The Greville Memoirs Volume II Part 17

Nothing but racing all this week; Parliament has been prorogued and all is quiet. The world seems tired, and requires rest. How soon it will all begin again G.o.d knows, but it will not be suffered to sleep long.

London, November 11th, 1831 {p.208}

[Page Head: RIOTS AT BRISTOL.]

Nothing written for a long time; I went after the second October meeting to Euston, and from thence to Horsham, returned to Newmarket, was going to Felbrigg, but came to town on Tuesday last (the 8th) on account of the cholera, which has broken out at Sunderland. The country was beginning to slumber after the fatigues of Reform, when it was rattled up by the business of Bristol,[3] which for brutal ferocity and wanton, unprovoked violence may vie with some of the worst scenes of the French Revolution, and may act as a damper to our national pride. The spirit which produced these atrocities was generated by Reform, but no pretext was afforded for their actual commission; it was a premature outbreaking of the thirst for plunder, and longing after havoc and destruction, which is the essence of Reform in the mind of the mob. The details are ample, and to be met with everywhere; nothing could exceed the ferocity of the populace, the imbecility of the magistracy, or the good conduct of the troops. More punishment was inflicted by them than has been generally known, and some hundreds were killed or severely wounded by the sabre. One body of dragoons pursued a rabble of colliers into the country, and covered the fields and roads with the bodies of wounded wretches, making a severe example of them.

In London there would probably have been a great uproar and riot, but fortunately Melbourne, who was frightened to death at the Bristol affair, gave Lord Hill and Fitzroy Somerset _carte blanche_, and they made such a provision of military force in addition to the civil power that the malcontents were paralysed.

The Bristol business has done some good, inasmuch as it has opened people's eyes (at least so it is said), but if we are to go on as we do with a mob-ridden Government and a foolish King, who renders himself subservient to all the wickedness and folly of his Ministers, where is the advantage of having people's eyes open, when seeing they will not perceive, and hearing they will not understand? Nothing was wanting to complete our situation but the addition of physical evil to our moral plague, and that is come in the shape of the cholera, which broke out at Sunderland a few days ago. To meet the exigency Government has formed another Board of Health, but without dissolving the first, though the second is intended to swallow up the first and leave it a mere nullity. Lord Lansdowne, who is President of the Council, an office which for once promises not to be a sinecure, has taken the opportunity to go to Bowood, and having come up (sent for express) on account of the cholera the day it was officially declared really to be that disease, he has trotted back to his house in the country.

[3] [Riots broke out with great violence at Bristol on the 29th of October, the pretext being the entry of Sir Charles Wetherell into that city (of which he was Recorder), who was notorious for his violent opposition to the Reform Bill. Much property was destroyed, and many lives lost.]

November 14th, 1831 {p.210}

For the last two or three days the reports from Sunderland about the cholera have been of a doubtful character. The disease makes so little progress that the doctors begin again to doubt whether it is the Indian cholera, and the merchants, shipowners, and inhabitants, who suffer from the restraints imposed upon an infected place, are loudly complaining of the measures which have been adopted, and strenuously insisting that their town is in a more healthy state than usual, and that the disease is no more than what it always is visited with every year at this season. In the meantime all preparations are going on in London, just as if the disorder was actually on its way to the metropolis. We have a Board at the Council Office, between which and the Board at the College some civilities have pa.s.sed, and the latter is now ready to yield up its functions to the former, which, however, will not be regularly const.i.tuted without much difficulty and many jealousies, all owing to official carelessness and mismanagement.

The Board has been diligently employed in drawing up suggestions and instructions to local boards and parochial authorities, and great activity has prevailed here in establishing committees for the purpose of visiting the different districts of the metropolis, and making such arrangements as may be necessary in the event of sickness breaking out. There is no lack of money or labour for this end, and one great good will be accomplished let what will happen, for much of the filth and misery of the town will be brought to light, and the condition of the poorer and more wretched of the inhabitants can hardly fail to be ameliorated. The reports from Sunderland exhibit a state of human misery, and necessarily of moral degradation, such as I hardly ever heard of, and it is no wonder, when a great part of the community is plunged into such a condition (and we may fairly suppose that there is a gradually mounting scale, with every degree of wretchedness up to the wealth and splendour which glitter on the surface of society), that there should be so many who are ripe for any desperate scheme of revolution. At Sunderland they say there are houses with 150 inmates, who are huddled five and six in a bed. They are in the lowest state of poverty. The sick in these receptacles are attended by an apothecary's boy, who brings them (or I suppose tosses them) medicines without distinction or enquiry.

I saw Lord Wharncliffe last night, just returned from Yorkshire; he gives a bad account of the state of the public mind; he thinks that there is a strong revolutionary spirit abroad; told me that the Duke of Wellington had written to the King a memorial upon the danger of the a.s.sociations that were on foot.

Roehampton, November 19th, 1831 {p.211}

[Page Head: OVERTURES FOR A COMPROMISE.]

On Tuesday last I went with the Duke of Richmond to pa.s.s a day at Shirley Lodge, a house that has been lent him by Mr. Maberly, and there we had a great deal of conversation about Reform and general politics, in the course of which I was struck by his apparent candour and moderation, and when I told him that nothing would do but a compromise between the parties he acceded to that opinion, and said that he should like to go to Lord Wharncliffe, and talk the matter over with him. This was on Wednesday. Yesterday morning I called on Lord Wharncliffe, and told him what Richmond had said.

He was sitting before a heap of papers, and when I told him this he laughed and said that Richmond was behindhand, that matters had gone a great deal further than this, and then proceeded to give me the following account of what had pa.s.sed. A short time ago Palmerston spoke to his son, John Wortley, and expressed a desire that some compromise could be effected between the Government and the Opposition leaders, which John imparted to Lord Harrowby and his father. The overture was so well received by them that Stanley went to Sandon, Lord Harrowby's place in Staffordshire, in his way to Ireland, with Lord Grey's consent, to talk it over with Lord Sandon. After this Lord Wharncliffe went to Sandon, and the two fathers and two sons discussed the matter, and came to a sort of general resolution as to the basis on which they would treat, which they drew up, and which Wharncliffe read to me. It was moderate, temperate, embraced ample concessions, and a.s.serted the necessity of each party refraining from demanding of the other what either was so pledged to as to be unable to concede without dishonour. On Wharncliffe's return to town he again saw Palmerston, and communicated to him Harrowby's concurrence in an equitable adjustment of the Reform question, and then suggested that if Government really desired this, it would be better that he (Wharncliffe) should see Lord Grey himself on the subject.

Palmerston told Lord Grey, who a.s.sented, and gave Wharncliffe a rendezvous at East Sheen on Wednesday last. There they had a long conversation, which by his account was conducted in a very fair and amicable spirit on both sides, and they seem to have come to a good understanding as to the principle on which they should treat.

On parting, Grey shook hands with him twice, and told him he had not felt so much relieved for a long time. The next day Lord Grey made a minute of their conversation, which he submitted to the Cabinet; they approved of it, and he sent it to Wharncliffe to peruse, who returned it to Lord Grey. In this state the matter stood yesterday morning, apparently with every prospect of being arranged. Wharncliffe had already spoken to Dudley, Lyndhurst, and De Ros, the only Peers of his party he had seen, and to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who were all delighted at what had pa.s.sed. He had written to the Duke of Wellington and Peel, and he is busying himself in consulting and communicating with all the Peers and influential Commoners of the party whom he can find in town. The terms are not settled, but the general basis agreed upon seems to be this: the concession of Schedule A, of representatives to the great towns, and a great extension of the county representation on one side; the abandonment, or nearly so, of Schedule B, such an arrangement with regard to the 10 qualification as shall have the practical effect of a higher rate, and an understanding that the manufacturing interest is not to have a preponderating influence in the county representation; a great deal to be left open to discussion, especially on all the subordinate points.

[Page Head: NEGOTIATION WITH THE WAVERERS]

Such is the history of this curious transaction, which affords a triumphant justification of the course which the Opposition adopted; indeed, Palmerston admitted to Wharncliffe that their tactics had been entirely judicious. It is likewise a great homage rendered to character, for Wharncliffe has neither wealth, influence, nor superior abilities, nor even popularity with his own party. He is a spirited, sensible, zealous, honourable, consistent country gentleman; their knowledge of his moderation and integrity induced Ministers to commit themselves to him, and he will thus be in all probability enabled to render an essential service to his country, and be a princ.i.p.al instrument in the settlement of a question the continued agitation of which would have been perilous in the extreme. Besides the prospect of a less objectionable Bill, an immense object is gained in the complete separation of the Ministry from the subversive party, for their old allies the Radicals will never forgive them for this compromise with the anti-Reformers, and they have now no alternative but to unite with those who call themselves the Conservative party against the rebels, republicans, a.s.sociators, and all the disaffected in the country. After all their declarations and their unbending insolence, to have brought down their pride to these terms, and to the humiliation of making overtures to a party whose voice was only the other day designated by John Russell as 'the whisper of a faction,' shows plainly how deeply alarmed they are at the general state of the country, and how the conflagration of Bristol has suddenly illuminated their minds. That incident, the language of the a.s.sociations, the domiciliary visits to Lord Grey at midnight of Place and his rabble, and the licentiousness of the press, have opened their eyes, and convinced them that if existing inst.i.tutions are to be preserved at all there is no time to be lost in making such an arrangement as may enable all who have anything to lose to coalesce for their mutual safety and protection. Whatever may be the amount of their concessions, the Radicals will never pardon Lord Grey for negotiating with the Tories at all, and nothing will prevent his being henceforward the object of their suspicion and aversion, and marked out for their vengeance. By what process Althorp and John Russell were induced to concur, and how they are to set about swallowing their own words, I do not guess.

As a proof of the disposition which exists, and the good understanding between Wharncliffe and the Government, he told me that some time ago Ward and Palmer went to him, and said that in the City the majority of men of weight and property were favourable to Reform, but not to the late Bill, and that they were desirous of having a declaration drawn up for signature, expressive of their adherence to Reform, but of their hope that the next measure might be such as would give satisfaction to all parties. Wharncliffe drew this up (there was likewise an acknowledgment of the right of the House of Lords to exercise their privileges as they had done) and gave it to them. It is gone to be signed, having been previously submitted to Grey and Althorp, who approved of it.

November 21st, 1831 {p.214}

Came to town from Roehampton yesterday morning, saw Henry de Ros, who had seen Barnes[4] the evening before, and opened to him the pending negotiation. His rage and fury exceeded all bounds. He swore Brougham and Grey (particularly the former) were the greatest of villains. After a long discussion he agreed to try and persuade his colleagues to adopt a moderate tone, and not to begin at once to _jeter feu et flamme_. Henry's object was to persuade him, if possible, that the interest of the paper will be in the long run better consulted by leaning towards the side of order and quiet than by continuing to exasperate and inflame. He seemed to a certain degree moved by this argument, though he is evidently a desperate Radical. Henry went to Melbourne afterwards, who is most anxious for the happy consummation of this affair, but expressed some alarm lest they should be unable to agree upon the details.

There is an article in the 'Times' this morning of half-menacing import, sulkily and gloomily written, but not ferocious, and leaving it open to them to take what line they think fit. In the afternoon I met Melbourne, who told me they were going to put forth a proclamation against 'Attwood and the Birmingham fellows,'

which was grateful to my ears.

[4] [Then editor of the 'Times' newspaper.]

November 22nd, 1831 {p.215}

[Page Head: PROCLAMATION AGAINST THE UNIONS]

The King came to town yesterday for a Council, at which the meeting of Parliament on the 6th of December was settled. The proclamation against the unions (which was not ready, and the King signed a blank) and some orders about cholera were despatched. Lord Grey told me that the union had already determined to dissolve itself.

My satisfaction was yesterday considerably damped by what I heard of the pending negotiation concerning Reform. Agar Ellis at Roehampton talked with great doubt of its being successful, which I attributed to his ignorance of what had pa.s.sed, but I fear it is from his knowledge that the Government mean, in fact, to give up nothing of importance. George Bentinck came to me in the morning, and told me he had discovered from the Duke of Richmond that the concessions were not only to be all one way, but that the altered Bill would be, in fact, more objectionable than the last, inasmuch as it is more democratic in its tendency, so much so that Richmond is exceedingly dissatisfied himself, for he has always been the advocate of the aristocratic interest in the Cabinet, and has battled to make the Bill less adverse to it. Now he says he can contend no longer, for he is met by the unanswerable argument that their opponents are ready to concede more. I own I was alarmed, and my mind misgave me when I heard of the extreme satisfaction of Althorp and Co.; and I always dreaded that Wharncliffe, however honest and well-meaning, had not calibre enough to conduct such a negotiation, and might be misled by his vanity. He bustles about the town, chatting away to all the people he meets, and I fear is both ignorant himself of what he is about and involuntarily deceiving others too; he is in a fool's paradise. I spoke to Henry de Ros about this last night, who seemed by no means aware of it, and it is difficult to believe that Lyndhurst and Harrowby should not be perfectly alive to all the consequences of Wharncliffe's proceedings, or that they would sanction them if they had really the tendency that George Bentinck gives me to understand.

The cholera, which is going on (but without greatly extending itself) at Sunderland, has excited an unusual alarm, but it is now beginning to subside. People seeing that it does not appear elsewhere take courage, but the preparations are not relaxed, and they are constantly enforced by the Central Board of Health (as it is called), which is established at the Council Office, and labours very a.s.siduously in the cause. Undoubtedly a great deal of good will be done in the way of purification. As to the disorder, if it had not the name of cholera n.o.body would be alarmed, for many an epidemic has prevailed at different times far more fatal than this. On Friday last we despatched Dr. Barry down to Sunderland with very ample powers, and to procure information, which it is very difficult to get. Nothing can be more disgraceful than the state of that town, exhibiting a lamentable proof of the practical inutility of that diffusion of knowledge and education which we boast of, and which we fancy renders us so morally and intellectually superior to the rest of the world. When Dr. Russell was in Russia, he was disgusted with the violence and prejudices he found there on the part of both medical men and the people, and he says he finds just as much here. The conduct of the people of Sunderland on this occasion is more suitable to the barbarism of the interior of Africa than to a town in a civilised country. The medical men and the higher cla.s.ses are split into parties, quarrelling about the nature of the disease, and perverting and concealing facts which militate against their respective theories. The people are taught to believe that there is really no cholera at all, and that those who say so intend to plunder and murder them. The consequence is prodigious irritation and excitement, an invincible repugnance on the part of the lower orders to avail themselves of any of the preparations which are made for curing them, and a p.r.o.neness to believe any reports, however monstrous and exaggerated. In a very curious letter which was received yesterday from Dr. Daur, he says (after complaining of the medical men, who would send him no returns of the cases of sickness) it was believed that bodies had been dissected before the life was out of them, and one woman, was said to have been cut up while she was begging to be spared.

The consequence of this is that we have put forward a strong order to compel medical men to give information, and another for the compulsory removal of nuisances. It is, however, rather amusing that everybody who has got in their vicinity anything disagreeable, or that they would like to be rid of, thinks that now is their time, and the table of the Board of Health is covered with applications of this nature, from every variety of person and of place.

November 23rd, 1831 {p.217}

Dr. Barry's first letter from Sunderland came yesterday, in which he declares the ident.i.ty of the disease with the cholera he had seen in Russia. He describes some cases he had visited, exhibiting scenes of misery and poverty far exceeding what one could have believed it possible to find in this country; but we who float on the surface of society know but little of the privations and sufferings which pervade the ma.s.s. I wrote to the Bishop of Durham, to the chief magistrates, and sent down 200 to Colonel Creagh (which Althorp immediately advanced) to relieve the immediate and pressing cases of distress.

[Page Head: DISAPPOINTMENT.]

Saw George Bentinck in the afternoon, who confirmed my apprehension that Wharncliffe had been cajoled into a negotiation which Government intended should end by getting all they want.

Richmond, Grey, and Palmerston were in a minority of three in the Cabinet for putting off the meeting of Parliament. One of the most Radical of the Cabinet is G.o.derich. Such a thing it is to be of feeble intellect and character, and yet he is a smart speaker, and an agreeable man. The moderate party are Richmond, who cannot have much weight, Stanley, who is in Ireland, Lansdowne, who is always 'gone to Bowood,' Palmerston, and Melbourne. Yet I am led to think that if Wharncliffe had insisted on better conditions, and held out, he would have got them, and that the Cabinet were really disposed to make all the concessions they could without compromising themselves. The meeting in the City yesterday was a total failure. Henry Drummond, who is mad, but very clever, and a Reformer, though for saving the rotten boroughs, spoke against the declaration, some others followed him, and after a couple of hours wasted in vain endeavours to procure unanimity the meeting broke up, and nothing was done. I saw Wharncliffe last night, who was exceedingly disappointed.

November 28th, 1831 {p.218}

The negotiation with Wharncliffe goes on languidly; he wrote to Lord Grey the other day, and suggested some heads as the basis of an accommodation, consisting of some extension of Schedule B, excluding town voters from county voting, and one or two other points; to which Lord Grey replied that some of the things he mentioned might be feasible, but that there would be great difficulty about others, that he feared nothing might come of their communications, as he would not hear of any other Peers who were disposed to go along with him. It is not a bad thing that they should each be impressed with a salutary apprehension, the one that he will have the same difficulties to encounter in the House of Lords, the other that n.o.body will follow him, for it will render an arrangement more probable than if they both thought they had only to agree together, and that the rest must follow as a matter of course. The Duke of Wellington has written again to Wharncliffe, declining altogether to be a party to any negotiation. De Ros told me that he never saw such a letter as Peel's--so stiff, dry, and reserved, just like the man in whom great talents are so counteracted, and almost made mischievous, by the effects of his cold, selfish, calculating character. In the meantime the state of the country is certainly better, the proclamation putting down the unions has been generally obeyed, the press has suspended its fury, and the approach of the meeting of Parliament seems to have calmed the country to a great degree.

The event most to be desired is that the Government may carry their Bill quietly through the House of Commons, amendments be carried in the Committee of the House of Lords, and upon these there may be a compromise, though after all it is impossible not to have a secret misgiving that the alterations which appear desirable may prove to be mischievous, for it is the great evil of the measure that being certainly new no human being can guess how it will work, or how its different parts will act upon one another, and what result they will produce.

There seems to be a constant sort of electrical reciprocity of effort between us and France just now. The three days produced much of our political excitement, and our Bristol business has been acted with great similarity of circ.u.mstance at Lyons, and is still going on. Talleyrand produced the 'Moniteur' last night with the account, lamented that the Duc d'Orleans had been sent with Marshal Soult to Lyons, which he said was unnecessary and absurd, that Soult was the best man for the purpose of putting it down. It was begun by the workpeople, who were very numerous, not political in its objects, but the cries denoted a mixture of everything, as they shouted 'Henri V., Napoleon II, La Republique, and Bristol.'

He was at Lady Holland's, looking very cadaverous, and not very talkative, talked of Madame du Barri, that she had been very handsome, and had some remains of beauty up to the period of her death; of Luckner, who was guillotined, and as the car pa.s.sed on the people cried (as they used), 'a la guillotine! a la guillotine!' Luckner turned round and said, '_On_ y va, canaille.'

[Page Head: POULETT THOMSON.]

We have just sent a commission to Paris to treat with the French Government about a commercial treaty on the principles of free trade. Poulett Thomson, who has been at Paris some time, has originated it, and Althorp selected George Villiers for the purpose, but has added to him as a colleague Dr. Bowring, who has in fact been selected by Thomson, a theorist, and a jobber, deeply implicated in the 'Greek Fire,' and a Benthamite. He was the subject of a cutting satire of Moore's, beginning,

The ghost of Miltiades came by night, And stood by the bed of the Benthamite;

but he has been at Paris some time, understanding the subject, and has wound himself into some intimacy with the French King and his Ministers. It is, however, Poulett Thomson who has persuaded Althorp to appoint him, in order to have a creature of his own there.

I have never been able to understand the enormous unpopularity of this man, who appears civil, well-bred, intelligent, and agreeable (only rather a c.o.xcomb), and has made a certain figure in the House of Commons, but it has been explained to me by a person who knows him well. He was originally a merchant, and had a quant.i.ty of counting-house knowledge. He became member of a club of political economists, and a scholar of M'Culloch's. In this club there were some obscure but very able men, and by them he got crammed with the principles of commerce and political economy, and from his mercantile connections he got facts. He possessed great industry and sufficient ability to work up the materials he thus acquired into a very plausible exhibition of knowledge upon these subjects, and having opportunities of preparing himself for every particular question, and the advantage of addressing an audience the greater part of which is profoundly ignorant, he pa.s.sed for a young gentleman of extraordinary ability and profound knowledge, and amongst the greatest of his admirers was Althorp, who, when the Whigs came in, promoted him to his present situation. Since he has been there he has not had the same opportunities of learning his lesson from others behind the curtain, and the envy which always attends success has delighted to pull down his reputation, so that he now appears something like the jackdaw stripped of the peac.o.c.k's feathers.

November 30th, 1831 {p.220}

Went to breakfast at the Tower, which I had never seen. Dined with Lady Holland, first time for seven years, finished the quarrel, and the last of that batch; they should not last for ever. In the morning Wharncliffe came to me from Lord Grey's, with whom he had had a final interview. He showed me the paper he gave Grey containing his proposals, which were nearly to this effect: conceding what the Government required, with these exceptions and counter-concessions, an alteration in Schedule B with a view to preserve in many cases the two members; that voters for the great manufacturing towns should have votes for the counties; that London districts should not have so many representatives; that when the franchise was given to great manufacturing towns, _their_ county should not have more representatives; that corporate rights should be saved, though with an infusion of 10 voters where required; that Cheltenham and Brighton (particularly) should have no members. These were the princ.i.p.al heads, proposed in a paper of moderate length and civil expression. Grey said the terms were inadmissible, that some parts of his proposal might be feasible, but the points on which Wharncliffe most insisted (London, and town and county voting) he could not agree to. So with many expressions of civility and mutual esteem they parted. He is disappointed, but not dejected, and I tried to persuade him that an arrangement on this basis is not less probable than it was.

The fact is it would have been nearly impossible for Government to introduce a Bill so different from the first as these changes would have made it, as the result of a negotiation. They would have been exposed to great obloquy, and have had innumerable difficulties to encounter, but if the Bill goes into a Committee of the Lords, and the other clauses pa.s.s without opposition, the Government may not think themselves obliged to contest these alterations. I think the Government would accept them, and probably they feel that in no other way could they do so. It seems to me that the success of these amendments depends now very much upon the Opposition themselves, upon their firmness, their union, and above all their reasonableness. Saw Talleyrand last night, who said they had better news from Lyons, that there was nothing political in it. News came yesterday morning that the cholera had broken out at Ma.r.s.eilles.

December 3rd, 1831 {p.221}

Wharncliffe showed me his correspondence with the Duke of Wellington on this negotiation. They differed greatly, but amicably enough, though I take it he was not very well pleased with Wharncliffe's last letter, in which he distinctly told the Duke that his speech on the Address, and declaration against any Reform, was what overthrew his Government. This he never will admit, and, pa.s.sing over the proximate cause, always refers his fall to (what was certainly the remote cause) the Catholic question--that is, to the breaking up of the Tory party which followed it, and the union of the old Tories with the Whigs and Radicals on purpose to turn him out. In this correspondence Wharncliffe has much the best of it, and I was surprised to find with what tenacity the Duke clings to his cherished prejudices, and how he shuts his eyes to the signs of the times and the real state of the country. With the point at issue he never would grapple. Wharncliffe argued for concession, _because_ they have not the means of resistance, and that they are in fact at the mercy of their opponents. The Duke admitted the force against them, but thought it would be possible to govern the country without Reform 'if the King was not against them'--an important increment of his conditions; there is no doubt that 'the King's name is a tower of strength, which they upon the adverse faction want'--and he continued through all his letters arguing the question on its abstract merits, and repeating the topic that had been over and over again urged, but without reference to the actual state of things and the means of resistance. It seems, however, pretty clear that he will oppose this Bill just as he did the last, and he will probably have a great many followers; but the party is broken up, for Wharncliffe and Harrowby will vote for the second reading; the bishops will generally go with them, and probably a sufficient number of Peers. If Lord Grey can see a reasonable chance of carrying the Bill without making Peers, there can be very little doubt he will put off that resource till the last moment.