THE DEATH OF GEORGE IV.--THE POLITICAL SITUATION OF PARTIES, AND OF LADY
ERPINGHAM.
The death of George the Fourth was the birth of a new era. During the
later years of that monarch a silent spirit had been gathering over the
land, which had crept even to the very walls of his seclusion. It cannot
be denied that the various expenses of his reign,--no longer consecrated
by the youthful graces of the prince, no longer disguised beneath
the military triumphs of the people,--had contributed far more than
theoretical speculations to the desire of political change. The shortest
road to liberty lies through attenuated pockets!
Constance was much at Windsor during the king’s last illness, one of
the saddest periods that ever passed within the walls of a palace. The
memorialists of the reign of the magnificent Louis XIV. will best convey
to the reader a notion of the last days of George the Fourth. For, like
that great king, he was the representation in himself of a particular
period, and he preserved much of the habits of (and much too of the
personal interest attached to) his youth, through the dreary decline of
age. It was melancholy to see one who had played, not only so exalted,
but so gallant a part, breathing his life away; nor was the gloom
diminished by the many glimpses of a fine original nature, which broke
forth amidst infirmity and disease.
George the Fourth died; his brother succeeded; and the English world
began to breathe more freely, to look around, and to feel that the
change, long coming, was come at last. The French Revolution, the new
parliament, Henry Brougham’s return for Yorkshire, Mr. Hurne’s return
for Middlesex, the burst of astonished indignation at the Duke of
Wellington’s memorable words against reform, all betrayed, while they
ripened, the signs of the new age. The Whig Ministry was appointed,
appointed amidst discontents in the city, suspicions amongst the
friends of the people, amidst fires and insurrections in the
provinces;--convulsions abroad, and turbulence at home.
The situation of Constance in these changes was rather curious;
her intimacy with the late king was no recommendation with the Whig
government of his successor. Her power, as the power of fashion always
must in stormy times, had received a shock; and as she had of late been
a little divided from the main body of the Whigs, she did not share at
once in their success, or claim to be one of their allies. She remained
silent and aloof; her parties were numerous and splendid as ever, but
the small plotting reunions of intriguers were suspended. She hinted
mysteriously at the necessity of pausing, to see what reform the new
ministers would recommend, and what economy they would effect. The
Tories, especially the more moderate tribe, began to court her: the
Whigs, flushed with their triumph, and too busy to think of women, began
to neglect. This last circumstance the high Constance felt keenly--but
with the keenness rather of scorn than indignation; years had deepened
her secret disgust at all aristocratic ordinances, and looking rather
at what the Whigs had been than what, pressed by the times, they have
become, she regarded them as only playing with democratic counters for
aristocratic rewards. She repaid their neglect with contempt, and the
silent neutralist soon became regarded by them as the secret foe.
But Constance was sufficiently the woman to feel mortified and wounded
by that which she affected to despise. No post at court had been offered
to her by her former friends; the confidant of George the Fourth had
ceased to be the confidant of Lord Grey. Arrived at that doubtful time
of life when the beauty although possessing, is no longer assured of,
her charms, she felt the decay of her personal influence as a personal
affront; and thus vexed, wounded, alarmed, in her mid-career, Constance
was more than ever sensible of the peculiar disquietudes that await
female ambition, and turned with sighs more frequent than heretofore
to the recollections of that domestic love which seemed lost to her for
ever.
Mingled with the more outward and visible stream of politics there
was, as there ever is, a latent tide of more theoretic and speculative
opinions. While the practical politicians were playing their momentary
parts, schemers, and levellers, were propagating in all quarters
doctrines which they fondly imagined were addressed to immortal ends.
And Constance began to turn with some curiosity to these charlatans or
sages. The bright countess listened to their harangues, pondered over
their demonstrations, and mused over their hopes. But she had lived too
much on the surface of the actual world, her habits of thought were
too essentially worldly, to be converted, while she was attracted, by
doctrines so startling in their ultimate conclusions. She turned once
more to herself, and waited, in a sad and thoughtful stillness, the
progress of things--convinced only of the vanity of them all.