Elizabeth Lee

“ It is certain that when Disraeli made up his mind to win her, his attitude towards her, judging by his acts and his letters, is very much that of a lover, and a sincere one. It was not all quite as fair sailing as the gossips would have us believe. When they were both in London he went to see her every day, and describes her talk as "that bright play of fancy and affection which welcomes me daily with such vivacious sweetness." He dislikes being separated from her: "My present feelings convince me of what I have ever believed, that there is no hell on earth like separated love." ”

“ In these days of storm and stress and feverish excitement and unrest among women, it is well to recall the life of a woman like Mrs. Gladstone who, in a period when such mechanical aids to activity as motor-cars and telephones were non-existent, yet contrived to be a devoted wife, smoothing her husband’s path in every direction, accompanying him everywhere, an equally devoted mother, as well as a charming hostess of country-house parties at Hawarden and of the more formal entertainments in London consequent on her position as the wife of a great Minister of State. ”

“ Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman became leader of the House of Commons, and led his party in the New Parliament with immense success.
It was a great triumph, but, like most human triumphs, spiced with bitterness. It was not that a few people who should have known better thought it clever and smart to gibe at the quiet, elderly Scotch couple. Lady Campbell-Bannerman was a dying woman, and those near her knew it. For twenty years she had struggled with a disease of which the end was certain from the beginning, and the end was now near. ”

“ Once in conversation Herbert Spencer assured her that the prospect of annihilation had no terrors for him, and Lady Russell confesses that she was thinking all the time that without immortality life was “all a cheat, and without a Father in heaven, right and wrong, love, conscience, joy, sorrow, are words without a meaning, and the Universe, if governed at all, is governed by a malignant spirit who gives us hopes and aspirations never to be fulfilled, affections to be wasted, a thirst for knowledge never to be quenched.” ”

“ When a woman is already in so high a position that no one can think she is seeking her own advancement, when she is eminently high-minded and warm-hearted, when she is never petty or false or ungenerous or uncharitable, then such an influence as she may exercise either directly or indirectly can only make for good. There is no doubt that Lady Palmerston, by her personal amiability, her vivacity of mind, charm of manner, and experience of the world, helped to strengthen the position of her husband. ”

“ My experience gives me no satisfaction; all my opinions, and beliefs, and feelings are shaken, as if suffering from frequent little shocks of earthquakes. I am like a boat in a calm, in an unknown and to me unsought-for sea, without compass to guide or even a knowledge whither I am destined. Now, this is probably the case of millions, but that does not mend the matter, and whilst a fly exists, it seeks to save itself. Therefore excuse me if I try to do the same."
In these letters we have Lady Caroline almost at her best. In another of them there is pertinent criticism of Godwin's books. ”

“ Religion not forced, not obtruded, but as natural and vital as fresh air, was, not an adjunct of life, but life itself. In her own devotions, in the daily services of the Church, in many a Eucharist did Catherine Gladstone renew her soul’s life, and increase the charity and the delightful gaiety of her temperament, and from the spirit of wisdom learn those intuitions which so rarely failed her. ”

“ Disraeli said in a tone of pity for those who could not possibly know what a fine figure of a man really meant, "Oh! you should see my Dizzy in his bath!" On another occasion after a dinner-party, one of the guests present took her to her carriage and said, "Mr. Disraeli spoke most eloquently in the House to-night; how well he is looking." Mrs. Disraeli, hugely delighted, replied, "Ah! you think he looks well—you think him handsome, yet people call him ugly; but he is not, he is handsome; they should see him asleep." ”

“ It might be young girls entering on life in the first joy of a marriage engagement, or young beauties to whom she would gently suggest thoughts that were unworldly. Very often it would be some hard-worked London priest toiling single-handed amongst his thousands, and thinking no one cared, who found in Mrs. Gladstone a listener not only sympathetic but suggestive, one who did not forget, but would forward his plans, and who had the rare gift of setting other people to work. ”

“ Every one cannot be a Lady Holland, but it is not only the women who are most in the public eye who exercise influence on affairs and on the actions of public men. Sometimes where it may seem, to an outside observer, that a woman is overshadowed by her husband, she may, as a matter of fact, have helped more to his success than the world will ever know. ”

“ Besides the natural beauty of the situation of the city of flowers and its wonderful buildings and art treasures, Lady John thoroughly enjoyed the society there, finding in it more cordiality and ease than in London. There were dancing and amateur theatricals for the young people, and for their parents intercourse with the men who were working for Italy’s independence, men who would “greatly dare and greatlier persevere,” and who became welcome guests at Pembroke Lodge when they visited England. ”

“ When she was eighty she would wear a bright crimson velvet tunic high to the throat, Disraeli's miniature fastened like an order on the left breast; at a great party at Stowe in 1845, when Queen Victoria was present, she wore black velvet, with hanging sleeves looped up with knots of blue and diamond buttons, the head-dress being blue velvet bows and buttons. She evidently had no eye for beauty, for she once said that she did not care in the least for looks in men, and would as soon have married a black man as not. ”

“ I have every hope that a safe and good government may be formed. I do not dread anything much, for (amidst other reliances which I have) I feel sure that they will find a Powerful and a Successful opponent in my husband to any dangerous measures they might be induced to attempt, but I am no Politician, and will not bore you with talking about that, which I profess not to understand.—Always, believe me, dear Sir Robert, yours very truly,
"Julia Peel." ”

“ In the House of Lords he seldom had to face real opposition, and the consciousness of a foregone conclusion to the discussions imparted a degree of languor to debate. Lord Salisbury himself complained that they were all too much of one mind. At any rate, for one reason or another, he grew more and more to despise public opinion because it was public opinion, an attitude very attractive to certain types of mind, but which is apt to leave a politician the dismal choice whether he will acquiesce or resign when overborne by a public opinion formed by some one else. ”

“ She had absolute faith in her husband, and her geniality and warmth of feeling and kindness of heart endeared her to her friends, despite her utter want of tact and her propensity for saying gauche things. Some one once asked Mr. Disraeli if he did not get annoyed by the gauche things his wife so often said. He replied, “Oh no! I am never put out by them.” “Well then,” retorted his interlocutor, “you must be a man of most extraordinary qualities.” “Not at all,” answered Disraeli, “I only possess one quality in which most men are deficient—gratitude.” ”

“ But Lady Caroline, with all her cleverness, was no artist in life, and did not realise that true wisdom and happiness resided in making the most of what she possessed, and that the thing for her to do was to occupy herself with her husband and child. ”

“ Disraeli, without her husband's knowledge, wrote to Peel the famous letter in which she told him, "my husband's political career is for ever crushed if you do not appreciate him." She pointed out that Disraeli, for Peel's sake, had made personal enemies of Peel's opponents, that he had stood four most expensive elections, in two of which he had gained seats from Whigs, and that he had abandoned literature for politics. "Do not destroy all his hopes, and make him feel his life has been a mistake." ”

“ But she was occasionally cast down by the weight of the tiresome conventions imposed on such hospitality. “Why,” she asks, “cannot human nature find out and rejoice in blessings of civilisation and society without encumbering them with petty etiquettes and fashions and forms which deprive them of half their value? Human nature strives and struggles and gives life itself for political freedom, while it forges social chains and fetters for itself.” ”

“ She was buried at Drayton beside her husband.
Lady Peel's individuality scarcely stands out apart from her husband. She was ever the gracious presence by his side, lightening his cares, cheering him when discouraged, merging her wishes and hopes in his. Her special qualities of heart and head made her the right companion for a man of Peel's temperament. ”

“ Lord Abercorn seeing his granddaughters on the one hand, the children of his daughter, deprived of their mother, and on the other his grandsons, the children of his son, deprived of their father, thought it would be an admirable arrangement to marry the widower to the widow. Although Lord Aberdeen never forgot his first wife, he had a strong affection for his second, and his letters to her are full of loving tenderness. Unhappily his daughters all died young, and Lady Aberdeen herself on 26th August 1833. ”

“ Gladstone spoke of those political interests which appealed more especially to women, and pointed out how women might assist in the regeneration of the world. Addressing the women present he said:
“The harder and sterner and drier lessons of political economy are little to your taste. You do not concern yourselves with abstract propositions. It is that side of politics that is associated with the heart of man that I must call your side of politics.” ”

“ It has been said, “Happy the woman that has no history.” It was never more than a half-truth, and in the face of a career like Lady Campbell-Bannerman’s it has an ironic sound. But for her long illness it can hardly be doubted that she would have used her very remarkable gifts in a way that would have left her personal impress on her generation. Hampered and exhausted by suffering, she was yet able to affect passing events by reason of the immense influence she exercised on her husband, who took no action without consulting her. ”

“ Lady John Russell herself is an abiding example of the best type of woman, quick to sympathise, ready to counsel, who, while admiring her husband as a statesman and giving him every assistance in his public career, admired the man more than the politician. ”

“ It is all very well if one died at the end of a tragic scene, after playing a desperate part; but if one lives, and instead of growing wiser, one remains the same victim of every folly and passion, without the excuse of youth and inexperience, what then? Pray say a few wise words to me. There is no one more deeply sensible than myself of kindness from persons of high intellect, and at this period of my life I need it.
“I have nothing to do—I mean necessarily. There is no particular reason why I should exist; it conduces to no one’s happiness, and, on the contrary, I stand in the way of many. ”

“ There had always been a warm friendship between him and Sir Henry, a circumstance perhaps equally perplexing to the "unco" patriotic among the satellites of the one and the "unco guid" among the followers of the other. But Lady Campbell-Bannerman's body, as befitted one who was Scotch in every fibre of her being, was taken to her home in Scotland and buried in Meigle kirkyard.
Courage, staunchness, humour—these are the three things that stand out in the recollections of one who knew her well (there were not many who did) . ”

“ In spite of her youth, Lady Fanny was serious-minded, wholly without self-consciousness, never realising her beauty and attractiveness, very intelligent and observant, full of enthusiasm for every good cause that made for progress and improvement, delighting in literature and poetry, and indeed in every way suited to become the life companion of a great statesman. Lord Minto evidently saw how the land lay, and invited Lord John to accompany them to Minto when Parliament rose. ”

“ Certain it was that she seldom seemed to realise how very severe a tax it might be on a man, who had been hard at work in a contentious atmosphere all day and all the evening, to sit up by a sick-bed or break his sleep to soothe an invalid. Yet by a curious contradiction if there was ever any occasion when Sir Henry was tempted to leave politics altogether, or there was some possibility that he might be defeated by a rival in the contest for leadership, no one was more stubborn than his wife in the determination that he should suffer no such thing. ”

“ In his reply to Gladstone's note of sympathy, he said, "Marriage is the greatest earthly happiness when founded on complete sympathy; that hallowed lot was mine for a moiety of existence." [15] He used to say how in thirty-three years of married life she had never given him a dull moment. To Gathorne Hardy he wrote: "To lose such a friend is to lose half one's existence." [16] The marriage had been the making of Disraeli, and he fully recognised the fact. ”

“ Nowadays, when the rights of small nations are the proclaimed preoccupation of both the Old World and the New, it is interesting to record Lady Campbell-Bannerman's firm conviction of their value in the international atmosphere, creating, "through their determined endeavour to remain independent, a healthy, stimulating effect on the world and life in general"—a conviction cherished by her at a date when it was anything but fashionable. ”