.gif)
Life of Sir George Grey: Governor, High commissioner, and Premier. An Historical Biography.
Chapter XIII. — An Interlude
Chapter XIII.
An Interlude.
At the Colonial Office.
It was the fate of Grey that, even when he was at the height of success, he was dogged by the shadow, if not of failure, yet of misdoing; the croaking voice of censure jarred upon the ear just saluted with the shouts of triumph. He had hardly set foot in London when he was chilled by the cold air of official disapproval that blew through the icy corridors of the Colonial Office. The Colonial Office, in fact, turned its back on him. His official friend, Lord Lincoln, now Duke of Newcastle and Secretary for the Colonies, positively refused to see him; and the Permanent Under-Secretary treated him sternly. What had he done? He had been guilty of the worst of all faults in the eyes of a State department—he had disobeyed its behests. The Duke had already, in December, 1853, replied to the despatch of May, 1852, where Grey explained the course he had taken in respect of the land fund. In a despatch that crossed his homeward journey he was told that his disobedience was unpardonable. All the considerations he urged were already known to his superiors. He was imperatively ordered to transmit the money without delay. This single statement seems to prove that he had never received leave of absence. The Colonial Office was unaware that he was on his way to England.
In Parliament.
He had not only the cold chills of the Colonial Office to encounter. He had to meet the fury of the British Parliament. In the House of Commons the attack was led by legislators so authorised as Sir John Pakington page 95and Sir Charles Adderley, and withstood by the Under-Secretary, Sir Frederick Peel; in the House of Lords Grey was attacked by Lord Lyttelton and defended by the Duke of Newcastle. He might well have been summoned, a new Clive or Hastings, to the bar of either Chamber when he was thus virtually impeached. Grey claimed, or his official apologist claimed for him, that he had often been silent when he was attacked or condemned. This was not an occasion for being silent, and in a memorandum, dated July 1854, he made a capital defence of himself. We will not say that he practically exonerated himself from the charges brought against him, nor that this was proved, as he himself held, by the withdrawal of the motions in both chambers. A Parliamentary resolution is often moved with the sole object of drawing public attention to the facts stated and withdrawn when that object has been gained. But the charges made, though grave in the eyes of the Colonial Office, were light in the public eye, and he left the court, so to speak, without a stain on his character. His mana was still unimpaired, and his fame was augumented. High-handed doings are not often visited with censure at Oxford, and the honorary degree of D.C.L., bestowed on a man who had just turned forty, amid the frenzied applause of the Sheldonian Theatre, must have consoled him for the disapproval of the Tite Barnacles and biased legislators.