Chapter XXXI: Part 31

The attention of Parliament was called to one other important topic, which may be regarded as the finishing stroke to Canning's foreign policy. It will be remembered that he had always declared that any attack on Portugal would be regarded as a sufficient cause for the entrance of England into the war. The French troops still occupied Spain, and in the civil war which was continued in that country the royalists had been joined by several regiments of the Portuguese army. In spite of urgent demands and repeated promises that these deserting troops should be disbanded, they were allowed, if not encouraged, by the Spanish royalists to make inroads into constitutional Portugal. The Princess Regent applied to England for assistance; Canning at once acted vigorously according to his principles. At first the information given was not accurate, but on Friday the 8th of December precise information arrived, and Canning could triumphantly assert in the House--"On Saturday his Majesty's confidential servants came to a decision, on Sunday that decision received the sanction of his Majesty, on Monday it was submitted to both Houses of Parliament, and this day (Tuesday) on which I have the honour of addressing you the troops are on their march for embarkation." It was plain to all men that the honour of England was safe in such hands, and proof was afforded to all Europe that England had distinctly broken from her old connections; and that her sympathies were on the side of political freedom and national independence.

[Sidenote: Division in the ministry.]

[Sidenote: Illness of Lord Liverpool. Feb. 1827.]

It is not to be supposed that the changes worked by Canning and by Huskisson, and the decided preponderance of the more liberal-minded members of the Cabinet, were regarded with favour by all their colleagues. Personally distasteful to many of them because of their want of aristocratic connection, the innovating character of their policy, and their views, which were closely assimilated on most points to those of the Whigs separated them entirely from the representatives of the old Tory party. They seem to have had but one point in common--their opposition to parliamentary reform. Lord Liverpool's Government had from the first been one of compromise. One of the greatest questions of the day, which had already caused the fall of more than one ministry, had been allowed to fall from the list of Cabinet questions, and it had been agreed that Catholic emancipation should stand entirely upon its own merits. But this was a point on which men felt very keenly, and there had thus arisen a complete division in the ministry; on the one side were ranked the followers of Canning, including such men as Huskisson, Wellesley; Robinson, Sturges-Bourne, and Lord Palmerston; and on the other the high Tory or Protestant party, at the head of which was Liverpool himself, Lord Eldon, and the Duke of Wellington, and, although he was regarded as less bigoted, Peel. How great the split between the parties was is made plain not only by the strong if decorous language to be found in Lord Eldon's correspondence, but by the more outspoken expressions of Palmerston in his private letters. In the election of 1826, though himself a member of the ministry, Palmerston had been opposed at Cambridge by Goulbourn (also one of the administration), and all the influence of the Tory section had been used against him. In a letter describing the effects of that election, he says, "As to the commonplace balance between Opposition and Government, the election will have little effect upon it. The Government are as strong as any government can wish to be, as far as regards those who sit facing them; but in truth the real Opposition of the present day sit behind the Treasury bench. It is by the stupid old Tory party, who bawl out the memory and praises of Pitt, while they are opposing all the measures and principles which he held most important, it is by these that the progress of the Government in every improvement which they are attempting is thwarted and opposed. On the Catholic question, on the principles of commerce, on the corn laws, on the settlement of the currency, on the laws regulating the trade in money, on colonial slavery, on the game laws, which are intimately connected with the moral habits of the people; on all these questions, and everything like them, the Government find support from the Whigs and resistance from their self-denominated friends." While again, speaking of the foolish obstruction to the Catholic claims, he writes of his colleagues in most unmeasured terms: "I can forgive old women like the Chancellor, spoonies like Liverpool, ignoramuses like Westmoreland, old stumped-up Tories like Bathurst, but how such a man as Peel, liberal, enlightened, and fresh-minded, should find himself running in such a pack is hardly intelligible." It is plain that a Government thinking so differently on the most important topics of the day must have been near its dissolution. It was held together in fact only by the tact and personal influence of Lord Liverpool; and when, on the 17th February, the Premier was found struck with an apoplectic fit it was certain that a ministerial crisis must arise.

[Sidenote: Difficulties attending the formation of a new ministry.]

[Sidenote: Necessity of a change in the corn laws.]

The difficulty in the formation of a new permanent Government was likely to be increased by the two great questions which were expected to occupy the session. One of these was a change in the corn laws, and an attempt to bring them more into harmony with the new commercial views of Huskisson and his friends; the other the Catholic emancipation, on which already the existing Cabinet was so much divided. The constant repetition of temporary measures required by the existing state of the law, the fluctuation of prices, and the consequent suffering of the poor, proved to those who were not pledged to the interests of the landowning and agricultural party that some alteration in the arrangements with regard to corn was necessary. With much care Canning and Huskisson, although both were too ill to allow of personal communication, had arranged a joint measure, by which foreign corn might be imported free of duty, to be warehoused and admitted to the market for home consumption, regardless of the price of corn, on the payment of duties varying in accordance with a certain scale; when wheat was at seventy shillings the duty was to be one shilling, and to increase two shillings with every decrease of one shilling in price. The Bill was passed on the 12th of April, during the interval it was thought decent to allow for the possible restoration of Lord Liverpool's health. It did not come on in the Upper House till after the new Government was formed, but it was there thrown out in favour of an amendment produced by the Duke of Wellington, declaring that foreign corn should not be taken out of bond till corn had reached sixty-six shillings. The object of the Bill, which was to supply foreign corn whenever the sale of it was remunerative, was thus entirely frustrated and the Bill abandoned.

[Sidenote: Increasing importance of the Catholic question.]

It was during the same period, while the Government was in abeyance, that the Roman Catholic question was brought on. The settlement of this question in one way or other had become almost a necessity. It has been seen how Pitt was compelled, by fear of the old King's health, to give up a cause which he undoubtedly regarded as just, and how the obstinacy of George III. upon the same point had ruined Lord Grenville's ministry. During Mr. Perceval's ministry, which was formed on the avowed principle of withstanding the claims of the Catholics, the dangers attendant upon the war afforded sufficient excuse for alleging that the time was inconvenient to move so critical a question; but during the whole of that period they had, by means of an organization and the establishment of a central Catholic committee, kept their claims before the world, waiting till a favourable time should come. Lord Liverpool had found it impossible, as already stated, to form a ministry unanimous on the point, and year after year, as Bills in favour of the Catholics were introduced in the House, Castlereagh and Canning had been seen supporting them in opposition to most of their colleagues.

[Sidenote: Disturbances in Ireland.]

[Sidenote: Failure of Wellesley's administration. 1822.]

[Sidenote: Formation of the Catholic Association. 1823.]

In Ireland, meanwhile, the question had naturally become the watchword of parties, and, like every other political question in that country, had assumed a national form and was leading to a division of races. Both the Protestant Orange Lodges and the Catholic Associations of White Boys had again sprung into existence, and so great was the disorder that in 1822 the Habeas Corpus Act had been suspended. At the same time, in agreement with the uncertain and half-hearted policy of Lord Liverpool's Government, Lord Wellesley, a favourer of the Catholic claims, was made Lord-Lieutenant, and Plunkett (in whose hands the chief management of Catholic parliamentary affairs was) Attorney-General, but yoked to Mr Goulbourn, who was a strong anti-Catholic, as Chief Secretary. The hopes of the Irish, not unreasonably raised by these appointments, were disappointed. Received upon his arrival with every sign of admiration and attachment, before long Wellesley was publicly assaulted and pelted in the theatres. He had attempted, in the midst of the wild excitement of the passionate Irishmen of both parties, to follow a cool and impartial policy. His chief object was to suppress secret societies and to compel all parties to submit quietly to the law. By the use of very stringent measures, by the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, and by the Insurrection Act, which allowed him to establish where necessary something nearly equivalent to martial law, he had succeeded in weakening the secret societies and in lessening the amount of crime; he thus earned for himself the hearty dislike of the extreme Catholics. At the same time the restraint which he put upon the Orange societies and Protestant demonstrations roused the extreme Protestants to fury, so that riots took place in Dublin which could only be checked by the military. He thus laid himself open to the charges brought against him by the ultra-Protestants of England, who urged, with a show of truth, that he had proved himself inefficient, and that it was plain that lenity and conciliatory measures would not produce the expected effect. And now, seeing that their hopes in their Lord-Lieutenant were not realized, and wishing to gain favour with classes to whom secret societies were abhorrent, the Catholic party of Ireland, under the leadership of O'Connell, set on foot the great organization known as the Catholic Association, which, while it held aloof from secret societies, and kept itself as far as possible within the limits of the law, was inspired as completely with fanaticism as any of its predecessors had been. Its avowed object was the preparation of petitions to Parliament; but it held regular sessions, had its committee of grievances, ordered a census of the population, and exacted a tax known as the Catholic rent. The effect of this Association was for a time to alienate the Catholics of England, and to make the question a more distinctly national one, and by 1825 the Association had become so formidable that, by a large majority, a Bill was passed rendering it illegal and attempting to dissolve it. The Bill declared that political associations were incapable of adjournment for more than fourteen days, incapable of having corresponding societies, of levying contributions, or of requiring oaths. The dissolution of the Association was only nominal, a new Association was immediately formed, and the Catholic body were advised to proceed by all political and legal means.

[Sidenote: Rejection of the Catholic Relief Bill. 1826.]

[Sidenote: Rejection of Burdett's resolution. March 5, 1827.]

The Catholics had in fact gained a very important step in compelling Parliament to recognize the existence of the Association. It was no longer possible to postpone the consideration of their claims, and in March 1826, Sir Francis Burdett brought in what was called a Relief Bill, of which O'Connell, entirely falsely, claimed to be the chief author. Besides the Bill for the relief of disabilities there were two subsidiary Bills, the one raising the Catholic franchise to £10 instead of £2, which was thought to be a sop to the Protestants, the other to supply a State provision for the Catholic clergy, by which it was thought the other party might be pleased. Freed from the dread of the Association, the English partisans of the Catholic claims used all their influence and eloquence in favour of the Bill, and it passed the Commons by a considerable majority. Its fate in the House of Lords was different. It there encountered an opposition verging upon the unconstitutional; the Duke of York, the heir to the crown, adopting all his father's old scruples, declared, in distinct allusion to his probable succession to the throne, that under no circumstances and in no position would he assent to such a Bill. He succeeded in obtaining its rejection by a majority of forty-eight. The Duke's action was highly popular; it seems pretty certain that the feeling of the majority of Englishmen was against the Catholics. The plea that the Coronation Oath stood in the way of the royal assent to such a Bill no longer found defenders except with the extremest Tories, but the feeling of race which had been excited, the fear, not wholly ungrounded, that a measure so anxiously desired by the priests must hide some considerable advantage to the Roman Church, and the occasional rash declaration of some furious partisan that obedience to the Papal See was superior to any earthly obedience, made the majority of those who were not guided by reason and principle desire to retain the disabilities which still existed. The effect of their defeat in the House of Lords was not to dishearten the Catholics, on the contrary, they took courage at their success in the Commons, and were only eager if possible to complete their triumph before the accession of the bigoted Duke of York should throw a fresh obstacle in their way. A Catholic petition was therefore prepared, which Sir Francis Burdett presented during the illness of Lord Liverpool, proposing at the same time a resolution that the affairs of Ireland required immediate and earnest attention. But an election had taken place since the last Bill had been introduced, and the anti-Catholic feeling had apparently gained ground in the new Parliament; in spite of all the support which Canning could give it, the resolution was rejected. It was the last defeat the champions of emancipation were destined to meet.

[Sidenote: Canning Prime Minister. April 10, 1827.]

[Sidenote: Canning's new ministry. 1827.]

[Sidenote: Death of Canning. Aug. 8, 1827.]

While Canning was thus defeated on the two questions he had most at heart,--the improvement of the corn laws and the Catholic emancipation,--he found himself called upon to undertake the duties of Prime Minister. There was indeed no one in the existing ministry who could well compete with him, and the popular voice at once nominated him as Lord Liverpool's successor. Yet from the first it was clear that his appointment implied a complete change of ministry. It was not to be expected that his opponents in the Cabinet, whether on aristocratic and personal or on political grounds, would consent to serve under him. The King, who had lately been drawing more towards the anti-Catholic party, himself hesitated, but when a cabal of Tory Lords threatened him with the loss of their support should he appoint Canning, his mind was at once made up to resent the affront, and Canning was sent for. His appointment was followed by the resignation of all the most important members of the ministry; Wellington, Melville, Eldon, Bathurst, Westmoreland, Bexley, and Peel, chiefly on account of the obligations under which he felt as member for the Protestant University of Oxford, with several less important ministers, withdrew. As Canning was willing to consent that the Catholic question should still remain open, this great defection seems to show how clearly defined his general liberal tendencies had become. From among his own friends, and such of the Tories as would still serve with him, by the 27th of April a new Government was formed. The Duke of Clarence, since the death of the Duke of York (Jan. 5, 1827) heir-presumptive, was made Lord High Admiral, Copley, made Lord Lyndhurst, became Chancellor, Lord Dudley, a very able though eccentric man, went to the Foreign Office, Mr. Robinson became Lord Goderich, and led the party in the Upper House as Secretary for the Colonies, Sturges-Bourne went to the Home Office, Mr. Huskisson remaining at the Board of Trade. These first appointments were however provisional; so also was Canning's own acceptance of the place of Chancellor of the Exchequer. The new Prime Minister, after the secession of his colleagues, was received with such marked approbation by the Whigs, that it was not difficult to see that his coalition with them would be only a matter of time; and as they would require their fair share in the administration, it was necessary to keep some of the high places in hand, or only provisionally filled. As far as the support of parties in the House went, the union between the Canningites and the Whigs was accomplished; Brougham, Burdett, and Tierney sat on the Government side of the house; but, although Lord Lansdowne had already a seat in the Cabinet, Canning did not live long enough to complete the fusion of parties in the ministry. After the Easter holidays, during which the ministry were got together, little business of public importance was transacted, and the session was spent in a series of vehement attacks and personalities directed against Canning by his old friends. The only fact of importance was the failure of the Corn Bill in the Upper House, which has been already mentioned. In July, to the relief of all parties--for the bitter feelings lately excited had rendered the session an unusually disagreeable one--Parliament was prorogued. On the 8th of the next month Canning died of an illness caught at the funeral of the Duke of York, and rendered worse by the effects of the constant attacks to which he had been subjected acting upon his sensitive nature. Thus was prematurely terminated a change in the position of parties which, by uniting the moderate Tories and the Whigs, and placing the united forces under the command of so able a leader as Canning, seemed full of promise for the constitutional advance of England.

[Sidenote: Character and policy of Canning.]

The death of Canning was felt to be a national loss. In spite of every effort to render his funeral private, vast crowds attended, and Whigs and Tories joined in doing him honour. It was only the exclusive clique which, like Chatham, he had broken through which retained its enmity and regarded him to the end as a renegade adventurer. His title to greatness can scarcely be questioned. Adorned with the richest gifts of body and mind, a noble and attractive presence, overflowing wit, and a majestic eloquence, he showed himself an essentially practical statesman. On most subjects his views were large and liberal; by his assistance his friend Huskisson was enabled to launch England upon a fresh course of commercial prosperity, and by so doing to alleviate the miseries under which the people were groaning. As a foreign minister he enabled the country to assume a great place among nations. Two principles formed the bases of his policy--peace, and the greatness of his native country, which he regarded as indissolubly connected with its national individuality. He thus broke from the trammels of the Holy Alliance, and set on foot the policy of non-intervention, which, though its misuse has much destroyed its credit, is, when the dignity of the country is properly supported, the true policy to be pursued by a people at once desirous to secure peace and to allow to other nations the opportunity of working out their own development, and of securing that national freedom of action which it claims for itself. There were undoubtedly inconsistencies in his political views. Like his successor, Peel, he belonged to a transition time, and had a mind capable of growth. Several remnants of his early political creed hung about him to the last. He was always a firm opponent to parliamentary reform; while supporting continually the claims of the Catholics, he would listen to no arguments in favour of the relaxation of the Test and Corporation Acts; and he always upheld the repressive measures of Lord Sidmouth. It is to be remembered that his youth had been passed in the midst of the French Revolution, against which all the weapons of his wit had been directed, and that he was the favourite disciple of Pitt at the time when that minister's energies were chiefly directed to the suppression of revolutionary and Jacobinical tendencies; while, in his prime, temperate reform had become so connected with the exaggerated views of the radical reformers, that it is not to be wondered at that a statesman trained as Canning had been should object to measures which might open a door to the admission of so violent a flood of change.

[Sidenote: Goderich's ministry.]

Though its chief was gone, it was determined to continue the ministry which Canning had formed on the same principle of compromise on the subject of Catholic reform. The King could not make up his mind to take any decided step one way or the other, and fixed upon Lord Goderich, a colourless man, as best fitted to carry on the system. The changes necessary were few, but some of them important for the future. Lord Goderich's own place was taken by Huskisson; Lord Lansdowne accepted, at the King's personal request, the Home Office; the Chancellorship of the Exchequer, which Canning had held, was, with some want of wisdom, considering the connection of the Canningites and Whigs, given to Mr. Herries, a Tory, an appointment which at once shook the administration. Another important nomination was that of the Duke of Wellington, who, immediately upon Canning's death, was without difficulty persuaded to resume the command of the army, showing how far personal enmity had been the cause of his previous resignation. The accession of these two Tories was at the time regarded as a sure augury for the early break up of the Cabinet. "Before six months are over," said Lord Anglesey, who had been the agent in securing Wellington's adhesion, "he will trip up all your heels." These forebodings were speedily fulfilled. A quarrel broke out about the appointment of a chairman to a Finance Committee which was to be formed at the opening of the session. The position naturally belonged to Mr. Herries, but Tierney and Huskisson appear to have secured the appointment of Lord Althorp without Mr. Herries' knowledge (Nov. 29). Both Huskisson and Herries sent in their resignation; it seemed impossible to keep them both, and Lord Goderich, unable to take a firm course in the matter, sent in his own resignation, which, after he had once weakly withdrawn it, was finally accepted (Jan. 8, 1828). After seven months of useless life the abortive ministry expired.

[Sidenote: Wellington made Prime Minister. Jan. 1828.]

There was great difficulty in finding a successor for Goderich. Lord Harrowby declined the position. Huskisson, who was thought of, was supposed unable to lead the Commons, and the King, weary of compromise, determined to have recourse to the Tories, and, at the advice of Lord Lyndhurst, applied to the Duke of Wellington, whose supposed firmness of character inspired him with confidence. But even yet George attempted to postpone the final settlement of the Catholic question; the conditions he laid on Wellington were only to avoid a union with Lord Grey and to establish a lasting Government. The Duke therefore, in spite of his late conduct, asked and received the adhesion of Dudley, Palmerston, Huskisson, and some others. The Whigs of the late Government naturally retired, and in their place the Tories of Lord Liverpool's Government resumed office. In fact the attempt was made to reconstitute the Liverpool Cabinet. Mr. Huskisson declared to his constituents at Liverpool that the presence of so many Canningites was a guarantee that that minister's policy would be continued, but it was generally understood that the accession of Wellington to the premiership was in fact a Tory triumph, and such it speedily proved. In a very few months an opportunity, arising from a slight difference of opinion, enabled the Duke to insist upon the resignation of Mr. Huskisson; with him the rest of Canning's party left the ministry, and the Government was constituted entirely on a Tory basis (May).

[Sidenote: Difficulty of the Turkish question.]

[Sidenote: Canning's diplomacy on the subject.]

[Sidenote: Protocol between England and Russia. April 1826.]

The continuation of Canning's policy in some way or other was indeed almost a necessity, but the way in which his plans were completed by Wellington would hardly have satisfied Canning. He had died, leaving unfinished in the hands of his successors one of the most difficult diplomatic questions which he had undertaken. For six years a war, marked by extreme barbarity, had been carried on between the Turks and their Greek subjects. It will be remembered that on this point the Czar, who regarded himself as the natural protector of the Greeks, and who nourished the traditional desire of conquest on the side of Turkey, had found himself at variance with his own principles. His mind was divided between a wish to seize the opportunity offered of extending his influence over Turkey, and his love of legitimacy, which, as chief of the Holy Alliance, he constantly upheld, and which seemed to forbid him to take the part of insurgents against their legitimate sovereign. Lengthened conferences between the representatives of the sovereigns of Europe had been held at St. Petersburg, where France and Austria, bitterly opposed to the English policy, both with regard to the constitutionalists of Spain, and the acknowledgment of the independence of the South American colonies, had shown themselves eager upon the side of legitimacy, and where Austria especially had expressed a constant wish that the Greeks should be treated merely as insurgents. Supported therefore by the advice of Austria, and trusting to the well-known feeling in favour of the Mahomedan rule in Turkey which existed among the Tories in England, the Porte had refused to listen to any offers of mediation. Nor did it seem possible that the English ministry, anxious at once to prevent Russia from attacking Turkey and yet to save the Greeks, could intervene with any hope of honourable success. At last, in 1824, an opening occurred, and the hope was raised in Canning's mind that these two apparently contrary objects might be obtained. The provisional government in Greece in its despair made a formal appeal to the English, and showed itself quite as fearful of the warlike views of Russia as Turkey itself, in the belief that the outbreak of a war with Turkey would ensure its own immediate destruction. The English minister now thought it possible to bring the conferences, from which he had hitherto held quite aloof, under his own hand in London. The course of events tended to assist his plan. In 1825 the conferences at St. Petersburg broke up without action, the other powers having refused to join Russia in mediation. It was the conduct of Metternich, who dreaded before all things any tampering with the principles of legitimate sovereignty, and constantly abetted the obstinacy of the Porte, which had rendered the mediation futile. Thus thwarted in his plans, and feeling that his failure was due to Metternich, the Czar found a point of union with Canning in their dislike to the Austrian minister. England was represented at Constantinople by Sir Stratford Canning, and by his skilful management the ambassadors of the two courts there began to draw together; and at last, in November 1825, Canning had a triumphant proof of the success of his policy and of the importance of England, when all the ministers of the great powers in London confessed that they saw no way out of their difficulty but by English intervention. This favourable state of things was for the moment crossed by the death of Alexander (Dec. 1, 1825). The view which his successor Nicholas would take became in the last degree important; Canning, with great wisdom, chose Wellington--opposed indeed to his policy, but personally acceptable to the Russian Czar--as his special ambassador to take the royal congratulations upon the new Emperor's accession, and to continue the negotiations if possible. The appointment met with universal approbation; even Metternich believed that in the hands of Wellington the question must be settled in accordance with his views. It was with much surprise and anger that the Turks and Austrians heard that, on the 4th of April, an arrangement had been arrived at between the Courts of England and Russia. Taking advantage of the very moderate claims of the Greeks, who demanded no more than to be placed on the same footing as the Danubian Principalities, remaining as self-governing but dependent vassals of the Turkish Government, the English minister had succeeded in procuring the signature of a protocol embodying a plan for peaceful intervention.

[Sidenote: Enthusiasm for Greek independence in England.]

[Sidenote: Turkey refuses the armistice demanded by the allies. April 1827.]

[Sidenote: The Treaty of London consequently signed.]

The cause of Greek independence had already excited enthusiasm in England, many volunteers had joined the armies, and money had been subscribed for them. In this enthusiasm Canning in his heart fully joined; from early youth one of his favourite dreams had been the independence of that race to which as an ardent lover of the classics he felt he owed so much. But, true to his principles, and determined to maintain the strict neutrality of England, he had done his best to check any active assistance to the insurgents. According to his view it was necessary that England should intervene with clean hands, and as the friend of both parties. He was also in constant dread of the watchfulness of his Tory enemies, fearing lest any sign of too great favour to Russia should enable them entirely to thwart his plans. Nevertheless the knowledge of the approaching intervention gave a great impetus to the feeling in favour of Greece in England, and men and money were poured in considerable quantities into the peninsula. Lord Cochrane, the most dashing and adventurous of English sailors, had joined the insurgents with an American frigate, General Churchill took command of their armies, yet their destruction seemed imminent. The Egyptians, under Ibrahim Pasha, had come to the assistance of their enemies; their fleet, which was little better than a body of pirates, was swept from the sea; Missalonghi was for the third time taken, and in spite of General Churchill's efforts, Athens and the Acropolis had fallen. If the protocol was to be of any use the time for acting upon it had arrived. The allies received a great accession of strength when, after a visit of Canning to Paris in the spring of 1826, the French Government and the King himself entered heartily into their plans. It was plain that for the second time Canning had struck a severe blow at the principles of the Holy Alliance. In April 1827 the three powers proceeded to act with renewed strength. They demanded an immediate armistice, pointed out that the war did not seem to be approaching its conclusion, that it caused interference with the traffic of the world, and that in the interests of Europe it must cease. Almost of course the Turks, still trusting to Austria, and still unable to believe in the changed posture of England, rejected this demand. Therefore, in accordance with the expressed wish of the French, which no doubt agreed with Canning's own wishes, the protocol was changed into a treaty known as the Treaty of London, signed on the 6th of July by Lord Dudley, Count Lieven, and the Prince of Polignac. In strict accordance with the terms of the protocol, it set forth the necessity of European action, it stated the terms which must be given to Greece, and which went no further than establishing its self-government under Turkish supremacy and saddled with a tribute to the Porte, and declared that none of the parties to the treaty sought territorial increase or commercial advantages. Fear of Russian aggrandizement was thus withdrawn, the intervention was at first to be purely friendly; but secret articles went on to say that, if the intervention were rejected, more stringent means must be used to oblige its acceptance both by one party and by the other, and that it would be necessary to show countenance to Greece, by acknowledging her as a belligerent power, and establishing consuls at her ports. It was not expressly stated what the further means of coercion were to be. A month was given to the Porte for consideration of the terms offered. If no answer, or an unfavourable answer came, the secret articles were to be put into execution. If the armistice was refused by the Turks, the allied squadrons then in the Mediterranean were to unite, to enter into friendly relations with the Greeks, and to intercept all ships freighted with men and arms destined to act against the Greeks, whether from Turkey or from Egypt. At the same time they were carefully to avoid hostilities. It is doubtful whether Canning could have succeeded in carrying out this his last measure of peace policy and non-intervention without having recourse to war. When the affair had reached this point he died, and the completion of his work fell into weaker and less competent hands.

[Sidenote: Attempt of the allies to compel the armistice.]

[Sidenote: Battle of Navarino. Oct. 20, 1827.]

In August, a joint note having been again sent, and all satisfactory answer having been entirely refused by Reis Effendi, the Turkish minister, consuls were appointed according to the treaty, and the fleets ordered to compel the armistice. The execution of this delicate duty was intrusted to Admiral Codrington on the part of the English, to the French Admiral de Rigny, and to Count Heyden, who commanded the Russian fleet. Twenty-eight Turkish and Egyptian ships of war lay in Navarino Bay awaiting fresh reinforcements from Egypt. Had the union taken place, the combined fleets of Turkey and Egypt would have entirely destroyed the Greek Government then in the Ionian Islands, and have swept away what remained of the Greek fleet. The allies appeared before Navarino, explained to Ibrahim Pasha, who was in command, the negotiations which were proceeding, and declared that the Turkish fleet should not sail. Ibrahim, nothing daunted, while asserting that he would take orders from his own sovereign only, pledged himself, on the 25th of September, that the fleet should remain quiet for twenty days to enable him to receive an answer from Constantinople. In spite of this promise, Codrington, who had withdrawn, heard on the 1st of October that the fleet had left harbour. He at once went to meet it, and turned back the first squadron he encountered. On the 13th the combined fleets were in front of Navarino. Then Ibrahim in anger let loose his troops on the wretched people, and before the eyes of the allies terrible scenes of barbarity were enacted. Codrington, though with difficulty, kept himself in restraint, but on the 20th his fleet sailed into the harbour, to say that they would convoy the Turkish ships to Turkey, the Egyptian ships to Egypt. They found the Turks and Egyptians drawn up in the form of a horseshoe and ready for battle. Strict orders were given not to fire unless the enemy proceeded to hostilities, and Codrington, bringing his ship close to that of the Turkish admiral, opened communications with him. Meanwhile, a boat from the Dartmouth was fired upon, and a cannon shot was fired against the French flagship. In spite of this Codrington went on parleying till his pilot was shot by his side and a broadside fired upon his ship. The battle then began in earnest, and in four hours the hostile fleet was entirely destroyed.

[Sidenote: Goderich's inaction renders the victory nugatory.]

[Sidenote: Wellington retains his alliance with Turkey. 1828.]

The news of the victory was received with delight in France and Russia, and at first with triumph in England, where at the instant Sir Edward Codrington met with the full approval of the Government. None the less did it present to the weak and tottering Cabinet of Lord Goderich difficulties of the gravest kind. The peaceful policy of their late chief had ended in a fierce and destructive battle; they hardly knew whether to accept the whole responsibility of it or not. At all events they did not follow up the blow or act with any vigour under the circumstances. The effect of this delay was to strengthen in Constantinople the belief that the union between the three powers was not hearty, and to encourage the Turks in their obstinacy. The foreign merchants in Constantinople were apprehended, the Porte determined on war, demanding that the allies should refrain entirely from interfering on the Greek question, pay the fleet, and indemnify the Sultan for his losses. In spite of the efforts of the ambassadors, before they had left Constantinople, which they did upon the 8th of December, nothing could be gained beyond an offer of a general amnesty to the Greeks. Had the allied fleets proceeded at once to Constantinople, which was the wish both of Sir Stratford Canning and of Codrington, it is probable that they might have put an end to the war with Greece, and have succeeded in carrying out at least one part of the London Treaty, by saving Turkey from the invasion of Russia, which now became inevitable. As it was, England had in fact only handed the country up, weakened by the loss of its fleet, to the hands of that power. The weakness of the Goderich Government prevented such efficient action, and the accession of Wellington to office rendered it still more impossible. True to his Tory traditions, while pretending to continue the policy of Canning, he fell back upon the words of the London Treaty, which were no doubt intended to be pacific. The speech at the opening of Parliament, on the 29th of January 1828, mentioned the battle of Navarino in somewhat disparaging terms as "the untoward event," which it was hoped would not be followed by further hostilities, and the Duke himself declared that the preservation of the Ottoman Porte as an independent and powerful state was necessary to the wellbeing of this country. In fact, he suffered the matter again to fall back into negotiations. England kept out of war, and Russia was allowed to overrun Turkey, to take Adrianople (Aug. 20, 1828), and from thence to dictate terms which left the Porte for ten years at least defenceless in their hands. Among the terms demanded by Russia was necessarily the independence of Greece. The limits were arranged by the three powers in London. Neither Turkey nor Greece were allowed a voice in the matter; the frontiers were fixed, and a monarchical form of government established; the crown for a while went begging; it was declined by the Saxon Prince John, and by Prince Leopold (May 1830), subsequently King of the Belgians, nor was it till the year 1832 that Otho of Bavaria, a lad of eighteen, was found to undertake a post which offered almost insuperable difficulties and but very little honour.

[Sidenote: Character of Wellington's Government.]

[Sidenote: Repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts. May 1828.]

The Duke of Wellington had been no doubt first called to the Premiership for the purpose of continuing as far as possible the system of the Tories. His conduct as head of the Government was so peculiar that it would scarcely have been tolerated in a less influential man. He regarded his office as he would have regarded a military command,--a trust not lightly to be laid down. He fought till his opponents became irresistible and then suddenly retreated, without thinking it necessary to resign office on account of his defeat. This view of his duty had the same practical results as the most determined place-hunting, and reduced his Government to that most dangerous form of weakness which consists in driving opposition to irresistible extremes, and then suddenly yielding to pressure. This peculiar tendency to give up his opinion and yet retain office was visible at the very outset. He had taken the Premiership, although a few months before he had declared himself wholly unfit for it; he had formed a mixed Government, though his views and those of the King were in favour of a united one. His next concession was upon the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts. In the first session of 1828, Lord John Russell moved for a Committee upon those Acts. Canning had always withstood their repeal; the Duke and Mr. Peel were known to share the late minister's opinion. But when a majority of forty-four in a full House decided in favour of Lord John Russell's Committee, the leaders of the Government accepted their decision, and declared themselves satisfied with the substitution of a declaration that the incoming office-holder would do nothing to injure the Church, instead of the old sacramental test. After a lengthened and bitter opposition, led by Lord Eldon in the Upper House, the Bill was carried. The old Chancellor's view of the conduct of Government was very unfavourable. "They began in the Commons," he said, "by opposition, and then ran away like a parcel of cowards."

[Sidenote: The Corn Bill passed.]

The second important Bill of the session was the Corn Bill, to be substituted for that which Wellington had himself succeeded in throwing out in the preceding session. Here again he yielded to circumstances. Entirely leaving his previous standing-ground, the Premier now supported the Bill on exactly the same principle of duties on a graduated scale as that he had previously thwarted. The fixed point in the scale was a few shillings higher, but in principle the Bill was identical.

[Sidenote: The resignation of Huskisson and his friends. May 1828.]

No doubt the necessity for such concessions was very irksome to the Duke, and, as before mentioned, an opportunity soon occurred for ridding himself of the more liberal members of his Cabinet, whose pressure he had been unable to resist. On a trivial question as to the disposition of the seats of two disfranchised boroughs Huskisson had thought it his duty to vote against his colleagues. It had been before settled that the question should not be a Cabinet one; but Huskisson, while still under excitement, thought it right to send the Duke a letter offering to retire should the Premier wish it. The Duke seized his opportunity, treated the letter as an absolute resignation, would listen to no explanation, and obliged Huskisson to resign. With him went Palmerston, Dudley, Lamb, and Grant; their places were filled with Tories, and the Government seemed at length thoroughly homogeneous.

[Sidenote: The Catholic Emancipation question.]

Yet the establishment of this Tory Cabinet was followed almost immediately by a far greater concession than any of the preceding ones, in the passage of the Catholic Emancipation Bill. The Government had been constituted as far as possible on a Protestant basis. It was known that the King was strong in his anti-Catholic propensities. Although a small majority in the Commons had, on the 8th of May, declared in favour of bringing the question to a settlement, and although both the Chancellor and the Prime Minister had confessed, while opposing the motion successfully in the Lords, that they saw no way at present out of the great difficulty, thereby apparently implying a wish for a settlement, the declarations both of Wellington and of Peel gave little hope of any relaxation of the disabilities. But meanwhile events were occurring which rendered some settlement obviously necessary. There was indeed a general and growing feeling that a question which in the last thirty-five years had ruined more than one Cabinet, which was in fact uppermost in all men's minds at the time of every new ministerial arrangement, and which had kept Ireland permanently uneasy, could no longer be left uncertain. Events were now occurring in Ireland which would have rendered the further postponement of the settlement little short of madness.

[Sidenote: Renewed agitation in Ireland.]

[Sidenote: Election of O'Connell for Clare. June 1828.]

The agitation in that country, which had almost subsided during the administration of Canning, a well-known supporter of the Catholic claims, and which had only slightly revived during Goderich's administration, broke out again in full force when the hostile ministry of Wellington came into office. The law for the suppression of the Association would expire in the coming July, and meanwhile, keeping within the limits of the law, for all practical purposes the organization remained alive. The last general election had opened the eyes of the leaders of the Association to a new and irresistible source of power; it had proved that the power of the priests was in some cases stronger than that of the landlords. In their eagerness to secure their parliamentary influence, the landlords had followed the disastrous plan of breaking up their estates into small forty shilling freeholds, taking advantage of the low franchise which existed in Ireland. Several instances had occurred in which the tenantry had broken loose from their landlords, and at Waterford, among other places, they had proved themselves too strong even for the great Beresford interest. What had then been done in a few instances it was the intention of the Association to carry out in a large scale, and great efforts were made to secure the votes of those who were known as the Irish "forties" in the coming general election. The anger of the proprietors thus assaulted in their strongholds was very great, and class animosity reached a terrible pitch. The power of the Association was soon brought to the test. With the rest of the Canningites, Grant, President of the Board of Trade, had resigned; his place had been given to Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald, member for Clare, whose re-election thus became necessary. Aware that, even if they succeeded in excluding the Government candidate, the election of a Protestant representative would be of no great value to them, the Association determined to strike a great blow, and to bring forward O'Connell himself to dispute Mr. Fitzgerald's seat. His triumph was complete; after a few days' polling Mr. Fitzgerald withdrew. But more wonderful and more terrible than his mere success was the admirable discipline and order with which it was obtained. Lord Palmerston thus narrates the event:--"The event was dramatic and somewhat sublime. The Prime Minister of England tells the Catholics in his speech in the House of Lords that if they will only be perfectly quiet for a few years, cease to urge their claims, and let people forget the question entirely, then after a few years perhaps something may be done for them. They reply to this advice, within a few weeks after it is given, by raising the population of a whole province like one man, keeping them within the strictest obedience to the law, and by strictly legal and constitutional means hurling from his seat in the representation one of the Cabinet ministers of the King. There were 30,000 Irish peasants in and about Ennis in sultry July, and not a drunken man among them, or only one, and he an Englishman and a Protestant, O'Connell's own coachman, whom O'Connell had committed upon his own deposition for a breach of the peace. No Irishman ever stirs a mile from his house without a stick, but not a stick was to be seen at the election. One hundred and forty priests were brought from other places to harangue the people from morning to night, and to go round to the several parishes to exhort and bring up voters.... All passed off quietly. The population of the adjoining counties was on the move, and large bodies had actually advanced in echelon, as it were, closing in upon Ennis, the people of one village going on to the next, and those of that next advancing to a nearer station, and so on." The sheriff and his assessor declared that the election was legal, the only obstacle to O'Connell's appearance in the House being the oaths he would have to take on his admittance. It was determined to follow up the success. O'Connell declared that Catholic representatives must be elected for all the counties of Ireland. The funds of the Association, which assumed its old form in July on the expiration of the suppression law, were partially devoted to the support of those on whom the vengeance of the landlords fell; and not content with declaring the necessity of the election of Catholic members, the Association drew up certain pledges to be required of all future Catholic candidates. These consisted in a promise to be the determined opponents of the ministry of Wellington and Peel till it granted Catholic emancipation, to support religious and civil liberty, to procure a repeal of the Subletting Act (which was an attempt to restrain the minute subdivision of property), and to support a reform of Parliament.

[Sidenote: Influence of the Association.]

[Sidenote: Resignation of Lord Anglesey. Jan. 1829.]

The power the Association had already exhibited, and its determination to have those representatives whom it should elect thus closely bound to pursue the line of conduct it dictated, much increased the dread with which it was regarded. Symptoms were already visible of the influence it might exert; only ten days after the establishment of the pledges (Aug. 2), Mr. Dawson, Peel's brother-in-law, and himself in the Administration, after a lively picture of the enormous power of the Association, concluded with the unexpected assertion, that as this power could not be crushed it ought to be conciliated. Coming from such a source the assertion was received as a certain proof that the cause of the Catholics was winning its way. Consequently the efforts of the Association were pressed forward with redoubled zeal. Parochial clubs were established, and great aggregate meetings held in various parts of Ireland. Mr. Shiel, one of its most ardent supporters, thus describes the condition of Ireland under its influence:--"Does not a tremendous organization extend over the whole island? Have not all the natural bonds by which men are tied together been broken and burst asunder? Are not all the relations of society which exist elsewhere gone? Has not property lost its influence? Has not rank been stripped of the respect which should belong to it? Has not an internal government grown up, which, gradually superseding the legitimate authorities, has armed itself with a complete domination? Is it nothing that the whole body of the clergy are alienated from the State, and that the Catholic gentry and peasantry and priesthood are all combined in one vast confederacy?" His description was true; the Association was omnipotent, and in nothing did it show its power so much as in the complete restraint it held over the excitable people. Faction and faction fights disappeared; crime of a graver sort almost vanished; and though the people were drilled and brought into something resembling military organization, although they were eager to know against whom they were to fight, the influence of the Association restrained them from all demonstrations likely to provoke hostilities, and on one occasion a few words from O'Connell at once broke up and dispersed a body of 50,000 men. This was the more admirable as the temper of the Protestants had naturally been roused, and Brunswick clubs had sprung up, to take the place of the Orange organization, which do not seem to have been as self-restrained as the Catholics. During the whole of this time the Duke was painfully making up his mind to his retreat. The peculiarity of his action was that he became absolutely silent; so complete was his silence, that Mr. Shiel thus describes the situation:--"The minister folds his arms as if he were a mere indifferent observer, and the terrific contest between Protestant and Catholic only afforded him a spectacle for the amusement of his official leisure; he sits as if two gladiators were crossing their swords for his gratification: the Cabinet seems to be little better than a box in a theatre from which his Majesty's ministers may survey the business of blood." Indeed, so strangely reticent was the Duke, that he ceased to correspond at all with his Lord Lieutenant, the Marquis of Anglesey. Uninstructed from home, Lord Anglesey, who was a Liberal, and inclined to the emancipation, naturally followed the dictates of his own opinions, and rendered the conduct of the Government almost treacherous from the indirect support he gave to the Liberals, while his chief in London was supporting the opposite party. The inevitable consequence was that he shortly committed an indiscretion which necessitated his recall. His place was taken by the Duke of Northumberland, a strong Tory.

[Sidenote: Peel and Wellington see the urgency of the Catholic question.]