Given his position and all its difficulties, Melbourne behaved loyally and generously to the Queen and to his successors. He knew the days of his own Government were numbered, and that Peel would succeed him, and he did his best to bring about a more cordial personal feeling between the Queen and Peel and the Tory party. The Queen tells us that to her his word constantly was, “Hold out the olive-branch to them a little;” with Peel, he tried to induce the shy, proud man to put on a little of the courtier and the man of the world. At a Court ball in 1840, “Melbourne went up to Peel and whispered to him with the greatest earnestness, ‘For God’s sake, go and speak to the Queen;’ Peel did not go, but the entreaty and the refusal were both characteristic.” When the long-anticipated fall of the Melbourne Administration came, and the election of 1841 resulted in the return of the Tories to power with a majority of over 80, Melbourne, who had worked unceasingly to reconcile the Queen to the impending change, did not desist from his good offices with her new Ministers.[17] He could not approach them directly, but he took the opportunity after Peel’s Government had been formed of giving them a few hints, through Greville. He met Greville at a dinner-party and took him on one side and said: “‘Have you any means of speaking to _these chaps_?’ I said, ‘Yes, I can say anything to them.’ ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I think there are one or two things Peel ought to be told, and I wish you would tell him. Don’t let him suffer any appointment he is going to make to be talked about, and don’t let her hear it through anybody but himself; and whenever he does anything, or has anything to propose, let him explain to her clearly his reasons. The Queen is not conceited; she is aware there are many things she cannot understand, and she likes to have them explained to her elementarily, not at length and in detail, but shortly and clearly; neither does she like long audiences, and I never stayed with her a long time. These things he should attend to, and they will make matters go on more smoothly.’” Greville conveyed the message, which was taken in exceedingly good part, and from 1841 onwards till his death the relations between Sir Robert Peel and the Queen were all that could be desired. Her former antipathy was changed into cordial respect and admiration; when he lost his shyness and reserve, and was able to show himself in his real character, she soon appreciated the very fine qualities of the man, far transcending in real worth those of the Minister whom in the beginning of her reign she had so strongly preferred. When Peel’s Ministry had been in office a few months, Greville asked Sir James Graham, the Home Secretary, how they were going on with the Queen. He said, “Very well. They sought for no favor, and were better without it. She was very civil, very gracious, and even on two or three little occasions, she had granted favors in a way