A STORMY SESSION.

253

The session of 1827 was brief and stormy. Its principal events were the defeat of the Government's Corn Bill in the House of Lords, the personal hostility of Peel and the Duke, and the inexplicable, or at least unjustifiable, opposition of Earl Grey.* Canning was doubtlessly glad

ately. The places were all filled up, but the appointments were understood to be only provisional, and the Duke of Portland, Lord Dudley, and Sturges Bourne were considered to hold their offices until Lord Lansdowne, Lord Carlisle, and Tierney should join the Cabinet. With this arrangement Parliament met, and the rage which had been accumulating in the minds of the seceders soon burst forth in a furious attack on this provisional arrangement. The Whigs have nearly in a body joined Government, with the exception of Lord Grey in the House of Lords, who in a speech full of eloquence attacked Canning's political life and character, and announced his intention of remaining neuter." After recording, on the 3rd of June, the entrance of Tierney, Lansdowne, and Carlisle into the Cabinet, Greville adds:-"It is quite evident that the present state of affairs is far from satisfactory; the government is not established on a firm or secure basis, and the members of it are not altogether satisfied with each other or themselves."-'The Greville Memoirs,' i. 94-98. See also the 6th volume of the New Series of the Duke of Wellington's 'Despatches.' It is a moot question whether, if Canning had lived, he would have been able to keep his Cabinet afloat. We are disposed to think he would have succeeded, but he must have depended more and more largely upon Whig support, and the attacks of the Tory Opposition would have been incessant and severe (a). His difficulty would have been in the King's personal feeling upon the Catholic question. It is worth noticing that Canning's name is not associated with a single legislative measure of importance; and we may expect, therefore, that his fame will not be of long duration. Such as it is, it is based even now on the recollection of two or three great speeches and some clever squibs.

*"It is difficult to understand the motives which actuated Earl Grey, unless we assume that his pride was wounded by the little attention that

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(a) Lord Campbell however, says that, even if Canning had lived, the combination against him would probably have been too strong to be resisted."-Lives of the Chancellors,' viii. 54.

254

THE MINISTER'S ILL-HEALTH.

to prorogue Parliament, and obtain leisure to consider his position and adjust the plan of a future campaign (July the 2nd). At this time he was not in very robust health, having caught a serious cold at the funeral of the Duke of York in January, and having suffered considerably from the prolonged strain of the Ministerial interregnum and the exacerbated warfare directed against him in Parliament. But he recovered sufficiently to pay a visit to

had been paid to his opinions and wishes, or that he felt an aristocratic jealousy of the accession to power of one who had long been regarded as an adventurer. Either motive was unworthy of Lord Grey. That much might be said as to Canning's inconsistency is, of course, very true ; but Lord Grey should have rejoiced that so powerful a mind had gradually relieved itself of its early prejudices, and showed a capacity of receiving newer and higher impressions. There seems good reason to believe that of all the attacks levelled at Canning, this was felt most deeply. "A more striking and mournful instance can hardly be found of the effect of prejudice in blinding one great man to the merits,-even to the most familiar attributes,-of another. Lord Grey had soon occasion to show how well he could bear misconstruction and rancour; but if anything could have shaken his firmness in his own hour of the ordeal, it must have been the remembrance of this fatal attack on Canning, so insolent, hard, and cold, so insulting and so cruel! As might be expected from the state of mind which produced it, the speech was full of misconstructions and mistakes. As far as its matter was concerned, nothing could have been easier than to answer it; but the question was how? The practice of answering in one House the personal attacks made in another, is radically objectionable; and Mr. Canning had the greatest reluctance to have recourse to this apparently only method; and besides, he was not in a state of health which would have borne him through such an exertion. He believed that ere long [by his elevation to the peerage] he should be able to reply to Lord Grey in person, but they never met more. Lord Grey's political friends, now the allies of the Minister, did full justice to Mr. Canning's character in the Upper House; but this particular speech was never efficiently answered, and the thought of it rankled in the breast of the victim to the last."-History of England during the Thirty Years' Peace,' i. 442, 443.

HIS DANGEROUS CONDITION.

255

the King, at the close of the month, in his retirement at Windsor. On the 31st he attended the Foreign Office,as it proved, for the last time,-returning to his Chiswick residence* in the afternoon.† His secretary observed that he appeared very languid, and that he looked "dreadfully ill." On the 2nd of August Sir William Knighton called, and was so struck with his state that he ordered two eminent physicians, Dr. Holland and Dr. Farre, to be summoned. The malady, however, made rapid progress, and he was declared to be in great and imminent danger. On Sunday, the 3rd, the doctors deemed it advisable to issue a bulletin, announcing his serious condition. In the forenoon he proposed that his daughter should read the prayers to him, but as his mind began to wander, this was not done. In the

* The Duke of Devonshire had placed his villa at Chiswick at Mr. Canning's disposal.

A few days after Parliament had been prorogued, Mr. Canning dined with Lord Lyndhurst at Wimbledon, and after heating himself by a rapid walk, sat down under a tree to rest. The consequence was a feverish cold and an attack of rheumatism. On the 18th, Huskisson, who was also in feeble health, called to take leave of him before going on the Continent. He found him in bed, and looking so wan and ill that he could not help remarking that Canning seemed more in need of change and relaxation than himself; to which the Minister replied, "Oh! it is only the reflection of the yellow linings of the curtains." Two days later, Canning removed to the Duke of Devonshire's villa at Chiswick, where Fox spent his last days, and occupied the very room in which Fox died. He did not grow stronger, but attended to business regularly, and on the 25th dined with Lord Clanricarde. On the 30th he had his last interview with the King, who was so shocked by his appearance that he sent Sir William Knighton to him. Some friends dined with him on the 31st. He retired early to the bed which he was never more to leave again alive. His illness developed into inflammation of the bowels, and his sufferings were terrible. Shortly before his death, mortification supervened.

256

HIS LAST DAYS.

course of the day he asked for his secretary; and in reply to an inquiry whether he felt better, said, "Yes, very little; but if all the pain which I have suffered throughout my life were collected together, it would not amount to the one-hundredth part of the pain which I have suffered these last three days." When the physicians saw him in the evening he was in great agony, and exclaimed, "My God! My God!" Dr. Farre observed: "You do right, sir, to call upon your God. I hope that you pray to Him yourself in secret." "I do, I do," was his answer. "You ask," continued the physician, "for mercy and salvation, through the merits of your Redeemer ?" "Yes," he replied, "I do, through the merits of Jesus Christ." The doctor then inquired if he had anything to say about public affairs; but, lest it should excite him, the question was not pressed. In the course of the evening he said to Sir William Knighton, "This may be hard upon me, but it is still harder upon the King."

During the next three days the Minister continued to sink, and on the 8th he died; * passing away so quietly

* From the Morning Post of August 9th, 1827, we extract the following 'bulletins and notices: '

"Chiswick, Wednesday afternoon. "The symptoms of Mr. Canning's illness towards one o'clock yesterday afternoon assumed a more decided crisis than hitherto, and it was ascertained that mortification had taken place in the region of the left side, which appeared greatly to extend; notwithstanding some intervals of sleep, his medical attendants perceived that he was gradually sinking under the effects of the malady, and towards evening the lassitude and weakness produced by the mortification became more manifest, and Mr. Canning wandered occasionally in mind. But his powers altogether were gradually departing, and the extremities were weakening more and more,

DEATH OF CANNING.

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that the exact moment could not be ascertained, but it was between twelve and ten minutes before four in the morning.* He had won the great prize of his ambition, the object of his struggles and aspirations; but had not enjoyed it long enough to furnish us with

and losing all perceivable life or motion. Mr. Canning during the early part of the night had interviews with Mrs. Canning, his son, and daughter; he had nearly lost the power of speech, but was in full possession of his faculties... About three o'clock the state of the Right Hon. Gentleman became more critical, and his death was momentarily expected. During the last hour Mr. Canning had been altogether free from pain, and had been in a state of excessive drowsiness or stupor, from which he could not be aroused. The Right Hon. Gentleman's son-in-law, the Marquis of Clanricarde, and Mr. Stapleton, who has for many years been his private secretary, were the only individuals, except his medical attendants, who were present at that distressing moment. Shortly after midnight, he sunk rapidly from exhaustion, and a few minutes before four o'clock this morning, without a sigh and apparently without a pain, he gently breathed his last. The malady which produced this distinguished gentleman's decease, was an inflammation of the intestines, which could not be checked in time to arrest the mortification."

In the Times of the same day occur the following particulars :

"The faint hopes which even the least sanguine of those who watched the sufferings of Mr. Canning cherished, during the early part of yesterday, in consequence of the manner in which he had rallied, gradually vanished as the day advanced, and towards evening it became certain that the closing scene was at hand. Mrs. Canning was with him throughout the night; and towards morning about ten minutes before his dissolution became so overpowered by a few broken sentences addressed at intervals to her by Mr. Canning, that she fainted, and was removed insensible from the room. She had scarcely quitted it, when her husband, whose energies rallied for an instant, suddenly relaxed, stupefaction ensued, and he died without a struggle."

6

* Stapleton, George Canning and His Times,' pp. 603, 605.

VOL. II.

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