1869 MR. GLADSTONE'S SPEECH "May 17, 1869. "MY DEAR WEST,-How kind of you to send me the Spectator! but it is far too flattering; and I always say that men in my life (with a few exceptions, such as Sir James Graham) if they sometimes get undeserved blame, get a great deal more of praise which is in excess of their just claims. Of none is this more true than of me. "Yours sincerely, "W. E. GLADSTONE." The afternoon of March 1, 1869, on which Mr. Gladstone made his great speech on the Disestablishment of the Protestant Church in Ireland, I was with him at his house at 3.45, and he had not then finally arranged the order of it, and was sitting in his arm-chair reading Shakespeare no doubt refreshing his mind with the words of King Lear, which he afterwards quoted, when Edgar endeavors to persuade Gloucester that he has fallen over the cliffs of Dover: "Ten masts at each make not the altitude Which thou hast perpendicularly fell: He calculated that his speech would occupy three hours in delivery, and it lasted for three hours and ten minutes, practically without a check, being only interrupted once by Seymour Damer, who asked a very silly question about glebes. "Had I wished," said Mr. Gladstone, "entirely to obscure the question I have in hand, I should have, as the honorable member suggests, included glebe lands, etc." During the Irish Church debate I always attended the House and kept a corrected bill of all amendments proposed and carried, for Mr. Gladstone's use next day. The Derby preceded Whitsuntide, and Lords Granville and Wolverton, then George Glyn, persuaded Mr. Gladstone to go with them and see it. I confess I did not much approve, thinking it out of his line and not altogether a dignified thing for him to do; however, they went, and joining us in the evening at a station on the line, we all went for our holidays to Walmer Castle on a visit to Lord Granville, then the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports. To me it was more than ordinarily pleasant, because I was able to show my wife all the scenes of my childhood and early boyhood-my father's house; the bathing-machines where I had been nearly drowned; the hill which I had raced down with the old Duke of Wellington, and the very spot where I had missed hitting him with a stone; and the downs where I had learned to ride and follow the West Street Harriers. We had a lovely time basking in the sunshine and enjoying a real week's holiday after six months' severe strain, so soon to be recommenced. Lord Granville had spent great sums in enlarging the castle, and had called into his assistance Mr. Devey, who had conceived the happy idea of bringing the old stones of Sandown Castle, which was rapidly falling into the sea, and with them building the new tower. So successful had he been, that a friend staying there at the time mistook the new for the old, and pointed out its superiority. But beyond these additions Lord Granville had built new stables, for he kept the West Street Harriers, and had purchased a farm on which he had erected a lovely building overhanging the sea, which he christened after his daughter "Villa Vita," and here in the hot afternoons we used to have tea. After Whitsuntide the weather was very warm, and on our return we often had our dinner in the garden of Downing Street. Mr. Gladstone enjoyed the cool air in the evenings, which refreshed him for his return to the House of Commons. He and I used frequently to walk home together from the House in the early morning-he |