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October 29, 1853.] THE LEADER, 1047
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IWHCK T O CORKKHrONDKNTS. . , Wn nro npu...
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PUlNTlNf! KOR 'i'HK HoUMKH OK PaKU AMIfl...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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The Governing- Classes. No. Viii. The Ka...
he always said , he would not ; and if they chose to give him office , why they must look out for a deuce of a jjjggs—and there always was a deuce of a mess . He liked office , of course ; it enabled him io provide for friends and " relatives ; it added to the social distinction ; and it must be pleasant , on a death-bed , to recall that one has been Secretary of State and Lord of the Treasury ¦; besides , it enhanced the fun of the history ¦ which he was requested to act . The race is more exciting when you have something to lose ; and taking office was . with Lord Derby , regarded as a sort of bet with
the Opposition . Those who study the drama of politics in the theatre , and not in the closet—who judge of an actor not by the dialogue , but by his look and voice—and because so few do , there is in England great knowledge of politics , but total ignorance of politicians—have ever come to the same conclusion about Lord Derby : that in public life he is merely the sportsman and the gladiator . He used to call O'Connell a " heavy weight , " and his great attacks on that eminent giant , * ' rounds . " Lord Derby was—he is growing bald now—the ideal of a " sparrer . " When he
spoke iu Parliament , his lithe , sinewy fame , " breed " in every fibre , and his handsome face , lit up with a daring smile , suggested "fight ; " and his style was always a fighting style ; he never argued , he replied and attacked . Even when Premier , and steadied into a good deal of discretion , he couldn't keep his hands off tempting faces . And the moment he left Premierdom he breathed freely again , and relapsed . As he quitted office he made an assault on Sir James Graham , merely because Sir James Graham happened to be
sitting in the gallery , killing time ; and since Lord Derby has been in Opposition again , he has twice driven Lord Aberdeen , and once Lord Clarendon , and every day the Duke of Newcastle , into a passion . Nor has he done with the Coalition yet ; for though exploded as a political chief , he has still a career , as a veteran bruiser , to train young Tory peers , who have very small heads and a venomous belief that a hatred of primogeniture is at the bottom of Uadidicalism .
Mr . Stanley became a Wing because the House of Derby , with its inveterate tendency to the weaker side , was Whig ; and while the Whigs were struggling at the era of the Reform Bill , Mr . Stanley was a capital Whig . It is an historical incident how he leaped on the table at Brookes ' , and poured out his passionate nonsense to keep the waverers together- — which the nonsense , being a future Earl ' s , really did . But he became a waverer himself directly the Whigs got safe into Downing-street ; and the moment that they were going to make Ireland sure for ever to
England , by the ruin of the Irish Church , off he went , a desperate young Tory . His father , a solid Whig , who voted for Lord John to the last day of his life , shook his venerable and worthy head , and took to ruining the property by collecting tho Stanleys—all the odditiesof the brute and bird creation into a . menagerie at KnowHlcy , which was tho admiration of Lancashire , and tho torror of Africa and Asia ; but neither tho rem onstrances of family connexion , party , or purse , stopped tho chivalrous defender of that ecclesias tical institution , tho most dishonest , and
disgraceful , and despotic , which modern mankind havo permitted to exist ; tho Whigs woro getting too strong , were really annihilating the Tories , and a Tory champion would Lord Stanley therefore be . That pugna city luul its consequences ¦— it ruined the Whigs . Thoy could havo done without tho intellects and the honours of Lord Stanley and Sir James ( u raha m ; but Lord Stanley made such a clatter in his desertion that the aristocracy got frightened ; tho Whig lordH told tho Whig leaders that lladicaliflm would not do ; that they were getting on a littlo too font ; and from that day to this tho WhigH novor
proposed a bold measure !—were passed by tho Tories , in bold measured , and havo sunk behind tho Tonkin in a poalition . Pool nourished when Stanley joined him ! ' » Opposition ; and Pool , Graham " , and Stanley gnvo ' •<> no to OnpoHition , ro-eolleotod a Tory party , and much an Wellington did for Conservatism , it is probablo that Pool owed his rapid return to power in 1841 " »<»¦»> to Lord Stanley than to tho Duke . A olovor poor in Hiieh n card for an ambitious parvenu , jwid l'oor Pool had no very low ! Then Lord Stanley wciat »' "w : lc to the Colonial OfHco , to tho groat deli ght of tho ° )< irka ivnd tho horror of Canadians , Australians , West
Indians , Ionians , and in fact all the outlying subjects of Her Majesty ; and there for two or three years Lord Stanley , in the intervals of racing , amused himself enormously ; and , according to those who have studied his proceedings , developed an amazing genius for confusion—the Topsy of the Colonial Office . Colonies were to him games and counters ; and Government a rouge et noir . Dealing with them came out the inveterate combative spirit of his family ; and it was a matter of course that he should set one against another , and all of them against England . His
grandfather died , and in bed , in witnessing a pair of game cocks ( the Derby breed is celebrated in the north ) spurring one another to death on his coverlet . And the grandson enjoyed the dignity of bis position—having colonies for cocks . In his consulship , in fact , appeared the school of colonial reformers , and Charles Buller , Lord Howick , Mr . Kintoul , and Sir William Molesworth , spoke and wrote a great deal in the amusing apprehension that they were making the Colonial Secretary very angry . Then came the Maynooth and Irish Colleges question . The same Lord Stanley , who would not appropriate the revenues of the Irish Establishment , should now have resigned , as Mr . Gladstone
did , on an attempt to endow and organize the Irish Roman Catholic Priesthood ; and so Lord Stanley would have resigned but for one reason—the Peel Ministry was tottering in consequence of so daring a proposal . Desert the weak of course he would not , so he stayed and carried Peel through that crisis ; for the old Peers and young Conservatives , both with remarkably small heads , which is the characteristic of British aristocracy , had now all the more confidence in him that he had once been a revolutionary Whig , besides liking and loving him for his fine nature and his magnificent manner . But then came Peel ' proposal in the Cabinet to repeal the Corn laws . That carried in the Cabinet without a dissentient—would have carried
Peel as Premier to the end of his days ; would have made the Ministry eternal ; would have consolidated the Toiy party , and taken the ground from under the Whigs . Now , then , was Lord Stanley ' s time—go on winning for ever ? Not he ; he resigned . Singular that such a man should have such power ; but the history England is now living is the consequence of Lord Stanley ' s resignation in 1846 . He had ruined the Whigs , he now ruined Peel . Lord Stanley ' s was a name ; without it there could have been no presentable Protectionist party ; with his name to rally round , a new
great furious party was a matter of course ; Peel was separated from the Tories ; all tho skilful administrators who had adhered to Peel , like honest men , were separated from the Tories ; and now , as the result of all that , we have a Coalition—not of parties , but of men ; so that Lord Stanley , by virtue of simple recklessness , has been enabled , in a short lifetime , to destroy every party in turn ! How ho must onjoy n \\ that ! He , certainly , enjoyed the Protectionist fight—simply because it was so hopeless . The glee with which ho must have brought out Lord George Bontinck , whom ho
told to go in and win I- —that sjiorting nobleman going in accordingly , and not winning , with glorious animal energy and strength of lungs . Peel was so slow and solemn , and discreet and good , that Lord Stanley must havo pined , when , sitting by him in tho Cabinet , to show him up—or to double him up ; and ho used , undoubtedly , to read Disraeli ' s superbly malignant Peolics with tears in his eyes . It is only a Lord Stanley who would havo encouraged such a man as Mr . Disraeli to hope for great office ; but of all tho jokes Lord Stanley had oncountcrod in politics , tho
joko of presenting Mr . Disraeli as leader of tho bigoted Tory and Protestant party , must havo Htruek him ; is tho most uniquely sublime ! Mr . DinnioH wais a man after Lord Stanloy ' n own heart ; and tho wjiy ho kept him up—despite tho consternation and tho romonstrancoH of tho Jnglisoa and tho old poors of his now party—dooB tho highest credit to his character as a wag . Notoriously all tho dull and doeorous small
heads woro for giving Mr . Disraeli a nnmll oflico out of tho Cabinet , ' when , in oonsequenoo of tho royal row botween Lord Joint and Lord Palmordtoii , tl m Protectionists—because tlioro was nobody « 1 h «—got in ; but , Lord Derby had a screw to lift Mr . DiHtuoli , —ho threatened to go down again to tho Lords and toll them , - tho truth , —that in tho whole Tory aristocracy of England thoro was not a man fit to preside in a Government bureau I Ho oaiU that onco , a « a capital joko : and ho
was just the man to say it again if they wouldn ' t let him have his way ! So he landed Mr . Disraeli into the lead of the Commons : and we can fancy Lord Derby saying to himself , ' 'Tandem , I have completed my fame , as a kicking peer of the realm ; I have made a fashionable novelist Chancellor of the British Exchequer ; and now , I can die happy ! " Yet he was not content , even with that ; he made Mr . Walpole a Secretary of State , and put him up to proposing a Militia Franchise ! More ; he took all his squad down to Oxford and made
' em Doctors ! As a collective joke , perhaps that was his finest . But his ministry was altogether a practical joke . In a minority in Parliament , detested and despised in the country , he appreciated the furious joke of persisting in remaining in power in the face of the opposition , not only of Parliament , but of people —he looked upon the whole business as a fight—as a race , and he did his best to win , —taking the
oddsand ends , as in Major Beresford . He posted Ma money ; he made all the rich peers post their money ; and he got together an enormous sum of money , and he did his best to bribe the majority out of the electors ; and he did get 300 for a laughing chorus , and would have got all , but that the Whigs bribed enormously too , and that there are certain places which won't be bribed , which would not take the
joke , and which did send up Radicals ; — Whigs , Radicals , and the floating balance of Roman Catholics and waverer 3 accordingly turning him out . They turned him out because he did not know when . to stop joking . Mr . Disraeli ' s was a funny Budget ; but Budgets are serious things ; and the result was that such slow men a 3 Lord Aberdeen and Mr . Gladstone came in—to govern us seriously . And the worst ol : it was , that Lord Derby had joked away his own party , too ; for in putting up Mr . Disraeli to laugh at the notion that Lord Derby had ever been , i Protectionist ,
the country might have been amused ; but the Newdegates ( prices were not ag high then as they are now ) were disgusted . So that when Lord Derby left power he left party ; and the Coalition cai'ries all before it . Perhaps , therefore , he is now , for tiro first time in his life , beginning to think and look serious ; for there ia neither a party to desert nor to join ! In his desperation he has undertaken to anticipate a party—a democratic party—to whom he bids defiance valiantly . But that ' s hardly funny ; all jokers overstrain tho point now and then .
Yet the satire is very fine . It is a very rich notion . —a Democracy in England ! — a Democracy in a , country which has seen Lord Derby a Minister , and made him chief governor ! A Democracy in a country which permits hucIi an electoral system that a man like Lord Derby can break up Ministries by leaving them , or by joining them ! Until wo realize what a thoroughly ludicrous people wo are , wo can never understand such a man an Lord Derby . English politics
are a joko ; jui < 1 ho only evidences his superior naturo and finer honesty in openly laughing at all tho shams , and griimingly taking advantage of them . Were we , indeed , a self-governed , self-reliant people— -if we woro thoughtful and wise—if wo were free at homo , and did not adore our nobility—if wo had a policy abroad , and had tho manhood to work it out—Lord Dorby would bo steadied into greatness by respect for hi « countrymen . Ah it is , ho is tomptcd into intolerant Toryism by hid very derision of them . ]] NoN-KustfTOB .
October 29, 1853.] The Leader, 1047
October 29 , 1853 . ] THE LEADER , 1047
Iwhck T O Corkkhrondknts. . , Wn Nro Npu...
IWHCK T O CORKKHrONDKNTS . . , Wn nro npuin unavoidably compelled to postpone tlio flrHt of a m-rlcH ol ' urMdoH ol " i > xlri : i > io interest < uul importance , on Kuhhiak Buniwoii for which wo uro indebted <<> tho fliHllntfuiHhed pnn of M Aloximdre Ilerzon . Kunhian Hhufdom ihuhI , mow I > o inudo an Ji ' uropmiit ( iuoHtiwii not like Undo Toiniani , n HUnVml-HouHO Question . Hoveral lettorH to our Open Council , unri other nrticloH , nro noccHHnrily omitted Mi in week .
Pulntlnf! Kor 'I'Hk Houmkh Ok Paku Amifl...
PUlNTlNf ! KOR 'i'HK HoUMKH OK PaKU AMIflNT . TllO oxpoiiHo to tho public for printing for tho Houses of Parliament last yonv was Hi , 0 U 0 / . Colucotion oif TUK Kisvkndio .- In the year ondod tho f > th January Junk tho charges of collection on tho revenue amounted to 1 £ , O' dS , 7 < W '•
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 29, 1853, page 15, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_29101853/page/15/
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