William Pitt and the Great War Part 26

Pointing out the need of a General Enclosure Act, Sinclair claimed that of the 22,107,000 acres of waste in England and Wales, a large portion could be afforested, while only one million acres were quite useless--a very hopeful estimate.[429] In order to investigate this question, a Select Committee was appointed, comprising among others Lord William Russell, Ryder, Carew, c.o.ke of Norfolk, Plumer, and Whitbread. The outcome of its research was the General Enclosure Bill introduced early in the session of 1796, which elicited the sanguine prophecy of its author quoted at the head of this chapter.

The measure aroused keen interest. On 15th March the London Court of Aldermen urged its members to a.s.sist in pa.s.sing some such measure with a view to increasing the food supply, and providing work for the poor, as well as for soldiers and sailors discharged at the peace. The proposals were as follows: The present method of enclosure would be extended so as to enable the parties concerned to frame an inexpensive and friendly agreement. In case of disagreement the Bill would enable the majority of the paris.h.i.+oners, voting, not by head, but according to the value of their rights, to decide on the question of enclosure. But, in order to safeguard the rights of the poor, the choice of commissioners charged with the duty of re-allotting the soil would rest with the majority, reckoned both according to heads and value. The lord of the manor could not veto enclosure; but his convenience was specially to be consulted in the re-apportionment of the land. Sinclair also pointed out to Pitt that, as t.i.the-owners were now "much run at," their interests must be carefully guarded. As for the cottagers, they would find compensation for the lapse of their fuel rights by the acquisition of small allotments near to their cottages. The poor also would not be charged with the expenses of enclosure, and might raise money on loan to fence the plots awarded to them in lieu of their share in the waste and the open fields. To insist, said Sinclair, on four acres being annexed to every cottage was really harmful. Finally he expressed the hope that, under his plan, the legal expenses of enclosure would on an average be 5 per parish as against the present burden of 500.[430]

Pitt's treatment of the General Enclosure Bill is somewhat obscure.

Again and again Sinclair urged him to greater activity. In April 1796 he begged him to consult with the judges so as to meet the objections of t.i.the-owners. In May he warned him of the general disappointment that must ensue if no measure of that kind pa.s.sed in that session. He asked him whether the Bill, as now amended by the committee, would not answer its purpose. Pitt gave no encouraging sign. On the contrary, he gratified the country gentlemen by opposing a Bill for the Reform of the Game Laws. The proposer, Curwen, sought merely to legalize the killing of game started on ground farmed by the occupier. But the squires took alarm, a.s.serting that every small farmer could then pursue hares and rabbits from his ground into their preserves, and that country life, on those terms, would be intolerable. Pitt took their side, averring that sport was a relaxation well suited to the higher Orders of State, but likely to entice farmers away "from more serious and useful occupations." Much may be forgiven to a Prime Minister shortly before a General Election, which, in fact, gave to Pitt a new lease of power.

To Sinclair the election brought defeat and chagrin. He travelled northward to the Orkneys to seek a seat there, and, writing from Edinburgh on 6th July, tartly informed Pitt of his rejection after a journey of nearly a thousand miles. He must (he adds) either obtain a seat elsewhere, or take no further interest in the Board of Agriculture. If Pitt approves of his labour at the Board, will he show it in some way? "If, on the other hand," he continues, "you feel the least hesitation about giving it support, your candour, I am persuaded, will induce you to inform me at once, that I may no longer be tempted to waste so much time and labour in such pursuits.... I still flatter myself, however, that you will see the object in such a light that you will give the President of the Board of Agriculture a seat either in the Upper or the Lower House, that he may be encouraged to carry on the concerns of that useful inst.i.tution with redoubled energy." Pitt's comment on the back of the letter is suggestive: "That he has lost his election, but flatters himself that a seat will be given him either in the _Lower_ or Upper House, or he must decline taking further concern in the proceedings of the Board of Agriculture." A little later Sinclair renewed his appeal for a seat either at Midhurst, or in Scotland.

Failing that, he hinted that the President of the Board of Agriculture ought to be a Peer. Is it surprising that Pitt fulfilled the suggestion by giving his influence in favour of Lord Somerville, who displaced Sinclair at the Board in 1798? Loughborough it was who suggested the change;[431] but Pitt must have approved it; and thereafter the Board deteriorated.

In truth the thane of Thurso had become a bore. His letters to Pitt teem with advice on foreign politics and the distillation of whisky, on new taxes and high farming, on increasing the silver coinage and checking smuggling, on manning the navy and raising corps of Fencibles. Wisdom flas.h.i.+ng forth in these diverse forms begets distrust. Sinclair the omniscient correspondent injured Sinclair the agrarian reformer. Young treated the Prime Minister with more tact. His letters were fewer, and his help was practical. A pleasing instance of this was his presence at Holwood in April 1798, when Pitt was draining the hillside near his house, so as to preserve it from damp and provide water for the farm and garden below. Young drew up the scheme, went down more than once to superintend the boring and trenching, and then added these words: "I beg you will permit me to give such attention merely and solely as a mark of grat.i.tude for the goodness I have already experienced at your hands."[432]

Sinclair, now member for Petersfield, brought his General Enclosure Bill before Parliament in 1797. In order to meet the objections of t.i.the-owners and lawyers, he divided it into two parts, the former applying to parishes where all the persons concerned were unanimous, the latter where this was not the case. Even so the measure met with opposition from the legal profession; and on 13th May he wrote to Pitt expressing deep concern at the opposition of the Solicitor-General. In July he besought Pitt to make the Bill a Cabinet measure in order to "prevent either legal or ecclesiastical prejudices operating against it." Nevertheless Pitt remained neutral, and the Bill was lost in the Lords, mainly owing to the opposition of the Lord Chancellor.[433] In December Sinclair announced his intention of bringing in a Bill for the improvement of waste land; but, he added significantly, "I should be glad previously to know whether it is your intention to support that measure or not." Pitt gave no sign, and the proposal did not come forward.

Pitt's treatment of one of the most important questions of that time deserves censure. We may grant that the fussiness of Sinclair told against his proposals. It is also true that the drafting of a Bill applicable to every English parish was beset with difficulties, and that enclosures, while adding greatly to the food supply of the nation, had for the most part told against the independence of the poorer villagers.

But this was largely due to the expense and chicanery consequent on the pa.s.sing of parochial Acts of Parliament; and what objections were there to facilitating the enclosure of wastes and open fields by parishes where everyone desired it? In such a case it was the bounden duty of Parliament to end the law's delays and cheapen the procedure.

That Pitt did little or nothing to avert the hostility of bishops and lawyers in the Upper House convicts him either of apathy or of covert opposition. He is largely responsible for the continuance of the old customs, under which a parish faced the expense of procuring a separate Act of Parliament only under stress of severe dearth; and, as a rule, the crisis ended long before the c.u.mbrous machinery of the law enabled the new lands to come under the plough. It is, however, possible that he hoped to inaugurate a system of enclosures of waste lands by a clause which appeared in his abortive proposals of the year 1797 for the relief of the poor. His Bill on that subject comprised not only very generous plans of relief, but also the grant of cows to the deserving poor, the erection of Schools of Industry in every parish or group of parishes, and facilities for reclaiming waste land. His treatment of the question of poor relief is too extensive a subject to admit of adequate description here; but I propose to return to it and to notice somewhat fully the criticisms of Bentham and others.[434] It must suffice to say that the draft of that measure bespeaks a keen interest in the welfare of the poor, and indeed errs on the side of generosity. Abbot, afterwards Lord Colchester, was asked by Pitt to help in drafting the Poor Bill; and he p.r.o.nounced it "as bad in the mode as the principles were good in substance."[435]

After the withdrawal of Pitt's Poor Bill, nothing was done to facilitate enclosures until the accession of Addington to power. His General Enclosure Act of the year 1801 afforded timely relief in the matter of food-supply, a fact which shows that the difficulties in the way of such a measure were far from serious. The pa.s.sing of that Bill, it is true, was helped on by the terrible dearth of that year, when the average price of wheat was close on 116 s.h.i.+llings the quarter. But Pitt was content to meet the almost equally acute crisis of 1795-6 by temporary s.h.i.+fts, one of which exasperated the neutral States of the North and prepared the way for the renewal of the hostile League of the Baltic.

FOOTNOTES:

[420] B.M. Add. MSS., 27808.

[421] "H. O.," Geo. III (Domestic), 36.

[422] "H. O.," (Departmental), Secs. of State.

[423] B.M. Add. MSS., 27808; "Hist. of the Two Acts," 330 _et seq._

[424] Pitt MSS., 190; "W. O.," 113.

[425] "H. O.," Geo. III (Domestic), 36.

[426] "Parl. Hist.," x.x.xii, 235-42, 687-700, 1156; Tooke, "Hist. of Prices," i, 185 _et seq._; Porter, "Progress of the Nation," 147, 452.

[427] "Dropmore P.," iii, 87, 243, 526-30; "Report of the American Hist.

a.s.soc." (1903), ii, 67-9, 354, 375, 440 _et seq._, 552-8; E. Channing, "United States," 148-50; Cunningham, 512, 694.

[428] "Mems. of Sir John Sinclair," i, ch. iv; ii, ch. i.

[429] "Mems. of Sir John Sinclair," ii, 60-4, 104; Sinclair, "Address ... on the Cultivation of Waste Lands (1795)"; "Observations on ... a Bill for facilitating the Division of Commons." He first urged this on Pitt on 10th January 1795 (Pitt MSS., 175).

[430] Pitt MSS., 178.

[431] "Corresp. of Sir John Sinclair," i, 124.

[432] Pitt MSS., 193. Sinclair raised two corps of Fencibles. The list of his works, pamphlets, etc., fills thirty-two pages at the end of his Memoirs.

[433] "Mems. of Sir John Sinclair," ii, 106-9.

[434] "Pitt and Napoleon Miscellanies."

[435] "Lord Colchester's Diary," i, 82.

CHAPTER XIV

THE YEARS OF STRAIN (1796-7)

Torn as we are by faction, without an army, without money, trusting entirely to a navy whom we may not be able to pay, and on whose loyalty, even if we can, no firm reliance is to be placed, how are we to get out of this cursed war without a Revolution?--CORNWALLIS TO ROSS, _15th December 1797_.

The year 1797, which opened with events portending the overthrow of Austria and the financial collapse of England, brought a pa.s.sing gleam of suns.h.i.+ne into the gray life of Pitt. For some time he had been a frequent visitor at Eden Farm, Beckenham, the seat of Lord Auckland. It was on the way to Holwood, and the cheerful society of that large family afforded a relief from cares of state not to be found in his bachelor household. His circle of friends, never large, had somewhat diminished with the wear and tear of politics. His affection for Wilberforce, perhaps, had not quite regained its former fervour. As for the vinous society of Dundas, a valuable colleague but a far from ideal companion, Pitt must in his better moments have held it cheap. He rarely saw his mother, far away in Somerset; and probably his relations to his brother had cooled since he removed him from the Admiralty. In truth, despite his loving disposition, Pitt was a lonely man.

The voice of rumour, in his case always unfair, charged him with utter indifference to feminine charms. His niece, Lady Hester Stanhope, who later on had opportunities of observing him closely, vehemently denied the charge, declaring that he was much impressed by beauty in women, and noted the least defect, whether of feature, demeanour, or dress. She declared that, on one occasion, while commending her preparations for the ball-room, he suggested the looping up of one particular fold. At once she recognized the voice of the expert and hailed the experiment as an artistic triumph. Hester's recollections, it is true, belong to the lonely years spent in the Lebanon, when she indulged in ecstatic or spiteful outbursts; and we therefore question her statement that Pitt was once so enamoured of a certain Miss W----, who became Mrs. B----s of Devons.h.i.+re, as to drink wine out of her shoe. But Hester's remarks are detailed enough to refute the reports of his unnatural insensibility, which elicited coa.r.s.e jests from opponents; and we may fully trust that severe critic of all Pitt's friends, when, recalling a special visit to Beckenham Church, she p.r.o.nounced the Honourable Eleanor Eden gloriously beautiful.[436]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE HON. ELEANOR EDEN. (From a miniature)]

To this bright vivacious girl of twenty years Pitt's affections went forth in the winter of 1796-7;[437] and she reciprocated them. Every one agrees that Eleanor combined beauty with good sense, sprightliness with tact. Having had varied experiences during Auckland's missions to Paris, Madrid, and The Hague, she had matured far beyond her years. In mental endowments she would have been a fit companion even to Pitt; and she possessed a rich store of the social graces in which he was somewhat deficient. In fact, here was his weak point as a political leader. He and his colleagues had no _salon_ which could vie with those of the Whig grandees. The accession of Portland had been a social boon; but Pitt and his intimate followers exerted little influence on London Society. He and Grenville were too stiff. Neither Dundas nor Wilberforce moved in the highest circles. Portland, Spencer, and Windham held somewhat aloof, and Leeds, Sydney, and others had been alienated. Accordingly, the news that Pitt was paying marked attentions to Auckland's eldest daughter caused a flutter of excitement. Her charm and tact warranted the belief that in the near future the Prime Minister would dominate the social sphere hardly less than the political.

Among his friends who knew how warm a heart beat under that cold exterior, the news inspired the hope that here was the talisman which would reveal the hidden treasures of his nature. The stiff form would now unbend; the political leader would figure as a genial host; the martinet would become a man. a.s.suredly their estimate was correct.

Pitt's nature needed more glow, wider sympathies, a freer expression. A happy marriage would in any case have widened his outlook and matured his character. But a union with Eleanor Eden would have supplied to him the amenities of life. We picture her exerting upon him an influence not unlike that which Wordsworth believed that his sister had exerted upon his being:

thou didst plant its crevices with flowers, Hang it with shrubs that twinkle in the breeze, And teach the little birds to build their nests And warble in its chambers.[438]

It was not to be. After toying with this day-dream, Pitt suddenly broke away to Downing Street. His letter to Auckland, written there on 20th January 1797, announced the decision of the Minister in chillingly correct terms. In pathetically halting and laboured phraseology he implied that he had throughout observed a correct aloofness. After five long sentences of apology to the father he proceeded thus:

Whoever may have the good fortune ever to be united to her is destined to more than his share of human happiness. Whether, at any rate, I could have had any ground to hope that such would have been my lot, I am in no degree ent.i.tled to guess. I have to reproach myself for ever having indulged the idea on my own part as far as I have done, without asking myself carefully and early enough what were the difficulties in the way of its being realised. I have suffered myself to overlook them too long, but having now at length reflected as fully and as calmly as I am able on every circ.u.mstance that ought to come under my consideration (at least as much for her sake as for my own) I am compelled to say that I find the obstacles to it decisive and insurmountable.[439]

Auckland had a right to feel the deepest pain at this official missive.

The matter had been discussed in newspapers. Indeed, a caricaturist ventured to publish a sketch showing Pitt as Adam conducting Eve to the nuptial bower in the garden of Eden, while behind it squatted Satan as a toad, leering hatred through the features of Fox. It is to be hoped that Auckland did not know of this indelicate cartoon when he replied to Pitt. That letter has very properly been destroyed. But we have Pitt's second letter to Auckland, in which he again a.s.sures him how deeply he is affected by hearing of "the sentiments of another person, unhappily too nearly interested in the subject in question." He adds these moving words: "Believe me, I have not lightly or easily sacrificed my best hopes and earnest wishes to my conviction and judgment." Auckland's reply of 23rd January reveals the grief of his wife and daughter. For two or three days they remained in absolute solitude, and that, too, in a household remarkable for domestic affection. To Pitt also the decision was a matter of deep pain and life-long regret. Thenceforth he trod the path of duty alone. On 7th February the Archbishop of Canterbury wrote to Auckland (his brother-in-law) that Pitt lived in seclusion and seemed dreamy. At a recent Council meeting his face was swollen and unhealthy looking. Probably this was the time at which Pitt informed Addington that he must take the helm of State.[440]

We can only conjecture as to the insuperable obstacles to the union; but it seems highly probable that they were of a financial kind. In the Pitt MSS. (No. 196) there is a brief Memorandum in Pitt's writing, of the year 1797, which must refer to his yearly expenses, either at Downing Street or at Holwood. It gives the liquor account of the steward's room as "300 and upwards," and states that the other expenses of that room might be reduced from 600 to 300, those of his own wardrobe from 600 to 400, and those of the stable from 400 to 300. These figures do not tally with those of the Downing Street or Holwood accounts for the latter half of 1797, which will be stated later; and the loose way in which Pitt estimates his expenses is highly suggestive. We now know that he was heading straight for bankruptcy throughout this period; and probably on looking into his affairs he discovered the fact. It is also certain that he lent money to his mother. She seems to have lost on farming experiments at Burton Pynsent; for she charged her sons to defray her just debts incurred in this manner, and the Bishop of Lincoln in July 1801 stated that she owed to Pitt the sum of 5,800 on which she ought to pay interest but did not. Chatham also borrowed 1,000 from Pitt in August 1791, and the fact that he paid not a penny to help to discharge the debts of his brother in the year 1801 seems to show that he himself was still in low water.[441]

Piecing together these fragments of evidence, we may infer that Pitt's near relations were a source of considerable expense, and that his own heedlessness had by this time further served to embarra.s.s him.

Therefore, his conduct towards Miss Eden, which at first sight seems heartless, was probably dictated by sheer financial need. We may also reject the spiteful statement in which Lady Hester Stanhope represented Pitt as saying: "Oh, there was her mother [Lady Auckland],--such a chatterer! and then the family intrigues! I can't keep them out of my house; and for my King's and my country's sake I must remain a single man." This is mere romancing. Pitt went to the Aucklands' house, not they to his. As for the remark about Auckland's intrigues, it clearly refers to the painful days after 1801, when Pitt broke with the household at Beckenham.

There was only one method whereby Pitt could have a.s.sured his marriage with Eleanor Eden, namely, by condescending to political jobbery. It was beyond the power of Auckland, a comparatively poor man, burdened with a large family, to grant a dowry with her unless Pitt awarded to him a lucrative post and sinecures. Of course any such step was wholly out of the question for either of them. In fact, Pitt opposed Auckland's promotion, opened up by the death of Lord Mansfield, President of the Council, though the public voice acclaimed Auckland as the successor.[442] Equally noteworthy is the fact that, early in the year 1798, Pitt appointed Auckland Postmaster-General, with an annual stipend of 2,500, but required him to give up his pension of 2,000 for diplomatic services.[443] It is pleasing to record that their friends.h.i.+p was not overclouded, except for a brief period.

There, then, we must leave this painful incident, but with heightened admiration for Pitt. Outwardly his conduct appears frigid in the extreme. Those, however, who probe the secrets of that reserved soul see that his renunciation of conjugal bliss resulted from a scrupulous sense of honour. As to the tenderness of his feelings at this time, Addington, who knew him well, gives striking testimony, averring that in his disposition there was "very much of the softness and milkiness of human nature." That was the real Pitt.

Finance was the all-absorbing question in that gloomy winter of 1796-7.

The triumphs of Bonaparte in Italy and Hoche's attempt to invade Ireland sank into insignificance in comparison with the oncoming shadow of bankruptcy. The causes of this phenomenon are too technical to receive adequate treatment here. Certainly the Bank Crisis of February of 1797 was not due to the exhaustion of the nation; for the revenue testified to its abounding vitality. The Permanent Taxes maintained nearly the high level reached in the prosperous year of peace, 1792, and the figures for British Imports and Exports told the same tale, but the sums of money borrowed in the years 1796, 1797 undoubtedly strained the national credit.[444] Austria also applied to England for loans to enable her to continue the war; and Pitt helped her to borrow in London the sum of 4,600,000 in 1795, and 4,620,000 in 1796.