Victorian worthies

But whatever offence Carlyle committed with his ungovernable tongue or pen, he had rare virtues in conduct. His generosity was as unassuming as it was persistent; and it began at home. Long before he was free from anxieties about money for himself, he was helping two of his brothers to make a career, one in agriculture, and the other in medicine. In his latter days he regularly gave away large sums in such a way that no one knew the source from which they came. His letters show a deep tenderness of affection for his mother, his wife, and others of the family; and the humble Annandale home was always in his thoughts. His charity embraced even those whose claim on him was but indirect. When his wife was dead, he could remember to celebrate her birthday by sending a present to her old nurse. He was scrupulous in money-dealing and frugal in all matters of personal comfort; in his innermost thoughts he was always pure-hearted and sincere; for nothing on earth would he traffic in his independence or in adherence to the truth.

His style has not largely influenced other historians; and this is as well, since imitations of it easily fall into mere obscurity and extravagance. But his historical method has been of great value, the patient study of original authorities, the copious references quoted, the careful indexing, all being proof how anxious he was that the subject should be presented clearly and veraciously, rather than that the books should shine as literary performances. How far the principles which he valued and taught have spread it is difficult to say. Party politicians still appeal to the sacred name of liberty without inquiring what true liberty means; publicists still speak as if the material gains of modern life, cheap food and machine-made products, meant nothing but advance in the history of the human race; but there are others who look to the spiritual factors and wish to enlarge the bounds of political economy.

The writings of Carlyle, and of Ruskin, on whom fell the prophet's mantle, certainly made their influence felt in later books devoted to that once 'dismal' science. Few can be quite indifferent to the man or to his message. Those who demand moderation, clearness, and Attic simplicity, will be repelled by his extravagances or by his mysticism. Others will be attracted by his glowing imagination and by his fiery eloquence, and will reserve for him a foremost place in their affections. These will echo the words which Emerson was heard to say on his death-bed, when his eyes fell on a portrait of the familiar rugged features, 'That is the man, my man'.

sir robert peel
From the painting by J. Linnell in the National Portrait Gallery

SIR ROBERT PEEL

In the years that lay between the Treaty of Utrecht and the close of the Napoleonic wars British politics were largely dominated by Walpole and the two Pitts: their great figures only stand out in stronger relief because their place was filled for a time by such weak ministers as Newcastle and Bute, as Grafton and North. In the nineteenth century there were many gifted statesmen who held the position of first minister of the Crown. Disraeli and Palmerston by shrewdness and force of character, Canning and Derby by brilliant oratorical gifts, Russell and Aberdeen by earnest devotion to public service, were all commanding figures in their day, whose claims to the chieftainship of a party and of a government were generally admitted. Gladstone, the most versatile genius of them all, had abilities second to none; but his place in history will for long be a subject of acute controversy. He stands too close to our own time to be fairly judged. Of the others no one had the same combination of gifts as Sir Robert Peel, no one had in the same measure that particular knowledge, judgement, and ability which characterize the statesman. His career was the most fruitful, his work the most enduring: he has left his mark in English history to a degree which no one of his rivals can equal.

The Peel family can be traced back to the misty days of Danish inroads. Its original home in England is disputed between Yorkshire and Lancashire; but as early as the days of Elizabeth the branch from which our statesman was descended is certainly to be found at Blackburn, and its members lived for generations as sturdy yeomen of that district. The first of them known to strike out an independent line was his grandfather, Robert Peel, who with his brother-in-law, Mr. Haworth, started the first firm for calico-printing in Lancashire about the year 1760, ceasing the practice of sending the material to be printed in France. This grandfather was a type of the men who were making the new England, leading the way in the creation of industries that were to transform the North and Midlands. The business prospered and he moved from Blackburn to Burton-on-Trent, where he built three new mills. His third son, named Robert, was also gifted with resource. Beginning as a member of the family firm, he soon came to be its chief director, and added another branch at Tamworth, where later he built the house of Drayton Manor, the family seat in the nineteenth century. He was a Tory and a staunch follower of the younger Pitt, who rewarded his services with a baronetcy in 1800. He too was a typical man of his age and class, an age of material progress and expansion, a class full of self-confidence and animated by a spirit of stubborn resistance to so-called un-English ideas. His eldest son, the third Robert and the second baronet, is our subject. It is impossible to grasp the springs of his conduct unless we know what traditions he inherited from his forbears.

Peel's education was begun at home with a specific purpose. Though his father had every reason to be satisfied with his own success, for his son he cherished a yet higher ambition and one which he did not conceal. He said openly that he intended him to be Prime Minister of his country. The knowledge of this provoked many jests among the boy's friends and caused him no slight embarrassment. It conspired with the shyness and reserve, which were innate in him, to win him from the outset a reputation for pride and aloofness. If he had not been forced to mix with those of his own age, and if he had not resolutely set himself to overcome this feeling, he might have grown into a student and a recluse. Both at school and college he did 'attend to his book': at Harrow he roused the greatest hopes. His brilliant schoolfellow, Lord Byron, while claiming to excel him in general information and history, admits that Peel was greatly his superior as a scholar. The working of their minds, now and afterwards, was curiously different. Bagehot[6] illustrates the contrast by a striking metaphor: Byron's mind, he says, worked by momentary eruptions of volcanic force from within and then relapsed into inactivity. Peel on the other hand steadily accumulated knowledge and opinions, his mind receiving impressions from outward experience like the alluvial soil deposited by a river in its course. But this is to anticipate. At Oxford Peel was the first man to win a 'Double First' (i.e. a first class both in classics and mathematics), in which distinction Gladstone alone, among our Prime Ministers, equalled him. But he also found time during the term to indulge in cricket, in rowing, and in riding, while in the vacation he developed a more marked taste for shooting, and thus freed himself from the charge of being a mere bookworm. He was good-looking, rather a dandy in his dress, stiff in his manner, regular in his habits, conforming to the Oxford standards of excellence and as yet showing few signs of independence of character.

Peel went into Parliament early, after the fashion of the day. He was twenty-one when, in 1809, a seat was offered him at Cashel in Ireland. The system of 'rotten boroughs' had many faults—our text-books of history do not spare it—but it may claim to have offered an easy way into Parliament for some men of brilliant talents. Peel's family connexions and his own training marked out the path for him. It was difficult for the young Oxford prizeman not to follow Lord Chancellor Eldon, that stout survival of the high old Tories: it was impossible for his father's son not to sit behind the successors of Pitt. We shall see how far his own reasoning powers and clear vision led him from this path; but the early influences were never quite effaced. His first patron was Lord Liverpool, to whom he became private secretary in the following year. This nobleman, described by Disraeli in a famous passage as an 'arch-mediocrity' was Prime Minister for fifteen years. He owed his long tenure of office largely to the tolerance with which he allowed his abler lieutenants to usurp his power: perhaps he owed it still more to the victories which Wellington was then winning abroad and which secured the confidence of the country; but at least he seems to have been a good judge of men. In 1811 he promoted Peel to be Under-Secretary for the Colonies, and in 1812 to be Chief Secretary for Ireland. His abilities must have made a great impression to win him such promotion: he must have had plenty of self-confidence to undertake such duties, for he was only twenty-four years old. We are accustomed to-day to under-secretaries of forty or forty-five; but we must remember that the younger Pitt led the House of Commons at twenty-four and was Prime Minister at twenty-five.

At Dublin Castle Peel was not expected to deal with the great political questions which convulsed Parliament at different periods of the century. He had to administer the law. It was routine work of a tedious and difficult kind; it involved the close study of facts—not in order to make a showy speech or to win a case for the moment, but in order to frame practical measures which would stand the test of time. Peel eschewed the usual recreations of Dublin society, and flung himself into his work whole-heartedly. In Roman history we see how Caesar was trained in the details of administration as quaestor, aedile, praetor, consul, while Pompeius passed in a lordly progress from one high command to another; how Caesar voluntarily exiled himself from Rome for ten years to conquer and develop Gaul, while Cicero bewailed himself over a few months' absence from the Forum. Of these three famous men only one proved himself able to guide the ship of state in stormy waters. Analogy must not be too closely pressed; but we see that, while Canning for all his ability established no durable influence, and his oratory burnt itself out after a brief blaze, while Wellington's fame paled year after year from his inability to control the course of civil strife, Peel's light burnt brighter every decade, as he rose from office to office and faced one difficult situation after another with coolness and success. He stayed at his post in Dublin for six years: he worked at the details of his office—education, agriculture, and police—and brought in many practical reforms. His beneficial activity is still better seen in the years 1821 to 1827 when he was Home Secretary. To-day he is chiefly remembered as the eponymous hero of our police; but in many other ways his tenure of the latter office is a landmark in departmental work. It may be that he originated little himself: that Romilly was the pioneer in the humanizing of law, that Horner taught him the doctrines of sound finance, that Huskisson led the way in freeing trade from the shackles with which it had been bound. But Peel in all these cases lent generous support and made their cause his own. He had a cool head and a warm heart, a knowledge of Parliament and an influence in Parliament already unrivalled. He saw what could be done, and how it could be done, and so he was able to push through successfully the reforms which his colleagues initiated. The value of his work in this sphere has never been seriously contested.

The point on which Peel's enemies fastened in judging his career was the number of times that he changed his convictions, abandoned his party, and carried through a measure which he himself had formerly opposed. To understand his claim to be called a great statesman it is particularly necessary to study these changes.

The first instance was the Reform of the Currency. Early in the French wars the London banks had been in difficulties. The Government was forced to borrow large sums from the Bank of England in order to give subsidies to our allies, and was unable to pay its debts. The Bank could not at the same time meet the demands of the Government and the claims of its private customers. Since a panic might at any moment cause an unprecedented run on its reserves, Pitt suspended cash payments till six months after the conclusion of peace. The Bank was thus allowed to circulate notes without being obliged to pay full cash value for them immediately on demand, and the purchasing power of these notes tended to vary far more than that of a metal currency. Also foreigners refused to accept a pound note in the place of a pound sterling; foreign payments had to be made in specie, and the gold was rapidly drained abroad. When the war was over, Horner and other economists began to draw attention to the bad effect of this on foreign trade and to the varying price of commodities at home, due to the want of a fixed currency. As Pitt had allowed the system of inconvertible paper, the Tories generally applauded and were ready to perpetuate it. The elder Sir Robert Peel had been always a firm supporter of these views and his son began by accepting them. He continued to acquiesce in them till his attention was definitely turned to the subject. In 1819 he was asked to be a member of a committee of very eminent men, including Canning and Mackintosh, which was to investigate the question, and he was elected chairman of it. But, though his verdict was taken for granted by his party, his mind was so constituted that he could not shut it against evidence. He listened to arguments, and judged them fairly; and, being by nature unable to palter with the truth, once he was convinced of it, he threw in all his weight with the reformers and reported in favour of a return to cash payments. History has vindicated his judgement, and he himself crowned his financial work by the famous Bank Act of 1844, passed when he was Prime Minister.

The second question on which Peel's conduct surprised his colleagues was that of Catholic Emancipation. Since 1793 Roman Catholic electors had the parliamentary vote; but, since no Roman Catholic could sit in Parliament, they had hitherto been content to cast their votes for the more tolerant of the Protestant candidates. Pitt had failed to induce George III to grant the Catholics civil equality, and George IV, despite his liberal professions, took up the same attitude as his father on succeeding to the throne. But the majority of the Whigs, and some even of the Tories, such as Castlereagh and Canning, were prepared to make concessions; and since 1820 the Irish agitation led by O'Connell had been gaining in strength. Peel had several reasons for being on the other side. His early training by his father, his friendship with Eldon and Wellington, his attachment to the Established Church, all had influence upon him. He saw clearly that Disestablishment would follow closely in Ireland on the granting of the Catholic demands; and since 1817, when he became Member for Oxford University, he felt bound to resist this. In taking this line he was no better and no worse than any other Tory member of the day; and in later times many politicians have allowed their traditions and prejudices to blind them to the existence of an Irish problem.

For all that, Peel ought earlier to have recognized the facts, to have looked ahead and formed a policy. As Chief Secretary for Ireland he had unrivalled opportunities for studying the whole question; but he did not let it penetrate beneath the surface of his mind. He had continued to bring up the same arguments on the few occasions when he spoke at Westminster, and had buried himself in administrative work. He seems to have hoped that he could evade it. If the Whigs got a majority and introduced an Emancipation Bill, he would have satisfied his constituents by formally opposing the measure and would not have gone beyond this. As he saw it gradually coming, he satisfied his own conscience by retiring from Lord Liverpool's Government and by refusing to join Canning, when he became Prime Minister in 1827. As a private member he would only be responsible for his own vote, and would not feel that he was settling the question for others. But Canning died after holding office only a month, and a Government was formed by Wellington in which Peel returned to office as Home Secretary and became leader of the House of Commons. Now he had to pay the penalty for his lack of foresight, and to deal with the tide of feeling which had been rising for some years on both sides of the Irish Channel. At least he could see facts which were before his eyes.

In 1828, before he had been twelve months in office, his decision was aided by a definite event. A by-election had to be fought in Clare, Mr. Fitzgerald seeking re-election on joining the Government. Against him came forward no less a person than Daniel O'Connell himself, the most eloquent and most popular of the Catholic leaders; and, although under the existing laws his candidature was void, he received an overwhelming majority. The bewilderment of the Tories was ludicrous. Fitzgerald himself wrote, 'The proceedings of yesterday were those of madmen; but the country is mad.' Peel took a careful view of the situation and decided on his course. He certainly laid himself open to the charge of giving way before a breach of the law, and the charge was pressed by the angry Tories. But his judgement was clearly based on a complete survey of all the facts. A single event was the candle which lit up the scene, but by the light of it he surveyed the whole room. He still held to his view about the dangers of Disestablishment ahead, but he maintained that a crisis had arisen involving graver dangers at the moment, and that the statesman must choose the lesser of two evils. There is no doubt that the situation was critical. The Duke of Wellington and Lord Anglesey (a Waterloo veteran, who was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland) both had fears of mutiny in the army; and civil war was to be expected, if O'Connell was not admitted to the House of Commons. Peel's personal consistency was one matter; the public welfare was another and a weightier. His first idea was to retire from office and to lend unofficial support to a measure which he could not advocate in principle. But the only hope of breaking down the old Tory opposition lay in the influence of the Tory ministers; no Whig Government could prevail in the temper of that time; and Wellington appealed in the strongest terms to Peel to remain in office and to lead the House. Peel yielded from motives of public policy and made himself responsible for a measure of Catholic Emancipation, which he had been pledged to resist.

It was a surrender—an undisguised surrender—and Peel did not, as on the Bullion Committee, profess to have changed his mind. But it was an honest surrender carried out in the light of day; and, before Parliament met, Peel announced his decision to resign his seat at Oxford and to give his constituents the chance of expressing their opinion of his conduct. The verdict was not long in doubt: the University, which in 1865 rejected another of its brilliant sons, gave a majority of one hundred and forty-six against him, and his political connexion with Oxford was severed. The verdict of posterity has been more liberal. The chief fault laid to Peel's charge is that he should for so many years have ignored all signs of the danger which was approaching, and not have made up his mind in time. He could see the crisis clearly, when it came, and could put the national interest above everything else: he could not look far enough ahead.

It was a similar want of foresight that led to the fall of the Tory Government in 1830. The Reform movement, so long delayed by the great wars, had been gathering force again. Events in France, where Charles X was driven from the throne and Louis Philippe proclaimed as Citizen-king, gave it additional impetus. The famous lawyer Brougham was thundering against the Government in Parliament, while throughout the country the platforms from which Radical orators declaimed were surrounded by eager throngs. The history of the movement cannot be told here. Its chief actors were the Whigs, who on Wellington's resignation formed a Government under Earl Grey at the end of 1830. Peel was fighting a losing fight and he did not show his usual judgement or cool temper. He opposed the Reform Bill to the last: he was haranguing violently against it when Black Rod arrived to summon the Commons to the presence of the King. William IV came down in person, at the instance of the Whig ministers, to dissolve Parliament and so to stay all proceedings by which, in the as yet unreformed Parliament, the Bill might have been defeated. In the General Election of 1831 the Whigs carried all before them, and in July, when Lord Grey carried the second reading, he could command a majority of 136. Even then it took three months of stubborn fighting to vanquish the Tory opposition in the House of Commons. When the Peers rejected the Bill, the question was raised whether a Tory Government could be formed; but Peel, however he might dislike the Bill, could recognize facts, and his refusal to co-operate in defying public opinion was decisive. Lord Grey returned to office fortified by the King's promise to make any number of new peers, if required; and the influence of Wellington was effective in dissuading the Upper House from further futile resistance. Again Peel had shown his good sense in accepting the situation. So far as he was concerned, there was no talk of repeal. He explicitly said that he regarded the question as 'finally and irrevocably disposed of', and he set to work to adapt his policy to the new situation.

It might well seem a desperate one for the Tories. Here were three hundred new members, most of whom had just received their seats from the Whigs against the direct opposition of their rivals. Gratitude and self-interest impelled them to support the Whig party; and its leaders, who had for nearly fifty years been out in the cold shade of opposition, might count on a long spell of power, especially as the Canningites, stronger in talents than in numbers, joined them at this juncture. Brougham had gone to the House of Lords, but three future Prime Ministers—Stanley (afterwards Lord Derby), Lord John Russell, and Palmerston—were in the House of Commons serving under Lord Althorp, who, though gifted with no oratorical talent, by his good sense and still more by his high character, commanded general respect. On the other side there was only one figure of the first rank, and that was Peel. Till 1832 he had not grown to his full stature: the Reformed Parliament gave him his chance and drew forth all his powers. It represented a new force in politics. No longer were the members sent to Westminster by a few great land-holders, by the small market towns, and by the agricultural labourers. The great industrial districts, Lancashire, Yorkshire, and the Midlands, were there in the persons of well-to-do citizens, experienced in business and serious in temper; and Peel, who was himself sprung from a notable family of this kind, was eminently the man to lead these classes and to win their confidence. It was also a gain to him to stand alone. His judgement was ripened, his confidence firm; and he could dominate his party, while the able and ambitious leaders on the other side too often clashed with one another. Above all, in the years 1832 to 1834, he showed that he had patience. Instead of snatching at occasions to ally himself with O'Connell, who was in opposition to every Government, and to embarrass the Whigs in a factious party-spirit, he showed a marked respect for principle. He supported or opposed the Whig bills purely on their merits, and gradually trained his party to be ready for the inevitable reaction when it should come.

By 1834 the tendencies to disruption in the victorious party were clearly showing themselves. First Stanley, on grounds of policy, and then Lord Grey, for personal reasons never quite cleared up, resigned office. Soon after, Lord Althorp left the House of Commons on succeeding to his father's earldom, and a little later Melbourne, the new Premier, was unexpectedly dismissed by the King. At the time Peel, expecting no immediate crisis, was abroad, in Rome; and we have interesting details of his slow journey home to meet the urgent call of Wellington, who was carrying on the administration provisionally. The changes of the last few years were shown by the fact that the Tories felt bound to choose their Premier from the Lower House. It was Wellington who recommended Peel for the place which, under the old conditions, he might have been expected to take himself. On his return, Peel accepted the task of forming a ministry, and, conscious of the numerical weakness of his own party, he made overtures to some of the Whigs. But Stanley and Graham[7] refused to join him, and he had to fall back on the Tories of Wellington's last Government. Before going to the country he laid down his principles in the famous Tamworth Manifesto.[8] This manifesto is important for its acceptance of the changes permanently made by the Reform Bill, and for the clear exposition of his attitude towards the important Church questions which were imminent. It is an excellent document for any one to study who wishes to understand the evolution of the old Tories into the modern Conservative party.

Peel's first administration was not destined to last long. The Liberal wave was not spent, and the Tories had little to hope for, at this moment, from a General Election. As so often happened afterwards, when the two English parties were evenly balanced, the Irish votes turned the scale. Peel had been forced into this position by the King: his own judgement would have led him to wait some years. He fought dexterously for four months, helped in some measure by Stanley, who had left the Whigs when they threatened the Established Church in Ireland; but it was this question which in the end upset him. Lord John Russell, in alliance with O'Connell, proposed the disendowment of that Church and defeated Peel by thirty-three votes. It was a question of principle, though it was raised in a factious way, and subsequent history showed that the mover, after his tactical victory of the moment, could not effect any practical solution. Peel was driven to resign. But in this short period, so far from losing credit, he had won the confidence of his party and the respect of his opponents; he had put some useful measures on the Statute Book; and he had shown the country that a new spirit, practical and enlightened, was growing up in the Tory party, and that there was a minister capable of utilizing it for the general good.

In the Greville papers and other literature of the time we get many references to the predominant place which he held in the esteem of the House of Commons. An entry in Greville's journal for February 1834 shows Peel's unique power. 'No matter how unruly the House, how impatient or fatigued, the moment he rises, all is silence, and he is sure of being heard with profound attention and respect.' Lady Lyttelton,[9] who met him later at Windsor, shows us another aspect. His readiness and presence of mind come out in the most trivial matters. When Queen Victoria suddenly, one evening, issued her command that all who could dance were to dance, the more elderly guests were much embarrassed. Such an order was not to Peel's taste. 'He was, in fact, to a close observer, evidently both shy and cross'; but he was 'much the best figure of all, so mincing with his legs and feet, his countenance full of the funniest attempt to look unconcerned and "matter of course".' Another time when games were improvised in the royal circle, Lady Lyttelton was 'much struck with the quickness and watchful cautious characteristic sagacity which Sir Robert showed in learning and playing a new round game'. And to the ladies-in-waiting he commended himself by his quiet courtesy. 'Sir Robert Peel', we read, 'was in his most conversable mood and so very agreeable. I never enjoyed an evening more.'

Perhaps the best description to show how personally he impressed his contemporaries at this time is given by Lord Dalling and Bulwer in his memoir. Sir Robert Peel, he tells us, was 'tall and powerfully built, his body somewhat bulky for his limbs, his head small and well-formed, his features regular. His countenance was not what would be generally called expressive, but it was capable of taking the expression he wished to give it, humour, sarcasm, persuasion, and command, being its alternate characteristics. The character of the man was seen more... in the whole person than in the face. He did not stoop, but he bent rather forwards; his mode of walking was peculiar, and rather like that of a cat, but of a cat that was well acquainted with the ground it was moving over; the step showed no doubt or apprehension, it could hardly be called stealthy, but it glided on firmly and cautiously, without haste, or swagger, or unevenness.... The oftener you heard him speak, the more his speaking gained upon you.... He never seemed occupied with himself. His effort was evidently directed to convince you, not that he was eloquent, but that he was right.... He seemed rather to aim at gaining the doubtful, than mortifying or crushing the hostile.' These qualities appealed especially to the practical men of business whom the Reform Bill had brought into politics. They were suited to the temper of the day, and his speaking won the favour of the best judges in the House of Commons. Though he disappointed ardent crusaders like Lord Shaftesbury by his apparent coldness and calculating caution, he impressed his fellow members as pre-eminently honest and as anxious to advance in the most effective manner those causes which his judgement approved. He was not the man to lead a forlorn hope, but rather the sagacious commander who directed his troops through a practicable breach.

He was to be in opposition for another six years; but during these years the Whigs were in constant difficulties, and, as Greville notes, it was often obvious that Peel was leading the House from the front Opposition bench. Had he imitated Russell's conduct in 1834 and devoted his chief energies to overthrowing the Whigs, he could have found many an occasion. Sedition in Canada and Jamaica, rivalry with France in the Levant and with Russia in the Farther East, financial troubles and deficits, the spread of Chartist doctrine, all combined to embarrass a Government which had no single will and no concentrated resolution. The accession of Queen Victoria, in 1837, made no change for the moment. But Wellington's famous remark that the Tories would have no chance with a Queen because Peel had no manners and he had no small talk, is only quoted now because of the falsity of the prediction; both politicians soon came to form a better estimate of her judgement and public spirit. It was some years before this could be fairly tested. The Tories, while improving their position, failed to gain an absolute majority in the elections, and Peel's want of tact in insisting on the Queen changing all the ladies of her household delayed his triumph from 1839 to 1841. Meanwhile he spent his energies in training his party and organizing their resources. He studied measures and he studied men, and he gradually gathered round him a body of loyal followers who believed in their chief and were ready to help him in administrative reform when the time should come. Among his most devoted adherents was Mr. Gladstone, at this time more famous as a churchman than as a financier; and even Mr. Disraeli, for all his eccentricities, accepted Peel's leadership without question. Few could then foresee the very different careers that lay before his two brilliant lieutenants.

By 1841 the power of the Whigs was spent. A vote of want of confidence was carried by Peel, the King dissolved Parliament, and the Tories came back with a majority of ninety in the new House of Commons. Now begins the most famous part of Peel's career, that associated with the Repeal of the Corn Laws, the third of his so-called 'betrayals' of his party. No action of his has been so variously criticized, none caused such bitterness in political circles. There is no space here to discuss the value of Protection or the wisdom of the Anti-Corn-Law League, still less the merits or demerits of a fixed duty as opposed to a 'sliding-scale'. We are concerned with Peel's conduct and must try to answer the questions—What were Peel's earlier views on the subject? What caused him to change these views? Was this change effected honestly, or was he guilty of abandoning his party in order to retain office himself?

The Corn Laws, introThatduced in 1670, re-enacted in 1815, forbade any one to import corn into England till the price of home-grown corn had reached eighty shillings a quarter. It is easy to attack a system based on rigid figures applied to conditions varying widely in every century; but the idea was that the English farmer should be given a decisive advantage over his foreign rivals, and only when the price rose to a prohibitive point might the interest of the consumer be allowed to outweigh that of the producer. The revival of the old law in 1815 met with strong opposition. England had greatly changed; the agricultural area had not been widely increased, but there were many more millions of mouths to feed, thanks to the growth of population in the industrial districts. But while in 1815 the House of Commons represented almost exclusively the land-owning and corn-growing classes, between 1815 and 1840 opposition to their policy had lately been growing and had been organized, outside Parliament, by the famous league of which Richard Cobden was the leading spirit. Peel, though he had been brought up by his father a strong Protectionist and Tory, had been largely influenced by Huskisson, the most remarkable President of the Board of Trade that this country has ever seen, and had shown on many occasions that he grasped the principle of Free Trade as well as any statesman of the day. The Whigs had left the finances of the country in a very bad state, and Peel had to take sweeping measures to restore credit. From 1842 to 1845 he brought in Budgets of a Free Trade character, designed to encourage commerce by remitting taxation, especially on raw material; and he made up the loss thus incurred by the Treasury, by imposing an income-tax. To this policy there were two exceptions, the Corn Laws and the Sugar Duties. On the latter he felt that England, since she had abolished slave-owning, had a duty to her colonies to see that they did not suffer by the competition of sugar produced by slave labour elsewhere. On the former he held that England ought, so far as possible, to produce its own food and to be self-sufficing; and as a practical man he recognized that it was too much to expect of the agricultural interest, so strongly represented in both Houses of Parliament, to pronounce what seemed to be its death-warrant. But through these years he came more and more to see that the interest of a class must give way to the interest of the nation; and his clear intellect was from time to time shaken by the arguments of the Anti-Corn-Law League and its orators. In 1845 he was probably expecting that he would tide over this Parliament, thanks to his Budgets and to good harvests, and that at a general election he would be able to declare for a change of fiscal policy without going back on his pledges to the party. Meanwhile his general attitude had been noted by shrewd observers. Cobden himself in a speech delivered at Birmingham said, 'There can be no doubt that Sir Robert Peel is at heart as good a Free Trader as I am. He has told us so in the House of Commons again and again.'

Among the causes which influenced Peel at the moment two are specially noteworthy as reminding us of the way in which his opinion was changed over Catholic Emancipation. Severe critics say that, to retain office, he surrendered to the agitation of Cobden, as he had surrendered to that of O'Connell. Undoubtedly the increasing size and success of Cobden's meetings, which were on a scale unknown before in political agitation, did cause Peel to consider fully what he had only half considered before: it did help to force open a door in his mind, and to break down a water-tight compartment. But Peel's mind, once opened, saw far more than an agitation and a transfer of votes: it looked at the merits of the question and surveyed the interest of the whole country. He had seen that the fall of a Protestant Church was less serious than the loss of Ireland: he now saw that a shock to the agricultural interest was less serious than general starvation in the country. And as with the Clare election, so with the Irish potato famine in 1845: a definite event arrested his attention and clamoured for instant decision. Peel was as humane a man as has ever presided over the destinies of this country, and the picture of Ireland's sufferings was brought forcibly before his imagination by the reports presented to him and by his own knowledge of the country. His personal consistency could not be put in the balance against national distress.

That the manner in which he made the change did give great offence to his followers, there is no room to doubt. Peel was naturally reserved in manner and in his Cabinet he occupied a position of such unquestioned superiority that he had no need of advice to make up his mind, and was apt to keep matters in his own hand. Whether he was preparing to consult his colleagues or not, the Irish potato famine forced his hand before he had done so. When in November 1845 he made suddenly in the Cabinet a definite proposal to suspend the duties on corn, only three members supported him. Year after year Peel had opposed the motion brought in by Mr. Villiers[10] for repeal: only those who had been studying the situation as closely as Peel and with as clear a vision—and they were few—could understand this sudden declaration of a change of policy. After holding four Cabinet councils in one week, winning over some waverers, but still failing to get a unanimous vote, he expressed a wish to resign. But the Whigs, owing to personal disagreements, could not form a ministry and Queen Victoria asked Peel to retain office: it was evident that he alone could carry through the measure which he believed to be so urgent, and he steeled himself to face the breach with his own party. As Lord John Russell had already pledged the Whigs to repeal, the issue was no longer in doubt; but Peel was not to win the victory without heavy cost. Disraeli, who had been offended at not being given a place in the ministry in 1841, came forward, rallied the agricultural interest, and attacked his leader in a series of bitter speeches, opening old sores, and charging him with having for the second time broken his pledges and betrayed his party. The Protectionists could not defeat the Government. In the Commons the Whig votes ensured a majority: in the Lords the influence of Wellington triumphed over the resistance of the more obstinate landowners. The Bill passed its third reading by ninety-eight votes.

But Peel knew how uncertain was his position in view of the hostility aroused. At this very time the Irish question was acute, as a Coercion Bill was under consideration, and this gave his enemies their chance. The Protectionist Tories made an unprincipled alliance for the moment with the Irish members; and on the very day when the Repeal of the Corn Laws passed the House of Lords, the ministry was defeated in the Commons. The moment of his fall, when Disraeli and the Protectionists were loudest in their exultation, was the moment of his triumph. It is the climax of his career. In the long debate on Repeal he had refused to notice personal attacks: he now rose superior to all personal rancour. In defeat he bore himself with dignity, and in his last speech as minister he praised Cobden in very generous terms, giving him the chief credit for the benefits which the Bill conferred upon his fellow-countrymen. This speech gave offence to his late colleagues, Aberdeen, Sidney Herbert, and Gladstone, and was interpreted as being designed to mark clearly Peel's breach with the Conservative party. The whole episode is illustrated in an interesting way in the Life of Gladstone. Lord Morley[11] reports a long conversation between the two friends and colleagues, where Peel declares his intention to act in future as a private member and to abstain from party politics. Gladstone, while fully allowing that Peel had earned the right to retire after such labours ('you have been Prime Minister in a sense in which no other man has been since Mr. Pitt's time'), pointed out how impossible it would be for him to carry out his intentions. His personal ascendancy in Parliament was too great: men must look to him as a leader. But Peel evidently was at the end of his strength, and had been suffering acutely from pains in the head, due to an old shooting accident but intensified by recent hard work. For the moment repose was essential.

It was Gladstone, Peel's disciple and true successor, who seven years later paid the following tribute to his memory: 'It is easy', he said, 'to enumerate many characteristics of the greatness of Sir Robert Peel. It is easy to speak of his ability, of his sagacity, of his indefatigable industry. But there was something yet more admirable... and that was his sense of public virtue;... when he had to choose between personal ease and enjoyment, or again, on the other hand, between political power and distinction, and what he knew to be the welfare of the nation, his choice was made at once. When his choice was made, no man ever saw him hesitate, no man ever saw him hold back from that which was necessary to give it effect.' Though his own political views changed, Gladstone always paid tribute to the moral influence which Peel had exercised in political life, purifying its practices and ennobling its traditions.

For the last four years of his life he was in opposition, but he held a place of dignity and independence which few fallen ministers have ever enjoyed. He was the trusted friend and adviser of Queen Victoria and the Prince Consort; he was often consulted in grave matters by the chiefs of the Government; his speeches both in the House and in the country carried greater weight than those of any minister. Despite the bitterness of the Protectionists he seemed still to have a great future before him, and in any national emergency the country would unfailingly have called him to the helm. But on July 29, 1850, when he was just reaching the age of sixty-two, he had a fall from his horse which caused very grave injuries, and he only survived three days.

The interest of Peel's life is almost absorbed by public questions. He was not picturesque like Disraeli; he did not, like Gladstone, live long enough to be in his lifetime a mythical figure; the public did not cherish anecdotes about his sayings or doings, nor did he lend himself to the art of the caricaturist. He was an English gentleman to the backbone, in his tastes, in his conduct, in his nature. His married life was entirely happy, he had a few devoted friends, he avoided general society; he had a genuine fondness for shooting and country life, he was a judicious patron of art, and his collection of Dutch pictures form to-day a very precious part of our National Gallery. Just because of his aloofness, his gravity, the concentration of his energies, he is the best example that we can study if we want to know how an English statesman should train himself to do work of lasting value and how he should bear himself in the hour of trial. Within little more than half a century three famous politicians, Peel, Gladstone, and Chamberlain, have split their parties in two by an abrupt change of policy, and their conduct has been bitterly criticized by those to whom the traditions of party are dear. It is the glory of British politics that these traditions remained honourable so long, and no one of these statesmen broke with them lightly or without regret. For all that, let us be thankful that from time to time statesmen do arise who are capable of responding to a still higher call, of following their own individual consciences and of looking only to what, so far as they can judge, is the highest interest of the nation.

CHARLES JAMES NAPIER

The famous Napier brothers, Charles, George, and William, came of no mean parentage. Their father, Colonel the Hon. George Napier, of a distinguished Scotch family, was remarkable alike for physical strength and mental ability. In the fervour of his admiration his son Charles relates how he could 'take a pewter quart and squeeze it flat in his hand like a bit of paper'. In height 6 feet 3 inches, in person very handsome, he won the admiration of others besides his sons. He had served in the American war, but his later years were passed in organizing work, and he showed conspicuous honesty and ability in dealing with Irish military accounts. One of his reforms was the abolition of all fees in his office, by which he reduced his own salary from £20,000 to £600 per annum, emulating the more famous act of the elder Pitt as Paymaster-general half a century before. Their mother, Lady Sarah Lennox, daughter of the Duke of Richmond, had been a reigning toast in 1760. She had even been courted by George III, and might have been handed down to history as the mother of princes. In her old age she was more proud to be the mother of heroes; and her letters still exist, written in the period of the great wars, to show how a British mother could combine the Spartan ideal with the tenderest personal affection.

sir charles napier
From the drawing by Edwin Williams in the National Portrait Gallery

Instead of class feeling and narrow interests the boys developed early a great sympathy for the poor, and a capacity for judging people independently of rank. Charles Napier himself, born in Whitehall, was three years old when they moved to Ireland. He was a sickly child, the one short member of a tall family, but equal to any of them in courage and resolution. His heroism in endurance of pain was put to a severe test when he broke his leg at the age of seventeen. It was twice badly set. He was threatened first by the entire loss of it, next with the prospect of a crooked leg, but he bore cheerfully the most excruciating torture in having it straightened by a series of painful experiments, and in no long time he recovered his activity. In the army he showed his strength of will by rigid abstinence from drinking and gambling, no easy feat in those days; and he learned by his father's example to control all extravagance and to live contentedly on a small allowance. His earliest enthusiasm among books was for Plutarch's Lives, the favourite reading of so many great commanders. He had many outdoor tastes: riding, fishing, and shooting, and he was soon familiar with the country-side. There was no need of classes or prizes to stimulate his reading, no need of organized games to provide an outlet for his energies or to fill his leisure time.

The confidence that his father had in the training of his sons is best shown by the early age at which he put them in responsible positions. Charles actually received a commission in the 33rd Regiment at the age of twelve, but he did not see service till he was seventeen. Meanwhile the young ensign continued his schooling from his father's house at Celbridge, to which he and his brother returned every evening, sometimes in the most unconventional manner. Celbridge, like other Irish villages, had its pigs. The Irish pig is longer in the leg and more active than his English cousin, and the Napier boys would be seen careering along at a headlong pace on these strange mounts, with a cheering company of village boys behind them. They were Protestants among older Roman Catholic comrades, but they soon became the leaders in the school, and Charles, despite his youth and small stature, was chosen to command a school volunteer corps at the age of fourteen. At seventeen he joined his regiment at Limerick, and for six or seven years he led the life of a soldier in various garrison towns of southern England, fretting at inaction, learning what he could, and welcoming any chance of increased work and danger. At this time his enthusiasm for soldiering was very variable. In a letter written in 1803 he makes fun of the routine of his profession, as he was set to practise it, and ends up, 'Such is the difference between a hero of the present time and the idea of one formed from reading Plutarch! Yet people wonder I don't like the army!'

But this was a passing mood. When stirring events were taking place, no one was more full of ardour, and when he came under such a general as Sir John Moore he expressed himself in a very different tone. In 1805 Moore was commanding at Hythe, and Charles Napier's letters are aglow with enthusiasm for the great qualities which he showed as an administrator and army reformer. Like Wolseley seventy or eighty years later, Moore had the gift of finding the best among his subalterns and training them in his own excellences. After his own father there was no one who had so much influence as Moore in the making of Charles Napier. In 1808 he sailed for the Peninsula with the rank of major, commanding the 50th Regiment in the colonel's absence; he took an active part in Moore's famous retreat at Coruña, and in the battle was taken prisoner after conduct of the greatest gallantry in leading his regiment under fire. Two months later he was released and again went to the front. In 1810 and 1811 he and his brothers George and William were fighting under Wellington, and were all so frequently wounded that the family fortunes became a subject of common talk. On more than one occasion Wellington himself wrote to Lady Sarah to inform her of the gallantry and misfortunes of her sons. At Busaco Charles had his jaw broken and was forced to retire into hospital at Lisbon. In his haste to rejoin the army, which he did when only half convalescent, he accomplished the feat of riding ninety miles on one horse in a single day; and in the course of his ride met two of his brothers being carried down, wounded, to the base. But in 1811 promotion withdrew Charles Napier from the Peninsula. A short command in Guernsey was followed by another in Bermuda, which involved him in the American war. He had little taste for warfare with men of the same race as himself, and was heartily glad to exchange back to the 50th in 1813, and to return to England. He started out as a volunteer to share in the campaign of Waterloo, but all was over before he could join the army in Flanders, and this part of his soldiering career ended quietly. He had received far more wounds than honours, and might well have been discouraged in the pursuit of his profession.

But here we can put to the test how far Napier's expressions of distaste for the service affected his conduct. He chafed at the inactivity of peace; but instead of abandoning the army for some more profitable career, he used his enforced leisure to prepare for further service and to extend his knowledge of political and military history. He spent the greater part of three years at the Military College, then established at Farnham, varying his professional studies with sallies into the domain of politics, and as a result he developed marked Radical views which he held through life. His note-books show a splendid grasp of principles and a close attention to facts; they range from the enforcing of the death penalty for marauding to the details of cavalry-kit. His Spartan regime became famous in later years; even now he prescribed a strict rule, 'a cloak, a pair of shoes, two flannel shirts, and a piece of soap—these, wrapped up in an oil-skin, must go in the right holster, and a pistol in the left.' He took no opinions at second hand, but studied the best authorities and thought for himself; he was as thorough in self-education as the famous Confederate general 'Stonewall' Jackson, who every evening sat for an hour, facing a blank wall and reviewing in his mind the subjects which he had read during the day.

No opportunity for reaping the fruit of these studies and exercising his great gifts was given him till May 1819. Then he was appointed to the post of inspecting-officer in the Ionian Islands;[12] and in 1822 he was appointed Military Resident in Cephalonia, the largest of these islands, a pile of rugged limestone hills, scantily supplied with water, and ruined by years of neglect and the oppression of Turkish pashas. So began what was certainly the happiest, and perhaps the most fruitful, period in Charles Napier's life. It was not strictly military work, but, without the authority which his military rank gave him and without the despotic methods of martial law, little could have been achieved in the disordered state of the country. The whole episode is a good example of how a well-trained soldier of original mind can, when left to himself, impress his character on a semi-civilized people, and may be compared with the work of Sir Harry Smith in South Africa, or Sir Henry Lawrence in the Punjab. The practical reforms which he initiated in law, in commerce, in agriculture, are too numerous to mention. 'Expect no letters from me', he writes to his mother, 'save about roads. No going home for me: it would be wrong to leave a place where so much good is being done.... My market-place is roofed. My pedestal is a tremendous job, but two months more will finish that also. My roads will not be finished by me.' And again, 'I take no rest myself and give nobody else any.' To his superiors he showed himself somewhat impracticable in temper, and he was certainly exacting to his subordinates, though generous in his praise of those who helped him. He was compassionate to the poor and vigorous in his dealings with the privileged classes; and he gave the islanders an entirely new conception of justice. When he quitted the island after six years of office he left behind him two new market-places, one and a half miles of pier, one hundred miles of road largely blasted out of solid rock, spacious streets, a girls' school, and many other improvements; and he put into the natives a spirit of endeavour which outlived his term of office. One sign of the latter was that, after his departure, some peasants yearly transmitted to him the profits of a small piece of land which he had left uncared for, without disclosing the names of those whose labours had earned it.

During this period, in visits to Corinth and the Morea, he worked out strategic plans for keeping the Turks out of Greece. He also made friends with Lord Byron, who came out in 1823 to help the Greek patriots and to meet his death in the swamps of Missolonghi. Byron conceived the greatest admiration for Napier's talents and believed him to be capable of liberating Greece, if he were given a free hand. But this was not to be. Reasons of State and petty rivalries barred the way to the appointment of a British general, though it might have set the name of Napier in history beside those of Bolivar and Garibaldi; for he would have identified himself heart and soul with such a cause, and, in the opinion of many good judges, would have triumphed over the difficulties of the situation.

From 1830 to 1839 there is little to narrate. The gifts which might have been devoted to commanding a regiment, to training young officers, or to ruling a distant province, were too lightly rated by the Government, and he spent his time quietly in England and France educating his two daughters,[13] interesting himself in politics, and continuing to learn. It was the political crisis in England which called him back to active life. The readjustment of the labour market to meet the use of machinery, and the occurrence of a series of bad harvests had caused widespread discontent, and the Chartist movement was at its height in 1839. Labourers and factory owners were alarmed; the Government was besieged with petitions for military protection at a hundred points, and all the elements of a dangerous explosion were gathered together. At this critical time Charles Napier was offered the command of the troops in the northern district, and amply did he vindicate the choice. By the most careful preparation beforehand, by the most consummate coolness in the moment of danger, he rode the storm. He saw the danger of billeting small detachments of troops in isolated positions; he concentrated them at the important points. He interviewed alarmed magistrates, and he attended, in person and unarmed, a large gathering of Chartists. To all he spoke calmly but resolutely. He made it clear to the rich that he would not order a shot to be fired while peaceful measures were possible; he made it equally clear to the Chartists that he would suppress disorder, if it arose, promptly and mercilessly. With only four thousand troops under his command to control all the industrial districts of the north, Newcastle and Manchester, Sheffield and Nottingham, he did his work effectually without a shot being fired. 'Ars est celare artem': and just because of his success, few observers realized from how great a danger the community had been preserved.

Thus he had proved his versatile talents in regimental service in the Peninsula, in the reclamation of an eastern island from barbarism, and in the control of disorder at home. It was not till he had reached the age of sixty that he was to prove these gifts in the highest sphere, in the handling of an army in the field and in the direction of a campaign. But the offer of a command in India roused his indomitable spirit, the more so as trouble was threatening on the north-west frontier. An ill-judged interference in Afghānistān had in 1841 caused the massacre near Kābul of one British force: other contingents were besieged in Jalālābād and Ghazni, and were in danger of a similar fate, and the prestige of British arms was at its lowest in the valley of the Indus. Lord Ellenborough, the new Viceroy, turned to Charles Napier for advice, and in April 1842 he was given the command in Upper and Lower Sind, the districts comprising the lower Indus valley. It was his first experience of India and his first command in war. He was sixty years old and he had not faced an enemy's army in the field since the age of twenty-five. As he said, 'I go to command in Sind with no orders, no instructions, no precise line of policy given! How many men are in Sind? How many soldiers to command? No one knows!... They tell me I must form and model the staff of the army altogether! Feeling myself but an apprentice in Indian matters, I yet look in vain for a master.' But the years of study and preparation had not been in vain, and responsibility never failed to call out his best qualities. It was not many months before British officers and soldiers, Baluch chiefs and Sindian peasants owned him as a master—such a master of the arts of war and peace as had not been seen on the Indus since the days of Alexander the Great.

First, like a true pupil of Sir John Moore, he set to work thoroughly to drill his army. He experimented in person with British muskets and Marāthā matchlocks, and reassured his soldiers on the superiority of the former. He experimented with rockets to test their efficiency; and, with his usual luck in the matter of wounds, he had the calf of his leg badly torn by one that burst. He would put his hand to any labour and his life to any risk, if so he might stir the activity of others and promote the cause. He convinced himself, by studying the question at first hand, that the Baluch Amīrs, who ruled the country, were not only aliens but oppressors of the native peasantry, not only ill-disposed to British policy, but actively plotting with the hill-tribes beyond the Indus, and at the right moment he struck.

The danger of the situation lay in the great extent of the country, in the difficulty of marching in such heat amid the sand, and in the possibility of the Amīrs escaping from his grasp and taking refuge in fortresses in the heart of the desert, believed to be inaccessible. His first notable exploit was a march northwards one hundred miles into the desert to capture Imāmghar; his last, crowning a memorable sixteen days, was a similar descent upon Omarkot, which lay one hundred miles eastward beyond Mīrpur. These raids involved the organization of a camel corps, the carrying of water across the desert, and the greatest hardships for the troops, all of which Charles Napier shared uncomplainingly in person. Under his leadership British regiments and Bombay sepoys alike did wonders. Who could complain for himself when he saw the spare frame of the old general, his health undermined by fever and watches, his hooked nose and flashing eye turned this way and that, riding daily at their head, prepared to stint himself of all but the barest necessaries and to share every peril? He had begun the campaign in January; the crowning success was won on April 6. Between these dates he fought two pitched battles at Miāni and Dabo, and completely broke the power of the Amīrs.

Miāni (February 17, 1843) was the most glorious day in his life. With 2,400 troops, of whom barely 500 were Europeans, he attacked an army variously estimated between 20,000 and 40,000. Drawn up in a position, which they had themselves chosen, on the raised bank of a dry river bed, the Baluchī seemed to have every advantage on their side. But the British troops, advancing in echelon from the right, led by the 22nd Regiment, and developing an effective musketry fire, fought their way up to the outer slope of the steep bank and held it for three hours. Here the 22nd, with the two regiments of Bombay sepoys on their left, trusting chiefly to the bayonet, but firing occasional volleys, resisted the onslaught of Baluchī swordsmen in overwhelming numbers. During nearly all this time the two lines were less than twenty yards apart, and Napier was conspicuous on horseback riding coolly along the front of the British line. The matchlocks, with which many of the Baluchī were armed, seem to have been ineffective; their national weapon was the sword. The tribesmen were grand fighters but badly led. They attacked in detachments with no concerted action. For all that, the British line frequently staggered under the weight of their courageous rushes, and irregular firing went on across the narrow gap. Napier says, 'I expected death as much from our own men as from the enemy, and I was much singed by our fire—my whiskers twice or thrice so, and my face peppered by fellows who, in their fear, fired over all heads but mine, and nearly scattered my brains'. Not even Scarlett at Balaclava had a more miraculous escape. This exposure of his own person to risk was not due to mere recklessness. In his days at the Royal Military College he had carefully considered the occasions when a commander must expose himself to get the best out of his men; and from Coruña to Dabo he acted consistently on his principles. Early in the battle he had cleverly disposed his troops so as to neutralize in some measure the vast numerical superiority of the enemy; his few guns were well placed and well served. At a critical moment he ordered a charge of cavalry which broke the right of their position and threatened their camp; but the issue had to be decided by hard fighting, and all depended on the morale which was to carry the troops through such a punishing day.

The second battle was fought a month later at Dabo, near Hyderābād. The most redoubtable of the Amīrs, Sher Muhammad, known as 'the Lion of Mīrpur', had been gathering a force of his own and was only a few miles distant from Miāni when that battle was fought. Napier could have attacked him at once; but, to avoid bloodshed, he was ready to negotiate. 'The Lion' only used the respite to collect more troops, and was soon defying the British with a force of 25,000 men, full of ardour despite their recent defeat. Indeed Napier encouraged their confidence by spreading rumours of the terror prevailing in his own camp. He did not wish to exhaust his men needlessly by long marches in tropical heat; so he played a waiting game, gathering reinforcements and trusting that the enemy would soon give him a chance of fighting. This chance came on March 24, and with a force of 5,000 men and 19 guns Napier took another three hours to win his second battle and to drive Sher Muhammad from his position with the loss of 5,000 killed. The British losses were relatively trifling, amounting to 270, of whom 147 belonged to the sorely tried 22nd Regiment. They were all full of confidence and fought splendidly under the general's eye. 'The Lion' himself escaped northwards, and two months of hard marching and clever strategy were needed to prevent him stirring up trouble among the tribesmen. The climate took toll of the British troops and even the general was for a time prostrated by sunstroke; but the operations were successful and the last nucleus of an army was broken up by Colonel Jacob on June 15. Sher Muhammad ended his days ignominiously at Lahore, then the capital of the Sikhs, having outlived his fame and sunk into idleness and debauchery.

Thus in June 1843 the general could write in his diary: 'We have taught the Baluch that neither his sun nor his desert nor his jungles nor his nullahs can stop us. He will never face us more.' But Charles Napier's own work was far from being finished. He had to bind together the different elements in the province, to reconcile chieftain and peasant Baluch, Hindu, and Sindian, to living together in amity and submitting to British rule; and he had to set up a framework of military and civilian officers to carry on the work. He held firmly the principle that military rule must be temporary. For the moment it was more effective; but it was his business to prepare the new province for regular civil government as soon as was feasible. He showed his ingenuity in the personal interviews which he had with the chieftains; and the ascendancy which he won by his character was marked. Perhaps his qualities were such as could be more easily appreciated by orientals than by his own countrymen, for he was impetuous, self-reliant, and autocratic in no common degree. He was only one of a number of great Englishmen of this century whose direct personal contact with Eastern princes was worth scores of diplomatic letters and paper constitutions. Such men were Henry Lawrence, John Nicholson, and Charles Gordon; in them the power of Great Britain was incarnate in such a form as to strike the imagination and leave an ineffaceable impression. Many of the Amīrs wished to swear allegiance to a governor present in the flesh rather than to the distant queen beyond the sea, so strongly were they impressed by Napier's personal character.

He did not forget his own countrymen, least of all that valued friend 'Thomas Atkins' and his comrade the sepoy. By the erection of spacious barracks he made the soldier's life more pleasant and his health more secure; and in a hundred other ways he showed his care and affection for them. In return few British generals have been so loved by the rank and file. He also gave much thought to material progress, to strengthening the fortress of Hyderābād, to developing the harbour at Karāchi, and, above all, to enriching the peasants by irrigation schemes. It was the story of Cephalonia on a bigger scale; but Napier was now twenty years older, overwhelmed with work, and he could give less attention to details. He did his best to find subordinates after his own heart, men who would 'scorn delights and live laborious days'. 'Does he wear varnished boots?' was a typical question that he put to a friend in Bombay, when a new engineer was commended to him. His own rewards were meagre. The Grand Cross of the Bath and the colonelcy of his favourite regiment, the 22nd, were all the recognition given for a campaign whose difficulties were minimized at home because he had mastered them so triumphantly.

Two other achievements belong to the period of his government of Sind. The campaign against the tribes of the Kachhi Hills, to the north-west of his province, rendered necessary by continued marauding, shows all his old mastery of organization. Any one who has glanced into Indian history knows the danger of these raids and the bitter experience which our Indian army has gained in them. In less than two months (January-March 1845) Napier had led five thousand men safely over burning deserts and through most difficult mountain country, had by careful strategy driven the marauders into a corner, forcing them to surrender with trifling loss, and had made an impression on the hill chieftains which lasted for many a year. This work, though slighted by the directors of the Company, received enthusiastic praise from such good judges of war as Lord Hardinge and the Duke of Wellington. The second emergency arose when the first Sikh war broke out in the Punjab. Napier felt so confident in the loyalty of his newly-pacified province that within six weeks he drew together an army of 15,000 men, and took post at Rohri, ready to co-operate against the Sikhs from the south, while Lord Hardinge advanced from the east. Before he could arrive, the decisive battle had been fought, and all he was asked to do was to assist in a council of war at Lahore. The mistakes made in the campaign had been numerous. No one saw them more clearly than Napier, and no one foretold more accurately the troubles which were to follow. For all that, he wrote in generous admiration of Lord Hardinge the Viceroy and Lord Gough the Commander-in-Chief at a time when criticism and personal bitterness were prevalent in many quarters.