Memoirs of James Robert Hope-Scott Part 17

Towards the end of August 1867, her Majesty Queen Victoria, visiting the Duke and d.u.c.h.ess of Roxburghe, at Floors Castle, was received with great rejoicings at the various Scottish border towns on the Waverley route from Carlisle to Kelso. On this occasion her Majesty honoured Mr. and Lady Victoria Hope-Scott by calling at Abbotsford. The newspapers of the day contain copious narratives of the tour, otherwise unimportant for our present purpose. The following account is taken from the 'Daily Telegraph'

of August 24, with a few additional particulars introduced from the 'Border Advertiser' of August 23, 1867, the former journal supplying details of much interest relating to Mr. Hope-Scott's improvements at Abbotsford. I have shortened the original, and made some slight alterations in it:--

Her Majesty visited Melrose and Abbotsford on Thursday, August 22, with Princess Louise, Prince and Princess Christian, the Duke and d.u.c.h.ess of Roxburghe, and the Duke of Buccleuch. The Queen having viewed Melrose Abbey, Mr. Hope-Scott and his family were honoured, later in the day, by her Majesty's presence at Abbotsford, which was reached shortly after six o'clock. In the fields in front of the lodge, and for a great distance along the road, was a great concourse of people, many of whom had waited for hours, and vehement cheering rang through the Abbotsford woods.

Many alterations and additions had been made to the Abbotsford of Sir Walter during Mr. Hope-Scott's nineteen years' possession of the place. In the lifetime of the Great Magician, the ground on which he fixed his abode was nearly on a level with the highway running along the south front; and wayfarers could survey the whole domain by looking over the hedge. Mr.

Hope-Scott, twelve years ago or more (1855), threw up a high embankment on the road front of Abbotsford, and it is from this steep gra.s.sy mound that one of the best views may be had. The long, regular slope, steep near the level top where laurels are planted, is a beautiful bank from end to end, being well timbered with a rich variety of trees, among others the silver birch, the oak, the elm, the beech, the plane, and the good old Scotch fir; and being, moreover, naturally favourable to the wild flora of the district, especially to the bluebell and forget-me-not. The wild strawberry also is in great abundance, with its sweet, round little beads of fruit dotting the green. The square courtyard of the house is planned as a garden, with clipped yews at the corners of the ornamental plots of gra.s.s, and with beds all ablaze with summer flowers, a brilliant pink annual making a peculiarly fine appearance by well-arranged contrast with the sober greys of an edging of foliage plants. On one side of the courtyard is a postern, which was thrown open when the royal cavalcade had entered the grounds by the lodge gate. The opposite flank of the quadrangle is a kind of ornamental palisade, or open screen of Gothic stonework, the s.p.a.ces of which are filled up by iron railings. This palisade divides the courtyard from the pleasure-gardens, which are well laid out, and bordered with greenhouses. The porch was beautifully decorated with rows of ferns along the margin of the pa.s.sage, and behind the ferns were magnificent fuchsias rising to the roof, and mingled with other choice and rare flowers. The floors of the porch and other rooms were covered with crimson cloth, but beyond that, and the addition of vases of flowers, 'Sir Walter's Rooms'

were in the same condition in which they have been witnessed by the many thousands drawn thither from every civilised country in the world.

Her Majesty was received by Mr. Hope-Scott, Lady Victoria Hope-Scott, and Miss Hope-Scott, Lord and Lady Henry Kerr, Miss Kerr, and Miss Mackenzie.

Mr. Hope-Scott bowed to the Queen, and led the way to the drawing-room, where a few minutes were pa.s.sed. Her Majesty then in succession pa.s.sed through Sir Walter's library, study, hall, and armoury, and viewed with great interest all these memorials. The royal party then proceeded to the dining-room, where fruits, ices, and other refreshments had been prepared, but her Majesty partook only of a cup of tea and 'Selkirk bannock.' When the Queen was pa.s.sing through 'Sir Walter's library,' some photographic views of Abbotsford, which had been taken recently by Mr. Horsburgh of Edinburgh, attracted her attention, and she graciously acceded to the request of Mr. Hope-Scott that her Majesty might be pleased to accept of a set of the photographs. Her Majesty expressed to Mr. Hope-Scott the great pleasure she had experienced in visiting what had been the residence of Sir Walter Scott. The Queen and suite then entered their carriages, and left Abbotsford about seven o'clock. The day was not so bright as the preceding one; but the little rain which fell, just as her Majesty had got under the shelter of the historical roof, did not spoil the holiday which some thousands of people from Galas.h.i.+els, Hawick, Kelso, Berwick, and Edinburgh had been bent on making.

Mr. Hope-Scott, in a letter to Mr. Badeley of August 23, 1867, gives a brief description of the Queen's visit, concluding as follows:--

'Throughout her visit, her Majesty was most gracious and kind, and her conduct to Mamo was quite touching.

She showed a great deal of interest in the place and the princ.i.p.al curiosities, looked remarkably well and active, and, I am told, is much pleased with the reception she has met with on the Border.'

The political aspects of Mr. Hope-Scott's character, on which it is now time that we should enter, do not require any very extended discussion. His opinions and feelings were Conservative in the const.i.tutional sense, and in his early years seem to have gone a good deal further. It is perhaps scarcely fair to bring evidence from the correspondence of youths of nineteen, but Mr. Leader tells him (November 3, 1831): 'The latter part of your letter is an admirable specimen of Tory liberality and Tory argument.... What! are all Radicals fools or knaves, and all Conservatives honest or intelligent?... _Absint hae ineptiae paene aniles_.' A few years later the Thun correspondence, though only affording incidental references to Mr. Hope's own letters, shows clearly that, like 'young Oxford' of that date and long afterwards, he adopted Tory views as deductions from Scripture, and as the political side of religion. Thus Count Leo Thun writing to Mr. Hope on December 14, 1834, says: 'We both agree in the first principles; I copy your own words: "Everything we do is to be done in the name of the Lord: admitting this, it is evident that the _principle_ on which we are to act with regard to politics is to be derived from the Scriptures."' The future Austrian statesman, however, declares that he cannot find in the Scriptures 'that blind and pa.s.sive obedience' which his friend requires, and enters at considerable length into the question, controverting the application which the latter had made of certain pa.s.sages. Again pa.s.s on a few years, and we find Mr. Hope writing to Mr. Badeley (it is the first letter in that collection), January 12, 1838: 'I have managed to read Pusey's sermon, in which there is nothing that I am disposed to quarrel with. The origin of civil government used long ago to be a favourite subject of inquiry with me; and I had long been convinced of the absurdity of any but the patriarchal scheme. Aristotle, the most sensible man, perhaps, who ever lived, came to the same conclusion without the aid of revelation.'

These views sustained practically some modification as time went on.

Toryism, in its _historical_ sense, could never be the political creed of a mind on which the Church of England had lost its hold. This begins to appear in a speech made by him at an early date, without preparation indeed, but not carelessly spoken. On the occasion of the ceremony for turning the first sod for the Sheffield and Huddersfield Railway (August 29, 1845), Mr. Hope said:--

If you lived under a despotic government, you would have lines made without reference to your local wants, and perhaps from visionary views of public advantage, but without reference to your private interests. It would be the same if a democratic body were to govern. In the one case you would be subject to the dictates of the imperial office; in the other, to the votes of a turbulent a.s.semblage; but in neither case would there be that mixed regard to public justice and private interests which are combined in an efficient system. I dare say we [railway lawyers] are troublesome, but we belong to a system which has in it great elements of const.i.tutional principle, which combines a regard for the public interest, and for private rights, with that free spirit which enterprises of this nature require in a great commercial country. [Footnote: _Sheffield and Rotherham Independent_, August 30, 1845.]

In the letter to Mr. Gladstone, of December 9, 1847 (quoted p. 78), we perceive an uncertain, sea-sick tone, the sadness natural to a mind not yet sure of its course. Very different is the buoyancy that breathes in Mr.

Hope-Scott's remarks, ten years later, on the rivalry between Manchester and Liverpool, in his speech on the Mersey Conservancy and Docks Bill (quoted p. 115), though that, perhaps, is too rhetorical for us to found an argument upon. It will be more to the purpose here if I give an extract from a letter which he had written that same year, as an Irish proprietor, on the eve of a contested election, to the agent for his estates in co.

Mayo, Joseph J. Blake, Esq., at Castlebar. It will show the wise and kindly spirit in which he dealt with his people, as well as the reference to the interests of Catholicity which now governed his politics:--

As to the election for the county of Mayo, I am in considerable ignorance about the state of parties in that particular part of Ireland. I may state, however, that I should myself prefer the candidate who is the most sincere friend of the Catholic Church, and most disposed to take a calm and careful view of the questions which most affect the interests of the Irish people-- say Tenant Right, for instance, in which I think something should be done, but perhaps not so much as the more noisy promoters of it insist on. I do not, however, wish to influence my tenants more decidedly than by letting them know my general feelings on these subjects. (March 25, 1857.)

The question here involved, which has very recently ripened into difficulties so formidable as far as regards Ireland, also affected at the time, as it still affects, the state of property in the Western Highlands, where it seems to have interfered a good deal with Mr. Hope-Scott's efforts to raise the condition of his tenantry. He urged on them the necessity of cultivating more of the waste land which stretched for miles before their doors, but they never took kindly to this task. No rent was to be demanded for the reclaimed lands, and they were promised compensation if called upon to give them up at any future year. They were perfectly convinced of Mr.

Hope-Scott's sincerity, but were unwilling to enter into these schemes of amelioration without the security of possession guaranteed by leases.

[Footnote: Further details of Mr. Hope-Scott's relations with his Highland tenants will he found in chap. xxvi. See also chap. xxiv. pp. 171, 172 in this vol. as affording some indirect ill.u.s.tration.] My office not being that of the political economist, it is unnecessary to enlarge on the subject, especially as the following important letter of Mr. Hope-Scott himself will enable the reader to judge of the reasons upon which he acted:--

_J. R. Hope-Scott, Esq., Q.C. to the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P._

(_Private_.) Abbotsford: Oct. 28, 1868.

Dear Gladstone,--As you are kind enough to care for my political ideas, I will try to describe them.

Born and bred a Tory and a Protestant, I have discarded both the creeds of my youth. But with this difference in the result: in religion I have found sure anchorage; in politics I am still adrift.

Had the followers of Sir Robert Peel been able to found a permanent party, my case would probably have been different. But death took many of them, and the rest are scattered.

Of the two great parties now forming on the ruins of the old ones, that which you lead has a claim upon me for the work of justice [disestablishment of the Irish Church] which it has undertaken, and which the other seeks to frustrate. But, nevertheless, this work is to me no test of the abiding principles of the party. In you I acknowledge the promotion of it to be a sign of honesty and courage which few can better appreciate than myself; and I know that you mean it as a pledge of steady advancement in the same path. But amongst those who act with you there are many minds of a very different stamp.

A few words will bring out my views.

Speaking logically, justice to the Catholic people of Ireland means, if it means anything, the undoing of the Reformation, the replacing of the Church of the great majority in the position from which it has been unjustly removed.

But had you proposed this, or anything savouring of this, you know that your followers would have been few indeed; and that you have been able wholly to avoid such a danger for yourself, and even to turn it against your political opponents, has arisen chiefly from the moderation and wisdom of the Catholic clergy.

By their acquiescence in a mere disestablishment you got so far rid of the fear of Popery as to give scope to the voluntary principles of ultra- Protestantism, and, as a consequence, many now support you upon grounds so wholly different from your own, that, when the a.s.sault is over, and the stronghold taken, half your forces may disappear from the field, or remain only to rebel against your next movement.

This, then, is the reason why, seeking for a party, I cannot accept the present action against the Irish establishment as materially affecting my choice; but I must add that the Church question does not, in point of statesmans.h.i.+p, appear to me to be either the most important or the most difficult of the Irish questions.

That of Land Tenure exercises a wider influence among the people, and calls for a higher science of government.

Now, upon this most difficult and most delicate subject, there are prominent men among your supporters who have put forth views which I am forced to call in the highest degree crude, if not extravagant.

The law of demand and supply renders one cla.s.s dependent upon another to an extent little short of slavery, not only in contracts for land in Ireland, but in all questions which, in free countries, turn upon the possession by one man of what another cannot or will not do without. The scale of wages of the agricultural labourers in some counties in England, and the rates paid for the worst lodgings by the poorest cla.s.ses in our large towns, are full of the same meaning as the difficulties of the Irish tenant farmer.

But, more than this, the Irish land question itself is not exclusively Irish. It is to be found also, smaller of course in extent, but identical in its main features and in some of its worst consequences, in the West Highlands of Scotland; and I, who am a proprietor in both countries, can hardly be expected to put much trust in the political physicians who, to cure a disease in Mayo or Galway, propound remedies the first principles of which they would deem inapplicable to the same disorder in Argyle or Inverness.

That I am hopeless of any reasonable mode of relief being found, I will not say; but, if it is to be safe, it certainly cannot be speedy; and if it is to be permanent, it must depend upon a change in the habits of a race rather than upon a new distribution of landed property by Parliament.

And now, turning from Irish to general policy, I profess that I accept your principles of finance and commerce with entire satisfaction, and with a confidence in your power of applying them which I give to no other man.

I enter heartily also into your schemes for the material improvement of the labouring cla.s.ses, and admire the wisdom as well as the kindness of what you have done.

With regard to the Franchise, I have no fear of Household Suffrage, and I prefer it to the more limited measure which you formerly advocated, because it brings into play a greater variety of interests; and, if it is liable to the objection that it gives votes to the ignorant and the profligate, I answer that your bill would have bestowed still greater, because more exclusive and more concentrated power, upon a cla.s.s which comprises not only the Lancas.h.i.+re operative, but the Sheffield rattener.

Moreover, I believe that all which is worth defending in our social and political state in England and Scotland, has better guarantees in the spirit of the people than in any provision of the law. When Talleyrand said that England was the most aristocratic country in the world, because there was scarcely any one in it who did not look down on somebody else, he touched the keystone of our society. I have already met with amusing instances of the effect on Scotch middle-cla.s.s Liberals of the recent enfranchis.e.m.e.nt of those below them; and my conviction is, that the more you widen the base, the more closely will you bind the superstructure together.

What I fear more than democracy is the strife between capital and skilled labour. This appears to me to be among the most pressing questions of the day, and I shall think well of the statesman, whoever he may be, who, with a just but firm hand, shall regulate the relations of these forces.

On Education I hope we are agreed; at any rate, I feel sure that you will not intentionally divorce it from religion; but I have yet to learn what measure your party would support.

There remains one subject of home policy which with me is paramount. At the time when I became a Catholic the so-called Papal Aggression was the great topic of the day; and while the ignorance and violence of the majority, both in and out of Parliament, greatly a.s.sisted my conversion, the steady reason and justice of Lord Aberdeen, and of those who, like yourself, acted with him, drew from me a greater feeling of respect than I have ever been sensible of on any other political occasion, or towards any other political men. I felt that they were determined honestly to carry out the principles of Catholic emanc.i.p.ation, amidst great popular excitement, and without reference even to their personal prejudices, far less to their political interests, and I honoured them with no stinted honour.

In the same direction much still remains to be done, and I wonder to myself whether you will ever head a party which will venture its political power in a contest with county magistrates and parish vestries on behalf of the Catholic poor.

I wonder too sometimes, but with less of hope, whether yours will be a party which will be content to forego that political propagandism which seems chiefly favoured in England when applied to the weaker countries which profess the Catholic faith, and which, in those countries, seems to impair religion much more than it increases temporal prosperity; and, lastly, whether it will have enough moderation to admit that the protection of the public law of Europe ought not to be denied to the States of the Church, merely because a neighbouring power demands them in the name of Italian unity.

Such, my dear Gladstone, are the thoughts of a somewhat indolent, but not indifferent observer of what is going on around him. They are put before you neither to elicit opinions nor to provoke controversy, but to explain how it is that an old friend, who loves and admires you, should withhold his support, insignificant as it is, at the very moment when, as the leader of a party, you might be thought to have justly earned it.

Yours aff'ly,

JAMES R. HOPE-SCOTT.

The Right Hon'ble W. E. Gladstone, &c. &c. &c.

_The Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone, M.P. to J. R. Hope-Scott, Esq., Q.C._

Hawarden, N.W.: Nov. 1, '68

My dear Hope-Scott,--Everything in your handwriting is pleasant to read, and I thank you sincerely for your letter.