" CHAPTER XVIII THE HUNDRED DAYS OF CANNING "Even I can praise thee-Tories do no more; BYRON, Age of Bronze" (1823). I. THE PROLOGUE 'He who had toiled thirty years to attain this dizzy height; he who had held it for three months of intrigue and obloquy, and now a heap of dust, and that is all."-SIR WALTER SCOTT, Journal, 10th Aug. 1827. THE last struggle in which Canning engaged was perhaps the fiercest, as it was certainly the most triumphant, of his life. It was called by Metternich The Hundred Days' of Canning, and in that brief space were crowded all sorts of intrigues and counterplots which ended in a tragedy. It witnessed the grapple of old prejudices with new parties; the appearance of a new Prime Minister, opposed by factions and by old parliamentary hands, but, like the two Pitts, visibly called to office by the voice of the nation. His advent not only signalised the end of old combinations at home; it also had a message and a meaning for the world. After three months of strife and uncertainty he adjourned Parliament with a triumphant majority. Within a fortnight the nation was applauding a new and epoch-making phase in foreign policy. A fortnight more and sinister rumours began to flit about, and a week later the new Prime Minister was dead. 2. THE DIVISIONS IN THE CABINET AND LIVERPOOL'S ILLNESS (17TH FEBRUARY 1827) The outlines of the drama are simple; the details infinitely complex. It is a tragedy in two ways, for it lowered the fame of Wellington and hastened the death of Canning. The crux r lay in the Catholic question. On this the Cabinet had agreed on division, the Whips being withdrawn, and both Ministers and Members voting as it seemed good on the question. When Canning had entered the Cabinet in 1822, there were only three Emancipationists besides himself, of whom Castlereagh was one. Canning, as the most ardent of Emancipationists and the most brilliant of speakers, had done much to encourage their cause. There were still only four so-called 'Catholics in the Cabinet-Canning, Huskisson, Melville, and Robinson; the 'Protestants' were eight-Wellington, Bathurst, Harrowby, Westmoreland, Bexley, Eldon, Peel, and Liverpool himself. When the latter fell, most of the Protestants' refused to have a Catholic' for Premier; some were determined to exclude Canning altogether from office. The attempt had been actually begun before Liverpool's incapacity was made known.1 Jof It is not quite fair to suggest that this was the sole motive of the Protestants,' and that they had no other grounds for opposition. Since 1825 Canning had had his own way in the Cabinet, and been supported, through thick and thin, by Liverpool. As soon as Liverpool was gone, the Ultra section of the Cabinet saw an opportunity for recovering their lost control of foreign policy. An Ultra Prime Minister might hold Canning in check; one of his own kidney would only lend him further support. The cause subsequently assigned by Wellington for refusal to serve under Canning was that he had had previous relations with the Whigs. 2 In the strict sense this statement was apparently incorrect. Canning had had friendly relations and private correspondence with Lord Holland and Sir Robert Wilson; he had intimated through friends to Brougham that he appreciated the tone of his speeches and the support he had lent to his foreign policy; he had sent the Dukes of Devonshire and Northumberland on complimentary missions to St Petersburg and to Paris. Beyond this he had not gone, though his general sympathy with some of their ideas was clear. The fact is that the real Opposition. ་ 1 The Duke of York, a most ardent anti-Catholic, and heir to the throne, died on Jan. 5/27. Shortly before this he had written to the King, demanding a uniform anti-Catholic Ministry, a demand really aimed at Canning. Stap., P.L., iii. 299-300; Yonge's Liverpool, iii. 432-7. 2 Vide Notes to Chapter XVIII., pp. 521-30. sat on the Treasury Bench.' They consisted, wrote Palmerston breezily, 21st October 1826, "of old women like the Chancellor [Eldon] . . . ignoramuses like Westmoreland [the sot privé], old stumped-up Tories like Bathurst; how such a man as Peel, liberal, enlightened, and fresh minded, should find himself running in such a pack is hardly intelligible." Like Canning" Peel leaned in the direction of relaxing the Navigation Acts, of modifying the Corn Laws, of abolishing the Slave Trade, and he seems to have favoured a liberal foreign policy. The Ultras forgave all these faults to Peel because he was a Protestant,' and none of them to Canning because he was a Catholic.' Canning was as suspect to the Ultras in the Cabinet as he was agreeable to the Whigs in opposition. Here again the disablement of Liverpool rendered it almost inevitable that the two sections of the Cabinet should fly apart. Canning's head was not that of the cherub behind which the two wings of the Cabinet could unite. Some of them, indeed, thought his countenance anything but cherubic. ་ The true causes pierced deeper than principles to personality. Wellington had forced Canning on the King in 1822, trusting to have an obedient and grateful Foreign Minister, and relying on the King and the majority of the Cabinet to keep him in check. But the Foreign Minister had displayed unexpected independence, and the Duke discovered at the end of 1824 that neither he, nor the majority, nor the King could prevent the recognition of the independence of Spanish America. He complained bitterly of the fact to Esterházy. Fresh humiliaFresh humiliations followed. Canning settled the question of Brazil in 1825, and of Portugal in 1826, on his own lines, and induced Wellington himself to sign the April Protocol as to Greece. The Duke was dismayed at the dissolution of the Congress System, furious at the popular success Canning achieved over Portugal. His pen flowed with vitriol. Canning is " certainly a most extraordinary man. Either his mind does not seize a case accurately; or he forgets the impressions which ought to be received from what he reads, or is stated to him; or knowing or remembering the accurate state of the case, he 1 Hobhouse notes the feeling thus in his Diary, Feb. 12/27: He [Canning] has been very ill indeed, and some of his colleagues had been congratulating themselves on the probable event. Shame!" Recollections of a Long Life, ii. 168. Italics my own. distorts and misrepresents facts in his instructions to his ministers with a view to entrap the consent of the Cabinet to some principle on which he would found a new-fangled system." "In respect to the negotiation itself with the Porte I have never in my life known anything half so confused as Mr C.'s ideas." 1 Just about the same time Arbuthnot (the Duke's henchman) informed Liverpool that Wellington had been dissatisfied with the conduct of foreign policy ever since Castlereagh's death, that he would be 'no party' to war, and might resign from the Cabinet.2 These communications took place before Canning recalled our Minister from Madrid on his own responsibility, and before he made his famous Portugal speech of the 12th December 1826. From January to March 1827 the Duke continued to write Canning letters protesting against the steps he was taking as regards Greece, and attempting to prevent the conclusion of the Treaty on the lines he evidently desired. This matter was much more important to Wellington than the Catholic one, for he was a political, rather than a religious, Protestant.' One thing is clear from first to last. The Duke's great fear was that the Whigs, whom he suspected of intriguing with Canning, might join the government. In that case they would carry the Greek Treaty, which he abhorred. He was resolved never to admit Canning as Prime Minister, but thought the government too weak to go on without him in the Cabinet. Canning, on the other hand, was resolved either to be the acknowledged Prime Minister, or to serve only under a dummy' who would carry out his wishes. He was quite aware, however, of the distrust many of the Ultras entertained for him. Hence he was resolved to give them no occasion for saying anything against him. Until his actual accession to office it was therefore much to his interest to act with 1 Wellington to Bathurst, Sept. 7/26. The passage here quoted is suppressed in W.N.D., iii. 403, but printed in Bathurst Papers, [1923], p. 615. 2 Arbuthnot to Liverpool, Sept. 5/26, v. Yonge's Liverpool, [1868), iii. 395. A little later four peers were made without Wellington's knowledge; two of them, Seaford (Charles Ellis) and Clanricarde, being Canning's nominees, v. Gr. MSS. Lord Morley to Granville, Nov. 16/26. Owing to Canning's influence, and against Wellington's views, Sir Charles Stuart was refused a peerage. Cp. Colchester Diary [1861], iii. 500. |