The Greville Memoirs, Part 2 (of 3), Volume 1 (of 3): A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852Greville, Charles
History
The Greville Memoirs, Part 2 (of 3), Volume 1 (of 3): A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852
Greville, Charles
Great Britain -- History -- Victoria, 1837-1901
This is a very large place, the house immense, with no good room
in it but the dining room. The country is generally flat, but
there are fine trees and thriving plantations, so that it is
altogether sufficiently enjoyable. It is a strange thing to see
Stanley here; he is certainly the most natural character I ever
saw; he seems never to think of throwing a veil over any part of
himself; it is this straightforward energy which makes him so
considerable a person as he is. In London he is one of the great
political leaders, and the second orator in the House of Commons,
and here he is a lively rattling sportsman, apparently devoted to
racing and rabbit-shooting, gay, boisterous, almost rustic in his
manners, without refinement, and if one did not know what his
powers are and what his position is, it would be next to
impossible to believe that the Stanley of Knowsley could be the
Stanley of the House of Commons.
Just before I left London, the Proclamation of the King of
Hanover appeared, by which he threw over the new Constitution.
Lyndhurst told me of it, before I had seen it, with many
expressions of disappointment, and complaining of his folly and
of the bad effect it would produce here. The Government papers
have taken it up, though rather clumsily, for the purpose of
connecting this violent measure with the Tory party; but it is a
great folly in the Opposition, and in the journals belonging to
them, not to reject at once and peremptorily all connexion with
the King of Hanover, and all participation in, or approbation of,
his measures. Lyndhurst told me that the King had all along
protested against this Constitution, and refused to sign or be a
party to it; that he contended it was illegal, inasmuch as the
States by which it had been enacted had been illegally convoked;
that he was _able_ to do what he has done by his independence in
point of finance, having a great revenue from Crown lands. The
late King was very anxious to give this up, and to have a Civil
List instead; but when this was proposed, the Duke of Cumberland
exerted his influence successfully to defeat the project, and it
was accordingly thrown out in the Senate (I think the Senate) by
a small majority. Though we have nothing to do with Hanover, this
violence will, no doubt, render him still more odious here than
he was before, and it would be an awful thing if the Crown were,
by any accident, to devolve upon him. The late King's desire to
effect this change affords an indisputable proof of the sincerity
of his constitutional principles, and it is no small praise that
he was satisfied with a constitutional sovereignty, and did not
hanker after despotic power.
July 25th, 1837 {p.012}
[Page Head: RESULT OF THE ELECTIONS.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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