Edward Smith-Stanley, 1st Earl of Palmerston

“ His father formed his second Administration in February 1858, and Lord Stanley was made Colonial Secretary. He appears to have accepted the office with some reluctance, and only because Sir E. Bulwer, for whom it was at first intended, found that he could not secure his re-election. The Government was a very weak one, and it opened with the worst prospects. It was a Government in a minority. Its very existence depended on the dissensions between Lord Palmerston and Lord John Russell, and its first steps met with little favour either in the House or in the country. ”

“ Is there any man in England who has thought that Catholic Emancipation, Free Trade in corn, or Reform of Parliament has been dear to the normal Tory mind?
Lord Palmerston made his attack on Lord Stanley in the speech above quoted. Lord Stanley treasured up the grievance; and in years to come, when Palmerston was back at the Foreign Office, in 1850, had his revenge, by the studied accusation he made in the House of Lords in regard to Don Pacifico. But Don Pacifico and the circumstances of his eventful career were still in the womb of time.
He at once begins life as an idle man ”

“ Aberdeen thinks Palmerston wrote it. He takes popular ground, and cannot impose himself upon a reluctant people. The fact is Friday's bulletin wrote his letter.
The Duke thinks he will be shown up. The papers presented to-morrow will be no more than it was before intended to present; but Aberdeen will announce the evasion of the sovereign, and say that that circumstance will render necessary the production of other papers which will be presented as soon as they can be printed. The whole discussion will turn upon Leopold's conduct. ”

“ He argued for what he called 'colonial emancipation' — for the conversion of the self-governing colonies into independent states. He advocated the abandonment of Gibraltar to Spain, declared his belief that India would be best governed as an independent empire under an English emperor, and described the Indian empire in its existing guise as 'a splendid curse’ (letter to John Bright) . Smith hailed the cession by Lord Palmerston's government of the Ionian Isles to Greece in 1862-3 as a step in support of his own principles. ”

“ Stanley and Aberdeen will do their best or their worst in the House of Lords, but all their blows will fall on the soft, non-resisting cushion of Lansdowne's evasive urbanity, while in the House of Commons there will be nobody to attack Palmerston, and between those who won't grapple with him, and those who can't, he will come off unscathed, as he has always done. ”

“ Friendly to efforts made abroad for the recovery of liberty, he has been held in terror by those who would still keep liberty in chains. Of all living Ministers, Lord Palmerston is the most personally popular. He has served with many parties, and yet is no party man. The Whigs do not love him; the Conservatives cannot claim him; the Radicals own him not. ”

“ Edward used every exertion to procure the Earl’s liberty, and wrote to several sovereign princes, soliciting them to interfere on the subject; but he did not immediately succeed. In the 11th Edward II., Pembroke was once more in the Scottish wars, and was appointed governor of Rockingham castle; and upon the King’s purposed voyage in the 13th Edward II., to do homage to the King of France for the Duchy of Acquitaine, he was constituted Guardian of the realm during his absence, being then also Custos of Scotland. In the 15th Edward II., he sat in judgment on the Earl of Lancaster at Pontefract ”

“ May 9th.—Palmerston got another drubbing last night in the Lords, which will be a lesson to him, if anything can. Stanley made a second speech, still more effective than his first, and Aberdeen followed him. Lord Lansdowne was miserably feeble in reply, as he might well be, having no case. I never saw public opinion more strongly or generally pronounced, and it may be of use in moderating Palmerston for the future. If he were not the man he is, there would be 174 no doubt of it, but he is apparently incurable. The whole affair is very discreditable to the Government. ”

“ During the interval she spent some time in London with Sir John and Lady Maria Stanley, and in the literary society of the opening years of the nineteenth century she was much sought after for her charm and appreciativeness, and for what Sydney Smith called her "porcelain understanding." The wits and lions of the Miss Berrys' parties vied with each other in making much of her; Rogers and Scott delighted in her conversation—in short, every one agreed, as her sister-in-law Maria wrote, that "in Kitty Leycester Edward will indeed have a treasure." ”

“ An early instance of this was the case of Dean Stanley. A later one, on July 13, 1900, was the gathering called at Marlborough House and presided over by the Prince for the purpose of erecting a national memorial in Westminster Abbey to the Duke of Westminster. In speaking, His Royal Highness said: "To me personally the death of the Duke meant the loss of a life-long friend. I had known him from his boyhood and there is no one whose friendship I appreciated more than his. In my judgment there is no one whose public services more fully deserve public recognition by his countrymen." ”

“ At the battle of Blore Heath in August 1459 Stanley, though close at hand with a large force, did not join the royal army, whilst his brother William fought openly for York. In 1461 Stanley was made chief justice of Cheshire by Edward IV., but ten years later he sided with his brother-in-law Warwick in the Lancastrian restoration. Nevertheless, after Warwick’s fall, Edward made Stanley steward of his household. Stanley served with the king in the French expedition of 1475, and with Richard of Gloucester in Scotland in 1482. ”

“ The widely different tone which was adopted by Lord Clarendon and Lord Granville, the open breach between Palmerston and Lord John Russell on account of the way in which the former conducted his foreign policy without consultation with the Cabinet, and the refusal of Lord Grey, in a most critical moment, to take office in a Government in which Lord Palmerston held the seals of the Foreign Office, show how fully in this respect the sentiments of the Queen accorded with those of many of Lord Palmerston's own colleagues. ”

“ Generously has the British Empire done by Lord Strathcona, and generously and freely has Lord Strathcona done by the Empire. Under the ægis of the Union Jack in Scotland, Donald Alexander Smith spent the first eighteen years of his life. ”

“ Gladstone replaced Stanley at the War and Colonial Office, and Stanley became the acknowledged leader of the protectionist Opposition. Having Lord John's assurance that the Whigs would support anti-Corn Law legislation, Peel set about preparing his famous measure. But before it could be discussed in Parliament, the usual explanations with regard to resignation and resumption of office had to be gone through. In his speech on this occasion, Lord John tried to shield Lord Grey as far as possible from the unpopularity which he had incurred by refusing to work with Palmerston in the same Cabinet. ”

“ He also marked his sense of the loss which the nation had sustained, in the disappearance of an illustrious man, by giving his noble-minded and broken-hearted widow the refusal of a peerage.
Meanwhile, Lord Palmerston, on the strength of the vote of confidence in the Commons, was somewhat of a popular hero. People who believe that England can do no wrong, at least abroad, believed in him. His audacity delighted the man in the club. ”

“ He seldom visits his superiors, or, if he does, it is rather to show that he is entitled to live in such company, than for any real satisfaction that he enjoys in it. It is as Lord Clarendon says of the Earl of Arundel, that he sometimes went to court, because he could there only find a greater man than himself ”

“ STRUGGLE WITH WALES AND SCOTLAND.
1. Edward I.—After the death of Earl Simon and the defeat of the barons, Prince Edward went to the Crusades, and did not return until nearly two years after his father’s death. Edward was one of our best kings. He was a tall and powerful man, a great warrior and statesman—one who loved his people, although sometimes harsh and unjust. He had been a good son, and was an affectionate husband and father. In his reign many wise and good laws were made. From Earl Simon he had learned much, and now when he was made king he put Simon’s teachings in force. ”

“ Never! the people of this country are averse, indeed, to wanton and unnecessary war; but where the honour of England is at stake, there is no consequence which they are not prepared to meet—no hazard which they will not be prompt to encounter.” The debate was protracted by another adjournment to a third night.
Lord Palmerston, who had been repeatedly called upon in the course of the debates, at length arose to defend government from the imputations of their opponents. ”

“ In private life his gaiety, his buoyancy, his high breeding, made even his political opponents forget their differences; and even the warmest altercations on public affairs were merged in his large hospitality and cordial social relations. In this respect he was aided with consummate ability by the tact and grace of Lady Palmerston, the widow of the 5th Earl Cowper, whom he married at the close of 1839, and who died in 1869. She devoted herself with enthusiasm to all her husband's interests and pursuits, and she made his house the most attractive centre of society in London, if not in Europe. ”

“ James Stansfeld [q. v. Suppl.] as a civil lord of the admiralty, under the Duke of Somerset, the first lord in Lord Palmerston's administration, and from the first showed himself to be a strong supporter of economy and reform in dockyard administration. In August 1865 he was appointed financial secretary to the treasury, and cemented a friendship with Gladstone, then chancellor of the exchequer, whose policy rather than that of Palmerston he was from the first inclined to support. ”

“ I was not sorry she fought under British colors, for though she was never at a loss, I knew I could express and defend myself better than had she spoken in French. I hurried her as much as decency would permit from one subject to another, but I found politics were uppermost in her thoughts.... She was equally averse to both parties—to the royal because she said it was despotism; the Imperial because it was tyranny. "Is there," said I, "no happy medium; are there none who can feel the advantages of liberty, and wish for a free constitution?" ”

“ The third son, Charles Edward, a young officer in the Royal Engineers, who had done good work in the Ordnance Survey of Wales, and was already high in his profession, was suddenly cut off by fever at his official post in Tasmania in 1849.
The eldest daughter, Mary, had great powers of organisation, was a keen philanthropist and her father's right hand at Norwich. In 1854 she took charge of a detachment of nurses who followed Miss Nightingale's pioneer band to the East, and worked devotedly for the Crimean sick and wounded at the hospital at Koulalee. ”

“ Lively, well-bred, and unaffected, Lord Palmerston is a man that is so well acquainted with the routine of official duties, performs them so readily and pleasantly, and is so free from the assumption of self-importance that too frequently appertains to adepts in them, that, whether Whig or Tory government has the ascendant in England, his services will be always considered a desideratum to be secured if possible. ”

“ He is, therefore, at once the modern "money king," the absolute political Czar the social despot and the infallible Pope of his "Kingdom!"
Just as men fight for the retention of a throne and the maintenance of a dynasty, so he and his courtiers defend his rule and maintain his autocracy with every weapon of absolutism. And just as royalty, while possessed of unlimited wealth, has never lacked mercenaries, press bureaus, and all the sycophantic defenders of a crown, so Smith is able to command an array of service as great as any ever brought to the defense of a social system. ”

“ In 1572 the Queen conferred on him the Chancellorship of the Order of the Garter; and shortly afterwards, on Lord Burghley's preferment to the office of Lord Treasurer, vacant by the death of the Marquis of Winchester, made him Secretary of State, a post which, four-and-twenty years before, he held under Edward VI. Smith died at his residence called Mounthaut, or Hill-hall, in Essex on the 12th of August 1577, and was buried in the parish church of Theydon Mount, where a monument was erected to his memory. ”

“ Smith, Annals of University College, p. 12) ; in 1274 he was keeper of the wardrobe to Edward I (Rymer, Fœd. i. 519) ; on 29 Sept. 1278 he was one of the lords of parliament present at Westminster when Alexander III of Scotland did homage (ib. p. 563) ; in 1279 he became lord treasurer (Pat. 1 Edw. I, m. 7) ”

“ There he is—the most popular Foreign Secretary of the day, the man in whom the country has perhaps as great a confidence as in any one, engaged in squabbles over town police, graveyards, sewers, and the rest. Lord Palmerston cannot be said to be at home in his office. The country is disposed to look with favour upon him on account of his great name and services ”

“ Two years after Edward had accepted the incumbency, his father died in London, but he had long before given up living in Cheshire, and Alderley Park had been occupied at his desire by his eldest son, afterwards Sir John, who had made his home there since his marriage in 1796.
Both the Stanley brothers married remarkable women. Lady Maria Josepha Holroyd, Sir John's wife, was the elder daughter of the first Lord Sheffield, the friend and biographer of Gibbon, and her strong personality impressed every one who met her. ”