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THE CREEVEY PAPERS
First Edition . .
Reprinted ....
Reprinted ....
Reprinted ....
Second Edition . . {Fifth Impressioii)
Reprinted ....
One Vol. Edition .
November^ 1903- December.^ i903' Jamiary^ 1904. Jan7iary, 1904, Febfiiary, 1904.
February^ 1904. March, 1904.
&o<!^J^i^U-^k'ic
riTR CREEVEY PAPERS
•■T
LECTION FROM PONDENCE & DI
THOM '
CORRES- H LATE
EDITED BY aOHT HON. SIR HERBERT MAXWELL BART., M.P., LL.D., F.R.S.
WITH PORTRAITS
F. P. DUTT*^'
THI
ASEl POND
^ //.^^/L^-..-^^ //^/v
THE CREEVEY PAPERS
A SELECTION FROM THE CORRES- PONDENCE & DIARIES OF THE LATE
THOMAS CREEVEY, M.P.
I)
BORN 1768— DIED 1838
EDITED BY
,THE RIGHT HON. SIR HERBERT MAXWELL
BART., M.P., LL.D., F.R.S.
WITH PORTRAITS
NEW YORK
E. P. BUTTON & COMPANY
1904
Printed in Great Britain.
HXOHANGB BBOWN UNIV. LIBEABT M/»3r 9.^ , 1939
PRINTED BV WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LI^aTED, LONDON AND BBCCLES.
INTRODUCTION.
"How little," exclaims Mr. Birrell, in his recent memoir of William Hazlitt, " how little is it we know about the character of a dead man we never saw!" Little enough, as a rule, of the performer, even when the part he has played has been historical ; still less when his natural gifts have not availed to raise him to distinction, or circumstances refused him a place above the common run of his kind. Nevertheless it is given to certain men of subordinate importance in their day so to reveal themselves in correspondence or, more rarely, in their journals, as to leave upon him who, in after years, shall stir the venerable store and decipher the faded pages, an impression of their personality so vivid as to convince him of the writer's character and motives.
Of such was Thomas Creevey, sometime member of Parliament for Thetford, and afterwards for Appleby — both of them pocket boroughs of the most unre- generate type. Born in Liverpool in March, 1768, he was the son of William Creevey, merchant of that city, and certain allusions in his correspondence seem to show that his parents were natives of Ireland. But Creevey himself seems to have been pretty much in
VI INTRODUCTION.
the dark as to his own pedigree. He formed an early and intimate friendship with Dr. J. Currie, a dis- tinguished physician and leading citizen of Liverpool,* who writes as follows in 1803 : —
" Well, I know all about your birth and parentage. You came originally from Galloway in Scotland, and settled on the Irish coast right opposite, within sight of the sweet country you had left — you are of an ancient Scottish family in that county, now nearly extinct (except that it revives in your own person) to whom belonged the castle and manor of Castle Creevey near Glenluce (with which I am perfectly acquainted) now in the family of Lord Selkirk, I believe. Then your grandfather who was an officer in the army, if not born was certainly begotten in Scotland, and as far as Mrs. Eaton and I can ascertain the fact, in the very town of Dumfries — but that we won't be sure of. — And to come to the point, it would not be at all surprising if in the last 500 years some of our ancestors had joined issue together, and if our great-grandfathers, ten or twenty times removed, had been one and the same person ! "
Now in one respect, at least, the learned doctor's statements herein will not bear examination. Castle Creavie, indeed, is in Galloway; but it is not near Glenluce, which is in Wigtownshire (Western Gallo- way), and it never belonged to the family of Lord Selkirk. It is a farm in Rerwick parish, in the Stewartry of Kircudbright (Eastern Galloway), distant fully fifty miles from Glenluce, and has been owned successively by different families; but not since 1646, at least, by any of the name of Creevey or Creavie. Neither is there, nor has there
* James Currie, M.D. [1756-1805], son of a Scottish minister, emigrated to Virginia in 177 1, Avhere he studied medicine. Returning to Great Britain in 1777, he continued his studies at Edinburgh University, and ultimately became the chief exponent of the cold-water cure, and the advocate of thermometrical observations in fever.
INTRODUCTION. Vll
been, any castle there, although the prefix doubtless was derived from a couple of pre-historic hill forts, of which the mounds remain on the north and east of the present farmhouse.*
This Thomas Creevey was educated at a grammar school at Hackney — " old School Lane," he calls it — and at Queens College, Cambridge, graduating B.A. as seventh wrangler in 1789, and M.A. in 1792. On 9th November, 1789, he was admitted student of the Inner Temple, and on 7th November, 1791, of Gray's Inn; being called to the Bar on 27th June, 1794. The voluminous correspondence and fragmentary journals left by him afford no explanation of how he obtained in 1802 the Duke of Norfolk's nomination for the snug little borough of Thetford with its thirty-one docile electors. That year was notable for another important event in his life, namely, his marriage with the widow of William Ord, Esq., of Fenham, New- minster Abbey, and Whitfield. This lady, who was the daughter of Charles Brandling, Esq., of Gosforth House, M.P. for Newcastle-on-Tyne, was possessed of comfortable, if not of considerable, means. To her first husband she had borne two sons and four daughters ; and one of these daughters, Elizabeth Ord, who never married, became her step-father's confidante and favourite correspondent. After their mother's death in 18 18, the Miss Ords lived at Rivenhall in Essex, and in Cheltenham ; and Miss Elizabeth corre- sponded regularly with Mr. Creevey, whose industry and volubility in response are truly amazing. A large proportion of the following pages are filled with extracts from these letters — extracts which probably
* Land and their Owners i7i Galloivay^ by P. H. McKerlie, vol. V. p. 113.
Vlll INTRODUCTION.
do not amount to more than one-fiftieth of the whole. As time went on, Mr. Creevey conceived the idea of compiling a history of his own times, and used to tell Miss Elizabeth Ord to keep his letters, " for," said he, " in future times the Creevey Papers may form a curious collection."
In regard to the papers as a whole. Miss Ord faith- fully observed her step-father's instructions. They have been admirably kept; many of them having been copied out in her clear, pretty handwriting — an immense advantage to the present editor, for Mr. Creevey's penmanship was simply execrable. It is characteristic of such matters that some of the events and episodes of which Creevey thought it most important to leave a detailed record, have parted with much of their moment, having received full explana- tion and description from other sources. What the modern reader is most likely to enjoy are the gossip of a bygone day, side-lights on society of the late Georgian era, and traits and illustrations of persons who figured prominently on the stage of public life. Creevey was admirably equipped as a purveyor of such information. His activity must have been as ceaseless as his curiosity was insatiable. His was one of those active intellects not of the first, nor even of the second, order, amassing details of the busy life in which they are cast, recording traits and chronicling episodes whereon the greater actors have no attention to bestow or time to dwell, and revealing his private motives and animosities with an almost Pepysian frankness. A very poor man most of his days, for with his wife Creevey lost whatever income she brought to him, he must have had social and conver- sational powers of no mean order to attract the
INTRODUCTION. IX
endless hospitality of which he was the subject, and which he was wholly unable to return. The repository of innumerable confidences from persons of both sexes, it must be confessed that he was not always very scrupulous in observing the seal of secrecy, neither has it appeared expedient, even at this distance of time, to dispense with a severe system of selection in dealing with his chroniqtie scandaleuse.
It is natural to compare a collection such as this with the well-known " Croker Papers " which have already seen the light, and indeed they cover much the same ground, but from an opposite point of view. John Wilson Croker was a Tory, and his party were in office during the long, weary years when it was the lot of Thomas Creevey and his friends to gnash their teeth in opposition. The two men probably were of not unequal calibre. Creevey had not the literary turn of Croker ; but it was opportunity alone which prevented him becoming at least as distin- guished a legislator as the other; and, had the fortune and position of parties been reversed, Creevey would, in all likelihood, have attained to higher office than Croker ever filled. He had been but four years in Parliament when, after Pitt's death, the brief " All-the- Talents " Ministry was formed, and in this he received the office of Secretary to the Board of Control. By the time his party came into power again, Creevey was sixty-two, and had lost his seat ; but his services received instant recognition by his appointment, despite his age, first to the Treasurership of the Ordnance, and afterwards to that of Greenwich Hospital.
If any evidence were wanting as to the disunion and its causes, which sapped the efficacy of the Whig
X INTRODUCTION.
opposition during the first thirty years of the nine- teenth century, it is amply forthcoming in Creevey's letters, and nobody can complain that it is not ex- pressed in forcible enough language. It must ever be a source of wonder to the student of history how the Tory Government weathered the stress and storm of those years. For twenty years a mighty war, taxing to the utmost the physical resources of a popula- tion not exceeding fifteen millions, was sustained at the cost of a crushing increment of debt. The fall in prices suddenly ensuing upon the peace of 1815, plunged the whole agricultural community into dire distress, and was accompanied by an almost total cessation of continental demand for British manufac- tures, arising from the utter loss of buying power in foreign markets, which involved the artisan population in the terrible distress. Nor was this all, though well it might be reckoned enough to bring about the fall of any administration. Ministers groaned under the affliction of a mad King and a deplorable Regent. The whole heart of the nation was stirred against the Administration by reason of the part assigned to Ministers in the proceedings against Queen Caroline. How was it that they survived a single session ?
The answer may be clearly read in Creevey's correspondence. First, in regard to the war, the people were practically of one jfnind — to see it through. It has ever been so in our country, and please God it ever shall be so ! Once let the drums beat the point of war, and they rouse an echo in British hearts which dies not away till the thing has been carried to a finish. Men will not listen to those counsellors who would have them believe that the policy which
INTRODUCTION. XI
led to war was foolish or wrong — nay, they will not pause to weigh even the justice of the cause. Of all sentiments, patriotism is perhaps one of those least amenable to reason — the least calculating ; those that hesitate in the crisis, still more those who carp and thwart, become by force of circumstance and quite apart from their own honesty of opinion, the anti-national party. We have seen the same in every great war that it has been the lot of England to wage ; and it is the knowledge of this and the feeling that lies deepest in every Briton's heart, that disorganises opposition at such times. The extreme men move resolutions which the moderate men will not support ; then, when the moderates agree upon a line of action, the others stand resentfully aloof Perhaps the most interesting and instructive political passages in these papers are those in which are revealed the most secret counsels of the opposition, and the course of action which repeatedly saved Lord Liverpool's administration from shipwreck.
References to Thomas Creevey in the published writings of his contemporaries are few, and for the most part slight. The fullest notice I have en- countered is in some passages in the Journal of Charles Greville.
Writing in 1829, he has the following: —
" Old Creevey is rather an extraordinary character. I know nothing of the early part of his history, but I believe he was an attorney or barrister ; he married a widow, who died a few years ago ; she had something, he nothing ; he got into Parliament, belonged to the Whigs, displayed a good deal of shrewdness and humour, and was for some time very troublesome to the Tory Government by continually attacking abuses. After some time he lost his seat, and went to live at
Xll INTRODUCTION.
Brussels, where he became intimate with the Duke of Wellington. Then his wife died, upon which event he . was thrown upon the world with about ;^20o a year or less ; no home, few connections, a great many acquaint- ances, a good constitution and extraordinary spirits. He possesses nothing but his clothes ; no property of any sort ; he leads a vagrant life, visiting a number of people who are delighted to have him, and sometimes roving about to various places, as fancy happens to direct, and staying till he has spent what money he has in his pocket. He has no servant, no home, no creditors ; he buys everything as he wants it at the place he is at ; he has no ties upon him, and has his time entirely at his own disposal and that of his friends. He is certainly a living proof that a man may be perfectly happy and exceedingly poor, or rather without riches, for he suffers none of the priva- tions of poverty and enjoys many of the advantages of wealth. I think he is the only man I know in society who possesses nothing."*
Again in 1838: —
"Feb. 20th. — I made no allusion to the death of Creevey at the time it took place, about a fortnight ago, having said something about him elsewhere. Since that period he had got into a more settled way of life. He was appointed to one of the Ordnance offices by Lord Grey, and subsequently by Lord Mel- bourne to the Treasurership of Greenwich Hospital, with a salary of ;^6oo a year and a house. As he died very suddenly, and none of his connexions were at hand. Lord Sefton sent to his lodgings and (in con- junction with Vizard the solicitor) caused all his papers to be sealed up. It was found that he had left a woman who had lived with him for four years as his mistress, his sole executrix and residuary legatee (the value of which was very small, not more than ^^300 or ^^"400), and to all the papers which he had left behind him. These last are exceedingly valuable, for he had kept a copious diary for thirty-six years, had preserved all his own and Mrs. Creevey's letters, and copies or
* Grcville Memoirs^ i. 235.
INTRODUCTION. Xlll
originals of a vast miscellaneous correspondence. The only person who is acquainted with the contents of these papers is his daughter-in-law, whom he had frequently employed to copy papers for him, and she knows how much there is of delicate and interesting matter, the publication of which would be painful and embarrassing to many people now alive, and make very inconvenient and premature revelations upon private and confidential matters. . . . Then there is Creevey's own correspondence with various people," especially with Brougham, which evidently contains thmgs which Brougham is anxious to suppress, for he has taken pains to prevent the papers from falling into the hands of any person likely to publish them, and has urged Vizard to get possession of them either by persuasion, or purchase, or both. In point of fact, they are now in Vizard's hands, and it is intended by him and Brougham, probably with the concurrence of others, to buy them of Creevey's mistress ; though who is to become the owner of the documents, or what the stipulated price, and what their contemplated destina- tion, I do not know. The most extraordinary part of the affair is that the woman has behaved with the utmost delicacy and propriety, has shown no mer-
.cenary disposition, but expressed her desire to be guided by the wishes and opinions of Creevey's friends and connexions, and to concur in whatever measures may be thought best by th-em with reference to the character of Creevey, and the interests and feel- ings of those who might be affected by the contents of the papers. Here is a strange situation in which ' to find a rectitude of conduct, a moral sentiment, a grateful and disinterested liberality, which would do honour tO,,thelnghes^ the most careful cultiva-
■"troTTand the strictest principle. It would be a hundred to one against any individual in the ordinary ranks of society and of average good character acting with such entire absence of selfishness, and I cannot help being struck with the contrast between the motives and disposition of those who want to get hold of these papers, and of this poor woman who is ready to give them up. They — well knowing that in the present thirst for the sort of information Creevey's journals and correspondence contain, a very large sum might
b
XIV INTRODUCTION.
be obtained for them — are endeavouring to drive the best bargain they can with her for their own particular ends, while she puts her whole confidence in them, and only wants to do what they tell her she ought to do under the circumstances of the case."
A couple of years later, Greville has a further reference to Creevey.
" i2//f March, 1840. — Her Majesty went out last night to the Ancient Concert (which she particularly dislikes), so I got Melbourne to dine with me, and he stayed talking till 12 o'clock. . . . He expressed his surprise that anybody should write a journal. . . . He talked of Creevey's journal, and of that which Dover is supposed to have left behind him. . . . He said Creevey had been very shrewd, but exceedingly bitter and malignant."
Mrs Blackett Ord, of Whitfield, whose husband was the grandson of Mr. Creevey's eldest step- daughter, Anne, by her husband, Lieut. -Colonel Hamilton, having entrusted to me the task of ex- amining these papers, and preparing for the press such parts of them as should seem worthy of pub- lication, I have endeavoured to let Mr. Creevey tell his own story as much as possible, connecting the extracts only by such explanatory paragraphs as may serve to refresh the memory of the reader. The "copious diary " referred to by Charles Greville has not come into my hands with the letters. If it ever existed in fact. Lord Brougham probably succeeded in his attempt to get hold of it, for it is only brief and broken periods that are covered by anything of that kind in Creevey's handwriting.
In respect to orthography, I have thought it better to retain the characteristic archaisms of the period,
\
INTRODUCTION. XV
such as "chuse," " compleatly," and "politicks." Misspellings of proper names, such as "Wyndham" for " Windham," I have altered for the sake of identification, and ordinary slips in spelling have also been rectified. Words and sentences enclosed in marks of parentheses ( ) stand so in the original; those added by myself to supplement the meaning will be found in square brackets [ ].
HERBERT MAXWELL.
MONREITH, 1903.
NICKNAMES USED BY MR. CREEVEY TO DESIGNATE SUNDRY PERSONAGES.
Atfy
Arch-fiend, The Barney .
Beau, The Beelzebub
Billy, Old Billy, Our Billy Russell .
Bogey
Bruffam .
Calibre, Old or Lord
CJieerful Charlie Ciss .
Chinch . Cole, Mrs.
Lord Arthur Hill, 2nd son of 2nd Marquess
of Downshire, and afterwards succeeded
his mother as Lord Sandys. See Beelzebub, 1 2th Duke of Norfolk. See also Twitch
and Scroop. The Duke of Wellington. Henry, ist Lord Brougham and Vaux.
See also Bruffam, The Arch-fiend, and
Wicked-shifts. 4th Earl Fitzwilliam. William IV. Lord William Russell, brother of 5 th Duke
of Bedford. Lord Grenville. See Beelzebub. Mr. Western, M.P., created Lord Western
in 1833. 5th Duke of Rutland. Lady Cecilia Buggin, daughter of the 2nd
Earl of Arran and widow of Sir George
Buggin, married in 1826 to H.R.H.
Augustus Frederick, Duke of Sussex,
and was created Duchess of Inverness
in 1840. Lord Althorp. Mr. Tierney.
NICKNAMES USED BY MR. CREEVEY.
XVI 1
Cole, Young
Comical Bob
Ciipid
Dear Eddard Denny Doctor, The
Fergy . Frog, The Frog, Young Frothy . Gooserump Jack the Painter
Jaffa Jenky
Jockey, The King Jog
King Tom
Madagascar . Merryman, The Mouldy . Mrs. P. . Mull .
Niffy-naffy
Og or Ogg
Old Nobs
Old Sally or Dow.
Sally Old Stiff-rump or
The Squire Pet, The . P., Young Pie and Thimble
Hon. James Abercromby, elected Speaker
in 1835 and created Lord Dunfermline
in 1839. Lord Robert Spenceiv brother of the 3rd
Duke of Marlborough. ^ Viscount Palmerston. Hon. Robert Edward Petre. Mr. Denison of Denbies. Right Hon. Henry Addington, created
Viscount Sidmouth in 1805. General Ronald Ferguson of Raith. King William I. of Holland. The Prince of Orange. Hon. H. G. Bennet, M.P. The 6th Earl of Carlisle. Right Hon. T. Spring Rice, created Lord
Monteagle in 1839. General Sir Robert Wilson. Lord Liverpool. The nth Duke of Norfolk. J. G. Lambton of Lambton, afterwards
Earl of Durham. Thomas Coke of Holkham, afterwards
Earl of Leicester. Lady Holland. Mr. Canning. Lord Bexley.
The Princess of Wales (Queen Caroline). Lord Molyneux, son of the 3rd Earl of
Sefton. Earl of Darlington, afterwards ist Duke of
Cleveland. The 2nd Lord Kensington. George IH.
f Mary Amelia, Marchioness of Salisbury.
) Mr. Western, M. P., afterwards Lord f Western.
3rd Earl of Sefton.
Princess Charlotte of Wales.
Lord John Russell.
xviii NICKNAMES USED BY MR. CREEVEY.
Pop^ The •
Prinney . Punch . Roscius , , ,
Sally . .
Sallyy Old or Dow.
Scroop
Slice
Snip
Snipe Snoutch . Squire, T/ie, or
Stiff-rump Suss
Spinning Jeniiy Taffy . . Twitch . Vanderjioot, Old Vestmus Vic, Little Wicked-shifts .
Old\
Countess of Darlington, afterwards Duchess
of Cleveland. The Prince of Wales (George IV.). Charles Greville, Clerk of the Council. Lord Henry Petty, afterwards 3rd Marquess
of Lansdowne. Sarah, Countess of Jersey. Mary Amelia, Marchioness of Salisbury. The 1 2th Duke of Norfolk. H.R.H. the Duke of Gloucester. Right Hon. Thomas Robinson, successively
Viscount Goderich and Earl of Ripon Princess Lieven. Right Hon. George Ponsonby. Mr. Western, M.P., afterwards Lord
Western. H.R.H. the Duke of Sussex. Sir Robert Peel. Lord Dinorbin. The 1 2 th Duke of Norfolk. William Van Mildert, Bishop of Durham. Hon. Douglas Kinnaird. Queen Victoria. See Beelzehih.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
Introduction ... ... ... ... ... ... v
Nicknames used by Mr. Creevey ... ... ... xvi
List of Illustrations ... ... ... ... ... xxvii
CHAPTER I.
1793-1804.
Creevey enters Parliament — Paris under the Consulate — Actors in the Revolution — The Addington Ministry — Sir John Moore — ^War — The return of Pitt — Per mare et terras — The Front Bench — Laudator temporis adi — Pitt and Fox as allies — The bonds of party — The hope of the Whigs — Threats of invasion — The Irish difficulty 1-31
CHAPTER II.
1805.
Melville's disgrace — The campaign against jobs — The Radicals make the pace — The Sheridans — Romilly declines Parlia- ment—Irish affairs — Ulm and Austerlitz 32-45
CHAPTER III.
1805.
The Heir Apparent — Life at the Pavilion — Sheridan — Sheridan's marriage — Frolics at Brighton — Warren Hastings — Lord Thurlow — The Duke of York— Society at Brighton — Even- ings at the Pavilion — Death of Nelson — The Prince of Wales and Mrs. Fitzherbert 46-73
XX CONTENTS.
CHAPTER IV. I 806-1 808.
PAGE
" All the Talents " — Creevey in office — Fox's last illness — Sheridan jibs — High living — The Portland Administration — Alliance with Spain — The Convention of Cintra — Mr. Whitbread unbosoms himself ... 74-92
CHAPTER V. 1809.
Walcheren — Castlereagh's duel with Canning — Whitbread on the situation — The passage of the Douro — Sir Arthur Wellesley remonstrates — Mr. Whitbread explains — Journal ... 93-116
CHAPTER VI. 1810.
The sentiments of Brougham — Difficulties of the Opposition — Debate on the Address — Divided counsels — The Walcheren enquiry — Wellington and the Common Council — Defeat of the Government — A sailor's opinion of Sir Richard Strachan ; 1 17-134
CHAPTER VII.
1811.
Cabinet making — Whitbread's proposals — The prospect of office — Creevey's conditions — The Prince's coolness to the Whigs — Journal — The Canningites scattered 135-152
CHAPTER VIII.
1812.
Parliament is dissolved — Who shall be Premier? — Prolonged suspense — Lord Wellesley tries his hand — Lord Grey stands aloof — Lord Liverpool takes office— Creevey stands for Liver- pool— Re-elected for Thetford — Defeated at Liverpool — Visit to Knowsley ... IS3-I74
CONTENTS. XXI
CHAPTER IX.
1813-1814.
PAGE
The Regent's domestic affairs — Brougham on the war-path — Brougham's opinion of Whitbread — Partisans; — Plot and counter-plot — Napoleon abdicates — Tales of the town — The peace — Brougham without a seat — The Emperor of Russia — Princess Charlotte of Wales — The Princess of Wales throws over her advisers — Lord Cochrane's case ... 175-204
CHAPTER X.
1814-1815.
Brougham on the situation — The pinch of the property-tax— The Hundred Days — Brussels in 1815 — The shadow of war — Napoleon's last stakes — Tidings from the frontier — Arrival of Wellington — Confusion in Brussels — The Iron Duke — The Duchess of Richmond's ball — The eve of Waterloo — The eighteenth of June — Conflicting rumours — Victory — Conversation with the Duke — Close of the campaign ... 205-239
CHAPTER XI.
1815-1816.
Death of Whitbread — Misfortunes of the Opposition — The duke- dom of Norfolk — Disorganised Whigs — Brougham startles his friends — Who shall lead the Whigs ? — Brougham's views — A lady's letter — A dispirited Radical—" You must come over!" 240-260
CHAPTER XII. 1817-1818.
From Lord Holland — Mr. Tierney chosen leader — Napoleon at St. Helena — The Duke of Kent's confidences — Lord Kin- naird's affair — Mr. Creevey dislodged from Thetford — Journal — Sir Hudson Lowe — Objections to Tierney ... 261-291
XXll CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XIII. 1819-1820.
PAGE
Lord Holland upon the situation — Death of George III. — Queen Caroline reappears — Dissension in the Opposition — Does Brougham run straight? — The question of the Liturgy- Opinion at Knowsley — Opening of the trial— Proceedings in the Lords — The case for the Crown — Unfavourable evidence — Louise Demont — The Solicitor-General sums up — The divorce clause abandoned — Brougham opens the defence — Ministers lose ground — The Duke of Norfolk's opinion — Adjournment of the Commons — Brougham's tactics — Mr. Denman sums up — Nearing the end — What will be the majority ? — The division — The Bill • abandoned — The pro- rogation 292-342
CHAPTER XIV.
1821.
Queen Caroline's establishment — The summary prorogation— The pretender Olivia — Lady Holland at home — Brougham fulfils a pledge — Dinner with the Queen — Lord Holland's apology — ^The Queen excluded from the Abbey — The north to be roused — The Queen's death — Suspicions about Brougham's honesty — An honourable executor — Lord Lauderdale — George IV. in Ireland — End of the Royal visit 343-374
CHAPTER XV.
1822.
Creevey's activity — In the Whig camp — "A Voice from St. Helena " — The frequency of suicide — Castlereagh's death — George IV. in Scotland — The Duke of Sussex — Canning assumes the lead — Lord Thanet on the situation — Can- ning's voice, Castlereagh's hand — Mr. Cobbett's views — Knowsley revisited 375-400
CHAPTER XVI. .
1823-1824.
A young lady's letters — Criticism upon Canning — Two very different dukes — The Duke of Buckingham—Social scheming — Tittle-tattle — At Crockford's — Royal Ascot — • Newmarket A visit to Lambton — Captain FitzClarence's opinions 401-425
CONTENTS. XXIU
CHAPTER XVII. 1825-1826.
PAGE
Two Scottish divines — The birth of railways — Creevey's seat in jeopardy — Lambton revisited — Creevey as an author — Lady Grey's views — Lord J. Russell on Reform — Canning and the Opposition — The Corn Laws 436-444
CHAPTER XVIIL
1827.
Liverpool's last illness — Brougham receives a challenge — Creevey enjoys his freedom — ^A Cabinet crisis — Mischievous times — Brougham in the thick of it — Coalition — Creevey's objec- tions— ^Wellington and Grey — Death of Canning — Grey and Brougham — Lowther Castle — The Goderich Ministry — Party politics in the north — The aifair of Navarino 445-476
CHAPTER XIX.
1827-1828.
Return to Croxteth — Rumours of war — Lord Grey's speculations — Sefton and Brougham — What is Brougham after? — General distress in the country — 'A quarrel — Overtures to the Whigs — -Rival marquesses — The Duke of Sussex and the Whigs — Lord Hill puts down his foot— Huskisson resigns — CoUing- wood's memoirs — Petworth — Creevey out in the cold — The Clare election ... 477-509
CHAPTER XX.
1828.
An obsequious cicerone — The Bessborough estates — Lord Hutchinson — Power of Kilfane — Impressions of Ireland- Lord Donoughmore's recollections — Irish society— Dan O'Connell — The Tighes of Woodstock— Creevey's indiscre- tion— The Viceregal Lodge — Carton ... 510-534
CHAPTER XXI.
1829.
Catholic emancipation — The Garth scandal — A party at Lady Sefton's — Intrigues in the Opposition — First trip on the railway— A spendthrift peer ... ... ... ... 535-547
XXIV CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XXII. 1830-1831.
PAGE
Brougham's literary schemes — Lord Douro's engagement — Death of George IV. — Death of Huskisson — Lord Grey's administration — A party in Downing Street— Oueen Ade- laide's Drawing-room — The first draft of Reform — Stirring times — The second reading carried — The Bill in Committee — Creevey returns to Parliament — The Prime Minister — Influenza — The race for honours — Coronation gossip — The Reform agitation 548-581
CHAPTER XXIIL
1832-1833.
The prospects of the Bill — A party at Lady Grey's — Lord Grey resigns — The Reform Bill passed — The end of the old order — The Reformed Parliament — Affairs in Arlington Street — Miss Berry's dinner-party — Roscoe as historian — King William's levee 582-602
CHAPTER XXIV.
1833.
The Court at Windsor — Private political history — Lord Hol- land's ability — Gossip — ^Joseph Parkes 603-613
CHAPTER XXV.
1834.
Creevey's office threatened — Rogers's dinner-party — Competition for office — Oxford declines Talleyrand — Creevey's new post — Anecdote about Lord Grey — Brougham blamed for the crisis — Lord Grey's opinion of Brougham — A breeze with Brougham — The Road at its prime— Lord Grey in retire- ment— Qvertures to Lord Howick — Melbourne's dismissal — Character of Lord Sefton — Visit at Howick — At Holland House again 614-645
CHAPTER XXVI.
I 835-1 836.
Creevey as an onlooker — Lady Grey at home — " Bear " Ellice — Action against Lord Melbourne — Cassiobury — Death of Charles X 646-658
CONTENTS. XXV
CHAPTER XXVIL, AND Last. 1837-1838.
I'AGE
Death of Mrs. Fitzherbert— and of William IV. — The young Queen — Brighton revisited — The Marquess Wellesley— Dinner with the Duke of Sussex — Holkham — Lady Charlotte Bury's book — " Where shall I go next ? " 659-678
Index 679
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
Thomas Creevey ... ... ... ... F?-ontispicce
From a Water-colour Drawitig, in the possession of Miss Elizabeth Blackett Ord, at B^-oivnsidey Cumberland
TO FACE PAGE
Mrs. Fitzherbert ... ... ... ... ... 50
From the Picture by JoHN RussELL, R.A., ?'« the pos- sessiofi of Mr. Basil Fitzherbert^ at Swinnerion Hall, Staffordshire
Lord Thurlow ... ... ... ... ... 60
From the Picture by Thomas Phillips, R.A,, in the Motional Portrait Gallery
Admiral Sir Graham Moore ... ... ... .... 90
From the Picture by Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A., in the National Portrait Gallery
R. Brinsley Sheridan ... ... ... ... 146
From a Picture ^k JoHN HOPPNER, R.A., in the possessioti of George Harland Peck^ Esq.
Henry Brougham in Early Life ... ... ... 172
From the Picttire by James Lonsdale, in the National Portrait Gallery
Samuel Whitbread ... ... ... ... ... 242
From an Engraving by S. W. Reynolds, after ^. Opie, R.A.
Sir Samuel Romilly ... ... ... ... ... 290
From the Picttire by Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A., iti the National Portrait Gallery
Sarah, Countess of Jersey ... ... ... ... 296
Froi?i a Picture by Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A., iiithe possession of the Earl of Jersey.
XXVIU LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
TO FACE PAGE
Mrs. Creevey ... ... ... ... ... ... 342
From a Picture in the possessioji of Airs. Blackett Ord, Whitfield, Northumberland
Viscount Castlereagh ... ... ... ... 384
Fj-om the Picture by Sir Thomas Lawrence, I'.R.A., in the National Portrait Gallery
Joseph Hume ... ... ... ... ... ... 416
F}'07n the Mezzotint by T. HoDGETTS, after J. Graham
The Third Marquess of Lansdowne ... ... ... 458
From the Picture by H. Walton, in the National Portrait Gallery
George Canning ... ... ... ... ... 464
From the Picture by Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A., at Christ Chtirch, Oxford
John Allen ... ... ... ... ... ... 498
From the Picture by SlR Edwin Landseer, R.A., in the National Portrait Gallery
Daniel O'Connell, M.P. ... ... ... ... 536
Frovi the Picture by B. Mulrenin, R.H.A., in the National Poiirait Gallery
Earl Grey ... ... ... ... ... ... 55S
F7-oi}i the Picture by Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A., in the National Portrait Gallery
The Countess Grey and two Children ... ... 586
From the Mezzotint by Samuel COUSINS, R.A., after Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A.
Lady Holland... ... ... ... ... ... 598
Fivm an Engraving by S. W. Reynolds, after C. R. Leslie, R.A.
Viscount Melbourne ... ... ... ... ... 668
Frofn the Picture by SiR Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A., iti the National Portrait Gallery
THE CREEVEY PAPERS.
CHAPTER I.
1 793-1 804.
The earliest letter preserved in the huge mass of Mr. Creevey's correspondence is a very brief one ; but it strikes the note which carried dismay and indignation into every court in Europe, and was the prelude to twenty years of widespread war.
Hon. Charles Grey, M.P. [afterwards 2nd Earl Greji], to
Mrs, Ord.
"24th Jan., 1793.
" Dear Mrs. Ord,
" I have only a moment before the post goes out. . . . An account is come that the King of France was executed on Monday morning. Everything in Paris bore the appearance of another tumult and massacre. Bad as I am thought, I cannot express the horror I feel at this atrocity.
" Yours affectionately,
"C. Grey.
" War is certain, and — God grant we may not all lament the consequences of it ! "
There are few letters during the remaining years of the eighteenth century referring to anything except
2 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
private affairs of little interest. Dr. J. Currie of Liverpool wrote pretty regularly to Mr. Creevey, who seems to have been reading for the Bar at this time.
Dr, Currie to Thomas Creevey.
"Liverpool, 30th Dec, 1795.
"... I once thought you a modest fellow — now I laugh at the very idea of it. Upon my soul, Creevey, it was all a damned hum. What with your election songs and your rompings — what with your carousings with the men and your bamboozlings with the women, you are a most complete hand indeed. Widow, wife, or maid, it is all one to you. ... If you go on in this way, and keep out of Doctors Commons, the Lord knows what you may rise to. . . ."
" 17th Dec, 1798.
"... I am, I assure you, deeply concerned to hear that you think so poorly of Dr. Tennant's health ; and perfectly disturbed to think that he has had any trouble about my thermometers.* The truth is I wished to avail myself of his intuitive skill in framing an instrument free of all exception for taking heat in contagious diseases where approach is hazardous. But since he left us ... I have so far succeeded in constructing a sensible [? sensitive] instrument with Six's iron index as to answer my purpose. ... I have done very little but read Voltaire since I saw you. He is an exquisite fellow. One thing in him is peculiarly striking — his clear knowledge of the limits of the human understanding. He pursues his game as far as the scent carries him, but no further. Where this fails, he turns off with a jest, that marks distinctly where a wise man ought to stop. . . . You know, my dear fellow, I owe the delight of reading him to you."
* The most enduring part of Dr. Currie's work as a physician consists in the advance he made in the use of the thermometer in fevers.
1793-1804.] CREEVEY ENTERS PARLIAMENT. 3
"20th Jan., i8oi.
"... I envy you the company you keep. When you tell me of meeting Erskine, Parr and Mackintosh familiarly, I sigh at m}^ allotment in this corner of the Island, It is impossible not to rust here, even if one had talents of a better kind. In London, and perhaps there only, practice and exercise keep men polished and bright. ... So you are become an intimate friend of Lady Oxford, My dear Creevey — these women — these beautiful women — are the devil's most powerful temptation — but I yvill not moralize, on paper at least. . . ."
In 1802 Mr. Creevey was returned to Parliament as member for Thetford, a pocket borough in the gift of the Duke of Norfolk. How he obtained this nomi- nation there is no evidence to show ; but he was an enthusiastic Whig of the advanced type which was about to reject that time-worn title, and adopt the more expressive one of Radical. Indeed, the animosity of this section against the old Whigs, under the lead of Lord Grenville, was almost as intense as it was against the Tories under Pitt
Sir Francis Burdett, M.P., to Mr. Creevey, M.P.
"Piccadilly, August i8th, 1802.
" My dear Creevey,
" I have scarcely time to turn round,'but will not defer sending a line in answer to your very kind letter — as I am entirely of your opinion in every point. I look upon your advice as excellent, and intend consequently to follow it. You know by this time the Petition is taken out of my hands, in a manner most flattering and honourable. The conduct of the Sheriffs I believe quite unprecedented, but whether they will be punished, protected or rewarded exceeds my sagacity to foretell, perhaps both the latter.
" I regard the issue of this contest exactly in the same light as you do — a subject of great triumph and not of mortification. My friend is compleatly satisfied.
4 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
I have done my duty and the Public acknowledge it — surely this is sufficient to satisfy the ambition of an honest man.
" I, however, cannot help envying you your happi- ness and comfort, and wish most heartily 1 was of the party. You cannot think how friendly Ord was nor how much I feel obliged to him — we used his house, but I hope not injure it.
" Sherry is quite grown loving again ; he came here yesterday with all sorts of [illegible] from the Prince, Mrs. Fitzherbert, &c., &c. ; it is a year and half, I believe before this Election, since we almost spoke. Mrs. Sheridan came one day on the Hastings, and was much delighted and entertained at being hailed by the multitude as Mrs. Burdett. . . .
" Yours sincerely,
" F. Burdett."
Mr. Creevey, M.P., to Dr. Currie.
" Great Cumberland Place, 8th Nov., 1802.
". . . The Grenvilles are in great spirits; the Morjiing Post, and Morning Chronicle- too, are strongly suspected of being in their pay, and to-day it is said Tom Grenville is to be started as Speaker against Abbott. Great are the speculations about Pitt : it is asserted that he is fonder of his relations [the Grenvilles] than the Doctor,* but I hear of no authority for this opinion. I, for one, if they try their strength in the choice of a Speaker, tho' I detest Abbott, will vote for him or anybody else supported by Addington, in opposition to a Grenville or a Pittite. I am affraid of this damned Addington being bullied out of his pacific disposition. He will be most cursedly run at, and he has neither talents to command open coadjutors, nor sufficient skill in intriguing to acquire private ones. Still I think we cannot surely be pushed again into the field of battle.
"Now for France — all the world has been there, and various is the information imported from thence.
* The Right Hon. Henry Addington, created Viscount Sidmouth in 1805. He was nicknamed "the Doctor " because his father wa§ a physician.
J793-1804.] PARIS UNDER THE CONSULATE. 5
Whishaw was my first historian, and I think the worst. He was at Paris only a fortnight, but he travelled through France. I apprehend, either from a scanty supply of the language or of proper introductions, he has been merely a stage coach traveller. He has seen soldiers in every part of his tour, and superintending every department of the Government . . . and has returned quite scared out of his wits at the dreadful power and villainy of the French Government. . . . Romilly* is my next relator, and much more amusing. His private friends were the Liancourts, de la Roche- foucaults, &c., and he dined at different times with Talleyrand, Berthier, and all the other Ministers at their houses. Ministers, however, and statesmen are^ alike in all countries ; they alone are precluded from' telling you anything about the country in whose service they are, and emigrants are too insecure to indulge any freedom in conversation. Romilly's account, therefore, as one might suppose, makes his society of Paris the most gloomy possible. He says at Talleyrand's table, where you have such magni- ficence as was never seen before in France, the Master of the House, who as an exile in England without a guinea was the pleasantest of Men, in France and in the midst of his prosperity sits the most melancholy picture apparently of sorrow and despair. Romilly sat next to Fox at Talleyrand's dinner, and had all his conversation to himself; but not a word of public aff'airs — all vertu and French belles lettres. Romilly would not grace the court of Buonaparte, but left Paris with as much detestation of him and his Government as Whishaw, and with much more reason.
"But the great lion of all upon the subject of Paris is Mackintosh.! He has really seen most entertaining things and people. He, too, dined with Ministers, and has held a long consultation with the Consul!
* Samuel Romilly, K.C., entered Parliament in 1806, appointed Solicitor-General, and was knighted. An ardent Reformer, and father of the first Lord Romilly, he committed suicide in 18 18.
t Sir James Mackintosh [1765-1832], barrister, philosopher, and politician.
% Bonaparte.
6 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
upon the Norman and English laws; but his means of living with the active people of France has far exceeded that of any other English. I think his most valuable acquaintance must have been Madame de Souza, She is a Frenchwoman, was a widow, and is now the wife of the Portuguese ambassador. She is the friend and companion and confidante of Madame Buonaparte, and satisfied all Mackintosh's enquiries respecting her friend and her husband the Consul. Her history to Mackintosh (confirmed by Madame Cabarrus, late Madame Tallien) of Madame Buona- parte and her husband is this. — Madame Buonaparte is a woman nearly fifty, of singular good temper, and without a little of intrigue. She is a Creole, and has large West India possessions. On these last accounts it was that she was married by the Viscount Beau- harnois — a lively nobleman about the old Court ; and both in his life and since his death his wife remained a great favorite in Paris.
" Immediately previous to the directorial power being established in 1795, the Sections all rose upon the Convention or Assembly, whatever it was, in consequence of an odious vote or decree they had made. At this period, no general would incur the risque of an unsuccessful attack upon the Sections ; Buonaparte alone, who was known only from having served at the siege of Toulon, being then in Paris, said if any General would lend him a coat, he would fight the Sections. He put his coat on ; he peppered the Sections with grape shot ; the establishment of the Directory was the consequence to them, and to him in return they gave the command of the army of Italy.* He became, therefore, the fashion, and was asked to meet good company, and he was asked to Tallien's to put him next the widow Beauharnois, that he might vex Hoche, who was then after her and her fortune. Madame Tallien did so, and the new lovers were
* Napoleon's own report upon the suppression of the Sections places the responsibility of the act upon Barras, who employed him merely as a good artillery officer. Before being appointed to the command of the army in Italy, in 1796, Bonaparte was rewarded, in 1795, for his action against the Sections by succeeding Barras in command of the army of the Interior.
,1793-1804.] ACTORS IN THE REVOLUTION. 7
married in ten days. She never was Barras' mistress ; Madame Cabarrus (Tallien that was) told Mackintosh that was calumny, for that she herself was his mistress at that very time.* Madame de Souza says no one but Madame Buonaparte could live with the Consul; he is subject to fits of passion, bordering upon derange- ment, and upon the appearance of one of these distempered freaks of his, he is left by all about him to his fate and to the effects of time. It is a service of great danger, even in his milder moments, to propose anything to him, and it is from his wife's forbearance in both ways that she can possibly con- trive to have the respect she meets with from him.
"Every wreck of the different parties" in France for the last ten years that is now to be found in Paris, Mackintosh met and lived familiarly with — La Fayette, [illegible], Jean Bon Saint-Andre, Barthelemy, Camille Jourdan, Abbe Morelaix, Fouche, Boissy Danglas, &c., Sec. Tallien f no one visits of his countrymen ; his conversations with Mackintosh, if one had not his authority, surpass belief His only lamentation over the revolution was its want of success, and that it should be on account of only half measures having been adopted. He almost shed tears at the mention of Danton, whom he styled bon enfant, and as a man of great promise.
"Mackintosh dined at Barthelemy's the banker — the brother of the ex-director — with a pleasant party. The ex-director was there, and next to him sat Fouche — now a senator — but who formerly, as Minister of Police, actually deported the ex-director to Cayenne. There was likewise a person there who|told M. he had seen Fouche ride full gallop to preside at some celebrated massacre, with a pair of human ears stuck one on each side of his hat.| The conversation of
* The beautiful Madame de Tallien, previously Comtesse de Fontenay, was as fickle as she was frail, for she was also the mistress of the rich banker Ouvrard. Tallien obtained a divorce in 1802, and she married the Prince de Chimay.
t Jean Lambert Tallien, one of the chief organisers and bloodiest agents of the Terror, leader in the overthrow of Robespierre.
X Joseph Fouche, afterwards Due d'Otranto, had as yet but accom- plished half his cycle of cynical tergiversation, which brought him to
8 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
this notable assembly was as charming as the per- formers themselves ; it turned principally upon the blessings of peace and humanity,
"All the others whom I have mentioned above have no connection with Fouche or Tallien, and are reasonable men, perfectly unrestrained in their con- versation, quite anti - Buonapartian, and as much devoted to England. To such men Fox has given great surprise by his conversation, as he has given offence to his friends here. He talks publicly of Liberty being asleep in France, but dead in England. He will be attacked in the House of Commons cer- tainly, and I think will find it difficult to justify himself. He has been damned imprudent."
At the time of Creevey's entrance to the House of Commons, Pitt was in seclusion. He had retired from office in March, 1801, putting up the former Speaker, Mr. Addington, as Prime Minister and Leader of the House of Commons. George HI. heartily approved of this arrangement, although on the face of it were all the signs of instability. Taking Pitt and Addington aside at the Palace one day — " If we three keep together," said he, "all will go well." But as the months went on, Pitt chafed at his own in- activity and fretted at the incapacity of his nominee. Pitt's friends were importunate for his return; he himself was burning to take the reins again, but was too proud, perhaps too loyal to Addington, to adopt overt action to effect it. Moreover, Addington, who had been an excellent Speaker, had no suspicion of the poor figure he cut as head of the Government. It never occurred to him to take any of the numerous hints offered by Canning and other Tories, until the necessity for some change was forced upon him by
office under Louis XVI II. after the fall of Napoleon. He died in 1820, a naturalised Austrian subject, having amassed enormous wealth.
1793-1804.] THE ADDINGTON MINISTRY. 9
the imminence of disaster from the disaffection of his followers. He offered to resign the Treasury in favour of a peer, Pitt and he to share the administration of affairs as Secretary of State. This proposal Pitt brushed contemptuously, almost derisively, aside; matters went on as before, except that the former friendship of Pitt and Addington was at an end. When Parliament met on 24th November, Pitt did not appear in the House.
Mr. Creevey to Dr. Currie.
"25th Nov., 1802, " I went yesterday to the opening of our campaign, with some apprehension, I confess, as I knew Fox was to be there, least his sentiments upon the subject of France and England should diminish my esteem for him. His conduct, however, and his speech were, in my mind, in every respect perfect; and if he will let them be the models for his future imitation, he will keep in the Doctor and preserve the peace. God con- tinue Fox's prudence and Pitt's gout ! The infamous malignity and misrepresentation of that scoundrel Windham did injury only to himself: never creature less deserved it than poor Fox. You cannot imagine the pleasure I feel in having this noble animal still to look up to as my champion. Nothing can be so whimsical as the state of the House of Commons. The Ministers, feeble beyond all powers of carica- turing, are unsupported — at least by the acclama- tions— of that great mass of persons who always support all Ministers, but who are ashamed publicly to applaud them. They are insulted by the indigent, mercenary Canning, who wants again to be in place, and they are openly pelted by the sanguinary faction of Windham and the Grenvillites as dastardly poltroons, for not rushing instantly into war. Under these circumstances their only ally is the old Opposition. ... If they are so supported, I see distinctly that Fox will at least have arrived at this situation that, tho' unable to be Minister himself, he may in fact
lO THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
prevent one from being turned out. . . . God send Pitt and Dundas anywhere but to the House of Commons, and much might, I think, be done by a judicious dandling of the Doctor.
" Lord Henry Petty and I dined together yesterday. He is as good as ever. We both took our seats behind old Charley."
The treaty of Amiens had been concluded in March, 1802, but Bonaparte's restless ambition, and especially his desire to re-establish the colonial power of France, menaced the maritime ascendancy of Great Britain, and Addington watched uneasily the war-clouds gathering again upon the horizon.
In February, 1803, M. Talleyrand demanded from Lord Whitworth, British Ambassador in Paris, an assurance of the speedy evacuation of Malta by King George's Government, in compliance with the tenth article of the Treaty of Amiens, which provided for the restoration of that island to the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem. In reply to this. Lord Whitworth was instructed to point to the aggrandisement of France subsequent to and in contravention of the terms of the said treaty as justifying the British Government in delaying the evacuation. On i8th February Lord Whitworth had a personal interview with the First Consul, when he failed to obtain from him any admission of the violation by the French of the treaty, or any assurance that the redress claimed for certain British subjects would receive considera- tion. Negotiations dragged on till, on 13th March, Whitworth had a stormy interview with Bonaparte, who charged the British Government with being deter- mined to drag him into war. Finally, on 12th May the rupture was complete; Lord Whitworth requested his passport, and the two countries were at war.
1793-1804.] SIR JOHN MOORE. II
Mr. Creeveyyo Dr. Curne.
"nth March, 1803,
". . . No one knows the precise point on which the damn'd Corsican and the Doctor* have knocked their heads together, but I must think, till I know more, that Addington has been precipitate. The injury done is incalculable. I defy any man to have con- fidence in public credit in future, till a perfectly new order of things takes place. ... As long as the neigh- bouring Monster lives, he will bully and defy us ; and being once discovered, as it now is, that even Adding- ton will bluster as well as him in return, I see no prospect of prosperity in this country, that is — the prosperity of peace — as long as Buonaparte lives. . . . Was it not lucky that I sold out at 74^ ? They are to-day about 64."
"7th April, 1803.
"... I have barely time to say that of all the Men I have ever seen, your countryman General Moore f is the greatest prodigy. I thank my good fortune to have seen so much of him — such a combination of acknowledged fame, of devotion from all who have served under him — of the most touching simplicity and yet most accomplished manners — of the most capital understanding, captivating conversation, and sentiments of honour as exalted as his practice. . . . Think of such a beast as Pitt treating, almost with contempt, certainly with injury, such a man as Moore. ..."
"1 8th.
"... I think if I was to say anything more about General Moore to you than what I wrote to you from the House of Commons, it would only be diffusive. . . . I never saw the Man before who made me think so much about him after each time that I had seen him. We all think of him with the same devotion. . . ."
* Mr. Addington.
t General Sir John Moore, K.B.
12 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
Dr. Currie to Mr. Creevey.
"Liverpool, May ist, 1803.
" I was infinitely obliged by your last report, and beg of you to give me another, as matters draw fast to a crisis, I will expect to have a few lines at latest by the post of Wednesday.
" I fear thi-s Billy * will come in after all.
" I have to tell you one or two things about your friends here.
"First, I have been attending your aunt, Mrs. Eaton, who was very ill, but is recovered. I was to have written to you about the time she got better, but neglected it. But in answer to her earnest enquiries, 1 delivered your love (God forgive me) and your con- gratulations on her recovery. I said everything kind and civil for you to Eaton too, so that you are not to pretend that you did not hear of her illness. But you are now to write a few lines either to him or her as soon as convenient, saying what you see fit on so afi'ecting an occasion — now do not forget this. I cannot think how the old lady came to trust herself in my hands, for I had just been in at the death of two of her neighbours, and I consider my being called to her as a symptom of great attachment to you, and probably in its consequences no way unfavourable to you. For I must tell you that she and I are wondrous great, and we talk you over by the half-hour together. She and he seem very much devoted to you. . . . They are quite pleased, too, with Mrs. Creevey.
"Give my love to Moore f when you see him. Scarlett J has been here with his brother; a very worthy fellow. He says you are coming on. What sort of a thing is this presentation ? I see you are a nominee in the Boston election. I hope it is for Maddock, whom I know a little and like a good deal.
"We are all cursed flatt here about the spun out negociations. Nothing doing. Everything stagnated.
* Mr. Pitt.
t Captain (afterwards Admiral Sir Graham) Moore, R.N., brother to Sir John Moore.
X Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer in 1834 ; created Lord Abinger in 1835.
I793-I804.] WAR. 1 3
We shall have war, because it is just the most absurd thing in creation."
Mr. Creevey to Dr. Cttrrie.
" Saturday, 7th May.
" No news is good news, you know they say, and at this moment I think it certainly is. Lord Whit- worth was certainly at Paris on Wednesday night late, and I think he is traced as far as Thursday. It is equally certain that he had a new proposal from the Consul,* and this is still better news. There is a general inclination to-day to think we shall have peace after all. ..."
"nth May.
"... I supped last night with Fox at Mrs. Bou- verie's . . . There were there Grey, Whitbread, Lord Lauderdale, Fitzpatrick, Lord Robert Spencer,! Lord John Townshend and your humble servant. . . . You would be perfectly astonished at the vigour of body, the energy of mind, the innocent playfulness and happiness of Fox. The contrast between him and his old associates is the most marvellous thing I ever saw — they having all the air of shattered debauchees, of passing gaming, drinking, sleepless nights, whereas the old leader of the gang might really pass for the pattern and the effect of domestic good order. ... A telegraphic dispatch announces that Lord Whitworth has left Paris."!
"Saturday, 14th May.
"... A messenger has arrived to-day who left Paris at 9 o'clock Thursday night, and Lord Whit- worth was to leave it in the night, or rather morning, at two ; so I presume he will be in England on Monday. Think only what a day Monday or Tuesday will be in the House of Commons ! and think likewise what a damn'd eternal fool the Doctor must turn out to be. Upon my soul ! it is too shocking to think of the wretched destiny of mankind in being placed
* Bonaparte.
t Third son of the 3rd Duke of Marlborough.
X News was telegraphed by semaphore signals.
14 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
in the hands of such pitiful, squirting politicians as this accursed Apothecary * and his family and friends ! . . ."
On i6th May the King sent a message to the House of Commons calling upon it to support him in resist- ing the aggressive policy of France and the ambitious schemes of the First Consul. Pitt might no longer hold aloof.
Mr. Creevey to Dr. Currie.
" i6th May.
"... I supped with Fox, Grey, &c., &c., last night at Whitbread's. Fox says there are no state papers to be given us ; the whole dispute has been carried on by conversation. It began in consequence of some intemperate furious expression of Buonaparte ; it re- lated to Egypt. . . . The Consul got irritated ; said he would put himself at the head of his army and invade England. But the offence is about Egypt. He said upon this subject — Nous Vaurons malgre vous! Fox says he believes this conversation to be the origin of the dispute, and that our claims upon Malta are in the way of recognizance to make Buonaparte keep the peace. . . ."
" 20th.
". , . This damned fellow Pitt has taken his seat and is here, and, what is worse, it is certain that he and his fellows are to support the war. They are to say the time for criticism is suspended; that the question is not now whether Ministers have been too tardy or too rash, but the French are to be fought. Upon my soul ! the prospect has turned me perfectly sick. . . ."
"21st.
". . . It is really infinitely droll to see these old rogues so defeated by the Court and Doctor. I really think Pitt is done : his face is no longer red, but yellow ; his looks are dejected ; his countenance I
* Mr. Addington.
1793-1804.] THE RETURN OF PITT. 1 5
think much changed and fallen, and every now and then he gives a hollow cough. Upon my soul, hating him as I do, I am almost moved to pity to see his fallen greatness. I saw this once splendid fellow drive yesterday to the House of Lords in his forlorn, shattered equipage, and I stood near him behind the throne till two o'clock this morning. I saw no ex- pression but melancholy on the fellow's face — princes of the blood passing him without speaking to him, and, as I could fancy, an universal sentiment in those around him that he was done. ..."
An offer of mediation between Britain and France having been received from the Emperor Alexander of Russia, a debate arose in the House of Commons.
"24tli May, 1803.
". . . Lord Hawkesbury * then began and made a very elaborate speech of two hours, containing little inflammatory matter, and being a fair and reasonable representation of his case and justification of the war. Erskine followed in the most confused, unintelligible, inefficient performance that ever came from the mouth of man. Then came the great fiend himself — Pitt — who, in the elevation of his tone of mind and composition, in the infinite energy of his style, the miraculous perspicuity and fluency of his periods, outdid (as it was thought) all former performances of his. Never, to be sure, was there such an exhibition ; its effect was dreadful. He spoke nearly two hours — all for war, and for war without end. He would say nothing for Ministers, but he exhorted or rather commanded them to lose no time in establishing measures of finance suited to our situation. . . . Wil- berforce made an inimitable speech for peace and on grounds the most calculated for popular approbation. . . . It is said the House of Commons never behaved so ill as in their reception of this speech. They tried over and over again to cough him down, but without effect. ..."
* Afterwards Earl of Liverpool and Prime Minister.
l6 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
The speech referred to above was universally ac- knovi^ledged as one of the finest ever delivered by Pitt ; but it is not included among his published speeches, owing to the accidental exclusion of reporters from the gallery. Fox replied on the second night of the debate in a speech of equal merit ; but there is a gap in Creevey's letters covering the whole of the rest of the session, and we know not, though we may imagine, the effect of his leader's eloquence upon his mind. His next letter to Dr. Currie deals with a matter of common criticism and objection at the present day, by men of all parties — namely, the anomaly of the Lord Lieutenancy of Ireland. Nobody can explain its merits : its defects are patent to everybody ; while the selection of a peer to fill what ought to be one of the most responsible posts in any administration, has to be made from a very limited number, with more regard to their private means than to their capacity for public service ; so excessive is the expenditure entailed upon the Lord Lieutenant's private income. It is apparent from the following letter that the objection is nearly as old as the Union : —
Mr. Creevey to Dr. Currie.
"22nd Aug., 1803.
"... I saw a great deal of Sheridan. We dined together several times, got a little bosky, and he took great pains to convince me he was sincere and confi- dential with me. ... A plan of his relates to Ireland, and it is the substitution of a Council for the present Viceroy, the head of the Council to be the Prince of Wales, his assistants to be Lord Moira, Lord Hutchin- son and Sheridan himself The Prince is quite heated upon the subject ; nothing else is discussed by them. Lord Hutchinson is as deep in the design as any of them, but God knows it is about as probable as the
1 793-1804.] PER MARE ET TERRAS. 1 7
embassy of old Charley * to Russia. I believe Sherry is very much in the confidence of the Ministers. They have convinced him of the difficulty of pressing the King for any attentions to the Prince of Wales ; he is quite set against him, and holds entirely to the Duke of York, who, on the other hand, is most odious to the Ministry. . . . Have you begun your visits to Knowsleyyet? . . . If you see Mrs. Hornby, cultivate her. She is an excellent creature ; her husband, the
rector, is the most tiresome, prosy son of a I
ever met with, but is worthy. ..."
General Sir John Moore to Mr. Creevey.
" Sandgate, 15th Sept., 1803.
". . . The newspapers have disposed of me and my troops at Lisbon and Cherbourgh, but we be- lieve that we have not moved from this place. I begun to despair of seeing you here, and am quite happy to find that, at last, 1 am to have that pleasure. If the Miss Ords do not think they can trust to the Camp for beaux, or if they have any in attendance whose curiosity to see soldiers they may chuse to indulge, assure them that whoever accompanies them shall be cordially received by everybody here. . . ."
Capt. Graham Moore, R.N., to Mr. Creevey.
*' Plymouth, August 7th, 1803.
"... I never had to do with a new ship's company before made up of Falstaff 's men — ' decayed tapsters,' &c., so I do not bear that very well and I get no sea- men but those who enter here at Plj^mouth, which are very few indeed. The Admiralty will not let me have any who enter for the ship at any of the other ports, which cuts up my hopes of a tolerable ship's company. ... I hear sometimes from my brother Jack.f He says they have had a review of his whole Corps before the Duke of York. . . . My mother was more delighted with the scene than any boy or girl of fifteen. N.B. — she is near 70. . . . She is an excellent mother of a soldier. I am not afraid of showing her
* Mr. Fox. t General Sir John Moore.
I8 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
to Mrs. Creevey, altho' she is of a very different cast from what she has generally lived with. If Mrs. Creevey does not like her, 1 shall never feel how the devil she came to like me.
''Jack says his Corps are not at all what he would have them, yet that they will beat any of the French whom he leads them up to. I am convinced the French can make no progress in England, and do not believe now that they will attempt it ; but how is all this to end ? However that may be, as I am in for it, I wish to God I was tolerably ready, and scouring the seas. What the devil can Fox mean by his palaver about a military command for the Prince of Wales ? That may come well enough from Mrs. Barham perhaps."
'■'■ Indefatigable, Cawsand Bay, Sept. i6th, 1803.
". . . It has pleased the Worthies aloft to keep us in expectation of sailing at an hours notice since Sunday last. This is very proper, I am sure, and rather inconvenient too. I hate to be a-going a- going. It is disagreeable to Jack, because I have sent all his wives and his loves on shore, and altho' I have made him an apology, he must think the Captain is no great things. The blackguards will know me by-and-by. They seem a tolerable set, and I am already inclined to love them. If they fight, I shall worship them. . . . There is another very fine frigate here, as ready as we are — the Fisgard, commanded by a delightful little fellow, Lord Mark Kerr.* He is an honour to Lords as they go. . . . If there is to be a war with Spain, it would be well to let us know of it before we sail, as money — altho' nothing to a philosopher — is something to me. I am growing old, and none of the women will have me now if I cannot keep them in style, and you know there is no carrying on the war ashore in the peace, when it comes, with- out animals of that description. . . . The most cheer- ful fellow on politics is my brother Jack ; you'll hear no croaking from him. He says it's all nonsense. . . ."
* Third son of the 5th Marquess of Lothian: married the Countess of Antrim in her own right, and became father of the 4th and 5th Earls of Antrim. Died in 1840,
1793-1804.] THE FRONT BENGH. 19
Mr. Creevey to Dr. Currie.
"London, Dec. 21, 1803.
' "... My impression of Addington and his col- leagues during this short part of the Session, has been pretty much what it has heretofore been. They are, upon my soul, the feeblest — lowest almost — of Men, still more so of Ministers. When there is anything like a general attack upon them, they look as if they felt it all; they blush and look at one another in despair; they make no fight; or, if they offer to defend themselves, no one listens but to laugh at them. When the House is empty and their enemies are scattered, they rally and fall in a body upon Wind- ham, call him all kinds of names, and adopt all kinds of the most unfounded misrepresentations of his sentiments. Upon these occasions they are quite altered men ; they talk loud and long, and cheer one another enough to pull the house down. These periodical triumphs look well upon paper, and no doubt must captivate a great portion of the publick ; but rely upon it, the bitterest enemy Windham has in the world, who is possessed of any sense and any character, turns with disgust from the sound of these low-lived philippics. Bad — miserable as I have heard Erskine in the House of Commons, never was he so execrable as on the night when you rejoice that he attacked Windham. These creatures of imbecillity have no such thing as a plan ; they live by temporary expedients from hand to mouth — by the contrary views and characters of their opponents — by that very feebleness which in itself cannot rouse up personal animosity in nobler minds — by low cunning — by appro- priate adoption of humility and impudence. In addi- tion to all this, they have done what the worst men might have done — they have most wickedly and wantonly plunged us into this contemptible war, and the just reputation of their besotted folly throughout the world is a security for our remaining in it, till chance or accident shall relieve us.
"With all their faults, I confess they are well- behaved and civil, as compleatly so as your own
20 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. Ch. I.
servant can be, and I must believe that, had they no restraint upon them from their Master, the mediocrity of their understandings, their situation in life, their private characters and turns of mind, would not per- mit them to think of gratifying any ambition or resent- ment by either desolating the v^orld by war or tyran- nically invading the liberties of their country.
"The impression of Pitt was what his enemies most triumphantly delight in; but what they never could have been sanguine enough to expect, his speech was the production of the dirtiest of mankind, and so it was received. His intimates — his nearest neigh- bours— Canning and Co., sat mute, astounded and evi- dently thinking themselves disgraced by the shuffling tacticks of their military leader. His lingering after Addington, tho' at open war with him in print — his caution of touching either Fox or Windham, those proscribed victims of fortune — his senseless vapouring and most untrue and envious criticism upon volun- teers, and, above all, his officious and disgusting senti- ment as to the recovery of his Majesty's electoral do- minion,* accommodated all his hearers with sufficient reasons for condemnation, and, for once in his life, I have no doubt this prodigy of art and elocution had in his favorite theatre not a single admirer. Canning and Sturges, talking to me afterwards about the excellence of Fox's speech, said what a pity it was Pitt had not taken the same manly part. I asked why he had not done so, and they shrugged up their shoulders and said a man who had been minister eighteen years was a bad opposition man.
" Old Charley was himself, and of course was ex- quisitely delightful. Unfettered by any hopes or fears — by any systems or connection — he turned his huge understanding loose amongst these skirmishers, and it soon settled, with its usual and beautiful per- spicuity, all the points that came within the decision of reasoning, judgment, experience and knowledge of mankind. In addition to the correctness of his views and delineations, he was all fire and simplicity and sweet temper; and the effect of these united per- fections upon the House was as visible in his favor as
* The kingdom of Hanover.
1793^1804.] LAUDATOR TEMPORIS ACTL 21
their disappointment and disgust had been before at the unworthy performance of Colonel Pitt.
" It is almost too advanced a state of my letter to take in the Windhams and Co. We all know that he and the Grenvilles have been the merciless blood- hounds of past times, and no friend of Fox can ever forget or forgive the bitter malignity with which Windham pursued and hunted down the great and amiable creature. But as a party, and with such a foil to it as the present administration, they are entitled to greater weight than they have."
One constantly hears lamentation from grave persons over the deterioration of the House of Com- mons from some past ideal; but just as people are accustomed now to look back upon the time when Pitt and Fox were protagonists as the true parlia- mentary golden age, so it was in that day. In con- cluding this long letter, Creevey, who had just one year of parliamentary experience, moralises upon the lowered tone of the debates.
" Windham, Lord Grenville and Elliott have great parliamentary talents, and Tom Grenville is most respectable in the same way, and of a high and unsullied character. They are of the old school as compared with the Ministry ; they are full of courage, _ of acquirements, of elevated manners ; there is nothing low in the fellows, there is no cringing to power or popularity. In Fox's absence they are the only repre- sentatives of past and better days in Parliament."
"21 Jan., 1804.
". . . When I repeat any of Sheridan's opinions, I do so with more doubt than in stating the opinions of any other persons, for he has acquired such tricks at Drury Lane, such skill in scene-shifting, that I am compelled by experience to listen with distrust to him. For the last three months he has been damning Fox in the midst of his enemies, and in his drunken and unguarded moments has not spared him even in the
22 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
circles of his most devoted admirers. He did so at Woburn, the Duke of Bedford's, and was (as you may have heard) challenged for it upon the spot by Adair.* Whitbread, who was present and who made it up (for Sheridan accepted the challenge), told me all the par- ticulars. Now he apparently is much pacified and less inclined to volunteer his panegyric upon the Doctor ;t and if one may venture to guess at the motive in so perfect a performer in all mysterious arts, I should say he had been damnably galled by the coldness with which Fox's friends resented the abuse of the old fellow, and that the dinners and stupidity of Addington and his family parties had been but a poor recompense for his treachery to Fox, and that he was creeping back as well as he is able into his old place. Tierney, as you may suppose, would be dished by Pitt and Addington embracing, and he is therefore laboring to keep the present administration as it is, and with this view is in- cessantly intriguing for support of it. ... I forget whether I ever told you of his inviting me to dinner once. It was to meet Brogden and Col. Porter, two cursed rum touches that he has persuaded to vote with him and to desert Fox; so I told Mrs. Creevey before I went that I was sure I was invited to be converted. Accordingly, after a decent time and a considerable allowance of wine had been consumed after dinner, my gentlemen begun to open their batteries upon me. I returned their fire by telling them I should save them much time and trouble by stating to them at once that my political creed was very simple and within a very narrow compass — that it was 'Devotion to Fox.' And so we all got to loggerheads directly, and jawed and drank till twelve or one o'clock, and I suppose I was devilish abusive, for they are all as shy as be damned of me ever since."
* Sir Robert Adair [1763-1855], Whig member for Appleby, famous as the target of Canning's frequent satire. Canning wrote of him as " Bawba-dara-adul-phoolah," and introduced him to im- mortahty by making him the hero of the ballad "Sweet Matilda Pottingen," which was supposed to describe the course of Adair's love when he was a student at Gottingen.
t Addington.
i793-i8o4.] PITT AND FOX AS ALLIES. 23
Pitt's intolerance of Addington now passed into an active phase, and the unfortunate Prime Minister found himself under a cross-fire directed by the tw6 most powerful men in the House — Pitt and Fox. The following notes dispel any doubt which may still exist as to the formal and explicit understanding between these ancient antagonists for the object which both had at heart, though for very different reasons, namely, the overthrow of Addington : —
Rt Hon. Charles Fox to Mr. Creevey.
"Arlington St., Saturday [1804].
"Dear Sir,
" I enclose you a part of a letter from Grey. If you can speak to Brandling * upon the subject you may tell him that in all the divisions we shall have this next week, either Mr. Pitt will be with us or we with him.
" Yours,
"C J. Fox."
Enclosure in above.
"My dear Fox,
" I forgot yesterday to answer your question about Brandling. He is not at present in this county [Northumberland], and I don't know whether he is in London or in Yorkshire. Creevey, his brother-in-law, will be able to suggest the best mode of applying to him ; but I should think, notwithstanding his hatred of the Doctor, that he would not vote against him without Pitt."
The unnatural alliance between Pitt and Fox was manifested in its least commendable aspect upon the occasion of Pitt's motion for an inquiry into the administration of the First Lord of the Admiralty,
* Mr. Brandling, M.P. for Ne\vcastle-on-Tyne, was Mrs. Creevey's brother.
24, THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
Earl St. Vincent, who had not only contributed to securing for his country the mastery of the ocean, but, by means of the Commission of Inquiry which he established as First Lord, had exposed and put an end to many abuses in the service. Pitt's motion, of course, was hostile to the gallant admiral, through whose discredit he sought to bring Addington's Government into disgrace; and Fox supported the motion in a speech the insincerity of which was not inferior to that of Pitt, and staggered even such a good party man as Creevey.
Capt Graham Moore, R.N., to Mr. Creevey.
"Plymouth Dock, Feby. ist, 1804.
"... I suppose you mean to join the set that prepare to worry the poor Doctor when Parliament meets. What can he do? He seems, or we seem, to do as well as Bonoparte — fretting and fuming and playing off his tricks from Calais to Boulogne and back again. The fellow has done too much for a mere hum; he certainly will try something, and 1 hope to be in at the death of some of his expeditions. If they do not take my men, we shall soon be ready for sea again. New copper, my boy! we shall sail like the wind. . . ."
Mr. Creevey to Dr. Currie.
"22 March, 1804.
". . . With respect to the debate . . . nothing could be ... so unlike a case against Lord St. Vincent: I really doubted the fidelity of my ears all the time I listened to him (Fox), he was so very unlike himself. His first reply was a great and striking display of his powers, but the charge against the Admiralty derived little support or elucidation from it. I confess I felt a wish that Fox would not have taken the part he did, because I cannot reconcile it to my notions either of private friendship or parliamentary justice to put a
1793-1804.] THE BONDS OF PARTY. 25
man upon his trial, because I am sure he is innocent. There were, however, most powerful arguments urged by Fox that in a great measure reconciled me to the vote I gave, and indeed had they been much less and much weaker, I should most readily have gone with him. A Leader of a Party has a most difficult part imposed upon him on such an occasion. It is im- possible he can be alone influenced by the abstract question of merit or demerit of the motion but of course must calculate in every way upon the effects of his vote. As a private of a party there is nothing so fatal to publick principle, or one's own private respect and consequence, as acting for oneself upon great questions. I am more passionately attached every day to Party. I am certain that without it nothing can be done, and I am more certain from every day's experience that the leader of the party to which I belong is as superior in talents, in enlightened views, in publick and private virtues, to all other party leaders as one human being can be to another. He must therefore give many, many votes that I may think are wrong, before I vote against him or not with him.
" I scarcely know an earthly blessing 1 would pur- chase at the expense of those sensations I feel towards the incomparable Charley ! "
" 2nd April.
". . . The fact is I believe, as I have always done, that the Regal function will never more be exercised by him (George III.), and the Dr.* has most impudently assumed these functions in doing what he has done.
"And now again for speculation. I can swear to what Sheridan will try for, if the thing does not too suddenly come to a crisis. His insuperable vanity has suggested to him the brilliancy of being first with the Prince and governing his councils. He will, if he sees it practicable, try, and is now trying, to alienate the Prince from Fox, and to reconcile him to the wretched Addington. The effect of such a diabolical project is doubtless to be dreaded with a person so unsteady as the Prince; but then again there are
* Mr, Addinsjton.
26 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
things that comfort me. If the Prince has a point on which he is uniform, it is a proud and just attachment to the old Nobility of the country, articles which fortunately find no place in the composition of the present ministers. His notion, too, of Sheridan, I believe, has not much to do with his qualities for a statesman. Devonshire House, too, is his constant haunt, where every one is against Sheridan ; and where the Prince, at his own request, met Grey three weeks ago and offered him any pledge as a security for his calling Fox to his councils whenever he had the power. Master Sherry does not know this, and of course it must not be known ; but I know it and am certain of the fact. Sheridan displays evident distrust of his own projects, and is basely playing an under game as Fox's friend, in the event of defeat to him and his Dr. I never saw conduct more distinctly base than his."
" I St May.
". . . The enemy of mankind is Pitt. I detest from the bottom of my heart him and all his satellites. I am sure, too, that, independent of his dispositions, his mind is of a mean and little structure, much below the requisite for times like these — active, intriguing and most powerful, but all in detail, quite incapable of accompanying the elevated views of Fox."
Addington stuck stiffly to his post, but the forces allied against him in the Commons proved irresistible in the end; in May, 1804, he resigned, and Pitt entered upon his last administration. Addington, smother- ing his resentment of the rough handling he had received, joined Pitt's Cabinet as President of the Council in January, 1805, accepting at the same time the peerage which he had previously declined. Pitt would have given Fox a share in the administration hardly inferior to his own, but the King would not hear of it, and thus was lost for ever the noble project of uniting the chief political parties for the defence of the Empire.
1793-1804.] THE HOPE OF THE WHIGS. 27
Mr. Creevey to Dr. Currie.
" 2ncl May, 1804.
". . . It is felt by the Pittites that the Prince and a Regency must be resorted to, and as the Prince evinced on every occasion the strongest decision in favor of Fox, the Pittites are preparing for a reci- procity of good offices. God send we may have a Regency, and then the cards are in our hands. I wish you had seen the party of which I formed one in the park just now. Lord Buckingham, his son Temple, Ld. Derby, Charles Grey,* Ld. Fitzwilliam, Canning, Ld. Morpeth t and Ld. Stafford. J . . . The four physicians were at Buckingham House this morning : I feel certain he (the King) is devilish bad. . . ."
" 3rd May.
" Under our present circumstances no news is good news, because it shows there are great diffi- culties in making the peace between the King and Pitt. . . . The King has communicated to him that he will see him to-morrow or Saturday, ivhich com- mimication Pitt immediately forwarded to Fox. There is, I hope, much value in these facts : they show, I hope, that the Monarch is done, and can no longer make Ministers ; they show too, I hope, that Pitt thinks so. Why this delay at such a time if the King is well ? Why this civility from Pitt to Fox ? if the former did not suspect no good was to come of his interviews with his Master. We are all in better spirits — by 'all,' I mean the admirers of Fox and haters of Pitt. . . ."
" 8tli May,
"... I was too late for last night's post, and besides I was struck dumb and lifeless by the elevation of that wretch Pitt to his former fatal eminence — sick to death, too, with something like a sensation of Fox's disgrace and defeat, and of the
* Afterwards 2nd Earl Grey, t Afterwards 6th Earl of Carlisle.
X 2nd Marquess of Stafford ; created Duke of Sutherland in 1833.
28 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [CiL 1.
termination of all our hopes. But I am better to-day ; the Grenvilles and Wyndhamites have to a man stuck fast to Fox and refuse to treat with Pitt. The Prince, too, loads Fox with caresses, and swears his father's exception to Fox alone is meant as the last and greatest of personal injuries to himself, because the King knows full well that Fox is the first favorite of the Prince."
" Park Place, June 2nd, 1804.
". . . Well — I think, considering we have certainly been out-jockeyed by the villain Pitt, we are doing famously. Pitt, I think, is in a damnable dilemma; his character has received a cursed blow from the appearance of puzzle in his late conduct, from the wretched farce of [illegible] turning out Addington, and keeping those who were worse than him ; and from his having produced no military plans yet, after all his anathemas against the late Ministers for their delay. The country, I now firmly believe, was tired of Pitt and even of the Court, and conceived some new men and councils, and above all an union of all great men, was a necessary experiment for the situation. Pitt has disappointed this- wish and expectation, and has shown no necessity that has compelled him so to do. He has all the air of having acted a rapacious, selfish, shabby part ; he is sur- rounded by shabby partizans ; in comparison with his own relations, the Grenvilles, he is degraded ; he has no novelty to recommend him ; his Master * is on the wane, and to a certain extent is evidently hostile to him. In addition to all this, the daily and nightly attendance of Dr. Simmonds and four physicians at Buckingham House must inevitably increase the Prince's power, and diminish that of Pitt. I saw these five Drs. and Dundass, the surgeon from Richmond, come out of Buckingham House with Pitt half an hour ago. Simmonds and one of the physicians allways return at five in the evening — the former for the night — the latter for some hours. I have watched and know their motions well. This must end surely at no distant period — a Regency — and then I hope
* George III.
1793-1804.] THREATS OF INVASION. 29
the game's our own ! In the mean time, these dinners and this activity of the Prince are certainly doing good, and our friends are much more numerous than I expected. We are a great body — the Prince at the head of us. Fox, Grey, &c., are all in great spirits. . . . Your humble servant partakes in the passing festivities of these Opposition grandees. I dine to-morrow at Lord Fitzwilliam's, this day week at Carlton House; Monday I dined at Lord Derby's. I really believe I have played my cards, so far, excellently with these people."
General Sir John Moore to Mr. Creevey.
" Sandgate, 27th Aug., 1804.
". . . We understand that Government have positive information that we are to be invaded, and I am told that Pitt believes it. The experience of the last twelve months has taught me to place little confidence in the information or belief of Ministers, and as the undertaking seems to me so arduous, and offering so little prospect of success, I cannot per- suade myself that Bonoparte will be mad enough to attempt it. He will continue to threaten, by which means alone he can do us harm. The invasion would, I am confident, end in our glory and in his disgrace.
''The newspapers continue to mention secret expeditions, and have sometimes named me as one of the Generals to be employed. I put these upon a par with the invasion. We have at present no dispose- able force, and, if we had, I see no object worthy upon which to risk it. Thus, without belief in in- vasion or foreign expeditions, my situation here becomes daily more irksome, and I am almost reduced to wish for peace. I am tired of the confinement, without the occupation, of war."
In the following letter from Dr. Currie occurs the first mention of one, hitherto unheard of, with whom Creevey was destined to be long and intimately
3P THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. I.
associated. Currie complains of the unfairness of Henry Brougham's criticism of " Lord Lauderdale's very ingenious book."
"2nd October, 1804.
". . . The review of his book in the Edinr. Review is every way unfair and foul. It is by a scatter-brained fellow, one Brougham, who wrote two volumes on colonial policy, the two practical objects of which were — to abolish the slave-trade, and to propose that we should join our armies to those of the French for the extirpation of the Negroes of St. Domingo. . . . He has got a sort of philosophical cant about him, and a way of putting obscure sentences together, which seem to fools to contain deep meaning, especially as an air of consummate petulance and confidence runs through the whole. He has been taken up, I am told, by Wilberforce, and is paying his court to Pitt. He is a notorious prostitute, and is setting himself up to sale. It seems Ld. Lauderdale offended him by refusing to be introduced to him, but it is to pay court to Pitt, depend on it, that he writes as he does. . . . You may mention this to Mr. Grey."
Lord Henry Petty \afterwards $rd Marquess of Lansdowjie] to Mr. Creevey.
"Bath, Nov. 23rd, 1804.
"... [We are] within a few doors here of Ld, Thurlow's house, which has been recently honor'd with a Royal visit, when, as you may suppose, the whole scene of ministerial intrigue and family negociation was laid open: some legal business of importance was also transacted, for one lawyer came down with the P., and another was sent for while he remained. . . . Most probably it relates to some arrangement for the Princess. I am really glad to find he has conducted himself with so much firmness, and at the same time with some decorum. I give him the more credit for it, as I suspect the councils of
1793-1804.] THE IRISH DIFFICULTY. 3 1
Carlton House are not composed of the most high- minded or immaculate statesmen.*
" I have received a long and interesting letter from Mr. Parnell with an account of the Catholic proceed- ings in Dublin, which have at last assumed a very formidable aspect. . . . He says — ' In a month's time three millions of men will be formed into a well- disciplined and united body, headed by men of great wealth, and, what is better, great prudence. Weak as this Empire was in civil power, it is still further weakened by being divided with Foster;! so that I do not think I shall be mistaken in saying that all the moral force which influences men's minds and their actions thro' their opinions will be lodged in the hands of the Catholics ; and unless the Irish Govt, can raise a rebellion, which I do not think they can, they will fall into an insignificance equal to their deserts.' He adds that the meeting in Dublin was attended by upwards of eighty gentlemen, the poorest of whom has ;^20oo per ann. However the mere question of numbers may stand, Pitt's situation must, I think, appear far more critical at the commence- ment of the ensuing, than at the close of the last, session. No army raised at home — no foreign con- nections made or improved — on the contrary, a new war unnecessarily undertaken, and ungraciously entered upon — the Catholic body united in their demands, founded on past promises, and a powerfull and unbroken Opposition ready and willing to support. If such a combination of circumstances does not shake the Treasury bench, what mortal power can ? . . ."
* " At that period we had a kind of Cabinet, with whom I used to consult. They were the Dukes of York, Portland, Devonshire and Northumberland, Lord Guilford (that was Lord North), Lords Stormont, Moira and Fitzwilliam and Charles Fox." — Statement by George IV. to J. W. Croker [The Croker Papers, i. 289].
t Right Hon. J. Foster, Chancellor of the Exchequer of Ireland.
( 32 )
CHAPTER II.
1805.
The following holograph note, without date, probably belongs to the year 1805, and is interesting as being written by the future William IV. on behalf of the future George IV. : —
H.R.H. the Duke of Clarence to Mr. Creevey [holograph].
" St. James's, Friday night.
" Dear Sir,
" The Prince desires you will meet at dinner here on Saturday the Eighteenth instant at six o'Clock Lord \illegible\ and Sheridan. I hope I need not add how happy your presence will make me. I remain
"Yours sincerely,
" William."
Foreign politics during these years absorbed all the energies of Ministers, and diverted Pitt from those schemes of reform which undoubtedly lay near his heart. But the spirit of reform was awake, though it was crushed out of the plans of the Cabinet by stress of circumstance. The Opposition enjoyed more freedom and less responsibility. Creevey attached himself to that section of it which was foremost in hunting out abuses and proposing drastic measures of redress. At this time Henry Dundas, Viscount Melville, was
i8o5.] MELVILLE'S DISGRACE. 33'
First Lord of the Admiralty. The loth Report of the Commission appointed "to inquire into frauds and abuses in the Royal Navy " contained grave charges against Melville, who was accused in the House of Commons of malversation in his office of Treasurer of the Navy, committed in years subsequent to 1782, The division on 8th April showed 216 votes in each lobby, when the Speaker gave his casting vote in favour of Whitbread's motion. Melville at once re- signed, and his name was erased from the list of Privy Councillors. He was impeached before the House of Lords and acquitted, but not till 12th June, 1806, six months after Pitt's death.
"I have ever thought," wrote Lord Fitzharris, "that an aiding cause in Pitt's death, certainly one that tended to shorten his existence, was the result of the proceedings against his old friend and colleague Lord Melville."
M7'. Creevey to Dr. Ciirrie.
" 13th March, 1805. .
"... I am trying to learn my lesson as a future under-secretary or Secretary of the Treasury. . . . We had a famous debate on Sheridan's motion : never anything was so hollow as the argument on our side. Sherry's speech and reply were both excellent. In that part of his reply when he fired upon Pitt for his treachery to the Catholics, Pitt's eyes started with defiance from their sockets, and seemed to tell him if he advanced an atom further he would have his life. Sherry left him a little alone and tickled him about the greatness'of his mind and the good temf)er of Melville ; and then he turned upon him again with redoubled fury. . . . Never has it fallen to my lot to hear such words before in publick or in private used by man to man."
34 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. II.
"April 13, 1805,
". . . We have had indeed most famous sport with this same Leviathan, Lord Melville. His tumbling so soon was as unexpected by all of us as it was by him- self or you. It was clear from the first that he was ruined sooner or later, but no one anticipated his defeat upon the first Attack, and supported as he was by the Addingtons as well as Pitts, and with the nostrum held out, too, of further enquiry by a secret Committee. The history of that celebrated night presents a wide field of attack upon Pitt under all the infinite difficulties of his situation ; a clamour for reform in the expenditure of the publick money is at last found to be the touchstone of the House of Commons and of the publick. . . . Grey is to give notice immediately when we meet to bring in a bill appointing Commissioners to examine into abuses in the Army, in the Barracks — the Ordnance — the Com- missariat Departments. This plan, if it is worth any- thing . . , must place Pitt in the cursedest dilemma possible. Can he refuse enquiry when it is so loudly called for? or, if he grants it, what must become of the Duke of York and the Greenwoods and Hammers- leys and Delaneys, &:c., &c., &c., whose tricks with money in these departments would whitewash those of Trotter by comparison. ... I have no hesitation in saying that Pitt must be more than man to stand it. . . . You can form no notion of his fallen crest in the House of Commons — of his dolorous, distracted air. He betrayed Melville only to save himself, and so the Dundas's think and say. His own ruin must come next, and that, I think, at no great distance. You may have perceived I have not deserted from my enquiries into less important jobs, although old Fordyce * got such assistance from Fox. The latter, I have reason to believe, repents most cursedly of that business. Grey and Whitbread have acted with unparalleled kindness to me. I mean to have another touch at Fordyce when we meet again. ... At our
* John Fordyce, Esq., of Ayton, Berwickshire, Receiver-General of Land Tax in Scotland. He married Miss Catherine Maxwell of Monreith, sister of Jane, Duchess of Gordon.
i8o5.] THE CAMPAIGN AGAINST JOBS. 35,
first dinner after my motion about Fordyce, about three days after, there were, I daresay, fifty or sixty people, Fox in the chair. I was sulky and getting pretty drunk, when Fox call'd upon me for a toast — a publick man — and so I gave 'Fordyce,' This brought on a jaw, during which I got more and more drunk, but never departed from my creed that I was a betrayed man. However, say nothing of this, I beg. With reference to my own interest, I am sure I have been a gainer by all this."
"London, May ir, 1805. ,
" Upon my soul I don't know what to say for myself in vindication of my apparently abominable neglect of you ; but these are really tempestuous times, and I bother myself with too many things and too many thoughts, and I get irritable, and I believe I eat and drink too much. The upshot of the thing is, that day after day passes and my intentions to write to you, and to do other good things, pass too.
" Our campaign for the last six weeks has been a marvellous one. . . . The country has surprised me as much as the votes of the 8th and loth, and these meetings and resolutions have brought us safe into port, as far, at least, as relates to Melville. Pitt, too, is greatly, if not irreparably damaged by Melville's defeat and by certain irregularities of his own. Whit- bread's select committee has done great additional injury to Melville, and has got sufficient matter estab- lished for a resolution against Pitt. The latter has confessed that he lent ;^40,ooo to Boyd, Benfield and Co. out of money voted for Navy services, in order to enable them to make good their instalments upon Omnium. He has admitted, too, that he advanced them ;^ioo,ooo in order to enable them to make a purchase for Government, at a time that he was informed by the Bank of their approaching ruin. A great part of that sum is now a debt to Government in consequence of their bankruptcy. This is a damned unpopular business — to advance publick money to two members of Parliament, who are bankrupts, too. It is a damned thing, too, for the friends and admirers of this once great man, to see him sent for by
36 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [CH. II.
Whitbread, and to hear him examined for anything like money irregularities. He is, I am certain, infinitely injured in the estimation of the House of Commons ; and then think of his situation in other respects — his right hand, Melville, lopped off — a superannuated Methodist at the head of the Admiralty, in order to catch the votes of Wilberforce and Co. now and then — all the fleets of France and Spain in motion — the finances at their utmost stretch — not an official person but Huskisson and Rose to do anything at their respective offices — publick business multiplied by opposition beyond all former example — and himself more averse to business daily — disunited with Adding- ton — having quite lost his own character and with a King perfectly mad and involving his ministry in the damnedest scrapes upon the subject of expense. . . . I know Pitt's friends think he can't go on, and they all wish him not to try it. You may guess how the matter is when I tell you that Abercromby, the member for Edinburgh, and Hope, the member for your county, have struck and fled, declaring they won't support Pitt any longer^ whom they both pronounce to be a damned rascal. My authority is James Abercomby,* and I will answer for the truth of these facts.
". . . Bennet f has been here, and is now re- turned to Bath. He is most desirous to know you, and I promised I would write to you and mention him by way of introduction. He is most amiable, occa- sionally most boring, but at all times most upright and honorable. Make him introduce you to Lord and Lady Tankerville. The former is very fond of me ; he is a haughty, honorable man — has lived at one time in the heart of political leaders — was the friend of Lansdowne — has been in office several times, and is now a misanthrope, but very communicative and entertaining when he likes his man. His only remain- ing passion is for clever men, of which description he considers himself as one, tho' certainly unjustly. Lady Tankerville has perhaps as much merit as any
* Hon. James Abercromby : Speaker 1835-9 '• created Lord Dunfermline 1839 : died 1858.
t Hon. H. G, Bennet, M.P., 2nd son of 4th Earl of Tankerville.
i8o5.] THE RADICALS MAKE THE PACE. 37
woman in England.* She is, too, very clever, and has great wit ; but she, like her Lord, is depress'd and unhappy. They compose together the most striking libel upon the blessing of Fortune ; they are rich mucii beyond their desires or expenditure, they have the most elevated rank of their country, I know of nothing to disturb their happiness, and they are apparently the most miserable people I ever saw."
"Thorndon [Lord Petre's], 28tli July, 1805.
". . . You must know that I came out of the battle [of the session] very sick of it and of my leaders. It appears to me we had Pitt upon his very last legs, and might have destroyed him upon the spot ; instead of which, every opportunity for so doing was either lost or converted to a contrary purpose. Could the most inveterate enemy of Pitt have wished for any- thing better than to .find him lending ;^40,ooo, appro- priated by law to particular publick purposes, to two bankrupt merchant members of parliament who voted always with him ? f and could the most pertinacious derider of Fox's political folly have dared to conceive that Fox on such an occasion should acquit Pitt of all corruption, and should add likewise this sentiment to his opinion, that to have so detected him in corrup- tion would have made him (Fox) the most miserable of men? ... In short, between ourselves, my dear Doctor, I believe that Fox has no principle about publick money, and that he would give it away, if he had the power, in any way or for any job quite as dis- gusting as the worst of Pitt's. It is a painful con- clusion this to come to, and dreadfully diminishes one's parliamentary amusement. You can have no conception how feverish I became about Fox's conduct during this damned Athol business.| I talked at him
* She was Emma, daughter and co-heiress ot Sir James Cole- brooke, Bart.
t Boyd, Benfield and Co., to whom Pitt advanced the sum named out of money voted for Navy services. They were Government agents, and shortly afterwards went bankrupt.
X The 3rd Duke of Athol having inherited the sovereignty of the Ifile of Man through his wife, daughter and heiress of his uncle, the
'38 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. II.
in private, and no doubt vexed him infernally; but this you'll say is but poor work, to be making myself enemies in the persons whose jobs I oppose, and to quarrel with my own friends for not opposing the jobs too. I must have some discussion with my con- science and my temper before the next campaign, to see whether I can't go on a little more smoothly, and without prejudice to my interest. ... I see a great deal of Windham. He has dined with me, but my opinion of him is not at all improved by my acquaint- ance with him. He is, at the same time, decidedly the most agreeable and witty in conversation of all these great men. . . . "
The following notes are without date, but the allusion to Tom Sheridan's bride shows that they belong to the summer of 1805.
R. B. Sheridan, M.P., to Mr. Creevey.
" Richmond Hill, " Monday — the third day of Peace and Tranquillity.
"My dear Creevey,
"You must make my excuse to the Lord Mayor. Pray vouch that you should have brought me, but my cold is really so bad that I should infallibly lay myself up if I attempted to go. Here are pure air, quiet and innocence, and everything that suits me. "Fray; let me caution you not to expose yourself to the air after Dinner, as I find malicious people disposed to attribute to wine what was clearly the mere effect of the atmosphere. My last hour to your Ladies, as I am certainly going to die ; till when, however,
" Yours truly,
" R. B. S."
-2nd Duke, sold the same in 1765 to the Government for ^70,000 and a pension of ;!{^2000 for their joint lives, but reserving their land rents. The 4th Duke, after two failures, succeeded in getting a bill through Parliament in 1805, settling one-fourth of the customs of the island upon him and the heirs general of James Stanley, 7th Earl of Derby. The bill was vigorously opposed, and Creevey denounced it as a job. The fourth of the customs was subsequently commuted for ;^409,ooo.
1805.] THE SHERIDANS. 39
" Thursday evening. " My DEAR Greevey,
" If you don't leave town to-morrow, come and eat your mutton with me in George St. and meet Adam and McMahon, and more than all, my Son and Daughter.
" Mrs. Greevey will excuse you at my request, and you will be a Piece of a Lion to have seen so early Mrs. T. S.,* whom I think lovely and engaging and interesting beyond measure, and, as far as I can judge, with a most superior understanding.
" Yours ever,
" R. B. S."
" Grosvenor Place, Saturday morning. " My dear Mrs. Greevey,
" I left Hester about two hours ago : she violently expects you. Remember we have a bed for you, a fishing rod for Greevey on Monday morning. If you will stay over Monday, Hester and Richmond Hill will make you quite well, and there are, not cockney, but classical Lions for Greevey to see. ..."
It is difficult in these later days to realise the degree in which Royal personages were allowed, and even expected, to interfere with politics and the work of Parliament under the Hanoverian dynasty. It is notorious that, George III. having evinced his deter- mination to have a Tory Gabinet, the Heir Apparent chose his friends and counsellors from the Whig Opposition, trafficking in seats in Parliament as keenly as any boroughmonger of them all. Among others whom he sought to enlist in his Parliamentary party
* Sheridan's only son, Tom [1775-1817], married Caroline Henrietta Callander in 1805. She was a celebrated beauty, wrote three novels which had some popularity, and was the mother of four sons and three beautiful daughters — Mrs. Blackwood, afterwards Lady Dufferin, and lastly, Countess of Gifford ; The Hon. Mrs. Norton, afterwards Lady Stirling-Maxwell of Keir ; and the youngest, the Duchess of Somerset, Queen of Beauty at the Eglinton Tournament.
,40 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. II.
was the gentle and erudite Samuel Romilly, whose name must ever be associated with the unwearying efforts he made to reform and mitigate the atrociously sanguinary penal code of England. Measured by the extent of the immediate success of these efforts, Romilly's influence upon the statute-book may be reckoned trifling, seeing that all he was able to effect against Lord Ellenborough and the House of Lords was the repeal, in 1812, of the law which prescribed the death penalty upon any soldier or mariner who should presume to beg, without permission from his commanding officer or a magistrate. Nevertheless the fruits of his life-work ripened after his untimely death by his own hand in 1818, and although he can- not be reckoned among the noisiest nor among the most profusely munificent philanthropists, the in- fluence of Samuel Romilly was indeed one of the most powerful and beneficent ever exerted in the cause of humanity
Samuel Romilly, K.C., to Mr. Creevey.
" Little Ealing, Sept. 23rd, 1805. " Dear Creevey,
" I have just received your letter. ... It has indeed very much surprised me, and I am afraid my answer to it will occasion as much surprise in you. I cannot express to you how much flattered I am by the honor which the Prince of Wales does me. No event in the whole course of my life has been so gratifying to me. ... I have formed no resolution to keep out of Parliament ; on the contrary, it has long been my intention and is still my wish, to obtain a seat in the House, though not immediately.* If I had been a member from the beginning of the
* He was elected member for Queenborough in 1806, on taking office as Solicitor-General in " All the Talents."
i8o5.] ROMILLY DECLINES PARLIAMENT. 41
present Parliament, my vote would have been uni- formly given in a way which I presume would have been agreeable to the Prince of Wales. . . . Upon all questions I should have voted with Mr. Fox ; and yet, with all this, I feel myself obliged to decline the offer which his Royal Highness has the great conde- scension to make me. . . . When I was a young man, a seat in Parliament was offered me. It was offered in the handsomest manner imaginable : no condition whatever was annexed to it : I was told that I was to be quite independent, and was to vote and act just as I thought proper. I could not, however, relieve myself from the apprehension that . . . the person to whom I owed the seat would consider me, without perhaps being quite conscious of it himself, as his representative in Parliament . . . and that I should have some other than my own reason and conscience to account to for my public conduct. ... In other respects, the offer was to me a most tempting one. I had then no professional business with which it would interfere. ... As a young man, I was vain and foolish enough to imagine that I might distinguish myself as a public speaker. I weighed the offer very maturely, and in the end I rejected it. I persuaded myself that (altho' that were not the case with others) it was impossible that the little talents which I possessed could ever be exerted with any advantage to the public, or any credit to myself, unless I came into Parliament quite independent, and answerable for my conduct to God and to my country alone. I had felt the temptation so strong that, in order to fortify myself against any others of the same kind, I formed to myself the unalterable resolution never, unless I held a public office, to come into Parliament but by a popular election, or by paying the common price for my seat. It is true that, when I formed this resolution, the possibility of a seat being offered me by the Prince of Wales had never entered into my thoughts, and that the rules which I had laid down to regulate my conduct ought perhaps to yield to such a circumstance as this. But yet I have so long acted on this resolution — the principles on which I formed it have become so much a part of the system of my life, and that life is now so far advanced, that I cannot
42 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. II.
convince myself — proud as I am of the distinction which his Royal Highness is willing to confer upon me, that I ought to accept it. The answer that I should wish to give to his Royal Highness is to express in the strongest terms my gratitude for the offer, but in the most respectful possible way to decline it; and at the same time to say that, if his R. H. thinks that my being in Parliament can be at all useful to the public, I shall be very glad to procure myself a seat the first opportunity that I can find. But the difficulty is to know how to give such an answer with propriety. I am fearful that it may be thought, in every way that it occurs to me to convey it, not sufficiently respectful to his R. H., and from this embarrassment I know not how to relieve myself. My only recourse is to trust that you will be able to do for me what I cannot do for myself . . ."
Lord Henry Petty* to Mr. Creevey.
"Dublin, Sept. 15th, 1805.
"Dear Greevey,
" I have for some time meditated writing to you, more, I confess, in the hope of procuring an answer, than with that of being able to communicate anything that can interest you from this country, altho' it affords me a great deal of amusement as a traveller.
" The town of Dublin is full of fine buildings, fine streets, &c., but so ill placed and imperfectly finished as to give it the appearance of a great piece of patch- work, made up without skill and without attention. The Custom House is, however, an exception, and in every respect a noble edifice, in which there is no fault to be found except that old Beresfordt is sumptuously lodged in it.
" The Union is become generally unpopular — more
* Chancellor of the Exchequer in "All the Talents," 1806-7, and afterwards 3rd Marquess of Lansdowne.
t The Right Hon. John Beresford [1737-1805], for many years chairman of the Revenue Board of Ireland, greatly relied on by Pitt in affairs of Irish administration. He died 5th November, 1805.
i8o5.] IRISH AFFAIRS. 43
SO, I think, than it deserves; but the Irish pride is wounded with the hauteur and neglect of the English Govt. Castlereagh's defeat was received with accla- mation by all classes here, and the city would have been illuminated if the Mayor had not prevented it, giving rather awkwardly as an excuse that he did not think the occasion of sufficient magnitude.* . . ."
"Belfast; Oct. 24th, 1805.
" Many thanks for your letter, which it would have given me pleasure to receive anywhere, but par- ticularly in the remote district of Munster where it found me, meditating upon the means of converting bogs into fields, rocks into quarries, and (not the least difficult of metamorphoses) Irish peasants into efficient labourers. We have, at the other extremity of the island, got into a more civilised region. Downshire is the Yorkshire of Ireland — the same universal appearance of wealth and industry, and even of neat- ness and comfort, prevails.
"The shops here are full of prints and songs against Castlereagh, the leavings of the election, which has produced a general effect throughout Ireland. I am far from thinking the elections here will be so completely under the controll of Govt, as many of their adversaries, as well as friends, suppose. There is in most counties a rising spirit of indepen- dence, and the weight of the Catholic interest will be strongly felt. I have been myself strongly sollicited by a number of freeholders of the Co. of Kerry to offer myself at the gen. election, nor should I have the least doubt of success, if I had not other views,
* Viscount Castlereagh [1769-1822] had been returned as Whig member for county Down in 1790, the election costing his father the almost incredible sum of _;^6o,ooo. He joined the Tories in 1795, became Chief Secretary for Ireland in 1797, and incurred the hatred of many of his countrymen by the ardour and success with which he forwarded Pitt's project of the Union, by buying up borough-mongers. But he was a strong advocate of Roman Catholic emancipation, and retired with Pitt when George III. set his veto upon the measure to which Pitt was pledged. He took office under Addington as President of the Board of Controul in 1802, and lost his seat on seeking re-election in 1805 when he was appointed War Minister under Pitt.
44 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. II.
and could bring myself to face the tumult of an Irish contest, which would not be, I think, the most amusing of recreations.
" What great events are passing on the Continent. It is terrible to think that Pitt has so much of the fate of England and of Europe in his hands. I understand there has been some disagreement with Russia in consequence of the D. of Y. being intended for the command of a combined army of Russians and English, against which the Court of Petersburgh remonstrated. How disgracefull to be indebted to a foreign court for teaching us commonsense and our own interest at such a crisis ! "
At Christmastide, 1805, Pitt received his death- blow. He had staked the existence of his country and the freedom of Europe upon the coalition of Austria, Russia, and England against Bonaparte and the destructive energies of France. But before these formidable allies could come into line, even before the British force had embarked for Germany, Napoleon swept through the Black Forest with 100,000 men. The Austrian commander Mack, posted on the Iller from Ulm to Memmingen, was surprised, taken in rear, and laid down his arms on 19th October, Werneck's corps having done the like the day before to Murat. By the end of the month the Austrian field force of 80,000 was no more. When rumours reached Pitt of the capitulation of Ulm — "Don't believe it," he exclaimed; "it is all a fiction." Next day the terrible news received confirmation ; the shock could not be repaired, even by the glorious intelligence which arrived four days later of the destruction of the French and Spanish fleets at Trafalgar. That, indeed, revived shattered hopes for the moment, but it was followed closely by the news of Austerlitz, where the second partner in the coalition had been crushed with
i8o5.] ULM AND AUSTERLlTZ. 45
a loss of 26,000 men. Not only was the coalition at an end, but its author passed quickly into the shadow of death.
Hon, Charles Grey, M.P. {afterwards 2nd Earl Grey), to Mr. Creevey.
"Howick, Dec. 29th, 1805.
", . . Your details, which I had received from no other person, have left no doubt upon my mind. Of the delay of fresh intelligence I think nothing. I remember the same thing happened after the battle of Ulm, when the same inferences were drawn from it, and the opportunity taken to circulate the same reports of the defeat of the French. It seems Robert Ward sent to all the newspapers the paragraphs which you wd. see, asserting the Russian capitulation and Count Palfy's letters to be forgeries; and this, I am assured, without the least authority for doing so, except his own foolish belief All this, I agree with you, is as much calculated to hurt Pitt, when it is completely exposed, as the disasters themselves, and the folly of doing it is inconceivable. If the defeat of the 2nd * was as calamitous as I believe it to have been, it is nonsense to talk any more of Continental confederacies. The game is too desperate even for Pitt himself, desperate as he is ; and the King of Prussia certainly would not expose himself alone, which in the first instance he must do, to all the power and vengeance of France. I am more inclined to think that they [Pitt's Cabinet] really do flatter themselves against all evidence into a belief in these renewed battles and consequent changes of fortune. There is nothing too absurd for them in a military view. They are naturally confident and sanguine, and this is their last hope."
* At Austerlitz.
(46 )
CHAPTER III.
1805.
The following reminiscences were written by Mr. Creevey in the reign of William IV., but as they refer chiefly to his doings in 1805, they find their proper sequence in this place. At the time they were written Mr. Creevey's feelings towards George IV. had undergone a complete revulsion; but in 1805 he was full of enthusiasm for the Heir Apparent, upon whom the hopes of the whole Whig party were fixed.
"It was in 1804 when I first began to take a part in the House of Commons, at which time the Prince of Wales was a most warm and active partizan of Mr. Fox and the Opposition. It was then that the Prince began first to notice me, and to stop his horse and talk with me when he met me in the streets ; but I recollect only one occasion, in that or the succeed- ing year, that I dined at Carlton House, and that was with a party of the Opposition, to whom he gave various dinners during that spring. On that occasion Lord Dundas and Calcraft sat at the top and bottom of the table, the Prince in the middle at one side, with the Duke of Clarence next to him ; Fox, Sheridan and about 30 opposition members of both Houses making the whole party. We walked about the garden before dinner without our hats.
"The only thing that made an impression upon me in favour of the Prince that day (always except- ing his excellent manners and appearance of good humour) was his receiving a note during dinner
i8o5.] THE HEIR APPARENT. 47.
which he flung across the table to Fox and asked if he must not answer it, which Fox assented to ; and then, without the slightest fuss, the Prince left his place, went into another room and wrote an answer, which he brought to Fox for his approval, and when the latter said it was quite right, the Prince seemed delighted, which I thought very pretty in him, and a striking proof of Fox's influence over him.
" During dinner he was very gracious, funny and agreeable, but after dinner he took to making speeches, and was very prosy as well as highly in- judicious. He made a long harangue in favour of the Catholics and took occasion to tell us that his brother William and himself were the only two of his family who were not Germans — this too in a company which was, most of them, barely known to him. Likewise I remember his halloaing to Sir Charles Bamfyld at the other end of the table, and asking him if he had seen Mother Windsor * lately. I brought Lord Howick f and George Walpole home at night in my coach, and so ended that day.
"At the beginning of September, 1805, Mrs. Creevey and myself with her daughters went to Brighton to spend the autumn there, the Prince then living at the Pavilion. I think it was the first, or at furthest the second, day after our arrival, when my two eldest daughters % and myself were walking on the Steyne, and the Prince, who was sitting talking to old Lady Clermont, having perceived me, left her and came up to speak to me, when I presented my daughters to him. He was very gracious to us all and hoped he should see me shortly at dinner. In two or three days from this time I received an invi- tation to dine at the Pavilion. . . . Mrs. Fitzherbert, whom I had never been in a room with before, sat on one side of the Prince, and the Duke of Clarence on the other. ... In the course of the evening the Prince took me up to the card table where Mrs. Fitz- herbert was playing, and said — ' Mrs. Fitzherbert, I wish you would call upon Mrs. Creevey, and say
* A notorious procuress in King's Place, t Afterwards Earl Grey, the Prime Minister. X His step-daughters, the Miss Ords.
48 THE CREEVEY MPERS. [Ch. III.
Irom me I shall be happy to see her here.' Mrs. Fitzherbert did call accordingly, and altho' she and Mrs. Creevey had never seen each other before, an acquaintance began that soon grew into a very sin- cere and agreeable friendship, which lasted the re- mainder of Mrs. Creevey's life. . . .
". . . Immediately after this first visit from Mrs. Fitzherbert, Mrs. Creevey and her daughters became invited with myself to the Prince's parties at the Pavilion, and till the first week in January — a space of about four months — except a few days when the Prince went to see the King at Weymouth, and a short time that I was in London in November, there was not a day we were not at the Pavilion, I dining there always once or twice a week, Mrs. Creevey frequently dining with me likewise, but in the even- ing we were always there.
"During these four months the Prince behaved with the greatest good humour as well as kindness to us all. He was always merry and full of his jokes, and any one would have said he was really a very happy man. Indeed I have heard him say repeatedly during that time that he never should be so happy when King, as he was then.
"I suppose the Courts or houses of Princes are all alike in one thing, viz., that in attending them you lose your liberty. After one month was gone by, you fell naturally and of course into the ranks, and had to reserve your observations till you were asked for them. These royal invitations are by no means calculated to reconcile one to a Court. To be sent for half an hour before dinner, or perhaps in the middle of one's own, was a little too humiliating to be very agreeable.
". . . Lord Hutchinson* was a great feature at the Pavilion. He lived in the house, or rather the one adjoining it, and within the grounds. . . . As a military man he was a great resource at that time, as we were in the midst of expectations about the
* Brother of the ist Earl of Donoughmore ; a general officer, succeeded Sir Ralph Abercromby in command of the army in Egypt, and was raised to the peerage in 1801, with a pension of ^2000. Died in 1832.
i8os.] LIFE AT THE PAVILION. 49
Austrians and Buonaparte, and the battle which we all knew would so soon take place between them. It was a funny thing to hear the Prince, when the battle had taken place, express the same opinion as was given in the London Government newspapers, that it was all over with the French — that they were all sent to the devil, and the Lord knows what. Maps were got out to satisfy everybody as to the precise ground where the battle had been fought and the route by which the French had retreated. While these opera- tions were going on in one window of the Pavilion, Lord Hutchinson took me privately to another, when he put into my hand his own private dispatch from Gordon, then Secretary to the Commander-in-Chief, giving him the true account of the battle of Auster- litz, with the complete victory of the French. This news, unaccountable as it may appear, was repeated day after day at the Pavilion for nearly a week ; and when the truth began at last to make its appearance in the newspapers, the Prince puts them all in his pockets, so that no paper was forthcoming at the Pavilion, instead of half-a-dozen, the usual number. . . . We used to dine pretty punctually at six, the average number being about sixteen. . . . Mrs. Fitz- herbert always dined there, and mostly one other lady — Lady Downshire very often, sometimes Lady Clare or Lady Berkeley or Mrs. Creevey. Mrs. Fitz- herbert was a great card-player, and played every night. The Prince never touched a card, but was occupied in talking to his guests, and very much in listening to and giving directions to the band. At 12 o'clock punctually the band stopped, and sand- wiches and wine and water handed about, and shortly after the Prince made a bow and we all dispersed.
" I had heard a great deal of the Prince's drinking, but, during the time that I speak of, I never saw him the least drunk but once, and I was rnyself pretty much the occasion of it. We were dining at the Pavilion, and poor Fonblanque, a dolorous fop of a lawyer, and a member of Parliament too, was one of the guests. After drinking some wine, I could not resist having some jokes at Fonblanque's expense, which the Prince encouraged greatly. I went on and invented stories about speeches Fonblanque had
50 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. III.
made in Parliament, which were so pathetic as to have affected his audience to tears, all of which in- ventions of mine Fonblanque denied to be true with such overpowering gravity that the Prince said he should die of it if I did not stop. ... In the evening, at about ten or eleven o'clock, he said he would go to the ball at the Castle, and said I should go with him. So I went in his coach, and he entered the room with his arm through mine, everybody standing and getting upon benches to see him. He was certainly tipsey, and so, of course, was I, but not much, for I well re- member his taking me up to Mrs. Creevey and her daughters, and telling them he had never spent a pleasanter day in his life, and that ' Creevey had been very great' He used to drink a great quantity of wine at dinner, and was very fond of making any newcomer drunk by drinking wine with him very frequently, always recommending his strongest wines, and at last some remarkably strong old brandy which he called Diabolino.
" It used to be the Duke of Norfolk's custom to come over every year from Arundel to pay his respects to the Prince and to stay two days at Brighton, both of which he always dined at the Pavilion. In the year 1804, upon this annual visit, the Prince had drunk so much as to be made very seriously ill by it, so that in 1805 (the year that I was there) when the Duke came, Mrs. Fitzherbert, who was always the Prince's best friend, was very much afraid of his being again made ill, and she persuaded the Prince to adopt different stratagems to avoid drinking with the Duke. I dined there on both days, and letters were brought in each day after dinner to the Prince, which he affected to consider of great im- portance, and so went out to answer them, while the Duke of Clarence went on drinking with the Duke of Norfolk. But on the second day this joke was carried too far, and in the evening the Duke of Norfolk showed he was affronted. The Prince took me aside and said — ' Stay after everyone is gone to- night. The Jockey's got sulky, and I must give him a broiled bone to get him in good humour again.' So of course I stayed, and about one o'clock the Prince of Wales and Duke of Clarence, the Duke of Norfolk
MRS. FITZHERBERT.
[To face p. 50.
iSosO SHERIDAN. 5 1
and myself sat down to a supper of broiled bones, the result of which was that, having fallen asleep myself, I was awoke by the sound of the Duke of Norfolk's snoring. I found the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Clarence in a very animated discussion as to the particular shape and make of the wig worn by George II.
"Among other visitors to the Pavilion came Sheridan, with whom I was then pretty intimate, though perhaps not so much so as afterwards. I was curious to see him and the Prince daily in this way, considering the very great intimacy there had been between them for so many years. Nothing, certainly, could be more creditable to both parties than their conduct. I never saw Sheridan during the period of three weeks (I think it was) take the least more liberty in the Prince's presence than if it had been the first day he had ever seen him. On the other hand, the Prince always showed by his manner that he thought Sheridan a man that any prince might be proud of as his friend.
" So much for manners ; but I was witness to a kind of altercation between them in which Sheridan could make no impression on the Prince. The latter had just given Sheridan the office of Auditor of the Duchy of Cornwall, worth about £1200 per annum, and Sheridan was most anxious that the Prince should transfer the appointment to his son, Tom Sheridan, who was just then married. What Sheri- dan's object in this was, cannot be exactly made out ; whether it really was affection for Tom, or whether it was to keep the profit of the office out of the reach of his creditors, or whether it was to have a young life in the patent instead of his own. Whichever of these objects he had in view, he pursued it with the greatest vehemence ; so much so, that I saw him cry bitterly one night in making his supplication to the Prince. The latter, however, was not to be shaken ... he resisted the demand upon the sole ground that Sheridan's reputation was such, that it made it not only justifiable, but most honourable to him, the Prince, to make such a selection for the office. . . .
" This reminds me of another circumstance relating to the same office when in Sheridan's
52 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [CH. III.
possession. In the year 1810, Mrs. Creevey, her daughters and myself were spending our summer at Richmond. Sheridan and his wife (who was a rela- tion and particular friend of Mrs. Creevey's) came down to dine and stay all night with us. There being no other person present after dinner, when the ladies had left the room, Sheridan said : —
"*A damned odd thing happened to me this morning, and Hester [Mrs. Sheridan] and I have agreed in coming down here to-day that no human being shall ever know of it as long as we live ; so that nothing but my firm conviction that Hester is at this moment telling it to Mrs. Creevey could induce me to tell it to you.'
"Then he said that the money belonging to this office of his in the Duchy being always paid into Biddulph's or Cox's bank (I think it was) at Charing Cross, it was his habit to look in there. There was one particular clerk who seemed always so fond of him, and so proud of his acquaintance, that he every now and then cajoled him into advancing him ;^io or ;^20 more than his account entitled him to. . . . That morning he thought his friend looked particularly smiling upon him, so he said : —
" ' 1 looked in to see if you could let me have ten pounds.'
" ' Ten pounds ! ' replied the clerk ; ' to be sure I can, Mr. Sheridan. You've got my letter, sir, have you not?'
" ' No,' said Sheridan, ' what letter ? '
" It is literally true that at this time and for many, many years Sheridan never got twopenny-post letters,* because there was no money to pay for them, and the postman would not leave them without payment.
" ' Why, don't you know what has happened, sir ? ' asked the clerk. 'There is ^^1300 paid into your account. There has been a very great fine paid for one of the Duchy estates, and this ;^i300 is your per- centage as auditor.'
* The charge at this time for letters sent and delivered within the metropolitan district was only 2^., payable by the recipient ; but country letters were charged from lod, to is. 6d. and more, according to distance.
i8os.] SHERIDAN. S3
" Sheridan was, of course, very much set up with this ;^i30o, and, on the very next day upon leaving us, he took a house at Barnes Terrace, where he spent all his ;^i300. At the end of two or three months at most, the tradespeople would no longer supply him without being paid, so he was obliged to remove. What made this folly the more striking was that Sheridan had occupied five or six different houses in this neighbourhood at different periods of his life, and on each occasion had been driven away literally by non-payment of his bills and consequent want of food for the house. Yet he was as full of his fun during these two months as ever he could be — gave dinners perpetually and was always on the road between Barnes and London, or Barnes and Oatlands (the Duke of York's), in a large job coach upon which he would have his family arms painted. . . .
". . . As I may not have another opportunity of committing to paper what little I have of perfect recollection of what Sheridan told me in our walks at Brighton respecting his early life, and as he certainly was a very extraordinary man, I may as well insert it here.
" He was at school at Harrow, and, as he told me, never had any scholastic fame while he was there, nor did he appear to have formed any friendships there. He said he was a very low-spirited boy, much given to crying when alone, and he attributed this very much to being neglected by his father, to his being left without money, and often not taken home at the regular holidays. From Harrow he went to live in John Street, out of Soho Square, whether with his father or some other instructor, I forget, but he dwelt upon the two years he spent there as those in which he acquired all the reading and learning he had upon any subject.
" At the end of this time his father determined to open a kind of academy at Bath — the masters or in- structors to be Sheridan the father, his eldest son Charles, and our Sheridan, who was to be rhetorical usher. According to his account, however, the whole concern was presently laughed off the stage, and then Sheridan described his happiness as beginning. He danced with all the women at Bath, wrote sonnets
54 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. III.
and verses in praise of some, satires and lampoons upon others, and in a very short time became the established wit and fashion of the place.
" It was at this period of his life he fell in love with Miss Lindley, whom he afterwards married, but she was carried off by her father at that time to a convent in France, to be kept out of his way. Then it was he became embroiled with Mr. Mathews, who was likewise a lover of Miss Lindley, as well as her libeller. Sheridan fought two duels with Mr. Mathews upon this subject, both times with swords. The first was in some hotel or tavern in Henrietta St., Covent Garden, when Mathews was disarmed and begged his life. Upon Mr. Mathew's return to Bath, Sheridan used his triumph with so little moderation, that Mr. Mathews left Bath to live in Wales; but soon he was induced to believe that he had compromised his honour by quitting Bath and leaving his reputation at the mercy of Sheridan. Accordingly, a messenger arrived from him to Sheridan, with a written certifi- cate in favour of Mathews's undoubted honour in the former aff'air, to be signed by Sheridan, or else the messenger was to deliver him a second challenge.
" Sheridan preferred the latter course of proceed- ing, and the duel was fought at King's Weston (if I recollect right). According to Sheridan's account, never was anything so desperate. Sheridan's sword broke in a point blank thrust into Mathews's chest ; upon this he closed, and they both fell, Mathews uppermost ; but, in falling, his sword broke likewise, sticking into the earth and snapping. However, he drew the sharp end out of the ground, and with this he stabbed Sheridan in the face and body, over and over again, till it was thought he must die. Sheridan named both the seconds, but I forget them. He said they were both cut for ever afterwards for not inter- fering. He said, likewise, there was a regular pro- ceeding before the Mayor of Bristol, on the ground that Mr. Mathews had worn some kind of armour to protect him, which broke Sheridan's sword. . . . Sheri- dan was taken to some hotel at Bath, where his life for some time was despaired of, but ... he rallied and recovered.
" He then lived for some time at Waltham Cross,
i8os.] SHERIDAN'S MARRIAGE. 55
and was in bad health, but used to steal up to town to see and hear Miss Lindley in publick, though he was under an engagement with her family not to pursue her any more in private. At length, however, they met, and eventually were married. Miss Lindley's reputation at this time was so great, that her engage- ments for the year were ;^5ooo. This resource, how- ever, Sheridan would not listen to her receiving any longer, altho' he himself had not a single farthing. He said she might sing to oblige the King or Queen, but to receive money while she was his wife was quite out of the question. Upon which old Lindley, her father, said this might do very well for him — Mr. Sheri- dan— but that for him — Mr. Lindley — it was a very hard case ; that his daughter had always been a very good daughter to him, and very generous to him out of the funds she gained by her profession, and that it was very hard upon him to be cut off all at once from this supply. This objection was disposed of by Sheridan in the following manner.
"Miss Lindley had ^^3000 of her own, of which Sheridan gave her father ;i^2000. With the remaining ;^iooo, the only fortune Mr. and Mrs, Sheridan began the world with, he took a cottage at Slough, where they lived, he said, most happily, a gig and horse being their principal luxury, with a man to look after both the master and his horse. But by the end, or before the end, of the year, the ;^iooo was drawing rapidly to a finish, and then it was that Sheridan thought of play-writing as a pecuftiary resource, and he wrote The Rivals. Having got an introduction to the theatre, he took his play there, and finally was present to see it acted, but would not let Mrs. Sheri- dan come up from Slough for the same purpose. The Rivals, upon its first performance, was damned ; when Sheridan got to Slough and told his wife of it she said :
" ' My dear Dick, I am delighted. I always knew it was impossible you could make anything by writing plays ; so now there is nothing for it but my begin- ning to sing publickly again, and we shall have as much money as we like.'
" ' No,' said Sheridan, ' that shall never be. I see where the fault was ; the play was too long, and the parts were badly cast,'
56 _ THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. III.
" So he altered and curtailed the play, and had address or interest enough to get the parts newly cast. At the expiration of six weeks it was acted again, and with unbounded applause. His fame as a dramatick writer was settled from that time. When it was he became proprietor of Drury Lane Theatre, or how it was accomplished, I did not learn from him, but it was the only property he ever possessed, and, with the commonest discretion on his part, would have made him a most afQuent man.
" Sheridan's talents, displayed in his plays, pro- cured him very shortly both male and female admirers among the higher orders. The families of Lord Coventry and Lord Harrington he spoke of as his first patrons. When it was he begun with politicks, I don't recollect, but he was a great parliamentary re- former the latter end of the American war, and one of a committee of either five or seven (I forget which number) who used to sit regularly at the Mansion House upon this subject.
" In 1780, the year of a general election, his object was to get into Parliament if possible, and he was going to make a trial at Wootton-Bassett. The night before he set out, being at Devonshire House and everybody talking about the general election. Lady Cork* asked Sheridan about kis plans, which led to her saying that she had often heard her brother Monckton say he thought an opposition man might come in for Stafford, and that if, in the event of Sheri- dan failing at Wootton, he liked to try his chance at Stafford, she would give him a letter of introduction to her brother.
" This was immediately done. Sheridan went to Wootton-Bassett, where he had not a chance. Then he went to Stafford, produced Lady Cork's letter, offered himself as a candidate, and was elected. For Stafford he was member till 1806 — six-and-twenty years. I remember asking him if he could fix upon any one point of time in his life that w^as decidedly happier than all the rest, and he said certainly — it was after dinner the day of this first election for Stafford,
* Second wife of the 7th Earl, youngest daughter of the ist Vis- count Galway.
i8os.] FROLICS AT BRIGHTON. 57
when he stole away by himself to speculate upon those prospects of distinguishing himself which had been opened to him.
" I did not hear any further of his own history from himself than this first getting into parliament. It has been a constant subject of regret to me that I did not put down at the time all he told me, be- cause it was much more than I have stated ; but I feel confident my memory is correct in what I have written,
"To return to Sheridan at Brighton in the year 1805. His ^oint of diff'erence with the Prince being at an end, bheridan entered into whatever fun was going on at the Pavilion as if he had been a boy, tho' he was then 55 years of age. Upon one occasion he came into the drawing-room disguised as a police officer to take up the Dowager Lady Sefton * for playing at some unlawful game ; and at another time, when we had a phantasmagoria at the Pavilion, and were all shut up in perfect darkness, he continued to seat himself upon the lap of Madame Gerobtzoff" [?], a haughty Russian dame, who made row enough for the whole town to hear her.
"The Prince, of course, was delighted with all this ; but at last Sheridan made himself so ill with drinking, that he came to us soon after breakfast one day, saying he was in a perfect fever, desiring he might have some table beer, and declaring that he would spend that day with us, and send his excuses by Bloomfield for not dining at the Pavilion. I felt his pulse, and found it going tremendously, but in- stead of beer, we gave him some hot white wine, of which he drank a bottle, I remember, and his pulse subsided almost instantly. . . . After dinner that day he must have drunk at least a bottle and a half of wine. In the evening we were all going to the Pavilion, where there was to be a ball, and Sheridan said he would go home, i.e., to the Pavilion (where he slept) and would go quietly to bed. He desired me to tell the Prince, if he asked me after him, that he was far from well, and was gone to bed.
* Isabella, daughter of 2nd Earl of Harrington, and widow of the 9th Viscount and ist Earl of Sefton.
58 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. III.
" So when supper was served at the Pavilion about 12 o'clock, the Prince came up to me and said :
" ' What the devil have you done with Sheridan to-day, Creevey? I know he has been dining with you, and I have not seen him the whole day.'
" I said he was by no means well and had gone to bed ; upon which the Prince laughed heartily, as if he thought it all fudge, and then, taldng a bottle of claret and a glass, he put them both in my hands and said :
'' ' Now Creevey, go to his bedside and tell him I'll drink a glass of wine with him, and if he refuses, I admit he must be damned bad indeed.'
" I would willingly have excused myself on the score of his being really ill, but the Prince would not believe a word of it, so go I must. When I entered Sheridan's bedroom, he was in bed, and, his great fine eyes being instantly fixed upon me, he said : —
" ' Come, I see this is some joke of the Prince, and I am not in a state for it.'
" I excused myself as well as I could, and as he would not touch the wine, I returned without pressing it, and the Prince seemed satisfied he must be ill.
"About two o'clock, however, the supper having been long over, and everybody engaged in dancing, who should I see standing at the door but Sheridan, powdered as white as snow, as smartly dressed as ever he could be from top to toe. ... I joined him and expressed my infinite surprise at this freak of his. He said :
" * Will you go with me, my dear fellow, into the kitchen, and let me see if I can find a bit of supper.'
" Having arrived there, he began to play off his cajolery upon the servants, saying if he was the Prince they should have much better accommodation, &c., &c., so that he was surrounded by supper of all kinds, every one waiting upon him. He ate away and drank a bottle of claret in a minute, returned to the ball- room, and when I left it between three and four he was dancing.
" In the beginning of November, as Sheridan was returning to London, and I was going there for a short time, he proposed our going together, and nothing would serve him but that we must be two days on the road : that nothing was so foolish as
i8os.] WARREN HASTINGS. 59
hurrying oneself in such short days, and nothing so pleasant as living at an inn ; that the Cock at Sutton was an excellent place to dine and sleep at ; that he himself was very well known there, and would write and have a nice little dinner ready for our arrival.
"We set off in a job chaise of his, Edwards the box keeper of Drury Lane being on the dicky box, for he always acted as Sheridan's valet when he left London. Before we had travelled many miles, having knocked my foot against some earthenware vessel in the chaise, I asked Sheridan what it could be, and he replied he dared say it was something Edwards was taking to his wife. Arriving in the evening at Sutton, I found there was not a soul in the house who had ever seen Sheridan before ; that his letter had never arrived, and that no dinner was ready for us. I heard him muttering on about its being an extraordinary mistake, that his particular friend was out of the way, and so forth, but that he knew the house to be an excellent one, and no where that you could have a nicer little dinner. He went fidgetting in and out of the room, without exciting the least suspicion on my part, till dinner was announced. Then I found his fun had been to bring the dinner with him from the Pavilion. The bowl I had kicked contained the soup, and there were the best fish, woodcocks and every- thing else, with claret and sherry and port all from the same place.
"Among other persons who came to pay their respects to the Prince during the Autumn of 1805 was Mr. Hastings,* whom I had never seen before excepting at his trial in Westminster Hall. He and Mrs. Hastings came to the Pavilion, and I was present when the Prince introduced Sheridan to him, which was curious, con- sidering that Sheridan's parliamentary fame had been built upon his celebrated speech against Hastings. However, he lost no time in attempting to cajole old Hastings, begging him to believe that any part he had ever taken against him was purely political, and that no one had a greater respect for him than himself, &c., &c., upon which old Hastings said with great gravity that 'it would be a great consolation to him in his
* Warren Hastings.
6o THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. III.
declining days if Mr. Sheridan would make that sentence more publick;' but Sheridan was obliged to mutter and get out of such an engagement as well as he could.
" Another very curious person I saw a great deal of this autumn of 1805, sometimes at the Pavilion, sometimes at Mrs. Clowes's, was Lord Thurlow, to whom the Prince always behaved with the most marked deference and attention. I had never seen him but once before, and the occasion was an extra- ordinary one. Lady Oxford, who then had a house at Ealing (it was in 1801) had, by Lord Thurlow's desire, I believe, at all events with his acquiescence, invited Horne-Tooke to dinner to meet him. Lord Thurlow never had seen him since he had prosecuted him when Attorney-General for a libel in 1774 (I believe it was), when the greatest bitterness was shown on both sides, so that the dinner was a meeting of great curiosity to us who were invited to it. Sheridan was there and Mrs. Sheridan, the late Lord Camelford, Sir Francis Burdett, Charles Warren, with several others and myself. Tooke evidently came prepared for a display, and as I had met him repeatedly, and considered his powers of conversation as surpassing those of any person I had ever seen, in point of skill and dexterity (and, if at all necessary, in lying), I took for granted old grumbling Thurlow would be obliged to lower his topsail to him. But it seemed as if the very look and voice of Thurlow scared him out of his senses, and certainly nothing could be much more formidable. So Tooke tried to recruit himself by wine, and tho' not a drinker, was very drunk. But all would not do ; he was perpetually trying to distinguish himself, and Thurlow constantly laughing at him.
"In the autumn of 1805, Thurlow had declined greatly in energy from the time I refer to. It was the year only before his death. He used to read or ride out in the morning, and his daughter Mrs. Brown, and Mr. Sneyd, the clergyman of Brighton, occupied them- selves in procuring any stranger or other person who they thought would be agreeable to the old man to dine with him, the party being thus 10 or 12 every day, or more. I had the good fortune to be occasion- ally there with Mrs, Creevey. . . . However rough
LORD THURLOW.
\Toface p. 60.
i8o5.] LORD THURLOW. 6 1
Thurlow might be with men, he was the politest man in the world to ladies. Two or three hours were occupied by him at dinner in laying wait for any unfortunate slip or ridiculous observation that might be made by any of his male visitors, whom, when caught, he never left hold of, till I have seen the sweat run down their faces from the scrape they had got into.
" Having seen this property of his, I took care, of course, to keep clear of him, and have often enjoyed extremely seeing the figures which men have cut who came with the evident intention of shewing off before him. Curran, the Irish lawyer, was a striking instance of this. I dined with him at Thurlow's one day, and Thurlow just made as great a fool of him as he did formerly of Tooke.
"Thurlow was always dressed in a full suit of cloaths of the old fashion, great cuffs and massy buttons, great wig, long ruffles, &c. ; the black eye- brows exceeded in size any I have ever seen, and his voice, tho' by no means devoid of melody, was a kind of rolling, murmuring thunder. He had great reading, particularly classical, and was a very distinguished, as well as most daring, converser. I never heard of any one but Mr. Hare who had fairly beat him, and this I know from persons who were present, Hare did more than once, at Carlton House and at Woburn.
" Sir Philip Francis, whom I knew intimately, and who certainly was a remarkably quick and clever man, was perpetually vowing vengeance against Thurlow, and always fixing his time during this autumn of 1805 for 'making an example of the old ruffian,' either at the Pavilion or wherever he met him ; but I have seen them meet afterwards, and tho' Thurlow was always ready for battle, Francis, who on all other occasions was bold as a lion, would never stir.
"The grudge he owed to Thurlow was certainly not slightly grounded. When Francis and Generals Clavering and Monson were sent to India in 1773, to check Hastings in his career, their conduct was extolled to the skies by our party in parliament, while, on the other hand, Lord Thurlow in the House of Lords said that the greatest misfortune to India and to England was that the ship which carried these three gentlemen out had not gone to the bottom. . . .
62 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. III.
". . . During the autumn of 1805 the Prince was a very great politician. He considered himself as the Head of the Whig Party, and was perpetually at work cajoling shabby people, as he thought, into becoming Whigs out of compliment to him, but who ate his dinners and voted with the Ministers just the same. I remember dining with him at George Johnstone's at Brighton — the Duke of Clarence, old Thurlow, Lord and Lady Bessborough and a very large party, of which Suza, the Portuguese Ambassador was one. After dinner the Prince, addressing himself to Suza, described himself as being the Head of the great Whig party in England, and then entered at great length upon the merit of Whig principles, and the great glory it was to him, the Prince, to be the head of a party who advocated such principles. Finally, he appealed to Suza for his opinion upon that subject; but the Portuguese was much too wary to be taken in. He thanked the Prince with great force, ability and pro- priety for his condescension in giving him the infor- mation he had done, but, as he added, the subject was an entirely new one to him, he prayed his Royal Highness would have the goodness to excuse him giving an opinion upon it, till he had considered it more maturely.
" It seemed at that time the Prince's politicks were almost always uppermost with him . . . Upon one occasion I remember dining with the Prince at Lady Downshire's, Lord Winslow and different people being there. After dinner he said to me privately : ' Creevey, you must go home with me.' So when he went he took me in his coach, and when we got to the Pavilion he said : ' Now, Creevey, you and I must go over the House of Commons together, and see who are our friends and who are our enemies.' Accordingly, he got his own red book, and we went over the House of Commons name by name. He had one mark for a friend and another for an enemy, and of course every member of the Government who was then in the House of Commons had the enemy's mark put against his name. . . . Having made all these marks himself, he gave me the book, and told me to take it home with me. At this time Lord Castlereagh had just lost his election for the county of Down, entirely from Lady
i8o5.] THE DUKE OF YORK. 63
Downshire's opposition. She had gone over to Ireland expressly for that purpose.
" When the Prince returned from a visit of two or three days to the King at Weymouth, he was very indiscreet in talking at his table about the King's infirmities, there being such people as Miles Peter Andrews and Sir George Shee present, in common with other spies and courtiers. So when he described the King as so blind that he had nearly fallen into some hole at Lord Dorchester's, I said — ' Poor man, Sir!' in a very audible and serious tone, and he immediately took the hint and stopt.
" Upon another occasion the Duke of York* came to the Pavilion. It was some military occasion — a review of the troops, I believe — and there was a great assemblage of military people there. Nothing could be so cold and formal as the Prince's manner to the Duke. As he was coming up the room towards the Prince, the Prince said to me in an undertone — ' Do you know the Duke of York.' On my replying — 'No, sir,' he said — ' He's a damned bad politician, but I'll introduce you to him,' and this he did, with great form.
" Amongst other things, the Prince took to a violent desire of bringing Romilly into Parliament, and having found that I was well acquainted with him, he com- missioned me to write to Romilly, and to offer him a seat in the House of Commons in the Prince's name. This of course I did, but, in so doing, I did not hesitate to express my own suspicions as to the reality of the thing offered, nor did I withhold my opinion as to Romilly's doing best to decline it, could it even be accomplished. I begged him, however, to write me two answers, one for the Prince's inspection, and the other for my own private instruction, if he was desirous the project should be entertained at all. Romilly, however, as I was sure he would, wrote me an answer that was an unequivocal, tho' of course very grateful, refusal of the favour offered him.f
" Having mentioned a dinner I had at Johnstone's in Brighton in 1805, I can't help adverting to what took place that day. The late King (George IV.) and
* Commander-in-chief, t See p. 40, supra.
64 ' THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [CH. III.
the present one (William IV.) both dined there, and it so happened that there was a great fight on the same day between the Chicken* and Gully.f The Duke of Clarence was present at it, and as the battle, from the interference of Magistrates, was fought at a greater distance from Brighton than was intended, the Duke was very late, and did not arrive till dinner was nearly over. I mention the case on account of the change that has since taken place as to these parties. Gully was then a professional prize-fighter from the ranks, and fighting for money. Since that time, the Duke of Clarence has become Sovereign of the country, and Gully has become one of its representatives in par- liament. As Gully always attends at Court, as well as in the House of Commons, it would be curious to know whether the King, with his accurate recollec- tion of all the events of his life, and his passion for adverting to them, has ever given to Gully any hint of that day's proceedings. There is, to be sure, one reason why he should not, for Gully was beaten that day by the Chicken, as I have reason to remember ; for Lord Thurlow and myself being the two first to arrive before dinner, he asked if I had heard any account of the fight. I repeated what I had heard in the streets, viz. that Gully had given the Chicken so tremendous a knock-down blow at starting, that the latter had never answered to him ; so when the Duke of Clarence came and told us that Gully was beat, old Thurlow growled out from his end of the table — ' Mr. Creevey, I think an action would lie against you by the Chicken for taking away his character.'
" Lord Thurlow was a great drinker of port wine, and Johnstone, who was the most ridiculous toady of great men, said to him that evening — * I am afraid, my lord, the port wine is not so good as I could wish ; *
* Heniy Pearce, the " Game Chicken," champion of England.
t John Gully [1783-1863], son of a publican and butcher, made his debut in the prize-ring in 1805, and was recognised as virtual, though not formal, champion after Pearce, the Game Chicken, retired at the end of that year. In 1808 he became a bookmaker and publican. He made a good deal of money ; became a successful owner of racehorses; and, having purchased Ackworth Park, near Pontefract, represented that borough in Parliament from 1832 till 1837.
i8o5.] SOCIETY AT BRIGHTON. 6$
upon which old Thurlow growled again — *I have tasted better ! '"
The foregoing narrative will enable the reader to understand many of the allusions in the following letters written by Mrs. Creevey from Brighton to her husband while he was attending to his parliamentary duties. It must be understood also that Creevey was quite sensible of the advantage which might be ex- pected in regard to his own political prospects from the favour he had found in the royal leader of the Whigs. The King's madness might return on any day; the Prince of Wales would become Regent, and nobody doubted that, so soon as he had the power, he would dismiss the Tory Ministers of his father. Mrs. Creevey, therefore, loyally played up to her husband's hand, and, like her lord, continued charitably blind to the character and habits of their master. Like all who ever made her acquaintance, both Mr. and Mrs. Creevey speak enthusiastically of the unfortunate Mrs. Fitzherbert, whom the Prince had married in 1785.
Mrs. Creevey to Mr. Creevey in London.
"Brighton, Oct. 29th, 1805.
". . . Oh, this wicked Pavillion! we were there till \ past one this morng., and it has kept me in bed with the headache till 12 to-day. . . . The invitation did not come to us till 9 o'clock : we went in Lord Thurlow's carriage, and were in fear of being too late ; but the Prince did not come out of the dining-room till II. Till then our only companions were Lady Downshire and Mr. and Miss Johnstone — the former very goodnatured and amiable. ... When the Prince appeared, I instantly saw he had got more wine than usual, and it was still more evident that the German Baron was extremely drunk. The Prince came up and
66 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. III.
sat by me- — introduced McMahon to me, and talked a great deal about Mrs. Fitzherbert — said she had been * delighted ' with my note, and wished much to see me. He asked her * When ? '—and he said her answer was —'Not till jyou are gone, and. I can see her comfortably.* I suppose this might be correct, for Mac told me he had been 'worrying her to death' all the morning.
"It appears to me I have found a true friend in Mac* He is even more foolish than I expected; but I shall be disappointed if, even to you, he does not profess himself my devoted admirer.
"Afterwards the Prince led all the party to the table where the maps lie, to see him shoot with an air-gun at a target placed at the end of the room. He did it very skilfully, and wanted all the ladies to attempt it. The girls and I excused ourselves on account of our short sight; but Lady Downshire hit a fiddler in the dining-room, Miss Johnstone a door and Bloomfield the ceiling. ... I soon had enough of this, and retired to the fire with Mac. ... At last a waltz was played by the band, and the Prince offered to waltz with Miss Johnstone, but very quietly, and once round the table made him giddy, so of course it was proper for his partner to be giddy too ; but he cruelly only thought of supporting himself, so she reclined on the Baron."
"Sunday, Nov. 3, 1805.
"And so I amuse you by my histories. Well! I am glad of it, and it encourages me to go on ; and yet I can tell you I could tire of such horrors as I have had the last 3 evenings. I nevertheless estimate them as you do, and am quite disposed to persevere. The second evening was the worst. We were in the dining- room (a comfortless place except for eating and drink- ing in), and sat in a circle round the fire, which (to indulge you with 'detail') was thus arranged. Mrs. F[itzherbert] in the chimney corner (but not knitting), next to her Lady Downshire — then Mrs. Creevey— then Geoff — then Dr. [erasedj— then Savory — then Warner — then Day, vis-a-vis his mistress, and most of the time snoring like a pig and waking for nothing
* The Right Hon. John Macmahon, Private Secretary and Keeper of the Privy Purse to the Prince of Wales. Died in 18 17.
i8o5.] EVENINGS AT THE PAVILION. iS^
better than a glass of water, which he call'd for, hoping, I think, to be offered something better. . . . Last night was better; it was the same party only instead of Savory, a Col. or Major Watley [?] of the Gloster Militia, and the addition of Mrs. Morant, an old card-playing woman. . . . Mrs. Fitz shone last night very much in a sketch she gave me of the history of a very rich Russian woman of quality who is coming to Lord Berkeley's house. She has been long in England, and is I suppose generally known in London, though new to me. She was a married woman with children, and of great consequence at the court of Petersburgh when Lord Whitworth was there some years ago. He was poor and handsome — she rich and in love with him, and tired of a very magnificent husband to whom she had been married at 14 years old. In short, she kept my Lord, and spent immense sums in doing so and gratifying his great extravagance. In the midst of all this he return'd to England, but they corresponded, and she left her husband and her country to come to him, expecting to marry him — got as far as Berlin, and there heard he was married to the Duchess of Dorset.
" She was raving mad for some time, and Mrs. F. describes her as being often nearly so now, but at other times most interesting, and most miserable. Her husband and children come to England to visit her, and Mrs. F. says she is an eternal subject of remorse to Lord Whitworth, whom she [Mrs. F.] spoke of in warm terms as * a monster,' and said she could tell me far more to make me think so. The story sometimes hit upon points that made her blush and check herself, which was to me not the least interest- ing part of it. . . . She laughed more last night than ever at the Johnstones — said he was a most vulgar man, but seem'd to give him credit for his good nature to his sister and his generosity. The Baron is pre- paring a phantasmagoria at the Pavillion, and she [Mrs. F.] laughs at what he may do with Miss John- stone in a dark room."
"5th Nov., 1805,
". . . My head is very^ bad, I suppose with the heat of the Pavillion last night. We were there before
'68 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. III.
Mrs, Fitzherbert came, and it almost made her faint, but she put on no airs to be interesting and soon recovered, and I had a great deal of comfortable prose with her. It was rather formidable when we arrived : nobody but Mrs. Morant and the Prince and Dr. Fraser, and for at least- half-an-hour in this little circle the conversation was all between the Prince and me — first about Sheridan, and about not seeing you, and his determination to make you come (if not bring you) back next week, when he is to have Lord St. Vincent, Markham, Sheridan, Tierney, &c. . . . Lady Down- shire soon came, but did not help conversation — then came Geoff and Mrs. Fitz, and soon afterwards the men from the dining-room, consisting of only Day and Warner, Savory, Bloomfield and the Baron. The Prince told Mrs. F. he would not have any more, lest they should disturb her. . . . Before she came, he was talking of the fineness of the day, and said : — ' But I was not out. I went to Mrs. Fitzherbert's at one o'clock, and stay'd talking with her till past 6, which was certainly very unfashionable' Now was he not at that moment thinking of her as his lawful wife ? for in no other sense could he call it unfashionable !'
"Wednesday, Nov. 6, 1805.
"I am much flatter'd, dearest Creevey, that you complain when my letters are short. ... I went to the Pavillion last night quite well, and moreover am well to-day and fit for Johnstone's ball, which at last is to be. They were at the Pavillion and she [Miss Johnstone] persecuted both the Prince and Mrs. Fitz- herbert like a most impudent fool. The former was all complyance and good nature — the latter very civil, but most steady in refusing to go. She said she could not go out, and Miss J. grinned and answer'd — 'Oh! . but you are out here ' — then urged that it had been put off on purpose for Mrs. F.,who said she was sorry for it, but hoped it wd. be put off no longer. All this Mrs. F. told me herself, with further remarks, just before I came away, which I did with Lady Down- shire, and left the Johnstones with their affairs in an unsettled state, and with faces of great anxiety and misery. But the attack was renew'd, and the Prince
i8os.] DEATH OF NELSON. 69
said : — ' I shall have great pleasure in looking in upon you, but indeed I cannot let this good woman (Mrs. F.) come : she is quite unfit for it.' And so we shall see the fun of his looking in or staying all the evening, for poor Johnstone has been running about the Steyne with a paper in his hand all the morning and invited us all. . . . When I got to the Pavillion last night . . . the Prince sat down by me directly, and I told him my headache had made me late, and he was very affectionate. . . . Harry Grey has just come in with news of a great victory at sea and poor Nelson being kill'd. It has come by express to the Prince, and it is said 20 sail are taken or destroyed. What will this do ? not, I hope, save Pitt ; but both parties may now be humble and make peace. ...
" I have had new visitors here this morning — Madle. Voeykoff, the niece of the old Russian, and Mde. Pieton, a young friend, daughter of the famous Mrs. Nesbitt and Prince Ferdinand of Wirtemburgh, as is supposed. I talked with her last night, because Mrs. F. praised her "as a most amiable creature, and I liked her very much. In short, as usual, the Pavillion amused me, and I wd. rather have been there again to-night than at Johnstone's nasty ball and fine supper."
Mrs. Fitzherbert to Mrs. Creevey.
"Nov. 6, 1805. " Dr. Madam,
'^The Prince has this moment reed, an account from the Admiralty of the death of poor Lord Nelson, which has affected him most extremely. I think you may wish to know the news, which, upon any other occasion might be called a glorious victory — twenty out of three and thirty of the eneniy's fleet being entirely destroyed — no English ship being taken or sunk — Capts. Duff and Cook both kill'd, and the French Adl. Villeneuve taken prisoner. Poor Lord Nelson reed, his death by a shot of a musket from the enemy's ship upon his shoulder, and expir'd two hours after, but not till the ship struck and afterwards sunk, which he had the consolation of hearing, as well
70 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. III.
as his compleat victory, before he died. Excuse this hurried scrawl : I am so nervous I scarce can hold my pen. God bless you.
"Yours,
"M. FiTZHERBERT."
Mrs. Creevey to Mr. Creevey.
" Friday night, 12 o'clock.
"Dearest Creevey,
"... I think you will like to hear I have spent a very comfortable evening with my mistress.* We had a long discourse about Lady Wellesley. The folly of men marrying such women led us to Mrs. Fox, and I saw she would have liked to go further than I dared, or than our neighbours would permit. . . . They were all full of Prussians and Swedes and Danes and Russians coming soon with irresistible destruction on Buonaparte. I wonder if there is a chance of it. I don't believe it. . , ."
"Nov. 7, 1805.
". . . [The Prince's] sorrow [for Nelson's death] rriight help to prevent his coming to dinner at the Pavillion or to Johnstone's ball. He did neither, but stayed with Mrs. Fitz ; and you may imagine the dis- appointment of the Johnstones. The girl grin'd it off with the captain, but Johnstone had a face of perfect horror all night, and I think he was very near insane. I once lamented Lord Nelson to him, and he said : — * Oh shocking : and to come at such ai; unlucky time!' ..."
" 8th Nov.
". . . The first of my visits this morning was to ' my Mistress.' ... I found her alone, and she was excellent — gave me an account of the Prince's grief about Lord N., and then entered into the domestic failings of the latter in a way infinitely creditable to her, and skilful too. She was all for Lady Nelson and against Lady Hamilton, who, she said (hero as he was) overpower'd him and took possession of him
* Mrs. Fitzherbert.
1805.] ■ MRS. FITZHERBERT. 7%
quite by force. But she ended in a natural, good way, by saying :— * Poor creature ! I am sorry for her now, for I suppose she is in grief.' "
" Past 4 o'clock, Monday.
". . . Mrs. Fitzherbert came before 12 and has literally only this moment left me. We have been all the time alone, and she has been confidential to a degree that almost frightens me, and that I can hardly think sufficiently accounted for by her professing in the strongest terms to have liked me more and more every time she has seen me, tho' at first she told Mr. Tierney no person had ever struck her so much at first sight. . . . So much in excuse for her telling me the history of her life, and dwelling more particularly on the explanation of all her feelings and conduct towards the Prince. If she is as true as I think she is wise, she is an extraordinary person,' and most worthy to be beloved. It was quite Impossible to keep clear of Devonshire House; and there her opinions are all precisely mine and yours, and, what is better, she says they are now the Prince's; that he knows everything— above all, how money is made by promises, unauthorised by him, in the event of his haying power; that he knows how his character is involved in various transactions of that house, and that he only goes into it, from motives of compassion and old friendship, when he is persecuted to do so. In short, he tells Mrs. F. all he sees and hears, shews her all the Duchess's letters and notes, and she says she knows the Dss. hates her. . . . We talked of her life being written ; she said she supposed it would some time or other, but with thousands of lies ; but she would be dead and it would not signify. I urged her to write it herself, but she said it would break hei* heart."
"Nov. 27, 1805.
"... I was very sorry indeed to go to the Pavil- lion, and 'my Master' made me no amends for my exertion — no shaking hands — only a common bow in passing — and not a word all night, except just before I came away some artificial stuff about the Baron, and then a little parting shake of the hand with this
72 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. III.
interesting observation — ' So Creevey is gone,' and the interesting answer of — ' Yes, Sir.' In short I suspect he was a little affronted by our going away the night before : but I don't mind it — he will soon come about again ; or if he does not, I will make him ashamed by begging his pardon."
" Nov. 29th.
"... Well, I am quite in favor again. When I entered Gerobtzoff"'s room last night Prinny * was on a sofa directly opposite the door, and in return for a curtsey, perhaps rather more grave, more low and humble than usual (meaning — 'I beg your pardon dear foolish, beautiful Prinny for making you take the pet '), he put out his hand. . . . We soon went to see the ball at the Pavillion, and Mrs. Fitz selected me to go in the first party in a way that set up the backs of various persons and puzzled even Geoff. ... We were soon tired of the amusement and sick of the heat and stink. Neither the Prince nor any one stay'd long, and the rest of the evening was horribly dull ; but luckily for me, when the Prince returned I was sitting on a little sofa that wd. only hold two, and the other seat was vacant; so he came to it, and never left me or spoke to another person till within 10 minutes of my coming away at ^ past 12. . . . We had the old stories of Mrs. Sheridan, only with some new additions . . . we had Charles Grey too, and he talked of his [Grey's] dislike to him, because in the Regency he wd. not hear of his being Chancellor of the Ex- chequer. He talked of his bad temper and his early presumption in overrating his own talents. . . . He told me that when he was king he wd. not give up his private society, and on my saying a little flattering sentence about the good I expected from him, he actually said — * he hoped I should never have cause to think differently of him.' This was going his length, so I stopt."
"Dec. 2, 1805. .
". . . We have been at the Pavillion both Friday and yesterday, and Mrs. F. has desired us to come every night without invitation. . . . Both these parties
* The Prince of Wales.
i8o5.] THE PRINCE OF WALES. 73
have been private and the Prince ecjually good and attentive to me at both. . . . Last night he took me under his arm through the dark, wet garden into the other house, to shew me a picture of himself. Poor little Lady Downshire push'd herself (tho' humbly) into our party, but he sent her before with Bloomfield and the lanthorn, and he and I might have gone astray in any way we had liked ; but I can assure you (faith- less as you are about coming back to me) nothing worse happened than his promise of giving me the best print that ever was done of him, and mine that it shall hang in the best place amongst my friends."
"Dec. 5, 1805.
". . . It was a large party at the Pavillion last night, and the Prince was not well . . . and went off to bed. ... Lord Hutchinson was my chief flirt for the evening, but before Prinny went off he took a seat by me to tell me all this bad news had made him bilious and that he was further overset yesterday by seeing the ship with Lord Nelson's body on board. . . . None of them knew Pitt was gone to Bath till I told them. I ask'd both Lord H[utchinson] and his Master if they wd. like him to die now, or live a little longer to be turn'd out. They both decidedly prefer instant death. ... I think Sheridan may probably return with you on Friday if you ask him. On second thoughts — I would not have you ask him, for he will make you wait and sleep at the Cock at Sutton."
( 74 )
CHAPTER IV.
1 806-1 808.
Pitt never rallied from the shock of Ulm and Austerlitz. Parliament was to meet on 21st January, 1806, and he travelled up from Bath by easy stages to his villa at Putney, where he arrived on the nth, and invitations were issued for the customary official dinner of the First Lord of the Treasury on the 20th. But that dinner never took place. Lord Henry Petty had given notice of an amendment to the Address censuring Pitt's administration ; but out of respect to a disabled foe, he did not move it, and the Address was agreed to without debate.
Hon. Charles Grey, M.P., to Mr. Creevey.
" Howick, Jan. 13, 1806.
" I received your letter last night, and had from other quarters the same reports of Pitt's illness and resignation, I think you will probably find these among the false reports of the day. I cannot believe in his resigning again while he has breath ; and as to his health, I shall not be surprised to see him making a speech of two hours on the first day of the Session."
Pitt expired on 23rd January, and the old King had at last to have recourse to the Whigs. Lord
i8o6-8.] "ALL THE TALENTS." 75
Grenville formed a coalition Cabinet, nicknamed "All the Talents," in which Fox held the seals of the Foreign Office, Grey was First Lord of the Admiralty, Addington, now Lord Sidmouth, took the Privy Seal, and Erskine as Whig Lord Chancellor balanced Ellenborough as Tory Lord Chief Justice with a seat in the Cabinet. Mr. Creevey's past activity and promise of more were not overlooked, and he was appointed Secretary to the Board of Controul — a post which, as his friend Mr. (afterwards Lord) Grey wrote to him, was " better in point of emolument and of more real work" than a seat at the Board of Admiralty which was first intended for him, "and not obliging you to vacate your seat " in Parliament. Associated with this office were the duties of party whip, which Creevey began to discharge forthwith. Some of the Ministers seeking re-election on taking office had to fight fiercely for their seats ; the Whig Lord Henry Petty, having accepted office as Chan- cellor of the Exchequer, was opposed at Cambridge by Lord Althorp and Lord Palmerston — both of them future leaders of the Liberal party in the House of Commons. But before that should happen, Palmer- ston had twenty years to serve as a Tory Minister. It was of this contest between Petty and Palmerston that Byron wrote in Hours of Idleness : —
" One on his power and place depends, The other on the Lord knows what ; Each to some eloquence pretends,
Though neither will convince by that."
76 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. IV.
Lord Henry Petty to Mr. Creevey.
"Cambridge, January, 1806. " We go on well, and I hope to beat Palmerston even if Althorp stands, which is possible, for he tells me he is urged to continue, and tries to think he has some chance of success, which is out of the question. The Johnians have discovered that I am a lurking dissenter. . . . Some five Pittites proposed setting up Ld. Hadley to give the College an opportunity of showing its respect for the memory of Mr. P. by voting against Ld. Althorp and me."
" Cambridge, 28th Jany., 1806.
"Dear Creevey,
" We go on as well as you will see by the list. I have a very handsome letter from Ld. Percy,, who tells me he has written to the Master, Tutors and all his friends at St. John's in my favor, but I fear they are all engaged to Palmerston. The latter, I am told, has 130 secure. Althorp does not give way, but I threaten with a formal proposal to com- pare strength, which discomposes him a good deal.
" Ever yrs.,
" Hy. Petty.'^
The Prince of Wales, as a keen party man, and considering himself leader of the Whigs, was not idle at such a crisis. He sent out his commands right and left; woe betide him who failed to vote as directed. Such, at least, was evidently the appre- hension of one of his chaplains, who had rashly pledged himself without consulting his royal master's wishes.
Rev. W. Price to H.R.H. the Prince of Wales.
" 5S> Upper John St., Fitzroy Square, Feb. ist, 1806.
" Sir,
" Permit me to observe to Your Royal High- ness, that few events in the course of my Life have impress'd me with more uneasiness than the Letter
i8o6-8.] CREEVEY IN OFFICE. JJ
which I have receiv'd from Col. McMahon in which is intimated Your Royal Highness's commands that I give my Interest to Lord Henry Petty as a Candidate for the University of Cambridge.
"I beg with all humility to assure Your Royal Highness, my Inclination no less than my Duty would dictate an obedience to Your Royal Highness upon this and every occasion, but I am to lament when I had the Honor to attend his Majesty at St. James's with the Address from the University of Cambridge, Lord Spencer solicited my Vote in behalf of his Son Lord Althorp, when I, not conceiving Your Royal Highness had any commands on this occasion, •promis'd to Lord Spencer that Vote which he now claims, informing me Your Royal Highness assur'd him yesterday you wou'd not have interfer'd in opposition to Ld. Althorp, had you known his intention to offer himself. 1 am therefore humbly to solicit Your Ro}^al Highness's indulgence, and that I may not suffer in your estimation on this occasion, and beg to profess how greatly I feel in Duty and Obedience.
"Your Royal Highness's most devoted and most humble Servant and Chaplain,
"William Price."
Lord Robert Spencer* to Mr. Creevey.
" Saturday night.
" Dear Creevey,
" Pray don't forget that the responsibility rests with you as to C. Fox's coming to town for Monday or not.
"Yrs. ever,
"R. Spencer."
Capt. Graham Moore, R.N., to Mr. Creevey.
" /<zw^ at the Nore, 6tli Feb., 1806.
". . . I think as you are now a staunch supporter of the Government, there can be no great harm in my corresponding with you. I own to you that, since
* Youngest son of the 3rd Duke of Marlborough.
78 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. IV,
Pitt's death, I have been clearly of opinion that Charles Fox was the man whom I wished to see at the helm, and, altho' I have long ceased to be very sangwine in my expectation with regard to the con- duct of public men, yet I have hopes that we shall see a manly, decided line of conduct adopted by the present Muphties. . . . We are just on the point of weighing anchor, and are only waiting for daylight to see our way to St. Helens, where I am ordered. We have been manned a few days — so-so — about 90 of the Victory s form the groundwork. They are not what you might expect from the companions of Nelson, but they will do with some whipping and spurring. We shall be tolerable in about six months ; in the mean- time we must do our best. . . ."
Mr. Creevey to Dr. Currie.
"July, 1 806.
"... I dined at the London Tavern last night and there were eight Ministers of State and all the India directors, and secretaries and under-secre- taries and fellow-servants of all descriptions without end, in all about 200, but the devil a bit of Turtle ! upon which I thought little Kensington * would have cried. Sheridan and I were for crying 'Off! off! off! ' and damning the whole piece on account of the absence of the principal performer. I sat opposite to Morpeth,t and I made him blush and laugh and almost cry all at once. I swore it was the beggarly budget that frightened the directors out of giving their masters turtle. My comrogues laughed, and the directors did not half like the joke. . . . You see my friend Mr. Howorth has been adding to the amusements of Brighton races by fighting a duel with Lord Barrymore. His lordship was his adver- sary at whist, and chose to tell him that something he said about the cards was 'false;' upon which Howorth gave him such a blow as makes the lord walk about at this moment with a black eye. Of
* The 2nd Lord Kensington.
t Lord Morpeth [1773-1848], afterwards 6th Earl of Carlisle, re- presented India in the new administration.
i8o6-8.] FOX'S LAST ILLNESS. 79
course a duel could not be prevented. When they got to the ground, Howorth very coolly pulled off his coat and said : ' My lord, having been a surgeon I know that the most dangerous thing in a wound is having a piece of cloth shot into it, so I advise you to follow my example.' The peer, I believe, despised such low professional care, and no harm happened to either of them."
Six months had not gone by since Pitt breathed his last, when the health of his great rival, Fox, broke down. He appeared for the last time in the House of Commons on loth June, already exceedingly ill, but determined to be at his post in order to move cer- tain resolutions preparatory to the bill for abolishing the slave trade. This he accomplished, and the bill giving effect to these resolutions became law in the following year; but by that time Charles Fox was no more. He lingered till 13th September, 1806, and every bulletin during his last illness was anxiously watched for and canvassed by men and women of both parties in the State. Assuredly no public man was ever better beloved than Fox on account of his private qualities. Notwithstanding that his great natural abilities suffered damage, and his energies were diverted and impaired by his excessive convivi- ality and love of gambling, even his political enemies could not help loving the man. Pitt's * haughtiness repelled; Fox's simplicity and sweetness of address attracted all hearts. Pitt's talents and penetrating foresight commanded the confidence and gratitude of his followers ; but it was not his lot to secure the passionate affection, approaching to idolatry, which was freely given to Fox.
8o THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. IV.
Mrs. Creevey to Mr. Creevey.
"July lo, 1806.
". . . Hester * and Sheridan dined with us yester- day, as well as Harry Scott, and we were extremely sociable and agreeable all the evening, until Lord and Lady Howick,t General Grey and Charlotte Hughes added to our party. Poor Charlotte % was rather ' in the basket,' for you know Ogles and Greys do not take much pains to make a stranger comfortable ; but old Sherry with his usual good taste was very attentive to her. . . . Lord Howick was in better spirits and very amiable, no doubt owing to his im- proved hopes about Mr. Fox. He had been that morning for the first time convinced that he was materially better, both from the opinion of Vaughan and from having seen him — that his looks were wonder- fully improved. He is sure his body and legs are lessened and Mr. Fox said himself, 'whatever my disease has been, I am convinced it is much abated, and I think I shall do again.^ . , . Lord and Lady Howick and the General went away before 12, and then Sherry, who had been very good at dinner and most agreeable all the evening, seem'd to have a little hankering after a broiled bone ... so in due time he had it."
Mr. Creevey to Dr. Currie.
" 1 2th July.
". . . Fox is a great deal better to-day certainly than he has ever been yet, and is walking about in his garden; so I hope to G — we shall all do. . . . We had a devil of a business last night altogether. We got off from the House to Sherry's a little before 8 — about 14 of us — without him, so I made him give me
* The 2nd Mrs. Sheridan, nee Ogle.
t Sir Charles Grey of Howick having been created Earl Grey in this year, his eldest son assumed the courtesy title of Lord Howick.
% Mrs. Hughes of 'Kinmel, whose husband was created Lord Dinorben in 1831.
i8o6-8.] . SHERIDAN JIBS. 8l
a written order 'to his two cooks to serve up the turtle in his absence, which they did, and which we presently devoured. In the midst of the second course, a black, sooty kitchenmaid rushed into the room screaming 'Fire ! ' At the house door were various other persons hallooing to the same purpose, and it turned out to be the curtains in Mrs. Sheridan's dressing-room in a blaze, which Harry Scott had presence of mind to pull down by force, instead of joining in the general clamour for buckets, which was repeated from all the box-keepers, scene-shifters, thief-takers, and sheriff's officers who were performing the character of servants out of livery. So the fire was extinguished, with some injury to Harry's thumb.
" Half an hour afterwards we were summoned to a division which did not take place till three, and another at four. Our situation in the House was as precarious as at Sheridan's. His behaviour was infamous.* . . . He said he had stayed away all the session from dis- approving all our military measures, and finally made a motion which, if the Addingtonians had supported, would have left us in a minority. . . . Grey made one of his best speeches, full of honor, courage and good faith — it made a great impression, and Sherry was left to the contempt from all sides he so justly de- served. . . . Prinney t sent McMahon to me yesterday desiring to know whether I would induce Tufnell to withdraw his pretensions to Colchester. He was asked to make this request to me by Sir Wm. Smith,
that of a fellow you may remember at Brighton,
and who himself has started. But I returned Prinney such a bill of fare of Tuffy's merits and pretensions, that I have no doubt old Smith in his turn will be asked to give way."
* Sheridan held office in " All the Talents " as Treasurer of the Navy ; but he declared on this occasion that " he was sure the Cabinet would never look to him for the subserviency of sacrificing his in- dependence of opinion to any consideration of office ; at least, if ever they should so expect, they would be disappointed " [^Hansard, July 1 1 , 1806].
t The Prince of Wales.
82 THE CREEVEY PAPERS. [Ch. IV.
Mrs. Creevey to Miss Ord,
«i5thjuly.' ". . . I, ani returned from my morning's travels, but they were sadly shortened by going first to the Admiralty and hearing from Lady Howick that Hester fMrs. Sheridan] was not well. I proceeded to Somerset House ; Mr. Secretary * got into the coach in Parliament Street, and when we got to Somerset House, we found Hester so well, and with such a nicq cold chicken and tongue before her, that we made him get out of the coach and eat with us. Then I had only time to call at Mr. Fox's, who continues better. . . , He is advised, I hear, to go to the sea, and McMahdri says it will be Brighton, for Prinney has offered him one of his houses, and presses him much to take it, McMahon says he will, but I cannot sa}^ I think the dinners at the Pavilion will be good for him. ... The offer, I think, looks as if Prin thought he could niake up the quarrel with Mrs. Fitzherbert,t which I wish he may, but you