[ 278 ] [MARCH, 



NOTES FOR THE MONTH. 



Ministerial arrangements, past and present, have formed the chief 

 topic of public discussion during the last month. And long u explana- 

 tions" have been given, by Lord Goderich, Mr. Herries, and Mr. Hus- 

 kisson, of the circumstances connected with the dissolution of the late, 

 and the formation of the present, government ; which have ended as 

 all explanations should end in rendering the subject in question con- 

 siderably more obscure than it was before they began. As the tale is 

 told taking the supposition that all has been told it certainly seems 

 very abundantly incomprehensible : and we are a little afraid, though 

 we never entertained a doubt of Lord Goderich's honour, that some of 

 the blame which belongs to his inefficiency has been borne by other 

 persons. Resolute people, we believe, alone, after all, can be practically 

 honest : the weak and fearful bring themselves and their friends always 

 into scrapes ; and then, conscious of their own entirely good intentions, 

 actually believe that every thing that is wrong must be the fault of 

 somebody else.' 



Lord Goderich states distinctly, that the cause of the dissolution of 

 the late ministry, Was the quarrel between Mr. Huskisson and Mr. 

 Herries : the " irreconcileable difference" about the appointment of 

 Lord Althorpe as Chairman of the Finance Committee. Mr. Herries 

 says, that this was not the cause it was the excuse for breaking up 

 the ministry. And undoubtedly this distinction receives some coun- 

 tenance from the fact, that such a cause to go no farther was wholly 

 inadequate, and unworthy to produce such an effect. Mr. Herries * 

 there is no doubt said that he must resign, if Lord Althorpe were 

 appointed. Mr. Huskisson said that he must resign, if the noble Lord 

 were not. But still this affords no satisfactory Cause for breaking up the 

 ministry : Mr. Huskisson' s resignation, at the time it was tendered, Lord 

 Goderich could not have afforded to accept : but there was nothing 

 (that is upcome) to prevent his having acceded to that of Mr. Herries.* 

 In the view of the public, Mr. Herries's secession from the cabinet 

 would not have been of the slightest consequence : the surprise was 

 rather (and a feeling not unnatural to the essay of a new and undis- 

 tinguished man), how he had been brought into it ? And the tale, 

 that he was appointed, " because he Was the only man whose official 

 and financial knowledge qualified him for the place of Chancellor of the 

 Exchequer," if it ever had any believers, must have fallen, by this time> 

 into the gross contempt it merited ; because, here we have Mr. Herries^ 

 in the ministry, but filling another office : and Mr. Goulburn is raised to 

 the post of Chancellor of the Exchequer ; who beyond having once 

 calculated that three half-crowns were five shillings nobody ever sus- 

 pected, we believe, of any glimmerings of (< - financial knowledge" at ail- 

 However, his Lordship does not see the merits of his colleagues in this 

 light. His amiable temper represents their importance to be such, that 

 it is impossible to carry on the government in the absence of either of 

 them. And, being frightened out of his life by the declaration, that 

 " one must resign !" he adopts the alternative thinking it is no matter 

 who the room is made by of resigning himself. Upon which the two 



* One of the current reports is, that Mr. Herries was so deeply in the secret of all Lord 

 Goderich's financial blunders, that the noble lord had not the power to dismiss him from 

 the ministry. 



