Robert Southey

MARQUIS WELLESLEY RESIGNS OFFICE. OVERTURES OF PEACE. MURDER OF MR. PERCEVAL. NEGOTIATIONS FOR FORMING A NEW ADMINISTRATION. SIR ROWLAND HILL’S SUCCESS AT ALMARAZ. BATTLE OF SALAMANCA.

The year which had commenced thus auspiciously for the British arms was distinguished also by important events both at home and on the continent, ... events which materially affected the conduct and the issue of ?Marquis Wellesley resigns office.? the war. Early in the year Marquis Wellesley resigned the seals of his office: he could not prevail upon his colleagues in the cabinet to place such means at the disposal of Lord Wellington as might enable him to follow up his advantages with every human certainty of complete success; and he was impatient of continuing in a subordinate station to Mr. Perceval, whom he seems to have estimated far below the standard of his worth. The seals were put into the Earl of Liverpool’s hands till a successor should be appointed. ?Restrictions on the Regency expire.
Feb. 13.? At this time the restrictions on the Regency were about to expire, and the Prince addressed a letter to his brother the Duke of York, saying how much it would gratify him if some of those persons with whom the habits of his public life had been formed would strengthen his hands and constitute a part of his government; and authorizing him to communicate his wishes to Lord Grey, who would make them known to Lord Grenville. “The national faith,” said the Prince, “has been preserved inviolate towards our allies; and if character is strength, as applied to a nation, the increased and increasing reputation of his Majesty’s arms will show to the nations of the continent how much they may still achieve when animated by a glorious spirit of resistance to a foreign yoke. In the critical situation of the war in the Peninsula, I shall be most anxious to avoid any measure which can lead my allies to suppose that I mean to depart from the present system. Perseverance alone can achieve the great object in question; and I cannot withhold my approbation from those who have honourably distinguished themselves in the support of it. I have no predilections to indulge, ... no resentments to gratify, ... no objects to attain but such as are common to the whole empire.”

It was not likely that this communication to the two joint leaders of the Opposition would bring them to act in concert with Mr. Perceval, whom having tried and proved, the Prince would not now have abandoned. Earl Grey had said in the debate on the address, “he should feel unhappy if he departed from that House without declaring that he retained all the opinions which he before held on subjects of great magnitude, ... opinions confirmed by experience and the evidence of facts, ... opinions which he should ever be ready to maintain and defend, the system that had been adopted having been, in fact, the source of almost all our present and impending calamities.” Lord Grenville’s language on the same occasion had been to the same purport: “The framers of the Prince Regent’s speech,” he said, “were the very men who by their obstinate blindness had brought the country to the brink of ruin, and who, in the midst of the distresses they themselves had occasioned, still held the same flattering and fallacious language. He would protest against a continuance of those measures which had brought such calamities on the country, ... calamities so real and momentous, that they must soon press themselves with irresistible force on their lordships’ attention, whether or not they were willing to give them the consideration they deserved. People might choose to close their eyes, but the force of truth must dispel the wilful blindness; they might choose to shut their ears, but the voice of a suffering nation must sooner or later be heard. He still retained his objections to every part of the system which he had so often condemned; he still deprecated that wanton waste of money and of all the public resources, when it was more necessary than ever to husband them with the most provident care.”

The two lords framed their reply to the Duke of York’s communication in conformity with these declared opinions: “No sacrifice,” they said, “except those of honour and duty, could appear to us too great to be made, for the purpose of healing the divisions of our country, and uniting both its government and its people. All personal exclusion we entirely disclaim; we rest on public measures; and it is on this ground alone that we must express, without reserve, the impossibility of our uniting with the present government. Our differences of opinion are too many and too important to admit of such an union: ... they embrace almost all the leading features of the present policy of the empire.” Then touching upon the state of Ireland, “We are firmly persuaded,” they said, “of the necessity of a total change in the present system of government in that country.”

The great body of the nation dreaded at this time nothing so much as any change in the ministry which would bring the despondents into office; they therefore regarded this refusal of the Prince Regent’s overture with the greatest satisfaction; but it gave offence to others of that party, who looked upon themselves with some reason as having been included in the overtures, and were of opinion that they ought to have been consulted before such an answer was returned; there might have been a distribution of loaves and fishes; and though the two lords were not hungry, they were: ... this ?March.? the public learned from their complaints. The seals of the foreign department were now accepted by Lord Castlereagh, who while out of office, instead of entering into opposition, had supported the measures of a cabinet whose general course of policy he approved, and in whom the ministry, if they gained little accession of strength in public opinion, obtained an active and useful colleague, on whose intrepidity and honour and straightforward integrity they could rely.

Lord Boringdon, however, thought proper to move in the House of Lords for an address to the Prince Regent, requesting that he would endeavour to form a cabinet which might effectually call forth the resources of the empire. “The motion was founded,” he said, “on his deep sense of the alarming evils which threatened the safety of the nation, and on the imperative necessity of obtaining an efficient administration capable of averting them; ... for the darkest and most gloomy prospects now surrounded us; dangers were pressing upon us on every side, and at this same time the means of averting them were weakened.” The Catholic question was largely introduced in the ensuing debate; a party in Parliament using that question as a means for harassing the administration, while men of worse intentions but far greater foresight employed it as an engine by which they expected to separate Ireland from England, eradicate the Protestant Church in one country, and finally subvert the constitution of the other. But the public looked with much more interest to the opinions concerning the war expressed by those who, notwithstanding their late refusal of office, were supposed to be expectant of it; and upon this point Earl Grey’s sentiments seemed to have undergone some modification. “Certainly,” he said, “he was not prepared to affirm that it was expedient to recall our troops immediately home, but certainly he did not wish to proceed in that expensive mode of warfare without having some military authority as to the result of it. He ?Speech of Earl Grey.? thought, and most decidedly, that a reduction of our expenditure was called for by reflections of the most urgent and powerful kind, ... but if any thing like a certainty of success could be shown in the schemes that were devised, then all his hesitations would be removed, and he should consider even the most extensive scale of foreign operations as recommended by the principles of economy itself. He felt warmly the justice of that cause which we were maintaining in the Peninsula. No cause related in the annals of mankind ever rested more entirely on sentiments of the most honourable feeling, or was more connected (if circumstances were favourable) with principles of national advantage. The spectacle exhibited was the most interesting that could engage the sympathies or the attention of the world; and it was impossible not to wish to afford assistance to the noble struggle of a free people, against the most unparalleled treachery, the most atrocious violence, that ever stained or degraded the ambition of despotic power. But those principles upon which the prosecution of that war could be defended must be reduced to a mere speculative theory, unless supported by adequate exertions from the Spanish people and the Spanish government. Without that necessary co-operation, all our efforts must prove useless. The success of our arms during the last two years had been called complete: he could coincide in no such declaration, knowing, as every other man knew, that the defence of Portugal must be impracticable after Spain should be entirely subdued. We had unquestionably achieved much, and in the capture of Cuidad Rodrigo he concurred in the admiration justly due to the great commander who conducted that important enterprise. But when he looked to another part of that kingdom, and saw Badajoz in possession of the enemy, ... when he looked to Catalonia, Valencia, Murcia, ... he was at a loss to discover what new prospects of success had dawned upon the Spaniards. Those conquests opened to the enemy a free communication between all their divisions, and they would soon be enabled by that circumstance to bring the whole weight of their united forces against the British. He did think, too, that ministers had been culpably negligent in not having exerted in that quarter the means actually in their power, by employing a considerable naval force for the purpose of lending our allies more effectual succour. Such a system, if properly conducted, would in all probability have enabled the Catalans to expel their invaders. Where then were the symptoms of this boasted success? Lord Wellington, at the head of 62,000 as effective men as were ever led into the field, had been compelled to remain on the defensive! With a force greater than that commanded by the Duke of Marlborough at the most splendid era of our military history, Lord Wellington had found himself limited to the pursuit of a defensive system!”

Lord Boringdon’s motion met with little support, and the tidings of Lord Wellington’s success at Badajoz contributed to confirm the confidence which the great majority of the public felt in the existing administration. The fall of that fortress was so decisive a proof of British enterprise and courage, that Buonaparte would not allow it to be mentioned in the French newspapers; and under his vigilant despotism the French people could know nothing more of public affairs than he thought proper to communicate. At this time he was preparing for an expedition upon a greater scale than any which he had before undertaken, and to a greater distance than he had yet advanced in his career of conquest. An overture for peace to the British Government, upon grounds which he knew to be inadmissible, served now, as on former occasions, for a prelude to this new drama of his ambition. “His Majesty the Emperor,” the Duc de Bassano said in a ?April 17.? communication to Lord Castlereagh, “being constantly actuated by sentiments friendly to moderation and peace, and moved by the awful circumstances in which the world is at present placed, is pleased again to make a solemn and sincere attempt for putting an end to the miseries of war. Many changes have taken place in Europe during the last ten years, which have been the necessary consequence of the war between France and England, and many more changes will be effected by the same cause. The particular character which the war has assumed may add to the extent and duration of these results. Exclusive and arbitrary principles cannot be combated but by an opposition without measure or end; and the system of preservation and resistance must have the same character of universality, perseverance, and vigour. This might have been prevented if the peace of Amiens had been observed.” Having referred then to the overtures which Buonaparte had made in the years 1805, 1808 and 1810, the French minister proceeded thus: ... “I will express myself, Sir, in a manner which your excellency will find conformable to the sincerity of the step that I am authorized to take; and nothing will better evince the sincerity and sublimity of it than the precise terms of the language which I have been instructed to use. What motives should induce me to envelope myself in formalities suitable to weakness, which alone can find its interest in deceit?... The affairs of the Peninsula and of the Two Sicilies are the points of difference which appear least to admit of being adjusted.... I am authorized to propose an arrangement of them on the following basis: ... The integrity of Spain shall be guaranteed. France shall renounce all intention of extending her dominions beyond the Pyrenees. The present dynasty shall be declared independent, and Spain shall be governed by a national constitution of her Cortes. The independence and integrity of Portugal shall also be guaranteed, and the house of Braganza shall have the sovereign authority. The kingdom of Naples shall remain in possession of the present monarch, and the kingdom of Sicily shall be guaranteed to the present family of Sicily. As a consequence of these stipulations, Spain, Portugal and Sicily shall be evacuated by the French and English land and naval forces. With respect to the other subjects of discussion, they may be negotiated upon this basis, that each power shall retain that of which the other could not deprive it by war. Such, Sir, are the grounds of conciliation offered by his Majesty to his Royal Highness the Prince Regent. His Majesty, the Emperor and King, in taking this step, does not look either to the advantages or losses which this empire may derive from the war, if it should be prolonged: he is influenced simply by considerations of the interests of humanity, and the peace of his people. And if this fourth attempt, like those which have preceded it, should not be attended with success, France will at least have the consolation of thinking that whatever blood may yet flow, will be justly imputable to England alone.”

This overture was answered as it deserved; Lord Castlereagh was instructed, before he entered into any explanations, to ascertain the precise meaning attached by the French Government to its proposal concerning the actual dynasty and government of Spain. “If,” said he, “as His Royal Highness fears, the meaning of this proposition is, that the royal authority of Spain and the government established by the Cortes shall be recognised as residing in the brother of the head of the French Government, and the Cortes formed under his authority, not in the legitimate sovereign Ferdinand VII., and his heirs, and the extraordinary assembly of the Cortes, now invested with the power of the government in that kingdom, in his name and by his authority, I am commanded frankly and explicitly to declare, that the obligations of good faith do not permit His Royal Highness to receive a proposition for peace founded on such a basis. But if the expressions apply to the actual government of Spain, which exercises the sovereign authority in the name of Ferdinand VII., upon an assurance of your Excellency to that effect, the Prince Regent will feel himself disposed to enter into a full explanation upon the basis which has been transmitted; it being his most earnest wish to contribute, in concert with his allies, to the repose of Europe; and to bring about a peace which may be at once honourable not only for Great Britain and France, but also for those states which are in amity with each of these powers. Having made known, without reserve, the sentiments of the Prince Regent with respect to a point on which it is necessary to have a full understanding previous to any ulterior discussion, I shall adhere to the instructions of his Royal Highness, by avoiding all superfluous comment and recriminations on the accessary objects of your letter. I might, advantageously for the justification of the conduct observed by Great Britain at the different periods alluded to by your Excellency, refer to the correspondence which then took place, and to the judgment which the world has long since formed of it. As to the particular character the war has unhappily assumed, and the arbitrary principles which your Excellency conceives to have marked its progress, denying as I do, that these evils are attributable to the British Government, I at the same time can assure your Excellency, that it sincerely deplores their existence, as uselessly aggravating the calamities of war; and that its most anxious desire, whether at peace or at war with France, is to have the relations of the two countries restored to the liberal principles usually acted upon in former times.”

No answer was attempted to this unanswerable reply; and the signal success of the British arms since the commencement of the year had so far raised the public spirit, that no attempt was made in Parliament to ground upon the failure of these overtures any accusation against the ministers for wantonly prolonging the war. With a great majority in both Houses, and a still greater in the nation, with the confidence also of the Prince Regent, which was now no longer doubtful, the administration seemed, for the first time since the king’s ?Mr. Perceval murdered.
May 11.? malady, to be firmly established, when Mr. Perceval was shot through the heart, in the lobby of the House of Commons, by a madman. The murderer was a person who, having failed in some mercantile speculations at Archangel, and having been thrown into prison there, imagined himself wronged by the Russian Government, and by the British Government, because it had not taken up his cause, concerning which he had molested both governments, with repeated and groundless memorials; for the business was entirely of a private nature, in which they could not interfere. He made no attempt to escape. “My name,” he said, “is Bellingham; it is a private injury; it was a denial of justice on the part of government. I know what I have done. They have driven me to despair by telling me at the public offices that I might do my worst. I have obeyed them: I have been watching more than a fortnight for a favourable opportunity; I have done my worst, and I rejoice in the deed!” He had no personal enmity to Mr. Perceval, with whom, as it happened, he had not at any time communicated; and he would rather have had Lord Levison Gower for his victim, who, having been ambassador in Russia, ought, according to his opinion, to have interfered.

Bellingham was insane on the single point of his own imagined injuries; but his insanity was of a kind which, for the sake of society, must not be pleaded in bar of justice before an earthly tribunal. The murder was committed on a Monday, and as the sessions had commenced at the Old Bailey, he was brought to trial on the Friday, and executed on the Monday following. On this occasion, it was seen to what a degree seditious journalists, the most nefarious that ever were allowed to make a free press their engine for mischief, had succeeded in corrupting no small portion of the ignorant and deluded multitude. When he was conveyed from the House of Commons to Newgate, in a carriage ?Conduct of the populace.? and under an escort, an attempt was made to rescue him, and the soldiers were hooted. The mob which collected next day in Palace-Yard uttered the most atrocious exclamations. Before it was known that Bellingham was an object of commiseration as well as horror, he was extolled in pot-houses as a friend to the people, who had done them good service in killing a prime minister; exulting anticipations were expressed that this was but the beginning, and that more such examples would follow; healths were drunk to those members of Parliament, whose language at various times (whatever their intentions may have been) had been mischievous enough to bring upon them the stigma of such popularity: and in certain manufacturing places public rejoicings were made for the murder of a minister, who both in private and in public life was absolutely without reproach. In public life he was without fear also: this kingdom was never blest with a more intrepid nor a more upright minister; he feared God, and therefore he had no fear of man. There were persons who upon his elevation alluded to the Knight of the Round Table, from whom his family derive their descent, and said that Sir Perceval was not the man who could sit in the “Siege Perilous.” That seat, however, he took, and filled it worthily; and like his ancestor in the romance, he was qualified to do this by the purity as well as by the strength of his character. A sense of religious duty was the key-stone which crowned his virtues and his talents, and kept them firm.

A grant of £50,000 for the twelve children of Mr. Perceval was voted by Parliament, with a pension of £2000 to his widow, and to the eldest son, whose reversion was subsequently commuted for one of those sinecures, against which, if they were always thus properly bestowed, no voice would be raised. The loss of the murdered minister was thus repaired to his family, as far as it was reparable; but how was his place in the ?Overtures from the ministry to M. Wellesley and Mr. Canning.
May 17.? cabinet to be supplied? Overtures were made to Mr. Canning and Marquis Wellesley, as persons who were understood to act in unison, and who in their views of foreign policy differed in no respect from the existing ministers. They were informed that the Prince naturally looked to them, because he was desirous of continuing his administration upon its present basis, and also of strengthening it as much as possible by associating to it such persons in public life as agreed most nearly and generally in the principles upon which public affairs had been conducted. Lord Liverpool, by whom this communication was made, stated that his colleagues wished him to be appointed First Lord of the Treasury, and that their wish was known to the Prince, when His Royal Highness charged him with this negotiation; he added also, that Lord Castlereagh was to retain his office, and act as leader in the House of Commons.

It is probable that Mr. Canning was offended at this latter intimation, though he manifested no such displeasure: it is probable that he thought himself disparaged when that part of the business of the House of Commons for which he could not but be conscious that he was pre-eminently qualified, was assigned to a person who was in oratorical powers greatly his inferior. Marquis Wellesley may also be supposed to have felt a kindred disappointment; he could number few followers in Parliament, but he had other friends, who for some time had been endeavouring with more zeal and activity than discretion, to persuade the nation that he was the only statesman capable of conducting the government at a crisis when the interests of all Europe were at stake. But in this, though they appealed to his vigorous and splendid administration in India, they altogether failed. No doubt was entertained of his surpassing abilities, nor of his comprehensive views, nor of the energy with which he was capable of acting upon them. But that was wanting on which the British people in the healthy and natural state of public feeling were accustomed to rely; he had to a certain degree their admiration, but not their confidence. And while his merits as an Indian governor were understood by those only who were conversant with Indian affairs, the villanous calumnies with which he had been assailed for his conduct in that distant country were more widely known, and were moreover fresher in remembrance.

He gained no ground in public opinion by his conduct in the negotiation. The difference upon the Roman Catholic question between himself and the cabinet which he was invited to join, “was of the utmost importance,” he said, “and would alone compel him to decline the proposition.” But that question, though in its consequences more mischievous than any by which these kingdoms have been agitated since the Restoration, was of no pressing importance at that time, nor could all the arts and efforts of those who promoted it induce the nation to think it so. He asked also, whether all those persons designated by the name of the opposition were to be excluded from the proposed scheme of administration; “an inquiry which,” he said, “originated in his sincere conviction (founded upon an attentive observation of the general state of public opinion, and of the condition of the empire) that no administration which should not comprise some of those persons, could prove advantageous to the Prince Regent, conciliatory towards Ireland, and equal to the conduct of the war, on a scale of sufficient extent.” Marquis Wellesley must have been strangely deceived when he supposed that public opinion supported him in this notion: and it is even more remarkable that he should have expected those persons to co-operate with him in his vigorous plans for prosecuting the war, knowing as he did, that from the beginning they had considered it as hopeless, and had not less repeatedly than confidently predicted its total failure. Farther, the Marquis stated that the considerations which had induced him to resign office had since acquired additional force, and would constitute an insuperable obstacle to his acceptance of any station in the present administration. He had withdrawn from Mr. Perceval’s because his general opinions on various important questions had not sufficient weight in that cabinet to justify him towards the public, or towards his own character in continuing in office. “My objection,” said he, “to remaining in that cabinet arose, in a great degree, from the imperfect scale on which the efforts in the Peninsula were conducted. It was always stated to me that it was impracticable to enlarge that system. I thought it was perfectly practicable; and that it was neither safe nor honest towards this country or the allies to continue the present inadequate scheme. Since my resignation it has been found practicable to make some extension; but it is still intimated, that my views are more extensive than the resources of the country can enable the government to reduce to practice. I, however, still entertain the same views and opinions, without diminution or alteration; and I am convinced that a considerable extension of the scale of our operations in the Peninsula, and also an effectual correction of many branches of our system in that quarter, are objects of indispensable necessity and of easy attainment. With such a decided difference of opinion in relation to the conduct and management of the war, my return into a cabinet composed as the present is, would offer to me no better prospect than the renewal of discussions which have hitherto proved unavailing.”

Mr. Canning rested his refusal of office solely upon the Catholic question: “To accept it,” he said, “would be to lend himself to the defeating of his own declared opinions on that most important question; opinions which were as far as those of any man from being favourable to precipitate an unqualified concession. But by entering into the administration while all consideration of that question was to be resisted, I should incur,” said he, “such a loss of personal and public character as would disappoint the object which His Royal Highness the Prince Regent has at heart, and must render my accession to his government a new source of weakness rather than an addition of strength.” Lord Liverpool had stated to Mr. Canning, that Lord Castlereagh had from motives of delicacy absented himself from the cabinet when the grounds on which the overture was to be made were discussed; and that he would be no obstacle in the way of arrangement. This was consistent with the manliness and generosity of Lord Castlereagh’s character, and it was received in a corresponding spirit by Mr. Canning. “After the expressions,” said he to Lord Liverpool, “with which you were charged on the part of all your colleagues, I should not be warranted in omitting to declare that no objection of a personal sort should have prevented me from uniting with any or all of them, if I could have done so with honour.... I cannot deny myself the satisfaction of adding, that the manner of your communication with us has entirely corresponded with the habits and sentiments of a friendship of so many years; a friendship which our general concurrence on many great political principles has strengthened, and which our occasional differences have in no degree impaired.”

If the failure of this overture disappointed the hopes which ministers had reasonably entertained of strengthening themselves by the accession of the two persons who were most in accord with them upon all points of foreign policy, it had no tendency to widen their differences; but just as it terminated, a statement of the causes which had induced Marquess Wellesley to resign found its way into the newspapers through the indiscretion of some of his friends. It spoke in no measured terms of his late colleagues: in his judgment, it was said, the cabinet neither possessed ability and knowledge to devise a good plan, nor temper and discernment to adopt what was recommended to them: ... it said also that Marquis Wellesley could not pay any deference to Mr. Perceval’s judgment and attainments without injury to the public service: that if his own opinions had been adopted, he might have been willing to have served with him, but would never have consented to serve under him in any circumstances: that he had offered to act under Earl Moira or Lord Holland, and made no exception to any person as prime minister but Mr. Perceval, whom he considered incompetent to fill that office, although sufficiently qualified for inferior stations. The publication of this statement would have been indiscreet at any time; but being published a few days only after the murder of Mr. Perceval, it excited a strong feeling of displeasure. Just at this juncture, Mr. Stuart Wortley ?Mr. Stuart Wortley’s motion.? moved in the House of Commons, that an address should be presented to the Prince, praying him to take measures for forming a strong and efficient government. This ill-judged motion was carried by a small majority; and the Prince in consequence sent for Marquis Wellesley, and desired him to form a plan of an administration. The Marquis requested Mr. Canning, as the channel which might be ?May 23.
M. Wellesley charged to form an administration.? most agreeable to Lord Liverpool, to inquire whether he and all or any of his colleagues would form part of a ministry constituted upon the principles of taking the Catholic question into early consideration, with a view to its final and satisfactory settlement, and of prosecuting the war in the Peninsula with the best means of the country. There was the strongest wish, it was added, to comprehend in the arrangement, without any individual or party exclusion whatever, as many as possible of such persons as might be able to agree in giving their public service to the country upon these two principles. With regard to the distribution of offices nothing was stipulated; every thing, therefore, was open to be arranged ?The ministers refuse to act with him.? to the honour and satisfaction of all parties. An immediate answer was returned by Lord Liverpool, for himself and his colleagues, saying, that it was not necessary for them to enter into any discussion of the two principles, because they all felt themselves bound, particularly after what had recently passed, to decline the proposal of becoming members of an administration to be formed by Marquis Wellesley.

Marquis Wellesley made a similar communication to Lords Grey and Grenville, and through them to their friends, observing, that he neither claimed nor desired for himself any place in the new arrangement, looking upon himself merely as the instrument of executing the Prince’s commands in this instance. Lords Grey and Grenville professed in reply, that they felt it to be the duty of all public men at such a moment; both by frank and conciliatory explanations of principle, and by the total abandonment of every personal object, to facilitate the means of giving effect to the late vote of the House of Commons, and of averting the imminent and unparalleled dangers of the country. They cordially agreed with him upon the Catholic question. As to the second point, “No person,” they said, “feels more strongly than we do the advantages which would result from a successful termination of the present contest in Spain; but we are of opinion, that the direction of military operations in an extensive war, and the more or less vigorous prosecution of those operations, are questions not of principle but of policy; to be regulated by circumstances in their nature temporary and fluctuating, and in many cases known only to persons in official stations; by the engagements of the country, the prospect of ultimate success, the extent of the exertions necessary for its attainment, and the means of supporting those efforts without too great a pressure on the finances and internal prosperity of the country. On such questions, therefore, no public men, either in or out of office, can undertake for more than a deliberate and dispassionate consideration, according to the circumstances of the case as it may appear, and to such means of information as may then be within their reach. But we cannot in sincerity conceal from Marquis Wellesley, that in the present state of the finances we entertain the strongest doubts of the practicability of an increase in any branch of the public expenditure.” Lords Lansdowne and Holland concurred in this answer of the two opposition leaders. Earl Moira’s reply was, “That a plan of government on the basis proposed would have his most cordial wishes; but that this declaration was not to imply any engagement on his part to accept office.” In the subsequent correspondence, Marquis Wellesley and Mr. Canning said respecting the Catholic question, that they did not conceive any farther parliamentary proceeding to be necessary or practicable that session, than such as might be sufficient to ensure, either by compulsion upon a hostile administration, or by pledge from a friendly one, the consideration of the question during the recess, with a view to its being brought before Parliament by the recommendation of the Crown early in the ensuing session.” Earl Grey replied to this, “That he should very reluctantly abandon the hope of passing a bill even during the present session for the repeal of the disabilities whereof the Catholics complained; but if this could not be done, he held it indispensable that the most distinct and authentic pledge should be given of the intention both of the executive government and of Parliament to take the matter up as one of the first measures of the next.” Touching the conduct of the war, “It is impossible,” said he, “to reduce a question of this nature to any fixed principle. Whatever we can say with our present means of information must necessarily be general and inconclusive. I can have no hesitation in subscribing to the proposition, that if it shall be found expedient to continue the exertions we are now making in the Peninsula, they should be conducted in the manner best calculated to answer their end.”

Here Marquis Wellesley’s commission ended: but the ministers considered themselves as holding office only till their successors should be appointed; and in a few days the Marquis received full authority to form an administration on the two principles which he had laid down, and he was specially instructed to communicate with Lords Grey and Grenville. The Prince signified his pleasure that Marquis Wellesley should conduct the formation of the administration in all its branches, and should be first Commissioner of the Treasury; and that Earl Moira, Lord Erskine, and Mr. Canning should be members of the cabinet. A cabinet formed on an enlarged basis must be extended to the number of twelve or thirteen members; and the Prince wished Lords Grey and Grenville to recommend four persons if it consisted of twelve, five if it should consist of thirteen; these persons to be selected by the two lords without any exception or personal exclusion, and to be appointed by His Royal Highness to such stations as might hereafter be arranged. It was added, that entire liberty had been ?The two Lords persist in their reply.
June 3.? granted to Marquis Wellesley to propose for the Prince’s approbation the names of any persons then occupying stations in His Royal Highness’s councils, or of any other persons. In reply, the two lords repeated their declaration, that no sense of the public distress and difficulty, no personal feelings of whatever description, would have prevented them from accepting with dutiful submission any situations in which they could have hoped to serve His Royal Highness usefully and honourably; “But the present proposal,” they said, “could not justify any such expectation. We are invited,” they pursued, “not to discuss with your lordship, or with any other public men, according to the usual practice in such cases, the various and important considerations, both of measures and of arrangements, which belong to the formation of a new government in all its branches; but to recommend to His Royal Highness a number, limited by previous stipulation, of persons willing to be included in a cabinet of which the outlines are already definitively arranged. To this proposal we could not accede without the sacrifice of the very object which the House of Commons has recommended, ... the formation of a strong and efficient administration.... It is to the principle of disunion and jealousy that we object; ... to the supposed balance of contending interests in a cabinet so measured out by preliminary stipulation. The times imperiously require an administration united in principle and strong in mutual reliance; possessing also the confidence of the Crown, and assured of its support in those healing measures which the public safety requires, and which are necessary to secure to the government the opinion and affections of the people. No such hope is presented to us by this project, which appears to us equally new in practice and objectionable in principle. It tends, as we think, to establish within the cabinet itself a system of counteraction inconsistent with the prosecution of any uniform and beneficial course of policy. We must therefore request permission to decline all participation in a government constituted upon such principles, satisfied as we are that the certain loss of character which must arise from it to ourselves could be productive only of disunion and weakness in the administration of the public interests.”

This called forth an explanatory letter to Earl Grey from Earl Moira, who thought that the answer of the two lords conveyed an oblique imputation upon him, as a party involved in the procedure. “You represent the proposition,” said he, “as one calculated to found a cabinet upon a principle of counteraction. When the most material of the public ?June 3.? objects which were to be the immediate ground of that cabinet’s exertion had been previously understood between the parties, I own it is difficult for me to comprehend what principle of counteraction could be introduced.... With regard to the indication of certain individuals, I can assert, that it was a measure adopted through the highest spirit of fairness to you and your friends. Mr. Canning’s name was mentioned because Marquis Wellesley would have declined office without him, and it was a frankness to apprize you of it; and Lord Erskine’s and mine were stated with a view of showing, that Marquis Wellesley, so far from having any jealousy to maintain a preponderance in the cabinet, actually left a majority to those who had been accustomed to concur upon most public questions; and he specified Lord Erskine and myself, that you might see the number submitted for your exclusive nomination was not narrowed by the necessity of advertence to us. The choice of an additional member of the cabinet left to you must prove how undistinguishable we consider our interests and yours, when this was referred to your consideration as a mere matter of convenience, the embarrassment of a numerous cabinet being well known. The reference to members of the late cabinet, or other persons, was always to be coupled with the established point, that they were such as could concur in the principles laid down as the foundation for the projected ministry; and the statement was principally dictated by the wish to show that no system of exclusion could interfere with the arrangements which the public service might demand. On the selection of those persons, I aver, the opinions of you, Lord Grenville, and the others whom you might bring forward as members of the cabinet, were to operate as fully as our own; and this was to be the case also with regard to subordinate offices. The expression that this was left to be proposed by Marquis Wellesley was intended to prove that His Royal Highness did not, even in the most indirect manner, suggest any one of those individuals. It is really impossible that the spirit of fairness can have been carried further than has been the intention in this negotiation. I therefore lament most deeply that an arrangement, so important for the interests of the country, should go off upon points which I cannot but think wide of the substance of the case.”

This frank and manly remonstrance produced no effect upon the determination of the two lords. The objections stated in their joint letter “could not,” they said, “be ?June 4.? altered by a private explanation, which, though it might lessen some obvious objections to a part of the detail, still left the general character of the proceeding unchanged. They were, however, happy to receive it as an expression of personal regard, and of that desire which they readily acknowledged in Lord Wellesley and Moira, and which was reciprocal on their own part, that no difference of opinion on the matter in question should produce on either side any personal impression which might obstruct the renewal of a conciliatory intercourse whenever a more favourable opportunity ?M. Wellesley resigns his commission.? shall be afforded for it.” Marquis Wellesley then thought it indispensably necessary for his public and private honour to declare in parliament that he had resigned the commission with which the Prince had charged him. Something he lost in public opinion through the indiscretion of his friends, which had rendered it impossible for his former colleagues ever again cordially to unite with him; something on the other hand he gained by the unavoidable comparison which was drawn between the fair and explicit straight-forwardness of his overtures to the two lords, and the captious manner in which they had been received.

Earl Moira now, after conferring with the Duke of Bedford, addressed a note to the two lords. “Venturing, as being honoured,” he said, “with the Prince Regent’s confidence to indulge his anxiety that an arrangement of the utmost importance to the country should not go off on any misunderstanding, he entreated them to advert to his explanatory letter, and desired an interview with them, if they thought the disposition expressed in that letter were likely to lead to any co-operation. Should the issue of the interview be according to his hope, he would then solicit the Prince’s permission to address them formally: the present mode he had adopted for the sake of precluding all difficulties in the outset.” The two lords replied, “That they were highly gratified by the kindness of the motive on which Earl Moira acted; that personal communication with him would always be acceptable and honourable to them, but they hoped he would be sensible that no advantage was likely to result from pursuing this subject by unauthorized discussion, and in a course different from the usual practice. Motives of obvious delicacy,” they said, “must prevent their taking any step toward determining the Prince to authorize Earl Moira to address them personally. They should always receive with dutiful submission His Royal Highness’s commands, in whatever manner and through whatever channel he might be pleased to signify them; but they could not venture to suggest to His Royal Highness, through any other person, their opinions on points on which His Royal Highness was not pleased to require their advice.”

Earl Moira reported this to the Prince, and being then provided with the required formalities, he renewed his overture, but with diminished hope. “Discouraged,” he said, “as he must be, he could not reconcile it to himself to leave any effort untried, and he had therefore adopted the principle of the two lords for an interview, though doubting whether the desired conclusion could be so well advanced by it as by the mode which he had suggested. He had now the Prince’s instructions to take steps for the formation of a ministry, and was specially authorized to address himself to Lords Grey and Grenville, with whom, therefore, in company with Lord Erskine, he requested an interview.” It was one characteristic of these remarkable negotiations, that whatever passed in conversation between the parties was minuted, and that publicity was given to those minutes and to all the notes which were interchanged ... a mode of proceeding neither prudent in itself nor as a precedent. At this meeting, what Earl Moira considered the preliminary points were satisfactorily disposed of; the two lords, it was declared, might pursue their own course of policy both with regard to Ireland and to the United States of America, and the majority which they were to have in the cabinet assured them the same preponderance upon other questions. There was, however, another preliminary which appeared to them of great importance, and which they thought it necessary to bring forward immediately, lest farther inconvenient and embarrassing delay might be produced, if this negotiation should be broken off in a more advanced state: no restriction was laid on their considering any points which they might deem useful for the Prince’s service; they asked, therefore, whether this full liberty extended to the consideration of new appointments to those great offices of the household which have usually been included in the political arrangements made on a change of administration; and they intimated their opinion, that it would be necessary to act on the same principle now. Earl Moira answered, “that the Prince had laid no restriction upon him in that respect, and had never pointed in the most distant manner at the protection of those officers from removal” but he added, “that it would be impossible for him to concur in making the exercise of this power positive and indispensable in the formation of the administration, because he should deem it on public grounds peculiarly objectionable.” To this Lords Grey and Grenville replied, “That they also acted on public grounds alone, and with no other feeling whatever than that which arose from the necessity of giving to a new government that character of efficiency and stability, and those marks of the constitutional support of the Crown, which were required for enabling it to act usefully for the public service; and that on these grounds it appeared indispensable that the connexion of the great offices of the court with the political administration should be clearly established in its first arrangement.” This decided difference having been thus expressed on both sides, the conversation ended here, with mutual declarations of regret: and here also, to the great satisfaction of the public, ended all negotiations with the two leaders of Opposition, at the very time when, but for their own marvellous mismanagement, the government would have been delivered into their hands.