UPHOLDS THE CIVIL AUTHORITY OF HIS OFFICE. 69

sary, he showed a bold front and appealed to the Cabinet. He successfully maintained that the Secretary at War always had been and continued to be actually and personally the depositary of His Majesty's pleasure as to all matters which concerned his department, and was entitled to communicate it authentically to the army and its parts.

An explanation that he wrote at this time of the historical character and position of the Secretary at War is one of the ablest papers in the War Office.

CHAPTER III.

PERCEVAL'S DEATH-PALMERSTON REMAINS IN LORD LIVERPOOL'S GOVERNMENT-SPEAKS IN FAVOUR OF CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION -POLICY AS TO COLONIES-VISIT TO FRANCE-ESCAPE FROM ASSASSINATION-CORRESPONDENCE AT HORSE GUARDS-SPEECHES IN PARLIAMENT-GENERAL POSITION-NEW PARTY FORMEDELECTION FOR CAMBRIDGE SEPARATES HIM FROM THE TORIES-CORRESPONDENCE.

OLD

A CONSIDERABLE space now intervenes in the private correspondence. Meanwhile the ministry of Perceval, which, as may be seen by one or two of the letters quoted, was but a rickety one, terminated by the melancholy death of that statesman, May 11, 1812, who was on that day shot by a man named Bellingham in the lobby of the House of Commons. The general desire produced by this event was to see a Government formed equal to the critical situation of affairs; but this desire was rendered abortive by the public and private differences existing at that time amongst leading statesmen, and the country saw with disappointment the advent of an administration under Lord Liverpool universally considered the weakest that ever undertook to hold the helm of a great state, yet which suffered less from opponents, and was more favoured by events than almost any other that has conducted the affairs of England. In this administration Lord Palmerston, having refused-before the offer was made to Mr. Peel -the Secretaryship for Ireland, maintained, without rise or fall, during fifteen years the post which he had received in 1810 from Mr. Perceval, uniting during this period the pleasures of a man of the world with the duties of a man of business. No one went more

ADVOCATES CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION.

71

into what is vulgarly termed 'fashionable society,' or attended more scrupulously to the affairs of his office; no one made better speeches on the question, whatever it was, that his place required him to speak on, or spoke less when a speech from him was not wanted. His ambition seemed confined to performing his peculiar functions with credit, without going out of the beaten track as a volunteer for distinction. To this general rule, however, there was one exception; when Mr. Grattan, in 1813, brought forward the question of Catholic Emancipation, he made an eloquent oration in support of it. Still the line he took was cautious, and eminently characteristic of his practical mind. did not assert that the State had not the right to exclude the Catholic body from participation in its affairs; a consideration for the public interests was, according to him, supreme over all other considerations; but in this case he contended that the State imperilled itself by the measures it adopted for its security.

He

'If I think,' he said, that there is no real danger in the removal of these disabilities, accompanied by such other corresponding regulations as the House may ultimately adopt, I do think there is both inconvenience and danger in the continuance of the present anomalous state of things.

'Is it wise to say to men of rank and property, who, from old lineage or present possessions, have a deep interest in the common weal, that they live in a country where, by the blessings of a free constitution, it is possible for any man, themselves only excepted, by the honest exertion of talents and industry in the avocations of political life, to make himself honoured and respected by his countrymen, and to render good service to the State;-that they alone can never be permitted to enter this career that they may, indeed, usefully employ themselves in the humbler avocations of private life, but that public service they never can perform, public honour they never shall attain? What we have lost by the continuance of this system it is not for man to know; what we might have lost can be more easily imagined. If it had unfortunately happened that, by the circumstances of birth and education, a Nelson, a Wellington, a

Burke, a Fox, or a Pitt, had belonged to this class of the community, of what honours and what glory might not the page of British history have been deprived ? To what perils and calamities might not this country have been exposed? The question is not whether we would have so large a part of the population Catholic or not. There they are, and we must deal with them as we can. It is in vain to think that by any human pressure we can stop the spring which gushes from the earth. But it is for us to consider whether we will force it to spend its strength in secret and hidden courses, undermining our fences and corrupting our soil, or whether we shall at once turn the current into the open and spacious channel of honourable and constitutional ambition, converting it into the means of national prosperity and public wealth.'

He argued in this manner; for his nature was not one that lingers over abstract rights or speculative theories: the broad fact which struck him practically, and which struck him the more forcibly, as being one of a school which considered the power and greatness of his country the main object of a statesman was, that the discontented condition of a large portion of British subjects weakened, when their contentment would strengthen, England. He saw, in the one case, Ireland, a snarling cur worrying our heels; in the other, a gallant and faithful mastiff standing by our side.

The war in the meantime took a sudden turn; light penetrated the gloom that had long obscured the prospects of Europe; the great conqueror became the conquered; and he who had refused to have his sway limited by the Rhine accepted as his empire a microscopic island in the Mediterranean. In such a position it was certain he would not long remain; but in a new struggle with fortune he was again overpowered; and in the last and fatal battle at Waterloo which decided his fate, and that of Europe, a British commander at the head of British troops had been victorious. This was a proud time for England, and the more severe and exciting labours of the Secretary at War were over. But if he had lighter work at the War Office, he had

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heavier in the House of Commons, with which it was easier to deal when the Minister who had to ask for the means to support a large army could plead we were engaged in a gigantic conflict, than when, with an army which still seemed large to those who had to pay for it, he could not pretend it was wanted for a foreign foe.

On one of these occasions (in 1816) he had to encounter Mr. Brougham, who had just been making one of those powerful but discursive harangues with which he used to overawe the Treasury bench; and one cannot but admire the readiness and courage with which the usually silent Secretary at War puts aside the arguments of a speech it would have been difficult to answer, and retorts the sarcasm of an antagonist whom most would have feared to provoke. We can see him rising, with an undisturbed and half careless air, as he says:

The honourable and learned member has made an accusation which I certainly cannot retort upon that honourable gentleman himself, namely, that he very seldom troubles the House with his observations. I, at all events, will abstain from all declamation, and from any dissertation on the Constitution, and confine myself to the business at present on hand-the Army Estimates of the current year.

It may be interesting to notice the extent and employment of our army at this period. Exclusive of the troops in India, and the army in occupation of France, the total number of men proposed in the votes was 99,000. These were divided under four heads: those stationed in Great Britain; those in Ireland; those in our old colonies, that is, the colonies we had possessed previously to the war; and those in our new colonies, which we had acquired during the progress of the It was proposed to have 25,000 troops in Great Britain; the same number in Ireland; 23,800 in our old colonies, and 22,200 in the new. Add to these 3,000, as a reserve for reliefs to the colonial garrisons.

war.

'With respect to the old colonies, the estimates provided