CHAPTER XXIII

WILLIAM PITT THE YOUNGER-A COMPARISON OF FATHER AND SONAN ESTIMATE OF CHARACTER-WILLIAM PITT THE ELDER-THE GLORY OF BATH-HOW HE LOST HIS SAMSON LOCKS"- -AN EPIGRAM

FTER the death of Lady Rosebery the Earl

A spent a good deal of time at his country

homes and on the Continent. His health had broken down under the bereavement he had suffered, and his two daughters were in delicate health. Lord Rosebery had determined to devote a large portion of his time for the future to his children, and from that time, however deeply engrossed in his public work, he has never failed in his devoted attention to their education and training. Early in 1891 he paid a visit to Spain, meeting there our Ambassador, Sir Clare Ford, through whom, during the Earl's first period of office as Foreign Secretary, the Commercial Treaty with Spain had been arranged. Lord Rosebery at the same time, on the advice of Mr. John Morley, gave his attention to the book on Pitt which he had promised to write, and that book was soon produced.

A Datbetic Dedication

633

Lord Rosebery's study of Pitt' had this prefatory note: "This little book has been written under many disadvantages, but with a sincere desire to ascertain the truth. My chief happiness in completing it would have been to give it to my wife; it can now only be inscribed to her memory." The book is a study of the character and doings of the great statesman all through that interesting career.

"Of the private life of Pitt there is not much to be said. There are constant attestations of his personal fascination in that intimate and familiar intercourse which was the only kind of society that he enjoyed. He seems to have liked that country-house life which is the special grace of England we find him visiting at Longleat and Stowe, at Wycombe and Dropmore, at Cirencester and Wilderness, at Buckden and Short Grove, at the villas of Hawkesbury, and Rose, and Long, and Dundas, and Addington. Here we find him indulging-proh pudor-in a game of cards: the once fashionable Speculation or Commerce, now relegated to children. In all these societies he seems to have left but one unfavourable impression. A high-born spinster, who met him at Dropmore, says I was disappointed in that turned-up nose, and in that countenance in which it was impossible to find any indication of the mind, and in that person which was so deficient in dignity that he

1 "Pitt," by Lord Rosebery. Macmillan & Co., Ltd.

had hardly the air of a gentleman. If not tropes, I fully expected the dictums of wisdom each time that he opened his mouth. From what I then heard and saw, I should say that mouth was made for eating.' This is a harsh judgment. On the other hand, one of the choicest ladies of the French aristocracy, who met him during the Revolution, expressed her delight in his grave and lofty courtesy, and long recalled the patient pleasure with which he heard French books read aloud. To the purity of his French she also paid a tribute. Butler records that his talk was fascinating, full of animation and playfulness. Pitt said of Buckingham that he possessed the condescension of pride. It was said of his own manners in society that he possessed the talent of condescension; than which, if it means that he made condescension tolerable, there is perhaps none more rare. His friendship, although, like all worthy friendship, not lavishly given, was singularly warm, and was enthusiastically returned. Nothing in history is more creditable and interesting than his affectionate and lifelong intimacy with Wilberforce, so widely differing from him in his views of life. Hardened politicians such as Rose and Farnborough were softened by their intercourse with him, and cherished his memory to the end of their lives with something of religious adoration. His family affections were warm and His letters to his mother are pleasant

constant.

Pitt's Private Life

635

to read; he was indeed the most dutiful of sons. His grief at the death of his favourite sister, Lady Harriet, and her husband, Mr. Eliot, was beyond description. His kindness to his oppressed nephews and nieces, the Stanhopes, was constant and extreme; the father who harassed them had long quarrelled with him. It was truly remarked that he unselfishly made a great sacrifice and cheerfully ran a great risk, when, after a life of bachelorhood, he took his niece Hester to keep house for him. She led him an uneasy life with her terrible frankness of speech; but he bore all with composure, and she repaid him with the rare devotion of that vain, petulant nature, which fretted off into something like insanity.

Once, and once only, he formed an attachment which might have led to marriage; though he liked women's society, and is even said to have drunk a toast out of the shoe of a famous Devonshire beauty. But in 1796 his feeling for Eleanor Eden, the eldest daughter of Lord Auckland, went so far that he wrote to her father to declare his affection, but to avow that his debts made it impossible for him to contemplate marriage. Auckland was obliged to take the same view; Pitt discontinued his visits; and the lady married Lord Hobart, afterwards Lord Buckinghamshire. Lady Hester said that this nearly broke Pitt's heart; but Lady Hester's statements do not impress one with conviction.

Lord Holland, also an indifferent authority on this subject, says that Pitt paid attentions to Miss Duncan, who was afterwards Lady Dalrymple Hamilton. But there seems no further confirmation of this statement. However, though we cannot imagine a married Pitt more than a married Pope, it is clear that he did seriously contemplate the married state; and cynics may remark with a smile that he afterwards showed a certain dislike of Lord Buckinghamshire, and a reluctance to admit him to the Cabinet; though other reasons might well account for that. His life was pure; in an age of eager scandal it was beyond reproach, There was, indeed, within living recollection a doorkeeper of the House of Commons who from some chance resemblance was said to be his son ; but Pitt's features, without the intellect and majesty which gave them life, lend themselves easily to chance resemblance and ignoble comparison. Wraxall hints at a licentious amour; but even Wraxall expresses his scepticism. The austerity of his morals inspired many indecorous epigrams, but also a real reverence. His one weakness, it is said, was for port wine, on which he was reared from childhood, and of which he drank prodigious quantities.

"To estimate Pitt as a statesman, to sum up his career, to strike his account with history, one must take adequate means and scales. It