

GLADSTONE, WILLIAM EWART. 



305 



in the " clisthressful country " and expanded his 

 ideas of the Irish grievances. These were indeed 

 very real. The land held by English landlords was 

 in nearly every instance in the hands of a resident 

 agent, whose sole interest was to wring from the 

 peasantry the highest possible rental. There was no 

 tie of personal attachment between the " absentee 

 landlord" and the oppressed tenant; the agent was 

 the only medium of communication, and was almost 

 invariably tyrannical, cruel, and unjust. Often a 

 man would take at a low rental a piece of rocky 

 hillside or unproductive bog land, and after he, and 

 possibly his sons, had reduced this to something 

 approaching a remunerative condition after eight or 

 ten years of hard toil, would think they had secured 

 a comfortable homestead ; but the alert agent was 

 always on the watch, and wherever the land was so 

 improved he insisted on doubling the rent. Refusal 

 to pay meant eviction, and eviction of the crudest, 

 harshest, and most inhuman kind. This was a 

 question affecting the peasantry only; but there 

 were other abuses in connection with the Irish 

 Church, and the fact that all public works under- 

 taken in Ireland, and for which private bills had to 

 be passed, had to go through the English Parlia- 

 ment, witnesses and lawyers being put to the cost 

 of appearing at Westminster. These latter disabili- 

 ties were a source of friction to the better class of 

 the Irish people, and often insured their sympathy 

 with acts of violence committed by the peasantry. 

 Such was the condition of Ireland" at the time of 

 the first reform Parliament. Gladstone sat in the 

 house as the representative of a great historic house 

 of pronounced Tory proclivities. The Duke of 

 Newcastle, indeed, had the ideas of a feudal lord, 

 and thought he had the undoubted right to send 

 whom he pleased to Parliament to represent the 

 interests of his own large tenantry. Gladstone had 

 taken but a languid interest in Ireland, but the ter- 

 rible condition of things roused his sympathy and 

 stirred his heart, and he determined to secure by 

 legal enactment just - and equitable treatment for 

 the Irish peasantry. He was gaining parliamentary 

 experience, and he eagerly sought, what other mem- 

 bers shirked, the tedious and arduous duty of sitting 

 on committees. These committees met 'at 11 A. M. 

 and often were continued to 4 p. M., when the regu- 

 lar business of the house began, and as the house 

 often was in session until 3, 4, or 5 A. M., Gladstone s 

 day was indeed a hard one ; but the experience he 

 gained and his indefatigable energy impressed Sir 

 Robert Peel, who made him Junior Lord of the 

 1 Treasury, and shortly afterward advanced him to 

 ; the office of Under Secretary for the Colonies. In 

 : the latter capacity he had no time to show his abil- 

 ity, for, before he could pass his first bill, the Peel 

 ministry was defeated and the Whigs resumed 

 power. During the next six years Gladstone took 

 little part in the bitter party struggles, and during 

 this lull in political activity he wrote ' The State 

 m its Relation with the Church," insisting that 

 religion was the great end and aim of all civilized 

 government. This book, published in 1838, was the 

 .'abject of an exhaustive and elaborate review by 

 tfacaulay, who speaks of Gladstone somewhat sar- 

 astically as "a young man of unblemished charac- 

 er and of distinguished parliamentary talents, the 

 ising hope of those unbending Tories', who follow, 

 i eluctantly and mutinously, a leader, whose experi- 

 ! nee and eloquence are indispensable to them, but 

 rhose cautious temper and moderate opinions they 

 bhor." Macaulay generally disagrees with Glad- 

 tone's ideas, and incidentally says : " Pie has one 

 ift most dangerous to a speculator, a vast com- 

 j nand of a kind of language, grave and majestic, 

 i >ut of vague and uncertain import ; of a kind of 

 inguage which affects us much in the same way in 

 VOL. xxxviii. 20 A 



which the lofty diction of the chorus of ' The Clouds ' 

 affected the simple-hearted Athenian." This is very 

 similar to the quaint words of the well-known charge 

 of " being intoxicated with the exuberance of bis 

 own verbosity," made by Disraeli. 



Close application and' study by candlelight had so 

 impaired Gladstone's sight that he found it necessary, 

 in the autumn of 1838, to seek medical advice, and 

 rest being prescribed, decided to winter at Rome. 

 Among the visitors in that city were Lady Glynne, 

 widow of Sir Richard Glynne, of Hawarden Castle, 

 Flintshire. North Wales, and Lady Glynue's daugh- 

 ters. Gladstone already had some knowledge of the 

 family and recollections of a pleasant visit to Lady 

 Glynne's son, a college friend at Oxford, at Ha- 

 warden Castle. The intimacy was revived, and he 

 whose star seemed always in the ascendant secured 

 the love of Lady Glynne's eldest daughter, Cath- 

 erine. They were married on July 25, 1839, at Ha- 

 warden, and at the same time and place the younger 

 daughter, Mary, was united to George William, 

 fourth Lord Lyttleton. Miss Catherine Glynne was 

 heir to the Hawarden estates on the decease of Sir 

 Richard Glynne, and on his death, some time later, 

 Gladstone and his wife decided to occupy the cas- 

 tle, and this became the family home. Of all the 

 happy fortunes that befell Gladstone, none equal 

 that of his marriage. Mrs. Gladstone relieved her 

 husband of all the little petty domestic worries that 

 so often harass great thinkers. . The conditions of 

 Gladstone's domestic relations were a great help to 

 him in his life work. 



In 1841, on the return of Peel to power, Glad- 

 stone was appointed Master of the Mint and Vice- 

 President of the Board of Trade. Gladstone came 

 of a great commercial family, conversant with fig- 

 ures, and cradled in finance, and in the tariff revision 

 introduced by Peel he was chiefly instrumental} 

 the abolition or reduction of duty upon 750 out of 

 1,200 duty-paying articles drew marked attention to 

 his financial ability. During the session of 1842 

 Gladstone made over a hundred speeches, chiefly on 

 fiscal legislation, which he controlled. His ability 

 as an impressive and powerful orator and a ready 

 and dexterous debater had been proved, but he had 

 now shown ability of another order, exhibiting the 

 versatility of his genius and indicating eminent fit- 

 ness for control of the national exchequer. In 1843 

 he was made President of the Board of Trade. He 

 put up a self-made barrier to his progress by some- 

 what eccentric action on the subject of the grant to 

 Maynooth College, and resigned his office, but when 

 free from its responsibility supported the measure. 



He returned to the ministry as Secretary for the 

 Colonies in 1846. Feeling that he was out of touch 

 with his Newark constituency, he resigned, and for 

 a year had no seat in the house. Meanwhile Peel 

 had been forced, in great measure by the potato 

 famine in Ireland, to repeal the corn laws ; but 

 the Tory party had their revenge, as on the same 

 day, very greatly owing to Disraeli's influence, who 

 was now rising to power, they defeated the Govern- 

 ment on a coercion bill for Ireland. Gladstone was 

 returned to Parliament by Oxford University in 

 1847. He had altered his views on the question of 

 admitting Jews to Parliament, greatly to the cha- 

 grin of his Conservative constituents. In 1849 he 

 attacked the policy of Lord Palmerston in the Don 

 Pacifico difficulty, when Greece very properly pro- 

 tested against an outrageous claim for damages, 

 which Palmerston proposed to enforce with a high 

 hand. The speech was a plea for consideration of 

 the weaker country, and Gladstone said it was the 

 duty of states, as of individuals, to deal gently with 

 the weak. He was not attracted by a dazzling pol- 

 icy calculated to spread English influence and 

 make foreign nations jealous and Englishmen 



