the various
Russian statesmen and influential persons, and had, from time to time,
been able to supplement his own information. Lord Clarendon kept me with
him for an hour or more, and when I took leave of him he said: “I shall
tell Palmerston that he must see you, so do not go out of town till you
hear from him.” Two days afterwards I received a summons to Cambridge
House and had another long talk with Lord Palmerston, who was as genial
and kind as he always had been, cross-examined me at length, and sent me
on to see Lord Halifax at the India Office.
The difference between the three interviews was curious. The two great
men were not above seeing whether the young man could tell them anything
worth hearing—Lord Halifax was kindness itself, but he only wished to
talk. As for wanting to hear what I might be able to say he had no care
for that.
The last time that I saw Lord Clarendon was, as I have already intimated,
in the early summer of 1870. During the time that I was in the Far East
he used to make my father send him the letters which I wrote home, and
when I reached London his welcome to me was of the warmest. He at once
invited me to dinner, and after dinner kept me in talk for some time. He
asked me about the book I was writing, giving me great encouragement and
some advice, which, unlike most advice, was followed. Two or three weeks
later he was gone. On the 27th of April he died in harness, in the heat
of the work which he loved so well, and busy with the craft of which he
was a past master.
Was Bismarck right in saying that if he had lived the war of 1870 would
not have taken place? I doubt it. I think that when Bismarck made his
famous speech to Lady Ampthill, telling her that nothing had ever given
him so much pleasure as her father’s death, because it meant that his
schemes would not be foiled, that was his rough, _burschikos_ way of
paying her a compliment on Lord Clarendon’s power, sagacity and skill
as a diplomatist. There is no doubt that he had immense influence both
with Louis Napoléon and with the Empress, whom he had known as a child in
the intimacy of her mother’s house when he was Minister at Madrid; but
there were silent intrigues of which the English Foreign Office and our
Ambassadors abroad knew nothing, as was shown when Mr. Hammond told Lord
Granville on his taking over Lord Clarendon’s succession that there never
had been a time when there was such a perfectly peaceful outlook. In a
fortnight the Paris mob was shouting “_A Berlin!_”
In recent works Mr. Hammond has been greatly and most unjustly blamed for
his want of prescience. Nothing could be more unfair. Mr. Hammond was
guided by the reports, and, more important still, by the private letters,
of the Ambassadors at Paris, Berlin, and other Courts. That no one—not
even Bismarck himself—knew how near war was is amply proved by Bismarck’s
own memoirs. The thing fell like a thunder-clap—the result of the Ems
episode—and Bismarck was as much staggered as the rest of the world by
the opportunity which arose for him.
Things had gone too far for any hope of successful official interference.
Had Lord Clarendon been out of office, able to go to Paris, and discuss
matters face to face with the Emperor, who loved him, his winning ways
and sound sense might, at an earlier moment, a few weeks sooner, have had
some effect. But chained to a desk in Downing Street, only able to speak,
as it were, through an interpreter, and only informed by agents who
could not report a secret which was well kept because it did not exist,
his power was largely discounted—the personal element was, of course,
entirely wanting. Moreover, it was too late; the threat and the execution
were simultaneous. Both sides were bent on war, and both were working in
a deadly secrecy which has perhaps never been surpassed. The most astute
diplomatists, the most practised politicians, were not prepared for the
storm that was about to burst; the barometer had given no indication.
France was upon the brink of a volcano. Deep below the surface there were
underground mutterings and growls which sent shivers of fear through
those who knew, and yet, like London, Paris went on laughing with
Offenbach, Schneider, Dupuis & Co., and the _cafés chantants_ were never
fuller, the _premières_ at the theatres never more a matter of serious
importance.
The fatal year 1870 had opened prosperously enough in France. The new
liberal and quasi-constitutional Government under Emile Ollivier was
apparently sailing in smooth waters. All of a sudden a storm burst which
went far towards wrecking the ship. On the 10th of January Prince Pierre
Bonaparte was sitting quietly in his library at Auteuil when Messieurs
Fonvielle and Victor Noir were announced;—two gentlemen who were editors
or sub-editors of Rochefort’s republican newspaper, the _Marseillaise_.
They came to call the Prince to account for an article which had appeared
in a Corsican newspaper. The Prince, taken by surprise, pulled out a
pistol and shot Victor Noir, while Fonvielle made his escape.
It is easy to imagine the cry that would be raised among the republicans
by the death of one of their prophets at the hands of a member of the
hated family. It is not so easy to describe the concentrated rage with
which Rochefort, that master of vituperation, lashed the Emperor and the
Government. The Empress told Lord Lyons that matters would have been
worse “under the old _régime_”; that, however, is hard to believe. What
is strange is that an event which so profoundly stirred all France,
which was so pregnant with results, should be so little noticed by the
publicists of to-day. Pierre Bonaparte was acquitted and left France, but
he had sown the seed of an ineradicable canker.
France was in a state of internal fever; the German was waiting for an
opportunity to spring at her throat; the fates were indeed busy with
the thread of the Empire’s life. No man felt this more profoundly than
Louis Napoléon—no man was less fitted at that time to deal with such
a situation. Older than his years, he was only sixty-two, racked by a
torturing disease, it seemed easier to him to embark upon a foreign
war than to face the horrors and the risks of a second _coup d’état_.
That this latter alternative was inevitable unless the attention of the
Belleville mob could be turned by a cry of patriotism, was manifest. The
whole influence of the Emperor’s surroundings—including the Empress—was
cast into the balance for war.
In the summer of 1871, after the Commune, the Duc de Persigny, with whom,
when he was French Ambassador in London, I had been on intimate terms,
came to England. I saw him several times at the St. James’s Club, and we
had much conversation, always about the war and the events that led to
it. Although he was not in office during Emile Ollivier’s premiership,
he, as one of the Emperor’s oldest and most familiar friends, always had
access to His Majesty.
He told me that, one day, in the late spring of 1870, he went to the
Tuileries to pay his respects. He found the Emperor looking ill and
careworn, and it was not long before His Majesty began to pour out
his anxieties and fears, asking counsel of his tried and faithful
servant. The Emperor said that nothing was open to him but one of two
alternatives—a foreign war or stern measures of repression at home.
Persigny implored him not to think of a foreign war. The Emperor answered
that it was easy enough to say that, but what ministry would take office
with the understanding to “balayer Belleville”—would Persigny himself
form a government with such a programme? The Duke asked for forty-eight
hours in which to consult his friends. The Emperor dismissed him in the
kindest way, apparently much cheered by the hope of avoiding a war, and
bade the Duke come back in forty-eight hours. Persigny did not tell me
who were the friends with whom he conferred, but he said that he had
no difficulty in obtaining promises of assistance from men who, in his
judgment, would have formed a very strong administration pledged to
throttle disaffection and all revolutionary conspiracies.
At the appointed time he went back to the Tuileries; to his amazement he
was kept in a waiting room for half an hour—he who was always admitted at
once and never had to _faire antichambre_. When at last he was shown into
the Emperor’s study he found his Majesty closeted with General Lebœuf.
Seeing this he said: “Sire, I presume that it is useless for me again
to address Your Majesty upon the subject of our conversation of the day
before yesterday.” “Effectivement, mon cher, nous avons un peu changé
d’avis,” replied the Emperor, who shook him warmly by the hand, and sent
him away, resuming his conversation with Lebœuf. I have often wondered
whether that was the famous interview when Lebœuf assured the Emperor
that “il n’y a pas un bouton qui manque!”
Persigny was of course furious; ordinary language was not strong enough
to express his indignation against the people by whom the Emperor was
surrounded—more especially did he fall foul of the female influence to
which he ascribed all the misfortunes of France, culminating in the fall
of the dynasty. I felt very sorry for him; the emotion with which he
spoke was obviously sincere. He loved the Emperor dearly, he was as true
as daylight, and one of the few straight men in that rather pinchbeck
Court.
If Persigny has not left behind him a great reputation as statesman and
diplomatist he was, at any rate, a scrupulously honest man—very different
from the crew of Stock Exchange gamblers by whom, to his undoing, Louis
Napoléon was surrounded.
France, then, was determined to go to war, and with Germany. Bismarck
was of opinion that the French Government thought that the Hohenzollern
candidature for the throne of Spain was politically a rare opportunity
for them. They did not believe that in such a cause the rest of Germany
would stand by Prussia. Such States as Bavaria, Baden, Saxony and others
would look upon the affair as a simple family concern, affecting only
the reigning House of Prussia. Why should they spend blood and money to
serve the ambition of a Prince of Hohenzollern? If such were indeed, as
Bismarck thought, the prophecies of the French political soothsayers
their forecasts did them but little credit. Attack Prussia, and the
_Wacht am Rhein_ was the answer.
So much for France. And Prussia? What of her?
On the 13th of July, 1870, three men sat round a dinner table at Berlin.
Three notable men; Bismarck, the host, Von Roon, the War Minister, and
the silent Moltke. All three were profoundly dejected. They could not
eat, and their wine was distasteful to them. Bismarck had arrived the
day before, from Varzin on his way to Ems to urge the King to summon
Parliament for the purpose of mobilizing the army. For war was in the
air. Indeed, as he drove in his open carriage through Wussow, he saw his
old friend, Pastor Mulert, and answered his kindly greeting with a thrust
of his hand in quart and tierce. The old clergyman took the hint. As he
was about to leave his carriage to enter his house a sheaf of telegrams
was put into his hands, informing him of the repeated audiences which
Benedetti, the French Ambassador, had had of the King upon the subject
of the Spanish monarchy. Bismarck was up in arms. He considered that
Benedetti had no justification for thrusting himself upon the King and
ignoring the King’s ministers, nor was he pleased that the King should
have so far lowered himself as to treat directly with Benedetti, and even
listen to threats. He should have referred him to the Foreign Office.
But there was worse to come; Bismarck was discussing with the two
soldiers the propriety of resigning office when a further telegram
arrived from the Embassy at Paris, announcing that, in the interests of
peace, the Prince of Hohenzollern had abandoned his candidature. Such a
_kō tou_ to the arrogance of France was more than could be tolerated! To
haul down the flag in such a fashion would be a shameful thing! While the
three men were chewing the cud of their misery there arrived the famous
telegram from Ems, signed by Abeken, who was in attendance upon the King.
It ran as follows:
“His Majesty writes to me: ‘Count Benedetti stopped me on the promenade
in order to urge me, in what became a very peremptory fashion, to
authorize him at once to telegraph that I bound myself for all time never
again to give my consent if the Hohenzollerns should return to their
candidature. I pointed out to him rather sternly that to give such an
undertaking _à tout jamais_ was what no man ought to or could do. Of
course, I told him that I had received no news and that, inasmuch as
he had been informed from Madrid and Paris sooner than myself, he must
see that my Government was taking no hand in the game.’ Since then His
Majesty has received a letter from the Prince.
“Inasmuch as His Majesty had told Count Benedetti that he was awaiting
news from the Prince, the King, in view of the presumption referred to
above, acting upon the advice of Count Eulenburg and myself, determined
not to receive Count Benedetti again but only to inform him through
an aide-de-camp that His Majesty had now received from the Prince the
confirmation of the news which Benedetti had received from Paris, and
that he had nothing further to say to the Ambassador. His Majesty
leaves it to Your Excellency to determine whether this new demand of
Benedetti’s and its rejection should be at once communicated to our
Envoys abroad, as well as to the public press.”
On the receipt of this dispatch the three men were astounded. The insult
was flagrant. Bismarck, however, read it again and saw his way clear. He
asked Moltke whether it would be for the advantage of Germany that war
should take place at once, or be delayed for a while. Moltke’s answer
was that any delay would be all for the benefit of France. If war there
must be let it be at once, and he gave his reasons for what he said.
Bismarck craftily took advantage of the royal permission to publish the
contents of the telegram, and in the presence of his two guests he drew
up the communication in the exact terms of Abeken’s telegram with certain
erasures but “without adding or altering a single word.” As edited by
Bismarck it ran as follows:
“Since the news of the renunciation of the hereditary Prince of
Hohenzollern has been officially communicated by the Spanish Government
to the Imperial French Government the French Ambassador at Ems has
further demanded of His Majesty the King that he should authorize him
to telegraph to Paris that His Majesty the King bound himself for all
time never again to give his consent if the Hohenzollerns should ever
return to their candidature. Upon this His Majesty the King refused to
receive the French Ambassador again, and caused him to be informed by the
aide-de-camp in waiting that His Majesty had no further communication to
make to the Ambassador.”
Bismarck read the _communiqué_ through to his two guests. Moltke,
the silent, remarked: “That has quite another ring. It sounded like
a _chamade_ (a parley). Now it’s like a trumpet call in answer to a
challenge.” Bismarck said: “If I send this Text, which contains no
alteration in or addition to the telegram, at once, in pursuance of the
royal command, not only to the newspapers but also by telegraph to all
our representatives abroad, it will be known in Paris before midnight
and will be as a red rag to the French bull, not only on account of its
contents, but also of the manner of its publication. We must strike,
unless we are prepared to accept the part of having been beaten without a
struggle.
“Success depends essentially upon the impressions which the origin of
the war creates at home and abroad; it is important that it should be
we who are attacked, and that is what we shall achieve by the arrogance
and irritability of the French, if we, so far as is possible without the
speaking trumpet of Parliament, publish to all Europe that we are ready
without fear to meet the open threats of France.”
Bismarck’s description of the effect which these words had upon the two
generals is striking. All dejection and melancholy had disappeared and
given place to such high spirits that he himself was astonished. Their
appetite returned—they began to eat and drink merrily. Roon said: “The
God of our fathers is still alive and will not allow us to fall into
disgrace.” Moltke departed so far from his usual indifferent passivity
that, looking up to the ceiling and for once eschewing his usual measured
language, he struck himself on the breast and said: “If I may still live
to lead our host in such a war, then let the Devil fetch away this old
carcase as soon as he pleases.”
This is the story of the famous telegram from Ems, as Bismarck himself
tells it in his “Gedanken und Erinnerungen,” Vol. II., pp. 104-113.
Popular Edition, 1913. But how characteristically German is von Roon’s
recognition of the hand of God in the cooking of a telegram!
A little reflection upon the temper prevailing both in France and in
Russia should, I think, suffice to show that no patching up of the
differences between them was possible. The Emperor threatened by anarchy,
trembling for his dynasty, a drowning man clutching at a straw—and such
a straw! Prussia flushed by the successes of 1864 and 1866, ill prepared
to submit to the haughty pin-pricks of the French, and eager to win fresh
laurels. Who could hope to mediate between them? That is what makes me
think that Bismarck’s speech about Lord Clarendon was no more than the
expression of an honest admiration for a statesman whom he held, as is
well known, in the highest respect. If a little tactless in manner it was
at any rate as noble a tribute as one great statesman ever paid to the
memory of another.
It would be difficult to find two men in greater contrast to one another
than Prince Bismarck and Lord Clarendon—the one rough and uncouth, caring
little for outward observances; the other courtly, polished, dignified,
the pattern of a high-bred gentleman—yet there was one quality which they
had in common; both were absolutely frank and honest in discussion; both
scorned those tricks and subterfuges which have given diplomacy a bad
name. Clarendon’s love of truth—even where he had to risk giving offence
in high quarters—was proverbial; so it was that no English minister was
more highly esteemed at home, better respected abroad. Of the various
positions which he held, of the exalted offices and dignities which he
refused, his biographer has recorded the sum for the benefit of future
historians.
So Lord Clarendon died loved and deeply regretted by all those whose good
fortune had brought them into contact with him—held in honour by every
sovereign and statesman in Europe. At the Foreign Office Lord Granville
ruled in his place. No minister ever had to face greater difficulties.
The Franco-German war at once ravelled all the threads of diplomacy into
a tangle of which the intricate confusion was without a parallel, and
the position became more and more complicated month by month. Prince
Gortchakoff who, as I have shown in my account of what took place at St.
Petersburg six years earlier, had made up his mind that he need no longer
take the opposition of England into account, saw in the discomfiture of
France his opportunity for flinging in our faces the Black Sea treaty,
and, in defiance of all engagements, pushing forward into Central Asia,
until Russia had advanced perilously near to our Indian frontier with
only Afghanistan as a buffer state.
Men have most unjustly blamed Lord Granville for this; but what could
he do? To threaten when action is impossible is contemptible. England’s
arm was not long enough to reach into Central Asia, and where could
Russia be attacked by any puny force that England alone could at that
time bring to bear upon her? Lord Russell had given England away in
1864. Lord Granville could now do no more than protest, and protest he
did; but in diplomacy, as in other phases of life, hard words break no
bones. Treaties are good until the strong man armed comes and tears them
to tatters with his mailed fist. Prince Gortchakoff chuckled over the
misfortunes of France, and felt more than ever convinced that England was
a negligible quantity. When eight years later he went to the Congress of
Berlin he had to sing another and a sadder tune.
* * * * *
One evening Lord Granville and I were dining together early at the
Travellers’, as we sometimes did when he was in London alone for a night,
in order to go to the French play; all of a sudden, in the middle of
dinner, he turned round to me in a little abrupt way that was peculiarly
his own and said, “Bertie, it must be a great bore for you to be a
Conservative.” I laughed and asked why? “Well, because you always seem
to me to live much more with all of us than with the members of your own
party.”
It was quite true—with few exceptions besides Lord Beaconsfield,
Lord George Hamilton and Mr. W. H. Smith, I hardly knew any of the
Conservative leaders at all intimately. I had a slight acquaintance
with them, but Lord Derby, Lord Stanley, Lord Malmesbury, and the other
potentates of the party were to me little more than _magna nomina_. On
the other hand, Lord Palmerston, Lord Granville, Lord Clarendon, Mr.
Charles Villiers and many more Liberals were most kind friends to me, and
I was much with them both in town and country. No great Conservative lady
of my time had succeeded in having a _salon_. Lady Derby’s parties were
of a dullness as depressing as a London fog; whereas the evenings at Lady
Palmerston’s, Lady Clarendon’s, Lady Granville’s, were gatherings where
whatever was most brilliant in politics, art, science, literature met
together to be gay and merry. There would be repeated a new witticism of
Alfred Montgomery, the last audacious sally of Quin or Bernal Osborne,
the gossip of the Lobby, a happy Latin quotation by Bob Lowe, perhaps
even some wicked little story from “behind the curtain.”
I do not suppose that Lord Granville ever made a speech that could be
called famous. He was not a master of oratory. But as a leader in the
House of Lords he was gifted with a delightful manner, and a genius for
conciliation which made him supremely popular with both friends and
foes, and which gave him a very real power. In debate he was almost
matchless. His playful cleverness of fence made him a foeman worthy
of the nimblest steel that could be brought against him. I was not a
member of the House of Lords in his time, but I used often to attend the
debates, and I was always lost in admiration of his clever tactics, and
of the masterly skill with which he could disarm an opponent without for
one moment condescending to any departure from the strictest rules of the
_salle d’armes_. His delicate sword-play was often more effective than
the heavy artillery of such a born orator as the Duke of Argyll.
As an after-dinner speaker, Lord Granville was quite admirable; no man
could turn a compliment with a more persuasive grace, and the points of
his speeches, garnished with anecdotes gathered in intimate converse
with notable men both at home and abroad, were always telling. Once, as
he told me, he happened to ask Charles Dickens whom he considered to
be the best after-dinner speaker of the day. Dickens answered: “Well,
there are many great orators in England,” and he cited Gladstone, the
Duke of Argyll, Disraeli, John Bright, and others; “but if you want a
really bright, witty, genial speech for a banquet, commend me to Bishop
Wilberforce.” A few days later Lord Granville met the Bishop, and
suddenly the spirit of fun moved him to put to his right reverend friend
the same question that he had addressed to Dickens. “Oh,” answered the
Bishop, using almost the same words as the great novelist, “Gladstone,
the Duke of Argyll, Disraeli, John Bright and some others are great
speakers. But for a charming after-dinner speech give me Charles
Dickens.” I should have added the questioner himself.
Lord Granville told me that when Leighton was made President of the Royal
Academy he consulted him as to the speeches which he should make at the
annual dinner. Lord Granville advised him, since he must have so many
toasts to propose, to concentrate himself upon one speech and let the
others be merely formal. Above all, not to be too long. “He did not take
my advice,” said Lord Granville slyly.
Leighton was nevertheless a very effective speaker, though his speeches
were too much laboured. He once told me that he was obliged to write
them all out and learn them by heart, as the power of “thinking upon
his legs” had been denied to him. One evening after the banquet, John
Bright went up to him and complimented him on his speeches. Leighton in
thanking him asked for the criticism of so great a master, and drove the
question home rather persistently. “Well, Sir Frederic, since you ask
me,” said Bright, “don’t you think there is rather much confectionery in
your oratory—rather sugary, eh?” It was a true criticism; with a little
less ornament Leighton’s speeches would have been well-nigh perfect. What
made Lord Granville’s short speeches so charming was their freedom from
anything like fulsome adulation; he knew how to pay a compliment without
rendering it valueless by exaggeration.
The task of an after-dinner speaker is seldom to be argumentative, always
to give pleasure, and in that Lord Granville succeeded to perfection;
never having had the luck to hear either Dickens or Bishop Wilberforce
make such a speech, I look upon him as the greatest master of that
peculiar art that I ever listened to. He was so neat and polished, and
his points went home with such consummate skill, with never a word too
much, that the regret was general when he left off, rubbing his hands
together—a favourite trick of his when speaking—and sat down. Like
Oliver, we wanted more. As a _raconteur_ he was matchless. His store
of anecdotes—never a bad one among them—was as inexhaustible as the
conjuror’s bottle, and in his skilful hands they ran no risk of becoming,
as he warned his children, “a fearful instrument of torture to mankind.”
Another feature in his character which endeared him to Englishmen was his
honest love of sport. Throwing off for the moment the cares of State, he
would ride straight to hounds, stalk a stag, bring down a rocketer, drive
four in hand—at one time, if my memory serves me right, he even kept
a pack of harriers at Walmer. But his crown of laurels as a sportsman
was won in 1874, as is recorded in his life by Lord Edmund Fitzmaurice,
when the Liberal retiring Cabinet having been taunted by certain people
for their want of sportsmanlike or athletic prowess, in fact as being
“a pack of muffs,” he threw down the glove. “I am prepared,” he said,
“to challenge the present Ministry to pick their best men and pit them
against a like number of the defunct Liberal Government for a ride across
country.” As Lord Edmund shows, he had some good men to choose from in
Lord Spencer, Lord Halifax and Lord Hartington, all first-rate men to
hounds, besides himself, and we know that he, the old Master of the Royal
Buckhounds, would not have been unworthy of his colleagues. The challenge
led to an amusing correspondence with the gigantic Ward Hunt, a noted
“bruiser” with the Pytchley—“Bright,” wrote Lord Granville to Ward Hunt,
“is no use, he cannot pronounce the name of your hunt.”
A memorable dinner in Carlton House Terrace celebrated the first Cabinet
meeting of the new Government, in the Spring of 1880. There was an
evening party afterwards to which I, who had been staying at Walmer
during the crisis, was invited. The tail was quite a small non-political
gathering, but Count Károlyi, the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador, was
among the guests. As soon as he came in, Lord Granville took him up to
introduce him to Mr. Gladstone. It was rather an awkward moment, and one
which it needed all the host’s consummate tact to manage.
On March 17th, during the Midlothian campaign, Mr. Gladstone had said,
“Austria has ever been the unflinching foe of freedom in every country of
Europe. Austria trampled Italy under foot, Austria resisted the unity of
Germany.... Austria has never been the friend even of Slavonic freedom.
Austria did all she could to prevent the creation of Belgium. Austria
never lifted a finger for the regeneration and constitution of Greece.
There is not an instance—there is not a spot upon the whole map where
you can lay your finger and say—there Austria did good.” Such words as
these had stung and irritated beyond endurance the proud Hungarian noble.
The only excuse offered was that the speech had been rendered necessary
for election purposes, but Count Károlyi was not the man to allow the
honour of his Sovereign and his country to be used as a counter in the
electioneering game. He was furious, and had declared more than once
that if he met Mr. Gladstone he should turn his back upon him; he also
threatened that he would resign his post. Lord Granville smoothed matters
over.
Mr. Gladstone that evening apologized to Count Károlyi, and a day or two
later wrote him a letter which the Emperor Francis Joseph characterized
as “the letter of an English gentleman.” At home the letter was bitterly
criticized. Mr. Gladstone was taunted with having humiliated himself and
his country also. There were not a few Liberal politicians who joined in
the strictures passed by Lord George Hamilton and Lord Salisbury.[23]
The conversation between Count Károlyi and Mr. Gladstone lasted some
minutes; it was evident that the apology was politely but coldly
received. As it was a fine night the Ambassador, with whom I was very
intimate, asked me to walk home with him; he talked of nothing but Mr.
Gladstone and Lord Granville. For the latter Count Károlyi professed
great friendship, and even affection, but from what he said to me then,
and on other occasions, I know that he had been too deeply wounded to
share the Emperor’s admiration for “the letter of an English gentleman,”
or its author.
But it was not only in smoothing the asperities that Mr. Gladstone could,
perhaps, hardly help raising with Foreign Powers that Lord Granville had
to exercise his diplomatic skill. There were not a few rifts within the
Liberal lute which it needed all those gentle and purring ways, that
in his youth had earned for him the name of “Pussie,” to hinder from
widening. He was by nature essentially the peace-maker, the reconciler.
Cabinets do not always, like “birds in their little nests, agree.”
They come together upon some one great question, some dominant national
cry—such as Home Rule, Tariff Reform, the upheaval of the Constitution,
and the like. For a while all goes well; but by degrees it becomes
manifest that here one, there another, Minister has a special axe to
grind, while there are with no less certainty dearly-beloved colleagues
who are determined that the edge of that axe shall not be sharpened—nay,
more, that as many notches shall be beaten into it as possible. The
Cabinet of 1880 was no exception to this rule; but what an asset Lord
Granville’s tact and powers of conciliation must have been in the rather
distracted Downing Street of that time!
The late Duke of Devonshire told me that when Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice—now
Lord Fitzmaurice—asked him to lend his correspondence with Lord Granville
for the purpose of his biography, there was much which he had to hold
back because it was mainly concerned with keeping the peace between
himself (the Duke) and a colleague who was then still alive. For such
revelations the time had not yet come.
When the final crash arrived, when the Liberal camp was divided over the
vexed question of Home Rule, Lord Granville had to sacrifice personal
feelings and the most affectionate ties of family to the interests of
party and of political principles which, with him, stood above every
other consideration. The parting of the ways which led him and the Duke
of Devonshire into opposite camps must have been a deep sorrow to him.
“Lord Hartington and I,” he wrote to the Queen in 1880, “have acted in
perfect harmony for the last ten years.” The cleft was bitter to both.
There were many other friendships and intimacies which Mr. Gladstone’s
change of front in regard to Home Rule broke up; none more conspicuous
than the old alliance which existed between him and his near neighbour
and devoted follower, the Duke of Westminster, and his brother, Lord
Richard Grosvenor, the chief Liberal Whip. On one occasion when I was
staying with the Duke at Eaton he took me into Bend Or’s stable. The Duke
looked at the beautiful animal, the hero of the Derby of 1880, and turned
round to me, saying: “He is as superior to every other horse as Gladstone
is to every other statesman.” Within a few months he sold Gladstone’s
portrait by Millais; it irked him to look upon it.
Perhaps no man had more temptations to break with Mr. Gladstone than
Lord Granville. He would have slept more softly could he have found it
in his conscience to cast his lot in with the Duke of Devonshire, the
Duke of Argyll, the Duke of Westminster and others, all near and dear
kinsmen, who had fought side by side with him in many a tough fight over
a long period of years. In a letter dated July 9th, 1895, the Duke of
Argyll taunted him with the overwhelming value he set on party fidelity.
“I have sometimes asked myself, ‘Is there any conceivable measure that
Granville would _not_ accept rather than split the party?’ and I have
never been able to answer this question to my own satisfaction.” Lord
Granville’s answer was characteristic. “I could, if I chose, give you
instances of when I have disagreed with Gladstone, and upon which I may
disagree with him again; but I am convinced that as long as he remains a
political leader he is a _conservative_ power which will not be replaced
by Salisbury, Churchill, or some of the best Whigs.”[24]
So Lord Granville and his brother, Mr. Frederick Leveson Gower, remained
faithful to Mr. Gladstone. We may not all of us agree with the political
creed which they thus endorsed, and to which they lent all the weight of
their great name; but one thing is certain: no two nobler gentlemen ever
trod the pavement of Westminster Hall.
Personally and socially it would be difficult to imagine two men more
widely apart than Lord Granville and Mr. Gladstone. The one a scholar, a
mathematician and a theologian; the very highest expression of an Oxford
common room, who, in spite of Eton and Christ Church, never seemed quite
at home in what is commonly called the great world. The other a sportsman
and highly-cultured patrician who would have shone as brilliantly at the
Court of the _Grand Monarque_ as he did at that of Queen Victoria: a man
who had acquired all the pliancy which long usage of diplomacy confers,
and who yet, being a man of contrasts, was as firm as adamant where
conscience and political conviction were at stake. From what he conceived
to be his duty he was immovable.
To be invited to spend a week-end or three or four days at Walmer, a
pleasure which I so often enjoyed, was to see Lord Granville at his
best—and what a best it was! When, in 1865, he became Lord Warden of
the Cinque Ports, that ancient dignity of which my own ancestor on
my mother’s side, Bertram Ashburnham, was the second holder in King
Harold’s time, the old castle was but a poor dwelling-place. Lord
Granville determined to live there, and so, with the help of Mr. Devey,
a famous architect of that time, he added to the accommodation, made
many improvements, and turned it into a most delightful and picturesque
sea-side home.
Not the least of its attractions was the garden, upon which he lavished
consummate taste and care. The old place was full of traditions of the
mighty past, full of memories of the great Duke who died there. Even
when Lord Granville had added to it, there was but a very small amount
of accommodation. But what of that? It was all the more intimate and
friendly. I never remember more than two or three guests, except upon
one occasion, when the Duke and Duchess of Teck were staying there. Even
then we only sat down eight at dinner. It was wonderful to see the host
working away with his red boxes and papers at a little writing-table
in the one small drawing-room which served him as office and study.
Surrounded by his beautiful wife and children—and one would have thought
distracted by the general conversation—he would toil from morning till
night, looking up now and then to give utterance to some bright idea,
always smiling with such a radiantly happy face, even when affairs must
have been pressing upon him the most heavily, for in office or out of
office, the leadership of his party in the House of Lords was no trifle.
His power of abstraction and detachment was wonderful. I look back upon
those old days at Walmer with a feeling of affectionate regret and
gratitude.
Though Lord Granville was heart and soul a Liberal, socially he was the
most fastidious of men. How could it be otherwise with his exquisite
taste and upbringing, in the midst of all that was the most refined? His
dinners were delightful. His cook, Béguinot, who was at one time with Mr.
Frederick Leveson Gower, was a pearl of great price, and the talk was
always most exceptionally good.
It has been the fashion to say that conversation died with Sydney Smith,
Luttrell, Rogers and the men of that generation. Those who remember Lord
Granville’s dinners must deny that. At his smaller parties there was
no room for those political Tadpoles and Tapers who contrive to climb
into Governments, and even, sometimes, into Cabinets, on the shoulders
of bigger men. Talent there was in plenty, but it must be of the best.
Till his death in 1865 Charles Greville, the Clerk of the Council and
diarist—and his brother Henry, who, also, was the author of most amusing
journals—were pretty frequent guests. Charles Greville indeed—“the
Gruncher,” or, as Lord Granville used to call him, “the Lodger”—had rooms
on the ground floor of Lord Granville’s house in Bruton Street. He was a
cynic, but a most sagacious man, a patrician to his finger-tips, whose
political knowledge was matchless, and there were few difficulties,
whether social or public, in which he was not consulted. Indeed, his
position as Clerk of the Council brought him into the most intimate
relations with politicians of all shades of thought, and he often had to
act as _amicus curiæ_ between opponents. For instance when changes of
government took place he it was who was employed as go-between to carry
on such negotiations as might be necessary for the conduct of public
business. That he did not pass through this ordeal without making enemies
is certain. Witness Lord Rosslyn’s lines upon his memoirs:
“For forty years he listened at the door,
He heard some secrets and invented more;
These he wrote down, and Statesmen, Queens and Kings
Were all degraded into common things.
Many are gone, but others still remain
To whom these memoirs give a needless pain.
And though they laugh and say, ‘It’s only Greville,’
They wish his memoirs with him at the Devil.”
Both Charles and Henry Greville were old friends of ours, and they
were very kind to me. I, at least, never had any reason to be alarmed
at either of them as so many men were, for they were both great social
potentates.
How brilliant was the talk of the band of men over whom Lord Granville
held the conductor’s baton! Quin, the famous homeopathic doctor and
wit, was one of the favoured guests; his life had been varied. In 1821,
when a mere lad of twenty-two, he had been appointed to go out to St.
Helena as private physician to Napoleon, but the Emperor died before he
could start, so he set up in his profession at Naples. Afterwards he was
attached to King Leopold. He was, I believe, Hahnemann’s first disciple
in England and was very much the fashion, though more as a man of the
world than as a doctor. His wit and fun were rather boisterous, but there
was a deep stratum of wisdom underneath, and he was a valued friend of
great men, even among those who laughed at his globules. He it was whom
Disraeli in 1868 persuaded to sound Lord Granville as to the possibility
of their uniting forces. Naturally Lord Granville declined in a very
pretty note, but at the same time he paid Quin the compliment of saying
that no better emissary could have been chosen. If Quin’s chaff was
rather of the sledge-hammer order, that of Alfred Montgomery, enhanced
by a slight stammer, was always delicate and as fine as the edge of a
razor. Not that it was ever cutting or cruel, though he could rebuke
impertinence on occasions. His famous answer to Mr. Poole, the tailor,
was a case in point. Mr. Poole had been sent for to Bradgate to measure
Lord Stamford; for reasons which it is needless to revive, Bradgate was
not quite well looked upon. Alfred happened to go into Poole’s shop when
he came back and asked him who had been staying at Bradgate. “Oh! a very
mixed lot, sir, a very mixed lot.” “Confound it, Mr. Poole,” was the
answer, with his captivating stammer, “you could not expect them to be
all t-t-tailors!” “The only thing which I cannot resist is temptation,”
was shamelessly cribbed by Oscar Wilde.
A saying of Alfred’s at Somerset House reminds one of Charles Lamb in the
same building. One day he arrived at the office (he was a Commissioner
of Inland Revenue), and said plaintively “I think I must take a little
holiday; I have not had one this year!” His colleagues, who knew their
Alfred’s ways, looked at him in amazement, until one of them remembered
that it was the 1st of January! Alfred Montgomery had been a great friend
of Lord Brougham, d’Orsay, Lady Blessington and the Kensington Gore
set, and he it was who took the news of Brougham’s death to a party at
Lady Blessington’s: a sly trick of the ex-Chancellor to find out what
the newspapers would say of him. Clever as he was, Alfred fell into the
trap when he received a letter informing him of the sad event! Alfred’s
own little dinners in his tiny house in Chesterfield Street were of the
choicest—the best of food, the best of wine, the best of welcomes. The
setting—a picture for a _dilettante_. I wonder whether there is to-day in
London a drawing-room of equal size so dainty and so choice. It would
need the pen of an expert from Christie and Manson’s to describe it.
To the end of his life he kept his good looks. His features, as finely
cut as those in a classic gem, never changed. I went to see him a day
or two before his death. He could hardly speak, but he was, as always,
beautifully groomed. As he himself once said to someone who chaffed him
on his smart appearance, “I can’t help growing old, but there is no
reason why I should be dirty.” His bed, his dressing-table and all his
belongings were as smart as a bride’s, and as he lay dying, very tired
and feeble, his humour was as droll and merry as ever—full of fun to the
last. How few men when they go leave a gap in the great world: in their
own families some are perhaps missed for a while; but outside their own
little surroundings it is only the rarest and choicest who are remembered
and lamented. Alfred was one of these.
One day Lord Granville, Alfred and I were walking together by the sea
at Walmer. Lord Granville stopped short and said, “Now, Alfred, there’s
nobody here but Bertie and I—do tell us how old you are.” “Don’t ask
me, my dear G-G-G-Granville; I am that most horrible thing, a well
p-p-p-preserved man.” As he had been private secretary to Lord Wellesley
when he was Viceroy of Ireland, he must then have been pretty well
stricken in years. Well preserved he certainly was—he did not look more
than sixty.
Mr. Henry Reeve, the editor of the _Edinburgh Review_, was another of
those agreeable diners-out whom Lord Granville made welcome. As a talker
he had not the light playfulness of those whom I have mentioned, but
like Delane he had a marvellous memory—a great asset as a corrective in
conversation. Perhaps his greatest claim to fame lies in the editing of
the memoirs of Charles Greville, who made him his literary executor.
Many thought that he ought to have allowed more time to pass before
publishing diaries which affected so many people who were still living.
It must be borne in mind that he was already an old man of sixty-two or
sixty-three when the first volumes appeared, and he might well think that
as the precious papers had been committed to his charge he was bound to
see that there should be as little risk as possible of their falling
into the hands of others less discreet than himself.
It is difficult to call up these ghosts of the old happy days without
a passing mention of Henry Calcraft—a much younger man. His power of
repartee was great, and I once heard him absolutely crush Buckle, the
author of the “Civilization,” who had been rather boring a very smart
party at Baron Lionel de Rothschild’s with one of his interminable
monologues. Unfortunately it was uttered after the ladies had left the
room, and cannot be repeated here. To name all the wits and men of mark
with whom Lord Granville used to salt the somewhat ponderous utterances
of the big political guns and social magnates whom he invited, would fill
many pages. But however sparkling the talk might be, the host himself was
always the choragus.
Lord Granville never had but one mission abroad, and that was when he was
sent as special Ambassador to the Coronation of the Emperor Alexander
the Second in the month of August, 1856. It was in every way a brilliant
Embassy, Lord and Lady Stafford, she in the zenith of her young beauty,
Lord Hartington, Lord Ward, Sir Robert and Lady Emily Peel, Lord Ashley
and others. The Duke of Devonshire had caused his famous collection of
gems to be mounted for Lady Granville’s use, and had placed his plate at
Lord Granville’s disposal; the horses and carriages were superb, and so
great was the sensation created that it was still alive when I reached
St. Petersburg, seven years later. The Duc de Morny was the French
representative, and he, too, made a dazzling show. His liveries were
gorgeous, but when someone said that they quite outshone the less gaudy
Leveson Gower footmen, Tutchef said, “Oui c’est vrai—les livrées du Duc
de Morny sont plus belles, mais ce pauvre Lord Granville n’a pas comme
lui les coudées franches. Vous voyez il a eu le malheur d’avoir un père.”
As a rule, these tinsel and gewgaw complimentary missions are entrusted
to some peer of moderate, or perhaps no, attainments—that is a matter
of indifference—who is glad to undertake the job and return home with a
ribbon and star as an acknowledgment of the discretion with which he has
fulfilled his important task. These are what may be called the carpet
knights of diplomacy. A Foreign Office Clerk is told off to dry-nurse
them and to see that they are guilty of no compromising incongruities.
Lord Granville’s Embassy was of a very different character. England and
Russia were at peace after the struggle of the Crimean War; but there was
anything but a good feeling between the two governments. The leanings
of Russia were all towards France, and it was a matter of the first
importance to arrive at a better understanding. The Cabinet determined to
send out a Cabinet Minister as Ambassador, and, obviously, Lord Granville
was the man. His knowledge of French—the language chiefly spoken at the
Russian Court—his exquisite discretion, and his authority as a prominent
member of the Government, were bound to produce the best effect. It was a
happy choice.
There were moments of great difficulty which needed all Lord Granville’s
great qualities of tact and temper to tide over. His conversations with
the Emperor might easily have degenerated into discussions anything but
friendly. Not for one moment did Lord Granville allow the Tsar to imagine
that the Queen’s Ambassador could be treated with anything but the
respect due to the sovereign of whom he was the personal representative;
and yet he knew that if he were to take huff his special Embassy must
come to an end, and a ridiculous end. His own account of his interviews
with the Emperor and Prince Gortchakoff is a liberal education in
diplomatic tactics.[25]
It will be evident to any one who may have had the patience to read
this sketch, that in my judgment the public services rendered by Lord
Granville have not been recognized as they deserved. That was also
the opinion of my old friend and colleague, Sir Robert Meade, who, as
private secretary and Under Secretary of State, had been his confidential
right-hand man for more than a quarter of a century. Sir Robert Meade, a
man of singularly calm and solid judgment, absolutely repudiated the myth
which spoke of him as a pleasure-loving man, who sacrificed business to
pleasure. Never was a greater mistake. “He enjoyed amusements but never
neglected business.” (Note by Sir R. Meade quoted by Lord Fitzmaurice.)
To the truth of those words I can myself bear witness.
A remarkable feature in Lord Granville’s character was his power of
self-effacement. Of this he gave evidence on two notable occasions.
The first was in 1859, when upon the fall of Lord Derby’s Government
the Queen, tired of the rivalry between Lord Palmerston and Lord John
Russell, with neither of whom she was in sympathy, sent for him and
desired him to form a Government. He and Lord Clarendon were both of
opinion that, unless he could secure the adhesion of the two, whose
bristles were up at not having been themselves sent for, they would
sooner or later make common cause against him, and so as he put it
himself in a letter to Lord John Russell, “as soon as I found that I
was an obstacle instead of a facility towards the formation of a strong
Government, I went to the Queen to ask her to excuse me from the task
which she had so unexpectedly and so graciously imposed upon me.” It
was unlucky; for the Queen, having sent for Lord Palmerston, Lord John
insisted as the price of his co-operation upon having the seals of the
Foreign Office, and that was a national misfortune, of which we are at
this moment (1915) feeling the full effects.[26]
The second occasion occurred twenty-one years later. In 1875, Mr.
Gladstone announced his matured determination to resign the leadership of
the Liberal Party. He pleaded that he was tired and that after forty-two
years of strenuous public life he was entitled to rest from his labours.
He hinted that more serious interests must occupy the remainder of his
life. He wished Lord Granville to become the leader of the Liberal Party.
Lord Granville declined to play the part of Elisha to his Elijah, but,
after many discussions, it was agreed that he should lead the party in
the Lords, and Lord Hartington should be the chief in the Commons.
Lord Granville never for a moment believed that learned theological
polemics with cardinals, the making of his soul, or even the ordering
of the dispositions for his own funeral, would satisfy the magnificent
activities of that titanic brain. Lord Granville was right. He had gauged
the situation with unerring instinct. So had Lord Hartington. The latter
felt acutely the false position in which he was placed; Mr. Gladstone,
although no longer leader, was undoubtedly the most dominant power
among the Liberals in the House of Commons, and without a rival when
Mr. Disraeli went to the Lords; consistency had never been one of his
merits, and, as a free lance, he could not but be a thorn in his nominal
leader’s side. His support could never be looked upon as a certainty; at
any moment he might be a hindrance, indirectly in all probability for the
most part, but perhaps on occasions, as actually happened on Sir Wilfrid
Lawson’s amendment to the proposal to call out the reserves in the
Turkish crisis of 1877, an active opponent, voting against his leader.
It is true that he afterwards “trounced” that extraordinary crank, Sir
Wilfrid Lawson,[27] but the mischief was done.
Some of Mr. Gladstone’s speeches all over the country were of the nature
to create difficulties for his party—or, at least, for its leaders—Lord
Hartington was chafing under the irritation, and his correspondence with
Lord Granville showed how irksome it was to him to retain a leadership in
the Commons under conditions which were, to say the least, hampering and
galling.
Nothing but the rarest and most disinterested public spirit would have
been equal to the self-sacrifice that was demanded of him. With what zest
he must, when occasion served, have drunk in the crisp air of Newmarket
Heath, far from the madding crowd of St. Stephen’s and from those cares
of office without power which are the curse of the “cold shades of
Opposition”—darkened in his case by the incubus of danger from within.
No one who was even on the fringe of politics at that time could help
feeling the greatest respect for Lord Hartington, but that respect must
be immeasurably enhanced by the publication of the letters in Lord
Fitzmaurice’s book. By nature a sportsman, a fine rider to hounds, a
good shot, keenly interested in racing, delighting in a rubber of whist
till bridge seduced his affections from the more venerable game,—had he
chosen to lead a life of leisure, his position by birth and by the power
of wealth would have enabled him to have spent his days happily, if
unprofitably, in congenial occupations.
He found, however, very early in life that better things were expected of
him. He still indulged in sport, but only as a pastime. He soon showed
that he could force himself into great industry, conquering the dullest
details of official life. In nothing was his quality better shown than
in the way in which he mastered the intricacies of foreign politics, in
which one would hardly have expected so bull-dog an Englishman to be a
proficient, and yet in which, as his letters show, he took the broadest,
soundest and most comprehensive view. In such questions, indeed, reading
between the lines we can see that what he deemed to be for England’s good
was entirely uninfluenced by party considerations. He was above all a
patriot.
When Lord Beaconsfield dissolved Parliament in 1880 and the collapse of
the Conservative party followed, the Queen sent for Lord Granville. For
the second time in his life he was invited to become Prime Minister of
England; for the second time loyalty to principle bade him refuse. Had
it not been for Mr. Gladstone either Lord Hartington or Lord Granville
could, without doubt, have formed a strong Liberal Government; but Mr.
Gladstone blocked the way; he distinctly refused to serve under either of
them, and they knew that any Liberal Prime Minister, with the tremendous
shadow of Mr. Gladstone in the background, must ultimately see his
party shattered after himself enduring the torments of Hades. In such
circumstances, the reversion of the leadership would be indeed a heritage
of woe. So the two men who had borne the heat and burthen of six years
of Opposition effaced themselves, and Mr. Gladstone once more came into
power. Lord Granville became Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Lord
Hartington went to the India Office, and in 1882 took command at the War
Office. Lord Hartington’s acceptance of office can only be regarded as a
sublime piece of self-abnegation.
Between Lord Granville and Mr. Gladstone there was, no doubt, some
measure of affection, though I am inclined to think that even in that
case it was rather prompted by a sense of political expediency and
respect for the statesman’s powers than by personal love. But Lord
Hartington would have been more or less than human, if after those six
penitential years any spark of personal attachment had remained. Nor was
he altogether a blind admirer of Mr. Gladstone’s oratory. Mr. Forster’s
_mot_ about that is historic: “Mr. Gladstone can persuade most men of
most things, and himself of anything.” Lord Hartington’s appreciation of
his speeches was, to my mind, even better: “Mr. Gladstone could never be
made to understand that people who listen to him and admire his speeches
don’t necessarily agree with him.” That was exactly the impression
conveyed to my mind by Mr. Gladstone’s marvellous power over language. It
was my luck later in life to hear some of his most famous speeches;—to
sit on the benches opposite to him when he brought in his last Home Rule
Bill. The Niagara of words, the overpowering cataract of eloquence,
stupefied and dismayed, but it did not convince me. In private life his
conversation was amazing. Several times he did me the honour to invite me
to dinner, and I often met him at other great houses; he would attack the
most abstruse technical subjects in the presence of experts and sometimes
laid himself open to attack; but on one of those occasions, when he
had had a rather heated argument with Tyndall, who would not “take a
licking,” Mrs. Gladstone came to the rescue of her lord and sent a little
slip of paper to his fierce opponent, “We never contradict Mr. G.”