Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third Volume II Part 30

I have written this to you, though the thing has not yet taken its final turn, because any delay might possibly prevent your receiving it before your arrival here, for which I now look with increased impatience and anxiety.

G.o.d bless you, my dearest brother.

The weak point of the Government was its combination of opposite parties; and the consideration which finally determined the course of Ministers, was the necessity of preventing their differences from coming to an open rupture--a result that would have jeopardized the very existence of the Administration. With that paramount object in view, Lord Grenville, writing again to his brother, a.n.a.lyses the difficulties of the situation, and points out the only paths that could be opened to an honourable and creditable accommodation.

LORD GRENVILLE TO MR. THOMAS GRENVILLE.

Dover Street, Oct. 24th, 1794.

MY DEAREST BROTHER,

Since I wrote my last letter I have received yours, written the day of your leaving Vienna, and I calculate that this will probably find you at the Hague. Our situation, with respect to the point on which I wrote to you so much at large, has been a little, and but a little, improved by a conversation between the Duke of P. and Pitt.

Nothing having since pa.s.sed, we conclude that there is a desire to wait for the benefit of your opinion and Lord Spencer's upon this difficult and distressing subject--a desire in which I need not say we most heartily concur.

As far as anything can be concluded from a conversation which did not lead to any decisive issue, I hope that we have been too easily alarmed by Irish reports on the subject of a _new system_, and that, probably in the imagination of those who have first given rise to those reports, some loose and general expressions have been construed into pointed and specific a.s.surances. Be this however as it may, it is certain that infinite mischief has already been done by the prevalence of those reports, and both the settlement of the points in discussion here, and the subsequent task of the future Governor of Ireland, whoever he may be, have been rendered much more difficult than they would have been if more reserve and caution had been used. It is, however, useless to regret what is past, and all our endeavours ought to be applied to remedy the present evil. I most anxiously wait for the moment of talking over with you the means of doing this, which I am confident every one concerned joins in wishing, though all are obliged to confess the difficulty of it.

Three points are to be considered--Has Lord F. still kept himself sufficiently open with respect to his engagements with Grattan and the Ponsonbys, as to be able to undertake the Irish Government with honour and satisfaction to himself, without displacing the old tenants of Government to make room for their opponents, and without giving to the Ponsonbys in particular more influence and power than belongs to their situation as one among several of the great connexions in that country? If not, there seems no hope of any permanent agreement on this subject, even if it were so patched up for the present as that he could go to Ireland. The next is whether it is possible for him to undertake the Government without insisting on the removal of Fitzgibbon? If this cannot be done, the thing must come to an immediate stop, as we are more and more convinced that we cannot in honour or duty accede to that measure.

And lastly, supposing any or all of these considerations to oppose an insurmountable obstacle in the way of his going, ought that to prevent his continuing to hold his present situation? and can the Duke of P., Lord F., and _others_, be justified in bringing on the country the infinite mischiefs of the dissolution of the present united Government, on no stronger ground than because alterations, however desirable in their opinion, in the system of governing Ireland cannot be adopted.

I have said nothing in all this of the question about Lord Westmoreland's removal. I should readily agree with what you say in your last letter on that subject, that he ought to wait for a provision, if I did not see that even this is rendered more difficult by the _eclat_ of what has happened. Still I should think he ought to forego his claim; but if he thinks otherwise, he has a positive promise, which of course cannot be broken. But I always feel a confidence that this point would in some manner be arranged, because I am sure that we should all be willing to make almost any sacrifice rather than let it be said by the enemy, that after having professed to unite on public principle, we had separated on a mere squabble about the distribution of places.

The other points are those from which I fear the most. It is, however, a satisfaction to me to think that I see on both sides (I know it exists on one) a very sincere and earnest desire to prevent the fatal consequences which a division amongst us, at such a moment as the present, must infallibly produce. And I can truly add that, on our part, this desire is increased by the manner in which everything else had gone on before this unhappy subject was started.

You are coming from a bad scene and to a bad scene; but we must hope the best, both at home and abroad, and at least we ought all to be quite sure that we can tell ourselves we have each done our best to prevent the misfortunes which seem to hang over us.

G.o.d bless you, my dearest brother.

LORD GRENVILLE TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

Dover Street, Oct. 30th, 1794.

MY DEAREST BROTHER,

I received your letter the day before yesterday at Dropmore. Mr.

Pitt, who had left me that morning, had shown me your letter to him, with respect to which I say nothing, as I understood he meant to write to you upon the subject. The whole business to which it relates is in a situation, the final issue of which is extremely doubtful. With my impression of the advantage, and even necessity, of uniting at this time in the public service the great bulk of the landed property of the country, and doing away all distinctions of party between those who wish the maintenance of order and tranquillity here, I shall very deeply regret, as a great public misfortune, any event that leads to the dissolution of a system so lately formed. But, on the other hand, I have certainly no intention of making myself a party to any system of government in Ireland that is incompatible with my views of the interest of this country there. And in any case, I certainly neither have, nor can take, as far as relates to myself, any step upon the subject which has its origin in any other motive than a sense of public duty under circ.u.mstances of much difficulty.

I considered the subject of my brother's acceptance of the situation offered to him in Ireland as being, as in fact he appears to have stated it to you, very undecided, even if any arrangement were made for Lord Fitzwilliam's going there. I could have no motive to keep it back from you, but felt it due to him to leave it to him to do what I was sure he would be anxious to do. The whole subject appears now in some degree suspended till his arrival. When I see him I should of course state to him, as far as I am able to do it, your ideas respecting it.

I am still of opinion that it will turn out that the alarm created in Ireland, and the impression given here has originated in very loose reports, magnified, as usual, by persons repeating them according to their interest and wishes; but I state this as matter of opinion only.

I expect my brother here every day. They left Vienna in the beginning of this month, without having concluded any treaty, though they seem to have established a juster sense of the present crisis than prevailed before.

Our Prussian ally has had his payments stopped, and is withdrawing his troops. In the meantime, the Empress of Russia has done his business, or rather her own, in Poland, the Polish army being completely defeated, and Kosciusko, who was the soul of the enterprise, taken prisoner.

G.o.d bless you, my dearest brother.

Believe me ever most affectionately yours, G.

The conduct of Lord Fitzwilliam had been reprehensible from the beginning. The suggestion of the Lord-Lieutenancy had scarcely taken a definite shape, when he opened a communication, as appeared afterwards, with the heads of the Irish party, and announced the system on which he intended to govern the country. In any case, such a proceeding would have been inexpedient and indefensible, its inevitable effect being to commit the policy of the Administration beforehand, to deprive it at once of all dignity and independence, and to revive those heart-burnings and dissensions which had already so nearly endangered the connection of the two kingdoms.

But, composed as the Cabinet was of men who were known to entertain different opinions in reference to Ireland, the premature and unwarrantable publicity given by Lord Fitzwilliam to his own views was calculated to precipitate still more injurious results. So far back as the 23rd of August, he had written to Mr. Grattan, who was then personally unknown to him, apprising him of his approaching appointment; and, in plain terms, calling in that gentleman and his party to his future councils. From the very first paragraph of his letter, it is evident that at the time when this ill-judged communication was made, the arrangements respecting the Lord-Lieutenancy had not advanced sufficiently far to justify him in taking any ostensible step whatever in reference to Ireland. His own language was abundantly explicit on this point: "Though I have not as yet the honour of an appointment to succeed Lord Westmoreland, there certainly is great probability of that event taking place very soon." Yet in this early stage of the ministerial negotiations, he did not hesitate to inform Mr. Grattan that he intended to look to "the system of the Duke of Portland, as the model," by which he should regulate his conduct; and that, in order to enable him to render that system effective, it was necessary he should be supported by Mr. Grattan and his friends. "It is, Sir, to you," he observes, "and your friends, the Ponsonbys, that I look for a.s.sistance in bringing it to bear," adding, "it is that a.s.sistance which I am therefore now soliciting." The letter concludes by inviting Mr. Grattan to form an "intimate, direct, and avowed connection" with the Castle, which he had never hitherto "approached in confidence and avowed friendship;" and in the postscript he gives Mr. Grattan this significant caution: "It may seem a little inconsistent, and that this letter is written rather prematurely, when I beg not to be quoted as having announced myself in the character of a Lord-Lieutenant elect; my nomination not having yet been mentioned to the King, on account of his absence at Weymouth."[C]

This indiscreet and unjustifiable line of proceeding placed the Ministry in a dilemma, from which the escape, either way, was surrounded by dangers. They selected that alternative which appeared, under all circ.u.mstances, to be the least hazardous; and on the 10th of December, Lord Fitzwilliam attended the levee to kiss hands on his appointment.

Mr. Thomas Grenville, however, declined the office of Secretary, which was conferred on Lord Milton.

[Footnote C: This letter is published in full in the Life of Mr.

Grattan.]

1795.

LORD FITZWILLIAM'S ADMINISTRATION IN IRELAND.

The line of policy Lord Fitzwilliam intended to adopt was intimated at the opening of the Parliament in January. Mr. Grattan moved the Address in answer to the Speech; a little later Mr. Conolly withdrew his opposition to the prorogation in deference to the wishes of Government; and the old supporters of the Administration were displaced by the Ponsonbys and their connections. Remembering how all these men had acted in the Regency business, the obstructions they had thrown in the way of the public service, and the vindictive opposition they had given to his measures, Lord Buckingham was deeply wounded by the apparent sanction extended to this complete change of system, which he regarded as a disavowal of the course he had pursued in Ireland, and, in some sort, as a personal indignity. In his communications with Lord Grenville he stated his feelings on this subject without reserve. He considered that in a.s.senting to the appointment of Lord Fitzwilliam, after the damaging disclosures that had taken place, the Cabinet had abandoned him to the obloquy of that party against whose inveterate hostility he had successfully preserved the executive union of the two kingdoms; and this consideration was embittered by the reflection that Lord Grenville, from his position in the Ministry, had contributed influentially to place him in that humiliating light before the public. Lord Buckingham, with his acute sense of what was due to his own honour, looked at the question from that point alone; but Lord Grenville, in the discharge of his responsibilities as a Cabinet Minister, was compelled to take a more comprehensive view of it. Whether he decided rightly or wrongly, there can be no doubt that he decided conscientiously, and that it was impossible he could resolve upon any conclusion likely to be painful to Lord Buckingham which his affection for him would not render equally painful to himself. But he felt at the same time that his duty demanded at his hands the sacrifice of his private feelings, and that this was a case in which any hesitation upon such grounds would be attended by the gravest consequences to the Administration. It may be seen, also, from the following letter, that he did not put the same construction upon these transactions as that which was so sensitively urged by Lord Buckingham. His more practical mind discerned in the irresistible necessity of the position a sufficient answer to all individual scruples; and maintaining, as he had stated in a former letter, that the security and repose of Ireland depended, not upon this or that set of men, which his observation of the character of the people and their politics had led him to regard with comparative indifference, but upon the soundness of the measures applied to her condition, he could not admit that the decision which had been come to with respect to Lord Fitzwilliam implied, even remotely, a disavowal of the line of conduct Lord Buckingham had so successfully pursued under totally different circ.u.mstances.

LORD GRENVILLE TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

Dover Street, Jan. 5th, 1795.

MY DEAR BROTHER,

As I keep no copies of my letters to you, and have neither time enough, nor a mind sufficiently disengaged, to measure my expressions, nor have ever accustomed myself to do so in writing to you, all I can say on the subject of my last letter is, that if it conveyed to you any impression different from that of the sincere friendship and affection which dictated it, it very ill expressed my feelings.

With respect to the rest, I can only say that, to the best of my understanding, I have neither disavowed nor abandoned you, but given a _very strong_ proof of my determination to do neither; that I cannot believe that any such impression exists anywhere; that not knowing the proofs of its existence, to which you refer, I can only guess at them, and I therefore forbear to make upon them the remarks to which, if my conjecture is right, they are so obviously liable. But that I am at a loss even to guess at the meaning of that part of your letter, which speaks of proofs laying before you of some compact made on this subject above twelve months since, not having, in my own mind, the smallest idea of the fact to which this can refer.

Having never had any intention to disavow you, or to consent to any system or measure to which I thought you could wish to object, it was impossible for me to make to you any previous communication of such intention.

The detail of all that pa.s.sed respecting Lord Fitzwilliam's appointment would be too long to go into now; and I have reason to believe that you are not unacquainted with many of the circ.u.mstances which would prove how very little idea there was of concealment or mystery on my part respecting that subject. From the first moment that you stated to me that you considered the idea of giving to the Ponsonbys a share of office in Ireland as a measure injurious to you, I explained to you my reasons for viewing it in a different light. But I anxiously reconsidered the object in my own mind, and I then acted, as I was bound to do, on my deliberate and fixed opinion respecting a point which, in either view of it, was of much too great public importance to make it possible for me to decide it merely on the desire I must ever feel to consult your wishes in preference to my own. Which of us is right in our view of this question, it is not for me to say. The motives and grounds of my opinion remain the same; and I see with regret that they do not make on your mind the impression they have made on mine.

It would be a painful and invidious task to discuss the question further; but I cannot receive from you a letter in which you tell me that you feel you have lost my affection, without repeating to you the a.s.surance, which I still hope is not indifferent to you, that this is not, in the smallest degree, the case. I have intended to do nothing towards you but what should be the _most_ kind and affectionate. I think I have so acted; but I am sure that I have so meant to act. If any contrary impression produces in your mind any feelings different from those which have made so great a part of my happiness throughout life, I shall deeply regret what seems to be annexed as a curse inseparable from the pursuit of a public life; but I will once more beg you to be a.s.sured that neither those feelings on your part, nor anything which they can produce, will vary my sincere and heartfelt affection towards you, and that whether my judgment has been right, as I still think it has, or wrong, as you think it, my heart is, and shall be, uniformly and invariably the same towards you.

It is with these sentiments that I shall ever be, my dearest brother,

Most sincerely and affectionately yours, GRENVILLE.

Lord Fitzwilliam had scarcely arrived in Ireland when he collected about him the party with whom he had been in previous communication, and commenced his new system by a series of dismissals of the former supporters of Mr. Pitt's Government. Announcing his conviction that the immediate concession of the Catholic claims was indispensable to the tranquillity and security of the country, he followed up his objects with a vigour and expedition that created considerable alarm in England.

The Attorney-General was to be displaced, to make way for Mr. George Ponsonby; the Solicitor-General was also to be removed, and Mr.

Beresford, who was Purse-bearer to the Chancellor, and Mr. Cooke, Secretary at War, were to be dismissed. The dismissal of Mr. Beresford was regarded as a measure of such extreme violence that it brought matters to an issue between Lord Fitzwilliam and the Cabinet. Some letters at this time from Mr. Cooke to Lord Buckingham present a striking _coup d'oeil_ of these affairs, as they appeared to one who was deeply interested in their progress. Lord Fitzwilliam, it should be observed, arrived in Ireland on the 5th of January, and the rapidity of his official movements may be inferred from the date of the first of the following letters, which was written only ten days afterwards.

MR. COOKE TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

Dublin Castle, Jan. 15th, 1795.

MY DEAR LORD,