Chapter V

1846-1850.

The Irish Famine--Smith O'Brien's Rebellion--Widow Cormack's
Cabbages--The Special Commission--Revival of the Chartist
Movement--The Monster Petition--Its Exposure and Collapse of the
Movement--Revolutionary Movements in Britain compared with those
in other Countries--Growing Affection for the Queen--Its
Causes--Royal Visit to Ireland--The Pacifico Imbroglio--Rupture
with France Imminent--_Civis Romanus Sum_--Lord Palmerston's
Rise--Sir Robert Peel's Death--The Invention of Chloroform.

[Sidenote: The Irish Famine.]

The condition of affairs in Ireland, with which it had fallen to the Russell Ministry to deal on entering office in 1846, had become truly appalling. Nearly a million of money had been expended by Peel's Government in relief of the distress caused by the failure of the potato crop in 1845, and the disease had reappeared with greater intensity in the following season. Further measures of relief were brought forward by the Prime Minister; charitable subscriptions poured in from every town in England and Scotland; nearly every country in Europe, including even Turkey, contributed help in the hour of need, and the United States Government freighted some of their war vessels with grain for their starving cousins.

Invented by A. Siebe, 1839. Now in the Patents Museum. South Kensington.]

Nevertheless, the situation was one of extraordinary perplexity. In the footprints of famine stalked sedition. Agrarian murders rose to a frightful figure; secret societies grew apace; midnight drilling went on in almost every county; and that very peasantry whose destitution had touched the hearts of the whole civilised world, proved themselves able to buy enormous quantities of arms and ammunition. In Clonmel alone, 1,138 stand of arms were sold in a few days, and everywhere, to quote a letter written at the time, "the peasantry are armed or are arming almost to a man. The stores of the armourer are more frequently exhausted than the provision stores." So brisk was the demand as to cause a revival of the gun trade in Birmingham, where the existing stock of small arms was entirely cleared out. But there could be no doubt of the reality and severity of the distress. It was worst in the south and west; famine and famine-fever carried off thousands, and the population of Ireland, which had stood at eight millions in 1845, could only be reckoned at six millions in 1848. The difference, however, was not entirely due to deaths by starvation or disease. The westward stream of emigration had set in, and tens of thousands of Irish families sought and found the means of better existence in the land of plenty beyond the Atlantic.

AN INTERESTING GROUP; OR, "MISFORTUNE MAKES STRANGE BEDFELLOWS."

Lord Lincoln, Sir Robert Peel, Mr. Goulbourne, Mr. Disraeli, Lord George Bentinck, and Mr. O'Brien.

Lord George Bentinck's plan of relief works for Ireland, which mainly took the form of railway extension, was at first opposed by the Government, but afterwards adopted by them, thus bringing this "interesting group" of men into line.]

But the ferment of rebellion was spreading swiftly among those who remained. All the misery of the famine was laid at the door of the land system; not unfrequently coroners' juries returned verdicts of wilful murder against the Prime Minister or Lord Lieutenant, holding them directly responsible for not averting the disasters of the country. Once more the Government had to undertake the hateful task of bringing forward a Coercion Bill, for the people seemed on the brink of civil war. Technically that limit was actually transgressed, though the means were ludicrously inadequate to the end--repeal of the Union. The "Young Ireland" party, inflamed by the successful revolution in France, separated from and plunged ahead of O'Connor's Repealers. O'Connor had precipitated the rupture by endeavouring to induce his party to pledge themselves against any except constitutional means. His proposal was laughed to scorn. William Smith O'Brien, brother of Lord Inchiquin, claiming descent from Brian Boruibh, placed himself at the head of the "Confederates," as the new party was called, with Meagher, Dillon, and others as his lieutenants; the _United Irishman_ newspaper was started in opposition to the less inflammatory _Nation_, the organ of the older party. It was managed by John Mitchell, who filled its columns week by week with the most violent and acrid sedition.

HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE OF WALES Christmas 1846.]

HER MAJESTY AND THE PRINCE CONSORT WITH THE ROYAL CHILDREN, 1846.

The Princess Royal (born 1840), Prince of Wales (1841), Princess Alice (1843), Prince Alfred (1844), and Princess Helena (1846).]

[Sidenote: Smith O'Brien's Rebellion.]

[Sidenote: Widow Cormack's Cabbages.]

[Sidenote: The Special Commission.]

It was impossible for the Government to allow this sort of stuff to be circulated among an excitable peasantry, smarting under imaginary wrongs and real distress and armed to the teeth; but the existing law contained no provisions framed to stop it. The Prime Minister, therefore, introduced and passed what is known as the Treason Felony Act, making written incitement to insurrection a crime punishable with transportation, and enabling the Executive to imprison persons charged with contravention of it. Mitchell was arrested at once, but Smith O'Brien continued to hold armed meetings in various parts of Ireland: matters looked threatening, and there was grave apprehension in England as to the result. On the morning of August 7 it was turned into mirth by the arrival in London from Liverpool of one of the first telegraphic despatches of importance ever published in this country. Rebellion had actually broken out: Smith O'Brien in person had led a considerable force to attack a body of fifty or sixty police, who defended themselves in the house of one Widow Cormack, near Ballingarry, in Tipperary. A good deal of firing took place but very little bloodshed; thanks, on the one hand, to the indifferent arms carried by the rebels, and, on the other, to the forbearance of the police, who could easily have shot O'Brien, so theatrically did he expose himself during the brief contest. The chief damage was done to the poor widow's cabbages, which the Confederates trampled to pieces in the garden adjoining the house. The affair was soon over: the patriots, not relishing a few rounds from the muskets of the police, melted quickly away, and the heroic O'Brien was arrested in the act of taking his railway ticket at Thurles station. It is unlucky for any cause--it is worse, it is fatal to it--when it becomes ridiculous, and people have never since been able to mention Smith O'Brien's cabbage garden without a grin. But the general state of Ireland had grown to be no laughing matter. The number of persons arrested for complicity in seditions, or for the frequent murders of landlords, agents, and policemen far exceeded what the ordinary tribunals of the country could deal with, and a special Commission of judges was appointed to try them.

The first light-vessel was moored at the Nore in 1732. Since that date, to the untechnical eye, the change in the outward appearance of a lightship has not been great; but the efficiency of the light has been increased, since 1837, from about 1,500 candles to about 20,000 candles. The _Spurn_ Lightship shows a light of the power just named, and in foggy weather sounds a powerful siren in place of the old-fashioned gong.]

The present Lighthouse was erected in 1881, when Smeaton's celebrated tower was removed to the Hoe at Plymouth, except the lowermost courses, which are shown in the picture and still remain on the rock. The lantern sends out a series of flashes of 79,000 candle-power.]

With the exception of Smeaton's tower at the Eddystone and that on the Bell Rock, this was the only rock Lighthouse on the coast of Great Britain in 1837. It was built on oak piles, and in stormy weather rocked like a ship. Its lantern was furnished with twenty-seven argand lamps with reflectors, giving a light of about 3,000 candle-power. It was superseded by the present granite tower in 1861.]

[Sidenote: Revival of the Chartist Movement.]

The spirit of revolution was astir in many lands besides Ireland in the year when Louis Philippe was forced from the throne of France. In England the Chartist movement was sympathetically inflamed into renewed activity. A Chartist convention assembled in London in spring and made arrangements for a monster demonstration to be held on Kennington Common on April 10. But the Convention had hardly begun deliberating before disunion appeared in its councils. There were two parties among the Chartists--the constitutional Radicals and the physical force party. The latter were for assembling on Kennington Common under arms; but the venerable leader of the whole movement, Feargus O'Connor, would have nothing to do with unconstitutional or violent proceedings. The consequence of this was a rupture in the camp. Every preparation was made by the authorities to protect London from the ravages of a mob: the troops were under arms: the police mustered in great force: thousands of special constables were sworn in, and the Chartist procession was prohibited. But about 20,000 Chartists did assemble on the Common to listen to harangues by O'Connor and others. O'Connor then went to the Home Office, interviewed Sir George Grey, and told him the meeting had taken place without disorder. "Are you going back to it?" asked Grey. "No," replied O'Connor, "I've had my toes trodden on till I'm lame: my pocket has been picked, and I'll have no more to do with them."

The series of circular glass prisms collects the rays from the lamp--usually an oil lamp with several concentric wicks--and concentrates them into a horizontal beam of great power. The Lantern illustrated is that of the Lighthouse at Spurn Point, and is the most powerful oil Lantern yet made; it has a maximum intensity of 179,000 candles. But this power is greatly exceeded by the electric lights at St. Catherine's, the Lizard, and elsewhere.]

[Sidenote: The Monster Petition.]

[Sidenote: Its Exposure, and Collapse of the Movement.]

It was ridicule--that universal solvent--which finally shattered this once formidable Chartist League. A monster petition to Parliament had been in course of signature for some months. Feargus O'Connor, in presenting it, declared that 5,700,000 names were attached to it. It was remitted in the ordinary course to the Committee on Public Petitions, who employed a number of clerks to examine the signatures. The result was speedily made known. Instead of nearly six million names, less than two million were appended to it. Whole sheets of these were found to have been written by the same hand. But the crowning exposure, which convulsed the whole nation with laughter, appeared from the analysis of the names themselves. Those of the Queen and Prince Albert, of Ministers and leaders of Opposition were of frequent occurrence; noted names in fiction, especially that of "Cheeks the Marine," a familiar character in Marryat's novels, then very popular, appeared in every sheet, besides all sorts of ribaldries, indecencies, and buffooneries. Chartism was a genuine and an earnest movement: it was an upheaval against class privileges, a revolt against class grievances. But these privileges and grievances were in course of removal; the extension of the franchise had brought about repeal of the corn laws, laid the foundation of free trade, and redressed some, at least, of the evils prevalent in factories and mines. Much remained to be done, which has been done since, but Chartism was to have no hand in the doing of it. As a political force it collapsed; as a social movement it crumbled away under the intolerable ridicule of the Monster Petition.

Shewing the interior, and the method of morticing the stones for greater security. The Lantern is a double dioptric one, and consists of two such arrangements as that shewn on the left of this page placed one above the other. The fog-signal is an explosive one of gun-cotton.]

[Sidenote: Revolutionary Movements in Britain compared with those in other Countries.]

It will be long before English statesmen forget the lessons of 1848-9. During these years the whole of Europe was convulsed by violent popular conflicts with authority. In France the Bourbon dynasty collapsed with the abdication of Louis Philippe, and then, to repeat Mr. Justin McCarthy's happy phrase, "came a Red Republican rising against a Republic that strove not to be red," to be drowned in blood by Cavaignac. The Pope was chased from Rome, the Emperor of Austria from Vienna, the Italian princes from their duchies, the German rulers from their principalities; there were sanguinary struggles in Poland, in Naples, in Sardinia; while Great Britain had only to blush for Widow Cormack's cabbages and the picking of Feargus O'Connor's pocket at Kennington. Yet there was no doubt of the earnestness of the leaders of agitation and insurrection in England: no question about the reality of the grievances.

Freedom of speech and freedom of the press, no ineffective safety valves in times of discontent, were tolerated in the United Kingdom--then, as now--far beyond the limits of public security, as these were reckoned by every other European State. But the chief safety of England lay in the faith of the masses in the power of Parliament to devise measures of redress, and their confidence that the Sovereign would interpose no bar to remedial legislation. Nor have that faith and confidence been betrayed. Throughout all the years that have elapsed since the dissolution of the Chartist League, Parliament has been diligent in devising measures to meet the ever-changing and growing wants of the people, and the Royal Assent has always been cordially given to them. The Queen and her Consort do not appear very prominently or very often in the chronicles of these early years, but all the time there had been growing silently that popular affection for the Sovereign which disappeared entirely from practical politics with the active reign of George III. The qualities of Prince Albert, his industry, his untiring anxiety for the welfare of the people, his unobtrusive influence in favour of freedom, were becoming known: the Crown was becoming more than the decorative centre of the Court--the mere frontispiece of the aristocracy--it was becoming recognised as the actual head of the British people.

HER MAJESTY IN THE WALKING COSTUME OF 1846.]

[Sidenote: Growing Affection for the Queen. Its Causes.]

[Sidenote: Royal Visit to Ireland.]

The growing affection of the people for their Queen was stimulated about this time by the act of a harebrained scamp who, on May 17, discharged a rusty pistol, loaded, it is believed, with no deadly missile, at Her Majesty as she was driving in Constitution Hill with three of her children. The fact that the wretch was an Irishman was regarded rightly as being of no political significance, and it was a happy--it was more, it was a wise--project which was carried into effect by the visit of the Queen and Prince Albert, with the Prince of Wales and Princess Royal, to Ireland in August 1849. The Royal yacht was escorted by four warships, but the reception they met with at Cork, at Dublin, and at Belfast proved that to be but a formal precaution. Perhaps, had it been possible in later years that the Monarch and her family should become more familiar to the warm-hearted Irish, many subsequent misfortunes and misunderstandings might never have taken place.

[Sidenote: The Pacifico Imbroglio.]

The Parliamentary session of 1850 must ever be memorable for two events--the sudden rise of Lord Palmerston into fame and popularity, and the equally sudden removal of the most illustrious figure in the House of Commons. The debate, which was the occasion of the first, and immediately preceded the second of these events, arose out of one of the most trivial and least creditable matters that ever agitated the Councils and menaced the peace of a great nation. Certain British subjects had suffered loss in the destruction of their property during the disturbances at Athens in 1847, and had lodged claims for compensation against the Greek Government. The principal sufferer was a Portuguese Jew, named Pacifico, a British subject in virtue of having been born in Gibraltar. The Greeks were needy and delayed a settlement. Then there was Mr. Finlay, too, the historian of Greece, long resident at Athens, who had a grievance of a different sort, arising out of a demand made by the Greek Government that he should surrender a piece of land at less than he considered its value. The strange thing was that Palmerston took up these private claims as an international question, although neither of the claimants had tried the experiment of litigation in the Greek courts. A British squadron was ordered to the Piræus, all the Greek vessels in that harbour were seized, and Athens was blockaded. The Greeks appealed to the governments of France and Russia, who remonstrated with Great Britain touching this high-handed dealing with a weak State. Russia was rudely outspoken and menacing: she was told bluntly by Lord Palmerston that it was none of her business. France was more conciliatory, and by her aid a convention in regard to the disputed claims was arranged in London. But there was so much delay in communicating the result to the British Ambassador in Athens, Mr. Wyse, that he was left in ignorance that a modified payment had been agreed on, and continued to press for payment of the full claims. Thereupon arose serious misunderstanding between the British and French Governments, England being accused of breach of faith. Appearances were certainly against her; the French Ambassador was recalled from London, and two great nations seemed on the brink of war.

THE GRECIAN DIFFICULTY.

Mr. Punch: "Why don't you hit one of your own size?"]

YE COMMONS RESSOLVED INTO A COMMYTTEE OF YE WHOLE HOUSE.

_Richard Doyle._} {_From "Punch."_]

[Sidenote: Rupture with France Imminent.]

[Sidenote: Civis Romanus Sum.]

The Government had a wretchedly bad case to defend in Parliament; a case, too, which had been damaged by the introduction of that element which had told with such fatal effect against the Chartists and Smith O'Brien's Confederates--the element of ridicule. For the grasping Jew Pacifico had specified in his bill against the Greek Government various possessions strangely out of keeping with what had always been his modest household. Among the articles alleged to have been destroyed by fire were a bedstead, valued at £150, sheets for the same at £30, and a pillow-case at £10. Ministers already beaten in the Upper House stood in a critical position in the Lower. But Lord Palmerston rose to the occasion, and exhibited eloquence which hitherto he had not been suspected of possessing. He spoke with great vigour for nearly five hours, and wound up with a peroration which, spoken by a man of other mould than "Old Pam," might have savoured of claptrap, and read in cold blood at this day, seems to rise no higher than what Americans call "spread-eagleism." "If," he asked, "a subject of ancient Rome could hold himself free from indignity by saying _Civis Romanus sum_, shall not a British subject also, in whatever land he may be, feel confident that the watchful eye and strong arm of England will protect him against injustice and wrong?" _Civis Romanus_ carried the House and the country with the speaker: Palmerston's appeal saved the Government.

[Sidenote: Lord Palmerston's Rise.]

[Sidenote: Sir Robert Peel's Death.]

Sir Robert Peel made his last speech in opposition to the vote of confidence: though, in referring to Palmerston's defence of the Government, he declared that "his speech made us all proud of the man who made it." He delivered his last vote on the fourth day of the debate, about four o'clock in the morning of June 29. Next day at noon he attended a meeting of the Royal Commissioners of the Great Exhibition which was to be held the following year. After the meeting he mounted his horse, went to write his name in the Queen's book at Buckingham Palace, and then rode up Constitution Hill. He stopped to talk to the Hon. Miss Ellis, whom he met riding down from Hyde Park: something frightened his horse, which, by a sudden bound, unseated him. Peel in falling kept hold of the reins and pulled the horse on the top of him. He was internally and fatally injured, one of his ribs having been broken and forced into the lung. He died on July 2, after terrible suffering. The doctors were unable to deal with the injuries owing to the intense agony caused by the slightest movement. It brings to one's apprehension what an incalculable boon to suffering humanity has since that time been discovered in the use of anæsthetics. Chloroform had already been invented, it is true, in 1850; but its employment was little understood. Three years earlier Charles Greville had witnessed one of the first operations under chloroform in St. George's Hospital. How many suffering ones and friends of suffering ones have had cause to echo the feeling expressed in his journal: "I have no words to express my admiration for this invention, which is the greatest blessing ever bestowed on mankind, and the inventor of it the greatest of benefactors, whose memory ought to be venerated by countless millions for ages yet to come." In spite of this, it is greatly to be feared that the names of Guthrie the American and Soubeiran the Frenchman, who simultaneously discovered chloroform in 1831, and Lawrence of London and Simpson of Edinburgh, who first employed it in our hospitals, have been almost forgotten by the many.

THE LIFEBOAT OF 1837.

The form of Lifeboat introduced by Henry Greathead in 1789, having a curved keel, and rendered additionally buoyant by means of cork, was still the recognised form in 1837, and boats built by him have been in use until quite recently. The Lifeboat crews on the north and east coasts still prefer, and use, a boat of very similar shape.]

THE LIFEBOAT OF 1897.

This is the standard self-righting boat of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, and is the outcome of innumerable experiments. The Institution has a fleet of 298 Lifeboats, and has been the means of saving, since 1824, no fewer than 39,815 lives. The Illustration shews the Newquay boat entering the water by means of the slip way.]