Chapter XXXI: At the Local Government Board

I.

Under the pressure of the excitements of 1882 caused by foreign affairs, business legislation for the needs of the British community had been crushed out, but there was agreement that in the New Year time must be given for Mr. Chamberlain's Bankruptcy Bill to become law; also that the electioneering question of Corrupt Practices should be dealt with. Beyond this immediate programme lay two matters of the first importance--reform of local government in town and in country, and reform of the electorate. In regard to these, the year was chiefly consumed by Government dissensions, partly as to the character of the measures, but principally as to their order of precedence.

As administrator in his new office, Sir Charles turned at once to the position of the civil servants under his control:

'On New Year's Day I had begun to be bothered about what was called my
patronage at the Local Government Board, which was considerable. At
the Foreign Office I had none at all, and had had the greatest
possible difficulty in getting Lord Granville to give a consulate to
Henry George Kennedy, who had been my secretary for many years, and
who had considerable claims--as he had lost his health in the consular
service before he first came to me, and then recovered his health
after a serious illness. At the Local Government Board I was my own
master, and all the patronage of the office was absolutely at my
disposal, and the first post or two that fell vacant I gave to persons
suggested by Hartington, James, and other colleagues. But I very soon
formed a strong opinion that the patronage of the Local Government
Board ought to be used in a different way from that which had
prevailed ever since the end of Stansfeld's term of office' (1871-
1874). 'Stansfeld had made excellent use of his patronage, but
Sclater-Booth' [Footnote: Mr. George Sclater-Booth, created Lord
Basing in 1887.] (1874-1880) 'and Dodson' (1880-1882), 'and even
Goschen' (1868-1871), 'had used it less well, and had put in men of
the kind that colleagues often force upon one--political partisans or
supporters, not always the best men. I talked the matter over, and
decided to make the service during my term of office a close service,
and to promote men already in the service to all vacancies as they
occurred, making inspectors of auditors or clerks, and giving the good
auditorships to the best men in the inferior ones. As regarded new
appointments to auditorships at the lowest scale, I had a list of men
who were working with auditors without pay on the chance of my giving
them appointments later on, and I brought in several of this kind on
good reports from auditors. Bodley, my Private Secretary, managed the
whole of my patronage for me, and did it extremely well, and after I
had started the system I was able to leave it absolutely in his
hands.'

He notes later on that one of his colleagues was 'furious' with him because he would not do a job for the family solicitor, who was also Parliamentary agent of the colleague's son. A previous President had 'jobbed in a Tory agent,' and the colleague expected that Sir Charles should follow with the Whig agent. 'I refused, as I intended to promote one of our best and worst-paid men.'

An illustration of the same principle is the case of Mr. Walter Sendall:

'It was at this time' (November, 1883) 'that I had taken up, as
against Lord Kimberley and Lord Derby, the case of Sendall--an
Assistant Secretary in the Local Government Board, who had been
previously appointed Governor of Natal, and then withdrawn on account
of Natal feeling that he would be too much under the control of Sir
Hercules Robinson, the Governor of the Cape. There being nothing
against Sendall, I thought that we were bound to find him another
Governorship, and Horace Seymour, Mr. Gladstone's secretary, was in
strong agreement with me. The matter was brought to a point at this
moment by the selection of Blake for a Governorship in preference to
Sendall. A strong letter from Seymour pointed out that "heaps of
deserving men in the Colonial service were passed by to make this
appointment, and Sendall, who has a _real_ claim on the Government, is
put on one side. In my opinion an appointment of this kind is most
mischievous, and I sincerely trust that the Healys and the Biggars
will make the most of it, and for once they will have at least my
hearty sympathy...." Seymour was Lady Spencer's brother, and he on his
side and I on mine made the lives of Lord Derby and Lord Kimberley'
(Ministers responsible in regard to the withdrawal) 'so uncomfortable
that we finally got Sendall an appointment. Blake turned out a success
as a Colonial Governor.'

Mr. H. Preston Thomas, C.B., in his _Work and Play of a Government Inspector_, written after fifty years' experience of the Civil Service, bears testimony to Sir Charles's work as an administrator, especially by the introduction of the principle of competition:

"It was during the presidency of Sir Charles Dilke that the staff of
the Local Government Board was reorganized, and for the first time
placed on a more or less satisfactory footing.... A leaven of highly
educated men was much wanted in the junior ranks, and this was secured
by the reorganization of 1884, when eight clerkships of the Higher
Division were thrown open to public competition.... Every one of the
successful candidates had graduated in honours at Oxford or Cambridge,
while two or three were Fellows of their Colleges. The infusion of new
blood acted most beneficially, and the heads of the department were
able to delegate to subordinates some of the duties of which the
enormous mass had fairly overwhelmed them." [Footnote: P. 195.]

The new President threw himself with energy into the administrative work of his department: the Memoir abounds in references to visits of inspection to workhouse infirmaries, sewage farms, schools, and training- ships. One instance in which he personally intervened was that of Nazareth House at Hammersmith, a Roman Catholic establishment at which there had been an outbreak of typhus. There were reasons which made Sir Charles think, after a visit to the house, that the local Medical Officer had been unjustly severe. Instructions were given as to changes to be made, and a letter of warm gratitude came from Cardinal Manning, April 27th, 1883, who spoke of himself as "disabled and shut up, and therefore doubly grateful." This was endorsed by the action of the Sisters, and Sir Charles's own phrase, 'I have always continued on intimate terms with the Sisters of Nazareth House until this day,' gives but a slight idea of the homage rendered to him and his wife by this community until the end.

When he was standing for re-election in January, his speeches contained strong protests against over-centralization. Even where he was most zealous for reform, Sir Charles bore in mind that local bodies are liable to make mistakes, but that public interest is often best served by allowing such errors to correct themselves. Here is an instance:

'On August 31st, 1883, I inspected Westminster Union Workhouse, in
consequence of the serious misconduct of the master, who had been
bitterly attacked in the House of Commons, and with regard to whom I
had laid down the principle that it was for the Guardians and not for
me to dismiss him. This was a test case with regard to centralization.
Feeling in the Press was strong against the master, and his acts were
entirely indefensible, but he had the support of the majority of his
Guardians. I made public my opinion, but did nothing else, and
ultimately the Guardians who supported him lost their seats, and the
master was removed by the new Board.'

At this time the unravelling of the conspiracy which had led to the Phoenix Park murders and dynamite outrages was causing a panic in London itself. Sir William Harcourt at the Home Office, while he threw himself into the task of fighting these menaces with energy, demanded exemption from less engrossing cares. On March 17th

'he told the Cabinet that he was so overburdened with work that he
must hand all the ordinary business over to the Local Government
Board.... I noted that Harcourt thought himself a Fouché, and wanted
to have the whole police work of the country, and nothing but police.
The matter was finally completed during the Easter recess by letter on
a scheme drawn up by Hibbert' (Parliamentary Secretary to the Local
Government Board), 'who knew both offices. It was even proposed at one
moment that a Bill should be brought in to give the Local Government
Board for ever the inspections, such as mines, factories, etc., and
the Artisans' Dwellings Acts and other matters not connected with
Police and Justice; but no legislation took place, as the idea was
hotly opposed by the Home Office, and we went on from hand to mouth by
a mere personal arrangement between Harcourt and myself. [Footnote:
The Diary of this time deals with the Ministry of Agriculture; it was
decided to create an Agricultural Vice-President of the Council, so as
to separate Agriculture from Education, and to appoint 'Dodson as
Vice-President, under Carlingford as Lord President.' 'Some had asked
for the creation of a Ministry of Agriculture and Commerce, as in
France, a wonderful combination.' Sir Charles reported to the Cabinet
the fact that a new Ministry had been unanimously agreed to by the
House of Commons some years before (though no notice had been taken of
the resolution)--a Ministry of Justice.

Sir Charles Dilke was always opposed to the increase of Ministers
Ministries. See "Labour," Chapter LII. (Vol. II., pp. 342-367).]

'On Monday, April 2nd, there came up the question of whether Harcourt
would himself deal with the matter of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade,
which was raised by a debate in the House, and which the Home Office
insisted on his taking. To their disgust, however, Harcourt would not
look at the documents, and sent them all to me in a box for me to deal
with.'

Home Office duties, as Sir Charles discovered, are 'highly miscellaneous,' and at the end of May an item in the 'curious mixture of subjects' that he had before him was a letter from the Primate, giving the views of a meeting of Bishops about cemeteries.

The transference of so much business to the Minister of another department was not pleasing to the Home Office permanent officials. When Lord Rosebery resigned in the beginning of June, Sir Charles secured the promotion of Mr. Hibbert, Parliamentary Secretary to the Local Government Board, to the Under-Secretaryship of the Home Office; [Footnote: Mr. J. Tomlinson Hibbert, afterwards for many years Chairman of the Lancashire County Council and of the County Councils Association.] and out of several names submitted to him by Mr. Gladstone for Mr. Hibbert's place he selected that of Mr. G. W. E. Russell, who, a short time before this, had published in one of the reviews an article vehemently attacking the Whig tradition. Sir Charles notes that Mr. Russell was congratulated by his kinsman, that great Whig, the Duke of Bedford, as follows:

'After singing Russell's praises, he concluded: "As, my dear George,
you have now not only an official _but also a literary income_, it
will, perhaps, no longer be necessary that I should offer to continue
to pay your election expenses." This story has been denied, but is
true.

'All through the autumn I felt myself in considerable difficulties in
dealing with the important questions which Harcourt had handed over to
me from the Home Office, but as to which in many cases new departure
was evidently needed which I had no authority to take. One such
question was factory inspection. The current work was thrown on me,
and I had to defend what the factory branch of the Home Office did. On
the other hand, although I had the strongest opinion that the
Inspectorate should be increased, and women inspectors appointed for
factories where women were employed, Harcourt would not agree to this,
and kept the patronage in his private secretary's hands, so that I had
no real control.'

It was, however, in Sir Charles's power to appoint women inspectors at the Local Government Board, and he did so, thus leading the way in the movement for associating women with public work.

'The same was the case at first with regard to what were known as
Cross's Acts, or the larger scheme affecting artisans' dwellings, as
to which I had at the end of October some correspondence with Cardinal
Manning, who was in Italy. Manning had written, in a letter which I
received on November 2nd: "Without a high-handed executive nothing
will be done till another generation has been morally destroyed, but
construction must keep pace with destruction. Some of my parishes are
so crowded owing to destruction without construction as to reproduce
the same mischiefs in new places. You know I am no narrow politician,
but I am impatient at political conflicts while these social plagues
are destroying our people."

'The matter was brought to a head on the next day by the receipt of a
letter from Mr. Gladstone sending me a letter from the Queen on the
dwellings of the people, with copy of what he had said in reply. The
letter was:

'"BALMORAL CASTLE,
'"_October 30th_, '83.

'"The Queen has been much distressed by all she has heard and read
lately of the deplorable condition of the homes of the poor in our
great towns.... The Queen will be glad to hear Mr. Gladstone's
opinion ... and to learn whether the Government contemplate the
introduction of any measures, or propose to take any steps to obtain
more precise information as to the _true_ state of affairs in these
overcrowded, unhealthy, and squalid bodies. She cannot but think that
there are questions of less importance than these which are under
discussion, and which might wait till one involving the _very_
existence of thousands, nay, millions, had been fully considered by
the Government."

'Mr. Gladstone, in reply, said: "Mr. Gladstone will not fail to
communicate with Sir Charles Dilke ... on the subject of your
Majesty's letter. He himself does not doubt that improvements in local
government which he trusts are near at hand will lead to a sensible
progress...."

'In consequence of this communication from the Queen, I decided to
examine all the worst parts of London for myself, and on November 9th
I wrote to Lyulph Stanley and to Miss Maude Stanley and others for a
list of what they considered the worst places in London, "as we want
to test our administrative powers under the present law. As we have to
show that the Local Authority have 'made default,' it would be best to
take cases as to which the Medical Officers have reported to the
Vestry in the past, and nothing has been done." During the remainder
of the year I met all the Medical Officers of London with the District
Surveyors of the parishes, each man in his own district, and visited
with them all those places on which they had reported without success;
and, making my own notes, I picked out the very worst cases, and when
I was certain that I was on firm ground took occasion to mention them
in public.'

After some discussion, in which Mr. Gladstone and also Harcourt and Chamberlain were consulted, it was agreed that Dilke should do what he pleased in the name either of the Home Office or Local Government Board 'as to fighting Vestries about the dwellings of the poor.' At this moment, near the end of November, several delicate diplomatic questions were in hand, upon which, as a member of the Cabinet, Sir Charles was now taking a leading part. Accordingly Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice, who thoroughly understood Local Government problems, took charge of the work on the detail of the Local Government Bill:

'It might be said that Fitzmaurice was doing my work and I was doing
his. Although I was visiting St. Giles and the courts about the
Strand, the worst streets near Judd Street (St. Pancras), Lisson
Grove, and other curious places in Marylebone, Lord Salisbury's Courts
in the neighbourhood of St. Martin's Lane, and the worst slums of St.
George the Martyr, Newington, St. Saviour's, and St. George's in the
East, yet as regarded the preparation of the details of my Bill I
turned the matter over to Fitzmaurice....'

Sir Charles's main interest of these months was making up the case against those responsible for bad housing, and he fixed responsibility on some who showed themselves honourably sensitive:

'About this time I received a very strong and detailed anonymous
letter calling my attention to the condition of the Northampton
tenants in Clerkenwell, and I sent it to Lord William Compton--
afterwards Lord Compton, and later Lord Northampton--who was serving
as a clerk in the Turkish Department of the Foreign Office. At my
request he went down to Clerkenwell and looked into the matter for
himself, and found the state of things so horrible that he warmly took
up the question, and I then took him down to Clerkenwell again. I
found Clerkenwell to be my strongest case, as it was the only parish
in which the local authority was entirely in the house-farmers' hands,
and from this time forward I put it in a prominent place in all my
speeches.'

Before departing, on December 20th, for Toulon,

'I had a correspondence with the Archbishop of Canterbury (Benson)
with regard to the condition of the property in London of the
Ecclesiastical Commissioners, which I thought a disgrace to the
Church. He only asked me to send him the facts, which I did, pointing
out that the district "in the Borough" at the meeting of St.
Saviour's, Bermondsey, Newington, and St. George the Martyr, was in a
shameful state.'

The outcome of these inquiries was the appointment of the Royal Commission on Housing. The subject afforded safe ground on which to meet the Queen when he first went down as a guest to Windsor, and it was supplemented by another matter, on which much correspondence had passed between him and Sir Henry Ponsonby--that of certain cement works near West Cowes, the smoke from which killed the Queen's shrubs at Osborne.

'On Tuesday, November 27th, I dined and slept at Windsor, and the
Queen talked artisans' dwellings and Osborne chemical works. Ponsonby
I thought very able and very pleasant. I suppose I had Dizzy's rooms,
because there was not only a statue of him, but also a framed
photograph, in the sitting-room, while in the bedroom there was a
recent statue of the Empress Eugenie. The Queen was, of course, very
courteous, but she was more bright and pleasant than I had expected.
The Duke and Duchess of Albany were at Windsor, and I had her next me
at dinner. Lorne was also there, and after the Queen had gone to bed
the Duke and Lorne showed me all the curiosities, having had the whole
of the galleries lighted. We sat up very late. Loene is serious-
minded ... through his real attempt to understand his work, and would
do most things well....'

In this year Sir Charles opposed the scheme of "assisted emigration" under which was offered to the world the amazing spectacle of a Government paying its own subjects to quit its shores and its flag. Irish peasants, half starved, clad in garments promiscuously flung out from the slop-shop, often quite unfit to make their way in a strange country, were induced by the offer of a free passage (without even inspection to see that they were decently accommodated on board) to pour in thousands out of a country whose rulers had no better thing to offer them than this cynical quittance in full. Sir Charles 'violently opposed the scheme' in one of his first Cabinets (May 5th), and again on July 25th tried to abolish it, but 'only succeeded in getting a promise that the second year of it should be the last.'

At the beginning of 1883 his brother Ashton was very ill at Algiers, and on February 17th the manager of his paper, the Weekly Dispatch, brought to Sloane Street a communication in Ashton Dilke's own hand, which contained, amongst other directions to be carried out after his death, the actual paragraph by which it was to be announced. When the end came, on March 12th, 1883, it meant 'a serious breaking with the past. William Dilke alone was left to me, if, indeed, at eighty-eight one could speak of a man as left.' This old grand-uncle, with his military memories of Waterloo days, whom Sir Charles Dilke yearly visited at Chichester, and who often stayed at Sloane Street, was also at this moment very ill, and supposed to be dying; but he recovered, and lived on for more than two years. In April Sir Charles ordered from Mr. W. E. F. Britten, the painter, whom Leighton had commended to him, a portrait of his brother, which 'proved very good,' and which hung always in 76, Sloane Street.

He clung to family ties, and later in the year paid a visit to distant kindred, the heads of the Dilke family:

'On Saturday, August 25th, I went to Maxstoke, and returned on Monday,
the 27th. There dined on the Saturday night Lord and Lady Norton and
their eldest son, Charles Adderley. The old man said a very true thing
to me about the place. "What a good castle this is, and how lucky that
it has always been inhabited by people too poor to spoil it!" From the
Commonwealth times, when Peter Wentworth plundered the Dilke of his
day for delinquency after the two years during which Fairfax had held
the Castle, they have never had money, and no attempt was ever made to
rebuild the interior house after the two fires by which two-thirds of
it were successively destroyed. They are, owing to Mrs. Dilke having a
little money, a little more prosperous just now, and there is a larger
herd of deer than usual; on this occasion I counted over one hundred
from the walls.'

The loss of his only brother had been preceded by a 'heavy blow.' That "great and illustrious friend" for whom, in the early seventies, Sir Charles prophesied that, in spite of the opposition of French aristocracy and clericalism, he would govern France, had passed away on the last day of 1882. Gambetta was dead.

On New Year's Day, 1883, Sir Charles, speaking to the electors of Chelsea, dwelt on the qualities of "the greatest of all Frenchmen of his time"-- "the magnitude of his courage, his tremendous energy, his splendid oratory, and, for those who knew him in private, his unmatched gaiety and sparkling wit."

Among those who wrote to him was Mr. Gladstone, condoling on a death "you will much feel." To one friend who wrote of Gambetta's "moral power," he replied: "It seems difficult to speak of 'moral' power about Gambetta. His kind of power was almost purely physical; it was a power of courage, energy, and oratory." During his visit to Paris in January, 1883, 'my first visit after Gambetta's death,' he and Lord Lyons 'talked chiefly about Gambetta.'

Later, turning--with the detachment of judgment which characterized his attitude to public life--from his private friendship to his estimate of the needs of France, he left this estimate of Gambetta and the Republic:

'Much as I loved his society, I did not think him a loss to the
Republic, for he was too dictatorial and too little inclined to let
other men do important work to suit that form of government, except,
indeed, in time of war. It is quite true that his was the only strong
personality of which France could boast, and it was possible that, so
long as he was there, the people would not be likely in a panic to
hunt in other camps for a saviour: but great as was his power--
physical power, power of courage and of oratory--and terrible as was
the hole in France made by his death, nevertheless the smaller men
were perhaps more able to conduct the Republic to prosperity and to
general acceptance by the people.'

II.

The governing fact of English politics at this moment was the general expectation of Mr. Gladstone's retirement. Since Lord Hartington would undoubtedly succeed him, the Radical wing, led by Dilke and Chamberlain, was doubly eager to commit the Government in advance to Radical measures. Each of the two main subjects contemplated had two subdivisions. Reform of the electorate included extension of the franchise, to which the Radicals attached most importance, and to which Lord Hartington was sullenly opposed; it also included redistribution of seats. Reform of local government included, first, proposals for a new system of county government; [Footnote: These had taken some shape, and Dilke found a draft of them in his office when he succeeded to it; but Mr. Chamberlain agreed with him in thinking it "a poor thing which I should not like to father."] secondly, the Bill for the Government of London, which Sir William Harcourt and Sir Charles Dilke had prepared with the help of Mr. Beal and Mr. Firth, and this was ready for circulation to the Cabinet.

While Dilke, with his son, was passing Christmas-time at Toulon, Mr. Gladstone had also come to the Mediterranean coast.

'I went to Cannes, where I dined with Mr. Gladstone twice, and went to
church with him on Sunday, January 21st, 1883.

'While Mr. Gladstone was at Cannes he talked very freely to Ribot and
other Frenchmen in the presence of Mrs. Emily Crawford, the _Daily
News_ correspondent in Paris, about the London Government Bill.
Harcourt had insisted, against myself and Firth and Beal, and against
most of the Commons members of the Cabinet, including the Prime
Minister, on keeping the control of the police in the hands of the
Government. Ribot asked Mr. Gladstone whether we could really trust
London with its police, as few Frenchmen dared trust Paris, and Mr.
Gladstone said that we could and should, a statement which was at once
sent to the _Daily News_, and printed, to Harcourt's horror.'

'On February 2nd we had a conference on London Government at the Home
Office, in which the police question again came up. In consequence of
our difference of opinion Harcourt shortly after circulated to the
Cabinet a memorandum on the police authority in the new municipality
of London....

'"No competent statesmen and no authoritative body of men have
considered this matter without arriving at the same conclusion--
namely, that there ought to be one police force, and not two, in the
Metropolis. I will therefore take it for granted that it is impossible
to raise an argument against the union of the whole of the police
force in the Metropolis under one control.... There is only one
question worthy of debate--namely, whether the united force shall be
placed under the control of the corporation or of the Government.... A
practical consideration of the case will, I think, demonstrate the
sheer impossibility of vesting in a popular council the discipline and
administration of such a force as the Metropolitan Police.... Suppose,
for example, that news arrived either from America or Ireland which
required instant and secret action by the police throughout London
against a Fenian outbreak. Is it to be contended that a meeting of the
Watch Committee is to be summoned ... a debate to be raised and a vote
taken?... When the Government determined to arrest Davitt, was the
warrant to be canvassed ... in the Watch Committee?..."

'On this I wrote in strong dissent: "Suppose the same news as regards
Liverpool. A case in point was the attack on Chester Castle. Liverpool
was the Fenian centre for this. Liverpool is by far the most Fenian
town in England. Yet all the arrests were made in Liverpool, and all
worked perfectly. If all this argument were really true, there would
be Fenian Alsatias in existence now. We do not find any difference
between town and town. We do not find that the Fenians avoid London,
where Harcourt has all his force and all his powers."

'Harcourt's memorandum went on in extraordinarily violent and anti-
popular language.... To this reasoning neither Mr. Gladstone nor
Chamberlain nor I yielded.'

Extension of the franchise involved Ireland. It was certain enormously to increase Mr. Parnell's following, and Lord Hartington's opposition to the proposal was very largely due to this fact. The Whig leader's attitude to Ireland was expressed in a speech at Bacup, in which he declared that it would be "madness to give Ireland more extended self-government" unless they could "receive from the Irish people some assurance that this boon would not be used for the purposes of agitation."

'Chamberlain wrote to me January 20th:

'"Hartington's speech was very Conservative the other day. I cannot
complain, as he has as much right to talk Whiggism as you and I to
spout Radicalism. Only I don't see how we are to get on together when
Mr. G. goes.... But the general impression left on my mind is that the
country (_our_ country, that is--the great majority of Liberal
opinion) is ripe for a new departure in constructive Radicalism, and
only wants leaders. So if we are driven to fight, we shall easily
recruit an army."'

Speaking at Swansea on February 1st, Mr. Chamberlain said:

"So long as Ireland is without any institution of Local Government
worthy of the name, so long the seeds of discontent and disloyalty
will remain, and burst forth into luxuriant growth at the first
favourable occasion."

Radicals were already uneasy about Lord Spencer's administration, and their uneasiness was finding expression in public. Sir Charles notes in January, 1883, before his brother Ashton's death:

'My brother had in January placed his application for the Chiltern
Hundreds secretly in the hands of his Newcastle friends, to be used so
soon as they had found a candidate, and I managed through Chamberlain
the selection of John Morley. Lord Spencer and Trevelyan were at this
time very hostile to Morley, who was writing against their policy in
the _Pall Mall_, and was supposed to be instigated by Chamberlain. In
sending me a letter of complaint from Trevelyan, Chamberlain wrote:

'"It seems to me devilishly like Forster over again. I think it may
wait without further reply; but I fear there may be more trouble in
store in Ireland yet, and we may have to put our feet down on further
coercion."

'In a letter of February 2nd, Chamberlain wrote:

'"If Spencer and Trevelyan really believe that I have set Morley
against them, they are very foolish. On the other hand, I have done
all I can to keep him straight, but you know he is kittle cattle to
drive. If I have not converted him, I must admit that he has rather
shaken me, and I have not quite so much confidence in their discretion
as I thought it politic to express last night" (at Swansea). "The more
I think of the prosecutions of the Press and of Members of Parliament,
the less I like them. But I have said nothing of this to Morley. You
will see that I replied to Hartington by implication. I do not want to
have a row, but if it must come I shall not shrink from it.'"

The Radicals were pressing forward a proposal to deal at once with the extension of franchise instead of with Local Government; but here they were overruled.

'On this last point of the order of our chief Bills, Chamberlain and I
jointly consulted the Cabinet in writing, with the result that all
pronounced against our view except Mr. Gladstone, who was away and did
not write.' (Mr. Gladstone did not return from Cannes till the
beginning of March.) 'Hartington showed in his minute not only that he
wanted County Government dealt with first, but that he wanted
redistribution dealt with in the same Session with franchise. Lord
Spencer and Lord Selborne strongly agreed with Hartington. Lord
Granville was against binding ourselves to couple redistribution with
equalization of franchise, but thought that to introduce Bills dealing
with one or both of these subjects "would be prematurely hastening the
end of a good Parliament, and would delay the passing of useful
measures, including Local Government. It seems to me important to test
the utility of the new rules of procedure by several non-political
Bills, together with such Bills as the Local Government Bill and the
reform of the municipality of London." Lord Granville, of course, was
anxious to stop in, and was merely finding reasons for not touching a
subject which he thought dangerous.

'Lord Derby agreed with Lord Granville: "The objection on general
grounds to bringing forward a County Franchise Bill in the present
Session seems to me strong. You could not postpone redistribution of
seats, and this latter measure would involve the necessity for
dissolution, either in order to carry it or immediately after it was
carried. Local Government would thus be delayed for several years."
Lord Kimberley wrote: "I agree with Lord Derby. From the time when we
propose the extension of the county franchise until (by some
Governments) the redistribution of seats is carried, there will be a
political crisis, and all other measures will be postponed."

'In consequence of the position taken up by the Cabinet, I proceeded
to draft a Local Government Bill.' [Footnote: The measure was a large
one, but he notes in his Memoir that 'it was a less complete and
comprehensive measure than that prepared by me for Chamberlain in
1886.']

Thus, immediately on his entry into the Cabinet Sir Charles found himself entrusted with the task of framing the chief measure for the succeeding Session. When the outlines had been sketched in, he wrote:

'Before I started for my Easter holiday I went through the draft of
the Local Government Bill. Drawing great Bills is heart-breaking work,
for one always feels that they will never be introduced or seen, so
considerable are the chances against any given Bill going forward. All
the great labour that we had given to the London Bill was wasted, and
this forms a reason why the Foreign Office is pleasanter than other
offices, as no work is wasted there.'

The decision to postpone extension of the franchise, though it eased the situation, did not solve all difficulties. Mr. Chamberlain urged a Tenant Rights Bill for England, which, he said to Sir Charles, "would be a great stroke of business. Without it" they would "lose the farmers for a certainty." Sir Charles concurred, and an Agricultural Holdings Bill was amongst the measures carried in that Session. It did not go far in the direction of tenant right, and therefore created no controversy with the Whigs. But with regard to Ireland, Mr. Chamberlain 'was strongly in favour of an Irish Local Government Bill' (which had been promised in a previous Queen's Speech). The Prime Minister was of Mr. Chamberlain's view. On February 3rd to 5th, when Dilke was staying with the Duke of Albany at Claremont (and 'admiring Clive's Durbar carpet, for which the house was built'), the Duke 'talked over Mr. Gladstone's strong desire for an Irish Local Government Bill.' That desire was, indeed, no secret, for Mr. Gladstone, still in his expansive mood of Cannes, gave an interview to M. Clemenceau, in which he expressed his hope to "make the humblest Irishman feel that he is a self governing agency, and that the Government is to be carried on by him and for him."

At the Cabinet of February 9th

'we looked forward to what the schoolboys call "a jolly blow up," when
Mr. Gladstone should return. The letter from Mr. Gladstone, which was
read, was so steady in its terms that I passed a paper to Chamberlain,
saying: "He is quite as obstinate as you are."

'On February 12th I ... found Harcourt perfectly furious at Mr.
Gladstone's conversations as reported in the _Daily News_. I wrote to
Chamberlain to tell him, and he replied: u It is lovely. And his
conversation with Clemenceau will send Hartington into hysterics re
Irish Local Government.'

Sir Charles's first Cabinet Council was on Tuesday, February 6th, 1883.

'This was the Queen's Speech Cabinet, and my notes show that I wrote a
good deal of the speech, especially the part which concerned the
Bills. I was much surprised at the form of the circular calling the
Cabinet: "A Meeting of Her Majesty's servants will be held," etc....
We were thirteen on this day, and spent a portion of our valuable time
in wondering which of us would be gone before the year was out. Mr.
Gladstone still stated in his letters that he would retire at Easter,
or at the latest in August, and it was generally thought that he meant
August.'

A series of Cabinets followed in which the Prime Minister continued to make himself felt, though absent, and Sir Charles wrote in his Diary:

"Talk of two Kings of Brentford! This Cabinet has to serve two
despotic monarchs--one a Tory one, at Osborne, and one a Radical one,
at Cannes."

It shows the temper of the moment that Sir Charles should have described the second monarch as 'Radical.' But Ireland was then the central subject of contention, and concerning Ireland Mr. Gladstone was with the Radicals, Dilke and Chamberlain, and against those who wanted to revenge upon the whole Irish nation, the plots of the "Invincibles," then being exposed by the evidence of James Carey, the Phoenix Park assassin, who had been accepted as an informer.

'On Sunday, February 18th, I dined with the Prince and Princess of
Wales at Marlborough House, where were present Prince Edward of Saxe-
Weimar, Hartington, the Duchess of Manchester, Lord and Lady Hamilton
(afterwards Duke and Duchess of Abercorn), Lord and Lady Granville,
Lady Lonsdale (afterwards Lady de Grey), Lord Rowton, H. Bismarck,
Leighton, Alfred de Rothschild, and Sir Joseph Crowe. Lord Granville
and I sat in a corner and talked Danube Conference. Lord Granville
told me, when we returned to other matters, that Harcourt was in a
dangerous frame of mind, and might at any moment burst out publicly
about the necessity of governing Ireland by the sword. He was also
threatening resignation on account of Mr. Gladstone's views about the
Metropolitan Police.'

'On February 19th there was an informal Cabinet in Mr. Gladstone's
room, which was now temporarily mine.... Harcourt fought against Lord
Granville, Kimberley, Northbrook, Carlingford, and Childers, in favour
of his violent views about the Irish. At last Carlingford, although an
Irish landlord, cried out: "Your language is that of the lowest Tory."
Harcourt then said: "In the course of this very debate I shall say
that there must be no more Irish legislation, and no more
conciliation, and that Ireland can only be governed by the sword." "If
you say that," replied Carlingford, "it will not be as representing
the Government, for none of your colleagues agree with you." It was
only temper, and Harcourt said nothing of the kind, but made an
excellent speech.' [Footnote: Sir Charles Dilke's view of the Irish
movement is expressed in a letter of March 7th, 1883: "I don't think
that the movement in Ireland is to be traced to the same causes as
that on the Continent. The Irish movement is Nationalist. It is
patriotic--not cosmopolitan, and is as detached from French Anarchism
and German or American Socialism as is the Polish Nationalist
movement."]

'On March 1st I heard that when the Irish Government, through the Home
Office, had applied to the Foreign Office to ask the Americans for P.
J. Sheridan, the Home Office had said that they feared it was useless
to apply to the United States except on a charge of murder. On this
hint the Irish Government at once charged Sheridan with murder.
Harcourt told me that their promptitude reminded him of a story which
he had heard from Kinglake, who was once applied to by a friend as to
the circumstances which would be sufficient to legalize a "nuncupative
[Footnote: "Nuncupative" is a legal term for an oral as distinguished
from a written will.] death-bed will." Kinglake wrote a figurative
account of an imaginary case in much detail, and by the next post
received a solemn affidavit from the man setting out Kinglake's own
exact series of incidents as having actually occurred.'

Prosecutions and sentences had no more effect than such things generally have in face of a suppressed revolution and on the night of March 15th, 1883, a dynamite explosion took place at the Local Government Board. Sir Charles, however, did not take a very serious view of it:

'The dynamiters chose a quiet corner, and they chose an hour when
nobody was about, which showed that the object was not to hurt
anybody, but only to get money from the United States. At the same
time they picked their office most unfortunately, for the Local
Government Board is the only office where people worked late at night,
and two out of my four leading men were still in their rooms, although
they had come at ten in the morning and the explosion did not take
place till nine at night.'

Mr. Gladstone had returned at the beginning of this month, and on March 5th Sir Charles saw him for the first time in Cabinet, 'singularly quiet, hardly saying anything at all.' He did, however, say that Mr. Bradlaugh was "a stone round their necks," 'which in a Parliamentary sense he was.' Despite one of Mr. Gladstone's greatest speeches, Government were again beaten when they proposed to let him affirm.

In this spring there was an agitation to create a Secretaryship of State for Scotland, and Lord Rosebery was looked upon as designate for the office. Sir Charles did not think the change necessary, but was strongly for having Lord Rosebery in the Cabinet, and wrote to Sir M. Grant Duff, Governor of Madras:

"It would be natural to give Rosebery the Privy Seal, and let him keep
the Scotch work; but nothing will induce Mr. G. to look upon him as
anything but a nice promising baby, and he will not hear of letting
him into the Cabinet." 'Nothing,' he adds, 'was settled on this
occasion.'

"A smaller Bill than those which I have mentioned, but one in which I
was interested, was my Municipal Corporations (unreformed) Bill, which
had passed the House of Lords, but failed to pass the Commons.
[Footnote: Previous reference to Sir Charles's persistent fight for
this Bill is to be found in Chapter XIII.] Rosebery thought that this
time it should be introduced into the Commons... because, although the
Lords were pledged to it by having passed it," this pledge must not be
strained too hard by constantly waving the red flag of uncomfortable
reform before the hereditary bull. "Harcourt having agreed with me
that the Bill should be introduced into the Lords, and having also
agreed with Rosebery that it should be introduced in the Commons,
Rosebery again wrote: 'I am afraid if you go on bringing this measure
before the peers they will begin to smell out suspicious matter in
it."'

On April 21st 'Rosebery again promised me to introduce a Bill,' and the Bill became law in 1884.

After his brother's death on March 12th Sir Charles Dilke, in his reply to a very kind letter from the Prince of Wales in the name of himself and the Princess, mentioned Lord Rosebery and the Scotch agitation. The Prince wrote back:

"I quite agree. If Rosebery was not to be President of the Council, he
ought at least to be Privy Seal. It seems very hard, as he has every
claim, especially after the Midlothian election."

Several matters relating to the Queen and Royal Family appear at this time in the Memoir. At the Cabinet of March 5th

'a letter from the Queen was read as to her strong wish to have an
Indian bodyguard, consisting of twenty noncommissioned officers of the
native cavalry. I did not say a word, and Chamberlain not much, but
all the others strongly attacked the scheme, which they ended by
rejecting. Lord Derby said that the Empress title had been forced on
the former Conservative Cabinet, of which he had been a member, in the
same way. It was pointed out that if India consented to pay the men,
and they only carried side-arms, they might be treated as pages or
servants, not soldiers, and need not be voted at all as "men" in the
Army Estimates.'

'A day or two later Villiers, our military attach. in Paris, reported
the existence of a military plot, said to have been got up by General
Billot, the Minister of War: the plan being that fifteen commanders of
corps were to turn out Grévy and put in the due d'Aumale. The story
was probably a lie.'

'On March 18th there was to have been a "forgiving party" at Windsor,
for Lord Derby was commanded as well as I. The Harcourts were to have
gone, but the Queen sent in the morning to say she had slipped down,
and must put off her Sunday dinner.'

'At this time peace was restored between Randolph Churchill and the
Royal Family. The reconciliation was marked by Lady Randolph attending
the Drawing-Room held on March 13th at the Queen's special wish.'

'At the Marlborough House dinner on May 27th, the Prince spoke to me
about the allowance for his sons as they came of age, and told me that
he thought the money might be given to him as head of the family. My
own view is very much the same, but I would give it all to the Crown,
and let the King for the time being distribute it so that we should
not deal with any other members of the family.'

'At Claremont I found, from the conversation of the Duke of Albany and
of his secretary, that if the Duke of Cambridge resigned speedily, as
then seemed probable, the Duke of Connaught had no chance of obtaining
the place; but it was hoped at Court that the Commander-in-Chief would
hold his position for five or six years, and then might be succeeded
by the Duke of Connaught.'

Later Sir Charles mentions the Duke of Albany's conversation with him as to Canada, of which he wished to be Governor, but the Queen opposed the project, and Lord Lansdowne was eventually sent out.

Returning to the Easter recess:

'The Government programme now began to be revised in the light of
men's declared intentions.'

'On Wednesday, March 21st, I crossed to Paris, and went to Toulon. I
must have been back in London on Thursday, March 29th, on which day I
had a long interview with Mr. Gladstone on things in general. He had
told Harcourt that he would hardly budge about the London police. His
last word was that they should be retained by the Home Office for a
period distinctly temporary, and to be named in the Bill. I gathered
from Mr. Gladstone's talk that all idea of retirement had gone out of
his mind.'

There was a Cabinet on April 7th, and 'London Government was again postponed, but, owing to the fierce conflict between Harcourt and Mr. Gladstone, was looked upon as dead.'

Mr. Gladstone, in his anger, told Sir Charles that "Harcourt, through laziness, wanted to get out of the Government of London Bill." But the truth was, says the Memoir, 'that he could think of nothing but the dynamite conspiracy.' A Bill to meet this was being rushed through Parliament, with an almost grotesque haste, that was as grotesquely baffled in the end.

'On April 9th the Queen sat up half the night at Harcourt's wish in
order to be ready to sign the Explosives Bill at once, but Mr. Palmer
of the Crown Office (the gentleman who signs "Palmer" as though he
were a peer) could not be found; and the other man, Zwingler, was in
bed at Turnham Green, and to Harcourt's rage the thing could not be
done. On the 16th Harcourt told the Chancellor that in the discussion
of the Crown Office vote he should move the omission of the item for
his nephew's pay.' [Footnote: Mr. Ralph Charlton Palmer was Lord
Selborne's second cousin, and secretary to Lord Selborne in the Lord
Chancellor's Office. He was afterwards a Commissioner in Lunacy.]

The London Government Bill was not yet given up for lost. On April 11th Sir Charles Dilke wrote to Mr. Gladstone to deprecate its withdrawal, and the Prime Minister replied, agreeing that "withdrawal ... would be a serious mischief, and a blow to the Government."

'On April 14th there was a Cabinet, at which Mr. Gladstone announced
that Harcourt had written to him refusing to go on with the Government
of London Bill after the second reading of the measure, and proposing
that I should conduct it through Committee.'

'At the Cabinet of this day (April 21st) Mr. Gladstone said that he
wanted the bearing of the Agricultural Holdings Bill on Scotland
explained to him. "I wish Argyll were here," said he. "I wish to God
he was," said Hartington, who had been fighting alone against the
Bill, deserted even by the Chancellor and by Lord Derby. Indeed, all
my lords were very Radical to-day except Hartington, who was simply
ferocious, being at bay. He told us that Lord Derby was a mere owner
of Liverpool ground rents, who knew nothing about land.'

'On Thursday, May 24th, there was a meeting at the Home Office of nine
members of the Cabinet as to the Government of London Bill, and I
wrote after it to Chamberlain: "Victory! Hartington alone dissenting,
everybody was for going on with everything, and sitting in the
autumn." And Chamberlain replied: "At last! But why the devil was it
not decided before?"'

At a full Cabinet a few days later 'the police difficulty finally slew the London Bill.' This seemed to Sir Charles a very serious matter, and he thought of resigning. Mr. Chamberlain, however, was against this, though agreeing that he should resign in the autumn 'unless Mr. Gladstone would promise to put franchise first next year.'

So it was left. But presently Mr. Chamberlain himself became the cause of very grave dissensions. On June 13th, 1883, a great assembly was held at Birmingham to celebrate the twenty-fifth year of Mr. Bright's membership for the borough, and Mr. Chamberlain in speaking observed that representatives of royalty were not present, neither were they missed. [Footnote: On Monday, June 11th, 1883, there was a "monster procession and fete constituting the popular prelude to the more serious business of the Bright celebration at Birmingham" that week. On June 13th Mr. Chamberlain said: "Twice in a short interval we have read how vast multitudes of human beings have gathered together to acclaim and welcome the ruler of the people. In Russia, in the ancient capital of that mighty Empire, the descendant of a long line of ancient Princes, accompanied by a countless host of soldiers, escorted by all the dignitaries of the State, and by the representatives of foreign Powers, was received with every demonstration of joy by the vast population which was gathered together to witness his triumphal entry. I have been told that more than a million sterling of public money was expended on these ceremonies and festivities.... Your demonstration on Monday lacked nearly all the elements which constituted the great pageant of the Russian Coronation. Pomp and circumstance were wanting; no public money was expended; no military display accompanied Mr. Bright. The brilliant uniforms, the crowds of high officials, the representatives of Royalty, were absent, and nobody missed them; for yours was essentially a demonstration of the people and by the people, in honour of the man whom the people delighted to honour, and the hero of that demonstration had no offices to bestow--no ribands, or rank, or Court titles, to confer. He was only the plain citizen--one of ourselves...." (the Times, June 14th, 1883).] He added that the country was in his opinion more Radical than the majority of the House of Commons, but not more Radical than the Government; that the country was in favour of Disestablishment, and that three things were wanted: First, "a suffrage from which no man who is not disqualified by crime or the recipient of relief shall be excluded "; secondly, equal electoral districts; and, thirdly, payment of members.

'On June 25th Mr. Gladstone had sent for me about a recent speech by
Chamberlain at Birmingham.

'The Queen had been angry at his "They toil not, neither do they
spin," but was still more angry about this recent speech, at which Mr.
Gladstone was also himself offended. [Footnote: "This speech is open
to exception from three points of view, I think--first in relation to
Bright, secondly in relation to the Cabinet, thirdly and most
especially in relation to the Crown, to which the speech did not
indicate the consciousness of his holding any special relation," wrote
Mr. Gladstone to Sir Henry Ponsonby (Morley's Life of Gladstone, vol.
iii., p. 112).] I pointed out that Hartington had committed his
colleagues on a practical question when he spoke as to Irish Local
Government last January, and Mr. Gladstone had committed them when he
talked on Ireland and on London government to Ribot and Clemenceau at
Cannes. Mr. Gladstone defended himself, but threw over Hartington, who
had "behaved worse than Chamberlain." I went to see Chamberlain about
it, and found him very stiff, but tried to get him to say something
about it at the Cobden Club, where he was to preside on Saturday, the
30th. On the next day he promised that he would do this, but when he
came to read me the words that he intended to use I came to the
conclusion that, although they would make his own position very clear,
they would only make matters worse as far as Mr. Gladstone and the
Queen were concerned.'

Dilke's mediation was ultimately successful, and 'on July 2nd Mr. Gladstone, in a letter to Chamberlain, accepted his explanations with regard to his speech.' In the House of Commons, charge of the Corrupt Practices Bill had been entrusted to the President of the Local Government Board--a very unusual arrangement--and it meant sitting late many nights, once till 5.30 a.m., after which 'I had to get up as usual for my fencing people.'

'On July 25th there was another Cabinet, before which I had
"circulated" to my colleagues my local government scheme. Many members
of the Cabinet objected to it as too complete, and on my communicating
their views to the draftsman, Sir Henry Thring, he wrote:

'"I believe that the great superiority of your plan of local
government over any other I have seen consists in its extent. I
believe that you will find that your scheme, though apparently far
more extreme than any scheme yet proposed, will practically not make a
greater alteration in existing arrangements than a far less
comprehensive scheme would make. It is, as far as I can judge,
impossible to make a partial plan for local government: such a plan
disturbs everything and settles nothing.... Your plan, when carried
into effect, will disturb most things, no doubt, but will at the same
time settle everything."'

At a Cabinet held in the recess on October 25th

'Mr. Gladstone made a speech about the next Session which virtually
meant franchise first, and the rest nowhere. After this I locked up my
now useless Local Government Bill, of which the principal draft had
been dated August 24th. One of its most important parts had been the
consolidation of rates and declaration of the liability of owners for
half the rates. It had then gone on to establish district councils,
and then the County Councils. There was, however, to be some slight
resuscitation of the Bill a little later.'

Two minor concerns which interested Sir Charles exceedingly were under prolonged discussion this year. The first was the proposed purchase of the Ashburnham and Stowe collections. Sir Charles 'voted all through against the purchase of the Ashburnham manuscripts, being certain that we were being imposed upon.' He noted

'the experts always want to buy, and always say that the thing is
invaluable and a chance which will never happen again. No one can care
for the National Gallery more than I do; I know the pictures very
well, for I go there almost every week.'

He thought, however, that some wholesale purchases for public collections had been all but worthless, with perhaps one admirable thing in a mass of rubbish.

Secondly, there arose in May a discussion over the Duke of Wellington's statue, which Leighton and the Prince of Wales wanted to remove from Hyde Park Corner, but which Sir Charles cherished as an old friend. It was one of the matters on which he and Mr. Gladstone were united by a common conservatism:

'The ridiculous question of the Duke of Wellington's statue had come
up again at the Cabinet of August 9th, and the numbers were taken
three times over by Mr. Gladstone, who was in favour of the old statue
and against all removals, in which view I steadily supported him, the
Cabinet being against us, and Mr. Gladstone constantly trying to get
his own way against the majority. It was the only subject upon which,
while I was a member of it, I ever knew the Cabinet take a show of
hands.'

In the last Cabinet of the Session they 'once more informally divided about the Wellington statue'; and he recorded the fact that he 'still hoped to save it.' Yet in the end he failed; and 'now,' he notes pathetically, 'I should have to go to Aldershot to see it if I wished to do so.'