when he had to defend the cashiering of the gallant Sir Robert Wilson on account of his conduct at the funeral of Queen Caroline. He was especially happy when answering a pertinacious opponent, for instance, when he informed the habitually inaccurate Joseph Hume that "an ancient sage said that there were two things over which even the immortal gods had no power, namely, past events and arithmetic. The honourable gentleman, however, seemed to have power over both.” But the best monument of Palmerston's powers at this time is an admirable paper on the historical character and position of the Secretary at War, which he drew up on the occasion of a dispute between the Commanderin-Chief, Sir David Dundas, and himself as to their respective spheres of action. Addressed to the Prince Regent, who, as usual, solved the difficulty by leaving it alone, it set forth with great clearness and evident research, that "it had never belonged to the Commanderin-Chief to issue by his authority orders and regulations respecting the public money," but that the Secretary at War was the accustomed and proper channel for any signification of the royal pleasure on such subjects.*

Having accompanied Lord Palmerston to the first stepping-stone of his official career, we may as well pause to consider what manner of man he was. The key to his character is perhaps to be found in the fact that while doing the Governments of Perceval and Liverpool genuine service in the House and at the War Office, he was, in conjunction with Croker and

There was at this time a Secretary at War who controlled army expenditure, and a Secretary for War, who had the direction of military operations. Lord Palmerston was simply the financier of the forces, and had nothing to do with the campaigns in the Peninsula and elsewhere. Thus he was hardly an "organizer of victory," though his functions were of considerable importance.

Peel, amusing himself and his friends, and probably annoying his foes not a little, by a series of squibs contributed to the Courier and other Ministerial papers, which were afterwards republished under the title of The New Whig Guide. Some of the parodies of Byron are almost worthy of the Anti-Jacobin; but they were probably Croker's, not Palmerston's. However, the

poem on "The Choice of a Leader," which may be attributed with confidence to Palmerston, contains some amusing lines, for instance, the following burlesque of a famous speech of Sir James Mackintosh against the annexation of Heligoland:

But scarcely less vile than the seizure of Poland
Has been their base conduct to poor Heligoland;
That innocent isle we have stolen from the Danes,

And it groans with the weight of our trade and our chains.

On that happy strand, not two lustres ago,

The thistle was free with luxuriance to grow;
The people at liberty starved, and enjoyed
Their natural freedom, by riches uncloy'd.
But now all this primitive virtue is fled;
Rum, sugar, tobacco, are come in its stead.
And debauch'd by our profligate commerce, we see
This much-injured race drinking porter and tea,
And damning, half-fuddled (I tell it in pain),
Their true and legitimate master-the Dane!

Their connection with the New Whig Guide was subsequently the cause of a very animated passage of arms between Croker and Palmerston.

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Though the light and jaunty manner of the author of "The Choice of a Leader," was considerably against him among serious politicians, he could hardly fail to be popular in society. Cupid," as he was called, was a great dandy, frequenting chiefly the company of the Whigs, notably of Sheridan, at whose table he was present on the famous occasion when the bailiffs acted

as waiters. Palmerston's account of the dinner, as chronicled by Mr. Hayward, was that "Sheridan, Canning, Frere, and others, including myself, had agreed to form a society (projected, you may remember, by Swift) for the improvement of the English language. We were to give dinners in turn; Sheridan gave the first, and my attention was attracted by the frequent appeals of the improvised servants to Mr. Sheridan.' And did you improve the language?' 'Not, certainly, at that dinner; for Sheridan got drunk, and a good many words of doubtful propriety were employed.'" It was probably from the recollection of old acquaintance, though the two men did not frequent the same circles, that Palmerston, when Foreign Secretary, appointed the broken-down Beau Brummel to the British Consulate at Caen. He was admitted to the jealously exclusive circle of Almack's, where, on the introduction of the waltz into England, he might be seen whirling round with Madame de Lieven, the wife of the Russian Ambassador, an intimacy which cooled considerably in after life. Of course he was on the turf, but, though enough to amuse, not enough to ruin; for he is said seldom to have betted, and throughout his long racing career rarely owned more than three or four horses at a time, and took care that they paid their way.* In fact, beneath

* Lord Palmerston's connection with the turf began as far back as 1815, when he ran a filly called Mignonette, at Winchester. He was, as "Nimrod" said, almost exclusively a "provincial sportsman," and the only races of importance which he carried off were the Cesarewitch, with Ilione, in 1840, and the Ascot Stakes with Buckthorn, in 1852. Mainstone was a strong favourite for the Derby of 1860, but failed completely in the race, not without some suspicions of foul play. Baldwin was the only horse of merit owned by Palmerston after the Mainstone fiasco. He was elected an honorary member of the Jockey Club in 1845, and his colours were green jacket and orange cap

the exterior of a man of pleasure lay very shrewd habits of business. He took a share of a slate mine in North Wales, and, in spite of numerous disappointments and a heavy outlay, the speculation proved in the end satisfactory. So, too, when paying visits to his Irish estates, he writes enthusiastically to his brother about the making of roads, the construction of a harbour, the drainage of bogs and the building of schools. It was probably rather in jest than in earnest that he contemplates finding some evangelical follower of Mr. Simeon at Cambridge, and sending him to win his "Jerusalem spurs by a campaign in the parish of Ahamlish "; but he shows a real desire to improve the condition of his tenantry, particularly by the extirpation of the middlemen, or petty landlords. The property at Broadlands was throughout his life the subject of quite as much solicitude.

I have been busy [he wrote to his brother in 1843] reading books on agriculture and horticulture, and trying to acquire some knowledge on those matters which are now become sciences. If one does not know something of them oneself, one can never hope to get one's estate or garden well managed. I have let all my farms at Broadlands that were out of lease, and tolerably well, in spite of the badness of the times. I had a shocking set of bad tenants, but have got rid of most of them, and brought in people with skill and capital. Our new gardener does pretty well, and understands the theory of his department; but he is a Methodist and goes preaching on Sunday, and I fear he thinks too much of his sermons to be very successful in his garden.

Palmerston also preserved game, and seems to have been fond of shooting. Riding to hounds with the neighbouring packs was another of his relaxations. whenever he had leisure for a gallop, which during his later years seldom happened, but exercise on horseback of a more limited character was one of his daily rules, and the personality of his old grey was almost as

familiar to Londoners as his own. "Every other abstinence," was his saying, "will not make up for abstinence from exercise." Always an active man, he was but little of a student, although his knowledge of the chief Latin and English classics was fairly extensive. The quotations from Virgil and Horace, which are to be found in his speeches and letters, are often extremely happy, and he evidently knew Sheridan's plays pretty nearly by heart. But if his critical taste is to be judged by the pension which he bestowed on the poet Close, it was catholic rather than cultivated; and it is significant that in the whole of his published letters there is only one allusion to current literature, and that is to Coningsby. In his later years he was, according to Mr. Hayward, much attracted by the absurd theory that the plays of Shakespeare were really written by Bacon. When the positive testimony of Ben Jonson in the verses. prefixed to the edition of 1623 was adduced, he remarked, “Oh, these fellows always stand up for one another." The argument," says Hayward, "had struck Lord Palmerston by its ingenuity, and he wanted leisure for a searching exposure of its groundlessness. According to the same authority, the game of billiards was Palmerston's favourite amusement indoors, and "fortune favoured him in this as much as in the political game." After three or four flukes he would say, “I think I had better not name my stroke."

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Palmerston's interests were wide, though possibly not very deep. Sir Henry Holland, his doctor, found that he took pleasure in hearing of the latest discoveries. in the physical sciences, more especially astronomy, chemistry, and mechanics, and that he had a singular facility in comprehending the importance of their