But the opinion, and even convinced Clarendon himself.' fact was that the tide of events rolled decisively in Lord Palmerston's favour. Almost every mail brought tidings either of the reluctance of France to go to war, or of fresh successes on the coast of Syria; till at last the fall of Acre necessitated Ibrahim's retreat, and practically terminated the crisis; while Lord Palmerston, with the good taste which disarmed an opponent, wound up the correspondence by giving Lord John the credit. C[ARLTON] TERRACE]: December 4, 1840. MY DEAR JOHn Russell,—It is quite true that our policy in the Levant has been more completely and more rapidly successful than the most sanguine of us could have ventured to hope: and I think you must feel gratified that it was your support of the Treaty of July which chiefly induced the Cabinet to adopt it. Yours sincerely, PALMERSTON. It would have required a rougher temperament than that with which Lord John was endowed, to quarrel with a colleague who bore his triumphs so well, and was so generous to others. Yet Lord John was undoubtedly in the right, both in his demands and in his complaints. WILTON CRESCENT: November 19, 1840. MY DEAR MELBOURNE,-. . . In the days of Lord Grey, every important note was carefully revised by him, and generally submitted to the Cabinet. As Paymaster of the Forces, I then had more information and more power of advising than I have now. At present I receive the most important despatches in a printed form some days after they are sent. Now it cannot, of course, be expected that I am to defend in the House of Commons acts which I have not advised, and of which the editors [of newspapers] are as cognisant as myself. . . . To this day I am not aware what was written to Lord Granville in consequence of our two Cabinet meetings. All this is very unpleasant, but I think it best to tell you what I feel. I beg, however, that you will not send this letter Yours truly, to Palmerston. 1 Greville, Memoirs, pt. ii. vol. i. p. 347. J. RUSSELL. But for the present Lord Palmerston had prevailed. Few indeed could have foreseen the full consequences of his success. His high-handed proceedings in 1840 were to prevent the formation of a Whig Government in 1845; repeated from 1846 to 1850, they were to lead to complaints on his sovereign's part which read like mere echoes of Lord John's letter of 1840; and they were eventually to occasion his own removal from office in 1851, and the disruption of the Whig party in 1852. CHAPTER XIV. THE FALL OF LORD MELBOURNE. THE year 1841 opened favourably for the Whig Government. News arrived on January 6 that Dost Mahommed, the Afghan King whom Lord Auckland had dethroned, had surrendered to the British at Cabul; and that the Chinese had made terms with Admiral Elliot. The Duke of Bedford wrote from Woburn You and your I wish you joy of the good news from China. colleagues may march into Parliament on the first day with colours flying and drums beating. Old Byng says he went to Brighton in the autumn with five wishes in his heart : Ist. That there might be good news from Syria. 2nd. Good from India. 3rd. Good from China. 4th. A majority for Guizot. 5th. The safety of the Queen and her child. All have been realised; and all are humane and benevolent wishes. Yet nothing is certain but the unforeseen. The year which commenced thus auspiciously witnessed a renewal of the Chinese war; a disaster, unprecedented in its magnitude, in Afghanistan; and the crushing defeat of the Government. When Parliament met on January 26, 1841, the debate on the Address was rapidly disposed of. Lord John, who had been staying at Broadlands with Lord Palmerston during the recess, was able to defend the policy of the Treaty of July. No outward sign was visible of the dissensions which had nearly wrecked the Ministry in the previous autumn, and the Whigs seemed more firmly seated in office than they had been since 1839. At the opening of the session, however, one or two byeelections were unexpectedly carried by Tory candidates, and the fears and hopes thereby excited on either side of the House were confirmed by the first great contest of the session -on the Irish Registration Bill1-which the Government only succeeded in carrying by 299 votes to 294. The Whig majority had thus fallen to the exact point which had induced Lord Melbourne to tender his resignation in the spring of 1839. This fact alone made it necessary for the Government to make a great effort. But another circumstance simultaneously forced them to adopt a bold policy. The years of Whig rule under Lord Melbourne had been years of famine; trade had been stagnant; agriculture depressed; the revenue had declined; and Mr. Spring Rice had not had the courage to propose-while Lord Melbourne had not had the wisdom to insist on measures to terminate the constantly increasing deficits which had occurred. Mr. Baring, succeeding to the Exchequer, made an honest attempt to terminate a discreditable deficiency by raising the burdens all round. But the Budget of 1840 was not much more successful than the Budgets which preceded it. Lord Palmerston's foreign policy, by creating alarm and increasing expenditure, indirectly occasioned a fresh deficiency; and, as the old system of increased taxation had broken down, it was absolutely necessary to try some new method. No statesman in such circumstances could avoid dealing with the customs tariff. The twelve hundred duties which encumbered it had avowedly been placed on it, not for the purpose of revenue, but for the purpose of protection. And an increase of these duties brought no corresponding benefit to the Exchequer, because they were already prohibitive, and 1 I have not thought it necessary to relate in detail the protracted struggle on Irish Registration, which commenced in 1840 and was renewed in 1841. Lord Morpeth was the chief champion on one side, Lord Stanley on the other: the Whigs desiring to extend the Irish franchise, and to remove difficulties in the way of its exercise; the Tories endeavouring to restrict the franchise, and to clear the register of fictitious voters. They destroyed the trade on which in theory they relied. were not all founded on the same principle. Those which had been designed for the protection of the home trade were based on the idea that foreign competition could and should be destroyed by the heavy taxation of foreign goods. Where protection was afforded to the colonies an intermediate plan was adopted. The colonial goods were taxed; and the competing foreign goods were taxed more heavily. The colonist, in short, was to enjoy an advantage as against the foreigner, while the home producer was to have a similar advantage as against the colonist. Taxation on cereals, again, was based on a third principle. Statesmen had taken infinite pains to devise what was known as a sliding scale, which, in spite of long experience to the contrary, they fondly imagined would equalise the price of corn, since the rate of duty varied with the price, rising as it fell, and falling as it rose. This system, denounced in the previous century in 'The Wealth of Nations,' and assailed in the nineteenth century by the later economists, flourished in 1841 almost in its pristine vigour. Few statesmen had either the knowledge or the hardihood to quesion its expediency. Lord John himself had begun his life by declaring that 'political economy is an awful thing;' and even in his 'Essay on the Constitution' he had written, Without going the length of the Venetian proverb, "Prima Veneziani, poi Cristiani," I am disposed to say, "Let us first be Englishmen, and then economists."'1 Before the close of 1838, however, the increasing distress of the country, and the growing activity of the Anti-Corn Law League, had satisfied Lord John that the existing system could not be maintained; and early in January 1839 he publicly avowed his own opinions : considering it an But it is my I gave my support to the Bill of [1828], improvement on the former prohibitory system. opinion that a moderate fixed duty would be more advantageous, not only to trade and manufacture, but also to agriculture, than 1 Essays on Life and Character, p. 125. English Constitution, p. 295. 2 The Corn Law passed by the Wellington Administration. |
