THREE:The coarse manners of the gentlemen were gradually yielding to refining influences, but the society of ladies amongst the upper classes was generally neglected. Husbands spent their days in hunting or other masculine occupations, and their evenings in dining and drinking; the dinner party, which commenced at seven, not breaking up before one in the morning. Four- or five-, or even six-bottle men were not uncommon among the nobility. Lord Eldon and his brother Lord Stowell used to say that they had drunk more bad port than any two men in England. The Italian Opera was then the greatest attraction. It became[441] less exclusive in its arrangements when the Opera House was under the management of Mr. Waters; but the strictest etiquette was still kept up with regard to the dress of gentlemen, who were only admitted with knee-buckles, ruffles, and chapeaux bras. If there happened to be a Drawing Room, the ladies as well as the gentlemen would come to the opera in their Court dresses.Such was the state of things in Canada which the Imperial Parliament was called upon to consider in the spring of 1838. The first feeling which the news of the insurrection produced in Britain was one of alarm; the next was that all the forces that could be spared should be immediately dispatched for the purpose of crushing the revolt; and a ship of the line was employed for the first time in carrying a battalion of 800 Guards across the Atlantic. The Duke of Wellington censured the Government for not having had a sufficient military force to preserve the peace in Canada, and used the oft-repeated expression that was stultified on several occasions during the latter portion of Victoria's reign, that a great nation cannot make a little war. On the 22nd of January Lord John Russell moved[447] for leave to bring in a Bill suspending the Constitution in Lower Canada for three years, and providing for the future government of that province, with a view to effecting a satisfactory settlement of the affairs of the colony. He stated that her Majesty's Government had resolved to send out an experienced statesman, of high character and position, and of well-known popular sympathies, with ample powers, and that Lord Durham had consented to go. The Government measure was carried in the House of Commons by a majority of 262 to 16, and unanimously in the Lords.
FORE:The discussion of the question, though it was so summarily dismissed as it regarded the Church, did not prevent a certain number of the Dissenters from coming forward to endeavour to relieve themselves of the yoke of these Articles. In the Toleration Act, passed after the Revolution, it had been stated that this toleration was conceded to those only who were willing to subscribe these Articles, with the exception of the first clause of the 20th, which asserts that the Church has power to decree rites and ceremonies, and to settle controversies of faith; the 34th, which relates to the traditions of the Church; the 35th, relating to the homilies; and the 36th, relating to the consecration of bishops and ministers. With these exceptions, the Articles had been little objected to by the Dissenters till the Presbyterians of England had, for the most part, embraced Unitarianism. It was chiefly from this class that the movement against these Articles now took its rise; but not altogether, for the subscription to the Articles included in the Toleration Act having for some time been little insisted on, some Dissenters, who had not subscribed them, were menaced with trouble on that account by officious clergymen. Amongst these Dr. Doddridge was mentioned as one who had been so disturbed. It was now thought fit to press the question on Parliament, and in April, 1772, Sir Henry Houghton moved for leave to bring in a Bill for that object, under the title of "A Bill for the further Relief of Dissenters." Sir Roger Newdigate, destined for so many years to be the champion of Church Toryism, led the way in opposition, as one of the members of the University of Oxford; and he was supported by two or three men of the same stamp. In this case, however, Burke voted for the Bill as only reasonable, and it passed by a majority of seventy against nine. But in the Lords, the Bishops came forward in full strength against it, and Barrington, Bishop of Llandaff, pointed it out as a Socinian movement, and quoted, with telling effect, some of the most objectionable passages from the writings of Dr. Priestley. There were cries of "Monstrous! Horrible! Shocking!" and, amongst the utterers of these, the loudest was Lord Chatham. The Bishop of London said that, so far from the Dissenters generally advocating this measure, he had been waited on by some of their ministers to inform him that they regarded it, not as a measure to relieve Dissenters from the Articles of the Church, but certain persons from the obligations of Christianity. It was thrown out by a hundred and two against twenty-nine.These disorders appealed with irresistible force to the Government and the legislature to put an end to a system fraught with so much evil, and threatening the utter disruption of society in Ireland. In the first place, something must be done to meet the wants of the destitute clergy and their families. Accordingly, Mr. Stanley brought in a Bill in May, 1832, authorising the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland to advance 60,000 as a fund for the payment of the clergy, who were unable to collect their tithes for the year 1831. This measure was designed to meet the existing necessity, and was only a preliminary to the promised settlement of the tithe question. It was therefore passed quickly through both Houses, and became law on the 1st of June. But the money thus advanced was not placed on the Consolidated Fund. The Government took upon itself the collection of the arrears of tithes and to reimburse itself for its advances out of the sum that it succeeded in recovering. It was a maxim with Mr. Stanley that the people should be made to respect the law; that they should not be allowed to trample upon it with impunity. The odious task thus assumed produced a state of unparalleled excitement. The people were driven to frenzy, instead of being frightened by the Chief Secretary becoming tithe-collector-general, and the army employed in its collection. The first proceeding of the Government to recover the tithes under the Act of the 1st of June was, therefore, the signal for general war. Bonfires blazed upon the hills, the rallying sounds of horns were heard along the valleys, and the mustering tread of thousands upon the roads, hurrying to the scene of a seizure or an auction. It was a bloody campaign; there was considerable loss of life, and the Church and the Government thus became more obnoxious to the people than ever. Mr. Stanley being the commander-in-chief on one side, and O'Connell on the other, the contest was embittered by their personal antipathies. It was found that the amount of the arrears for the year 1831 was 104,285, and that the whole amount which the Government was able to levy, after putting forward its strength in every possible way, was 12,000, the cost of collection being 15,000, so that the Government was not able to raise as much money as would pay the expenses of the campaign. This was how Mr. Stanley illustrated his favourite sentiment that the people should be made to respect the law. But the Liberal party among the Protestants fully sympathised with the anti-tithe recusants.
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THREE:
THREE:"No words," says Sir Archibald Alison, "can convey an adequate idea of the astonishment which the announcement of this project of Reform created in the House of Commons and the country. Nothing approaching to it had ever been witnessed before, or has been since. Men's minds were prepared for a change, perhaps a very considerable one, especially in the enfranchising of new cities and towns which were unrepresented; but it never entered into the imagination of any human being out of the Cabinet that so sweeping and entire a change would be proposed, especially by the king's Ministers. The Tories had never dreaded such a revolution; the Radicals had never hoped for it. Astonishment was the universal feeling. Many laughed outright; none thought the Bill could pass. It was supposed by many that Ministers neither intended nor desired it, but wished only to establish a thorn in the side of their adversaries, which should prevent them from holding power if they succeeded in displacing them. So universal was this feeling, that it is now generally admitted that had Sir Robert Peel, instead of permitting the debate to go on, instantly divided the House, on the plea that the proposed measure was too revolutionary to be for a moment entertained, leave to bring in the Bill would have been refused by a large majority. The Cabinet Ministers themselves are known to have thought at the time that their official existence then hung upon a thread." Such a result, however, was most unlikely, as Sir Robert Inglis and other Tory orators were eager to speak, having collected precedents, arguments, and quotations against the Bill. These they proceeded to impart to the House. After a debate of seven nights, the Bill was read a first time, without a division, and the second reading was set down for the 21st of March.
