CHAPTER XIII

Fall of the Whigs in 1867-Disraeli as Chancellor of the ExchequerReform Bill why undertaken-Necessities real or fancied of a Party Leader-Alternatives-Split in the Cabinet-Disraeli carries his point-Niagara to be shot--Retirement of Lord Derby-Disraeli Prime Minister-Various judgments of his character-The House of Commons responsible for his elevation-Increasing popularity with all classes.

SOMETHING else too as well as the Castilian pedigree Disraeli might have done better to leave to others. In 1865 he had uttered his memorable warning in the House of Commons against playing tricks with the Constitution. Other countries might emerge out of a revolution and 'begin again.' England could not begin again. Lord John Russell's Reform Bill was thrown out. The Whig Ministry fell in 1867, and Lord Derby came a third time to the helm with Disraeli for his Chancellor of the Exchequer. They at least, it might have been thought, would have let alone a subject on which the latter had pronounced so recently so emphatic an opinion. But they were still a Ministry on sufferance, and how to turn a minority into a majority was still an unsolved problem. The spectre of Reform was unexorcised. Both parties had evoked it at intervals, when they wished ultimately to pose before the world as the people's friends. Yet no experienced statesman, Whig or Tory, unless from unworthy jealousy, would have opened his lips to recommend

a change from which he could not honestly expect improvement. Even the working classes themselves, who were to be admitted to the suffrage, were not actively demanding it. No good had come to them from the great Bill of 1832. 'I don't care who is in or who is out,' said a rough artisan to me. 'I could never see that any of them cared for us.' They had been told that they were living in a world where everyone was to look out for himself, that their interests would never be attended to till they had representatives who would force attention to them. But their general sense was that the ills which they complained of were out of reach of Parliament, and they were looking for a remedy in combination among themselves which would take the place of the old Guilds. The ancient organisation of labour had been destroyed in the name of Liberty. Their employers had piled up fortunes. They had been left 'free,' as it was called, with their families to multiply as they would, and to gather their living under the hoofs of the horses of a civilisation which had become an aggregate of self-seeking units. To this they had been brought by a Parliamentary government, which, as far as they were concerned, was no government at all; and they were incredulous of any benefit that was to arrive to them from improvements in a machine so barren. Thus they were looking rather with amused indifference than active concern while the parties in the House of Commons were fencing for the honour of being their champion.

And yet Reform was in the air. The educated mind of England had been filled to saturation with the new Liberal philosophy. In the old days a 'freeman' was a master of his craft, and not till he had learnt to do, and do well, some work which was useful to society did he enter upon his

privileges as a citizen. The situation was now reversed. To be 'free' was to have a voice in making the laws of the country. Those who had no votes were still in bondage, and bondage was a moral degradation. Freedom was no longer a consequence and a reward, but the fountain of all virtue; a baptismal sacrament in which alone human nature could be regenerated. In Great Britain and Ireland there were some thirty millions of inhabitants. Of these, under the Reform Bill of 1832, three hundred thousand only were in possession of their birthright. What claim, it was asked, had a mere fraction to monopolise a privilege which was not only a power in the State but the indispensable condition of spiritual growth and progress? We heard much about generous confidence in the people, about the political stability to be expected from broadening the base of the pyramid, about the elevating consciousness of responsibility which would rise out of the possession of a vote-beautiful visions of the return of Astræa, the millennium made into a fact by the establishment of universal liberty. Of all this Disraeli believed nothing. No one hated empty verbiage more than he. His dislike of cant was the most genuine part of him. But he too had once imagined that the working-men were safer depositaries of power than the ten-pound householders; and even old Tories, though they thought an extension of the franchise foolish and needless, did not suppose it would be necessarily dangerous unless accompanied with a vast redistribution of seats. Thus, although the mass of the existing voters were content with their privileges, and were not eager to share them, the House of Commons had already committed itself by second readings to the principle of Reform. The question would return upon them again and again till it was settled, and as

things stood either party had a Parliamentary right to deal with it.

What were Lord Derby and Disraeli to do? Accident had brought them into power, and accident or some adverse resolution of the House might at any time displace them. Experienced Parliamentary politicians had observed that the shake of the Constitution from the Act of 1832 had arisen more from the manner in which it was carried than from the measure in itself. A second Radical Reform Bill, which might be passed in a similar manner, was evidently imminent; the multitude, who were so far quiet, might again be stirred; and if once the classes and the masses were pitted against one another the breaking loose of a torrent might sweep away Church, House of Lords, landed estates, and all that was left of the old institutions of England. Such were the arguments on public grounds; to which, though it was unavowed, might be added the pleasure of 'dishing the Whigs.'

But if Disraeli had looked back upon his own past career he might have remembered to have once said that there were considerations higher than any of these—that public men ought to be true to their real convictions. The Liberals had professed to believe in Reform. The Tories had never looked on it as more than an unwelcome and a useless necessity. Lord Derby had been a member of Lord Grey's first Reform Cabinet. Disraeli in his enthusiastic youth had called himself a Radical. But Lord Derby had been cured of his illusions; and Disraeli had learnt the difference between realities and dreams. They might think that the danger of concession was less than the danger of resistance, but that was all. There were persons credulous enough to hope that there might be found men at last.

among their Parliamentary leaders who would adhere in office to what they had said in Opposition. In the opinion of the Conservatives, the need of England was wise government, not political revolution. They might have said that if the experiment of Democracy was to be tried it should be tried by those who were in favour of the change on their own responsibility. They themselves would have no hand in it. They might be turned out of office, but the country would know that they had been faithful to their word, and could be relied upon when there was need of them again. Tories of the old school would have said so and dared the consequences, which might not have been very terrible after all, and Parliamentary government would have escaped the contempt into which it is now so rapidly falling.

Unfortunately political leaders have ceased to think of what is good for the nation, or of their own consistency, or even of what in the long run may be best for themselves. Their business is the immediate campaign, in which they are to outmanœuvre and defeat their enemies. On this condition only they can keep their party together. The Conservatives had been out of office, with but short-lived intervals, for thirtyfive years. Peel's Government had been, as Disraeli said, not Conservative at all, but an organised hypocrisy. they were to regard themselves as condemned to be in a perpetual minority, with no inducement to offer to tempt ability or ambition into their ranks, they would inevitably become disheartened and indifferent. The Parliamentary Constitution depended on the continuance of two parties, and if one of these disappeared the constitution would itself cease to exist.

If

Disraeli's notion that the aristocracy were to recover their