Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Henry Reeve, C.B., D.C.L. Part 26

Val Richer, 4 juin.

My dear Sir,--La destruction a atteint son terme, l'oeuvre de reconstruction commence. Elle sera tres difficile, mais je n'en desespere pas, et j'y prendrai quelque part sans sortir de ma cellule. Quelle vie que la mienne! Mon plus ancien souvenir politique est d'avoir vu de loin, du haut d'une terra.s.se de la pet.i.te maison de campagne ou ma mere s'etait refugiee pendant la Terreur, en 1794, les Jacobins poursuivis et a.s.sommes par la reaction contre Robespierre au 9 thermidor. La scene se pa.s.sait sur les boulevards de Nismes. J'a.s.siste en 1871, de la campagne aussi, a la chute des nouveaux Jacobins, vrais heritiers et eleves de la Terreur. Et que n'ai-je pas vu, en fait d'evenement, dans cet intervalle de 77 ans!

Sur ce je vous dis adieu. Je me porte a.s.sez bien, malgre mes 83 ans et ces spectacles Shakspeariens. La France est, depuis 1789, une immense tragedie de Shakspeare.

Tout a vous,

GUIZOT.

Reverting to the Journal:--

Mr. Grote died on June 18th. I attended the funeral in Westminster Abbey on the 24th. John Mill and Overstone were among the pall-bearers.

At The Club dinner, on June 20th, the Duc d'Aumale took leave of us before returning to France. There were present: the Lord Chancellor (Hatherley), Master of the Rolls [Romilly], Duke of Cleveland, Lord Salisbury, Lord Derby, Sir H. Holland, Dean Stanley, W. Smith, and self.

About this time I was made a Companion of the Order of the Bath. Lord Ripon, then Lord President, had asked them to make me a K.C.B., but Gladstone wrote me word that it was a rule that men should pa.s.s through the third grade to arrive at the second. [Footnote: That there was such a rule has been very fully proved by numerous exceptions.] Arthur Helps and William Stephenson were made C.B.'s at the same time, and afterwards K.C.B.'s. I was gazetted a C.B. on June 30th.

The following from Lord Granville refers to a conversation in the House of Lords on the const.i.tution of the Appellate Court of the Judicial Committee.

The Marquis of Salisbury had said that in his opinion it should be a court of fixed const.i.tution.

At present it was often difficult to discover who were the judges in the particular case. He believed the President of the Council in every case appointed the judges; but, as he understood, it was practically done by a gentleman for whom all had the greatest respect, Mr. Henry Reeve, the Registrar. This did not seem a satisfactory state of things for a tribunal dealing with matters which excited people's pa.s.sions and feelings to the highest degree, and on which parties were angrily divided. n.o.body conversant with the matter could harbour the unworthy suspicion that the Court was ever packed for the trial of a particular case--he had no apprehensions on that score; but it was because the action and const.i.tution of the Court should be above all suspicion that he would urge the n.o.ble and learned lord on the woolsack to provide some fixed const.i.tution, so that the Court should not be const.i.tuted afresh for each particular case it had to consider.

Lord Granville replied in the sense of his letter to Reeve, except that he said 'Mr. Reeve invariably consulted _the Lord President_, who, on some occasions, called a Cabinet Council.' The Lord President at that time was the Marquis of Ripon. Granville was followed by Lord Cairns, who said:--

He could testify from considerable experience to the way in which Mr. Reeve performed his duties. The fact was that there was a great unwillingness to attend, and undergo the great labour and responsibility of hearing important cases. Mr. Reeve, knowing this, and having an earnest desire to perform the duties of his office effectively--no public officer could discharge them better--was in the habit of making himself acquainted with the arrangements of those who might be expected to attend, with a view--not to decide who ought to attend to hear particular cases--but as to whose services were obtainable, in order that some kind of Court might be const.i.tuted.... It ought to be understood that no person had any power of selecting some and excluding others, and that the Registrar's endeavour to procure the attendance of individuals had merely arisen from anxiety lest there should be no quorum. [Footnote: Hansard, 1871, June 22nd, cols.

389-91.]

_From Lord Granville_

16 _Bruton Street, June 23rd_.--I see the report in the 'Times' is defective. I stated that the Lord President was undoubtedly responsible for all that you did. I paid a high tribute to your services to the Judicial Committee (which was cheered by the law lords); I said the difficulty was often great to collect sufficient members to attend; that you took great pains, by ascertaining the wishes and possible dates, to ensure this; that for ordinary meetings of the Court you acted on your own judgement; but that in all cases where there was a possibility of party or personal feeling being made a cause of want of confidence in the composition of the Court, you had always consulted me; and I had, on some occasions, not only consulted the Home Office, but the Cabinet, in order to do that which would ensure public confidence. I should not be sorry if you could show that I was not in the wrong. I was delighted to hear of your C.B. None could be more deserved.

The Journal records:--

_July 7th_.--I dined with Mrs. Grote; one of the first persons she saw after Grote's death.

_8th_.--A banquet was given at the Crystal Palace to the members of the Comedie Francaise, who had been driven over to London by the siege of Paris and the Commune.

This 'banquet' was of the nature of a lunch, beginning at two o'clock.

Lord Dufferin was in the chair, supported by Lords Granville, Stanhope, Powerscourt, Lytton, Houghton, Mr. Disraeli, Tennyson, Macready, and others. When 'the desire of eating was taken away,' the chairman, speaking in French, proposed the health of the guests. M. Got responded. Horace Wigan, too, spoke; and Lord Granville, 'whose fluent command of extempore French excited general admiration,' gave 'The Health of the Chairman,' and, with a neat reference to the 'Letters from High Lat.i.tudes,' then 14, not 41 years old, said: 'L'accueil que vous avez donne a son discours doit ra.s.surer Lord Dufferin et lui faire meme oublier les succes oratoires que--Latiniste incomparable, et voue au purisme Ciceronien--il a obtenus dans les regions plus septentrionales.' To this chaff Lord Dufferin replied in English: 'Lord Granville has been good enough to allude to what he is pleased to describe as an oratorical triumph in a distant country; and I would venture to remind you--and you may take the word of an experienced person in confirmation of what I am about to say--that when anybody wishes to make a speech in a foreign language, he will find it much more easy to do so after dinner than at an early hour in the morning.'

For Reeve this wound up the season. A few days later, July 23rd, he, with his wife, started for Germany.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE GREVILLE MEMOIRS

Dr. de Mussy had recommended Reeve to drink the water at Carlsbad, so to Carlsbad they went, and stayed there twenty-four days. The manner of life at Carlsbad may be very wholesome, but no one has ever ventured to speak of it as jovial. The Reeves thought it 'dull enough,' and left it with a feeling of release, on August 23rd. On the 24th they were at Dresden, and reached home on September 3rd. And then came a curious reaction; a disagreeable experience of the Carlsbad treatment. 'Henry,' wrote Mrs.

Reeve a few days later, 'who had been quite well and quite free from gout all the time, had a tendency thereto on leaving Hamburg, which, on landing at Gravesend, was a sharp attack in the right hand. He cannot hold a pen.... His doctor and some fellow-patients all say that after Carlsbad waters such attacks are frequent, and that they in no way imply that the waters did not suit.' The Journal goes on:--

_September 16th_.--To Gorhambury [Lord Verulam's] with Christine. On leaving the house on the 18th to go to the station, the horse in the fly ran away. We were overturned near the park gates, and had a narrow escape.

n.o.body was hurt, and we drove on [in another fly] to Lord Ebury's at Moor Park.

_October 2nd_.--To Scotland on a visit to Moncreiff at Cultoquhey; thence to Minard (Mr. Pender's) on Loch Fyne; thence to Edinburgh; Ormiston on the 21st; the John Stanleys there and Lord Neaves. [Footnote: A lord of justiciary, one of the foremost authorities on criminal law in Scotland, and for more than forty years a regular contributor of prose and verse to _Blackwood's Magazine_.] Lady Ruthven to dinner.

_26th_.--To Auchin, and home on the 28th.

A bill had pa.s.sed at the close of the last session for the appointment of four paid members of the Privy Council. They were Sir James Colvile, Sir Barnes Peac.o.c.k, Sir Montague Smith, and Sir Robert Collier. These judges began to sit on November 6th of this year. The Court, from that time, sat continuously. I obtained an additional clerk, and also an addition of 300 a year to my own salary, which was fixed at 1,500 .

Pleasant visit to New Lodge (Van de Weyer's) in November. Shooting at Lithe Hill in December.

The Prince of Wales's serious illness. He very nearly died on December 6th.

_December 20th_.--The Broglies dined with us, to meet Beust and the Foresters.

_22nd_.--Mrs. Forester asked us, at my desire, to meet Disraeli and Lady Beaconsfield, at a small party. There was n.o.body else there but Lord and Lady Colville. It was very interesting and agreeable.

1872.--The year opened in Paris, where I had gone after Christmas; the first time I had been there since the war. M. Thiers was President of the Republic. I went to Versailles to see him on January 3rd, and found him in the Prefecture--the room that had been occupied just before by the German Emperor. M. Lesseps was there that evening, and we returned to Paris together. He and his friends were apparently very anxious to sell the Suez Ca.n.a.l. I dined with Thiers on the 6th also.

M. Thiers's conversation on the war, the Commune and the siege was very interesting. He said to me: 'Certainement je suis pour la Republique! Sans la Republique qu'est-ce que je serais, moi?--bourgeois, Adolphe Thiers.' He described the withdrawal of the troops from Paris, which was his own act.

Then the siege, which he claims to have directed, the battery of Mouton Tout, adding, 'Nous avons enterre, en entrant a Paris, vingt mille cadavres.'

Dined at Mme. Mohl's on the 5th with M. de Lomenie and M. Chevreuil, who is about eighty-five.

The Duc d'Aumale had opened his house in the Faubourg St.-Honore; reception there.

_January 8th_.--Dined with the Economists to meet the Emperor of Brazil. I was presented to him, and made a speech in French on the maintenance of the commercial treaty, which was applauded. Back to London on the 9th.

Reeve had already proposed to Mr. Longman to publish a volume of his articles from the 'Edinburgh Review.' He now wrote to him:--

_C.O., January 11th_.--I find that the French articles I wish to collect and publish amount to _twelve_. I enclose a list of them. They make about 380 pages of the 'Edinburgh Review' form. How much will that make if printed in a smaller form? The t.i.tle of the volume is an important matter.

I have thought of 'Royal and Republican France,' or 'A Cycle of French History;' but I may think of something better. If you will make the arrangements, I shall be able to supply copy very soon. The introduction can be printed afterwards, I suppose?

I conclude you will publish on the half-profit plan, though my past experience of that system does not lead me to regard it as the road to fortune. Of our military volume about 650 copies were sold, and Chesney and I made 2 . 3_s_. 0_d_. apiece!

To this Mr. Longman replied:--

_From Mr. T. Longman_

_January 14th_.--I will have the calculation made of the articles you mention. I conclude you would wish to print in the usual demy 8vo. form, like Macaulay's Essays and all the other reprints from the 'E.R.'

The plan of a division of profits has been usual in such republications; and it seems peculiarly adapted to them, as neither the contributor nor the publisher can republish separately without the consent of the other.

Whether that plan of publication may be a road to fortune or not depends on the demand for the book. I had once the satisfaction of paying 20,000 on one year's account, on that principle, to Lord Macaulay. I certainly had no expectation of a fortune from the republication which produced you 2 3_s_. 0_d_.; but had I purchased the right of separate publication for 100 , I hardly think you would have been satisfied that fortune should have so favoured you at my expense. It seems to be the fas.h.i.+on to decry that mode of publication; but there will always be books that can be published on no other terms, unless at the cost and risk of the author.

_From Lord Westbury_