CHAPTER CLXXV.

CONCLUSION OF THE LIFE OF LORD LOUGHBOROUGH.

OUR EX-Chancellor, to the great surprise of the new Premier, retained his key of the Cabinet boxes, and continued, unsummoned, actually to attend the meetings of the Cabinet. He was treated on these occasions with respect; but he at last received the following formal dismissal :

CHAP.

CLXXV.

A. D. 1801.

Lord Loughborough's attempt to continue a

member of

the Ca

Letter to

him from

Lord Sidmouth, forbidding him to attend the meetings of the Ca

binet.

"MY DEAR LORD, "A misconception appears to have taken place, in consequence binet. of which I am led to trouble your Lordship from various considerations, and particularly from a sense of duty to the King. I have reason to believe that his Majesty considered your Lordship's attendance at the Cabinet as having naturally ceased upon the resignation of the Seals, and supposed it to be so understood by your Lordship. Much as I should feel personally gratified in having the benefit of your Lordship's counsel and assistance, I will fairly acknowledge to you, that I did not offer to his Majesty any suggestion to the contrary; and, indeed, I must have felt myself precluded from doing so by having previously in more instances than one expressed and acted upon the opinion, that the members of the Cabinet should not exceed that of the persons whose responsible situations in office require their being members of it. Under these circumstances, I feel that I have perhaps given way to a mistaken delicacy, in not having sooner made the communication to your Lordship; but I am persuaded you will see that I should be wanting in duty to the King, and in what is due to yourself, if I delayed it beyond the time when a minute of Cabinet with the names of the persons present must be prepared in order to be submitted to his Majesty.

"I hope your Lordship will give me full credit for the motives by which I can alone be actuated upon this occasion, as well as for the sincere sentiments of esteem and regard with which I am, my dear Lord,

"Your Lordship's most obedient and faithful servant,

* Rossl. MSS.

"HENRY ADDINGTON." *

CLXXV.

CHAP. It would have been well for the dignity of Lord Loughborough's character if he had died on the day of his resigna1801-1804. tion. The world would then have said, that if his life had

He be

comes a

hanger on at Court.

been prolonged, after he was freed from the toils and cares
of office, he would have devoted his great abilities to the
task of reforming and improving the laws of his country, and
that the literary ardour which had burned so bright in his
bosom when he was the associate of David Hume and Adam
Smith, being rekindled, he would have rivalled Clarendon in
handing down to posterity a brilliant history of the times in
which he lived. Unfortunately he survived; and thus his
real destiny is recorded: "A still more crafty successor
obtained both the place he had just quitted in the King's
service, and the place he had hoped to fill in the King's
favour; he was made an Earl; he was laid on the shelf;
and, as his last move, he retired to a villa remarkable for its
want of all beauty and all comforts, but recommended by
its near neighbourhood to Windsor Castle, where the former
Chancellor was seen dancing a ridiculous attendance upon
Royalty, unnoticed by the object of his suit, and marked
only by the jeering and motley crowd that frequented the
terrace. For three years he lived in this state of public
neglect, without the virtue to employ his remaining fa-
culties in his country's service by Parliamentary attendance,
or the manliness to use them for his own protection and
aggrandizement."-There is some rhetorical exaggeration
in this statement; but it is substantially correct.
a reference to the Lords' Journals, we find that the Ex-
Chancellor was tolerably regular in attending the House
during the remainder of the session of 1801 †, and during the

*

By

* I have been informed by my friend and former colleague, Sir William Hore, who occupied this villa with his family during a long vacation, that although it is not remarkable for picturesque beauty, it is very spacious and commodious;;and according to the testimony of Miss Cotes and others, George III., without any real regard for the Ex-Chancellor, always behaved to him with courtesy and seeming kindness.

† Lord Brougham's Statesmen, i. 86.

Having resigned the Great Seal on the 14th of April, he was present on the 18th, 20th, 21st, 22d, 23d, and 27th, as “D3. Loughborough." On the 28th he was introduced as "Earl of Rosslyn," and he appears in the roll as " C. Rosslyn" about as often as any Earl not in office. In 1804 he was present ten times in March, five times in April, four times in May, once in June, and eleven

-

CHAP. CLXXV.

1801-1804. His subsequent in

glorious

the House

of Lords.

sessions of 1802, 1803, and 1804, although he took very little part in its proceedings. He did not at all assist in judicial business, as, without any open quarrel, there was no cordiality between him and his successor; and he merely, like the great bulk of our hereditary legislators, came to lounge in the House a short time before dinner, that he might career in inquire after news, when he had not any more lively occupation. He now and then spoke a few sentences in a conversational tone, but never aimed at an oration. Having once or twice heard him on these occasions, I remember being rather at a loss to conceive how he could have been the formidable opponent of Dunning and Thurlow, of Fox and Burke, although it might be discovered that he had become unnerved by listlessness, and that, if excited, he might still have been capable of great things.

He first opened his mouth as Ex-Chancellor to express his 1802, 1803. approbation of Lord Thurlow's doctrine, that a divorce should be granted on the petition of the wife for the adultery of the husband with the wife's sister.*-When the bill was brought in to indemnify those who should be sued for any thing done under the "Habeas Corpus Suspension Act,” he took merit to the late Administration for having saved the state, and boldly justified their habit of employing spies and informers. † He supported against Thurlow the bill introduced when the Reverend John Horne Tooke was returned to Parliament, to prevent a priest in orders from ever again sitting in the House of Commons,and with some historical research he showed that this regulation was according to ancient usage. The articles of the peace of Amiens coming on to be debated, he censured them, but chiefly confined his objection to the omission of an article to recognize the honour to which the British flag was entitled in the narrow seas

66

'an important right, which implied our dominion of the sea, and the maintenance of which warmed the heart of every

times in July the last of these being the day of the prorogation; and I do not find his name afterwards in the Journals; so that I presume he never again appeared in Parliament.

Ib. 1549.

A. D. 1801.

CHAP. British seaman." ""* When hostilities were recommenced, he CLXXV. supported the Government, saying that Buonaparte's rudeness to Lord Whitworth was a sufficient cause of war, and that his whole conduct since he signed the treaty had been a uniform system of arrogance, insult, and injury.†—In 1804 he made a few unimportant observations on the proceedings against Judge Fox ‡, -on the mode of maintaining the London clergy §, · and on the Insolvent Debtors' Bill. He never again spoke in the House. Such is the inglorious termination of his Parliamentary career!

He is treated

with neg

lect by the new Adminis

tration.

Oct. 1801.

of Port

land's com

man.

--

He appears to have been treated with neglect by all which is not much to be wondered at, considering parties which the little pains he took to preserve his importance as a public The Duke of Portland, the President of the Council, having heard of his complaints of the slights he experienced from the Government, and of his saying that "he now knew The Duke nothing except what he read in the newspapers," became alarmed lest he might actually join the Opposition, and thus passion for wrote to Lord Chancellor Eldon: "The most perfect means should be taken to put an end to the sort of language which is held by Lord Rosslyn to remove from him all cause of complaint upon the ground of want of attention, or shyness, on the part of those who compose the Administration. With permission, I cannot help thinking that the station you hold gives you a particular title to commiserate and consult with him; and excuse me for adding, that I am very anxious that the suggestion I have ventured to throw out respecting Lord Rosslyn may be approved and adopted by you."

him.

But it is not wonderful to see him so fallen as to be a fit object for the commiseration of his former friends, when we find that his great object of ambition now really was the personal notice of the Sovereign. We have observed that as he became alienated from Mr. Pitt he enlisted himself in the band of "King's friends." His Majesty, who, notwithstanding his apparent bluntness, had considerable powers of dissimulation, thenceforth treated him with such seeming confidence as to lead the wary Scotsman into the delusion

* 35 Parl. Hist. 723. † Ib. 1511.
§ Parl. Debates, vol. xi. 1109.

Parl. Debates, vol. xi. 925. || Ib. 1130.

CLXXV.

1801-1804.

His resi

dence at

Baylis, near Wind

that he was a special favourite. Even when superseded CHAP by Eldon, the King still induced him to believe that this was only for political reasons, and that personally his Majesty was affectionately attached to him having taken an opportunity to tell him that "the Queen, likewise, found much pleasure in his society, and that they both desired to see him as much as possible at Court." This conversation, which he took au pied de la lettre, was the cause of his hiring the ugly villa of Baylis, near Slough, that he might be near Windsor*, and he did frequently throw himself in the sor. way of the Royal Family while they were resident there. He likewise followed them to Weymouth, where they spent a considerable part of every summer, and was greatly delighted to be noticed by them on the Esplanade, or to be invited to join their excursions on the water. In August 1801, from Weymouth, he writes a letter to Lord Auckland tendance which, after touching on some private matters, and showing that he was on very familiar terms with the Queen and the princesses, thus proceeds: "I can with perfect satisfaction mouth, confirm to you all that you may have heard of their Majesties' perfect health. The King, I think, has at no time when I have had the means of seeing him every day, and often all the day, appeared to be in so steady a state of health. He might at times appear, to those who have always seen him in high spirits, to be rather low; but the case really is, that his manner is much more composed, and he is always ready to enter into conversation when it is going on, though he

* He likewise had a farm at Baylis, which he seems to have bargained for with great deliberation. I find the following memorandum in his handwriting:

"1. What should be a fair rent?

"2. How far, at a rent of 40s., parts might be underlet?

"3. What number of horses would be necessary for the farm? Expense of their keep?

"4. What number of men? Whether two to each team sufficient for all the work, as ploughing, &c.?

5. What the allowance to bailiff?

"6. What ought to be the produce to cover rent, taxes, tithes, and the charge of management?"

Among his papers are very minute accounts of the farm, the number of labourers employed, and the operations of each day throughout the year. Rossl. MSS.

-

His at

on the

King at

Wey