Chapter XI: Book THE THIRD

1812-1815

N.B.—Written in 1821, 1822, and subsequent years. Transcribed in 1825.

Lord Liverpool’s new Administration, huddled up from the cast rags and tatters of the old, and consisting of pieces neither costly in themselves nor well assorted to one another, seemed of no very lasting texture or composition. On the great question of domestic policy—commonly called Catholic Emancipation, they could only avoid disunion and dismemberment by renouncing all opinion and action as a Government. The Prime Minister in the Lords, as well as a majority in the Cabinet, was hostile to the measure; yet the Leader in the Commons, Lord Castlereagh, a man of judgment, temper, and courage, but destitute of all eloquence, wit, taste, or knowledge, and at that period alike unpopular in England and Ireland, had avowed that one great purpose of his public life was to carry it.

Of the parliamentary statesmen not actually in the ranks of their opponents, none had any strong predilections and many had personal enmities to the Ministers. Mr. Wilberforce[151] and the party called “Saints” could not view with very great complacency an Administration formed almost exclusively of the ancient and inveterate enemies of their favourite measure “the Abolition.” If Mr. Canning was somewhat less disposed than he had been to ridicule the incapacity of Lord Liverpool, his resentment to Lord Castlereagh for his Ministerial opposition and personal hostility in 1809 had scarcely abated. Lord Wellesley did not conceal his private aversion and public scorn of his late colleagues; and even the Prince Regent himself, though united cordially with them in hatred of the Whigs, had no strong ties of personal attachment or political gratitude to cement his connection with them. A war with America was impending, and the Orders in Council could not be maintained without ruin to the country, and, on the other hand, could hardly be abandoned without disgusting the only warm supporters the Ministry had, _viz._, the adherents of Mr. Perceval. They relinquished them, however, and to all appearance at the instance or from a dread of Mr. Brougham.[152]

Such an acknowledgment of weakness seemed an inauspicious commencement of an Administration. From all these premises it was foreboded that the Ministry would be inglorious and short-lived. But though philosophy never would teach us to discard all foresight, prudence, or calculation, she has been often compelled to acknowledge that in political affairs what is probable seldom happens. Time and accident enabled this rickety Ministry to disappoint the expectation of their opponents; and though their adherents scarcely pretend to attribute their success to any extraordinary merit in them, yet the splendour of victories abroad and the undisturbed possession of power at home, which have failed to procure them contemporary applause even from the vulgar much more any approbation from the wise, will not improbably obtain for them the encomiums and possibly the admiration of more remote historians and posterity. It must be acknowledged that, with the exception of Wellington in the field and Eldon on the Bench, any reverence they inspire must be from a distance[153]—from those who never transacted business in their offices, never heard their harangues in Parliament, nor approached their persons in private. With all such, mediocrity is their characteristic.

The perseverance of Mr. Brougham in exposing the Orders in Council before any new Administration was formed had made an impression both on the House and the country. The Ministers, though with some hesitation and much bad grace, began by announcing an intention to rescind them. That resolution, or rather concession, though too late to prevent a war with America,[154] disarmed the Opposition at home on the occurrence of that event, and satisfied the country that the hostile disposition to the United States and the narrow spirit of Mr. Perceval’s policy had died with that Minister. The persuasion was strengthened by his personal and political friend, Mr. Stephen,[155] the real instigator of those impolitic measures, withdrawing himself from public discussions.

The Catholic question seemed, at first, to have gained by the death of its chief Ministerial opponent and the sort of interregnum which intervened. Mr. Canning, in June, moved a resolution to take it into consideration in the ensuing Session, and the motion was carried by 235 to 106. The main question had been lost two months before by 300 to 215! Such is the difference which a partial change of Ministry can make in a House of Commons! In the Lords, the alteration was not so sensible, for though Lord Wellesley lost a similar question only by the trifling majority of one, the numbers who voted for his motion and those who supported that of Lord Donoughmore on the preceding April differed only by 24.

I presented two bills on the subject of _ex officio_ informations.[156] They were both rejected on the second reading, upon the opposition of Lord Chief Justice Ellenborough and Lord Chancellor Eldon. The object of one of them I have since had the good fortune to obtain.[157] The Attorney-General has it no longer in his power to keep an _ex officio_ information hanging _in terrorem_ over the head of an accused person for an indefinite period. The other mischief which I attempted to remove by these bills is, on the contrary, greatly extended in practice. It is now not only recognised as law, but actually considered as a matter of course, to hold to bail on an _ex officio_ information any person accused of libel or other misdemeanour tending to a breach of the peace, though admitted not to amount to one. Subjects of this nature seldom excite much interest in the public, without exciting too much to render it practicable or perhaps prudent to legislate about them. It is part of the duty of a public man, and one which I have endeavoured to perform, to keep in view the abuses of which at any one time he has felt the inconvenience without being able to rectify it, and to seize the opportunity of quickly and silently correcting them, when there is less prejudice or passion likely to be offered to him and less commendation or notice likely to attend his success.

All such considerations, and others of yet greater delicacy and importance, were soon afterwards overwhelmed by a marvellous tide of good fortune in our foreign wars. Lord Wellington displayed the promptitude and decision of a great general in the battle of Salamanca. General Marmont (whose elevation to command, by the favour or caprice of Napoleon, was destined to be fatal to the interests of that extraordinary man) exposed his army to disadvantage.[158] Lord Wellington seized the moment; his movements were rapid, judicious, and fortunate, and his victory decisive.[159] The battle is considered by military men, and, I believe, by the General himself, as the greatest action of his life. In its consequences it was scarcely less important than his subsequent more brilliant and celebrated, though perhaps not better deserved, victories. Madrid was entered by the English, our army advanced into Old Castile, and the siege of Cadiz was raised in the course of a month. Some of the fruits of this success were indeed lost by Lord Wellington’s rash and obstinate attack on Burgos, and by the prudent manœuvres of General Clausel[160] on his flank. Yet the south of Spain was permanently relieved, and a prospect of liberation from the French held out to all Spaniards, which was ultimately realised in their favour. At home our hopes revived. Ministers wisely judged the moment propitious for the election of a new House of Commons, and they dissolved Parliament. The event justified their policy. The Parliament of 1812 was not less subservient to the Ministry than the one which had preceded it.

The theatre at Drury Lane, rebuilt in consequence of the labours of a Committee of which I was a member, but in which Mr. Whitbread was chief director, adviser, and agent, was opened in October. So rose within the compass of a year an age’s work—a glorious theatre. Mr. Whitbread somewhat incautiously advertised for a competition of addresses to be spoken at the opening, with a promise of £100 to the successful candidate, and of entire impartiality in the selection.[161] We received many dozen copies of verses. One was worse than the other, and not one fit to be delivered. In this emergency, for it was no less, I applied to Lord Byron; and observed that nothing but such a prologue as he alone could write, and the authority of so great a poetical name as his, could extricate us from our distress and excuse us with the public for breaking faith with the poetasters. He kindly undertook the task. His verses, though not particularly adapted to stage recitation nor equal to some of his happiest effusions, will always be read for their poetry, and fully justified the expectation we had formed of them. He was singularly good-humoured and even docile in correcting, curtailing, or lengthening any passage at my request; but he earnestly and emphatically conjured me, when once “those fellows the actors” had touched or even seen them, not to allow so much as a comma to be displaced. We offered him a concealed place in the theatre to hear them delivered, but he vehemently exclaimed: “I would not be within fifty miles of the place, on that night, for the universe.” It was well he was not. Mr. Elliston[162] recited them in a manner to drive an author mad.

When first Lord Byron agreed to write this address, he said to me, “I will try, but how shall I avoid that d—d Phœnix? We must not for the world have a feather of that rare bird, which is become as commonplace as a turtledove.” Mr. Whitbread, in doubt whether Lord Byron would comply, composed an address himself of more than fifty lines, in which the burning and rebuilding of the theatre were very elaborately compared to the death and revival of the Phœnix, whose plumage, appearance, and natural history were very minutely described. I mentioned this circumstance to Mr. Sheridan, with the obvious remark that Byron felt about his task like a poet, and Whitbread like a schoolboy. “Like a schoolboy!” exclaimed Sheridan, who had seen the copy. “No, rather like a poulterer.” There was no great harm and there was much pleasantry in this sarcasm on Mr. Whitbread’s bad taste; but in many of Sheridan’s observations on his benefactor and friend there was such malignity as too clearly showed that he was of a nature which, uneasy under the weight of an obligation, made him bitterly hate the man who had conferred it. His pride was mortified at the success of that interference of Mr. Whitbread, which he had himself solicited.[163] He rejected the offer of a private box, and I believe he never set his foot in the new theatre.

To the Russian campaign Napoleon had directed the efforts of his vast Empire; and to the diversion of his attention and forces towards that quarter, as well as to the spirit of the Spanish people, to the skill of Lord Wellington, and to the improving valour and discipline of the English armies, our great successes in the Peninsula are mainly to be ascribed. But the scene for which he prepared such sacrifices exhibited yet more dreadful disasters to his army. The French, after a course of victories more or less disputed, had advanced to Moscow, which they entered on September 14, 1812. Soon afterwards a large portion of that immense city was burnt to the ground, whether by accident or by design is still perhaps a problem, but, in either case, by the Russian inhabitants and not by the foreign invaders. For a time, however, the deed was imputed to the French, and the heartless and horrid sacrifice of so many lives and so much property was stigmatised, with great parade of humanity, by our writers and politicians. When, however, the consequences of the conflagration were perceived to be injurious to the invading army as well as ruinous to the inhabitants, and when it was known that the French had made every exertion to extinguish, not to spread, the flames, then the incendiaries (whoever they were) changed into patriots; and whether the act was perpetrated as a desperate military expedient by the Cabinet of Russia, or (as indeed is most probable) was the resource of an unprincipled band of robbers, with the hopes of plunder and impunity, it was extolled as an heroic exploit, an instance of self-devotion almost unparalleled in history. Such is the justice of public opinion during war. All sense of right and wrong is confounded; passion, self-interest, and national prejudice govern the world.

The ravages of the fire certainly rendered the French occupation of Moscow insecure and inconvenient. They abandoned it in October, and cold weather setting in unusually early that season, many hardships of their retreat were known in England, and more disasters confidently expected at the meeting of the new Parliament in November. The House and the country were too much elated to listen to any recommendation of peace. Mr. Canning was said to have prepared a triumphant answer to the pacific language which he was persuaded that Mr. Whitbread would not fail to adopt in a speech and an amendment. That gentleman, having some inkling of the intentions of his opponent and rival, prudently gave up all thoughts of any motion, and concealed himself during the earlier part of the debate. He did not quit his retreat till Mr. Canning, impatient of his absence and fearful of the question being put, had actually commenced his harangue. He then, by walking up the House with a complacent smile, somewhat disconcerted Mr. Canning, who, between the invectives he had prepared and the more temperate tone which the state of the debate seemed to enjoin, produced little or no effect on the House, disappointed the young members by a bad specimen of his eloquence, and conciliated no party by his ill-timed oration. But though the successes on the Continent furnished no opportunity of triumph to Mr. Canning over the friends of peace in the House of Commons, they strengthened the Ministry, and revived hopes long relinquished in the Court and the country.

A sum of money was voted by Parliament for the relief of the sufferers in Russia. Such a measure, as an indication of national feeling, might have some effect on the opinion of people on the Continent. Even if not judicious to propose it, it would have been invidious to oppose it. It was said, however, to mortify the pride rather than conciliate the goodwill of the Russian Government. It was, moreover, so much diverted from its destination in its progress to the sufferers, that it enriched agents and jobbers in a much larger proportion than it relieved the objects of compassion.

Napoleon, in his rapid march to Moscow and his subsequent delay in and about that capital, reckoned, from his personal knowledge, on the irresolute character of the Emperor Alexander, his inexperience in war, his distrust and suspicions of his own generals. Such qualities, he very reasonably argued, might induce him to submit to peace, rather than prolong a contest which must end in his utter ruin or in his being rescued by skill and experience which would render some of his subjects too powerful for their Sovereign. But in acting on such views, Napoleon risked the consequences of a great military fault on a political speculation, which a little foresight might have shown him was an uncertain one, and which events proved to be a fallacious one. In his notions of the want of firmness of Alexander he was not mistaken; but he miscalculated his power, and overlooked the dangers which, on the other side, might operate on that very want of firmness, and did, in fact, counteract the first inclinations of the Czar, which were such as Napoleon foresaw. It required, in truth, as much resolution to make peace as to persevere in war. The spirit of the army,[164] the interest of the nobles, and the vanity of the Russian nation all conspired to deprecate any ignominious treaty; and their remonstrances were, I have been told, in a character which a Russian Sovereign well knows how to decipher and is seldom disposed to neglect. These circumstances and the representations of Bernadotte, the Crown Prince of Sweden, over-ruled Alexander’s wavering disposition, and made him a patriot and a conqueror in despite of his own judgment and in defiance of nature, which, though it had bestowed on him some little talent and dexterity, had denied him that energy of character which is generally the most requisite ingredient in the composition of a warrior and a hero.

The language of our Ministers at the end of 1812, if not pacific, was to the full as moderate as the temper of Parliament or of the country, and even more so than that of some of our Whig connections. Some manufacturing districts in the heart of the kingdom did, indeed, show a disposition to petition for peace; but there was no ground to suppose that our Government would insist on very unreasonable terms, and there was some reason to apprehend that an earnest clamour for peace out of doors might so far revive the spirit of Napoleon as to lead him to reject conditions to which he might with honour submit. I, accordingly, informed such of the petitioners as applied to me that I was “friendly to the object of their prayer, eager and anxious to promote it, but that I had some doubts of the policy of petitioning for it at that period, and could not engage, should I present their petitions, to found any motion upon them. I was apprehensive that such public demonstrations of the necessity of peace might raise the terms of the enemy, and I was not certain that our Ministers were not actually negotiating to obtain peace. If, however, I found that they took no steps for that purpose, I should ere long be anxious that the people by their earnest remonstrances might compel them to do so.” In most instances the petitioners acquiesced in my advice. Some few insisted on my presenting their petitions, but they were not sufficient either in number or weight to place the friends of peace in any awkward predicament, or to provoke the adverse party to sound their war whoop in Parliament with any effect.

In the meanwhile petitions of a different nature seemed to occupy the people. Several meetings had been called, both in towns and counties, to petition Parliament against any concession to the Roman Catholics. The friends of the measure, if not lukewarm, were timid. A strong persuasion that the sense of the country was decidedly hostile induced them to let many meetings pass without opposition, and to confine all their exertions for the cause within the walls of Parliament. Lord Lansdowne, however, and myself determined to meet the anti-Catholics in one of their fastnesses, Wiltshire. We attended a meeting at Devizes, and partly, we flattered ourselves, by argument, but chiefly by the assistance of the Protestant Dissenters and the Methodists, succeeded in defeating the projected petition. I claimed on that occasion from the active agents of the Methodists that assistance in favour of other Christians, which in 1811 they had promised me.[165] They fulfilled their promise most faithfully, and not only zealously co-operated with us at Devizes, but handsomely furnished me and others with the admirable and well-organised facilities which they have at their command, for disseminating such tracts and arguments as we deemed serviceable to the general cause of religious liberty and to Catholic Emancipation in particular.

The temperate conduct of Mr. Grattan and the argumentative eloquence of Mr. Plunket[166] had their weight with the House of Commons, who, on March 2, 1813, in a House of 488 members, passed, by a majority of 40, a resolution to take the claims of the Roman Catholics into immediate consideration and refer them to a Committee. After much consultation out of doors, in which Mr. Grattan, Mr. Canning, Mr. Ponsonby, Mr. Whitbread, Mr. Elliot,[167] Lord Grey, Lord Grenville, Lord Lansdowne, and myself took a part, a bill, founded on the mistaken principle of exacting different securities for the allegiance of Catholics and of Protestants, and in some other respects ill-framed, was brought into the House of Commons, and after various discussions passed the first stages and was committed on May 24.

The Speaker, Mr. Abbot,[168] a pragmatical man of some talents for detail, but alike incapable of great views and generous feelings, moved to omit the clause admitting Roman Catholics to Parliament, and effected his intolerant purpose by a majority of four. Mr. Ponsonby somewhat hastily declared the boon, so limited, not to be worth the acceptance of the Catholics nor beneficial to the service of the country, and, moving that the Chairman should leave the chair, relinquished the bill altogether. The question was not brought forward that year in the Lords. At the termination of the Session Mr. Abbot, in an unusual and unparliamentary manner, thought proper to mention in his speech at the bar of the House of Lords the relinquishment of the measure in a Committee, as a firm determination to support our establishments. Lord Morpeth informed him privately before he withdrew from the House of Lords that he would in the ensuing Session bring his conduct before the Commons;[169] and when in a few years afterwards he retired from the chair, Lord William Russell objected to the usual vote of thanks, and founded his resistance to them on this very act of irregularity, originating in adulation and servility to the Crown, and rewarded, as it should seem, by a pension and a peerage.

In April, 1813, died my maternal uncle, General FitzPatrick,[170] one of the dearest friends I ever had. He was, I think, the most agreeable man I ever conversed with. One or two of his contemporaries might vie with him in wit and exceed him _perhaps_ in some mental endowments, _certainly_ in knowledge and learning; but none united with an equal portion of such qualifications his evenness of temper and spirits, his polished manners, pure taste, sound judgment, and worldly experience. His conversation was delightful in all seasons, situations, and societies, in the hour of confidence and affliction, and in the moments of relaxation and carelessness. He shone equally as a friend, an adviser, or a companion. He had been the associate of Mr. Fox from their first entrance into life, and was to the close of it the man on whose friendship he most implicitly relied in private, in whose conversation he most delighted, and on whose judgment and advice he most depended in all grave and public affairs. He had as much scorn of a Court, and as much disdain of all petty objects of avarice and ambition, as Mr. Fox himself; he was, too, full as inflexible, where principle or high spirit required firmness. He had, however, less ardour in his pursuits; he had perhaps less popular feeling, though not less party honour; in short, he was less susceptible of that glorious enthusiasm which stimulates genius into action, than his friend. He sometimes allayed the impetuosity, and yet more frequently checked the too unbounded confidence, which the sanguine and artless disposition of Mr. Fox was inclined to repose on the efficacy of a just cause and the co-operation of accidental connections.

He had, at an early period, been active in public life, and, both as Secretary in Ireland with the Duke of Portland and Secretary at War in 1784,[171] had shown much firmness and talents for business and even some powers of application. But he was constitutionally indolent, and habitual indulgence of his passion for women and play increased that infirmity so much, that in the Administration of 1806 he was a cypher in Parliament.

The death of Mr. Fox extinguished the few sparks of ambition that remained in him; and although to preserve the Russell interest in Bedfordshire he obligingly consented to be brought forward for that county, he took little interest in politics after losing the friend of his youth and the leader of his party. The gout, and yet more the remedies taken to relieve it, weakened his constitution. Without any actual depression of spirits, his exertions in the intercourse of private society grew fainter and fainter, and the charms of his conversation were often questioned by those of his new acquaintance who were not at the pains to draw them forth. As a poet he was best known for his share in the _Rolliad_ and other political pieces—a species of composition in which nobody but Sir Charles Hanbury Williams ever excelled him; but there are many other light poems of his writing extant, both in manuscript and in print, which for ease, sprightliness, feeling, and harmony would bear comparison with the happiest effusions of Prior. They should some day be collected and published. I found the following lines among his papers, entitled,

MY OWN EPITAPH

Whose turn is next? This monitory stone
Replies, “Vain Passenger, perhaps thy own.”
If idly curious thou shouldst seek to know,
Whose relics mingle with the dust below,
Enough to tell thee that his destined span
On Earth he dwelt, and like thyself was Man.
Nor distant far th’ inevitable day,
When thou, poor Mortal, shalt, like him, be clay.
Thro’ life he walked, unemulous of fame,
Nor wished beyond it to preserve a name,
Content so friendship on his humble bier
Dropped but the heartfelt tribute of a tear,
Tho’ countless ages should unconscious glide
Nor learn that he has ever lived or died.

His illness and death prevented my attendance in Parliament for some weeks during the spring of 1813. Lord Grenville during that time supported the inroads made on the monopoly of the East India Company on the occasion of the renewal of their Charter, in a very able speech.[172] He took this line without consulting Mr. Tierney, the President of the Board of Control in his Administration. Mr. Tierney was perhaps too much wedded to the narrow policy which usually governed the Company, and he was certainly nettled at this mark of want of confidence from Lord Grenville. He, on the other hand, had not been pleased at Mr. Tierney’s twice declining an offer from the Marquis of Buckingham to bring him into Parliament. Such personal estrangements produced no quarrel in the party; but when in 1818 and 1819 difference of opinion on public matters led to a separation, they diminished the regret of individuals, and perhaps accelerated an inevitable event.

The conduct of Mr. Whitbread on the business of the Princess of Wales yet more naturally excited feelings of resentment in different members of the party. I do not wish to relate at length any of the transactions connected with that lady’s conduct, case, or fortunes. The documents are all preserved and published; and the whole business, though it agitated the public at various periods, in 1806[173] and 1813, in 1820 and 1821, was at all times degrading to the national character, disgusting and tiresome to those who viewed public affairs with any philosophy, nearly devoid of interest to me, and entirely devoid of it to posterity.

Suffice it to say that the Regent, on the death of Mr. Perceval, wished once more to revive inquiries into the conduct of the Princess, with the prospect of getting rid of her; while she, availing herself of the hopes excited by the increasing importance of the heir-presumptive, her daughter, was studious to court popularity and pity for the purpose of gratifying her resentment and mortifying her husband and persecutor. Hence he referred all the documents and papers relating to the investigation of 1806, together with suggestions of new matter of suspicion, to his Ministers and Privy Council; and she, on hearing the rumour thereof, wrote to the Speaker of the House of Commons and to the Prince Regent himself. She consulted Mr. Brougham professionally; and Mr. Whitbread, secretly instigated by Mr. Creevey, eagerly espoused her cause both prospectively and retrospectively.

He[174] thereby involved Sir Samuel Romilly, Lord Erskine, and Lord Ellenborough, and indeed the whole Ministry of 1806 and the leaders of the party with whom he was acting, in one sweeping charge of base servility to the Prince and injustice to a persecuted and innocent woman. In a yet more unfriendly manner he concealed his intentions from those he was so ready to suspect and accuse. So far from seeking any private explanation before he made a public attack, he walked down to the House of Commons with Lord Grey on March 17, and never consulted him on the communications he had received from Mrs. Lisle,[175] which he read that very day in his place; though they, and yet more the remarks of Mr. Whitbread upon them, tended to inculpate the Commissioners and the Cabinet of 1806 in a transaction which they alone could explain and of which he himself was utterly ignorant. The statements he made were in themselves incorrect, the inferences he drew unfair, and the impression he laboured to produce most injurious to the character of persons he professed to respect. The four Commissioners, Lord Ellenborough, Lord Erskine, Lord Spencer, and Lord Grenville, vindicated themselves on a subsequent day in the House of Lords; but the intemperate language of Lord Ellenborough, who nicknamed Whitbread “Folly,” and said his assertions were “as false as Hell,” somewhat diverted attention from the rashness of the popular orator to the violence of the Chief Justice, and divided the censure and indignation of the Whig party pretty equally between the two injudicious combatants. The result of the whole affair was to recognise the right in the Prince Regent to regulate all intercourse with his daughter, to convey a strong public censure of any revival of proceedings against the Princess, and to show that the power to which her husband had been raised, and in the exercise of which he was so strongly supported in Parliament, had not diminished one tittle of his personal unpopularity.

Before the Princess of Wales made her appeal to Parliament and the public, her counsel solemnly but secretly conjured her not to proceed, if on recollection she could charge herself with any impropriety or levity of conduct, much less with anything approaching to criminality[176]; but she, with that courage which characterised her throughout and supplied the place, if it did not imply the reality, of innocence, was all for defiance. Her advisers had, perhaps, not so much confidence in her veracity as admiration of her intrepidity, and were not entirely relieved from their anxiety about the consequences by her boldness in facing them. But shortly afterwards all their fears were unexpectedly allayed by a manœuvre of Lord Moira. In the hope of alarming Mr. Whitbread with the consequences of any serious investigation about the conduct of the Princess, that zealous but injudicious friend of the Prince spontaneously communicated all the charges and, if I mistake not, all the evidence that had been prepared against Her Royal Highness, to her immediate friends and advisers, _viz._, Mr. Whitbread, Mr. Creevey, and Mr. Brougham. From that time they knew the extent of the case against their client, and, deeming it insufficient, proceeded in good heart, without hesitation or delay.

In the course of these transactions, and yet more in those which ensued, relating to the pecuniary provision for Her Royal Highness and her departure from England in 1814, they had opportunities of discovering in the character of their royal client many qualities less respectable than that courage which was termed by her friends intrepidity, and to which her enemies gave a harsher name. She showed a total disregard of truth, and a want of all gratitude, justice, or feeling to those who served her. As I do not wish to revert to this subject, I shall here mention my notion of the real solution of all the conduct of this exalted but uninteresting lady. I am satisfied that she was always in a state bordering on insanity, and sometimes actually insane. I should add, however, that this persuasion of a contemporary is founded on a knowledge of her actions and language _as repeated by others_, not on any personal observation.[177]

I never conversed with her but three times. On the first occasion, when I met her accidentally in a small and crowded inn in the Apennines, she conducted herself not only with courtesy, but with great taste, delicacy, and propriety. In two visits which I paid Her Royal Highness at Naples, her manner was hurried and her conversation strange; but there was nothing indecorous or incoherent enough to infer any positive aberration of intellect, though sufficient to suggest to my mind the possibility of her being liable, as well as others of her family, to that dreadful infirmity. A strange fatality seemed to attend her and all who approached her. Those who accused and those who defended her, the Prince, the Ministers, the Parliament, and the people, all who took any prominent part either in her condemnation or triumph, degraded themselves, and appear to me to have lost all discretion and judgment. The truth is that the frequency and violence of the ferment raised by the petty and unprofitable spite of an irritated husband, and the levities, irregularities, and extravagances of a lady, neither young nor handsome, were severe comments on the institution of Monarchy, and the zeal inspired in her favour by her persecutions, real or supposed, a no less strong proof of the childish love for Royalty still prevalent in this country. Strange indeed that neither war nor peace, laws nor liberties, could excite so much anxiety in a free and civilised nation as the personal character and comfort of two individuals, who had nothing but their rank about them to raise interest or even curiosity!

I revert to my narrative. The disasters of the French in the north had compelled Napoleon to drain his army in Spain; and that circumstance, combined with the skill and vigilance of Lord Wellington and the unabated aversion of the Spaniards to the French, led to many brilliant successes of the English in the Peninsula. In the spring of 1813 Joseph and his Government abandoned Madrid, and before the end of June Lord Wellington had gained the glorious battle of Vittoria, nearly on the spot where the Black Prince defeated Du Guesclin four hundred and fifty years before.[178] Lord Wellington, by the rapidity and skill of his movements, executed in a masterly style by Sir G. Murray,[179] his very able Quarter-Master-General, had intercepted and surprised the French. Indeed, the signal victory he obtained at Vittoria was, like that of Salamanca, as much owing to the superiority of his generalship as to the courage of his troops. In the course of the ensuing three months he drove the French beyond the frontiers, and soon became with his English, Spanish, and Portuguese force the invader of France. Our Ministers were too much elated with this success, with the disastrous retreat of the French from Moscow, and with the prospect of the deliverance of Germany by a Confederacy of Sweden, Russia, and Prussia, to make any reasonable overtures of peace to the Emperor on his return to Paris.

Anxious as I was for peace, I did not think it prudent to urge it upon Parliament during the early part of the Session, from the following considerations:

1st. It was just possible that some negotiations might be on foot, and that public discussion might be injurious to them.

2ndly. Debate would have betrayed some difference of opinion among our own friends; for Lord Grenville and others would have recommended our insisting upon terms yet more extravagant than any which Ministers were likely to suggest.

3rdly. If there had been, as was shrewdly suspected, two parties in the Cabinet, one disposed to negotiate with the Emperor Napoleon, the other to stickle for a change of government in France, a motion for peace in Parliament and the discussions thereupon would have tended to strengthen the latter rather than the more pacific and moderate division of our counsels.

4thly and lastly. I must acknowledge that I thought a Ministry, composed of Lords Liverpool, Sidmouth, and Castlereagh, to the full as likely to adopt moderate counsels, from a sense of their convenience, as the Parliament or the public, in their then state of elation, to enforce them.

In the meanwhile, the silence of the Allied Powers during the winter had impressed the people of France with a belief that their pretensions were unreasonable, and the spirit and genius of Napoleon enabled him to draw forth once more the immense resources of his Empire, to recruit his armies, and to resume the field in the month of April. His first efforts were fortunate; but he, like his adversaries, lost the opportunity of acting with moderation and magnanimity in the hour of prosperity. He agreed, indeed, to an armistice, and affected to negotiate for peace; but he was so unreasonable in his demands, and so obviously averse to any permanent adjustment of the interests of all parties, that not only were hostilities renewed, but the Court of Vienna was provoked by him or induced by the Allies to join in the Confederacy against him. I am inclined to ascribe the fluctuation in the Austrian counsels to real weakness and irresolution, and not to duplicity. The latter quality, however, is the weapon most congenial to the taste and best adapted to the faculties of that cowardly and ignorant Court, when it wishes to resent an injury or ruin an enemy.

Before Parliament broke up I urged, in a speech, a motion, and a protest, my conviction that a favourable period for negotiation had been allowed to elapse; and though the course of events, and above all the misconduct of the French Government, retrieved the error, I do not repent having recorded such an opinion, or dread the judgment of such impartial persons hereafter as will be at the pains of examining all the circumstances in which we are placed.

On the rupture of the truce the tide of success set in for the Confederates. In number and in spirit they overpowered the French, and not only the fortune but the genius of Napoleon seems for a short season to have abandoned him.[180] He permitted his enemies to encircle and his allies to betray him in a manner that half his usual military skill or political sagacity would have prevented. This period of unaccountable error terminated in the great battle of Leipsic on October 18, 1813, a battle fatal to the predominance of Napoleon in Europe, and the only action in his eventful career derogatory to his skill as a General. He was circumvented and defeated in a way that persons unpractised in war had for several weeks predicted that he would be, and by armies commanded by men not only inferior to him, but [in] no wise eminent for talents, experience, or judgment. One of the critical moments of this great battle was decided in favour of the Allies by the promptitude and gallantry of Sir Robert Wilson, who, without any actual command, rallied a large body of troops when yielding to the fire of the enemy—a brilliant exploit which the Emperor Alexander in person rewarded by bestowing on the field great military honours on Sir Robert.[181] He received also in the course of a few days from every member of the Confederacy some of those tokens of approbation, which they were afterwards base and silly enough to recall.

The news of the victory of Leipsic reached London on the eve of the meeting of Parliament. The Prince Regent’s Speech was, I believe, altered to introduce an allusion to that great event. It was admirably composed. Some exultation was natural, and it was there; but it was not insolent, and there was more moderation towards both France and America than could well have been expected. Neither Lord Grey nor Mr. Ponsonby came up to the opening of Parliament. Lord Grenville had shown an inclination not only to support the war, but to urge Ministers to continue it, with a view of wresting further conquests from France: he was even disposed to _lament_ the Spanish campaigns as having exhausted our means of assisting our Allies in the North. From these topics, however, he was dissuaded by Lord Grey, with whom he corresponded. The apprehension of Whitbread moving for peace, so far from deterring Lord Grenville from warlike language, manifestly furnished an additional inducement. The temperate Speech from the Throne disarmed all persons who were disposed to move for peace, and Mr. Whitbread defeated all projects, if there were any, for widening the breach between him and the Grenville branch of Opposition, by supporting Ministers cordially on questions of subsidies, militia, and war. “Not the first time,” observed Mr. Grenville, in a tone of disappointment, “that he has shown dexterity in avoiding an actual rupture.”

In the Lords, the Duke of Sussex and Lord Wellesley expressed their exultation at the events of the campaign, and their approbation of the temper in which the Speech was conceived. Lord Grenville told Lord Wellesley, when he sat down, that he differed with him and must animadvert on his being so very pacific; but on my expostulating with him and requesting him to forbear, with an acknowledgment that if he disclaimed the pacific sentiments of Lord Wellesley I must attempt to maintain them or leave the House, he very good-humouredly abstained from all allusion to what Lord Wellesley had said, and confined himself to the speech which he had originally intended to deliver. His expressions were measured, but the general tone of his language was more warlike than I liked or approved. The impression that it was more warlike than that of Ministers was prevalent in the House at the time and in the country afterwards. I felt a repugnance to any agreement with Ministers rather than with my friends, and to avoid all such appearance I gave a silent vote for the address.

Mr. Canning, jealous of the applause bestowed on Lord Grenville’s speech by the lovers of war, came up some days afterwards and delivered a very flowery harangue, in which he arrogated to the framers of former defeated confederacies a large share of the merit of this, the only successful one. He affected to distrust the Whigs in their support of the Ministry, and laboured to render the contest as personal as he could against Napoleon. He failed in his views. The Opposition, throughout the Session, persisted in the line they had adopted at the commencement of it. They purposely and studiously commended the temperate language of Government, augured well of success, either in negotiation or by arms, from the moderation of the views of Ministers, and exhorted them to act up to their professions by abstaining from all interference with the Government of France, and from all endeavours to impose any particular dynasty either on a friendly or a conquered people.

One transaction only was open to any animadversion. On the reverses of the French in Germany, a counter-revolution had taken place in Holland. From the thoughtless impetuosity of the multitude or from some cabal among designing politicians, the populace, not content with restoring the Prince of Orange, bestowed on him the title of King, which his family had never enjoyed and which his countrymen had in better times regarded with aversion.[182] The Prince himself would have been satisfied, possibly better satisfied, with the Stadtholderate. Even the English Ministers disclaimed any direct participation in the measure, though some of them, and more of their supporters at Court, could not suppress their triumph at the suppression of the very name of Republic, which the fashionable and servile seemed to regard like an indecent word, unfit to be mentioned in company. The war, as Mr. Sheridan observed, which had originated in an alarm lest all Europe should become a Republic, ended in converting every Republic therein into a Monarchy or a dependency on some Monarchy.

The events in Holland encouraged the Prince Regent and others in their hopes (strange ones for a Prince of the House of Brunswick) of restoring the Bourbons in France on the principle of divine hereditary right, ill-concealed under the specious title of legitimacy. Lord Castlereagh, however, who left England for Holland after an adjournment of Parliament, unusually long, at the end of December, 1813, certainly neither harboured nor encouraged at that period any such design. Soon after his arrival in Holland, and early in January, 1814, the great bodies of the Allied armies passed the frontiers of France on the Spanish, Swiss, and German sides, and were pressing forward with unequal but uninterrupted success to the centre of the Empire. Napoleon agreed to and even offered negotiations; and Lord Castlereagh, as English Plenipotentiary, accepted his passports, and met the Ministers of the various Confederate Powers and General Caulaincourt, the French negotiator, at Chatillon, with the professed purpose, and, as I believe, with the earnest expectation of concluding a treaty of peace with the Emperor Napoleon.

The situation of the plenipotentiaries was singular. Lord Castlereagh and General Caulaincourt were personally sincere in their efforts for a peace, which their respective Courts would perhaps have disclaimed, and would certainly have regretted. Prussia and Russia and the other Powers, some from pusillanimity, some from revenge, some from distrust of Austria, were desirous of dethroning Napoleon; while Austria herself would have willingly promoted that object, provided the Regency of France could have been secured to the Empress Maria Louisa and the succession to her son. In such counsels the Court of Vienna flattered itself that it could, for a season at least, obtain considerable ascendancy. In the meanwhile the Duke of Angoulême, secretly instigated by the Prince Regent and invited perhaps through Lord Bathurst by Lord Wellington, joined the armies of the latter General, in spite of the discouraging but at that time correct remark of his cousin the Duke of Bourbon, who observed, “_Il s’agit de nous nulle part._”

The hope of separating Austria from the Confederacy, by awakening her jealousy and gratifying her well-known appetite for territory, deterred Napoleon from adopting the frank and direct line which would have best served his interests as well as suited his character. Hence, when, in the course of his spirited and almost miraculous defence, his efforts were crowned with any transient success, he more naturally than wisely recoiled from the ignominious necessity of signing a peace with hostile armies in the heart of his Empire, and he had recourse to disgraceful subterfuges to elude it. But his military genius never shone brighter than in that painful campaign. It was seconded by the valour of his army, now comparatively small, and by the spirit [of] his officers, the younger part of whom more especially displayed a devotion to his cause and to his person seldom, if ever, exceeded in history. But he must have perceived that the mass of the people, harassed by long and repeated sacrifices, distrustful perhaps lest high thoughts would return with any favourable change of fortune, and unanimated by those illusions and hopes of liberty which invigorated their defence of national independence in the early part of the Revolution, were comparatively indifferent to the contest. They plotted, indeed, neither for the Bourbons nor for the Republic, but they sighed for peace. They listened, too, with more complacency than became good subjects, or even good citizens, to those arguments which his own late conduct at Prague had rendered so plausible, _viz._, that he was the main obstacle to the attainment of general pacification.

If such were the pardonable feelings of quiet, meek, and peaceable spirits in the provinces, baser motives concurred with a desire for tranquillity to engage some factions in Paris in a design of deposing the great man whom they had contributed to elevate and to corrupt, and whom they had for many years so abjectly served. Many, and among them Prince Talleyrand,[183] had long since forfeited his favour. They had attempted in the hour of his adversity to weaken his authority at home. If his fortunes were restored, they thought they could not be forgiven. They were, therefore, not merely ready to sacrifice Napoleon for peace, but they were secretly desirous that the Allies should demand and obtain that species of payment for the article.

With this view Talleyrand and, I believe, the Duke Dalberg[184] fixed upon a M. Vitrolles, a man of bad private character, to convey a message to the Austrians.[185] Their object was confined to this simple inquiry: “_What conditions would be imposed on France, should France dethrone or abandon Napoleon?_” They were not aware that the man they had selected was, in truth, a secret agent of the Bourbons. Their very precautions enabled him to render them his dupes. They prudently abstained from all writing. Talleyrand furnished him with a ring known to Prince Metternich, which would give weight to his assertion that he was the bearer of a message from Paris. He arrived at Chatillon with some difficulty. The Allies were at that moment much exasperated with what they termed the subterfuges and bad faith of Napoleon. They were on the eve of breaking off the negotiations. They were disposed to insist on his deposal, but still irresolute and possibly divided as to what revolution to substitute as the price of peace to France. Austria had enforced her own predisposition in favour of a Regency and the succession of the King of Rome, by observing that the silence and apathy of all parts of France within the lines of the Allies proved the contempt and oblivion into which the persons and cause of the Bourbons had fallen. That just remark was towards the end of the conferences at Chatillon more weakened in appearance than in reality, by the declarations in favour of the exiled family at Bordeaux, on the entrance of the English troops, on March 12, 1814.

Though there was hardly time for all the details and intrigues of that transaction to have reached Chatillon, the Allies were probably aware that it was the contrivance of one or two busy merchants connected with England by commerce and by blood, and instigated by foreigners or emigrants rather than any spontaneous effusion of popular feeling which led to the display of the White Cockade in that city, where the distresses occasioned by war with England are, however, always more felt than in any other part of France.[186] The officious loyalty of Mr. Lynch, the head of an Irish house in Bordeaux, however agreeable to Louis XVIII. or to the Prince Regent, would hardly have swayed the determination of the Congress of Chatillon. But when M. Vitrolles, after producing for his credentials the ring of Prince Talleyrand, artfully gave to his mission the character of a communication rather than an inquiry, and asserted that Talleyrand and others had formed their plot and were anxiously expecting at Paris the Allied armies and a prompt declaration in favour of the exiled family of Bourbon, the Austrians themselves were overpowered by such evidence; and those who at all times would have preferred the triumph of hereditary despotism over any other form of government, naturally concluded that considerations of prudence were no longer in the way of their favourite measure.

Such, according to the report of many well-informed persons to me,[187] was the intrigue by which the Sovereigns were ultimately led to espouse the cause of the Bourbons. It is certain that when the armies did arrive at Paris the Allies were much surprised to find no conspiracy for the Bourbons actually organised; and I believe that Talleyrand, on the first explanation, was no less surprised at finding that his name had been quoted to the Sovereigns as advising the restoration of the Bourbons. He was too quicksighted not to make a virtue of necessity, and too dexterous, when he found the restoration unavoidable, not to father the spurious child which had been so unexpectedly sworn to him by the prostitute who had conceived it. The Prince Regent, who had hardly concealed his alarm lest the conferences at Chatillon should terminate in a treaty, and who, from petty motives and despicable prejudices incident to his nature and his station, had always panted for the restoration of the Bourbons, represented and probably thought this accidental consummation of his wishes the result of his personal sagacity and great exertions in their cause. When this was related to Mr. Sheridan, and it was added that the Prince Regent assumed the merit of the campaigns and the termination of them in the restoration of Louis XVIII., he drily remarked, “No, surely! I thought it was the abundant harvest on which he chiefly plumed himself.”

The facility with which the vanity of His Royal Highness often admitted and seemed to believe that great actions to which he could not have contributed originated with him, was on many occasions ludicrous. He spoke of battles, at which it was notorious he could not have been present, in the direct terms of an eye witness; and he gravely remonstrated with Mr. Westmacott[188] for omitting him in the sketch of a _bas-relief_ which represented the battle of Waterloo. It must, however, be acknowledged that he might more plausibly attribute the restoration of the Bourbons in 1814 to his personal exertions than at first sight appears, for there is reason to suspect that he not only sent the Duke of Angoulême to Bordeaux, but that he intrigued at home and abroad to convert his own Ministers and Foreign Powers to the persuasion of the propriety and even necessity of that measure. In the military events he had, indeed, no share, as he never quitted England and never witnessed an action. They were too various and extensive for any one not conversant in such matters even to recount very intelligibly, but they are fortunately too well known to require a place in such notes as I have undertaken to write.

Of the Allies, the Prussians showed most zeal and enterprise; the Russians most method and constancy; and the Austrians least military skill or prowess. It was remarkable that the armies of those three Powers defeated the first General of his age at Leipsic, pursued him into the heart of his populous Empire, and finally wrested from him his capital and his crown, without establishing one military reputation or furnishing history with one name which, either in war or politics, will swell the catalogue of great men. Schwarzenberg was a mere cypher; Blucher at best a dashing huzzar; and among the Russians there was not a single man prominent enough to require either notice or character. Never were such vast objects obtained by more insignificant personages. It is gratifying to an Englishman to observe that these remarks do not apply to Lord Wellington. He was a great man in the field, and a more considerable one in a Cabinet than his sorry exhibitions in the Senate led the Parliamentary public to suppose.

When he resumed offensive operations in the Peninsula he had to contend with Soult, the Duke of Dalmatia, one of the ablest of the captains of Napoleon. He baffled all his manœuvres, and gained more than one pitched battle over his troops; and then closed his brilliant campaign by a hard-fought action in which he was successful, on April 10, near Toulouse, so many days after the entrance of the Allies into Paris, the decree of the Senate, and even the abdication of Napoleon, that either great neglect had occurred in conveying intelligence to the French generals, or Marshal Soult is answerable for an unnecessary effusion of blood,[189] like that imputed to William III. at St. Denis, near Mons, in 1678.

Of the transactions immediately connected with the abdication of Napoleon at Fontainebleau and the counter-revolution at Paris, it would be superfluous to speak more.[190] Louis, long represented as dying, revived with the thoughts of reigning. He came to Grillon’s Hotel, Albemarle Street.[191] London was crowded with equipages and attendants covered with that ancient badge of pure hereditary despotism, the white cockade, which, whether as the symbol of the Stuarts or of the Bourbons, would have been construed into an overt act of treason at almost any other period since the acknowledgment of the Parliamentary title of the House of Brunswick. The Prince Regent with his own hand bestowed the Garter on Louis. Much emotion was affected on the occasion; but the two actors were too unwieldy, too old, and above all too well known, to excite any great interest in that flat and insipid exhibition.

The French King was conveyed to his native shore from Dover by the Duke of Clarence. On his arrival at Paris, the same white symbol of ancient servitude and modern rebellion was substituted for the tricolor cockade, long endeared to the French army by the sacred rights of which it was an emblem and by the recollection of numberless victories in which it had been worn. In the same spirit, the restored Prince assumed the title of Louis the _Eighteenth_, thereby proclaiming himself heir to the rights which the nation had neglected or denied, and not merely of those they had instituted and acknowledged. He contrived to evade, or to alter even, the conditions of his recall. The Emperor of Russia himself affected to lament the adherence of the restored dynasty to ancient and exploded notions, and a remark of Prince Talleyrand’s on the Royalists was much repeated, namely, that they had _forgotten_ nothing and _learnt_ nothing during their emigration.[192]

Peace was signed at Paris on May 30, 1814. The Confederates, with a view of reconciling the French to the counter-revolution, either generously or foolishly abstained from imposing such conditions on the House of Bourbon as the respective situation of their forces would have enabled and entitled them to exact from France. Lord Castlereagh neglected to insist on the general, immediate, and final abolition of the Slave Trade.[193] The Saints,[194] and indeed the public in England, were deeply disappointed at this omission, which, whether oversight or design, betrayed indifference in the cause. It was, at least, no matter of surprise to those who reflected that the English Ministry was exclusively composed of men who, during the long controversy on that subject, had uniformly signalised themselves as the enemies of the abolition, and represented the zeal in its favour as the enthusiasm of visionaries or the pretences of designing hypocrites.

Lord Wellington had the bad taste to accept of the Embassy to Paris—a station which he filled with less credit to himself than any to which his fortune had called him.

The Emperor of Russia and the King of Prussia visited England early in June. The Emperor of Austria had been expected, but pleaded business or health as an excuse. If his object was to ingratiate himself with the Prince Regent, he did not act injudiciously in absenting himself. The King of Prussia attracted little notice, either in society or among the populace. He appeared what he was—a plain soldier and mere corporal, and he was overshadowed by his own dragoon, General Blucher, whose coarse and jovial manners, the result of vulgar ignorance and military good-humour, together with his veteran appearance, rendered him a prodigious favourite with the multitude. Alexander very reasonably excited more curiosity and interest. His extensive empire, his inordinate and uncontrolled power, his age, and even his personal qualities, which, though not extraordinary, were far superior to those of his brother Sovereigns, his recent popularity at Paris, and a thousand other circumstances, made him an object of attention to all who affected or felt any concern in the events of the political world. Moreover, he lay out for popularity; he acted his part decently in society and very well in public. A monarch younger than himself, thus caressing and caressed by an English crowd, afforded no gratification to the Prince Regent; and he could not but be nettled at a foreign Prince, manifestly observant of such matters, becoming a witness to his personal unpopularity in the streets and to the liberties taken both with his Administration and his family in Parliament.

From contrivance or from accident a conversation arose in the Commons on subjects connected with the Princess of Wales on the very day the Sovereigns visited that House.[195] It was as notorious as it was strange that while the cannon were actually announcing the signature of peace by victorious generals in the capital of the enemy, the Prince Regent was pursued in his passage from Carlton to Buckingham House by the hisses and execrations of the people! These were not agreeable scenes to be exhibited to such foreign spectators.

It is true that when the Sovereigns accompanied His Royal Highness into the city no such marks of displeasure escaped from the throngs who pressed upon them, but even then the populace were at some pains to make it manifest that affection for their own Prince had no share in reconciling them to the cavalcade or assemblage of Monarchs, which they applauded. It was obvious that Alexander remarked these appearances: it was, moreover, whispered at Court that he and his sister, the Duchess of Oldenburg, had been busy in estranging the mind of the Princess Charlotte from a marriage with Henry, the Prince of Orange,[196] then in contemplation. It is certain that a matrimonial alliance took place soon afterwards between that Prince and an Arch-duchess of Russia. The apprehension of having been outwitted in a political intrigue by the two Russian visitors exasperated the Prince Regent not a little, and all these considerations produced in his mind a strong personal dislike to the Emperor Alexander. It was shrewdly suspected that the scheme of marriage, thus frustrated by the Russians, had been entertained by the Court of Carlton House, with the double view of removing from the eyes of the public the object of their growing idolatry and from the Princess of Wales the only person in whose society she could find any resource and from whose affections she could derive any support. On the other hand, it is just to add that the advisers of the Prince Regent have maintained that his principal motive in pressing an immediate marriage, and possibly in preferring one which would lead to occasional absences from England, was a knowledge and dread of the singular impropriety, both of conduct and conversation, of her mother, and a well-grounded suspicion of a systematic design in that quarter of involving Princess Charlotte in imprudent, if not criminal, intercourse with young officers and men of gallantry and adventure.

Stories of that sort, well or ill authenticated, certainly formed an original part of the green bag of 1820;[197] and the readiness with which the Prince Regent and the old Queen acquiesced in, and even promoted, the subsequent marriage with Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg, though not suggested by either of them,[198] is some presumptive proof that an early marriage, and not absence, was the object they had chiefly in view. The conduct of the young lady, if not indecorous, was at least intrepid enough. She showed strong dispositions to continue the habit of the Brunswick family, and, had she lived, a disunion between the child and the parent would in all probability have been as prominent a feature in the reign of George IV. as it had been in those of his three predecessors. She peremptorily declined marriage with the Prince of Orange, and in her letter to him contrived to assign the two motives most unpalatable to her father, _viz._, a repugnance to any residence abroad and a strong affection for her mother. The letter was as follows:

WARWICK HOUSE, _16 June, 1814_.

After reconsidering, according to your wishes, the conversation
that passed between us this morning, I am still of opinion
the duties and affections that naturally bind us to our own
respective countries render our marriage incompatible, not only
from motives of policy, but domestic happiness. From recent
circumstances that have occurred I am fully convinced that
my interest is naturally connected with that of my mother,
and that my residence out of this Kingdom would be equally
prejudicial to her interests and my own; as I can never forget
the maternal claims she has upon my duty and attachment. I am
equally aware of the claims your country has upon you. It was
this consideration, added to the desire I had of complying
with your wishes, which induced me some time ago to agree to
accompany you to Holland, if I obtained satisfactory security
of having it in my power to return. Since that time the many
unforeseen events that have occurred, particularly those
regarding the Princess,[199] make me feel it impossible to quit
England at present, or to enter into any engagement leading to
it at a future time.

After what has passed this morning between us (which was much
too conclusive to require explanation), I must consider our
engagement from this moment to be _totally and for ever at an
end_. I leave the explanation of this affair to be made by you
to the Prince in whatever manner is most agreeable to you,
trusting it entirely to your honour (of which for a moment
I never doubted). I cannot conclude without expressing the
sincere concern I feel in being the cause of giving you pain;
which feeling, however, is lessened in a degree by the hope I
stand acquitted in your eyes of having acted dishonourably by
you in the course of this business, or of having ever raised
false hopes in your mind with respect to my consenting to a
residence abroad. You must recollect that in a letter from me
to yours of May 3, that I told you that it was impossible for
me to give any promise on that subject, as it must totally
depend on circumstances.

It only now remains for me to entreat you to accept my
sincerest and best wishes for your happiness, and to express
the friendship and interest I shall always feel towards you.

(Signed) CHARLOTTE.[200]

_Sir T. Lawrence, P.R.A. Pinx._

_Emery Walker Ph. Sc._]

The selection of topics in the above letter was unquestionably as offensive as it could be to the Prince Regent. The unforeseen events regarding the Princess of Wales were: her late exclusion from Court, her husband’s declaration that he would never meet her, her appeal to Parliament in a letter to the Speaker, and the discussions that arose thereupon.[201] The Prince was exceedingly irritated, and, after various altercations with his daughter, in which according to her account many menaces were resorted to, exasperated or alarmed her so much that she suddenly eloped on July 12, and conveyed herself in a hackney coach to her mother’s house in Connaught Place. She did so _certainly_ without legal advice, and I have been always assured without any concert with the Princess of Wales, who, after consulting Mr. Brougham and the Duke of Sussex, persuaded her to return.[202] The only use that Princess Charlotte made of her strange and indecorous _escapade_, was to record a solemn declaration _while she was at liberty_, that she had herself, of her own free will, broken off the match with the Prince of Orange, and that it should never take place.

Soon after these transactions, or rather while they were passing, I left England, and spent the remainder of the year 1814 abroad. I consequently know little or nothing that occurred in this country from that time till the renewal of war in 1815 that is not to be found in newspapers, Parliamentary reports, and _Annual Registers_.