5: Lord Palmerston
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I
In 1851 the Prince's fortunes reached their high-water mark. The success of the Great
Exhibition enormously increased his reputation and seemed to assure him henceforward a
leading place in the national life. But before the year was out another triumph, in a very
different sphere of action, was also his. This triumph, big with fateful consequences, was
itself the outcome of a series of complicated circumstances which had been gathering to a
climax for many years.
The unpopularity of Albert in high society had not diminished with
time. Aristocratic persons continued to regard him with disfavour; and he on his side,
withdrew further and further into a contemptuous reserve. For a moment, indeed, it
appeared as if the dislike of the upper classes was about to be suddenly converted into
cordiality; for they learnt with amazement that the Prince, during a country visit, had
ridden to hounds and acquitted himself remarkably well. They had always taken it for
granted that his horsemanship was of some second-rate foreign quality, and here he was
jumping five-barred gates and tearing after the fox as if he had been born and bred in
Leicestershire. They could hardly believe it; was it possible that they had made a
mistake, and that Albert was a good fellow after all? Had he wished to be thought so he
would certainly have seized this opportunity, purchased several hunters, and used them
constantly. But he had no such desire; hunting bored him, and made Victoria nervous. He
continued, as before, to ride, as he himself put it, for exercise or convenience, not for
amusement; and it was agreed that though the Prince, no doubt, could keep in his saddle
well enough, he was no sportsman.
This was a serious matter. It was not merely that Albert was laughed at
by fine ladies and sneered at by fine gentlemen; it was not merely that Victoria, who
before her marriage had cut some figure in society, had, under her husband's influence,
almost completely given it up. Since Charles the Second the sovereigns of England had,
with a single exception, always been unfashionable; and the fact that the exception was
George the Fourth seemed to give an added significance to the rule. What was grave was not
the lack of fashion, but the lack of other and more important qualities. The hostility of
the upper classes was symptomatic of an antagonism more profound than one of manners or
even of tastes. The Prince, in a word, was un-English. What that word precisely meant it
was difficult to say; but the fact was patent to every eye. Lord Palmerston, also, was not
fashionable; the great Whig aristocrats looked askance at him, and only tolerated him as
an unpleasant necessity thrust upon them by fate. But Lord Palmerston was English through
and through, there was something in him that expressed, with extraordinary vigour, the
fundamental qualities of the English race. And he was the very antithesis of the Prince.
By a curious chance it so happened that this typical Englishman was brought into closer
contact than any other of his countrymen with the alien from over the sea. It thus fell
out that differences which, in more fortunate circumstances, might have been smoothed away
and obliterated, became accentuated to the highest pitch. All the mysterious forces in
Albert's soul leapt out to do battle with his adversary, and, in the long and violent
conflict that followed, it almost seemed as if he was struggling with England herself.
Palmerston's whole life had been spent in the government of the
country. At twenty-two he had been a Minister; at twenty-five he had been offered the
Chancellorship of the Exchequer, which, with that prudence which formed so unexpected a
part of his character, he had declined to accept. His first spell of office had lasted
uninterruptedly for twenty-one years. When Lord Grey came into power he received the
Foreign Secretaryship, a post which he continued to occupy, with two intervals, for
another twenty-one years. Throughout this period his reputation with the public had
steadily grown, and when, in 1846, he became Foreign Secretary for the third time, his
position in the country was almost, if not quite, on an equality with that of the Prime
Minister, Lord John Russell. He was a tall, big man of sixty-two, with a jaunty air, a
large face, dyed whiskers, and a long sardonic upper lip. His private life was far from
respectable, but he had greatly strengthened his position in society by marrying, late in
life, Lady Cowper, the sister of Lord Melbourne, and one of the most influential of the
Whig hostesses. Powerful, experienced, and supremely self-confident, he naturally paid
very little attention to Albert. Why should he? The Prince was interested in foreign
affairs? Very well, then; let the Prince pay attention to him—to him, who had been a
Cabinet Minister when Albert was in the cradle, who was the chosen leader of a great
nation, and who had never failed in anything he had undertaken in the whole course of his
life. Not that he wanted the Prince's attention—far from it: so far as he could see,
Albert was merely a young foreigner, who suffered from having no vices, and whose only
claim to distinction was that he had happened to marry the Queen of England. This
estimate, as he found out to his cost, was a mistaken one. Albert was by no means
insignificant, and, behind Albert, there was another figure by no means insignificant
either—there was Stockmar.
But Palmerston, busy with his plans, his ambitions, and the management
of a great department, brushed all such considerations on one side; it was his favourite
method of action. He lived by instinct—by a quick eye and a strong hand, a dexterous
management of every crisis as it arose, a half-unconscious sense of the vital elements in
a situation. He was very bold; and nothing gave him more exhilaration than to steer the
ship of state in a high wind, on a rough sea, with every stitch of canvas on her that she
could carry. But there is a point beyond which boldness becomes rashness—a point
perceptible only to intuition and not to reason; and beyond that point Palmerston never
went. When he saw that the cast demanded it, he could go slow—very slow indeed in
fact, his whole career, so full of vigorous adventure, was nevertheless a masterly example
of the proverb, "tout vient à point à qui sait attendre." But when he decided
to go quick, nobody went quicker. One day, returning from Osborne, he found that he had
missed the train to London; he ordered a special, but the station master told him that to
put a special train upon the line at that time of day would be dangerous and he could not
allow it. Palmerston insisted declaring that he had important business in London, which
could not wait. The station-master supported by all the officials, continued to demur the
company, he said, could not possibly take the responsibility. "On my
responsibility, then!" said Palmerston, in his off-hand, peremptory way whereupon the
station-master ordered up the train and the Foreign Secretary reached London in time for
his work, without an accident. The story, is typical of the happy valiance with which he
conducted both his own affairs and those of the nation. "England," he used to
say, "is strong enough to brave consequences." Apparently, under Palmerston's
guidance, she was. While the officials protested and shook in their shoes, he would wave
them away with his airy "my responsibility!" and carry the country
swiftly along the line of his choice, to a triumphant destination—without an
accident. His immense popularity was the result partly of his diplomatic successes, partly
of his extraordinary personal affability, but chiefly of the genuine intensity with which
he responded to the feelings and supported the interests of his countrymen. The public
knew that it had in Lord Palmerston not only a high-mettled master, but also a devoted
servant—that he was, in every sense of the word, a public man. When he was Prime
Minister, he noticed that iron hurdles had been put up on the grass in the Green Park; he
immediately wrote to the Minister responsible, ordering, in the severest language, their
instant removal, declaring that they were "an intolerable nuisance," and that
the purpose of the grass was "to be walked upon freely and without restraint by the
people, old and young, for whose enjoyment the parks are maintained." It was in this
spirit that, as Foreign Secretary, he watched over the interests of Englishmen abroad.
Nothing could be more agreeable for Englishmen; but foreign governments were less pleased.
They found Lord Palmerston interfering, exasperating, and alarming. In Paris they spoke
with bated breath of "ce terrible milord Palmerston;" and in Germany they made a
little song about him-
Hat der Teufel einen Sohn,
So ist er sicher Palmerston
But their complaints, their threats, and their agitations were all in vain. Palmerston,
with his upper lip sardonically curving, braved consequences, and held on his course.
The first diplomatic crisis which arose after his return to office,
though the Prince and the Queen were closely concerned with it, passed off without serious
disagreement between the Court and the Minister. For some years past a curious problem had
been perplexing the chanceries of Europe. Spain, ever since the time of Napoleon a prey to
civil convulsions, had settled down for a short interval to a state of comparative quiet
under the rule of Christina, the Queen Mother, and her daughter Isabella, the young Queen.
In 1846, the question of Isabella's marriage, which had for long been the subject of
diplomatic speculations, suddenly became acute. Various candidates for her hand were
proposed—among others, two cousins of her own, another Spanish prince, and Prince
Leopold of Saxe-Coburg, a first cousin of Victoria's and Albert's; for different reasons,
however, none of these young men seemed altogether satisfactory. Isabella was not yet
sixteen; and it might have been supposed that her marriage could be put off for a few
years more; but this was considered to be out of the question. "Vous ne savez
pas," said a high authority, "ce que c'est que ces princesses espagnoles; elles
ont le diable au corps, et on a toujours dit que si nous ne nous hâtions pas, l'héritier
viendrait avant le mari." It might also have been supposed that the young Queen's
marriage was a matter to be settled by herself, her mother, and the Spanish Government;
but this again was far from being the case. It had become, by one of those periodical
reversions to the ways of the eighteenth century, which, it is rumoured, are still not
unknown in diplomacy, a question of dominating importance in the foreign policies both of
France and England. For several years, Louis Philippe and his Prime Minister Guizot had
been privately maturing a very subtle plan. It was the object of the French King to repeat
the glorious coup of Louis XIV, and to abolish the Pyrenees by placing one of his
grandsons on the throne of Spain. In order to bring this about, he did not venture to
suggest that his younger son, the Duc de Montpensier, should marry Isabella; that would
have been too obvious a move, which would have raised immediate and insurmountable
opposition. He therefore proposed that Isabella should marry her cousin, the Duke of
Cádiz, while Montpensier married Isabella's younger sister, the Infanta Fernanda; and
pray, what possible objection could there be to that? The wily old King whispered into the
chaste ears of Guizot the key to the secret; he had good reason to believe that the Duke
of Cádiz was incapable of having children, and therefore the offspring of Fernanda would
inherit the Spanish crown. Guizot rubbed his hands, and began at once to set the necessary
springs in motion; but, of course, the whole scheme was very soon divulged and understood.
The English Government took an extremely serious view of the matter; the balance of power
was clearly at stake, and the French intrigue must be frustrated at all hazards. A
diplomatic struggle of great intensity followed; and it occasionally appeared that a
second War of the Spanish Succession was about to break out. This was avoided, but the
consequences of this strange imbroglio were far-reaching and completely different from
what any of the parties concerned could have guessed.
In the course of the long and intricate negotiations there was one
point upon which Louis Philippe laid a special stress—the candidature of Prince
Leopold of Saxe-Coburg. The prospect of a marriage between a Coburg Prince and the Queen
of Spain was, he declared, at least as threatening to the balance of power in Europe as
that of a marriage between the Duc de Montpensier and the Infanta; and, indeed, there was
much to be said for this contention. The ruin which had fallen upon the House of Coburg
during the Napoleonic wars had apparently only served to multiply its vitality, for that
princely family had by now extended itself over Europe in an extraordinary manner. King
Leopold was firmly fixed in Belgium; his niece was Queen of England; one of his nephews
was the husband of the Queen of England, and another the husband of the Queen of Portugal;
yet another was Duke of Wurtemberg. Where was this to end? There seemed to be a Coburg
Trust ready to send out one of its members at any moment to fill up any vacant place among
the ruling families of Europe. And even beyond Europe there were signs of this infection
spreading. An American who had arrived in Brussels had assured King Leopold that there was
a strong feeling in the United States in favour of monarchy instead of the misrule of
mobs, and had suggested, to the delight of His Majesty, that some branch of the Coburg
family might be available for the position. That danger might, perhaps, be remote; but the
Spanish danger was close at hand; and if Prince Leopold were to marry Queen Isabella the
position of France would be one of humiliation, if not of positive danger. Such were the
asseverations of Louis Philippe. The English Government had no wish to support Prince
Leopold, and though Albert and Victoria had some hankerings for the match, the wisdom of
Stockmar had induced them to give up all thoughts of it. The way thus seemed open for a
settlement: England would be reasonable about Leopold, if France would be reasonable about
Montpensier. At the Chateau d'Eu, the agreement was made, in a series of conversations
between the King and Guizot on the one side, and the Queen, the Prince, and Lord Aberdeen
on the other. Aberdeen, as Foreign Minister, declared that England would neither recognise
nor support Prince Leopold as a candidate for the hand of the Queen of Spain; while Louis
Philippe solemnly promised, both to Aberdeen and to Victoria, that the Duc de Montpensier
should not marry the Infanta Fernanda until after the Queen was married and had issue. All
went well, and the crisis seemed to be over, when the whole question was suddenly
re-opened by Palmerston, who had succeeded Aberdeen at the Foreign Office. In a despatch
to the English Minister at Madrid, he mentioned, in a list of possible candidates for
Queen Isabella's hand, Prince Leopold of Coburg; and at the same time he took occasion to
denounce in violent language the tyranny and incompetence of the Spanish Government. This
despatch, indiscreet in any case, was rendered infinitely more so by being communicated to
Guizot. Louis Philippe saw his opportunity and pounced on it. Though there was nothing in
Palmerston's language to show that he either recognised or supported Prince Leopold, the
King at once assumed that the English had broken their engagement, and that he was
therefore free to do likewise. He then sent the despatch to the Queen Mother, declared
that the English were intriguing for the Coburg marriage, bade her mark the animosity of
Palmerston against the Spanish Government, and urged her to escape from her difficulties
and ensure the friendship of France by marrying Isabella to the Duke of Cádiz and
Fernanda to Montpensier. The Queen Mother, alarmed and furious, was easily convinced.
There was only one difficulty: Isabella loathed the very sight of her cousin. But this was
soon surmounted; there was a wild supper-party at the Palace, and in the course of it the
young girl was induced to consent to anything that was asked of her. Shortly after, and on
the same day, both the marriages took place.
The news burst like a bomb on the English Government, who saw with rage
and mortification that they had been completely outmanoeuvred by the crafty King.
Victoria, in particular, was outraged. Not only had she been the personal recipient of
Louis Philippe's pledge, but he had won his way to her heart by presenting the Prince of
Wales with a box of soldiers and sending the Princess Royal a beautiful Parisian doll with
eyes that opened and shut. And now insult was added to injury. The Queen of the French
wrote her a formal letter, calmly announcing, as a family event in which she was sure
Victoria would be interested, the marriage of her son, Montpensier--"qui ajoutera à
notre bonheur intérieur, le seul vrai dans ce monde, et que vous, madame, savez si bien
apprecier." But the English Queen had not long to wait for her revenge. Within
eighteen months the monarchy of Louis Philippe, discredited, unpopular, and fatally
weakened by the withdrawal of English support, was swept into limbo, while he and his
family threw themselves as suppliant fugitives at the feet of Victoria.
II
In this affair both the Queen and the Prince had been too much
occupied with the delinquencies of Louis Philippe to have any wrath to spare for those of
Palmerston; and, indeed, on the main issue, Palmerston's attitude and their own had been
in complete agreement. But in this the case was unique. In every other foreign
complication—and they were many and serious—during the ensuing years, the
differences between the royal couple and the Foreign Secretary were constant and profound.
There was a sharp quarrel over Portugal, where violently hostile parties were flying at
each other's throats. The royal sympathy was naturally enlisted on behalf of the Queen and
her Coburg husband, while Palmerston gave his support to the progressive elements in the
country. It was not until 1848, however, that the strain became really serious. In that
year of revolutions, when, in all directions and with alarming frequency, crowns kept
rolling off royal heads, Albert and Victoria were appalled to find that the policy of
England was persistently directed—in Germany, in Switzerland, in Austria, in Italy,
in Sicily—so as to favour the insurgent forces. The situation, indeed, was just such
a one as the soul of Palmerston loved. There was danger and excitement, the necessity of
decision, the opportunity for action, on every hand. A disciple of Canning, with an
English gentleman's contempt and dislike of foreign potentates deep in his heart, the
spectacle of the popular uprisings, and of the oppressors bundled ignominiously out of the
palaces they had disgraced, gave him unbounded pleasure, and he was determined that there
should be no doubt whatever, all over the Continent, on which side in the great struggle
England stood. It was not that he had the slightest tincture in him of philosophical
radicalism; he had no philosophical tinctures of any kind; he was quite content to be
inconsistent—to be a Conservative at home and a Liberal abroad. There were very good
reasons for keeping the Irish in their places; but what had that to do with it? The point
was this—when any decent man read an account of the political prisons in Naples his
gorge rose. He did not want war; but he saw that without war a skillful and determined use
of England's power might do much to further the cause of the Liberals in Europe. It was a
difficult and a hazardous game to play, but he set about playing it with delighted
alacrity. And then, to his intense annoyance, just as he needed all his nerve and all
possible freedom of action, he found himself being hampered and distracted at every turn
by... those people at Osborne. He saw what it was; the opposition was systematic and
informed, and the Queen alone would have been incapable of it; the Prince was at the
bottom of the whole thing. It was exceedingly vexatious; but Palmerston was in a hurry,
and could not wait; the Prince, if he would insist upon interfering, must be brushed on
one side.
Albert was very angry. He highly disapproved both of Palmerston's
policy and of his methods of action. He was opposed to absolutism; but in his opinion
Palmerston's proceedings were simply calculated to substitute for absolutism, all over
Europe, something no better and very possibly worse—the anarchy of faction and mob
violence. The dangers of this revolutionary ferment were grave; even in England Chartism
was rampant—a sinister movement, which might at any moment upset the Constitution and
abolish the Monarchy. Surely, with such dangers at home, this was a very bad time to
choose for encouraging lawlessness abroad. He naturally took a particular interest in
Germany. His instincts, his affections, his prepossessions, were ineradicably German;
Stockmar was deeply involved in German politics; and he had a multitude of relatives among
the ruling German families, who, from the midst of the hurly-burly of revolution, wrote
him long and agitated letters once a week. Having considered the question of Germany's
future from every point of view, he came to the conclusion, under Stockmar's guidance,
that the great aim for every lover of Germany should be her unification under the
sovereignty of Prussia. The intricacy of the situation was extreme, and the possibilities
of good or evil which every hour might bring forth were incalculable; yet he saw with
horror that Palmerston neither understood nor cared to understand the niceties of this
momentous problem, but rushed on blindly, dealing blows to right and left, quite—so
far as he could see—without system, and even without motive—except, indeed, a
totally unreasonable distrust of the Prussian State.
But his disagreement with the details of Palmerston's policy was in
reality merely a symptom of the fundamental differences between the characters of the two
men. In Albert's eyes Palmerston was a coarse, reckless egotist, whose combined arrogance
and ignorance must inevitably have their issue in folly and disaster. Nothing could be
more antipathetic to him than a mind so strangely lacking in patience, in reflection, in
principle, and in the habits of ratiocination. For to him it was intolerable to think in a
hurry, to jump to slapdash decisions, to act on instincts that could not be explained.
Everything must be done in due order, with careful premeditation; the premises of the
position must first be firmly established; and he must reach the correct conclusion by a
regular series of rational steps. In complicated questions—and what questions,
rightly looked at, were not complicated?—to commit one's thoughts to paper was the
wisest course, and it was the course which Albert, laborious though it might be,
invariably adopted. It was as well, too, to draw up a reasoned statement after an event,
as well as before it; and accordingly, whatever happened, it was always found that the
Prince had made a memorandum. On one occasion he reduced to six pages of foolscap the
substance of a confidential conversation with Sir Robert Peel, and, having read them aloud
to him, asked him to append his signature; Sir Robert, who never liked to commit himself,
became extremely uneasy; upon which the Prince, understanding that it was necessary to
humour the singular susceptibilities of Englishmen, with great tact dropped that
particular memorandum into the fire. But as for Palmerston, he never even gave one so much
as a chance to read him a memorandum, he positively seemed to dislike discussion; and,
before one knew where one was, without any warning whatever, he would plunge into some
hare-brained, violent project, which, as likely as not, would logically involve a European
war. Closely connected, too, with this cautious, painstaking reasonableness of Albert's,
was his desire to examine questions thoroughly from every point of view, to go down to the
roots of things, and to act in strict accordance with some well-defined principle. Under
Stockmar's tutelage he was constantly engaged in enlarging his outlook and in endeavouring
to envisage vital problems both theoretically and practically—both with precision and
with depth. To one whose mind was thus habitually occupied, the empirical activities of
Palmerston, who had no notion what a principle meant, resembled the incoherent vagaries of
a tiresome child. What did Palmerston know of economics, of science, of history? What did
he care for morality and education? How much consideration had he devoted in the whole
course of his life to the improvement of the condition of the working-classes and to the
general amelioration of the human race? The answers to such questions were all too
obvious; and yet it is easy to imagine, also, what might have been Palmerston's jaunty
comment. "Ah! your Royal Highness is busy with fine schemes and beneficent
calculations exactly! Well, as for me, I must say I'm quite satisfied with my morning's
work—I've had the iron hurdles taken out of the Green Park."
The exasperating man, however, preferred to make no comment, and to
proceed in smiling silence on his inexcusable way. The process of "brushing on one
side" very soon came into operation. Important Foreign Office despatches were either
submitted to the Queen so late that there was no time to correct them, or they were not
submitted to her at all; or, having been submitted, and some passage in them being
objected to and an alteration suggested, they were after all sent off in their original
form. The Queen complained, the Prince complained: both complained together. It was quite
useless. Palmerston was most apologetic—could not understand how it had
occurred—must give the clerks a wigging—certainly Her Majesty's wishes should be
attended to, and such a thing should never happen again. But, of course, it very soon
happened again, and the royal remonstrances redoubled. Victoria, her partisan passions
thoroughly aroused, imported into her protests a personal vehemence which those of Albert
lacked. Did Lord Palmerston forget that she was Queen of England? How could she tolerate a
state of affairs in which despatches written in her name were sent abroad without her
approval or even her knowledge? What could be more derogatory to her position than to be
obliged to receive indignant letters from the crowned heads to whom those despatches were
addressed—letters which she did not know how to answer, since she so thoroughly
agreed with them? She addressed herself to the Prime Minister. "No remonstrance has
any effect with Lord Palmerston," she said. "Lord Palmerston," she told him
on another occasion, "has as usual pretended not to have had time to submit the draft
to the Queen before he had sent it off." She summoned Lord John to her presence,
poured out her indignation, and afterwards, on the advice of Albert, noted down what had
passed in a memorandum: "I said that I thought that Lord Palmerston often endangered
the honour of England by taking a very prejudiced and one-sided view of a question; that
his writings were always as bitter as gall and did great harm, which Lord John entirely
assented to, and that I often felt quite ill from anxiety." Then she turned to her
uncle. "The state of Germany," she wrote in a comprehensive and despairing
review of the European situation, "is dreadful, and one does feel quite ashamed about
that once really so peaceful and happy country. That there are still good people there I
am sure, but they allow themselves to be worked upon in a frightful and shameful way. In
France a crisis seems at hand. What a very bad figure we cut in this mediation!
Really it is quite immoral, with Ireland quivering in our grasp and ready to throw off her
allegiance at any moment, for us to force Austria to give up her lawful possessions. What
shall we say if Canada, Malta, etc., begin to trouble us? It hurts me terribly." But
what did Lord Palmerston care?
Lord John's position grew more and more irksome. He did not approve of
his colleague's treatment of the Queen. When he begged him to be more careful, he was met
with the reply that 28,000 despatches passed through the Foreign Office in a single year,
that, if every one of these were to be subjected to the royal criticism, the delay would
be most serious, that, as it was, the waste of time and the worry involved in submitting
drafts to the meticulous examination of Prince Albert was almost too much for an
overworked Minister, and that, as a matter of fact, the postponement of important
decisions owing to this cause had already produced very unpleasant diplomatic
consequences. These excuses would have impressed Lord John more favourably if he had not
himself had to suffer from a similar neglect. As often as not Palmerston failed to
communicate even to him the most important despatches. The Foreign Secretary was becoming
an almost independent power, acting on his own initiative, and swaying the policy of
England on his own responsibility. On one occasion, in 1847, he had actually been upon the
point of threatening to break off diplomatic relations with France without consulting
either the Cabinet or the Prime Minister. And such incidents were constantly recurring.
When this became known to the Prince, he saw that his opportunity had come. If he could
only drive in to the utmost the wedge between the two statesmen, if he could only secure
the alliance of Lord John, then the suppression or the removal of Lord Palmerston would be
almost certain to follow. He set about the business with all the pertinacity of his
nature. Both he and the Queen put every kind of pressure upon the Prime Minister. They
wrote, they harangued, they relapsed into awful silence. It occurred to them that Lord
Clarendon, an important member of the Cabinet, would be a useful channel for their griefs.
They commanded him to dine at the Palace, and, directly the meal was over, "the
Queen," as he described it afterwards, "exploded, and went with the utmost
vehemence and bitterness into the whole of Palmerston's conduct, all the effects produced
all over the world, and all her own feelings and sentiments about it." When she had
finished, the Prince took up the tale, with less excitement, but with equal force. Lord
Clarendon found himself in an awkward situation; he disliked Palmerston's policy, but he
was his colleague, and he disapproved of the attitude of his royal hosts. In his opinion,
they were "wrong in wishing that courtiers rather than Ministers should conduct the
affairs of the country," and he thought that they "laboured under the curious
mistake that the Foreign Office was their peculiar department, and that they had the right
to control, if not to direct, the foreign policy of England." He, therefore, with
extreme politeness, gave it to be understood that he would not commit himself in any way.
But Lord John, in reality, needed no pressure. Attacked by his Sovereign, ignored by his
Foreign Secretary, he led a miserable life. With the advent of the dreadful
Schleswig-Holstein question—the most complex in the whole diplomatic history of
Europe—his position, crushed between the upper and the nether mill-stones, grew
positively unbearable. He became anxious above all things to get Palmerston out of the
Foreign Office. But then—supposing Palmerston refused to go?
In a memorandum made by the Prince, at about this time, of an interview
between himself, the Queen, and the Prime Minister, we catch a curious glimpse of the
states of mind of those three high personages—the anxiety and irritation of Lord
John, the vehement acrimony of Victoria, and the reasonable animosity of Albert—drawn
together, as it were, under the shadow of an unseen Presence, the cause of that celestial
anger—the gay, portentous Palmerston. At one point in the conversation Lord John
observed that he believed the Foreign Secretary would consent to a change of offices; Lord
Palmerston, he said, realised that he had lost the Queen's confidence—though only on
public, and not on personal, grounds. But on that, the Prince noted, "the Queen
interrupted Lord John by remarking that she distrusted him on personal grounds
also, but I remarked that Lord Palmerston had so far at least seen rightly; that he had
become disagreeable to the Queen, not on account of his person, but of his political
doings—to which the Queen assented." Then the Prince suggested that there was a
danger of the Cabinet breaking up, and of Lord Palmerston returning to office as Prime
Minister. But on that point Lord John was reassuring: he "thought Lord Palmerston too
old to do much in the future (having passed his sixty-fifth year)." Eventually it was
decided that nothing could be done for the present, but that the utmost secrecy
must be observed; and so the conclave ended.
At last, in 1850, deliverance seemed to be at hand. There were signs
that the public were growing weary of the alarums and excursions of Palmerston's
diplomacy; and when his support of Don Pacifico, a British subject, in a quarrel with the
Greek Government, seemed to be upon the point of involving the country in a war not only
with Greece but also with France, and possibly with Russia into the bargain, a heavy cloud
of distrust and displeasure appeared to be gathering and about to burst over his head. A
motion directed against him in the House of Lords was passed by a substantial majority.
The question was next to be discussed in the House of Commons, where another adverse vote
was not improbable, and would seal the doom of the Minister. Palmerston received the
attack with complete nonchalance, and then, at the last possible moment, he struck. In a
speech of over four hours, in which exposition, invective, argument, declamation, plain
talk and resounding eloquence were mingled together with consummate art and extraordinary
felicity, he annihilated his enemies. The hostile motion was defeated, and Palmerston was
once more the hero of the hour. Simultaneously, Atropos herself conspired to favour him.
Sir Robert Peel was thrown from his horse and killed. By this tragic chance, Palmerston
saw the one rival great enough to cope with him removed from his path. He judged—and
judged rightly—that he was the most popular man in England; and when Lord John
revived the project of his exchanging the Foreign Office for some other position in the
Cabinet, he absolutely refused to stir.
Great was the disappointment of Albert; great was the indignation of
Victoria. "The House of Commons," she wrote, "is becoming very unmanageable
and troublesome." The Prince, perceiving that Palmerston was more firmly fixed in the
saddle than ever, decided that something drastic must be done. Five months before, the
prescient Baron had drawn up, in case of emergency, a memorandum, which had been carefully
docketed, and placed in a pigeon-hole ready to hand. The emergency had now arisen, and the
memorandum must be used. The Queen copied out the words of Stockmar, and sent them to the
Prime Minister, requesting him to show her letter to Palmerston. "She thinks it
right," she wrote, "in order to prevent any mistake for the future,
shortly to explain what she expects from her foreign secretary.
She requires: (1) That he will distinctly state what he proposes in a given case, in order
that the Queen may know as distinctly to what she has given her Royal sanction;
(2) Having once given her sanction to a measure, that it be not arbitrarily
altered or modified by the Minister; such an act she must consider as failing in sincerity
towards the Crown, and justly to be visited by the exercise of her Constitutional right of
dismissing that Minister." Lord John Russell did as he was bid, and forwarded the
Queen's letter to Lord Palmerston. This transaction, which was of grave constitutional
significance, was entirely unknown to the outside world.
If Palmerston had been a sensitive man, he would probably have resigned
on the receipt of the Queen's missive. But he was far from sensitive; he loved power, and
his power was greater than ever; an unerring instinct told him that this was not the time
to go. Nevertheless, he was seriously perturbed. He understood at last that he was
struggling with a formidable adversary, whose skill and strength, unless they were
mollified, might do irreparable injury to his career. He therefore wrote to Lord John,
briefly acquiescing in the Queen's requirements—"I have taken a copy of this
memorandum of the Queen and will not fail to attend to the directions which it
contains"—and at the same time, he asked for an interview with the Prince.
Albert at once summoned him to the Palace, and was astonished to observe, as he noted in a
memorandum, that when Palmerston entered the room "he was very much agitated, shook,
and had tears in his eyes, so as quite to move me, who never under any circumstances had
known him otherwise than with a bland smile on his face." The old statesman was
profuse in protestations and excuses; the young one was coldly polite. At last, after a
long and inconclusive conversation, the Prince, drawing himself up, said that, in order to
give Lord Palmerston "an example of what the Queen wanted," he would "ask
him a question point-blank." Lord Palmerston waited in respectful silence, while the
Prince proceeded as follows: "You are aware that the Queen has objected to the
Protocol about Schleswig, and of the grounds on which she has done so. Her opinion has
been overruled, the Protocol stating the desire of the Great Powers to see the integrity
of the Danish monarchy preserved has been signed, and upon this the King of Denmark has
invaded Schleswig, where the war is raging. If Holstein is attacked also, which is likely,
the Germans will not be restrained from flying to her assistance; Russia has menaced to
interfere with arms, if the Schleswigers are successful. What will you do, if this
emergency arises (provoking most likely an European war), and which will arise very
probably when we shall be at Balmoral and Lord John in another part of Scotland? The Queen
expects from your foresight that you have contemplated this possibility, and requires a
categorical answer as to what you would do in the event supposed." Strangely enough,
to this pointblank question, the Foreign Secretary appeared to be unable to reply. The
whole matter, he said, was extremely complicated, and the contingencies mentioned by His
Royal Highness were very unlikely to arise. The Prince persisted; but it was useless; for
a full hour he struggled to extract a categorical answer, until at length Palmerston bowed
himself out of the room. Albert threw up his hands in shocked amazement: what could one do
with such a man?
What indeed? For, in spite of all his apologies and all his promises,
within a few weeks the incorrigible reprobate was at his tricks again. The Austrian
General Haynau, notorious as a rigorous suppressor of rebellion in Hungary and Italy, and
in particular as a flogger of women, came to England and took it into his head to pay a
visit to Messrs. Barclay and Perkins's brewery. The features of "General Hyena,"
as he was everywhere called—his grim thin face, his enormous pepper-and-salt
moustaches—had gained a horrid celebrity; and it so happened that among the clerks at
the brewery there was a refugee from Vienna, who had given his fellow-workers a first-hand
account of the General's characteristics. The Austrian Ambassador, scenting danger, begged
his friend not to appear in public, or, if he must do so, to cut off his moustaches first.
But the General would take no advice. He went to the brewery, was immediately recognised,
surrounded by a crowd of angry draymen, pushed about, shouted at, punched in the ribs, and
pulled by the moustaches until, bolting down an alley with the mob at his heels
brandishing brooms and roaring "Hyena!" he managed to take refuge in a public
house, whence he was removed under the protection of several policemen. The Austrian
Government was angry and demanded explanations. Palmerston, who, of course, was privately
delighted by the incident, replied regretting what had occurred, but adding that in his
opinion the General had "evinced a want of propriety in coming to England at the
present moment;" and he delivered his note to the Ambassador without having
previously submitted it to the Queen or to the Prime Minister. Naturally, when this was
discovered, there was a serious storm. The Prince was especially indignant; the conduct of
the draymen he regarded, with disgust and alarm, as "a slight foretaste of what an
unregulated mass of illiterate people is capable;" and Palmerston was requested by
Lord John to withdraw his note, and to substitute for it another from which all censure of
the General had been omitted. On this the Foreign Secretary threatened resignation, but
the Prime Minister was firm. For a moment the royal hopes rose high, only to be dashed to
the ground again by the cruel compliance of the enemy. Palmerston, suddenly lamblike,
agreed to everything; the note was withdrawn and altered, and peace was patched up once
more.
It lasted for a year, and then, in October, 1851, the arrival of
Kossuth in England brought on another crisis. Palmerston's desire to receive the Hungarian
patriot at his house in London was vetoed by Lord John; once more there was a sharp
struggle; once more Palmerston, after threatening resignation, yielded. But still the
insubordinate man could not keep quiet. A few weeks later a deputation of Radicals from
Finsbury and Islington waited on him at the Foreign Office and presented him with an
address, in which the Emperors of Austria and Russia were stigmatised as "odious and
detestable assassins" and "merciless tyrants and despots." The Foreign
Secretary in his reply, while mildly deprecating these expressions, allowed his real
sentiments to appear with a most undiplomatic insouciance There was an immediate scandal,
and the Court flowed over with rage and vituperation. "I think," said the Baron,
"the man has been for some time insane." Victoria, in an agitated letter, urged
Lord John to assert his authority. But Lord John perceived that on this matter the Foreign
Secretary had the support of public opinion, and he judged it wiser to bide his time.
He had not long to wait. The culmination of the long series of
conflicts, threats, and exacerbations came before the year was out. On December 2, Louis
Napoleon's coup d'etat took place in Paris; and on the following day Palmerston, without
consulting anybody, expressed in a conversation with the French Ambassador his approval of
Napoleon's act. Two days later, he was instructed by the Prime Minister, in accordance
with a letter from the Queen, that it was the policy of the English Government to maintain
an attitude of strict neutrality towards the affairs of France. Nevertheless, in an
official despatch to the British Ambassador in Paris, he repeated the approval of the coup
d'etat which he had already given verbally to the French Ambassador in London. This
despatch was submitted neither to the Queen nor to the Prime Minister. Lord John's
patience, as he himself said, "was drained to the last drop." He dismissed Lord
Palmerston.
Victoria was in ecstasies; and Albert knew that the triumph was his
even more than Lord John's. It was his wish that Lord Granville, a young man whom he
believed to be pliant to his influence, should be Palmerston's successor; and Lord
Granville was appointed. Henceforward, it seemed that the Prince would have his way in
foreign affairs. After years of struggle and mortification, success greeted him on every
hand. In his family, he was an adored master; in the country, the Great Exhibition had
brought him respect and glory; and now in the secret seats of power he had gained a new
supremacy. He had wrestled with the terrible Lord Palmerston, the embodiment of all that
was most hostile to him in the spirit of England, and his redoubtable opponent had been
overthrown. Was England herself at his feet? It might be so; and yet... it is said that
the sons of England have a certain tiresome quality: they never know when they are beaten.
It was odd, but Palmerston was positively still jaunty. Was it possible? Could he believe,
in his blind arrogance, that even his ignominious dismissal from office was something that
could be brushed aside?
III
The Prince's triumph was short-lived. A few weeks later, owing to
Palmerston's influence, the Government was defeated in the House, and Lord John resigned.
Then, after a short interval, a coalition between the Whigs and the followers of Peel came
into power, under the premiership of Lord Aberdeen. Once more, Palmerston was in the
Cabinet. It was true that he did not return to the Foreign Office; that was something to
the good; in the Home Department it might be hoped that his activities would be less
dangerous and disagreeable. But the Foreign Secretary was no longer the complacent
Granville; and in Lord Clarendon the Prince knew that he had a Minister to deal with, who,
discreet and courteous as he was, had a mind of his own. These changes, however, were
merely the preliminaries of a far more serious development.
Events, on every side, were moving towards a catastrophe. Suddenly the
nation found itself under the awful shadow of imminent war. For several months, amid the
shifting mysteries of diplomacy and the perplexed agitations of politics, the issue grew
more doubtful and more dark, while the national temper was strained to the breaking-point.
At the very crisis of the long and ominous negotiations, it was announced that Lord
Palmerston had resigned. Then the pent-up fury of the people burst forth. They had felt
that in the terrible complexity of events they were being guided by weak and embarrassed
counsels; but they had been reassured by the knowledge that at the centre of power there
was one man with strength, with courage, with determination, in whom they could put their
trust. They now learnt that that man was no longer among their leaders. Why? In their
rage, anxiety, and nervous exhaustion, they looked round desperately for some hidden and
horrible explanation of what had occurred. They suspected plots, they smelt treachery in
the air. It was easy to guess the object upon which their frenzy would vent itself. Was
there not a foreigner in the highest of high places, a foreigner whose hostility to their
own adored champion was unrelenting and unconcealed? The moment that Palmerston's
resignation was known, there was a universal outcry and an extraordinary tempest of anger
and hatred burst, with unparalleled violence, upon the head of the Prince.
It was everywhere asserted and believed that the Queen's husband was a
traitor to the country, that he was a tool of the Russian Court, that in obedience to
Russian influences he had forced Palmerston out of the Government, and that he was
directing the foreign policy of England in the interests of England's enemies. For many
weeks these accusations filled the whole of the press; repeated at public meetings,
elaborated in private talk, they flew over the country, growing every moment more extreme
and more improbable. While respectable newspapers thundered out their grave invectives,
halfpenny broadsides, hawked through the streets of London, re-echoed in doggerel
vulgarity the same sentiments and the same suspicions.(4)
At last the wildest rumours began to spread.
In January, 1854, it was whispered that the Prince had been seized,
that he had been found guilty of high treason, that he was to be committed to the Tower.
The Queen herself, some declared, had been arrested, and large crowds actually collected
round the Tower to watch the incarceration of the royal miscreants.(5)
These fantastic hallucinations, the result of the fevered atmosphere of
approaching war, were devoid of any basis in actual fact. Palmerston's resignation had
been in all probability totally disconnected with foreign policy; it had certainly been
entirely spontaneous, and had surprised the Court as much as the nation. Nor had Albert's
influence been used in any way to favour the interests of Russia. As often happens in such
cases, the Government had been swinging backwards and forwards between two incompatible
policies—that of non-interference and that of threats supported by force—either
of which, if consistently followed, might well have had a successful and peaceful issue,
but which, mingled together, could only lead to war. Albert, with characteristic
scrupulosity, attempted to thread his way through the complicated labyrinth of European
diplomacy, and eventually was lost in the maze. But so was the whole of the Cabinet; and,
when war came, his anti-Russian feelings were quite as vehement as those of the most
bellicose of Englishmen.
Nevertheless, though the specific charges levelled against the Prince
were without foundation, there were underlying elements in the situation which explained,
if they did not justify, the popular state of mind. It was true that the Queen's husband
was a foreigner, who had been brought up in a foreign Court, was impregnated with foreign
ideas, and was closely related to a multitude of foreign princes. Clearly this, though
perhaps an unavoidable, was an undesirable, state of affairs; nor were the objections to
it merely theoretical; it had in fact produced unpleasant consequences of a serious kind.
The Prince's German proclivities were perpetually lamented by English Ministers; Lord
Palmerston, Lord Clarendon, Lord Aberdeen, all told the same tale; and it was constantly
necessary, in grave questions of national policy, to combat the prepossessions of a Court
in which German views and German sentiments held a disproportionate place. As for
Palmerston, his language on this topic was apt to be unbridled. At the height of his
annoyance over his resignation, he roundly declared that he had been made a victim to
foreign intrigue. He afterwards toned down this accusation; but the mere fact that such a
suggestion from such a quarter was possible at all showed to what unfortunate consequences
Albert's foreign birth and foreign upbringing might lead.
But this was not all. A constitutional question of the most profound
importance was raised by the position of the Prince in England. His presence gave a new
prominence to an old problem—the precise definition of the functions and the powers
of the Crown. Those functions and powers had become, in effect, his; and what sort of use
was he making of them? His views as to the place of the Crown in the Constitution are
easily ascertainable; for they were Stockmar's; and it happens that we possess a detailed
account of Stockmar's opinions upon the subject in a long letter addressed by him to the
Prince at the time of this very crisis, just before the outbreak of the Crimean War.
Constitutional Monarchy, according to the Baron, had suffered an eclipse since the passing
of the Reform Bill. It was now "constantly in danger of becoming a pure Ministerial
Government." The old race of Tories, who "had a direct interest in upholding the
prerogatives of the Crown," had died out; and the Whigs were "nothing but partly
conscious, partly unconscious Republicans, who stand in the same relation to the Throne as
the wolf does to the lamb." There was a rule that it was unconstitutional to
introduce "the name and person of the irresponsible Sovereign" into
parliamentary debates on constitutional matters; this was "a constitutional fiction,
which, although undoubtedly of old standing, was fraught with danger"; and the Baron
warned the Prince that "if the English Crown permit a Whig Ministry to follow this
rule in practice, without exception, you must not wonder if in a little time you find the
majority of the people impressed with the belief that the King, in the view of the law, is
nothing but a mandarin figure, which has to nod its head in assent, or shake it in denial,
as his Minister pleases." To prevent this from happening, it was of extreme
importance, said the Baron, "that no opportunity should be let slip of vindicating
the legitimate position of the Crown." "And this is not hard to do," he
added, "and can never embarrass a Minister where such straightforward loyal
personages as the Queen and the Prince are concerned." In his opinion, the very
lowest claim of the Royal Prerogative should include "a right on the part of the King
to be the permanent President of his Ministerial Council." The Sovereign ought to be
"in the position of a permanent Premier, who takes rank above the temporary head of
the Cabinet, and in matters of discipline exercises supreme authority." The Sovereign
"may even take a part in the initiation and the maturing of the Government measures;
for it would be unreasonable to expect that a king, himself as able, as accomplished, and
as patriotic as the best of his Ministers, should be prevented from making use of these
qualities at the deliberations of his Council." "The judicious exercise of this
right," concluded the Baron, "which certainly requires a master mind, would not
only be the best guarantee for Constitutional Monarchy, but would raise it to a height of
power, stability, and symmetry, which has never been attained."
Now it may be that this reading of the Constitution is a possible one,
though indeed it is hard to see how it can be made compatible with the fundamental
doctrine of ministerial responsibility. William III presided over his Council, and he was
a constitutional monarch; and it seems that Stockmar had in his mind a conception of the
Crown which would have given it a place in the Constitution analogous to that which it
filled at the time of William III. But it is clear that such a theory, which would invest
the Crown with more power than it possessed even under George III, runs counter to the
whole development of English public life since the Revolution; and the fact that it was
held by Stockmar, and instilled by him into Albert, was of very serious importance. For
there was good reason to believe not only that these doctrines were held by Albert in
theory, but that he was making a deliberate and sustained attempt to give them practical
validity. The history of the struggle between the Crown and Palmerston provided startling
evidence that this was the case. That struggle reached its culmination when, in Stockmar's
memorandum of 1850, the Queen asserted her "constitutional right" to dismiss the
Foreign Secretary if he altered a despatch which had received her sanction. The memorandum
was, in fact, a plain declaration that the Crown intended to act independently of the
Prime Minister. Lord John Russell, anxious at all costs to strengthen himself against
Palmerston, accepted the memorandum, and thereby implicitly allowed the claim of the
Crown. More than that; after the dismissal of Palmerston, among the grounds on which Lord
John justified that dismissal in the House of Commons he gave a prominent place to the
memorandum of 1850. It became apparent that the displeasure of the Sovereign might be a
reason for the removal of a powerful and popular Minister. It seemed indeed as if, under
the guidance of Stockmar and Albert, the "Constitutional Monarchy" might in very
truth be rising "to a height of power, stability, and symmetry, which had never been
attained."
But this new development in the position of the Crown, grave as it was
in itself, was rendered peculiarly disquieting by the unusual circumstances which
surrounded it. For the functions of the Crown were now, in effect, being exercised by a
person unknown to the Constitution, who wielded over the Sovereign an undefined and
unbounded influence. The fact that this person was the Sovereign's husband, while it
explained his influence and even made it inevitable, by no means diminished its strange
and momentous import. An ambiguous, prepotent figure had come to disturb the ancient,
subtle, and jealously guarded balance of the English Constitution. Such had been the
unexpected outcome of the tentative and fainthearted opening of Albert's political life.
He himself made no attempt to minimise either the multiplicity or the significance of the
functions he performed. He considered that it was his duty, he told the Duke of Wellington
in 1850, to "sink his own individual existence in that of his
wife—assume no separate responsibility before the public, but make his position
entirely a part of hers—fill up every gap which, as a woman, she would naturally
leave in the exercise of her regal functions—continually and anxiously watch every
part of the public business, in order to be able to advise and assist her at any moment in
any of the multifarious and difficult questions or duties brought before her, sometimes
international, sometimes political, or social, or personal. As the natural head of her
family, superintendent of her household, manager of her private affairs, sole confidential
adviser in politics, and only assistant in her communications with the officers of the
Government, he is, besides, the husband of the Queen, the tutor of the royal children, the
private secretary of the Sovereign, and her permanent minister." Stockmar's pupil had
assuredly gone far and learnt well. Stockmar's pupil!—precisely; the public,
painfully aware of Albert's predominance, had grown, too, uneasily conscious that
Victoria's master had a master of his own. Deep in the darkness the Baron loomed. Another
foreigner! Decidedly, there were elements in the situation which went far to justify the
popular alarm. A foreign Baron controlled a foreign Prince, and the foreign Prince
controlled the Crown of England. And the Crown itself was creeping forward ominously; and
when, from under its shadow, the Baron and the Prince had frowned, a great Minister,
beloved of the people, had fallen. Where was all this to end?
Within a few weeks Palmerston withdrew his resignation, and the public
frenzy subsided as quickly as it had arisen. When Parliament met, the leaders of both the
parties in both the Houses made speeches in favour of the Prince, asserting his
unimpeachable loyalty to the country and vindicating his right to advise the Sovereign in
all matters of State. Victoria was delighted. "The position of my beloved lord and
master," she told the Baron, "has been defined for once amid all and his merits
have been acknowledged on all sides most duly. There was an immense concourse of people
assembled when we went to the House of Lords, and the people were very friendly."
Immediately afterwards, the country finally plunged into the Crimean War. In the struggle
that followed, Albert's patriotism was put beyond a doubt, and the animosities of the past
were forgotten. But the war had another consequence, less gratifying to the royal couple:
it crowned the ambition of Lord Palmerston. In 1855, the man who five years before had
been pronounced by Lord John Russell to be "too old to do much in the future,"
became Prime Minister of England, and, with one short interval, remained in that position
for ten years.
______________________________
4. The Turkish war both far and near
Has played the very deuce then,
And little Al, the royal pal,
They say has turned a Russian;
Old Aberdeen, as may be seen,
Looks woeful pale and yellow,
And Old John Bull had his belly full
Of dirty Russian tallow.
Chorus: We'll send him home and make him groan,
Oh, Al! you've played the deuce then;
The German lad has acted sad
And turned tail with the Russians.
Last Monday night, all in a fright,
Al out of bed did tumble.
The German lad was raving mad,
How he did groan and grumble!
He cried to Vic, 'I've cut my stick:
To St. Petersburg go right slap.'
When Vic, 'tis said, jumped out of bed,
And wopped him with her night-cap.
From Lovely Albert! a broadside preserved at the British Museum.
5. You Jolly Turks, now go to work,
And show the Bear your power.
t'is rumoured over Britain's isle
That A—— is in the Tower;
The postmen some suspicion had,
And opened the two letters,
'Twas a pity sad the German lad
Should not have known much better!"
Lovely Albert!
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