The Last of the Protectionists : a Passage of Parliamentary History.

By W. Skeen.

The annals of our party dissensions do not supply an instance where the victory of the conquerors was more complete, or the submission of the vanquished more prompt and decided, than in the case of the great fight that was fought out within the walls of Parliament fourteen years ago. The beneficent fruits of the Corn Law Repeal were so palpable in their evidence, and so rapid in their growth, that the men who prophesied all manner of evil from the measures of 1846 have since that time been left without a single pretext for the maintenance of their opinions. The great majority, indeed, have with graceful candour confessed their error; and, though here and there one of the old Protectionists—the "cannon balls," as they have been designated—may still he encountered, it is well understood that his consistency in the face of light is clue quite as much to the obstinacy of pride, or to the idiosyncrasy of the individual, as to the convictions of the politician. The country has, reaped the advantages of this in every way. The material prosperity which followed with a full flood the repeal has not only increased the national resources to an amazing extent, but it has put the different classes of the community into good humour with each other. Dr. Chalmers's prediction, expressed in his own terse language, that nothing would tend so much "to sweeten the breath of society" as a repeal of the Corn Laws, has been fulfilled in a still wider sense than even he perhaps meant it. The clamours of the poor against the rich have been stilled; the gladiators who fought front to front in the arena have long since shaken hands. It would be a strange tiling now to hear either farmer or squire curse the treachery of Sir Robert Peel; and those who enjoy the fruits of the victory he won for them may afford to look back with interest, and even with a certain degree of admiration, on the struggles of the men who did their best to withhold them, and who, taken all at unawares, still made so gallant a defence, and fought so desperately on behalf of what they at least believed to be the cause of the country.

They undoubtedly fought at a disadvantage. The men in whom they had been accustomed to repose their confidence suddenly moved from their side, and went over to the camp of their adversaries. It was not the ministers alone, though that would have been aggravation enough; but almost every man of their party who had been accustomed to address the House with anything like acceptance announced his intention of following in the ministerial track. Upon, the bulk of the party the new doctrines had made no impression; but then they were of the class whom nature had formed for the lobby rather page 258 than the floor of the House, and who influenced divisions rather than debates—men who would shrink from the echoes of their own voices if they heard them within the walls of St. Stephen's expressing any more articulate sounds than "Hear, hear." That their rage was at the highest all knew, but many doubted whether even then it would boil over in words. Many excruciating jokes were made against the poor Protectionists, in those days left guideless as a flock of their own sheep when the bellwethers have been removed. It was exultingly proclaimed in Free Trade circles, how each squire at the Carlton was urging his bucolic brother to stand up in the House, and make a martyr of himself in the cause of his country and protection, and how each, as the honour was offered him, passed it round, and professed his willingness to undertake any part but that. He would attend in his place; he would shout himself hoarse in cheering whatever the orators on his side might advance, without at all inquiring into the quality of the address; but as for making a speech himself, that he neither could nor would do! The Free Traders therefore hugged themselves in the expectation of an easy and rapid victory, not because they hoped to convince their opponents, but because they believed their opponents would have nothing to say. The speeches, they asserted, as well as the arguments, would be all on me side. On that point, however, the; were mistaken. Surprised, abandonee, deserted—as they believed, betrayed—the Protectionists still showed in that lour of their extremity the characteristics of their English blood and breeding. Though cowed, they were not panic-stricken; deprived of their old leaders, and hardly as yet knowing in whom to trust, they closed their ranks, stood shoulder to shoulder, and determined to fight it out to the last. Not even on that fearful morning when the British army on the heights of Inkermann fought and won their glorious "soldier's victory," did the stubborn endurance of our race stand out in stronger relief than was manifested by the county members in the hour of their surprise. With the character of the arguments they used we have here nothing to do. History can charitably afford to forget them; but those who would most condemn their perversity will ever be forward to ad-mire the courage with which, believing what they said and did to be right, they devoted themselves to their task, the energy they flung into their cause, and the pertinacious resistance which contested to the last inch of ground what was from the first a manifestly hopeless battle.

After all, there was found to be no lack of speakers. Out of the wreck of the party a few tolerable orators were still found remaining on their side, among whom Mr. Disraeli, having an envenomed personal quarrel to fight out with the Minister, was then as now facile princeps; and there were plenty of youthful aspirants for fame ready to fill up the gaps caused by the desertions. The men who had been for years in the House of Commons and the men who entered yesterday were in some respects on a level; a short and direct way to distinction was open to any one who might have the boldness to snatch and the intellect to retain it. A new party was shaping itself out of the wreck of the old, and its adherents were fully conscious that their success depended on organization, discipline, and, over and above all,—as agents in enforcing both,—leaders. But for the present the leading staff lay on the ground, waiting for the bold hand to grasp it. The glittering prize was displayed full in view to tempt the young and ambitious politician. Who was to be the fortunate man that in this hour of chaos would step forth to assuage the jarring elements, assign each man his place, and concentrate and direct the energies of those sanguine but perplexed politicians, who, helpless in their disorganization, stood ready to welcome the first who should prove himself fit for command, to elevate him on their shields, and proclaim him for their chief. Aspirations after such a page 259 prize flitted across the brain of more than one rising statesman, whose speeches had heretofore met with more than usual acceptance. One in particular, we recollect—an amiable and accomplished gentleman, slightly tinged with vanity, on whom the grave has since prematurely closed—took it on him, at one unlucky moment of more than usual elation, to thank the members of his party for their devotion, and, as if he had already been installed at their head, to assure them that their constancy in attending through the discussions had been particularly gratifying "to my mind." the burst of irrepressible laughter which followed from his own friends completely and for ever extinguished the pretensions of the kind-hearted egotist. But not the less the necessity of having a leader was acknowledged; and this small outburst of individual ambition served, perhaps, to hasten the decision. When rival pretenders are in the field, it is time that the dictator should be distinctly proclaimed. Yet the decision of the party, when it was announced, took the world by surprise, and supplied matter for inexhaustible ridicule to their opponents. Their choice fell on Lord George Bentinck—a nobleman who could not be said to be unknown to the world, for his name had been associated for years with the proceedings on every race-course in England; but as a politician he had never been heard of. For twenty years indeed he had sat in the House of Commons, as member for the borough of King's Lynn; and there is a tradition that once, during the early part of that period, he seconded the address in reply to the Royal Speech; but all the rest of his parliamentary duties had been confined to the division lobbies. Silent in debate, not very constant in attendance, his preference at all times markedly shown for the hunting-field or the race-course over the dry details of politics, his life had hitherto been that of a fashionable man of pleasure, to whose name the appendage of M.P. is regarded as a graceful ornament, without any corresponding sense of duty or obligation. Was such a man to be entrusted with the management of a great party? How was he, who had been himself so slack in all matters of party discipline, to tighten the reins on the necks of others? He who had ever shown contempt for the details of business—how was he now to throw aside the habits of a lifetime, and devote himself to their mastery? He who hardly knew the forms of the House, or whether it was in or out of committee, except by the fact that the Speaker was in or out of the chair—where was he now to acquire that knowledge of minute and intricate yet important parts of parliamentary pràctice, unfamiliarity with which only exposes a public man the more to ridicule? And, more than all, who ever heard of a party leader that was not at the same time the party orator? Where would be the use of a mute leader in the House of Commons? And yet what better was to be expected from the man who for twenty years had sat in the midst of them, listening to the discussion of the most stirring questions that had ever agitated Europe, without once opening his lips? If he possessed the tongue of fire, however latent, surely some spark must have fallen upon it in all that time to cause it to leap forth in flame! Or was it the danger to the paternal interests that was once again to revive the miracle of ancient days in giving speech to the dumb? The latter explanation was most in favour with the scoffing Free Traders, while the wisest of the Protectionist party looked on the experiment with fear and misgiving, as one akin to the position of their party—a desperate venture in a desperate cause.

But the subject of all these comments admitted of no such misgivings. So many of them as came to his ears only the more nerved him to undertake the task. He came of a race which had ever been conspicuous for warm and strong feelings, and who often concealed under a cold exterior the most chivalrous devotion to a desperate cause. The qualities which Macaulay has immortalised as possessed by the Dutch head of the family had been preserved by him in all page 260 their fine and noble elements, inwrought in the course of generations with all that was frank, open, and manly in the character of an English gentleman. How such rare qualities should have been wasted during the best, and alas! much the longest, portion of Lord George's lifetime, is to be imputed probably to the luxurious and enervating era of the Regency in which his early life was cast; but it shows how little those follies had affected his noble nature, that at the call of his party he so readily threw them all aside, and devoted himself to the work of those who had called him from his inglorious ease. Whatever his inward sense of disqualification might be, it is certain that he allowed no symptoms of them to escape him. He ex-changed, to use one of his own rough and vigorous similes, the pike of the soldier for the truncheon of the general with as much ease and dignity as if he had carried the latter all his life. It was a favourite theory among the party then—a theory created by the exigencies of their own position—that there was no mystery in politics; that an honest heart and an unvarnished tongue were all that were wanted for the government of England. Of course the new chief was a loud assertor of a doctrine that told so much in his own favour; but he did not the less set himself in private to prepare for the task he had under-taken. One of the reproaches he seems to have felt most keenly was the objection that he could not make a long speech. It is said that, nettled by the sarcasm, he introduced his turf habits into the councils of the party, and offered any odds that he would address the House of Commons in a speech of three hours' duration. There were plenty of kindred spirits among the Protectionists to accept the bet, and from that time forward Lord George and his three hours' speech became a standing subject for ridicule, till, as we shall presently see, it proved to be neither joke nor fable. His first essay in the House, however, was one of a much more modest nature. On that memorable night when Sir Robert Peel unfolded his Corn-Law project amidst the dead silence of those who had all his lifetime been his supporters, and the enthusiastic cheers of those who only once before, and then at the expense of a similar party desertion, had found themselves on the same side with him—he had no sooner sat down than he was assailed on all sides with questions, many of them honestly put on points that had been left obscure, but the greater portion ensnaring and entangling in their character, intended to entrap him into some unguarded admission, or to show that he had left some great interest unconsidered These snares, however, the great minister snapped as easily as Samson did the green withes; and he was on the point of issuing from the ordeal, all the more strengthened in his position, when, from the end of one of the backmost benches below the gangway, rose a tall, slender, graceful figure, who in a voice clear and well modulated, though slightly nervous, begged to ask if the minister had considered the effect of the Corn-Law repeal on the position of the farmers under the Tithe Commutation Act. Sir Robert was evidently taken by surprise : he for the first time faltered and hesitated in his reply, and at length admitted he had not adverted to that point, but added, to cover his retreat, that he did not believe his measure would operate to injure the position of the farmer. This palpable hit delighted Lord George's followers, who cheered as if the shot, delivered with such an air of simplicity, and which had gone so directly home, were the sure prelude to their coming triumph. To understand its point, it must be borne in mind that, by the Tithe Commutation Act of England, the farmer pays his tithe, not according to the price of corn in that particular year, but on an average computed according to its price for the seven years preceding, so that any violent derangement, producing a fall in the price, would, in addition to its other evils, entail on the farmer the hardship of paying tithes calculated on a high scale during the years in which he was suffering unwonted depression. This fear, we need not say, turned out to be page 261 as groundless as the other illusions of the party; but at the time it was thought to have hit an uncovered spot in what otherwise appeared to be the complete panoply of the minister.

These were skirmishes. The pitched battle was fought on the second reading of the bill, when the whole forces of the opposition were brought into action. The squirearchy, to the astonishment of their opponents, and not less, perhaps, of themselves, displayed an extraordinary amount of the speaking faculty. Instead of the discussion being all on one side, as the Free Traders had somewhat boastfully predicted, the hitherto silent Protectionists took to the trade of oratory with a will, and maintained the wordy contest for three full weeks, debating night after night incessantly, and to the very last showing no lack of aspirants for parliamentary fame. Of the quality of those speeches, as we have already hinted, there is not much to be said; but quality was at that time only a secondary element in the matter. What was wanted was speakers; good, bad, and indifferent, all were welcomed alike who had the courage to face the House, and address "Mr. Speaker." It was touching to witness the devotion of some of these martyrs, who had done violence to their strongest feelings in offering themselves to the notice of the House; but they did not go without a martyr's consolation in the enthusiasm with which platitudes the most trite, paradoxes the most astounding, and sophistries the most glaring, were cheered by common consent of the whole party. Most of these men have since that time sunk back again into the obscurity from which they for the moment emerged; but there are others who, then making their first essay in the House, have since maintained the footing then gained, and have even become men of weight and authority there. Among these may be mentioned the right honourable member for Oxfordshire, Mr. Henley, who on that occasion made the first exhibition of that sharp, shrewd, quick intellect, obtuse enough in dealing with great principles, but marvellous in its power of detecting small flaws in points of detail, which has since rendered him the terror of all who have the charge of bills in the House of Commons. But in the main the debate went along drearily enough. It was the policy of the Free Trade minister to make no attempt to shorten the discussion, but to give the fullest scope to all speakers on both sides, as he rightly considered that one full debate at the outset would smooth the way to more rapid progress hereafter. Nevertheless, towards the close of the third week, it began to be felt by all parties that they had had enough; and by common consent it was arranged that the Friday night of that week should witness the division. The delay that had occurred allowed Mr. Cobden, who had previously been laid aside by indisposition, to take his place among the Free Trade orators who with so much spirit and ability vindicated the measure, and to bring his "unadorned eloquence" to the final triumph of the cause it had contributed so largely to win. The minister had made his reply; all his subordinates had contributed their quota of argument—Sir James Graham, in particular, having tossed off from his shoulders a whole pile of inconsistencies, quoted from Hansard, with the one defiant reply, "I've changed my mind, and there's an end on't;" and at midnight on Friday the question seemed ripe for settlement. But all this while the hero of the Protection party had kept in the background. In the language of the turf, which he at least would not have resented, "the dark horse" was now to be brought out. Lord George Bentinck had waited till this time, that he might have the credit of closing the debate, and send the members to the division lobbies with his words still ringing in their ears, and the spell of his eloquence, if that might be, fresh on their spirits. And now, before an exhausted House and in the midst of loud calls for a division, he arose. With what feelings he contemplated the task before him—how he looked around the House, where he had been so long a quiet listener to the page 262 deliberations he all at once aspired to sway—it would he useless to speculate. But his appearance at once stilled the excited members, and hushed the clamours for a division. There had been much talk of his advent; the expectations of his friends had extended so far among his opponents as to produce a feeling of considerable interest in him; and his rising was looked for with a keen and eager curiosity on all sides. Men were anxious to ascertain whether he would prove himself worthy of the trust reposed in him; and there was, besides, that generous feeling which ever has, and, let us hope, ever will exist in the House of Commons the desire to find in every new speaker a probable accession to the at all times scanty bead-roll of living parliamentary celebrities. So, on his rising, members ceased their impatient outcries, settled themselves in their seats again, glad to compound by the farther delay of an hour or so for the opportunity of hearing the man who was named by the voice of the whole party for the post of future opposition leader. And the impression made at the beginning of his speech was not unfavourable. From the first he showed the graceful self-possession of an English gentleman. He faltered, indeed, terribly; but it was more from want of practice than from nervousness: his tongue seemed as if it were encrusted with the rust of years, and creaked harshly on its hinges, at times altogether refusing to do its master's bid-ding; but that has been the fault of many a great orator at the outset of his career; and every one knows that, if the ideas are there, they will, at whatever cost, force a channel for themselves. The flow of Lord George's eloquence was far from smooth, but it was rendered the more picturesque by its continuous breaking and foaming and gurgling and rushing round the many obstructions which his utter wan of practice threw in his way. His auditors looked kindly on his efforts: not only is a new aspirant for parliamentary fane, but also because the House is always n the mood of

"Honeying to the accents of a lord."

So for an hour or so due order was kept, and a respectful, if not an enthusiastic, audience given by his opponents to statements and arguments which, not very new in themselves, derived little advantage from the way in which they were presented. Here and there, in-deed,' scattered at irregular intervals through the address, there was a rough but apt metaphor, or a vigorous thought, enough to show that the choice of the party was not wholly without excuse; but for the most part all was a dull, dreary level of commonplace, and attention was kept alive only by the interest felt in the speaker's evident struggle to give those commonplaces birth. It was not in human nature to endure much of this. Men got tired at last of listening to a repetition of often refuted arguments, that had not even the merit of being set forth in a now dress : of piles of figures produced, without regard to order or arrangement, but tumbled forth before the House all in a heap, a crude, indigestible mass, while the speaker went stammering, faltering, blundering on, till men's minds grew dizzy, and the very scope and bearing of his argument was lost. At first there were muttered shouts of "time" and "divide," which were instantly treated as a defiance, and drowned in the vehement cheers of his partisans. By-and-by the dissentients became more decided in their opposition, which his friends, nothing disheartened, met again with counter shouts, breathing defiance to their antagonists and encouragement to their champion. As the time went on, these opposing shouts became more continuous and more loud, till at last they swelled into one continuous roar, in which the voice of Lord George Bentinck was wholly drowned. But in the midst of it all, calm, collected, and smiling, Lord George might be seen upon his legs, moving his head, and gesticulating with his arms, as if with them to piece out the imperfections of his tongue, but otherwise as little moved by the din and hubbub that raged all around him as if he had been discoursing with a few friends in his own page 263 dining-room. The effect was curious. As, in some of the sublime compositions of Handel, a thunder-storm of music breaks forth from the choir, and then for an instant or two a single voice is heard pealing forth the strains of praise, or the wail of anguish, to be again as quickly swallowed up in another burst from all the voices in the orchestra, so fared it with Lord George Bentinck; the screams, the shouts, the yells even, that rose around him on all sides affected him not; he knew it was of no use stopping till silence could be obtained; he had his speech to deliver, his three hours to occupy, and on the delivery of his speech, and the occupation of his self-appointed time, he was determined, let come what might. "When the sonorous tones of Mr. Speaker Lefevre, rising high and clear above all the din for a minute or two, awed his refractory subjects into silence, or when sheer exhaustion compelled a momentary lull on both sides, his voice was heard stumbling and struggling, but still placid as ever, setting forth, perhaps, some unintelligible figures about the silk trade, or the varying prices of wool. It was but for a moment; the rival shouters had only paused for breath; and then the battle recommenced, and raged more furiously than ever, while through it all, in calm and in storm the same, the undaunted orator held on his way, and never ceased his efforts, nor allowed the House a respite till the three hours he had undertaken to occupy were expired, and then he sat down with the proud consciousness of a man who under arduous circumstances had done his duty and earned his reward. At three o'clock the House divided, and the fate of the Corn Laws was sealed.

Such as Lord George Bentinck was on that eventful night, such he continued to be through the remainder of his brief career. After this he spoke often and long, showing traces of a vigorous mind, which, if disciplined by early training and practice, might have been capable of great things. But he could never overcome the defects arising from his long silence in the House. He never became a smooth and graceful speaker; to the last his hesitation was painful to the listener. He had one still more capital defect, which seemed innate in his mind, and which would have permanently disqualified him from taking a high place among parliamentary orators; to the last he was incapable of grappling with great principles, and lost himself as well as his hearers in an ocean of details, which he was not able to master or arrange. His notion of a statesman, borrowed in some degree, it must be confessed, from the example of Sir Robert Peel, was that of a man who was deep in a knowledge of" imports and exports—who had the range of manufacturing prices at his fingers' ends; and, from the moment he resolved to embark in politics, he buried himself in a mass of blue-books. Over these he pored by day; and with the undigested results he had obtained from these he surfeited the House by night. It is generally Understood that his insane devotion to them affected his health, and brought to a premature grave a man who, with all his faults and all his perversities, deserves to be regarded by his countrymen as the model type of a high-souled, frank-hearted, manly Englishman.