Memoirs of the Life of the Rt. Hon. Richard Brinsley Sheridan Volume II Part 19

"Convinced as I am of the sincerity of your good will towards me, I do not regard it as an impertinent intrusion to inform you that the Prince has, in the most gracious manner, and wholly unsolicited, been pleased to appoint me to the late Lord Elliot's situation in the Duchy of Cornwall.

I feel a desire to communicate this to you myself, because I feel a confidence that you will be glad of it. It has been my pride and pleasure to have exerted my humble efforts to serve the Prince without ever accepting the slightest obligation from him; but, in the present case, and under the present circ.u.mstances, I think it would have been really false pride and apparently mischievous affectation to have declined this mark of His Royal Highness's confidence and favor. I will not disguise that, at this peculiar crisis, I am greatly gratified at this event. Had it been the result of a mean and subservient devotion to the Prince's every wish and object, I could neither have respected the gift, the giver, nor myself; but when I consider how recently it was my misfortune to find myself compelled by a sense of duty, stronger than my attachment to him, wholly to risk the situation I held in his confidence and favor, and that upon a subject [Footnote: The offer made by the Prince of his personal services in 1803,--on which occasion Sheridan coincided with the views of Mr. Addington somewhat more than was agreeable to His Royal Highness.] on which his feelings were so eager and irritable, I cannot but regard the increased attention, with which he has since honored me, as a most gratifying demonstration that he has clearness of judgment and firmness of spirit to distinguish the real friends to his true glory and interests from the mean and mercenary sycophants, who fear and abhor that such friends should be near him. It is satisfactory to me, also, that this appointment gives me the t.i.tle and opportunity of seeing the Prince, on trying occasions, openly and in the face of day, and puts aside the mask of mystery and concealment. I trust I need not add, that whatever small portion of fair influence I may at any time possess with the Prince, it shall be uniformly exerted to promote those feelings of duty and affection towards their Majesties, which, though seemingly interrupted by adverse circ.u.mstances, I am sure are in his heart warm and unalterable--and, as far as I may presume, that general concord throughout his ill.u.s.trious family, which must be looked to by every honest subject, as an essential part of the public strength at this momentous period. I have the honor to be, with great respect and esteem,

"Your obedient Servant,

"_Right Hon. Henry Addington_.

"R. B. SHERIDAN."

The same views that influenced Mr. Sheridan, Lord Moira, and others, in supporting an administration which, with all its defects, they considered preferable to a relapse into the hands of Mr. Pitt, had led Mr. Tierney, at the close of the last Session, to confer upon it a still more efficient sanction, by enrolling himself in its ranks as Treasurer of the Navy. In the early part of the present year, another ornament of the Whig party, Mr. Erskine, was on the point of following in the same footsteps, by accepting, from Mr. Addington, the office of Attorney-General. He had, indeed, proceeded so far in his intention as to submit the overtures of the Minister to the consideration of the Prince, in a letter which was transmitted to his Royal Highness by Sheridan. The answer of the Prince, conveyed also through Sheridan, while it expressed the most friendly feelings towards Erskine, declined, at the same time, giving any opinion as to either his acceptance or refusal of the office of Attorney-General, if offered to him under the present circ.u.mstances. His Royal Highness also added the expression of his sincere regret, that a proposal of this nature should have been submitted to his consideration by one, of whose attachment and fidelity to himself he was well convinced, but who ought to have felt, from the line of conduct adopted and persevered in by his Royal Highness, that he was the very last person that should have been applied to for either his opinion or countenance respecting the political conduct or connection of any public character,--especially of one so intimately connected with him, and belonging to his family.

If, at any time, Sheridan had entertained the idea of a.s.sociating himself, by office, with the Ministry of Mr. Addington, (and proposals to this effect were, it is certain, made to him,) his knowledge of the existence of such feelings as prompted this answer to Mr. Erskine would, of course, have been sufficient to divert him from the intention.

The following doc.u.ment, which I have found, in his own handwriting, and which was intended, apparently, for publication in the newspapers, contains some particulars with respect to the proceedings of his party at this time, which, coming from such a source, may be considered as authentic:--

"STATE OF PARTIES.

"Among the various rumors of Coalitions, or attempted Coalitions, we have already expressed our disbelief in that reported to have taken place between the Grenville-Windhamites and Mr. Fox. At least, if it was ever in negotiation, we have reason to think it received an early check, arising from a strong party of the _Old Opposition_ protesting against it. The account of this transaction, as whispered in the political circles, is as follows:--

"In consequence of some of the most respectable members of the Old Opposition being sounded on the subject, a meeting was held at Norfolk-House; when it was determined, with very few dissentient voices, to present a friendly remonstrance on the subject to Mr. Fox, stating the manifold reasons which obviously presented themselves against such a procedure, both as affecting Character and Party. it was urged that the present Ministers had, on the score of innovation on the Const.i.tution, given the Whigs no pretence for complaint whatever; and, as to their alleged incapacity, it remained to be proved that they were capable of committing errors and producing miscarriages, equal to those which had marked the councils of their predecessors, whom the measure in question was expressly calculated to replace in power. At such a momentous crisis, therefore, waving all considerations of past political provocation, to attempt, by the strength and combination of party, to expel the Ministers of His Majesty's choice, and to force into his closet those whom the Whigs ought to be the first to rejoice that he had excluded from it, was stated to be a proceeding which would a.s.suredly revolt the public feeling, degrade the character of Parliament, and produce possibly incalculable mischief to the country.

"We understand that Mr. Fox's reply was, that he would never take any political step against the wishes and advice of the majority of his old friends.

"The paper is said to have been drawn up by Mr. Erskine, and to have been presented to Mr. Fox by his Grace of Norfolk, on the day His Majesty was p.r.o.nounced to be recovered from his first illness. Rumor places among the supporters of this measure the written authority of the Duke of Northumberland and the Earl of Moira, with the signatures of Messrs.

Erskine, Sheridan, Shum, Curwen, Western, Brogden, and a long _et caetera_. It is said also that the Prince's sanction had been previously given to the Duke,--His Royal Highness deprecating all party struggle, at a moment when the defence of all that is dear to Britons ought to be the single sentiment that should fill the public mind.

"We do not vouch for the above being strictly accurate; but we are confident that it is not far from the truth."

The illness of the King, referred to in this paper, had been first publicly announced in the month of February, and was for some time considered of so serious a nature, that arrangements were actually in progress for the establishment of a Regency. Mr. Sheridan, who now formed a sort of connecting link between Carlton-House and the Minister, took, of course, a leading part in the negotiations preparatory to such a measure. It appears, from a letter of Mr. Fox on the subject, that the Prince and another person, whom it is unnecessary to name, were at one moment not a little alarmed by a rumor of an intention to a.s.sociate the Duke of York and the Queen in the Regency. Mr. Fox, however, begs of Sheridan to tranquillize their minds on this point:--the intentions, (he adds,) of "the Doctor," [Footnote: To the infliction of this nickname on his friend, Mr. Addington, Sheridan was, in no small degree, accessory, by applying to those who disapproved of his administration, and yet gave no reasons for their disapprobation, the well-known lines,--

"I do not love thee, Doctor Fell, And why I cannot tell; But this I know full well, I do not love thee, Doctor Fell."] though bad enough in all reason, do not go to such lengths; and a proposal of this nature, from any other quarter, could be easily defeated.

Within about two months from the date of the Remonstrance, which, according to a statement already given, was presented to Mr. Fox by his brother Whigs, one of the consequences which it prognosticated from the connection of their party with the Grenvilles took place, in the resignation of Mr. Addington and the return of Mr. Pitt to power.

The confidence of Mr. Pitt, in thus taking upon himself, almost single-handed, the government of the country at such an awful crisis, was, he soon perceived, not shared by the public. A general expectation had prevailed that the three great Parties, which had lately been encamped together on the field of opposition, would have each sent its Chiefs into the public councils, and thus formed such a Congress of power and talent as the difficulties of the empire, in that trying moment, demanded. This hope had been frustrated by the repugnance of the King to Mr. Fox, and the too ready facility with which Mr. Pitt had given way to it. Not only, indeed, in his undignified eagerness for office, did he sacrifice without stipulation the important question, which, but two years before, had been made the _sine-qua non_ of his services, but, in yielding so readily to the Royal prejudices against his rival, he gave a sanction to that unconst.i.tutional principle of exclusion, [Footnote: "This principle of personal exclusion, (said Lord Grenville,) is one of which I never can approve, because, independently of its operation to prevent Parliament and the people from enjoying the Administration they desired, and which it was their particular interest to have, it tends to establish a dangerous precedent, that would afford too much opportunity of private pique against the public interest. I, for one, therefore, refused to connect myself with any one argument that should sanction that principle; and, in my opinion, every man who accepted office under that Administration is, according to the letter and spirit of the const.i.tution, responsible for its character and construction, and the principle upon which it is founded."--_Speech of Lord Grenville on the motion of Lord Darnley for the repeal of the Additional Force Bill, Feb.

15, 1805._] which, if thus acted upon by the party-feelings of the Monarch, would soon narrow the Throne into the mere nucleus of a favored faction. In allowing, too, his friends and partisans to throw the whole blame of this exclusive Ministry on the King, he but repeated the indecorum of which he had been guilty in 1802. For, having at that time made use of the religious prejudices of the Monarch, as a pretext for his manner of quitting office, he now employed the political prejudices of the same personage, as an equally convenient excuse for his manner of returning to it.

A few extracts from the speech of Mr. Sheridan upon the Additional Force Bill,--the only occasion on which he seems to have spoken during the present year,--will show that the rarity of his displays was not owing to any failure of power, but rather, perhaps, to the increasing involvement of his circ.u.mstances, which left no time for the thought and preparation that all his public efforts required.

Mr. Pitt had, at the commencement of this year, condescended to call to his aid the co-operation of Mr. Addington, Lord Buckinghamshire, and other members of that Administration, which had withered away, but a few months before, under the blight of his sarcasm and scorn. In alluding to this Coalition, Sheridan says--

"The Right Honorable Gentleman went into office alone;--but, lest the government should become too full of vigor from his support, he thought proper to beckon back some of the weakness of the former administration.

He, I suppose, thought that the Ministry became, from his support, like spirits above proof, and required to be diluted; that, like gold refined to a certain degree, it would be unfit for use without a certain mixture of alloy; that the administration would be too brilliant, and dazzle the House, unless he called back a certain part of the mist and fog of the last administration to render it tolerable to the eye. As to the great change made in the Ministry by the introduction of the Right Honorable Gentleman himself, I would ask, does he imagine that he came back to office with the same estimation that he left it? I am sure he is much mistaken if he fancies that he did. The Right Honorable Gentleman retired from office because, as was stated, he could not carry an important question, which he deemed necessary to satisfy the just claims of the Catholics; and in going out he did not hesitate to tear off the sacred veil of Majesty, describing his Sovereign as the only person that stood in the way of this desirable object. After the Right Honorable Gentleman's retirement, he advised the Catholics to look to no one but him for the attainment of their rights, and cautiously to abstain from forming a connection with any other person. But how does it appear, now that the Right Honorable Gentleman is returned to office? He declines to perform his promise; and has received, as his colleagues in office, those who are pledged to resist the measure. Does not the Right Honorable Gentleman then feel that he comes back to office with a character degraded by the violation of a solemn pledge, given to a great and respectable body of the people, upon a particular and momentous occasion?

Does the Right Honorable Gentleman imagine either that he returns to office with the same character for political wisdom, after the description which he gave of the talents and capacity of his predecessors, and after having shown, by his own actions, that his description was totally unfounded?"

In alluding to Lord Melville's appointment to the Admiralty; he says,--

"But then, I am told, there is the First Lord of the Admiralty,--'Do you forget the leader of the grand Catamaran project? Are you not aware of the important change in that department, and the advantage the country is likely to derive from that change?' Why, I answer, that I do not know of any peculiar qualifications the n.o.ble Lord has to preside over the Admiralty; but I do know, that if I were to judge of him from the kind of capacity he evinced while Minister of War, I should entertain little hopes of him. If, however, the Right Honorable Gentleman should say to me, 'Where else would you put that n.o.ble Lord, would you have him appointed War-Minister again?' I should say, Oh no, by no means,--I remember too well the expeditions to Toulon, to Quiberon, to Corsica, and to Holland, the responsibility for each of which the n.o.ble Lord took on himself, entirely releasing from any responsibility the Commander in Chief and the Secretary at War. I also remember that, which, although so glorious to our arms in the result, I still shall call a most unwarrantable project.--the expedition to Egypt. It may be said, that as the n.o.ble Lord was so unfit for the military department, the naval was the proper place for him. Perhaps there wore people who would adopt this whimsical reasoning. I remember a story told respecting Mr. Garrick, who was once applied to by an eccentric Scotchman, to introduce a production of his on the stage. This Scotchman was such a good-humored fellow, that he was called 'Honest Johnny M'Cree.' Johnny wrote four acts of a tragedy, which he showed to Mr. Garrick, who dissuaded him from finishing it; telling him that his talent did not lie that way; so Johnny abandoned the tragedy, and set about writing a comedy. When this was finished, he showed it to Mr. Garrick, who found it to be still more exceptionable than the tragedy, and of course could not be persuaded to bring it forward on the stage. This surprised poor Johnny, and he remonstrated.

'Nay, now, David, (said Johnny,) did you not tell me my talents did not lie in tragedy?'--'Yes, (replied Garrick,) but I did not tell you that they lay in comedy.'--'Then, (exclaimed Johnny,) gin they dinna lie there, where the de'il dittha lie, mon?' Unless the n.o.ble Lord at the head of the Admiralty has the same reasoning in his mind as Johnny M'Cree, he cannot possibly suppose that his incapacity for the direction of the War-department necessarily qualifies him for the Presidency of the Naval. Perhaps, if the n.o.ble Lord be told that he has no talents for the latter, His Lordship may exclaim with honest Johnny M'Cree, 'Gin they dinna lie there, where the de'il dittha lie, mon?'"

On the 10th of May, the claims of the Roman Catholics of Ireland, were, for the first time, brought under the notice of the Imperial Parliament, by Lord Grenville in the House of Lords, and by Mr. Fox in the House of Commons. A few days before the debate, as appears, by the following remarkable letter, Mr. Sheridan was made the medium of a communication from Carlton House, the object of which was to prevent Mr. Fox from presenting the Pet.i.tion.

"DEAR SHERIDAN,

"I did not receive your letter till last night.

"I did, on Thursday, consent to be the presenter of the Catholic Pet.i.tion, at the request of the Delegates, and had further conversation on the subject with them at Lord Grenville's yesterday morning. Lord Grenville also consented to present the Pet.i.tion to the House of Lords.

Now, therefore, any discussion on this part of the subject would be too late; but I will fairly own, that, if it were not, I could not be dissuaded from doing the public act, which, of all others, it will give me the greatest satisfaction and pride to perform. No past event in my political life ever did, and no future one ever can, give me such pleasure.

"I am sure you know how painful it would be to me to disobey any command of His Royal Highness's, or even to act in any manner that might be in the slightest degree contrary to his wishes, and therefore I am not sorry that your intimation came too late. I shall endeavor to see the Prince today; but, if I should fail, pray take care that he knows how things stand before we meet at dinner, lest any conversation there should appear to come upon him by surprise.

"Yours ever,

_"Arlington Street, Sunday,_

"C. J. F."

It would be rash, without some further insight into the circ.u.mstances of this singular interference, to enter into any speculations with respect to its nature or motives, or to p.r.o.nounce how far Mr. Sheridan was justified in being the instrument of it. But on the share of Mr. Fox in the transaction, such suspension of opinion is unnecessary. We have here his simple and honest words before us,--and they breathe a spirit of sincerity from which even Princes might take a lesson with advantage.

Mr. Pitt was not long in discovering that place does not always imply Power, and that in separating himself from the other able men of the day, he had but created an Opposition as much too strong for the Government, as the Government itself was too weak for the country. The humiliating resource to which he was driven, in trying, as a tonic, the reluctant alliance of Lord Sidmouth,--the abortiveness of his efforts to avert the full of his old friend, Lord Melville, and the fatality of ill luck that still attended his exertions against France,--all concurred to render this reign of the once powerful Minister a series of humiliations, shifts, and disasters, unlike his former proud period in every thing but ill success.

The powerful Coalition opposed to him already had a prospect of carrying by storm the post which he occupied, when, by his death, it was surrendered, without parley, into their hands.

The Administration that succeeded, under the auspices of Lord Greville and Mr. Fox, bore a resemblance to the celebrated Bra.s.s of Corinth, more, perhaps, in the variety of the metals brought together, than in the perfection of the compound that resulted from their fusion. [Footnote: See in the Annual Register of 1806, some able remarks upon Coalitions in general, as well as a temperate defence of this Coalition in particular,--for which that work is, I suspect, indebted to a hand such as has not often, since the time of Burke, enriched its pages.] There were comprised in it, indeed, not only the two great parties of the leading chiefs, but those Whigs who differed with them both under the Addington Ministry, and the Addingtons that differed with them all on the subject of the Catholic claims. With this last anomalous addition to the miscellany the influence of Sheridan is mainly chargeable. Having, for some time past, exerted all his powers of management to bring about a coalition between Carlton-House and Lord Sidmouth, he had been at length so successful, that upon the formation of the present Ministry, it was the express desire of the Prince that Lord Sidmouth should const.i.tute a part of it. To the same unlucky influence, too, is to be traced the very questionable measure, (notwithstanding the great learning and ability with which it was defended,) of introducing the Chief Justice, Lord Ellenborough, into the Cabinet.

As to Sheridan's own share in the arrangements, it was, no doubt, expected by him that he should now be included among the members of the Cabinet; and it is probable that Mr. Fox, at the head of a purely Whig ministry, would have so far considered the services of his ancient ally, and the popularity still attached to his name through the country, as to confer upon him this mark of distinction and confidence. But there were other interests to be consulted;--and the undisguised earnestness with which Sheridan had opposed the union of his party with the Grenvilles, left him but little supererogation of services to expect in that quarter.

Some of his nearest friends, and particularly Mrs. Sheridan, entreated, as I understand, in the most anxious manner, that he would not accept any such office as that of Treasurer of the Navy, for the responsibility and business of which they knew his habits so wholly unfitted him,--but that, if excluded by his colleagues from the distinction of a seat in the Cabinet, he should decline all office whatsoever, and take his chance in a friendly independence of them. But the time was now past when he could afford to adopt this policy,--the emoluments of a place were too necessary to him to be rejected;--and, in accepting the same office that had been allotted to him in the Regency--arrangements of 1789, he must have felt, with no small degree of mortification, how stationary all his efforts since then had left him, and what a blank was thus made of all his services in the interval.

The period of this Ministry, connected with the name of Mr. Fox, though brief, and in some respects, far from laudable, was distinguished by two measures,--the Plan of Limited Service, and the Resolution for the Abolition of the Slave-Trade,--which will long be remembered to the honor of those concerned in them. The motion of Mr. Fox against the Slave-Trade was the last he ever made in Parliament;--and the same sort of melancholy admiration that Pliny expressed, in speaking of a beautiful picture, the painter of which had died in finishing it,--"dolor manas dum id ageret, abreptae"--comes naturally over our hearts in thinking of the last, glorious work, to which this ill.u.s.trious statesman, in dying, set his hand.

Though it is not true, as has been a.s.serted, that Mr. Fox refused to see Sheridan in his last illness, it is but too certain that those appearances of alienation or reserve, which had been for some time past observable in the former, continued to throw a restraint over their intercourse with each other to the last. It is a proof, however, of the absence of any serious grounds for this distrust, that Sheridan as the person selected by the relatives of Mr. Fox to preside over and direct the arrangements of the funeral, and that he put the last, solemn seal to their long intimacy, by following his friend, as mourner, to the grave.

The honor of representing the city of Westminster in Parliament had been, for some time, one of the dreams of Sheridan's ambition. It was suspected, indeed,--I know not with what justice,--that in advising Mr.

Fox, as he is said to have done, about the year 1800, to secede from public life altogether, he was actuated by a wish to succeed him in the representation of Westminster, and had even already set on foot some private negotiations towards that object. Whatever grounds there may have been for this suspicion, the strong wish that he felt on the subject had long been sufficiently known to his colleagues; and on the death of Mr.

Fox, it appeared, not only to himself, but the public, that he was the person naturally pointed out as most fit to be his parliamentary successor. It was, therefore, with no slight degree of disappointment he discovered, that the ascendancy of Aristocratic influence was, as usual, to prevail, and that the young son of the Duke of Northumberland would be supported by the Government in preference to him, It is but right, however, in justice to the Ministry, to state, that the neglect with which they appear to have treated him on this occasion,--particularly in not apprising him of their decision in favor of Lord Percy, sufficiently early to save him from the humiliation of a fruitless attempt,--is proved, by the following letters, to have originated in a double misapprehension, by which, while Sheridan, on one side, was led to believe that the Ministers would favor his pretensions, the Ministers, on the other, were induced to think that he had given up all intentions of being a candidate.

The first letter is addressed to the gentleman, (one of Sheridan's intimate friends,) who seems to have been, unintentionally, the cause of the mistake on both sides.

"DEAR ----,

"_Somerset-Place, September 14._

"You must have seen by my manner, yesterday, how much I was surprised and hurt at learning, for the first time, that Lord Grenville had, many days previous to Mr. Fox's death, decided to support Lord Percy on the expected vacancy for Westminster, and that you had since been the active agent in the canva.s.s actually commenced. I do not like to think I have grounds to complain or change my opinion of any friend, without being very explicit, and opening my mind, without reserve, on such a subject. I must frankly declare, that I think you have brought yourself and me into a very unpleasant dilemma. You seemed to say, last night, that you had not been apprised of my intention to offer for Westminster on the apprehended vacancy. I am confident you have acted under that impression; but I must impute to you either great inattention to what fell from me in our last conversation on the subject, or great inaccuracy of recollection; for I solemnly protest I considered you as the individual most distinctly apprised, that at this moment to succeed that great man and revered friend in Westminster, should the fatal event take place, would be the highest object of my ambition; for, in that conversation I thanked you expressly for informing me that Lord Grenville had said to yourself, upon Lord Percy being suggested to him, that he, Lord Grenville, '_would decide on nothing until Mr. Sheridan had been spoken to, and his intentions known_' or words precisely to that effect. I expressed my grateful sense of Lord Grenville's attention, and said, that it would confirm me in my intention of making no application, however hopeless myself respecting Mr. Fox, while life remained with him,--and these words of Lord Grenville you allowed last night to have been so stated to me, though not as a message from His Lordship. Since that time I think we have not happened to meet; at least sure I am, we have had no conversation on the subject. Having the highest opinion of Lord Grenville's honor and sincerity, I must be confident that he must have had another impression made on his mind respecting my wishes before I was entirely pa.s.sed by. I do not mean to say that my offering myself was immediately to ent.i.tle me to the support of Government, but I do mean to say, that my pretensions were ent.i.tled to consideration before that support was offered to another without the slightest notice taken of me,--the more especially as the words of Lord Grenville, reported by you to me, had been stated by me to many friends as my reliance and justification in not following their advice by making a direct application to Government. I pledged myself to them that Lord Grenville would not promise the support of Government till my intentions had been asked, and I quoted your authority for doing so: I never heard a syllable of that support being promised to Lord Percy until from you on the evening of Mr. Fox's death. Did I ever authorize you to inform Lord Grenville that I had abandoned the idea of offering myself? These are points which it is necessary, for the honor of all parties, should be amicably explained. I therefore propose, as the shortest way of effecting it,--wishing you not to consider this letter as in any degree confidential,--that my statements in this letter may be submitted to any two common friends, or to the Lord Chancellor alone, and let it be ascertained where the error has arisen, for error is all I complain of; and, with regard to Lord Grenville, I desire distinctly to say, that I feel myself indebted for the fairness and kindness of his intentions towards me. My disappointment of the protection of Government may be a sufficient excuse to the friends I am pledged to, should I retire; but I must have it understood whether or not I deceived them, when I led them to expect that I should have that support.

"I hope to remain ever yours sincerely,

"R. B. SHERIDAN.

"The sooner the reference I propose the better."

The second letter, which is still further explanatory of the misconception, was addressed by Sheridan to Lord Grenville: