Memoirs of the Court of George IV. 1820-1830 Part 31

St. James's Square, Feb. 1822.

MY DEAR DUKE,

I am sorry to hear that you have such authentic accounts of the attack on _me_. I have still reason to believe that none will be made till the general one on the Civil List. Charles has had a conversation with Lord Londonderry, who says that he is perfectly ready to meet any attack, both as to the time the mission had been vacant, and as to the expediency of having a person there with my rank. With respect to the first, he says that as soon as Canning left Switzerland, he took the King's pleasure as to Lord Clanwilliam's appointment, which was approved, but that in consequence of Hamilton's illness, he was appointed, _ad interim_, Under Secretary of State, and that he liked the business so much, that he now wishes to hold the situation permanently. With respect to the expediency of appointing a Minister, he defends it on the plea of all the great powers having a representative there with that rank, and that in case of disturbances in Italy, it might be a very important post. In point of expense, I find that it will be more considerable than Munich, Stuttgard, or Frankfort. Lord Londonderry thanked Charles for my offer, but said that he did not see any necessity for accepting it, and that it would be of bad consequences, as showing weakness at the first start. Duncannon told Phillimore that they were not making any whip for the first days.

Many thanks for your box, respecting which I have sent to inquire.

I kiss hands on Monday, after which I will call in Pall Mall, in hopes of finding you arrived.

Ever yours affectionately,

H. WILLIAMS WYNN.

The references to the late Dean of Westminster, to be found in the two following letters, are not without interest. The Duke of Buckingham was anxious to engage him as a travelling companion in a tour he was about to undertake, in which he proposed to avail himself of every opportunity for adding to his knowledge of geology.

LORD GRENVILLE TO THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM.

Dropmore, Feb. 17, 1822.

My friend Buckland is so far from being a quiz in a buzz wig, that he is, I think, one of the men I should most choose for an _agreeable companion in a post-chaise_. Whether he is prepared to undertake so formidable an expedition as you speak of, I should have some doubt, and the rather because he has usually some project of his own for spending the long vacation abroad in the prosecution of his inquiries. I can, however, have no difficulty in asking him the question, and at all events I should be glad of the opportunity of making him known to you, because I am sure you cannot but like him.

I have been reading Lord Londonderry's speech, which, as far as I understand his figures, seems to me more satisfactory than I had hoped. The great question is--will it satisfy the country gentlemen, without whom he cannot go on, and will they, on this ground, make a real and firm stand in his behalf? Of that of course I cannot pretend to judge, nor perhaps is it easy to say who can.

Government have certainly, under all the circ.u.mstances, acted wisely in taking the present moment for reducing the Five per cents. quite down to Four, though it is obvious they might have made rather a better bargain by a little further delay. So far is well, and I think the Malt Tax is, on the whole, the best they could have chosen, though I am not sure whether the Window Tax would not have given more general relief. His million for next year (a.s.suming Ireland to be tranquillized), I also fully understand and approve.

But pray explain to me if you can (for from the newspaper I can make nothing of it), from what quarter his 500,000_l._ in each year, for the four preceding years, is to come? Observe he states it (if said _Courier_ be correct), as something independent of, and in addition to, the future reduction of Four per cents. down to Three.

If by the conjuration of what is called _borrowing of the community_, in order to keep up the nominal Sinking Fund, he means to apply the five millions annual surplus at _simple_ interest, and not at _compound_, he ought in the first place to say so distinctly, for whether right or wrong (about which much might be said), it is, at least, a more complete departure than any yet made from the original principle of the Sinking Fund. I do not say it would be necessarily wrong because _new_, but it would be _so new_ that it ought to be brought distinctly under view.

But I suspect this cannot be his meaning, both from his relying so much on the necessity of keeping up Pitt's measure, and also from his expressly stating the larger amount of this sinking fund of five millions in proportion to debt when compared with Pitt's original million in proportion to the debt of 1786. The fallacy of such a comparison would be monstrous, if the one was a fund working at compound interest, and the other be meant to work only at simple interest. Besides, even if this were to be done, the annual interest set free by the 5,000,000_l._ annually applied would, at four per cent. be 200,000_l._, not 500,000_l._ So I am at a loss to make it out, and perhaps after all it is only the blunder of the newspaper reporter. If you can explain it to me pray do.

Lord L---- takes no notice of the successive falling in of the army and navy half-pay and pensions, which, if the present amount be as he states it, 5,000,000_l._, cannot be put at less than from 100,000_l._ to 150,000_l._ to put in in each year. I suppose he was afraid of the old joke against Sir George Yonge, who was said to have expressed a hope that the half-pay officers would die off fast, and be thus _provided for_.

Ever most affectionately yours,

G.

LORD GRENVILLE TO THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM.

Dropmore, Feb. 20, 1822.

I enclose you Mr. Buckland's answer, which I think you may pretty nearly consider as an acceptance of your offer, and I really congratulate you upon it. He is full of information of all sorts, with lively spirits, and a most active mind and body, and will, I think, be as cheerful and amusing a companion as a man could have in such a tour. I trust you take a draughtsman with you, for without that your _cortege_ will be very incomplete.

I do not think Monday's discussion argues at all favourably for the Government, and Huskisson's loss will be most severely felt on the corn cause, if he is really so weak as to be driven from it by a little pelting in pamphlets and speeches. To my taste his speech read as much the best that was made on the former day. But I cannot for the life of me see what good the four millions are to do; nor can I understand, on the other side, Ricardo's fears of the harm they are to do.

The Bank have acted with the same ignorance as has characterized them throughout. If they do not lend their gold to Government, they must lend it to individuals by lowering their discounts, and if they incur loss by either operation, I do not see who but they will suffer by it.

Ever most affectionately yours,

G.

I see by the subsequent accounts in the _Courier_, that Government does plainly mean to apply the 5,000,000_l._ at simple, and not at compound interest, and I do not see why one should be sorry for it.

But even so, I cannot work 200,000_l._ up to 500,000_l._ I suppose the rest is to come, and much more I am confident will come, from casual saving and increased revenue in each successive year.

If I cared a farthing about my predictions, otherwise than as the facts are of public benefit, I should have great cause to be proud of all I have said from the first day of peace, as to the necessary rise of our revenue to follow from it, and that while all the world was croaking all round me on that subject.

The threatened attack did not come off for some time; nevertheless a fair amount of political skirmis.h.i.+ng took place in both Houses, and every great question was a wager of battle in which the contending parties exerted themselves to the utmost to overpower their adversaries.

Catholic Emanc.i.p.ation was expected to be a severe contest, but the increasing disturbances in the sister kingdom caused the friends of Ireland much anxiety, and rendered a coercive policy inevitable. At this period the country gentlemen began to exhibit a diminution of ministerial support, which created considerable embarra.s.sment.

THE RIGHT HON. CHARLES W. WYNN TO THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM.

MY DEAR B----,

I yesterday met the Chancellor in Cabinet, who immediately came to me, and expressed in the strongest manner the pain which he had felt at seeing sentiments attributed to him by Fyshe Palmer, in his speech at the Bedford meeting, which he never entertained, and which if he had, he trusts he never should have been fool enough to have so expressed.

The joke is a very bad one, and was repeated to me when I came to town in January as Mackintosh's, probably with just as little foundation as it is now attributed to the Chancellor.

Lord John's coa.r.s.e and ungentlemanlike attack appeared to me very much to miss fire, and my reply was well received and listened to; but it is curious to see what common cause the newspaper reports make in hostility against me--wilfully altering, and even inserting things for which there was not the least foundation in my speech.

The _Times_ contained the only tolerable report, which was copied in the _Courier_, and even from that it would appear that, instead of being extremely clamorous and inattentive to Folkestone[80] (so much that he was obliged repeatedly to stop, in order to procure silence), and then listening to what I said very favourably, the House had adopted a conduct exactly the reverse.

Lord Londonderry is to-day to open a plan of providing for the annual charge of five millions now paid in half-pay, pensions, &c., by granting long annuities for forty-five years, by which means a saving of two millions annually is to be made, which is to repeal the salt tax and diminish the window-tax.

Being myself no friend to the Sinking Fund, and anxious that the Government should have the credit of affording every practicable remission of taxation, I have no objection whatever to this; but I must say for those who support that system, it is somewhat ridiculous with one hand to expend five millions in relief of the burthens of posterity, and with the other to transpose a burthen from our own shoulders upon theirs.

I am still myself sanguine in my hope of the continuance of peace, as I think it clear that both powers wish to avoid war, and that the Emperor Alexander is aware of the certainty that the flame once lighted must spread further.

[80] Viscount Folkestone, the present Earl of Radnor.

THE RIGHT HON. CHARLES W. WYNN TO THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM.

House of Commons, Six P.M.

MY DEAR B----,

Lord Liverpool had not, at eleven this morning, returned from Brighton, and Londonderry was not out of bed, or at least not come down. I sent your two notes to the latter, but have not yet seen him, though the post is just going out.

The visit to Brighton relates, I believe, wholly to the Civil List, on which the country gentlemen are to make their next serious attack. I do not agree with you in your wish that the Government should break up upon so very unpopular a question as that of the Admiralty. I myself look at the minority on the salt tax with more apprehension and concern than the majority on the Admiralty.

Ever yours,

C. W. W.