demand for kings who would "reign without governing." Having backed out
of Greece, Leopold got Belgium. And here we enter, in these Memoirs, on
a series of chapters giving the history of the Belgian Question, with
all its supplementary entanglements, as dry as saw-dust, and scarcely
readable, we should think, at the present day, even to diplomatists,
much less to mortal men. Unfortunately the greater part of the two
volumes is taken up with similar dissertations on various European
questions, while the personal touches, and details which Stockmar could
have given us in abundance, are few and far between. We seldom care much
for his opinions on European questions even when the questions
themselves are still alive and the sand-built structures of diplomacy
have not been swept away by the advancing tide of revolution. The
sovereigns whose wirepuller he was were constitutional, and themselves
exercised practically very little influence on the course of events.
In the Belgian question however, he seems to have really played an
active part. We get from him a strong impression of the restless vanity
and unscrupulous ambition of France. We learn also that Leopold
practised very early in the day the policy which assured him a quiet
reign--that of keeping his trunk packed and letting the people
understand that if they were tired of him he was ready to take the next
train and leave them to enjoy the deluge.
Stockmar found employment especially suited to him in settling the
question of Leopold's English annuity, which was given up on the Price's
election to the Crown of Belgium, but with certain reservations, upon
which the Radicals made attacks, Sir Samuel Whalley, a physician leading
the van. In the course of the struggle Stockmar received a
characteristic letter from Palmerston.
"March 9,1834
"MY DEAR BARON,--I have many apologies to make to you for not having
sooner acknowledged the receipt of the papers you sent me last week, and
for which I am much obliged to you. The case seems to me as clear as day
and without meaning to question the omnipotence of Parliament, which it
is well known can do anything but turn men into women and women into
men, I must and shall assert that the House of Commons have no more
right to enquire into the details of those debts and engagements, which
the King of the Belgians considers himself bound to satisfy before he
begins to make his payments into the Exchequer, than they have to ask
Sir Samuel Whalley how he disposed of the fees which his mad patients
used to pay him before he began to practise upon the foolish
constituents who have sent him to Parliament. There can be no doubt
whatever that we must positively resist any such enquiry, and I am very
much mistaken in my estimate of the present House of Commons if a large
majority do not concur in scouting so untenable a proposition.
"My dear Baron,
"Yours sincerely,
"PALMERSTON
"The Baron de Stockmar"
That the House of Commons cannot turn women into men is a position not
so unquestioned now as it was in Palmerston's day.
Stockmar now left England for a time, but he kept his eye on English
affairs, to his continued interest in which we owe it seems, the
publication of a rather curious document, the existence of which in
manuscript was, however, well known. It is a Memoir of King William IV.,
purporting to be drawn up by himself, and extending over the eventful
years of 1830-35 'King William's style,' says the uncourtly biographer,
"abounds to overflowing in what is called in England Parliamentary
circumlocution, in which, instead of direct, simple expressions,
bombastic paraphrases are always chosen, which become in the end
intolerably prolix and dull, and are enough to drive a foreigner to
despair." The style is indeed august; but the real penman is not the
King, whose strong point was not grammatical composition, but some
confidant, very likely Sir Herbert Taylor, who was employed by the King
to negotiate with the "waverers" in the House of Lords, and get the
Reform Bill passed without a swamping creation of peers. The Memoir
contains nothing of the slightest historical importance. It is
instructive only as showing how completely a constitutional king may be
under the illusion of his office--how complacently he may fancy that he
is himself guiding the State, when he is in fact merely signing what is
put before him by his advisers, who are themselves the organs of the
majority in Parliament. Old William, Duke of Gloucester, the king's
uncle, being rather weak in intellect, was called "Silly Billy." When
King William IV. gave his assent to the Reform Bill, the Duke, who knew
his own nickname, cried "Who's Silly Billy now?" It would have been more
difficult from the Conservative point of view to answer that question if
the King had possessed the liberty of action which in his Memoir he
imagines himself to possess.
The year 1836 opened a new field to the active beneficence of Stockmar.
"The approaching majority, and probably not distant accession to the
throne, of Princess Victoria of England, engaged the vigilant and far-
sighted care of her uncle, King Leopold. At the same time he was already
making preparations for the eventual execution of a plan, which had long
formed the subject of the wishes of the Coburg family, to wit, the
marriage of the future Queen of England with his nephew, Prince Albert
of Coburg." Stockmar was charged with the duty of standing by the
Princess, as her confidential adviser, at the critical moment of her
coming of age, which might also be that of her accession to the throne.
Meanwhile King Leopold consulted with him as to the manner in which
Prince Albert should make acquaintance with his cousin, and how he
"should be prepared for his future vocation." This is pretty broad, and
a little lets down the expressions of intense affection for the Queen
and unbounded admiration of Prince Albert with which Stockmar overflows.
However, a feeling may be genuine though its source is not divine.
Stockmar played his part adroitly. He came over to England, slipped into
the place of private Secretary to the Queen, and for fifteen months
"continued his noiseless, quiet activity, without any publicly defined
position." The marriage was brought about and resulted, as we all know,
in perfect happiness till death entered the Royal home.
Stockmar was evidently very useful in guiding the Royal couple through
the difficulties connected with the settlement of the Prince's income
and his rank, and with the Regency Bill. His idea was that questions
affecting the Royal family should be regarded as above party, and in
this he apparently induced the leaders of both parties to acquiesce,
though they could not perfectly control their followers. The connection
with the Whigs into which the young Queen had been drawn by attachment
to her political mentor, Lord Melbourne, had strewn her path with
thorns. The Tory party was bitterly hostile to the Court. If Sir Charles
Dilke and Mr. Odger wish to provide themselves with material for retorts
to Tory denunciations of their disloyalty, they cannot do better than
look up the speeches and writings of the Tory party during the years
1835-1841. What was called the Bedchamber Plot, in 1839, had rendered
the relations between the Court and the Conservative leaders still more
awkward, and Stockmar appears to have done a real service in smoothing
the way for the formation of the Conservative Ministry in 1841.
Stockmar, looking at Peel from the Court point of view, was at first
prejudiced against him, especially on account of his having, in
deference probably to the feelings of his party against the Court, cut
down the Prince Consort's allowance. All the more striking is the
testimony which, after long acquaintance, the Baron bears to Peel's
character and merits as a statesman.
"Peel's mind and character rested on moral foundations, which I have not
seen once shaken, either in his private or his public life. From these
foundations rose that never-failing spring of fairness, honesty,
kindness, moderation and regard for others, which Peel showed to all
men, and under all circumstances. On these foundations grew that love of
country which pervaded his whole being, which knew of but one object--
the true welfare of England of but one glory and one reward for each
citizen, viz., to have contributed something towards that welfare. Such
love of country admits of but one ambition, and hence the ambition of
that man was as pure as his heart. To make every sacrifice for that
ambition, which the fates of his country demand from everyone, he
considered his most sacred duty, and he has made these sacrifices,
however difficult they might have been to him. Wherein lay the real
difficulty of those sacrifices will perhaps hereafter be explained by
those who knew the secret of the political circumstances and the
personal character of the men with whom he was brought in contact; and
who would not think of weighing imponderable sacrifices on the balance
of vulgar gain.
"The man whose feelings for his own country rested on so firm a
foundation could not be dishonest or unfair towards foreign countries.
The same right understanding, fairness, and moderation, which he evinced
in his treatment of internal affairs, guided Peel in his treatment of
all foreign questions. The wish frequently expressed by him, to see the
welfare of all nations improved, was thoroughly sincere. He knew France
and Italy from his own observation, and he had studied the political
history of the former with great industry. For Germany he had a good
will, nay, a predilection, particularly for Prussia.
"In his private life, Peel was a real pattern. He was the most loving,
faithful, conscientious husband, father, and brother, unchanging and
indulgent to his friends, and always ready to help his fellow-citizens
according to his power.
"Of the vulnerable parts of his character his enemies may have many
things to tell. What had been observed by all who came into closer
contact with him, could not escape my own observation. I mean his too
great prudence, caution, and at times, extreme reserve, in important as
well as in unimportant matters, which he showed, not only towards more
distant, but even towards his nearer acquaintances. If he was but too
often sparing of words, and timidly cautious in oral transactions, he
was naturally still more so in his written communications. The fear
never left him that he might have to hear an opinion once expressed, or
a, judgment once uttered by him, repeated by the wrong man, and in the
wrong place, and misapplied. His friends were sometimes in despair over
this peculiarity. To his opponents it supplied an apparent ground for
suspicion and incrimination. It seemed but too likely that there was a
doubtful motive for such reserve, or that it was intended to cover
narrowness and weakness of thought and feeling, or want of enterprise
and courage. To me also this peculiarity deemed often injurious to
himself and to the matter in hand; and I could not help being sometimes
put out by it, and wishing from the bottom of my heart that he could
have got rid of it. But when one came to weigh the acts of the man
against his manner, the disagreeable impression soon gave way. I quickly
convinced myself, that this, to me, so objectionable a trait was but an
innate peculiarity; and that in a sphere of activity where thoughtless
unreserve and _laisser aller_ showed themselves in every possible
form, Peel was not likely to find any incentive, or to form a resolution
to overcome, in this point, his natural disposition.
"I have been told, or I have read it somewhere, that Peel was the most
successful type of political mediocrity. In accepting this estimate of
my departed friend as perfectly true, I ask Heaven to relieve all
Ministers, within and without Europe, of their superiority, and to endow
them with Peel's mediocrity: and I ask this for the welfare of all
nations, and in the firm conviction that ninety-nine hundredths of the
higher political affairs can be properly and successfully conducted by
such Ministers only as possess Peel's mediocrity: though I am willing to
admit that the remaining hundredth may, through the power and boldness
of a true genius, be brought to a particularly happy, or, it may be, to
a particularly unhappy, issue."
Of the late Lord Derby, on the other hand, Stockmar speaks with the
greatest contempt, calling him "a frivolous aristocrat who delighted in
making mischief. "It does not appear whether the two men ever came into
collision with each other, but if they did, Lord Derby was likely enough
to leave a sting.
Stockmar regularly spent a great part of each year with the English
Royal Family. Apartments were appropriated to him in each of the Royal
residences, and he lived with the Queen and Prince on the footing of an
intimate, or rather of a member, and almost the father, of the family.
Indeed, he used a familiarity beyond that of any friend or relative.
Having an objection to taking leave, he was in the habit of disappearing
without notice, and leaving his rooms vacant when the fancy took him.
Then we are told, letters complaining of his faithlessness would follow
him, and in course of time others urging his return. Etiquette, the
highest of all laws, was dispensed within his case. After dining with
the Queen, when Her Majesty had risen from table, and after holding a
circle had sat down again to tea, Stockmar would generally be seen
walking straight through the drawing-room and returning to his
apartment, there to study his own comfort. More than this, when Mordecai
became the King's favorite, he was led forth on the royal steed,
apparelled in the royal robe, and with the royal crown upon his head. A
less demonstrative and picturesque, but not less signal or significant,
mark of Royal favor was bestowed on Stockmar. In his case tights were
dispensed with, and he was allowed to wear trousers, which better suited
his thin legs. We believe this exemption to be without parallel, though
we have heard of a single dispensation being granted, after many
searchings of heart, in a case where the invitation had been sudden, and
the mystic garment did not exist, and also of a more melancholy case, in
which the garment was split in rushing down to dinner, and its wearer
was compelled to appear in the forbidden trousers, and very late,
without the possibility of explaining what had occurred.
Notwithstanding the enormous power indicated by his privileged nether
limbs, Stockmar remained disinterested. A rich Englishman, described as
an author, and member of Parliament, called upon him one day, and
promised to give him L10,000 if he would further his petition to the
Queen for a peerage. Stockmar replied, "I will now go into the next
room, in order to give you time. If upon my return I still find you
here, I shall have you turned out by the servants."
We are told that the Baron had little intercourse with any circles but
those of the court--a circumstance which was not likely to diminish any
bad impressions that might prevail with regard to his secret influence.
Among his intimate friends in the household was his fellow-countryman
Dr. Pratorius, "who ever zealously strengthened the Prince's
inclinations in the sense which Stockmar desired, and always insisted
upon the highest moral considerations." Nature, in the case of the
doctor; had not been so lavish of personal beauty as of moral
endowments. The Queen was once reading the Bible with her daughter, the
little Princess Victoria. They came to the passage, "God created man in
his own image, in the image of God created He him." "O Mamma," cried the
Princess, "not Dr. Pratorius!"
Stockmar's administrative genius effected a reform in the Royal
household, and as appears from his memorandum, not before there was
occasion for it. "The housekeepers, pages, housemaids, etc., are under
the authority of the Lord Chamberlain; all the footmen, livery-porters
and under-butlers, by the strangest anomaly, under that of Master of the
Horse, at whose office they are clothed and paid; and the rest of the
servants, such as the clerk of the kitchen, the cooks, the porters,
etc., are under the jurisdiction of the Lord Steward. Yet these
ludicrous divisions extend not only to persons, but likewise to things
and actions. The Lord Steward, for example, finds the fuel and lays the
fire, and the Lord Chamberlain lights it. It was under this state of
things that the writer of this paper, having been sent one day by Her
present Majesty to Sir Frederick Watson, then the Master of the
Household, to complain that the dining-room was always cold, was gravely
answered: 'You see, properly speaking, it is not our fault, for the Lord
Steward lays the fire only, and the Lord Chamberlain lights it.' In the
same manner the Lord Chamberlain provides all the lamps, and the Lord
Steward must clean, trim and light them. If a pane of glass or the door
in a cupboard in the scullery requires mending, it cannot now be done
without the following process: A requisition is prepared and signed by
the chief cook, it is then countersigned by the clerk of the kitchen,
then it is taken to be signed by the Master of the Household, thence it
is taken to the Lord Chamberlain's office, where it is authorized, and
then laid before the Clerk of the Works under the office of Woods and
Forests; and consequently many a window and cupboard have remained
broken for months" Worse than this--"There is no one who attends to the
comforts of the Queen's guests on their arrival at the Royal residence.
When they arrive at present there is no one prepared to show them to or
from their apartments; there is no gentleman in the palace who even
knows where they are lodged, and there is not even a servant who can
perform this duty, which is attached to the Lord Chamberlain's
department. It frequently happens at Windsor that some of the visitors
are at a loss to find the drawing-room, and, at night, if they happen to
forget the right entrance from the corridor, they wander for an hour
helpless, and unassisted. There is nobody to apply to in such a case,
for it is not in the department of the Master of the Household, and the
only remedy is to send a servant, if one can be found, to the porter's
lodge, to ascertain the apartment in question." People were rather
surprised when the boy Jones was discovered, at one o'clock in the
morning, under the sofa in the room adjoining Her Majesty's bedroom. But
it seems nobody was responsible--not the Lord Chamberlain, who was in
Staffordshire, and in whose department the porters were not; not the
Lord Steward, who was in London, and had nothing to do with the pages
and attendants nearest to the royal person; not the Master of the
Household, who was only a subordinate officer in the Lord Steward's
department. So the King of Spain, who was roasted to death because the
right Lord-in-Waiting could not be found to take him from the fire, was
not without a parallel in that which calls itself the most practical of
nations. Stockmar reformed the system by simply inducing each of the
three great officers, without nominally giving up his authority (which
would have shaken the foundations of the Monarchy), to delegate so much
of it as would enable the fire to be laid and lighted by the same power.
We fancy, however, that even since the Stockmarian reconstruction, we
have heard of guests finding themselves adrift in the corridors of
Windsor. There used to be no bells to the rooms, it being assumed that
in the abode of Royalty servants, were always within call, a theory
which would have been full of comfort to any nervous gentleman, who, on
the approach of the royal dinner hour, might happen to find himself left
with somebody else's small clothes.
In 1854 came the outbreak of public feeling against Prince Albert and
Stockmar, as his friend and adviser, to which we have referred at the
beginning of this article. The Prince's lamented death caused such a
reaction of feeling in his favor that it is difficult now to recall to
recollection the degree of unpopularity under which he at one time
laboured. Some of the causes of this unpopularity are correctly stated
by the author of the present memoir. The Prince was a foreigner, his
ways were not those of Englishmen, he did not dress like an Englishman,
shake hands like an Englishman. He was suspected of "Germanizing"
tendencies, very offensive to high churchmen, especially in philosophy
and religion. He displeased the Conservatives by his Liberalism, the
coarser Radicals by his pietism and culture. He displeased the fast set
by his strict morality; they called him slow, because he did not bet,
gamble, use bad language, keep an opera dancer. With more reason he
displeased the army by meddling, under the name of a too courtly
Commander-in-Chief, with professional matters which he could not
understand. But there was a cause of his unpopularity scarcely
appreciable by the German author of this memoir. He had brought with him
the condescending manner of a German Prince. The English prefer a frank
manner; they will bear a high manner in persons of sufficient rank, but
a condescending manner they will not endure; nor will any man or woman
but those who live in a German Court. So it was, however, that the
Prince, during his life, though respected by the people for his virtues,
and by men of intellect for his culture, was disliked and disparaged by
"Society," and especially by the great ladies who are at the head of it.
The Conservatives, male and female, had a further grudge against him as
the reputed friend of Peel, who was the object of their almost demoniac
hatred.