PITT AND HIS FRIENDS
(1783–94)
Keep thy friend
Under thy own life’s key.
SHAKESPEARE, _All’s Well that Ends Well_.
A crowd is not company, and faces are but a gallery of pictures,
and talk but a tinkling cymball where there is no love.--BACON.
Some statesmen merit notice solely from the magnitude of their
achievements; others attract attention by the charm of their
personality. Pitt claims homage on both accounts. Accordingly I propose
to devote this chapter to his private life and friendships during the
early part of his career, beginning with the time when he laid down the
Chancellorship of the Exchequer and fled to the house of his friend
Wilberforce at Wimbledon. In the Diary of the latter we read this brief
but suggestive entry: “April 3 [1783]. To Wimbledon, where Pitt, etc.,
dined and slept. Evening walk--to bed a little past two. April 4.
Delicious day: lounged the morning at Wimbledon with friends: foining
at night, and run about the garden for an hour or two.”
We can picture the scene. Lauriston House, Wilberforce’s abode on
the south side of Wimbledon Common, is a spacious villa, comfortable
in its eighteenth-century solidity, and scarcely changed since those
days. One of the front bedrooms is known as “Mr. Pitt’s room.” There
he would look forth on the Common, which had for him a peculiar charm.
At the back, the south windows look upon an extensive lawn, bordered
not too thickly by trees, under one of which, a maple, tradition says
that he was wont to lounge away his Sunday mornings, to the distress
of his host. At other times the garden was the scene of half riotous
mirth. Pitt, Dudley Ryder, Pepper Arden, Tom Steele, and Wilberforce
there broke loose from the restraints of Westminster, and indulged
in _foyning_. That old-English word, denoting thrusting or fencing,
conjures up visions of quips and pranks such as Horace loved. Would
that Pitt had had more time for these wholesome follies!
Imagine these youths, with the freshness of Cambridge still upon
them, cheating the hours with fun. Pitt, the stately, austere leader
of the House of Commons, who, on entering its precincts, fixed
his eyes straight on his seat, and tilted his nose loftily in air
during his State progress thither, with not so much as a nod to his
supporters[367]--yet here, on the lawn of Lauriston House, is all fun
and laughter, sharpening his wit against the edge of Wilberforce’s
fancy, answering jest with jest, quotation with quotation, in a fresh
mingling of jollity and culture. As yet all is joyous in the lives
of the friends. Wilberforce has inherited from an uncle an ample
fortune along with Lauriston House, and adds rooms to it so as fitly
to entertain the friends who always cluster about him. The woes of the
slaves have not yet struck a chill to his life, and he lives amidst
a buzz of friends and admirers. He reminds us of that character in
Disraeli’s “Lothair,” who proved an irresistible magnet at every
party--no one quite knew why; but every one sought to be next him. The
magnetism of Wilberforce is easily intelligible; it lay in his lovable
and gifted nature, which welled forth freely in genial anecdote,
friendly parody, sparkling retort.
For Pitt, too, there were as yet no oppressive cares. True, at that
time, there loomed before him the toilsome career of an impecunious
barrister, but that did not daunt his serene and self-reliant nature.
Doubtless the troubles of England moved him more, now that the prospect
of peace with America and the half of Europe was overclouded by the
triumph of Fox and North. But Pitt had that protective faculty,
inherent in all great natures, of laying aside personal and even
national cares in the company of his dearest friends, and it set him
free for life-restoring mirth. Then, too, his nature, shy and stiff
to mere acquaintances, blossomed forth radiantly to a chosen circle,
such as he found at Wimbledon. Here, then, was seen the real man.
Away went the mask of official reserve, which prudence compelled him
to wear at Westminster as a defence against his seniors. Here, among
youths and friends, his pranks were startling. One of them must be
told in the words of Wilberforce: “We found one morning the fruits of
Pitt’s earlier rising in the careful sowing of the garden beds with the
fragments of a dress-hat in which Dudley Ryder had overnight come down
from the opera.”
Would that we knew more of those bright days! For Pitt the man, not
Pitt the statesman, is seen at Wimbledon. The pillar of State, columnar
in its Doric austerity, becomes a lithe facile form, twined about
with social graces, gay with the flowers of friendship. The hours of
recreation, rather than those spent in the office, reveal the inner
life. Alas! the self-revealing episodes in the life of Pitt are hidden
from us. None of his friends was a Boswell. Wilberforce, who might
have been the enlightener, was troubled by defective eyesight, which
curtailed his correspondence; and his Diary is a series of tantalizing
jottings, a veritable Barmecide feast. As for Pitt’s relatives, they
never drew him out of himself. Lord Chatham, though a good talker
in general company, seems to have exerted on his younger brother
a slightly chilling influence; and their letters were fraternally
business-like. We therefore search in vain for those lighter traits
of character, those sparkles of wit, which enlivened the joyous years
1783–5. This side of Pitt’s character is little more known to us than
are the hidden regions of the moon. We wish to know it all the more
because it is not the frozen but the sunny side of his being.
Failing to catch more than one sportive echo of those glad times, the
chronicler falls back on mere externals, such as Pitt’s occasional
reluctance to attend the parish church at Wimbledon, or his fondness
for fishing in Lord Spencer’s lake on the lower land east of the
Common. Clearly the neighbourhood must have attracted him; for in
August 1784 he leased the house next to Lord Ashburton’s, on the
north side of Putney Heath, scarcely two miles distant from the abode
of Wilberforce. He resided there up to the autumn of 1785, when the
opportunity of buying the house at Holwood drew him to the scenes of
his boyhood, near Hayes, in Kent. Nevertheless the Surrey Common was to
win him back. For, during his last term of office, he purchased Bowling
Green House, on the old Portsmouth road, near the middle of that
beautiful space.
There it was that he fought his duel with Tierney on Whitsunday 1798.
There, too, he breathed his last, on 23rd January 1806. In the dark
days that followed on the news of Austerlitz, his thoughts turned with
one final flicker of hope towards the news which he expected from his
special envoy to Berlin, the Earl of Harrowby, formerly Dudley Ryder.
The news proved to be heart-breaking. But fancy persists in wondering
whether, perchance, during the time of waiting, the dauntless spirit
did not for a brief space fling off the thraldom of the present and
flit across the open to dwell with fond remembrance on that spring
sowing of the flower-beds of his friend Wilberforce.[368]
* * * * *
After the severe disappointments of the session of 1785, the signs
of friskiness vanish from the life of Pitt. Up to that time his
hopefulness is of almost boyish intensity. Confidence in himself, and
in the goodness of his cause, and determination to carry out a work of
national revival, lead him to grapple with great enterprises in a way
that astonishes friends and baffles opponents. The nation having given
him a mandate in 1784, he hopes to solve the most urgent of existing
problems. They are the restoration of public credit, the reduction
of the National Debt, the reform of Parliament, the subordination of
the East India Company to the control of Parliament, the opening up
of freer trade not only with Ireland but also with France, and the
preservation of peace, so that, as he phrased it--“Let peace continue
for five years, and we shall again look any Power in Europe in the
face.”[369]
Here was a programme which transcended anything previously seen. But
to it were added the many unforeseen events and problems that provide
a full stock in trade for an ordinary parliamentary leader. The Warren
Hastings affair alone would have occupied a whole session under a
quiescent Minister; and we may here note that Pitt’s conscientious
treatment of it, as a matter on which Ministers and members must vote
according to their convictions, tended to relax the bonds of party
discipline to a dangerous extent.
Indeed, there is only one of his important actions during the first
years of power that needs apology. This is the persistence with which
he pressed against Fox the demand for a complete scrutiny of the
Westminster election. Despite the fact that that wearisome and very
expensive inquiry brought to light few bad votes, and did not exclude
Fox from Parliament (for as we saw, he sat as Member for Orkney), the
Prime Minister refused to put an end to “this cursed business,” as
Pulteney termed it,[370] until his own supporters compelled him to
desist. How are we to explain this conduct? It led to waste of time
and temper in Parliament, besides annoying many of his friends, and
straining to breaking-point the allegiance of his composite majority.
There can be no doubt that he committed a blunder, and one which
Englishmen detest; for his conduct seemed ungenerous to a beaten foe
and a violation of the unwritten rules of fair-play.
Nevertheless, it is likely that he acted, not from rancour, not from
a desire to ban his enemy, least of all under any dictation from
Windsor (of this I have found no sign), but rather from the dictates
of political morality. That there had been trumping up of false votes
was notorious; for the votes polled exceeded the total number of
voters; and Pitt, as the champion of purity at elections, may have
deemed it his duty to probe the sore to the bottom. In these days an
avowed champion of Reform would be praised for such conduct. In that
age he was condemned; and it was certainly tactless to single out Fox
from among the many candidates for whom corrupt practices had been
used. Such an act appeared the outcome of personal pique, not of zeal
for electoral purity. So at least men looked on it in the spring of
1785. Pulteney, Wraxall, and the ordinary ruck of members failed to
see anything but personal motives in the whole affair.[371] Fox, who
always gauged the temper of the House aright, carried it with him when
he protested that he had little expected to find Pitt acting as the
agent of the Crown in his persecution; that it was clearly the aim of
the Ministry to ruin him, for he was a poor man. “Yet,” he added, “in
such a cause I will lay down my last shilling. If ultimately I lose
my election, it will be for want of money, not from want of a legal
majority of votes, while Westminster will be deprived of its franchise
because I am unable to prosecute a pecuniary contest with the Treasury.”
This is the most effective type of parliamentary speech. It avoided
all reference to the abstract principles which were at stake, and it
appealed with telling force to the sporting instincts of squires.
Little wonder is it that Pitt’s followers went over to the side which
seemed to stand for fair play to a poor man in his contest with a
spiteful bureaucracy. A few days later Pitt could muster only a
majority of nine (21st February 1785), and this clearly foreshadowed
the end of the scrutiny, which came with a vote hostile to Ministers on
3rd March. On a subordinate motion, six days later, several malcontents
returned to their allegiance, thus proving, in Wraxall’s words, that
“they wished to control and restrain, but had no desire to overturn,
the Administration.”[372]
This affair deserves mention here because it illustrates what was the
chief weakness of Pitt. His secluded childhood, his education apart
from other youths, even at Cambridge, his shyness in general company,
and his decided preference for the society of a few friends, gave him
very few opportunities for knowing ordinary men. He therefore was
slow in understanding the temper of the House, and he never gained
what we may call the Palmerston touch. Well would it have been for
him if he had mixed more with men and shown towards members of the
House the affability with which Fox and North charmed friends and
foes alike. But, like Peel, Pitt had neither parliamentary graces
nor small talk for the lobby. In truth he was too shy or too proud
to unbend with ease. Or rather he did so only in a circle of friends
or among his juniors. Then his sense of fun could go to surprising
lengths, witness that historic romp when Lady Hester Stanhope, two of
her younger brothers, and young William Napier (the future historian)
managed to get him down and blacken his face. In the midst of their
jubilant triumph there came a knock at the door. Two Ministers were
announced as desirous of taking his commands on some question. For a
few minutes State business stood still until the Prime Minister shook
off his assailants and washed his face for the interview. Then the
boys marvelled more at the change of manner than of colour. The Prime
Minister threw up his chin, loftily inquired the cause of the visit,
imparted his decision, stiffly dismissed the Ministers--and resumed the
romp.[373] Clearly there were two Pitts.
His rather stilted manners at Westminster were doubtless a
reflection--a lunar reflection--of the melodramatic splendours of his
father. Never was a colleague or a subordinate introduced to Chatham’s
presence until the effects of light were Rembrandtesque, and the
telling phrase had been coined. But where the father triumphed by the
force of his personality, the son only half succeeded. For he was more
a Grenville than a Pitt, and he inherited from that family some of its
congenital stiffness. Hence the efforts which the son put forth, as if
with the aim of fulfilling the precept of St. Paul to Timothy--“Let no
man despise thy youth”--were calculated, not to impress beholders, but
rather to freeze them.
Far different was the easy good nature of Fox, which often salved
the wounds inflicted in the course of debate. It is said that Lord
North, after one of the debates on the American War, in which Fox had
mercilessly belaboured one of the Ministers, good-humouredly remarked
to the orator, “You were in fine feather to-night, Charles; I am
glad that it was not my turn to be fallen upon.” Fox, we may add,
reciprocated these sentiments. However he might threaten North with
impeachment, he was ready in private to shake him by the hand; and
shortly before the fall of that Minister he publicly asked his pardon
for offending him by his tremendous indictment, adding that he meant it
not. To us this sounds unreal. Either the indictment against the author
of the nation’s ruin was not quite sincere, or the apology was hollow.
Pitt, with his exceptionally high standard of truthfulness,[374] could
not have tendered it. Fox did; and Wraxall praised his conduct, adding
that Pitt was less placable, and was wanting in those frank, winning,
open ways which made friends and retained them through adversity.[375]
This rather superficial verdict--for Wraxall knew Pitt only very
slightly--summed up the views of the easy-going mass, which cares
nothing for principles, little for measures, and very much for men,
provided that they keep up the parliamentary game according to the old
rules and in a sportsmanlike way. It must always be remembered that
few members of Parliament took their duties seriously, and looked on
the debates mainly as a change from the life of the other fashionable
clubs. To such an assembly the political philosophy of Burke was
foolishness, and the lofty principles of Pitt, mere Pharisaism. Its
ideal would have been Esau, provided that he had held fast to the
customs of primogeniture.
We have little or nothing that directly shows the impression produced
on Pitt by his discovery of the shallowness and fickleness of his
supporters. Perhaps it intensified his natural shyness and awkwardness
of manner, which Wilberforce assures us were very great. Certainly
he did not mix more with men. “Pitt does not make friends” is a
significant entry in Wilberforce’s Diary for March 1785.[376] This
inability to make a wide circle of friends was not incompatible with
those rarer gifts which link a man closely to those with whom he had
real kinship of spirit. If we may read Shakespeare’s thoughts into the
well-known words of Polonius to Laertes, the poet supremely admired a
man who inspired the few with ardent affection and held the many at
arm’s length. In regard to character, then, we may honour Pitt for the
very characteristic which to men like Wraxall seemed a blemish.
Nevertheless, it was a serious failing in a parliamentary tactician.
Onlookers, who saw only the cold and reserved exterior, described
Pitt as the embodiment of egotism and pride. His friends knew full
well that he was the soul of kindness. Dundas and Wilberforce testify
to his affable behaviour to subordinates, his fund of good temper,
which was proof even against contradiction and the advent of bad
news. Wilberforce mentions a case in point. Pitt had long been
ruminating on some revenue proposal, and at length mentioned it to
the Attorney-General, only to learn that there would be grave legal
objections to the scheme; far from showing annoyance, he received the
announcement “with the most unruffled good-humour,” and, giving up
his plan, “pursued his other business as cheerfully and pleasantly as
usual.”[377]
It is not thus that a proud and egotistical nature sees his castle
vanish into air. Anecdotes such as this have been known only since the
year 1897. Now we know the real Pitt; the men of these times saw only
the professional mask; and therefore we find exclamations like that of
Sir Gilbert Elliot who, after hearing the almost inspired speech of
Pitt on the abolition of the slave-trade, remarked: “One felt almost
to like the man”;[378] or again Lady Anne Hamilton in her “Memoirs
of the Court of George III,” asserted that Pitt was always cold and
carried his frostiness even into his carouses.
This certainly was the general belief. In one particular Pitt’s
behaviour often gave colour to the charge of pride or egotism. His
letters were as stiff as his parliamentary attitudes. Worst of all,
he very often left letters unanswered; and this applied not merely to
begging letters, against which silence is a Prime Minister’s panoply,
but even to important matters of State. We find Eden, in the midst
of the commercial negotiations with France, writing from Paris in
despairing terms about the Prime Minister’s silence, and finally
suggesting that all his letters of the last fortnight must have sunk
in the Channel. Sir James Harris, too, when fighting an unequal battle
against the French party in Holland, begged Pitt to send a few lines
to encourage the hard pressed friends of England. For four months not
a line came; and at last Harris begged Carmarthen to cajole a letter
out of his chief: “Is it impossible to move him, _who speaks_ so well,
to write one poor line to these sound shillings and pence men?”[379]
The excuse doubtless was, that Pitt was overworked in Parliament
(as indeed he stated to Eden);[380] but, even with the then scanty
facilities for dealing with a vast correspondence, he should certainly
have handled it with more method and tact. Careless correspondents will
readily conjecture how much a Prime Minister may harm his prospects by
subjecting friends and foes alike to a peculiarly annoying slight.
Pitt, then, owed little or nothing to social graces; and Horace Walpole
gave a very superficial judgement, when, in his companion sketches of
Pitt and Fox, he stated that the former “cultivated friends to form a
party.” On the contrary, he harmed his party by cooling his friends.
* * * * *
The men who most helped Pitt to keep in touch with his following were
Dundas, Grenville, and Jenkinson. They did not, as Wraxall avers, hold
the first place in his confidence. That was still held by Wilberforce;
and to their friendship we may apply the apt remark of Montaigne, that
the amity which possesses and sways the soul cannot be double. For
political reasons Pitt after the year 1784 came into closer contact
with his subalterns, among whom Dundas and Grenville claim notice.
Henry Dundas (1742–1811), a younger son of the Right Honourable
Robert Dundas, Lord President of the Scottish Court of Session, and
of Anne Gordon of Invergordon, was born at Edinburgh, where he was
educated first at school, then in the University. The atmosphere in
which he grew up was strictly legal; and his ancestry, no less than
his upbringing, seemed to fit him for success at the Bar, at which
he appeared in 1763. His rise was rapid, and in 1774 he entered
Parliament as member for Midlothian. At Westminster he attached himself
to North’s party and became known as a hard worker and hard hitter.
United as these powers were with a manly presence, genial gifts, and
the full fund of Scottish shrewdness, he acquired favour and became
Lord Advocate. Grace and persuasiveness of speech he lacked; a harsh
voice, a still harsher accent, and awkward gestures told against him;
but above these defects he rose triumphant, thanks to indomitable
courage, which enabled him unabashed to bear the heaviest blows of
debate. Napoleon once expressed his admiration of Blücher, because,
however badly he was beaten, “the old devil” came up again as though
nothing had happened. So it was with Dundas in his many encounters with
Fox. He might be repulsed but never routed. His features were bold
and handsome, and, if they were “tinged with convivial purple,” that
perhaps enhanced their charm. For the House loved a _bon vivant_, who
entertained with lairdly lavishness and had good store, not only of
wine, but of broad stories.
Wraxall, while admitting Dundas’s appearance to be “manly and
advantageous,” avers that his conviviality was part of a deep-laid
scheme for managing men and tightening his grip on the Administration;
for “never did any man conceal deeper views of every kind under
the appearance of careless inattention to self-interest.” The same
insinuation is wittily conveyed by the authors of “The Rolliad” in a
skit on the Cabinet Meetings which Dundas was supposed to hold in his
villa. “March 9th, 1787. Got Thurlow to dine with us at Wimbledon--gave
him my best Burgundy and blasphemy to put him into good humour. After
a brace of bottles ventured to drop a hint of business. Thurlow cursed
me, and asked Pitt for a sentiment. Pitt looked foolish, Grenville
wise. Mulgrave stared. Sydney’s chin lengthened. Tried the effect of
another bottle. Pitt began a long speech on the subject of our meeting.
Sydney fell asleep by the fire”--and so on.
In one respect Dundas was the great political agent of the age. He
managed Scotland, so thoroughly, indeed, that he has been termed “the
foremost Scotsman of the eighteenth century.”[381] No civilian since
the time of John Knox has ever controlled the energies of that people
so thoroughly as Henry Dundas. What the great Reformer achieved by an
appeal to their highest aspirations, the party manipulator achieved
by an appeal to the purse. Since the collapse of the Stuart cause
material interests had been paramount; and their deadening effect on
national character appears in the political torpor which lay upon
Scotland until the strident call of the French Revolution awakened her.
The men north of the Tweed had even more reason than Englishmen to
desire Parliamentary Reform; for, as will be seen in a later chapter,
in all Scotland there were only 1303 electors; and these returned 45
members as against 44 who misrepresented Cornwall. But so long as the
Scots slumbered, it mattered not whether they had 45 members or 4;
for the return of 45, and their course of conduct at Westminster were
alike prescribed by Dundas. The soporific fruit which drugged the
Scottish people and kept their representatives close to his heel was
“patronage.” Dundas it was who dispensed all important prizes both in
Church and State. Valuable livings at home, lucrative posts in India
or speedy advancement in the navy, these and many other rewards were
in his hands. His influence at the Admiralty and at the India Board of
Control was immense; he worked hard for his men; and it may be admitted
that his choice of officials, especially for India, was often sound.
Certain it is that he opened up golden avenues to hundreds of poor
Scottish families, so that he was often hailed as the benefactor of his
people.
In one respect Dundas conferred a substantial boon. He persuaded Pitt
to extinguish the embers of hatred to the reigning dynasty which still
smouldered in the Highlands, by restoring the estates that were
confiscated after the “Forty-five.” By this act of clemency Pitt and
Dundas linked their names to the work of reconciliation so tactfully
begun by Chatham, and helped to foster the sentiment of British
nationality, which bore a rich harvest on the fields of Salamanca
and Waterloo. It is not surprising, then, that Dundas had the small
governing clique in Scotland entirely at his beck and call. One of his
forty-five henchmen at Westminster, Ferguson of Pitfour, frankly stated
that he had never heard a speech which had influenced his vote, and
that there was only one defect in Dundas’s leadership, namely, that he
was not quite tall enough to enable his followers readily to see into
which lobby he was going at division-time.[382]
Even so, the magnetic influence of Dundas upon the obedient Caledonian
squad was a political asset of no small worth. Not seldom could
the laird of Melville decide the fate of Cabinets by throwing his
forty-five votes into this or that scale. He himself was fully aware of
his importance; for in a letter which he wrote to Grenville early in
1789, he declined another official post because in his present position
(or positions) he was “a cement of political strength to the present
Administration,” the dissolution of which might be ruinous. The words
are instinct, not only with the Scottish canniness, but with Scottish
loyalty. In truth, the staunchness of Dundas’s friendship to Pitt
suffices to refute those critics, both of his own and later times, who
speak of him as of a political Vicar of Bray. In his early days his
trimming propensities were often disagreeably prominent; and the speech
in which he hailed the rising sun of Pitt, and slighted the waning
orb of North, was quite characteristic of the earlier half of his
career.[383] But, for him as for some others, the splendour of Pitt’s
genius, and the glow of his pure patriotism, inaugurated a brighter
future; and he might well say of his tergiversation at that time what
Talleyrand said of his still more numerous changes of front: “I have
never deserted a party before it deserted itself.” While recognizing
in this new ally great powers of work, and still greater powers of
“influence,” Pitt did not at once give him his whole confidence; and
we shall probably not be far wrong in inferring that only after the
disillusionment of the spring of 1785, did “Henry VIIIth of Scotland”
become his counsellor on matters of the highest moment. Thenceforth
his influence over Pitt steadily increased, while that of Wilberforce
somewhat waned; and we find the latter declaring at a later time that
Pitt’s connection with Dundas was his “great misfortune,” a remark
which applied mainly to the slavery question.[384] It is, however,
still more applicable to Dundas’s conduct of the war, when, as we
shall see, his absorption in other work, and his utter inexperience of
military affairs, should have made him backward in giving advice. Far
from that, he was for some time the guiding spirit; and from his seat
at the Home Office or the India Board, or from his suburban villa, he
dashed off orders of momentous import, which were to gladden the heart
of Carnot.
Such, then, was the man at whose house, on the west side of Wimbledon
Common, Pitt was a frequent visitor. There the conviviality was
unrestrained by those scruples which more and more prevailed at
Wilberforce’s abode hard by; and after the latter gave up that villa,
in the autumn of 1786, the associations of Pitt with Wimbledon are
somewhat vinous. Both Pitt and Dundas were hard drinkers. The former
frequently tossed off several tumblers of port wine before a great
speech in the House of Commons; and it would seem, if rumour spoke
truly, that at Dundas’s the potations were long and deep. It must not,
however, be supposed that Pitt performed no serious work there. The
long and important despatches which he wrote at Wimbledon show the
contrary; and their contents prove them to have been written before
the Bacchic pleasures, which men of that age deemed the appropriate
close of a busy day. Only once did the pleasures of dessert at Dundas’s
cause Pitt and his host to compromise themselves in public. But on one
occasion they came to the House of Commons obviously the worse for
liquor. The occasion was equally remarkable. It was on the acceptance
of the French Declaration of War, in February 1793. Fox generously
forebore from taking advantage of his rival’s incapacity,[385] but the
situation was hit off in the following lines:
I cannot see the Speaker, Hal, can you?
What! Cannot see the Speaker, I see two.
A man so frank and intriguing, so subtle and pugnacious as Dundas, is
fair game for the satirist; and it is not surprising that the Whig
rhymsters who compiled the “Rolliad” scourged the factotum of Caledonia:
Whose exalted soul
No bonds of vulgar prejudice control.
Of shame unconscious in his bold career
He spurns that honour which the weak revere;
For, true to public Virtue’s patriot plan,
He loves the _Minister_ and not the _Man_.
Alike the advocate of North and Wit,
The friend of Shelburne and the guide of Pitt,
His ready tongue with sophistries at will
Can say, unsay, and be consistent still.
This is, of course, the effusion of unscrupulous party hacks; but it
shows the skill with which the enemies of Dundas seized on the weak
points in his career. As a matter of fact, few men have worked harder
than the future Viscount Melville, and on few men has fortune at the
close pressed more unkindly.
* * * * *
William Wyndham Grenville (1759–1834) is a less interesting man than
Dundas. First cousin to Pitt, and born in the same year, he seemed
destined to advance hand in hand with him, just as his father had
signally helped Chatham in certain parts of that meteoric career.
Nature, however, had clearly designed the Grenvilles, both father
and son, not to be comets, scarcely planets, but rather satellites.
The traditional pride of the Grenvilles (in which Pitt was by no
means lacking) appeared in William Grenville, blended with a freezing
manner, the effect of which was enhanced by his heavy features and
stiff carriage. To counterbalance these defects, he was dowered with
an upright and virtuous disposition, great industry, a choice store of
classical learning, good sense, though not illuminated by imagination,
and oratorical gifts, which, if neither majestic nor pleasing, partook
of his native solidity. As Paymaster of the Forces (conjointly with
Lord Mulgrave) he did useful work, the higher branches of which
involved questions of foreign policy.
[Illustration:
_Emery Walker Ph. sc._
_William Wyndham, Lord Grenville
from a painting by Hoppner_
]
Pitt’s appreciation of his sound sense appeared in his choice of
Grenville for very delicate diplomatic missions to The Hague and
Paris in the crisis of 1787. The evenness of his judgement and temper
procured him the Speakership of the House of Commons in 1789,
after the death of Cornwall. From this honourable post he was soon
transferred to more congenial duties, as Secretary of State, and
entered the Upper House as Lord Grenville. In 1791 he became Secretary
for Foreign Affairs, his conduct of which will engage our attention
later on. Here we may note that in all his undertakings he gained a
reputation for soundness; and if the neutral tints of his character
procured for him neither the enthusiastic love of friends nor the
hatred of foes, he won the respect of all. The envious railers who
penned the “Rolliad” could fasten on nothing worse than his solidity--
A youth who boasts no common share of head.
What plenteous stores of knowledge may contain
The spacious tenement of Grenville’s brain!
Nature, in all her dispensations wise,
Who formed his head-piece of so vast a size,
Hath not, ’tis true, neglected to bestow
Its due proportion to the part below.
Unfortunately, though Grenville could manage business, he could not
manage men; and at this point he failed to make good a defect in
the political panoply of Pitt. On neither of the cousins had nature
bestowed the social tact which might have smoothed the rubs of
diplomatic discussion, say, in those with the French envoy, Chauvelin,
in 1792. That fervid royalist, Hyde de Neuville, complained bitterly
of the freezing powers of Downing Street. The enthusiastic young
Canning found it impossible to work with Grenville, who was also on
strained terms with Dundas. The “inner Cabinet,” composed of Pitt,
Grenville, Dundas, must have been the scene of many triangular duels;
and it needed all the mental and moral superiority of Pitt (as to which
every one bears witness) to preserve even the appearance of harmony
between seconds who were alike opinionated, obstinate, and covetous of
patronage.[386] On the whole, the personality of Grenville must rank
among the dullest of that age. I have found no striking phrase which
glitters amidst the leaden mass of his speeches and correspondence. His
life has never been written. He would be a very conscientious zealot
who would undertake it.
* * * * *
Turning to the central figure of the group, we have once more to
mourn the lack of information about those smaller details which light
up traits of character. Few of Pitt’s letters refer to his private
affairs in the years 1784–86; and the knowledge which we have of them
is largely inferential. Even the secondary sources fared badly; for it
seems that Pitt’s housemaid made a holocaust of the many letters which
Wilberforce wrote to him during his foreign tour in 1785.[387] In the
Pitt Papers there is only one letter of Wilberforce of this period; and
as it throws light on their friendship and the anxiety felt by Pitt’s
friends at the time of the Irish Propositions, I print it here almost
_in extenso_.[388]
Lausanne, 2nd Aug., 1785.
MY DEAR PITT,
... If I were to suffer myself to think on politics, I should be
very unhappy at the accounts I hear from all quarters: nothing
has come from any great authority; but all the reports, such as
they are, are of one tendency. I repose myself with confidence on
you, being sure that you have spirit enough not to be deterred by
difficulties if you can carry your point thro’; and trusting that
you will have that greater degree of spirit which is requisite to
make a person give up at once when the bad consequences which would
follow his going on are at a distance. Yet I cannot help being
extremely anxious: your own character, as well as the welfare of
the country are at stake; but we may congratulate ourselves that
they are here inseparably connected. In the opinion of unprejudiced
men I do not think you will suffer from adjourning the Irish
propositions _ad calendas Graecas_, if the state of Ireland makes
it dangerous to proceed and you can make it evident you had good
reason to bring them on, which I think you can. At the worst, the
consequences on this side are only that you suffer (the Country
may suffer too, but I am taking for granted this is the lesser
evil); but I tremble and look forward to what may happen if the
Irish Parliament should pass the propositions, and the Irish nation
refuse to accept them; nor would it be one struggle only; but as
often as any Bill should come over from our House of Commons to
be passed in theirs, which was obnoxious, there would be a fresh
opportunity for reviving it, especially as you have an Opposition
to deal with as unprincipled and mischievous as ever embroiled the
affairs of any country. God bless you, my dear Pitt and carry you
thro’ all your difficulties! You may reckon yourself most fortunate
in that chearfulness of mind which enables you every now and then
to throw off your load for a few hours and rest yourself. I fancy
it must have been this which, when I am with you, prevents my
considering you as an object of compassion, tho’ Prime Minister
of England; for now, when I am at a distance, out of hearing of
your foyning, and your (illegible) other proofs of a light heart,
I cannot help representing you to myself as oppressed with cares
and troubles, and what I feel for you is more, I believe, than even
Pepper feels in the moments of his greatest anxiety; and what can I
say more?...
Pepper Arden, to whom Wilberforce here refers, scarcely lived up to his
name. His character and his countenance alike lacked distinction. The
latter suffered from the want of a nose, or at least, of an effectively
imposing feature. What must this have meant in a generation which
remembered the effect produced by Chatham’s “terrifying beak,” and was
dominated by the long and concave curve on which Pitt suspended the
House of Commons! Further, Pepper lacked dignity. His manner was noisy
and inelegant.[389] He pushed himself forward as a Cambridge friend of
Pitt; and the House resented the painful efforts of this flippant young
man to run in harness by the side of the genius. Members roared with
laughter when Arden marched in, at Christmastide of 1783, to announce
that Pitt, as Prime Minister of the Crown, would offer himself for
re-election. The effrontery of the statement was heightened by the
voice and bearing of the speaker. Nevertheless, Pitt, as we have seen,
made him Attorney-General. No appointment called forth more criticism.
He entered the peerage as Lord Alvanley.
It is the characteristic of genius to attract and inspire the young;
and Pitt’s influence on them was second only to that of Chatham. As
we shall see later on, Canning caught the first glow of political
enthusiasm from the kindling gaze of the young Prime Minister.
Patriotism so fervid, probity so spotless, eloquence so moving fired
cooller natures than Canning’s; and among the most noteworthy of
those who now came forward was Henry Addington. His father, Anthony
Addington, had started life as a medical man in Reading, and afterwards
in Bedford Row, London, where Henry was born in 1754. In days when
that profession held a lower place than at present, this fact was to
be thrown in the teeth of the son on becoming Prime Minister. Chatham,
however, always treated his family physician (for such Addington
became) with chivalrous courtesy. Largely by the care of the doctor
William Pitt was coaxed into maturity after his “wan” youth.[390] It
was natural, then, that the sons should become acquainted, especially
as young Addington, after passing through Winchester School and
Brasenose College, Oxford, entered at Lincoln’s Inn while Pitt was
still keeping his terms there.
Considering the community of their studies and tastes, it is singular
that few, if any, of their letters of this period survive. Such as
have come down to us are the veriest scraps. Here, then, as elsewhere,
some evil destiny (was it Bishop Tomline?) must have intervened to
blot out the glimpses of the social side of the statesman’s life.
It is clear, however, that Pitt must have begun to turn Addington’s
thoughts away from Chancery Lane to Westminster; for the latter in 1783
writes eagerly against “the offensive Coalition of Fox and North.” At
Christmas, when Pitt leaped to office as Prime Minister, he sought to
bring Addington into the political arena, and held out the prospect
of some subordinate post. Addington accordingly stood for Devizes,
and was chosen by a unanimous vote at the hustings in April 1784.
Nevertheless, his cool and circumspect nature rose slowly to the height
of the situation at Westminster. Externals were all in his favour.
His figure was tall and well proportioned; his features, faultlessly
regular, were lit up by a benevolent smile; and his deferential manners
gave token of success either as family physician or family attorney.
In fine, a man who needed only the spur of ambition, or the stroke of
calamity, to achieve a respectable success. It is said that Pitt early
bade him fix his gaze on the Speaker’s chair, to which, in fact, he
helped him in 1789, after Grenville’s retirement. But, for the present,
nothing stirred Addington’s nature from its exasperating calm. As
worldly inducements failed, Pitt finally made trial of poetry. During a
ride together to Pitt’s seat at Holwood, the statesman sought in vain
to appeal to his ambition; but Addington--five years his senior, be
it remembered--pleaded the disqualifying effects of early habits and
disposition. Thereupon Pitt burst out with the following passage from
Waller’s poem on Henrietta Maria:
The lark that shuns on lofty boughs to build
Her humble nest, lies silent in the field;
But should the promise of a brighter day,
Aurora smiling, bid her rise and play,
Quickly she’ll show ’twas not for want of voice,
Or power to climb, she made so low a choice;
Singing she mounts; her airy notes are stretch’d
Towards heaven, as if from heaven alone her notes she fetch’d.
Then the statesman set spurs to his horse and left Addington far
behind.[391] It is curious that when Addington’s ambition was fully
aroused, it proved to be an obstacle to Pitt and a danger to the
country in the crisis of 1803–4.
Adverting now to certain details of Pitt’s private life, we notice
that he varied the time of his first residence on Putney Heath (August
1784–November 1785) by several visits to Brighthelmstone, perhaps in
order to shake off the fatigue and disappointment attendant on his
Irish and Reform policy. At that seaside resort he spent some weeks in
the early autumn of 1785, enjoying the society of his old Cambridge
friends, “Bob” Smith (afterwards Lord Carrington), Pratt (afterwards
Lord Camden), and Steele. We can imagine them riding along the quaint
little front, or on the downs, their interchange of thought and sallies
of wit probably helping in no small degree the invigorating influences
of sea air and exercise. If we may trust the sprightly but spiteful
lines in one of the “Political Eclogues,” it was at Brighton that Pitt
at these times especially enjoyed the society of “Tom” Steele, whom he
had made Secretary of the Treasury conjointly with George Rose. Unlike
his colleague, whose visage always bore signs of the care and toil of
his office, Steele was remarkable for the rotundity and joviality of
his face and an inexhaustible fund of animal spirits.[392] Perhaps
it was this which attracted Pitt to him in times of recreation. The
lines above referred to occur in an effusion styled--“Rose, or the
Complaint,”--where the hard working colleague is shown as bemoaning
Pitt’s preference for Steele:
But vain his hope to shine in Billy’s eyes,
Vain all his votes, his speeches, and his lies.
Steele’s happier claims the boy’s regard engage,
Alike their studies, nor unlike their age:
With Steele, companion of his vacant hours,
Oft would he seek Brighthelmstone’s sea-girt towers;
For Steele relinquish Beauty’s trifling talk,
With Steele each morning ride, each evening walk;
Or in full tea-cups drowning cares of state
On gentler topics urge the mock debate.
However much Pitt enjoyed Steele’s company on occasions like these,
he did not allow his feelings to influence him when a question of
promotion arose. Steele’s talents being only moderate, his rise was
slow, but he finally became one of the Paymasters of the Forces. In
that station his conduct was not wholly satisfactory; and Pitt’s
friendship towards him cooled, though it was renewed not long before
the Prime Minister’s death.
For George Rose, on the other hand, despite his lack of joviality, Pitt
cherished an ever deepening regard proportioned to the thoroughness and
tactfulness of his services at the Treasury. In view of the vast number
of applications for places and pensions, of which, moreover, Burke’s
Economy Bill had lessened the supply, the need of firm control at the
Treasury is obvious; and Pitt and the country owed much to the man
who for sixteen years held the purse-strings tight.[393] On his part
Rose felt unwavering enthusiasm for his chief from the time of their
first interview in Paris in 1783 until the dark days that followed
Austerlitz. Only on two subjects did he refuse to follow Pitt, namely,
on Parliamentary Reform, from which he augured “the most direful
consequences,” and the Slavery Question. That he ventured twice to
differ decidedly from Pitt (in spite of earnest private appeals) proves
his independence of mind as well as the narrowness of his outlook.
He even offered to resign his post at the Treasury owing to their
difference on Reform, but Pitt negatived this proposal. We need not
accept his complacent statement that Pitt later on came over decidedly
to his opinion on that topic.[394]
The tastes of the two friends were very similar, especially in their
love of the country; and it was in the same month (September 1785)
that each bought a small estate. We find Pitt writing at that time to
Wilberforce respecting his purchase of “Holwood Hill,” near Bromley,
Kent, and stating that Rose had just bought an estate in the New
Forest, which he vowed was “just breakfasting distance from town.” “We
are all turning country gentlemen very fast,” added the statesman. A
harassing session like that of 1785 is certain to set up a centrifugal
tendency; and we may be sure that the nearness of Holwood to Hayes was
a further attraction. Not that Pitt was as yet fond of agriculture.
He had neither the time nor the money to spare for the high farming
which was then yearly adding to the wealth of the nation. But he
inherited Chatham’s love of arranging an estate, and he was now to
find the delight of laying out grounds, planting trees and shrubs and
watching their growth. Holwood had many charms--“a most beautiful spot,
wanting nothing but a house fit to live in”--so he described it to
Wilberforce.[395] He moved into his new abode on 5th November 1785, and
during the rest of the vacation spent most of his time there, residing
at Downing Street only on Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays. Many
affairs of State were decided at parties at Holwood, or, later on, at
Dundas’s villa at Wimbledon.
Pitt admitted to Wilberforce that the purchase of Holwood was a piece
of folly; and this was soon apparent to all Pitt’s friends who had
old-fashioned notions of making both ends meet. That desirable result
had rarely, if ever, been attained by the son of the magnificent
Chatham. Sparing for the nation’s exchequer, Pitt was prodigal of
his own. The aristocratic _hauteur_, of which all but his friends
complained, led him to disregard the peccadilloes of servants and the
overcharges of tradesmen. A bachelor Prime Minister, whose nose is
high in air, is good sport for parasites; and even before the purchase
of Holwood, Pitt was in difficulties. During one of the visits to
Brighthelmstone, “Bob” Smith undertook to overhaul his affairs, and
found old and forgotten bills amounting to £7,914. The discovery came
as a shock; for Pitt, with his usual hopefulness, had told his Mentor
that, as three-quarters of his official salary were due, he would have
enough for his current liabilities. A further scrutiny showed that
tradesmen, in default of any present return, took care to ensure an
abundant harvest in the future. The butcher usually sent, or charged
for, three or four hundredweight of meat on a Saturday, probably
because Pitt was often away for the week-end. The meat bill for
January 1785, when Pitt generally dined out, was £96, which, reckoning
the price at sixpence a pound, implied a delivery of 34 hundredweight.
Other bills for provisions (wrote Smith to Wilberforce) “exceed
anything I could have imagined.” Apparently they rose in proportion
to Pitt’s absence from home. His accounts were kept by a man named
Wood, whose book-keeping seems to have been correct; but Smith begged
Wilberforce to urge on Pitt the need of an immediate reform of his
household affairs.[396] Whether it took place, we cannot tell; for this
is one of the private subjects over which Bishop Tomline chose to draw
the veil of propriety.
An economical householder would have found relief from the addition
of £3,000 a year to his income. That was the net sum which accrued
to him after August 1792, from the Lord Wardenship of the Cinque
Ports.[397] That Pitt felt more easy in his mind is clear from his
letter to Lady Chatham, dated Downing Street, 11th November 1793. She
had been in temporary embarrassment. He therefore sent £300, and gently
chid her for concealing her need so long. He continued as follows:
“My accession of income has hitherto found so much employment in the
discharge of former arrears as to leave no very large fund which I can
with propriety dispose of. This, however, will mend every day, and at
all events I trust you will never scruple to tell me when you have the
slightest occasion for any aid that I can supply.”[398]
Unfortunately, Pitt soon fell into difficulties, and partly from his
own generosity as Colonel of the Walmer Volunteers. As we shall also
see, he gave £2,000 to the Patriotic Fund started in January 1798.
But carelessness continued to be his chief curse. In truth his lordly
nature and his early training in the household of Chatham unfitted him
for the practice of that bourgeois virtue, frugality. That he sought to
practise it for the Commonwealth is a signal proof of his patriotism.
We shall see that his embarrassments probably hindered him from a
marriage, which might have crowned with joy his somewhat solitary life.
In the career of Pitt we find few incidents of the lighter kind, which
diversify the lives of most statesmen of that age. Two such, however,
connect him with the jovial society of Dundas. It was their custom
to outline over their cups the course of the forthcoming debates;
and on one occasion, when a motion was to be brought forward by Mr.
(afterwards Earl) Grey, Dundas amused the company by making a burlesque
oration on the Whig side. Pitt was so charmed by the performance that
he declared that Dundas must make the official reply. The joke sounded
well over wine; but great was the Scotsman’s astonishment to find
himself saddled with the task in the House. Members were equally taken
aback; and the lobbies soon rustled with eager conjectures as to the
reason why Pitt had surrendered his dearly cherished prerogative. It
then transpired that the Prime Minister had acted partly on a whim, and
partly on the conviction that a speaker who had so cleverly pleaded a
case must be able to answer it with equal effect.[399]
The other incident is likewise Bacchic, and is also uncertain as to
date. Pitt, Dundas, and Thurlow had been dining with Jenkinson at
Croydon; and during their rollicking career back towards Wimbledon,
they found a toll-bar gate between Streatham and Tooting carelessly
left open. Wine, darkness, and the frolicsome spirit of youth prompted
them to ride through and cheat the keeper. He ran out, called to them
in vain, and, taking them for highwaymen, fired his blunderbuss at
their retreating forms.[400] The discharge was of course as harmless
as that of firearms usually was except at point-blank range; but the
writers of the “Rolliad” got wind of the affair, and satirised Pitt’s
lawlessness in the following lines:
Ah, think what danger on debauch attends!
Let Pitt o’er wine preach temperance to his friends,
How, as he wandered darkling o’er the plain,
His reason drowned in Jenkinson’s champagne,
A rustic’s hand, but righteous fate withstood,
Had shed a premier’s for a robber’s blood.
Gaiety and grief often tread close on one another’s heels; and Pitt
had his full share of the latter. The sudden death of his sister
Harriet, on 25th September 1786, was a severe blow. She had married his
Cambridge friend, Eliot, and expired shortly after childbirth. She was
his favourite sister, having entered closely and fondly into his early
life. He was prostrated with grief, and for some time could not attend
even to the public business which was his second nature. Eliot, now
destined to be more than ever a friend and brother, came to his house
and for some time lived with him. It will be of interest to print here
a new letter of George III to a Mr. Frazer who had informed him of the
sad event.
WINDSOR,
_Sept. 25, 1786._ 9.15 p.m.[401]
I am excessively hurt, as indeed all my family are, at the death
of the amiable Lady Harriot Elliot (_sic_); but I do not the less
approve Mr. Frazer’s attention in acquainting me of this very
melancholy event. I owne I dread the effect it may have on Mr.
Pitt’s health: I think it best not at this early period to trouble
him with my very sincere condolence; but I know I can trust to the
prudence of Mr. Frazer, and therefore desire he will take the most
proper method of letting Mr. Pitt know what I feel for him, and
that I think it kindest at present to be silent.
G. R.
The King further evinced his tactful sympathy by suggesting that
Pitt should for a time visit his mother at Burton Pynsent. In other
respects his private life was uneventfully happy. The conclusion of the
commercial treaty with France, the buoyancy of the national revenue,
and the satisfactory issue of the Dutch troubles must have eased his
anxieties in the years 1786–87; and after the serious crisis last
named, his position was truly enviable, until the acute situation
arising from the mental malady of George III overclouded his prospects
at the close of the year 1788.
Certainly Pitt was little troubled by his constituents. Almost the only
proof of his parliamentary connection with the University of Cambridge
(apart from warnings from friends at election times how so and so is to
“be got at”) is in a letter which I have discovered in the Hardwicke
Papers. It refers to a Cambridge Debt Bill about to be introduced by
Charles Yorke in April 1787, to which the University had requested Pitt
to move certain amendments in its interest. It will be seen that Pitt
proposed to treat the request rather lightly:
DEAR YORKE,
I am rather inclined to wish the Cambridge [Debt] Bill should
pass without any alteration, unless you think there are material
reasons for it.--The impanelling the jury does not seem to be
a point of much consequence, but seems most naturally to be the
province of the mayor.--With regard to the appeal, I think we
agreed to strike it out entirely.--As the Commission are a mixed
body from the town, the county, and the University, there seems to
be an impropriety in appealing either to the town sessions or the
County Sessions, either of which may be considered as only one out
of three parties interested. The decision of the Commission appears
therefore the most satisfactory, and if I recollect right, it is
final as the bill now stands.
Yours most sincerely,
W. PITT.[402]
In the whole of Pitt’s correspondence I have found only one episode
which lights up the recesses of his mind. As a rule, his letters are
disappointingly business-like and formal. He wrote as a Prime Minister
to supporters, rarely as a friend to a friend. And those who search
the hundreds of packets of the Pitt Papers in order to find the real
man will be tempted to liken him to that elusive creature which, when
pursued, shoots away among the rocks under a protective cloud of ink.
At one point, however, we catch a glimpse of his inmost beliefs.
Wilberforce, having come under deep religious convictions in the autumn
of 1785, resolved to retire for a time from all kinds of activity
in order to take his bearings anew. Then he wrote to Pitt a full
description of his changed views of life, stating also his conviction
that he must give up some forms of work and amusement, and that he
could never be so much of a party man as he had hitherto been. Pitt’s
reply, of 2nd December 1785, has recently seen the light. After stating
that any essential opposition between them would cause him grief but
must leave his affection quite untouched, he continued as follows:
Forgive me if I cannot help expressing my fear that you are
nevertheless deluding yourself into principles which have but too
much tendency to counteract your own object and to render your
virtues and your talents useless both to yourself and to mankind.
I am not, however, without hopes that my anxiety paints this too
strongly. For you confess that the character of religion is not a
gloomy one, and that it is not that of an enthusiast. But why then
this preparation of solitude, which can hardly avoid tincturing the
mind either with melancholy or superstition? If a Christian may act
in the several relations of life, must he seclude himself from them
all to become so? Surely the principles as well as the practice of
Christianity are simple, and lead not to meditation only but to
action. I will not, however, enlarge upon these subjects now. What
I ask of you, as a mark both of your friendship and of the candour
which belongs to your mind, is to open yourself fully and without
reserve to one, who, believe me, does not know how to separate his
happiness from your own.[403]
On the morrow, a Saturday, he called on Wilberforce at Wimbledon, and
the friends for two hours unburdened their hearts to one another.
We know little of that moving converse. The two men had ideals so
different that unison was out of the question. The statesman, so we
learn, had never reflected much on religion, that is, in the keenly
introspective sense in which Wilberforce now used the word. To Pitt, as
to most Englishmen, religion meant the acceptance of certain doctrines
laid down by the State Church, and we may describe it as largely
political and conventional, buttressing the existing order, but by no
means transforming life or character. One glance alone we gain into the
sanctuary of his thoughts; he told Wilberforce that Bishop Butler’s
“Analogy” raised in his mind more doubts than it answered--a proof
(perhaps the only proof that survives) of his cherishing under that
correct exterior a critical and questioning spirit.
To Wilberforce, thenceforth, all doubts were visitations of the devil.
Indeed, the microscopic watch which he kept on his thoughts and moods
seemed likely to stunt his activities. From this he was perhaps saved
by his friendship with Pitt. True, they could no longer tread the same
path. Pitt obeyed that call to action on behalf of his country which
from his boyhood had deadened all other sounds. Wilberforce for a long
time held aloof from politics as debateable ground beset with snares
to the soul. And yet, though the two men diverged, the promptings of
affection kept them ever within hail. No gulf ever opened out such as
Coleridge finely pictured as yawning between two parted friends:
They stood aloof, the scars remaining,
Like cliffs which had been rent asunder;
A dreary sea now flows between.
Indeed, Wilberforce found with some surprise that on most questions
they agreed as before[404]--a proof that there was no desertion of
principle on Pitt’s part after the session of 1785. We may go further,
and assert that in their changed relations the two friends exerted upon
each other a mutually beneficent influence. The new convictions of
Wilberforce tended to refine the activities of his friend; and Pitt’s
practical good sense helped to launch the philanthropist on that career
of usefulness in which he could both glorify God and uplift myriads of
negroes.
A sharp difference of opinion respecting the war with France
overclouded their lives in the year 1793. Wilberforce fully recognized
the sincerity of the Cabinet’s efforts to avoid a rupture, and admitted
that Ministers had not pursued a “war system.” But shortly before
the outbreak of hostilities, when he was about to speak in favour
of conciliation, Pitt took the strange step of sending Bankes to
him, earnestly begging him not to speak, as it might do irreparable
mischief, and promising him an opportunity for the statement of his
views. That opportunity did not come; and Wilberforce evidently
resented this attempt to make political capital out of their
friendship.[405] The breach between them did not widen until late
in the year 1794, when Wilberforce deemed it his duty to move an
amendment in favour of peace. Bankes and Duncombe supported it; but it
was easily defeated. In the following year the relations between Pitt
and Wilberforce on this question became so strained as to cause both
of them deep distress. Indeed Pitt, who generally enjoyed profound
slumbers, for a time suffered from insomnia. The only other occasions
when sleep fled from him were the sudden resignation of Earl Temple
late in 1783, the mutiny at the Nore, and the arrival of the news of
Trafalgar.
The old feelings began to reassert themselves, when Pitt spoke
strongly in favour of the Abolition of the Slave Trade (26th February
1795); but the friends did not meet for nearly a month, and then with
some little embarrassment on both sides. All shadows, however, vanished
in a few months’ time, when Wilberforce came to see that his friend
longed for peace so soon as it was compatible with security. Thereafter
their old friendship revived, though tinged with the sadness attending
disappointed hopes.
Pitt did not so readily forget the independence now and again
displayed by Bankes, for instance, in opposing Parliamentary Reform,
the Westminster Scrutiny, and the continuance of the war. Though they
were friendly at Cambridge, and afterwards at Goostree’s Club and in
the House, Pitt never warmed to Bankes, whose nature indeed was too
precise, cold, and prudent ever to call forth affection. Respected
by all for his sound but stolid speeches, he for forty years sat at
Westminster as member for Corfe Castle. No one seems ever to have
thought of making Bankes either a Minister or a peer. At a later time
the circle of Pitt’s friends included Canning and Wellesley, who will
receive notice in later chapters.
On the whole, Pitt seems to have been somewhat exacting in his
friendships. One of his early comrades complained that all suggestions
to the Prime Minister must, under pain of his resentment, go forth
to the world as emanations of his wisdom. This is to sacrifice
friendliness and candour to egotism and parliamentary punctilio. True,
no statesman can afford to neglect prudential considerations; and we
may freely grant that the cautious calculations of Pitt rarely obsessed
his whole being, as that of Napoleon was dominated by his egotism.
We do not find Pitt acting, still less speaking, in the sense which
prompted the remark of Napoleon about an over scrupulous servant: “He
is not devoted to me; he does not want to get on.”
It must be confessed that there is something wanting about Pitt. He
lacked geniality and glow alike in his treatment of men, and in his
attitude towards the aspirations of the age then dawning. Probably this
defect sprang from a physical basis. It must be remembered that Chatham
was nearly all his life a martyr to gout. He bequeathed this weakness
to his second son, a fact which may account for the coldness of Pitt’s
nature. Just as creatures with a torpid circulation love to bask in the
sun, so his chilliness may have prompted the cravings for the Bacchic
society of Dundas and Steele. In this respect he suffers by comparison
with Fox, the full-blooded man, the impetuous foe, the open-handed,
forgiving friend, whose character somewhat resembles that of Antony,
deified by Cleopatra:
For his bounty,
There was no winter in ’t; an autumn ’twas
That grew the more by reaping; his delights
Were dolphin-like; they showed his back above
The element they lived in.[406]